Chapter 16

Putting on what remained of his armor the minister almost immediately seemed to relax, as he turned his sensory stalk towards Pyotr he asked “what did you do?”

“Powered armor suit, suppresses our presence, atleast to your kind. Has other benefits too but overall that's the key one for this particular job especially after the bullshit yall been calling me.”

“Hrmm” was all the minister said before the hissing of pneumatic gasses could be heard.

The hovercraft touched down on one of the squids' overly exaggerated landing pads, dropping Pyotr, the minister and a few of his guards off. The buildings entrance which loomed well above them was generally considered a pride of the imperial authority. Yet all that Pyotr was trying to figure out was how many sets of high yield explosives it would take to cause a “accident”

Instead of continuing to fantasize Pyotr readied up, as far as he knew he was the first human to ever come here, so it wouldn't

The minister walked ahead of his little entourage as a procession of squids approached him from the archway entrance ahead of them.

“ ahh minister… so good to see you again.” the flying calamari meatball at the head of the procession called out.

“Guild master my friend it has been so long, you look well.” replied the minister

Holy shit its like a dime penny play right now

The back and forth between these two lasted a solid 10 minutes as the guild master tried shepherding the congregation back indoors, under his own domain. All the while it was like a day time soap just constant back and forth of useless fucking information. Edventually though the minister went down the line introducing his collected group he brought the the guildhall.

After the pleasantries were exchanged the procession broke off from the guildmaster with a wave of a tentacle. The proclaimed guildmaster turned back to the minister

“So what is the reason you're here, come to ask for my help after all?”

“Not exactly, this is our investigator, he asked to see your security.” the minister making a gesture towards Pyotr

The guildmasters' senses turned towards pyotr, and almost automatically like it was some in built evolutionary behavior an air of superiority waffed towards Pyotr.

“Oh this **investigator** wants to question this glorious institute about our security, on what grounds?”

“A fairly logical conclusion i must admit” the minister said

“Which is?”

“Does it really make sense that someone can breach this institute undetected? Because as soon as this investigator suggested teh idea i realized he had a point.”

“Your suggesting collusion and corruption” the guildmaster was barely containing himself as he took an aggressive posiiton towards the minister the electricity in the air was beginning to buzz

“Stand down Guildmaster, and indeed i am, which is why i and the investigator are here now, not the knights to help ensure that no stain of these tragic events befall this beloved institution.” the minister said clearly having experience navigating political waters

The guildmaster seemed to pause for a moment computing possibilities “if…IF i am to take you at your word im guaranteed nothing will fall back on the guild?”

“Of course guildmaster, i always find its better to have friends rather than enemies” the minister said and Pyotr swears he looked almost cat-like.

“I’ll even throw in some Barak’vian stock, i now it was some of your favorite”

“fine, ill help, but keep your…. “Investigator” on a short leash.” the guildmast finally aquiesed the bribery seeming to push him over the edge

A short bow offered by the minister and they were off, despite his panic when Pyotr first introduced himself; he really is a well composed squid. That carrot and stick despite only getting a humanized translation was efficient enough that it only took *checks time* a few minutes since getting rid of the hangerons.

“So besides standard genetic identification protocols, we also have active Djikit tracking on all floors, hard light doors in almost every archway, signal disruption, thermal insulation, thousands of drones working towards active scanning processes, and most importantly we have the Waters of Innverse” the guild master boasted proudly.

“ a very impressive series of securities indeed, makes the question even more pressing now. Could you imagine if a breach occurred somewhere else, somewhere even more prestigious?” the minister hinted

“Even more, I doubt that the only place that fits that description is the imperial thron…. Oh i see” to say this guildmaster was being led was an understatement.

Despite the species differential, Pyotr thought how utterly human these squids seemed. He hated them for that, like it was taking away form the monsters he always knew they were.

“Whats the Waters of incest now?” Pyotr said gritting his teeth as he motioned with his two lower arms

“Waters of Innverse,” corrected the guildmaster before continuing “ and a thing like you has no right too know”

“Oh for fucks sake” Pyotr hissed under his breath

“Look if you want me to do my job i need to know what im looking at, otherwise i might miss something thats really fucking obvious.” Pyotr continued

The minister sighed, or at least their species equivalent, it was more like deflating. “I know there is logic too what your saying but based on the terms of our contract…” a momentary pause as he floats and motions Pyotr away from the indigent Guildmaster. “ i’ll tell you but only if you swear to give me the opportunity to outbid anyone who approaches you about it”

Pyotrs mind flashed back to the old saturday morning cartoons with the cat and the money symbol slot machine eyes.

“Yea, sure, you have my word ill let you have an opportunity to outbid **anyone** who fuckin comes to me” Pyotr promised

“The Waters of Inverse are our species greatest accomplishment, as for what it is…” a moment paused as the squid twists himself trying to explain

The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

“Maybe its better if i explain what it does rather than explain what it is…”

“Ok you gonna keep teasing or finally get to the part where i know what the fuck were doing here.”

“Alright, it allows us to see the future, at least within an acceptable margin of error.”

Pyotr blinked 4 of his six eyes before answering “alright… so what you sacrifice a chicken say some hocus pocus, have a tentacle orgy then check out the stain pattern to read whats what?”

“What IMPUE….” taking a moment before continuing “no, we use exceptionally high sensitive highborn, they view the current of all Djikit, and observe whats going to happen. the more sensitive the seer the further distance wise they can cover. Most can barely maintain a household, the more elite end up in guilds or the imperial throne.”

“So its a security camera that lets you look…. How far into the future?” Pyotr sasked still not convinced.

“Depends on the seer, but most can only see a few hours into the future the best can see a few years.” said the minister not even registering how insane this sounds.

“Ok, im going to suspend my fucking disbelief like im at a magic show and ask if it can see forward can it see backwards?”

“I.. don't know, i don't think anyone ever has.”

“What… why… you know what… hey Guildmaster, can you seers look at events that have already happened?”

“Why of course they can…. Uh i believe they can yes”

“Alright fuck it that works lead on guildmaster were gonna watch your home movies.”

“Whats a home movie?” asked the Guildmaster

The group moved through the halls, all the scribes they passed scraped and bowed to the two Highborn twits floating ahead of Pyotr. The amassed golden arches wrapping over themselves like some kind of complex space wasting design. Every nook and cranny along the walls lit with bright blue lights showing the stacks of huge amounts of infinite data, taken and recorded from everywhere in the empire, even a small segment worth a fortune. Every twist, every turn, more and more of these hapless scribes turned out like fucking ants in a festering garbage can. Yet when they made the final approach heading down a long elaborate hallway towards a simply furnished waiting room style area, there was practically no one. Intentionally abandoned and lost, a simple yet effective security. The minister and guildmaster floated towards the door as both of them seemed to offer themselves up for a scan. Two huge golden lights beaming down from the ceiling almost burn into the two squids underneath, the scan only last for a few seconds before finishing and a series of high speech code appears between the two of them. T despite her best algorithmic senses can't make head nor tail of this gobbledygook, still seeing it written felt familiar to Pyotr even though he couldn't understand it. Weird.

After the two squids responded the password seemingly accepted the sets of doors tore open with lightning cracking away. A portal… smart thought Pyotr. Wormholes take a considerable amount of juice to create, so he never had to experience one on planet before, it was brighter than he had imagined.

As the hole in space stabilized both of the prominent squids floated through the minister turned around towards Pyotr and motioned for him to follow, Pyotr knocked from his stupor followed. Looking inside he saw a number of other squids all “singing” there was a current floating through the air, forcing all of Pyotrs smaller hairs to stand on end as the expectation of danger was all around him… it felt like thousands of ticks swarming across his skin. He hated it. but as the minister and the guild master approached a dias near the forward section of the room the two of them started addressing the collected seers. Pyotr took note many of the congressed squids moved away from meditating positions around a massive pool of water, with a completely flat, still surface, looking around Pyotr couldn't see any of the walls as they faded away through layers upon layers of some kind of thin fabric. Shaking his head, Pyotr looked back to the minister and guildmaster. While Pyotr couldn't translate high speech he was able to read the general confusion amongst the gathered group. Seems like no one ever thought to look backwards and ask hey what happened on X day. Fucking squids so smart their dumb. As the conversation went back and forth, Pyotr could see the frustration building,a s the minister and guild master insisted, and the seers resisted. More back and forth and the hum in the air was increasing in its vibrations. This went on for a few more minutes before the congregation seemed to give up on there debate of why the couldnt and were ready to give it a shot.

The gathered squids started to turn their attention to a rising globe of water that turned with tumultuous currents as it rose Pyotr saw not hands but something reaching out towards the edge of the globe like something was reaching for purchase. Reminded him of those old school horror movies he watched back on earth, the Freddie Krueger special move of putting hands through elastic surfaces. Watching this made Pyotr feel even more uncomfortable then before

Shivered under his power armor. The squids began to sing louder and louder and the sphere rose towards the ceiling where a gold clad ingress was designed above all who were watching.

Then with a flash the orb lit up like a newly born sun, flashing Pyotr and all those gathered, only the automatic shading effects from his helmet kept him from being permanently blinded.

Shifting forms appeared inside the orb twitching and moving in unnatural ways as the song weavers below poured their voices louder and louder into whatever the fuck this was.

The orb flickered a few times changing its intensity over and over until finally Pyotr started to make out similar shapes and forms, a squid of some noble birth making his way along a massive extensive hallway, a box laden with gold held withing his hands, at this point Pyotr realized he was watching the scribe go about his day before his death. Taking a breath Pyotr told T telepathically to record everything, as he turned to watch Rijji’s last day.

1 hour 37 minutes later

With the recording finished Pyotr looked up towards the orb he noticed two important things, first the assassin never showed up on the bubble feed, and two none of the supposed advance systems detected anything was wrong either. T was working through her recording seeing if she could spot anything that the squids missed. Looking over too the minister, Pyotr asked “do you have like logs of what happens in the day to day?”

“Uh guildmaster?”

“We have security logs, but im not sure what good that will do, if the Waters of Innverse didnt catch anything i assure you our security didnt”

“Im sure that uh thief… he had inside information, which means hes very well informed so im not looking for any notes on him, i'm looking for other anomalies, things that rippled out from the assassins presence.”

“... that thought may have merit…” the guildmaster admitted halfheartedly.

Ahh a little bit of recognition im actually impressed he did not spontaneously combust. A few members of the local security teams pulled up the daily logs, and Pyotr had it translated by T, as he darts scrolling through he noticed a few things, and decided begrudgingly that it fell under possible leads. He turns back to the ministers, “hey can you ask earth wind and fire over there to scroll back the bubble and take a look at the front entrance, not long after the scribe died?”

“I can why?” asked the minister

“Not sure yet, but i have a guess were about to see some freaky shit.”

The minister relayed Pyotrs orders and lo and behold not long after the scribe died a shuttle transport landed outfront opened its drop panel and everyone watched as nothing happened with the shuttle before the door closed and it took off. As the bubble started to distort, Pyotr saw something arriving off the corner of the viewing.

“Hey tell them to keep going, don't stop!” shouted Pyotr, the minster had a confused posture as he relayed the order.

The “video” resumed and Pyotr watched as a small cleaning droid went flying off the ront entrance and slammed into the shuttle. “Hey what unit is that is it still connected to your network?” he asked the guards next to him as they checked the logs.

The guard turned back to Pyotr and said the model in question looks like it was forcibly disconnected from the server, and once that happened it couldnt be tracked. Fuck. thought Pyotr.

Turning back he motioned to the minister and the guildmaster, he left the security wing as the portal closed behind the small group he looked towards them.

“So good news bad news, good news looks like i can figure out where our illusive friend ducked off too, but im going to need to find the shuttlecraft and figure out where they delivered him. Bad news is that im still not sure how hes invisible on your “psychic camera” but i noticed a student swiped in twice to this facility on the logs about an hour apart. If i had to guess your dealing with spoofing.”

“Spoofing?” they both asked

“Basically identity fraud in this case, doesn't matter, i can't follow that lead cause thats not what im paid to do, but if you want to minister i recommend starting with the student, might give you some insight on our thief and where they have been. Might be worth more than finding out where our thief was taken too. So do me a favor and call a shuttle minister, i'm going hunting.”

Pyotr wasnt sure how accommodating a shuttle service would be, but he seriously doubted they would be hardened criminals. Damn shame he couldnt rob this place before leaving though.