Chapter 3: 3)

3)

Donovan- On the floor of the Party-Mart

Voices. Distant, muffled. From outside?

First, a creepy sounding girl’s voice, all the words said in the same even tone. “What exactly is this place?”

Another voice from an excited girl. “It’s a convenience store. Unholy crap!”

Then a deep voiced girl. “Explain.”

"It's that crappy little stop and rob near the university, the place Prince Corwin always goes to." an excited girl said, “Somehow it’s now down here in hell, still powered up. And since no one has slapped their sigil on it, I’m claiming it.”

Deep voice. “So it’s everything you ever wanted?”

Excited voice, now sounding like she's pouting. "Don't be mean Clarice. I guess the illusion of it being filled with rubble is weird, but it might still be a once in a lifetime opportunity.”

Illusion?

Creepy girl. “Maybe we should ask the guy on the floor about it.”

Oh, crap. They can see me. I struggled to get to my feet, my hand brushed up against cold metal. The gun.

“What guy?” the other two sounded off.

"Oh him, I thought that was just a corpse." The excited girl said in a bored voice.

Deep voice girl. “I was just thinking this store had everything.”

I stumbled blindly into something that fell with a crash. Then I bounced off the front counter and began to feel my way in the dark toward the back of the store.

The bells on the door rang. Miss creepy again. “See, the sign says welcome, so we can just walk past the threshold no problem."

Excited girl. “Still kind of feels like we are in someone’s home uninvited, but not enough to sap our strength.”

Deep. “I don’t feel anything.” Someone murmurs in agreement.

Excited responds “Hold on, let me check something. So, analyze linked to power, both around self and...”

“Oh wow, this place has wards all over the place. Fire dampening, anti-spoiling wards, even mental compulsions to not rob the place. A bit sloppy, but technically solid. Looks like a student’s work.”

“And it must only be affecting me since I'm planning on claiming the place and the theft wards consider that like robbing the place. Pffft, I'll just make them my bitch later on."

The voices were getting closer, surrounding me. “Keep back!” I swung the gun around. A strong hand twisted it out of my grip.

The deep voice. “Best to take that away little boy, you might hurt yourself.” a sniffing sound. “Smells like you’ve shot your load already.”

I yelped and threw myself back into what felt like a countertop, something cold was against my back and unseen things made some noise as they fell to the ground.

Excited girl, now sounding more like fed up girl, "Oh for... Linda, there's some rock putting out the illusion by the front door, can you shut it down before he makes even more of a mess?

Martin- Still in the other Party-Mart

I begin to pace and stopped at the sight of Little Eddie’s snacks appearing in small bursts of pale blue light in the dedicated display rack. Each snack cake pulled a drab of the Orderex mana from my core before it is instantly refilled from the store's pool.

In less than a minute a royal shopping spree of empty carbs had been entirely restocked.

"Okay...so for one. The renewal spell I used to heal me, somehow targeted the store as well, and is still in effect.'

“Two. I am linked to the store like the master of an artifact so I am automatically drawing on its mana."

“Three. The store is pulling in unrefined Chaos from being in the Umbral realms, to convert to Orderex and fill its pool, possibly from all of the realms since they all overlap in the shifting lands.’

“Four. The store is drawing on my core to keep the spell going.’

“So, therefore, if the store was brought here by the spell and the spell is still going. Ending the spell might send it back.”

Right, easy, if my amateur spell theory is correct. Except I had no idea what spell I had ended up casting with my so called Magebane bringing up extra symbols and switching them in and out while I was casting the spell and all of them constantly changing around how I wanted them to link together.

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I stepped up to the door and looked out at the sunny semi-tropical forest that had replaced the tall grass covered plain.

About a third of the parking lot had made the trip, along with a curvy bit narrowing to a point going out far enough along the narrow green patch on the side of the lot to bring along the dogwood tree that had managed to survive decades of abuse from drunk collage kids and now a trip to another dimension.

I started to open the door and for a moment I saw something big and scaly in the reflection of the glass, but I blinked and it was gone. Right, figure that one out later. I headed outside and as soon as I stepped off the pavement to the soft grass of the clearing in the forest in front of the stone, I just know something was wrong.

Powering forward as I sometimes do, I first noticed the pain in my stomach when I get about eight feet out, then the dampness from the blood at about sixteen feet. So another eight feet away from the store and I would probably start bleeding out.

Again.

Dam it. I didn't heal myself at all. I just made it so my body was being maintained in a renewed state without actually fixing anything.

Looks like I’m might be stuck working a never-ending shift.

"I guess this is hell."

Cassy - The Exchange

The bells at the door tinkled as I headed into the Exchange, because of course they do. Everyone knows bells, or an electric tone nowadays, sound off when the store's doors open, it is part of the traditional ritual of going into a store.

Technically the place was a pawn shop, but in addition to the dozen or so signs proclaiming that they did not buy textbooks, it was also a lot cleaner and more well organized them most such places.

Bikes were hung from a rack up over a dozen or so dorm room sized fridges. A back corner was filled with weights and other exercise equipment while the wall behind the counter was filled with guitars. All sorts of the things that college students buy once they are away from their parent's watchful eyes for the first time in their lives and then end up selling when they find out they just don’t have the time to use them.

The clerk recognized me from my past visits as he gave me a nod and turned to the open door behind him to let Khalid know I was there. The old djinn came out to greet me at the same time as my boss, who had been hiding behind me, stepped out and then around to in front of me as if appearing from nowhere.

I hate it when she pulls that, I only got eight inches on her and a slightly broader built, Norski from my father's side, and she still manages to keep pulling that trick, and it’s not even magic.

Our host doesn't seem surprised to see her, but then this is his domain. “Welcome to my store Miss Thibedeau, always a pleasure, and Miss Varrow as well. Welcome, welcome.’

Yeah, let’s get this back on track. “Lieutenant Cassandra Varrow, State police. I need to ask you a few questions Mr. Khalid."

I show my I.D., my ritual part that turns a little background mana to Orderex for myself

The Djinn gave a slight smile and a slight nod in acceptance at playing out his part. “Of course lieutenant, please step into my office, I believe you are not a coffee drinker, but may I offer you some water.’

The offering of hospitality. A ritual for a host to create some Orderex for himself and his guests who accept it.

Before I could answer my boss goes off “Oh that smells good, coffee for me, water for the agent.”

With her acceptance on her own and my behalf, she can take all of the guest’s share of mana for herself if she chooses. Not that I think she plans to, it’s just her way of subtly reminding everyone she’s the one really in charge. Typical of a Thibedeau, but I think sometimes she isn't even aware she's doing it. So I let it go, she just can’t help herself.

“It's Lieutenant, Natalie." I accepted the water with a smile. I had never heard of the Vivian brand, but cold water by any name was nice on a summer day. Even with the tiny Tolerance lithoglyph I had made at the institute hanging around my neck, the heat was already rising as we closed on ten in the morning, and the humidity which was always there was only going to make things worst.

My boss gave me an innocent look. "No, it's Captain Natalie, in the state police. You’re the Lieutenant.” then waved over at Khalid for me to continue.

Ok, that one was deliberate, she set that up. Hate her. Vengeance will be mine.

“Mr. Khalid, you may have noticed that the Party-Mart across the street is gone.”

He nodded, all traces of a smile now gone. "Yes, I have reviewed the tapes and saw a young man... actually it may be easiest just to show you." With that, he turned the monitor of the desktop computer sitting on a second smaller desk to his left towards us. IT showed the screen split into four viewpoints, already set up to show the recording from 12:47 the night before.

One aimed at the parking lot showed a young teen frozen in a grainy, black and white freeze-framed in mid-step approaching the store. Another showed the alleyway behind the store, one showed the back of the clerk at the counter and the last was high up. It showed most of the interior of the store and the face of the clerk.

Natalie leaned forward for a better look. "Well, shit." then "He didn't get any taller at all in the last four years. Still a shrimp.'

Both me and Khalid gave my 5'2" boss matching looks of disbelief.

“What?” She looked back and forth at us in return, managing somehow to look both confused, and amused. “Hey, how did you get access to the camera’s in someone else’s store?”

"Ah. The store was a gift to my daughter and her husband for their marriage. With the apartment above, it assured my daughter's family had both a livelihood and a place to live.” Khalid frowned for a moment at some memory. “With a child on the way they needed both.”

He waved away the old grudge. “I arranged the security system for them and neither Ali or Fatima ever bothered to remove my access.”

He sighed, "Neither of them were in the store last night. They have a house now and my son-in-law wanted an early night. So he asked young Martin to close the store for him, to my family's salvation.”

“I’m afraid the recording may be quite disturbing for you Miss Thibedeau, but if you watch to the end you will see there is still some hope for young Mr. Martin.”

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