Magic As A Whole

Chapter 11

* Two Months Later, OCTA Expo *

"Welcome OCTA insiders, blogger, and journalists. We're delighted that you've joined us to participate in our special event. Today marks the beginning of a bright new journey in social networking. Our latest product, Octa 8..." I recite back stage in a false British accent while watching the other stage crew work around me and I finish what I was supposed to say and make my way to fiddle with some of technical things back here waiting for the others to get back here.

"All set backstage, Dylan, just need to connect after the circuit board is ours" I say quietly to Dylan in my earpiece pretending to push my hair behind my ear.

"Alright Harmony, just wait for the other to do what they need to do. Atlas, go" Dylan says seeing as we were all connected though our earpieces.

'No, Dylan, I can't' Danny says and I can hear some frustration in his voice.

"What? What's the problem?"

'No, there's too many people.'

"Atlas, I got Owen landing now."

'Okay, I'm going now' I hear Danny mutter out.

"Everything going okay, Dylan?" I ask feigning being busy with some tech issue as I set up my laptop that was set for today only then it would be trashed, especially if we needed to get away, which hopefully won't happen.

"Yeah, everything is going to plan, just keep focus" Dylan responds.

"The circuit board is ours" Danny says through the earpiece.

"Awesome, I'll get to it right now" I say through the earpiece getting the laptop hooked up and connected.

"All set up in here now that the circuit boards is up, I'm going to go get changed out of my outfit" I respond and make my way to get out of the stage crew outfit and into my on stage outfit, which was a bit uncomfortable seeing as I had to get a size up not wanting to reveal my small little bump, but if you looked closely enough you probably could see I had a bump which worried me a bit.

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As soon as I'm done and walk back to where we were meeting I hear Lula doing what she does best and being her dramatic self when doing her magic.
"Welcome everybody! And now, the moment you've all been waiting for..." the women on stage says out to the crowd as Lula and Merritt walk up and I rush over to Lula.

"That was awesome! I almost laughed when you doing your trick that I almost blew it," I say as I hug Lula happily.

"Nice work, lady" Merritt compliments Lula putting on his hat.

"Thanks Harmony, and Thank you Merritt" Lula says hugging me back before pulling me in between herself and Merritt.

"Owen is in your control?" I ask Merritt who nods.

"I'm actually nervous, and I'm not even going onstage" Jack says as he walks up standing next to Lula.

"You know, I've heard that if you're nervous, it can be really helpful to picture each other naked" Lula says in a flirty way to Jack and I scrunch up my nose.

"Isn't that supposed to be picture the..." I start to say only for Danny to cut me off.

"It's actually picture the audience naked" Danny interrupts.

"That's what I was going to say Daniel" I say glaring at Danny who walked up right next to Merritt.

"No, this is new. This is a new science. So, I don't know. So, do you want to...we should try it." Lula suggests and I cough trying to cover up my laugh at her flirting with Jack.

"Not the right mood" Jack says with a shy laugh shaking his head.

"Guess that leaves you and me old buddy" Merritt jokes to Danny whose eyes go wide shaking his head.

"What? Picture each other...No. No, thank you"

"I mean, I must admit, from the neck up there are issues. But from the neck down, the David..."Merritt jokes and I cringe.

"Oh my god Merritt! I don't want to picture that at all!" I yelp out covering my eyes trying to thinking of something else.

"Owen Case" The women onstage announces introducing Owen to the audience.

"Good, morning, Octa-lites" Merritt says into the earpiece that was connected to Owen.

"Good, morning, Octa-lites"

"Now, I've made the claim..." Merritt says saying what he was feeding to Owen.

"Now, I've made the claim that Octa 8 is pure magic. But the truth is, that's just one of those things I say...when in fact I mean something else. What else do I mean? Well, here to fill you in on some of my fabulous lies and hypocrisy, and to perform some of the most dazzling feats of magic you have ever seen... They are the world's greatest magicians. Here to expose me for the fraud I truly am. Ladies and gentlemen, here are the Horsemen!"

Owen introduces us onstage and we all dash out from the screens making our entrance and getting a loud applause from the audience.

"Hello New York!" Danny says waving into the crowd and clapping as well.

"Thank you so much." I say happily glancing around happily at everyone and catching Dylan's eye briefly.

"Hey, it's great to be back" Merritt says into the crowd.

"And have you met our newest Horseman, Lula?" I say gesturing to Lula who was next to me on stage with a bounce in my step.

"Feels good right?" Danny asks looking at Lula.

"Pretty Good. Pretty Good" Lula agrees.

"Thank you, thank you. Um, okay. We want to talk to you about your privacy" I say getting the crowd to calm down and get to what we needed to talk about.

"What does your privacy mean to you?" Danny says moving his hands about.

"Because apparently to Own Case, it means absolutely nothing." Merritt says walking around onstage.

"No, actually it means less than absolutely nothing." Lula says.

"You see, he's mocked your privacy, he's scorned it." I say making a gesture of a brush off.

"Right, and we're not just talking about the things that you already agreed to when you signed, probably without reading the terms and conditions of Octas 1 through 7." Danny says going over what we were going to talk about and I notice out of the corner of my eye Dylan glancing down at his tablet in confusion and I hear Jack saying something about the FBI being here and glace at Dylan with a worried look as he turns to go deal with the FBI.

"Before we start the show...we had Owen agree to a few terms and conditions of our own," Lula says out to the crowd.

"So, everything that he had once considered private..." I start to say only for my mike to cut out and I glance at Danny who tries to continue what I was saying.

"Yeah, everything that he had once considered private is now... Oh my" Danny goes to continue only for the screen to change from what we had set on the laptop to play to change to some 3D animated face moving around a bit making me jump back as it was like a jump scare and latch onto Lula's jacket with a squeak of surprise.

"As the Horsemen like to say, magic is about controlling perception. You see them as champions of the truth, but are they? Or is it just another one of their illusions? So since they clearly love secrets...let's reveal some of theirs."

"Harmony, everyone get off the stage. Abort. Jack, go with them. I'll see you at the meet-up point. Harmony, make sure everyone gets there. Let's go!" Dylan says through his earpiece and I start pushing everyone off stage.

"You heard him everyone off, I'll take the rear." I say pushing them off noting Jack rushing off as well.

"Do you recall the death of Jack Wilder? What if I told you he's not just alive, but he's actually right here?" The Voice says only for a spotlight to shine in on where Jack was and a picture of him to pop up on the screen before he rushes out and I put my hand on his back pushing him in front of me.

"Go, we can take care of this mess later, just go!" I yell out to them as we make our way backstage only to hear the voice once again.

"And do you know who else is here? The FBI. Let's let them in shall we? And now for the big reveal. There's a fifth Horseman, and he's the biggest criminal of them all. FBI agent, Dylan Rhodes!" The voice reveals and I bite my lip in worry knowing this was all going down hill really fast as we finally make it to the stairs to go up to the roof.

"We gotta get to the chute. Go!" Jack yells out to everyone as we run on the roof.

"Easy for you to say! You aren't wearing any heel-type shoes!" I yell out annoyed with myself over not wearing my high tops with my outfit. "Ouch!" I yelp as I nearly trip over one of the many things on the rooftop.
"Who are those guys?" Lula yells out.

"Who cares? Come on!" Jack yells as we go over another set of stairs and I nearly trip on the last step.

"Shit!" I yelp out catching myself as everyone stops. "Just go, I'll catch up. Give me a second I just have to quickly switch shoes!" I yell out to them as they get up and going again. "Damn shoes, never wearing heels again after this."

"How the hell could this happen? I thought Dylan had everything under control?" I hear Merritt complain as I quickly pull out some flats that I had stored in my pocket of my jacket that was similar to Lula's but more of a dark navy color and change my shoes.

"Yeah. Apparently he didn't" Danny says snappily.

"Maybe you're the leak Dan. Where you been sneaking off to?" Merritt snaps out.

"Don't you do that. Don't you dare for a second insinuate that I had..." Danny starts to go off.

"I'm not insinuating. That's your...." Merritt starts to rebut.

"Just go you idiots! Now is not the time for arguing!" I Yell out from where I was finishing putting on my shoes and standing up grazing my bump to make sure it was all right.

"Let's get to the truck, come on!" Jack yells out after helping Lula from the last ladder, which I was now climbing down on.

"Stay together!" I yell out as I see them one by one go down the shoot only for me to stop at the top of it biting my lip.

"Oh my gosh I was really hoping we didn't have to do this" I mutter closing my eyes as I sit and the top and putting my hands over my ears trying to think of something else as I take a deep breath and slide down the slide.

"Nope, nope, nope, nope. I don't ever want to do this again!" I yell out though blocking out any other sound or light from myself as I finally get to the bottom assumingly as I fly out and land against another body into a truck making me open my eyes carefully noticing everyone sleeping.

"What? This isn't where we were supposed to end up. Guys what's going..."I start to say only for a hand to cover my mouth and myself being yanked out of the top of the truck and shoved in the car part of the truck.

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First update of 2017! Yay! Sorry it took so long, I've been busy and still have yet to write. I want to finish this though so I'm going to try and get past this writers block and time problem.