The Unskillful Thaumaturge

V

"Yes, what is it?"

For the third time in the last 24 hours, Lillian was attending to a knock on the door of the dorm, this one even earlier than the first, at 8:00 in the morning. She cracked open the door. "What is it?" she repeated.

The stranger from the previous day was back, looking even more nervous than before. "Yes?" Lillian snapped.

"Do you have my, um, key?"

"No," she said quickly. "I don't have your key." This was truthful; she had given the key to the DIAO already. "Maybe if you hadn't come over here yesterday and said weird stuff, you would have kept track of it better. Now please-" she placed particular emphasis on this word- "leave me alone!" And, retreating from the door, she slammed it behind her.

Lillian resumed gathering her supplies for her quantum lab. She heard the stranger stomp down the hall in disgust, then waited a few seconds before following him out of the building on the way to her lab. While Lillian headed away from the park past the Crave and towards the science building, the stranger walked along the park and disappeared into the thaumaturgy building. That's odd, she thought, craning her neck to see better, and nearly walked into a lightpost. Shaking her head, she started looking where she was going. As she entered the science building, she spotted someone she recognized studying in a corner and ducked away, but not quite in time.

"What's up, Red?" the boy jeered at her. Everyone in the lobby turned to watch. "Going to fail another lab?"

Lillian turned and gave him a look icy enough to freeze nitrogen. "Oh, so you've been getting updates from Amandi, huh? Why don't you tell her that if she wants to talk about failing labs, she should get rid of individual reports like the physics department did?"

"Yeah, well that's not a physics department lab, is it?"

"Maybe not, but I'm not looking to get a degree in that or anything, Matt. But I know someone who is." She began to walk away. "Why don't you go hang out with your girlfriend- with Amandi? I'm sure she doesn't mind the attitude," she called over her shoulder, then remembered about looking where she was going and caught herself before she walked into a pillar. Matt grunted in response and watched her disappear up the stairwell. Several people in the lobby who had been watching the exchange with interest returned to their homework.

☙❧

Dakota paced around his office, dialing a number on his phone. He got no answer. He sighed and sat down in his chair despondently.

Are you going to dial every single Cody number? I bet they're all public phones.

"You're probably right about that."

Then why are you doing it?

"Maybe one number is a smartphone that actually belongs to one of them. It's just a guess."

Fine, keep trying. Maybe they don't want to talk. Maybe they want you to figure it out yourself.

"If they did, I think I'd get a Cody call and they'd tell me."

You keep thinking you're going to get another call. I think if they wanted to call you they would have.

"Well, how else am I supposed to get information?"

I'll tell you what I did. I knocked the key out of your pocket and it landed in her dorm. From there, one of several things could have happened: she could have picked it up and lied about it, she could have picked it up and told the truth because she didn't know it was yours, one of her roommates could have picked it up, she could have gotten rid of it, or it could have gotten cleaned up by accident by either her or one of her roommates.

"That's optimistic."

We don't know. I'm only trying to help. They are not helping.

"Well, maybe there's a reason they're not calling us. Maybe they know something..."

We'll just have to figure it out then...

☙❧

Ashley turned on the radio, and a mediocre rock song blared out of the speakers. Her daughter in the passenger's seat sighed as she began to sing along.

"Concentrate on the road, Mom."

"It's fine, Galena, we're totally safe."

"Not if you're going to lip-synch with your eyes closed." Galena complained, ignoring her mother's rules about who was in control of the radio and reaching over to turn it off. "That is not safe. Either leave it off or let me drive."

"Fine," Ashley replied, annoyed. "I'm telling you it's safe, but if you won't listen, that's probably better for you."

Galena stopped complaining, confused. "But-"

Her mother interrupted her. "What are you doing at work?"

Galena's eyes narrowed. "That's confidential."

"Come on, you can tell your mother."

"No, I really can't. It's very important. And confidential. If I told you..."

"What, you think I would leak it?"

"Yes," Galena sheepishly admitted.

"You know your mother." Ashley smiled so wide that she squinted- Galena was sure it was sarcastic- and leaned over, pinching her daughter's cheek. Galena winced. "Okay, Mom, you can let me off here."

"Really?" Ashley slowed to a stop in front of the DIAO building.

"Yes. Really." Galena stepped out of the car, grabbing her ID card. "See you later!" she called. "Don't crash my car!" She turned away and walked into the building. Ashley watched her for a second before turning on the radio again and dialing a number into her smartphone. The person on the other line asked a question.

"Yes, of course," she answered irritably. "Yes, I know. They'll be looking for you."

Without explaining her meaning, she hung up and drove away, eyes closed, lip-synching the song on the radio.

☙❧

Rolf was sitting down and twiddling a pencil when Galena walked into his office. "So?" she asked expectantly. "Find him?"

"Sure. It's a girl, by the way," Rolf replied, focused on the pencil.

"And?" Galena prompted, raising her eyebrows.

"And she had no idea."

Galena stared. "No way. Did you tell her?"

"I will, when she comes in tomorrow for testing."

"You didn't tell her yet?"

"I wanted it to be a surprise."

Galena shot him a reproachful glance. "You are working in a government agency. You do not make things 'surprises'."

Rolf fiddled with the pencil nervously. "Does that mean I have to tell her now?"

A hint of a smile appeared on Galena's face. "Just because you shouldn't have done it doesn't mean her reaction won't be interesting to watch." She giggled softly, shifting from foot to foot. Rolf smiled.

"Agreed."