- Location
- Here
Demons and Angels
- Thread starter Derek M
- Start date
- Crossover
- Location
- Ylisse
Is this meant to be Marcone or is the crime boss in this someone else?
- Location
- Ontario, Canada
The precursor to this one, ship of fools
- Location
- Maryland
Good catch. Thank you! Falcone is from the Batman stories. Marcone is Dresden. Wrong detective. I still got 5 out of 7 letters correct, which probably has more to say about what writers think are good names for mobsters than anything else...
Chapter 18: Visiting
- Location
- Maryland
Chapter 18: Visiting
Sophia and her friends were sitting and listening to the leadership of the Earth Defense Force debate what to do next about their vacation. May's parents were physically present in the room, as were Reed Richards and the billionaire industrialist known as Tony Stark. Joining via video was the ruler of Latveria, Victor von Doom, and the stern-faced Director of S.H.I.E.L.D., Nick Fury. Sophia noted that Fury did indeed look a lot like Samual Jackson, but he was missing his trademark eyepatch. In retrospect, she should have expected that given the EDF's association with the Family. It was highly unlikely Ianthe wouldn't offer to fix the man's eye the first time they met in person. And speaking of the Family, they were also represented via video by Metis. The black-scaled lizard hadn't said much so far, but most of the meeting up until now had been the three teens describing exactly what had happened with their attacker and answering follow-up questions.
Peter started off the debate. "Do we think this is another Skrull plot? We thought they were behind the last symbiote-linked agents, after all."
"Perhaps," commented Doom, "but I am troubled by the mystical skill evinced by this attacker. I trust Ms. Dresden's assessment of that."
Fury grunted. "I think we need to bring in Strange on this one."
"He has a previous engagement," replied Reed. "He let Sue and I know he was going to be unavailable in the immediate future while he dealt with an issue involving Mephisto."
"Yes," agreed Metis on the screen, "he contacted us as well on the chance that he might need our assistance, but so far he seems to have things well in hand."
"Perhaps the girls should return to the ship, then? That would be the safest option," suggested Mary Jane. Sophia grimaced but kept her tongue. She could hear a small noise of discontent from May's direction.
Tony leaned forward and put his chin on his hand. Sophia had to admit he was a stunningly handsome man for an old guy. "I'm not sure the girls are actually in any danger," said the industrialist. "They seem to have just been caught up in an attempt to learn more about EDF business."
"That doesn't change the fact that anybody in the Parker family is a potential target," argued Fury. Sophia could see from the expressions in the room that nobody disagreed with that, including May. That didn't bode well for their vacation.
"I'm not certain that we know enough about what is going on quite yet," countered Metis. "For all we know, the girls may have just been a target of opportunity." She appeared to look directly at Sophia. "I think they should stay, and I would like to send somebody else to serve as an escort for them. We can monitor them remotely. Of course, I would expect the girls to keep their gear with them from now on."
Mary Jane frowned. "I'm not sure I'm comfortable with that."
Fury, however, seemed to be intrigued by the idea. "I have somebody who could help look after them as well. With two escorts and FamTech gear, I can't think of much that would threaten them."
"Let's not dance around the real situation," said Doom. He looked directly at the three teenagers. "You three girls should realize that the goal of our reptilian friend, as well as Director Fury and myself, would be to try and elicit additional hostile action from our foes. You would be bait, albeit bait that would be mostly impervious."
Peter was frowning. "Metis, I'm a little surprised to hear you suggest something like that...and possibly a little disappointed."
Metis smiled at Peter. "Peter, I can assure you that the girls would be in no danger. The person I have in mind would be ready to pull in Family assistance at a moment's notice, and the girls have EDM costumes and healing symbiotes."
"My agent would be able to deal with anything below that threat level," added Fury. "I think you'll like who I have in mind."
Peter and Mary Jane looked at each other and appeared to be having a silent conversation. Finally, MJ gave Peter a reluctant nod. May's father then turned to her. "May, you're not a small child anymore. I have to admit that I was heroing in New York at your age, and I didn't have anywhere near your level of support. Still, I expect the three of you to use good sense."
"Yes, Dad," said May. Sophia thought she sounded atypically obedient, but then none of them wanted to be dragged back to the ship before their vacation was done.
"All right," replied Peter. "Why don't you girls go wait in the visitor lounge until your escorts are here." He turned to regard the rest of the group. "The rest of us have to talk about what else we're going to do in response to this."
The three teens quickly left, with May leading them to the place her father mentioned. Sophia said, "I'm surprised your parents were willing to go along with that." She knew that if it had been her parents making the decision, then she would have already been on her way back to safety.
May frowned. "Mom isn't happy about it. Neither is Dad, really. Having said that, they both know I've been training to follow in their footsteps and that just being their daughter is going to make me a target on a regular basis. As long as we don't do anything reckless or foolish, they'll trust us to take care of ourselves."
"My parents are kind of the same way," added Maggie. "Don't get me wrong. They would raise hell...sometimes literally...if they had to in order to protect me. They also know that they can't keep me away from all danger. Dresden Security has a lot of enemies back home, and some of them make the super-villains in this New York look like drunk footie hooligans in terms of threat."
Sophia considered that. "I'm pretty sure my parents haven't internalized what being a cape means in my world other than that it can be incredibly dangerous. I also don't think that they understand what the Family can really do. Most capes back home don't have a costume made of Family super metal and magi-tech."
"I'm sure Metis will help explain things to them," said May. "We just have to deal with the burden of being hot chicks with superpowers."
Sophia heard Maggie mutter, "Dios mío," and didn't have to look at her to know the Latina was rolling her eyes. Louder, the witch said, "I'm confident the Family will help us if things get too dangerous." She glanced over at May. "Who do you think we're getting as escorts?"
May pursed her lips. "I have suspicions, but I don't want to jinx it."
The three girls went quiet as they each considered the possibilities.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Aaron was looking around the park, trying to find the girl he was here to meet. He had, somewhat reluctantly, told his mother he was going out today to meet a girl. She had just smirked slightly at his embarrassment. That was more than OK with Aaron, though, as it kept her from asking him anything that might reveal his secret magical studies. Better to let his mother think that he was just nervous about a girl. Of course, he had to admit that he was nervous about that, as well, but Penny seemed surprisingly tolerant of his awkward verbal fumbling.
The girl in question was sitting on a bench by herself and was obviously looking around for him. When she saw him, she waved to him. Aaron lifted his hand in response and quickened his step. "Hi, Penny," he said when he got closer.
"Are you hungry? I was thinking we could go get something to eat while we talk?" she asked.
He wasn't really that hungry, but he wasn't going to turn her down. "Sure, that sounds great," he said with a smile.
The two walked together to one of the dining halls. This one was currently decorated like a Mexican restaurant, though the decor could be turned off or switched to pretty much anything. It didn't really matter, as the replicators could create any meal in the ship's records. He decided to roll with the theme and ordered a couple of tacos with a side of pico de gallo. Penny got New York-style pizza, which he thought was also a good choice. The replicators on board were adept at creating really good pizza with perfect crusts.
As they grabbed a table, he struggled to find something to say. Picking a safe topic, Aaron asked, "So, did you make it through any more of the book?"
Penny took a bite of her pizza and nodded. After swallowing, she said, "yeah, two more chapters. It turns out chapter two was a lot harder than the others. I think it's meant to be more of a reference chapter." The text in chapter two had rather thickly gone over a wide variety of rules, warnings, and principles of magic, followed by examples and exceptions. Sometimes, the exceptions took more text than the original topic. "Chapter three was on magical sponsors like gods, and the next one talked about magical focuses."
His teeth crunched through a taco shell as she spoke. Once he chewed and swallowed, wiping a bit of sauce off his chin with a napkin, he asked, "What are magical focuses?"
"All sorts of things," she replied. "But the most common ones are magic wands and wizard staffs...staves? I don't know what the right word is." He watched her nab a bit of cheese with her finger and pop it in her mouth. Aaron found it strangely endearing. "It also talks about magic crystals, plants and animals, technomancy, jewelry, and even vehicles."
They spent their time talking about various magic topics while they finished their lunch. He was really curious about technomancy, as it sounded very powerful and very Family. As they were busing their dishes back to the replicator, Aaron screwed up his courage and said, "Hey, Penny, thanks for helping me with this. They're having a sports exhibition from different worlds tomorrow afternoon in the Deck Seven Rec Center. Some friends and I were planning on going. I was wondering if you would want to go with us?"
She looked at him speculatively. "Are you asking me on a date?"
"Um...yeah, if you want to? I mean, we'll be with other people, but I would like to go with you?" He smiled at her hopefully.
She smiled back, much to his relief. "Yes, I'll go with you and your friends."
He relaxed. If tomorrow went well, then he could see about doing something with just the two of them.
It never occurred to him that Penny had already agreed to meet him in the park today and that then they had spent their lunch together, talking about topics of mutual interest. His father could have told them that it was a better first date than most...once he had stopped laughing at how clueless his son was about girls.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Yong-Gongju was looking at the assembled members of her clan. She couldn't stop herself from giving short bows to the older Dragon and Bahamut. They were effectively the clan elders. The rest of the family included Astilabor, Draco, Ramoth, Samantha, and River. Her branch of the clan was represented by her own dimension's Dragon, as well as her nieces, Tina, Maris, and Ada. The Family-affiliated Dragon started things off. "Yong-Gongju has discovered something during her excursion to the Slayer Earth that merits all of our attention."
"Actually," said the Korean-styled AI, "it involves both the Slayer world and also the Stargate universe." River and Samantha were the only two who weren't surprised by that.
"Is this another Wormhole X-treme! thing?" asked Cousin Asti.
She shook her head. "No, it has nothing to do with the television show or even dimensional travelers, as far as I know." She proceeded to explain what had happened with the seer who reached out to her and then to describe the events at the data center owned by the Goa'uld Tanthis. Yong-Gongju displayed her visual and auditory recordings of the events, pausing now and then to add commentary.
"It's not surprising that an information broker would have information on the Family, honestly," said Ramoth after the recording ended. "They do make quite an impression on anybody who meets them."
Tina nodded. "It's also not surprising that somebody else would want to steal it."
Bahamut raised an eyebrow. "I think you're both missing the real issue, here, which is the question of why a higher power in the Slayer universe would warn us about something happening in an entirely different reality. That suggests that there is a significant amount going on beyond the obvious."
"The seer suggested this involved a great evil," commented mirror-universe Dragon. "Presumably, the attackers could be servants or minions of that power?"
The Dragon Princess shook her head. "Ani, we can't assume prophecy is so straight-forward. While it's possible that they are agents of the evil in question, it's also possible that the data they were stealing would have led them to that evil. It's even possible that the events I witnessed would have led to releasing an evil inadvertently by another party...and that other party could even be us."
"It's wise to be cautious," agreed Bahamut. "Having said that, the direct nature of the warning suggests that we can't afford to ignore the attack itself. It would be best to identify who is behind it."
River brought up the images of the attackers again. "These soldiers have gone out of their way to hide their identity, so there isn't much to go on to track them down. They were shielded against scans and don't seem to be marked with any type of insignia. The recordings couldn't even hear what language they were speaking. We can start doing searches for similar uniforms, but human military attire doesn't vary that much even across different human worlds." That was true for technologically advanced civilizations, at least, which clearly described the unknown raiders.
"Can we figure out why the powers in the Slayer reality took an interest?" asked Maris.
"Eh," interjected Draco. "Wouldn't it be obvious? We know there's been dimensional leakage between those realities in the past thanks to the incident with that television program. Something significantly bad could cross over and cause problems in both realities."
"Wouldn't there be a lot of things that could cause those kinds of problems, though? Like, the Replicators or the Ori?" asked Asti.
"They very well might have been threats, but we weren't around at the time to receive the warning," said the older Dragon. "Can we reach out to the powers in that reality and simply ask?"
Bahamut slowly nodded her head. "We can try, but..." She paused. "Oh, now that is interesting..."
Tina, Draco, Yong-Gongju, and Ada all simultaneously said, "What?" Asti smirked and yelled, "Jinx!" The others ignored her, focusing on Bahamut.
"We just received a message from Luthor. I think I should just play it," said Bahamut.
An image appeared in front of the group. Lex Luthor looked much healthier than he had when he had first encountered the Family. He was clearly more focused and energetic, but the most obvious change was his shoulder-length red hair. His message was short and to the point. "Bahamut, I'm calling to let you know that one of the LexCorp data centers was attacked earlier today. That center contained most of the information I have on the members of the Justice League, as well as information on the Family and their associates. My security forces were able to fight off the invaders with significant losses. The attackers used some type of plasma rifle, and they were wearing black uniforms without any form of identification. Normally, I would suspect a local threat like Intergang, but something interesting happened during the attack. Look at this."
The image changed to show what was clearly a fight between LexCorp security and what was a very familiar-seeming group of attackers. Overlaid on the side of the image was the output from the facility security scanners. It was clear that scans of the assailants were being blocked. About ten seconds into the video, though, something interesting happened. A pulse laser turret popped up out of a hidden wall mount and unleashed a torrent of energy against one of the attackers. The attacker was thrown back with severe burns, but more importantly, the jamming was momentarily disrupted. The readings were inconclusive, and the jamming resumed quickly, but one aspect stood out clearly.
"As you can no doubt interpret from the scan data, the attackers are not native to this dimension. The scan didn't last long enough to get a specific quantum signature, unfortunately. I felt it was important to let you and the Family know about this as soon as possible. I will, of course, also be informing the Guardian Lanterns...and also asking them why they didn't detect a dimensional breach given that such things fall under their remit. I will also send you a full log of the security recordings from this attack."
The AI's were quiet for a short time as they pondered the meaning. Of course, that time was measured in nanoseconds, but time passes differently for machine intelligences.
"Well, I think we can see why the powers would be concerned if this is a multi-dimensional threat," commented Ramoth. "I think we all need to start looking in the various universes where we maintain a regular presence to see if there are any incidents like this that have fallen outside of our notice."
Bahamut turned to look at Yong-Gongju. "Can you postpone your other tasks and liaise with the Sineya Council and Dresden Security about these incidents? Those realities have much weaker AI coverage than the others, so we could use their help."
"Ye, of course," agreed the Dragon Princess.
Yong-Gongju's sister Dragon added, "We'll forward anything we come across to the group and then decide when we need to meet again?"
The others all nodded or signaled their assent. Everyone present was troubled by the implications of events so far, but only time would tell how serious things actually were.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
The next day, the girls were waiting at the Parker residence for their escort to show up.
"What do you want to do today, assuming our chaperones are willing?" asked May. As the local, she was willing to follow the lead of her guests.
Sophia considered the question. "We could go shopping," she suggested.
Maggie nodded. "Yeah, New York has to have their own version of Chicago's Magnificent Mile, right?"
"Ha!" exclaimed May. "What kind of shopping do you want? Do you want the Madison Avenue boutiques? Something trendy in SoHo? We could head to Canal and look around Chinatown, too. There are a lot of options just in Manhattan, and more if you consider all of the boroughs."
The Brockton Bay native glanced out the window at the sky. "Looks a little cloudy, today. Is the weather going to be OK?" Even with her costume on, she didn't want to wander around in a rainstorm.
The native girl shrugged. "Why don't we stay in Midtown? If it gets wet, we can always head inside to Columbus Circle or one of the other indoor malls."
"Will I be able to afford anything at a place like that?" asked Sophia. She had spending money, but it wasn't a fortune.
Maggie and May both waved away that concern. "Don't worry about it. Money really isn't an issue for people who work with the lizards. We can cover it." Sophia frowned, but it was hard to argue against it when the reptiles could literally conjure anything they wanted out of thin air. She had seen it happen herself with her own costume.
There was a chime from the door to the condo, and May's mother went to answer it. "Maybe that's our escort?" commented Maggie.
MJ's face lit up as she opened the door. "Nat! Fury roped you into watching the girls today?"
The often taciturn S.H.I.E.L.D. agent gave her friend a small smile. "It's not an imposition, MJ," she said. The two formidable redheads each stepped forward for a quick hug.
Sophia's eyes widened slightly. Given that she was staying with Spider-Man, she really shouldn't be surprised that their guardian was going to be Black Widow, but it still made an impression on her. The woman was second only to Wolverine in terms of her favorite comic characters and was a total badass. In the back of her mind, there was a brief thought that she probably should talk to the Nox about her tastes in comic stories, but she put that aside for later consideration.
Maggie and May both moved forward to greet one of their favorite honorary aunts. Maggie knew Natasha Romanoff from their stay in Bolivia while her father studied under Doctor Strange. Romanoff had come specifically to work with her mother on martial arts and gunplay. May was quite familiar with the female Avenger due to her father's career as a superhero and the leader of the Earth Defense Force. May took it upon herself to introduce Sophia. "Aunt Nat, this is our friend Sophia. She's a hero from one of the Brockton Bay alternates."
Sophia slightly hesitantly reached out to shake the woman's hand. The brief hand grasp made it clear that the Russian superspy was quite strong, even given how good the woman had to be at masking her strength in casual situations. The teen was also surprised that they were approximately the same height, though the older woman's presence was enough to easily overwhelm that trivial parity between them. "It's nice to meet you," said Romanoff. She turned to look at May. "Do you girls have an idea of where you want to go today?" The three explained their plans, and their escort looked pleased by their choices. Sophia wondered if their sight-seeing from the previous day would have bored the well-traveled woman. "We just have to wait for your other escort, then, and we can get going," said Widow.
At that moment, a portal began to open in the middle of the Parker living room. Neither Natasha nor May's mother appeared in the slightest bit worried, so Sophia quickly relaxed as the opening widened into one that a human could step through easily. The person who actually stepped through surprised her.
An older teen boy stepped into the room. He was quite familiar to the girls, though he was atypically dressed in normal street clothes for New York City. "Well, hello there!" he greeted.
"Tom?" asked Sophia. The teen she had recently met after her latest Danger Room session was standing there, looking at them expectantly as the portal behind him sealed itself.
"You're going with us around New York today?" asked Maggie.
"Metis asked me to, so I said yes," answered the wizard. He looked to the two older women. "I assume one of you is Agent Romanoff?"
"That would be me," said Romanoff. "This is Mary Jane Parker," she added, gesturing to May's mother.
Tom nodded his head politely. "It's a pleasure. My name is Tom Riddle, and I'm a wizard. Metis thought that, given the nature of what happened to the girls and the fact that Stephen Strange is busy elsewhere, some mystical support on the ground would be a good idea. Of course, I'm perfectly happy to defer to the expertise of the senior agent on the scene."
Natasha just nodded as if she expected it. "Good. Now that you're here, we can begin shopping."
"Shopping?" asked the young man, his eyes widening slightly. Metis hadn't mentioned that he would be accompanying a group of teenage girls on a shopping expedition.
The three teen girls all looked at him sharply. Maggie finally broke into a giggle and said, "Oh, don't worry Tom. At least you won't have to carry our bags in your hands. You can just shrink them and put them in your pocket." The Marvel universe had no rules about the overt use of magic. That would have been rather pointless when mutants, aliens, supersoldiers, and paranormal heroes and villains regularly had brawls in the middle of the city.
"You're wearing your costumes under your clothes, aren't you?" asked Widow. The three girls nodded. "Well, then you've all got oversized pockets, so that shouldn't be an issue." Sophia could feel her cheeks heat up in embarrassment. She had forgotten about that in favor of teasing Tom...and she hadn't been the only one, based on the reactions of the other two girls. "Let's get going."
The five of them left, appearing to be four normal teens with an adult chaperone to any watcher. There was one watcher who wasn't fooled, however.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
The communications device was a complex piece of technomancy that allowed for instantaneous conversation over interstellar distances. The image that appeared to hover over the main crystal showed only a shadowy outline, but this was expected. A whispery voice ordered, "Report!"
Calynx bowed slightly to show respect, and said, "The young humans have again gone out into the city, but they have guardians with them now. One is an older female that we know works for Fury. The other is a younger male. I have never seen him before, but the air around him tastes like sorcery."
There was a brief pause and the shadowy figure replied, "That is not good news. Our new allies have asked that we capture one of the young females for questioning."
Calynx was surprised at that. His original ambush had simply been a way to gather information on Earth's defenders. Earlier attempts at infiltration had shown that it was not wise to underestimate the many and varied warriors guarding this world. "I will need assistance to ensure the success of an abduction. The young females all have power, albeit inexpertly applied. I would expect their watchers to be even more formidable."
He was again surprised to see his superior nod in agreement without debate. "You will have it," said the figure. "Our new allies have proven that they can help the Dire Wraiths become the dominant force in this galaxy. We must do everything we can to keep them agreeable." That this state of affairs would only last for as long as their allies proved to be useful did not need to be said out loud. "You should expect a strike team to arrive shortly."
The transmission then ended, leaving Calynx to begin planning how to best intercept their targets. He was particularly worried about the S.H.I.E.L.D. agent. It would probably be best to employ a diversion. He shifted his form to one of his regularly used human guises to shift his voice and used a mundane (and disposable) mobile phone to place a call.
"This is Taskmaster," said a voice as soon as the call connected.
"This is Mr. Jacobs. How quickly can you get to New York City?" asked Calynx. He had dealt with Taskmaster before using this alias and found the human mercenary to be both efficient and effective.
There was a pause. "I can be there within four hours. You have a job?"
"My associates and I need to keep a certain Russian spider occupied while we acquire a needed asset," said Calynx. He was confident that he and the pending strike team would be able to handle a single sorcerer and the girls themselves. The Widow was the problem.
"You know my fee. Just tell me when and where," agreed the mercenary.
"I'll be in touch within the next six hours," said Calynx. That should give him plenty of time for the strike team to get here and in the interim, he would be scrying on his targets. He hadn't been expecting the young females to be so capable the first time. He wouldn't take any chances with their next encounter.
Sophia and her friends were sitting and listening to the leadership of the Earth Defense Force debate what to do next about their vacation. May's parents were physically present in the room, as were Reed Richards and the billionaire industrialist known as Tony Stark. Joining via video was the ruler of Latveria, Victor von Doom, and the stern-faced Director of S.H.I.E.L.D., Nick Fury. Sophia noted that Fury did indeed look a lot like Samual Jackson, but he was missing his trademark eyepatch. In retrospect, she should have expected that given the EDF's association with the Family. It was highly unlikely Ianthe wouldn't offer to fix the man's eye the first time they met in person. And speaking of the Family, they were also represented via video by Metis. The black-scaled lizard hadn't said much so far, but most of the meeting up until now had been the three teens describing exactly what had happened with their attacker and answering follow-up questions.
Peter started off the debate. "Do we think this is another Skrull plot? We thought they were behind the last symbiote-linked agents, after all."
"Perhaps," commented Doom, "but I am troubled by the mystical skill evinced by this attacker. I trust Ms. Dresden's assessment of that."
Fury grunted. "I think we need to bring in Strange on this one."
"He has a previous engagement," replied Reed. "He let Sue and I know he was going to be unavailable in the immediate future while he dealt with an issue involving Mephisto."
"Yes," agreed Metis on the screen, "he contacted us as well on the chance that he might need our assistance, but so far he seems to have things well in hand."
"Perhaps the girls should return to the ship, then? That would be the safest option," suggested Mary Jane. Sophia grimaced but kept her tongue. She could hear a small noise of discontent from May's direction.
Tony leaned forward and put his chin on his hand. Sophia had to admit he was a stunningly handsome man for an old guy. "I'm not sure the girls are actually in any danger," said the industrialist. "They seem to have just been caught up in an attempt to learn more about EDF business."
"That doesn't change the fact that anybody in the Parker family is a potential target," argued Fury. Sophia could see from the expressions in the room that nobody disagreed with that, including May. That didn't bode well for their vacation.
"I'm not certain that we know enough about what is going on quite yet," countered Metis. "For all we know, the girls may have just been a target of opportunity." She appeared to look directly at Sophia. "I think they should stay, and I would like to send somebody else to serve as an escort for them. We can monitor them remotely. Of course, I would expect the girls to keep their gear with them from now on."
Mary Jane frowned. "I'm not sure I'm comfortable with that."
Fury, however, seemed to be intrigued by the idea. "I have somebody who could help look after them as well. With two escorts and FamTech gear, I can't think of much that would threaten them."
"Let's not dance around the real situation," said Doom. He looked directly at the three teenagers. "You three girls should realize that the goal of our reptilian friend, as well as Director Fury and myself, would be to try and elicit additional hostile action from our foes. You would be bait, albeit bait that would be mostly impervious."
Peter was frowning. "Metis, I'm a little surprised to hear you suggest something like that...and possibly a little disappointed."
Metis smiled at Peter. "Peter, I can assure you that the girls would be in no danger. The person I have in mind would be ready to pull in Family assistance at a moment's notice, and the girls have EDM costumes and healing symbiotes."
"My agent would be able to deal with anything below that threat level," added Fury. "I think you'll like who I have in mind."
Peter and Mary Jane looked at each other and appeared to be having a silent conversation. Finally, MJ gave Peter a reluctant nod. May's father then turned to her. "May, you're not a small child anymore. I have to admit that I was heroing in New York at your age, and I didn't have anywhere near your level of support. Still, I expect the three of you to use good sense."
"Yes, Dad," said May. Sophia thought she sounded atypically obedient, but then none of them wanted to be dragged back to the ship before their vacation was done.
"All right," replied Peter. "Why don't you girls go wait in the visitor lounge until your escorts are here." He turned to regard the rest of the group. "The rest of us have to talk about what else we're going to do in response to this."
The three teens quickly left, with May leading them to the place her father mentioned. Sophia said, "I'm surprised your parents were willing to go along with that." She knew that if it had been her parents making the decision, then she would have already been on her way back to safety.
May frowned. "Mom isn't happy about it. Neither is Dad, really. Having said that, they both know I've been training to follow in their footsteps and that just being their daughter is going to make me a target on a regular basis. As long as we don't do anything reckless or foolish, they'll trust us to take care of ourselves."
"My parents are kind of the same way," added Maggie. "Don't get me wrong. They would raise hell...sometimes literally...if they had to in order to protect me. They also know that they can't keep me away from all danger. Dresden Security has a lot of enemies back home, and some of them make the super-villains in this New York look like drunk footie hooligans in terms of threat."
Sophia considered that. "I'm pretty sure my parents haven't internalized what being a cape means in my world other than that it can be incredibly dangerous. I also don't think that they understand what the Family can really do. Most capes back home don't have a costume made of Family super metal and magi-tech."
"I'm sure Metis will help explain things to them," said May. "We just have to deal with the burden of being hot chicks with superpowers."
Sophia heard Maggie mutter, "Dios mío," and didn't have to look at her to know the Latina was rolling her eyes. Louder, the witch said, "I'm confident the Family will help us if things get too dangerous." She glanced over at May. "Who do you think we're getting as escorts?"
May pursed her lips. "I have suspicions, but I don't want to jinx it."
The three girls went quiet as they each considered the possibilities.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Aaron was looking around the park, trying to find the girl he was here to meet. He had, somewhat reluctantly, told his mother he was going out today to meet a girl. She had just smirked slightly at his embarrassment. That was more than OK with Aaron, though, as it kept her from asking him anything that might reveal his secret magical studies. Better to let his mother think that he was just nervous about a girl. Of course, he had to admit that he was nervous about that, as well, but Penny seemed surprisingly tolerant of his awkward verbal fumbling.
The girl in question was sitting on a bench by herself and was obviously looking around for him. When she saw him, she waved to him. Aaron lifted his hand in response and quickened his step. "Hi, Penny," he said when he got closer.
"Are you hungry? I was thinking we could go get something to eat while we talk?" she asked.
He wasn't really that hungry, but he wasn't going to turn her down. "Sure, that sounds great," he said with a smile.
The two walked together to one of the dining halls. This one was currently decorated like a Mexican restaurant, though the decor could be turned off or switched to pretty much anything. It didn't really matter, as the replicators could create any meal in the ship's records. He decided to roll with the theme and ordered a couple of tacos with a side of pico de gallo. Penny got New York-style pizza, which he thought was also a good choice. The replicators on board were adept at creating really good pizza with perfect crusts.
As they grabbed a table, he struggled to find something to say. Picking a safe topic, Aaron asked, "So, did you make it through any more of the book?"
Penny took a bite of her pizza and nodded. After swallowing, she said, "yeah, two more chapters. It turns out chapter two was a lot harder than the others. I think it's meant to be more of a reference chapter." The text in chapter two had rather thickly gone over a wide variety of rules, warnings, and principles of magic, followed by examples and exceptions. Sometimes, the exceptions took more text than the original topic. "Chapter three was on magical sponsors like gods, and the next one talked about magical focuses."
His teeth crunched through a taco shell as she spoke. Once he chewed and swallowed, wiping a bit of sauce off his chin with a napkin, he asked, "What are magical focuses?"
"All sorts of things," she replied. "But the most common ones are magic wands and wizard staffs...staves? I don't know what the right word is." He watched her nab a bit of cheese with her finger and pop it in her mouth. Aaron found it strangely endearing. "It also talks about magic crystals, plants and animals, technomancy, jewelry, and even vehicles."
They spent their time talking about various magic topics while they finished their lunch. He was really curious about technomancy, as it sounded very powerful and very Family. As they were busing their dishes back to the replicator, Aaron screwed up his courage and said, "Hey, Penny, thanks for helping me with this. They're having a sports exhibition from different worlds tomorrow afternoon in the Deck Seven Rec Center. Some friends and I were planning on going. I was wondering if you would want to go with us?"
She looked at him speculatively. "Are you asking me on a date?"
"Um...yeah, if you want to? I mean, we'll be with other people, but I would like to go with you?" He smiled at her hopefully.
She smiled back, much to his relief. "Yes, I'll go with you and your friends."
He relaxed. If tomorrow went well, then he could see about doing something with just the two of them.
It never occurred to him that Penny had already agreed to meet him in the park today and that then they had spent their lunch together, talking about topics of mutual interest. His father could have told them that it was a better first date than most...once he had stopped laughing at how clueless his son was about girls.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Yong-Gongju was looking at the assembled members of her clan. She couldn't stop herself from giving short bows to the older Dragon and Bahamut. They were effectively the clan elders. The rest of the family included Astilabor, Draco, Ramoth, Samantha, and River. Her branch of the clan was represented by her own dimension's Dragon, as well as her nieces, Tina, Maris, and Ada. The Family-affiliated Dragon started things off. "Yong-Gongju has discovered something during her excursion to the Slayer Earth that merits all of our attention."
"Actually," said the Korean-styled AI, "it involves both the Slayer world and also the Stargate universe." River and Samantha were the only two who weren't surprised by that.
"Is this another Wormhole X-treme! thing?" asked Cousin Asti.
She shook her head. "No, it has nothing to do with the television show or even dimensional travelers, as far as I know." She proceeded to explain what had happened with the seer who reached out to her and then to describe the events at the data center owned by the Goa'uld Tanthis. Yong-Gongju displayed her visual and auditory recordings of the events, pausing now and then to add commentary.
"It's not surprising that an information broker would have information on the Family, honestly," said Ramoth after the recording ended. "They do make quite an impression on anybody who meets them."
Tina nodded. "It's also not surprising that somebody else would want to steal it."
Bahamut raised an eyebrow. "I think you're both missing the real issue, here, which is the question of why a higher power in the Slayer universe would warn us about something happening in an entirely different reality. That suggests that there is a significant amount going on beyond the obvious."
"The seer suggested this involved a great evil," commented mirror-universe Dragon. "Presumably, the attackers could be servants or minions of that power?"
The Dragon Princess shook her head. "Ani, we can't assume prophecy is so straight-forward. While it's possible that they are agents of the evil in question, it's also possible that the data they were stealing would have led them to that evil. It's even possible that the events I witnessed would have led to releasing an evil inadvertently by another party...and that other party could even be us."
"It's wise to be cautious," agreed Bahamut. "Having said that, the direct nature of the warning suggests that we can't afford to ignore the attack itself. It would be best to identify who is behind it."
River brought up the images of the attackers again. "These soldiers have gone out of their way to hide their identity, so there isn't much to go on to track them down. They were shielded against scans and don't seem to be marked with any type of insignia. The recordings couldn't even hear what language they were speaking. We can start doing searches for similar uniforms, but human military attire doesn't vary that much even across different human worlds." That was true for technologically advanced civilizations, at least, which clearly described the unknown raiders.
"Can we figure out why the powers in the Slayer reality took an interest?" asked Maris.
"Eh," interjected Draco. "Wouldn't it be obvious? We know there's been dimensional leakage between those realities in the past thanks to the incident with that television program. Something significantly bad could cross over and cause problems in both realities."
"Wouldn't there be a lot of things that could cause those kinds of problems, though? Like, the Replicators or the Ori?" asked Asti.
"They very well might have been threats, but we weren't around at the time to receive the warning," said the older Dragon. "Can we reach out to the powers in that reality and simply ask?"
Bahamut slowly nodded her head. "We can try, but..." She paused. "Oh, now that is interesting..."
Tina, Draco, Yong-Gongju, and Ada all simultaneously said, "What?" Asti smirked and yelled, "Jinx!" The others ignored her, focusing on Bahamut.
"We just received a message from Luthor. I think I should just play it," said Bahamut.
An image appeared in front of the group. Lex Luthor looked much healthier than he had when he had first encountered the Family. He was clearly more focused and energetic, but the most obvious change was his shoulder-length red hair. His message was short and to the point. "Bahamut, I'm calling to let you know that one of the LexCorp data centers was attacked earlier today. That center contained most of the information I have on the members of the Justice League, as well as information on the Family and their associates. My security forces were able to fight off the invaders with significant losses. The attackers used some type of plasma rifle, and they were wearing black uniforms without any form of identification. Normally, I would suspect a local threat like Intergang, but something interesting happened during the attack. Look at this."
The image changed to show what was clearly a fight between LexCorp security and what was a very familiar-seeming group of attackers. Overlaid on the side of the image was the output from the facility security scanners. It was clear that scans of the assailants were being blocked. About ten seconds into the video, though, something interesting happened. A pulse laser turret popped up out of a hidden wall mount and unleashed a torrent of energy against one of the attackers. The attacker was thrown back with severe burns, but more importantly, the jamming was momentarily disrupted. The readings were inconclusive, and the jamming resumed quickly, but one aspect stood out clearly.
"As you can no doubt interpret from the scan data, the attackers are not native to this dimension. The scan didn't last long enough to get a specific quantum signature, unfortunately. I felt it was important to let you and the Family know about this as soon as possible. I will, of course, also be informing the Guardian Lanterns...and also asking them why they didn't detect a dimensional breach given that such things fall under their remit. I will also send you a full log of the security recordings from this attack."
The AI's were quiet for a short time as they pondered the meaning. Of course, that time was measured in nanoseconds, but time passes differently for machine intelligences.
"Well, I think we can see why the powers would be concerned if this is a multi-dimensional threat," commented Ramoth. "I think we all need to start looking in the various universes where we maintain a regular presence to see if there are any incidents like this that have fallen outside of our notice."
Bahamut turned to look at Yong-Gongju. "Can you postpone your other tasks and liaise with the Sineya Council and Dresden Security about these incidents? Those realities have much weaker AI coverage than the others, so we could use their help."
"Ye, of course," agreed the Dragon Princess.
Yong-Gongju's sister Dragon added, "We'll forward anything we come across to the group and then decide when we need to meet again?"
The others all nodded or signaled their assent. Everyone present was troubled by the implications of events so far, but only time would tell how serious things actually were.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
The next day, the girls were waiting at the Parker residence for their escort to show up.
"What do you want to do today, assuming our chaperones are willing?" asked May. As the local, she was willing to follow the lead of her guests.
Sophia considered the question. "We could go shopping," she suggested.
Maggie nodded. "Yeah, New York has to have their own version of Chicago's Magnificent Mile, right?"
"Ha!" exclaimed May. "What kind of shopping do you want? Do you want the Madison Avenue boutiques? Something trendy in SoHo? We could head to Canal and look around Chinatown, too. There are a lot of options just in Manhattan, and more if you consider all of the boroughs."
The Brockton Bay native glanced out the window at the sky. "Looks a little cloudy, today. Is the weather going to be OK?" Even with her costume on, she didn't want to wander around in a rainstorm.
The native girl shrugged. "Why don't we stay in Midtown? If it gets wet, we can always head inside to Columbus Circle or one of the other indoor malls."
"Will I be able to afford anything at a place like that?" asked Sophia. She had spending money, but it wasn't a fortune.
Maggie and May both waved away that concern. "Don't worry about it. Money really isn't an issue for people who work with the lizards. We can cover it." Sophia frowned, but it was hard to argue against it when the reptiles could literally conjure anything they wanted out of thin air. She had seen it happen herself with her own costume.
There was a chime from the door to the condo, and May's mother went to answer it. "Maybe that's our escort?" commented Maggie.
MJ's face lit up as she opened the door. "Nat! Fury roped you into watching the girls today?"
The often taciturn S.H.I.E.L.D. agent gave her friend a small smile. "It's not an imposition, MJ," she said. The two formidable redheads each stepped forward for a quick hug.
Sophia's eyes widened slightly. Given that she was staying with Spider-Man, she really shouldn't be surprised that their guardian was going to be Black Widow, but it still made an impression on her. The woman was second only to Wolverine in terms of her favorite comic characters and was a total badass. In the back of her mind, there was a brief thought that she probably should talk to the Nox about her tastes in comic stories, but she put that aside for later consideration.
Maggie and May both moved forward to greet one of their favorite honorary aunts. Maggie knew Natasha Romanoff from their stay in Bolivia while her father studied under Doctor Strange. Romanoff had come specifically to work with her mother on martial arts and gunplay. May was quite familiar with the female Avenger due to her father's career as a superhero and the leader of the Earth Defense Force. May took it upon herself to introduce Sophia. "Aunt Nat, this is our friend Sophia. She's a hero from one of the Brockton Bay alternates."
Sophia slightly hesitantly reached out to shake the woman's hand. The brief hand grasp made it clear that the Russian superspy was quite strong, even given how good the woman had to be at masking her strength in casual situations. The teen was also surprised that they were approximately the same height, though the older woman's presence was enough to easily overwhelm that trivial parity between them. "It's nice to meet you," said Romanoff. She turned to look at May. "Do you girls have an idea of where you want to go today?" The three explained their plans, and their escort looked pleased by their choices. Sophia wondered if their sight-seeing from the previous day would have bored the well-traveled woman. "We just have to wait for your other escort, then, and we can get going," said Widow.
At that moment, a portal began to open in the middle of the Parker living room. Neither Natasha nor May's mother appeared in the slightest bit worried, so Sophia quickly relaxed as the opening widened into one that a human could step through easily. The person who actually stepped through surprised her.
An older teen boy stepped into the room. He was quite familiar to the girls, though he was atypically dressed in normal street clothes for New York City. "Well, hello there!" he greeted.
"Tom?" asked Sophia. The teen she had recently met after her latest Danger Room session was standing there, looking at them expectantly as the portal behind him sealed itself.
"You're going with us around New York today?" asked Maggie.
"Metis asked me to, so I said yes," answered the wizard. He looked to the two older women. "I assume one of you is Agent Romanoff?"
"That would be me," said Romanoff. "This is Mary Jane Parker," she added, gesturing to May's mother.
Tom nodded his head politely. "It's a pleasure. My name is Tom Riddle, and I'm a wizard. Metis thought that, given the nature of what happened to the girls and the fact that Stephen Strange is busy elsewhere, some mystical support on the ground would be a good idea. Of course, I'm perfectly happy to defer to the expertise of the senior agent on the scene."
Natasha just nodded as if she expected it. "Good. Now that you're here, we can begin shopping."
"Shopping?" asked the young man, his eyes widening slightly. Metis hadn't mentioned that he would be accompanying a group of teenage girls on a shopping expedition.
The three teen girls all looked at him sharply. Maggie finally broke into a giggle and said, "Oh, don't worry Tom. At least you won't have to carry our bags in your hands. You can just shrink them and put them in your pocket." The Marvel universe had no rules about the overt use of magic. That would have been rather pointless when mutants, aliens, supersoldiers, and paranormal heroes and villains regularly had brawls in the middle of the city.
"You're wearing your costumes under your clothes, aren't you?" asked Widow. The three girls nodded. "Well, then you've all got oversized pockets, so that shouldn't be an issue." Sophia could feel her cheeks heat up in embarrassment. She had forgotten about that in favor of teasing Tom...and she hadn't been the only one, based on the reactions of the other two girls. "Let's get going."
The five of them left, appearing to be four normal teens with an adult chaperone to any watcher. There was one watcher who wasn't fooled, however.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
The communications device was a complex piece of technomancy that allowed for instantaneous conversation over interstellar distances. The image that appeared to hover over the main crystal showed only a shadowy outline, but this was expected. A whispery voice ordered, "Report!"
Calynx bowed slightly to show respect, and said, "The young humans have again gone out into the city, but they have guardians with them now. One is an older female that we know works for Fury. The other is a younger male. I have never seen him before, but the air around him tastes like sorcery."
There was a brief pause and the shadowy figure replied, "That is not good news. Our new allies have asked that we capture one of the young females for questioning."
Calynx was surprised at that. His original ambush had simply been a way to gather information on Earth's defenders. Earlier attempts at infiltration had shown that it was not wise to underestimate the many and varied warriors guarding this world. "I will need assistance to ensure the success of an abduction. The young females all have power, albeit inexpertly applied. I would expect their watchers to be even more formidable."
He was again surprised to see his superior nod in agreement without debate. "You will have it," said the figure. "Our new allies have proven that they can help the Dire Wraiths become the dominant force in this galaxy. We must do everything we can to keep them agreeable." That this state of affairs would only last for as long as their allies proved to be useful did not need to be said out loud. "You should expect a strike team to arrive shortly."
The transmission then ended, leaving Calynx to begin planning how to best intercept their targets. He was particularly worried about the S.H.I.E.L.D. agent. It would probably be best to employ a diversion. He shifted his form to one of his regularly used human guises to shift his voice and used a mundane (and disposable) mobile phone to place a call.
"This is Taskmaster," said a voice as soon as the call connected.
"This is Mr. Jacobs. How quickly can you get to New York City?" asked Calynx. He had dealt with Taskmaster before using this alias and found the human mercenary to be both efficient and effective.
There was a pause. "I can be there within four hours. You have a job?"
"My associates and I need to keep a certain Russian spider occupied while we acquire a needed asset," said Calynx. He was confident that he and the pending strike team would be able to handle a single sorcerer and the girls themselves. The Widow was the problem.
"You know my fee. Just tell me when and where," agreed the mercenary.
"I'll be in touch within the next six hours," said Calynx. That should give him plenty of time for the strike team to get here and in the interim, he would be scrying on his targets. He hadn't been expecting the young females to be so capable the first time. He wouldn't take any chances with their next encounter.
Not sure why he would be scrying them and assume the sorcerer who's now with them wouldn't notice?
They have no idea about his capabilities. For all they know, this sorcerer could be set as the protector simply because he has possible scry detection capabilities.
Kinda want the bad guys to win some of these though. Assume they don't have idiot balls being thrown around and all that.
They have no idea about his capabilities. For all they know, this sorcerer could be set as the protector simply because he has possible scry detection capabilities.
Kinda want the bad guys to win some of these though. Assume they don't have idiot balls being thrown around and all that.
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A Dire-wraith with a Symbiote, nasty combination.
For those unfamiliar with them, Dire-wraiths are shapeshifters, and the females are generally dark sorcerors while the males tend toward advanced tech. Their society is female dominated. According to the Marvel wiki I linked above, they splintered off of the Skrulls millions of years ago.
For those unfamiliar with them, Dire-wraiths are shapeshifters, and the females are generally dark sorcerors while the males tend toward advanced tech. Their society is female dominated. According to the Marvel wiki I linked above, they splintered off of the Skrulls millions of years ago.
- Location
- Maryland
Happy New Year!
Thanks to everyone who continues to follow this story, especially given that real-life has significantly slowed the rate of posting. Between health problems and my job, it's been harder to keep up a regular rate. Having said that, I fully intend to bring this story to a satisfying conclusion!
So, here's hoping 2021 turns into a much better year for all of us.
Thanks to everyone who continues to follow this story, especially given that real-life has significantly slowed the rate of posting. Between health problems and my job, it's been harder to keep up a regular rate. Having said that, I fully intend to bring this story to a satisfying conclusion!
So, here's hoping 2021 turns into a much better year for all of us.
- Location
- The general area. Possibly behind you.
I too am keen to see where this goes, as I find it highly entertaining 
Make 2021 Great Again!
Make 2021 Great Again!
- Location
- Buffalo, NY, USA
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!
No.
Some Dire-wraiths about to get curb-stomped.
Chapter 19: Developments
- Location
- Maryland
Chapter 19: Developments
Saurial looked at the image of the planet below on the monitor. It was a massive gas giant with a swirling, deep blue atmosphere located in the outer reaches of a binary star system. A human ship from most realities would have ignored it entirely, or seen it as a convenient place to refine hydrogen, discharge accumulated energy, or hide from detection (depending upon the technical abilities of the civilization in question). Scanning the atmosphere for life signs, however, revealed large creatures that seemed to gather together in unusually structured forms.
'Seeing these results, I believe I now understand the information provided to us by Eden. The creatures below appear to be made up of colonies of smaller organisms. These colonies display increasing intelligence as their size grows. They are tool users and seem to have access to technology that functions around the same level as 17th-century Europe,' thought Varga.
'Colonial organisms with shared intellect? Do you think that will be a theme?' This was the third world on the list that they had visited based on Eden's information. The first had been populated by squid-like creatures living on a world that was 85% water. The creatures had seemed to have an insect-like social structure with queens controlling large territories. The smaller drone squids had not been fully sapient, though there seemed to be different classes of drones with varying levels of intellect.
Varga's small dragon form appeared on one of the consoles of the Skimmer. "Quite possibly. The entities' experiments would seem to predicate a need for a large number of individual minds capable of both engaging in conflict and inventing new uses for individual powers. Eden and her ilk would seem to ignore unsuitable species unless they pose a significant threat." The second world visited had been scoured bare of all life, clearly through some form of orbital bombardment. Eden's information had simply tagged the extinct species as, "natural weapon users," but there was nothing left on the world to give them any additional clue as to what that meant. Whatever the threat, the entities clearly considered it dangerous enough to vaporize it entirely.
"There isn't any sign that Eden and Scion were ever here, according to the scans," said Saurial with a frown after reviewing the sensor records. "They didn't even leave a sensor probe to monitor the development of the inhabitants."
Varga nodded his small head. "They have no curiosity in the sense that humans do, at least not without taking on aspects of humanity with their avatars. Their experiments are driven by a perceived threat rather than any desire to learn for its own sake. Given the volume of knowledge accumulated within their agents, it's possible that they discarded that instinct as no longer necessary."
Saurial shook her head. "That seems horribly short-sighted. It also makes me wonder if this is a wild goose chase."
"Perhaps," agreed Varga. "I suspect that they saw it as a way of avoiding distractions and ignored the other consequences. As for our search, we have fourteen more civilizations to investigate. I suggest we continue our explorations. If nothing else, the results are interesting from a purely scientific perspective. I find it far more entertaining to examine unusual species in person rather than just reading about them in the databases of the Federation or the Asgard."
Saurial smirked. "Do you have a form that would work well in the atmosphere below?" They had swum in the oceans of the squid creatures under the assassin's cloak, and Taylor had to admit it was one of their more exciting diversions. It had been completely alien to her experiences, and even Varga had seemed surprised by some aspects of their society.
"I think we could..." began Varga, only to pause when a communication alert sounded.
Saurial reached over and pressed a control spot and a familiar black lizard appeared on the screen. "Hello, Metis," said Saurial. "Something happen?"
The black-scaled reptile frowned. "We just got a message from Luthor. Our mysterious assailants tried to attack a LexCorp data center. Fortunately, their security was better than that of the Goa'uld that Yong-Gongju visited, and we were able to get some scans of the attackers' equipment. The strange thing is that we found at least three different dimensional signatures."
"That could simply be a way for them to obscure their point of origin," commented the small dragon.
Metis nodded. "Yes, or it could be indicative that they have holdings in multiple realities...or both. I'm sending you the information. I thought that since you two were already wandering the multiverse, you could make a side trip to look for clues."
Saurial and Varga looked at each other. The former reptile shrugged. The latter replied, "I believe we can take the time to look at those realities. At least, we can do a quick scan of likely worlds in this galaxy." There were a number of spots in each reality that the Guardians from the DC Universe referred to as nexuses. Those planets were normally the center of any unusual happenings. Of course, that didn't mean that interesting things couldn't happen elsewhere.
"We may be looking for a needle in a very big haystack," added Saurial. The scope of even a single universe was hard for the human mind to comprehend. Taylor was better able than most, but even she wasn't yet at the point that she could equal Varga's ability.
Metis nodded. "I know, but these attackers are starting to become a nuisance. The Dragon Clan is starting to suspect that they may be involved in a number of incidents in different realities. It's hard to verify, however, as they're exceedingly good at covering their tracks."
"We'll let you know if we find anything," replied Saurial.
Metis disconnected, and Saurial and Varga looked at each other. Figuring out how to float in and navigate around the atmosphere of a gas giant would have to wait for another day.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Tom was enjoying being in New York City, but he was slightly disconcerted that the girls seemed more interested in interrogating him about his past than they were in actually looking for anything to buy on their shopping trip.
"Your parents are archaeologists?" asked May. She and Sophia were asking most of the questions, as Maggie had met Danial and Sarah Jackson in the past.
Tom nodded. "Yes...or at least, that's how they started. They've since branched out into adjacent fields of study such as anthropology, xenoarcheology, biology, and historical analysis. Mum jokes that my father's string of doctorates is longer than his actual name. She just calls him, 'Doctor,' half the time, even though her education is almost the equivalent."
Sophia felt like something about his background didn't add up. "Wait, if your parents are scientists, then how did you end up a wizard?"
Tom smiled at her. "Well, I was born to it. On my version of Earth, some people happen to be born with a gene for magic. There's a whole secret community of magical people."
"Are you from the Justice League reality?" asked Maggie. "Are you one of the homo magi?" Maggie had met Zatanna Zatara when she had come to visit her father.
"No," he replied with a slight shake of his head. He was making an effort to keep his attention on his surroundings, but he knew Natasha was also doing so, and he strongly suspected that Fury hadn't assigned her to work alone. Whoever the other watchers might be, they were being quite discreet. "There are stories in the ship's library about my reality. They're named after one of the sons of an old magical family, the Potters."
That twigged some vague memories for Sophia of some Earth Aleph fantasy films. "You're from Harry Potter?"
Tom gave her a strange look. "I'm from a world that is similar to the one described in those stories, yes, but it isn't exactly the same."
"Do you know Harry Potter?" she asked slightly persistently.
Now the older teen wizard looked slightly uncomfortable. "I've never had the pleasure, which is probably for the best. Are we almost to the shopping district?" His last question was said slightly urgently as if he wanted to change the topic.
"Yeah, we're almost there," said May. "We're only three blocks from Central Park right now." They had decided to walk rather than take public transit due to the threat of attack. Getting caught in a subway car by a creature like the one who attacked them wasn't particularly appealing, and there was always an increased risk to innocent bystanders in such close quarters.
Maggie looked up at the sky. The weather was a little better than they had expected. "Does anybody want to look around the park?"
May shrugged and glanced at Sophia. "We could, I suppose. We could head over to Umpire Rock, or even go to the zoo? It's at the south end."
Sophia grimaced. "I don't mind checking out the park, but I'm not really that interested in the zoo." She glanced at Maggie. "Unless you really want to go?"
The witch shook her head. "No, that's fine. Let's just look around the park for a bit."
"Three teenaged girls aren't eager to go shopping?" asked Tom jokingly. "Should I be checking you three for mind control?"
Sophia raised an eyebrow. "Were you hoping we would model outfits for you?"
"What? No!" he replied, slightly flustered.
May got a mischievous look on her face. "There's a swimsuit store in this part of town that's got some very cutting edge designs. Some of them are barely there."
Tom was smart enough to keep his mouth shut, though he was blushing slightly. Natasha didn't bother to keep the small smile off of her face. Young people could be really amusing at times.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
This show was exceedingly intriguing. The setting was apparently a version of human civilization that had not had powers introduced by the creators. Instead, there were other sources of strange abilities -- like magic. There was evidence that the scary reptilian demons had access to such powers, but the program he was watching showed normal humans making use of it. That suggested an alternate reality -- one with slightly different physical laws than this one.
One example of such magic was when the human designated Kay had used a magic book to freeze the human designated Charity. It was unclear exactly why the two had such a contentious rivalry. There was a conflict over mating with another human designated Miguel, but Leviathan wondered if it also had something to do with the fact that Kay's and Charity's parents were siblings? The most interesting aspect of this magic ability was how Kay used it to create a reanimated corpse version of Charity. The Endbringer considered how such an ability could be mimicked using powers. While it could be done in a variety of ways, it would be difficult to duplicate the effects shown in the television program exactly. He wondered if there were inaccuracies in how the events were depicted? He was savvy enough to know the difference between live broadcasts and recreations of stories by actors and how there could be variances from actual events in the latter.
Leviathan sent out a request to search for references to the town of Harmony and was puzzled by his sister's somewhat exasperated response that such a town didn't exist in this reality. While disappointed, he refrained from asking additional questions. The last thing he wanted was for his sister to restrict his access to this world's information networks, given how little else there was to do while trapped at the bottom of the sea. With a mental shrug, he began another episode. Maybe he could figure out how the characters managed to watch episodes of the show that they were already playing in? It was an intriguing exercise in predictive divination...
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
"Are we going to talk about it, or are you going to keep giving me the silent treatment?" asked Peter as he and his wife continued to sort through the paperwork required to run a global extraterrestrial defense force.
Mary Jane Parker raised an eyebrow at him. "I'm not giving you the silent treatment. We just had a ten-minute conversation on how to give countries without standing navies more investment in the service?" Most ship's crew candidates seemed to perform better after retraining if they had experience in a wet navy, but not every country had even a token nautical force.
Peter simply gave her a look. "How long have we been married?"
She looked back at him with a blank face. The two continued to look placidly at each other for almost a full minute. Finally, she broke their stand-off first with a sigh. "You know I'm not happy with us using those girls as bait."
Peter frowned. "I'm not particularly happy about it either."
Now her expression turned slightly accusatory. "You didn't argue much with Nick and Victor."
He gave his own sigh before responding. "Because I know -- and YOU know -- that they were right. The girls are as protected as they can possibly be. You know Metis wouldn't put them at risk. Hell, even Nick would go out of his way to make sure nothing happened to May. He's obviously got more than Nat watching them. So what's really bothering you?"
MJ looked down at her hands. Peter gave her time to get her thoughts together. He was familiar with how her mind worked and had learned early in their relationship that pressing her before she was ready with something complicated just irritated her needlessly. Finally, she looked back up at him. "Do you think we should have done more to discourage May from following in our footsteps? Putting on a costume and fighting crime isn't exactly a safe lifestyle..."
Peter thought back to their own history and couldn't help but shake his head at the irony of this conversation. He had originally broken up his own marriage because he was afraid of putting his family and any (at the time, potential) children at risk due to his crime-fighting career. Then, after his inadvertent trip to another universe to help another member of the spider-family, he had gotten back together with his wife and healed over that split...only to get sucked into yet another multiverse adventure involving a family of giant lizards. Ianthe had offered to share Peter's powers with Mary Jane and they had accepted. At that point, he had had to quash his own misgivings about his wife joining him on patrol. Well, at least he knew how to try to address this issue based on his own past feelings.
"Do you think May is the type of person who would stand by and not act if she found somebody in trouble?" he asked his wife.
She frowned. "We could have done more to steer her away from putting herself at risk."
"How?" he asked, slightly perplexed. "I mean, she wouldn't be your daughter if she didn't care about other people."
MJ flushed a little at the compliment but persisted. "It's our job as parents to keep our kids out of danger."
Peter nodded. "To a point, I agree. That's why we let her go study with the Family the first time we thought she might be at risk. There comes a point, though, when we have to trust her to make her own decisions. I think she's showed good judgment so far."
"What about the incident with the plaster koala bear?" asked MJ skeptically.
He paused. "MOSTLY good judgment...and she was only ten at the time."
She rolled her eyes but finally agreed. "All right, yes, she generally has a good head on her shoulders...for a teenager."
"She also handled the attack about as well as we could expect. All three of them did, frankly," said Peter thoughtfully. "It's clear that Sophia's been paying attention to her training based on the debriefing...and you know Harry and Karrin would have made sure Maggie can handle herself." He watched the expressions on his wife's face shift. "What's really getting to you?"
His wife walked over to the sofa to the side of his office and dropped heavily down into the plush cushions. "We let Fury and the Family talk us into taking on this job with the EDF, and now people are targeting our family over it."
Peter let a slight smile curve the edges of his mouth, happy to get to the crux of the issue. "You feel guilty because they got attacked."
"Well, it is our fault, isn't it? I never really wanted this kind of responsibility, and now people are ambushing May to get at us," she replied. "I'm not even sure I'm the right person to help you run our version of Starfleet Command."
Peter thought about that. It hadn't actually occurred to him that MJ might be feeling overwhelmed by the responsibilities of her job on top of the stress from the situation with May and her friends. "I don't think this job has anything to do with May being in danger. She's Spider-Man's daughter. Even if I had never met the Family, she would be a target. The good news is that she's much better protected now than she might have been otherwise."
His wife considered that and then grudgingly nodded her agreement.
"As for your other question...I want to understand more where you're coming from. I think you've done an amazing job. I don't know if I could have done this without you," he said.
He could see a flash of annoyance. "Peter, you absolutely could have. I wish you wouldn't be so hard on yourself."
He smiled at her. "Yes, I probably could have." He still had regrets related to a certain theme restaurant that had done terribly, among other bad decisions like leaving his wife the first time, but he no longer blamed himself for the whole fiasco. "Having you by my side has made me ten times more effective, though. You have a natural skill and grace with people that I don't. I can't count the number of times you've gotten Reed and Victor, or Nick and Tony...or hell, any other combination of that ball of egos we call a council...to actually listen to each other. That's not even counting how much having you as the public face of the EDF has boosted our standing with the civilian population. You've also helped make sure our uniforms are far more stylish than Starfleet's." The last was said with a grin.
Ignoring the joke, Mary Jane flopped back and put her hands behind her head. "I never expected to be more than an actress or model, Pete. At this stage in my life, I had hoped that the hardest decisions I had to make would have been which project to tell my agent to accept on my behalf. Instead, we're dealing with life-and-death problems involving the fate of the entire planet. It is a bit much."
He plunked himself down next to his wife on the sofa. He was concerned with how tired she looked. "You know, I think it's about time we had another family vacation. We haven't really taken a break since before May went back to school. It's been more than two years."
"It's been busy around here," she said non-committedly.
"It has," he agreed, "but we have lots of good people who can keep things going if we're gone for a few weeks."
She looked at him sideways. "What did you have in mind?"
"Last time I spoke to Daniel, he told me that Disney in his world had made a big effort to integrate Asgard technology into their theme parks. I thought we could spend a couple of weeks in Florida, then another couple weeks in Hawaii...or maybe someplace more exotic?"
"We haven't been to Southern Europe in a while," said MJ thoughtfully. "I think we can plan something fun. It's probably a lot easier to get around on vacation on that version of Earth." Despite the advanced technology available in their world, most people still used commercial aircraft to get around. She doubted the Asgard would tolerate their protégées relying on such an expensive and polluting technology.
"I'll call Metis after May's gone back to school," agreed Peter. "I'm sure she can help us make the arrangements."
"Let's just hope she can go back without being attacked again..." said MJ. At that point, the intruder alarm for EDF headquarters began blaring in a fairly good impression of the afore-mentioned Starfleet's red alert sound. "I shouldn't have said that," she said with a grimace.
The two heroes jumped up and rushed off to respond to the latest emergency. Peter had to wonder if the universe still had it in for him for some reason, even if he wasn't cursed...or maybe it was time to ask Stephen or Willow to check for that again.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Calynx looked at the four dire wraiths who had arrived. They were technologically enhanced soldiers with the latest in dire wraith gear. In theory, they would be more than a match for the humans, but he hadn't gotten to his rank by being an optimist. That attitude could be deadly, even if he hadn't been one of those rare male wraiths with a talent for the mystical. The only way to make others take you seriously, under those circumstances, was to be good enough to force the matter by punishing anyone who dared to mock you or discount your abilities.
The field leader for this group had a dispassionate expression on his face. If he felt any scorn at being assigned to a male with magic, he kept it suppressed. Internally, Calynx approved of his professionalism. Outwardly, he said, "Your mission is to capture three young human females. Use your stunners on them. They are currently being escorted by two older humans, a female and a male who likely have additional support available to them in the event of an emergency. You may disable or eliminate any escorts or reinforcements as you see fit."
The team leader asked, "Do the targets have any abilities of concern?"
His impression of the team leader rose slightly. Not every Wraith would consider the tactical implications of the humans' propensity for unusual powers, even if they should do so. "All of the targets are enhanced. Of the three younger females, one has abilities similar to the hostile known as Spider-Man as per your briefing packet. One is a capable witch. The third has the ability to shift to a shadow state. All show evidence of advanced training, but only the first has above-human-normal strength and flexibility. The older woman is one of Earth's super soldiers. She is extremely well-trained and experienced. The man is a powerful mage, which is why you're being issued magic suppressor stones."
The soldier in front of him emoted a barely perceptible level of surprise. "What class?"
"Class three," replied Calynx. The suppression field on those would be powerful enough to give even Earth's Sorcerer Supreme some difficulty, and their intelligence suggested that he was currently off-world -- and would be for some time. "In addition, I've arranged for a local mercenary to distract the super soldier and any additional support elements she may have. He will take orders from you in the field should you see the need." He didn't have to tell the soldier that the mercenary couldn't be trusted. That much was assumed. "The plan is for you to use your holocloaks to infiltrate near them, hiding among the local population, and then allow the local mercenary to distract the escort before you move in for the capture. He should also be able to flush out any supporting elements guarding your targets. It is imperative that we capture at least one of the three for interrogation, but all three would be better." He thought it would be better to capture Parker's spawn, but his superior had made it clear that any of the three were desirable targets.
"Understood," said the team leader.
Calynx nodded in approval of the response. He added, "Speed is going to be essential on this mission. The target zone is Class Red for a reason. The longer we're on-site, the more likely we will see intervention from other enhanced humans. New York is one of the largest cities on this world, and it has a correspondingly high population of powered individuals." He didn't bother mentioning that some of those individuals had managed to fend of Galactus, a feat which had impressed even the arrogant Shi'ar. Any Dire Wraith deployed to Earth would have already been briefed on that. "Are there any questions?"
The soldiers did have a few, mostly related to aspects of the local culture that would help them blend in prior to the start of the attack, although the team leader did ask for more specifics about the capabilities of Taskmaster, which he easily provided. He would give this team any reasonable advantage that he could. This world had a reputation for odd things happening. Calynx had no intention of being one of the long string of foes who had drastically underestimated humans and ended up defeated and humiliated. He would be there in person to make sure of it. While the four soldiers should have no problem, especially with the exceedingly competent Taskmaster assisting in the capture, Calynx would step in with magical support, if necessary, to deal with any bothersome surprises. If this attempt wasn't successful then they could withdraw, but the chance of their targets being so exposed again any time in the near future was vanishingly small. Calynx did NOT want to have to make that report to his superior. He just hoped that his superior's mysterious allies were worth all of this effort.
Saurial looked at the image of the planet below on the monitor. It was a massive gas giant with a swirling, deep blue atmosphere located in the outer reaches of a binary star system. A human ship from most realities would have ignored it entirely, or seen it as a convenient place to refine hydrogen, discharge accumulated energy, or hide from detection (depending upon the technical abilities of the civilization in question). Scanning the atmosphere for life signs, however, revealed large creatures that seemed to gather together in unusually structured forms.
'Seeing these results, I believe I now understand the information provided to us by Eden. The creatures below appear to be made up of colonies of smaller organisms. These colonies display increasing intelligence as their size grows. They are tool users and seem to have access to technology that functions around the same level as 17th-century Europe,' thought Varga.
'Colonial organisms with shared intellect? Do you think that will be a theme?' This was the third world on the list that they had visited based on Eden's information. The first had been populated by squid-like creatures living on a world that was 85% water. The creatures had seemed to have an insect-like social structure with queens controlling large territories. The smaller drone squids had not been fully sapient, though there seemed to be different classes of drones with varying levels of intellect.
Varga's small dragon form appeared on one of the consoles of the Skimmer. "Quite possibly. The entities' experiments would seem to predicate a need for a large number of individual minds capable of both engaging in conflict and inventing new uses for individual powers. Eden and her ilk would seem to ignore unsuitable species unless they pose a significant threat." The second world visited had been scoured bare of all life, clearly through some form of orbital bombardment. Eden's information had simply tagged the extinct species as, "natural weapon users," but there was nothing left on the world to give them any additional clue as to what that meant. Whatever the threat, the entities clearly considered it dangerous enough to vaporize it entirely.
"There isn't any sign that Eden and Scion were ever here, according to the scans," said Saurial with a frown after reviewing the sensor records. "They didn't even leave a sensor probe to monitor the development of the inhabitants."
Varga nodded his small head. "They have no curiosity in the sense that humans do, at least not without taking on aspects of humanity with their avatars. Their experiments are driven by a perceived threat rather than any desire to learn for its own sake. Given the volume of knowledge accumulated within their agents, it's possible that they discarded that instinct as no longer necessary."
Saurial shook her head. "That seems horribly short-sighted. It also makes me wonder if this is a wild goose chase."
"Perhaps," agreed Varga. "I suspect that they saw it as a way of avoiding distractions and ignored the other consequences. As for our search, we have fourteen more civilizations to investigate. I suggest we continue our explorations. If nothing else, the results are interesting from a purely scientific perspective. I find it far more entertaining to examine unusual species in person rather than just reading about them in the databases of the Federation or the Asgard."
Saurial smirked. "Do you have a form that would work well in the atmosphere below?" They had swum in the oceans of the squid creatures under the assassin's cloak, and Taylor had to admit it was one of their more exciting diversions. It had been completely alien to her experiences, and even Varga had seemed surprised by some aspects of their society.
"I think we could..." began Varga, only to pause when a communication alert sounded.
Saurial reached over and pressed a control spot and a familiar black lizard appeared on the screen. "Hello, Metis," said Saurial. "Something happen?"
The black-scaled reptile frowned. "We just got a message from Luthor. Our mysterious assailants tried to attack a LexCorp data center. Fortunately, their security was better than that of the Goa'uld that Yong-Gongju visited, and we were able to get some scans of the attackers' equipment. The strange thing is that we found at least three different dimensional signatures."
"That could simply be a way for them to obscure their point of origin," commented the small dragon.
Metis nodded. "Yes, or it could be indicative that they have holdings in multiple realities...or both. I'm sending you the information. I thought that since you two were already wandering the multiverse, you could make a side trip to look for clues."
Saurial and Varga looked at each other. The former reptile shrugged. The latter replied, "I believe we can take the time to look at those realities. At least, we can do a quick scan of likely worlds in this galaxy." There were a number of spots in each reality that the Guardians from the DC Universe referred to as nexuses. Those planets were normally the center of any unusual happenings. Of course, that didn't mean that interesting things couldn't happen elsewhere.
"We may be looking for a needle in a very big haystack," added Saurial. The scope of even a single universe was hard for the human mind to comprehend. Taylor was better able than most, but even she wasn't yet at the point that she could equal Varga's ability.
Metis nodded. "I know, but these attackers are starting to become a nuisance. The Dragon Clan is starting to suspect that they may be involved in a number of incidents in different realities. It's hard to verify, however, as they're exceedingly good at covering their tracks."
"We'll let you know if we find anything," replied Saurial.
Metis disconnected, and Saurial and Varga looked at each other. Figuring out how to float in and navigate around the atmosphere of a gas giant would have to wait for another day.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Tom was enjoying being in New York City, but he was slightly disconcerted that the girls seemed more interested in interrogating him about his past than they were in actually looking for anything to buy on their shopping trip.
"Your parents are archaeologists?" asked May. She and Sophia were asking most of the questions, as Maggie had met Danial and Sarah Jackson in the past.
Tom nodded. "Yes...or at least, that's how they started. They've since branched out into adjacent fields of study such as anthropology, xenoarcheology, biology, and historical analysis. Mum jokes that my father's string of doctorates is longer than his actual name. She just calls him, 'Doctor,' half the time, even though her education is almost the equivalent."
Sophia felt like something about his background didn't add up. "Wait, if your parents are scientists, then how did you end up a wizard?"
Tom smiled at her. "Well, I was born to it. On my version of Earth, some people happen to be born with a gene for magic. There's a whole secret community of magical people."
"Are you from the Justice League reality?" asked Maggie. "Are you one of the homo magi?" Maggie had met Zatanna Zatara when she had come to visit her father.
"No," he replied with a slight shake of his head. He was making an effort to keep his attention on his surroundings, but he knew Natasha was also doing so, and he strongly suspected that Fury hadn't assigned her to work alone. Whoever the other watchers might be, they were being quite discreet. "There are stories in the ship's library about my reality. They're named after one of the sons of an old magical family, the Potters."
That twigged some vague memories for Sophia of some Earth Aleph fantasy films. "You're from Harry Potter?"
Tom gave her a strange look. "I'm from a world that is similar to the one described in those stories, yes, but it isn't exactly the same."
"Do you know Harry Potter?" she asked slightly persistently.
Now the older teen wizard looked slightly uncomfortable. "I've never had the pleasure, which is probably for the best. Are we almost to the shopping district?" His last question was said slightly urgently as if he wanted to change the topic.
"Yeah, we're almost there," said May. "We're only three blocks from Central Park right now." They had decided to walk rather than take public transit due to the threat of attack. Getting caught in a subway car by a creature like the one who attacked them wasn't particularly appealing, and there was always an increased risk to innocent bystanders in such close quarters.
Maggie looked up at the sky. The weather was a little better than they had expected. "Does anybody want to look around the park?"
May shrugged and glanced at Sophia. "We could, I suppose. We could head over to Umpire Rock, or even go to the zoo? It's at the south end."
Sophia grimaced. "I don't mind checking out the park, but I'm not really that interested in the zoo." She glanced at Maggie. "Unless you really want to go?"
The witch shook her head. "No, that's fine. Let's just look around the park for a bit."
"Three teenaged girls aren't eager to go shopping?" asked Tom jokingly. "Should I be checking you three for mind control?"
Sophia raised an eyebrow. "Were you hoping we would model outfits for you?"
"What? No!" he replied, slightly flustered.
May got a mischievous look on her face. "There's a swimsuit store in this part of town that's got some very cutting edge designs. Some of them are barely there."
Tom was smart enough to keep his mouth shut, though he was blushing slightly. Natasha didn't bother to keep the small smile off of her face. Young people could be really amusing at times.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
This show was exceedingly intriguing. The setting was apparently a version of human civilization that had not had powers introduced by the creators. Instead, there were other sources of strange abilities -- like magic. There was evidence that the scary reptilian demons had access to such powers, but the program he was watching showed normal humans making use of it. That suggested an alternate reality -- one with slightly different physical laws than this one.
One example of such magic was when the human designated Kay had used a magic book to freeze the human designated Charity. It was unclear exactly why the two had such a contentious rivalry. There was a conflict over mating with another human designated Miguel, but Leviathan wondered if it also had something to do with the fact that Kay's and Charity's parents were siblings? The most interesting aspect of this magic ability was how Kay used it to create a reanimated corpse version of Charity. The Endbringer considered how such an ability could be mimicked using powers. While it could be done in a variety of ways, it would be difficult to duplicate the effects shown in the television program exactly. He wondered if there were inaccuracies in how the events were depicted? He was savvy enough to know the difference between live broadcasts and recreations of stories by actors and how there could be variances from actual events in the latter.
Leviathan sent out a request to search for references to the town of Harmony and was puzzled by his sister's somewhat exasperated response that such a town didn't exist in this reality. While disappointed, he refrained from asking additional questions. The last thing he wanted was for his sister to restrict his access to this world's information networks, given how little else there was to do while trapped at the bottom of the sea. With a mental shrug, he began another episode. Maybe he could figure out how the characters managed to watch episodes of the show that they were already playing in? It was an intriguing exercise in predictive divination...
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
"Are we going to talk about it, or are you going to keep giving me the silent treatment?" asked Peter as he and his wife continued to sort through the paperwork required to run a global extraterrestrial defense force.
Mary Jane Parker raised an eyebrow at him. "I'm not giving you the silent treatment. We just had a ten-minute conversation on how to give countries without standing navies more investment in the service?" Most ship's crew candidates seemed to perform better after retraining if they had experience in a wet navy, but not every country had even a token nautical force.
Peter simply gave her a look. "How long have we been married?"
She looked back at him with a blank face. The two continued to look placidly at each other for almost a full minute. Finally, she broke their stand-off first with a sigh. "You know I'm not happy with us using those girls as bait."
Peter frowned. "I'm not particularly happy about it either."
Now her expression turned slightly accusatory. "You didn't argue much with Nick and Victor."
He gave his own sigh before responding. "Because I know -- and YOU know -- that they were right. The girls are as protected as they can possibly be. You know Metis wouldn't put them at risk. Hell, even Nick would go out of his way to make sure nothing happened to May. He's obviously got more than Nat watching them. So what's really bothering you?"
MJ looked down at her hands. Peter gave her time to get her thoughts together. He was familiar with how her mind worked and had learned early in their relationship that pressing her before she was ready with something complicated just irritated her needlessly. Finally, she looked back up at him. "Do you think we should have done more to discourage May from following in our footsteps? Putting on a costume and fighting crime isn't exactly a safe lifestyle..."
Peter thought back to their own history and couldn't help but shake his head at the irony of this conversation. He had originally broken up his own marriage because he was afraid of putting his family and any (at the time, potential) children at risk due to his crime-fighting career. Then, after his inadvertent trip to another universe to help another member of the spider-family, he had gotten back together with his wife and healed over that split...only to get sucked into yet another multiverse adventure involving a family of giant lizards. Ianthe had offered to share Peter's powers with Mary Jane and they had accepted. At that point, he had had to quash his own misgivings about his wife joining him on patrol. Well, at least he knew how to try to address this issue based on his own past feelings.
"Do you think May is the type of person who would stand by and not act if she found somebody in trouble?" he asked his wife.
She frowned. "We could have done more to steer her away from putting herself at risk."
"How?" he asked, slightly perplexed. "I mean, she wouldn't be your daughter if she didn't care about other people."
MJ flushed a little at the compliment but persisted. "It's our job as parents to keep our kids out of danger."
Peter nodded. "To a point, I agree. That's why we let her go study with the Family the first time we thought she might be at risk. There comes a point, though, when we have to trust her to make her own decisions. I think she's showed good judgment so far."
"What about the incident with the plaster koala bear?" asked MJ skeptically.
He paused. "MOSTLY good judgment...and she was only ten at the time."
She rolled her eyes but finally agreed. "All right, yes, she generally has a good head on her shoulders...for a teenager."
"She also handled the attack about as well as we could expect. All three of them did, frankly," said Peter thoughtfully. "It's clear that Sophia's been paying attention to her training based on the debriefing...and you know Harry and Karrin would have made sure Maggie can handle herself." He watched the expressions on his wife's face shift. "What's really getting to you?"
His wife walked over to the sofa to the side of his office and dropped heavily down into the plush cushions. "We let Fury and the Family talk us into taking on this job with the EDF, and now people are targeting our family over it."
Peter let a slight smile curve the edges of his mouth, happy to get to the crux of the issue. "You feel guilty because they got attacked."
"Well, it is our fault, isn't it? I never really wanted this kind of responsibility, and now people are ambushing May to get at us," she replied. "I'm not even sure I'm the right person to help you run our version of Starfleet Command."
Peter thought about that. It hadn't actually occurred to him that MJ might be feeling overwhelmed by the responsibilities of her job on top of the stress from the situation with May and her friends. "I don't think this job has anything to do with May being in danger. She's Spider-Man's daughter. Even if I had never met the Family, she would be a target. The good news is that she's much better protected now than she might have been otherwise."
His wife considered that and then grudgingly nodded her agreement.
"As for your other question...I want to understand more where you're coming from. I think you've done an amazing job. I don't know if I could have done this without you," he said.
He could see a flash of annoyance. "Peter, you absolutely could have. I wish you wouldn't be so hard on yourself."
He smiled at her. "Yes, I probably could have." He still had regrets related to a certain theme restaurant that had done terribly, among other bad decisions like leaving his wife the first time, but he no longer blamed himself for the whole fiasco. "Having you by my side has made me ten times more effective, though. You have a natural skill and grace with people that I don't. I can't count the number of times you've gotten Reed and Victor, or Nick and Tony...or hell, any other combination of that ball of egos we call a council...to actually listen to each other. That's not even counting how much having you as the public face of the EDF has boosted our standing with the civilian population. You've also helped make sure our uniforms are far more stylish than Starfleet's." The last was said with a grin.
Ignoring the joke, Mary Jane flopped back and put her hands behind her head. "I never expected to be more than an actress or model, Pete. At this stage in my life, I had hoped that the hardest decisions I had to make would have been which project to tell my agent to accept on my behalf. Instead, we're dealing with life-and-death problems involving the fate of the entire planet. It is a bit much."
He plunked himself down next to his wife on the sofa. He was concerned with how tired she looked. "You know, I think it's about time we had another family vacation. We haven't really taken a break since before May went back to school. It's been more than two years."
"It's been busy around here," she said non-committedly.
"It has," he agreed, "but we have lots of good people who can keep things going if we're gone for a few weeks."
She looked at him sideways. "What did you have in mind?"
"Last time I spoke to Daniel, he told me that Disney in his world had made a big effort to integrate Asgard technology into their theme parks. I thought we could spend a couple of weeks in Florida, then another couple weeks in Hawaii...or maybe someplace more exotic?"
"We haven't been to Southern Europe in a while," said MJ thoughtfully. "I think we can plan something fun. It's probably a lot easier to get around on vacation on that version of Earth." Despite the advanced technology available in their world, most people still used commercial aircraft to get around. She doubted the Asgard would tolerate their protégées relying on such an expensive and polluting technology.
"I'll call Metis after May's gone back to school," agreed Peter. "I'm sure she can help us make the arrangements."
"Let's just hope she can go back without being attacked again..." said MJ. At that point, the intruder alarm for EDF headquarters began blaring in a fairly good impression of the afore-mentioned Starfleet's red alert sound. "I shouldn't have said that," she said with a grimace.
The two heroes jumped up and rushed off to respond to the latest emergency. Peter had to wonder if the universe still had it in for him for some reason, even if he wasn't cursed...or maybe it was time to ask Stephen or Willow to check for that again.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Calynx looked at the four dire wraiths who had arrived. They were technologically enhanced soldiers with the latest in dire wraith gear. In theory, they would be more than a match for the humans, but he hadn't gotten to his rank by being an optimist. That attitude could be deadly, even if he hadn't been one of those rare male wraiths with a talent for the mystical. The only way to make others take you seriously, under those circumstances, was to be good enough to force the matter by punishing anyone who dared to mock you or discount your abilities.
The field leader for this group had a dispassionate expression on his face. If he felt any scorn at being assigned to a male with magic, he kept it suppressed. Internally, Calynx approved of his professionalism. Outwardly, he said, "Your mission is to capture three young human females. Use your stunners on them. They are currently being escorted by two older humans, a female and a male who likely have additional support available to them in the event of an emergency. You may disable or eliminate any escorts or reinforcements as you see fit."
The team leader asked, "Do the targets have any abilities of concern?"
His impression of the team leader rose slightly. Not every Wraith would consider the tactical implications of the humans' propensity for unusual powers, even if they should do so. "All of the targets are enhanced. Of the three younger females, one has abilities similar to the hostile known as Spider-Man as per your briefing packet. One is a capable witch. The third has the ability to shift to a shadow state. All show evidence of advanced training, but only the first has above-human-normal strength and flexibility. The older woman is one of Earth's super soldiers. She is extremely well-trained and experienced. The man is a powerful mage, which is why you're being issued magic suppressor stones."
The soldier in front of him emoted a barely perceptible level of surprise. "What class?"
"Class three," replied Calynx. The suppression field on those would be powerful enough to give even Earth's Sorcerer Supreme some difficulty, and their intelligence suggested that he was currently off-world -- and would be for some time. "In addition, I've arranged for a local mercenary to distract the super soldier and any additional support elements she may have. He will take orders from you in the field should you see the need." He didn't have to tell the soldier that the mercenary couldn't be trusted. That much was assumed. "The plan is for you to use your holocloaks to infiltrate near them, hiding among the local population, and then allow the local mercenary to distract the escort before you move in for the capture. He should also be able to flush out any supporting elements guarding your targets. It is imperative that we capture at least one of the three for interrogation, but all three would be better." He thought it would be better to capture Parker's spawn, but his superior had made it clear that any of the three were desirable targets.
"Understood," said the team leader.
Calynx nodded in approval of the response. He added, "Speed is going to be essential on this mission. The target zone is Class Red for a reason. The longer we're on-site, the more likely we will see intervention from other enhanced humans. New York is one of the largest cities on this world, and it has a correspondingly high population of powered individuals." He didn't bother mentioning that some of those individuals had managed to fend of Galactus, a feat which had impressed even the arrogant Shi'ar. Any Dire Wraith deployed to Earth would have already been briefed on that. "Are there any questions?"
The soldiers did have a few, mostly related to aspects of the local culture that would help them blend in prior to the start of the attack, although the team leader did ask for more specifics about the capabilities of Taskmaster, which he easily provided. He would give this team any reasonable advantage that he could. This world had a reputation for odd things happening. Calynx had no intention of being one of the long string of foes who had drastically underestimated humans and ended up defeated and humiliated. He would be there in person to make sure of it. While the four soldiers should have no problem, especially with the exceedingly competent Taskmaster assisting in the capture, Calynx would step in with magical support, if necessary, to deal with any bothersome surprises. If this attempt wasn't successful then they could withdraw, but the chance of their targets being so exposed again any time in the near future was vanishingly small. Calynx did NOT want to have to make that report to his superior. He just hoped that his superior's mysterious allies were worth all of this effort.
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M. H. Fuzzball
Aperture Science-certified Horrible Person
- Location
- Sector 2814
So do they stop spells from affecting the wearer, or is it more of a field effect to stop Tom and Maggie from casting at all?
Because if it's the first, they might not have as good a time as they think, because it's frankly ridiculous to assume that Tom Riddle can't cast Serpensortia.
1eragon33
an Island of crazy in a sea of normality
- Location
- dallas
Yah a black mamba in you face is going to give anyone a bad day.
Rajvik_wolfboy
Wolf amongst the stars.
- Location
- Florida
Another thing to remember is that magic can be used to lift and throw heavy objects, and once the magic is no longer supporting them, well, gravity works.
LostArchivist
Sane, unfortunately.
- Location
- The State of Confusion
I'm guessing the stones stop magic use in some radius around them, however.
discreet
Chapter 20: It's a Trap!
- Location
- Maryland
Chapter 20: It's a Trap!
Saurial appeared in a long, metallic corridor illuminated by industrial fluorescent lighting inset on the border between the walls and ceiling. The walls were mostly plain, though there were intermittent access panels obviously intended to allow for maintenance access to various bits of technology. Some of these panels had labels in French, while others lacked any indication of their purpose. The air itself was slightly cool and dry by human standards, and it was easy for her reptilian nose to smell the chemicals used to maintain the environmental standards needed for the inhabitants of the facility. She could also feel the slight internal lurch that was standard for teleporting into a new location with a significant difference in gravity, and this version of Earth's moon had the same fraction of a G as the one on Taylor's home Earth.
Trusting the magic of her Assassin's Cloak spell, she made her way into a more public area of the moon base. Personnel wearing unfamiliar uniforms made up the majority of the people moving about, though there were more casually-dressed people mixed in. Presumably, they were civilians, while those in uniform were members of the local military. Oddly, while the majority of the inhabitants appeared to be caucasian, many of the civilian staff seemed to favor attire that looked heavily influenced by traditional Asian fashions with dark silk jackets. Idly, Taylor wondered what Victoria would have made of the local fashions.
It didn't take long for her to locate an information terminal set into a wall near some kind of food court. The interface was also in French, but there were other language options. English wasn't one of them, but Japanese was, so she switched to that as it was easier for her to read than French. Having to negotiate with Lung was paying additional dividends. The oddities with language selection were soon explained. The Earth in this reality was still a balkanized mess of different nation-states, but the great powers were very different. The United States didn't exist and North America appeared to be broken up into a variety of nations, including large chunks owned by the Empire of Japan and, oddly enough, Sweden. South America was dominated by a very powerful and very capitalist version of Brazil, which helped explain why Portuguese was one of the available language choices. This installation, and indeed, the entire moon, was owned by the Kingdom of France. A little more research made it clear that while the Kingdom didn't have much in the way of territory on the planet itself, they completely dominated the moon and Earth's orbital space. That gave them a degree of parity with an Imperial Japan that seemed to own half of Earth.
'It seems that Robespierre didn't exist in this universe,' thought Taylor.
'Or perhaps the revolutionary movements of the 18th century simply failed. Regardless, we should look for references to dimensional travel,' replied Varga. The reality signatures read from their mysterious, black-clad attackers had come from this universe, but they lacked the information needed to narrow down a location. A quick search for references to technology showed that while this world was slightly more advanced than her Earth (ignoring Tinkertech), the only references to alternate realities were either theoretical or purely speculative.
Saurial frowned. 'If it exists, then it's classified beyond what we can find in a public information terminal. This world has a number of great powers in competition with each other. Any one of them, or even a minor power, could have a secret research project similar to the Stargate program in Jackson's universe. We may have to call in Dragon or one of her family to search for it.'
She continued to browse through the information repository, making note of the oddities of this world while also taking note of the geopolitical tensions. The nations in this world were not living in harmony. She had no desire to accidentally spark a world war, especially when nuclear deterrence was clearly a concept thoroughly understood by the locals. The level of paranoia present was clearly demonstrated when a pair of obvious security personnel arrived at the terminal. Saurial stepped away as one of them began to access security logs on the machine. Somebody had either noticed that the terminal was in use without anybody appearing on the security cameras or else they had flagged the language selection...or possibly both. Regardless, it was impressive attention to detail for what was supposed to be a public information terminal.
'If we can get the Dragon clan to sift through the information networks on this version of Earth, then we can investigate some other worlds in this reality to see if they hold anything of interest.' Even with a wormhole drive, visiting all of the candidates would take some time. Their list was made up of important sites in other realities, including worlds like Krypton, Gaia, Vulcan, and Acheron/Sineya. Of course, the list's composition was based on the possibly overly optimistic assumption that certain worlds tended to attract interesting events in multiple realities. While that was true in some parts of the multiverse, they hadn't verified it across the entire scope of everything, and probably never would, given the nature of infinity.
Saurial looked around at the food options available now that their data terminal was taken over by two increasingly puzzled local investigators. The smells were intriguing. Some of it was traditional French with a mix of other offerings, including a fusion cuisine dish that looked like escargot tempura. Popping one in her mouth with a substantial crunch, she wondered how regular humans were supposed to eat it when they didn't remove the shells before frying? She paused as she was reaching for an odd-looking, slightly pinkish quiche when a very familiar and very distracting feeling tingled at the edge of her awareness.
'You felt that?'
'Yes, and it feels like it's coming from that direction," replied Varga with a mental nudge. Saurial quickly began moving toward the source. The corridors of the station began to look less militaristic and more varied and civilian as they entered a commercial sector that reminded her vaguely of the promenade on DS9, albeit without the obvious non-humans (apart from herself). Though the feeling disappeared after a short time, it lasted long enough to lead them to the front of a fairly nondescript storefront.
'Does it seem odd to you that somebody is opening pandimensional portals hidden behind the facade of a general trade and merchandise shop on a French moonbase?' queried Taylor.
Varga gave her a mental nod. 'Something odd is clearly happening. Of course, it could be a trap for people investigating such things.'
'Well, there's an obvious way to find out,' replied Taylor as she reached to open the door beneath the sign, White Star Traders, with the tinkle of a bell to alert the occupants of a potential customer.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Spider-Man and Arachne were jumping their way down a stairwell to help defend their headquarters from an invading force. The security reports made it clear that the attackers were attempting to reach the data archives on sublevel three. That was consistent with the other known attacks, given that every other attack also seemed to be focused on gathering intelligence. Whoever these people were, they were clearly intent on learning whatever they could about other powers in the multiverse. It wasn't clear yet what the limits of their scope of interest might be.
The two exited the stairwell into a corridor that had a criss-cross of energy weapon fire shooting down its length. Pete was reminded of the opening battle in Star Wars, though thankfully their security troops had body armor that was more effective against the aggressors' plasma bolts than that worn by the rebels in the old movie. He made a mental note to thank Tony again for sharing that particular tech. Unfortunately, the invaders also had armor, and it was good enough to shrug off stun blasts and bullets. The pulse laser rifles were proving more effective, but they didn't have enough of those to equip the entire headquarters garrison. Even an amply-funded organization had to make compromises in terms of budget allocation when their charge was the defense of the entire planet and its surrounding space.
Pete and his wife leaped down the length of the corridor, relying on their EDM suits to shield them from the fire from both directions. His security staff was well aware that they didn't have to hold their shots just because the boss was in the line of fire. He and his wife both sent their trademark webbing at a pair of attackers, only to be disappointed as the sticky fluid slipped off of some type of kinetic energy forcefield. Somebody had prepared for their typical tactics, though Peter as a bright flash obscured his vision briefly. His and MJ's suits shielded them from the effects of the weapon, but he frowned when he noticed that a handful of the defending soldiers had been rendered insensate by what had to have been some type of stun grenade. With the sudden slacking of opposing fire from their side, a squad of black-clad invaders was now charging down the hall in their direction.
Arachne met them first, flipping the lead attacker over and slamming him to the floor. Two others raised plasma pistols and began putting close-range blasts into her, but she ignored their fire in favor of landing a blow that knocked the first attacker unconscious. Peter leaped over her head and knocked over the two attacking his wife like bowling pins. He landed in a roll that brought him back to his feet and turned to look at the fourth member of the squad. This one wasn't shooting at either of them but instead appeared to be fiddling with some type of device in his hands. The device made a loud humming noise and then his wife came in with a flying kick that knocked the distracted soldier into the wall. He dropped the device, then quickly slapped his hand to another button on his belt. There was another flash and the four attacking soldiers vanished in a teleportation beam.
"Well, that was anticlimactic," commented Arachne as she looked around at the empty hall.
Pete looked at the strange device. It was a black sphere with a handful of buttons and a single knob. There was no writing or any other indication of function. There was also a glowing amber light that seemed to indicate that, whatever its purpose, it was currently active. "I wonder what that thing does?"
"We probably should let the bomb guys deal with it," said his wife. "Arachne to security," she then said in a tone that indicated she was using her suit's communicator. There was a pause. "Arachne to security!" After another pause, she asked, "Spider-Man, does your communicator work?"
Pete tried it with a similar lack of effect. "Hm, must be a jamming device." He looked over to where the defenders had been knocked out and then stopped, stunned when he realized what he was seeing. "Or maybe not..."
At the end of the hall, they watched as EDF personnel moved at a ridiculously high rate of speed. The unconscious soldiers had already been cleared away, and now a group of soldiers and technical staff appeared to be scanning the section of the corridor where the two heroes were standing. They appeared to be moving at a speed that was at least ten times normal but seemed unable to actually enter the corridor.
"Well, I guess we know what that thing does, now," said MJ sardonically.
Pete frowned. Whoever they were, their attackers had clearly been prepared for him and his wife to be present and had set a trap. He just hoped that their being metaphorically trapped in amber didn't have any drastic consequences for their defense of the headquarters complex. He also hoped that the girls were all right out in the city.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Sophia frowned as she considered her options. There were serious consequences to consider with either choice, but she wasn't sure which would be the better one. She needed help. Luckily, she had backup.
"OK, this skirt would go amazing with my favorite jacket," she said, holding up the article of clothing in question, "but look how this one hangs around my legs," she said, moving her hips to swirl the pleats in a way that she thought emphasized her best features.
May considered the question seriously. "You could get both?"
The Brocktonite frowned. "Mom would probably throw a fit if I got too greedy." She already wouldn't be happy that May's parents were footing the bill for this fairly expensive shopping trip.
"You know that money isn't really a thing that friends of the Family have to worry about, right?" commented Maggie. "You could take a picture of the skirt, and Saurial could just magic it into existence."
Sophia bit her bottom lip. She knew that Maggie was absolutely right, and she also knew that there was no way her parents were comfortable enough with their current situation to accept that fact without a lot of hassle and yelling. Even her dad would be suspicious of anything offered without cost. You couldn't grow up in their gang-ridden home city without being suspicious of gifts. It didn't help her case that the two skirts cost more than $300 each, and this wasn't even the most expensive shop they had seen so far today.
May took pity on her. "I can hold onto one of them, then give it to you as part of an outfit for your birthday? That's coming up in like, two months, right?"
That was so tempting but finally, she shook her head. "No, I'll just get the first one. It works better with the outfits I already have." With a slight pout, she went and changed back into her street clothes and left the pleated skirt on the returns cart. She then pretended to not notice when Maggie ducked back into the changing rooms as she and May walked to the register. Her mother couldn't be mad at her for something she didn't see, after all.
Tom was waiting at the front of the store. While he took his role as escort seriously, he was smart enough to know better than to try and directly chaperone three teenaged girls through clothes shopping. Slowly creeping boredom would be the best result from that scenario. Instead, he made a deliberate attempt to keep an eye on the foot traffic in the store without triggering anyone's creepy stalker sensors. He seemed to be successful, apart from one blue-haired grandmother who gave him the evil eye. Maybe Widow would switch with him in the next store and he could be the one to stalk around the block looking for external threats? He had no doubt that the superspy was capable of shopping for clothes without losing situational awareness. She also undoubtedly had more valid opinions on fashion than he did. There was something to be said for his homeland's tendency to mostly wear simple robes.
The girls finished with their purchases, then clustered around him as they got ready to leave. They had developed a simple process where they would serve as a distraction and block sightlines while he surreptitiously shrunk their purchases for easy storage in a pocket. While the local New Yorkers were undoubtedly used to more bizarre sights than a little magic, there was no reason to draw extra attention to themselves. Nat was waiting for them when they walked out of the store. She somehow seemed to have a sixth sense about when they were ready to leave, as she had managed to meet them at the exactly correct time at four different stores. The one time she hadn't was because she had actually gone into the store with them when they arrived. The agent simply nodded to Tom as the girls discussed their next destination. Tom took the opportunity to look around at the crowd for anything legitimately threatening (as opposed to just New York City strange). The shopping crowd was mostly inoffensive, more dangerous because they could serve as camouflage for real threats.
Of course, sometimes subtlety was overrated. When the somewhat expected attack came, an armored figure with a skull-like mask simply stepped around the corner of a nearby building and proceeded to empty the magazine of an assault rifle into Black Widow. Her Family-provided suit instantly sealed itself as the bullets flattened against the armor and dropped to the ground thanks to the inlaid vibranium mesh. She looked over to Tom. "Seal up and watch the girls. I'll take care of the attacker." Tom nodded and triggered his own suit, including the full helmet. The three teens shared a quick glance and also activated their own suits, which formed over their street clothes seamlessly. The last attack had made it clear that wearing their full costumes armored with EDM and vibranium was a smart idea. Natasha, meanwhile, ran at full speed toward the shooter, who stepped back behind the corner...possibly to reload, or possibly to run.
Tony Masters, who went by Taskmaster in the mercenary trade, did replace the spent magazine in his rifle with a full one but slung the weapon over his shoulder and prepared to go hand-to-hand with Black Widow. It wasn't the first time they had encountered each other and he was curious to see what new tricks she might have for him. The important thing on this op wasn't to beat her but to keep her occupied while the other strike force swept in to capture the girls. When the Russian woman came around the corner, she came face-first into a spinning kick launched by the mercenary. Taskmaster was slightly surprised that the kick connected fully instead of being dodged, and even more surprised at how he felt the momentum of his strike dissipate completely while Romanov continued moving forward. The abrupt shift in motion momentarily threw him off balance. Rather than leave himself open, he transitioned into a side flip that opened up the distance between them and let him quickly recover his equilibrium.
The female S.H.I.E.L.D. agent darted in quickly with a combination of strikes that Masters was able to glide parry. He knew Widow was a lot stronger than she looked, and he also wasn't sure if her costume enhanced her native strength. His next surprise, though, came when he counter-attacked with his own strikes. She wasn't even bothering to parry or dodge, letting her armor take the full force of every attack. That change to her style threw him momentarily until his own power adjusted to it. He quickly realized that he had a problem, though. While he could mirror her moves and anticipate her attacks, his own armor didn't appear to be anywhere close to as strong as hers. He made a mental note to try and track down where she got it and wondered if it was something Stark invented.
On instinct, Taskmaster did a series of sudden backflips to avoid the arrows that began to rain down from a sniper spot on a nearby rooftop. He had estimated there was a three-in-five chance that Hawkeye would be backing up Black Widow and that seemed to be the case in reality. He came up into a kneeling position from the final flip, smoothly brought up the assault rifle, and began sending shots back at the sniper's perch. He smirked as the archer ducked back into cover, but then frowned when there was a flash of light off of a thrown blade and the barrel of his assault rifle fell off. Glancing to his left, he saw what appeared to be a knife buried up to the hilt in a nearby trash can. Widow had thrown it and managed to sever the carbon steel barrel of his weapon with a laser-straight cut. What the hell was that blade made of?
Masters moved closer to the weather cover of a bus stop, which temporarily blocked the line of sight to Hawkeye's position. He needed to stay engaged with Black Widow, but he had a plan to draw her into an alley if necessary to shield himself from sniper fire. It would take time for Hawkeye to get down to street level, and he was confident of his ability to go toe-to-toe with Widow for some time, even with her fancy new armor. He grimaced slightly as his armor grounded out a tazer blast from Widow. Apparently, she wasn't afraid to try her old standards, even if she guessed he was prepared for them. Getting shocked wasn't pleasant, even if he was protected from the worst of it.
Natasha let Taskmaster lead her into an alley, knowing that Clint would move down to join them. Hopefully, their "distraction" would be enough to draw out the girls' attempted kidnappers where they could be captured.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Sophia noticed that the crowd around them seemed to thin out. The shoppers were mostly locals and they had the sense to make themselves scarce when a superpowered battle appeared imminent. Some gawkers already had their cell phones out, of course, and she was sure that whatever happened, it would be up on social media before the fight was even over. It was a wonder that more people weren't killed trying to get likes, both here and back home in the Bay.
"How long do you think it will be?" asked May out loud.
Tom shook his head. "Not long."
As if that was the signal to attack, four of the bystanders in the thinning crowd appeared to shift their appearance into larger, monstrous forms with scaley red skin. Their faces had more than two eyes, but it was hard to see details because they were also wearing some kind of advanced armor and carrying large energy rifles. Three of the four fired the rifles at the girls, while the fourth tossed a pair of glowing stones into the middle of the group. Sophia blinked as the energy from the rifles appeared to wash over her armor without effect. A glance to her side showed that the others were equally unaffected. Their attackers fired again and once again, then apparently clued into the fact that the sophisticated-looking weapons were useless against their protection.
One of the creatures charged at Sophia and she shifted to shadow and dodged through her attacker, kicking him in the back and staggering him as he went by. As he recovered, she checked on her comrades. May seemed to be rather easily dancing around her attacker while her armor absorbed any strikes that got through. Tom and Maggie were also still fine, but they seemed to hesitate in their movements. She triggered her comm system. "Tom, what's wrong?"
"Those stones are magic suppressors," he said as he dodged an oddly disquieting kick from the fluid limb of an attacker. "It caught Maggie and me by surprise, but we're OK."
It was actually pretty obvious that while the lack of magic was a distraction, both casters had some fairly thorough training in hand-to-hand combat. Sophia was slightly impressed, and she was easily holding her own against her opponent. It occurred to her that when the gold standard for combat skills was Saurial, then even average students of that school were likely to be able to handle themselves capably in a fight.
Calynx watched from a distance, covered by his own holocloak. He was pretending to be one of the idiotic younger humans obsessed with documenting things in return for social status. What he was seeing, though, was not making him happy. The armor that the teens and their guardian were wearing was making their stunners completely ineffective, and while the suppression stones were working as expected, they didn't seem to be nearly as debilitating to the magic users as he had hoped. Most female wraiths would have been rendered easy prey without their mystical abilities, but these humans were skilled in protecting themselves using only their bodies...and that ridiculously durable armor. When all four of the attacking troops were disabled, he knew he had to act. His chance of avoiding punishment for a second failure to obtain his targets would be almost vanishingly small. With a grimace, he activated the semi-secret secondary function of the magic suppression stones. What was about to happen would have a very negative effect on his own health, but it was better than failing. Of course, it would have a much worse effect on the four captured dire wraith, but that hardly mattered.
The two stones on the ground began to glow with an ominous red light and lightning-like beams reached out to the four disabled dire wraiths on the ground. The four creatures let out a synchronized shriek that sounded like a theremin being slowly fed into a malfunctioning sausage maker and then began to visibly wilt and shrink in upon themselves. The four teen-aged observers stared as the glowing stones intensified in brightness while their former attackers were rather quickly devoured. The two stones then each shot a beam toward a nondescript teen with a mobile phone on the edge of the combat zone. When they struck, it became clear that his appearance was just an illusion covering their original attacker from the other day.
Calynx felt the energy stolen from the soldiers by the stones flood into him. It felt like he was standing in the center of a blast furnace and he could feel it as his body responded to the influx by growing and changing. Once, when he had been a young student of magic, one of the witches had lost her patience with his mistakes and proceeded to burn the skin off of a third of his body. That had been the worst pain he had ever felt...up until this moment. He quickly used some of the power he was being fed to dampen his pain. He couldn't make the pain go away, but the wraiths had techniques for ignoring it for as long as necessary to accomplish a mission.
Tom and Maggie both felt the massive surge of magical energy and quickly shared a look of alarm. Tom immediately began sending magical bolts of spellfire at the new foe. Maggie added shouted spells of her own that sent wind, fire, and force at the same target. Both Sophia and May were surprised by the aggressive assault but began sending webbing and bolts of their own after a moment's hesitation.
The magic energies swirling around him let him easily redirect the attacks being sent against him. Calynx focused his concentration on the air surrounding him and he used his increased power to solidify the air around the four young humans, locking them in place despite their impressive costumes. Now he just had to form another spell to send them into unconsciousness... Before he could finish his next casting, his concentration was shredded as a truly massive force slammed into him from behind, sending him tumbling end-over-end down the street.
Sophia had been panicking slightly when she could no longer move. Even shifting to shadow-form didn't seem to help. Suddenly, there was a flash of lightning that blanked out her vision momentarily. When it came back, she saw that their new attacker had been knocked ass-over-teakettle by a very large, very angry blond man. As she stared at the new arrival, he caught hold of a massive, flying warhammer that still had electrical energy sparkling over its surface. In a shockingly loud voice, the newcomer yelled, "WHAT COWARD DARES ATTACK THE CHILDREN OF MY FRIENDS AND ALLIES? THIS TRESPASS WILL NOT BE FORGIVEN! HAVE AT THEE!" With that, he leaped into the air and flew at the still tumbling monster.
"I think it might be a good idea for you four to go back to EDF headquarters," said a voice from off to the side. She turned to look, then felt her jaw drop as she realized the speaker was wearing a red, white, and blue uniform and had a VERY recognizable shield. "Leave this to the rest of us."
"The rest of you?" said Sophia absently while her brain tried desperately to re-engage control of her mouth. Motion out of the corner of her eye made her turn her head back in curiosity, only to see a familiar red and gold set of armor swoop in and strike the creature with repulsor blasts from both palms.
"I'll take them back, Captain. Thank you for the help," said Tom. Captain America nodded with a smile and ran to join the melee. Sophia thought she heard a gravelly voice in the distance yell, "SMASH!" Tom picked up a piece of wood that looked like it had broken off of a cargo pallet and said, "Portus! Girls, please grab onto this." She did as asked, and she suddenly felt as if somebody had embedded a hook in her stomach and was in the process of sucking her entire body through a narrow tube. She was reminded of Maggie's comment a few days ago that being drunk was less fun when you were a glass of water.
The group of them stumbled slightly upon arrival, and it took Sophia a good ten seconds before she realized that the flashes of light she was seeing weren't a side-effect of the teleportation. Instead, a rather sizeable group of black-clad soldiers were sending blasts of hot plasma in their direction. She could also hear the sound of gunfire, as well as flashes from some other type of weapon. Behind her, she heard Tom say, "Merlin's bollocks, what the hell is going on now?" That one sentence seemed to sum up their vacation so far, she thought as she instinctively began to look for cover just as one of the attacking invaders tossed a small object into the air.
Saurial appeared in a long, metallic corridor illuminated by industrial fluorescent lighting inset on the border between the walls and ceiling. The walls were mostly plain, though there were intermittent access panels obviously intended to allow for maintenance access to various bits of technology. Some of these panels had labels in French, while others lacked any indication of their purpose. The air itself was slightly cool and dry by human standards, and it was easy for her reptilian nose to smell the chemicals used to maintain the environmental standards needed for the inhabitants of the facility. She could also feel the slight internal lurch that was standard for teleporting into a new location with a significant difference in gravity, and this version of Earth's moon had the same fraction of a G as the one on Taylor's home Earth.
Trusting the magic of her Assassin's Cloak spell, she made her way into a more public area of the moon base. Personnel wearing unfamiliar uniforms made up the majority of the people moving about, though there were more casually-dressed people mixed in. Presumably, they were civilians, while those in uniform were members of the local military. Oddly, while the majority of the inhabitants appeared to be caucasian, many of the civilian staff seemed to favor attire that looked heavily influenced by traditional Asian fashions with dark silk jackets. Idly, Taylor wondered what Victoria would have made of the local fashions.
It didn't take long for her to locate an information terminal set into a wall near some kind of food court. The interface was also in French, but there were other language options. English wasn't one of them, but Japanese was, so she switched to that as it was easier for her to read than French. Having to negotiate with Lung was paying additional dividends. The oddities with language selection were soon explained. The Earth in this reality was still a balkanized mess of different nation-states, but the great powers were very different. The United States didn't exist and North America appeared to be broken up into a variety of nations, including large chunks owned by the Empire of Japan and, oddly enough, Sweden. South America was dominated by a very powerful and very capitalist version of Brazil, which helped explain why Portuguese was one of the available language choices. This installation, and indeed, the entire moon, was owned by the Kingdom of France. A little more research made it clear that while the Kingdom didn't have much in the way of territory on the planet itself, they completely dominated the moon and Earth's orbital space. That gave them a degree of parity with an Imperial Japan that seemed to own half of Earth.
'It seems that Robespierre didn't exist in this universe,' thought Taylor.
'Or perhaps the revolutionary movements of the 18th century simply failed. Regardless, we should look for references to dimensional travel,' replied Varga. The reality signatures read from their mysterious, black-clad attackers had come from this universe, but they lacked the information needed to narrow down a location. A quick search for references to technology showed that while this world was slightly more advanced than her Earth (ignoring Tinkertech), the only references to alternate realities were either theoretical or purely speculative.
Saurial frowned. 'If it exists, then it's classified beyond what we can find in a public information terminal. This world has a number of great powers in competition with each other. Any one of them, or even a minor power, could have a secret research project similar to the Stargate program in Jackson's universe. We may have to call in Dragon or one of her family to search for it.'
She continued to browse through the information repository, making note of the oddities of this world while also taking note of the geopolitical tensions. The nations in this world were not living in harmony. She had no desire to accidentally spark a world war, especially when nuclear deterrence was clearly a concept thoroughly understood by the locals. The level of paranoia present was clearly demonstrated when a pair of obvious security personnel arrived at the terminal. Saurial stepped away as one of them began to access security logs on the machine. Somebody had either noticed that the terminal was in use without anybody appearing on the security cameras or else they had flagged the language selection...or possibly both. Regardless, it was impressive attention to detail for what was supposed to be a public information terminal.
'If we can get the Dragon clan to sift through the information networks on this version of Earth, then we can investigate some other worlds in this reality to see if they hold anything of interest.' Even with a wormhole drive, visiting all of the candidates would take some time. Their list was made up of important sites in other realities, including worlds like Krypton, Gaia, Vulcan, and Acheron/Sineya. Of course, the list's composition was based on the possibly overly optimistic assumption that certain worlds tended to attract interesting events in multiple realities. While that was true in some parts of the multiverse, they hadn't verified it across the entire scope of everything, and probably never would, given the nature of infinity.
Saurial looked around at the food options available now that their data terminal was taken over by two increasingly puzzled local investigators. The smells were intriguing. Some of it was traditional French with a mix of other offerings, including a fusion cuisine dish that looked like escargot tempura. Popping one in her mouth with a substantial crunch, she wondered how regular humans were supposed to eat it when they didn't remove the shells before frying? She paused as she was reaching for an odd-looking, slightly pinkish quiche when a very familiar and very distracting feeling tingled at the edge of her awareness.
'You felt that?'
'Yes, and it feels like it's coming from that direction," replied Varga with a mental nudge. Saurial quickly began moving toward the source. The corridors of the station began to look less militaristic and more varied and civilian as they entered a commercial sector that reminded her vaguely of the promenade on DS9, albeit without the obvious non-humans (apart from herself). Though the feeling disappeared after a short time, it lasted long enough to lead them to the front of a fairly nondescript storefront.
'Does it seem odd to you that somebody is opening pandimensional portals hidden behind the facade of a general trade and merchandise shop on a French moonbase?' queried Taylor.
Varga gave her a mental nod. 'Something odd is clearly happening. Of course, it could be a trap for people investigating such things.'
'Well, there's an obvious way to find out,' replied Taylor as she reached to open the door beneath the sign, White Star Traders, with the tinkle of a bell to alert the occupants of a potential customer.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Spider-Man and Arachne were jumping their way down a stairwell to help defend their headquarters from an invading force. The security reports made it clear that the attackers were attempting to reach the data archives on sublevel three. That was consistent with the other known attacks, given that every other attack also seemed to be focused on gathering intelligence. Whoever these people were, they were clearly intent on learning whatever they could about other powers in the multiverse. It wasn't clear yet what the limits of their scope of interest might be.
The two exited the stairwell into a corridor that had a criss-cross of energy weapon fire shooting down its length. Pete was reminded of the opening battle in Star Wars, though thankfully their security troops had body armor that was more effective against the aggressors' plasma bolts than that worn by the rebels in the old movie. He made a mental note to thank Tony again for sharing that particular tech. Unfortunately, the invaders also had armor, and it was good enough to shrug off stun blasts and bullets. The pulse laser rifles were proving more effective, but they didn't have enough of those to equip the entire headquarters garrison. Even an amply-funded organization had to make compromises in terms of budget allocation when their charge was the defense of the entire planet and its surrounding space.
Pete and his wife leaped down the length of the corridor, relying on their EDM suits to shield them from the fire from both directions. His security staff was well aware that they didn't have to hold their shots just because the boss was in the line of fire. He and his wife both sent their trademark webbing at a pair of attackers, only to be disappointed as the sticky fluid slipped off of some type of kinetic energy forcefield. Somebody had prepared for their typical tactics, though Peter as a bright flash obscured his vision briefly. His and MJ's suits shielded them from the effects of the weapon, but he frowned when he noticed that a handful of the defending soldiers had been rendered insensate by what had to have been some type of stun grenade. With the sudden slacking of opposing fire from their side, a squad of black-clad invaders was now charging down the hall in their direction.
Arachne met them first, flipping the lead attacker over and slamming him to the floor. Two others raised plasma pistols and began putting close-range blasts into her, but she ignored their fire in favor of landing a blow that knocked the first attacker unconscious. Peter leaped over her head and knocked over the two attacking his wife like bowling pins. He landed in a roll that brought him back to his feet and turned to look at the fourth member of the squad. This one wasn't shooting at either of them but instead appeared to be fiddling with some type of device in his hands. The device made a loud humming noise and then his wife came in with a flying kick that knocked the distracted soldier into the wall. He dropped the device, then quickly slapped his hand to another button on his belt. There was another flash and the four attacking soldiers vanished in a teleportation beam.
"Well, that was anticlimactic," commented Arachne as she looked around at the empty hall.
Pete looked at the strange device. It was a black sphere with a handful of buttons and a single knob. There was no writing or any other indication of function. There was also a glowing amber light that seemed to indicate that, whatever its purpose, it was currently active. "I wonder what that thing does?"
"We probably should let the bomb guys deal with it," said his wife. "Arachne to security," she then said in a tone that indicated she was using her suit's communicator. There was a pause. "Arachne to security!" After another pause, she asked, "Spider-Man, does your communicator work?"
Pete tried it with a similar lack of effect. "Hm, must be a jamming device." He looked over to where the defenders had been knocked out and then stopped, stunned when he realized what he was seeing. "Or maybe not..."
At the end of the hall, they watched as EDF personnel moved at a ridiculously high rate of speed. The unconscious soldiers had already been cleared away, and now a group of soldiers and technical staff appeared to be scanning the section of the corridor where the two heroes were standing. They appeared to be moving at a speed that was at least ten times normal but seemed unable to actually enter the corridor.
"Well, I guess we know what that thing does, now," said MJ sardonically.
Pete frowned. Whoever they were, their attackers had clearly been prepared for him and his wife to be present and had set a trap. He just hoped that their being metaphorically trapped in amber didn't have any drastic consequences for their defense of the headquarters complex. He also hoped that the girls were all right out in the city.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Sophia frowned as she considered her options. There were serious consequences to consider with either choice, but she wasn't sure which would be the better one. She needed help. Luckily, she had backup.
"OK, this skirt would go amazing with my favorite jacket," she said, holding up the article of clothing in question, "but look how this one hangs around my legs," she said, moving her hips to swirl the pleats in a way that she thought emphasized her best features.
May considered the question seriously. "You could get both?"
The Brocktonite frowned. "Mom would probably throw a fit if I got too greedy." She already wouldn't be happy that May's parents were footing the bill for this fairly expensive shopping trip.
"You know that money isn't really a thing that friends of the Family have to worry about, right?" commented Maggie. "You could take a picture of the skirt, and Saurial could just magic it into existence."
Sophia bit her bottom lip. She knew that Maggie was absolutely right, and she also knew that there was no way her parents were comfortable enough with their current situation to accept that fact without a lot of hassle and yelling. Even her dad would be suspicious of anything offered without cost. You couldn't grow up in their gang-ridden home city without being suspicious of gifts. It didn't help her case that the two skirts cost more than $300 each, and this wasn't even the most expensive shop they had seen so far today.
May took pity on her. "I can hold onto one of them, then give it to you as part of an outfit for your birthday? That's coming up in like, two months, right?"
That was so tempting but finally, she shook her head. "No, I'll just get the first one. It works better with the outfits I already have." With a slight pout, she went and changed back into her street clothes and left the pleated skirt on the returns cart. She then pretended to not notice when Maggie ducked back into the changing rooms as she and May walked to the register. Her mother couldn't be mad at her for something she didn't see, after all.
Tom was waiting at the front of the store. While he took his role as escort seriously, he was smart enough to know better than to try and directly chaperone three teenaged girls through clothes shopping. Slowly creeping boredom would be the best result from that scenario. Instead, he made a deliberate attempt to keep an eye on the foot traffic in the store without triggering anyone's creepy stalker sensors. He seemed to be successful, apart from one blue-haired grandmother who gave him the evil eye. Maybe Widow would switch with him in the next store and he could be the one to stalk around the block looking for external threats? He had no doubt that the superspy was capable of shopping for clothes without losing situational awareness. She also undoubtedly had more valid opinions on fashion than he did. There was something to be said for his homeland's tendency to mostly wear simple robes.
The girls finished with their purchases, then clustered around him as they got ready to leave. They had developed a simple process where they would serve as a distraction and block sightlines while he surreptitiously shrunk their purchases for easy storage in a pocket. While the local New Yorkers were undoubtedly used to more bizarre sights than a little magic, there was no reason to draw extra attention to themselves. Nat was waiting for them when they walked out of the store. She somehow seemed to have a sixth sense about when they were ready to leave, as she had managed to meet them at the exactly correct time at four different stores. The one time she hadn't was because she had actually gone into the store with them when they arrived. The agent simply nodded to Tom as the girls discussed their next destination. Tom took the opportunity to look around at the crowd for anything legitimately threatening (as opposed to just New York City strange). The shopping crowd was mostly inoffensive, more dangerous because they could serve as camouflage for real threats.
Of course, sometimes subtlety was overrated. When the somewhat expected attack came, an armored figure with a skull-like mask simply stepped around the corner of a nearby building and proceeded to empty the magazine of an assault rifle into Black Widow. Her Family-provided suit instantly sealed itself as the bullets flattened against the armor and dropped to the ground thanks to the inlaid vibranium mesh. She looked over to Tom. "Seal up and watch the girls. I'll take care of the attacker." Tom nodded and triggered his own suit, including the full helmet. The three teens shared a quick glance and also activated their own suits, which formed over their street clothes seamlessly. The last attack had made it clear that wearing their full costumes armored with EDM and vibranium was a smart idea. Natasha, meanwhile, ran at full speed toward the shooter, who stepped back behind the corner...possibly to reload, or possibly to run.
Tony Masters, who went by Taskmaster in the mercenary trade, did replace the spent magazine in his rifle with a full one but slung the weapon over his shoulder and prepared to go hand-to-hand with Black Widow. It wasn't the first time they had encountered each other and he was curious to see what new tricks she might have for him. The important thing on this op wasn't to beat her but to keep her occupied while the other strike force swept in to capture the girls. When the Russian woman came around the corner, she came face-first into a spinning kick launched by the mercenary. Taskmaster was slightly surprised that the kick connected fully instead of being dodged, and even more surprised at how he felt the momentum of his strike dissipate completely while Romanov continued moving forward. The abrupt shift in motion momentarily threw him off balance. Rather than leave himself open, he transitioned into a side flip that opened up the distance between them and let him quickly recover his equilibrium.
The female S.H.I.E.L.D. agent darted in quickly with a combination of strikes that Masters was able to glide parry. He knew Widow was a lot stronger than she looked, and he also wasn't sure if her costume enhanced her native strength. His next surprise, though, came when he counter-attacked with his own strikes. She wasn't even bothering to parry or dodge, letting her armor take the full force of every attack. That change to her style threw him momentarily until his own power adjusted to it. He quickly realized that he had a problem, though. While he could mirror her moves and anticipate her attacks, his own armor didn't appear to be anywhere close to as strong as hers. He made a mental note to try and track down where she got it and wondered if it was something Stark invented.
On instinct, Taskmaster did a series of sudden backflips to avoid the arrows that began to rain down from a sniper spot on a nearby rooftop. He had estimated there was a three-in-five chance that Hawkeye would be backing up Black Widow and that seemed to be the case in reality. He came up into a kneeling position from the final flip, smoothly brought up the assault rifle, and began sending shots back at the sniper's perch. He smirked as the archer ducked back into cover, but then frowned when there was a flash of light off of a thrown blade and the barrel of his assault rifle fell off. Glancing to his left, he saw what appeared to be a knife buried up to the hilt in a nearby trash can. Widow had thrown it and managed to sever the carbon steel barrel of his weapon with a laser-straight cut. What the hell was that blade made of?
Masters moved closer to the weather cover of a bus stop, which temporarily blocked the line of sight to Hawkeye's position. He needed to stay engaged with Black Widow, but he had a plan to draw her into an alley if necessary to shield himself from sniper fire. It would take time for Hawkeye to get down to street level, and he was confident of his ability to go toe-to-toe with Widow for some time, even with her fancy new armor. He grimaced slightly as his armor grounded out a tazer blast from Widow. Apparently, she wasn't afraid to try her old standards, even if she guessed he was prepared for them. Getting shocked wasn't pleasant, even if he was protected from the worst of it.
Natasha let Taskmaster lead her into an alley, knowing that Clint would move down to join them. Hopefully, their "distraction" would be enough to draw out the girls' attempted kidnappers where they could be captured.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Sophia noticed that the crowd around them seemed to thin out. The shoppers were mostly locals and they had the sense to make themselves scarce when a superpowered battle appeared imminent. Some gawkers already had their cell phones out, of course, and she was sure that whatever happened, it would be up on social media before the fight was even over. It was a wonder that more people weren't killed trying to get likes, both here and back home in the Bay.
"How long do you think it will be?" asked May out loud.
Tom shook his head. "Not long."
As if that was the signal to attack, four of the bystanders in the thinning crowd appeared to shift their appearance into larger, monstrous forms with scaley red skin. Their faces had more than two eyes, but it was hard to see details because they were also wearing some kind of advanced armor and carrying large energy rifles. Three of the four fired the rifles at the girls, while the fourth tossed a pair of glowing stones into the middle of the group. Sophia blinked as the energy from the rifles appeared to wash over her armor without effect. A glance to her side showed that the others were equally unaffected. Their attackers fired again and once again, then apparently clued into the fact that the sophisticated-looking weapons were useless against their protection.
One of the creatures charged at Sophia and she shifted to shadow and dodged through her attacker, kicking him in the back and staggering him as he went by. As he recovered, she checked on her comrades. May seemed to be rather easily dancing around her attacker while her armor absorbed any strikes that got through. Tom and Maggie were also still fine, but they seemed to hesitate in their movements. She triggered her comm system. "Tom, what's wrong?"
"Those stones are magic suppressors," he said as he dodged an oddly disquieting kick from the fluid limb of an attacker. "It caught Maggie and me by surprise, but we're OK."
It was actually pretty obvious that while the lack of magic was a distraction, both casters had some fairly thorough training in hand-to-hand combat. Sophia was slightly impressed, and she was easily holding her own against her opponent. It occurred to her that when the gold standard for combat skills was Saurial, then even average students of that school were likely to be able to handle themselves capably in a fight.
Calynx watched from a distance, covered by his own holocloak. He was pretending to be one of the idiotic younger humans obsessed with documenting things in return for social status. What he was seeing, though, was not making him happy. The armor that the teens and their guardian were wearing was making their stunners completely ineffective, and while the suppression stones were working as expected, they didn't seem to be nearly as debilitating to the magic users as he had hoped. Most female wraiths would have been rendered easy prey without their mystical abilities, but these humans were skilled in protecting themselves using only their bodies...and that ridiculously durable armor. When all four of the attacking troops were disabled, he knew he had to act. His chance of avoiding punishment for a second failure to obtain his targets would be almost vanishingly small. With a grimace, he activated the semi-secret secondary function of the magic suppression stones. What was about to happen would have a very negative effect on his own health, but it was better than failing. Of course, it would have a much worse effect on the four captured dire wraith, but that hardly mattered.
The two stones on the ground began to glow with an ominous red light and lightning-like beams reached out to the four disabled dire wraiths on the ground. The four creatures let out a synchronized shriek that sounded like a theremin being slowly fed into a malfunctioning sausage maker and then began to visibly wilt and shrink in upon themselves. The four teen-aged observers stared as the glowing stones intensified in brightness while their former attackers were rather quickly devoured. The two stones then each shot a beam toward a nondescript teen with a mobile phone on the edge of the combat zone. When they struck, it became clear that his appearance was just an illusion covering their original attacker from the other day.
Calynx felt the energy stolen from the soldiers by the stones flood into him. It felt like he was standing in the center of a blast furnace and he could feel it as his body responded to the influx by growing and changing. Once, when he had been a young student of magic, one of the witches had lost her patience with his mistakes and proceeded to burn the skin off of a third of his body. That had been the worst pain he had ever felt...up until this moment. He quickly used some of the power he was being fed to dampen his pain. He couldn't make the pain go away, but the wraiths had techniques for ignoring it for as long as necessary to accomplish a mission.
Tom and Maggie both felt the massive surge of magical energy and quickly shared a look of alarm. Tom immediately began sending magical bolts of spellfire at the new foe. Maggie added shouted spells of her own that sent wind, fire, and force at the same target. Both Sophia and May were surprised by the aggressive assault but began sending webbing and bolts of their own after a moment's hesitation.
The magic energies swirling around him let him easily redirect the attacks being sent against him. Calynx focused his concentration on the air surrounding him and he used his increased power to solidify the air around the four young humans, locking them in place despite their impressive costumes. Now he just had to form another spell to send them into unconsciousness... Before he could finish his next casting, his concentration was shredded as a truly massive force slammed into him from behind, sending him tumbling end-over-end down the street.
Sophia had been panicking slightly when she could no longer move. Even shifting to shadow-form didn't seem to help. Suddenly, there was a flash of lightning that blanked out her vision momentarily. When it came back, she saw that their new attacker had been knocked ass-over-teakettle by a very large, very angry blond man. As she stared at the new arrival, he caught hold of a massive, flying warhammer that still had electrical energy sparkling over its surface. In a shockingly loud voice, the newcomer yelled, "WHAT COWARD DARES ATTACK THE CHILDREN OF MY FRIENDS AND ALLIES? THIS TRESPASS WILL NOT BE FORGIVEN! HAVE AT THEE!" With that, he leaped into the air and flew at the still tumbling monster.
"I think it might be a good idea for you four to go back to EDF headquarters," said a voice from off to the side. She turned to look, then felt her jaw drop as she realized the speaker was wearing a red, white, and blue uniform and had a VERY recognizable shield. "Leave this to the rest of us."
"The rest of you?" said Sophia absently while her brain tried desperately to re-engage control of her mouth. Motion out of the corner of her eye made her turn her head back in curiosity, only to see a familiar red and gold set of armor swoop in and strike the creature with repulsor blasts from both palms.
"I'll take them back, Captain. Thank you for the help," said Tom. Captain America nodded with a smile and ran to join the melee. Sophia thought she heard a gravelly voice in the distance yell, "SMASH!" Tom picked up a piece of wood that looked like it had broken off of a cargo pallet and said, "Portus! Girls, please grab onto this." She did as asked, and she suddenly felt as if somebody had embedded a hook in her stomach and was in the process of sucking her entire body through a narrow tube. She was reminded of Maggie's comment a few days ago that being drunk was less fun when you were a glass of water.
The group of them stumbled slightly upon arrival, and it took Sophia a good ten seconds before she realized that the flashes of light she was seeing weren't a side-effect of the teleportation. Instead, a rather sizeable group of black-clad soldiers were sending blasts of hot plasma in their direction. She could also hear the sound of gunfire, as well as flashes from some other type of weapon. Behind her, she heard Tom say, "Merlin's bollocks, what the hell is going on now?" That one sentence seemed to sum up their vacation so far, she thought as she instinctively began to look for cover just as one of the attacking invaders tossed a small object into the air.
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- Location
- Maryland
Ask, and you shall receive!
Seriously, I was going through some serious writer's block, but I seem to have worked out where things are going. Hopefully, it won't be another month before the next update.
Think it was a Hulk Smash, rather than a (US State) Smash.Wait.. is that...
Is that All-Might!Thor?
...but that could be an interesting story. Mjolnir in addition to One For All, instead of One For All, or One For All as an item that turns its users into All Might?
- Location
- Home
All Might, after finally burning out every last bit of One for All finds a magic hammer. Sounds like a pretty solid fanfic idea.