Slumrat Rising

Truth was confronted with an awkward problem. You never, ever, go to the same dead drop twice. Once you touch it, the drop is dead. Touch it a second time, and you are dead. So if you check it, it had DAMN well better have something in it. Hence having covert signals to let operatives know the drop was made. Truth found it all refreshingly simple and robust. The signal he was looking for was a white stone.

He considered the chicken-egg-sized rock in front of him. Was it a light gray? Or white? Was the color different from any of the thirty other stones in the maybe pile? Hard to say. Damned hard to say. He had already run off and snagged some white things from nearby houses as color-matching samples, but it was still irritatingly inconclusive. He had already limited his search area to the space between the third and fifth post on the fence, coming from the eastern end. Categorically, anything considered “Under the Fourth Post” should be in that field.

He threw the rock onto the maybe pile. The definitely no pile had four rocks in it. The definitely yes pile had zero. He was going to kill someone. Several someones.

Truth collapsed on the sidewalk next to his little heaps. He had been sighing a lot lately, he felt. Maybe he was just getting old. He never figured on living to thirty, so twenty-five-ish must put him in his twilight years. He didn’t have a pension. He would have to work until he died. Months of labor, maybe, before a disgraceful end.

The plight of the working poor- you work harder than anyone else, live worse than anyone else, and then, at the end, you die worse than anyone else. What would a better world even look like? He couldn’t imagine it. All he could imagine was if he was the rich one.

He sat up and started working through the maybe pile again. Morbid self-pity time was over. He would make himself feel better later by helping to murder the richest man in the world.

In the end, none of the rocks seemed particularly white. He put them back tidily. It killed him to wait, but he would have to wait. Give it a few days. If nothing, start checking backup dead drops. What to do…

He went up on the porch of the house. Someone had hung a little bench on chains from the porch roof. It swung back and forth as he sat there. He was completely drawing a blank on what to do next. Go to the next city over and start a campaign of terror for a couple of days? It was doable but… honestly… he was still emotionally wiped. It had been an exhausting few days.

He watched a pedestrian with judgemental eyes. Just some local hayseed, off for their shopping. Sauntering along. Sure, they had their troubles, but “Kill God” troubles? No chance. No, no, she was in the same boat as everyone else, worried about all the changes.

He smirked when she stubbed her toe on something, his sharp ears picking up the clatter of little rocks. She didn’t break her stride or fall or make a face, though, so… limited amusement there. He watched her walk past. It occurred to him he didn’t even notice if she was pretty or not. Etenesh really did a number on him.

Wait. Wait a goddamn second. He put back all the rocks. What did she just kick?

Truth reached the fence in two steps. Nestled discreetly under the fourth fence post was a single blindingly white stone.

__________________________________________

Truth collected the hidden documents from the dead drop. Thoughtfully, Siphios Intelligence (or whoever they were) encoded the information in a tiny gem. Send the correct pulses of energy into it, and it projected the recorded information. Essentially a tiny talisman that required constant cosmic energy to work and would explode violently if you didn’t power it just right. Truth reviewed the information on the jobs.

The hit on the Level Six was actually pretty straightforward, if difficult. He was a researcher, living in a remote mountain village with a research center attached. A pretty spectacular, very private research center. Truth would carefully investigate first, as he flat-out refused to believe there weren’t hidden protections for a top-notch modern magic researcher. The known protections were bad enough. Likewise, the danger if things went wrong would be enormous. The burglary would be hazardous too, if somewhat less so, as it was clearly a well secured location.

He considered which one to do first and swiftly concluded that it was more important to find a lead on the Shattervoid girl. Besides, if he popped the researcher, security would be increased at research facilities. They might even start deleting or removing files. Can’t have that. So burglary first, murder second.

His nostrils were suddenly ambushed as he jogged along the country roads. Someone was running a grill next to a convenience store. They were selling skewers of roasted vegetables and rice cakes slathered in a spicy sauce. There would have to be a slight change of plans.

The research facility was in a corner of a light industrial park outside Sunch, a town just on the edge of being a city, about sixty-five kilometers from where he was now. Longer if you couldn’t fly in a perfectly straight line, of course. Truth sighed. He just… did not want to run the whole way. He could. It would be the fastest way to travel, even. A sensible person would take a bus or train, but they were absolutely being surveilled. No question. He sat on the hood of a parked carriage, moping. Then slapped his head so hard, they should have heard it in Siphios.

“This is why being a whiner is for losers. You start thinking everything is impossible and miss the obvious solutions,” he scolded himself. Truth hopped up on the roof of the carriage and looked around. Everything was kind of trash. There was a Birtoen Skywander, only about ten years old. Envy of the block in Hicksville, probably. Hope the owner has insurance. Truth had the door open, and the carriage hotwired in seconds. It took longer to adjust the seat and mirrors. What kind of tiny-wee-micro-person was he robbing? With a friendly slap to the bound spirit, he set off.

“Thrush, attend me.” The imp materialized next to him.

“How may I serve, Dread Magus?”

“Scout the following location-” he gave the address, “Do now alow yourself to be discovered. Also report on any surrounding points of interest, such as police or army installations, Starbrite presence, schools, hospitals, hazards, that sort of thing.”

“At once. It is my pleasure to serve.” Thrush flapped off. Truth had been keeping the demon in its summoning token. Just a little extra precaution.

The countryside started whipping past. In Jeon, you were never too far from people because everyone and everything was hemmed in by the mountains. After seeing the mountains in Siphios, he had to admit the mountains of Jeon were a bit stumpy. Stumpy or not, they dominated the Jeon peninsula, the country seeming to grow in the cracks between them. He had never minded them before. Now they felt claustrophobic. Like a short, round, older “uncle” type, who was also a not-so-secret secret policeman. All looming around him.

He looked grimly at a completely dull mountain along the side of the road. Theoretically, at a high enough level, the Meditations should let him slap a mountain flat. He nodded at that thought and carefully checked his location. I’ll be back.

The drive was dull, the industrial park more so. The fancy-sounding research facility was an office building next to a building where they machined precision dies for mass-producing water producing talismans. Woo.

Grey building, tinted windows, and enough recording talismans to make a porn star blush. A very decent layer of wards coated the whole building too. He spotted several physical barriers, multiple layers of anti-spell wards, summons barriers, and then he ran into a layer of camouflaging magic. There was more under there, but they didn’t care to let outsiders snoop easily. Fun.

He had no idea where to start searching. The information was damnably vague about where, exactly, in this entire building, the important information was. Wasn’t like he had forever to wander around looking for things, either. He’d just have to ask someone. And that wasn’t exactly easy. Hard to torture or brianwash someone under the System’s terminal protection.

Evening was closing in. Truth found a convenient sewer grate, had a piss, and tried to get comfortable in his carriage. It would be a long wait. Researchers worked late. An hour went past, then another. He got bored and started looking around at the other carriages. Some half-way nice ones here, actually. Oh, and someone even left a suit in the back of one. Not that it remotely fit him, but it did give him a decent idea.

“Thrush, where is the nearest bar?”

“There is a… bar… just a short drive down the road, Master. A crude place.”

“Well, it will do. Oh, whoops! Gotta secure my ride.”

A tired-looking suit walked out of the die maker and made his way to the nice sedan Truth had been eyeballing. Looked like a rough day. Shame. Truth grabbed him around the neck and dragged him ‘round the back of his own factory. He quickly stripped him, keeping the tie and using the rest to tie him securely. Any time the suit tried to talk or yell, Truth slapped him. He got the message eventually. When he had him secured, he leered down at his victim.

“Now, before I gag you, there are two things you should know. One, this isn’t about you or your factory. Behave and you, and your factory, won’t have any sudden problems. Problems involving fires. The kind of fires that catch everyone at home. The second thing you should know is this.” Truth held up a coin, leaning on Incisive. The suit turned sheet white, all fight draining out of him. “When the sun rises again, you may call for help. You got mugged. You don’t know who did it. Workers must take care to stay safe. Thank me for my consideration.”

“Thank. Thank you for your mercy.” Truth slapped him.

“Thank me for my consideration.”

“Thank you for your consideration!”

“That’s better. Open wide.”

A few hours later, well into the night, a researcher staggered out of the facility. Clearly exhausted and desiring nothing more than bed. Truth read the name on the parking spot he was headed for- Thom Vulk.

“Thom! That you boy?”

The researcher looked over. It was one of his seniors from undergrad. He knew him. They were in clubs together. Oh God, hadn’t they gone drinking together? He thought they might have. But for the life of him, he couldn’t remember the guy’s name!

“Oh… Hi! What are you doing here?”

“Haha, thinking about buying this place!”

“The lab?!”

“What lab? I’m talking about the die maker, man, the die maker. You know I went into business after University. Well everyone is selling for peanuts these days. Freaking peanuts.”

The researcher thought that rang a bell, but the name remained elusive. It was agonizing. He was proud of his memory. He knew this face. He had seen this face dozens of times, hundreds of times. But he couldn’t remember it!

“Sounds like you have done well for yourself. What’s the name of your outfit?”

“Ah, we can talk about all that over dinner. Hop on in. My ride is right here.” He slapped the hood of the sedan, loosening his clearly expensive tie.

“Sweet ride, but I can’t, I have plans tonight!” He tried to escape.

“Nonsense! How could I let a junior go without buying them dinner? It’s been years. No, no arguments, in you get. There is a bar nearby, and they do some decent fried chicken. My treat. And a little wine to wet our throats, eh?”

“Oh. Gosh. Um.” Truth shoved him into the passenger seat of the carriage, then got in himself.

“So, junior, what are you up to these days? Still in the nerd game?”

“Er… yes. I got my doctorate in Theosophy, ultimately. My parents were against it at first, but my advisor managed to get me an interview, and here I am.” The researcher subtly tried to show off his seven-pointed pin.

“EEEY! Nice going, junior! C-Tier huh? Is that where you get a fancy apartment for free?”

“You have to rent them, and they are just cheaper, not free. And not fancy. Well, you could get a fancy one for extra…”

“What is Theosophy anyway? Honestly, sounds made up.”

“Everything.”

“What? You got a degree in everything?”

“Sort of. Theosophy is the origin of everything. That a single universal truth is at the origin of religion, philosophy, and the natural sciences. Every scrap of magic, every demon, angel, even God, can be reduced to its origin point, theoretically. It is the Theosophist’s job to walk towards that unification.” The researcher repeated something he had clearly said dozens of times over the years.

“Huh. And you do that in your office there?”

“Well. Yes.”

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