“...I don't believe I heard you clearly, sir. You're going to what?”
“You heard me perfectly well, Tamany. You just have trouble getting your head around it. I said I've decided to terminate the minions.”
***
For SC, the nineteen-year-old pink fox that ran the Game Over crime syndicate, the day had started much like any other day. After waking up in his quarters in the late morning after another late night of cruising the Internet and reading stories, he headed down a floor or two to the washing chamber, where his servant girl, Panchico, would give him a scrubbing so through he was surprised he still had a fur coat in order to help wake him up and prepare him for the day.
However, something seemed a little different this time. Many others occupied Mt. Majesty, artificial creatures, organic robots in the shape of common Marioverse occupants, created by a computer program that SC had written. SC often saw them wandering the halls when they weren't really on duty. The only ones that ever seemed to do a ton of work were the Chargin' Chucks, who served as guards to important rooms, and X-Naut PhDs, who were really hired away from Grodus when their old general joined the Game Over.
Normally, walking down to the washing chamber, wearing a purple bathrobe over his pajamas and slippers on his feet, SC wasn't bothered by the minion characters that moved about the halls. But today, he felt... what was it called? Embarrassed? Violated? For some little reason that crept into his head during the night, he didn't like how any one of them could've just turned and seen him out of, for lack of a better term, uniform.
He kept quiet for the moment, pondering. He didn't even tell Panchico about it. After all, she was one of them.
***
“Whadda mean, yer terminatin' th' minions, bossman? Yer just plannin' on throwin' out almost all of yer forces now?”
“Yes, Calcutta Joe, yes I am.”
***
Due to the nature in which the minions were created, they truly were mere robots in terms of mind. As far as SC knew, none of them possessed any sort of soul. They never would've shown up on the SC's soul-detecting radar if they weren't also programmed to also locate Game Over operations.
After his bath, SC returned to his room for breakfast. As usual, the tray lay on his bed. Today was a Belgian Waffle topped with strawberries and whipped cream, one of SC's favorites next to pigs in a blanket. He sat down on the bed and put the tray on his lap; he was pleased to see that he had been left a knife, fork and napkin as he proceeded to eat.
The meal continued without incident. As SC finished off the last of the crumbs and removed the tray from his lap, a thought crossed his mind.
In order for my breakfast to get here, someone has to enter my room every morning. Panchico's washing me at the time, so I know it's not her. But if it's not her... Then just who comes in here every morning...?
He doubted that there was any danger, as he knew loyalty to the Game Over was hardwired into their minds. It was an unnerving thought, though.
***
“But why?! Ther's no talk o' treason, o' lootin', o' dissent. Why destroy yer loyal subjects?”
“Everyone, think. Present company excluded, what have any of them actually done?”
***
After eating his breakfast, he decided to tell the chef what he would be wanting for lunch later, figuring he'd just forget if he didn't do it now. Deciding he'd get some exercise on the way, he made his way down the many floors of Mt. Majesty.
As he moved down through the many hallways that made up the upper segment of the mountain, he was curiously attentive of the figures he passed, the multiple Koopas, Goombas, and various other species such as Dayzees that occupied the hallways. They paid him no notice. Why wouldn't they? He didn't address one of them. They just resumed talking amongst themselves, unaware he were even there.
Again, unnerving. He sped up his pace.
Eventually, one of the elevators down deposited him on the spiral walkway that moved around the hollowed-out bottom of the mountain. In the center of the chamber stood the Mushroom Bowl stadium, his destination. Many other minions were in this area, and like the ones in the hallway, they paid him no heed.
Eventually, he arrived at the stadium and proceeded through a pair of “Authorized Personnel Only” doors into the large kitchen. All the Koopa chefs, dressed in white toque and apron along with their black shells with Poison Mushrooms imprinted on it, were busy at their various stations in the large white kitchen. Standing out from them was one with a black uniform to match his shell, with thick black eyebrows and a little black mustache on his upper lip. He was giving out orders to the others.
SC rapped his knuckles against the back of a nearby upside-down cookie tray, producing a sound still audible over the sounds of the kitchen. “Keaton.”
The black-garbed Koopa turned and saw SC, then headed over. “Vhat es it, Monsieur Es-Zee?” he asked. In spite of the French word, his accent was heavily German. “I still have much vork to do! All theze people wanting ze food!”
“It won't take long, Keaton,” SC replied. “Just wanted to give you the heads up that I'm in the mood for a cheeseburger and fries for lunch later today.”
“Oooh, I'm zo zorry, monsieur,” Keaton replied with a hint of sadness in his voice, “but I'm afraid ve don't have ze ingredientz for my exzellent burger rezipee.”
“What?! I know we had some burger patties in the freezer last night before I went to bed!”
“The legionz of zoldierz have already eaten them all! Ve do not have anythink left ve can use for a proper burger. No buns, no pattiez, no lettace, no picklez, no cheeze, no nothink! Thiz, monsieur, iz ze disadvantage of living on land that only growz fruit!”
SC groaned. “Looks like I'm gonna have to go shopping again...”
***
“...Whatcha mean, bossman?”
“I mean, most of the computer-generated minions don't actually do anything. Among those employed by the Game Over that aren't actually natural beings, only the Chargin' Chucks serve any real purpose these days. The others don't do much of anything except use up resources, and I hate having to deal with Olga every other day. She creeps me out!”
***
Few people know that if you walk in a straight line far enough you will eventually come across a vast desert that covers the landscape all the way to the horizon, flat, barren, and generally discouraging of life aside from the occasional shrub and small animal. This desert is, known to even fewer, its own self-contained world, and as such has been christened as The World Where the Worlds Cross due to its strange property of being able to accessed from any other universe in spite of not needing the technology normally used for interdimensional transportation.
There is only one known settlement in this world, the city known as Oineplugmitt. The adobe brick buildings greatly resembled that of those in the Aladdin movie, and a large well stood in the center. There were many people where from many walks of universes; a handful of the species included human, cat, fox, dog, mouse, all of all varieties, seemingly acting as though it was perfectly natural for these creatures to interact. As such, the technology of the world was a chimeric combination of technology from all kinds of universes, and ranged from the most primitive of stone wheels to the most futuristic laser cutters.
However, none of that was the reason SC frequented this location. It was because of the Black Market.
The Black Market referred to the shadiest and most run-down neighborhood in all of Oineplugmitt, which consisted mostly of poor overcrowded boarding houses and primitive-looking shops. For some reason, it was always quite dark, as the sun overhead never seemed to get more than a few inches past the rooftops. Thankfully for all furries, the lack of direct sunlight in the neighborhood made for cooler outdoor temperatures. The only gate between it and the rest of the city was a dark alleyway that few outsiders had remembered the entrance to and most residents avoided, resulting in it being more or less isolated from the remainder of Oineplugmitt, both geologically and politically. It was almost its own little world beyond the threshold of the alleyway entrance, one where crime was a frequent occurrence and illegal activities were allowed to run rampart with little police control and its own dirty little government, a crime family known as the Black Scarabs.
As such, it was the only place in the whole of the macroverse where no one would mind a young criminal genius fox buying some cheese and hamburger patties. As expected, the prices were generally more expensive than normal markets, but the young fox felt he had no other alternative.
SC despised having to go to the Black Market for good reason; since he was an outsider, he never felt quite safe within its boundaries due to the influence of the Scarabs. Trying his best to blend in with the rest of the neighborhood, he always wore a large dirt-brown cloak with frayed edges, the color of the cloth emphasized with actual low-grade dirt and dust, that covered his entire body, as well as the small raggedy-looking backpack on his back. This not only served to protect his identity, but also from keeping him from standing out with his pink fur. It even managed to cover his tails.
SC tried his best to act inconspicuous as he traveled the dirty and sandy streets of Oineplugmitt. Sand. Another thing he hated about his shopping trips. The World Where the Worlds Cross just had to have so much sand. He hated it when sand got into his shoes and between his toes.
Eventually, though, he came to the mouth of the alleyway and, after looking back and forth to make sure an Aisha and a turtle nearby were looking the other way, slipped into the shadows.
Several steps later, he entered the large street that seemed to serve as the central hub of the Black Market. Several streets branched off to the side, all, while the normal size when one thinks of a road, were only half of the size of the central street. SC avoided looking to the side as he headed to his first destination; he had seen the poverty-stricken residents of the neighborhood, and he didn't want to brought to tears by the pathetic sight of the Kacheek family over to his left.
Eventually he turned onto a side street. This road was known for its shops in various trinkets and souvenir knick-knacks from around the macroverse. One in particular specialized in the selling of magical artifacts. This shop was run by a weasel named Jacque. He was fairly well-built, as most of the males in the Black Market were, and wore a dirty yellow vest on his orange-brown fur coat. He had a general ragged look about him, and his eyes were a dull blue; SC suspected they shined before he had ever come here.
“Well well well,” Jacque said mockingly as SC stepped into his shop. “If it isn't my best customer.”
“Spare me, Jacque,” SC replied as he walked up to the counter. “I've got other things to do, so let's just get this over with.”
“You got more Jiggies again?”
Few outside the Game Over knew that SC had a second job as a Jiggy Hunter, a specialized type of treasure hunter that locates large magical golden jigsaw pieces called Jiggies. While Jiggies were primarily located in the Banjo-Kazooie world, where they are regarded with great respect, some Jiggies had been found scattered about in other universes. Due to their usefulness as a great power source and their compact easy-to-carry size, they are often in high demand by anyone needing to run a large machine. SC collected them more for bragging rights than a power source, which is why it always hurt just a little that he had to sell off parts of his collection just to make ends meet.
“What's the exchange rate?” SC asked.
“Same as usual. I'll take one Jiggy off your hands, only to replace it with 450 Dino.” The Dino was the currently of Oineplugmitt; all the stands and shops that lined the streets accepted it.
SC reached over and tried to take off his backpack. Naturally he had trouble doing so with the cloak on.
“Maybe you should take the cloak off for a minute,” Jacque suggested.
“I'd rather live,” SC replied, finally pulling the pack loose. He opened it and pulled out four Jiggies, which he placed on the counter in front of the weasel.
Jacque took his sweet time examining them, making sure they weren't flawed in some aspect. SC was more annoyed than worried; only in rare circumstances did Jiggies ever falter in structure or magical power, and the weasel knew that all too well.
Eventually, Jacque was satisfied and agreed to buy the Jiggies in full. He placed several small bags full of gold coins on the counter and disappeared into the back room with the magical objects. SC took the time to look over the bags. The minuscule Cell Shades also decided to have a look, and made an interesting discovery.
When Jacque returned from the back room, he was surprised to find the gold was still on the counter. “Hey, how come you didn't take your payment?”
“You're short.”
“What're you talkin' about? I'm the perfect height for a weasel my age.”
SC was not amused at the cheap joke the first time he had come here, and he certainly didn't like it now. “Four Jiggies at 450 a Jiggy adds up to 1800 Dino. There's only 1700 here. You're short 100 Dino.”
Jacque was quiet and motionless for a moment, then he grumbled as he pulled out another bag and put it on the counter.
SC examined it with the Cell Shades. “Much better.” He started to place the bags, one at a time, into his backpack.
“How do you do that?”
“How do I do what?”
“How the hell could you have figured out I shortchanged you? You didn't even touch the bags!”
“Let's just say I'm a very... observant sort of person.” He was putting the last of the bags in as he said this line, and as soon as he was finished, he put it back on his back. “Later, Jacque.”
He turned and left the store, leaving a still confused weasel in his wake.
***
“Creepiness of the grocery lady aside, boss, are you planning on taking out all of the computer-generated minions? Including Calcutta, Tamany, and myself?”
“Of course not. I have full intentions of keeping everyone in this room, as well as any other Division Head or Commando. I'm also keeping Maggie, Keaton, and Panchico, along with Keaton's team of cooks and the security team, which includes the Chargin' Chuck guards. And of course, all Shy Guy and X-Naut forces that came with Lord Crump and General Guy will remain, as they are not CET products. Everyone else, though, they won't be as lucky.”
***
SC hated The World Where the Worlds Crossed. SC hated Oineplugmitt. SC hated the Black Market. SC hated the scheming cheater Jacque and his store.
But SC hated Olga more than the rest of them combined.
Many described Olga as an old cow, which she quite literally was. Her clothing remind SC of Morguss from Neopia. Her skin, however, was white instead of green, she was hunched over, and she carried a long black cane in her right hand with which she supported herself.
SC would've preferred to have spent his life avoiding her, more because she freaked him out than posed a threat to his well-being, but she was the only grocer in the Black Market.
Aside from being made of adobe, Olga's Grocery resembled a general store in terms of layout. A few stands of fruit stood outside the building; SC generally ignored these as the Game Over could produce fruit on its own. Inside was the counter, behind which one could usually find Olga as well as a door leading to the back room, and an old but still working cash register stood on it. There were a few aisles of various foods, covering the entire pyramid as SC knew it, as well as a large fridge room; while the Black Market was usually one or two levels below the rest of the city in terms of technology, Olga had more advanced technology due to her receiving many Dino a month; not everyone needed magical artifacts, but everyone needed to eat. Even though she monopolized the market, however, Olga was a firm believer in quality products; there were few complaints about them, even among those that didn't consider her a witch.
Olga, SC knew, was kinder than he had led himself to believe. But one look from her was enough for him to quake in his boots. Or sneakers. Whatever. He often wondered why, as the old cow held no resemblance to Kat, DC, Syzygy, Sapphira, or any one of the few others he had grown to fear in his lifetime. He had to remember to try and look into that when he got back to Mt. Majesty.
“Hello, young one.” Olga's voice had the vague hint of nails on a chalkboard. “Can I help you?”
“I know that you know me,” SC replied, trying his best to avoid making eye contact beneath his hood, as he approached the counter. “So I know you know what I want.”
“Your usual hamburger and hog dog packages, then?” SC had come to this store many times, and old Olga never forgot a face. Or rather, lack thereof; SC never lowered his hood within city limits.
“Yes,” he replied, wanting to be done and gone.
Olga quickly got to it. SC watched with amazement as she moved about the store at a fairly quick pace for one of her apparent age, taking various buns, meats, and vegetables from their places and putting them in a bag. SC knew that her grocery bags had a pocket dimension in them; he had become quite experienced with them between his pant pockets and Calcutta's hat.
When she was done, she placed the bag with all the items on the counter next to the register and rang it up. “That'll be 1650 Dino, dearie.”
SC grimaced at being called “dearie” by the old hag as he pulled off his backpack and place several of the bags he got from Jacque on the counter in front of Olga. He took a moment to scan them with the Cell Shades. “That should cover it exactly.”
Olga took the bags and counted the coins as she poured them into her register's drawer. After she finished, she nodded to show that he had paid sufficiently. “No change coming. Have a nice day.”
“Believe me, it's a little late for that,” he replied as he placed the grocery bag in his backpack. “Good day.” With that, he turned and left.
***
“But why keep us? I can understand Panchico given the... recent developments, but the rest of us are as disposable as any other Koopa made by the program.”
“No, you are not. Because you people actually do stuff. I'm doing this because I, accompanied by a handful of you all, are the only ones that are in the field on any operation or mission. The Game Over has changed; we are now closer to a interdimensional crime family than we are a macroversal military force. The army has proved helpful, as we did when 666, Tamany, Calcutta, Shard and I found ourselves in the Ham-Ham universe, and I am grateful for their loyalty and dedication. But in the interest of efficiency, I have little other choice.”
***
On his way out the Black Market, where he could call for Tamany to open a portal home without fear of being followed, SC was attacked.
He was almost at the alley separating the Black Market from the rest of the city when two big muscle guys blocked his path. One of them had the tattoo on his upper arm, bare due his sleeveless black shirt, that indicated he worked for the Black Scarabs. Probably a grunt, as he didn't appear to have much in terms of brains.
“Whatcha leavin' so early for?” the tattooed one asked. He sounded as dumb as he looked.
“Yeah, we don't see youse 'round here often,” the other accompanied. The difference in the voices was almost nonexistent.
SC decided to remain quiet. He slowly backed away from them, but stopped when he heard the crunch of desert dust behind him. The Cell Shades indicated that his back was vulnerable to three newcomers, probably Scarabs as well.
“We saw how you had those gold jigsaws on youse,” the first guy said, “and we thought, 'How come he's not sharin' the wealth? Sounds pretty unfair t' me.'”
“Even fresh meat has to respect the Black Scarabs!” the second one added.
As they started to close in, the Cell Shades searched for an escape route. Eventually, they found one in the form of an alley to SC's left. As they pounced for him, he ducked and dashed into the alley, causing them to crash into each other like cartoon characters. However, he knew they'd be back up in a matter of seconds, so he kept going.
SC followed the twisting turns of the alleyway, the five Scarabs on his heel, when suddenly the road ended. An adobe wall, surprisingly smooth, prevented SC's continued fleeing. When he turned around, he saw the mobsters closing in on him, slowly as if to savor the moment. One in the front had drawn what looked like a switchblade knife.
However, SC now had one prime advantage: they were all in front of him. Which meant he could use that one technique he hadn't had much of a chance to try out.
Not all that long ago, SC had left the Game Over in the hands of the Division Heads and sent himself to Dreamland, cutting almost all connection to the outside world, in an attempt to train and become stronger at combat so he would be a better boyfriend for his favorite girl, Mirror “Shard” Asha. On the trip over, the plothole portal transformed him into an orange Batamon. During this time, he had been taken in by Yo-Yo Master Coaltrain and taught the ancient art of using the yo-yo as a combat tool.
Many of the exercises were not just combat. One such exercise was where Master Coaltrain attempted to help SC developing a strong determination and focus without falling back on the Cell Shades. It consisted of using a move with the yo-yo that hypnotized him, and the test was to resist and try to break the control. The first several times were utter failures; SC was overconfident due to his apparent inability to fall into hypnosis, and succumbed rather quickly. Once he was under, Coaltrain put him into all sorts of silly and humiliating situations before waking him up. Twice he found himself stapled to the dojo ceiling, with a tag labeled “turducken” in Japanese katakana, in his own handwriting no less, stuck to his forehead (if there were two things that could be said about Coaltrain, they would be that he was a very strong and fierce opponent in battle, and that he had one weird sense of humor).
With time and training, SC managed to finally throw off Coaltrain's control with repeating success. Eventually the move would have barely any effect on him. Coaltrain, however, continued to set the exercise at seemingly random times to keep SC on his toes (and probably because the dojo toilets needed a good scrubbing every now and then). SC took advantage of his opportunity to teach himself the technique through mimicking what he remembered of it. It took quite some time then for SC to perfect it in private, because Coaltrain didn't want him learning it. The Master was certainly mad when he caught him practicing it on Referdee (a Waddle Dee that lived at the dojo and worked as a referee for official combat matches). Coaltrain was both impressed and upset at SC for learning the move, but he eventually let it slide (with a little nudge in the right direction). In spite of how effective it was in all sorts of situations, the Game Over leader had promised himself he would only use it in particular life-threatening situations.
And judging by that knife, I'd say this qualifies, he thought as he snapped back to the present.
Trying his best to ignore the incoming army of Black Scarabs, he had his right hand pull out his yo-yo. It was red and had a Poison Mushroom for a label; it was a form of the Game Over Wand he called the “GO-yo.” Being a magical object, he used it as a medium for his magical powers in a way that prevented it from taking a toll on his body's energy level. It also had a set of unique techniques and spells all its own.
“Aw look, a yo-yo,” one of the Scarabs mocked. “Little kid thinks 'e can beat us up with a toy! Haw!”
If you knew what I was gonna pull... well, you'd still be jeering me since you're too dumb to run on your own, SC thought to himself, but said nothing. He held the GO-yo in front of him, his hands below it and closed his eyes in concentration. Flexing his right index and thumb, the yo-yo spun straight up in the air and, at his will, froze in midair, the Poison Mushroom on the label staring into the crowd.
“Um... what's he doing?”
With minute, almost invisible, movements in his hands, SC coaxed the yo-yo in swinging back and forth, back and forth, like a pendulum pointing up. As it did, it exuded a mystical air as it began to broadcast his silent will over the crowd. After a while, the GO-yo started to spin around, randomly reversing direction and changing speed, making it even more captivating to watch.
Even with his eyes closed, SC could tell. They were looking at it. Looking at it, blissfully unaware they were slowly losing control of their own minds to the person they were trying to mug.
After several minutes, he could hear the mindless moans of the five gangsters. He took a peek and opened his right eye a crack. They looked even stupider than they did before, their blank eyes staring as the swinging yo-yo.
Satisfied they were deep enough, he closed his eye again and spoke, loud and clear. “Listen to my voice. Listen and obey. When this yo-yo stops swinging, you will wake up. You will all forget your attempt to mug me. For the next hour, you will not be able to see or hear me. When I stop swinging this yo-yo, you will wake up, leave this alley, and return to whatever you were doing before you met me. You will not see, hear, or remember me. Say 'yes, sir' if you understand and will obey.”
“Yes, sir,” a chorus of monotonous voices responded.
“Very good.” He recalled the GO-yo, and it swung back into his hand.
As soon as the yo-yo hit his hand, the Scarabs snapped out of it and looked around. SC opened his eyes and watched. Thankfully, none of them seemed to take notice of him.
“Yo man, what are w' doin' 'ere?” one of them asked.
“I dunno,” another answered, “but if w' don't get back t' our posts soon, th' boss is gonna be mad.”
The others silently agreed, and soon the alleyway was deserted sans a little pink fox in a dirty brown cloak.
“...That was easy enough,” he said to himself, and he too left, both the alley and the city.
***
“Sir, if I may. I've seen the plans for your latest warship, the planetoid-composed starship called 'Game Over Galaxy.' Certainly such a large and complex ship based off the Comet Observatory would require a large crew to maintain it...”
“So reassign them all to that, is that what you're proposing, Tamany? It has merit, but it won't work. Galaxy as a whole is still in the planning stages, I haven't even settled on exactly what changes need to be made to a copy of the CET to control such a ship, and only recently have I started construction on the shell of the Lumaluma Factory control center. I suppose maybe we can keep the construction crew until Lumaluma is built, as I intend to use Lumas to build everything else, but I'd have to wait for Galaxy to be finished before I can assign anybody to the crew. And you know I don't like to be kept waiting.”
***
“Yo Keaton.”
The head chef Koopa turned around just in time to catch the bag of groceries SC had tossed him.
“Have Maggie call me when lunch is ready,” SC concluded as he left the kitchen.
SC climbed all the way back up to his room. He was feeling really weary after all the walking, plus the yo-yo hypnosis had drained a lot of his power especially since he used it on so many people at once. “Why did I put my room on the top floor...?” he muttered as he climbed. He passed many minions as he went up, and they seemed to unnerve him even more. Where was that unpleasant feeling coming from...?
Panchico was in the room when SC entered, probably doing some tidying up. He ignored her and flopped on the bed.
“Master, are you OK?” the orange Birdo asked, concern in her voice.
“I'm fine, Panchico,” SC replied. “Just tired.”
“OK, Master, if you say so...”
SC noticed that Panchico had trailed off. He thought on how when she was first created, she would've just ended the sentence like one would any other. She would've believed him without question. But for the past several months, he wasn't sure when it started, Panchico seemed to grow more independent. She had ignored his commands several times, often with the result being better than he imagined it to be. One example was that, when he had left for Dreamland to train, he told Panchico where he was going so she wouldn't worry and told her not to tell anybody else and not to come after him; however, she did, which resulted in him returning home just in time to see Shard, who had refused to eat and sleep out of worry for him. No longer would she throw herself off a cliff just to get a glass of pink lemonade for him; instead, she'd steal a nearby parasol to use as a parachute and drift down. SC's current theory for her beyond-her-programming behavior was that she had somehow developed a soul, but further research had to be performed before he could conclude anything. All he knew was that see acted a lot more... real than the others created by the CET, and for some reason she wasn't unnerving him like the others were.
“Um, Master...?”
“Yes, Panchico?”
“Did you go shopping today?”
“Yes I did, Panchico. Why?”
“The dirt from the cloak is getting on the bed.”
SC looked and saw she was right; he had forgotten to remove the cloak before he had flopped on the bed. Facepalming and cursing himself in his head, he got up; he went to place the cloak in the closet while Panchico used a small brush to sweep the dirt into a dustpan.
“Sorry about that,” SC apologized as he brushed any dirt off of him.
“It's OK, Master,” Panchico replied as she finished. “I know you didn't mean it.”
That was another thing. SC often addressed Panchico by name; by now it was out of habit, but at the beginning, back when she was more program than alive, it was the signal that she would pay attention to the sentence. The fact she responded even though SC didn't say her name was further evidence that she had grown beyond her original parameters.
“Master, I've often wondered something...”
“What is it, Panchico?”
“Why don't you ever send some of your minions out to get the groceries instead of getting them yourself? Isn't that the purpose of minions?”
“Panchico Panchico Panchico... Don't you remember? The last time I sent minions to the Black Market they all got killed. Besides, I can't risk my Jiggy collection, even parts of it, in the hands of anyone else?”
“Then... why do you have them?”
...That was actually a pretty good question. “...Because you can't take over the macroverse without an army, Panchico.”
“Master, I haven't been around for very long, but even before you met Miss Asha, the army didn't really do all that much. You prefer using more, um... covert methods for taking over territories instead of showing brute force.”
“Panchico, are you suggesting I get rid of all the people that work for me?” His voice had a little sarcasm in it, but Panchico interpreted it as annoyance.
“N-no, Master, not all of them, just the ones that you don't need,” Panchico replied with a stutter. “I've heard companies do it all the time when they don't need people.” She took on a worried look. “Did I say something wrong, Master? I don't like making you upset...”
SC heaved a sigh. “I'm not upset, Panchico, stop worrying about it. It's just... how shallow the minions are, how robotic they are without being robots... It's freaking me out.” He crossed his arms and closed his eyes in thought, and he was silent for several minutes. “Hm...” Eventually, his eyes reopened. “Panchico.”
“Yes, Master?”
“Contact the Division Heads, tell them to meet at the mount's main conference room in two hours. It's time for a change...”
***
“As I hope you all see by now, the purpose of the minions is long gone. As I have said, we are no longer a macroversal military force. We are now more along the lines of a crime family, with a few select and extremely skilled members, with our natural, and in our case artificial, talents making up for our lack of numbers. Mt. Majesty and all the outposts are self-maintaining; anything they can't fix by themselves can be done by the PhDs that remain as well as myself. In conclusion, we need to eliminate the excess minions and streamline our operations if we are to have any success, and that is ultimately why I am proposing their termination. Now, my proposal is to use a special subroutine I installed in every minion under the Game Over that would cause them to dissolve back into data and return to wherever it came from, a sort of suicide pill in case they were captured by the enemy. We can remotely trigger the subroutine from the CET-XX mainframe console while excluding the identification numbers of all the Division Heads, Commandos, all the others I've decided to keep. It's perfectly humane, no trace will remain to show they even existed, and, since everyone being terminated never truly lived life anyway, they won't feel a thing. Now, let's put it to a vote, shall we? All in favor of remotely triggering the suicide subroutine, say aye.”
The conference room echoed with voices from all universes, all saying that one word. “Aye.”