[hider=PAYDAY$: SHINING SCALE DLC]

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	Now was not the time to lay in a puddle. Amber had places to go and people to see. But the first order of business was to heal Sue. Thankfully, Magical girls blessed with water magic were capable of healing. Water truly was one of the most versatile spheres of magic. She wasn't quite sure how other magical girls got around without it. Perhaps that was why most magical girls tried to form alliances and work in teams.  Such things were impossible for Amber to do with her current patron. The pirate knelled over her feathered companion. Her hands were spread apart like she was warming them over a fire. The puddle was being turned into a healing mist, which soothed and mended Sue's weary body.

	“Tell me that feels at least a little bit better than the tentacles did.”

	“I was in pain. I'm liable to say a few silly things, okay?” Sue sighed. “So is the fight over?”

	“It appears to be.”

	The familiar moved her head around. “Their end goal was just to throw us in a bank vault?”

	That was a pretty strange fight. Firstly, Amber is usually the one to do the ambushing. The idea that she would be the one to get jumped was quite the surprise. The portal girl and her harpies were very good at coordinating attacks. They even managed to make Amber shoot herself with her own stream of water! Fortunately, they fought her in a confined space, which greatly played to the pirate's advantage. With so much water in such a small space, Amber was able to erect a defense that they couldn't penetrate. Or at least it seemed that way for a time. But their boss, or the squad leader at least, sure had tenacity. Who would have suspected that she would have opened a portal right into Amber's barrier? The pirate had her heart in her throat the entire time she was separated from Sue. This was definitely a close fight. It could have gone much differently if that portal girl knew more about how Amber operated. The pirate was already thinking about tactics to employ should they meet their attackers again.

	“Amber?”

	“I'm just thinking.” Amber shook herself awake. “I'd really like you to be more careful next time. It was just luck that you didn't get shot or worse when you tried to choke that girl out. You could have been killed.”

	“But I wasn't!”

	“True!” Amber's charismatic smile returned. She looked away from the petrel to observe her surroundings. “I doubt this was their intended location for us. I wonder what they wanted. They didn't seem to be deterred by the fact that I was a magical girl.”

	“We didn't even get their name.”

	“And you screamed mine over and over again.” Amber sighed. “Doesn't matter. I'm sure they put us in here because they don't want to deal with us. If they remain in Highbrook, we won't see them once we arrive in Penrose.”

	“How ARE we going to get out of here?” Sue was still laying on her back. She was starting to relax more now that the magic was shrinking the bruises. “Waiting for the bank staff to open the vault sounds like a good idea. We can just sleep until they open it up. Who's going to blame a little girl and her bird for robbing a bank?”

	Amber giggled. “The first thing they're going to do is hit me with questions I can't answer. They will ask where my parents are, how I got locked inside, and a slew of other questions that will be very difficult to explain away.”

	“Well.” Sue stood up and looked at amber. She was fully healed, if a bit stiff. “What if Boteg and I pose as your parents? We both have human forms.”

	“Do you think you could do any better answering those kinds of questions? I know Boteg would give himself away at the start.” Amber sighed, but kept her smile up. “We have no documents. Just a business credit card that isn't exactly proof of identity. It'll be weeks before they get done questioning us, if they don't lock us up instead.” 

	“We should get false identities made for ourselves in the future.”

	“Duly noted.” 

	Sue whined. “So we can't count on Boteg for this after all?”

	“Afraid not.” Amber had a mental link to Boteg. But it seemed pointless to make him worry about something he was powerless to do anything about. The old dragon was pretty easy to scare. Trying to contact Boteg would be like phoning up your dad after you damaged the family car. Better to take care of the problem before he notices. They were not staying at the same hotel, and Boteg had only wanted Amber to chase away that red skinned monster girl. As long as they got out tonight, everything would be fine.

	“Got any ideas?”

	The pirate rubbed her chin. “I may have a few. Vaults always interested me as a kid.”

	Bank vaults were a product of the gold rush in 1849. When treasure seekers couldn't find any gold below ground, they started to look for riches above ground in banks. In those days, banks kept everything in small safes. Thieves would drag them off and break into them at a secure location. So the bankers saw the need for something that couldn't be moved so easily. Bigger and bigger safes were made, until the modern bank vault came into existence.

	Trying to blow your way out of a bank vault isn't very practical, even with a cannon. The walls, ceiling, and floor are made out of a special cement blend. It's poured into moulds that are filled with steel rods, further reinforcing the panels. These panels are only three inches thick, but are stronger than eighteen inches of normal reinforced concrete. When they dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, the only structure that wasn't destroyed by the blast was a bank vault. Even during the Manhattan project, they dropped an atomic bomb directly onto a bank vault just to see what would happen. It loosened up some of the trim. Amber's cannonballs weren't nearly as strong as an atomic bomb. There were also no vents, as nothing in a bank vault typically needs to breath. Amber might have been in trouble if her suit didn't generate its own atmosphere. The only way in and out of a bank vault was through the vault door.

	The familiar watched Amber walk towards the locked exitway. “Do you think you can open it?”

	“I don't know.” Amber was still holding onto her cannon. “But we aren't in a high security prison. Vaults are designed to keep people out, not in.” The pirate stopped in front of the vault door. Directly in front of her were three LCD displays, each showing a string of numbers. “Alright, first order of business is taking care of the time locks.”

	Time locks are devices that prevent a vault door from being opened at certain times. This is to prevent thieves from torturing authorized personnel into opening the vault. It can also prevent employees from gaining access to the vault when it's suppose to be kept shut. What makes these locks “thief proof” is that they are located inside the vault itself, far out of the reach of modern thief's tools. But this made the devices very easy for Amber to access. The reason why three were set up is because they had to be battery powered. If one of them were to fail, one of the remaining two would stand in to do the primary time lock's job. In the event that all the clocks were to lose power, the safe would be able to be opened at all times to prevent a costly lock out. Normally getting access to the battery would involve a key or special tools, but with water magic, Amber had a much easier method available to her.

	“Amber, are you sure you can blow them apart with a cannon? I mean, is that smart?”

	The pirate only smiled. “Just giving them a little bath.”

	It was easy to spray the time locks. Then it was just a matter of making the water creep inside the cases and flood the battery chamber, causing them to short. The LCD's went dead, and the safe could be opened... provided Amber could get the combination.

	“Wow.” Sue looked at the large window on the vault door. It had hinges on it so that it could be opened, but it was locked down to prevent tampering. “They actually have a window right over the tumblers for the combination lock? That doesn't seem very secure...”

	The pirate nodded. “It's important to remember that thieves are usually on the other side of the vault door. It's actually very expensive to have a vault door lock itself shut. So there needs to be a way to check on all the important parts on a daily basis.” Amber tapped the glass. “Not to mention there's a very practical reason to have this hear. You can change the combination once you have access to the back of the vault door. One could routinely change the combination for added security.”

	“Still, they keep it behind glass?”

	The pirate giggled once more. “Well, it's locked up tight, and there are a few sensors in the vault door itself. If it picks up the correct sound frequency, it will trigger an alarm. Which is why I'm going to resist the temptation to break the glass.” Amber then very slowly allowed water to run out of the end of her cannon. The seal around the window wasn't strong enough to keep all the water out, and so it started to creep into the vault door.

	Sue cocked her head to the side. “Also, why are there two tumblers?”

	“Added security.” Once there was enough water behind the glass to manipulate the tumblers, Amber started moving them in unison, going clockwise and counter clockwise as was necessary. The glass made it pretty easy to tell where the tumblers had to be stopped. Each tumbler had a large notch that needed to be lined up with a flat piece of iron. If all the slots lined up with the iron, then the iron piece would have room to drop into the slot when someone attempted to open the safe. “The tumblers both have the same combination, they just need to be turned to the correct combination at the same time. It prevents a single individual from opening the bank vault.”

	“This vault security is starting to seem really absurd!”

	With a satisfying click, both tumblers stopped in the correct position. Now all that was left was to release the lock mechanism. This was pretty simple. You just turn the wheel located on the outside of the safe. This spins various gears that pull all of the locking pins back and allow the vault door to be opened. It is the absolute last, and most important step, to opening the safe. And probably the hardest thing to do from the inside.

	“We just need to turn the wheel now, Sue.”

	“Mhm.” The bird's tail bobbed up and down in anticipation. “Do you think you can do it?”

	“I won't know until I try!”

	Once again, Amber was going to call upon the power of water to help. She was going to need a lot of it this time. However, the pirate had to be slow. She didn't want to trigger any sound sensors in her haste to escape. The water trickled out of the end of her cannon and made its way through the gap between the vault and the door. As secure as vaults are, they are designed to protect valuables from thieves. A vault might be able to stand up to an atomic blast, but they aren't water tight. There are plenty of cases with banks being flooded and valuables being damaged by the water. This is why people with safe deposit boxes need to get flood insurance to really make sure their property is safe. 

	It would take some time, but Amber would create a small scale bubble like what she used during her battle with the portal girl. Amber's goal was to hover the water over the wheel on the other side of the door. She could then spin it fast enough to get the wheel to turn. This would not be the first time amber tried to manipulate water she couldn't see. However, it was difficult to do so. She could feel the presence of water, but had no tactile feel for the water itself. It would be difficult to tell if she was positioned in the right spot. But the one thing the pirate had was time. 

	“Hey Amber.” Sue looked up at the pirate. “There's probably going to be some security on our way out of this joint. How are you going to deal with it.”

	“I have an idea.” The pirate's focus was clearly on trying to open the door. “One headache at a time though.”

	“Are you turning it counter-clockwise?”

	“I think so.”

	Sue waited a moment before speaking again. “Because we're inside the vault now, wouldn't you want to turn it clockwise to open?”

	Amber froze in place. “You're asking me too many questions!” The flow of the water reversed. Sure enough, Amber could see all the gears slowly starting to turn. Freedom would be theirs. It was hard not to laugh a little bit. For a moment, the pirate thought she'd have to attempt an escape once the managers opened the vault up the following day. This was much more preferable. “Alright, now see if you can find me a bank bag.”

	Sue flew towards the back of the vault. “Did we have a change of heart?”


	Amber turned to look at the rows and rows of safety deposit boxes. She had the tools to open any one of them. They weren't nearly as secure as the bank vault itself, and no alarms would be triggered. “No.” Amber shook her head. “It's tempting, I know. But I stand by what I said. We're pirates. We plunder, we don't thieve.”

	When sue came back, she had an empty bank bag in her mouth. “So then what's the bag for?”

	“Well...”

	Sue started to look disappointed. “Please don't tell me you're going to use it a disguise.”

[hr]

	The footage of the bank heist was most curious. The film's authenticity is frequently questioned, with most believing it to be a hoax or a publicity stunt. Regardless, the timestamps match the exact time the alarm was sounded in the Highbrook city bank. 

	At 8:53 PM, something seeped out of the bank vault. It looked like water, but the grainy, black and white picture didn't show too much detail. This mystery fluid proceeded to try and spin the vault door's wheel in the wrong direction. After some time, it corrected itself and started to spin the right way. As soon as the door was unlocked, the fluid fell to the floor. Investigators would later discover a wet spot in front of the vault. Though forensics could find nothing special about it. It appeared to be regular water, albeit one with an unusually high number of trace metals. 

	At 9:02, the vault door opened. Then someone came running out of the vault. It is impossible to identify the individual, as they were wearing a bank bag. They appeared to have cut holes in it for their arms and eyes. The suspect was also holding a long cylindrical object, but investigators have yet to determine what such a device could be. They are believe to be the soul offender in this case. They simply ran for the front door, unlocked it, and ran outside. An eye witness spotted the perpetrator ducking into a back ally as soon as they left the bank. Nothing inside the vault is believed to be stolen. The only thing the culprit damaged was three time locks inside the vault. It is still unknown how someone wound up inside the vault.  There is no footage showing anyone matching the perpetrator's description ever entering the vault that day. [/hider]