Shaggy stared down at the prone form of Levy. Her body twisted and spun in the dirt, and Shaggy could only sigh. He somehow knew this was going to happen. It was just his luck, really. Levy kicked her feet into the air and clutched her stomach as she feebly tried to suck in air. Her face was red and tears streaked her cheeks as she rolled around. Rubbing his temples, Shaggy tried to put a stop to it.
“It’s not that funny.” He said, dryly.
“HAHAHAHAHAHAHA… It… Hahahaha… really… Hahaha… is” Levy panted out as she fell into another long burst of laughter.
Shaggy looked to his pack for help. But they were all deep in concentration. Ephemara, pink in the face, was sitting in the lotus position, trying hard to ignore them. Once Shaggy had gotten the hang of sending emotions through the Link, the next few steps were up to them. He could point at the emotions they needed, but it was up to them to access them. Occasionally he’d send a bit of the emotion down the line to Sybil, Vick, or Stanley. Ephemara, however, was trickier.
“HAHAHAHAHA! I mean… what the hell? HAHA! The game really is signaling something here, isn’t it?” Levy wiped tears from her eyes as she tried to sit up.
Shaggy offered his wife a hand up. She took it, still cackling the whole way. Once she was back on her feet, she shot a glance at Ephemara and put a hand to her mouth. Shaggy groaned as his wife was almost incapacitated with laughter again. She had walked over while they were experimenting. Which meant she got to see and hear about Ephemara’s trigger emotion. Trying to distract his wife, Shaggy asked.
“So, what did you want? You were overseeing the construction down here, right?”
“Oh, you are not wriggling out of this. Your precious second-in-command NPC needs your help, Shaggy. Go on. Feed her the emotion she needs.” Levy grinned.
Shaggy studied his wife’s face, looking for any duplicity. But all he saw was genuine delight at the situation. “Do we need to talk?”
Levy’s face was still smiling, but she raised an eyebrow as she looked between Shaggy and Ephemara. “Maybe…”
Shaggy blinked and tried to process that. But Levy smacked him on the shoulder.
“Not right now. Now I want to see what happens when you send feelings of lust down your little Link-thing.”
Shaggy saw Ephemara shudder. Whether in dread or anticipation, he didn’t know. Keeping his gaze firmly on his wife, Shaggy focused on a quick, but powerful, memory. He pulled out the feelings of lust and sent them down the Link. He didn’t watch the effect, but judging by the sly grin on Levy’s face, it was something to see. Levy turned her gaze back to him and Shaggy could see the curiosity behind those eyes.
“Yeah, we definitely need to talk,” Levy muttered before a shout of elation interrupted them.
Shaggy spun, briefly taken in Ephemara’s pink-cheeked face, before he caught sight of Stanley. The young teen had leapt to his feet, hands in front of him. He was panting hard as his body shifted and morphed slowly. Vick and the others gave the boy room as his body bulged and then caved into itself. Shaggy heard Sybil cursing to herself as Stanley’s shift sped up and ended abruptly.
Now, standing where Stanley had been, was a sleek-looking, shiny, silver wolf. Shaggy blinked as he took in the creature’s deep black eyes. Stanley was shaking his massive head as he got used to the new sensations. His skin was practically smoothed, silver armor. It reminded Shaggy of the boy’s Quinica parasite. With that thought, Shaggy quickly scanned the boy for any obvious weak-spot, but he didn’t have one. He blew out a breath in relief.
“Damn, kid. Not bad.” Vick said as he walked around the enormous wolf.
Stanley was sleek and thin, where Cekrass was huge. He was also slightly taller than Rita’s wolf. Shaggy could feel sheer curiosity filling the boy’s wolfish form. He wanted to run and discover what he could achieve. He wanted to know what the Quinica brought to his new form, and he wondered how he would stack up against Cekrass now.
The lizard’s big scaly wolf bumped shoulders with Stanley’s sliver one. They both batted at each other for a bit before they started running through the cavern. The place was still growing, But Shaggy worried the two would damage something. Rita sent him some images of her watching over the two as her own wolf trotted after the playful pair.
Turning back to Sybil and Vick, Shaggy saw them both deep in concentration. They were both trying to follow their own emotions to the core of their wolves. They both had odd triggers for some reason. Sybil’s was based around domination. Wanting to be the best and then flaunting it. But Vick’s was based on some form of sadness. Which was a weird thing for Shaggy to get a handle on. It wasn’t a deep, lasting sadness, like sorrow. But it was related to the emotion in some way. The sharpshooter was running through every feeling he could get, trying to narrow it down. Meanwhile, Sybil was trying to bask in the feeling of domination.
“Can’t you help them a bit as well?” Levy asked, nodding at the two.
“With Vick, I don’t even know the right emotion and I don’t have the proper emotional memories to help Sybil.”
“So, is that what you're transferring to each of them? Memories?” Levy asked with a pointed look at Ephemara.
Shaggy coughed awkwardly and didn’t answer. Instead, he turned his mind inward and searched for something to help. But all he could pull up in his mind were images of victories and failures, happiness and sadness, loneliness and comfort. He searched and searched, but his mind was hazy with the effort. Eventually, he shook it off and glanced around.
Ephemara, Vick and Sybil were still working on it. Tom was still unconscious on the ground and the rest of his pack was off helping the dig. Levy gave him a grin and a wink when he returned his gaze to her. He smiled back and pointed up at the ceiling of the cave.
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“Want to go see how Frank’s doing with the deli?”
“Weren’t you supposed to be in hiding after getting your ass kicked?”
“Yes, but I figure going into our defunct deli won’t hurt. I’ve helped as much as I can here. At this point, I am probably more of a distraction than a help.”
“Aww, you don’t want to shove any more memories into Ephe?”
Shaggy sighed at his wife and spun. She cackled behind him as she rushed to join him. Shaggy sent his pack orders to keep watch on the entrance. But there were already some Lackeys there. Kek’zar’s weapons and armor really gave his people a proper look. They appeared ready to go to war. Shaggy smiled at the two aliens guarding the entrance/exit to their cave and hurried down the tunnel. Levy by his side.
The entire trip, Shaggy waited for Levy to have the conversation she apparently wanted to have. But she kept silent the entire way up to the deli. Which told Shaggy she probably wanted to have the conversation in the real world. Respecting that, Shaggy kept silent and walked up the stairs into the deli.
The sounds of power tools and men shouting filled the air as they entered the kitchen area. Franklin was standing there talking things over with a few workers. But when he spotted them, he waved them over. Shaggy smiled back at Mr. Stein and looked around. Everywhere bits of the building were broken down as new teams of workers moved in and tried to set things up.
With the arrival of Frank and his truck, Shaggy could implement some of the terminal’s features. Such as building things quicker for a certain amount of credits. They could also now buy things through the terminal, but they’d have to wait for delivery. Although Shaggy suspected that they’d have the same issues they had with their builders.
Frank had called every news outlet he could anonymously. But Shaggy wasn’t sure of the impact they would have. All he could do was sit back and hope. The HLO was doing its best to isolate and buy out the area. Going by how desolate the place was, Shaggy could see they were succeeding.
Levy tapped his arm and pointed to the front. “Why do we want tables and chairs? We’re a deli, right?”
“Yeah, ostensibly. But I was also thinking of adding like a sandwich counter or something. That way, we have an excuse for our people to be loitering around.” Shaggy grinned, happy at his idea.
“Oh, that is a good idea. Maybe we can even do an outdoor coffee area? Get that crowd in here. You know how people love their over-priced terrible coffee.”
Shaggy thought about it for a few seconds before he shook his head. “Maybe not. Sandwiches is already a stretch and I don’t really want too many people hanging around. We still have to decide on an illegal business to set up in the back of the shop.”
“Do we have the space?”
“We don’t, but it’s an option on the Terminal. We just pick the racket and we can build it out. But this is going to be our first one, so it has to be special.”
“Casino?”
“But isn’t that played out?”
“Sure, but that’s for a reason. They are great at laundering and earning cash. People expect to lose money at a casino. So long as we add a couple of ringers that work for us, people will think they have a chance.”
“Devious.” Shaggy grinned.
“It’s why you love me. Also, what if I build my coffee-shop next door and we combine the ‘backrooms?’ That way, we will have twice the space for our little casino.”
“Lovely idea, my love. Shall we get to spending?”
Levy smiled as Franklin finally got a word in. “Uhh, boss. I just want to thank you again for the opportunity. Thanks to Frank, we can get the place built out. We still have supply issues, though.”
Shaggy looked at Franklin’s hopeful face as they moved toward the Manager’s office. He sighed. “Good point. We still need meat and sandwich stuff, right?”
“Actually, I have an idea about that. The local bodegas and shops that are still in the area have their own hookups for groceries. We could send some people out to figure out where they get their stuff. Then we can decide how extra-legal we want to get with acquiring it.”
“Legal, Franklin. We need everything associated with the deli to be perfectly legal. Did you get all the paperwork settled?”
Franklin nodded. “Almost. There are still a few things ‘under review’, but I don’t foresee a problem.”
“Good, then get your boys to make overtures to the shop owners in the area. Find their suppliers and we’ll take it from there.”
“What if they won’t tell us? Some of them are hugely territorial.”
“Then we nuke them, right?” Levy asked excitedly.
Shaggy sighed. “No. Then we hit up Nuc and see what she says. Remember, my bloodthirsty wife, we are legitimate business owners.”
“I’m about to sell overpriced coffee to posers. There’s nothing legitimate about that.” Levy snarked.
Shaggy nodded idly in agreement as he started pouring through the terminal interface. He shared it with Levy. Franklin rushed off to grab some Lackeys. So Shaggy and Levy tabbed through the various menus, ordering and shifting the floor plan of the deli around. Shaggy built out space underground for their upcoming casino. The interface made the whole thing fairly simple. But the credit expenditures were getting expensive. Also, the deli’s terminal wouldn’t let them build outside the deli. So Levy was going to have to go next door and do the renovations herself until she got a terminal to appear.
“Oh, that will be fun!” Levy shouted excitedly. “I’ll be able to build out my store and then we can connect them beneath the ground.”
Shaggy blinked at the fairly suggestive tone in his wife’s voice. When he glanced at her, she grinned and stuck her tongue out at him playfully.
“Got to keep you on your toes, love. Ya got a lust-wolf downstairs after all.” Shaggy tried to speak up, but Levy put up a hand. “Later, darling. I’m going to grab a few Lackeys and check the surrounding buildings.”
Shaggy sighed and waved to her as she walked out of the room. With a few more button presses, Shaggy completed the build of their underground casino. For now, it was just the space. They would have to acquire the furniture and tables ‘extra-legally’, as Franklin had put it. Shaggy inhaled deeply, getting the scents of sweating men, sawdust, and overworked power tools. Looking out the large front windows of the deli, Shaggy saw that night was truly upon them.
“Maybe if all the pack gets their wolves, we can go for a run at night. That should be safe and we can run off some energy. I don’t want to be cooped up at all hours of the day.”
Shaggy smiled as he thought about his pack running seven-strong through the dark streets of Austin. They were sure to freak out more than a few pedestrians. Maybe they could scare up some of the white armored bastards too. His inner-wolf perked up at the thought and that clenched it for Shaggy. He was supposed to be in hiding right now. But when the metaphysical wolf within you wants to go for a run, it’s best to let the beast run, right?