Michael crept into the chamber once occupied by a certain cheery Shadow in the Nox.He crept against the faint hope that she might actually have been inside. His hopes rang hollow, nonetheless. The walls were still adorned with photographs of ballerinas. There were still books and charts crammed almost impossibly into a tidy working order amongst the shelves and atop her desk. It still smelled faintly of lemons - or maybe that was just wishful thinking. There was no perky Seneschal with one prosthetic leg at that desk. Michael hung his head slightly. He would have given anything to see her again. She had a funny little accent and a bright demeanor that had made just a few nights of his Requiem fun. She had seemed like the most innocent and interesting Kindred he had ever met. He never really knew, for certain, how she felt about him. For that matter, maybe her kind nature had all been a front. Maybe she thought he was boring and just wanted to be rid of him. Whatever the case, Michael had secretly hoped she had been sincere. For a time.
Michael approached the desk with a package in his hands. A colorful shoebox with green and gold stripes, tied together with a big red bow. Within, carefully swaddled in bubble-wrap, was a finished Revell 1:250 scale model of NASA's Space Shuttle. He set it down gently, next to a neat stack of paperwork. He then set an envelope just under the edge of the box. He looked around once more, just to take in the scene again and keep one more pleasant memory. Satisfied, he turned and walked back out the door, peering out into the hallway lest someone catch him where he probably didn't belong. Something changed within him that night. He hadn't just left a present there on the desk: he had left a part of himself that, at last, he was ready to give up for good. Trust.
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8+8 modifer, -1 Vitae for Celerity
