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It was less than a second after the knock that the feet of a chair could be heard scraping across the floor as someone adjusted their position. Muffled footsteps followed, and then the doorknob turned. "It's a bit late, Sylvite," said Cybele as she opened the door. "Is everything-"

The sentence cut off as she blinked at the stranger standing in front of her.

While she was powered up, as she tended to be whenever possible, she had not been expecting company. Her shoes and antlers were off, and her hair, while not quite to the point of disheveled, was undeniably edging in that direction.

At least the room behind her was neat enough. There were pressed clothes lined up on a rolling rack, a new laptop and some books perched on the desk, and little else.

Cybele stared at the general, not bothering to be subtle about it. Her gaze lingered on his flaming torso for a long moment. Youma? Something else? Although she was used to all manner of magic and monsters, there was something about this that sent a chill down her back. Her gaze was careful when she finally met his eyes, and there was no warmth to her voice when she asked, crisply, "Can I help you?"

Even dressed down, Cybele was still wearing the dark wings that marked her rank, and she turned so that they were visible. "Not so new," she said, tone marginally more relaxed now that it was clear that the General was not here on some sort of urgent business.

If she'd managed to come across one of the few people who did not know about her eventful introduction to the Negaverse, there was no need to bring it up right away. Now that her gaze was fixed on his face, she had to wonder how long he'd been involved in all this. There was something distinctly inhuman in his eyes, it was true, but there was also something young.

"I'm Cybele, Eternal Senshi of the Hunt," she said with a small nod, although, wary of the flames, she did not offer a hand, either. "It's nice to meet you," she said instead, finally flashing a small, practiced smile.

She glanced down the hall. "I think seven and eight are open. Perhaps a few upstairs, as well." She was silent for a moment, still staring, still trying to determine what exactly it was that was wrong with him. Then, all at once, she seemed to remember more of her manners and added, "Have you been in here before? I can show you around, if you'd like."

The layout of the building wasn't so complicated, but it was still nice to know what was what.

"I was never assigned one," she said with a small shrug. "But I'm newer to the Negaverse than to the war, yes."

There was no hiding that, she supposed.

Early on, Cybele of the Hunt had been the only hint of who she was that she'd had to cling to. Now it didn't matter so much, and if someone insisted that she take a mineral name, she would probably do it, but that would take adjustment. For now, being Cybele did not affect the performance of her duties.

She turned off her lights and closed her door before making her way down the hallway, half a step in front of the fiery General. Somehow, it was easier if she did not have to look at him.

"You've been around for a bit, then?" she glanced over her shoulder for a moment, just long enough to be polite. "What brings you here now?" She had a difficult time imagining someone constantly on fire having much luck finding a place in the city, unless there was some magic to help with that.

She knocked lightly, then opened a door at the end of the hallway. "This is one of the bathrooms."

Cybele's brow creased in the mirror at the final question, at the departure from the stalemate of pleasantries. She met his reflected gaze for a moment before turning to stare at his hands and wrists instead, as if that might be what sparked some memories of this boy.

"No," she said. "I don't remember anything at all from before last September."

Nothing came to her now. Memories never did. Around Ganymede and some of the other senshi who seemed to know her, there might be a vague tug of something in her chest, but that was all, and with Faustite, there was none of that.

When she looked at him, she mostly felt concerned about that fire.

"It's not surprising. I've heard a bit about who I was before, enough to start to put together some pieces. From what I understand, she was brutal." She let the bathroom door swing shut behind her and rested a hand on the wall, instead. "I am sorry about your wrist."

While sincere, the apology was not quite personal. It was somebody else who had hurt him, somebody dead.

Cybele gave a final glance towards where his organs should have been before continuing down the hall.

"That wasn't her, was it?"

She didn't think it was, although there was no real reason why. For all she knew, her past self would have gladly ripped someone in half. She would do it now with a good enough reason.

It wasn't a long walk before they reached the next door, and Cybele shouldered it open, revealing a smallish kitchen plastered with passive aggressive sticky notes.

"Yes," she said, still matter of fact. "I'm Sylvite's acquisition, as some call it. Although I don't remember much of the ambush, either." Of course she knew that she'd woken up in the General King's office with a hand in her chest, but even that and the first few days after were something of a blur.

She nodded towards the sink, which was surprisingly clean. "Wash your dishes if you eat in here instead of the castle. We might have not bugs down here, but a particularly rancid youma tries to sneak inside and nest if things get too dirty."

It wasn't actually clear if he even would eat, but since she was giving the tour, of course she'd go over the rules just in case.

Cybele shot a sharp side-eye in Faustite's direction. "I'm sure you can find some sort of friend that doesn't want to eat my fingers," she said, dead serious. Some of the sticky notes were hers. She did not like the sink youma. She did not like any youma, really. Chaos or no, they always seemed to get feisty if she got too close.

"I'm trying to get better at being a well rounded person," she said. He was right in guessing that she did not often feel like a person at all, but that did not seem right to bring up in front of someone who was clearly less human than she was. Anyway, she was getting better at pretending. "I spend plenty of time in the city. I have a job. I've tried archery, primitive weapons hunting, improv, things like that," she said. It always felt strained when she tried her hand at the hobbies she saw on her old social media, as if she were grasping for some sort of connection that wasn't there. She'd only done the improv class once. Hunting in the woods was a little better, but harder to plan when she didn't have much of the gear for it.

"I'll eat lunch out and bring back takeout sometimes, but if there's nothing going on, I'll eat down here."

There were also, of course, the times that she needed a sandwich at three in the morning. The kitchen got plenty of use. Still, there was only so much to see here, and she backed out of the room, gesturing for Faustite to follow.

"I'll break your teeth if you try," she said without looking towards him. Her voice was quieter and not quite aggressive, but she was just as half-serious as he was.

It was a short lived moment, though. She was back to being polite enough as she crossed the hallway and pointed between two doors with an open palm, allowing Faustite to do the honors since one of these would likely be where he ended up staying. "People sleep here," she said. "People eat here, yes. A few are like me. A few, I believe, are like you." The fire might have thrown her off at first, but the context clues were pointing more and more towards him being half youma. "As I said, these are the only rooms free on this floor."

There was always the possibility that someone had moved out without her noticing. Things fluctuated here without much fuss, but there had always been enough people around that her point still stood.

"That's about all this place is good for, though. If you want anything more interesting than that, it's best to go to the city, or at least the castle."

Cybele was not particularly interested in whatever baked goods and starseed experiments that were housed in the dark hallways of the citadel, but perhaps they would be more his style.

"It's why I'm trying out hobbies," she added with a small shrug. "I'm not under orders for it. Staring at these walls for all my free time got a bit boring after a month or so. It's just trial and error to find out what I actually like."

There was an element of following Fleur Willis's paper trail as well, to see what she'd liked in her old life and if it clicked now, but not many people knew that she'd found her old social media, and she decided not to bring it up now.