Chapter 35 – And Another Thing

  “We at the Order have always been a bit of an odd bunch. Not any one race or even one realm is dominate in our Order. Naturally this leads to some rather interesting combinations of food and culture.” - Penny talking to Kurt over lunch.

  “Are you sure you don’t want to stay? I don’t know what Penny has pnned for us, but you can always hang around.” Val was saying to Kristi as Kurt was making coffee.

  “No, please it’s fine. I should probably drop my bags off and do my chores.” Kristi was holding up her hands like Val was about to mug her. “I will come back tonight. Besides, Kurt promised to invite Alec over and is making chili.”

  Val squinted at her then pointed a finger at her friend in a surprisingly threating fashion. “Promise?”

  Kristi ughed nervously while looking at the finger in her face. “I promise.” She looked to Kurt. “I have had a wonderful time and will exploit your hospitality as much as possible.”

  Kurt held up a fist for her to bump as he poured out the coffee, making four cups since he assumed Penny would be along shortly. “You are, of course, welcome at any time.”

  Just as he had predicted, the front door opened a moment ter and Penny strolled through. Once again, she was in her more formal clothing, fit for an office. “Good mo… Oh, hi there.” She said upon seeing Kristi. “Umm. I’m Penny.” She held out her hand.

  “Hi Penny, I am Kristi.” The dragon kin smirked as she said it.

  Penny squinted at her while shaking hands then it suddenly clicked. “Wait, Kristi who was in the program?” she looked her up and down. “You look so different.”

  Touching the pendant on her neck, Kristi turned off the enchantment. “Kurt helped me out.” She turned and smiled at him. She reactivated the enchantment before grabbing her bag and going to Val, giving her a big hug. She gave Kurt a smile and he toasted her with his mug before she was headed for the hub to go back to the order. She had to do a little hop around the concrete forms but managed just fine.

  “Well, Penny, what is on the agenda for today?” Kurt asked while sliding her cup toward an empty stool at the counter.

  She looked back and forth from Kristi to them a couple times before coming to sit. “We are going to finish your onboarding today come hell or high water. Also, I was going to take you through the bazar to see if we could bait someone from the enchanter’s guild a little bit.”

  “Need me to do anything special there?” He wasn’t sure how they envisioned that encounter pying out. Was he supposed to act a certain way or solicit them directly?

  “Nope, just be you.” Penny answered after taking a sip of her coffee.

  “Apparently I am enough of an ass to upset the apple cart.” Kurt joked to Val.

  She grinned. “Oh, that ass can upset some things for sure.” Her bawdy comment was naturally paired with some bouncing eyebrows.

  Kurt ughed but felt that he was noticing a bit of a pattern. They hadn’t been together since they had Kristi over, so she had gone without for a few days. Apparently that short of a time was enough to get that particur motor running. Kurt could sympathize since they still cuddled at night, and it was hard to hold back out of respect to their guest. Not that they really needed to with his sound proofing.

  “Are you guys ready to go?” Penny asked. “I know its early still but the sooner we get on with it, the sooner it’s over.”

  “Sorry, no can do. I gotta get all that into the crock pot.” Kurt hiked his thumb over his shoulder at the pile of cans and ingredients stacked by Americas favorite slow cooker. It didn’t take him long since he had prepped everything major the night before, so it was really just a matter of getting it all into the bowl and turning it on.

  Penny was curious about the construction that was happening between the hub and the house. Kurt and Val filled her in on their decision to create an enclosed pathway. If Kurt was being honest, it would likely have happened sooner than ter since he didn’t really like the idea of digging his way to his car in the winter.

  Not long after they were sitting down in Penny’s office again. She was once more giving them the agent orientation and basic guidelines for the role. She did offer to show them the binders with all the rules and regutions in detail, but they passed when they found out it was over a thousand pages. Even with them passing on the long format introduction, it still took a few hours to slog through.

  “Pretty much the abridged version is that you should do whatever possible to avoid alerting the local popution. Try not to kill anyone that doesn’t absolutely deserve it, handle rifts in a timely manner and cooperate with other Order assets.” Penny summed up the regutions part of the briefing.

  “So just do what we have been doing?” Kurt asked. It seemed pretty simple to him and like it wouldn’t take too much to stay within the lines.

  “Yup!” Val said as she kicked back on the couch in Penny’s office. “The extra mumbo jumbo is just there to cover the Order in case one of the federal organizations comes a knocking.”

  “HR doing HR things I see.” Kurt rolled his eyes. “So, what’s next?”

  Penny put away her materials and locked her computer. “I think that makes lunch.” She said while looking at her watch.

  After Kurt went and stirred his chili, it was suggested that they go to one of the restaurants in the recreation areas. It was on this trip that he got his first look at the strange interior cells of the Order’s space between realms. While he had heard about the Order and even knew a bit of how it was made, he wasn’t fully prepared for experiencing it in person.

  The hallway that Penny’s office was in looked like the interior of any office building from twenty years ago, just out of date enough to be ugly but not so much that it needed repcing. While that was fine, the sudden transition to what looked like the streets of ancient Rome was not. After rounding the corner, they were suddenly on a wide avenue decorated with marble columns.

  “This is… not right.” Kurt said while walking around a fountain in the middle of the street. The sides of the hall all had individual houses and doors coming off it. He saw people a plenty, all moving along like nothing was a miss.

  Penny apparently took this as her chance to be a tour guide. “Remember how I said this space was built in sections and that there aren’t really any maps of it? Yeah, that’s because the sections are added as needed and where they are needed.”

  “So, each mage that adds a new section puts their twist on what it should be.” Val finished the line of expnation. “You will see stuff from several Earth cultures and eras along with a bunch from other realms.”

  Kurt was now looking at the rows of brick town houses that had repced the Roman designs when they turned another corner in the ‘hallway’. “I am sure I will get used to it.” He grumbled while the approached a crowd of people in an open town square area.

  They stepped into a line and had to wait a few minutes until it was their turn on the teleportation device. Rather than a circle, it was a gate that had two-way traffic flowing. Their stream on the left and another on the right. When Kurt stepped through the gate, he was once again surprised to find himself in what looked like an open-air stadium.

  Rather than the stadium walls having seats for people to watch, it was filled with terraced offices and shops decorated with hanging gardens on the walls between. On the field below was what looked like a city park, rge open areas and paved paths ran through the grass and trees. What looked like a sun hovered above, providing warmth to the surprisingly natural feeling area.

  “This is one of my favorite pces to take a break.” Penny said as they descended the stairs toward the lower level. “The upper area is some private businesses operating under the umbrel of the Order. Legal firms, investments, tech stuff and so on.”

  She then pointed to the ring of businesses around the park. “Those are almost all restaurants. Pretty much every realm is represented in some way with their foods.”

  Kurt was fascinated by the wide array of signs that decorated the shops. Dozens of written nguages could be seen in a variety of fonts. He nearly missed one sign in English that was written in a font with a very harsh snt. Another strange thing was that all he could smell was the park and the pnts, not a single whiff of the food being offered.

  The strange phenomena continued and got a little worse as the approached some people eating at the outdoor dining area. He couldn’t smell a thing until it suddenly spped him in the face once he crossed over the line that separated the sidewalk from the patio. It was like a light being flicked on, going from nothing to full bst in an instant.

  “Woah. That’s a lot all at once.” He said and stepped back, noting the smell vanished except for the lingering effect in his nose.

  “That would be the enchantment id into the patios.” Penny said. “This pce has a rule that if you serve food, you must contain the smells, otherwise the entire area would be a disaster of odor.”

  They walked around the ring until they found what looked like a Mexican restaurant and ducked inside. While the smell was that of South American spices, the food looked more like it belonged in the Mediterranean. Pastas and gyros could be seen moving in and out of the kitchen along with soups and some rather ambitious sads.

  They sat and ordered, Kurt having something that looked like a gyro but tasted like a fajita. He rather liked the experience but was not expecting the sauce to be cheese based rather than yogurt. Washing it all down with a yellow soda that tasted like blueberry really cemented the effect of weirdness. After that gastric delight, they had a bit more walking to reach their next destination.

  On the way to the market, Penny and Val expined the trick with navigating the Order. They said there were several ‘wings’ that were generally marked out. Every corner had a sign pointing at the nearest path to any given wing. These naturally varied since some portals skipped over the area you thought they should go to.

  Kurt saw signs for residential, entertainment, production, and operations along with several others that had the color codes of the primary wings. There were also secondary sign markers for the more local attractions. They just passed one pointing to the theater district and another pointing to sports arenas.

  Naturally they were following the signs to their next stop, the market. After Kurt got a little navigation practice, they entered another rge area. This one was simir to the previous, with a series of terraced levels ascending the outer walls but the center had a tower with walkways around the perimeter and no terraces.

  “This is the market or sometimes called the bazar.” Penny said as they walked down one of the staircases on the exterior. “Each of the four sides has a sort of specialty. On the north is alchemy products, east is accessories, south is weapons and armors, and the west is pretty much everything else.”

  “Seems a little chaotic.” Kurt said. “How do they handle the corners?”

  “There is some bleed over where shops might fit into either category or have shifted as space was avaible.” Val said as she guided them off the stairs and onto to the third level. “There is some jockeying for position in the different levels, but it’s generally considered that the lower levels are the more prestigious shops.”

  “And the tower?” Kurt asked pointing to the central structure. “What’s the deal with that?”

  Penny pointed to the lower level of the tower where some merchants were out on the street trying to attract customers. “Temporary shops. Think of it like a short-term rental unit. Anything can go anywhere but they are generally a three-month lease or less.”

  Kurt noted that a lot of what was being sold in the central tower was consumable in nature. One merchant was selling a variety of meats and cheeses while his neighbor had a dispy full of electronics. Another just above those shops had what looked like ammunition by the crate stacked as deep as his stall would allow.

  “Where to first?” Kurt asked after watching the interactions of several people. So far, everything seemed rather orderly and while there was a general murmur of talking, there wasn’t nearly as much noise as the middle eastern bazars he had been to before.

  “That is entirely up to you.” Penny said. “At this point, I am just observing things as your trainer and handler. Also, it occurs to me that Jay asked me to give you this.” She handed him an envelope.

  Kurt took it and opened it to see a note and a folded-up paper. Naturally he picked up the note first since you should always read the card before opening something. The note was from Jay, and it said that he handled the transfer of funds to his account. It also said that his account had been changed over to private banking due to the sudden influx of funds.

  The folded-up paper was the receipt of the funds transfer and a note from his new banker that expressed how it would be good to set up a meeting to talk about his financial future.

  “He wanted to say that he will facilitate getting anything you need but figured it would be easier to just give you the money in case you wanted to buy without going through him.” Penny said, not noticing that Kurt was still staring bnkly at the page.

  “What’s wrong?” Val asked, reading his expression.

  He snapped out of it at her question. “Oh, nothing it just… the money, it wasn’t real before. You know what I mean?”

  Val tilted her head back and forth while she thought. “Yeah, I think I do. Kinda like when I was told you would take me as a teammate. It wasn’t real until you made breakfast.” She ughed at the st part.

  “His breakfast is ‘really’ good though.” Penny said while putting a little emphasis on the really to make a bit of a pun. Naturally both Kurt and Val groaned at the comment.

  “Well, let’s go look at arms and armor I guess.” Kurt said as they began walking around the level they were on. “I also want to check out the middle tower. I am curious about why they set up there and not just run internet stores.”

  They walked around the level they were currently on, having to go to the side on their right. They hadn’t made it far when one of the numerous flying beings suddenly diverted from its path across the open area and headed their way. The flying creature alit on the banister right in front of them in a furious buzzing from its wings that still fluttered as it banced.

  When Kurt inspected the tiny person, he realized it was a fairy of some sort. He was around a foot and a half tall, with long translucent wings that folded down as he stepped over to one of the ft-topped columns that supported the railing. He waved his entire arm at Penny as she was about to pass.

  “Penny, Penny! Hey, I was just coming to see you.” He said in a voice that was surprisingly normal in tone and volume despite Kurt expecting something high pitched and squeaky.

  “Hi, Garnith. What can I help you with.” Penny asked, moving over to talk to the fairy.

  Garnith straightened his jacket which made Kurt realize he was wearing a type of b coat in a yellow color. “Hey, do you happen to have any more of that gem that you sent over for analysis?”

  “Why do you need it?” she asked while pulling out her phone.

  “OH! So, remember how I tried heating it and it turned into a more metallic substance?”

  Penny smiled. “Let’s just pretend that I do.” She began typing a message while listening, nodding occasionally as words came tumbling out of the excited fairy.

  Seemingly unbothered by her ck of understanding, Garnith plowed on. “Right so I was telling my colleague about it and how awesome its conductivity was and how it changed materials with heat. Well, he goes and asks, ‘What happens when you super cool it?’ and I didn’t know and the sample I had was kinda used up in testing.” He rattled out his context like a fire hose sprays water. “So, do you have more so I can test it? I would be willing to buy it off you at let’s say five grand a kilo?”

  Kurt felt his phone buzz and he checked the screen to see a message from Penny. It asked if he wanted to be anonymous or if he would want to deal with Garnith alone. He looked up to her and saw she was looking at him out of the corner of her eye. He shook his head, not wanting to divulge that information yet.

  “Listen, I can reach out to the person I got it from and see if they can get you some more.” She held up a finger. “But I make no promises. I will contact you by the end of the day with what I find out.”

  “Fuck yeah!” Garith nearly shouted and held out a fist. “You’re the best, Penny.”

  Carefully extending her own fist, Penny bumped his tiny one. He said a few parting words before he took off, sounding like the world’s rgest hummingbird. They watched him go for a few moments, seeing the yellow dot merge back with the overhead.

  “Here.” Kurt said and passed her a thumb sized chunk of the crystal.

  Penny palmed it and mimed putting it in her own pocket when she actually stored it in her ring. They continued along the path toward the part of the market that had arms and armor. Kurt figured them staying on the third level would be just fine for getting a feel of the area and what was on offer.

  Most of the stores they passed by had more ‘traditional’ arms, with rows of swords, shields, and a variety of pole arms were dispyed in the windows. Kurt saw a few with what looked like bck powder weapons but nothing really modern. The st shop they passed actually had an old thirty cal dispyed in the window on its tripod.

  Kurt saw that and decided this might be a good pce if they put an attention grabbed like that out front. He pointed the store out and they began walking that way but didn’t exactly make it inside. He did notice the being standing just off to the side of the door was eyeing them up and down.

  “Hold on folks.” Said a doorman who was quite obviously a gargoyle. “Anything in particur you are after?” His accent was thick, but Kurt couldn’t quite tell what it was and figured that it might not even be from Earth.

  “Ahh, just coming in to see what’s for sale?” Kurt answered the question with a question. “Is that a problem or something?”

  The ‘greeter’ looked over them quickly before responding. “Look man, it’s like this.” He leaned in and lowered his voice. “I know you are from Earth, the boss will know and the boss doesn’t exactly like earthlings. Nothing against your race but something about his brother and a deal that went bad.”

  Kurt was frankly surprised the hulking figure was being so candid with them. “So, is that going to be a thing everywhere?” Kurt gestured to the other shops.

  The gargoyle shrugged. “Sorry man. I don’t have a problem with you guys but then again, I got bills to pay and a family to feed.” He looked genuinely remorseful. “But I’ll do this for you.” He pointed to the central tower. “Fifth level, north side there is vendor I know. They might have some stuff you actually want too. Not just these antiques.”

  Kurt nodded. “Thanks for the advice.” And with that, he turned away. They hadn’t gone a dozen yards when he heard a voice asking what those ‘Damn Earthers’ wanted in a way that was clearly meant to be heard.

  They just kept walking but after a little while, Kurt asked something that had been on his mind. “Why haven’t we seen much modern stuff? Like there were some things higher up but I haven’t seen much of anything on the lower levels.”

  “How do you feel about the test apps and smart phones and things like that?” Penny asked in return.

  “I was fine with my flip phone.” Kurt shrugged, causing Val to snort.

  His kitsune partner chuckled before answering. “Now how do you think these old shop owners that have been around for hundreds of years feel about the test weapons? Not to mention that they don’t work in every realm.”

  Kurt now felt a little stupid. He knew that modern gunpowder didn’t work in a few realms, the one his parents were in, for example. He also knew that there were some ws about those things in the realms that did allow it.

  “Got it, well lets go see what’s up the guy on the tower.” He said as they turned and began walking down the stairs.