Word Count: 1248

“Pathetic.”

Aquamarine nudged the body slumped at his feet with the toe of his boot, but the action earned him little more than a quiet groan and the brief flicker of eye movement beneath a pair of closed eyelids.

If the man ever shared his name with him that night, Aquamarine couldn’t immediately recall what it was. David? Damien? Daniel? Something basic that began with a D. Lovely spent an hour listening to him rant about an argument he had with his wife, and another hour after that getting him drunk enough to overlook his marriage and follow Lovely out of the bar — all on David-Damien-Daniel’s tab, of course. He must have gone a bit overboard, or David-Damien-Daniel was more of a lightweight than either of them assumed, because he barely got the idiot to turn down a nearby alley before said idiot leaned most of his weight against him and passed out before Lovely had the chance to make the change to Aquamarine.

Not that it made much of a difference. He was going to knock him out anyway. When Aquamarine went to the trouble of hooking a mark like this, it was always less of a hassle to draw the energy out of an inert body than a fully conscious one. He could make things easier on himself and take energy from random passersby, and he often did, but sometimes his hatred for the world and society in general reached a point that required a more specific outlet — someone with a name and a face and a story worthy of his anger.

With a flick of his wrist, Aquamarine sent the purple orb of stolen energy into subspace for safe keeping, then crouched in front of the body to study his chosen prey.

There wasn’t anything remarkable about him. Average height, average build, average level of attractiveness, neither ugly nor particularly handsome, but well groomed enough to make up for any perceived shortcomings. The watch on his wrist was what originally caught Lovely’s eye at the bar. In a world full of Apple watches, David-Damien-Daniel chose to walk around with a pricey looking Rolex. His suit spoke of money, too — tailored to his form in a way a simple department store purchase could not accomplish. If Aquamarine chose to investigate, he’d likely find a designer tag.

“You pretentious piece of s**t,” he muttered.

Aquamarine pondered the possibility of remorse, and wondered further what it meant about him that he couldn’t dredge up so much as a shred of it. He didn’t feel guilty for drawing David-Damien-Daniel out here. He didn’t regret stealing his energy, and he had no second thoughts about leaving him here unconscious, potentially for some thieving criminal to stumble across later.

That in itself gave Aquamarine pause. He tilted his head to study the man more closely, searching the depths of his own soul for something resembling a conscience.

He had one somewhere, it just didn’t extend quite this far. Unlike other Negaverse agents, Aquamarine usually wasn’t out for blood, he had nothing to seek revenge for, and his lust for power was pretty much nonexistent these days. Compared to many of his peers, Aquamarine was tame, his sense of morality relatively intact, though perhaps somewhat skewed to favor his own comfort and convenience.

He helped take captives, half a decade ago when he was a stupid fifteen-year-old trying to find his place in an organization he didn’t particularly care for. He talked himself into believing it mattered to him, that he craved the recognition and the glory that came with a job well done. He helped torture those captives, maybe even enjoyed it to an extent; it felt good at first, to have the enemy at his mercy, to accomplish something more than the endless monotony of draining energy. But the pleasure was quick to fade when the job grew tedious. He let things unfold however they meant to and found moments of entertainment where he could, because if he didn’t find something at least mildly amusing about the whole thing, he would have spent far too much time actually thinking about what they were doing.

Those were Senshi and Knights, of course. One could argue they deserved it. Jet certainly would, and there were times when Aquamarine could agree. If it wasn’t for them, Aquamarine wouldn’t be caught up in this mess. He wouldn’t be wandering the city at night in uniform, fighting against magic with a dagger and a rapier and a single ancient spell, and luring men out of bars to steal their energy and leave their unconscious forms down dark alleys.

But civilians were different, weren’t they? They had even less to do with this stupid war than Aquamarine did himself.

Not that he could tell who the truly innocent civilians were, and which ones were Senshi and Knights masquerading as normal people. For all he knew, David-Damien-Daniel could be as much his enemy as the b***h who killed Jet’s brother.

Aquamarine reached into the unconscious man’s pockets, searching each one until he found a wallet. He flipped it open and tore through its contents — a few hundred dollars in cash, several credit cards made of thick plastic, a driver’s license, and a few pictures encased in protective film.

“Daren,” he read the name off of the driver’s license, his expression bland and unimpressed. “Thanks for the energy, Daren. It’s the least you could do for me after that god awful sob story I had to listen to.”

He couldn’t even remember half of it. Something about his wife being distant or failing to pay enough attention to him or not catering to his needs. Aquamarine rolled his eyes and looked through the pictures, a few of which seemed to show the wife in question — far too pretty for a man like Daren — and a few more which boasted a couple of grinning brats.

“You never told me there were kids,” Aquamarine said. He made a disapproving noise with his tongue and tossed the wallet back into Daren’s lap. “Is this the first time you’ve picked up a younger guy at a bar?”

Daren’s eyes flickered behind his lids again, but he made no sound.

“I don’t suppose you’d want to do this again sometime. Sorry to disappoint you, but I’m already spoken for.”

Aquamarine stood, his gaze contemptuous as he continued to watch the inert body. One of Daren’s hands twitched, the one that bore the watch at its wrist, but he soon went still.

“I could take your starseed,” Aquamarine mused. “Maybe you deserve it, you cheating b*****d. Do you think your wife would care? Would your brats miss you? Should’ve thought of that before you turned down this alley, huh?”

He considered it, flexed his fingers and leaned over like he meant to sink his hand into Daren’s chest. Ultimately, Aquamarine scoffed and decided against it. He kicked Daren in the stomach instead, which knocked his unconscious body to the side, sprawled out on the ground.

Apparently, Aquamarine wasn’t so consumed by Chaos that pulling some random civilian’s starseed brought him any satisfaction.

“Consider yourself fortunate that I’m a s**t agent,” he said.

Aquamarine tossed Daren’s wallet next to him. Chances were someone else would come by and steal it, but that wasn’t any of his concern.

He left the man there in the alley, turning the corner to make his way home.