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((The Monday Triple: page 2 of 3))
“Ugh, man, why ya gotta be so uptight? We got a great thing goin’ here, and you can’t just show up outta the blue like this and talk all this smack like we ain’t even civilized ‘r nothin’, man.”

“Oh my goddess, Leo. Sai-hee is going to flip her shit when I tell her what you’ve been doing here.”

“Well, then, maybe don’t tell her, man.”

“What? Of course I’m going to tell her. Your actions--or the lack thereof, I suppose--have consequences, Leo. Honestly, even for you, this is a new low. You’ve always been a bit lazy, but I’ve never known you to be irresponsible. And where the hell is Ericoros, by the way? He’s at fault, too, for not keeping you in check.”

“Oh, y’know, he was crampin’ my style, so I decided to give him a time out for a little while.”

After that, there came an extended silence. Roman looked around the open-air lobby another time and decided to keep heading up stairs, stopping intermittently to check if their conversation had resumed yet.

If nothing else, Roman knew that he wouldn’t be asking Leo for help, but whoever he was talking to seemed to know what they were doing. Roman just had to find the right opportunity to negotiate with them. Admittedly, he wasn’t quite sure how he was going to accomplish that just yet. Maybe start with a bit of stalking while he waited for an opening, and then if worse came to worst, he could always throw money at the problem and hope for the best.

He hated doing that, though. Winning people over with devilish good looks and a can-do attitude was always preferable, he felt.

‘Leo...’

Ah, there’d been a reaper present, too, Roman realized. That might’ve explained all the silence. His ability couldn’t help him hear voices that didn’t actually make sound, obviously, but now that he was on the same floor as them, he was close enough to hear everything. Conveniently enough, he spotted a janitor’s closet. Less conveniently, it was locked, and he wasn’t sure he had a key for it or not, so he decided to just lean against the door while he listened.

‘...Are you feeling alright, Leo?’

“Never better, man.”