Chapter Eighteen – Robber Points

They made it to the gas station with no issues. The place was closed down, but surprisingly still had power. The lights within were on and she suspected that the pumps still worked.

Maybe the HRF was using the station to refuel their patrol vans? It would make sense, and save some logistical hassle. The place was locked, though.

Teddy tugged on the door, and all it did was rattle and clang. “Think there’s an alarm?” she asked.

“Maybe,” Aurora said. “I don’t know if we want to risk it. If we break the window or something it might alert the police.”

“What police?” Athena asked. “There’s no police here at all.”

“If the power was out, then the alarms would be too,” Maple said. “Ah, I don’t have many of my tools with me, but if there’s anything in the garbage out in the back maybe I can make something to disable the alarms.”

“I volunteer to look!” Trinity said.

Emily shook her head. It was… cute, how enthusiastic her sisters were about helping out and tackling this issue together. It was less cute when she considered that they were basically planning out how to rob a gas station convenience store. The least cute part was that she had come here to do just that. “Let’s not get too hasty,” she said. “We’re in an Endgame, we don’t know all the rules yet, or if there even are any.”

“The more time you spend and the more you play, the more stuff you get from it,” Teddy said. “At least, I think that’s how it usually goes.”

Athena nodded along next to her. “If we’re playing Robbers, then we’ll probably get Robber powers.”

“Robber powers?” Emily asked.

“Yeah!” Trinity cheered. “Robber powers! Woo!”

“No, I mean, what would that even include?” Emily asked.

“They’ll be kinda lame, but like, things that help us do robbery stuff,” Teddy said. “If the Endgame thinks that the teams aren’t fairly balanced, then we’ll probably get better powers than the Cops team.”

“I see,” Emily said. “And these powers… will they have a normal interface, like our other powers?”

“Prolly’ something a little different,” Teddy said.

“Okay,” Emily said. Nothing had popped up so far, but maybe that was normal. They had just entered the Endgame. On top of that, she’d noticed that the system that handed out powers tended to like it when people acted. Which meant… “Okay. We’ll try to be fast. Aurora, can you lift Maple up?”

“Uh, sure,” Aurora said. She scooped Maple up from under her armpits, and the little beaver girl went limp, like a kitten being grabbed by her mom. Aurora didn’t even strain to hold her up, not that Maple weighed very much.

“Why?” Maple asked.

“Sorry,” Emily said. “I should have explained. Can you see any alarm things? Cameras? And if so… do you think you can shut them off once we’re inside?”

“Oh,” Maple said. She became a little more animated at that and started to squint as she stared into the station. “I see some cameras. I think they’re all linked to that room back there, behind the counters.”

“Okay,” Emily said. “Trinity, find a nice big rock. Teddy, your job is to help Maple get to the security room. You’re allowed to turn into a bear. If. If the door is locked and you need to knock it down.”

“Alright!” Teddy agreed.

“Athena, Trinity, you’re helping with the food gathering. I see some boxes over there by the back. We’ll grab those. Aurora, can you help carry things too?”

“Sure thing, Boss,” Aurora said. “Typical smash and grab, then?”

“We… should try to be quick about it, yeah,” Emily said. She could hardly believe she was doing this, but… yup, here she was.

The place was probably insured, right? So no one would be harmed. And it was just one window… and the food was probably going to be bad by the time the Endgame cleared out anyway, so it would all be thrown out no matter what.

She could probably think of a few more justifications, but that thinking was put off when Trinity put a rock through one of the windows at the front and it exploded apart rather loudly. “I found a rock!” she announced.

Robber Points Gained: 1

Total Robber Points: 1

Emily stared at the prompt for a few moments. “Huh,” she said.

“Oh!” Teddy replied. “It’s an item shop game! Those are the best!”

“I thought they’d be kind of capitalist?” Athena asked.

“What? No! It’s merit based! That makes it okay!” Teddy replied.

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“Girls, focus,” Emily said. A split-second later, a small alarm went off. It was… not that loud? It was clearly an alarm though. A constant beep-beep that caught the ear and which was annoyingly high-pitched. “Move! Grab snacks. Leave anything that needs to be cooked behind. Don’t get cut on the window sill!”

They kicked the last of the window in, then hopped over the edge. As it turned out, the front door could be unlocked from within, so their exit would be safer, at least.

Teddy and Maple rushed to the back, and Emily sighed as Teddy turned into a bear and started to maul at the door. The door… did not win that conflict.

She tried to keep focused on the task at hand. System stuff could wait until after. Trinity and Athena came back with some cardboard boxes, and they started to load them up with food and supplies. Lots of jerky, a few bags of chips, some chocolates… a lot of chocolates.

Emily took one of the boxes and went to the back, where there was a small section with other kinds of supplies. Camping stuff, mostly, the overpriced, low-quality kind, but there were candles and bug spray and she picked up a couple of small first-aid kits as well.

Aurora found a larger box and filled it with twelve-packs of soda which was… well, that would keep for a while. “No energy drinks!” Emily called out.

She grabbed an entire set of camo-pattern ponchos with little hoods. That might be handy, and there was electrical tape and a few other things too.

“The alarm is off,” Maple said at about the same time as the alarm stopped beeping. “Should I do anything now?”

“Take anything you might want to tinker with,” Emily said. “Anything small. We do need to carry it back to our base. Teddy, help her.”

“Okay,” Maple said.

Emily was starting to get nervous so she packed in a few last things, then started towards the front. How soon would the HRF show up? She half expected to see a line of cars and SWAT outside already, but the coast was clear… for now. “Alright, grab anything you can stuff in your pockets and… no, Trinity, not popsicles, they’ll melt. Okay, let’s go!”

Her heart was beating at a million beats a second as they ran out of the store and sprinted for the small patch of forest behind the gas station. Once there, she sank behind the bushes and tried to catch her breath.

Robber Points Gained: 2

Total Robber Points: 3

Right, that.

“Maple, did you turn off the cameras too?” Emily asked.

“Mhm! And Teddy ate the recordings.”

“Just chewed on ’em,” Teddy said.

“Right, good,” Emily said. There was that, at least. “Let’s… start heading back.”

“You might want to look at the Endgame stuff before we leave it,” Athena said. “It’ll disappear once we’re out.”

“Including the points we make?” Emily asked. She wasn’t too attached to the three she had, but it would be a loss.”

“Nah, we’ll probably get those back once we return to the Endgame,” Athena said.

Well, that was something. As they started to slowly sneak their way back, she focused for a moment, and soon a new, unfamiliar menu popped up before her.

Robber Power Shop

Total Robber Points: 3

Power – Cost

Unlock Simple Door

(3 Points)

Minor Shadow Blend (3 Points)

Featherstep (4 Points)

Reach (3 Points)

Whisper Drift (3 Points)

Summon Glow (3 Points)

Quick Patch (4 Points)

Gust Flick (4 Points)

Shadow Hop (5 Points)

Minor Illusory Double (6 Points)

Dust Hand (5 Points)

Blinking, Emily scrolled through the list, then focused on one of them near the top.

Unlock Simple Door (3 Points)

You can manipulate the mechanism of a locked door to open it quietly and without a key on touch.

That was… a very weak power, but she could immediately see how it might have come in handy just a few minutes ago.

Scanning through the rest of the list showed other, similarly weak powers. None of them were anywhere near the same league as something like her Create Sister power, but… maybe they didn’t have to be in order to be useful?

The moment they crossed out of the boundary of the Endgame, the menu and its options disappeared.

She’d have to test these… tomorrow. For now, a bit of rest would do her heart good.

***

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