A/N: Hey, realized that the last chapter I put Iris's height as 'Five Foot Nothing' but I think that was her height when the foundation acquired her. I think her height might be slightly taller. Whatever it actually is, her height in my story is around 5'3 5'4. That's all. Enjoy the next chapter.

Oh wait, trigger warning. There is going to be a mention of self-harm in this chapter when Cole gets back to the motel. Just wanted to give a heads up for anybody bothered by that.

Okay, now enjoy.

"Quiet, Iris." The older man stepped up next to the girl and placed his hand on her shoulder. I was about to remove his offending appendage when the girl shrugged him off.

"Fuck you." She simply stated.

"Come on kid, you know better." The man pleaded, but his face was stoic and betrayed no emotion. Not to mention his eyes were on me the entire time.

"Fuck. You." The venom dripped from her tongue, the rage inside of her was coming to the surface and I could only imagine this girl was not with this man by choice.

"Who is this guy to you? Do you need help?" I addressed her, but kept my eyes on him. His body language started to read as being ready for a fight, but I just remained on the stool with my arms crossed. He felt weird, and I would be cautious about him having something up his sleeve but I wasn't worried.

"I'm fine. Though after all this excitement, my bladder has finally kicked in and I need to pee. Excuse me." She starts making her way to the bathroom, bumping into me as she does. She gives an apology as she continues on. The man looks to be ready to follow or grab her but I get in his way. He looks right at me, our height being similar allows our eyes to be on level with each other.

"You mind getting out of my way cue-ball?" He mocks.

"What? You want to watch her you old bastard?" I growled.

The guy had something very wrong about him. He had heterochromia, evident by one blue eye and one green eye. What bothered me about this was his pupils almost looked like they were absorbing the light around them. It wasn't that well lit in this diner, most of the light being natural light from outside. Maybe I was seeing things. Either way he unnerved me a bit.

He looked ready to punch me in the mouth before Rob walked over and asked to speak with him.

"We got a problem." Clef sighed.

"Fine I'll be over in a second." Rob nodded, looked at me, gave me a nod of respect and walked away.

"Who are you?" He asked.

"Going to offer your name before I give mine?" I questioned. He snorted at my response.

"Dr. Alto Clef." I laughed, heartily. There was no way.

"Yeah, and they call me the Demon of Empire City." He raised a brow, obviously not expecting that as an answer. "What? You just gave me a fake name. Mine was at least a title."

"It's not fake." He stated flatly.

"Really? Your parents were just obsessed musicians then?" He was so lying his eyes should be brown.

"My parents hated me actually." He gave a smirk. Seemingly enjoying the banter. I still felt like he was off. His demeanour didn't do anything to alleviate that so it was something about him and not his attitude or intentions.

"Wow."

"What?"

"Oh, nothing. Just, nostalgia."

"Great, maybe we can grab a drink and bond over childhood trauma."

"For some reason I feel like drinking with you isn't the wisest choice." The man gave a mirthless laugh to my statement.

"I think I like you Demon. I'll be back in a minute to continue this back and forth." He turned away and headed over to Jack and Rob who were leaning over the guy that had been sitting in Iris and Clef's booth. They had rolled up the sleeve to show him a tattoo. What it's significance was I could only guess, but it wasn't my concern at the moment.

I immediately activated my radar pulse and sensed for the girl in the bathroom. During our little verbal exchange the girl managed to escape the building and was swiftly walking away from our location. I decided to give a proverbial middle finger to the older man by not mentioning it.

Turning back to this 'Alto Clef', it looked like the guy was somewhat aggravated about something, pinching the bridge of his nose. A distraction that I could utilize.

Looking around, I saw that nobody was really looking at me, so I started moving towards the kitchen. Figured I'd escape out the back without issue. Nobody in the building was injured, save me and the crooks I took down, so I didn't need to stick around and tend to anybody. I actually made it half-way through the kitchen before I felt a weird energy for a brief moment, and then it was gone. I didn't pay it too much attention at first, but I realized after opening the back door that I should have.

"Leaving so soon? I thought our date was going so well?" I was a little surprised at the speed this man must of had to get to the back door so quickly. I used the radar pulse again and saw that the reading I had from before was slightly different. He still felt like the same person though.

"Sorry, but it appears I was cat-fished. I thought you were human. Maybe a dad or uncle." Clef, again, mirthlessly laughed.

"I'd be a terrible dad. Besides, I thought a Demon could always recognize the Devil." His smirk turned into a grin. His grin reminding me of Jack Nicholson as the Joker.

"Been there, killed that, not interested in repeating the event. So, do us all a favour and leave me alone." I step out of the diner and try to go about my business but he puts his hand on my shoulder. I feel uneasy with him in contact of me so I give him a little shock to make him let go. He doesn't. Would have worked on any other person.

"I'm sorry, but letting you go isn't protocol for encountering anomalous phenomena out in the wild, even if that phenomena is basically a comic book character playing hero." I groan in frustration.

"What, you going to hit me a few times before throwing a steel ball at my head?"

"Is that a reference I'm supposed to understand?" He states.

"How about this one. Fuck. You." He chuckles lightly at my call back as I reach up and grab his wrist.

"You asked to be caught showing off the way you did." He tightens his grip, strength almost comparable to a conduit.

"Do you know how powerful a lightning bolt is?" His grin almost fades but he keeps it up. He just looks at me, and I start sparking up my arm. Ready to send everything through him.

"Anywhere between 100 million and 1 billion volts of-" I send a stronger shock through him. He definitely feels it. It's a short burst that ends after a few seconds. Even though he definitely felt it, the bastard didn't seem to bothered in the aftermath.

"Okay good this will make it easy then. Have you or anybody you've loved been hit by lightning before?" This was familiar. The feeling I got after Trish died. Shutting down emotions and becoming the thing everybody started calling me back then.

He actually seems to not remember, taking a moment to think about whether or not he's witnessed such a thing. There is no way anybody could forget an experience like that. Not anybody human anyway.

After a few seconds he shakes his head and looks back at me.

"No, can't s-"

"Alright, let me paint you a picture. Read a story once about a guy who was hiking with a group through a forest on a mountain. Gets hit by a bolt. He goes down instantly, but he doesn't die. He can hear screams from his group, see what was going on around him, was conscious. He was trapped. Had no voluntary control of any muscle groups in his body. He realizes that he fell in an upright position with his legs stretched out in front of him and his arms are seizing and convulsing. He could smell, see, and hear, everything. He tried to breathe, only to find his lungs were filled with fluid. He tried to spit, only to be reminded he had lost control of his body. He tried rocking side to side in a desperate attempt to have the fluid drain, only to be reminded that he. Had. No. Control. He was at the mercy of those around him and God... if you believe in that sort of thing." The grin is gone from his face, he seems ready to let go.

"Okay, I ge-AAH-motherfu-" He tries to let go, but I tighten my grip around him and send enough power into the next shock to keep his arm tensed shut around my shoulder. His strength is considerable.

"No you don't. He was in pain that whole time. It took 2.5 hours for the first responders to make it up the mountain. That entire time he realized he was likely going to drown on a mountain in a forest, unable to do anything about it. He was right, he died twice. When they got there, they drained his lungs and opted to fly him to the hospital, because if they drove he would have gone into shock in the bumpy ride down. There deliberation over what they should do happened right in front of him. He was paralyzed, but conscious. Hearing them talk about how unlikely it was he was going to make it. A total 6.5 hours later he's at the hospital. Nearly 2 days later he then asks how powerful a bolt of lightning is. At the 48 hour mark he finds out." Clef looks like he wants to reach for something so I shock him with a stronger hit.

"Ss-s-s-" He wants me to stop. Something in the back of my mind tells me that he thought my heroics from earlier was a sign of weakness or lack of awareness. Not being so naive however, was what was allowing me to get one up on him. Otherwise, I feel like this would be way more difficult.

Or maybe I'm giving him too much credit.

"From captured footage and photos that were being taken when the bolt struck, the thing came out of the sky, hungry, and out for blood, hitting a tree first. The fucking thing wrapped itself around the tree hitting it three times before hitting a young vibrant, 23 year old woman by the name of Ashley O'Connor, killing her instantly. It jumped from Ashley and entered the author's neck, bouncing around quite a bit before leaving out of a metal tag on the guys boot, from which it arced into 3 more bolts and hit 3 more members of the group." Finally, I let go of Clef's wrist, and let him drop to his knees. He's lucky I didn't hit him with an actual lightning bolt and only tased him. I'm surprised he could remain on his knees and not fall on his face after that.

He twitches a bit, but seems to regain control of his body a little faster then I expected. By the time he looks up at me however I am on the roof of the diner.

"The point I'm getting at here doctor, is that I don't have any intentions to fight you or to surrender. I simply want to be left alone, and I think that girl should be left alone as well. However, I know you operate in the shadows types. DARPA, CIA, and now you from the mysterious 'Foundation', makes no difference. You won't leave me alone. So, when you ask yourself if it's worth getting into a fight with me, remember this. Lightning is the most powerful force you can imagine... and then some. It can cause destruction and pain on levels you cannot begin to understand.' We clear?" I smirk, watching Clef getting his balance back so quickly was interesting. He closes his eyes and looks down again to focus. Resilient bastard, I'll give him that. I was certain my little story was enough to give him pause, if only for a minute. I still doubted it wouldn't end whatever animosity that I was probably quickly building from this group.

"Crystal." He sounded way more amused then he should be. He finally looks up at me again and he's smiling. I'm no longer smirking.

"What's the matter, Demon? Didn't expect me to be so elated about your display?" I groan. He was going to be annoying.

I don't say anything. I probably wasted enough of his time to allow the girl to get a major head start. Now it was time for me to leave.

"Would you like a job?" I stop half way from turning around. I take a moment to take in what he just said. What game was he playing?

"You can't be serious." I deadpan my reply, keeping my confusion hidden. Who offers a job to a guy that just fried you as an obvious threat to leave him alone? You know what, people like Moya, probably. Hell I think Augustine would even do it. So shit, why wouldn't this guy.

"Deadly. See, my employers really don't like leaving little anomalies like you to your own little hobbies without supervision. So bring back SCP-105 and turn yourself in and we can discuss your employment." He rubs his wrist as he speaks. Good, he's not indestructible.

"Don't know what that SCP thing is. Regardless, I'm not doing any harm. I haven't even killed anybody since I got here. Not even when people are shooting at me. Besides, I don't know the first thing about what you deal with, and I have a major problem with authority." I cross my arms, looking at him while standing with my shoulder pointed to him. I was supposed to be gone by now. I was compelled to hear what he was willing to give up in order to hire me though. Would the suit from the train even care if I got another job? What did it even want me to do? Clef sighs as he prepares a response.

"Look, it doesn't matter to the SCP Foundation what you're doing, what you are, who you are, where you're from, if you aren't human, you're an anomaly and they will come for you. You don't seem to be interested in hiding yourself if it means letting people get killed, so they will catch up to you." Clef pauses a moment, slightly tilting his head and adjusting his gaze to the side. It was like somebody was addressing him but I didn't see or feel anything. Maybe he was telepathically talking to someone, like Sasha, or John did.

"What a sales pitch." My sarcasm seemed to bring him back to reality. Shaking his head of whatever grabbed his attention.

"If I had tried sugar coating it you'd never believe me. Best be honest. Despite your assumptions about us, we do manage to do some good to. You appear to want to do that. I'm thinking you're the right guy for the job." I was certain he was playing me. Just a ploy to get me in their clutches so they can sink in deep and keep me on a leash.

"Right guy, but I'm in the wrong place." Didn't mean to say that. Stupid of me to give away what was likely to make them even more interested in me. Don't need them investigating another world, especially not the one I'm from. Though, him offering me a job as an alternative to playing cat and mouse probably means I'm doomed, in terms of getting them to leave me alone without countless lives being lost. Hopefully he didn't realize what I meant.

"Well, it's either that or I can promise you a battle you have no hope of winning.'" I felt a terrible chill down my spine as Clef said those words. That... entity on the train... It's face taking up the empty space in my mind and my eyes nearly pop out of my head. Clef's smile just goes back to being smug.

After a few seconds I regain my composure. I glare at him, and he grins back at me. I'm just about ready to leave. Talking with him has been uneasy and I don't like him at all. I glanced around the roof for an exit away from the girl... and this fucker... when a question pops up in my head.

"What's an SCP?" I ask, earnestly.

"Ask Iris when you see her next." I raise my brow. Does he know she's gone? How? Was he getting communications some how and somebody spotted her? Regardless I need to start moving.

"You've been so helpful." With the sarcastic comment lobbed out, I turn around and start scanning the structures around me to plot my best route out of this area.

"We should do this again some time. Let me get to second base on the second date!" I ignore his silly antics and continue planning my route.

Just ahead of me is a power line, and it leads away form the direction that Iris went in. Which is good because if they were going to follow me, I'd rather lead them away, lose them, and then circle back. That in mind I hop on the line and proceed to leave this diner for good.

After grinding on the power lines for almost 20 minutes I start traversing from rooftop to rooftop. Doing my best to avoid the public's gaze I eventually drop to street level and just start jogging. I happen across a thrift store and pop in for a short time, grabbing some new clothes. I didn't have the luxury of carrying every new outfit with me, so I switched the forest green hoodie for a yellow t-shirt, the blue bomber jacket for a black windbreaker with a hood, and a pair of dark grey cargo pants. My shoes remained unchanged. I also grabbed an Iron Head Baseball cap and a pair of sunglasses. Hat and sunglasses doesn't normally work that well but the whole get up being changed should help.

I had noticed when I was emptying my pockets before switching clothes, that my key for the motel room was missing. Breaking in wouldn't be a problem, but I wasn't sure who took it, because there was no way I dropped it. I thought back, remembering Iris walking into me, and at any point I was in close proximity with Clef he could have swiped it. Assuming he was that good. The closest he got to me was arms reach and he had my full attention when his hand was on me. I believed it was more likely that Iris had it, but was going to approach the motel carefully, casing it out, before just strolling in to a trap in case Clef has it.

After leaving the store, it took me another 40 minutes to walk back to my motel. I would have gone to look for Iris, but I wanted to grab my bag and amp before leaving town, which was the first thing I was going to do with or without her.

My luck had to have been looking up because when I approached the motel I sensed the same small strangeness I got from her in my room. Well, my luck could have been complete shit as normal and it was someone or something else in there.

My room was on the top floor. Four stories up, which made for an easy escape for me but not so easy for anybody that couldn't fall that distance without hurting themselves. I left one of the back windows ajar when I left, in case I didn't want to be spotted by the clerk coming back to my room. I went around the building to the back alley, thanking past Cole for making sure I did something smart like getting the room with a window facing an alley in the first place. Looking in all directions, I made sure I wasn't being watched, and started climbing.

When I got to the window of my room I took as discrete of a peek inside as possible. The curtains were only half drawn and the lights were off, so I couldn't see very much. What I did see, were a pair of shoes at the foot of the bed, with clothes scattered on the floor. I could hear the shower going, and figured the girl wanted to freshen up. I sighed. Did I really want to sit inside and wait for her only to make her feel uncomfortable when she comes out in a towel. Or hell, without a towel if she was so bold.

I shake those thoughts from my head and opt to climb to the roof. Picking the most obscured place next to a bulkhead, I throw up my windbreakers hood and lean back against the wall of said construction. I keep watch on the sky and peek over the edge of the roof every so often to check to see if anybody was coming to raid the building. Nothing. I would climb down to the window and just listen for the shower, not risking peeping on the girl getting changed. The first two times the shower was still going, checking twice in twenty minutes. She must have just gotten in when I showed up, and wanted to take a long one. Probably to try and relax herself. I decided to wait another 25 minutes before the next time I checked.

By this point the sun was setting, purple orange and pink spread across the landscape. I thought back to the days before all this. Before my power. Trish and I on a rooftop, having gotten her to climb with me onto a smaller building then I was used to, just to make her feel more comfortable. I laugh remembering how it didn't matter how high the building was, she was slightly nervous about heights, and decided after that to never climb with me again, unless it was to save her life. I refrained from making a comment about practising making it more likely for that to work. She and I just sat there for a few hours. At first enjoying a snack, then making out, then watching the sunset, than sex, and then climbing back down and going home. It was sort of simple, inexpensive, and fun.

I wipe the tears from my face, realizing how low the sun was getting. I silently cursed myself for losing track of time and not paying attention for Clef and any forces he might bring with him to get us. A few radar scans of the area let me know that we were likely clear. No sign of Clef or any secret agent types, nor heavily armed goons. No helicopters, no unmarked vans, nothing. I didn't even sense him near by. Maybe he really did leave us alone, but that was wishful thinking. It was likely that he never had her trail and I lost him. That, or he was playing with us. I briefly remember Moya and Kessler. Both of them were lying pieces of shit that were rarely seen out in the open. I wouldn't be surprised if Clef was exactly like them. Trying to control circumstances they have no hope of controlling what-so-ever, and end up getting people killed over it. Yet somehow they survive.

Well, in Moya and Kessler's case, they didn't survive long after they met me.

Finally, I climb back down to the window again and listen for the shower. I silently thanked the universe when I didn't hear any running water and hoped to God that Iris was dressed or at least covered up some way. Steeling myself, I slowly leaned over to look through the window.

On the floor still remained her jeans, shoes, and socks, along with her hoodie. So she was now wearing her panties, bra and shirt. I didn't see her in the room, of which I could only see the chair in the corner, the tv, and the dresser along with the window next to the front door, but not able to see the front door or the bed. Nor could I see the bathroom door that well.

Reaching through the window I gently and slowly move the curtain out of the way. I didn't want to make any noise and scare her, but honestly I was probably going to be scaring her coming through the window anyway.

I managed to get the curtain out of my way with minimal effort, revealing Iris, her hair loose, laying in bed, facing the opposite direction of the window. The covers were partially covering her, one of her legs exposed, hugging the bunched up quilt and a pillow, while clinging to another. I hoped she was sleeping and proceeded to hang from the window to take off my shoes. Wanted to make my entrance as quiet as possible.

Leaning in the window, I gently place my shoes on the floor before leaning back out, putting my hands on either side of the upper part of the window frame, lifting my legs up and putting them through the window. I slowly lowered myself in and landed softly, not appearing to garner any attention.

I hold my breath for a bit longer then I should have once I'm inside. Taking a minute to gather myself before I begin my trek around the bed to see if she's awake.

She was indeed sleeping, and her eyes were puffy and red. Probably crying out of relief, or maybe crying because now that she was out of their hands, she knew her life was still screwed by what she experienced. I thought on Clef's words. That she was just going to end up captured all too soon. That she's done this before and it never worked out for her. I wonder if they have more people like him, or people stronger, willing to come after her.

I noticed some light scarring on her leg and arms. At first, I thought she was a cutter, but it seemed like battle wounds. Or maybe it was a mix of both. I didn't have a good look at her wrists so I couldn't tell but on her legs it looked more like injuries from knives, guns, maybe some were environmentally caused, but most of them were superficial and barely noticeable, with only one or two that stood out. None of them were grotesque or particularly nasty. I did notice that her leg and arms were well toned. Why were they keeping her fit? Was it some sick game of cat and mouse? The better shape she's in the more fun it is? No, I don't think that's it. Not off the table though. He said he was a doctor right? I feel like he was a bullshitter through and through, but if he was telling the truth about that, maybe they need her in top physical health for experiments involving people like her.

Deciding to leave her be and save my questions for later, I prepare for some rest myself.

I took off my jacket and shirt, placing them on the back of a chair. I brushed my teeth, washed my face, and went and sat in the lazy boy, reclining back and resting for a bit. I didn't plan on falling asleep, seeing as how it was still early in the evening, but soon my thoughts went to my old life once more, and unconsciousness took me.