Dark Matter Ascension-Chapter 56B2 - : Getting into the vault

Dee had encountered undead once before, when she and her sister were traveling through Khrox and visiting a shopping mall. A finely-dressed gentleman, wearing a robe and a top-hat, and holding a jeweled cane. He was quite the man, treating the two Plorps to a wonderful meal and just asking for an interesting story and their company in exchange for the food.

These skeletons rushing towards her were not the type she had previously encountered. And despite the feeling of dread that seeing these corpses brought on, there was also a sense of excitement. More stuff to blow up! She raised her carapace’s hand, and aimed right at the fancy-dressed lady holding back. “Nebula Explosion (Rank 24!)” Thanks to her earlier use of Artillerist’s Discipline while they were getting ready to enter this Complex, she knew that blowing up this whole space would not threaten Priam or Greg’s safety.

The enormous explosion of acid spread all around the space, and the green, viscous ichor clung to the skeletal forms…but did not melt them. Weird, she thought.

It was then that she noticed; this fancy-looking skeleton was holding up a staff or scepter of some kind, and an enormous beam of brilliant, red energy arced out. It was on a direct collision course for Dee, but as soon as it entered the radius of Greg’s sphere, it was redirected to him. He grunted, let out a curse, and the barrier surrounding him that Priam had generated cracked instantly.

“Crap! Disintegration!” Priam shouted. “Instant-defensive Skill negation! Greg, drop your redirect!”

The bluish sphere surrounding the trio faded as the remaining skeletons rushed forward. The acid from Dee’s earlier attack was still eating at them; but they were not melting! That’s not fair! Dee backpedaled and shifted her focus, “Nebula Explosion (Rank 24)!” This time, instead of channeling an acidic nebula, she invoked one composed of icy crystals. The entire room exploded in a shower of razor-sharp crystals that turned to harmless vapor before impacting Dee, Greg, or Priam; but they tore through the skeletons, embedding into them.

Damnit! That’s just not working!

Greg began trading blows with the skeletons, pummeling them with his metal stick as he cracked bones and shattered skulls. Another red blast began to gather in the lady’s rod, and Priam ran up behind Dee. “Give me cover, I have to keep making new shields. Pulsar Ward (Rank 35) [Multi-Target]!” The golden honeycomb shield appeared around the trio once more.

And just in time, as another red beam lanced out and impacted the barrier surrounding Dee. She saw it splinter to pieces, and as the golden flecks lanced by her eyes, she saw the rush of two skeletons. “Fine!” she shouted as she raised her hand once more. “Secret weapon time! Nebula Beam (Rank 23)!” This time, she channeled the power of a nebula cloud composed of silicate particles that were a fine dust.

Effectively, she was sand-blasting the entire room.

The abrasive micro-particles shredded the skeletons to bits, and only the skeleton-lady with the rod at the far end survived the barrage as a barrier of crimson flickered around her. Priam slapped Dee on the back with a congratulatory yelp. “Yes! My turn! Wrath of the Gods (Rank 5)!” From his palm, a tiny marble of golden light arced out into the center of the chamber before exploding into a blinding flash of radiant energy.

There was an odd hissing noise that permeated the air, and when the light faded, all of the skeletons were naught but ash and dust on the floor. Priam was breathing heavily, and Dee felt quite tired as well. Greg seemed alright, and he walked over to the two, “You good?”

Dee nodded, “Yeah! I hate using dust nebula. Always leaves a mess, and it gets in my goop.”

Priam frowned, “We aren’t getting the ‘Complex cleared’ System message. We killed the other thirteen skeletons, and I don’t see Yhan-vor-oth either.” He rubbed his ear that was poking out of his cute hat, “I mean…hmm…she could have a phylactery as well. We have to go deeper into the Complex, find it, and shatter it.”

“Phylactery?” Greg asked.

“Soul storage, basically,” Priam replied. “Let’s rest for a few minutes before going deeper. Let our energy come back. Reconstituting undead form takes a good few hours…most of the time.”

Dee laid down on the floor and sighed, feeling the silicate particles all in her goop. Damn dust nebula. Why does the most effective physical damage have to be this crud?

***

Jace finally got the second lock picked and put away his picks. “Ollie, check if the coast is clear.”

The otter flew out from around his neck, poked his head through the door, and pulled it back. “Looks clear for now.”

Jace opened the door and shut it behind him: but did not lock it. Scanning down the hallway, he saw to his satisfaction that the corridor had easy-to-spot, swinging signs that were marked with the various merchant group’s symbols. The one he was looking for was easy to find: the only one with a spool of thread as the symbol. None of the others looked similar, and that struck Jace as a bit odd. They have a lot of similar icons. Why do that if you want competition?

Going to the vault, he saw that the door was similar to the one he had just spent an hour picking. “Pain in the ass,” he muttered as he pulled his picks out once more.

“Why not just chop it down?” Ollie asked. “Or disintegrate a hole like you did in the back of that other vault?”

Jace smirked, “First rule of breaking and entering, or robbing someone in general: misdirect your objective. If someone finds that hole, or the open door, then they’ll be busy dealing with taking inventory of that vault.” He kept at the tumbler and felt the first pin lock into place. “Plus,” he continued, “They’re going to be looking for how the person got in or out: they won’t be focused on the other vaults.”

Ollie poked his head through the door of the vault before pulling it back once more, “You really had an underhanded upbringing, did you not?”

“My mentor,” Jace stated. “Worked for a megacorp, fought in the last major corpo war, got injured and declared KIA. He was laid up in a hospital for a few years before getting back home: and by then, his kid was taken away by a megacorp.”

“Sad,” Ollie replied. “Your mentor taught you much.”

Jace got the first lock in about half the time as the last one, and the second dial popped out as he began working at it. “Quiet for a few seconds,” he muttered as he focused on the slight clicks as he turned the dial back and forth. After getting the combination correct, the last keyhole slid into view, and he set to work with the picks again. “He taught a whole bunch of us street kids. Kept us alive. Taught me how to run, evade, hide, break into places, stay undetected-”

“He made you into a thief or rogue.”

Jace glanced sideways at Ollie as he got the last pin into place and rotated his other tool, “Yeah, I guess you could say that. Every street kid is a bit of a thief.” He yanked open the door and walked into the room, shutting the door and locking it behind him. All around were bolts of cloth that looked like they were quite valuable: dyed all manner of vibrant colors and with gemstones embedded within them. “Thankfully, with the Star Council taking over…street kids on Earth should be a thing of the past.”

Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.

Ollie nodded as he swam through spectral starlight over the various bolts of cloth. “How are we going to get all of this out of here?”

Jace pointed his hand up to the ceiling, “Void Beam (Rank 1) [Limited Range].” The invisible-to-all-others beam of grey light shot up and bored a hole through the top of the building. He began grabbing bolts of cloth, putting them into large bundles that he then wrapped other cloth around before pulling it tight and fastening it with some knots. That left him with four enormous ‘rolls’ of cloth.

Stacking them all under the hole, Jace coiled his legs under him and jumped the twenty feet up to the roof with one bound, clambering out of the hole with ease. The spikes pointing in all directions were negligible to his footing, but he couldn’t risk the cloth getting caught on it. Unsheathing his sword, he chopped through enough to clear an area around him. Then, pointing his Ghostlight Grapnel down to each of the bundles, pulling them up and setting them down on the roof.

He heard the sound of shouts from the back lot. Must’ve discovered the hole, he thought as he looked at the four bundles on the roof next to him. Now, to stash some of this. Grabbing two of the bundles under his arms, he was about to jump away but paused. Wait a second…Pulling off his (Heavy) Venture pack, and using a ripped-off piece of the valuable fabric, he affixed the other two bundles to the sides of his pack.

“All in one load,” Ollie commented. “Good. And it sounds like we should be getting out of here.”

Jace nodded as he stood up and shouldered his various loads, taking off across the rooftops and clearing the gaps between buildings as he avoided the now-busy network entirely. Instead, he bounded across the cityscape, arriving at the meetup location once more. The establishment was not very busy, and he saw the same ‘clientele’ of the Gold Paws in their similar positions. He spotted Copperpaw and walked over to the woman, dropping his Cloak.

She jumped, “Gah! Don’t do that!”

Jace dropped the two bundles and then untied the others from his pack, “The whole vault: cleared out.”

Everyone’s eyes were riveted on Jace. He heard someone drop a glass that shattered. Copperpaw put her hand to her face and groaned. “You took everything?!”

“Why is that a bad thing?” Jace asked as he re-shouldered his pack and cross his arms.

“They’re going to be ruined! How can we keep using them as a consistent mark if you’ve taken all of their inventory!”

“Okay, calm down. I’ll go and return a bundle.” Jace started to reach down, but stopped as Copperpaw held up her hand and sighed.

“No, it’s fine. We’ll just wait for the reward to come out, and then capture a Jester’s member, plant the fabric on them, and present them for the reward. We’ll handle it.” She laughed a little; a nervous, anxiety filled laugh. “I…I guess I should’ve expected this from an Aspirant.”

“When do I get to meet your boss?” Jace asked.

The bartender; the towering, quiet man, waved Jace over. “You’ve met him,” he stated. His deep, tenor voice resonated through the air. “Come on to the back room.”

Jace nodded to him before turning back to Copperpaw, “Don’t forget my cut.” He followed the man behind the bar and into a storage room. Passing through that, they descended down an open trap door.

“This is the depths of the Gold Paw’s organization,” the man stated. “I’m Goldpaw himself.”

“Unimaginative name,” Ollie commented. “Naming the whole thing after himself? So vain.”

Jace ignored Ollie’s quip and listened intently as the man kept talking. “With an Aspirant of your capability helping us out, we could easily deal with the other thieves’ guilds. But that is risky.” He reached the end of the cellar and grabbed a barrel of wine, moving it aside and revealing a small tunnel. Getting on his hands and knees, he crawled through, and Jace followed. They emerged in what looked to be a locker room; some were open, some were closed.

There were a few doors splitting off and Jace heard some sounds of camaraderie from one direction, but he followed Goldpaw to what looked like a mission room. A large map of the city was hung up on the wall, a top-down view, with various territories, marks, and jobs noted down. Goldpaw went to a desk at the far wall and sat behind it, gesturing to the seat opposite him for Jace to occupy.

“What do you want besides Stardust?” he asked as he leaned forward, grabbed a cigar from a box, cut the end, and lit it with a match he struck against the desk. The heady, deep smoke billowed from his mouth and clouded the chamber. “Someone with your skills doesn’t need to come to a place like this to make Stardust. You don’t need to work in a guild. You could freelance.”

Jace smirked and kicked his legs up: a display of confidence and bravado. But, he ensured to tilt prosthetic legs at an angle that the hidden blades were just barely visible to a keen eye. “I don’t like stepping into territory and just staking my claim. Don’t want to step on any toes.”

Goldpaw nodded, “A wise thief you are, Flicker.” He leaned back in his chair, “If you want to make some real money…how good are your pickpocket and sleight of hand capabilities?”

Jace reached out to the cigar box, grabbed a cigar, and gestured for the cutter. The man gave it to him, and with a swift, deft motion that was practically impossible to track due to his various Skills amplifying his speed, he cut the cigar, put the clipper back onto its small holder atop the desk, took the matches from the desk, and lit the object. He took a slight puff before extinguishing it. “I’m pretty good,” he stated.

Goldpaw let out a guffaw, and pointed the cigar at Jace, “That is excellent. Come, join me at the map wall.” He stood up and walked over to the wall, pointing at a district called the Hightower Quarter. “We had planned to get our hands on those valuable fabrics to help with infiltrating one of the nightly parties that the richest of the rich put on.” He glanced at Jace out of the corner of his eye, “How are you with pissing off factions of The Cosmic System?”

“Depends on the faction.”

The source of this c𝐨ntent is freёnovelkiss.com.

“Nebula Alliance.”

Jace chuckled, “I’ve already made an enemy of them.”

Goldpaw took a draw on his cigar and nodded, “Then you’ll appreciate that they are the hosts of these parties. The upper crust of Yittka society, all up there in their lofty towers.” He looked to Jace, “With your acquisition of this cloth, we can get appropriate outfits to let our operatives blend in. We’ve been training up how to blend in with the upper crust: but you can turn outright invisible. Here’s what I propose. Give us the day to craft some outfits. Then, we’ll send you along with a group of our pickpockets in disguise. You’ll shadow them, and you’re going to be the ‘hand off’ man.”

“Not a term I’m familiar with,” Jace whispered just loud enough for Ollie to hear.

“Other people pickpocket at the party, you go to each of them and pickpocket from them so that if they get caught, they don’t actually have anything that connects them to the crime.”

Jace nodded and smirked at Goldpaw, “Sounds like a plan. But remember, I’m in this for the Stardust.”

Goldpaw shook his head, “Somehow I doubt that. But, I won’t pry. Your business is your business. Help us with ours, and…oh, that’s right.” He went back to the desk, pulled out a small, gold thread, and walked over to Jace once more. “Palm, please.”

“That won’t work,” Jace replied as he held out his prosthetic hand and rapped on it with his knuckles. “Magic replacements.”

“Ah. Well, I suppose you don’t really need the Gold Paw’s mark if we can easily sight you with that Cosmic Power symbol.” He took another draw on his cigar. “What is it, by the way?”

“A secret,” Jace replied. “I’ll come back when your dormancy period starts.”

“An hour before,” Goldpaw replied as he gestured to the door and hidden tunnel entrance. “We need time to get there, after all.”

Jace nodded and left. And just like that, I’m in with a guild. “I think we’re making good progress,” he muttered to Ollie.

“Yup!” The otter curled around his neck once more and patted him on the chin. “You are making excellent strides towards becoming a criminal in the underworld of this enormous city.”

“I’m still trying to game out how best to use this temporary partnership with our goal,” Jace whispered as he crawled through the tunnel, moved the wine barrel back into place, and went up to the bar. The patrons were mostly there, but a few were gone: including Copperpaw. And all the bolts of fabric were gone, as well. “We know the cult is sacrificing people. We know that people can be bought and sold: or their servitude contracts can be, I guess.”

“Correct.”

Jace sat down at one of the boots and used Dark Matter Cloak (Rank 3) to ensure none could hear him. “We have to find someone who sells information.”

“A data broker!”

Jace nodded and tapped his earpiece, “Hey, Quinn. You there?”

“Go for it,” she replied. “It’s been interesting watching your escapades. Getting back to your street folk roots a bit, eh?” she said with a bit of lightness to her voice.

“Yeah, I guess so. Hey, can you find me someone who buys or sells information in the city here?”

“Hmm…okay, using Magic World Interface (Rank 10), stand by…” Several minutes passed and Jace made sure to count out the time to have a good idea as to how long this would routinely take. “Got something,” Quinn stated. “It looks like there is someone who goes by the title or name Merchant of Misinformation. An intentionally misleading name to throw off any mundane attempts to find them.”

“How can I find them?” Jace asked.

“Looks like they work exclusively with the various thieves’ guilds. Good thing you chose to get your foot in the door, eh?”

“Yeah.” Jace stood up and left the building, heading back to The Cosmic Corridor. “If I’ve got time to burn, I’m going to spend it with Shhiv.”