“…and then we turned around and came back here. I’m telling you, it wasn’t a big thing.” Shaggy argued as he ordered another beer.”

“You didn’t run into any trouble?” Slink asked.

“Naw. Rak’s shot at us. But their weapons are pretty weak.”

Vlad snorted. “A fact they wouldn’t be aware of if you hadn’t gone traipsing through half of Under-Town. Now, they’ll probably focus on upgrading their weaponry to deal with our werewolf contingent.”

“Werewolf contingent?” Levy asked around a mouthful of hamburger.

“It’s just the three of us, Vlad, hardly a contingent. Although with the way the others were interrogating Rita and Cekrass, I will bet the others will shift soon, too.”

“Even then, that will only make five werewolves, right?” Ren asked, slamming back his own drink.

They had commandeered a table in the far corner of the first floor of the bar. A surprising side-effect of Shaggy’s little outing was that they drew many patrons toward their bar. So now all three stories and the outside area were full of diners and rambunctious gangsters, looking for clues about the enormous wolves. Vlad had insisted on everyone keeping quiet, but judging by the looks Shaggy was getting. He didn’t think that was happening.

A few thugs had rolled into the Square early on and tried something. Until they realized the number of Legion Lackeys around the place. It was hilarious. At least to Shaggy. Slink was expecting it to rouse up several of the big gangs nearby. Including the Brute Clan. So they were waiting for the obvious inquires from their supposed contemporaries. The Raks were sure to try something, as were the UGB. Slink had Ephemara on counter-spying detail, so all they had to do was wait.

“Yeah. Shags makes them slower than you, Vlad. But they seem tougher at the start.” Dave chuckled as he rolled up a napkin and tossed it into a nearby trashcan.

An angry hissing came from nearby and Shaggy rolled his eyes at the table of vampires. They were still clinging to Vlad like a bunch of lost puppies. Vlad sent his own death glare at the table before addressing Dave.

“True. Which is why I still think we should keep them in reserve. They are a great shock troop.”

“They are also my pack. So I’ll deal with them. You manage your sanguisuge sycophants.”

“Honey, are you using the in-game dictionary for alliterative reasons again?”

Shaggy quickly closed the in-game window and looked at his wife. “No.”

“We are still a Legion, Shaggy. So we should all have a say on how we use our resources.” Vlad said, ignoring their byplay.

“That was only for large gang decisions. We did a Founding Members split when we set up the Legion so we could each have some autonomy, Vlad. You have your vamps, Slink has the logistic staff, Dave has the trainees, I have the supply guys, and Shaggy has he’s pack.” Ren explained.

“If anything, he has the smallest group out of all of us. Therefore, we shouldn’t be deciding what he does with them.”

“Seconded.” Slink added.

“Agreed.” said Dave.

“Hey, what do I run in this Legion?” Levy asked.

All five people at the table turned to look at the obsidian-skinned sorceress. Shaggy raised an eyebrow as he said.

“Uhh, our fledgling Magic department, love. I thought that was obvious.”

“I was never told that,” Levy said, crossing her arms.

Shaggy coughed awkwardly and looked at Slink. The young man shrugged his shoulders. “Dude, I was never told. Plus, adding members IS a Legion decision. So all of us need to be present to add her.”

Ren nodded and smacked the table gently. “Well, we are all here, so let’s vote on it now. Magic is a huge blind spot for the Legion.”

Shaggy dove into his menus and found the Legion tab. Scrolling over it, he found the ‘add a member’ button and clicked it. After entering Levy’s name and the position they wanted her to fill, he pushed it out to the other members. It was a few more minutes until Levy jerked in her sit and then grinned.

“Ahhh, absolute power. Finally.”

“Oh, calm down. Now you have to go about finding us some mages. Can you do that?”

Levy was nodding as Vlad raised a hand. “Do we have time for that? I mean, the Raid is happening soon, right?”

“Yeah, but we can still shore up our defenses around here. While we do that, Levy can get a start on our Magic Division.”

“Actually, there’s not much else we need to do.” Slink said. “I mean, the defenses on the bar are pretty solid. All we need to do is wait to see what comes from your show of force and then we can move on to the raid.”

“You think they’ll do anything?”

Slink shook his head. “Not really. We may see an increase in activity along our borders. But we should be more than fine.”

“So…” Shaggy said, standing up. “We can go out on patrols, then?”

“Dude, you just got back from riling up the neighbors.” Vlad rolled his eyes.

“Yeah, but what else can are we going to do? We are kind of in a holding pattern while waiting for the Raid. So let’s hunt down some Quinica and look into shit we put on the back burner.”

“We do still have Cog’s column thing downstairs.”

“Yeah, that thing is supposed to get us a robot army, right?”

“Something like that.” Ren nodded in thought. “I also have some stuff I want to look into around our tunnel exit.”

Shaggy waved a hand at everyone and raised an eyebrow at Vlad. The pale vampire exhaled roughly and finished his own drink. They discussed a little more about their plans before they broke apart. Levy stuck with Shaggy. After promising Slink and Vlad, she would look into getting them more mages. The two of them went down to the basement. Shaggy wanted to know what the Quinica were up to, so he decided to find Ephemara.

If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

His Number One Lackey was in charge of their spy network. So he figured if anyone knew about the hiding vamps, she would. It didn’t take long to find her as she was, once again, covering for Slink at the war table. Apparently, she still had full access to manage her team through the interface. Shaggy wasn’t sure how that worked. But he brushed it off as he spotted her annoyed face.

The pack link seemed to double-down on the annoyed feeling and Shaggy sensed a headache coming.

“What do you want, boss? If it’s more work for my team, you can forget it. We are already stretched thin.”

Shaggy tilted his head. “What all are you working on? I thought you were just looking at the Quinica.”

Ephemara snorted and waved at the war table. The holographic map glowed blue, and the shifted as Ephemara worked the map. It zoomed out, showing a wide view of the north-eastern quadrant of Under-Town. Shaggy had enough time to spot three friendly green dots in the area before Ephemara explained.

“Sure, we have our feelers out. But really, the real big pain in the ass is on the Rakgu side.”

Ephemara spun the map and showed the South-eastern quadrant. Multiple green dots were spread out along their southern border. To Shaggy, it looked like they were patrolling. But he really didn’t know enough about the war table. He made a mental note to learn about the damn thing soon. Not right now, of course. He had better things to do.

“What are they doing?” Levy asked.

“Counter-intelligence.” Ephemara gave both of them a wicked grin. “We’ve been finding and stopping spies from coming into our turf since the whole Quinica shit calmed down.”

Shaggy nodded as Levy hummed pensively. Both Shaggy and Ephemara turned to regard the tall sorceress.

“Well, you know you don’t have to eliminate all of them, right? I mean, this place has plenty of protections against intrusion. Plus, if you can spot the spies and follow them here. Then we can control what information the get.”

“Isn’t it better if they don’t get shit?”

“Sure. But I bet they’ve increased their efforts every time they’ve failed. So it’s better to throw them a bone, instead of killing every dog that comes our way. That way, they’ll stop trying so hard and leave us alone. Once people succeed, they get complacent.” Levy nodded.

Ephemara seemed to think about it for a few seconds before she sighed. “Yeah, you're right. Plus, if I control the information, they get. Then we can plan around it. I was so busy slaughtering them, I didn’t think about the job. But in my defense, slaughtering them is fun.”

“Sure, but this way you can free up more of your team to hunt down the Quinica. Any news on that front?” Shaggy asked.

Ephemara grimaced. “Not really. It’s like they up and vanished. One of my guys is a Lektosian, so he could find residual energy markers in the Quinica’s old buildings. I think they teleported out of here, boss.”

Levy smiled. “So that’s a good thing, right? I mean one less problem to deal with.”

“That would be true, if we weren’t also still getting reports of our patrols finding random Quinica groups. Not just one or two guys, either. Like, full-on, heavily equipped, strike teams.” Ephemara said, handing over a data-tablet.

Shaggy immediately passed it to Levy as he asked. “Guerrilla warfare?”

Ephemara nodded. “Looks like it, chief. Our guys have taken them down with sheer numbers and grit. But if it keeps up, we’re going to be in trouble.”

“This says that the teleportation device is suspected to be technological. Do we have any confirmation of that?” Levy asked as she looked over the tablet.

“Nope. Just what Ghulnosh told me he found. His powers don’t work with the ‘magical spectrum.’ Whatever that is.”

Levy’s face brightened as she looked up. “Oh! Some magic on the mortal plane operates like wave lengths. So your guy probably can’t pick up on anything like that. Which I guess makes sense. I mean, picking up techno-waves and then magical ones would probably make for a big headache.”

Both Shaggy and Ephemara nodded dumbly when Levy finished speaking. Shaggy tried to keep a contemplative look on his face. But he clearly failed as Levy’s smile dropped and she huffily went back to perusing the tablet. He coughed awkwardly as he turned back to Ephemara.

“What about Roald? Has he taken a whack at this? He is supposed to be our tech guy now, right?”

Ephemara grimaced again. “He has been pretty cagey about helping. Some guys think he’s the one that sold the Quinica the teleporting tech.”

“Why hasn’t anyone questioned him then?!”

“Well, the report’s pretty new.” Levy said. “I doubt Vlad or Slink have seen this yet, right?”

Ephemara nodded and Shaggy growled slightly. “Ephe, please prioritize this stuff.”

“Hey, boss. I got tons of info coming at me all the time. I set aside the report to hand off to one of you the next time I saw ya. Now you have it.”

Shaggy bit his tongue. He couldn’t really say anything. The woman was clearly overworked and was still doing a hell of a job. Ephemara grinned as she felt his conflicted feelings. She gave him a harsh pat on the shoulder and turned back to the table. Shaggy could see the green dots moving away from the southern border slowly. A red mark popped up almost immediately.

“Got you, ya little…” Ephemara grinned as she sent more commands to her team.

Shaggy sighed and turned back to Levy. “You mind handing that to a runner? I need to see a jackass about some tech.”

Levy bent down and kissed his cheek. “See you in a moment, dear.”

Shaggy nodded, and they both left the war room. Levy immediately grabbed a random Lackey and began explaining. Shaggy rushed off down the dirt tunnels, remembering where he had seen Roald’s little store. Lackeys stepped aside as Shaggy rushed through and he saw a few smile at him. He gave them little more than a head tilt as he turned into Roald's room.

The smell of machine oil and the sound of whirling gears immediately assaulted Shaggy, and he froze. The room had been silent before he entered. But now it was a roaring torrent of noise. Shaggy grimaced as his ears got used to the noise. Looking around, he saw that a few Lackeys were in the small square room. Some were looking through the shelves of equipment. While others were lined up at a counter. Shaggy grinned as he spotted the old man Sylus behind the counter.

Several tiny robots rushed about. Restocking shelves and bumping into customers. As he looked around, Shaggy spotted the source of the noise. Behind the counter, there was an enormous machine banging and whirring as Roald sat before it. The young man was still in his automated chair as he rushed about the machine. He would occasionally stop and focus on something before rushing around again.

Shaggy stalked through the small store and passed the counter. Sylus looked up to yell something. But when he saw it was Shaggy, he returned to his customers. Shaggy gave the old man a wave as he got a full look at the large silver machine Roald was working on. Although from the looks of things, the machine was giving Roald a workout.

It was a thirteen foot monster that spanned the entire length of the shop. As Shaggy watched occasionally, random weapons or armor would pop out. Little droids would then rush in and grab the items before running toward the store. Shaggy nodded in amazement as he saw the machine work.

“What do you want?” said the annoyed boy.

Shaggy glanced back to Roald to see the kid still running about the machine. “You got space to talk?”

“No. This damn thing takes constant maintenance. It would be different if this damn thing made anything useful. But this is a waste of my talents.”

“Let me guess. Mass produced shit is lower quality?”

“The lowest. Besides, my area of expertise is robotics. Not equipment.”

Shaggy nodded. “What about teleportation? You help anyone with that yet?”

Roald turned to stare at Shaggy even as his chair still moved about the machine. “No. Not since I dismantled most of my portal network.”

Behind him, Shaggy heard more footsteps. He turned to see Levy, Vlad and Slink marching their way into the store. Shaggy turned back to the kid.

“Yeah. Shut this stuff down for now, kid. We got to have a talk.”

Roald brought out a small cloth and wiped his sweaty brow with it. His eyes widened as he saw the other three enter the store’s back area. Shaggy could see worry in the kid’s eyes, so he smiled.

“Don’t worry. We just want to know if you heard anything about the Quinica having teleporting technology.”

Roald’s eyes went wide before he shook his head. “No. But tell me everything.”

Shaggy sighed as Levy and the others joined him. “Well…”