"Steve, what are you guys doing here?" asked Briggs, as the two of them walked up to the table.

"Somebody called my private phone and told me to come here," said Jimenez. "How did you even get-"

Hector turned around in his chair.

"Man, the service here is quicker than I thought," he said, smiling at the agents.

"You again?" Briggs and Jimenez said, in unison. Briggs raised a suspicious eyebrow at her junior agent.

"You know him too?" she said. "That wasn't in your reports…"

"It's… complicated?" said Jimenez, wearing a nervous smile.

"Exo let me live!" said Hector, waving a waiter over to him. "Your partner saw the whole thing!"

Briggs turned her glare from Jimenez to Steve, who turned pale. Hector leaned up to the waiter and asked if they could bring some additional chairs, in perfect Cantonese, with an impeccable accent.

"There was a lot going on with me that day," Steve said, knowing it helped his case little, if at all. "Hector isn't here to fight us-"

"I know what he's about," said Briggs. A pair of busboys brought over two more chairs, and she and Jimenez joined the others around the square table.

"Are you all going to sit over there?" asked Hector. The others were sitting as far away from him as they could be; leaving the five of them squeezed around one side of a rather small table.

"I think we're fine the way we are," said Steve, his shoulders pressed in by Johnny on one side and Briggs on the other. "…for now."

"You look like a b-list version of the Last Supper," said Hector. "And all the spring rolls are on my side."

"You didn't pay for those!" said Johnny.

Briggs pinched the bridge of her nose.

"Let's just get this over with…" she groaned. "I want to go back to you being an existential threat to our civilization."

"Sake!" Hector called. "Can we get some Sake over here?"

Everyone else around the table shouted at once.

"Fine… fine," Hector said, leaning forward onto his helmet. "Can't let a man enjoy himself. Don't know how many chances I'll get."

A waitress brought over a bamboo server and a matching cup. Hector poured out a measure of the rice wine and knocked it back like he was doing shots.

"The Skinwalkers had a ritual," he said, pouring another glass. "They led me to believe it was something they needed the Rider out of the way for. I was half right. They wanted Exo out of the way, and they wanted to create a big showy distraction on the other side of town to lure me there."

He knocked back another drink and poured out a third.

"All this time I thought I was hiding from them, they knew my every move before I made it," he said, wiping his lips. "I got to the compound and there was nothing there, just a bunch of cultists too stoned to move. They told me the plan was to block Exo up at the hospital so he couldn't mess up their real plan."

He tossed back yet another glass of sake and kept pouring.

"I went to get Exo," he said. "That was my next mistake. The ritual was going to take place there the whole time. It wasn't meant to kill Exo, it was going to wake him up to the fullness of his potential. It was the blood that did it, Steve, the blood!"

He finished the next cup, but found no more sake remaining. He tossed the cup and server over his shoulder without looking.

"You spilled your blood on him," he said, pointing to Jimenez. "Your blood was what brought him back to this world. It connected him to the realm of humans."

"That's… how did you know that?" asked Johnny.

"Everything that happened that night was classified," said Jimenez.

"We didn't just have cultists outside the hospital," said Hector, shaking his head from side to side, red lanterns hanging from the ceiling reflecting off his sunglasses. "They didn't all need to storm the place. Some just had to clock in. If we… they wanted you dead they could have done it with a needle."

"Why would they bring me back up to full strength?" said Steve, rubbing his temple. "I'm the only one who's supposed to be able to stop them. They could have won their undead holy war without a fight."

"The big man thinks he needs you for something," Hector said. "He's obsessed with you. Everyone else is just a pawn he sends to die to you, and they go to it like it's a trip to Disneyland!" he chuckled to himself. "Until they see death coming for them. Oh, those poor bastards are not ready."

"Well… good, then," said Briggs, drumming her fingers on the table. "Your glorious leader just brought his sworn enemy back to life. I'm glad you brought us this vital intelligence on operation Tactical Suicide, I don't know what we could have done without you here."

"Johnny's blood was only part of it," said Hector, leaning forward, glaring across the table from behind his shades. "The ritual needed sacrifices. Willing ones. …or at least near enough to willing. Their blood is what brings out true power."

"Some of the carvings on the tomb talked about that," said Nikki, her knee bouncing up and down against the table leg. "They spoke of men who sacrificed themselves to animal spirits to take on the powers of the beasts. Some wanted more power still, and gathered followers to worship them, some even sacrificing themselves and giving their spiritual energy to the beast-men. They were said to gain the power of gods."

"Good, you did the homework," said Hector. "The way I understand it, the blood and the sacrifice strengthens the connection between human and animal… somehow. I'm not a priest, man, I never understood how all this worked. Just fell in with a bad crowd."

"I'm so sorry you didn't have a good upbringing in your werewolf cult," Briggs growled.

"Bitch I'm trying to-"

"Hector!" Steve shouted, cutting him off. "You said that you wouldn't come here to fight, but if that's what you want…"

"No… no, I just came here to talk," he said. "But I think it's about time I go." He stood up from his chair and started stuffing his pockets with Chinese food over the objections of the table. "Just wanted to enjoy one last night is all, but I guess I can't even have that…"

"What do you mean one last night?" asked Jimenez.

"I mean that once the blood gets on you, it's going to start changing you, Steve," he said, pointing across the table. "I don't know what it'll do to you, you're some… some weird thing, you're not like us. But it's going to be weird. And it's going to happen soon." He whipped off his sunglasses. The skin around his eyes was black and puffy, and the sclera had turned a bright, bloody red, with pools of unending blackness in the center. "I got the blood on me too. I can feel it working."

"Holy crap…" Johnny gasped. "What the hell is that?"

"I'm no doctor either," said Hector, slipping his shades into his pocket with one hand and grabbing his bike helmet with the other. "Steve, I don't know who or what you'll be when we next meet, but when that happens, I'm gonna be a lot more Hopper than Hector."

"Hector wait," said Steve, jumping to his feet. "There has to be a way to… to come back from this!"

"The world doesn't work like that, buddy," Hector smiled as he put on his helmet. "Next time we meet, you gotta put me down. You're the only one who can."