Magi Saga 2: Shadows of Darkness (10 page)

A new player

May 17
th

Bronx, New York

Lucian lounged in a reclining chair in a dark and dusty office that perched in the rafters of a warehouse. The room felt dead. Disused for a long time, Lucian used it now to stay hidden but close to the proceedings below. He didn’t need to be here for these meetings, but he liked to attend a few of them, keep a close eye on his empire and make sure his employees knew he was around.

Everything in the room had a thin covering of dust on it, apart from the chair Lucian sat upon. He’d magically cleaned it before parking himself in it.

He looked down through the dirty glass window that he sat next too. Below him his workers went about their business, while on a nearby table, several men sat in conversation.

He didn’t concern himself with the details though, that wasn’t his domain, he left that to others, the important thing being that the client wanted to buy more drugs from him, more Cocaine. That was the important thing.

The eyes of a few of the thugs that the buyers had brought with them kept drifting to the workers nearby as they stood at their tables, cutting the drugs, preparing them for distribution in a variety of strength’s. Their hungry glares giving away their own desire for the product that Lucian sold.

Amounts and costs were agreed upon, delivery dates set and the deal was done.

Another successful day for Lucian’s business it seemed. Lucians’ representative, Jalen Toney, shook the hands of the buyers, before they were shown to the door with smiles on their faces.

Lucian walked from the office and down the metal stairs to the ground floor to see Jalen.

Jalen had no Magical ability, as an Initiated he merely knew of its existence and the benefits it brought to him, not least of which being the money that Lucian threw at him. He walked over to Lucian in that cocky almost limping manor that many gang members and cool teenagers did these days. Lucian thought it looked ludicrous, but Jalen, despite his occasional personal foible, had always been a capable worker, which Lucian appreciated more than anything else.

Jalen wore a black suit with a white shirt that he only buttoned up half way showing off his toned chest and the large amount of bling around his neck. He wore so much gold that Lucian sometimes wondered how he managed to stand up at all. Maybe the chains were the reason for his lop sided walk?

‘They’re happy then mon?’ Lucian said, as Jalen approached.

Yeah, they happy. Buying more from us this time than ever before. They doin’ well!’

‘Great. You did good tonight. How’s the latest shipment coming along?’ Lucian asked.’

‘We’re on schedule, everything should be ready for the buyers in good time. We’ll be left with some spare to shift later, I’m sure of that.’

‘Excellent.’

‘Thank you for coming tonight Lucian, it was, unexpected for you to visit.’

‘I know Mon. I have other business here tonight.’

‘Anything I can help with?’ Jalen asked.

‘Fuck no. Just do your job.’

Jalen didn’t reply, he knew he had been a little more familiar than he should be with his boss. Lucian didn’t care too much, but he liked to keep his employees on their toes, especially Jalen and others who had attained that stature within his empire. They had access to Lucian that others did not, but Lucian didn’t what them to think he cared about them at all. They were all expendable and there were always more who wanted to take their place and reap the rewards that people like Jalen did.

Coming here tonight and seeing the fairly standard meeting had been vaguely interesting, but it had not been the main reason for the visit. He had other plans, a meeting of his own to attend shortly, and as this building remained one that Ekua did not know about, it made sense to come here.

It also made sense to come here early and see how this branch of his empire had grown.

Jalen backed off from Lucian, his eyes looking at the floor now as he spoke.

‘As you wish Baal Lucian.’ He whispered.

Lucian turned to the 4 rows of rectangular tables arrayed end to end across the large open plan room with workers on either side cutting the white powder with other white powders, diluting the drug and increasing the weight of the final product. He didn’t care what white powders went into the drug, all he wanted was to keep the profits rolling in and his influence over the city to grow. He left such boring details to his employees.

Satisfied that everything here seemed to be going fine, he turned away and marched past the meeting table and into the darkness on the other side of the room. Lucian’s operation only took up half of this warehouse, but its location, hidden away from casual on lookers, made it a perfect fit for his business. This had been Jalen’s choice, he had done well.

Lucian’s magical sight meant he had no need for light or a torch, he could see perfectly fine and he could easily make out the stairs that sat in the corner and led up, to the upper catwalks and the roof in this part of the building.

As he approached the stairs, a side door opened just next to them and a figure stepped out. Shaun stepped into view just as Lucian had requested.

Shaun waited at the bottom of the stairway, dressed in black from the neck down, only the pale waxy skin of his deformed head remained on show.

He inclined his head in greeting and fell into step behind Lucian as he walked up the stairs in silence. He knew all he needed to know for this meeting, and the next part of his masters plan. No need to go into any further detail.

A catwalk and another set of stairs later and they found themselves in a small room on the roof of the building with one small door that led outside. Lucian didn’t hesitate, he walked straight out and into the middle of the roof. Most of the other buildings in this area were of a similar size, mainly warehouses and tenement blocks. Nothing really overlooked this building, which provided another reason for its choice as a meeting place. In the distance the lights of Manhattan glowed in the night like a city of the future. Here in the Bronx, the lights were not quite as bright. Neon signs and lit up billboards dotted the landscape around them, but the warehouse district they were in felt very dark at night as the businesses that used these buildings stopped their activities for the most part.

Lucian’s own business being one such exception.

Lucian looked around, there seemed to be no one else on the roof, only himself and Shaun. Meaning his contact had yet to arrive.

So, suspecting that they were likely being cautious and probably watching him right now, he waited and used his Magical sight to try and spot them. But they must be using Magic of their own to hide their presence from Magical detection.

After a few minutes, and just as Shaun seemed to be getting a bit bored as Lucian could hear him shifting about a lot, a sudden dull thud sounded from behind him.

Lucian turned, as did Shaun to look at the figure who had just landed on the roof as they came to a stand from the crouching position they had landed in.

As the single figure rose up, her gender became obvious, as the woman’s body filled out the strikingly designed tight fitting stealth suit in a way that Lucian appreciated.

This would be the Black Lotus, someone that Lucian had been wanting to invite to New York for a long time, ever since he had found out about Yoh, the one Arcadian Magi that lived in New York and that he had so far, failed to find and kill.

Yoh had become something of an obsession for Lucian over the years. He had kept to himself for the most part and didn’t do much to disrupt Lucian’s plans. But it had become a matter of professional pride that his city should not have any Arcadians living within it.

After a few years of research, he had finally found out where this Magus had come from, and he also found out about the Black Lotus and her hatred for Yoh.

The woman walked towards Lucian, a blank slate in his Magical view. She didn’t even show up as alive. She might as well have not been there.

Her boots crunched on the ground as she walked towards Lucian, and stopped a few meters short of him.

The Lotus stood in her stealth suit, covered from head to toe in pure black, but as they watched, some of the black on the catsuit she wore faded away to white, leaving behind a black and white pattern all over her that looked like stylised Japanese Lotus flowers.

The suit even covered her head, only a ponytail of long black hair gave any hint as to her actual appearance.

Strapped to her stealth suit, tactical webbing held pouches and holsters of all kinds, each filled with weapons or other implements of death. The Black Lotus was an assassin, an Initiated Mundane who worked for a secretive organisation from Japan who took out contract killings that straddled the divide between the Mortal world and the Magi world.

Lucian also knew that the Black Lotus would not be able to resist the lure of finding Yoh.

‘You’ve found him, Lucian-San.’ She said. Her voice carrying a strong Japanese accent, even though she spoke excellent English.

‘I have. He’s here in New York. Shaun here can show you where you can find him.’

She looked over at Shaun, before glancing back to Lucian to offer a brief bow of thanks. ‘Hai’ she said, before turning back to Shaun and stepping closer to him.

Shaun stepped forward and offered her a slip of paper.

‘Meet me in the city in an hour at this address.’

She took it and looked at it, before she bowed briefly to Shaun and turned away from the two men and moments later, jumped off the roof.

Satisfied, Lucian turned to Shaun and nodded at him before Porting off the roof and appearing instantaneously in a corridor of The Pit Club. His Magic allowing him to pass through the ‘backdoor’ built into the clubs Aegis.

Lucian started to make his way through the corridors, looking for Raal, Lex and Aneurin to update them on the latest developments. Instead, he found himself running into Ekua as he rounded the corner and looked into one of the communal rooms.

‘Lucian. Wha gwaan. I’ve hardly seen you mon. Hey, how dem latest Arcadians die?’

Lucian kept his face neutral. He didn’t want his thoughts and feelings betraying him to Ekua. They were coven mates, but their rivalry had been simmering for a long time, and Lucian knew that Ekua had progressed in his Magical ability in recent years to the point where he could potentially best Lucian, if he wasn’t careful. Lucian also knew that Ekua’s comment had been designed to bait him. Lucian had made sure that Ekua heard of their failed attempts to find the Arcadians. Lucian fed these stories out through the Coven, as an attempt to stall Ekua for as long as he could.

The moment that Ekua knew something concrete about Lucian’s dilemma, he would almost certainly go to straight to Nymira and then Lucian would have some explaining to do. At the very least he suspected that Ekua would be promoted to Coven leader, and his life would be made much harder, and probably more painful.

‘Ekua mon, these fucks will be crushed. I have my crew on it. They can’t hide forever.’

‘You ain’t found dem yet? What da fuck you doin? If Nymira…’

‘She knows.’ That much wasn’t a lie. He had sent word to his master that Arcadians had entered the city and he had been hunting them down. Better it come from him then Ekua.

‘Chill mon. I know you on it.’ He said, and eyed Lucian carefully.

Lucian left the room, his face a picture of calm, but inside he felt in turmoil. He had to get these Arcadians out of his City and soon. They could ruin everything.

He hoped that the Black Lotus might be able to kill two birds with one stone. Maybe killing Yoh, who Lucian knew had befriended Amanda, would force them out. He wasn’t sure if Yoh would be included in the protection of Yasmin or not, and he had no way to check. But rather than get his own hands dirty, by using an assassin he might at least have a bit of plausible deniability should Yasmin be unhappy with Yoh’s death. Also, by killing him, it removed that particular thorn in his side and would give him some leeway with Ekua and Nymira again.

He shook his head as he walked away from the encounter with Ekua. The mental gymnastics he was having to go through to keep things straight with Ekua and his master, while at the same time, trying to find a way to scare Amanda off of Manhattan for good took its toll on him.

He headed back towards his quarters and dropped himself into his couch with a grunt born of frustration and exhaustion.

Soon, he thought, soon the Black Lotus would confront Yoh, and with a bit of luck, his problems would sort themselves out finally and he could go back to running his business.

- Online Chat between Chronos and Edge dated April 8th

Chronos: You’re close, so close to the truth.

Edge: Excuse me? Who is this?

Chronos: You can call me Chronos. I have read your blog, and the conclusions you have drawn are, close. How do you know all this?

Edge: Investigation. I follow the rabbit hole wherever it takes me.

Chronos: Matrix reference.

Edge: Well spotted.

Chronos: You’re in the UK right?

Edge: Correct, how did you know?

Chronos: You’re good, but you have a lot to learn.

- Online Chat between Chronos and Edge, dated April 16th

Edge: What’s this?

Chronos: An address.

Edge: And what’s there?

Chronos: If you’re careful, your first steps to learning the truth.

Edge: Is it dangerous?

Chronos: Of course. Watch, at a safe distance, and don’t get caught. Got it?

Edge: Got it.