The Beginning Ch. 29-30

Answering the cry to go in, I opened the door, surprised to see that I was the last to arrive. Since this was a general room, it lacked a bathroom, which opened up the space and made it feel bigger than mine. Ten other people were in the room, Vince and Fiona standing beside a screen on the left wall, facing eight others in chairs.

"Took you long enough, Cannon Fodder," Vince said, snidely, as I stood there in surprise.

"Your nickname for him is the same as for our squad?" Fiona asked, turning to face him. "You really are unimaginative, aren't you?"

"Do we have a problem, Centurion?" Vince retorted in an imperious tone, still looking at me.

"Pick on my squad, and we will. Sainyanayak," she answered, using his title almost as an afterthought, and through gritted teeth.

"Do not test me, Centurion," Vince snarled, turning to face her. "Are you looking to lose your command?"

They stared at each other for a few moments, neither of them backing down, the tension growing thicker by the second. Fiona finally looked away, and Vince relaxed, before turning back to me.

"Take a fucking seat, already," he commanded, sneering in victory.

In a clear show of defiance, I looked over at Fiona, waiting for her to give me a nod, before walking in and taking the only available chair, towards the back of the room. The others, perhaps anticipating my arrival, had been kind enough to leave a vacant seat towards the edge, so I didn't have to brush past them, like at a movie theatre. Fiona shot me a supportive smile as I did, before Vince cleared his throat and started speaking.

"We've received reports of random electronic outages in this area of Limerick city," he began, pointing to a location on the map that had taken up the screen. "Your squad has been tasked with authenticating the reports and identifying any Dark cells which may be present. As always, your priority is to report, not act. Centurion Fiona will handle individual assignments. That is all."

He turned and stormed out of the room, slamming the door shut behind him. Fiona looked tense, the veins along her arms and around her neck bulging in barely-suppressed anger, the room deathly till she calmed down.

"Absolute motherfucker!" she swore loudly, which seemed to help release some of the tension she was holding.

"Squad," she addressed us, "you heard the culus. We're heading to Limerick. Ryan, as our Mundane coordinator, you will remain at the hotel, once there, and relay any pertinent information back here, to headquarters. Since this is his first mission, Chris will remain with you, and help you by linking up to our magic comms— just in case you weren't informed, Chris, we've taken to calling them 'Communicators'."

"Roger," a redheaded man sitting in the front row said, in an unmistakably Dublin accent, turning around to look at me.

He was dressed in a dark gray suit, and had a circular face that had a light spattering of freckles. Like all the other agents there, he was clean-shaven, which allowed me to see the curly white wire that held his earpiece in. He shot me a smile and a nod, and I nodded back, getting a good vibe off him, overall.

"Leandra and Troy, you'll handle grid 1," Fiona continued, having divided the area the report was from into four grids. "Michelle and Daniel, grid 2. Maria and Emily get grid 3, and Rory, you're with me for grid 4. We leave in 10, so get your gear ready. Ryan, can you look after Chris for this one, just help him settle into our modus operandi?"

"Roger, Centurion," he agreed, and I nodded along as well.

"On your way, then," Fiona dismissed us, and I filed out with the others.

The whole thing had been so quick, I hadn't even gotten a moment to associate names with people, or even get a good look at the people sitting next to me. Figuring that I'd have plenty of time to do so over the next few days, I went back to my room to get a go-bag together. Emptying the one that I'd arrived with, I packed some fresh clothes from amongst those in the cubby, mentally tallying what I might have to buy.

Seeing a stack of the cloth bags that Fiona had mentioned, I saw that they were completely opaque, closed via drawstrings, and had my room number stitched on. I stuffed the clothes that I'd used so far in, deciding to get them laundered, ASAP. At the last minute, I packed my Academy clothing as well, figuring that it wouldn't hurt to be prepared.

Ryan was waiting outside my room for me, a bag of his own slung over his shoulder. He'd changed into casual clothing, too, though he still had his earpiece in. Patting my pocket to make sure that I'd carried my Communicator, I locked up behind me, following Ryan out through the mess hall and into the tunnel on the opposite side.

We didn't really speak as we walked, so I turned my attention to my surroundings, just trying to take it all in. Never, in a million years, could I have imagined that something like the I.G.A.D.W.T.F. even existed. Being there was somehow even more surreal than living at the Academy; granted, magic was quite a difficult concept for me to get my head around, but seeing what I previously knew as two distinct worlds colliding and coexisting in this way, was proving to be a harder fact to digest.

I was so lost in thought that I didn't even realize that we'd stepped onto a different elevator than the one I'd previously taken. When the doors slid open, I found myself standing in a location that seemed somewhat familiar.

We were standing in what looked like a regular parking garage, on the third floor. It was open-air, and would have seemed indistinguishable from other garages to anybody else, but something about the way it looked, the things I could see... something pulled at me.

"I know this place," I stated, looking around, trying to get my bearings. "Why do I feel like I know where we are?"

"I was hoping you'd recognize it," Ryan said, smiling at me. "The project had just begun when Michael was killed, but he always did have a unique approach that shone through."

"This was his company's last project?" I asked, bewildered, as a strangely serene feeling washed over me.

"It was," Ryan confirmed, indicating for me to follow him. "Back then, we didn't even know if we'd need it; the entire department was just one squad of Wielders and a handful of us Mundanes. It was only after the attack at your house that we were 'activated', for lack of a better word."

"And that led to the department needing a whole parking garage?" I asked him, as we arrived at a nondescript black coupe.

"Well, yes," he answered, as we dropped our bags in the boot and settled into the car. "While the Wielder squads stay on-site, most of us Mundanes actually work here in shifts. This is how we get in and out. We're basically government employees with specific skill sets.

"I'm actually getting a fair bit of overtime for going on this mission!"

"On that topic," I mused, as we pulled out of the parking structure, "what was with Vince calling the whole squad 'cannon fodder'?"

"Ah," Ryan grunted, with a morbid chuckle. "Vince. There's a grade-A arsehole, if I ever saw one! Rushes in out of the blue one day, takes over the whole operation, displacing Fiona in the process, and basically upends the whole place.

"Fiona ran a tight ship, but she was fair; Vince was the opposite. Just worked everybody over like donkeys. Us regular folks had it okay enough, since Aisling stood up for us and enforced our rights. Fiona, too, in her defense. But most of your lot started requesting transfers, which actually proved to be detrimental.

"Most of the replacements Vince brought in were his ilk; short-tempered, brash, high on their own power, and just aching for a fight. Our squad's the only one that really stuck around, so along with Aisling and Fiona, we ended up bearing his ire, too.

"We're the only squad that's constantly expected to be on duty, and we're the ones who end up having to verify most claims, which means that if they're true, we're first in the line of fire. Fiona tries to let us do our own thing when we're actually back on base, and Vince has tried to chew her out over it time and again. I guess we're just lucky that Fiona doesn't answer to his commander, the chap with the weird Indian name."

"Byrav?" I asked, raising an eyebrow. "He's a real motherfucker, too."

"No love lost, eh?" Ryan commented, with a soft chuckle. "Well, gotta say, Chris, you aren't what I expected. We were actually in two minds about you; those of us who knew your folks hoped you'd be decent enough, more like them, yeah? The others expected another one of Vince's typical recruits. When we heard that you were from the Indian Academy, we definitely expected you to be in his pocket, spying on us for him."

"Well, I hope you know that I'm the opposite of that!" I protested, actually wounded that they'd think that I'd blindly follow Vince like that.

"Yeah, yeah, you're grand," he said, reassuringly. "Fiona vouching for you earlier was good enough, but combined with Vince's chewing you out and your clear deference to her as your superior on the chain— class act, by the by— we've decided to give you the benefit of the doubt."

"None of you trust easily, huh?" I asked, eyeing him sideways.

"We're spies, boy," he chortled. "What else did you expect?"

I just smiled back, settling in for the long drive to Limerick. I had the feeling that I was going to fit in just fine, and regardless of how I got here, that things might turn out alright, after all.

Chapter 30- The Turn

28th March, 2017

4:57 a.m.

I.G.A.D.W.T.F. Safehouse, Limerick, Ireland

After driving all night, I was absolutely knackered by the time we pulled up to an apartment building on the outskirts of the city of Limerick. I hadn't visited the city or the county even while living in Ireland, so being there was a first for me. After getting our gear and locking up, Ryan and I took the elevator up to the second floor, heading for apartment "2C".

We seemed to be the first to arrive, and after pulling the key out of where it was hidden atop the doorframe, Ryan pushed open the front door, and I got my first glimpse inside a safehouse. Unlike how it was depicted in popular media, the safehouse looked like a regular old apartment; no torn upholstery, no thick curtains, no cracked walls, and quite a homey feel.

"Not what you expected?" Ryan asked, as he walked in and dropped his bag on one of the two couches in the living room, which faced a moderately-sized flatscreen T.V.

A dining table with seats for four people stood behind the couch, close to the kitchen island, which helped divide an otherwise open-concept kitchen from the rest of the room. Shaking my head to the contrary, I walked through the doorway to the right of the kitchen space, and found myself in a passageway. The door on the far end opened up into a bathroom, with two bedrooms opening off the passageway.

Unlike the living room, the bedrooms were sparsely furnished, both having double beds with simple mattresses upon them, and a dresser sans mirror. The bathroom had a sink, toilet, and shower, but that was it. Compared to how plush and lived-in the living room felt, the rest of the apartment was cold and lifeless.

"Inquisitive visitors usually don't go past the living room," Ryan explained, as I walked back out. "All our safehouses are in occupied apartment complexes, furnished pretty similarly. The T.V. and lights are usually on randomized timers, which creates an illusion of being occupied."

"What if somebody was to knock while the T.V. was on?" I asked, dropping my bag on the floor and taking a seat at the table.

"It's just ignored," Ryan answered, shrugging. "At worst, we might be thought of as inconsiderate neighbors who value our privacy too much."

I nodded in agreement, just as the door swung open, and two women walked in. The one in the lead was leaner, with elfin features, a pronounced nose, and buzz-cut blonde hair. The brunette who followed her was curvier, but had a lethality around her that was palpable. It honestly wasn't a surprise that she was decked out in black leather, from head-to-toe.

"I realize introductions weren't made earlier," Ryan volunteered, stepping up to take their bags. "Chris, this lovely blonde is Leandra, and that's Emily, behind her."

Leandra just nodded in greeting, while Emily flashed me a surprisingly sweet smile, waving cutely. I didn't really have a chance to analyze that further, as the others arrived in one big group, and Ryan continued the introductions.

Troy was a tall, well-built man, though he was shorter than Fiona. He had a square jaw, a rounded nose, blue eyes, and curly, reddish-blonde hair. Daniel was almost a polar opposite to Troy, standing at around five-feet tall, and was on the leaner side, to boot. His face seemed to be locked into a grumpy expression at all times, and his larger nose, black hair, and sunken brown eyes had earned him the nickname "Grumpy", after a dwarf in a beloved children's tale.

The last man, Rory, was around my height and build, and with his light brown eyes that seemed to sparkle, messy brownish hair, and mischievous grin, he was undoubtedly the loving prankster of the group. His greeting was also the friendliest of them all: A full-bodied hug that threatened to leave me breathless.

Michelle and Maria, I was surprised to see, were identical twins with heterochromatic eyes. Michelle's right eye was brown while her left was blue, and Maria's left eye was blue and her right was brown. They both wore their blonde hair in tight buns, and had equally strict-looking faces. Even their bodies were similar, with slight busts that were hidden behind baggy sweatshirts, and fit-looking bodies. They even gave me equally nonchalant looks, before dropping their bags on the floor and sitting beside each other on the unoccupied couch.

"Glad to see you're all here, ahead of schedule," Fiona said, taking a look around the room. "Claim your spaces and rest up till zero-nine-hundred hours. We'll meet for breakfast and a final briefing, before heading out. Any questions?"

When nobody spoke up, Fiona just nodded firmly, turning on her heel to go claim one of the bedrooms. The twins claimed the other, and Emily and Leandra took the couches, leaving myself and the other lads to sleep on the floor. Luckily, the others had the foresight to pack sleeping bags, and with the other bedding that was in the rooms, we were all quite comfortable. After the exhausting day I'd had, I was quite happy to let sleep take over, falling into a deeper slumber than I'd expected.

Ryan's shaking of my shoulder woke me up a while later, and unused to the new location, I instinctively reached for my magic, augmenting myself and tearing the sleeping bag apart, in my rush to defend myself. With a start, I realized what was happening and let my magic go, looking at the others, sheepishly.

"Good reflexes, kid," Fiona said, looking me over and patting a surprised Ryan on the shoulder. "They'll come in handy if we're ever in real danger. For now, though, you owe me a sleeping bag."

"Sorry about that," I apologized, rubbing the back of my neck. "It's been a while since I woke up in a new place."

"All good," Ryan said, smiling at me. "The others are already up and have gone to grab some grub. You wanna wash up and join us?"

"Grand," I agreed, heading towards the bathroom to do just that.

Ten minutes later, I was standing on the street with Fiona and Ryan, showered and changed, as we debated where to eat. Agreeing on a nearby coffeehouse— search engines had really upped their mapping and suggesting game in the time I'd been away from technology— we set off, Ryan and myself leading the way while Fiona explained away the technological "blink" I'd caused by drawing on magic, earlier. While smaller spells might only cause networks to waver, causing interference, the amount of Power I'd drawn forth had caused all the electronics within a two-hundred-meter radius to stop functioning, only starting up again when I let the Power go.

Even though she waved away my apologies, I felt compelled to offer to pay for her and Ryan's breakfasts, and three full Irish breakfasts later, we were jogging back to the safehouse, braving the cold Irish rain. I'd never really appreciated the beauty of the simple spell embedded in my Academy clothing that helped keep me dry and warm, but in that moment, I would have been absolutely truthful in saying that it was the one spell I'd never give up.

Ryan and Fiona were in complete agreement when I expressed the same thing to them, with Ryan commenting on the utility that spell would have in a climate like Ireland's. We walked back into the apartment amidst him listing the spells he thought he wouldn't have been able to live without, to find all the others back, already. Apologizing for cutting him off, it was like a shiver ran through Fiona, as she shifted into "Centurion Mode", calling everybody to attention as we went over the plan one last time.

"Given that the risk of threat is negligible," Fiona said, in conclusion, "there is no need to summon or armor or weapons. Stay in your civilian clothing. The only magic you are to use is to power your Communicators, which shouldn't cause much interference with the devices around you. Stay in contact and stay safe. Is that clear?"

We nodded in unison, the others getting prepped to head on out, as Ryan pulled out all the devices he'd need to keep track of the operation. What surprised me, though, was a mess of wires and rods that he brought out from one of the bedrooms and started setting up.

"Faraday cage," he explained, as he assembled it around one of the chairs, "made from materials that block magical waves. Since you're staying back here and using magic, you need to stay inside it. That helps ensure that communication with the base isn't interrupted in any way. Your own electronics won't work in there, though; but hey, they wouldn't work when you're using magic, anyway."

While I had no shortage of protests against getting into an actual cage, I couldn't fault his logic. After he'd finished assembling it, I saw that it couldn't be locked or secured in any way, and that it was flimsy enough that even a Mundane could bust their way out. While that didn't lessen my trepidation at all, once inside, I found no real reason to complain.

"Comm check," I said, loudly and clearly, as I powered up the Communicator.

"Loud and clear," Fiona answered, as the others checked in, in turn.

I'd never really known what to expect from my first mission, but honestly, the next few hours were just humdrum and boring. The others basically went from location to location, steadily questioning people in shops and such, as they tried to figure out whether the tech outages were a one-off or had repeated enough to be a pattern.

Three hours in, we'd still found nothing, when Maria and Emily actually got caught in a wave of outages. They followed the trail to the source of it all, and found our perpetrator— a Mundane teenager, working on an Electromagnetic Pulse device for an upcoming science fair.

After giving her a strong talking-to, backed up with their Interpol identities, they continued to finish their verification sweep, as did the other teams. Once all the grids had been completely explored, and no magical cause for the outages was identified, we all headed out to grab lunch at various eateries.

Even though absolutely nothing had happened, at all, we were all required to fill out forms and complete a bunch of paperwork, before Fiona dismissed us, officially closing the file on the mission. We decided to stay the night, getting a little more sleep, so I headed out to the shopping district, looking to buy a wallet and a couple of sleeping bags.

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