[So um. Forgot to post this chapter. Lmao. If you want the most consistent updates, you'll wanna check this fic out on AO3, under the same name and psuedonym]

As Kravitz made his way through the crowded streets of the city, his entire being seemed to vibrate with excitement. That bot… That bot was the answer to all his problems…

The Raven Queen had sent out her favourite bounty hunter for a single reason: to find where the souls of the dead were being hidden. In the past decade, thousands of souls had disappeared right under the Queen and her reapers' noses without even a trace. Kravitz had suspected necromancers, at first, but there was no proof, no smell of it when he tracked down the bodies of the missing souls.

When a missing soul did appear, they were often insane or simply unable to tell what had happened to them— those were the worst; they never understood that they had died in the first place. At least the insane ones had lead them to necromancers, although they had no connection to the disappearances.

But this, paired with necromancers attempting to bind themselves to an android body, was an absolute breakthrough.

The bot had a soul of a dead man.

Taako Taaco had died two months, one day, 12 hours, and 23 seconds ago. He had not reached the Astral Plane, same as his sister, who had died shortly after. It was supposed to be a clean and cut case; the reaper had been following them for hours before their death, keeping a close eye on them, and they'd slipped right from under their noses.

"Um, excuse me, sir," came a nasally voice from behind him. "You dropped this."

Kravitz turned and blinked down at the shaky hand before him, holding his watch. "Oh! Thank you; most people would have simply stolen it," he said, reaching out to take it.

Upon the graze of his fingertips against the stranger's bare hand, Kravitz suddenly cried out and flinched away, as though he'd been burned suddenly. If he hadn't stuffed his hand back into his pocket with watch in hand, the entire car would've seen how the elf's hand had seemingly disintegrated into bone.

"Are you okay?" asked the nasal voiced stranger, reaching out to touch him. "Did I shock you? Oh jeez, I always do that, I- I'm so sorry—"

The voice continued on like that as Kravitz reeled from the pain, forcing flesh back over his bones. As a being of radiant energy, he was vulnerable to necrotic energies, but to be affected like this in his living form… What the hell were they?

"I'm fine, I'm fine. Just… surprised me, is all. What did you say your name was?"

"Lucas. Lucas Miller. Oh! This is my stop! Um, try not to lose that watch anymore, stranger!"

As Kravitz watched the man brush by and run out onto platform, he began to wonder what he'd gotten himself into with this bounty.

The silence of the library was broken suddenly by the sound of Lucretia's stone of farspeech ringing, making the two of them jump. The older woman sighed and placed the files she'd gathered in front of Angus before answering the call. "Director speaking."

"Lucy, we got a problem," said Merle, his voice barely a whisper. "It's that Bluejeans guy."

"Hallwinter?" Angus's ears perked up as he listened in, eyes focused on the text before him (his mother did not care if he knew about her secret organization, but he at least had the decency to pretend he wasn't listening. "What's happened? Is everything alright?"

"It's fine— sorta. If you… Consider half his face burned off alright."

"Wait, what?!" Angus shouted. "Wh— sir, what happened?!"

"Aw, jeez— seriously, Lucretia? You're letting the kid listen to this?"

"Angus has proven himself to be a valuable asset to our cause and—"

"Hi Ango!" interrupted Magnus. "Jules is asleep right now, but she wanted to know if you and Lucretia wanted to come over for Candlenights?"

"Maggie, I love ya, but—"

"We'd be happy to come, Magnus. I haven't heard from her lately, has she been busy?"

"Sirs, can we please get back on track?" Angus finally interjected. "What happened to Barry?"

"Right, right. Billy—"

"Barry," the three of them said in unison.

"— had his face… well, melted by fire. More specifically, by magic from a very powerful evocation user. It couldn't've been more than a second's touch, but he won't have any sight in his right eye after this, and the scarring will take a better cleric than I to get rid of."

The four of them stood by in silence. Angus could see his mother worrying her lip, the gears turning in his head. "Will this… interfere with his ability to repair Davenport?"

"Momma!" Angus gasped, but neither Merle nor Magnus seemed perturbed by it.

"We can't know for sure, but the fire didn't hit any of his brain, so with a little time to learn to get around with one eye, he should be able to get the captain back in working order."

That was right; mother had told Angus that Davenport was the first bot they ever built to… to have a human soul. Something had gone wrong in his head, at some point, and now all he was good at was acting like a parrot and abiding by his butler programming.

"Thank the gods. He's our last option. I fear Lucas might be going into the next step of his plan soon— I've lost contact with Noelle."

Noelle, Noelle… right, Lucas's assistant and momma's spy.

"I can't say how long it'll take to get Bluejeans back in working order, but I'll try my best, Lucy. I swear."