Shaggy sighed.

“So let me see if I understand the plan.” He whispered as their group of friends huddled in a far corner of the diner.

“We hand over our brand-new work IDs, which have our fake identities on them.”

“Some of us didn’t use fake identities, dude.” Dave complained.

Ren groaned. “Again. Why would you use your real name?”

Dave just crossed his arms and looked sullen as Shaggy continued.

“Then we explain what we saw, with the asshole bear and the woman. All the while, we pray to the various video game gods that they don’t run our credentials or have any sort of facial recognition?”

It was Vlad’s turn to sigh this time. “Like I said, they aren’t going to send a lot of cops out for a domestic violence call. We’ll get a couple of uniforms and maybe an ambulance. So we play along for a bit, then announce that we have to get going.”

“Yeah. We have to make sure our new friend and fellow Union member, Ralph, gets home okay,” Ren said, waving a massive grey hand at the currently unconscious Ralph.

“I can’t believe you guys knocked him out.” Slink grinned.

Vlad shrugged. “We were going to need a place to stay tonight. We figured we could invade the jerk-wad's place. Also, he has a car parked around the corner, apparently.”

Shaggy glanced over at the crowd of NPCs, who were all quietly whispering near the front door to the diner. Janet and her abusive alien boyfriend had been separated, and the bartender was keeping an eye on everyone. The weird alien shotgun seemed to pulse with power as Shaggy got a good look at it. He guessed it was an energy weapon. Whatever it did, it was enough to make everyone in the bar listen to the portly diner owner.

“You realize Dave is going to be questioned the most, right? Since he’s the one that knocked out the bear-guy.” Slink said.

Shaggy nodded agreement, but said. “Yeah, but he’s also one of the few of us who’s not an escaped prisoner.”

Ren raised a hand up and Dave immediately slapped him five. The pair of them were getting a little smug about not having visited the game’s prison system. Shaggy grunted, annoyed, but he couldn’t disagree. Being an escaped prisoner had made some of their dealings topside somewhat annoying. Shaggy wondered how long the local PD would spend looking for them. It had been well over a week since he, Vlad, and Slink had made a break for it. They weren’t even in classified as dangerous criminals.

Shaggy had been tossed into low-powered D-Block because he was taken down by a Non-powered super. Vlad was in there because he was captured while in his blood stupor. Slink had tried to kill his schoolmates using just his fist. They were all low-tier offenders. Maybe they weren’t even looking for them anymore. Shaggy was about to mention this when red and blue lights lit up the front of the diner.

Everyone in the bar started backing away from the front door. Janet was hoisted up by a pair of people and walked toward the door. Her unconscious boyfriend was dragged unceremoniously by Myron. Shaggy saw Dave take a few steps away from their group. They had all decided that, if possible, they should distance themselves. At least partially. Shaggy wasn’t sure how that was going to work out, but he was more than willing to try.

Three humanoids marched their way into the bar and silence fell. A yellow and red alien woman immediately spotted Janet and walked over, pulling a small tablet from her pocket. The largest of the cops, a red demon-looking guy, had posted up near the front door and was eyeballing everyone in the room. Finally, the lone human of their group was a blonde, handsome man who smiled warmly at everyone as he took in the room. Shaggy instantly hated him.

“Good evening everyone.” The man said. “I am officer Hawthorne. My partners are Officers Mickle and Xelthub. I will take your statements one by one, while Xelthub will clear everyone as they leave.”

Everyone nodded dumbly, and Shaggy sent a worried look at Vlad. But the vampire was currently pretending to shake Ralph awake. But according to Ren, he had knocked the guy pretty hard. Shaggy was pretty sure Ralph would not wake for a while. Slink was digging in his pockets for his employee ID and Shaggy figured he should do the same.

“So I am going to need everyone involved with the incident to step forward, and I’ll take your statements one at a time. If you were not a part of the altercation, I ask for your patience so we can get everything sorted out.”

“How long is that going to take?” A worried voice called from the mass of people at the bar.

“As long as it takes.” Officer Xelthub said from his spot near the door.

Officer Hawthorne shot his compatriot a withering look. But eventually he nodded. “He’s not wrong. This could take a while. So I ask that everyone settle in and we’ll try to get you home as soon as possible.”

Shaggy slumped into a chair as there were voices of annoyed agreement filled the bar. Dave moved closer to the cops and waited to tell his story. Slink joined Shaggy at his table and worriedly played with his employee ID. Shaggy quickly pulled out his and watched the officer’s work. Xelthub seemed to have closed his eyes and was simply standing near the front door. Mickle was taking a crying Janet’s statement and checking the poor woman for visible wounds. Although Shaggy thought the large-ass welt on the girl’s face would’ve been enough evidence.

Now that the cops were involved, Janet seemed way more willing to talk. Shaggy couldn’t hear her because of all the patron’s indistinct murmurs, but she looked like a person unburdening themselves. He could practically smell her relief in the air. His ‘taste’ for scents seemed to be improving. He could even smell the annoyance on a few people. In fact, someone smelled…

“Someone’s about to do something stupid.” Shaggy whispered to Slink.

The pale kid’s eyes widened as he started looking around. “What do you mean?”

Shaggy tapped his nose. “Fear. Someone’s afraid and it’s getting stronger.”

Shaggy kept scanning the diner as he tried to trace where the scent was coming from. The blue and yellow scent trails in the air crisscrossed everywhere. But he couldn’t pinpoint where the fear was coming from. He was about to get up and surreptitiously search for it, but the guy outed himself. One member of the kitchen staff made a mad dash toward the back of the room.

Shaggy guessed there was a backdoor or something around the corner near the kitchen. But the poor server barely made it four steps when reddish-black bands formed around his torso and lifted him into the air. The young human-looking server started to scream and struggle.

“NO! Lemme go! You fucking cops will not get me!”

Shaggy searched for the source of the bands and found Xelthub moving toward the young server. Hand outstretched. He guessed the demon guy was some kind of mage or something. Everyone stopped and stared as Xelthub spun the still struggling man upside down. Hawthorne and Mickle ignored their partner and tried to get everyone back on track.

“Let the Sorcerer work, folks.” Hawthorne said, as he tried to get Myron talking again.

But Myron wasn’t paying attention anymore. “Chuli? What did you do, son?”

“Oh, fuck you Myron! Why couldn’t you leave everything alone? You ignored it the first six times Karlo beat Janet. But, No! Seven times is far too many! Now they’re going to-”

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Chuli quickly silenced himself and Shaggy grimaced. Poor dude just gave himself away. He was clearly hiding something in the diner and now that the police were here; he had flipped and tried to flee. Xelthub moved his face nose to nose with the upside down Chuli and sniffed. He snorted as he shook his head and righted the server.

“Glow addict. He probably has a stash somewhere.” Xelthub said over his shoulder.

Hawthorne rubbed his eyes. “Priority is the DV call. We can search the place when we finish taking statements.”

“Or this punk can just tell me where his drugs are?” Xelthub growled.

Chuli remained tight-lipped and continued to struggle against his magical bonds. Shaggy sighed as he figured they would have to wait even longer to get out of here. He sat back in his chair and closed his eyes, but a tap on his arm brought him around. Vlad was back at their table, and he was mouthing something.

“Help.”

Shaggy raised an eyebrow, but Vlad just said the word again and pointed over his shoulder at Xelthub and Chuli. Myron was back to giving his statement and Janet was now alone. Mickle had moved toward the entrance and opened the door for a short man in white robes to come in. The man had a large red cross emblazoned on his robes and Shaggy guessed that was the paramedic or magical equivalent. Vlad waved a hand to get Shaggy’s attention and mouthed the word ‘help’ again.

Shaggy sighed and gave his vampire friend an incredulous look. But Vlad seemed adamant as he repeated the word for a fourth time. Shaggy growled under his breath and got up. The movement drew a look from Hawthorne, but the blonde cop continued to take Myron’s statement. Shaggy took a large whiff of the room and he got a heavy dose of annoyance coming from practically everyone, even the cops. As he approached Xelthub, the big demon man didn’t even turn to look at him.

“I’m going to have to ask you to back away, citizen. We don’t know what this kid is capable of or if he has any powers. Glow can do some messed up stuff to a person’s head.”

Shaggy stopped moving and raised both his hands, palms up. “Just looking to help.”

Xelthub finally turned and raised an eyebrow. “You a registered Supe?”

Shaggy noted the less than civil way the demon cop said that and shook his head. Pointing to his nose, he said.

“No, but my senses are pretty good. If I can get a whiff of what you’re looking for, I could probably find it.”

“Is that safe?” Mickle called from her spot near the front door. She had moved halfway between the door and Janet. Trying to watch both.

“Should be fine.” Xelthub called. “Glow has to be injected. So sniffing won’t cause any adverse effects. Are you looking to be a Supe?”

Shaggy couldn’t hide a chuckle. “Hell no. I just want to get home as fast as possible. Waiting for you guys to overturn the place doesn’t sound like fun.”

Xelthub considered it, but Hawthorne gave his final word. “Let him try Xel. We can get these people out of here quickly. Just monitor everything and make sure he touches nothing.”

Shaggy saw that Dave was now giving his own statement, with Janet standing nearby. Xelthub shot Shaggy a look, but seemed to agree with his partner. Chuli’s floating form was brought closer to Shaggy and the surly server gave him the ugliest of looks. Shaggy ignored the kid as he moved slightly closer and took a huge whiff.

“BLEGH!” Shaggy coughed and moved back as the smell of sulfur and fear assaulted his nose.

“Are you okay?” Xelthub asked, actually sounding concerned.

Shaggy bleakly registered that Chuli’s body was moved away as he tried to blink the water from his eyes.

“Yeah, yeah. I’m fine. But man, that shit stinks. Holy hell. What the hell is that?”

Xelthub chuckled darkly. “Synthesized demon blood cut with a bit of magic. Supposedly a real good high, but the shit turns your blood to acid and your rubs your nervous system raw. Well, it would if anyone could survive over six doses of the stuff. The paranoia will have you doing something stupid long before it gets to that stage, though.”

Shaggy rubbed his eyes and nodded understandingly. He kind of got why Ren was so anti-drug. If magical drugs smelt like that, Shaggy wasn’t sure he wanted any part of them, either. He was drawn out of his thoughts by Xelthub asking him a question.

“Did you get what you needed?”

“Huh?” Shaggy asked, not understanding.

But then he realized, and he blearily nodded. “Oh yeah, give me a second. I just have to find the trail.”

Shaggy took another large whiff of the room and quickly tried to grey out all the other scents. Normally, the scents he could see were from enemies or fellow humanoids. Now he was trying to track a particular scent through the air. Luckily, the scent of bad eggs was an easy one to find. Although some of that smell was coming from Officer Xelthub. Which Shaggy figured made sense if the drug was made from demon blood.

Shaggy circled the room a little under the watchful eye of Xelthub. Every few seconds, he would take another sniff and move closer and closer toward the scent. Xelthub and Chuli following him around hardly helped, but he didn’t want to tell the officer to back off. So he concentrated as best he could until he followed the scent toward the kitchen. But right before the door, the scent veered off and went down a hallway. Shaggy followed it down the hallway and into the unisex bathroom the diner had. Xelthub used Chuli’s magically wrapped body to push his way in.

Shaggy had to shake off the pungent smell of various chemical cleaners. The bathroom smelled liked it had just been cleaned and the smell of the chemicals was doing a good job of masking the scent. Shaggy circled the room several times before he sighed loudly.

“Nothing?” Xelthub’s gravely voice asked.

Shaggy shook his head. “It’s in here. But whatever cleaning chemicals they use are blocking the scent.”

Xelthub spun Chuli around and eyed the oddly quiet drug-addict. “Well? Want to make my life easier and tell us where your stash is? Either way, this isn’t good for you.”

“Fuck you, cop!” Chuli yelled defiantly.

Shaggy could admire the staunch resistance the kid was showing. But he also really wanted this night to be over. So, as Xelthub continued to question and cajole his suspect, Shaggy checked the room stall by stall. He even got his nose close to a few standing urinals. Which had been fairly unpleasant, even with the smell of cleaners in the air. Shaggy was about to check the final bathroom stall when Chuli lost his already limited cool.

“NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! NO!” The skinny server twisted this way and that in the officer’s magical grip.

Xelthub grinned as he nodded to Shaggy. “Looks like you were getting close. Why don’t you-”

BAM!

Suddenly, Shaggy was deaf and blind. His skin burned and his nostrils were filled with the horrible stench of sulfur. His vision was obscured with grey smoke and a light blue glow seemed to shine dimly in his vision. He felt a warm viscous liquid coat his arms and chest as he tried to get his hearing and vision back.

Sound came back first, but it helped nothing. Low moaning and stifled shouts came from somewhere in front of him. He could feel a prickling sensation on his arms and legs. As his vision came back, Shaggy saw that he was surrounded by a thin layer of grey smoke. The light blue glow was actually an eerie blue flame that coated the bathroom and the front of his body. He could just make out the sight of Xelthub’s black boot in the grey smoke. But Chuli was nowhere to be seen.

“Ugh! Cough. You okay?” Xelthub’s voice shouted from the smoke.

But before Shaggy could answer, a stampede of footsteps came rushing through the bathroom door. Hawthorne and Mickle were suddenly standing there, service pistols raised and checking for threats. Shaggy raised his hands slowly and moved down to his knees to present the smallest and most non-threatening image he could. Xelthub seemed to understand what was going on as he quickly shouted his partners down.

“It’s clear! WE’RE CLEAR! Punk detonated. He must have been an addict for a longer period than I had guessed.”

Shaggy’s hands dropped as he tried to work out what that sentence meant. “What do you mean, he detonated?”

Hawthorne sighed loudly as he holstered his sidearm. Mickle continued to search the restroom as the blonde cop explained.

“Sometimes if a Glow addict has taken enough of the stuff, they can explode when they are in a highly emotional state. It turns their blood into liquid fire and they pop like a damn balloon.”

Shaggy glanced down and realized that his clothes were still on fire and they were still burning. So he rapidly put himself out with his hands. Xelthub got to his feet as Mickle finished her search of the bathroom. Shaggy got the last of the flames out and was lamenting the loss of another shirt when Xelthub asked.

“Whoa! Are you okay?”

Shaggy looked around and then down at himself, confused.

“Looks like he’s fine to me.” Mickle chuckled dryly.

“You sure you’re not a Supe?” Hawthorne asked.

Shaggy tried to figure out what they were talking about and then he realized his regeneration was quickly sorting out all of his injuries. He was literally healing right in front of them. It must have looked a little freaky to see a grown man heal from burns and like that. Then again, Xelthub was completely fine, too. So what was the deal?

Finally, Shaggy shrugged. “What do you mean?”

Xelthub raised an eyebrow and waved his head at Shaggy’s body. “Well, for one, you seem completely fine after getting blown up.”

“So do you.” Shaggy interrupted.

Xelthub nodded, but continued. “Fair. But you also seem to absorb the burning blood.”

Shaggy raised his own eyebrow as he glanced down at his body. Most of the flames had already been put out and he could feel his healing slowly going to work on the bruises from the explosion. But he didn’t see any burnt skin. Which was a new one. Had he unlocked some kind of weird inflammable ability? Or maybe his dermal plating made him more resistant to fire.

Shaggy shrugged his shoulders and was about to brush it off as a notification window popped into his face. Man, did he hate those things. But a quick read through of the blue translucent window made his eyes bug out. That was most definitely new one.

Demon-Touched

Xang, the god of the Blood Realm, has set his blessing upon you. Your own powers will be augmented with a small portion of the blood God’s power. How this power manifest is infinite, but it comes with a Sacred Duty. A Duty set forth to you by Xang themselves. If you do not perform the Sacred task within the allotted time frame, Xang will take back their blessing. They may even curse you, but should you succeed, then Xang may increase their blessing.

Demon Blood Absorbed

Werewolf Form Augmented

Sacred Duty: Kill the abomination, Cog, and banish him to the Blood Realm for his slight against the Blood God.

Time Frame: 2 months