Hello everyone. I am so sorry for the long absence. I don't really have a good excuse except that I was in my first year of university and have been focusing on my studies. I've finally gotten this chapter completed and correctly edited, so I decided to post it now. Please note that this chapter is pretty much a filler chapter and is basically explaining a little in terms of powers, backstories and some bonding occurs between the Horsemen.

But enough from me, please enjoy!

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Chapter 2 - Getting to Know You

Daniel had known what Merritt was from the moment he first laid eyes on him - the faintly luminescent irises and tangy, blood-stained scent gave the vampire away from the get go - and a quick glance at Henley showed that she knew as well, the púca's eyes eager and knowing. They'd been about to reveal themselves, knowing instinctively that he had no idea what they were, when Jack had come up the stairs. Jack was a cause of confusion for Daniel, his scent unlike any creature the incubus had met before, foreign and exotic but also saturated with the strong scent of the local humans; he couldn't tell if Jack was a creature or a human in close contact with a creature.

He had pulled Henley aside the second that the blueprints had faded, leading the way out of the apartment and down the hall before turning to her.

"What is he?" Daniel asked abruptly, his confusion and irritation clear in his tone. "Merritt I know - vamps aren't all that unusual nowadays - but Jack? I don't recognise his scent at all."

"Neither do I." Henley agreed, glancing back at the apartment behind her. "He smells like a creature, definitely, but there's so much human mixed in that I can't place it."

"Definately a foreign creature." the incubus stated. "He doesn't smell like any of the European creatures I've met, but that doesn't rule out very many. The Pacific and Asian areas have hundreds of creatures and I've barely met any of them. He could be pretty much anything."

"Think we should ask him?"

"But are we certain that he's not human?"

"Well…"

"Then we can't risk it."

"But he'll be working with us from now on." Henley argued. "He'll find out, one way or the other. Better to tell now and have him accept it than to hide it and scare him later."

"I suppose…" He didn't like it, not even vaguely, but Daniel could see the wisdom in the suggestion.

"Then it's settled. We confront them both tonight."

"Both?"

"Merritt doesn't know what we are, I'm certain. He must be a newborn for him to not recognise what you are at least."

"Gee, thanks." Daniel rolled his eyes.

"Whatever. We speak to them tonight."

"Alright."

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"Okay, so..." Henley glanced at each of the guys in turn, hazel eyes serious. The four were sitting in the hotel room that the púca had booked for herself, sprawled out on the bed, chair and on the floor in Jack's case. "Our instructions are that we need to get to know and trust each other before this whole thing even starts, so let's begin with the elephant in the room, shall we?" Jack and Merritt stared at her in confusion, not picking up on the dubbed 'elephant in the room'. Daniel, on the other hand, just nodded in agreement. "So, we know that you're not human."

The reaction to that was almost as expected - Merritt went very still, eyes locked on the fae and the demon as he tried to categorise them into 'friend' or 'foe'. Jack, on the other hand, sucked in a breath so fast that he choked, coughing a little into his fist as he tried to get himself under control. That at least confirmed that their suspicions weren't unfounded, not a single soul in the room was human.

Jack moved slowly out of his lounging sprawl after he'd recovered, manoeuvring himself until he was balanced on his hands and the balls of his feet, poised to run at a moments notice. Merritt was doing the same, slowly shifting himself to the edge of the chair, fully prepared to just ditch the room and his things if need be.

"Oh relax." Henley rolled her eyes. "We're not going to come after you with flaming brands and pitchforks or anything. It'd not only be hypocritical, it'd be pretty stupid thing to do if one wants to keep their people safe."

"P-people?" Jack asked, still wary.

"How, exactly, would it be hypocritical?" Merritt asked stiffly.

"Well, for one, we're not human either, so it's not like we'd kill you out of fear or anything. Plus I'm pretty sure both of us are older than the two of you, so we'd technically be stronger in terms of powers too." Daniel shrugged, reclining lazily on the bed.

"And to answer your question, Jack, I'm a púca, one of the Irish fae. The púca are sort of like seasonal sprites." Henley tried to explain. "We claim the over-ripe blackberries and the unharvested wheat in the fall and can shapeshift into any living creature we know of, both alive and extinct. The fae don't kill, not ever. We play tricks, sure, but never anything dangerous enough to permanently harm or kill."

"I've never heard of púca before." Merritt said, relaxing back into his chair. "And my leader told me about most kinds of creature that have been around for the last couple of millennia or so."

"Well, the púca, along with the rest of the Irish fae passed through the mounds into the Otherworld around three thousand years ago to escape the 'iron-wielding mortals'. I'm not surprised that we've become myth even among the creature factions. I only came back nine years ago, in '03."

"You said that neither of you are human." Merritt turned to Daniel. "So what are you?"

Daniel grinned and slid off the bed, standing up straight as he dropped the illusion hiding his true form. His scrolling horns protruded at an angle out of his head from just above his ears, curving back and up as they tapered into sharp points. Great black bat wings spread from his shoulders and folded neatly against his spine while a long black tail curled down behind him, the end tipped with a dragon-like spade. His clothes had also completely changed, the outfit from before having just been a layer of the illusion weaved around his form. He was shirtless, with tight leather pants and knee-high boots clinging to his legs under a black, sleeveless and calf-length vest. There were silver cuffs around both wrists and a long necklace with a coiled dragon pendant around his neck to complete the ensemble.

"I'm an incubus." Daniel purred and leveled a smouldering stare at the two, spinning in a slow circle to put himself on display before sitting back down. "A demon, according to the humans, and we don't really bother to correct them."

Jack stared, speechless and glowing with a bright red blush. Merritt only just managed to shake off the need to gape. "So, are the myths true?" He managed to get out, tearing his eyes away. Daniel just smiled knowingly and winked one ruby eye.

"So now that know you know what we are," Daniel's expression suddenly became serious. "Why don't you tell us what you are, Jack? I already know what Merritt is, but I don't recognise you. I know the scents of most creatures, but yours is different... Human, but not."

Everyone was silent for several minutes, all eyes turned to Jack. He sighed and reached under his shirt, pulling out a pretty gold necklace with a leaf-shaped pendant, carefully lifting it over his head and dropping it to the floor. His body shifted and changed, eventually settling on the form of a black fox, roughly the size of a large dog, with two white-tipped tails swishing back and forth as he settled comfortably on his haunches.

"I'm a nogitsune." It wasn't so much talking as his voice being projected through the fox's mouth, like a record playing through a speaker. "We're also called yako."

"And that is..." Merritt prompted.

"A Japanese fox spirit, a yokai. We're basically the same as the kitsune, but where kitsune are benevolent, we are more mischievous and prone to causing trouble. Plus we grow new tails more often than the kitsune, one every fifty years for us while it's every hundred years for them. I'm actually considered a hanyou or a half-demon since I have a human father, which is why you said I smell so much like a human. I'm technically weaker than pure blooded fox spirits, though I still have all the same powers as a full yako so it doesn't matter that much." Jack shrugged as best he could in his fox body, picking his necklace up in his teeth and hopping onto the bed by Daniel's knee.

"I've heard tales of kitsune being able to summon fire and have powers of possession. They're common myths in Japan, and I've never had the opportunity to verify them until now." Daniel said, running a gentle hand down Jack's furry back, causing the fox's chest to rumble with a pleasured purr. "How many of the myths are true?"

"Well," Jack's voice was soft and dreamy, distracted by the hand carding through his fur. "We can summon fire and lightning - it's called kitsune-bi - plus we can enter people's dreams, fly short distances, turn invisible, and we can possess people, which the humans call kitsunetsuki. Some of the older kitsune and yako can create powerful illusions, drive people mad, manipulate space and time and transform into impossible things, like another moon in the sky or a massively tall tree. I'm still young, so I don't have powers beyond manipulating my element, kitsune-bi, kitsunetsuki, dream walking and short periods of flight and invisibility, though I do have some talent in manipulating space, but only enough to change small things and make small pocket dimensions."

"Can you show us?" Henley asked, clapping her hands together in excitement. Jack nodded and closed his eyes, concentrating hard. He started to fade, slowly turning invisible until he'd completely disappeared.

"Okay, that's cool." Merritt whistled as Jack reappeared, the fox's head dipping low in embarrassed delight.

"Merritt, Daniel and Henley seem to know what you are, but I don't recognise your scent." The fox's head tilted curiously. "What are you?"

Merritt staring for several moments before opening his mouth, displaying two sets of sharp, elongated fangs, one set on his top jaw and one on the bottom. "I'm a vampire, part of the Skywolf Coven lead by the Karis twins and based in New Orleans. I was turned just under eight years ago by a rogue who's been state-hopping for the last couple of decades. And before you ask, yes I do drink blood, no not all that often, and yes I can turn into a bat, along with any other nocturnal animal. Oh and just so we're clear, vampires don't burst into flames and die if out in the sunlight, so please don't assume that I do. It's the stupidest myth the humans have ever thought up about us... Well, aside from the 'sparkles in the sun' bullshit. That one starts arguments... big arguments."

Daniel pressed the heel of his hand to his mouth to stifle his laughter, the blunt statement giving rise to the mental image of Merritt sparkling in the sun like some sort of demented mirror ball. He showed more tact than Jack who burst out laughing without bothering to try to hide it. Henley just shook her head in disgust; she'd boycotted that series to the point where she hadn't even conceded to watching a trailer for the movies.

"Aside from the obvious," Merritt continued, mostly for Jack's sake, since he knew the least out of them all. "Each vampire also has a small plethora of powers; we can all read minds, but not many have the ability to control them like I can. I also have telekinesis and several other smaller mind-based powers."

"So, basically you're a psychic vampire?" Henley asked, intrigued. She didn't know that much about a vampire's powers, so any information was interesting to her. "Are all vampire abilities like yours or are there physical ones too?"

"There are physical and elemental powers too. Psychic abilities are rather common, while advanced shapeshifting and the various kinesis abilities are less so. It's rarer to have more than one ability. My coven leader can manipulate fire as well as transform into a pretty massive wolf, as can his brother though Regulus controls water instead of fire. It's not the same as lycanthropy, since werewolves are forcefully changed on the full moon while vampiric 'shifters aren't, and for some reason normal vampires like me can't transform into wolves like we can bats and possoms."

"Are these the Karis twins you mentioned earlier?" Jack asked.

"Yeah. The elder, Kaleb, is the leader and the oldest in the coven. He saved me after I was attacked by the rogue, kept me alive and tried to cure me of my impending vampirism, but found me too late to stop the transformation. And so, here I am as a supernatural creature."

There were several moments of silence before Henley broke it, clearing her throat and shifting on the bed.

"Now that we know what we all are," Henley started. "How about we play a game to get to know each other properly?" The guys shrugged, watching as Henley reached into her bag and pulled out a small red box. "This was with our instructions. It's called 'Table Topics'. It's supposed to be a good icebreaker game."

"How do you play?" Jack asked, stepping delicately over the sheets and Danny's legs to peer down at the cube, tapping the closed box with his paw curiously.

"You pull out a card and answer what's written on it, that's really all there is to it." Henley said, pulling out the cards to shuffle them before putting them back into the cube. "So, who wants to go first?"

"I'll go." Daniel reached out and pulled out a card, reading the printed question. "Okay... It's asking 'where is your favourite place in the world?' I'd have to say Thailand or Malaysia. It's warm, the food's good, the people are polite and stuff is cheap."

"I've never been to Thailand or Malaysia before." Jack said, tilting his head as a thought came to mind. "Actually, come to think about it, I've never left the state before."

"Never?" Henley looked at Jack, shocked. "You've never left New York?"

"No. My father lived here, so did Mother until... Yeah. Anyway, I never had enough money to get away, and it's not like I knew where to go either. I don't know anything about navigating foreign countries." Jack shook his head, dislodging the depressive thoughts. "But enough about that, I'll go next." He slipped on his necklace and transformed back to human form, pulling out a card and reading it aloud. "'You see a snake cross the road in front of you. How would you react?' Um... What? Why would a snake be crossing the road?"

"The same reason the chicken crossed the road." Merritt deadpanned.

"But anyway, I guess I'd keep my distance, I'd prefer a flattened or dead snake to getting bitten."

"Understandable." Henley nodded and reached into the cube. "'What is the key to happiness?' Um... I don't know... Having your family and loved ones around you? I never really thought about it."

"Not many do." Daniel nodded. "Personally, I'd go with being safe and comfortable and satisfied with my life. Incubi don't build families, so we're a little more materialistic in what we consider happiness."

"Each to their own. It's my turn." Merritt reached into the box. "'Hard work and success is like a chicken and egg story. Which came first?' This question is stupid. Who made this game?"

"I have no idea, but I really hope there aren't too many questions like that." Jack muttered, giving the box an unimpressed stare.

"Hard work obviously comes first. You need to work to become successful. It doesn't just fall into your lap, and if it does, then it's probably a trick."

"I concur. I've seen too many of those not to think that." Daniel agreed, reaching into the box for his next card. "'Do you remember your worst hangover?' No, I can't actually get drunk, so hangovers kind of don't happen to me."

"Lucky!" Merritt groaned, rubbing his temples. "Just thinking of hangovers gives me a headache."

"I have been quite thankful for my inability to get drunk multiple times in the past." Daniel mused darkly. "It's always better to stay completely sober when running from the crazy demon-hunting humans, especially when they know your face, your name and where you were living at the time."

"You... Were chased by demon hunters?" Jack's voice was quiet, but full of curiosity. "When was this? And how did you escape them?"

"This was almost four hundred years ago, in Italy. I was being hounded by the Inquisition because someone had somehow seen my true form. I got caught once and was tortured for information and their personal amusement before I managed to escape and flee the country. I have never been so grateful to have wings before." Daniel stretched one wing out, curling it around to stroke the warm, leathery membrane. "They and my ability to weave illusions helped me get out of Italy and into Switzerland without being recaptured. Granted, there were a few close calls, but thankfully I escaped without sustaining further injuries."

"Is that's why you didn't want me reading you?" Merritt asked quietly. "You didn't want anyone to see your memories of the torture?"

"That, and because I don't want to inadvertently relive them while you were watching." Daniel shrugged. "At least they didn't try to burn me at the stake or something, that would have left some seriously scarring memories. Though in hindsight, they probably would have staked me if I'd given in to the torture and dropped the illusion."

"How can you talk about this so easily?" Jack asked, resting a hand on Daniel's leather-clad knee. "Wouldn't it be painful to remember?"

"It was, once." The incubus said with a shrug, his tail flicking around to soothingly trail across the back of Jack's hand. "But four hundred years is a long time, more than enough to get used to the knowledge of what happened. I'm okay with it now, I just don't want to relive it again."

Jack nodded his understanding. "How about we move on with the game?" At the answering nods, Jack reached into the cube and pulled out his next card. "'What is your favourite season and why?' Well, I like summer. I can go out and nap in the park since it's warm and there are plenty of tourists that I can pickpocket. Plus I hate the cold. Winter is hard on the streets."

"You were on the streets?"

"Yeah, I've been on the streets for... I don't know how long exactly... It's a little hard to find a place to stay when you are literally living off money you stole from random people. Pick-pocketing isn't exactly the most successful of careers, not when so many people don't even carry paper money anymore. Seven out of ten wallets haven't got more in then than maybe three or four dollars, and no one wants to hire a homeless, penniless 'bum'."

"You aren't a bum." Henley said firmly, pulling Jack into a gentle hug. "You just had a hard life."

Jack laughed mirthlessly, burying his nose into the púca's shoulder. "You have no idea."

"Okay, this is getting a little too sentimental for me." Merritt said, ruining the serious atmosphere. "Your go Henley."

Henley let Jack go and reached into the cube for her next card. "'A Midsummer Night's Dream'. Okay, what about it?"

"... Does it say anything else?" Daniel lifted an eyebrow, peering at the card over Henley's shoulder. "Apparently not."

"Maybe say what you think about it. Have you read it, watched it?" Merritt suggested, convinced that the maker of the game was an idiot.

"I've never read it..." Henley said, putting the card down. "Nor have I watch the movie. Literally all that I know about it is that there's a guy named Puck and I think he turns someone into a donkey or something. But that's it. Oh, and there are fairies, I think."

"Ill met by moonlight, proud Titania!" Daniel said dramatically, flipping his hair as if he were annoyed at someone. Merritt snorted at him, shaking his head, Henley stared impassively and Jack just looked confused.

"What's a midsummer night's dream?" Jack asked, completely lost.

"It's a play by Shakespeare," Merritt explained. "It was turned into a movie some years back."

"It's a classic." Daniel explained. "One of Shakespeare's romantic comedies, though I prefer Twelfth Night to A Midsummer Night's Dream. The movie for Twelfth Night was a lot better than that of Midsummer too."

"We had to study the books while I was in school." Merritt added. "Some of the Shakespearean plays are downright disturbing. Macbeth completely freaked me out and I hear the movie wasn't much better. Romeo and Juliet was just annoying beyond logical explanation and I couldn't quite stop myself from criticising everything that Romeo and Juliet did."

"I hear you." Daniel rolled his eyes. "If they had just thought to communicate a little then they probably wouldn't have died. But oh no, forget communication, I'll just take a roofie from a priest to commit fake suicide without telling my partner and hope it works out!" The incubus snorted derisively. "Morons."

"The priest and the nurse weren't much better."

Daniel chuckled, grinning over at the vampire. "It's nice to know that there's someone here who's read the classics enough to talk about them, even if they weren't read by choice. I tried to get Henley to read them but she never did."

"What? They were boring and I couldn't understand the language that well. It's different from what I was used to and the Fae didn't really have much need for writing. We passed on all important knowledge through stories and songs, not textbooks and essays like they do now."

"Well, the language is hard." Merritt agreed, pulling a card from the box. "But I suppose it's just a matter of getting used to it. 'Is honesty the best policy?' Okay, let's recap, shall we? I'm a mentalist, I work in the entertainment business, I'm a vampire hiding in plain sight. Obviously honesty isn't always the safest thing for us. Plus the whole point of a magician's job is to deceive the audience."

"But sometimes it is better to tell the truth." Jack countered. "Telling lies here won't allow us start trusting each other faster, if at all. With trust comes honesty and understanding, you can't have one without the others."

"That's quite philosophical, Jack." Danny teased, ruffling the yako's hair. "Very mature."

"Oh shut up." Jack grumbled, trying and failing to fix his hair.

"But anyway, shall we move on?" Daniel took his next card, eyebrows furrowing in confusion. "'The chicken is involved, the pig is committed. When it comes to life, what are you, the chicken or the pig?' I'm not sure that I understand this one. Was the pig committed to an asylum because of the chicken?"

"Maybe the chicken and the pig were both involved in something but the pig was blamed?" Henley suggested.

"It could be asking whether you're the type to cause trouble or if you're the one blamed for what others do." Merritt guessed. "Though that's not the greatest way of asking the question that I've ever heard, but I guess it's worth a shot."

There was a chorus of huhs and Daniel nodded his understanding. "In that case, I'd be the chicken."

Henley snorted and poked one of his wings. "Yeah, a plucked chicken."

"I prefer demonic chicken, if you don't mind."

"This is the weirdest argument I've ever heard." Jack giggled, glancing bemusedly between the grinning púca and the lounging, deadpanned incubus.

"Get used to it."

"... How common are these again?"

"Don't ask. Just take your turn please."

"Fine..." Jack took his card. "'Tell us something that no one else knows about you.'" He went strangely silent, eyes glazing a bit as he turned his attention inward. "I haven't got much that I can tell. Much of my life... Well, probably over 20 years of my life were spent on the streets. For the years before that I was with my... Mother."

Merritt 's eyebrows lifted. "Touchy subject, is it? What happened to her?"

"She died. It's nothing that you need to concern yourselves over." Was the stiff reply, but that just made Merritt all the more suspicious.

"Really now? But something happened before she died, didn't it? What was it? Divorce, abandonment, drugs, alcohol, murde-" he froze when he saw the minute flinch pass through Jack's thin frame. "Your joking. Who did it?"

"I did." They all stared at him in shock, trying to connect the happy, awe-struck fox with a bloodthirsty killer and came up blank. "I had no choice, okay?! It was her - the crazed yako who had killed my father in cold blood and beat me for thinking that it was wrong to do so - or an innocent who hadn't done anything at all, not to provoke her, not to hurt anyone, nothing. I wasn't going to let her get away with it again."

"She killed your father?" Henley asked quietly, reaching out for the distraught young yako but pulled back before she touched him. "Why?"

"Because he was teaching me that life is sacred and that one should always try to do as much good as they can in the time they have on this earth." Jack sneered in disgust, his fox ears and tails manifesting as he lost control of his emotions. The ears lay flat against his head and tails bristled with suppressed fury as he spoke, voice shaking the tiniest bit. "Mother disagreed. She was an outlaw, banished from the homeland because she enjoyed bloodshed a little too much. She tried to raise me to be the same, Dad thankfully got to me first."

Henley reached out again, but this time she didn't pull back until she had a hand wrapped firmly around Jack's upper arm. She pulled him into a hug, stroking his hair soothingly. "I'm sorry."

"It's alright. It happened a long time ago." The Nogitsune shrugged awkwardly. "And you guys didn't know."

"Even so..." Daniel's voice rumbled from just behind him, warm breath tickling the hair behind his ear as the incubus joined the hug. "We apologise for bringing up painful memories."

"It really should be me apologising." Merritt protested, shifting from the chair to the bed and pressing a hand to Jack's back, not quite joining the embrace but sitting close enough that he was almost a part of it. "I didn't realise it would be something like that. I honestly thought it would be alcohol or something, not this."

"Like I said, it's okay. We've all got dark memories, this is just one of mine." Jack closed his eyes and snuggled deeper into the comforting touches, basking in the warmth of the bodies around him. "It's only fair, we heard one of Daniel's earlier."

"Hush now." Henley shushed, stroking his hair affectionately. They sat like that for what felt like hours, wrapped in each other's arms and the soft leather of Daniel's wings, staying close to each other until Merritt pulled back, prompting Daniel and then Henley to do the same. They untangled themselves and resettled in their chosen seats.

"Do you want to continue or stop here?" Henley asked, gesturing to the box of question cards.

"Let's stop." Daniel sighed. "It's late, I'm tired and the thought of sleep sounds very tempting right now."

"I need to get going too," Jack nodded in agreement. "I still need to find a hidey-hole to stay in until I can go back to where I usually bunk."

"I think we'd all prefer it if you didn't stay on the streets." Henley said sternly. "In fact, you can sleep in my hotel room, assuming that you don't mind staying in fox form."

Jack shook his head. "I don't mind, but are you sure you don't mind me staying with you? I don't want to be a bother."

"I insist." The púca said with an air of finality. Jack didn't even try to argue.

"Well." Daniel broke the awkward silence when he stood and moved for the door, fading back into his human form as he did so. "I'm gonna go now. I assume we'll meet at the apartment tomorrow?"

"Yep." The other three nodded. "Let's meet there at 11 o'clock tomorrow morning." Merritt suggested. "That way we can all get some proper sleep and good food into us."

"Okay then." Daniel tossed a wave over his shoulder and opened the door. "See you there."