The silhouette of the pub was already visible in my view. Walking alongside me were the other eight people in the squad. I glanced at the surrounding team. One by one, my eyes moved from the squad leader, Nina, down to the two brutes who had pinned me down earlier, and finally to the last members whose names I still didn't even know.
This was supposed to be my official introduction, assuming I hadn't unconsciously thrown my first punch and turned into the very enemy standing before them. Strangely, I didn't feel any lingering desire for revenge. Even toward Nina, who had basically saved my life, I didn't feel any sudden affection, let alone the urge to worship her. It was just a cold, passing thought born in a moment of crisis. I don't know—it was just what I felt.
"Edgar, remember the plan," a voice muttered beside me. "We wait for you here for exactly thirty minutes. If you're not done by then, we charge inside and subjugate the suspect. You play a vital role here. Don't mess it up."
Who do you think you're talking to? I thought bitterly. I was the only one here who fully understood how grave my situation was. Any slip of the tongue, the slightest hesitation noticed by the target, and I'd turn into a corpse a second later.
"I understand..." With a simple nod, I loosened my tie, took a long, steadying breath, and walked slowly toward the pub entrance.
Kring... kring.
The bell chimed above me as I stepped inside. To my surprise, the interior wasn't completely dark. It was dimmed, but not enough to hinder my sight. The music was kept relatively low, too—the perfect setting for a casual hangout with friends or a light meeting with a colleague.
Nice. This might actually work.
I scanned the patrons in the room, my eyes grazing every face until they locked onto a man who looked identical to the photos the squad leader had projected from her orb earlier. It was him. Definitely him. He had a build similar to mine but looked a little more muscular, military short black hair and a visible scar cutting across the back of his neck. His last known location had been a joint gathering for underworld firearm trading.
My hand reached into my pocket, brushing against the orb. As per my instructions, the orb set to recording for the team be aware of the situation inside. I double-tapped the smooth metal surface to signal the squad that I had made visual contact with the suspect.
Now, it was all on me untill the next 30 minutes.
I took one last deep breath to shake off my nervousness. I rubbed my hair vigorously with both hands, messing it up until I looked exactly like a stressed-out man looking for a stiff drink to ease his mind. Here goes nothing..
I walked with a haggard, heavy stride toward the bar counter, sliding onto a stool right beside the suspect. Sweat ran down my chin. Slouching carelessly over the dark wood, I shouted to the bartender.
"Give me the absolute best, strongest alcohol you've got!"
Time to keep up the act.
With a simple nod, the bartender pulled five heavy bottles from the back shelf, lining them up like soldiers on the bar: absinthe, brandy, gin, vodka, and blackberry liqueur. Skipping the shaker entirely, she reached for a chilled mixing glass filled to the brim with large cubes of ice.
With practiced precision, she free-poured equal measures of each spirit into the glass. The sharp, medicinal aroma of the absinthe immediately cut through the air, quickly followed by the deep, fruity scent of the blackberry liqueur. She slid a long bar spoon into the glass, stirring rapidly. The metal clicked rhythmically against the glass, chilling the potent, all-alcohol mixture without over-diluting it.
She placed a clean coaster on the counter right in front of me. With a strainer held firmly over the mixing glass, she poured the dark, amber-hued liquid into a chilled coupe glass. To finish, she expressed an orange peel over the top, releasing a burst of citrus oils, twisted it neatly, and dropped it into the drink.
"An 'Aunt Roberta.' Enjoy," she said, sliding the glass toward me with a satisfying smile.
It looked expensive—way out of line compared to the cheap grape wine you could buy at the local street store. I reached across the dark wooden counter and wrapped my fingers around the stem of the chilled glass. Lifting it, the aroma hit me instantly—a sharp collision of fresh citrus oil and the heavy, licorice scent of absinthe.
I brought the rim to my lips and took the first sip. The liquid felt surprisingly heavy on my tongue. For a fraction of a second, it was smooth. Then, the pure alcohol hit. Because there were no juices or sodas to dilute it, the raw burn of the vodka and gin bloomed across my palate, anchored by a deep, oaky warmth from the brandy.
Before the fire could completely take over, the flavors began to separate. The tongue-numbing bite of the absinthe cut through the center, followed immediately by the thick, sweet syrup of the blackberry liqueur. It caught in the back of my throat, a dark berry sweetness that tempered the burn just enough to make me want another taste.
I lowered the glass back to the bar table, setting it carefully on the coaster. As I exhaled, a deep, creeping warmth radiated down my chest. Looking at the dark amber liquid left in the glass, I realized exactly why this drink was notorious.
Ahhh,so good. Might as well let loose.
"Fuck you, Prisma!" I suddenly barked out, slamming my hand down. "Want to kill me, huh? Not so easy, you whore!"
I paused, breathing heavily, acting out my manufactured rage. "What is wrong with pointing out a mistake you made, bitch?! Why lash your anger at me? Why is it so hard to use your head for something so simple? Just you wait. When I get into a better position later, I'll fuck you so hard that you'll keep begging me over and over!" As I lashed out, I took a quick, subtle peek at the person beside me to check his expression.
These act was called Prep work. The very first thing a season Hypnotist should do. To lower the guard of the target.
Good. He didn't look annoyed. In fact, he looked interested.
"Hey buddy," I said, turning slightly toward him. "Seems like your glass is about to dry up. Let me pour you another one. I need a drinking buddy tonight." Without waiting for his response, I shouted to the bartender again. "Hey, beauty! Please pour another glass for this gentleman here. Bill's on me!"
I turned back to him, letting out a heavy, miserable sigh. "Huh... my wife left me alone with a kid at home years ago. Now my female boss keeps criticizing me on every single thing that I do. The Earth would be a whole lot better without women. Don't you think the same?"
I nudged his shoulder slowly with my elbow, prodding for a response. To my surprise, he replied almost instantly.
"Agree," he muttered, his voice gravelly. "Especially when a woman thinks you're always beneath her. It makes your world turn from worst to hell."
I looked closely at his face. There was a subtle, hardened tension in his expression, a deep anger just waiting to let loose.
"Yeah!" I chimed in, fueling the fire. "That is exactly why having a female boss is such a misfortune. There's an old saying that to soften a harsh female boss, you need to conquer her in bed first. The rest feels like living in paradise. What do you think?"
"I'm not sure," he sighed, staring into his drink. "How can you even try when she keeps shouting the moment you walk into her line of sight? I'm not married yet, so I don't know your exact situation. But as for having a bad female boss... we're more or less in the exact same boat. You know, she even orders me to be the bait sometimes, just so she can safely return. FUCK! How can such heartless women even exist?"
Wow, wow, buddy, I thought, keeping my face miserable while my mind smirked. I don't know how many bottles you already gulped down before I got here, but you seem high enough.
"Let's shout together," I laughed, raising my glass. "To relieve our grievances against them! On the count of three. One... two... three!!"
"Fuck you, asshole!" I yelled.
"Die, you bitch!" he roared right along with me.
"HAHAHA! Feels better, right?" I laughed loudly, clinking my glass against his. "Now let's gulp down another one."
He understood the gesture and raised his own glass.
Cting! Our glasses collided, the sharp chime cutting through the low hum of the pub music
"For a better life!" I toasted.
"For a better life!" he echoed.
Ahhh... the alcohol hit the right spot. How could a drink taste this good?
"Beauty, another glass, please! For him as well," I called out.
While the bartender prepared the next round, I looked at him intensely. He was staring with sheer hatred into his empty glass, gripping the rim so tightly with his right hand that the veins on his forearm were bulging. Is it normal to see veins popping like that just from holding a glass?
"Hey buddy, seems like you're facing real trouble with your boss, too" I said softly, lowering my voice to a comforting pitch. "You can share it with me. Tonight, you're my only friend. Please, take me as one, too."
"Huuh... it was like this..." He slowly began to spill his story. Of course, he didn't mention the specific details of his illegal work, focusing entirely on the abuse and the unfair orders he was dealing with.
Man, I actually felt a pang of pity for him. But a mission is a mission. It was either him or me who died. This is life.
As he kept talking, I kept my wavelenght detection focused entirely on his brain. From the moment I sat down, I had been reading his brainwave ripples. It was mild Beta when I first sat beside him, turning into a low Beta wave when I shared my first manufactured story.
Great. Finding comfort in talking meant he had already lowered his guard toward me. It was matching my simulation perfectly. The next step was to keep choking him with more alcohol until he lost his spatial awareness, his impulse control, and his cognitive processing. Just a bit more.
"Dude, I feel you." I threw my left arm around his shoulder, embracing him like an old high school buddy, and gestured for him to finish his drink. "Cheers!"
We gulped it down.
Ahhh... A numbing, heavy sensation was starting to creep into my own head. If this kept going, I would pass out before he did. My tolerance was pathetic. I needed to do this fast.
"Beauty, another glass!!" I called out. The bartender glanced at me and flashed a small smile. Crap. Even her smile was starting to look inviting and beautiful to me now. Just how low was my tolerance?
I wanted to induce my suggestion already, but if I rushed it, it would backfire horribly, just like it did with Lucy back then. This was the most vital step to bringing a target under hypnosis: the Inducing Phase. By the calculations I ran before the mission, I needed his frontal lobe activity to hit a steady Theta state as a guarantee.
But waiting for the alcohol to do its magic might take too long, and my own brain was turning to mush. Not to mention the time set by the damn female giant.
I didn't have enough time....