“One. Two. Three. Four. One, two, three, four. One two three four. Onetwothreefour. Ontwthrfr” The rhythm was muttered under the hunter’s breath.

In his hands was the vicious combination of metal, wood, and mana known as, Magus Judicium, or to the non-catholics, Arcane Justice. It’s master cracked the barrel and in a flurry of movement filled the empty chambers with shells, raised the gun, and fired. The spray of lead dug into the bark of an old evergreen. The blast echoed, but then the silence returned again.

“Still a little slow. He did it faster so can I.” Jaklo growled.

Putting the shotgun away in his backpack Jaklo began to walk back to his abode. The dawning sun greeted him as he walked through the forest to his cabin. He often spent his mornings this way. He’d always be training in different ways. One day it’d be with the sword, the next just agility training climbing trees, and the day after that he’d just run until he couldn’t lift his legs. There were acres of forest around his home. Not exactly like the ones he grew up in but close enough. They were secluded and he liked it that way. No one else tended to appreciate them the way he did.

Upon reaching home Jaklo hung up his backpack and headed for the bathroom. He showered up before dressing for work. He had quite the distaste for “professional” attire as they called it. In his profession efficiency came before fashion. The only reason he gave in was that he’d often be picked out during work by those not entirely in the loop. When everyone else is wearing suits and slacks then the same becomes camouflage. In some ways he was a private investigator of course, but no matter what being a hunter mattered far more than working for W&R. On that awkward thought Jaklo headed for the office.

It was cold for September even for Maine. Jaklo flipped his trench coat's collar up and brought his shoulders off to help shrug off the cold. He made a mental note to find a way to enchant the coat to keep him warm. Despite the distance Jaklo had never bought a car. He saw no use for the machines with his abilities.

When he finally reached main street Jaklo stopped into the little coffee shop diner on the corner, Sam’s. The place was just starting to gain it’s morning clientele. Besides those few people the place was straight out of the sixties yet another time capsule in old town. Jaklo got two boxes of a dozen donuts. Usually the office would rotate through grabbing breakfast or lunch. It was just a handy thing incase there was something sudden. Only one person would be out getting food , and people could get to the office earlier for breakfast. Admittedly there was usually a series of complaints about the frequency of donuts, but in the end they’d be eaten and nothing changed.

Jaklo found himself on the stoop of the historic Wells and Raick Investigations. The building blended right in with main street. Dull red brick covered its facade, but the overcast morning left it a washed out brown. In all honesty it looked very good for its age. It was clean and while not obvious modern upgraded had been made. Matty had done a good job keeping up the old place.

Now there was a strange fellow. He had been working at W&R far longer than Jaklo, but only seemed to be a handyman. He was quiet and nothing else really. He was always just there.

Just as Jaklo was getting in the door he heard a woman's voice call to him,

“Don't close it!”

Jaklo turned around but kept his foot out to hold the door open. Coming up the sidewalk was what appeared to be a stack of boxes with legs. Infact buried under those was Maria Yung the agency's resident quartermaster. Despite her small stature Maria was a master with the making of arcane weaponry and devices. Unlike the others at W&R she had never trained to use magic for anything other than crafting. While technically her studies fell under beastology and alchemology she was really an enchantress not a hunter.

Maria scuttled in and hurried downstairs without another word. On the first floor was a reception kind of area that let the company separate the clients into magical and mundane cases. Markiel was sitting at a big wooden desk in the center of the room. The thing had been built for the office decades ago and was a rather imposing piece of furniture. Shelves and storage were kept behind the desk for all the case files and business documents. Behind those was a dividing wall that separated the foyer from his office. The warlock was casually sitting back while reading a musty tome. More than likely the tome was an actual book from an ancient era. Mr. Relovski always was picking up new artifacts for his collection.

“Whatch ya get your hands on this time?” Jaklo asked crossing the room to the desk.

Mr. Relovski looked up closing the book. Before he did Jaklo was able to see the writing wasn’t even in a modern alphabet.

“Just a little study on early cryokinesis and it’s progenitors.” His accent only slightly coming through.

“Well nothing that would help me so I’ll just head upstairs. I assume nothing has come in for us.” Jaklo replied disappointed.

“No. It’s been quiet on all the fronts, but before you go…” Markiel grabbed one of the donut boxes and selected an entirely plain donut which was put down next to his coffee.

Jaklo carried on upstairs to the second floor office. All of the employees of the true side of W&R were given a desk here and the right to do with the area as they pleased. While for the sake of cover the company had a couple actual PI’s they weren’t given offices and instead called in when the cases were for them. Jaklo had selected the one in the far back right corner. Jaklo had built up some privacy walls and made himself a little eight by eight room. He did have an actual desk with a PC on it, but most of the space was taken up by a workbench and tool boxes. Over the workbench was a submarine style murphy bed with literally just enough space for Jaklo to lay down. The only other things in the room was a desk chair and a locker.

Before going to his office he stopped by the little kitchenette built in under the stairs up to the third floor. He put down the donuts then got settled in. He sat down at the workbench and absently began to tinker with an old backup piece of his.

The air in the forest was crisp. A gunshot echoed through the air. Dirt and leaves littered the ground, covering the small insect colonies built. The dense thicket of trees went on for quite some time, before stopping in a small clearing. There was a faint ring of perfectly healthy grass outlining the plain, but most of the grass within the circle was yellow and dead. This is due to a failed brewing experiment. To the right, there was a tall chain link fence, covering what looked to be a small farm and a septic tank. In the center of this plain was a small stone structure, that seemingly led underground. There was a single, large opening on one side that had a door and some wooden boards blocking it. Above the door stood a sign: CONDEMNED. Faint smoke rises from below the door. Some movement can be heard from within the mine, the movement eventually evolving into a one sided conversation.

Leading down the stone steps, there is another door. This door is also wooden in nature. Behind this door is a makeshift laboratory, with various pieces of scientific equipment on a table in the center. This room smells of fire, brimstone, and liquor. To the right lies 3 containers, filled with various minerals and alchemy ingredients. Directly behind the table is a bird perch, with a food container and a raven sitting upon it. There are various shelves with beaten up equipment that must be 100 years old. There is a side room to the right, which has within it a bed, and lamp, and a dresser filled with various outfits. In the very back, behind a large oaken door, lies various generators and water purifiers. There are other doors, and behind them other things. But now we turn our focus to the man working at the table.

"Alright, alright. Trial 3 was a failure.", Atlas said to nobody in particular. He scribbles something in a beaten up leather book, putting it next to similar ones in a messy pile. His gloves are charred from the small fire. He stood next to the remnants of what was going to be a new weapon. "I figured as much. But I had to be sure. We were almost on to something." With that last sentence, he seemed to be talking to the raven, which had no name and preferred it that way. "Caffeine. I need caffeine.", he says, fumbling around for some instant coffee. He pulls out a decades old mug and a bottle of some generic brand instant coffee. He begins pouring a red, blood like substance into the cup instead of water. While he is preparing the concoction, he continues to talk,"They expect me to go to work when just stepping outside will kill me near instantly. I have had more chemicals pumping through my body in the past two weeks than I have in the last 127 years." He finishes the now red-brown substance, and drinks it at an alarming speed. Afterwards, he almost seems to gag. Whether it be at the taste of the coffee or the sight of blood, we may never know. "Watch the lab while I'm gone.", he says to his avian friend.

Where at one second there was a man (if you could call him that), there is a bat. This bat flies out of the mine, and into the general downtown area. The people of this town walk below, doing their daily business. Although this is a bat, it almost expresses disgust. It reaches an old building is surprisingly good condition, and dives down the chimney. He reaches the basement level, a lab of lesser caliber to his own. And where there was at one second a bat there now stands a man, preparing to go to work. The others worked above, but due to his condition, he was forced into this musty corner of the building. He is almost envious. Almost. But he gets to work on brewing what needed too be brewed, while the caffeine was still in his system.

He changed out of his Victorian-esque clothing, and into lab gear: gloves, boots, goggles, etc. He slowly begins to regret not skipping work today, or at least working on his schedule, as he is preparing a mandrake root potion, and must test it on himself. He begins to chop up the insufferable thing, and so the work day begins...

A loud scream erupted from Barons mouth as he sat straight up in his bed. Well, bed being a term used loosely. A small modern day apartment housed the young Arcanist, as well as the library of books from his past residence. A lack of space and an overabundance of books lead to almost every square inch of the living space to be covered in the leather bound pages. His bed was especially stacked in the books, stacked up high enough to be mistaken for a childs fort. His face had been resting on the open pages of one book, his arm propping four more open, unmoved from his studies the nights previous.

A cold sweat coated Baron, and he looked with distaste at a greasy stain on the pages of his book. The rich hide pages were already absorbing the filth -he supposed that would just go to make them even more 'used' looking, an aesthetic he enjoyed. He frowned as he studied the pages that had so engrossed him the night before -or, more accruately, a couple of hours earlier as shown by the clock on his wall, long hand straight upward, short hand to the floor. A slight tick-tick-tick noise broke his focus, reminding him of his dwindling time. Baron let a sigh escape his mouth, voice rumbling in distaste as he slammed shut the book before him. A hastily sketched picture of a demon surrounded in scrawled notes seemed to wave as it was closed away between the pages of the book. This prompted Jacques to rub the fatigue from his eyes as he stood.

After carefully navigating his way carefully through the musty labyrinth to his bathroom, Jacques stripped out from the very little he had worn to sleep. In his short walk to the bathroom, he picked up a book and briefly studied a page from it, before discarding it on a pile next to the toilet. He stepped with a jaunt into his shower, turning the water on quickly. Scalding hot water cascaded down from the showerhead, raising a heavy cloud of steam as it cascaded onto the young man's body. Jacques cared not for the heat, in fact embraced it. An angry look crossed his face as he caught a glance of his tattooed body in the mirror -he quickly looked away.

After cleaning up and getting dressed, Baron fell down heavily in a large worn armchair -red leather on a mahogany frame. His hand lazily traced a rip in the leather cover of his chair before reaching out to pick up a book. He lazily thumbed through the pages, muttering incantations along as he read. His tattoos glowed in the dim lighting of his apartment as he read, pulsing brighter as he put heavy emphasis on some words. He stuttered over a phrase, and felt a sharp pain from his tattoos as they protested his mispronunciation. A growl escaped his mouth as he slammed the book shut angrily. The book tumbled from his grasp to the floor as he lazily let it go. It thudded to the floor in a cloud of shimmering dust, atop a pile of similarly discarded books.

Jacques Baron looked up at the clock upon his wall, eyes narrowing as he realized how much time he had wasted. The short hand had moved ahead three entire hours in his time reading. He cracked his neck annoyedly as he moved to his bed, grabbing and attaching his bionic arm. He flexed the mechanics and frowned at the sluggish lagging response. He sighed, flicking a switch on the wrist as he maneuvered it to grip his cane. Baron stretched out his good arm before he headed out the door, picking up both his briefcase and an apple on the way out the door, his fingers awkwardly twisting around the objects to carry them. As he walked swiftly down the road, ignoring the brisk temperatures, Baron jammed as much of the apple as he could in his mouth, spitting that which was not immediately swallowed into a trashcan as he passed.

A smirk crossed his face as he entered the building of W&R, his cane clacking a steady beat on the floor. He cocked his head as he entered, making a beeline for the stairs. He nodded to everyone warmly as he passed, aching to cross up to the second floor. As he made it up to the office level, he stretched out, arms spreading wide. In this stretch, his tattoos glowed brilliantly. Tentacles erupted from his back, glowing with energy as they twisted and wound behind him. Thin appendages reached around, taking a hold of his briefcase and cane as he walked, freeing his arms. The tentacles passed intangibly through desks as he walked, disturbing the contents like a light breeze. Baron took a seat at his own desk, close to the stairs. As he leaned back in his chair, his ethereal tentacles rushed to bring books from the desk to his hands, where he began reading once again until interrupted. His studies were not something he could afford to let cease, not while there was more to learn.

“Good morning missy,” the old lobsterman called as he reached out to grab her hand and help her aboard. He looked the very picture of an old salt with his bristly white bead, yellow canvas hat and a dark blue LL Bean jacket as ancient and weather beaten as he was.

“Good morning Bert,” Lenya replied as she stepped from the wooden dock onto the gently rocking deck of the unnamed lobster boat. Pots and floats lay beside neatly coiled lines. Ready to be hurled into the sea once Bert had safely delivered her to shore. Bert probably didn’t need the income, given the stipend she paid him to transport her to and from Islesboro each day, but in his mind he remained a lobsterman and lobstermen fished for lobster. There was a slight shudder and the smell of diesel combustion as Bert pushed forward the throttle and they moved away from shore at a sedate speed. He would be the envy of his old cronies once the season ended and he still had the steady work of water taxi to depend on.

Living on the island presented its own unique challenges but since returning from Micronesia she found that living near the ocean was exhilarating. She took her usual place beside the wheel, listening to Bert’s prognostication on the weather, discussion of the lobster catch and Augusta’s apparently chronic hatred for all fishermen with good grace. In addition to ferrying her to and from the mainland Bert also acted as an unofficial groundsman and handy man and as a useful go-between with the small island community. It paid to keep the help happy she had discovered. It was easy enough to let the strangely accented English wash over her with only occasional agreements and comments to give the impression she was paying attention.

It was a calm day, despite the chilly Atlantic wind, a sombre promise of winter storms yet to come, and the passage was quick. She thanked Bert and wished him luck with his pots as she stepped onto the quay. A brisk walk took her to the red brick post office. Opening her briefcase she took the package slip she had received yesterday and handed it to a bored looking clerk. The man heaved a long suffering sigh and went back into the mailroom to search for her package. A few minutes later he returned with a brown paper parcel, the rustic look somewhat spoiled by the various airmail stickers and customs forms currently affixed to its surface. Vienna Austria. Excellent. Tucking the package under her arm she walked to one of the various coffee houses which had sprung up recently and purchased her usual brew. Thus armed, she headed for the office.

She attracted little enough attention on her way in, beyond the occasional admiring glance from some of the locals. There was little enough to remark upon, just a blond woman in a business skirt and jacket with a briefcase. An attorney maybe, or a particularly successful real estate agent. The irony of the perception bought a slight broadening to her usual professional smile. She moved quickly through the public area, nodding politely to the firms employees before reaching the offices. Her nose twitched slightly detecting the scent of fresh donuts. Decisions decisions. Repressing her urge to make a beeline for the donuts she instead headed to her office. There was more mail in her in-tray, mostly academic journals to which she still insisted on subscribing in the old fashioned paper medium. There were a number of half-finished documents laid out on the table. Ritual workings she still needed to discuss with Emmaline. Carefully she gathered them up and tucked them into a drawer before setting her coffee, briefcase and parcel down on the polished wooden surface.

Opening another draw she retrieved a silver letter opener and carefully opened the package. Inside were several Adel vice blossoms and a small book. She tutted, her mothers understanding of international customs wasn’t what it might be. The book was unadorned and modern, a recent copy from her mothers library. The letters across the cover read, in German: Die Shriken und Wunder. She opened the book and thumbed idly through it. Modern printing reproduced ancient illuminated drawings and text. She supposed her mother had it in PDF but it seemed to lack the intimacy of paper. Thessonicus of Bregga had penned Die Shriken shortly before his execution as a heretic, a diary of his tragic dealings with a particularly vile demon. This was probably only the second copy in existence, medieval copyists and book burners being what they were. Max would be pleased. Leaving the book on her desk she rose and set out on the more important quest, to locate a chocolate donut to go with her coffee…

“Et ad inferos”
Silence. Blindness. Deafness. Quite. Peace,
“Tueri maleficus”
Like floating in water, he remained suspended,
“Ostende mihi veritate”
The darkness enveloped him, he felt nothing, saw nothing, heard nothing.
“Aperite portas”
Warmth. There was warmth! Spreading through out, lights flashed, music sang, the body grew rested and-
“Omph”

Coal came crashing back down to his own circle, and a velvet voice chuckled at his misfortune as the Witch struggled to get up on his shaky legs.

“My, my, that didn’t go too well, did it?”

“Shut up, Cerberus”

The golden eyes of the three-headed cat flashed with glee as it let out another purred laugh, “Not my fault you can’t get a hang on traversing planes.” He hopped down from his spot on top of Coal’s bookshelf, landing gracefully onto to dark-oak flooring. “Maybe you should just quit while you’re ahead.”

Coal slumped onto his rickety chair, splinters flew off the old thing as Coal let out a groan, holding his throbbing head in his hands, “You know, you give crap encouragement.” The Witch gazed over at the squatting cat, eyes heavy and tired, and very annoyed right about now.
“I’m just trying to help,” the cat mewled as he stalked over to Coal, taking his seat at the Witch’s side, “What’s so special about that place anyway that you’re risking your health to get into?”
“It’s going to guarantee me an honest living!”, getting out of his chair, he stalked back to his failed circle, “I’m tired of just living in a dank forest, and stealing bagels from fat men. I want to actually earn something.”
“Hah! Years of hiding in the shadows, stealing and scheming, and now you want an honest living?”, Cerberus let out a hiss of laughter, though he may be able to speak English, he can’t always get the cat part of his transformation out of his speech.
“Dumb cat,” Coal huffed as he kicked the chalk drawings, breaking the circle. Just looking at it gave him a headache.
“Hedge witch,” The cat hissed back before promptly trotting over back to Coal, “What’s wrong with this place anyway? Out in the mortal world, everything is effectively the same, but here. Everything speaks you. Do you really want to give up all you worked for just so you don’t have to get your hands dirty once in awhile?”
“I mean-”, Coal bit the inside of his cheek, letting out an involuntary groan. Cerberus was kinda right.

This little cabin, while shabby, was all he ever truly called home. Though skyscrapers, and huge apartments may seem grand, can any of them compare to a home you built yourself? He remembers his first days living out here, cold and fighting to survive, sleeping in hungry, constantly working to try to better himself and his situation, and finally managing to achieve that goal. It seems crazy now to want to go back to the “real world”.

Coal’s eyes swept the little room one last time. His little cabin was only one room big. His eyes glazing over the enchanted wood he worked so hard on warding, now it was covered in chalk and spell-ingredients. A small Persian rug laid down messily with a cauldron magically bubbling on it with no need of fire. That thick orange substance which he called “Lunch” was giving the whole room an irresistible aroma of freshly made meals, and when he wasn’t cooking, all the various herbs used in spells was enough to make the whole house smell of rich perfume. A bookcase was hastily shoved on the far right of the wall, stacked to the brim with (stolen) books, scrolls, and tomes. Sigils and runes were scrawled on his wall, magically levitating and frozen meat hovered about, it all was so him. From the walls, to the floor, and everything in between, it all seemed to speak Coal.

He felt his eyes water and moisten, as the soft pitch-black pelt of Cerberus was rubbing against his thin arm with his three heads. “See? You love this place! Why leave?”
“No, Cerberus.”

“What?”

Coal took in a long relaxing breath, “No Cerberus,” he repeated and continued, “I’m leaving, there is so much of the world to explore. I’m not staying locked up here like a kidnapped princess,”
Straightening up, he got ready to simply poof out off the room, he had no time for arguments.
“See you later, Cer-”

“Wait,” Cerberus narrowed all eleven of his eyes, “If you’re going, at least don’t show up in that”

Coal looked down at himself. True, he wasn’t dressed very professional. A black jacket too big for him that hid his frame, two black-jean clad stilt like legs poking out from underneath, with black hi-tops. Normal. What normal people wear. That’s what Coal was outside of his shack, Normal.

“Magic is growing rare these days, they’ll take me in no matter what I wear,”

Cerberus let out an audible sigh, “I foresee great danger, y’know.”

“Guess that’s how life is, GoodBye Cerberus” A twinkle, and a wave of his hand. With his chocolate-brown eyes turning amethyst purple, he vanished.

The alarm rang and the man awoke.

"Awoke" was perhaps a strong term- Maximilian Cotto often found himself in a sort of half-doze in the hour before the alarm went off. A conscious dream. Sometimes he had pleasant thoughts, sometimes he saw things he couldn't be certain were real or a nightmare. Given the number of occult books packed into the sprawling old Cape Cod style house, Max had no way to be sure.

At any rate, Max got out of bed, stretched, wandered into his newly refinished bathroom for a leisurely shower, an exacting shave, and to meticulously brush and floss before combing his hair. His grooming routine completed to his exacting specifications, Max then entered his walk-in closet and dressed for the day, selecting a dark blue three-piece. Scrupulously clean and boasting the latest gadgets, the kitchen had been recently expanded and refurbished as well. Aware of the Wells and Raick tradition of bringing breakfast foods (and trying to remember when his turn was coming up), Max did no cooking, instead brewing a pot of strong, freshly-ground Ethiopian coffee- a born Seattleite, anything less than the best coffee would elicit no enthusiasm from him. He drank precisely one cup of the flavorful brew, before pouring the rest into a Thermos to be drank at the office.

Now it was time for the part of his morning ritual that he always, always dreaded.

Max returned to his bedroom and got the items he needed from his bedstand- his Hand of Miriam necklace, his revolver, his shofar. Revolver in one hand, shofar in the other, he walked to the door of his library. Max glanced down at the bottom of the case-hardened steel door- the Ward of salt was undisturbed, a positive sign. He turned the key in the heavy deadbolts in the thick door, took a deep breath, and walked in.

This one room had required more renovations than any other part of the house. Several bedrooms and a study had been joined in one cavernous chamber, the walls knocked out and the ceiling raised to accommodate his magical library. The windows had been bricked up to prevent natural light from coming in- or the escape of any of the demons he occasionally Summoned in this chamber. The walls had been thickened from the inside with a layer of reinforced concrete. And of course the hermetic seals, the rerouted ventilation, the careful light and climate control to protect some of the more ancient volumes.

Revolver raised, Max made a thorough and careful survey of this room. Having this many magical books in one place could become a bane as much as a boon. They gathered arcane force of their own, and there was always a possibility that the amount would reach a sort of magical critical mass, a weight too heavy for our reality to carry. His teachers had warned him of this hazard of amassing too many occult books- no one wanted to repeat the infamous experience of the Hermit of the Rif in 1895. No one at all. Max looked for what he had been told were early warning signs. Nothing out of place from when he left it last night, no ectoplasm, no scorch marks, no smell of brimstone. Good. Ever cautious, Max took a careful look at the heavy steel safe in which some of his more dangerous tomes were locked. Still untouched since the move, still unopened since he had placed the script for The King in Yellow inside with the other dangerous works last month.

Finally satisfied that there was nothing to see here, Max walked over to the desk in the center of the library, picked up the book had had received via airmail yesterday. A 1922 edition of Tobin's Spirit Guide in the original French, unlike the abridged and bastardized English translation. Most of the French copies had been destroyed by bombing in WWII, but through determined Internet searches he had chased down a copy in Bruges. He thought it might make a useful reference guide to keep in the office- though honestly only Lenya would be likely to use it and the higher-ups probably had everything in there memorized.

Done with his morning routine, Max donned a light scarf- it was getting cold earlier than he was accustomed to- and made the morning commute in his Chrysler 300 sedan. The drive into town passed uneventfully, and he was soon walking into red-brick building that housed Wells and Raick.

He planned to stop only long enough to grab a Bavarian cream donut on his way up to the bullpen, but saw he was not the only person working on the most important meal of the day- Lenya was also hunting through the donuts with an intent expression on her face. "Guten Morgen, Lenya," he called with a smile and wave. Excitement getting the better of him, he set down his Thermos long enough to open his briefcase and pull out Tobin's Spirit Guide to show her. "I managed a decent find. Thought we might keep this around the office for quick reference." This was a difficult and rare find, surely a fellow bibliophile would have some enthusiasm for it. A good way to start out the day.

Double chocolate glazed. Victory. Lenya plucked the sugary treat from the tray and began the long mental process of promising that she would work out extra hard to justify it. Experience told her that promises made in this phase were frequently overblown so she applied a liberal dose of mental inflation to her imagined future exercise regime. She was just about to take a bite when Max arrived and excitedly opened his briefcase.

“Guten Morgen Herr..Max,” she responded cheerfully her eyes widening at the proffered book. She momentarily regretted leaving her copy of Die Shriken und Wunder at her desk. Lenya liked Max, raised among a tight knit family of women she was always a little uncomfortable around men. Her time in college and in the field had erased most of that old awkwardness but a kernel of it remained. It was the scholars caution that set her at ease. Generations of witches had stressed and internalized the need for caution and secrecy. Some of Wells and Raick's more... flamboyant employees made her nervous.

“In the original french?” she asked. After a moment of indecision she sat her donut down and wiped her hands carefully on a napkin. She could hear the doors opening as others arrived in the office but kept her focus on the book.

“Max this is wonderful,” she declared in english as she paged through the book. The English translation was woefully and, some said, intentionally mangled. It was amazing how much esoteric work came out of France and how rarely, and poorly it was translated.

She opened the book to a random page, the title read, Rue d’Auesil; with precise, if strange, directions. The familiar thrill of discovery ran up her spine.

“We must sit and talk I have questions, and my french is not so good as yours,” she declared excitedly. Hopefully it would prove a slow day and they would have ample time to discuss the book. It didn't seem like there was much of a rush on as yet.

“I have something to show you too but ...” her eyes fell on the donut once more, “perhaps we will eat first ya?”

Jaklo managed to entirely disassemble the small pistol, and was looking over the mess of parts. The piece was actually an entirely regular gun. Just a glock 20 from some of his early training. It was only kept around because it was that old. Sure a lead bullet could kill a fair few monsters, but a little glock wasn’t nearly enough fire power for the level Jaklo was at. He left it apart and stashed the bits in a toolbox drawer. He rolled away from his desk to look around for the others. So far three had come in.

He debated whether or not it was worth to bother seeing what was going on. It was awkward being the only hunter. Well besides the new kid who was more of a morphologist anyway. Jaklo felt strange around them all. Did he really belong with so many mages? He never showed a lapse in confidence, but there were some shaky thoughts crossing his mind. He knew he had magic and power because of it. Everyone does it just doesn't manifest every time. His manifested as rage. A cold pointless anger that was always in him. How was that power? These others could rend space and channel fire. All he had was a shotgun. Jaklo sighed rolling the chair under his desk.

He headed across the room to the kitchenette where Max and Lenya were conversing. He could hear the conversation in clarity just as he stepped out of the cubicle. His senses were above average and the room was pretty much silent otherwise. Jaklo first tended to the donut box and grabbed a whipped cream filled one.

“Ya know Relovski has a new tome. As far as i could tell from an artificer’s standpoint was that it was likely eastern to northern European. Around twelve hundred maybe. At the very least probably means he’ll let people see the last one he picked up. The journal by… who was it… Faust? Or was it Czeori? I can’t keep all the demonologists straight. I have enough hunters to keep up on as is.” Jaklo had a slight twinge of insecurity in his voice, but was rather casual about it otherwise.

Looking to the window while he let the thought settle he noticed it had begun to fog up a lot. The corners even looked a bit frosty. He knew weather forecasters were inaccurate sometimes, but they had called for low fifties today and now it looked like mid thirties. Jaklo growled with disgust,

“I had plenty’a winter last year thanks. I don’t need it starting again now.”

A small flow of foam erupted from one of the beakers. The small table was bursting with activity from all sorts of chemical reactions, but three objects stood out from the rest. One was a small vat of blood, with two lines feeding green and blue liquid into it. This stood in the center of the table and seemed to garner the most importance. On the right, there was a medium sized device, which resembled a washing machine. Inside was a turmoil of normal and magical substances. And in the back there was a small blender, a cutting board, some sharp knives, and an almost baby-like, shrivelled up plant. The plant was inside a soundproof box, and seemed to be screaming. A man stand behind it, preparing to chop. The room smells of chlorine, with a hint of cinnamon.

“God forbid these things comply with me for the greater good.”, muttered Atlas. He knew that if the box was opened in the slightest, the entire W&R building would go to sleep. Normally, Atlas would not mind, but he was also affected by the shriek. “Guess I have no choice.”, he muttered. His hands seemed to be glowing, and seemed to emanate a tangible cold. He gripped the box, and as it frosted over he saw the mandrake’s mouth close, along with it’s eyes. He promptly stuck the box above a bunsen burner, and waited for it to thaw. It was extremely slight, but this action seemed to drain him. He knew he could easily surpass anyone in the building when it came to spells, give him another 100 years. But he had been turning his back on the art for quite some time, and so only knew a single spell.

He heard footsteps from above. The rest of the employees would be filing in. As he waited for the now deceased mandrake to thaw, he shuffled about, checking on the various experiments he had been running. The building was slowly coming to life. He smelled baked goods enter, along with coffee. He stops the mixer, checking on the contents. He scribbles something in his notes, and closes the machine. “This lab may have less available materials, but a reliable power supply is quite useful”, he remarks. He checks on the vat, dipping his finger in and tasting what had stuck. He gagged, and went into the far corner to wash his hands. As he began to dry them, his stomach lurched. “Max.”, he stated. The scholar surrounded himself with so many holy objects it somewhat pained Atlas to be in the same building. But they were coworkers. So he handled it.

He rushes over to the bunsen burner. The mandrake died in the cold, and the heat made it usable for alchemy. He took the root over to the chopping table, and diced it into hundreds of unrecognizable pieces. He walked over the the right wall, pressing the button on the com and waiting for Markiel to pick up. After a few rings, he answers.

“Hey, Atlas here...Right, who else could it be. Listen, could you...Yes, I am aware that you are a very busy individual, but...Listen, it’s what, 10 am? I don’t know and don’t care. The sun is still up so I can’t enter the upper floors. I need somebody, you or the handyman or whoever is available, to bring me a powdered donut...You know i can’t eat them without the...you know...the blood...Anyways, I need the sugar for this brew and I need it before this mandrake spoils. Thank you and good day...Yeah, well you can tell your owl tha-”, he is cut off.

Markiel having hung up, Atlas began to pile the mandrake into the blender. He walked to retrieve the contents of the mixer, and poured it into the blender. It smelled of rotting wood and sulfur. All that was left was to wait for the sugar delivery.

Stumbling out an of a very suspicious and dark alley way, and knocking over an old lady wasn’t the best way to hide the fact you just materialized a few feet away from people. Eyes were instantly drawn onto him, “Grand-mama!” a French teen exclaimed, apparently too shocked to hep her own grand-mother up, and Coal felt his cheeks burn as he awkwardly helped the old woman up.
”Fiche moi le paix”, she spat as she tried pushing Coal away, and so he let go. His lips tightened in disgust, ”How dare she?”, his inner voice screamed, yet Coal remained quite. He thought best to quickly escape the situation.
Turning right round, he speed-walked off, hoping the now slur-spewing old woman would cause enough of a distraction for him to just vanish. Again. Invisible to all.

Putting the whole situation behind him, Coal tried to remain positive. Humming old tunes to himself as he took long gliding steps towards his destination. Weaving in and out of crowds of kids, was it a holiday, or were they just bunking? His own “normal” life seemed so far away, he almost forgot about school. ”I should really go back to school”, he thought in tune with Lady Gaga’s “Judas”. All this time, Coal just summoned a Golem to go to school for him. A Wizard’s of the Waverly Place scenario as he liked to put it. The golem was great at impersonating him. Take notes, be quite, come back home. All the actions the Golem knew, and that’s what Coal did anyway before his whole life was turned upside down. There was no time for school in between trying to summon in demons and brewing magic potions.
Ignoring his own thoughts for a second, Coal expertly dodged workers with their heads glued to their phones, muttering something in their heads as Coal listened to their thoughts. One was complaining about how annoying his wife was this morning, another smiling at a picture of his son, all of their private thoughts were being read by Coal like an open book. He couldn’t stop even if he wanted to.
It shocked Coal how many humans think so loud. Their minds were so open as they thought of their darkest secrets. Pin numbers, secret lovers, seeing the truth as they lied to their spouse with confidence. Coal just couldn’t help but to listen. “Witch Magic” is usually defined as wild, and with so many people thinking around him, it was hard to keep control of his powers, and know what thoughts were really his. But as immoral as it may seem, it did help Coal from going bored, or lonely. It was like a one-way conversation, and people had so many fantastical stories to tell, so why miss out? Problem was, people who knew mind-reading witches were about could hide their thoughts without any need of magic, Coal felt cheated at times, and at others it helped to detect hiding supernaturals just like him. Though he never really did anything with that information anyway.

As he walked on, the crowds started to grow smaller, and smaller. Soon, the only souls accompanying him were mewling cats hiding near dark corners. He finally found the strength to lift his eyes up from the worn, cobble sidewalk and look around for once. Gazing over at tightly stacked Victorian buildings, rusted drains that held secrets of the past, it was like Coal stepped into another world. Red bricked buildings, large, swollen clouds, and plenty of cats. Why bother teleporting if it meant not being able to see such a pretty sight? It also gave him a good idea of good escape routes, and hiding spots if the need for them ever rose. Always better to be safe than sorry he told himself.

The silence pounded on his ears, no noise other than his light footsteps were heard. Moving his gaze away from a worn-down abandoned home, he saw the R&W building slowly approaching him. Though the building may have seemed as normal as possible, and practically impossible to distinguish it from the buildings surrounding it. However, to a magic-sensitive witch, it was glowing. It was hard to ignore the numerous wards placed around the building, that just radiated magic. Powerful spells must’ve been done here, and Coal felt a rising feeling of child-like excitement, and cat-like curiosity.
He started walking faster, a bounce in his step, he was finally going to be part of something! No more forging for lavander, a place like this probably had everything from Agar Agar to Dragon’s Blood. Probably libraries full of tomes, and scrolls. With so much hidden power. The image of old, powerful mages crouched over a cauldron flashed in Coal’s mind. To be surrounded with people like him seemed too good to be true. He glee seemed to have no limit.

Nearing the rusty, old building bit by bit, he felt all of that confidence slowly be chipped away from him.

”What if they don’t like me?”, he started to fret,

”Maybe I’m not powerful enough,” self-doubt washed over him,

”Maybe they’re dangerous,” worry seeped through him like poison.

As he finally reached the large heavy door, the image of him bursting in with incredible power was wiped from his mind. Instead of banging the door open like some sort of hero fresh from the battle, he creaked it open, sticking his head in.

“Hello?”

The tentacles wove around Jacques haphazardly, each seeming to move of their own volition. They traced lazy lines in the air around him, followed by a telltale ethereal blue glow. Two stood unnervingly rigid in the air, one supporting a book just inches from his face, the other holding a book next to his hand that he lazily flipped through as he leaned back in his chair. His foot impatiently tapped as he read, before he looked away from his books to his desk, covered in books in a similar fashion to his home. No cases. No new material to study. A low rumble erupted from the frenchmans stomach. "No food either, it seems." Jacques thought to himself, realizing he would need more to get him through the day than the half-apple from earlier.

With a groan of protest from his knees, Jacques stood, a tentacle moving to maneuver his cane to his hand for support. He moved his way to the kitchenette beneath the stairs, having seen Jaklo with doughnut boxes earlier. His cane tapped a steady beat across the floor in his movement, moving in a one-two-one pattern. He hovered behind Jaklo for a moment, listening to the butt end of the conversation onto which he had walked on. Lenya, Max, and Jaklo, it seemed had the same idea as him, and a smirk fell on his face as he joined them, moving to the doughnut boxes. When he passed by Jaklo to reach for a doughnut -taking whichever his hands fell upon first -his tentacles faded from existence, blurring away into a mist of arcane energies. His tattoos faded to black, and he suddenly was standing straighter, no longer feeling his muscles strain.

The French morphologist glanced briefly at the book in Lenya's hands, before giving a brief grunt of approval. His eyes drank in detail from the pages, a reflex of sorts by that point. He hadn't caught much of the conversation, and frankly hadn't cared enough to listen too deeply. "Something something, Lenya was showing something to Max, something something boring hunters, something something weather." Jacques mentally reviewed what he had heard, before a smirk fell across his face. "Ah, small talk. How adorably mundane." He thought as he leaned back against a wall, good hand propped between his head and the wall, robotic hand pointing straight at the ground with cane still in hand.

"Interesting read. Any chance I could borrow it sometime?" Baron inquired in his vaguely accented voice. Though the difference in speech pattern was quite distinctive, it fell on a blurred line. Not quite French, but not quite anything else either. The effect of time travelling throughout two centuries had an interesting effect on speech patterns, as it would happen. He himself was still adjusting to the change in accent -well, change in everything. Even his body had changed with the times, as evidenced by the sleek metallic protrusion from his shoulder. Everything about the new time he had been shunted into was not easy to acclimate to, and even after more than a year he was still caught off guard by the most mundane of experiences to those used to the modern day. "Still, not all of the new world is bad." He mused internally, flexing the robotic arm. He had to admit, even this rudimentary tool was better than the utter lack of function he had in years past.

After waiting for ten whole minutes, Atlas grew impatient. If left untouched, the potion would mature into a tea that when consumed would completely destroy the one who drank it, from the inside out. Despite appreciating the pure evil of the brew, he knew what he was developing now was much more important. He decided he must brave the second floor, and the presence of his coworkers. He went to a medium sized wardrobe, located under the stairs. He pulled out a large trench coat, a wide brimmed hat, and large, almost novelty sunglasses. He changes his clothing yet again, into thick winter pants, wool socks, large boots. He applied sunblock to his face, put on some gloves, and headed upstairs.

The general lobby of W&R had two windows to the front, making it quite a hazard for Atlas to venture to the upper floors. He almost glided past Markiel’s desk, giving him the finger as he went toward the stairs. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed some kid walk through the main doors. He had read something about a new arrival in some memo, but thought nothing of it. He shuddered at the thought of having new coworkers. He despised most of his current coworkers, but since he needed the ingredient for the catalyst, he went upstairs to brave the horrors of human socialization.

He climbed up the wooden steps to the office space. He probably had an office up here, but couldn’t handle all the sunlight exposure. He saw most of his coworkers crowded around the kitchenette, where the donuts would be. He sighed, and braved it. He approached the crowd of people, trying to snag a powdered donut. He finally grasped one, and took it quickly, accidentally bumped into Lenya.

“Sorry”, he grumbled. He realized he had been sucked into the conversation, and almost ran. But he needed to keep composure, so he had to play along.

“So, everyone….how is...the work day….so far?”. It had been a good while since he had a proper conversation, and was quite bad at it.

“Hello?”, the man behind the desk asked again, with hints of a Polish heritage in his voice. Rising from the huge desk that engulfed and hid his frame, he leaned in, inspecting the new arrival.
“Oh, hi!”, Coal waved. ”You waved? Stupid, stupid, stupid! Look professional.", he screamed in his head as he strode forward, his curious eyes darting from every inch of the room. He was unsure if he felt underwhelmed, or relieved. But he definitely was surprised.
Coal was expecting extravagant large rooms, with rich decor placed elegantly everywhere. This rather small, and modest room was a sharp contrast to what he was expecting, but the rather homey nature of it really tied it together. Wood floors that creaked every so slightly, stairs and vast, yet empty, rooms off to the side, and a desk too large for this man. Breaking the monotone nature of most modern buildings, Coal was evidently pleased with this surprise.

The, what Coal guessed was the, secretary cleared his throat, snapping Coal back into reality. Coal realising he was smiling like an idiot to himself while his eyes wandered, let out a confused garble of “Oh”s and “Um”s before he regained himself and outstretched a hand, the secretary took it and shook it. His hand was comfortingly warm.

Everything about him seemed warm infact. He resembled someone's uncle. Khakis, a polo, messy chestnut hair, with hints of greying at his temples. Approachable, like someone who was willing to just sit down and listen. It made Coal almost feel silly for trying to act so professional. Almost. Still, there was nothing sinister about his nature at all, his eyes twinkled when he smiled, he was well-mannered, an absolute gentleman. A friendly guy you could trade secrets with. However, he didn't seem like the guy that would hide secrets. And he was, of course, warm. He felt warm, from his personality to his skin, he was radiating heat. Demon perhaps? Was all of these good manners just a clever trick, a glamour perhaps? Maybe he was fresh from a ritual? Whatever it was, Coal found it hard to distrust the man no matter the suspicious warmth.
“Ah, you must be the new recruit! It’s wonderful to have you here!”, he started to blabber on, “Coal is it? Yes, I’ve read so much about you! Witch, right? Right! Well, I’m sure you’ll be a wonderful recruit,” he was still firmly shaking Coal’s hand, going on about how happy he is to have Coal here.
”Christ,” Coal chuckled in his head, “He even sounds warm.
Opening his mouth for once, Coal laughed awkwardly. Completely unsure how to react to praise, he let out another flurry of “Uh”s before managed to get his words out. “Oh, well, thanks. Happy to be here, Mr. Uh. What was your name again?”

“Markiel Relovski!”, he said as if it was the most common and simple name there is.

“Markeel Reolovki”, Coal repeated, messing up God knows how many syllables. He can fluently speak over 5 languages, yet can’t say a name when under pressure. Yet, Markiel didn’t seem bothered. He smiled along and gave Coal a friendly pat on the back, “Ah, you look as if you’re meeting death face-to-face. Do not worry, we here at Wells and Rick are a friendly bunch! In fact, most of our members are up-stairs, why don’t you go meet them?”
Having his fill of human interaction for the day, Coal thanked Markiel (this time managing to get his name right), and went off towards the stairs. Markiel sat back down on the leather chair, and got back to whatever he was doing. Sparing him one last look before heading up the stairs, Coal could've sworn he saw a red owl giving him a disapproving gaze as he walked up, he increased his pace after that.

As he neared the stair landing, he could already hear a conversation. Too faint to make out the words, but he felt that there were a group of people up there. The fresh aroma of donuts wafted down the steps, and a grumble followed after Coal’s first whiff, remembering he didn’t have breakfast yet.

Reaching the door that stood ajar, he creaked it open, looking as disheveled as ever as the eyes of the occupants swiveled onto him. A nervous smirk broke on Coal’s face.

“Hello!”

Lenya was enjoying her conversation with Max and the young hunter and had been about to excuse herself to fetch her gift when a weight bumped into her and threw her off balance. It was, perhaps, unfortunate that the assembled group fell silent as she exclaimed:

“Verdammt!” The word hung in the sudden silence for a moment and her cheeks flared red with embarrassment. She looked up to see a figure covered from head to toe in clothing, including a trench coat and an impressive wide brimmed hat.

“Sorry...So, everyone….how is...the work day….so far?” the man inquired. It was… what was his name? Atlas? Yes that was it. She smiled forgivingly at the vampire straightening herself up. This wasn’t exactly the first she had seen of him but their interactions in the past were few and far between. Lenya opened her mouth to speak when another voice interrupted her. The gathered employees turned to see a skinny young man looking rather the worse for wear.

“Ah you must be Mr Coal,” she said into the stretching silence. She hadn’t, in truth, expected one so young. Perhaps she should, the apparent median age around here was shockingly young. Apparent age didn’t always track with actual age of course.

“Welcome to the office. I am Lenya Von Morganstern,” she declared in her clipped Austrian accent.

Oh, lord. The new arrival had made his way up the stairs, and stood there awkwardly. Atlas decided to ignore him. He will be acknowledged when he speaks, or acts, or whatever he does. Atlas mainly used the company bulletins as fuel for fires. Reaching into one of his coat pockets, he pulled out an odd looking device. It resembled something between a perfume bottle, a syringe, and a faucet. He injected the baked good with the needle. He pressed a button on the machine, and the doughnut disappeared instantly. A small yellow light began flashing on the machine, and Atlas took out a small vial, and attached it to the faucet end. The light turned green, and colorless liquid filled the vial. Atlas shut down the machine, sealed the vial, and stuck both items back into his pocket.

Faking a cough, as one does, Atlas panicked. He had no idea what do here. He didn’t want to appear inept in front of all these...idiots. Atlas sorted his thoughts, trying to think of a more appropriate phrase. Bumbling hooligans. Yes. Atlas was satisfied with this, and decided to move on the conversation whilst waiting for the new kid to talk.

“Well, I hope it’s been going….well? Yes. Well.”. Panicking yet again, he struggled to think to what people talk about. “How about…”, he glanced at the now frosted over windows.”Wow. The weather sure did deteriorate quite quickly. You would think it would get...warmer. This reminds me of my days in Siberia. I was lurking around the outskirts of a peasant village, around July. You’d think the weather would be slightly better, but it was all the more dangerous. I knew magic when I smelt it, and decided to investigate. I knew there were some ruins of some fort where Peter the Great once stayed or something. I ventured to the ruins, and who did I see but a cryomancer, attempting to hold the village hostage. I waited for when he slept, and collapsed the entire building. I never did care for getting my hands dirty.” With the last sentence, he seemed to grimace. He had been ranting for quite some time, oblivious to the rest of his coworkers. They had gone off to great the new employee or something, and realized he had been talking to the empty kitchenette for quite some time.

He glanced at the thick layers of clouds outside. Appreciating the lack of sunlight, Atlas took his hat off. He quickly darted down to the lab, mixed the vial in with the mandrake smoothie, and went on to examine the vat of blood. This blood was being pumped with various fungi extracts and some powerful ether. He took a beaker, filled it to the top, and poured the blood in. He set the blender to maximum power. Even at this level, it would take an hour for the potion to be finished. He promptly ran back upstairs, nobody noticing his absence due to speed, agility, and the distraction of Charcoal or whatever his name was. He realized he did have an office space. He only used it for research. It was in the very corner of the floor. A desktop computer was seated on a simple metal table. There was a swerving office chair. Another, slightly less long table was placed, creating the image of an uncompleted square. This second table was covered in successful potions, along with cleaned up versions of his notes. It was impeccably clean. Atlas sighed, walked over, and began to type on the computer.

“Hello!”, Coal smiled his best fake smile, taking survey of the whole group. They definitely were a colourful bunch. Well, not colourful, just varied. The amount of dark colours they sported made gun-metal grey look colourful, and that was rich coming from Coal.
Still, these were Coal’s co-workers, they seemed like an O.K. bunch to him, though a little taken aback it seems. Did he just walk in during a conversation? God he felt stupid. For the fiftieth time today.

“Ah you must be Mr Coal,” someone finally spoke to him, stopping him from zoning out again. A tall Germanic woman, almost towering above Coal, spoke kindly to him, and he fake-smiled again, giving them a little wave. Contrary to his, hopefully, cool exterior, Coal was burning up inside. Slightly intimidated by everyone in there. Everyone in that room looked like they could squash Coal under their foot. All worn from experience, and decades older than him. Possibly even centuries knowing the unpredictability of magic.

“Oh, yes, hey!” he fumbled up again, public speaking wasn’t Coal’s strong point, “I’m Coal. Though you already knew that,” Coal’s voice faltered as he finished his sentence, silence flew upon the room once again after that muck up. Coal was too spooked to speak anyway, he could feel the eyes of everyone in that room sizing him up, he felt his face flush, praying for a distraction.
And a heavily clothed man unknowingly answered his prayers by, badly, pretending to cough. He felt eyes glide off him for a glorious split second. Coal could finally stop himself from hyperventilating and also ponder where he magically came from. He was gigantic, wearing the male equivalent to a burqa, and holding what looked like a needle from a bad sci-fi film, hard to miss, and yet Coal did. His first guess as to who this mystery man was, was that he was a vampire. Judging by what he’s wearing, Coal couldn’t have been that far off the mark.
Eyes slid right back at Coal, and Coal, after revising a mental script hundreds of times, was ready to talk like a normal functioning human being.

It was mostly just small talk, “How are you”s were asked and names were exchanged. Though it was unnecessary, Coal already probed their minds for their names, and knew how they felt, but not on purpose anyway. Something as natural as a name was easy to figure out, with or without knowing it.

Small talk continued and Coal finally mustered up the strength to asked his question. “Him? Oh he’s Atlas”, Lenya jerked her thumb towards the heavily clothed man. He was too busy muttering to himself to greet the newcomer, and by the fact no one was paying attention to Atlas, it must be a common thing for him to zone out like that. Coal was fine with it, Coal was fine with everything. Everything was fine right about now. Got a proper job, met some nice folk, got called a “bumbling hooligan”.

”Hooligan?” Coal mentally gasped. Atlas was still looking as scatterbrained as ever, and Coal must’ve accidently wandered in his head, and witnessed a memory.
Lenya was talking about something, Coal didn’t really care, he was just called a hooligan! A part of him wanted to invade Atlas’ mind and force an embarrassing memory of his unto him, and another wanted to congratulate himself for accurately guessing what Atlas was as he swiftly bounded down the stairs again.
Swift, mysterious nature, afraid of being open. Definitely a vampire.

Coal then later let out a garbled “huh” as Lenya finished her story.

Across town, in a grey row house flanked by white azaleas, there was a bedroom alarm clock that seemed to have shirked its morning duties. Glory Grey was lying in bed face down, the sun streaming in slats across her back, which was clad in a very soft but nearly threadbare flannel nightgown. The alarm was supposed to have gone off an hour ago, and here she was. The house was quiet. The old baseboard heating hummed faintly, sending tendrils of warmth across the weathered pine floorboards. Softly, a clicking sound came skittering down the un-carpeted hallway to the bedroom where Glory was sleeping. A sizable but not obtrusive weight introduced itself onto the quilted bed, the antique frame creaking, and something wet dragged up the side of Glory's face.

"Waylon," she groaned into the pillows, tugging on one of the dog's ears. "Do you have to pee or something?"

Quiet settled in the house again, aside from the excited snuffling of Waylon's damp black nose. For a moment, Glory remained in her prone position, nestled in layers of blankets.

"Oh, custard..." she muttered, then rolled over onto her back and swung herself forcibly upright, reaching for the alarm clock on her bedside table and holding it close to her face so that her sleep-blurry eyes could make out the numbers. "Damnation!" She threw back the quilt that covered her, leapt to the floor, and ran to the bathroom, Waylon hot on her heels, his brown ears flopping as he hopped along behind her. On a wooden shelf above the old claw-foot bathtub were bottles and vials with hand-printed labels on brown paper. She pulled one down and popped out the cork with her teeth. A dollop of pale cream poured out into the palm of her hand, smelling distinctly of figs, and she ran the substance through the wild bird's nest of dark brown hair on her head until it was tame enough to be woven into a braid. The rest of her morning routine was completed in haste. She threw on a knee-length black dress with tiny white flowers on the skirt, which had a line of pearl buttons up the back. Boots, white gloves, and a black felt hat completed the look, though the boots had seen better days.

In the kitchen on her way out, Glory stopped by the garden door, over which hung a heavy charm of sorts fashioned from a horseshoe, a cross, and some twine. The pane of glass in the kitchen door looked out onto a small but densely green back garden. Glory muttered a brief prayer under her breath and the metal bits of the charm seemed to crackle with electricity for an instant. She grabbed a covered basket from the counter and headed for the door. Out of the corner of her eye as she left, she spotted one of her hanging ivy plants in the small front foyer which was drooping and beginning to turn brown. She turned to glare at it.

"Stop that," she said firmly. Intimidated, the ivy flushed a healthy green again. Glory left the row house, Waylon the dog in tow, and climbed into her El Dorado, which would take her to her new job. She had only been there for a week, and already she was coming in late. She shook her head, gripping the wheel a little tighter in her demurely gloved hands. When she reached the weathered red-brick office building, she took the front steps two at a time. As she sped past them, the boxwood hedges on either side of the steps seemed to turn a little greener. In the lobby of W&R, she paused, caught her breath, and held the basket in her hand aloft.

"Sorry I'm late," she said to no specific person in particular, but more to the office as its own entity, "But I brought corn muffins for break- ... Oh, there are doughnuts."

Crestfallen, she lowered her basket of savory treats. Waylon sniffed at the basket curiously, decided it didn't contain anything of interest to his canine tastes, and wandered off.

Across a small apartment building, a mouth to a rocky forest, the sound of a tree falling over shook the nearby earth with a loud thud. Drake was dressed in his casual attire with his brown cowl to help conceal him from the chilly Maine breeze. With his monster of an axe in his grip he had already severed a few trees, and had begun to make them into dividable pieces. It was around this time that Drake would collect fire wood for the coming frigid days of winter. This also gave him some additional 'training' as he thought, or at least would make the excuse of, mindlessly swinging his axe and making cheesy poses and moves from some poor imitation of an action movie that any on looker would think anything but cool or viable moves.
After dismembering a few logs it dawned upon him that he was supposed to be at work today. Cursing to himself he would run out of the woods, deciding that he'd continue after wards, and would sprint back by his apartment and across more of the road. Though he didn't have a mode of transportation he didn't live too far from the old building. Arriving after about 30 minutes of sprinting he would collapse on the sidewalk out of breathe.

Jaklo sized up the new meat. He was even younger than him. If he was a hunter, which seemed unlikely considering the magic pulsing around him, and he distinctly smelled of strange ingredients with a hint of brimstone. A demonologist? An Alchemist? Either way the kid seemed massively underwhelming. Jaklo had heard there was someone supposed to stop by about joining, but now Jaklo was doubting Markiel’s judgement. It seemed more like they were taking in a stray than a new recruit. The kid was dressed scraggy regular clothes, not even good field gear, and honestly seemed like he wanted to run and hide just from a basic conversation. Jaklo stepped around Lenya, and approached the kid looking him up and down.

“If you think this is just a club for mages then you will be rudely awakened. So think twice before you sign anything. This isn’t a job you usually get to retire from.” Jaklo was cold and clear.

He made sure the message was conveyed and headed down to the first floor to discuss something with Markiel.

The warlock was standing behind the reception desk as he read from his new tome that was on the desktop. The sign on the front door had been flipped to say closed, an extremely rare occurrence. Mark muttered in Polish his face full of concern. Kelvin was on his shoulder and cawed when it saw Jaklo. Markiel looked up and instantly his visage changed to his normal positive demeanor.

“Jaklo, I din’t’ear you come down.” He said his accent now think having just been using his native tongue.

“The sign’s flipped. You never do that. Clearly we have something going on. Care to share?” Jaklo inquired casually.

“We noticed an irregularity. A strange weather front has been expanding from the north. It’s entirely unnatural. It’s been getting worse as it moves. It already has dropped the temperature twenty degrees and at the origin point the temperature is dipping into the single digits. I’ve been studying all I can, but I’m no closer right now. Seph is going to address everyone in a couple minutes. He just wanted to sort out somethings. I’ll get Maria. Please get everyone up to his office.” Markiel wasn’t foolish enough to try and sound cheery as he explained all of this.

Jaklo nodded and climbed the stairs back up. He grinned to the crowd.

“Seems like fate has given us great timing for the new arrival. We’ve got a case. Looks like you’re getting to see what we do first hand. Everyone needs to be in Seph’s office in five.” He was clearly mocking the kid at this point, but he didn’t care.

If this kid couldn’t handle this then how could he handle facing down a sphinx about to bite his head off or a vodoo doctor trying to dissect him. Jaklo headed for his cubicle and collected his things. He changed clothes into field gear. On top of it all was Visage. He pulled out Arcane Justice and strolled back to the group. Which had been joined by Glory with a basket of warm, buttery, corn muffins.

“OooOoo muffins!” Jaklo said taking two from the basket and chowing down.

He realized he probably looked like a pig and as such promptly justified himself,

“With great power comes great metabolism.” He said just after swallowing, “Anyway... Glory, we have a case so there’s a meeting in five in Seph’s office.”

Glancing up from his computer, Atlas comments on the announcement."Ah, things are about to get interesting. My first field case.", Atlas grimaced. He knew something was up, call it his supernatural spider sense. He knew there would be others. People were running late today, so they would not be alone when it came time to face this evil. Atlas recoiled yet again. Another priest, or something. For him, the work environment was particularly hostile. Gory Grey? No, the name would be less...crude. Atlas didn't care, and so opened a drawer in his desk. He pulled out a dusty satchel, with spots for vials and other small objects. He swiveled his chair, turning over to the second desk. He pulled out some of his more...violent? No. More than that. At a loss for words, he just settled upon atomic potions. He also grabbed healing and mana potions, and a small sack of spices. He thought for a second,"Did I miss anything?". Something clicked. He had forgotten two extremely important weapons. Well, one. He was waiting for a parcel delivery that delivered a component of the other. He commented how it would help with his brewing, then turned to a dusty book

The title read: A COMPLETE EXPLANATION AS TO WHY THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS SANTA. He opened it, dust flying everywhere. It was hollow, and a key was inside. He took this key, then pulled a small box out, from below his desk. Fumbling with the lock, he opened the box. A set of extremely sharp knives sat in some expensive looking cloth. There were enchantments to make the blades unholy monstrosities. The others had magic, and magic guns, and muffins, but at least Atlas had decent cutlery. He put them in his satchel, and removed his coat. Sunlight could not penetrate these clouds, but just in case he pulled out a large umbrella, sticking it in the bag. He stood, wearing some Victorian clothing and a wicked grin on his face. He always worked better when something was at stake. Just before leaving, he grabbed a bottle of liquor. Vampirism didn't counteract raging alcoholism. He rejoined the group, a seemingly different person

"Well then. It seems we have a case. Cheers.", he said, as he laughed and drank at the same time, a seemingly impossible feat. "What is it, 2, 3 people haven't shown up for work? We're screwed seven ways to Sunday. We can hope, da?". He had slipped back into Russian. "Excuse that slip up. And you, boy". He turned to Coal. He was thinking, in a spiteful manner, "Don't go poking around in the head of somebody 7 times your age. I've met con men with more finesse than you.". He merely told the rest, "Let's hope SOMEBODY dies this time" Chuckling, he began to head upstairs, knowing full well he pissed just about everyone off. He tripped on the stairs, turning it into a failed flip. But he didn't stop laughing. He sat down at the table, opened his bags, and began organizing his bottles and potions before the meeting began.