After:

Chapter 9: Red-Hued Smoke

After arriving back at the compound, Farrah had headed to her room and spent the rest of the evening in relative confinement. She sent a few messages out to numbers she’d had for Brie and Willie, messages to be passed on from their local haunts by paper if need be. The possibility of what was coming, the plan to get Cole, made her want to reach out to her friends, make sure they were okay. There was a very real chance that soon she might not be.

Meeting Shanae had been interesting, and if Farrah hadn’t known what she was (from what Iron-Eyes had said), Farrah wouldn’t have suspected a thing. Nothing about her said that she was dead. Her skin was pale and ashen, but in Mid that wasn’t something that would be a sign that says “Hey, I’m a dead chick”. How many of them were out there, and how many were we going to have to deal with when we did go into Cole’s place? There were a lot of variables that Farrah thought about until she fell into a fitful sleep.

Her dreams were fucked up, vampires, werewolves, voices she couldn’t see, her body pulled in so many directions it felt like she would split apart. Farrah’s mind worked through the new knowledge, and new fears as best it could, and while she didn’t hear much noise when she was in the compound, upon waking she felt as if her head was ringing with it. She wasn’t quite herself when she made her way to breakfast, the moment she was up, she’d started thinking about everything that was going on, the plan, and what was coming. Iron-Eyes had called her a Hunter now. She wasn’t feeling much like one. What she did feel like was working in the shop.

As sparks hit her bare skin, Farrah spent her day working hard in the shop, letting the ideas that ran through her head push out the worry and fear she felt for the current situation away. Getting lost in the metal work, creating new ideas, working on Iron-Eyes’ bike, it made her feel free, and the work was comfortable and familiar. By the time she was ready to break, it was well after lunch. There was grease and sweat everywhere, and for what she’d gotten finished, a slight smile of accomplishment graced her features. For a second, there is a bit of laughter.

I’ll be okay, I’m too fucking talented to die…