by D M Gilmore
Duncan’s eyes narrowed, and he clenched his fist, cracking his knuckles. “I will pay you what it’s worth. It’s worth a thousand.”
“No, it’s worth what you offered me. Five thousand, or no deal,” Asher growled, holding out his hand to the drake across the table. The pair stared into each other’s eyes for a moment, saying nothing, as they contemplated their next moves. Asher was already preparing the gesture to activate a spell in his off hand, readying himself for a fight, just in case. He doubted Smog would be so crass as to start something in the middle of his own club, but it always paid to be careful.
“Two and a half,” Smog finally said, holding up the data key between two fingers, “and you do another job for me.”
Asher’s eyes immediately widened in surprise, and for a moment he unclenched his fist, cancelling the spell. It took him second, but when he realized what had been said, he frowned again, and lowered his outstretched arm to his knee. “That’s not what we agreed on.”
“Look, Asher,” Duncan grinned, twirling the data key between his fingers, “I understand that you want the money, and I promise you’ll get it and more. I just need some proof that the spell works in practice. Demonstrations are good and all, but they prove nothing unless they are done through an example of intended use. I need to know it can be used for what I want,” he clapped his hands around the data key, before setting it in the middle of the table with a careful touch. “So, here is what I’m proposing. You perform one job for me, as proof that the spell works, and upon completion I’ll pay you the other half we originally agreed on and I’ll even throw in a bonus, just to sweeten things up a little. In total, let’s call it ten thousand for the job, including what I’ll owe you for Shimmerscale.”
It took all of Asher’s combined willpower to stop his jaw from hitting the floor. Ten thousand dollars was just under a month’s salary at Lovecraft. He could do a lot with that money, the most important being able to pay their rent for at least the next month or two when combined with Lovecraft’s severance. He could work on some side deals, earn some extra cash, maybe look into making his business legitimate if he could find the time. This could work.
“What’s the job?” Asher growled, crossing his legs. He still wasn’t happy with being denied the money he was owed, but in his experience Duncan only ever caved to flattery or submission. It was better to submit to his whims than try to flatter him at this point, so that was the course Asher chose. He would humour this notion for a moment, hear what the job was about, and if he thought he could do it, he’d take it. If not, they were right back to haggling.
“A contact of mine has recently alerted me that there are some mana orbs in the Scarborough station that will need to be changed within the next week. I want you to steal one of them before the Centre of Magical Affairs comes in and takes them away.”
This time, Asher couldn’t help but let his jaw drop. Smog wanted him to steal a mana orb? Mana came from these things. They were so hard to find that only the Centre of Magical Affairs, commonly called COMA, had the information necessary to track them down. More than that, he wanted Asher to steal a mostly depleted mana orb, even though there would be orbs fully charged not two feet away. It made sense, he supposed, draquartz came from depleted mana orbs. If Asher had to hazard a guess, Smog most likely wanted the orb in order to smash it and renew his draquartz stock. The pieces lined up decently enough.
“That’s a pretty tall order,” Asher finally replied, scratching his chin as he growled in thought. “Those aren’t easy to get to, Smog. Not to mention I don’t want to bring the global government down on my head.”
“I understand that it’s not the most ideal situation, but you have to understand that this opportunity is unlike any other. If I don’t get an orb within this rotation window, it could be months, maybe even a year before a local mana station has the orbs I need.”
“I still don’t see why I should get myself involved in this,” Asher growled, meeting Smog’s gaze.
“Because you need the money,” Duncan offered, picking up the tumbler he had set down on the table and taking a quick sip. He set it back down and smacked his lips before continuing. “I know they raised the rent in your building last month. What do you pay now? Seven thousand a month? Eight? Utilities aren’t cheap these days, especially at the rate you go through mana, so you have to be paying at least two grand a month in energy bills, that’s not even including food and other expenses. I’d have to think you pay close to…” He paused for a moment, doing mental math in his head. “Fifteen thousand a month in total for the expenses of both yourself and your brother?”
Asher said nothing. He didn’t need to ask how Duncan had known that information. Anyone with a little skill could dig into the ledgers of his building and find out exactly how much each tenant owed and for what. It didn’t surprise him at all to know that Smog had done some research.
He wasn’t wrong, either. Asher did need that money, especially since he didn’t know how long it would be before he found another job. He still had some money coming in from Lovecraft’s generous termination package, but that wouldn’t be enough to last. It would be gone fast.
“If you know all that,” Asher finally said, “then by your own words you already know what you offered won’t be enough for me, so why even bother offering it?”
Duncan grinned a malicious smile and leaned forward, beckoning for Asher to move in. Asher did as he was told, and Smog whispered in his ear. “I know you were let go from Lovecraft, kid, and I get it, times are hard, but I’m offering you a lot of money for one little, time sensitive, job. You do this for me, you get paid, and you’re able to live for a bit while you hunt for something to supplement the income.”
“How did you know about that,” Asher growled, pulling himself away from Smog, “I’m under manshit contracts not to talk about that, how do you already know?”
Duncan grinned and leaned back in his seat, tutting and waving a finger from side to side. “Lovecraft isn’t the only one who can outsource to snoops, son.”
Asher growled low in his throat but said nothing else.
“There, now all the cards are on the table. I know you’re desperate for cash, you know I’m willing to pay. So,” Smog clapped his hands loudly, “what is your answer?”
Chapter 5
Asher couldn’t look Ruth in the eyes as he stormed out of Club Erebor and stomped his way down the street to the hidden lot where he had parked his rust-bucket of a car. The pounding of his bare feet against the pavement coincided with the pounding rhythm he could still feel coming from the club’s bass, but as with everything else, he ignored it as his mind whirred with possibility.
“Asher!” Ruth shouted, calling to his brother for a third time as he lightly jogged to keep up with his older brother’s brisk powerwalk. “Dammit, scaler, stop ignoring me!”
Asher perked up as his brother swore at him, and he finally lowered his hood and looked over his shoulder. “What?” he asked, knowing very well what it was that Ruth was mad about. Asher still hadn’t told him all the details yet, only that Smog had given him a job, and he had accepted it.
“What’s the job? What are you doing, Asher, that is so important that you’re keeping it from me?” Ruth asked, as Asher unlocked his car with a flick of his wrist. The rust-bucket wheezed to life, shaking and rattling up until Asher cast the spell that held it together, sitting in the driver’s seat and slamming his door shut. “Dammit, Asher, fucking answer me!!”
“Get in the car!” Asher growled, rolling down the windows a crack to hiss at his brother.
Ruth grumbled angrily to himself as he stomped along the back of the vehicle, kicking some debris out of the way of the back tires as he went. He was extra careful not to puncture the delicate rubber with his bare claws, and by the time he got around to the passenger side, Asher had thrown open the door for him. Ruth climbed into the cabin, the chair automatically adjusting to support his size. It leaned back to a thirty-degree angle,
and lowered several inches. Ruth glared at the back of his brother’s head as he slammed his door shut.
“Talk,” he growled, his eyes narrowing and his brow furrowed, “what did you do in there?!”
“I took a job,” Asher admitted, his voice hushed and low. “Steal a mana orb from the station. One orb, ten grand.”
Ruth’s jaw dropped and eyes bulged at the mention of the money. Ten grand for one job? That was almost unheard of! “Why the hell would you agree to that without consulting me first?! That’s some serious shit!”
Asher didn’t respond, didn’t even make eye contact with his younger brother. Ruth shut his mouth and frowned at the older drake in both anger and confusion.
“Dammit, Asher,” Ruth muttered, “this is a bad time to fall into your own head.”
“I got fired,” Asher muttered in return, lowering his snout as he stared at the floor. “Earlier today, Lovecraft fired me for being a drake. They got some private snoop to follow me around and take pictures, then used those to claim I was breaking company policy, and that it was termination with cause. I couldn’t fight it. Even if I wanted to. They made me sign a contract that says I left willingly, otherwise they wouldn’t pay me my severance. Hell, it even stops me from suing them for every penny I can, from even going to the media with their crimes.” He sighed, and finally turned to look at his brother. “I’m in a bind, bro. I was hoping that the money from Shimmerscale would give me enough keep you in the dark a bit longer.”
“To hell with that,” Ruth growled, gently punching Asher’s shoulder, “you know I’ll always have your back, Ash, especially when you get hit for shit like that. Next time shit like that happens, how about you just tell me instead of trying to hide it?”
Asher wanted to smile, but he didn’t have the heart, so instead he quickly activated the autonav’s home function, and pulled up a hologram screen while the car pulled out of the parking lot. “Does that mean you’re onboard with the heist?”
“Is that what we’re calling it?” Ruth smirked, sitting up as much as he could, the tips of his horns scraping against the roof of the car, much like Asher’s. “Yeah, I’m onboard, not like I got much of a choice. If you go down for this, I’ll end up going down with you.”
“Yeah, that’s what I’m afraid of,” Asher admitted, passing his brother the screen. “Can you map the place?”
“Won’t be to scale,” Ruth grumbled, reaching for the screen with the tip of his claw and dragging it through the hologram. Everywhere his claw passed, a bright white line was left in the dark canvas. “I’ve mopped every inch of this place, there’s no room I don’t know like the back of my claw.”
Asher nodded, watching his brother through the semi-transparent hologram screen. As the map came into shape, an idea began to form in his head. Ruth’s map was crude at best, giving him very basic knowledge of the layout but nothing about the security systems or wards they could have in place. He wasn’t too surprised, in a building so large it would be difficult to keep track of all the security. Mana orbs were precious, and this wouldn’t be the first time somebody tried to steal one. The only difference between anybody else and Asher, though, was that Asher would be ready.
“They do tours of the building, right?” Asher asked, as Ruth passed the screen back over to him.
“Mostly for schooldrakes,” Ruth nodded, scratching his scaly chin with a claw, “but tours are part of the hiring process. If you get a job interview, you get a tour.”
“Can you get me in for a tour? I can scan the facility, maybe find some cracks in their security...” Asher asked, not even thinking for a moment that his brother had just offered to help him get another job. He was too preoccupied, his mind a whir of gears as he looked over the map, drawing route after route through the building, checking for the fastest route from the entrance to where Ruth had marked the orb generator.
“Yeah, they should have an opening in the Integrated Magic department,” Ruth nodded, leaning forward a bit more to see if his older brother was catching on. When he was sure that Asher was still oblivious, he slumped back in his seat and gave up in the attempt. Asher was back in his own little world, lost to the complexities and calculations that came with focusing so hard on a task. “Hey Asher, if you’re listening, say what.”
Asher was nodding idly, muttering to himself in a hushed tone that Ruth couldn’t hear, and the larger drake sighed as loud as he could in an attempt to get his brother’s attention. Asher did a double take, finally realizing he’d fallen into a hyper focused state again, and dismissed the map, saving it to his phone for later. He called up a new screen, this one blank with a virtual keyboard hovering beneath it.
“Can you recall what kind of security the place has?” He asked, setting his claws in the air to type. He would never ask Ruth to use a keyboard, his younger brother had tried typing once when they were younger and could only type with one finger at a time, which wasn’t fast enough for Asher’s liking. Ever since, the older of the two would always type for the younger whenever possible.
“They have wards above every door,” Ruth said, while Asher quickly hammered out everything he said. “I think your lockpicking spell will be enough to open the actual locks, but the wards are going to be a problem.”
“Do they all operate at different frequencies?” Asher asked, pausing his typing to ask a question.
Ward frequencies were how fast they pulsed mana, which was a useful way of keeping track of things in a busy building. A frequency of 50 pulses per second was useful for detecting things from moving bodies to changes in temperatures. A frequency of 100 pulses per second was normally enough to detect bullets being fired from a gun.
Ruth nodded. “They pulse at 50 pps while in scanning mode. If they don’t detect abnormalities, stuff like more people being in a room than there should be at the time, they’ll stay in scanning mode. If they do detect abnormalities, they crank up to 200 pps.”
Asher nodded in understanding, quickly typing what his brother said. That was a good system for making sure people were where they were supposed to be. If a ward was pulsing faster than it should, security would be alerted. It was effectively a rudimentary motion sensor, but it could detect someone even if they were standing perfectly still, or if they were invisible for that matter. He scratched his chin for a moment as he contemplated how he would get around that one. It wasn’t impossible to trick a ward, but it might be easier just to override it and force it to pulse at the lower frequency.
“Is there a central control system for the wards?” Asher asked, quickly typing override all wards onto his document.
“The main security office,” Ruth nodded, calling up the map that Asher had already dismissed. He quickly filled in where the office was located, a few rooms off the main entrance, and circled it a couple of times. “There’s a console in there, near the camera monitors, that shows which wards are pulsing at which frequency, as well being able to turn them off. I wouldn’t turn them off, though, because that would be a dead giveaway to security that somebody is in the building.”
“If I can get at that console, or at least gain remote access, I can probably make myself invisible to the wards,” Asher said, nodding and taking notes. “What about in the generator room?”
Ruth quickly dismissed the map and pulled up a blank canvas, where he quickly sketched out a more complex map of one room specifically. “The generator room is the most heavily guarded room in the whole facility. Security patrols it regularly,” he said, drawing symbols for cameras in six different locations, one in each corner, and then one on both the left and right side walls. “There are four pylons,” he continued, drawing four circles in the middle of the room, “each one houses about ten orbs. They rotate extremely fast, though, each individual pylon rotates counterclockwise at about 60 RPMs while the whole array rotates in the other direction at about the same speed.”
“Is there a way to stop it?” Asher asked, his face looking grimmer.
“Yeah, on the f
ar wall is a control panel,” Ruth nodded, sketching the panel onto the wall. “Stopping the rotation doesn’t stop the flow of power, but it does make the mana unstable. If you stop it for more than,” he paused for a moment to scratch his chin, “I think the longest I’ve seen them stopped is five minutes? Apparently if they’re stopped for longer than that, we get some anomalies.”
“Then how do they change the orbs?”
“The orbs are staggered, only one pylon needs to be changed every few years,” Ruth answered. “I’ve only seen them change the orbs, like, three or four times since I started working there.”
Asher nodded and quickly typed cycle security cameras in generator room. He sighed and scratched his cheek, for a quick second plunging deep into thought. Ruth watched as his brother’s eyes quickly scanned over the text written in front of him, the neon lights of the floating hologram signs whizzing past on the street casting his face in eerie shadows. The security system would be easy enough to deal with, if he could get a good look at the system to analyze it and figure out its weakness, but armed guards were going to be a bit more of a problem. He wouldn’t be able to just knock them unconscious...
“Can you do it?” Ruth asked, leaning forward in his seat in anticipation. Ruth knew it wasn’t impossible to infiltrate the station, it had happened once or twice in the past, but getting into the generator room and getting out with an orb was unheard of.
“I have a lot of prep work ahead of me,” Asher grinned, casting his glowing eyes at his brother in eagerness, “but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t looking forward to the challenge.”
Chapter 6
Asher sat on the reinforced chair in his room, swivelling it from screen to screen as he looked over the state of a few of his spells. It had been a full twenty hours since he had accepted Smog’s job, and he was still nowhere near coming up with a suitable plan for infiltrating and exiting the facility.
