Kim closed the door behind us as we walked into her office. "Please sit, Void. I'm very happy that you've come to see me again. I wanted to thank you again for assisting the Bureau with the Chimera."
Her hands shook slightly as she pulled out the whiskey she kept in her desk and poured us two glasses. "Drink?"
I tried to sense the liquid for any energy that wasn't strictly chemical. After I had enhanced my body, I wasn't immune to poisons, but it took elephantine doses to do anything to me.
Kim took a sip of my glass. "It's fine."
"You are also immortal," I chuckled. She could have filled the glass with enough poison to kill a city, and it wouldn't have done anything to her.
"Hey, I would still have a reaction if I were to poison myself. It wouldn't kill me, but it sure as hell would try. Being poisoned while immortal is brutal." She went back to her own glass. "So, to what do I owe this visit? Care to enlighten me why you shot that blast?"
I shrugged. "The rain was bothering me."
Kim set her glass down and stared at me. "The rain was bothering you?" she repeated it slowly, either not buying it or thinking I was an idiot.
She clarified when I didn't speak. "You made the Bureau go into a panic."
"The rain was sad, and I was already in a bad mood. So, I blew the rain cloud away. People use their powers for things all the time. Plus, you said I'm no longer a criminal."
Kim put her head in her hands, peeking out between her fingers at me before running them through her hair and sitting up straight again with a heavy sigh. "Yes, but your power sets off a lot of alarms."
"Sounds to me like you need better detectors. And I guess I’m just a little rusty after not using my power for a while." I smiled, but she couldn’t see it through my disguise.
Kim stared at me for a moment before setting down her glass and clearly working herself up to something. "You could join the BSH. You could be a hero, out in the open. And I’ll give you all the training facilities you need. You could practice using your powers again on monsters outside the city. Hell, I’d be your personal manager, if you wanted.” She started really gearing up into her pitch.
I laughed. "No. I appreciate what you did, that you told the world that I'm not the man they thought I was." With a sad shake of my head, I continued. "However, I'm stuck as a villain in too many minds."
She sagged at my rejection, but she perked up and tried again. "Most people didn't even know who you were when you showed up all dark and scary." She waved at my current form. "Also, my analysts are having a field day trying to figure out what power you have. Care to put them out of their misery?"
I smirked. "Nice try."
Kim just shrugged and leaned back in her chair with her drink. "Can't blame me for trying. So, you blew away a rain cloud today and then decided to swing in for a chat. Anything you want to talk about? Also, strong-arming the security guard and blocking all the damn cameras was a bit of overkill. I’d be happy to set up some time with you if you’d call."
"Can't I just come in for a drink?" I replied.
"I suppose. But you haven't touched your drink," Kim shot back.
So, I took a sip. "Not bad.” I paused, knowing she wanted more. “When I used my power today, it was before I decided to use it a bit more. And I thought maybe that I should start with the stupid giant super that almost crushed me at the plaza."
Kim took the rest of her drink in a single shot. "Fuck. You were there?"
"Your heroes did a great job. Whereas I felt useless, now that I’m not as deeply in hiding, yet I’m not free enough to use my powers without risking attack."
"So, you feel comfortable blowing away a cloud, but not a villain?" She frowned and came around her desk to sit on the edge. The move placed her legs right next to mine.
Apparently, she was upset that I hadn’t helped… myself, earlier today.
"You had heroes right there who would have attacked me. Killing the villains would have forced me to kill those heroes, too," I explained, thinking quickly on my feet.
"So, you don't want to kill heroes?" She was trying to gauge my reaction.
I shrugged. "My goals aren't so simple. Mostly, I want to live unfettered by the bullshit that surrounds me."
Her leg touched mine, and I stopped myself from reacting. When she got no reaction, she got a bit bolder. She stretched out one of her legs, rubbing her calf up my leg.
"Unfettered you say? Sounds like a hell of a way to live." She tilted her head, a sweeter expression than I’d ever seen filling her face as she batted her eyes.
I tried to break it down, wondering if it was some sort of tactic. She wasn’t normally flirtatious and physical.
I refused to let her get a reaction. "When you are betrayed by those you thought were heroes, the world looks very different. I still remember when you asked Becks to be a hero, and it ended with her spine being ripped out."
My statement was effective. She became somber; I’d effectively dumped a bucket of ice water on any potential flirting. At least she pulled her leg back.
"Becks," she repeated, as if committing my nickname to memory. "I still have nightmares about that. Becky was so strong, though. Some of us thought that when Fortress retired, she'd make a go at the number one hero spot. She could already handle me. And then I took her down with words in the end.”
Her head dipped to her chest, and she couldn’t meet my eyes.
Yet she continued. "At the time, I had just hoped to stop Fortress. I thought that if he’d stop, even for a second, I’d be able to get through to him.” She was staring at the floor, but I could tell that she was lost in her memories.
"Shame. I have the same nightmares. Just from a different perspective." I’d had those nightmares for so long. They’d only recently subsided, and I attributed that to my women.
"We should meet regularly. I could make a big lantern and put a spooky image over it and shine it up in the clouds when I want to meet." Kim smiled, back in the present, no longer dwelling on the past.
I rolled my eyes. "Don't be ridiculous. Do you realize how much attention that would garner?"
"Then how about you stop by like this once or twice a week? Hell, you are the only person who really gets some of what I’m dealing with. And I’m curious about what happened after the incident. Your aunt and uncle always thought you died. We never corrected them."
I froze.
"Yeah, we figured out who you used to be. But Miles disappeared, and even with some of the new facial recognition software out there, we could never find you. I'll admit that I've been curious for a very long time where you disappeared to, Miles."
It hit me strangely, given that I still used the name. "Funny. If I wanted to be known, I would have put a signal in the sky. Don't call me Miles; that name is dead." I did my best to be uncomfortable with her usage of it, which wasn't hard since she had come pretty close to spooking me.
"Okay." She held up her hands. "I've let it drop. Well... mostly. There is this guy that works here. I swear on my power, he is your spitting image if you were twenty or thirty years younger. He even goes by Miles. I thought he might be your son."
"No kids. I'm fairly sure of that one." I didn't need any of the complications that came with them.
"He checked out. Made my analysts dig hard, but they came up with nothing. Must be a cruel joke of fate. Finish your drink and promise me you'll come visit me again; I'll leave instructions with the guard desk. Although, you should bring the liquor next time so that you are more comfortable drinking." She patted her desk and stood up straight, waiting for me.
I downed the rest of the glass and shook my head. "I can't promise—"
"Just say it, even if you don't mean it. In some ways, we are on opposite sides, but I don’t think we’re so different. I’d like it if you came by."
"Fine. I'll see you next week." I turned and left, feeling odd.
I wasn’t sure how I felt about making appointments as Void, but I also had a feeling I’d be using my powers more. So, it didn’t hurt to have a way to check in with her.
At least she seemed better this time than last, and we’d moved past some of the past. I could see that she wanted me to join the Bureau. She wanted to make me a hero.
I snorted.
The guard nervously waved at me as I left and blasted off into the air.
Kim's words rang out in the back of my head.
We were the only two survivors of the Fortress incident. While she may have told the others how it had played out, they hadn’t been there. They hadn’t felt it. That shared experience had bonded Kim and me together.
And she had also gotten scarily close to the truth. I knew Kim was intelligent, and part of me wondered if she was playing with me.
Did she really know? Was she just treating me with kid gloves? Was she taunting me? Was she trying to egg me on to reveal myself?
I cursed. She’d managed to get into my head, whether she’d meant to or not. But if she knew, she hadn’t acted on it yet. My best option was just to push forward.
I would have to be more aware, though. There wasn’t much that could stand up to me, but I needed to make sure that she stayed on my side, especially if she knew. She had the mad scientists, after all, and I wouldn’t put it past them to create something new, especially if her analysts could sort through my powers.
But for the moment, I felt safe. And for once, I had confidence and stability in my power. And I was ready to use them to solve my problems.
Landing back at the manor, I immediately heard fighting between Mona and Stella.
"You two, stop it," I insisted, dropping my invisibility and grabbing Melody. "Come on. Let's go have a little fun."
Angelina got up from her seat and followed me. "Miles, we missed a session."
"Therapy takes time. And I have a great way to relax." Wrapping her and Melody with my power, I started to strip off their clothes and tossed them on the bed. "A lot of relaxing fun."
I was up early, feeling chipper as I floated breakfast around the kitchen.
"You still put on a show when no one is here?" Angelina ducked under a flying pile of hash browns.
"It’s fun and efficient. Less to clean up. And the more I practice, the better I can control all the various parts."
Understanding dawned in her eyes. "Cooking requires you to control numerous pieces with high precision."
"Yup. You should have seen the messes I made when I first started to cook like this." I laughed and realized there was only one person who had seen those.
"This happened with Emma?" Angelina read my expression. "You don't talk much about her."
"No. It was a dark time. After the Fortress incident, I was in and out of homeless communities and shelters. Lots of petty theft." I regretted those days.
Angelina came over and pressed herself into me. "You were trying to survive. Stealing for food and shelter is not the same as villainy."
"Still criminal in the eyes of the law. Though, I understand that there are people who do far worse legally."
She hummed. "And those people aren't part of this conversation. I’d like to know more about Emma. It seems she’s going to be finding a way into our lives one way or another soon, although you’ve barely spoken about your interaction yesterday."
I chuckled. Angelina had been trying to talk when I was trying to enjoy her amorphous body to its fullest extent.
"Emma caught me at the Bureau. I tried to talk to her, help her step out of villainy, but she thinks I’ve been brainwashed or have some elaborate con I’m not letting her in on. She seems to think she can drag me back into villainy."
Angelina paused and faced me. "How much should we be worried? What's her power?"
"She's able to take on different powers based on what types of gems she focuses on," I explained. "Some are simple. Diamond gives her durability. Onyx gives her strength. Then there's emerald, which she is passionate about, for an apparent reason. She's nearly immortal if she's using an emerald."
My purple and green slime woman blinked dumbly at me. "She's nearly immortal?"
"Yeah, she had a bracelet she called her Nine Lives. Nine quarter-sized emeralds on a gold cuff." I pointed to my upper arm. "She wears it here under her clothes. If she's out of prison, I have no doubt she's found it again. When we first met, she had a three-strand diamond necklace that would let her power her hardness for a pretty good amount of time."
"Wait, there's a limit?" Angelina focused on my words.
"Depends on the size and the number of gems. Size helps with the potency, and the number helps with how long she can use them," I explained. "She's mostly a thief, collecting a large number of gemstones."
Mona came around the corner into the kitchen. "Makes sense. Sorry, I was listening in." She tapped her head.
I smiled, enjoying the normalness of that moment. She seemed more in control. But when I peeked into her brain, not much had changed. She still wanted to do whatever it took to convince me to continue our connection. Only she was expressing herself better.
"So, Emma is a thief with a broad range of power sets, and you don't even know if there are other, rarer gemstones out there that would give her other potential powers?" Mona reached up without looking and did a little hop, snagging a sausage out of the air. "And she wants to bring you back to villainy."
I realized she was viewing herself through my eyes in order to catch that sausage.
"We are going back to villainy?" Stella asked, walking in wearing one of my shirts as she joined the table followed by Melody, who yawned and stretched as a serious case of bed head mopped at her shoulder.
"Before we get into all of that, can you help me comb out my hair again, Angelina? He always knots it up so badly." Melody sat at the table and tugged at a particularly massive knot.
"We aren't going back to villainy. I was discussing Emma and her desire to push me back into it."
Stella let out an evil chuckle. "Let me talk to her." She cracked her knuckles.
"I don't think that'd go over so well." I watched as Angelina left my side to join Melody.
Angelina dropped some liquids into Melody’s hair before combing through with slimy fingers. I watched, intrigued that a woman with slime hair was so good at helping Melody with her normal hair.
"Now, rather than taking orders..." Serving plates landed on the table, and pancakes, waffles, along with an assortment of potatoes and meat stacked themselves. "I’ll be surviving buffet style."
"Ooh," Stella cooed and started picking at the pancakes and completely smothering them in enough syrup that they could be made of plastic and she'd never know it.
Melody was far more careful, measuring out how much she put on her plate. I knew she must be tracking the calories. Which, in my opinion, was silly. With her workouts and the calories she burned using her powers, she didn’t have much to worry about. I made a mental note to be sure to privately show her how much I loved her body exactly as it was.
Angelina took a small portion of meat, while Mona eyed the food like it was a delicacy she didn't deserve.
"Eat up, Mona," I encouraged her.
She hesitated for just another second as she checked my mind before her face lit up and she let herself enjoy the moment. She piled her plate with food. "Melody, if you want, Miles can actually boost your metabolism. You don't have to worry about getting fat."
"Wait, really?!" Melody stared at me as if I'd just betrayed her. "Why didn't you tell me this before?"
I shrugged. "Never came up. But you see the way I eat."
She blinked. "I thought you just had good genes."
"Nope. I cheat." Taking a seat, I waited for Obsidian to knock on the front door, but it never came.
Shrugging it off for the moment, I focused on the food before me.
"What about your succubus? Are you boosting her metabolism?" Melody asked, clearly stuck on the topic.
"Nope," Stella answered happily, taking a moment to use the pancake a bit like a spoon, scooping it across the plate to sweep up as much syrup as she could before whipping it into her mouth before she lost any. "It just all goes to my chest if I get fat."
Melody's fork clattered onto her plate in disbelief. "So unfair."
"Well, you can eat that bacon now." I pointed to the piece she had hesitated over earlier.
"Fuck. Fine. Just one." Melody grabbed a fistful.
Angelina was looking over at the front door. "I would have thought an Obsidian clone would have arrived by now."
"Yeah, I thought so, too, but maybe we’ve made some progress." I reached out with my senses and didn't feel an Obsidian clone approaching. "My kindness has likely caused a minor disruption."
"Ah," Mona said calmly, digging through my mind. "That might just work. Very clever, as expected of my fated."
"You are hoping to win over the clones that aren’t making the decisions," Angelina said, understanding it herself.
I stuffed my mouth and had to chew before I could respond. "Exactly. But we will have to let that one play out. For now, we need to get to work and push forward on what we can change.”
Finishing my food, I got ready while I flicked through the tablet on the bed, reading about current plans at the BSH.
The scientists still hadn't sent a report, but my analysts had several pings with reports on Emma. Both of those were on my list for the morning. Then I needed to do some power evaluations of a few new supers and round it out with our patrol.
"All right, let's get going, girls. I don't think Obsidian is showing today, and there's a lot to get done."