Project: Gamer Ver. 2 Alpha Build 0.9.8
Disclaimer Me Do: I own nothing you recognize. And most of what you don't recognize, I still don't own.
_________________________________________________________________________
Robin walked through the tunnel created by the Zeta Tube with calm purpose. It had been a few days since they'd cleared Captain Atom's name, and the high of completing a mission, even after it all went to hell, was starting to fade.
Coming into Mount Justice, though... Something seemed off.
Some of the lights, once bright white, had dimmed to an aging yellow. A fine coating of dust covered most things.
Sitting at a table nearby, looking at their phone was someone that looked familiar.
"Robin?" They looked up and he recognized who the person was, barely.
Alchemist looked to have aged, though how much the Boy Wonder wasn't sure of.
"Robin, is it really you? Gods, it feels like it's been years! What's the last thing you remember?" That threw him... At first.
"Hah. Hah. Nice try, but I was there when you told Batman you were putting yourself in a new body." Rather than being upset at having his prank interrupted, Alchemist instead grinned at Robin. "How did you make everything look half-abandoned?"
"Magic, of course. One spell did most of this, covers color changing and making things dirty. Now go hide somewhere nearby, I don't think anyone told Kid Flash!"
-----
Wally had to run to make it to the Mountain in any reasonable time.
His school just let out a little later than everyone else's.
He stepped out of the terminal, breathing hard, and froze. Some of the lights overhead were out, the monitors were covered in thick layers of dust.
A few of the chairs were still clean, and there was someone sitting in one of them.
An older guy, maybe some new adult? He was looking at a yellow gemstone in obvious confusion.
"Ex...cuse me?" Thinking about it, he hadn't noticed the zeta terminal announcing his arrival.
That was... Kinda weird. Maybe a new security feature?
The guy in the chair looked up and froze, eyes wide.
Huh. Same color as the crystal he was looking at.
"Kid... Flash? Is that you? Really you?" The guy stood up and walked over towards him, acting like he'd seen a ghost.
"Uh, yeah?" Alright, he was starting to get a little freaked out here. "Who are you supposed to be?"
"It's... You don't recognize me? I-uh-I'm Alchemist?" The guy held out his hand and snapped his fingers, casting something on Wally.
Well, his ankles hurt a little less now?
"Nobody has seen you in- I don't even know how long! And you look like you've barely aged a day!" What? He'd seen everyone yesterday!
"Listen, buddy. I don't know what you're trying to play at, but I've only been away for like, a day. Max! And there's no way you're Alchemist! He's this-this... Nuh-uh. Nope. No way." Wally turned around and started walking back to the Zeta Terminal.
"Al...right? Oh, be careful you don't break the time barrier if you try to run! Bad things happen if you do." Wally barely heard Alchemist's? parting words.
And weren't those ominous.
He was going to go home and see his parents and make sure they weren't old and gray.
And maybe tell them he loved them.
And then call Uncle Barry and ask what the hell that guy meant about a time barrier!
-----
"Alright." Robin said, coming in through the side door. "I have to admit, that was funnier than I thought."
"The best part?" Alchemist grinned, tossing the yellow phozon crystal he'd made with Conversion from hand to hand. "It's all on camera!"
He'd thought the crystal would be red, when he went to make it. That was the color of the artificial ones, at least the ones made by the Magic Cauldron in the Kingdom of Valentine. His, however, had come out yellow and he didn't yet know why.
Perhaps a difference in origin and cost? The blue ones came from Odette's realm, forming naturally. Red ones came from a self-aware magic cauldron that was powered by... The souls of... The dead. Well. He supposed if he really stretched the definitions a bit, he and the Cauldron weren't too different. He was just powered by the one soul, and he came across that bit honestly.
"Megan, Connor and Karen should be coming along next. Do you want to try and get them too?" He really should've expected that pranks would be the common language between him and Robin.
Alchemist cast Mind Blank on himself and gave Robin a thumbs up.
-----
M'gaan giggled as Connor told her about a would-be bully.
Not that Connor even noticed he was trying to be a bully. The boy was just too innocent and cute!
Meanwhile Karen would occasionally interject and tell her about how the girls were trying to get her to join the cheer squad. They kept asking how the kryptonian had such flawless skin and she didn't understand why it was such a big deal.
Stepping out of the Zeta Tube, she froze.
The terminal room was completely dark save a pair of goggled eyes lit up by the reflected glow of a monitor. Waiting for them.
She couldn't feel the mind of whoever was there!
Connor stepped through and nearly knocked her over when he ran into her. When Karen stepped into him, they all went falling to the floor!
They were a jumbled mess on the floor when the other person in the room started walking to them. Their steps loud in the dark room.
"I've been waiting for you." The mindless voice said, right next to her.
She flew up in a jolt, startled at how close they seemed.
"Who-who are you?" Why couldn't she feel their mind?!
"You know who I am." There was a click, and the lights flicked on all at once. She could finally see them. Dressed in jeans and a black tee, they looked similar to Connor.
Kind of.
A lot of humans did.
She told most of them apart by how their minds felt, okay?!
"I've been waiting for you, M'gann." He took one more step forward.
And M'gann bolted, flying through the side door at speed. Knocking over Robin who'd been waiting there in anticipation for something.
"J'onn!" She screamed, audibly and mentally. "Uncle J'onn! M'arvinn the mindkiller is real!"
She was out of the mountain in seconds, rushing to a safe Zeta Terminal.
The Martian Manhunter would eventually find her in his apartment, hiding under a blanket.
-----
"Uh, Alchemist?" Superboy asked after standing up, unsure what just happened.
"...Yeah?" The man in question was looking in the direction Megan had just flown off to.
"You look different." Not really that different though. He was a bit taller and his face had thinned out.
"Yeah, that's fair. You think she's okay?" Connor didn't know how to answer that, so he didn't.
"Huh." Powergirl was looking at Alchemist closely, practically squinting. "You do look different. Did you get a haircut?
"Like, oh my god." Alchemist grinned. Connor wasn't sure he liked it when he saw the magician grinning. He tended to make things weird. "I am like, totes stoked that somebody finally noticed!"
-----
The terminal room was empty when Kaldur arrived.
Hardly surprising, he hadn't heard of there being anything that needed done today. He was just checking in, making sure nobody needed anything.
He was about to head into the base proper when he saw a light flickering from behind him. Turning around, he saw it was coming from the zeta tube itself!
He stepped forward, feeling an echo of -something-... And then jumped back as a body was practically thrown out of the zeta tube!
They rolled a few times before coming to a stop, and then got their hands under them.
They got up to one knee, and Kaldur could finally see their face.
"Alchemist?" They looked... Older, much older than he'd been just yesterday. "Is that you?"
They finished standing up, unsteady on their feet, and looked at him.
An intense, unblinking stare that lasted for far too long.
"Aqualad? Is that... You look so young!" Alchemist almost fell over as he rushed over to him. He leaned down, tilting his head to the side.
...He'd never gotten this close to Kaldur before. It was actually kind of creepy.
"I think it worked. I'm back! I'm really back! Aqualad!" Alchemist grabbed on to his shoulders with surprising strength, locking him in place. "Listen very, very closely. It's important."
"...Okay?" At this point he'd agree to almost anything. Alchemist always avoided peoples personal space outside of training, and Kaldur was wishing it had stayed that way.
"Alright." Alchemist inhaled noisily. "Alright. Listen."
He leaned forward, his voice dropping to a whisper.
"Your Father, your real father, is a terrible, no-good, awful man named Black Manta. He's going to call you, asking for bail money soon and offering to have you join his family business. I'd suggest telling him to sit and spin." He leaned back, words imparted. His yellow eyes stared into Kaldur's pale green, still unblinking, before he nodded and let go.
Aqualad had no idea what most of that meant. He was confused enough he wasn't quite angry at the implications Alchemist had made about his mother...
At least he wasn't until Alchemist walked out the door, humming something banal.
Aqualad rushed at the door, intent on tracking him down... But the hallway was empty.
-----
Alchemist... Was out of ideas.
Time travel was played out. Whatever the Black Martian thing was that M'gann was so scared of had actually gone overboard.
He'd sent the girl a text apologizing, but he had no idea if she'd even seen it yet.
Maybe for Player One he should go the opposite direction? Pretend everything is normal and he'd always looked this way?
He'd figure it out when she showed up.
In the meantime, he had to figure out what he was going to do with the phozon crystals. While it was thematic to put them into weapons, it wasn't strictly necessary.
The Halja, also called Wraith's or even Shinigami, Odette's grim reapers from the game Odin Sphere would simply carry a large crystal in their off-hand.
...And, being painfully honest with himself, he just didn't feel especially comfortable with most melee weapons. Out of everything he'd practiced with so far, he did best with knives. Well, knife. Singular. Watching, waiting for an opportunity to stab. Or grabbing with his off-hand and making the opportunity.
Goblins didn't like him and the feeling was mutual.
There was an example of a crossbow that had a phozon crystal embedded in it, able to fire magical projectiles or even magical charged bullets...
Except he had no idea how to rig that up. He wasn't some dwarven mastersmith after all. He'd been hoping to get some clues as to how that was done if Death had actually found Riblam for him, but he wasn't about to complain.
Alchemist held his artificial yellow phozon crystal in front of himself and cycled his magic into it.
It was fed back into him, unchanged, but he felt something tugging on a part of him he'd never really felt before. Something behind where his heart was, a core of...
He stopped when he realized he could almost see things, floating in the air around himself.
Almost. Just small distortions of light, floating lazily in the air.
Maybe if he made a demi-gauntlet with an armored vambrace? He could set a crystal in it, use it that way while keeping a hand free? He'd tried full-sized gauntlets in Bitterblack Isle and found they were just too limiting, it was hard to grip or grab things.
He'd get it figured out later, maybe see about trying to work out how to use one with a gun. He might not have decades of experience, but he could try and plumb the insane brilliance of the internet later.
The zeta terminal activated and he put those thoughts away.
Player One stomped in through the tube.
"Ah, Patty-Ann, glad you could join us toda-" He blinked in confusion when she crossed the distance in a burst of speed that would've made the Flash proud.
~~ -200 HP! ~~
~~ -1 VP! ~~
~~ Critical Hit! ~~
And slammed her fist into his face, knocking him off his chair.
"You!" She hissed, actually hissed with open fury. "You absolute rat bastard!"
"something something MAGIC something something IMPREGNATE."
"WAIT, WHAT WAS THAT ABOUT IMPREGNATE?!?! HALP I NEED AN ADULT!!!"