I'll give Rev/Des this, I felt their pain.

The music itself was kind of a bland, bass heavy, fast rhythm, and light melody sound, similar to a thousand other pieces, even from my world. The notes served as an innocuous background to the message of shared suffering.

The vocals though, amazing. Truly marvelous.

The lead singer's performance was so haunting, so soulful that I caught myself a few times becoming entranced by their voice, even though I was trying to ignore the music and pay attention to the people swaying in the masses outside. I was curious if the voice was the product of chrome or not.

The band itself was playing on the roof, only a small crowd got to be up there to see them live. Big eddies for that privilege. Likely all wheelers and dealers perhaps some idle rich, with just a handful of super-fans splurging on a once in a blue moon show. Security was all the Mox's heavies. No one was getting near the band, without major iron and a lot of blood.

The club was jammed full of folks getting a full live broadcast experience for a lighter but still considerable price. Most folks were behaving and the general vibe was one of joyful sorrow. The Mox had a lot of their mid-liners keeping the peace in there.

The outside was sectioned off and a small fee was charged to hear the band from here. To be fair, it was a great experience out here. You could hear everything and still felt like part of the show. To all of our shocked expectations, no one caused any major trouble.

A few too handsy folks, and a brief scuffle over some imagined slight. Easily diffused by the boys.

We where working the event in pairs, I was with Jarous. Who was one of the first folks summoned by at the founding of New Lordaeron. He was a calm and jovial fellow, always with a lite quip or jape. A really likable guy.

Mostly we talked about how different things were here. Though the consensus amongst the troops was fascination at all the technology. To them, it was almost as if they were part of one of the legends of their world.

Well, I'll try my damnedest to make sure they really were legends in this world.

When the show was over. We helped hustle people out of the area. Then we helped with the clean up.

A few Probes would have speed this up considerably but I wanted the outposts all connected as soon as possible so I didn't call any out here. Though that did highlight that the Psifield now covered a good portion of the eastern half of the city. I could sense them working if I concentrated on it for a moment.

Nothing seemed out of sorts and I had no messages when I checked briefly.

Once everything was tidied up, we were allowed in the club for the afterparty.

Which was a subdued affair, at least by Mox standards.

Softer music, the lights were at a normal level. Most of the Mox were showing their real personalities rather than their working personas.

I was sipping a modest whiskey while sitting at a table with Rita, Raynor, John, Kimmie, Mateo and the Lead Singer of Rev/Des, Revy. Revy was a spitfire of a tall redheaded woman, she lived and breathed the stereotypes of redheaded women. Lots of fire.

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

It didn't hurt at all that she was quite a stunning woman. If I hadn't had Sally and Megan, I might have made a fool of myself. She was hard not to fall for.

The boys were mingling with the Mox and thankfully everyone seemed to be getting along just fine, maybe a little too fine... Nah, let them have their fun. We'd have some other crazy bullshit to deal with soon enough.

"Remember when you pulled Mateo down and spanked his ass in front of the whole club, all because he hit on your sister?" Rita was half way to drunk, which had me wondering what was wrong.

Though the out of place question pulled my thoughts back to the table. I scoped Mateo to see how he took it. The answer, with a shrug.

"I liked her, still do."

"Well, she needed to focus on her studies. Plus, we all know how your relationships end up Mattie." Revy laughed making a spanking motion.

Rita went quiet, thinking of something. Probably bad judging by her face.

Kimmie chirped, "You sister was Saphie, right?" Her tone was off. Ah, I saw where this was going.

"Yeah. A toast to my sister. May her name live a little longer." A toast for the departed. Revy did have an interesting way with words.

We all lifted our glasses to that. What heartless bastard wouldn't?

After the toast, I saw that Rita was looking at me with a thoughtful expression.

I raised my eyebrow at her, and circled my hand, even in this place it meant "Get on with it."

"Ryan you still have those drones right?" She began softly.

"Sure."

"Would you be willing to do me another favor?" She was subdued.

"Spit it out Rita, I promise the worst I'll say is no."

"Saphie's missing almost a year now. We have no clue what happened to her, none at all. Would you be willing to look into it?" She was looking down, she knew asking was crossing a bit of a line. Poking a sore point.

"Rita... " I struggled with myself for a moment. Then I saw the look on Revy's face. It was a sick kind of hope. She knew her sister was gone but not knowing the how or the why of the situation was slowly eating her up inside.

"Fuck. Okay, I'll look into to it. Send me all the detes, and I mean all of them. I don't care if you think they are not relevant. I don't care if it makes somebody else look bad. All of them."

Yeah, I was going to cheat my ass off. Feed all of that data to Alina and between the Probes and an Observer or two, if there was anything to be found we would find it.

"I'll pay you." I wasn't liking this version of Rita.

"Shut up, Rita. Tell me how you think you screwed up." That was the only reason I could see her behaving like this with an acquaintance like me.

"I was suppose to be her escort for a run up to Portland. We were going to meet up at Tom's for breakfast and head out, but she never showed." Her head was between her shoulders. She was slumped and had a defeated look.

"Rita, you gonk. Let me guess, you blame yourself. You think you should have let her stay with you the night before or something. Right?" She nodded, "Yeah, I'd likely carry that weight too. It ain't your fault but it sure would feel shitty. Hindsight's a bitch." I growled.

I looked at John. He nodded.

My glance at Raynor confirmed he was doing the same.

"Look, we'll do what we can. I don't need payment. Money's not our problem. We need connections here in the city. Promise to help us meet the right folks, and get us wired into the pulse of this town and we'll do everything we can to figure this out."

"Tha.." she pulled herself up a bit.

"Yeah, none of that. I'm not promising we can find anything, it's been way too long. So don't thank me for effort that will likely end up with nothing. If and when I find anything, then you can play kiss ass." I tried to show I was joking with a grin.

Rita gave me a smirk, "If that's what you want."

Kimmie chimed in, "Can I help?"

I gave her my best, "Are you Serious?" look.

Rita laughed, "He's dating Longshot Sally and Murdermind Megan, you'll have to talk to them about sharing."

What's this? Why is this the first time I've heard those names?

Kimmie blanched. So, they had quite the rep.

Revy whistled, "You must be some input. No one's had the balls to actually date those two. Though I know about a few of their conquests if you want to hear..."

"Let me stop you there. The past stays in the past, at least where that kind of thing is concerned."

The rest of our time there was light conversation and good company, with a few more drink thrown in.

I was going to have to have a conversation with the ladies when I got back.