﻿The hairs on the back of Reggy's neck stood up weakly as he felt the ghost of the girl's gaze on his sagging shoulders. Not enough to give him the creeps, but enough to let him know her attention was solidly focused on him. At any other time, Reg would have been thrilled at the thought, but tonight he was too busy alternating between self-loathing for his own vast ineptitude and worrying for the injured rat-man. So busy in fact, he even completely failed to notice how natural it now felt<em>to be worried about an injured rat-man</em>.<br/><br/>The girl's voice managed to break through Reggy's self-imposed funk, showing more life and strength than she'd demonstrated all evening. "You are not useless. You have helped me." Reggy straightened up slightly, but her words did little to change his mind.<em>'Yeah, sure,'</em>he thought bitterly,<em>'I've really done you a solid...brought you to a broken down house on a dead-end street, where you'll be lucky if you can get a couple hours sleep and some cold cereal without getting harrassed by a liquored-up harpy. Knight in shining armor, that's Reginald Barker...'</em><br/><br/>Reggy almost missed her next words, but glanced back at her again just as she was leaving the room. A heavy sigh passed his lips and his shoulders slumped even lower than before. "...pleased to meet you...Samantha," he said under his breath. He shrugged and shook his head; poor girl must not have wanted to risk him refusing her request for the shower.<em>'Yeah, keep telling yourself that, tiger. Maybe it'll keep your mind off the fact she probably just felt dirty being around you so long...'</em><br/><br/>Another sigh escaped him, but before his depression could worsen the rat half-leaped, half-tumbled off the dresser to the grungy carpet below and pattered out into the hall on unsteady little legs, tiny droplets of blood trailing behind him. For a moment Reggy watched in stunned silence, amazed the poor thing still had enough energy to move so quickly. He was about to follow when almost immediately after the rat disappeared into the hall, he heard the shambling sounds of bare feet. Another instant later, and Silas -- naked, bloody, human Silas -- staggered back into Reggy's bedroom, wrapped in a thick towel that was quickly becoming saturated with blood.<br/><br/>His voice was shaky and weak when he asked Reggy for the book, and the boy fumbled wildly in the satchel as Silas dipped two fingers in his own blood and proceeded to sketch a strange symbol on his dresser mirror. "Look for that heading in the book," Silas ordered, Reggy flipping madly through the pages, matching and discarding symbol after symbol. Figure-8 with a cross struck through? No. Two squares atop a third, bisected square? Wrong. Three concentric circles over a diagonal bar with a flat top? Not even close. An 8-point cross with wavy lines down each side? Keep looking. Two triangles connected with a circle? Still wro--no, wait! That was it!<br/><br/>He slammed his palm on the page and looked anxiously to Silas, holding the book up to show the dying man his salvation. Reggy's blood ran cold, however, upon realizing that<em>he</em>would have to be the one to read the spell. His mouth felt dry and sticky and his breath came in short, panicked gasps as he looked back and forth between Silas and the book. He'd been carrying it around with him for weeks, pretending himself to be some great sorcerer-in-training, wrapped up in his own pathetic little delusions to give his worthless life some ridiculous and impossible purpose. Deep down, in his secret heart, Reggy never really dreamed he could actually work magic. He always considered himself fortunate enough to be able to work a microwave, for gods' sake!<br/><br/>But now, a man was in his room, hurt and bleeding. A man who, for better or worse (almost certainly worse) had opened Reggy's eyes to a much larger, much more dangerous world. A man who had a snowball's chance in hell of surviving for another ten minutes through any means<em>except</em>magic. And like it or not, Reggy was his only hope. His heart was pounding so hard he was sure it would crack one of his ribs, but the boy managed to steady himself with a couple of deep breaths and rapidly blinked a film of tears from his eyes. He swallowed hard and nodded, and he spoke in a croaking voice as he struggled desperately to hold the book steady enough to read.<br/><br/>"Alright...I-I-I'm ready..."