It turned out that Teddy’s grand gesture of offering up his badge was just just that, a gesture. They hadn’t had time since they got back to have their badges renewed and it was still his iron rank badge. Vincent had grabbed a piece of paper and scrawled on it and the same assistant came in to take away their old badges and to bring back a functionary who would take a new aura imprint for the bronze rank badges.
While they waited Lucy questioned how Vincent was summoning the assistant each time and he revealed that she had the Paper and highly sought after Time essence. She had a precognition ability to see written information within her aura which made her very valuable, they had her carefully vetted and anything sensitive was written well outside her aura.
Once the badges were complete they had their new stars put on. One each for Lucy, Kyra and James and two stars put on for Teddy. They asked for their old badge wallets and carefully took the Remore annex ribbons out and placed them into their new wallets. Vincent reminded them that they would mean almost nothing once they travelled far enough away from Greenstone but the team thought they weren’t complete without them.
Teddy then explained his plan that he had thought of, making sure the door was well closed and they used their privacy bubble as an extra precaution. None of the team had failed to notice that there was something much larger at play here and they were being used as pawns, they were going to take as much control as they could in keeping the team safe.
Once they left the society campus they headed home to the villa, they had three days until the shipment arrived and had picked up some contracts to keep them busy. The water contracts were never well valued by the locals as they were often more trouble than they were worth for the low powered monsters that were hard to spot out in the massive deeps beyond the marina.
………
Three days later Genevieve Picot was standing at the adventure society docks overseeing the unloading of the ship that pulled in that morning. She had looked over the manifest in detail. The teams below loaded the various exotic stores onto different carts to be taken all over the city and some onto more robust carts to go further inland.
She was satisfied with the progress the team was making. She was content in general until she felt a familiar presence approach. She turned to see the woman approach, a perpetual pursed mouth like she was sucking on a sour sweet. Although an essence user the beautifying effects hadn’t taken away her haughty look.
“Trinette Whipparrel, a pleasure to see you here, a lucky happenstance this morning? I didn’t see your name on any of the goods in the manifest.”
“Genevieve,” the haughty woman started before the Director interrupted her.
“That’s Madam Director Mrs Whipparrel, I am here in an official capacity and while I am open to pleasantries one must be careful not to be distracted.”
Trinette’s lips somehow managed to get even more pursed.
“Madam Director, I’ll cut the pleasantries then to keep you at your business. You know the package I am here for, our friends over the sea have kept me apprised of the delays.”
Genevieve tried not to prickle at the constant intrusions of the families into adventure society business, the movement of the goods was an infrequent but routine shipment. It had been going on for so many years that the families had sunk their hooks in.
“What concern is it of yours where the package is? You are not currently under contract.”
“No we are not.” Trinette used the collective term to imply the collective aristocratic families. “And I cannot see those who are contracted here either which is worrying considering the value of the goods.”
“The contract is between the Society administration and the contracted adventurer, you should not even know who is contracted.”
“Yes yes the society is a bedrock of integrity and efficiency. So where are the Mitchells then? You’ve kept them away from me for some time now.”
“The Mitchells are their own agents, they are free to come and go and as long as they take any directed contracts as issued from this office then they may live their own lives and take or not take whatever contracts they wish.”
“So you have not directed them to this contract then?”
“I am not discussing their contract status at the moment, you may book an appointment to see the clerk for any open records of their activity or you may petition if you have valid reason to suggest that they are not conduction a contract in progress adequately to be removed from said contract by my office.”
Trinette sensed that she was not going to get anywhere with the director and turned to face the unloading of the ship.
“So where are the wonderful Mitchells I wonder.” She muttered to herself.
………
Three days earlier, when the Mitchells got home to the villa after confirming that they were indeed going to take the contract they sat around the dining table discussing the way ahead.
“Teds, why did you pick up so many water contracts? They’re trash contracts for adventurers that specialise in water to get paid. Shouldn’t we be spending more time getting ready for the big trip?” James opined.
“He’s explained this,” Kyra helped as Teddy had just taken a big bite. “We need it to not seem suspicious that we’re heading out each day to the ocean. We’ve taken enough contracts out to make it feasible for three days worth of hunting.”
Teddy swallowed his mouthful. “Exactly, except we’re rockstars and going to bust out three days worth of hunting in one day, then hand the completed contracts in at the end of day one, they file them one day at a time to make it look like we’re coming and going.”
James picked up a large hunk of meat by the bone protruding from one end and took a huge bite, speaking around his mouthful while chewing he argued his point. “Still seems we could have taken less.”
The next morning they were up at the first hint of daylight, Teddy, Lucy and Kyra all carried a barrel from the house and James carried one under each arm. Kyra had the Serenity model appear in front of them into the courtyard and they loaded the stores. Gerald came out behind them with a box of food.
“That’n there is the first lot, I’ll be makin another batch while your oot hunting an that should be enough coffee to see you for the interim, seein as you’re going to be going away for so long I may even see what the locals think of your special brew.”
“Thankyou Gerald, we’ll try and ration it but there truly is nothing like a morning cup of coffee.” Kyra said patting him on the arm.
With the Serenity loaded up they took it out of the villa and headed for the coast. Not long after they were speeding through the waves looking for their first target. Teddy was at the wheel and the others stood in the wheelhouse with him to chat.
“Once we’ve taken this first closest one together we’ll split up. I’m going to take lefty, Kyra take righty, Lucy you get the Serenity and James you get wet.”
“Maybe we need names for the two buggies as well?” Kyra suggested.
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“That’s a discussion we can have on our very long trip away. At the moment lefty and righty work. Coming up to the first area.” Teddy could see on his map which was always more detailed that they were in a shaded red area that had populated on his map when he took the contract. He had a series of them out in the open water, some with arrows down for depth, the intent was to guide the others into these areas. The bigger excitement he had to explain to the others was when they had accepted the large contract and had been given a map, it had copied across before they had unfurled it and he had seen the distance. Pallimustus was roughly the same size and shape of continents as Earth with a few differences. Greenstone was in the south west region of Africa. They saw that they had to take the cargo to the equivalent of Egypt and then Bulgaria.
Lucy went out the back of the wheelhouse on the top deck then around to the front of the boat. She raised her right hand and a stream of runes flowed down her arm to form a circle at the end, the runes didn’t stop and a second circle formed. She aimed high into the air and fired a magic missile. The royal blue magic surged out of her hand, looking like it would have come from a large artillery piece. It hit the first circle and changed from the missile to a ball of force, it then hit the second circle and was wreathed in fire. It arced over the sky and hit the surface of the water, disappearing still flaming and sizzling under the water. Teddy slowed the boat so as not to get too near, shortly there was an explosion and a plume of water shot straight up.
“Magical depth charges, nice.” James said.
“The force wave doesn’t react well to water, its cocooned by the magical flames until they are eroded by the water at which point, boom.”
“And who doesn’t like boom? …when its not directed at them.”
“I can adjust the depth of the charge with how much strength I put into the second rune circle.”
“Nice.” Teddy said. “This should flush it out in no time.”
After they had repeated the process a few times they saw the long dorsal fin headed for the boat.
“Game on.” Teddy said, spinning the wheel and accelerating at it.
From nowhere a dark bolt plunged out of the sky and snatched the twenty foot long serpent out of the water and carried it up. Lechuza shredded the body with her talons and beak.
“Well I suppose she is the best hunter.” Teddy said. He marked the targets and he and Kyra went and got their dune buggies out.
As with the main vehicle they didn’t produce wheels when on water. They sat low in the water and behaved like jet skis with no visible propulsion. They zipped around the Serenity to get used to the movement. James was still on the top deck with Lucy, he gave her a hug and moved to the prow and dived off headfirst. Before he hit the water he transformed into a dinosaur looking creature, his jaws were huge and double hinged to extend further, the neck was five foot long and slender and muscled. The body was a smooth oval shape with large fins, the tail was a mirror of the neck but split into five individual tails, three were different in that they were tentacle-like with razored suckers down their entire length and the other two were smooth muscle tails with barbs on the end.
[Ok team, time to split, then when you’re done go help whoever you’re nearest then we’ll all meet up, keep a water breathing potion on you at all times; thats in place of a life jacket. Don’t go out of range, Lechuza is going to be airborne for extended range but don’t test it as she’s going to be hunting as and when she sees things.]
They split up, Teddy raced James for a little until the monster looking creature that was his brother dived to find something his enhanced animal senses picked something up and Teddy zoomed off to his own hunt.
The end of the day had Lucy, Kyra and Teddy were back on board. Kyra was treating Teddy for a magical healing resistant chemical burn on his neck where an octopus-type monster had sprayed him. They saw the dark shadow approach them under the water towards the boat and had a moments fear until they checked the map and saw the familiar blue dot come towards them. The monster launched out of the water as if it was jumping clear over the Serenity bobbing in the water. It shrunk in mid air and James appeared, the arc changed and he landed dripping wet on the back deck. Teddy checked the map, as they had been hunting they had been checking in with him and he had marked each area as complete. With a clean sweep he took the wheel and spun the Serenity towards Greenstone and chased the setting sun back home.
They weren’t shy as they parked up in the marina. The Serenity could produce a powerful light from within the crystal, shining a cool blue light to see the dock so they could pull alongside. They left a few running lights on and Koda asleep on the gangplank whilst they walked past the renovations after the battle to turn in their contracts.
They met the sleepy clerk who was surprised to see anyone turning in contracts so late, even though the desk was manned at all times, there was a general acceptance after completing a contract and returning home that turning it in could wait until the next day. The clerk was even more flustered to realise there were special instructions for if the Mitchells were to come in. The team waited patiently while the clerk read and understood what they were meant to do before they bid them a goodnight and headed back out. They headed back to the dock to find Koda on all fours watching a group of men nervously standing around a bunch of crates and a few barrels.
“Err, got some deliveries for yer?” The oldest man said. “We woulda loaded em for yer but the big guy didn’t like that idea.”
Koda sat and ruffled his neck fur by twisting his head back and forth, his way of saying no.
“Probably for the best.” James said. He held out his arm and Koda absorbed into him, swelling him in every proportion.
“Neat trick Mr!” The youngest and smallest and kind of weedy member of the delivery team said.
“Yeh you need something to get you to grow.” One of the others teased him.
“Yeh stop you being quite so useless.”
“Maybe you’d be able to get a girl if you could grow.”
The team didn’t join in with the laughter that the group of men started. It wasn’t the good natured banter of a group of comrades but actual bullying.
“What’s going on? Who are you all to him?” Teddy asked.
“Beggin yer pardon Mr, he’s me youngest. They’re all me boys see? He just needs a bit of toughening up.” The older man who had spoken before said.
Kyra turned to the boy. He was a young man, skinny, obviously a different build to his brothers and as much as his father wanted to ‘toughen him up’ he was never going to be as burly as his brothers.
“Pardon me, What’s your name?” She asked.
“Sheldon Miss.”
One of the older boys clapped him on the back of the head.
“It’s Ma’am you dolt.”
Kyra stared daggers at the older boy and he backed off going pale.
(Kyra Mitchell) has requested [Octopus essence] from (Theodore Mitchell).
Accept Y/N?
Teddy saw the notification pop up on his interface.
[What are you about to do?] he asked her as he approved the item transfer. Trusting her. He had looted the essence from the monster that had got him with the acid which was the only reason he wasn’t so annoyed about getting hit.
Item: [Octopus Essence] (unranked, common)
Manifested essence of an Octopus (consumable, essence).
Requirements: Less than 4 absorbed essences
Effect: Imbues 1 awakened Octopus essence ability and 4 unawakened Octopus essence abilities.
Kyra held her hand out and a mirror appeared, she looked at her other hand with the mirror and the essence appeared and she held it out to the boy in front of her.
“Well Sheldon, maybe this will help you get one over on your brothers and get them off your back.”
The young man looked at her in confusion, not really understanding what was going on. The other boys looked amazed and jealous, a few had mean expressions. The father looked like he was going to pass out. None of the family had any essences.
“That, thats for me? What did you want me to do?” The boy asked in confusion.
“I would like you to take it, then help your brothers load our boat, then you can head home.” She tossed him a bronze rank coin. “That should more than enough pay for a ritual to absorb the essence at the magic society.” She looked around the brothers and flexed her aura, her Resolve of Diamond aura was domineering and even though they weren’t essence users they felt the power. “If on my return to the city I find that you have been stopped from taking this essence I will not be pleased.” And for effect she had the earth tremble slightly under their feet. She smiled and place the essence in his hand, patting his shoulder as she walked past him and up the gangplank. Lucy, Teddy and James all looked at each other and shrugged. Lucy followed her up the gangplank and the boys helped load the stores.
When they were back on board they had gently dimmed the lights so no one would notice then silently slipped the boat out of the docks in the night, the black water absorbing the dark blue boat. When they were far enough away Teddy opened up the throttle, speeding them out into the empty ocean.
“We just casually changing peoples lives now then K?” Teddy asked her.
“Don’t we change peoples lives every day? Every time we save a village or kill a wild monster. I just can’t stand bullies. He was destined to live in their shadow and take their abuse forever, now he can stand up to them.”
Teddy gave her a one armed hug from where he was standing at the wheel.
“You’re a hell of a woman Kyra.”
With Koda up front on the prow Teddy locked off the steering on the boat while it powered on. He and Kyra went belowdecks to the middle deck with the large dining room, the kitchen and the lounge at the front. Lucy and James had just finished putting away all the supplies in the cupboards and left out a plate of cold cuts for dinner.
“I reckon we’ll meet the ship about this time tomorrow.” Teddy said.
“Good, time for a couple of hands.” Lucy said as she shuffled a pack of cards. They sat down and had a game of cards at the table. Just them, with their family, with their boat. In the middle of the ocean with the lights of Greenstone shrinking in the distance.