“If this address is correct, I will eat a scarf…” Retvik cursed as he, Nyssi, Tenuk and Kayel all stepped out of Nyssi’s truck, onto an empty, muddy patch of land that served as a small car park. There were several other vehicles all parked nearby, most of which were small Skyan hover-crafts. Across the road was an apartment block with a shoe shop at its base.
“Hang on, we were here yesterday!” Tenuk exclaimed.
“Yeah, I live just down the road…” Kayel was much less confident. “Which is why I don’t think this is right either. I seriously can’t live just down the road from the Thantophor.”
“I don’t have high hopes either guys, but this is one of two Arkays we found on Friendface, one of them has to be everyone’s favourite Death God!” Nyssi pranced off towards the pavement, refused to look either way and crossed instantly. The others quickly understood how she’d managed to have been hit by a truck the other day, then quickly followed.
As they glanced down the side of the building, they quickly spotted an entrance, which lead to the back of the shoe shop, an elevator and some stairs. Considering the size of the elevator, the four of them decided to take the stairs. The first floor was just another part of the shoe shop, but the second floor contained actual apartments.
“Room 101, but it’s on the second floor…” Tenuk frowned. “Alright, who’s knocking?”
“I should knock. In case it’s just a random Skyan. Don’t want to frighten them…” Kayel offered, stepping forward. He didn’t spot a doorbell, so he very gently knocked on the door.
Inside, a shout of surprise was heard, followed by rustling around and cursing. After a moment, a key turned in the lock on the other side, and the door clicked open.
“Kairos, you said you were coming tomorrow… Oh. You’re not Kairos.”
Standing in the doorway was a black-skinned, yellow-plated Skyavok. They looked a lot like Kayel, except slightly shorter, and with glowing golden eyes.
“Hi, are you Arkay?”
“How in the name of my fellow gods did you find me?”
“Your profile on Friendface has your address on it…” Kayel explained. “Are you the Thantophor?”
The Skyan rolled their eyes, then stepped to one side. “Dammit Sini… If you’ve tracked me down, then this must be important. Come inside. All four of you.”
Everyone did as they were asked, cautiously entering the apartment. There were four and a half rooms. One main living area with two sofas, a tiny coffee table and a desk. One bedroom that was completely filled with stuffed animals, clothing and boxes of construction toys. One kitchen that contained little more than cupboards, a fridge and a washing machine. One strange storage room which connected to what one assumed was the bathroom. To Kayel, it felt all too familiar. To everyone else, they wondered how the literal god of death could live in such a tiny place. The only thing out of place was the massive collection of sharp, pointy weapons and tools, shoved into a corner behind one of the sofas.
“Sit down. Any of you want a drink? I have water, diet caramel soda or a horrible strawberry milkshake powder I bought for 27 cents and quickly regretted.”
Everyone shook their heads. Arkay turned around and inspected his four visitors.
“I feel like I should know you all, but I don’t. Despite the fact that I do know you all…” Arkay paused, examining them one at a time. “Retvik Rethianos, Lightbearer and Exile of the Family of Dawn. Nyssi Tharru, descendant of the Clan Unmourned. Kayel Theanon, former Phantasma and K-Class experimental soldier. And do you want me to tell them, or do you want to tell them, ‘Tenuk’?”
Tenuk swallowed nervously. “Uh, no, I’ll… I’ll tell them later.”
Arkay gave a nod of approval, then returned to his trail of thought. “The thing is, I know who you are, but I didn’t even notice you approach my door, even though I notice everyone who approaches my door. It’s like I didn’t know you existed. What are you doing here?”
“We saw you in the pharmacy the other day. You saved us from that suicidal Spast!” Nyssi smiled uneasily. “We, uh, wanted to say thank you, and ask you whether you gave us the power to not die or not.”
“What?” The Thantophor suddenly looked very concerned.
“Was it you or Holy Sini who made it so we heal almost instantly?”
“Have you… tested it?” Arkay asked.
Nyssi shook her head. “Not really. But I got hit by a truck yesterday, properly run over and everything, and got up no problem.”
“Since when… when did all this start to happen?”
Retvik frowned awkwardly. Just the thought of remembering what happened was enough to make Retvik feel uneasy. And he was already uneasy enough as it was. “When we each survived one of the four catastrophes that-”
“The catastrophes that happened when I was bleeding out…” The more these mortals spoke, the more Arkay began to worry. “This is very bad. Actually, for you four, it’s amazing, because you are no longer conventionally killable. Because I wasn’t… alive when you four would have naturally died, I kinda… forgot about you and that’s given you Sini-levels of regeneration. But if Sini finds out about this, she’s going to try and kill me again in order to try and replicate these results, and that just ends up with a fuckton of other stuff going wrong.”
“If you don’t mind me asking, Mister Arkay, why can’t you just die and make everyone immortal?” Nyssi asked as innocently as she could.
“Because if I die, then things don’t decay and you find you can no longer convert sugar and oxygen into energy in order to function and everything ends up cold and dead anyway.” Arkay explained, before trailing off again. “Well, the good news is that Sini didn’t intentionally try to kill me and she doesn’t know about you four yet…”
“See, I told you, Nyssi, the Allbirther DOES kidnap and experiment on people!” Tenuk abruptly exclaimed, before immediately shutting up. “Uh, sorry, Thantophor.”
“You can call me Arkay. And you’re going to have to get used to me, because I’m going to have to keep an eye on you all.”
“Are you going to take away our new magic undeathiness?” Nyssi asked.
“What? No, of course not!” Arkay hissed. “I’m not that cruel. I just need to make sure Sini doesn’t capture you and do very nasty things to you… Either way, I need you all to go. I have work to do, and if you linger here, then the others will notice. You’re all staying in one place, right?”
Retvik nodded. “They are staying with me.”
“Alright, good…” Arkay lifted everyone out of their seats, then led them to the door. Even if it was only a few feet away. “If you can just keep your heads down for the next few days, act like everything is normal. I’ll… contact you when I’ve sorted things out.”