Chapter 49: A Helping Hand

Chapter 49: A Helping Hand It wasn’t a loud sound, more like a rustle, but I was sure it was coming from inside the flat. Immediately, I dropped the bag and forced myself to calm down. I didn’t want to rip up the clothes I’d just put on. I even considered striping just in case, but decided not to. What if it was a well intentioned neighbour come to see what had happened or some bird that had flown in. If I turned up completely naked, I don’t know who would die of embarrassment - them or me. So, I kept my clothes on and crouched to the floor and slowly made my way to the living room. Everything looked to be fine but for the coffee table. It was vibrating, rattling on its four feet. I knew there was a small draw on the underside of the table so I told myself it had to just be something in there making a fuss. Definitely no ghosts. Heart in my throat, I skirted a big circle around the living room and ducked into the kitchen for a nice big knife. Now that I was armed, I headed, carefully, back into the living room and towards the coffee table. The table seemed almost to sense my approach and stopped rattling so much and instead vibrating slightly. I edged closer and closer and reached out my free hand. With the knife ready in my other, I yanked open the drawer. And out popped mini Colin. The little man seemed to not have expected to suddenly be released and went splat on his face from the force of his movements. "...Colin?" I asked, still a little uncertain. The little man got up, rubbed his head and looked around. It took him a moment to spot me and he jumped when he did. "Mini Colin, right?" I asked again. Mini Colin stared a few moments then finally nodded. Perhaps size determines processing speed. "What are you doing here?" I asked. Mini Colin did more staring then started gesturing with both arms. I forgot he can’t speak. "Nevermind," I said quickly before the little guy tired himself out. "How about this. You help me find some stuff and I let you out of here, how about that?" More staring, then an enthusiastic nod. "Great. Now, look around in the flat for anything to do with Bran’s aunt, can you do that?" Mini Colin’s face dropped and he stared at his small feet. Ah well, it was worth a try. "Okay, how about instead, you gather things for camping. Can you do that?" Mini Colin perked up and nodded. "Great." -- Tuesday was tapping away at her computer when Helen entered the cave. The jiaoren had pestered and cajoled her way into being given a whole cave all to herself to start setting up her equipment and even a few servers to get her started, but even with that help, she said it would take time to get her system truly back online. Helen watched Tuesday’s crouched figure for a few moments then, when it became clear that Tuesday was too absorbed in her work to realise she had a visitor, stepped forward and to the side to try to get into the workaholic’s peripheral vision. Tuesday jump and swore. "When did you get there?!" she gasped, putting a hand to her chest. "Just now," said Helen with a little laugh. "You could have made a bit more noise..." Tuesday muttered darkly, making Helen laugh more. "How are things?" Helen asked. She walked up and crouched down beside her friend. Tuesday had decided to forgo her usual chair setup and instead opted to drag everything near the pool of water in the centre of the cave, that way she could keep herself always halfway transformed. Helen had asked if it was more tiring that way, but it turned out it was the opposite. Tuesday sighed, stretched and yawned, her sharp canines catching the light. "Okay. Fine. Could be worse," she replied. "You? Didn’t you just have a...?" "Meeting," finished Helen. "Yeah, that. How’d it go?" Now it was Helen’s turn to sigh. "That bad?" "It’s not... bad," said Helen. "It’s more..." she searched for a way to describe how she and the rest of the team was feeling, "daunting." Tuesday rolled onto her side and planted her head on a hand. "Go on." Helen shifted and sat cross-legged on the ground. "You know about how dragons have been going missing recently, right?" "Just dragons? I thought there was a variety of creatures." Helen shook her head. "Those are separate cases. The one I’m talking about, the serial kidnappings, is only dragons. And Misha’s father." "Oh? Given your phrasing... Are you saying Misha’s father is a dragon?" asked Tuesday, her eyes narrowing. Helen shrugged. "At this point, who really knows? The corpse in the morgue’s a fake, just a body double puppet, but we don’t even know if it’s Artemis Long faking his own death, or someone else trying to pass his death off as something mundane when the truth is a lot worse." "Or more telling," said Tuesday. She raised herself up then transformed the bottom half of herself into slender human legs and stepped out of the pool. Helen rose too and handed her the towel sitting nearby. "There’s something off about Misha," said Tuesday as she dried herself off. "I thought he was a nice a nice kid. Good for Bran," said Helen. Tuesday waved a hand to dismiss the thought. "That’s not what I mean," she said. "He’s nice, sure, but there’s something off about him as a being. Has Bran told you Misha wasn’t really born in Hong Kong?" "No. Wasn’t he? But on his ID card..." "Forget his ID card. Things like ID cards can be obfuscated if you know what you’re doing. My point, is that, here is a dragon, being raised as a human who doesn’t officially even exist." "You think he’s a threat?" Helen’s voice was light and non-accusatory. Tuesday was her friend, her closest friend, so there was no need to beat around any bushes. "That, or he’s a threat to someone else," said Tuesday. She tucked the corner of the towel in at her waist to turn the whole thing into a skirt, and flounced over to the beaten-up metal cabinet in the corner. She popped it open and pulled out two bottles of mineral water. Helen tried to hide her grimace. Mineral water? Really? "Artemis Long attacked Misha, so they’re clearly not on the same side. Then someone attacked Artemis, so they’re also not on the same side..." said Helen aloud. "Do you think Misha went after his father then?" asked Tuesday. Helen rolled her eyes. "As if. The kid’s barely got a grip on anything. No way he’s going around killing or kidnapping people and leaving behind fake corpses. Besides, Bran’s not that stupid." Tuesday opened her mineral water and took a long chug. "He’s fallen pretty hard though," she said airily. "Oh?" Helen perked up. "Do you have gossip?" Her friend gave an ambiguous shrug then gestured for Helen to come with her to the filing cabinet against the opposite wall. Tuesday dragged open one drawer, flicked through a few files, then pulled one out. "That’s Misha’s elemental resonance," she said, holding out the folder with the relevant page facing up. Helen took it and stared. "Are you sure? This is..." "I’m sure," said Tuesday. "And Bran, he had barely any reaction, no doubt or anything. That kid’s fallen hard." Helen flipped through a few more pages. "Tuesday..." "Mm?" Helen shut the folder and held it out. "Just what is Misha? Do you have any idea?" Tuesday took the file from her and put it back in her filing cabinet. "If I knew, I wouldn’t be worrying so much..." -- To Misha’s surprise, both he and Mini Colin were able to find quite a few useful items, so between the tent and small portable gas stove Mini Colin found, and the door charms Misha found, the dragon was feeling a little more confident. The broken window was a problem, but looking around and out of it Misha determined that it wasn’t as bad as he initially thought. Sure, if it rained, that would become a bit of an issue, but other than that, it was probably fine leaving it as it was. The window opened onto the sound well in the estate that housed mostly just air-conditioning units so no one looked at them, much less pay them any attention. But perhaps the bigger problem, after finding where Bran’s aunt was, was carrying all the stuff. Misha, as a dragon, could carry more than an average human, especially in his draconic form, but not a lot more. Plus, his snaky body made it hard to get things to stay properly and not slip off his tail. Misha frowned at the assembled small tent Mini Colin had found. He had an idea. "Colin, come here a sec," he said. Mini Colin came over dutifully. He’d been munching on a biscuit and he quickly brushed his hands clean and stood to attention. Misha slapped one of those door charms of Bran’s on the flap of the tent then pointed at the flap. "Go through there," he said to Mini Colin. The little man shoved the rest of the biscuit in his mouth and bravely unzipped the flap and bounced inside... And popped out that one special door in the living room. Misha grinned. Apparently tent flaps count as doors! One major problem down, one more to go.