Salem. Kind of a predictable place for a magic-based case. At least to me. Do people still fear magic here? Seems like you'd be brought up with parents that did. Of course, I could be wrong.
"You sure he said something?" Clyde asks, referring to Barry who was taking off in his jet.
"Yes! He told me that I smelled bad and to sit down."
"Yeah...I don't believe that."
"I didn't think you would."
Barry dropped us off at a vacant field with civilization not too far from here. It'll be a bit of walking, but that'll give us time to think about where to start looking.
"Hey, can I piggyback on you?" I ask, giving him my best puppy face.
He smirks and turns around, kneeling down for me to climb on his back. I do, and he stands back up with ease like I weigh nothing. He starts heading towards the buildings in the distance, from here they look like residency lands.
"So, what's our plan of action here?" he asks.
"The case file Marston gave us also includes their reports for three days before they failed to report on the fourth. We'll follow their footsteps in chronological order of their reports, that way it'll be like retracing their footsteps."
"Wouldn't that mean we'd just get caught in the same exact way?"
"No, because we'll be able to see it coming."
"Sounds like a plan. Where are we headed to first?"
Before I can answer, we are both startled by a human man seemingly teleporting to the side of us, as if out of thin air. Either that, or he's very good at sneaking. I get off of Clyde and face him. Clyde is already in a battle stance, but I remain calm. The man doesn't say anything, all he does is eyeball us up and down.
I break the awkward intro first. "Um, hello. You kinda came out of nowhere there. What're you doing way out here in these fields? Are you lost?"
"He's not a child," Clyde says, lowering his battle stance, "he's out here for a reason." He addresses the man, "So what's the reason?"
"To meet you here," he calmly says.
That's impossible, nobody mentioned our departure for a mission except Marston and Adams, and they don't openly talk about briefings. Barry's jet had the cloaking device up the moment we hit Salem airs, so nobody saw us flying here either.
"To meet us?" I repeat. "Who are you?"
He ignores me, instead, he talks to a watch he's wearing on his wrist. "More Ispio agents, probably here for the old ones. Apprehending now."
As quickly as he said it, two more bodies, one human male, one anthro deer male, teleport around us too; actually teleport! That's got to be some impressive technology they've got, not even Amelia's lab can teleport things yet.
Absolutely stunned at how quickly we've been found out, I meekly stutter, "Uh, Clyde?"
Clyde raises his defense again. "Don't just stand there, fight!"
All three assailants pull out a metal rod with wires, a shock baton most likely. Stunning equipment to incapacitate and capture, not for a lethal takedown. They want us alive, just like Jack and Abby. They come at us from every angle, swinging wildly with no technique.
Clyde and I split up quickly, forcing them to widen their aim for a harder target. All three miss their first strike as we weave through their electric sticks. Now we stand on opposite ends with the three in the middle, that's easier to deal with.
"Ah," the first man says, "why are the younger ones more defiant? Don't make me sweat, just give up, you're gonna lose anyway."
I laugh, "Ha! With your combat training, I won't even need a gadget to whoop your butts!"
The two new ones gang up on Clyde while the first man goes for me. He swings around his weapon just as predictably as on his first attempt, and I use little effort to dodge it. I can see that he's getting angrier from his failed attempts, but that just makes it even easier to see him coming. I let him do a few more whacks before I decide I've had my fun and counter his brutish swings by taking away his baton and using it on him. He falls flat on his back but is still conscious. I look at Clyde to see if he's alright, but his attackers were already out cold.
I throw the baton on the ground and mount our only awake friend. "That was so pathetic, I think I want to apologize."
The man heaves heavily trying to catch his breath he lost to the shock. He raises his watch, only to discover it short-circuited with the extra electricity. "Gloating doesn't suit you, Troy."
"So you know about us, but you still only came armed with sticks?" I grab him by the neck of his shirt and lift him up slightly, "I'm insulted."
"Heard you guys were doing badly as a unit, figured a stick is all we need."
Unbelievable, how does this guy know so much about us, right down to today's gossip?
"Cute. Real cute."
Clyde approaches him. "So let's get to it: Who are you and how do you know so much about us?"
The man sighs, one that imposes annoyance. "Nope. Not doing this by-the-book interrogation."
Clyde hovers his big boot over the man's head and lightly rests it on top of him. "You don't have a choice. Start talking. Who are you?"
Clearly shaken by the size of Clyde's foot and heavy weight, he complies. "Alright, alright! I can't tell you who we are, but we know a lot about you because we've been watching."
"Watching?" I ask. "How? Is there a spy planted in the company? Did a unit get too careless with discretion? How do you know that Ispio even exists?"
"No, no, nothing like that. We can see you through the other plane, listen to you, observe."
"Other plane? You better start making sense, or my friend here will turn your head into a pancake."
Clyde presses down harder, making the man squeal in agony.
"Ow!" he complains. "It's through the power of Zooh. You wouldn't understand. Non-magic users never do."
"Zooh who? Fuck you. You're wasting our time."
"Troy!" Clyde shouts, "Don't cuss so harshly, do you wanna get a mature filter added?"
Ignoring Clyde, I press. "Fine, I'll take your word for it because that explains a few things. You mentioned some old ones, who are they?"
He grins under Clyde's boot. "You're a femboy fox who smells pretty and weighs like 90 pounds, I can't be scared of you even if I tried."
I know what he's doing. He's trying to belittle us and discourage our questions so we can't ask the right ones. Small mental trick, but it won't work. Although now I have to tell Barry that someone said I smell good.
I let go of his shirt. "That's fine. You don't have to be scared of me." I turn to Clyde, "We've got a brave one."
Clyde lifts his boot off of the man and grabs him by the neck, picking him up with one arm. "Not brave, just stupid."
The man strains his voice, "Big foot you've got there. What size?"
"14. The old ones, who are they?"
Before he gives the man a chance to answer, he places both hands on his neck and begins to choke him, gradually squeezing harder and harder. A scare tactic he likes to use to make the victim think he doesn't really care if they answer or not. The man turns all shades of the spectrum until finally, his eyes roll to the back of his head. That's when Clyde lets up.
"Jack Frohling and Abigail Larocca," he spits out before going into a huge coughing fit. He turns to me. "You're just gonna let him kill me!?"
I walk closer to his suspended body. "Where are they, and why can't we use the tracker to find them."
His bloodshot eyes dart back at Clyde, and I imagine he's thinking about the strangling he just experienced. He talks immediately. "You can't find them because their nanobots have been harvested. The signal's been terminated. I can't tell you where they are. I can't."
"Clyde?"
Clyde begins to squeeze his tiny throat again, but the man interrupts. "No no no no wait wait wait! I can't because I physically can't. They never told me where they stashed those agents, and there's a ward on their bio-coding so nobody can use the other plane to locate them."
"Bio-coding? This is beginning to be too much. What do you think, Clyde?"
"I think that if he can't tell us where they are, he's going to help us find them."
"What, you mean bring him along?" I'm shocked that Clyde would ever allow someone to join an investigation, let alone a criminal who just attacked us.
"It'll save us some legwork and valuable time."
The man speaks up the best that he can with Clyde's hands wrapped around his throat. "That's not a good idea."
"Quiet, you! Your vote doesn't count."
I turn to Clyde. "Are you sure about this? I mean, think really hard about what you're saying. You want to let a criminal help with a confidential rescue mission that he took part in."
"Thank you for breaking it down, but my decision stands. He's coming with us, whether he likes it or not."
"Oh come on," he pleads, "take one of the other guys or something. I just wanted to finish this job and go home to read the new book I bought yesterday."
We look at the other two men, but they're gone, no footprints in the grass or anything. If they can teleport here to attack us, they can teleport away when we're not looking.
"They're gone," I tell him, my arms crossed in annoyance.
"Cowards!" he yells.
"Name, now," Clyde says.
"We're getting personal already? Fine, it's Sandy."
Clyde finally releases his grip, letting Sandy fall to the floor. He breathes in deeply, still coughing and rubbing his newly raw neck.
"That's a girl's name."
Sandy's color returns to him. "Yeah, thanks for pointing that out just like the rest of the kids in school. My parents wanted a laugh, I guess."
"Or a daughter," I snicker.
Clyde grabs him by the back of his shirt, lifting him up on his feet. "So what's to stop you from teleporting away like your scumbag friends?"
"Not my friends, just coven members. And I won't, not because I'm loyal to my word, but because I'm out of mana. I can't use magic unless I recharge, which could take days without a font."
Clyde pinches the skin between his eyes, clearly aggravated with all this new slang Sandy keeps using. "Whatever, just stay with us. If you leave and I find you later, you're dead."
"Wow, is this what true friends say to each other?" he asks, sarcasm apparent.
"We're not friends," I tell him, "you're helping us, that's it."
He turns to me. "I thought you were supposed to be the nice one."
"You gotta be nice back, and trying to tase me isn't how you get into my good graces."
"Fair enough." He looks at both of us, slowly accepting his new role. "So where am I guiding my kidnappers first?"
Did we just become the bad guys?
I open the file that I've been carrying, looking for the first report Jack and Abby wrote. "Can you take us to the motel they checked into? Clipper Ship Inn?"
He looks at Clyde, who gives him a cold stare and a knuckle-crack, then looks back at me. "Yes, your highness." He even adds a flourishing bow at the end. I hope Clyde made the right call.