create

4. see-through

Sylver woke up to Goldie shouting her name right in her face.
"Goldie, shht, there are sensors everywhere!", Sylver whispered, but even as she said it, even with her Focus turned off again, she realised that they were safe. Behind Goldie's back she saw the backside of the wall they had just opened. Goldie must've realised what was happening, and she caught her and dragged her inside.
"OH MY GOODNESS SYLVER YOU'RE AWAKE THANK EVERYTHING!!!", Goldie cried out loud, "YOU HAVE TO GET THIS UNDER CONTROL SYLVER! YOU ARE RISKING YOUR LIFE!"
Sylver was risking Goldie's life and the operation as well, but Goldie was selfless that way. This was the first job she was risking anything on. Because it could trigger a revolution. The small people could rise against the counts, the kings, even the Watcher. That was an opportunity that Goldie could never in her life just let go past.
And yet she worried about Sylver more.
Sylver just wanted to thank her and give her reassurance when the AfterFocus punched in. That always happened. Just one small instance. But especially this time it was enough to make her look. Because what she had just felt was strong, pure, and endless fear.
"Sylver?", Goldie asked, now with her voice lowered back to normal, "What the fuck is...?"
Goldie couldn't finish her question, as Sylver had put a finger on her chin and pushed upwards. And now Goldie saw it too. The vault. Their goal was just mere metres away. And yet they both had never felt more hopeless in their entire lives.

"This looks so easy...", Goldie whispered sadly.
It did indeed. The reason they were here at all, the stones, they just lay there, on top of waist-high pillars scattered around the gloomy vault they were in.
Goldie helped Sylver, who had been lying on the ground up until now, stand up, and they stood there, hand in hand, looking around helplessly.
Whenever it looked easy, they both knew from experience, the security messures were off the charts good.
Unbreakable. Impossible.
Sylver was dragged down so much by that realisation that she didn't even think about her Focus. Not that she would've been able to activate it. It seemed to have a cooldown of some sort.
"What do we do now?", she asked.
Goldie had never looked so beaten down before, it actually scared Sylver. But she caught herself, shook her head to probably clear her mind, and she scanned the room, first with her eyes only and then with her personal All-Inclusive-Device, a phone she modified until it fit her technical needs perfectly.
"Sylver", she said after checking the results of the A.I.D., "the room is clean... there is nothing electronic in here, only the lights on the floor, and there are no traps anywhere..."
Sylver could not believe her ears. How confident was the Watcher in his security system outdoors? Did he really think nobody would get in?
"This is just... no human guards either?", Sylver asked, and Goldie shook her head. This was too easy. Where was the catch?
Goldie stepped forward. One step. Two. Three. Five more. She was right infront of the first pilar now. All of them were arranged in a random system that didn't make sense to Sylver, but there were dozens. The room was more of almost an entire hallway.
"Here goes nothing!", Goldie said and extended her hand.
"Be careful!", Sylver shouted as she stumbled forwards, but Goldie had already grabbed the pale red stone. And... nothing.
It was just a pale, smooth, oval, red stone. There was nothing special about it.
Of course, neither of the two women knew how the stones worked, or how they were supposed to work, or basically anything about them except for that they existed in the first place.
"That", Goldie said, "was surprisingly uneventful..."
"Do you think they are what we are looking for? I didn't look at anything in particular outside, but even that ugly heart seemed to be worth more...", Sylver whispered.
Goldie nodded.
"I know what you mean, but these here... they have to be what we're looking for! Maybe the lack of security is to make everyone who makes it this far turn back!"
That made sense. The Watcher was cunning, everybody knew that. He had won this very mansion by betting against himself in a gamble against the Count. His calculatory skills were unmatched, as far as the population was aware. Up until now. Because Goldie was in.
"But... what do we do now?", Sylver asked. She trusted Goldie's judgement. Sylver was very smart herself, no doubt about it, but Goldie was the mastermind behind the operation.
"I am the stronger one of us, and I have the bigger bag. I start from the far back, you start here. Load as many in as possible. We're taking them all. If we still have the strength and time, and if the genius outside hasn't spilled the beans yet, we'll take whatever is worth much on the outside as well, okay?", Goldie ended her plan with a question.
Sylver nodded. Goldie was the key to success here, Sylver has helped enough with her Focus.
"Start in the corner over there, on the far right! Imma be diagonally to you up there! Be quick!", Goldie said, kissed her on the cheek, and then she was already running, barely visible in the gloomy room.
Sylver turned to the right, and she knew exactly where to start.
But, of course, easy was the opposite of this whole operation.
The pillar in the far right corner was empty. Which didn't make any sense whatsoever. Was there one missing? Had it been stolen? Was it being used right now?
Sylver couldn't make any sense of it. But now that she stood so close she could see that there was a tiny letter engraved into the middle of the pillar, right where the stone usually was supposed to lie.
L.
Strange.
Sylver went to the next pillar, where a almost cubic green stone lay. Sylver put down her backpack and tried to grab for the stone, and she immediately cried out.
"Sylver???", she heard Goldie shout, but from far, far away, as Sylver fell on her knees, holding her right hand tightly to her body. She was aware of a poisonous-looking green glow that seemed to emmit from the top of the pillar. Meanwhile, her arm still burnt like a bitch. It felt as if a thousand needles were piercing her arm at once, and as if the sharp teeth of a thousand saws were eating away on her flesh. Sylver knew this pain. Damion had described it to her in his last living moments. And when Sylver looked down, she saw the same thing that had eaten away Damion: acid. Sylver's arm was being eaten away. Her ringfinger, or at least the flesh, was gone almost completely. Chunks of flesh were losing their grip on her bones of her underarm, and she could look through a rapidly growing hole in her hand already. And she knew she couldn't do anything to stop this. Her arm was lost to an acid trap.