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Light yellow/green-dark red-… Hennessy blinked, trying to focus. Her mother was talking to dark dark blue-darkest purple/dark blue-light orange… to her father. She couldn’t hear them, but it was easier to keep track of their conversation by way of their emotions than their words, anyway – a physical screen meant nothing to her. She was…

Her attention was drawn away by the constant pressure of darkest yellow-darkest light blue…

She shook her head, trying to push away the intense emotions that her en- her ri- her sister was radiating. She moved her eyes away from dark blue… the D- her father’s… her grandfather, and looked at her, her…

All she saw was a tangle of colours, an impossibly complicated effigy woven out of pure light in more colours than could be counted. There was a blinding yellow tinged with light green and a blazing blue. There was a very light red tinged with a brighter blue. None of the shades of purple, though, that she was used to seeing from her whenever they fought, or the dark red and occasional darkest red, or…

She blinked, and she saw a white-haired girl with eyes like hers, wearing a pretty dress and trying to jiggle closer to her without sitting up, making small hops with her chair. Again and again, Camille reached out to push her away, connecting to her with light dark green-dark red-dark light blue strands.

Hennessy could feel Camille’s emotions like a warm blanket and cool armor, wrapping around her. She knew how hard a situation like this was to her, and she was trying to drown out the storm of emotions from her sister and her parents… but she was only partially succeeding. Too much, it was too much, her sister was like a furnace of emotions that were pushing against Hennessy’s consciousness, strands of brilliant colour wrapping around her as if for an embrace – or to choke. She was having a hard time telling them apart from what she herself was feeling, which was why she wasn’t reacting to anything… she didn’t know whether the joy and the surprise and the fear and the remorse she was feeling were her own, or whether everyone around her was influencing them, and she had to disentangle her own emotions from theirs.

Sadly enough, the one revelation that should’ve shook her the most – being the granddaughter of the Dark – was the easiest to deal with right now. When they’d arrived, she’d felt her father inside, and the strangely muted employees of the restaurant – she could tell that someone was dampening their minds – and she’d been able to tell that someone was there with him, because of the way his emotions were focused on a present person… but she hadn’t been able to tell who it was, because everyone else was so muted.

Then they’d come in, and she’d seen him. Really seen him, without the tangle of emotions blinding her to his appearance. Usually, she had to take a few seconds to focus her sight on the real world, as opposed to the sight her tenant had gifted her with, but he was so muted, his effigy barely visible, a tightly controlled dark light blue of surprise, a little light dark blue of pensiveness, a light orange of interest, the telltale mixture of dark light blue and light dark green, that being awe… but so little of it, the strands so fine she could see through them to the matter beneath.

Right now, as things were, he was the least troublesome person in the room to her, and so she focused her gaze on him, focusing on his emotions. Normally, she used Camille or her mother as an anchoring point, because she knew perfectly well how they felt about her, and how she herself felt about them. Extrapolating from there to untangle her own emotions from those of her surroundings had become almost an instinct to her, one of the few ways she had to preserve her sanity. But her mother was a tangle of colours and emotions right now, and Camille was too angry and surprised and terrified to help. So instead she focused on the Dark, on his muted emotions, and on what she felt about him. She focused on the tangles of light yellow and light dark blue and darkest light blue and dark dark green that connected from her to him, compared them to the strands which emerged from him towards her, and worked from there to untangle all the colours that were choking her.

Of course, that was all grossly simplified. She saw so many more colours than the human language had words for, not just shades of colours that humans knew, but whole new colours that she’d never seen before or since, except when viewing people’s emotions… and sometimes those of their tenants. It was there that she usually found these eldritch colours that made no sense to anyone else.

Still, during therapy, her counselor had suggested that she simplify the process, using clear colours to break down what she saw and classify it. Amazingly, it had helped get a measure of control over her tenant and lately, she’d actually been able to walk through a mall with Camille and see the world, not just the tangles of colours from everyone around them.

Her parents were still talking to each other, their emotions straightening themselves out. That made it a little easier to distinguish what she felt and what they imposed on her through simple proximity; it helped that her father’s (it still felt unfamiliar, applying that term to a real person she wasn’t fantasising about) emotions were always threaded through by those strange other colours that she’d come to associate with a particularly strong influence of a person’s tenant on their emotions – she knew it from her own, but from few others, though no metahuman was completely free of it. Soon, she’d cut them out as well, much like her grandfather before. Next, she untangled Camille’s emotions – which were ever so familiar and dear to her, but nonetheless, she needed some space in her head right now – from her own (there’d be time to drown in each other later, when they were alone and safe). Finally, she slowly separated herself from the wellspring of emotions that was still trying to come closer to her, though it took her two whole minutes to do so and actually look at her newfound sister… half sister. She looked so… stunningly normal. So unlike any other time they’d met (which had almost always been in battle). She was a tangle of emotions, of course, but somehow… simpler than most metahumans.

Usually, she had to disentangle a metahuman’s from those weird ones that came from their tenants, but the Mat- Elouise’s effigy (a word suggested by her counselor) was two-fold, half around her, half within her shadow – and the eldritch parts were mostly limited to the shadow, which she could ignore completely. She was almost as easy to read as Camille was, to her, despite the lack of familiarity.

She looked at her new family member and thought about how weird it felt that, after spending her whole life dreaming of having a father, and a sibling her own age, she’d get both in the span of just two days, and a grandfather as well… only two of them were villains and her father was… almost as twisted inside as she was

Her eyes moved from her sister to her grandfather and then to the screen that her parents were talking behind, and back to her grandfather.

She probably shouldn’t be surprised that they were all messed up, seeing how his blood ran through their veins.

Hennessy released a breath she hadn’t even realised she’d been holding, just as her parents came back. Her head was starting to hurt, as it always did when she tried to focus on words and faces. She blinked, having long since figured out that her tenant didn’t like it when she relied on normal human communication. It punished her, usually starting with migraines, whenever she spent too much time blocking out peoples’ emotions.

But she needed to hear this. To see their faces, to be human just for a little while.

Just give me a few minutes, she thought, not sure whether her tenant could even understand her. I just need a little time.

***

Tamara sat down to join Hennessy, taking a chair between her and Elouise – which put a hold to Elouise’s attempts to get closer to Hennessy (though by the look on her face, she was already plotting how to close the distance regardless of the new obstacle).

I, on the other hand, sat down on the empty side of the table opposite of Elouise, with my father to my right. “Alright,” I said, drawing the attention of everyone other than Camille, who was watching my father like a hawk… a very obviously scared hawk.

Please, God, don’t let her try and use her power on him. If she did… I didn’t believe for a moment that he didn’t have something lined up in case she tried, or else he wouldn’t be here anymore. But if she lashed out, it might provoke a reaction from Elouise, which would provoke a reaction from Hennessy…

No, best to keep everyone focused on me and busy. “I apologise for springing this on everyone so suddenly,” I said once I was sure that everyone was focused on me.

“No shit,” Camille helpfully threw in. “What’s next, is Di-fucking-L gonna walk in and join us?”

“Language, young lady,” Tamara reprimanded her.

I ignored the little exchange. “So, obviously, you’ll all have some questions. How about we get them out of the way? Ask, and I’ll answer to the best of my ability. No lies, I promise.” I looked around the table, to see who’d speak up first.

To my surprise, Hennessy was the first one to move – literally, she raised her hand onto the table and tapped a finger on the polished wood covered by white cloth. There was no projection of emotions, though, for whatever reason.

Instead, she looked at me, then pointed at Elouise. Then she spread both of her hands in a questioning gesture.

It was the single most normal way she’d expressed herself to me, so far (while awake, at least), but I shelved my curiosity for now. “You want to know how I happened to have a daughter with the Matriarch,” I translated her question. She nodded, and so I regaled to them the (really uncomfortable) tale of how Elouise came to be.

Afterwards, everyone just stared at me; or at least Hennessy, Tamara and Camille did. Elouise seemed embarrassed by the tale, but mostly she was still focusing on Hennessy, while my father was… being very quiet. He was just looking at Elouise and Hennessy (or so I guessed – hard to tell, since he might not even be facing in the direction his wraith was looking) and not doing anything.

“So… the Matriarch basically tricked you into putting a baby into her in order to… control you?” Camille asked slowly, as if she couldn’t quite believe it. “Isn’t that a tad extreme? Even if you’re a real speedster, having a baby with you just to get her claws into you seems… way over the top.”

“Not at all,” Elouise countered. “To my mother, that was just a ‘strategic initiative’. Truth is, she’d done it before, over the decades.” She looked at my father, then at me. “To be honest though, seeing who my grandfather is, makes me believe that she probably knew about your connection to him – she was always a little too insistent in using him as an example for my training; she was probably hoping that he’d feel flattered by me and thus support her endeavours more openly.”

So, you don’t have any illusions about her feelings for you, either? I thought to myself, trying to swallow the bile that I felt creeping up my throat.

Hennessy was giving Elouise a look that told me she probably felt the same.

“Wait wait wait wait,” Camille spoke up again. “Your mom had you just to impress that guy!?” She pointed at my father (I was starting to doubt that the girl could feel real fear). “And you knew it?” She was looking horrified.

Elouise shrugged. “I love my mother, but I’ve known since I was eight that the feeling was never mutual.” She turned to me. “Who’s your mother? She must’ve been quite the character to… um… draw your attention, Sir,” she finished in a more respectful tone directed towards my father.

I felt one side of my mouth quirk up. “She sure was. Her name was Wanda Alexandrou. She was an immigrant from Greece, by way of Britain. You may have heard the story of a psychologist trying to ‘cure’ him,” I replied, nodding towards my father. “And falling in love with him in the process. That was… well her.”

Camille gave me a weird look and opened her mouth. “Wait, weren’t that woman and her child l-“

Hennessy either picked up on my emotions or simply remembered how I’d reacted back when we’d looked at the photographs, because she put her hand on Camille’s shoulder, silencing her.

My father was still not reacting. At all. I was starting to get worried.

“Any other questions?”

“Is this connected to the Ascendant’s return, and do you know why he’s attacking me, as well?” Elouise asked.

“Wait, he attacked you? Why would he?” Camille exclaimed, and Hennessy’s body language revealed similar shock to what I heard in her girlfriend’s voice.

“I just asked him that, so I obviously don’t know,” Elouise replied with a rather annoyed look on her face.

I decided to interject before Camille could reply, because I was pretty sure the two of them couldn’t stand each other. “I don’t know why he’s doing what he’s doing – what I’ve been able to find out about him only makes his behaviour more baffling,” I said urgently, now focusing on Elouise. “I gathered you all here because… well, because I saw where this was all heading. The secrets, the unknown factors. I decided to cut the Gordian Knot, so to speak, and just put all the cards on the table. And I was hoping to enlist your help in taking the Ascendant down for good,” I finished with a look towards my father.

He still didn’t react.

“Is something… wrong with him?” Camille asked carefully, as if she was afraid of insulting him (she did have some common sense, then). “He’s being so… quiet.”

What’s wrong with him? Where to begin? Still, it was a valid question, and so I turned to him. “Father. Father! Dad!” I shouted, and he flinched.

He flinched. In front of others. Not a good sign. Then he looked at me. “Yes, Aaron?” Using my real name when there is someone other than me present.

Tamara mouthed the words ‘Your name is Aaron?’, but I ignored them and focused on him again.

“Is something wrong? You are being… uncharacteristically quiet in the face of this scene,” I asked as diplomatically as I could.

He looked at me, then at the girls. Then at Tamara, and back at me. “You’ve… had children,” he said, his choral voice at odds with the flat intonation of his words.

“Yes, that is rather the point,” I replied. What is going on here?

“You had children,” he said again. “You. Not just one, but two. I am man enough to admit that I never truly considered the possibility.“

Ah. That explains it, I thought, even as I felt a (hopefully) faint blush creep up on my cheeks. “Well, it happened. I don’t see why it’s such a big deal.” For all his brilliance, he’d never been that good at accepting things he’d not seen coming at all. Not that I knew what was so unexpected about this.

He tilted his head to the side. “I remember a certain someone swearing, with the help of various invectives which I shall not repeat in this company, that he would never, ever, under any circumstances, even if he was the last man on Earth, have children.“

I sighed. “I was thirteen. It’s been more than two decades since then.”

“It’s been twenty-two years, three months, a week and a day since the last time we spoke,” he said. “You will excuse me if it takes me a little while to update my mental image of you.“

He rose up from his seat – and everyone except for me tensed up. I saw Elouise’s shadow partially rise from where it’d been clinging to her chair, and I thought I saw a glimmer flash in Hennessy’s eyes, for just a moment. My father, however, ignored that, and then…

And then his wraith faded away. I didn’t expect that. I don’t think anyone expected that.

I hadn’t seen this form since I’d been twelve years old. A tall, slender figure wearing a jet black, featureless bodysuit that extended seamlessly into a pair of equally black, featureless boots and gloves. Over that, an equally black coat not unlike Journeyman’s – it was, in fact, identical down to the wide sleeves. The face beneath the hood was hidden in shadows, though I knew that the bodysuit he wore extended to a completely featureless, skintight mask. All in all, his costume and Journeyman’s were identical, save for the colour of their light robes.

He ignored the stares he was getting (or perhaps he enjoyed them) to walk around the table and put a hand onto Elouise’s shoulder. She shivered as he continued to walk, his gloved fingers sliding over her bare shoulders, and rose from her seat when his hand wrapped gently around her biceps, pulling her along. He took her past Tamara – who looked more tense than I’d ever seen her, turning on her chair to watch them intently – and reached with his other hand for Hennessy.

Camille didn’t give him the chance. “Keep your hands off of her!” she shouted as she rose to interpose herself between my daughter and my father, and something struck him, knocking him off his feet and at least ten feet away!

Oh, she did not just do that! I thought to myself, half-poised to leap across the table and interject myself, but to my eternal relief, father just got up with a chuckle, dusting himself off while Elouise just stared at him, mouth open, and Tamara and Hennessy stared at Camille.

“Excuse me,” he said, his voice normal for once. Still finely honed steel wrapped in silk, as I so often pictured it, but now recognisably human. He approached again. “I mean none of you any harm,” he said calmly, as if she hadn’t just knocked the King of Supervillains around. “Camille, would you please allow me to properly greet my granddaughter?” he asked her in a soothing, polite tone of voice.

She looked at him, then looked over her shoulder at Hennessy, then back at him. She chewed on her lip for a moment. “Alright. But do anything weird and I won’t hold back next time!”

He nodded, as if there was any possible way for her to actually harm him. But it seemed to be enough for her – barely – and she stepped aside.

Hennessy rose up and approached him, together with Elouise. He looked them both up and down, and Elouise at least seemed pretty embarrassed – like she was afraid he’d disapprove of her appearance in some fashion.

Is that just how a normal child would react when first meeting her grandfather, or is that her mother’s education, her desire to please the Dark? I couldn’t be sure, and I wasn’t sure that I wanted to be sure.

“I’ve never had grandchildren before,” he said quietly. “If I’d known, I would’ve brought presents.” He looked at me, as if telling me that we had to go shopping for several year’s worth of presents.

I was seriously getting creeped out by his casual attitude right now.

“Nevertheless, let me just say this – I’m perhaps not the ideal grandfather you could wish for, but I do intend to be there for you from now on… provided that you want me to.”

And then the jerk hugged them both, if briefly. I haven’t even gotten to do that yet.

Hennessy gave no indication at all as to what she was feeling, but Elouise looked ready to burst with joy.

Before she could blow up and make a mess, though, he let go, and Hennessy was pulled back by an invisible force, straight into Camille’s arms. The young blonde hugged my daughter close, throwing murderous looks at father and me.

Elouise looked at her, as if she couldn’t believe how she was acting.

“Now, I believe there are some urgent matters to discuss,” father continued, and he turned to look at me. “I presume that you are worried about the Ascendant?”

Thanks for steering the conversation back on track, I thought. Not that I was sure we’d ever been on track before, but still. “Yes. I’ve found out some troubling news – namely, that he’s a member of the Gefährten.”

“Ah,” he replied simply. “That makes sense. You need my help to deal with them.” It wasn’t a question.

I didn’t even bother to nod.

“Who’re the Gefährten?” Tamara asked. “Their name is German – that can’t be a good sign.” She was focusing on me, not my father, and I was pretty sure she was feeling way out of her depth.

I’m sorry for putting you through this. “They’re an old villain organisation. Older than the Syndicate. They’re the kind of people that made monsters like Weisswald possible.” There was no use in sugarcoating things – they had to know, so they’d be careful.

Elouise and Tamara both paled, while Camille and Hennessy hugged each other tight. Way to scare the most important people in your life, Aaron.

“You needn’t be afraid,” father interjected in his smoothest voice. “I shall take care of this. Aaron,” He turned to me, then hesitated, then looked at the girls, then back at me. “I shall wait outside. Join me when you’re ready.” His wraith rose up again, wrapping around him, and he left the restaurant.

I exhaled, relaxing a bit. That went better than I expected.

“I think… that’s more than I can take for a day,” Tamara said, leaning back on her seat. “Kev- Aaron, what were you thinking?”

“I was thinking that I need the biggest guns I can get in order to keep my family safe,” I said as I went around the table and to Elouise, who was standing there alone. I put my arm around her shoulders and walked towards Hennessy and Camille.

My daughter disentangled herself from her girlfriend and met us halfway, and I pulled her in for that long overdue group hug.

“No matter what else happens, or what you may think of me, or each other,” I whispered to them, “I’ll keep you two safe, by any means necessary.”

They both shivered and hugged me back.

***

I left the restaurant a few minutes later, after organising a family get-together of sorts (I was exploiting their stunned state of mind for all it was worth, trying to set things up as favourably as I could while I still had the momentum on my side), to find my father waiting there in plain sight, in his wraith form, leaning against a lamppost.

“That was expertly played,” he said when I approached him, while I sent a message with my phone.

“I wasn’t playing, Dad,” I replied, annoyed. Of course he’d think that. “I wasn’t intending to manipulate you, or them. I simply want to keep them safe, and to stop with the lies.”

He looked at me for a moment. “I believe you,” he said simply and turned to look down the street just as Cartastrophy’s heavily modified vehicle raced around the corner. “What’s your plan?“

“Take down the Ascendant and his people with extreme prejudice,” I replied. “If possible, take slow, long, delicious vengeance on him for what he put my child and her loved ones through.”

“That is acceptable. Let’s turn it into a father-son outing,” he said as Cartastrophy pulled up next to us, retracting the roof of his patchwork car to goggle at the two of us. “I know you dislike my ways, but they are more appropriate for this than yours.“

“I wouldn’t be asking you for help if I wasn’t ready to work with you,” I replied, opening the back door of the car for him. He got in while Cartastrophy was staring at me (I didn’t need x-ray vision to picture his facial expression behind that face-concealing helmet). Then I got in on the passenger’s side. “Cartastrophy, take us to the nearest entry into the Undercity, please.”

“Seriously?” he asked, even as he took off. “You called him in? It’s gotten that bad?”

I give him an ‘isn’t that obvious’ look.

“He knows?” Father asked with some surprise in his voice.

“Of course he knows,” I answered him without bothering to look at him. “He’s my friend. You do know what that is, right?” I couldn’t stop myself from saying.

He gave me one of his patented maddening chuckles. “I am aware of the concept, though I’ve never bothered with any myself.“

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