Xaviers!

An unmarked entirely inconspicuous Ford Transit was parked on Maldon High Street, left overnight -- nothing even remotely interesting or noteworthy about that.


Inside the van, however, Will and anyone who was concerned about the recent string of unremarkable break-ins would be waiting. The van was filled with high-tech monitoring equipment, police scanners, wired connections to the burglar systems on the local street, a posse of college students who like to punch things, and enough coffee and sugary snacks to keep a bull elephant on it's toes for weeks -- this wasn't Will's first rodeo.

With nothing to do at the moment but wait, Will had his feet on the dash, as he kept one eye on the alarm monitoring systems. There was no guarantee that another break-in would happen tonight, but some statistical modeling and some good old fashioned guess work had tonight as likely as anything else, and he was going to be ready for it.

((open))

Tosh was in the back, manning the high-tech equipment. Unlike Will, most of his experience with stakeouts came from watching cop shows.

"Yanno, this is a lot like science. Hours of watching equipment to see if anything happens," he said, popping a handful of goldfish crackers, "Just with more potential punching if anything does."

"The glamorous life of a crime fighter. It's not all sound effects and one liners," Will said, with a small chuckle.

"The slow pace is almost refreshing after all the nonsense we usually put up with."

"Tell me about it. Something straightforward and clear is just what the doctor ordered."

"Well, as clear as something based on a gut suspicion can be."

"But, hey, there are worse things than snacking and talking all night."

"Well, hopefully our larcenous friend won't keep us waiting. And hopefully, they'll have a darn good explanation, because I still don't get what's going on here."

"If they're guilty of anything it's breaking and entering. Or maybe just trespassing as there's been no damage."

Maybe it's a ghost Bro.

Not sure those exist buddy.

"Yeah, we're not dealing with a criminal mastermind here -- and I somehow doubt that they've been, I dunno, planting bombs or something to set up for some sort of dastardly..."

Will was interrupted by some lights flashing on the status monitor -- an alarm!

"Willow & Fox", Will said, checking the results. "Discount fashion and homewears store, just off the high street. Fits the pattern of going cheaper and more downscale, and the location is right, too."

"Well then, step on it," he said as he strapped in.

"Hah! I always wanted to say that."

Will rolled his eyes at that -- just a little bit, but it was there -- and slowly moved the van out and around the block, so as to not draw attention.

The front of the Willow & Fox seemed quiet -- they could see the alarm light flashing inside; it had definitely been triggered, which meant that something had passed through it's sensor region inside. But there was no sign of forced entry; no sign of forced exit, and the door was still locked.

"Well, that's... unusual. Could be a phaser or a teleporter, but that shouldn't trigger a simple door alarm," Tosh said, preparing his scanning tool.

"Investigation time?"

"Investigation time," Will agreed, walking up the door, and sticking his finger into the lock, looking to the side for one moment as he felt the tumblers, and then opened the door with a click.

"Lock wasn't manipulated with, as far as I can tell," he said, going to shut the alarm off -- first thing's first.

Tosh walked along the storefront, waving his device towards the glass.

"If a phasing mutant passed through, I assume there'd be some molecular distortion. Granted, it could easily be too minor for me to find without taking a sample."

Tosh's scanner didn't detect any molecular distortion in the glass, probably ruling out that someone had phased through it.

"I suppose they could have just had a key, but I somehow doubt that the owners of the store would be handing those out like candy." Will said, producing a flashlight and shining it along the storefront -- rows of clothes, accessories, jewelry, both on display and on racks; bath and body supplies, candles, cards, cushions, and even some things that didn't begin with the letter 'C'. All in all, not the sort of shop that either Will or Tosh would normally spend much time in.

"A glasses case with a little dog on the front -- think Tereza would disembowl me or defenestrate me if I got one for her?" he joked.

"Possibly both."

He looked at the open door with hesitation.

"I just hope we don't get arrested ourselves for going in there."

"We're X-Men. We're working with X-Corp, on an official mission from the university. We're law enforcement," Will said, with an authoritative air. "We're the good guys, remember?"

He relaxed.

"I don't know about us being law enforcement, but I see your point," he said, heading in. He kept his scanner out, checking for anything out of the ordinary.

"Well, call us what we will, but I doubt the police would have been cooperative with me asking questions about the alarm system if they were just going to show up and arrest us," Will laughed.


Still no signs of molecular distortion on the scanner, but the ambient temperature was a bit warmer -- as if something with body heat had walked through here moments before.

"I'm getting a residual heat signature," he said quietly, for the first time truly believing there was something more than a bizarre coincidence going on, "So something was just here."

"I knew it," Will said, knowing it. "But I don't see anything.

Invisible, do you think?"

"It's a distinct possibility," he said, using his scanner to follow the heat trail as far as he could before it cooled.

The heat trail was strangely meandering, leading Will and Tosh in a couple loops and twists around the shop floor -- it must have been moving quite fast to leave this long of a trail in the time it took for the two of them to drive over. Around past the three mannequins in the center of the menswear department, past the jewelry case, through rows of scented candles, behind the counter where the register was, into and out of the back store room, and then back to the the two mannequins in the center of the menswear department...

...

"What the hell is going on here?" Tosh pondered, scratching the back of his head.

Then he frowned at the mannequins, "Umm... Weren't there three of these?"

Will looked back. "Well, there's not now."

"So... an invisible man with a mannequin fetish? That's the least creepy explanation anyway," he said scanning where the mannequin should be, for lack of anything else more productive to do other than continuing to chase hot air.

Will shook his head. "If it was a fetish, I think we'd have found, erm, signs at some of the other locations," he said. "And nothing's been stolen before..."

Maybe the mannequin is the thief. Oooooh.

Not funny Bruce.

"Unless..." he muttered, looking around nervously despite himself.

"Unless...?" Will prompted. "No telepaths on this mission, my friend."

"Nothing. Just my imagination acting up," he answered. He felt silly as he resumed following the heat trail.

"And maybe you should guard the door so they can't escape. Assuming they haven't already or can't just walk through you."

He wouldn't feel silly for long.

As he continued to walk through the store, there was a clattering behind him -- a hat-rack had fallen over as something had rushed by it, and there was commotion behind the counter as something small tried to get back past the detective duo.

Tosh whirled around, using his highly customized sci-phone as a flashlight as he rushed after the small form. In the back of his mind, he hoped it wasn't going to get a face full of alien wing-wong.

No alien wing-wong to be seen, but a flash of green as the figure darted into the back room was at least not entirely unfamiliar...

Tosh quickly set his device to look for foreign dimensional signatures, filtering out the large source that was Will. He'd save an annoyed groan for when he knew it was called for.

Yup. Annoyed groan time.

The small Will had dashed back into the back room, and was pretty well hidden from sight -- though that obviously didn't stop the dimensional scanner mabob from zeroing on on a pile of shoeboxes in the corner.

"Well, I've identified your mystery culprit," Tosh groaned, "A wayward you."

He quietly motioned towards the shoeboxes, mouthing, "Trap him."

"Ah, hell," Will moaned, as he snuck around to the back of the shoeboxes. With a lunge, he tried to grab at them -- only for one pair of shoes to fly up in the air, kick him in the chin, and try to escape past Tosh.

Tosh attempted to pin a fleeing shoe under his foot.

Well, he was half successful, at the very least, pinning a sneaker under his right foot. That left the other one hopping along, out towards the front door and (presumably) the street.

The sneaker under his foot twisted and turned, trying to break free.

Tosh holstered his device into his unstable molecule belt and morphed into Bruce. He was glad he suited up for this.

"Sorry 'bout this little dude."

Bruce pushed down onto the shoe and gave it a light jolt.