Two days before Christmas, Heracles receives a small orange envelope in the mail. The card inside is glossy cardstock with a picture of an unenthused black cat wearing a festive party hat. It's the kind of gimmicky card you'd see at your local drugstore. In fact, Heracles might have looked at this particular card when he was filling his cat's insulin prescription last week.

There is a thin package behind the card labeled "Cat Grass" with instructions on the back for growing. Heracles grins; he has always fancied himself a bit of a do-it-yourself kind of man. The backside of the card reads "Happy Birthday Eros!" and just below it, a small note in equally legible print: for help with the nausea. The bottom is signed with a familiar, barely decipherable, slanted scrawl: Kiku Honda.

Heracles calls him immediately.