Will

"Hello there, friend. Sorry about the wait."

The man sitting in the entryway of the side door slowly picked his chin up off his chest as he roused from sleep; blinking blearily, arms tightly crossed into his armpits. "Who the fuck are you?" were his first words upon waking.

"I'm Will," said Will. "And you must be Bill."

"A right fucking sleuth you are, pilgrim." Bill hopped to his feet. A Level 5 Builder, he was an ugly fellow with a badly receding hairline and a squished bulldog face. "Well?" he said. "What are we standing here for? It's bad enough you left me sitting out here for three fucking hours—leave this lot any longer, and it'll start to stink."

"By all means, Master Bill. As I said, I apologize for the wait." Will did not see the need to mention that the man couldn't possibly have been waiting out there for three hours—it was probably less than one. He could put up with a little melodrama if it meant getting what he needed.

Bill went and took up a two-wheeled hand cart stacked with three bulky, tarp-wrapped objects, and Will stood aside from the doorway to let the man push his burden into the library. Once he'd offloaded the three somethings onto the floor, Will tugged open the tarp flaps of each one to confirm the delivery. Sure enough, they were three male corpses, average in height and weight and not too long dead.

This would do fine, he reckoned. Then again, it wasn't really up to him.

"Can you work with this?" Will asked.

"I think so," Serene replied, looking down at the bodies. "Do you want me to try?"

Will nodded. "Please do. Just let me make things square with our friend here first."

Will took the former slave aside to pay him the second installment of what he was owed—the first half having been paid by Nyx when the demoness engaged his services—and added a generous tip to make up for the cold initial reception. Not that it improved his mood any. He was evidently the glass half-empty type.

"Went through a lot of trouble to get you those," Bill grumbled while he meticulously counted out his glories. "You know, seeing how I don't actually work on the sanitation crew anymore. Got sacked the minute they took the collar off. There's such a thing as unwanted favors, you know that right?"

"That sounds hard," Will said, though he really couldn't care less about the man's whining.

Bill gave a derisive snort. "Hard! Ha! That's one way to put it. You know what I've had to do since I got free? No work these days for an honest working man like myself. I've been cleaning cesspits—fucking cesspits! Eight cunting years on the goddamn sanitation crew, and I never smelled anything half as disgusting as that."

"I'm sure Nyx will have jobs like this for you every once in a while."

Bill finished counting, then went over the bills a second time, eyeing Will suspiciously every so often as though expecting him to snatch the money out of his hand as soon as he looked away. "Well, all right," he grunted at last, and stuffed the money in his pocket. "I'd say it was a pleasure, but it sure fucking wasn't. And tell that bitch of yours we're even now."

"My what?" Will asked.

"You know, that big bitch. The one who said she'd get me free. You and her both work for the demon, don't you?"

"You mean Sam Darling."

Bill shrugged. "Sure. That bitch."

"Sam. You can call her Sam."

Bill scoffed, and began to spew out some other rudeness before he looked up. Will's displeasure must have been showing, because the man fell silent then, and he rolled his shoulders uncomfortably as he chewed his words somewhat more carefully.

"Yeah," Bill said at last. "Sam. Tell her 'thanks', or whatever."

Will gave a joyless smile. "I'll do that. Good evening to you, Master Bill."

The man left in a hurry with his empty hand cart, throwing glances over his shoulder. Will felt no pity for him. Some people could do with learning some manners.

Returning to the others, Will found that Serene had already conjured an Illusion on one of the bodies, and was looking back and forth between canvas and model as she worked on perfecting the fine details, the corpse's face appearing to subtly shift and meld as she manipulated the Illusion. The corpse's expression of mute shock and horror, frozen in death, she had added on her own. It was a nice touch.

The librarian acted out his role as model with great reluctance, huffing and stomping about on the spot as though on the verge of running away.

Rather than break Serene's concentration, Will studied her in silence while she worked. She still looked clammy and somewhat queasy, her lips pressed into a pale line, but she was at least steady on her feet, which Will took as a good sign. He couldn't afford for her to fall short—not until the job was done.

She had let her own mask drop as she worked on that of the dead man. About her shoulders, various people flickered in and out of existence. Most vivid was the spectral afterimage of the man Will had learned was called Ratcatcher—briefly a friend of both Sam and Serene before his untimely demise. It appeared that the Entertainer had entered some kind of macabre post-mortem romance with him; he now stood at her side, a hand on her shoulder as he whispered encouraging words in her ear.

It was a truly revolting display of self-delusion, but seeing as it appeared to be lending her strength, Will saw no reason to delete the spirit at present. At long as she did her job, that was all that mattered.

"The Illusion won't be perfect, no matter how careful I am with it," Serene said without looking up. "It won't react dynamically to things like lighting changes unless I'm there to modify it in real time, so it's probably best if no one looks too close."

"That's fine," Will said. "But you can tie off the cast so it won't disappear when you stop focusing on it, right?"

"Yes. I can probably make it last an hour or more."

"Good. That should do fine."

"Are you sure about all this?" Fletcher asked, picking anxiously at strings of letters floating around him.

"It will be all right," Will said with what he hoped was a reassuring smile. "You should probably start bringing supplies into the undercroft once she's done—enough to last a week at least. Remember, you'll have two others to feed as well. If need be I'll have more brought over in secret."

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The librarian offered more half-hearted excuses, insisting that he couldn't possibly be away from his books for a full week. Will brushed them aside, and was about to rebuke the old man back into compliance when something struck him mute. A stirring at the edge of his extended Detect [Life].

There was a group of people in the road just off campus. Going by the distribution and body language of their spectral outlines, they were neither vagrants nor guardsmen on regular patrol duty. They were disembarking from a vehicle of some sort, and they had their faces turned up toward the library.

He didn't use Identify on them lest they pick up on the mental intrusion, but he didn't need the extra confirmation anyway.

"Shit," Will muttered.

"What?" Fletcher asked urgently. "What's wrong, my boy?"

"Pickup crew. They're early."

"Is that bad? It sounds bad."

"It means we're in a hurry. Serene, get that Illusion finished. Fletcher, you help her mess this place up a bit, make it look like I struggled with you. I'll keep them busy."

"O… Okay! I'll try!"

"You have Telepathy, don't you? Signal me when you're finished and have made yourselves scarce. We'll figure out the supply situation later."

"Okay."

Will approached Serene, and the apparition of Ratcatcher vanished when Will put his hand on her other shoulder. "You got this?" he asked.

"I've got this," Serene replied, teeth gritted. "Just go."

Will nodded, and hurried for the front doors, unlocking the familiar mechanism with a weak cast of Repel without needing to Detect its workings. He shut the doors behind him and made west, toward the edge of the campus grounds, where five armed guards were already making their way toward him.

Not guards, he realized. Their armor was too fine, as were their weapons. They all carried shouldered rifles in addition to bladed sidearms. It was a detachment of Thorpe's commandos. He recognized the woman heading them up—Captain Wynn, their leader.

They were supposed to be elite troops, and judging just by the way they carried themselves, Will could believe it. They were all Level 10 or 11, aside from Wynn at 12.

"Good evening, One-Eye," Wynn said with a smile when they met along a stone path.

Will nodded in reply. They shook hands.

"We were sent to give you some backup," Wynn explained. "I understand you were given quite the undertaking. Three targets in one night, all over Level 15, is that right?"

"That's right," Will said, keeping his voice calm even though he could hardly hear himself over the blood rushing in his ears. "I appreciate the offer, but to be honest, I don't need the help."

By 'backup', Will assumed she really meant 'babysit'. He needed to get rid of them quickly. It wouldn't do to have them standing around watching while he was setting up the other fake bodies, and aside from Wynn herself, the troop had one other Explorer, meaning they likely had the sensory abilities needed to see through the Illusions if only they got wary enough to use them.

It was bad all around. He hadn't expected this sort of turnout. Brimstone had never sat on him like this for a contract.

"I work better alone," he continued, "and I've planned out this job quite closely. You'd only get in my way."

A bland smile played on Wynn's face as she considered, chewing on a mangled toothpick. She looked like a hard woman, hair cropped short and eyes glinting like steel out of the night shadows.

"Well, I'd hate to disappoint my girls," she said, motioning to the men behind her, "since they got all prettied up for a night out and all, but…" She shrugged. "You're in charge of this operation, I suppose. We'll dance to your tune tonight. And we'd hate to step on any toes, yours least of all. We've all heard big things about you, Mr. One-Eye, haven't we ladies?"

A few of the commandos gave terse grunts of assent.

"Good," Will said, not allowing himself any relief just yet. There was something altogether too shrewd about this lady for comfort. "You brought a wagon, yes?"

"Yessir." She looked back, and pointed toward the horse-drawn vehicle standing in the road under a flickering oil street lamp. "We were told to handle disposal for you as well."

"Then you can just do that for tonight. I'm sorry I don't have anything more meaningful for you to do, but if I'd been told about this in advance, I'd have asked your superiors not to bother."

Wynn shrugged. "I mean, sure, but you'd only need one guy, two max, to haul the bodies. Even if you don't think you need the backup, having it there can't hurt, can it?"

"I see your point. But like I said, I've planned this job out beforehand. My targets are dangerous people—observant. I'm good at hiding my presence, but if they catch wind of any of you clattering about in that armor, it'll give me away. Better I go alone, rely on the element of surprise. If things go sour, I'll fall back and wait for you lot to reinforce me."

"We know a thing or two about subterfuge. We can take the armor off, go light. Won't get in your way."

"I appreciate it, but I've got my method. Now is too late to start mixing things up."

Wynn chuckled, and shrugged the rifle strap higher on her shoulder. "All right bossman—have it your way. Can't blame me for trying though, can you? Getting to work a job with the infamous Misfortune of Sheerhome sounded like good fun."

"I understand. Some other time, maybe. I figure there'll be more than enough work for us killers once the real fighting starts." He nodded to the north—toward Stormfront.

"True enough," Wynn said. "Well, if all we've got to do is carry out the trash, we'll make sure to do it proper. You finish with the librarian already, I take it?"

Will nodded slowly.

Status? he thought.

<Finished, I think,> came Fletcher's Telepathic reply a moment later, his thoughts erratic and quick when pressed up against Will's mind. <You can send them in.>

Will led the commandos up toward the library, resisting the strong urge to glance over his shoulder every five seconds to make sure they weren't getting ready to shank him in the back. He hoped they hadn't seen Bill on his way out.

"If you don't mind me asking," Will said as they walked, "who gave you the order to come here? They don't usually make such a fuss over me."

"It was Handsome," Wynn replied smoothly. "I guess he figured this was an important enough job to warrant some extra security."

"Right. Worked with him before, have you?"

"No, not really. I've always been stationed in Timbryhall. Why?"

"No reason." The way she spoke about the advisor had sounded oddly familiar. Was she lying about not knowing him? What would be the point in that?

He brought the commandos inside the library, and found the place well trashed, ruined books strewn across the floor. Serene's work, he guessed, not Fletcher's. He would rather have taken cyanide than ruin one piece of his precious collection.

There was also a great deal of blood spattered about. The fact that Will could not tell if it was real or Illusory was a rather good sign in his eyes.

Wynn glanced briefly at the one corpse left out in the hall, comparing it to his likeness on a piece of paper, then nodded; satisfied. Once she had confirmed the kill, Will refolded the tarp so the face was covered.

"Awfully nice of you to gift wrap him up for us," Wynn said, while directing two of her boys to pick up the body between them. "You always this considerate with us foot soldiers?"

"I'd hardly call you foot soldiers," Will replied. "I wouldn't call myself considerate either."

"And he's modest, too!" Wynn laughed. "What a catch! You girls hear that? Be on your best behavior and bat your eyelashes all nice, he might take one of you home with him."

"Fuck off, sir," one of the men replied with a chuckle of his own. He was standing by one of the bookshelves, picking out books at random to flip through before discarding them on the floor.

"Aw, they're a little cranky," Wynn said. "Well, I reckon we should be off, then. If we wrap this up quick enough I might take them by the pits so they get to see some kind of action at least. Not meaning to rush you, of course. Take your time."

"I understand," Will said.

"We'll drop this one down a hole, then come meet you at the second location. You going for the priest or the firefighter next?"

"The firefighter."

"Roger that.

Will calmly watched them leave with the wrapped-up corpse, and waited until they passed beyond the edge of his Detect [Life] before opening a door down to the complex network of basement tunnels running under the Academy, where Serene and Fletcher were waiting for him. He took the second body over one shoulder, and had Serene follow him as he went back up.

They were on the clock now—had to finish with the second target before the commandos came along for the pickup.

Damn it all, Will thought bitterly, and cursed Handsome for his consideration. The fact that he couldn't tell if the advisor was trying to trip him up or genuinely meaning to help did not make him feel any better.

Whatever. There was nothing to be done for it now but follow the plan to the end and hope for the best.

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