I spent a rather restless night on a roof, as planned. I took advantage of the peace it gave me, despite being slightly uncomfortable, to try and get as much help on my new character sheet as possible.

It looked like TGOW gave you power-ups, but didn’t actually affect your native abilities much. For instance, you could get a magical strength boost if you had sorcery, or perhaps some kind of cybernetic or chemical boost, but working out, actually building your muscle, took those boosts to an entirely higher level. That’s why my strength and durability were both considered superb, while my actual lifting and toughness were far beyond that level. Yes, I got a rank for my improved strength and durability, but my body level of 6 took any actual feats of strength and toughness to entirely new levels.

My attribute might have said superb, but in general, each modifying rank increased your ability to use that strength up by a multiple… My strength was superb, but when using it with my body it might as well have been absurd, and my durability attribute, with the durability boost, was some unforeseen level. I knew I could bounce bullets, but hell, I might even be able to bounce armor-piercing rockets!

Endurance was obvious. I knew I could keep going as long as I needed to, and had no idea how that translated, but that was probably how I managed to endure the vacuum despite not having any powers to do so for as long as I had. Max had not been joking when he said it could take me an extraordinarily long time to die. He could have been talking months, not days! Healing is based on endurance, not durability, which was why I had a very strong regeneration.

Yeah, there were people running around with much higher levels of enhanced durability, but the combination of both that and regeneration, plus the natural state I tended to keep myself at, made me very tough.

Chaos resistance was unusual. Apparently, Chaos was like radiation, and prolonged exposure tended to cause corruption, whether cancer or mutation. Not the good kind of mutation where you turn into a green rage monster and play the coolest hero around, but the bad kind, where your body twisted and you grew extra eyes in nasty places and the like or developed something that killed you or turned you into a monster.

Aural strengthening was fun. It was like using it to shield myself, but I could also use it to temporarily shield something else and make them tougher for a while. A very useful addition to my toolkit, especially when you considered potions that could do similar things. With aural strengthening, I didn’t actually need to bleed to activate my potions, I just needed to concentrate my aura on them. Although bleeding did provide a hefty sacrifice cost that helped my potions enormously.

Medicine was not my medical knowledge, exactly… it was something I could use when healing myself, it could more accurately be referred to as anatomic familiarity. Technically, if I knew what was wrong with someone, I should be able to use my aura to heal them or at least put them back together, even without a potion. It also helped make my healing and regeneration potions stronger, which I could only be grateful for.

Technically, I had actually lost power, maybe. In general, I knew my regeneration was strong enough to heal me from even fatal wounds, although I had some questions about my head. Max had mentioned respawns, like dying would give you an extra life, based on your rank, which was now reset to one. Did that mean that my regeneration couldn’t handle a fatal wound? Or was that something completely separate from my regeneration ability? I wish I knew, but I had a feeling Max wouldn’t have told me.

I had managed to grab a short nap with my back and my disgusting tee shirt up against a heating vent. I wasn’t cold, but then, I wasn’t cold when I was fighting in Siberia either.

The sun was cresting, sending radiant reds and golds across the low-slung buildings of Fremantle, and making many of the windows sparkle like a Christmas display minus the green, which was more than adequately provided by the ocean at my back as I watched the sunrise. A few moments later, a hole in space appeared. It looked… denser than Lauren’s portal had looked before, with small sparkling flickers of yellow and blue electricity traveling along the outside edges of the hole, and without hesitation, I stepped through.

Only to be met by a pair of arms wrapping around me. I hugged Lauren right back, half-lifting her off of the steel floor, and she squeaked a little before I set her down.

“Gods, I am so sorry, I was too weak to send a portal, and by the time I could get one to form, we had already gone way too far for me to get one to you, if I even could figure out how. Paul told me you would be okay, but I thought he was full of shit… uhh… sir.” She seemed to be crying a little, so I wrapped my arms around her again, despite the wonderfully pungent garments I was barely wearing.

She sounded a little muffled but didn’t seem to want to pull back at all. “I knew you weren’t dead, I knew it! I would have felt it! But it was weird. One minute I could listen to Paul talking about the future, and when I opened my eyes, I knew everything he was telling me was wrong. I mean, I knew you weren’t dead, but when he told me you weren’t, I doubted it.”

I nuzzled the top of her head, “You know about his curse, right?”

She nodded, “Yes sir, that’s why I knew you were still alive.”

I chuckled and noticed Paul standing nearby. We were in the combat information center, and the displays were actually active. In fact, there was a smell of several recent occupants, and I realized they must have cleared out the room for this.

“Okay dipshit, you can let them come back in, whoever they are. I need desperately to get cleaned up, and I hope there are some kind of clothes I can wear. My other stuff doesn’t fit anymore.” I said to Paul.

Lauren seemed to tear up a little again, “I know what you gave up. Thank you. I don’t know how to thank you, but I will find a way.”

I smiled at her, “Honestly, right now, you already have.”

I felt like I was home. If home was a gigantic steel battleship which, according to the CIC displays, had a full set of railguns and autocannons active. People made it home. Even my dipshit brother.

***

Surprisingly, Sif had set aside a room for me. I know she hadn’t thought I survived, but apparently, Paul and Lauren had been insistent enough that Paul had a place near the bridge to take me. It was, unsurprisingly, Cadmium’s old room, but it had been cleaned up and spruced up with a new bed, and a series of bags and backpacks containing some of my older clothes, as well as a few things I didn’t remember buying before my unnatural growth.

Okay, Paul insisted that my normal height of 6’5” was unnatural, but Towering over 7 feet was fun while it lasted. Doors were a lot easier now, though. I still towered over Lauren, fortunately, I think she might have been disappointed if I had suddenly shrunk to Paul’s height.

I decided to play the role again. Lauren had been...loyal. I wasn’t used to loyalty, mostly I expected people to stab me in the back when I wasn’t looking. “Girl, I need a shower. Grab me an appropriate outfit, and let me know how my interests have been going in my absence. I am going to leave the door open, and waste an awful lot of hot water, but you aren’t joining me yet, I have plans for you later after I square away this place.”

She giggled and then covered her mouth, straightening up slightly. “Yes sir. Do you wish to be dressed formally, shipwise, for work, or as the great and terrible overlord?”

I was surprised, “Great and terrible Overlord? Do we actually have an outfit for that?”

Lauren nodded, “Absolutely. It sort of matches my Vectress outfit if you want to show a united front. Paul said you would lose your hat, and we don’t have your special armor, but I did get a polyprovantus chest plate and boots, but finding sports gear sized for you is… not easy.

I nodded and grinned, “Well, set it up.” I said, unbuckling the overalls and pulling them down, sans underpants. I hadn’t had the courage to rip off someone’s used underpants, even if whoever usually wore these overalls might have been a fan of free balling. Her eyes widened and she stifled a chuckle at the ‘bikini inspector’ tee shirt but looked admiringly at the rest of me as I stepped out of the ill-fitting boots and peeled off the rest. “And feel free to burn this. Except for the tee shirt. I need it cleaned up, I think it’s cool.”

Yeah, and Spencers at the mall probably had a better-fitting version, new and clean, for less than twenty bucks. Evil overlords were supposed to collect trophies, though, and since I didn’t happen to have a Stronghold to display right now, my second crime would have to do. I was about to change the world, rip overwhelming power away from ‘superheroes’ forever, I needed to get into the appropriate mindset.

Oh, joy! Sure, I wasn’t bloody anymore, but I hadn’t had a chance to clean up after my stint in the ocean, and I had salt in several less-than-comfortable places that the hot water happily steamed away. I was tempted to call Lauren in since there’s only one thing better than a hot shower when you really needed it, but I had plans for her, and I intended to do right by her.

Loyalty. What a trip.

“So, financially, Alison was able to get most of your funds into a numbered account before they were seized. The house is technically still yours, but right now I think it’s mostly just a place for them to stash agents who are in the doghouse since they assigned another new agent to your case. I have no idea what’s going on, but I think they think you will show up.”

“Stronghold is officially still in orbit, but damaged. Dropping it into the atmosphere wrecked it, though we were able to get the sleepers off of it. Camilla was apparently happy to see it go since she considered it antiquated junk with an attitude problem, and right now what’s left of it is resting comfortably at the bottom of the Marianas trench. Not impossible to get to, for Metahumans, but the trench is pretty big, and no one but you, me, Paul, Aquantis, Sif, and Alison know where we were when we let it sink. It might be recoverable for the scrap metal, but that’s a lot of water pressure and the hatches were left open.”

She chuckled a little as she continued, “Not to mention I was able to pop off one hell of an EMP inside its skin. It was old, and while its electronics were shielded, I doubt very much any record remains of who or what happened to it.”

I stuck my head out of the shower, “You can do an EMP now?” I asked.

She nodded, “Yes, and electrical regeneration, to a low level too. I have been helping on the med decks after we ran out of potions. A lot of people have a lot of damage, and the really sick part is that people are missing organs and limbs that they had before they were knocked unconscious. The really weird part is that most of them were not even metahumans. A group of five said that they were fey and couldn’t tolerate the ship, too much iron, and one of the guys Sif had to deal with was allergic to sunlight and demanded blood and tried to hypnotize people, but most of the remaining claim various unusual abilities without a hint of metahuman registering at all.”

She shrugged and I ducked my head back under the spray. “The few metas that were up there were all of the ‘oh my, what an unfortunate side effect to the powers you have' type. Mainly their disappearance was a relief to a lot of people since some of them are not particularly pleasant to look at or have powers that are always on that caused… problems. Camilla is handling those, though.”

I nodded, “So, as far as you can tell, we got away with it clean?”

“I think so. Aquantis hasn’t been censured. Galactica was keeping things quiet, but nothing has been announced about her. Sif and Calliope are both technically still members of their respective teams, although Sif apparently has a history of blowing off her teams for years at a time. She’s still here since technically command reverted to her when you were dead.”

I stepped out of the shower, no grease spots I could find, but a few new minor scars that would fade soon enough. Decent shape even if I slept for a month, apparently. “How about Antonia?” I asked as I toweled off. Being clean was a good thing.

“Antonia has been reclassified as a threat in the US because of some suspicious behavior while she was an agent, and is wanted for questioning. Right now, as far as I know, she’s in mourning in France, probably sipping coffee in a bistro somewhere while handsome Frenchmen eye her. She’s been very close-mouthed since she found out what was going on in Stronghold, and I get the feeling she’s seriously considering biting the bullet and giving Proteus and the DMA the proverbial finger. Several of the… personnel we discovered on the station were directly tied to the DMA, and the DMA has sent a lot of people up there over the years.”

“How many people did we wind up rescuing?” I asked curiously, walking towards the bed where she had laid a lot of dark purple and black.

“Over two hundred, but according to Antonia, the US alone has sent almost twice that up over the last five years. That means that they were regularly disposing of extra bodies somehow.”

I nodded. Dark purple turtleneck, almost black, but not quite deep enough to qualify as monochromatic. My old biker boots, which I appreciated seeing again. Black denim jeans, that new black instead of the stone-washed look, and a gold polyprovantus chest piece that looked almost like a techno rib cage. Good protection, with a black underlayer to prevent gaps.

A different top hat. This one was black with gold filigree, what looked a bit like a stylized skull along the front of the brim, with bones woven into the appliqued vines. There was even a small helmet designed to go under the top hat, a skull cap of Polyprovantus over a titanium dome, and a suspiciously skull-like gold mask that attached to the cap, sort of like the top half of Klytus’ mask from the Flash Gordon movie without all of the brow ridge, and with a pair of high-impact plastic shades over the eyes.

I slid the stuff on, and then the top hat and even the mask. “So how do I look?” I asked her curiously.

She smiled and licked her lips, “Appropriately terrifying sir. There’s just enough hint of Halloween to look like either a very distinguished villain, or a rather edgy antihero. I find it very appealing.”

I looked in the mirror. Generally, I had a bit of a baby face despite my size, which occasionally worked against me when I was trying to be intimidating, but this get-up was interesting. You could still see my chin and mouth, obviously, but the whole thing looked somewhat menacing without going for the whole Skeletor look.

“Am I going to be attacked on sight for heroes?” I wondered aloud.

Lauren shrugged, “Have you seen the getups of some of the protectors? Technomancer in his full battle gear looks like someone Ripley would smash with a giant robot, hell, the whole Detroit Protectors team looks more like the bad guys from a post-apocalypse dystopia flick than a team of heroes. You would be amazed at how many Vigilantes consider scaring villains to death to be as important as stopping their crimes.”

I chuckled, “Yeah, compared to some of them, I look a proper four-color hero. This will do for now. It should probably be decent for working in too. Paul said he was picking up ingredients for a special type of pill, which could be needed, although I have news I want Sif and Alison to hear.”

She smiled and bowed a little bit, and I suddenly what she was wearing. Apparently, she had decided to get an outfit similar to her Victrix look, albeit in far better repair. She carefully tugged on a mask, which had one of those holographic circuits that changed her eye color to a lovely violet and slightly altered her facial structure, and I realized that our outfits definitely matched.

“You were really thinking about the uniforms, weren’t you?” I asked curiously. “You look as sexy as a half-naked hula girl to a sailor, and we look quite the pair.”

She nodded and reached forward to gently brush the front of the thin turtleneck over my stomach. “Yes sir, Paul said you would have something important to say, but he actually was surprisingly clueless about the content. Should I send a message to the bridge to meet in the battle room in full gear?”

I nodded and grabbed her around her waist, leaning forward to plant a little kiss on her lips. “Absolutely. I plan on monologuing on my evil plan for world domination, and I figure the audience should look as appropriate as you do.”

Lauren, or rather Vectress in this outfit, purred. “Yes sir. I find the idea of a secret evil meeting of secret evil overlords to be quite exciting.” She giggled, “Especially since your evil plans always wind up not being very evil.”

***

Yummy. Sif was in her full battle gear, which was actually slightly more complicated than she had worn to Japan. She greeted me with a full hug, possibly even full strength because my ribs ached a little bit. Paul and Windfall were there, Although Alison was dressed in a new costume. Gone were the oversized glasses, she wore a little golden half-mask and a very nice full-body suit with thin polyprovantus scale armor over her torso and a slender skullcap that allowed her hair to flow behind her. She was hovering suspiciously close to Paul, and when she shot me a worried glance, I just grinned and waggled my eyebrows, and she came over and gave me a hug.

“I am cool,” I told her. “If my brother floats your boat, I’m not exactly hurting for attention. I’ll just call it a missed opportunity, and if he had something to do with your missing glasses, I will probably buy him a beer.”

She nodded, “Yes. Although I have to admit, he’s just as pushy as you are when it comes to shutting down my odds management ability, possibly even worse.”

Callie was there, surprisingly enough, as was the fellow that looked an awful lot like an overgrown praying mantis and a wizened, dark-skinned old woman that looked like she’d been middle-aged when Lazarus was a brat. She had incredibly white hair in long braids down the side of her head and was wearing a grey robe of some sort.

When she caught me looking at her, she said in a thick Cajun accent, “Hey boy. I hear ye likes dem ladies. I’s skyclad under this robe, ya wanna see?” she grinned toothlessly and started lifting the front of her robe.

I shook my head, “As lovely as your unclothed form may be, young lady, It would be far too distracting for this group. We have important things to discuss and your doubtless ability to stop traffic would leave us all incapable of speech.”

She cackled, “Oh, the boy has a silver tongue. Might have to ask him to show me later. He’s a fine piece of work. M’names Maggie, Sif gots tagether the folks what comes closest to representin’ their type, and me ladies and lads decided I fit th’ bill.”

Sif sighed and shook her head, “Technically, I took command because I thought you were dead. Camilla!”

Camilla appeared, dressed in a somewhat-formal looking sailor’s uniform, “Yes Captain?” she asked.

I lifted my hand up, “Hold on a second, Sif. You are the Captain, right?”

She nodded, “Yes.”

I smiled, “Did you decide to become my minion? You asked for time to think it over, did you have enough time?”

Sif quirked an eyebrow, “I don’t mind working with you as a commander, although I might disagree with the term minion. After the station, though, I realized that we can do more together, with you calling the major shots, because you seem to actually listen to what other people say, and I know from experience that superteams and democracy don’t mix. So yes, You can call me your… Lieutenant.”

I shook my head, “I am actually happier with you being captain. I am an overlord, not a micromanager. We needed the ship, we accomplished our goal, and we need it for future endeavors, primarily stopping the fake rifts before the real ones start. I’d much rather worry about how we are going to accomplish that than be the commander. You are welcome to keep the ship, it’s yours. Assuming, of course, I get to keep my stateroom and lab.”

Sif nodded, smiling, “That will make things far easier for dealing with the scions. No offense, but they don’t know you at all, you are not a scion, and even if you were, we don’t necessarily trust each other well. It’s much easier to get them to come to my ship than the ship I just happen to be attached to.”

I nodded, “Good. And you are?” I asked the rather slender insectile gentleman.

He held out one of his four hands. His hands were jointed and covered with a carapace, much like the rest of his body, and I realized that while he did have four arms, underneath the carapace he seemed to be proportioned like a slender human. His powers really did come with an unfortunate side effect, but the mouth underneath his chitinous head covering looked as human as mine. The fangs that seemed to extend down either side of his face were not insectile mouthparts, they were simply armor.

“My name is, as could be expected, is Mantid. I won’t share my original name, mostly because I cannot pretend to be him anymore. Even if I melt my armor, my slenderness and extra arms would give me away. I am here representing the Metahumans on board, most of whom have unusual appearances in some way, but I can assure you that I am as human as anyone else here.”

He spoke in clipped tones with an English accent, reminding me a bit of the actor that played C-3PO. I nodded and carefully shook his hand, as I had no idea of how durable he was. The exoskeleton was dry and slightly cool, but not necessarily unpleasant. “Understood. I cannot exactly stay hidden behind a secret identity either, although for slightly different reasons.”

He nodded slowly and took his seat. “Good. A pleasure to meet you, Alchemyst.”

“Louis. Call me Louis. I never invented the name I was saddled with, but that doesn’t mean I am willing to dive wholly into it. I glanced at Maggie, “And what type are you representing, Young Lady?” I asked her.

She beamed toothlessly at me again, “Th’ magickers! We was the ones that got caught cause we wasn’t good enough at hidin, or we built a rep. Most people play us off as metas, but Proteus done swept a few of us up, caught us good and proper. They didn’t catch the wizards, them folks play rougher than us witches, but we makes charms and potions and been getting’ stronger in the last couple of decades, but we don’t play with the elemental magics.”

I nodded and raised my eyebrow at her, “I take it witch and wizard are not female and male practitioners?”

She shook her head, “Nahh, man. They be boy witches and girl wizards, They’s also warlocks, but witches don’t make no pacts with demons or chaos creatures. Wizards specialize in external magics, witches in internal. A witch can’t cast a fireball or a ward to hold off a demon, but a wizard cannot restore fertility, make a young couple fall in love and live happily, or ward off curses or bad luck.” she glanced at Alison. “Paul called me up, and we tied off one oh the girl’s curses. The other one’s a work in progress, but it grows weaker as her confidence grows, and she can defeat it without me magics.”

I nodded, “Alright. Well, introductions done, I think it’s time to go over the basics, as I understand them.” I quickly went over the concepts I had learned, mostly about the origins of powers and why they were just now becoming more powerful.

Sif looked surprised and kept looking surprised. “So humans colonized this world, but it already had humans on it?”

I nodded, “I think so. I think humans exist in every dimension. I don’t have any clue about the history, I don’t know if a God made them, if there was some kind of colony seeding or terraforming, or if it was just a random roll of the dice. The local humans had one kind of magic, the new imports had another, and then there were other things, like the Fey, that had another kind. The original TGOW couldn’t compensate for it, but there was a lot of interbreeding, and sometimes it would activate them. When the energy level, mana, power, or whatever dropped, it stopped happening.”

Maggie nodded, “If whatcha say is right, that be when the demons came, the cratures oh’ Chaos, the Djinn. Solomon sealed ‘em right away, he did, but it cost the world a ton o’ magic. I figures that a lot of folks what didn’t get activated still had the strength o’ magic, but it needed training… none o’ them metahumans for a long time, and none o’ them awakened second humans, but we still made magic work in small ways.”

She shrugged, “most of us Magickers has fey blood, so that might be why we could still learn magics. So what yer saying is that we can join this game, fighting the Djinn, and it gives us powers?”

I shook my head, “Not exactly. I think it can only magnify what is already there, and help you figure out how to direct it. Obviously, if you have no traces of magic, it probably uses technology to help you out, but in my case, I have four aspects… Ranged, Sorcery, Physical, and technology. Max mentioned a number of other potential aspects, Chi for one. I suspect that everyone will have access to some aspect path if they choose to play, and I am betting a lot of people are already part of the Game, even if they don’t know it and it hasn’t announced itself.”

Maggie slowly nodded, “I’m too old to change like that, but a lot o’ younger witches, most o’ them wizards, and a lot o’ the sorts like seers and mediums would be more’n happy to jump at it, if only to prove they wasn’t liars.”

Sif spoke up again, “Where do the gods, and the children of gods, fit into this?”

I sighed, “Honestly, I don’t know for sure. I suspect that the Pantheon deities know how to use the original system, though. Maybe they helped build it or it created them, or maybe they existed outside of it and took advantage of it, or maybe there is no connection at all. I won’t know until a scion chooses to join the game, or upgrade to a new version if they already have it.”

She nodded, “Expect a lot of flack. Loki will think this is the greatest thing ever, a bunch of mortals unlocking their abilities to potentially challenge the gods themselves. Odin probably already knows about it, that might be why he told me to cultivate you. Thor is likely to get into a pissing contest about it, and the Norns? They are wicked old bitches that hate any threat to their power, they will likely see it as a challenge, and send misfortune and monsters at you at every turn.”

I nodded, “I didn’t expect this to go without a hitch.”

Mantid spoke. He had remained fairly quiet so far, but now he added his voice. “I am not sure if I care for this, from the point of view of one who has been strongly altered by their abilities.”

I glanced at him, “Why is that?”

“The thing that sets us apart, that gives us the strength to counterbalance the horrifying effect of our awakening, is the strength and power we gain. I am not sure I like the idea that every normal human can simply fight and pay for what sets us apart without having to deal with the pain and sacrifice we have suffered for our abilities. One of the things that sets those of us with visual and power deformities apart and makes us a threat is that humanity treats us as different, and so we tend to lose a connection with humanity, but in general, we also tend to be far more powerful than the run of the mill metahuman as well, as if in compensation for our disability.”

I nodded, “I get it completely, and please excuse me if I say that that attitude is understandable but extremely selfish.”

Maggie started cackling. And everyone looked at her.

“Magic has a price, boy!” she gleefully answered, “Ya think you’d know that better than most! To match ya, I bet folks would be gleefully selecting disabilities what give them greater power. That means it becomes a thing, not a deformity. Ya folks will be the gold standard. Yer thinking too small. Also, if this system thing works, who’s to say ya cannot learn to control yer strength? I seen Blue, she ain’t got no idea how ta turn her disintegrate off, don’t ya think the system would let her figure it out?”

She giggled, “And I can tell ya boy, I knows a few witches and more’n a few Fey girlies that would love to find theyselfs a boyfriend what gots four hands!”

Under the chitin, around his mouth, I could see a hint of redness. “Objection withdrawn.”

“Okay, from here, I want you to talk to your people. Technically the GOW is a secret, but don’t kill yourselves keeping it. It’s going to get out eventually, and Max, the guy who was helping me deal with it, implied that only the upgrade will require my intervention. If there are folks that want to join that are not already in, there might be another method since I am only one guy and the number of pills I can produce is sharply limited. Once we get a general idea, We can meet again and find volunteers to upgrade. Any questions?”

Mantid nodded, “I have billions of questions, but apparently most of them are restricted for some reason, and will not be revealed until we have more test cases. I do request, however, that if there is a major downside, we willingly discontinue the experiment until it can be addressed. I might be considered a bit of an immoral researcher, but I draw the line at forcing the innocent into accepting an unknown factor that could completely change their lives. We have already had more than enough of that, thank you.”

I nodded, “That sounds like a very good idea, and I agree. Until then, I need to head to the lab and see about making more regen and healing potions, as well as more upgrade pills. There’s also another pill I have discovered that may potentially unlock another source of power for humans that don’t possess sorcery, and I want to make sure that those who choose to join are not handicapped by a lack of potential.”

We broke up at that point, and Alison stopped me, with Paul beside her, a weird smile on his face. “You know that there is a greater than 80% chance that some of this information will leak by the end of this week?”

I nodded to her, “I assumed it.”

She sighed, “And there’s a better than 90% chance that a war of some sort will develop based on this. The Norns are not the only ones who will stop at nothing to prevent the greater mass of humanity from meaningfully challenging those who already use the old system. When word gets out, Proteus will probably issue a kill-on-sight order to all protectors and as many defenders that will listen, and I expect you will catch a bounty in the hundreds of millions, if not billions.”

Paul chuckled, “In my opinion, I think her statements are extremely likely,” he said, carefully avoiding actually stating that it was going to happen.

I nodded, “That’s what I assumed would happen. In addition, the governments are not going to be happy with a bunch more people they cannot control, and I assume that a bunch of people who feel like they have no way of escaping their fate will turn from drugs to working with TGOW. That means they will be targeting me more than they have. The Gods are going to be pissed at losing their new dark ages, The criminal underworld will hate me for basically arming their victims, and I figure that a lot of religious zealots of various stripes will call me the Antichrist or anti Mohammed or something. Is there anyone I forgot?”

Maggie was still here, and she snorted, “Yep. Some o’ the Fey lords is gonna hate ya for exposing them, wizards is gonna hate ya for breaking their power, as will th’ leeches and supernatural brokers. They been hidden for a long time, and I suspect that the game will give normal folks the chance to notice ‘em. On the other hand, ye might gain a few allies ya ain’t expectin’ too. The girl says war might happen, I says it’s inev… it is gonna happen, no doubt.”

I nodded, “I am going into this eyes wide open. What’s a supervillain without a few enemies? I am betting that while Proteus might have their teams behind them, The defender teams are going to tell them to shove it where the sun don’t shine. This is going to be a bit of a color revolution, but if the Chaos entities have already been mucking about with our world, it shouldn’t impact too hard… New players are going to have more important things to do than screw around with who owns what, And Max said the quest system tends to try and keep things stable, especially for non-players. If the new Darth Invader decides to conquer Slovakia, pretty soon a bunch of folks get a quest to end his influence.”

Paul grabbed Alison’s shoulders and steered her towards the mess decks. “Told you. He already knows. But you didn’t believe me. Right now, he’s got a lot of work to do, and a scolding to endure, and we don’t want to be here when that happens, believe me.” Her slight smile told me all I needed to know.

For some reason, Maggie was following me. I stopped a moment and glanced at her. “Is there something I can help you with?” I asked curiously.

She nodded, “Aye, we’s goin’ to yer lab, and I’m gonna watch you screw up and totally wreck dozens of potion and pat yerself on the back for your idiocy.”

“What the hell?” I asked her.

She grinned at me again, “Yer an idiot. Yer makin’ potions all wrong, and yer ignorant as hell. I been making potions fer over three hundred years. I am gonna fix yer fuckups and show ye th’ right way, and yer gonna thank me for it.”