Small Blind

@poptart
Felicity rushed back into her dining room, quickly running her arms across her table to knock all the shit off of it, shattering several plates and scattering silverware. Her expression seemed panicked, almost, completely unlike anything Joker had seen of her prior. She dumped the stack and rolls of paper onto the table, and then left just as hurriedly. She jogged over to her window, peering out the blinds and then shutting them up as tightly as she could, pulling the light-blocking shades over. This was the least safe house she could have possibly gotten, because, well, it was her house. And that wasn't intelligent at all. But she had to make due.

She jogged again across the room, to her landline phone; archaic, indeed, but still useful in some instances. She proceeded to tear the line out of the wall, and then break the phone casing open. Seemingly content, she threw it across the room. At this point, or perhaps earlier, it was clear that she was getting twitchy as fuck. Her cell phone was the next victim, crashed against the ground.

Joker had been called to her place under the pretense of one on one study, and the additional subtle pretense of student-teacher makeouts. Whatever Joker believed would have happened was entirely untrue, as neither of those things would occur. Rather, he would have been seated in her dining room. Whatever adolescent fantasy ran through his head, it would all be for naught, as she walked out of her bedroom, not in lingerie, but brandishing a 9mm and checking the magazine before laying it on the table to return to her bedroom.

She returned out to deposit all the paperwork and then to wreck every electronic device around, stripping out the panels to check for anything nonstandard. Apparently satisfied, she finally gave a long sigh and slumped down in a chair. After the calm, cool, collected Chevalier he witnessed in the classroom, this seemed an entirely different affair.

In fact, Felicity was experiencing what is kindly known as a relapse. After having kept herself from doing any illicit activity for so long, when she finally accepted she would, she exploded. She didn't like a student seeing her like this, but it wouldn't be the worst moment in these upcoming few days, nor the most exciting. She was one of the worst influences a teenager could have, and she relished in it.

"I invited you here, Joker, because I plan on conducting my first theft on this island. However, this is at least a two man job, and without the time to rapport with the underworld, I'm left with very few options. This means you'll be my second," she went to the first paper on the top of the pile, handing it to him. "this is the target. You've been here longer than me, so I'm sure you're aware of it. Gomorrah, the night club. I managed to gain access to case the place initially by convincing the frontman I was only half human and that I was in fact a shapeshifter, though I used a different face. I got the floorplan- which isn't everything, since things change since public records are made, plus I can't imagine that a demon like Baltimore wouldn't have some fanciful secret passages somewhere-" mind you, if there's more than one, he's breaking some laws of mystery- "Gomorrah is based on a city from the Bible, one of those cities where all the inhabitants did all kinds of things that certain people didn't like, so God destroyed them all..." quickly realizing she was going on a tangent, she stopped herself.

The paper she handed to him was just a flyer, but underneath that paper were lists of the guard rotations, where each was, significant landmarks in the place, even down to menu items. Most significantly, an 'establishment closed' sign she had pilfered. "I was planning on it regardless, and though I do enjoy hiding in plain sight, this makes things easier. The place will be closed and it will be simply a get in, get out operation. Baltimore is gone, and he was the primary threat; the goons will be no more difficult to avoid than a museum security guard. My source says the primary object is a necklace, though there are other things we can find as well."

Her ramblings seeming sufficient, she finally took a deep breath and stopped completely. She stood up, bending over to grab Joker by the shoulders.

"I'm inviting you to join me for the experience. I cannot guarantee your safety, but I will take full responsibility. This is real; so no texting, no rumors, no talking. The only way we can get away with this is if no one thinks or knows we have any possible connection to it. I know firsthand the power of some of the investigators on this island, and I have no intention of testing them. Yes, or no?"

"Good. Good. So I just need to call.." she realized it was too late for that now. "Damn. Nevermind that, then. So, here's the plan."

She rolled out her hand drawn updated floorplan of the Gomorrah. However, there were too many things. She didn't have a version with the lightened employee load due to closure. It had been an impromptu decision to move ahead with the plan so quickly.

She had had only one day to check up on the new schedules of the employees. She would take one more day to do so, and then if it was roughly similar, she would go in on the third day. If Baltimore was indeed on a business trip as the rumors suggested, then he would be gone no more than a few days.

If the first day was the same as the second, then the plan would, theoretically, work. While the place was guarded not like a bank, it was at least watched over and locked. The average punk wouldn't be able to get in, but they would not be average. As long as there are still employees there, there is always a way in; there is no closed room as long as there is a person inside.

If the second day was the same as the first (tomorrow and last night, respectively) then the plan would proceed thusly:

the place still gets dusted and cleaned out, so there are a couple janitorial staff. They take the trash out before clocking out in the evening. Her and Joker would stake out until they show up, and then take their place, violently.

Charming themselves to appear however the janitors did, herself and Joker re-enter the premises. The remaining guards appeared to be on a regular hourly schedule (most likely not to check for intruders, but rather to ensure nothing caught on fire sporadically) and so she would try and catch them on a break time to avoid direct contact. Particularly if the janitors were of a significantly different size than her and Joker, then it would only be sufficiently convincing from a distance, or a camera.

Speaking of cameras, any such cameras would be dealt with as necessary. She could charm them, though preferably they would want to seem like they were supposed to be wherever they were.

The target item is on the third floor, the VIP floor, and the even VIP-er room. The floor was used for 'private' events, as far as she could work out, far too inappropriate for her to describe to Joker. What, furthermore, many of those creatures even did, she could not even imagine.

Any other cameras would be charmed to make it look like they were always on the second floor. Even so, that was not entirely important.

At this point is where she began to find unknowns, and where improvisation would begin; she was unable to get very far into the VIP floor, since as soon as she got anywhere she had to make an excuse that she got lost to some guard, and would immediately be ejected to the second floor and directed to the restroom. All she could figure out was that that lock on the VIP-er door was fairly ordinary, though she didn't have much of a way to tell if it was magicked in any way. She would deal with it at the time.

It didn't particularly matter if they left traces, since at some point or another this theft would be reported. What mattered was that they didn't leave traces back to themselves. They could go as far as incapacitating all the guards, if necessary, as long as they didn't call any police or see their real faces. Killing was off limits unless their own lives were at stake. The gun she had, engraved with some initials, was mostly in fact for herself if it came to that, though she expected no such problems.

Once inside and the items were located, she would collect what she could; because of no certain exfiltration route, they were limited to wait they could comfortably carry and hide on their persons. Jewelry, artifacts, whatever seemed pricey and small. She already had tendrils into the black magic market, so selling things shouldn't be a problem. Her talents were also suitably effective for fencing.

Once they were outside of the building, it should be a free escape. These items would be so deep into the VIP floor that the guards would never be able to check there, so it wouldn't noticed until Baltimore himself returned. By then, everything should be cozily sold or put to auction and the commission money would be safely in her fifth alternate Seychelles bank account.

Joker would get a cut when he graduated high school. It was part incentive to do well, and part incentive to try in school. Even now she could be an obnoxious teacher.

She wouldn't tell him the expected price the particularly sought after items would fetch; he would find out when he graduated. Even with no more than 5% of the cut, he would be filthy rich. Of course, stolen money is curious; how one uses it has to be extremely careful lest you attract the attention of the most dangerous of enemies, a state revenue service. The necromancy and black arts of the IRS has been the bane of many a thief, and she has almost come under scrutiny several times from different services.

It was not to be the hardest heist she had ever pulled, but it certainly had the most unknowns. Magic seemed to always have a lot of unknowns, and it always caused problems for her. She suspected that leaving zero magical trail and keeping it that way afterwards would be the hardest part; and she was even now worried that Joker would blab something. He raised himself to be the class clown, the one that spoke the loudest, unlike her, who stayed as far under the radar as possible. It was always hard to not brag about such achievements, but that was what partners in crime were for; to give an outlet for that sort of social relief.

Even so, she didn't know who to trust, or why. If Joker fucked it up in the end, then she would take responsibility, since she had dragged him into this.

Felicity didn't like to steal from nightclub owners, because they tended to draw their information from the same underworld she did. They were inherently part of the same community, even if they considered themselves higher class to the common thieves and fences.

"...that should be most of it. Any questions?" she didn't seem to break a sweat explaining everything, like she had done it a thousand times before. She still seemed hyper, but she had at least calmed down a little bit.

"The first part will take place tonight, where we scout the place. I don't think there will be any problems about that, but if there are, I might call it all off. There are still way too many unknowns," Felicity said, starting to clean up after her tirade. She's at least gotten a little less frazzled after finishing her explanation. She could look for technological things, but magical things.. she wasn't so sure. She hoped that Joker would have a little more experience in that field, even if only marginally more than her. "No guns. You can bring a knife if you want, but I'll be coming with a full kit so it's not really a big deal if you forget something."

"Meet me downtown at around 1800. Not exactly 1800, a few minutes before or after. Dress casually. I will be a..." she thinks about it. If she gets caught inside and decides she wants to talk it out, she needs to appear be a non-human of some kind. "well, do you have any suggestions? I need to not appear human. I've seen plenty of non-humans, but I don't want to fuck it up and be something that doesn't actually even exist. Also, I don't want to be a shark or anything where me not being huge will become a problem." She sat down, rubbing her forehead. It would be a few really long nights.

((OOOOPS))

Joker would have been waiting. It was probably not until about twenty minutes after 6 that he finally saw something that could be construed as being Felicity; or, in fact, anything of interest at all.

Better late than never, huh?

The door to Cynthia's store burst open and a woman, clad in something akin to a skort and a loosefitting top ran out at full speed. She didn't look like Felicity, but for some reason Joker had an instinctual feeling that it was her; plus, the woman had indeed taken on some animal-like traits, becoming a foxgirl or something near to it, with amber red hair, fox ears atop her head, and a billowy but constrained tail coming out of her lower back.

She skid to a stop outside the store, and then took off in a full sprint in the other direction, which took her across Joker. She stopped for just a moment, looking at him, and then grabbed his sleeve to pull him along with her.

"Let's go! Go! C'mon!"

Finally, Felicity stops, catching her breath. She makes a big scene of taking a huge breath, and then letting it out.

"Sorry, I was running away from the awful fashion!"

Her show of being tired instantly dissipates, and she laughs and slaps her knee in the corniest fashion the could have possibly been done in the past 30 years. She takes another ten seconds or so to laugh at her own joke, and then pats her chest to calm herself down.

"This is day two: remember the plan? We're going to case it once more and I'll see if anything weird changes, or if the patrol layouts are roughly similar. Usually guards are too dumb to do their own routes, so they follow the same ones over and over or just neglect to do them at all. If they do do them, they will be at certain times, since they need to be reminded to do it."

This looked to be an alley for trash, mostly. That meant there was some inlet.

"This is the only time we're going to go in invisible. Invisibility is too conspicuous in a real heist; if something just disappears, they know exactly what happened. If you make it look like other people did it, framing them, ie, then you may get enough time for their eventual trail to go cold, since we should be well on our way."

She puts one hand on his shoulder, and then focuses. A moment later, they can't even see themselves. It's a bit unsettling.

"Windows are going to be locked, and we can't get in that way, since it would make too much noise to get in. It doesn't matter if doors are locked, because I can deal with that without difficulty; the problem is if anything is magically sealed."

She goes down the alley to the side entrance.

"Try it."