All Work and no Play Make Alice a Dull Girl
Alice stared at the piece of paper in her hands. She tilted her head, wondering if she was reading it wrong, before trying to rub her eyes. Alas for her, the words and numbers did not change.
"Lupe, are you sure there isn't an extra zero or two on the total?" Alcie asked. "This is a bit…"
"The amount is correct." Lupe confirmed. "Given the purpose of the combat team and you stating you wanted the best gear you could get them, well, this is the best."
Well, obviously Alice wanted the best. Like hell she was going to equip her maids with shitty weapons! That way led to her maids having more odds of getting killed in action and that was simply unacceptable. No way, not acceptable at all!
Unfortunately, quality had a price. Maintenance too.
"…I suppose it's too much to hope gangs would have good weapons?" Alice asked, feeling a headache coming.
"Do you honestly need me to answer that, mistress?"
"No."
Stupid corpos. Stupid overpriced gear. But if she wanted and remodded her maids to have the stabby type of tentacles whenever they needed them, people would panic a lot faster and then magical girls would be called.
Fuck.
"...I'm gonna have to actually work, huh?" Alice grumbled. Sure, the whole thing was mostly a front and she had a big advantage in that her minions needed only food, lodgings and energy to take care of. Unfortunately, she simply couldn't spam guns.
…Well, it would be all worth it. Just a bit of work and the guns would be paid for.
--
Unfortunately for Alice, that hope died in a fire fast once the shooting started.
"Geh." She let out, looking at all the expenses. It turned out that combat burned a lot of bullets. A huge shitload of bullets. It also turned out that corpos that actually were worth hitting also tended to equip their private soldiers with good armors, needing more and better bullets. Turns out blanks for the firing range also needed a ton of them. Also, guns could have parts breaking and needing replacements during a fight. And of course, explosives were single use.
Then there was the sheer enthusiasm of her maids about it. Sure, they were happy to do it because she ordered it. But then there was that hate of other corpos that always existed that made their use of ammo quite liberal.
But she had no fatality yet so that was all good, right?
"And of course, to ensure popularity, our combat units don't hesitate to eliminate monsters when they encounter them." Lupe reported. "That does help our intelligence since they trust them with anything odd happening."
Alice's face crashed on her desk. Who would have expected running her own military operations would burn this much cash so fast and so often?! Now she was going to have to work more to ensure they had enough income!
At least she had another date with Kaina soon. That was one bright spot she was really looking forward to. But why did being responsible sucked so much?! How did Steele manage it?!
--
Meanwhile
"Do you get the feeling we're missing something?" Steele asked her two friends, having their usual meeting to discuss situations.
For once however, things were… calmer. How, well, she had some ideas. There were reports of corpo warfare, but magical girls had no business getting in on that. But gangs were eliminated and those meant less distractions for magical girls.
And then there were reports a recent corporation was nice enough to remove monsters in the slums!
"Do we actually care?" Libromancer asked. "I mean, if someone out there wants to try to be better, let them be."
Steele opened her mouth, stopped at the first word she was about to say and then closed her mouth. Huh, that was a good point. What was happening was a good thing so there was no reason to stick her hand into it.
"Good point." Steele conceded. She turned her head to look at Kaina…
Who was off in her little world again staring at her phone. Probably texting her girlfriend again. The frown was a bit of an issue however.
"Everything good?" Steele asked.
"Yes." Kaina answered. "But… Alice sounds a bit stressed. She says it's work."
"Eh, it happens." Steele answered. "God knows it takes a lot to run a business."
--
"What." Alice let out, her tone as if all joys in the world ceased to be.
"I need more people." Kisha said. "I'm doing my best, but… Even if I can stop any attempt, there's more and more of them. We're getting more attention now and at some point, I'm going to be swallowed by the numbers."
But.. But… Kisha was supposed to be super good at this?!
"Can't you make some sort of gigantic firewall that stops everything?" Alice pleaded, even as she knew how absurd she sounded.
"If only." Kisha sighed wishfully. "But well, everyone has their own way to hack. I'm happy to say my methods have yet to be seriously blocked, but that doesn't mean I know each and every method of everyone else out there. And I shudder to think what will happen when a corpo decides to sick AIs on us."
No, no, no! That was a perfectly reasonable reason to need more people! She couldn't let her security have holes! And she couldn't just get her maids on it because they were from the streets and the less said about their computer skills, the better.
But that meant she had to work even more to get the money to pay them! Bad enough she decided being able to manufacture her own bullets would be better in the long run, she needed to hire people for that too! People she had to actually pay because she couldn't just put everyone in tentacle pods at this point because they had families that would ask questions!
Oh wait, she had a good idea! She would just direct her forces to fuck with those corpos trying to get at her. But for now…
"You and your sister. At my bed tonight." Alice demanded.
The thing she did for her cuties… She would make sure to get her fill of them at least.
--
"Steele, if you set up a conspiracy board, I'm setting it and you on fire." Libromancer declared.
Despite the news that criminal activities dropped even further than before, something that surprised even her, Steele insisted the other shoe would drop. So what if some corpos got gutted with their criminal activities exposed and others gleefully took their bases? Let them fight. If one of them proved troublesome, it was less of them to take down.
"Aren't you the least bit wondering what is causing this?" Steele argued back. "I mean, this basically never happens. There's got to be something happening that we don't see."
"We're not the city's entire police force, remember? That was what you said."
"Yes. You shouldn't work yourself too hard about it." A third voice chimed in.
Libromancer blinked. Was it really Kaina that just said that? THAT Kaina?
"...Did you just tell me I'm working too hard?" Steele asked, equally confused.
"Yes?"
Steele blinked again. She walked towards the window to look up for some reason, but Libromancer would wager she wanted to check the sky remained the same color as it was five minutes ago.
Of course, that all went over Infinity princess' head who just wondered what Steele was doing.
"You know what? Fuck it." Steele decided. "We have more free time than ever and I got a new recreation room I didn't even find the time to try myself yet. Let's just hang out."
--
Why did she make Lupe like a dog?! What sort of insanity made it sound like a good idea back then? She could find her whenever she tried to hide now!
"Nooooo!" Alice cried out as Lupe showed yet another bill. "I don't want to work anymore! Let me play! I wanna play!"
"I'm sorry, mistress." Lupe apologized. The worst thing was that she really did mean it. "I tried to do as much as I could, but then there are decisions I simply cannot make."
Why did she even start doing this seriously?! How did this all start?! Oh right, she wanted to take on bad guys because they were doing stuff involving her loves. Except funding her private military cost money.
And then it snowballed to hell because more and more started picking fights with her. It was almost like she was back to being a magical girl and just thinking that made Alice consider just torching the whole thing and starting over. Or just go slaughter the main corps involved. Which she couldn't really do because then her loves would definitely be called..
How worse could it get?!
As if summoned, a maid entered the room looking nervous.
"Errr, mistress?" The maid nervously called. "You have received an invitation to join the city's security council… What are we supposed to answer here?"
"...What."
--
"We HAVE to find some new rules between ourselves." Steele groaned.
The pool table was nice. Steele had even made sure everything was reinforced enough in case Kaina slipped and used too much strength. Teaching her how to play was nice.
And then she started to pocket every ball on the first shot. Libromancer was feeling competitive and then matched that, probably with some obscure magic spell she learned. And of course, she didn't want to be left behind as well, so she had her assistant math all she needed to do the same.
So it turned out reinforcing everything let them all bullshit the game as soon as it started since the table and balls could take it. Oops?
She was pondering between either dropping down all the magic or just saying the winner was the one with the most bounces when pocketing them all when Kaina's phone buzzed. Enamored as she was, she checked right away but then she frowned.
"Oh… Alice is not having a good time." Kaina explained. "Her maid is asking me if I can help cheer her up. Too much overwork and all."
"Right, she's doing a lot of good, last I heard." Steele muttered. "Well, make sure you do something extra nice for her when you see her. I'm sure she'll appreciate it.
"I will." Kaina answered, completely earnest. Man did Kaina have it good, being so much in love. Almost made Steele wonder if she would be the same if she found someone like that.
--
"No more! I can't do this anymore!" Alice cried out, hiding in her bedsheets. She had finally hit her breaking point and now the maids were somewhat in chaos due to her state too.
"Mistress Alice…" Lupe muttered. "I know how you feel but please, you have a guest."
"No! No more corpo wannabe smooth-talkers! I quit!" Alice shouted. "All I wanted was to be surrounded by cute girls, have fun with them and go find love with my idols! How did it all come to this?!"
"Err, mistress…"
"I can't even find the time anymore to enjoy this properly! What's the point of working so hard if I can't even have fun with my maids anymore?! How am I supposed to find time with Kaina too?! So what if what I want is lewd, I didn't deserve all this in return?!"
"Mistress, please!"
"I wanna give headpats! I wanna lick my maids! I want them in my bed! I want to love them! I'm in dire lack of Kaina too! I just wanna kiss her and forget everything and maybe plenty of other things! I didn't ask for all this work!"
"This is what you wanted, Alice?" A third voice asked.
Kaina's voice, in fact. Alice stilled, realizing that the guest Lupe mentioned was Kaina.
Oh, fuck.
…No, wait, she didn't even have the energy to pretend anymore.
"I'm so sorryyyyyy, Kaina!" Alcie cried out, discarding the sheets and diving into Kaina. The girl simply raised her arms to catch her as Alcie started to cry out in her chest. "All I wanted was to resolve an issue so I could devote all my time to you all, but it just added more work!"
"I see…" Kaina muttered, pondering something before speaking again. "Then, since you worked so hard, you can have your reward."
"...Huh?"
--
Steele stared at the phone in her hands. She tilted her head, wondering if she was reading it wrong, before trying to rub her eyes. Alas for her, the words did not change.
Following your suggestion, I'l be taking some time to stay with Alice. She stressed out from overwork.
With the help of Miss Lupe, we'll be having a company-wide orgy for the next three days for Alice, with all those willing.
Alice is already starting to feel better. Miss Lupe mentionned to me my friends are welcomed to join, if you want to.
"What the fuck?"
Good End?
--
So I pondered what would happen if we actually had to take care of costs. And then I also pondered if it could snowball. And then I remembered a particular South Part Episode, where Cartman get a theme park.
The end result is Alice caught in a vicious circle while our magical trio get to enjoy the extra time off.
Aren't we glad GG and ultima aren't tracking money or corpo work in this? I know you guys enough that we would have a faction going all work, no play first if we managed that too.