I took Alison to bed. I could have probably taken her to bed-bed, but Akiko had made it pretty clear that she would prefer not to be a part of anything I did with someone else, and I suspect that anything exciting would also be rather noisy. I took Alison and tucked her back into her own bed, giving her a kiss, and then checked on Toby again before I grabbed the keys I had left in my own room, gladly noted that I seemed to have some packages from Amazon which turned out to be plastic-wrapped clothes. I was not too worried about washing them first, so I put on a nice dark green pullover which fit surprisingly well, a pair of black jeans, tucked the billion and a half yen J-crypto card into my pocket, and headed downstairs.

Sometimes barely sleeping was useful. I started experimenting and analyzing the two supernatural substances I had picked up in Japan. I had also gotten some of Chikau’s blood, and he had been too busy playing his father’s nasty games to notice. There was still a little sake in the bottle that Sif had used to collect the green slime, but as a suspension, I didn’t think it would make much of a difference.

The Ghul venom was nasty stuff, but I found that by blending it with the Oni essence and several of the golden rings, I was able to create something that was… I didn’t know if it was terrifying or if I had just discovered the origin of a supernatural species.

Vampire venom

Value: 0

Aspects: Undeath, Life, Death, magic

Power: 30

This venom charge a creature with body aspect alone with life and unlife. This will make them stronger, faster, and more durable for a month.

If the majority of blood is removed from a creature containing the full effects of this venom, the creature will die, and be reborn as a vampire.

I made two bottles out of what I had mixed and tucked them into my pouch. I didn’t know what becoming a vampire truly meant, but if I had done this before the battle, I might have been able to use them on...no. No, I wouldn’t have done that to Lauren, and since she had more aspects than solely body, it would not have worked anyway. I didn’t need to play the what-if game, just like I had told Alison. This stuff was dangerous, and I resolved not to let it leave my pouch until I had someplace safer to store it.

I was able to pull two more concoctions, and surprisingly enough, it was a blend of dandelions, oni essence, aloe vera, turmeric, ginseng, and one of my own regeneration potions that led to something I thought would work. My gift guided me to heat the mixture gently in a glass pot on the stove, and after the fumes cleared I was left with a substance that needed to be poured into a pill mold and allowed to set. For the first time, I managed to create a pill that didn’t solely affect me!

Purification and rejuvenation pill

Value:0

Aspects: Life, body

Power: 5

This pill is highly sought after by cultivators and mortals alike. As a body ages, it collects more and more tainted essence, causing physical age-related damage as well as filling the body with impurities.

This pill is painful to take, but it clears almost all impurities, as well as reverting age-related damage and regenerating many traumas.

It will help clear blockages in your dantians and channels, and allow qui to flow more cleanly through your body. This is not the most powerful version of this pill, since inadequate and unenchanted tools were used in it’s creation as well as impure and less refined essences, but it is still considered incredibly powerful and valuable to nearly all of those that do not rely on their impure blood for power.

Caution! This pill will likely strip out impure blood in metahumans, returning them to human. It will increase your lifespan as it removes impurities, but it does not grant immortality, toxins and tainted essence can regrow at normal rates. It will not have any effect on those who have yet to reach maturity.

The single blend seemed to create 5 pills, and I had no idea what to do with them.

I understand that my analysis couched things in terms basic to my own understanding, and I had read enough translated novels to understand a lot of the terminology used, but I had thought that the whole Xuanhuan thing was total fiction based on Daoism and mythology.

Then again, I had literally just had some fictional stories thrust into my face, or, in the case of a certain lovely kitsune, thrust my face into them.

I refreshed my supply of emergency potions, and carefully washed out the kitchenware. The dish I had used to mix the vampire venom was carefully cleaned out, and then I took it out and buried it, and burned the rag I used to wipe it out. Like the elixir, I had zero interest in finding out what happens to normal creatures that consume it.

I was tempted to try it out on myself, but I really needed to talk to someone who might know what it was and how it worked. That meant finding a….cultivator. Would Akiko know? Would the charming young class B I had met while flying across China know?

Was it possible that some of the superheroes renowned for their martial arts were straight out of Chinese mythology? It certainly seemed that way, as time went on more and more oddities kept popping up. It was almost as though supernatural beings had welcomed the arrival of Metahumans as an excuse to come out of the closet.

Next, I expected to start meeting aliens, demons, wizards, and elves.

***

The next morning, I woke up early. As usual. I had needed to be disconnected from humanity for a while, but I finally turned my phone back on.

I got several worried messages from Antonia and Aquantis, and I sent off a message to Antonia letting her know I was okay and Mariah letting her know that I had made it, but Lauren hadn’t.

When Aquantis asked where I should meet her I let her know that she should probably wait a few days. I had some vengeance to get, and while I would love her help, it would make me poisonous for a little while, but I would meet her as soon as physically possible if she still wanted to.

I felt bad, but I didn’t accept her call right after that.

Joe’s message that he had gotten a ride back to Virginia and would meet me just got ignored. I didn’t have anything against the guy, but I didn’t want to see him, especially after the last place we had been. He would be a huge liability to my plan because he was the law.

I even got a message from Sif, stating that she was back in AC and that if I needed help, she could get here quickly.

Surprisingly, I didn’t get a ton of messages saying my condolences like I expected. I called Sif back at the number she had texted from.

“Hello, Louis. I expected you to have more downtime before you were willing to call.”

“I have something I need to do. It’s not… lawful. Would you be willing to help me?” I asked.

“That depends,” Sif replied. “Is it something we should discuss over the phone, or over breakfast?”

I sighed, “Probably over breakfast. I need to talk to Akiko first, and we can be there in about 45 minutes.”

“That’s faster than I could get there. Where should we meet?” She asked.

“Umm… that’s a good question. Except for the docks and the Defender HQ, I haven’t really seen much of AC. Do you have somewhere in mind?”

“Tell you what. I can be there in a little over two hours. You go do your workout, and I can meet you there when you are done?”

“Yes,” I answered. “That sounds fine. Bring your battle loadout. You will either need it to help me or need it to kick my ass when you refuse. Sounds fair?”

“Yep. In that case, we should meet where you went to train Callie.”

“Alright, see you in two hours.”

I wrote down the basics of the purification pill and then went downstairs to make breakfast. I hurried through it, making enough eggs and bacon to feed a small army, but I wanted to hurry. The smell of coffee, eggs, bacon, and toast was enough to drag both of them downstairs, and Toby was already wide awake when Alison brought him downstairs.

I had already done a lot of grazing while cooking, and I handled getting Toby fed while the girls ate. It was probably my lack of experience, but I actually had a lot of fun getting him to eat a banana and some eggs. I had no idea if his mother would approve, but he was a marvel of learning, I kept saying ‘banana’ every time I gave him a bite in his high chair, and by the end, he was saying ‘anana’.

“I know we normally do this before breakfast, but I wanted to get Toby fed. I need to talk to both of you and then we head to the Gym.” I put the container with 5 pills, and my transcription of what analyze told me, next to Akiko, and said, “Is this what I think it is? And is it what we were looking for, Kyokudai?”

Akiko smiled, “You can use my name, Alison knows it already, and it’s not going to risk anyone for her to know it.”

I nodded and noticed Toby had no problems grabbing another slice of banana and stuffing it in his own mouth. I was not real good at handling babies, but I had assumed that he was younger than he was. He had most of his teeth, but Lauren had been feeding him baby food… He seemed to really like the eggs, so I tried a piece of bacon, which he happily devoured. Note to self, Toddlers are not babies.

Akiko looked shocked, “Is this how your analyze works?” She asked.

I nodded, “Mostly. I get this idea, and it uses my own language to present it, but a lot of the information involves concepts I might or might not be familiar with. I think it draws from my own mind, but also from someplace else, just like my gift. It’s not like in those lit books, I don’t think there’s some kind of god or system feeding it to me, but I spent most of my early life glued to a computer. As my analyze skill grows, the amount of information and its clarity seems to run with it.”

Alison nodded, “That’s sort of similar to what I get, but it feels more like I am opening pages in a book, with text that changes moment by moment. I can look at the index and find what I am trying to create, or write the text myself, but sometimes it isn’t perfect, and it takes time to write my idea out completely. I get a feel for the sacrifice, or at least I do now, but I didn’t at first.”

I nodded, “Exactly. I just sort of think of things I can give up, and if it fits, it sits, like a cat in a cardboard box. Sometimes my sacrifices were… not ideal.”

I realized that my two-hour estimate would not be enough, but the house was sitting on 15 acres, I texted Sif with the home address, since, while I didn’t fully trust her, This place may not be my home base for much longer.

Akiko smiled a little, “If your analysis is right, right now I am looking at more money than my father paid you. You didn’t take a pill, did you?”

I shook my head.

“Good.” she replied, “They are sort of designed for regular humans, the people of nod, as you said, not true humans. I have seen something similar, they are very, very expensive pills for early cultivators. Usually, the ingredients for these are not even available in this world. There are not very many cultivators here, and as a result, the techniques and manuals to use them are mostly lost to history, the few times I have seen something like this, they have come from world-hoppers like high-ranking Kitsune and Celestials.”

She smiled a little, “Something like this, even though it mentions that it is inexpert, could help catapult someone into a C-ranked cultivator in mere decades, possibly faster if they are a young genius, prodigy, or are already well-trained in body control and martial arts. We would have to be careful, though, because some people becoming so much more powerful than others could shift the balance of power on this world enormously.”

“More enormously than a bunch of metahumans already playing superhero and being phenomenally more powerful randomly?” I asked, “or constant invasions from extradimensional aliens bent on consuming this world?”

She smiled, “That is a very good point. This pill, for normal humans, should accomplish what you want. It’s even possible that with the time to learn and experiment, a cultivation base could grow and people could create cultivation techniques. I might even be able to find an old cultivation manual or two from before the emergence of metahumans. The thing is, a lot of it is based out of China, and Japan had its own weapon traditions. If you want to find real cultivators, you might have to look in China and hunt them down the hard way, since they tend to be very secretive. Something like this could help, though, You might be able to pry mouths open with it.”

She shook her head, “This won’t work for true humans or people like me, though. We get our… innate techniques instinctively. Metahumans that receive their power from non-human bloodlines might get stripped down to baseline human completely, and have their energy structures destroyed. This would allow them to grow their cultivation like a normal human, but there are not a lot of metahumans that would be willing to lose their powers and start from nothing.”

I disagreed. I had met more than a few metas in prison that had… unfortunate side effects from their abilities that they would be all too happy to eliminate. They called themselves Jokers, from an old superhero anthology series. And were often almost too happy for some of the energy dampeners meta facilities provided. The problem is, I was not an idiot. If the governments or Proteus knew of a way to rid metas of their powers, how long would it take them to decide to use it as a weapon?

Right now this seemed to be exclusive to me and was all the more reason not to allow myself to be tied to any power structure. It merely cemented my resolve for the next step in my plans.

I sent a text to Tino, letting him know I was going to visit and needed a set of coordinates. I also told him that I would be bringing Toby, Vectress’ boy, and a pair of strangers, so they should keep any extracurricular activities under wraps.

It took almost twenty minutes for Tino to reply, and all he sent was a set of coordinates for the ship.

The next hour we spent packing up clothes and getting the house ready for storage. It would be a useful safe house if we needed it, and my own clothes were still mostly in the packages. My new coat had arrived, remarkably quickly for custom clothing, and I spent a few minutes modifying it with the appropriate substances before we all got into costume… except Toby, of course. He was starting to walk now, and I was gleefully showing him around the outside while he was trying to catch his balance when Sif arrived via dropping in on a pair of wings that rivaled my own.

Akiko swooped Toby up and took him inside the house while I beckoned the large woman to accompany me on a walk. It was still a little strange to be almost the same size as she was, but I smiled slightly, “I had no idea you had wings.”

She chuckled, “I don’t. Scions have access to a number of special items. It wouldn’t do for me to show up for a fight in a Ryde, and I wasn’t going to get dropped off in one of the Defender’s VTOLs. The cloak of wings is not much good in a fight, but it’s certainly impressive enough for a landing. Usually they are just meant for gliding, but I have enough wind control to get decent distance from them, as long as no one shoots at me.”

I nodded, “Thank you for coming. I need your help with something, but it’s not something the Defenders would necessarily approve of. It might involve associating with known international criminals, some fighting, and a big chunk of violating international treaties and stealing.”

“You are planning on starting your own crime wave? I know you called yourself a supervillain despite playing the hero again and again, but I didn’t expect you to be quite so blatant about it. Are you sure you want to tell me? I would love to spar with you, but I might have to call in a local team if you are going to go hard-core villain.”

I nodded, “Yes. Because I think you will help. I plan on taking out Cadmium and stealing his shit, over international waters, without giving him the chance to surrender or offering to arrest him.”

Sif chuckled, and I was abruptly glad she hadn’t given me the whole ‘sorry for your loss’ bit. “Why me?”

“Because you are the toughest person that I trust. You have played straight with me so far, and I plan on turning his flying fortress into a safe haven and training camp for Scions, as well as hiring as many as I can get as mercenaries. This is damned close to a suicide mission, which is why I am not taking Kyokudai or Windfall with me on the initial strike. I hope she can get in after we have cleared the initial defenses.”

She nodded, “And you figure that the two of us are tough enough to handle the initial assault, and once I get in I can cover Kyokudai’s back while we push our way through to where he is located?”

I nodded, “Exactly. I am not some kind of old-school paladin, I don’t have any kind of honor attached to facing him in personal combat, and he’s a B-ranked meta inventor. If we give him the chance to surrender he will probably kill all of us instead. I want to hit him fast, hard, and never give him a chance to think.”

I sighed, “He’s been supplying metatech to some of the most powerful figures around for a very long time, and he hit and killed innocent people in Chicago. If he goes to trial, he will be free before we can blink. He stopped helping in the invasions several years ago, so as far as I am concerned, he gave up his right to a fair trial the minute he shot a missile at a building full of civilians he wasn’t at war with. You can call me judge, jury, and executioner if you like, but the system is broken in too many ways to let people like him slip through the cracks.”

She was smiling a little, “You are definitely working on the Supervillain thing. That was a pretty decent monologue.”

I nodded, “Yeah, I have been working on it for a while. You don’t sit on the bench if you aren’t ready to play, right? To be honest, I thought you might try to attack when I said I planned on taking him out, so I was going to give you the full bit while you were helpless and at my mercy, maybe tied up with some shitty ropes or something you could break and escape while I cackled evilly.”

She shook her head, “You assumed you would win?”

I nodded, “Yeah, actually. I figured it would turn into like a sex game and you’d miss your chances to take me out which I could exploit. I haven’t actually rigged up an easily escapable and overly complicated death trap yet, but I was hoping I could rig something that was supposed to make you orgasm to death.”

She smiled a little and shook her head, “I don’t think that would actually work.”

I nodded, “I know it won’t. That wasn’t the point. The point was to get you naked and helpless and moaning for a while until you found yourself helplessly drawn back to my raw masculinity like a moth to a flame.”

She licked her lips, “I have actually kind of had my fill of raw masculinity. I kind of prefer the refined masculinity you have right now more. But we can talk about that later. For right now, have you decided what you are going to do about fake Commander Freedom?”

I was shocked, I opened my mouth and closed it. I said, “You knew?”

She nodded, “I talked with him before, when we switched over to the defenders. It was a good illusion, but I have seen him fight before. He talks like a military man from the 50s, not a gamer from the 90s, and he always uses the precise amount of force necessary to accomplish his goals as quickly as possible, not the flashy garbage he was doing at the invasion. I have no idea what is going on, but Galactica noticed it as well, which is why she grabbed Joe and started strafing.”

I nodded, “Getting ahold of Cadmium’s fortress is part of that. The firepower he has would have blown through the invasion in no time flat, and I noticed a lot of people were in trouble. Hell, Commander faker was laughing about how many widows there were going to be after the fight. If I had been thinking straight, I probably would have tried to kill him right there.”

She nodded, “If you are serious about trying to make it a mobile stronghold for scions, I am completely in. I am a Defender, but that’s mostly because I needed an in, and I am good at playing the game. I have no more interest in letting real killers walk than you do. You do realize that you are going to be burning more than a few bridges with this, right? From what I understand, even the DMA has been known to invest in a bit of Cadmium tech. Proteus won’t buy from him directly, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t wind up in their hands. It’s one of the few equalizers that can put human agents on par with rogue metahumans.”

I nodded, “I already have a plan for that. I am not sure if it will work, but I have the world’s greatest gambling cheat on my side, and I intend to put her to work.”

***

We met a boat in Virginia beach piloted by none other than Rattler, the Armani-clad minion that had woken me up after my capture.

I don’t think he recognized me, and the boat was much larger and more comfortable, clearly the captain’s gig. I wish that I could have gotten Antonia’s help, but this mission was a little too edgy for me to be comfortable getting her involved, and I wasn’t sure of my ability to maneuver carrying more than just Sif. Akiko noted that if I could tell her where we were, once we were in the fortress, she could shadow walk in, but for the initial penetration, it would just be Sif and me.

Caelo had dressed considerably down for the occasion, meeting us in a flowered black bikini top and short shorts. She was looking much better, healthier, and somewhat more taut than the last time I had seen her, and as she gave me a hug I realized just how short she had become, comparatively.

She has noticed you have changed. She does not care as much for the towering height, but appreciates your other changes very much. She would like to know about your companions? She had heard already from Tino via Akiko that Vectress was a casualty, and is very sorrowful.

I nodded, “I appreciate your new look as well. You look better than ever. This is Sif, and Alison, and, of course, I would like to introduce you to Toby, Vectress’ little boy, who I am planning on adopting.”

Caelo looked into Toby’s eyes for a few moments and then smiled, picking him up and holding him in her arms.

She notes that Toby doesn’t wish to talk much either, and misses his mom, both of them. She knows of Sif, but assumes Sif is not here for business. When You marry Caelo, she shall be proud to adopt the boy as well, and treat him like one of the many children you will also put into her.

Akiko stared at me and chuckled a little as my face turned beet red. “I still cannot get over how you can just talk to her like that. What did she say?”

I coughed a little and noted that Sif was staring at me with amusement as well. “She was just flirting a little.”

Alison shook her head, “No, she said she was going to marry him and make him put lots of babies into her.” Traitorous bitch, she was actually looking amused behind her thick lenses. She must have picked up a trick or two from Lauren.

She can be heard by Alison as well?

Alison nodded, “When you communicate at range, you radiate, and my gift can pick it up as well. I think if you practice, you might be able to direct it more and maybe even send things to people who don’t have analysis. It’s not telepathy or mental waves or anything like that, it’s more like you can flex energy in patterns that resemble speech. I am not allowed to passively analyze anymore, but you should be able to eventually communicate with anyone that uses supernatural energies, including some well-trained humans.”

She wonders if this means she could learn to communicate with her friend Kyokudai?

Alison nodded, “Yes, Kyokudai should be able to tell what you are saying if you practice.”

I smiled at Caelo, “I hate to have to ask this, but our house is not exactly a safe and secure place right now. If you can, I’d like you to have someone scan our belongings for bugs, and put us up for a while. We have something we need to take care of, and need a safe place for Toby and Alison while we do, as well as a temporary haven.”

She nodded and snapped her fingers, pointing at Rattler, who was busy with several other men unloading bags from the boat. The ship was considerably more occupied than before, and it looked like a full crew was back on board. He left quickly, I presume to grab a detector.

Her Father is currently unavailable for the next month. Her father stated that he was going into seclusion to commune with the Loas, but curiously seemed to find that seclusion in the company of a woman with whom he often finds… seclusion. Her father has left Caelo behind in order to learn more about how the business is run, with Tino’s assistance. She greatly looks forward to an extended visit from Louis, if he is not terribly occupied with the three women that already accompany him.

I shook my head and looked at Akiko. She was concealed, but she raised an eyebrow and I could almost see her smiling under her mask.

I quickly scanned Caelo.

Calixte Lovelie Dupree (Caelo)

Metahuman 44% class C(S)

Aspects: body, mind, soul

Power: 198

Conditions: 48 days until menses

Projected lifespan: ???. Current age: 18

healthy, aroused, excited, nervous, and wondering if you have noticed that she can tell when you are analyzing her? She has plans tonight that involve you, a bed, and a whole lot of nakedness. She can tell that Akiko has already claimed you, but is… somewhat worn, and hopes she does not object to sharing.

Powers: Microenergy Manipulation, Empathic Energy Absorption, Dreamwalking, Dreamspeaking, Spirit Command

no current abnormal infections, psychologically blocked communication outside of dreamspeaking

Alison said that her ability was not telepathy, but it still felt a lot like mental powers to me.