[Indigo]

Normally Witness wouldn't have stayed out this late, but Silas was having some sort of existential crisis, and he seemed to think that as a theologian she was the only person who could help him. He tended to be difficult to reason with when he got into one of these moods, and she didn't have any pressing engagements, so she'd done her best. Not that she thought it had helped much. He was remarkably resistant to all her advice.

In any case, she'd done what she could, and now she was headed home with ears rotating wildly just in case. Easier to be suspicious of sound than sight, since weird people in cloaks slinking through the shadows were fairly common and usually harmless to the best of her knowledge. People made certain sounds when they were trying to sneak up on you, and that was far easier to monitor.

She wasn't too far from her street when something loomed out of the shadows, just for a moment, an enormous scaly head with eyes that followed her unsettlingly for a few seconds before vanishing back into the dark. Curious, but probably not an immediate threat, though she did pick up the pace a bit. A few more blocks and she was home, darting up the stairs and through the halls and closing the door firmly behind her, and locking it, because those eyes had thrown her more than she'd like to admit.

She had just settled into her chair when the phone rang. It was, unsurprisingly, Silas. She would have rolled her eyes, had she been able.

[Indigo]

"I can't actually resolve your issues with the concept of an afterlife, Silas, and I'm not sure why you insist I can. Look, why is this a concern right now? Are you dying? Yes, that's hilarious, now please answer the question. Then it can definitely wait at least until morning. No, I'm not c--hang on, someone's at the door."

It was with slightly more force than necessary that she flung open the door and said, "What."

"Good evening." She noticed the voice first, because it was the voice of someone who was trying to sound mysterious and intimidating, and therefore she completely failed to find it threatening. Then she noticed the eyes.

They were the same eyes that had followed her from the alley, though there were more of them now. They moved in sync, which was what she'd expected, but was still somehow worse than if they hadn't. In roughly the center of them was a grinning mouth, with a tongue flicking out occasionally between the teeth. The grin was beginning to look a little forced.

Witness had never actually met a Nonaga before, and she became aware that she was staring, though it was unlikely anyone else could tell. She said, "Did you want something?"

"I would like to speak with you," said the Nonaga smoothly, in exactly the same tone as before, "about a matter of utmost importance. A matter of life and death."

"You and everyone else," she replied. "Care to be more specific?"

[Indigo]

The Nonaga blinked, which was something to see. She had apparently never considered that she might need to actually explain herself, at least not right away. After a pause in which the eyes darted every which way she said, "I...am trying to prevent a number of deaths, but I find myself unable to do it on my own. That is all I can tell you at the moment."

"It's going to take more than that." Not that Witness was especially enthusiastic about the prospect of arguing with Silas about the existence of the soul, but compared to following a cryptic stranger onto a darkened street it was almost appealing. Almost.

"It is something of a delicate matter--but," the Nonaga said quickly, perhaps noticing the set of Wit's ears, "I suppose I can tell you a little more. I have recently left an organization which was not working to the best interests of this world. Not from malicious intent, but because they do not understand the consequences of what they do, and they do not listen when I try to warn them. I have been forced to take matters into my own hands. Unfortunately I am used to working with at least one other agent at my back, so my plan depends on having one other with me."

"I'm not an agent of anything."

"No, but you will do in the circumstances. I can give you what training you need quickly enough. The more extensive parts, you will lack, but I do not require a particularly skilled agent." The grin returned. "The fate of your world may be at stake, Witness Robinson. Do you wish to learn for certain whether there is life after death?"

Witness stood perfectly still a moment in unreadable silence, and then she slammed the door. Then she looked from it to her chair, and back to the door again. She walked to the phone.

"Silas," she said, "I'm going to have to call you back."

[Indigo]

The Nonaga was still there when she opened the door, though looking a bit startled. She wondered what she'd been expected to do, exactly. The only way a perfect stranger could know her full name and what she'd been talking about just now--actually, there were a number of reasons, but most of them required close enough study that they'd also be able to predict her actions, surely. Even a few minutes of observation would have told them quite enough.

"Do I need to bring anything?" she said, when the Nonaga failed to speak.

"Ah--no. We will be able to return here frequently. Or to return around here. It is...complicated, but it will make things easier."

Witness considered this, and took down a coat from behind the door. She dumped a few things into the pockets just in case. It didn't seem terribly wise to trust this person completely. "Do I get to know your name?" she said, fiddling with her keys. "Or are you going to keep being cryptic?"

"You may call me Violet." The Nonaga continued to watch her intently as she finally found the right key and locked the door, and tapped the hinges to activate the wards. They'd been expensive, but worth it. "Are you ready?"

"I'm always ready," Witness said. It was almost entirely true.

[Indigo]

She followed Violet out into the street, where they found that it had started to rain. She turned up her collar and tucked her headphones into one of the inside pockets. "I can't help but notice that you haven't bothered to tell me where we're going."

"The where is not so important," said Violet. "Stand there."

"In the middle of the street?"

"It will only be for a moment. I have seen no one driving near here, anyway." She watched Witness until the latter complied. "Thank you. Hold still." And then she said something else, which Witness could only assume was a word, though not one in any language she recognized. She did something with her hands, something that looked very much like unbuttoning the air, and then she swept her hands apart and the rain between them seemed to...stop. A cloud of dust rose up instead, though as soon as it passed her hands it was stopped by the rain. Violet smiled.

"Come here," she said, "I can only hold it for so long."

Witness stepped forward, dubious, and at the other's prompting carefully poked her head into the dust-filled space. Blinding light filtered through her mask, and she drew back sharply, but under Violet's many stern glares she had no choice but to move forward again. Slowly, and with much prompting, she stepped through an opening she hadn't been sure was there.

A moment later Violet, too, vanished from the street, as did the dust. Somewhere in Witness's building, a phone rang.

Go here.