176 Striking A Deal

The walk through Toybox was an interesting one. The building seems to spit in the face of conventional physics at every opportunity it gets.

I walked through several corridors that were definitely hundreds of metres long in just a couple of steps, which only makes sense if you decide to build a corridor that molests space-time like some kind of catholic priest would a choir boy.

There were also a lot of turrets and lasers, and I'm honestly not sure if they were showing me them on purpose or if they were just there anyway, either way, I'm not exactly feeling intimidated. Especially when I have my source of infinite food walking by my side.

We're both basically impossible to kill and with some food in my gullet my regeneration becomes basically instantaneous. Not that I'm here to fight, even if the nerds seem to refuse to accept that.

However, I have never really been one for tech stuff, so I'm probably not the right person to appreciate the surroundings. As far as I'm concerned, it's all just a bunch of metal.

Machines don't have emotions, they can't  feel anything, so what's even the point?

Either way, it only takes a short walk before we are led to a meeting room of sorts, whereupon the seven of them sit on one side of the table while I sit at the other, Cerberus by my side just the same as their eighth member, who becomes visible once more as the ceiling folds away, revealing his towering robotic form.

Scaryyy.~

Yet, despite sitting down, no one moves to speak.

I'm quite content to wait, let them gather their nerves and speak when they're ready, while they seem to be under some mistaken conclusion that I am going to just start making demands or something.

Eventually however, one of them cracks and, amusingly enough, it's Stacy who starts things of, or I suppose I should be calling her Keeper. Wouldn't want to give  that game away so soon.

"So, uhm, Miss Tear-" She starts, only for me to interject, cutting her off.

"-Please, just call me Lusia," I say with a smile.

"Uhm, right, ok then Miss Lusia. Uhm, w-what uh, what can we do for you?"

My oh my,~ she sounds so unsure.~ It's kind of cute, not as cute as Clara mind you, but still cute.

"As I said, I'm here for business.~ No need to be so skittish, I'm just another customer, nothing you haven't dealt with before.~" I answer, trying to reassure them and only mostly failing, which is technically an improvement.

"In that case, what is it you want to commission? I assume you know what's available?" A small man says, and I recognise him to be Big Rig purely because he's the only dude I've ever met who stands at five-three.

Offering them a shrug, I decide fuck it, if they're gonna be scared of me anyway, I might as well play with them a little.

"Fire manipulation, special effects and guns," I say, pointing at Pyrotechnical, feeling thankful to Stacy's descriptions so I actually know who's who before moving my finger down the line to point at Glace, "cryogenics and stasis."

Moving further down the line, I point at Big Rig, "builder drones," I say before moving my finger up to the big robot and the man who goes by Toy Soldier inside, "bimg fumkin cosplay.~"

Heh, I nearly got a couple of laughs from that, though they soon stopped themselves, which is actually kind of stupid now that I think about it. I literally dress up as a clown on the regular, do you really think I'll get upset if you laugh?

Whatever. 

"Cybernetic augments," I say, moving to the opposite side of the row, since Pyro was in the middle. That guy's name is a bit on the nose since he literally calls himself Augment, but I guess it's good advertising, kinda like Vendor. Either way, I move my hand again to point at Stacy, "robot animals."

It's incredibly amusing to me the way she tenses up with my attention, because if any of her fellow Tinkers weren't already so tense they'd realise that she's tensing up from more than just fear of me. She's such a bad actor.

Moving on without actually giving anything away, I point to the last man present, Clockwork, "wind up toys,~" I say, because his power is also on the nose with his name, which isn't very creative.

Lastly, I point to the final Tinker, the one who I came here to see and the only one present who really interests me in any way, Cranial.

"And finally, neurology." I'm sure Riley would kill, literally, just to have the chance to brainstorm with this woman, so I guess I should figure something out to let that happen.

Consider it a birthday gift or something, I don't know.

"You're well informed," Cranial responds, inadvertently making Stacy cringe, which not only amuses me but also makes me realise that none of them are wearing masks.

I suppose they don't really have a need since they're not supposed to be showing themselves anyway, and this wasn't exactly an announced visit. Or maybe they thought I'd be insulted to be the only one without a mask?

Well, it's not like it matters.

"What can I say? A Clown can hardly entertain if we don't know our audience.~"

"So, if you know what we offer, then what do you want?" Pyrotechnical asks, sounding slightly abrasive but still with a lessened undercurrent of fear.

"Don't worry, it's nothing you can't give," I answer with a roll of my eyes before leaning forward, resting my forearms on the table and holding my splayed fingers together like a proper businesswoman, "I'm really only here for Cranial's services, but I'd also be interested in knowing if any of you could rig up some kind of mobile phone-esque object that my dear friend here could use? It's quite the hassle to get into contact with him otherwise.~"

I would have thought that having my attention would have made Cranial  more afraid, but rather than that, it is a different emotion that seems to grow within her.

Pride. 

Ah sweet pride, the downfall of many. 

Though, I suppose it's fair enough, since i am literally brushing off all of her fellows in favour of her own services.

"While I would be happy to provide, I'm not sure exactly what I could offer you? More combat skills? It would feel superfluous and I'm not sure if you're really lacking any skills, unless you want to take up accounting?" Cranial says, suddenly a lot more confident now that she thinks she's needed, which she kind of is, even if it's more of a quality of life thing.

"Nah, nothing like that," I say, waving her assumptions away like a foul smell, "that would be cheating. I learnt how to fight fair and square, and if I ever get into accounting then I'll do that fair and square too."

I'd actually probably make a pretty good accountant at this point if I'm being honest. Numberman has been giving me some pointers in how money works, helping me be a better challenge for our game. He's actually a pretty chill guy, funny too.

I wonder if he'd accept an invitation to my Clowns? It'd be one hell of a trump card to have on our side, but I think he'll be happier staying solo. Besides, I don't like the idea of having someone I could not control at all join.

My Clowns may not have any kind of real hierarchy, but it's no secret that I'm basically top dog, even more so since all the most powerful members defer to me.

...Actually, now that I think about it, maybe it'd be more fun to have some challenge there?

Nah, my Clowns exist to help me have fun elsewhere. I can find challenges whenever I want, cutting off my Clowns as an available resource would mostly hinder me.

Then again, I founded the Clowns once, I can always just do it again.

Whatever, thoughts for when I'm not in the middle of a meeting.

Clicking my fingers as I focus back on the world, I continue where I left off.

"No, instead of any of that, what I want is actually pretty simple.~ See, I've decided to do some travelling, and I want you to install some languages in my head to save me the trouble of learning them.~"

It is technically cheating, but I consider it more quality of life than anything else since it's only to facilitate communication, and I want to visit a lot of places, it'd take years to learn all the languages.

And why would I do that when there's a woman who makes her living by selling memories and skills, either the acquisition of them or their removal?

"I can certainly do that," Cranial responds, maybe a little too quick and I get the feeling someone is eager to please, "do you have a list of languages? I have a lot of them stored, but I might not have everything."

Does she perhaps get teased by her fellow Tinkers because she's the only one who can't make robots and machines and stuff, since her focus is on the brain specifically?

I sense insecurity!~ How fun!~ I love insecurity, it always makes people do stupid shit. Very fun to watch.

Combine it with social isolation and you've got a person ready to be convinced of literally anything.

"I do actually have a list!~ Gimme a sec," I say before rolling up my sleeve, exposing my Pastor tattoo, and digging into my arm with my other hand, spilling blood all over the table as I pull out a plastic baggie with a crumpled piece of paper inside of it.

"I didn't want to lose it ehe,~" I say with a dorky smile as the room looks at me with either horror or morbid curiosity.

Uncaring of the blood on the table, I open the bag and take out the note, while at the same time flexing my power a little bit so that all the spilled blood returns to my body.

No sense to be giving them free research material after all.

After doing so, I hold the list up and mime putting on a pair of glasses, as I don't actually have any glasses, before remembering I can pretend better with my power and forming a frame out of blood and delicately clearing my throat.

"I would like to know Spanish, Mandarin, Hindi, Arabic, Portuguese, even though it's basically Spanish anyway, Russian, Japanese, Vietnamese, Turkish, Korean, Greenlandic, Danish, German, Polish, Indonesian, Oshiwambo, Afrikaans, Romanian, Latin, Greek, Irish and finally just whatever you've got for the Bantu languages. Oh, and Klingon, because why not right?"

It's a lot of languages, but why the hell would I only ask for like three? Might as well just learn all the languages I'll ever need.

At least I already know French, not that I've ever really had a reason to use it, but still, that's one less for the list.

Everyone at the table is giving me funny looks.

"What?" I ask, and they all seem to blink back into focus in synchronisation, "so can you do that?"

Her previous confidence seems to have wilted somewhat at my request, which is annoying.

"Um, that's a lot of languages. I uh, am not sure if I'll have all of them saved, but I should let you know that installing so many languages at once could be pretty dangerous. It's a lot of information and it could cause an overload in your brain..."

She lets her words hang, but I just wave them off.

If I die from this then I'm sure my fellow Clowns will get a good laugh out of it, but I've literally had my head disintegrated by Eidolon that one time, so I think I'll be fine.

"Eh, don't worry about it.~ Instead, we should move onto the matter of payment," I say and immediately the tenseness returns and I speak up again before they can offer waive the payment, "just give me the market price."

"Ah, well, I usually charge two million dollars for a language..." Cranial says, gulping nervously.

I do some quick maths in my head and realise that that adds up to forty-eight million, and that's not even counting what I want made for Cerberus.

...I actually don't think I still have that much in my account. It's hard to keep track since I don't really have any steady income, my wealth just jumps incredibly high then plummets to nothing and jumps back up again.

But that's fine, because I have an idea about alternate payment.

"Cool, in that case, how about this. Since it's a bulk buy, I'll give you thirty million dollars," I say, completely unsure if I actually have that much money, "and in addition to this, I have an offer for you all to consider."

A smile grows on my face as a plan rapidly unfolds in my mind, only to immediately leave my lips. As a side-note, this is why I never bother to think of plans beforehand, because it's not like it's difficult to come up with good plans and, like right now, I can just come up with the plan when it's relevant instead of wasting my time thinking about it when I don't need to.

"How would you feel about Toybox becoming an affiliate of sorts under my Clowns?~" I ask, immediately getting a negative reaction out of them but I speak up again before they can reject me, "calm down, I'm not suggesting you work for me, I know why this little group was founded after all, for the express purpose of avoiding the situation you Tinkers so often find yourselves in, getting gang-pressed into groups when you want to ride solo, or at least be free to choose."

Pausing for a moment, both to breathe and to let them calm themselves, I speak again, my tone soft and enticing, like the whispers of the devil, except my deals are far more fair.

I'm not a greedy woman after all.

"You see, my Clowns is less of an enterprise and more like a group of sponsors, so you would still be free to do whatever you want, except we could provide funding or resources that you may be unable to acquire yourself.~ Not only that, but Fast Travel is working on creating a delivery service right now, so we could offer a way to deliver your finished products without any risks to yourselves.~"

My offer is a good one, I know this because it is completely in their favour. Now that I think about it, objectively speaking, most of the deals I make tend to favour the other party and are just  bad deals for me.

But that's only the case if I want money or whatever, but seeing as I only want to enjoy myself and spread some more opportunities for interesting individuals to shine, I am perfectly okay with making bad deals.

Not like I need the money. It's not difficult to make after all, I could be a billionaire with like a couple months worth of work. Even less if I really try.

"If you don't mind me asking, what exactly do you get out of this deal?" Glace asks, her tone frosty, but I think that's more just her default tone rather than indicative of her feelings.

"Not much," I say, before adding on more, mostly because people tend to be more sceptical of deals that ask for nothing in return, "maybe some discounts for Clowns, and maybe we'll ask you to do something once in a blue moon.~ For instance, one of us is a Tinker who also knows quite a bit about the human mind, I think they'd love to have a sit down to brainstorm with you, Cranial. Other than that, you don't even have to let on that we're sponsoring you.~ The other groups we're currently sponsoring certainly doesn't.~"

I'm referring to James' Red Hearts and Harlequin's whatever you want to call it. Point is, we Clowns are helping both of them expand, and that's without even considering Fast Travel, because I'm not sure if his business should count as an affiliate or just dealing with Clowns directly.

Oh, and there's also Last Laugh.

...I can't believe I forgot about my  own business. It's doing pretty well last time I checked. Uppercrust has provided plenty of people willing to work for basically free in exchange for the enhancement surgery Riley's perfected that uses my own blood.

She still hasn't figured out how to do a full transformation without keeping the whole cannibalism thing though, which sucks because it tends to just result in the subject starving to death after a couple months.

According to Riley, Rc cells don't naturally exist anywhere on the planet except for inside of me, and it's probably my passenger that's converting the flesh I consume into Rc cells for me, so anyone else would just starve, because they aren't connected to my passenger.

Personally, it feels like my power is being possessive, which I just find  adorable.

Ah well. I'll see about getting those Orchid guys involved at some point. They might be able to come up with a solution.

Thoughts for later, I have 'learning' to do.

=================

A/N: He~llo! Dear readers!

If you have the opportunity to learn any language instantly, you would just go all in and go for broke right? It's the only logical choice.

Also, I wonder how many of Lusia's holiday locations y'all will be able to predict based on the languages, cuz I realised I'd be giving the game away if she only learned the languages of the places she'd be visiting, so I added a bunch.

She's not going to be visiting any klingons, that was just for funsies, like Latin.

(5+)Advanced chapters with the links below!

pat/reon.com/user?u=41732867 (get rid of the first slash or check the description)

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