The Chained Watcher

Another Meeting

~~~

The ringing of a bell echoed through the empty halls of the base.

"Alright people, you know the drill. Standard weekly meeting stuff. Anyone got something new we should know?"

Ever since Grian had started dropping in on their meetings, the dress code had gotten noticeably more lax for most members of the Secret Seekers. It just felt a lot less secretive when the subject of their investigations would show up in the middle of a discussion about him. Combine that with the difficulties most of them had with getting all the bits and bobs to sit right, and most of them were settling for a themed cloak and a mask.

Tango raised his hand to get attention, setting an empty piece of paper on the table and activating the quill. He started speaking, and it started writing. "So we've got this thing now. It writes down what it hears. Also, before I forget, Grian found the base." A chorus of groans rose from the table. "I was theorizing with Cleo, and Grian showed up. He offered a so-called 'milestone reward' since we collected so much stuff, and proceeded to... well, let me just play the video."

Fiddling with his communicator, he got the video he took up and running for the others, remaining silent as it played. They all crowded around, watching the feather as it changed from white to purple and began to write. Tango also set out the transcript it had written of the conversation, just in case any of them could make something of it.

Managing to stick to previously established protocol, they all remained silent and let the video play through in its entirety before asking questions. There was a chaotic couple of seconds where they all tried to speak at once, before order returned and one request came forth. Ren rewound the video back to right before Grian changed the feather and asked, "Can someone put this in slow-mo for me? I want to get a good look at how he enchanted the feather."

After the required settings were adjusted, he started the video again, watching with singular focus as the purple color traveled from where Grian's fingers were touching, down the length of the quill, and into the fluffy parts of the feather. It was actually a lot more methodical than Tango had been expecting, considering the speed with which it had been done.

Ren leaned back with a sigh. "I will admit, I was expecting to see... I don't know, something more? For all appearances, it looks like all he did was color it purple." He looked at the diligently scribbling feather. "But that's clearly not the case."

Impulse nodded, "Yeah, same. Before we get too caught up discussing this one topic, is there anything else we should keep in mind?"

Oh! Tango glanced at the trio at their card table, only half their attention on their game. "I actually have a question for those three over there, if they don't mind." All three looked up in surprise. "When I was talking to Grian, he said he doesn't really care if you talk about what you were doing before you found his secret. He also didn't tell me himself, but that's not really surprising. So if you don't mind me asking, what were you three doing for over a day where you answered not a single message?"

All three of them wilted slightly under the curious gazes of the other Hermits, faces twisted by... Embarrassment? Several more seconds pass before Doc finally mumbles, "We might have, just a little, gone out past the signal towers to burn a temple..."

Pearl was quick to throw him under the bus, grumbling quietly, "You're the one who insisted on going out to test your new design yourself. We just tagged along to try to keep you out of trouble."

Tango brought forth the main question for this subject. "Okay, but how did you learn Grian's secret?"

Though he hadn't thought it possible, their faces got even redder. "Fine, we were dumb, we got caught, he got us out before anything bad could happen."