Shorn Strings

Titus looked up to the knock on the doors and put aside his notes about the time dilation field he had lived through. "Come in."

The door swung open and in walked Mark, or Slipstream as he liked to be called. "How's it goin' Dr. Dawkins? Long time, no see. Glad to have you back in our world. Whatcha been up to?"

"Well, I have been having many learning experiences with my team," Titus said as he pulled out the white noise generator and closed the door. "And how are you?"

"Doin' pretty good. Actually, I have a problem that I need your help with. But that can wait." Mark said leaning back in his chair. "Catch me up. How's runnin' been working for you?"

"Well it's been a very... ...novel experience. I'm observing phenomenon in ways that would never occur in the lab. It's really quite inspiring."

"Yeah, yeah. Make with the details. Spill it."

"Very well. The most recent run involved a concerned gentleman who wanted us to rescue his sister."

"Whoa, the whole damsel in distress thing! Who's the dragon?"

"Well, luckily in this case it wasn't actually a dragon. It was a minor member of the Yakuza."

"Hey, they're pretty bad, too. You want to watch your step around them--they'll frag you good."

"Yes, we had some inclination of that. The basic plan was to talk to the guy who knew where the kidnapper was. Unfortunately, this individual wasn't very cooperative. When negotiations failed, I tried to probe his mind after not spotting any awakened in the area. It appeared his retained shaman was better at hiding than I was at spotting, because she warned him and started attacking us. At this point his goons started attacking us, which was most unfortunate since we had checked our weapons at the door."

"Luckily the other members of my group are much better in a fist fight than I am. One of his goons was amazingly fast and knocked me through a trid screen before much happened. My teammates moved in to deal with him while I provided some magical support. Unfortunately, hindsight being acute, I should have activated my Increased Reflexes spell when the commotion first started. It seems like everyone moves so much faster and it makes it difficult to act. My friends were dispatching with the goons pretty effectively when their shaman, who had disappeared brought forth a hearth spirit who proceeded to confuse us all. I cannot articulate how frustrating that experience is."

"Yeah, tell me about it. Elementals are good for a lot of things, but that ain't one of them."

"Luckily our shaman was able to disperse it and I brought forth a rather large earth elemental, which turned the tide, bagged the guy, and got us the information we needed. Walking out was a bit of a tense moment, but we did it."

Mark leaned forward in his chair. "It seems like you're doin' pretty well. I had my doubts at first, but perhaps you are suited to the biz."

"Um, thank you. From there we scouted out the location of the kidnapper. A little astral reconnaissance revealed that he had kidnapped many people and had a small gang. We now know that they were scheduled to become a type of cyberpuppet prostitute."

"What the? Man, I tell you--that cyber stuff ain't nothin' but trouble."

"Yes, particularly in this case. Our shaman was able to quietly take out their sentries. We then closed in on the first floor of the building where a few gang members were hanging out. Having quietly dispatched them, we then prepared to tackle the real challenge--the troll with the light machinegun guarding the top of the stairs. Using a trick I had recently learned, I took over his mind and had him shoot at his friends. They took him down pretty quickly with a lucky shot, but it did solve our problem of the troll itself. Our troll, a recent addition to our team that proved his value quite effectively, launched a grenade into the top of the stairs which bought us some time. I protected the troll with an Armor spell and he charged in, got shot a lot and finished off the gang with a well-placed grenade. A tough troll protected with an Armor spell is a really frightening thing. From there we rescued all of the girls that were being held there, dropped them off with Lone Star, and returned the sister to our employer.”

“Hey, you rescued the damsel, did you get the reward,” Slipstream said winking.

“Please, Mark, they were really quite young.”

“I’m jus’ yankin’ ya, Dr. Dawkins. Say, it seems like you’ve worked out pretty well with that team of yours.”

“Yes, they are pretty capable when it comes down to it. What was it you needed help with?”

“Well, we’re trying to get into this facility that has some pretty involved magic security and I wanted to pick your brain.”

“Shoot.”