World Tree MUSH

    The room isn the basement of a knick-knack shop in the hidden sanctuary city of El Camino Al Atardecer, known as the Sunset Road for the orichalcum road that winds west into the pocket realm. The room is decorated with warding insignias, meant to proof the area against spirits and ghosts. Sitting in a similarly warded cage made of faintly glowing silver is an overly large monkey, resembling an Emperor Tamarin with red eyes. Next to him, reading a book, is a young woman in a midnight blue dress.
    "... Are you going to torture me?" The caged creature's warbly voice asks of the young woman.
    "Only if you want me to, Mephy." She flips a page.
    Mephy looks aghast. "B-but Dorothy, how can you say such things?"
    "... I'm not even being mean. You do have some explaining to do, and I'm sure Benedicta and her friends have lots of questions for you."

Benedicta enters the basement of the knick-knack shop. The al-mir'aj girl is still a bit surprised that someone actually managed to catch Mephy. She figures the monkey would flee before letting himself be imprisoned. "You can say that again, there's a lot that's happened over the past 4 years but I'm sure it goes back even further than that." She sounds a bit weary. "What are you trying to accomplish anyway?"

    Last time Cagliostro was here, it ended up being something of a chaotic mess. She doesn't really know what goes on here, but has picked up the very basic gist of it, and a casual run-in has lead her to wander in and see if she can cross-examine.
    She knows basically nothing of the mess of the last four years, but the petite blonde certainly seems willing to listen, out of sheer curiosity if nothing else.
    "Is torture the standard? That seems pretty mean!" Cagliostro pouts lightly, and she does look like a barely teenage girl. But when Mephy glances her way, she quietly adds, "There are so much more reliable ways to get information," with a decidedly sinister grin.
    The grin is gone a moment later, as Cagliostro looks to be playing with the hem of her dress as if bored.

    Luke wanted to help any way he would, even if interrogations are not usually his strong point!. The boy makes his way down the store, and follows the others into the basement, his gaze focusing on the captive, blinking at the talk of torture. He assumes they are all trying to 'intimidate' Mephy into speaking, so he gets closer, "Oh?, what methods?" he asks. "Usually back home, if those team rocket guys refuse to speak, they get to spend some time with my pokemon, they tend to be much more talkative afterwards."

    Without looking up from her book, Dorothy Andrew answers Luke. "Methods like using spirit magic to force him to only speak the truth." Her eyes glance over at Mephy, who lets out a soft 'eep'. "But I've been told that's rude and the Beacon Society only does that for hostile or uncooperative spirts and ghosts."
    Mephy opens his mouth, closes it, ridiculous white mustache quivering nervously. He shrugs helplessly at Benedicta. "I... had a quota to fill. Buuut-! Now there's a man made of worms who wants me." He presses his face against the bars of his cage. "He'll take me apart and I'll stop existing!"

"Hey Luke, welcome to the questioning. And letting Sybil mess around with my soul was part of your quota? You're not the only one Mendel is after." Her attention then turns towards Calgliostro, "Hey, you were there when we dealt with the melting dogs. Are you a member of Beacon? I don't think I've seen you around here before?" She certainly looks like a Mahou.

    "Fear for existence is, traditionally, a good motivator," Cagliostro notes in something of a surprising sympathetic observation." However, Luke's comment has her looking at him in surprise. Who knew the kid was so hardcore? Then again... "That probably works."
    Benedicta starts asking pesky questions! "No, just a nosy passerby who happened upon some of this trouble a few months ago, and decided to nose about. I'm not really affiliated with anyone here, but an acquaintance of mine prefers it when I help out the underdog." She grins. "Besides, it's much more fun when I do. So if you need any alchemy requests, I have some skill in that. You can call me Cagliostro, or Most Adorable if you prefer~"
    Now, back to the interrogation at hand. "A man made of worms, you say? Like a construct made of worms or...? And you believe these people cannot protect you from him?"

    Luke did have to... get some answers from someone in the past, Team rocket can be quite nasty, but he was mostly just trying to intimdate the prisoner, he was not quite expecting to follow 'through' regardless. The boy nods a bit, nodding to Benedicta and the others, before focusing on Mephy, "So someone is going to destroy you?" he asks, "Perhaps we can keep you safe, as long as you answer their questions.". He really has no authority to make such an offer, but the guy looks fairly scared.

    Mephy bemoans his fate. "Doctor Worm is the worms, the worms are Doctor Worm." He rattles his own cage a bit. 
    Dorothy lets out a sigh of exasperation. "We're going to protect you as best we can, Mephy. But you really should explain better."
    Mephy looks gloomily at Luke, Benedicta, and Cagliostro. "I-If he gets ahold of me and my summoning contract, he could do what he wants with the maho I've created contracts with over the centuries. You got to find my contract and destroy it." He hesitates for a moment. "I could show Dorothy how to fix you, Benedicta."

"Most adorable, someone thinks highly of herself. Wait, he can do what? Oh crap...wait that won't have any kind of negative effect on anyone you've empowered will it? And fixing me is easier said than did, we have to find the other Benedicta first. I've had no luck with summoning her..." She can't help but to frown a bit.

    "Other Benedicta, hmm?" Cagliostro doesn't sound surprised, since literally the only time she's been in this world before now, she was dealling with doppels. She taps her chin though. "A contract magic binding those empowered. Yes, I see the problem and why he would want it."
    She snaps her fingers. "Well then, we'll just have to find it!" That simple eh? "Or, failing that, find some means of transferring the binding to a new contract. I'm afraid alchemy is my speciality, not contract magic, though I do know a bit about soul tethering."

    Luke doesn't really know much of the situation either, glancing back to Mephy, then back to Benedicta, "Maybe if you can't summon, can't you track that double instead?, maybe he knows some way of doing that?" he asks, glancing back to the captive one last time. "Where is your contract, in any case?" he adds, "how do we find such a thing?"

    Dorothy calmly looks up from her book, at Mephy, eyes narrowed. "wait. I'm a spirit mage, how would I be able to fix Benedicta without a fistful of oboli?"
    Mephy starts trembling as Dorothy leans to put her face near the cage. "Are you lying to save your own skin, Mephy? Because you really don't need to and I'm sure Benedicta can suggest some punishments if you are..."
    Mephy gulps. "D-d-do you want to risk that I'm not?" Dorothy withdraws with a hmph, going back to her book. "Y-yes. Contracts. They're like keys. I-I was summoned by Fauste ages ago, on behalf of the Order of Hermes, and my contract gives others power over me. T-the Order of Hermes p-probably has my contract filed with the ones for other puchuu like me. And if Doctor Worm has my contract, he can coerce me to give him the contracts I made with maho like Alan." Then he mumbles something about how there aren't actually contracts for Sybil or Benedicta and this is why his magic screwed up so badly. He mumbles something that sounds suspiciously like 'sorry' to Benedicta.

"Wait, so that's what we needed the mirrors for...we weren't actually empowered..." Benedicta suddenly realizes. "Sybil managed to use my mirror to split my body into two so she could control it. That's why I no longer have it. Part of my soul inside it though and Sybil as well. Yeah, it's a total mess. Well, that's easily solved, Kira should know where it is right? Could you use alchemy to put someone's soul back together? And tracking it...I'm not sure would she leave some kind spiritual trail behind her, Dorothy?"

    Benedicta's question has Cagliostro flourish, "Of course! It would be a trivial matter!" A pause... "Is what I would like to say. It's true that I am something of an expert, but dealing with a soul is always a delicate matter, especially given I am in a different world from my own. That being said, if both halves were willing and desiring to reunite, I believe I could do it provided I had some time to prepare. If there is a simpler way, I would advise that, but I believe I could succeed if absolutely necessary."
    The alchemist, now bragging about her skills, has been recruited quite easily! She's listening to Dorothy as well now! "MMm, Order of the Hermes, is it? I like the sound of that. And by like, I mean hate. I tend to not get along well with organizations that study the arcane. It's always 'blah blah give us the secret of eternal life' and so on." She does love to talk about herself, but nothing will get done if she keeps up, so she clams up to actually think about the contracts issue and listen to the others. She nudges Luke, "Know anything about filing systems?"

    The boy looks back to Cagliostro at the nudge, that was a question for sure. "Not really, all I ever had to organize and read was some pokemon information, but it is just simple clasification of stuff by types." he mumbles, rubbing the back of his head. "So not sure how much I can help with that." he says with a grin. "I admit I pretty much just... only know about pokemon related things, battling, and caring for such."

    Dorothy looks at Benedicta sheepishly. She holds up the book she's been reading, which is entitled 'Practical Grimoire For Beckoning Spirits'. "I'm still learning alot about spirits and souls, Bene. I'll have to ask somebody with experience?"
    Mephy quickly expounds on something for Cagliostro's sake. "No no. They just want to control the world and follow the teachings of Hermes Trimegustus. Us spirits do a lot of their dirty work." He glances at Luke. "Are your pokemon a kind of spirit?"

    The question from Mephy gets his attention, and he actually seems to consider that for a bit. "I am not... sure?, heard many things about pokemon legends and mysthical things from them... they certainly seem... more unique than creatures on other worlds, as far as I have seen.". He reaches around one of his pokeballs, and clicks it open, releasing Pangshi, the small costumed, panda creature looking around curiously, before turning to Mephy, "This is a pokemon, he is a ghost type.". Pangshi waves, floating a foot from the ground. "Maybe they are?".

    "Ugh, boring," Cagliostro says, making a face. "Control the world? Why bother with that? They clearly don't deserve anything they've found." Seems she has a dislike of that motivation... even if it isn't exactly altruistic of her, at least she claims it isn't.
    The talk of souls is more in her wheelhouse, so Cagliostro joins in. "The issue is that different worlds appear to have slightly different metaphysics. That said, in a very gross sense they all seem similar, so perhaps?" Idly examining the Pangshi.

"Yeah, I'm not sure if my other half wants to get back together. She kind of tried to kill me and then ran away." Benedicta can't help but to wonder about that. "I wonder how much Shel knows...I mean she's not a spirit mage but she's pretty powerful and undead." Of course that would have to get ahold of her first. "Well, the order kind of likes to keep magic a secret from the public. I mean letting everyone know would cause problems, but on the other you can't keep it a secret forever." She knows people are going to find out eventually one way or another.