I do not own TMI or any of the characters (sadly)

Jace stood with Alec and Isabelle on the dance floor of Pandemonium. Alec with sticking close to him, waiting for him to make a move, but Izzy had a thought process of her own. She was floating around the room, walking gracefully in her floor-length white dress. From here, Jace could see the ruby pendant she was wearing around her neck, bright red and bold, enticing to most people, even himself.

"Jace," Alec said in his ear. He was looking at the door. He followed his line of sight and saw what they had been waiting for.

The Eidolon demon stood in the doorway, the bouncer blocking his way into the club. Jace could see them fighting about the wood spear he had, the bouncer not wanting to let him in with it. The people behind him were getting jittery, bouncing around trying to see what the hold-up was. Abruptly, the bouncer moved aside and let the boy in.

"Iz!" Jace called, trying to get her attention from across the room. She looked up and tried to locate him. She saw his blue hair shine in the light of the club and started walking in his general direction. As she got into view, the demon looked straight at her with a look of desire. Jace saw Isabelle give him one of her most sultry stares, and then beckoned for him to follow her into the storage room.

"Now?" Alec asked.

"Now," Jace replied as he walked across the room, blending in with the shadows. Alec trailed him closely as they saw the demon follow Iz through the door that said NO ADMITTANCE. They closed the distance to the room and slid in through the door.

The two boys walked in and saw the demon get a sudden look of understanding on his face, just as Isabelle flicked her wrist, tightening the grip of her whip around his ankles. She smiled a devilish smile. "He's all yours, boys," she said when she saw them.

Jace laughed a low, throaty laugh, then picked him up and threw him against the concrete pillar as Alec tied his hands with wire behind him. Jace walked around the pillar into the blue-haired boy's view. "So," he said, "are there any more with you?"

The boy fought his restraints slightly. "Any other what?" he answered defiantly.

Jace sighed inwardly. "Come on now," he began as he slowly lifted his arms letting his sleeves fall past his wrists, showing off some of his runes. "You know what I am."

The boy was fighting with himself. "Shadowhunter," he spat indignantly.

Jace grinned largely. "Got you," he declared.

Iz laughed at the demon's face when he realized what he had fallen into.

"So, you still haven't told me if there are any other of your kind with you," Jace pressed.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"He means other demons," Alec explained. "You do know what a demon is, don't you?" The boy fought harder against the wire.

"Demons," Jace emphasized as he led on his rant. "Religiously defined as hell's denizens, the servants of Satan, but understood here, for the purposes of the Clave, to be any malevolent spirit whose origin is outside our own home dimension—"

"That's enough, Jace," Izzy cut in.

"Isabelle's right," Alec stressed. "Nobody here needs a lesson in semantics—or demonology."

Jace just smiled and looked at the boy. "Isabelle and Alec think I talk too much," he said proudly. "Do you think I talk too much?"

The boy didn't respond automatically, but he was still conjuring up an answer to his question. "I could give you information," he insisted suddenly. "I know where Valentine is."

Jace looked back at Alec and raised his eyebrow questioningly. He shrugged back at him. "Valentine is in the ground," Jace declared. "The thing's just toying with us."

Isabelle, sounding tired said, "Kill it, Jace. It's not going to tell us anything."

Jace raised his left hand with his knife in it and started to bring it down toward the demon. "Valentine is back!" he sputtered, while pulling at the wire that held him back. "All the Infernal Worlds know it—I know it—I can tell you where he is—"

Jace felt the anger boil up inside himself. "By the Angel, every time we capture one of you bastards, you claim you know where Valentine is. Well, we know where he is to. He's in hell. And you—" Jace rotated the knife hilt in his hand, "You can join him there."

Jace was about to stab the thing in the chest when a girl cried out, "Stop!" He flung around to find the noise. "You can't do this," she said.

Jace looked around himself; Isabelle and Alec were gawking at the girl in disbelief; the demon hung against his bonds, startled. Jace realized he was weaponless as he had dropped his knife when he had spun to look at the girl.

She must have been a full foot shorter than Jace, insanely short, but her features made up for the rest of her height. She had hair the color of fire, the curls it hung in made it look even more like flames dancing around the night. Her eyes were a bright green, showing her emotion as the dim light glittered brilliantly off of them. He skin was pale, a creamy peach tone. She was slight, but she looked like she might take on the three of them and the demon and still live to tell the tale.

As Jace was taking this all in, Alec regained some of his composure. "What's this?" he asked, looking from the girl to Isabelle and Jace, almost expecting an answer from them.

"It's a girl," Jace taunted. "Surely you've seen girls before, Alec. Your sister Isabelle is one." This earned him a scolding look at his back from Alec as he stepped closer to the girl. "A mundie girl," he mused. "And she can see us."

"Of course I can see you," she said. "I'm not blind, you know."

"Oh, but you are," Jace explained as he bent down to pick up the knife where it had landed on the concrete floor. "You just don't know it." He stood up and turned to face her. "You'd better get out of here, if you know what's good for you," he warned.

"I'm not going anywhere," she protested. "If I do, you'll kill him." She motioned toward the demon.

"That's true," Jace confirmed as he spun the knife around in his hand. "What do you care if I kill him or not?"

"Be-because—," she faltered. "You can't just go around killing people."

"You're right," Jace said, giving acknowledgment to the point she had made, "but that is not a person, little girl. It may look like a person and talk like a person and maybe even bleed like a person. But it's a monster."

"Jace," Isabelle warned. "That's enough."

The girl backed away from them slowly. "You're crazy," she assured herself. "I've called the police, you know. They'll be here any second."

Alec answered that one. "She's lying," he said, but he doubted himself. "Jace, do you—"

Right then, the demon launched himself at Jace with a fierce cry, tearing himself free from the wire. The collapsed onto the ground in a heap, the demon clawing at Jace while Jace scrambled frantically to get hold of the knife. They stopped rolling and the demon ended up on Jace's chest. The demon slashed at his face, but Jace took the blow on his arm instead, feeling the skin being raked across, seriously bleeding. The demon lunged at Jace again, but this time, Isabelle flicked her wrist and brought her whip down on his back. He screamed and fell off Jace's chest.

Jace rolled over and plunged the blade of his knife deep into the demon's chest. Black blood spurted from the wound. It's back arched and his body contorted into odd poses. Jace slowly stood up. He looked down disgustedly at the twitching body of the demon and pulled his knife out, not wanting it to be contaminated further by sitting in its dying body.

The demon's eyes flitted open, fixating them on Jace. "So be it. The Forsaken will take you all." He hissed between his teeth.

Jace growled at it as it slowly died and folded in on itself, disappearing gradually.

The girl, who had somehow fallen in the corner, scrambled up and began to back toward the door. None of the shadowhunters noticed. Alec had come closer to Jace and was holding his arm carefully, pulling the sleeve back to look at the wound closer. Isabelle quickly moved to the door as the girl tried to make a run for it. She twitched her whip toward the girl, wrapping it around her wrist and held it tightly. The girl gasped involuntarily.

"Stupid little mundie," Isabelle snarled. "You could have gotten Jace killed."

"He's crazy," she defended, while trying to pull her wrist away. "You're all crazy. What do you think you are, vigilante killers? The police—"

Jace cut her off. "The police aren't usually interested unless you can produce a body."He made his way across the room, gingerly holding his arm, while Alec sulked after him. The girl looked at the spot where Jace had stabbed the demon with a slightly shocked look on her face. The floor was completely bare.

"They return to their home dimensions when they die," Jace explained, "In case you were wondering."

"Jace," Alec warned. "Be careful."

Jace answered him indifferently. "She can see us, Alec. She already knows too much."

"So what do you want me to do with her?" Isabelle urged.

"Let her go." Isabelle looked at him with an almost angry look. Jace was fascinated with this girl. It didn't make any sense to him why he was, he only knew that he would not let anything happen to her until he knew what was so different about her. Isabelle let her whip slide down the girl's wrist.

"Maybe we should bring her back with us," Alec suggested. "I bet Hodge would like to talk to her."

"No way are we bringing her to the Institute," Isabelle fought. "She's a mundie."

"Or is she?" Jace mused softly. He walked slightly closer to the girl, watching her reaction. "Have you had dealings with demons, little girl? Walked with warlocks, talked with the Night Children? Have you—"

"My name is not 'little girl,'" she interrupted, frustrated. "And I have no idea what you're talking about. I don't believe in—in demons, or whatever you—," she stuttered as two more people walked into the closet.

"Clary?" the boy standing next to the bouncer asked, cutting her off efficiently. "Are you okay? Are you in here by yourself? What happened to the guys—you know, the ones with the knives?" he questioned.

She just stared at him with wide eyes, and then glanced behind herself to where Jace, Alec, and Isabelle were all standing. Jace quirked up the side of his mouth and have her a shrug, trying to convey that this, in fact, was normal. To his surprise, she went along with it. She turned back toward the two mundanes.

"I thought they went in here," she concluded lamely. "But I guess they didn't. I'm sorry." She looked from one person to the other. "It was a mistake." The bouncer sighed and rolled his eyes as he walked out and the mundie boy just looked at the girl, not entirely believing her.

Beside Jace, he heard Isabelle giggle.

The girl walked out of the closet with her friend, leaving Jace, Alec, and Isabelle alone, and leaving Jace, more than anything, wanting to follow that red-headed girl to figure out what she really was.

First Chapter, as follows in the book. Review if you like it, review if you don't. Let me know what you like, what you don't and how i can make it better in any way. I'll be working on the next couple chapters tomorrow. The beginning of the next one should include more dialogue that's not actually in the book, but i couldn't exactly do that with this chapter.

Thanks!

~Melissa