Post by Hunter on Mar 20, 2015 18:19:46 GMT -6
The woman known as Artemis stands inside what appears to be a darkened closet or small room of sorts in an old condemned building. Urban Exploration was a hobby of hers and this time, it had caught her in a sticky situation. Panic starts to set in as she finds the door will not move no matter how she presses upon it, the locking mechanism still worked after all these countless years of being left to rot… and now the prospect of meeting that same fate herself has her sweating. Her breath comes in ragged, irregular shots, fear racing through her to an almost paralyzing degree. She pounds on the wall next to the door, knowing that now that she’s hanging by a thread, there’s no one to hear her scream.
As the sweat rolls down her face, her chest pounding with what feels like a rapid cannon choking the very breath from her, she falls back into a seated position, pulling her knees in close where she can grab them. She starts rocking back and forth, hoping beyond hope that she can just blink this all away, that it’ll be just a bad dream. Just as she starts to lose her grip, the door opens. She looks up in shock to find her savior, Cole Hunter, standing there, peering down at her gently. He extends a hand and she takes it, clearly certain this is probably not real.
Cole Hunter: My Huntress, I believe a reassessment of the situation is clearly in order.
She looks up at him surprised.
Artemis: Cole? OK now I know I'm hallucinating...
Smirking, he shakes his head.
Cole Hunter: This is no hallucinatory delusion, though I'm flattered you believe I would factor into such an occurrence.
She leaps up and hugs him.
Artemis: Thank you... I... sorry I'm a scared blubbering mess right now... you've found my Achilles heel.
Surprised, he hugs her back.
Cole Hunter: Traumatic memory?
She nods.
Artemis: Yeah...
Cole nods and takes her by the hand.
Cole Hunter: Perhaps we should halt the conversation until such time as we have adjourned ourselves to a more suitable and structurally sound section of this tattered establishment?
She nods.
Artemis: Ok.
They climb over part of a mangled structure that apparently used to be a staircase set against a wall, carefully making it’ll hold as they go. A few minutes later, they find themselves outside in an overgrown garden. Vines and roses grow all around them, grass it long and brown with a weathered gazebo just begging them to have a seat in the middle of it.
Artemis: How did you know where to find me?
He nods to the phone in her hand.
Cole Hunter: Tracking devices wired for GPS are beautiful things in such situations.
She blushes a deep crimson.
Artemis: Sorry, I don't know how I ended up with your phone... I must have grabbed it on my way out by accident...
Cole can't help but chuckle.
Cole Hunter: You say this as if it was not kismet.
She frowns.
Artemis: Kismet?
Cole Hunter: Well, if you had not taken my phone, it would not have necessitated my retrieving it...
Artemis: And I'd still be locked in that room...
She looks down.
Artemis: I think I kinda locked your phone trying to use it...
Cole shrugs.
Cole Hunter: A minor inconvenience...
Artemis: I'm sorry you had to see me freaking out like that.
Nodding, Cole pats her hand.
Cole Hunter: It is only in moments where no guard is presented that you truly see who someone else is.
Artemis: And now you see I am weak and scared of confined spaces...
Cole Hunter: Closet, basement or trunk?
She looks down again, biting her lip, hesitating.
Artemis: All of the above... But mostly a closet under...
Cole Hunter: All the same individual?
She nods.
Artemis: Yeah... same guy.
Cole Hunter: Apollo?
She nods sadly.
Artemis: Yeah... Him... he used to “punish” me by locking me away in whatever small space he could find. That was after her beat me and degraded me... yet still I was stupid and stayed by him side, deluded into thinking he was going to change... That he was going to get better...
She shakes her head.
Cole Hunter: There was a debt involved?
Artemis: I needed him to survive. I was on the streets and he was all I had, all I knew. He gave me a roof above my head and food and money and I... I guess I felt like I owed him.
Cole Hunter: Was that assumption a simple misunderstanding or a hard fact of life?
Artemis: I Thought is was fact... I had nothing else at the time and he made me believe I needed him. Truth was he just wanted my skills and a fuck every night... He used me and gave little in return except abuse...
She pulls down the top of her top revealing a nasty looking scar.
Artemis: Just one of the many I got from him.
Cole Hunter: Charming...
Artemis: Sometimes he was.. other times...
She shivers visibly.
Artemis: There's a reason I'm running from him after all...
He pauses, frowning.
Cole Hunter: Your skills and sexual gratification... some would say I resemble that particular remark...
Artemis: You dont beat me... You treat me with respect... You don't claim to love me then slice open my flesh with a butcher knife the next minute.
Cole frowns as if the idea is both foreign to him and completely repugnant.
Cole Hunter: I could endeavor to ideate many and varied utilizations for your visceral assets... none of them would involve blades...
He pauses and then shrugs.
Cole Hunter: Unless of course, that was a request you made yourself...
Artemis: I never asked for blades, but he did it, even though I begged him not to...
She turns away as a tear trickles down her cheek.
Cole Hunter: Most undivine of him.
Artemis: I wish I had never met him... Living on the streets alone would have been better than what he put me through.
Cole Hunter: How did someone of such... gain such a moniker?
Artemis: Beats me.
Shaking his head, Cole's teeth grind momentarily.
Cole Hunter: Is Apollo his actual legal nomenclature?
Artemis: No, much like mine its a nickname... One he chose after he met me. He claimed to be my Apollo. Dude didn't know his greek mythology very well...
Cole frowns.
Cole Hunter: Is Apollo not Artemis' twin brother?
Artemis: See even you know... Apollo was convinced they were lovers... Even though I told him otherwise. He called me his moon, claimed I was his sun.
Cole can't help but smirk.
Cole Hunter: I suppose that would make me Orion...
Artemis: I suppose it does... Though I sincerely hope you don't go falling for Apollo any time soon.
Cole Hunter: Why would i do such a thing? In the stories, Apollo was the one jealous of Orion... and in most, Orion simply hunts with Artemis.
Artemis: There was one I read where Apollo and Orion lay together. where Orion like many was taken with Apollos beauty and lay with him for an afternoon. but maybe that was just a false story. You get that a lot.... People putting their own spin on things and all.
Cole Hunter: The ones most seen have Apollo becoming jealous that his sister enjoys spending her time with Orion more than she enjoys spending time with Apollo and Apollo attempts to manipulate her into terminating Orion.
Artemis: Well in this story, Apollos not gonna be manipulating me to do anything... killing Orion least of all.
Cole Hunter: He hunts you?
Artemis: I'm on the run from him, remember?
Cole Hunter: Does he have a favored territory?
Artemis: New York,the Bronx, that’s where we usually were.
Cole Hunter: So we would do well to avoid a Mister Apollo... something... in the Bronx...
She nods.
Artemis: Or just avoid New York in general.. I'm cool with that choice.
Cole Hunter: So far, that has not proven difficult in the slightest.
Artemis: That’s true... It has...
She pauses.
Artemis: I would be perfectly happy if that bastard was dead and I never had to see his face ever again.
Cole Hunter: Dare to dream, Miss Artemis. Dare to dream.
Artemis: Oh I do... it’s one of the only things that got me through... until I met you.
Cole Hunter: Happy to be of service, my lady.
Artemis: Now I have you, who from what I can tell is a genuine friend who means me no harm.
Cole Hunter: You have given no reason to mean any harm. You are gifted, talented, skilled, intelligent and willing to give... to say nothing of what most would take that to mean...
Artemis: And I appreciate that... that you would never hurt me.
Cole Hunter: Has there been anyone besides Apollo?
She shakes her head.
Artemis: Apollo was my first and only. Sure there's be many men and woman that I've laid with, but no one I've given my heart to. Cause I'm scared to... scared whoever I give my heart to will treat me just as he did.
Cole nods.
Cole Hunter: Unfortunate.
Artemis frowns.
Artemis: You almost sound disappointed.
Cole Hunter: Should it not be disappointing to encounter such an exquisite example of womanhood to have been treated so shabbily?
Artemis: That's true...
She blushes deeply at his words. Exquisite? Not something she'd ever been called before.
Cole Hunter: Is something... problematic?
She shakes her head.
Artemis: Just not used to kind words that's all... I'm used to being called bitch whore...
She swallows.
Artemis: Worthless waste of space...
Cole's teeth grind again.
Cole Hunter: You do not resemble that remark.
Artemis: Then what do I resemble? He called me that so often I was starting to believe it to be true...
Cole Hunter: As earlier stated, you are an exquisite specimen to behold... in all areas of womanhood.
She blushes deeply again. For so long she had wanted sometime to say words like that to her. For someone to appreciate her... say to her all the romantic things to her that she had seen in books. For a moment she can't speak. Then she shakes her head, her defences coming up just a little. Though a part of her she's not used to feeling wishes his words were true.
Artemis: You're just saying that to make me feel better...
Cole Hunter: You doubt my sincerity?
She sighs.
Artemis: I would love to live with you forever in your castle just like in a fairy tale...
Cole Hunter: I sense a "but" coming...
Artemis: But it scares me almost as much as being in that little room to think that.... even if I want it... I can't...
She shakes her head.
Artemis: I just can't...
Cole Hunter: What is that you want?
Artemis: Everything... white picket fence... a prince to ride off into the sunset with me... kiss me... not hit me...
Cole Hunter: Well, the hit part will never happen again. The rest, I suppose is a work in progress.
Artemis: Are you saying you would want to... be a prince. .. for me?
Cole Hunter: Not certain I would call myself a prince.
Artemis: Everyone's royal in their own respects.
Cole Hunter: And you should definitely be treated as a queen...
Artemis: I'm no queen...
Cole grins.
Cole Hunter: Right, goddess...
Artemis grins.
Artemis: Damn straight.
Cole Hunter: The Huntress, My Goddess of the Hunt!
Artemis suddenly launches at him pushing him to the ground and kissing him. Public indiscretions had never been an issue for her and she hoped he was the same. No one would hear nor see them but the thought of being caught was a thrill in itself.
The next morning…
Cole sits up, smirking for the camera as the shot opens upon him and woman lying in bed next to him. He nods knowingly, cruelly as the camera zooms on his command, a button in his left hand.
Cole Hunter: I must say, the demonstration presented when last we met…
The head rolls back, the eyes rolling further still until they close as the tongue rolls over his lips. He nods, his eyes opening to allow his gaze to fall back on the camera.
Cole Hunter: Simply amazing…
Glancing down, his eyes fallen upon the one lying next to him, his Goddess of the Hunt, still exhausted from their last hunting trip.
Cole Hunter: There definitely was some Zing in Amy on that particular occasion…
His hand falls upon Artemis’s back, running his finger back sensually along her spine until he reaches her neck.
Cole Hunter: But what of now, when Simply Amy Zing and a rather real “Hot Rod” Dickie Tramel engage in professional activity… with me?
Artemis shivers as his finger starts tracing an unseen line towards her arm.
Cole Hunter: We do enjoy such wondrous professional courtesy, do we now, My Huntress?
She giggles as he continues to trace the unseen line on her bare flesh.
Cole Hunter: Indeed, although, Amy was a rare delicacy served up in rather delicious manner, I do enjoy a Szechuan feast…
Artemis shivers again at his touch.
Cole Hunter: And now soy sauce and Canadian bacon that enjoys taking a pounding…
Leaning down, the finger begins tracing back again across her back. The eyes move down and the gaze follows to her.
Cole Hunter: Such… interesting co-workers…
The smirk grows.
Cole Hunter: And I… I am nothing…
Cole nods, looking back up into the camera.
Cole Hunter: Just keep telling yourself that…
As the sweat rolls down her face, her chest pounding with what feels like a rapid cannon choking the very breath from her, she falls back into a seated position, pulling her knees in close where she can grab them. She starts rocking back and forth, hoping beyond hope that she can just blink this all away, that it’ll be just a bad dream. Just as she starts to lose her grip, the door opens. She looks up in shock to find her savior, Cole Hunter, standing there, peering down at her gently. He extends a hand and she takes it, clearly certain this is probably not real.
Cole Hunter: My Huntress, I believe a reassessment of the situation is clearly in order.
She looks up at him surprised.
Artemis: Cole? OK now I know I'm hallucinating...
Smirking, he shakes his head.
Cole Hunter: This is no hallucinatory delusion, though I'm flattered you believe I would factor into such an occurrence.
She leaps up and hugs him.
Artemis: Thank you... I... sorry I'm a scared blubbering mess right now... you've found my Achilles heel.
Surprised, he hugs her back.
Cole Hunter: Traumatic memory?
She nods.
Artemis: Yeah...
Cole nods and takes her by the hand.
Cole Hunter: Perhaps we should halt the conversation until such time as we have adjourned ourselves to a more suitable and structurally sound section of this tattered establishment?
She nods.
Artemis: Ok.
They climb over part of a mangled structure that apparently used to be a staircase set against a wall, carefully making it’ll hold as they go. A few minutes later, they find themselves outside in an overgrown garden. Vines and roses grow all around them, grass it long and brown with a weathered gazebo just begging them to have a seat in the middle of it.
Artemis: How did you know where to find me?
He nods to the phone in her hand.
Cole Hunter: Tracking devices wired for GPS are beautiful things in such situations.
She blushes a deep crimson.
Artemis: Sorry, I don't know how I ended up with your phone... I must have grabbed it on my way out by accident...
Cole can't help but chuckle.
Cole Hunter: You say this as if it was not kismet.
She frowns.
Artemis: Kismet?
Cole Hunter: Well, if you had not taken my phone, it would not have necessitated my retrieving it...
Artemis: And I'd still be locked in that room...
She looks down.
Artemis: I think I kinda locked your phone trying to use it...
Cole shrugs.
Cole Hunter: A minor inconvenience...
Artemis: I'm sorry you had to see me freaking out like that.
Nodding, Cole pats her hand.
Cole Hunter: It is only in moments where no guard is presented that you truly see who someone else is.
Artemis: And now you see I am weak and scared of confined spaces...
Cole Hunter: Closet, basement or trunk?
She looks down again, biting her lip, hesitating.
Artemis: All of the above... But mostly a closet under...
Cole Hunter: All the same individual?
She nods.
Artemis: Yeah... same guy.
Cole Hunter: Apollo?
She nods sadly.
Artemis: Yeah... Him... he used to “punish” me by locking me away in whatever small space he could find. That was after her beat me and degraded me... yet still I was stupid and stayed by him side, deluded into thinking he was going to change... That he was going to get better...
She shakes her head.
Cole Hunter: There was a debt involved?
Artemis: I needed him to survive. I was on the streets and he was all I had, all I knew. He gave me a roof above my head and food and money and I... I guess I felt like I owed him.
Cole Hunter: Was that assumption a simple misunderstanding or a hard fact of life?
Artemis: I Thought is was fact... I had nothing else at the time and he made me believe I needed him. Truth was he just wanted my skills and a fuck every night... He used me and gave little in return except abuse...
She pulls down the top of her top revealing a nasty looking scar.
Artemis: Just one of the many I got from him.
Cole Hunter: Charming...
Artemis: Sometimes he was.. other times...
She shivers visibly.
Artemis: There's a reason I'm running from him after all...
He pauses, frowning.
Cole Hunter: Your skills and sexual gratification... some would say I resemble that particular remark...
Artemis: You dont beat me... You treat me with respect... You don't claim to love me then slice open my flesh with a butcher knife the next minute.
Cole frowns as if the idea is both foreign to him and completely repugnant.
Cole Hunter: I could endeavor to ideate many and varied utilizations for your visceral assets... none of them would involve blades...
He pauses and then shrugs.
Cole Hunter: Unless of course, that was a request you made yourself...
Artemis: I never asked for blades, but he did it, even though I begged him not to...
She turns away as a tear trickles down her cheek.
Cole Hunter: Most undivine of him.
Artemis: I wish I had never met him... Living on the streets alone would have been better than what he put me through.
Cole Hunter: How did someone of such... gain such a moniker?
Artemis: Beats me.
Shaking his head, Cole's teeth grind momentarily.
Cole Hunter: Is Apollo his actual legal nomenclature?
Artemis: No, much like mine its a nickname... One he chose after he met me. He claimed to be my Apollo. Dude didn't know his greek mythology very well...
Cole frowns.
Cole Hunter: Is Apollo not Artemis' twin brother?
Artemis: See even you know... Apollo was convinced they were lovers... Even though I told him otherwise. He called me his moon, claimed I was his sun.
Cole can't help but smirk.
Cole Hunter: I suppose that would make me Orion...
Artemis: I suppose it does... Though I sincerely hope you don't go falling for Apollo any time soon.
Cole Hunter: Why would i do such a thing? In the stories, Apollo was the one jealous of Orion... and in most, Orion simply hunts with Artemis.
Artemis: There was one I read where Apollo and Orion lay together. where Orion like many was taken with Apollos beauty and lay with him for an afternoon. but maybe that was just a false story. You get that a lot.... People putting their own spin on things and all.
Cole Hunter: The ones most seen have Apollo becoming jealous that his sister enjoys spending her time with Orion more than she enjoys spending time with Apollo and Apollo attempts to manipulate her into terminating Orion.
Artemis: Well in this story, Apollos not gonna be manipulating me to do anything... killing Orion least of all.
Cole Hunter: He hunts you?
Artemis: I'm on the run from him, remember?
Cole Hunter: Does he have a favored territory?
Artemis: New York,the Bronx, that’s where we usually were.
Cole Hunter: So we would do well to avoid a Mister Apollo... something... in the Bronx...
She nods.
Artemis: Or just avoid New York in general.. I'm cool with that choice.
Cole Hunter: So far, that has not proven difficult in the slightest.
Artemis: That’s true... It has...
She pauses.
Artemis: I would be perfectly happy if that bastard was dead and I never had to see his face ever again.
Cole Hunter: Dare to dream, Miss Artemis. Dare to dream.
Artemis: Oh I do... it’s one of the only things that got me through... until I met you.
Cole Hunter: Happy to be of service, my lady.
Artemis: Now I have you, who from what I can tell is a genuine friend who means me no harm.
Cole Hunter: You have given no reason to mean any harm. You are gifted, talented, skilled, intelligent and willing to give... to say nothing of what most would take that to mean...
Artemis: And I appreciate that... that you would never hurt me.
Cole Hunter: Has there been anyone besides Apollo?
She shakes her head.
Artemis: Apollo was my first and only. Sure there's be many men and woman that I've laid with, but no one I've given my heart to. Cause I'm scared to... scared whoever I give my heart to will treat me just as he did.
Cole nods.
Cole Hunter: Unfortunate.
Artemis frowns.
Artemis: You almost sound disappointed.
Cole Hunter: Should it not be disappointing to encounter such an exquisite example of womanhood to have been treated so shabbily?
Artemis: That's true...
She blushes deeply at his words. Exquisite? Not something she'd ever been called before.
Cole Hunter: Is something... problematic?
She shakes her head.
Artemis: Just not used to kind words that's all... I'm used to being called bitch whore...
She swallows.
Artemis: Worthless waste of space...
Cole's teeth grind again.
Cole Hunter: You do not resemble that remark.
Artemis: Then what do I resemble? He called me that so often I was starting to believe it to be true...
Cole Hunter: As earlier stated, you are an exquisite specimen to behold... in all areas of womanhood.
She blushes deeply again. For so long she had wanted sometime to say words like that to her. For someone to appreciate her... say to her all the romantic things to her that she had seen in books. For a moment she can't speak. Then she shakes her head, her defences coming up just a little. Though a part of her she's not used to feeling wishes his words were true.
Artemis: You're just saying that to make me feel better...
Cole Hunter: You doubt my sincerity?
She sighs.
Artemis: I would love to live with you forever in your castle just like in a fairy tale...
Cole Hunter: I sense a "but" coming...
Artemis: But it scares me almost as much as being in that little room to think that.... even if I want it... I can't...
She shakes her head.
Artemis: I just can't...
Cole Hunter: What is that you want?
Artemis: Everything... white picket fence... a prince to ride off into the sunset with me... kiss me... not hit me...
Cole Hunter: Well, the hit part will never happen again. The rest, I suppose is a work in progress.
Artemis: Are you saying you would want to... be a prince. .. for me?
Cole Hunter: Not certain I would call myself a prince.
Artemis: Everyone's royal in their own respects.
Cole Hunter: And you should definitely be treated as a queen...
Artemis: I'm no queen...
Cole grins.
Cole Hunter: Right, goddess...
Artemis grins.
Artemis: Damn straight.
Cole Hunter: The Huntress, My Goddess of the Hunt!
Artemis suddenly launches at him pushing him to the ground and kissing him. Public indiscretions had never been an issue for her and she hoped he was the same. No one would hear nor see them but the thought of being caught was a thrill in itself.
The next morning…
Cole sits up, smirking for the camera as the shot opens upon him and woman lying in bed next to him. He nods knowingly, cruelly as the camera zooms on his command, a button in his left hand.
Cole Hunter: I must say, the demonstration presented when last we met…
The head rolls back, the eyes rolling further still until they close as the tongue rolls over his lips. He nods, his eyes opening to allow his gaze to fall back on the camera.
Cole Hunter: Simply amazing…
Glancing down, his eyes fallen upon the one lying next to him, his Goddess of the Hunt, still exhausted from their last hunting trip.
Cole Hunter: There definitely was some Zing in Amy on that particular occasion…
His hand falls upon Artemis’s back, running his finger back sensually along her spine until he reaches her neck.
Cole Hunter: But what of now, when Simply Amy Zing and a rather real “Hot Rod” Dickie Tramel engage in professional activity… with me?
Artemis shivers as his finger starts tracing an unseen line towards her arm.
Cole Hunter: We do enjoy such wondrous professional courtesy, do we now, My Huntress?
She giggles as he continues to trace the unseen line on her bare flesh.
Cole Hunter: Indeed, although, Amy was a rare delicacy served up in rather delicious manner, I do enjoy a Szechuan feast…
Artemis shivers again at his touch.
Cole Hunter: And now soy sauce and Canadian bacon that enjoys taking a pounding…
Leaning down, the finger begins tracing back again across her back. The eyes move down and the gaze follows to her.
Cole Hunter: Such… interesting co-workers…
The smirk grows.
Cole Hunter: And I… I am nothing…
Cole nods, looking back up into the camera.
Cole Hunter: Just keep telling yourself that…
