The Law of Averages

Book 2: Chapter 168: Cheating Cheater Who Cheats

Dan took a seat on a bench across the street from Garden Gourmet—a high-end vegan restaurant in D.C.—and opened up his box of pizza. Anyone who bothered to check might realize the pizza restaurant in question was based in New York, and hadn't expanded past state lines. Dan didn't much care. He was hungry, the pizza was delicious, and the risk was marginal. He settled himself onto the uncomfortable metal bench, and began to eat. Meanwhile, his veil crept into the restaurant in front of him and his eyes took in what they could through the windows.

It was a popular spot. The crowds weren't exactly spilling out the door, but there were very few tables empty, even though it was getting late in the day for lunch. The building was subtle for Dimension A. The outside was painted like a gargantuan head of lettuce, with hanging fronds acting as chandeliers within. Waiters milled about in professional suits, something Dan was silently grateful for. He'd half-expected them to be skating around on cabbages or something equally asinine. But the sheer number of diners made navigating the place tricky.

Senator Madison had booked a private room for a meeting with a few of his donors. It took three slices of pizza worth of time for Dan to track down the room, taking exhaustive care to only traverse through non-organic materials. This was made much easier by the ceiling fronds. Rather than being real plant leaves, they were some kind of aluminum alloy, and were supported by a series of metal struts that ran the length of the restaurant. It was probably an unnecessary precaution, but Dan took it nonetheless. He wanted to get as close as possible to Madison, before possibly revealing the presence of his veil.

There were a few contingencies in place for such an outcome, though Anastasia seemed to think them wholly unnecessary. She could not sense his abilities, and therefore she reasoned nobody could. It wasn't an entirely unreasonable sentiment. Anastasia was probably one of the most skilled and powerful Natural's alive. Senator Madison was her superior in age, but nothing about the man's history indicated the kind of rigorous challenges one needed to constantly face in order to advance their power quickly.

Nevertheless, Madison was bound to have some tricks. Dan was determined to be careful. He kept his pace slow and steady as he methodically mapped out the restaurant. Anastasia had acquired the plans to the building, so Dan knew which room Senator Madison and his donors were in, but his well-earned paranoia demanded he check every inch of the place for anything that might not belong. Like a hidden basement. Or a giant vegetable monster that's secretly being harvested for its leafy organs. Or just an asshole with a gun.

Dan didn't find a damn thing.

Confidence growing, he inched his veil into the room where Senator Madison was wooing his supporters. Dan, still munching on his pizza, pulled his phone out from his wallet. Part of his veil extended onto the screen, and the other pooled into a frond leaf. Space twisted, warped, and a door opened across his screen. He kept it small, less than the size of his fingernail, and squinted down at the collection of figures gathered around a table.

Dan kept the portal open for three anxious seconds, taking in the position of each person, and quickly identifying Senator Madison. It wasn't difficult. The senator was giving some kind of pre-canned speech. Mission accomplished, Dan snapped his door shut and breathed out a heavy breath. Madison hadn't seemed to notice. His speech didn't even stutter. Nobody had that kind of self-control.

Next, to test the real threat. Dan pulled the majority of his veil up out of the fronds, and pooled it along the base of a wall strut, right where it touched the sheetrock. The floor was wood, and he presumed that Madison could sense any changes in it. Dan would have to act quickly, and multitask even more than he was used to. More importantly, he had to get closer to achieve the kind of speed he wanted.

Dan stood up, finishing off his last slice of pizza with a satisfied smack of his lips. He discarded the box in a nearby trashcan and strolled over to the crosswalk. He waited for the walk sign to go green, and casually sauntered across the street, ending up almost directly in front of Garden Gourmet. He counted pavement stones with every stride; a brisk wind slipped past his hood, biting at the back of his neck. His phone was still in his hand, an unopened door at the ready.

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He crossed the front of the restaurant without breaking stride. Some gleeful part of his brain shouted, "Jumpscare!" and his veil rushed forth from the walls and the floor, lancing out towards Senator Madison like they wished to impale him. Another door opened in the ceiling frond, and Dan peered through the tiny gap to watch the Senator's reaction.

Two seconds passed. His veil met Madison's shoes and began to climb. Leather, Dan noted absently, and wool for the pants. A leather belt, more wool, some silk. Everything was organic, everything came from something once alive. Everything except the cufflinks, and a tie-clip. The Senator was all-natural, and if he could sense Dan's veil coursing through his belongings, he was the greatest actor in the universe. Dan's veil wound it's way around the Senator like a hungry boa, and the man didn't so much as stutter.

It wasn't a relief, so much as confirmation of what Dan already knew. Even so, confirmation was worth its weight in safety. He pulled away, his veil spooling back into himself. His questions were answered. Whatever the Senator's powers, they weren't infallible. Dan didn't break pace as he passed the restaurant. He walked until the block ended, then rounded the corner, and disappeared into the Gap.

Now, to check out the house.

He returned to New York, meeting up with Anastasia to share his findings.

"I told you so," the old hag said. Dan ignored her, instead spreading out the satellite photo of Senator Madison's property. He rubbed his chin speculatively, trying to speculate on the safest point of entry. Dan's doorway's made infiltration fairly trivial, but he still ran the mild risk of disrupting some kind of exotic security measure if he just opened a random doorway.

Dan could use his veil through his own doors, which really made him a cheater of the highest order. It was the first time he'd ever seen Anastasia green with envy, and Dan gave his power an affectionate, metaphorical, pat on the head. They eventually decided on the front window as the easiest point of access. The frame appeared thick, the window almost certainly bulletproof, which minimized the chance that there was current running through it that his door might disrupt. He planned to make the portal as tiny as possible, just in case.

Anastasia produced a flat piece of metal which would serve as a base for Dan's doorway. She placed it on the table between them and said, "Let's get started."

Dan nodded; they both stood up and left the room. The door shut behind them with a pneumatic hiss. There was an electronic clunk, as defenses came online. Anastasia flicked her wrist, and Dan's ears popped as the pressure changed. The room with the metal slate was now as isolated as Anastasia could make it. Airtight, electronically shielded, and walled off from the world with enough metal to blunt a nuclear blast. There were about fifty different sensors engaged within. Anything that might be waiting for them in Senator Madison's home would be identified and dealt with in minutes, if not seconds.

"Alright," Dan said, snaking his veil through the layers of Genius-forged steel and exotic meta-material. It pierced the dense wall with ease, flowing across the floor, up the table, and into the metal slate. With a mental flex, he willed a door to open between the slate and the window of Madison's home. He kept it tiny, no more than a hair's breadth, and directly in the center of the glass pane. From there, his veil ventured bravely forth, tasting the polycarbonate glass.

Surprisingly, nothing exploded, and no alarms sounded. Dan let his shoulders relax after a moment, and he nodded to Anastasia.

"I'm in."

He pressed on, moving inch by inch until he reached the wood—

And sucked in a sharp breath. It was alive! Not in the way a person was—not holding enough of a connection to the Gap, to the source of consciousness, to repel his veil—but more like Merrill. Some weak spark existed, a little more than an animal, a little less than a person. Which was impressive, given that it was a piece of chopped up wood, and also a wall. But it was alive, of that there was no doubt, and though there was no chance at all of it sensing his veil, it would undoubtedly sense if he stuck a recording device inside of it somewhere.

"What's wrong?" Anastasia demanded, reading his face, or his aura, or whatever it was she did with her power. "What happened?"

"His house is alive," Dan breathed softly. It was upgraded, Dan realized with a start. Much like the tree he'd delivered, the entire house had been treated with cosmic radiation, and something new had sprung forth out of it.

Anastasia's mouth thinned. "That's unfortunate. The whole thing?"

Dan kept up his search. Tendrils left the walls and fanned out along the floor, grasping for furniture. He found a couch, also made of wood, but thankfully devoid of life. There was a counter, more wood; some chairs, also wood. Then, a television! With a wooden base. And a wooden frame. Dan was on the edge of violent cursing when he finally found a little metal inside the monstrosity.

"There's an old television," he told Anastasia. "One of those big, bulky things from the fifties, but scaled up. Probably custom made." He poked around some more, and quickly realized that the inner workings were more organic than not. "Definitely custom made. This thing has got less metal in it than tap water."

"Can you fit the recorder inside?" Anastasia asked. She held up the little device, barely the size of Dan's pinky nail. "Those things weren't exactly economical with their use of space."

"This one neither," Dan confirmed. He had, in fact, found a little gap within, where the bug could safely sit without touching anything organic. "Let me just..."

He strained, extending his veil up into the air, searching, just in case. Andros Bartholomew had taught him that lesson. Always check what's above. Even his veil had blind spots, when used carelessly.

Dan's paranoia paid off. Floating there, mixed in with the oxygen and nitrogen and little dabs of argon, was something else. Something... was that pollen? Mold? Little spores, with enough life to feel like a plant to Dan's senses. He extended his veil elsewhere, extruding from the walls and the ceiling, tasting, testing. It was everywhere. The house was packed with pollen. What were Madison's sinuses made of, to live like this?

No, more importantly: Could he sense through the pollen, like they assumed he could sense through wood. Dan could guess, and he didn't like the answer.

"We've got a problem," he said to Anastasia.