While Tessa organized her men and got them started on the basic tasks necessary to ensure they'd be ready in case of an attack, she had Greg scout the area surrounding the ship. Dozens of fairy Gregs spread across the land, taking in the terrain, looking for any signs of the Demon Empire, or even the Mage Republic. The aliens had landed the ship in a defensible valley, right in the middle of a mountain pass. One end of the pass opened up to overlook a large area filled with trees and hills, a winding river running through it all, while the other end of the pass led to a fertile plain. "I think we're defending this pass to keep the Demon Empire out of the plains." Greg turned to Tessa, after explaining what he'd seen. "Or they're in the plains and we're supposed to take it? But that seems less likely. Plus, we have no interest in taking anything for the Mage Republic, so if that was the case, it wouldn't matter."

"And you haven't seen any sign of any other forces in the area?" Tessa asked.

"Not yet." Greg shook his head. "I don't see any signs of any major fortifications in the plains, so if they are there, they're pretty far away, or very well hidden. On the other side… that shits a complete jungle. There could be anything hiding in there. I'm going to need some more time. I just hope they aren't invisible or something."

"Why would they be invisible?" Tessa asked, cocking an eyebrow at him.

"Well, the spaceship was when it first came to Earth." Greg shrugged. "If they can do it once, I'm sure they can do it again."

Tessa groaned. "If we have to deal with invisible attacks, I'm going to shoot someone."

"How are you going to shoot them if they're invisible?" Greg asked cheekily, grinning slightly.

Tessa scowled at him. "I'm going to shoot you!"

"Now how's that going to help anyone?" Greg snickered.

Tessa shook her head, but she couldn't keep a grin off her face. It was good to have him back. She hadn't even realized how much she missed being aggravated by him. "Are the Generals close to being done?" She asked after a moment.

"Oh, god no." Greg snickered. "They're still trying to figure out if it's smarter to remain with the ship or try to build our own defenses somewhere else. Apparently there's a concern over the aliens potentially returning and using the ship against us all, which… Well, I've seen them do it once before. Wouldn't put it past them to do it again." He paused. "I don't want to lose you for real." He whispered softly.

"I'm not going anywhere." Tessa promised, pulling him in for a kiss. She then pulled back with a sigh. "Still, they need to make a decision soon. The Colonels are doing what we can, but if we don't have any direction, there's only so much we can do."

Greg nodded in understanding. "My scouting is helping a bit. They're looking over the terrain for anywhere that might be better than here. It was a good idea to send me out there."

Tessa smiled. "Of course it was. I'm kinda brilliant, you know?"

Greg rolled his eyes, smiling. "Well, then can your brilliantness teach me how to get started on becoming a mage? I'm kinda fucked in the magic department at the moment."

"Right, yes!" Tessa exclaimed, scrambling for a wristband and handing it to him. "Put that on."

Greg glanced at it, recognizing it as one of the broken tools that got sent to him a lot early on, before putting it on his wrist. "Now what?"

"Now-" Tessa began, before freezing as she stared at his wrist. It wasn't lighting up. Why wasn't it lighting up?!? Was it broken? Had to be, right? "Hold on." She grabbed another wristband. They were everywhere, since it was a good idea to test yourself every now and then, to make sure you weren't drifting. She checked it over, making sure all the inscriptions were good, before handing it to Greg. "Put that one on."

Greg raised an eyebrow at her, before doing as she said, switching out the wristbands. "Good?" He asked.

Tessa just stared at the wristband. It still wasn't lighting up! She'd checked all the inscriptions, so that wasn't the problem. It should just be running off Greg's natural mana- Tessa paused. The way Greg's ability worked was all bound up in his smoke. If his natural mana was in there too… Tessa frowned. How would that work? Mana did infuse into a person's cells, as part of the process of increasing a person's mana pool. However, that mana only allowed the cells to handle more mana at once! It couldn't actually be used. If Greg's mana was stuck in his smoke… could he even cast spells? "You may be screwed." Tessa scowled.

Greg frowned. "Eh?"

Tessa grabbed the wristband he'd tried earlier, showing it to him as it lit up blue. "This thing runs off your natural mana. If you have mana, it lights up. If you don't… Well, obviously you do, but for some reason it can't be used. With the way your smoke works… I think it traps your mana, making it only usable for smoke, and nothing else. Which means… you probably can't cast spells."

Greg blinked at her, staring at her wristband, then at his own, frowning. His smoke was keeping him from casting spells? He let out a frustrated sigh. Yet another thing his smoke kept him from enjoying! Wouldn't let him sleep, wouldn't let him get drunk, wouldn't let him go to the bathroom, and now it wouldn't even let him do magic! At least he'd mostly fixed the other three when he learned he could make himself real bodi- Greg paused. "I might have an idea." Greg muttered as his body subtly solidified, all the smoke setting so that he could no longer simply poof into smoke. His heart began to pump, blood rushing through his veins, organs firing up as his bodily processes became necessary again. Greg rolled his shoulders, stretching slightly. "I don't think I'm ever going to get used to that." He muttered. The shift from smoke to real was always a bit trippy. It was like sitting in a room with a constant hum you'd tuned out that suddenly stopped. You knew something was missing, but you couldn't figure out what.

Tessa frowned at him. "What did you do?"

Greg shrugged. "I made my body real. If the smoke is the problem, then the answer should be to just not be smoke, right?"

Tessa glanced down at his wristband, which still wasn't glowing, raising an eyebrow. "I'm going to say no."

Greg rolled his eyes. "It's a new body! Of course it won't have any mana yet! It probably still needs to awaken, like the intelligent ferals did." Greg paused. "How do you do that?"

Tessa pinched the bridge of her nose. "Greg, you're just going to get smoke again! Your ability- your innate mana is smoke! That isn't going to change!"

Greg frowned. He hadn't thought of that… "Well, we could try anyway?" He shrugged helplessly. "I mean, genetically this body is much different than my original. Maybe something will change because of that?"

Tessa gave him a skeptical look, before sighing and shaking her head. "Come here." She waved him over, preparing a spell to strip her mana of any effect, essentially turning it into pure mana. She knew this was pointless, that nothing would change, but she also knew she needed to do it for Greg. She remembered the first few months on the ship, even after she'd realized there was no way Greg was on the ship, how she'd get hopeful every time she moved up to a higher division. Even though she knew he wouldn't be there, she didn't know until she got there and saw that he wasn't. Greg probably knew this was pointless as well, but he didn't know, and he couldn't give up on magic that easily. Tessa slowly formed a ball of pure mana, pumping all her mana into it. The spell was horribly inefficient, but it was necessary to remove any effect from the mana. Otherwise she'd end up sending a body manipulation spell into Greg, and he'd end up with cancer or something. Once the ball was big enough, she carefully pushed it into Greg's chest, before letting it burst.

The moment Tessa's mana ball burst inside Greg's chest, all his excess smoke got ejected in black cloud, covering them both! Tessa yelped, jumping back, out of the smoke cloud. Greg chuckled, waving his hand as he collected all the smoke into a small ball. "Sorry about that. Probably should have realized that would happen. Smoke and energy don't mix very well."

"You think?!?" Tessa retorted, glaring at him. "I suppose that answers that though… just more smoke. I'm sorry, Greg." She sighed, shaking her head.

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"Actually… that was just the smoke that was already there." Greg replied, raising his wrist, showing a blue glow, grinning. "I've got mana now."

*

"Okay, now this ability makes sense!" Greg announced happily. A little too happily.

"You have two abilities." Tessa muttered dumbly.

"Two amazing abilities!" Greg replied happily.

"You can't have two abilities!" Tessa exclaimed in frustration.

"I can, and do! And they're wonderful!" Greg retorted.

"Greg, quit it!" Tessa scolded him.

"But life is so good right now!" Greg sighed happily, leaning back in a recliner made out of smoke, relaxing happily. His new ability was awesome! It wasn't super powerful, but it made him happy! Greg liked being happy! He could just lay here being happy for- Greg paused, frowning. Wait, this ability was tied to this body. He needed to keep it healthy. Ugh, bodies were so high maintenance. Especially pregnant bodies. Oh! He should go use his new ability on his other bodies! Could he use it on them? He wasn't sure… Oh! He should awaken them too! Hmmm, probably after the babies though… didn't want to risk anything untoward happening to them.

"Greg. Greg!" Tessa snapped, grabbing his attention. Greg glanced at her, before sighing and waving his hand, creating a smoke Greg before going back to enjoying his new ability.

Smoke Greg glanced at real Greg, frowning slightly, before turning back to Tessa. "Sorry about that. The new ability is pretty… effective. It might take me a bit to get used to it."

"What you need to do is turn it off!" Tessa growled. "You're like a damn drug addict!"

"It's not-" Greg began, before hesitating. "Okay, it's kinda like that, but! There's a benefit! My mind works faster, my senses are better, pretty much everything mental is just better! Part of that includes being really happy, yes, but it's just a byproduct while my brain is working overtime."

Tessa glanced at real Greg skeptically. "You don't seem to be doing a lot of thinking over there."

Greg coughed awkwardly. "Well, I am but… I haven't quite found the right balance yet. Too much and I just indulge in the happiness, too little and the boost is pretty much pointless."

Tessa narrowed her eyes. "You said you're more sensitive, right?"

Greg frowned. "Yes?" He answered hesitantly. Tessa raised her hand, pointing a finger at real Greg as a beam shot from her finger.

"Mother fucker!!!" Real Greg cursed as he jumped to his feet, rubbing a small burn on his arm. He turned to Tessa. "Why?!?"

"To help you find balance." Tessa replied, smiling innocently. "The pain will keep you from going too far, while the happiness will make sure you go far enough, right?"

Greg hesitated. "That… could work?" The burn really wasn't that bad. It was just when his sensitivity increased, everything was magnified. If he balanced the pain and happiness… he began to run his ability again, slowly increasing it until the pain was just barely bearable. Everything seemed to move in slow motion as Greg looked around, including himself. He realized this must have been happening before, but he'd been so caught up in the euphoria his ability brought that he just didn't care to notice. Each second felt like a minute as Greg's mind wandered on the edge of pain and pleasure, taking in everything that was happening around him and his other selves. As the pleasure drew him in, the pain pushed him back, keeping his mind sharp. A cloud of smoke slowly flowed in front of him, resolving into a project that had frustrated him to no end back on Earth and in the trash compactor: his phone. Even though he could see the damage, he'd had no idea how to actually fix it. There were so many tiny little components within it that were fused together in a jumbled mess which he couldn't make heads or tails of before. Now however… it still didn't really make sense, but he noticed patterns he hadn't seen before, ways things needed to connect for the power to flow. After a few minutes of work, which in reality was actually only a few seconds, Greg held the power button down, his face lighting up as the logo appeared on the screen. It then proceeded to spark and almost explode before he rapidly turned it back into smoke, but still, progress! He loved his new ability!

*

Real Greg was lost in his own little world again, but at least this time he looked productive, so Tessa decided to leave him to it, taking smoke Greg and refocusing on managing her brigade. There wasn't much more she could teach him about mana until he'd proven he could maintain his self image and began growing his mana pool anyway. Not that she was too worried. Greg had always had a pretty firm grasp on who he was and what he was about. Plus, his wristband hadn't even flickered the entire time she'd been watching him. No, the only thing to do now was keep the soldiers busy and wait for the Generals to get their heads out of their asses long enough to give them some damn direction!

In the meantime, Greg was still scouting the surroundings, having mostly given up on the plains, focusing on the mountain chain and the jungle, both presenting unique obstacles to him actually figuring out if anything was actually there. With the plains, it was easy. Look out over them. Do you see anything? Yup, a giant herd of kangaroo cows. With claws. Stay away from the plains guys. However, in the mountains, everything was hidden in cracks and caves. There could be anything in there, and Greg would never know. In the jungle, he had similar problems, but with a slight twist. He couldn't see anything, but they could damn sure see him, and apparently he looked like food! Thankfully none of the creatures were airtight, so when he did get eaten (and he did get eaten) he could slip out through one end or the other as smoke to escape.

Otherwise he'd need to wait for them to go through their natural digestive process, because all these creatures were full of mana! It was like there were dozens, hundreds of cheesegraters all around him! His smoke couldn't dissolve them, and he wasn't strong enough to fight them physically. All he could do was survive, which… Well, it was something, he wasn't going to lie. Anyone else out here would have died a dozen times over, while he was just minorly inconvenienced. Plus, it wasn't like he was completely helpless. These creatures were still creatures, so they weren't all that bright. If they were willing to eat him, he could turn into a rock in the middle of their throat and choke them to death or something. Unless mana would help them survive suffocation… it did keep people from dying of starvation or dehydration. Something to test later. For now, he didn't feel like killing random creatures for no reason, particularly not in such a shitty way. Maybe if he could put up a fair fight he'd give it a shot, but killing like that just seemed boring.

Plus, it would distract from his actual mission out here: finding some sort of trace of the Demon Empire. So far he'd found nothing, and he was beginning to think they weren't actually there, or at least not close. Maybe an army was coming their way or something? He wasn't sure, but they definitely didn't have a base anywhere nearby, at least not one large enough to threaten the ship. Which, Greg supposed, was a good thing. The thing they needed most right now was time. Time to develop and grow, so that when whatever was coming after them came, they wouldn't be utterly screwed. Of course, the odds were that they'd still be utterly screwed, but there wasn't much they could do about that.

Then, out of nowhere, the ship began to glow. Complicated lines lit up along the tall central tower as a beam burst from the tip, shooting into the sky! More beams shot into the sky around them, presumably from other ships, as a giant barrier began to form in the sky! Barely an instant after the shield formed, the sky exploded as something hit the shield, lighting up the sky! Greg stared at the sky as the attack shook the world, eyes wide as something clicked. The Demon Empire wasn't coming from the planet. They were coming to the planet! Greg tried to imagine what that blast would have done if it hadn't been blocked by the shield… destruction. Everything living on the surface would be doomed, at the minimum. The only thing keeping them all from being killed was that shield.

Greg glanced at the pillar of light streaming from the tower. No wonder the aliens had just left them here! If the shield fell, they all died! They needed to defend it, no matter what. Even if they despised the Mage Republic, they had no choice but to fight for them, because if they didn't, they'd doom themselves as well. Greg glanced up again as tiny black spots began to impact the shield, piercing through and falling towards the ground, all clustered near beams of light. He watched as a cluster fell around them, some in the mountains, others in the jungle, a few stragglers hitting the plains. Yup, it was time to warn the Generals. Leaving the ship was not an option. He should get Tessa focused on defenses as well. Maybe see about building some walls. War was here, and they needed to be prepared. But first… he should check these guys out, shouldn't he?