Mary watched as her expedition for the Pirate coast left harbour, it was quite a sizable fleet for an island state, and her people were well equipped and trained. Hopefully they would be able to convince the people who were being forced to support the pirates to remain neutral.

Then her Earth self contacted her. « Hey me, Trish, any ideas on a bodyguard that can remain mostly unseen? »

Mary contemplated her other memories and thought things through. « Unseen? How ‘bout a shadow mage? Got the skills pack thanks to Shadow. » while Trish added her two cents worth.

« Me, how ‘bout a leopard ‘folk, can we optimise ‘em for stealth, sneaky tactics an’ ambushes. »

Mary agreed that her other self had something, she hadn’t done leopards yet, so she linked minds with herself and Trish tagged along. Soon they were deep in the process of adaption and creation. Everything was looking good and they were finalising the design when Jerica showed up.

Jerica hurled herself at Trisha, hugging her aunt while screaming: “Hello aunty Trisha.”

Mary was able to observe it all, but only just. Jerica’s mind touched their gestalt, and a tendril of her mind was encouraged to slot into her other self’s gaping companion bond slot. Encouraged!

« Companion link established – transfer accomplished. »

Bluey’s smug statement pretty much confirmed the responsible party. The question now was, why was he meddling?

Trisha gazed wide eyed at where her cousin had been only seconds ago. “Jerica is too much like you Mary, they are not a pair I would have considered suitable. She’s more likely to encourage you in your recklessness than balance you.”

« Sorry Trish, ‘twas Bluey’s doing. Dunno why. But conditions on Earth are different from Parthia. However, yeah, Jerica’s a little tearaway and not the best influence on me. How you goin’ to tell her mother? »

“Erm... Oh, I’ll blame it all on Bluey and commiserate with her. Um, it even has the merit of being kind of true. Um, after all she can still talk with Jerica through us...”

* * *

Chee Jong-Su and Ivy watched as Robin Goodfellow and his company left. They fell to studying the two caverns that had been gifted them.

“That’s a surprisingly nasty combination Jong-Su, and none of the monsters are particularly dangerous on their own. How are we going to handle adventurers with plate armour on their legs?”

« Carefully. »

When Robin arrived in Garonmouth, he contacted Victoria and soon had everything he needed to set up a hall for his company. He purchased an appropriate building and arranged for it to be renovated.

* * * INTERLUDE 1 * * *

Top woke with a mild headache. He was in a makeshift sick bay in one of the semi permanent trailers in the compound. He could still hear the dungeon’s incredulous mocking laughter and that made him suspect that he was missing something important. He staggered to his feet and blinked at the nurse that was the only other person in the room with him.

“Can I have an aspirin please?”

Top made his way back to the house they were using for cover and was driven out by the crew that had arrived to fix it up. Or rather strip out much of the interior and rebuild. The racket was painful especially considering the state of his head.

So he headed down the road, as he was passing the girl’s house he noted that her jeep wasn’t present so he stopped and, with some apprehension, approached the property’s boundary. He recoiled from the dungeon domain he sensed and continued down the road where he engaged Mary’s neighbour in conversation, introducing himself as a new neighbour and asking about the new species of frog.

After enduring an hour of boredom Top was finally able to move on. He introduced himself to several of his new neighbours.

By the time he got back home his head was feeling better and he braced himself to enter and go through all the information he had been given about the girl and the area. The mocking laughter drove him to wonder what he was missing.

* * * INTERLUDE 2 * * *

Mary was heading home after a profitable day when her shields, or rather her jeep’s shields snapped into existence and two bullets went ricocheting into the downtown crowd. She floored the accelerator and wove through the – thankfully – few cars on the road. She poured manna into her steed trying for initiative, agility, invisibility and speed.

Jeep stirred; his chosen person was being attacked! She wanted to be unseen; then they would be unseen. As they tore down the road they passed close to one of the ones who wished his person ill. He, they reached out and left a frog on the sidewalk as they flashed by.

* * *

Joanne cursed, up ahead Mary just vanished. First a shimmering almost transparent globe had snapped into existence around her jeep and Mary had taken of at insane speeds weaving through the downtown traffic. The – force field – shrugged off an explosion before jeep and girl became invisible and she lost them.

The protection detail was soon involved in a firefight with the attackers while people raced for shelter. All in all it was a day Joanne wished to forget. Despite prompt action and massive disruption the results were not good. At least three of the attackers managed to get away, another two were dead and they had managed to capture three. Then there were the unfortunate passers by, two dead and ten injured.

* * *

Mary made it home in record time; the two shots had been aimed at her jeeps engine and the RPG or whatever it was had only been fired at her when it was obvious she was getting away.

‘I need better bodyguards than the Navy.’

« Hey me, Trish, any ideas on a bodyguard that can remain mostly unseen? »

« Unseen? How ‘bout a shadow mage? Got the skills pack thanks to Shadow. »

« You need a companion other Mary, don’t get someone vicious, you both need balancing, someone to keep you in touch with people. »

‘Shadow mage, Shadow... Not bad... But maybe a Tiger girl... Yeah can do that, maybe a Leopard girl ‘d be better.’

« Me, how ‘bout a leopard ‘folk, can we optimise ‘em for stealth, sneaky tactics an’ ambushes. »

There followed a three way link, Trish mostly observed as the Marys worked. Mary, both of her were happy with the way things were going. The blueprint and pattern was virtually set when someone intruded. Mary vaguely noted someone shouting, “Hello aunty Trisha” before the part of her/their merge that represented Trish was grabbed in an enthusiastic hug. A mind touched their gestalt and latched onto the part of her mind that was beginning to seek a companion.

« Companion link established – transfer accomplished. »

Mary found herself wholly back at home with a young sea sprite sitting on her lap. « Bluey you rat beep! »

Then the link fully established itself and the two partners realized they had much in common. They grinned at each other in contemplation of future mischief.