Shisha and the Wizard

Sisha looken nervously around as she proceeded

She was pretty sure she hadn't been spotted, but didn't want to take any chances.
Spotted by anyone that mattered anyway.

Too many snoopies, too many dirty phones.
She didn't have a clean phone...
Hadn't had one for ages.
Thus the radio silence.

It hadn't bothered her overmuch till now...
Her advanced degree in discretion being second nature

She quickly checked that she didn't have a tail then proceeded.

This was her third attempt...
She had to find the wizard.
She HAD to find him...

Casually she locked eyes with the barista, silently mouthing the words
"the wizard"
He tightlipped, shook his head.

She left with a nod...

The wizard, well, that's how some knew him...
techno jargon for the technicallly gifted...

Also a hacker callsign...

Laser grid, laser grid...
How the fuck was she supposed to get past a laser grid?

Drop 30 pounds, lycra up and gymnast like it was oceans 13?
Year right...

Perhaps rumplestilskin would knit her a fairy palace while she was at it...

It was beyond her, but she needed an answer.
And she knew the wizard would have a hack, or could get one...

Wherever he was, discrete as usual...

The street was thronging but she was focussed on on her thoughts, and alert for watchers so she almost missed the cue.

A psychedelically dressed, somewhat wizened old woman was flicking a lighter nearby, and when she locked eyes with her she
saw the glint of intention...

"Back of ashwood and vine street", she said widely with a knowing look.

Then she flicked her ligher again in front of her and opened her eyes and tilted her head slightly as if to say, "get it?"

Shisha got it.

"Thanks" she said solidly.

OK, street flare...

It took about half an hour to find a glowstick and make it to the referenced back alley

She had written "Q? laser grid? SHSHA" on the glowstick and cracked it, leaving it haphazardly yet carefully discretely in a darkened nook.
SHSHA was her graffiti handle when she was in high school.
She smiled, briefly recalling good times.
Long since graduated...

OK nothing to do now but to wait.

A quick dinner, coffee, back to her abode...

A very handly and artfully decorated roller door entrance art studio cum workshop come bedroom cum kitchen as it was.

There were two expensive hotels next door which she had taken the liberty of providing herself electronic masterkey cards for,
partly as an excercise, and also, uselful.
So she could shower and bathe and have her ablutions in luxury.
So the sparse furnishings were fine for the moment...
She didn't plan to be there for too much longer...
just long enough to grab what was required...

Then a few months on the french riviera perhaps...
or somewhere exciting...
Somewhere to get clean, some clean id ...
A bit of time for any scents to go cold...

Maybe even a clean phone...

Here's hoping...

OK. Sleep time...
Nothing to do but wait...

She slept...
The kind of tense adrenalin teased sleep of someone waiting for a big event the next day...
It was ok, microsleep worthy, restorative, yet somewhere her system couldn't let her completely go deep.

To let her guard down enough to sleep that hard, till she had this done...

But she was experienced enough to know she needed the rest so she didn't make mistakes...

The laser grid had her stumped,
and that troubled her...
She was an independant type...liked to be and feel in control...
It galled her to ask for help. But the wizard was help she know she could count on...

She just needed it soon, real soon.
Like REAL soon.

3AM, her eyes opened and she was awake again...

Back to it...

At the back of ashwood and vine, the romantic and boutique cobbled laneway did not dissapoint her.
There was her somewhat dimmed glowstick, with another brighter flare next to it.

It had "ANSW: Door3 WZ" written on it...

She strode eagerly the the entrance of the third door of the laneway.
It had a sometimes flickering neon above it, the kind that seemed to be affected by body capacitance as, if you aproached it, it stopped flickering and stayed on...

And there was her answer, written clearly in the language only the initated could understand...
three flattened baloons next to a toy plastic helicpoter lay in the entranceway.
on the left side of the entrance a plastic fly was glued and circled in orange.

Of course...

He was a geniuus...

She might have thought of it too, now that she had the idea, but she was thinking along diffrent lines...
A mental ricochet from striking the unexpected roadblock...
The solution was easy of course in hindsight...

But that simplicity too was part of his genius...

Thanks wizard, she thought solidly.
Another one I owe you...

She cleaned up the glowsticks and the baloons and other items, depositing them in different bins several blocks apart, just to be safe...

That was it then...
No gymnastics required...

"Fly on the wall" wifi camera to observe the beam patterns
Remote control helium baloon helicopter to navigate the space above the laser grid and grab the goods.
She could modify one of those pretty simply.
And they had the advantage of being usefully quiet.
A remote control helicopeter itself could also be used, but had the disadvantage of crashing to the floor if it lost power.
A helium baloon filled remote could be made lighter and could be made to fail safe to float up if it lost power...

All the details she could could work out, she just needed the shape of the solution...

She relaxed inside...
OK. She knew she could do this now...

Back to it...