Tag Archives: Amy

B012.9 Born At Sleep

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Crocell’s eye swiveled around, passing over the approaching capes and cowl – to focus, apparently, on Tyche again.

“The fu-” she started to say before Basil tackled her out of the way of the beam of whatever-it-was that Crocell sent her way.

The two of them fell off the roof as half of it – the half Tyche had been on – was disintegrated. Hecate, having stood on the other side of Basil from Tyche, was safe, though she smoked away just to be safe.

Basil fired a hook, swinging away from the doomed building – but clearly, Crocell wasn’t done, as it turned its head to pursue them with its lethal beam. He saw it approach them and knew that there was no way he could evade it – but Tyche could, maybe, if she turned to smoke, so he threw her away from himself.

“What are y-” she began to shout, only to be interrupted again.

“Smoke away!” he shouted, and she did as the beam approached.

If I swing around the building, I might get away, he thought, only then it was rendered moot as Kraquok tackled Crocell, one arm punching it’s barely existent jaw to snap its mouth shut.

The multi-limbed cowl roared as he pushed against the even bigger monster, whose limbs were still stuck to the ground by the silvery field the girl from the Feral family – Mercury, if he remembered their roster correctly – and bent it over backwards.

Crocell tried to open its maw, perhaps to roar but more likely to blast Kraquok off of itself, but the veteran fighter was using two of its limbs to hold it closed, while bending the feral monstrosity backwards – if it’d had anything like a classic skeleton, it’d have a broken spine by now; Kraquok was very nearly straddling it at this point, Crocell’s head and back just a metre or two away from touching the ground and getting stuck to Mercury’s field.

“Come on…” he couldn’t help but whisper as he swung onto another building. It would’ve been smarter to get out of sight, to only watch through his ravens, but he really, really wanted to see the pro’s go to town in person.

Evidently, others felt the same way, as capes and cowls gathered around the park. Whether they were holding back out of morbid curiosity, or because they didn’t want to get in the way (and possibly get hit by Kraquok’s infamous breath weapon), hold back they did, as Tyche and Hecate joined Basil again. Gilgul was up above, closer to the battle, looking for a chance to strike.

“Hey B, thanks for saving my ass – again,” Tyche said lightly, though Basil could hear an undercurrent of actual gratitude hidden beneath her light-hearted demeanor.

“I wonder why it’s been targeting you,” Hecate said, seemingly more worried than Tyche herself. “You’re hardly the most dangerous person around, and yet it’s been going after you every time it hasn’t been distracted by others.”

The redhead girl shrugged, just as Kraquok finally succeeded in bending Crocell over to the point where its head and shoulders were now stuck, leaving the monster now bent backwards in a rather grotesque way, its limbs flailing around uselessly.

He immediately got out of the way, at the same time that Doc Feral made a simple hand motion, and the whole Feral family sprang into action.

Wunderkind downed a glowing potion. Several others either drank or injected or, in one case, inhaled various concoctions. Doc Feral herself stabbed an injector into her left forearm. Only Mercury (a name she couldn’t possibly have claimed had it not been in the Feral Family for decades) kept her current power, maintaining the hold on Crocell.

And then they ripped into the beast.

They acted in pairs, at least, if not in trios. Basil couldn’t even tell what the individual powers they’d picked were, as they never used them independently of each other; instead, they heterodyned with an ease that made his and Polymnia’s gadgeteering session seem anemic. Brilliant beams of spiraling energy, twisting, semi-solid masses of corrosive light, vicious exploding mist lashing out like a lovecraftian horror with countless tentacles and more assaulted their prone quarry. Some of them stuck together, some only combined for a single attack before they cycled through partners, powers or both.

The result was a glorious, perfectly coordinated storm of destruction that flayed the flesh off Crocell’s side and hips. Clear fluid shot out as if it was filled with high-pressure hoses, as masses of pearlescent, pale white flesh and what looked like cartilaginous bones (in a configuration which seemed to be meant for a fish rather than a humanoid) were exposed, and the assault didn’t stop there – they only dug deeper.

The cacophony of the Feral Family’s attack was bad enough, but Crocell trumped them all a moment later, screaming at such a high volume, Basil had to steady the girls again as they reeled from the attack. Hecate even dropped her staff in favour of holding her hands over her ears, while Tyche’s rifle only remained with her due to the strap she was carrying it by.

And the monster kept screaming, only rising in pitch. Glass shattered for several blocks around the park, as people collapsed with their ears bleeding. The Feral family was hit the hardest, as they were also closest. Even Kraquok reeled, stumbling in disorientation.

Basil’s ravens were being destroyed as well, and he’d actually made an effort to make them resistant to sonic attacks; since it clearly hadn’t been sufficient, he sent them away instead. Even so, he was down to just two ravens now, out of what had once been a whole unkindness.

He took a step back, holding onto the girls, as he furiously thought about some way to get them to safety – as well as himself, as he didn’t know how long his own protection would hold out against this level of noise.

All that was rendered moot, though, as all the sound suddenly vanished; they were all plunged into total silence, silence so complete, it made Basil’s ears ring.

He looked up to see Gloom Glimmer in the air above, cape billowing with the now soundless pressure of Crocell’s cry, her left arm extended, palm up, with a blueish sphere the size of a softball hovering above it.

She was looking furious, her eyes turned red and black again.

An impact shook the building Basil was standing on, drawing his attention away from her. In the seconds he’d been distracted, the Feral Family had managed to recover and gone back to their assault on the giant monster. Three of them – Basil didn’t recognise them, but they looked like father, mother and son in matching costumes – were standing together, holding hands in a triangle formation. They raised their intertwined hands in synchronous motion, then brought them down – and with them came a pillar of what appeared to be solid gold, slamming into Crocell’s midsection, where he’d been regenerating the damage done to him – it served to both slow down his visible regeneration and also kept him down, as Mercury had passed out from the sonic assault, freeing him from the silvery field she’d covered the ground beneath him with. The rest of the family was no slouch either – Doc Feral was leading a group of five, the others teaming up in pairs of two or three, renewing their assault on the beast.

Basil and the girls all watched in awe as they blasted the beast across the park, slowly but surely driving it down the main street to try and get it out of the city. It was, frankly, not something they’d expected from the Ferals.

The Shining Guardians were the favourite subject of more message boards, talk shows and video channels than one could count, and one of the favourite pastimes of them was to compare the members of the group, both past and present, and rank them – in these rankings, the Feral Family usually took last place.

Fleur was Lady Light’s former sidekick, the first she’d taken on since Elysium’s death; a hugely successful heroine whom many described as a good Weisswald, power-wise.

Quetzalcoatl was, frankly, a monster, a catastrophe made flesh which, in any sane world, would be hunted down by any means necessary. Since he lived in Brazil, though, he was a national hero.

Severance was the last truly original member, mysterious and shrewd enough to keep the nature of his power a secret over a seventy-year career.  He was als somehow managing to keep a lid on crime in New Johannesburg, which spoke volumes about his capabilities. The criminals of that city supposedly feared him more than Sovereign.

Huong Long was young, had a questionable history, big problems with the Japanese Sentai and the kind of power that had catapulted her to the world stage within a month and a half of manifesting.

Doc Feral, meanwhile, only ever showed up with her family – Basil wasn’t even sure whether there was any footage of her fighting on her own – and they usually stayed in the back of the big fights, overshadowed by the flashier. members of the Shining Guardians and even some other heroes.

Or, perhaps, they simply prefer a support role when there are others around to stand up front, Basil though. The way they work, they’re probably better-suited to it, anyway.

Clearly, though, they could bring the hurt when necessary. Crocell was being driven out of the city, screaming and trashing without a sound, as the gathered heroes and villains followed the stoically advancing Feral Family.

Gloom Glimmer floated down to move along Basil and the girls, along with Gilgul.

“I feel so darn useless,” Gilgul admitted, sounding both awed and annoyed. “What are we even here for? The Ferals seem like they can take him down on their own.”

“They can’t keep this up forever,” Gloom Glimmer explained, her voice reverberating oddly with itself. “Some of them can only make small amounts of formula a day, others can only take a limited amount of it per day without serious side effects and every one they lose reduces their overall power exponentially.”

“So they have a lot of power, but not a lot of staying power,” Hecate summarised. Gloom Glimmer nodded in affirmation.

“How is Polymnia?” Basil asked curiously. “Those screams can not have been good for her.”

The floating girl bit her lower lip, a look of frustration spreading over her face. “It knocked her out. I was able to fix her ears and wake her up, but… I couldn’t fix the pain it caused. She’s at the command post.”

“Your power is not cooperating?” He watched the Feral family change powers, creating no less than eleven different kinds of bindings, from purple chains to arms growing out of the ground, while Doc Feral, Wunderkind and one other member were charging up what looked like a small sun.

“I’m used to it,” she said, as they watched them blast the immobilized Crocell square in the chest, causing an explosion of steam which obscured all vision. “Though I really would’ve thought I’d want to ease her pain to get a power for that…”

“Don’t be too hard on yourself,” Tyche told her as she patted the floating girl’s shoulder. “I got nothing like control over my power and if it’s taught me one thing it’s that you can’t take it personally. Powers are weird.”

Gloom Glimmer giggled, reluctantly, just as a strong, cool wind picked up.

Basil turned his head and saw the woman in the brown costume again, standing next to Prospero. She had her arms raised, waving them about as if conducting a play, as the wind blew the steam away.

Prospero, meanwhile, was holding his staff up over his head with both hands, holding it horizontally, as he seemed to… cuss at the sky?

One of Basil’s ravens was close and he sent it closer still, until its microphone (battered though it was) picked up a steady stream of insults, curses and general derogatory comments, which Prospero was shouting at the air at the top of his lungs, while a humanoid figure formed out of the wind that the woman in brown was moving.

It looked androgynous, sexless, with long, ethereal hair several times its height of about a metre and a half. Once it was fully formed – though still translucent – it flew out towards Crocell, while Prospero went to work cussing up another spir-

“Brennus, why are you giggling?” Hecate asked in a worried tone of voice.

“I, ah, I just… nothing,” he replied, once had himself back under control. Well, mostly. It was still too funny, even for him. He looked over at Prospero drawing more of his wind spirit out of the air, aided by the woman’s power, as he continued shouting at his own creations. Basil stifled another giggle. He’s cussing up a storm.

The steam was gone, by that point, and they could see the results of it all. Crocell was picking itself up off the ground, having been pushed very nearly to the city’s limits, most of its front flayed off to the muscle. Even now, it was regenerating, the attack apparently having had no greater effect, than previous efforts.

The Feral Family had retreated by about fifty metres, while several of the present heroes were forming up a line between them and the monster. Hollywood’s sphere of light was hovering up above the battle, providing its boons to all defenders of the city.

Weirdly enough, Basil couldn’t make out Kraquok anywhere, even though the monstrous villain had grown far too big to simply slip out of sight. A few others were missing, as well – Waverider and Father Manus. He could see Amy, hovering over a nearby rooftop, circled by several compressed spheres of metal – former cars she’d turned into impromptu projectiles. Lamarr was nowhere to be seen. Nor had Totemic or Sovereign’s Subjugator made an appearance yet.

Let’s hope they’re planning something big, Basil thought to himself, though he didn’t share his thoughts with the others.

“I’m going to join the heavy hitters,” Gilgul announced, looking at the girls, then at Basil, nodding quickly. “Stay safe, all of you.”

“Yes ma’am,” Basil replied, his mask hiding his smile as she flew away towards the line of frontline fighters.

Gloom Glimmer nodded to them and flew ahead as well.

“What do we do, B-Six?” Tyche asked him. “We’re kind of superfluous here.”

Hecate made a surprisingly refined snort. “I don’t think so. I’m going to get closer and angle for a shot. See you two later.” And she burst into smoke, flying away before either of them could say anything.

Basil took a look at Tyche. She was still unharmed. Barely a speck of dust on her; she’d even managed to keep ahold of her rifle, which he was quite glad about – it was nearly a match to his own, in sheer stopping power, though it lacked some of the more exotic (and delicate) additions his rail gun had, and it would have been hideously expensive to remake.

“We are going to run Search and Rescue, I guess,” he replied. “I only have two ravens left, but between them and your luck, we should be able to h-“

He saw it move through the one raven he’d sent up above, keeping a bird’s eye view of the battlefield, and reacted at the last moment, throwing himself at Tyche and knocking her out of the way at the last moment, just as Crocell shot another beam aimed straight at her. It missed them by barely an inch, very nearly blasting off Basil’s legs.

The sonic boom it caused hit them in spite of Gloom Glimmer’s power negating the actual sound of it, shaking Basil to the core and disorienting him greatly.

He very nearly threw up in his mask as his sight turned black for moments, and he lost all sense of direction while he and Tyche were thrown off the roof, approaching the ground in a graceless tumble.

Acting on reflex, he fired his grappling hooks left and right, hoping for some, any kind of purchase – but the blast had damaged the left one, causing it to get stuck, while the other one didn’t hit anything but air.

And then his and Tyche’s fall was suddenly arrested, as the air itself seemed to catch them, bringing them to a brain-shaking halt.

“Ugh…” Tyche made a sick sound, before she audibly threw up – fortunately, she didn’t throw up on him. That would’ve seriously crimped his white cape’s style.

Slowly, Basil’s vision returned as he and Tyche were deposited on the street, just in time to see the woman in brown float gracefully down to meet them. Unfortunately, as his vision sharpened, he saw that the impact had caused a lot of damage to his equipment – especially to his mask’s HUD and cameras, forcing him to trigger the failsafe and open up two slits for his eyes. Well, it’s this kind of situation I built them in for.

“Are you two alright?” the woman asked with a voice that didn’t match her boring, rather forgettable costume – it was strong, weathered, a practiced voice that could easily be heard across the roar of a storm – and which drew his attention away from inspecting the damage readouts he still had access to.

Tyche groaned, heaving, but Basil righted himself and nodded. “We are quite fine. Thank you for the save.”

She nodded. “Let’s get out of here before that thing-“

There was a roar, and then a groundshaking impact, and then the two buildings behind them – including the one Crocell had shorn the top off of – began to topple towards them.

Basil didn’t bother wasting breath to curse or anything – instead, he grabbed Tyche by her upper arm and charged forward, hooking his other arm into the woman’s own, and pulled them with him as he ran to the right, trying to get out of the collapsing buildings’ arc.

But it was too late and the two constructions, built to fit the modern customs and regulations (you really couldn’t afford having buildings be too easy to bring down, nowadays) crashed down atop them with a deafening noise.

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B012.7 Born At Sleep

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“I don’t like this,” Amazon grumbled as everyone gathered on the rooftop of the UH’s headquarters.

As one of the three principal divisions of the organisation on the North American continent (the other two were based in San Diego and Toronto), it housed a great many parts of its bureaucracy, thus justifying the fact that the building it was housed in was one of the tallest ones in the city.

The fact that it made an impressive statement was a deliberate bonus. It was also a good place to look out over the city from.

It was a pain to get up on, at least for Basil, as there were no other buildings nearly as tall within a block of it. It would’ve taken a while for him to get up on top with his grappling hooks, so Prisca had picked him up and carried him to the top, trailed by the entirety of his unkindness of ravens (he’d originally deliberated whether to use ‘conspiracy’ or ‘unkindness’, then settled on the latter; merely calling them a ‘flock’ was just too boring).

They’d been greeted by Amazon, still the only adult superhero in town who wasn’t a street-level vigilante. With the cold war now growing rapidly hot, that was unlikely to change any time soon.

The entirety of the Juniors was present, save for Polymnia, as well, from Gloom Glimmer (whom Basil was quite glad to have on their side in any crisis) down to Spellgun and Osore, whom he wouldn’t have expected to join, based just on their powers – Spellgun had some nasty shots, but was otherwise just a normal human, lacking any versatility beyond what his rifle and ammunition provided, while Osore’s ability to make people afraid – devastating though it had been in its accidental use against Basil – didn’t seem that useful in the usual S-Class situation.

He was still glad about every bit of added support.

Amazon, though, didn’t seem too pleased with the situation. The first thing she’d done had been to protest taking teenagers into an unknown S-Class situation, new laws be damned. Even Gloom Glimmer was only supposed to provide transportation, not engage.

No one wanted to hear that and she was quickly convinced to let it go; now they were just waiting for Polymnia to get there – she’d been in the middle of some work and was just now stepping out of the elevator.

Basil took the chance to look her power armor over, feeling a pang of envy – of course she could still afford one, unlike him. It even looked like she’d improved it since the last time he’d seen it – the armor was noticeably more streamlined, more form-fitting, the transparent purplish-pink material (he still wasn’t sure what kind of alloy it was made of) more opaque than before, probably because it was also more dense – either that, or she’d sacrificed protection in exchange for making it more skin-tight, and he doubted she’d do that. Her robotic arms had been redesigned entirely and, unless she’d been hiding or developed a different specialisation, not by herself – they were less like a spider’s legs now and looked more like segmented metallic tentacles, with the segments painted with the same colour she used on her hair and lips. He’d done some research on that a while ago – the colour did not react to movement, per se, but rather to vibrations in the air – to sound. Which was why her hair always turned into a light show during her concerts, as Vasiliki had been all too happy to demonstrate by playing all of Polymnia’s concerts on the big screen and speaker system in his lair. Right now, the colours moved rather lazily across the metal and her hair. Since they all reacted to the same sounds – which, currently, came mostly from Amazon, Tartsche and Hecate arguing about who’d get to come along – the effect seemed to start at the four tentacles closest to the arguing trio and travel across them, over her hair (tied into a high pony tail today), her lips and onto the other four. As before, the top two tentacles held a selection of speakers, the two below were lacking in anything but the clawed tips all eight shared, meant for combat and movement, the next two held the two pieces of her keyboard-like control system and the last two were like the second set, currently on the ground to help balance the weight of the others.

Maybe she just took the servo-motors out of her armor, he thought as he appraised her work. She is strong enough to move her armor on her own and her tentacle-rig can carry and balance itself. Yeah, that made sense. It would make her armor more reliable, as well – less parts that could be damaged or fail.

The only part of her setup which seemed unchanged was her visor.

He noticed her eyes roaming over his load out, as well, as she appraised his new setup the same way he’d done with hers. Normally, he’d have approached her and started talking shop, but today… he just had too much on his mind.

So he just nodded to her and turned around, walking up to the trio.

Tartsche was just making a point about them needing every bit of firepower possible when dealing with an unknown S-Class – especially if the people in question had already proven to be reliable in no less than two such events – but Amazon didn’t seem convinced.

“Amazon,” Basil said as he stepped into the triangle they’d formed. She was, amazingly, taller than he was – no mean feat – so he had to look up at her, if only slightly. “I understand and appreciate your concern for our well-being,” She smiled, relaxing a bit, “but we are determined to participate in this. You can either take us with you and integrate us smoothly into whatever command structure will be in place there, or you can leave us behind – in which case we would arrive by alternate means.” She tensed up again as soon as he pronounced the ‘but’ and only got more agitated from there.

“Why’re you here, then?” she asked between clenched teeth.

“Because Gloom Glimmer is still our fastest, most reliable way to Esperanza and we’d also like to be, as I already explained, integrated into the local command structure, which should go much more smoothly if you take us along as reinforcements – S-Class protocols allow you to recruit any volunteer without an extended kill warrant on their head for such a situation.”

She growled at him under her breath, trying to transfix him with her gaze – but honestly, compared to Amy’s scowl, her’s was rather cute and pleasant.

He stood there, giving her fifteen seconds to process his words before he continued in a softer voice, “Look, we just want to help. We are heroes, and we live dangerously, anyway. So just let us do our job.”

“It’s not your job,” she said softly, deflating. “None of you have a duty to do this.” She turned to the junior heroes. “There is no shame in sitting this one out. You don’t owe it to anyone.”

“Oh, good, I’ll wish you all a nice d-” Outstep began, before Spellgun slapped him over the back of the head.

“We’re coming,” Tartsche said. “At the very least, we can help with the evacuation. Gloom Glimmer is probably our most powerful healer…”

“Not a reliable one, though,” Gloom Glimmer whispered, her face hidden in the shadows of her cowl. Polymnia put an arm around her shoulders, giving her a friendly (if stiff) squeeze.

“Brennus has excellent medical and field aid knowledge,” he continued unperturbed.

Not that I have any idea where I have it from, Basil thought in turn.

“Spellgun, Tyche,” he pointed at her sniper rifle, “Hecate and Polymnia can both support from long range,  I can tank any hit and no one’s better at high-speed evac than Outstep,” he concluded.

“Speaking of high speed,” Basil interjected before the speeches could continue, “We are wasting time.”

To his annoyance, it looked like she was going to further object, but she was interrupted by a cabin – an elevator – rising up from the ground next to the helipad, and a slovenly dressed, unshaven man rushed out.

Basil barely recognised Jason Widard – he’d never been one to pay too much attention to his appearance, even when he appeared on television, but he was looking positively run-down now!

“Why’re you still here!?” he asked, his face tight. “Our precogs just upgraded their threat assessment! From Green to Yellow!”

Amazon looked at him, briefly, then turned to the teens. “Alright. I’ll take you along – but you do as I say, when I say it, got it? I have more experience at this than all of you put together, and by God, you will obey me and the other veterans!”

“Yes ma’am!” they all replied at once, before they gathered around Gloom Glimmer.

***

Basil blinked, feeling more than a little confused. He’d expected some manner of effect, something to mark the transition, but… one moment, they’d been clustering around Gloom Glimmer (who’d stayed uncharacteristically quiet, judging by what he’d seen of her before), the next they stood on a large market square, with numerous other capes and cowls gathered near them. The transition had been instant.

First things first… He checked – Prisca was there. They’d been worried, briefly, about whether or not a teleportation ability would work on her, and whether she could sustain her projection at such distance.

She looked at him, nodding with a small. Everything appeared to be alright.

Whispers rose among the gathered metahumans – and there were really only metahumans around. Unless Esperanza had had a sudden surge in non-powered costumed figures.

“Stay where you are,” Amazon told them before she walked towards the stage.

Basil recognised a few of the people gathered. The United Heroes’ Esperanza Division stood on a portable stage, their Juniors stood in a small cluster off to one side.

Father Manus, their field (and spiritual) leader, in his priestly black robe with the stiff white collar, wearing no mask, his porcelain-like face sporting a serene yet determined expression. Basil didn’t know whether he was permanently transformed or whether he could change into a normal form.

Hollywood, his daughter, stood to his right in stark contrast, her risqué outfit looking like something halfway between a ball gown and a bikini, made from pure white silk that contrasted with her caramel-coloured skin and jet black hair. She eschewed a mask, much like her father, but wore professionally applied make up.

To Hollywood’s left stood her husband Waverider, looking quite boring next to his inhuman father-in-law and his glamorous wife in spite of his movie-star-slash-surfer-dude looks. He wore a practical set of body armor over thick pants, the only difference between it and standard special ops gear being the light blue wave patterns covering it. He had one arm wrapped around Hollywood’s waist, holding her close.

Next came Little Boy, a man who seemed to be morbidly obese, with no hair at all, wearing a thick long coat he barely seemed to fit into. Yet a second look revealed that he was growing, getting fatter and bigger in small increments as he kept building up his destructive power.

Finally, another pair stood to Father Manus’ left, a man and a woman holding hands.

The man, Silver Falcon, wore a skin-tight dark blue bodysuit with a wing-like, silver cape and beak-shaped mask. He looked more slender than muscular, but there was a kind of natural grace to his stance.

His sister Charybdis, the West Coast’s heavy hitter (even more so than Little Boy, really), was the shortest person on the stage, shorter than her own brother by more than a head at least, even though they were supposed to be twins. She wore a thick blue-black bodysuit with tight, molded armor reminiscent of blue-green scales on her chest, with matching greaves and bracers, as well as a similarly designed helmet which enclosed her head entirely, save for her mouth, showing off pale skin and even paler lips.

There were even more figures gathered, at least fifty capes and cowls, not counting their own group. Quite a few villains he recognised, as well…

Oh shit.

Amy was there. With Kraquok and Lamarr. They stood a good deal away from the heroes, with the local street villains clustering around them.

Kraquok looked the same as every time Basil had seen him on television or on the internet. Big, freaky beyond belief with his crocodile-like double-face and his weirdly patched-together physique, combining elements from human, saurian and weirder anatomy into a world-renowned nightmarish blend.

His teammate, Lamarr, looked positively average next to him in his three-piece magician’s suit with the purple velvet top hat and wide cape, holding a black-and-white wand in his gloved hands. Unlike the thirty or so villains around him, he looked utterly at ease, as if he was just out on a walk.

Amy… was staring daggers at Basil. She was, in fact, shaking with barely restrained anger, apparently barely held in check by Kraquok having placed a clawed hand on her shoulder (not that physically restraining her would mean anything).

Vasiliki growled next to him, her eyes fixated on Amy. Though he couldn’t determine her expression, it was no big deal to guess what she was thinking.

Amazon did not seem pleased to see Amy, either, and she was much more obvious about it than Vasiliki.

Fortunately, though, the two groups stood far enough apart from each other for it to not be obvious that Amy was looking at him specifically.

I am going to feed your spleen to you through your nose, Amy spoke straight into his head, her mental voice fairly bubbling over with rage.

Provided I still have one, and a nose, after this, he couldn’t restrain himself from thinking back at her, feeling a flash of irritation. She hardly had the right to criticise his choices, considering her own.

If you die here, I’m going to kill you, she replied calmly.

I love you, too. Be safe.

Look who’s talking.

“-ing at?” Vasiliki said, pulling his attention back to his immediate surroundings.

“Huh?” he asked, momentarily confused.

She was looking at the stage again, though throwing suspicious looks over her shoulder every now and then, glaring at Amy. “I’d like to know what the hell that bitch is looking at,” she replied angrily.

“Language!” Dalia reprimanded her with a grin. Vasiliki almost blew up at her, visibly, but the redhead just pressed on, “Look, I know what you got against her, but we need to keep our heads clear here. Put your issues with her off until after this.”

“You…” Vasiliki tensed, almost lifting her staff – but then she deflated, lowering her head. “… are right. Thanks.” She took a deep breath and pointedly turned away entirely from Amy.

And just in time, too, as two armored figures approached the group.

Ah, finally, good news! Basil thought as he and Polymnia stepped forward immediately to meet them.

The two figures looked as different as night and day, yet there was an odd sense of… similarity about them which went beyond their outward appearance. Both were wearing power armour, but that’s where the similarities ended.

The taller of the duo was clad from head to toe in blackened,  steel. His armour was blocky, so broad it looked almost like a cartoon, and it moved quite stiffly, with exceedingly heavy steps which threatened to crack the pavement. The only colour to it, aside from several heat vents at his sides, were the circular red lenses over his eyes. The armour’s left arm ended in a huge cannon instead of a hand, looking as blocky and ragged as the rest of his equipment (though Basil was guessing about the gender – there really was no way to tell how the person inside that armour looked).

His name was Boom-Boom, one of the few teenage gadgeteers currently active in the USA – and a supervillain, as well.

In stark contrast to his appearance, the girl next to him looked like she’d come out of a science-fiction comic book. Her armour was sleek and – Basil had never thought he’d use the word in relation to power armour, except in jest, but it just fit – quite sexy. It was so thin and tight, it looked more like simple body armour, yet he knew that it was definitely powered. Her armour was made of some manner of silverly-golden metal, covering her from head to toe. It was segmented and sported an old-fashioned clock face with three brassy hands indicating the time in Roman numerals. The armor was so form-fitting, there was no doubt that there was a slender girl underneath – it was even molded to fit her breasts like a second skin, a feature not even Polymnia’s body-accentuating armour sported. Furthermore, each step of hers was accentuated with the sound of a ticking clock. A mass of long black hair tied into a ponytail poked out of the back of her armor, and a red-golden visor made up the upper half of her helmet’s faceplate. Two sleek guns rested in holsters on her hips, and a long, sleek rifle was strapped to her back. Each piece of her equipment ticked, much like her armour did, and they were all in perfect tune.

Her name was Tick-Tock. Second-youngest – though senior – member of the local Juniors, an up-and-coming Gadgeteer much like Basil and Polymnia.

The four of them came to a halt just a few feet from each other, looking at their respective equipment. Polymnia’s tentacles even folded back so as not to obstruct their sight.

Finally, after a few moments of quiet analysis, Boom-Boom spoke up, holding out his hand towards Basil.

“Cowl’s Boom-Boom,” he introduced himself, his voice modulated by a voice-changer and further distorted by his thick helmet, as they shook hands (his massive right gauntlet made his entire hand disappear). “Everything I make explodes.”

“Brennus,” Basil replied in kind, “Speciality still up in the air, though I currently trend towards some manner of Electromagnetic theory as part of it.”

“Ah, you’re still trying to figure it out,” Tick-Tock replied as she and Polymnia shook hands. “I remember that time.” She focused on Polymnia again, “Tick-Tock’s my cape, and everything I make involves a timer of some kind.”

<Polymnia,> the pop princess replied. <I specialise in acoustic effects. As well as music.>

Boom-Boom shook hands with her as well, while Basil exchanged greetings with Tick-Tock. “Nice to have some more techies on the team,” the blocky supervillain said. “Maybe we’ll even get a chance to work together on something. Here’s to us making a bigass electro-acoustic time bomb!”

Tick-Tock slapped the back of his helmet, making a bell-like ringing sound. “All you ever think of is stuff blowing up,” she complained. “Please don’t use this situation as an excuse to blow even more things up than you already have.”

He just shrugged, a truly impressive motion given his frame, despite the limited movement he could actually put into it.

<If we’re really lucky,> Polymnia interjected with a wistful smile, <We won’t have to fight at all, this’ll all blow over and we can all work on something fun.>

“Explosions are fun. They’re all the fun!” Boom-Boom countered with unsettling intensity. Tick-Tock slapped him over the head again, causing him to continue in a more normal voice: “Besides, we’re unlikely to work together outside of an S-Class party like this, seeing how I’m a supervillain and all.”

“Well, I am a vigilante, so technically that is not an issue for m- is that what I think it is?” Basil looked up at a nearby building – a bank, though he didn’t bother to check which one – along with everyone else as a penetrating hum filled the air, and a gleaming silver shape rose up over the roof, smoothly gliding through the air and over the market square.

It looked, at first glance, like a particularly blocky jet fighter, except it was the size of two school busses standing next to each other, with a squared snout sporting four black spheres, one on each side, which moved around like a chamaeleon’s eyes. Its wings were similarly squared, thicker than any jet’s wings were ever going to be; clearly, streamlining the craft had not been a priority. A huge cannon’s barrel – some manner of railgun, Basil guessed – extended almost from the very hind of the craft over the tip, facing forward. It had no other visible armaments. There were several depressions worked smoothly into the metal, almost like channels, which covered most of its surface, from the tip all the way to the back end, emitting a pale silver light. It moved with no visible means of propulsion, producing only that pervasive, pulsing humming sound. The air around it seemed to almost cling to its shape, causing slight distortions in the light that passed through, blurring the edges of the craft.

“That… that is…” Boom-Boom stammered. If he wasn’t covered in more than a ton of steel, he’d probably be trembling.

No matter, the other three were trembling more than enough to make up for him.

“That is a Mark VII Subjugator,” Basil whispered in awe as their companions from New Lennston joind up with the small group of Gadgeteers. “It is the third-latest model of Subjugators, and the latest mass produced one. Why is it here?”

“It’s not public knowledge yet,” Gloom Glimmer replied to his question, her silken voice barely audible over the pulsing sound of the Subjugator touching down on top of the city hall, projecting a shimmering force-field in lieu of other landing gear, “There’s a major conference planned on the subject of nature protection and endangered species in particular. They expected delegates from all over the world, including GAIN and the AMU. In fact, unless I’m mistaken, there should be-“

She stopped speaking as the hum cut off and people started whispering among each other – but not about the Subjugator, no. Instead, their attention was drawn to the stage, where two new arrivals had joined the local heroes.

One was a very tall, almost freakishly thin man with a long, care-lined face, wearing a dark blue robe and wizard’s hat, while holding a long wooden staff in one hand.

The other looked, at first, like an elongated fur ball standing on four wooden sticks. A second glance, though, revealed that the sticks were actually its brown, gnarled arms, ending in over-sized, clawed hands; the fur ball was its body, wrapped in dirty brown fur which moved almost as if a breeze was running through it, despite the stillness of the air. Zooming in, Basil could see hints of shapes moving within the fur, like small ghosts.

“There they are,” Gloom Glimmer concluded. “Prospero and Totemic.”

“That’s one hell of a hippie conference,” Dalia said half in jest. “I wouldn’t have expected those people to be so environmentally minded.”

Gloom Glimmer shrugged casually. “It’s not something which comes up often in the media, but Sovereign is actually very environmentally sensitive. He’s backing most charities that share his passion for protecting nature – he just doesn’t care about humans the same way. As for Madd- I mean, Queen Madeleine, she’s not exactly an avid believer herself, but Totemic is a very active defender of endangered species. He owns the world’s largest zoo, as well. I suspect Prospero is here to serve as a translator and to keep an eye on him. The Queensguard never operates solo by principle.”

“Wow, I suddenly feel like we’re not even needed here,” Vasiliki breathed. “What’s next, are the Shining G-“

There was a loud sound, like a huge cord being strung tight, a booming explosion in the air, and a whirling golden portal opened on the stage, a tall, muscular woman in her mid-thirties stepping out of it; She wore leather pants, a white shirt and a leather jacket stepping out, sporting two bandoliers which held numerous vials and leather pouches, her dark brown hair cut into a practical bob cut. She was followed by fifteen others, all in similar garb – dressed like adventurers from Pulp novels – who took position in a line at the back of the stage, as she joined Prospero and Father Manus at the front.

<That,> Timothy spoke up through their comlink, his voice hushed, <Is Doc Feral. This is rapidly turning into one hell of a crisis crossover roster. “What’s next, are Lady Light and the Dark gonna show up and join in on the fun?>

Everyone around – including a few of the gathered heroes and villains who stood further away – turned to look at Gloom Glimmer.

The girl seemed to briefly shrink into her cape, as if startled by the sudden rush of attention. Then she replied, “I really don’t think so… I tried to reach them, but Mom and Dad are both… off. I don’t know where to or why, I don’t even know if they’re together, I just know that neither of them is reachable right now, even for me.”

“Unless we are about to fight DiL,” Outstep spoke up in an amused tone, “I don’t really think they’re going to be necessary for this one.”

As he spoke, Basil saw Gloom Glimmer twitch, briefly, her eyes flashing red for a moment before she got herself under control again.

What is that about? he asked himself, though he only said, “Way to tempt fate, mate.”

Outstep laughed out loud, though despite his bravado, he looked pretty nervous.

Before anyone could further comment on the issue, Father Manus stepped away from the other two capes and looked at the gathered heroes, clearly preparing to speak to them all.

***

“My dear brothers and sisters in arms,” the porcelain man spoke in a deep, sonorous voice, spreading his arms wide to include everyone on the square. “Welcome and thank you for appearing in such numbers to help protect our home from whatever calamity is fast approaching. We – by which I mean the local division of the United Heroes, as well as Doc Feral of the Shining Guardians – are well aware that many of you are volunteers from remote locations, and we deeply appreciate your willingness to help us in our hour of need.” He briefly bowed towards the people on the square, before he turned around to do the same towards the AMU delegates and the Subjugator up above.

Afterwards, he turned around again to adress the people on the square again. “Unfortunately, we’re still unclear as to the exact nature of the prophecised threat – we only know that it is a considerable one, tentatively classified as a Code Yellow S-Class event.”

“That’s just two steps below DiL,” Vasiliki whispered as she and Dalia moved a little closer to each other for comfort. Basil himself was already holding hands with Prisca, and most others had paired up. Boom-Boom and Tick-Tock were holding hands, as well.

“Since we don’t know when exactly it is going to make itself manifest, nor where exactly, we must move quickly into position!” Father Manus continued speaking while Waverider created a crackling blue-white disc of energy, on which Little Boy loaded a stack of small black boxes. The disc moved around the people on the stage – except for the heroes, who already had boxes such as those attached to their belts or chests. Everyone it passed by took one of those boxes. It came down and moved through the crowd as well.

“Waverider is distributing communicators,” the porcelain man explained. “They attach to your costume or body through a vacuum. Please speak your cape or cowl into them, confirm by pressing the blue button and keep them on your person at all times – they will allow us to contact you, coordinate your movements and…”

He went on explaining how the communicators worked, while Basil took one and attached it to his belt, next to his knife sheath (well, one of them) after entering and confirming his name.

“As we don’t have sufficient information to create an elaborate battle plan, I’ll ask you all to remain in your teams with the people you have already worked with. If you don’t have a team, please find at least two other people to team up with for the duration of this event,” the priestly superhero went on. “Each group will be given a location to get to and await further developments.”

The gathered capes and cowls listened quietly, with not even any whispers to break the quiet in between his sentences.

“There is not much time, but let me say this – thank you for being here. Be safe. Stay together. Take care of each other. And God be with you.”

***

After briefly exchanging well wishes, Basil and his team had been directed to a high-rise apartment building near the waterfront, where they’d landed on the rooftop to take up positions. Someone had turned the roof into a garden with benches and tables, and they spread out, taking seats to try and calm down a bit before the storm.

“If I’d known it would take this long, I’d have waited before coming here,” Prisca said after five minutes of nothing happening, as she sat on a sun chair, in full armour. “I’m wasting time. Literally.”

“You could not have flown here that quickly,” Basil replied. He was the only one not sitting, having instead taken up position at the West edge of the roof, staring towards the bright blue ocean. “Not without burning more time than you would gain from waiting. And teleporting here would require Gloom Glimmer’s cooperation, which would require explaining your power to her.”

She made a grumpy sound, but didn’t press the issue.

“Hey, B-Six,” Dalia spoke up from where she was lounging on a swinging bench. “What’d you mean when you said we had other means of getting here?” she asked curiously, one leg dangling from the bench, using her toe to cause it to swing back and forth. “I didn’t know we could do something like that.”

“I’d like to know about what you meant, as well,” Vasiliki added, turning to look at him – she’d been sitting at a table, sketching something on a pad she’d pulled out of her bag of holding. “You pressured Amazon a lot there.”

“I was bluffing,” Basil admitted without turning to look at them – he was too busy distributing his ravens across Esperanza.He felt their stares on his neck.

<Duuuuuuude,> Timothy breathed. <That’s… I didn’t know you could bluff like that.>

<Yeah, I figured you were one of those ‘always speak the truth’ types,> Stephi commented.

Basil barely held himself back from laughing out loud. Well, they do not know me very well after all, do they?

“It was just a simple bluff, nothing worth mentioning, really,” he said. “Though I do feel bad about being so pushy. But then again, her concern really was misplaced.” Honestly, compared to what we have already been through, how bad could this be?

As if trying to reprimand him for even thinking that, there was a loud beep from their communicators at just that moment.

<Unknown object coming from the West,> spoke a calm woman’s voice. <Something massive is approaching the city from beneath the water. All teams, be ready to deploy.>

The girls leapt up and joined Basil in watching the ocean, forming a single line. Prisca stood to his left, and her hand found his, gently squeezing it. He squeezed back, as they saw a large shadow approach the beach littered with sunshades and various booths – fortunately, the civilians had already retreated into the numerous shelters built all around the huge metropolis.

“That… looks big,” Dalia commented lamely.

The approaching shadow looked like it was the size of a football field.

As it came closer, the water rose, bulging as the colossal shape rose up, simultaneously moving forwad and somehow shrinking back, as if the act of rising up forced it to redistribute its mass, changing its shape.The water rose higher, until a pillar of water forty meters tall stood just in front of the beach, with a darker, slightly shorter shape standing within.

The creature – whatever it was – appeared to be humanoid in shape, though very roughly so, its torso nearly pear-shaped with no visible neck between its conical head and its barely distinguishable shoulders – if it even had shoudlers – visible in this state. It was barely possible to distinguish two thick, round arms which reached down to the knees of its disproportionally short legs.It seemed to just stand there, for a few moments, the water around it never falling off until it suddenly leaned forward, taking a slow, lumbering step onto the sandy ground in front of it.And with that, its water shroud fell off, revealing…

“Oh, come on!” Basil shouted. “First a giant pile of shit, and now… now this!?”

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B009.8 Family Matters

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Even later…

 

This looks as good a place as any, Amy thought as she dragged the half-conscious Dalia through the street. The girl had woken up after she’d gotten her out of the club, only to throw up and groan all the way.

 

Amy had no idea where Dalia lived, and something told her that it’d be stupid to risk Basil walking in on her and his drunk, sparsely dressed friend, even if she was just putting her down on the couch or something. Her reputation wouldn’t do her any favours. Though it probably would be very funny. But then again, Basil had been weird lately, especially yesterday, and she thought it best not to agitate him any more than absolutely necessary.

 

So she’d decided to get the girl someplace warm, with something to eat and drink. And the nearest place she found was the “Dionysian Grill”, which sounded quite promising, food-wise. They probably didn’t offer all the other kinds of fun the name promised. And what a shame that is.

 

She reaffirmed her grip on Dalia, one of the girl’s arms over her shoulder, and took her inside. The place was set up more like a real restaurant than a fast-food restaurant, with someone standing at the entrance, waiting to assign tables. Everything was made of wood, except for the huge open stainless steel kitchen, where a team of cooks were preparing some big amounts of food. Good thing I came hungry.

 

Their entrance got some attention from the other patrons – two gorgeous girls in party clothing – though Dalia’s state also drew frowns of disapproval. The woman at the entrance looked confused, for a moment, and before she could gather herself and throw them out or anything, Amy poked her mind with some good old pleasure.

 

It was really funny, how little it took to control most people. The pleasure signals entered the woman’s brain, and her mind worked them into her reality to make them make sense. Thus, she felt happy to see them, and was quite open to giving them a secluded corner, where people couldn’t see much of them (just in case Dalia made a scene). Amy ordered two glasses of cooled water with lemon lemon juice and sat down next to Dalia, keeping her telepathy up so she’d notice if someone was listening in on them.

 

“How’re you feeling?” she asked the dizzy girl. She only got a groan in response, as Dalia put her head down on her folded arms. Amy giggled. “First time getting drunk?” Another groan, and Dalia put two fingers up without moving her hand. “Second? But first time since… the change?” A barely perceptible nod. “Stupid you. You’re not used to this body yet, you should’ve taken it easier,” Amy admonished her, thinking back to her own first contact with alcohol after her manifestation. It had been… unique. She had been very careful not to get drunk again. Of course, she couldn’t share that, so she gently patted the girl’s bare back (she was wearing a really nice dress – if only she wasn’t such a hack with make-up, she’d have been positively ravishing).

 

Footsteps came closer, and a young girl who would not look amiss in their company came up with two glasses of water (with extra lemon slices on top) on a tray.

 

“Vasiliki?” Amy asked with surprise, looking the girl up and down – she was wearing a light blue skirt with white trim and a pure white shirt and blue tie. Apparently the uniform here, and a nice one to be sure, giving Amy all sorts of ideas…

 

“Amy? Dalia!? What happened?” The Greek girl put her tray down, looking alternatively at them.

 

“I picked her up at a club – she overdid it with the drinks,” Amy said back in a low voice – but Dalia still groaned. “I didn’t want to take her to my place, I don’t know where she lives, so I took her to the nearest place where I could get her fed and watered – and which has a bathroom.”

 

“Good thing you brought her here,” Vasiliki replied, putting the drinks out in front of them onto paper saucers, then handed them the menu. “Look through the menu, tell me what you want – it’s on the house.”

 

“Thank you very much dear. And may I say, that uniform looks absolutely fetching on you,” Amy said in response, putting just the tiniest amount of innuendo into her voice, and was rewarded with a pretty blush.

 

“I’m flattered. You don’t look half-bad, either,” Vasiliki said and hurried off with her tray.

 

“She’s fun to tease,” Amy whispered to Dalia, and got an affirmative grunt in response. “Do you know any of her preferences?” A groan, then, “Boys only.” Such a shame. “So, why the drunken party girl act? I didn’t take you to be that reckless. Who knows what dastardly villain could have picked you up!”

 

“Head hurts… no talking, please…” Dalia sighed, raising her head to take a sip from her glass, making a sour expression when the taste hit. “This is awful.”

 

“It helps, believe me,” Amy said as she took a short draft herself. “Food will help even more. And going to the bathroom. You’ve got to get it all out of your system.” She looked through the menu, picking out something to eat. I’ll have to remember this place.

 

With some prodding, her erstwhile ward picked out something to eat, and the next time Vasiliki came by, they gave her their orders. “Alright, sit tight, I’ll be back soon!”

 

They spent their time waiting, quietly, until Vasiliki came back balancing two whole trays loaded down with food, abusing her supernatural sense of balance. She put them down, and there was quite a bit more than they had ordered.

 

“I’m taking my break, and I thought I’d join you – unless that’s a problem,” she explained when she saw Amy’s questioning gaze.

 

“Oh no, no problem at all!” Amy replied, arranging her food properly in front of her. Dalia simply pulled it all close and started eating without another word.

 

Vasiliki joined them, and they ate quietly for a few minutes. It was really good. Not real five-star food, but it was better than any fast-food joint Amy knew (she knew a lot) and better than most restaurants she’d been to (she’d been to a lot), too.

 

Dalia had to go to the bathroom several times, as her body processed the alcohol faster than was normal.

 

“So, Dalia, what’s wrong?” Vasiliki when she finished her main course, and turned to her salad.

 

“Why you think something’s wrong?” Dalia asked, slightly slurring her ‘s’ and ‘r’ sounds. She only got a deadpan look in response. “I just thought I’d party a little, you know? Have some fun, now that I’m hot, you know?” Her face was an awful mess, pale and sweaty, with dark rings around her eyes making her make-up look even worse than before.

 

“Don’t be like that, I’m sure you were plenty cute before,” Amy threw in. Self esteem issues, huh? That explains a lot.

 

Dalia snorted in a decidedly unladylike manner. “I was a fat, half-blind loser with permanent bed-hair. Nothing cute about it,” she replied between two mouthfuls of salad.

 

“You shouldn’t look down on yourself so much,” Vasiliki said. “Even if you weren’t conventionally attractive, that’s no reason to have that kind of attitude towards yourself – lots of girls our age have body issues, it’s nothing to feel bad about!”

 

“Says the girl who’s looked like a supermodel even before she manifested,” Dalia snarled.

 

“You did?” Amy asked, curious. This was the first time she was meeting someone else who’d been pretty before, like her!

 

Vasiliki shrugged. “I didn’t change, outwardly, all that much. My skin cleared up, otherwise, I’m pretty much the same as before.”

 

“How interesting. Did you know that, according to current theory, the Adonis trait is sparked by body image issues? That’s why so many metas, especially women, look like they’re out of a fantasy – they adapt to their beauty ideal, meaning, our culture’s beauty ideal, as they see it apply to themselves.”

 

“Thus the big…” Vasiliki looks at Dalia’s less-than-modest bust, then back at Amy’s face.

 

“Thus the big girls, yes,” Amy affirmed. “It’s also the reason why most metahumans – male and female both – don’t have body hair anymore.”

 

“That’s about what I’ve read so far, though my books had a more long-winded way of describing it,” Vasiliki said. “What about you, Amy? You certainly look like you could already be a metahuman.”

 

“Are you asking if I’m secretly a meta?” Amy replied, a little bit uncomfortable, and a lot amused.

 

“N-no, I guess Basil would have told us, and if not, then you probably wouldn’t, either, but I mean… you certainly look the part,” she pulled back. Now, even Dalia was actually paying attention.

 

“I guess I’ve just been blessed with good genes. Or I might be one of those zero tier metahumans you hear about lately. They’re supposed to not even notice their manifestation,” Amy continued, steering the conversation away from her.

 

“Yeah, what’s up with those? I asked B-six, but his explanation made no sense to me,” Dalia said, slowly brightening up.

 

Vasiliki immediately got what Amy called the ‘Lecturing Expression’ – she saw it a lot on Basil. No wonder he likes her.

 

“Zero tier metahumans are an only recently recognised phenomenon – though they might have existed long before, unnoticed. They generally exhibit low-level enhancements to their physical abilities – not high enough justify a proper rating – as well as exceptional health, fertility and beauty – consistent with Adonis-types, and they may also share their generally longer lifespan,” she pontificated. “They generally seem to, for lack of a better word, slip into their manifestation – no known case remembers manifesting, or when exactly the changes began, as they seem to take a while to set in.”

 

“So… basically, they’re just prettier than normal, and nothing else?” Dalia summed up.

 

“And healthier. That’s about all of it,” Amy concluded. “And since we’re talking about manifestations already – I’ve been meaning to ask, how did you two manifest? Would you mind sharing? Basil insists on not telling me your stories.” He’s so… annoyingly loyal.

 

“Got bullied. For years,” Dalia said, shrugging – and wincing immediately, as another ice pick of pain stabbed her brain.

 

Let me help with that, Amy thought, gently prodding her mind, emitting a soothing sensation. She didn’t want to enter her mind fully, so this was all she could do without risking notice.

 

“It got really bad, and I… I was considering suicide, I guess. I got really low,” Dalia continued, which gave Vasiliki a wide-eyed look. But before the other girl could respond, Dalia continued, “And well, I was… I was taking a walk, thinking about stuff, and there was some festival going on, and I bought this ticket for a lottery that was going on there. I decided, if I won, I’d keep going, if not… well, you know.”

 

Wow. I did not expect this, Amy thought, feeling honestly shocked.

 

“And that’s when it happened – suddenly, everything was standing still, and then the stand exploded into light, and there was this beautiful star,” the girl continued, apparently oblivious to how her audience felt, an enraptured smile spreading on her drawn face. “I felt I had a choice to make, and I decided to… to live. I took the star, saw some weird visions I can’t make sense of – something about stars and suns and a huge snake – and then I woke up and I was standing there, and the owner of the stand called out my number! First time I ever won something! That’s how I got my leather jacket – it fell off its hook, just when I was trying to decide what prize to choose. And well, I guess you know the rest. Played the lottery, went out to kick butt and take names, ran into B-six and Vasiliki here…” She looked at the two them. “That’s my story. What’s yours?” she asked towards Vasiliki.

 

To Amy’s surprise, the girl blushed. Ohh, did she manifest due to something naughty? There might be more fun in this girl than she’d thought…

 

“I’m not sure… my manifestation seems rather, uh… trivial, compared to yours,” she said, looking down at her empty plate.

 

Dalia snorted. “C’mon, you can tell me! I won’t hold it against you, you know that!”

 

C’mon, share, girl! Amy reached out, gently sending some relaxation her way. The girl’s shoulders visibly relaxed and she looked up at the two of them (they’d somehow ended up sitting in a triangle).

 

“It’s really… um, promise me you won’t tell anyone, alright?” she asked in a small voice.

 

“Of course!” the other two replied in unison – then looked at each other and giggled, which prompted another flinch of pain from the younger girl, followed by her emptying her glass. Vasiliki called for another one, then put her hands on the table, lacing her fingers together.

 

“It was summer, really hot, and all my friends where on vacation, so I… I kinda… sorta… got myself a joint-” she began, but was interrupted by a torrent of giggle (interspersed with groans of pain) from Dalia.

 

“Y-y-you got a joint? You got high? Oh God, I think I’m either completely drunk or unconscious and dreaming, because this… this is…” She broke out into giggles again.

 

Vasiliki rolled her eyes, waiting for her friend to calm down, while Amy just watched them with amusement. They were so cute, Basil really needed to seduce them and start his own harem. It was the only sensible choice.

 

“May I continue?” Vasiliki asked, obviously annoyed. When Dalia finally got herself back under control, the dark-skinned girl (those perfect Greek features with that Mediterranean dark skin looked really yummy) took a deep breath and continued her tale, “My family has a cabin in the Abershy Forest, near the foot of the mountain to the West. I went there, set things up and lit m-“

 

“Set things up?” Amy interrupted, sensing unnecessarily complicated preparations (you learn to do that when you grow up with Basil Blake). “Do elaborate, my dear!”

 

“Uh, I fired the fireplace up, even though it was high summer, and I put an old, thick blanket over the couch I’d be sitting on, and I opened all the windows and turned on the ventilation. I stripped naked, put my clothes in a bag, the bag then under the same blanket. My plan was to take a shower right afterwards, then burn the blanket – our fireplace is big enough for that – and so avoid the smell sticking ot anything.”

 

Amy bit her lip, refusing to break out laughing and seem like she was ridiculing the younger girl. Even Dalia resisted, barely – though that might have had more to do with her groaning in pain as another headache attacked her (Amy could only soothe it, not make it go away).

 

“You know, you and Basil fit together quite nicely,” Amy said, making Vasiliki blush again. Maybe she’s interested? Well, of course she’d be, Basil is a real sweetheart! (In Amy’s mind, at least, Basil was a girl magnet. So far, she’d seen no reason to assume otherwise).

 

“I- I don’t know about that,” the girl deflected, looking away. “A-anyway, I smoked the joint and, well… you hear about people manifesting on drugs, right? Just having a bad reaction to them, or actually overdosing, or stuff? Well, in my case, I had a really good reaction to it – I mean, it was glorious,” she said, and the same enraptured smile that had been on Dalia’s face before appeared on hers now. “I… I just stood up and walked out the cabin, strolling around the forest, totally aiml-“

 

“Naked? You took a naked stroll through a public forest?” Dalia asked before breaking out into torrents of giggles again. Even Amy had to fight hard not to join in. I would’ve liked to see that.

 

Now Vasiliki was blushing from her scalp down to her throat (and probably deeper, but that outfit showed too little cleavage), but she continued resolutely, “At some point, the scenery changed – I was in a forest that looked like it came right out of a dream – vibrant colours, rolling hills, gargantuan trees with large roots – like in those Japanese movies with the wolf princess or the giant bugs – and more, and I… I come to this spring, and I kneel down to drink, and then she appeared.”

 

Now her gaze was positively blissful, and Amy leaned in closer, more curious than ever. She’d heard about people meeting strangers, fantastic and real figures during their manifestations…

 

“It was Hecate. I mean, the Goddess. She appeared as three beautiful, identical women in dark green chitons, with magnificient golden girdles. And she talked to me, in three voices, about… about some prophecy, about five lights I had to find and three suns and another, something she called the Black Sun. I still can’t make heads or tails of it, but then she asked me if I wanted to accept it, and the three put their hands together, holding out this star… and I took it, waking up back at the cabin, completely sober again.”

 

She looked at them with a smile, but Dalia seemed thoughtful. “You know…” she began. “I think, the visions I saw… there were five stars, maybe it was about the same thing?”

 

Vasiliki got a thoughtful look, and so did Amy. “There’ve been cases of people witnessing fragments of the future during their manifestation… Doctor Despair claimed he’d dreamed of DiL’s attack on Los Angeles, though it hadn’t made any sense to him at the time,” she said. How curious.

 

“I can… I can’t remember, right now, but I’m sure I’ll be able to, once I’m back to one hundred percent,” Dalia groaned.

 

“I’ll keep it in mind. We should ask Basil, too, maybe he saw something as well?” Vasiliki offered.

 

“I’m sure he’ll love a new riddle to solve,” Amy contributed. “But now, another question I’ve always been meaning to ask you two – why’re you vigilantes? Why didn’t you join the heroes, if you want to fight the good fight?”

 

They both thought it over, and Dalia answered first, “It just kinda worked out that way, and I thought it’d be fun to stick with these two.”

 

How very… you. Amy turned to Vasiliki, as did Dalia.

 

The girl looked down at her interlaced fingers again, looking… ashamed. “I… I wouldn’t make a good hero, I think. They’d probably lock me up,” she explained.

 

Amy’s eyebrows rose up. Interesting… “Why, what have you done?”

 

“It’s not what I’ve already done, it’s what I’m going to do. What I plan to do, once I get the chance… and the power to do it,” she continued. Before either of the others could dig deeper, she explained, “I have… had a cousin I was very close to. She was a superhero – well, more like a super-environmentalist – and she… she was murdered.”

 

Ahhh… “And you want revenge?”

 

Vasiliki nodded. “She was… like a sister to me.” There were tears in her eyes. Dalia surprised them both when she slid over to her, putting an arm around Vasiliki’s shoulders.

 

“It’s alright, teacher. We understand. And for what it’s worth, I’ll help ya get your revenge, when the time comes,” she said, trying to be comforting (though her breath probably ruined part of the effect, judging by the way Vasiliki was trying not to breathe in.

 

Oh, this is so much fun.

 

“Th-thank you.”

 

“Now, can you tell us who your sister was? And what asshole killed her, I need a name if I’m gonna help you track him down!”

 

“It wasn’t a man. And my cousin’s cape was Lupa Maior,” Vasiliki explained, her voice wistful. “She was a really sweet girl, just barely an adult, and she only really patrolled forests and nature parks, hunting poachers and the like.”

 

Oh. Crap. Amy knew that name.

 

“And the monster who killed her was Mindstar, that twisted bitch,” the girl continued, her face twisted by raw hatred. “And someday, I’m gonna twist her face back onto her neck, like she did with Estephania!”

 

Awwwwwwkward!

 

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B009.7 Family Matters

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5th November, Early Morning

The morning had actually turned out warmer than expected – Basil still had to wear a jacket and a scarf, but at least there was not any new snow. Not that he disliked snow – far from it – frozen surfaces were bad for his grappling hooks and, subsequently, bad for him.

And I will have a lot less protection than before, once I have reworked my armor into something lighter and cheaper. He really had to get more money. Maybe I should have asked Mister Karlson for a job, he thought with a smirk no one saw.

He walked on past a fast food restaurant as he thought about yesterday evening – he had tried to talk to Amy, but she had been in a weird mood, and he had decided to wait for a better opportunity to take his first step in… well, he did not know if it could be called redeeming, but perhaps reigning her in? He should have talked to her at once, made his position clear, set boundaries…

Except the mere idea of getting into a fight with her made him physically ill. Just looking at Amy at breakfast had made him feel both ashamed, angry and wistful, all once, remembering the good old days.

I wonder if this is how Lady Light feels, every time she looks at the Dark. Was that what he was doomed to do? Spend the rest of his life trying to reign a mostly insane – and he could not deny it, Amy was not all right in the head (but neither was he, so he could not really throw stones) – supervillain in, always trying to preserve those beautiful memories of better days, trying to bring them back to life?

Maybe he was assuming too much – there probably were other, better reasons, more noble ideals and goals, maybe even something tied to Point Zero and their powers involved – but that would explain a lot of things. He only had a few years of those really good memories, and they were rather normal – Lady Light had a full score of years, an entire lifetime of being together with him, through an entire world war even before they got powers, and everything since then… Maybe that was the reason for conceiving Irene? A desperate attempt to draw them closer, to pull him back onto the side of the angels? It certainly seemed to work, he had never been as mellow and restrained as during the past decade.

Or perhaps a weapon to stop her older sister… because there certainly seems to be no other way besides bringing overwhelming power to bear against her.

But that, too was just speculation.

I would sure like to talk to them both. First, though, I need to stop distracting myself from the issue at hand. Amy.

He walked by the alley next to the restaurant just as he finished these thoughts, and caught a movement out of the corner of his eye. A trash can’s lid had moved.

I found Grimalkin in a place like this, he thought, and suddenly he hoped… maybe he would find him again? He sure missed that crazy red-brown eyed furball of a cat. Despite what it had done to Amy’s underwear drawer. Or maybe because of it. It had been rather funny, after the horror had worn off. I could keep him in my hideout now, so Amy could not object.

Reaching out, he lifted the trash lid – and a rat jumped out and scuttled away. So not Grimalkin. He put the lid back down and walked on towards his hideout.

I wonder what happened to him – where he is by now.

Shaking his head, Basil continued on his way to his hideout. There was a lot of work to be done. And maybe, tonight, he would feel up to confronting Amy.

 

 

* * *

 

The lift went down into the lair, and Basil was not surprised to find Vasiliki already there, in her winter school uniform, sitting on the couch.

“You know, your perfume is nice, but you wear too much of it,” he said in lieu of a greeting.

She looked up from her book (she was always reading something) and gave him a deadpan look. “It’s supposed to be noticable,” she said as she closed her book and stood up. “And I didn’t come here to discuss cosmetics.”

He shrugged, taking his jacket and boots off. “Why did you come here? You don’t usually come in the morning.”

“Since I don’t have school this week – again – I’ll be working in one of our restaurants, and I drew the afternoon shift,” she explained, brushing a few stray strands of hair behind her ear. “Anyway, I wanted to try an experiment with y-“

His head whipped around from where he’d been switching into his labcoat. “Experiment! Tell me more!”

“Weeeeeeell… you know how they say, Contriving and Gadgeteering can’t go together? I thought, maybe, there’s a way to get around that. Here’s what I was thinking…”

 

 

* * *

 

“Oh God, I think it’s alive!”

“Muhahahahaha!”

“What in the name of God are you doing!?”

“I always swore to myself I would laugh madly if this happened! I have been practicing the laugh ever since I got my powers!”

“Are you c- Oh shit, it’s trying to escape! Quick, we have to stop it before it gets out!”

 

 

* * *

 

“Let us never do this again,” she sighed, falling down onto her butt.

“Agreed.”

“Let us never speak of this to anyone,” she added.

“Agreed. I guess there IS a good reason why people do not do these experiments anymore. Though I have to say, it was rather… sporting, do you not think so?” he replied, sitting down next to her, looking very deliberately away from her.

“Well… yeah, but… how come I always end up indecent after these things!? Thank God I wasn’t wearing my costume, because I only have one left!” she replied, glad that he was not the peeping type (sometimes she thought he didn’t have a sex drive to begin with).

“Here, take my coat,” he said, giving her his labcoat. Of course he’d gotten out of it unharmed – though Vasiliki had to admit, his reaction time was insane to begin with. In fact, they should probably test him sometime, in case he had some kind of secondary power that sped them up.

Because it was either that, or being a grizzled veteran with finely honed instincts in disguise. And that was too ridiculous to consider, really.

Basil was many things, but not grizzled.

“Do you want a dragonskin suit? I should have enough material for one more,” he offered.

She thought it over. She really didn’t want to impose on his fading resources, but… her current costume was basically just fabric – she could only enchant objects she’d customized to meet her standards, and doing that to a fullbody skin-tight suit took time.

“I’ll take it. I insist on paying you back, though. If only in rates,” she said, giving him a look that dared him to give it to her for free.

To her surprise, he just nodded, his expression understanding. “Alright. We will work something out. How about you pay me in meals at your restaurant? Haven’t ever been there, but I hear the chain’s great. And I love Greek food.”

She shrugged. “Suits me. I’ll give you a card, then they’ll be putting it on my name.”

He raised an eyebrow. “You actually have a system for giving out free meals to people?”

She raised her nose up. “Paying people with food is common Hellenic family tradition.”

“Think I can join your family?”

She looked away. “D-don’t be ridiculous!”

“Huh? Why are you blushing?”

 

 

* * *

 

Around Noon

Melody stumbled back into her room, yawning. She really shouldn’t have gone drinking with Irene. They were too young! And she’d never even touched alcohol before, except for a sip of wine during Christmas or such. Of course, her body could take it – she’d emptied half a bottle of… something Irene had given her, and had barely felt her fingertips and toes prickle.

But still, they’d really lost track of time, and she’d never even considered the damage Irene might have caused if she got drunk – but she turned out to be the most pleasant drunk Melody could imagine (it turned out her power didn’t protect her from alcohol at all unless she wanted it to, and sometimes not even then). She’d just gotten quieter and quieter, and then fallen asleep.

Of course, that meant they were stuck in Italy, two underage girls without passports or anything. And Irene wouldn’t wake up.

She could have gone to the local United Heroes chapter, but… somehow, she really didn’t want this to become official.

Finally, she’d done something she never thought she would – she’d taken Irene’s cellphone and called her father (she didn’t want to disturb Lady Light at work, and something told her the Dark would be more understanding of the situation – besides, anything to distract him from doing Evil).

And… well, travel by Darkwraith was definitely not something she ever wanted to do again. He’d been a perfect gentleman, even seemed to find it funny what had happened – apparently, he already knew how Irene reacted to alcohol – and had taken her straight back here, dropping her off in the nearest alley, out of sight, telling her to ‘be a good girl’.

Look who’s talking, she thought as she pulled her sticky clothes off – the first half of a bottle hadn’t done much, but the following nine bottles of Italian spirit had done a number on her senses.

She stumbled out of her room in a bathrobe and into the showers, passing by a disgustingly chipper Aimi (who began to say something, then saw how messed up Melody was and wisely shut her mouth), and all but falling under the first showerhead, turning it on to ice-cold.

Brrrrr! Now, that helped better than any other remedy against a hangover… or whatever one would call her state. Not her field of expertise.

How did we even get the idea to try out Italian alcoholic drinks? Had it been Irene’s idea, or hers? She couldn’t quite remember…

Maybe Irene would remember, whenever she woke up. Her father had said it might take time, though.

I should probably go to sleep, she thought. No school this week, anyway. She turned the shower off, put the bathrobe on, and walked back into her room, wet and dripping. There wasn’t much chance of her catching a cold, but… she still sat down to dry her hair.

Turns out, she shouldn’t have, because someone knocked.

“Melody? It’s me, Sarah!” her handler said in a soft voice.

Oh, please don’t tell me I have an appointment. She at least couldn’t remember one.

“You have an appointment with Mister Patrid and Mister Gerden, from the Board of Directors.”

Dratz, why can’t they let me- wait, the Board of Directors!? What do they want with me!?

 

 

* * *

 

Later that evening

Dalia raised her glass high, shouting along with the other people in the club. The band had gotten a call-response thing going, and though she couldn’t, for the life of her, tell what she was supposed to say in response, she just shouted along with the others. The intervals were just big enough to take another draw from her drink, or call for a new one, and it was awesome.

She never could have gotten into a place like this! No way, even if she hadn’t so obviously been underage. Now the bouncers didn’t care if she was underage or not – she was hot, she was dressed up and obviously up for a party, so she was just waved in.

Suck on that, Zara! Bet’ya you never got to skip the line just for being hot! she thought in triumph as she emptied her glass and put it back on the counter, calling for a new one. Another advantage of being her, she could take a lot. As in, she was on her ninth drink, and she barely noticed a buzz – when she’d tried some alcohol back then, she’d dropped after just one drink! Now, her vision was a little weird and unfocused, but she could still tell where everything was and all!

And the guys. They were all looking at her when she danced by them, looked her body up and down, feasting on every bit of skin she was showing off… It made her feel so much more like a woman than she ever had before!

And, as if she wasn’t feeling good enough already, just then, she saw her. Good God, was she hot. She’d known that before, of course, but she’d never seen her dressed up for partying before!

Grabbing her new drink – something blue and gold and sparkly, with a name she couldn’t even pronounce – she danced her way through the crowd – I fucking love this – I don’t even need training to dance, it just works – and towards her. There was already a throng of guys around her, trying to dance her up, but she just danced by all of them, teasing, playing.

She’d already taken the dancefloor over, as people began to dance around her, she had that much presence.

I should hate her for stealing my thunder. But she had to admit, she still had to learn a lot, and here was a chance for some of it.

“Didn’t ecssspect to find yyyyyou here,” she said, not noticing the slur in her own voice. “How come yyyyou can dshuust come in here and make everyone pay attentschion like that?”

She turned, looking at her, eyes and lips sparkling brightly. “I just do it!” she replied. “And aren’t you a little young for a Fleur de Lune?” she asked, taking Dalia’s drink and emptying it in one draft!

And yet, I just want to kiss her. How does she do that? “I can take ik!” Dalia said proudly. “I lick alcohol! Never knew it wash thish goot!” she continued, giggling.

She smirked, and took her hand. “I think I can do better than some alcohol! Come, let’s dance!”

Dalia was so focused on the warmth and softness of her hand, she barely noticed when she pulled her onto the dance floor, held her hand up in hers, put her other hand on her hip and started to move.

It started slow, in tune with the slowly winding up song the band was just getting into, and then sped up along with it.

And Dalia was keeping up. She’d never have believed it, but her every step was perfect, keeping up with her as they whirled around the floor, two unbelievably hot babes dancing in a way that was just barely out of the realm of indecency.

She was so warm, and she smelled so nice, and the room was so hot and loud and full and just…

The world whirled around them, and Dalia couldn’t even really tell what they were talking about, just that she felt so… fuzzy…

 

 

* * *

 

“Well, this is awkward,” Amy whispered as she twirled with the barely conscious girl, getting her off the dance floor without making a scene. She was emitting gentle waves of don’t notice us, and once she was sure they were unobserved, she picked her up like a baby (she weighed about as much to her) and carried her out of the club through the backdoor.

“Basil would kill me if I didn’t take care of you now, you know? What a bothersome girl…” She looked down at the pretty face with the badly applied make-up. “A cutie, though.”

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B009.2 Family Matters

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“A week after the probing attack on the British Isles by the Red Army, what many expect to develop into the third world war has entered a new – and worrying – stage, as a coalition of various Sovjet metahumans from both side of the law have declared open rebellion against the remnants of the Red Council. Lead by the longtime member of the Foremen, Kopatel – also known as ‘the Digger’ – they attacked the temporary capital of the Sovjet Union, Saint Petersburg today, taking the Second High Secretary of the Red Council hostage and occupying the local government buildings…”

Basil and Amy watched as the news anchor rattled off the events. The revolutionaries had declared their intention to do away with the Red Council for good, preventing their resurrection. There was no information yet on what kind of follow-up government they wanted to implement, but their declaration of intent seemed mostly focused on them just taking down the council.

“Do you know why they do not talk about their actual goal beyond toppling the current rulership?” Basil asked his sister. She ought to know something, having been in Russia (and they would have a talk about her going off on such a dangerous job without telling him).

“Because they have none. Or rather, too many,” she explained as she ate chips out of a bag. “They’re not one group. They’re several distinct, even opposed groups of metahumans who are united solely by their desire to bring down the red council.” She finished the bag, crumpling it. “They’ll almost definitely turn on each other if they succeed.”

He nodded, focusing his attention back on the television (he had to upgrade it. The one they had at home was just a commercial model, utterly beneath his standards). There were some profiles given of the various metahumans and groups identified so far. Since he knew all about Kopatel (one of his personal favourite capes) and most of the others, he kind of spaced out while watching, devising the improvements he could make on the television whitout turning it into an obvious gadget. No Human Eradication Mode, then.

They saved the Devil’s Bride for last. Her profile was short, really. A (censored) picture – too many naked women out there, he thought surly; it was hard enough getting Amy to dress decently as it was, he did not want her to get the idea of doing away with clothes entirely (and she would, probably) – of a tall, slender woman with pure white skin and hair, the latter in a braid that was twice as long as she was tall. Her eyes were scarlet red.

Exact powerset unknown, but rumors from the other side suggested that she was considered an S-Class in the Sovjet Union and had evaded capture for two decades now.

“That’s bollocks, by the way,” Amy said. “The Sovjets class her as an S-plus meta.”

“What can she do?” he asked with a shudder. Not another one. That classification had originally been supposed to exist only for Desolation-in-Light. Then Emyr Blackhill – also known as the Godking of Mars – had been retroactively classified as an S-Plus threat. Then Ember had joined that list, and people had prayed it would stop there.

“She’s a… well, technically, she’s a power mimic,” Amy explained. Wait, was she not just using a British accent? “She permanently takes the powers of other people – by eating them.”

“Permanently? The whole power?” he asked. Nasty.

Amy slid over the back of the couch, cuddling up to him from the side. “Far as we could find out, she can only use three powers at a time, but it can be any power she’s ever eaten. Plus she’s got some kind of immortality going on – she regenerates slowly, but she can and has recovered from complete dismemberment and even cremation.”

“Oh, great. So she is basically a mini-DiL?” Just what we needed.

“Yup. She even manifested during a DiL-attack, back in the early days,” Amy said, wrapping her arms around his waist as she made herself comfortable. “Spent the last two decades roaming the lands eating people. Now, for whatever reason, she suddenly decided to involve herself in politics.“

Basil sighed, putting his right arm around Amy’s shoulders. What’s next?

 

 

* * *

 

An hour later, Amy had fallen asleep, drooling on his shirt. He did not have the heart to disturb her, even to just close her mouth. She had obviously tired herself out more than she had been willing to admit.

Besides, it looked utterly adorable. He took pictures with his cellphone, in case he needed some blackmail material.

Then he leaned back, switching through channels. He had never been much of a television watcher, all things considered. Daytime (and nighttime) television mostly bored him, except for a show or two every season.

Still, this was rather nice. Just relaxing on the couch with Amy. They had not done that since… well, since he had started building his base. Way too long.

So he just enjoyed relaxing, trying to ignore the ache that was still left after Gloom Glimmer had pretty much healed his entire body. Even with her power level, that had been draining. He still suffered from phantom pains every now and then, and a constant ache that had only gradually lessened over the last week.

Not to mention this damn headache.

That’s not from the healing, mate, the man in the moon spoke up. You’ve been overusing your power, over the last week, trying to make your stuff low cost and low maintainance.

I can not exactly not use my power, as you well know, Basil replied. And besides, unless I manage to do just that, then we will have to somehow make a lot of money in a short time. And I do not know how.

We’ll figure somethign out. Worst case, we’ll see about selling some of your stuff, or get ourselves a loan from A-

No. I am not going to rely on her for this, Basil cut him off decidedly. Setting aside the issue of me wanting to be independent from her on this, we are talking about money made out of criminal activities-

Which you obviously don’t object to enough to actually call Amy out, the man replied in something like a sneer.

What did you say? Basil thought angrily.

I’m literally talking right inside your fuckin’ head, he said, unimpressed. No way you didn’t understand me, matey.

I…

Oi, don’t get me wrong. I totally get why you’re making an exception for her. She’s family. Only family, at that. Still, if you’re gonna ignore the fact that you’re currently cuddled up to a serial rapist and murderer, then I’m sure you can ignore that fact when you use her money to buy yourself some quality materials and equipment to work with.

Basil fell silent (mentally), looking at Amy’s drooling, sleeping face. He wanted to punch the guy in the face for calling her those things, but… well, he would have to punch himself, to do that. Also, he was right.

He had never really connected Amy to Mindstar’s deeds, not… not emotionally, at least.

I am a hypocrite, am I not? he asked. I go after criminals, but no one I’ve fought so far – not even Hastur or Panthera Rex – was half as bad as Mindstar, were they not?

The voice in his head replied, in a somber tone, It’s not so cut and dry, pal. She’s family. Everyone makes exceptions for family.

There is a limit to it, though, Basil thought. How can I call myself a hero, sharing a home with, cooking meals for and tolerating a… well, her? He could not bring himself to put those words to her himself.

Best to look at it from a pragmatic point of view – you couldn’t possibly fight someone as powerful as she is, and that’s not even counting in her allies or her boss. You’re doing far more good concentrating on badguys on your level, and providing her some human grounding. Who knows how monstrous she’d be if she didn’t have you to ground her?

Tell that to Amazon. Or that sorority at the East Texas University.

By all accounts, the girls enjoyed that night, came the reply. In fact, I believe more than a few of them have been trying to get her to come back, haven’t they?

And how much of that is their own will?

You know as well as I do that Amy couldn’t possibly mind control that many people over an extended period of time. Face it, sometimes, reality makes pornos look reasonable.

I think we have derailed this conversation.

Well, what are we supposed to talk about? Apart from lots and lots of naked girls having a night-long orgy? It’s not like you’re actually considering turning Amy in, or working against her. Even if you could, you wouldn’t and we both know it.

Basil turned the television off, falling silent. He looked down at Amy, gently caressing her flank. She smiled, closing her mouth and snuggling closer.

 

 

* * *

 

“I think it’s funny,” Irene said. “How you’re more nervous about this than you were about meeting my parents.” She was sitting on Melody’s bed, one foot drawn up to rest her chin on her knee as she watched her friend try and pick out a dress to wear. She enjoyed seeing her in her underwear more than she wanted to, but neither could she take her eyes off Melody’s backside as she bent over to rummage through her drawer.

Am I really that bad? Melody asked absentmindedly. Irene had grown so used to being mentally connected to her, her power did it pretty much automatically whenever they were close. I mean, I know was a mess when we had dinner with them… even though your mom was really nice, and your dad not as scary as I thought he’d be…

“Yep, you’re even more agitated now. And I did tell you that dad was just deliberately messing with you, right? He’s not actually that scary, at least not in private,” she admonished her friend.

I know, I know, but… I mean, he’s the Dark. I ate dinner with the Dark and Lady Light. How could I not be agitated? Melody asked as she turned to look at Irene, interrupting her search.

“Don’t think of them as the oldest and most powerful cape and cowl of the world. Just think of them as your BFF’s quirky parents.”

Yeah, that’s not gonna happen any time soon. Also, I was quite freaked out that your dad just showed me his real form. I mean, didn’t he go out of his way to destroy all pictures of himself?

“He did, except for those that belong to mom. But who’re you going to tell? Why would you?”

True.

“Anyway, relax. This is your family. I’m sure they’ll be glad to see you,” a shadow passed over Melody’s face, “And I promise to not be naughty. C’mon, it’ll be fun!” She smiled for her friend, trying very hard not to use her power to calm her emotions. That would be wrong.

Melody took a deep breath (drawing Irene’s eyes to her bust for a moment, before she reigned herself in) and relaxed, fractionally. Then she turned back to her dresser drawer. After a few quiet minutes, she finally chose two dresses and presented them to Irene, holding them alternatively in front of her body.

One was a knee-length cotton dress in bright pink, to be worn with pantyhose beneath. No cleavage, long sleeves. It’d probably cling tightly to her body, but be thick enough to not show too much.

The other was longer, made of thinner blue material and clung tightly. The neckline was tame, but considering Melody’s bust size, that still put a lot of smooth, delcious f- Stop it, Irene. She’s your friend!

“Go with the pink one,” she said, hoping Melody hadn’t noticed the direction of her thoughts. Her power surged, confirming that no, she hadn’t. She was too nervous. “It’s more appropriate for a casual get together with family and friends. And it’s so you.”

Melody nodded and put the blue dress away. Then she pulled on a black pantyhose before putting the dress on. Irene clucked her tongue and stood up, helping Melody fix her hair again.

“It’ll all be fine,” Irene said. “We’ll meet your family, I’ll make your brothers drool, we’ll eat, make small talk, then go about our way. Relax.”

I don’t think it’ll be so simple, Melody said. I told you what they think of me, and what I do.

“I’m sure it’s not as bad as you make it out to be,” Irene replied. “I mean, my dad is the king of supervillains, and he wouldn’t ever be that mean to me.”

It’s kind of sad that the Dark seems to be a better dad than mine is.

“Oh, shut up!” Irene slapped her friend’s butt, making her jump up. Feels nice and so- Stop it, Irene! “Let’s go eat and have fun! Family awaits!”

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B007.e Sweet Dreams (Donation Bonus)

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Rage born of Fear

“Give me one reason why I shouldn’t break your bloody arms an’ legs and lock you up in your room,” said Amy quite calmly. It was quite clear, though, that she was very nearly boiling over with rage.

“Um… because you love me?” Basil replied as she kept him pressed flat against the ceiling.

“Not sufficient, I’m afraid,” she replied, and he felt her power start to tug and press against his arms and legs.

He was not worried that she would hurt him, not even by accident, but he did not put it beneath her to lock him up without a thing to use his power on. “Um, because I would just make prosthetics? I mean, Hastur and her cronies broke nearly every bone in my body and I still killed half of th-“

Wrong thing to say. A vein appeared on Amy’s forehead, pulsing angrily. “She. Did. What?!”

“Uh, maybe you could put me down and I could tell you what happened to me today?” he asked, hoping to somehow avert a total freakout (not a good idea when someone has purely mental powers).

Amy took a deep, slow breath, regaining her composure – a little. The pressure on his limbs vanished and he flew through the hallway and into the living room, where he was unceremoniously dropped onto the floor in front of Amy’s favourite love seat.

She came in and sat down, adjusting her bathrobe before she put one leg over the other and stared down at him. “Talk.”

* * *

Love and Words and…

Ten Minutes later…

“You… you…” Amy put her left hand to the bridge of her nose, kneading it as she closed her eyes. Trying to find her center before she crushed something in the house with ten tons of force.

When she opened her eyes again, Basil was still sitting in front of her on the floor, looking up with hopeful, big eyes… but she knew that trick already, and it wasn’t going to work on her this time.

“Basil… remember the discussion we had after you fought the Spiteborn?” she asked, trying to keep her voice calm. She succeeded, mostly. At least she thought she did, but Basil flinched, though that may have been due to her words, not her voice.

She did not like making Basil flinch from her. For whatever reason.

“Yeah… I do,” he said, rubbing the back of his head.

“I believe I made it clear that you were not to fight, or in any way engage, an S-Class threat, no matter the reason!” She immediately berated herself for screaming at Basil. That shouldn’t be happening.

He tried to take it with humor, which wasn’t a good idea at all. “Well, considering that you are an S-Class threat, wouldn’t that mean breaking off all con-“

“The difference between me and other S-Classes is that I would NEVER hurt you!” she screamed at the top of her lungs as she lunged forward, grabbing him by his collar and lifting him up as easily as a ragdoll. You bloody idiot, why won’t you understand!?, she screamed into his mind as her eyes turned purple. You could have died today in a dozen different bloody ways! You could have been beaten to death! You could have been impaled, blown to pieces, ripped apart! You could have been transformed, then died along with the rest of them when Hastur died and her power failed to support her toys! You could have left me alone!

Basil’s eyes widened as she projected all her misery into his mind, her fear and –

She cut off the connection before it would hurt him, gently putting him down. “You could’ve died,” she said as she felt something moist and warm on her cheeks. “You could’ve been gone.”

“So could you,” he replied, looking seriously into her eyes. His voice fell down to a whisper. “You fought Desolation-in-Light, who is a million times more powerful than Hastur could ever be. You have fought her several times now, and I have never protested, because I knew you felt like you had to.”

“Oh Basil,” she said, realizing how he must have felt. “There’s a difference, little brother. I’m quite a bit more powerful than you, my body is way tougher, I have low-level regeneration and I don’t bloody well get into close combat with her or anyone close to my weight class!“

He shook his head, as if to say that it didn’t make a difference, and she prepared a retort, but then she felt… she felt him notice something that shocked him, or rather surprised him.

“Amy,” he said, his eyes growing inquisitive. “You… you just spoke in a British accent… I think even a London accent! You’ve never done that before!”

That got her out of her current state of mind, as she went over what she’d said earlier. “Yeah. Yeah, I did. How come, I’ve never even been in London,” she mused, tapping her chin. Then she shook her head, regaining her focus. “Don’t try to change the subject now, little-“

“No, Amy, this is important!” he cut her off again, grabbing her by the shoulders. “Think. Where did you get that accent from?”

She did, thinking things through… he was so insistent, suddenly… “I don’t know, it just… it just slipped out,” she replied. “I’m pretty sure that has never happened before.”

Letting go of her arms, he turned around and took a few steps away from her, running his fingers through his hair (it had grown a bit, she noticed, and remembered that it had been a while since she’d cut his hair).

But that was not what was worrying her right now. “Basil? Basil, what is going on? Why is this so important?” she asked.

He turned back around to her. “Amy, I need an honest answer from you – on a possibly very delicate matter,” he said. “Will you promise me to say the truth?”

Now she felt hurt. “Basil, I wouldn’t lie to you!” she replied, feeling the anger rising again.

Nodding as if he’d expected that answer, he asked: “Do you know someone named Macia-“

* * *

Words unspoken, Thoughts unthought

“What were we talking about just now?” asked Amy as she found herself sitting in her loveseat again. When had she sat down? And why was Basil on the floor, looking rumpled?

“I do not… I think I was telling you how worried I was about you fighting Desolation-in-Light… did you tell me what happened?” he asked.

I… my memory jumped again, I… But her concern over that was so hard to hold on to, so she focused on the easier territory of answering his question. “I didn’t… but I guess I should, shouldn’t I?”

He nodded.

“Well, it turns out… and this is strictly between us, ’cause I’m not supposed to tell anyone yet… but it seems DiL attacked another location in between her attack on Okinawa and Kansas City.”

“Huh? Where?” he asked. Surely, an attack would have been reported?

“Well… she attacked Osaka… while the Savage Six were holding it in Heretic’s sealed dimension.”

That stunned him. “She can get in there!? What the hell happened? I assume they bailed?”

She shook her head. “They either didn’t want to or couldn’t, once her Desolation Field spread throughout the pocket dimension. Long story short, she engaged Heretic and eyewitnesses – what few remain – report consistently that he was completely destroyed. Every sphere, every rod, she annihilated it all.”

His mouth fell open. “Heretic is… dead? Are you sure?”

Shaking her head, she replied: “There’s no being sure… but his pocket dimension collapsed and expelled the entire city of Osaka and whoever was still alive, as well as the Six’ base of operations and what remained of their minions. Eyewitness reports put the collapse at the same time at which the last bit of Heretic was destroyed, and there were a few sightings of the remaining four members fleeing in the real world.”

“Holy… I mean, hell…” He put his hands to his head, unsure of how to react. She knew how he felt.

Could this be it?, she was asking herself, and she didn’t need telepathy to tell that he was having the same thought. Could this be the end of the Six? Could Desolation-in-Light have finally done something good for the world?

“So… the Six are on the run… that is good… but what does that have to do with her attack on Kansas?”

“Well… she didn’t harden her Desolation Field,” she said, returning to her original point. “She… she mimicked Heretic, displacing the entire space within her field into another dimension, completely cutting us off from the real world.”

“No. Way. Desolation-in-Light… learns? That does not happen!”

She shrugged. “Well, we always had suspicions that she wasn’t as… simple-minded as most believe, so I guess…”

“No, you do not get it! She has been active for more than twenty-six years now, and she has never, ever varied her modus operandi, apart from starting to employ her Desolation Field since her third recorded appearance!”

“But she did. But there might be an upside to it,” she tried to calm him down.

“Huh? What could pos-” He stopped, thinking it over, and she could practically see him arrive to the right conclusion. “If the site of her attack was cut off from the real world… then there might not be any far-reaching after-effects, since her power wouldn’t have reached beyond the city!”

“As far as we can tell, damage was contained within the battleground… reinforcements were cut off, but it seems that ‘only’ Kansas City, or rather an area about four square miles across, was devastated,” she explained with a smile. “We still got our Superbrains watching the place, calculating possibilities and all, but it seems like we’re finally getting kind of a break with her.”

He smiled back, and they both relaxed, their earlier fight nearly completely forgotten.

After a minute, Basil slid up to her and hugged her waist. “I am glad you are safe, sister.”

“And I’m glad you’re safe, too. Now, let’s both go to bed, we’ve had a stressful day, each of us.”

* * *

Lust and Love (and Popcorn)

She’d taken Basil up and kissed him goodnight before he went into the bathroom, and she went to her own bedroom to dry her hair and get ready for bed. By the time she’d finished her hair and put on her nightgown, he was already in bed, half asleep.

Smiling to herself, she laid down on her bed, relaxed and… heard someone knock on his bedroom window.

Snapping back up, she sent her sight and hearing out into his room, expecting to see an attacker or a robber or someone else she’d need to quickly remove and brutally murder out of sight of Basil… but only found a girl in a golden armour she could not look into.

The armour was too thin, too skintight and detailed to be real, and she got ready to blast her away… but Basil looked through the window, gave a start and hurried to open it and let her in before turning on the light in his room.

What the hell?

Wait, of course! His girlfriend had manifested. Her sleepy brain supplied the details.

My my, he didn’t mention that she ended up creating a drop-dead gorgeous bombshell.

Now curious, she watched as the girl leapt in, her helmet vanishing to reveal rich dark red curls, bright green eyes and red lips she mashed onto Basil’s as she caught him in a hug.

This promises to be interesting, she thought as she watched her boots vanish before she touched the floor of the room. Sneaking out of her room (not hard to do when you can just float out) by returning her sight to herself and keeping only her hearing with them, she eavesdropped on the two as they greeted each other and got to the serious business of some more – and very heated – kissing (and quite a bit of groping on her part).

Reaching the kitchen, she took out a pan and started to make some buttered popcorn, returning her sight to the room as soon as she could.

“I’ve missed you,” Prisca said, her face mere inches away from Basil’s.

He chuckled, rubbing his nose against hers.

Hey, that’s supposed to be just between you and me!

“It’s been just a few hours. And don’t you need to recharge your power?”

Oh, interesting. He didn’t note any limitations before.

Prisca shrugged a little. “As far as I can tell… I need to be awake twice as long as I want to use my power. I spent the last four hours awake, so I’d have two hours now for… this…” And her armour melted away, leaving only smooth, supple flesh as she slid (literally slid) backwards, giving Basil (and Amy) a nice view.

Yummy.

Basil seemed to agree, unable to tear his eyes off of her. He swallowed drily. “Um… I guess you… ah.”

Oh God, he’s so adorable, Amy thought as she snapped her sight between Basil’s room and the kitchen, buttering the popcorn just a little before glazing it in honey. She almost considered not being a peeping tom when her little brother lost his virginity. She wondered who was going to-

“I want you to have sex with me. A lot.”

Ah. Well, she’s nicely forward. Then again, she probably knows you need to, with Basil. He can be a little slow.

“I, uh, I see,” said slow person managed to say, still fighting to tear his eyes off her magnificent rack.

“Enough talk, let’s get to the fun part!” she said, grabbing him and pulling him into a tight hug and the kind of kiss Amy had just recently shared with Lamarr… though this one had far less skill and far more… fire involved.

It took them nearly three minutes to part their lips, and by the time they did, their faces were flushed and they were both breathing heavily (even though she could not possibly feel tired already). Their eyes were dilated, too.

“Let’s get you out of these stupid pajamas and get to some f-“

“No,” Basil suddenly said, his face growing serious as he put her at arms length… though his hands remained on her shoulders.

“What?”

What?

He looked at her with something like… sadness in his eyes. “Prisca, love, how do you feel?”

She blinked, her mouth open as she tried to switch mental tracks. “I feel… great. I mean, I’ve never felt this good and I’m whole again and strong and healthy and I can really feel you and why in God’s name are you not in bed with me having sex already!?”

Smiling sadly, he said: “Look, I am not exactly an expert when it comes to people-“

Ain’t that the truth, Amy thought as she put the popcorn into a large bowl, still hoping for some entertainment. Some more entertainment, because this was already promising to turn into one hell of a show, with or without sex.

“-but even I can tell that you are… that you are quite literally high on your power right now.”

“What does that have to do with anything!?” Prisca asked in an indignant voice, trying to wiggle out of his grip and get closer to him – but though she was quite obviously physically superior to him, he evaded her easily by taking an almost dance-like step around her, so their positions only reversed.

“Because sleeping with you now, when you are for all intents and purposes intoxicated would be a real sleazebag move… and we both deserve better than that.”

Oh God, is he seriously letting morals get in the way of teenage love sex? Perhaps she should nudge him in the right direction? No. Don’t even think about that. You swore to yourself that you’d never do that to Basil, whatever the reason.

“Basil, that’s stupid, I might be a little euphoric – big surprise! – but that doesn’t mean I’m not in control or anything!”

“Can you look me in the eyes and say honestly that you would even have considered just getting into my room at this time and jumping my bones before getting your power – if you had been physically capable of it?”

“Look, I’m just trying to get the most out of my new body, and you’re a big part of that!”

“Prisca, I have known you for months, and I am telling you – you are not acting like yourself right now.”

“Well, big fucking surprise, I just cut out my own eyes hours ago, got superpowers, fought a giant monster made of shit, helped take down an insane teenage monster girl-“

“And you expect me to believe that you are not in the least bit influenced by those events? Look, Prisca, I really, really want to… to make love to you… but right now, it would just be sex. And probably not the good kind, either, because neither of us has any idea what to do, I am tired and you are probably not yet in full control of your b-“

“GOOD GOD BASIL, why won’t you just fuck me?!” she shouted at him. “It’s sweet that you’re so concerned about morals and doing it right the first time, but I want it now and you’re seriously pissing me off right now!”

He actually seemed to relax when she said that. “I can live with that. Because tomorrow, or maybe the day after tomorrow, you might hold it against me if I took advantage of you here, or if we did it and it turned out wrong in any way, we might both hold it against each other for a long time… maybe forever. I would rather live with your anger now than with th-“

“For the love of FUCK, could you stop being so rational and considerate and shit and just fuck me!? Why are you even thinking about it so much!?”

Yeah, why aren’t you just having fun with the super-beautiful sexbomb who’s throwing herself at you?

Basil looked sadly at her. “Look, thinking is pretty much my superpower, even if it is usually limited to technical stuff. And besides, there is another reason why I… why I want to wait. Until we are both ready.”

“Oh? Do tell, and it better be good!” she said as she kept standing in front of him, stark naked.

“I would much rather… have our first time with your real body, after I have hea-“

“This is my real body, Basil!” she screeched, her composure blowing away for a moment. Both Basil and Amy reeled back in surprise at her outbreak. “That… that piece of shit back in the hospital? That hasn’t been my body since Dusu had her way with it! She twisted it, broke it, turned it into… not me!”

Hm…

“This is how I see myself… how I should have been, had that monster not fucked up my life! As far as I’m concerned, the piece of meat back in the hospital is just there to project and recharge this form… and I know that every. Single. Moment I spend in it to recharge my power will be pure hell, waiting to get out of that prison again!”

“Prisca, look, I know this projection feels great, but you shou-“

“No, Basil, you don’t get it!” Prisca replied, cutting him off. “This is me. The me inside of me, the one you always said you saw in me when I asked what you saw in me! Why won’t you take it now?”

“Because neither of us is ready, Prisca, and I’d rath-“

“Agh!” She threw her arms up and turned on the spot, wrapping them around her head. “Why are you so… so responsible and considerate? What kind of teenage boy says no to… to sex?“

He giggled. “I am not a normal teenage boy… and I love you enough to wait for as long as it takes for us both to be ready. You are worth it, and I am sure our first time will be worth it, too.”

Ohh, how sweet.

Finally, Prisca relaxed and looked over her shoulder, her eyes misty. “I hate this. You’re right, but I don’t care, I still just want to… to jump you.”

“Maybe you would rather go out with me – a nighttime stroll, to burn off some energy?” he asked, relaxing now that she was calming down.

“No… no, you’re right. You’ve got to be horribly tired, and I need some me-time to… to cool off. And get to know this body.” A simple dark green bodysuit appeared on her, looking a lot like standard hero wear, skintight and smooth. “At least I don’t need to ever worry about clothes,” she added.

Basil nodded, stepping forward to pull her into a far more tender kiss than before. When he let go of her, they were both flushed again, but the… tension from before was no longer there. “I am sorry I am being so stubborn right now, but I hope we will both look back at this and laugh, later,” he told her.

She nodded, her eyes more than a little wet. “I… I guess we will. It’s sweet, at least. But now I should go, or I might just jump you nonetheless.”

Smiling, he wished her good night and closed the window behind her.

Good Lord, that was not what I expected, at all. What did I make this popcorn for, now?

She watched as Basil pulled the curtains shut, then walked over to the one free wall in his room – well, more like the one part of his walls that he could easily stand in front of – and started to headbutt it.

Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.

Rolling her eyes, Amy walked to his room and went inside without knocking.

“Feeling stupid?” she asked with a smirk.

Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.

“You watched.” It wasn’t a question.

“Of course I did – for a moment, I was ready to blast her into the sky before I remembered that she was your girlfriend’s projection.”

“A wee little more than that, it seems. At least to her,” he replied.

“Yeah, well, about that. What did you expect? She’s been trapped in a body that was deformed by forces completely out of her control and now she suddenly gets her perfect dream body… it’s really a common problem for Spawners who actually create remote bodies of some kind. Think there’s a scientific term for it…”

Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.

“Multiple Body Disorder, kind of the opposite of Fluid Disorder, or a close cousin to it, depending on the theory you adhere to. People with multiple or changeable bodies often have trouble with their physical identity, to say the least… often followed by a complete disintegration of their former identity,” he rattled off as he kept hitting the wall with his head.

“But that’s not why you’re hitting that poor wall with your thick head, is it?” she asked playfully.

Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.

She smirked. “No, it’s because you just passed on what was surely going to be passionate, unrestrained and most probably mindblowing sex… all for the possibility that it might make her feel bad in the future… even though she’d most probably love it.”

Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.

“C’mon, everyone’s an idiot sometimes – come here.” He looked at her with a questioning look.

Winking, she said: “How about we watch a movie before going to sleep? Come on, I made popcorn, and you need some distraction.”

Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.

“Alright.”

“And please stop punishing that wall. Now, come on, my dearest little idiot.”

He snorted and turned away from the wall, before stopping in his tracks and looking at her. “What the hell did you make popcorn for?”

* * *

Memories forgotten, but not lost

They’d ended up watching a Disney movie (The Lion King, it had always been great at distracting him from whatever was weighing down on him) and emptying the bowl before going to bed.

Amy laid down in her queen-sized bed, the strain of the day catching up to her as her eyes closed…

“Are we there yet?” she asked her big brother.

“Not yet, Amy,” he said as he carried her on his back by a few straps he was using to hold her there and dangle the sack with the… pieces from.

“Amy? Why Amy?” she asked as she rubbed her cheek against his shoulder. “I thought my name was Amanda now?”

“Well, Amy is like, a nickname. A short form, right?” he replied. “Amanda can be your full name, and Amy the name your friends and family use.”

“That’s stupid! You’re the only one that matters, so why do we need names in the first place? And why do you call yourself Macian, anyway?” she asked, giggling as he threw her an annoyed look over his shoulder. This was nice, distracting her from the pain of the missing pieces.

“Well, first of all, it’s not an actual name, but a cape. Means ‘Maker’, which is just bloody fitting, don’t ya think?”

She tilted her head to the side, confused. “A ‘cape’? But it’s a word!” she replied, indignant that he was violating common sense now.

He chuckled now, which she thought was nice. He did it so rarely. “It’s slang. A kind of technical term. A ‘cape’ is a superhero’s whole identity – costume, name, modus operandi, stuff – and a ‘cowl’ is the same, only it belongs to a villain.”

“So you’re gonna be a superhero? Cool!”

“Yeah, Ember really left an impression,” he replied, blushing a little. “Especially considering I barely got to know him before we were seperated again by that bugger’s spell.”

“He sounds nice. And he helped you pick a name for me! So I wanna meet him, can we do that?”

“Of course, as soon as we get out of here. We’ll go to the sea and have a bath, we’ll get our own house, and friends, and family…”

She giggled, imagining all that before the pain of… before it made her flinch again. She tried to surpress a cry of pain, but she knew he’d noticed, and it always made him sad when she was in pain, even if it wasn’t ever his fault…

“What about you? Don’t you need a real name, too?”

“Hm, I do. Forgot to ask him for help with that. Got any ideas?”

“You’re asking me!?” she asked, delighted.

“Well, of course,” he said as they rounded a corner and he looked over his shoulder at her. “I picked yours, so it’s only fair if you pick mine.”

She would have clapped her hands in glee if she could. “Hmm, a name, a name… something with a ‘B’!”

“Why a B?”

“Because mine starts with an A, so yours should start with a B… how about… uh…”

She thought about it real hard as he went into an empty room and gently put her down. “I need to think some more, I think,” she said as he unpacked the sack, and took his tools out of his belt.

“Take your time, I’ve got plenty to do,” he said as he began to clean the pieces and her up and started to clean his tools, too.

“Hmm…” She thought about it some more when he started to work, and it even distracted her from the pain… a little. “B… Basil? Bart? What about Balthasar, that was someone in one of those books you read me before. About that old king, and that Daniel boy.”

“Bart is a short form for Bartholomew, I think. And Basil for Basileus,” he said as he made his stitches. It hurt, but she was used to it.

“Hm, Basileus, or Bartholomew, or Balthasar… they’re all nice, and they fit you, I think. Feels right. But which one, I can’t decide!” she complained, trying to ignore the pain in her leg as he finished and made her try it out.

“Well, why not take them all? Greed is good. So… Basileus Bartholomew Balthasar… Basil short. What should be our last name?”

“A last name? You mean… like a real family?”

He nodded.

“Hmm… Black!” she said as she looked into his eyes. They were so pretty, and bright and black…

“Black… Blake, then. It means ‘Black’, but sounds more interesting than just black,” he said as he went to work on her other leg. “Should we have a double last name, too? You know, like, our parents married but decided to keep both last names?”

“Sure! But then you choose the other name!” She flinched a little when he finished and made her test it, but neither of them commented on that.

“Okay… hmm… a little difficult… how about… Brant?” he asked, trying to smile while he worked on her left arm.

“Why Brant?” She tried to smile back.

“Just because. So, Basileus Bartholomew Balthasar Brant-Blake it is!”

She giggled happily. It was so silly. She liked it. And when she started to smile, he smiled too, for real this time, and that made her smile some more…

And then she got careless and cried out a little when he finished the left arm, making them both flinch.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to…” he started, but she shook her head vigoriously.

“It’s alright. I’m used to it, and you’ve gotten way better,” she said, trying to calm him down. Her silly brother always took everything so serious…

“I need to finish the other arm, and your right eye, so please relax now,” he said as he took one of his knives and approached her empty left eye soc-

Amy literally flew out of her bed, almost slamming into the ceiling before she caught herself.

What? What!?

She was drenched in sweat, her heart beating like crazy as she floated down again, rubbing her rough arms.

Another one of those dreams… if only I could remember… I need a shower…

Going to the bathroom, she immediately got into the shower without even turning on the light, throwing her nightgown into the laundry basket and turning the water on hot.

Rubbing herself vigoriously with the sponge, she tried to get the clammy sensation of sticky sweat off of her, and wash off the… the remnants of that dream. Whatever she’d dreamed about, it always made her all sweaty and worked up and feel so rough.

Getting out of the shower, she stepped in front of the mirror, sopping wet, and turned the light on with a thought…

And she screamed for a second before cutting it off.

Oh God, what happened to me!?

Her whole skin was covered in scars. From her scalp down to… she looked… down to her toes, scars everywhere, making her look like a leathery carricature of a woman… as if she’d been cut and torn apart thousands of times, and someone had put her back together, again and again and now she remembered the dream, twinkle twinkle little star, she saw the boy with the blazing black eyes, it was Basil but he was older than her, how I wonder what you are, that made no s-

Amy stepped out of the shower to dry herself off in front of the mirror. Her skin was no longer sweaty and clammy, but back to its usual softness. She could barely remember what had happened, only a bad dream, and now a lingering sense of… unease. A lack of safety.

What is going on wi-

She went to Basil’s room, not bothering to clothe herself, and slipped under his blankets, hugging him close.

The feeling vanished as she felt… safe.

Here she did. Only here, really, with her brother, did she feel… safe and whole… as if he was the only thing holding her together, putting her together…

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