"I'm thinking we get one, and I put machinery in it, pilot it. Maybe even remotely. What do you think?"

Evening.

The room, or as Displo had started calling it, the Base Camp.

You, Displo, S (through the laptop), Agoti, Kapi and Tabi were all sitting at the table. TURINGS was booting, the same hologram of the compound present on the screen. It was a meeting of prospective criminals and an unusual amount of musicians.

As Displo set up TURINGS he had started talking about the operation fallout. Just a quick recap. Everyone had been paid as promised. Even S got his paid. He was given some 'rings', the main currency of Mobius. Not that he needed it but insisted he be compensated. Displo had already given you the rundown yesterday and everyone had been interviewed (except S).

"We have two main things to discuss tonight." You started once Displo had settled. "Displo, you go first."

"Thank you. After yesterday it has become apparent we need a magic user. Between the size of the compound and the 'inhuman' aspect of the Family having a magic user is imperative. I made this observation yesterday. It is without a doubt an inevitability that they will use magic against us. To have an expert in our ranks would make things easier."

"I believe they may even have such precautions set up already." Even though everyone was paying attention, Displo slammed his hand on the table, causing Kapi to flinch.

"Do any of you know any magic users?" He said dramatically.

You and Kapi shook your heads. S didn't know anyone sans the crew, so he was out. Agoti looked at Tabi.

"Well, we know someone..." Agoti said coyly.

"Absolutely not. We do not need that witch." Tabi shot right back. Agoti took a second to reply, watching Tabi. "Yeah..I think you're right."

"Who?" You ask.

"Just some nuisance. Don't worry about it." Tabi said.

"Well we do need a magic user. I already know IRIS supplying one is out of the question." Displo said.

But other than Tabi and Agoti's 'nuisance' nobody had an idea. With no direct people the discussion switched to recruitment.

"How the hell do we recruit a mage?" Tabi asked. He had a shoe on the table edge, leaning off the chair, rocking back and forth.

"You really don't know a single magic user?" Displo asked. He seemed more surprised than anything. "No."

"I find that hard to believe. No offence intended but have you not sought out a magic user to correct your 'issues'?"

Tabi glared at Displo. "Tch." He said nothing further.

"Can't we just put ads out?" S asked.

"Uh no. We can't just advertise 'hey we need a mage to help us take out the most powerful people in the city, oh yeah you might get killed or worse btw'." Agoti said sarcastically.

"Well we can have a tournament, have them fight it out and the winner will be our mage." S said.

"That sounds cool! We could do a DDR thing; winner joins the team!" Kapi added.

"We are getting off-track. What about friends of friends? Have none of you ever even met a magic user?" Displo asked.

"I knew people on the force who used magic, but none of them will join. I can guarantee that." You say.

"What about recruiting a criminal?" Kapi asked.

"We kinda already tried that earlier when we were looking for a hacker. I could look again. I'm kind of interested in recruitment though. Maybe not a billboard ad but what if we asked around, 'super-secret team' looking for a skilled magic user, spread it through our circles."

"I don't even know anyone I could ask." Tabi said.

"Yeah, you don't want my fans on this team. It'll make it too awkward." Agoti mused. "Well, there's one fan but she's not even a magic user." He looked to Tabi.

"Ayana?" He asked.

"Yeah. She might know. Been a minute since I spoke to her though."

"Bah. I have nothing to say to her right now. You can ask. I'm good." Tabi said, tapping out. He adjusted his seat and sat upright again.

"I know what we can do." You say. "I knew of a secret service agency that recruited people by making them solve riddles. Anyone smart enough to do it would be offered membership."

"That true?" Kapi asked.

"Apparently. They were called, uh, Cicada...something. Either way what if we made a riddle or something to recruit magic users. Like a cypher. Someone bold enough to solve it would probably be interested in the whole 'mystery of conspiracy'."

"That is a good idea (Y/N) but I wouldn't even know how to begin constructing such a thing." Displo said as he sat down.

"Magic, eh? I think I get it." S chimed in. He had the Wikipedia page of magic open and was reading it. "This looks pretty much like what I can do. Just in real life." Despite having complete control over the system, S instead walked to the scroll bar and forcibly pulled it down. "Yeah. I think I can make something. And get it around too! It'll be just like my last calling card."

"You can make something for us?" Displo asked.

"I think I can. Yeah. I'll just need some time. It's gonna be perfect, just you watch." S smiled, blood dripping from his eyes. While you had gotten used to S' monstrous appearance Displo hadn't, finding him disturbing to look at.

"Well that will solve that. As for other roles we'll have to discuss them later. The departments are still processing their recommendations for us." Displo said.

"That solves that." You conclude. "Kapi? You wanna fill us in on your idea?" You ask, passing the torch to the cat boy.

"Yeah. Well I, uh.." Kapi started to say only to trail off after seeing Tabi look at him.

"What we discussed at the bakery." You say.

"R-right. I don't think I'm going to be the, um, guy running in."

It was clear he was having an issue trying to get to his point.

"Take your time. We can come back to it later. I can discuss more on the compound." Displo said.

"No!" Kapi took a deep breath, collecting his thoughts.

"Alright, so I can't be the guy who runs in. I did horribly yesterday, I can't disguise, it is not for me, but I spoke with (Y/N) and I'm good at robotics and I think that might be able to help." Kapi spoke with run-on sentences. You weren't sure why he was so anxious about it. Perhaps he held everyone else to a higher standard.

"Interesting. A roboticist could definitely help. We haven't worked out the attack and defense groups, but you could easily fit on either team. What kinds of robots?" Displo asked, now interested.

"Like, uh, robots. Suits? I could probably control a drone. N-not like you 'course."

"I am an android. Not a robot. What do you mean by suits?"

"Y-y'know like pilots, mech-suits. I'm not lying this time! I can do it!"

"Ah. Well that is very useful. You should have mentioned it earlier. I'm sure I could have requested something for the operation."

"Yeah, anyways. I thought I could pilot something...like, uh, if you know who D.Va is. From that Overwatch mercenary group."

"Like Eggman! I like it. You're exactly my nemesis!" S exclaimed enthusiastically. If he was physical, he would have patted Kapi on the back. "So you can build the kinds of machines he made?" S asked.

"I presume you have some sort of machinery in mind?" Displo asked.

"Yep. It's just..uh...hold on..." Kapi mumbled. He started rifling through his satchel, flipping through papers.

"I might be able to actually provide some sort of machinery-"

"No, hold on. I got it right...here!" Kapi said pulling a bunch of papers out. He started flipping through them.

"I was at work today and there's this old magazine. I borrowed it, it has this cool toy that I would be perfect for this. Hmmmm...here." He ripped a page out of the magazine and put it on the table for everyone to see. It had glitched the hologram that was still on. With the unseen flick of a switch, Displo turned off TURINGS and the lights came on, illuminating the advertisement.

Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.

"I'm thinking we get one, and I put machinery in it, pilot it. Maybe even remotely. What do you think?"

Though Kapi was on a different side of the table you could still see the paper, albeit upside-down. It was from some old children's toy catalog. It had to be at least 20-30 years old as evident by its yellowed edges and sepia tint. It was a one page spread about some toy company. You could make out that it was an interview, presumably with someone at said company.

It displayed a bunch of different toys. Kapi had pointed to a specific one. It was long blue toy that looked like an anorexic Cookie Monster. There were some words captioned under it.

"Lemme see." You take the paper and flip it properly.

'Figure 4-13. Playtime Co. has just unveiled its new 'family' sized toy! Say hello to its newest member!

Huggy Wuggy.' You read that aloud.

Its dimensions were also listed. It looked to be a huge toy, taller than Displo and maybe even the ceiling. You couldn't envision its true size from dimensions alone. You put the paper back. Displo, Agoti and Tabi were confused at what Kapi was even proposing. Huggy looked a bit like a monkey. With the paper now within the laptop's sight, S looked at it.

"Is that me?" S asked, peering through the camera.

"What? No. It looks nothing like you." Kapi said.

"Well I can't see it properly. Someone move my camera down."

"So you want us to get one of these...blue things and you can turn it into a mech?" Tabi asked. Through unintentional it came out as sarcastic.

"Yep!" Kapi said, beaming.

"May I?" Displo asked, picking up the paper and studying it himself.

"To be honest, I like it. But, what you gonna put in it?" Agoti asked, interested.

"Whatever we need. I can easily hollow it out and re-enforce it. B-but I'll need some parts. Displo?" Kapi asked.

"Just a second. I'm checking where to purchase one of these. Hmmm. Thought so." Displo was staring at the paper, studying it.

After a minute, Displo put it down. "I'm afraid this toy was never put up for sale." Displo's changed something on TURINGS, and it came back to life. As if a terminal was in front of you a news article came up. A similar hologram appeared in front of everyone excluding S, who forced one to appear anyways.

"It appears this Playtime Company was shut down due to unspecified violations 35 years ago." Displo said. You scroll through the article for any inspector names you might know. It was far before your time on the force.

There weren't any names listed.

"W-wait really?" Kapi said, reading the article. He was silently cursing himself for not looking it up earlier, now feeling like an idiot.

"But...according to leaked manufacturing logs and some old forum posts it appears this toy was actually made. Just never released." Displo continued as he searched.

"Oh. So we can get one then!" Kapi said, trying to salvage his idea.

"It appears as if their central manufacturing factory was based out of this city. Looking through addresses it appears as if this factory is still standing, albeit abandoned in the U.E. Industrial Park."

"Well let's go!" Kapi said, happiness returning.

"Hold on. I'm not going to go break into some factory on a whim. Especially an abandoned one." Tabi spat. "Who knows what could be lurking in there. Plus it says here there have been disappearances. Count me out." Tabi pointed to the article.

"What about security?" Agoti asked.

With the flick of the wrist, Displo made the hologram of the factory come up.

"Breaking into something like this would be good practice though. And it's structure is a little similar to the compound." Displo made both appear. The only similarity was that they were both 'box-shaped'. "Hrm. I am afraid I cannot find any information regarding it's existing security systems. It may actually be completely abandoned."

"Pfft. Let me look. I'll find it." S said before vanishing.

Agoti had been staring at the photo, tuning most of the conversation out. "I think you can easily turn this guy into a war machine. I don't know about disguising and just walking in. This guy would be pure offense."

"I'm fine with that. I can't disguise. It's just not my thing. The operation proved that." He sighed. "Ooo! What if I carried bombs with it, help us blow up the vault door?!"

Agoti smiled. "That could work. Tabi here's pretty much a demolitionist."

"Unofficially. I can make them but I'm not that good at it." Tabi said, looking away.

"Really man? I've seen the stuff you cooked up. You're a damn terrorist!" Agoti said, not intending to sound insulting.

Tabi just shook his head. "And it detonated at the wrong time. If it worked I would have defeated those two. I stopped doing it after joining this crew. I prefer working with fire anyways."

S returned, forcing the laptop to make an audible notification sound. "There's no security. In fact I can't even scan the place. It has no network. It's just an empty spot on the electrical grid."

"Well then getting in should be easy." Kapi added.

"If they even have any of that blue guy left." Tabi said.

"Well. I'm not against it. Displo's right. It would be good practice." You say, defending Kapi.

"Y'know what, count me in." Agoti said.

"Then it is settled. When you 3 are free, I will assist and Kapi will lead an expedition into this factory, retrieve this 'Huggy' and I will work on getting the parts."

"Awesome!" Kapi said.

"You sure you don't want to help?" You ask Tabi. He shook his head without saying a word.

"Was there anything else we needed to discuss?" You ask.

"Yes. Since we're 'picking classes' I want to choose. If he gets to be a mechanic, it's only fair I get a role."

"This is not some video game, Tabi. I assure you whatever talents you have will be considered by all of us fairly." Displo said.

Tabi looked to you with a confused look. You just shrug.

"Shoot." You say.

"In the operation I will be in charge of the pyrotechnics. I know how fire works. I used to be the lead pyro during my old concerts. I even did some for Agoti here."

"Alright, change what I said. You can just melt the vault door." Agoti laughed.

"Sure. I'm sure that'll help." You reply.

"I am in agreement. Do you have your tools still?" Displo acknowledged.

"He's got 'em. They're still at my place." Agoti said playfully.

"That is correct."

"Dunno if dad will let you take them, but ehn, we'll see."

"Very well. With nothing further to discuss I presume we end this meeting. S. You will be creating the riddle, correct?"

"Yep! I will be working on it soon as this is over!"

"Then I would like to thank you all for coming. Our next meeting is tomorrow, and we shall begin planning the factory break-in."

With that the meeting came to a close. It was decided that the factory expedition would occur on the weekend when everyone was off work. Tabi had refused to come but you did not expect it should cause any problems.

At home you found a bouquet of chocolates at your front door. It was suspicious at first but upon reading it apparently some people at the station had put together a belated Easter gift. It had already been opened and some chocolates were gone. You just pick it up and dump it on the kitchen counter. Clearly it was just an afterthought.

After a rough night of sleep you found yourself at work, around dinner time, napping on the desk at the lobby. You moved some potted plants in front so customers couldn't see. You had spent earlier lunch time dealing with a group of rowdy kids. They had taken a lot out of you.

IRIS' recommendations came through for Blindside. At work Displo discussed it with you. While you had expected some actual help it was just a bunch of complaints. Tabi was too scary looking, Agoti was too violent, Kapi got caught instantly, and the report had retconned it to say he was caught be security and not some scientist outshining the actual security teams. Absolutely no mention of S. To Displo's agreement you just tore it up.

Your nap didn't last long when S started freaking out on your phone. "I can't believe it! (Y/N) look at this! Get up!" He shouted through your phone speaker.

Groggily you look at your phone. "I posted the riddle, really complicated, and someone cracked it! Even did the exact thing I asked."

S was jumping up and down in some messaging app S had installed. There were a bunch of messages exchanged with a random user called "Applejack1".

Looking through them it appeared as if the mystery person had broken S' riddle and was messaging him.

"Read this. Not only did someone solve it but they know really good magic." S exclaimed.

You were glad that there weren't any customers around to hear.

You scroll through the messages. After solving the riddle they reached out to S and contacted them. From there S and them wrote to each other, S gaging how much magic they knew. A few encyclopedia pages on magic were dumped in the chat as well, S having to figure certain things out as Applejack1 explained them.

There were a few grainy videos of someone or something casting fireballs and thunder. Whoever they were the videos were low quality.

You also notice that in one of the opening messages S repeatedly referred to the crew and heist as 'saving the world' and "to be part of history". It looked as if he advertised the whole cypher as a recruitment ad for some shadowy organization, fully taking the idea from you.

Based on the texts that followed not only did Applejack1 believe it to be that but S only laid it on further telling them that they'd 'be part of something big'.

"Where did you advertise this?"

"On some website called pony-island. I saw that the horses were sparkling, figured it was a magic forum."

You'd never heard of the site. You decide to ask Displo later. Either way, in no time at all did S find a magician.

Despite S' obvious lies the conversation between them was friendly. S had taken the username SonicFromEarth5.

The last message was an address to Applejack1's home. Looking at the address you roughly recognized the area. It was out of the city, deep in the farms and rural settlements. S had agreed to meet them on the weekend, the same time as the factory expedition.

"What do you think? I think they're a keeper. What do you say?"

"We gotta tell Displo about this. But sure. We gotta reschedule though. That's when the factory event is."

"Bah. Just send Tabi to go collect them. He's not coming anyways."

When you explained it to Displo later he was not very happy. "I am not surprised you haven't heard of this site, (Y/N). It's a children's game where they play with virtual horses."

"Who cares what the site is used for? We got a magic user."

Displo pinched his where his nose would be. "I don't think we are going to get much out of this but very well." He said with a sigh. "It shall be discussed at the meeting."

The meeting that night was brief. You and Displo determined that as much as the group needs practice, a second reconnaissance mission was needed. With the upcoming expedition plus the magic user situation it was decided to do that next week. Kapi remarked he would use his personal drone for it.

The other topic was figuring out what was going on with the magic user. Displo brought up the 'pony-island' situation, but nobody seemed to care much. S had found a magic user; it didn't matter where he found them.

The obvious question then arose as to why S hadn’t ported into their phone. He said it was a few reasons. First, he said it was a matter of privacy, though nobody feeling like pointing out the obvious contradiction at first.

The second reason made more sense. He explained that he had scanned Applejack1's phone and that it was constantly losing its connection to the chat.

"If I go into that phone and get stuck there, I'm gonna lose it. I've been stranded once before. Never again. Plus. When I'm stuck like that, I can't hide myself. I may just go crazy!"

In private later, Tabi made a remark about how he should get lost. Tabi had asked him to try again but he refused. He brought up the privacy aspect again saying he liked the person and didn't want to piss them off.

To your appeal, S asked if Applejack1 could reschedule to Sunday. They refused, stating it must take place on Saturday. They were apparently 'super busy' on that Sunday.

It was quickly determined that the crew split up 2 ways. One group goes to the farm, the other to the factory.

You and Kapi were to go to the factory and steal Huggy. While that was ongoing Agoti, and Tabi would go to the farm and meet with Applejack1. S said he would go with Tabi only when they were there, just to make sure they had a signal. Until then he'd stay with Displo.

Displo had refused to go along with both trips, citing a lack of power in the countryside in case something happened to him. He said no to the factory on the basis there would be no power in the factory either. "I am not a field agent." He had said. He chose to stay at the restaurant just in case anything happened. You found it a weak excuse, noting he was probably just scared of the factory. Regardless of it didn't take long to situate everyone.

With the team divided, the meeting adjourned. The next one was scheduled Saturday night in which the team would come together and deal with the fallout from both trips.

When the day finally came, one group headed out of town for the farm.

The other group headed for the abandoned factory.

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The next chapter will be called Depths of Time.