19 Moons- Hunt For The Stolen Child (3rd Night, 4th Trail)

--- Jon ---

His eyes traced over what he could see of the warehouse, fitting in the last few pieces of his forming plan as he nodded to himself. “Yeah, that should do it.”

Pix gave him a curious look.

“We’ll sneak in, knock out anyone between us and the intel and sneak back out.” He explained, “If everything goes right, we can get in and out of the warehouse without anyone the wiser. Meaning if we’re lucky nobody has to get shot tonight.” (Save that one guy from a few hours ago.)

He shook his head, before distracting himself by pushing magic into his contract with Wolf and summoning her in a flash of light that he couldn’t risk if he was any closer to the Warehouse.

Seeing that they were neither in his apartment nor in the woods, Wolf gave him the curious look before tilting her head in confusion as she caught sight of him.

“You remember how I told you we were looking for little Kenneth?” He asked, before waiting for Wolf’s nod of confirmation. “Right, well you see that Warehouse over there. The one with those guards in front of it? The gang Kenneth’s kidnapper belongs to works out of there. I’m hoping if I sneak in there I’ll be able to find something telling me where he is. You any good at sneaking around?”

Wolf gave him the canine equivalent of a scoff before seemingly gesturing to herself, as if to remind him that she was -as her name implied- a wolf.

“Right. Thanks.” He laughed, in some weird mix of nerves and gratitude.

(There’s no need to be nervous.) He told himself, as he climbed down from the roof he was on. (This is just like in Blackwell when-)

(Blood poured from the man’s throat and-)

He forced himself to take a calming breath as his feet hit the ground. “Hopefully, not that bad…”

Wolf paused as she trotted up to him, before giving him another confused tilt of her head.

“It’s nothing.” He (lied)promised, before changing topics as they crossed the alley street. “So, think you can knock people out without getting caught?” He honestly wasn’t sure if her stealth skills were limited to ripping her prey’s throat out or not. (Actually I probably should’ve considered that before summoning her…)

His carnivorous companion seemed to consider the concept for a moment, before giving him a determined nod.

(Good might’ve had to send her back if she wasn’t.) He was fairly confident she wouldn’t have liked that, especially not after he’d just asked for her help.

“In that case…” He glanced around a building corner, before spotting the guards watching the warehouse. “Think you can take the guy on the left?”

Wolf gave him another nod before dashing off and disappearing from his sight.

(Well… here’s hoping she knows what she’s doing.) He sighed, before steeling himself one last time for what he was about to do.

Hiding in the shadows was an easy enough task, given how frequently he’d needed to hide from the Corrupted, that said actually moving through those shadows was taking a bit more focus than he was used to given how the lack of shifting foliage was making it harder to cover his own movements.

Still even with this challenge of hiding his movements, he managed to make his way behind his target without getting caught.

A quick pulse of magic through his bond to Wolf, as well as her own responding pulse, let him know when they were both in position.

(Right, let’s do this.)

He sent out one last pulse before rushing out of the shadows and towards the guard he’d marked for himself.

“What the fu-” A quick upper cut off the guards words before he could even try to draw his gun, and a foot hooked around his ankle sent the man toppling to the ground where Jon delivered one last blow to the face, cracking the man’s skull against the pavement.

He glanced to where the other guard had been and found Wolf standing over him, faint traces of a mystical breeze still visible in the air.

“Good job.” He told her, before jostling his backpack. “Pix, come out here and make sure we didn’t do anything permanent.” (I’m not going to let this turn out like last time.)

The little fairy gave him a trill of understanding before flying out of the bag and doing a couple circles over each guard. Once she was done she flew in front of his face before making several gestures in the air involving her head and then holding up a number of her fingers.

“Got it.” He nodded before turning back to Wolf as the little fairy returned to her hiding place. “Pix made sure we didn’t give them any permanent damage, but in doing so she also put us on a timer before they start waking up.”

Wolf gave him a confused whine.

“We had to fix them now, if we’d waited too long the damage could’ve worsened or become permanent.” He explained, not admitting to the fact that he was probably being too cautious so as to prevent a repeat of the last time he’d broken into a guarded warehouse. “Either way we need to make this quick.”

Wolf nodded, following him into the actual warehouse as they both clung to the shadows, their steps as quiet as could be as they moved between the warehouse aisles.

(Surprised there aren’t more guys.) He thought, not having seen anyone during his jaunt through the warehouse. (Then again they might only have the guards and the actual Dealers here. In which case there are probably two or three other guys watching the supply.)

The only reason he knew there were still guards in the warehouse was due to the fact that he could hear a loud synthetic bass echoing throughout the warehouse.

Eventually they did find a group of four playing cards, and jeering loudly at each other as they screamed to be heard over a speaker blaring an obnoxiously loud bass from a table covered in what he could tell at but a glance was drugs.

(Right, how to do this…) If he wanted to take these four out, then he’d have to break stealth even with Wolf helping him out. (Unless…)

“Pix.” He whispered jostling his backpack, until the little fairy took a peek out from her hiding hole. “Think you can distract those four long enough for me and wolf to get an extra shot in?”

The little fairy tilted her head at him in confusion, which as she tried to trill out a response over the bass pounding around them reminded him that not only did the helmet and scarf make it harder to hear him, but it also made it harder for him to emote.

(Which makes up half of Pix’s understanding when I talk, given how she’s still learning english…)

Given how fast she’d grasped it, he sometimes forgot that Pix didn’t actually know a word of english until she’d met him, at which point he’d helped her pick up the basics and she’d learned some of his more common speech patterns even if her vocal chords couldn’t repeat them.

Shaking his head before he could go on a tangent, he covered where his eyes would be on the helmet and then pointed at the four Dealers at the table.

Pix followed his finger for a moment before turning back to him and nodding as she flew out of his backpack and into the rafters above.

“Alright, can you hear me still?” He asked Wolf, hoping her canine hearing could still pick him up despite the loud music and his whispering. Receiving a nod in return he told her to, “Be ready once Pix has them distracted we’re going to have to act fast or else they might get a shot in at one of us.”

Wolf gave him another nod before jumping further than he could manage as she leapt to the top of one of the nearby shelves and proceeded to jump to another shelf on the other side of the room.

Reaching into his quiver he pulled out the two arrows making up his Trip-wire arrow. While these arrows were best for tripping enemies chasing after him or setting up traps, that didn’t change the fact that he’d found a few… creative uses for said arrows. Ones that he was about to use once more.

With this in mind he notched one of the arrows, while holding the other between his ring and little finger. (Just have to wait for Pix’s distraction.)

After a moment one of the Dealers began to blink staring at the air in a daze. “Uh, guys are you seeing something weird with the air?”

“No.” Another admitted. “You been touching the supply on the side?”

“Fuck you,” The first dealer growled, before looking concerned. “But uh, seriously you guys don’t see this rainbowy shit in the air? Because this stuff ish realwy pwetty…”

One of the Dealers frowned, “Uh, you feeling alright ma-Ahh!” The man screamed as an arrow tore through his shoulder.

“The fuck!” A third cursed as the two remaining Dealers jumped out of their seats, or tried to as one of them was tackled into the table by massive wolf.

“Oh shit!” Before the final Dealer could grab their gun, a second arrow pierced through their arm, a wire connecting it to the first. A wire that was rapidly going taught before the two dealers were pulled towards each other, sending both crashing into the remains of the table and forming a pile between it and the three downed Dealers.

Making his way over, he found that wolf had already rendered the three unconscious as more of her magic laced air swirled around them.

(Then that just leaves.) He turned to the last Dealer who was still sitting and staring at the air with a dazed expression on his face, completely unbothered by everything that had just happened less than two feet from him.

Unplugging the stereo he glanced at Pix as she began to hover around her victim. “You may’ve gone a little too far with whatever illusion you put him under…”

The little fairy just shrugged, clearly unaware -(or just unbothered)- by the fact that to inflict that strong of illusion and render the Dealer in this state, she’d have had to inflict a fair amount of brain damage to the man.

“Right just… patch everyone up, before they start bleeding out.” He sighed, ripping the arrows out of the two he’d shot since he knew she’d have trouble doing as much herself. Surprisingly the two stayed unconscious, leaving him wondering just what Wolf had done to the two.

(Now’s not the time.) He reminded himself with a shake of his head, before looking around the warehouse sincerely hoping he wasn’t going to have to have another… talk tonight.

Luckily however he managed to spot an overseer’s office for the warehouse, one that he could see through an open door had a desk covered in drugs, money, and paperwork.

(There’s got to be something in there I can use.) He figured making his way to the office, before calling over his shoulder. “Wolf keep an eye out in case we missed anybody.”

He doubted it, but it was still better to be safe than sorry.

As he shifted through the paperwork on the desk, he came across a ledger listing debts people owed to this branch of the Dealers as well as the payments they made to the Mad Dogs to protect them. (Not that it’s doing them much good.)

Despite his best hopes, nothing on the desk pointed him in the direction of Kenneth or Ramirez, in fact the only other thing of note on the desk was a separate file listing a number of orders and shipments to and from another location. (Another link in the supply chain…)

None of this was exactly what he was looking for, but at the very least it would give him a few leads to work through for the next few days.

Taking pictures of all of the paperwork, as well as the money and drugs, he contemplated what to do next. He was going to investigate what he found and find Kenneth of course, but there were still a couple of other things he had to figure out before he could make his escape.

First -and he blamed Miss Edna’s money-grubbing influence for this- was the money sitting on the desk.

Since it belonged to the Dealers -who he was fairly certain pushed drugs onto kids- he had no major issues… requisitioning the money to help him find Kenneth. Especially since said money was more than enough to cover what he’d spent on the Compass and then some.

This was of course something the Dealers would take exception to, even if one were to ignore the fact that all of their guys were knocked out without even putting up a fight. Something that they might otherwise keep quiet about -if only for their pride- at least so long as there wasn’t any permanent damage.

To compound that issue, was also the matter of whether or not he should alert the police about this warehouse.

As a cop’s kid he was somewhat obligated to send all of this evidence to the police in the hopes of encouraging a raid on this warehouse. In addition to a certain morality to this option, it also came with the added tactical benefit of reducing the amount of manpower the Dealers and their associates could direct his way, at least for the time being.

Unfortunately, it also came with the disadvantage. of increasing the police presence in the area. Which could slow down his own investigation, as well as increasing the alert level of whatever Dealers remained on the streets.

Taking one last photo, he shook his head. (I can figure this out later. Right now I need to focus on getting out of here.)