The Loonatics arrived at their destination with the help of their jet since the girls were unfamiliar with the jetpacks. They landed close by before they stepped out to the streets.
"That was so cool! I've never been on a plane before, much less a jet," Layla said as she walked off the jet.
"I think I may have gotten a bit sick during the ride," Luna mumbled as she walked out of the jet slowly. She leaned against the jet with a hand to get herself together as Lexi, Tech, and Ace got off easily. Layla went over to Luna to check on her, Lexi approaching as well.
"Is she going to be alright?" Lexi asked.
"I think so. Just seems like she got a bit of motion sickness," Layla replied. After a bit, Luna stood up properly.
"I'm better. I think I might need to get used to riding that the jet more," Luna commented.
"Probably. Have you ever ridden a jet or plane before?"
"Not in forever ago, much less a jet."
"Then you definitely need to get used to it. We use it a lot if we don't use our jetpacks."
"Got it." The girls walked away toward the guys, who were waiting for them just at the museum's entrance, a man waiting for them in formal casual wear.
"Is everyting okay?" Ace asked them.
"Yeah. I just got a little motion sick," Luna responded to ease them.
"I hope you don't get too much motion sickness." Ace turned to the semi-casually dressed man. "These two are our new recruits. Meet Layla and Luna. Goils, dis is Detective Evan Grant. He's in charge of dis case." The girls respectively shook hands with Evan while Ace said their names.
"Thank you for coming. I didn't think you would have to be involved in something like robbery, but it seems it can't be helped," Evan said. "Let me show you the way." The detective turned around and started to walk into the museum, guiding them through the labyrinth.
"We have security cameras all around this whole building and on every single angle in each room. We have no idea how this person could have entered without making a single sound or a single trace. We checked the perimeter over and over and still can't find clues. Not even the cameras were messed with. This is the toughest case we've got in a long time." After a bit, they made it to the room where there were a few people in white suits with some cops standing guard.
"These is our forensic unit. They still can't seem to find anything from the glass. There's footprints in front of the casing, but from there, they seem to disappear after just two steps to turn around." They looked around a little as they took in the information and what other items were around.
"Why didn't this person attempt to steal anything else? They had ample opportunity to do so if they were able to sneak in so easily," Tech observed.
"This person only ever steals what they aim for in their note. Anything else is of no importance to them."
"Interesting. My biggest question is why do they steal every once in a while and not continuously," Ace added, putting a finger to his chin in thought.
"Maybe this necklace could be of some importance to them. Some museums do get some of their items illegally," Layla pointed out as she looked at one of the items around.
"We asked the owner and he didn't want to answer that. He just simply said that he got them authenticated and that they were all real." The detective put his hands into his pockets as he watched them.
"Mind if I use something to try to figure it out more? I'll need the whole area," Tech asked as he started to take out a small bulky monitor.
"Be my guest. I don't think you'll find anything else." The detective motioned for the forensic team to step aside and let Tech do his thing. They complied and stood to the side as Tech pressed some buttons on the monitor before a red light brightened up from the top of the monitor and the screen turning red.
"Hey Doc. What exactly is that."
"It's a sort of heat seeker and footprint finder for now. It has other features but I call it the Bio-Detector 3000," Tech explained as he started to scan the whole area, making sure to scan the footprints of their thief to make sure to follow that one specifically. After a few seconds, the monitor showed their desired footprint and revealed their were more footprints than what they had seen without the monitor.
"Gotcha. Looks like they were able to hide their footprints from our sight, but not via monitor."
"Great job, Tech."
"You seriously outdo yourself a lot, don't you?" Layla asked with a smile. Tech let out a small chuckle, his light blush not able to be shown through.
"Hehe, thanks." Tech focused again on the monitor and followed the tracks the thief had left. "This person clearly made sure to try to hide their tracks and had hopes that they would mix with everybody else's."
"They seriously don't want to be caught. How were they able to hide their footprints is the million dollar question," Luna added as she observed.
"Well, that much is obvious," Lexi said. All of them followed Tech as he continued before he found where the tracks started and ended. Tech looked up and saw there was a vent opening just above them.
"That should be their entry and exit," Ace pointed out.
"Classic move if you ask me. If they were able to go through the front door, they would have been seen easier," Luna added as she crossed her arms.
"We should check out what's up there. Would you goils like to try it out?"
"Sure. We need a little boost, though." Luna got ready to boost up any of the other girls to get them up to the vent. Lexi decided to go as she stepped back before running and jumping off Luna's hands up to the vents. She grabbed on and realized that it was a bit loose.
"They definitely used the vents. They didn't even put it back very well," Lexi said as she moved the cover aside and making sure she didn't fall down. She got in and looked around in the darkness. "Can't see in here very well, but they were definitely in here. There's dust that got moved and a few cobwebs." Lexi got down and made sure to bend as she got onto her feet to not hurt herself.
"Nice woik, you two. We finally got a lead on dis case. Hey, Grant. Think we can go to da security room and double check if the footage wasn't tampered with at all?" Ace asked as he turned to the detective.
"You can check it one more time, but I'm sure we've looked through it a million times by now and haven't found anything," Evan said. Evan then started to lead the group away from their spot over to a far part of the museum, opening the door to a security room with two guards already there. The men stood up and the detective raised a hand to tell them to relax.
"Can you show us the footage from last night to us please?" Tech asked as he got closer to the computer.
"Sure," One guard said as he turned back to the computer and started to pull up on one of the other screens the footage from before. Tech stood closely and watched the footage carefully, making sure to observe very closely. The same footage Zadavia had shown them played on the screen. Tech could see there was almost no flaw to the video and no form that it was intercepted.
"May I have a hand at the computer?"
"Of course, sir." The guard got out of his seat and moved aside to let Tech take his place and mess with the computer. As he did his job, the girls and Ace observed him.
"This is pretty cool. Do you guys usually do this kind of detective-ing work?" Layla asked, her hands behind her back.
"Not normally. Only if it involves something that's a little out of the police's league or if they ask for our help," Lexi responded, placing her hands on her hips.
"Sometimes dey lead to some pretty big guys to fight. Example, Massive. He was just a thief, but he also had supa-powers. Dat's when we had to step in," Ace explained.
"Pretty interesting," Luna added as she put a hand on her chin. Ace raised a brow at the girls, remembering his conversation with the man from before. 'It can't be true that they are involved with him…it would be too much of a coincidence.'
After a few more minutes, Tech exclaimed as if he found something. "What did you find, doc?"
"It turned out that the footage was tampered with. Well, that the computer was hacked. It's just hard to figure out since this thief used a very sophisticated device to manipulate the time the cameras were on so that it looked like it was continuously playing when in reality, they replaced the footage for enough time to sneak in and make it look like they just appeared."
"Dat's very clever of them."
"If they were able to do that, then that means that we've been played a little too well this whole time," Evan exclaimed.
"In other words-" Layla started.
"A modern day magician thief." Luna finished. They looked at each other as if surprised that they finished each other's sentences.
"Right. Maybe we should also take another look at what are the items that have been stolen in the past and see if there's any sort of connection back at headquarters." Tech started to get up and walk over to the group out the door.
"Good idea, Tech. Thanks for showing us around, Detective Grant." Ace extended a hand to Evan, the detective taking it.
"No problem. Anything to help our great heroes." Tech, Ace, Layla, Lexi, and Luna then started to walk out of the museum and to the jet.
"We have a lot of work to do now. Tech, think you're okay looking into the items that got stolen more? I'll have our new recruits train some more," Ace explained.
"No problem, chief."
I tried to make this chapter as long as I could based on their perspective. Sorry if it came out boring to some, but I really pushed myself to do my past some justice. I'll be trying to do some more since I'm even going to take classes on better creative writing. Hope you all enjoyed your vacation and I apologize for my hiatus.