Into That Wild Blue Yonder

27. Piece by Piece

Colm, Idara, and Ulan stood silently around the table by the collection they took their set from when they last came to the store. Between being jerked around in the sudden movements of combat and being ragdolled by a wendigo, the pieces Colm negotiated for had been thoroughly destroyed during the events of the night. It wasn't a big deal, really, but Colm still felt a little strange about the pieces' destruction.

Several employees stood awkwardly next to the trio. Their eyes clearly betrayed their desire to ask about the events of the night, but none of the three maintained an approachable enough demeanor to encourage questions. Which they were fine with, naturally. It wasn't a pleasant experience to recall, and they still had the physical pain to go along with the memory.

After what could have been an eternity for all anyone knew, an aid from the upstairs offices came down to bring the trio up to Christobal for their reward. They took slow, heavy steps up to the offices, still recovering from the previous night's insanity and lamenting that they would have to head to the police station next to take care of their statements.

As they made their way through the offices with Ulan barely able to fit between the cubicles, Colm noticed that no one seemed to be working today. It wasn't exactly loud the last time he was there, but now, he could practically hear a pin drop to the carpet. Normally, it would set him at ease, but he couldn't stand it this time and he couldn't think of why.

The aid knocked on Christobal's door and left the trio to wait for him. After a few minutes of listening to him fumble around inside his office, he finally opened the door with haggard, sleepy eyes. He motioned for everyone to come in and took a seat at his desk to fish their reward out of one of the drawers.

"Are you alright?" Ulan asked.

"Afraid not," Christobal said as he rummaged through various drawers. "I have new problems coming now. But that's not anything for you youngsters."

"You sure?" Idara said, defiantly putting her hands against her hips. "We handled the situation last night pretty well."

"This is an investigatory matter, I'm afraid," Christobal said. His eyes lit up for just a moment as he found a small case with the fragments in his bottom drawer. "New details came to light about the kidnappers that I'm... not happy about."

"Is that why the office is empty?" Colm asked.

"Uhhh..." Idara cocked an eyebrow at him. "It's Saturday?"

"Oh."

"We all have dumb moments," Ulan said, tapping his clawed hand against Colm's shoulder comfortingly. "It's okay."

"Seems like some of us get hit by many of them all at once," Christobal said with an exasperated tone. He slid the case with two map fragments across his desk toward the trio. "Here are your fragments."

"Yes!" Idara said happily, swiping up the case. "Two more!"

"Out of how many?" Ulan asked.

"Does it matter?"

"I guess not."

"You can all probably expect to find contacts for them a bit easier too, now," Christobal said. Colm cocked his head sideways at the comment. "People noticed the two of you. And Idara, you seemed to network pretty easily with that crowd. Your friend may be able to learn from you..."

"I talked to Oswansha," Colm said. Idara deadpanned at him and then turned back to Christobal.

"And she talks to everyone," Christobal said with a chuckle. "A lot of powerful and important people know that she was saved by the Sole Survivor, Galactica, and the Dragon Bard. And now they know that you're looking for these fragments, though that's more my doing."