Thereafter Chapter 20: Close Encounter
The Exalted fend off some henchmen, and reach a provisional conclusion about the theft of the Sword Of Lakes.
It did not take them long to unsheathe their weapons, and by the time the anonymous group that Michael had come to think of as the Goon Squad arrived, they were met with drawn swords, axes, notched arrows and an ominous swirl of arcane energy. As they approached the door, Michael got his first good look at them.
Goon squad had been a decent enough description of the three thugs that scrabbled up the stairs. One of them was a tall, weasel-faced man, one stout, fighty-looking dwarf woman, and a very wide fellow that looked a bit like Michael from a nastier universe. The group froze up once they realized they weren’t alone, and that there were multiple weapons pointed their way.
“We don’t want any trouble,” Michael said, his voice even. “We’re looking for Keegan, we believe he has taken something that doesn’t belong to him.”
“Oh he has, has he?” The dwarf spoke, her voice a pleasant if unpolished alto. “Wouldn’t tell you where he was if I knew. We’ve got our own business with the cad.”
“Well there’s no sign of him here.”
“He’s fled the coop,” The weasel-faced one tittered, sounding for all the world like he was having a whale of a time.
“Right,” The dwarf said. “You lot get out of our way, then, we’ll go looking around a little all the same. Worst comes to worst we’ll grab what collateral we can.”
“You’re planning to rob him?” Michael asked, his cool slipped into incredulity.
“Call it collecting on unpaid debts if it makes you feel any better.”
“We’re not going to let you do that,” It was Alicia who spoke up. Michael was of half a mind to contradict her.
“I would like to see you try, princess”
“What did you call me?”
“You heard me. I heard you, and now we appear to be at an impasse. What is there to do with this?”
The little group shifted almost imperceptibly. If Michael had not kept careful track with his tremorsense he might’ve missed that all three of them shifted their weight, readying for some sort of action.
“Don’t kill if you don’t have to,” Michael managed to shout before all hell broke loose.
Something flew at Michael, he batted it away with his cane. Before his brain had the chance to process that he had deflected a throwing knife, the lanky man was upon him. Steel flashed in his opponent’s hand, Michael stepped back. The knife sliced through the space that had up until recently held his neck. Michael struck back, a reversal of the cane sweep that sent the lanky man reeling back.
Michael’s pulse throbbed in his cane hand. He wanted to turn his attention to his colleagues, see where the other two assailants went, but a sensible voice in him reminded him that the softly giggling knife-wielder not two paces away from him would have to remain a priority.
The man shifted his weight, Michael felt the lunge before it came and met it with a swipe of his sword. Steel rung out in sonorous protest as his sword clinched with the knife. The tall man met Michael’s gaze, a wild gleam in his eyes. Out of the corner of his eyes, Michael couldn’t help but spot the dwarf woman making an odd gesture, as if she tried to pry apart reality with raking fingers. Much to his surprise, her efforts appeared to work, leaving streaks of gleaming light.
The distraction is exactly what weasel-face was looking for. His body blurring with sudden speed as he launched himself at Michael. It was all Michael could do to raise a sword in a desperate attempt to block the knife. Something struck the black iron with a dull thud. The millisecond of relief fractured into adrenalic despair as Michael realized what had happened. A feint. Weasle-Face had switched his knife into his off-hand and struck Michael’s armor with his flat palm, his left hand mid-stab at Michael’s neck.
Entirely too many things happened at once. With a boom Michael could only describe as “meaty,” something approximately human-sized was launched somewhere past Michael’s constricted universe to hit the wall with a dull thud. Michael’s terrified brain brayed for retreat. He wasn’t going to listen. In fact, he was going to do the opposite.
Michael wasn’t the strongest person in the world. In his efforts to work out within the tolerance of his knee he had discovered there was only so strong one could become without training in ways his knee disapproved of. That said, he was pretty large, and mass had a force of it’s own.
The slight hesitation the boom had caused in Weasel-Face was enough, and Michael launched himself at him. It wasn’t quite a leap, and it wasn’t quite a fall. The no-holds-barred body check slammed into the lanky assailant, sending them both sprawling to the ground. Michael’s cane fell, untethered to him as he grasped for the hand of Weasel-Face. Even if he was, as Michael suspected, stronger than he looked, it would be hard to leverage much strength without letting go of the knife.
They hit the ground somewhere between a second after and half a second before, a directionless tumble that all the same made Michael’s head spin. Weasel-Face squirmed like he was a conglomerate of snakes in a bag of human skin, and Michael couldn’t imagine successfully hanging on to him any more than he could walk on walls. The survival-voice in Michael’s mind chanted “Don’t let him keep the knife” like a mantra as Michael found himself slamming Weasel-Face’s hand into the floor as hard as he could. Something clanged to the ground, maybe it was the knife, Michael didn’t have the processing power to consider it. He didn’t stop before his opponents got leverage on him and flipped him over rather roughly.
Michael felt the world blur around him as his opponent towered over him. Imperious and threatening like a mighty tower. Weasel-Face clutched a rod in one raised arm. Even in his dazed state Michael found the bandwith to briefly consider the cruel irony of the scene. Is he really going to beat me to death with my own cane? That’s fucked up.
“Freeze, fuckbreath.”
Weasel-Face, being the fuckbreath in this scenario, froze. Michael’s eyes rolled in an attempt to catch who had just spoken. Provided Michael could still trust his senses, it was Felipe. He pointed a bow at Weasel-Face, the notched arrow looking very sharp indeed.
“Talk about stealing my glory,” Michael found himself slurring, he was apparently more punch-drunk than he thought. “I had him dead to rights.”
Once Alicia had helped him to his feet, Michael joined the ongoing interrogation of Weasel-Face and the dwarf woman. His doppelganger, from how Alicia told it, had recovered from being thrown into a wall with unprecedented speed, and had fled the scene before even Felipe got a shot off. “Didn’t have a clean shot,” Felipe mumbled in his defense.
The dwarf woman and Weasel-Face found themselves hovering in the air, suspended by some working of Lex’
“I presume you know how this is going to go,” Lex said. “I ask you a bunch of stuff, you tell me what you’re going to do with what part of me once you get out of my bindings, Alicia threatens to break your everything, maybe Michael here Good Cops you for a bit. Eventually you’ll tell us what we want to know.” Lex listed this sequence of events like they genuinely were bored with them already. There was, Michael figured, something to be said about having an abrasive personality. “You can do it now, or after Alicia gets to that whole breaking thing.”
“I don’t know about breaking,” Alicia said, there was a joke in her tone, but also a disconcerting level of sincerity. “I feel more like squashing today.”
“So,” The Dwarf woman said. “Keegan hired you did he?”
Lex blinked, first once, then again.
“What? No? Didn’t we tell you we were looking for him.”
“Pardon me, Magus, must’ve forgot.” The dwarf wasn’t exactly insincere, but there had been some kind of a hook there, Michael was sure.
“You are also looking for him.” Lex’ statement wasn’t a question, but Michael had no problem seeing the hook there.
“We are. Old fuck owes the boss. Services Rendered and all that. He sent us ‘round to do a wellness check on him, remind him of his balance you understand.”
“Right. I suppose you’re not going to tell me what the nature or history of the debts is”
“Not my job to know. Sides, you know there’s no easy way of quantifying value these days.”
“I was wondering how you do shakedowns in a city without currency, or even fart about with debt anyway.” Alicia said, more a casual observation than a question
“Lots of things have value sunshine. The boss keeps very thorough ledgers, is all.”
“Alright, so what do we think?” Lex asked their collaborators at this point. “Do we let these fools go or do we see if we can squeeze more info out of them?”
“Torture is ineffective for extracting valid intel,” Alicia said.
“Says Ms. Squashing.” Felipe said, a barbed comment. Michael noticed Lex had not used him as a threat or even a component of the interrogation. He made mental note of this, it felt like the kind of thing that might mean something.
“Threats of violence works some times.” Alicia shrugged.
“Yeah I think we’re not getting much more, these are low-level grunts.” Michael said, before suddenly becoming overcome with awareness that the grunts could hear him. “No offense.”
“None taken, ham hocks" The dwarf woman shrugged as much as she could in functional zero G. “If the shoe fits, right?”
“Any comments Felipe?” Lex asked. Felipe shrugged. “Right, in that case we’re going to let you go now. I know we can’t stop you from running back to your boss, but I would take it as a kindness if you didn’t start any more trouble for us this night. That goes for you,” Lex pointed at the dwarf woman “and your creepy friend here,” Lex indicated Weasel-Face
“Him? Oh he’s harmless,” The dwarf woman said dismissively. “We’ll be nice won’t we ‘Torius?”
Torius, as the gaunt fellow was apparently called, smiled in reply. It had about as much warmth as lake Michigan in winter, and it was about as full of sharp things.
“As I said, harmless. Now can you let us down? I’m getting kinda dizzy up here.”
“Before that, just one small question,” Michael said, feeling his brain recover from the punch-drunk state bit by bit. “The RICO act isn’t a thing around here, so I suspect you’ll have no trouble answering. Did you get your orders from Nih-Ka directly?”
“No idea what that RICO thing is even supposed to be, but no. Boss is a busy man. Word ‘round Worship was we should maybe check on the geezer and I figured tonight’s as good a night as any. Now pretty please with honeymead drizzled elegantly over it, let me the fuck down.”
As Lex went about undoing her workings, and Felipe and Alicia kept watchful vigil over the retreating goons, Michael was lost in his own thoughts. They had mentioned Worship, so it was possible that Bartholomew was involved in this, but that link was circumstantial as all hell. It could be a place all of Nih-Ka’s goons and lieutenants hung out for all he knew. If it had been Bartholomew who gave the order, though, Michael got a feeling it didn’t necessarily come all the way from the top. Hell, that could be true either way, and it would be the angle he chose if he had to argue his case. He didn’t want to rat out Bartholomew if he didn’t have to, but he recognized that this was one of those decisions that held somewhat more weight than he’d like them to.
“Right, so this was a bust.” Felipe said once the goons were well and good out of earshot. “A dead-end lead.”
“Perhaps,” Lex said. “But don’t you think it feels relevant that Nih-Ka is involved?”
“How so?” Alicia asked.
“There’s two possibilities as far as I am concerned, come let’s walk and talk, no use hanging around here.” Lex shooed them out of the apartment. “Now where was I, oh yes, Nih-Ka. It is possible that he has nabbed Keegan and the sword, and the knowledge of that is Need-To-Know. It is also possible that the debt is centered around helping Keegan to escape or hide.”
“And what if all of this is unrelated and this is just coincidence?” Alicia asked, rolling her shoulder in way that, to Michael, yelled “pulled something.”
“I find coincidence to be too convenient of an explanation,” Lex said. “I will, however, concede that we should run this by Eltern, see if it shakes something loose in that labyrinthine think box of his.”
“Hey, Alicia you doing ok?” Michael asked after they had walked for a while and Lex’ theories and speculations had wound down to concentrated ponderings as they tried to make still more complex theories to include all the available data.
“Oh? Yeah, I’m fine. I think I kinda overextended when I threw that guy. Turns out the Deep Song does not stop me from making a fool out of myself in that regard.”
“Guess we’re all human, magic or no.”
“Sucks.”
“I guess you’re more of a DC fan then?”
“Nah, I just think it sucks more to exist as a Marvel character.”
“You know,” Michael said. “Yeah I can see that. Anyway. Do you need a massage or something once we get back to the Castle?” A second passed while the implication settled on him. “No, uh, funny business, mind.”
“Who says I don’t want funny business?”
“Uh…”
“I’m messing with you Ham Hocks, you owe me one anyway.”
“Is that nickname going to stick you think?”
“Nah, I’m using it until the fun wears out.”
Once they reached the relative comfort of the Exalted room, the evening descended into softness. Michael rubbed Alicia’s neck, paying extra attention to the right shoulder which was, as far as he could see, the problem area. Alicia, for her part, offered to give Felipe a foot massage. This came as a response on an escalating series of signals and suggestions that Felipe was feeling ignored which Michael had entirely missed until Alicia had rolled her eyes and told Felipe to scoot over.
“So, anyone see where Lex went?” Michael said after a while. He had lost track of them somewhere around entering the Castle.
“I think they, unh, little bit to the left please”
“Sure”
“Ah yeah that’s it. They went to go quiz Eltern. Told me to keep you two occupied for a while.”
“So that’s what’s going on here? You distracting the big dumb boys so we don’t break something?”
“Nah. That may be what Lex thinks of this, but I’m hanging out with my boys. Big and Dumb though they might be.”
“We’re dumb now?” Felipe asked.
“A bit, but that’s charming.”
“I guess I can live with charming for now.” Felipe said. Michael couldn’t quite put a finger on how he did it, but some way some how Felipe always managed to make such things seem like a brutality he endured most nobly.
Michael enjoyed the quiet time enough that even his restless soul found peace in just sitting in it, feeling the light dizziness that came from human touch, ever so slightly buzzed on it’s calming effect. Eventually he found it in himself to speak, as he so often did.
“Y’know, for a while I felt like I was going to be the leader of this little band.”
“Oh yeah?” Alicia was not surprised. She had a knack to give noncommittal answers that didn’t sound evasive, but Michael was pretty sure she was well aware of the dynamics at play.
“You mean to tell me you’re not?” Felipe said. It felt like one of his jabs, but the fact that it wasn’t made it somewhat puzzling to Michael.
“Not even a little. This is Lex’ show, I’m just reading the sheet music, thank god.”
“I’m not sure they’d agree with that.” Alicia said. “I mean they’re spearheading this whole investigation, but I don’t think they see themselves as a “leader.””
“Excuse me,” Michael said, “but don’t they literally sit on you while you do pushups?”
“They told me it’s enrichment, and I don’t mind the extra weight.”
“And it’s not some kind of sapphic sex thing you mean to tell me?” Felipe’s barb was back.
“You have some strange ideas about sex Espino.”
“I’m just a poor innocent Catholic boy, me.”
“Yeah, you and Tom of Finland.” Michael couldn’t help but laugh. After the small cluster of laughter and Aggravated Felipe Sounds cleared, Michael cleared his throat. “Anyway, I also think an argument could be made you’re our leader Alicia.”
Alicia’s shoulders tensed suddenly at the mention of this.
“I mean, you don’t boss us around or anything,” Michael hastened to add. “But you’re… kind of our conscience I feel like? You stay focused on what’s right, and you don’t hesitate to let your opinion be known. Lex gives the straight path, you find the shortest route that doesn’t step on any landmines or orphanage-destroying big red buttons? I don’t know, am I rambling.”
“Lil bit, Saint.” Felipe winked at him.
Alicia’s shoulders eased up again. ”I suppose that’s true,” she said. “I’m not used to think of myself like that. Lia was always the one with the conscience back in the Steppelands, and I feel like I’ve been floundering ever since then.”
“Sure,” Michael said. “But you are self employed aren’t you?”
“I mean yeah you almost gotta be, the kind of business I’m in.”
“The business of… what, tying barbells into a knot? Scaring white boys?” Felipe suggested.
“Being an influencer, you Olympic fuckboy.”
“Oooh I like that,” Felipe grinned furiously. “Talk dirty to me some more Crazy.”
Before the playful banter could escalate much further, Lex returned, shoulders hunched with a grim expression on their face.
“There better be room for one more on there,” they said as they approached the couch.
Alicia surveyed the situation briefly.
“Alright, massage time is over. It’s time to pile up. Get up Espino, I want Michael and me at the bottom.”
“Aye Aye, Crazy.”
And so pile up they did. It wasn’t the clean stack Alicia had described, but Michael did find himself under the majority of his cuddle partners. Felipe’s legs lay across his lap, and Lex lay on his chest in a way that would probably be uncomfortable if Lex wasn’t surprisingly light. There really wasn’t much weight to add there.
“So I take it talking to Eltern was a pain?” Michael asked once they were properly situated.
“A bit,” Lex said with a shrug. “If he knew that Keegan had debts, he kept that fact to himself. I managed to get some info on Nih-Ka though.”
“Oh? Spill!” Alicia played absentmindedly with a lock of Felipe’s hair.
“He apparently does this kind of thing a lot. Starts out by giving gifts, then when people come back for more it becomes a loan.”
“Huh, what kind of stuff does he give out?” Michael asked.
“Luxury items. Bottles of wine or ale, fine clothes, sweets, dried meats. The kind of things you don’t need to survive but want anyway.”
“Huh,” Michael said. “I guess it’s hard to blame people for wanting more than the absolute minimum. Not sure I’d go into debt for it, but…”
“The way Eltern frames it, it’s not even debt as much as owing the guy a favor, and then another favor, and then another favor and before you pick up on what’s happening you’re working for the guy.”
“I guess that would be the way you become a loan shark in a world without an economy.” Alicia said pensively.
“This doesn’t prove anything,” Lex whined.
“Who needs proof,” Felipe asked. “We’re not cops are we? I say we go check Nih-Ka’s place out. If we end up kicking his ass about this predatory lending business… two birds one stone, you know?”
Michael didn’t want to agree with Felipe, and it wasn’t just the principle of the matter. There were no laws to break in Thereafter, but that didn’t mean there weren’t things that were right and things that were wrong. Still, though, there was no denying that Nih-Ka was their best lead, and there similarly was no point to going over to ask politely. The elderly moleboar seemed to like Michael just fine, but there was little, if any, love lost between him and the Council, and Eltern in particular. They would get nowhere championing the Council’s case. Seeing as that was, indeed, what they were doing, though, a different approach might be necessary.
“I hate to say this,” Michael said, and he really did, in part because it felt like it really undermined his “I’m not the leader” thing, and in part because what it was he was to say. “but Felipe is right. We go right to the source. I have a guy on the inside, and if we’re lucky we can get this done without any bloodshed.”
“Hell yeah Saint. Let’s have ourselves a Heist”
Author’s Note: We are rapidly closing in on the climax of this part of the story, and that is both exciting and terrifying to me. I have the ending pretty thoroughly mapped out, but it’s still a tiny touch vague to me exactly how many chapters there’s going to be. Gotta see how it shakes out when I write it, I suppose. Fun fact: This is the longest chapter of Thereafter to date, but I suspect it will be dethroned by at least one chapter in the climax, maybe more than one. Either way I’m very happy with the way this book is going to end, and I’m excited to show you what sort of tribulations I’ve got lined up, ready to fall.
Catch you later!
V.S.D