After the sale, we deposit the money with a bank (AbadarCorp, of course…) so we'll have it avaible the next time we lose, and head back to the ships to interrogate the deceased.

  We y the three we kept out in a cargo bay, and discuss our options.

  “So… Speak with Dead from Starfinder or Summon Spirit from Spheres?” Alice is contemptive.

  “Summon Spirit,” Brenna signs, “It doesn't give as many questions… but all four of us can try it in succession.”

  “Better chance of success…” Charlene considers, “we met them in person, kind of, and have the corpse, so they should be at a ten point penalty to the save… Speak with Dead doesn't have that cuse.”

  “Works for me,” I nod, “As for the questions… we want to know who's after us and where to find them, yes?”

  “So…” Charlene begins, “Who's your boss, why are you after us, and where do we find your boss?”

  “Works for me,” Brenna signs.

  “I'll start…” Alice announces as she sits down and begins the hour-long casting.

  I watch as the room darkens mysteriously, a cold wind picks up from nowhere, and a shadowy figure slowly forms over the corpse. When the spell is done, Alice begins her questions.

  “What is your boss's name?”

  The apparition speaks, compelled by the spell, sounding like wind whistling through trees in a graveyard, sending chills up my spine, “Wudhagh Krilge.”

  “How do we contact him?”

  “Dunno. He always contacts me.” Ugh… the voice sounds like it's trying to suck the life out of us… but it's also just so… stupid.

  “Why did you attack us?”

  “It's a living,” and with the third question, the spell expires, the wraith fades from existence, the wind dies down, and the lights go back to normal.

  “Well, he didn't lie or deceive,” Brenna signs.

  “We at least have a name now,” Charlene considers, “Something to inquire about.”

  “The Gather Information of Diplomacy, huh?” I smile, “That'll do.”

  “You may want to rest up first,” our ghost volunteers, “You're at the threshold of a new level.”

  We look at each other, and all head back to our quarters to rest, and soon enough, find the world fading away to be repced by the wrecked rainbow bridge….

  SpoilerFor Alice's ship, we downgrade the sensors (they're redundant with the sub-ships, mostly) so we can upgrade the cloak to max… which also requires upgrading the power core a touch. For the others, we push the shields to max, add Mark 1 Horacalcum defenses (which will slow incoming missiles which in turn will let the high speed movement we put on these ships, modified by special materials and the Pilot sphere, outrun any of them), upgrade the power core to cover them, add a Consciousness Uplink Drive (it lets a person plug in via a datajack impnt to act as two crew members, basically) and upgrade to Magic Thrusters (they help with the ships’ maneuverability)... and drop the point defense weapon and associated add-on mount.

  For my build, I want to be able to live again while not risking my hide… so I take a one level dip into Incanter on the off side, for the Sphere Specialization: Death. That grants me a one point bonus to my Death Sphere caster level, putting me at tenth for it. For my main side, I just keep going with Eldritch Godling, putting that at sixth, netting me native access to third level spells…and with the native caster level of nine, that will let me do fourth level spells, no problem.

  For my Mythic Tradition, I change out my Expertise: The Fey Adept's Shadowstuff is nice… but it's less useful when I can already have all the real talents it can emute quickly and easily. So instead? I grab the Mystic Dreamer connection, for the sixth level ability to spend Resolve points to cast any spell of a level I can cast. That works really well with Spheres of Power's transparency rules, because a caster level ten effect is a fifth level spell… so I can get Teleport, Lesser Pnar Binding, and so on quite easily… I just can't apply metamagic to them. I also swap my Curse for Promethian: Con damage when I don't have a Con score is meaningless, and it's easy to heal if it trips while I'm in a Conjuration Companion or something.

  Mythic also advances this level, and I get something I have wanted for a while: My second instance of Heirloom. That makes my ring a lesser artifact, and nets me two more abilities for it. I go with Eternal Bond (it's of little value of itself, it just means this Mythic item will always be mine, but it's a requirement for what I'm really after) and Soul Safe (basically it means my minor artifact ring - which can only be destroyed by some specific method set by the game master - acts as a phyctery, and will raise me up after twenty four hours… which is what I'm really after). For the feat, I take Extra Path Ability to grab Borrowed Power from the Spheremaster: That will let me briefly pick up other Mythic Path abilities as a swift action whenever I like… which I expect will be handy at some point. I take the time to swap out Flexible Counterspell for Implement Master, which will let me use any Implement I have on any sphere, which will be nice.

  For my wealth… an effectively infinite duration Instant Upgrade spell will cover any cybernetics I need, so I drop the Synaptic Accelerators and the Limited Telepathy Graft, as both can be cybernetic. The Warp sphere has some storage, as does the Dark Sphere, so I skip the Null Space Chamber as well, and spend eight of my fifteen grand on a Spheres Implement to boost my Death Sphere caster level by two… which also means, under transparency, that I can cast sixth level spells, which lets my Dreamer connection cast anything of that level and under. For the other seven grand, I get Intercepting Ears (it's a magitech impnt) so I can listen in on telepathic conversations and spend the rest on minor utility items.

  For my real feat, I take Counterspell from Spheres. It's not all that great on its own (Dispel Magic is better for my purposes), but it will serve as a nice prerequisite for things that are: Counterspelling Strike to dispel things while doing other tasks, Harmonic Counter to dispel technological items, Imperious Counterspell to take over summons and things, and Spelltheif to change spells’ targets… and things will get fun next level when I can get Counterspell Mastery to Counterspell as a reaction.

  I also tweak my casting tradition a little, trading Mental Focus for Innate Curse(Unchained), so I qualify for the drawback feat Curse Mastery, so I can have the full benefits of that Oracle’s Curse for the cost of another buff spell.

  I find I'm the st to finish… which is fine… and ‘sign off’ to get back to the material pne.

  [colpse]Once I'm back in what is hopefully the real world, I go through the buff routine for myself and my party mates. It's not nearly as long this time: Everything is effectively immune to dispelling so I only need to add newly-accessible spells (such as Greater Invisibility for my 'real' body), repce effects that can benefit from my new (higher) caster level, and add feats that people didn't previously qualify to have… also resummon my Conjuration Companions (of which I maintain two: one for my personal Starship, one to carry me) to take advantage of my upgraded Implement… and yes, I possess my heavily buffed minion.

  I take some time to try out my spell-based cybernetics; with the Arcforge Additional Item Slot feat (many, many times over) I can squeeze two augmentation into each system, so my posessed summon has an Accelerated Datajack and a Limited Telepathy graft in the brain, Illusion Refractors and a Heat Tracker graft in the eyes, a Sneakygraft and Fortified Feet in the feet, a Standard Speed Suspension and an Agile graft for the legs, and so on… and I can swap them out easily by dismissing and re-casting them.

  Connecting to my ship with the datajack is… interesting. I am the ship while I'm logged in. I can see through the sensors (as though I were in any of the ships, thanks to the Data Net), I can move it like my own body (or at least the one I'm currently possessing), and I feel the damage to it... it's strange. But it should let me pilot and fire the weapons easily… and the drawback of taking critical damage when the ship does doesn't matter too much when it's a disposable summon that will pay the price.

  “Are you done pying?” I hear on the airwaves directly. Alice is using her comm, and I'm still plugged into the ship, “We got a good lead on Wudhagh Krilge's location via the Witness the City Spheres talent. Let's go get him and figure out who hired him, eh?”

  “Be right there…” I initiate the disconnection procedure and head out.

  I meet the party at the airlock, and we leave together, heading to a residential section of Absalom Station… a very nice one: They have actual trees lining the road on a space station for goodness’ sake.

  Alice leads us to a specific ‘building’ (it's styled like a castle, but it's just minate over bulkheads). “So how do we want to py this?” Alice speaks into my mind as we walk past the target door.

  We can all ‘see’ inside as we walk. The Divination Sphere's Sense talents (especially Advanced Alternative Divination's Touchsight) combine well with Burrowing Spell metamagic to ignore line of effect and all barriers: We can ‘see’ through anything within our range (and with both Reach and Enrge metamagic, “our range” is the length of several football fields stacked end to end), provided teleportation isn't blocked. There's a single occupant, an orc male, who is currently eating a steak dinner with a side of mashed potatoes and gravy, and a bottle of wine… with his rifle, a sidearm, and a melee weapon at his side, while wearing heavy armor with the mask open.

  “Clearly he's expecting trouble,” Brenna replies, “We could just give it to him, but we want him alive to find out who hired him.”

  “I dunno,” Charlene comments on our mental channel, “We walk around in full armor whenever we don't have a specific reason to go without, and it's good sense to have the environmental protections avaible at all times while not on a pnet. It could just be habit.”

  “Well, we want to interrogate him, and teleportation isn't blocked.” Alice shrugs, “Greater Invisibility, Dimension Door, and the Mind sphere should get the job done. He won't even know who did it if we do it right.”

  “Mind control is rsther squicky,” I consider as we keep walking.

  “He either accepted or initiated a hit on us,” Brenna shakes her head, “and apparently ran a professional band of mercs who take such jobs. . The guy who orders murder, or accepts money to order murder, isn't exactly someone I'm going to coddle. Let's do it.”

  “It is exactly the kind of thing we'd do in game,” Charlene grins, “Scry and die is a well known tactic.”

  “Yeah, but the game master usually has something waiting for us,” I consider.

  “Got a better pn?” Alice shrugs.

  I think for a bit, “...well, we're using Burrowing Spell anyway, we can just mind-whammy him from here. Mind Sphere, Burrowing Spell, Ranged Mind, Subtlety, Candor, Mind Spy, and Command should combine well. We can interrogate him from the next ‘building’ over.”

  “We'll be going through spell points like they're water,” Brenna considers.

  “For us, they pretty much are,” Charlene points out.

  “Don't forget Amnesia,” Alice adds, “we don't want him to remember it happened. Okay, let's do it….”

  We all start with Mind Spy and Subtlety, repeating the spells until we can all see and hear what he does. We follow it up with Candor to force the truth until that sticks, followed by Command… Alice gets him first.

  And then, it's time for questions….