Chapter 2

Monday Morning, five minutes till work. Derek shot up and out of bed like a missile as his alarm blared at max volume. Cursing like a sailor he took a quick shower before sliding into a pair of jeans that had gone a bit too long without a wash. Shimmying into a slightly too tight polo he managed to snag his backpack and a granola bar on his way out of the door. Being careful to not open the door too fast, he didn't want to run into his neighbor again. Luckily she wasn’t out in the hallway, but unluckily it was still raining from last night. Saying a quick prayer to the goddess of protection Derek ran out into the rain. Sprinting for the subway, hoping he wouldn’t be too late.

Half an hour later, Derek trudged into work soaked to the bone. Each step squelched across the floor, and the receptionist gave him a pitying smile as he walked past her. His cubicle was close by luckily and he settled into his moderately comfortable work chair. Already dreading the fact that he was going to soak it with water and it would likely smell slightly mildewy all day tomorrow. So much for the goddess of protection. He snorted and got to work. Booting up his computer and glancing at the new data. Yesterday's sales, tomorrow's projections, putting them all into neat dashboards so that the higher ups could make more informed decisions.

He snorted to himself as he began to laugh. Not one of them ever used his data, they usually ended up making the exact opposite choices anyways. That’s why the yearly sales were down 10% from last year and the CEO was in hot water. Oh well, nothing was going to affect his job anyways. He was too low on the totem pole for any of that to affect him, besides the sale of the company of course. Glancing at the clock he wondered what Isabella was getting up to when a short rotund man with a ginger beard covering the entire bottom of his face poked over the top of his cubicle. The man's nose nearly touched the top of the wall, clearly struggling to even push his head that high.

“Yooooo Derek! You missed it! The Ice Queen might get fired! The supervisor came in at 8 and said the projections weren’t good enough. She doesn’t even manage the sales team! Hahahahahahaha.”

Derek nodded to the dwarf, raising an eyebrow as he clicked on the projections for next week.

“Yeah they aren’t looking good Gimble, they might look better if you weren’t taking the paperclips from the break room though.”

The pair shared a laugh and Gimble waved as he disappeared behind the cubicle wall.

“They’d definitely be better if you adjusted your formula!”

The dwarf hit Derek with a parting shot, knowing that altering the projections to better align with the sales team's actual numbers wasn’t their job. It wasn’t his fault they couldn’t sell industrial runic enchantments, or that the head of their division ran it like a daycare. For all that his own boss had her issues, she at least ran a tight ship. As if summoned by his thoughts, the Ice Queen appeared. Her aura of frost set his teeth chattering even as he turned to look at her.

“C-c-can I help y-y-ou?”

He asked haltingly, the chill settling into his bones as he looked up at her. The ice dragon towered over him, her breath crystalizing into little bits of snow that floated down atop his head. Derek’s whole body shook slightly as she snorted with frustration at him.

“Clearly Gimble already told you about this morning. Your tardiness did not help my case. So from today onward you’re going to be our liaison with the sales team. Do not be late again. I’ll email you the rest of the details.”

With that the imperious ice dragoness turned and left, her tail swaying back and forth behind her as she walked, her ass only half covered by her wings. Derek knew better than to look, the last guy who had tried that ended up as an icicle for a week and a half. Grumbling and rubbing his arms to try and warm up, Derek spotted Gimble once again looking at him from just over the cubicle wall. The dwarf just shook his head and disappeared once more. Leaving Derek to his now freezing cold morning, and additional responsibilities without a word.

Struggling to wipe off the frost from his legs, he wondered what Isabella was doing right now. It was almost the middle of his first selected time block. Reading an erotic book. Derek wondered what kind she was reading, and if the app somehow mind controlled her into reading it. All sorts of questions floated in his mind as he drafted an email to the sales team.

Hello Sales Team,

I’m Derek and I will be your new liaison with the Data Analytics team moving forward. If you need any information or would like more in depth dashboards let me know. Additionally any concerns can be forwarded to my boss who has been copied to this email. I’m on the fourth floor, third cubicle to the right of the elevator so come by and say hello anytime.

Best,

Derek Fitzsimmons

Data Analyst

Runic Industries, LLC

Then he opened his phone to look at the time again, already bored out of his mind. Opening his idle harem app, he watched as Isabella’s stats changed in real time. Some part of it scratched a piece of his brain.

Harem Member 001: Isabella Vern

Race: Elf

Corruption: 2

Love: -50

Obedience: -50

Stress: 35

Perks: None

Tasks: Full!

One step closer, no matter how agonizingly slow it was, with this app he would make her his…wait. What did he really want from her? Did he want her to be a ****? A fucktoy? A doll? Or his girlfriend? He had so many options now, as long as this app wasn’t just bullshitting him. He’d have to figure it out as he went along, but the app certainly seemed to want him to turn her into his sex toy.

“Oi! Whatcha looking at there boyo?”

Gimble’s voice came from over the top of the cubicle, startling Derek into dropping his phone onto the ground. The Idle Harem app was completely visible, along with all his perverted tasks for Isabella. This was it, his life was over. He’d be fired for some kind of harassment charge and that was it.

“Your phone is all white, what kinda app is that? Some kind of privacy screen?”

The dwarf had walked around the side of the divider that split their cubicles and picked up his phone faster than he could think to stammer out a reply. Tapping it a few times the dwarf tossed it back to Derek and patted the young man's leg.

“Don’t worry about being the new liaison, the sales team is a bunch of idiots and their turnover rate is way higher than ours. Odds are they’ll all be fired before next week.”

The older man hit Derek with some good news before returning to his cubicle. They worked the rest of the day without incident, no visits from the Ice Queen or from the sales team thank the goddesses. The rain had let up around midday, and now the city of Paeth glowered in the sunlight. The dark stone that made up much of the city was drinking in the light, as the curved rooftops provided shade in abundance. So it was no surprise as Derek exited the building to see a pale vampiress floating in the darkness provided by the blackstone buildings. The young woman twirled and spun in the air before rounding a corner to disappear.

The city had been built by vampires, and mostly for vampires. Massive skyscrapers with built in resting spots where vampires hung from hooks, slightly tilted buildings to provide more shade, and even festivals planned for all kinds of eclipses. As Derek made his way back to the subway, a vampire sitting in the corner caught his eye. It looked…hungry way too hungry if the glowing red light from its eyes was any indication. No matter how much they paid for blood, some of them always went hungry. The nearly mad vampire just sat in the corner of the subway the entire ride, only getting up when Derek stood up to get off at his stop.

He had thought that the Ice Queen’s aura had been cold, but now his hair was standing on end. Fingers automatically typing 911, he raised his phone to his ear and dialed. Acting completely normal, he stepped off the subway car and into the station.

Ring

Ring

Ring

They finally picked up, a rough gravely voice answered the line. Some kind of werebeast perhaps? Derek thought to himself.

“This is 911, what is your emergency?”

Of course, with a hungry vampire on his tail he couldn’t exactly tell this guy his emergency. With super hearing, the vamp would easily jump him before help could arrive.

“I’m on my way to an unpaid blood drive.”

Using the common code for this occurrence, Derek made his way towards his apartment. Crossing the street with caution, the responder tracked his call and let him know just how fucked he was.

“We’ve sent out a team. Will you make it five minutes?”

Derek grunted as he was nearly slammed into by a taxi, glancing behind him showed the mad vampire was still trailing him.

“Guess I’m going to have to, aren't I?”

He pocketed his phone and slowed his pace. Praying for some kind of miracle, that whoever they sent would show up faster than expected. Or that one of the goddesses would grant him some kind of blessing.

None of that happened as he neared his apartment building. He could almost feel the vampire's breath on his neck as he opened the door. Then he saw her, his neighbor standing there in the middle of the hallway looking up at the lights. Her four arms raised up as if to touch the flickering fluorescent bulbs, how sad must that be? For a moth to live in a place designed to limit the light of the sun and stars.

Then she looked at him, her eyes going wide as she saw who was following him. That was when all hell broke loose. His neighbor exploded into motion, moving faster than Derek could fully register. Slipping past his right side, two arms extended, and the other two rearing back for hammerblows. Just then a bright light slammed into his back, pinning him to the ground as a loud voice blared above them from just outside the door.

“Everyone stand down. This is Illuminator Cole. We have reports of a starving vampire. I repeat. Stand down.”

The hard light pinned Derek to the floor, and a bit of blood began to leak from his nose. Then the light tightened, slipping off his body and zeroing in on the vampire that thrashed and smoked slightly. Filling the air with the smell of burning hair and skin. He turned and saw Xrn looking up at the bright light, her eyes twinkling with adoration and love. Floating above them, he saw the illuminator, flanked by a valkyrie. Cole, the illuminator held a staff capped by what looked like a miniature sun, the valkyrie held a stained silver battleaxe and was carried aloft by massive white wings.

“You, called this one in?”

Cole asked as Derek shook himself free of his awe at the sight of such powerful magic. That a human could cast something like that. Cole must be a genius, he thought to himself as he nodded mutely.

“I’ll take this one to the station. You can handle the rest Sefi.”

With that a sphere of hard light picked up the thrashing vampire and followed Cole as the illuminator flew off. Leaving Xrn looking disappointed while the Valkyrie descended slowly towards the pair. Hovering right off the ground as she planted her axe into the dark cobblestones.

“This seems to be a pretty cut and dry case, let's just get some more information. When did you first notice the vampire following you? And you ma’am, why did you intervene?”

The valkyrie’s question seemed to stump Xrn who looked at Derek and almost blushed. Covering her cheeks with her antenna, the mothgirl looked mortified.

“Um, he seemed like he uh, like he needed help?”

She managed to squeak out, while Derek tried to shake off the near **** experience.

“The subway, he got up at the same time I did, had glowing red eyes, the works.”

The valkyrie narrowed her eyes at them but shrugged and flapped her wings a bit harder, ascending back into the air as her axe dislodged from the ground.

“Works for me, if we need any more information we’ll reach out!”

She shouted down at the duo before she disappeared, a white streak in the air the only indication that she had flown off. Derek’s adrenaline was still racing as he turned toward Xrn.

“Thanks for trying to save me. I really owe you one.”

He ran his fingers through the back of his hair and sighed sheepishly, turning to head deeper into the apartment building before he felt the cool touch of a hand on his shoulder.

“You….you can owe me lunch. This weekend maybe?”

Derek stood there, unmoving, stunned to his core as his adrenaline flared even higher. He was…getting asked out by a girl? Or was she just using him for free food? Narrowing his eyes slightly as he looked at her, the nervous mothgirl took her hand off his shoulder and put her hands behind her back, causing her dress to tighten slightly over her chest. Maybe, but he’d give it a try.

“Sure, I’d like that. Somewhere with lots of natural light?”

Xrn smiled and lit up the room with ease as she giggled and walked around him, nodding her head as she slid into the stairwell. But not before Derek had snapped a picture of her with his new app. A new profile slid across his screen while he punched his floor number into the elevator.

Harem Member 002 Added: Xrn Klvzskch

Race: Mothgirl (Luna moth Variant)

Corruption: 0

Love: 3

Obedience: 0

Stress: 68

Perks: None

Tasks: None (New Tasks Available!)

—

Later that night, as Derek reached the pinnacle of a game of DracoFight 4 there was a knock on his door. Annoyed at once again being disrupted from the game, he ran to the door and opened it expecting it to be the police or some kind of salesman. What he did not expect was a thick envelope to be laying on the ground and not a single person in the hallway. It was the dead of night, but still. The name written on the envelope in blood red ink stared up at him from the floor.

DEREK FITZSIMMONS

With a pale face he grabbed it and closed the door as quickly as he could. The slam echoing in the hallway while he ripped into the envelope. A thick wad of cash hit the floor with a thud, but he didn’t even care, the actual letter unfolding in front of his eyes.

Dear Mr. Fitzsimmons,

We the Noble and Ancient Andilet family do humbly apologize for the actions of one of our family members. We do hope that you find the enclosed cash enough to cover the terror you must have felt when you were hunted down. You are humbly invited to our estate next Monday at 2am for a banquet, although you are not required to attend we certainly hope that you will.

Best,

Lord and Lady Andilet

The letter dissolved into red dust after he had finished reading it. That vampire had been one of the Andilets? If he had been eaten they could have easily just swept it under the table. The Andilet’s had been in Paeth since its founding and had considerable political power as well as monetary resources. If this was just some attempt to unsettle him, it was working. A chime from his computer alerted him that he had just lost that game of DracoFight, and he began to curse up a storm. What on Earth could the Andilet's want from him?