“Housepets and houseplants, this is your commander speaking,” you announce into the speakerphone. “We’ll be docking at Tower 3 in five minutes. Please make sure you collect all your belongings and try your best to not hog the bathrooms at mother base for too long. We hope you had a pleasant flight, and thank you for choosing Anon Airlines.”

The airship passes into the ever-present storm cloud hanging above Storm Island, more of that delicious rain falling across the deck as you plunge further into it’s depths, the reddish tint of the sunset light at your backs fading quickly as you do. Grubber continued his flight with your Storm Lens in hand, aiming the vessel straight towards the aforementioned Tower 3.

It should be visible any moment now.

“Man, I’m so happy your guys haven’t stolen my food,” said Grubber.

“Please,” you scoff, “My boys are professionals.”

“Well the last time I was out with Tempest, they took my whole box of muffins!”

“Yeah, ‘cause you were out with Tempest. What did ya think her animals were gonna do? That’s like leaving your door unlocked and being surprised someone broke in!”

Grubber humphs in response. Rolling your eyes, you continue to nibble on one of your fajitas.

And then the cloud cover clears.

Deep within the dark bowels of the eternal storm cloud billowing from the Storm Island caldera was the Storm King’s base. A network of towers, shooting up out of the deep lake of the caldera, made up the vast majority of the complex. Each of the towers were spiky, angular, and made of black metal, as if Sauron’s designer had a hand in making them, and were connected to each other with long, fully enclosed bridges of various widths and lengths like a chaotic spiderweb of dark metal hubs and spokes. Most towers were uniform in size and shape, the most notable exceptions being for the ones in the middle and the ones on the outside. And aside from the various lights coming from the darkened, almost polarized windows dotting the towers, the only light source in the entire area was the frequent flashes of lightning, reflecting off of the water’s surface and bathing the structures in harsh strobes of bright light.

In the core of the tower complex was the Storm King’s tower, the tallest of them all. A huge blue magic crystal was clasped in the middle of it’s spiked crown, spewing stormclouds and sparks of electricity straight up into the air like a volcanic ash cloud. Surrounding that central tower was a hexagon of six smaller towers, each topped with a smaller crystal that continuously arced magical lightning up into the main crystal. Those buttressing towers were the sole connections to the main tower, and were where all of the other wings of the complex had naturally grown from.

And you also happened to know that they created this big exclusion bubble that muffled the thunder and kept the clouds from blocking the view of the place. Though they didn’t do shit for the rain. Not that you’d want them to.

Your destination, however, was the thick and wide docking towers. In this case, Tower 3. These towers were a bit over three times the thickness of the normal towers, and had huge docking bay doors all along their sides that swung wide open for the ships. The docking bays were fully enclosed, and kept all of the King’s warships well protected against the forces of nature when they weren’t in use. They were also one of the few towers to have really big, extra wide cargo bridges leading off to the similarly thick storage towers, supported with cables and hung really close to the water level down below. The caldera had been filled to capacity from the constant rainfall a long time ago, with some waterfalls visible from the outside if you looked really close, so there wasn’t any real risk of those low bridges getting flooded. It just looked cool and felt dangerous to be close to them.

Grubber passes you back your Storm Lens, and loads up the flare gun while you stow the lens away. He fires off a bright green flare towards the still distant tower, waiting for it’s response. A green flare fires off from the tower in response, and the red warning lights of Bay 12’s doors, all the way at the top of the tower, start blinking. Grubber steers the ship towards the receiving doors, which begin to swing open as he approaches, revealing the brightly lit interior full of storm beast troops and technicians waiting to receive you.

It’s not long before the ship touches down into it’s cradle, the docking clamps engage, and the huge door closes behind you with a resounding CLUNK. The bay’s docking bridges come out, looking just like the ones you’d see on an airliner, meeting the port and starboard gangplanks halfway before swallowing them whole, clamping down onto the deck and completing the docking procedure.

Grubber powers down the airship and retrieves the key for it while a good chunk of your boys tear off down the bridges, clutching their asses as they ran while desperately racing to find a bathroom in time. The less gastrointestinally compromised members of your team saunter off down the bridges, chattering and laughing to one another. Like any good captain, you wait for all to disembark before you disembark yourself, Grubber tagging along for the ride with two bags of food in tow to your one.

“I still can’t believe she actually pulled it off!” Grubber remarks.

“Oh I believe it,” you grin. “Never doubted her for a second.”

“Really? How come?”

“Because the heroes always pull through in the end. I know how this game is played.”

“Heroes? Really?”

“Yeah, that’s what I said.”

“Boss, they’re pirates.”

“And?”

“They’re pirates.”

“Still not hearing the problem.”

“They steal things for a living!”

“Yeah, but like, only from people who deserve it.”

“That’s still stealing!”

“From the system, maaaaan!”

“What kind of sense does that make?”

“You’re arguing with the logic of pirates, my dude.”

“Well, pirates are stupid.”

“That’s why they’re so easy to catch!”

Grubber raises a finger to object, but pulls it back.

“Huh. Good point.”

The pair of you cross a few connecting bridges until you arrive at the Commander’s Tower. You wave to the pair of guards blocking the entrance, who let you in with plenty of enthusiasm. Always loved those doormen. The two of you dip into the elevator, punching in the floor numbers for your respective quarters.

“Just remember,” you remind Grubber, “We’ve still gotta be debriefed by the Storm King before we can take a load off.”

“H-hahah, er...” Grubber fidgets around in place. “C-can I not and say that I did?”

“You’re not still afraid of the big bad King, are you?”

“Afraid? No! I, uh...”

He nervously looks around for a few seconds before swallowing dry.

“Okay, maybe a little.”

You quirk an eyebrow.

“Okay, maybe a lot.”

“What the hell for?”

“What do you mean, ‘what for’? Have you seen him?”

“Lots of times.”

“Then you already know!”

“No, can’t say I do.”

Nah, you did know why he was a scary mofo to everyone else. Tall and imposing to them, clearly unhinged, hates being questioned, waves around an unpowered magic staff, the whole shiteree. It’s just that he’s never been scary for you.

“Besides,” he whines, “Tempest is probably gonna be there, too! How am I supposed to deal with both of them, boss?”

“With your chin held up high and a pair of balls anchoring you down, little man. C’mon, you’ll never make commander with that kinda attitude!”

“Good, I don’t wanna. I’m just fine being the sidekick, thank you very much!”

“Oh, well in that case,” you chuckle, leaning against the elevator wall, “I might be amenable to pulling an excuse out of my pocketbook.”

“Yes!” he cheers, fist-pumping.

“But my excuses have a price.”

And just like that, his joy flip-turns upside down into nervousness. And when he sees you eyeing up his bags of food, it turns to conflict. The little guy was like a walking black hole, vacuuming up food constantly with no capacity for being full. Parting with food was a very difficult decision for him, and in any other situation, he’d have refused you on the spot. But he’s also shit scared of Tempest and the Storm King, so...

Grubber is wracked with an internal debate, pacing and fidgeting as he decides between facing his fears and parting with his nutrients. But, eventually, one side wins out. Shoulders slumping, he hands you one of his bags.

“I’ll tell ‘em that Celie gave you a concussion,” you smirk, taking the offered bag. “And that you need plenty of bed rest.”

“Yeah,” he mumbles, voice laden with sadness. He’d won, but at what cost?

The elevator dings at long last, and Grubber steps off onto his floor, deflated and exhausted. Poor lil’ goober. But alas, dark dealings such as these are just part and parcel of the job he’s got, and it’s not the first time you’ve cut a deal like this with him.

Such is the life of the dark side.

At the very top of the tower, the elevator opens up to your sick, two-storey penthouse apartment, pimped out from top to bottom with obscenely high-end, expensive, and luxurious furnishings and amenities. All stolen, of course. Not like those Abyssinian fucks were gonna need it anymore, let alone deserve it.

But of course, standing by as always was your ever-fashionable butler, dolled up in the finest suit that would fit a big storm beast like him. He even had a bottle of champagne all ready to go in an ice bucket, held on top of a serving platter with some glasses at the ready beside it.

“Top o’ the evening to ‘ya, Cid!” you say to the big guy, dropping your newly acquired bag of food off on a small table as you went. “Everything good on the homefront?”

Cid nods and gives a very refined grunt as an affirmative. The downside of not understanding what the everloving fuck they’re saying is that you have no idea what their actual names are. Or even if they had names. So you just named them off the top of your head, and they kinda just ran with it. Besides, you’ve never seen the King address them by name before, so you figured your highest performers deserved a little individuality. They sure seemed to like it!

You approach Cid for the traditional early evening champagne, the hulking beast working his free hand with grace and precision to POP the bottle open, pouring its foaming contents out into a glass for you. You happily take the glass, the slip of paper wrapped around it’s stem not escaping your notice.

Well, you’d have been shocked if there weren’t any updates.

“Now, I trust the training’s been going well since me and the boys have been out?”

Of course it hasn’t been, and Cid affirms as such. But you both knew this was just small talk to cover up that you were reading what’s on the tiny slip around the glass.

“That bad, huh? Well, now that I’m back in black, I’ll be making up for lost time, big time. Count on that.”

Returning the now empty glass to Cid’s tray, you fish out your notepad from the depths of your armour, simply titled “Testament of the Great Commandy One”.

A menacing aura radiates from the depths of your plated suit, following the second item you were foolishly liberating from it’s prison deep within. Its dull yellow surface, light dully reflecting from each of it’s longitudinal hexagonal faces, radiates with the pure, unfiltered madness and anguish of it’s mere existence, the tormented screams of the damned audible if one were to listen closely enough. The tips of the long instrument of torment were each custom-tooled for both aspects of its inhumane purpose of being. The first, sharpened to a needle’s point, the long-dead cellulose of its formerly living constituent body giving way to and ultimately ending in the soft, coal-like substance cored within, the foul material better suited to the hellscape of a blast furnace than as part of the Hadean tool. The other end holds the only component that has any semblance of being natural: a crown of natural rubber, mounted like the gemstone of a sceptre to the top and mated to the horrific body of the instrument by the cruel barbs of the shiny, reflective metal ring clamped into place, the sleek exterior of the binding masking the torment it inflicted underneath in order to maintain the abominable connection. And just below the ring, as if the horror of the instrument’s mere existence were not complete, sat the blackened scar of the brand pressed into one of the faces of the implement’s yellow body, the two characters seared into the unliving flesh displaying it’s cold, calculated identifier from now until it’s final, tormented days.

2.

“Man alive, I’ve got a lot to take care of,” you hum, reading down your little checklist of things to do. Changes and additions are made with cruel efficiency, as each character of the list is scarred into the unsuspecting paper’s surface by stroke after merciless stroke of the foulest of daemonic graphite. “Forget just training, the fucking supply chain’s probably gonna need a good fuck-start or twelve.”

The life of a bad motherfucker was never as easy as it might sound. The woes of training, feeding, and equipping an army don’t just vanish overnight because you play for the League of Super Evil, despite what the Chinese cartoons might imply to the contrary. Before long, your list has extended to about three pages.

You were gonna need some serious help from your star duo.

Cid, ever the gentleman, had another champagne glass ready to go for you. Thanking the big guy, you stow away your dread instrument of inscription and your handy Testament before taking the glass and downing it in only a few gulps. No time to enjoy it, unfortunately. Not when there’s work to do.

Cid takes the glass back, quietly collecting the second slip of paper you’d surreptitiously wrapped around it’s stem.

“Thanks for the pick-me-up, pal-i-o. But I’ve still got to go in for the debrief before I can take a load off proper. Make sure everything’s set up and ready to go for me when I get back, aight?”

Cid grunts his affirmation.

“Awesome, I’ll see you in two shakes.”

With a parting wave, you step back onto the elevator and begin your trek to the central tower complex. Even with your plate as full as it was, there was no need to rush things, and you took every opportunity you could to drink in the sights and sounds of each skybridge you crossed. There was nothing quite like the beating of rain on the modestly thick metal plating that covered the bridges. Never compared to feeling it on your face, but it was a damn good sound all the same.

The two elite guards guarding the final bridge to the central tower gave you big, happy hellos upon seeing you back, which you return with a big wink and a pair of finger-guns as you pass on by, much to their delight. One more flight of stairs later, and you finally arrive at your destination.

Or, more accurately, you introduce it’s double-doors to your mighty foot, crashing into the strategy room with precisely √−1 fucks given.

The Storm King jumps like a little girl at the entrance, though just barely manages to avoid screaming like one as well. But he wasn’t the main attraction of your dynamic entry: that honour went to Tempest. She looked to be halfway across the room on the way to the door you booted down, and only a brief flash of surprise is visible in her eyes before she settles on a small frown and an annoyed little snort.

It might’ve been intimidating if her ears hadn’t flopped as she did it.

God, she’s such a cutie.

And then you ignore her for the moment, walking right on past her like you owned the place and towards the still recovering Storm King, arms flung wide open in the traditional ‘well, what is it’ configuration.

“♫ Three to the one from the one to the three, ♫” you bellow, “♫ I beat a bird bitch back out with lil’ G-- ♫”

“Commander Anonymous!” the Storm King hollers back, remembering how to use his words again. “How many times do I have to tell you to knock on the damned door?!”

“How many times do I have to tell you to never interrupt my goddamn musicals?”

“Weapons of mass destruction should not be used in my strategy room!”

“And those same weapons of mass destruction should not be tasked with fighting off fucking pirates, old man.”

“And just what is that supposed to mean, Commander?”

“It means that we’re at least two weeks behind fucking schedule thanks to my entire week being pissed away on Jolly Roger whack-a-mole! An absence that, may I remind you, was completely preventable!”

“Completely preventable?! Absolutely not! Do you have any idea how hard it was to source plushies of that quality?!”

“Well you know what’s not hard to source? My fucking underlings! They could’ve handled this job with both hands tied behind their balls!”

“As if I would leave the defence of my valuable merchandising operation to the rank-and-file!”

“Well you sure left the fucking invasion training to the rank-and-file, now didn’t you?!”

Neither one of you noticed Tempest grinding her teeth and snorting in rapidly building anger as the two of you grab each other by the collars of your respective get-up, getting right into each other’s faces as the two of you get to the expected part of all of your meetings together.
“--Listen up you piece-a-shit faggot muthafucka--”
“--I’ve just about had enough of your insubordinate--”
“--No, it’s not true! Piece-a-shit! And if I had to guess--”
“--antics! From the very start of your time--”
“--it was probably YOU that fuckin’ flagged him! Muthafuckin’ lyin’--”
“--with me here, you’ve done nothing but second guess--”
“--cocksuckin’ faggot! Muthafucka! You wanna holla over me--”
“--my perfectly reasonable orders! The task I gave you--”
“--every fuckin’ second? I can just scream over you too--”
“--was every bit as important as the invasion effort--”
“--you piece-a-shit muthafucka! Keep fuckin’ running your mouth--”
“--and I will NOT have you saying anything to the contrary--”
“--I’ll just keep hollahin’ you muthafuckin’ piece-a-shit! Eat a fuckin’ cock--”
“--much less implying it! Do you understand me? I am the one--”
“--go kill yourself, you fuckin’ piece-a-muthafuckin-shit! I fuckin’ God damn--”
“--in charge here, and you WILL fall in line, or so help me I’m going to--!”
“--Aaaah, we can just holla over each other all fuckin’ day! Waaaaaraaayaaaaagh--!”

KA-CRACK

“ENOUGH!”

Tempest really put her all into that explosive outburst, broken-horned light show and all, causing both you and the King to stop hollering in each other’s faces and instead look over at her in confusion.

“The fuck was that about, Tempie?” you ask, voicing your confusion.

“Yes, what’s the meaning of this?” he adds, voicing his own confusion.

“I’m not going to stand here and listen to you two scream at each other like this,” she snarls, horn fizzling. “Not again!”

“Uh, Tempie?” you retort, raised finger and all, “We haven’t even started screaming at each other yet.”

“Yes,” the King agrees, “This was just the warm-up. Honestly, I was expecting at least another hour worth of screaming!”

“Really?” you chime in, “I was expecting two.”

“Two maximum.”

“Eh,” you shrug, “Fair enough.”

“Anyways,” Tempest growls, trotting her way back towards the strategy room table, “I believe you said you wanted us both here for something, your majesty?”

“Ohh, yes yes yes!” the King cheered, flipping right into being as giddy as a schoolgirl, complete with a few claps of his hands. “Thank you so much for reminding me! Come, gather round, gather round!”

Oh boy, he’s got something else planned, does he? Well, might as well rip that band-aid off now. You take up your own position at the table while the King gallivants off towards his side. Y’know, the side with the controls.

“Yes, anyways, I’m certain you did a great job with those raiders, and I’ll hear your report on it in just a moment, my good Commander. But for the moment, you’ll both need to set aside your plans for the immediate future.”

You already hate the sound of that, but you don’t voice your distaste. The King flips some levers and pushes some buttons, causing the middle of the table to fold out, allowing the cool magic hologram projector thing it was hiding to pop out and begin warming up.

“Concerning the upcoming invasion of Equestria, it’s no secret that we don’t have an answer for those pesky little pony princesses of theirs. It’s not as if we can just ask them nicely to arrange themselves in a circle for my staff to do it’s work, after all! And while both of you are talented beyond measure, it would still be two against four. Thus, I’ve been busy doing a bit of digging. And I’ve found just the thing to shift the tide in our favour.”

The hologram fires up and projects a translucent green orb, with a chaotic, always-changing spiky black mass in the middle, almost like a ferrofluid. The projection shrunk down into something you could carry in the palm of your hand, and a whole bunch more divided out from it like cells, spreading out to and orbiting around the outskirts of the table.

“These, my good Commanders, are the Obsidian Spheres! And they...” he begins to say before reconsidering. “Actually, you know what, I’m just going to demonstrate for you!”

He snaps his fingers, and a side door opens up to reveal a pair of elite guard storm beasts with a chained and muzzled pony captive in tow. They lead the shivering mare into the room like a dog, all but throwing her up on top of the table.

The king then reaches into his own outfit, pulling free a very real version of that green glowing Obsidian Sphere thing that looked even cooler in person. And after a few experimental juggles, he launches the sphere right at the pony. It breaks into a cloud of green haze, and the pony begins to be encased in solid rock, screaming and squirming as much as she could before she was straight-up turned into a statue.

Consider yourself thoroughly interested.

“Duuuuuude,” you gape, “You got fucking cockatrice grenades? That’s sick!”

Tempest gives no commentary, but looks on with well-hidden interest.

“I had only one sphere, my good Commander,” the King clarifies. “And it was procured by the very pony that served as a demonstration. They are produced by the great basilisks that live deep within Black Skull Island.”

“Wait, isn’t that one of those places with the whole ‘many go, none return’ reputation?”

“Yes, it is. But as it so happens, there’s a very exclusive black market hidden deep inside of the island. I tried the nice approach at first, reaching out to see about purchasing some of the Spheres. But they wouldn’t deal with me! Me! Something about ‘drawing too much heat’, or some such nonsense!”

Translation: the King made them a shitty offer and threatened to out them to the world if they didn’t comply. And they told him to go suck a bag of dicks. Which means...

“So we’re going to take the not-so-nice approach,” he glowers, the mirth gone from his tone. “Those Spheres will be mine. And they will surrender them to me, one way or another.”

Yep, there it is. Guy really doesn’t know how to take ‘no’ for an answer, but shit, not like you really care much either way. Cockatrice grenades! Hell yes, you want to get your hands on some cockatrice grenades! How have you been steamrolling punks without those so far?

Oh, wait. Sheer fucking talent, that’s how.

Still, any edge against those princess ponies is going to be much appreciated. From what you’ve been told, they’re all three pony races rolled into one adorable package, and have the magical power level equivalent of your average Super Saiyan. Even with Tempest to tag-team them, you’d still have a tough time dealing with their, uh, you don’t know, friendship spirit bombs? Care Bear stares? Or whatever gay shit pony princesses do that isn’t crushing their enemies. Imagine having all that power and not crushing your enemies with it!

It’s like they want to get the Princess Peach treatment!

“And that is where you two will come in. Five days from now, you will both be storming Black Skull Island. You will be taking the largest, most talented invasion forces you can bring. You will secure their stockpiles of Obsidian Spheres. And failure will not be an option.”

Your breath hitches. Tempest’s breath hitches too, but for a very different reason.

“Wait,” Tempest blurts, “You can’t mean that I’ll--!”

“No way, a co-op campaign?!” you all but squeal.

“That’s right,” the King says, “You will be working together on this.”

"YES!" you cry out in delight, jumping for joy.

“Absolutely not,” Tempest hisses, “I am not working with... him!”

“Oh abso-fuckin’-lutely yes!” you cheer, throwing your hands in the air like you just don’t care, “I am so working with her!”

“No, you are not!”

“Oh, are too!”

“You will not!”

“Oh, get down with the sickness, baby!” you cry out, feeling a song coming on. “♫ It takes two to make a thing go right--! ♫”

SLAM

That’s the second time the Storm King’s interrupted your musical number today. You will remember this.

“You are not getting a choice in the matter, my dear Tempest,” he growls to her with a surprising degree of menace. “Unless, of course, you’ve decided to abandon your chance at regaining what you’ve lost.”

Ah well shit, that was a real low blow. Kinda puts a pall on your shitting and giggling, now doesn’t it?

Tempest retains her stoic glare, but any idiot could see the brief flash of pain in her eyes when he brought that up.

“It won’t be a problem,” she says after a brief moment of silence. “The Spheres will be ours.”

“Yes,” he all but snarls, “Yes, they will be.”

“Yeah yeah, that’s all well and good,” you cut in, “Can we hurry this along? I’ve got a triple-fluffed king-sized cloud bed at my place that hasn’t been used for nearly a week!”

Looks like your tactical defusing of the situation worked, since all focus is now back on you.

“Yes, well, fair enough,” the King agrees, glancing back at her. “I only needed Tempest here for this news anyways. You may go now, commander.”

Tempest doesn’t waste any time, trotting out of the strategy room without skipping a beat and allowing you to finally give him the run-down of what happened.

Honestly, the debriefing goes on autopilot for you, the lion’s share of your thoughts preoccupied with the upcoming joint operation. And, of course, how your plans and preparations were going to need to be structured around this event. So much to do in the month or so leading up to the big assault on Equestria. So little time to do it in. But, like life, you’ll find a way.

And as we all know, Evil always finds a way.

Miraculously, you leave the strategy room without getting into the screaming war you were expecting to wage with the King. Almost disappointing, honestly. But hell, at least that was the hard part out of the way. Now all you wanted to do was hit up your penthouse for some well-earned R&R, and burn daylight lifting weights and reading books until your bedtime came around.

But first things first.

Your path takes you in the opposite direction from your tower and over towards a much taller and thinner one, ringed with glass viewing balconies and taking more than it’s fair share of lightning strikes on it’s sharp, spear-like tip. The bridge guards for this one barely acknowledge you as you pass them by and step on board the elevator, riding it to the very top. You plop yourself down on one of the many benches and spend some time gazing off into the far distance, taking in the sound of the rain pounding against the glass and the muffled thunderclaps of the lightning strikes above.

And there you wait for all of six minutes, until a pair of guards on patrol come by. It was pretty normal for them to patrol around the towers, though almost nobody wanted to do the newer, far out of the way towers like this one. Good thing for you that these two weren’t normal guards, then.

“Biggs, Wedge,” you greet, not even looking their way yet. “Miss me?”

A few strangled sniffles escape from one of the guards before he starts bawling. Looking over, you see the dynamic duo in all their uniquely named glory. Wedge, his pair of geeky glasses pulled aside as he weeps into his hands. Biggs, his cool-dude sunglasses still on, pats Wedge’s shoulder and consoles him.

“Yeah, I know,” you groan, “Trust me, no way in hell I could’ve planned for that wrench in the works. And it’s about to get even worse, kiddies.”

Wedge’s crying seizes up with a whimper, while Biggs facepalms with an annoyed groan.

“Five days from now, the boss-man wants me on a joint op with Tempest, out at Black Skull Island.” You adjust your position a bit. “Now, joint ops with best girl, we love. Unscheduled ops, not so fucking much. So we’re still playing it by ear here.”

Wedge perks up at the mention of Black Skull Island, and starts digging around in his armour for his own notepad. Biggs watches with interest as he flicks through it’s pages, eventually arriving at one page that he then shows to you.

Your eyes shoot wide open only halfway down the page, a big smile crossing your face.

“No shit, big guy?”

Wedge nods furiously with many accompanying grunts, while Biggs grunt-chuckles his approval, clapping his hand onto his cohort’s shoulder.

“Well, then. Looks like things are finally gonna go my way this time around!” you laugh, standing up and extending your hands to them both. “Gimmie ten!”

Both of them high-five and low-five your extended hands with some laughs of their own, quietly hiding away the slips of paper you’d slipped to them in the exchange. You dust off your hands and plant them on your hips, sneaking the paper slips you’d received into your high-quality seal leather belt.

“Alright, you guys better make like atoms and split before your overseer catches you. Plenty of time to play catch-up during training tomorrow!”

Biggs throws his hands in the air and cheers at the mere mention of more training. Wedge, on the other hand, not so much.

“Listen big guy,” you say to Wedge, “If it were up to me, you’d be an information officer or something, instead of just a grunt. But I don’t make the rules on that shit. Not even Cid gets out of grunt work, and believe me, he’s tried. You don’t want to get behind on your beating quota again, do you?”

Wedge shakes his head, torn between having to do physical exercise and having to deal with being dressed down by the Storm King again. Biggs, meanwhile, tried his best to cover up his jealousy at the mere mention of your boy Cid, but you knew him better than that.

“Then you’d better give tomorrow’s CQC training 110 percent, my dude. Right?”

Sighing, Wedge finally grunts his agreement.

“That’s more like it. Besides, I think everyone else is hurting for some goddamn instruction from yours truly, isn’t that right?”

Biggs’s hurrah of agreement is cut short by the sound of the elevator dinging. The pair of them scramble to take off their glasses and appear like normal, indistinguishable storm beasts again, an act they’re very accustomed to doing by now.

You, of course, slip into your own act just as easily.

“Good,” you say with no inflection, “It’s about time that work started to get done around here. As you were, gentlemen.”

They salute with monotone grunts, and you push through them on your way to the elevator, passing by their overseer. Of course, being a brown-nosing little shitstain, the overseer’s excuse to holler at your boys is cut real short by your mere presence. Though the glare you shot him probably helped a lot, too. It sure was on the right track to loosen his bladder control, if nothing else.

And with the last of today’s big, important tasks out of the way, you head on back to your tower. No detours or scenic routes this time, either. Just a straight shot to your penthouse apartment, where you immediately jumped into your massive bathroom to strip down to your skivvies and have a well-earned hot shower. Cid, knowing you so well by this point, had a tall beer poured and ready by the time you emerged in your silken bathrobe.

With nothing to do but wait until bedtime, you kick back and relax on the couch, sip on your drink, munch on your leftover Mexican food, and flick through your latest edition of Playcolt, all while idly lifting some 50lb dumbbells.