Baptism 1.10
"Let me start with a general introduction. My job is to help rogues stay on the side of the law, and to make arrangements for you to meet the right PRT departments if you want to offer any services or products directly to the PRT. As a rogue, it's not legally required for you to register with the PRT, but if you start a business with a parahuman power of any kind, it's much better for you to have gotten the right approvals and checks through the PRT first. The PRT isn't your lawyer or consultant, however, so if you face lawsuits or demands from other branches of government, we can't help you with that."
I nodded. "That's understandable. What about protection from villains?"
Officer Berger gave me an eager smile. "If you are thinking about selling your goods or services to the PRT, you can rest assured that we will do everything in our power to keep you safe. A rogue supplier is as much an asset to the PRT as any of the heroes on the roster, and even if your goods or services aren't critical, we still do our best because we don't want rogues falling into the hands of villains. You will get PRT issued devices to rapidly get into contact with us, and we will have our people check in with you regularly to make sure nothing's wrong. If you request it, we can even assign troops to guard you when you're in public, but you have to pay for that, unless you have a valid reason to believe that you're being actively targeted—and we look at all requests seriously. You also get access to some PRT equipment for purchase, and we'd be able to connect you with other rogue suppliers that work with us."
"That sounds pretty good. Does that only apply to rogues that sell things to you? Do rogues that just register and operate their own business get similar protections?"
He shook his head. "I'm afraid that would be a little different. Unfortunately, if you just register and don't have a formal supplier relationship with us, you are essentially just a civilian, like every other civilian. Because the PRT is a public policing force, we cannot discriminate between who to protect among civilians. So we can't give you any special privileges, but I can tell you that the PRT keeps close tabs on all rogues that register, and make every effort to keep them safe from villains."
Then he gave me a measured look. "Again, if you have a valid reason to believe you are being targeted, the PRT can then take more active measures to protect you. That applies even if you were just a normal civilian too. Are you asking because you think you're at risk?"
"No, that's not it. I'm just trying to understand how all this works. But I admit that having protection is important to me. Although I don't think anybody is targeting me yet, I do think my power makes me an especially attractive target."
"White Mage, if your main motivation is looking for protection, it would be better to sign up for the hero roster. As much as I'd like to work with you as a rogue, heroes are definitely at lower risk of something like a kidnapping. A large part of the security is also deterrence and threat of retaliation. When a villain tries to kidnap a Ward or Protectorate hero, for example, it's considered a more serious crime with much higher chances of leading to a Birdcage sentence, because they are part of the law enforcement force, and also because they're more visible in the public eye. Another difference is that heroes have made a clear commitment to work for the PRT and the law, and to fight against villains. Rogues don't have that. Even suppliers are limited to a business relationship with the PRT, and the understanding is that they're motivated by financial incentive to help the PRT. So if a rogue gets captured and forced to work with a villain as often happens, well…how exactly does the PRT know that the rogue didn't become a villain willingly?"
"But if the PRT has that kind of attitude, it just makes rogues an even more attractive target for villains to conscript."
"I'm afraid you're right. Don't get me wrong, the PRT doesn't want rogues getting kidnapped by villains, and we are constantly on the watch for that kind of thing, but when it happens, it's much harder to make the call on what to do compared to a known hero. And as I said, for non-supplier rogues, we legally can't offer them any special privileges that a normal citizen wouldn't have. For suppliers, we do everything we can, but if it starts to look like you joined a villain group on your own, there's a point at which the PRT will stop trying to rescue you, especially if you fight us while we're trying to do that. By the way, if you don't want to be on the frontlines, it's entirely possible to be a hero that doesn't patrol and only provides goods and services. You would just be paid a salary instead of based on supplier contracts."
I could sort of understand where they were coming from, but that was disappointing. I wasn't surprised about it though. Their attitude toward rogues was only slightly better than innocent people. A lot of unpowered people got kidnapped, blackmailed, or otherwise forced into crime, and I rarely saw the PRT or even police rescuing those kinds of victims in the news.
Once they were involved in crime, the line between victim and perpetrator started to blur, and the longer they stayed involved, the harder it was to treat them as victims.
"I get it. What about the rogues that supply strategically valuable things to the PRT?"
"Well, officially? It's the same as any other rogue supplier. But I can tell you that the PRT does take the strategic value of a supplier into account. Simply put, the PRT may consider your power valuable enough to launch operations to deny it to any villain groups regardless of whether you joined it of your own volition. So is that what you're hoping to do, provide something strategically valuable?"
"I am considering the option. I believe I have very valuable services to provide, such as healing."
His face lit up. "Really, healing? That's probably the number one most in demand service that the PRT would pay for. Of course here in Brockton Bay we have Panacea, so the local team doesn't need it as much, but healing is always in short supply in other branches, and even more so if can be done on the field."
"Yup, that's why I'm calling myself White Mage. Does Panacea charge the PRT for healing?"
"No, and she's available most of the time so she's the preferred option for our local branch. However, she doesn't generally travel anywhere or take requests from other branches except when there's no other available healer. If you want to sell healing services, you'd make the most money if you were willing to travel around. Otherwise, the PRT branches in nearby states would probably be willing to send their injured here if your rates were good enough, and depending on exactly what you're able to heal. Do you know what your capabilities and limits are?"
"Some. I don't know exactly what types of injuries or diseases I can't heal. My healing works pretty much instantly though, and I'd guess it would heal most physical injuries. But I don't know for sure, that's just my power instinct."
I was basing that off the number value of the healing. The spell healed 3 health, which was three times more health than most people had in the first place. But the description said "minor" injuries and diseases, so there had to be some kind of restriction. Maybe it couldn't regenerate lost limbs? Maybe there was a time limit on how recent the injury was, or if the body still considered itself to be at less than 'max' health?
"You would need to get power testing done then. Medical uses for powers are particularly onerous on the testing requirements, because powers often have negative effects on certain diseases. Things like cancer for example, could be exacerbated by regenerative powers and Tinker drugs. There are very few healers like Panacea who have that much scope and control over the healing. In fact, powers capable of healing aren't generally 'healing powers' per se, just something that could be adapted for medical care."
"How does the power testing work? I mean, how many tests would I have to undergo? My power has a limited set of uses within a given period of time that needs to recharge."
"Don't quote me, but I think it's at least twenty."
Damn. That was way more than I could do in a short period of time.
"But that's the full set of tests, you can get by on less than five if you're fine with working on a limited set of potential patients."
"What about pricing then? What kind of prices would the PRT be willing to pay?"
"Hold on. There's a standard list of prices for different kinds of injuries and turnaround time. Let me get it for you," he said.
O O O
When he came back almost ten minutes later, it wasn't just with the list, but another man in a collared shirt and dress pants.
"This is David Hudgins, our purchasing manager. He was just in the hall, and I thought it might be a good idea for you to speak directly with him, as he manages the local branch's supplier relationships, as well as make arrangements for rogues that want to supply their services and products to other branches.
"A pleasure to meet you, White Mage. Just call me David."
"Hi, nice to meet you," I said.
They both took a seat, then officer Berger gave me the list.
David spoke up again, taking the lead. "I've already got the basic gist of what you're looking for, and I'm very interested in working with you. Like Jason said, I'm the guy that buys stuff from suppliers, but I'm also the guy that handles the affiliated rogues that want to sell stuff to other branches. Now Panacea's got you outcompeted locally in healing, but there's a big shortage of healing capes everywhere else."
I assumed that Jason was officer Berger's first name. Before I could say anything in response, he kept going.
"The thing you need to understand is that unlike a normal rogue, when a rogue supplier registers with us, you're affiliated with our local branch, not just the overall PRT umbrella. You would be considered 'our rogue', so to speak, and we're responsible for getting you set up as a supplier for the other branches, but we also take a cut of the profits, which gets added to our local procurement budget. That's our motivation for helping you, and that's my motivation for helping you, because the more money I can help you make, the more money I have to spend on the stuff our branch needs and get our people in shape to fight bad guys. And the more resources we have, the more we have to protect you as well. Get it? I'm telling you all this up front so you understand that it's better for all of us if we put our cards on the table and work together."
"Oh, is that how it works? I am more than happy to work together with you, then."
"Good," he said with a big smile. "Now you don't have to go by this list. We can get better prices negotiating with each PRT branch individually, and there's a lot of leeway depending on just how effective and fast your healing is, as well as your own availability and response time. It makes a big difference if someone can get healed on the field or within hours instead of waiting several days before they can get back in action."
"I see." I glanced over the list quickly anyways to see what the standard prices were for reference. Cuts and bruises were the least pricey. Broken bones, sprained joints, and torn ligaments went up to several thousand dollars, while spinal injuries, nerve damage, multiple internal organ wounds went much higher into the tens of thousands. Lost limbs and brain damage topped it out, varying from hundreds of thousands to over seven figures for "Vegetative state".
There were also significant bonuses for rapid response times on some types of injuries, especially healing on the field, such as Tinker drugs.
I wasn't sure how much that might compare to market prices for medical services for civilians, but it didn't seem too bad to me. More importantly, from my perspective, getting the money to build more altars and expand my mana generation rate was much more important than getting the best price. My magic was only a limited resource because I didn't have enough mana.
"Okay so how do we get started?"
O O O
When I got home, I was feeling great about my prospects as a rogue. Based on everything I had learned, I stood to make a lot of money once I got through the tests and enchanted more items to get more charges. I was confident that my [Heal] spell would be able to treat a lot of injuries, and if I was willing to sell the item, it could work on the field and be that much more valuable.
Plus, although the PRT had given me a good impression, I know they weren't my only option. If they were willing to pay me well, what about others?
Well, I was going to be a hero, so obviously I'd prefer dealing with PRT. But I had to consider that healing might be in even greater demand by villains and criminals, and they'd probably pay even more. Would it be wrong to heal them? I didn't think so. It was the opposite really.
Refusing to heal people in need, even if they were criminals, was wrong. Even the government treated criminals after arresting them.
And if I took take their cash and turn it towards good purposes—my purposes, wasn't that even better?
Of course, I would have to get stronger before considering anything like that, or I would be at risk of being kidnapped and pressganged to work for one of the villain groups. And the PRT might become less friendly if they found out. Still, just because I treated villains didn't mean there was anything illegal about it if I paid all my taxes, and didn't protect them from the law or anything, right?
But as I looked at my altar again, I felt that the future was bright. It wouldn't be long before I could start making money and get the materials I needed to build more altars.
Wait a minute.
I stared at the altar as a sudden thought struck me.
The reason I needed cash was to buy the valuable materials needed for the altar—gold and silver, but gold was better. Everything else wasn't that hard to get. Gems and other embellishments would help, but they weren't necessary. Ultimately it was gold that was the real bottleneck.
I could transmute iron into gold.
…
How in the world did I miss that before?
Why oh why, did I try to sell the gold for cash, if the whole point of cash was to buy gold?
Ten seconds and one facepalm later, I got to work on my next altar.
O O O
Mini-Mirror
Power: 93
EXP: 4
MP: 26
Gold: 0
Upkeep: 0
Equipment: 1 Armlet of Heroism, 1 Armlet of Speed +3
O O O
A/N: By a combination of requests and exciting developments with the Caster of Magic mod, the adventures of Taylor the budding Master of Magic are back.
And rereading the story, there was an error in the last chapter, in which I said Taylor spent 95 MP to make an Armlet of Heal with 3 charges. Unfortunately, based on the mechanics explained in 1.4, each Heal costs 15 MP to cast, x3 to turn it into 1 spell charge, x3 again for the maximum 3 charges, +50MP for the base cost of enchanting spell items. That means it should have cost 185, which Taylor didn't have yet—and to be frank, doesn't make much sense for her to spend so much MP on because Heals have no return investment if she doesn't frequently need to heal herself or anybody else yet, unlike the passives that are constantly active and protecting her. As a result, I've changed it to a passive attribute boosting item instead, which costs 30 MP base + 20 MP per point boosted.