It took everything he had to peel himself off the floor of his apartment. His phone was switched off again the moment his final message to Regan went through, the rest of the messages ignored entirely. If not for the way she’d worded the ‘request,’ Emilio might have ignored it, too. But… There was a clear threat there. And it was hard for Emilio to ignore a thing like that, hard for him to justify this Leah Ramirez getting hurt so he could drown himself in whiskey and feel sorry for himself. On top of that, if Ari and Kaden were right and something was… altering Regan, she’d probably feel like shit when she came out of it even if she didn’t hurt anyone. So it would be best, he figured, to make sure she didn’t.

But he took the bottle with him. 

He staggered into the library, sniffing as he glanced around. It was empty, save for a woman behind the desk. She looked Hispanic, which was enough for Emilio to decide that she must be Ramirez. Private investigator. Best damn one in town.

Walking over to the desk, he leaned against it and yanked the bottle from his jacket, taking a quick swig of amber liquid before stuffing it back away. He wanted to get this done as quickly as possible so he could go back home and lock his damn door, maybe never leave the apartment again. “You Leah Ramirez? I need — El huesos.”

The second the conversation with Regan seemed to be over, Leah ran down to the scribary to find any piece of iron jewelry she could, just in case.  She wasn’t as stupid as she was stubborn, and she knew Regan’s threats weren’t in vain.  It was time, then, to take as many precautions as she could, starting with laying low the next few days.  She’d wrap up at the library tonight and then hop around friends houses for the next few days, places where Regan wouldn’t know where to find her:  Her sister’s house, her parents’ house, the Vural’s cabin, Nicole’s house… she’d have plenty of options until they all figured out how to get Regan back to normal.  The iron necklace and bracelet would barely be of any protection tonight, but like the noise canceling headphones, they were a start.

A man she didn’t recognize walked into the library as she was wrapping everything up, and at first, she assumed he was just a patron.  “Oh, I’m so sorry, Sir.  We actually just closed.  If you want to come back tomorrow, we’ll be open again at 8:00 am”.  Okay, so this dude was clearly drunk.  Maybe he was looking for somewhere to stay?

“We don’t allow food or alcohol in the bui-”, She was in the middle of correcting him when he called her by her name, and then asked for the very thing she was trying to protect.  The deer skull was the only leverage she currently had over Regan, her only possible chance for another shot at getting the one she actually needed. 

She hadn’t expected someone to be sent so promptly. 

“You need to leave.  Now. Ahora mismo. I have nothing that you want.”  She felt the skull against her knees as she leaned against the front desk, staring the man down. 

He wanted this to be easy. He wanted it to be a simple, achievable thing that he could knock out in half an hour, something that would require no thought and no present mind to do. There was no shot at him feeling accomplished when it was done — more likely, he’d feel worse than he had before starting — but if it was over with quickly, at least, he’d stand a better chance at getting home without running into anyone he knew. He wanted it to be simple, but it wasn’t. Nothing ever was.

Her whole demeanor changed when he mentioned the bones. From friendly ‘customer service’ mode to suspicious and protective. Emilio wanted to scream. What was up with people in this town and clinging to bones? If he were a more articulate man — or a more sober one — he might think of the metaphor behind that, of the way people held onto things even when the life was gone from them, of the way he was drunk and mournful because he was doing the same. But he wasn’t articulate and he wasn’t sober. And he wanted to go home.

“No,” he said, “you don’t have anything I want. But you’ve got something I need.” He leaned further against the desk, the bottle in his jacket thudding against the wood. It hit against one of the knives tucked in the pocket beside it as it did so with a sharp ting of metal on glass. The sound wasn’t meant to be a threat; Emilio had no intention of getting violent and was in no state to attempt it. But it could be taken as one all the same.

Exhaling sharply through his nose, Emilio glanced around the library, trying to figure out where the damn bones might be hidden. When he didn’t see any obvious places, he looked back to the librarian. “Look,” he said, words slurring, “if you don’t give me what I came for, it’s bad news for us both. I’m the carrot. The stick’s a lot meaner.” And came with shadow coyotes to boot. “Just — Just give me the pinche bones, and I’ll leave. You’ll never see me again.”

The tell tale clink in his pockets when the man moved closer was all Leah needed to know that getting out of this with her skull leverage was not going to be as easy as she wanted it to be.  She tightened her grip on the desk between them, searching around the library for any hint of a viable plan.  She shook her head at the weak metaphor, letting out a scoff.  “The stick is not herself right now.  And you’re indulging her affect by coming here.  Go home. I can deal with the stick just fine”.  

“See, the problem is, even if I had the bones you wanted, I would have no leverage over her to get the bones I actually want if I gave them to you.  She wants these bones, I want the ones she’s obsessed with.”  Had Regan promise bound this man?  Had she threatened him? “How’d she convince you to come here, anyway?  We don’t have to do this, you know.  It can be as easy as you walking away right now.”

She knew she had a dagger in the locked drawer under the computer.  Fire was out of the question in the library- it was too dangerous for the books, but there was always the option of rising his temperature to the point of exhaustion, right?  Where had she left her goddamn phone?

So she knew who had sent him. That was hardly a surprise; after all, how many people would care enough about a pile of old bones to send someone to shake down a librarian to collect them? It might have been laughable if anything was. It might have been amusing if the world  didn’t feel so fucking heavy right now. “You think I’d be here if going home was an option?” He scoffed, rolling his eyes and crossing his arms over his chest and pretending he actually felt the offense that was painted over his expression. 

But she was stubborn. Everyone in this town was so goddamn stubborn, and the exhaustion clung to Emilio like a physical thing. He scrubbed at his face with his hand, closing his eyes for a moment before yanking the bottle from his pocket again, taking another long swig. He wanted to go home. He didn’t want to be here. Even on a good day, this errand would have felt like a pointless one, and today was far from a good day. “No,” he said, shaking his head with a heavy sigh, “you don’t have to do this. I do. And I don’t —” He broke off, holding up a finger to indicate a need to pause and using the beat of silence to swallow more of the whiskey. When he pulled the bottle away, the burn settled into his chest, and he swayed just a little. “I really don’t want it to be a fight.” As if he was capable of one, in his current state. He didn’t know who she was — didn’t know what she was, but it wouldn’t take a lot to take him out at the moment. Maybe that was why he hadn’t tried to argue with Regan before embarking on this particular mission; self destruction was hard to shake even when he wasn’t in a state like this.

“I can’t leave without them,” he said, eyes darting around the library again, “so you’re going to have to either give them to me, or I’m going to have to take them. We can do this the easy way. I don’t mind it.”

“You speak as if choosing a library as a fun place to pass the time is outlandish”, Leah accused, only a tiny bit offended.  Some people just didn’t realize how great and immersive libraries could be, though she guessed that was their problem.

Her eyes followed his bottle, and she pressed her lips together, annoyed.  She reached out to grab it, attempting to stop it in its tracks before it got back into his pocket.  “I’m sorry, you must not have heard me over your threats. I’ll say it again. There is no food or drinks allowed in the library.”  She let the bottle go and gave him a look, the stern kind you might give a child who stole a cookie.  “If you don’t want it to be a fight then get off my property.  You don’t get to come here making demands and then leave with a gift.  That’s not how this works.  If Regan wants the bones, she can come get them herself.” 

She studied the man, taking a deep breath and tried once again to figure out what kind of hold Regan had over him.  Kaden did say she was promise bounding people, so it wasn’t out of the question.  “I’m not interested in negotiating with you, unless you care to tell me why you can’t possibly leave without them”.  A thought flashed through her mind.  If he was promised bound to get the bones, would him leaving with a random skull he thought was correct fulfill that promise?  “Otherwise, I’m going to ask you one more time to leave, and then I’ll stop being so polite.” 

“It is,” Emilio replied, rolling his eyes. Unsurprisingly to anyone who knew him, reading had never been a hobby he engaged in. It wasn’t even something he was particularly good at. His parents had taught him how to read, but not particularly well. And certainly never for pleasure. The library was nothing to him but a building currently housing something he desperately needed. 

And it was harder to get than he’d hoped it would be. 

She reached for his bottle, and Emilio’s efforts to keep it from her grasp were surprisingly deft, considering how intoxicated he was. He twisted his body away from hers, curling around the bottle protectively as he slipped it back into his inside pocket and shot her a dark glare. “Then give me what I came for and I won’t have to be in the library anymore.” Her stern look only served to darken his glare, and he rolled his eyes with a frustrated grunt. “I — You don’t want her to come herself. She made that pretty clear. I’m here, doing — Trying to do something…” His words came out tangled, tongue heavy with the whiskey he’d been coating it with since the warehouse fire. He rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands, looking momentarily exhausted. 

“I owe her a favor,” he admitted, voice flat now. “So you can ask me to leave as rudely as you want, but unless I’m leaving with those bones, there’s nothing you can do to me that’ll be worth whatever happens if I leave without them. I don’t understand why — They’re bones. They’re just pinche bones. And I — I want to go home. So, just… Please. Okay? Por favor dámelos a mí.” 

The man was right, in a way.  Leah didn’t want Regan to come.  Not until she was ready for her, anyway.   Not until she had back up, or until Regan was willing to trade one skull for another.  It was an oversight not to expect her to act so swiftly.

“If you owe her a favor than fulfill another one.  There are ways you can get around favors!  Think of how she worded the request… Think of…” This was not working.  Asking nicely wasn’t getting this stranger out of the library any quicker than staring at him would have.  And while it was perfectly clear now that he was obligated by a favor to Regan, she was determined not to go down without a fight.  She cared about Regan too much to give up her only leverage so easily.  “They’re bones that could save her life.  You can keep dismissing them as just bones but it just shows how ignorant you are to the situation.  And that’s exactly why I can’t give them to you.” She swallowed, staring at the man with flared nostrils.  She looked him up and down and then, much too quickly for human comfort, absorbed a good amount of his body heat.  She raised her eyebrows quickly, pursing her lips.  “I’m normally not so… cold to my patrons, but you understand, I’m sure.”

Emilio rolled his eyes at the suggestions. They weren’t bad ones, really — he’d utilized the idea of loopholes with the deal with Levi more than once — but he was far too drunk to try to think of any kind of way around them now. And he shouldn’t have to. Handing over some dusty bones to a stranger so that he could take them to a banshee who really wanted them should have been a goddamn no brainer, but Leah Ramirez was stubborn. 

“Bones aren’t going to save anyone’s life,” he snapped. The anger was a familiar thing. If he weren’t so irritated, he might have been grateful to her for drawing it out of him. “Christ, this is — This is stupid. If you won’t give them to me, I’m going to have to take them. I tried to be nice. I tried.” He took a step forward, clumsy and unsteady, but determined all the same. But… something shifted. A sudden cold pierced through him, sending a shiver down his spine. It wasn’t hard to figure out what was happening; not when she practically told him. Gritting his teeth against the newfound cold and hating the way it was attempting to combat his buzz, he shot her a dark look. “Me estás matando,” he said lowly. “You want to save her life? You’re going to cost me mine. Is that a trade you can live with? I go back to her without those bones, and what do you think happens to me?” 

He didn’t think it was true. Nothing he knew about Regan suggested she’d kill him intentionally, and while the promise he’d made to her would have dire consequences if broken, he was only meant to protect her and the coyote bones. Not bringing these specific bones back to her wouldn’t break that promise, he didn’t think, and if it did, it wouldn’t break it significantly enough to inspire anything deadly to happen to him. The worst he might face was another coyote attack or another scream, but he doubted either would prove fatal. But… Leah didn’t know that. Leah didn’t know the specifics of the bind tying him to Regan. He wasn’t even sure if she knew precisely how Regan was acting at the moment. He was hoping her conscience would kick in here, hoping she’d take pity on his situation and just… give him what he came for. If she didn’t, he’d still do his damndest to take it by force, but his chances felt a lot slimmer now that he knew the kind of (literal) heat she was packing. Slimmer still with the alcohol still buzzing through him. 

He wanted to do this the easy way. He wanted to finish here so he could go home and crawl back into his grief-filled haze. He wanted a lot of things he knew he probably wouldn’t get. 

“She- she wouldn’t.  She wouldn’t, not even like this”.  But Leah knew that there was a chance that the man was right.  She didn’t even know what like this was, how was she so sure this thing inside her wouldn’t turn her into a murderer as well.  Hell, Leah was willing to couch surf for the time being just to avoid that fate herself.  She closed her eyes, frustrated, and let out a breath through her nose.  Slowly and reluctantly, she gave him his heat back. “I don’t want you to be hurt. I don’t… people being hurt is exactly what I’m trying to prevent.”  

She took a step backward and looked down at the skull, safe and snug in it’s shelf.   Tears filled her eyes as she looked it over, knowing the jig was up.  She couldn’t put this man’s life at risk, especially when she had no guarantee that the deer skull would provide any solid leverage, anyway.  After a beat and a shaky breath, she pulled it out and held it in her hands, not yet putting it down or offering it to the man.  “I have a favor to ask if I let you take this”.  Leah thought about the irony of asking someone for a favor who’s own life currently depended on owing someone. . “You have a chance to get close to her when you bring this back, and if I want to help her be who she once was, I need information.  I know you don’t know me from a hole in the wall.  You might not even know her either.  But any information  I can get- especially about any coyote skull she might be speaking to… it could help.  If you’d consider… she’d end up being very grateful if you helped bring her back, so…” She put the skull on the desk and shoved her hands into her pockets, ducking her head to catch his eyes.  “Please”. 

“How sure are you?” Emilio challenged, hoping the bluff would hold. And it seemed to. He saw the emotions dance across her face — reluctance, guilt, uncertainty — and the warmth rushed back into his bones. The way his shoulders slumped as it happened was real relief, not a show; he hadn’t been sure the play would work, and he hadn’t been sure what his next move would have been if it hadn’t. He was too drunk to fight even a baseline human with confidence that he’d come out on top, much less someone with whatever capability she had. “Believe it or not, that’s what I came here trying to prevent, too.” He wouldn’t have come if not for the way Regan asked it. You don’t want me to be the one to do it. Even as drunk as he was, he knew a threat when he saw one. 

He watched the way she stepped back, watched her bend down to fetch the skull. Another surge of relief washed over him, and he closed his eyes for a moment. Stuffing his hands into his pockets as she spoke, he fiddled with their contents — the blades, the weaponry, the bottle — and waited for her to get to the point and hand him the damn skull so he could go home. Suspicion stood the hairs on the back of his neck on end, and he tensed. “Doing favors for people is how I ended up fetching skulls from librarians two bottles deep,” he pointed out, but after a careful moment, he shrugged. “I’m not promising anything,” he said carefully. “I’ll try to find out what I can. But… I wouldn’t get my hopes up. Think she sees me as more of a dog than a business partner.” He took the skull quickly, before she could change her mind, and stuffed it under his jacket. Regan could complain about the rough treatment if she wanted, but he was far too drunk to be gentle. 

It wasn’t a promise.  Hell, it wasn’t even a hope, but at least it was an attempt.  An attempt was all Leah could ask for, she supposed, because the situation was way more tricky and nuanced than she first understood.  And if he wasn’t able to get anything, Leah would have to resort to plan B.  To going back to Regan’s when she least suspected it and grabbing the coyote skull herself.  There were plenty of places it could be, but her yard was always littered with bones.  Was it possible she’d let it rest there at night?   Would she be so careless with it? It wasn’t an ideal plan, and the fact she got away unscathed the first time was probably a testament to the fact that she shouldn’t press her luck, but she couldn’t just sit by and watch Regan be destroyed from the inside out.  Not after all she’d been through.  Not after all the work she’d done.  She’d need a getaway driver- preferably someone who had no idea what she was doing.

But she could think about that later.  For now, she watched as the man- God, she didn’t even know his name, stuffed the skull under his jacket haphazardly.  She licked her lips, uttering her next words before she had the chance to stop herself.  “There’s a vial of phoenix tears in it for you if you get me something worthwhile.  Don’t ask me where I got them.”  It wouldn’t be obvious where she got them, right?  

It was clear that the librarian cared about Regan. That was probably why she’d sent Emilio in her stead, even if she’d used the threats as a front for it. He’d seen glimpses of the real Regan peek through when she’d dragged him to Kaden’s, seen how distressed she became when whatever the thing possessing her was went to war with whatever she was without it. Emilio didn’t know her outside of what she was now, didn’t know what she was like when she wasn’t like this, but Kaden and Ari both seemed to believe that it was different enough to warrant suspicion that an outside force was responsible. Leah, too, seemed inclined to agree. And… maybe underneath all the grief and anger and whiskey in his system now, there was some part of Emilio that was sympathetic to that plight. A person deserved a chance to be who they were. Not who someone or something else turned them into.

The forest road was alive with the subtle rustling and animal calls of spring as Adam skinned a large Torple that’d shuffled onto the Vural’s property, instinctually drawn by the taste of spellcraft that practically saturated the area. The Hunter supposed such predators were a hazard of having so much mojo concentrated in one place. Being a muggle himself, Adam wasn’t in much danger from these lumbering magic-eating worms, but the Hunter felt it behooved him to quietly take care of threats to his significant other’s family. 

The Torple looked like the big-mouthed lovechild of a naked mole-rat and an earthworm with massive human teeth. Even seated on a hefty moss-covered rock, Adam was barely taller than the corpulent segmented creature. It’s webbed limbs were spindly in comparison to its body while its enormous yet unsettlingly humanoid mouth made it a wonder the Torple could move at all. It jaws were immovable once latched on, but it was the thick glistening layer of magic negating mucus covering the magivore that made Adam preemptively take a machete to it outside the boundary of his hostesses’ wards, lest its mere presence unravel them. 

Adam worked a curved ulu knife down the dead Torples’ sides, scraping the anti-magic slime off with the skinning blade and scooping it into nearby barrels. He vaguely felt Leah’s approach before he heard her footsteps, the icy-heat of her paranormal presence growing stronger as she approached. Once he caught sight of the familiar face, the Hunter took his hand  off the handle of a hidden blade and got back to scraping Torple slime. 

“Hey Library Warrior, could I have a minute? I need to ask you about something.” 

Having Bea back in town felt like relief.  When she died, Leah had been so caught off guard that she was always waiting for the other shoe to drop now that she was back to life.  At any given moment, she expected another phone call from Nell or Felix or anyone telling her that it happened again, that there was no way to fix it this time.  And New York felt so tauntingly far away, especially to someone who had barely ever left White Crest.  And so the news that her best friend was coming back to town made the tension ease from her neck- had she been holding her shoulders that tight the whole time she’d been away?

Maybe she had been spending too much time at the Vural Sister’s house that weekend (to be fair, one-third of the sister trio would have said any time Leah spent there was too much, but that’s besides the point), but for the tension to truly escape her, she need some real, tangible time with her friend. 

While Bea was busy inside cooking, Leah chose to explore the property outside, eager to soak up some sun and enjoy the chill of winter finally breaking.  She grimaced when she happened upon Adam, and watched him with an unamused expression.  It was kind of easy to ignore that he was a hunter, most of the time, but not when he was slicing something up right in front of her.  She let out a breath when he called out to her, sitting on her hip.

“What’s up?”, she asked.  She was sure he was just curious about a book, or something- maybe he lost his copy of Green Eggs and Ham.

“What is that there?” she asked, gesturing to the creature he was scraping.  Damn her and her innate curiosity and thirst for knowledge.

“I need to ask you about Phoenixs,” Adam replied with the blunt directness that frequently came when one was focused on multiple tasks at once. “There is a fire chicken that’s gone supernova in a valley. Luce is like...a fire scientist but she isn’t sure what would make em go..” Adam made a sound in his throat evocative of an explosion. I was wondering if you’d heard of anything like that,” the Hunter asked of the Not-Spriggan. 

Adam patted the enormous human-mouthed earthworm with a gloved hand as he scrapped more slime from the corpse into a bucket. “This is a Torple, they hunt people who do magic,” Adam supplied. “The Vural place is kinna a beacon with the Hogwarts stuff going on.” 

Leah felt her eyebrows furrow at Adam’s statement- both at the boldness with which he said it, and the statement itself.  She felt heat rise to her cheeks- did he know about her?  Was the knife he held over the creature actually intended for her- her tears or information or life? But no, Nell wouldn’t let that happen, right?  Nell would have at least warned her if he found out.   She felt herself visibly relax when he explained more, swallowing before she responded.  “Luce told me about this, but… what makes you think I know anything about phoenixes?”, she asked, trying to remain stoic and unblinking.  “They’re just about the rarest known creatures- information is pretty rare on them.”  The last time they spoke on the subject, Adam himself had thought phoenixes only ever spent time in their firestate, which was laughable, at best.  “You want to explode them?  I don’t think Luce is down with that idea. And neither am I, if you’re taking my help.  You need to find a way to cure them, not kill them.”  Killing the corrupted phoenix would be very, very easy.  Adam could take notes from Dorothy and the Wicked Witch of the West, if he wanted to be cruel like hunters tended to be.  

She pressed her lips together, unable to look at the slaughtered earthworm for too long.  Torples.  She’d heard of them, but not a ton.  She’d have to see if they had anything written up on them when she went home later tonight.  “Well- it’s good that you got it, then”, she said with an awkward nod, glancing at the bucket.  “Is the slime useful, or something?”

“Because you’re like... a supernatural librarian lady,” Adam pointed out as if this somehow gave Leah some form of nerd-omniscience. “I figured that you’d be a person to ask about something that rare y’know?”

Leah seemed to misinterpreted his amazing sound effects. “Hey hey hey,” Adam exclaimed with a note of petulance, holding up his slimy free hand in a staying gesture. “Look, that Phoenix was already exploding when we found it ok,” he asserted with boyish pique. “What I mean is that I was wondering if you knew how we could switch them into I dunno... unexplode mode, like a song, some herbs they like, an off button, we’ll take anything.” 

Adam went back to driving his blade into the annelid’s side, exposing the yellowish nerve cords beneath its ridged skin. “It interferes with magic,” he explained. “Honestly, because of how many damn Chickcharneys there are around here, I end up dunking alotta people in this slime to try and bounce the Chickcharney curse off them.” Adam chose not to mention the part where he’d erased a wizards wards with this slime and accidentally become an accessory to murder. 

Leah let out a slow breath, watching Adam carefully.  He wasn’t… wrong.  But what were the ethical implications involved with helping a hunter learn about one of the rarest, most vulnerable species that existed? 

What were they if she let someone like Adam try to figure it out on his own?

She rolled her eyes at his defense, but held her hands up in apology.  “Sorry- I shouldn’t have jumped to conclusions.”  Even though it was so hard not to with a hunter. She walked closer to him as she continued.  “I told Luce that I have an idea of how the phoenix got so out of control, but up until now, I thought it was only a myth.”  She paused- could she really trust him?  When she thought about it, she wasn’t sure, but maybe it didn’t matter.  What difference would it make if Luce and Adam were working together in this?  One way or another, Adam was going to find out.  Better it be out of the horse’s mouth.  

“We call them corrupted- it means that their ashes were on corrupted ground when they were reborn.  Sometimes the corruption happens right away, and other times the phoenix could be well into adulthood, with a life and a family before it happens.  There are no warning signs, either.   I don’t… I still haven’t found a cure in my research, but…”  She took a deep breath before continuing, and her next words came out faster than she intended.  “If this phoenix doesn’t survive…whatever you end up doing... the best way to help them in the next life is to keep their ashes somewhere safe and sacred.”

At that imagery, Leah couldn’t help but crack a smile.  “Are you telling me you make a habit out of performing Torple Slime Baptisms, so to speak?”

The palpable feelings of otherness intensified as Leah got closer, there’d been a time when Adam would have immediately gone into fight or flight mode when his Hunter senses reacted. But in White Crest he’d had to acclimate. That conditioning was an asset when hunting alghoul out in the sticks, but here it could end up him going all kill-zone on a librarian. 

Adam paused his gory worm skinning and listened to Leah as she spoke. He noticed the use of the word ‘we’ but kept silent and impassive during the explanation. It turned out that Luce had already tapped Leah on this matter, which was unsurprising. But while he’d hadn’t doubted that she was knowledgeable, Adam’d already suspected that Ramirez wasn’t your average bibliophile, but she knew even legends of the legend. 

“We ….as in the Maine librarian’s union?”  Adam’s question was playfully phrased. There were many species, secret societies, and so on that did not appreciate their ways being pried into, and Adam didn’t want to start shit with the one person who seemed to have solid intel on Chernobyl phoenix. 

“I would rather they survive,” Adam assured. “At the end of the day I’ll do what it takes to protect civilians, but from what you’ve said it sounds like this is some demon radiation juju that they didn’t have any say in.” 

Adam inhaled. “But, if it does come to that, has your research given you any idea of a holy place that’d work for keeping the ashes safe? Maybe some place sacred to uh...I don’t know if Phoenixes worship any gods,” he admitted. “But maybe somewhere that means alot to their culture?”

The unexpected jocularity of the question, from Leah especially, took Adam openly off-guard, teasing a sheepish smile from him. “Uh yeah actually,” he admitted while scrapping some more slime off the giant mage-eater worm into a bucket. “It’s not glamorous and the clients always hate it, but the Torple-dunkage sometimes works for really minor stuff like that.”

Leah blanched, blinking at Adam’s question.  Had she been so careless to say we?  “I uh… we as in, me.  Of course. Me,us.  And the other people who are interested in supernatural history.”  She swallowed, unsure if Adam were picking up on her status as a phoenix or her status as a scribe.  Possibly both, right?  This close, he had to be having those creepy senses that she wasn’t as human as she appeared.  Either way, it was bad news.  

“I’d rather that too, but I don’t think it’s unrealistic to prepare for the worst, either.” Something Adam said struck a chord in Leah, and she couldn’t stop herself before she commented.  “I mean, that’s true of most supernatural creatures though, isn’t it?  Born or bitten, werewolves, zombies, and vampires didn’t have a say in.  Do you grant them the same courtesy when they’re out of control?”

“I know a few places that could work”, she said, crossing her arms over her chest.  Whether she would tell Adam unless he absolutely needed them- that was another story.  “Not necessarily a culture to be had per say.  Because of their rarity and ability to blend in, it’s not often a phoenix ever meets another like them in their lifetime.”  She and her family were so incredibly lucky to have each other to love; to grow and learn from when they were the most vulnerable.  “I...know a family that would take care of the baby once they’re reborn, too, so-... if it comes to that, it’ll be all covered.”   

Leah let herself get a good look at the creature, taking as many mental notes as she could to write down later.  Sometimes Adam wasn’t as bad as he seemed.  “I think most people would be pissed if you dunked them into a baby pool of slime and sludge.  I certainly would.”

“It depends,” Adam answered without any attempt at dissemblance. “Gotta measure their life against the lives of those they’d kill when outta control,” the Hunter continued as he got down from the rock he’d been perched on to move his flaying blade to the Torple’s lower portion. “Most humans just get ripped in half if they meet a vamp that's gone all hunger frenzy, but I was born strong enough to match them,” he reasoned. “In the ideal scenario I wrestle the vamp or whatever off the civilian and get them to snap out of it.” 

Adam took the long strip of worm skin over to a tree and slung it over one of the branches to dry in the sunshine. “But uh, reality doesn’t give ideal scenarios most of the time y’know? Sometimes you have to make a split-second judgement or alotta people die,” the Hunter admitted. “ But yeah, I guess the best answer I can give you is that I try.” 

“That uh...sounds pretty lonely, being all human torchy and not having anything to relate to what the hell is going on,” Adam admitted, as he walked back to the Torple corpse. “Do you do the supernatural foster care stuff alot Leah?” 

Adam rolled his eyes amiably at the resistance to necessary alien-worm slime dunking. “Hey  Chick-a-Curses are worse though. Like all of their hexes are bad, but the one your head twists backwards...gah!  I either have to bribe a witch to visit their hospital room and decurse them, or I have to sneak in and pour worm slime over some poor bastard in a hospital bed and hope it works.” 

“Most vamps get stabbed if they meet an egotistical hunter”, Leah countered immediately.  “I appreciate your attempt to be civil in the way you handle things, but I don’t find the same to be true for most hunters.”  She couldn’t help but get into these debates with the hunters in her life, and if she were being honest, she didn’t really tire of them, either.

“It’s not all bad.  I know you assumed at first that they’re literal chickens, but like I said- phoenixes spend most of their time looking like humans.  And while a lot of them end up growing up not knowing what they are until they sneeze some smoke or look for a reason feathers are popping out of their foreheads, they’re not lost for companionship.  I’ve even heard tell of families who are able to stay together throughout their cyclical lives, raising each other generation after generation.  This is incredibly rare, of course.”

She blanched at Adam’s next question, opening her mouth and closing it.  She thought of the golden goose egg, still safely incubating in her basement, surely ready to hatch at any moment.  “I… how did you know I meant myself?”

Leah couldn’t help but laugh at his anecdotes, no matter how much she wanted to disavow them for being those of a hunter.  “That doesn’t sound like a fun way to wake up- are witches so untrustworthy of you that they don’t trust that your slime is for good?”

Adam rolled his eyes with a smirk. “Y’know, if I made the same argument in reverse about ‘most vamps’ being violent and evil you’d call me out for generalizing and being a bigot Ramirez,” he pointed out. 

Adam decided not to point out the fact that statistically the deaths on humans at the hands of vampires were uncountable orders of magnitude greater than vampires dying to Hunters. But frankly, it was pretty fucking obvious that Leah considered one supernatural life precious, but human lives were just numbers to her, devoid of emotional significance unless she knew them personally. 

It’s pointless to argue with people like that. 

“You don’t know ‘most Hunters’ Leah, not even close,” Adam pointed out bluntly, “Look Ramirez you hate people like me for reasons that are obviously personal. I’m fine with that.” the footballer said with a shrug of his broad shoulders, as if he felt this truce of hate sufficient. “It’s chill. 

Despite the slip into harsh words, Adam continued to listen patiently to the talk of phoenixes, families, and cycles of rebirth. It was all pretty surreal honestly. What would it be like to be with his family across a thousand lives over and over?

He wouldn’t know. Adam had grown up being raised with the knowledge that every moment with his family was precious, that he needed to learn how to survive on his own before they fell one by one in the line of duty. 

Adam hacked into the Torple with an unnecessary force as his chest constricted. 

“Do they line...remember each other each rebirth? Or are they all new different people each time?”

Leah’s unexpected motion of surprise caused Adam’s attention to flick to her instinctively, but her following question dispelled the moment of tenseness. “I didn’t,” he admitted. “I more meant that you seemed to already have homes in mind as if you were a supernatural social worker or somethin.” 

“You….really down to be a fire mom Leah?”

Adam considered Leah’s question for a moment. “I think that magic, like all resources, should be used for the betterment of society,” Adam said, hinting at a certain level of utopianism behind the memes and crass commentary. “But I can’t force everyone to think that way. If I’m going to bug a busy sorceress to leave her research to cure some rando she doesn’t know, I need to be able to pay her. Just how it is.’ 

Leah rolled her eyes, crossing her arms over her chest.  Adam was ignoring the fact that the violence that came from vampires was out of their control, and many of the deaths that came from them were for a need to survive.  Hunters, however, had plenty of control over what they did, and though there were a few gentle ones like Adam or Kaden, most would do what they did for sport, if given the chance.

“Neither do you”, she shot back.  And he’d never had to fear them, either.  She’d read countless stories about the atrocities they’d committed, and so excuse her if she didn’t trust a hunter as far as she could through them.

Again, his questions about phoenixes gave her pause.  Was this information relevant?  “It depends”, she explained.  “Not always concrete memories that you or I might have from last week or last year, but it’s more like… glimpses or feelings.  Sometimes even that doesn’t pop up right away, either.  Most phoenixes end up with a touchstone through most of their lives to help them connect.”  The touchstones didn’t always work.  She felt an invisible buzzing pull from the stone around her neck, taunting and teasing.  

She blanched at his elaboration, embarrassed that she’d assumed so quickly.  She didn’t hate the idea of that type of job, if she were being honest- supernatural social work sounded extremely fulfilling.  “Maybe I am on the side”, she teased.

“If it came down to it, yes.  But even if I couldn’t, there are arrangements I could make, if I’m being completely transparent.  Do you think you’d do the same thing, if you needed to?”

“I agree- but sometimes an idea like that is hard, because the idea of a better society can be so subjective and even divisive, you know?  What you and I think might be wonderful isn’t going to be the same as Joe who works at Excalibur.”  It was true,  Excalibur Joe had told her more than once that he thought the world would be better off without traffic lights.  “That’s not to say I don’t think betterment can happen- it’s just that the hard part is figuring out exactly what that betterment is for everyone.”

“You're right,” Adam allowed with the rueful triumph of someone who felt pain after a headbutt but took satisfaction in his opponent getting the worst of it. 

“Hmmm that sucks,” Adam mused as Leah explained firebird memories. “Guess that’s why we haven’t just solved all history questions with a few Phoenix interviews,” he reasoned.

Adam was quiet for a time as he flayed off more worm skin and yellow cutaneous tissues. “Maybe that’s better though,” he admitted after a while. “Dealing with one lifetime of going through shit is hard enough to deal with,” said the young man who trained and exercised himself to exhaustion in order to sleep. “Having to remember like other lives of horrible crap too? Don't think I could deal with it, i’d completely lose it.” 

Well ok, lose it sooner than most Hunters, Adam admitted to himself, knowing that after a time the human brain can only see so much before you start to break inside. 

“I think you’d do good at it,” Adam noted, meeting Leah’s joke with earnestness. “A foster advocate for kids i mean.” 

“Mhm. My parents adopted Hunters who were orphaned or whatnot, and I’d do the same,” Adam explained, to the question of whether he’d adopt as if there were only one answer. “Whether I take in kids or am a father, I’ll teach em how to survive,” said the Hunter, something in his tone suggesting this grim promise was the purest expression of parental love. 

“People are never going to agree on betterment,” asserted the young man born into a world of war with a shrug. “We just gotta decide what parts of our ideal world we have to get by force,”  and when talking things out is better,” said Adam. 

Leah had her mouth open, ready and willing to argue more, when Adam said that she was right.  She closed her mouth, sending him a resolute nod.  She sure was.   If only it were this easy to convince Kaden.

“Maybe, but I think it’s more the fact that they’re so rare.  Knowledge about them might even be scarce on purpose, in order to protect them.”  Did Adam know about the healing tears? Would he understand why they needed protection?  “Perhaps every life doesn’t have to be horrible, though.  It must be torture to know you’ve lived, say… three or four lifetimes before but have no idea about everything you learned throughout them”.

She smiled sheepishly at his compliment, pressing her lips together in earnest.  “Thank you”, she started.  “It means a lot.”

Adam raising children into more hunters was decidedly not what Leah was talking about, but his comments about his parents intrigued her.  “You had a lot of adopted siblings growing up, then?”  She didn’t want to delve into what he might have meant by ‘teach them how to survive’.

“I guess I just wonder who gets to decide”, she mused, turning back toward the house as she heard her name called in the distance. “My ideal would be to not have to do it by force, but I suppose that’s why Luce insists I’m an optimist.” She let out a breath, pressing her lips together in a smile.  “Did you have any other questions… about phoenixes?”

Adam nodded. “I mean I have alot of family in general like siblings, cousins, so on. As a kid it didn’t make much difference which ones had my blood or not. Some little Hunters were adopted fully, others just came to live with us and be trained for a few years,” the Hunter shrugged, indicating perhaps that his household had been a lively place full of both laughter and endless preparations for war. 

“That’s always the trick huh,” Adam affirmed with a grimace. “With Democracy you just get mob rule and decisions made without long term planning. With some elite body you get corruption and unaccountability,” the frat boy noted with a salience his professors would never hear him express in class. “I don’t think anybody’s solved that question yet.” 

Adam glanced toward the house and looked back to Leah, brown eyes intent for a time, hands dripping with the slime and blood of the massive witcheater.