Surely most have heard tell of it, or maybe even cringed at the ringing of such cheap imitations as dare to run rampant in the theatre district.  For it is oftern referenced, that cackle for the depths.  A convenient plot device it is, the overused symbol of madness and heh stereotypical depravity which any proper opposition must offer. Hollow.  A prop.  Figurehead among the mewls of dramatized madness.

Yet even the world's banalities must find their origin somewhere.

Was it from her parched throat, then, that the inspiration for such insipidness lay?  For whatever giggle had welled up from the depths of insanity must either be the origin of or a grand tribute to the infamous cackle of all things evil.

Funny, that she should be hearing it.  Her voice had never been the first to rebel before.  A disturbing step towards the inevitable, framed in the unforgiving darkness of night.  Perhaps also a call to mental arms.  The north wind raising goosebumps on her exposed flesh had faile in that regard.

Sierra had to concentrate; focus on something simple enough to preserve some shard of her weary mind.

My name is Sierra Miuret.

This struggle, she knew, was useless.  There was no stopping slim ivory legs from running throug the forest to succulent civilization.  The hunger would not cease simply because she willed it to with all her heart. A fruitless battle could no more bring back the tarnished glory of another self than any other longing to will itself into reality.

I was the Lady of the Vampire Tribe.

Blood was everywhere - her own, of course.  Nothing else could have made the journey away from wherever she had last rested so intoxicating.  Away, away, away... to blood, to the killing fields, and to the loss of self which even her rational mind secretly craved.

Hunger....

No!  My Name is Sierra Miuret, and I dream of a tribe...

vengance...

nobility...

To sleep perchance to dream.  Visions induced as an escape from reality too cruel to be concieved of by the reality's young pawn or through the world-weary optimism of a great Lady.

But there were really no dreams for her, were there? Every building she had constructed crumbled. Dreams meant eventual death, though wether that be the eventual and lingering decline of hope or the swift destruction of a human body mattered not.  Were there even such things as dreams, then?  No.  The illusions which populated the mind during slumber were simply a diversion for the soul, a way to forget about the events of a day.  Or a night.  Or a lifetime.  There were none, now she was sure of it. They were really - perhaps sadly - only tricks played by the subconcious in a vain attempt to restore to life the flagging passions of the weary.  That or to help the damned relax in a false amnesia before confronting their crimes.

Hunger.

The Killer did so want to forget.   Sad, that she had once let herself be strung along by such fickle illusions as the visions of a better life.  To think that she had once believed that she could restore that pockey of tranquility which stark reality had destroyed so many years ago.  The blue moon rose only in her mind.  Selena, Ferris, Samael, Harburn... if only... if only she could avenge than as she did each night in her mind's eye.

I was once a dreamer, yet I don't belive in dreams.

Wishes don't come true.  Not now.  Not ever.  Certainly not in the dense undergrowth which was almost too alive for the vampire to bear, and must be escaped from as quickly as possible.  If it couldn't happen in the fairytale halls of a long-lost empire to the purest of dreamers then there was no possibility of some fabled miracle occuring now.

Yet the struggle was still important, somehow, even if her body had already been lost to Hunger.

Ah.  A young traveller waited in the clearing before her. She was ragged yet comfortable; perfectly ordinary in every way.  Her pulsing heart offered a break from rampant vegitation and the chance to fulfill an automatic craving.  Fortunate, cried her muscles.  The vestiges of a mind contradicted.

My name is Sierra Miuret...

and I once believed in miracles....

Specifically, the magic of moonlight.  That injection of Eternity - the morphine taking away the harshness of a past existence with its miracle power.  The fountain of youth hung in the sky above her, preserving flesh that might long have decayed enough to pad towards the campsite of an unarmed woman.  When she was young, so very young, she had thought that power which now drove her to kill almost a blessing; a gift from the gods to the suffering.

Hunger.

A dishonorable kill.  Should that matter?  Yes.  Did it matter?  Not to the mists taking hold of her conciousness - the ones which had once panicked her in their unfamiliarity.  Oddly enough, not to her as well.

But that was not truly I, now was it?

Miracles cease to be so divine when they exact a price.  There is a point where every pact can become a deal with the devil.  Had she realized that her "gift" would one day murder a soul lost long ago the young Lady Miuret might not have been so eager to make her way in the world.  Perhaps that had been the true problem with her beloved home - nothing can survive on a foundation built of wishes and dreams of a better life.  The miracle power could not sustain when it did not exist.

Had the Lady been mistaken, then?  That simply could not be... she was the Lady, and the Lady was perfect...

But wouldn't a miracle have saved her from this by now, if such mythical creatures truly existed?

The Lady died when her fairytale ended.

My name is Sierra Miuret, and I wish... I wish...

that I could be her again.

For just one second the killer's body paused while on the threshold of the young woman's campsite. The Dreaming was enveloping her soul, and yet, and yet.... she could break this.  If she wanted to, the scarlet Lady could break this.

Hunger.

But she was so very, very tired... and the vampire did not remember if the Lady had ever existed beyond some idolized aspect of her own self.  She could not even recall how she had come to this remote little patch of desolation.

My name is Sierra Miuret...  and who is that?

Oh, but she knew.  The purposeful strides of a corpse surrendered to the Hunger made it more than clear what sort spirit she was.  Not the Dreaming, though... had there ever been a Dreaming?  Or was it only an excuse, a way to avoid admiting to herself the true nature of the beast?

It was so shameful that the mortals might have known her true nature for centuries, while she was realizing it only now.

I don't believe in dreams...

The girl was screaming, her face contorted in fear as she cowered against her tent.  Why, exactly?  Ah.  It must be the blood. Mortals tended to fear blood.

No.  No they didn't. They freeze in terror at the implication of blood - a reaction which is drilled into every human child from birth.  They fear the unknown, the darkness.  It was funny, that, for so had she until just about now.  The moonlight, her healer, a miracle power - it was a crutch that way.  Something to believe in when the alternative was madness.

I DON'T BELIEVE IN DREAMS.

Madness sounded like a good option right about now. And so the vampire let go - truly let go.  For the first time Sierra willingly surrendered to insanity, if that was what this was.  Make no mistake, she had never been insane before.  Trapped withing the confines of her mind, perhaps.... but not mad.  Did the fact that she did not care if she was mad make her insane?

The things which one ponders to while away the minutes when one's body is beyond control are often rather odd.

Bathed in firelight, arctic hands easily lifted a specimen of the average up from her fetal position.  Tears flowed freely, wetting an iron grip which threatened to break the yound woman's jaw.  As the Killer had no compunctions when it came to these sorts of things it soon did exactly that - crushing bone with a sickening crunch.   Oblivious to the screams, she stole from the girl her life's blood with every bit of abandom that she had forced herself to stifle when she was with Oulan.  It tasted good, she decided - invigorating as it burned it's way down her throat.

Hunger

What was that touch... a butterfly? No; it was manicured hands flailing in their sson to be ended confusion.  Were the screams words now?  She didn't care to hear very well.  The Killer supposed that the girl was pleading for her life...

Hunger

There was no moral dillemma.  Perhaps there never had been.  Al that there happened to be between the blinders set by hunger was the all-encompassing embrace of blood.  Drowning her senses, snuffing out one last spark of regret ... mother.  The only real mother she had ever known was in those crimson depths, and as the tide washed over her it easily snuffed out one last smouldering regret.

"No... no... please.  I'm pregnant; please, my baby... and my son... don't .... PLEASE!"

Hunger

A son?  The mortal had lasted surprisingly little time, and was now feeding her own fire.  Such a waste was sad; the carrion eaters might have enjoyed her.  The Killer breathed in the stench as if it was a narcotic - and in a way it was.

Hunger

A son.  Of course.  She could not help but hear him sniffling in the trees - a weak boy, then.

He was just like she had been.  An innocent - eyes wet and shining and beautiful under the stars.  Fine tendrils of curled hair framaed  a face not yet free of the inherent roundness of infancy. He was obviously no more than five or six.   Had she been the Sierra of twelve hours before the Killer might have recognized his face as somethign akin to what she had once seen in a painting several lifetimes ago.  A little boy with wings, that had been it - an angel  framed in watercolor light.

Even in this state the Killer did not really need his blood.  There was, however, no glow of sanctity to be found in the darkness.

This boy was her last chance.  For a last chance, his blood tasted divine as he called for the burning corpse behind him to come and help.

"Mommma... Mommna, heeeeeeeellllp!"

There's no use.....

"Mommmmaaaaaaa!"

I don't believe in Dreams....

" m-mo......"