After my visit to Auschwitz, the next day was a lot less… well, less like finding a secret Nazi continuing experiments.

I got back to New York and stopped a mugging, a suicide, and some guy breaking into a car before heading to Noa’s apartment.

It was long enough that I hoped her visitors had gotten her through her very understandable horror at shaking hands and interacting with Essex. Fucking Mr. Sinister. Back home, he straddled the line between being a fun villain and being the kind of monster that made literal demons seem useless.

It’s the difference between being scared of monsters in the dark, and being scared of a government using its citizens for experimentation. The latter was all too real, which made the fear so much worse. And Noa had interacted with someone behind the worst version of that.

So I was unsurprised when I got to her apartment and my knock at the door was answered by a woman I had never met before. She was decently tall, probably somewhere between five-eight and five-ten, and had short brown hair in a pixie cut. I glanced down and saw a badge on her hip. Huh, guess that was why she reminded me of Maria Hill.

“So you’re her newest pet project, huh?” The woman looked me up and down before huffing a bit. “You’ve got ten seconds to tell me why my best friend can barely string a sentence together before I arrest you now and justify it later.”

“Ohhhh, I like you,” I said immediately. “That’s not my defense, just stating that I like you for being willing to go to bat for a friend on sight. I’m Dial, I’m a superhero from two universes away, Noa was called in by Fury for political reasons beyond my control, I promised to help her with a thing that ended in horrible Nazi things, and if you want to blame anyone for her current state, blame dickhead Nazi’s,” Wait, I had two more seconds. “Also, whatever your name is, you should invest in cryptocurrency, but only until it’s popular.”

“In what?” She shook her head. “You know what? No, I’m not drunk enough for superhero shenanigans. Just… ugh.” She turned and walked away from the door. I guess she was letting me in. “I’m Cate, by the way.”

“Nice to meetcha. You know, I’ll be honest, you’re in the wrong city if you don’t want superhero shenanigans,” I joked before calming a bit as I followed her inside. “How is she? Seriously?”

The cop, fed, whatever she was, stopped before turning into the kitchen. “Not sure. She’ll probably be fine after a good cry and a full night’s sleep, but, well? It’s Nazis, and she’s Jewish. How do you think she’s doing?”

Fair. Not like there weren’t thousands of people who’d had similar responses to that level of horror. The Graveyard still left me disquieted thinking about it. I, at least, had the benefit of knowing most of the monsters in human form I’d run into had either fallen at my hands or at one of my friends’. I’d never had to shake their hands.

“Let me know if you need me to run out to get things for her. Even if you want me to fly her out to the Bahamas or something for a couple days off. And I can run interference for any shenanigans.”

“We just got back from a vacation cut short. Don’t think that’ll help,” Cate sighed. “You know what? Just… go get a couple pints of ice cream. Mint chip and Rocky Road. I’ll give you some cash.”

I glanced briefly inside. Noa was on her sofa, a cup of steaming liquid in her hand. Tea, presumably. Taking the cash, I turned and rushed out to do as ordered. I waited till I was out of sight to hit Fasttrack form and buzzed out.

The store I usually shopped at in the neighborhood was still there, a bit newer and less advanced. Different person at the register of course. The small act of waiting in line behind a mom and her kid, waving at the shy little girl as she hid smiling behind her momma? It helped. Made me feel a bit better about the world.

On days where I ran into horrors, simple bits of humanity really made the difference.

With my two tubs of sugary icy happiness under my arms, I rushed back to the apartment, stopping a mugging on the way. New York City, man. Knocking again, I waited for a shorter period this time before the door opened. Probably got back faster than expected.

Even with the mugging, Fasttrack lived up to his name.

Noa’s friend Cate was at the door again, this time looking utterly exhausted. “Please tell me you have the ice cream.” I held up the frozen goodness, and she sagged in relief. “Oh thank god. Come on, get that in the kitchen.”

The door opened, and I heard a new voice talking that hadn’t been there before. Funny enough, one that was actually familiar. As Cate led the way, I saw him.

“And then, the glue inside just exploded outwards. Apparently, Paste-Pot didn’t account for what to do if webbing blocked the end, so the pressure blew it up and left him covered in the stuff!” Spider-Man sat in his classic resting pose on top of an armchair, relaxed as his mask shifted to show hints of a smile underneath.

“I still don’t understand how someone can call themselves that.” Thank goodness, Noa was smiling now. Her eyes were still puffy, I could see that from here, but at least this was better than morose.

“The best part was what he said after! He just looks at me, covered in sticky white stuff, and goes,” Spider-Man took on a very serious tone. “‘I swear, this usually never happens.’”

“Oh, for the love of god,” she giggled. Then she looked over the back of the sofa at me, and her smile fell. “Ah. Back already?”

“I come bearing gifts,” I held up the ice cream, having forgone a bag in the hope that actually seeing the mint and rocky road on the packages would help. And if the way her eyes went wide was any indication, it did.

“Give.” I handed her the rocky road. “No, not this one, the other one.” I took the rocky road back and handed her the mint chip.

Noa tore it open like a demon possessed, then paused when she saw that she didn’t have a spoon. She grabbed the end of her tail in one hand, looked at the ice cream, looked back at her tail.

“I can grab a spoon!” I said, almost laughing as I rushed off after Cate, who was waiting for me with a spoon in hand and a knowing smile on her face.

“Oh hey, you’re that guy!” Spidey said as I came back, handing Noa her weapon of choice. She stabbed that spoon deep into the ice cream, carved out her prize, took a bite, and made a happy noise. Oh, and her tail was tapping the couch.

Cuuuuute.

“Man, you forgot my name,” I teased one of my childhood heroes. “Usually the alien guy is more memorable.”

“In my defense, I meet a lot of weirdos in my life.”

“Fair and relatable,” I sat down on the sofa. “Good to see you. Though it’s funny, I thought Noa said she wasn’t really involved with the hero thing. So far I’ve met Cap, Quicksilver, you again…”

“Yeah, she’s in denial,” Spidey sounded like he was highly amused. “Some of the X-Men kids think she’s secretly in charge of her own private hero team.”

I looked over at Noa, who was still spoon deep in her pint of mint chip and oblivious to the rest of us. Even Cate, who was apparently her best friend, and who was very pointedly not looking at Spider-Man.

“I can see it. Truly, she is a threat beyond my comprehension,” I turned away from the tail-wagging, happily-humming blonde to focus up on Spider-Man. Who was looking at the gauntlet on my arm.

“So uh… how does that work exactly?” Ah. There was the scientist within the heroic jokester. “Shapeshifting on that level, I’ve never seen anything like it. I mean, lots of people can shapeshift, but getting powers with each one is crazy!”

“Technically, the powers are… okay, well,” I held out the watch/gauntlet, the Omnitrix glowing. “This is the Omnitrix. And it was first made as a way to communicate with other species. A peacekeeping tool.”

“...Is this like how people keep building nukes in the name of peace?” Peter said in a world weary tone.

“Believe me, I get it. But it’s true. The man who made this was an alien named Azmuth. He lived in a universe with hundreds of species, living in a whole host of different environments.”

“That’s… wow. But, uh, jeeze. Your universe, this other guy’s universe, probably a few more besides? Oof, yeah, you can keep this whole ‘other universes’ stuff. No thanks.”

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

“...”

“You’re being really quiet…” I could just tell there was a raised eyebrow under that mask. “Why?”

“SO! Azmuth.”

“That’s really suspicious-”

“Azmuth made a sword that could rip apart planets with a swing!” I said as firmly as I could.

“If you two are gonna technobabble, take it outside!” Noa yelled at the two of us around her spoon, pointing at the door.

Chuckling, I rose up and walked out, Peter hopping up to the ceiling to crawl easily at my pace. We headed to the roof to continue. Soon, Peter was stuck to a wall across from me as I sat on the floor across from him.

“So. He made a weapon that could destroy planets. Not because he was some kind of asshole. It was because he saw it was possible, and he did it.”

“Yeah… I’ve met some people like that,” Peter said quietly. “I mean, I tried to make explosive webbing once, just to see if I could, but… man, there’s gotta be some kind of limit, somewhere.”

“Azmuth would agree. When he saw what he ‘wrought’ as the poet guys say, he decided to make a tool of peace. The Omnitrix,” I lifted it up. “His universe, like I said, had hundreds of species. And the Omnitrix has all those species. It can even absorb the DNA of species it hasn’t encountered, long as they’re sapient.”

“So… wait, does that include dolphins?” Peter asked.

“Yeah, far as I know.”

“But how?” Peter asked. “Like, is it just manipulating your DNA? Where does the mass come from for larger forms!?”

“The Omnitrix has an advanced form of energy production that it turns to mass in order to transform into larger forms.”

“When you change back, is it back to your original form, or a form the Omnitrix had saved?”

“Kid, you’re lucky Tony ran me through how to explain this shit-”

“TONY STARK!?”

The next fifteen minutes was like that. It was kinda fun, seeing Peter geek out over the explanation of alien technology. Course, just when it got interesting…

“So how does it interact with more primitive-” Peter cut himself off as a light on the back of his hands suddenly shone. A blinking green one. It was pretty clever actually, set into his suit almost invisibly until it turned on. Suddenly he looked into the distance.

“I hear sirens,” he said. “More than one. Sounds like… ten, maybe fifteen blocks? Not an ambulance, maybe a firetruck and a squad car?”

“On it,” I snapped to my feet. “Spidermonkey!”

In my latest new form with a green flash, I spoke in the more squeaky voice. “Lead the way!”

“I feel like yer making fun of me,” Spider-Man said as he leapt outwards, a familiar ‘thwipp’ sound filling the air.

“You kidding!? I’ve wanted to webswing since your game was announced!” Ah man, I missed out playing that.

“My what!?” Spidey yelled. “Like a Super Nintendo thing?”

“Buddy, you have no idea!”

After we finished, I went back to the apartment alone. Noa was asleep, while Cate let me in before heading home. Which I took as a sign of having some trust in me, if not too much.

Sleeping in Goop form in the sink of the kitchen was more comfortable than the couch, so I did that. Scared Noa a bit when I stretched upwards yawning while she was cooking eggs though. Thankfully my Goop form was immune to the pan she threw at me.

After that, things were boriiiiing. Look. I have great relationships with lawyers. Even ignoring that my insanely hot green gamma girlfriend was one, Matt and Foggy were awesome. But the actual nuances of the law, important as they were, were so goddamn dry.

It had to be, though. Despite what TV taught me, most of law was very serious stuff with paperwork signing and reading heavy, hardback books, rather than a breeding ground for sexy people fighting over the moral fate of humanity with shouting matches.

Still, answering questions while Noa read up on things like immigration procedure and talked to herself about asylum and citizenship? Yeah, wasn’t my kinda thing. Much more exciting was when someone came over to help her.

“Holy shit!” I said in unison with the visitor once Noa walked her in. She walked over, all 8 feet of her.

Jennifer Walters. Comic edition. Just as unfairly hot as mine. Do I even need to describe She-Hulk?

“No you do not,” the Jade Giantess said with a very nice smile.

“Uh, hey,” I said, looking up at her with that weird sense of familiar and new that Cap and Pietro had instilled in me. Combined with the weirdness of having had sex with her alternate, which, how do you even unpack that?

“You are buff,” Jen said, walking over to poke at me.

“Thanks! Working out with supersoldiers and gods, you know. I highly recommend. You?”

“Gamma baths and working out with The Thing,” she said, buffing her nails on her jacket.

“For the love of-ow!” Noa hissed from behind the door. She reached and grabbed her tail in one hand, gingerly rubbing at a spot partway up its length. Okay, that explained the ‘ow’. “Jen, stop trying to eyefuck the visitor, he’s seeing someone.”

“Oh, I know that! He’s seeing another me!” Jen gave a wicked grin. “Cmon, Noa. I know you know about the fourth wall. Me and other Jen had a chat, and she’s all good if he’s all good!”

“Are you seriously-“ The smaller mutant cut herself off. “You know what? Sure. Fine. Whatever. After you’re done helping me.” The tiny mutant pointed her finger at me. “You. Go… I dunno. Go kill time somewhere. Solve crimes. Fight bad guys. I don’t care. Just don’t come back for a few hours or I won’t be responsible for what Jen does to your spine and pelvis. Clear?”

“I never regret the things Jen does to my pelvis-” I immediately spun and jumped out of the window before whatever Noa was reaching for could be thrown, Jen’s laughter following. In a flash of green I was back in Big Chill form, zipping off invisibly into the sky.

Whole new world to explore huh? First things first. I called my newest friend through the Omnitrix.

“Hey Peter, you up?” I said in Big Chill’s ghostly tone.

“...Excuse me? Who is this?” The voice that spoke was not Peter. It was older. And male.

…Oh. Oh shit. This was Uncle Ben. Somehow I’d forgotten that when Peter handed me his number, it would be to his house, not to a cell. The things I took for granted about the modern day.

“I’m a friend of Peter’s. One of the high-flying ones? If that makes sense?”

“...Ah. One of those, huh?” He sounded like some combination of aggrieved and warm. “He’s in the middle of homework. You want me to tell him you called?”

“Sure. Just let him know Dial is down for any walkabouts if he wants. Thank you, Mr. Parker.”

“Please, call me Ben.”

With that, we disconnected. Thinking to myself, I finally twisted around in the air to head into the streets.

I was bored, and New York City was a treasure trove of trouble. Time to find my own fun!

New York City always seemed to increase its crime rate in relation to the number of heroes around. And this version of New York City was full of superheroes. Comparatively at least It was honestly incredible. Back home, while we all did patrol, the number of heroes was smaller than most comic universes I knew.

Here? I ended up running into Iron Fist while he was walking on the streets below. Iron FUCKING Fist! He gave me an awkward wave which I returned in Spider-Monkey form, the two of us going our own way. I had to give him credit for not immediately attacking me.

The number of superheroes who seem to just brawl on sight in the comics…

At one point I came across Darkhawk flying over one section of the city, heading in the direction I came from.

“Mugging!?” I called out to him.

“Uh, yeah!” the armor-clad (or was he an android? Couldn’t remember.) hero shouted back.

“I stopped that! I’m heading to a home invasion, wanna come?”

“S-Sure thing!” He shouted back. Twisting in the air, he joined me in flight. “I-I’m Darkhawk by the way!”

“I know. I’m Dial.”

“You know who I am!?”

Ah… shit. He’d just gotten started, hadn’t he? “I heard it from some guy on the street.”

“Nice!” Darkhawk whispered, clearly underestimating how good Spider-Monkey’s hearing was.

We dropped in on a guy robbing an old couple in their apartment. After a funny moment where he shattered a baseball bat on Darkhawk’s head, we tied him up in webbing, sped the old couple to the hospital, made sure the cops got the apartment, and separated ways.

What, it was a home invasion. Not much room for excitement for those in superheroics.

More interesting was when I decided to do something nice.

“Yeah, Blockbuster is across the street from me. What do you want me to pick up?” I asked Noa through the Omnitrix. “I was gonna grab an action movie, but I figured you’d want something more uh… healing, I guess?”

I entered into the past. I mean, I’d already been there, but Blockbuster was nostalgic. The sight of VHS tapes resting on shelves all across the place, a bored redheaded female employee in the familiar blue. The place I’d found was in the Upper West Side. In my world it had been replaced by a discount store.

Here it was a thriving business. You know, until Netflix ripped it’s heart out and ate it.

Walking in, the bored employee gave me a glance, before I disappeared into the shelves. Still on the phone with Noa and Jen, I continued speaking. “What do you think, Disney and Ahnald?”

“Yes to both, please!” Jen said through the omnitrix. The employee glanced up, surprised.

Oh right. No cell phones. She must have thought I was crazy.

I chuckled, waving at her before continuing to speak. “All right. They have Beauty and the Beast, Little Mermai-”

“That one, absolutely. I was too busy to see it in theaters, and I need a copy for the archives!”

Archives? “Gotcha. Oh hey. The Great… Mouse… Detectiv-”

I cut myself off. Someone else had entered the store. Not a normal customer.

He was taller than me. But part of that might have been the giant green helmet. Seriously, it was HUGE, almost glowing green, with a pair of fins poking out the sides and three small slits for the eyes and mouth. He was also only wearing a big ass chest strap of the same neon green over his muscular torso. Combined with his pants of the same color…

Well. He looked like an idiot. Even with all that muscle, his outfit was so dumb that I couldn’t even laugh.

He glanced my way, then promptly ignored me, instead walking up to the cashier. Who stepped back in horror.

“Everything in the register, now!” he barked in as deep a voice as he could.

“Y-Yeah, okay!” She hurriedly began opening the register.

“...call you back,” I mumbled.

“Have fun!” Jen said cheerily through the Omnitrix.

Walking up behind him, I tapped him on the shoulder. He looked at me, then scowled.

“So! Trying to be a hero are we-”

“Who are you?”

“W-What?”

“Who are you? Seriously, I don’t remember.”

“W-Whirlwind!” the redhead squeaked. “He fought the Avengers!”

“Whirlwind… wait, don’t you have a creepy crush on Wasp?”

“It’s not creepy!” his voice, previously trying to sound tough, rose a few octaves. “She loves me, she just doesn’t-”

“Know it?”

“Exactly!”

“Dude, that’s creepy behavior! She clearly doesn’t want anything to do with you. Can you believe this guy?” I asked the employee.

“Leave me out of this.”

“You son of a-” He reached out for me.

I punched him in the gut before he could touch me. He let out a gasp of pain, stumbling back and spinning around before a burst of wind smashed into me, sending me flying back. I landed in a roll and grabbed a few VHS tapes off the wall, tossing them like ninja stars while running.

“You dare!?” Whirlwind spun in place again. This time, a full on tornado surrounded his legs, sending the copies of Pretty Lady I’d thrown at him flying, followed by the shelf next to him lifting up and getting tossed away.

I ducked under a packet of M&M’s that tried to brain me and grabbed the door handle, rushing through it as he followed. “Why do you guys always say, ‘you dare!?’ Like you’re surprised someone tried to stop you?”

“I was stealing a mere pittance!” Whirlwind shouted, coming out proper into the street. “You fool! I’ve fought the Avengers! Giant Man himself has fallen before me!”

“What, from laughter?” I twisted the dial of the Omnitrix as I spun to face him. Damnit. I didn’t remember anything about Whirlwind. Just that he was spinny. And based on how the tapes I’d tossed just bounced off his wind, I’d need a form that wouldn’t just get thrown aside. Fasttrack then. Make an opposing tornado to his.

Plan made, I pushed down very politely on the dial.

And shrank down three feet. The flash of green was followed by me looking down at my hands, now a bright white in color.

“...HAHAHAHA!” Whirlwind laughed aloud, dropping down to face my now far smaller form. “Is this what decides to challenge me! A tiny robot.”

He continued to spin in place, a tornado blowing trash about the street around us. I don’t think he noticed how happy I was. (Also, the guy who fought Ant-Man and the Wasp underestimating me for my size was kind of hilarious).

“Well that’s just too cool.” My voice was autotuned now. Very reverby. Loved it.

Whirlwind flew towards me, clearly planning on running me over. I ducked aside, my small body get lifted by his wake and smacking into a car. On instinct, I activated one of my powers.

“Come here you little… uh…” Whirlwind stopped and looked at me. Then he looked at the other me. And the other. And the other.

12 of me stood around him in a full circle, all in white with green trimming. We smiled at him in unison.

“Echo… ECHOOOO▄▄▅▅!"

Waves of pure sound smashed into Whirlwind. Seeing what was coming, he spun faster in place, trying to fly away, before he got hit with everything I had. The sonic waves bounced off each other, shaking the air, turning the world around him into an echo chamber. Within that space, Whirlwind screamed, unheard by anyone. After a while, his eyes rolled into his head as he passed out, falling to the ground once the blasts holding him up stopped.

In flashes of greens, the other me’s flowed into my body, the sensation very weird. I’d imagined it a few times, but feeling yourself join you is weird as hell. In another flash, I was human again.

“Is… is it over?” I looked over to see the redhead employee walk over, wincing as she dug a finger into her ear.

“Yeah, it’s done. Sorry about the uh,” I gestured to my own ears.

“D-Don’t worry about it.” She looked at Whirlwind, stunned. “Wow. You really beat him.”

“Yeah, guess he was a D-lister.”

“He fought the Avengers!”

“I’m pretty sure Leap Frog has fought the Avengers. It’s not the pedigree it sounds like. You call the cops.”

“They’re on their way. Are you uh… going to run away now?”

“Hell no. I still need to buy tapes.”

“...A supervillain just attacked my store, scaring the shit out of me, and now you want me to do my job?”

“Welcome to the wonderful world of retail. Seriously though, I’m willing to wait until you can help me out.”

As she sighed, pulling out a cigarette, I moved in to tie up whoever the hell Whirlwind was.

All in all it was a great day.