A few days later, we were pulling up outside the Lone Star building. I looked at Alpha. “Are you sure this is going to work?”
He nodded. “I’m sure. Put on your uniform.”
I put on the uniform with “Thompson AC Repair Service” emblazoned on it. A few hours before, Jazz had hacked the AC for the building and caused it to short out. She had then intercepted the message that had been sent to an AC repair company. We were now posing as employees of said company.
Alpha and Jazz were also wearing the uniform. Jazz, who knew exactly what she’d done, would be able to repair the AC. Alpha would do the talking. I’d visit the restroom while the other two were working and turn invisible before placing a data tap on a terminal connected to the casefiles data storage. This data tap would allow Jazz to hack the casefiles once we were away. Then she would remotely destroy the data tap. We’d be in and out with our data with no one the wiser. Or, at least, that was the plan.
We entered the building. The receptionist in the front took one look at us and sighed in relief. “Thank God you guys are here. I’m roasting. I swear, I could fry an egg on my desk."
Alpha nodded professionally. “We’ll fix it, sir.”
He nodded. “Let me just page someone to take you to the unit.”
A few minutes later, a Lone Star officer was escorting us to the AC unit. She also seemed relieved to see us, and I could understand why. Armored jackets were hot.
Jazz started to work on the unit, and Alpha pretended to help her while chatting with the guard. I pretended to be their apprentice, handing them tools and occasionally receiving gruff instruction from Jazz.
I was wearing my imaging contacts, allowing me to receive messages from the group, among other things. A few minutes after we started, a message scrolled across the bottom of my vision. “It’s go time.” It was from Jazz.
I turned to the officer. “Mind if I use the restroom?”
She nodded. “No problem. Just let me get someone to escort you. We can’t have you wandering the building unsupervised.”
She spoke on her commlink, and, a few minutes later, another Lone Star officer showed up. She nodded at me, seeming bored. “Follow me. I’ll show you where the restroom is.”
When we got to the restroom, she followed me inside. I bit my lip. We had planned for this possibility, but I’d been hoping she’d wait outside.
I entered the stall and latched the door. Then I sat down with my pants around my ankles and groaned. “I don’t feel so good,” I muttered. Then I began to concentrate. This would be tricky. Tricky, but doable.
I cast an illusion spell of myself, carefully layering it over my body. An instant later, I made my actual body invisible. Then I stood as the illusion made a foul noise and smell.
The Lone Star officer made a sympathetic noise. “Take your time.” She sighed. “It’s not like I have anything better to do.”
The invisibility spell was being held by my sustaining focus, but I was holding the illusion myself, allowing me more fine control. Once I'd pulled my pants up, I dropped to my hands and knees and crawled out from under the stall as the illusion made another foul noise, covering any sounds I might have made.
I stood from the floor, making a face. Bathroom floor. Ick. At least it looked mostly clean.
I’d been fortunate. When we’d entered, there had been another person in the restroom. She came out of her stall, looking grossed out. She washed her hands, and I wished I could do the same to mine, so recently on the bathroom floor.
As she exited, I followed her out. So far so good.
She was an officer, so her desk presumably had a terminal with access to casefile storage. I followed her as she stalked down the hall, muttering something under her breath. She seemed in a foul mood.
As she walked through a doorway into another room, I heard a voice inside my head. “If you go in there,” it said, “I’ll have to attack you.”
I froze, and then looked hurriedly around the room. Nothing.
“You heard me. Thank the Maker,” said the voice, obviously relieved. “I wasn’t sure you’d be able to. Normally only my summoner can hear me. Well, them, and anyone who is astrally perceiving. But I thought- well, hoped, really- that you might be able to.”
It was a spirit, I realized. Probably one not currently materialized. I started astrally perceiving. Which, I realized, I should have already been doing, because of course this place had magical security.
Looking around, I still saw nothing. The spirit sighed. “I’m supposed to hide,” it said. It sounded guilty. “I’m kind of bending the rules by talking to you. But I didn’t want to have to attack you.”
I groaned inwardly. What would I do about this? I could try to banish the spirit, but I’d never been good at banishing, and, anyways, the mage who summoned the spirit would feel that it was banished and sound the alarm. They would probably also sound the alarm if the spirit told them they’d been attacked. And, whatever I did, I’d need to find the spirit first.
In my astral sight, Ember drifted beside me. “I could help,” he murmured. “They’re not very powerful. If Paw, Carmilla, and I attack them together, they won’t have time to tell their summoner they were attacked before being disrupted. But we need to find them first.”
I had an idea on that. I looked around, making sure there was no one was nearby. Then I began to hum softly.
Apparently, when I was consciously trying to force spirits to manifest, it happened faster. Ember, Paw, Carmilla, and an air spirit were abruptly visible. Instantly, Ember turned on the spirit. I gestured for Paw and Carmilla to do the same. The air spirit was disrupted before it could so much as blink.
Disrupting a spirit, though painful, did no permanent damage, fortunately. Hurriedly, I gestured for the three spirits to dematerialize. They did so, and not a moment too soon. A Lone Star officer came around the corner.
I waited to see if he would go through the door. He did, and I slipped in behind him. Soon I was placing the data tap. Now all I had to do was get back to the restroom.
Unfortunately, no one looked like they would be leaving the room anytime soon. Twenty minutes passed with no one opening a door. We’d allowed for this. That was why I was supposed to pretend I was sick, to justify taking longer on the toilet. Unfortunately, the thing with the spirit had eaten up too much time. Thinking fast, I made a plan.
I slipped into the astral and spoke to Ember. “Can you heat up the room? Just a bit?”
He frowned. “I can. Why?"
“If people feel too overheated, they might leave,” I explained.
He nodded. “Ok.”
I could feel the room heating up. I tugged on the collar of my uniform. This was not comfortable.
The angry lady I’d originally followed from the bathroom huffed. “It’s roasting in here. I’m going to get some air.”
The man next to her nodded distractedly. He was playing minesweeper in the corner of his monitor. “You do that.”
She left the room, and I followed. Hurriedly, I headed toward the restroom. I didn’t have to wait long before someone entered. Good. I crawled into the stall as the illusion groaned loudly, and lined myself back up with my illusion. Then I dismissed the two spells.
I stood, and exited the stall. “I’m done,” I told the Lone Star officer with a sigh. “Just let me wash my hands.”
I did so, and we went back to the AC unit. As Alpha pretended to scold me for taking so long in the restroom, Jazz finished up. She stood. “Whelp, that’s done.” Pressing a button, she restarted the AC.
The officer who’d escorted me had already left. The remaining officer sighed in relief. “That’ll be so much better.”
Alpha nodded. “Just doing our job, ma’am.” And, with that, the three of us were escorted out.
When we got back in the van, Alpha turned to Jazz. “We need to get the information quickly,” she said. “Before they wonder why we’re still parked here.”
She grinned. “Challenge accepted!” She closed her eyes and went limp in her chair, brow furrowed with concentration and lips moving soundlessly.
As she worked, I bit my lip. “There’s something you should know,” I told Alpha. I explained about having to disrupt the spirit.
He frowned. “So they’ll know someone was in the building. However, they won’t know what you look like, or that you were connected to Jazz and I.” With a shrug, he added, “Nothing we can do about it now. And it doesn’t seem like that big a deal anyways.”
A few minutes later, my commlink pinged. It was receiving a download. I looked at who it was from. Jazz. I pressed the ‘Accept data transfer’ button on the screen, and the download began. My eyebrows went up when I saw the size. “That’s a lot of information.”
Jazz opened her eyes and sat up, stretching. “I split the information between your commlink, Alpha’s commlink, and mine,” she said. “I wasn’t certain what we needed, so I got all the information about pickpockets in the city for the past six months or so. Or, at least, pickpockets that weren’t apprehended. We can sort through the download when we get home.”
Alpha nodded. “Good work, Jazz. You too, Song. Let’s go home.”
*
The four of us sat around the table, sorting through the files. The client had said that the thief hadn’t been seen at all, so we searched for pickpocket cases like that, or with other indications that magic had been involved. There were a surprising number of cases where the pickpocket hadn’t been seen, including some where no one but the target’s bodyguards had been nearby at the time. As we found likely cases, Jazz plotted their locations on a map. Pretty soon, a pattern began to emerge.
Shark grunted. “So this area looks like the pickpocket’s general stomping grounds.”
Alpha nodded, tracing a street on the map with the tip of her finger. “The outliers are likely just cases where the target didn’t notice being robbed. Ok, here’s the plan…”
*
I sat on a park bench, apparently reading something on my commlink. In actuality, I was looking into the astral, searching for the pickpocket. Every so often I would pop back into the material plane to check my messages. Shark, who had a difficult time blending in in the nicer parts of town, was under my invisibility spell, waiting nearby in case he was needed. Alpha was walking down the street, doing his best impression of a VIP, trying to attract the pickpocket. Jazz walked roughly 100 feet behind her, keeping her eyes on the electronics Alpha was carrying as pickpocket bait: a commlink, a datachip, and a credstick with a stealth tag concealed on it.
We’d done the same shtick several times a day for the past three days. I was starting to get bored.
I popped back into my body again. This time I had a message. “Credstick and datachip are on the move.” It was from Jazz. I knew the rest of the team would be seeing the same report. I fought the urge to pump my fist in the air. Finally! Something was happening.
I looked through the astral at the area around Alpha. Nothing. I sent a message to the rest of the team. “I don’t see them.”
The only sign Alpha had seen the messages was a slight furrowing of his brow. Jazz, however, sent me another message. “How is that possible?”
I frowned, and sent back, “I have no idea. Are you sure the datachip and credstick are moving?”
Her answer was to highlight the area they were in on my imaging contacts. The space was a blank area of air. My brow furrowed. I slipped into the astral and examined that particular spot. Nothing.
Ember drifted past me in the astral. “What’s up?” he asked. I explained that the pickpocket had been spotted. He examined the same area I’d been searching. “I don’t see anything either.”
There really was nothing to do but return to my body. I looked down at my commlink. Jazz had sent another message. “The datachip has vanished from my vision, and I just found the stealth tag on the ground. The pickpocket is gone.”
Alpha pulled out his commlink. “Return to the apartment and regroup,” he sent. “We need to talk about this.”
*
When I entered the apartment with Shark, Jazz was already there. She stood when she saw me. “You missed them!” she accused.
I sighed. “I did not. There was nothing there on the astral, I swear.”
Jazz’s eyes narrowed. “That’s not possible. They weren’t visible. Therefore, they must have been using a spell. They should have been easy to spot, you incompotent-”
Carmilla materialized between Jazz and me. Technically, Carmilla couldn’t do anything to Jazz without my orders, but that did not stop Jazz from backpedaling with a gasp.
Shark stepped in front of Jazz. “Don’t you dare,” he rumbled to Carmilla. “Don’t you dare threaten her.”
Ember materialized. “You don’t need to worry about the shadow spirit,” he said. “She can’t do anything unless Songbird allows it.” His eyes narrowed. “It’s me you should be worried about.”
Shark stepped up until he was nose to nose with Ember and drew his katana. “You want to fight me?” he growled. “I’ll kick your ass.”
Ember smiled as he reverted from his human seeming form to his fire one. “Do you really want to bet your life on that?”
I held up my hands. “Guys, there’s no need to fight! Just calm-”
“She said you were incompetent!” snarled Ember. “I will burn her!”
Shark growled.
At that moment, Alpha walked in. Her eyes widened at the confrontation. “Everyone,” she said soothingly. “Just calm down. Now, what is the problem?”
Jazz peered around Shark. “Ember and Carmilla threatened me!”
Alpha raised an eyebrow. Jazz blushed. “After I called Songbird incompotent.”
Alpha sighed. “Jazz, Carmilla can’t do anything without Song’s orders, and Song would never order her to hurt you. Right, Song?”
I nodded. “Right.”
Ember chuckled. “I don’t need Song’s say so to do anything.”
I spoke up quickly. “Ember, we need Jazz! And, more importantly, I consider her a friend, even if that doesn’t go both ways. Please?”
Ember glared at Jazz one last time. Then he dematerialized.
I looked at Carmilla. “You, too.”
She vanished.
Alpha turned to Shark. “Mind standing down?”
As she said that, Shark was already nudging Jazz onto the sofa. He sat beside her. Alpha nodded, and took a chair, leaving the other one for me.
“Now,” she said, “I know that didn’t go as planned.”
“You’ve got that right,” muttered Jazz. “Songbird-”
Alpha cut her off. “Let’s not start that again. It’s not Song’s fault.” She looked between us. “Now, there are any number of ways for someone to become invisible without being visible on the astral plane. It could be some new kind of spell, or some weird initiate power. We need to do research. I’ve got a contact at the university in the thaumaturgical research department, and then there’s Glitter the talismonger. We should start with them. They might know, and, if they don’t, odds are at least one knows where to look next.”
She glanced at me. “I’ve been meaning to ask my contact at the university to take a look at you, Song. See what she can figure out about your powers.”
I frowned. “Is that a good idea? Wouldn’t it potentially draw attention to me?”
Alpha looked at me, face serious. “I’d trust this woman with my life. If I ask her to keep quiet about you, she will do so.”
“You’re talking about Dr. Theris, right?” rumbled Shark.
Alpha nodded. “That’s right.”
Shark faced me. “I trust her, too. She’s got history with me and Alpha.” He looked at Alpha. “Should I come?”
Alpha shrugged. “If you want to. I’m sure she’d be glad to see you.”
“I’m not coming,” said Jazz, shivering.
Alpha frowned. “I doubt we’d run into-”
Jazz cut her off. “Still not coming.”
Alpha nodded. “Very well. You can hold down the fort here. Though I’m sure Dr. Theris would like to see you again, too.”
Jazz sighed. “I know.”
I looked between my teammates. It was obvious they and Dr. Theris had history, and I thought Jazz might have a nasy history with someone else at the university. Or perhaps the university itself. I decided not to ask. If they wanted to tell me, they would.
Alpha nodded. “Then that’s settled. Tomorrow Song, Shark, and I will go to see Dr. Theris.”
*
After we’d finished talking, I ate dinner. Then I headed to my room. As I entered, Ember materialized between me and the door. I started as he pushed it shut. “Ember?”
He looked pissed. “I’ve told you before, you don’t get to order me around. I’m not one of your bound spirits. Nor do I intend to become one.”
I winced. “When I asked you not to hurt Jazz, I did say please.”
He glared at me. “I suppose.”
Alpha knocked on my door. “Song? Is everything ok in there?”
“If she interferes,” murmured Ember, “I’ll kill her.”
I wasn’t sure he would follow through, but I decided not to risk it. “I’m fine.”
Alpha sighed. “If you say so.” I heard her walk away.
Ember shoved me against the wall, pinning me there. “You do not,” he repeated, “Get to order me around. Got it?”
I was suddenly acutely aware that the only thing keeping Ember from attacking me was his own feelings about me. And if he did attack me, he would likely win. He’d been a strong spirit to start with. His status as a free spirit had made him stronger. I started to shake. “I-I’ve got it.”
His gaze softened, and he took a step backwards, releasing me. “As long as you understand. But we have something else we need to discuss.”
I was still shaking. “W-what?”
His eyes narrowed. “I’m not sure I like the idea of you revealing yourself to this Dr. Theris.”
I frowned. “Don’t you trust Alpha?”
Ember frowned thoughtfully. “I trust her not to deliberately put you in harm’s way. However, I’m not sure I trust her judgement about Dr. Theris. It sounds like Alpha has a soft spot for her. I’m worried that, if she decides she’s interested in your abilities, you’ll end up in a lab somewhere.”
I shivered. It hadn’t occurred to me until now that people might be interested in my abilities, but they certainly were unique, at least as far as I knew. It was entirely possible someone might decide to see what made me tick. “Perhaps,” I suggested, “We could ask Alpha why she trusts Dr. Theris. Maybe the answer would put your mind at ease.”
Ember nodded. “We’ll do that. But if I don’t like what she tells us, you will stay here. Promise?”
I sighed. “I promise.”
With a final decisive nod, Ember vanished.
