Doug looked at his best friend Sandy, who looked back, her eyes wide. Then they both looked back at the man who was pointing a knife in their general direction. "I said, money and phones," the man repeated with the air of someone to whom this was routine. The mask he was wearing, a cheap dog one from one of the stands in the main hall to their left, moved as he spoke, his voice a little hollow.
They'd been curious about the rest of the conference center and had decided to have a quick explore, having grown tired for the moment of the heaving mass of humanity filling the three halls of the convention. The plan had been to sneak off and wander around to see what else was going on, for half an hour or until they got bored and/or caught, then go back and finish the main hall. After that it would be time for lunch, then the other two halls.
Doug's father had dropped both of them off, told them to try to stay out of trouble this time with a weary sort of preknowledge, and that he'd see them either at the end of the day or when the police called him.
It had happened before.
Although it totally wasn't their fault, either of the last two times.
The third time, he'd admit they might have had something to do with, but it was an accident. It was always an accident. They just happened to be in the area when odd things occurred, and he'd swear to his dying day that was the case. Sandy would as well, even though her mother had different ideas. Apparently Doug was a bad influence on her.
Which he found amusing, since his Dad said the same thing about Sandy.
Even with all that in mind, though, this was the first time they'd been mugged. And in the middle of a convention, as well, which seemed a bit much. Out on the street, maybe, but in here…
All that went through his mind in moments, before Sandy said in a low voice, "What do we do?"
"Um..."
"You give me your money, and your phones," the man said for the third time, slowly and patiently. "That's how this works. I'm mugging you, you're the victims, therefore you do what I say. Then you go away, poorer in property but richer in life experience." He almost sounded amused now, and was surprisingly well-spoken for a violent criminal.
"And if we don't?" she demanded defiantly, her hands on her hips. "We could scream and people would come running."
Their mugger took a step forward, the knife, which was in Doug's opinion vastly larger than required for the job in hand, and much sharper than he really liked, glinting in the overhead lights. "You could, true, but I think I can get to you before they can get to me. There's no need for heroics, is there? You're what, fourteen or so? I don't think I'd have too much trouble with either of you."
He was awful chatty for a mugger, Doug mused.
"It took months to save up for this, and now you want to take it all from us?" Sandy growled.
"That's the basic idea behind a mugging, yes," the man replied. "My clients earn the money, they bring the money to where I am, I get the money, I'm happy. Admittedly they're not, but life is seldom fair." He shrugged. "Hurry up, kid, I want to see the costume show."
They looked at each other again. Sandy flicked her eyes to the right, towards the nearest entrance to the hall. He shook his head very slightly, that led them closer to the mugger. She rolled her eyes a little, then flicked them the other way. He thought, nodded, looked back to the mugger, then both of them bolted.
"Oh, for fuck's sake," the man sighed, following. "You do realize that's a dead end, don't you?" he called after them.
No, they hadn't realized that at all.
Doug rattled the handle on the locked door at the end of the service corridor they'd found themselves in, then turned to Sandy, who was looking annoyed and somewhat scared. "Great job, thanks. Now he's mad, and we're trapped."
"Hey, I don't want to give him my money any more than you do. I thought this went back to the lobby."
"It doesn't."
"Well, duh. I can see it doesn't." She rolled her eyes again, her hands on her hips. Then she brightened up. "Oh, it was the next one along. That's the one that leads back to the lobby."
"Thanks. That really helps," he sighed, turning to face the masked mugger, who had approached while they were talking and was standing a few feet away, waiting for them to stop arguing. "Um… sorry?" he tried.
"It was a good attempt, but you picked the wrong corridor," the man chuckled. "Next one along was the one you wanted."
"That's what I just said," Sandy put in. Both Doug and the mugger looked at her, making her flush a little. "Well, I did," she muttered in a low voice.
"OK, kids, fun's over, I have a job to do. Money, phones, anything else you have on you. Come on, hand it over." He gestured with the knife.
Reaching into his pocket, Doug sighed. Then he stared past the man's shoulder, as something very, very odd happened to the corridor behind him.
Raising his other hand, he pointed. "Um..."
Sandy was gaping as well.
"Nice try. How stupid do you think I am?" the man asked.
Doug kept pointing. "What the hell is that?" he squeaked.
The end of the corridor was… warping. That was the best description he could come up with. It was he was looking at it through some sort of lens, which was moving towards them, the floor curving and sliding up the walls, which in turn were rotating out of the way of the ceiling as it bent downwards. The effect was very hard on the eyes and made him feel like he was falling forwards, although he could tell he wasn't.
In the middle of it, a petite figure in a robe or something like that, a set of wires holding a flat wooden cross-shaped thing a couple of feet over its head like a puppet, was sauntering towards them. There were a number of unnerving things, other than the very disturbing warping effect, about this. One was that he could see that the lights overhead appeared to be illuminating the inside of the hood, which certainly looked from here like it was empty.
Another one was the way the figure was a good foot off the ground, floating along in mid air.
The worse part was the way it was eating a pretzel, without using a mouth…
"Hello," a hissing voice said, making him shiver. Sandy went 'eep' and hid behind him. The mugger jumped about a foot in the air, then whirled around, gaping.
"What the fuck?" he said in a stunned voice.
"Am I interrupting something?" the floating thing said. Doug got the impression it was probably female, but the voice was extremely odd and while totally clear, made little determinations like that more difficult than it should be. Another bite of giant pretzel vanished into the empty hood. "That's a big knife."
The man looked at the weapon, then held it up threateningly. "Stay back, whoever you are." He studied the hovering figure somewhat uncertainly. "Or whatever."
"Good event, isn't it?" the thing said, moving closer, the corridor distorting around it. Behind it, the lights seemed to have disappeared into a sort of rainbow ring, the corridor itself now apparently going to infinity.
Or beyond, Doug thought uneasily. He could feel Sandy pressed against his back, shivering a little.
"You appear to be engaged in a mugging," it added in a reflective tone. "Don't like muggers."
It moved closer. The man stepped back, waving his enormous knife.
"Get back, I'm warning you," he growled, but both teenagers could hear the worry in his voice.
"Are you two all right?" the cloaked figure asked, turning its attention to Doug and Sandy. Both of them nodded a little jerkily. "Good, otherwise I'd have to be angry. Now, all I have to do is hand this guy over to security."
"You're not doing anything," the man shouted abruptly, diving at the figure, which didn't move.
Doug stared in total disbelief as the man appeared to somehow… stretch… his body elongating into a hard to look at shape, orbiting around the floating figure in a way that defied explanation, then snapped back into normality facing them on the other side of the corridor. He stood motionless for a moment, then ripped his mask off and puked noisily onto the carpet.
"Oh, yuck," Sandy mumbled into Doug's ear.
There was a snicker from somewhere in the cloak. "What am I supposed to say now?" it mused in a low voice. "Oh, right, I remember. There is no escape, criminal scum! Drop your weapon and come quietly, or there will be..." It leaned forward meaningfully. "...Trouble."
The mugger straightened up, wiping his mouth on his sleeve. Under the mask was a completely average face, which was looking both worried and very, very confused.
"What the fuck was that?" he said hoarsely.
"Simple spacial manipulation, causing a localized singularity, which you traveled around," the weird creature, which Doug was beginning to think might not actually be human at all, said in a happy tone. "Good, isn't it? Took me a while to work out, at first everything kept coming out all crushed and ruined. Very messy. But it's completely safe now, just a bit disorientating."
He threw his knife at her.
They all watched as it stretched, then gaped at the silver blur wrapped around her a foot or two away like a belt hanging in mid air.
The hood cocked to one side curiously.
"Did you really think that would work?" It shrugged. "Slightly less stupid than throwing a gun at me, I guess. People do that all the time." A hand came out of the cloth and plucked the orbiting anomaly out of the air, making it resolve back into a knife again. "Nice knife, though."
With a wild shout, the man tried to get past her again, pressing hard against the wall as far away from the middle of the corridor as he could get. Doug and Sandy watched as he slipped past, then charged down the weirdly distorted hallway. The figure rotated in mid air to do the same.
The mugger ran as fast as he could, but seemed to be slowing down rapidly, even though his legs and arms were pumping. Twenty feet further on he was for all intents running on the spot.
"How the hell are you doing that?" Sandy asked in a stunned voice.
"I've got all sorts of interesting abilities," the cloaked figure hissed with satisfaction. It ate another bite of the pretzel it was still holding in the other hand, apparently completely unconcerned. "Don't worry about it. You should get back to the hall, I'll hand this guy over to security."
"He's between us and the hall," Sandy commented, sounding nervous.
The knife disappeared into the hood, making them both stare again. The free hand pointed to the side, at an air vent which suddenly warped and distorted, growing to cover the wall, then one of the slots in it expanding into a doorway-sized opening. Through it they could, impossibly, see the main hall and lots of people milling around, none of whom seemed to notice.
"Holy crap," Doug whispered.
"There you go." Their rescuer sounded amused. "Have fun. Try one of the pretzels, they're really nice."
"Ah..." Sandy moved around Doug, looked at the apparent opening to the main hall, then towards the mugger who was now standing, his head slumped, watching them in a disconsolate way. Both of them knew for a fact that the hall itself was past him, not in the direction of the wall. They exchanged a glance. "Thank you?"
A hand, which they both noticed was leathery and clawed, not looking at all human, waved dismissively. "No trouble, I was happy to help. Go on, enjoy. This is a really nice event."
Grabbing Doug's hand, Sandy squeezed it, then pulled him towards the passage back to the hall. Sticking her other hand through it, she waved it around, grinned madly, and yanked him through.
"All right, my friend, let's go and find a security guard, OK?" they faintly heard from behind them. Turning around, all they could see was the wall of the huge room, a small vent on it settling back into shape silently. A moment later everything was normal.
There was a long silence, both of them in a little bubble of isolation even in the midst of a crowd of thousands. Then they looked at each other.
"What the hell just happened?" Doug asked in a weak voice.
"I have… no idea at all," Sandy admitted quietly.
"Should we tell anyone?"
"No." She shook her head quickly. "No one would believe us." They looked around a little helplessly, then back at the wall. "Screw it. I want a pretzel," she added, turning around and pushing through the crowd towards the food court area. Doug stared at the vent on the wall for a second or two longer, then followed, sidling around someone dressed in an incredibly good humanoid reptile costume with a muttered apology, and ran to catch up.
He was very confused.
But at least he still had his money, his phone, and his best friend.