A Werewolf In Under-Town

“Unhand my creation, you quack!”

“It’s got me! You damn demented hamster!”

“I am not a hamster! You filthy human. Bertie rip his arms off!”

“Whoa whoa whoa!”

The five-foot robot twisted the taller human’s arm at an odd angle. Vlad jumped over the table and started wrestling the robot away as the doctor screamed in pain. Meanwhile, Shaggy sighed and gave the other two applicants an apologetic look. They both gave him awkward smiles as they pushed their chairs away from the impromptu wrestling match. Next to him, Petra had her head down on the table, ignoring everything going on.

“Don’t hurt my baby, you knaves! That is state-of-the-art equipment. If it’s damaged, you’ll owe me forty-thousand credits for the power supply alone!”

Shaggy glanced at the spindly droid. As it tried to escape Vlad’s grip, bits of rusted metal fell on the infirmary floor. Its wires sparked and the visible gears clanked audibly. Shaggy grunted and stood. It wasn’t the first time he had to escort a scientist’s creation out, and it probably would not be the last. As he approached, Vlad gave him a stern look, but he ignored it. The vampire was being far too diplomatic with trouble-makers in Shaggy’s opinion. He’d already let a few arrogant scientists belittle and curse their organization.

Shaggy snatched the humanoid robot from Vlad by the neck and lifted it. He brought the struggle robot around to its creator’s face. The furry alien was sputtering and gnashing its large teeth in anger as Shaggy smiled at him. When he was sure he had the hamster-alien’s attention, Shaggy shook the robot roughly. A loud clanging filled the infirmary as the shoddily built robot fell apart in his hands.

The short, round hamster-alien ballooned out his cheeks and chittered. “You brute! That was years of high intensity work. Why I have half a mind to go to the authorities! I demand you pay me right this instance for the damages to my robot and for the mental trauma you have caused.”

Shaggy growled low in his throat as Slink moved the human doctor away. “Yeah. That’s not happening. You need to go, Darnum Stankweasel.”

The hamster’s eyes opened wide. “That’s not my name, you neanderthal! My name was…”

“I don’t care! Leave damn it! Before I eat you!” Shaggy roared.

The hamster alien huffed and glared up at Shaggy. The two held glares for a dozen seconds before the hamster finally looked away and trudged away. Shaggy gave Vlad his best smug grin and was about to return to his seat when the small hamster-alien spun back around. A large bulbous pistol in his hands.

“FOOLS! Did you think I came to this meeting unprepared!?”

“This was an interview.” Shaggy muttered as he put himself in the gun’s path.

“Irrelevant! I will not be made a fool of by a bunch of low IQ plebeians. You all are going to give me the recognition I deserve before…”

Shaggy sighed and flicked his finger against the bulbous middle of the large pistols. The material cracked under his strike and a purple liquid spray out of it. The liquid hit the hamster square in the face and he started sputtering and choking. Shaggy felt his finger sting slightly, and he glanced at it. The skin melted away and then regrew before his eyes. Unfortunately for the alien, he didn’t have Shaggy’s healing.

The poor guy was sputtering and choking as his face and fur were melting away. Shaggy glanced up at the others in the room and shrugged. Looking at the three other applicants in the room, he asked.

“Any of you doctors want to help him out?”

The tall human man the hamster had been arguing with looked down at the writhing hamster and then back up to Shaggy. The answer on his face was a clear no, and judging by the looks on the two applicants. They weren’t going to help either. Shaggy looked at his two friends in the room. Vlad was glaring at him. Probably for killing the hamster. But Slink was back to his seat at the interview table looking over his notes. The young boy drug his pen through a long line of notes he had just made. Probably on the still choking hamster.

“Jesus, Shaggy. End it. I don’t need to hear the guy’s death rattle.” Vlad said, annoyed.

Shaggy moved over to the sputtering mad scientist and stomped on the short alien’s neck. “Hey, don’t take that tone with me. I gave you the chance to eject the guy. You were the one taking forever.”

“I never thought I’d have to say this in an interview room, but STOP KILLING PEOPLE! We’ve been at this for two hours now and you’ve killed four scientists.”

“Yeah, but we’ve hired three nurses.”

Vlad shook his head, confused. “What does that have to do with anything?!”

“I don’t know. How the hell are you scoring this? I just figured that I’ve scored three and I’m down four. Which overall ain’t bad.”

“Damn it, Shaggy. We’ve lost people from our line cause you keep throwing corpses into the hallway.”

“Then they don’t have the stomach for what we do. It’s good that they know now before they join up and have to deal with stuff like this daily.” Shaggy said, reaching down and picking up the dead hamster-alien.

“Shaggy! No! Not the hallway!” Vlad started.

“Vlad, where do you want me to throw the body? We can’t leave him in here.”

Vlad groaned loudly, but before he could say anything, the human doctor spoke up. “Actually, if none of you care, I can take the body.”

Shaggy and Vlad turned to the doctor. Even Petra and Slink picked their heads up from the table. The doctor coughed awkwardly under all of their gazes. He wrung his hands together and hurriedly tried to explain.

“I just mean, alien corpses are a fount of knowledge. Regardless of what I learned in medical school, there is always more to learn about alien biology. There are interesting variants in almost every alien species we know of, and I’d really like to study this one.”

“Sure. Fine. Whatever. You take him.” Shaggy said, roughly thrusting the dead alien into the human’s arms.

The other two interviewees were shooting the doctor dirty looks. But he ignored them as he tried to get a firm grip on the dead body in his arms. Vlad sighed loudly and moved back to his seat. Shaggy joined him and all four of them at the table got ready to continue the interview.

“Ahem. So where were we?” Shaggy asked as he checked his notes.

Unfortunately, they weren’t really helpful. He stopped taking notes a few interviews back and started doodling. So as he stared at a crude drawing of him, strangling faceless stick people, Vlad tried to get the interview back on track.

“Doctor Clock was telling us about his area of expertise. Although I’m guessing Necromancy?”

The tall, dark-haired doctor in a lab coat dropped the corpse in his arms and answered. “No. I do not study Necromancy. I have no magical capabilities whatsoever. My skills lie in the study of skin and the various maladies related to it.”

“You’re a dermatologist?” Slink asked, not looking up from his notes.

“Wha- I- No. I’m not a Dermatologist! I mean, I study how a person’s skin reacts to various chemicals and reagents!”

“Yeah. We need a doctor, not a dermatologist.” Vlad said, ignoring Dr. Clock. “Thank you for your time.”

“I said I am not a dermatologist! My work is more highly specialized than that. Please, you have to see…”

“LEAVE!” Shaggy growled

Dr. Clocked jumped slightly before quickly collecting himself and rushing toward the door. Petra sighed before she called.

“Don’t forget your corpse!”

The good doctor rushed back into the room and grabbed the dead hamster alien. Dr. Clock gave them all a dirty look before he rushed back out of the room. They all waited for the door to slam shut again and then they had to wait for the shocked gasps to die down before they go back to it. Shaggy rubbed his eyes before he pointed to the next guy seated in one of the chairs. He had said he was here as a doctor candidate.

“So, what about you? What you got?”

“Shaggy, could you please be a little more professional?”

“No, Vlad. Professional stopped an hour ago. Now we need to cut the fat,” Shaggy said before barking at the pale doctor again. “You! Kid! Power! Go!”

The pale alien jumped in his seat as Shaggy growled at him. “I- um, I’m a Hemomancer. I can control blood.”

Shaggy and the other sat up straighter. Slink’s hand worked rapidly across his paper as he asked. “Can you create blood?”

“Um. Not yet? But I think I’ll be able to... maybe.”

“So you’re a Mutant, not a magic-based doctor?” Shaggy asked.

“I- uh… Yes, sir.”

“Fine. I’m good with him. All in favor?”

“It shouldn't be this fast, Shaggy. We need to vet…”

“Kid, you fuck us and I will eat you. Clear?”

“Uhh… YES! I mean yes, sir.”

“In favor!” Shaggy said again.

Petra and Slink both had their hands raised, but Vlad was glaring at him. Eventually, the pale vampire simply nodded and Shaggy grinned. Turning back to the Kid, Shaggy glanced at Vlad’s notes to find the new doctor’s name.

“Okay. Dr. Cula. You are going to start as a nurse, and once we have the entire team in place, you’ll join them. Is all that clear?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“Good. Come back the day after tomorrow. Now on to you,” Shaggy said, completely ignoring their newly minted doctor and staring at the young woman in the last chair.

She shrunk in on herself as Shaggy barked at her. “Power!”

“I don’t… I mean… I wasn’t…” she stuttered.

“Out with it!”

“I thought this was a soup line!” The woman cried, tears appearing in her eyes.

Shaggy sighed as he pointed out the door. “Nope. Food’s at the bar. Get out. Dr. Cula, we will see you in a few days.”

Cula and the trembling woman hurried from the room as Shaggy nodded to himself. He glanced down the table as the door slammed shut again. Vlad was giving him an incredulous look. But Shaggy ignored him and checked on Slink and Petra. The female NPC looked tired but ready to continue. Slink was still rapidly writing things down. When the boy was finished, he craned his neck back up and gave Shaggy a nod.

“Okay, ready when you are.”

“Everyone else?” Shaggy asked.

“You’re a pain in my ass,” Vlad grumbled as Petra nodded.

“Not what I asked, but we are going anyway,” Shaggy chuckled to himself. “Tinsel! Send in the next group of four!”

The sound of the infirmary door opening filled the air as four people walked in. The door shut behind the last man, leaving the new people to stare at them questioningly. Shaggy growled in his throat as he shouted.

“Front in center. Give us your name and the position you’re applying for. Double-time. Move it!”

The four NPCs jumped, all confused, before they rushed over to the table and rattled off their names.

“Lia Tyhmes, MagiMedic Student… uh… Doctor?”

“Next!” Shaggy said as Slink’s pen went to work.

“Rollo Leitner, Mechanic. Applying for the Workshop.” The second man said cooly.

“Great. Love the energy. Next!”

“Ulmayda Lovelace, Assassin. Looking to join your gang.” The third man said.

“Not what the line was for.” Shaggy sighed.

“So you’re not recruiting assassins?” Ulmayda asked.

“Nope.” Shaggy said, taking in Ulmayda’s clothes.

The man was tall, almost seven feet. Dressed in a long black cloak that covered his body with an obvious sword on his hip. Shaggy had to check if the guy was a player. But switching on his HUD revealed that only three people in the room had names over their heads. Shaggy turned his HUD back off and stared at Ulmayda. The man’s dark eyes stared at him over a black half-mask that went down to his chin. Shaggy sighed and turned to the others on his side of the table. When he did, Ulmayda moved.

The tall assassin drew his sword in one quick motion and swiped it across the table. Vlad, sitting on the end, simply moved out of the way. But Shaggy was next in line and he just took the blade to his shoulder. The sword cut deep into Shaggy flesh and then stopped as it hit bone. Shaggy was surprised the blade made it that far. But he ignored the pain and yanked the blade out of Ulmayda’s hands. The assassin tapped something on the blade’s hilt, and Shaggy felt his muscles spasm uncontrollably for a few seconds.

In that brief span of time, Ulmayda dove for his sword again. But Slink finally got to his feet and thrust his right arm out. Moe appeared from a hole in Slink’s arm and collided with the onrushing Ulmayda. The large orange snake wrapped the assassin’s head up and they both fell to the floor. Shaggy’s muscles finally stopped twitching, and he threw himself over the table and stomped on Ulmayda’s chest. A loud crack reverberated through the infirmary and Ulmayda went still. Slink called Moe back, and Vlad appeared at Shaggy’s shoulder.

“Where were you on that one, speedster?” Shaggy groused.

“You had it handled.” Vlad smirked.

“You’re petty. That’s petty.”

Vlad didn’t deny it and instead glanced down at the unmoving Ulmayda. He quickly checked the man’s pockets but came up empty. He turned to Shaggy to say something, when Ulmayda sat bolt upright.

“HAHAHA! Yes! That’s what I am looking for!” Ulmayda cheered, trying to get to his feet.

But Shaggy and Vlad each gripped a shoulder and forced the crazed assassin to stay seated. Ulmayda looked confused until he spotted their angry faces. Shaggy was about to grow his claws when Ulmayda raised both his hands in surrender. He was still chuckling as he explained.

“I am sorry. But I had to be sure who I was going to be working for.”

“You realize I can’t hire an assassin who tried to kill me, right? That would go against all good sense,” Shaggy growled.

Ulmayda cackled. “Yeah, but who needs good sense? Besides, I’m not an assassin.”

Vlad snorted. “Then what the fuck are you? Cause you just tried to kill us.”

“If I had wanted to kill you, I would’ve dropped a package off with enough explosive to remove this entire building from the face of Under-Town.” Ulmayda said slowly, raising.

Shaggy and Vlad back up and let the tall man get to his feet. Once he had dusted himself off, Ulmayda took his mask off. Underneath was the mangled remains of a lower jaw. But the man still spoke as if nothing was wrong. Ulmayda bowed slowly as he introduced himself again.

“I am Ulmayda Lovelace, mechanical virtuoso extraordinaire and willing cohort to your group.”

“Great. Another Mad Scientist.” Slink grumbled.

“My boy, I assure you I am the sanest man you will ever meet.”

“You just attacked the people you want a job from. Doesn’t sound very sane.”

Ulmayda grimaced at them all. “Why? I have to be sure you lot can protect me, don’t I? Besides, what’s a little assassination attempt between new friends?”

“What are your qualifications?” Vlad asked.

Shaggy rubbed his forehead in consternation but didn’t interrupt. Ulmayda threw open his black cloak and revealed his clothes underneath. The man was in surprisingly mundane clothes except for a large multilayered armored plate he wore on his chest. The armor was cracked and a green liquid was spilled down over the man’s jeans. But Ulmayda ignored it as he pointed out the armor and sword.

“I give you the Ulmayda multilayered dermic armor and Stun Sword. Capable of withstanding multiple pounds of force and slicing through even the toughest armors.”

“He DID slice through my plates and survive me punching him full force.” Shaggy admitted angrily.

“Another reason for my deception!” Ulmayda said. Clearly latching on to an excuse.

Shaggy and Vlad shared a look before Shaggy asked a question. “So what? You want to work in our workshop?”

Ulmayda nodded. “Of course! That’s why I was in line, y’know, and not because I thought it was a soup line or anything like that.”

Shaggy narrowed his eyes, but let the matter drop. Slink was back to writing things down, and Vlad was already apologizing to the other applicants. Petra gave him a look that said she wanted the madman out of her bar.

“Look. Why don’t you come back in a few days? We’ll see how you get on with some of the other people that are going to be in the workshop.”

The room went silent. Shaggy heard Slink’s pen stop its scratching and Petra’s already annoyed glance went frigid. Vlad excused himself from his conversation and spun on his heel. Shaggy met the vampire’s eyes and grinned past the Mad Scientist.

“You can’t be serious…” Vlad muttered.

“What? I like him. Plus, he is the sanest scientist we have seen in the past two hours.”

Slink sighed from the table before addressing Ulmayda. “What salary were you thinking?”

Ulmayda looked affronted as he wrapped his cloak around his body. “Why?! I would never accept payment for advancing the sciences! All I need is a workshop and the materials to keep myself busy.”

“That’s a vote from me too, then.”

“I would like to request that you build the workshop further away from my bar then.”

Vlad hissed as he turned to point a finger at Ulmayda, still addressing Shaggy. “This nutcase just attacked you!”

“So did Chromia.”

“We don’t even know what his specialties are.”

“I have an imaginary familiarity with several science disciplines.”

“IMAGINARY!?”

“Yes. I imagine something and then I make it. It really is all highly scienti-logical.”

Slink sighed as began writing again. “Yeah, that’s not a word. Although that power sounds interesting. Any other issues, Vlad?”

The pale vampire mutant gripped his nose in frustration and took several calming breaths before throwing up his hands. He went over to Leitner and Tyhmes, which reminded Shaggy of the fourth applicant in the room. The young man was looking at all of them like they were all insane. Shaggy grinned, showing off his enlarged canines. The poor kid started rapidly backing toward the door before breaking into a full on run, slamming the door behind him.

Shaggy sighed, but nodded understandingly. “Not everyone is built for this kind of environment. Lia! Rollo! How about you two? You in?”

“And how much do you want?”

Lia and Rollo broke away from Vlad to answer. Lia was the first to speak, pointedly not looking at Ulmayda.

“I want three thousand credits a month and the capability preform any experiments I want on willing volunteers.”

Shaggy blinked at the casual way the woman mentioned human experimentation. But he figured that whoever was joining a criminal organization was going to have a few eccentricities. She kept eye contact with Slink for a few seconds before she moved her gaze to Shaggy and then Vlad. The three of them looked at each other. Shaggy shrugged, Vlad sighed, and Slink answered.

“Twenty-five hundred a month and you’ll take a penalty for every... volunteer you kill. Acceptable?”

Lia grimaced, but nodded her head. “Fine. Where will I be working?”

“Facilities are being designed. Come back in two days to meet your coworkers.” Shaggy said. Brushing over the fact that they weren’t designing anything.

The room then turned to Rollo, who was studying Ulmayda cautiously. The Tall Mad scientist was digging through his large cloak. Pulling out absurdly large items. Shaggy quirked an eyebrow, but quickly returned his questioning gaze back to Rollo. The mechanic sighed.

“Will his area be sectioned off?” He asked, waving at Ulmayda.

Vlad nodded slowly. “That’s a good idea. Sectioned off and heavily reinforced.”

Everyone in the room nodded as Ulmayda yanked what looked like an electrified slinky from his pants. Shaggy bit back a smile as Slink wrote more things done. Rollo sighed but nodded.

“That’s fine then. I’ll take the going rate you're giving people. I can keep what I make in my off time?”

Shaggy wanted to say no. But Slink spoke up before him. “Yes. However, anything you create in the workshop that has a commercial value that you then sell, the Legion gets a cut.”

Rollo grimaced. “How much?”

“Twenty percent of each sale of the item. But we will also help you with mass production, if you want to go that route.”

“You have the facilities for that?”

“Not at the moment. But we are expanding.” Slink smiled.

Rollo thought about it for a few seconds before finally he nodded. Slink drew up rough contracts for the three new applicants and they all signed. Afterward they were hurried out the door and Shaggy and his fellow interviewers all sighed. Shaggy took his seat as Vlad joined him, still complaining.

“That madman is going to cost us a fortune in damages.”

“Yeah. But think about what he can create. Literally anything he can imagine, he can build. How do you not see the value in that?” Shaggy asked.

“Oh, I see it. But I also see all the headaches having someone so erratic in the Legion will cause. YOU can oversee the workshop, Shaggy. I’ll take the Infirmary. Which apparently I have to design and plan out in two days?”

Shaggy chuckled as he slapped his friend’s shoulder. “We need to expand, anyway. You’ve seen the line outside. How much of that is money just walking away? We need to build out and up.”

“I agree with the out. But let’s not go too high up.” Slink interjected. “There is still the odd drunk flyer or Cog robot floating around down here. Last thing we need is someone to crash into our damn building.”

“Yes. Please. We already spend enough replacing chairs and tables. I don’t want to think about the expense of repairing walls.” Petra complained.

Shaggy and Vlad nodded slowly. The poor woman seemed completely drained after so many interviews, and they still had more to go. Shaggy only had around an hour or so left of game time. So he really wanted to get to the next group of applicants. But first he had a question.

“How many are we at?”

“Lia makes five for the infirmary and Ulmayda and Rollo are the only ones in the Workshop.”

“Great! So all we need are workshop people, right?”

“Is five enough for the infirmary?” Vlad asked.

“Can we afford more?” Shaggy countered.

Both of them turned to Slink, who was busy chewing on the end of his pen. When he felt Shaggy and Vlad’s gazes, he looked up.

“We are good, so far. But I think Shaggy is right about the infirmary. We got what we need. If we have to hire more, we can pawn it off on Lia or Cula.”

“Fantastic!” Shaggy said, leaping over the table and marching toward the door. He stuck his head out into the hallway and screamed around Tinsel’s body. “The Infirmary jobs have been filled! Get your shit and get out! Check back in a few days. We might have no-shows or we might kill a couple of interns when they fuck up!”

There were some loud groans and complaints. But mostly people left the line and head back out the door. A few tried to get Shaggy’s attention. But he ignored them and spoke to Tinsel, who was still manning the door.

“Give them a few to clear up and then send the rest in.”

Tinsel gave him a quick nod and Shaggy ducked back into the room. Vlad was standing at the table, looking annoyed. Petra had her head down and Slink was back to writing his novel or whatever he was doing. Shaggy ignored Vlad’s glare and returned to his seat, whistling happily. They all sat in silence for a few minutes. Slink’s pen was the only noise until eventually that stopped and the boy perked up his head.

“Are we really going to be killing the interns?”

“Depends how stupid they are. But really, I figure we’ll have to fire a few. There are going to be some growing pains in this endeavor.”

Slink nodded and sat back in his chair. It was another couple of minutes before the door to the infirmary creaked open again and more people were let in. However, the next hour passed with little incident. Shaggy was surprised to not see another mad scientist in the bunch that appeared. There were a few interesting mutant with metallurgical powers, but nothing mad about any of them.

Thankfully, Shaggy maintained his speed interview style. Which upset a few, but resulted in them finishing fairly quickly. They got another three Workshop employees fairly quickly and Slink even wrote a few for future consideration. Petra had fallen asleep after thirty minutes. But with Shaggy leading the interviews, they hardly needed her. Shaggy was considering giving the woman a vacation when the infirmary door slammed open again.

Shaggy almost summoned his claws. But when he realized it was Levy, he relaxed. Levy stomped into the room looked annoyed before she spotted him. She said nothing as she raised her wrist and sarcastically tapped her finger against it. Shaggy sighed and turned to his two compatriots at the table.

“Looks like I can’t play anymore, guys. I gotta wake up and do adult stuff now.”

“Gross.”

“Don’t need to hear about it.”

“Not that kind of adult stuff, you bastards. I gotta log off. Slink you got everything handled?”

“Yeah, I got it Shaggy. I’ll set some stuff up for the Legion and then log myself. I’m late for school already.”

Vlad sighed and rubbed a hand down his face. “I guess I’ll get out of here too.”

“See you all tonight then.” Shaggy smiled and as he rushed over to Levy and hugged her.

“Back to the real world, then.” Levy sighed.

“Always sucks. But we can cause some mayhem when we get back, right?” Shaggy grinned.

“Oh, more than you know, dear.” Levy’s smiled became predatory. “My mistress has apparently found out where Cog is. She’s calling all of her acolytes back for a ritual.”

Shaggy felt his eyes grow wide as he suddenly remembered what they knew about Cog. He was about to ask more when the motes of light obscured his vision and he disappeared from the game world.