I felt like a loser. It was a Friday night and here I was, shelving books at a second hand bookstore that smelled like a musty library and cat pee. I heaved myself up on the rickety ladder with some trepidation, trying not to let the books in my other arm topple ten feet down to the floor. The dangers of such a narrow store involved very high shelves, and were increased when the books themselves were heavy and old. I glanced at what had to be a seventy year old anthology of English literature. It weighed like five pounds.

The weather outside was as dreary as it had been five hours ago, the only difference being that the sun was down now. It was still drizzling and it was still cold. This was not what it was usually like in October in Los Angeles, and we'd all bundled up accordingly- except for Landon, whom we suspect is a werewolf and seems to run anywhere from four to five degrees hotter than an average human. The cold didn't bother him. I was very jealous of this trait, even though I preferred fall and winter to spring and summer. I jumped the last few rungs of the ladder and peered outside the front window. It was glazed with water and my breath fogged it up. Across the street, I could see the little cafes were just closing up. It had to be at least ten then. There were bars that stayed open a lot later, but they weren't necessarily in a part of town that you wanted to go to. I bundled my blond hair back into a haphazard bun.

Wearily, I tallied up the day's sales and realized how pointless it was staying open on Friday when we only made about fifty bucks anyway. I wasn't the owner, but I knew if I brought it up then we'd probably be closed on Friday. Pulp- the store- is basically run like a very calm commune. If someone can't come in, no one else panics unless there's really a reason to panic- once David, the owner, got mugged and sipped by a vampire, so then we panicked- and the place just closes for a couple of hours. No, that's not a practical way to run a business, but clearly something worked because during the week the place was hopping. All the writers and poets and even some performance artists from the nearby colleges frequented the place.

I should have gone to college. Now I was about three years past twenty-one and feeling distinctly weary of the idea. I had the brain, but unfortunately, when you are also extremely psychic, it makes being around large groups of people intensely difficult. Or it does for me, anyway.

I'm not a psychic in the usual sense; I'm what the other psychics derisively call a manipulator... like what they do isn't manipulative anyway. I've heard the less condescending term is "shadow walker." I can flit in and out of dreams. That's what I'm best at. It's also why I happen to be a chronic insomniac, addicted to coffee and the reason why I work nights whenever possible. I have trappings of the other psychic abilities, but largely I can fix your dreams to my liking. If I like you, that's good. If I don't like you, then it's not so good. Luckily, I have to know you relatively well to do this. Spirits also find their way to me, sometimes. I can do this really cool thing that's like channeling, only it's not, not strictly speaking.

Think of what you can do to an ex-boyfriend with those talents. I had done it. I still didn't think he was sleeping properly, but it wasn't as though I checked up on him all the time.

Point being, the other psychics don't like manipulators very much. I feel like they feel like we cheat. The demons, on the other hand, tend to like us a lot. Mind you, this was all hearsay and theoretical knowledge. I'd had to learn a lot once I figured out how I worked, but since we were apparently so few, I'd never had a teacher. Psychic powers run heavy in my family, but they were more telepathic than anything. My bother has the Second Sight: he sees the angels and demons on this plane. He sees ghosts too. Maybe way back, there was someone who could do what I did, but they were dead by now.

Lost in thought, I either didn't hear the door open, or didn't remember that it should have been locked. Because our building is so old, dating back to the early nineteen hundreds, we only have a back door that now faces a community parking lot. But when I glanced up, there was a very tall, very monochromatic man in front of me. He looked down his nose into my eyes.

"We're closed now," I said blandly. "We closed an hour ago. I thought I'd locked the door." I didn't bother adding an apology, as this man was looking at me with the expression one usually reserved for a slug or a cockroach.

And he was literally almost entirely colorless. His skin was an odd, milky pale tone, and his hair and eyes were so transparently grey they reminded me of a silverfish. Cheekbones jutted from his face, and his nose stuck out like the prow of a ship. He was wearing all black and looked distinctly severe. Our wall sconces flickered very gently when he tapped his fingers along his crossed arms. I blinked, feeling the hairs on the nape of my neck prickle as the lights dimmed, and then returned back to their normal brightness. The mist hadn't seemed to affect him. His clothes didn't even look damp, much less wet.

I stood up as he addressed me. "This is not our concern." That voice made me want to cover my ears- mostly because it was so damn weird. If the absence of sound had a sound, this man's voice would be it. I gaped at him. What the hell did that mean, exactly? "We need the book."

Well, that was helpful. "As you can see, we have lots of books. More than one book."

He barred his teeth. Actually barred his teeth at me, like an angry dog. "Your sarcasm is not appreciated." The nothing man advanced towards me, indicating the book I held in my hands now. It was born of pure habit, holding a book and not knowing what it was. I flinched. Generally speaking, I thought about trying to make him pay until his skin made contact with mine. It was a jolt, that skin. Temperature- dry ice. Texture- dried up vellum or mummies. He took the book as my fingers fell limp. I didn't register that I was hitting the floor until my head slammed into one of the empty bottom shelves.

When I woke up, there were police in the store. Oh hell. I was laying on the cot from the back room as the new kid, Chas, described how he'd found me. That's it, he must have come in to open this morning. I didn't want to open my eyes; I could feel the light pounding on them like miniature hammers. "Look," someone said, "she's coming to." I couldn't help but groan. My arms felt incredibly heavy. Footsteps fell closer to me and I wrenched one eye open. Some cop was looming over me. His eyes were limpid and brown in a prematurely aged face. "Hi," he said gently. "They were about to take you to the hospital. You're Evangeline... Cotillard?"

"Wish I wasn't. I don't need to go," I protested.

"You could have a concussion," the cop pointed out, with good reason.

"No health insurance. Don't want to pay," I croaked.

The cop hesitated. After a minute, he said, "All right. But we can't be held responsible-"

"Fine," I agreed, letting him help prop me up. Everything was blurry.

"I'm Inspector Weiss," the cop told me. "Do you remember anything specific? Chas here found you crumpled on the floor when he came in this morning, with the back door wide open." I frowned. I remembered inventorying the shelves, counting down the drawer...

"Yes," I said finally. "There was a man."

Chas glanced over from the officer he was talking to, I guess to listen to me. He was literally brand new- David had just hired him last week. This was his fourth or fifth day working at Pulp. I felt sorry for him. "A man?" Weiss prodded. He produced a pad of paper from his back pocket and began jotting notes. Jesus, my head hurt. I could do with a shot or five of vodka. The good kind, where the label was written in Cyrillic. Chas strolled over to the two of us, and I gave him a weak grin. He returned it and straightened his rather filthy newspaper boy hat. It was difficult to say what color the fabric was against his brown curls.

I blinked. "He was... like, all one color." Weiss scowled at me, paused in his writing. "I mean, his hair and eyes were gray. His skin was pale, paler than mine." I waggled an arm to demonstrate. I was anemic, so being disgustingly pale came with that territory. "He was wearing all black, and he wasn't very tall. Maybe 5'7 at the most. Elderly-ish." More like ageless gone backwards.

"And he attacked you? Stole something valuable?"

Wasn't this going to be embarrassing. "Er, yeah, he did steal something fairly valuable." I scrunched my face up in concentration. I hadn't paid much attention to what book he'd taken, but at the moment I could recall what it looked like. There was only one book that looked like that in the whole store. "It was a Bible. But not a normal Bible. This might sound dumb, but it was a nineteenth century edition of a sort of... Satanist Bible. I mean, one that supposedly comes from Hell." I was nominally Catholic, but that sounded far-fetched even to me sometimes, and both my sets of grandparents were French Catholics who still attended Mass in Latin. I could tell by the way Weiss was staring at me that he was now factoring in temporary insanity with the concussion. However, Chas looked beyond piqued. Maybe he was another wannabe Satanist. I'd had my fair share of those in here.

Apparently Weiss found me to be in too delicate a state for him to argue my point. "Then he knocked you out?"

Whatever the guy had done to make me pass out, it was definitely paranormal and definitely more in line with my abilities on all planes other than this one. I was not about to tell a Los Angeles police officer this. "We do have some really heavy things in here. I guess he did." I tried my best to look apologetic, and played the hurt woman card to the hilt. It worked, because Weiss nodded sympathetically and folded up his notepad.

"Miss Cotillard, I suggest you close up for the day and head home. We'll be working on this- there's been quite a few, er, book thefts lately. One at the Huntington Library in San Marino, even. We have some reason to believe that the same person was involved in all of them." He looked disconcerted that anyone would be willing to steal an antique book, but there you go. He shook hands with me and I tried smiling at him, although my face muscles were starting to behave like old Play-Doh. The contingent of cops left the store, filing out the back. I'd been out cold for their photos and their evidence gathering. They weren't going to find anything concrete. I shuddered as I thought of the unknown man's skin. I didn't need to be psychic to know he wasn't supposed to be here in my world.

The new kid was leaning against a bookshelf. On closer inspection he wasn't all that much younger than me, though he carried himself more like a high schooler than someone in his twenties. I blew air out from my cheeks, regretting it instantly because it made my head throb all the more. "I believe you," he said. Off my look, he added, "About the book being a Bible from Hell."

Oh boy, here we go. "Right," I said guardedly. I heaved myself up and groped around for my cell phone. "Why?" I was expecting stories about a coven gone awry. Something melodramatic. I was not expecting the next answer.

"Because one of my... friend's friends has another copy."

That was not what I was waiting to hear. I paused, mid-dial, and flipped the little phone closed. Who was I going to call, anyway? Both my parents were dead and my best friend was out of town. "Oh."

"I think my friend," Chas continued, "would like to know about what happened to you."

"Doubt it," I snorted. "Look, kid- Chas. I don't even want to know about what happened to me." I was resisting the flood of memories that was coming back into my nerves, especially the ones concerning the way the lights had flickered when the nothing man had come in. I'd seen a lot in the past few years, but whenever I saw that I was still afraid. I didn't like things that took away light, even if I was, technically, one. The boy fell silent. It was a heavy silence, the kind that was full of thoughts. Against my better judgment, I asked, "Who's your friend and why would he be interested in me?"

Chas grinned. "I can't really tell you why, because we don't know yet, but I can tell you who."

"Who?" I prompted. I'd been around the occult circles here; Pulp carried many books, tomes, and otherwise hard-to-find magical, esoteric and religious volumes. And Chas was smiling like I'd be pleased.

"Constantine. John Constantine," said Chas, in the finest display of hero worship I'd ever come across. I chewed his reply over. On the one hand, Constantine was The Big Gun. There were a few Big Guns here in my town. But he was a Big Gun I'd heard literally tons about. David, for one, was utterly enthralled by his escapades. I'd come to regard Constantine as the kind of Mick Jagger of the west coast occult world, someone I would never meet, nor want to meet, but a man I could admire from afar.

The Big Guns came with Baggage. Loads of it. Constantine's, in particular, was his legion of ghosts- people who'd been killed working with him, being involved with him, and broadly, being around him. I didn't know how the man could stand that.

I'd also heard he was an asshole, but who was I to judge? "Okay..." I said uncertainly, massaging my head.

"You guys could meet at a bar, or somewhere," Chas said helpfully. He really did seem to think that there'd be a point in me meeting his "friend." I thought about that choice in words, smirking a little. Gently, I let myself probe Chas, his aura. It told me nothing specific, but he did have some brand of Second Sight. It wasn't very developed- maybe because he'd just reconciled himself with it, or recognized it for what it was- but it was distinct. That comforted me a little. I sighed because Chas probably meant Midnite's. Anybody worth his psychic salt went there. That was the whole point of getting in- passing a little psychic "test." I'd never been, figuring I'd have no luck if the bouncer wasn't sleeping. But then, I'd never tried. I wondered if I gave off any kind of freaky vibe to Chas, because many other magic practitioners and psychics tended to give me the cold shoulder about it.

That could be because sleep was supposed to be inviolate. It was supposed to be refreshing, and restorative. The idea that someone could literally manipulate it made most people immensely uncomfortable. Sleep was apparently sacrosanct, or something. I wouldn't know; I never got enough of it. The dream walking, shadow walking thing went both ways. Demons, angels, ghosts, other psychics, could all use your head as a sort of telepathic highway. Unfortunately, when I did sleep and dream, it usually involved things to that affect. Things that were none of my business. Lately I'd been seeing a lot of some pretty man in expensive pinstriped suits. I mean, if you could call some rotting green monstrosity who was shaped like a man, a man. I really didn't like him. He was the reason I'd gotten six hours of sleep in the past three days.

Logically, that shouldn't be possible. I should be in the hospital with exhaustion. I should be behaving like a drunk woman. But I wasn't- another of the quirks God had gifted me with, joy.

Being unconscious was actually more restful than sleeping. I hadn't dreamt while I'd been knocked out.

Weakly, I nodded, as softly as possible. I didn't want to disturb the rocks rolling around in my brain. My life needed a little more variety and interest, and apparently I was about to get it. "You mean Midnite's, don't you?"

If he was surprised I knew what it was, he hid it. Sheepishly, with a tone that told me he'd been thinking too much about the topic, "Yup. He's headed there tonight. I mean, in a couple of hours. It's actually pretty late." I glanced outside. He was right; the sun was setting already.

"What time did you get here?" I asked suspiciously. Pulp opened at one in the afternoon on weekdays. Chas had to have gotten here really, really late then. "I won't say anything to David."

He looked down, studying his shoes. "I had a late night driving some people... and some errands to run today. I came in about four. I know I was supposed to be here to open..."

I shrugged. "You'll find it doesn't much matter here. Especially since you and I are the only ones who haven't taken vacations this week. What time is it now?"

"Almost six. I can drive you over." That was nice of him. Nice and far too assuming. But since I had no car and often walked everywhere- my apartment was not at all far from Pulp, either, so the Metro and the buses suited me just fine- I'd pretty much have to let him. "I drive a taxi, so it's kind of... my job?" he supplied. I felt a little better, then.

Tapping my fingers on the counter, which is where my feet had taken me to without my body really admitting it, I nodded again. "Let me change then. I can't go there looking like I've slept in the same clothes for two days, much less with blood on my shirt." I gestured to my wrinkled t-shirt and creased cargo pants. "I keep things in the back- I left a dress here the other night when we had a party. I won't be long."

An hour later we were strolling- well, I was strolling and Chas was trotting- down the steps to Midnite's. I'd passed it so many times during the day it was hard to recognize it. Chas tarried before the foyer, nervously. I muttered under my breath. Don't tell me he couldn't come in. I never needed a wingman like I needed one tonight. The sad part was, I felt like once I was inside my Sight would kick in (as much as it could since that wasn't my thing, per se) and I would know exactly who I was dealing with. Also, John Constantine being described as a tall, lean brunette puffing on cigarettes kind of helped. Chas had elaborated, saying he favored white shirts, black ties and black pants. Interesting guy. I stopped and Chas almost collided into me. "What?" I asked.

Shuffling his hands in his pockets a little, he said, very quietly, "I'm not... I can't..."

"Oh, for Heaven's sake," I snapped. I straightened the straps on my champagne colored dress, which had cost me about two and a half paychecks. It looked it too. I prodded him forward, and when we stepped through the door we were both inundated with red light. The bouncer was black and burly, and he looked like any other bouncer I've ever seen. But instead of motioning to check our I.D.'s he held up a card. The kind of card psychologists used to perform E.S.P. tests, or a Tarot card. I couldn't tell which by the ornate back. I stared at it for a second, thinking, Oh- haven't seen one of these for a really long time... and then I had the image floating in my head. "Rat in a dress," I said confidently.

The bouncer lifted the rope so I could pass through. I waited for Chas. The bouncer held up another card. Poor kid, he goggled at it, then proclaimed, "Rat in a dress." I could see, from my angle, that it wasn't. It was actually The Hanged Man... so the bouncer liked to mix suits. The huge man shook his head. Chas looked over at me apologetically, tossing up his hands.

"I told you," he called, over the growing din of some weird European trance music. Great. I was going into a supernatural rave. I shrugged, not really knowing how to handle the situation other than to keep heading in. "I'll be... outside. Somewhere," Chas concluded lamely, looking extremely irked. I felt like once this bizarre day had ended, I would end up really liking him. He reminded me a lot of my younger brother. I waved to him, took a deep breath, and strode forward.

My first impression was not the best. They had the place all darkened, and there were some strobe lights going off like nobody's business.

Secondly, my Sight was struggling to catch up with everything it was now seeing and hearing. I couldn't imagine what it was like for a stronger psychic than me. The only thing I was really retaining was the obvious fact that everyone here was psychic, angelic, or demonic. Their auras were colored, glittered, bright, dark... against the stark darkness of the club it was all excruciatingly harsh. And the mental voices. I stood stock still for a second, simply trying to adjust. Probably having a mild concussion wasn't helping a thing, either. I willed myself to stagger over to the enormous bar, generating a fair amount of attention as I did so. I supposed this was because I was new, and because my own aura had its own specialness to it. Midnite's was home to regulars, not casual observers.

With a thud, I settled onto a stool less gracefully than I would have liked. The barman, a man who was somewhere in his forties, had a deep purple sheen to his skin that shimmered as he moved. He was glaring at me. "I'll have a martini," I volunteered, definitely not heartened by his welcome. He grunted in reply and turned away to mix the drink.

"Make that two." The voice was male, silky. And British. These were two things I very much like. I peered over my shoulder at the man who had sidled up to me.

Immediately, I felt my stomach drop, and my hormones screech to a halt.

It was the guy from my head. Well, my dreams. Either way. Green, rotting, corpse guy. Only right now he was under a heavy glamor, one that gave him the appearance that, I'm sure, worked to his advantage with any human who couldn't see what it was hiding. I swallowed and forced a smile. My brain was whirring: did he recognize me for what I was? It was entirely possible. Though I hoped not. He gave me such a warm smile, my guard slipped a little.

This was very disconcerting, being around a being who had the ability to make me both charmed and direly frightened at once. "Thank you. I'm Evangeline," I said, amping up my slight French accent in an attempt to have some subterfuge. Hey, I was born to parents whose second language was English- it came naturally. I think.

As he looked at me, I slowly got the impression that he was trying to mine me. Mine my mind. No- he wasn't going to win that game. Once I had the feeling of somebody trying to stick their metaphorical fingers in my brainwaves, I erected a sloppy kind of wall between me and him. It wasn't something I'd had much experience with, so I wasn't sure it would work, but if stubbornness won me points then I'd have it made. In the darkness, his eyes flashed red. A glamor spell of the most powerful kind couldn't hide that. "Balthazar," he said at length. He'd felt that.

The barman slid our drinks over to us and I took a sip, all innocence and female docility. Balthazar's metaphorical fingers- I'm sorry, I can't describe it any better than that- wrenched harder at my wall, which, for the moment, wasn't budging. "You're... new," he breathed, sounding delicious. Smooth. The rotting guy was smooth. And obviously unconcerned with his demon status in regards to me. I was willing to bet my cat and both kidneys that most women he met didn't care. It would be part of his mystique, the whole package.

Playing up the flirt factor, I licked my lips. "Yes, I recently moved here from-" thinking of my home town, I improvised. "New Orleans." For someone who had just spent more than twelve hours out cold, I knew I looked good. I have pretty coloring, at least.

He chuckled and lit a cigarette. "Mind if I smoke?" Mutely, I shook my head. He'd already lit the thing anyway. "I love New Orleans. So many interesting people." His tone implied that I, too, was one of those interesting people.

This was a little like playing chicken with a cobra. "Oh, of course," I agreed, nodding. He blew smoke out, slowly, those freaky eyes of his glittering. Every so often his glamor faltered and the way he truly looked flickered through. "My family, they practiced a kind of folk magic. Like voodoo." So now I was really improvising. My mother and father had done no such thing, and my other relatives practiced Catholicism that was heavy on the superstitions of the south. I practiced more magic than they did. But what I could do frightened me in its implications, so I didn't mess about with it too much.

"That must account for your aura," he prompted, very subtly. I wasn't going to fall for it.

"I don't know what you mean," I said innocently. Delicately, I ate the cocktail olive on the end of the stirrer. He wasn't going to fall for it either. His eyes narrowed slightly.

"Oh, but you must." He was a study in coercion. I felt my wall falter, slip. That must be his particular talent. I knew demons tended to "specialize" in something.

"Balthazar," said a new voice, "you promised you would go out with me tonight." I nearly skipped with relief. One more second and he'd have my head cracked open like a melon. Again, we're talking metaphorically. An amber haired woman stood at his arm, giving me hardly a second glance. She was gorgeous, in a cold, untouchable kind of way. I would never look like that if I had a decade to spend every morning in front of my mirror. My mind went immediately to "whore" because of the cut of her dress, and then I saw the telltale glimmer of her eyes. It wasn't much of a stretch before the word "succubus" slipped to the surface. A classy demon whore, to be exact.

"A moment, Ellie," he said indulgently, pinning me with his gaze. Fluidly, he rose from his chair and took her hand. "It was very nice meeting you, Evangeline." Before he walked with the female demon, he leaned over and whispered in my ear, "Sweet dreams, little shadow walker." I gripped my drink fiercely, glaring at him. Now I really didn't want to go to sleep any time soon. My heart was combating its way out of my throat for several minutes before they'd left my line of sight in a trail of shimmering green sequins and blue cigarette smoke.

Then I nearly deflated, until I heard what someone murmured over at me: "It's not exactly something you can hide." I whipped around, my hair flying into my mouth. The man who sat next to me now was probably the one I'd been told to come find. I could kind of catch that his aura was distinct from everybody else's, and anyway, everybody else was giving him a relatively wide berth. His mouth languidly held a cigarillo, and his dark hair was messy, standing up at different angles. "You haven't noticed the stares?" His voice was sardonic and had a slight rasp in it.

Mulishly, I shrugged. "Why'd you think I sat here, with my back to the main floor?" I knew this would happen. I just knew it.

"It's your deal," he said mildly. John Constantine settled himself, catlike, into the seat next to me. "There aren't many of you. I don't know if it's genetics, or what."

Scowling at him, I finished up the martini. "Lucky me. What was he? He's been using my head like a freeway for a few weeks." He was something powerful, that's what.

I stared at the barman, whose back was to us, but I could have sworn he was still glowering. John opened his mouth, then closed it. He appeared to be choosing his words carefully. "We, ah, have a history. He's kind of the... high ranking emissary from Hell. He's been here a long time, on this plane. He's got a lot of clout." The Big Gun rolled his eyes. "Unfortunately."

Pursing my lips to avoid laughing- which I'm sure would make my head hurt- I couldn't help but dryly ask, "A history, huh?" There were a lot of implications in that word too, the way there was when Chas said John was his "friend." It wasn't so much the word as the tone. Particularly in John's case.

He said "history" the way I might admit I'd had a one night stand with David: like he had a lemon in his mouth. I had never slept with David, by the way. I was ninety percent positive that Chas and John had at least fooled around. When that happens, your aura will pick up some of the other person's color, especially if you have any emotional attachment. Chas had been emphatically green, the same color as healthy ivy, and I could see traces of it in the cold, deep slate surrounding John.

As soon as the thought crossed my mind, I decided to keep it under better wraps, whether or not John was telepathic.

He changed subjects, not before giving me a very hard look. "You kept him out, for a while. But he knew what you were the second you came in," John said. "It's why he sat next to you."

"It's probably why you're sitting next to me too," I said. He smiled, more than a little wolfishly. It was probably no coincidence that a lot of the ghosts crowding the air around him were pretty women. That didn't bode well. "But in any case, your apprentice told me to come here and talk to you."

"Chas?" John asked, and then took a drag, exhaling. "I didn't know he could talk to girls without there being some horrifically embarrassing incident." He raised an eyebrow. I studied his face. It was oddly angular, but not in an unattractive way, necessarily.

"Oh no, I was the one who had the horrifically embarrassing incident," I replied readily. "I work with him. At Pulp. He found me this afternoon, knocked out and sprawled on the floor." I was assuming John kept tabs enough on Chas to know where he worked, and I was also assuming he knew what Pulp was. Perhaps a bad assumption, but I didn't care to explain myself tonight much further than I had to.

John stretched his legs and leaned back, cracking his neck. He looked supremely nonchalant, or plain careless. I couldn't really decide if I wanted to tell him anything. He didn't exactly inspire confidence; he made you feel a little like you were wasting his time. But Chas had seemed so adamant, and he'd warned me about John's lack of people skills. It was nothing personal. "I'll bite. Why?"

"A... man... came in last night and stole a copy of a Bible from Hell. I was holding it while he took it, and he touched me, and everything slipped away. I remember hitting my head on a shelf, and that's all. I think he could... manipulate my talent." I was not about to go into detail concerning what I could do. Besides, he already seemed to know. Euphemisms would be fine for now. "We were resonating on the same level. I felt it."

"Someone who can manipulate the manipulator," John said thoughtfully. His eyes were very dark, almost the same color as his hair. He was staring at me pretty unashamedly, only I doubted it had to do with my physical looks. His look was evaluating, shrewd. Well, shit. I can't have been this intriguing, otherwise things here were more boring than I gave them credit for.

I started straight back at him. He was still outlined in his slate color, but I found if I thought about it, I could focus and he looked normal. Normal, though, was deceptive.