MARCUS
Closing the door behind me as I step outside Aleksey's room. I look at my watch on my wrist, it says: eighteen o' five. I sigh inwardly.
Through the glass window on the door, I look back at his sleeping figure.
He looks so small.
He needs to heal up fast. We already wasted weeks in this barely functioning hideout. Getting supplies from the city to this abandoned warehouse has been a hassle, to say the least.
I'll let him rest for an hour before he starts the healing session with Bunny. I decided.
Three hours awake, but he already looks ready to collapse. He'll be even more so after the healing session tonight, but he doesn't have the luxury of breaking. Not yet.
Our talk earlier forced him to relive the events that derailed his life; it cost him more than he'll ever say aloud.
I have to give the kid some credit, though; he's taking all this far calmer than I imagined. He did not panic when he woke up; instead, I saw his sharp blue eyes assessing, calculating, and planning a way out.
He's quite observant… too observant.
He hid his expression well when Bunny and Fox dropped some intel about themselves. Speaking of those two blabber mouths, I need to have a stern talk with them about that.
I did test him with my own slip-up— a breadcrumb of information. And as I suspected, he's also sharp enough to notice that we're not from the council. Confirming his suspicions was the right move; it got him to talk at least.
Looking at the dilapidated hallway— a stark contrast to the much better-kept room our guest is in—the smell of dust and staleness fills the air. My footsteps echo throughout the space, accompanied by a dripping pipe somewhere in the distance.
This place was intended to be a quick hideout that the organization maintained for recovery and extraction missions like this. A quick stop to heal and recuperate. Who knew he'd be in such a rough state when we got to him?
I should have anticipated this.
The Council wouldn't have mobilized Task Force: White Lotus for a small crime like manslaughter. I stopped at the entrance to our makeshift huddle room, where Bunny and Fox were sitting on mismatched chairs, circling a wooden crate with a mana stone etched with a heat rune on its surface.
The mana stone glows in a warm light, illuminating the space, and a steady pulse of heat wafts from it.
"You didn't overdo the interrogation… right, Marcus?" Bunny probe with a brow arch.
Brows furrowing, I directed a scowl at her.
"It's Raven, Bunny. We use our codenames when we're on a mission. You're not a naïve greenhorn to not know that." She rolls her eyes at me. "Or should I recommend that you go through basic training again?" Bunny scoffs at that.
"Fine." She concedes. "Did you push too hard on him?" A flicker of worry faintly brushes her expression before she covers it.
Clearing my throat, I answered her plainly. "No."
"Did you get any information from him? Aside from what we know so far, Captain?" A low timber voice asks.
I glance at the corner of the room to find the source of the question. And there, I see a burly man with a beer gut in a similar outfit to mine, with an unimaginative code name— Bear.
"No," I said matter-of-factly.
"But it still doesn't add up, though," Bunny's forehead creases. "Why would the council use the White Lotus to hunt him down like that? For Goddess sake, those are like the council's secret op unit."
"Yeah, it doesn't really match their MO Cap," Bear added. "I mean, the kid committed murder, but that's hardly an appropriate response. Don't you think? Hell, crimes have risen over the past couple of years, but you don't see them being hunted by a pack of Hellhounds like that."
I nod in agreement.
"Well, I don't know about that…" Fox supplies.
I look at the redhead and raise a brow at him.
"Have you found anything new?" I query.
Fox nods once but ultimately shakes his head instead. "Not me. I was talking with Seal earlier, and I think he found something interesting in one of the correspondents from the local Petty Court Council." He sighs. "I don't really know the details, I'm not a computer wiz like him."
"Where is Seal anyway?" Bunny asked while sipping a cup of hot instant coffee that Bear handed to her.
I look at my watch again to check the time. My jaw clenched a little, being reminded of the limited time we had left.
"He's out on patrol," I answered Bunny. "I tasked him to check and monitor our surroundings since the council is still out there looking for our guest."
"Based on their movement and search parameter so far, I'll give us two or three days till they close in on us." Bear assess.
This mismatched bunch of nuts — my very own peanut gallery — has been with me for seven years now. They're annoying, but they've stayed. And in this line of work, that's more than most can say.
I don't know why the organization likes to group us specifically, but times like this make me smile inwardly. But I tamp it down quickly.
Clearing my throat, I directed their attention back to the matter at hand.
"Let's discuss this further when Seal gets back." I sat on a stool opposite Fox.
I stretched my hands out to feel the warmth emitted from the mana stone and rolled my shoulders. Getting rid of some kinks in my neck and shoulders.
"Good." Bear nods as he walks towards the portable stove with a pot atop it. "I made some pasta from Bunny's last hall."
Bear serves his pasta on some paper plates and hands each of us a serving. Fox and Bunny, without hesitating, chow down on the food like some feral beast.
"Ugh! So good!" Both Bunny and Fox exclaimed in unison, which earned a chuckle from Bear.
"I swear, Bear, how do you make such amazing food out of nothing! Like really!" Fox praises, mouth full of pasta, making Bear blush from the compliment.
"You guys are exaggerating, it's nothing special." Bear protests but hides a sheepish grin with a hand.
"No, like seriously, Bear." Bunny swallows her food before continuing. "Without you on our team, we would have long been dead from food poisoning or starvation!"
Bear shakes his head in response.
"I agree with them," I added, making everyone look at me, dumbfounded. "What?" I grumble.
"Why don't you ever say nice things to me like that?" Bunny mock pouted.
"I give credit where credit is due." I deadpan.
Bear looks at me with a warm smile and nods. I nod back.
***
A little while later, Seal walks in. I tense up inwardly, thinking the worst possible case.
Did they make a change to their search patterns? Are they closing in on us earlier than we expected?
These thoughts race through me, but when I see Seal's calm, dopey expression and a small smirk directed at me, I ease up.
"You worry too much, Cap." His smirk turns into a tired smile.
"Report," I ordered. My grip on the cup is a little tighter, as I hold what's left of my second cup of instant coffee.
Bear hands him a plate of pasta, and Seal sits next to him, making everyone face the mana stone and completing a loose circle around it.
"Nothing out of the ordinary." He sips a cup of coffee that Fox handed to him.
His plate of food sits on his lap untouched.
"The main warehouse above is secured. The entrance to the underground passage is also secured, and I replenished the invisibility spell on it as well." Seal summarized.
I nod in approval.
The spell Seal used in the secret entrance to the lower levels of this hideout is a low-tier invisibility spell. Contrary to the spell's name, it doesn't actually make the entrance invisible.
It makes it so that its presence goes over your senses, and you won't notice it's there unless you are actively looking for it.
Even now, if I didn't know where the entrance was, my eyes would slide right over it. My brain refuses to hold onto the outline of the doorway— like trying to remember a fading dream.
This works because higher-tier spells use more mana, and with someone having an attunement for similar spells, as well as a keen eye, they can easily detect it.
Sometimes, a low-tech solution works best if done right.
"I didn't detect any presence nearby aside from wildlife, that is." Seal continues. "And yes, Fox, I also check if they are familiars in disguise. And yes, Bear, I checked it twice."
Fox and Bear glance at each other and share a knowing smile.
"And no, Bunny, the animals don't want to cuddle with you, still," Seal adds.
Bunny's jaw dropped, and the rest of the crew laughed. I chuckled at that, too. Well, a little.
"Back to business," I break the group's musings. "Fox says you found something interesting?"
Everyone looks at Seal, and in response, he shrugs at us while taking another sip of his coffee.
"Nothing much really, just odd behavior that I flagged." Seal states.
I nod for him to continue. Seal sighs and puts down his cup and plate on the ground. He leans in like he's about to tell a campfire story to us, and everyone is in full attention and hanging on Seal's every word.
"So what we know so far after we rescued him is this: He killed his husband's affair partner, who happens to be his brother. Shoker, I know! This is like a scene from a telenovela type shit. Like when Juliani found Don. Roberto, with his mistress, the caniving heiress Valentina. Like 'yikes', am I right? Understandable behavior, I mean, if I found—"
"Focuse Seal." I cut him off, holding a hand up to stop him from his rambling.
Seal blushes in embarrassment and covers it up with a cough. "Ahem. Sorry, I got a bit too excited."
"We know your love for classic telenovela and spicy drama, Seal, but reign it back a bit." Bunny soothes.
"Okay, back to the topic. So, he killed someone. We don't really know why the council is after him like that, considering it was a crime of passion he committed. But we suspected that it had something to do with how he killed his brother." Seal reiterates what we already suspected in the last week.
"Indeed, yes," Bear confirms.
"The only reason we intercepted the council in capturing that guy—"
"I like the term rescude." Fox interrupted Seal.
"Okay, no more interruptions, please," I ordered, frustration building.
These guys will be the death of me.
"As I was saying, the only reason we intercepted the council in rescuing him was our organization's network of people in the council tipping us off on a suspicious mobilization of the White Lotus." Seal continued without pauses.
We all nodded at Seal's words.
"So, I did some digging and checked on the guy and found some information on him. He was adopted by the Redverse from River Way Orphanage." Seal revealed.
"Wait," Bunny interrupts. "You mean to tell me that Aleksey is a Redverse? Like a son of the founder and owner of Redverse Global Holdings and Industries?"
"Um, who are these Redverse?" Bear confusedly asked.
"The Redverse is a really wealthy family. They own many multimillion-dollar companies." I supplied.
"Yup, the same family Aleksey was adopted into," Seal confirms.
"The kid lucked out." Bear whistles.
"I don't know about 'lucked out' considering with the mess he's in," Fox added. "A brother-husband affair? Murder? I guess you really can't have it all in life."
"Ahem," I look at them with an unimpressed look. "Can we stop getting sidelined and focus on what matters right now?" I grumble.
"How did you find all this?" Bear asked. "The only clue we had was his first name on a dry cleaning receipt."
"I checked the flights," Seal answered matter-of-factly with a smug satisfaction plastered on his face.
"What's the relation?" Bunny asked with a lost expression.
"Seriously?" Seal deadpan. "The address on the receipt! Duh! The address said London on it!"
"It did?" Bear crinkles his brow. Seal's mouth hung agape in disbelief.
"So you checked all the flights coming from London in the past weeks?" I asked, impressed with Seal's work ethic.
"Yup," Seal beams at me. "Luckily for me, the date on the receipt is also the date he left from London!"
"That doesn't make sense. I thought billionaires use private jets?" Bunny exclaimed in exasperation.
"Multi-millionaire still actual. About an 800 million net worth." Seal corrected.
"Not the point here. I mean, billionaire or multi-hundred-millionaire or whatever, they have a private jet, right?" Bunny is still hung up on that detail.
"They do have a private jet, multiple actually. It would have been a little trickier to find out who he is if he had used his family's private jet. Again, thank the Gods beyond that he's environmentally conscious, I guess." Seal retorts.
"That's awesome, Seal" Fox complimented. "You really outdid yourself with this one. How'd you know he was adopted, though?"
"I Googled him." Seal stated.
"Googled?" Bunny injects. "I thought you hacked the mainframe to get access to the council's backdoor or something."
"Don't be daft, Bunny!" Seal laughs. "You watch too many Hollywood movies. Hacking IRL is not like the movies, where you see characters smashing random keys on a keyboard and then magically gaining access to servers, databases, and systems. Ha-ha your killing me here."
Seal laughs hysterically, clutching his stomach and wiping a tear from his eyes, which earned him a smack to the head with Bunny's telekinesis.
"Ow!" Seal covers his head, and the rest of the gang laughs, except me.
Dear moon Gods of old, give me strength and patience, I might actually kill these morons.
"So you checked all the flights, huh?" Fox brings back the conversation.
Thank you, Fox. I sigh inwardly.
"Yeah, like I said, there was a possibility that he used a private jet or other modes of transportation, but luckily for us, I looked into the flights first and saw the name 'Aleksey', which is a really unique way of spelling that name if you ask me. He flew business class, of course." Seal answered.
"Is that it? You found his identity, anything else?" I probe, feeling disappointed with what little information we have on the situation still. "That doesn't really answer why the council is after him. I thought you found something… more?"
"Oh, I did, kinda." Seal picks up his cup from the floor and sips some of his coffee.
Seal put his coffee down again and, with a swift motion, he pressed his palms together like he was about to pray. He shifts it so that one palm is lying on top of the other. He closes his eyes, and shadowy tendrils of mana snaked from his palm like tentacles. Sliding his palms in opposite directions, a flat void appears in the distance between.
Seal is well-versed in spatial magic as well; he's the reason why, in all our missions, we can afford to bring many items and weapons. Our very own walking luggage carrier. But, we are still limited to what we could put inside the dimensional pocket Seal has, since it's not infinite.
From the slit in reality, rose Seal's laptop. He grabbed it, and the void sealed itself back up. He opened it and turned it around to face us. Seal showed us a slide show of grainy images of what looks to be screenshots from a CCTV feed across the local council office and a back alley of one of the police offices in the area.
"So, we know he killed his brother because of the police chatter and the dispatch call from that night. After we secured him, we really didn't have any information on him, right?" Seal began. We nodded.
"We couldn't take his fingerprints and send them to the organization because the council is hot on our trail," I supplied.
"Yes. And we had shitty wifi." Seal adds. "Well, during my turn to go get supplies, I did some reconnaissance, if you will. As I said, I found his identity, and from there I also kept tabs on the council's movements and the local police unit who would have had his case on their hands."
"Had? Would have had?" Fox queries.
"I'm getting there," Seal answered. "So I checked the local police roster in Oakville, where his husband works as well, and found a 'way in' as you put it, through an unsuspecting cop looking for a car insurance quote for his daughter. Sucker did't even suspect the form he submitted from an ad on Facebook gave me a sneak peek into his browser fingerprint, session tokens, and network metadata. Haha!"
"So you used targeted malicious ads and geofenced it around the police office and council just for a chance that a staff member or officer would click it?" Fox asks, pride in his voice.
"Wow, I can't believe you caught on Fox!" Seal beams at Fox, who gave a bashful smile.
"Well, you talk too much about this stuff, and you kinda rubbed off on me," Fox said.
"Well, I'm glad I did." Seal praised. "Now, as Fox said, I did the same thing with a janitorial staff in the council as well. It's not much, but the janitor is friends with a council agent, and they share a lot of memes, so I directed them to an ad on a site with the 'Top 10 memes of all time.' And from there, I checked their log activities."
"Wow," we all said in unison.
"During the past week, I've been getting to know them," Seal wiggles his brows. "On the police side, I found out that Derek, the husband, has been AWOL for the past week."
"Did the council get to him?" I asked.
"No, I'm not sure, but the council is also looking for him, so maybe not… or not yet at least." Seal clarified. "The council did issue a gag order about this case, or the lack thereof."
My brows furrowed, as did the rest of the team except for Seal.
"What do you mean by that?" Bear asked.
"Well, usually a big, high-profile case like this would have them all in a buzz, especially the media. But as far as I could gather, nada, zilch, not even on gossip pages." Seal revealed.
"It was buried," I said matter-of-factly. Seal nodded.
"Bingo," Seal confirmed.
"Not even a case file? An incident report?" Bunny asked for clarification.
"Yup," Seal answered. "The council also sent a gag order to the police. I found out through one of the email correspondents from the police officer to a higher-up. Turns out he's a friend of Derek's and was inquiring why Derek's husband's case was never filed, and his concern that he couldn't get a hold of Derek."
A heavy silence filled the room. We each look at one another, a knowing weight pressed on all of us. This is bigger than we originally thought.
"Marcus…" Bunny started with a very cautious tone. It was her serious tone, and Bunny is very different when she's serious. I even let the use of my name slide. "What did he tell you about what he did that night?"
I clenched my jaw and told them what Aleksey said to me earlier about that night.
***
Aleksey's screams filled the hallways, echoing his agony. His entire body is covered in sweat; his hospital gown is soaked. His body twisted in pain, Bear and Fox had to hold his wrist down as Seal, and I watched.
Bunny's hands tremble and glow a light green color, a sign of a healing spell being cast. Her eyes closed in deep concentration, brown furrowed tight as sweat runs and drips across her flushed face.
Bunny dropped her hands and sat on the floor panting. Aleksey stopped moving as well, breathing unevenly. We all just stayed there, observing our patient as his breath evens out, and exhumation knocked him out.
Fox helped his sister to sit on the nearest chair and flopped beside her.
"Hope he has enough strength to continue this tomorrow… three more times." Bunny pants slowly now, getting a hold of her breathing.
Fox stood and walked towards Aleksey's leg with the metal rods. He took out a pair of scissors and focused on the blades. A green cleansing fire erupts and consumes the blades before dying down, leaving the object fully sterilized.
He then cut the bandages off, revealing a leg with scars all over it. Bunny walks towards Fox's side, and with her powers, the metal pins fixing the leg in place twist, unscrew, and dismantle themselves away from the healing leg.
Holes were left in place of those metal rods. Fox grabbed a jar of ointment concoction and covered the holes with it.
The procedure was done in total silence; no one spoke, broken only by Seal's sigh.
"Three more sessions of that, tomorrow?" Seal asked.
"Worst, I'll be healing him too alongside Bunny," Fox answered.
"Yikes," Bear grimaced.
"He doesn't have a choice." Bunny solemnly replied. "The White Lotus is closer now; they'll eventually find this place."
"Will he be okay?" Seal asked me, and everyone looked towards me.
"He'll have to endure," I said plainly. Everyone nodded.