The entire gym entryway seemed to darken after I made my statement, and in just a moment I realized it really had darkened for a moment, a thin layer of mist sprang from the ceiling and a fine line of static seemed to flow down the doorframe for a moment before it dissipated.

I grinned, “Neat trick.” and nodded to Sif, and she shrugged back.

“Excuse me. I had assumed you were like so many other human males.” Sif was nearly 7 feet tall, and every inch an Amazonian warrior. With her buzz-cut platinum blonde hair and impressive musculature, she was a bull’s wet dream, but I had her word that she was straight.

I looked at her curiously.

“Most males look at me as their fantasy of a dominant female. Not as a person so much as an icon of female empowerment.” She explained. “But you were deadly serious when you said they had to die. And then I realized, except for when you spoke of your knowledge of Hyde, you were being very forthright in your description of their crimes, and the passion you displayed proved to me that you did not control the monster.”

“I didn’t?” I asked her curiously.

She shook her head, “No. You are the monster, aren’t you?”

I schooled my expression. I knew there was a chance she would figure it out. “I can safely neither confirm nor deny that claim, although I will state if anyone or anything is recording this, that the likelihood that someone who willingly consented to produce drugs as a slave for a year of near-constant starvation and torture, and then spent two years locked willingly into a featureless cell, seems extraordinarily unlikely to be capable of destroying a resort with his bare hands.”

She nodded, and smiled slightly, “For someone who can speak absolute truth in such a fashion, you lie with extraordinary facility. I am not recording anything, I give you my word as Sif Thorsdottir on my Grandfather’s eye. I am not speaking to confirm or record your guilt. I simply need to know.”

I nodded and looked her over carefully. Sif was almost 7 feet tall, taller than me by a good 7 inches, and built like a female pro wrestler. I was beefier, but I was glad she hadn’t built her muscle to those levels, or it would have wrecked her proud, large breasts and extremely feminine frame. She managed to pull off both deadly and beautiful at the same time, and I would have been intimidated if I weren’t just so sick and tired of letting things intimidate me.

Her scan confirmed that she was something called a Scion, which implied the daughter of something not quite human. Her last name was Thorsdottir, or Daughter of Thor, which implied that her grandfather was the one-eyed Norse king of the gods himself, Odin. Nothing she had told me implied that she had anything other than complete belief in that heritage… not as faith, but as simple knowledge and experience. I would take her word.

“Fine, but I have to warn you that the more information I give you, the more things I might require in return.” I tried to leer at her lasciviously. I wasn’t great at the leer, yet, it looked like a grin, but I winked so that she’d get the point.

She chuckled a little, “You know, I have seen that tactic used on other women before, but curiously men seem to refrain in my presence. Has it actually worked?”

I shrugged. “The night is still young.”

She nodded, “Then I agree to your conditions. However, if they are sexual, I may place my own conditions upon your requests, such as, say, successfully defeating me. That is a very traditional demand for a Female Warrior, and would be upheld in the face of my word.”

I nodded, “I guess now is not a good time to tell you I was mostly trying to restrict your questions? Don’t get me wrong, your body would probably be the greatest destination I could ever hope to visit, including the danger, but there are a lot of questions that are not mine to answer.”

I was serious, Sif was stupidly strong, and could probably pinch a man in half at the waist while in the muscular throes of an orgasm. Unless he was really tough, like me or capable of regeneration, also like me. But I bet it would still hurt. Might be worth it, though, how tight would that… anyway. I had a girlfriend, halfway across the country. And a slave I was not sleeping with. And a girl that refused to be parted from me and planned to have sex with me eventually when her superpower told her the time was right. Add to that a lovely and powerful Haitian girl that possessed theoretically impossible mental powers and whose father wanted me as a son-in-law, a beautiful Japanese assassin that had agreed to sleep with me by the request of my oversized alter ego, and a super-strong provisional special agent who had disappeared weeks ago, and my dance card was full, while I was deprived of female sustenance.

She nodded, “Some of the concerns are mine, some are from those who have asked for my assistance, and some are those of my grandfather. He has immortal vision, and eternal wisdom, and knows of anything that can be seen, but the hearts of men are closed to him.”

She sighed a little, “This creature… monster, being, what is it?”

I shrugged, “It’s me, me free. No restrictions and all extraneous demands are stripped away. That includes, unfortunately, the restrictions I place on myself in a lot of cases.”

“Do you have control of it?” she asked.

I shrugged, “Sort of. But like I said, he is me, free of restrictions and intellectual baggage, such as much of my intelligence. If I think about a set of goals, I generally accomplish them if I keep them simple and straightforward. I am not stupid, Hyde still has the ability to draw conclusions from logic like I can, but I don’t overthink things, care about measurements or tactics, and I am mostly reactive unless I set a goal.”

She nodded, “Is it like… a warp spasm? Berserk?”

I shook my head, “If you are talking about Cuchulain or the Incredible Bulk, no. I am not angry. I don’t gain strength from being angry, although I couldn’t tell you what would happen if I did get excited or angry. Adrenalin might do horrible things. To be honest, I was mostly irritated at the little buggers shooting at me, and my senses are improved… they wouldn’t stop all the painful racket.”

She looked thoughtful and leaned forward. “Is he stronger than me?” She asked.

I smiled a little, “I am slightly weaker than Punto Doble, but that might have been due to my moment-arm. Less torque in a small space. I have considerably more mass, however, so if I had taken him seriously I would have tossed him a couple of miles away.”

She nodded slowly, “Then the answer is yes. I am strong, but Doble has class B strength. This means that you might be slightly higher in destructive potential, because, as you mentioned, you have greater mass and reach. You also tuned his hip to a broken pitch, which implies you broke through his class C defenses with ease. How much damage are you capable of withstanding?”

I looked at her with a raised eyebrow.

She coughed a little, “Right. How much damage are you confident that you can easily withstand?”

I smiled, “I haven’t been harmed yet? I mean, lots of things hurt, but most of them don’t do anything. Totem was able to slightly cut me, but it healed the moment it happened. I imagine if I had let him dig for a while, maybe a few minutes, he might have gotten to the bone, but I don’t know if he could have cut through it, and I might have healed right behind his blades. Hell, even if he lopped something off, at my rate of healing, it probably would have grown back faster than he could cut anything else off.”

She nodded, “So hugely tough then, Totem was a truly dangerous class C, which would make your total defense class a minimum of C, and probably B. Do fire and Acid cause permanent damage?”

I chuckled. “Like a Troll? I can control my own body chemistry. Do you really think I cannot fix cellular degradation? Please. Now you are just being insulting.”

She sighed, “I apologize. Of course. I wasn’t aware you were that controlled. So why do you choose not to become a hero or even a Promethean? That form is clearly powerful enough, and there are many rewards, and he doesn’t seem particularly monstrous unless provoked.”

I sighed. “I have control issues.”

She nodded, “You would be one of many.”

“No, I am not a murderous fucker like Rainbow or an Idiot like Doble, but I am free. Let’s just say that if I experience a particular desire, unless I have a very strong reason not to, I would indulge it.”

“You mean you might just decide that you want to wear a car as a hat, or steal something just because you want it?” She asked.

I shook my head, “Nope, I am free of greed too. I might play with cars, though. They look like big toys when I am… Your size.”

“I don’t understand.”

I smiled, “If you saw him naked you would. I am going to be blunt. I have a bit of lust for you, which is understandable since you are glorious. If I were not distracted and I was Hyde at the time, he would recognize that you are tough enough to umm…”

She looked thoughtful, “You would try to hug me, as… you said, Hyde?”

I shook my head, “No. You can take it, and he has a dick like a billy club. He likes you, but you may not be able to convince him that no means no. Especially since I wouldn’t mind doing the same thing.”

She looked at me askance. “You mean he would try to rape me?”

I sighed, “It’s a little more complicated than that. I wouldn’t want to hurt you because I like you, but I would definitely try to have sex with you, and I might not recognize reluctance short of knocking me unconscious. It doesn’t help that my current love interest is very vocal, so even screaming might just encourage me. You could call it rape, I guess, but I have refrained every time I thought I would hurt someone. It wouldn’t be malicious, I don’t crave power, I just… am kind of animalistic that way. If Hyde wants to have sex with you, so I would, unless you convinced me that it would hurt you or stop me.”

She nodded. “I do understand that, but others do not. Rape without violence is a relatively recent concept. I approve of the modern distinction, but I understand the problem. Hyde is primitive. If a girl does not dissuade him with violence, and he will not physically damage her, he will not understand her unwillingness. I could see how that could be a very big problem.”

I nodded, “That is the perfect description. Hyde is primitive. My hindbrain coming to the fore. That’s not the only reason I don’t want to become a hero, but it’s a big reason. I am not a rapist, and if I turn into Hyde, it becomes a possibility.”

She nodded, “But you said he recognizes when people would be harmed?”

I nodded, “Yes, but if it was someone I disliked, I may not care. That’s why I intend to keep Hyde away from some people I am otherwise social with. Because there’s some kind of bad blood that may allow me to decide that I don’t care whether they are people or not.”

She twisted on her chair, “So, as long as he is not provoked, and is not around a girl he dislikes or that he thinks he can have relations with, he is relatively safe? What if he had sex, would he calm down?”

I sighed. “I don’t know, I haven’t indulged like that yet. If it was someone that could handle it, I might, or I might get overly emotional, or I might roll over and fall asleep. It also might not be much fun, since I might not worry about things like foreplay or romance.”

I grinned, “Well, you also cannot let me get bored. Think of me as a big, horny, hyperactive child. If I get bored, I start looking for things or people to do. Oh, and I will eat or drink anything, especially booze. A child that has fully adult knowledge and interests is capable of running at three hundred miles an hour, hopping a hundred feet in an instant, is almost unstoppable and immune to almost all damage, catches bullets, and is capable of turning a tank into a wadded up ball of metal.”

She nodded. “Those were my questions that I will pay the price for. My other questions are more personal, and I will not demand the truth.”

I noticed in the gym through the archway, that Glinda seemed to be arguing with Baldwin. Good, based on what the argument was about, I might have found an excuse.

I looked at Sif, who was watching me curiously. “I have seen how you interact with me and Callie, and the girl with the thick lenses as well. Your relationship with the brown-haired woman is odd. What is she to you?”

I smiled slightly, “She is my personal assistant.”

She tilted her tightly-shorn head. “That is slightly true and slightly untrue.”

I smiled more broadly. “Are you insisting on the truth? That might cost you.”

She sighed. “I suppose. My secondary purpose is to assure that you are dependable. I feel that this may impact that determination.”

I nodded, “Can you assure me that, under no circumstances, will you allow the answer to offend you? I don’t particularly feel like fighting you right now.”

She nodded, “Unless you are telling me that she is your sacrifice, you are going to kill or torture her.”

I clamped my lips shut.

“You are going to kill her?” She asked.

I shook my head, “No, but she is certainly a sacrifice. She is the woman that tortured and kidnapped me and sold me as a slave to the cartels. It is only luck that the man she chose to sell me to decided to utilize my talents differently, and I made a mentor of him.”

She nodded, “So why is she here then instead of dead?”

I shrugged, “Because of her child. I was not going to kill someone a little boy depends on to be his future mother. I understand why she did what she did, and while I may not forgive her for it, I won’t kill her for it either.”

She nodded, “So she is your slave?”

I sighed and nodded. And was surprised when she said, “Good. The Allfather was right. You are a good man, you should be cultivated. I did not understand what he meant, but you are merciful to a weak woman who sinned and needs a master. I can smell her weakness from here. It is not a bad thing for a woman such as her to be weak, but she has power, her weakness would destroy her or allow others to destroy her. A weaker man would have simply forgiven her and then allowed her to be turned to evil purposes again. That is not the mercy of strength, that is the power of laziness.”

I chuckled, “Okay, you are going all mystical daughter of a god enigmatic on me again.”

She shrugged, “I do not disapprove of you taking a woman who so clearly needs to be taken. Is that not enough?”

I sighed and nodded, “Fine. I have three questions, but only two of them require truth.”

She nodded, “That was the agreement.”

I shrugged, “The first question is, what is the real reason Proteus or the DMA wants me so badly? I mean, they are aware I can create elixir, I get that, but they could have contracted me at any time, offered me a healthy settlement, and then paraded people past me day and night and had me make elixirs for them. My healing potions are a nice addition to the healing metas that are often on teams, but they could have paid for that too. As far as I can tell, with activating the vigilantes, there is going to be an absolute glut of registered metas running around soon. So why are they working so hard to get me under their thumb? Especially Proteus?”

She leaned back against the couch, stretching as she answered. I guess she wanted to make sure my attention was riveted on her, and she was right. “Proteus needs your help, or all is lost.”

I suddenly snapped out of the haze her delicious form wriggling on the couch evoked. “Come again?” I said, and couldn’t even come up with a flirting secondary comment to my own gimme line. I was that shocked.

She sighed a little, “Proteus is not that bad. But they need your help. Every time the portals in Siberia open, more Kaiju leak out. The portals that Warlock summoned have grown much larger since his death, and his mission to unleash hell on earth is succeeding. Every time there is an event, more Prometheans die, and Class C Metas just aren’t enough to contain them anymore.”

I shrugged a little, “So why should I help? And how can I help? I mean, they have Galactica and Captain Freedom, right? What do they need me for?”

She sighed, “When the Portals open, they dispense masters. Leaders of the creatures that pour forth. Captain Freedom is required to dispatch those leaders, and Galactica is barely able to contain and dispatch the creatures that managed to escape the Prometheans. The creatures are of various classes, but many of them are close to class C, and they are more than a match for the Prometheans that fight them. There are simply not enough experienced class C warriors to keep them contained, and their numbers are swelling while ours diminish.”

“Again, why should I care? Proteus are still dicks, and it’s Siberia.”

She looked at me closely. “Perhaps I misjudged you again. You do not care to save the world you live on?”

I stood up. “Them’s fighting words. Of course, I care about it.”

She smiled a little, “The creatures that escape are Kaiju. That means Giant monster in Japanese. When Galactica cannot intercept them, they can spread, and many of them can fly upwards of the speed of sound. Then they begin eating everything. They gradually gain in size and class, and in a few uninterrupted years, they can become class A and start breeding more of themselves. Do you know what a horde of monsters the size of skyscrapers, all class A would do to this world?”

Shit. The eaters.

***

I got her number and promised to meet with her later. I had two more questions I wanted to be answered, and I doubted very much that after that confession she would be ready to share. She nodded, and then headed out, stating that she had several things to do. I asked her for a hug before she left, clothing-optional, and she just smirked and headed out, knowing I was teasing. Damn, flirting thwarted.

Baldwin was inside, talking to Jim. Jim hadn’t seemed to change much in the three years since I had seen him last, except for a couple of new gray hairs and a slightly less toned physique. Jim still looked fit, and it was obvious he still lifted regularly, but he was nearing 50 and it was starting to show more.

Glinda, also known as the traitorous bitch Vectress, was on a bench, a scowl on her face as she practiced with a tiny set of lady’s weights. She was wearing a tight tank top that emphasized her impressive cleavage, and leotard bottoms that clung to her curves, but the whole look screamed gym bunny to anyone that cared. Of course, it was a gym in the middle of the day. There was a whole lot of caring and a lot more looks. I knew, when she appeared in that outfit, that this would be the result, but I wondered how she would handle it.

Windfall, also known as Alison, since she hated the name Windfall the same way I did Alchemyst, Was dressed in a light green Tee-shirt with a pocket and a pair of shapeless sweatpants. She was here to work, not be an ornament, and based on the sweat soaking her outfit she was doing so, using the rowing machine fervently.

“Jim!” I said, grinning.

“Spock!” He replied, instantly getting the joke and taking a step to give me a hug. A manly hug, of course, with lots of backslapping and only a minor attempt to grab my ass that I fended off easily.

“Dude, seriously, how have you been? What’s been going on?” I asked and he shrugged, taking a step backward with a big smile.

“Not much different than before you left. The UFC has kinda died in popularity a little after Roadkill popped a meta test. Now people don’t know if a new winner is a human or a meta in disguise. We still have the ring, as you can tell, but I am considering ditching it and just letting sparring happen outside. Add in a few more weight benches since we’ve been kind of popular lately and the lines are building up, or maybe even go whole hog and add one of those meta lifting machines, but I think that might appeal more to gym bunnies wanting to meet metas than serious workmen.”

I nodded, “You look uglier than ever. You must be happy.”

He nodded, “Yeah, the guy I was dating, Richie, decided to take his shit and go. He was cute, but about ten pounds of stupid in a five-pound bag, his stupid used to spill out over everything. I want to say that the cross-fit thing was the last straw, but he was great with his mouth. The fact was, he was a slob that put even me to shame. I literally tripped and sprained my wrist over a stack of pizza boxes he was collecting when I came home, and when I yelled he was gone. I haven’t been happier.”

I nodded, “Good riddance.” Jim was sorta gay but in a weird way. He would occasionally hire a female prostitute, and not the cheap kind, the 2000 dollars just to knock on your door, young, beautiful kinds, and he had a healthy appreciation for female beauty. But for actual dating, he preferred men and said that they got along better. He usually had a boyfriend, was a total gym bunny and muscle freak himself, and had been known to lose a boyfriend or two when they found out he occasionally needed to step out for pussy instead of dick.

“No new boyfriend prospects?” I asked him curiously.

He shook his head, “No, I am getting old, and I like them pretty. I might have to switch out and find some girl to marry and then step out for dick instead. An old fag is a sad sight, but even at my age I still get the occasional bunny girl licking her lips at me. Unless you have finally decided to switch hit?”

I shook my head and grinned, “Look what I walked in with.”

Jim chuckled, “I did. Man. I’d lick the sweat out of that guy’s armpits. He’s like a walking advertisement for a license to kill.”

I laughed. “Yeah, I am pretty sure he’s straight.”

Jim nodded, “I noticed. He keeps staring at that Lauren Girl’s boobs like they are life preservers and he’s on the titanic. What is he, your bodyguard? Does he have a life? You might need to let him off his leash. A few days here and he’d have bunny pussy all over him.”

I grinned, “You have detailed my secret plot to get him laid. I actually agree. He keeps hanging around Glin… uhh… Lauren and I know he’s not a fan of her personality, she’s a wreck, but he’s been a monk for like a month and she’s not exactly ugly.

He nodded, “Before we get to business, what the fuck happened to you? I heard you’d moved out because of some sort of family shit, but then one of the guys that’s dating this spectacular redhead that works at the Home Workshop said you’d been in some sort of altercation with a coworker, guns were involved, and you were either laying low or in witsec. You didn’t write, you didn’t call, and after that hot meta girl I thought you were either dead or getting your rocks off with her in Rome or something.”

I chuckled a little, Brandi had hooked up with a lifter, that was really no surprise at all, and good for her. “Let’s just say that I was on the wrong end of a gun. It didn’t have much to do with Callie, but I let too much stuff be seen, some bad guys noticed, and after a lot of the kind of crap that bad action movies are made of, I spent a couple of years in Seven Locks. You know I am not that type, and I am in the process of getting it expunged, but that’s why Baldwin is here.”

“And the girls? The redhead is kind of mousy, but I know you add three just for hair color alone, and she’s got good potential if she gets into shape. If she ditched the glasses or got laser or something she could probably hit nine or ten with a bit of work. The other one, though, is pretty much top shelf if you are just into the packaging. She has no work ethic but kept insisting you had to tell her what to do. I hope she’s an amazing fuck because I’d hate to think of the mess a girl like that would make as a real personal assistant.”

I chuckled, “No, she’s a bit of a charity case. Got into a bad spot, and I have a little cash now and more later from a settlement. She’s a rotten, horrible bitch, but she keeps her mouth shut for the most part. Her little boy needs a mom, though, so I am letting things slide. Gonna work her ass to the bone, though, to make up for all the stupid shit she put me through, and I am not tapping either of them.”

He sighed and shook his head, “Still the celibate priest, huh? Surrounded by amazing pussy and keeping it in your pants. You always did have a soft head for kids, though.”

I smiled and leaned forward conspiratorially, “I have a girlfriend.” Jim was like a dad to me when my own father ate an IED, and then sort of became my mom too, after the accident. He liked to joke about me turning to the dark side so he could have at me, but it was a running gag, and I knew he wasn’t serious. If I ever did get serious about him, I am pretty sure he would have beat my head in, because he knew damned well that I was only into girls.

He stepped back, looking shocked. “What? Did my little boy finally become a man? Tell me it ain’t so! I was always holding out a hope that you just hadn’t come around to embracing the D, yet. Did she break your maidenhead? Tell me about her!”

I nodded and started ticking off on my fingers, “Well, first off she isn’t a redhead.”

He shook his head, “Holy shit man. I think I am going to have a heart attack. What else?”

“Secondly, she’s Spanish and Catholic, or Orthodox, I think, but not hardcore about it. She gets my weird ethics. And yeah, she broke my cherry. We hooked up when a lot of weird shit hit the fan, and she’s a bit of a gym bunny, but not stupid about it. She’s smart, smarter than me, anyway, You want to know the best part?”

He nodded, “I assume she’s gorgeous?”

I smiled, “Oh you better believe it, beautiful in both body and spirit, although she’s human enough to get snarky and mean occasionally, her heart is definitely in the right place. But that’s not the best part.”

He chuckled, “Better than that?”

I nodded and whispered, “She’s a meta. And she can change her appearance to any girl she wants to. I have learned that green hair is as sexy as red hair, but she can have red, blonde, green, purple, whatever. Any size assets. Any body shape that she wants, or maybe that I want. I mean, the original packaging is amazing, but…”

Jim started coughing. And I had to smack him on the back until he started breathing again. He wasn’t going to have a heart attack, my scan confirmed that his heart would probably give him another 30 years, easy, but he finally started gasping for breath.

“Son of a bitch.” He gasped. “I should have guessed. God’s gift to women gets God’s gift to men. I am guessing the Calliope thing didn’t work out. So what are you doing back?”

I shrugged. “Callie’s a superhero. Until I get it expunged, I am a convict. Hell, I am technically a parole violator right now, but if someone tries to bring me in, the whole shit ball that got me in comes unraveled and cops lose their jobs, politicians get scandals, and metas might even get kicked off teams.”

He nodded slowly, so I continued, “I am back to try and finish my degrees while I have money to do it with. I am also sending Lauren to school so she has a future other than waiting tables. So, now that I am back in town, I need to find a place for them to train, and I was hoping you could oblige. I want the works. A personal trainer that can keep their hands to themselves, and special membership for all four of us for a while.”

He nodded, “That tears it then. The ring goes. I will miss it, but I am going to go ahead and shell out for the meta kit. We still have the ring in the back, and with UFC’s slowdown missing a few days for bad weather and closing for the winter’s not going to cost me much.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Why?” I asked.

He shook his head, “Durr. Because you aren’t going to get shit out of the normal stuff. Meta like you needs the big weights.”