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What Leslie's always imagined of dark, underground, possibly secret passages is that it's supposed to be cold, eerie and quiet, quiet, quiet, save for the distant, inexplicable, but universal sound of dripping water at any given time.
Currently, the path they'd taken is filled with air that feels humid, damp, and holding only a bare hint of chill; warmer than outside. The subway tracks have stopped completely by now, and Leslie is vaguely pleased to have seen wood and metal ones at least once in her lifetime. While the defunct light globes have since petered out, the glow of a third wand lights up the tunnel better than they ever could've managed. The two in front of her are walking confidently enough that her misgivings about direction are quelled, at least for now.
The sounds of their steps echo only a little bit. Their voices echo a bit louder.
"-known you since before you were actually a seeker,"
"I know, Agatha."
"Used to bump ways with you at least once every few months, you cagey fiend,"
"I remember, Agatha,"
"-a fuckin' mystery! Not a last name given, not one mentioned, not even one on your forms,"
"I know, Agatha."
"That drove Angus crazy, you know, more than I, as a person, ever did. And that's fuckin' saying something, Sid."
"It sure is, Agatha."
"And you just give it like that. Willy nilly. Introducing yourself to an absolute stranger-"
And like that, Agatha stops. There's only the sound of steps for a moment, and the shape of Agatha's head nods once.
"You took your wife's name." It is not a question.
The clap he gives her on the back is cheery. "Took you long enough to figure that out."
Agatha grumbles. He outright laughs, drowning out the sound of her voice when the grumbles turn into audible swearing.
Leslie feels her focus slipping away from the conversation. She turns to pulling out the pocket watch she'd thought to buy yesterday. It's still shiny, and better yet, it has a little glowing light she can use in the darkness.
(It have played with into the night, when she'd gotten bored of poring over her notes. Agatha may have told her to go to sleep after ten minutes of her flicking it on and off. It's in the realm of possibility.)
It's been twenty minutes since they'd left the old station. Leslie is no stranger to walking at this point; but above ground there'd at least been visible signs of distance being made. There's also only so much she can listen from a conversation that isn't hers before boredom started creeping in.
Blinking the pocket watch light on and off manages to occupy her attention for a couple minutes of conversation. The rhythm she'd managed to build up stutters when she hears Obsidian's next question.
"So, about this method you mentioned,"
Agatha juts a thumb over her shoulder. "Ask her."
His gaze follows, and his mildly surprised look is visible in the light of Leslie's wand.
The rhythm of her light flickering stops entirely as he slows down to walk by her.
Oh boy. Ohhhh boy. Now's the time to test your bluffing skills, Leslie, don't screw it up don't screw it up
A dozen responses fly through her thoughts. The idea had been to look him in the face and say her chosen one before he could actually ask anything. What happens is that her eyes get stuck downwards on the tattered end of his cloak and refuse to look any higher.
"I. Uh," she begins, managing to force her gaze higher. It's now firmly on where she thinks his elbow is. "It's a secret."
He snorts. "Ah. Can't even share a tidbit with me?"
She can't tell if he's teasing or serious. Could be both, the way Agatha does sometimes. A moment is taken to return the pocketwatch to her coat and she tosses her hair with all the confidence of a five year old with stage fright. "It's, well, top secret, I'm afraid."
"Not even I know how she does it." Agatha supplies over her shoulder.
The wand light isn't sufficient enough to be certain, but she's fairly sure his eyes flicked curiously between the both of them. "That so?"
Leslie begins fumbling for a response.
She's saved from actually having to finish one; Agatha speaks up again over her stumbling starts of an answer. "Cool it, Sid. I wouldn't've mentioned it if I wasn't sure she could. Saw her do it myself."
Obsidian looks back to Leslie; the gesture in itself is enough of a question. She nods to confirm Agatha's claim.
"Saw you do it, but couldn't figure out how you did it," he begins aloud. His head tilts back in thought. "Most likely means it's something you can do quickly, and discreetly. Means it can't be lock picking, on the spot key enchantment circles, or anything else that requires time, visible tools, or leaves extensive traces."
This is what high blood pressure probably feels like.
Leslie struggles to not wince when he tilts his head back down and looks her way. "Do you need a wand to do it? A specialized spell's one of the only possibilities left."
"Uh," she mumbles intelligently. The fact that he'd managed to make strides that far in logic in less than two minutes is starting to make her head cloud in bewilderment. She decides to try sidestepping the question. "Is it, uh, something you need to know? Do you usually figure things out that fast?"
The frank nod and smile she gets in return has her realize that she'd instead directly confirmed that he'd been hitting the nail on the head so far. Goddammit.
Certainty is not a thing she can have with him, not like she has with Agatha; she's known him for less than an hour. But the smile doesn't look like it's hiding anything; malicious or otherwise.
"I get curious! Besides, if I can figure out the method, then there's the chance I can replicate it myself. Being able to open locks that fast and that unnoticeably is a very valuable skill to have."
The last part is said with a nod to her, and a hint of pride appears to dissolve a little of the wariness in her chest. The skill is not hard, and it's not finessed, but it's hers, and it's useful.
She's aware the compliment is the cause for it, but it's decided on the spot that another hint couldn't hurt. "You, uh, you probably couldn't, I'm afraid," she admits sheepishly.
"Really, now?" he cajoles. "Lack of appropriate tools? The know-how? The magic?"
"It's, uh," Her mouth clamps shut when she notices that he's grinning. Another toss of the hair, still not any more impressive with the still neck-length hair, but it's more secure this time. "Still top secret!"
As if Leslie running through the same excuse for the second time was a signal, Agatha speaks up again. "Oi, Sid. When'd you pick up the habit of interrogating youngsters, if you don't mind me askin'," she says without turning her head. "You're a father now; you should know better."
The not-entirely-clear-gesture he does under the cloak could be taken as a shrug, and a trickle of relief runs through Leslie as he turns his attention away from her to respond to Agatha's jibes.
"What's with this 'now', like I'm new to it?" His tone is still lightly amused. "I've been retired for the better part of two decades now,"
"Mmhm. How old's he now?"
"If I'm not wrong, he should be --" He looks her way again. "How old did you say you were, Leslie?"
The fact that it's something she hasn't mentioned once yet is something she decides to let slide. At least he's staying away from the earlier subject. "Eighteen."
Agatha snorts at the quick response. "Leslie, Sid ain't gonna breathe a word about you to anybody. You can be honest."
"Hey now-" She stops herself, and self-consciously tugs at the front of her over-large coat, as if to straighten it. Leslie doesn't want to sound defensive, but the words come out in little flimsy armor suits anyways. "I'm close enough to eighteen, okay."
Leslie keeps her stare fixed on the wall, even as Agatha twists around to stare at her in muted astonishment.
Obsidian lets out a huff that turns out to be a laugh. "Let's take your word for it. He's a couple years younger than you. Turned fourteen last July."
Agatha scoffs. "Yeah, but is he taller than you yet?"
The pride in his voice is unmistakable. "You haven't met his mother. He reached my height a long time ago."
Pride over something as simple as natural growth. Is that normal?
She'd like to pretend she doesn't know the cause of the sudden return of the small and lonely feeling in her gut. She'd also like to pretend that it's not there at all. The downturn in mood and clarity of thought that usually follows is as familiar as the feeling itself; like the backs of her teeth to her tongue.
The conversation has reached a lull; the only sounds echoing off the walls are their footsteps. Agatha is still leading the way, and Obsidian is still walking beside her.
Leslie casts around for a change of topic. One comes to her as she glances around the tunnel again and finds that the stone of the walls has changed.
"So, uh," she begins, pausing to bite her lip when Obsidian looks her way again. "How do you know about this..." The ground is subjected to a waving from the hand that isn't holding her wand.
"I found a strange amount of passages that shouldn't be there at the end of some old subway tracks."
"That doesn't explain much," Leslie comments. "What were you doing exploring some old subway tunnels? Uh. Seeking an item?"
The movement-that-could-be-a-shrug is done again. "Exploring some old subway tunnels." He grins at her befuddled look. "I was always much less a seeker than just a wanderer. I almost never actually looked for anything; most of what I earned was from items I'd happen upon in my exploring. Even my retirement from it was less that and more that I was just ready to settle again."
"So finding these tunnels was a fluke?"
"Hah. Hardly. Nowadays, it's no problem getting in here as long as you know someplace to enter from. Back when I found it the lines'd been down for only a year by then and they were still keeping a close eye on whatever ways in they hadn't completely sealed yet. I actually had to sneak."
"Why were you trying to sneak in?"
He runs a hand through his hair. "Suspicious rumors. That, and the fact that they were cracking down fairly harshly on anyone they did find sneaking in."
"Harshly?"
"Short jail time levels of harsh. Why would that be, if they weren't trying to hide something?"
Her mind is still stuck on the before point. "You, uh, didn't let possible jail time stop you because...?"
Agatha juts in. "Because he has no sense of self-preservation,"
Obsidian snorts, but otherwise continues as though there was no interruption. "I was curious. The shutdown was abrupt and left the city without any tram lines for about a year. Finding a possible explanation was mostly my motivation." He nods jauntily. "That, and I had no healthy sense of self-preservation."
"We're supposed to be leaving the city, right? It shouldn't-" Her voice stops and she can feel her face scrunch in thought. "I don't think one underground way out of the city would get that kind of secrecy, would it?"
"You'd be right. That's not the only thing down here. I never actually managed to explore it in its entirety; some pathways were blocked, and I had to duck out after a few days of wandering down here. Another chance to try didn't come up before I had to move on.
"I'd believe that they were using these tunnels to collect sedentary magic; but as far as I could tell, there weren't any visible means of actually collecting the energy, and these tunnels seem to run under at least a huge chunk of the city. I wasn't looking out for any possible exits, so they just might be passageways. Another guess is that they could've been intended to be artificial leylines, but the number of ones that didn't show signs of that is larger than the ones that did, and I can't really theorize any further without actually being able to tell what was above any given passage."
Leslie is in the middle of absorbing the information when a thought strikes her with the force of a small hammer.
Magic routing. Goes around the city. Might go under-
The next thought strikes her with the force of a full sledgehammer.
"Do you think-"
He looks at her curiously when she stops. "... Do you have an idea?"
Oh boy. Oh god. You already started talking; either finish the sentence or crash it somewhere else.
... Might as well.
"Think, well-" The fact that Agatha is now staring at her too with an unreadable expression over her shoulder and that she's chewing her lip register at the same time. "Do you suppose any of these tunnels connect to the Blotwell Reserve?"
For the first time she's known him, Obsidian looks more than mildly surprised."The Blotwell Reserve? Source of Keystone's abundant magic? I-" He runs a hand through his hair again. "Couldn't be sure without actually knowing where that'd be."
The lip chewing gets harder, and only stops to let her speak. "... It's under the Clavier family estate."
Quiet muttering; it takes Leslie a moment to realize that its source is Agatha. "The family that watches after it, right? It'd make sense if it was."
"This estate would be where in the city?"
She's not familiar as she should be with the city's layout. Mostly through short trips out made on time that had to be stolen, and from poring through whatever maps she could get her hands on. Still, the Clavier family's estate is a well-known sight of Keystone, to the point that she'd had to convince Agatha to not go see it up close.
"Near the center of the city. Would you suppose the tunnels reach there?"
"... Like I mentioned, some passages had barriers I couldn't make my way past. Mostly, they appeared in deeper areas that took me hours to reach. Still can't be sure, but I'd personally wager on the tunnels reaching at least near there. So,"
Leslie starts at the sudden sound and movement of him clasping his hands together.
"-to summarize! The theory is that these tunnels connect to the Blotwell Reserve. If true, then these tunnels are most likely actually intended to spread magic from it evenly across the city, instead of letting it naturally spread as scattered magic. The subways were shut down to keep these tunnels safer from being found. Is that what we're going with?"
Agatha breaks the short silence that follows with a grunt. "Alright. So why would there be a way outta the city if these tunnels are meant to just spread magic?"
"... We're, um, agreeing, as a part of this theory, that the tunnels would connect to the reserve, right?" Leslie offers. When no one disagrees, she continues. "Then that'd mean that they connect to the Clavier estate. These tunnels could be both a way to spread magic from the reserve, and a way to get around the city. Or out of it, in case of emergencies."
"Fair enough." Agatha agrees. "But we've managed to get this far into the tunnels without anything stopping our way so far. From an old station. Why's the subway connect right into 'em?"
Nothing springs to mind. "... Um."
"Hey now," Obsidian adds in. He nods at Leslie. "Plenty of the tunnels showed signs of older purposes, and of new things being added before being abandoned."
It hits her. "They reused some of the tunnels! Instead of wasting time digging out new ones, they built off some of these old ones."
For a long moment, there is no response, and the only sound in the tunnel is of their footsteps again.
It's right when she's convinced herself that she'd said something horribly wrong that Sid snorts. "Clever girl."
Agatha's response is fond. "Ain't she?"
Leslie's head ducks, and she can't tell if whatever it is that forms in her gut at the praise is good or bad. Not... clever. Just informed.
A sound from Sid has her raising her head again. The look in his eye has shifted back into inquisitive, and has her shoving the feeling down to answer him.
"I haven't mentioned it yet, but," he asks. "Would your method work on magical seals?"
... That's a good question.
"I've never actually tried unlocking seals before," she admits. "But I do know that it should work."
He nods. "Good. The cache was blocked off with an enchantment, not a lock."
"Speakin' of it. Exactly how long've we been movin' and exactly how much longer is it gonna be?"
The motion of Agatha uncovering her wristwatch and Leslie taking her pocket watch back out happen at the same time. Leslie, however, manages to get the information first and flashes both the light and the face of the pocket watch at him.
"Ah." He nods again. "An hour already. That was fast."
The motion of Agatha tugging at her sleeve stops. "Leslie, when I turn to look around, it'd better not be that godforsaken pocket watch."
"No ma'am." Leslie says primly as she slips it back into her coat.
Sid begins speaking again when Agatha turns her head like promised. "We should be there soon. Not much further, if my memory serves."
"If your memory serves, eh? Speakin' of which, exactly how long've you been sitting on your theories about down here? Did you have to do your theorizing thing?"
Sid has already sped up to go back to speaking face-to-face with her. "Well-"
When she's certain enough that Agatha's fully occupied, she goes back to discreetly fiddling with her pocketwatch.
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