“With whom do I have the pleasure of speaking, might I ask?” Thomas said, using his most obnoxious, stereotypical ignorant upper-class nobility-type voice. He figured that he was going to be speaking with someone important due to the call being from a large ship from the Andromedan Empire, but even if they were not important, putting on a front as transparent as this might actually be enough to confuse and quite possibly manipulate the inbred morons and genetically engineered servants of the Andromedan nobility.

“Hmph!” snorted a voice on the other end. Thomas was overjoyed that he could not see the caller’s face, as she sounded a bit like what you would expect a human with the face of a Pug to sound like. Thomas could only imagine the level of plastic surgery and other body-mods that whoever he was talking to had applied to them, and every time he tried to imagine their appearance his stomach did a few somersaults inside him.

“I speak on behalf of my entire people when I say I wish to apologize for leaving you to waste your precious time sending such a stream of calls.” Thomas said, hamming up his act even more, now going so far as to gesture and pose in overly dramatic and theatrical fashion as Axton watched on and tried desperately to hold in his laughter.

“Ah! No!” cried the female voice on the other end of the call. “Would that I have known that you, a great Outworlder, were busy dealing with whatever sub-human trash you had forced yourself to waste your valuable time with, I would have not flooded your War Suit with so many calls!”

Thomas looked over to Axton, who was listening in. Thomas mouthed a question to his friend, and Axton merely shrugged and shook his head side to side. It seemed that neither of them knew if she was bullshitting them or was actually concerned that she could be in trouble. Either way, Thomas had to respond.

“Worry not, my fair maiden,” Thomas replied with as snooty and pompous a voice as he could muster without accidentally breaking character and laughing at himself. “I, unlike some of my kind, am willing to show mercy to those that wrong me. Not that you did such a thing, only that one could mistake the boarding action taken upon my slave’s ship for an attempt to defy the mandate set down upon the most GLORIOUS Empire by their majesty themselves.”

This apparently caused the woman on the other end to audibly wince, but whether she actually cared or not didn’t mean a damn thing, as she seemed to take Thomas’ words in stride.

“Ah, yes, but that was not of my will.” The woman said, obviously trying to distance herself from the mess she had created. “My siblings were the ones to organize that rather insane and sacrilegious affront to both your esteemed self and to our most excellent and eternal Empire.”

“Yes, yes, and so long as they face at least some punishment for their sins, all will be forgiven.” Thomas said dismissively, waving his hand even though only Axton could see him. “Of course..” he added while stopping his hand waving and staring off towards one side even as his face was turned almost entirely in another. “They will need to publicly pay the price of their foolishness, and if no one brings them to justice for their crimes, then I may be of the mind to inform the rest of my people how little the Empire actually thinks of us.”

At this, there was an audible squeal from the other side of the call, but this was ended as shortly as it began as the woman on the ‘phone’ collected herself remarkably quickly.

“I will inform my family and the proper authorities immediately, my Lord. One can only hope that you inform them that I was in no way, shape or form responsible for their foolish and heretical actions.”

“Indeed. Should they contact me, I will speak of something similar. Now, what else did you wish to call me for? Surely you do not seek to waste my precious moments of enjoyment for nothing, no?”

“Ah, yes, well…” the woman sputtered. “I… uh…”

“Well,” Thomas said pompously and with a raised voice. “GET ON WITH IT!”

“I wished to offer unto you a bit of help. I saw how these sub-humans dared to wrong one such as yourself, and as such, I have sent word to other noble families. Together, we are lobbying for this world to become yours, along with the garish space station above it.”

Thomas cracked a bit of a smirk. The ship that the Andromedan Empire’s people were on made the station look like rusted metal covered in a veneer of dirt and fecal matter in comparison. Sure, the station, with its gold, jewels, and bright lights was indeed garish, but it had nothing on the sheer level of moronic decorative bullshit that was the Andromedan spaceship.

“And what do you expect me to do with this world?” Thomas asked, once again in a dismissive tone, acting as if he didn’t care for the ‘gift’. “I have ill need of such unnecessary baggage.”

“Ah, but we could send aides to assist you in-.”

Thomas laughed. “Oh, don’t worry. Though I do not need something like this world, if you can offer it, I shall take it. However, I do not need such brownnosers and yes-men. If you do somehow manage to get this world into my most enlightened grasp, know that I will forge my own way forward, as is my privilege and right as a higher, more perfect being.” A slight pause followed before Thomas added, “I trust you are fine with that?”

There was a gulping sound on the other side of the comms line, but after an awkward silence, the woman assented to Thomas’ will.

“Good! Good!” Thomas said jovially. “Do let me know posthaste about how things turn out. Since this system is far removed from Imperial Space, I would be remiss to not admit that I will be showing this planet, and possibly this solar system, as being neutral, at least on the surface.”

“But, in actuality, it won’t be, right?”

Thomas chuckled as he and Axton shared a knowing glance.

“Oh, yes. It will be far from neutral.”

“Oh! Wonderful!” the woman exclaimed, whatever front she had tried to put up now fully removed. “I will have this arranged at once, your Lordship.”

“Then, if you don’t mind, we’ll end the call here.” Thomas said as he ended the call.

Thomas looked over at Axton and smirked.

“I don’t want to rule.” Thomas said. “You?”

“Not my style, either.” Axton replied.

“Then, we ask Daxter and the rest?”

“Yep.”

“And after they fuck up and give us the planet, if not the system, we tell them to go pound sand and otherwise fuck off?”

“We wouldn’t be ‘far from neutral’ if we didn’t.”