“Before you launch into your whole plan and we get caught up in the details and I let you distract me,” Olivia said, sliding a receipt across the table, “reimburse me for the new phone. You said you would.”

“Yeah, yeah.” I found my wallet and counted out the cash I owed her.

“Now tell me how you could possibly think knocking over Pishon Industries was a good idea.”

“Well, in my defense, I didn’t know that was where we were going until after making a very aggressive sales pitch to a well-guarded foreign man.”

“You mean giving up all your trade secrets?” Liv asked.

“Not all of- no, I was clearing a background check, so that I could work with a very well-paying client. And, um, it became much more difficult to turn down the job once I’d worked that hard to convince him to let me take it.”

“Luke. The plan. Spill.”

I nodded. “Right. So, Pishon’s a high-security place. You got a lot of tech-based powers in one spot, you’re gonna be dealing with state of the art security systems. But powers just go to whoever gets them, you know? Whatever controls that, it’s not some merit-based program. You can know the ins and outs of building a great security system, but who says you know how to use a great security system?”

“Did any of what you just said mean anything?” Olivia took a bite of her fish.

“Ahem. I’m saying that the weak link in the security at Pishon is the same thing that’s always the weak link in the security. It’s the people.”

“So what?”

“So wh- Do you have to break my flow, Liv? I’m laying out the whole operation, here.”

She took a drink of wine.

“Anyway,” I said, “these techie types always want to feel so smart that they end up doing the dumbest shit. I honestly bet most of their security is automated, which means that as long as we’re fooling their computers, we’re fooling everyone in the building. They’re not gonna double-check anything. We waltz right in, take what Davor Kolyich wants, and piss off.”

“That’s not a plan. That’s just you underestimating your enemy.”

I sighed. “Work with me, here, okay? We’ve gotten through- that was the hook, that’s like the introduction paragraph. I work through the details after I have your attention.”

“Lucas, this is a one-on-one meeting about something I specifically asked you to clear up. You don’t need to get my attention.”

“You really have no appreciation for showmanship,” I complained.

“No reason to waste it on me, then.”

“Fine. Whatever. Pishon uses RFID badges, right?”

“How should I know?”

“Well, they do. That’s the case, it’s true. Mae can clone RFID signals, with, um. That gizmo she has. That’s how we got into Touro to pick up all that medical equipment for the laundromat.”

“I still don’t think we should’ve robbed a school, to be honest.”

“Again, did you want to steal equipment from a hospital, instead, Liv?”

“Why didn’t you just buy Lazuli’s equipment?”

“She operates at enough of a loss as-is. Hey, we’re off-topic, right?”

Liv rolled her eyes.

“So, we load up everyone I’ll need for the plan, and we stake out Pishon, right?”

“Wait, who all do you need for this plan? How many moving parts are- how many of your employees are about to go out of town at the same time?”

“Liv, we’re getting paid enough for this to bribe everyone who would ever notice that. Try to keep up.”

“Some people don’t take bribes,” Liv insisted.

“That is a fascinating theory, and if it were true, we’d be able to figure out some other arrangement.”

“Who all are you trying to bring on this trip, Luke?”

“Right. Well, there’s me, I’m going. I could very much use Mister Spot’s help.”

Olivia grunted in annoyance.

“Caleb’s gonna be our chauffeur. Big truck, you know, room for the people and the gear we’re taking. Samuel and Mae are going to get me into the building. It wouldn’t be the worst idea to bring Buridan.”

“Why?”

“Oh, just in case. Three powers are better than two, right?”

“Is that all?” she asked.

“I think so, yeah. That’s the lineup I’ve got in mind.”

“And the plan?”

“I was getting to that,” I said, curt. I had been planning to launch into the explanation right away, but just to rebel against being rushed, I used my milkshake to delay for a few more seconds.

“Any time now,” Liv said.

I could take the brain freeze, if it meant not blinking first.

Once I had established a comfortable silence, I ignored her rolling her eyes and started explaining how we were going to pull this off.

“We all load up our gear in Caleb’s truck, set up the hidden part of the trailer as a mobile base of operations. Your power should reinforce that false wall, right?”

“Sure, maybe. I don’t know.”

“Well, I think it will. We set up our hidden base in the trailer, and we all head to California. We case Pishon. I’m sure I can follow an employee home, and I’m certain that their house is going to be less fortified than the main building we’re targeting. I pick up a badge, I get it to the base, and we can work up a fake with no trouble. Mae clones the RFID signal, Samuel’s going to have his printing equipment to pretty it up, and we’ve got the keys to the castle. I sneak the badge back to the employee, it never gets reported missing, and boom. Free reign of Pishon Industries, no questions asked.”

“What if they keep the badges in the building?” Liv asked.

“Ha. ‘What if they keep the badges-‘ Yeah, like I’d forget to plan around them keeping the badges in the building,” I said, in a mocking tone. Fuck. What do I do if they keep the badges in the building? “You know the old, uh, ladder trick?”

“Pishon Industries is not falling for the ladder trick, Luke.”

“Duh. Take a joke, come on.” Think!

“Hilarious,” she said, monotone.

“How about this? That building, it’s going to have some point of infiltration once my power is in the mix. I can get in after hours, with everything locked up, dodge one or two night guards, and take as many badges as I want from the little security checkpoint where grunts pick up and drop off their ID for the day. Same plan after that. Mae and Samuel get a replica worked up, I put the real badges back to avoid suspicion. And, um, I guess I put the fake one there, too, and I get it from the door guard on my way in.”

“You won’t be on the shift schedule. Or in the system at all, if they check for that.”

“And that is where my roguish charm comes in, Liv.”

She snorted. Rude.

“Account for the human element, here,” I said. “I just tell the guards I’m here on an off-day, I’m dropping in to say hi to a friend, and I’ll need my badge to get around the building. That’s a totally believable story, and the badge will be there, so it’d be insane to call me out on it. They don’t want to feel insane. They work at a freaking tech startup. The last thing they want to do is look stupid.”

“You can’t plan around other people doing what you want, Lucas. That’s how you get caught, again.”

“I’m planning around other people doing what they want! Put yourself in that situation. Sure, you don’t recognize this person, but they’ve got their badge in the badge pile or whatever, it looks official, and all they’re asking to do is take their badge to walk around the building. You’re going to keep the peace, socially. There’s no good reason not to think that would work.”

“I’m- Whatever. What’s your plan when you’ve gotten into the building?”

“Oh, I leave a rat in the truck, I pick up the computer I’m supposed to steal, and I teleport out of the building. Duh.”

“What about the security footage of you doing that?”

“We’d have one of their computers. An in-network device. Mae works her magic, gets rid of that stuff hacker-style, and we ride into the sunset.” I made a sweeping gesture with my arm.

“What if it’s CCTV?”

“What if it what?”

“What if the cameras aren’t on the same network as the stolen computer?”

“Um. That- What do you mean?”

“Fuck’s sake, how do survive in this day and age?”

“Alright, I’ve got it. This is urban California we’re talking about. I bring a mask, nobody’s batting an eye. I lower it just the one time, to get checked in at the door and pick up my badge, and it stops cameras from getting anything useful on me for the rest of the visit. Easy-peasy. The photo on the badge is too small to get picked up by a camera, and the fact that I’m wearing a badge means I don’t look out of place on my way to the computer.”

“What if someone thinks you’re an actual employee and they try to make you help them with something?”

“See, now you’re just throwing out edge cases to try and make it seem like a bad plan. It’s not a bad plan, Liv, this is going to work. Come on, tell me you’re on board.”

“It’s not that unlikely.”

“Fine. If someone asks me to help them, I’ll say ‘fuck off,’ and by the time they get to the HR office to report me, I’ve teleported out of the building with the stupid hard drive. We good?”

“Am I seriously only coming to make the truck less suspicious?”

“Oh! Right, no, I need you to charge the badges with your power. The fake badge, it’s already going to look right and it’s already going to work on the RFID scanners, but you’re going to sell it just that little bit more.”

“Mm.”

“Come on. You know this is going to work.”

“I hope this is going to work,” she relented.

“That’s the spirit.”

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