Larry's very bad, not good time
A door opened. Slowly.
Whoever was opening it tried their best to avoid making any noise.
The hinges of this particular door were well oiled; it would not make noise even if it were opened faster than at a snail’s pace.
Once the door was open wide enough, a head peeked inside the room, the darkness inside making it nearly impossible to detect anything but the basic shapes of rows upon rows of shelves. “Seems like there is nobody inside”, the head stated. “I told you, but you never believe me,” another voice, slightly muffled, complained. “Because last time you said that we ran into a gargoyle,” the head countered while moving further into the room, followed by a body. Not that the body was separate from the head; that would be weird. It was a perfectly normal body attached to a perfectly normal head. It was too dark, and with the light from outside shining onto the wrong end of the figure, it was hard to make out anything besides the outlines of a long coat draped around the body. The door closed, leaving the figure standing alone in darkness.
“And so he spoke, ‘There shall be light’” the second voice intoned before a cool glowing orb manifested in the air above the body, revealing it to belong to a man, the head too, of course; they were connected after all. Short messy hair, a dirty shave, tired eyes, and a long coat with equally long sleeves, hiding most of the body. “Thank you very much” the man said to no one in particular and started to walk into the warehouse. The orb hovered around him, keeping his pace, but not staying fixed to one particular spot in the man’s orbit. It illuminated the shelves he passed by, dipping them into its cold and artificial light before they were released back into darkness once the man passed them. Each shelf was packed with boxes of all shapes and sizes; the only commonality being the material, a very splintery-looking rough wood, and the fact that all of them were sealed, not by conventional locks but by pieces of artfully designed paper.
Besides the man’s footsteps, there was only the soft creaking of the warehouse’s metal spine. For the potential worth of what was inside, its upkeep had clearly been neglected. “You are sure it is even in here?” The man stopped, seemingly randomly peering into the unlit parts of the warehouse in front of him. “I am sure. But aren’t you supposed to be the artifact specialist? Shouldn’t you already have sensed it?” “With a talisman sealing it?” the bodiless voice quipped with a dry laugh. “As long as you know which box to take, it does not matter whether I can sense it. So keep going; the night is not going to last forever.”
With a sigh the man started to move again, eyes moving from box to box. It should be around here somewhere, the shape not so different from the other boxes but distinct enough that someone who knew what he was looking for could still spot it. One shelf.. Two shelves.. Three shelves later, the man stopped again. “This one” He reached out, a gloved left hand appearing out of the long coat’s sleeves, hovering over a box that seemed indistinguishable from its neighbors, illuminated by the cool light of the orb that now hovered right beside the man’s head. The box was made out of the same rough wood, light as a feather, and the piece of paper sealing it was not different from any other box, at least not to a normal human eye. But to the eye of someone trained in magics, or any magical being like a spirit, the talisman looked vastly different from all the others. Its intricate runes stood still and flowed from one form to another at the same time, colorless and yet more vibrant than a rainbow. Whatever was inside the box, the talisman was working overtime to keep its magic from flowing out, making it undetectable and safe to handle.
Gripping the box, the man opened his cloak, revealing suspender-held jeans and a dirty grey shirt underneath; he stashed it away in a perfectly fitting pocket before closing his cloak again. The bodiless voice chimed in, “Maybe check if it is tracked”. The man’s face scrunched, like a school boy who had forgotten his homework and was asked to present it to the class. Without a word he opened his cloak, took the box out, and turned it in his hands, inspecting it from all sides. It did not have anything tacked onto its wooden exterior, only some potential splinters. “The talisman” the voice said. “Yeah, yeah” the man sighed in resignation, taking a closer look at the piece of paper that sealed the box tight. “Even if; can’t remove the damn thing if we want to keep a low profile” His eyes followed the shifting-still patterns, trying to decipher any hidden parts of the spell on it. “Can you cloak it?” He asked the air. “Like put another layer on top of it so if something tracks it, it can’t find it no more?” “Maybe when you are back outside” he got as an answer. No explanation as to why, but he did not ask because the answer was clear, and he knew he would get chided if he did ask; if there were a tracker on this box, then removing it might raise an alarm, and having a head start outside the warehouse would be better than being caught off guard inside.
With a shrug the man opened his cloak for a third time, putting the box back into the perfectly fitting pocket, which by now had moved further out to so it could be reached more easily. After that, he started walking back towards the door from which he had entered. His pace was a bit more graceful and way less tense than when he had entered; after all, everything had gone smoothly so far.
A door opened. Fast.
Whoever was opening it was not particularly afraid of making noise.
While the hinges were well oiled, that did not make much of a difference in reducing noise as the door was thrust open with enough power to fling it from its hinges and send it right into the room, taking out a whole shelf when it landed.
“Police! Nobody move!” A shrill voice called out, accompanied by the sound of heavy footsteps as multiple figures stormed through the door and into the warehouse.
A moment after the door opened, the orb above the man’s head flickered out of existence, leaving him in relative darkness, making him hard to spot. As the police entered, he quickly retreated backward, making sure to keep quiet and to stay out of sight. There was another exit; he knew that, and with some luck the police did not. At least they seemed to be only coming in from one side. The policemen shouted orders into the warehouse, addressing whoever might be inside. “Hands where I can see them!” “Step into the light!” “Do not resist!” like dogs barking at a shadow. Their head-mounted lamps were perfect for knowing their position and where they were looking at, making avoidance almost effortless.
The shelves were packed tightly so that they might as well be walls, blocking the light coming from the police officers from penetrating deep into the warehouse. A few times a beam of light scanned over a spot that the man had been in just a second before, but nothing of the police’s behavior made him suspect that they knew of his presence. Moving carefully, he managed to sneak through the darkness, doing his best to avoid hitting anything that could make noise. When he finally reached the far end of the warehouse, away from the loud police officers who were moving quite slowly due to their somewhat methodical procedure, he spotted the other exit.
“Why didn’t you warn me?” He asked his companion while closing in on the metal rectangle that promised freedom from getting caught by the police.
“I didn’t sense them,” he got as a hissed answer.
“Oh so just like the artifact. Were the cops cloaked too?” The man complained while opening the door to make his exit into the night and leave the scene with his catch secured. “I mean, if they were, then they probably would have-” The door opened a bit faster than he intended, like someone from the outside was pulling it open while he was pushing. And once it was fully open, he was face-to-face with a gargoyle.
“Shit”
Two hours later Larry F. Jett was released from custody. The police had taken him in for questioning after finding the small man in a too-large cloak trespassing in a warehouse near the docks. After searching him, they found nothing stolen and nothing of any interest to ‘ongoing investigations.’ He did have to give them his phone number so they could call in case they had further questions, but besides that, he was free to go home; the station’s cells were full, and he was clearly no threat. As an upstanding citizen who simply had been a ‘bit drunk’ and ’taken the wrong door’ on one of his ’late-night strolls near the water,’ he of course complied and made sure not to look too happy when he walked out.
Leaving the police station, Larry frowned, doing his best to look the part of someone who had gotten caught up in an unfortunate misunderstanding and was quite puzzled about it. But once he managed to cross the noisy street and was making his way towards the tube station, the frown slowly gave way to a smile underneath. “That went better than expected,” the bodiless voice noted. “You think?” Larry’s asked. “I mean, I could have done without being dragged over the pavement by that stone-fucker, but I will take it over being shot. Anyway, I am glad they did not let them search me; it would have been a real situation to explain why I have that box from the warehouse stashed in a magic pocket and who you are.” The voice was silent for a moment before answering with an invisible grin. “Good that that did not happen. The last thing you could use right now would be having your arm chopped of.” “Haha very funny. But you are okay, right?” His voice gave away that Larry was less concerned about the small scrapes from when the gargoyle had dragged him to the police car than he was about his invisible companion. “Yes. I am okay. It sucked to be near the gargoyle, but I could cloak myself quick enough so nothing happened and they did not detect me.” “Good…” Larry felt better with the assurance that his companion was fine. He kept on walking, down the stairs and onto the platform. As luck would have it, there was a train coming in at this moment, so he got on. During the ride he managed to find an empty section to sit down in, allowing him to relax for a moment and converse with his unseen friend. “Why do you think the cops were even there?” he asked. “Who knows. That warehouse must have been on their radar for a long time with how much stuff was in there. I guess we just chose the wrong night.” “Or the right one. One day later and the place would have been locked down and emptied by people who actually know what to look for.” He shifted in his seat, suppressing the urge to take the box out and inspect it; no matter how fascinating it might be in better lighting conditions, it was not worth anyone seeing him with it.
Twenty minutes later, he arrived at South Market Station and made his way to the industrial area. It was about noon, so there was quite a bit of foot traffic. Hardworking men and women were taking their well-earned breaks, going home, or arriving at work for their shift. After walking two times around one of the many factory lots to make sure that he was not followed, Larry finally took the correct way to the designated dead drop. Standing next to a building, he tried his best to look like he was just a worker on break while dislodging a loose brick in the wall, opening a small hole barely large enough for the box he quickly took out of his coat. “That reminds me, did you ever cloak this thing?” Larry asked while looking at the rough wood. “Eh… better put it in and walk away quickly” was the worrying answer. He did as told, and after putting the brick back in place, Larry made sure to leave as quickly as possible without raising any suspicion. Surely, walking around for so long with an artifact that was possibly tracked by the mob would not have any ramifications…
To be continued?