The car with the hooker made a left turn. Cat studied the profile of the man whose baby probably wasn't on board with unnaturally sharp vision. She stared off into the distance for a few minutes. Alex glanced over at her, wondering if her story was finished. He opened his mouth to ask her if she was going to go on when she spoke.       "I gave up on the straight jobs and moved around for a while."       She is nineteen. Everything she owns is in a backpack that is held closed with a padlock. It's not the most fool proof security system in the world, but it keeps the amateurs away. She has been on the streets for six months and has done many horrible things to survive. She has lost what little innocence and trust she had left.       She is talking to a drug-dealer named Ignacio, who wants to 'employ' her as a 'courier.' He is offering her drugs in exchange for her services. She tries to think of a diplomatic way to tell him to fuck off, but fails. She doesn't see his fist heading towards her stomach. He doesn't see the glove studded across the palm with push pins heading for his crotch. Catrina bashes his head in with a brick as he lays on the ground, silent with pain. She steals everything she can from his body and walks away.       "I got a job as a do-girl for this tattoo artist. You know, picking up lunch, cleaning up the shop... I worked for a little cash, and art, but mostly I worked for apprenticeship." She idly runs a finger across the intricate tattoo on her wrist and the titanium barbell in the flesh just above it. "They let me live in the storage space over the shop." She stops for a long moment, watching the cars go by. Once again, Alex watches her, not sure if she will go on. "They were good people," she finishes quietly. The ghoul sits back, startled. This is the only kindness he has ever heard from her.       She is twenty-one. Neil and Michelle close the shop for the night and buy Catrina her first legal alcoholic drink. She smiles as they come in, a Zippo wedged into a slit in the case of Budweiser. They sit and talk for hours, laughing and drinking.       Neil pats the tattooing table and smiles as he offers her 'one on the house.' She sits for a moment, looking into her can. She lays face down on the table and points to a spot below her third nape stud. She tells him what she wants, and he goes to work. She is still and silent as the pain shoots along her nerves, making her fingers twitch. He passes over a horribly sensitive part of her neck and she grimaces and whimpers. Michelle takes her hand.       'Hush, little kitten. You're stronger than that.' In this moment, Catrina knows she loves these people, in her own strange way.       "Then Quin found me."       "Quin?" Alex looked away, frowning and confused. He wasn't used to thinking of her as a creature who shows soft emotions. He was disgusted by the very thought of it.       "The one who made me. He heard about my... talent," she sneers. "Michelle was five times better than me. Neil was ten times better... But he picked me," she finished, her voice fading. She sat there for a moment, shaking her head.       She is twenty-three. She is sitting in the front of the shop, her feet up on the coffee table, reading a magazine. The bell over the door jingles and she looks up. He is perfectly beautiful. He smiles at her and the magazine falls from her hands.       'Can I help you?' she asks. Please let me help you, she thinks desperately. He holds out his hand and says something. After a moment, she translates it as an offer to take her to dinner. She yells something that she hopes is a farewell to Neil and Michelle, probably with a promise to be home later.       She puts a finger through one of the hoops around her collarbone, stroking it gently. "It took seven nights for him to perform his Rites on me." She smiles proudly and taps the hoop. "One night for each of these, and knowledge to go with it."       It is six months later. The room she is in is dim. Quin sits at a small table near where she is standing. He looks up and smiles that brilliant smile that melts her brain. She smiles back, the metal in her face glittering slightly.       'You know what will happen... If you don't survive-'       'I will survive, Quin.'       The brilliant smile fades into something quietly horrible, a rictus of abhorrent amusement. 'Don't be so sure of that, my sweet kitten.'       'I've survived worse than you, Quin,' she says bravely, repressing the sick fear in her stomach. She begins to understand that there is more to this man than she knows. She isn't so sure that she wants to find out what it is anymore.       Alex studies the six rings around her collarbones, contemplating the excruciating pain she must have endured to receive them.       "And on the seventh night?"       Her lips twitch and she taps her breastbone where a huge tattoo of a tribal-style rose lays upon a black sun. "The mark of our blood, and fire." She grins.