Chapter 36 : It always starts with a training montage (Flashocalypse)

 

The Mirror Dimension, image of Manhattan, the same day, 15:09, in Flash Thompson’s mind

 

Flash’s eyes shot open at the same time he let out a low groan of pain escape his lips.

 

With a wince, his instincts made him dial down his own pain responses to a more manageable level, commending and interacting with the ever continuous stream of data his brain was inundated with since he got back yesterday.

 

He had absolutely no idea how he managed to build a HUD while busy screaming his ass off in pain and writhing on the floor when Aria brought him back, but, the world that he could now see behind his baby blue eyes sported more in common with a Matrix movie than the one he always lived in.

 

His perspective had changed once more, painting a thin layer of numbers and data packets all around him, everywhere and everytime at once.

 

And now, his HUD was telling him that his composite healing factor and his own cybermorpher instincts were working overtime trying to reverse the damage he just took when Aria yeeted him.

 

Flash’s brows narrowed a bit.

 

He had definitely felt that hit, the previous one, where he had been sent ass over teakettle through two different buildings earlier, favorably comparing with a lovetap in comparison.

 

The weight, momentum and harshness of Aria’s response had been totally uncalled for.

 

He let out a low sigh of annoyance, barely taking notice of the metallic whine of what passed as his hips as they snapped back into their proper place.

 

He felt like he should be mad, but couldn’t really find it in himself.

 

He had been alone with her for months in the Astral Plane, and he knew the sad reality behind Aria’s ever-smiling face.

 

The golden girl had been broken by what she perceived as her own error, and waking in what she called ‘Marvel Comicdom’ dialed her fight or flight response up to the kazoo.

 

In hindsight, with how much angst toward humanity’s future she packed in herself, the fact that her bond with Iris went so well was a fucking miracle. Or meditation was just the perfect answer to the bonding’s early stage and she was a genius to have thought about it.

 

They had spoken at length about what she swore was coming their way, and, yes, the picture was grim, bad enough for him not to make a peep when she suggested that his own sister trained herself with the Vishantis.

 

But Aria needed a wake up call.

 

She was putting a lot of weight on her shoulders with her own impossible expectations to make things right, but how will she be once the curtain falls and the battle is won ?

 

Flash had sort of seen this coming, that’s why he had asked her to allow him two things if she succeeded to bring him back less zany than she found him.

 

The talk with a non-suggested Liz’, of course, because it was only right that his girlfriend, whom he previously had treated a bit like a prized pet, a fact he was still cringing hard about, knew the unfiltered truth about what happened to him.

 

Liz’ was a nice girl, and deserved much more than dismissive behavior and being left aside from the lie that Aria had crafted for her integration’s benefits in her new life.

 

And the right to help his savior in her future shenanigans and increasingly dangerous prospects, because Aria would need all the help she could find, and because he was worried that she would neglect her health, especially her mental one, along the way.

 

He had learned to appreciate the woman after spending so much time with her, and would rather shoot himself than let her forget how to live and become one of the monsters she had warned him about along her journey.

 

She had saved him from madness, and he would act as an additional ward against it for her in turn, in case her bond wouldn’t suffice.

 

As his healing was nearing completion, he casted a look downward to his prone form, his eyes shifting through the visual spectrums, making him able to get a better picture despite the low level of ambient light he had access to.

 

Flash couldn’t hold back a scowl to mar his face when he finally saw the results.

 

His legs weren’t still one hundred percent operational, a fact his HUD had already told him about, but that wasn’t what really annoyed him since they were continuously being put together, his silver blood flowing backwards toward his previously maimed members, metal and mechanical parts reassembling themselves all along, sparks occasionally jutting out from his ‘injuries’.

 

No, the fact that he had lost his pants to Aria’s hit was what really set him on edge.

 

“That was my favorite jean, dammit.” Flash swore under his breath.

 

A slight that definitely warranted a wallop from his part, if you asked him.

 

Closing his eyes to help him focus, a silly human gesture that his new body definitely didn’t need but that he kept finding himself doing, he reached out towards the machines, metallic parts and other pieces of equipment he could find to accelerate the last dregs of his healing, and to gather enough firepower to smack some sense in the golden girl’s head.

 

She wanted a spar, and he would provide.

 

At least, if he found himself flung around the Mirror Dimension once more, it would be because he rose to the challenge instead of just being a more appropriate physical outlet for Aria’s annoyance than the more squishy and vulnerable Jessica.

 

He reached out, and the minds and personalities of all that contained gears, electronics, and rarely just metal that had once been used in one or more constructs, answered.

 

Being reflections of their earthen counterparts, they responded more like dolls to his puppetry skill as he reached out, only giving a vague feeling of agreement, just slaves for him waiting to be used.

 

It rubbed him the wrong way on a deep level, having felt himself the kind of loss of agency he wouldn’t wish to his dirrest enemies.

 

As all that mechanic started to gather around him as if he was the center of a deadly maelstrom, he finally took a look upward, absentmindedly noting that he had found himself in a subway track.

 

The hole he had involuntarily drilled on his way in was a gaping maw, from which electrical sparks and water was falling merilly, shredded asphalt, cement and plaster having gathered under it in a suitably impressive pile.

 

Flash instantly revised his previous rating of Aria’s hit from dangerous to fucking deadly.

 

He had gone through four different buildings before ending up here, if his memory, backed by his hardware, was to be trusted.

 

That was a tremendous level of pseudo-physical might.

 

And according to his newfound twin, it wouldn’t be enough.

 

The thought was sobering, throwing him a bit off as he fashioned himself a simple armor suit to better cover his privates and offer a smidgen of protection, as mechanical limbs started building themselves like so many extensions of himself from the parts the maelstrom had gathered in his stead.

 

As the all green light signals finally reached his cortex, his body once more at a hundred percent capacity, he straightened himself almost instantly, not letting the part of his will animating the maelstrom go, and started to pull himself out in the light of the Mirror Dimension through the same way he previously came in, limbs supporting him in his legs' stead, drilling holes as they helped him ever upwards like the most deadly and messed up mechanical octopus a human mind had ever imagined.

 

Gathering even more parts, shredding buildings and cars in passing and his eyes closed once more as he focused, gaining even more height and weight, limbs multiplying around his form, Flash started to make his way toward Aria and the others, firmly determined to at least physically show her once that she had gone overboard with him, grumbling a bit under his breath.

 

She could’ve just asked for me to leave Jessica and her alone for a minute, for fuck’s sake.

 

***

The Mirror Dimension, image of Manhattan, the same day, 15:15

 

Multiple crashing sounds suddenly ring out in the relative quiet of the Mirror Dimension, and my moment with Jessica is interupted.

 

Turning myself toward the sound's point of origin, I can’t really help myself from blinking in disbelief.

 

From the direction I had previously yeeted Flash toward, a move more dictated by Iris and I shared states instinctual responses and my own annoyance toward Jessica attitude and low self-esteem, buildings started crumbling in the distance.

 

“What the hell is that ?” Jessica asks a little shakily as I damp my eyes to better narrow them in focus.

 

“My money's on a slightly angry Flash Thompson.” I answer a little wryly, seeing the edges of an immense tempest of metallic and mechanical parts all around him.

 

I think we can safely add magnetokinesis to the list of his capacities, because it certainly goes beyond low-level telekinesis.

 

Maybe a variant keyed to his own cyberpathy ?

 

Yesterday’s display should’ve clued me in.

 

“Do you think that messing with his original DNA awakened his own X-gene in passing ?” I ponder mentally to Iris.

 

“[Hesitation] : I mean, there was something there for sure, but since it was previously dormant I can’t really make a conclusive statement.” She answers after a beat.

 

I hmm aloud as the storm comes ever nearby, buildings falling aparts under its pull, holes and foundation getting ripped off their facades as more and more mechanical and metallic parts join the party.

 

I throw a look in the direction Mr. Drumm and the girls had been standing previously, noting with a certain relief that they chose to vacate the premises.

 

“You may want to go back toward the Sanctum for a bit.” I comment idly to Jessica.

 

“Will it be alright ?” She asks as she starts to take flight anew.

 

“Yeah,” I answer with a sigh, “It’s sort of my fault, I shouldn’t have hit him that hard. Hell, I shouldn’t even have hit him at all, but our joint state messed up my judgment for a bit and I overreacted.”

 

“It’s because I made you mad…” She lamely comments.

 

I slowly blink, mulling over my thoughts.

 

“I mean, yes, kind of, but that still wasn’t a valid reason.” I point out softly, “I’m a bit of a hormonal and emotional mess right now and should’ve taken the time to center myself a bit more before throwing myself into a super powered spar, considering all the implications the alterations to my brain and Iris and I joint state put me through.”

 

Iris gives me a full body squeeze to chase away my depreciative thoughts, but that doesn’t really work.

 

“So, I guess I’m going to have to at least take a few hits before he accepts my apologies.” I end as another building, nearer this time, crumbles apart.

 

In front of us, on the rooftop of the building on the other side of the street, multiples worm-like construct writhing, showers of sparks falling off of them, form a massive hand that comes crashing down.

 

With a last ‘eep’, I hear Jessica take off behind me, not giving any second look towards the titanic and pseudo-robotic figure at the center of the storm as it shreds the fifteen floor building he just collided with.

 

Buffeted by the wind the rotating pieces of metal are rising in their passing, my white mane move wildly around me as I shield my eyes from the dust and little debris getting flung all around as the last vestige of the building fall apart amid a layered crashing sound, like a tak-tak-tak-tak as each floor crashes onto the others, concrete and metal groaning while giving away.

 

My life has become fucking surreal.

 

I bear witness of the power of a neo-Apocalypse mutant when they’re ticked off for the first time then, a giant at least a good twelves stories tall, made of the similar tentacle-cum-worms constructs he used to trap me with earlier. They writhe all around the ‘body’ in an ever changing motion, animated through sheer will. The face is empty, only two big holes for eyes from which electrical and metallic sparks fall continuously.

 

I have to admit that Flashy has some style, this giant mech-body of his is absolutely terrifying.

 

I also absentmindedly note that it will be the one and only time I piss him off because the world wouldn’t endure us having a falling out.

 

Then the titanic figure takes a step as his eyes narrow slightly in my direction, and the whole world shakes with it.

 

I didn’t even notice earlier, thinking it was the collapsing buildings, but the weight that thing must have is probably ridiculous.

 

Iris covers my head, giving my 'jumpsuit' a complete hood as our minds align anew.

 

A mouth carves itself on the titan’s face, vomiting sparks as it opens, and a voice like a growl of a metallic beast resonates all around us, and I can feel it even in my bones despite the touch-TK Iris maintains continuously to shield herself from harmful soundwaves.

 

“THAT HURT.” Flashocalypse says.

 

“Is it too late for an apology ?” We answer, our touch-TK rising around our bonded state, white and purple mingling seamlessly, “We lost it for a bit, didn’t really mean to ? We promise to make pancakes for a week as a way of making amends ?”

 

“THAT WOULD BE TOO EASY.” The rumbling of a denial comes immediately.

 

I kinda had to try though, I don’t really fancy myself carving through fucktons of metal to reach him.

 

“[Agreement, wariness] : That’s going to take a while if we don’t pull out all the stops.” Iris agrees through our shared-mind.

 

I want to sigh and facepalm at the same time as Flashocalypse takes another steps, shaking the world and rupturing the asphalt, windows giving under the vibrations.

 

“I guess it is as good as any opportunity to test if my little idea has some weight behind it ?” I tell Iris offhandedly, kicking myself mentally for having lost it like that.

 

Granted, Jessica’s attitude and her criticism of my sister’s work really pissed me off.

 

I’m fucking sublime, not a stupid barbie doll !

 

“[Excitation, eagerness] : The feathered one ?” Iris asks, giddiness at the idea blossoming on our mind-link.

 

“If you can handle the strain of having so many of them out at once, yes.” I answer immediately.

 

The lumbering titanic form keeps moving forward, one of his arms taking a winding motion.

 

“[Confidence, eagerness] : If we remain at this size, it shouldn’t be a problem. It’ll take much longer to get bigger, though, and you'll have to be in charge of most of the movements.” She says decisively.

 

“Alright, go for it.” I give her the go ahead.

 

As what feels like [Childish whooping] resonates on our shared-mind, Iris’ snow white feathers starts blossoming in an ever increasing pace, molding into each other in increasingly thick and tight layers around our whole bonded-state, soon leaving us the aspect of pristine whiteness, like carved of alabaster, as multiples wings starts emerging all around us, three especially big ones covering my faked breasts and privates parts.

 

The process had barely taken a few seconds, and we absentmindedly flex our wings, our whole form surrounding itself once more in our white and purple aura.

 

We feel everything just as we should and I deem the idea successful.

 

I’m this close to give ourselves a pat on the shoulder as the massive fist finally falls in our direction.

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