Thievery

Finally, the party…

“Ekko…I mean, Hibiki…” Ikari-san corrected himself, using my incognito name now that we were in public. “Damn…I need to get that right.” He looked a bit frustrated under that eye covering mask.

“Don’t worry about it,” I gave him a kiss on the cheek. “What were you going to say?”

“We should probably spread out and look for anyone who might have the ID card we need.”

I wasn’t against that plan. We more or less needed to get a lay of the land anyways, so exploring the place would help us in the long run.

To better disguise ourselves, all three of us were wearing similar masks to the ones from the auction last night. They only covered our eyes, but anything more would make us rather easy to pick out in a crowd.

We passed by a group of laughing girls before we parted ways. I decided to plant down in a seat near them to listen in on what all the excitement was.

Apparently, they were laughing at a man who walked into the party alone.

“What a peasant,” a woman with puffy yellow hair cackled. “He thought he could come back here without a servant? Didn’t that guy say last year he was going to have a woman this year?”

“God, what a loser,” another girl supported.

“The biggest loser. I hear he still lives with his parents too. Aren’t those old fogies ready to be liability expelled or whatever they do down there?”

It seems the man didn’t recognize that the ladies were scolding him and came right over.

I took a sip of my drink, very curious to watch what was about to happen.

“Sophia, ladies, good to see you again.” he said with a charming smile.

“I’m so glad you could make it!” The puffy haired girl’s personality did a complete 180 and she ran up and hugged him. “It’s so good to see you.”

Sophia, is it? She sounded so genuine. If I hadn’t seen her verbally tear him up just a second ago, I would have assumed she actually liked the guy.

“Ahh, how could I miss a party like this one? It’s the biggest one of the year.”

“Truth!” Sophia cheered, letting go of him and stepping back to her table.

“Hey, you still dating that guy from before?”

“Yaku? Nah. He wasn’t good enough. He was such a loser.”

“Heh, I bet he was.” The man combed back his hair, clearly trying to impress Sophia.

He wasn’t bad looking by any means, but he clearly reeked of desperation. As a woman myself, I can tell you that’s not very attractive. Although, I really don’t have much of a leg to stand on, since I kind of forced a guy to be with me…

“Oh, I’m so thirsty!” A girl behind Sophia announced, holding up a thin glass of champagne. “If only there were drinks around here bigger than these sips of water.”

Sophia joined in on her exaggerated weeping, clearly hinting to the man that they wanted something.

“Hey, I’ll go get you gals some drinks.”

“Really? You will? Oh!” Sophia jumped up a few times excitedly. “Can you get me that top shelf one? I’ve always wanted to try it.”

“Eh…sure. Yeah. Whatever you ladies want.” He was mesmerized by the bounce of her chest.

“Yeay!” All the girls cheered as they tapped glasses.

As he shuffled off, probably thinking he was some hero to these parched young fauns, they all burst out into laughter.

“God, he really is such an idiot! Drink up girls, it’s on him tonight!”

“Yeah!”

As much as I wanted to call them out and say they were horrible people, I couldn’t help but see a bit of myself in them. The amount of people I’d manipulated over the last few months, abusing my own body’s shape, taking advantage of emotions, stealing from people…

No matter the cause, I could sympathize with them. They knew how to get what they wanted, and so did I.

The man did eventually return with a whole two bottles full of some very expensive looking wine.

“Say, is your dad still kicking?” the man smiled as he handed each of the girls a glass and poured the liquor in.

“Yep, still working in Arakawa.”

“Hmm?” I perked up. Arakawa is where the factory was.

“It must be great having a dad who’s so smart. Does he tell you about all the drugs he produces?”

Bingo! I think we’ve got a lead.

"Um...not really. I don't really care about that stuff."

I needed to know her full name. If I did, I could ask around and find the her dad.

Her name was Sophia. But Sophia what? What was her last name?

I knew she wasn’t married, so she would have kept her father’s last name. And clearly she kept ties with him.

As subtle as possible, I moved to a closer position to listen in on the conversation. If need be, I could walk over and strike up a conversation. I think two witches like us would have a decent time conversing. I could easily pull info out of her like candy from a baby.

“This drink tastes funny.” Sophia started wobbling around.

“That’s just your taste buds getting used to the high life,” the man claimed.

All the other girls were getting a little loopy too. Some sat down and laughed hysterically.

“Sophia, is your dad around right now? Like anywhere nearby?”

“Nah, he’s in another room.” she chuckled. “Daddy’s gone bald, so his shiny head stands blinds people.”

He’s bald. That’s helpful info. But why was this guy so interested in him? Maybe we had some competition.

“Oh yeah? Poor guy. I bet some meds will fix that right up.” He smiled, pouring another glass for all the girls.

Something was off about how he was acting. He seemed to become more pleased the longer the girls were drinking. The weirdest part was how he himself hadn’t drank anything yet.

“Woah, look at the din…ahh…”

Sophia passed out in her seat. The other girls quickly followed suit.

“Sophi, Sophi!?” the man faked a serious face, then shook the woman. “Oh no, looks like you all drank too much,” he laughed.

A serpent had fooled the witches.

I expected this to get ugly, so I watched where this was going. He didn’t even notice me.

Immediately he took Sophia’s purse and started digging through it. He pulled out two things:

Her ID card.

And her phone.

His eyes started to wander around the woman, inspecting her features, but he caught himself in the act, slapping his face and running off.

I tailed just behind.

He dove into a hallway that had a bunch of rooms to the left and right. I think this party was taking place at a hotel, so people were staying in these rooms.

If I wanted to confront him, I’d need to wait for a more secluded spot, otherwise I’d cause a scene.

My dress was horrible to move around in, so I tore off a large portion of the big skirt and discarded it. Much more maneuverability! Although, my legs were a bit exposed.

That was fine. The dress wasn’t totally compromised. In fact, it almost looked like a stylistic choice.

He went up two flights of stairs, all the way to a carpeted catwalk birdge that overlooked the whole party. Just across from him was a roof access door, so he was planning on escaping here. This was my only chance to catch him.

“And here I thought I was the only thief in town,” I said to the man. “Looks like you got the prize first.”

“Eh?” he turned around, completely panicked by my presence. “The hell are you?”

“Just a witch, looking out for her sister.”

“Sophia has a sister?” his brow furrowed and he shook his head. “Guh…never mind that! Just leave me alone.”

That game wasn’t going to fly with me. I approached him.

When he realized I wasn’t going to stop, he pulled out a knife.

“Listen, woman! don’t make me use this!”

I unholstered my gun and aimed it at him, keeping my finger away from the trigger.

“Alright, man. You shouldn’t bring a knife to a gunfight.”

He cowered at the presence of my weapon, but took a breath and glared at me.

“You wouldn’t shoot that here.” He slowly became comfortable enough to laugh. “You clearly waited until we were alone to make sure nobody's watching. That gun is going to make a lot of noise, you know. We’ll be found out in an instant.”

He was more clever than he looked. But fate was on my side.

Suddenly, fireworks started going off outside. The open windows on the roof of the hotel allowed their blasts to echo all around this part of the party.

“What’s one gunshot among fireworks?” I seized the opportunity to my advantage.

He once more cowered, taking a few steps back, prepared to flee.

BANG!

I fired the gun once, purposefully missing his head.

“Ahhh!” his scream was lost in the cheering below.

“That was a warning shot. Surrender that ID and phone, and you can leave.”

“I can’t!” he shouted.

“And why’s that?” I asked.

“I didn’t know Sophia had a bodyguard, but listen! Do you know what that bitch has done to me? What she’s done to so many people? She thinks because her father is this bigshot in the medication industry that she’s able to stomp all over us like we're dirt!”

“It seems like you’re the ones who fell for her charm to begin with,” I argued.

“I’m getting back at her. I’m taking her money and her identity! I’ll make sure she gets what she deserves! These rich losers think their money shields them, well screw that!”

Did I really hate the idea that he was going to give that woman a taste of her own medicine? Not particularly. Even my shred of sympathy for her wasn’t enough for me to actually care what happens to her life going forward.

I was tempted to just check the phone for her information and let him leave, but at this point, he probably wouldn’t trust me, and he already knew too much about the heat I was packing.

“I’ll give you one chance to slide the ID card and phone over to me, then you can leave.”

“Without this info? Hell no!”

He made a run for the door, but I dove forward and stylishly flipped toward him.

Seeing my acrobatics stunned him. My feet struck both his knife wielding hand and his head, causing him to get knocked out cold.

The ID and phone flew out of his other hand, about to fall off the catwalk.

I reached out and caught the ID card, but missed the phone with my hand.

A small gap in the railing allowed me to abandon my high heels grab it with my foot stuck out.

I just barely managed to catch it, but it was sliding through my nylons, ready to continue its plummet down onto some random table.

Quickly I began to reel it back in, using all my flexibility to maneuver my foot just right so that I could safely bring it over the carpeted catwalk.

“Done…” I breathed out as it was finally in a safe position.

Before I checked her info out, I made sure to hide the man outside on the roof. He was scum, but if I wanted to deal with every scumbag at this party, it would be a slaughter house.

“Yume. Sophia Yume,” I read off at her ID card.

Since I had her phone, I examined her texting patterns. Not only was she an atrocious speller, but she had a crude way of communicating with her father.

I opened it up the chat and began texting her dad…

“-Daddy, I have a gurlfrnd who wnt’s to learn all the psyence stuf U do. Please please please meat with hur?-”

“Send…” I clicked the send button.

Within a few moments, her father replied and said he’d be delighted to speak with me. So far so good. Even with this, getting a scan of his card was going to be the real challenge.