A/N: This Chapter is a bit more graphic than usual

Chapter 7 – The Lock that Mocks

Jakarta, Indonesia. 1:43am, 24th August 2031.

Much is said about the capabilities of trickle down economics, however, none of it's effects have seemed to have spread to this part of town. If there were one thing that was truly ever present, it would be the smell. The smell of garbage, strewn everywhere in open and unsecure tips, floating on top of the river, resting in open cesspools where people have tried to cram as much trash as they can before attempting to cover it. It doesn't work as they fill up faster than they can be made. Even the smell of his own sweat is more of a comfort to Alex as it drips slowly down his face in the 95% humidity. His shirt is just soaked in sweat, his fingers rest in pools of sweat inside his gloves that make it difficult to get a firm grip on his cane. He is careful with every step not to go into any puddle of water or any rotten garbage, as well as keeping both his tail and his cane off the ground.

After walking through some of the more disparate parts of town, he arrives in a suburb that has definitely seen some economic benefits. However, with all of the fronts lit up, it's easy to see that it's not trickle down economics that have come here, but more like raging torrent economics. These houses are 3 stories tall at least, with manicured lawns, high fences and security measures a plenty. Security cameras are visible even around the high walls and the huge gates that protect these bastions of obscene wealth.

Alex's job for tonight; break inside a specific house, crack the safe, clean it out. His client is actually lives inside said house and ventured into the more forbidden parts of town to ask for help to seek revenge; Revenge over something extremely petty in Alex's mind, being grounded.

He was sitting over a bowl of cooked rice, trying to eat it with chop sticks when she just came from no where at the door of his tiny room.

"Alex Cooper?" She asks, the girl couldn't be much older than 13, if at all.

"Yeah." Alex responds casually, not looking up as he concentrates on balancing the sticky grains of rice on top of the two thin strands of wood called chopsticks

"I need help." She pleas. When Alex drops his rice back into his bowl in frustration, Alex looks up to see the short leopard standing at his door. She was too well groomed and dressed to have come from the slums, so Alex took some interest.

"With what?" Alex asks, hoping it would be just a tiny thing like reaching under a couch for a toy, but then again she had asked for him by name. And how did she even get his name anyway?

"Stealing." She replies. It first he didn't really think she had wanted to ask him that, but he had to entertain that prospect so he didn't scare her as he vanished.

"Some advice." Alex begins, but slowly and kindly in order not to alienate the little girl. "Stealing won't solve your problems."

"Please." She begs. "They have a safe, take it from them."

"And why should I, do this for you?" Alex asks, more as just a chance for her to explain herself before he tells her to leave.

"Because my parents grounded me again for 2 weeks, just because I left my house to see a friend." She says.

"You have to talk to your parents about this, I'm that last person you want to talk to." Alex reaffirms. "It's late, you should be in bed sleeping."

"You sound like my parents." She replies.

"Don't you imagine what your parents would be feeling if they found you had left, they would be worried sick?" Alex wonders.

"They don't notice. I once was out for the whole afternoon and they didn't even notice. Whereas, I saw my dad grab his wallet, and he stood there and felt it. I think he knew someone must have taken something. So… he runs upstairs and I… I didn't see it but… I could hear it. He was beating my mother, I didn't scream for help because I was afraid… afraid, that he'd do the same to me." She explains, it visibly troubles her and Alex can both hear and see it as she struggles to come to terms with it. However, the grounding seems only to be the tip of the iceberg for her vile father. But it's the saddened and desperate look on her face that convinces Alex to do it.

"Okay." Alex answers reluctantly.

"Yes!" She exclaims to herself quietly, suddenly becoming much more pleased as her story perfectly manipulated him into accepting. "I can show you where it is, number 14."

"I'm not going unless you promise me some things." Alex says, trying to get the upper hand over the girl.

"Anything." She replies.

"Good. Firstly, I don't exist, you never met me and you never asked me to do anything. Secondly, you have to get back in your bedroom before I get there and act as if I'm not there. Thirdly, if it goes wrong, I'm going to blame you for it. You should really deal with your parents." Alex asserts.

"I know and I promise." She answers, eager to get her revenge.

"Now go to sleep." Alex commands as he gets up wearily, not because of being tired, but because of the humidity. She runs off away from the room and presumably followed his instructions, which he hopes has happened as he searches for the correct house. The stainless steel numbers of a one then a four next to each other points the raccoon in the right direction. Standing outside the 4 story building, he sees only the top two stories due to the height of the walls he has to scale. But then sees a new path via the power poles nearby. Having to put the cane in his mouth is a disgusting thing given the areas he's had to walk through as he climbs up the wooden pole that gives him a much better view of the inside, a perfectly green lawn in the front before the building itself. Luckily, he doesn't need to touch the ground as there is a cable that runs from the pole to a point in the wall, presumably to run cable TV Alex thinks. It doesn't matter what the purpose is though, all that matters is that it's a way in.

Alex walks the proverbial tightrope in the night, avoiding the security cameras pointed at the inside of the wall and the bright lights that illuminate the front lawn to make it easy for people to be spotted. There is a third floor balcony to the right of the cable which Alex reaches up to in order to climb onto more solid ground. All the blinds are down so he can't see inside, but there is no lock on this door perhaps because the owners never thought they would need to lock a supposedly inaccessible door. All the exterior doors on the top two floors must be like that, Alex thinks as he slowly makes his way through this room which looks like a living area with leather couches and a huge TV in front of him and a staircase to the left. But it's not the furnishings that takes his attention, but the coolness of the air conditioning, not just because of the cool temperature but the low humidity. It's where he goes to first, as they must be sleeping on the most secure top floor.

Alex makes his way up the smooth concrete staircase and immediately sees the bed that the two parents are sleeping in together, a bed larger than king size with a wooden partition wall acting as a headboard. Other than those features, from the top of the staircase, there are no other large features, nothing where a safe could be hidden he thinks apart from the cupboards off to the left of the staircase in this ultra modernistic and minimalist bedroom. Alex sneaks into the bedroom and looks at the cupboards to find the handle to open them. It looks like a single piece of wood to Alex, that's until he spots the almost invisible grooves that act as handles. Slowly, he pulls one of the four doors open to see what is behind the screen, nothing but a lot of women's clothing is what he finds in this section as well as the adjacent sections when he peaks his head inside without having to open the other doors. A quick and silent check of the last part reveals the only sanctuary for male leopards clothing, still more substantial than Alex's own set of clothing by a long way.

Having checked the cupboards, Alex sneaks around the bed to behind the partition wall. What he sees is a bathroom sparsely filled with a bath, shower and toilet. The room is larger than what Alex is staying in, it makes him wish he had this amount of space, even just to stay in. The first thing he spots is a painting hanging on the wall, Alex goes up to it and feels around the edge for a safe but finds nothing. It must not be up here, Alex thinks, so it must be in the basement. Since Alex thinks it's in the basement, he thinks the potential takings could be huge, more than he could carry. However, as he turns around, he hears a noise, the ruffling of the blanket. He thinks it's just them tossing and turning in bed as he waits from behind the partition wall. Then he hears the planting off feet on the hardwood floor. His heart starts beating faster, he pleas that they don't come this way. Oh crap, he's coming this way!

Alex stays as still as he can as he becomes more nervous with every step that gets closer. Even in the dark room, he can just see the shadow of the leopard moving in his direction. He walks past Alex and around the wall towards the toilet, as he does so, Alex sneaks around in the other direction. Alex sees the staircase and heads towards it as quickly and silently as he can, however, something catches his eye at the foot of the bed. No wonder the bed was overly large, Alex thinks to himself, the bed is the safe. The covering looks like the side of a mattress, but behind the velcroed covering is a fully functional safe. Even under a bed sheet, he could see the outline of safe, or rather the shimmering lights showed him where it is. In any case, he moves closer to the foot of the bed and lies down on his side so that he won't be seen from on top of the bed if he can be at all. He sends his right hand underneath the top mattress and pulls the bottom of the bed sheet up to reveal only a part of the covering, the outline of which is easily visible even in the dark for him. Alex does this along the length of the covering so he can pull it away. The covering will make a loud noise as the Velcro is taken off, an inadvertent security feature. Therefore, Alex needs a distraction.

He goes back downstairs to the big TV and turns it on, quickly putting it on mute so they don't hear it's use, at least not for now. He searches for a channel that would create the right kind of distraction, not sports, not reality TV, not news, but a movie channel. More precisely, Alex is trying to simulate a break in. It helps that the surround sound will create a believable sense of depth which will make it sound more realistic. Once he finds the right channel and the right program, he turns the TV off and readies the surround sound. He looks for his way back upstairs and turns on the volume, louder than he anticipated, which is a good thing, he doesn't need the mirror to find out why. As soon as he is startled, he moves quickly back upstairs and reaches the top just as he sees the two parents tiredly escape the clutches of warmth from their blanket and move towards the stairs, Alex moves straight away to the foot of bed in anticipation for when they rush down stairs.

At the very least, he will have less than half a minute to at least assess the possible ways on how to crack the safe. Once the father moves downstairs slowly to protect himself, Alex waits for the mother to run past but she doesn't, presumably out of fear. So, he improvises and rips it off in one go when the sound gets loud, hoping to mask the sound of it. He hopes he has timed it right as he slides the cotton covered wood cover under the bed quickly. Alex looks at the security device, a combination tumbler with three dials set inside each other with a number for each one. He presses his ear against the door to listen for the sounds of the safe, made easier by the fact that the surround sound has just been switched off, but that means he has less than 10 seconds to crack the safe, an impossible feat. So he lies at the foot of the bed motionless and most importantly, nervously.

"No!" Alex can hear being exclaimed in disbelief, probably at seeing the discovered safe.

"Get up! Get Up!" He shouts in fear. "Call the police, we've been broken into!"

"What's happened?" She responds tiredly.

"We have to find Nadia, come on, call the police!" He begs. Alex can hear a phone being used with the beep it makes when it's unlocked, most likely via a fingerprint scanner. He can hear the rush of footsteps as they both go downstairs together to check on their daughter. At this point, Alex doubts the veracity of the girls story that her parents don't care, clearly they do otherwise they'd be more concerned about the safe than her. In any case, the raccoon only gets a few more minutes to crack the safe and get out. He begins with the outermost ring, rotating it and checking for the distinctive click that tells him that tumbler is in the correct position. Once done, he proceeds with the next two in quick succession. In under a minute, he picks a combination out of the 274,625 total possibilities. The handle doesn't turn.

It must be a false tumbler lock, Alex thinks as he retries his combination again.

The clicks he heard threw off Alex into getting the wrong combination by 'clicking' at another number instead of the correct one. So he begins again, going around and feeling for the point when the tumbler latches onto a notch inside the inner workings of the vault. He knows what the sound is when that happens but they sound almost identical, the fake and real clicks, it takes an expert to even have a vague idea of which one is which, and to be clear, Alex is not an expert at safecracking. It's always been one of his weaker abilities, no matter how much he has tried to improve at guessing or cracking combinations. After Alex tries another combination, he tries the handle again to no avail. Alex begins weighing up the chances of him taking more attempts before the police arrive, it wouldn't take him more than 30 seconds to leave the house via the same way he got in. So Alex tries again, a third time, and it doesn't open.

Frustrated, he lashes out at the ground with a muffled thump of his fist before looking back at the lock. Alex even tries again, one last time he tells himself, and it still doesn't open. He's so close to the prize, but can't get at it. Alex gets up quickly and opens a sliding door to the top floor balcony so he can hear the police coming. Alex goes back to the lock again and continues to try and break it's impervious stranglehold on the bed-safe's contents. A fifth try, a sixth try and a seventh try all fail to open up the safe. At this point he wishes that his sister Erin was here, she would have taken only one try to crack a safe he thinks, but she couldn't be persuaded to leave school to join him. 'Time's up', Alex thinks as he peers over the balcony and sees no flashing lights or sirens but a police car outside the property. Now is the time to bail, he thinks. Alex puts the cover back on the safe and then leaves the bedroom, running down one flight of stairs to go out the same way he went in. He sees the police car doors open and two officers go out as he peers over the balcony before going over the railing and onto the same cable. Compared to the lock cracking, this should be an easy feat for Alex to go straight over the top of them and away to safety.

The first few steps are predictably straight forward, using his cane to balance himself. Each step is a step further away from this failure of his, it's almost a sigh of relief to be doing this. However, in the same recurring motif of the night, Alex slips on the cable as he takes a step. He pulls his cane in to try and hang from the cable but the cable snaps as he comes down. Luckily for him, he falls onto the soft grass but the falling cable catches their attention. They turn on their flashlights and begin to scan for the intruder; not knowing or seeing that he is right in the open. Alex sees the flashlights searching over the lawn, the light not revealing a fallen raccoon. That raccoon gets back up and moves out of the way towards one of the pillars of the gate, wondering if he's a cat considering the amount of lives he's had tonight. Alex hears the officer's sailing into the intercom, asking for them to open up the gate. It's his ticket out of here, but he can't relax at all; if he does, he will be spotted. As the large motorised metal gate is slowly slid open into the wall the two officers walk in and Alex goes out, empty handed.

If there's one thing on his mind, it's that his trip to Indonesia ends now and the soonest way out of the country is his destination.