Sarah sat on the floor, head throbbing as she shut her eyes against the afternoon sunlight streaming through the window of the warehouse she was squatting in these days. A clothes rack nearby held all the articles she owned, not including the pile nearby. The mountain of blankets on a mattress marked where she slept. She felt a bout of nausea and heartburn flare up making her grab for the nearby water bottle. She didn't have her gloves on, though. She pulled back frantically, bile rising, as her skin came in contact with the bottle. Hes minds eye saw the plastic, melted and formed into shape before being filled on the mechanized assembly line and shipped to the corner store she had bought it at. She groaned and squinted looking for her gloves. They were lying hidden under her clothes from the night before. She put them on quickly, the familiar memories from the fabric a comforting, dull push against her senses after so much use.
Typically she would still be a sleep at this time. Most jobs for Kieren happened at night, and most activities she cared to pursue for that matter. This was the first job he had ever given her in the middle of the day and her body wasn’t in an agreeable mood about it. Sarah rolled over to grab her black leather jacket and shrugged it on over her shoulders. Kieren's money, or his ‘friends’ money, was as good as anyone’s . He played the tough drug lord but he was a coward at heart. Shed got a glimpse when she shook his hand their first time meeting and knew he wouldn't risk losing her talents. The money she brought in for him made her too valuable and the drugs he provided her helped keep her magic headaches in check. Which was good because she wasn’t going back to the institution, not ever. No one was locking her up again.
Her stomach growled for attention as Sarah threw on a pair of boots and made her way outside. The crisp morning breeze brushed her hair as she pushed the front door open. The bright sunlight hurt her eyes and she quickly fished out her sunglasses from the depths of her jacket. To her left, across the sparkling river the forests of the guardian reservation stretched into the distance. Trees stretched up into the sky and within its depths she could just make out the tip of the chapel spire, majestic above the tree tops. She smiled as she thought of the winding trails and grassy hills throughout the Reservation. The people of the Scarlet Pact tribe let her be and were welcoming to everyone.
She turned to the right, moving through the projects of Qorluna that were her current home. Further ahead lay the sprawling metropolis of Quorluna, the jewel of Sylverdol. To get there she had to work her way through the sprawling maze of abandoned, run down buildings full of squatters and refugees from Bailey. She felt a sense of unease as she walked through the slums, her eyes darting nervously at any man that walked by. The people here could be strange and unpredictable, cultures between Sylverdol and the native guardians mixing for those living on the border.
After a while the buildings began to look better, more maintained. The occasional police car rushing by made the citizens closer towards the city center feel safe and secured. The glittering buildings shone ahead of her, reflecting weakly off the buildings behind with their broken windows.
She could have had Kierin’s man pick her up at the warehouse, but she didn’t like people knowing where she slept. Ya that was it. She wasn’t hiding the fact that she was squatting from anyone. She had agreed to meet him at “The Dusty Cup”, a café well within the main city.
Sarah walked into the café, her eyes adjusting to the dim lighting inside. The smell of freshly brewed coffee and baked goods greeted her as she made her way to a corner booth. The café was nearly empty, save for a few regulars who sat huddled over their drinks in conversation. She scanned the room, searching for any sign of the man she was meeting. She had only spoken to him over the phone, and had no idea what he looked like.
As she sat down, Sarah tried to calm her nerves. She didn't know what this man wanted or what he was going to ask of her. All she knew was that she needed money, and she was willing to do whatever it took to get it. It was about survival out here, and Sarah knew how to survive. As she waited, she barely paid attention to the notifications popping up on her phone until one caught her eye. A post from an old acquaintance who she knew had connections to the underworld. The real underworld, or so he said. Everything he'd ever said had matched up to what her own power showed her about certain people. She shivered as she remember touching some of the older bones. It was almost as if the mind was still there, watching over her shoulder as she rifted through the memories like a collage of photos.
Just then, a man walked in and scanned the café, his eyes landing on her. He made his way over to her table, his formal attire contrasting with the casual atmosphere of the café. "Excuse me, Sarah?" he asked with a polite smile.
She nodded, eyeing the pin on his tie. It was a fist, holding a lightning bolt. "Yes, I am. And you are?"
"Nigel," he replied, extending his hand for a handshake. “A pleasure to finally meet you.”
This one is polite, she thought with a smile. She got up and shook the offered hand. Sarah followed the man out of the café to a waiting black van with tinted windows. Nigel stepped forward and opened the door for her with a slight bow and motion to enter. After a moment’s hesitation Sarah entered the dark interior. The only other occupant was the driver with a chauffeur’s uniform and professional attitude as he looked straight ahead. Nigel followed in a moment after Sarah sat down and the door closed with a bang. Without a word to the driver, the car began moving forward into traffic.
“What has Mr. Kieren told you about our request today?” Asked Nigel calmly.
“um, im supposed to break into some rich guy’s safe. ” she said uncertainly.
Nigel nodded,” We have installed new security, but were curious how well it holds up against … more extreme methods of breaking in. “
Sarah watched the buildings pass by outside. People out for their day, walking on their way to somewhere or taking a break to socialize. “My magic isn’t that extreme. Im not going to be able to break anything open. It doesn’t work like that. Whats so special about this safe?”
“IF you can get in, ill answer any questions you have. But for the moment. Just focus on whether you can enter or not.”
“What if I can’t?”
“Then I’m sorry to have wasted your time. We will take you back wherever you would like to be dropped off”
Sarah squinted at him and didn’t say anything. She wasn t used to this. Kierin’s men tended to be the do what I say or I’ll break your legs kinda guys. Nigel just politely smiled at her and waited patently as the car took another turn,. There was more gray than brown in his smother back hair and he looked like he had all the time in the world as he watched Sarah.The car began to slow and then slid to a stop. Did he really intend to move on if she couldn’t do the work? Now wouldn’t that be nice?
“ are there any concerns before we proceed?", asked Nigel as the driver got out and walked around the open the door for them
Five thousand to remember a guys safe password or combination lock. No way they made her do all this and they just hid the key. This was one of her easier jobs by far, and the company smelled better. Wasn’t as touchy as some of the other men tended to be either. But she still felt uneasy and she knew she couldn’t just blame the man being over polite. She just nodded and muttered
“Im good”
Nigel beamed, “Splendid!”
Following after Nigel, Sarah took the drivers offered hand and exited the vehicle. She noticed that he also had a pin on his jacket, the lightning bolt held in a fist. College fraternity brothers maybe? They were parked in front of a large glass tower with cement walls at the bottom level. A metal sign on the wall depicted it as the Sylverdol Center of Microbiology and Chemical Research. Across the street, the public courthouse sat in the shadow of Zodiac tower, situated three blocks away. People pushed past in front of the building, giving little room for nigel and the driver as they waited on sarah.
Nigel led the way and led Sarah through a set of revolving doors into a front lobby. Two spiraling staircases stood to either side of the lobby, connecting the multiple floors, and a center elevator at the other end of the lobby had a glass window showing what Sarah was sure was a spectacular view. Nigel greeted the front attendant in the lobby and presented a badge before ushering Sarahher into the elevator.
The elevator took them up to the 13th floor and Nigel beckoned her to follow. They got off on a hallway with other elevator entrances and the entrance to one of the staircases off to her side. Nigel led her down the hallway and immediately took a turn. Sarah hurried to keep up with him. They passed windows showing cubicles and meeting rooms. After a second turn, Nigel made his way towards large steel doors with a card reader at the entrance. Once again, he pulled out a badge and scanned himself in, unlocking the doors to the lab.
They stepped into a laboratory with bright white lights and rows of desks and workspaces with various equipment. Computers and vials were visible at odd intervals amid the machinery along with random items. That was broken pieces of a mirror, the edges of the frame set to the side of the mat supported samples. Half of what looked like a chair or a table, definitely some kind of furniture was set in a corner, odd blue gems embedded in the rotted wood.
Nigel walked quickly past the tables towards another set of doors at the back. A red light was lit above the doors, bright against the already illuminated room. Nigel stopped at the door then turned around and put his arms behind his back.
He smiled as he turned to Sarah, “Mam? Are you ready to proceed?”
Sarah walked up slowly to the doors. It was a safe, no doubt in her mind with the giant tunable wheel on the front. She was sure that was mostly for show though as he looked at the digital keypad to the right of the door. It showed the same icon that had been on the pins both the driver and Nigel bore. The strange glyph of a hand holding a lightning bolt. She looked at Nigel but he just watched her expectantly. So this was where the job started.
The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.
Sarah walked up to the key pad and slowly pulled off one of her gloves. She ran her fingers along the metal, it’s cold smoothness rubbing her skin. She took a deep breath and let the power take her.
It started with a pull, like a black hole between her hands trying to drag her down face first into the screen. She felt like pieces of her were melting off, pulled into the vortex as she struggled to stand straight. Then came the voices, a jumbled mess of conversations too overlapped and inconsistent to follow. She tried tried to focus. Next came smell but not smells she recognized. The smell of soldering as the keypad components were assembled. The smell of construction as the building was created and the keypad was installed. Then the feelings. Of fingers pushing the screen. Of death and blood and terror.
She didn’t know how long she stood there but she eventually realized her hand hovered over the pad, ready to enter the right code. She pulled her hand back frantically and looked at Nigel sweating. She couldn’t hold his gaze, not after what she had just seen. Instead walked to the middle of the door and grasping the poles that stuck out of the safe door wheel. She grasped two opposite poles and rotated them clockwise before pulling them forward towards her. They swiveled forward on hinges with a soft click. Sarah grasped a third pole and did the same before pulling it towards her. She turned the wheel clockwise twisted the poles and then pushed all three poles back into their original positions with a soft click.
The key pad next to the safe beeped and the number pad was replaced by a table of strange glyphs. No not strange. Guardian glyphs, from the Lorenthian language. Sarah didn’t understand any of them but her hands flowed over the screen, tapping out a pattern of glyphs as if a phantom hand was guiding her. Maybe it was. She always remembered exactly what she saw, and she could recall it perfectly on demand. After a few minutes, there was a beep and large locks could be heard coming undone from within the safe door.
Sarah let out a breath she didn’t realize she’d been holding. She wiped the sweat off of her forehead and shakily sat down to the floor.
Nigel laughed softly and clapped his hands, ”Well Done Sarah. Well done indeed”
She forced a cracked smile and stepped back as the door suddenly began to open with a bang. She couldn’t see inside from where she stood, the edges of some storage shelves were just visible from the corner of the interior. Nigel moved forward as if to enter the chamber. Sarah let out a sigh of relief. Her part was done here. Whatever was going on, if they were using Guardian symbols in their security she wanted out. Walking forward, Nigel stopped just short of the safe entrance and held out his hand.
Sarah looked curiously inside and jerked back when a man stepped out of the safe, taking Nigel’s hand to exit. The man who emerged from the safe was tall, with dark hair that was streaked with silver. His eyes were a deep shade of brown, almost black, and seemed to bore into Sarah's soul as he glanced her way. She couldn't place his ethnicity - he had features that were a mix of native Sylverdol and Soventhian. But there was something unsettling about him, something that made her skin crawl.
He was dressed in a dark suit that was perfectly tailored to his muscular frame, and he wore a small pin on his lapel - the same lightning bolt and fist symbol that she had seen on Nigel and the driver. As he stepped out of the safe, he ran a hand over his hair and gave Nigel a nod.
"Excellent work, Nigel," he said in a deep, commanding voice. "And you must be Sarah. It's a pleasure to finally meet you."
He extended a hand towards her before Nigel had even begun to nod in acknowledgment, but Sarah hesitated. He smiled at her, but it was a cold, calculating smile that sent shivers down her spine.
"Don't be afraid, Sarah. I'm not going to hurt you… I was the one who hired you to break in to my safe.”
A hand slapped her on the back, brushing her neck and Sarah twisted away. Another man had walked up behind them laughing as he saw her face. “Don’t be scared now miss. You did an excellent job. My names Richard and the boss man here is Micah”
Sarah scratched at the back of her neck as it tingled where he had touched her.“Your safe…” She mumbled.
She couldn't get the memories of the blood out of her head. What would have happened if she hadn’t put in the right code? She wondered but she already knew. She’d seen what had happened to the others before her. Sarah felt her stomach twist. What the hell was going on? She was going to kill Kierin when she got a hold of his scrawny little neck. Micah noticed her discomfort and withdrew his hand before taking out an envelope from his coat pocket and placing it on a lab table to the left of Sarah. She quickly backed a few steps.
“Richard,” sighed Nigel, “Stay back please. We weren’t ready for you yet”
Richard looked over at Sarah who still felt confused by all the new people showing up, “Take a look at her. Shes freaked.”
Ignoring the two men Micah stepped forward and placed an envelope on a table by Sarah, “Here is ten thousand Ms. Brown. You can take it and leave if you would like. However I would like to offer you another business proposition. Think of this as an initiation test. Some of your time helping with an academic study of mine would be invaluable and it seems your powers could be very helpful.”
“What are you talking about an academic study?” shot Sarah, “ Im no good at school.”
Shit, he knew her last name. She knew for a fact Kieren didn’t know that. So how did these men have it? This situation was making her more and more uncomfortable by the second. She needed out. Now. But…. Who exactly were these men and what did they want. Curiosity rooted her to the spot.
“So why the audition?”
“Its always good to see a demonstration of a persons capabilities before investing in them.” said the man calmly.
“and no hard feelings if I say no?” said Sarah cautiously?
“None.”
Sarah paused for a minute. That was a lie. Not all of the dead applicants had failed to enter the safe. Some had tried to leave. She didn’t know what was going on but it didn’t look like she was in immediate danger. So the loon had hired her to break into his own safe. Maybe he wanted to come after the security company if it wasn’t up to standard. Maybe, though she would love to know what kind of standard this man asked for. She glanced over at Nigel. Hed been in those memories too, walking each of the applicants up to test the safe. Watching those that attempted to leave, his magic killing them without a word. Sarah had seen his magic work without a touch in those memories, with just a thought and a glance killed men and women alike as they fled.
“why do you think I can help?”
As Micah extended his hand, palm up, Sarah noticed something strange. Frost flashed across the skin of his palm and a white stem grew from the center. Soon a bulb expanded and icy blue petals unfurled, exposing white veins across the translucent shades of blue shimmering under the bright laboratory lights. Sarah gasped, he had magic. Unlike most magic users, this man seemed to create things with his magic that extended beyond his body while still within his control. The rose floated a few inches off of his hand and slowly rotated, a cold fog billowed in his cupped hand.
“Sarah, please let me introduce myself. My name is Micah Blackwood, and like yourself I can use magic. Mine is ice magic. I hear yours is very special in its own way, I was hoping you could help me with a personal history project”
He stepped back and gestured within the safe. Sarah’s curiosity overtook her and she stepped forward to take a look. Inside was shelves filled with an assortment of relics, antiques, and as best she could tell, things that belonged in a museum or a junk store. There was pottery and paintings depicting wild jungles and animals in bright colors that had faded with time. Broken pieces of wood and metal were gathered in boxes and rolls of thick parchment were organized into small shelves.
Sarah stepped in and started looking at everything intrigued. It’s smelled musty in here but everything was clean. No dust on any surface. She thought she could hear a low murmuring, like voices just behind a corner and beyond hearing. These pieces held a story, she didn’t need the small remaining scripts of guardian symbols etched around the artifacts to tell her that. Some of them held magic, it made her skin crawl with its strength. It was not the subtle blood magic of the guardian people. This was wild magic, ancient magic from before the fall of Atlans, the country that had long ago fallen off the edge of the world.
Atlans, a country lost to time and myth, was said to have been a magnificent metropolis at the edge of the known world in the Silverein Depths. It was a place where magic and ancient technologies coexisted in perfect harmony. Its people had open access to magic and tools that were unimaginable to the rest of the world.. The empire was said to have been spread along a network of colossal islands that floated on the very edge of the world, where the oceans poured over the edge into the infinite abyss below.
Atlans had been a center of knowledge, where scholars and mages gathered to study the arcane arts, and its libraries had been filled with texts from every civilization that had ever existed. Sovaria’s modern Academy paled in its attempts to reach Atlan’s level of glory. The citizens of Atlans were said to have unlocked the secrets of the universe, from the nature of time and space to the very essence of life itself.
However, one fateful day, the country simply vanished. Giant islands with vast cities and villages. Hundreds of thousands of people and animals gone in an instant. Some say it was a cataclysmic event, a consequence of the citizens tampering with forces beyond their understanding. Others believe it was the result of an invasion from another plane of existence or a deliberate act of sabotage by envious rival nations. Of one thing everyone could agree, no record of the country’s history had been left behind. Scraps and relics washed up on the shore every so often, with people claiming that it was from the ruins of Atlans. Still no stories and histories remained of Atlan or its people. Regardless of the cause, Atlans, its vast knowledge, and all of its secrets were lost to the ages, leaving behind only myths and legends. Even those too faded into obscurity with the centuries. Magic was not welcome in the world of today.
As Sarah looked around the safe, she couldn't help but wonder if some of these artifacts held the key to understanding what had happened to Atlans. If she could learn more about the country and its people, she might be able to learn more about wild magics. The Guardians had attempted to help her with controlling her own magic but she had less control than ever after all these years it seemed. Only the pills stopped every touch from invading her mind. Maybe there was another way, lost to time.
"Do you know anything about these relics?" Sarah asked, her curiosity getting the better of her.
Micah nodded, "Some of them are from Atlans, and others are from civilizations that have had contact with the lost city. I've been collecting them for years, trying to piece together the puzzle of Atlans and the magic its people possessed."
"And you think I can help you with that?"
Micah smiled, "I have no doubt. With your unique ability to tap into the past and the memories attached to these objects, you might be the key to unlocking their secrets."
Sarah considered the offer for a moment. While she was hesitant to get involved with such a mysterious man and his strange collection, the allure of uncovering the lost secrets of Atlans was too great to resist.
"Alright, I'll help you," she agreed, her voice barely a whisper.
Micah's smile broadened, and he extended his hand again, this time without the icy flower. "Welcome aboard, Sarah"
Sarah felt his hand clasp around hers and knew she was trapped. The safe had been a test alright. She had seen the trick with the wheel and remembered the correct guardian symbol sequence. She had watched the ‘failures’ before her. Spears of ice shooting out of the safe wall to impale would-be safe crackers, the magic ward hidden from mundane eyes but visible now that she knew where to look. She glanced at Nigel. He was the problem. She had seen the memory of men trying to walk away. Choosing not to go through with the test after finding the hidden killing ward. From across the room Nigel had smiled, a cold hard thing, and each of them had exploded in a fountain of gore and viscera. The mess slowly sliding itself off the walls and floors to pull itself neatly into a waste bucket for disposal at Nigel direction. He hadn’t moved. He hadn’t touched them to transfer his magic to them. Nigel had stood there watching, and the world had changed as he willed it. She knew the memory was still there even if the blood no longer was. She knew there was no saying no to these men. Not if she wanted to keep living.