"You're saying it isn't even there?"

The old man behind the counter shook his head vigorously in answer to the question.

"You're saying that this shop, the shop you own, is number eleven. And yet you know nothing of a number thirteen on Elm street?"

The old man nodded, placing his hands in the air as if it were a hold up. Well, to tell the truth, Cesar certainly felt like pointing a gun at him. How could no one know of number thirteen on Elm street? It's not as if it could up and leave, take a plane to Paris and change it's name to Ferdinand. All right, a slight exaggeration, but Cesar was trying everything he could to distract from the fact that he was fuming. And wildly unsuccessfully.

"Thank you for your time," he responded, placing his smoke coloured glasses back over his near-black eyes. He turned and left the small shop, only faintly hearing the small bell announcing his exit. He wasn't wearing a suit as he usually did. After all, he was looking for some kind of wicked witch of the west owned club that didn't seem to exist, so he had to dress down. He wore normal jeans, faded slightly, and a tight sleeveless black shirt. His large and intimidating muscles showed clearly in this outfit, but he wasn't about to go in to a club wearing a tuxedo. That is, if he could find the goddamn club to begin with.

Being a CIA agent didn't seem to change anything. None of his training told him how to find a club that was invisible. It just told him how to properly fade in to the background once in, but that didn't seem likely. He had scoped the area out before, but he was sure he saw people heading towards the slim area between two shops. If you could call it an area at all.

Cesar, his ebony skin shining in the fading sunlight, was now standing infront of where number thirteen on Elm street should be. He had already interrogated both shop owners in number eleven and fifteen, but they knew nothing. What a load of crap. He sighed audibly, people muttering about how he was blocking up the sidewalk.

"How the hell do I find it?" He asked himself, not caring if anyone heard anymore. In his mind he agreed to simply 'hang around' and wait until someone approached the supposed-to-be-number-thirteen area. Maybe they would slip up. A part in his mind told him it was going to be a long night.

Maybe he turns away for a second. Maybe he blinks. One way or another, there's now a gaunt young man leaned up against the thing slice of brick wall between 11 Elm and 15 Elm.

He's pale. First off and right away-- he's pale. Very thin, very white-skinned. Even his hair, loosely curled around his face, is white-- giving him the look of an unfinished drawing. His loose, summery dress shirt is white, too, though there's a thick stripeof forest green over his chest-- the lapels and thick cuffs are green, as well. His looks pants are khaki. None of this disguises the fact that he's pale.

His arms are crossed over his chest. His eyes are closed. He doesn't seem aware of cesar, and is in fact acting as though he's been here, right here, all along.

Cesar took an involuntary step back when he saw the young man. His eyebrow creased as he wondered how he could have so easilly looked him over. Was that possible? Well either way, the young man was there, standing in the very spot Cesar was supposed to be watching for strange occurences. He allowed himself to look over the young man, noticing his skin first off. He looked like he had been frozen for hundreds of years, the ice slowly draining the colour from him, and only now had he awoken. It was a strange feeling. He was probably just albino. Cesar decided to stop staring and instead looked up and down the streets.

No one else seemed to notice or walk towards the small space in between eleven and fifteen. Well, he had come this far, made a fool of himself infront of the shop owners, might as well continue this long line of discredit. He stepped up to the pale man.

"Sorry to bug you," he began, his voice deep and rich, "But do you know of a number thirteen on this street?" It was risk to ask, as he might be uncovered as some kind of tourist when that was the exact opposite of what was supposed to happen. Well, whichever way, the risk was taken.

Albinos have pink eyes.

The young man opens his eyes, and they're white-- a dark ring around the iris, a dark pupil, but the iris a flat, icy white. The eyes lock into Cesar's, and only then does he smile.

"A number thirteen?" he asks, in the voice that hovers on the edge of hearing at every murder scene. "You mean the Triskele?"

The eyes shock him in to place, which is not something that is easilly done. He soon recovers though, only to be hit again with the strange voice. He cleared his throat and pretended that the adrenaline hadn't started pumping through his veins.

"Exactly. You know about it?" Now he needed to think of an excuse of why he couldn't get in. Well, he would get to that question if it was ever asked. Right now he was concentrating on keeping a level gaze with the obviously not-albino man standing in front of him. He was glad he wore his sunglasses.

The stranger smiles and nods, never dropping his diamond-hard eyes from Cesar's. The sunglasses don't seem to bother him.

"Yes... I patronize the place myself, on occasion. Let me guess---"

He waves a long-fingered hand elegantly in the air.

"No one gave you a card, and you're feeling left out."

Cesar broke in to a smile, laughing lightly. "Something like that," he replied, crossing his strong arms across his broad chest. So this was the sometimes patron of the club? He seemed young, but very capable. Cesar wasn't feeling shocked with the voice and appearance anymore, now that his goal was in full view it had the entire concentration of his mind.

He shrugged lightly. "I'm not the type to wait around for things to happen," he said, his smile widening to show well-kept teeth.

Obviously amused, the pale young man fans his lashes down over his eyes and then back up again, apparently... considering something?

"Well, then... how about you come in and have a look around." He lifts himself up off the wall, and behind hm is a heavy oak door with the number '13' simply inscribed into it in brass. The stranger's thin body could not possibly have been hiding it from view.

He places a hand on the knob and pulls the door open, his eyes still on cesar.

Cesar's smile had faded by now, and he managed a chuckle. Not because he was forcing it, but mostly because he had no idea how the door could have suddenly appeared, so instead of trying to make it logical he simply laughed it off. It was effective, because he didn't even bother to try and figure out how it worked. He was supposed to be gathering information on magic, right? Let's just say Peter Pan did it and move on.

"Thanks, man," he said, clapping a hand in a friendly manner on the young man's shoulder before stepping inside.

The young man's cold to the touch, leaving a few delicate whorls of frost on Cesar's dark skin.

Dark stairs. Smell of pipe smoke and wood polish. At the top-- probably only one storey up-- a little vestibule with a coat closet, and a door. The chilly young club-goer follows Cesar up, his pace steady.

As he walked up the stairs Cesar casually wiped off some water and frost from his hand. Maybe he had been on ice for hundreds of years. Again, he decided not to push the subject and instead began memorizing as much as he could of his surroundings. He stopped at the door and gestured that the young man should go ahead first.

He stopped for a moment. "I don't believe I ever got your name?"

The young man pauses with his hand on the door, his back to Cesar.
"No, you didn't," he says, in a musing tone.

"It's Death." And he turns the handle, pushing the door open onto a throbbing club.

It's not as full as it is some nights, but it's not as empty as it can be, either. the music pulses through the air, a techno variation on something celtic-sounding, pandering both to the patrons who embrace the modern world and those who have nostalgia for the past. People stand here and there, the majority of them more or less human-seeming, everyone dressed up for a good time, mostly in modern outfits. The entire place is done up in wood and green plush or carpeting, giving it an old-world feel that somehow doesn't clash with the people hanging around the bars, sitting in groups, or dancing.

Cesar rolled his dark eyes behind his glasses. A few strange things may have occured, but this guy was obviously insane. Great, he had been brought in to a club by a raving lunatic, probably escaped froma mental institute, and now he had to 'blend in'. Maybe he should call himself Famine and be done with it.

"Veni, viddi, vicci," he muttered as he stepped in to the pulsing room. It seemed normal enough. He was half expecting jousting duels and vampire covens.

"So who made this club?" He asked the young man. He may be crazy, but he was good for information.

When Cesar's eyes return to Death after scanning the crowd, he's different-- his clothing has changed. Where before it was white and green and beige, it's black-- tight black bellbottoms made of a somewhat shiny material, a black dress-shirt made of a similar material, and thick black boots. Gold bracelets encircle his wrists and jangle as he walks-- more hoops twine around his thin neck, and each ear is laced all the way to the top with small gold hoop earrings. His pale eyes are circled in black eyeliner and his face dusted with gold.

He turns back to smile at the considerably less dressed-up man.

"Curious, aren't you? It was made a while ago by someone not of much note. It wasn't originally the Triskele, but some of us got attached to it and preserved it as you see it today."

It took a lot not to stand and gawk, but Cesar managed all right. He had to pretend all of this freaky stuff wasn't out of the ordinary. He suddenly found himself wondering what the hell the government thought this was all about. He managed a small nod before reverting his eyes back to the dancing or drinking crowd. If he stared at 'Death' for too long he was sure he would just start looking over his changed clothing and maybe draw too much attention to the fact. It seemed like a normal nightclub...A couple necking in the corner...He couldn't see them very well. He looked over the people as he walked a little further in to the room, some gave him strange looks, other curious ones, some just whispered to each other.

He scoffed. "Like a normal one," he mumbled. He looked over his shoulder, back towards Death. "You come here often, then?"

"Oh, occasionally, occasionally." He turns and smiles over his shoulder at the FBI agent.

He slides his thin frame onto a seat at the bar and nods to the 'tender, who looks vaguely uncomfortable and nods back. Just because people are Innish doesn't mean they're comfortable with the Gods, particularly one like Death.

"Off-duty, mostly." He nods to the couple 'necking' in the corner.

"The vampires are supposed to keep their meals to outside."

Cesar would have loved nothing more than to stay in a dark corner and just watch, but which dark corner? Besides, he needed a drink. He sat down casually next to Death, nodding politely to the bartender before removing his glasses and hooking them on the rim of his shirt. He leaned his elbows on the bar casually, running a hand over his bald head in what looked like stress. Eventually he asked for a beer, doesn't matter which one, and looked back over at Death.

"So, what kind of work do you do?" The 'off-duty' had caught his attention. Some kind of cop for the freaky department?

Death gives Cesar a level stare as the bartender passes him an amaretto sour (without the deity having to order, it should be noted.)

Finally, he says, "I collect the souls of the living and usher them to their final destination," before taking a sip of his drink.

Cesar nods as a tall foaming beer is set in front of him. "Of course, of course...I should have known better," his tone only rang subtly with sarcasm as he took a sip of the beer. He glanced over at the necking couple. One of them had gone limp. "Damn vamps and their meals..." He complained, shaking his head from side to side as if this happened all the time. He wasn't pretending he was accustomed to all of this, but he was, in a way, making fun of it.

"So, you the only horseman of the apocalypse out there?" He asked casually but politely, turning slightly so as to better see the pale man next to him.

"Ah, well, a body's got to eat," he says, shrugging off the vampire rather more successfully.

Taking another sip of his drink, he shakes his head.

"Famine and pestilence aren't really big players anymore... they tend to hang around in christian-centric areas of Africa, last I heard. I'm doing well, myself, and of course War is well."

"Glad to hear it," he managed, eventually turning around on the stool and leaning back on the bar. Suddenly the goal of his assignement became clear again. His dark eyes sharpened and flitted about the room, one person (if that's what you would call some of them) to another. Something was definitely up. It wasn't what he was seeing, it was more the feeling of the room. Something else was in the air besides music and club lights.

"Why couldn't I find the club earlier?" he finally asked, ears open but his eyes wandering.

"You don't have a card," Death explains, slitting his unnatural eyes and watching the room. Someone smiles nervously at him. A few others look away. Most of the regulars here learn who is who-- it's always bad to accidentally piss off a god trying to relax.

"No card, no entrance. Only Gods don't need cards." He pauses, and adds, "Well, and a few other beings powerful enough to see through the door spell."

"Door spell..." Cesar repeated, trying to words on for size. They made sense, in some ways. In other parts of his mind, though, he was laughing. Well, so far he knew vampires and Gods were real...Not to mention magic in general. Well the guys at the office won't let this go for a long time. 'Hey Cesar, why are you driving to work? Don't you have a magic carpet?' 'Hey Cesar, Harry Potter called, I took a message...' he could almost taste the humiliation. Of course, no one knew about his mission except himself and his superiors, but that didn't make the mental image any less potent. "So who exactly cast the door spell?" He was tempted to ask 'Gandalf?' but restrained himself from being an ass.

"Curious, curious." Azrael takes a sip from his drink and pulls the ice of his gaze back to Cesar.

"One might almost think you know nothing of magic."

Now this Cesar understood. This type of intimidation. He wasn't about to take it. He reached back and brought his beer around and took a sip, still watching the people. He shrugged lightly.

"Maybe I'm just starting," he began, eyes catching on the unmoving shadow of the person who was necking with what he now referred to as a vampire. "Or maybe I'm fine with magic, but new in town." Cesar was not one to be intimidated, even by some sun-deprived anorexic kid who called himself Death and probably played too much Dungeons and Dragons.

"Maybe."

It's very hard to accurately describe the sound of ice crystallizing out of thin air. It has almost a plastic crisp to it, and though many attempts have been made, it still remains inaccurately described. There's that sound. Ice creeps along in frost patterns away from the pleasantly-smiling Death.

"Or maybe you're trying to pull me leg."

Cesar turned back around, setting his beer down carefully before leaning in threateningly towards Death. He levelled his dark eyes with the white ones and didn't care that his body was telling him not to do this.

"Maybe you're pulling mine," He then got up from his stool, took out a bill, and tossed in casually on the bar. "I don't need this," he said before walking off, pushing through all the warm, cold, and scalding bodies of the dance floor. He was just about to reach the first door. His thought process? This assignment had some truth to it. But he needed to get out of here before everyone found out who and what he was, otherwise by the end of the night he would be gnawed on by some vampire-like persons.

The door opens and Azrael leans in the doorway, his casual pose effectively blocking Cesar's escape. He's smiling. Of course.

"Well, I don't know. I have fairly effective proof of who I am. Do you?"

The shock registers, but only for a split second as he somewhat rudely pushes past Death. He walked down the stairs briskly, as if nothing was wrong and Death weren't following him.

"I don't need to prove anything," he declared evenly, opening the second door and finding himself outside.

Death is leaning against the brickwork, much as he had been only a few minutes ago when he'd first met Cesar.

"Are you so sure of that?" he asks, with a rather innocently questioning smile. The gold bangles jingle as he shifts his hand up to rub his chin.

"Positive," Cesar answered bitterly, not letting himself be taken for a fool by Snow White. He walked steadilly, arm muscles bulging as his hands clenched in to tight powerful fists. He was walking towards his car, his BMW soul mate, the only thing that ever kept him going. Enough work for one day. He needed to go make a full report, that is if he could shake off Death for a moment.

And apparently he can, for the deity shrugs and... lets him go, deciding instead to return to the Triskele club. If Cesar looks back, he wouldn't see either the God or the door.

It would be a mistake to think that Death has forgotten about him, though.