The bank was winding down for the day, watery golden sunlight struggling through the high atrium windows as the winter sun dipped below the city skyline when John noticed the missing trolley. He surreptitiously checked it wasn’t just tucked further in back, before resigning himself to an inevitable confrontation and wondering whether he should get it over with sooner or later. Technically, he couldn’t see anything obviously wrong with leaving the trolley in the vault overnight, but the procedures were clear and his shift-manager was a stickler for anything written in a rule book. And there was always the other reason not to leave trolleys down in the vault, of course. John ran a professional eye over the last few stragglers; an old lady with a walking frame, white hair and her own body-weight worth of shopping bags, a harried looking father, two toddlers swinging from his legs as he fumbled bills into his wallet and a couple of uni students loitering by the ATMs in the corner. One was scowling and punching buttons with a force that made John wince internally.
His radio gave a garbled squawk of static, but a glance over at Mitchell showed that he had his eyes firmly fixed on the students, and wasn’t trying to contact John. Putting the burst down to a recurrent yet annoyingly intermittent glitch, John thumbed the ‘talk’ button to catch Mitch’s attention. With a quick wave and a tilt of his head, John indicated he was headed down to lock up the vault, not even bothering to use the radio. It was a routine task, and they’d worked together before. Mitchell nodded briefly, barely taking his eyes off the students long enough to see John’s gesture.
The stairs were poured concrete set with anti-slip steel grates on the edges; the metal rang and echoed along the chilly corridor with every step. Despite the gleaming electric lights overhead, there was something uniquely claustrophobic about entering a basement, even one as high-tech as the bank’s. He could feel the weight of the building pressing in from all sides. It didn’t help that the stairs had been retrofitted in, replacing the old residential stairs which, as far as John could tell, had been designed for people with the same general proportions as a piece of spaghetti. The new stairs were sturdier, but there was only so much that could be done about the space.
Before the stairs switchbacked deeper into the basement, John cast a quick glance back up the stairs. The time-lock doors stayed reassuringly open, as he’d known they would, but the look soothed his irrational nerves, and that was what counted.
It was a relief to reach the bottom of the steps, and John reached out to trail his fingers over the sigils he’d painted onto the walls with oil. No-one else ever noticed them; even with his second-sight they were faint in the searing brilliance of the electric lights. Good fortune. Luck. He wasn’t sure they worked in any literal sense, but they comforted him. And besides, he wasn’t sure he wanted to live in a world where drawing a few shapes in rose oil magically resulted in money appearing in your bank account. He liked to think his actions meant something.
As he approached the vault, he began to hear voices. Since he and Mitchell were the only people in the bank supposed to have access to the vault at this time of day, this fact might have worried any other person. John simply sighed. The voices were familiar, as was the soft clink of small valuables against a metal surface. He stepped around the doorframe, managing to muster a frown that almost edged closer to annoyance than amusement.
“All right you lot, time to clear out. Pack it up, the lot of you, let’s go!”
A few loose coins, glinting gold in the vault’s light, rattled to a standstill atop the trolley. Crisp notes and a few small gemstones lay scattered where the bullion had sat only this morning, and John rubbed his temple. Whoever had left the trolley here was an idiot. They always did this when they had a ‘table’.
Flint ‘Quickdraw’ Beauchamp tipped his hat to John, a single battered copper piece sitting on the trolley in front of him. One of his boots, spur and all, sat in the pot, surrounded by currency.
“May be that you’ve got a point there, sheriff. Quittin’ while I’m ahead an’ all that.”
The two other occupants of the table ignored them, gazes locked in a steely battle of wills. Mack Long, grey pinstripe suit immaculate and an unlit cigar hanging from her mouth, tapped her foot soundlessly against the metal floor. Deidre Smithson met her gaze as she settled her petticoats, fingers running over her hand of cards thoughtfully.
“Oh dearie me... Oh, this hand of mine, oh what a shame... If only I had my glasses, oooh, I’m quite sure I can’t read these cards right...” Deidre squinted at her cards through delicate wire-framed reading lenses.
“You ridiculous old biddy, you’re wearing your glasses!” Mack slammed a hand into the trolley, face flushing with anger. She tossed her cards onto the table with a flourish. “Straight flush, granny. Beat that.”
“Oh dearie me...” Deidre’s hands shook as she splayed her cards, blue veins visible beneath translucent skin. She placed her cards onto the table.
“I do believe this is what you call a ‘royal flush’, isn’t it, lovey?” A sly smile slid across her lined face, making her eyes sparkle like ice. “I win again, dearie.”
John rubbed his temples, resigned. Every. Single. Time. With a feral growl, Mack turned sharply away from the smiling Deidre and threw the other cards into the air, where they fell onto a sleeping Pekinese. Its ear twitched, and it woke with a yap and a splutter as the cards vanished.
Flint frowned at Mack as he grabbed his boot off the table and tugged it back onto his foot.
“Don’t you go disturbing Thunderbolt’s siesta, city-slicker.”
Mack huffed at him, cigar wobbling threateningly, but any response was cut short by Thunderbolt’s sudden yapping. The dog bounced up and down on stiff little legs, barking furiously at a mangy charcoal-coloured cat that was bigger than he was. The cat, standing between John and the erstwhile gamblers, hissed and arched its back before darting away through John’s legs and down the corridor. Thunderbolt zipped after it, still yapping, and John shivered at the chill sensation as the dog darted through his legs.
“After that cat!” Flint tripped, boot still half on, falling straight through the trolley and half into the ground beneath it.
John just sighed as the trio variously ran, sauntered and hobbled out of the vault and he secured it. Not that it stopped them, but at least he didn’t feel like he was locking people in. He followed the sound of frantic yapping down the bare concrete corridors, wondering where in the heck that cat had come from. It hadn’t felt... right when it passed through him. Too hot, too... dark. And he hadn’t seen it get in, either. He reached out to stroke one of his security sigils. At his shoulder, his radio gave a garbled, staticky warble; he flicked its casing and resolved to get someone to look at it. It had been doing that for a while now, but the increasing frequency and volume was starting to get irritating.
“You can’t go about touching other people’s valuables, dearie, it’s not right.”
“Aw, not like they’ll know. ‘Sides, that cat jumped into it first.” A frown creased his face as he caught the gist of the distant conversation, and John picked up his pace a little. What in the world were those three up to now?
“It’s got good taste then. I’d estimate this stone’s worth a pretty penny or twelve. Wonderful faceting.” John raised an eyebrow at the sight of the three standing crowded around the door to the safe-box vault. Thunderbolt stopped yapping when he caught sight of John and hid behind Flint’s legs.
“What are you lot—“ He frowned at the sight of a large brown gem held in Flint’s gloved hand. Streaks of gold in the stone caught the light, making it seem almost alive. Old habits died hard, apparently, even when the habitees were already dead. “What have I told you about messing with customers’ things? Go put that back.”