The Weight of Glazed Clay

The air in the Manitoba Museum was a carefully curated blend of controlled humidity and the faint, papery scent of things long dead. It was the kind of quiet that felt heavy, a silence built from the reverence of schoolchildren and the shuffling feet of tourists. Dawson felt the counterfeit potshard in his jacket pocket, its smooth, fake glaze a small, cold point of reality against his hip in the otherwise historical dreamscape.

"See him?" Dave whispered, his voice too loud in the hall dedicated to the province's grasslands. He was trying to sound casual, looking at a diorama of a bison hunt, but his knuckles were white where he gripped the railing.

"No," Dawson breathed out, his eyes scanning past the taxidermied animals. "And stop acting like you're about to rob the place."

"We are robbing the place," Dave countered, a little tremor in his laugh.

"We're correcting a clerical error," Dawson corrected him, a line he'd practised. "The genuine article belongs with a collector who truly appreciates its cultural value. We are merely the facilitators." He didn't believe a word of it. The shard was going to a man named Moreau who would likely sell it to a soulless corporation in Toronto. But framing it this way calmed Dave's nerves, and right now, he needed Dave's nerves to be sheets of ice.

They moved on, their footsteps echoing softly on the polished concrete floors. They passed through the Winnipeg 1920s streetscape, the faux storefronts and antique cars feeling more real than their current enterprise. The target was ahead, in the Earth History Gallery, a small, unassuming piece of decorated pottery labelled 'Laurel Culture, c. 800 AD'. It was barely the size of Dawson's palm, but Moreau had promised them a sum that made Dawson's stomach clench with a mixture of greed and terror.

The Unscheduled Variable

The plan was simple. Insultingly so. Dave, a man whose natural state was a low-grade commotion, would create a slightly larger commotion near the Nonsuch, the replica 17th-century ship that dominated the museum's upper floor. He was going to 'trip' and knock over a velvet rope stanchion. In the ensuing flurry of apologies and security attention, Dawson would have a thirty-second window. A quick unlatching of the case—he'd practised on a similar model for weeks—the swap, and a brisk walk to the exit.

"Go time," Dawson muttered as they approached the gallery. He gave Dave a slight nod. Dave, looking pale and sweaty, peeled off towards the grand staircase leading up to the ship.

Dawson lingered by a display of trilobite fossils, his heart hammering a frantic rhythm against his ribs. He watched the lone security guard, a stout man with a bored expression, who was meant to be the only one on this level. Everything depended on him moving towards Dave's noise.

He heard it a moment later. A loud clang, followed by Dave's theatrical, "Oh, jeepers! So sorry, my goodness!" The sound was perfect—loud enough to be urgent, but not so loud as to trigger a lockdown.

The guard's head snapped up. He sighed, a gust of professional weariness, and began a slow, deliberate walk towards the staircase. This was it.

Dawson moved towards the Laurel Culture display. His hands felt slick. He pulled a small suction cup tool from his sleeve, pressed it to the glass, and lifted. The panel came away silently, just like in rehearsal. The air inside the case smelled even older, like dry earth and time itself. He reached in, his fingers closing around the cool, rough texture of the genuine shard. It felt different from the fake. It felt... real. Heavy with history.

He was pulling it out when a shadow fell over the case.

"Can I help you with something, sir?"

Dawson froze. His blood turned to slush. He looked up, not at the stout, bored guard who should have been halfway to the Nonsuch, but at a younger, fitter guard. This one had sharp, analytical eyes and he wasn't looking at Dawson's face, but at the open display case.

This wasn't part of the plan. Their intel, Moreau's intel, had been clear. One guard on the floor.

"Just… admiring the craftsmanship," Dawson stammered, his hand still inside the case. The lie was so thin it was transparent.

The guard's gaze didn't waver. He unclipped his radio from his belt. "Control, I have a situation in the Earth History Gallery. Code 7."

Panic, cold and absolute, seized Dawson. He dropped the real shard back onto its velvet pedestal, snatched his hand back, and slammed the glass panel shut. He didn't wait for the guard's reaction. He bolted.

He ran, a pure animal flight. Past the fossils, through the Winnipeg streetscape, his feet pounding on the floor. He saw Dave at the top of the stairs, his face a mask of confusion, the toppled stanchion at his feet. "Dawson? What's going on?"

"Run!" Dawson yelled, the word tearing from his throat.

They scrambled out the main entrance, bursting into the bright, cool afternoon air of the Forks. They didn't stop, sprinting across the plaza, dodging families and tourists, their lungs burning. They only skidded to a halt when they reached the relative cover of the rail bridge crossing the Assiniboine.

Dawson leaned over the railing, gasping for air. His pocket felt strangely empty without the weight of the counterfeit shard, which he'd left on the floor by the display case in his haste.

"What happened?" Dave panted, his face flushed. "There was another guard! He wasn't supposed to be there!"

Dawson didn't answer. He was scanning the courtyard they'd just fled. And then he saw him. Not a guard. Not a police officer. It was Moreau. He was standing near the museum entrance, not looking at them, but at the doors. He was wearing a crisp grey suit and holding a phone to his ear. As Dawson watched, Moreau looked up, his eyes sweeping the area until they landed directly on Dawson. He offered no sign of recognition, no hint of their shared conspiracy. Instead, his lips curled into the slightest, most chilling of smiles before he turned and walked calmly away.

The cold that washed over Dawson had nothing to do with the breeze off the river. The second guard hadn't been a random variable. He was a setup. The whole thing was. They weren't meant to succeed. They were the distraction for something else entirely. Or perhaps, they were just the price of Moreau's amusement.

"Dawson?" Dave asked, his voice small. "What do we do?"

Dawson stared at the empty space where Moreau had been. They hadn't just failed to steal a piece of history. They had been used, cast aside, and were now fugitives with a very powerful man holding all the strings. The lesson was brutal and sharp as a shard of broken pottery: in this game, you weren't a player until you understood you were also a piece, and they had just been sacrificed.