Owl had crossed the room and ignored everything else until she was standing across the desk from the lady. The lady glanced at her dagger where she had set it before her eyes flicked to me then returned to Owl. Owl saw it all but ignored it, she held out her wrist and a wireframe of the stone appeared, "You have something I am hunting for Lessa."
Lessa Bain looked at the wireframe and grimaced, "I don't have shit. Just because something like that is up for auction doesn't mean it's here on the premise."
"Then where is it?" Owl asked, leaning forward.
Lessa sat down in the chair she stood up from and leaned back away from us. She looked between the two of us, chewing on her lip before answering, "I can't tell you because I don't know."
Owl lowered the tone of her voice and replied, "But you know who does. Give me a name Lessa."
Lessa crossed her arms and tapped on her lip before leaning forward and searching her desk, "No. I'm not going to give you a name. I am going to give you an address."
She wrote something on a piece of paper then pushed it across her desk to Owl, looking very smug while doing so. Owl snatched the piece of paper then glanced at it. I watched her start to frown before she crumpled the piece of paper, threw it onto the desk then turned on her heel to march out of the room. I followed after Owl, throwing Lessa a wave as we left, which earned me a frown.
I noticed Peter had picked himself up as we exited the building and Owl seemed to know where she was going. We were pretty far away from the auction house and Lessa when I turned to Owl, "What was that about?"
Owl let out a frustrated sigh while we continued walking. We headed down random streets and alleys with her leading us. We were moving in a general direction so I knew she had a destination in mind. "I have been putting on this suit and going out at night for seven years. Do you know why this city is named Angle City?" When I shook my head negatively she continued, "When the city was coming together a priest made a sign and put it up. Nobody realized the city wasn't Angel City until the priest died. Every piece of paperwork was spelt Angle. This city has been cursed since its founding. Most of my time is watching the traffic going in and out of this city."
"So where are we headed?" I asked when she paused.
"We are going to the docks. She didn't give me an address, she gave me a shipping number." We were on the roofs now, hopping from building to building taking a more direct route, "a shipping number that I don't know about. That means it's not official and someone is smuggling."
The roofs were not any better than the rest of the city. Some places we had to go around because there was trash piled up on top. Others, we could see the sinking of the roof and didn't trust it to hold our weight as we crossed the city. The city was spread out from up here. It had more skyscrapers than Swivel City but they were all covered in statues. The air warped in the distance and those statues looked like they were moving out of the corner of your eye.
We started slowing as we approached the docks. There were massive ships covered in shipping containers in bays. Cranes were picking up the shipping containers and stacking them on semi trailers. It was a very active place. We stopped and I turned to Owl for directions. She was chewing on her lip and her hands were curled into fists, "Stay here. This calls for a deal of stealth."
I shrugged at that. "I'll just stay here an.." watch her drop off the side of the roof.
I sighed and stuck my pipe in my mouth and looked around for somewhere to sit. I didn't know how long this was going to take her and I didn't want to be something the people working at the docks could point at. Owl took her time, it was about an hour later when she showed back up. I was turned into an open doorway sucking on blueberry smoke when I heard the crunch of her boots. She had a frown on her face and looked to be quite frustrated. I raised an eyebrow at her and she sighed before answering, "I know where to look for the stone now. Finding it is going to be a problem."
I shrugged, "Why?"
"It's somewhere on the other side of the city." that meant nothing to me and Owl must have realized that because she continued, "that side of the city is the place where companies tried to revitalize the city. They failed and now it's all run down old factories turned into gang havens. Gangs led by enhanced individuals or the like."
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I stood from where I was crouched, "Well you asked me to be a heavy hitter. Let's go get that stone."
She shook her head, "If you go down there and start cracking heads a gang fight might break out and a whole lot of innocent people might get caught up into it." She started fiddling with her forearm, "we need to head back to the auction and pick it up there."
Space twisted next to us and a case appeared. Owl reached down and picked it up. I could hear her armor work overtime to lift it so I held out my hand. She passed it to me and I could feel it weighed about two hundred pounds. At my questioning look Owl replied, "Gold. Purified gold."
She stepped off the roof and I followed, landing in a crouch, "Why didn't we do this in the first place? Are they even going to let us participate in the auction?"
She shook her head as she led us through the city, "I did not want to fuel any of the underworld in Angle City. it tends to leak into other cities. We might see some of it in Swivel City. they will let us participate because money talks and you carry quite a lot of it."
I looked down at the case in my hands. It was silver with a double folded lid. People were giving it glances as we walked down the street until they looked at how heavily armored Owl was. "If you don't like giving money to them why don't we just break in and steal it? I could fight my way in there."
"It is simpler to just win it at the auction. That will shine a brighter light on the operation." She nodded at the case, "I can track those gold bars." She answered.
"How?" I asked. To me they were just gold bars.
She waved at the case. "Those are gold down to its atomic structure. Wherever they show up I will be able to find the trail. That trail will lead me to the people smuggling things into or even worse, out of Angle City."
Oh. I guess that made sense. We were getting close to the auction house again when Owl spoke again, "We are probably walking into an ambush. Lessa is probably counting on it."
"Are you going to be fine? She tried to stab you when we walked into the office."
"It wouldn't have worked. The faster something approaches me while I wear this armor the slower they go. She learned that the hard way."
Well that explained the bitterness. I chewed on the mouthpiece of my pipe in thought as we walked. "If your suit is that advanced, why do you need my help?"
"Titans are force multipliers. A construction company with one will out pace one that doesn't have one. Peter is a very high level one. I can fight a whole lot of people but if Peter gets a hold of me I cannot do much. Maybe sacrifice an arm to get away. Lessa thinks the slowing field was a one off, I want to keep it that way. It will make her relax and she will get sloppy." Owl replied.
We approached the auction house and it looked the same as before except there were a few cars parked outside and around the building. They were fancy ones that stood out in the streets of the city. Everyone walking around them avoided getting near them, it was telling. Owl pushed open the door to the auction house and I could instantly feel the difference. Before the auction house felt open and inviting. Now there was a sinister twist to it I don't think Owl felt.
There were a few people waiting for us inside. Lessa Bain was leaning against the reception desk at the end of the room. She looked pretty smug with the line up she had assembled. Peter was off to the side eyeing me with trepidation. I didn't blame him, getting hit in the liver hurt quite a bit. I saw it a few times at the dojo, it was normally a fight stopper. He probably wasn't used to feeling pain from fighting if he was as strong as Owl said.
There was a guy to our left, he looked younger than the rest. He wore a vest suit combo with a top hat. He had a straight cane with a jewel as its head. He had both his hands on the cane and he was putting all his weight on it, leaning forward and watching us as we walked towards Lessa. He had darker hair and a soul patch for a beard. He was almost as smug as Lessa.
I had to resist the urge to grab my pipe and throw it at the last person. It was really pale and everything inside of me told me I should kill it for standing in my presence. It had an overcoat with a top hat and it was leaning against the wall. I had given everyone in the room a glance but when my eyes locked on it I couldn't look away. When we stopped near Lessa I dropped the case on the desk next to her with a thud. Owl took a step back, cutting off my view and giving me a glance before focusing on Lessa, "We are going to participate in the auction."
Owl waved her hand at the case and the top popped open. Inside were gold bars set in slots, it looked really fancy. Lessa's head snapped towards it from where she was staring into Owl's masked eyes. Lessa let out a grunt then glared at Owl, "What's stopping us from taking that from you?"
I heard the guy with the cane shift behind me. Owl shook her head, "We both know that's not going to go the way you want it."
Lessa scoffed, "I'm going to take a fee." She pointed at the case, "That's going to be hard to get rid of."
Owl crossed her arms, "You're going to take what is offered nothing more. You're an auction house, take the fee from the people selling the goods."
Lessa tsked then waved at Peter. He came over and looked down at the case before grabbing it in one hand then leaving the room. "Second floor. Room seven. The auction starts in an hour. Hope you like the wait."
Lessa stood from where she was leaning against the desk and headed for the back. The guy in the vest followed her. Owl turned and started walking towards a side door and I saw the thing again. It was in the shape of a human female but it looked like someone had pulled all the blood from it. It gave me a look then turned and followed Lessa. It disappeared into the back and I turned to follow Owl where she had paused. When I got close she turned and we headed up a set of steps. She turned left and we walked to room seven. Inside were just two seats that gave us a view of the auction hall. We took a seat, Owls creaking slightly as she sat, I turned to her, "What was that thing?"