So while I'm waiting, I figure I might as well recharge the batteries I expended in the latest fight; I take them into Stephanie and hook them into a charging station.  And as I'm planning on giving Stephanie her captain’s cabin back… I go through looking at the personal effects I've collected here, which isn't much. A few sets of clothes, the strap-on I got from Euler, a couple of spare personal comms… oh, man, did I really use such low spec devices? And… some pink gemstones?  When did I…

…oh.  Right. Those two bounty hunters from way back when.  Mind controlled and sitting on my shelf for… months, maybe years, at this point? Huh.  Well… they’re not feeling it; it’s basically stasis.  Still… I suppose I should decide what to do with them.  They’re basically professional murderers, given that they don’t really check the why of their bounties, and they were going for the ‘dead’ bounty.  Hmm.  

“Eh, drop foot fetish in a star,” Patricia starts, “she seriously just wants her feet worshiped, and that's… meh,” My pink partner pauses, “Bondage gal could be interesting, though. Lots of possibilities for a woman who likes being helpless… cast that no-food spell on her, lock her in a milking machine, sell the milk, rent out her bum… she'd like it.”

Ugh. I really don't need another Cowbird… I store my stuff in my apartment Keyhome.

“You could toss them both in a star,” my Psycrystal suggests into my head.

Yeah… killing someone who's actively shooting at me is one thing, dropping a helpless prisoner into a star is QUITE another.

“Let them go, maybe?”

Patricia, I know you're trying to be helpful, but these idiots were the shoot first, ask questions never type; hired assassins with the veneer of a bounty hunter. What happens to the next guy if I let them loose?

"Umm… he'll get shot?” my pink partner thinks back at me.

Right, I don't want to just make them someone else's problem.

“Mind control, maybe?”

Mind control can lead to some VERY dark places, Patricia. I don't like slavery.

“No, I mean like that other batch. Give them a set of rules to always follow, and THEN let them loose.”

Oh, right, that fighter squadron. Control Undead, tuned for them, followed by some instructions… huh.

“Exactly.”

That could work… I'll need to do the share link thing with the Fallen Fey sphere… but that could work.

“Glad I could help.”

That settled… I probably should not do it here. I finish packing up, then Gate back over to the Magnificent Mansion spell… where I crack the gems holding the two bozos.

“Hold still,” I mentally command them… and they do.

I take a bit to look them over… a grizzled elf missing the tip of her left ear, and a dwarf.  Between the Domination and the Trap the Soul spell, both are very curvy, the elf less so than the dwarf (I was angry at the dwarf at the time, not so much the elf)... so the dwarf's chest almost reaches the ground, while the elf looks like a “normal” big bust porn model…and the elf's soul, while bright pink, hasn't quite reached neon like the dwarf did.

And they're still mind slaves, “Congratulations, I've decided to mostly let you go. You may speak.”

They both ask the obvious question:

“What do you mean, ‘mostly’?” in a high squeaky voice from the elf.

While the deeper voice of the dwarf just goes, “‘Mostly'?”

I shrug, “You both demonstrated you'll kill someone who hasn't really done much,” I begin by hitting them both with Share Link from the Fallen Fey sphere, “So I'm going to saddle you with some rules you'll need to follow for the rest of your lives,” I hit them both with Control Undead, attuned to Fey, “First, you are never to knowingly cause anyone's death,” now that the Control Undead spell has landed, I dismiss the Dominate spells… they're redundant, and much more easily identified, “Second, you are never to reveal any information about myself, my abilities, my technology, or my acquaintances,” that should mostly cover spy stuff, and of course, the first should get them out of bounty hunting, “you are to be loving mothers to any children you may conceive,” can't have the kids they'll inevitably have get left out in the cold, “and never come after me or mine, even indirectly, ever, and…" hopefully that's good enough, “Acknowledge.”

“We hear and obey, goddess,” they say in unison.

They both have neon pink souls now… and the dwarf's chest is actually resting on the ground. Oh well.

I consider getting them started on children… but decide against it. I have plenty of properly willing partners, after all, and these two's consent would be questionable at best, “Great! Now leave.”

I walk them out of the Mansion into the alleyway, dismissing the spell behind me.  I check my messages as the two ex-bounty hunters wobble away down the alley… nothing from the detective yet.  Which… leaves me somewhat stuck in town with little to do.

Well, not “town”: Alluvion is a major metropolis… and everything that implies. Businesses, apartments, bars, nightclubs, banks, restaurants, movie theaters, museums… it should all be here.

I start by going shopping, though - for library chips.  They come in a few varieties: Culture, Engineering, Life Science, Mysticism, and Physical Science. Fun little toys, they plug into a computer, and can be referenced to give bonuses to skill checks to know things and - with an exhaustive search - allows retries on such.  I get one of each, basically a full set of reference manuals. I nab a few movie chips as well… I have the money, may as well get some… historical dramas.  No fantasy or sci-fi? Oh, right: Those are both coveredby history, here.

To her credit, the sales lady doesn't blink when I eat them all so I can incorporate them into my body's built-in computer. I guess she's seen stranger things.  I of course disconnect from my body long enough to hook them in, then reconnect. I then check: Yes, instant access. Nifty.

I consider, and drop another Magnificent Mansion spell in an alleyway, enter it, and then head to my crafting plane via Gate: I have minions that can do twentieth level tech items, now, so I have them upgrade my magic com to a tier-10 computer with all the trimmings, including an unlimited distance comm unit (which uses Drift beacons, so it's quite slow compared to the interplanar com I use for most things, but this will let me send messages to places we haven't hooked in yet).  I don't dismiss this one: As long as the Mansion travels with Alluvion, I can come back here whenever.

That done, I re-enter Alluvion, and ask Patricia, “We're nominally stuck for a few days… how do you feel about a night on the town?”

My Psycrystal in human form screams out a “yes” as she jumps at me and wraps her arms around my neck, “Totally! I want to see it all! Strippers! Adult plays! Dead guys’ ‘private collections’ of ‘fine art’!”

It is her nature, I suppose, “We can do at least some of those, sure, assuming we can find appropriate venus.  Let's start with a suitable fine art museum….”

Despite being a technological paradise, they do have an ancient art museum… everything is holographic, so it can't really be stolen, but they're very high quality projectors with very good scans… they’re even hard light projectors, so we can touch them and mostly feel the stone or whatever the “art object” would have been made from.  I have some seriously amped up Perception skills, so I can easily spot that they're fakes… also, the signs saying “Touch if you like, they're fakes” and complete lack of security gives it away.

So when we pass a particular “silicone statue” of a nude, I pause, and take a good ten minutes tracing each line of it's folds, complimenting the amazing craftsmanship of the artist, sticking my fingers inside, and otherwise enjoying the synthetic softness… knowing full well that I'm handling a female android covered in body paint, who is posing otherwise nude.  What? She's choosing to pretend to be an object in an area that says touching such is okay: I'm not going to kink shame her.

We also visit an actual theater.  I haven't been reading reviews, so I just let Patricia pick… she picks some historical play, some drama about a world that gets taken over, then successfully rebels.  It opens well; holographic sets, real performers (some of which are holograms, but still: People), gets us used to the tranquility, then has the invasion… and on stage reenactments of war crimes, with the soldiers forcing captured civilians to service them… in graphic detail; they're very much doing the deed on stage.

The story follows a female freedom fighter who sleeps her way up through the ranks of the occupying forces, quietly murdering her “Johns” in their sleep after the act, eventually culminating in the general in charge catching her wrist as she tries to plunge the knife into his heart, and turning it on her, only to have her laugh as she breathes her last, citing that it doesn't matter, she's already done her job well enough, the resistance has all they need… and the resistance fighters burst through the door as the lights fade out.

I consider as we walk out of the theater, and chat with Patricia, “A better plot than most skin flicks, but how did you FIND that?”

Patricia giggles, “They really do have everything here. I checked online, that's all.”

I shake my head as we head to dinner… I'm suddenly concerned about what Restaurant she picked…