"It's like," Zell went on to the short, bushy-eyebrowed barkeep. "I got feelings too. As soft as it may it sound." He took a swig of his ale. "I'm a person."

"I dunno."

Zell looked offended. "Wha'dya mean, 'you dunno'?"

"Well, I mean, you did say you were the asshole o' the group. Doin asshole things. Sayin asshole things all e'time, reet?"

Bartender confidentiality didn't usually come with so much pushback. "Yeah, but not all the time. I can be nice. Clever? On occasion." Zell knew these were not the strongest claims. "Sort of," he weakly added. "Surely I've got more use to me than fuckinggg..." he shook his head, looking at the counter for the right words but couldn't find them. Then he looked further down, between his legs. "...I dunno... like I'm nothing more than a 6'2" breathing machine for my di-"

"Achoo!"

He was interrupted from finishing his vulgar comment at the last second by the other man sat at the bar. Both Zell and barkeep looked at the old man who was wiping his nose with one hand and raising the other in apology. The barkeep, who was on automatic, wiping 'clean' his dirty mugs with his dirty rag, put another mug down and grabbed the next one. "I can't say I can relate, lad," he said. "I've never been desired for my body."

Zell looked him up and down, noting in particular the giant belly hanging out from under his shirt. The Englishman tilted his head in understanding, then took another swig.

Now the old man with the sneeze decided to get involved. "Ay. Been listenin, I ave, to your dilemma. And I might ave the solution yer lookin for."

Zell's eyebrows were raised, his expression skeptical but he said nothing. The barkeep kept polishing his mugs, still mildly interested in the conversation. The old patron went on.

"I once heard of this scientist from out west who presented an experiment of sorts to his peers. He placed a rat in a small room with nought but a fresh cheese he'd posioned in advance." What the fuck!? was Zell's only thought. "He put it to his peers that until they went in the room to find out if the rat had eaten the cheese and died, two realities existed silemul-taneously. In one reality the rat was dead. In the other, it was alive. But both existed." You could tell that the old man felt quite smart relaying this information. "This phenomenon was coined after the scientists name and thereby dubbed, 'Broodinger's Rat.'" Sneeze! "I'd put it to you that, until you tell this girl o' yours how yous really feel, you don't know what her response will be. So both realities exist. One where you live happily e'r after. And one where yous take yer own life outta depression. Your love is like Broodinger's Rat."

There was a silence that fell on the three. Even the barkeep had stopped polishing. Zell, who literally looked in pain, he was so baffled by what he'd just heard, couldn't even begin. "Double-you. Tee. Eff." Aside from the absolute nonsense of a story, Zell wasn't even sure there'd been a solution presented. "What in the fuck kinda bollocks is that? This is what passes for science in Mytheria?"

The old man looked hurt. "Think so. It might be philosophy."

"Gibberish is what that was. In my world, if some so-called professor had come up with that, he'd be a laughing stock." He shared his disappointed expression between the old man and the barkeep. "Fat lotta help you two are."

"Hey, you're the one came cryin te us. No one asked for ye life story."

Zell supposed that was fair, but shook his head anyway. Done with the conversation, he swivelled on his stool to check out the rest of the room, clocking through the window by the door, a familiar face coming into the tavern. "Well, well." He quickly looked at the barkeep and the old man. "Hey, we never had this conversation, yeah? Not a word." Then he looked back at the door as it opened and nodded to his friend, letting the farmer mosey on over before speaking. "Bit of a coincidence, this, ain't it."

"I ain't even gonna ask what in the devil brought you out here..."

"You don't wanna know, bruv," Zell replied, noting Clive's tired face and tone, which was not like the Texan at all.

Then, as if reading the Englishman's mind, Clive put a hand on Zell's shoulder, sighing "Y'know you and I, we look like shit right now...Reckon we might as well drink to make us feel like it too."

Zell let out a breath. "Christ. Truer words were never spoken. Let's get to it."

And so the pair began their quest to get wasted. Each beer, they knocked their dirty mugs against eachother's in salute before starting on it. They talked a little about how military training was going, Zell naming a couple of soldiers from The Lions that he liked in particular. He was happy to hear about what Clive was doing with his own band as he hadn't seen too much of the Military Centre, the swordsman shirking his duties half the time. After two beers, Zell turned the conversation onto Earth.

"So tell me: Wha'dya miss most about Texas, eh?"

A bit of nostaglia was in order and Zell would enjoy hearing anything other than Mytheria shit, right now. America had always felt like a totally different place to Zell, but here in a world where armies of the undead, willy-nilly just decided to sit outside and lay siege to your city, America was practically home for the Englishman.

He also wanted to ask the man what was on his mind. Clive looked troubled. But Zell decided to wait another beer into their drinking session. He was actually quite happy to just drink and talk about regular stuff, but he figured he should give his friend a chance to get his problems off his chest if he felt like it. He did eventually ask.

Fenna watched her fighters battle an invisible enemy and to her untrained eyes, it looked good. How well would it go when the enemy was here? What more could she do to prepare? She turned to look at Sil, who sat nearby. The bird of prey had proven to be a good asset in battle, she had fearlessly attacked their foes so far.
"Can you set up some dummies?" she asked her appointed second in command. "Where the enemy will likely be when we fight."
The sergeant nodded and together with some other Falcons he set up some targets. "Practicing bow'n'arrow?" he asked.
"No, we'll practice Sil dropping things on them. Help me find some rubish, broken stone and logs the others don't need. lets how big and heavy we can go."

Fenna was fairly sure Sil wasn't an ordinary falcon, the way she had fought and how she reacted at times, there was an obvious intelligence. And, more importantly, a connection. Sil understood her better than any other falcon would, she understood her feelings. That's what Sil reacted to mostly. She came when Fenna was lonely, and that was just one of the many occasions Sil had shown understanding of what happened and what Fenna needed.

Using words while doing actions, Fenna tried to teach Sil three words: "pick up", "drop", "go". The last time she had send Sil on a mission she had used her words and formed mental images, and that had been enough to make Sil understand she had to deliver that message to Lucy. So that's what Fenna did again, while also using physical gestures. It didn't take long for the falcon to understand the three orders and would pick up what Fenna pointed at and dropped it at what she pointed at or visualized.
The Falcons cheered when Sil carried out the orders succesfully.

"You are a very special bird," Fenna said when Sil joined her, smiling at the falcon. "I'm so glad you joined me." She stroke the feathers. "Thank you for being with me." Sil gently touched her cheek with her head.

Fenna turned to the sergeant. "Can you wrap things up here? I need to go on errands."
"Of course, ma'am."
"I have an idea," she said to Sil as she walked away. "We're going to find a herbalist. And after that we shall find Zell for a drink and lament about the beer not being Heineken." Sil spread her wings and made an enthusiastic noise. "He's good company," Fenna agreed. "But they're all good people and we should try to help them as well as we can." She paused. "Maybe we'll start by not going near Wellsprings for the duration of our stay here. I've had enough of hooded people and powerful energies hidden in caves."
As she said that she realized she hadn't seen them again so far. Had they stopped stalking her, or they had gotten better at it? Although the last one was unlikely, whoever the robed people were, they were not good at staying unnoticed.

There was barely a space unoccupied on the floor of the massive hall. Long columns of tightly arranged mattresses, with citizens in a slightly less organised fashion, gathered in groups according to familial ties and, loosely, house address. It was like a refugee camp. This was just one of many buildings atop Citadel Hill that had been co-opted for the relocation of the displaced citizenry. MacKensie walked among them, feeling a little out of her element but looking for a way to help.

"Adventurer?" came a voice, slicing through the hum of chatter. MacKensie looked to see a woman, smiled and squeezed through the columns to get over to her.

"Yes? How can I help you?"

"I was given one dinner too few for my children," the woman told her, presenting the empty bowls as proof.

MacKensie did not bother to count them, she simply nodded and said, "I'll see about getting you another."

She didn't get more than a few steps before other people had noticed that she was taking requests.

"Excuse me?"

"Adventurer?"

MacKensie's work for the evening had just begun.

On his way to Golden Tree Park, Adam thought he heard something in the distance. He listened and heard the shrill voice of a certain gnome, complaining about whatever imagined thing it was Second Chance did to slight his ego - or some other dumb thing - he didn't really know, since he didn't care enough to pay attention.

The red-eyed man chuckled, impressed in a strange way at the consistency of the fool, though grateful he was far enough away to avoid having to deal with Xavier directly.

A nerve was seemingly touched.

The young man's reaction was clear as day, there had been much more to this incident than Alison had been told. He was traumatized by the experience, his retelling was forced, fast, and messy. So much covered, but nothing elaborated.

"So the Texan died but came back? Last I checked, that magic was pretty feared and frowned upon. Best not to press him now about it, he might just lock up if he has to remember anything further. A different angle of attack then." Alison thought, her interrogator mentality kicking in out of habit.

"I think the Academy may know more about him. Let me introduce you to Chief Shield. She is the head honcho of the Academy and a friend. If you ever need information about something, just tell her you know me, and she should hook you up with something." James finished with a shudder and a shaky breath. Alison smiled and nodded.

"Of course, I think I'll take you up on that. That's what we're on our way to do anyway right? That aside, did she try any other attempts since then on your teams' lives? My guess is that once that barrier comes down and the fighting is door to door, we're going to be separated. I'd like to know what vulnerabilities to look out for should some specialized team follow in with the attack and try to pick us off." she said, hoping shifting the focus away from that particular incident would get him talking again.

"It's what I would do. If my real threat was an elite team in the city, I'd use the chaos of the attack as cover for my hunter team. Split them up, isolate them, then eliminate them. The only way we can counter that is by staying in contact and coordinating, but without modern comms, that is going to be much easier said than done..." Alison thought to herself. The situation was rapidly evolving, and their enemy seemed to have more and more advantages the more she learned. But then a lightbulb went off. "On the other hand, the Queen never tried to slit my neck... Which means she might not know about me being a part of the team. The Whispers and Pete confirmed nobody was paying attention to our lunch, and even if they did, they'd have to be in there to hear my tale... So long as that barkeep keeps his mouth shut, I might be able to ambush the hunter team..." With that thought, a strategy began to form and a contingency began to evolve.

It was time that the Second Chance had a much friendlier shadow.

@Teyao

In room 103 at the academy, it had been a long session of practice and repeat. Two things which Barracker was used to with his training at ‘Paladin’s Respite’. He didn’t realise how stressful it could be. Neebs could tell how much progress he was making but from someone in the midst of it, it was hard to tell the progress. Neebs had told him to clear his mind and use his focus into an outlet to guide him in controlling the water. So neebs on one seat, sat reading a book. While Barracker sat on his seat, trying the principles taught by Neebs, which was increasing his time of synchronicity with the water. Neebs kept quiet, if called, he would place his book down and have a better look but he stayed seated as he could sense the water changing form. Barracker took a deep breath, his eyes stayed open, staring into the eye of the bowl. The water started separating, a whirlpool beginning. Then suddenly Neebs was standing next to him, the whirlpool faded, the water splashing together.

Neebs cocked an eyebrow. “Well, look at you friend, you’re coming along nicely. We have more lessons we need to go over, to help bring a bit more balance and give you more control.”

"So tell me: Wha'dya miss most about Texas, eh?" half-way through his second beer, the farmer set the empty mug on the bar with a thud wiping the froth from his lips with the back of his hand face distant if not somewhat pensive. Clive, slightly buzzed by this point had the luxury of his senses being somewhat fuzzy to dull the other more painful feelings and exhaustion that his body would no doubt feel the next day.

"Askin' them tough questions huh? Ah hell, I miss...I miss a lot, I miss my family...I miss home, and most of all-" the southerner raised the dirty mug up with a wry smile "Well good beer of course," Clive stifled a snort, knocking his mug against Zell's before sighing and looking somewhat more serious "If...If I'm bein' darn well honest I reckon what I miss most is what I used to have, my life was simple I...I was a gosh darn farmer, I worked a field and took care of horses not...Not this...Sometimes it's just so...Overwhelming y'know?" the farmer gave Zell a bit of a pointed look as to drop the question but he didn't seem to mind telling his drinking mate more about his life in Texas with a degree of pride, telling Zell of the many times he'd ridden through the fields drunker than Cooter Brown and about his horse and how she'd been his horse since he was a young lad til the day she caught colic and his pa had to shoot her dead.

"Y'know somethin?" the farmer leered closer to his companion placing a hand around his shoulder, his speech somewhat stunted and eyes bleary from the drink "When-Wh-When I died...Ag-Again, it was so dark..." through the redness of Clive's expression came a dark look, the words coming tumbling out maybe the alcohol loosening his otherwise tight lips or that he trusted Zell perhaps it was hard to tell.

"I can't get it out o' my head no matter how much I try."

Fenna continued her walk through the city. The atmosphere had definitely changed now that the big day was getting closer and closer. The continued siege outside made the people within the walls restless. They started having doubts about being able to defend themselves. According to the guards on the walls, the army outside was huge. There were whispers that some people had quietly left the city - had anyone actually seen Ambassador Malcolm Crane lately? - which did not help morale. Where Fenna went she also heard whispers about how blessed the people of Valheim felt with adventurers in the city, they would surely make a difference, but the lack of the highest tier of parties was another reason for concern. Sure, Second Change had defeated Aurok, but there weren't any parties above the gold rank in the city.

"I don't know if there's anything we can do to make them feel better," Fenna sighed. She knew Sil couldn't really answer her, but she enjoyed talking to her nonetheless.
She reached for a herbalist, asking for directions along the way, and once she found the building with a nettle on a wooden sigh she went inside.
"Sorry ma'am," the woman behind the counter said as soon as she saw Fenna. "We do not have any healing supplies left. Everything has been taken to the hospital and will be distributed over the healers for the big fight."
"I'm not here for healing herbs. I was wondering what you have in stock that will itch."
"Itch?"
"Preferably in powder in small cloth bags," Fenna continued.
The woman looked from Fenna to Sil and back to Fenna. "All right, I think I know what you're getting at. You be fighting in the battle, right? Yeah, yeah, I can do that. Leave that to me ma'am. No charge."

With that out of the way, Fenna went back in the city. She found herself near the spa and looked at the entrance. She had mixed feelings about that place now. The absolute pampering with MacKensie on one side, and the business with the hooded figures afterwards. Again she checked the area but there weren't any of them around.
"I think they stopped following us," she said to Sil, who made a sound that could be taken as agreeing.
To think there was this big ball of energy down there. As she thought back to it, she realised something. She could feel it, from here. The feeling was faint, but it was there.
"Okay, I'm going to get a drink now," she decided and turned her back om the building.

"You won?" a child asked.

"Not yet," MacKensie answered. What was intended to be a story to stop one child from his constant crying, had become a tale captivating an audience of at least a dozen, children and even some adults. "Aurok was not done with us yet. With his dying breaths, he began charging his most powerful attack. A magical explosion - intending to destroy us and half of the canyon along with him." There was a pantomime-like gasp from the ring around MacKensie. "We had no way to stop him. All we could do was look on as the magical ball of destruction got bigger and bigger - the screeching noise getting louder and louder." The emotion in her voice translated the fear and intensity of that day, the frenchwoman's eyes almost sightless as she relived the memory. The audience felt it. "But then... Arthur - a valiant knight of our party - appeared above us, at the summit of the canyon. He dove from the top, swinging his incredible anchor above his head like a lasso. And with one powerful lash, his giant anchor flew towards Aurok, striking the monster's heart, killing the beast and saving us all."

"Wow," was the breathless sentiment.

"Arthur lost his life in that heroic attack - hit by the dangerously sharp tail of Aurok - but his noble sacrifice averted calamity for the rest of us. And rid Mytheria of that dangerous monster once and for all. He will never be forgotten."

"What happened to the water ninja?" one older girl asked.

MacKensie smiled, more out of picturing Arthur's face than anything else, but with a mischevious tone, she said, "That was not the end of our epic struggle with him. And I promise to tell you what happened tomorrow..." Big groans and moans ensued. "...if you are all good, and stay strong for your parents, and do as they say - we will continue our tale. Okay?"

It was an agreement 'signed under great duress,' one might say. MacKensie smiled at them. Then she set her sights back on the original crying child, a boy no more than seven years old, with big brown eyes and a smile making space for future adult-teeth. She detached her blue cape from her shoulders and wrapped the boy in it, much to his delight. He was so small that it went around him a full time and then over his shoulder, swallowing him up. MacKensie covered a giggle with her fingers. He was so cute.

A short exchange afterwards saw storytime come to a close. MacKensie got a quiet 'thank you' from the mother of the boy who was no longer crying but proudly sporting his new adventurer cloak. She continued to see to the needs of the citizens, but was stopped at the bedding supplies by a woman.

"You had them in the palm of your hand?" the woman said, making herself known. MacKensie gave her a warm smile. It was clear from the woman's garb and necklace that she was not of the working and middle classes who were staying in this hall. "Agatha Pendlebury."

Pendlebury? MacKensie echoed in her mind. That name was familiar but she could not place it. "MacKensie Trydant. How do you do?"

"How do you do?" Agatha returned. "Come. You've more than earned some tea and dinner."

Meanwhile, in Capitol City…

Fletcher Foley, a tall, muscular blonde man, was happy to be done with his day at work. Maintenance for the city wasn't the most stressful work, but it could be tedious. Of course, it was necessary for his other job, so he kept at it. And thankfully, being an informant for the Merchant's Guild paid a lot more than the government did. And speaking of money, today was payday, so the guy was on his way to his favorite drinking establishment to spend some of it.

The White Lotus certainly wasn't the fanciest place in town. However, it certainly wasn't a rough place either. It was plain, clean, almost nondescript with its wooden furniture and well-lit environment. Of course, that's how the Guild liked it. Why attract the high-and-mighty to where they might overhear something they shouldn't? Better for those pompous bureaucrats to waste their time and money in their own clubs or in the brothels they pretended to be above frequenting.

And so, Fletcher entered the place like he had done many times before. It was a slow afternoon before the night rush, so nobody was there besides the bartender. 

“Vaellon!” the man yelled, a happy greeting for the elf behind the bar.

“Fletcher!”

The older creature with silver hair and black bags under his eyes was attentive towards his only customer. Then again, that wouldn’t have changed even if it was crowded; the government employee had been drinking there for over thirty years.

“What are you having?”

“Give me a-ah, damn it all.”

“What’s the matter?”

“I forgot, I promised the old ball-and-chain I wouldn't drink anymore.  

“Ah, well at least let me give you something on the house then. Something that should help cheer you up.” And after mixing a few ingredients, Vaellon gave the man what would be called a Shirley Temple on Earth.

“Fuck you and your entire pointy-eared race,” Fletcher said, though his facial expression indicated that he actually found this all to be rather amusing.

The barkeep's expression indicated he shared that sentiment.“Well, look on the bright side. Now you can use your money to get rich!” The elf gestured to a newspaper article on the table about the Four Rivers Shipping Corporation, and both men laughed hysterically.

“Sure, and then what, the Witch Queen trips and falls down the stairs?” Neither of them wanted the evil caster to win, but it was common knowledge that the Empire had been gathering all of its forces around Fornost. Valheim and Rivers End, the two biggest cities served by the business, were basically sacrificial lambs due to the government's policy. If either city was attacked like the rumors said they would, most of South Central Mytheria would be laughably easy to conquer. The shares of the company were consequently a terrible investment, and both of them knew it.

But something caused Fletcher to pause a moment, deep in thought. Then he took out his coin purse and placed it on the table. “Actually, I'm going to do that right now.”

The bartender looked at him like he was expecting a joke; however, the informant was serious. “I know what you're thinking, V. This isn't about the money, it's about my quality of life.”

“...you're gonna have to run that one by me, Chief.” Extremely confused, the elf waited for clarification on whatever this was.

Now excited by his idea, Fletcher went on. “See, when I go drinking, I only spend a little each night. Now if I go back home with no money at all after payday, the wife will have to let me drink again!”

Alison, bless her heart, decided to not press the issue and instead shifted her questions which was more than welcome on his part. To be asked about himself out of nowhere was... rattling, not unpleasant, despite the thousand sins he had committed and regretted there was still a sense of pride in his previous prowess. But to James, it still felt odd talking to strangers about their little situation, despite how far he has come in terms of moving past it.

Hearing her talk about being the enemy's thought process was a reminder of the sort of enemy they possessed.

"You make sense, from what I have heard, General Saladin is, well sorry for the language but he is a crafty motherfucker" He gave her a shake of the head "Cunning, pragmatic and with a penchant for overwhelming force, there is a reason why the Witch Queen has him at the forefront of the war"

He hesitated for a moment before elaborating, the subject was difficult but if he felt that anyone could do something with the info it was Alison.

"I learned a couple of days ago about something called the massacre of Eretia, Eredge, and Dantuin, a large scale conflict led by the General, the records are spotty as they were compiled by the few survivors that managed to escape but they spoke of spies and infiltrators long before the operation began, of long-range artillery supported by magic defenses, illusions, tunnels, poisoning of supplies and psychological attacks to lower morale. The General is a crafty old bastard whose pragmatism is surpassed only by his cunning. Make no mistake, if given the slightest opening he will slide a poisoned dagger through a gash in your armor and then convince you to kill your friends in exchange for an antidote"

Maybe there were such records, or maybe there weren't. He didn't know.

All he could remember was the barked orders, the FIREfire, the screams, and the glee.

"That is to say, never underestimate him, always assume he has a backup strategy and an escape route planned" He gave her a small node "I already brought this to the attention of the few authorities I know but what they do with it..."

They never stopped talking as they walked and eventually, the Academy was in sight.

With sure steps James walked right through the front doors while making a gesture to the guards that Alison was with him, he didn't know if there had always been guards stationed at the doors of the Academy or if it was a recent thing thanks to the siege but for all they were intimidating Charles and Manny were pleasant once you got to know them. Room by room he led Alison deeper into the Academy, until he arrived at the now familiar door, giving it a push he came across a familiar sight, a room full of Mytheria style computers and some kind of reinforced glass showing the Control Cube being held tightly by a pillar.

There were several familiar faces and he returned a couple of nods and greetings but his destination was the woman in a small podium overlooking the work stations. Clarissa Shield cut an intimidating figure as always, back straight and shoulders squared, one would think she was getting ready to throw down in a ring but that was just the way she did things.

"Hey Chief! Got someone I want you to meet"

She was also someone he considered a friend so there was a certain lel of informality he wouldn't allow to drop.

Clarissa was in a veritable state of paralysis as she stood, straight as an arrow on the podium. If one could see inside her mind, it would likely resemble the light-projected screen on the glass in front of her that showed an enlarged magnified image of the smaller holoscreen of the main computer. Whereas that enlarged screen showed the computer rapidly combing through the foriegn programming code of the cube, Clarissa's mind was reprocessing every event and finding that she, James and her team had gathered so far.

She registered James' voice, but it was not enough to break her state. Her head turned slowly and she stared at him for a moment, her eyes briefly scanning his hands to see if he'd brought her anything. Then after an uncomfortable amount of time, perhaps 20 seconds, her eyes went to Alison. She also checked the hands.

"We could do it manually," she mused, mulling it over before nodding to herself, still staring at the two adventurers. Then her posture broke and she stepped down off the podium as if to properly greet them. "One thing our generation is missing..." she addressed Alison. "Real hackers. I mean REAL hackers - Clarissa Shields, nice to meet you" (the scientist left the smallest gap to allow Alison the option to introduce herself) "- the golden age of programming is over. Everything is now prefabricated hacking software designed with algorithmic instruction to do all the heavy lifting for us. Sure, we have studied to the highest qualification to be able to bend these programs to our will and do amazing things with them, our manpower spent on higher machinations and ambitions. No longer do we waste 4 programmers and 3 weeks building the simplest piece of software. Our computers can do the same grunt work in a matter of hours. Why would we bother ourselves? Of course, we learn in class what it is that is taking place at the foundational level." She opened and closed her fists in front of her. "But unless you've spent time laying those foundations, brick by brick, yourself. Made the mistakes, wasted entire days pouring through your own code to figure out that you've misplaced a single digit in the sea of macros... it's hard to really respect a fellow programmer's feel for the discipline."

And finally the neurodivergent rant was over.

"Sirius," she looked sharply at James, her tone no longer distant. "Where've you been? I needed you." It was an admonishment. Not that she didn't acknowledge just how much time James had devoted to the cause of the Cube. She knew, and while not grateful in the slightest, she did understand that not everyone was a complete robot like herself. Normal people needed time to mentally decompress on occassion. "We have work to do. I don't suppose you know how to read code? Not Source Code. Computer code." (Again, the gap left for James to answer was incredibly small.) "No matter, your inspiration and creativity will be useful nonetheless." As she folded her arms, her thumb, ring and pinky casted a high-level Identify while her index and middle fingers modified the spell for stealth-magic. A habit of hers when sizing up another Source Crystal User, honed almost to an illusionists level of sleight-of-hand. "Time is of the essence," were her last words for James.

"Alison," she looked at the Rogue. Whether or not the woman had introduced herself by name, Identify was filling Clarissa in on the newcomer. "I'm glad you're here - well, not really, I need Sirius - but it is nice to meet you. I trust you must be interesting, if Sirius would bring you here. Perhaps we can have a proper chat under less pressing circumstances. But, it is quite the convenience that you are of the Rogue Class. If you would kindly follow me." She didn't care what James did, but she waited for Alison to follow and led her out of the room. "I trust you know of The Thieves' Guild," she said as she led Alison down the hall. Each door they passed had a sign above.

[Shields 4]...

[Shields 5]...

"My associate, Titus Hart is from the Guild. I've been letting him use one of my labs for a project that might help us get out of this siege problem with our lives - such an inconvenience. The siege, not Titus - but I do believe he has some toys lying around that someone of your calibre may be able to make use of. Perhaps you could take a look and see if any tickle your fancy. You may aswell. No point in waiting for official patents to come through when extermination is on the horizon."

[Shields 11]

"Here we are," she announced and went straight in without knocking. "Hart." Titus was leaned over a table, welding mask glowing brightly as he worked. He stopped what he was doing, put his tools down and took off the safety mask. Chin raised slightly, he held his wrist behind his back as he awaited them closing in.

"Shields," he said politely.

"We have a volunteer for field-testing some of your weapons." Titus looked at Alison and bowed his head slightly in greeting. "I will leave her in your capable hands."

Clarissa inclined her head to Alison in a silent thank you and left. Now, it was time to toss fancy software applications to one side and get into some old-fashioned hacking. James had arrived with perfect timing.