What happens when the world's strongest, greatest hero is no longer holding up the sky?
It was a question that comic books liked to ask a lot, because it was an interesting query to bring forth. When Superman was no longer the golden boy of Earth, ensuring that humanity was safe from threats internal and external, who could lift that shield was a real question that deserved asking. The Avengers had been broken up or disbanded plenty of times, or the disappearance of other major superheroic groups in Marvel. That question was the entire purpose for the original Thunderbolts run to explore the gap left in the defenses of the world.
Omni-Man, before he had gone off the reserve, had been that superhero. The Guardians of the Globe were important; don't get me wrong, they were strong and powerful in their own way, before Nolan had ripped them to pieces. But for decades he had been the unquestioned king of the heap when it came to the threats that faced the world.
Someone had to pick up the slack of the rogue meteors that Nolan managed to throw away or redirect. They had to be everywhere to present that picture of indomitable strength and let the people know that they were under their protection. It was as much psychological as it was a very real responsibility that someone had to take up.
Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on how you viewed the matter, that someone had to be me. Between my guttered chakra reserves and the actually wide range of brutal injury, it was a long and painful process. If there was one nice thing, though, as people came to visit, it was that it gave me time to think. To prepare, to plan, to acknowledge the failings not just in myself. More specifically, I was forced to come to terms with certain realities that had been starker than ever, especially when Nolan was trying his best to tear me apart.
I'd been treating this like a game.
Maybe not consciously; I'd never screw around and risk someone's life purposefully. That didn't mean I couldn't have been hitting the ground running from the day I'd arrived. I knew I was in a superhero setting, knew that I was in a world where things could likely go pear-shaped at a moment's notice, and instead of acquiring as much strength as humanly possible, I screwed around.
No, I didn't know that things were going to turn out in this fashion, that Nolan would go rogue as what we were discovering was the exemplar of a race of space fascists. It was logical to try and make excuses for how I'd been acting because of so much I didn't know that was going on behind the scenes. All of those things were technically true.
They weren't a balm on my spirit when I thought about how many people died because I couldn't take down Nolan fast enough. Or because he'd reacted too quickly and sent me to hell. That wasn't even mentioning the fact that Damien Darkblood literally walked into Hell just to send me back so that I had even the faintest chance to save the day.
So no. There were things that I should be doing, should be training, and any second that I wasn't throwing myself into that process was a second that might be wasted when the Viltrumites come. Maybe they'd write off Earth as a lost cause if their foremost agent stopped responding to their messages.
… Maybe.
I wasn't willing to bet on the lives of millions, or billions, on well-wishes and best-case scenarios, though. Not when I did have the means to sit down and actually begin my training in earnest. Earth had gotten its hooks into me, and I'd gotten complacent. From the moment I woke up, I swore that wouldn't be the case again.
For all that I'd tried to throw off the shackles of my blood, it seemed as if the world felt intent on dragging me back to a path to power. It wasn't like I'd forget to remember my scruples or ideals, but it also meant that I was fully planning on no more half measures when it really mattered. There were also a couple of things that I did manage to crack in that month, before my training of Rudy and then Mark started in earnest.
The Eight Gates might have gotten an enormously glamorized introduction into the Naruto series because of the Rock Lee versus Gaara fight, but they were useful. Ramping up how much chakra could be extracted from a body like mine, and fucking with the flow of it, was dangerous, likely even more so than what a human would normally have to deal with for the consequences. That didn't mean a sudden burst of speed and strength was unwelcome for the possible threats I'd have to deal with.
If there was a downside, it was the fact that the system to regulate how much chakra was being channeled from your body and extracted from your cells existed for a reason. I could maintain it for minutes at the moment when I was going two gates deep, and the drop in stamina after it was brutal. For a man who didn't even produce fatigue toxins the same way other organisms did, it was a helluva gutpunch to get tired after months of not quite experiencing it.
That wasn't to say I didn't find myself furthering my studies elsewhere. Teaching Rudy all of the elemental releases had been an outstanding primer for me in turn. While he wasn't pulling off S-rank jutsu constantly, he could do most others with an ease that would have made your average shinobi cry in the Elemental Nations.
His reserves were huge, monstrous even. Smaller than mine, which was like saying Lake Huron was smaller than Lake Superior. It was true, yet both were truly enormous amounts of water. Which meant that he had a lot of chakra to throw at his problems, even if I was teaching him the benefits of being more efficient and economical with its expenditure. Something I could have been better about myself.
He was picking up things quickly, though the one aspect of the training that I hadn't failed to notice he despised was taijutsu. Oh man, did that nerd hate getting punched in the face. As opposed to Mark, who complained about it but always got back up. No matter how weak he might have been at this moment, the kid had that dog in him. Which was good, considering it was his only avenue of attack.
All of this was at the expense of my personal free time and leisure. I hadn't slept in a month, and while the feeling was odd, I managed the constant unbroken chain of thought that might have killed most humans pretty fine. Sleeping was something I missed, and perhaps when I was more sure that the duties laid at my feet could be picked up by someone else, I'd relax.
Until then it was just a matter of continuing the grind with training, doing the things Omni-Man was famous for handling, like kaiju elimination, and maintaining an active membership in the Guardians of the Globe. Which was where we found ourselves now.
The bunch of the Guardians were lined up in front of Cecil, who seemed more haggard than ever. Then again, I would be too if I had to deal with the cleanup from the Chicago Incident. It was what the news and everyone else was calling it these days, something that'd just stuck by some offhanded line by a pundit.
"There have been some rough patches. I think we can all concede, considering how things were in the beginning," Cecil stated, as some of their less glamorous interventions were visible on the screen. "But there have also been some successes."
The footage shifted to the not insignificant amount of very visible public efforts that had been done by every member of the Guardians at one point or another in Chicago. Shrinking Rae going small enough to find survivors, for example, or a series of Dupli-Kate clones and Robot's drones working overtime to try and move rubble, the same with Monster-Girl. Hell, even Black Samson was there, though his suit was doing most of the heavy lifting.
I don't know if I'd say everyone was the most bosom buddies yet. My friendship with Rudy was the strongest out of the bunch, and to a lesser extent Kate, Rae, and Rex, with me barely having interacted as much with Amanda or Samson. However, we were still managing to rise above whatever social awkwardness existed to become an effective unit.
"Which is why I'd like to tentatively congratulate you all. I know that making you sit out on the fight against Omni-Man was an unpopular decision," Cecil continued, looking around in everyone's eyes. "But the work you've all managed to accomplish during and after the tragedy has gone a long way to winning the hearts and minds of the people."
"... Well, that's good news, right?" Rex piped up, looking pleased.
After all of this time, you'd have thought that Rex would have learned that Cecil rarely just gave out compliments. He could thank people without it, certainly; the man even came and thanked Genji personally while he was recovering. But much like a shark, he had a mind that couldn't stop moving. He was always onto the next thing, the next element to prepare for or make whatever existed better.
In many ways it was something I could really respect about him. Even if I could also acknowledge the ways that it probably rubbed some folks the wrong way.
"With that said, analyses have certainly targeted areas for improvement, looking at your last fifteen engagements. The leadership most of all."
If Rudy didn't have a reason to be paying attention, I saw him out of the corner of my eye stiffen and begin to take notice. Once more, I focused on how his features differed from mine.
Where I was a milky white that would never be mistaken for a skin tone humans could naturally have, unless they were dead, Rudy's cloned body was merely pale. His hair is darker than my brighter locks, and his features less inclined toward a certain kind of alien perfection. That much the Mauler Twins had to compromise on.
Yes, we had a very long talk when I discovered that he had broken them out of prison for this task. One where I had expressed my deep, significant displeasure with them being anywhere near my genetics. Yet the milk was spilled, and I didn't see any reason to do anything more than just be a little more leery of Rudy's bright ideas in the future.
With my complaints about the matter said, though, there were many means through which I could make my displeasure clear. Something that he quickly learned as I began to tutor him in his new abilities. One truth remained the more I sparred with Rudy and got him remotely whipped into respectable shape. Whatever the cloning process had involved, they had watered down the Ōtsutsuki percentages considerably. Don't get me wrong, being an appreciable percentage of my power as a baseline was still stronger than a good majority of superheroes on the planet.
Yet I was getting the feeling more and more that it also came with some downsides. His eyes were weaker than mine, with a much shorter range. Still a large range, and they'd likely be prodigious if not absurd by the standards of the Hyūga. The fact of the matter was, he and I were operating off of a different type of scale for the expectations that I held for him. When my eyes were at their fullest potential, even if I never evolved them further somehow, I should be able to see basically the entire continent of North America in my range.
Nor was he as physically powerful or speedy. His flight required more effort, more chakra, and finer control than the autonomic way I handled it. It was a lot of little things that made me feel better in a way, that he wasn't a perfect clone. A bit of an assholish thing to think, but it was true. If he could do everything I could do plus his incredible intelligence, let's be honest, who wouldn't begin to feel some type of way about it?
"What aspects of the leadership seem to be needing adjustment?" The long-haired man spoke, fidgeting slightly in his dark undersuit, typically used while in the middle of his suits. "I've thought that, outside of a few exceptions, the style of leadership was acceptable."
"Acceptable is a good starting point," Cecil replied. "We'd like to aim for exceptional. To which some changes are going to be made."
One thing I would also say about Cecil? The man loved his timing, as the Immortal hovered down from where he'd been watching things on the walkway above. I'd spotted him before but hadn't quite known what he was doing here.
He looked surprisingly decent, for the most part. For a man that I'd been told had been quite literally ripped apart by Omni-Man, he was remarkably hale and healthy. Though while I wasn't really sure as to if he was entirely recovered from a psychological level from two back-to-back deaths. There was a tension in his body, from what I could see.
If the GDA had cleared him for duty, I'd have to trust their teams of trained psychologists and analysts. To say that it was literally their job to ensure the bunch of us weren't going off the deep end was an understatement.
Cecil didn't seem to have any issues with him, seeing as what came out of his mouth next. "The Immortal will be brought on as an advisory position," he explained. "A couple thousand years of experience ought to set us up for success, Rudy."
"... You were waiting for your cue, weren't you?" Rex spoke, saying what I was thinking but was a little too polite to point out. "Oh my god, you were! It did look effortless, but I'll admit, I feel like a lot of preparation went into it."
"Making an entrance is important for a hero, Rex," I spoke up, half-serious about the matter. "But I don't actually think it's a bad thing that we'll have the assistance." Rudy looked at me sharply as I gave him a shrug. "Not a knock on your leadership, bud. It's just a matter of having more firepower to throw at the problems we face."
"Speaking of more firepower, he's not the only muscle being added to the team," Cecil interjected. "Say hello to Bulletproof."
Landing was yet another flight-capable superhero, though this wasn't one I recognized. Nor was I entirely sure I'd seen them at the tryouts for the next iterations of the Guardians of the Globe. A Black man, wearing a yellow and orange suit with cornrows and goggles. He seemed fit enough, but just from an errant check of the relevant energies inside of him, he was a little underwhelming.
Still, expanding the roster steadily was only a good thing in my eyes. The fact that we'd only had as many members as we did had always been something I was dissatisfied with. Ramping up the ranks, having more diverse powers in our members, and ensuring that we could reach more hotspots around the world would only ever be a net positive.
"Amazing," Rex snorted. "It's just a whole afternoon of new friends. And what do you do, besides having the most obvious name ever?"
"I'll admit I'm a little curious too," Rudy admitted, the faint pulse of chakra coming from him letting me know he was doing the same inspection I was.
Which was good. When his eyes were trained enough, I'd almost advise him to constantly use them. I certainly did these days. My qualms about privacy were totally, wholly tossed out of the window. If someone was coming at me quickly enough to be noticeable with the Byakugan, I wanted to know they were coming from states away.
"I'm built tough, and I'm strong," the man explained, gesturing to himself, and totally unphased by Rex's joshing. "Apparently I can come up with better names too than your elementary school bullshit. Did you come up with Rex-Splode, or did someone come up with it for you?"
"I… came up with it myself," Rex admitted, glancing away.
"At least he can banter," Kate commented.
"A high requirement for the Guardians of the Globe," I added. "Doesn't mean you have to be good at it. Just look at Rex."
He laughed, taking the reversal of the ribbing with good humor. "Screw you guys! Alright, I know when I'm beat."
Cecil had turned to Rudy. "This isn't an indictment on your leadership. But it's been put out that your new body has been a level of distraction on top of everything else. The Immortal's new position isn't to gainsay or overwrite your decisions. Are we good?"
Rudy paused before giving Cecil a stare before he slowly nodded. "We're good. I can't say that I'm thrilled, but from an objective understanding of the situation I can acknowledge that there's something to be said about the way I've been handling things."
"It's certainly a bigger scale than just operating the Teen Team, that's for sure," the balding man pointed out with a small smile. "We'll revisit the mentorship situation in a few months."
With that, Cecil turned, disappearing in a flash of light in that instant. It was at that moment the Immortal approached Rudy.
"While I won't lie and say that I wouldn't have liked to take up the role of leader again, I'll also acknowledge that this team isn't the same one as I led," Immortal admitted, just the faintest hint of pain in his voice as he said those words. You could see it in his eyes how much it was tearing him up. "There isn't the same history of effortless dynamics, even with Black Samson."
He glanced toward the man in question, who was off talking with Rae and Amanda, before shrugging softly. "He's been out of the game for some time. Nor do I personally believe I'm in any sort of headspace to actually lead another version of the team."
"Then… I'll be happy to take as much help as you can give."
Immortal smiled before glancing my way, seeing me at the periphery of the conversation. "And Taijitu?"
"Yes?"
"Thank you for stopping Nolan," the dark-haired, bulky man stated, his features flickering into a glower. "I wasn't strong enough and let my rage overtake my reason when I fought him. Thinking of everyone he ended in pursuit of his mad ambitions…"
Gritting his teeth and clenching his fists, that anger he showed when he'd woken up from being resurrected hadn't gone anywhere. It'd just been pushed down beneath the surface and was simmering, waiting to boil out at the least optimal second. Reading as much from his emotions when his mind drifted toward the Viltrumite made that clear.
Eventually though, Immortal calmed down, eyes closing as he let out a slow exhale. "... The duty of leadership is one I've taken up time and time again. That doesn't mean it's one I'm intent on returning to anytime soon."
"Stopping Nolan was the right thing to do, full stop," I responded, giving him a slight smile. "But I appreciate the sentiments all the same."
I offered a hand to shake, and he looked at it for a moment before shaking it firmly, pulling back as he glanced between Rudy and me. "Outside of that, I also heard a rumor that you've engaged in some higher-level training sessions with Rudy and Invincible for the sake of practicing conflict against more formidable opponents. I'd love to see about involving some of the others, too."
A glint entered my eyes at those words, one that Rudy immediately saw. Saying he was shaking wasn't quite accurate, though he was increasingly nervous, as he looked between us with an unsure smile. "Immortal, I'm hardly sure it'd be appropriate—"
"No, no, the more the merrier," I grinned, flashing nothing but pearly white teeth. "Monster-Girl, Bulletproof, Invincible, the Immortal, you…" A low, happy sigh rolled out of me.
Already I was thinking about the drills that I could pull from in order to expand the training options. More clones, maybe, that could transport the experience back to me? I already had a few off working on some things at this very moment, even if I was unsure whether some of those jutsu research efforts would pay off anytime soon.
"It'll be a splendid time," I assured him. "Let's go figure out some training schedules now."
"Outstanding," Immortal grinned.
Rudy could only whimper, knowing full well what was going to be involved with it. If he didn't want to deal with Ōtsutsuki expectations or problems, he shouldn't have become one. He wasn't going to find any sympathy from me.
The era of embracing humanity was over. It was time to buy in a little to this space alien demonic cultivator bullshit and see how far I could push the envelope without going totally off the rails.
It was okay for me to want things, and what I wanted was to be as strong humanly possible. For things to bend around me, rather than doing the bending. Was that too much for a man to ask for?
The Global Defense Agency was an organization that, well, organized no small number of superheroes. Now, while the Guardians of the Globe were one of their bigger priorities, they also fed out work to all sorts of smaller independents, more modestly sized teams and heroically aligned factions, or others that just so happened to be corporate entities that were benefiting from their existence.
A well-known example was the group known as Capes Inc. They usually treated superheroism like a nine-to-five job, with overtime, benefits, and generally handled coverage of specific cities or regions. I didn't see anything wrong with that, admittedly, because making a living off what you did was a fundamental human right.
Acting otherwise, like the fruits of superpowers were inherently owed to the world was a great way to inspire long-term detrimental ill-feelings. While I had a literally inhuman capacity to be selfless, because I didn't need to eat, sleep, or do any of the aspects that had life worth living for people, that didn't mean I couldn't see where others were coming from. So I wouldn't begrudge them for trying to do so.
Where was I going with all of this again? Right, the GDA tasking out work to the different partners and groups under their broad aegis. Invincible was one of them, though he hadn't actually been doing anything particularly high intensity over the last month outside of very simple rubble clearing and our training sessions.
But I could tell that he was chomping at the bit for anything to do. He was young and had just come off what was probably the worst beatdown of his life. It'd be stranger if he wasn't feeling some type of drive to prove himself.
What had to be singularly unpleasant, though, was Mark's incredible capacity to run straight into the worst possible situations. Genuinely, he might have this world's version of Parker Luck. Someone in the editorial staff seemed to genuinely have it out for him, with the regularity that shitty things occurred to him.
It had started innocently enough, with him admitting that he wanted to work for Cecil. There wasn't anything wrong with that, in and of itself. I started out that way and still ended up being given assignments that made me step away from the other Guardians for relatively simple missions here and there.
On his first real attempt to put that newfound position into action, investigating a power spike at a warehouse, that was where things got a little crazy. And by a little, I mean that he almost got beaten to death by a bunch of Mauler Twins from alternate universes, who were helping some guy do… something to a bunch of alternate universe versions of himself?
Like I said, Mark's luck had to be studied in a lab. There was no way a kid's fortune was this bad normally.
That was my personal thought as the entire roster of the Guardians of the Globe showed up to the aftermath of whatever had gone awry. Mark stood in a partially ruined costume, bloody, battered, and looking as if he'd gone through the ringer. For what we knew of the situation, that was likely pretty accurate.
All of the devastation was, if nothing else, comprehensive. Whatever the blast had been, it had been enough to outright carbonize the skeletons of many, many different Maulers that I was spotting all around the destruction. Many of the remains of what I suspected were just normal humans weren't even that lucky to withstand the desolation.
The Mark at the beginning of his career, at the Flaxan invasion, likely might have even joined them. But the one in front of me, here and now, was of an incredibly hardier constitution. Outside of the damage to his costume, I wasn't reading any actual injuries as we came onto the scene.
"I guess he really is… Invincible," Rex stated, only to get a withering stare from me. "Too soon?"
"A little, but I'm more interested in answers," I admitted, approaching Mark carefully. "Are you alright?"
"No, no, no…" He breathed out, looking at his bloody hands. "Not again…"
Of course, before I could even open my mouth, the comfort came from the least likely place as Rex approached him. "Hey, listen, this was the Maulers, not you. And apparently lots of them."
"I don't know what they were up to, but I'd say you stopped it pretty fuckin' spectacularly," Rex grinned, gesturing around them.
To which even a surprised, mildly affronted voice from Cecil conceded over the communications. "I can't believe I'm saying this, but listen to Rex."
"There were other people here," Mark stated, eyes swollen and bruised from whatever beating he'd received. "And even the Maulers didn't deserve this."
"Everyone here did this to themselves. Whatever they were planning, you stopped them," Cecil stated, with the assurance of a man who'd seen worse. "This is what happens when you follow my orders. It's not pretty, it's not nice, but the city is in one piece. In my books, this is a success."
Mark was quiet, not quite accepting that line of reasoning. Cecil seemed to read into his lowered mood, though. "Let's call it a day for you. Head on home and the Guardians can handle the clean-up."
"Right," Mark breathed, swallowing thickly. "I can do that."
Before he did, though, I caught him by the shoulder, stopping him. "Invincible."
Looking back at me, geeze, it was tough to see anything but how young he was. "This wasn't your fault, but I'm not going to coddle you and pretend like it isn't just part of the job. But it does get easier."
"Really?"
"Yeah," I lied, mind drifting to the thousands of bodies that were left in the wake of my own weakness. "It does."
"... Thanks, Taijitu, Rex." Mark gave us a weak smile before lifting off into the air. Whatever he was going through, I was going to talk to Cecil about trying to figure out some help for him.
If my problem was that I was becoming a little too human, the kid needed something more grounded to help him out. Regardless of the matter, I turned to Rudy, wanting to use this experience as a teachable moment for other reasons. How often would I ever get a set of real conditions this lifelike for training?
"How many still-breathing bodies are there in the rubble, Robot?"
He tilted his head ever so slightly to the side. "I'm surprised you can't tell."
"I can, but I want you to tell me." Training never really ended, and it was better to make using the Byakugan an instinctive thing for him. It was for me.
The man paused, not quite used to constantly using his Byakugan like I was. It'd come in due time, or after he got ambushed once or twice. Making it a knee-jerk, instinctive response was part of what I was trying to instill in him in training, to mixed results. Rudy was fantastic at the parts of using chakra that required having a big brain, being creative, and throwing things at the wall.
Where he struggled were the more physical, visceral elements of the process. Only time and experience would help with that.
"I'm counting at least six, maybe seven sets of deceased Mauler Twins," Robot admitted, ensconced in his new armor. If you didn't know that there was a person inside of it, you'd probably never even know the difference between the old models. "And two survivors. One Mauler, and one… human man."
"What's with the hesitation?" Rae asked.
"The guy who's still breathing isn't in great condition, but he's also incredibly warped," I filled in, focusing on the individual in question. Whatever had happened to him had caused an explosive growth in neurological tissues, bursting out of his skull and down the length of his spine.
It would have been a fascinating medical miracle if it weren't also disgusting in equal measure. Whatever state he was in must have been one of pure agony.
"We ought to get them secured then," Immortal stated, and I heard the part of the sentence where it was transitioned from a command to more of a suggestion.
"Right," Rudy nodded. "I'll direct our efforts accordingly."
It didn't take very long to find the sole Mauler that was still alive. He wasn't in the best of shape, still ambulatory and whole, but horribly scarred in every sense. Half of his face was burned to the point where there wouldn't be any trouble trying to determine what twin this was. Still, once we were sure he wasn't going to get up and fight us, I knelt and used some medical jutsu to try and patch him up.
Not enough to heal him to top condition, as I ran a hand over the bulky, blue body. Enough to ensure he wouldn't bleed out, as Rudy watched me carefully, and I instructed.
"You have to put in enough medicinal chakra to give the body some impetus to heal, but do you remember what I said about how it works?"
"It promotes healing, but most medical jutsu don't actually allow for much in the way of systematic alterations. Only ensuring what was there works better."
"Yep," I confirmed. "So what we're going to do is use our vision to ensure that any internal bleeding is taken care of. Maulers seem to be built tough, however. I can't anticipate much needing to be done."
Like I thought, all I had to do was ensure that he was more or less in one rough piece. From there I oversaw Rudy's efforts to use Earth Release to generate hard, sturdy bindings for the man, wrapping around his body. There were tiny little imperfections from the earth itself that'd been created, but it was serviceable for a makeshift, ad hoc creation.
"Y'all done over there with the Mauler?" Bulletproof asked, looking down at a figure near his feet. "We might need some help with this guy too, if you can patch people up."
Heading over, it wasn't entirely clear how much we could do, as I knelt at the side of the dark-skinned man that Bulletproof had plucked out of the debris. My lips pursed as I tried to parse what had been done to him, and the truly engorged amount of spiritual energy inside of him."
It wasn't just the terrifying, swollen lopsidedness that I'd gotten used to seeing from super scientists here. This was very, very different, as I inspected the man. Most of the actual efforts to fix his internal damage and keep him from continuing to spit up blood were easy. The real problem was the fact that his mind felt frayed in a way that I had only ever seen in the exceptionally mentally ill.
I could notice the problem, but I couldn't fix it. Medical jutsu and techniques, outside of things to directly heal in and after a fight, were a field I was lagging behind quite a bit. Let alone the level of sheer biological manipulation to help whatever the hell was going on with this guy. Touching him, I wasn't sure where it would even be appropriate to begin, with the way he'd mutated.
Worse yet, we didn't know if he was a perpetrator or victim yet. But I couldn't imagine anyone would willingly want to do this to themselves. What would be the point?
"This guy needs a hospital," I bluntly stated. "Do we have medical services coming? Or a specialist to deal with this kind of thing?"
"I can turn some of my scanners onto it, but I'll concede that this sort of thing isn't something this suit is quite designed for," Robot admitted, as he glanced at Bulletproof.
Bulletproof grimaced. "Don't look at me, man. Times like this I gotta call 911, just like the rest of you. Basic first aid isn't covering… whatever this guy did to himself."
"We've got paramedics en route," Cecil stated over the communications. "Is there anyone else in the rubble?"
"No one still breathing, it looks like," Kate commented as she found another body with the help of her clones.
"Then transfer over that man and we'll get him the help he needs. Perhaps we might get some answers out of him for what this whole shitshow was about anyway."
As far as endings for a day went, that seemed about as good as we were going to get for a situation that spiraled out of control before it ever reached our desk. The man below me felt off in a way that was hard to describe, almost akin to the portals that I could make, but different. As if a slightly similar flavor, strangely enough.
Suspicion and guesses weren't a good way to get the truth, though. Whatever the reason things turned out like this, I hoped we were able to fix this guy. No one deserved whatever the hell had happened to him.
Author's Notes
We're back to Genji's POV, at least for a bit. The coming chapters will hopefully begin to at least show the difference in his behavior, or how he's reacted to the Chicago Incident, in part due to some responses I've received from others about how Genji is kind of bland. I'm hoping it'll give his character some spice that wasn't there before.
Onto other news! I mostly just panicked because I thought chapter 26 wasn't, posted it again, but it turns out it just wasn't on the collection. And when I went to delete the new one, I accidentally deleted the old one. So I have made the resolve to not do any Big-P work that late at night so I don't make the same mistake again. It's annoying to have the chapters out of order, but everything that's supposed to be there is there, and available for the relevant tiers.
New Comeback Kid Chapter launching on QQ... I think it should be tomorrow? And I'm running the live Saturday. I may want to do more lives, so I can put out more chapters, since it does seem people really want more of it.
Additionally, if you would like to read ahead, you can find up to ten chapters ahead via the linktree in my profile. For the time being, all adult content like future smut in anything I write, will be on , though in due time I'll likely try to get the processing and authentication through on to be able to post it there as well. So be mindful of where you're supporting me.