The next morning was… more than a little disorientating.

Solaris was sat on the sofa, looking onwards and staring blankly as chaos and anarchy ruled all around it. Footsteps pounded around the room, papers flew practically everywhere, and it was sure it could hear the sound of things shattering as they were swept aside. There was also the constant shouting and screaming that echoed around the office, though this came from two voices rather than three.

"I thought you had it, Charmy!" the green crocodile, who Solaris could only assume to be Vector, yelled uproariously. He did not seem pleased, not in the slightest, and his tone was more than a little panicked. "You know the client's dropping by today! They need it! And I'm a croc of my word, not some shoddy disappointment!"

Charmy, who was hovering next to him with folded arms, glanced around the wreckage and then looked at Vector wryly. "Are ya' sure?"

Solaris' brow furrowed as the croc growled, swatting a dismissive hand at Charmy but not so close to actually hit him. It wasn't entirely sure what the fuss was about – the bee had told it little on the subject. But had it known, perhaps it would have felt a little offended Vector did not ask to borrow one of its crystals.

"What's so special about a dumb old crystal anyway?" Charmy huffed, raising an eyebrow. Just as Vector lifted his index finger, the bee added, "And money isn't an answer!"

Vector's expression dropped, but he looked on in annoyance, tensing a little. "Well, to me, it is! Look, kid, I don't know what the client needs it for – frankly I don't care! But we need to find it now or we might be losing more than our reputation!"

"I left the room for two minutes. What's happened?" a voice asked in disbelief, and the pair looked to a purple chameleon, paling slightly. They both glanced around the room briefly, before meeting the gold eyed gaze of their resident ninja.

"Uh… redecoration?" Charmy shrugged sheepishly, a bead of sweat dropping down his brow as his fingers crossed behind his back.

From what Solaris knew, this person was calm where the rest of the group was not – it supposed he made sure they didn't cause this sort of thing constantly… at least while he was in the room. Espio, Solaris believed, didn't look taken by his compatriot's excuse.

"You know I won't believe that," the chameleon stated, his expression unimpressed. His gaze shot to Vector, who looked twice as guilty, possibly due to the fact he probably did most of the damage. "You lost the client's item, didn't you, Boss?"

"Ah, y'see, Espio—"

He was about to make an excuse but the ninja's expression grew only further disapproving.

"…yeah, I probably did. But it was Charmy's fault!"

Espio's expression hardened, but then it softened again as he looked around the room at all the carnage. He was pretty sure he had a lot of glass and porcelain to sweep up…

"Now we have more bills than what we started with," Espio stated, sighing tiredly as the pair in front of him rubbed the back of their necks awkwardly. "We have enough as it is without you two wrecking the office."

"Sorry…" Vector and Charmy both apologized in unison, but their gazes snapped to each other to exchange an annoyed glare.

"Let's… just find the item for the client," Espio stated, rubbing his temples. "Or better yet – you both clean up, and I'll find it."

"That's probably the best idea," Vector grumbled reluctantly, eyes darting to the other side of the room.

Solaris caught his gaze and a few seconds seemed to pass before Vector readjusted his headphones and started to pick things up. Charmy hesitated for a moment before moving to pick up untouched objects from the floor.

"So… Charmy," Vector started as Espio left the room once more. "Gotten anything out of him?"

"Who? Solaris?" the bee questioned, tilting his head and squinting slightly at the older one.

"Yeah… 'Solaris'," Vector repeated, rolling his eyes slightly.

"Nothing apart from the name, really," Charmy responded with a shrug. "Quiet as a mouse!"

"Really?" Vector glanced over at Solaris, who stiffened at the hard stare being on its reptilian eyes.

"Why, is there a problem with that, Vector?" Charmy remarked, tone laced with sass.

"Not really. Just could've used some background. That's all."

Solaris wasn't sure how long that minute of staring lasted. Vector's gaze was that of distrust, though it didn't fully understand emotions – it just knew that whatever emotion he was feeling, it wasn't pleasant. There was also the hint of familiarity in the other's gaze, though where that familiarity could have been from would be anyone's guess. Solaris was the first to break the deadlock, looking down at its shoes once more in hope that Vector would stop paying attention.

It suddenly grew alert at a sense of realization. It had told Charmy much more than just its name, something sacred and something that someone would have wanted to boast about. Charmy hadn't, though… he hadn't said a word about its place in the world among everything else…

Glancing up, it noted Charmy looking at him with a grin and wink, before tending back to picking papers off the floor.

Had it the appropriate feature to do so, Solaris would have smiled – it had been stressing over Charmy possibly blurting out the truth and causing more havoc than what was worth. Thankfully, however, that was not the case, and it could breathe easily.

It paused for thought, and came to a conclusion, a positive one.

Perhaps it could trust Charmy. Perhaps, unlike Shadow, it had been the right option… maybe it was okay to ask others for aid, to trust them… but perhaps this theory still needed more time than what had occurred. Charmy was quite secretive among his peers regardless.

After thirty minutes or so of mumbling and bickering, the crocodile and the bee had managed to clean up what they could of the office. Nothing could be done about shattered flower vases, much to Charmy's dismay (who tried to save the latter plants by using the kitchen sink), but the room looked much nicer than it had before. As Solaris had observed the activity, it couldn't have helped feeling guilty that it wasn't doing anything to contribute to the activity, but Vector seemed to disapprove of it so much as touching a couple of papers. It didn't understand; what had it done to warrant such distrust?

Charmy hurtled towards the sofa beside the hedgehog-shaped creature, breathing a sigh of relief as he hit the pillow in what seemed to be overdramatized exhaustion.

"Finally," he groaned, turning on his back and staring at the ceiling. Solaris looked at the child almost fondly, amused but nonetheless happy that the ordeal was over. Or so it had thought…

"Not finally!" Vector exclaimed in annoyance, folding his arms as his gaze rushed around the room. "We're still missin' that crystal!"

"Why don't ya' just give him YOUR crystal?" the bee asked, folding his arms and glaring at the other in annoyance.

Vector seemed momentarily speechless before he huffed in response, looking away.

Charmy grinned wryly. "Oh, lemme' guess: you lost that too."

"Because it doesn't make sense to keep the same things in one pile," Vector replied sarcastically, his eyes narrowing at the younger one in irritation. "I was gonna' take one from the bunch and just give it to the client, like he asked."

"Well, doesn't matter now; we've lost all of 'em," Charmy commented with a shrug. "Sooooo, does that mean we have to go back to the desert now?"

Solaris stiffened slightly at the prospect of going home. While it wanted to flee to its empty sanctuary and leave its responsibilities behind, it could not. It felt even going there would be too tempting for it to pass up. Fortunately that wasn't an option, or at least, Vector deemed so.

"Back to that oven? No thank you!" he growled, his arms by his side once again before his gaze looked back to Solaris. He'd noted the way the visitor had tensed up, and only squinted at the reaction.

Charmy didn't seem to pay this much mind. He was sat up, and his attention was focused on something else, a purple chameleon stood at the door behind them to their sleeping quarters. He was holding a cluster of crystals and looking at the crocodile in a restrained expression of exasperation.

Vector, feeling a glare penetrating his back, turned to meet the gaze of the ninja and his face lit up in relief at seeing he'd been successful in finding the crystals.

"Espio! You found them!" he observed, suddenly thankful for the super power of teamwork. "Where were they?"

Espio's expression grew dry.

"Under your pillow," he said simply.

Vector's face dropped in awkward embarrassment, and he rubbed the back of his scaly neck, looking away. Of course it would have been in the most simple of places, but why didn't Vector look there before, or at least have thought to at any point? It sure did explain why his pillows were more concrete-like than usual, though…

"Huh, so I guess we wrecked the place for nothin', huh, Espio?" Charmy remarked, looking around the room as he twiddled his fingers on his stomach.

"Yes, basically," the chameleon responded, walking towards the detective's desk and setting down the crystals on its centre. He observed the room, briefly, then looked at both Vector and Charmy. "But I suppose you've fixed what you could. Damages don't seem such an eyesore now."

"Crisis averted. Mostly," Vector replied, walking towards the desk and briefly examining the crystals. He made certain they were the very same that they'd picked up the day before, then turned to lean on the desk, staring at the door. "I guess all we do now is wait for that client. He should be here soon…"

"I still don't trust him," Espio muttered, staring elsewhere in thoughtful suspicion.

"I don't trust the guy either, Espio, but we get good dough out of it, so why should it matter?" his boss asked, looking over. "If it turns out to be some horrible life decision, we'll fix it. Simple as."

"Yeah, exactly!" Charmy piqued in with a grin, to which the other smiled at him.

"It seems less of a problem we can fix and more of one that we kick ourselves over," Espio muttered, not seeming to trust Vector's judgement but not voicing himself loud enough to undermine it.

Solaris watched the scene play out with interest, intrigued by the fact that despite disagreements, they were still the tightly-knit team that Charmy had described. Part of it felt joyous at such a thing, whilst the other small part of it felt envy towards the individuals, having never had such a relationship with someone.

"Huh?" Vector blinked at Espio's under-breath comment, looking at him.

"Let's just see, boss," was the final response, before all of their gazes focused on the front door for a rather long time.

That time shattered after twenty minutes, long after Charmy had grown bored of waiting and resorted to pestering his newfound friend about all the things it was unfamiliar of.

The door opened, with an almost noticeable slam, as Vector shot to attention, seeing a cloaked figure stood within the door frame. As the door hit the shelf beside the entrance, knocking its trinkets over, Espio's expression hardened further in suspicion and disapproval.

Fortunately, Vector would be the one talking in this case. It might not have seemed like a smart idea to have a loud-mouthed croc carrying out a deal, but at times he was rather level-headed despite his temper soaring through the roof at everything Charmy said.

Charmy blinked and turned as the figure walked towards the end of the room, their hood shielding their face but their eyes seemingly intent on the crystals on the desk. Briefly, that gaze snapped to look at the child, who reeled slightly towards his friend, much to the confusion of Solaris. The figure stopped in front of Vector, and looked up at him ominously.

Vector was lucky he had his height to make the situation more bearable. Picking up one of the crystals with one hand, he held out his other, looking at the figure expectantly.

"Alright, I got your gem right here. You uphold your end of the bargain, and I'll hand it over."

The figure's brow furrowed almost menacingly, but retrieved a pouch from inside of their cloak, bound by a ring, holding it out to Vector.

"There," the figure muttered.

Grunting slightly, the crocodile took the pouch immediately, before handing over the crystal in his hand. The figure took it abruptly, turning around to examine it, its glow illuminating the face ever so slightly.

Solaris suddenly felt a cold shiver go down its spine at its gaze interlocking with the strange newcomer. Green, reptilian eyes glowered back at its own.

The person was about to leave the office behind, before Vector looked up, having looked into the pouch and counted what was in it.

"Hey, buddy! What do I call you in the files?" he asked casually. "Can you give us a name? Helps with the tax."

The figure stopped, seemingly contemplating the options. Then, after a long silence, he finally spoke.

"My name is Mephiles. Mephiles the Dark."