"See? Even your friend knows what's best in life," Boushh said merrily.<br/><br/>Ghost sighed and put a hand to his head. "Right. I'll see what I can do. Catgirls for Darc and... maybe the alien anthropologist that we ran into before the briefing?"<br/><br/>"Oh yes! The girl with three tongues."<br/><br/>"Right. Said she was here to study earth culture, had a funny way of going about it. Less like a scientist, more like just a perv- er,<em>aesthete</em>." That was the term for it, Ghost seemed reasonably certain. "I'm sure she could be convinced to tag along because you're obviously an important culture touchstone and this is an important event she should cover."<br/><br/>"Also she really likes pretty humans."<br/><br/>"Yes. That too."<br/><br/>Darclight changed the subject to something that wasn't escorts and Ghost gladly seized the opportunity to talk about something else. "Yes! Next targets. It depends on what sort of expertise I needed. If I were reeling after the Auxilia debacle and wanted a wizard with technology - assuming I wasn't looking for a literal wizard, I could do a lot worse than Doctor Jorias Quinn." The builder of technological monstrosities had begun as a professor at a technical school, and turned to villainy when budget cuts forced him out of a job. He had the benefit of being a master of his craft without most of the psychological drawbacks that mad scientists suffered from. He was usually willing (or coerced) to work under a villain with no scruples anyway, though, so his particular brand of sanity hadn't really helped anyone staring down the barrel of a giant mecha-cannon.<br/><br/>"On the other hand, if I felt like I had broken out all the... low-hanging fruit, as it were, and wanted to start cracking big threats without getting killed again, I'd go for Lord Recluse. That old bastard knew everyone and probably still does. He was the Kevin Bacon of supervillains." The self-described Count of Cruel was powerful in his own right, but he was uncannily good at bringing together other villains under his banner without the usual infighting that made villain team-ups prone to collapse, and combined their techniques and technology to foil heroes time and again.