Chapter 30: SS- The Talking Dead

Grave digger, grave digger
Bring me to my knee
Forget what I have done
Forgive me if you please
Save me if you can
The time for me has come
Let me be the one that got away

********

"I'm so jealous," Amy admitted as Mikael flew away.

"I know," Vicky nodded. The sisters were standing close, almost afraid the other would disappear. "The Boss is hot. Great hair, large package, and did you see those pecks? You could eat off them. Break out the food because those are the fancy plates. Huge DILF energy. Those lucky bitches are in for a wild ride. You did good work, Ames."

"I barely did anything," Amy grumbled, crossing her arms. "At least not consciously. As soon as I touched him, I zoned out. He was the one guiding my power to get the body he wanted. I can't even remember what his body is like."

"Still, good reason to be jealous of those women. Did you hear how thirsty they all were? If they aren't banging by now, they totally should be."

"I'm jealous of Mikael!" Amy deadpanned at her sister. Did she still not know she was gay? "Did you see those women? He has a Harem! Five beautiful women at his beck and call. Think he'd let me join? I don't mind sucking dick once in a while if I can get tail like that every day." Logan grunted in amusement while Vicky made to speak up.

"Ten," Xavier interrupted.

"What?" Amy asked.

"Ten women," the professor explained. "At least, that we know of. Three were with him when he met the Sorcerer Supreme, and the Goddess Ranni fought the League to a standstill when the Elden Lord first arrived. With the five we saw tonight, that is at least nine, but there are hints of others. Such as the telepath. So ten is the conservative estimate. And they are all formidable to some extent."

"The redhead packed a mean punch," Logan said with difficulty. The spear that had pierced his chest had disappeared with the woman, but it was healing slowly. Much slower than most wounds did.

"You should not underestimate any of them," Xavier said gravely. "Scathact is known to have trained the greatest heroes of Irish mythology. Medea was an infamous greek witch. Even if you have not heard of her, you should have heard about her first husband. Jason of the Argonauts. She is largely responsible for his and the Argonauts' general success."

"I could only interact with two people while I was all ghosty," Glory Girl pointed out. "I didn't get any names, so I don't know if I ever met her, but Medea sounds like my kind of gal."

"According to myth, she killed her children with Jason when he betrayed her and started the process that led to him dying alone and miserable." Charles cautioned. "And she destroyed some of the world's greatest wards in seconds. Those two are the only names of the retinue I recognize, but the others must be influential figures from their own worlds. Worlds the Elden Lord destroyed or conquered, according to Ranni. We cannot take them lightly."

"Nah, don't worry about the Boss," Vicky waived off the mutant's concern. "Yeah, he's strong, but so long as you don't piss him off, you're more in danger from his bad jokes than anything else."

"Are you sure you should be talking about him," Amy asked worriedly. "My contract stops me from revealing anything at all."

"It's all good," Glory Girl remained as unconcerned as ever. "He's pretty chill. Once he asked me if I wanted to come back, I followed him around for a few days while he looked for you, Ames. He doesn't really care about privacy, just secrecy. He doesn't want to talk about abilities or who is with him, but he's pretty open if it is questions about himself. Besides, it's just us four here. You all saw him firsthand. He's not a Bad Guy."

"Baring tonight's small skirmish," Xavier eyed Logan's blood covered from warily. "He hasn't instigated any violence. In fact, he has not sought out conflict since he landed. Can you tell me about his goals? He achieved his goal of getting a human body, but he mentioned meeting someone on Earth."

"I don't know anything about a meeting, though I could ask him."

"Don't," Amy said, arms tightening around her sister's waist to keep her still. "I don't want to risk him getting annoyed."

"Chill, Ames," Vicky rolled her eyes in exasperation. "The Boss is cool. You are treating him like he's going to blow up the planet or something."

"Quick to defend him, aren't you?" Logan pointed out.

"He just brought me back from the DEAD!" Victoria exclaimed, not understanding why everyone was being so hostile to a guy who, as far as she knew, hadn't done anything wrong.

"You are aware that you'll be placed in Master/Stranger confinement, correct?" Xavier pointed out. "We cannot be too careful, especially since we will need to verify you are Victoria Dallon and if he has done anything to you."

"That's gonna suck," Vicky groaned. "We expected it, and he warned me, but it's gonna blow either way."

"Apologies," Charles nodded his head with a warm smile at the young woman. "But I cannot access your mind to verify anything, so we will need to do it the old fashion way. I imagine you will be in confinement for a while."

"You can't?" Amy asked, surprised. "Is their telepath still around?"

"Nah, it's one of the perks of being bound to Mikael," Victoria said casually as if her words didn't have horrific implications. "I'm immune to telepaths, Masters and Strangers, most Thinkers, a few Strikers like Ames, and other stuff. I can stop the defences if I want, but I won't. I'm not stupid."

"Vicky!" Amy screamed, covering her sister's mouth and looking around desperately as if afraid Mikael would burst out of the shadows.

"You said you couldn't speak about abilities," Logan growled, looking around and sniffing the air for anything unusual.

"Will you all take a chill pill already," Glory Girl said, flying out of her sister's grip and hovering in the air. Amy tried to prevent her but found her powers no longer worked on the blonde. "These are my abilities now. You would have found out when I went through testing anyway. No reason to hide them."

"What else can you tell us?" Charles asked, intensely watching the flying blonde. "Any other abilities?"

"I mean," Victoria put her hand to her chin in thought. "It pretty much all passive, you know, things I don't do on purpose. The defences were a big one. The other, I guess, is the Talents. I only remember some of them. He had a list and everything. I remember the coolest ones, though. He called it Performance Talent and Martial Talent. You know, I can learn to sing and dance and kick ass super quick now."

"Is that all?" Amy snarked at her flying sister.

"Pretty much," Vicky nodded. "There were a few other things about gods, blessings, souls, immortality, and stuff, but he said I didn't really have to worry about it. Oh! He also said I might start to predict things before they happen or be able to punch immaterial stuff, but I should go see him if that ever happened."

"I was being sarcastic!" Amy said, palming her face.

It was like Vicky never died.

Don't get her wrong, she was thrilled to have her sister back, but she wished Vicky would think about this kind of thing more deeply.

Apparently, the fuck-off dragon she just gave a body to was a 'Trump 22+' or some bullshit.

"Wait," Amy said, realizing something. "Is that why your aura isn't working? Does it negate your own power?" Though Amy could now see the after-effects of the 'shaker' power on herself, she also knew Vicky had never been able to turn that power off completely and didn't really blame her for it.

"Ah," Vicky looked a bit sheepish. "Not really. Part of the Talent package is I can control my abilities perfectly now. I have it turned off because, well... the Boss really doesn't like Master effects. Like, at all. He was very... descriptive of what he would do if he found I was blasting it all over the place."

Amy looked concerned again, but Vicky just looked embarrassed, so she let it slide.

For now.

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"They all get these abilities?" Logan asked, lighting a new cigar. Amy held out her hand, and he passed her one as well. "That would explain some things. The broad with a spear, Scath or whatever, was faster and stronger than me, but she knew everything I would do before I did it. Like she could see the future. I hate fighting precogs."

"Everybody bound by Mikael gets the same abilities," Vicky nodded. "It's a baseline gift that Mikael gives us. But they've been with him for a while. I don't know exactly how long, just that he is old, like older than humanity old. They have way more practice with this stuff than I do and probably a dozen other tricks I don't know about."

Amy really should have listened to Yoruichi and tried to get some sleep. Everything Vicky said increased the headache she was feeling. And since she could see her own brain, Amy knew it was psychological rather than physical.

"You might be in confinement for longer than expected," Xavier said, deep in thought.

"Fine," Victoria pouted. "If I think it's bullshit, I am taking off, though. I get security, but I just came back to life. I want to have some fun. Being dead is peaceful and all, but you can't really do anything."

"What was it like?" Logan asked softly, eyes distant as smoke curled around his face. "Being dead?"

"Like I said, it was peaceful," Vicky smiled nostalgically at the short mutant. "All your worries, fears, desires, ambitions, everything fades away. The world passes you by, and you can watch, but you aren't affected. Occasionally you get flashes of emotions when something happens connected to you. When Amy was fighting the Joker and the heroes, I almost felt alive again. When they built this park, I felt grateful, almost happy. But most of the time, you do not feel anything for years. Time loses all meaning."

"So, no afterlife?" Logan grunted.

While most wouldn't realize it, Logan was old. He had been around for long enough to remember when Christianity was far more dominant than it was today. He wasn't on the best terms with the guy upstairs, but Victoria's words were still a bit of a bummer.

"There is," Vicky nodded. "I'm not really religious. I got what everyone else gets, a life and an end. If you dedicate your soul and beliefs to a religion or faith, that belief system claims you, for good or bad."

"Fair enough." Logan took another drag of his cigar.

He needed a beer.

"While this is fascinating," Xavier said, wheeling himself around to face the group. "We must be returning. People will be rising soon. We can ask these questions in a more secure environment."

"Sure thing, Wheels," Victoria said, making Logan grunt in amusement. "By the way, who are you two? Friends of Amy?"

"Charles is my psychologist and boss on Tuesdays and Thursdays. The short hairy one is Logan, my dealer," Amy snarked.

The healer and Canadian got along pretty well, all things considered.

They were both assholes in their own way.

"Aaaaammmmeeeeees," Victoria looked at her sister disapprovingly, who continued to smoke unrepentantly. Vicky's look would have been more intimidating if she didn't look like a twenty-year-old.

Amy was the older sister now.

"What should we do with those," Logan interrupted the stare-off by nodding at the barrels left in the center of the park.

"There's still blood left, so we need to get rid of it," Amy said seriously. "I wouldn't trust anyone with that stuff. It will either cure cancer or cause a biblical plague. Vicky, grab them. We'll incinerate them at the mansion."

"Fine," Vicky grumbled good-naturedly as she flew over to pick up the barrels. "You're even bossier these days."

Glory Girl needn't have bothered.

The shadows below the two barrels rose up around them like a blanket. Within seconds the blood barrels disappeared, though the pile of shadows remained.

"Raven?" Victoria asked, just to be sure. She had 'met' the umbrakinetic who lived in Mikael's shadow but had never seen the woman's actual body.

Her interactions with the women around Mikael had been minimal. Priscila was the only one who could see and interact with her, so Vicky had spent the most time with either her or Mikael.

Two pairs of red eyes, one on top of the other, appeared in the mass of darkness. The two right eyes winked at Vicky before disappearing.

A throaty chuckle rang out in the park as all the bioluminescent leaves in the park fell to the ground at once.

Within seconds, the only proof that anything had happened at the New Wave Memorial was the lack of leaves on the trees, the damages caused by Wolverine's bout with Scathach, and four slightly unnerved people.

"Oooookkkkaaaayyy," Vicky said slowly. Then she shrugged. "Whateves, now I don't have to carry those barrels around."

"That's it," Amy said, rubbing her temples. "I'm done. Tonight is over. No more. If there are other world-shaking revelations, crazy shenanigans or impossibilities popping out of nowhere, they can wait till I've had some sleep."

Even if she could heal the physical effects of exhaustion, the mental wear and tear remained. Just because she could now tweak her DNA to be closer to Superman than the average joe didn't mean she wanted to deal with all this bullshit.

"Let's get out of here." The healer turned and started to walk out of the park towards where she knew the X-jet was parked.

"So," Glory Girl asked as she floated behind her sister. "What's in fashion these days? I've a lot of catching up to do. Are Statement Sunglasses still in? Cause I've got a good idea for one."

Logan decided to follow the women, pushing Charles' wheelchair along, wisely keeping his mouth shut.

********

A bit on the shorter side, but tomorrow is moving day, so *shrugs*. Thanks to Old man of the mountain/Darklord331 for looking it over.

I promised to shift more toward DC, and I still will, but I had to clarify a few things. Honestly, this Side Story was supposed to be part of Emancipation 3, but I ran out of time. More than that, it isn't direct interaction with The Family, so I decided to make it a SS.

Like all SS, it is canon but not necessary for the main story. It is a fleshing out of how other parts of the story function. More specifically, it shows that the rest of the world is piecing more together about the Family and how Mikael sees 'secrecy' vs 'privacy.'

He honestly doesn't care that people see him naked, read his mind, or have a baseline knowledge about the group's abilities. He likes being tricky, always having a hidden ace to play, but doesn't go to the Batman extent of hiding all knowledge.

Of course, we know that the world at large has learned more than he wanted, but that will be elaborated on in the following Side Stories. I have at least one more SS planned for next time, a tiny Omake, and then back to regular chapters. I hope to get back to our regular schedule soon after this whole shitshow IRL is calmed down.

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