Arkemoz played with the sleeve of his new coat. On the way back, James had decided that Arkemoz couldn't keep walking around in the clothes he had, and he wouldn't listen to any of the demon's protests, so now he had new clothes.

He appreciated it, of course—only wearing a t-shirt wasn't something Arkemoz was comfortable with, but he now felt a little guilty. From what he understood about this world, one needed money in the form of thin papers or plastic cards to pay for things, and these could be gotten by doing work for people. Arkemoz assumed that James had gotten his from Aegis, but the demon had noticed him grimacing at the price he'd had to pay. And no matter how much the vampire assured him that it was okay, Arkemoz still felt odd about it.

Maybe in the future, he could get some of his own money to pay James back, but right now that wasn't possible. Or maybe he could make up for it another way. He felt like he had to, especially given that the boots he was now wearing were unfathomably more comfortable to walk in.

Arkemoz had had nothing to compare the ones he'd been wearing to, and now that he did, he never wanted to wear his original shoes again. He hadn't even really realized that they had been too big for him, and now he felt very stupid for not putting together that there were many sizes to choose from.

He's also gotten a new hat as well, but he wouldn't wear that unless he had to. If he were around other demons, he probably wouldn't mind an excuse to hide them, but James kept looking at them with fascination when he thought Arkemoz wasn't watching and that made his heart do odd things. Odd but pleasant.

The hat was now on top of the still confusing glove compartment, every so often illuminated by the tall street lights that they kept passing. Arkemoz stared out the window, trying to spot things he had seen on the way to the warlock since they were using the same roads. For the most part, he couldn't see much in the dark.

"So, how has Aegis been doing?" Qironin asked from the backseat casually, as if catching up with a not-often-seen friend. The warlock and James had been talking on and off the whole trip, most of which Arkemoz had spent being silent because the topics ranged from things he knew nothing about, to things he only had a vague understanding of. It made him feel more than a little awkward.

"It still exists," James replied, shrugging. Arkemoz couldn't tell if he was annoyed, or if he genuinely had nothing to say. Qironin didn't seem bothered either way.

"As I suspected." The warlock proceeded to laugh at his own joke. "You don't like Aegis very much, do you?"

"I can think of only one vampire who likes Aegis," James grumbled, putting both of his hands on the steering wheel. He paused for a moment before raising his index finger. "And I am not that vampire, just to be clear."

Arkemoz frowned at him. He hadn't been aware of this. "You don't like it?"

James sighed, giving Arkemoz an awkward smile. He sighed, shrugging again. "It's not Aegis' fault exactly. You know how I said that most employees are vampires?"

Arkemoz nodded, frowning more.

"Well, they sorta make us do it."

Arkemoz narrowed his eyes as James scratched the back of his neck, turning his attention to the road again. Was this something he was expected to understand and didn't due to his lack of knowledge, or not? How was he supposed to know?

Qironin poked his head between the front seats, looking at Arkemoz directly. "I can explain this if Mr. Adley here doesn't mind."

James shrugged yet again, avoiding both of their eyes. Arkemoz frowned, but this time it was because he felt bad for James. He wanted to understand, but if James didn't feel comfortable with this, it felt wrong to force the issue.

"See, all vampires are psychopathic killers thirsting for blood."

"Hey!" James looked both offended and ashamed.

"But if blood is taken away from them and replaced with something less intoxicating, they become fairly harmless," Qironin continued. "Now the obvious side effect of this is that they feel bad about themselves, and Aegis does not invest in therapists as it should."

Qironin leaned back against his seat, putting his hands in his lap. "And the other thing is that Aegis requires all rehabilitated vampires to work for them for a certain time to prove they won't go back to drinking blood right after. I personally don't condone it, but I can see the practicality."

James snorted, but not in that warm, amused way he usually did. This sounded sarcastic. "Practicality? It's a disaster waiting to happen."

Qironin chuckled, though he didn't sound very amused either. "I see your point, but Aegis is quite old now, and nothing has happened so far."

Since James didn't respond to that, and Arkemoz had no idea what to say, a tense silence filled the air and stayed with them until they reached the headquarters, which thankfully turned out to be only about fifteen more minutes. Arkemoz would have no idea without the clock in the car's computer, though. Time was still such a strange, unfathomable thing for him. How could people tell how long something took with how relative it all seemed? Sometimes hours could feel like minutes, and sometimes minutes felt like hours.

"Ah, I don't believe I've been at this exact Aegis building before," Qironin commented with excitement as he climbed out of the car and shut the door, leaving Arkemoz and James alone. The demon watched the warlock start chatting with the two guards by the entrance of the surprisingly nice-looking building.

Arkemoz hadn't taken the time to really look at the headquarters from the outside, but he liked it. With its pure white walls, pillars, and ornate carvings of what he assumed were supernatural creatures that actually existed here, it was a stark contrast to everything Arkemoz saw as familiar, but there was something inviting about it. There were even flowers of some kind, hanging down from planters on the windowsills.

Next to him, James sighed deeply. "How 'bout we get a snack, huh, Arkie?"

Arkemoz knew he didn't need to eat anything, but he had really liked that drink from earlier. "Is food...also sugary?"

James broke out in a big grin, his eyes sparkling with...fondness? Arkemoz would have thought James was mocking him again, but that look assured him.

"We're in America, Arkie. You can bet it's full of sugar."

Arkemoz still didn't know what the name America actually referred to, but he liked the sound of the sugar. He followed James out of the car and into the lounge area again. Arkemoz peered into the vending machine there. How was he supposed to know which food would taste good? It was all behind glass and wrapped in that strange material called plastic.

He ended up picking one of the things at random, which according to James turned out to be a bag full of small chocolate balls with peanuts in them. Arkemoz had no idea how chocolate or peanuts tasted, so it didn't make him feel more sure of his choices.

The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

The vampire bought himself a water bottle, which Arkemoz was confused by at first, but he very quickly got the answer as to why when they sat down and James poured gray powder into the bottle. This must have been the blood substitution.

Trying not to stare, Arkemoz popped a few of the chocolates in his mouth. His eyes widened. Okay, chocolate tasted very good. He would remember that.

"You like 'em, huh?"

Arkemoz nodded, eating more of them. James grinned at him before taking a swig of his drink. The powder seemed to have dissolved completely because Arkemoz couldn't see any of it in the water anymore.

"Listen, Arkie, that stuff about Aegis and vampires...." James paused, putting the bottle to his lips again. "Well, feel free to think what you want about me. But the reason I didn't bring it up even though I wanted to is because my boss didn't want you to hear my opinions about Aegis."

Arkemoz tilted his head at him. What was that supposed to mean? "Did he ask you to lie to me?"

"What?" James shook his head. "No, no, he just knows I'd never recommend working here."

The demon's eyes widened. Oh. They wanted him to join them. Suddenly all the favors made sense. Arkemoz felt a little insulted by being manipulated like this, but he'd also been thinking about this already, so it was nice in a way that he was wanted. Still, he didn't know enough about this organization to make a decision yet, and with the little he had heard they didn't seem entirely good either.

"Feel free to tell him to back off if he tries to pressure you, all right?" James continued, looking very serious for once. "You don't owe Aegis anything."

Arkemoz would beg to differ there. He clearly owed Aegis a whole lot given that they saved him and helped get those handcuffs off when he wouldn't have been able to fix it on his own. But he didn't argue. James didn't seem to be interested in arguing over it anyway.

"But speaking of all of this, Black said you're really strong. You're at full power now, right?"

Arkemoz narrowed his eyes, giving a nod.

"Wanna arm wrestle?"

Arkemoz frowned harder. With how excited James looked, this was probably a good thing, but it didn't sound that way. "What is that?"

James put his arm on the table, leaning on it with his elbow and keeping his hand up. From the way the vampire wagged his eyebrows at him, Arkemoz deduced that he was supposed to do the same thing. Not wanting to disappoint him, the demon did so, freezing for a second when James grasped his hand.

He relaxed when he saw James' smile widen. "Right, so now try to push my hand down while I try to do the same to you."

Arkemoz frowned in concentration, gripping James' hand more tightly. He could feel the vampire start to try to push his hand down to the table, but with how easy it was to hold him back it made Arkemoz wonder if he was just not using all of his strength.

But looking at the vampire's face, he didn't seem to be taking it easy on Arkemoz. In fact, he was giving him surprised glances every once in a while. Arkemoz started pushing back, then, slamming James' arm onto the table with a loud thud.

"Jesus Christ!" James exclaimed, looking really impressed but also kind of disturbed. "When he said you were strong, I didn't think it was this crazy."

"I'm below average in strength," Arkemoz replied, but that only seemed to make James more concerned.

"Damn. Remind me not to ever piss off Azralis."

Arkemoz looked down at his hand which was still on the table, frowning. Was James threatened by his strength? He certainly didn't look happy about being beaten so easily, even though it had been his idea to begin with.

But before the demon could think about this more, he noticed James was grinning at him again.

"This is seriously awesome. No wonder Black is so interested." Then his face turned serious and stern again. "Don't let that convince you you should join if you don't really wanna, though."

Arkemoz sighed. He wasn't sure what he wanted. He knew there was a lot of opportunity to do practically anything on Earth, but he hadn't been here long enough to make any decision like this yet. But he knew how to fight. His whole culture was focused on warfare, and fighting an enemy that was much stronger than the average demon, after all.

"I.... I want to know what happened to those demons," Arkemoz finally answered, looking up at James glumly. "Do you think I can help find that out without joining Aegis?"

James looked very pleased by that for some reason, probably due to Arkemoz not agreeing to join an organization James didn't like. "I'm pretty sure at this point they're glad for any help at all, so yeah. But you'll have to talk to Black about it."

That sounded reasonable. Arkemoz was assuming that agreeing to join meant agreeing to work for these people for some time, and he definitely didn't feel ready to make that kind of decision. But he did want to try to find and free those demons, assuming they weren't dead yet, which would mean working with Aegis. There was no way he could navigate this strange planet without some help.

"All right. I'll do that, then."

James grimaced. "Just, uh, keep in mind that we haven't been doing that well investigating this. I don't think that's necessarily Aegis' fault, but something to keep in mind. Might get frustrating."

Arkemoz was very familiar with frustration, so he could put up with that. It was the strange fluttering in his chest that James seemed to cause that continued baffling him.

James led him to Black's office, which Arkemoz was glad for because there was no way he'd find it on his own. There had been a lot of turns, which he definitely wouldn't have remembered if James had just told him about it.

Upon seeing Black, Arkemoz realized that he had already seen him from afar once or twice. He didn't like how pleased the vampire looked to see him.

"We meet at last, Arkemoz. My name is Arthur Black. I take it Qironin was able to help you?"

Arkemoz had no idea if he was actually supposed to answer that. Wasn't it obvious the warlock had managed to take off the cuffs? He didn't have them on his wrists anymore, after all. Not to mention that if this man was the leader of this division of Aegis, he must have talked with Qironin already.

He ended up opting for a nod.

"Great!" Black's smile quickly disappeared, though, replaced by a pensive frown. "Qironin's told me about the angelic magic involved."

That was permanently in the back of his mind since he'd found out about it, and Arkemoz would be lying if he pretended the idea didn't disturb him at least a little.

"Nevermind." Black smiled again. "I won't make you a part of this unless you want to be."

Arkemoz narrowed his eyes at him. This felt very much like Black was trying to get him to get involved by not divulging information otherwise. But the whole reason he was standing in this spacious office was that he wanted to get involved in the first place.

"I do." Arkemoz didn't even get the time to wonder if he had been too brief with that reply because Black was grinning at him, looking very pleased.

"Wonderful."

"I want to help, but I don't know if I want to fully join Aegis." Arkemoz felt awkward after saying that, though he wasn't sure why. It was exactly what he'd wanted to get out of the way before Black made him sign a contract with his blood, or however Aegis did things.

Though given how much those vampires had liked his blood, that was probably a bad idea.

"That's fine, too," Black said, his smile still in place. "We actually have quite a few people on our payroll like this."

Arkemoz put his hands in the pockets of his coat, having no idea what to do with them otherwise. "So you would pay me for this?"

"Of course."

Arkemoz both despised and was grateful for the gentle tone Black had used, and actually had been using this whole time. He didn't appreciate that people were treating him like someone who didn't understand anything and needed everything explained to him, but realistically, that was what he was in a way, so he couldn't blame others for it.

"And I assume you'd want to work with James?" The vampire was still smiling but now he'd also raised one eyebrow at him, as if trying to imply something. But the frustrating thing was that Arkemoz had no idea what, so he just huffed and shrugged.

He didn't know anyone else here, and despite his tendency to mock Arkemoz, he liked James, so there wasn't any reason not to work with him if it were possible. In fact, Arkemoz hadn't even thought of the possibility of working with someone else.

"Well, if you're sure you want to be involved, I do have something for you to take a look at."

Arkemoz immediately became even more focused.

"The other Aegis agent that helped rescue you—Denise. I sent her and a few others to check out a clue, and she has not reported in. And she's not picking up."

Arkemoz resisted the urge to ask what she wasn't picking up. That probably didn't mean what it seemed to mean. Earthly beings seemed to enjoy using metaphors.

"Under normal circumstances, I wouldn't be inclined to act so fast, but given that apparently angelic magic is involved...." Black shook his head. "Well, I want to send someone to go check on them."

That definitely didn't sound good. But it begged the question if Arkemoz should get involved in this specifically after all. What if this was just a trap to capture him again for whatever nefarious purposes these vampires had?

But when he said as much to Black, the man just waved his hand. "I'll send five or six more people with you, just in case. And our adversary is frustratingly secretive and subtle, so I highly doubt they would try anything with so many witnesses."

Arkemoz still wasn't convinced this was a great idea, but if he had a weapon to use against vampires, his chances of defending himself successfully would be exponentially better than last time, so maybe this wasn't as risky as he thought. His previous experience might also be a factor here.

"So, are you interested?"

Arkemoz hesitated for just a second. "Yes. I'm interested."