The Empty World | The Empty World Sequence [complete | rewriting]

Eight (Draft 3 WIP) "Possessions"

Hepburn then bowed and offered the magazine she'd stolen from Julien's room with both hands.

The Djinn's fingers seemed to touch as the magazine passed from one to the other.

Morpheus put his hand over his pocket where he kept a small mirror. If this didn't go well, he'd have to scry after all. While the Djinn worked things out, Joy was still drowsy in a Vampyre lair.

Their street rat shifted again from the actor to the supermodel on the magazine cover. Linda if Morpheus wasn't mistaken; one of the Big ones, like Blade, who appeared in every kind of media.

Linda Evangelista as a cabbie or mechanic, stranded motorist or sleepy passenger, boyish and pretty, edgy and couture, with bold chain jewelry.

"This speaks to me," said Evangelista.

"Kinda does something for me," Morpheus whispered. Honestly. He was surprised.

Hepburn glanced down at him, but then turned to sign to Evangelista. Julien, the one with a flower on his wrist, was lover to their companion — Hepburn gestured to Morpheus — and had arrived here with Siouxsie Sioux eyes, a Goth.

Evangelista's hands rose and showed palms. "Yous guys are even more recent arrivals than the ones you're lookin' for. Yous can't just come demanding, we got no pact. And I can't read signs."

"Not a foot or tongue of clay," Loren said, shifting again to the vampire-slaying cheerleader outfit.

"Not so 'politically correct', Comrade," Evangelista spoke in some accent, using quote fingers.

"Logocrat." Loren pouted at Hepburn over Eva's shoulder.

"Seriously, most of my grandparents wouldn't call Humans 'altiyn'."

Hepburn moved between them, with back to Morpheus, to make the next gestures private.

Morpheus averted his eyes, but some part of it was revealed as Eva sounded out the received message. "Shapes­—us genies—al Jinn­­—speak­—no? No mouth, no ear. OK. Yes. All." Eva nodded. "I understand, but my family back to my grandparents spoke Arabic or English at home. I always thought 'one who knows your tongue' meant spoken...or...."

Hepburn's posture was that of laughter, but then when gliding back and straightening, Hepburn briefly showed a tongue between parted lips.

"Euphemism?" Loren generated a tongue of flame in the palm of one hand.

Eva's expression went vacant, maybe puzzled, but then Eva's head shook. "Train."

Morpheus braced himself under the platform as the downtown train approached with the rush of air, hiss and roar. The Djinn dispersed, but the warmth of them was still about him.

The train rushed past the abandoned platforms of the ghost station behind the transiscopes, car after car, rattling sooty dust from below the tracks. The noise must have woken River, as he climbed up to his usual shoulder perch. Morpheus sensed a similar shift in consciousness from the wolf, but flicked a wingtip to put the animal back to sleep.

When the train had passed, the Djinn assumed visible forms again. Hepburn appearing as Audrey in a cheerleading uniform with leggings, Loren in a similar Slayer costume, and Evangelista as the supermodel taxi driver.

"Yous gonna tell me what's up? I see the Vampire Slayer thing yous two got going on, but this is my place, OK? I got a good thing here and I don't take orders from any spooky kids. I lost siblings in the Satanic Panic, understand?"

Morpheus shook his head.

"People thinking Satanic cults and devil worship are everywhere," River explained. "Can make it difficult to distinguish real cults or abuse."