Nothing's Gonna Harm You

[Tobias Ragg]

((ooc: Takes place shortly after The Past Is Catching Up To You and around the same time as Spare The Rod; closed to Toby, Mina, and Pavi, but might open to another circus worker soon))

Of course, they'd sent him to the vampire's tent.

Toby had looked emotionless as usual, when they'd told him to go and care to the bat woman's needs…but inwardly he'd panicked. No doubt they'd only done it as a strange, twisted sort of punishment; send the new boy into the vampire's tent, to get a good laugh if he came out screaming with blood running down his neck. Haha. How amusing.

Of the few things that Toby was afraid of in this world, that demon woman was definitely near the top of his list. He was very nervous about the idea of having to enter Mina's tent, alone, for obvious reasons. One, for example, being the thought that he'd be made a meal of before he'd have the chance to escape. Which was the precise reason he'd never gone into her tent willingly, always leaving it for someone else to handle.

This time, however, he'd been unable to avoid the task, as one of the older workers, Dr. Facilier, and specifically instructed that he and he alone be the one to clean up and bring her her necessities. And Facilier scared him nearly as bad as the woman did. They'd decided to be particularly "kind" to Mina today, if you could call anything they did kind, and sent with Toby a cage of nervous, jittering rabbits for her to feed on. They were rather small, and Toby doubted that much of a meal could be made of them, as all the stories he'd heard of vampires told of terrifying, ravenous creatures who were never satisfied no matter how much they consumed.

He made a face for the poor animals, feeling rather disturbed about the fact that he was leading them to their untimely doom…and the fact that they seemed to be able to sense it. Though it seemed to come much shorter than it aught, he'd at last completed his walk to the vampiress' tent, and paused nervously at the entrance, eying it disdainfully.

Despite the fact that she was a monster, like all the others, Toby knew that this was still a lady, and it would be ungentleman-like to go in without knocking. Or, in this case, just making his presence known.

"M-Ma'am?" He said cautiously, his voice shaking just a little. "Ma'am, may I come in?"

[Mina Murray]

Mina lay in the middle of the tent, completly broken. To scared and weak to scream. Alucard...Dracula...The Count. Whatever that monster called himselves these days he had survived, survived and attacked her again.

She felt icy fear forming inside her, fearing that this time he had changed her permently. That she was no longer a human, and would never be again. Already she could feel her body going cold from lack of blood. Mina couldn't move...she felt weak and tired. But she was afraid to close her eyes. Everytime she did she saw him.

[Tobias Ragg]

After several moments of silence, Toby at last breathe a small sigh of relief. Perhaps she wasn't there after all, and all he'd have to do was leave the rabbits behind and clean up any mess he happened to find. He had no idea where she would be other than her tent, but why should he really care? All that mattered was that she wasn't there now, if she happened to be as dangerous as the customers and a few of the workers said.

Toby briefly remembered something being mentioned before about a particular customer that the vampiress was known to visit outside of the circus, but he'd never paid much attention to the talk that spawned around it. It didn't concern him, and he didn't care to learn much of anything that had to do with this woman.

However, the moment that Toby stepped into the tent, he immediately dropped the small crate of animals, ignoring the fact that the cage door swung open as he did and allowed many to escape out of the tent just as soon as they'd been brought in. His jaw hung open, and his stared in shock and revulsion at the sight that laid before him.

The woman was laying in the center of the tent, crumpled on the floor with blood surrounding her. Her own blood, it appeared, judging by the large indentations covering her neck. Toby had the urge to back away, to run out of this tent, and as far away from this disturbing scene as he possibly could. But he could not; he was rooted to the spot out of pure shock and fear.

Because despite her terrifying billing, this woman looked like any other, aside from her rather revealing clothing and wings. Toby's mind flashed back to another woman who he'd been unable to protect...a woman who's name he hadn't dared to say since he failed her. Shaking his head, and at last finding some sort of motion in his limbs, Toby ran to Mina's side, dropping down beside her and shaking her shoulder desperately.

"Ma'am! Ma'am, are you alright?!" Toby asked, his heart pounding at the sight of the blood. Please be alright...what was he saying? "Ma'am, what happened? Please listen, answer me!"

[Mina Murray]

"Don't hurt me, please!" Mina said as loud as she could feeling someone's prescense above her. Fearing that it was The Count come back to finish her off she made an attempt to get away. She tried to crawl away, but was only able to move a few inches away from whoever was standing above her.

It hurt a lot, her wounds opening up again and the bloody mud smearing over most of her arms and wings. She let out a chocked sob of fear and pain. Her vision was blurred from tears and pain so she couldn't see Toby above her.
"Don't hurt me...." She sobbed again to weak to move she lowered her head into the mud and started shaking and crying. Thinking that this would be her last moment of life.

[Tobias Ragg]

Toby balked at the woman's panic, uncertain how to react. He doubted that she actually knew who he was to have come up with a reaction like that...after all, he'd never seen her in person before, and what would lead a grown woman, a vampiress nonetheless, to be frightened of a thirteen-year-old boy?

She was actually quite lovely, Toby thought, if not for the blood, scars or wings...but none of these were very distracting, save for the blood. And her dark brown curls and creamy skin were hauntingly familiar of...her. Toby forced this thought aside, retracting his hand in fear of making the situation worse.

"I...I won't harm you, ma'am," Toby said, a bit more quietly now. His eyes held a deep, worried concern, and he glanced around for some means of help for the woman. A towel beside a half-empty wash basin was at one corner of the tent, and he hurriedly ran towards it, bringing them both back over beside the bleeding woman. Dipping the towel into the water, he cautiously moved towards Mina again, biting his chapped lips as he contemplated how he should go about helping her.

"Nothin's gonna harm you, ma'am," Toby promised, kneeling beside Mina again and slowly, tentatively, placing the towel against the side of her bleeding neck. He had no idea what she'd been through, but all he knew was that it had to be something very traumatic for her to be weeping and wounded on the floor of the tent. She, who was supposedly one of the more dangerous acts of the show, was lying broken like a victim of prey, rather than a predator.

[Mina Murray]

"No! NO!" She screamed as soon as she felt the cold wet rag on her throat. She thought it was the vampires mouth. Ice cold and wet, that Toby's nails were the vampires teeth. She began sobbing and screaming intelligible. Howling for him allow her to live to leave her alone. That she'd do anything just let her be!

She was completely hysterical and intelligible at that point. So much so that she began sounding like a wounded animal rather than a person.
"Just let it end...Just let it end....please." She kept saying over and over, each word mixed in with a sob."Just kill me already!"

[Tobias Ragg]

Toby jumped at Mina's scream, dropping the rag like a burning ember. He suddenly moved to his feet, shaking a little with uncertainty at what he should do. She obviously wanted for him to leave her alone; for everyone to leave her alone. Especially whoever, or whatever, had done this to her. Should he listen to her and just leave her there, until she possibly calmed down, or more likely died? After all, what did she matter to him?

Mrs. Lovett.

He dared to think the name. Now he had to help her, no questions asked.

"I'll...I'll go get help!" Toby stuttered, saying so more to himself than the bleeding creature before him. His feet felt as though they were made of lead as he forced himself into a run, not wanting to leave her there alone, despite her obvious wish to be kept away from. The last time he'd left someone alone that he knew needed help...

Tobias forced the thought from his mind, trying to focus on what was happening right now. He had to find another worker, and fast, before something he didn't want to think about happened.

He made it about five steps out of the tent before he ran straight into someone waiting outside. Or rather, someone sitting outside. He'd tripped over the back wheel of a large chair, that was elevated on four wheels, two small and two big. The chair was being pushed by a tall, muscular man wearing dark sunglasses and tight clothing, who stared down at Toby with an expressionless glare.

The person sitting the chair was another man...though Toby had a bit of difficulty in determining that, as there was little that looked particularly "manly" about the gentleman. His lower legs were both covered in casts, but what really caught Toby's attention was his face. Or rather, faces. Toby stared in shock, and then in disgust, at the realization of the fact that another person's dead face covered the man's face, attached by six metal clips and stitching.

The man raised an eyebrow of the mask, his expression hardening and his eyes narrowing at Toby's fallen form. "What were-a you doing in-a there?" His voice was rather high-pitched, but dark all the same, and disgustingly foreign. Toby had heard that accent before, and knew it all too well. This man was Italian, or at least pretending to be...just like Signor Pirelli.

The man pushing the chair suddenly exposed a large gun, cocking it and looking to the masked man questioning. Toby struggled to find his tongue, and fearfully stuttered out, "S-She...I...Ma'am needs help! She's hurt somethin' awful!" Toby pointed to the tent, his mind suddenly flooding away from this man and back to Mina. She still needed his help!

The man suddenly turned to face the tent Toby was pointing at, his expression changing drastically at this information. Fear flashed over his false skin, and his body seemed to stiffen. He then turned sharply to face the man behind him, and he commanded something in Italian. Toby understood little; it had been too long since he'd heard Pirelli's butchered attempts at the language, and he doubted that he had truly learned many words other than "bastardo" and "cazzo."

Suddenly, the guard behind the masked man jerked Toby up by his triceps, holding onto him tightly. The man in the chair hurriedly struggled to push the wheels himself, though he was obviously having difficulty, before cursing again in Italian for the man to do something. Toby struggled and kicked to get away, but the man's grip was strong, and he merely threw Toby under one arm rather roughly, saying nothing as he used his other hand to quickly push the other man into the vampiress' tent.

"H-Hey! What're you doin'?! Put me down, I say! She needs my help! Let me go!"

"Shut-a him up, would-a you?" The Italian hissed, before the guard suddenly threw Toby to the ground, kicking his side. Toby could do little to protest(in fact, he could barely breathe, the wind had been so knocked out of him), and stared on with wide eyes as the strange man was pushed forward beside Mina. He ignored his own pain for a moment, more frightened now than before now that this man was here with Mina.

"Mina!" The man cried, his voice much less menacing than it had been before. This surprised Toby; what was this man planning to do with her?

"Mina, mio amore!" The masked man said again, panic in his eyes at the sight of the blood, and the hysterical Mina. Turning to his guard, he nodded his head quickly. "Pick-a her up, you idiot!"

[Mina Murray]

Mina calmed down somewhat when Pavi spoke, now that she knew that Pavi was there she felt better. Her sobbing turning into small whimpering and her breathing slowing down. That is until Pavi's body guard bent over to pick her up.

How were either of them to know that the man bore a resemblance to The Count? He had the same shaped face and long dark hair. The sunglasses only made it worse, because Dracula (or Alucard) would wear sunglasses in the daylight to shield his sensitive eyes from the sun.
She screamed fearing that Alucard had come back to feed on her, kill her and turn her like he had done before. Mina became hysterical once more screaming and sobbing not to hurt her, not to turn her into a monster.

She lashed out a few times clawing at the mans chest and hitting him in the face. Mina would have bit him but...she was afraid of ingesting vampire blood. Fearing that it would turn her, like it had before. Mina had become so hysterical that she completely forgot where she was and that Pavi was with her. She also didn't realize that Toby was there as well.

All she could think about was how she was going to die or worse. And how there would be no one to help her now.

[Pavi Largo]

Pavi's guard remained as motionless as possible, only twitching slightly at the clawing. In all honesty, it hurt like a bitch, but he'd been trained like all the others to remain silent and calm, unless instructed otherwise. He could deal with the pain and the blood the woman had caused him later; right now, he was doing business, and unless Pavi Largo were to tell him to do otherwise, he would willingly stand there and let her claw him to bits without making a sound.

Pavi's eyes widened sharply at Mina's reaction, unable to understand what to make of any of it. Something terrible had happened to the woman, of that he was sure. She'd been hurt badly...but by who?

Hyde.

Pavi immediately thought of the name, and his shock and worry had immediately turned to hot, boiling anger. The monster must have confronted Mina after their fight, and now...this. Turning sharply to face the boy, he asked lividly, with danger in his tone, "Who did-a this to her?"

"I...I don't know," Toby said, shaking his head honestly, fearfully. "I just came in to see if she needed anything, and found her...like that."

By this point Pavi was no longer looking at the boy; he was telling the truth, he was fairly sure. And if he wasn't, he could deal with that later. He had bigger things to deal with now. Motioning for his guard to come forward, Pavi nodded toward the screaming woman in his arms. "Bring-a her to me."

When the guard had gratefully placed her in Pavi's lap, the Largo grabbed hold of Mina's arms, attempting to calm her and assure her that everything was alright. He was a mixture of worried, infuriated, and fearful. But mostly worried. Worried for Mina's mere sanity, not to mention her physical condition.

"Mina, l'amore, calmati. E 'Pavi," Pavi whispered to her, holding her to his chest and rocking her in his lap. "Io sono qui ora."

[Mina Murray]

Mina was about to scream, thinking that The Count had changed his voice to get her to drop her guard, so that he could continue torturing her. She opened her eyes and instantly her scream stopped in her throat when she saw the look in Pavi's eyes. The vampire could never duplicate that look of concern and caring not in a thousand lifetimes.

The scream died in her throat and all that came out was a sob as she buried her face into Pavi's chest. Smearing his shirt front with her blood and tears. Mina wrapped her arms around Pavi's back and held onto him tightly as she sobbed, ignoring the guard and the boy.

All she felt was a combination of relief and fear. Fear that The Count would come back and find Pavi with her and kill him.
"We have to get out of here," She said between sobs, "If we don't leave now, Pavi, we'll die. And I can't live knowing I caused your death!"

[Pavi Largo]

Pavi's eyes widened further as Mina buried her face into his chest, and he instinctively wrapped his arms further around the woman. He stroked her hair gently, pressing his closer to him and whispering soft "shhs" as she continued to cry.

At the fearful tone in her voice, Pavi felt a deep spark of anger burn within him. So, Hyde had attempted to kill them both? Pavi could understand an attack on his own person; that didn't mean that he'd tolerate it either, but it was less anger-invoking than the alternative. To try and kill Mina in his burst of anger...now that made Pavi furious.

"Come on," he said, motioning darkly to his guard. The man responded quickly, pushing Pavi in his chair towards the exit of the tent. From the ground below, Toby suddenly reacted, jumping to his feet immediately.

"Wait," he asked sharply. "Wh-where are you taking her?" The boy didn't trust the Italian, despite the fact that he and the vampiress obviously knew each other.

"Home," Pavi said, an emotionless tone to his voice. Yes, he was taking her home. To their home. He didn't care what he had to pay the circus; he wouldn't have her here one more minute with that monster.

"Don't-a worry yourself. It's-a none of-a your business, boy."

[Mina Murray]

"Home."
Mina's heart fluttered a little bit when Pavi said that, because she thought of the Largo's mansion as the closest thing she had to home now. And she wondered, face still buried in Pavi's chest, if he meant it as their home as well.

It was the only place she felt safe and where she could truly relax and be herself. Not the 'evil seductress' act that she had to put on for the crowd. (Although that didn't mean she wouldn't occasionally slip into that role when she was alone with Pavi.)
But then almost anywhere would feel like home compared to the Circus.

She looked up at Pavi as they were being pushed away, just seeing his eyes made her feel better.They were a deep blue with the smallest bit of green in them around the pupils, they were possibly her favorite part of him. She held tightly and looked up at him trying to breath slowly to keep from thinking about the attack.

[Tobias Ragg]

As the guard pushed both Pavi and Mina outside the tent, it took Toby a few seconds to react. What was this man doing, just coming in and taking the vampiress away? Could he even do that? Not without the Ring Leader's say, he was sure.

And not without his say. He may be young, but he was still a circus worker. And he wasn't just going to let them take an act away under his watch. Not only because he was genuinely worried about the woman, but the fact that he'd let it happened would manage to get him into some serious trouble.

"Hey, w-wait!" Toby shouted, running after them and trying to sound intimidating. He grabbed the guard's thick arm, trying to pull him back fruitlessly before he could push both Mina and the man away. Immediately Pavi snapped his fingers, and the man suddenly wrapped his hand around Toby's thin neck, lifting him above ground without even turning to look.

"Antoine, do-a him a favor and-a put him to sleep," Pavi sighed, focusing on the woman curled against his chest. No doubt she hadn't even noticed the fact that he was in a wheelchair at the moment in her current state, but that could be dealt with later when he'd gotten her calmed down and settled back at the hotel.

"No! Ma'am!" Toby struggled to rasp out, trying to remove the man's fingers from his throat. Suddenly, the guard took his other hand and pressed against the other's temples with his thumb and forefinger. Toby slowly nodded off, his head falling limply in the man's firm grip. Dropping him onto the ground inside the tent, the guard quickly returned back to Pavi and Mina, continuing on as though nothing had ever happened.

No...ma'am, Toby's head swam with thoughts before completely fading to black. I won't let nothing harm you...not while I'm around...

[Mina Murray]

Mina's face was buried in Pavi's chest, eyes shut tight. Every once in awhile she let out a tiny whimper of fear. Now that they were outside the tent she expected the vampire, or one of his minions, to swoop down and rip them both apart.

It seemed like every shadow and noise had something sinister behind it. And she was still to weak to defend herself (not that she could with a vampire like Dracula) let alone attempt to escape. But she was more afraid for Pavi, he still didn't know what a real vampire was like. And knowing him and his guards they'd go for the old wives tales thinking they'd protect them. And be ripped apart in the process.

"Pavi..." She whimpered, grabbing onto one of his hands and holding it tightly. Just to make sure he was still alive.

[Pavi Largo]

Pavi's mask was emotionless, for once, despite the now ironically twisted smile that was carved into his current one. Inwardly, however, he was fuming. If the one who had hurt her was truly the one he thought it was(and who else could it be?), then he would make sure that Hyde would pay. He knew that the beast was being punished as it was for what he'd pulled yesterday, and if he wasn't dead yet, Pavi would make sure that he was soon enough.

He regretted his injury for two reasons; one, it had prevented him from getting here earlier and protecting Mina from the monster that had done this to her, and two, because if he hadn't done what he had to receive the injury, then more than likely none of this would have happened in the first place.

However, his thoughts were abruptly interrupted by Mina's hand clasping his own. He looked down at her, holding her closer with a small, regretful sigh. "Shh..." he breathed, attempting to reassure Mina with a gentle kiss against her forehead. "I'm-a here now," he whispered. "Nothing's-a gonna harm-a you now. We're-a going home, where you'll-a be safe."

They quickly arrived back at Pavi's limo, which, luckily, had been built large enough for a wheelchair. As he was pushed inside up a small ramp, Pavi sighed, stroking Mina's hair gently as the car door was closed, and they were left alone as the driver moved into his seat up ahead. "Please, Mina...don't-a be scared. You're with-a Pavi now. I will keep-a you safe, I promise."