Unexpected Trial

Alexis was a talented engineer, Levi, his younger brother, was a talented psychic! Together they were the crime duo of the city! Their fame preceded them. They were known to all, and the merchants guild, in fear of that duo, began incorporating new safety measures to try and counter the most feared criminals of the city of Curby. Alexis slammed his fist against Levi’s door, pounding on it “Bro come on! Get your lazy bum up! Tonight is the night!” 

“Huuhh?? Ughh..” grunted Levi, his grunts were shortly followed by a loud thump, and then a pained moan “ahh!! Ye ye.. Coming!”
Alexis sighed ‘that sleepy head…’ he thought to himself as he returned to the kitchen. A few short minutes later, Levi exited his room, and then he screamed as he came face to face with a head of a ghost sticking through the ceiling from the apartment above, where formerly, as he learned, a serial killer lived. 

“G’day mate! Might I trouble you with a simple question? What.. day of the week is it?”
Levi blinked a few times after catching his breath “It’s uhm.. Tuesday.”
“mmhh, I see, very well, thank ye mate!” replied the ghost before returning to his apartment.

“Which 1 was it this time?” inquired Alexis to which Levi replied in an annoyed tone “it was the uhh… what’s his name, headless Jerry? Or was it Henry?”
“Ah..” commented Alexis while preparing a steaming hot cup of chocolate for his brother. 

As the duo sat at the dining table in the small, run-down kitchen of their apartment, not the real apartment, this was their job apartment where they had pretend-lived for half a year now. Alexis placed a small, bottle-sized metal container on the table.
“Bro see this? My latest invention!”
Levi sipped on his hot chocolate “Oh lords what is it this time? A headache-inducing grenade? Or maybe laughing gas darts?”
“no no, it’s our distraction!”

Levi gasped. 

When Alex pressed a button on the side of the container and it hissed open. Levi raised his eyebrow “Really bro? Of all the things in the world ‘this’ is what you come up with as the perfect distraction plan?”
Alex grinned “hear this bro! We put a …”
“yeah nah that’s stupid…” “No no! Hear me out! If we have 1 of your ghost friends control this mech suit I made, it’ll make for a great distraction!” 

Levi shook his head “I’m not sure any w… wait.. Ohhhh I know who would agree to do it!” Alex nodded. “Yea, I thought you would know a ghost who’d love to go on a rampage in the most ridiculous mini-mech ever created!”
Levi glanced down at the suspended in a small container pickle mech suit “yeah… ridiculous isn’t the word I’d use… absurd is more like it.”
Alex pouted at him playfully “Oh come on bro! I spent a month making it! It’s the pinnacle of engineering!” 

“Alright, so the plan..” Alex rolled out a hand-drawn map of a casino, but no normal casino, this 1 was guarded by undead guards, the chief of security was a necromancer, and the executives were psychics who opted to use ghosts instead of security cameras. “Alright so.. We send in the mech through the service entrance, it’s small enough to get in through the vents.” “mhmmm” replied Levi while leaning on his arm. 

“Then he’ll sneak into the security armory and set off some grenades, and once the guards are distracted and their ghosts avert their attention, we walk in, through the front door, and straight down toward the vaul… bro?”
Alex lifted his gaze from the map and stared at his brother who had dozed off and was just snoring quietly while obviously enjoying whatever he’s dreaming about. Alex sighed, rolled up the map, and then slapped his brother across the face with it “UP AND AT IT LAD WE’RE GOING NOW!”

Levi snapped back awake, jumping up in his chair from the sudden slap
“Ah!? Huh? Yes! Great plan!” He grabbed his cup and chugged the rest of the hot chocolate. “Alright yea I’m set to let’s go! First stop, the abandoned theme park!”
“The park? Why?” inquired Alex to which Levi replied with a sly grin.
“Ohh, simple enough, I’ll have the crying clown Tom take over the mech. He loves doing stupid things, this is right up his alley!” 

After making their preparations and packing up. Alex opted to wear a tailored suit, while his brother wore a more eye-catching attire, although hardly eye-catching considering the nature of the casino they were about to rob. He wore a leather biker jacket, a large gold chain, an expensive gem decorated wristwatch, and biker pants, opting to look like a gang leader. 

They arrived at the abandoned theme park just outside the city, where roughly half a dozen ghosts that Levi had befriended, resided. After quick greetings and introductions, they were guided to where the crying clown Tom was. After a quick explanation that he was to pilot a mech suit made of pickle, and sneak into a casino guarded by the undead and the very dead, he was to set off to the ammo depot in the security rooms. Tom got a great giggle out of it and agreed without any further questions. 

And so the team was set, and they were on their way. Alex drove, Levi was talking with a ghost of a taxi driver who was catching a ride with them, and Tom was getting used to controlling his new temporary body.
“I get why pickles now!” said Tom curiously
“Oh?”
“yeah, somehow it’s super easy to possess something salty and fleshy.. I’m not sure why myself” replied Tom. 

Levi turned to face his brother
“Bro? You made that mech out of pickle because it’s easier for ghosts to possess it?”
Alex grinned “Yea! It’s the new research I was working on. Due to the nature and composition of…” The rest of the explanation bored Levi enough to fall asleep again. He awoke when the car came to a stop.
“So in short, yes, for some reason, ghosts have an easier time possessing pickles.”
“uhuh…” replied Levi as he glanced out the window of the car.

Behind the bushes, a dozen or so meters away was the casino they were to rob. “Let’s do this.” Tom disembarked and made his way to the service entrance, meanwhile, Alex turned the car around and stopped, awaiting the cue that was their entrance, in the shape of a loud explosion. In the meantime, Levi had to maintain a psychic connection with the ghost. 

He was passing over what Tom was reporting
“Approaching the door” “undead guards, 7 of them, patrolling.”
“Threw a rock at 1, three of those brain-dead idiots ran off in search of an intruder, and gave me an opening.”
“I’m by the vent, but it’s shut tight.”
“threw a rock in the went, 1 of the brain-dead idiots fired at it, gave me an opening, I am inside now”  

“Their vents are clean, squeaky clean” commented Tom as he made his way through and navigated the complex maze of interconnected building vents in search of the security ammo storage, checking the mini-map that was drawn up to him by Alex. It was surprisingly precise and accurate. Shortly after he found the storage, locked behind a bullet-proof glass wall, and a door, no way to sneak inside “Uhmm chief we got an issue..” he described to them the issue he had faced.

“Well” replied Alexis “I guess he’s in a… pickle” Levi snorted at the terrible pun.

“So, what now?” inquired Tom.
“Need I remind you that you’re a ghost? A ghost that can pass through solid objects! Go through and possess the lock or set off a grenade or something.”
Tom pondered about it for a moment “so wait… why did I need the mech suit made of pickle in the first place?” Levi passes his question on, to which Alex replied with a grin “I just wanted to make that joke…” 

Tom, unamused by Alex’s sense of humor quickly left the mech’s body he was possessing ‘Stupid.. Casual… normal… hmph! I’ll get him back! I’ll… hide all the toilet paper in his house! That bastard how dare he humiliate me like that…’ mumbled to himself Tom as he flew through the glass wall and glanced around the supply room.
“Hey you!”
“Yes?” replied Tom to a security ghost behind him.
“I’m going to sound the alarm!”
“Well I would expect no less from security!” replied Tom to the other ghost.

As the security ghost turned to leave in order to activate the alarm, Tom wasted no time, possessed a grenade on the shelf and began pushing the pin out. The security ghost panicked and possessed the pin, pushing himself back into the grenade. The battle was fierce as they both fought for the dominance of the grenade possession. But at last, one reigned supreme and forced the other to surrender. 

“So then the drunk man put his glass down and said…” Levi continued the joke but he was interrupted by a thunderous explosion that shook their car.
“Ohh, he succeeded, will have to offer a sacrifice for his hard work.” Alex drove the car to the casino.
“What kind of sacrifice?”
“oh, Tom actually loves candy!”
“Huh? But he’s a ghost, what does he do with it?”
“ah well he sucks the life out of it, or well, the essence to be precise ” replied Levi. 

Car came to a halt. The 2 exited it and handed the keys over to the valet. A few security guards were trying to calm the startled casino patrons down as a plume of smoke was escaping from behind the casino.
“Hoooo boy that was a big one huh?”
“Got the gear?” inquired Levi.
“Got your ghosts?” replied Alexis as he patted his fanny pack and grinned. The two ventured inside, to their surprise, nobody tried to stop them despite the fact that the rear 20% of their establishment had just become rubble. 

They practically danced their way through the crowd and the staff who were desperately attempting to calm the panicked crowd down.
“I heard a rumor…”
“hmm?” inquired Alexis.
“I heard the owner of the casino has a massive sweet tooth and loves hot chocolate.” “Focus!”
“yea yea but I heard she imports it from overseas.”
“So what?”
“Well, I thought I could steal some and try it.”
“We’re here to…”
“yeah yeah I know.. The dragon jewel, but a quick detour should be fine right?” 

As they walked down the stairs, Levi glanced around, and upon failing to spot any of the security ghosts he snapped his fingers, beside him appeared a ghost of a rat riding a cat “Roger, Stewart, scout ahead, find the vault, begin cracking the lock.” The rat nodded firmly at him and slammed the cat on the head, they disappeared as suddenly as they appeared.
“Good?”
“Great” replied Levi. 

They barely made it downstairs when two undead guards leaped at them from around the corner. Alexis dealt with the 1 that attacked him swiftly with the use of self-defense knowledge and a self-zipping pair of handcuffs. Levi on the other hand struggled at first, and then just pulled the soul out of the undead and banished it. The undead collapsed on the floor. 

“Didn’t know you could do that…”
Levi shrugged “didn’t know undead has souls, so… necromancy is a scam! They’re just psychics that force souls into dead bodies to power them…”
“So like what you did with Tom and my pickle mech?” joked Alex as he knelt by the door that led to the management hallway and pulled out a few gadgets to undo the lock. Levi chuckled “precisely that!” 

The lock beeped and then clicked, and the door creaked open. Levi peeked inside, the hallway behind it was long and dark “uhmm… you sure this is the way?”
“This is the way!” replied his brother, taking a firm step into the darkness.
Seemingly the walls and floor were all painted black, with barely any light sources around. “Ought to say, for a lover of sweets the owner has horrible decoration tastes” 

They walked down the hallway, and before reaching the end of it, they walked past a door that had a crooked sign above it ‘CEO’. Levi licked his lips, his heart pounded. Inside should be foreign hot chocolate. But a firm grasp of his brother on his wrist, and a powerful yank, snapped his focus back to what truly mattered, the vault. They made their way down the stairs and to the entrance to the vault. After a few doors and some bars, they stood before a gold-plated vault door.

As soon as Alexis reached for the door, Levi slapped his hand down and pulled his brother away “no! Don’t touch it!”
“What? Why?” Levi scanned the door up and down “It’s… not just a fancy-looking door… It’s a soul capture.” He snapped his fingers, but only the rat showed up, and even then, Stewart was missing a paw. Levi squinted at the ghost. 

Missing ghost and partly of the rat’s soul shape meant only that the ghost’s life force had been trapped by the door. “I need to summon those locked within it and undo the seal, then the door will be safe for ordinary humans…”
He glanced around “I understand why there are no more security ghosts around… When the alarm goes off, the vault absorbs the security ghosts to enhance itself.”
Alex raised his eyebrow “that’s possible?”

“Ghostly item enchantment, yes, now hush!” He gestured his brother to shut up, then pulled out a chalk and began drafting symbols and words on the ground before the door. As he finished up and began his chant, Alex stood guard by the entrance, but no one was coming. The ritual succeeded, ghosts were pouring out of the vault’s door by the dozens. A whole legion of them had been absorbed, and at last, the cat came out and the golden shine was no more. 

“Have at it” said Levi as he sat down on the ground, panting, then pulled out a hard candy from his pocket, unwrapped it and threw it in his mouth. Alex began his work with gadgets to undo the clever locks, with the assistance of the cat and rat, ghosts that had examined the lock from the inside.
“So, why sweets anyway?”
Levi shook his head “I don’t know.. Ghost work makes me have this massive sweet tooth and feel exhausted till I have some sugar…”
“So that explains your love for hot chocolate I guess..” 

The lock clicked at last. Levi lifted his gaze to look inside the vault as his brother slowly but confidently pushed the door open. Inside the vault, a small white room, sat a woman in black dress, sipping calmly on a steaming drink. On the table beside her lay a jewelry box. She grinned at the thieves
“At last!” Said the woman inside the room.
“Stacy?” exclaimed Alex as he glanced around the room “Why the hell are you here?”
She sighed “Why am I in my own establishment indeed? ” Alex’s eyes widened “Hmm…”

Levi got up and dusted his pants off “well that explains a lot of things.”
Alex sighed “sure does, but how’d you manage to hide your identity so well? We took half a year to prep for this job!”
She grinned “I run it from the shadows, the CEO is but a puppet I control.”
“Ah! Wise!” added Levi
“So uhmm.. We’ll.. Be on our way then!” Stuttered Alex.
“NOT so fast!” she placed the cup down, got up and picked up the jewelry box. Walking over to the brothers.  

She handed the box over to Alex and then walked past him. “This was a test, you both passed spectacularly. Follow me, I have a proposal.” Alex opened the box to peek inside, it was indeed, the dragon jewel, he gasped “uhmm.. O..okay” he replied, following her. Levi quietly followed them to her office, where they discussed something that no one else was meant to hear. And on this, the tale of two brothers ends!