Truth woke, having slept poorly. He had opted for a vacant office in a mostly empty office building. It looked like the previous tenants hadn’t even cleaned out the place when they left. All the office furniture was there. All the old files. Strange that the landlord hadn’t disposed of it either. Maybe it was tied up in a lawsuit or something. He poked around a little before bed. It seemed to have been a travel agency.

He slept in the fanciest office. It wasn’t the least bit more comfortable, but he liked to think he was maintaining standards. Everything was just too much at the moment. He would enjoy what humor he could find.

Truth could feel a good bit of moping coming on. He slapped his hands against his cheeks instead. “No moping! Today will be a busy, but good, day. Today, we start applying pressure directly to the System Astrologica. A positive, can-do attitude is required!”

He dusted himself off, packed his things, and set off back to the University. This time, he resolved to use his time a little more productively. There was a burglary target in the University, so it seemed foolish not to maximize his time. He would burgle, murder, then investigate a Starbrite office before raiding it. A full day.

The burglary target, according to Merkovah’s information, was in the Thomas and Martha Walton Center for Excellence in High Energy Thaumaturgy. Truth was a bit stuck when he saw it. How, exactly, does one describe sheer architectural violence?

It started, naturally, with concrete. A sort of white, or maybe gray… actually, it was hard to say if the color was intended, or the result of pollution and rain. It was the exact shade of depression. Windows, naturally, failed to be the same size or even on the same horizontal plane, tilting and morphing as they meandered across the walls. The overall shape of the building was somewhere between a stepped pyramid and the result of someone taking snuff made of colored tobacco, and sneezing onto a startled octopus.

There was a large plaque next to the door. Apparently, the building had won several awards. Truth memorized the names of the awarding bodies, swearing to find them if time permitted.

Mercifully, there was a building directory. His target was the Dr. Franklin Gaspard Memorial Laboratory, overseen by a Dr. Shihamratalmaranpi. His goal was to steal “Every memory crystal and recording talisman you can get your hands on.” He was also to expect everything to be in locked cabinets, likely quite well secured cabinets, and since the whole building was doing work of significant interest to governments and militaries everywhere, he should expect a non-trivial amount of security. Also, the Doctor himself was likely at least Level Four, and most of his staff would be Level Two or Three. So, unwise to screw around.

Truth figured that was fair enough, so he adopted a disguise. His clothes screamed “I’m coming back from a workout” so he leaned into it. He splashed water on his face, wetted down his hair, and tried to look tired. He was now a grad student coming back from a workout to start work. It didn’t take. He could force it, of course. But it would cost him a lot of energy.

He frowned, then grinned. He was a grad student… whose parents bought him his place. He was just here to get his evaluation signed by his professor, then it was straight back to the club. That clicked no problem. Truth felt very sorry for himself for exactly two seconds and then went to find the lab.

The door was more or less how the information packet described it- heavily locked, and heavily surveilled by recording talismans. Truth used a cunning ruse to bypass them. He knocked on the door.

Nobody answered. He knocked again.

There continued to be silence.

He knocked loudly and continuously, slightly varying his timing, trying to avoid patterns. He kept it up for five minutes. Eventually, an utterly frazzled and completely genuine grad student yanked the door open.

“WHAT?”

“‘Sup. Your ears working, brah?”

The door started to slam closed, but Truth caught it and held it open. “No can do, brah, got to get my thingy signed.”

“Your what signed?”

“Prof. S needs to sign my thingy so I can show the admin guy what a great lab assistant I am. You know. The thingy.” Truth waved a paper around.

“Doctor Shihamratalmaranpi-”

“No idea how you can pronounce that, brah. I’m out by “ham.”

“Doctor Shihamratalmaranpi is taking a meeting with Professor Cuinoird. He is not here. And you are definitely not one of his assistants. Tell you what, you have until I can reach the alarm gem to piss off.”

“Nah brah. I am legit an assistant to Doc S. Check the name on the form. Pretty sure you, and the Doc, know my parents.” Truth had shifted from boredom to a nasty smile. “Say, brah, how much do you cost? It’s got to cost a bit, keeping a full time lab assistant, right?”

The post doc started looking sick.

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“Not me, brah. I bring money to the lab. You got any Snakeblood? My hangover is killing me. Figure I can wait in a nice, quiet lab for Doc S.”

“Sure. Yeah. Just, you know, don’t touch anything. Uh… we may have Snakeblood in the fridge. Blue flavor ok?”

“Shit yeah brah, just not Green.”

“I’ll check.” He led Truth into the lab.

“Any idea on Doc’s ETA? I thought he was going to be in by now.” Truth looked around the lab. He didn’t know what he was expecting, but scrupulously clean black stone tables was not it. A lot of very complicated, very clearly cobbled together formations, and some talismans that looked badly in need of maintenance even if he didn’t know what they did lay on the tables.

“Uh. He was supposed to be in by now. Apparently Cuinoird got his hands on some test platform they wanted for a joint project.”

“Oh sweet.” Truth didn’t care, and it showed in his voice. Then he frowned. “Wait. I know that name. Cuinoird. Isn’t he a bio guy?”

“Yeah. It’s one of those not-secret-at-all secrets. He’s working on human-nephilim hybridization.”

“Brah, even I know how to do that. Fuck a nephilim.”

“I mean, after a person is already born. And, you know, not compatible.” The lab assistant shrugged.

“So what’s that got to do with Doc S?”

“Nephilim hold more and more energy in their bodies as they get older. They are actually more energy dense than human mages of a roughly comparable level. A lot more. Like… crazy more. So much more that they should just explode or turn into toxic goo. But they don’t. They can store that energy safely, somehow. So, I can’t tell you the details, but I think you can figure out why they are working together on something. And why your parents are probably sponsoring Cuinoird too.”

Truth nodded. The name had clicked into place. It was the professor Sophia was studying under. It had been in one of the drops, along with details about what Harmony was up to. No information about Vigor, of course. Who Truth had left in alarming circumstances back in Conjin.

Perhaps it was that, or the lack of beauty sleep, or the sheer stress and pressure of the last few weeks. Perhaps it was the isolation in the horrible, depressing apartment. Whatever it was, Truth made an uncharacteristically selfish decision.

“You know what? No offense brah, but I don’t feel like hanging around. Where is Cuinoird’s office?”

“You want to burst in on a meeting of two of the top natural philosophers in the world, so they can sign your “thing?”

“Brah. Were you not paying attention? I’m being forced to run around after the help. Now. Where are they?”

Truth ignored the building the bio-labs were in. Presumably it was some sort of architectural horror. That wasn’t important right now. He was fixated on seeing Sophia.

He didn’t know why, exactly. It just seemed like the most important thing in the world to confirm that she was alive and well. That she was, in fact, thriving. That even at the end of days, she was following her dreams. That she was getting everything out of education that Truth had dreamed for her. But most of all, that she was okay. That even without her big bro hovering around, she was okay.

He made his way to Cuinoird’s laboratory. It too was festooned with security measures, uselessly so, because the door had been propped open with a chair. The reason quickly became obvious, as it banged open and a young woman rushed out. She was passed by a young man rushing in. Two minutes later, he was out again, and a third person, another woman, was rushing in.

“I don’t give a damn, not one damn! My patrons demand results, and you whine about funds? You tell them that Cuinoird demands his order this instant, and if they want their fee, they can wait their turn. And if they don’t give it to you, I expect you to leap over the counter and beat them until they cough it up!”

“Professor, that’s-”

“Your job, or you may see yourself out and go whistle for any sort of reference!”

There was a long silence. “Yes, Professor.”

There was another flurry of activity.

“Imbeciles. The most obvious things in the world need to be explained, yet they expect to be coddled like geniuses.” Truth had never met Professor Cuinoird before, and he already didn’t like him. Still, when god-complexes open a door…

He walked in. There was an intense, charismatic man, if a bit whiffy, bent over a naked woman. Truth didn’t recognize the woman. There was a light projection above her, showing a tiny collection of dividing cells. This was apparently the subject of immense interest to the Professor. Truth didn’t know which of the hangers-on was Doctor Shihamratalmaranpi, but it didn’t really matter. He didn’t see Sophia either, which mattered a great deal more. Maybe she was one of the runners.

“Excuse me, Professor? I heard you needed some things collected by someone willing to use violence to obtain them?”

“What slanderous-” The Professor spun around, clocked Truth’s physique, and slammed to a halt. “Young man, how well do you know your genealogy?”

“I know my father and mother, and my siblings.” Truth shrugged.

“Would you like an exciting opportunity to participate in a research study?”

“Probably not.”

“I would pay considerably more for your assistance than I would for package collection.”

Truth hesitated. Sophia worked in this laboratory. It could be a way to see her.

“Let’s say I’m open to it. But I wouldn’t want to pull you away from the business at hand.” He nodded at the naked woman. She appeared to be awake, but didn’t appear aware of anything going on around her. Odd.

“Mmm. First sensible thing I have heard in an hour that I didn’t say. Have a seat somewhere.” Truth hopped up on a lab table and watched the work. He didn’t understand a single blessed thing that was happening. He did notice Sophia coming out of a little room off to one side of the lab. A few minutes later, a rather harried young man brought around mugs of coffee for the already tenured.

Truth felt Incisive tingling. He frowned, focusing on that feeling more. Usually he only got a bare second’s worth of notice of danger. Unless it was quite a big danger.

One of the coffee drinkers spat out their drink, spraying the naked woman. “What the hell is in this coffee?!”

Truth turned towards Sophia. She looked surprised. No, she looked “surprised.” He got his feet under him and leapt towards her. The blast caught him before he even got clear of the table.