John entered the room they kept Fianna in. It was one the nicer segments of the airplane, although its original ornate state was compromised by the moved furniture. Much of the plane’s furnishing was bolted down to stay put in case of a sudden plunge or similar unforeseen change in momentum. Consequently, they had to unscrew a lot of heavy nuts and bolts to take what was in the way and make room for the sickbed plus table that they had put together using elemental-grown materials.

“How are you feeling?” John asked Fianna.

“Good,” the mercenary answered, turning the bottle of water in her hands. “Guilty. Unreasonable, I know, sir, but emotions are what they are.”

John nodded and sat down at a nearby chair. Even dislodged from the floor, it was a perfectly good seat. “Just for the sake of it, then, let me say that none of this is your fault. No one expected a magical disease of this magnitude.”

“Only a truly sick mind engineers Abyssal diseases,” Fianna said and swung her legs out of the bed. “An aimless hail of arrows, self-replicating, a weapon that cannot be controlled.”

“I think we can give this enemy more credit than that, even if I broadly agree with you,” John responded. He did his best not to stare at his scout. Fianna wore a pyjama from the harem’s closet. The upside was that it was enchanted to change shape to fit her, the downside was that the white thing clung to the bottom heavy curves of the white-haired woman tightly. ‘Those really are maidly thighs,’ he thought, then forced himself back to reality.

The entry of Delicia made that a little easier. The short, stacked alchemist stepped out of the Mobile Laboratory that she had conjured in the middle of the room. On her left hand, she balanced a salver with a whole assortment of liquids. “This is why I’m not a fan of biomancy, I have to use other people as lab rats,” she complained and dunked a cotton swab in one of the liquids. She proceeded to rub it on the back of Fianna’s hand.

The sniper took the treatment without any complaint, just waiting for Delicia to go through the necessary motions. With every test concluded, Delicia’s expression soured. “I have bad news, worse news, and sort of good news. I’ll just give them in order… First, I can’t cure this yet.”

“I expected as much,” Fianna answered plainly.

“I just don’t get how biomancy works that well. I’ll try, but for now I can only work out how to offset the symptoms but… well, that’s the worse news. This disease is likely to gradually specialize itself to take hold in you specifically. In other words, the longer you have it, the more work we’ll have to put into keeping you healthy, until it eventually wastes you away entirely.” She gave Fianna an understanding look. “Been there, done that, wouldn’t recommend it. Let’s hope we solve this in a few weeks rather than months.”

“What are the symptoms?” Fianna wanted to know.

“Initial diagnostics suggest a high fever accompanied by gradual loss of blood supply to the fingertips and toes. Typically, something like that is followed by necrosis, making amputation necessary. Your core will be hot while your limbs get colder and colder. The good news is that healing does keep this effect at bay, but, again, I don’t know if that’ll be a solution forever.”

“I trust you will do the best you can,” Fianna answered stoically.

Delicia nodded, picked up her things and returned to the lab. She could still hear John and Fianna talk through the open door, but dedicated herself to her work primarily. “You are taking this well,” he complimented her.

“I am a mid-class Abyssal fighter. I knew my survival chances were vastly diminished when I took this assignment.” Fianna put the bottle aside and stretched. “Permission to move around while I can, sir?”

The contagion was already on every surface inside the plane and they lacked the ways to get rid of it. The only way to keep things sterile was to store it in inventories, without anything digestible in any other slot, and wait several hours. The pathogen required some kind of nourishment, be that food or other bacteria found on surfaces. It did have its weaknesses, just none that were immediately exploitable.

“Stay in the Mobile Barrier, otherwise you are free to,” John gave permission.

“How are things going with Norahnon?” Delicia shouted over from the lab.

“I’m about to reach him.”

_____________________________________________________________________________

The Creator Puppet had left the Mobile Barrier at the same time as the group extracting Fianna had. By luck or misfortune, it was difficult to say, Norahnon and his group had set out in a different direction, putting half a day of travel between him and the Gamer.

For the reason of that distance alone, this body of John was accompanied only by Momo, Beatrice, and his elementals, apart from Gnome. He wanted no one around that could not immediately teleport back if there was a nasty surprise.

The coordinates that had been sent to him marked a seemingly random spot about 600 metres off the road. A raised hand was all it took for that random spot to instead reveal a recently cleared bit of forest.

The Illusion Barrier was separated into two distinct parts. Fenced in by iron rods and tape stood a small ziggurat. It was barely taller than John and consisted only of a small hollow space, one flight of steep stairs, and an altar at the top. Parts of it had cracked and the surface still bore the marks of the vegetation that had been stripped of it just a few hours ago. Momo immediately wanted to fly on over there, but she knew better than to ignore the second half of the barrier.

West of the ziggurat, outside the tape, was a camp. Three large vehicles that John could only describe as houses on tank treads, formed a perimeter around a nice and orderly looking central space. The trees that had been removed had been chopped up into firewood, burning to fuel a barbeque. It almost felt like a family outing.

The oddities were swiftly apparent when the group approached.

The roughly dozen people John saw fell in two categories. One was the lab coat-wearing scientist types. Some were more stereotypical, looking like their caffeine addiction had ruined any semblance of a sleep schedule years ago, others were just normal people in the scientist uniform. The second category was larger and contained several augmented humans. Some of them just had implants, others had fully replaced limbs with mechanics.

The bridge between those two groups was a woman of average height. Starting with the neck, everything under the white lab coat appeared to be prosthetics or otherwise mechanical. Her hair was white and cut off at the chin, unequally parted and swiped behind her ears to not get into the way.

She took one look at the Gamer, shouted, “I’ll get the boss, wait a sec!” and disappeared into one of the houses on treads.

‘Not the worst idea,’ John thought and inspected one of the vehicles. ‘Definitely easier to get around in than an airplane… they’re probably using a similar strategy, uprooting the forest in front of them as they advance.’

Beatrice poked her words into his thoughts. ‘Inquiry: should I attempt to commission a similar vehicle?’

‘Maybe in the future. For us, we need the plane anyway in case we have to get back in a hurry. Norahnon has the benefit of people that can pick up the slack if there’s a crisis back home. France is a little more stable than our neck of the woods.’

As they had that mental conversation, John scanned for the described Asian woman, but failed to locate her. Something to ask about, even if he did not expect any helpful answers.

After a few minutes, Norahnon was dragged out of the central of the three houses and stumbled down the stairs. He walked as if he was about to fall over, but was forcefully rightened at the very last moment every time. Either the man had impressive instincts or he had some kind of implant under that half-burnt clothing.

“Yes, hello, I’m awake.” Norahnon stopped in front of John and yawned heartily. “Barely. Analysis suggests I overslept by two hours.”

“Three,” the woman, apparently his assistant, corrected.

“One hour oversleeping is added to the baseline calculation.”

“You know I did not agree to that, Nory.”

The Great Researcher yawned again, then ran a hand over his dishevelled, white hair. It barely did anything to give the mess of his thin hairline order. Green eyes focused on John. “The Gamer, we meet… in person…?”

“Not in person, that’s a double,” the assistant stated confidently. John wasn’t too surprised. The Creator Puppet was not supposed to be able to trick anything with an eye for true natures and the assistant of a co-ruler of one of the Divided Gates should have had that ability. “He even brought enough firepower to level a small nation.”

“You’ll have to excuse the caution. Just last night, one of mine was attacked.”

“One of the Horsemen?” Norahnon asked.

John nodded, seeing no benefit to withholding that information. “Glory, to be exact.”

“An uncanny one, that one, seemingly capable of just appearing in barriers as it suits him. Very interesting, is it not? I would love to know how that works!” Norahnon suddenly took a step forwards and put his body between Momo and her line of sight on the ziggurat. “Babababa! Get your own discoveries! Malady, what did I tell you about letting them see our stuff?!”

“Let them have a peek to make them jealous but do not let them actually look.”

“Exactly!”

“This seems to be in the peek category, still.”

“Can’t I just look around a little bit?” Momo pleaded.

John whistled, not wanting to lose himself in the weeds of archaeological competition yet. “I want to establish the ground rules here before we do anything else,” he stated. “Are we adversaries in this endeavour or allies?”

“That rather depends on you,” Norahnon answered and looked back and forth between John and Momo. “You would be welcome to join our expedition. We will mark you down as a notable contributor to our findings, should you be measured to exceed minimal expectations.”

“You expect us to place ourselves beneath you?” Siena hissed.

“I confirm that inquiry whole-heartedly!” Norahnon declared.

“Here’s the facts,” the assistant, Malady, spoke up. “We are on a very important expedition to uncover mysteries that have been left too long to be discovered.”

“Yes, so… why don’t we do it together?” Momo asked.

“You can assist us,” Norahnon reiterated.

“I feel like you don’t quite get what is potentially at stake here,” John groaned. “There’s a high class magical disease going about and we’ve already fought one of the locals telling us to get lost.”

“You have!? How fascinating! Already you contribute much!” Norahnon pulled a notepad out of an inventory. “Report! What did they-“

John grabbed the notepad and held it out of reach of the Great Researcher. Immediately, the air around the camp changed. Norahnon’s expression went from curious to serious. Hydraulic sounds accompanied several of the augmented warriors stepping closer. The elementals all manifested between them and John.

“Give that back,” Norahnon demanded.

“Listen, you-“

“Malady.”

“Yes, ye-“ Flashes of metal accompanied the rapid clash of a mechanical limb against Beatrice’s forearm. That their speed seemed about equal was the first actual surprise of this meeting. This Malady woman was fast, incredibly fast.

“Touching Master is not permitted,” Beatrice stated.

“Maybe he shouldn’t steal then.”

“Can we all relax for a moment?” Momo raised her voice over the commotion. “John, give him back the notepad.” Accepting his role as the bad cop, the Gamer obliged and let his chancellor take the lead in these negotiations. “Could you just help us see your side of things here? I am struggling to understand why you are being adversarial.”

“Because if you will not work for us, you will work against us,” Norahnon stated plainly.

Malady hastily added. “In this! For the love of God, he means on this expedition! The Illuminati does not wish to break political ties with Fusion! This an entirely private affair of Norahnon and his support staff.”

“Yes, that,” the Great Researcher agreed.

“There’s powers around here that threaten us both and likely the greater whole of the current Abyssal balance of power,” Momo insisted. “If we band together on this, that would make us all safer.”

Malady sighed. “If you feel so strongly about it, just agree to work under us. That simple.”

“Listen here, you smug little shit,“ Salamander growled. “We’re extending a hand here.”

“And so are we, on our terms.” Norahnon finished taking some notes, then put the notepad back into his dimensional pocket. “As far as I am concerned, this expedition has the firepower to stand for itself. We do not need your help. To state it bluntly: we are here to make discoveries. You are here to make discoveries. This makes us adversaries and I am not afraid to use violence to make sure we are the first ones to get somewhere. If you are doing this purely for the sake of discovery and the good of the world, agree to our terms.”

Momo was clearly contemplating the offer, but this was where John had to assert himself as the head of the household, even if she was the leader of the expedition. “I won’t work under you,” he stated clearly. His motivation was pride alone, admittedly, but that was good enough in this circumstance.

“Then let us clarify the relationship. We wish you no permanent harm. We will obstruct and fight, but we will not kill. If the situation is truly as terrible as you seem to assume, we can renegotiate at a later date.” Norahnon rolled his shoulder. “Which brings me to the topic I actually wanted to discuss: the disease.”

“Are you willing to work with my researcher on that at least?” the Gamer wanted to know.

Norahnon gave a mechanical nod. “It is too virulent to be left up for competition. I’d rather not lose any of my followers, even if that means giving up credit. You have Delicia Poor in your employ. She’ll have invaluable insights. I suggest establishing a shared camp to care for the sick. We have additional mobile homes to spare.”

‘So, this is only one of their camps?’ John thought. ‘That likely answers where the hired help is.’

He contemplated the offer itself. The whole fighting over archaeology was stupid, but any criticism of that rang hollow when he had refused to put themselves under the Great Researcher in this endeavour. Taking the idea of a shared sick camp in isolation, it wasn’t bad. Delicia could use extra instruments and manpower and he would like not having to cart Fianna around from potential danger zone to danger zone.

Of course, any such sick camp was also a potential target and he would have to leave additional protection with Delicia and Fianna. That would split their group further. With the teleport cooldowns, he could leave some of his maids there without losing any firepower in an emergency though.

The alternative was to have Delicia work on her own on something outside her area of expertise. His real self back in the plane had already asked the alchemist about her preference. “Probability to find a cure rises immensely with the Great Researcher’s team working with me on this,” she put it plainly.

That was really all that mattered.

“Alright,” John agreed. “We have one sick of our own.”

“Really? I thought you would all be too powerful for the disease to take hold!”

“She’s support staff… and a contender for my harem,” John said. Both statements were lies, but in combination it made her presence believable enough that they could maybe hide her membership in Nightfall. Unlikely, but he at least had to try. “In addition to her and Delicia, I’ll also leave Beatrice and Claire with you to protect the facility.”

‘Why meeeeeee?’ Claire whined. ‘I don’t want to be away from you, Master!’

‘I’ll give you all of the kisses once we’re back together,’ the Gamer promised. ‘My pool of candidates is slim, though, and you can keep an eye all around while Beatrice excels at taking out singular opponents. It is the best combination.’

‘Affirmative,’ Beatrice weighed in. “I shall remain here effective immediately,” the white-horned maid stated out loud. “Justification: I can relay intel effectively to my Master. Coordination to establish the camp will be faster this way.”

“Sounds good,” Norahnon agreed immediately. “That’s everything then. Shoo-shoo, get out of our discovery site!”

John really had to hold back on swinging Inkaryl at the man.