I totally came back (Anya)

[ahriman]

OK, so, Jimmy was prone to going to far-flung destinations in his search to work out exactly where Angra Mainyu was in this reality and thus far he hadn't found any sign of it. He'd also not reported back to his alleged home for several weeks after his various antics. Which was why he was now back in New York and trying desperately to remember exactly where Anya's appartment was. The first time he'd gotten there had been through teleportation and he'd, uhh, yeah.

Not a fan of teleporting.

He was wandering through New York when he finally spotted it, Anya's appartment was one of those ones you could only recognise by the prescence of cats loitering around it. He had no idea why but they seemed to be taking a liking to the area, must be because Anya fed them. That was the first hard thing done, now for the more difficult stuff...

He had to explain why he'd vanished for ages, who exactly he'd been with and probably why he kindof sortof had a bounty on his head. He'd been around the country a bit since he'd first got here but he hadn't really talked to anyone other than Anya so he figured she deserved to be caught up to speed on his antics. And it was also opening up an emotional can of worms since he was beginning to worry he was getting a crush on her. Seriously, she was the only woman he'd ever met who was anything like him, he knew exactly WHY he was getting all "she'd be so good for me" but had no idea whether it was actually a good idea to hit on her or just get over it.

Well, time to find out. After a brief moment of breaking and entering, Jimmy wracked his brains to try and remember the right appartment number and finally remembered it. Zipping up to the right door he braced himself, taking a few deep breaths, inadvertently transforming once and reverting as quickly as possible to avoid scaring people excessively before he finally worked up the courage to knock on the door.

*KNOCK KNOCK*

"Is she going to be mad?" He asked aloud "Nah, she won't be mad that I vanished for weeks and didn't tell her, surely. Surely." He shrugged, probably just paranoia. After all, he'd brought her a present, one of those Hello Kitty sewing patches. Well, a demonic one might have been more appropriate but he was sure this one would do just fine

I mean, she LOVED cats, she must like rabbits too, right? He kept the patch in his bag, he'd have to wait for a good time to give it to her, gauge how mad she was if she was mad at all.

((OOC: Stupid joke, but oh lord I had to make it ;D))

[Anya]

Anya hadn't headed over to the magic shop today.

Most people might have shrugged this off, imagining some sort of simple explanation - maybe she was sick. Or on vacation. But anyone who knew Anya personally...at all...might have found this just a little bit strange. And those who knew her really well probably would have found it downright worrying. Because money just about ranked up there with the vengeance demon's favorite things in the entire world - she never passed up an opportunity to make money. Not unless there was something very, very wrong...

But she kept trying to tell herself that there wasn't. Everything was fine; she'd just been a bit...stressed lately. Had a little difficulty sleeping. A few nightmares here, the odd feeling that she was being watched there - the reemergence of some of her darker abilities. It was nothing, but...admittedly she had been sort of tired recently. Which was probably why she'd fallen asleep on the couch this morning, even though it very much looked like she'd actually had every intention of going to work. The clothes she'd put on were fairly business-like, at least: a white blouse, a black skirt, and heels. Too bad she'd never actually made it to her place of business. On the bright side, sleeping during daylight hours (even accidentally) was proving to be...slightly less haunting than sleeping during the night.

And then came a knock on the door - and as she was jolted awake by the noise, Anya jumped into a bolt upright sitting position on the couch, her eyes wide. What...what had happened?! Her gaze trailed slowly over to the digital clock under the television. Oh...no. No. How had she managed to sleep in this long?! She sprung off the sofa with a slight groan, a bit disoriented as she tried to clear her thoughts. She needed to get to work - who knew how much business she'd lost already! But first...first she needed to see who was at the door, and what on earth they wanted. The knock puzzled her a bit, now that she had a moment to reflect on it. She was a very out-and-about kind of person, and sure, she'd met plenty of people during her ventures around New York. But none of them very often made house calls...Pausing only a moment to try hopelessly to fix up her sleep-disheveled blonde locks a little, she soon gave up, headed over to the door, and opened it. ...Only to freeze entirely a moment later when she recognized the familiar face staring back at her. For a long moment, Anya could offer no real reaction other than the blank sort of stare she'd fixed him with. Then suddenly, an instant later, she'd sprung forward and all but tackled the stranger who was not-so-much a stranger in the clumsy-but-affectionate way she had of hugging people.

"Jimmy!" the demoness squeaked out, her immediate reaction one that just radiated happiness and relief. She hadn't seen Jimmy in...well, it felt like forever, and what was worse - she'd had no idea what had happened to him. He'd just...been gone one day, without any real warning. She'd hoped that he'd just decided to up and leave. That, at least, would make sense - that was what people did. But a part of her had been worried that something much, much worse had happened to him. The first time they'd met, Anya had warned him about Hazama...what if Jimmy had decided to go looking for the sadistic green-haired man? Judging by the fact that he was, well, alive, that wasn't what happened. ...But still! Who knew what sort of trouble he could have been getting into. ...And he had never, in the time that he was gone, even said so much as a word to her - not even one, to let her know that he was alright!

Suddenly, her happiness evaporated in the blink of an eye - and she pulled back from the hug to fix him with a disbelieving glare. "Do you have any idea how worried I've been?! I don't like worrying! It makes you all jittery, and then you can't think straight, and - God, it's the dumbest human emotion ever! If you...EVER do that to me again..." Anya trailed off for a moment, her eyes narrowed angrily as she tried to think of something formidable to say. "...I'll think of something...very threatening!" she snapped at last, placing a hand on her hip and finally actually pausing for breath after her little mini-rant. There were...just about a million and one things she wanted to add to all that, but now that she was beginning to think rationally she supposed it'd be best to at least slow down a little. Taking a deep, calming breath, she went on a little less hysterically this time. "...Where have you been? I thought you were dead, or something." Despite the bluntness her words carried, as per usual, her voice shook slightly and betrayed the actual amount of concern she'd felt at the thought.

[ahriman]

That blank stare was alarming, it made him think she'd forgotten him. Although he barely had time to register her appearance before the next event happened.

It'd be hard to track his thought process but it boiled down to two emotions in rapid succession. The first was when she hugged him in a tackle was
"Oh god! She's so mad she's going to tackle me through the drywall and kill me in the elevator shaft!" but this was soon replaced with relief and a complex emotion humans to this day do not understand but its the feeling anyone gets when someone they feel an attraction towards hugs them and is sometimes love, sometimes lust and sometimes just appreciation of human contact. Along with slight concern over how detailed his scenario of being killed by her was.

He hugged her back as best he could from the surprise before she retracted and gave him a look which, he unfortunately missed when he jolted at her appearance. She looked good, well dressed and all that but at the same time she had a look he was extremely familiar with, rough sleep and lying somewhere not a bed. Admittedly, he tended to rock it better than her, but he couldn't work out why she'd be so sleep deprived. This train of thought was derailed by her pointing out his various failings in the reporting in scene and he sheepishly looked at his sneakers as her entirely justified rant spilled over him.

"I'm sorry I made you worry, I should've called but I sortof had police and military after me" he said awkwardly. Realising how that sounded he cut back in with "Not any more, they're all dead. Oh, uhh, Not that I killed them. Well, some of them, ummm... wow, this is... I'm really sorry, anyway. I kind of headed out and I actually did write you a letter but it got incinerated by this guy with flamethrower arms and I really hope you believe me because that sounded significantly more sane in my head and... wait, are you alright?"

It was weird to flip the concern like this but Jimmy was suddenly reaching out to her face and trying to look at her eyes. He was one of those weird people who never really acknowledged that there were far greater reasons to worry about THEMSELVES than others
"Have you been having trouble sleeping? Oh geez, this isn't because of me is it?" Jimmy looked genuinely ashamed then, he couldn't believe he'd done that, making her worry so badly. Which in some other scenario might have made him feel grateful, afterall, guilt was a pretty human emotion to have. But it didn't feel great right now, he felt pretty damn sleazy to have just run out on her like that.

He considered getting his gift out but it didn't feel like the right time, he didn't want to look like he was buying his way back into her good graces.

"Umm, can I come in? I'll tell you about what I've been doing and I'll be super-apologetic and everything, I'll even make it up to you. With money? I know you like money" he grinned at her sheepishly, lord please let her find his stupid jokes funny.

[Anya]

She'd very much intended to hold on to the anger that had suddenly taken hold of her for a good long while, but...as soon as Jimmy began to offer a bit of an explanation, her indignation was momentarily replaced by bewildered shock. The police...? Military...? What on earth had Jimmy done to get them chasing him all over the country?! And by the sound of it, that hadn't even been the worst of his problems. Not if he'd been running into people with flamethrower arms in addition to the cops. Anya leaned her shoulder slightly against the door frame, mostly because she didn't quite trust herself to process all of this and remember to keep herself upright without support at the same time. There weren't very many occasions at all in which the normally chatty vengeance demon actually could not form words, but there were so many questions and cluttered thoughts running through her mind now that speech was momentarily failing her. She blinked several times. Maybe she was still asleep; maybe this was all some insane dream, or...

Her thoughts broke off when she felt his hand brush against her face, and she quickly refocused on meeting his gaze questioningly. It took her a moment to register why he was asking her whether or not she was alright - apparently the fact that she hadn't been getting all that much sleep lately was showing. Just wonderful. And how could be possibly be thinking about that in light of everything else that'd happened? She studied him with an exasperated sort of expression which...actually did soften slightly when she observed the amount of guilt he was showing. Anya was silent for a moment. On one hand, she couldn't allow him to go on thinking he was entirely responsible for the state she'd been in lately - but on the other hand, telling him the real reason was...well, she couldn't. Admitting to the fact that she'd been struggling against a nature she'd very much been trying to deny the existence of felt...well, it felt like failure. She avoided his gaze and replied,"I'm fine. I was working late last night, that's all." Her words were uncharacteristically short - but she wasn't exactly the best liar, and that would probably have become painfully obvious if she'd said much more than that.

Thankfully, it was something that could easily avoid being dwelled on at the moment - what with the amount of explaining she very much intended to get out of Jimmy. She stared at him skeptically for a moment, trying to remain serious...though his money comment did ultimately force a hint of a smile out of her. The blonde rolled her eyes, albeit good-naturedly, and finally responded to his request to come in. "Are you kidding? I'm not letting you out of my sight for the next - forever. Come on." Stepping back, Anya opened the door a bit wider and motioned for him to come inside, still watching him closely. Was he hurt? He didn't...look hurt. Though actually, she doubted he'd immediately tell her - or show it, for that matter - if he was.

Once Jimmy had stepped inside, she would proceed to retreat a little further into the apartment - though she didn't take a seat. No, she was a bit too tense for that at the moment - tense with worry, confusion, and a bit of remaining anger. The way she wrapped her arms tightly around herself was reminiscent of the way one might react if a chill suddenly swept through the room - though really, it was just her way of keeping herself from fidgeting...which was what she usually did when she was nervous. "So maybe you could tell me what exactly you did to make so many people so angry at you? Is that why you ran off in the first place? Or -" Anya broke off, blinking again. Right. She needed to remember to pace herself here. No use getting worked up again. "...Maybe you should just start at the beginning." she suggested after a pause.

[ahriman]

While he wasn't completely buying her excuse (mainly because she broke eye-contact, whenever he was getting told off royal he expected someone to keep staring into his eyes until he broke down and told a convincing story) he was at least pleased to see a smile on his face. And goddamn, why was he feeling warm and fuzzy? He killed people! He didn't have the right to get warm and fuzzy did he? Well, it looked like he'd get to get this all off his chest anyway as she let him and he did his best not to beam at how she seemed genuinely concerned.

The appartment was welcomingly familiar, Jimmy did take some time to take note of everything around the place. He didn't notice any major changes and wondered idly how many cats had taken up residence in his bedroom. He sat on the couch and remembered the first time he'd taken this exact seat. Ice in water, man, that was luxury. He took his jacket off and draped it over the back of the sofa, inadvertently showing off a few cuts and stitched up holes in it as he did so. No marks on him, regeneration and all that.

Anya didn't take a seat next to him so he was probably not in the clear, she seemed to look decidedly unimpressed as she asked him why people were mad at him and finally brought it all back to why he'd left. Which was... kind of a hard question.

He remembered when he'd just left, he'd found a lead on the whole T-Virus thing, it was being held in a military base in Colorado which was pretty far for him to go. He could get there with Anya's teleporting but he'd be putting her at risk if he did take her into a military base. And he didn't really want to throw her in harm's way. Like at all. So he'd just left, running across country as Ahriman and only stopping to rest and eat. He wrote her letters whenever he did take a break but only managed to get one worth posting, right before he actually BREACHED the army base and...

"Are you sure you wanna stand? I mean this might be shocking so sitting down might- or not, you know I mean..." Jimmy rubbed the back of his head awkwardly and coughed to clear his throat, this was harder than he thought

"Right, so, remember when I ran off? It was because I found a lead on this T-Virus thing. I ended up flitting away to Colorado to check it out, and I know I should've told you but it was time sensitive if I left it too long then they would've moved it. Anyway, I didn't really make it in time but managed to piss off a bunch of army guys in the process. Including an experimental cyborg with aforementioned flamethrower hands.

"I got shot, uhh, a couple times... but I heal up really fast so its fine. But I had to take a longer route home, they were kinda looking for me. Well, not me, you know the blond, skinny white skinned version of me. I swung by Racoon City but thats a whole 'nother story which I'll get to later, because honestly, still not quite sure what happened" He shrugged a little but looked at her cautiously, he didn't want to get her more mad but he didn't think lying about what he'd been up to would cut it. Hopefully the truth wouldn't set him homeless.

"I didn't... I didn't want to get you mixed up in something dangerous. I know that's probably dumb or sexist but I didn't want to repay your kindness by getting you shot or burnt or something. I care about you" he mumbled that last part, trying not to let on how much he did.

"Oh, I got you a souvenir too, couldn't find a cat version but I found this" from inside his bag Jimmy produced the unfortunately bunnyphobic patch and looked slightly worried "I didn't know if you liked bunnies."

[Anya]

His suggestion that she sit down garnered a slight eyebrow raise from Anya, and she remained rigidly rooted to the spot. She was still a bit too...on edge to consider having a seat right at that particular moment, though...perhaps she'd be regretting that decision later. To her relief, however, Jimmy didn't linger on it for much longer before beginning his explanation. Right from the first pieceof information he gave her, her brow furrowed slightly. T-Virus? She'd only ever associated that term with the zombie infestation awhile back. Had Jimmy actually gone looking for its source?! Her eyes widened at the thought, and as if that wasn't enough to worry about, he had been hurt! Shot - more than once. ...But, as he reminded her a moment later, that sort of injury wasn't exactly deadly to him. It was enough to allow her to relax just a bit; her jaw clenching a little less tightly, some of the tension easing from her shoulders.

While she wasn't quite sure what to make of his not elaborating on Raccoon City and what had gone down there, at least he'd told her most of the story - and though quite honestly it'd scared her half to death, it was infinitely better than not knowing. And he was alright. That was the important thing. For a long moment, Anya was silent as she took all of this in. All in all, she was starting to realize how much she really sucked at distancing herself from people. After Sunnydale, the vengeance demon had been perfectly content with the idea of never getting too attached to anyone again - because then it hurt, once you lost them. And it had hurt when she'd thought something happened to Jimmy...proof of yet another failure on her part. Well. No use lamenting about it now. At least it wasn't like he'd deliberately tried to worry her to death - it actually did sound like he would have had a very difficult time getting in touch with her.

With a light sigh, she walked over to the sofa and finally sat down next to Jimmy, studying him closely. His confession that he cared about her had made her uncertain - mainly because if anything, how concerned she'd been about him proved that the feeling was mutual. She just...had a way of screwing these things up, and saying the wrong thing. And she didn't particularly want to just now. "...Well, I care about you too, silly." she muttered after a moment, scoffing slightly. "That's why I was angry at you. Bet you wouldn't like it very much if I just ran off into imminent danger without telling you." Noticeably, however, she sounded considerably less angry this time around - she even shot him a small, genuine smile before shrugging a little. "But...it's your business, really. You didn't have to tell me anything. It's just, this whole 'worrying' thing is kind of new to me. I don't particularly like it."

But she said that about a lot of human emotions without entirely meaning it. These feelings that humans...well, felt, were infuriating, sure. But she was much happier with them than she'd ever been without them. And speaking of happy - Anya brightened considerably when Jimmy mentioned that he'd gotten her a souvenir. "You did?! What--" Then, as she caught sight of what he was holding out to her, she completely...froze. Because that thing...was most definitely bunny-shaped. Oh god. Before she could stop herself, Anya let out a half-scream - half because she quickly muffled it by covering her mouth with one hand, staring at the completely terrifying souvenir as if afraid it was going to jump up and attack her.

...That...that was silly, though. It wasn't a real rabbit. It couldn't hurt her. And Jimmy had gone out of his way to get it for her, so...she was pretty sure she needed to show some form of appreciation at this point. So for his sake, at least, she reached out and tentatively took the sewing patch from him. "Th...thank you!" Anya responded brightly, all while avoiding looking at the bunny entirely. "It's so...um. I mean. I'm sure I can use it to...to scare away evil spirits! Like a gargoyle. Except scarier." She cleared her throat nervously, still gripping her gift a little too tightly. Though the fact that she hadn't thrown it across the room yet actually said a lot by her unapologetically blunt standards.

[ahriman]

Oh that loooong pause was one of the longest in Jimmy's life. He didn't mind the idea of being kicked out but he didn't want to have upset Anya and... stupid brain, don't be like that, now was not the time. He just sat in a slightly nervy silence until she gave in and sat next to him.

He looked up as she seemed to be examing him, looking for bullet-holes? There weren't any, he healed up pretty quick. Should he hug her at this point? No, that'd weird. Would it? Yeah, definitely, just wait until she says something that'll tell you if she's still mad

"...Well, I care about you too, silly."

(Why didn't I go for the hug!?) Jimmy thought to himself, doing his best not to show his thoughts on his face.

Jimmy listened as Anya made some completely valid points about how he'd not like it if she ran off into imminent danger and he had to concede that yeah, that would probably drive him nuts and he'd end up doing something stupid. He smiled dumbly as she admitted the whole worrying business was new to her and, to Jimmy's disbelief, it was to him too. He'd never worried about Emily because despite all those feelings he had for it was kind of muted compared to his concern for Anya. Predominantly because when he first met her they'd been attacked by monsters so that kind of set the tone for their entire friendship thus far.

At least I got her a present she'll like, Jimmy thought to himself as he showed her the patch and nearly fell backwards off the couch when she half-screamed. Landing on his shoulders he got up awkwardly as Anya reluctantly took the patch from him. He looked at her with mild caution as she thanked him for what was, apparently, an item of pure unbridled terror for her. He raised an eyebrow, completely unsure how to proceed with this
"Anya? Did you watch Night of the Lepus as a little kid or something?" (Source here because Jimmy watched crazy horror movies when he was younger)

He had no idea why but his one extra eccentricity only made him think Anya was more awesome than before
"If you don't like bunnies you don't need to keep it, you can throw it away. Next time I'll bring you with me and I'll get you something you actually like" he grinned as best he could while simultaneously keeping alert so he could dodge the patch if it was thrown across the room. Speaking of the room, Jimmy glanced around a bit more and asked
"So what's new with you? Anything interesting happened while I've been... while I've been?" he didn't want to think of a nice way to say fighting the army. There wasn't a nice way to say fighting the army.

[Anya]

Night of the...what?! Actually, Anya wasn't sure she wanted to know, but she shot Jimmy a partly mortified and partly inquiring look all the same. "No!" she managed tensely at last, biting her lip slightly as she struggled not to completely panic in response to the direction that this conversation was now heading in. "I've never...I mean, is it about bunnies? Because I wouldn't watch it if it was about bunnies." That was the last thing she needed, more nightmares. In an attempt not to even think about it, Anya reminded herself with some difficulty that this was very much not the point. She glanced down at the little cartoon image of the rabbit again and...could have sworn it was staring at her. Slowly, she placed it down on the coffee table, smoothed her skirt out, and finally tore her gaze away from it to look at Jimmy again.

"It's just that, um..." Her expression was almost comically serious, as if she were about to confide in him some deep, dark secret. "...Bunnies frighten me." Well. Now he knew. Anya cleared her throat and fidgeted a bit, brushing her hair out of her eyes and blinking several times before she shifted her gaze sharply back to him, as if expecting to catch him in the act of trying to hide his amusement. "A-and don't laugh! It's a very...serious phobia. Anyway, it was nice of you to get me something. Even if that 'something' may or may not have been a horrifying omen of evil." She still looked a bit rattled at the thought, but managed another smile - usually the blonde was one to scoff at silly human expressions like 'it's the thought that counts', but in all honesty she really did appreciate the fact that Jimmy had tried to do something nice for her. It even made the idea of an inanimate-but-vicious bunny-shaped gift a little less scary.

She shifted a bit as he asked her how she'd been, however. It wasn't like it was a difficult question to answer, but...she couldn't be as carelessly straightforward as she usually was. The entirely honest answer was that things hadn't been all that fantastic - but skirting around that and addressing another aspect of her life instead wasn't exactly lying. "Well...hmm. Not much has - oh! I know! My magic shop. You haven't been here since I opened it - but I finally saved up enough money, and now I have my own place of business! Which was sort of difficult to accomplish, because it required lots of patience - and being patient takes too long - but it was totally worth it because now I can make even more money than I did before!"

Finally, Anya paused to draw a breath - on the plus side, she was practically beaming now, because there were few things that put her in a better mood than talking about the magic shop. She'd already grown to love the place - but then, abruptly, she was reminded of the fact that she'd slept in past opening time that morning, and her grin faded slightly. Still, there was nothing she could really do about that now. So instead of moping, she tried to imagine what Jimmy would have thought of the place. It certainly was...unique. But she didn't imagine that'd bother him too much - she doubted he was the type to get too freaked out by the occasional cursed mummy hand. "You should come see it sometime - you know, assuming your next little misadventure doesn't conflict." But her tone was considerably lighter, even playful now - she really didn't have the energy to stay anywhere near close to irritable at the moment, and her usual bubbly mood was already returning somewhat.

[ahriman]

She was scared of bunnies? That was... unbelievably unsurprising. He wasn't about tell her that Night of the Lepus was about horrifying giant rabbits that ate people because the last thing he wanted to do was make her think that fear was rational. He just nodded and smiled as best he could, picking up the rabbit patch as best he could without looking weird. He looked at it's completely unominous, entirely unterrifying eyes and wondered if he could have picked a worse gift. He then wondered, seriously, whether he could have. Like, what if she was allergic to the image of hamsters or something.

Speaking of hamsters, the patch didn't look all that much like a rabbit. Maybe if he got some scissors or... or if he got lazy. Exerting some measure of self control, Jimmy transformed but tried to restrain his usual aura to just a background feeling of unease rather than general terror and with a quick twiddle of his fingers, sliced the bunny ears into slightly more rounded hamster ears. Turning fully human again he offered this modified version
"Edward Scissorhands I'm not but at least now it's not a bunny"

He actually smiled at her mentioning she'd opened a magic shop, somehow that seemed perfect for Anya. Running a shop dedicated to magic and spells was a pretty good cover for someone who was technically a demon. Because he always kind of pictured demons working in slightly more out-of-the-way jobs like librarians or lawyers. Although, that was just because he'd met quite a few librarians and lawyers in his day. He was genuinely interested in this place now, if it made Anya look so happy. If kind of... deshevelled

"I'd love to see the place, it sounds awesome. I'll make sure to time my misadventures. Uhhh, this may sound odd coming from someone who normally sleeps in ditches but have you been sleeping alright?" It was a weird question, probably too perceptive of him but Anya had this look. He'd only seen it once before, someone who was being haunted by a ghost allegedly. Turned out he was actually using Deva and his transformations kept him awake all night. Anya probably wasn't taking Deva.

"The shop isn't keeping you up at nights is it?" Jimmy had this odd habit of being perceptive about some things but then drawing completely innaccurate conclusions. A certain British detective would likely find him exasperating for a number of reasons, but this was easily the most irritating trait he had when it came to thinking. He thought slightly too late that she may not want to talk about it and if she didn't he wouldn't push it. Lucky he'd managed to catch her on her day-off though. Still, he was a little worried now. He'd given her a pretty honest account of his travels and Anya... wasn't exactly... AMAZING at lying. But he still felt this nagging sense something was bothering her that she hadn't told him.

That and he had suddenly remembered that he hadn't eaten in about 31 hours. His stomach growled mightily as he looked down at it, wondering why he hadn't noticed that before.

[Anya]

Just on instinct, she tensed a little when Jimmy transformed. It was strange, how...dark his aura became when he did that. Anya wasn't entirely unused to that sort of thing; she was well-accustomed to hanging around creatures straight out of hell, after all - but somehow, coming from Jimmy, it was just a tad unnerving. Though noticeably not as much as it had been the last time she'd seen him do this. With barely hidden curiosity, she watched as he made a few 'modifications' to the sewing patch until...well, actually, it didn't really even look like a rabbit any more. Hamster, maybe. Or just a ambiguously cute-and-furry-non-bunny little animal. A bright grin gradually appeared on her features as she realized what he'd done, and as he reverted to human form and offered the patch to her again, the vengeance demon took it considerably less hesitantly than she had a moment ago.

"Oh! It's so cute and furry and not-bunny-like!" Anya gushed, her attitude regarding the gift evidently having done a complete turn around. Turning to gaze at Jimmy again, she full-out beamed at him. "Thank you. It's much less terrifying now." Her words were exceedingly bright and casual for how...well, ridiculous they were, but as usual she didn't seem to think much of it. More important now was the fact that her friend hadn't snickered dubiously at her phobia the way...well, the way most people did. Instead, he'd gone out of his way to make her feel much better about the whole thing, and that little gesture resonated surprisingly strongly with the demoness.

In fact, she was too busy being in considerably higher spirits to really think about Jimmy's question before she opened her mouth to answer him. Then, abruptly, she froze like a deer in the headlights. Oh, no. Not the sleep thing again...couldn't he just be completely oblivious like everyone else?! Her teeth clicked softly as she sharply shut her mouth again, her light brown eyes darting once to the floor and then reluctantly back up to meet Jimmy's again. "Yes, um." she began awkwardly after a moment, realizing now that she was going to have to improvise something - and that the results probably wouldn't be as convincing as she meant them to be. "You know, we...get some of our best customers in the later hours! I guess night is a more magic-y time to shop. Or something. Can't go to sleep when there's money to be made!" Or when there were demons seemingly trying to drive you to the brink of insanity and darkness through sleep deprivation. Whichever.

Her sub-par explanation was at least spoken with a sense of finality, however, so hopefully that would dissuade him from asking any further questions. At any rate, Jimmy's stomach had particularly good timing in Anya's opinion. Though considerably relieved by the distraction, she managed to give him a look that was half-way exasperated. "Don't tell me you've been starving yourself too! When was the last time you've eaten?" Not waiting for an answer, Anya practically sprung off the couch and made for the kitchen, before realizing she was getting a little ahead of herself and spinning around to look at him again. "You know what's fun? Cooking! How do you feel about spaghetti?" Mainly because that...was probably the only thing she had in the house at the moment. With one thing and another, she'd not only had her appetite go down considerably, but...had sort of forgotten to go to the store lately.

"Oh! Or we could go out. Maybe get a burger, or some pizza, or..." Though it was clear she was a bit on-edge now, Anya really did seem to look enthusiastic about the whole thing. Cooking had turned out to be a surprising talent of hers, after Xander had taught her the basics - and as for going out to grab a bite to eat instead, that would serve to a) get her out of the apartment, which...she was beginning to associate with more unpleasant things, like sleeplessness, and b) give her a chance to catch up with Jimmy further. Either way, it worked out pretty nicely - especially since it had proved to be such an opportune subject-changer.

[ahriman]

It was so weird seeing her face light up from the modified patch. Jimmy looked a little sheepish, he sort of understood people with strange fears given that he was a little intimidated by approximately half the animal kingdom (though his was a rational fear, Horses went crazy round him, dogs got mad, everything helpful for normal people wanted to kick the tar out of him) so he wasn't about to judge Anya for what was likely a reasonable fear if you traced it back far enough. Probably. I mean, it was entirely possible?

It wasn't though was it? He could remember seeing Monty Python and the Holy Grail, that bit with the rabbit? Apart from confirming his childhood belief that British people lived in a dangerous place, he still wasn't scared of the rabbit...

Ahh, ignore it, Anya's answering the question about why she looks so tired. Jimmy listened to her answer and nodded reasonably and certainly, whilst simultaneously noting it was all a complete lie and she was just saying it to get him off her case. Well, maybe not, but he could normally tell when Anya was telling the truth.

... of the few conversations they'd had anyway.

But whatever was bothering her, she didn't want to talk about it he should back off. He wanted to say something like "Whatever's wrong, I can help" or something noble and cool sounding like that but he wasn't really expecting her to just suddenly open up to him since he'd, y'know, run off to fight the army. That old chestnut. He'd just have to wait, he'd be sleeping her (hopefully) so he'd just keep his ears open for when she woke up or had night terrors or whatever. Because living rough constantly meant you tend to undervalue sleep.

Still, it looked food was forthcoming. It was a subject change, not one he particularly wanted to change off of but if Anya didn't wanna talk then he probably shouldn't push it on her. She was talking about cooking food and Jimmy had a momentary flashback to when he'd lived alone and lived entirely off of 10 cent noodles. If it were possible to kill him, those 2 years may well have done it. He smiled at Anya's offer, he kind of imagined she'd be a good cook for some reason. Maybe it was the money-grabbing lifetsyle or something, but he just assumed she was a really good cook. Buuuut he owed her food after all.

"How about we go out to eat, I'll pay" Jimmy flashed a few notes held between his index and middle finger. They were not small notes. He smiled at Anya and really hoped she wouldn't ask how he came to posess this money.

"You lead the way, I'll just follow and be good conversation"

((OOC: blaah, a bit weak. You can pick restaurant, though Italian would be fun ))

[Anya]

'Hmm.' That was more or less Anya's internal response to Jimmy's pulling out quite a decent sum of money when he offered to pay for their meal. Sure, she could be a bit silly at times - and irrational at others - but she wasn't stupid. The possibility that Jimmy had gotten a nice, safe, part-time job somewhere during his death-brushing travels was, unfortunately, probably unlikely. But then...where had he...? She broke off mid-thought and decided that since he didn't seem to be pushing the sleep issue, she could do him the favor of not inquiring about this. Still though, she couldn't help but raise an eyebrow rather pointedly as she responded. "Nice of you. Thanks!" Anya briefly shot him a slight, playful grin before grabbing her purse from the table, her coat (sometimes it still struck her as weird, how 'human' she was getting), and making her way back over to the door. "You like Italian, right?" Really, though, from Anya's experience in the human world so far - who didn't like Italian?

Assuming he'd be following, she headed out the door of her apartment and down the hallway toward the outside. It did feel nice, having something to be so cheerful about - or someone, rather. She was beginning to notice that Jimmy tended to have that effect on her - a bit ironic, since his aura when he was Ahriman had the exact opposite effect on people. Just a little bit puzzling, too - but, as Anya did with most of the human emotions in the particularly confusing range, she shrugged it off for the moment. As she stepped outside, she turned slightly and shot Jimmy a bright grin. As she'd predicted, getting outside was proving to be considerably relaxing for her.

"So New York must seem pretty boring compared to some of the places you've been, huh?" They didn't exactly have the military chasing people around here, after all (well...not on a regular basis, anyway), and ever since the zombies had cleared out the city had been kind of quiet. ..And, Anya considered with some amusement, you knew you were hopelessly far from normal when you started thinking of a place like New York City as 'boring' or 'quiet'. Of course, even in the absence of zombies the city managed to maintain some level of craziness. A Demon God here, a teenager who a bunch of monsters referred to as their 'mother' there...but now she was getting side-tracked.

Refocusing, the vengeance demon couldn't help but add after a moment of thought, "Or, um, maybe I'm just saying that because the town I used to live in was built on top of a hellmouth..." This statement was rather unfortunately timed, however - at that moment a man rounded the street corner and brushed past them, shooting Anya a look that suggested he might be afraid for her sanity. She levelly met his gaze as they passed him, managing to look a bit affronted by his look. "What?" Her inquiry, asked as if she hadn't just been overheard talking about the mouth of hell, was evidently enough to make the man turn sharply away and continue on down the sidewalk. Anya rolled her eyes briefly, but remained mostly undeterred. Whether you were in Sunnydale or New York City - some things about humans just never changed.

[ahriman]

There was a moment, not a particularly long one, where Jimmy's heart began to pound in his ears as he wondered how he could explain this money if Anya DID push it. She didn't strike him as being overly moral but if he admitted he'd sort of robbed a drug lord on his trek back and terrified both the man and his family into never ever selling cocaine again before taking them for about 2,000 bucks, she may well think less of him. Or more? He didn't really understand how the vengeance demon thing worked, did that count as vengeance to her? Maybe if he was really creative about thinking how DEVA counted as a drug or something-

Oh sweet lords of mercy she didn't ask, and she was smiling! That was good, Jimmy was actually worried about her even though he knew he couldn't push the issue. Getting out of the appartment or out of the magic shop might help get her mind off it. Whatever it was. Stop it, Jimmy! Curiousity killed the... immortal... killing machine... hybrid... that saying kind of lost meaning after a while. Anya offered the idea of Italian, quite possibly Jimmy's favourite kind of food, so it probably wasn't much of a surprise that he simply grinned broadly and nodded.

"I don't believe there's anyone who doesn't like Italian. It's like the perfect benchmark food"

Following Anya out of the appartment, he glanced back at the door and shut it behind him (kind of hoping Anya had her keys with her) and managed to look up directly into the flash of a grin and was briefly dazzled and took him a moment to think of the answer to her question

"Oh, I dunno about boring. I'm quite fond of being able to walk down the street without being attacked by a monster or shot at or, y'know... some such"

It occured to him that he actually had a much longer list than that. He also liked that he wasn't assaulted by do-gooders who assumed him in his demonic alter-ego body was evil. Because seriously, how often had he been shot at by people who weren't angry at him but trying to kill on principal. Or, oh, best one, having a kid with super-powers think he was an ALIEN and trying to blast him to pieces with what appeared to be large amounts of radiation.

"I did get to see Mount Rushmore though. Which was kind of weird there, uhh, there were different presidents on the one from my old reality"

He didn't think about it all that often, but he wasn't originally from here. Just like how he was a foreign body because of the Angra Mainyu cells, he was a foreign body because he got ripped through dimensions. Double Outsider freshness... he had a slightly concerned look over his face for a second. Not feeling worried about the fact the universe he came from had been obliterated, but worried because what if Italian was different here? What if it was actually Mexican? He winced at his own stupid doubts but still, what would he do?

His concerns were suddenly obliterated when Anya described her old home

"Wait, WHAT? How is that even a thing? Why does Hell even NEED a mouth? And if it did why build a town over it? What kind of person has that lack of self preservation instinct?"

But it looked like he wasn't the only one who was confused by Anya's statement as a guy who brushed past them shot her a look. Jimmy frowned, that was weird, you overheard strange things in New York all the time, he walked past someone listening to incredibly heavy metal with bright green hair and showing just how jaded he was didn't bat an eyelid. This guy seemed interested and that automatically made him nervous. Anya just challenged him and the guy left but it had still made Jimmy slightly edgy. He didn't want to run the risk of violence breaking out. Not that Anya couldn't handle herself but... oh for the love of- he didn't want to butcher anyone in front of her! What kind of an emotion was that to be having!? She was a demon who already KNEW what he was. That was RAW stupid! Best stop thinking about it...

"Hey, does that place look good to you?"

Jimmy pointed at a restaurant across the road. It had a striped canopy, red, white and green and had the red and white cross-hatched table-cloth that Jimmy always considered to be "Italian restaurant-y" waiters in buttoned down vests, couples sipping wine. Yeah, this ought to get through a good chunk of the money in his pocket, and suitably distracted him from his stupid emotions. Jimmy waited for Anya's thoughts on the matter, just in case she was mortally terrified of... breadsticks or something. Even while they waited Jimmy tried desperately to think what the Italian for rabbit might be just in case they had it here. If Anya accidentally ate it she might go into shock...

[Anya]

Oddly, it was actually kind of a relief to hear that Jimmy didn't seem to find New York boring. It meant that there was less of a chance of him leaving again - of course, there were a hundred and one other reasons why he might disappear again in the future, but she didn't particularly want to focus on any of those. She liked the thought of Jimmy staying safe here much better. Even though 'here' wasn't exactly the safest place in the world either nowadays, even with all the zombies gone. Still.

She perked up a bit in interest when Jimmy mentioned his reality's version of Mount Rushmore. It was so curious the way alternate dimensions worked sometimes...so many things could be the same in concept, but with so many different variations. Anya would know - she'd been creating wish-based alternate realities for centuries - but she had to wonder what Jimmy's might have been like. "How...different was it, where you were from? I mean - was it just details like that, or are there some...really big things? I mean, people there couldn't - like, breathe underwater, or anything, could they?" Jimmy had never mentioned being able to breathe underwater. ...Whoa, now there was a strange thought. People'd be doing all sorts of crazy things - building underwater cities before you knew it, and...well, she was starting to get a little bit off track here. At least she was getting better at catching herself.

With a little mental shake, she brought herself back to earth and glanced briefly at him when he asked her about Sunnydale. Sometimes Anya really did forget how bizarre that sort of thing must sound to other people - even some of Sunnydale's residents themselves had been astoundingly oblivious to the fact that their town was built overtop the mouth of hell. She fidgeted absent-mindedly for a moment as she thought on how to answer his inquiries. "Well, the man who built it was an immortal sorcerer who wanted a feeding ground for all his little demonic buddies. If that answers your question." the blonde explained with a simple shrug, as if these sorts of sorcerers commonly walked the streets in day to day life. And she decided to leave out the part where Sunnydale's aforementioned immortal founder had returned to run for Mayor and...attempt to ascend to the form of a giant demonic snake. Jimmy had been through a lot, but she still had a feeling there was only so much 'crazy' he could handle at one time.

"As for why hell needs a mouth, I don't know. To let all the creatures of the night to come running out into our world, I guess. God forbid we ever get some normality around here..." But Anya trailed off as they paused in front of a particularly inviting Italian restaurant. It certainly looked like a cozy little place, and she brightened upon Jimmy suggesting it. "Oh, yes! Look! It doesn't look nearly as sleazy as that crazy little New Jersey diner we met in!" Sometimes just when she was beginning to think that she was finally staring to get the hang of this whole 'think before you speak' thing, she was effectively proven wrong by statements like this. Still, her good mood didn't falter as she grabbed Jimmy's arm and happily started for the door of the establishment. Not that she didn't earn an eyebrow raise or two from a few of the couples seated outside - but who particularly cared about them?

[ahriman]

He had to stop and think for a while when Anya asked about the big differences. As he could confirm after a particularly unpleasent experience underwater, humans couldn't breathe underwater and Ahriman could use telekinesis to bring oxygen down so he didn't die, he wondered what other things might be weird. He stroked his chin, there were differences, he used to keep a note. A few presidents here, a war won or lost there, there was a place called Estonia which didn't really exist where he came from, it was little things but he couldn't think of anything particularly important. Well, he guessed there were no demons or zombies, but maybe he just hadn't encountered them. And then he finally remembered them

"We couldn't breathe underwater, but we didn't have those weird pink fish things. Kind of like bugs? Shellfish! We didn't have any of them, must've missed that on the evolutionary chain."

Lobsters still freaked him out a bit, they were just so weird looking. A giant bug that lived in the water? There were more differences but that was all he could remember right now. No Shellfish. Well, and his reality was now completely obliterated through a means he still didn't COMPLETELY understand. But that was kind of minor in comparison.

And the Hellmouth story didn't actually sound all that far-fetched. Man finds incredibly evil resource. Decides to do entirely the wrong thing and, in this instance, build a town over it so the resource has a food supply with magic. As opposed to the far more scientific, 'find a way to transfer it onto people'. Jimmy'd actually been thinking about getting the DEVA sample in his bag analysed, because given the fact his cells were immortal (well, it was a heavily complicated arrangement so they weren't ALL immortal but generally they were) then how could they have seperated them from the base body at all? And what happened when the Ahri's died, did the cells just... stick around?

Jimmy was dwelling on all this and didn't even follow up the Hellmouth thing, he would probably end up seeing it sooner or later hopefully. And more hopefully, it wouldn't be a literal gaping more over a fiery pit of death. Because it'd be bad for the general intelligence of the world. He nodded at her pointing out Hell, indeed, didn't need a mouth and was pleasently surprised that she liked the look of the restaurant. Well, liked it more than the diner they'd met in.

He wanted to point out that particular diner had been destroyed by them and the mayor fighting some purple monsters but even New York has limits for things you could overhear and not get confused by. As they walked past the few couples outside he overheard a spattering of whispers

"-ooks like their first date, how romantic!-"

"-met in Jersey? What're the odds of finding someone decent there, like a million to one?-"

"-remember when we were that age, dear?" "No-"

And Jimmy's face slowly went redder and redder, a thin line of sweat dripping down his face as they were approached by the classy looking waiter. Slicked down hair, well trimmed moustache and suave attitude just made Jimmy more uncomfortable as he approached with an open hand

"Good afternoon, table for two?"

He seemed to be taking Anya's reasonably respectable business wear and Jimmy's jeans and T-shirt as some kind of exercise in 'offending the waiter' which he was masterfully pulling off the 'ignoring what bothers you' part as well as giving the faint subtext of 'letting them know that it exists'. He guided them through to a table, middle of the restaurant and asked them to, please, take a seat. Jimmy sat down, slipping his jacket off and hoping a white t-shirt wouldn't show stains if he started sweating in a panic.

"So, umm, this is a nice place, huh?" picking up the menu, Jimmy was suddenly very aware that this was a date and it was very important to him to NOT mess this up! He had to be very, very careful to not say or do anything stupid... now, what was the italian word for rabbit because it started with a C and he thinks he might see it, if he gets this wrong, oh god...

((OOC: Panicking. With styyyyle~)