Modern Age Online

"I'm sorry. What was that?" Kaleb asked, glancing up from his work.

Across the table, Jar-lock rolled his eyes as Vivienne and Farrah smiled at Kaleb. Claire and Two Gun were watching the conversation with interest and Abby was seated on Kaleb's right, watching him work. D34d-I was to his left, duck bill stuck in a stack of datapads. Kaleb raised his tongs out of his cybernetic shoulder joint to pay full attention to Farrah and Vivienne's report.

"Karick was not the only person kidnapping gang members." Farrah restated.

"Then what about all the people Abby and I freed from his personal realm? A large portion of them were gang members, right? Which is why they started fighting in the damn street when they were loose."

"Thanks for helping with that, by the way." Jar-lock snarked with a smile.

"Hey! When you stop a megalomaniac demigod, you get to clock out early," Abby responded.

"Really? A Demigod?" Two Gun asked, sounding skeptical.

"He had the power to shape that damn world to his will." Kaleb intoned. "We got lucky that he was an idiot."

Abby nodded. "Seriously. If he hadn't been a Player, we'd for sure be dead."

Farrah pressed a few buttons on her side of the table and a holo-emitter sprung from the center of their round table. A few more quick commands, and Karick's face was spinning in the air in front of them. Beside it was a list of his crimes and a brief bio.

"Karick Tore is a highly gifted mage with an emphasis on extra-planar dimensions. It seems his complete focus was on creating and… staffing his own personal universe. A few weeks ago, there was nothing on him. Then he was suddenly kicked out of the Magical Institute for trying to enslave fellow students. From there, he disappears for a while and it is believed he honed his craft in secret. Pouring all of his time into crafting his personal realm."

"That seems shortsighted." Claire said, sitting back in her chair.

"It's not really that crazy," Jar-lock responded. "I mean, he wanted to create a place he could control absolutely."

"If that was the case, how did those two survive?" Two Gun asked, pointing at Kaleb and Abby.

"Hey!" Abby shouted, affronted.

Kaleb's attention was drawn back down to his cybernetic arm lying on the table. Daivor had tapped his hand to move it out of the way. The Gnome was helping clear the broken metal out of his shoulder joint. Kaleb used his tongs to pick another broken piece out of the wreckage as Farrah explained.

"It seems Karick was exceptional at creating worlds, but a terrible magic user otherwise. He showed a slight affinity towards wind magic, though. However, his true talent was in Magical Theory."

"So we got lucky and found a Mage who sucked at combat magic." Kaleb stated, pulling out a particularly stubborn bit of metal.

"Essentially." Farrah nodded.

"I also think you caught him off-guard." Jar-lock said, pressing a few buttons on his side of the table.

A new image popped into being above the table. This one was a map of Imperial Valley, except it was see-through and had a light-blue web of pulsing energy flowing through it. Jar-lock spun the image and highlighted the line of flowing energy.

"This was Karick's power network. He piggybacked the Leyline we already knew was there and hid his own magic in its magical signature. However, he didn't account for what all that mana would do to his network. Which is why we got those fractures in the street. I think he was in the middle of fixing those fractures when the Professor and Abby fell through theirs."

"I claim no ownership of that space anus." Kaleb quipped.

"My point is," Jar-lock said over a round of snickers. "That I think Karick was caught off guard by people dropping in on him. He was kidnapping people, sure. But not to the extant we all thought."

"Which is why I believe Karick is not our face-snatcher," Vivienne said, using the table's interface to bring up a picture of a person without a face. Their eyes and mouth were gone. The skin stretched smoothly over where the missing organs were.

"Blegh!" Claire said, looking sick.

Farrah nodded at Claire's assessment, but kept her eyes on Kaleb and Abby. "You two didn't see anyone with these types of wounds on the other side, correct?"

"We did not." Abby answered for both of them. "The people we saw were all cartoon characters or toys."

"So to be fair, they might have had those wounds. But we couldn't see them." Kaleb added, pulling the last loose bit of metal from his shoulder joint.

Glancing up and seeing their confused faces, Kaleb continued explaining. "Karick's spell was like a mask or costume stretched over a person. It covered their real self underneath. So we don't know what the victims looked like."

"The few we saw at the expulsion zone had their faces, though." Vivienne said, looking at Jar-lock to confirm.

When the big Mage nodded, everyone fell into contemplative silence. This meant that there was another serial killer in their district. Someone that was removing people's faces. So, while removing Karick from the territory was a good thing. Their work wasn't done. Which meant Kaleb needed to get this damn joint replaced quickly.

His face was still buried in his cybernetic, trying to find a good way to pull the socket out without damaging it further. Karick had really done a number on the metal. The explosion from Milly's overload hadn't helped things much either. But overall, the cybernetic held up better than he expected. He just need to get the joint replacement done. Daivor pointed at a screw that wasn't covered by bent metal and dove for it. Kaleb reached over to grab a screwdriver for the small gnome when the conversation picked back up around the table.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

"So our next goal is to hunt down and arrest this face-snatcher, right? Do we even have any leads?" Two Gun asked.

"We know he likes to kidnap criminals. Like Tore."

"I think Karick was just grabbing who he could, Abby. But the fact that there are two kidnappers should change how we go about things." Jar-lock said.

"How?"

Kaleb picked up the response before Jar-lock could. "We cross-reference those we saved from those still missing and see if there's a pattern."

"Ha! Now you're thinking like a soldier." Jar-lock laughed.

"Hardly. It's just common sense. We take what we know and what we don't, then find the difference. Pretty simple problem solving, really."

"My team is already checking the profiles of those we saved. Most are criminals, but there are a few civilians mixed in there. Karick was quite roughshod with those he picked up."

"So we have to hope that Face-Snatcher isn't so picky. If they have a pattern, we need to find it, and fast."

"Actually," Vivienne started, seeming concerned. She turned to Jar-lock for support and the Mage nodded knowingly.

"We need to spend our time healing what Karick broke. Magical distortions are a serious threat. The local PD are even lending us their full magical support."

"What little of it there is." Farrah snorted.

"Really, Jar? You're working with those asshats?" Kaleb asked, looking up from his work.

"You mean the proper authorities? Yes!"

"The people who took half an hour to respond to our request for aid?"

"The ones that had to be threatened into action?"

*Quack*

"The people that just tried to contractually screw us out of our bounty?"

All eyes at the table turned to the little black duck sitting next to Kaleb. The alien duck had his winged hands around a stack of datapads and he looked pissed. His eyes were narrowed, and he was glaring at Farrah with an intensity that Kaleb had rarely seen. The rabbit woman quirked an eyebrow at the Player, daring him to continue. D34d-I blinked first, coughing and looking away as he plugged a datapad into the table.

A long string of text filled the air and Kaleb felt his eyes already closing at all the legalese on display. The contract was wordy, badly written and clearly designed to annoy the reader. Thankfully, D34d-I pressed a few more buttons and highlighted certain sections of the document. As he did, he pointed a wing at the highlighted sections.

*Quack*

"It's not all that complicated, but I'll cut it short for brevity's sake. The local PD just tried to allocate itself 80% of our bounty from the Karick capture."

"Bullshit!" Farrah said with heat. "I checked that contract myself. The police staff and I okay-ed everything on site before I forwarded it to you."

There was a pregnant pause as the rabbit and duck glared at each other. Eventually D34d-I pointed at the spinning contract hovering above the table again.

*Quack*

"Then what's wrong with this picture?"

Farrah angrily read through the floating text before a look of shock filled her face. "This isn't the contract we agreed to."

*Quack*

"Nope. But this was the one they sent over. I think they expected us to just assume it was the same one you agreed to in the field. I don't think they expected you to send me the first contract."

There was the sound of more clicking keys before a second document appeared in the air next to the first. Kaleb glanced up again, but the second document was just as wordy as the first. He read a few lines before he got bored and went back to work. Thankfully, there were a few people around the table more interested. Farrah smacked the table as everyone's faces turned angry.

"So they agreed to one contract in the field and then sent us another. Hoping we would just sign it and never look back."

"Those rotten fucks!" Abby practically shouted.

"Even worse," Two Gun said. "Now it's a he-said/she-said argument. Where one of the parties is the fucking police department. This is going to be a nightmare."

"Not really." Kaleb said quietly as he pulled free the rest of the socket with Daivor's help.

"What do you mean?" Claire asked. "They can just say they never agreed to the first contract and Farrah is lying. Meanwhile, we'll say that we never agreed to this second contract and that they are lying. Round and round from there."

Kaleb raised his eyes to look across at Farrah. "Were you wearing your earpiece?"

"Yes. I mean, I know I'm not a field agent like all y'all. But old habits and all that. Besides, its good idea in general."

"Then we should be golden." Kaleb said, going back to his work.

There was quiet around the table for a short while until a burst of noise filled Kaleb's ears. Everyone was shouting at him for some reason, and Farrah was giving him a dirty look. Abby gave him another HP-depleting smack on the shoulder and Kaleb pulled his head free of his work.

"What?!"

"Explain, dumbass!" Abby growled, readying her fist for another punch.

Kaleb flinched slightly before putting down his tongs. He rubbed his eyes as he explained. "Our ear comms are actually pretty sensitive. I had to dial back what they picked up in order for both parties to hear each other more clearly. But they still pick up everything. If Farrah was wearing one during her meeting, the audio is still there and probably retrievable."

"Probably retrievable?" Jar-lock asked, crossing his arms.

Kaleb shrugged. "Does it matter? All we have to do is inform the police that we have audio of that meeting and they'll fold like a stack of cards."

"They aren't going to be happy about being recorded." Farrah said.

"Fuck'em!" Abby responded. "They just tried to screw us over. Besides, did they explicitly say that no electronics could be at the meeting?"

"No. In fact, several of their staff were wearing walkies-talkies. They even got updates as we were hashing out the deal."

The mood around the table lightened, and Kaleb put his head back down to finish what he was doing. He was going to have to machine another socket joint. But for now, he wanted to check all the connection ports and find a better way to anchor everything. His thoughts were interrupted by a loud quack.

*Quack*

"Professor, start pulling that audio just in case. We might not need it, but best to be sure. Meanwhile, Farrah and I can contact the PD."

Kaleb helplessly waved at his broken arm. But no one was paying attention to him. Instead, Jar-lock tapped the table.

"Vivienne and I will start repairing the distortions Karick left in his wake. The rest of the team, minus the Professor, should hit the streets and find our face-snatcher."

"Sounds good to me."

"Roger."

"I'll leave the after-action report to you too, Professor."

Kaleb glared at Abby and shook his head. "Hell no! You're doing your own after-action, Abs. And the damn audio can wait until I get my arm repaired."

"Boss, I can get the kids to machine the new part. It'll be easy since we just need a replacement." Daivor grinned up at him.

Kaleb glared down at the little traitor before sighing loudly. He sat back in his chair and looked around the table. Jar-lock and Vivienne already had their heads together, talking about magic stuff. Claire and Two Gun were watching him with mild interest as D34d-I pulled his datapad out of the table. Farrah pulled her ear piece out of her large rabbit ear and slid across the table to him. Kaleb winced at the casual disrespect to his work, but sighed.

"Fine. I'll get the damn audio pulled. But afterward I'm working on my shit. No patrols till I'm done… unless y'all find the serial killer."

Farrah nodded. So did everyone else at the table. "I'll put some people on cross-referencing disappearances in our area. We should have a list of people Karick abducted."

*Quack*

"We do, but it was sent by the cops. So, y'know, grain of salt and all that."

Farrah grimaced as everyone except Kaleb rose from the table. There was a quick round of goodbyes and platitudes before he was left alone with Daivor. He picked up Farrah's ear piece before sighing again. It wasn't going to be hard work, amplifying the ear piece's audio. But it was going to be tedious. He looked down at Daivor, pulling some wires free inside from his arm's shoulder joint. With a final grunt, he pushed his chair back and picked up his arm.

Daivor easily rode the arm up to Kaleb's shoulder and continued his work like nothing happened. Kaleb angled for his workshop and got ready for the boring part of being a Hero, paperwork.