“So,” began the monster, slowly, licking it’s lips at the dribbles of information that may come, “Whaddya have for me?”

“Nothing much, just a few hints about who hurt this kid.”

For some reason, Juice’s words set something off in the large, purple monster. It’s hackles rose, its red-stained teeth baring, it’s huge paws flexing.

“Artie,” Mutter-growled the monster, “was not just a kid. Call him by his Name.”

“Okay, okay, jeez.” Said Juice, backing up and raising his hands, “Sorry, sore spot. Got it.”

“Just get on with it, Juice. If that’s even your name.” Snarled the large creature, though it’s body settled back down to the ground. It still looked slightly on edge, it’s ears still raised, rotating and flicking often. Juice rolled his eyes.

Juice took a seat on a broken chair that leaned up against the shack wall, crossing his legs at the knee. He tapped a finger on his leg, seeming to think where to start.

“So,” he started, those sharp eyes of his blinking as the monster edged as close as possible, his eyes creasing slightly, while still outside of the shack.

“So, I know that your Art was killed in the broken hospital. I also know that Art’s life before you was, seemingly, good.”

The monster sighed with a shiver, lowering it’s ears. The mere subject of Art was sore for the monster. Ironic, as most monsters seem to not care about humans at all.

Suppose to say that this monster was an Exception.

Juice noticed this, and, with sympathy, smiled at the monster.

“Yeah, I’ll move on.”

“Thanks,” Mumbled the monster, resting it’s head on it’s forearms again, it’s three eyes droopy and sad, looking like a wounded dog. It blinked and the X mark turned to a check again.

“The day Artie was-”

“Art.”

“Okay. got it, dude.” Said Juice, sighing. He wished that the creature would let him continue, but he also knew that the creature was hurt, still, about what happened to it’s friend.

“The day Art was killed,” Continued the human, putting emphasis on the name, “His sister and father also disappeared.”

The monster’s green ears lifted at the new information, the tufts of fur on the end standing up with interest.

It made a gesturing motion with it’s hand, a kind of, “Go on..” movement.

“It’s been suspected for a while that Art’s mother was involved with gangs, drugs, and… other things. I looked into this and,” Juice takes a deep inhale, closing his eyes for a moment, hiding the bright blue and brown of his eyes from sight. He opened them again, and continued, at an eerily slow pace.

“It turns out to be true. Art’s mother, Rosalinne, was basically the head of a gang, called ‘Ratskin’”

“Gross-seeming but delicious.” nodded the purple monster, attempting to make humour of a conversation that pained it so much.

“Gross. Just plain gross. Anyways, Rosalinne was super respected in this gang and on the streets. But, as always, there was jealousy.”

The monster huffed, rolling it’s eyes. It thought humans were foolish, getting jealous of others with mediocre positions of power. To it, jealousy wasn’t a thing. It had nothing to be jealous of, nor did it have a position of power for other beings to be jealous of.

Actually, scratch that.

It held power in one thing; It’s appearance. Fear can make a person weak.

“This prostitute, one day, decided she wanted to get at Art’s mother. The hooker herself didn’t harm or cause any injury to any of Art’s family; she simply ordered the hit.”

Juice inhaled deeply through his filter mask, a crackling noise emitting from the canisters as Co2 was pulled through. Yes, Co2. The man was like a plant.

But, anyways, as was being said.

“She hired three people originally, one to kill each of Art’s Mother’s family. It’s said that the daughter got away somehow, and that the dad was killed. It’s thought that maybe he’s still alive though. I'm currently looking through that.”

Juice tapped aggressively at his mask as he breathed, trying to fix the filters, but they seemed not to work. The man grumbled, tossing his auburn hair out of his face with a toss of his head, and stood up from the chair.

He stepped over to a box on the opposite side of the small shack, opening it and rummaging through the contents. He pulled out two green canisters, but instead of an “X” being painted on the face of them, there was a black checkmark. Taking off the filters that were attached to his mask, he put on the new ones, turning them and fastening with a small click.

“Sorry, anyways,” Coughed Juice, hitting his chest with a fist a few times, inhaling deeply to get the air through his mask and in his lungs. He sat on the broken chair and continued to cough and pound at his chest for a few more minutes before settling, the filters getting a constant flow of Co2 and his breathing returning to normal, however normal this man’s breathing could be, “The third almost got to Art, but they were scared half to death of you.”

See? Told you. Fear makes people weak. Though in this case, it was a good thing. It allowed for the monster to spend more time with it’s dear friend.

But now, Instead of going on, Juice stopped.

“In order to get more,” He started, leaning forward on the broken chair, “You’re going to have to give me something, or, rather, do something for me. I don’t usually give out information for free. Lucky you scared me, or else you’d have to do the thing first.” Juice grinned.

The monster growled, snarled really, as the human leaned forward in his chair, in that cocky know-all manner only an informant could.

The monster raised up again in anger, no, rather, frustration. It made no move to attack, because that would be, quite easily, one of the dumbest things it could do.

“What do you want, then?” Growled the towering purple creature, flexing it’s hands and paws in annoyance.