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razzle-zazzle · 2 months ago

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Whumptober Day 01: Race Against the Clock

Search Party

3487 Words; Ouroboros

TW for mentions of bloodsport

AO3 ver

The door slid open, and Norma immediately had to resist the urge to pinch the bridge of her nose and groan.

Arrayed throughout the room were the other junior agents. Gisu was at the computer, Lizzie standing beside her, and she hurried to minimize whatever she had pulled up on the screen the moment she caught sight of Norma. Raz and Adam were over with Morris by a box of paper records, and Sam was sitting on an old office chair in the corner, leaning over the back.

“So.” Norma put on an unimpressed expression and crossed her arms at the sight before her. Her fellow junior agents all wore varying expressions of sheepishness, which made her eyes narrow a fraction in irritation. “Why are all of you digging through confidential files?” Norma frowned as her voice came out higher than she wanted it, tinged with an emotion she couldn’t quite define as opposed to the level tone she had been aiming for. Hollis always made catching someone doing something they weren’t supposed to be doing look so cool; Norma felt awkward in comparison.

“No reason.” Raz’ face was pure innocence, hands folded in his lap like he hadn’t just been digging through the files of the box he was currently sitting on barely a second ago.

“Who said anything about confidential?” Lizzie challenged, affecting a casual air as she stared Norma down.

“Yeah,” Morris added, “Maybe we’re just grabbing a file for our mentors.” It was the weakest excuse Norma had ever heard from him—and she’d heard plenty of stinkers when he’d been dancing around the pirate radio station he thought he was hiding.

“Rrright.” Norma drawled, not buying it for a second. “All of your mentors, at the same time, sent you to look through files—most of which are confidential—to grab a file they could undoubtedly find for themselves in half the time?” Some part of her reveled in the way Gisu and Adam winced at her words—another part of her balked at the fact that Morris and Raz weren’t. Lizzie remained as collected as ever, and Sam… well, okay, Norma didn’t think she could ever make Sam wince.

Morris nodded. “Well, we weren’t all told to go look at the same time,” he explained, “but we all figured it would go faster if we worked together.” He sounded so confident, not stumbling over his words at all—Norma might have even believed the lie, if she hadn’t seen what Gisu and Lizzie had been looking at before Gisu minimized the file.

Adam nodded along. “Yeah, nothing to worry about.” He added, and Raz nodded along with him. He really was just a kid—discomfort pricked in Norma’s chest at the reminder.

Norma’s eyes narrowed. She stalked forwards, coming to a stop just beside Gisu and reaching for the mouse—

Lizzie’s hand was cold against her wrist, as it always was. Norma turned her ire to her sister—Lizzie’s eyes widened as she realized what she had just done, and what that action revealed.

Norma cleared her throat, carefully grabbed Lizzie’s arm with her free hand and freed her wrist, and then re-opened the file. Instead of perhaps the more innocuous mission report or amusing snide email chain, the file played across the screen detailed a mission that was ongoing—and more importantly, incredibly off-limits to anyone not a senior agent.

“I’m not stupid.” She said, glancing around at the room. Expressions varied, but it was clear—Norma had caught them in the act, and they all knew it.

Gisu threw her head back with a groan. “We were just looking!” She protested, wrestling the mouse back from Norma. “You don’t have to be so smug about it!”

Norma balked—she was not smug! “I’m not—” She started, only to pause and rethink. Recent… actions of hers still weighed in her mind. As much as she hated to admit it, some part of her was smug at catching them in the act. But another part of her that had been much larger as of late had her biting her lip, fingers twitching with what wasn’t quite frustration and what wasn’t quite dread. Fire itched in her brain, that sharp voice of reason in her head hissing at her to step back and think.

“Well, whatever.” Lizzie scoffed. “We can’t go anywhere with this, anyway.” Something in her tone implied that Norma was the one stopping them—or maybe Norma was just being paranoid. Still, she stepped back, regarding them all with a critical eye. Raz especially was obvious—how did she ever think he was the mole—frustration clear in his expression as his shoulders hunched. Norma could have laughed. Of course. Of course, they had all cooked up a plan to do something stupid and then went out of their way to exclude her—because of course they would, because who would ever want to talk to or work with a proven, snobby, snitch?

None of them needed to say it. Norma didn’t even need to be psychic to understand the shared thought in the room. They all wanted to do something… more. More interesting. More useful. More dangerous. More exciting. More like what they all imagined being a Psychonaut was like—and less menial.

Norma… she could never admit it, of course, because there was a method to how agents rose in the ranks and reckless self-endangerment wasn’t it, the voice in her head that often tended to have some degree of sense insisted—but some part of her agreed, with the notion that being a junior agent just hadn’t been enough. That she could—that she should—be doing more. Another voice, the same voice that had insisted that of course Raz had to be the mole, and was quite louder than the more sensible voice, agreed.

She looked at the screen again. “What did you even think you could do?” After the Lucktopus stunt, there was no way Hollis was going to clear any of them to go any further beyond the base than the nearest town—it didn’t matter that Hollis was still on vacation; she had passed the notion onto Truman, who was so bogged down with catching up on everything he had missed—and cleaning up the aftermath of the Gulch Incident—that he wasn’t going to approve anything beyond trips to town, either.

“It’s not like we’re gonna do anything dangerous.” Lizzie argued. “We’re just checking a lead that the senior agents are too busy to look at.”

Norma worked her jaw as she searched for what to say. “And how, exactly, did you plan to do that?” The lead Lizzie was referring to was two states away—there was no way for any of them to get there and back without being caught out.

“Ford!” Sam chimed in, before making her chair spin. It creaked ominously.

“Ford?” Norma repeated, incredulous.

“Ford.” Gisu agreed, to complete the bit.

“You’re going to get Ford to teleport you.” Norma confirmed, still not quite believing it. “And how are you going to convince him?”

Adam grabbed Raz by the sides and held him up like a cat. “Our secret weapon.” He said, and Raz beamed.

“Right.” Norma was decided. It was an easy decision, really—at least, easier than it would have been before Raz showed up and recent events—that Norma had played no small part in, to her displeasure. “I guess that’s enough of a plan to work off of, then.” She tried to look as collected as she could. “I’m coming with.”

Sam’s chair gave out with a final protesting groan, sending her clattering to the floor. Everyone stared as she picked herself up, dusted off her skirt, and then stared back at them all blankly.

“Okay…” Adam picked up the thread of the conversation. “Right, then,” he turned to Lizzie and Gisu. “Let’s look at what we know.” Gisu clicked through the files, and everyone crowded around her to peer at the screen. A summary—it appeared to be an investigation into the disappearance of various known psychics and their possible link to—

Norma frowned. “This is pretty serious.” She commented, fire dancing under her skin. A possible fighting ring, among other theories that were tossed around in the text.

“Oh, it gets better.” Gisu said, clicking through and opening a video file. The film was higher-quality than Norma was expecting. The content…

Lizzie and Adam both covered Raz’ eyes with their hands as the body hit the floor. Gisu closed out the video. “Apparently this place is pretty well known if you’re in the right circles.” She explained, flicking through to another file. “The video was recovered on a past mission. This is supposed to be the guy behind it, or something.”

Norma looked at—well, suspect was really the only word, wasn’t it? The picture was clean, professional—it was probably taken for a billboard or business card. The man in the picture had an easy smile, hands crossed over the handle of a suitcase resting on his legs. He looked like a run-of-the-mill CEO.

“And the lead?” Norma asked. She wasn’t sure if it was the heavy watch or the dark suit or if there really was something in the man’s eyes—whatever it was, the photo unsettled her. Not as much as the video, but—the man seemed larger than he really was, a sort of presence oozing from his features that made fire scratch against the inside of her skin.

Gisu pulled up the relevant file. A map.

Norma stared at the location—supposedly, this was a potential entrance to at least one of the rings, assuming there was more than one. It was also ridiculously mundane. “It’s a golf course.” She pointed out. “There’s nothing nearby that could be hiding an illegal fighting ring.”

“That’s ‘cause it’s underground.” Raz pointed out. Norma was once again reminded that oh, yeah, he was ten.

“Wrong kind of underground, Pooter.” Morris pointed out, but Sam was nodding in agreement with Raz, and Adam was looking contemplative.

“If it’s underground, then that might explain why it hasn’t been found yet.” Adam mused. “There aren’t really a whole lot of ways to check below the surface without digging.” He paused, then, “at least, nothing that the Psychonauts have access to.”

“So we’re digging?” Gisu asked.

“Yep.” Lizzie nodded. “We’re digging.”

+=+=+=+=+

A few hours, one guilt-tripped Ford, and two massive teleports later, and they were all standing at the edge of a golf course.

“Soooo now what?” Sam asked, staring out at the greens as though a hole might open up in the ground before them.

“We look around.” Adam suggested. “There’s gotta be an entrance somewhere.”

With no better ideas, everyone sort of slowly split up, poking around for a few hours before reconvening by a small brick building at Morris’ insistence. Norma glanced at the signs over the two doors—restrooms.

“Nobody who’s gone into here has come out.” Morris pointed out, nodding towards the building in question. “And their minds go down before they disappear, too.”

“Ominous.” Norma muttered.

“Maybe there’s a serial killer in there.” Lizzie suggested, jokingly. “Or a vampire.”

“Absolutely not.” Norma groused. “That’s not possible.” She looked back at the plans. “Maybe there’s psychic inhibitors,” she suggested, “and that’s how the minds are ‘disappearing’.”

“Well, it clearly goes somewhere.” Raz pointed out, “or else people would have been coming out.”

“Pooter’s got a point.” Morris said.

“So what, we just… walk in?” Norma asked. “Surely the senior agents have tried that before.” She wasn’t entirely sure what they could do—they were barely even junior agents, and that title really only existed in the first place for Lili.

But oh, she wanted to do something. Fire itched under her skin. She pushed open the door, and walked inside, looking over at two stalls and the row of sinks. “It’s just a bathroom.” And a gross one, at that—it reeked of bleach and floral perfume that was only halfway managing to cover up the other scent permeating the room.

“That door in the back.” Adam stalked forwards and opened it, pausing in surprise at it being unlocked. A musty closet full of cleaning supplies stood before them.

Raz made a face. “You’re sure it’s in here?” He asked.

Morris shrugged. “If you want to keep looking and getting weird looks from golfers, be my guest.”

“Aha!” Adam stepped out of the closet as a previously-undiscovered mechanism activated. A shuddery sort of groan, and then, as Norma peered into the closet, a rush of stale air hit her in the face. An entrance had opened up in the back of the closet, dim red lighting revealing a stairway going down.

“Yeah, that’s gotta be it.” Gisu said.

Sam frowned. “That was really easy.” She pointed out.

“Well,” Adam began, staring at the stairwell to memorize it, “we got information. Now, how do we… get… back…” He trailed off as they all realized that they had no idea how they were going to contact Ford at this distance.

“I say we keep going.” Gisu suggested. “We’ve come this far, we might as well go all the way.”

“We don’t know what’s down there.” Morris said. “The senior agents didn’t find this door, so we’ve already made our contribution.”

“I never took you for a coward, Martinez.” Lizzie commented coolly, as Morris gasped. “We don’t really have a way back. I say we go for it.”

“Yeah!” Raz nodded. “I wanna see what’s down there.”

Adam swallowed, looking to Sam and Norma. Sam shrugged, and Adam turned to Norma.

Norma knew they should just turn back. They’d found the door, they could go home and tell the senior agents and try not to get into any more trouble than they were undoubtedly going to be in when it came out that they snuck off to a golf course two whole states away to try and find an illegal fighting ring linked to the disappearance of countless psychics—

Or they could investigate further. Be the psychonaut agents they were all trying to be, and do more than just finding a door that the senior agents would have undoubtedly found on their own once they had the time to investigate.

Don’t you want to do something impressive? That little voice asked, don’t you want to make up for snitching directly to the mole?

“Just a quick in an out couldn’t hurt, right?” Norma bit her lip as everyone’s attention turned to her. “We leave the moment things go bad.” Their scrutiny felt so heavy, pinning her in place like a bug.

“Well, that’s that.” Lizzie said, sounding faintly… victorious? “You two are outvoted.” Okay, that one was definitely edging into satisfaction.

Whatever. Norma shook her head clear before following after Lizzie and Gisu as they started down the stairs, Raz attempting to cartwheel down in front of them. The hum of Morris’ levball signaled him, Sam, and Adam following down, and the door shut behind them with a sound of stone grinding against stone.

Now we really can’t go back. Norma wasn’t entirely sure who had thought that—maybe it was her own brain suddenly doubting itself. The red lighting was eerie, and as Norma stared down the stairs still laid out before her, some poetic part of her brain likened it to the maw of some great beast.

They continued on, and reached what seemed like the bottom of the stairs, only to find a short stairway leading up. A heavy feeling filled the air as Norma took the first step, like she was suddenly walking through molasses—and then she was through, and the air was… surprisingly clear, for being underground. They continued up for a bit, until the faint thrum of distant noise resolved itself into heavy music and a cacophony of voices. A set of doors stood before them, with various masks hanging up on racks beside the door.

“So we just grab a mask?” Gisu asked, doing exactly that.

“Maybe we should turn back.” Adam suggested, looking over the mask he grabbed. The grinning face stared up at him.

“I wanna see where this leads.” Lizzie argued, already putting on a purple mask she had found. One by one, they all masked up, faces hidden behind grinning facsimiles.

“Okay.” Adam said. “If we’re really doing this… we need some kind of escape plan.” He looked at each of them, exaggerating the turn of his head to make up for how the mask hid his expression. “The moment things get too hectic, we leave, okay?”

There was muttered agreement, and then they opened the door.

The first thing to really hit Norma was loud. Loud, hot, and sweaty—people in masks of various designs were mingling all over… it wasn’t quite a dance floor, wasn’t quite a ball room—if anything, it looked like a warehouse space, with a ceiling high above lit with dim colored lighting. Small tables of refreshments dotted the space, and TV screens were all over—all showing the same “waiting” screen with occasional flashes of ads.

The seven of them slowly spread out, unsure of what they were really doing. Raz ended up sticking with Adam and Gisu, while Morris trailed after a wandering Sam. And Lizzie…

Norma followed after her sister as she made her way towards a side door. On the way, she picked up bits and pieces of passing thoughts.

death pit is tonight

ugh, is she really wearing THAT

when does the fight start

it’s gonna be the lion again

Norma would have loved to have stopped and listened in greater detail, piecing together the greater image—but Lizzie was moving with purpose to a seemingly unattended side door, and ducked into a hallway without a single word.

Norms, Lizzie’s thoughts trickled into Norma’s mind like meltwater down a glacier, do you think you can act as lookout?

Norma frowned as Lizzie came to a stop in front of a door. The hallway they were in was much quieter than the party, with nobody in sight. Everything about the place screamed off-limits—so of course Lizzie had marked it as a place of interest for their investigation.

“Fine.” Norma muttered, as Lizzie picked a door seemingly at random and tested the knob. It didn’t budge, so Lizzie grabbed a bobby pin from her hair.

Can’t we find a door that’s unlocked? Norma wondered, leaning against the wall beside the door. She couldn’t see Lizzie’s expression behind the mask, but she could feel her sister’s amusement like snow fluttering down.

Because nothing important is put behind an unlocked door. Lizzie’s reply melted against Norma’s flames. C’mon, you know this, you’re the one who’s all gungho about being a secret agent.

Norma huffed. Feels risky. She thought back, fire itching under her scalp. We’re not supposed to be getting in too deep.

Lizzie snorted. Whatever her reply was, Norma didn’t catch it—she tensed at the sound of footsteps down the hall. A woman in a raven mask was approaching them. Norma paused, grabbing at Lizzie’s shirt to get her attention and yanker her up away from the lock in one go.

“You’re not supposed to be here.” The Raven remarked, with a quiet sort of mundanity.

“Yeah, we’re really lost,” Lizzie pitched her voice innocently, “Can you help us find the stands?”

The Raven’s head tilted. Norma felt something brush against her mind—shit. Lizzie lunged forwards, realizing the same thing as Norma. The Raven dodged to the side, and the door behind her opened up to reveal another woman, this one wearing a wolf mask. She was quick to grab Lizzie’s arm, and something in Norma burned with a need to burn those hands. Lizzie struggled to yank her arm free—but the Wolf’s grip was iron. Norma reached out with her mind, but nobody else was close enough—

Fire sprung forth from Norma’s fingers before she was even really thinking. The Wolf stumbled back, but didn’t let go of Lizzie’s arm. Fuck.

A heavy hand landed on Norma’s shoulder. She stumbled forwards, trying to put space between herself and the Raven behind her—

An iron grip grabbed her shoulder

Another brush against her mind. Norma thought of fire, of bright burning walls, and burned the intrusion away. The Raven scoffed.

“Didya get anything?” The Wolf asked, as both the sisters were dragged further down the hall.

“These two aren’t the only little spies running around.” The Raven replied. “That’s all I got.”

Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck. This was bad. This was so bad. Fire sparked from Norma’s fingers, frost climbing up the Wolf’s arms—

And then they were dragged into a room, and Norma hissed as the fire under her skin vanished, as the thin connection between her and Lizzie’s minds disappeared. Psychic inhibitors. Of all the—

Norma turned Lizzie, meeting her eyes through their masks. They couldn’t think at each other anymore, but it was pretty clear what they were both thinking.

This mission had gone sideways. And neither of them had any idea how to fix it.

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