[Complete] Call the Locksmith?

This job had been a bit of a hodgepodge of faces. Colt hadn’t minded, enjoying chilling at the back of the group, toothpick rolling back and forth as he mused to himself how difficult this lock was supposed to be. Now and then he’d check his roll of pick, checking their edges and sizes were all in order for when called upon. Only one face had been constant through the whole venture and that had been the boss running the whole business. Two had swapped out at their designated points, diversions, false trails for folks to follow if their little escapade had reached some ears. A dwarf had joined them some time earlier, the muscle Colt thought, judging from the stout things axe.

Now they were just waiting on the corner for their fourth. Leaning in the shadows, Colt would close his eyes, arms resting across his chest for a brief few winks as they waited. His simple, minimal gear offered nothing to catch the light. He’d sewed in secret pockets and hidden blades into the black leather. At his waist along a belt hung a few pouches along with a pair of sheathed daggers, their scabbards hooked around his thighs for sneakier approaches.

[color=#c10300]“We need another?”[/color] he’d ask casually, cocking a brow at his temporary employer. [color=#c10300]“Got Smithy here, and I’m a dab hand if things get hairy?”[/color] Yeah. Legging it. Was he fuck meeting the gallows for these fuckers.

Helena Prieskorn's favorite informant was a cherry-cheeked pick-pocket of a lass who never let go of her grudges. The woman had come to her door quietly several nights ago, and Helena had shared a bottle of wine, and in exchange, was regaled by an epic tale of love, betrayal, and the crippling flaw of pride. The lass, Stella, had gotten back on the good side of her old flame, and had been invited to a robbery of the chantry's tithehouse. Helena had first met Stella in jail. Her hands were scheduled to be chopped off. Stella owed Helena her hands, but Stella never came to Helena's door in mind to pay this debt. Stella was aflame. Helena had seen it in her eyes, and recognized it for what it was - vengeance. The two women never toasted to honor, nor to the Maker, despite it being Helena's usual tradition. They simply drank for themselves as Stella related all the details of the plot, and then Helena leaned forward with a small smile and told Stella what they would do.

Templar-Knight and thief matched gaits as they stepped into the circle shaded by the alleyway. Helena wore one of Stellas patched black cloaks, and carried a long, black ebony pole polished to shine in the lamplight - her magic focus.

"All here," said Stella in her swanky street-stretched accent. "Oy, even found us an umbra," Stella, hissed proudly, shooting a competitive glint at the boss for the job.

Helena pushed a loose strand of her hair back behind her ear, an old habit, half hidden by her hood. Then drawing her hand lower, she clamped her black-gloved thumb to the tip of her fingers, as if grasping an invisible thread, and seemed to twist and bend it. All around them, the streetlights dimmed. "Better." she whispered.

Colt’s gut clenched as two approached, joining the trio. Outwardly, he maintained the aloof, relaxed posture, perking a brow at the group's employer before he uttered a word. An extra body hadn’t been part of the plan and if this was his job, he’d be calling quits and finding who the rat was. No, one of them didn’t quite belong. The job had been sketchy to begin with, but now, now he was already mapping his escape route for when, not if, shit went awry.

Stella was greeted with irritation from the boss, not appreciating the lateness of her arrival. Yet his gaze would linger on the addition, casting a few glances back and forth between Stella and the hooded figure until the dimming light caught him somewhat off guard. Colt noticed the tension crawling up his back and along his shoulders, but if it was due to fear or annoyance, the locksmith couldn’t tell. Curious though.

“...We don’t need a fifth, but…” appearing to think about it, briefly. “...I warn you though, turn that shit on me and you’ll swiftly regret it.” Catching Colt’s eye as he turned away, the boss gestured with his head, hissing. “Get up. We move to the next checkpoint.”

Colt made a point of taking his time, exaggerating a small stretch, yawn and all at the man's back, tossing a casual wink at Stella.[color=#c10300] “He usually this much o’ an ass?”[/color] Moving to follow, Colt paused, gesturing with one hand, for Stella to take the lead, [color=#c10300]“Ladies first.” [/color]

As the lights dimmed, Helena let herself fade into Stella's shadow. She was just a quiet gray smudge, and that was all she needed to be, as her plotting gaze watched everyone move on, and followed.

Stella, meanwhile, was eager to talk. "What? Nevah seen an Umbra before?" she meanly asked the boss as he walked by, who gave her another brief sour look before ignoring her. She rolled her eyes, and came in an easy stride behind this new guy she'd never met. When he turned to her, her gaze roamed him up and down, and she tilted her head and offered a girlish smile. "Can't find a biggah one," she said almost hungrily, giving Colt a wink. "It's Stella," she said simply to his polite gesture, and with an easy stride loped ahead to catch up with the aforementioned asshole with more whispered shouts asking about the plan.

Helena watched all this, switching shadows to not pass the younger man when Stella ran ahead. Helena thought momentarily about how Stella's vicious wittiness would be their curtain call, but the employer seemed used to it. This insecurity marked her face with a concerned frown. 

Almost Antivan in form,  her small body hung back like a determine period, hoping he wouldn't make the same gesture towards her. She wanted to keep her distance from these criminals, and the thought of one looming behind her made her hackles rise.

As for her thoughts on this young man, as Helena was a mage always brimming with judgement, he was most discernably a commoner, and quite obviously a criminal and thus a predator of order, so of course, she disliked him like a laundress hates a stain. These thoughts twinkled in her eyes at him as she remained silent and waited for him to go next.

Colt. Colt was as common as dirt. His early life was stuck in the fields around Kirkwall until his drunk of a father made it intolerable. Then he’d been a street rat, pick-pocketing his way through Lowtown till he picked the right pocket. Alfred. Big old softy for a Coterie man, but it was better the old coot, than John Marc, and Colt losing his prize digits as penance. The two geezers had taken the skin and bone youth and gave him something, not a home, but his life and dexterous fingers.

Colt’s grin grew wide as Stella brightly spoke, teeth flashing briefly at the returned wink. [color=#c10300]“Well Stella, my name's Sonny,”[/color] he’d offer, using one of the many aliases he’d adopted over the years. He left out a laugh, [color=#c10300]“Aye? Well… that don’t bode well.” [/color]This boss was one shitty planner. Regret gnawed at his gut. What had he let himself in for?

With Stella taking the offer, following after the boss and dwarf, the shadow lingered much to his disappointment. [color=#c10300]“I don’t bite darlin’, I swear, but suit yourself.”[/color] Shrugging it off, he’d walk on, following in the direction of the others. She wanted the shadows so bad? Fine, he’d give them up. Colt still had his legs, and they hadn’t failed him yet.

The Tithe House wasn’t far away and from the final checkpoint, the group had a good vantage of the relatively light security surrounding it. The thief’s brow furrowed at the intended target, though. [color=#c10300]“I thought you said this was a clean vault. There ain’t fuck all clean about this.” [/color]

The tithe house a was a large warehouse with a broad, double-door entrance guarded at night by two men, three stories of ivy-laced stone facade, and two chimneys at either side of a steeple roof. Edging the property of the chantry complex, templars made rounds on the cobbled streets it faced every fifteen minutes or so.

Helena gently, finger by finger, peeled off her gloves and looked up at Sonny with a crumpled bottom lip. Stella rolled her eyes and crossed her arms. "What kinda rookie is he?" she thumbed at Sonny, scoffing, to the boss, "I don't get why you gotta bring more and more people on these jobs anyway," she rambled on, a jealous edge in her argued whisper.

Meanwhile, Helena had her gloves off, and folded it contemplatively looking at Colton, hearing the uncomfortable disbelief in his utterance while the other two were off in their own world. He was young garbage - she could to tell. But if he had a shred of the Maker's conscious in him, he'd back out and find a more honorable life. 

So, are you out? she asked, stepping beside him with a deep, smoky challenge in her voice. Her eyes narrowed with indiscernible judgements like black lace layered on black lace. What kind of man was he, to steal from the Chantry? And only if it were clean? Whatever that meant. At Helena's question, Stella looked curiously at Colton, as if she and Helena were of the same mind of kicking this street rat out of their real hunt.

On a good day with a good crew this job would be a breeze, an easy in and out under the cover of darkness. But this wasn’t his job and he didn’t pick the crew. Every alarm bell was ringing in Colton’s head as he took his first look at the grounds and the team assembled. He estimated there was an almost seventy percent chance someone wasn’t making it out, hell, all of them could land in the Guards dungeons or worse.

He’d scoff as Stella thumbed his way, calling him out as a rookie. [color=#c10300]“Now, now wee lass, don’t be finding fault in my good eye,”[/color] tossing her a wink for good measure. [color=#c10300]“I just don’t like fuckin’ with the Chantry.”[/color] That much was true. Especially growing up in Kirkwall. [color=#c10300]“Nothin’ was said about this job involving the Chantry. Tin Can’s take fingers and I like keeping all mine. Kinda need ‘em.”[/color] A hand fell in the space between them, lockpick danced over and between his fingers in deft display of their nimbility. It was slipped away back into its hiding place before the shadow drew next to him.

Colt’s gaze fell on her as she echoed the same vein of questioning as Stella. It piqued his instincts more that this whole job was reeking of spoiled fish. [color=#c10300]“And if I am? You ain’t gonna get far without a locksmith. Might as well go home sweetheart, the plan is fucked if I decide to hop it. Or you gonna try forcing it? Tricky since it’s likely got wards to sink your wee magic tricks.” [/color]

Now his back straightened, correcting the slouched posture for his full 6’4’’. He let his still expression linger on the mage a moment before searching for the boss’s take on Colt’s assessment of this bullshit task.

Helena raised an eyebrow, but here glare remained narrow, flicking between the lockpick and Stella opposite her. Stella caught her look and offered a silent shrug, to which Helena huffed and tilted her head to once again look the tall thief up and in reconsideration.

Meanwhile, several thumping footsteps announced the boss's attention to the shadowed huddle.

"Sonny, you rat-tailed traitor. That there vault ain't got nothin' we haven't lifted before. You bail on me now, I'll make sure you'll get your throat slit in your sleep. Why, I'll-"

But Helena raised a small hand with a soft light in her palm, which in a blink, snapped into the shape Sonny had been spinning in his own fingers. The pins of light also spun about her fingers.

We don't need him, she began, tilting her head to the side. She decided the thief was blessed by the Maker in some peculiar way she could figure out another day. But nothing risked, nothing gained. You're out out, Sonny.

Stella placed a mollifying hand on the boss, levelling a sympathetic smirk at the thief that the man's threats probably still stood.

"You sure, Sonny?" Stella chimed in, beside the tense ape of a man clenching and unclenching his fist.

Colt glanced back to the Tithe house, maintaining the idea that the target itself was the one thing that had him agitated. It was part of it, but the way the two lassies had swept in attempting to integrate themselves was also a factor. The looks, the huffs about his doubts he let wash over, uncaring of how it made him look in their eyes. He wasn’t about to stick his neck out for these fucks and their ludicrous idea of a plan.

His jaw clenched as the boss moved towards them, strictly for berating the thief for having valid concerns. Warning flashed in Colt’s eyes. The happy-go-lucky charm of his eyes turned dark in an instant a threat came at him or his. Even his voice changed, no longer aloof and cheeky, the tone held a quiet rumble of warning.[color=#c10300] “Try it and you’ll have half of Kirkwall on your he-”[/color] but the mage intervened, cutting him off.

His eyes watching her imitate his tools with her fancy tricks. Scoffing a laugh, Colt used it to break more of the tension. [color=#c10300]“Be my guest,”[/color] he grinned, tongue caught between his teeth. [color=#c10300]“But lemme say, ‘I told ya so,’ now, and you can think on that when you find yourself fucked and nowhere to go.” [/color]

Colt was ready for him to throw hands, his nimble, yet lanky limbs ready to swerve and parry a reckless jab if thrown. Even Stella chiming in didn’t have that carefree grin of his return. [color=#c10300]“Positive, wee lass. You give the city guard my best when you see ‘em though.” [/color]