And what's a Deuce?

"If you break something in my Deuce, I'll break you," Robyn snapped when they finally got moving again and slapped at John's hands as soon as he started fiddling with the radio. Surprisingly, despite how old it seemed, her car started up quite smoothly. It didn't clank, rumble, or roar like most old muscle cars that John had seen... if anything, it purred, and hearing it purr brought a smile to Robyn's lips as she pulled the car back out of the police station's parking lot and began speeding away from the cops as quickly as possible.

"Your Deuce?" he asked and cocked his head to the side curiously.

"Yeah, Deuce and a Quarter." She didn't give him much more of an explanation that that. She just expected him to catch on, like the answer she had given was all that was needed.

"I'm more of a video game guy, not a car guy," he muttered and watched as Robyn glanced at him out of her eye.

"It's a Buick Electra... 225," she said and stressed the numbers as hard as she could, but John didn't bother pushing for more of an explanation than that. Cars weren't his thing, and Robyn didn't exactly seem like she was eager to talk about it. She just let the silence take over the vehicle while John reluctantly reclined into his beige leather seat and stared longingly at the radio dials that would have brought on some much needed music if Robyn had not intervened.

Despite how rough and crude Robyn may have seemed with her tattoos and her unkempt hair, John found out pretty quickly that she kept her car astonishingly clean. There were no crumbs, wrappers, or stray bags sitting around on the inside of the vehicle; it was actually quite spotless. Even the hard metal exterior glistened like it had been recently hand-waxed and polished. The only thing that John ever actually found cluttering up the inside of the vehicle was Moira's personal shield and hammer. For some reason, the heavy metal plate that belonged to the Warden had been carefully set down in the back seat of the car to help keep it from poking holes into the vehicle’s spotless leather interior with its edges, but more important was the fact that the shield seemed... almost spotless too.

The last time that John had seen it had been inside the barrier where Michel had attacked him. It had been left destroyed and useless on the ground with a dozen different jagged holes poked through the front of it. Its unnaturally perfect gleam had been coated with a layer of dirt and dust at the time so it looked like nothing more than just another piece of trash in an abandoned city. The etched golden design of a prickly rose on its front had been eviscerated until it was nearly unrecognizable... but now it was back, like the shield had regenerated somehow. The holes in the front of the shield's plating were all gone along with all of the dirt and grime that it had been covered in, and its golden design shone just as brightly as ever.

It looked almost as indestructible as it seemed like it might be now that it was restored.

"Stay here," Robyn said as they finally pulled up in front of a large, wrought iron gate. The front of the gate did absolutely nothing to hide the giant, well-decorated manor behind it, but it did manage to inform John where they were. He didn't even have to wait to see the 'honorable' Lord Brighton standing by to greet them before he figured out whose mansion it was. The molded steel roses and familiar golden insignia told him who the house belonged to almost immediately, and while Robyn and the Lord Brighton didn't stay in conversation for very long, John still tried to duck down out of sight as Moira's father stepped off his property to accept the shield and hammer that Robyn had come to return to them.

He did not hide successfully from the redheaded giant of the Golden Rose. When Lord Brighton finally saw him, he did not look surprised. He just straightened his posture out, locked eyes with John, and stood in place glaring until Robyn put the car in reverse and drove them back off the property.

"Alright..." she muttered finally, breaking the long line of horrible silence that had pervaded the car up until that point.

"Alright?" John repeated exactly what she said and waited, confused about what she was trying to talk about. Conversations weren't her strong suit, and unfortunately, they weren't John's either.

"... why video games?" she asked finally, and John nodded in understanding... or at least he thought he understood.

"You mean, why not cars?" he said and tried to correct her, but Robyn stood by her original question.

"I mean... if you had the chance to use magic, then why would you spend all day inside doing something like pressing buttons on a mouse and shooting Nazis?" she paused for a moment to pull the car heavily to the left, and the two of them disappeared down a street, then down another street, and then finally they went through an alleyway.

"First of all, why would you not shoot Nazis? Secondly, they're Nazi zombies," John clarified. "There's an important difference there, they're immortal racists and they eat people. On top of that, most of the time the buttons are on the keyboard. You 'click' with a mouse, though there are some custom ones that you can order just to up your gaming ability that come with a few additional buttons and-"

"John," she didn't even try that hard to interrupt him. Just alerting the Gamer to the fact that he was rambling was enough now to help him push back on to the proper topic.

"Sorry," he muttered and then looked quickly out of the passenger window of the car. He felt a little **** to actually tell her anything about his powers... but she did just save him from the cops, and there was no horrible reason he could think of that made her do that. As far as he could tell, it was just an act of kindness. "I uh... I only got my powers about a week ago." The car screeched to a stop.

"You what?" John didn't even have to look over at Robyn to know that she was looking at him. He could feel her eyes on the back of his head.

"Well, it hasn't even technically been a week ye- No, wait. Yes, it has. It's a week today, I think. It's Monday, right?" he asked, and Robyn slowly nodded at him. "Yeah, one week..." Then he blinked hard as it suddenly hit him. "I have school today!"

"You're joking..." she said, and slowly the car began to pick up speed again.

"No, it's a weekday! I always have school on weekdays!" he said, and Robyn sputtered.

"No! Not that! Your powers! How in the hell did you beat Michel?!" Thankfully, the car didn't go much further. After she drove them down a few more alleyways, she finally pulled the vehicle to a full stop in a warehouse nearby to John's home and got out just as John finally admitted what it was that let him win that last fight against his friend. He tried to be quiet with it, not in the hope that she might not hear, more just because he hoped the near silence might help make what happened untrue.

You've entered the 'Frozen Flame's New Working Homebas- No... Eddie's Place. Insert New Name: Eddie's Place. No, not like that!' barrier.

"I got lucky," he said and then stepped out of the car as well and shoved the new pop-up to sit off to his side with all of the other ones he had not taken a moment to look at since getting blackout drunk.

As soon as the loud, grating garage door to the warehouse finally finished closing behind Robyn and John, the two of them were doused in darkness. The bright, yellowy headlights from the car she had been driving illuminated only the far wall for a moment, displaying a row of giant lockers that had been set up. Each one was filled with various types of military gear, the specifics of which varied slightly from person to person, but most of them stayed similar at least. They all had a gun and a dark kevlar suit of some kind to help block bullets and the generally weaker forms of spells, but the gun or style of the suit was the thing that usually changed. They were all initially made the same way... but after the soldiers got their hands on them, one suit would occasionally vary, one might have a bandanna to tuck under the neckline as a personal memento or a charm to hang from their belt loop. The differences weren't major, but they were there. The types of guns, however, were almost all different. Each person had a personal preference for their type of weapon, and Robyn's locker was one of the ones that varied the most. While he was staring at the dimly lit weapons cache, Robyn circled back to the trunk of her car.

She popped her hammer out of the back of it, and it flared slightly in her grasp, giving only a brief amount of light to the room before she stuck it in her own private locker along with her coat. The light that the hammer did provide didn't reveal much more than that. The warehouse was neatly organized in the main room. There was a small kitchen and nearly a dozen or so tables with six to eight chairs around each and a few couches nearby to recline in. The rest of the place was hidden behind closed doors. He saw a few that were marked barracks and many that were unmarked, but the only one of any significant importance was the one with a large, golden, bedazzled plaque on it.

"Come on. Eddie must have some music playing or something, because she isn't watching the cameras!" she shouted uselessly into the giant warehouse. Her voice echoed slightly as she led him to the one door indiscreetly marked as 'Eddie' and then opened it. "Watch your step."

Walking through Eddie's door was like walking into another world again. When they stepped through, they immediately fell a whole foot down onto a thin, metal staircase... but it wasn't only the first step that was like that. The whole staircase had been built to be uneven between each step, and it somehow nearly made John trip every time whenever he tried to go lower. The slightest difference, even as much as a single centimeter proved to make John feel like he was falling whenever he tried to enter the room, until both Robyn and John had to grab on to the nearby railing just to keep from falling down the rest of the way... because Eddie's room was in the basement... or it was the basement.

It was a little hard to tell where 'Eddie's place' started and stopped.

Compared to upstairs, the basement of the Frozen Flame's headquarters was like looking at the aftermath of a natural disaster. There were no doors or magical walls to open and close when they went down into the basement. The only thing that Eddie had at her disposal to separate the multiple coves in that room were a dozen different curtains that had been lazily forgotten and left hanging open. It didn't matter much to anyone that the room was littered with old, half-eaten pizza boxes or that John still couldn't walk around anywhere even after he got off the staircase because the floor was covered with wires. It only mattered that the setup worked for Eddie. There were no light bulbs, torches or floating magical crystals. The only illumination that this veritable dungeon had was the idle glow of a hundred different computer screens.

"Welcome to the hub." Robyn chuckled and then pushed past one of the nearby curtains to where they both heard a deep bassy rhythm repeating over and over again, rising in volume with each repetition until they could feel the noise shaking through the floor. The occasional beat would shake something throughout the room, and one of the many various items that had been tucked into old milk crates around John shifted and then fell. At first, it was only a few gears or circuits that John noticed falling from the piles of scrap around him... then he started to see things like old video game controllers or forgotten, half-built toys drop to the ground. As much as John wanted to see them, there were no robots in the 'hub'; at most John was able to make out the remnants or skeletons of uncompleted projects that had been set aside or, once again, forgotten for the time being. Many of the larger projects were just left leaning against a wall or a shelf, but the most recently worked on ones had been set up on tables or hung from the ceiling by chains. He even recognized two of these projects somehow, though there were some slight differences. One he identified as a prosthetic arm, albeit a little sleeker and slimmer than the one that Robyn currently had attached to her shoulder. The occasional spark flew from its frayed wiring and sent its hand twitching and jerking wildly about, but there was no mistaking what that project was.

The other project John recognized as a copy... or an improvement somehow of the hammer that Robyn already used. It was half finished and left open so that the minuscule jet engine inside of it remained partially dismantled and exposed, but it was unmistakable to him after he had already seen the first one. The other stuff John was just left amazed by and more than a little curious as to what some of them might do. He thought he identified something that looked like it might fire a magical laser of some sort, another that seemed like some kind of a gaudy, pink, grenade launcher, and then a bag of strange metallic balls.

E.M.P. Grenade Bag
Most people probably wouldn't test the works of an unknown amateur weapons maker when it came to using items like this. Even just having the name 'Grenade' in something like this usually implies that the user will end up with some kind of injury after using it, but the Frozen Flame still accepts the work of this craftsman nonetheless, and 'Eddie' has more than proven herself to be a capable weaponsmith on multiple occasions.
+Holds 20 E.M.P. Grenades.

He was tempted to try and steal it away almost immediately after he used Observe to figure out what it was. He only stopped himself when he considered that they might give it to him anyways if they were willing to recruit him. Reluctantly, he **** himself to pull away from one of the actual walls of goodies and fighting gear that Robyn had led him past and finally followed her through the maze of curtains and wires until they reached a corner nearly a few dozen feet away from the stairs they used to enter the basement.

The music... or rather the same, short, bassy line of rhythm that had been set to repeat over and over again got louder as they got closer to Eddie, until finally, it was so strong that John could feel the beat of the music making his teeth rattle. The two of them pushed past another curtain, and Robyn tried to discreetly hide a grin behind her fist as Eddie danced her way into their line of sight.

Dancing may have been an overstatement. Most of what she seemed to do was just bouncing, either in place or to move from one spot to the next and always to the rhythm of the next heavy beat. Her long, straight, matted, candy red hair swung wildly with every bounce and reached down far enough to brush against the small of her back, but it didn't get in her way. She had tied it into a single, long braid to try and prevent that, and it was only thanks to the fact that she didn't seem to be actively working with any heavy machinery that John didn't worry that it would get caught up in anything.

It also helped to distract him to find that her hair wasn't the only thing bouncing around with the music. Both Robyn and John let their gazes drop and then stared as Eddie swung out from around the far side of the table she was tinkering at and then bent far, far over the edge of it to get nice and close to whatever new piece of machinery that she was working on. Her back arched slightly and pushed her chest down to squeeze and squish against the hard wooden tabletop, but her apple-sized breasts weren't what the two of them were staring at.

Instead, they watched as Eddie twisted her bare ass up and into view for the both of them, sending her massive freckled butt cheeks jiggling and shaking as she worked. It was immediately apparent, much to John's own personal enjoyment, that the only thing Eddie had bothered to put on had been a simple, white, short-sleeved crop-top. The lone article of clothing was so tiny and tight that it didn't exactly hide anything and seemed like what one might have used for pajamas if they had only bothered to put one half of them on, but it was a cute top... if John had bothered to actually look at it. It had been chosen specifically for the science joke on its front that read 'You should never trust an atom... They make up everything.'

Unfortunately, he was more focused on watching the way her giant ass swung every time she bounced it up and down. Her thick thighs shook and quivered with each shake of her heavy ass, even though she had them tightly closed and squeezed together. She was too focused on her work to notice the way that her gyrating exposed herself to the two of them, flashing brief glimpses of her tiny winking backdoor and the plump mound that her swollen pussy lips made before her butt cheeks clapped together once more and temporarily closed off all sight again.

With such a lewd display, John didn't see much more than that at first. He was so focused on watching her shake her ass up and down that he didn't even notice Robyn moving until after he had found the little tuft of red pubic hair above Eddie's womanhood by peeking through a little gap that remained between her thighs even when she was squeezing them together. It was almost impossible to notice unless she was shaking her hips up, but the large arrow she had trimmed to point down at her slit was still there.

Robyn was not as hesitant as John was. While John was still dumbly watching and struggling to follow the blonde girl along, she strolled right up behind Eddie and grabbed the short redhead by her wide full hips. She didn't squeal or jump or screech in surprise. Instead, Eddie merely reached out and pressed a button to lower the volume of her music as Robyn leaned forward like she planned to whisper in the redhead's ear.

"You're supposed to be watching the cameras while we're out," she said with a low rumble and then rolled her hips against the smaller woman. John's jaw dropped, because, once again, Eddie didn't freak out, pull away, or even tell her to stop. She just smiled... and then rolled her hips back against the other woman until Robyn's pelvis was squeezing into her shapely rump like the other woman had taken it as her own personal cushion for the time being.

"Oops," the little redhead giggled and muttered something about how she forgot but never looked away from her project. She refused to let her attention be diverted, and it wasn't until Robyn straightened up again and scowled at Eddie that that changed. With a snap of her arm, Robyn seized the front of John's shirt and pulled him over to the two of them. He stumbled a bit, tripping slightly over some of the various tools that had been strewn all over the ground and sending a few wrenches clattering. "Who'd you bring with you?" Despite the surprise of another person, once again, Eddie did not bother turning away from her project. She didn't even react when Robyn pulled John close enough for their hips to bump against each other side by side, and she was pushed over slightly from the **** of Robyn's pull.

Instead, as Robyn stepped back and Eddie continued working, John watched as the short redhead turned her hips towards John and pressed herself against him, nestling the young Gamer right up against her large ass. The two firmly squeezed against each other as, once again, Eddie let her hips start up high with the beat of the music, or at least as high as she could reach while bent over and on the tips of her toes... and then she let her hips drop, and they both felt everything.

John had almost managed to stutter out an awkward greeting before he felt her ass squish and mold against his newly-toned stomach and waistline. He stared at her, as she casually hummed and pushed her butt against his firm muscles, and then just as he was about to try and pull away before the aura could take effect, she slid her butt and groin down across his crotch.

It would have been a lie to say that he wasn't already hard... or bulging through the front of the 'pahnts' that Mub had given him, but being erect was nothing compared to how he felt when Eddie's lower lips spread along the width of his cock and slid across the top of it. His pants strained and groaned with the sudden flex his cock made when she pushed herself hard enough against John to grip the fat bulge threatening to tear out of his pants, like a part of him knew that if he could just break free of his confines then he could be inside her. Yet, it was over almost as quickly as it began, just as long as it might take one to swipe a credit card, but that was more than enough for everyone in the room to realize how firmly she had ground her clit up along the length of his cock.

A strangled yelp echoed out over the music as Eddie jerked away from him like someone had shocked her and went stumbling back into Robyn's arms. A pair of gaudy, pink, giant safety goggles made from the remnants of a VR headset bounced up off her eyes and fell to the ground. The two of them stared at each other for a long moment, John taking in her thick lips, button nose, cherubic cheeks, and bright emerald green eyes and her... blatantly staring at his abs and the prominent bulge in his pants before they switched... and John was staring at her tits and pussy again while she looked him in the face as if to confirm that it really was a guy she was looking at. Her stomach wasn't toned or fit like nearly every other woman he had met thus far. Her belly was flat, for the most part, and just... soft, like she spent all of her time working on the weaponry down in the basement instead of fighting with the rest of the soldiers; a part of him couldn't help but imagine running his hands across it and the rest of her body as he pumped her full of cum. The fantasy was so vivid and so... desired that John felt like he had snapped out of a dream when he realized that his arousing aura was no longer affecting the short redhead; she was out of range, but her nipples kept hardening and poking out the from of her shirt like two thick, fat points. For a couple of seconds, she continued to get more and more turned on while he leered at her, and then the moment ended rather abruptly.

"Meet John," Robyn said, and Eddie's hands snapped down to cover her crotch, like she had just realized what was happening, and with a high squeal she barked at both him and Robyn.

"You couldn't warn me?!" she howled and snatched a nearby, oil-covered rag off one of the nearby machines. "Look away!" she ordered to John, and Robyn finally moved around to step between them just as Eddie tried to dangle the little cloth in front of her crotch.

"If you had been watching the fucking cameras like you're supposed to, then you would not have needed a warning," she said and then glared at John. Between the two of them, he got the message pretty quickly and reluctantly turned around. As luck would have it, facing away from the two of them didn't accomplish much as their reflections were still quite visible to him in one of the many dark computer screens that weren't being used. He watched as Robyn and Eddie barked back and forth at each other for a solid two minutes while Eddie hunted around for something to wear. She finally settled on a plain black thong that she found in a distant pile after discarding away other pieces of clothing because either they were too dirty or 'they didn't breathe enough' for her tastes.

When John was finally allowed to look back around, the attention was on him again.

"Why is he here?" Eddie asked, and John realized it wasn't necessarily the kind of attention he wanted. It wasn't even nice, it was... scrutinizing.

"This is the late bloomer that killed one of the Cabalists." Robyn chuckled and then sat down at the table that Eddie had been working on. She didn't even bother carefully trying to set the project aside, she just swept it out of the way and laid her robotic arm out for Eddie to see. Thankfully, her comment seemed to erase whatever judgement Eddie had been passing on John. Her features lightened and raised slightly as she looked John up and down again, slowly in some parts, and then furrowed her brow again.

"He's a late bloomer?" Despite how scrunched up her features got, Eddie's emerald green eyes stayed nice and wide as she stared at John, like she still couldn't bring herself to process what Robyn had just told her. She tapped a few buttons on some of the nearby keyboards connected to her computer screens, and the music stopped entirely. Robyn merely nodded.

"Why am I here?" he repeated Eddie's question and watched as the redhead blushed slightly when she finally heard his voice. A loud click and a hiss echoed throughout the basement as Robyn pressed on something in her mechanical arm... and then it detached from her body before she stood up again. He could still see a large metal socket for her to plug another arm into, but for the time being Robyn left her spare limb on the table while she moved into a better position to talk to the two of them.

"Because I want your help to try and find Moira and Cassandra."