[Stranger in a Strange Land]

Ixxis Ex had just flown in from another dimension and boy were his wings tired.

It still, he thought, wasn't particularly funny. Not funny, in fact, in the same way the place he'd been sent to was not funny. Furrabia, he'd been told, a kind of cross-dimensional meeting place; one of the multiverse's most infamous dens of vice. Said vice had been evident from the moment he'd soared in on the Divine Wind and shifted, finding himself suddenly dumped unceremoniously in the middle of... well, he wanted to say 'pile'. He thought 'orgy' might have been a better word. Prim, bejewled phoenix glanced up at him icily as he landed, crashing in an inelegant roll that sent his feathers flying and mek buzzing. Tail over ears against a wall and when the bursts of static had died down enough he could hear the clinking of heavy chains and pained mewls as a massive white wyrm yanked back a trio of near-naked felines. It wasn't all luck, however, and he'd barely registered that before he felt another plethora of limbs move to touch him; to stroke his feathers and fur and pick curiously at the wires and LEDs implanted down his arms.

"Low low low!" A flurry of claws and snapping beak and he managed to right himself, away from the groping paws and hungry eyes and the incomprehensable bursts of static in his ears as the translator implants did their thing. Still they came at him, laughing now -- it was always a game, in these sorts of places, he found -- and every now and again he caught words in between the gibberish. Somehow, it didn't make anything better and Ixxis bit down on the urge to electrocute the groping lot of them; surging the tiny fillaments that laced his fur, the same ones that lit up his bright yellow patterns against the otherwise uniform black. After all, he was here to deliver a message, not start a war.

So instead he shifted again, feeling the raven rise up and take over, and soon he was airborne, flapping uselessly againt a vaulted marble ceiling while several of the winged occupants below rose up to continue the chase. They were fast, but Ixxis was faster, and no Malakim worth its wings would dare let itself be caught out by a bunch of idolatrous halfbreed outcasts. The hole in the centre of the roof was a good enough exit as it was an entry, and soon Ixxis found himself gliding gently through the night.

Outside, it was hot and steamy and stank of sex and spice and sin. Not like his home sephira at all, more like the necropolis at Yesod; and how he hated that place, as well, and all its grinning, pale-faced vampire lords. Best, he thought, not to linger in this place any longer. Simply to find the Client and deliver his message. The scroll case was still firmly gripped in one boney claw; an inch and a half across and almost a foot long, capped at either end by gleaming titanium and filled with a glowing yellow plasma. The Message, and he would deliver it. It was what he had been made to do.

After what seemed like an age of ducking and weaving across the Furrabian sky, Ixxis finally found what he was looking for; a lone tree to the southwest of the City, and he landed awkwardly -- still holding the Message -- on one of the worn scarlet pillows beneath it. This was where he would wait; the Client would find him on his own. Ixxis had no knowledge of who it would be, of course -- nor who had hired him in the first place, but then again, Malakim never did -- but the Message itself would take care of that. Should any but its intended reader try and open it... well then.

No-one fucked with the postal service of God.

Sighing, Ixxis released the raven and felt his form unravel back into his more familiar shape. Stretching and cracking all six tired limbs, he leant himself heavily against the bark. Eyes closing as the mek in his ears obliged him with music. Message gripped firmly in one claw, and a slideshow of artificial light and sound playing out in his brain, Ixxis settled himself down and started waiting.

... and waiting.