shifted_logs | Summer Holiday

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Summer Holiday

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madamemoiselle
Location: Their shared vacation world!
Time: uhh idk Sunday
Summary: Sirius and Remus both like where they spent time in the summers as a vacation spot, and Diva just likes to be with people that she knows. So they all get stuck in the English countryside in a house together, and hijinks perhaps ensue.
Warnings: None at the moment!

She had spent most of the day locked up in her mansion-like house in New York, just turning the locket she had been wearing over and over in her hands. It was a surprise when she returned to the Plane to sulk, but a message greeted her. She wasn't really sure what she wanted, in terms of a vacation. Diva only wanted a place with people that she could talk to and not just the people that she was stuck with in New York City.

The locket had been turned in her fingers again while she just thought of that. I want a place with someone else.

It was disappointing when nothing really happened. But she just sighed, not really surprised that the Plane wouldn't do what it promised. She spent time on the Plane, just watching the stars and avoiding everyone else. That got boring after a while, though, so she returned home. Or, tried. She shielded herself from the cold, rushing air, but she hit the ground hard.

The air had left her lungs from the impact, but she sat up after a moment, coughing and looking around. She didn't recognize the place itself, but it looked very...English was the only word for it.

Not again.

"Ne, just--where is this? I'm tired of my home changing, so just keep it the same for once!"

She didn't expect anyone to hear it, but she said it for good measure anyways. Diva stood and brushed herself off, but frowned at the stains on her dress.

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Sirius wished he hadn't gone back to Azkaban. But he couldn't stay on the Plane forever, as badly as he wanted to...then time would never pass for him in his own reality. Of course, despite the terror of being back again, he had received a strange surprise.

He could walk straight into a Muggle city from his cell. Nobody noticed, of course, or if they did, nobody was sane enough to make a fuss about it. And the Dementors were...well. Dementors.

Sirius returned to the Plane after his discovery, determined to find out who he had merged with, only to find an empty mansion. He called out Diva's name, and was answered with a holographic message.

A holiday. His thoughts drifted to old memories, and he shook his head. Impossible. The Plane couldn't bring that back.

Since Diva was obviously on a holiday of her own, Sirius decided to return to his own reality and explore the latest addition to his cell. Only he was met with a rush of cold air as he fell through the stars, instead. He sat up with a groan, and blinked.

"Diva?"

Diva turned quickly, like she was startled, but her expression softened right away. "Sirius...?"

She crossed her arms as she stepped closer, but she still smiled warmly. It almost felt like it wasn't the best thing to spend time with people after what had happened this morning. Dr. Crane wasn't around, of course, but she was still worried, and fairly. But she was better at hiding her grief the second time around.

"Ne, I guess if you're here too, it's some kind of experiment, then. It's pretty, though."

Diva took a moment to look at the scenery and noticed a house nearby. It was lit up and smoke came from the chimney. "...I think someone's inside that house. Maybe they can help us figure out where we are?"

There was a hint of a reassuring smile in return -- Azkaban still had him shaken. "It looks a bit like the English countryside, actually," he replied thoughtfully, glancing around. "Did you get an odd message about a holiday while you were on the Plane too?"

He offered her his hand, then walked over to the cabin, knocking on the door.

She hesitated briefly, but enough to notice, before taking his hand. She held his hand gingerly, but he could still feel the coldness of her skin. That was normal for a girl that didn't have quite enough blood going through her veins, though.

"Does it? I've never been outside of London." And Manchester.

No one answered the knock at the door. So without pausing, Diva let go of Sirius's hand and pushed the door open herself. She looked at the interior of the house, smiling slightly.

"No one's here. Is it for us, do you think?"

The coldness was strange, but he didn't comment on it, or her hesitation. He simply nodded, and followed her inside.

"It must be. I didn't think the Plane would actually bring me here, but...Merlin, I wish Remus was here too," he murmured, his grey eyes taking in the interior of the cabin.

It was a warm and comfortable house that looked like it had been there for a hundred years or more, but had been excellently taken care of. Diva wandered inside, looking around in curiosity. The decor was as antique as the the house, but there were familiar elements there for both of them. But Diva's eyes widened in delight when she saw the piano in the parlor, which she immediately gravitated towards.

"Ah, maybe he will come? He could just be late, I don't know."

She lifted the cover, brushing her fingertips against the keys. "Ne, this is an old piano. It's really lovely, though."

Sirius stretched out on a nearby sofa, watching her. "Can you play?" he asked curiously. He didn't know a lot about Diva, other than what little Remus had told him, and what he had heard during that match.

Of course, that was more than he wanted to know. He hadn't figured out the best way to approach her about certain...things he'd heard, but maybe now was his chance, before Remus showed up. If he did, anyway.

"Opera is more my specialty, but I've been trained in piano and violin the best. I can play some other instruments too, but not as well," she said warmly before closing her eyes. She pressed the keys at random to evaluate how on key they were, but satisfied, she began to play.

It was a piano arrangement of Die Moldau (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6roDZiOLW1o) that she played very skillfully even though it was completely from memory. Though, Moldau was one of her favorite pieces ever written. She had seen the orchestral version performed in Russia and had loved it ever since. In her opinion, the piano arrangement only barely approached the beauty of the original piece, but that was the way that musicians tended to think of things.

But after she finished, she sighed contently. "If there's anything you'd like me to play, I can try. I only know older pieces, but I like to think I'm good with the piano."

Edited 2010-08-11 22:16 (UTC)

"You're better than good, Diva, you're brilliant," Sirius replied sincerely. Not that he was an expert in classical music, particularly of the Muggle variety, but it sounded brilliant to him.

"Actually, I was wondering if I could ask you a few questions," he admitted, looking a bit nervous now. Confronting a vampire when you were alone with one was a terrible idea, but it had to be done -- Remus was his best mate, after all, and he had to look out for him.

"Thank you," she said automatically, but put the fallboard back down over the keys. Diva turned on the piano bench, facing Sirius with an equally automatic smile.

"Of course? What do you want to know, Sirius?"

"I want to know what your intentions toward Remus are," he replied bluntly, cutting right to the chase. "I've got the feeling he likes you, but you seem pretty attached to that Sam bloke. In fact, I think I remember you saying he was the only boy you wanted."

Part of him wanted to ask about the other things, too -- like the fact that she'd killed before. But he trusted Remus' judgment as far as that was concerned.

Her lips pursed tightly, and, for a moment, there was a flicker of something dangerous in her expression. But while many had called her a monster in her lifetime, Diva had that monster tightly reined in by the mask of a proper human woman. If there had been any between them, she would have taken the pause to pour a cup of tea as she filled the space with idle conversation.

But with no tea, her hands only clutched tightly at the fabric of her dress. "Ce n'est pas--" she started in French, but realizing she wasn't using the right language, she waved vaguely to reorient her thoughts. "It's not a problem. Sam isn't a part of my life anymore."

It was cold, but the hurt was still there. It was easier to just seal off that part of herself, to not think about what his second departure meant. Her eyes didn't turn to the floor, but were focused coolly on Sirius.

"You don't really understand, though, Sirius. You didn't know me before I met Sam, before I came to the Plane. If you did know, you wouldn't be worried at all about how I feel about Sam, because you wouldn't be talking to me right now. It's amazing that Sam cared enough at all, really."

Her eyes turned away as she stood gracefully. Diva stepped to the side of the room, taking a box off a shelf. Even though she had never been to this house before, it was familiar, like an old, forgotten dream. She opened it, and music started to play, which made her laugh.

"Sam is the only person I want to love me because he was the only person to ever see me as anything. Oh, my Chevalier loved me, in their way, but they never treated me like a person, not really. I was a goddess, a mother, an experiment...Really, anything they wanted me to be, and I didn't mind that at all until I met Sam. I wanted to be Sam's until the day he died, because that's the only way I could ever show how grateful I was for him to free me. I love Remus, but I can never love him the same way that I love--loved Sam. Remus is a kind, gentle person, and I'm sure he would have done that for me, but Sam was there first."

Diva traced her fingers over the box before she closed it, putting it back on the shelf. She remembered where she knew the tune, now. It was playing when she and Amshel watched Berlin burn, when she found James. She turned back to Sirius again with an odd smile on her face. It was perfect and pristine, but fake and doll-like in its perfection.

"I don't have any intentions. If Remus loves me, I'll always return it. I'm a simple person whose lived for a long time and seen and experienced a lot of terrible things. Ne, that's really all."

Sirius sighed, giving himself a moment to absorb all that. "I'm sorry. And I'm sure Remus does see you the way Sam did...he's just that sort of bloke. But I trust you not to muck things up as far as his heart's concerned." He couldn't stop a bit of jealously seeping through, from the selfish part of him that wasn't feeling supportive at all.

"Mind you, he's generally fairly oblivious when it comes to this sort of thing," he added wryly. "I doubt he could tell someone was interested if they were dancing in front of him naked."

The fake smile gave way to a real, sly one as she giggled. "Oh, he has seen me, but I wasn't quite dancing. We were all stuck in that bathhouse once before. It wasn't bad at all, compared to other things."

After a moment of deliberation, she stepped closer and took a seat on the couch next to Sirius.

"I'll try not to. I never do it on purpose." She paused. "Well, I guess I have a few times, but I wouldn't do it anymore. I only did that because Amshel asked me to, and I didn't really care."

Sirius was trying not to imagine that scenario. It wasn't working very well. "I bet he blushed like a tomato," he murmured fondly.

He didn't protest when she sat next to him, though he did frown at the mention of Amshel. "You talked about him too, during the match. That he made you believe things, made you kill people...he sounds like Voldemort." His eyes were haunted, and distant.

"Redder," she said coolly, "but that's not really a surprise, is it?"

She couldn't help being flirtatious. It was a part of her ~~whoreibble~~ nature. But the amusement faded at the mention of Amshel, but she looked fond and distant, like she was recalling something truly wonderful.

"I don't know who Voldemort is, but Amshel...Amshel is my...I don't really know what to call him anymore. Sometimes he was my father, sometimes he was my lover, but he's the person that's been by my side since I was born. Amshel was the one that took care of me in the Tower, and my first Chevalier. We set fire underneath the world and watched it burn, all together. No one really understands what we had, because everyone thinks that Amshel was just a truly terrible person, and he was, but he was still my Amshel."

Diva twirled some hair around her fingers as the fondness faded slightly. "But I was Amshel's precious treasure, so I didn't get to do a lot of things. He used me, for my power and other things, but I didn't mind, as long as he loved me. But Sam always told me, that it wasn't really love. I'm still not entirely sure if I agree, but Amshel did do terrible things. He started wars because it was easy to hide his own goals in them, but...I never cared. Not really. So it didn't matter if he used me for his experiments, of if he let other people use me so that he could get in their favor. Even if it hurt, as long as my Amshel was there, I would do anything for him."

Sirius reached for her hand again, shaking his head. "Voldemort is the wizard Remus is fighting a war against. A very powerful, very dark wizard. My family...they thought he had all the right ideas. Purification of the wizarding race, having all the pure-bloods in charge, etc. Even my brother was brainwashed, and signed up to be a Death Eater. He tried to back out, but once you sign up with Voldemort, there's no backing out." His tone was a mess of emotions -- anger, regret, loneliness. He missed Regulus, even though he had been a stupid idiot.

"The point is, I understand. At least a little bit, anyway. I hated everything my family stood for -- I finally ran away when I was sixteen, and got blasted off the family tree. But before that...even after that, part of me still wanted their approval. I still wanted them to love me, despite all their terrible ideas, despite how they treated me for even daring to think differently."

Sirius drew his knees up to his chest, glancing down at his tattered grey robe. He wished he'd had a chance to change again before coming here, but he'd thought he was going back to Azkaban, not a holiday from distant memories. "I think, if they'd even pretended to love me, I might have stayed with them, even though I hated everything about them. That's probably why Regulus played along -- I was always reminded he was the better son."

She chuckled humorlessly, but allowed Sirius to take her hand. It sounded very similar to the Nazis that she had sided with, but she had never cared for their ideals. They were human ideals, after all. They didn't really care to follow it anyways, as long as you proved yourself stronger than they were. After all, Amshel was Jewish, though he had long since forgotten his human religion.

"Then it's similar. But you got to run away, so you're lucky. Even if I'd wanted to, I couldn't have. My Chevalier and I, we're bound by blood, and we're drawn to each other. They are my Knights, and I am their Queen. So no matter where I went, they would find me," Diva said easily. It was a matter-of-fact kind of thing, and now that they were all dead--well, it didn't matter anymore where she went.

She paused before continuing. "But thank you for not asking why I stayed with them. Everyone else has."

Sirius chuckled a bit himself. "I do pride myself on not being like everyone else, so it's really no trouble at all," he pointed out. "Besides, some people might raise an eyebrow at staying with a vampire, but you've offered me a home, and I haven't had one in a long time. I'm grateful for that," he added, somewhat awkwardly.

Diva frowned slightly.

"They would? It's really not that bad, is it? I mean, I know people don't like vampires, but..." she trailed off thoughtfully. Diva wasn't the best person for realizing social norms and graces, since she was really only recently observing the majority of them. But at one point, there had been several young men staying at Diva's home and she'd really seen nothing wrong with it.

"Nobody's commented so far, but I imagine people from my world would think it was strange. Granted, people from my world also think I'm a murderer, so on second thought, they probably wouldn't care," he replied bitterly.

"That reminds me, though...when I went back to Azkaban, there was a big Muggle city in my cell. Wouldn't happen to belong to you, would it?" he asked curiously. It couldn't belong to Remus, and he didn't know who else he was close enough to on the Plane for a merger to happen.

She noted the bitterness, but just smiled, nodding slightly. "Then it's fine. People don't really understand people like us."

But the melancholic note disappeared quickly, and her face lit up with surprise. Another merger? Not that she was complaining, but there had been quite a few recently!

"It might! Is it New York City, do you know? That's where I'm living now."

"Except for Moony, he understands." Sirius still couldn't quite believe that Remus had been so accepting about it all...that he still trusted him. But he wasn't complaining.

He shrugged at her question, though. "Could be? I've never been there, and I didn't explore much. How would I tell?"

Remus didn't give much thought to the offer, save for fleeting memories of simpler days; he wasn't the vacationing sort, really. He'd enjoyed travelling the world, but he was always focused on his goal, whether he was chasing information or people. Simple rest would be downright selfish, in times like this.

Even on the Plane, when he knew time didn't pass...spending any not dedicated to stopping Voldemort seemed wrong.

His visit was short.

He expected to arrive back in his study, warm and dim and comfortably cramped; instead, he stumbles as the chill wind hits him, blinking against the sunlight. The scenery around him is achingly familiar, and there, that house...

"Oh, Merlin," he murmured, before striding towards it. With some effort, he shed all of his stealth, letting his feet pound against the grass.

Diva started to answer, but the sound of someone approaching drew her attention. She stood from the couch, staring towards the door with her eyebrows furrowed in concentration. Since she was drinking less blood, the sound of heartbeats was fainter. But once she recognized the beat, she brightened, bringing her hands together in some excitement.

"Ne, you might get your wish, Sirius" was all she said. After all, Remus should make it clearer as soon as he opened the door.

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Summer Holiday

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