A slight announcement. As of this chapter 'The Swiftshadow Chronicles' as a whole now exceeds a hundred thousand words. So let's have a brief celebration.

YAY

I'd like to thank everyone who has joined me on this journey and hopefully continue with me. And newcomers, Welcome. hopefully you're all enjoying reading this story as much as I am writing it.

Anyways on with the show.

People were disappearing and Megamind didn't know why. He stared intently at the map before him. Pinned lines of thread trailed from various points of the map a leading to several missing person posters. There didn't seem any discernible pattern that he could see. The victims were both men and women, young and old. Ranging from a kind elderly lady by the name of Kathrine Schmitt and a wayward teen delinquent named Mark Thomas.

He forced every brain cell in his oversized head into overdrive trying to decode the clues. Numerous monitors stacked up on the wall played security cam footage on loop. No matter the angle or location they all told the same story. The victim going about their business before the camera would turn black for several moments before returning back to normal. Only for the victim would be gone without a trace.

Witness testimonies hung from the ceiling by threads. Similar stories were also painted on the pages. Here one minute, gone the next.

It all started about three weeks ago when the first disappearance occurred. A young man named Oswald lee. He had disappeared while walking home from work. At first It didn't seem out of the ordinary. Metrocity was a large place. People have been reported missing only to turn up a few hours later unharmed.

But as the hours turned into days, and the days turned into weeks and there was still no sign of the man. In the meantime more disappearances occurred. One every couple days for last three weeks. ten in all.

Megamind knit his brows in frustration. He was this cities hero for Pete's sake. He should have whoever's doing this thrown in prison by now. He tried numerous attempts at luring the felon out into the open to no avail. He had tried everything. Fireworks, dramatic proclamations, giant robots. Nothing seemed to work. The villain stubbornly remained hidden in the shadows. Plotting. Waiting. All Megamind do was wait until the made their move. It was infuriating.

"Sir, I got you some jelly donuts, your favourite," Megamind nearly jumped at the sound of minions voice. The piranha like fish eyed him concerningly from his tank. His mechanical gorilla suit held a box of decadent pastries in its hands.

"OH, thank you Minion," Megamind took donut and bit into it.

"Any closer to cracking that case, Sir?"

"I'm very close to break through, I can feel it," Megamind said as he reached to grab a hanging note, inspecting its contents. It unfortunately didn't reveal anything that he didn't already know. Sighing he reached for another.

"You know, Sir, you've been at this for hours and its getting pretty late, maybe you should get some sleep,"

"Sleep?! At a time like this?" He shouted, stomping on the ground, "People are going missing and it is my duty as this city's hero to find and rescue them. The more time wasted on things like sleep only increases the likelihood that they won't be found… well, alive,"

Megamind didn't want to consider the possibly that all the victims might already have met an unsavoury fate. That would mean he failed as this cities hero. A dark smudge to tarnish his fresh new start. His reputation ruined.

"Sir, if wear yourself out then you won't be in any condition to save anyone or defeat the bad guy. Not to mention Ms. Ritchi would say if she sound out you pulled another all nighter?" Minion gave him stern look. One that meant he should probably listen. Since the Tighten incident Megamind has been making effort to actually listen to his lifelong companion once in a while.

Megamind eyed a wastebasket overflowing with coffee cups. He been pulling a lot of all nighters. If Roxanne knew he was staying up all night again, she would probably kick his ass and trap him in his bedroom until he got a full night rest.

Trap.

"That's it!" He shouted.

"What's it?" Questioned a very confused Minion.

"We need a trap,"

"Good morning Metro City, This Is Roxanne Ritchi reporting from Megamind museum, reporting on another disappearance, as Bernard Stiller, the museums curator has been reported missing last night. This marks the eleventh abduction so far. While investigation are ongoing, few leads have presented themselves. Authorities have advised people to remain home at night or if you need to go out at night to not go out alone,"

"And cut," Roxanne's new cameraman, Calvin Booth, said as he turned the camera off, "you wanna go grab a coffee now? there's this joint down the street that saves the best cup of joe you ever had,"

"Maybe another time," Roxanne declined, "I promised a friend I'd do brunch with them. And after that I gotta help Megamind, Hopefully he's found something that leads to a break through,"

While she did have that planned for later in the day, she had also had scheduled brunch with Wayne. Despite everything the two had remained friends and decided to continue their little tradition of having brunch every so often.

"you both have been working nonstop on that case, you should take some time rest and relax. Otherwise you might burn yourself out,"

Roxanne sighed. She knew Calvin meant well, it was just that the mystery of these disappearances had clawed its way into her brain and refused to let go. And now Bernard was missing. While she and him had never been really close, barring the time Megamind took on his appearance, she still considered him a friend. He had been one of her main sources of information during Metro man's and Megamind's battles.

But then she had been nagging Megamind to take some rest once in a while.

"Maybe Tomorrow," She sighed.

"If you say so," Calvin hoisted the camera over his shoulder and wander over to the news van.

A pack of brainbots bowed overhead. Megamind had them patrolling the streets twenty-four seven. Their crimson eyes watching for any suspicious activity. A small comfort given the circumstances. Even with them people were still disappearing, leaving behind no evidence.

And she searched high and low for any clue or shred of evidence leading to anything. Another clue, hint, or the holy grail, the location of any of the victims. Yet no matter how hard she looked nothing ever turned up. At this point she would sell her left arm for any lead.

A loud crash threw Roxanne out of her thoughts. She immediately reached for the forget-me-stick on her belt. Calvin was also on high alert staring into the dark alley that the noise had emanated from. The two glanced at each other.

The carefully stalked the alleyway, inching closer. The brainbots had noticed her and Calvin's tense nature and were watching carefully. Their electric bogings filled the air.

Calvin pulled out a pair of brass knuckles. He wasn't the toughest looking man in the world, standing at the modest height of five foot eight, a head full of russet coloured hair and more freckles than stars in the sky. He at the very least looked like he had a steady workout routine.

Roxanne was partially thankful she wasn't alone right now.

A beast jumped out from the alley. Roxanne nearly swung at it before realizing what it was.

A dog. A simple stray mutt. it looked to be some sort cross between a lab, german shepherd, and a bit of husky. Mostly dark brown with a curled tail. In its maw was the leftover remains of a ham sandwich. It spotted the two humans and bolted down the street.

"Oh, it's just a dog," Roxanne heaved a sigh of relief as she lowered her weapon. She tried to steady her racing heart.

"Really? And here I thought it was the monster," Calvin chuckled.

"Anyways I gotta go. Tight schedules and all that," She said as she strode over to her car.

"Of course, just let me know if you know anything," said Calvin as stepped into the news van and drove off.

Roxanne was about to open her car door, she noticed a familiar figure leaning on a nearby streetlamp.

"The fearless Roxanne Ritchi spooked by a common mutt," He chuckled.

"Wayne, Didn't expect to see you so early,"

"We did plan brunch," he said matter of factly.

"You driving or am I?" She smirked.

"You know I never learned how to drive,"

"Anything new with you," Roxanne asked as the two of them buckled themselves in.

"Well I did have an interesting visiter last night,"

"A visitor? of what sort?" Roxanne's curiosity perked. The voracious reporter in her wanted all the details.

"A teenager, I think she's a runaway. I let her say in the school house for the night,"

"A runaway teen, huh, I wonder what she's running from. Did you get her name?"

"Ah, no, I guess I kinda forgot to ask. Too busy showing off my music skills. Gotta prepare for tonight's gig,"

"Now what establishment was desperate enough to hire you?"

Want shot her a glare, "Joe's tavern i'll have you know. Also My visiter was travelling with a fancy looking robot dinosaur. Really advanced looking too. The only reason I know Megamind didn't build it is because its white and blue, instead black with spikes,"

Metro man's visitor seemed like an interesting one to be sure. She could only hope that nothing nefarious comes of it. Heaven knows she and Megamind could only handle so much.

Swiftshadow stretched herself awake and pried herself off the floor of the dilapidated school house. Pinpricks of sunlight streamed in from the roof. She fortunately managed to find a dry enough spot to sleep. Wilson sat on a desk his eyes showing a somewhat board expression.

"Mornin' Wilson," Her spine popped as she sat up. The hard wooden floor was tough to sleep on. Her backpack served well as a pillow. She probably would've been more comfortable sleeping in dragon form, but she didn't feel comfortable transforming in front of Wayne.

"Morning, how was your sleep?"

"Well enough," Swiftshadow looked around and noticed that Wayne Scot was nowhere to be seen, "Where'd our generous host go?"

"He left a couple hours ago. Said he had to go visit a friend,"

"Well, at least that gives us some privacy," She pulled an old tome from her backpack. Dark cracked leather covered its bindings. Yellowed frayed pages peeked out around the edges. She carefully pried the pages apart with her metallic claws. She quickly found the page she was looking for, marked by a candy wrapper.

"You trying that again?"

"It is the only spell we've managed to translate halfway decently," Most of the page was written in latin as opposed to the half dozen other languages the rest of the book was written in. Each one of them occasionally crossing over into each other making almost impossible to translate with any accuracy. Only a codebreaker or linguist would've been able to decode the thing. All they had was a handful of of Julien's notes and what ever passages Wilson managed to decipher using Google Translate.

The page was titled 'illusions'. It featured a diagram of a man creating a duplicate of himself with a bunch of sparkles and shining rays coming off of the duplicate. The text read something along the lines of 'alterations of perception and make imaginings real'. Swiftshadow wasn't a hundred percent sure what that meant. Probably something along the lines of make magic copy of something.

She wished she had someone to teach her this magic. But the last person to bear the mark of The Wolf Spirit died centuries ago, along with all the other Beast Marked Champions. The spirits they heralded also fell to Malic Korvoth's darkness. Lost forever. She tried many times to contact The Wolf Spirit to no avail. Either she was doing it wrong or the The Wolf Spirit simply refused to answer for some reason.

So that left that Crawford guy. The mysterious man in the purple magicians outfit. She really only had only one experience with him as he guided her out of Malic's nightmare. He disappeared after that fiasco, and she'd hadn't seen neither cape nor feather of him. She kept a sharp eye out on any raven she'd encountered wondering if any of them were him in disguise. if any of them were he never revealed himself. Still she couldn't help but feel their ever watchful eyes on her everywhere she went.

Sighing she concentrated on following the fragmented instructions of the book. She felt for the power within as she would as if were summoning her soul fire. She imagined her dragon form before her. Sleek black scales, dark golden markings, powerful wings, sharp claws and sabre teeth.

A silvery cloud of mist formed before her. It took on a vague draconic shape. She tried to pull the magic together and shape it into something more tangible, but she could already feel it falling apart. She struggle to keep it stable but inevitably the scaffolding shattered. Dissipating in flurry of silver sparkling stars.

"I think you almost had it that time," Noted Wilson.

She panted from the effort. This magic thing was exhausting but she had to keep trying. After all what was the point of having magic if she didn't know how to use it? And an insurmountable enemy was on the rise, and she could use all the advantages she could get.