The two of us were on the empty shopping concourse. The only sound I was picking up was the burbling noise of a nearby fountain. “What?”

“A phone,” Trip exclaimed as he took off running. Everybody could hear better than me. I followed along, and a second later I could hear it as well. The ringing was coming from inside an information kiosk. Trip didn’t bother trying the door, and instead vaulted over the desk, knocking over a display of postcards and brochures of local attractions in the process.

“They’re going to charge us for those too.” I took up a defensive position next to the counter and scanned for threats while Trip looked for the phone.

“Bingo.” Trip came back up with a red headset. “Hello?”

If this was the security room warning us about something they’d seen on their video cameras, I couldn’t see it from here. As far as I knew, we were the only two in the entire shopping concourse, and this place was as big as a good-sized mall, only fancier. The palm trees’ leaves were swaying a bit from the air circulation. An ornate clock was ticking above. The ceiling was decorated with enough murals that it made the Sistine Chapel look dumpy. This was the section where the filthy rich came to buy absurdly bejeweled watches and designer shoes that cost more than normal houses. Come to think of it, I was actually in that sort of income bracket now, but mentally I would always be too much of an accountant to shop in a place like this.

“Yeah…Uh-huh…Okay. Got it.” Trip looked at me. “Mitch says we’ve got suspicious activity ahead to the right.”

That was back in the still ridiculously expensive but not completely unreasonable section. “Define suspicious.”

“One of the security alarms went off.”

“Tell Mitch that if he sees us start shooting to send backup.”

Trip did so then hung up the red phone. “Come on.”

Sound echoed for quite some distance in the huge space. As we ran toward the disturbance there was a sudden crash and the sound of breaking glass just ahead. It really made me wish for my radio. Stupid jamming. I reached the corner and signaled for Trip to hold position while I risked a peek. With Abomination at my shoulder, I snaked my way forward until I could peer between the leaves of a potted plant at the source of the noise.

One of the shops—an art gallery—had a broken window. The easels immediately inside had been knocked over. Glass was scattered across the tile. I couldn’t see what had caused the disturbance. It could be our monster, or it could be one of the guests had decided to do some looting. If it was the former, this could get nasty, if it was the later, it really wasn’t a problem.