Xaviers!

"Right. Well, let's go before I change my mind."

It doesn't take Alessia long to get ready and a short car ride later, they're at one of the upper end clothing shops on High Street in Kensington. The woman waiting on them appears to know Alessia and based on how solicitous she is, Alessia must be a a good customer. After the assorted pleasantries, Alessia hands over a credit card and gestures to Miriam. "Whatever she wants," Alessia says, "it's all on me."

Miriam's not about to turn that offer down and spends quite a bit of time picking out a number of outfits and accessories, opting to keep one of them on right away. With two more shopping bags in each hand she finally seems to be done and in a somewhat better mood.

For her part, Alessia seems to be content to watch, but Miriam can't quite shake the feeling that there's a little bit of assessment in Alessia's gaze. She signs the receipt and thanks the attendant before taking them back out to the car. The driver takes Miriam's bags, placing them in the trunk as they get into the back of the car. He whisks them away, dropping them outside of a club with quite the line outside it. As they approach the bouncer, Miriam can sense Alessia give the man a small mental push and he opens the velvet rope for them as if they're VIPs. "Still want that tequila or want something else?" Her thoughts touch Miriam's as they make their way through the noisy crowd.

"Yes. If I can even still get drunk." she says as she follows her into the club and they're enveloped by the music and masses of people. Often annoyed by being in a crowd with strangers she now finds a lot of them smelling almost obnoxiously inviting. Especially since most of them are flushed with intoxication or physical exertion. It feels like walking in on a banquet or maybe an opulent breakfast in the morning.

"Not as distracted by their thoughts?" Alessia leads the way to the bar, finding a spot and getting them two tequilas.

"In a manner of speaking..." she sends, quickly knocking the shot back and gesturing at the barkeeper to bring her another.

Alessia takes hers a little more slowly, but the bartender brings Miriam another one right away. The alcohol still burns and if she was one to drink it for the taste, she can still taste it, but she can tell any warm fuzzy effect she feels from it is all in her head. "They're all so ignorant," she thinks to Miriam as she mentally turns aside a couple of guys who were on the approach to buy them drinks.

Miriam frowns, but knocks back the second shot as well. It'll just take a while to really take effect, right?

"They're just... desperate to let slip a fraction of the darkness lurking in the back of their minds. Clad it in the acceptable trappings of society."

"Self-denial is all well and good sometimes, but you have to find a release valve or you will explode. Some of them will never learn that." She finishes her tequila and orders something sweeter.

Alessia's not wrong. Almost any time she'd used her power there had been somebody to tell her not to. That she had to learn how to use it mainly so she'd know how not to. And she did, having come to the conclusion that she's better than others simply for being able to control her mind while she was painfully aware of how little everyone else concerned themselves with their inner thoughts. Not that she was any better, but unable to really turn her power on herself it has certainly warped her perspective.

"Isn't that what society is though? Rules we put on ourselves so we don't descend into what's in the back of our minds?"

"Most people don't even bother to think about the rules in place before they accept them. They fear the retribution of society. Most don't even have the intelligence to consider when the rules no longer make sense. They just accept them on tradition and never think about them again. If you're going to limit yourself, I think it should be because you want to or see benefit in limiting yourself, not just avoiding society's condemnation."

The second shot didn't seem to be doing any more than the first one had.

"And that's why many of them will never be more than what they are. You scolded me earlier for my inadvertent cattle comparison, but honestly, with some of these people, I think sheep is probably more apt. They'd follow the herd straight off a cliff or into the jaws of wolves if that's the way the herd wanted to go. We have the time and the perspective to nudge things in better directions and make sure the herd doesn't self-destruct. Our abilities are just one of the tools we use to do that." She holds out her hand. "Feel like dancing?"

"So you manipulate them to do what's best for them? Or what's best for you?" she sends as she wordlessly takes Alessia's hand and stands up from her bar stool.

"Those aren't mutually exclusive outcomes." She led the way out close to the middle of the dance floor. She'd obviously had some training as a dancer, but there's was that supernatural grace edging her movements. "We're not monsters despite what popular culture makes us out to be. We're just few in number."

Miriam mostly just moves to the music, not so much trained, but she has a tendency to make the people around her fall into the same kind of swaying movements as her. And having an alluring dance partner certainly helps her just letting herself drift in the moment. "Drinking blood seems rather monstrous..."

"And where did that idea come from?" Alessia leans in, pulling Miriam close.

"I get it, it's just... I've seen what's in people heads, more than I care to admit sometimes. Where do you draw the line?" The question seems to almost be a bit more genuine than Miriam intended it to initially.

"Some of us do luxuriate in it like that and I can certainly see the appeal, so long as they don't put the rest of us in danger with whatever antics they get up to. There are certainly times when it has been useful to be the monster they see us as, but I prefer not to think of myself in those terms as a matter of standard policy." She leans in to kiss Miriam, because that's what couples on the dance floor do, right?

"It's certainly convenient..." Miriam responds, returning the kiss but seeming a little distracted. Her mind is skimming through the crowd and she has little trouble picking out the deeper urges. Alcohol and being immersed in the mass of bodies on the dance floor brings it closer to the surface already and it's just begging for an excuse, for a crack. Why not indulge them, right? There's a strange satisfaction that comes from brushing up against the darkness. A kind of morbid fascination and the thrill of being afraid. So why not indulge them? Become their release, their excuse to let the dark thoughts rise tot he surface for just a moment... The distraction slowly fades and the kiss grows more passionate.

"How deep have you looked into their minds? Can you read them? Their innermost thoughts?"

"Some I have. Some wear their dark thoughts so openly that I don't even have to dig particularly deep." Alessia can obviously sense what Miriam's doing, but it doesn't seem to bother her in the slightest. The two of them are starting to draw some attention though, even in this club.

And that's when Miriam bites Alessia lip, fangs sinking in deep enough to draw blood.

Alessia makes a small noise and wraps her arms tighter around Miriam. The bite feels just as good as earlier. Alessia's blood is not warm, but it still tastes good. Alessia seems to be getting that warm fuzzy feeling from the bite as well, though it doesn't register as strongly with her as it did with Anna.

It's almost intoxicating. Not even the blood but simply the indulgence of giving in to a darker impulse, doing what the tequila failed to accomplish. After a moment of just letting herself drift in the moment, enveloped by the music and the rush of Alessia's blood. She'd tried. Tried to chose Wanda over this. For a moment her thoughts drift to the night spend in front of the fireplace, but the idea of what could be if she was somebody better just hurts. The truth that Wanda is a good person while she simply isn't cuts too deep. It's a happiness she'll only ever be adjacent to and it's so much easier to let go of it.

She pulls back just a bit from Alessia to look at her, licking at her own lips to clean them of blood. "Maybe this is where I belong..."

Alessia sucks on her own lip for a moment and then smiles, no sign of damage from Miriam's bite to be seen. "I think you belong. Just give me the time and I can show you how wonderful this life can be."