Alistair felt it instantly in the pit of his stomach, that churning anxiety, an apprehension that caused the hair on his arms to stand on end even beneath the freshly pressed material of his tuxedo. Vampire. The vibrant green of his gaze turned upward to scan the crowd as he lackadaisically brought the glass of bourbon to his lips. At the very least, he could hear no shriek of panic, nor did he see anyone fleeing from some attack of the undead. Alistair's lips pressed together in a firm line as he moved towards the silent auction, his instincts were on high alert, even as he strolled calmly through the myriad of prizes on display. It was...peculiar for Alistair to sense their kind without an immediate attack following in the aftermath. Though he hardly believed that all of their kind were the personification of evil, he had yet to actually meet a vampire that didn't immediately leap to some attempt to murder him. For the moment, however, the artist allowed himself to be distracted by the auction as he wandered purposelessly through the set up tables. At the very least, the auction seemed to be doing significantly better this year, the items up were of higher caliber then he had anticipated given the events of the last year and a half.

He turned down the next makeshift aisle, only to be faced with a collection of artwork. A large majority of them were pieces from the students and recipients of funds from the Art Institute's various scholarships and yet, amongst those stood two pieces Alistair knew well. They were leagues apart from those that surrounded them - works from men who had years of further experience displayed in each brush stroke. He approached the two canvases, his gaze but briefly deviated from them to the man who presently stood in front of them. As he neared, that nagging instinct only seemed to increase, the one that almost chanted in the back of his mind, vampire, vampire, vampire. For a vampire, though, there was something almost...familiar about him. He had a face that Alistair was certain he'd seen before, somewhere. He hardly seemed terribly inclined to pounce upon the Dark Hunter in some crazy blood-hungry frenzy and so, for the moment, Alistair was content to simply ignore him as he approached the cityscape his coworker had painted. His own name was quickly written down on the sheet in front of it, even if Alistair was contributing to the bet the two had placed on whose piece would earn more. Seeing his coworker's face when he brought it in to announce his triumphant win was surely worth the few hundred dollars the bid was currently set at.

It was the soft mutterance upon the vampire's lips that drew Alistair's gaze upward and towards the man. His eyes turned back towards the cityscape in front of him as the man nodded in agreement. "It is." The last thing he expected was for the man beside him to point towards his own painting, only to start his preference for that one. Alistair's brow rose slightly as he eyed the suspiciously warm simper upon the man's lips, only for the vampire to snatch up the pin in front of the bid sheet to write down his auction number and a bid for - wait, WHAT?!. Alistair practically choked on the bourbon he'd brought to his lips as he glanced down at the sheet after the vampire was finished. His gaze darted up at the man, and then back down to the sheet...and back up at the vampire. "That piece is...definitely not worth that much." He insisted with clear incredulousness. His artwork had never sold for twenty thousand dollars! A few hundred at best, maybe! Surely the vampire was just messing with him. Or maybe it was that whole...show of a grand donation to the Art Institute? At the very least he was certain he'd won the bet on whose art would sell for more, he supposed.