by Zack Finley
"Orik left early this morning. This guy has no idea when he is coming back," Argon commed.
The apprentice arrived quickly, apologizing that Master Orik was not in the shop. He promised to let Orik know we dropped in.
We saw nothing gained by probing him and left. Not much, but it was all we were going to get.
We 'ported to the Losan Mage Guild, intending to visit a communications firm nearby. We'd learned they could provide some teleport locations throughout Losan, for a fee. I learned a lesson from our travel delays in Augun. Even the fastest basas can't match knowing a teleport site. Establishing transport options before they are needed were worth the investment.
The communications firm was only a block from the guild. It had a discrete sign on its door. Inside there was a small reception area. The nervous receptionist provided us with a list of services. The firm could provide everything from a mage communication's specialist, similar to Ramda, to transporting small packages throughout Losan. When Argon inquired about teleport locations, the receptionist provided a smaller list of specialized services. These mage-to-mage services came with hefty price tags.
Argon asked to speak with the proprietor. This receptionist excused herself and disappeared into the back room. While the receptionist had a mind shield, it was easily read. Business was not very good; the conflict on the docks was causing a ripple effect on the economy. She was worried about her job and was hoping we would become clients.
The proprietor was short and wiry, looking older than Tobron. He arrived promptly, greeting us with a semi-bow of acknowledgment. Argon asked if he had a meeting room. He ushered us into a small room with a well-worn table and chairs.
We weren't trying to read him, but he was definitely probing us.
"Do you treat all potential clients with such disrespect?" Argon asked.
Even without my mental app, you could see the little man was nearing a full-blown panic. But, the attack on our mind shields stopped.
"Much better," said Argon. "We are considering establishing a business office in Losan. The Losan Mage Guild suggested you could provide assistance with teleporting and communication. They did not suggest you would attempt to violate our mind shield. Perhaps you wish us to return the favor?"
I don't know what his mind shield was hiding, but it must have been quite damning because his panic exploded.
"No, I think he is physically afraid, we are well armed and have a very confident swagger," sent Argon. "A mind probe could be interpreted as an attack. He is afraid of what we might do in response."
"If you attempt another mind probe, I will strip your mental shield and paw through your brain to learn everything about you," said Argon. "We assume you require no further warning?"
He nodded, swallowing carefully. I was getting worried he would teleport away and we'd have to find another firm.
"Excellent, we wish to purchase a set of teleport locations throughout Losan today. We may also require the long-term assistance of a communications specialist once we have our office established. We are just getting established in Losan and need to spend most of our time elsewhere so it may take us some time," Argon said.
"What type of teleport locations?" he asked.
"The king's keep, each major inland city and several key locations along the river and tributaries," Argon said.
"How will you pay?"
"We have funds in the Losan guild bank. We have other resources as well," said Argon.
"I can sell you the teleport locations for the cities and keep today,” the proprietor said, panic mostly forgotten. “I will have to acquire the river sites you seek. That might take several days and require advance payment to the source.”
He and Argon bargained over the price. He ended up providing his teleport locations for a small metal bar from Argon's money pouch, with the understanding, we would pay a similar amount once he had the river locations.
We left with one of his com-cards. He said he'd contact us as soon as he acquired the rest of the teleport sites. I tried to bet Argon we would have to contact him first, but she wouldn't take the bet.
Now we had these new teleport spots, we had to check them out.
We 'ported first to King Arvich's keep. The 'port location was inside the main entrance. Good for official visits, not so good for clandestine arrivals. Our arrival startled the Losan guard patrolling the keep's entrance, causing him to draw his weapons.
We chose to give him a few moments to regain his composure by ignoring him.
Argon and I walked up to the reception clerk and got directions to the office of the Losan chamberlain.
I monitored the guardsman who stared at us for a few moments before sheathing his weapons and returning to his post.
An attendant escorted us to the chamberlain's office where we learned the chamberlain never met with the public without prior appointment. When we asked the best way to make an appointment, his staff suggested having the Losan Mage Guild make the request.
Their mind shields were better crafted than most. It took only a delicate probe to determine we could short-circuit the appointment process with a little bribery. I might have considered it if we were actually looking for an appointment.
Our escort took us back to the keep's main entrance. I tagged several teleport locations, which seemed better clandestine 'port sites. Argon wanted to check the outside of the keep. We strolled out the front door, past the guards and into the sunshine. The keep plantings were sending out very definite "don't tread on me" vibes all the way to the walled area surrounding them. The main gate had guardhouses on both sides. Armed Losan King's Guard patrolled the walls.
There was a boulevard with a carriage turnaround in front of the gate. Visitors departed from their carriages and walked to the keep entrance.
We strolled onto the boulevard and spotted a discrete alley next to the hotel on the corner nearest the gate. We tagged this as another clandestine 'port site for the keep.
We 'ported to the next three sites which placed us in front of two city halls and a garrison. No shady corners for our new mage business associate.
Our mind-reading app revealed things were still mostly normal in the outlying cities. There was some uneasiness about the conflict on the Losan docks. The consensus was this would soon pass. A few businesses were cutting back, but many were treating the lull like a holiday.
I sent Tobron a message to buy as many loads of food from Losan that he could and get them headed to Klee. If things went bad, rescuing the food stacking up in the Losan warehouses could be crucial. He agreed. He suggested we should check out the available ships first, to avoid any real pirates. He also said Capt. Malek was bringing his load of food directly to Klee instead of Augun. Tobron said Malek would be arriving in Klee later today if I wanted to talk with him.
We 'ported to Reeter's office to get the name of the ships and captains available in Losan for charter. We agreed to pre-screen our shippers for Tobron.
Reeter had already bought four shiploads of food, based on Tobron's order earlier this morning. He was now scrambling to locate several more based on Tobron's new directions.
We got the list of the ships Reeter had chosen and told him we would let him know if they were acceptable.
We were pleased with the first two captains. They were solid, not above a little smuggling, but still solid. Argon posted a positive memo on each in the common area. We both thought they might be positive additions to our nascent shipping company.
Number three preferred piracy to legitimate shipping and Argon stripped names, locations, and background from him. She posted a memo to avoid this ship along with her intel.
Number four was too larcenous for us. We blackballed the ship and captain.
Numbers five, six and seven were okay but not in the same category of the top two captains. Their ships were not as well maintained. They also had a high crew turnover.
Number eight was happy to wait in Losan. He'd been provided a contingency fee to hang arou
nd Losan for the next several weeks, pending a big shipment. He'd been hired out of Klee. Argon sent the picture of the person hiring him to Inoa for identification.
The response was swift; the photo was of one of the Klee conspirators. Inoa intended to interrogate him further since he hadn't revealed this activity under prior questioning.
Tobron said he was hiring some of the idle ships in Klee to go to Losan to pick up some of the shipments. I noticed memos on several ships had appeared in the joint area.
Argon began posting our new Losan teleport sites in the common area, along with a set of sites in Augun plus our Ylee and Kavil teleport locations. She asked our partners to post sites from the outlying cities in Klee there, too.
We didn't locate any ships full of raiders on the docks in Losan. Whether they were already poised to strike in the countryside or hadn’t arrived yet wasn't clear. Inoa believed the raiders were not easily contained on board ship, so she thought when they arrived we'd know the Losan coup was about to launch.
Another indication we'd barely foiled the Klee plot in time.
Tobron authorized Reeter to contract with the five ships we found acceptable, with preference given to the top two first.
Tobron had us assigned to Toffad's Keep for the rest of the afternoon.
He wanted us to wall off all of the port warehouses on the bottom floors, clear out several of the upper warehouses, and block off any we couldn't inspect. He wanted to begin diverting some of the supplies coming in directly to the keep.
We teleported directly to the wharf.
Argon tweaked my earth and fire magic, to allow me to access the rest of the power Shala had walled off. “I’ve meant to do this for you for days,” said Argon. “We will need it once we get those magical batteries going.”
We entered the keep through the small door, ignoring the portcullis for now. I hadn’t spotted the mechanism which raised or lowered it in my earlier visit.
I set up semi-permanent lights in the low-level entryway before we began putting up walls. We went up one level and repeated the process. By the time we got to the top floor I had to give Tobron credit, our stone wall conjuring spells were quick and very efficient. The more I used my magic, the easier and faster it went. Since Argon had significantly less earth magic than I, improving spell efficiency was a top priority for her. I benefited from her innovation, too.
In the top floor, we wanted to open as much warehouse space as possible. We both set up lights in the corridors and decided to explore the first corridor together. Not wanting anything from the other corridors to leak out, I conjured walls to block off all the corridors except the one we were exploring. We'd banish them one at a time when we were ready to open them.
Argon's earth magic was half gone. Mine was regenerating almost as fast as I used it.
We entered the remaining open corridor and put lights in each warehouse room we passed. Argon had her animal sensitivity raised to the highest level. We didn't expect to find people here, although I kept monitoring my mind-reading app. Tobron was concerned about dangerous animals or insects.
Argon helped me set my animal monitoring spells. We tweaked and added some versatility using some of the things we'd picked up with our mind-reading version. She reminded me stone could block our mind-reading app and its new variant the critter app. I asked if we could detect angry or dangerous plants. She'd never tried because plants were usually so reasonable.
Argon said for now we should be prepared for any animals to be hostile but not to kill or injure them until we knew for sure.
Argon reminded me of the basas and how treating the animals with consideration led to better outcomes.
"What about osos?" I asked.
"There are some exceptions," she replied. "But I doubt there are any osos in here."
We'd pre-selected several options. Walling off a room and removing the oxygen from it was the ultimate with a barrage of sun fire bullets to torch them while we smothered them.
Argon insisted our primary threat response was to be non-lethal. Left on my own I'd start at the last rooms and toss a firebomb in each room until I was at the end. I'd wall the corridor off, except for a large vent and let it burn out. Then vacuum out the ashes. Argon was not on board with that battle plan.
We couldn't afford the magic to flood the rooms with area-of-effect paralyze or stun spells. I set up a series of stun mental bullets, which could be guided based on the critter app or just target all quadrants of the room.
There were 12 large warehouse rooms along each corridor. We started with the two nearest the main entrance. Debris and moldy goo covered the floors of the first two rooms, but we detected no animals.
I tested the flammability of the goo. It flared briefly before sputtering out. I placed two lights in each room to make it easier for those who would be cleaning the warehouse for use.
Each warehouse room was a little different, but each had the same mystery goo and mounds of crusted debris.
We had just placed lights in the last two rooms when my gut told me something was wrong. I sent Argon an alert. She returned to my side, wondering what was up.
We had relaxed after the monotony of looking at 12 nearly identical rooms. With my gut at full alert, I had my lethal suite of spells poised to fire.
Argon reexamined our critter app, but nothing popped. No noises, just the feeling something was very wrong.
We edged back into the corridor and began moving back to the main entrance. Argon crept along the right side of the corridor while I hugged the left. We were both searching for the cause of my unease.
Argon covered me while I went into the next warehouse room on my side of the corridor. There was no change in the five minutes since we were there last. I covered Argon as she searched her room. Still nothing.
I was starting to doubt my gut, but years of training kept us both alert.
The third set of warehouse doors revealed nothing, either. As we neared the main entrance, I sped up to meet a potential threat in the entrance area.
Something big, hairy, and strong engulfed me from the warehouse door. It pinned my arms to my side with sticky ropes. I was down on the ground with a large stinger driving down into my chest.
Argon triggered both our emergency deadman's teleports.
I was so tightly connected to my assailant, I ‘ported the nightmare with us to the hospital. The spider-like horror kept jabbing me with its stinger. I set off a series of rocks, force and fire missiles at it, hoping to knock it off me, while Argon blasted its head with rocks.
I don't know what caused it to break off the attack and turn toward Argon, but I didn't question my good luck and dropped a slab on its head, driving it into the floor.
The sticky ropes couldn't grip my armor allowing me to get one hand on my kukri. Its force magic edge made quick work of the web wrapped around me. I banished the slab off the spider. It looked very dead, with its smashed head and thorax.
Argon was calming the hospital staff and apologizing for bringing the fight to them. Alba had arrived and was getting the cleanup started.
I grabbed the spider thing, and Argon and I teleported it back to Toffad's wharf. I threw it in the ocean and was happy to see a few large fish come up and bite chunks out of it.
Purple ooze from the stinger covered my front. Argon sprayed it off with a series of water blasts; worried it might be corrosive as well as poisonous. My new armor had resisted being pierced and had likely saved my life.
She'd sent an image of the thing to Tobron and asked if he recognized it.
He had offered to help while we were cleaning up at the hospital but we had things there under control. It didn’t take long for him to identify the spider-thing.
Tobron thought it was a ghost glappner. He warned where there was one there were hundreds. He said they hibernate when the food runs out and if they hibernate long enough, they become zombie-like. "I was worried about death cult artifacts. I suspect when you purge the final nest you'll find a dea
th cult altar," warned Tobron. "As undead, you will have to incinerate them or remove their heads to prevent them from coming back. Wounding them will slow them down, but don't turn your back on one unless you are sure it is dead."
Now we knew what we were facing, I told him to stand by. We restricted our operation to cleaning out the open warehouse corridor and chasing down any escapees.
Alba said she would be standing by the emergency transport site and she had reinforcements lined up to help. We'd need to discuss a better site for our emergency teleports after this mess was over.
Argon and I got inside the guild wards. We teleported to the keep-side entrance to the port facility. We didn't know how many glappners we woke up. As before none ever showed on our critter app. This time we were killing not capturing.