The clerk had been annoying, but informative nonetheless. More than once he'd insisted Alabaster remove his coat to try on something or other, and Alabaster had vehemently refused. The slight amiableness he'd adopted with Saga was nowhere to be found, and the stone-faced, no-nonsense agent was back in full-force. At long last, the clerk gave him a sizable pile of things to try on and gladly left him in a fitting room.

After a while he emerged, wearing a white collared shirt beneath a black suit jacket (as much as he hated leaving the thing unbuttoned, all of the posters and mannequins around the store begged to differ), and a pair of jeans. The shoes were his own, but he saw no reason to get new ones when the old ones seemed to complete the ensemble just as well. In one hand was his own soot-stained outfit, in the other a couple of changes of clothes in similar style and functionality as the one he now wore.

Now, where had Saga gone off to?