Reroll

I put my dragon away on the way up, leaving me alone on the trip to manufacture minions.  Which I do.  I'm going to need to cover the entire country, so… yeah.  

About thirty minutes into the trip back up, I get a mental report from a minion, “Sorry boss, there was nothing we could do.” I recognize the mental voice of the bodyguard I left on the elder of my two sisters.

I don't know how I still recognize my shadows individually with the numbers of them I have… magic, I guess, “You used ‘we’. What happened?” I stop minion manufacture for a bit to focus on the voice in my head.  That sounds a bit crazy, but that's my life now.

“The house blew up with our charges inside after coming home from a night out to eat to celebrate your youngest sister's high school graduation. Best guess for the moment is that someone slipped a bomb under the house while your family was out for the day; we of course went with our individual charges, and so weren't around to witness the actual chain of events, if that was indeed what happened.”

They're dead.  Someone killed them all, just like that.  That's not how that game is supposed to play out.  First you kidnap the leverage and then you contact the actual target. This doesn't make sense. Why?  Why them? How'd they find out? Why didn't they threaten me first? They're supposed to threaten me so I know who to hunt down and kill.  It can't happen this way, it makes no sense.  They're dead.  Someone killed them all, just like that.  That's not how that game is supposed to play out…

“Orders, boss?” Those two words make me realize I've been stuck in a loop.

I'm in shock. I need to think.  To think I need information.  “First, thoughts on why they didn't send me a ransom demand or threats first?”

“First guess is the handful of attempted kidnappers each of us iced.”

Right. I didn't include any orders about reporting things they could handle, because the intent was NOT to spy on my family. If one of my sisters was hooking up with someone, that's not my business; I shouldn't know who or how often until she tells me that.  “An actual count, please.”

There's a momentary pause on the “line”, “Seven attempts spread across all four of our charges, at least twenty-two fatalities among the enemy.”

It seems someone with deep pockets was very persistent, “‘At least’?”

“In three cases neutralizing the adversaries involved dropping a grenade into an area with an unclear number of targets after the enemy's intent was clear.  Protecting our charges took priority over an accurate body count.”

“Good call,” not that a spell needs affirmation. I should have told them to let me know… hindsight.  Next time.  There may be a next time, won't there? I took precautions.

“Thanks boss.”

“Continue reporting, please… any indication of who?”

“No, but… you didn't build us for detective work.”

“True. Okay. Find a police station and volunteer yourselves for helping with problem Mythics. First try talking down any violent or infectious Mythic, then attempt nonlethal takedowns if talking fails.  If a nonlethal takedown fails, you may use lethal force. You are only to participate when Mythics are involved, and then only for cases of violence or contagion.”

“Yes boss.”

I am curious… “Why are you the only one reporting?”

“I drew the short straw.  We're all in the same boat, no need to duplicate reports.”

“Thank you.”

"You're welcome, boss."

I repeat the “going forwards” orders to the other three.

Okay, so… I took precautions. They're dead… for now. As long as I don't die before then, they'll be fine in twenty-four hours, reforming next to my ring, wherever it happens to be.

I’m thinking “Luxury quarters on a cloaked ship in outer space,” is a good option. Good thing I'm heading there already.

I get on the comm and send Betty and Ed a text message: “My family was just murdered, assailant unknown. I'm taking a day or two of down time to fix that. I'll be waiting on my ship.”

Ed writes back immediately, “Ouch! Need me to cast Resurrection a few times?  Betty found she can Fabricate diamonds into bigger diamonds, which amplified production considerably.”

Heh. “No, but thank you for the offer,” I write back, “I have that covered already.” The ring… but thinking about spells, I do have that painting that can cast such spells, and ignore the components to boot. That… would let me do this one at a time, which would probably be better for modesty's sake.  And also lets me get other relatives back, without needing to worry about it in advance. Huh.

As I'm working that out, I hear a boom, the engine noise stops, and I lose gravity and lights.  None of which actually bothers me: The skycrane is a convenience, not a necessity. I release my current ‘Alice’ body, put her in storage, and poke my head through the hull to assess the damage.

Huh.  Okay, yeah… it looks like someone snuck in with the tourists and planted a bomb on an engine.  Starfinder hull metal is really tough stuff, so I didn't lose cabin pressure… but now Newton is at the helm.  No biggie, I can treat the skycrane as a tier-0 starship in this scenario, and be the engineer for a bit.  Patching a system to fix it for an hour is just a few actions, I only need thirty minutes to complete the trip, and multiple engineers can work together….

I get several out, and have them all work on it… and the skycrane is back on course very quickly.

Which leaves me time to get my Veranallia, and start giving it orders, “Greetings. Please prepare True Resurrection in place if the default Storm of Vengeance spell at your next opportunity.  I have some relatives to bring back from the dead.”

“Yes boss,” the creature replies, “Do keep in mind, that means you'll need to leave me out until an hour after dawn.”

I have a spaceship in orbit: Dawn is when I say it is, “Not a problem.” Especially with that view.  Rowr. A veranallia is a Large Outsider: She looks like a nude woman, her lower half covered with a tangle of moving vines (which are actually part of her) at various stages of a normal yearly cycle: Some blooming with flowers, others withered with a layer of frost. I mean, the scale is wrong: She's like ten feet tall… but she's not even slightly shy about those big bouncing orbs she's carrying around.  And that red hair… she is a vision of beauty.

…so I should probably cover her up.  Mating with a minion under my absolute command… no.  Just… no.  I should skip questionable consent scenarios. I handle that with a simple shirt via Create Reality and Permanent Image, have her put it on… and then get back to making minions for the rest of the trip.

When I do get back to my ship, I give the orders about the scheduled bombardment of empty water (the crew and VI can handle it, no problem), and of accelerating the dawn by picking our orbit.

Which means three hours later, my plant-like outsider painting has her spells prepared as requested.

I go to an unused crew cabin, and set a suitable scene.  I make the veranallia invisible (she doesn't need to be in the conversation), and use Create Reality to make a privacy screen and suitable clothes… I figure I'll start with my eldest sister: No real reason.  I also cloak myself in a full sensory illusion of who I used to be.  Face, body, clothes, and voice, affecting sight, sound, scent, and even touch.  Illusions don't support weight, but I can thanks to my gear and feat choices, and when I give my sister a hug… she won't feel my front impact funbags.

I still will, but eh.  She takes priority for a while.

I start the painting on the ten minute casting time, and while that's going on, I get an email from an unusual address.

“Hello Alice… or should I say Kenneth?  Yes, we know.”  Yeah… I kinda figured that out when you went after my family.  I keep reading, “We got your family, despite your precautions." On try number eight, your minions suck... well, sucked, many of them are dead now, "But you know, you have plenty of uncles, cousins, aunts, nieces, and nephews we can still target, plus your grandparents, and we can take out any of them at any time.  So you're going to do the following…”

I skim the list of demands: They don't really matter, as I'm not going to follow them.  When the death of a family member is a ten minute setback, there's very little reason to bother.  Still… might as well read them… stop the public healings… skip the nuclear demonstration… publicly renounce my plans to make a Mythic homeland… big payment to a specific bank account… meh.  I forward the email as an attachment (to preserve the headers) to a Computers specialist minion, and task her with tracking down and cracking the source.

That handled, I have something more pressing to focus on: My eldest sister's return to the land of the living… but not necessarily the world of mortals…