World Refugees Final Mix

Song shivered and also focused very intently on her cup of tea.

She felt that she'd done a good job of not missing Josiah while he was away. It certainly hadn't been painful as the absence of Orpheus had. In fact she felt wonderful, or she had up until a few moment ago.

The presence of James - the familiarity of his aura - was awakening a keen longing for her wayward lover, and she did not appreciate it in the least.

But she'd given him his answer, and he was offering to 'change their minds' about trusting him. She didn't trust him, of course, but the least she could do was try.
"You could help us," she said in a voice turned dull by her attempt to hide her frustration. "I believe the original agreement was a trade of stories, but other information might be more useful."

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"You could also tone down the pheromones or whatever the hell you're doing before I torch your ass." The threat was delivered with a smile and a completely cheerful tone of voice, but Amy was dead serious. She had finally had it with this guy. Oh sure, setting him on fire wasn't going to help anybody, but it'd be fun to watch.

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He winked at Amy, unruffled by the threat. "Oh, but you wouldn't, love." He leaned forward. "Besides, I would love to see how your mate would react under similar conditions."

He glanced between Song and Ren and again, smiled brightly and ignoring the request to restrain the energy that he was emitting. "Now I did promise that, didn't I? And I am certainly a person of my word. Although I admit that I would have preferred a more..." He nodded at Ren, "intimate setting for a tete-a-tete."

He crossed his arms, eyes shining cheerfully. "What would you like to know, love?"

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Ren blushed and bit her lip, switching her thoughts to clobbering Heartless instead. Or maybe just clobbering James. Yeah, that was nice and satisfying.

Much like Song, she was also feeling particularly aware of how lonely she was, but she hadn't been able to admit her feelings to the object of her affections, or with anyone else for that matter. It simply would have caused too many problems if she had. And Ren was trying to get over that, really, which was what was making James' tactics so effing frustrating.

She stayed quiet, not wanting to risk saying something she'd regret. Song seemed much more confident against James right now, anyway.

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Song straightened up, elegantly composing herself and putting all of her willpower into banishing the ghosts of memory - of warm arms around her and a gentle voice in her ear...
She still refrained from looking at James. Her eyes were closed.

Yasha had curled up under her seat, but he was still staring at the incubus nervously, and perhaps that was why Song didn't feel the need to watch him herself.

"We've had a few unexpected problems recently, ones we thought would not threaten us again. Heartless and Nobodies which were said to be gone for good have returned, and the Princesses of Heart have vanished. If you know anything about these events, or anything that might be connected to them, we are sorely lacking in clues right now."

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Oh, but I should.

Amy knew how Jalen would react, all right. There'd be a decapitated body in the kitchen by now. She reached over and gave Ren's hand a squeeze. James wasn't the only one she was starting to pick up on. What a morning.

Taking a deep breath, she tried to block him out, at least enough that she'd stop wanting to smack him. For a while, anyway. She understood why Song was bothering to talk to him - after all, anything he might know would definitely help, but...

Ugh.

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James shook his head with a chuckle. "I make it a point not to engage in the affairs of the worlds. I don't believe I can help you on that front." He leaned back casually against the counter and grinned. "But perhaps there may be something of importance that I know that I'm simply unaware of."

He passed a glance to all three women in the kitchen, the glow in his eyes becoming as noticeable as the energy in the air. "Strange how the memory is so selective at times."

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Ren suddenly bristled as the glow in James' eyes once again jogged her memory of another pair of unusual eyes she had seen not too long ago, and of an unfortunate meeting at the Star Market... "Ugh!" she ground out, suddenly no longer interested in her tea. "That's right! That slimy creep called himself James that day!" She shuddered and stared defiantly at the incubus, her indignation temporarily overriding her insecurity. "You might be interested to know that Calum borrowed your name for a bit during last year's Star Market," she told him. "Sure, it's a common name, but at this point, I don't think either of us believe in coincidences anymore."

Sure, it had little to do with the conversation now, but like James said, the memory is selective...

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Song was trying to imagine what James was implying, and hoping it wasn't the obvious, because she really didn't know what to say except something along the lines of 'we're not having sex with you for information.'

Ren once again provided a nice distraction. She'd honestly forgotten about Calum haunting the Star Market. Ren's rage actually made her smirk faintly, and she deigned to open her eyes again and glance at James. She was curious about how well he knew the pirate, since he obviously knew of him.

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"This whole conversation is beginning to give me a headache." Was her only addition to the discussion before she took a seat on her stool again. She'd be adding this to the list of things not to tell her husband about.

It was getting to be a long list.

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"Really now," James murmured. "I'm surprised. I always assumed he never liked me much." He sighed deeply, closing his eyes as if he were thinking about something before adding, "But I guess that's something entirely different."

He smiled again, beginning to walk around the island in a casual stroll. "But if I can be of any assistance, just let me know." As he walked past Ren, he nonchalantly brushed a hand on her arm, and a sharp sensation passed between them. He almost did the same with Amy, but settled for leaning a bit too far into her personal space. "I hate for such beautiful ladies to be in distress."

He stopped at Song, grinning at her, his eyes still glowing faintly. "And I'm sure there are other stories we can share."

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Ren was fully aware of just what that "sensation" meant, and she bit down on her lip again to stifle any embarrassing little sounds before they could come out. She took a few deep breaths through her nose before looking back up at James through narrowed eyes. "You're not doing much to help our 'distress," she snapped, hoping she was hiding her attraction toward him at the moment. Once again, she found herself thinking that this was entirely unfair... which led to her drawing a comparison between the two of them and Sarah and Jareth from Labyrinth, which wasn't helping all that much, either.

"But come on. Seven beautiful ladies are in distress right now. Surely you must know something about how we can help them?" Ren asked, stressing the fact most of them were very much female humans and very much uninterested in getting into their skirts.

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Speaking of distressed ladies, the closest door to the outside swung open suddenly and Ari made a undecipherable wailing sound. "Teeea." She moaned pitifully, waving the empty pot in her hand.

It should be mentioned that Ari had never been a morning person, usually with the fact she occasionally goes to bed around this time. Yesterday however, she had slept early only only to awaken to the fact she had no morning tea at all and the store was too far away for the half-asleep Ari to make. Thus, the trip to Rainbows End with the teapot, and completely missing the fact that there was a rather obvious tension in the air and the not-so-strange stranger.

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Song was looking at James with a rather good impression of a deer caught in headlights. So much for that lovely composure.

"I'm sure..." Damn him for having such pretty eyes. And for infusing the entire kitchen with his evil aphrodisiac aura. And for... everything else. This was supposed to have been a fun morning. What was more invigorating than testing the limits of a dangerous but useful creature of Darkness?
Okay, even that mental sentence hadn't come out right.

But Song was lucky, it seemed. This time the distraction came from Ari... or was that an as-of-yet unclassified tea zombie?
Either way, it was something interesting to focus on besides the incubus.

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Amy automatically jerked away from him as he invaded her space, and nearly fell off the stool. As he moved onto Song, she made up her mind. One incubus flambé, coming up. She held up a hand to snap her fingers-

And instead was completely startled off the stool as a half-asleep Ari (or possibly half-dead, she wasn't sure), came barging in, wailing about...tea.

"Damn it!" Scrambling to her feet, Amy righted the stool and resumed her perch on it, trying to act like she hadn't just fallen off like a complete dork.

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Before Ari even walked into the room, James was turning towards the door and just smiled slightly as the half-asleep girl entered. "Good morning, Ari." He nodded a greeting to her before moving away from Song, brushing past her with the same sensation that had passed between him and Ren.

"Ladies, I should leave you to your morning breakfast," he said, picking up his book and giving a little bow of farewell. "If any of you ever change your minds about actual talking, well... I'll be in the city. I really look forward to our future... conversations."

He then winked before grabbing a coat that was hung across one of the chairs closer to the door and walking out of the room.

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"You okay?" Ren asked Amy as she tried to help her up. She was also grateful for the distraction Ari had provided, and the poor little zombie girl was more than welcome to her own tea once this was over, provided it was still warm enough to be worth drinking. But ouch, poor Amy.

"As opposed to our morning dinner?" she couldn't help but mutter snarkily in response to James' "elegant" farewell.

"Bloody single-minded pervert," she grumbled once he had left. Okay, so he was what he was, but he didn't have to be so bloody blatant about it. Worst of all, she felt like she needed a cold shower, badly. Ugh...

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Blinking almost stupidly from where she stood, she tilted her head slightly at the scene in front of her. There were a few things that didn't add up (and most likely wouldn't add up for a while) but there was no way she would bother thinking about it for now.

She waved the hand with the pot at the morning greeting, before squinting at the guy. She knew him, right? Whatever sensation he gave off as he brushed past woke something up though and she blinked at his retreating back before glancing back at the others.

"....What's he doing here?" She asked. Hey, no one said anything about her being the sharpest tool in the shed this early in the morning after all.

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Song shuddered sharply as James touched her, and couldn't manage to get anything out of her mouth before he was gone.

She drained the rest of her tea and took a long look at the scene of muddled chaos he'd left in his wake.

"Well... that wasn't as fun as it was supposed to be."

She bent down to give Yasha a good scratch behind the ears, then stood and made a beeline out of the room. "I'm going back to bed.... Don't bother me for the next twenty minutes or so."

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"I'm fine Ren, thanks. Just embarrassed and irritated and-" The frown she'd developed shifted into a grin as Ari seemed to wake up a little, and Song took off for the hills. Ha. Locking herself in her room didn't seem like that bad of an idea, but for completely different reasons. She felt too much like a sponge that was full, and the best way to get rid of it was to be alone and let it dissipate. Jalen would worry though, and she didn't really want to tell him about this mess...though she supposed she'd have to eventually.

"I think I'm gonna go cuddle Eli for a while, if you guys don't mind." Amy gave Ren another hug and Ari got a tap on the head - Morning Sleepyhead! - before she darted out of the kitchen.

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Wait, was Song really going to--Ren blushed and delicately looked away. Well. Um. Good for her?

"All right, sure," Ren replied, giving Amy a quick hug back.

Well, that left her alone with Ari now. She sank back into her seat and quietly offered her the cup of tea she had left mostly untouched that morning. "Will this do for starters?" she asked before sighing and reaching for the toast that she had also ignored.

"Basically," Ren began explaining after taking her first bite, "James apparently invited himself over for breakfast so he could ask about Lilith. We tried to get him to help us with the current situation in return, and his response was to be infuriatingly sexy." She shuddered and absently rubbed the spot on her arm that he had touched. "I'm gonna need a nice, cold shower once I'm done eating..." she muttered to herself. Too much information? Quite possibly, but she was still a little too flustered to realize that.

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Ari slipped into one of the now empty chairs and sipped on the accepted tea, already feeling it work. Oh, good blessed tea how amazing you were to her sleepy self.

She could feel her eyebrow raising as Ren explained, not quite sure if she should be amused or not. "So that's why near everyone scattered after he left?" She mused, hiding her smirk behind the teacup. "I almost thought they were running from me." Never mind the fact that she was finally awake enough to understand that other parts were awake and why.

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"Run from you, Ari? Never!" Ren laughed, though her expression darkened shortly after. "Call me a prude, but I don't like that guy at all..."

She shook her head and smiled again at Ari, pointing at her tea-based life support. "So what happened to all of your tea that made you come stumbling over here for a fix?" she asked teasingly.

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