Leaving Gnome and Undine to keep a watch on Eliza, John and Aclysia left the apartment within John’s palace and went for the staircase. The replacement sphere flew just a metre ahead of him, but the Gamer concentrated on seeing through the two lenses in his eyes. It functioned relatively well, as long as he had his hands on something.

The progress was pretty tangible at this point. Sometimes he would get into the correct state of mind, the correct way to guide the Possession, that allowed him to keep both fields of vision synchronized. Then it would slip again. Each time, there was a minor increase in the duration, each time he had to think about it less. Basically, he had the procedure figured out, now it was just a question of repeating it ad nauseam until it was a background process like walking.

It was still good that he was careful about these things, as he lost his accurate perception on the staircase. Hitting his foot on one step, he first threatened to fall forwards, then over-compensated to the point that his hand slipped off the railing. With Aclysia behind him, nothing bad happened, as she simply caught him and they continued on after he got himself together.

They emerged under the socket of Lady Liberty. He could have ascended further, into the statue, but they instead went to the door that led to the outside. There was a basic green area up there. Lots of space to walk around contemplating existence and all that. Boring, however, as it was just that: a green area.

‘Maybe I should place some trees up here,’ John thought as he headed for the sole difference in surroundings around. The Transport Station was sitting there in all its usual pavilion-like glory. Four side platforms opened from the large central one like arms made from circular segments. The blue glow in the floor intensified when they got lower, the building sensing its creator by whatever machinations the Guild Hall functioned.

He and Aclysia both stepped on. One second they looked at Lady Liberty, the next at a wall in Scarlett’s tower. As was typical, the wall rolled open, well-greased machinery parting and unveiling the large, mostly empty office of the redhead Technomancer.

“There you are,” Scarlett announced, toasting them with a glass of some clear liquid. In a relaxed pose, she was lying back in her chair, feet resting on the edge of her table. Although she didn’t look like it whatsoever, she was working. On the opposite side of the room, mechanical tendrils and robotic arms went through a series of motions. “I suppose it’s time for our new strategy meeting?”

“What is that beverage you are drinking?” Aclysia wanted to know before anything else happened. Her bet with the Technomancer was still on: Scarlett had to go one month without any drugs of any description. It had mostly been about cigarettes, but alcohol was included in that list. In the meanwhile, John looked some more at the tools the bloodstained Technocrat was guiding. They seemed a bit different than usual.

“Water,” Scarlett answered, first taking a sip and then sliding the glass over the table to let Aclysia check. “Do you have any idea how much work I had the past week?”

“Judging by the question, a fuckton,” John dared to guess.

“A metric fuckton,” Scarlett agreed, calmly raising her legs and getting on her feet. “I spent the last three days upgrading my tools. Which was a pain in my sides.” So, it hadn’t just been John’s imagination.

The Gamer looked doubly closely at the mecha-tendrils and then realized what was off: parts of them had been replaced with shimmering bronze metal. “Baelementium?” he asked.

“With the amount of the stuff you supply, I figured I might as well treat myself on your cost,” Scarlett stated, causing John to raise an eyebrow. “I took it from the guild account.”

“Hey, I was stocking up on that!” John protested, but not particularly strongly.

Rolling her eyes, the redhead responded, “And I had a use for it immediately. You wouldn’t have given me access without knowing I would take what I need.” She was right on that front. “Anything else you want to waste our time with before we get going?” Reaching out to Aclysia, she got her glass of water back and emptied it in one go.

“Don’t act like you don’t enjoy the banter,” the Gamer snickered. “It’s about half of what defines having a relationship with me. The other half being mind-blowing sex, of course.”

“I am 90% in it for your power and wealth,” Scarlett denied, but a smirk of her own showed that to be a lie or, more likely, an overstatement. “The rest is just being tolerated.”

As she spoke, the room dimmed and the massive screen was lowered from the ceiling. Like their last meeting, Scarlett evidently wanted to give them a visual. Something that John appreciated, since their now extended borders meant they had to deal with some forces he barely knew about.

“Since you’ll go and properly integrate the Small Lake Pact into our territory and because I have already made arrangements for Fusion to go out and claim the formerly untaken areas,” Scarlett explained as the map appeared, “our current situation looks like this.”

“Do we even have the resources to take control of those?” John asked. It wasn’t a question of military power, Fusion’s current shortcoming, since the only few engagements to be had in the area were between special operatives and on the information front, areas his guild excelled in. Rather, it was a problem of actually claiming them.

To hold land in a proper sense, it needed to be governed by the state, whatever shape that took, that claimed it. Doing so meant that police stations, courts and other government buildings were all needed to establish presence, together with the people manning them. Since those areas, after years of conflict, were basically bereft of even a population to rule over, they needed to be taken from scratch.

“I am hiring some mercenaries to create preliminary fortresses. Once that is settled, we’re going to create some government sponsored program where moving gets encouraged,” Scarlett played with the glass in her hand, turning in circles. “Basically, we are going to throw money at the problem until it disappears.”

John wasn’t too happy with that line of action, but it was certainly effective. Those areas were important in a minor and a lesser sense. For the latter, it established a land connection to the Small Lake Pact. It wasn’t exactly important, with planes, trains and cars being the fastest ways of travelling and all of them being mundane vehicles. More important was to deny the enemy that space, since it would half the distance between their current border and Fusion’s capital in the Hudson Barrier.

Regardless, using mercenaries was something he wasn’t usually in favour of. Historically speaking, it was a terrible idea to rely on sell-swords too much. However, in terms of getting people quickly deployed, it was definitely a way to go about things. That and, in those defensive positions, they couldn’t wreak too much havoc.

“Thinking about it, mercenaries are actually pretty smart there,” John realized, thinking out loud to see if he was on the money. “Not only can we care less if the Lake Guilds catch wind of what is going on in time and wipe the operation out, but buying them also means the enemy can’t.”

“Which, given the way Abraham bolstered his side with mercenaries, is something we don’t want to repeat,” Scarlett finished the train of thought. “Also, we can dismiss them whenever. They’ll guard that bit of border for as long as we pay them, and I fucking overpay them so they won’t switch sides, and once the war is won, we can remove them.”

‘Unless we buy too many and they stage a massive rebellion,’ John thought, again, remembering what he knew about history. “Anyway, I find it pretty bold to already include the Small Lake Pact as absorbed.” Same could be said about the Hidden Tradition, but their inclusion into Fusion was basically a sealed deal already, while Aclysia had taken over the Small Lake Pact by brute force. Local culture or not, that wasn’t exactly a smooth annexation.

“Because you’ll make fucking sure it stays this way,” Scarlett stated, putting the glass on the table with an audible knock. “You have already heard what those guys specialize in, magic wise, right?”

“Defense, particularly of the fortification or booby-trap kind,” John answered.

“Yes, 300 people that are great securing a position while harassing an enemy one,” Scarlett crossed her arms, her androgynous face putting on a bit of a taunting face. “I don’t think I need to tell you that we need those right now.”

“You don’t, no,” John agreed. Aside from the raw manpower, which was still something Fusion sorely lacked since the disastrous culling of the numbers at the White House, their type of magic was perfect at giving them something they needed more than anything else: time.

John needed time to master his new sight. The Hidden Tradition needed time to properly organize. Fusion needed time to properly integrate them. Time itself would allow their still booming economy to grow further. In regards to the plans made just now, the more time they had, the firmer their grasp on those new lands would be. That was only mentioning all the internal things that needed attention to detail to solve.

“Isn’t it too risky to send Master out in his current state?” Aclysia chimed in.

“Between using Undine as a sensing cheat code and needing to get his ass back into gear, he will have to manage,” Scarlett put it crudely and directly. “He’s just going into an area where YOU were stronger than the strongest person around. That aside, you’ll be going with him. Just keep him safe and that’s that.”

Although it was worded dismissively, Scarlett’s eyes lingered for a few confronting moments on Aclysia during the last sentence. The weaponized maid nodded quickly, approving of this plan.

“Do you have some way for me to draw on this?” John asked, thinking about how it would go from there. In answer, the ground under his feet vibrated, then parted in front of him. A podium holding a touch screen rose up and turned on to reveal the same map. “Alright, so… I will go north and make sure the Small Lake Pact is properly annexed, recruiting them as fighters. Most of them will be tasked with securing their stretch of the border…” he drew in purple along the affected segment, “…the mercenaries will protect this bit…” he added a red line, “…and the Hidden Tradition the rest…” green covered what remained of the border, “…while more skilled members of the Small Lake Pact harass whatever operation centres we find.” A couple of randomly placed purple arrows finished the picture.

The war was still pretty cold, so this formation should make their border pretty secure. Of course they would have to keep forces further inland to ward against deep strikes via plane. Abyssal warfare was pretty complicated, with all those ways to get around that couldn’t be countered. John wondered if some of those planes that just mysteriously vanished were just shot packed to the brim with Abyssals and had been shot down.

“You are horrible at drawing,” Scarlett pointed out, and not even Aclysia mounted a defence to that one.

“Miss Summers used to say I was talented,” John grumbled, remembering his art teacher from back in Springfield. She had always been nice to him, one of the few people in school that had been. Which, given how sexy she was, had been grounds for more than one beating by Frank. That had been worth it though. “Anyway, what about the Amacat?”

The Technomancer grinned widely, clearly proud of what she was about to say. “You can consider them part of Fusion within the next five years, at the absolute latest.”

“Why?” John asked, feeling that was expected of him.

“Through Beatrice, I convinced some of their leaders that foreign investing was surely something they could profit from. I started by pumping some money into their military district…” John was slightly alarmed by this news, but he trusted Scarlett enough to hear her out to the end, “…which made them trust us enough that they decided absolute access to the stock market was a good idea.”

“Let me guess… you already had access to the stock market?” John theorized, not believing for a second that Scarlett hadn’t sunk her digital claws into something geographically close and centred around trade. “So, you’re now using the companies you still own from the Thorne days in addition to the new Fusion presence. By playing them off one another, you can grow the former rapidly, while keeping the latter at a slow ascension.”

“All the while lending them money like there is no tomorrow,” Scarlett confirmed, quoting John Adams next. “There are two ways to conquer and enslave a nation. One is by the sword and the other is by debt.”

“Basically, once we own the majority of their infrastructure and they owe us more money than they can scrape together each month, we just demand they join the Federation, is that the plan?” John wanted to make sure he got all of this right.

“We could also just keep extracting their wealth. Whatever happens, we win.”

As far as John was concerned, this was basically the best way to go about these things. A bit dirty, sure, but way less dirty than murdering soldiers and civilians. It was a completely bloodless takeover and the only people that were economically hurt by it, at least if all ran smoothly, were the people currently calling the shots over there.

If the leaders of Amacat had half a brain, it would take way less than five years for them to agree to joining Fusion, if they weren’t going to suggest it themselves. There was enough pressure to make it happen. Most of Amacat’s borders lay with John’s guild, now that the Small Lake Pact was theoretically part of it. Once they realized how Fusion was slowly taking over their entire economy, they would have basically no other choice.

Not like it would be bad for them either. As a trading guild, Amacat could basically take the place of the NTC within Fusion. At the very least, they would profit from John’s relationships with Lydia and other leaders in Europe. If he forgave them all debt upon joining, Amacat would experience an economic boom from all the advantages and fresh capital that would be given to them.

“Alright,” the Gamer nodded, having approved of this. “I’ll leave you to it… even if I might have to break up your monopoly eventually.”

“Bah,” Scarlett spat out. “Can’t have any fun on this market place with your antitrust laws and everything. Fucking communists.”

“I’d make the argument that monopolies are inherently anti-capitalistic because they centralize economy, just around a small group of oligarchs instead of the government,” John immediately countered.

“…That’s a good argument,” Scarlett had to concede. “I demand compensation, should you ever do that though.”

“Don’t you worry, I will choke you out nice and firmly, while I remove your chokehold on my economy,” John promised, earning himself a bit lip and a ‘fuck me’ glance of her red eyes. “We aren’t even close to done yet though. What about the western situation? Anything of note there?”

“Not really, if I am being honest,” Scarlett shrugged. “We can’t expand west for the moment, as we lack the manpower for as long as we need to guard the border and are occupied on the coast.” They both directed their eyes towards the uncreatively named Resistance.

The last rebels from the Little Maryland had all gathered in a single province and put an alliance together with some of the small fry in the area. Whether that had happened organically or if the Lake Alliance had their fingers in the happenings wasn’t clear, just that it was a thorn in their sides. “Is there a way to utilize them as controlled opposition?” John asked.

Scarlett shook her head. “We don’t have people on the inside and no idea about their exact resources. Best crush them while they’re still small.”

“Mhm, I’ll keep Metra in the area then. Do you still need Beatrice in the Amacat?”

“For the moment…” Scarlett’s fingers drummed on the table as she thought for a few seconds. “Since you’re already going north, you could go to their headquarters for a few days after you’re done around the lake. Further our goals, look nice for the camera, et cetera. If things go well enough, you can take Beatrice back home with you and send some standard diplomat that only focuses on maintaining our relationship.”

“Sounds good,” John wondered when he would actually be home the next time, since he couldn’t see those things take less than two weeks. “What about the rest?”

“What ABOUT the rest?” Scarlett sneered and quickly gave him the list. “New Libraria has been in diplomatic neutrality forever, the Gestalt countries haven’t recovered since the Death Zone appeared a decade ago and Florida is full of raving lunatics.”

“So, you’re saying Jane would like it there?” John joked.

“She unironically would, because your girlfriend also has a few screws loose,” the redhead responded in a serious tone.

Now John was pretty curious, but he couldn’t justify checking for himself. The one thing that pulled him in that direction was that the last thing he had heard about Nia was her heading south. “By the way, is that a literal Death Zone or a guild name?”

“The former,” Scarlett told him. “Abyssals that try to live there just up and vanish. Not that anyone tried recently.”

So many things going on in this world and John was messing with a fairly large chunk of them. “Well, I guess we’ll solve that mystery at some point,” he dared to say, but they were largely done with the strategy meeting now. “Once I am back, we will think about how we go on about the south.”

“Alright,” Scarlett nodded, with all the moving parts they had little influence over, making plans that extended beyond that would have been fairly useless. “When are you leaving?”

“On Monday,” John answered after putting in order what he wanted to do before going. There doubtlessly was a bunch of paperwork stacked up, since neither him, Rave nor Beatrice was working on it. Much of the apparatus worked without his necessary input at this point, but he still had to sign some things before they had any official power.