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Chapter Twenty-Three - Refreshed

Emily woke up surprisingly refreshed the next morning, which was saying something considering the amount of elbows and knees that had been poked into her all night long.

Today was the third day since they'd arrived at the Endgame, if she counted the day of their arrival as a whole day. Almost thirty-nine hours, basically. That many hours, and it didn't look like they'd been discovered and no one had broken into their hiding place in the dead of night to arrest them all.

She counted that as a win.

Today had one simple goal: to see how good the Robber system was. That meant, of course, testing.

"Morning," she said as Maple stumbled into the room. The beaver girl didn't quite look bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, but she was definitely awake. It was almost a miracle that Emily was able to pry her away from her tinkering the night before.

She was pretty sure that if she left Maple on her own, she would have spent the night tucked away in the garage, making unspeakably dangerous things with the supplies they'd brought over.

Emily preferred forcing her to bed early, even if Maple protested... a little. Maple wasn't the tantrum-throwing sort, and could be reasoned with.

"M-morning, Big Sis," Maple said before she yawned. "Is it breakfast?"

"In a little bit," Emily said.

"Oh... in that case, can I... um..."

"Yes, Maple, you can go play in the garage. But you'd better be back when I call for you with no complaints. And don't make too much noise. Remember, we're still trying to be stealthy here!"

She wasn't sure if Maple had caught that last bit as she flew out the back door.

Oh well, if she heard anything from in the house, she'd go out and warn Maple to be quieter. It was too early for arguing and she hadn't had nearly enough caffeine to handle anything of the sort.

Speaking of which...

Breakfast was, by necessity, going to be a simple affair, but that was fine. She laid out bowls and plates and then made herself some coffee using a small camping stove with the windows wide open.

The girls came over, Trinity was sent to fetch Maple (who reluctantly showed up for breakfast) and then Emily settled down and started to take notes.

She had a small notepad and was genuinely considering taking notes using some sort of cypher, but decided that it would be silly. A cypher meant she was trying to hide something, and whatever she came up with, someone could break.

So instead she just wrote what she had to, and replaced keywords with names while trying to stay consistent. If anyone read her notes now, they'd just sound like confusing gossip. Or so she hoped.

In any case..

There were eleven Robber powers she or her sisters could unlock.

Unlock Simple Door (3 Points)
Minor Shadow Blend (3 Points)
Featherstep (4 Points)
Reach (3 Points)

Whisper Drift (3 Points)
Summon Glow (3 Points)
Quick Patch (4 Points)
Gust Flick (4 Points)
Shadow Hop (5 Points)
Minor Illusory Double (6 Points)
Dust Hand (5 Points)

That was a decent number.

They were all sitting pretty on six points each, which meant that a lot of them could gain two powers.

In total, they had six people with six Robber points each for a grand total of... 36 points to spend. Unlocking all of the powers would cost 43 points.

They just didn't have enough. Emily chewed on the back of her pen, then looked the list over again. There were five powers that only cost three points each, though. That could mean...

She made a few little notes, in code, but when she read them plainly it sounded something like:
Unlock Simple Door (3 Points) > Teddy
Minor Shadow Blend (3 Points) > Athena
Reach (3 Points) > Trinity
Whisper Drift (3 Points) > Maple
Summon Glow (3 Points) > Aurora

Emily considered it for a moment longer, then nodded. That was the goal for today. Testing five of the eleven powers they could afford. If one of them proved to be very strong, then they'd have enough points to all buy a copy of it.

Once today's test was done, she was considering a small 'grocery run' a bit deeper into Saint Aire. It would maybe give them a few more points, scout the city out, and... well, get groceries.

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"Okay, girls," she said. "I have a plan for today."

That got some attention, and the usual breakfast-table banter calmed down. "What's the plan, Boss?" Teddy asked.

"We're going to test five of the Robber powers. The five cheapest. That's... Unlock Simple Door, Minor Shadow Blend, Reach, Whisper Drift, and Summon Glow."

"Dibs on the shadow one!" Trinity said.

Emily blinked. "Uh, okay?"

"I'll take the Whisper Drift, then," Athena said.

"And I'm taking the Glow one! To shine bright like the proletariat!"

Emily looked over to Aurora who shrugged. "No preference," the girl said, but then Maple raised her hand shyly.

"Can I have, um, Reach?"

"Of course," Emily said. "Which leaves..." She glanced at her notes. "Unlock Simple Door to you, Aurora, if you're good with that?"

"I don't mind it," Aurora said. "Seems handy."

"Yeah, I suppose so."

Emily took a moment to revise her list, scratching out names and replacing them with new ones.

Unlock Simple Door (3 Points) > Aurora
Minor Shadow Blend (3 Points) > Trinity
Reach (3 Points) > Maple
Whisper Drift (3 Points) > Athena
Summon Glow (3 Points) > Teddy

With a somewhat decent plan and breakfast, or what they'd managed of breakfast, done, she pushed her sisters to do their morning routines and get ready for another trip into the Endgame.

"We might hit up a clothing store today too," Emily muttered as she took in the state of Teddy's jeans. It was wild how quickly her sisters could wear through clothes. Then again, they were a lot more active than the average person, so it kind of made sense.

They left out the back, with Trinity running ahead to scout and confirm that the road was cleared, then they made for the town taking the same path as last time.

When they crossed the barrier into the Endgame, Emily paused, then looked around for that rock they'd moved the day before. She found it a pace deeper into the Endgame. So, about a metre a day.

That wasn't too much.

Then again, if the Endgame was a perfect circle, and it grew by one metre in radius per day, then its total area was actually growing at a nearly exponential rate.

And for all she knew, it might start accelerating. Where had it started? Three weeks ago? So a mere twenty-odd metres further in?

She was pretty sure it was a lot more than that. So maybe the total area was the same every time, but as it grew, it moved out less since the circle was wider?

Or all of her speculation was completely off and she was better off leaving it to the experts...

Probably that, yeah.

"Okay," she said. "Let's find a quiet place and get on with the experimenting."

Saint Arie was quiet. No barking dogs, no rumbling cars, none of the noises she'd come to expect from a city that wasn't dead. Just wind and their feet swishing through grass that was already growing to be quite wild.

They moved past the familiar gas station, across a wide street, then continued on past the hardware store. It didn't look like anyone had come to inspect it after they had... borrowed a few things from within.

There was, around the next intersection, a large playground hidden by a tall fence, and past that, a small elementary school. The sort that had been around for a hundred-plus years, with a few additions tacked on, and which could probably still only handle a few hundred students.

She hesitated, then made her way to it.

It was a place of learning, and they were here to learn. Besides, there might be things to distract her sisters in there, at least for a little while. The school didn't even have a parking lot out front, just an extra-wide street. There was litter around, and she imagined for a moment that it had been a place where a lot of panicked parents had rushed to when the Endgame began.

There was a large plaque to one side of the entrance, with bold lettering on a raised background. "Saint Aire Elementary School," Athena read. "Not real creative."

"I guess not." They walked up to the front door and unsurprisingly, when she tugged at it, it was locked. "Well... I guess this is a good time to see how that Unlock Simple Doors power works."

Aurora nodded, then rubbed her hands together. "Okay, Boss. Here goes!"

***