Wesley wanders around the exhibit hall, trying to stay unobtrusive while also feeling for anything magical or potent.
Wesley can sense the latticework of magical wards protecting the museum. None of the objects on display are intrinsically powerful, but spying the Curator across the way, the amount of magical objects on his person is nearly overwhelming.
The guards escort Ziss over to the Curator, who looks the Nomad up and down. He smiles at her, but the expression does not reach his eyes. ”Tonight’s gala is a very exclusive event. I oversaw the guest list personally. I do not recall including your name on the list, Miss...Ziss, was it? I am curious as to how you acquired your ticket...”
***
Wendy’s gadget pops open the door to the “Specimen Containment” room. Several cages and cells of various sizes are here, though most of them are empty. However, what appears to be a strange, high-tech coffin sits upright against the far wall. The front of the coffin is transparent, and inside is what appears to be a tall, bipedal cat-like beast with six limbs, four eyes and ears. The creature appears to be either asleep or dead, as it makes no movements within the device.
Before Wendy can get to close, however, a hulking three-headed hound suddenly lunges at her! The dog comes up short, though, as a chain around the base of its neck pulls taut, preventing it from reaching Wendy. The dog’s heads growl and slaver as it tugs at the chain. If she wants to examine the strange coffin further, she’ll have to deal with the hound somehow...
***
Carmen and Diego continue down the hall, finally reaching the vault. The door here is reinforced with multiple security measures, including a retinal scanner, voice recognition, and a keypad with a numerical code. Breaking in here will be no small feat...
"Okay..." Tumbler looks at the vault, giddy and excited. This was her jam. "I need someone to record the Curator's voice over the Ear Buddies so I can get past voice recognition. The number code should be easy," She says as she straps off her waitress vest and pulls open the lining to reveal her tools of the trade. She holds up was looks like a camera attached to some kind of laser printer with a disposable contact lens.
"This will make a copy of someone's retina. My mentor kitbashed it, so it's got medium range. But, you've got to keep it level with his eye for a whole second of recording by pressing this button in order to get a good copy. I'm going to work on cracking the keypad code," She says as she takes out another tech thief tool for cracking pins. It would only take a few minutes depending on the complexity.
"Alternatively," She says over the Ear Buddies, "A selfie with the Curator might have the right quality to copy his retinal pattern. If anyone can get that," She suggests.
"I did not stole or forged my ticket, Professor, I swear! But I doubt I'd be in any list." Ziss says, apparently freaking out. "I was hired to be here... and de reason I'm being vague is because I do not know by who!"
"Am I in trouble? I was paid just to get close to anoder girl... Nicole Jordensen, which some of your guards can certainly confirm I did." She confesses, clearly not pleased. "Please don't kick me out... I'm just trying to get some extra cash to pay for college... my family isn't rich, and I don't fink I'll ever be lucky enough to attend to a beautiful gala as dis again."
"But... but if you do want to kick me out, could you at least let me take a photo wif you? I'm a huge fan..."
"Sorry, I don't do photographs," the Curator says. "I can sympathize with your position, young lady, but regretfully, I am still going to have to ask you to leave. I hope you have a pleasant evening somewhere else."
He nods to the two security guards, who fall in line to be sure Ziss makes a swift exit from the museum.
Wendy taps one of the buttons on the waist of her skirt. A vape bomb drops out of the skirt in front of her shoe.
She casually kicks it to the three headed dog—and it bursts a billowing scented cloud (devoid of nicotine)!
The vape should last long enough for Wendy to move the calculated distance to point by the glass coffin where Cerberus’ chain keeps her safe.
Here’s hoping this isn’t stupid! she chided herself as she ninjabatically zips through her vape cloud.
Wendy dashes through the smoke cloud, quickly making it past the hell hound and moving alongside the glass coffin. She's safe for now, but will need to pull a similar trick to make it back out of the room without incident.
Up close, she can see numerous button along the coffin's side labeled in an unfamiliar language. There are also various charts and read-outs. Based on what she can observe, Wendy deduces that this must be some sort of stasis pod keeping the being inside alive but in a state of suspended animation...
Megan sneers at the approaching guards. "At least you're smart enough to call for backup. And believe me: Any time, any place - once we're off the clock."
Just hope 's going okay behind the lines. I guess I could claim they're getting squirrely and need to check things out, but 's definitely an escalation.
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While Wendy is assessing the strange machine another series of runes upon the machine flicker and dip into the ultraviolet spectrum of light, flashing for a few second. The pod hisses once the lights solidify and a chilled mist begins rolling out the top of the machine.
With a thud the four eyed creature lurches towards the view port the two smaller pair of the four arms raising up against the glass and a caught breath sounding from inside. It took in the environment with a predatory gaze, slow and methodical. Taking note of the small biped which it recognized as a human or ape creature from the logs, the sleeping tri-headed beast which vaguely resembled their companions, and the fact that the pod was still priming to release the capsule lid.
All four eyes seem to fixate on Wendy who seems to be at the controls the creature's mouth begins to move and as if sensing the awakened occupant a radio crackles to life on the outside of the pod.
"Salve terran I am Aedificator of Navis 'Mu'kals Judgement', Nulla-Eight-Six-Impetu-Seven-Three-Two, report Navis function read disrupted. I demand dimittis from this vessel. I must contact superior Tyr'gal and assess Tera viability contra plague. Your cooperation is commendable." It seemed whatever device was translating hadn't had time to pick up and translate all the human language before being brought to the sealed facility.
Wendy could see from her view at the port that the creature in the pod towered over her standing easily into the seven foot range. The creature now mostly animated in what looked like alien battle armor consisting of worked metal plates was covered in brown fur with black stripes, it's face looking like a mash between a tiger and some large canine, including the maw filled with teeth common to carnivorous animals. The smaller upper limbs seemed to terminate in digits much like Wendy's hands capped with tiny claws, while the two much larger limbs still hanging at it's side reminded her of a gorilla's forelimbs, strong and ending in large wide hands with deadly claws meant to tear. There were also two gun-like sidearms hanging on the midsection plate of the creature's armor.
After it's little speech it pressed a bit further into the glass showing it's fangs in a terrifying display of a 'smile' hoping to placate Wendy in to compliance.
Wendy looks at the… cat-thing… and contemplates the dog-thing. Well, I am a cat-person.
”Nulla 8-6… I’m Wendy. And you’re being held here against your will.” She takes out her phone, snaps a few shots for evidence because this has to be illegal as hell (not to say her entry is legal, but she can at least show her aunt), and finally she gets a close up of…
…the control panel.
She asks Nulla 8-6, ”How can I use this control panel to set you free?”
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The alien searches for a moment after what Wendy says, "Habitus, for tutum entry etiam Tera cantavit will search. Unknown locus." It stares at the small device for a moment and then points though the translation through the glass is a bit odd, seems to be pointing to the lower left section of the control panel. The symbol in question being some mix of scribbles and blurbs that are otherwise indecipherable to the Derby.
"Permit Dimittis, parvus Terran."
Wendy taps the photo of the panel as directed, and when 086 doesn’t say ‘wrong,’ she taps the real control.
Then stands back in case some kind of gas with high carbon content or extreme temperature poofs in her face… not that she can really move a safe enough distance for that, thanks to Cerberus!
Once Ziss is escorted out of the museum, she sends the Curator's voice recording to Tumbler. "Wasn't able to get a selfie wif de Curator, but at least got his voice... sorry, he knew all de guests and knew I wasn't in de list, so he kicked me out."
Barbs calls Ziss over Ear-Buddies, ”Did you get the girl’s number, Ziss? Perhaps she is willing to take a photo and send it to you. She should pan a recording about the room and not keep the camera on the professor, so as to appear to be snapping shots of various artifacts.” Knowing she is not the boss, and that Ziss has erred, she adds, ”That is my suggestion to make lemonade of life’s distributed lemon.”
…as I did with Ken, who is now a girl just like Wes.
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With another hiss of gas, the creature was obscured inside the pod for several moments as the automated seals and pressurization valves went about their work. After a few moments the capsule front split and parted allowing 86 to pull their way out of the cramped container, using their two primary arms. Stepping onto the landing that Wendy was on to deal with the pod controls the behemoth of an alien towered over the diminutive hero at what she would wager was well over seven feet tall. Flexing and rotating all four of their arms at the shoulder causing a cacophony of cracks suggesting that this being had an endoskeleton much like Humans.
Gazing down to Derby 86 spoke, no longer modulated by the pod's speakers, in a growl filled voice, "My thanks, parvus pueri." Standing tall on digitigrade legs ending on wide plated feet which ended in tearing claws similar to those on the main arms with what looked like a raptor-like kill-claw on the inside of each foot, 86 pointed to the Dog creature with a smaller grasping arm. "Companion like in records?"
The three-headed hound snarls and barks at the hulking creature, pulling at its chain but unable to reach them.
***
The guards back down when Megan steps away, though they continue to give her dirty looks.
In the meantime, Wesley follows along with the Sheik's entourage as they approach the Curator! Professor Braithwaite bows to the foreign dignitary. "Sheik al Fawari, I am honored that you deigned to attend my humble gathering tonight," he says. "I trust you have found the event accommodating?"
"Very much so, Professor," the Sheik replies. "And I trust all is in order for the other festivities this evening?"
"Indeed. We shall be starting those very shortly," Braithwaite replies. He smiles as he looks over the Sheik's guards and female companions. His eyes linger on Wesley. Is that a flicker of recognition in his gaze?
What do you do?
Ziss bites her lips as she considers what Barbs just suggested. She did not like the idea at all about involving Nicole in their heist, but since she messed up, she could not think of another idea.
Taking her phone, she types Nicole's number and sends her a voice message.
"Good night Nicole, here is Ziss. Had to leave earlier dan I want to... Have a proposition for you... if you can send me a video of Professor Braithwaite's face, as close as possible, you can choose the next time and circumstances we'll meet... if dat is somefing you'd like to do...
The response from Nicole is relatively swift. "That is something I would very much like to do. Just a sec."
A few minutes later, a video shows up of Professor Braithwaite speaking with Sheik al Fawari. The video zooms in, getting a very good close-up of the man's face.
Ziss forwards the video to Tumbler after she watches it.
She then replies to Nicole. "Wonderful! I do intend to keep my word. Surprise me."
Wendy says, ”They are not my dog, nor yours I gather. So let’s pass them without conflict. We don’t wish to draw attention.” I’m saying this to a seven-foot-plus-cat-person… sooooo many questions!
She is clearly geeking out. Too fascinated to be scared as she probably should be, she reaches into her purse and pulls out a bottle of scented foot massage oil. She replaced the cap with a functional sprinkler top—but if set under the dog, it should keep the spray localized.
Wendy barely manages to roll the bottle under the dog, and it sprays under Cerberus! She says to 86, ”Follow me. We’re on a mission and freeing you has become a part of it. Oh… and best not to use my name. Call me ‘Red’ for now.” She points to her braids, currently dyed a natural-looking red-orange.
Wendy and 86 quickly exit the room before the three-headed dog can recover from the gadget's calming spray. They close the door behind them, then hurry down the hallway to reconnect with Carmen and Diego...
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86 leans down to examine the strange device that Wendy pulls from her very small duffle bag, and snorts at the scent, ears pulling back along with the rest of the jawline in some sort of grimace. "Unpleasant, strange toxicus weapon." Trusting that the human could get past the beast once more 86 let the human show off it's technology. Watching it the entire time they passed the beast, a bit peckish, but now was not the time the tiny human child had a mission to accomplish, so did 86.
Honor bound to follow Wendy-red for the time until deemed necessary to do without they padded along behind them, two of their eyes glancing down at a wrist device which didn't seem to display anything to Wendy. "Locus designatus cantavit, when mission done. Wendy-Red. Must have magna honor to have duo nomina" The name portion seemed a bit slow and forced as if the words didn't quite work for them yet.
Stooping to get through the door that Wendy had used to originally enter the room, 86 looked onward, this structure looked non-natural so they had to ask. "Enemy aboard Tera-Vas? I kill well."
”Um… killing is not one of our mission parameters. Not-Killing is. That’s why I used nonlethal, mostly-harmless weapons.” She pulls out a few. ”Lipstick that sticks you to the floor, and uh… the feminine protection pad does the same thing. Step on it, full-stop! Got a few vapor-screens and slicks too!”
She leads 86 to Diego and Carmen. “This is Ace and Waitress. Sorry… we didn’t decide on fake names up-front.” To her friends, ”I’m Red and this is 86… which is not a fake name.” Looking up at the big Kitty, she adds, ”Might be her height in inches.”
Wesley makes brief eye contact with the Professor, careful to keep her expression neutral and hoping her feminine eyes enhanced with shadow and mascara throws the Curator off.
The Curator's smile broadens. "Your companion there is certainly enchanting. I wonder if you might be willing to allow me to borrow her for the presentation? I'm sure that my special guests would much rather have somebody more aesthetically pleasing to look at while I'm gabbing on and on!"
The Sheik bows. "Of course. She is yours for the evening, professor."
The Curator inclines his head and offers his arm to Wesley. "Come along, dear, we must make our final preparations..."
What do you do?
Diego grows restless as he waits at the vault door. He starts looking it over...
Wesley doesn't see an easy way out of this predicament, so she inclines her head and takes the Curator's arm. Not entirely sure why Professor Braithwaite wants a woman in a niqab next to him when there were so many other pieces of eye candy around, Wes stays quiet.
Tumbler helps Diego out. "This is a Acme-Ashran 9800. It's a pricey piece of security, but it does have its flaws," She tells him as she works on making the fake lens with the picture that Ziss' friend sent them. It's hopefully good enough to fool the sensor. There was also the audio recording. She wasn't sure she got enough of a sample from Ziss' interaction. "Anyone else who can get close enough to the Curator and get him talking, record and let me get enough to spoof his voice," She whispers out.
For now, she worked on codebreaking - or at least, she would have continued to do so if Derby hadn't returned with a terrifying tiger-man that had her a bit freaked out. "What- why- how-" She stammers. "...This is not the plan!"
”Oh, well…” Not wanting to undermine the team leader she stepped aside for, WeNdY says, “I was trying to take everything, per the plan… and it turned out that room had everyones rather than things.
“Oh, but this is big—not her, though she is most certainly not dainty… but I mean we now know the professor is holding a sentient being… heh, WAS!—against her will.
“I mean, that’s like way more illegal than what we’re doing. Inadmissible in a court of law, but… damn! He’s exposed. Like, boner out in a Zoom call exposed! The mosaic blur of our own illegal and unconstitutional entry can only protect him for so long.”
Wendy is as giddy as (and dressed as, and actually) a schoolgirl!
The Curator talks as he walks with Wesley. "There are many beautiful women here tonight, but for many, that beauty is only skin-deep. When I look into your eyes, I seem a woman possessed of a keen intellect and sharp wits. That, I find more beautiful than a dozen of these other ladies. What is your name, dear?"
His voice carries through the Ear Buddies, reaching Carmen and the others by the vault door.
"I'm called Cinnamon, sir," Wesley says. The name Diego gave her just popped into her head and rather than fight to come up with anything less cringy, she says it without hesitation.
"I'm sorry, but I don't know my role in the presentation. Is there anything I should know beforehand?"
”Yup… shoulda come up with fake names beforehand. Taking mental notes.”
”Please allow me. My mental notes are recorded and logged into a database.”
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There were several brief moments of 86 simply listening to what Wendy-Red was saying to the other two humans trying to parse through the bits that weren't being translated correctly as the automated filter tried it's best. But without access to a larger repository of their language it wasn't exactly a speedy nor successful process yet. Things got especially strange when she started talking about exposed bones in vids, such a battle wound would surely garner much popularity.
Looking over the contraption all the humans are fiddling with 86 can't help but to think if they are all supposed to be so tiny or if these actually are children. Leaning in and giving a snort to Wendy-red, and likely getting far to close for comfort, with little to no sense of personal space they ask in that deep timbre voice. "You go through pueri, Wendy-Red? Your stipant habens tribulationis."
They gesture vaguely to the large door and the two attempting to crack the vault with one of the multiple arms on their body. Even more curious as to what their mission entails. "What mission modulus?"
The Curator leads “Cinnamon” out of the exhibit hall and down a corridor toward his office. ”We will be auctioning off a few choice artifacts from my collection tonight. Your role, dear, will simply be to stand by my side and make me look good by association. I would caution you not to touch anything, as some of items might be dangerous. Perform well, and you will be amply compensated at the end of the night.”
***
Down below, the voice sample from the conversation is enough to give Tumbler the last bit of what she needs to crack the code. The vault door unlocks and grinds open. Within, numerous objects fill the space, most covered by sheets to prevent dust from costing them. The chamber’s walls are cold steel.
Taking a quick look around, Diego believes that almost all of the objects here are valuable commodities. The best way to end this quickly would be to locate the Aztec mirror within the vault and remove it posthaste.
Wendy says, ”Our mission: get the items and get out.”
She starts looking for the mirror, and also considers the very big kitty. ”I get the feeling you can carry a lot. Without breaking anything, right?”
The objects are arranged by size, so the mirror should be among the group of smaller objects. Nothing here seems to be threatening at first glance--but then Wendy notices a covered object in the center of the vault shift slightly. That seems suspicious...
Wendy points out the object in the center. ”Be ready… maybe get that thing last, if at all.”
She heads for the smaller objects. Once she finds the mirror, she will slip that into her scarf’s pocket dimension.
The Curator leads “Cinnamon” out of the exhibit hall and down a corridor toward his office. ”We will be auctioning off a few choice artifacts from my collection tonight. Your role, dear, will simply be to stand by my side and make me look good by association. I would caution you not to touch anything, as some of items might be dangerous. Perform well, and you will be amply compensated at the end of the night.”
That last part about compensation seemed unnecessary and frankly, quite disgusting to Wesley, but she keeps her mouth shut. Feeling like remaining silent was the culturally expected thing to do, she doesn't make a comment or reply to the Professor.
As Wendy heads for the smaller objects, her quick glances around the room show that none of the objects here appear to be rounded or oval like a mirror should be. The deduction is obvious—the mirror isn’t here!
At the same time, the thing in the center of the vault hurls the sheet off of it, revealing a credenza! But most credenzas don’t have a huge, slavering maw or writhing tentacles protruding from them! The monster begins to surge towards the Darling Derby!
***
In the office, the Curator moves to a locked cabinet near his desk. ”Let me look into the vault to make sure all of the auction pieces are where they should be, then we can get the festivities started.” He retrieves an obsidian mirror from the cabinet—the Eye of Tezcatlipoca!
”Come here, Cinnamon. I will need a bit of your blood. It will only hurt a moment, dear.”
”I was ready for you, ya jerk!” She tosses in her Feminine Protection Full-Stop Pad! “Chew on this!”
She hopes the adhesive will stick the mimic’s maw shut, giving it one less means to attack.
Hearing the Curator mention blood, she knows where the not-present mirror is!
”Toast-Crunch! Grab and go!”
Tumbler speaks up to Ziss over the Ear Buddies and to Diego here in front of her, all right before the vault is cracked. She's trying to ignore the beastial monster hovering over them since it seems intelligent and not hostile.
"Ziss, there's a white box truck one block away on the street with the keys hidden in the driver side wheel well taped up there. I need you to go and drive it to the museum and to the loading docks. We're going to unlock it from inside, should be simple with Barb helping out, and them we're going to load everything up. Diego, we need to grab some wheeled pallets to start things off. Hopefully we can do this quick before anyone catches wise," She says confidently.
She looks perhaps a little less confident when the credenza in the corner appears to be some monster set here to guard the vault. That was not something she had a plan for...but, fortune seemed to favor them. She looks back at 86. "Okay, I'm hoping you know how to fight that thing!"
Wesley's eyes widen. She doesn't bother trying to disguise her expression -- it's mostly hidden anyway -- as she takes a half-step back. The ear-buddie telling her that the vault heist is well underway, she knows the Curator doesn't need to be looking there anytime soon.
"Sir?" she asks uncertainly, deciding to draw out the process as long as possible. She hesitates, waits for him to coax her into complying with his usual words of assurances. In the meantime, Wesley hardens her skin into diamond toughness.
Finally, after a sufficient amount of hesitation, Wesley presents her arm for the bloodletting. "I'm sorry sir. You... might have selected the wrong candidate for this ritual."
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86 looked around at the useless nik-naks and wondered what the group was here for. "Can carry... but why?" when the mimic like creature burst forth and went lunging after Wendy who's quick reactions managed to subdue the beasts attack. She stood still for a moment hands reaching down to the weapons at her side. "kill foe now?"
”Yes,” Wendy replies with full confidence in 86’s capability.
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With confirmation, 86 cackles and rips the twin plasmoid pistols from the gut plate of the armor. And left into the fray blasting at anything vulnerable on the beast.
However it seems the stasis sickness hasn't quite worn off and between sluggish movements and unprimed equipment, the weapons click harmlessly. Leaving 86 is horribly out of position against this strange alien. "Corva Drix..."
Tumbler uses the vault's items to give herself cover and assess what was going on at the moment. Her heart hammers as she tries to think of ways to assist - was she not up to this?
Diego sighs and manifests a psi-blade and begins slashing away at the tentacled horror.