THE ILLUSIONISTS

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere

- Martin Luther king, jr.

Annabeth was desperately waiting for her head Mr. Chiron Brunner in the meeting room while her back rested on one of the chair surrounding the large circular table. She had to be nervous as it was her first classified field mission from the CIA. Along with Annabeth, her colleagues Luke castellan, Rachel Elizabeth Dare, Silena Beauregard and Charles Beckendorf were also waiting. Despite of the presence of five people, the room was filled with uncomfortable silence. But, Luke was the first person to break the quietness filled within as he spoke. "So, anybody even has the slightest of idea of what Mr. Brunner is up to?"

All the remaining four of them shook their head with disappointment on their face. "Boy, he is killing us with suspense" Silena muttered to herself. Soon they could hear faint footsteps getting nearer to them. The door creaked as an old man in his 40's with thick blackish brown hair and beard almost covering his chin entered the room. He cleared his throat before speaking. "I apologize to keep you all awaited as I was making final preparations for your mission." Annabeth took a deep breath as it was confirmed that she was called here due her involvement in the mission.

"Nervous Miss Chase?" asked the Chiron.

"I guess so Mr. Brunner" she replied with a small smile. She always thought of him as her idol and respected him since she joined the espionage due to his vast amount of success.

"So" He continued "As said before, you all might be aware for assembling here today. Before I start giving you the description of the mission you all will be participating, I would like to make it clear that this particular assignment is highly classified as well as very dangerous where you, if the situation comes, have to risk your lives. This task is very important. Though your names have been recommended to me by the higher officials, I am making it clear that if you don't want be here, you can exit the room this very moment as there would be no turning back afterwards."

Annabeth was first to respond as without any second thought "I am ready to face the consequences" Now Brunner was looking at the other four of them waiting for their answers. They took a deep breath and repeated what Annabeth had said.

Brunner again cleared his throat before speaking. He used to do this a lot these days. "I think you all would know about the Illusionists"

Her heart skipped a beat as she heard that name. They were the world's most famous group of thieves that held in the first position in most wanted criminals for CIA since four years. The five of them nodded in unison.

"Our mission is to stop them" Chiron said. I looked behind to take a glance of the reaction of the other members. Silena and Charles looked as shocked as Annabeth was but Luke just raised an eyebrow. That's what she admired about him. He was known to act cool even in the tensest situation.

"It's not First April today, isn't it?" asked Charles with a scowl on his face. Annabeth tried to control her laughter but failed to do it successfully.

Chiron gave a smile "Unfortunately it isn't" He came toward her and grabbed a small white colored remote that rested beside her on the table and pressed a red button on the top right corner while directing it towards the projector. "I am now going to give you all a brief description of all the four members of the Illusionists" He said.

Light shot out of it pointing towards the white surface to which all the four members were facing. After a few seconds a photo of a beautiful, perfectly tanned woman appeared on the screen. Her caramel brown hair and dark almond eyes completely matched her face making her look more stunning.

"Calypso greaves" Chiron sighed "First of the four Illusionists. The main role in the team in the team is playing as a hacker. She is highly specialized as computer technologist. She is capable of trespassing into even the most secured files. Much data about her is not known"

He then pressed another button and instantly, the image of a dull person came into view. He had dark brown eyes along with dull black hair. Excess amount of dark circles beneath his eyes were clearly visible. "Nico di'angelo, second in command of the team. His whole family has a criminal history. You might also know about his father, Hades di'angelo, underworld mafia. Unlike taking over their illegal family business, he parted ways and joined the Illusionists of which the reason is unknown. He still in communication with his father and it may be very dangerous if they combined forces."

He again pressed the same button, this time a female having short dark spiky hair appeared. With her electric blue eyes, she looked quite attractive but also intimidating at the same time. To, Annabeth, her face looked quite familiar.

"Thalia Grace. She is the only person out of the four members whom we have maximum information of. Mainly because of her father, Zeus Grace being the former mayor of Stanford, cooperated with us through investigation, to keep his political image up, despite of not willing to help us." Chiron took a bottle behind him on a small oak wood table and gulped a sip of water from it.

"What about the fourth member?" Charles asked with a confused face.

"The fourth member…the leader of the group, the mastermind of all the thefts, the main reason for the formation of the Illusionists, his name is Percy Jackson. He is the top criminal of whom CIA has the least data of"

"At least any facial or behavioral features by which we can identify him?" Luke asked

"Nothing. But, the interesting fact is that he is in the system unlike others. He can be anyone. He is known for the avatars he can change into. You won't even know him but you could have encountered him." Chiron replied without giving an eye contact with any of the members. Annabeth become suspicious as he was the one who taught her that people who lied hesitated to given an eye contact. Nobody was speaking for a few seconds.

"So, you just briefed us about the target's data, what about the mission?" Silena asked breaking the silence.

"Yes, I was coming to that point, Miss Beauregard" Chiron replied not removing his gaze from projector screen, which was now blank. He took a deep breath and started explaining while facing towards us. "We have CCTV camera reports from the New York airport of a person who looks exactly like Calypso greaves" He pressed another button on the remote and a footage appeared showing a girl covering her hair with a hijab and wearing large sized goggles occupying ample amount of her face. She was showing a police a piece of paper which probably looked like a boarding pass.

"This is the only footage we caught of her. She managed to escape all other cameras." He took a deep breath before speaking again."We went through her fake identity and somehow got her phone number. We were late till the time we got hold of the number but we managed to hear a few seconds of conversation with other guy before she destroyed the phone sim card."

Chiron handed them black colored headphones which they placed it on their heads. He opened his laptop and connected our headphones with Bluetooth and Annabeth could hear the conversation of two people.

-Do you know the reason why he called us to Boston so urgently?

-I thought you would be knowing, you are the 'smarty pants' of the team, right?

-It's not the time to joke idiot, I think we have another task

-What's it?

-I don't know but I am sure I heard the name fine arts in Boston

-Okay, now I don't think we should keep the conversation long, someone can tap our calls

-Okay, when he contacts us back, I would ask him the meeting place

As the voice ended and Annabeth removed the headphones.

"I think when they are referring to 'He' they mean to say the captain. What was his name again? yeah Percy" I told them

"What makes you think he is Percy, Annabeth?" Asked Silena.

"You told that he is the leader, so I think it's him as whom else's order they could be following. I don't think there is a fifth Illusionist that is working behind the scenes."

"We can't guess here Annabeth" Chiron interrupted.

"So what about the fine arts thingy?" Charles questioned.

"Yeah, now you came to the point. When we talk about fine arts in Boston, there is only one possibility and that is, the museum of fine arts. Fourth largest museum in the United States. According to our sources, there is a painting of a hydra, the Greek mythological creature whose bidding rage would probably start from 30 million dollars. So, you can imagine its worth. The painting would be transferred from museum of fine arts to the Connors centre, the conference hall where the auction would take place. The estimated distance between the two buildings is up to 20 miles. Auction would take place 23 days from now while the call we heard was 16 days earlier. And the auction of hydra painting is the only major event in 3 months from now. So according to us the Illusionists are basically behind the hydra"

"So…" Annabeth said with curiosity occupying my whole mind

"Your mission is to stay there till the auction is successfully completed. Till that time you people would be divided into two teams. The first team, that is Luke Castellan and Charles Beckendorf would be working as security guards in Museum of fine arts while the other team of Rachel Dare, Silena Beauregard and Annabeth Chase would be working in the Connors centre where Annabeth and Rachel would be working as Waiters and Silena would be a chef. Your work there is to observe the security systems of the place, note down and find evidence of any suspicious behavior in the surroundings and if possible, look for the Illusionists. As of me, I recommend you to find any strong evidence of which would prove that the Illusionists may be stealing the painting so we could stop the auction from taking place…..and successfully save the painting. We have kept this mission classified as we still aren't sure whether the Illusionists are up to any theft. But be careful, they won't have any second thoughts before killing you if you block their success. Am I clear?"

They all nodded as reply unable to speak any words.

"We have booked tickets for Boston and you would be leaving tomorrow night. The envelopes I will give you would contain your fake passports, your respective job applications and other essential data required for you and your mission. You all may now dismiss. And, being the most experienced candidate out of the five of you, Luke would be the captain of the field mission" He said.

Annabeth stood up and starting walking towards the door when she heard Chiron's voice "Charles and Silena, I don't want your romantic relationship act as an obstacle to the mission. Ok?"

She instantly took a glimpse behind only to see both of them blushing hard. A smile appeared on her face when she heard Luke chuckling. Charles turned towards him and gave a glare but that didn't make Luke stop."

. . . . .

"Chiron told me to give it to you, for the mission." Luke said while handing Annabeth small black colored briefcase. Inside the briefcase were a Glock 19 and 3 magazines containing six 9mm bullets.

"Is it really necessary?" She asked

He shrugged "I think it is. Not every day we get a brand new gun right? Anyways, if you need more ammunition, just tell me. I would be carrying two more spare magazines."

"Thanks, but I don't think we would even need a gun. It isn't even sure whether they are after the painting, right?"

"We can't be sure. But if they really are after it, and if we are successful to stop them, we would get a very good name here, and who knows? We can even manage to get a promotion."

She smiled "Ok, now I think I should go back home. It's getting late. Bye"

"Bye"

Annabeth started walking towards the exit after she bid farewell to her friends. As soon as she exited the office, she bumped into someone dropping the documents in her hand and the bag which was hung over the shoulder.

"I'm sorry" He said and quickly lifted all her belongings that fell of her hands. Annabeth tried to see his face which was covered with black colored hood masking his face. Annabeth grabbed her belongings and started heading towards her house.

. . . . .

"Mom, I would be going out to Boston along with Rachel and other colleagues for two weeks as we have some work there. Take care of yourself and call me if you need any help." Annabeth said while biting her lower lip. She felt guilty for not telling her mother about the mission but as it was classified, she wasn't even allowed to tell to her family members.

"Alright dear, but please keep call me twice in a week or I well get worried about you." She replied from the kitchen.

Annabeth started unzipping her bag to take a look at the envelope that Mr. Brunner gave. Everything was in her handbag, except the envelope. "Oh crap, where would I have kept it?" Annabeth muttered to herself.

"Mom, have you seen a long brown colored envelope?" Annabeth asks while searching it in the house.

"Was it important dear?" Athena asked

"Yes, it was very important"

Suddenly her phone started buzzing. When Annabeth looked at the screen, she saw an unknown number calling her. Frantically, she accepted the call and placed the phone on her hear.

"Hello? Who is this" She asked in hurry still worried about the lost envelope. For few seconds, she didn't hear any voice from the other sides, but finally she heard and a familiar smooth manly voice.

"This is your last warning Annabeth Chase. You are opposing the Illusionists. Back off our way or you would face the consequences."

"Who is this speaking? How do you know about…"

Even before Annabeth could question, the call ended. She wanted to tell this incident to someone, someone trustworthy. Suddenly, Luke's image flashed in her mind. Without thinking, she dialed his number.

"Hello, Annabeth?" A familiar voice asked which she could easily identify as Luke.

"Luke, everything is messed up, everything. I don't know what to do!" She was at panic.

"Annabeth, please don't panic. Tell me what happened!"

She took a deep breath and started speaking "My envelope containing the mission description and fake passports lost. I noticed that I lost it as soon as I entered home. But when I tried to find it, I got a call from unknown number. It was familiar but I couldn't able to identify it. The voice was of a male, he warned me to back off from Illusionist's path. I think they…..they got hold of the envelope." Annabeth tried to suppress her emotions. This was her first undercover field mission but she messed it up even before starting it.

"Annabeth, listen to me. Firstly, you message the number which called you. I would give to Silena. If the sim which he used for calling isn't completely destroyed, we could hear the conversation. We will try if we can identify the voice. The incident that just happened would be known within the team. Now as it's confirmed that the Illusionists are trying to steal painting, we have to stop them. If Chiron gets to know about this incident, he would surely abort the mission, which we can't let happen. So, this would only be within the team. I can manage to give you a fake passport with another name as a friend of mine can do it. You need to sleep as our mission would officially start from tomorrow."

"Okay"

"Alright, goodnight then."

Relief hit her face as her heart beat slowed down. Luke was right. Now as it was confirmed that the Illusionists are after the painting we they thought, it was their responsibility to stop them. He was also right about her needing sleep after all the events that happened today.

She slid back the phone to her pocket and went towards the bed.