Xul kept his eyes down, scowling slightly as her voice drew confused glances from random customers. In a flash he swept the woman’s assorted items above his scanner, shoved them into a branded canvas bag and nudged the package in her direction.

“I’m on the clock, Armie. Cash or card?”

“Card please.” She murmured, before stretching back to her impressive full height and letting her voice once more fill the room, “Doesn’t our rivalry supersede your little play-pretend as a regular mortal?”

Behind the counter, well out of sight of the shopping crowd, Xul’s fists balled. Spotting the top of Mark’s bare head bobbing among the shelves, he stifled the urge to snap at the unwelcome visitor.

“Thank you for shopping at Grab n’ Go market, please visit again, goodbye.”

As he rattled off the corporate-mandated phrase, the cold detachment in his tone made it obvious he wasn’t speaking from the heart.

“Sleep with one eye open, fiend!” She snatched her bounty, conspicuously pinching the tote closed rather than simply letting it hang by the handles as she beelined for the automated doors of the small convenience store.

As the clerk watched her leave, his expression caused the next in line to hesitate slightly before approaching. Before he could attend to them, a small brown-haired shape shuffled to his side.

“Mr. Xul?”

“Hi Cassie - what’s up?”

“Manager says I should work the register for a bit. I think he wants to talk to you out back.”

“F-f…” He stopped himself, exercising iron will. “Thanks. Give me a shout if you need help.”

She nodded happily and went straight to work, the disparity in their heights drawing a few scattered chuckles.

In the meantime, Xul cut towards the employee lot, carefully weaving around people staring wistfully at racks of cream-filled confectionaries and snacks. While he wasn’t anywhere as powerful as he used to be, someone of his general mass hitting a wiry high-schooler still wouldn’t be pretty. At last, he made it through no-man’s land, exiting the store and taking a long breath of fresh, cold fall air.

Another few feet away, a bald man with a fearsome, well-groomed beard puffed on a ratty cigarette he had no doubt found loose in a pocket moments ago. He acknowledged Xul with a silent nod.

“Mark, I’m sorry, man - I swear I’ve told her to leave me al-”

The manager put one palm up, muting him, then used the same hand to pat the bench next to him.

“You’re fine, don’t worry. It ain’t like that.”

Mark’s voice was low, even, and had the inexplicable quality of bringing some calm to even the most tortured souls - of course, by human standards. The actual tortured souls Xul led in battle were never quite as open to diplomacy.

Xul took a seat next to the man, politely waving away the wordless offer to smoke. Even sitting he was roughly half a head taller than him, and that was without horns. How he missed those.

“She your ex?”

Xul turned to stare at the bald man, eyes wide in sheer shock.

“Ah.” He swallowed the torrent of horrific curses that welled up in his throat, “No.”

Mark simply chuckled, his eyes locked on the skyline in the distance. “Well, she’s obsessed with you, she’s gorgeous, and I think you… speak her language, if that makes sense?”

Xul sighed - yes, he did indeed speak her language. Because of that, he always noticed when she let loose an odd turn of phrase, or awkwardly translated an idiom from their mother tongue. Of course, that wasn't what the other man meant. Though he would never allow himself to pity her, he had noticed a lot of human things Armistra struggled with.

“She’s just weird. I used to help out at a theater camp, so I know how to play along.”

“Nah.”

Mark’s sudden rejection immediately drew Xul’s concern - had his boss begun to catch on? Was he beginning to suspect there was something strange and otherworldly about her? He nervously scratched at a spot on his neck, waiting with bated breath as the laconic man finished his cigarette and stomped it out.

“I mean. Yeah, maybe.” Mark absentmindedly combed his hand through his beard, searching for the right words to express what he’d noticed. “I used to have a friend who’s a bit like that. He was sort of spacy, and out there. Sometimes stuff that seemed everyday went way over his head. He was a novelty. A character.”

“Sounds like her, I guess.”

“But that’s not all there is to him, right? He has the same worries and concerns as everyone else. Wants to live happy, eat well, share time with people he likes. Everyone's the same like that, but he just doesn’t know all the shorthand. Unspoken rules.”

Xul nodded, though he had to admit he was a bit lost. Armistra was a character - her bravado, her seeming inability to feel ashamed, her single-minded obsession with some prophecy. No matter how hard he thought about her, he couldn’t imagine her doing something normal, like crashing on a couch, or preparing one of the five ramen cups she bought weekly. If he could go from being a ruthless general to worrying about making a good impression on his new coworker, couldn’t she too? Had she ever been kept awake wondering if she would ever feel at home again, like him?

“Oh.” As his mind raced, the former warlord could only utter a quiet word.

Mark got up, pushing against his knees and grunting in a way that seemed - for a moment - to add another 20 years to his already youthless demeanor.

“Hey, you said you had this friend? What happened to him?”

A hefty hand clapped Xul’s back, and he looked up to see a faint smile on the other man’s face, pulling up the corners of his eyes.

“He got better with a little help.”

Xul watched Mark disappear back inside the store, utterly lost for words. For a few quiet moments, he stared down at the concrete paving between his boots. Slowly, his hand produced a cheap smartphone, tabbing through his contact list before settling on one. He took a deep breath and hit the call button.

One ring. Another. Another. He rubbed his brow with a free hand, pre-emptively regretting what he was about to do.

Another ring was cut short, followed by a maddened scramble and cacophony of shuffling sounds before he heard a woman’s voice - she was unbelievably loud, even over the phone.

“Accursed machine! How does anyone know how to use this damned thing!?” Xul heard a few dial tones come through as she fumbled with her phone on the other end of the line. “Who calls me, and what do you want?”

“Ah. Hey. Hi. Are you… are you free after 6 today? I think we should talk.”