'Fuck's sake, Chase…'
"If we call our company Mystery Inc. we're going to get sued into the ground."
On the other side of the grand living room, Chase sighs and leans back into his patchy armchair. "I dunno, man. I've never been good with names and stuff. Why don't you come up with something then?"
Looking down at the pad of paper filled with crossed out names, Alan sucks in a deep breath and tries to steady himself. He didn't sleep very well last night, having been out late with Chase in the woods, and dealing with typical Monday bullshit at work has only made his temper shorter. "Fine. Lemme think."
Alan lets his eyes roam Chase's home as he tries to puzzle out a fitting name for the hypothetical agency that he, Chase, and Prim are going to found.
Chase's home, fittingly, is a somewhat junky mobile home that was plopped down on some land that Chase nabbed for cheap. The interior is dim, the furniture is aged, and the walls are covered in shelves of odds and ends and hunting trophies. Despite the clutter, the small house is thankfully clean.
Looking towards Prim, who is in her wolfdog form, Alan sees her staring up at Chase's latest trophy. Above her head and on the wall is the taxidermied head of the chupacabra, its face set into a snarl.
"I'm surprised you got that thing mounted so quickly," Alan idly comments, looking at the blank, marble eyes of the monster. "I thought it took weeks to taxidermy something."
"It does," Chase grins, "but my new neighbors were all too happy to lend some mojo," he points a finger towards a window.
Alan follows the gesture, and out near the tree line, he sees the rescued gnomes.
The gnomes are all hard at work constructing something that Alan can't place right away, using shovels, axes, and other gardening tools with their long handles snapped in half, making each implement more gnome-friendly. They've displaced great mounds of loamy dirt, making a large hole that hides each gnome as they hop in and out, carrying lumber down in with them.
"What are they making?" Alan asks.
Chase shrugs. "Some kind of gnome burrow. I told 'em to go nuts so long as they don't hit any pipes," he says, turning his gaze towards Prim. "Sooo… Prim is like your magical pet or something?"
The demon turns her head away from the mounted chupacabra and gives Chase a glare, making the surrounding shadows seemingly lengthen. "The correct term is familiar, Mister Kenns," she says sharply. "I am no lesser nor a subordinate. Take care to choose thine words wisely, for many of my kin would not suffer the indignity of being referred to as a pet."
Leaning back with his hands raised in mock surrender, Chase clicks his tongue. "Easy, no need to bite my head off."
Prim's frown eases slightly. "But I've threatened you no such harm?"
"It's a human idiom, Prim," Alan provides, staring down at the notepad in his lap. Why is a catchy name so hard to come up with? "It means 'don't be so angry with me'."
"Back to what I was asking, though," Chase says, this time looking towards Alan. "How did you two meet? I thought you'd be a bigger skeptic, friendo."
Alan looks up towards Chase and shrugs. "There's not really much of a story to it. Prim is the one who found me, we talked for a bit, and we decided to do some business. She wants info on the modern world, and I want to be ahead of the curve on supernatural nonsense, so we made a partnership pact."
"Like, a magical pact?"
"Complete with a candle, a salt circle, and everything."
Chase nods slowly, accepting the explanation easily enough. "Okay, so, what are you exactly, Prim? A spirit? Some kind of elemental? A…"
"Demon?" Prim finishes for him, tilting her head and blinking her luminescent eyes. "To refer to me as an elemental is correct in the most technical sense, but most would regard me as a demon. Seeing as how you are going to be one of the chief proprietors of our yet-to-be-named business, perhaps it is appropriate if you are aware of my origin," she says, sending Alan a look.
Alan simply shrugs a response. "Your life, your story. Do what you want."
And so she does. Prim regales Chase with her origins, subtly puffing up as she talks about herself and her role in history. Alan does note that, although she talks about herself a fair amount, Prim doesn't so much as utter a syllable of her capabilities.
Come to think of it, Alan doesn't know much of what she can do, either. She can shapeshift, control shadows, knows how to do some rituals, and that's all Alan has seen thus far.
By the end, Chase is leaning forward in his chair, a look of childish wonder on his face. "Wow…" He breathes. "So you're not just some doggy imp or something, you're a Cthulhu big-dick swinger! Dammit that's cool!"
Prim jumps at the word 'Cthulhu', her ears pinning back for a moment, then she looks at Chase with reproach. "Names have power, Mister Kenns. Do not invoke them needlessly, lest you find yourself an unfortunate recipient of the owner's attention."
"Chase is fine, Mister Kenns was my old man," Chase waves her off and leans back into his chair. "Does that mean that Cthulhu is real?"
Prim's narrowing eyes are all the answer Chase needs.
Alan sighs, getting the pen and paper in his lap ready again. "Can we get back on the topic of a name? The sooner we get this part done, the sooner we can actually get to the important parts. Just don't pick something that's going to get us a letter from a lawyer the instant we open up shop."
Leaning forward once more, Chase rests his elbows on his knees and props his head up in his hands, his eyes narrow in focus. After a moment of silence, he shakes his head. "I told you, man, I'm not good at this kind of stuff."
"If we want to be catchy, maybe something with an acronym?" Alan tries to guide his friend, hiding his impatience. "If we can't think of anything, I'm just going to call it Conan and Kenns Paranormal Services."
"You're the corporate office guy, can't you think of something?"
Grumbling to himself, Alan wracks his brain. 'Supernatural Phenomenon or Other Killing Squad? Nah, someone spoiling for trouble will call us racist over the acronym. Freaky Beast Investigators? No, that sounds like something Chase would come up with. Paranormal Research and Investigations, Conan and Kenns?' Alan allows himself a childish smirk for that one, then he looks towards Prim. 'Maybe…'
"How about Paranormal Response, Investigation, and Management?" Alan tosses the idea out, "Or PRIM for short."
The demon in the room turns toward Alan, her face thoroughly unimpressed.
Chase, on the other hand, smiles, mouthing the name to himself. "Yeah… Yeah, I think that could work! It's got a nice acronym, it describes what we would do, it's got vague buzzwords, I think that's it!"
"Is that truly what passes for an acceptable business moniker in this era?" Prim asks, looking between Chase and Alan skeptically.
"There are places with much, much dumber names that turn record profits every year," Alan says with a sardonic smirk. "I figured that you'd be happy that the whole thing is named after you."
"Prim is my moniker because you are too lazy to recite my full name," the wolf-shaped demon replies flatly.
"And I'll continue to be," Alan says, writing the name down. "Okay, that's the first thing done. Chase and I will have to be the founders and owners on file since demons aren't legally recognized… Yet. We need to look into a place to operate out of, figure out what kind of supplies we need, figure out what kind of company we want to register ourselves as, actually do the paperwork, make a website, source some starting capital, start advertising, get clients lined up…"
"Alan?" Chase interrupts. "We also need to make plans for more employees."
Alan looks up from his notebook, giving Chase a skeptical glance. "It's a little early for that, don't you think?"
"Not really," Chase shakes his head. "I was talking to the gnomes before you got here, and I mentioned that we were starting up a business to deal with the 'reawakening' bullshit. The whole 'life debt' thing seems to really bug them, because a few of them asked if they could help out. Those guys are pretty damn good with their hands – " he nods towards the chupacabra trophy on the wall, "– so it seems like a waste to not take them up on their offer."
That gives Alan pause. "Say, Prim," he begins, glancing toward her. "You said gnomes were good craftsmen, right?"
She nods. "Indeed they are."
"Is there any kind of risk to bringing them in on this operation?"
Prim stands and walks to Alan's side, peering down at the list in his lap. "A broad question, one not easily answered and wholly dependent upon the character of each gnome. It would be wise to formalize such a relationship with a pact not unlike ours, but I do not see any great risk. The boons provided by a team of competent gnomish smiths, brewers, and builders are many." A black tendril emerges from Prim's shoulder and takes the pen from Alan's grip, scratching a correction onto his paper. "Your spelling of management was erroneous."
"Must be because I hate it so much," Alan grumbles, accepting the pen back. "Talk with Barley later, got it. I'll let you handle that, Mister landlord," he says, waggling his pen at Chase.
Chase answers with a salute. "I can start scoping out vacant space downtown and schmoozing with any potential new neighbors if you want to do the website and stuff."
Alan looks out the window, noting how the sun is getting low in the sky. "That'll be a tomorrow thing. I've got almost two weeks of PTO saved, so I may as well burn it all before I quit." From the corner of his eye, he sees Prim's inquisitive head tilt. "PTO; personal time off. Those are days you can take off of work and not get penalized. Most places give you a week and some change per year."
"That seems… low," Prim frowns.
"It be like that sometimes."
"If we're not getting started on the big stuff until tomorrow, you guys wanna stay for dinner?" Chase offers with a grin. "I promised to feed the gnomes until they get back on their feet, so I think it's time for a stack of pizzas and a case of beer. Hell, we could even put on a movie and call it a cultural lesson for Prim here."
The idea honestly sounds pretty pleasant, so Alan has no problem agreeing. "It has been a while since we last hung out, hasn't it? I'm in. If you want to order the pies, Prim and I will run and grab drinks."
----------------------------------------
Although Chase's home is out near the edge of town, there is still a gas station less than five minutes away, and that's the one that Alan's rickety old sedan is riding towards.
During the short ride, Prim looks towards Alan and speaks. "Chase mentioned that this movie is an object of significant cultural value, but I must admit that I am unsure what exactly a 'movie' is."
"It's, uh…" Alan stops and thinks for a moment. "You remember my work computer, and how the monitor, the rectangular glass bit, could display different things?"
"I do."
"A movie is kind of like a recorded theater performance that can be viewed on monitor-like devices called televisions. The business of making movies is huge nowadays," Alan explains, a frown slowly overtaking his face. "Too bad almost every movie in recent memory has been terrible. Chase thinks the same, so he'll probably pick a classic."
Prim blinks. "And these movies, these 'recorded theater performances', are truly such a cultural cornerstone?"
Alan nods, gently swerving the car to straddle a pothole in the road. "Oh yeah. There's a lot of English slang, lingo, and cultural references that don't make sense unless you're at least peripherally familiar with the work that spawned them. For example, if I said the phrase now this is pod racing, would you have any idea what I meant?"
The demon shakes her head. "I would not."
"It was a memorable quote from one of the Space Skirmishes movies, arguably one of the most influential series of films around," Alan slows the car as the gas station comes into view. "Ha! People thought the prequels were bad, but the reboots make the prequels look like Civilian Cane," he says with a sneer. "Oh no! The villain that was canonically killed in the final episode came back! Somehow, and we're not going to elaborate!" Alan pulls up into the parking lot of the dirty and rather sad looking no-name gas station, and after finding a spot, puts the car in park. "Fuckin' Hollywood hacks can't leave well enough alone…"
Prim melts into black goop and slinks into the shadow of Alan's jacket as he opens the door and steps out of the car. The parking lot is thankfully deserted, so no one is treated to the sight of a dog transforming into liquid.
Alan walks up to the sliding door of the gas station and stops, an odd sensation in his gut telling him to turn around.
He promptly ignores it.
The inside of the station is devoid of customers, and the clerk seems to be away, but when Alan steps in, he pauses and looks around with narrowed eyes.
Many of the shelves, displays, and refrigerators lining the wall are a total mess. Some have items placed haphazardly on them, but the price labels on the shelves don't match. A few of the labels are just complete gibberish. It only takes a few seconds of looking around to see a pattern emerge.
Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.
All of the food is low in stock. Candy, chips, and various snacks are gone with some wrappers littering the floor, the hotdog roller sitting on a central island in the store is empty, and the heatlamp table has only a single, haphazardly wrapped sandwich upon it. In the corner with some automotive products, a bottle of antifreeze is spilled on the floor, with what looks like a bite mark taken out of the plastic bottle.
In the darkness between Alan's jacket and shirt, Prim blinks her glowing eyes and scans the shelves with curiosity of her own. "How unusual… I was under the impression that a modern market would not see such inventory shortages."
"They don't," Alan murmurs back, beginning to suspect something freaky afoot. He moves his hand to hover over the revolver in his waistband. "Not this bad, at least."
Walking over to the cash register, Alan gazes at the door behind the checkout area labeled employees only and lightly knocks a knuckle on the counter. "Hello? Anyone there?"
There is a quiet gasp and shuffling behind the door, and then slowly, unsurely, the missing clerk steps out and looks upon Alan with open trepidation.
The clerk… Something seems off about him, and Alan uses the word 'him' tentatively, as the clerk is strangely androgynous. The man's clothes are ill-fitting, and his face is strangely proportioned and lacking facial hair. His jaw juts out a little too far, and his eyes are wide and bulging. The slight reddish tan of his skin and long, dark brown hair gives the impression of being a native, but his features are all wrong. The way he holds himself speaks of exhaustion, even as he nervously rings his hands.
"C-Can…" The clerk falters and starts again, shuffling to stand behind the register. "Can I… help you?" He croaks, his voice choppy.
"Just wondering what's going on with the place, man," Alan begins casually. He gestures broadly behind him, towards the empty shelves. "You guys having supplier issues?"
"Supri… Suupli… Suuuupplier issues?" The clerk parrots, tripping over his words again. He gulps heavily. "Yes?"
"That sounded like a question."
"Um…" The clerk shrinks in on himself and speaks no further.
Alan frowns. 'I'm not just giving some poor ugly guy the business for no reason, am I? I'm starting to feel like a dick, but I swear there's something I just can't put my finger on…' Outwardly, he decides on another test. "Can I get a pack of Cali 100s?" He asks, gesturing toward the glass case of cigarettes behind the clerk.
The clerk turns and looks at the case, oddly flexing his fingers. He digs in his pocket, producing a set of keys, and from there, fumbles around, taking several tries before he finally finds the correct key for the case. Finally getting the sliding door open, he hesitates again before grabbing an incorrect pack of cigarettes.
'Can this guy not read?'
And then Alan smells it. From the gas station employee comes a cloying, rotten smell, the kind only cadavers already halfway through decaying have.
He smells like death.
"Alan!" Prim hisses. "This is no man!"
Faster than a thought, Alan draws his gun and levels it with the creature's head, finger on the trigger. "Don't move a single muscle or I'll pop that fucked up looking head of yours like a grape. What are you and what are you doing here? Answer me!"
The clerk's complexion goes ghost white. Quite literally. The hue of his skin drains away, making him as pale as a sheet of paper, a feat human biology simply can't replicate. If Alan had any doubts before, they're dust in the wind now.
The not-man begins to shake, and brings his hands together in a lopsided prayer, one hand slightly higher than the other. "Please… Please…" He quietly begs, eyes locked onto the gun pointed at him. "No hurts intended. H-Hungry, but poison! Much poison! Less poison here, a-and hueman says I allowed here, do thing for he."
Alan's frown deepens. "You're not making any sense, and you didn't answer my first question. What the hell are you?"
"A wendigo," Prim finally speaks once more, pouring out of Alan's jacket and reforming into shape at his side.
Alan doesn't hazard looking away from the front sight of his revolver, or the quivering shape behind it. "A wendigo, Prim?" He asks. "Like, a skinwalker?"
"Although they share similar abilities, skinwalkers and wendigos are two different beings," the demon supplies. From the corner of his eyes, Alan can see Prim giving the supposed wendigo a narrow-eyed stare. "Wendigos are shape changers who prey on many creatures, but their most favored meals are humans. They will most often possess a human host and begin a cannibalistic feeding frenzy until they've had their fill. If they cannot find a host, they can shape change on their own."
"Really?" Alan drawls, giving the clerk an unimpressed look. "What's your body count at? Actually, I don't want to know."
As Alan's finger begins to squeeze the trigger it's wrapped around, the wendigo shrieks and throws itself back into the wall behind it, holding its hands up. "Wait! Wait! No bodies! No hurt! Please! Explain, I explain!"
As it speaks, the human disguise the creature wears begins to slough off, like soil giving way to a landslide. The skin of the hands falls away, leaving behind long, thin digits. Much the same happens to the head, the flesh disintegrating into fine dust, leaving a bare skull behind. The skull makes a series of sickening cracks and reshapes itself, becoming more animalistic and sprouting antlers. All the while, the stench of death grows worse, making the back of Alan's sinuses burn.
When the ghastly transformation is done, there is a lanky, dark-furred, skull-topped form in unfitting clothes. The creature frantically tries to wave Alan away. "See? Possession did not! No hurt hueman! Just me!" It says, its voice now a higher pitch.
Alan still doesn't lower his gun. "That still doesn't explain what you're doing here."
"Jer… Jor… Job!" The wendigo exclaims. "So hungry, but hueman poison hurts. No poooossession… Poison hueman say I work, I eat, but…" The wendigo looks forlornly at the multitude of poorly stocked shelves. "…Job hard, don't understand and not good. Food poison too, but less poison than hueman. Eat so much, but so little."
'Job? Was this thing starving and someone offered it a job?' Alan furrows his brow, trying to piece together the wendigo's broken speech. 'Huh. I thought it was going to take longer before we found a case of supernatural exploitation. What the hell is this about poison, though?'
When Alan asks the creature to elaborate on the 'poison' thing, it quivers and shakes its head. "N-No! Angry!" It points a long digit at the gun still leveled with its head. "I tell, make angry!"
Sucking in a deep breath and doing his best to push his frustration away, Alan replies slowly and carefully. "I promise, I won't be upset," he says, lowering his snub nose slightly. "Just explain, and I'll listen, okay?"
Not having a weapon pointed at its face calms the creature a bit, and it shakily nods. "Woke up from long sleep, very hungry. Tried to over take hueman, but hueman filled with poison! Hurt and burned, could not breathe!" It shakes its head. "Ran away, tried another, but more poison! Poison, poison, poison!" It shudders and clasps its lanky arms around its middle.
"Poisoned hosts?" Prim questions inquisitively, turning her gaze to Alan. "Have you any thoughts on what that could potentially mean?"
Alan mulls the question to himself. "I mean, the average person is probably filled with so much preservative, microplastics, heavy metals, and God knows what else that they'd taste… Like poison. Trying to possess someone would be like putting on a bodysuit filled with rusty thumbtacks."
The wendigo nods frantically. "Hurts."
"That certainly seems to 'check out', to use a human colloquialism," Prim soundlessly extends her neck, her head losing some of its definition as she sprouts extra eyes. The shadow demon peers over the counter at the wendigo, who whimpers. "These man-eaters are willowy creatures, but this one is especially gaunt. It is safe to assume that it speaks the truth regarding its emaciation."
"Hrm…" Alan lowers his gun further as Prim retracts her neck, her extra eyes closing. "So you were given a job here, and eating gas station junk isn't cutting it, huh? How much are you being paid? I'm talking money, not food." he asks the shape-shifter.
It blinks, the red lights in its eye sockets disappearing for a moment. "Money?"
'Confused, starving, weak, thrust into the system with no training, no idea what money is, but clearly knows it should be afraid of guns,' Alan's indignation melts away, replaced with a tiny pang of sympathy as the greater picture comes into focus. 'Man-eater or not, those are some shitty circumstances.'
Blowing out a tired breath, Alan lifts the side of his shirt and holsters his gun. "I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but you're getting fleeced. Hard."
"Fleece?" The wendigo questions once more, looking down at its own patchy hide. "No fleece."
"Your employer is exploiting you, is what I mean to say," Alan corrects, briefly screwing his eyes shut and reminding himself not to lose his temper amid a blooming headache. "The person who gave you your job at this place knows that you're desperate and ignorant of the rules that say you should be treated fairly."
It's difficult to gauge the expression of the wendigo's skull face, but it seems to comprehend what Alan is saying. "No choice," it sadly croons. "Poison everywhere. Even if no poison, too many eyes. No hunt. New chance come maybe never. No want to starve…"
No choice.
That phrase resonates in Alan's chest, and it stirs ugly emotions. He relates all too well to the feeling. From the surge of sympathy, an idea suddenly comes to mind, and despite part of him whispering that it's a bad idea, Alan sighs and speaks. "I want to test something. Put your disguise back on."
The wendigo does as ordered, human-like flesh sprouting from its hide and under its clothes. Its skull once more crackles as its antlers recede, and in less than a minute, the off-looking person is back.
Alan taps his mouth with a finger. "Move your jaw back a little, it doesn't look right."
The not-man looks confused, but does as asked. With a crackle of shifting bone, its jutting jaw retreats.
"Good. Now, narrow your eyes a bit."
Once more, it does as asked, top and bottom eyelids growing.
"Push your brow a bit forward."
"Human arms aren't that long."
"Cheekbones out and up."
"Your nose is too drooped."
"Brown is the safest eye color there is."
"Your skin is too uniform. Add a few blemishes."
For several minutes, Alan continually critiques the wendigo's disguise, and with each change, it looks less and less uncanny. Finally, they reach the point that Alan is splitting hairs, and he stops to really inspect the disguised cryptid.
Under Alan's instruction, the wendigo's previously unplaceable face now resembles that of a young woman. Not everything is entirely correct, and Alan still feels a prickle of unease looking at it, but the disguise should stand up to casual inspection.
"Huh, you pass as human at first glance, now," he grunts. "Do you know how to do math?"
A shake of its head is the wendigo's answer.
Clicking his tongue, Alan jumps the counter, landing next to the startled beast. Taking a pen and a discarded receipt from under the counter, he writes out 0,1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. "Pay attention. You're getting a crash course in money, addition, and subtraction."
"…Why?" The not-woman asks softly.
"So you don't get instantly sniffed out, duh,"
The wendigo shakes its head. "No. Why help? We enemies."
Alan huffs out a laugh. "Are we?"
----------------------------------------
As the credits for Space Skirmishes Ep. 4 begin to roll down the flatscreen TV, accompanied by a bombastic, brassy score, the gnomes all gathered in Chase's living room burst into applause.
"Incredible! Humans made this?"
"I had never even thought about what might be beyond this world…"
"The next one, Chase! May we please see the next one?!"
"N-none of that was truth, was it?"
Truly, the inside of Chase's living room looks like some kind of demented daycare parody. Chase claimed the armchair for the duration of the movie, while Alan and Prim were seated on the couch. Chase's gnome guests are spread out along the floor, each one with a paper plate holding naught but pizza crumbs now. Several of them have cans of beer with them, though a few of the gnomes couldn't stomach the "swill" (to use their words)that is modern beer, promising that they would make something better for their host in the future.
Prim, having shrunken down into a cat to comfortably sit next to Alan on the small couch, finally peels her eyes away from the television. "That was… I'm uncertain," she says after a long pause. She looks up to Alan. "You said this was a prime example of modern entertainment?"
"Were you entertained?"
Once again, she takes her time thinking over her words. "I was," she says, sounding mystified with herself. "I didn't realize that human imagination could be taken to such extremes. I would not oppose seeing another."
Alan allows himself a smile. "Glad you enjoyed it."
"If we've got a budding cinephile on our hands," Chase begins across the room, a grin on his face, "then we can make it a weekly thing. Alan needs some kind of obligation to hang out and not veg in his room."
"I don't veg," Alan's smile dies.
"Whatever you say, broski," Chase replies back, his grin stretching into a smirk. "Whatever. You. Say."
Alan turns away from the other man and looks back towards Prim's feline face. "Once I give you the lowdown on how to use a computer, remember the names of any movies that look interesting and I'll torrent them for next time," he says, before turning his attention to the window.
The sun has nearly sunken below the horizon.
"I think it's time for us to skedaddle," Alan says, standing and stretching a kink out of his back. "We got a lot of shit to do in the morning."
"Yeah, probably for the best," Chase stands as well. He walks over and holds out a fist for Alan to bump. "See you in the morning, man. We looking at offices first?"
"May as well," Alan replies, not really caring. He touches his knuckles to Chase's. "I'll get some paperwork drafted up. We'll probably want to start as an LLC, so it shouldn't be too bad."
"Hell yeah," Chase smiles and slaps on the back. "Things are looking up, bro,"
Alan shakes his head. Once more, Chase is counting his chickens before they're hatched. "Good night, man."
"Seeya, dude. Seeya later too, Prim,"
Prim morphs back into her usual canine form. "And a pleasant night to you as well, Chase."
Weaving around the chattering gnomes, Alan and Prim headed for the front door, and as the door shut behind them, Alan can hear Chase's voice pick up inside. "There's too much 'za for the fridge, so eat up, gents!"
----------------------------------------
"Yeah, an LLC is probably for the best," Alan murmurs to himself as he leans back in his computer chair. An hour or two of research points towards an LLC being the best structure for a small operation like the one P.R.I.M. should be.
"And an LLC is?"
Ah, right. Alan almost forgot that he has a permanent shadow now. He looks up towards the black smudge on the wall, which stares back with luminescent eyes. "It's short for 'limited liability company'. It basically protects the personal assets of the owners from being targeted by lawsuits that concern the company. There are some other nice parts, like how it's easy to set up and how a bunch of expenses can be written off of taxes." Alan rubs his eyes and glances at the clock.
11:41PM
"I can explain in more detail when it actually comes time to start filing everything that the state needs. For now, I think it's time for bed," Alan hit the button on his keyboard, locking his computer, before standing and falling over into bed.
Like she's done each night prior, Prim expands her shadowy form along the walls, drowning out every bit of light and leaving the room cool and dark. "Alan?"
"Yeah?" he questions, already beginning to doze off.
"Earlier today, with the wendigo…"
----------------------------------------
"Think you've got a handle on it?"
The not-woman looks at the dollar bills arranged from highest to lowest value on the counter. Taking a deep breath, it taps a finger on each one. "One, five, ten, twenty… Hundred?" It finishes with an inquisitive lit.
"Got it," Alan nods. He then nods to the two cases of beer that he's sat on the counter. "Scan 'em."
The wendigo lifts up the handheld scanner off of its cradle, points it at the barcodes on the beer cases and scans each one with a 'beep!' It then looks unsurely at the display on the cash register. "Th-thirty-eight doll-hairs?"
"Dollars."
"And… Seventy-eight cents?"
Alan places two twenty dollar bills on the counter, and the wendigo takes its sweet time putting the pair of bills in the cash register and retrieving Alan's change. When the disguised creature finally hands Alan's change back, he counts it and notes that he's been shorted several cents.
"Close enough," he shrugs, putting the money in his pocket and grabbing the beer cases. "That should get you through mostly everything."
The wendigo nods shyly. "Thank you…"
Alan turns to leave with his beer in hand, but he can't help but shoot the wendigo a few parting words. "Hey, a pal and I are putting a business together. It has real pay and actual training. I can't promise that it'll be anything outstanding, but I won't try to fuck you over. Sound like something you would be interested in?"
The wendigo's eyes go wide, before they narrow in distrust. It looks down at the shorthand notes that Alan wrote for it on the back of several receipts, and its expression softens. "Yes?" It says, once more sounding uncertain.
"That sounded like a question."
"Yes!" It cries with much more strength, its unnatural face screwing up into a desperate grimace.
Alan resumes walking. "When the spot opens up, I'll meet you here."
----------------------------------------
Alan throws his covers over himself and snuggles into his pillow. "Yeah, what about it?"
"Why offer the creature your help?"
Why indeed? Alan is still wondering that himself. He sits in silence for a few moments, a few ideas bouncing around in his skull before he finally lets one go. "Chase and I are going to need someone to man the office, like a receptionist or secretary or something, while we're busy. I figured that somebody already 'in the know' and who isn't going to demand crazy wages would be the best shot."
With his eyes closed, Alan can't see Prim's face, but he can practically imagine her eyebrows rising. "So your decision was selfish, and based on potential future gains?" She questions. "I can see the wisdom in your reasoning."
"…Man, I'm too tired for this philosophical shit," Alan groans, cracking open an eye and looking up at the black ceiling, where Prim peers down at him. "Yeah, I guess, but the wendigo kind of reminded me of myself and my own shitty job I didn't ask for."
"So emotions like sympathy also played a factor in your decision?"
"I guess," Alan shuts his eyes again. "Everyone being a dickhead is what made the world suck in the first place, so I… I dunno, can we leave this for the morning?"
"…Alan, I believe that we should begin your studies into the arcane when you have time."
Magic?
That wakes Alan back up. He turns his head and stares back up at the ceiling.
"The first and most basic of cantrips would have been a boon during the encounter at the gas station today," the inky black ceiling explains. "A detection spell, one you will most certainly find useful in our upcoming business ventures. Even the most novice of practitioners should find it within their grasp."
A laugh bubbles out of Alan's throat. "You couldn't have waited until the morning? Now I'm too amped to sleep."
"My apologies…"