Being asked to return to Vilhelmiina’s secret lair was an oddity considering I didn’t think there was anything more for me to do there. I’d already discovered everything I could about the various bits and pieces we’d obtained from Doctor Doomsday’s goons along with the scrying anchor. The request also didn’t come through the Brigade, so it shouldn’t be something new.

But I didn’t have to wait long. All I had to do was go to a certain diner, order a specific meal not on the menu as I sat in a specific spot, and then I was falling. That began to be concerning after a moment because unlike the other times I wasn’t in a tube or anything. It made me think I should probably have Feather Fall, though I hadn’t really been concerned about excessive vertical velocity before now. And anything that knocked me around enough for the spell to be worthwhile would probably just turn me into a pile of mush on the front end so that hardly mattered.

I landed in a bunch of gel. I sunk all the way up to my neck, but the not-quite-instant negation of momentum wasn’t too bad. I didn’t feel real injuries, at least. Probably not even a concussion, though I wasn’t going to guarantee that one.

The gel drained away from around me, miraculously not sticking to me. Then a door opened where I found Frank the cannon bot waiting. “Mage. Your presence is requested in pedestal room 17.”

I followed him towards our destination. As he walked along on cannon legs I thought they seemed rather inefficient, but I wasn’t the resident mad scientist. I was just a perfectly normal and sensible mage.

As the name implied, pedestal room 17 had a pedestal. It felt like it might be more efficient to place multiple pedestals in a single room, but clearly Vilhelmiina didn’t share that idea. It was just a lot of empty space and a stick.

No, rather, it should be a staff. It was rounded, after all, with flat ends. Other than that, I couldn’t say much except it looked plain and unadorned. It was made out of some sort of tan wood I couldn’t name, and it shone with a polish.

“What do you think?” Vilhelmiina said, appearing out of nowhere. There was also a chance I didn’t notice her approaching, but I could not discount the possibility of unanticipated teleportation. This whole place was full of tech power, so a little more might not have registered.

“It looks like a staff,” I said. Arcane Sight revealed no active magic or tech. “I can’t see anything active.”

“Well? Pick it up,” she gestured.

I wondered why, but I couldn’t see any dangers with that. I did idly wonder whether someone directing me into a trap counted as combat, or even dealing with traps in general. But it would be weird for this to be a trap. It would have been easier to make the whole room the trap, and I didn’t have any reason to distrust anything about Vilhelmiina except her safety protocols. Maybe I should Stoneskin myself, just in case?

Well, it was too late for that thought as I grasped the staff and lifted it up. After which, nothing happened. “It still feels normal.”

“That’s because I don't know how to juice it,” she said. “That’s your job.”

So it needed mana? I let some flow into it and could see a reaction. A familiar one, even. “Is this like the daggers?”

“It is the daggers!” she proclaimed.

“This is a staff, actually.”

“It can be two things. I put them in it. But I suppose it is a staff now.” She nodded seriously, “They just make the core. The outer shell is Yggdrasil wood.”

“Yggdrasil exists?” I asked. I knew some things about myths and legends in this world, but I couldn’t say I was exactly well versed. I just knew it was a big fancy tree.

“Does it?” she asked, tilting her head.

“You’re the one who should know, aren’t you? Since you said this is its wood?”

“Why can’t I have Yggdrasil wood without Yggdrasil existing? I just synthesized it from samples of every other tree. It seemed like it might grow too big, though, so I turned it into a bonsai.”

“I don’t know what that means?” My statement turned into a question along the way.

“It’s only five meters tall. Quite compact compared to the potential.”

“So do you want me to test this or…?” I waved the staff.

“Oh, good point! We could test it!” She turned to Frank. “Let him whap you with that!”

“Vilhelmiina Koskinen,” Frank replied. “According to your programming I am supposed to warn you about the possibility of irreparable damage to your devices.”

“Bah, don’t care.”

“I must insist. I would like to continue to retain my form.”

“Oh!” she nodded. “Yes, it would be a problem to have to rebuild you. Let’s see…” she looked around.

“... I can just cast Force Armor on something and see if it dispels it!”

“Oh, good point. Use that on me and take a good swing!”

Frank managed to make a sound of a throat clearing without having one. “Bodyguard protocols insist-”

“Fine do it on the pedestal or something!” she waved her hand.

That did seem like the most reasonable option. Of the things Vilhelmiina looked like, sturdy wasn’t one of them. Even if she had weird tech that might make her so, if the staff actually worked she wouldn’t be. And then I’d just be whacking an old woman with… a sort of heavy staff.

I hadn’t actually tried to cast Force Armor on an object before. It seemed to work though- though it wasn’t completely encircling the pedestal. Specifically, it didn’t seem to connect below. Not that it mattered. I tapped the pedestal with the staff. It bounced off the Force Armor. “Uh, so, the daggers are inside this, right? Does that mean the inside of the staff has to touch magic for it to dispel it?”

“Oooh,” Vilhelmiina’s face lit up. “That would be an interesting experiment! Perhaps it would automatically function on spectral forces…”

“It hasn’t done anything yet,” I pointed out.

“Well, obviously. You surround yourself in all sorts of magic, if it just got rid of everything it touched you’d be defenseless. You have to activate it.”

“How?” I asked.

“I don’t know!” she waved her arms wildly. “That’s your job. It’s a magic item, how do those get activated?”

“Sometimes like a command word or…?” I tilted my head. I’d never owned a magic item. Maybe I could just encourage the magic out the end? I tapped the pedestal several times… and eventually it worked. It was a bit sluggish, though. It took it almost a second of contact to completely pierce the Force Armor. “It seems pretty slow. Also, it’s a bit heavy and long? I don’t want to complain, but…”

“Don’t worry,” Vilhelmiina waved me off. “It will be just the right size once you finish your growth spurt.”

“How do you know that?” I asked. Both that I was apparently in a growth spurt, which had surprised even me, and how big or strong I would be.

“Intuition!” she said. “Also they let me analyze DNA samples from arrested orcs and I compared yours with your current parameters.”

“And that lets you know how tall I will be?”

“As long as you don’t suffer from malnutrition, but I think that would be quite difficult. You’re about twenty-five percent Power Brigade energy bars.”

“They’re pretty convenient,” I admitted. “So, uh, is this all?”

“That’s right,” she nodded. “Take that thing and get going.”

“Oh!” I hadn’t realized it was for me, but… why make it to theoretically match me if it wasn’t? “Well, thank you.”

“You’re the one who captured those daggers, and I got to take them apart. Fair is fair.”

“Technically our squad got them together. Especially Acid Man-”

“Don’t care. Busy now,” Vilhelmiina waved me off.

So I went, carrying with me a magic? Staff. Or an antimagic one. I was going to have to actually practice with this, wasn’t I? At least it would make some things easier. I was pretty decent in unarmed combat, but I didn’t have the powers to make that better than having an actual weapon. Staves were on the approved less-lethal list as long as I minimized blows to the head, a perfectly reasonable thing to make use of. And it was a staff, a proper magely weapon and not some sort of barbaric weapon like an axe.

-----

As a mercenary super, the day to day was mainly filled with training and patrols. Compared to heroes we weren’t that different, we just got the less desirable patrols. From a certain perspective, at least. Personally I felt that areas with more violence were better, as I could both stop more trouble and get experience for combat. In return for the trouble, we were paid more- at a base level. With ‘merchandising’ that didn’t necessarily stay true, and it was the image that was really what set heroes apart. Nobody wanted Captain Punch advertising their stuff. Even the gyms that thought they wanted it really didn’t. I heard about one incident where he complained about some place’s dumbbells not going anywhere close to one ton. The actual commercial never got recorded.

Mercenaries also accepted a wider variety of individuals… those who might not be able to get positions as heroes, for example. Say, for example, those with criminal records or who punched a fellow hero trainee in the face. Or orcs from a fantasy world who got arrested on their first day even if they were declared innocent.

It seemed like a lifetime ago that our squad was assigned to work that wasn’t for the city itself. To be fair, it had been a good portion of my stay in this world. After that point there had been so many patrols and trouble with Handface and portal incidents. It was also rare for private individuals to hire mercenary supers, as well. It was not cheap. I knew that for certain, because each of us were paid well. Enough to afford movie theater concessions every once in a while, where bags of popcorn cost as much as baggies of diamond dust.

We went over a general reminder of the protocols for how we should act on such a job, and then our squad made our way over to the actual person hiring us. We were met with a large head, pure black eyes, and a very tall chair behind a desk that barely made our employer for this job eye level.

She had a cigar almost as big as her hand held between two fingers. “It’s a pretty simple job. I’ve got a dock and warehouse. There’s a high value shipment coming in, and it needs to remain in the warehouse. Obviously. Don’t know what villains might catch word of it, but it’s your job to stop anyone from barging in.”

“We understand,” Ice Guy said, completely calm as smoke was exhaled generally in our direction. Not directly for any of us, but it was certainly… smoky. “I don’t believe we were introduced?”

“Kendrux,” the martian woman said. “I already know you. One of my employees vouched for your capabilities. So I already know you.” She tapped her cigar on a nearby ashtray. “She’ll be picking up the shipment in three days. Until then, we’ll have you remain on site. We’d like some of you on active duty at all times. But of course, everyone should be ready to participate in case something comes up. I’ll have my guards coordinate with you. They’re familiar with the area. They expect to see you in ten minutes, there’s a vehicle waiting.”

“Then we’ll be on our way,” the captain said.

Once we were out of the room, Midnight spoke up. “I have a bad feeling about her.”

“Why?” I asked. “Is it… because she smokes?”

“And the suit,” Rocker pointed out. “That screams mob. Haven’t you seen movies?”

“I have seen… more than one,” I commented. “Zorphax is nice though. He wears a suit.”

“But he doesn’t smoke cigars,” Ice Guy pointed out.

“He might. Just not at work.”

“Here’s the thing,” Ice Guy said. “Kendrux and her organization maintain at least the appearance of legitimacy. We wouldn’t sign up for this job otherwise. So unless we actually see anything criminal going on, she’s just a customer with bad people skills.”

“She seemed pretty efficient to me,” I commented. But it did seem the general consensus was negative. I had to admit I didn’t like the idea of lung cancer. Too bad I couldn’t know every useful spell and keep them active at all points, or I could filter the air coming into our lungs a couple different ways. But obviously, I had my limits.

“But what if…” Acid Man didn’t finish his question.

“What, they smuggle a shipment of drugs or guns? Then they wasted money hiring us,” Ice Guy said. “I know a few of you have special senses. If we detect anything alarming, we’ll handle it then. But I’m sure Kendrux is smart enough to not have anything crazy come through. Otherwise she would have hired, I don’t know, Super Soldiers Inc. or something.” He looked off to the side. “I’m sure she already anticipated this sort of discussion anyway. I’m betting on a shipping container full of gold statues.”

“We’re betting on that?” I tilted my head. “Then… astral diamonds.”

“Tuna,” Midnight said.

“Probably art,” Rocker said. “These types like their paintings by dead guys.”

Acid Man and Shockfire had no particular contributions to the ‘betting’, and soon we were in the car with a guy in a suit and sunglasses, driving us towards some specific warehouse.