Who's Houdini?

Everyone looked at me, expecting a plan, but I was at my wit's end.

Larry broke the trend and thought for himself.

"Who has the most Eneru out of this group? Other than myself of course." He asked.

"Probably me and Ben, Devin has to be exhausted from all of the portal opening he's been doing, and Ingen has been holding the sphere together." Unda said.

"Perfect, Ingen, stop moving, we are going to make a portal out of here. A long one."

Larry put one of his hands on Unda and the other on Devin, a blue line linked between them, and Unda started to look tired.

"Devin, start casting the longest distance portal you can, we have to get out of here, and you won't hold onto Unda's Eneru forever." Larry commanded.

"You got it, boss!"

Devin started to chain together long sequences of runes until a small portal in space formed, slowly enlarging itself.

"Ingen, you go first, all the rest of us are part of the portal."

I went through and found myself in the outskirts of Reike, only about four miles from the spot given to us by the rebels. One by one, each of our rag-tag group of wannabe rebels came through the portal, Ben came after me, then Unda, then Devin and Larry. Once we all felt safe, all the students in the group got a bad case of jelly-legs. Devin and I because we used all of our Eneru, Ben because he had never been in an earnest fight for his life as an active combatant, nor has he ever been on the losing side.

"Well, I'm not carrying you guys so we're going to have to camp here for a while. Luckily, this spot is in a hotspot so we don't have to light a fire."

Larry fed Devin a bit of Eneru from Ben so Devin could cast Dimensional Repulse, making it hard to track us even if the Constables managed to get into the metal sphere we left behind.

********

"Ok, let's get this straight, Laura was with the Constables ever since I developed the glider, she worked with the guys who sent us all super high and made me lose my arm, and she has been stealing my designs the entire time I've been in school?" I asked.

"Yes, and it's all gone above my head until your parents barged into the school with a recorded Telespeak conversation and blew stuff up."

"So were you with the rebels the whole time or what? It's hard to trust a known Constable."

"I was one of the founding members of the rebellion, I just remained anonymous so I could go on missions like this without endangering my family."

"Ok, then how much of my plans were stolen? If they got into my safe then they have everything they need to have a technological revolution given their resources."

"The Telespeak message specifically mentioned that they couldn't find your safe, but that will change soon when they search the tree tower in earnest."

"In that case, we have an important mission and we have to either go to the school or the rebels before sunrise tomorrow, I'd be willing to bet that they haven't gotten into the safe is only because of how hidden it is and its thickness of the metal around it. They could be infusing it as we speak."

"You're right, you rest here for the next twenty minutes and then take off for the meeting point, we have to find them for support cause we're going to have to go on a mission for the safe."

"You're going to stay here? I figured you would be one to never split the group up."

"Splitting is a good idea this time. Now, hurry up and wait." Larry spent his time reading over the intel he got from my father and mother.

Twenty minutes of me formulating my plan to get into the school went by, and then I took off unceremoniously, going as fast as my Eneru could push me until I reached the rendezvous.

When I landed behind mom and dad they welcomed me warmly.

"Ingen!" Mom's arms relaxed as if a huge weight was lifted off her shoulders. She wasted no time in giving me a big bear hug.

"Mom! I have important news! We have to get my safe, like now, the king could get in it at any moment and with the resources in his hands, he could revolutionize war as we know it."

Dad looked like he wanted to just take me home and call it a day, but resigned himself to helping me instead.

"We don't have a spatial mage on call right now so we can't call for backup in a reasonable timeframe, so we will have to make do with what we have. Dear, could you have James mobilize the golems?"

"Yes, I can."

Mom pulled out one of her many Telespeak amulets and chose the one labeled "James," activating it and clearly having a mental conversation with him.

"So, son, what's your plan?" Dad asked.

"This is going to sound very simple, but we're going to walk in there and take it. I'd be willing to bet that there are probably not many Constables still at the school since they are looking for me in the middle of the tundra and you guys torched the place."

"How about instead of banking on the Constables not being there, we bank on them being there in force because they likely are. There have to be at least one hundred Constables in total and we know that thirty of them have been allocated to this issue. Let's assume that twenty are searching for you and ten stayed to find the safe. That would mean that we would have to deal with ten mages who are at least the third cycle."

"In that case, we should make this political. Do you have a way to record an event? Potentially distribute said record?"

"I like your thinking, I can make such a device on the fly and interface it with the network of Displays we have in the major cities."

Dad pulled out three spirit papers, a Speakwrite, and a mithitite sphere no larger than a marble, he deformed it so it had a tiny lens with his fingers and spoke with extreme speed, making the speakwrite scribe an entire spirit paper in seconds. When he finished and bound the spirit paper to the "camera" he spoke to me.

"This invention of yours is quite a useful thing, take this Recorder, you will be the one who records the encounter, let's go find the others so you can explain the plan." Dad's version of Changeling Armor formed wings of ryustitite and he took off with mom under his arm.

I followed suit, praying for the success of my plan.