<strong>-- Delilah Etienne (http://img838.imageshack.us/img838/9682/boxingwoman.jpg) - Downtown, Florence Motel, Room 13 - Taking Stock  --</strong><br/><hr/><br/>There was nothing quite as brilliant as a good hangover after an evening of being nearly disemboweled by a hideous monster.  The sharp throb in Delilah's temples was a fair bit less agonizing than a knife wound, and couldn't even compare to getting shot or tossed bodily out of a car on the freeway.  Pain like that she could do without, hangovers always seemed to put things in perspective.  A little pain was good for focus.<br/><br/>The room was as moist and moldering as the rest of the town, and the bottom of her boots were already caked with all manner of unlucky insect.  The light was murky and rolled over the gaudy purple furniture like orange gelatin, and there was a rank odor not unlike spoiled milk wafting from the kitchen.  But it was soundproofed, private, low-key, and the owner didn't ask questions.  Sometimes a woman in her position had to make sacrifices.<br/><br/>She'd lived in worse places.<br/><br/>Her guns and munitions were laid out on the bed or tucked away in suitcases.  She didn't quite trust leaving them in the truck, though the thing was outfitted with enough traps and wards and silver that any freak attempting to get in would have a bitch of a time.<br/><br/>Silver.  Bane to supernaturals everywhere.  She didn't question it.  If it worked, that's all that really mattered.  She hadn't seen what fucking chaos had gone on in the bar, but she'd heard that howl same as the rest of them.  Shifter.  Hers?  Not likely.  But it was reason enough to stay in town.  Delilah didn't especially like her chances alone, but that was nothing new.  Only novices fought shifters and skinwalkers alone, and they never lived long enough to become veterans.  She hadn't seen where Otis and the loudmouthed hunter had gotten off to, but hooking up with them just seemed logical.  Worse comes to worse, they'd make good meat to put between her and the damn thing's claws.<br/><br/>Delilah fell back onto the bed, scaring a few moths into the fetid air.  She stared blankly at a water stain on the ceiling in the shape of a mourning woman, hugging her Smith & Wesson against her abdomen like a security blanket.  "Delilah, girl, jess what'd ya git yerself inta this time?"