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"...Alright; that should be the last symbol..." The Savannah Cat stepped back, looking critically at the sigil he'd drawn on the floor, chalk griped tightly as he compared it to the drawings and books on his desk. The inscribed symbols were a cobbled together mess of different incantations and names and runes from across several languages, cultures, and sources, patched together with pieces of rituals and spells borrowed for their supposed effects. Depending on how you looked at it, it was either a brilliant product of diverse research, or a confused and desperate mess.

Not particularly unlike the cat who'd drawn the sigil in the first place.

Checking his work one more time, Iru nodded to himself as he went down the checklist of materials. The sigil was complete, of course, and he had ample red and black candles lit around it. He had a cobbled-together incantation to try and reach out to the powers that would hear him, and as good of an athame as he could buy from the internet, cleaned and left in moonlight for seven days. All that was left was the doing, and the doing was the scariest part.

For just a moment, he hesitated, but his mind went back to the long nights alone, to the many unsuccessful attempts to form a deeper relationship with those he'd fallen for. To the number of times he'd been told "I couldn't be that close to you. You're like a brother to me!" All of that frustration and loneliness far outweighed his trepidation, and he held on to that determination. The fear of his undoing would not prevent him from trying to find his own happiness, at any cost. He took a breath before kneeling in front of the cobbled together altar on his floor, taking the athame in one hand and his long-necked lighter in the other.

"I call out to you, Ardat Lili, and request your presence with me," he said as he started to light the candles. "I would request a boon of you, and have come to weigh my soul in bargain." Athame trembling in his left hand, he held out the right and drew the blade across his palm, letting the steel bite into his flesh and draw blood. "I make this offering in good faith, in respect of your strength and beseech your power." He could feel a change in the room around him, though he couldn't speak to what it was. For a long, silent moment, he waited to see what would respond.

Life as a demon was not what Lili would call the most entertaining thing. For all the power she commanded and the time near-immortality gave her to do as she liked, she frequently found herself bored of the humans who sought her aid. It seemed as if they all wanted the same thing, no matter the time or the place, no matter how civilizations rose or fell. Power, knowledge, or sex were apparently easy ways to ply a human of their soul, and while it made for wonderful experiments it also made being summoned quite the chore - so much so that she once made a pact with herself that she would spare the soul of the next mortal who wanted something new for once.

Countless years had passed since, bleeding first into decades, then centuries, then millennia, her name called on less and less as time marched on. She was thankful for it, if she was honest, being able to devote herself to her own alchemical experiments and curiosities without needing to worry about the next would-be God-King spoiling her day. It had been so long, in fact, that when a summons finally did come it took her a long moment to recognize it. It was like a tug in the back of her mind, an insistence to pay attention to the mortal bold, foolish, or desperate enough to petition her.

"And just when things were starting to get interesting," she sighed as she raised her hands out to her sides, feeling her natural feathers fall like a cloak from shoulder to fingertip into her natural wings as the space around her distorted. It would hardly do not to appear in her full glory, the white owl demon decided as she focused on the pathway opened between her and her summoner, feeling more than seeing her lab disappear around her and replace itself with a rather unkempt bedroom. A frown crossed her beak as she phased into the mortal plane - not a great start, though she supposed it would hardly matter.

"Who dares invoke my name after..." The booming voice she started with trailed off as she tried to remember just how this part was supposed to go. "After, um... Listen, let's just skip this part, ok?" Glittering sapphire eyes fell on the brown feline that was looking up at her from the floor with a mix of awe and terror, dressed in a baggy t-shirt and shorts that could have stood a wash. While he certainly had the right tools, and enough of the old invocations to get her attention, a quick glance around the messy, laundry-strewn told her that this was either dumb luck or a kid playing with fire. And given the look of the one in front of her, she was almost certain it was the latter. "I'm not... entirely sure how you managed to summon me, to be honest, but I hope it was with a clear purpose. I don't take kindly to mortals who would waste my time."

Based on the little she gleaned just from looking both at him and her surroundings, several possibilities came to mind for what he had called her here for. Power was the easiest, wishing for some sort of revenge against a coworker or classmate to settle a score. Perhaps a desperate student too proud to fail, begging for the knowledge to finish his schooling and rise to the top of his class without any of the legwork? Even lust wouldn't have surprised her, a curious and horny boy who had dared try to invoke the occult just to get his rocks off. She'd certainly destroyed greater men for less. She waited with less rapt attention and more bored irritation for him to speak his wish. And waited. And waited.

For nearly a solid minute, the two stared at each other in a delicate standoff - her wrestling with impatience while he wrestled with shock. If not for the runes of protection he'd managed to incorporate into his summoning, she might have already snapped his neck and been done with it, but it seemed even fools had dumb luck sometimes. But before she could remember how to sever the summons and just get back to what she was doing, she heard his voice crack and squeak out to her.

Progress, if scant.

That worked? I mean, of course it worked!

Despite his hopes and ambitions, there was still a shock to be had when the runes had lit up, the floor itself seeming to distort as a hazy white silhouette appeared, slowly clearing up to be a very beautiful - and very naked - barn owl. She stood with what to him felt like an air of authority and majesty, cold eyes looking down on him with a mix of curiosity and irritation to have been called on by a mortal as her power filled the room.

Added to the list of subverted expectations was the casual sass with which she spoke, seeming almost bored by the whole affair as she opted out of trying to impress him any further. And if he was honest, it was hardly needed - how much more impressive did it get than being an immortal demon? It took him a long moment to find his voice again, only managing a sound somewhere between a cough and a squeak before clearing his throat. Staying down on his knees and praying internally he could say her name right, he looked up at her with as much reverence as he could display.

"Great Ardat Lili, I-"

"Listen, you can drop the flowery speech, ok?" The speed at which she cut him off silenced him immediately, which only seemed to leave her further unimpressed. "You have my full attention, and I've no desire to stand on ceremony. You have invoked my name and brought your soul to bargain with me - what boon do you seek in exchange?" Iru's ears fell flat against his head at the abrupt scolding, though he was undeterred in his mission. He'd given too much to be stopped now!

"Right uh, Miss- I mean, Mighty- I MEAN..." He took a breath before meeting her eyes, focusing on the desire he'd held in his heart. "Ardat Lili, I offer my soul in barter in exchange for... For... For your companionship! Please, be my girlfriend!"

There was a palpable silence in the room as she looked down at him, blinking a few times as she seemed to process what he was asking. For a moment he thought perhaps she hadn't heard him, that he'd only thought the words instead of spoken them. But a single wing raised when he opened his mouth to try again told him that was far from the case, silencing him as she seemed to consider both him and his request.

Lili didn't know what she'd meant when she said she wanted a request she'd never been asked for, but this certainly wasn't it. The audacity! To summon a demon as powerful and as seasoned as she was, for such a trivial thing? She didn't know to call him mad or brilliant. Still, there was a charm in his sincerity, and she could hardly say she didn't appreciate a mortal who would go to any lengths for his heart's desire. For a long moment, neither of them spoke as she considered his request. To grant it outright would be a problem as he currently was, and she would gain nothing from him in sparing his soul as well. But perhaps he could be useful, and grant her a different sort of boon. He tried to speak, and she silenced him with one wing raised, letting her own plot form in her mind.

"What you lack in self-preservation instinct, you certainly make up for in determination. Not many would have the guts to summon an elder demon like myself for so trivial a petition. ...What is your name, mortal?"

"I-Iru, ma'am. I-" She raised her wing again, finding it far more effective than trying to shout him down outright.

"Iru, I will make you a counter-offer. I will accept your petition and be your... girlfriend? But as you are now, you would not survive in my world, and I would grow quickly bored in yours. So rather than accept your soul, I will accept your mortality as my payment, and you will subject your body and your will to be shaped into a more suitable vessel for your boon." Her wings shimmered away into long, slender arms once more, ending in a hand extended in what mortals accepted as an acceptable offer. "Do we have a deal?"

To her surprise and delight, there was no hesitation on the part of the mortal boy in front of her. Rising on trembling legs, he nonetheless met her eyes and took her hand into his own bloodied palm, shaking it firmly.

"We have a deal."

There was some debate on whether or not Iru had lost his mind. Certainly he thought it must be so. It was crazy enough to summon a demon just to try and find a girlfriend, never mind offering to trade his soul for the fleeting happiness it would offer. But to go beyond that and subject his entire existance to her? Anyone with a shred of sanity left would have balked, taken the impasse as an out and rethought their whole life. But when Iru put his mind to something, he rarely backed down until he'd finished what he started. He'd come this far, and nothing would stop him from seeing the deed through. So pushing down his fear of what might become of him, he stood up and accepted the demon's outstretched hand, accepting her deal before he could second-guess himself.

When his bloody palm touched hers, he gasped out in pain. Not just from the self-inflicted wound, but from the way his blood almost seemed to boil for a moment as their pact was sealed. It was as if he were holding hands with iron pulled from a fire, swearing for a moment that he could feel the fur and flesh searing away to expose the bone below. And then just as quickly as it had begun, the pain vanished. Lili pulled her hand away, and he lifted his own to inspect what he was sure was catastrophic damage, only to find the appendage mostly unchanged. The blood was gone though, instead replaced by a symbol that he was sure was branded all the way down to his bones.

"So does that mean-?" He looked back to where Lili had been standing before him only to find her gone, a ring of ashes burned into the floor where she had been before and the candles all snuffed out. Were it not for the lingering sensation of the brand on his palm, he might have thought his little experiment just blew up in a puff of smoke and left him with a rather vivid hallucination. He stood there for a long moment, hoping against hope that the demon who had promised him companionship would return before a disappointed sigh escaped his lips.

"Of course," he groaned. "Leave it to me to be the first guy on the planet to be friend-zoned by a demon." His complaint was more exaggeration than fact, and he knew it - being friend-zoned would have required the demon to consider him a friend, after all. Laughing at himself and the almost cosmic joke he thought his life had become, he decided to go to the kitchen and get himself a beer. Better to go ahead and wash away the memory tonight, leave cleaning the ritual's remains up for the morning. He opened the bedroom door and crossed the short hallway to the kitchen, only to stop dead in his tracks. Lounging at the bar across the room, the blue-and-white feathered demon was looking around his apartment with some level of amusement in her eyes, swirling a clear vial in her hand.

"You know, for as messy as your bedroom looked, I would have sworn your apartment would be just as bad. But this is actually what could pass for tidy," she said casually, not bothering to meet his dumbstruck look. "Well? Go get dressed, dear. I can't wait to see what you have in mind for our first date." She turned to him, resting her elbows on the counter and folding her hands under her chin as she gave him a sly grin.

Twenty minutes. Lili counted them down on the microwave clock, the vial in her hand swirling lazily along. Twenty minutes for him to get dressed and presentable, for him to figure out what he would show her first of his world. All the same, she supposed excited look on his face was endearing, and he did clean up well. While he was getting himself together, she took her time looking around his apartment to get a better sense of the mortal she'd taken on as a companion.

Much like the kitchen, the small living room was kept in a reasonably clean state. The couches were decorated with cute pillows and the coffee table opened to reveal quite the collection of well-used tabletop games, with extra floor cushions stored under the table itself for convenience. The pictures hung with care along the walls seemed to confirm her suspicions about him as well, photos of the Savannah Cat smiling and hanging out with various friends and what must have been family interspersed between funny or inspirational wall hangings. It spoke of a warm young man, close to his friends and family, but without a single romantic interest to be found.

Her curiosity led her next to the entertainment center situated on the far wall, a respectable TV hung over top on the wall. Despite her long absence from mortal thought, she had done a bit of snooping on her own through the ages, always finding herself pleasantly surprised at what quaint things mortals came up with to entertain themselves. The collection of gaming consoles neatly lined up were no exception, with their games in neatly arranged sections below for easy access. To her, it spoke of having the systems out more for display than actual use, or else Iru was overly conscious of keeping everything a visitor might see neatly in its place. Given how his room looked in contrast, computer desk covered in empty plates and cups with media and books strewn about pell-mell, she had a feeling it was the latter.

The more she looked around, the better an idea Lili got of her new boyfriend. The place didn't so much speak as scream of a young man who cared greatly for those around him, but found himself unfulfilled in return. Certainly she had a better idea of why he would have been so desperate to summon her to begin with, though she still couldn't place why he chose her rather than another mortal. Love wishes were nearly as common those of lust, and nearly always stemmed from the same place. Was it that he had no one he felt that connection for, or simply that he felt he had a better chance trying to bond himself to a demon?

Her thoughts were interrupted by the cat emerging from his room, dressed now in a blue button down shirt and khaki cargo pants. Passable for a casual date, she decided after giving him the once-over. The way he was staring at her in return was a little unnerving though, and she had to wave a hand in front of his face to get his attention again.

"I- Sorry, I just... You know..." A blush was blossoming on his face as he looked away. "Aren't you going to get dressed too?" Looking down, she realized that though her downy feathers did a good enough job of keeping her decent, mortals would likely find her only wearing a belt to be somewhat obscene. A low sigh escaped Lili as she raised a hand, snapping her fingers with a roll of her eyes and summoning a flurry of snow to surround her.

"Honestly, with the things that you mortals get into, you would think this would be the least of your worries," she grumped as the flurry cleared, leaving her dressed in a ruffled low-cut blouse and a pair of black leather pants. Her more simple chain belt had been replaced by longer studded number, wrapped around her slender waist thrice to accent the outfit she wore. If anything, Iru was staring at her more now that she was dressed than he had at her naked body, leaving her somewhere between offended and amused. "Are you really going to just gawk at me all night, Iru? I hardly had to get dressed for that."

The teasing banter seemed to be enough to snap her companion out of his trance, making him blush as he snapped to attention. She watched with amusement as he ran to grab his keys from the counter, opening the front door with a heavy blush still coloring his cheeks.

"After you?" he offered, unable to look away as she sashayed her way out the door. Give the boy points, at least he knew his place.

Most of the time, Iru found his little silver pickup truck more than big enough for him and whatever he needed to haul. He'd bought it when he was 18, and had put perhaps more time and money into fixing it up than any sane person could. But it was sturdy and reliable now, and the cabin could fit four if he counted the rumble seats and his friends didn't mind squeezing in. But having Lili next to him made the truck feel so much smaller, the great demon filling the space with her presence more than with her actual form. She hadn't been as critical of the vehicle as he worried she might be, though she'd very quickly opened the window to let in the cool night air.

Late as it was, there wasn't much open for their first date that the brown cat felt worthy of his summoned girlfriend, though he felt like taking her nowhere at all would leave an even worse impression. So it was that they found themselves headed to a local old-style drive in restaurant, figuring that burgers and milkshakes would at least be a nostalgic sort of meal. The first few minutes of the drive were quiet, though before he could reach to turn on the radio she broke the quiet with some questions of her own.

"I will admit, Iru. Of all the things I've been asked for, companionship is absolutely a first. It seems like you've no lack of friends and family, at least on display." He waited for her to ask him the dreaded why. Why would he want to sell his soul for a companion, or why was he so lonely, or why- "Won't they miss you, when you're gone?"

"...I uh... Well, I hadn't... Thought of that." The idea of his family mourning his loss or his friends wondering where he had gone certainly did leave a different sort of feeling in his chest, the consequences of his desperate ritual hitting him for the first time. He certainly did have a lot of people around him that would be concerned or sad if he were to vanish, and perhaps his ambitions in that regard had been selfish. "But. I've always done what was best for others first, and while I'm very happy that my friends and family are safe and sound... I guess I needed to do this for myself, no matter the cost."

"All the more fortunate for you that your little gamble didn't cost your soul then," she said with a chuckle, seeming to accept his answer for now. "Though I can't help but wonder how long it'll take them to notice the little changes we'll be making to you. I do love a good social experiment, after all." She left the statement hanging in the air as they settled back into the quiet, the sound of the engine and the wind rushing in the window all that filled Iru's ears in the meantime. For just a moment, Iru wondered if somehow he'd managed to make a worse deal than simply signing his soul away. But then, he reasoned, whatever changes she made to him could only make him more suitable to be her boyfriend, right?

It was with these thoughts flitting through his head that they pulled into the drive through. Late as it was, it was unsurprisingly rather sparsely populated by other cars, most folks seeming to have already been served. Iru pulled into one of the open stalls near the back of the lot and rolled down his window, looking at the brightly illuminated menu board a minute before turning his attention back to the demon next to him.

"Um, do you... Have you had anything from-" He hardly got a chance to get his words out before Lili was leaning across his lap, long arms reaching through the window to push the call button while her thick tail feathers brushed his face. Trying to push said feathers out of his face, he found himself accidentally pushing against her rump and quickly pulling his hand back with a deep blush on his face. If she'd noticed the accidental groping though, she made no comment as the speaker crackled to life for them.

"How can we help you?" The voice that came across from the other end sounded tired despite their attempts to put on a customer service voice, as if they'd been on the clock all day. To Iru's continued surprise, Lili proceeded to order with such practiced ease that he would swear she was a regular here.

"Can we get two of your number three meal, one with no pickles and no tomatoes? I'll have a root beer, and my boyfriend here will have a sweet tea. And-" She looked back at him with a naughty smirk, making him blush further. "Yes, of course I know what you like. What kind of girlfriend would I be if I didn't? We'll have a large vanilla milkshake too, one straw please."

"Coming right up, ma'am!" The red light on the call button blinked out, and Lili pushed her way back into her own seat while Iru looked at her with a look of absolute confusion. She gave no answer to his unasked question, just a sweet smile that could have - and likely had - charmed the devil herself.

The degree that Iru had been impressed by her little parlor trick had Lili infinitely amused. Reading his mind would hardly have been difficult even if he hadn't bound himself to her, though she preferred not to if she could help it. Mortals just weren't any fun if you peeked at all the answers instead of getting them to tell all themselves. Settling herself more comfortably, she returned her piercing gaze to him with an amused smile, the vial returning to her hand once more for her to idly swirl around.

"I will say, you don't have the worst taste of the mortals I've dined with. A bit basic, perhaps, a bit casual, but respectable nonetheless. Even your choice for an outting I can respect. Safe, but quaint and intimate." She had no qualm about his apparent discomfort in her judgments, finding the exchange to be something that would benefit them both in the long run. "In fact, had you not summoned me, I would have guessed that you always tend to play it safe, never wanting to rock the boat, never wanting to take any big chances."

There was no need to read his mind - she knew by the way his cheeks glowed under her almost scathing words that she was right. In less than an hour, she already had a better idea about the cat sitting next to her than she was sure his longest and most ardent friends had. Most might have felt some modicum of pity for him, even among demons she knew. But Lili found no pity, only promise. He had already taken the first step towards taking control of his life even as he'd surrendered it to her.

"Don't feel bad, Iru." Her voice was nearly a purr as she leaned in towards him. "Think about it this way. You took one hell of a risk summoning me. And I have quite a few ways of making sure this pays off for both of us." The way that he squirmed under her gaze was gratifying, and she kept him pinned there longer than she needed to to drive her point home. It wasn't, in fact, until the waitress skated over to the truck that she leaned back into the seat, rolling her window down for the server while the Savannah Cat sat stunned in the driver's seat beside her.

Taking full advantage of the situation, she subtly tipped the vial in her hand over his drink, letting several drops of the icy blue liquid dissolve into his soda before handing it off to him with his food. He certainly seemed none the wiser as he accepted the sweet tea and the bag holding his burger and fries, eyes on her as she took a sip of their shared milkshake. Despite her earlier dressing down, she made a show of leaning her chair back to lounge a bit more comfortably before opening the paper bag in her lap to pull out a handful of the crinkle fries.

"Don't just sit there, dear. Your food will get cold if you don't dig in!"

Iru needed a long moment to recover from the way that Lili had all but read him like a book, laying out his insecurities with an icy efficiency. It was certainly a judgment, but one that fell in his favor with the promise of correcting each issue in turn. To top it off, she'd gone so easily from explaining him to himself to eating warm crinkle fries from a paper bag that he was pretty sure he had whiplash by proxy, leaving him to contemplate his choices once more as she leaned back in her seat. More on mechanical instinct than anything else, he raised the straw of his drink to his lips, noting that the tea was quite a bit sweeter on his tongue than his prior visits but chalking it up to having been from the very last of the batch. He was just reaching for a fry before a wave of nausea hit him, leaving him feeling as if the car were swaying below him as he reached forward to brace himself on the steering wheel. The last thing he could remember as his vision started to black out was Lili leaning over to put an arm around his shoulders, whispering softly in his ears.

"Don't fight it, Iru. Tomorrow, we start again with making a whole new you."