<div class="floatright">(https://elliquiy.com/elluiki/images/f/f1/23blonde3_zps656a14ef.jpg)</div><br/>Grace DeArca<br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">Real Name</div><div class="spoiler_body">Stephanie Jasmine Milano</div></div><br/>High Concept: Assassin Chosen By God<br/>Trouble: The Past Never Forgets<br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">Background: Joan of Arc's Crucifix Pendant</div><div class="spoiler_body"> People often hear the news about a serial killer and wonder how people can do such a thing.  The thing is, they're looking at it from their own perspective.  It can be so easy to stare at a life devoid of grime and wonder why other people aren't so clean and pure.<br/><br/>When evil all you know, the idea of living a good life doesn't even make any sense.  That's as true in Miami as it is in Seattle.<br/><br/>Stephanie Jasmine Milano was a lot of things, and none of them were very good, but the one that most people understand best is assassin.  Real life isn't like an action movie where people are trained from birth and can execute a person at 300 yards with a pistol, or come in through the vents, and Stephanie needed little more than a pretty face and basic understanding of firearms to get herself a degree of prestige in organized crime.<br/><br/>When she started out, it was simply as a spotter.  Working with a team, she'd follow a particular target, eventually backing away to allow someone else to take over.  Stealth isn't as easy as the movies, either, because anyone deliberately trying to be stealthy will immediately be noticed for a change in behavior.  It takes practice to walk without your footsteps making much noise, staying reasonably close to walls and staying fast enough to not be glimpsed for more than a moment or two.<br/><br/>Eventually, they gave her a gun and instructed her in its use, telling her to put a few bullets in the head of the target.  Once she did it, she really, truly belonged.  She found out about the Family, the secret group of assassins responsible for any number of deaths throughout the centuries.  Most of the jobs were in Miami, but a few of them required plane or train passage while she had an ironclad alibi back home.<br/><br/>A lot of great people worked in Los Angeles, and she misses quite a few of them.  Wheels, her driver, would pick her up even if it was three in the morning and she was too drunk to walk straight.  She never did find out his real name.  The Family accountant kept her inundated with enough money that she could buy a new dress each season, now represented just with her nest egg, a finite resources which should last her for a few more years if she keeps her expenses low.  God often provides in little ways, but there's no sense tempting Him by rushing through that money, and she knows that something will happen to help her by the time it's gone.<br/><br/>Once, it was a politician.  She doesn't remember which one, but she didn't have to kill him.  They were in the middle of having sex when she pulled a gun on him and told him, as she'd been instructed, that he'd have to honor his debts or he'd never feel safe again.  The pervert actually got even more turned on, though he promised to do the right thing.<br/><br/>There's just something about having a family that cares about you, even if that family isn't yours by blood.  How do you abandon the only people that know you even if they ask difficult things from you?  Even if you end up with nightmares?  If not for Gabriel Minaco, she might never have left.  Well, if not for the other man with him.<br/><br/>Back then, a target was just a target.  She knew habits, rituals, appearance, but nothing to actually make Gabriel any more than a corpse-to-be.  She didn't know his favorite color, or the sound of his laugh, or any of the other dozens of little things that would leave her desperate to understand the lives she snuffed out.<br/><br/>Gabriel was different only in that he was already dead when she got there.  Seated in his chair, he might well have only been asleep but for the recognition she held from someone who'd seen enough dead bodies to know the difference.  Standing over him was another man, immaculately dressed and offering her a smile.  "Hello, Stephanie."<br/><br/>Quick as lightning, her hands went up to snuff the witness.  The only thing to stop her was that he knew her name.  This had to be some sort of a setup.<br/><br/>"God still loves you, Stephanie."  She hated him for that, for not being afraid of her, for his smug arrogance.  "Aren't you tired of living like this?  Aren't you tired of the nightmares?"<br/><br/>At the time, she didn't know why she didn't shoot him.  Looking back, it only made sense that he was exactly right.  She did want a way out; she just didn't know it.  She would like to say that she felt something, then, but so much of those moments feel more like a dream.<br/><br/>The only proof she had that it happened was the crucifix pendant.  Belonging to Joan of Arc and passed down throughout history, it gives its bearer the ability to heal wounds that might otherwise cripple a person.  With all the damage she's taken over the years since, she's needed it.<br/></div></div><br/>Rising Conflict: Old Habits Die Hard<br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">Story "Purchased": The Devil Knows My Name</div><div class="spoiler_body">Some people felt it was silly for a hitman to have an office, but Aston preferred the security.  It gave his life a sense of stability, allowed him to maintain a level of professionalism.  More importantly, he could sweep the place regularly for listening devices without concern, and use signal jammers and low-level white noise to throw off any other means of recording him.  The police were paid well enough not to care, and the IRS had more interest in payment of taxes than in what work is done, but one can't be too careful when the business is killing someone for money.<br/><br/>Caution was the first thing that burned through his mind when she walked in.  After all, in his experience, anything that required caution in Los Angeles walked in on crimson stiletto heels with too-tall legs and the kind of dress that looked like it was spraypainted onto her.  The burning scarlet of her lips, her hair, her smile full of promises all threatened to burn him if he wasn't careful.<br/><br/>"Theodore vouched for me, right?"  Her words were soft honey carried by the wings of angels, and it became harder and harder to figure out why he couldn't shake the feeling that he should run.<br/><br/>"Lucy."  He gave a simple nod, deciding to at least hear her out for the time being.  It wouldn't be the first time that his overactive paranoia betrayed him, after all.  "Did you bring a photo?"<br/><br/>With a coy smile, Lucy plucked a photograph from her purse, sliding it across the desk with scarlet fingernails so perfectly manicured.  Something about the soft wave of her hand made him wonder whether having those nails raking through his back would truly scorch him, and he didn't even see the face until his hand reflexively caught the picture.  "Stephanie Jasmine Milano."<br/><br/>Aston frowned as he looked at the photo.  Certainly he knew the name, just as he knew Stephanie.  Half the family knew her, one way or another.  Yet there she was in what was clearly New Orleans, despite that he knew that she'd always wanted to go there and never got the assignments.  "She skipped out?"  Disgust filled his tone, one of the few emotions that raged past the distraction across from the desk.  "She was one of the good ones."<br/><br/>"Too good," Lucy mused.  "You'll most likely kill her, but if you can't, I'd like you to give her something for me."<br/><br/>Ready this time, Aston caught the blackened piece of silver, looking it over curiously.<br/></div></div><br/>Guest Starring [Sylvan]: Not Just A Pretty Face<br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">Guest Starring Redux (Matt): God Is My Judge</div><div class="spoiler_body">Crashes have a habit of drawing attention, except in bad neighborhoods.  In many places, people either want to help or simply to observe what was going on.  All too often, though, people will turn their backs and leave others to their own devices, or even believe that they've done a good turn if they bother to call an ambulance.<br/><br/>Grace remembered those days vividly.  Some parts of her old life carried a strong temptation to come back, but the helplessness, the disdain, the belief that everyone was in it for themselves and that she had to fight for every inch of her existence alone was a quiet horror that she would never miss.<br/><br/>She hadn't been alone even then, but knowing it and feeling it were entirely different things.  The path she walked had been ordained to ensure she was in the right place at the right time, exactly where she needed to be.<br/><br/>At the moment, that path involved seeing a Red Court Infected whose tattoos were showing, beating on a human who no doubt deserved to be pummeled within an inch of his life.  She tried letting the noise of cocking the Desert Eagle speak for her, but when that didn't suffice, spoke a single word, "Enough."<br/><br/>"And he doesn't deserve this?"  Barely-bridled rage spat at Grace from the Infected, but she let it slide.  Matt had already done so much for her that she could hardly expect him to be perfect.  Everyone had something to deal with, and he'd already proven he was stronger than she could ever be.  Then again, he had to be.<br/><br/>"I can take care of that."  She aimed the iron sights of her weapon just under his throat.  The recoil would catch the weapon when she fired, but she knew all too well how to take recoil into account, and the bullet would go through his forehead.  "I don't really think you want to see it when it happens."<br/><br/>Matt nodded, and released the man, who was frozen with terror.  Stephanie, Grace, didn't really try to be intimidating.  She just knew who she was, what she was, and what she had to do.  "May God forgive you," she said...<br/><br/>...and nothing.<br/><br/>The Bible describes Abraham's stopping his sacrifice of Isaac when an angel called out, but it wasn't what it felt like.  Her arm almost seemed to freeze, as if someone had grabbed her wrist.  At that moment, she couldn't fire any more than she could fly.<br/><br/>It wasn't the first time, but with Matt's certainty, she hadn't expected it.  Then again, in her darker nights, it seemed ridiculous that she should be sent out upon her task without much guidance.<br/><br/>Still, her duty wasn't complete.  "I trust you know where you need to deliver the girl you kidnapped?" she asked.<br/><br/>Silently quivering, he nodded.<br/><br/>"That one is spoken for.  You'll just have to bring me along instead."<br/></div></div><br/><hr/><br/>Skills<br/><table class="bbc_table"><tbody><tr><td>Superb     </td><td>Conviction, Guns</td></tr><tr><td>Great     </td><td>Alertness, Athletics</td></tr><tr><td>Good     </td><td>Endurance, Resources</td></tr><tr><td>Fair     </td><td>Contacts, Stealth</td></tr><tr><td>Average     </td><td>Lore, Presence</td></tr></tbody></table><br/><hr/><br/>Bless This House [–1] (page 187)<br/>Guide My Hand [–1] (page 187)<br/>Holy Touch [–1] (page 188)<br/>Righteousness [–2] (page 188)<br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">Item of Power - Crucifix Pendant</div><div class="spoiler_body">This simple necklace originally belonged to Joan of Arc.  It bestows Supernatural Recovery, with a Catch that any weapon forged with metal from the arrow or crossbow bolt that wounded Joan of Arc would have no effect upon her healing abilities.  The Denarians know about this Catch.<br/></div></div>[-1]<br/><br/>Refresh 2<br/><br/><hr/><br/>Desert Eagle - Weapon:3 - Bullets are usually steel-coated lead that have been dipped in holy water.<br/><br/>.38 Special - Weapon:2 - Usually kept in a boot.  Revolvers are often necessary if her Desert Eagle jams.<br/><br/>Flak Jacket - Armor:1 - Hidden under clothes when she intends to go hunting.