The Mansion that housed the European base of the Bureau of Paranormal Research and Detection was in Versailles, a suburb a little outside of Paris. Versailles was an old neighbourhood, dominated by the Palace of Versailles, a gaudy monstrosity of luxury. The mansion which Hellboy and Emma found themselves outside of was large and gloomy, a Napoleonic era home built to house twelve and with gates built to keep out the beggars and any untowards revolutionaries. The inside was clean enough; it staffed about fifteen full time employees and twenty agents. Emma was the only supernatural on staff and things were currently slow.

They walked through the large halls and Emma directed them down a flight of stairs that lead to the underground bunker. Steel and concrete plated it was very similar to the BPRD back in New York. Abe was already there in a makeshift tank that they had purchased from an aquarium a while back. Clay was at his side, flipping pages and yawning.

"What took you so long?" he yawned, stretching his arms behind him.

"Decided to walk," Hellboy answered in his deep baritone.

"You couldn't drive?" Clay retorted.

"Why on earth would anyone want to drive in the city?" Emma asked mirroring Clay in her stretches.

"Find anything?" Hellboy asked, thudding down on the nearest, and biggest, chair he could find.

"Yes," Abe answered. "It seems the magic preformed in the Louvre and in the Lab were from two different entities of the same species."

Emma groaned. "I hate it when they decide to gang up."

"What the hell has a scan of dead/human/ancient?" Hellboy asked, leaning back to light and cigar.

"Necromancer?" Abe offered looking up from his books.

Emma shrugged. "An ancient one though? Usually I would say vampire but…"

"Too much human in the power signature. Vamps get less human with age. It doesn't mix." Hellboy offered, finishing Emma sentence.

"Whatever it is, I want to take care of it so we can get out of here." Clay offered, sitting down on the couch beside Emma. "My kid's birthday is next week and if I'm not there my wife is going to shoot me."

"Maureen finally lay down the law?" Emma asked.

"Oh yeah," Hellboy answered, cutting Clay off. "If he's not home by six she's down at the Bureau chewing us all a new asshole."

Clay looked to his grinning comrades before shrugging. "She worries about me." He said with a note of pride in his voice.

The three of them sat in silence, taking turns to flip Abe's pages and pour through the books laid out on the table. While Clay and Emma flipped through the books, Hellboy had produced a cigar from seemingly thin air and was well on his way to giving them all lung cancer when a handsome man walked into the room.

"Michael," Emma said getting up to greet the man. He was a tall, with a strong jaw and clear blue eyes. In his early thirties, he was broad shouldered and wore a clean-cut navy suit, which fitted him perfectly. Hellboy instantly disliked him; Clay instantly wanted to be him.

"Emma," he matched her smile reaching forward to give her a kiss. "I'm sorry to hear about your lab and about Annie."

"It's okay." She murmured, turning to face her companions. "Abe, Clay, Red, this is Michael Stiles, he's with Interpol, currently runs liaison for us." Michael reached forward to shake Clay's hand. Hellboy didn't bother to get up but rather appraised the man with a furrowed brow and a frown.

"Pleasure to meet you." Clay said. He gave Emma a quick wink letting her know he heartily approved of her choices.

Emma rolled her eyes at Clay, as she moved forward. "Red, Michael's really into Scottish and Irish mythology, you should see some of his books while you're here." Michael looked at Hellboy with nothing more than warmth in his eyes.

"Emma's told me so much about you. It would be great if we could find time to –"

Hellboy cut him off. "I don't think so bub, case takes a lot of time."

Michael nodded, unfazed. "I flew in on the red eye, do you want to get me up to speed, darling?"

It took twenty minutes to fill him in. Abe explaining the research, Clay describing in great detail the fights, recounting how Hellboy had destroyed the mummy and then how HB and Emma had taken on a reanimated corpse and had her frozen down the hall.

"Frozen corpse?" Michael asked with a smile.

"Hey! You know a better way to preserve evidence?" Emma asked. She wasn't paying too much attention to Michael though; she couldn't help her eyes wandering to Hellboy's. He looked…in all honestly Emma didn't quite know what to make of his expression. He looked neutral to the average person but Emma knew him, she knew that that particular neutral expression hid whatever he didn't want the world to see.

Michael shook his head and gave her a quick peck on the top of her head, bringing her back into the present.

Hellboy grunted, "Can we focus?" Not taking care to notice the strange looks being thrown his way.

"Abe," Emma started, fiddling with the silver ring on her right hand. "When you said the two attacks were different entities, what lead you to that conclusion?"

Abe turned his focus back to one of his only friends in the world and he considered her question. "The power levels were different. The signatures were similar though. Both reads were the same."

"Shit," Emma said rubbing her eyes. It may have only been early afternoon but Emma felt like she had been awake for years.

Clay looked the way Emma felt. "Want to take bets?" He asked.

"Bets?" Michael questioned, getting himself comfortable on the small couch beside Emma.

"Yeah, a thing we do. Bet on what it is we're chasing and whose going to kill it. Loser buys the beer, winner gets a cigar." Clay said excitedly. He loved the betting. Originally, it had been a way to figure out who got one of Manning's Cuban cigars. After a successful mission he always gave one to the professor, who would give it to the kids.

Liz never wanted the cigar but played anyway. Abe abstained and served as judge. Hellboy always declared he would kill it and he didn't care what it was. It was Clay and Emma who really got down to it. Emma was usually right on what the creature was, Clay was often right on who ended up killing it. However, it was always Hellboy and Emma who ended up wrestling for the cigar while Clay and Abe shared a beer and Liz looked on in disapproval.

"Yeah," Hellboy said, taking a huge drag off his cigar. "Let's bet."

"Two different sorcerers, fighting over who can raise the biggest zombie army! Hellboy smashes them both to bits!" Clay declared jumping in his chair like a small child.

Emma smiled as Hellboy considered his bet.

"I kill it, it's probably just a couple of rouge sorcerers who are in over their heads." Hellboy said confidently.

They all turned their heads to Emma who weighed her options.

"Two necromancers, master and apprentice and I don't like it." She finally said.

"Thought you ruled out necromancer?" Clay asked.

She just shook her head, deep in thought. "The first magic signature was too low, did a piss poor job of resurrecting the mummy but the second guy? Couldn't be the same. Way more powerful and he just disappeared. Teleporting requires serious juice; he's obviously been practicing a while. And…Annie." She said, pushing the feelings down. "Annie was resurrected beautifully; strong, fast and completely independent. It was masterfully done."

She let her words hang for a moment, lost in thought. Finally, she finished her bet.

"Red kills the apprentice, the master is mine."

"So that's the gang." Michael stated as he held the door open to his quarters for Emma.

His quarters were military style, very few possessions and standard bedding and appliances. The only personal possessions were a photo of his sister and mother and a photo of Michael and Emma taken on her birthday last year. They were on top of the Eiffel tower, a big goofy smile on Michael's face and a smirk on Emma's.

"Yup," she said throwing her bag onto the floor and toeing off her shoes. "That's the gang. Clay, Abe and Red."

"Do you think he would let me call him Red?" Michael asked.

"Only if you want him to shoot you. He doesn't play nice with others." She chuckled. She couldn't believe she was finally reconciling the two halves of her lives. She was glad that so far it wasn't a complete shit show. Having Michael in the same room as Clay and Abe was…it was nice. Michael could have a beer and laugh with Clay, and talk science with Abe.

"He plays nice with you." Michael commented.

"He just doesn't like people he doesn't know." Emma explained quickly hoping that would be the end of it. She set puttering about the room moving her things into drawers as she prepared for a long stay.

"Up until yesterday morning you were convinced he didn't like you." Michael pointed out.

"We argued, we got it off our chests, we're good now."

Why did you think I left? She had screamed at him. Emma had given reasons, but she knew they weren't the only ones; she had just never opened that box labelled Hellboy in her mind. It was too messy and would just end up with her getting hurt.

"You're good?" Michael asked. "Are you ever going to explain what happened between the two of you, Emma?"

"What are you talking about? I told you!" Emma was beginning to feel like she was being interrogated.

"You told me you left because you always wanted to live in Paris and you and your partner were not getting along. Later that changed to your partner's girlfriend hated you and then you just stopped talking."

Emma was silent for a moment, not sure what exactly to say or do.

"Michael," she said softly, coming over to him. She ran her hand over his cheek gently, pushing him back so he his knees hit the bed, she pushed him a little harder forcing him to sit down.

She climbed onto his lap as he shifted to get a hold on her waist as she settled down. Running her hands through his hair and pushing herself up against him she settled her lips on his neck slowly dragging them up to his jaw.

"Emma," he murmured, groaning a little as she nibbled on his jaw moving to his ear.

"Yes?" she asked, grinning wickedly as she tugged his earlobe gently with her teeth.
"Are you trying to distract me?"

Shifting back so she could see him fully she leaned back and took her top off revealing a plain black bra that lifted her assets into bombshell territory.

"No," she said, kissing him lightly in between her words. "Maybe I'm trying to distract me too." She gave him a wicked little smirk before he got the hint, leaning backwards and pulling her on top of him.

Some hours, some good sex and a stack of mythology books later Emma finally had to admit that the adrenaline was wearing off and she was dead tired. She was staring at the coffee filter wondering why she poured whole coffee grounds into the filter and why she wasn't doing anything about it.

A small chuckled came from behind her causing her to jump halfway out of her skin.

"How are you so bloody quiet?" Emma asked the giant red man who was the only other soul in the small and only kitchen in the mansion. How anyone that big was that quiet was a kind of sorcery that Emma would never understand.

"You know you have to grind those first?" He said, leaning casualty against the counter.

She just squinted her eyes at the beans wondering if she could grind them with the power of her mind.

Instead she set them on fire.

"Shit!" she muttered, mustering up water in her hand. Before she could drench the small fire a large red hand put it out.

"You okay?" He asked, a small smile quirking his lips.

"Tired," she mumbled leaning against the counter. They were beside each other now, her head rolled to rest on his arm comfortably. She always did like how bloody warm he was.

They stood there in comfortable silence for a few moments, before Hellboy spoke.

"You're not going to be any help when you're this tired. Get some sleep, I'll take you to your room." He made like he was about pick her up before she mumbled something about staying in Michael's room.

He moved back to where he was standing looking down on her. "So, Michael?"

"Yeah?" She asked.

"You uh…you…" He stammered.

"What?" She asked, a little sleepy. He was very warm and she was beginning to give into how tired she was.

"How long?" He asked.

"Officially? I don't know. It just…it just happened?" She said it like a question, she honestly wasn't sure.

He just nodded seemingly lost for words. She worked up a huge yawn ending in the smallest groan as she tried to stretch herself out a little. They stayed like that for a moment longer before he nudged her with his shoulder and asked her a question she did not expect.

"Are you going to come back?" He asked it quietly, almost like he wasn't sure if he wanted to voice it at all.

She turned to him quickly watching his face. The neutral mask had fallen and all she saw was anxiety and hesitation.

"You mean back to the States?" She murmured.

He nodded silently.

"I don't know." She said honestly.

"Emma… I –" He got cut off as the Professor entered the kitchen and set out making himself a cup of tea.

Hellboy stood up fully and nudged Emma with his arm. "Come on lets get you to bed," he said lowly, guiding her up the stairs, she took it from there walking to Michael's room. Hellboy stopped her at the door and looked down at her, brushing a strand of her curls out of her face. "Emma," he asked as she opened the door. "I'm sorry, for everything, I never wanted you to leave." He said it quickly all in one breath. She reached up onto her tiptoes and wrapped her arms around him, which was an impossible feat.

"I know, I'm sorry I never talked to you before I left."

Hellboy grabbed her wrist as she went to turn away from him. "You have to come back." He said, turning around and marching down the hall before she could get a word out.