"Don't mistake the Order's compassion and generosity toward its employees as weakness. The history of the Order Stabilitas is steeped in doing horrible things in the name of survival and we haven't forgotten our old ways just because we have a new outlook." – Order onboarding to new hires

"Oh, son of… Hello?" Kurt fumbled with the device in his ear. "Hello? God damn…"

"Hey Kurt." Came Don's voice a moment later. "Yeah, I can hear you."

Kurt blew out a breath of frustration. He was having trouble with the wireless ear buds that Penny had suggested he try. On one hand, it was nice to listen to something while he worked, on the other he was still adapting to the buttons, tones and settings that the devices had.

"Oh, hey Don. What's happening?"

"Ah just wondering if you were around the house. Les and I are headed south and wanted to stop and say goodbye before we left." Came the clearly amused voice of the old hippie.

Glancing at the cheap clock on the wall of his shop, Kurt did a little math. "Sure, what time do you think you all will be over?"

"Oh, about twenty minutes, we are just leaving the house."

"Great see you then." Kurt said and ended the call.

Blowing out a breath, he looked back down to his workbench and then flinched when the music came back in full force. He tore the earbuds out and shoved it back in the charging case before putting it all back on the shelf.

Returning to the workbench, Kurt looked at the barely triangular sheet of paper that was laid out on it. He had been working on an enchantment to put an elemental charge on a projectile as it passed through a barrel. This one was for a machinegun barrel, hence the lack of taper to the template.

His main struggle was in getting the spell to siphon the energy of the burning propellant and then apply it to the bullet. It was proving to be an issue that looked like it would go unsolved, and he considered resorting to his less efficient and potent method. The original plan was to use ambient mana, convert it to neutral and then apply it to the bullet.

While he could make his original plan work, he worried about stressing the barrel with the extra energy that may or may not take the form of heat or pressure. He wouldn't know until testing if it would actually have that effect or if it was even worth doing.

His reason for making a siphon spell was because he saw what Jay had done with the ritual circle and got inspired. If he could solve the overheating issue that firearms had, he could significantly increase the rates and volumes of fire. His first plan had been to use an enchant similar to the silencers and just not allow them to collect heat, but it turned out to be not that simple, since that energy had nowhere else to go.

"I wonder if Jay would help me with this." Kurt muttered to himself as he packed up his books and the template he was working on. He had been inspired by the old demon's work but didn't quite have the experience to make it work.

Kurt wandered out to the lower living room and saw Val taking a little nap on the couch, her tablet still glowing in her hand from when she drifted off. He approached, unable to not glance at the screen, and saw she was reading some article about navigating human culture as a paranormal. He smiled and gently rubbed her shoulder, coaxing her awake.

"Hey, Don and Les are on their way south and are stopping by in a little bit." He said as she cracked an eye open and stretched.

"Hnnnnmmmm. Oooohhh kaaaay." She said with a yawn after her full body stretch that had her fuzzy toes wiggling and her tail curling slightly. "How long?"

"They said twenty minutes about five minutes ago."

"Could have just said fifteen…" She laughed.

Kurt leaned down and gave her a kiss on the cheek. "I know, just making sure you are awake." He smiled and dodged a pillow as she grumbled about math alarms.

He left her to finish waking up on her own and went to find his other girlfriend. It didn't take long as she was sunning herself in the living room and having another coffee while scrolling on her phone. Kurt had to pause for a minute to take in the sight of the sun glinting off her silvery white hair and he briefly imagined a halo around her head.

"I wonder if that's where it comes from." He said and she turned to face him.

"What's that?" She asked, looking up from her phone and setting down her mug.

"Oh, just the sun glinting off your hair, it kind of looked like a halo." Kurt admitted as he closed in, and she craned her neck to give him a kiss.

"It is. I don't have a full one so it can only be seen in certain situations." She said after their lips parted. When she saw the confusion in his expression, she continued. "It comes from my father's heritage, if I were a pure blood, I would almost always have a gold or silver disk about my head. But since I am only half, and the dragon side is stronger, it's barely noticeable under the right conditions."

Kurt could head a strange tone in her voice like she was trying to recite the words and distance herself from them. "Well, I think it's beautiful." He gave her shoulder a squeeze and saw her flush.

"Thanks, it's one of the few things from him that isn't a curse." She said, her tone going dark and sadness creeping back in. His expression caused her to add to her melancholic statement. "I'll tell you about it later. It's not something I want to talk about right now."

"Ok, I will be here when you are ready." Kurt said and took her hand, giving it a squeeze which she returned with a little hesitation. "If you want a distraction, Don and Les are going to be over in a little while to say Goodbye before they head south."

Kristi seemed to bounce right back and suddenly decided that lounging around in pajamas all day was not going to be ok. He watched her go and felt conflicted. On one hand he was really trying to let her come to him when she was comfortable but on the other, his wolf was driving him to push the issue. It wanted to protect her and had to know more about what was hurting her.

Val chose that moment to slide up behind him, rubbing his back with one hand as she entered the room. "What's that look for?"

"Hmm?" Kurt didn't know he was doing a look. "Oh, just that Kristi said something about her angel heritage and how it was a curse."

"Oh? She never really talked about it before." Val said in response. She of course knew the story of how she came to be and how she got to the Order but that was about it. It now peaked her curiosity, and she was about to go ask about it, but Kurt stopped her.

"Just let her be for a while. I think she is still adjusting to us and is opening up slowly." Kurt said, trying to put words to his feelings on the matter and thinking he did a good job. "Remember that relationships are a new thing for her. Besides, we all have a past that we haven't shared yet." He mentioned that last part as a reminder that neither of them had gone into much detail on their previous life experiences.

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She thought about it for a moment before conceding the point. "Yeah, I just… ah, forget it." She huffed a breath through her nose. "But this is something I think we all need to talk about. Being together is kind of a new experience for her and neither of us have been in a throuple before."

"Throuple?" Kurt said with a questioning look. "Why not triad?"

"What?" Val said defensively. "It's a perfectly accurate description for a three-person romantic relationship where all parties are equally involved. Just because Kristi and I haven't shared that experience yet doesn't mean the interest isn't there, it's just… new."

Holding up his hands, Kurt admitted defeat. "Fine, fine. It's just a word I hadn't heard before. I think you are right though, and we might need to focus more on growing closer together instead of just as individual pairs."

Kristi reemerged at that moment, having traded t-shirt and flannel pajama pants for a long sleeve shirt and jeans. "What's going on? What do we need to do?"

Val stalked over to her and gave the taller woman a hug. "We need to work on our relationship, not just as individuals and that means we need to get closer too." She punctuated her words by pulling Kristi down into a kiss.

It was a kiss that started simple and sweet but neither of the girls broke away, despite Kristi's surprise and sudden blush. Val deepened the kiss a little, pulling them closer together and running a hand down Kristi's back to rest on her butt before getting a startled noise and easing up.

"Ah…umm. Y-yeah, t-th…. Ahem, that sounds good." Kristi said while looking down at Val. She then cast her eyes to Kurt who just gave her a warm smile and a nod.

When Val turned around, Kurt saw the look of relief on her face. He guessed that she was relieved that the ploy had worked, and Kristi hadn't startled out of the situation too much. He knew from experience that she took a lot of calculated risks when it came to pushing the relationship boundaries.

He was about to say something when he heard the sound of a car pulling up and turned to see a large white sedan rolling in. He recognized the driver as Don, so they all went out to say goodbye to the older couple.

*****

"So, who was it that paid you off, Tran'lo?" Jay asked while raking the back of a talon over the elf's shoulder and leaving behind a welt. "Hmm? Was it, one of the cults? Perhaps that government agency that hassled Kurt in the past? Oh, wait! Terminus, was it them?"

"I-I-I d-d-don-don't know w-wha…" He began to stutter out.

His attempt to make an excuse was cut short as the talon that was leaving a bruise behind suddenly turned over and pierced his skin. The man screamed in pain as Jay wiggled the midnight black claw around, making sure to scrape the bone. He withdrew it a moment later to show not a scratch left on the man's skin.

"Funny thing about having a talent for spatial magics." Jay began as he returned to poking with the back of the claw. "I can skip right past all the skin and muscle that gets in the way and poke the spots that really hurt. Now, your little friend Sranta already sold you out. So, unless you want to test my knowledge of neuroscience, you are going to answer me."

Jay had already tracked down his first lead and delt with the harpy woman. She had folded much faster than Tran'lo, practically having to repeat things from how fast she talked. It was 'unfortunate' that she hadn't made it all the way through the portal he had opened to the Order prison, only her upper half had actually materialized.

"Sh-she wouldn't." Tran'lo tried to convince himself.

"But she did." Jay used his bored and dismissive tone, making it sound like his torture, correction, 'enhanced interrogation', was not at all interesting. "She ratted out you and your three other friends before I could even get my notebook out to write the names down."

"B-b-but…"

"Shh, don't worry, they will get theirs. Just tell me who paid you to deactivate the obfuscation spells on my agent's alters." Jay flicked him in the forehead with the back of his talon. "Then we can be all done, and I go on my merry way to deal with them."

The promise of him leaving seemed to tip the man over to making a decision. "I don't know what gro-Wait! Wait!" Jay had begun to reach forward once again with his index finger pointed at the elf's knee. "I think I know who they worked for! I swear!"

Jay held back his hand and looked the man in the eye, causing him to flinch away. Not for the first time, he regretted not being a daemon of temptation, they always made interrogations easy with their talents. "Then let's hear it."

Tran'lo swallowed hard and forced himself to look back to Jay. "He's a human. I think they were with the Cult of Revision. I saw part of a tattoo on my contact's wrist that looked like their logo."

"And where is this contact?" Jay said and pulled his hand all the way back to rest on his hip, drumming his fingers on his thigh. "Is he here in the order?"

"N-no, I-I met them on Earth. It was somewhere in western Europe, I think. And only the once!" He shuddered. "Everything else was via dead drop and notes." He rushed the words out as fast as he could.

"Where in Europe?"

"I-I d-don't know." He began to sob again. "I-it wasn't somewhere I recognized but it was warm, I think near the sea." He was beginning to panic even more. "Ma-maybe France? I think I saw a sign for Valensal or something."

Jay sighed. "You didn't know where you were? How did you get there?"

"The portal in Austria then I had train tickets that were waiting for me. I didn't pay attention until I got out in France and there was a car waiting for me that took me to meet him."

"Did you get a name?" Jay was fidgeting on his phone now.

"He said to call him 'X' like the letter, but he had an accent. I think it was English or something."

"Hmm. Ok, well, let's get you out of here, I got shit to do." Jay said and walked around to the back of the chair. The elf's hands were restrained with handcuffs that were looped around the metal chair and given just enough slack so he could hurt himself.

"Oh, thank you. I swer…" That was all he said as Jay poked at the back of his skull and pierced his brain using the same technique as the shoulder.

Jay made sure the elf was dead before opening a portal to an ocean on another realm and tossing the body through. He very much hated leaving messes, even when it was needed to send a message and flush out the rats. He still regretted closing a portal while Sranta was in it, it just made his skin crawl to do it.

Once more, cleaning up and storing the chair and handcuffs in his ring, he returned his hand to its more human appearance and went to find the rest of the co-conspirators. He had already seen to his other teams and made sure that they had the same ritual circle as Kurt. Although his team that was moving to the US had been delayed.

That little trip had cost him half a day and it was incredibly difficult when it came to the one agent who lived in a high-rise apartment in Tacoma. Turns out, modern city apartments don't like it when you carve things into the floor, so they had to get creative with where they put it.

Pulling out his phone, Jay called up his contact over in Intelligence, he just hit the call button and put the phone in his pocket since it would be declined. It naturally rang until the call was declined and then a few moments later, he got a call from a different number.

"Go for Chantad." Came the voice of someone who clearly smoked three packs a day and seemed to appreciate the feel of tarry lung butter.

"Chan, its Jay. I got a question for you." He said, using the nick name the seraphim preferred. "Know anything about the Cult of Revision operating in Valencia Spain? Got a little morsel of info of a possible Englishman going by the name of 'X' with their logo tattooed on him."

"Hmm, hang on." Chantad said before hanging up.

Jay sighed and made his way out of the warehouse section of the order. He was nearly back up to the quartermaster offices when he got a call back.

"So, the name X is a new one." Came the raspy voice as soon as the call connected before taking a pause, likely to drag on a cigarette. "But apparently there has been a guy with that mark on his left forearm making his way around that planet. Unfortunately, not many people in the Order are from Earth and they haven't had any contact to confirm the accent thing."

"Any idea what he is doing or wants?" Jay asked. "I get the sense that him targeting my teams specifically is for a reason."

"Ahh, right. You have those teams of half-bloods." The voice said with more than a little scorn. "Well, it might be because of that, but who knows at this point." Another long pause. "I will keep an ear open in case I hear anything and will let you know if I can dredge anything else up."

"That would be great. Thank you." Jay had to try and keep the eye roll out of his voice. "I will let you know if I find out anything else while I go poking around."

"Yeah, yeah. Talk to you later." Chantad said and the call ended with a beep.

Jay snorted and continued on his casual walk out of the warehouse. He had managed to find the source pretty quick so now all he had to do was track down the remaining accomplices. He then also briefly wondered if he should do anything about the fed's that had come sniffing around but decided against it. Kurt was a big boy and could handle them on his own.

If he was going to interfere with any of the uninvited guests, it would likely be those folks from Terminus. That little thought grew into an idea, then into the first stages of a plan as he thought about what Kurt had said. He had mentioned that the werewolf had acted like a spanked puppy and been completely submissive.

That little plan had Jay pulling his phone out and dialing a new number. "Hey, Penny. I think it would be a good idea for Kurt to visit his little police friend soon. Yes, I know they aren't friends but… because I was trying to be obnoxious. Haa yes, I'm sorry. Now, can you let him know? Because I am dealing with our little infestation. Trust me, you don't want to know. Ok, thanks Penny."

Jay hung up the phone and smiled. He liked his handlers; they had the stones to actually talk back to him and stand up for their teams. The best part was they all knew when they could push back and when they couldn't.

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