Summoned Again?

The secret service supervisor came into his office in a great mood. His wife had made his favorite meal for supper the night before and he had sneaked some leftovers into a container that he was going to enjoy having for lunch. He went into his office and sat down at his desk.

When he brought his computer out of its sleep mode, he saw the notification that the agents he had sent on an errand had returned. His spirits bolstered by the news that they had the anomaly in custody, he checked to see what holding cell they had him in. None of the cells were currently occupied. He frowned and called the agents at their desks, only to receive no answer. He checked the security desk and neither agent had reported for work.

His mind immediately went to the last two agents that had been involved with the anomaly and how that turned out, so he found the contact information for the more senior agent of the two he had sent. He dialed the phone, worried that something bad had happened, and waited anxiously for the phone to be answered.

“Hello?” A woman's voice asked.

“This is Daniel's supervisor at work.” The supervisor said. “Is he all right? He hasn't reported for work today.”

The woman chuckled. “That's because it's his day off.”

“What? I thought...”

“He's spending the whole day with me and the kids. We were halfway out the door when the phone rang.” She said. “Do you want to talk to him?”

“Briefly, if it's not too much trouble.” The supervisor said, a bit nervous that he had bothered one of his agents on his day off.

There was a clearly audible sigh as the phone was handed over.

“Hello, sir. What can I do for you?” Daniel asked.

“I just got into work and saw that you reported back, except that all the holding cells are empty.” Noseworthy said. “I was wondering what happened and if I need to issue an arrest warrant for his escape.”

“No!” Daniel exclaimed and then sighed. “Sir, you don't want to do anything like that.”

“You did bring him in, didn't you?” Noseworthy asked.

“No, sir.”

“What? Why not?”

Daniel let out another sigh and quickly explained what happened.

“Damaging federal property is a crime.” Noseworthy said sternly.

“Sir, you can't prove he did it, especially since the windows in the building don't open.” Daniel said. “We retreated and decided that it was best to leave the man alone.”

“He's suspected of stealing a hundred million dollars in precious art!” Noseworthy said loudly.

“Sir, a lot of people were in the Smithsonian that day. There's no way to prove that it was him that did it.” Daniel said.

“He bought the replicas! The sales clerk said that she even helped him find them by pointing them out on a map of the museum!”

“It's all circumstantial.” Daniel said. “Sir, I suggest you drop this. You do not want him to take this personally.”

“Personally? He's robbed the country's treasures!”

“No, he didn't.” Daniel said. “If I was to take a guess, he... he was... making a point.”

“What do you mean?”

“Even when we showed up, he...” Daniel sighed. “Sir, he very easily could steal the nation's treasures. He could probably take everything he wanted. I read the report from the agent that shot the supervisor from the treasury. He could walk into any bank and clean the place out with his magic tricks, and no one would know it was him.”

“That's a bit ridiculous.” Noseworthy said.

“I believe it, sir. He easily could.” Daniel said. “My partner and I have already requested replacement IDs, with the caveat that the others were lost in the line of duty.”

Noseworthy sat there and wasn't sure what to say.

“I suggest that you listen to everyone that's warning you to drop this. You need to let it go before things get out of hand.” Daniel said. “Have a good say, sir.”

Noseworthy sat there, a little stunned, that one of his agents hung up on him. He wondered if something else besides what was just told to him had happened to his agents. He scowled a little and thought furiously about it. He couldn't in good conscience let the assault of his agents go. They were agents of the United States government and they were to be respected, not disrespected.

He hung up the phone and tried to call the agents at their desks. No one answered. He checked with the security desk again and he was quite surprised that none of them had reported in. He started calling them at home, his earlier uneasiness about doing so forgotten, and he was surprised that each and every one claimed that it was their day off.

Noseworthy checked the booking schedule with the Human Resources department and was shocked that it was true. Each agent that was currently not out on assignment, had booked the next two days off. He sat there and stared at the pretty much useless phone in his hand. He couldn't call the others back, since they were assigned to the White House security detail, as well at several other sites that the president frequented.

He took a deep breath and thought about how he could handle it without any mobile agents available. He could call in and get several pairs of FBI agents if he gave his friend a call at the head office. The problem was, his agent was right. There was no concrete proof that the anomaly had stolen the artwork, especially since there was no evidence that he had switched them. The heavy circumstantial evidence wasn't enough to get an arrest warrant, even if it was justified.

Noseworthy dialed his friend at the FBI and had a quick discussion. He laid it out for him, left out the fact that they had taken a hundred million dollars of the anomaly's gold coins, and asked for the local branch of the FBI to send a few agents over to take the man in for questioning via conference call, with a possible delivery to him if necessary. He also warned them about the man's magic tricks and to be cautious.

When he hung up, Noseworthy sat back and hoped that it happened quickly, because he was a little desperate to get the situation handled quickly. The president himself was still unaware of the breach in the oval office and he intended to keep it that way. The less he knew about how unsafe he was, the better.

*

Nat and I went all out as we decorated the apartment. It was going to be the best teddy bear party ever. We had games, balloons, streamers, cake, snacks of all kinds, and even a pinata. Nat made up a nice banner with 'Teddy's Bear-ific Bonanza' written on it, too.

We had dressed them up in different colored vests to tell them apart, then sat four of the bears at the kitchen table to make them pretend to eat, put two on the couch to watch television, put one on the floor playing with Crystal's toys, had one leaning on the kitchen counter as if it was portioning out the snacks, and the last one was propped up by one of the windows as if looking outside.

When we were done, we both went over to stand near the apartment's door to look at our handiwork.

“Oh, my god.” Nat whispered. “Damon, can you see this?”

“I do have eyes, so yes.” I responded and she smacked my arm with the back of her hand.

“That's not what I meant.” Nat said. “You really did what I said to do. Crystal is going to walk in here and see teddy bears everywhere.”

“The funny part is, Teddy's not here and this place is already crowded.” I said.

“What? But... I thought...” Nat stopped talking and counted. “You're right! There's only nine!”

I chuckled. “You apparently have teddy bear blindness, or your inner little girl is just as excited to see this as Crystal will be.”

Nat gave me a look, then she smiled. “Okay, maybe I am.” She said and looked back at the scene. “I would have loved to see something like this when I came home on a random day.”

“I have no clue how we're going to top this for birthday parties.” I said and she laughed.

“I think it's safe to say that you never will.” Nat said. “We should grab a pile of kids meals before we go and pick up Crystal.”

“Good idea. I still have two from before; but, it doesn't hurt to have more for the kids.” I said and waved at all of the snacks and cookies. “They'll need something solid after all of this.”

“Definitely.” Nat said. “I wonder if we should make it a sleepover, too.”

“We can't. We're leaving on a plane in the morning, remember?”

“Oh, yeah.” Nat said, a bit disappointed.

“I could leave you and Crystal here if you want.” I suggested.

“No, Crystal's too excited about going flying.” Nat responded. “You do not want to disappoint her.”

“Not even a little bit.” I said and put an arm over Nat's shoulders. “You might want to take a few pictures with your cell phone while the room is in pristine condition, because you know it's not going to stay that way.”

Nat laughed. “Good point.” She said and took out her phone and took several pictures, then she came back over to the door and made a video as she walked through the apartment in the way she thought Crystal was going to come into the room.

Unlike Nat, I suspected that Crystal was going to pick a random direction and she would run full out to it as she was filled with excitement, then she would notice something else and run to that next. There won't be a reason or a pattern to it, because she'll just go at it with reckless abandon and enjoy it all as quickly as she could.

Nat was across the apartment and getting a shot of the teddy bear looking out the window and she leaned towards the window. “Damon, I think we have a problem.”

“What is it?” I asked and quickly crossed the room to stand next to her.

“A stream of six identical cars just pulled up to the front of the building.”

“Dammit. I don't have time for this crap.” I said and put a hand on her shoulder. “Don't answer the door, even if they bang on it.”

“Who is it?”

“FBI, probably.”

“What? Why?”

“Probably because they're closer than the secret service agency.” I said. “I'll be back in a few minutes.”

“What are you going to do?” Nat asked with squinted eyes.

“I'm going to annoy the hell out of them.” I said with a grin and ran to the door. “Don't open the door. I'll handle this.”

“It's about them kidnapping you, isn't it?”

“Part of it, anyway.” I said and closed the door, cast the lock spell on the door, then ran to the elevator. The door opened as soon as I pushed the button, to my relief, and I took out a piece of wood and jammed it into the opening to stop the doors from closing. I smiled as I went to the service elevator instead and rode it down to the ground floor.

I left the back of the building and used Detect to see where they were and saw twelve red dots were in the lobby waiting for the elevator. I chuckled, because they would be waiting there for quite some time and ran around to the front of the building. The idiots didn't leave anyone outside to guard their cars, even though there were six cars to watch and twelve agents to do it.

I glanced inside the lobby and they were talking and milling around as they waited for the elevator. Perfect. I thought and dashed across the open space to the cars. No one else was out on the street, so I stored each car as I passed it and ran around the building. I went back to the service elevator and rode it back up to the top floor, went to the normal elevator and thought about just leaving them sit there without an elevator, then realized I was denying the rest of the building of the elevator, too.

I shrugged and stored the piece of wood as I hit the button for the ground floor and stepped back out. The doors closed and I stood there and waited for the few minutes it would take for the elevator to come back.

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