“I just stored it,” Jason said. “It’s fine. Probably.”
“Probably?”
“I’ll pull it back out when we get there. Come on, let’s check out the new wheels. I haven’t had a chance to test this thing out yet.”
“I’m certainly curious,” Vermillion said. “Why does the license plate say repair man?”
Anna stood at the end of the table addressing the Steering Committee.
“Asano knows his value to us,” she said. “Or at least he’s made some good guesses. Look at the coins I just handed out. He left those for me on my kitchen counter. We’ve had them checked and they’re authentic, category-one spirit coins. Note the personalised design.”
Keith peered at the coin between his fingers, depicting a man giving a thumbs-up. On the other side was embossed text.
PRODUCT OF JASON
G’DAY MATE!
“He didn’t just leave these on a whim,” Anna said. “He wanted us to see them. These are personalised, which means he not only has however many coins he brought back with him, but a looting power. If he’s figured out that looting powers are the only source we have for spirit coins in our world, and that our branch doesn’t have one, he knows that his value to us is immense. Even if he doesn’t, the actions of Lyon branch highlight how valuable he is. If we get Asano on board, our reliance on the International Committee for spirit coins is ameliorated, if not eliminated entirely.”
“That’s attractive, certainly,” a committee member said. “But in return, he wants to put us at odds with the Lyon branch. The European branches are just as strong as the Asian branches. I’m not willing to accept that kind of risk.”
The committee member, Miranda, had once been Anna’s counterpart at the Melbourne branch. Her overly aggressive methodology was viewed as a problem, but her political connections made getting rid of her less than easy. Instead, she was promoted to Sydney’s Steering Committee. This was an increase in authority but removed her from direct operational control. It also allowed the rest of the committee to balance out her inclination for direct action. Since her arrival, Miranda had been at constant loggerheads with Anna, to the point of her default position being to resist anything the other woman proposed.
“We have leverage to push the Lyon branch,” Keith said. “They massively violated protocol in sending operatives here. Especially a category-three assassin. Who we have in custody, for even more leverage.”
“But we have to answer for the other operatives,” Miranda said. “We have to assume they’re dead.”
“I’m sure they are,” Anna said, “but we aren’t responsible for that. They made a move on a politically independent entity, outside of our knowledge and in violation of our territory. If anything, their death in our backyard is another mess the Lyon branch has to answer for.”
“We’d still be making a political enemy of a powerful branch,” Miranda said. “All for someone you admit won’t join our ranks and capitulate to our authority.”
“We wouldn’t be unleashing him on the world,” Anna said. “He’s already out there. Check the news. Every behavioural concession we get from him is a win.”
“We can take him in hand forcibly,” Miranda said.
“Go to the holding cells and ask our guest how well that went for him,” Anna said. “He came crawling to us just to survive.”
“We know he cares about family,” Miranda said. “We can leverage them.”
“And he can leverage magic itself,” Anna countered. “What happens when he starts a national tour of children’s hospitals and talk shows? Are you going to threaten the family of the guy curing adorable kids of leukaemia?”
“Then we act directly,” Miranda said. “If we take him alive, we can extract his resources. The Lyon branch clearly thinks he’s valuable enough, even unwilling, to take the risks they took.”
“Are you suggesting we kidnap and torture him?”
“Of course not. He’s already threatened the secrecy of magic and left a trail of bodies behind him,” Miranda said. “Bringing him in is our responsibility.”
“Miranda,” Keith said. “No one at this table believes you want to bring him in out of duty. Let’s at least be honest with one another.”
While Jason had added enough extra materials to the cloud flask to have the interior of the adaptive form mask itself as thoroughly as the exterior, he declined to have it do so. One thing he had missed since reviving on Earth was the luxurious comfort of cloud furniture. As they boarded, the sides of the vehicle extended out to create interior space, like an ordinary, high-end motorhome.
Vermillion frowned oddly as he stepped inside. Jason realised why as he followed, immediately feeling better about the exorbitant resource cost of the vortex accumulator.
You have entered a region of normalised magic. Your recovery rates will remain at normal levels without spirit coin consumption.
The interior of the motorhome was a mansion on wheels: two levels of opulence plus a roof deck on top. There weren’t stairs, but an elevating platform moving between the three levels.
“Bro, your magic RV has an elevator.”
On the lower floor was a luxurious lounge, bar, and kitchen and dining area, all surprisingly roomy once the walls were extended. The level above had a main bedroom with a sprawling bed, plus a second one with single beds and a bathroom. It also had the driving station at the front, which felt more like the cockpit of a spaceship, looking out through the curved glass oval. The roof deck had comfortable seating and another bar.
Jason had a large amount of control over the interior, able to reconfigure entire rooms. The four explored the vehicle, and Jason relished the chance to introduce the others to the luxuriant joys of cloud furniture. The interior was mostly cloud white but with embellishments in glorious sunset colours of orange, gold, blue, red and purple.
“It feels like I’m in the womb,” Taika said happily from his cloud chair. “Except there’s a bar. It’s not easy finding chairs that are comfy for someone my size.”
“Don’t drink anything from the bar,” Jason warned him. “It’s magic-infused alcohol. It’ll probably kill you.”
“Even your booze is magic?” Taika asked. “That’s hardcore.”
Once the cloud flask had been ranked up to bronze, Jason had been able to store things in the cloud constructs even when it was in the flask. He didn’t have the chance to stock up on amenities, since he had ranked it up in the astral space. It had some drinks his team had used to celebrate their rank-ups, but mostly just lower-value loot that was stored in the motorhome’s discreet storage spaces. They themselves were dimensional spaces that could be contained within a dimensional space when the cloud construct was stored in the flask, which had excited Clive immensely. It was a feature only something as sophisticated as the cloud flask was capable of.