After topping off my tank, I poured some AE3 into my canteen to test some things. I also set the canteen to start producing the stuff. Then, I got on my bike and headed back north to the warehouse. Although we'd gotten a face, we had yet to figure out what kind of group was behind the man and Ajay.

By the time I returned to Feras on the roof, easily sneaking past the building's lackluster security, I half expected the interface to announce level-ups. No such thing happened. I mean, I did technically get to the end of the current gig, right?

Maybe the powers behind the interface didn't consider the gig finished? Sure, the first contract was done, but that five thousand Rayn gig had been on my mind for a long time. Maybe because I didn't think I was done, the interface didn't think it was done? Or were they actively watching and manually doing stuff?

I made a step intentionally. It took more effort than I cared to admit. Feras flinched back to me, reaching for his gun. A materialized fox sprite next to him dropped back on its haunches and growled at me-

"Just me." I raised my hands, causing my rain jacket to shift. Cool rain dripped down my face from the night sky so far above.

The fox did one-eighty and coyly hid behind its tail, gazing up at me with its big eyes. I had a feeling that if Feras wasn't here, it run over and start pawing at my legs. Feras slouched back next to the ledge. "Bout time. You bring snacks?"

"You didn't ask." Now that I was close enough, I sent over the Rayn. Six hundred gone just like that. A promise was a promise though.

He immediately straightened his posture. "Six hundred! Thanks, boss!"

Both Feras and the fox sprite were completely dry. A rather large bubble surrounded them, blocking any rain. "What's with this?"

"Magic."

It sure was convenient. Beat out having to do this in the freezing cold rain. I didn't think I could even catch a cold anymore thanks to Quick Healing, but that didn't stop me from feeling the discomfort. I entered the bubble alongside them, and the rain stopped falling on me.

"Anything change down there?" I nodded to the dilapidated warehouse and zoomed in with my eye. We were across the street and a ways down from the warehouse.

"That guy a few minutes ago." He tilted his head slightly to the side as he looked down on the warehouse. "Why are we here though? We already got paid."

I paused and looked down on him for a moment. Do I tell him? Or kept it secret… hmm… "This is a lead on another gig. Very high payout."

"Twenty-five percent still?"

"Chek." A sigh left me. To be fair, every since he officially joined me on the gig, he'd done nothing but his best. And I did promise to cut him into the next job. Besides, I didn't want to leave a bad impression. I had a rep to build.

Right- this was just… um- networking? Was that right? Ew- that sounded way to corpy. Think positively too, Shiro! You'd still get thirty-seven hundred Rayn if things went well. We were already on the finish line regardless.

I moved up next to the grifter and took a seat. The fox bounced over to me and immediately hopped into my lap, not even sparing its summoner another look. I lightly dropped a hand onto its luscious fur and patted it.

"I'm jealous. They always seem so distant with me." Feras nodded to the fox sprite.

"What can I say?" I smirked and ruffled the little guy's ears. "They've got good sense."

"Whatever."

Silence returned to the roof. After about an hour of sitting around, I shifted the sleeping fox off my lap. It stirred and blinked softly up at me. I pulled at my collar and forced myself to look away. "What do you want to drink? I saw a vending machine on my way up."

Feras yawned and rubbed lightly at his eyes. "Um… did it have Nova-Cola?"

"Probably." I headed downstairs to the vending machine and bout two Nova-Colas and a bottle of water.

On my way back up, I found a camera deadzone and gulped down the water. Not nearly as refreshing as the stuff from my canteen, but that was as could be expected. I filled the bottle up with AE3. Instantly, a chill filled the air as the glowing blue fluid poured out of my canteen.

With that taken care of, I returned to the roof and tossed the Nova-Cola can at Feras. "Head's up."

The fox sprite caught it with its teeth just before the can could hit the sleepy Magus upside the head. Then it lightly dropped the can into his hand. "Thanks."

I settled back down to watch, though a bit further from Feras so he wouldn't see my bottle of AE3. The fox easily chose me and collapsed against my said, going back to sleep. I imagine it was largely do to Fox's Grace.

How would other types of sprites react to me though? If I was right, then I was technically contracted to the eidolons. Hmmm…

After thirty minutes of waiting, the bottle full of AE3 started to change. The glowing blue liquid evaporates slowly but steadily, eventually disappearing completely. I checked the time once more just to make sure. It'd been exactly thirty minutes.

A frown crept up to my lips. Originally I wanted to test if the AE3 from the canteen would keep its cold temperature, but this was a far more interesting result. I discreetly refilled the bottle outside of Feras's view and tried again, only to have the same result thirty minutes later.

I tried it again with a different liquid after waiting for it to refill partially. The same thing happened. It seemed as though liquids that came from the canteen couldn't exist outside of it for longer than thirty minutes. It was nice to know.

Wait- that didn't make sense? I'd been using it to sustain myself for a while in terms of hydration. Maybe it didn't go away because it had already been digested? How did that work? Ugh- it all went over my head. This magic stuff was too confusing, and it wasn't like I had a reliable source to ask about it.

In other news, the AE3 from the canteen would probably be able to run my bike as long as I refilled it every thirty minutes. Hmm… I wouldn't always have time to fill up my bike before going, especially if I was getting chased. Just to be safe, I should keep at least half a tank of 'real' AE3.

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"So… which fixer do you know?" Feras asked, causing the fox sprite's ears to twitch in his direction.

I looked up at him, taking a moment to process the question. I tossed the now-empty bottle into my bag. "Ishimaru and Carone… you?"

He stretched out and easily flowed back into his timid act. "M-more of a freelancer. I've been p-picked up in merc dives more than anything…"

"Never had the pleasure." I'd always been lucky enough to have close contact with a fixer since I was young. I'd heard plenty of horror stories about merc dives though. "How do those usually go?"

"D-decent, I guess. It's a b-bunch of one-shot crews more than anything. Can't t-trust anyone doing it e-either lest you get stabbed in the back." He threw his shoulders back into a shrug. "Like I said, decent.

Sounded like the job I did with Shinobu. Yeah, I think I'd rather stick with working for a fixer… at least, unless I want to start running my own jobs. Not sure if I'd ever do such a thing, but I couldn't deny it was tempting.

I'd be able to make a ton of Rayn without the need for a middleman, though that was assuming I even got the job. That side of the field relied a lot more on reputation. And I'd still need some to sell my loot, especially if it was high-end. Fixers always got their cut, one way or another.

"I-I've been meaning to ask, but w-what do you specialize in? I thought you were a techie at f-first, but you got into Artoras and Ajay's pretty easy."

Was this a probing question to get at my weaknesses? Still, we were working together. It was a fair concern to wonder what your partner in crime was good at. Hmm… "Klepping mainly, though I have gotten somewhat decent at tech stuff."

"I could see that… I'm really only good at g-grifting and negotiating." He tilted his head to the side in thought. "W-well, I'm also pretty decent at staying alive thanks to being a Magus, though I c-can't fight at all."

Good at negotiating? Then why did he fail every time he's tried to negotiate with me- wait, has he? Now that I really think about it, he's gotten his way almost every time. Hell, he even managed to get a quarter cut out of me.

Ugh- I shifted my head back to the warehouse in irritation. It was just in time to see a dark box truck move into the area. "Movement.

Feras turned serious and tracked onto the truck alongside. The truck pulled off the street and into the small courtyard in front of the warehouse. "A shipment? At this time of night? What do you think is in it?"

"I have no idea." Could just be a late delivery. Might not be anything suspicious… then again, at this time of night?

A few moments later, a dozen or so of the armed guards poured out of the warehouse and set up around the outside of the box truck. They held their rifles at the ready and set up a perimeter. Why? What were they expecting?

The driver of the truck got out and walked around the back. She unlatched and slid up the door. From our angle, we couldn't see into the truck. That didn't matter though. The guards wasted no time moving the 'cargo'.

Guards jumped into the vehicle. A moment later, a group of people were tossed out of the box truck. They all wore shackles around their limbs, holding them hostage. Most of them hit the ground hard, completely unable to resist. The majority looked like normal citizens of Aythryn City, albeit on the poorer side. There were a few middle-class ones in the bunch though.

"Fuck." Feras twitched as one of the guards smacked a woman upside the head with the butt of his rifle. The dual-zoom augment helped me watch in excruciating detail. The hit dislodged some of the chrome on her head, tilting it out. Blood began to pour from the seams. "Scavs?"

"No." I inspected the people a bit more, shoving aside the sinking feeling in my gut. Now wasn't the time to get emotional. Just try to focus on the details. "Look, some of them don't even have chrome."

We watched the group of people get battered around by the group of guards. They were forced into a line, standing in the rain with minimal protection. Every time someone shivered or cried out, the guards would beat them into submission and then expect them to stand like nothing happened.

A non-compliant man tried to fight back. He was mercilessly bashed over the head, dropping to the round. Before he could even move, a guard put several bullets through his chest. It was a grim example for the rest of the victims.

Feras shifted uncomfortably beside me and took pictures of it with his phone. "Think it's a Savant Lab?"

"I-" I paused and looked around the operation a bit more before turning off the dual-zoom. The entire thing was just too surgical, too practiced to be anything else. They didn't see those people as people. They were mere rats waiting to be experimented on.

I felt sick. My stomach rolled uncomfortably. All this time then, I was working for Savants? No- no, I couldn't be blamed for this. I didn't know. I had no way of knowing… but I knew now.

I took a few calming breaths to try and settle back down. "It would make sense."

Feras popped up with a disgusted look on his face. The fox left me and bounded up onto his shoulders. "Let's go to the Crusade! We can't just let this go on."

"Just- just give me a moment." My brain churned, trying to get through this. "Let me think."

Savants were arguably the worst group in Aythryn City. They held a similar position in the hearts of many to Scavs. Their kill count was only slightly less than the various Scav Dens around the city. There was an almost mutual dislike across the city for Savants and their Labs.

They were also worse though in some ways. Whereas Scavs were the floor below the barrel, Savants were the sewers below the floor. At least Scavs had the 'decency' to kill their victims after shredding them into sellable pieces.

Savants were the same type of scum to take people off the streets, sometimes even preferring children, to be brought back to their labs for experimentation. They practically tortured their victims, sometimes for years, until the victim would inevitably die due to a failed human experiment. Some of the experiments I had heard of were truly the stuff of nightmares, like attempting to turn HMV into a bioweapon.

The worst part? Most had corporate backing and funding. Although no corpo would ever admit to it, Savants were the breeding ground for products still in their experimental phase. If a corporation had a product or idea that 'required' humans, they would pull together a Savant Lab to test it in a black site with the victims of human trafficking. Truly a disgusting establishment.

Okay, okay… what to do… what to do… And how was Ajay connected with all of this?

A sickening idea popped into my head. I pulled off my bag and rifled through it for my deck. I wasted no time sticking in the chip with Ajay Insurance's client database on it. Next, I scanned through the list and checked it back through the missing person's list from the Blue Crusade.

One out of twenty people were on the missing person's list, which was abnormal. I filtered the client list, focusing on those without any relatives and in positions of poor income. To my absolute disgust, the number jumped up to one and three. I even recognized some of their faces from IDs stuffed in his safe.

Everything clicked in my head. The oddities I noticed over the past week. The absurd amount of funds that seemed to just pop out of nowhere. The expensive security that was far above what most small corporations could afford. Even the warehouse trying to blend in as a gang. Ajay was using his clients as fodder to sell to the Savant Lab, and the Savants were using them to, well, prove they were sick fucks.

Logically, it made sense. Who better to use as a human trafficker than an insurance corporation? They would know everything they needed about their victims, including if anyone would come looking for them if they were to just 'disappear'. Still, to think that Ajay was so greedy that he would sell out his own clients to-

"Zuku!" A hand touched my shoulder. I jerked back in surprise, my hand dropping to my pistol. "Did you hear me? Are we going to the Crusade?"

"Just- no." I shifted the direction of my hand and pulled out my phone instead. "The Crusade will take too long."

I didn't trust the corp. They were a hotbed for corruption, so there was no telling if they'd already been paid off about this particular lab. Hell, just a few weeks ago Iris's chum was almost assassinated. Even he didn't trust the Blue Crusade enough to go to them for help and he was one of their Inquisitors.

Not to mention they might not get Ajay. There was a way we could still play this though where we could end the Savant operation here. Hatred for Savants was almost universal. I had just the group that would be interested. And, if I played my cards right, we could cash in on the five thousand Rayn bounty too.

I flicked through my contacts, settling on one in particular. It rang for several seconds before a drunken voice came across. "Shiro, to what do I owe the pleashure?"

I held a hand up to Feras, stopping him from further questions. "I think I found a Savant Lab on the north side of Little Yukuto."

The drunken cheer completely vanished from his voice. The Jade Fang Elder turned completely stoic. "I'm all ears."

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