“They shouldn’t feel any pain,” Jen said to Tamako in the small dark alley, right after she placed eight homeless people into a deep, almost comatose state of sleep. Jen dropped her mice and lizards and steered them off to keep watch, and then she and Tamako started taking turns healing each of the homeless people.

As Tamako worked on healing the rheumatoid arthritis of an elderly lady, she said to Jen, “Is Sam doing O.K.?”

Jen shrugged, and replied, “He doesn’t like this unknown waiting time for the Oracle Quest and Deck to open. I’m surprised he hasn’t changed his mind and decided to go ahead and jump to the Third Deck. So…he’s just frustrated.”

Tamako suggested, “maybe we should jump to the Third Deck as we originally planned.”

“Maybe, but there is still the issue of exactly how we are going to survive a wild jump to the Oracle Deck or the Third Deck. It’s just the waiting that is frustrating him. How about you? After all the dying, but not dying in the recall arena over the last few weeks and using your Killing Intent skill. All the death still hasn’t started bothering you?”

Tamako answered, “I know you and Sam are new to The Decks and The System, but I never doubt for a moment that The System will heal me just like it claims.” Tamako then looked over at Jen and announced, “I’m done,” after healing the 3rd homeless person. Her mana was not as pure as Jen’s, and even with Jen’s help, she still hadn’t improved her mana technique much. Even so, Tamako’s tattoo still wasn’t out of mana, but she made sure to always keep at least a 40% reserve for emergencies.

Jen looked over at Tamako, nodding with a worried sigh and said, “Just a minute while I heal the last two.”

After healing the last person, Jen was about to leave the sleeping vagrants with a command to count to 30 before fully waking up, when she heard Tamako quietly exclaim, “what the heck!” and looked over to see her inspecting something down at her feet.

Tamako called to Jen, “Come over here and look at this.” As Jen approached, Tamako said, “it keeps pulling on my pants as if it wants me to follow it.”

“Holy crap! That looks like an animated action figure!” exclaimed Jen as she got a closer look.

“What’s an ‘action figure’?” asked Tamako.

Jen laughed, “it’s a type of toy they made on earth that was based on make-believe heroes and villains, but of course the toys did not move on their own like this thing.” Jen kneeled down and tried to extend her psych ability towards the little man and communicate with him. “It’s odd. I think it is intelligent, and partially self-aware, but it’s being controlled or directed by someone’s mana or will. It’s almost like a monster that is being controlled by a dungeon, but not exactly.”

Jen pinged Slim with a mental request through their bond, “Slim, if you're close by, I would like to request your opinion on something.”

Tamako was getting anxious as Jen continued to stare at the action figure silently, and she finally used one of Sam’s favorite questions, and asked, “What’s the plan?”

As Jen picked up the action figure, she replied, “I’m going to set these people to wake up in 30 seconds, and we’re going to take action-man somewhere else. Does that work for you?”

Slightly confused, Tamako replied, “Yea, that’s fine, but why are you calling it action man?”

Jen smiled at hearing her question and said, “I would probably call it something like G.I. Joe, but that is sure to be copyrighted, So I am using action-man as a generic name for this little guy.”

Tamako just shook her head with annoyance at all the weird names and customs Jen and Sam would use for things. She thought about asking her what a ‘copyright’ was, but just let it go.

As Jen was leaving the alley heading in the direction action-man was pointing, she felt Slim’s presence nearby, and she said to Tamako, “Slim’s going to be here in a few minutes, I want his opinion on action man.”

The action-man was not trying to get away while they waited for Slim, but he was insistent about taking them somewhere. Jen almost let a giggle escape as Slim sauntered/waddled around the corner, whipping his tail back and forth.

Slim asked, “What does the great Mistress Jen command of me?”

Jen’s raised an eyebrow with annoyance. “Slim, I’m not falling for your trolling anymore! We both know I don’t command you around.”

Slim interrupted her. “My little pure-heart, you are usually too easy to tease, but I guess not today. So… I need some scratching.” Slim rolled over on his back for a tummy rub.

Tamako laughed at Slim’s antics and Jen promised paybacks for his teasing, as they both gave him some serious scratching and affection.

If an action figure could look exasperated, action-man gave it his best try, as he was insistent on them following him right away. Action man then jumped from Jen’s hands and she noticed he was limping, and looked like he was missing a few parts, but he moved along pretty quickly.

Slim actually looked surprised when he spotted action-man, “That’s a puppet! How did you get a puppet?”

Jen replied, “He found us, but what’s a puppet?”

Slim cautiously inspected action-man, “He’s a small one. Puppeteers make puppets. They can be powerful. Some are basic and mindless like a golem, but others, like this one, can become pretty advanced. When I was very young, about 200 years ago, a puppeteer entered my dungeon with an army of puppets. Most were basic, and as soon as I shut down their mana connection with the puppeteer, they stopped moving. I then found out the more advanced puppets didn’t need a constant mana connection with their puppeteer. However, without their basic-puppet cannon fodder to slow me down, I quickly killed the advanced puppets and their puppeteer. Years later I overheard my slaver Mai Chang trying to locate a puppeteer for something she was planning, and it seemed like the skill must have died out because she wasn’t able to find one.”

Slim rolled over to his feet and said, “let’s see where he wants us to go.”

Slim’s response surprised Jen, but as she thought about it, action-man had a lot in common with Slim. Tamako looked at Jen and shrugged in agreement.

They were cautious. Jen was really pushing a lot of mana into her psych ability to feel for threats in Plinko City. As they turned and started walking down an exceptionally dark and filthy alley, Slim realized Jen and Tamako weren’t making any noise with their footsteps, causing Slim to almost trip over his own feet. Slim corrected his balance and inspected the soles of their boots. “This is superb work!” Then he said hastily, “but don’t tell Log I said that.”

Jen laughed and said, “Don’t worry, it’s our secret. Sam’s head is big enough as it is.”

“I know! It’s ridiculous how full of himself he can be at times!” Slim said, and started waddling forward, following action-man again. Both Jen and Tamako laughed at the cat-kettle calling the pot black.

Action man finally led them to a crumpled heap of an old beggar. He was laying in the alley with nothing but an empty bowl next to him. Without using her psych ability to sense the mana and emotions from the old man, Jen would have thought him dead. Tamako leaned down to get a closer look and jerked back when she realized that both of the man’s eyes were plucked out, and both of his hands were cut off. She then somewhat quietly snapped her fingers next to his ears, and commented, “what the hell! How is this man surviving without sight, hearing, or hands?”

Just then, action-man ran over to the bowl lying next to the old man, and took a few crumbs of food out of his little pack and placed it in the man’s bowl. Apparently, the old man could still smell, as he moved his head over and licked the crumbs out of the bowl.

Tamako used her body scan on the old man and reported, “He’s also missing part of his tongue, which is preventing him from speaking. He is in a pitiful state, but all his major organs are in working order.”

Jen asked, “what do you think we should heal first?”

Slim replied, “Pure-heart, heal nothing unless you want to create more pain for him. He is here in this condition because someone wants him to be. If you heal him up, they will do it to him all over again, and then look for the person who helped him.”

Tamako pulled a large sack out of her ring and said, “Let’s go,” as she put the man into the sack, and action-man jumped into the sack with him. “We will take him back to the shack, heal him up and smuggle him over to Domino Hill, and he will never know our identity.”

Tamako’s actions surprised Jen, but she was happy with the show of support. Slim gave a cat shrug. “That might work too,” he said.

As they entered the house, Slim ran off into Sam’s workshop room, and Jen heard Sam say, “Hey Slim!” and she knew Sam would have picked Slim up and started scratching him all over. Then Jen heard Slim, “Tell me about the dimensional space enchantments on the boots!” Jen laughed to herself, thinking Sam finally had someone to discuss the details of his ring enchantments with. She knew Slim would bring Sam up to speed about the abused old man.