“Souls are loose!” she shouts. “Secure the prisoner!”
She jostles me as she runs past and doesn’t even look back to check if CJ follows her instructions before turning into the stairwell and disappearing from sight.
“Well,” I say, letting out a breathy laugh, “it looks like New Guy likes to cut it close.”
Distraction is the con artist’s best friend.
Brains can only handle so much information, and when a person’s brain is at capacity, it starts taking mental shortcuts. Focus can’t be divided, so the novelty of a disruption takes precedence over more mundane things. Once the mark’s attention is anchored where we want it, their mind starts to filter out unrelated information. Add a sense of urgency, and decisions become about emotions rather than logic and reasoning.
Back in the communal cell, after I’d gotten the information I needed from Heather, I asked her a question.
“What would you do if the cell was unlocked?”
She gave me a long-suffering sigh. “I’d leave.”
“Where would you go?”
She shrugged. “Anywhere but here.”
I sat forward, looking her in the eye. “What would you do if you had a key that openedallthe cells in Tartarus?”
For the first time, an expression other than boredom or disdain crossed her face, a spark catching.
“I would open all the cells. Let out all the vengeful souls. And we would take down this shithole together.”
A good distraction can make or break a con. It can make or break a heist. It is absolutely necessary for a jailbreak. And the best distractions not only distract but disrupt.
I leaned back against the cell wall and raised an eyebrow at Heather. “Then the keepers of Tartarus better hope you never get handed the key.”
I hope Heather is having the time of her life—or death, I should say—ordering people around and causing chaos. Because one of us should get to punch prison guards.
I gaze in the direction the lady bolted down and shrug. Missed opportunity. I’d been seconds away from acting out my prison riot fantasies when a wave of despair had passed over me. I was convinced I was doomed to fail and my only option was to give up.
That is so not like me.
I look to CJ, who won’t meet my eyes.
“You just used your magic on me,” I gasp.
They grit their teeth. “You would have gotten caught.”
I press my palms to the side of my head. “Oh my god. I have never felt so terrible in my entire life.”
They wince.
“That was so cool!”
They blink.
“Do it again,” I say, prodding them.
“Absolutely not.” They’re already walking away.
I twirl the keys I just pickpocketed from the guard lady and run after them. “I wonder what else you could do. Could you make me, I don’t know, think I’m a chicken?”
CJ taps on the door to cell DCLXVII with their ear to the grate. “What emotion would make you think you’re a chicken?”
“I don’t know. Boredom. Paranoia?” I fumble through the keys, noticing they’re all secured on a cochlea. Gross. “Maybe you could even move on to telepathy and mind control next!”