Chapter 2

Nothing happens quickly, we spent the night in our room on the second floor. Security moved into an adjoining room, and the room across the hallway. The manager brought our dinner himself, and security brought us some clothes, and the chocolate that remained from our shopping trip.

The hotel safes were gone, all three of them. Nothing else seemed to be touched. I did get a call during breakfast from the purchaser I had hired to acquire the watch. She informed me the auction would be on Wednesday, and asked for an upper limit. I told her 500k, but to call if it went over that so I could up my bid.

Just before lunch we were informed that the room was ready for our return. We did a quick tour, then security took us to a delightful little bistro, and a museum. The museum of art was a wonderful place to visit.

We finally got to spend Tuesday night back in our bed. After Nora was asleep, I decided to do a little investigating. I cloaked myself, and used my power to open a hole in the skylight above the bed. After passing thru, I closed the hole back up.

I had to uncloak my phone, and checked the route to Haener’s house. I also put in on airplane mode, then cloaked against all radio and light, I lifted into the sky, and arrowed towards Alt-Zuerst.

The house was dark, as I circled it, scanning. No one home. There was police tape at the front door. I found several safes and hidden compartments, but they were either open or empty. I scanned the rest of the property, there was a large truck with a boat hauler attached, but no boat. I scanned out as far as I could, but found nothing of interest.

The lake by the house was huge, and with the boat hauler the boat could be anywhere. I didn’t want to spend all night searching for information, so I lifted back up, and returned the way I came. On the way back I got the idea to grab the air in front of me, and shape it as a windshield. It was a much more comfortable flight back.

My new 16 gram storage slot arrived just as I got back to the hotel. I checked my energy corridor, and found it about 40% wider than it was after the last new slot. I did a quick check, and discovered that increasing a circle by about 40% doubled the area. I now had a specific correlation between energy growth, and storage slots.

As I floated in the air above the hotel, I suddenly realized I hadn’t checked something important. My senses reached out, and I found a small bug. I brought it to me, and stuck it in a free storage slot.

Next would be interesting, would it still be alive when I conjured it? I conjured it into my palm, where it walked around, before leaping into the air to fly away. I conjured a second, and it did the almost same exact thing. The next 20 repeated the same actions.

It was clear that they were all alive and duplicates. This had profound implications. At my current growth rate I would pass 1 kilogram in storage capacity by the end of the month. By the end of December it would be measured in tonnes. Could I duplicate myself? I already planned to do so, in a sense, but that was a dopleganger that would die and be buried or cremated.

I flew off out of the city again. I found a small house in the woods. There was an older man sleeping, I cast out my senses and discovered a deer. There was sufficient raw materials, so I began to copy the man using my power to control atoms, converting the deer into an exact duplicate.

There was a bit of extra that I dissolved. I looked down, the naked man lay in the grass. No heartbeat, an exact duplicate on an atomic scale, but not alive. I reached out and shocked the body. It twitched, but no heartbeat. I carefully scanned the man inside to see what I was missing, and I couldn’t tell. I tried filling the lungs with oxygen, and shocking the heart again. It beat once, then quit. I began using my power to make the heart beat, making sure the body was at the proper temperature. I injected power into the brain, thinking maybe it needed an electrochemical jump start. Nothing, it would not live.

I touched the body, and converted it to energy. I lifted up, and moved thru the woods. I was looking for a baby mouse. Eventually I found a small nest. My power grabbed onto the smallest, and brought the frightened animal to my hand, where I slotted it into my new 16g storage spot.

I conjured it back into my hand, holding it tight as it struggled to free itself. I returned it to the nest. As I passed the house of the sleeping man whose duplicate would not live, I touched the thin single pane window, and conjured mice into the living room. With a smile I returned to the hotel, leaving my dozen presents behind.

The next morning I enjoyed a wake up shower with Nora, the one with the special surprise. We had lost some privacy with security’s new presence, but there was one advantage, they brought in a chef every morning to make breakfast.

While eating Christian would go thru the items on our list for the day. After breakfast they would plan a tourist expedition to a variety of places. Today was the toy museum and the watch museum. With a nice lunch somewhere in the middle.

We enjoyed ourselves, and got to play tourist. I put my remaining diamonds in my conjuring storage, and simply enjoyed Zurich. But behind everything I was waiting for the next shoe to drop.

Thursday Rebecca arrived at the airport, was picked up by security and brought to the hotel. She had a neighboring room, where security brought her luggage, but I was waiting at the door to greet her with a big hug.

“Uncle Adam, you look great!” she said, stepping back to hold me at arms length.

I gave her a good look as well. “You look a little rumpled. Did you fly first class?”

“It was full, I flew business class.” she admitted. “But business class on Swiss Air is really really good.”