"You!" Triskadeka Hellion of the Maverick Army fixed the magical boy down the hall with an accusatory pointing finger. "Arcanus Crystallum!"
The young man in the crystal-themed pajamas looked back at Triskadeka blankly, coffee mug in hand. "... Yes?"
"Bold of you to show your face here in the Maverick Mansion! You may have defeated many of our soldiers, but you have never met me, Triskadeka Hellion! With my power over all things thirteen, I will—"
"Oh, hey Karl." Triskadeka's carefully prepared speech faltered as Crystallum casually turned to greet Karlotomus the Devourer coming down the hall.
"Hey Jacob," Karlotomus replied, a sizeable sandwich in hand. "How's it going?"
"Karlotomus, excellent!" Triskadeka called to the hulking warrior woman. They would have preferred to not share the glory, but they weren't so vain as to turn down any assistance they could get. "You can help me defeat this infiltrator, and help the Maverick Army conquer this planet once and for all!"
Crystallum gave the towering woman beside him a look. "Does this person know...?"
"Nah, they're a new recruit," she replied. "Don't worry, I got this." Her midsection opened a toothy maw as she casually tossed her entire sandwich in, then brushed the crumbs off her fingers as she stepped between Triskadeka and the magical boy. "It's fine, Trisky, Jacob here's through the place all the time."
"Wh— It's fine? How could this be fine?! He was in New Minion Orientation, biggest—"
"Biggest obstacle to our success, yeah, yeah, look. It's true that he's the one that thwarts our plans pretty consistently, but he's also the one helping make them happen as often if not more. He's changing sides all the time, seriously, I mean— What's it this time, Jacob?"
"Arcanus Pyrum needed some space," Crystallum replied. "She's been going through it since she got that positive pregnancy test, and I know my crystal tuning is hard to ignore. I think the cover story this time is that Metallo put a vein of hypnotic metal into my crystals?"
"Ah, good luck to her, I remember what having my kid was like. Does Metallomagus know?"
"Yeah, I caught them in the break room while I was grabbing some coffee. Speaking of, I was just about to settle in to get all that tuning done, do you...?"
"Nah, go on ahead. Bedroom should be how you left it."
"Awesome, thanks Karl."
Triskadeka stared, slack-jawed and speechless as Arcanus Crystallum, slides 5–8 of the orientation presentation, casually walked off. Karlotomus gave them a moment before clearing her throat. "So, starting to see how it works? Out there, we're enemies. We try to conquer the planet because Master Maverick says so, the Arcanus Admirabilis try to stop us. In here though, none of that matters."
"... And this is just... fine?" Triskadeka finally managed.
"Yeah! He actually helped me figure out how to keep my maw from slowly devouring me, in fact. Seriously, hit him up for board games or something while he's here, he's great. Might even help you figure out how to do some fun things with that whole thirteen gimmick of yours." Karlotomus pulled out her phone for a quick glance. "Listen, I gotta get to a meeting with Master Maverick, do the whole smile-and-nod song and dance for our next assault plan. You good?"
"... Yeah, I think so."
"Great." She gave the numerologist a friendly pat on the shoulder on her way by, and left Triskadeka Hellion, Thaumaturge of Thirteen and Izdress of Impressiville, struggling to figure out if "Friend of Arcanus Crystallum" also fit in their list of titles.
