Wow, I really must have been still fucked up from everything that just happened.

Give myself to the Corpos.

Was I fucking insane?

I went over everything that a few more times in my head.

Yes. Yes, I was very messed up.

This wasn't a good time to make decisions.

I couldn't trust anything right now, including myself.

Well that wasn't completely true, there was a few folks I could trust.

"John, I think my brain is too screwed up to function properly right now. Let's get the cleanup and after action done here, then I need some sleep."

"Good idea."

Waking Jaina up wasn't difficult.

She immediately started crying.

I did my best to comfort her, but in many ways I was just as devastated as her. I guess it was a team effort to pull ourselves together.

I discovered that I couldn't cry. Something blocked it off.

Well it was handy for right then because it let me seem calmer than I was. That in turn helped Jaina to reach a state of calm.

Me being dysfunctional for the win. Yay.

Wait, was I really being that guy?

Argh.

I gave myself a mental slap.

This wasn't about me. It was about Jaina.

"Jaina, I know you are not okay right now. I going to let you process this, but lets start with this. None of this was your fault." Yeah, it was mine.

Her eyes opened wider but she didn't seem to have any other reaction.

"Going forward we'll get better at searching out assholes like those two skanks." And I'll do the same or worse to them.

She nodded as her face firmed up. Her eyes narrowed. She went grim real quick. I couldn't blame her, it was a better reaction than I expected.

But I couldn't sense her emotions right now. In fact, the part of me that could do that seemed asleep right now. Huh.

"I think we both know I'm not very good at emotional stuff, so I'm just spitballin' here. If you need to talk, once we clean this up and we all get some proper sleep, I'm here for you."

She smiled a little before her face went back to stone. She nodded again.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

"First we need to figure out to give you back the tower. This is too much power for me to safely handle. I'm certain there will be a lot of consequences for what went down here today."

"Yes my Lord. It is simple, just hold still." She placed her hand over my heart.

I felt a brief pulse of cool clear mana.

She frowned. "You really latched on to the command sigils hard, my Lord. It will take a moment to untangle this."

"Take all the time you need." I gave her a grin.

Seconds stretched to minutes and the minute stretched to just about an hour. I felt her working the whole time, her mana control was leagues above mine. I could sense her dedication and passion for magic in every little adjustment, every shift of energy. That part of my abilities still worked. Hmm. Why would one set of abilities be offline while the rest worked fine?

Finally, I felt the Tower's control return back to her. Thankfully, she left me a connection but only a minor one.

"You'll still have a student's access permissions. I think it would behoove you to come for lessons soon, my Lord. Your strength is frightening, made worse by your control being rudimentary."

I laughed, "Yeah, that sounds about right. I'll try to make time for it. I have a feeling time is going to be in short supply, though." My mood shifted quite a bit during that statement.

I wanted to sigh but held it in. I read somewhere once people found it annoying. Some even thought of it as a sign of weakness.

I could no longer afford to be weak. Nor ignorant for that matter.

All my efforts were too scattered. Too random, from one thing to the next.

I was reacting, not acting.

The one thing my previous thoughts had made clear, I... no we required a long term plan.

There was a need to sit down with everyone and plan. Not just for tomorrow but for the next few years at least.

Jaina still had her hand on my heart her mana was softly pulsing as she was searching for something.

I gave her a questioning look.

"Just making sure you are still yourself my Lord."

"Ha! Good idea." Trust but verify. What a good phrase that was.

With Life Control I could suss out the cyberware that allowed impersonation. We could go over all the nomads, and likely find any other moles.

One thing was certain, whether she was an agent or not I wasn't looking forward to dealing with Amanda.

I had some Probes drag the two still catatonic imposters to the town square in front of the Town Hall.

Alina had restored the nomads to the exceptions list. Needless to say their exclusion had ruffled some feathers, but no where near as much as explaining why it happened.

If I hadn't shown them the agent and let Ricky, their Doc, examine them they wouldn't have taken my word for it.

They let me go over them one by one. I was shocked when no one objected. I was more shocked to find no other moles.

I let them get back to their routines.

Which left John, Jaina and me with Amanda who was clinging to Jim as hard as could be. She wasn't crying though. Real steel, she was.

They had been, ahem, being intimate, when I called this gathering. I was sorry I stripped the moment away from them. It was a day for crappy feelings.

It also told me Raynor had decided to trust her before this had all played out. I'm sure he had his reasons, I was also sure he was better at dealing with people than I was.

"I don't know what they did to the real ladies, but they said they had been embedded with you for a year. I don't know if they could have been lying. I can't really trust my opinions on it right now."

She stared at me with an iron gaze.

"They're probably dead. Once they had a personality imprint they wouldn't have needed them anymore." Her voice was flat, just another list being read. I wished I had that level of control.

She shook her head, probably trying to wrap her head around how she of all people didn't notice.

I nodded. I had been avoiding thinking too much about that part of things. I had never really known the true ladies. Did that make it better or worse?

"It doesn't change our position, unless you want to count it as a violation of the treaty." Again that flat tone, maybe it wasn't control? Maybe she had just shut down?

"No, Amanda. I'm not going to hold this against the Aldecaldos. If you can stand continuing in this with us, that's what I want."

She nodded.

The light of this day, almost two days from when we had arrived back in town, was almost gone.

"I suggest we all get what rest we can and then meet up after to figure things out going forward." Raynor with the sage advice.

We all went our separate ways, to our own beds.

To think and perhaps to dream.

I found that despite my blankets, my bed was very cold.