“So why do I have to wear this ridiculous costume?” asked Chudsworth as a small team began to button up his loose woolen cloak. “And this material itches! Who would wear such a thing?”

Delphi’s team was standing in a large dressing room in the back of the local theater. It was situated in the closest city to the dead vampire’s lair, where they all expected the hero to head off to after completing his previous quest.

Around the agents swarmed a team of theater professionals, including several dressers and a smattering of makeup artists, their minds and hands entirely focused on their latest- albeit unconventional- client.

“Old, wizened hermits for one,” replied Delphi. “And poor people. I had a hand-me-down sweater made of the same stuff when I was a little girl.”

Chudsworth scratched his arm and tried shooing away a man holding a brush lined with gray makeup. “Did your parents not love you? Why would they make you wear something so dreadful?”

“Didn’t have any parents, this was all the orphanage could afford.”

The room went quiet. Even the theater staff stopped what they were doing after finding themselves in range of that bombshell.

“I… uh,” Chudsworth stuttered. “But this material? I thought my father made regular donations to such charities in order to prevent such crimes of fashion.”

Delphi’s eyelids narrowed into a glare as her lips remained still.

“What is this thing anyway? Some kind of garbage wool?”

“That’s correct, it’s Garbage Wool,” replied the lead dresser, forcing a sentence into the awkward haze and chipping away at its mentally crippling miasma. “Literally sheared off of Garbage Sheep who eat, you guessed it, literal garbage. So the stuff is dirt cheap and surprisingly resilient; exactly what you’d expect some hermit living in the woods to wear.”

“If only such sages put in an honest day’s work, they’d be able to wear something actually comfortable!” said Chudsworth with a scoff. “Will the hero actually listen to someone this destitute?”

The room went quiet again, and even the lead dresser stayed her tongue. What was the point when all of her efforts would be undone by a simple, careless comment? Rather, the theater staff continued their work in silence.

“Is it fine if I stab him?” asked Ted, carefully whispering the words into Delphi’s ear.

The team leader simply shook her head with a frown.

“If we’re lucky, the spy will do it for us,” Nash whispered in her other ear.

Delphi looked back at Chudsworth and let out an internal sigh when she noticed that he hadn’t heard their conversation. But for an empath, why hadn’t he-

“I can tell you’re all nervous about my first mission, but don’t be!” he exclaimed with a bright smile. “I’ll put on an award-worthy performance as the wise old man!”

Delphi nodded with a static smile on her own face. “This suddenly feels like a terrible idea, why did we do this?!” she thought to herself.

“By the way, I’ve marked out the effective range he should be able to detect any of us,” said Nash, interrupting her leader’s thoughts. “And we’ll be safe at about two thousand feet away, and that’s if we’re surrounded by a massive crowd.”

“Oh yeah, that’s why,” thought Delphi. “This spy is on a level we don’t even have clearance to know about! We’re desperate!”

“I also surveyed the ideal locations to have Nepo and the hero speak,” said Ted. “Nash shared the distances and crowd requirements with me earlier, so I’ve also found the ideal positions for the rest of us to observe.”

Delphi felt herself beginning to relax. “Even with what we’re up against, I wouldn’t do it without you two.”

The others smiled back.

“Up against the hero? Am I not the one actually giving the quest to him?” asked Chudsworth. “I memorized the script by the way, and I’ll keep a read on the newest party member so we can check his compatibility with the hero.”

“I think we’re ready then, let’s all get into position,” said Delphi, nodding in response. “And even if we’re not, we’ll only have to deal with one problem soon enough.”

“That’s the meeting point?” shouted Delphi while staring through a pair of binoculars. “That’s almost as bad as our surveying point!”

“Honestly, I’d say the surveying point is worse,” shouted Nash.

“What’s wrong? Both locations fit within the bounds specified!” exclaimed Ted at just the right volume to be heard over the din around them.

A loud bang went out from behind the trio that forced them to turn around on reflex. A young mage threw up a swirl of fire that was more sound than substance, but the two dozen people who surrounded him responded in laughs and cheers. One of them handed him a pastry that was being passed around alongside drinks.

“How are we supposed to focus on Nepo and the hero with a rooftop party happening all around us?!” screamed Nash.

“The elevation makes for a good vantage point, and the crowd that also includes a mage will remove suspicion from the spy’s magical and life detection spells,” replied Ted, matter-of-factly. “This was the only location I could find that fulfilled all of our needs.”

“You’re not supposed to take everything so literally,” replied Nash, sporting a growing frown. “Think for yourself, do you think you could focus on the hero with all of these distractions?”

Before Ted could respond, an older woman walked forward with a handful of bottles and handed one to each of them. “Thank you so much for helping arrange this party!” she said with a matronly smile. “And to think a graduate of the Magical University would be passing through town and want to sponsor the next generation… it warms my heart.”

“Magical University?” asked Nash with a painfully neutral look. She looked over to Ted and her lips dropped into a frown. “What’s this about the Magical University, Ted?”

He simply looked back with his soulless eyes and artificial smile.

“I swear-”

“The hero’s here!” exclaimed Delphi, cutting the argument short and grabbing the other two’s attention.

About two thousand feet away, in a dark alley, an old man sat in front of a draped table with a crystal ball on top. His hands slowly waved around the object as if it were a pool of water, and he were controlling the ebb and flow of the waves of fate with his fingers.

“He’s really getting into it, isn’t he? At least he’d have me convinced,” said Nash, looking through a pair of her own binoculars. She removed the cap from her drink and took a sip. “At least he wouldn’t be completely useless without daddy’s influence with acting skills like that.”

A young man with a large sword strapped to his back swaggered across the main road perpendicular to the alleyway with a pair of women and a much too ordinary looking man just behind him. As he passed the darkly lit avenue, he slowed down to take a quick look at the curious sight before continuing onward.

Delphi felt her heart rate spike in fear before the old-looking hermit looked up from his crystal ball and waved towards the young man passing by.

The trio on the rooftop collectively sighed.

“So what are they saying?” asked Nash. “I wish we could’ve put a bug on Nepo.”

“The spy would’ve been able to pick up on it, but don’t worry,” replied Delphi. “I can read lips.”

“What is their exchange?” asked Ted.

“‘Hello young man, wuu-jya wah-nuh fortune told?’”

“Perhaps it would be better to tell us the whole words instead of enunciating the sounds he makes,” said Ted.

“Those are the words he’s saying,” replied Delphi. “He’s putting on an accent. A really strong one.”

“I take it back about the backup acting career,” said Nash with a shrug.

Through the binoculars, the team could see the hero nodding curiously while he and Chudsworth went back to the table. The hero’s three companions caught up and began to crowd around behind him.

“‘In yee-ooer f-ee-oo-tcha, I see’-”

The binoculars were yanked out of Delphi’s hands as she was mid-lip read.

“What are you three looking at?” asked a burly man in his mid thirties as he put Delphi’s eyepiece to his own face. “Hey, is that the hero? Everyone, check it out!”

The party behind them ran forwards at the mention of the national celebrity and began to grab at the three pairs of binoculars available.

“Hey, give that back!” shouted Nash as she wrestled a pair of teenagers to get back her own.

Ted simply handed his binoculars to the woman who’d brought them drinks and turned expectantly at Delphi.

“No, Ted!” she shouted in between fighting for one of the eyepieces now being passed around.

The man frowned but went back to keeping his eyes focused on the crowd.

The din continued, with the entire party joining in for a chance to see the hero outside of a mere picture. Man or woman, young or old, sober or drunk, the rooftop turned into a cacophony of shouting and grabbing.

Eventually, opportunity struck.

The burly man from earlier handed a pair of binoculars over to a young girl, barely old enough to walk, and looked away for a moment.

Ted creeped his way over to the child with a small object in hand and shoved it at her, forcing her to let go of the binoculars.

The burly man looked over just then to see Ted walking away with the eyepiece, and his daughter holding a large piece of candy. He was ready to go after Ted, but the bigger look of happiness on the little girl’s face, now that she was holding something much more interesting, convinced him otherwise.

“Here Delphi,” said Ted, handing over the binoculars to the black haired woman. “And I didn’t even stab anyone for it, just like you asked.”

“Thanks!” she said, holding the eyepiece to her face.

The conversation between Chudsworth and the hero was still going on, but Delphi’s smile was sadly short-lived.

“What’s wrong?” asked Nash, having noticed that her boss had finally grabbed a pair and heading over to keeping it that way.

“The other three are blocking the view! I can’t see either of their lips properly.”

Delphi felt her grip loosen and allowed the next partygoer to take the binoculars from her without putting up a fight.

“Looks like we’re going to have to rely on Chudsworth’s report,” she said.

“I hope the spy doesn’t stab him first,” said Ted.