The place doesn't sound like anywhere that James has heard of. And he's not entirely sure what plane shift means, but given everything he's seen and heard from Elodea, he can guess. "You're not from around here, are you," he says, stepping into the elevator and motioning her to follow. "How common is magic like yours where you're from?"

"I don't know where I am to guess," she replies. "It's not very common, the stuff that lets you become a wizard is a scarce resource."

"I bet it's even more scarce here, since I've never heard of it, and I doubt anyone else has either. Well, lucky for me, I suppose, even if you have caused me quite a bit of hassle."

 The door of the elevator opens into the lobby, high-ceilinged with tall marble columns and artsy paintings on the walls. James always thought it gave his business an air of legitimacy, though that was hardly on his mind at the moment. 

"Is everything all right, doctor?" The security guard asked as he hurried by. "Maria just ran past looking like something horrible had happened to her. Is there anything I can-"

"Don't worry about it," James said, cutting him off, and pushing open the glass doors to head for his car. He needed to get home, change himself and the girl with a much finer eye to detail, what with the hack job he'd done on her, and then get the hell out of town with her. And only then could he relax. At least his new acquisition was hot, and would certainly help him relax once they had a moment  

Certainly! After all, she does want to help and please him, and...helping him relax...won't get anyone else hurt, and even once she's not mind-controlled anymore she's not going to be more upset about this than about a normal iteration of getting got by the curse. 

"Should I ask questions as I have them, or speak only when spoken to, Master?" she asks deferentially once they're in the car and nobody else can hear her. 

James would be happy to hear that, but he's going to more than make sure of that anyways. Very sure of that, given that she has strange magic that can apparently break his control like that. Extra especially sure of it. 

James isn't used to the people he changes having all that much initiative, and turns around back in surprise when she speaks. Still, he's hardly had time to do much of anything to her yet. "Feel free to ask," he tells her. It might help him figure out a little more about her, and right now he's a little too panicked to ask questions of his own, and it'll give them something to do for the ride. And once he changes her properly it won't matter what she knows, and he'll feel calm enough to find out everything she knows, properly. 

"What is this that we're riding in? What's the local magic like? Wizardry can do some interesting things with Celestials, so I might be able to help you better if I understand this plane's magic." 

James laughs. "As far as I know, there is no local magic. Or at least if there is, I don't know anything about it. As far as I know, and I've looked, the only people I know with magic are myself, the strange man who gave me magic, and now you. You're a truly excellent find. I don't know how I lucked out such that you landed right on top of me, maybe you were drawn to magic? But even if you're making my life a bit more difficult at the moment, I expect you'll be doing a lot more good for me in the future. Depending on what you can do, I could certainly expand my little operation quite a bit." 

"Hm. Maybe. I don't know. Just be careful when you're rearranging my head, if you're not careful enough I could lose my magic." 

James mouth twists with annoyance and frustration. "Shit. Is there any danger of that? I don't get as much feedback from the use of my powers as I might like. What would make you lose your magic?" 

"Magic exists in structures in the brain. Anything that makes me less intelligent or creative or anything like that could fuck up the structures until they can't hold magic any more." 

James breathes a sigh of relief. That should be work-aroundable. Normally the people he transforms end up a little more simple, but instead she just needs to be intelligent and creative for him. Still, he should make sure he hasn't messed any of that up, otherwise this would have been a very annoying interruption and all for nothing. "Have I affected your magic at all, yet? As long as you can tell without using your magic. Actually, don't use your magic without my permission unless I say otherwise." She was supposed to please him, and she clearly wanted to, and was already calling her Master, but he still had not reason not to be extra cautious. If he needed her power to defend himself he should have enough time to tell her so. He could always release this stricture once he was very sure of her loyalty and service. 

"I don't think it would have, but I can't tell without trying to use magic." 

"Alright, what's something small you can do?" James turns the corner. There's no traffic at all. Thank goodness. He's not sure how much time they're racing against, but the more time they have the better. 

"I can...hm. I dunno. I can do lots of stuff, but I don't know enough about this plane to know what's safe." 

"Is this plane that different from where you're from? Make a reasonable guess." 

"Hmm, something small...I could do a divination, those are generally safe. But a null result wouldn't be conclusive, those can fail for other reasons."

Her magic seems like it could be very interesting. Clearly complicated, but interesting. He considers asking her what kinds of things she could divinate for, but honestly he can ask that later more at his leisure and right now a result would be better than not a result. "Let's try something a little more conclusive then. Can you, say, levitate something? Or change something into something else? Something so we can be sure." 

"...The levitation I have would not be safe at this speed."

"Hm, I suppose it can wait until we get there, then." There's so much to ask and they have to run first and this is going to make things rather difficult. And clearly her purported intelligence and cleverness are hardly being pointed in his direction at the moment, and he should easily be able to fix that. But first things first. "Is there anything else you wanted to ask, then?" He turns another corner. They should be there soon. 

"If this thing isn't magic then...what is it?"

James grins, smug and superior. "Technology. Lots and lots of technology. Maybe where you're from, you use magic to make up the difference, or something, but here we just have technology, and lots of it. I don't know how it all works, necessarily, but it, and many other things, are purchasable." More or less as he expected from her primitive and strange manner of dress, but wherever she's from is clearly not as advanced as here is. 

She considers possible responses, and settles on an impressed little "Oh!" and sitting back in her seat, apparently satisfied. 

James had been expecting a little bit more of her being impressed. But, that doesn't matter at the moment. And if she has nothing more to ask, they'll arrive and pull into his driveway after another couple minutes. 

She figures out how to operate the door and gets out and waits for further instruction. 

He motions her to follow inside, and pulls a coin out of his pocket and hands it to her. "Let's just make sure your magic still works," he tells her. "Levitate that for me, if you can."