Disclaimer: See first chapter. Warning: This chapter has lots of cursing. I don't usually warn for that but this chapter is almost excessive.

Wary

Despite the general fear in the air, so thick it was almost possible to actually feel it, Whisper saw more than just a few people walking around without a care in the world. "What's your plan for this?" Orange asked next to her ear. Whisper saw someone else with a green wisp next to their head, babbling incessantly about food and why they wanted more of it.

Even in the rain, people were walking around like they didn't care about the lock down, and that nothing was wrong. More than a few had umbrellas, a few of the more aquatic people didn't even have coats on. "I don't know yet. Ask around?" Whisper suggested. She had to stop herself from rolling her eyes at it; of course no one would just answer her if she asked about anything. Maybe if she had an actual location, but it wasn't like anyone could just get that, either.

Orange watched as another orange gave her the side-eye, before Whisper caught a whispered, "Help me!" from them, a small leash tied to one of their legs leading to a small child, skipping happily along.

Whisper's and Orange's eyes met, and she immediately imbued herself into the variable wispon. Whisper darted to another alcove, crawling up the wall surprisingly quickly. The fire escape went all the way down to the street, which was unusual even here. She needed a vantage point, and it wasn't as if the orange wispon was actually loud. She reached the roof and hid under the ledges, trying to find the perfect spot. She found it easy enough.

No, the weapon was silent. What was loud was the sound of the trigger. And when the kid was halfway down the street, and no one else was going to see where it came from, Whisper pulled the trigger.

The leash suddenly went slack in the kid's hands as the material was cut near perfectly. The orange wisp immediately shouted a "Whee!" as it used its power to hover straight into the air. The kid stared at the broken leash, and the hovering wisp, before they started to stand still and cry.

Whisper ducked underneath the building's ledges. "That's what we should do," Whisper suggested.

Orange dis-imbued herself from the wispon. "You've lost me. Do what?"

"Find a vantage point. Find the weak connection, and weaken it further."

"Just like with the wisp?"

"Just like the wisp," Whisper agreed.

She popped her head off of the building's side, realizing she'd climbed nearly two stories without thinking about it. The rain pattered against her hood, and against the concrete all around her.

Her ear twitched as her radio clicked on. "Whisper, this is Amy," Amy's voice patched through. "I'm hoping you still have the old one, I could barely remember the frequencies-"

"I hear you Amy," Whisper said as she pulled down her mask.

"Oh good! I did remember the right one. Took me a few tries...anyways, you're...safe? You kind of walked out on us this morning."

"Taking care of the problem."

"That's Shadow's problem, not yours. Yours is to get used to what happened to you, and to rest."

"And I'm going to get rest at your place?" Whisper said, making sure her voice didn't have an accusatory tone to it. She wanted it to, though. With four kids, five if Sonic was included, their house was never going to be quiet.

"...Ouch. We could put you up somewhere else, you know...Just make sure you don't do anything that would be seeing you in jail, okay?"

"The laws haven't changed," Whisper answered. "The specifics may have, but they haven't. I wasn't gone that long."

"You know what I mean, Whisper. I'll be staying on here, so if you need anything...Mata! Thunder! Stop fighting this instant! Velocity, give the girls their chance-" Amy's voice trailed off. Whisper clicked it off with a sigh.

"If you need anything, good luck getting it," Orange said amused. "With four kids, I'm surprised she has time to even run around."

"I'm sure Sonic helps," Whisper said, defending her friend even though he wasn't there. Orange stared at her for a moment, and Whisper felt her eyes look decisively unimpressed. "Most of the time," she amended.

"Wait, what's that? Down there, third complex on the left," Orange pointed out. Whisper pulled up her scope.

"Just an old storage unit," Whisper said. Orange's eyes were pulled elsewhere, but the wolf stared at it a bit longer. There were various gang signs in there, and only some of the locks had been broken in. There was no code lock to get in, and the gate had long since been ripped off. "Good eyes, Orange," she complimented. Gang signs, the ones out for the Mayor's head were probably a powerful gang. Some other gangs in the area would probably have an idea of who they were.

"For what? Oh, I see!" Orange said. "How you going to get down? We don't have Green here for a hover?"

"Same way we got up. Just in reverse," Whisper said, resting the wispon on her back as she pulled herself over the side, finding the familiar handholds and footholds as she dropped to the ground.

"I think there was a lot less falling upwards when we went up. You ran up stairs, last time," Orange mollified herself. Whisper ignored her.

Whisper had figured her clothing would get her a few looks, or the least that her mask would. Instead, most of the people on the side streets here didn't bother looking at her. Some were drugged out of their mind, and some looked down on their luck, but most of them were fairly 'normal'.

The storage complex was nearly three blocks away, but it took only a few minutes before Whisper was at the fence. Her radio clicked on again. "Whisper. This is Shadow. Name your position," the dark hedgehog's baritone blared its way through her ears.

There was no sign anywhere, let alone any identifiers that she could see. "Corner next to Mary's Supply Chain," she rattled off as she looked at a nearby corner store.

There were a bunch of fences surrounding the storage area, some of it having ripped up barbed wire at the top. Most of it had come down since it had been put up, and Whisper could tell it would be mostly painless to climb through.

She heard voices through the radio as she jumped onto the chain, pulling herself up and over with ease. "The Faker knows where it is. Stay there, and don't do anything," Shadow's voice said.

"Understood," she responded instantly.

"You know they're going to take that as an acknowledgement. And then they're going to be mad that you didn't do as they said," Orange noted from around her head.

"I know. Let them be mad. I'm already in dangerous territory," Whisper answered. The warehouses seemed abandoned, and she could see more than one lock that had been busted open. Some of the doors were open, their contents spilled out onto the pavement.

There weren't any voices around, which tipped Whisper off that maybe this wasn't the actual hideout. Her eyes narrowed as she passed a corner, seeing a normal storage unit on the other side. What made it stand out was the brand new looking code lock. It didn't have the same amount of dust that most of the others did. "Found something," she warned Orange. She felt the wisp's acknowledgement more than she heard it.

It was a coded padlock, Whisper realized as she stepped up to it. The rain beat down on her hood as she knelt over it. "Think we can guess it?" Orange asked.

"No need," Whisper said, pulling out the wispon and putting it on the lightest amount of power. "Just keep focusing," she continued, aiming it with ease.

"Won't this get you into trouble if they find it?"

"They won't find it."

"That doesn't spark me with a lot of optimism, Whisper."

The lock broke as the orange sniper laser cut through it. It didn't fall, but rather spun in place a bit. Whisper caught it before it fell onto the ground. She hissed as it burnt onto her gloves. But the door was open, now.

"You sure this was the right door? I'd hate to break into someone's random storage unit."

"I know. Should be. Was the only one with a decent lock. I doubt anyone with the right mind uses this place. Did you see the gang signs on the main entrance?"

"Yes?"

"Each of those was another gang. And all of them were faded, some of them newer than others. This may be contested territory for all of them."

"This is going to be a lot of trouble, isn't it?"

Whisper unlatched the door, trying to open it as quietly as she could. In another moment, she was underneath it, the inside darker than anything outside. Rather than turning on a light, she just turned on the night vision in her mask, pulling it down to completely cover her face again.

Three islanders, sleeping in the corner. Each of them had what looked like a bag of drugs, dozens of line on the table between them. Two lizards and one dog, it seemed. They weren't awake, even with Whisper breaking her way in. The lizards were covered with tattoos, and the dog had plenty of fur paint to mimic them.

"Yes, it is," Whisper said, quieter than usual. They were surrounded by dozens of briefcases, some filled with various white powders that even she recognized as some form of drug, and loads of cash strapped together with rubber bands. There was a door on the far side, wide open. Whisper made for it, her boots silently hitting the ground as she ran. She was glad that she'd had some amount of stealth training, both from the old Diamond Cutters and the Neo Diamond Cutters. She wasn't exactly the best at it, but it was paramount when it was needed.

The inside of the door wasn't much better. It looked like an old kitchen, but it had been gutted except for the basics. Small pieces of crystal lie all over the place, and silently Whisper activated the gas mask feature of her mask. It had a small storage of air, only around half an hour, but it would enough she'd hope. She had a feeling she knew what this was.

Two people, humans this time, came in. They weren't wearing lab clothes, but base aprons and plain cloth shirts and pants. They weren't tattooed up like the others had been. Whisper dove behind a table, hoping that her silence was maintained. "Dammit, those islander fuckers outside left the door open again. You get it?" one of them asked.

The other answered in a much higher pitch. Female? Whisper couldn't tell just from body shape. "Those 'islander fuckers' are also better fucks than you lot," they answered. The door shut loudly, making Whisper jump a bit. "How much bleach shit do we need to add?"

"Four parts for each cup. Then we add some of the good stuff." They were mixing some form of liquids with another form, being very careful to measure everything out. Every word they said pounded into Whisper's head that these were probably very dangerous people.

"Fifty parts per million, really? Seems a bit high doesn't it?"

"It's what the boss wants. This is for sellin', not for our group. Be careful of all that, one blast and this whole thing goes kablooie." They pulled down an oven of some kind, slotting in the liquid. Or they'd mixed it with a solid, Whisper wasn't sure. She wasn't about to try to figure it out, either.

"Yeah yeah, I know what I'm doing," the higher pitched one said. "Alright. Getting baked. Five minutes before next check."

"Long enough for a game?"

"Probably not. Then again, with your luck...maybe."

Whisper stopped listening, glancing around the empty kitchen. There was another door, but this one was carefully shut, and it had rusted hinges. It wasn't going to be quiet to open up at all. But slightly above them was a small window, barely a crack open, leading to another room. She wasn't sure why there was a window leading to another room, but she'd have to do this quietly if she wanted to get out of this.

She made a mental note that next time she did something like this, listen to Orange and don't do it. She'd figured that the other gangs would know the truth about these 'Baragrafo Bullies', but unless she found someone particularly high up...She had to focus on getting out of here first. She could think about her plan later.

To get to it, she'd have to jump off the counter, bounce off a cabinet, and grab onto it without anyone seeing her. They were in a bright kitchen-esque area, so the likelihood of someone seeing her was pretty high.

"Hey, I still got some of the last batch. You want some?" the man's voice filtered into her ears again.

"Move! He's coming right for you!"

Orange's warning heeded, Whisper ducked underneath the table, glad that she was a lot shorter than most humans. She'd only met a few of them, long ago. Most of what she knew were the islanders, like Sonic and Tangle.

"Hells yes. Sign me up. Probably not a good idea to cook while coked out, but whatever. I'm game."

Oh gods they were going to be drugged out while handling explosive materials. She needed out of here, and fast. She didn't quite have what she had come for yet, but it was a start. The police could do something with the drugs. There was a sound of searching through a drawer, before one of them pulled out a couple of things that Whisper couldn't see. She heard the sound of a lighter flicking up, and the following puffs of smoke. She was never so grateful for her gas mask as she was now.

She waited another fifteen minutes before she felt that both were suitably distracted. They had finished whatever it was they were 'cooking', and was now sitting back and letting it cool and crystallize. They had what looked like a pipe in their hands, gently smoking something.

They looked drugged out and not paying attention. Perfect. Fortunately.

Whisper slid out from under the table, bouncing on top of the counter and off the cabinet. There were words being yelled, but they came out more as "Fucker fuck fuck fucker! Shit!"

If anyone could get anything from that, Whisper didn't know what it was.

She was definitely seen, but the two humans had just sat there shouting at her as she grabbed the window and wrenched it open in a single motion. The window led to another large warehouse, around six or eight of the storage units with the walls removed. It was obviously haphazard as they left most of the struts around. Whisper grabbed onto one, letting it sway before she hopped to the next one. Her idea of the door not being quiet was proved, as the door leading to the kitchen slammed open, the rust squeaking loudly. "Adaddaada!" the man screamed.

There were three people standing there, one of them sitting down. Maybe a gang boss or a warlord or however it was that gang's modeled themselves after. Maybe he knew something.

"Fuck, he's coked out and seeing shit that ain't there. Robinson, the fuck are you talking about? You sampling the product again?" the one sitting down asked. "You know we need that shit."

Whisper leapt from strut to strut, lighting cable to lighting cable. More than once she had to hold on or otherwise she would have fallen. She was forever grateful for the people who tore down a bunch of storage units and didn't bother making sure they were up to actual code. If they had, she'd have been a goner.

"Adkuck shads tor from!"

"Tory, visit Kelse and see that she's not coked out either. If they both are, take 'em downstairs till they sober up," the boss waved to the guy next to him. He immediately nodded, and grabbed the man, Robinson, on the arm hard as he went. The girl, Kelse or something, was marched out a moment later.

Whisper stopped on top of a small heater. She was light enough that it didn't move or fall, but it was still difficult keeping her balance.

"Think they managed to finish it up?" the boss was asked by the other tall man next to him.

"That a volunteer Ron? You volunteering?"

"I can cook boss, you know that. Not as well as those two, but I can do it."

"Yeah, go in there and finish it up. Don't try to sample the product. We'll let the big boss know what's going on, and she ain't gonna be happy if we don't have no updates or product. We need all this for the Bullies, else they'll come after us." Whisper's ears perked up. Well, that was easy. Her eyes narrowed a bit. Too easy.

Ron went to the kitchen, grumbling about the unfairness of putting all this shit on him. The boss didn't seem to care, but after the door was shut he sighed and pulled out the phone.

"Hey Hilda, this is Johnny. The two cooks got coked out so I'm having Ron finish up. Shouldn't be much of a delay, maybe only an hour if Ron has to re-do it."

Whisper nodded. That was it. A gang leader, or at least a higher up like this one, would probably only speak to another higher up. Find the chain, and cut it at the bottom. If she'd had Cyan with her, she would have imbued herself into the phone, finding the other side of the connection. Instead Whisper had to do this the older way.

"Yeah, I know I don't like it either. Just don't shoot me, yeah? I gave you more product than usual last time, don't that goodwill get carried over?"

Whisper pulled out her wispon. "Orange, think you can listen in without being seen?" she asked, quieter than even usual. She didn't get a response, but she saw Orange disimbue herself from the wispon, silently hovering behind the boss.

"Fine, fine, the usual spot, an hour later. Usual guarantees of product, yeah yeah," he said to the phone.

The door slammed open a moment later. "Boss! We got a problem!" one of the lizards that had been asleep yelled out. He was able to quite clearly see Orange behind the boss, and stood there with an open mouth.

"Well? Don't just stand there, say something!" the boss shouted.

"Wisp! Behind you!"

Orange took that moment to use her ability, rocketing up to the ceiling and imbue herself into the wispon. Unfortunately that left an orange trail of smoke showing quite visibly where Whisper was.

The boss turned, and his eyes followed the smoke trail.

Whisper shot down from the ladder, her cloak fanning out behind her as she landed on the desk, her weapon out and ready to fire. The solid wood thudded under her boots. "Usual place. Tell me where it is," she threatened.

The boss fell back to his chair and threatened to have it fall apart under him. "I...I...holy shit..." Whisper tried to channel everything she remembered about her 'Guardian Angel' days. Those had been long ago, even before this adventure, but the boss seemed terrified enough that she seemed to be doing a good job.

"Tell me!" Whisper once again said. There was very little chance of this working asides from the intimidation factor, but the fact she was using a wispon said she was, in general, a good person.

Of course, assuming that these people knew the myths behind wispon and wisps.

"Fine, fine! Holy shit. On the corner of Fairfield and Denmoor, the corner store. We break into the alley in the back!" the boss volunteered.

"Thank you," Whisper said, firing her wispon at the door next to the lizard behind both of them. The door exploded with a loud crash, and the lizard flailed to the ground. The smoke covering up her escape, she grabbed a rock and chucked it through one of the upper windows, using the smokescreen to exit out a way they wouldn't expect. Hopefully it'd give them the impression that she was more vigilante than mercenary. She crashed through another window, and started running far away from her exit point.

"So...that was cool. How much of that did you make up on the fly?" Orange asked her as she ran. She hadn't seemed to notice that Whisper was trying to run as fast as she possibly could. There was a crowd around the door lock that she'd broken, slowly muttering about what could do that kind of damage. Most of them were running back into the building with weapons armed.

"Almost all of it," Whisper admitted. "I took a few cues from Tangle."

"I could tell. By the way, that door shot-"

"Wait for it..." Whisper said, booking it away from the storage unit. Breath tore at her throat, but she knew she had made that shot. The door sparks probably wouldn't have hit anything, but there was some very sensitive equipment in that kitchen.

Not even a moment later the windows turned red as she felt and heard the explosion tear across the storage units. "Yeah. That. Did you know that would happen?"

"I wanted it to," Whisper said. "Tell me they didn't deserve it and I won't argue."

"Oh no, they deserved it. I'm doubting any of them were actually getting hurt by it though. Though he is just going to call that Hilda person and tell them you're coming."

"I expect him to."

"Alright, but that math ain't mathing. You got a plan?"

"No."

"...I'm not going to like this, am I? This is a Cyan plan. This sounds like a Cyan plan. Or a Pink plan. Is this a Pink plan?"

"This is a Shadow plan," Whisper admitted as she darted over the broken fence. She headed over to where she had told Shadow she was going to be.

Instead she just found Sonic, standing there with a worried look as he glanced over to the burning and broken storage unit. "Whisper! You're alright!" he shouted as he noticed her coming.

"I wasn't close to it," Whisper said.

"Yeah she was. Well, when it started. You didn't get any charcoal or anything, and you're lucky nothing else exploded," Orange muttered.

"Shadow went to check it out. Explosions on this side of town are...never a good sign," Sonic admitted. "We should head back to the car. Vio has the Tornado mostly fixed, she says," he finished, grabbing his crutch and trying to shuffle back to a small blue minivan.

"There's still one place left to check out. Do you know of a small alleyway on Denmoor and..."

"Fairfield."

"Fairfield," Whisper finished.

Sonic's eyes looked up. "I know the place you're talking about. Drug Alley, they call it. I've never figured out why the police don't do something. Where all the major sales go down."

"There's a buyer there tonight. Hilda."

"I'm not going to like how you know this information, am I?"

"Come on Sonic, where's your Restoration spirit! Although truthfully it's more Resistance spirit..."

"No, you aren't."

The hedgehog sighed, before he reached down for a small radio. "Shadow, this is Sonic. Whisper's here, she's okay. I don't see any sign of the explosion on her, but she wants to check out Drug Alley. Says that someone's going to be there tonight."

"Fine. Tell her I'm heading there too, she's not going alone."

"Shadow, she has me too. What, you think just because I'm crippled I'm not me?" Sonic asked, acting offended. Whisper could tell he wasn't, just trying to lighten up everything.

"It's because she has you that I'm worried. Go, then, but don't do anything stupid," Shadow warned.

Sonic rolled his eyes. "Honestly. I have kids now, I'm not going to do anything to risk that," he said aloud. The minivan started up easy, and Whisper was pleased to note that he was A) a much better driver than she thought he'd be, extremely safe and surprisingly slow, and B) a lot better than Lanolin was, to say nothing of Tangle.

Better than her, too, but she wasn't going to tell him that part.

And this is about where I lost the plot. It's still there. This is a mere detour.

Until Next Time.