"Very well. Dr. Montgomery, this is the culmination of my life's work, and failure would set me back for years. I hope you don't disappoint me."

"Don't worry, I've got it covered. For the coming of Bedlam and the glorious chaos."

"For the coming of Bedlam and the glorious chaos," newcomer agrees, and steps into the Sideways entrance.

Notes notes notes...

Okay. So. Um.

If that second guy was a cape, he's been here a while. And capes would probably be common knowledge if they were appearing regularly - her power is subtle, and teleportation certainly could be, but your standard flying brick with lasers isn't very, and it'd only take one of those to blow it wide open. So either he's not a cape at all, or they're rare enough that he's not going to guess that she exists. Probably. ...though if he is a cape, who knows what powers he has; she decides to play it safe and switch to listening from someplace else.

Second guy disappears into the Sideways, and a certain cubist girl starts following on his heels before he takes one too many non-Euclidean turns and goes beyond her range of hearing. First guy continues muttering to himself and writing stuff on the white board.

Somehow she's not surprised.

She finds a new spot - not closer, but with a more direct route, if the remaining guy leaves she's going to take a shot at breaking into the place to get pictures of his whiteboard - and emails Sadde again. I'm okay and I think everything's safe right now, but something really strange is going on - and then the transcript.

Ooookaaaay that is creepy. That is way creepy. You didn't get the other guy's name?

(Dr. Montgomery continues working.)

Nope. I'd probably recognize him if I heard him again, but I'd have to be paying attention.

She keeps half an ear on Dr. Montgomery, and scans around the area with the rest of her attention - any other whiteboards in unexpected places? Or anything else weird and perhaps relevant?

Where are you? Are you safe?

There are a couple of whiteboards, but the floor he's in is quite inaccessible—except for the Sideways entrance and whatever method that other guy used. The floor above his has a small laboratory-like place with a few crates and a bunch of labeled vials.

I'm like ten short blocks away, but if that guy can teleport he might be able to do other things too, I dunno. I've moved since he left, I don't think he knows I was there.

I'd have to check the map to figure out addresses, but it's five blocks north and eight east of the subway stop here, tall brick building with an abandoned pet store across the street.

There's a pharmacy room upstairs of the Picasso guy, that's probably not good. And the stairs up are all blocked, he must be getting there by the Sideways entrance in the room there.

Maybe he didn't teleport, maybe there's a one-way Sideways entrance there or something. Or maybe he's a Picasso and just flickered there.

I can hear the kind of one-way that things can come out of, and he wasn't a Picasso when he appeared, but maybe.

What do we do, is the more important question.

Scanning, scanning - nearby buildings? If she can't get to that one maybe she can get a picture from across the street or something? Also, what's in the crates?

There is definitely a building across the street with a view to that one. The crates contain other vials with mysterious liquids in them, or are empty.

What's in the pharmacy room?

Glass bottles with liquids in them, and tools for working with them - scales and stuff. And boxes with more bottles - ingredients, I think, and empty ones. And another whiteboard and stuff.

She heads for the building with the view, stopping every couple blocks to make sure nobody's acting strange in a way that suggests she's been noticed.

Nope, no one has noticed her.

So maybe we do call the D.o.S. They might be better at this.

They don't believe I'm real, yet. I could tell Hollister that we need to hurry with that, but I'm not sure he can do anything.

Fair enough. But maybe it could be an anonymous tip? Like, you detected signs of cubism from that building?

Yeah, can't hurt.

Okay, here's the building; this close, she should be able to catch most security stuff or bugs, if she's paying attention. Anything?

Yes, actually. The building has very, very subtle bugs, probably meant to detect exactly the sort of espionage she wanted to do from it.

Yikes. Okay, not doing that, then; she walks on for another couple blocks to deflect any suspicion and then returns to her nice safe underground tunnels.

I was going to try to get some pictures but the building that I could do it from is all bugged up.

I'm sending the tip in now.

Okay. Tell me how it goes?

Yeah, I'll keep you posted.

The reporting instructions are hopefully straightforward? She'll make a separate email account for it, if she needs one, something obviously pseudonymous like 'ConcernedCitizen' or something.

Yeah, she doesn't even need an email, there's an anonymous online form for it.

Excellent. One quick web search for what signs of cubism she might have noticed and a consultation with the map app for the address later, and it's done.

The form says they will verify the location but could take up to thirty minutes to arrive, depending on how many other crises they have and where the place is. They advise the submitter to stay away from the building and not try to get in contact with anything or anyone from it.

Doctor Montgomery continues doing work for a while. Even to someone who understands chemistry and mathematics, half of what he's saying is gibberish.

What good advice. She's staying put; the way that other building was bugged, it seems more likely than not that they're just going to spook him, which is certainly better than nothing, but she wants to hear what happens when they do.

All of what he's saying is gibberish to her, and not surprisingly; institutions aren't exactly known for their impressive STEM classes.

It's been twenty minutes. No sign of the D.o.S. yet.