TW: stress, kidnapping

……………………….

Rosie and Zete exited the tower in silence. There was a tension waiting to be broken, but the elevator and the lobby were too public. Outside, Rosie glanced around for Droya, but he had already spotted them and beelined to the valet station. The valet was fast, and the car pulled up to the circle drive only a moment after Rosie and Zete finished crossing the courtyard. Droya eyed Rosie’s blank look warily, but said nothing. His gaze flicked to Zete, who looked a bit stiff.

It was only after the car turned a corner and the tower faded out of sight that Rosie unraveled and Zete spoke.

She bent over in her seat and hugged her knees.

“I didn’t know you had it in you,” Zete said.

“I’m going to throw up,” Rosie moaned.

“I mean, wow, that guy looked like he was shitting himself,” Zete went on, poking fun a little.

“Hurrrrrr,” Rosie said, a sort of weird groaning sound.

“What happened?” Droya asked, his hands clenching the steering wheel, casting alarmed glances at Rosie.

“She got the job!” Zete said with satisfaction. “And she insisted that we stay on through her contract.”

“Aaauuuuugh,” Rosie said.

“Wha- that’s great! I think? What’s wrong with her?” Droya tried to focus on the road.

Zete shrugged. “I’m not really sure,” he admitted.

“I was meeeean,” Rosie whined. “He looked so upset. And I negotiated! Negotiated! What was I thinking?!”

She bolted upright and clutched her chest dramatically.

“She gave me a ten thousand dollar bonus to start on Monday,” Rosie said.

She took a shallow breath and then another. She was starting to hyperventilate.

Zete smiled. “And a housing allowance so we can move out of the Cainella House. Including housing for us!” He looked at Droya, who appeared stunned.

“What do you mean ‘for us’?” he asked Zete.

“Rosie wants us to have our own rooms,” Zete said.

Droya frowned at Zete. He had never had his own room, not for more than a few days at a time. He had lived in guild housing his whole life, first with his parents, then as a full member. When he wasn’t on a job, he slept in the barracks with his guild brothers and sisters.

He wasn’t sure what to do with this information. He supposed it would just be like being on a job, but, for longer?

“How long is the job?” he asked.

“A year,” Zete said.

A year-long paying job? Droya’s mouth watered a little. Steady employment was also something he’d never experienced before. Jobs came and went, and the guild made sure to fill the gaps with a bed and meals, but long contracts were rare. There were a few senior members, highly trained and skilled, with multi-year arrangements, but it was rare if a bodyguard job lasted longer than 2 weeks. And Rosie had negotiated for this? Rosie had negotiated for him?

“I’m going to throw up,” Rosie said again, gasping for air.

“Do you want to go back to the hotel?” Droya asked her.

Rosie put her hands on the dashboard and took a few deep breaths.

“Not really,” she said. “Can we just drive around for a while?”

“Only if you promise not to throw up,” Droya said uneasily.

Rosie turned to look at him, and he glanced at her quickly, then back to the road.

“I’ll try,” she said solemnly.

Droya drove in a big loop around the hotel. All three were silent.

Zete was thrilled to have the job, and pleased that he would get to work for Rosie. She had impressed him. He had been fairly certain going into the interview that she would do as poorly as she thought she would. He would never have told her that, but she obviously did not fit in, and he had doubts about her. But as soon as the council member began speaking about the library project, Rosie had lit up like a puff of Hellfire. It gave him confidence that she was more capable than she seemed.

He was intrigued about having his own housing – much like Droya, he was accustomed to living in a bit of a crowd. His parents were part of a familial hive, and he had grown up surrounded by countless cousins, aunts, uncles, nephews, and nieces. On a job, living arrangements could vary – usually because of his size, he was expected to simply take up residence in a closet, drawer, or cabinet. The Cainella House was the first place he had ever stayed that had a pixie burrow installed in the wall, and his first taste of privacy. He liked it.

Rosie fought to quiet her anxiety. She tried to focus on logistics instead. She needed to pack up her apartment, find a place in Brulla, move in, find a way to get online, talk to Mom and Ray, pay some bills, and quit her three part-time jobs with no notice. She winced at that; she hated to leave people in the lurch. But she felt like she had essentially just won the lottery. They would understand. And if not… well, none of the jobs were library jobs, they weren’t her actual career. They would fade into obscurity on her resume, overshadowed by Consulting Librarian to the First Public Library in Hell.

“I need to make some phone calls,” Rosie said abruptly, making Droya and Zete jump a bit after the several long minutes of silence.

“Well,” Zete said, “since you’re going to be staying for a while, you should probably get a phone.”

“I can’t use my cell phone here, right?” Rosie said, remembering what she had read in the safety pamphlet about batteries.

“No,” Zete said. “I think there’s only one company that has interdimensional service,” he said, looking to Droya. “Do you know where there’s a Hellphone Plus around here?”

“I’ll head that direction,” Droya said with a nod.

“Hellphone,” Rosie parroted, and busted out an involuntary laugh. Her anxiety latched onto it and she laughed until her eyes welled up, and she thumped her chest a couple times, whimpering away the giggles.

“I need to get a laptop too,” she wheezed. “Can I get onto the Earth internet from here?”

“I believe you just need to purchase a subscription,” Zete said. “I helped another client with it once. Hellphone Plus should have that as a package.”

Rosie giggled and muttered “Hellphone.” She shook her head.

“Wait,” she said, touching Droya’s shoulder. “Let’s go to the bank first. I saw a branch near the hotel.”

They spent the next few hours running errands with Rosie. At the bank, she got a debit card that would work in Hell, and confirmed that the bonus had already been deposited to her account, just as instantly as Yellette had assured her it would be. She got a new phone with the Earth add-on package, a new laptop and the Earth add-on package for that as well. They stopped at a restaurant that Zete said served pretty good food, and Rosie treated the demon and the pixie to lunch. She barely picked at her tuna salad sandwich, too consumed with her growing and detailed to-do list.

“I need to go back to Earth and get my apartment packed into storage and grab some more clothes and a few things,” she said to herself between distracted nibbles. It was already Wednesday, and she was starting next Monday. There wasn’t a lot of time.

“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” Droya asked after swallowing a chunk of something that appeared to be coated in charcoal. “The portal was unpleasant for you, was it not?”

Rosie’s expression darkened. She’d pushed it out of her mind, but now that Droya mentioned it, that trip had been very unpleasant.

“Did you see anything strange in the portal?” Zete asked. “I’ve heard that when it fluctuates like that, some people see things.”

Rosie bit her lip.

“It was less seeing things and more feeling things,” she said quietly. She stared at the sandwich on her plate, squinting her eyes. It was still so vividly imprinted in her memory.

“I felt like I was buried for a thousand years,” she said. Her voice was sort of hollow, and Droya felt a surge of alarm run through his spine, all the way down his tail. He didn’t like her voice like that.

“I was dead except my heart was still going,” she continued. “I was so scared. Completely alone. Couldn’t… move.” She shivered and rubbed her arms, blinking away bad memories. “It felt like forever. Ice cold. And then there was light and… fire… and I wasn’t scared anymore. But it was so… strong. For a moment when I came out of the portal, I couldn’t even remember what I was.”

The demon and the pixie chewed their food slowly, watching her.

“Maybe you should just hire movers,” Zete proposed.

Rosie shivered again, shoving the memory away with a deep breath.

“Maybe so,” she said. “I don’t like not saying a proper goodbye in person, and I especially don’t like being so far from my mom, but maybe I can visit after a couple weeks. Maybe it won’t be bad like that again…”

She took a small bite of her sandwich and thought as she chewed.

“We should look for an apartment near the south side of town, where the library is going to be,” she said, moving on. “We can do multiple small apartments or one big one with rooms for each of us. I don’t mind a roommate type thing, it would be sort of like the hotel. But if you both want your own places, for privacy, the housing allowance should cover it.”

“Privacy does not help me keep you safe,” Droya said.

“I doubt I’m in any danger, Droya,” Rosie said with a smile. “I mostly wanted to keep you around so you can teach me about Hell. I trust you, and I like your company. I hope you’ll see me more as a friend than a… a client.”

Droya tilted his head, considering her carefully. “I like your company as well,” he said. “I will not fail to guard your safety, though. My job is my life.”

“I can work with that,” Rosie said. She pushed her plate a couple inches away, too wound up to eat any more. “Let’s head back to the hotel for now, I need to make lots of phone calls.”

They left the restaurant and headed toward the parking garage two blocks away. They had taken a late lunch, so pedestrian traffic had died off a little since peak hours, and the sidewalks were fairly clear. They turned a corner, and Rosie was nearly bowled over by a small demon woman running in a panic.

Droya snarled and shoved the woman off Rosie, putting himself between them before Rosie could even figure out what happened. His tail lashed through the air and his stance was low.

“Please help me!” the demon woman cried out in English. “Please, I can’t find my son, I think someone took him!” Her eyes were wide and she clasped her hands together, pleading.

“You lie,” Droya said, his claws extended. He took a measured step backward, forcing Rosie further from the threat.

“No, please, I think they went this direction, please help me!” the woman wailed. “He’s too little to fight, he’s still a baby! Oh, my baby!”

“You’re lying,” Droya said in Hellish. “Call the authorities if you need help. Keep your distance.”

The woman gave him a desperate look, then she seemed to flip a switch and suddenly smirked.

“Rosie,” Droya said, switching to English, “stay back.” All his senses were telling him the woman was dangerous.

The woman took a couple steps back, then bolted.

Droya whirled around, ready to grab Rosie’s hand and get them all back to the car as quickly as possible.

There were two red high-heeled shoes on the sidewalk.

Rosie and Zete were gone.