PART 1

A simple thrust down on the right, then a sharp swing back up and diagonally to the left. Keep up the momentum by spinning the spear overhead once and cut down diagonally from the other side. Pull back with a half-step and level the shaft with the ground, bend the knees, and then jab forward. Pull back before it would become a full lunge and parry counter-clockwise, then chain that into a low stab. Use the momentum to side-step to the left while pulling the spear back overhead, feint a high stab, then change it up in the last second into a horizontal swipe.

Swish. Swish. Swish. My battered yet reliable training spear made a soft whistling noise every time it cut through the empty air. There was no profound technique behind my movements. In fact, there wasn't much in terms of rhyme or reason in them to begin with. I wasn't fighting an imaginary opponent either; I simply moved for the sake of moving my body, chaining one strike into another based on nothing but instinct and how comfortable the movement felt at the moment. There was nothing deep about it, neither was I in some kind of meditative trance or any other silly notion like that. I was simply exercising to let off some steam in the process, and ho boy, did I have a lot of pent-up steam to work out after what happened this afternoon!

At last, after about fifteen minutes of intense sparring with thin air, I finished my impromptu training session by setting the butt of the spear against the concrete floor with a soft yet forceful thud. I wiped my forehead with the sleeve of my sweater and, fittingly enough, I was sweating so much I looked like I just ran a marathon in the Saharan desert.

"[The form of thy spearsmanship is remarkable as ever, Blackcloak,]" Brang grunted a few words of mostly unwarranted praise, then he handed me a clean towel with the nonchalant familiarity of a friendly trainer in a local gym looking after the newbie. I graciously received it and this time I wiped my whole face. While I did that, the Faun ex-general continued to play his role by reminding me, "[I beseech you to rest, or thine body will suffer.]"

"I know," I answered while handing the towel back to him. "I'm just about done."

He gave me a small nod, and while his expression didn't change, his eyes were strangely affectionate. Was this what people called 'smiling eyes'? When he looked at me like that, I could kind of understand why Snowy called him her uncle. Under all the fur and muscle and creepy ram features, he was kind of grandfatherly… if you squinted hard enough.

But enough of that. I set the spear against the wall by the improvised weapon storage the Faun constructed from some spare lockers. Speaking of them, I turned on my heel and looked over the mook squad, who were incidentally also training in the spacious main hall inside the shelter.

"[I request your presence! Come forth at once!]

The Faun all stopped on their tracks (though, since most of them were doing Dominance training, they weren't moving around a lot to begin with) and they sent me some questioning glances. Their confusion didn't last long though, as in just a couple of seconds they formed a tidy line right in front of me. Brang also joined them for last, and by the expectant looks in their eyes, I had a feeling they already had a good idea about what I wanted to tell them.

I took a deep breath and adopted my best drill sergeant mannerism.

"[Hear me, and hear me well!]" I began as a looked over the group with a slow, measured pace. "[Aware as you are, I shall echo the events of the not so distant past, for their weight is one that we shall bear for a long while. My kindred suffered the perils of an ambush most craven, right within the heart of our home of concrete and steel.]" I paused for a moment, and after some hesitation, I decided to go with the third explanation I came up with during my exercise. "[The governors of our land, the wingless leeches of the veins of the silver essence act as a gaggle of incompetent buffoons at best, or may not even be feigning at worst, thus we shall not entrust our safety into their hands.]"

"[Wingless what of what?]" Hrul whispered under his breath towards his left, where Rabom subtly shrugged his shoulders.

"[Leeches, I think. I didn't get the second half eith—]" he whispered back, only to freeze up the moment he noticed I was looking at him.

"[Hold thy tongue at bay and heed my words,]" I warned him with a frown, and he averted his eyes with an almost bashful expression. I let out a shallow breath and tried to get back into my groove, and after a few seconds I resumed my speech by saying, "[As you are absconders in the eyes of the loathsome vassals of the raven-haired one, I have long wished to conceal your presence from the ever-prying eyes of the outside world, yet the state of irksome affairs surrounding us leave me with nary a choice but to set your wings free in the night.]"

"[What is thy command, Lord Blackcloak?]" Brang cut in with a surprisingly eager voice. He placed his clenched right fist against his broad chest in a form of salute, a gesture the rest of the group followed, if a little less eagerly. As for me, I couldn't help but employ the tried and tested combination of a roll of my eyes and an unsubtle groan to express just how bloody annoyed I was about all this.

"[For times uncountable and more; cease your incessant attempts to hang yet more superfluous titles upon my person!]" Brang didn't respond with words, instead he just gave me an odd, amused smile, obviously not taking my protest seriously at all. I suppressed my indignation and made a mental note to give him an earful after this briefing was over, following which I turned towards the rest again. "[Let us return to the true substance of our discussion; a request, nay, a mandate, I do possess. Faun of the house Inanna, I—!]" I began, but before I could even get started in earnest, I was once again interrupted by someone.

"[Inanna-Dunning,]" Karukk told me in such an innocently helpful tone that for a moment I forgot to be completely infuriated with him. He must have mistaken my momentary silence for approval, as he added, "[We are serving the young lady, and she now has your name, so technically we are—]"

"[Cease thine interruptions, or you shall oblige me to insert my hind limb into thine hole of excretion so deep that it shall take you weeks to wash the taste boot-leather out of thine mouth!]"

Karukk gave me a pretty comical look, and in retrospect, I realized that my words might have been a smidgen more graphic than I originally intended, so I hastily cleared my throat.

"[Those words, you shall not mind. In its stead, heed my words once more, for I shall call to a halt of the superfluous walloping of the vicinity of the shrubbery! You shall all scour the lands surrounding my home with prejudice of the most excessive variety. I require you to seek any and all traces of the eastern slayer of phantasmal beings, the furtive creature she seeks, or the preposterous lifeless constructs in lemony colors menacing my kin. For this purpose, you shall be allowed to leave the walls of this subterranean fortress at your own discretion. If you possess inquires, voice them now.]"

"[What do we do if we find any of them?]" Pip asked after a moment of hesitation.

"[Observe, track, report. If discovered, elude their pursuit.]"

I glanced over the group, but they didn't seem to have any other questions. I hoped it was because they were professional enough so that my instructions were sufficient for them. Anyhow, I exhaled a long breath and told them, "[I leave your methods up your preference,]" as my way of ending the briefing before turning around and heading towards the far corner of the hall, or more specifically to the makeshift bench over there. It had a set of empty lunch boxes on it, which incidentally used to contain my dinner. At first, I wanted to teleport back home right away, but on second thought I decided to sit down for a moment first.

The reason why I was all alone (save for the Fauns) was fairly simple: I needed some time by myself to calm down a little, but at the same time I was simply too restless to think straight.

After the most recent incident was definitely over, I hastily gathered a change of spare clothes for Josh, Snowy, and Elly. Strangely enough, even though they were just recently ambushed, they insisted that I uphold my promise with Angie and take them out to the local sweets shop.

That was taking things in stride a little too much already, if you asked me, but then it turned out that Josh himself was, I kid you not, completely hyped up by the whole ordeal. It probably had something to do with him beating up a couple of those 'Sprocket' things, at least according to Snowy's description of the events. Ugh, just remembering those atrocities against good taste and competent minion design made me shake with barely restrained indignation.

Anyhow, over the span of our stay at the confectionery, it became blindingly apparent that the people who were actually ambushed were not shaken at all by the ordeal, while I, the person who wasn't even in the same neighborhood at the time, was feeling dangerously stressed out by the events. Because of this, after we all returned home and they recounted the incident one more time, I excused myself and hopped over to the secret base to... well, I actually told them I did it because I had to think by myself, but if I wanted to be honest, I had to admit that it was so that I could do that exact opposite.

So, I did just that. I emptied my head, immersed myself in swinging my spear, and let out some steam. I'd be lying if I said it didn't work, as I was no longer feeling like a bundle of nerves, but I was still far from being the next incarnation of the Buddha. It must've shown on my face, as before I knew it, I had everyone's favorite Faun ex-general walking towards me with a curious yet somewhat worried expression.

I know it's not exactly the best moment to point it out, but just why the hell were Faun faces so expressive anyway? You would think that a genetically engineered race of hyper-muscular goat/ram/whatever hybrid shock troopers would be completely stern and unreadable, but instead they were like walking, talking open books. Though again, apparently only Snowy and I could read them so well, so maybe it had more to do with our aptitude than their expressiveness. I was tempted to believe it was more of a mix of the two. Still, after a while it was hard to take them seriously as proud and honorable warriors when even their leader kept making goofy faces.

Nevertheless, this was all beside the point, just as Brang was beside me at the moment. He looked at me in silence for a couple of seconds and then, at last, he let out a shallow growl that was, for a change, an actual guttural sound instead of a long-winded thesis about the nature of life or something.

"[What burdens thy shoulders, Blackcloak?]"

I was tempted to just explode up in the face of the guy, but after taking a painfully deep breath I managed to keep my calm. If he didn't get the memo about the whole 'Blackcloak' monicker being my very own berserk button yet, I figured explaining it to him in a quiet and not at all raving mad manner one more time wouldn't do it either, so I decided to let it go. Instead I finally let out the breath that threatened to burst my lungs (why did I even think this was a good idea?) and told him, "It's complicated," without bothering to use Faunish.

"[Are you troubled by the unforeseen assailants?]" he guessed, and after a moment of thinking I shrugged in response.

"You could say that, yes."

"[Vigilance is a thing of great importance, yet I must confess; by the telling of the heiress, their ambushers posed but the feeblest threat to her and her company.]"

I gave the big, friendly creature of campfire scare tales a sidelong glance, then told him, "Not all threats are physical. They pose more of a… metaphysical problem." Brang's ears swiveled in a very obvious show of perplexity, so I explained to him, "What I wanted to say was that, even if those bloody ridiculous-looking robot things posed absolutely no threat to us, the mere fact that they exist in the first place is causing me a lot of headaches."

"[I understand,]" Brang grunted after a second of silence, though his tone implied he still had no idea what I was talking about and wasn't invested enough in the conversation to pry any further, and instead he told me, "[I advise you not to let such pains of thy head sap thy vitality. Nay, if I may be so presumptuous, I shall urge you to take good care of thy health, for as regent, thine wellness of being is the wellness of the house Inanna-Dunning."

After he finished speaking, for a couple of long seconds I was staring at him in deafening silence. He didn't seem to get the clue, though he must have realized there was something wrong with what he just said, as his ears kept swiveling left and right.

At long last, I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, and after looking him in the eyes again I asked him, in my most discreet voice, "Excuse me, but could you repeat that? Specifically the last part?"

Brang tilted his head to the right, his face set in a mixture of incomprehension and curiosity, and he repeated, "[You are the regent of house Inanna-Dunning, are you not?]"

"Since when?" I asked back sharply.

"[You took custody of our young heiress, and she has adopted thine name in return. After arrangements such as these, the conferral of regency until the young heiress comes to age is all but a formality. I knew the surface of thine mind, Blackcloak, and so I reckoned you eschewed to observe the ceremonies of old, yet I never for a heartbeat doubted thine legitimacy. Were my deliberations in error?]"

I gave the befuddled Faun a long, hard, critical look, but no matter how I looked at it, he seemed to be completely serious.

"So the reason why you called my 'Lord' before was because…?" I nudged him a little.

"[While I'm aware that you do not ascribe much weight to the traditional approach of leadership we are familiar with, my age and experience both tell me that some modicum of hierarchy must be maintained for the younger ones to fulfill their duties with the vigor and dedication expected of them.]"

"I see…" I muttered as my hand reached for my temple practically on its own as I could feel another not-so-literal headache coming. "How about we come back to this discussion later? Preferably when Snowy is also with us?"

"[As you wish,]" Brang answered with a small bow.

I took this as my cue to call it a day, so I stood back up and limbered up my shoulders a little.

"I think I'll get going now. Please do as we just discussed. Make the huntress your first priority, then the ambushers, and then the stray Chimera."

The big Faun flashed a toothy grin out of the clear blue sky and gave me another vigorous salute.

"[As you command.]"

I stealthily rolled my eyes at his theatrics and, without any further ado, I left the secret base the usual way.

"I'm back," I greeted Judy after reappearing in my living room. It was a testament to her adaptability that she barely even batted an eye anymore at my unexpected arrival.

"Welcome home, Chief," she glanced up from her notes (as in, actual, honest to goodness, dead-tree-pulp-based ones for a change) and greeted me back, only for her to stop and look me over. "You're sweaty. Go take a shower."

"That's the plan," I responded while stretching my back. "When did the others leave?" I asked more out of courtesy than actual curiosity, as I actually kept tabs on them via Far Sight and so I saw them leave.

"About an hour ago," she responded off-handedly while holding a stack of pages vertically and hitting the edge against the tabletop. "Eleanor wanted to wait for you, but I kicked her out."

"That's a rude thing to do."

"But necessary," she countered while organizing another bundle... of empty papers. It made sense that she didn't need to write a lot of things down, considering her excellent memory, but then why did she even bother? Maybe it was just to create the right atmosphere? Sometimes my assistant's thought processes felt completely impenetrable.

In the end, I shrugged my shoulders and headed upstairs. After a quick and refreshing shower, I changed into a fresh set of clothes and walked back downstairs with a towel haphazardly thrown over my head.

"That's better," Judy stated after laying her eyes on me and she gestured for me to sit beside her. I graciously declined the offer and instead I took a seat on my usual, if slightly battered, comfy chair. In my opinion, it was more productive to have discussions face to face.

"I hereby open today's emergency meeting," I stated a little dourly.

"Present," Judy raised her hand as she responded.

"Are you prepared?" I asked her as my eyes conspicuously scanned over the stacks of mostly empty pages in front of her, and she nodded. "Very well. As we agreed beforehand, you're in charge of the Doylist side of things, as usual, while I will focus on the Watsonian explanations, also as usual."

Judy nodded in agreement and I took a deep breath in preparation.

Now, some might be curious about what the heck we actually agreed upon just now. In short, after the world threatened to flip its setting upside down onto my head, I concluded that, if I wanted to keep up, I'd have to compromise my stance on the meta-narrative.

I still wasn't ready to jump headlong into subversive, meta-knowledge exploiting shenanigans yet, so for the time being I proposed a new way to analyze our surroundings and the events. Since she already had an affinity for it, I tasked Judy with proposing meta-analysis, while I would stick to the more 'common sense' explanations.

As for the terminology, it actually comes from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories, and they are usually invoked to explain plot holes and inconsistencies. To give a concise explanation, let's try an example.

Sherlock Holmes is a great detective. He is very smart, knowledgeable, intuitive, a habitual pipe smoker, and a bit of a smug douche depending on the writer, but that last part is not relevant in this example.

Let's say our super-detective walks into a crime scene. A poor bloke is dead all over the dinner table. Our dear Holmes then looks over the scene and picks up the half-empty (or half-full, if you are an optimist) wine-glass from the table, and just by taking a single whiff, he immediately deduces its brand and year based on its aroma alone, much to the awe and wonder of a certain Watson that tends to hang around the guy. So far so clichéd.

Then, a few chapters later, after interrogating a bunch of people (even though if he was as smart as he thinks he is, he would immediately know that the butler did it, because it's always the butler) and some misadventures (during which he may or may not get high as a kite) he figures out that the hapless victim was assassinated by cyanide in his wine, a compound that has a distinct smell similar to almonds, and one that a super-duper-the-best-thing-since-slice-bread detective would surely notice… or would he? How does one reconcile these two seemingly contradictory elements?

The Watsonian explanation would use in-universe elements to explain away the inconsistency, just as a character in the story, say, a certain Dr. Watson would do. The idea is that, if you asked him the question, 'Hey, did Holmes just screw the pooch?', then the poor, psychologically conditioned tagalong would obviously try to excuse him with all his might.

For a start, he could say that the aroma of the wine was so strong it masked the smell of the cyanide. Sure, that's plausible. Then, alternatively, he could point at an earlier scene where Holmes sneezed as he walked into the building, proposing that he had a stuffy nose and in fact couldn't smell anything, meaning his grand deduction was just a show he put up for the onlookers, and he actually knew the make and vintage of the wine by recognizing the open bottle on the same table, the cheating git.

On the other end of the spectrum, we have the Doylist explanation, which is based not on the story and its elements, but the author and the quirks of storytelling.

In this interpretation, Holmes didn't make note of the faint scent of almonds because the author himself wasn't aware of the fact that the poison has a characteristic smell to it. Alternatively, he was aware, but he wanted to have a specific scene where Holmes amazes his onlookers with his all-encompassing knowledge and decided to fudge this small detail, hoping his readers would skim over it and it wouldn't impact the overall experience. And then, of course, one could even argue for authorial genius by noting that cyanide actually smells like bitter almonds, so Holmes' inability to smell and/or recognize it is actually just the author showing off their research in a roundabout way only the true connoisseurs of the literary arts could appreciate.

In other words, one method was concerned with explaining events and inconsistencies using available in-universe evidence, while the other invoked authorial intent and narrative devices to do the same. It sounds complicated, but it's actually pretty straightforward.

That said, I took a huge breath and began.

"Let's start from the very beginning and open with a topic we already partially discussed."

"Namely?"

"The big conflict with Crowey at the school," I clarified.

"I presume that we are in agreement that it was the climax," Judy proposed.

"More or less, though the question of 'the climax of what' is still not clear."

"In my perspective, it was for the school life period of the narrative," Judy told me with confidence. "It existed to violently expose Joshua to the supernatural elements of the setting. It was also a contrived situation designed in a way so that only our group could resolve it."

"You say 'contrived' but all of the elements that lead to the situation make internal sense." I countered. "They kidnapped Josh because they were privy to his significance in the prophecy. It took place at the school and at a time when no one was around to stop him because Crowey was flexing his 'genius' scheming abilities and picked the time and place in advance on purpose. All of it makes sense in context."

"True," Judy seemingly concede the point, but then she said, "However, it is also true that all the major supernatural players conveniently vacated the island on the same night, as if just to allow him to do so, and that Neige's suspicious activities were ignored both by the mages and us."

"Please don't say narrative influence," I muttered, though I was already certain of her answer.

"But that is the most obvious explanation," she told me with a tiny frown. "Why do you keep denying it?"

"Because it is such a broad term that if I accepted it at face value, it would mean that literally every single one of our actions could be the result of it."

"In that case let's narrow it down," my assistant compromised. "We already theorized that people are subject to a certain level of perception filtering regarding the more obvious peculiarities of the world, such as placeholder behavior. Let us presume that it also applies to us to some degree."

"So the idea is that any time we would realize something that would drastically change some predetermined event, our perception would be compromised to keep us in the dark," I mused aloud, and then, after a short but meaningful silence, I continued, "So, theoretically speaking, let's say I would've taken Snowy's odd behavior seriously and investigated it. What would've happened?"

Now it was Judy's turn to fall silent as she considered things in earnest.

"You would've stopped her preparations for the barrier. Without the barrier in place, Noire would've had to abort his plans, meaning Joshua wouldn't have been initiated into the supernatural elements of the setting, meaning the whole scenario would've been set back at best, or completely ruined at worst."

"So your hypothesis is that narrative influence isn't random, but a subtle form of railroading?"

"Please define your terms," Judy cut in with a prompt she occasionally used in the past whenever I was talking about tropes she was unfamiliar with.

"Railroading is a term originating from tabletop role-playing games, where one participant takes up the role of the storyteller responsible for creating a scenario for the rest. When the players go too far out of the bounds of the plot the storyteller devised, they might try to put them back on the right track by force if necessary. Say, if the ragtag, low-level adventurers wanted to go left at an intersection, but the game master wanted them to go right, he might subtly influence them to go in the correct direction by, for example, dropping a hydra on them and having it chase them there."

"Thank you, that was very informative," she showed her appreciation with a small smile, but then she quickly reverted back to her serious mode and she continued with, "But back to the original topic: if we grant that, would it mean that any occurrence of such perception filtering would serve as a strong indication that the event or situation that triggered it is crucial for the narrative's progression."

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

"That's an interesting idea," I pondered for a moment. "Would that mean that, so long as we could reliably detect them as they occur instead of in retrospect, we could use them to get a handle on our elusive narrative?"

"Possibly. We should devise a testing protocol for that. We are already behind our monthly testing quota."

I didn't respond right away, but when I did, my brows skyrocketed in a split-second and I asked, "Wait, since when do we have a quota? I don't remember explicitly agreeing on one."

"I had one from the very beginning, because at least one of us had to take things seriously," Judy told me with just a hint of smugness. "It was on hold until now because of your injury and the incidents since then."

"Really? Then I guess we have some catching up to do.," I told her while rubbing my chin, then I used the same hand to lightly point at her and added, "Also, that was as good a segue as any, so we might as well discuss the recent events." Before I continued, I leaned forward a little in my seat, then asked, "How would you categorize the current situation from a meta-perspective?"

"I'm not entirely sure," Judy replied thoughtfully, "but based on how the incidents progressed, there seem to be at least two main plot threads running in parallel."

"What are you thinking of when you say 'plot'?" I asked her to clarify.

"A pre-planned, interrelated sequence of events that leads or drags us towards the next plot point."

"I can work with that," I told her, then after a few seconds of pause I cleared my throat and followed up with, "I presume the two main plotlines you are talking about are related to the monster huntress and the ambushers."

"Indeed. Both are outside context elements that came into existence just to create a conflict. If I had to make an educated guess, I'd say that reason behind the two separate plots is you." Judy paused here for a while, and it took me an embarrassingly long time to gesture for her to continue. She gave me an odd look, but nevertheless, she proceeded to elaborate on her point. "As you've previously deduced, your actions during the climax of the previous story arc, in conjunction with your general attitude and behavior, designated you as a 'protagonist'. Due to that, the narrative, or whoever is in control of it, created a plot line for you. Dr. Robatto and his Sprockets most likely exist as low-threat introductory antagonists to ease Joshua into combat scenarios, while the hunter woman and her prey exist for you to follow up on and solidify your status as a monster slayer." She paused again, then after a few short seconds she forcefully cleared her throat and asked, "Any objections?"

"Um... None at all, for now," I answered, slightly disoriented. "So I gather that is your Doylist analysis?" She nodded, so I inhaled deeply and said, "I have an objection though."

"You just said you had no objections..." my dear assistant stated flatly, and in response I playfully wagged my finger in her direction.

"I also said, 'for now'."

"Less than ten seconds passed since then," she continued her deadpan assault on my flawless reasoning.

"But what an insightful ten seconds it had been!" I exclaimed with a dramatic sigh and then, seeing that she wasn't receptive, I said, "Jokes aside, I do think that there's one blind spot in your theory; the involvement of an ethereal, unverified manipulating force notwithstanding."

"I'm listening."

"It's Lord Grandpa, obviously," I told her without bothering to beat around the bush. "Not only that, but in my interpretation of the events, there is only one 'plot' here, and he is responsible for it."

"Oh?" Judy let out an intrigued little noise. "Now you have my full attention."

"Really? How much of your attention did I have until now?"

"About two-thirds," she responded as plainly as if I only asked about the weather.

"Neat," I answered with a poker face matching hers. "Where was I? Right, Lord Grandpa."

"You said he is responsible for the narrative."

"No, not the narrative," I denied with a shake of my head. "When I said 'plot', I meant the other definition of the word. I'm fairly sure this is all some kind of huge, overly elaborate, inefficient scheme he is weaving."

"Do you have any evidence?"

"Thank you for asking!" I flashed a grin at my assistant and assumed my best 'inscrutable erudite' impression by linking my fingers and straightening my back. "While I only have circumstantial evidence, all of it points in his direction. First off, we have the three leads he foisted on me. Since we already discussed their idiosyncrasies, I won't repeat myself. The second hint was how Rinne, who apparently just arrived on the island, already knew my face and address. Someone had to clue her in, and I'd bet my pancreas that it was the old man. Thirdly, today's incident was all kinds of fishy."

I took a deep breath and began to count the ways.

"First and foremost, remember how Ammy turned half the school upside down to find me and tell me to go to the nurse's?" Judy nodded in response, so I resumed, "She said Peabody told her grandfather he wanted to see me, and he, in turn, told her to get me. However, when I got there, Peabody was surprised I showed up and it almost sounded like he was also told by the Arch-mage that I'd be coming over to visit him. Not only that, but the ambush on you guys coincidentally happened just when I was occupied elsewhere, and I wouldn't have been so if not for a certain old badger pulling some strings to get me to show up in the infirmary. Oh, and also note that Ammy was also coincidentally told to take a break from school, but at the same time, she was still used as a messenger by her grandfather. It's almost as if someone wanted to keep me and his granddaughter away from the battle."

"Or it could be that the narrative made sure you were engaged elsewhere so that you wouldn't interfere with Joshua's plotline," Judy posited.

"Possibly, but I still find it more reasonable that Lord Grandpa set the whole thing up."

"Wouldn't that mean that he could control Dr. Robatto?"

I sent my assistant a flat look and told her, on no uncertain terms, "Stop using that stupid name. Even Stevie Wonder could see that it was the Research Society, and he doesn't even know about the supernatural!"

"True, but irrelevant," Judy countered with a slight pout on her lips. "We don't actually know the name of the person behind the mask, so Dr. Robatto is a perfectly fine designation for him."

"Suit yourself then, but I still won't call him that," I compromised with a minuscule groan on the side. "Anyhow, you have to admit that the timing was simply too perfect, and I still think it was because I was set up."

"Very well, let's entertain the thought," Judy compromised as well and stole my pose by linking her fingers and leaning back a little. "Let's presume that Lord Amadeus purposefully misdirected you, and then he leaked this information to Dr. Robatto so that he could attack the rest of us. Do you have any motive?"

"Aside from general animosity, no, I don't," I admitted, but then I immediately added, "However, we also don't have a reasonable motive for why the masked guy with the stupid name wanted to attack the gang either. We don't know why, or even if, he was after Josh."

"I grant you that. He started to give some kind of speech, but then Neige transformed and he ran away."

"There was a speech? The others didn't say anything about a speech," I voiced my surprise and urged Judy to continue. "What did he say?"

"He said, 'Aaaah! I, Dr. Robatto, have reawakened after ten thousand years! It's time to conquer Earth!'. Then, after Neige transformed, he said, 'My head hurts! Sprockets, take care of them!' and he left."

"Wow," I muttered as I was caught in a moment of stupor. "That guy is truly fearless. He didn't just steal the aesthetics; he even ripped off the catch-phrases! Either that, or he has amazing copyright lawyers."

"I don't get it," Judy told me with an uncomprehending frown on her brow.

"Never mind," I dismissed the topic with a wave of my hand. "The actual point is that he didn't really give you any reason why he attacked you. As far as we know, he might've been set up by the old man as well."

"Chief… are you sure your theories are not influenced by the irrational animosity you feel towards Lord Amadeus?"

"No, Dormouse," I said while emphatically shaking my head. "I assure you, my hatred towards the old coot is entirely rational."

"Putting rationality aside, you still didn't produce a reasonable motive for Lord Amadeus to… Chief, why do you keep spacing out?"

"Huh?" I blinked a few times in surprise, then I told her, "I'm listening, I was just checking on Ammy."

Judy's expression slowly morphed into a unique mixture of baffled and peevish, ultimately settling on one that was decidedly in the latter category and she stated, "We've only been dating for a few days, and you are already openly ogling other girls while we are talking with each other. Is the flame already gone?"

"Not funny," I reproached her before I let out a shallow sigh and explained, "Since phones don't work in and out of the Purple Zone, I decided to keep closer tabs on the important people in my life so that I wouldn't be caught with my pants down like today. It just so happened that I was looking at Ammy when you called me out."

"What is she doing?"

"You can have three guesses," I said in a bleak tone, which I figured was enough for her to figure it out.

"Paperwork?"

"Bingo," I answered, then I closed my eyes and slowly shook my head. "At this rate, we have to organize an intervention for her."

"What about Noire?" Judy suddenly asked, completely skimming over my previous comment.

"Who…? Oh, wait, you meant Crowey, didn't you?" I paused for a moment while I switched my attention to his dot, and I told her. "Nothing much. He is still recuperating. Why do you ask?"

"I think it's prudent to keep the man who wanted to kidnap your friend and kill you under surveillance."

"Hey, I am keeping him under surveillance," I protested. "It's just that nothing's happening around the guy. I've been peeking on him three or four times every day, but for the past three days, he was just lying in his bed and staring at the ceiling. Not exactly riveting to watch. Not to mention, the number of people I have to routinely check upon keeps increasing all the time. For example, just today I marked the—" I began, but then my words involuntarily trailed off and my brows furrowed in light of what I was seeing.

"You marked who?" Judy inquired with audible apprehension in her voice.

"The nurse, and I have to go," I told her in a hurry as I jumped to my feet, only to realize that I was still in just a shirt and sweatpants after my recent shower, so I rushed over to the hangers by the entrance and picked one of my identical coats.

"Is there an emergency?" Judy asked as she was about to hurriedly rise to her feet as well, but I gestured for her to remain still.

"No, it's more of an opportunity. Don't go anywhere; I don't know when I'll be back. Let's continue this conversation later."

Judy was obviously about to object, but by then I already put on my sneakers as well and I disappeared from the room. I had a feeling I would get an earful for that later, but I decided will avoid that bridge when I get there.

PART 2

I took a shallow breath the moment I arrived at my destination, held it in, and quickly hid in a dark little cranny I picked ahead of time by the nearest door. I was in a poorly lit concrete corridor, and the familiar smell of heavy and slightly stale air immediately told me that I was underground. I couldn't see too far in either direction, since the only source of light in the hallway was coming from the open door by my side. By the looks of the slightly arched ceiling and the various metal pipes running by the walls, I figured it was probably some kind of service tunnel, if a fairly prim and clean one. No surprise there, the ninja maids were ever-present and very meticulous after all.

After making sure there was no one in sight (I already looked around once during Far Sight, just in case there was any magical or mundane surveillance in the tunnel, but hey, looking twice never hurt anyone), and then I carefully inched forward and set my back against the wall before using my Far Sight again.

I squinted for a moment while my incorporeal eyes got accustomed to the cold, blue neon light coming from the various light fixtures in the room. It was a medium-sized chamber, about five-by-five meters, with white walls and even whiter furniture. On the left side, the desks and workbenches I could see were covered by stacks of haphazardly piled up books and papers, with the rest of the space taken up by a wide variety of glass tubes, round flasks, beaked alembics, and other containers filled with liquids of various colors and consistencies, some of them violently bubbling, others letting off copious amounts of dangerous-looking white vapors by themselves. On the right, the situation was mostly the same, except instead of stereotypical chemistry sets, every surface was packed full of large devices filled with exposed tesla coils, metal boxes with lots of buttons and switches, and small round screens that reminded me of old analog oscilloscopes.

In short, the place looked just like the ominous lair or laboratory of a cackling mad scientist type. Cue…

"Ki-hi-hi!"

No, I wasn't even surprised anymore. The aforementioned laughter came from one of the three people inside the room. The first one was obviously Mr. Peabody, who just finished putting his coat onto a hanger by the entrance, still close enough to the wall so that I could transfer to the other side without anyone being the wiser. His presence was quite self-evident, as without him being here, I wouldn't have had an anchor for Far Sight to target. The other two figures, on the other hand, were considerably less obvious.

First off, there was the fairly short source of the previous cackling. I'm not going to mince my words here; he was obviously 'Dr. Robatto', though this time he wasn't wearing his ridiculous getup. Since he was looking at the nurse, and thus roughly in the direction of the door, I could get a good look at his face (though again, since I could freely change my point of view in a small radius around Peabody, it was more or less incidental).

He had a pair of round, thick-rimmed glasses sitting on a small nose, and overall I'd go as far as to say that he was deceptively handsome even with the disheveled hair and the dark circles under his eyes. Actually, wasn't there even a character archetype for this kind of appearance? I think it was for shoujo manga male love interests; something about being handsome but sickly and frail to create a contrast and trigger maternal feelings or something. I decided that I would ask Judy when I get back, since she seems to be the expert on that subject nowadays.

But back to the description: he was also pretty young, probably in spitting distance to twenty by the looks of it, and while this time he wasn't wearing the silly mask, he was still sporting the same frayed lab coat from the picture. All things considered, while he didn't look exceedingly weird at the moment, if I was lost in a bad neighborhood, I sure as hell wouldn't ask him for directions.

However, if we wanted to talk about weird, the woman standing beside him definitely provided enough of it for the both of them. She was almost a head taller than the guy, with her long, purple hair in a ponytail that reached down to her waist. She had a full hourglass figure, which was put on full display by her dark green, honeycomb-patterned bodysuit. As if that wasn't enough to show off all her 'goods', her outfit had a neckline that plunged right down to her navel, revealing a generous amount of cleavage in the process. On top of all that, she was wearing thick, heavy-looking boots and gauntlets covered in complex, circuitry-like golden filigree, with equally well-decorated golden shoulder pads and a thick, angular single-piece diadem with a freaking unicorn horn in its middle. Furthermore, where the woman's ears were supposed to be, there was instead a pair of sleek metal somethings with green lights on them, sticking out of her head like some giant, high-tech earphones.

While I was observing the two, Peabody made his way over to them and said, "O-ho-ho. How did the operation go?" his characteristic laughter made even more grating by the slight echo provided by hearing him both with my ears and through Far Sight at the same time. On a side note though, it was good to know that he wasn't doing the silly laughter just to annoy me.

Anyway, the younger guy let out a grating chuckle of his own and said, in a high-pitched voice, "Ki-hi-hi! It went exactly as I expected! All the first-generation foot soldiers got wiped out, but I got a lot of tasty, succulent data out of the encounter!" He paused for a moment, then added, "I wasn't expecting the Abyssal though. She was scary," in a considerably less manic voice, only to flare up again by saying, "Also, very scantily clad! It was weird, right, Galatea?"

"I wasn't there, master," the woman stated with an actually mechanical voice. As in, it actually sounded like her voice was synthesized. The guy let out a surprised grunt, then he grabbed his own chin and looked over her from head to toe.

"It had to be an attempt at psychological warfare; to distract the opponents and make them hesitate! Ki-hi-hi! Too bad such shameless tactics didn't work on my Sprockets!"

"They still got wrecked in minutes though," the woman stated with the same voice.

"I told you, it was all within my calculations!" the presumed mad scientist huffed before he looked over the woman one more time and said, "Ki-hi-hi! Hey, Galatea?"

"Yes, master?" she responded without her expression changing at all.

"How about we take a page from their books and try to apply some of that psychological warfare ourselves?"

"A brilliant idea as always, master," she answered with a robotic nod. "I will now proceed to browse speedos in master's size on the internet. I'm certain master will do a great job at distracting the opponents."

"Halt! Halt, I tell you! I wasn't talking about me, but you!" the man protested while frantically waving his hands.

"Error," she stated while repeatedly blinking. "My visual receptors have been fortified against such tactics, so my cogitation core cannot compute a scenario where master's naked body would distract me. Please clarify your query and try again."

"O-ho-ho! I see you are still getting along like you are attached at the hip," Peabody cut between the two of them with a few jovial steps.

"Error. Such attachment would greatly reduce my operation efficiency. Please reconsider."

"Ki-hi-hi! Don't pay attention to Galatea, uncle," the guy in the lab coat told the nurse with a dismissive shrug. "She's just in a difficult phase."

"O-ho-ho! I see, I see…"

I had no idea what he was seeing, but as for me, I was getting more confused by the second about what I was looking at. Still, for the moment I bid my time and waited for my chance, while also hoping that they might accidentally drop some tasty bits of information in the process. Such as this one.

"What are the plans for next time?" Peabody inquired, further solidifying his status as an accomplice.

"I plan on doing the same thing, but with more Sprockets!" Labcoat Guy declared with his arms akimbo, then he quickly added, "Oh, and I will also mix in a few MkII models to see how they perform in a group." At this point, there was a long pause in the conversation, during which he awkwardly tried to decide whether to keep his hands on his hips or cross them in front of his chest, but in the end he decided to simply pocket them and he began pacing up and down beside the chemistry sets. "Ki-hi-hi! If my calculations are correct, then four or five such tests should yield enough usable data to upgrade them to MkIII!"

"O-ho-ho? Won't you run out of your robots? I thought you were short on funds."

"Ki-hi-hi! Don't worry uncle! I calculated everything, including the budget! Even then, if the Sprockets won't be enough, I will just release one of the Biomechanical Gigants!"

"Correction," the woman cut in with an unchanging serious expression, "The precise term is 'Biomechanical Kernels'. They only become beings of unusual size after they are injected with the growth hormone formula and their rapid transformation is triggered by the pre-determined embarrassing code phrase master came up with."

"Thank you Galatea, that was very helpful," Peabody told the woman with a jovial voice, thought her 'master' was only rolling his eyes and continued his pacing up and down.

"Uncle, don't encourage her! She's getting worse ever since I let her browse the internet unsupervised…" The nurse only let out a soft 'O-ho-ho!' in response, so the mad scientist cosplayer rolled his eyes at him this time and continued by telling him, "I still need some time to work out some of the kinks with the MkII Sprockets, but they should be ready by tomorrow if I pull an all-nighter. When the time comes, could you stall the Chimera Slayer again? Oh, and the Abyssal girl too, if possible. If the Sprockets are destroyed too fast and his agent cannot intervene in time, then our sponsor's going to be really mad at us."

"O-ho-ho. My boy, you are asking too much from these old bones," the nurse answered while theatricals stretching his back. "If not for Endymonion's cooperation, I doubt I could've even gotten him to come to the infirmary. He is a very willful young man."

"Really? That's a right pickle! Ki-hi-hi! I might have to roll out the Gigants for him to play with," the guy in the labcoat muttered before turning around and facing his 'uncle' again. "You said he was in the infirmary. Did you find his weakness?"

"My boy, I told you not to ask about confidential details. I don't want to break my Hippocratic Oath," the nurse stated in a borderline ominous tone.

"Yes, yes, and then the Brotherhood of Hippocrates would hunt you down. You've been telling me that since I was five years old!"

"O-ho-ho! You are right! I can remember it like it was yesterday! You've grown so much since then!"

"Master has indeed grown in many ways, except for his height," the woman stated, earning her a glare from the younger man.

"Shut up, Galatea," he hissed between clenched teeth, "or I'll have you clean the waste disposal chute again, and this time you won't be allowed to turn off your olfactory sensors."

"If I'm on cleaning duty, can I change out of this outfit?"

"No."

"Processing… processing… I conclude that I must stay silent."

"Good," he stated with a huff before turning back to the nurse again. "Okay, so the same trick cannot be used twice to stall him. What about the Abyssal? Can you at least pull her aside with some excuses?"

"I'll think of something," Peabody relented, prompting the other man to ominously rub his hands together.

"Ki-hi-hi! Good, very good! I can't wait to get my hands on all of that juicy data! Then, our funding will finally be stabilized and we can finally focus on the important things! Like taking over the world… of SCIENCE! Ka-ha-ha-haaaa!" After he finished cackling maniacally, there was a long moment of awkward silence in the chamber, only for him to clear his throat and add, "Speaking of funding, I think we need to reconsider our quarterly budget after all."

What followed were several minutes of mind-numbing finance number being thrown back and forth between the two of them, so I used the time to organize what I just learned.

One: this guy was running some kind of workshop or laboratory and he was making artificial life forms. Two: while they never said it outright, I'd bet my head that he was part of the Research Society. Three: Peabody was in cahoots with him, and it was possible that he also worked for the Research Society. Four: they apparently worked with Lord Grandpa, or at the very least he was helping them out, though their exact relationship was never stated. Five: he had a freaking fembot! I mean, it's really obvious, right? Not only that, it was a snarky, deadpan fembot! I had a feeling that if my dear Judybot heard about it, she'd either suffer another existential crisis, or threaten to sue someone.

Jokes aside, it still meant that, if they had the tech for something like her, then it subsequently implied that our weird little word had advanced magitech at best, or straight up mad super science at worst.

Anyhow, I wasn't going to learn anything important just by sitting still. In fact, if I only wanted to listen in on their conversation, I didn't even need to teleport over. My actual goal in coming here was pretty simple: since I literally couldn't keep a constant eye on all of my friends all the time, just in case this sentai ripoff showed his not particularly ugly mug, I figured that I could instead mark him and keep an eye on just him instead, avoiding a lot of hassle in the process.

Unfortunately, getting there also wasn't entirely hassle-free, as tagging the guy was easier said than done. I hoped that at one point or another he would maybe leave through the door, or even just get close enough for me to sneakily touch him, but the three of them seemed to be rooted in their spots and refused to move much. I also considered just teleporting on top of him, but he was constantly looked over by the fembot, and since I had no idea of her capabilities, I didn't dare to risk it, especially since, even after getting used to it, teleporting still left me disoriented for a couple of precious moments after arrival.

If only my phantom limb could tag people… Actually, if it could, I wouldn't have had any problem marking the huntress either, but that would be just too simple, now wouldn't it? One would think that, since it was crucial for taking people along when teleporting, and since my ability to mark people and my ability to teleport seemed to be closely linked, my invisible extra appendage would naturally be able to mark people, yet after just a few quick tests it became obvious it couldn't actually do so. I swear, sometimes I felt like there was no consistency in the metaphysical rules governing the supernatural of this world. Or maybe it was just my powers that were all kinds of screwy? Either way, it was a pain in the neck.

I couldn't just sit tight and wait forever either, so after some consideration, I decided to try my luck with some tried and true distraction tactics. I quietly pulled out my phone from my breast pocket and went into the clock menu to set an alarm. I went out of my way to pick an especially jaunty tone from the list and cranked up the volume to the max before I placed it onto the floor next to the open door.

The plan was simple and straightforward: First, wait for the alarm to sound. The people in the room would, hopefully, all look towards the door to see what's going on, and during that window of opportunity, I would quickly teleport behind them and tag the guy, and then immediately leave the premises.

Not only that, but if the situation was absolutely perfect, I figured I might as well try to grab my target and teleport him with me. In that case, I naturally won't go home right away, but would teleport right next to Brang instead, so that he could help me to apprehend the guy. That was, of course, the best-case scenario, but hey, it didn't hurt to be optimistic every once in a while.

As such, I prepared myself by taking a huge breath, calmed my nerves, observed the frantic pacing of Labcoat Guy, aaaaand… alarm!

The moment Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture began to blare out of the small yet surprisingly impressive speakers on the sides of my phone, the three people inside the room all shuddered in apprehension.

"W-What's that?!" Labcoat Guy yelled out with equal measures of fright and confusion as he jumped behind his fembot.

At the same time, the previously expressionless woman's face also crunched up in a glare and she exclaimed, "Master, step back!" while extending her right hand towards my location. Peabody, on the other hand, was completely shocked silly by the developments and was standing still like a statue with his mouth half-open.

While all of this was going on, I naturally wasn't sitting on my laurels either. I considered my options, and after a moment of hesitation, I discarded my covert kidnapping idea as too risky, since my target was clinging onto his android's back almost as tightly as her outfit. Instead, I focused on my main objective, so without any further hesitation I teleported right behind the hapless mad scientist and, without any further ado, I delivered a single, precise karate-chop right at the base of his neck.

The short man let out a pained, high-pitched yelp. I knew that it was going to draw the others' attention right away, so I immediately teleported right back to my starting position. To be honest, the rapid back and forth transportation was playing havoc with my head, but it was a small price to pay. I held back the momentary vertigo with sheer force of will and reached out for my phone, only to be hit by an unexpected and quite chilling sense of dread.

Time itself came to crawl as my probably supernatural sense of danger told me that I was currently in some serious jeopardy and I should dodge and flee right away. At the same time a more rational part of my brain told me that I should not leave behind any evidence.

While these thoughts battled it out in my head, the wall I was touching began to violently tremble. To be frank, I wasn't entirely sure about how I managed to do it in a split-second, but I entered into Far Sight, threw myself to the side, found Judy, reached out and grabbed the phone mid-roll, and then promptly teleported out of danger.

Unfortunately for me, because of the way my ability conserved momentum, as soon as I appeared back in my living room I immediately toppled over. No, scratch that. I actually had so much momentum that I was sent tumbling back and I ended up rolling on the floor before ending up on my back and staring at the ceiling in a sort of startled stupor.

"Chief, are you all right!?" Judy appeared at my side out of thin air, though in retrospect I had a feeling I probably just blanked out for a second or two while she rushed over.

After taking a few deep breaths to reorient myself, I raised the hand that wasn't still clutching my phone up to my temple and muttered, "I'm fine, I think…" even though I didn't feel fine at all.

"You are bleeding," my assistant gasped while she propped me up so that I could sit.

"Where?" I asked as I absent-mindedly lowered my hand onto my face and my fingers came away wet, immediately answering my question. I looked at the red liquid at my fingertips, and after letting out a surprised grunt I asked, "Hey, Judy? Did I get one of those cool scars, or one of the ugly ones?"

"Stop joking and get up! We need to clean those wounds! And why is your phone still playing music at a time like this?!" Judy complained while dragging me to my feet, just in time for Snowy to show up at the top of the stairs.

"What's going on? Did something happen…?" my sister's words trailed off into a stunned silence, then without any further question she exclaimed, "I'm getting the first aid kit!" and she disappeared into the bathroom. Wow, I must've looked much worse than how I actually felt, and considering I felt like crap at the moment, that didn't bode well.

In the meantime, Judy continued to drag me towards the washroom, but even while doing so, she didn't forget to interrogate me. "Where did you go? What happened?"

"I paid a visit to that 'Robatto' guy," I answered her honestly. "As for what happened… give me a second," I told her as we stopped just in front of the stairs and I quickly entered into Far Sight again. A split second later I was back in the mad scientist brand worship, now filled with concrete dust and the sound of coughing.

"What the hell, Galatea!? What's wrong with you!?" Labcoat guy yelled out between two coughs.

Once the dust settled, in this case quite literally, I glanced around from my disembodied vantage point, and I quickly found Peabody covering under one of the tables. The fembot, on the other hand, was standing still in the middle of the room. Her right hand was literally hanging off the bottom of her vambraces, as if on a hinge, and from the stump extended a short barrel still softly glowing after its discharge. When I followed the direction where she was pointing at, I realized that the section of the wall behind which I was hiding until a few seconds ago was completely gone, replaced by a circular hole, its edges still glowing with a dull red light that reminded me of the color of burning coal.

While I was inspecting said hole, the fembot's arm cannon retracted back into her forearm with a series of metallic clicks and her hand swung back into its natural place. She moved her fingers one by one, probably to make sure they were functioning right before she turned to her 'master' and stated.

"I detected an intruder, master. I neutralized them."

"With your Plasma Disintegrator!?"

"Yes," she responded like it was the most natural thing in the world, then after a second she added, "Master, my batteries are low. I request permission to recharge."

"You wouldn't need to recharge if you showed just a little restraint! Look at that hole! You probably vaporized whoever was on the other side!"

"Affirmative. That is what the Plasma Disintegrator is for."

The two of them continued to bicker, and in the meantime the chamber was quickly flooded by a combination of seemingly identical, ugly as sin Sprocket things, probably in response to the noise.

Overall, while I might've made a mess, and there was a risky call at the end, I couldn't help but smile, for there was a brand new red dot on my Far Seeing radar.

"All right, so I was apparently attacked by something called a Plasma Disintegrator," I told Judy, and she immediately began to pull me along again.

"You can tell me about it later. First, we need to remove all of this concrete shrapnel from your side."

"Sure, I'll tell you in great detail," I answered her while still grinning to myself, only to pause and tentatively ask, "Wait… did you just say 'shrapnel'…?"