A person’s name is everything.

No matter how wonderful you are, or how terrible you are, if your name fits a certain stereotype or sound, you’ll never be seen as anything different. That’s the reason certain names simply no longer exist; for instance, some courts might rule naming a child Hitler or Stalin to be forms of abuse. While that might be extreme, it doesn’t detract from the importance of a person’s name.

Which was why, no matter what he did, or how he acted, Officer Jake Bambi would never be respected in his entire life. He came to realize this at a young age. Once upon a time, he dreamed of changing it, but circumstances made him reconsider. Surely it wasn’t that bad, was it? Just a bit of ribbing here, a little teasing there. Nothing awful. To keep people from going too far, Bambi went out of his way to look as tough as possible. Overcompensating by building muscles, shaving his head, and wearing a permanent scowl. Of course, that just made him seem like the gentle giant type, since his last name biased people into thinking he was a kind soul. In the end, it was all mostly fine. He could get through life without much trouble.

But the one thing that grated on him more than anything else was when people referred to him by his last name.

Everytime it happened, his left eye twitched.

“Bambi!”

Like that.

“Yes, chief?”

“You’re not doing anything right now, right?” The division chief was a portly man with a mustache. He was finishing some paperwork, intentionally going as slowly as possible to avoid going back home to his family. “What the hell am I saying? You never do any work.”

“Chief...you wound me…”

“Shut up,” the division chief said. “Seriously, you’re free? We just got a call.”

“...about?”

“Somebody saw something strange down in a residential neighborhood. Could just be a prank call, but we don’t have anyone patrolling the area. My guess would be it’s just some kids playing a prank, but we can’t just let it be.”

“Something strange?”

“Some ‘rough’ sounding man said he saw what might’ve been a kidnapping happening. Called from a payphone and didn’t give any other information, but we’ve got the rough address of where the call came from.” The chief tossed a piece of paper with some hastily scribbled street names on it. “Probably a waste of time, like I said, but we can’t just ignore it. And since you’re expendable and all…”

“Are you sure you can’t send someone else?”

“Get off your ass!”

In a matter of minutes, Bambi was in his car and driving towards the scene. Well, his shift was basically starting anyway, so this made sense, but it was still annoying. Driving through residential areas bothered him. He couldn’t exactly describe why, but they did. Perhaps it was because dealing with family emergencies felt uncomfortable to him?

Driving around aimlessly because of prank phone calls wasn’t much better. He sighed as he came up to a red light. It was almost nine at night, and while many of the houses were lit up on the inside, there were plenty that had gone completely dark. He was driving around in a standard cruiser, so if there were any actual criminals around this area, and they saw him, it’d be easy just to hop a fence into one of these house’s backyards. Maybe that was what bothered him about these neighborhoods. As someone who always lived in tiny apartments, having a big sprawling and open attachment just seemed weird.

By pure coincidence, he happened to see a familiar figure walk across the road, almost a block to his left.

Jesus fucking christ.

If that was who he thought it was…

Bambi pulled the car around to just a bit before where the alley would exit, but not to where anyone walking through would see him. He flipped the lights off and got out of his cruiser, walking over to the alley exit slowly. He could hear voices, two men talking, as he turned his walkie talkie off. When the men were about to see him, he took a step out with his hands above his head in as non-threatening a pose as possible.

“Evening, everyone,” Bambi said, interrupting the conversation. He tried to think of something to say, but things looked so much worse from up front that he couldn’t come up with anything else. Markus looked mostly normal, other than wearing a hoodie completely soaked with blood. Some it still seemed fresh. Under one arm was Ern, a local magi, but he was missing his arms and legs at the elbow and knee joints. They were completely gone. Then, Markus had hoisted what looked like a teenage girl over his other shoulder. From a distance, it was harder to tell the specifics of the three, as they shimmered like a heat wave. But now, with everything becoming clear, Bambi started getting worried. Eventually, his mind stopped short-circuiting, and he decided on what to say. “What the fuck are you all doing?”

“Huh?”

“Don’t curse.”

The two men acted like absolutely nothing was wrong.

“Sorry,” Bambi said. “Let me repeat myself: what the frick are you all doing?”

“Oh, morning officer,” Ern said, tilting his head a bit. Markus nodded as well.

Bambi waited for the explanation.

“This might look suspicious, I admit,” Ern continued. “But trust me, no, trust us. This is absolutely not suspicious at all. We are perfectly normal citizens doing as perfectly normal citizens do.”

“You-”

“Let me finish,” Ern snapped. Then he smirked as Bambi frowned. That kid was the definition of evil. “We just had a bit of a scuffle. Everything is resolved, probably. I’m not in any danger, and neither is Markus. Or this girl. She’s unconscious, but trust me, she’s plenty fine. At least for now.”

“For now?”

“For now,” Ern repeated. He looked at Markus. “This is just a bit of...inter faction trouble. Nothing for the authorities to worry about. I mean, come on, you don’t want us in your hair, do you?”

Bambi was a corrupt cop. That was another way he bolstered his manhood. Taking kickbacks from the organized crime groups in the city, which also happened to be bizarre cults of demons and wizards, from a place they called ‘beyond the veil’. Bambi barely knew anything about it, only that he got paid well to keep all their secrets under the table.

“I don’t want anyone in my hair-”

“If you had any.”

“Shut up,” Bambi said. He cleared his throat. “But there’s not much I can do when you’re walking around in public like this.”

“In public?” Markus asked. He scoffed. “But Mr. Officer Bambi Sir, we’re not technically in public. Ern and I were masking our presence, so the ignorant wouldn’t take note of us.”

“They shouldn’t,” Ern agreed. “But then again...if Bambi over here found us, it wasn’t working perfectly, was it?”

“I’m not sure what you’re talking about, and I don’t really care about the specifics,” Bambi said. “But yes, I did see you. And I’m not the only one. We got a call to an emergency hotline about a black man carrying what looked like two children, one of whom didn’t have any arms or legs. Thought it was a prank call…”

“But it wasn’t,” Ern finished Bambi’s grumble. “That’s strange.” He looked at the unconscious girl. Her face was completely covered by her long black hair. It almost looked like the creepy ghost from that Japanese movie, though he couldn’t tell her ethnicity. “Well, I can think of a few reasons why my familiar was having trouble disguising us.”

“Yeah?”

“I don’t care what your reasons are,” Bambi said. “What I care about is making sure you don’t get caught so I get paid. Since it was an anonymous call, it should be pretty easy to cover this all up...but there wasn’t anything else, right? Nothing I should know about?”

The way Markus and Ern both smiled at the same time made Bambi’s stomach turn.

“What the fuck happened?”

“What the frick, you mean.”

Bambi grated his teeth. To stay in the graces of Alfonse Parci, one needed to watch their tongue and not use swear words. It pissed him off, especially when his underlings did it to such an extent.

“Sorry,” Bambi said. “What the frick happened?”

Ern sighed for a second, then cleared his throat.

***

--Earlier--

“Before that,” Ern said. “I was wondering if I could ask for one more thing…”

“Huh? More than sparing your life?”

“Trust me, this is well worth the five seconds it’ll take to explain.”

Markus nodded and crossed his arms. “Go ahead.”

“Bezret,” Ern said, calling his familiar out. The snake slithered out onto his palm, yellow eye forward. “Okay, Markus, take a closer look. You can sense the Od that comes together to form Bezret, right?”

The source of energy and life, Od was a primordial force that was contained in all beings. Certain phantasms, including spirits and shades, were created entirely out of this material. To others, like vampires, Od was a food source. The tiny bits of Od that flowed through the bloodstream were the typical meals a vampire ate, but if necessary, they could consume other phantasms. They usually lacked in flavor, but a vampire as old as Markus could tell the quality of Od from a creature after a few seconds of study. He squinted at the familiar to do so before speaking.

“I can…” Markus started, then paused. He didn’t know much about the relationships between masters and familiars, but something seemed wrong. “Your cute little snake is missing something.”

“It was drained,” Ern said. “Because something, or some’one’, sucked the life essence out of it. Not you, right?”

“I was too busy with these clowns.” As Markus said that, he pointed at the bloody bodies of the robbers.

“Exactly. So, if it wasn’t you, and it wasn’t me, then who was it?”

The answer seemed sort of obvious, so Markus looked at the girl, curled up on the ground and shaking. There was blood splattered on the ground in front of her. It looked disgusting. Right...it was the same type of blood a phantasm would have. The kind of meal Markus could eat if he really wanted to, but would barely provide any sustenance. Then did that mean she was the one who bit off part of Ern’s familiar?

“That’s completely right,” Ern said before Markus could open his mouth. “My good friend and hostage here, Ms. Whatshername. Without thinking, my cute Bezret-” (upon being called cute again Bezret growled and vanished into the darkness under Ern’s sleeve) “-stalked over to her. Thinking that it might get a free meal with all the chaos going on, slurping up her misery. But what happened was the complete opposite.

“In the end, Bezret was the one who got chewed. But from what I can tell, it wasn’t an intentional thing. I mean, take a look at this chick. She ain’t even listening to us right now. Not because she’s scared, but because she’s too focused on something else. That ain’t normal on its own, but what’s less normal is that Bezret lost Od just being close to her.”

“What do you mean?”

“Geez, Markus, are you kidding me? You don’t even understand this much?”

“Ah, don’t be like that buddy,” Markus said, stepping closer and putting his hand on Ern’s head. “Here I am sparing your life...so why don’t ya’ just explain it instead of playing around?”

Ern gulped audibly.

“Right, right. Yes, that’s what I was going to continue doing,” Ern said. “Well, you probably already knew this, but sucking Od out like that just from proximity isn’t normal. Eating it is all well and good, but to just draw it out automatically? To guide Bezret over and drain from it without even realizing? Markus, this is totally crazy, but this girl isn’t normal. I’m just spitballing here, but the smart money says she’s some kind of cursed human. Like, a really high grade one, too. I’m talking Grade A, devourer or fiend level.”

“Those sound powerful.”

“That they are,” Ern confirmed. “And they are absolutely worth a lot. Now, this girl isn’t some long time super powerful phantasm. The exact opposite. When we came in, she was absolutely normal. It was exposure to Bezret and yourself that awakened her to this, somehow.”

Markus nodded.

But he was starting to get bored. This job was already taking a long time, and he wanted to play some basketball with his other vampire friends. All this nerd talk with Ern was endearing, but seemed pointless.

So he said that.

“Ern, what’s the point? What do you want?”

“Oh yeah, that’s what we were talking about,” Ern said. He smiled at Markus and clapped his hands together. “I’ve got a proposition for you.”

“Propersation?”

“Close enough. You were told to come here and kill everybody, right?”

“I was.”

“But you didn’t know I was supposed to be here.”

“Nope.”

“And you didn’t know the girl was here either. Or not her specifically, but the Boss didn’t tell you about any other phantasms you needed to kill, right?”

“Yep, that’s right.”

“Doesn’t that seem a bit strange?” Ern asked. “The Boss tells you to go clear out a building, but doesn’t tell you about any specific targets? That he would want you to kill a very specific phantasm and/or magus without saying so? That’s not normal for his OCD orders, is it?”

It really wasn’t. If the Boss wanted someone dead, he would tell Markus exactly who to kill.

“He’s pretty hecking smart,” Ern continued. “But not perfect. Don’t tell him I said that, by the way. He couldn’t predict that I would be here, and there’s no way he could predict that a high grade curse devourer would awaken upon seeing you. That’s completely out of the range of anyone’s estimation. But, that doesn’t mean it can’t be taken advantage of. With a bit of practice, someone like her could be very useful to the Boss. I mean, she’d make my job incredibly easy. Devouring curses like she seems to be able to is pretty uncommon, and I’m sure he would appreciate it.”

“Get to the point.”

“I’m suggesting that the two of us go to the Boss and say that we scouted her,” Ern finally admitted. He looked over at the girl to see that she was finally paying attention, though her eyes were blurry. Seemed like her glasses had been snapped in two, and she was trying to put them together. “That way, none of us end up getting hurt, and we end up getting maybe some money, instead. A win-win for everyone around. Sounds good, right?”

“Well…” Markus thought for a second, closing his eyes. “Alright. I guess. I’m still gonna remove your arms and legs.”

“Oh come on!”

“You already got your compromise with bringing the girl,” Markus said. “Speaking of...yo! Little lady! You got a choice right now. Die, like everyone else here, or get dragged to a mafia family head and maybe die then, but with like, a ten percent less chance of death. Pick your poison!”

It took a few seconds for her to realize she was being spoken to. Hastily, she tried to put her glasses on, but they didn’t stick. Seemed like they were broken in more than just the front.

“S-sorry?”

“Huh? What are you saying sorry for?” Markus asked. “Did you not hear me?”

“No,” she said. “What? Sorry, I wasn’t really listening.”

“...”

“Don’t worry about it, Markus,” Ern said, taking a step between the two of them and putting a hand on Markus’s chest. “I’m way better at talking to girls than you are. Leave this to me.” Then, to the girl, he continued: “What’s your name? I’m Ern, and this is Markus. Nice to meet you.” He held the other hand out to her, extended to help lift her off the ground.

She didn’t take it.

“Yeah, I know who you are,” she said. Then, as if bothered by her own words, she frowned. “I’m...my name is Caitlyn. What do you want? What the fuck is going on?”

This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

“Ah, don’t use the ‘f’ word, please.”

“...sorry.”

“But anyway, yeah, I understand the confusion,” Ern said. “And I’m glad you’re not freaking out right now like most people would be. I mean, with all the dead bodies and an evil vampire in front of you, that’s gotta be tough on the brain and all.”

Caitlyn was quiet for a few moments before speaking.

“I think I am freaking out.”

“Then that’s normal. Totally expected in this situation. But whatever, who cares about that. What’s more important is what happens next.”

“Next?”

“Yeah,” Ern said. “I’ll just repeat what Markus asked you. In simpler terms: do you want to live, or do you want to die?”

***

“...and that’s basically the gist of it,” Ern finished, nodding and looking quite satisfied with himself. “Now, are we under arrest, officer?”

Bambi did not like Ern.

The teen was from a family of immoral spellcasters who played with souls and the dead. Bambi wasn’t religious, but desecrating corpses would make anyone bristle. To top it off, Ern was given quite a bit of leniency with his position as the cities only exorcist, which made him free to do whatever he wanted. Offend anyone he wanted. And nobody could do anything about it.

“You’re fine,” Bambi finally said, sighing. “A bunch of people were slaughtered mercilessly, huh? You didn’t clean the scene up at all?”

“That’s your job, isn’t it?” Markus asked. He smiled, matching the cocky attitude Ern gave the cop.

Bambi didn’t like Markus either.

But he couldn’t do anything about it. He was just a corrupt cop, living in a world where horrible creatures like Markus could slaughter him in a second. Bambi looked at the ground.

“I’ll figure something out,” he said. “But you need to be more careful. If other people see you, then there’ll be a big problem.”

“Can’t you go silence the person who saw us?”

“It was an anonymous call. We’ll investigate it, but since I’m gonna just say it was a prank, the force will probably drop it. I’m more concerned with this whole convenience store slaughter or whatever. There was a ward right? Who set it up? And you’re sure the security cameras were affected by it, right? You didn’t leave any other evidence or fingerprints, right? And the causes of death all looked natural? Please tell me that you at least took some precautions to keep it from looking like a living tornado of death went in and killed everything. Wait, you made sure everyone was dead, right? Nobody just hanging on, or anyone hiding? You took those measures, right? So that none of this would get out? No, actually, hold on. Don’t say anything, just stop. Wait.”

Neither Ern or Markus said anything as Bambi continued ranting. “Don’t answer any of those questions. Don’t say anything that would implicate you. No proof, or words that make it seem like you were there. In fact, I have no proof you were. And you won’t give me any. Because I never saw any of you. But please, think really, really, really, reaaaaally hard about what I asked and make sure this doesn’t get traced back to you. Okay?”

“I have no idea who placed the ward, thinking about it,” Markus said. “Hey, can you give us a ride?”

Bambi blinked at the vampire.

“No.”

“Darn. Well, it was worth asking. Anyway, I’ll catch you later, Bambi.”

“Seeya later,” Ern added, saluting with a nub. “Bambi.”

Caitlyn groaned.

“Well then,” Bambi started as he pulled his keys out. “Markus. Ern. Young girl being kidnapped. It was a pleasure seeing you all tonight. I wish you luck in whatever the fuck you’re doing, and I hope we can agree that none of us met tonight. Capisce?”

“Capisce,” Markus said.

“Capisce,” Ern repeated.

Caitlyn coughed.

Then, without another word, the officer returned to his car and left the three to their own devices. When they were gone, Bambi clasped his hands together and prayed that none of this came back to him.

***

What was she getting herself into?

This was reality, Caitlyn realized. Right now, she was sitting inside a small room decorated with red tapestry and elegant paintings on the walls to either side of her. The three of them were let into the room by a large wooden double door, and Markus set them on a velvet couch in the center of the room. A wide desk sat in front of them, and behind it, a glass door continued to a balcony that observed the cloudy sky. The only other person in the room was an enigma. The one who opened the door and told them to sit was a tall man, wearing a fully plated suit of armor, two glowing blue eyes visible underneath the visor. He was wordless, standing in the corner of the room by an alcohol cabinet, though Markus and Ern had greeted him as Carmichael when they entered. The knight didn’t say anything in return, and since then, everything was quiet.

The bleeding at her forehead had stopped, but it still itched, and it took everything in her not to scratch at it. Accidentally bleeding over expensive looking furniture would be bad. These people...whoever they were...were incredibly dangerous. That thought kept bouncing around in her brain. Earlier, it had seemed like the group of robbers with their guns were the worst people in the world, but it had only taken a few minutes for the man named Markus, or Mozart, to cement his place as the most terrifying. And then, she was forced to come along with them. As some kind of good. It made her stomach turn. What was going to happen? This was some kind of organized crime, right? Did that really happen in Seattle? She wanted to try and run, to sprint away as quickly as possible, but after seeing what Markus did, she knew it wouldn’t matter. Even when confronted by a cop nothing happened. It was inevitable.

Somehow, despite the horror of it all, Caitlyn felt a bit relieved. Why shouldn’t she? Only half an hour ago, it would’ve seemed like she was about to die. But now, she was just in the clutches of some criminal organization. A much better fate.

There was a bit of commotion as two men came into the room.

One drew far more attention than the other.

He was tall and sharp. His face was thin and his chin cut down like a razor, with a curt smile and relaxed eyes, both with black sclera and red pupils. He had slicked back blond hair, with a few strands sticking out from the front, and was wearing a perfectly fitting black pinstripe suit. The man’s tie was red, and it was held to him by a golden tie clip. He moved with absolute precision, every step with confidence, and when his eyes moved over the three and finally stopped at Caitlyn, she looked away. Whoever this person was, he was scary. There was just something about him that made the room feel oppressive.

The other man, not so much. A scrawny black guy, wearing a frazzled suit with his tie incorrectly tied. Unshaved and with his tiny afro pressed down on one side and not on the other. He was holding a clipboard and talking as the two entered the room.

“-which when you look at the amount flowing in from...ah, hold on, this is what Markus was talking about, I think,” the black guy said. “Should I be staying for this, Boss?”

Then the blond guy was their boss.

“Please do,” he said, walking around the room over to the desk, where he sat down and put his feet on the table. “Carmichael, bring me something to drink. I hate wine normally, but washing the taste out with some AB neg is truly flavorful. Oh, and some lime with it, as well.”

“As you wish,” Carmichael, the man in the suit of armor, said. His voice was like gravel.

Then it was quiet.

The only sounds Caitlyn could make out were her own heartbeat and breath, as well as the soft patter of rain on the glass doors and the clinking of glass from the drink being made. She was keenly aware that the Boss was staring at her, but she couldn’t meet his gaze. Her eyes were focused on the ground and she felt tense. This lasted for almost an entire minute before Carmichael finished, walking over to set a wine glass with dark red liquid in front of the Boss.

“Markus,” the Boss started. “I take it you did your job properly?”

“Mmm. Mostly.”

“The ‘mostly’ referring to these two stragglers?”

“Yep.”

“Well, I seem to recognize one of them,” the Boss said, glancing at Ern. “Normally I’d be pretty pissed that you just decided to go against the job you were supposed to do...but I guess I can’t really complain considering the circumstances. Our little human boy here is most likely worth keeping alive. For now, at least.”

His eyes slowly moved back to Caitlyn.

“But about the other. She doesn’t look like any of the restricted people I know. I take it she’s a friend of Ern’s? But even so, to bring her here...what’s the purpose?”

The question hung in the air for a second as Markus shrugged. He put a hand on Ern’s shoulder.

Leaving the heavy explanation all on Ern’s anemic shoulders.

“Boss, you trust me, right?”

“Not really.”

“Understandable,” Ern said. A bead of sweat rolled down his spine. “But even if you don’t trust me, you can at least trust that I’m always looking out for myself. And right now, I’m looking out for myself. This person, Caitlyn, or whatever, may look normal, but that isn’t quite the case. You can sense that, right?”

The Boss took a sip.

“Of course I can sense her state of being. She’s a phantasm, just like Markus or I. But why does that mean she should be spared? The only reason to keep you alive is because of your usefulness.”

“I’m saying she’s useful.”

“Then are you useful?”

The Boss asked the question to Caitlyn as he slowly spun in his chair, looking out the window. His back was to the rest of the room, but that didn’t make him seem any less threatening. Caitlyn felt like this was the first time she got a chance to breathe, and blinked.

Ah, she was supposed to say something here.

“Uh...I...I’m not sure,” Caitlyn admitted. “They were saying something about it...but I’ve got no idea. Sorry. I don’t really want to die, though…”

“You don’t ‘really’?”

“Sorry.”

The Boss paused for a moment.

Then, he sighed and pulled a cellphone from his pocket and sent a quick text. After finishing, he lazily tossed it onto the desk behind him and spun back around to the group.

“Ern, what good is she? I don’t employ prostitutes, you know that.”

Caitlyn didn’t really listen to Ern’s answer.

Perhaps it was because the adrenaline was starting to wear off, but Caitlyn was starting to get cold. When she went to the convenience store earlier, she expected to be in and out in under half an hour. To be back home before it even turned nine.

But now, it was long past that, the clock slowly making its way near midnight. And here she was, sitting inside some criminal headquarters with a bunch of psychos. And psychos that were...not normal. Her mind was still scrambled. These weren’t hallucinations, but it was still difficult to admit they were real. Still…

Her eyes slowly moved to Ern’s stumps.

When Markus was slicing them off, Ern screamed. It was hellish. Caitlyn was no stranger to horror and slasher film genres, but hearing those screams of raw pain were completely different. Or maybe they weren’t, and it was just because of her proximity that she felt so bothered. Because she knew that it could be her, instead. What did they want her to do? Ah, she knew they talked about it earlier, and she was aware they were talking about it right now, but she just couldn’t pay attention. It was too hard. Too difficult to keep all of this in her head, to keep it all together right now.

But she did.

If Caitlyn had one skill, it was staying calm. Things could be horrible, could be traumatizing, or could be wonderful, but after just a little bit of time, Caitlyn would feel her emotions going back to normal. Her pulse stabilizing, and rationality flowing into her brain. Ever since she was a little girl; before her mom was sent away. This superpower of hers, automatic dissociation, had its perks. It let her sit here, looking perfectly calm to outsiders, all while knowing that at any moment she might be killed.

Or worse. Earlier, she thought that anything would be better than death. I mean, if she wasn’t dead, and she still had her mind intact, couldn’t she just recover? But that was before she saw the Boss. That single word made her feel a knot clench in her guts. Prostitution. There were fates worse than death. She could imagine it. Picture different fates that would cause her to beg for release...things these people probably did without batting an eyelash. This overactive imagination was killing her.

She…

Stopped thinking when she felt a hand on her shoulder. Caitlyn looked to her side to see the skinny black dude. He was smiling. Not in a cruel way, or a sorry way, but like how her dad used to. The expression was difficult to place, but for a moment, she felt calm.

The door to the room opened, and a woman in a stylish business suit strolled in. Her hair was messy and long: dark red and falling down to the middle of her back. She was smoking a cigarette and had an eyepatch, with a tattoo of a triangle underneath the other eye. Her jacket was open, and very openly it looked like she was carrying two holstered pistols, each with engravings on the side Caitlyn couldn’t read. The woman glanced at her for a second, then closed the doors behind her. This entrance caused the conversation between Ern and his Boss to stop.

“Boss,” she started. “You texted?”

“Serena, yes, thanks for taking the time out of your oh so busy schedule to come up to the realm of the mortals and immortals,” the Boss said, spreading his arms wide to grandstand. “I hate to call you up for something so insignificant, but I was hoping that I could get you to confirm something for me, with your spiritsight.”

The woman named Serena sighed.

“On this little girl, I take it?”

“Yes.”

“Fine,” Serena said, pushing hair out of her face. She tied some of it into a ponytail on top of her head, then her single good eye shot to Caitlyn. “What’s your name, kid?”

“Me?”

“You’re the only person here I don’t know, so yes.”

“...Caitlyn Till.”

“Caitlyn Till,” Serena echoed. After a few seconds where she seemed to think the name over in her head, Serena placed one hand over her good eye and used her other hand to remove her eyepatch. “Become illuminated.”

The empty socket expanded.

Fingers began to crawl out of the woman’s head, longer than they should have been. Gray spindly things with slate fingernails that sprouted from her empty eyeball that soon grew into arms that obscured her entire face. Then, once six arms had emerged up to the shoulders, they stopped moving. The palms slowly opened, each of them holding a glossy eye in the center. As soon as it began, it stopped, and Serena pulled her eyepatch back on.

“Okay,” she said. “I did it. Now what?”

“You tell me. Ern claims this chick is worth my time.”

“Not sure exactly what you want me to tell you,” Serena said. She looked back again at Caitlyn with her normal eye. “She’s certainly full of Od, but not enough to make an impression. You’ve gotta be aware of this, right? If you’re a seven on a scale of one to ten and I’m a four, this girl is only a two and a half at best.”

“Hmm…”

“Boss,” Ern started. He moved slightly, which caused his limbless body to sway before Markus caught him. “Hold on a second. Sure, she’s not some crazy powerful phantasm just yet, but think of the future!”

“The future?”

“Right. Just because she’s weak right now doesn’t mean that won’t grow exponentially. I mean, we’re talking about a Grade-A cursed human here. A devourer class. That isn’t something that you just see everyday, especially when they jump from being a regular person to phantasm in half an hour.”

“Speculative,” Serena said. “As nice as that sounds, I doubt we’d get much from some teen.”

“I’m probably the same age,” Ern replied. “And I’m not useless, am I?”

“You’re not a phantasm. You’ve been trained to do your job since you were born, and not much else. Those are two completely different things.”

“Look, Boss, this is my specialty. Dealing with curses and cursed humans and whatnot. And when I tell you that she’s absolutely worth investing in, I mean it. With a little bit of guidance and training, I’m sure she’d become useful.”

“At doing your job?” Serena asked. “Why are you vouching for her, anyway? If she’s capable of devouring curses, then doesn’t that make you redundant?”

“Not if she’s working specifically with the Parci Family directly,” Ern said. “Then Boss Parci wouldn’t need me. The other families would still need my services, so it wouldn’t be that bad.”

“Then it’s an entirely selfless decision? You just want to do good for no reason?”

A moment passed.

“Well, I’d also like to get paid for finding such a useful tool,” Ern slowly answered. “And then there’s my personal curiosity. But mostly the payment thing. You guys haven’t been giving me very high paying jobs recently, so my savings account is starting to get kinda low…just think about it. A one time finders fee for Caitlyn here, instead of charging me whenever you need a curse exorcised. Think about it! What a deal? You really can’t say that over the long term, this wouldn’t pay itself off. Oh, but I haven’t even told you how much I was thinking. I-”

The Boss held up his hand and Ern stopped.

“Don’t rush yourself into the business side of things, Ern,” he said, gently placing a finger over his lips. “It makes you unsympathetic. So far, you’ve just explained why your friend would be good for me. And I understand what you’re saying. You know that we need curses exorcised, and you know that right now, we can’t push our limits without having you on call. Currently, the limits of our violent activity is determined only by your availability, which is minimal enough on its own, not even considering what Fernand and Lawrence want.

“I understand it all. You’ve made a very convincing argument, even if my subordinates disagree. There is value in a devourer. If you went to any other organization like ours, they’d pay a premium for a phantasm like this. And I know that you, personally, would have preferred to take her under your own wing to ease your own workload. All of that knowledge is set deep within my brain, tumbling around.”

Ern smiled weakly. He looked over to Caitlyn for a second, who was only still barely calming down from seeing Serena’s face blossom into a dozen arms.

“What the most important thing is,” the Boss continued. “Is not ‘what’ total good a person can do for you is. What’s way more important is: what ‘will’ that person do for you? We are a criminal group, after all. Plucking a random person off the street to work for you, even if they’re the best in the world, wouldn’t do you much good if they don’t get invested. And right now, Ms. Caitlyn Till looks like she’s barely surviving through a panic attack. Even if you tell me she can do so much for us, that’s only hypothetically.”

The pale man stood up from his chair, letting it spin behind him, and he set his wine glass on the desk. Slowly, he walked around the table, until he was standing directly over Caitlyn. He put a hand on her head, then lowered his head and forced her to stare him directly in the eyes.

She could smell his breath; a scent of rusty iron and mint combined. It made her eyes water.

“My apologies for not introducing myself earlier, young lady. My name is Alfonse Parci, and I run a small mafia,” the Boss, or Alfonse Parci said. “My small little family here, excluding Ern of course, are all terrible psychos who run the underworld as a business. Drugs, prostitution, underground fights, loan sharking, and all sorts of other fun ventures. The kind of stuff that you see on crime shows. I myself have killed more people than I can remember. It’s nice to meet you, Caitlyn Till. Now, introduce yourself.”

“I...uh, sorry, uh...I’m-I mean, my name’s Caitlyn. Nice to meet you. Sorry.”

“Compared to my introduction, I feel like yours is a bit lackluster, but perhaps that’s for the better,” Alfonse said. He let go of Caitlyn’s head, but still stood before her. “You have no idea what’s going on, do you?”

“...w-what?”

“All of this. It makes some sense to you; I can tell. At the very least, you understand that we’re criminals, and that being here is dangerous. You’re perfect at imitating prey, and making yourself invisible. You almost seem to disappear if I don’t pay attention to you. Not literally, of course. But even though everyone is talking about you, and your fate, you seem to have a lack of input. Why is that? Not because you don’t care, nor because you’re afraid. If you actually understood what was going on, you’d be talking a lot more. Or, well, at least I think you would be. That’s just my read.

“Knowing Markus and Ern, they probably didn’t say much to you, did they? Ern thought you were interesting, like a cool new toy, and told his friend to drag you along. He’s trying so hard to justify helping you here. Whether it's for his own sake or not, he’s pulling all the stops for it. But you’re just quiet. And unless you talk, none of us can move forward. So, tell us what you don’t understand, so that we can have an adult conversation.”

…

“I...I don’t get any of this…” Caitlyn admitted. “I’m sorry, but what the hell are you guys talking about? That woman...sorry, I’m sorry. But what’s happening?”

A beat as Alfonse’s eye twitched.

Then, the man burst out laughing, almost tumbling to the floor. Carmichael sauntered over to put a hand on the Boss’s shoulder, steadying him, but by that point, Alfonse was back to normal.

“As I expected,” Alfonse said. “Well, here, what about this. We can start with the really easy questions. Even someone as dumb as Markus would be able to answer them properly. First: which would you prefer? To live, or to die?”

“...to be alive? I guess?”

“Good choice. The second question is: what would you be willing to do to survive?”

Caitlyn took a deep breath.

“Uh...I don’t know what you want from me...sorry…”

“Nothing too dangerous, trust me,” Alfonse said. “I take it you didn’t understand anything that Ern was saying about you? The whole: cursed human, devourer, whatever thing? About exorcising curses? Actually, you probably weren’t even listening, were you?”

“...yeah, I don’t get it.”

“That’s completely fine, it wouldn’t make sense to expect you to. Let me just make this incredibly simple for you. Is that fine?”

Caitlyn nodded hesitantly.

“You should have died tonight,” Alfonse started. That made Caitlyn’s stomach drop. “More specifically, if what Ern tells me is the truth, which I believe it is, you should’ve been killed. Slaughtered like a pig, like the rest of the unfortunate souls of that tiny convenience store. But right now, you’re alive. So, if you think about it, we’ve in some sense saved your life. Perhaps spared is a better word, but regardless, you are only living right now because of Markus’s decision. Which might as well be my own decision.

“So while it may be true that you’ve been kidnapped and forced to be here, your other option would be death. This probably should speak for itself, but not a single soul in this room should ever reveal the details of what happened in that store. The mission Markus went on must stay with all of us until death, and if I learn the details have leaked, then someone will pay. And the only way I can make sure that you don’t speak of them, Caitlyn, is to have control of you. Don’t worry, I’m not suggesting anything too sinister. To make it simple, I just want you to join the Parci Family, and become what might be best described as a special type of cleaner.

“I won’t go into the specifics of the work, because Ern knows it far better than I, but right now, there’s only one way for you to keep living, and that would be to take this job. I’m not an evil person; I’ll pay you a fair amount. Nothing too extreme, of course, but the standard rate we’d pay Ern. More than you’d get at any job for high schoolers. Do you understand so far?”

“I...think so.”

“Good, good! In that case, I think you should understand the point completely, then. You’ve got two choices in front of you: death, or to become my tool and work for my mafia. So please, decide right now.”