Maid service preferred

[Cayce]

"I look at it like this: the construction worker likes working with their hands, the accountant likes their numbers, the vet likes animals, the chef loves their food, and the detective loves their mysteries. You don't bring in an exterminator who's afraid of bugs and you don't tell someone with vertigo to clean your roof off. We like what we do at the Abbey, we do it for sport, yes, but we also do it because it needs to be done. If the monsters learn that we can be even worse than they are, maybe they'll start leave us alone. Don't cops feel the same way?" Alexis asked, finishing her drink. "I could be wrong, but I thought that was why SWAT and stuff existed, to show the criminals that they weren't the baddest thing on the block."

"But, yeah, painting can be fun too. If you're ever interested I can get you tickets to some exclusive art shows." Lexi looked slightly confused, realizing that they were both holding several conversations at once. Hopefully they could pair it down soon.

[Cayce]

"How'd you end up getting into this, anyways?" Lexi asked suddenly, sitting up. "I've been wondering about that for a while, now. You seem like a pretty straight arrow, not the type of person that I would imagine being up for all of this. I mean, is this just another job for you? Just another duty? Just something you endure or is there something else? 'Cause I don't know about you, but I just can't see wasting this life, swallowing the dregs of fear and guilt so that I can bring down one more thing that roams the city. You don't hate being a cop, too, do you?"

[Cayce]

Lexi stood up and shrugged, pacing over to a immensely uncomfortable-looking chair made from stainless steel cubes. "I don't know, it just seems that you must hate doing this, night after night, if it's nothing but a duty, and being a cop's not much different from what I can figure, so I assumed that if you didn't like one you wouldn't like the other. I mean, really Day, what do you like about being a cop?"

Alexis sat down and stared into her empty glass, her mind partially lost in some realm of thought. "What's the use of doing it if you don't like it? You only live once, right?"

[Cayce]

"Well, that's why we're having this talk right? Get things like that cleared up," Alexis shrugged, the long hours of the night starting to weigh on her. She rubbed at her eyes and let out a sigh, mentally mapping the trip to her medicine cabinet. After the stinking, gore stained depths she'd walked through, and the realization that there was a vampire in her basement, she'd need pills if she wanted to sleep without bouts of spastic tossing and turning, no matter how tired she was. Silence built, immersing the room in a haze of drowsiness.

Languorously Alexis stood, the empty glass trailing in one hand while she yawned. "Well, why we were talking about it. Sorry, Day, but I think it's time to turn in before I fall asleep right here."

[Cayce]

"Oh. Um, okay, nooo nickname, then" Lexi called after the departing detective. "Drive safe, don't crash."

Alexis gathered the used glasses and followed after Daysha, waving once while the detective got into her car, and then she shut the door soundly and flipped the locks. Satisfied that everything was buttoned down, Lexi left the glasses in the kitchen sink and slunk off towards the bathroom where her ticket to a full night of rest lay waiting. She began rooting through her medicine cabinet, occasionally rubbing at her eyes, until she finally found the orange jewel that was a bottle of sleeping pills. She desperately wanted to fall into her silk sheets and fade into blissful unconsciousness, but the things rattling around insider her skull, the vision of finger bones, flies, and slavering jaws stained crimson, refused to leave her, mixing wonderfully with the reminder that a murdering thing was sleeping in her basement. The silence of the house seeped into her ears, a fertile backdrop for the theatre of her memories and imaginations, the lack of activity opening the vault of feelings she never wanted to feel again, the heady cocktail of emotions and thoughts swirling through her veins like poison.

The last thing she wanted to do now was sleep. She needed to stay awake, to fight off her subconscious, to occupy, to fill time, to do something, and suddenly the pill bottle was clattering into the sink. Lexi's hands, now freed, grasped desperately for a small baggy hidden in the back of the cabinet, her nose tingling in anticipation. She moved on autopilot, her fingers deftly cutting a line, and almost before she knew it, an explosion of vibrant bliss sounded off in her brain. Ten minutes later, Alexis Kane raced off into the night, the locked safehouse fading from vision in the rear-view mirror of her Camaro...