Out of the Darkness
Chapter 4

We were stationed a few streets over, listening and watching just in case anything were to go wrong. We had all the equipment we would need packed in to this small van as well as the five of us, so as you could imagine it was quite cramped. This isn’t the first time we’ve done this kind of mission so we all knew what it would be like, but we have no idea how long we will be in here for, and as time goes on I can guarantee you that Jenkins will start up with his usual jokes that will get on everyone’s nerves.

Before Raven went in we bugged her so she now has an earpiece and a small camera disguised in her glasses, cliché I know, but we had limited time and we didn’t have many other options. That and the fact that Jenkins wouldn’t shut up about the fact that blonde haired blue eyed Raven would look hot with glasses. It was just easier all around.

Any noise that Raven could hear went through to our headsets and anything that she could see would be transmitted to our laptops and automatically recorded. We could speak to her through a microphone in to her earpiece in case we needed to warn her about anything.

Turning my attention to the screen I saw that Raven had easily made it through reception and was being lead to the elevator by a male employee. The amount of guards I could see through the hidden camera made me nervous, not liking the idea of her going in alone. But it would be suspicious to send more than one person in to fix a virus, and Raven would be able to handle herself if she got in to any dangerous situations.

As the elevator took them to the higher levels of the building there was silence between the two of them. He led her to the room that we had predicted and followed her in. He motioned to the servers.

“You should be able to solve the problem here.” He said to her.

She nodded, sat down and began typing. I didn’t hear any footsteps that would mean he had left the room, and if he didn’t then this wasn’t going to work. Raven turned her head to the side slightly and we could see that he was watching her, he didn’t notice her gaze though as his own was currently travelling down her body.

“Raven, you need to get rid of him.” I said to her through the earpiece. And she nodded in reply.

“Hey, can you come here a moment please? There is some sort of password that I need.” She said to him and he bent down slightly to look at the computer screen. He paused a moment, confused as there was nothing on the screen. Raven reached her arm up and quickly pressed down on the closest pressure point on his body. He was unconscious within seconds.

“How are you going to explain that when he wakes up?” Clara asked her.

“I’ll erase his memory and replant one that would mean he fell asleep when I was fixing the computer.” Raven replied telepathically to us all, we had discussed beforehand that she couldn’t speak out loud just in case there were any bugs planted in the room, unlikely I’ll admit, but it doesn’t hurt to be careful. Raven plugged the device in to the computer that Jenkins made to fix the problem he created and headed towards the door. Before leaving she picked up the guy with ease and put him in a near-by chair.

Opening the door she found a long empty hallway, she turned left and followed the turns of the hallway that the blueprints showed her. Raven made it to a steel code-locked door. It was Alice’s turn to step in now. The computer programming in the camera allowed her to replace out the code for the door, it took her a few minutes and in that time Raven had to stay completely still otherwise the camera would lose focus on the lock.

“5193.” Alice said to Raven through her earpiece. She typed in the numbers and the light changed to green. She pushed open the door and looked around for any other security measures. The room was huge and was filled with aisles of boxes. She made her way through and found the safe.

“Ok Raven, put your ear to the safe and turn the dial slowly.” Jake told her. She did as he said and followed his instructions until he had figured out the combination. Raven opened the safe to reveal stacks of money and the artefact that we were sent to retrieve. After she reached in and plucked it from the safe we all paused for a moment expecting some sort of alarm to go off, when nothing happened she put it in her jacket and closed up the safe. Just as she turned we all paused once again, but this time it wasn’t to see if there was an alarm, it was because we heard footsteps. Raven dashed to the side and hid in one of the aisles. The footsteps were getting closer and as they did we could hear that there were five sets.

“What if they went in the room that you’re supposed to be in?” Alice asked concerned.

“Already taken care of. Before I left I created an illusion so anyone who enters the room will see me there fixing the computer.” She told us telepathically.

“But what if they speak to the illusion of you?” Clara criticised.

“Then the illusion of me will reply as I would usually.” She explained.

“That is so cool! But also sounds impossible to do.” Jenkins said excited, he can seem like such a big kid sometimes.

“It took quite a long time to perfect.” Raven replied.

The footsteps were getting closer now and Raven moved further down the aisle, she hid along the edge of it as they passed down the other side and then moved towards the exit. She stopped further down and looked back to see them moving towards the safe. She ran silently down the middle of the room towards them.

“Raven be careful, they’ll see you.” I warned her. One of them turned slightly and I thought all our hard work would be for nothing. Except for one thing. When he turned, he would’ve been looking right at her, but his eyes travelled straight past her and he didn’t seem to be able to see what was right in front of him. Raven moved around to the right, where one of the men were just opening the safe. When he opened the door the artefact was right back where Raven had found it.

“What the hell?” Jenkins and Jake said at the same time. I was just glad I wasn’t the only confused one here.

As they saw that everything was in order the guard locked the safe, turned and left with the others following him. As soon as they were gone, Raven re-entered the combination and retrieved the artefact once again.

“Raven, brief explanation please?” I asked her.

“Well, I turned myself invisible and then as soon as the door was open I transported the artefact back in to its rightful place.” Raven explained to us and we were all silent. Until Jenkins decided to cheer and fist pump the air. In response we heard Raven laughing from the other end.

We watched through the computer screen as she made her way back through the hallways and to the room where the employee was still unconscious. She walked up to him and put her fingers to his temples, tampering with his memory I presumed. Going back to the computer she retrieved the device that had fixed the problem.

“Hello?” She walked up to the guard and used magic to make him regain consciousness. He opened his eyes and blinked up at her.

“What’s going on?” He asked confused.

“You fell asleep whilst I was fixing the computer, it’s all done now though, you shouldn’t have any more problems with it.” She said to him.

“That’s great, thank you.” He replied and led her back down to reception. As she walked out of the doors I let out a sigh of relief. She walked away from the building, down a few winding roads like we had discussed earlier and in to the wooded area to change her disguise. She didn’t transform her looks to how we usually see her though, just in case someone did recognise her. She exited the woods on the opposite side that she entered, so it wouldn’t look suspicious and then circled back around and met us at the van. As soon as she came through the door and closed it behind her Jenkins wrapped his arms around her in a hug. Now we don’t really know Raven very well so I didn’t know how she would react to that. But, to my surprise she just returned the hug without hesitation.

“Good work kid, you did great!” He said to her.

“Kid? You realise that you are probably only a couple years older than me right?” She said with a laugh.

“My bad.” He replied with a smile.

“Come on guys, time to head back.” I said as I climbed in to the driver’s seat. I smiled as I could sense the happy atmosphere that always comes after a successful mission.

“Does it bother anyone else that it was so easy to retrieve that?” Raven asked and the mood in the van instantly plummeted. “Other than the guards that came in to check on it there weren’t any others posted on that floor.”

“Maybe not all the employees knew about it, and it would look suspicious for guards to be on that floor.” Alice suggested.

“Maybe.” Raven replied, unconvinced.

I hadn’t thought about how easy it was, I was just glad that nothing went wrong. I hoped that Alice was right so we didn’t have to worry about anything except figuring out what that artefact is, and why it’s so important.