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You know? Being dead isn't really so bad.
It's calm, peaceful. Quiet.
Beautifully so. Tinnitus didn't carry over.
Just myself, my thoughts, and an endless yawning abyss filled with horrors and eyes. Staring, judging, weighing and waiting...
I waved.
"Please don't encourage them!" And I suppose I should introduce the only other 'Person' here with me.
Terra-Tan, girl was a head and a half shorter than me, measuring up to a rough one-point-four meters. Ish. Maybe. Size is relative here, I think. She had wheat-gold hair done in a pair of drill-like pigtails and eyes the lightest color of jade I'd ever seen.
And she was dressed in a magical girl outfit. I kid you not. Frills and bows everywhere, even had a scepter with a large red gem at the end, with one ring with a pair of pearls right around it, and another ring with four pearls around that.
Total weeb.
"Why are you so rude!" Fists on her hips, cheeks puffed out, she tried to lean forward and look intimidating.
"Because I'm all thoughts and no filter?" And it wasn't working. I just couldn't muster up the energy to be afraid.
I was already dead after all. Stroke in my mid-fifties, just like the rest of my family. Except without the cigarettes and alcohol.
Honestly, I thought I'd been doing pretty good.
"And you were." The girl, goddess probably. Or bad joke my own psyche is playing on me, admitted. "The stress you put on yourself didn't help any, but if you'd gotten to a doctor, you would have made a full recovery. Or as full as it gets, I guess. Brains are hard."
"So, what happens next? Reincarnation? Recursion? Passed around like a sorority girl to the elder gods?" The last one involved actual madness, it should be entertaining for a bit.
"What? Eww, no! They're just here because it's the only thing entertaining left at this level of reality. I pick a human soul, offer them my boon, and then throw them into a random part of the multiverse!" She seemed very proud about that, leaning back in this indefinable space with a smug grin and closed eyes.
"Oh! You mean like Aqua!" She deflated at my words, almost visibly shrinking.
"I'm better than Aqua!" Terra shouted as she waved her fists and pouted. "I don't have to send people to her miserable little death world, and I don't prey on NEETs and Shut-Ins!"
Well, that was fair enough. Now I was kind of wondering if my wife would be calling my workplace. The bastards would probably pull out a Ouija board and ask if I could come in on Friday.
"And-and-and I'm the one who made the first gamer! Without me, Han Jihan, Harvest and countless others would've just-just... Why are you looking at me like that?" The girl slowed down, less and less certain as her audience of one was, for all of her boasting, not impressed.
"Which I suppose is what you were going to offer me?"
"Yup-Yup!"
"Oh." Was my entirely unenthusiastic response. "I think I'll pass."
"Excuse me?" She was looking at me like I'd said something absurd, or just realized I was simple. "Maybe you don't understand. Magic? Stats? Potential for unlimited power? Loot? You guys like loot, right?"
"Yeah, that's awesome and all, but I had enough trouble relating to people without sociopathy from the whole 'Mind Protected From Emotions' thing you got going on with it. How many of your gamers -Don't- end up being ADHD murderbots?" I was not a paragon of virtue, no, but most of the gamers I knew about were murder-obsessed blood knights.
It was incredibly telling when she refused to answer.
"Right, so, if we could just get this ball rolling? I'm sure there's some other option for me. Maybe reincarnating as a fish? I like fish, well, fried fish."
"...I've been trying to patch things..." She was mumbling.
"Sorry?" I leaned down. "Don't think I got all that."
"I'm TRYING!" She exploded, shouting in my face. "But do you have -Any- idea how hard it is to fix things when people are complaining 'Where's my skills, Terra?' 'Why can't I have a party, Terra?' 'My HP hit zero 'cuz of a paper-cut, Terra!'? Well do you?!"
"I was married, so yes." My response was said in such a sincere deadpan, too.
She screamed wordlessly, the... Things, in the background, screaming as well. Or maybe laughing.
"Alright, alright, just take a deep breath, okay?" I tried placating her, but I wasn't sure it was working. Her eyes were glowing a darker green now, and I was pretty sure I could hear her teeth grinding.
Literally in both cases.
"How about you just tell me what changes you've tried, and we'll workshop this, alright?" At my urging she did take a slow, deep breath before exhaling in the loudest, most obvious way I'd seen.
Outside of an anime.
The weeb.
"Alright. Alright. So I've tried toggling access to the shop. Some gamers have it, some gamers don't, it doesn't change much. I've also tried ID create. Some of the more entertaining gamers have used it for a kind of teleportation, and that was really cool! Bust most of them just go in and pew-pew-pew zombies until they're too strong for their reality." She actually did finger guns for the pew-pew-pew part.
"But the gamers who don't get ID create just find some other mechanic to abuse?" I already knew the answer.
"Yeah... They usually go for the adaptive abilities and do crazy stuff like catch themselves on fire or eat lightning bolts or stuff. Then they walk up to the big bad and become a bigger bad." She sounded more and more depressed, which was fair. On the surface, it was a cool idea.
"Alright, and what about relationshi-"
"No." She stopped me cold.
"Yeah, that's fair." I already had a good idea about the next set of questions. "What about Gamer's Body and Gamer's Mind?"
"What about 'em? They're, well, they're like the whole draw aren't they? Live life like a video game! Be the ultimate gamer! Who doesn't love that?" She seemed incredibly proud about that, too.
"But maybe they're a big part of the problem?" I could already see that she was going to argue, so I held up my hands. "Hey, hey, just give it a thought, okay? A lot of the really good protagonists have got some trauma, or some kind of motivation, right? Something they feel really strong about?"
She nodded, still not looking too happy with me.
"Being an emotionless tactician is great in things like the Civilization series, but your gamers are supposed to be action RPG's, yeah?" She nodded again, looking slightly less unhappy with me. "So maybe they need to be a little more vulnerable? Let them be scared, and reckless, and clumsy so they can make mistakes. Mr.Perfect is Mr.Boring, isn't he?"
Terra still didn't look happy, but she nodded at me.
"But... I built it all on those things. ID create, Gamer's Body, Gamer's Mind. They're, like, my hallmarks!" Ooh, tears now! Aqua vibes rising.
"And sometimes you have to innovate, try new things, cut out some bugs! Or is your name Bethesda instead of Terra?" To be fair, I was goading her. I really shouldn't have been surprised.
"You know what? You're right!"
I was? I mean, yeah, I was!
"And you get to be my beta tester!" Terra was starting to sound manic. Why was Terra sounding manic?
"I'd really rather not. Could I maybe just, y'know, pass on?" Seriously, I'd already lived. I wasn't actually eager to go on to some afterlife, but I was very, very keen on not being some god's entertainment.
"Nope!" Yay.
INITIALIZING CHANGES...
"So, is this gonna be some kind of reincarnation deal then?" I wasn't sure if I hoped it was or wasn't. Both sides had their pros and cons.
CORE MODULE: GAMER'S MIND - UNINSTALLED
"Eh, well, no. I've got a great deal with the Death of that multiverse though!"
CORE MODULE: GAMER'S BODY - UNINSTALLED
"So, y'see, when someone decides to unalive themselves there, I can make them an offer. In exchange for incarnating my champion in their body, I'll erase their karmic debt and help them reincarnate."
CORE MODULE: ID CREATE - UNINSTALLED
"I really can't help but feel I won't be terribly useful at the bottom of a rope." Or with any of the other common side effects of that kind of activity.
CORE MODULE: ID ESCAPE - ERROR! FILE SET TO READ ONLY!
"Don't be silly! The swap happens the same moment they -decided- fully and certainly, to do it. I just rewind the clock a little bit and do a little switcharoo." She looked a bit concerned about the error message, but shrugged it off. "Though, if you could maybe resolve whatever caused them that pain to start with? I'd... Really appreciate it."
CORE MODULE: MENU - SUCCESSFULLY LOADED!
CORE MODULE: STATUS - SUCCESSFULLY LOADED!
CORE MODULE: SKILLS - SUCCESSFULLY LOADED!
CORE MODULE: SPELLS - SUCCESSFULLY LOADED!
CORE MODULE: PERKS - SUCCESSFULLY LOADED!
CORE MODULE: SHOP - SUCCESSFULLY LOADED!
CORE MODULE: SETTINGS - ERROR! (MULTIPLE) MASTER FILES MISSING!
"Good enough!" Terra was actively giggling now. That was probably a bad sign. "Are you ready?"
"No?"
"Too bad!" Then the stupid magical girl hit me in the face with her stupid scepter and I 'Woke Up'.
Project: Gamer Ver. 2 Alpha Build 0.0.2
Disclaimer Me Do: I own nothing you recognize. And most of what you don't recognize, I still don't own.
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"Don't worry, he knows."
Those were the first words he heard when he woke up in this reality, wearing the skin of someone else. It was accompanied by a full body jerk as he tried to figure out what was going on.
One moment he'd been in the abyss, talking to... Well, she never quite introduced herself beyond her name, Terra-tan, but he was going to assume goddess. Or eldritch equivalent in a convenient, non-mind breaking package.
The world was already in full focus, which was disorienting in the extreme. Human minds struggle terribly with shifts that happen without transition.
It didn't take incredibly long for him to put together where he was, or what was going on around him though.
The air stank, bitter and very reminiscent of skunk. Empty cans were piled up on every surface nearby. Explosions and gunshots coming from the television screen.
A girl, someone his meatsuit presumably knew, getting felt up and kissed by an older man. Potentially a problem, but... How old even was she?
'13'
Alright, huge problem. How old was the guy kissing her?
'37'
Yep. Awesome. Huge problem.
"Bro, you alright?" One of the two boys playing the game on the tv asked him. Who was he?
'Johnny'
"Yeah Johnny. Just... Man, I really need some chips." He didn't have the full details, he couldn't even remember what was supposed to be happening here! Every time he tried, he could remember what he'd been doing before he died, but nothing about any of this.
Except that he -could- answer himself if he asked a question he should know. Which was... Interesting. The kids brain could answer queries, but it couldn't be directly accessed.
Maybe a software to hardware mismatch? Fifty year old nerd trying to run on thirteen year old stoner brain.
"Man, I could go for some cookies!" The other boy on the couch...?
'Tommy'
Tommy said.
"A'ight. You got money? I'll walk to the corner store, get some stuff." Tommy waited until his character got downed by a headshot and gave...
'What's my name supposed to be?'
'Leslie Winters'
'...'
Leslie a fistful of crumpled bills he pulled out of his pocket. He didn't bother counting them before stuffing them in his own pocket, pointedly ignoring what was happening on the chair and shuffling outside.
It was hot, incredibly humid, and fairly early if the sun being high in the sky meant anything.
Leslie stalked down the road, making a mental note of the house number as he passed the mailbox.
--QUEST ALERT!--
--Resolve the events that lead to the suicide of Leslie Winters!--
--REWARD!--
--1000 GP!--
As he got further down the road, he looked up, checking the street sign, and then began patting down his pockets. He found the wad of bills Tommy gave him, a flip lighter and a wallet that had a student I.D. and a further fifty dollars in it.
And a scuffed smartphone with a cracked screen.
Perfect.
It took him a moment to turn it on and he stared at the lock screen.
'What's my P.I.N?'
'7734'
'This kid was such an edgelord' Well, Leslie thought that, but didn't bother voicing it. Too little too late after all.
Passcode put in, a moment to puzzle out the buttons later and-
"Nine-One-One, what's your emergency?" The responder was a woman, he thought her accent was from the east coast but he wasn't actually sure.
"There's a pedophile with three kids in his house, he's been giving them weed and beer. He was feeling up a twelve or thirteen year old girl when I saw it."
She asked a few further questions, things he didn't have an immediate answer for except the address. Leslie might have, but other people asking questions didn't prompt that little answer like his asking did.
"Listen, if I stick around I'm going to commit a crime. Tell the officers if they need me I'll be at the corner store two blocks south of the house. Leslie. Green hoodie and blue jeans." It would've been dramatic for him to just hang up on the responder then and there, but not terribly useful. She asked a few further questions before thanking him for his time and telling him to stay put for the officers.
Not something he was looking forward to, but it'd probably resolve his starter quest.
Leslie hung up and continued walking. No starting knowledge of a setting and waking up to a tragedy, this was going to be awesome, he could already tell.
"Inventory?" He was expecting a grid, but got a list instead. In the upper right corner it listed GP, and had the number one-thousand there.
Experimentally he pushed the flip lighter into it.
It still sank right in, and at the very top of the list the word -Lighter- was filled in. Thinking at the menu didn't move the selector up or down, but he found he could move it with his eyes by focusing on the words, or he could wave his hands and move things that way. He highlighted the lighter he'd just put in and shifted his focus to the neighboring screen.
-Flip Lighter-
-Brand: Zippo-
-Fuel: 67%-
-Description-
"A flip lighter with a Buckeye leaf on one side, and a large red O on the other. Leslie stole this from a tourist because he thought it was a marijuana leaf."
Disappointed, though not surprised, he closed the inventory.
"Status?" A new window popped into existence. It had seven core statistics, and three other figures.
Strength and Vitality, Dexterity and Agility, Intelligence and Wisdom, and finally Luck. A little bit bare-bones, but not too surprising.
HP and MP were expected as well. VP wasn't. He highlighted that.
-VP- Vitality Points
"These points are not directly affected by your in-game stats. Instead they represent your bodies actual health. HP may act as a buffer or shield to defend against permanent or crippling injuries, but VP represents your actual life remaining. Piercing damage, critical blows and various debilitations or injuries can cause direct harm to VP. Non-Lethal attacks cannot reduce VP"
He had one-hundred HP, twenty-five MP, seven VP, and a flat five in every stat.
Three squad cars passed him by, heading in the opposite direction. He was almost at the store, a Seven/Eleven.
Did he just get incarnated back into normal reality?
"Shop?" This window was just a search bar. Unlike his inventory though, it responded directly to what he thought.
'Status Recovery' He wasn't stumbling around drunk on the side of the road, but he could taste something bitter at the back of his throat and his thoughts felt... Off, somehow.
A lot of options were brought up, and he did mean a lot. Powdered unicorn horns, pixie dust, anti-anything he could think of was listed here.
And most of it was more expensive than he could afford.
He scrolled down, moving past the single use items and into spell and skill books. Just like before, most of it was just outside his price range. Cure Condition, Status Restore, Purge, Chakra Cycle, Vera, Spoon, the list went on and on. And the prices went up and up.
Except for one. Listed at Six-Hundred GP was a spell called Esuna. Well, there were a bunch of different Esuna listed, but this one was conspicuously inexpensive. He highlighted it.
-Esuna-
"This version of the spell is from the world of Palakkia. It can initially only cure poison and blindness. As the caster becomes more experienced, however, it can be used to cure nearly all debilitations!"
He clicked purchase.
He also picked up a bottle of water from a refrigerated rack in the store and a pack of mint gum. Paying for it, he sat down in front of the store on the sidewalk and pulled out his new spellbook from his inventory.
It very inconveniently did not burst into motes of light and ash and add itself to his list of known spells. He had to actually read the book before the spell was useful.
Which wasn't actually too bad, it was thirty pages and closer to an idiots guide than a magical treatise. He even got to keep it when he was done.
"Spells?"
There were actually two entries here, which was fairly surprising. Esuna, which he'd been expecting. And I.D. escape, which he hadn't been expecting.
Well, that wasn't terribly important right now. He focused on Esuna, focused on himself, and with a strange twisting feeling, it was cast.
[Alcohol has been removed]
[Tetrahydrocannabinol has been removed]
No lightshow though, which was surprising. Good, but surprising. He was going to have to figure out how to increase his MP however, or he'd be unable to cast the spell after it leveled up a few times.
He took a sip of his water and was about to reopen the status menu when a squad car pulled up and parked in front of the store.
Gotham City Police Department.
Oh. That... Wasn't good.
A portly man stepped out of the vehicle, wearing a beige trench coat and a brown trilby hat.
Leslie started chewing a piece of gum.
"Hey kid, you the one called in that Chester up the road?" The officer stopped directly in front of Leslie, so he got up.
"Two blocks north of here?" Leslie wasn't quite sure what he meant by Chester.
"That's the one, yeah." The man reached into his coat and pulled out his badge. "Harvey Bullock, GCPD."
"Leslie Winters." The boy held out his hand, but the detective didn't shake it. "What do you need?"
"I'm a need you to fill out a statement kiddo. Ya wanna do it here, we can do it here. Otherwise you an' me are gonna have ta go to tha station and do it there." The detective was getting more brusque, but then he could probably smell the cheap weed Leslie was soaked in.
'Where do I live?'
The address the remnant of Leslie offered was relatively nearby.
"I live three blocks over, Mr.Bullock. You wanna just go there, get my mom to sign off on whatever she's gotta and we get this over with?" Leslie was still a minor, if this world was anything like the real world then she'd have to get involved with the whole mess anyway.
"Not happenin' kid. Here or the station." The detective was getting impatient.
Leslie wondered if he'd been having a bad day to start with, or this just upset him.
Or both.
"You're gonna take me to the station either way, aren't you?" Bullock didn't say anything, but he did cross his arms. Screw it. "Let's just go to the station. Sooner begun, sooner we're done."
"'Least you're smarter than your two pothead friends." No handcuffs were involved, and the detective didn't 'Help' him into the car, but still. An hour and a half into day one in this reality, he was already in police custody.
Awesome start.
Project: Gamer Ver. 2 Alpha Build 0.0.3
Disclaimer Me Do: I own nothing you recognize. And most of what you don't recognize, I still don't own.
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They'd arrived at the police station without issue, and Bullock had handed Leslie off to a junior officer.
Apparently his shift had been about to end when they'd gotten the call about a pedophile, and Bullock had drawn the short straw.
Leslie hadn't asked about the kids, probably his friends, more likely former friends. And Bullock had been content to spend the entire drive complaining about clowns. And mimes. And then more about clowns.
Couldn't exactly blame the guy, this was a Detective Comics Comics universe. Probably.
Bullock, Gotham, clowns. Too many icons that narrowed things down less than Leslie would have liked. After all, how many different versions, forms, timelines and reboots were there? Leslie wasn't sure, but the answer was at least 'A lot'.
Officer Pulowski had taken over for the man, and really all she'd done was have him fill out an incident report and answer some questions.
Then his mom came and things got more difficult. He wasn't sure how they'd gotten a hold of her, since he hadn't been asked for her details, but here she was.
Maybe he had a record. Maybe someone in the station knew him. Maybe John, Thomas or the girl had called her. He had no idea.
Any which way, she was here. And Officer Pulowski requested permission to do a drug test. Apparently he was a 'Known Associate' of people who had recently been apprehended for trafficking.
As if he wasn't the entire reason the arrests had happened at all.
His mom had been getting redder and redder, more and more angry at him. Probably not a good thing, seeing as she was overweight, wearing heels and in a fairly professional looking suit and skirt combo.
Leslie was guessing she worked either in legal or finance.
'Accountant' The Leslie that was whispered in his mind.
Well, the long and short of it came out that he was clean (Esuna had been more thorough than he'd thought) and after a few more questions he was frog-marched out of the building. She didn't manhandle him into her little four-door hybrid but it was a near thing.
Leslie really wasn't sure if she was a bad driver, slamming the gas constantly and tailgating the car ahead at every opportunity, or if she just shouldn't drive angry. When he was thrown forward as she slammed the brakes at another red light, he decided it didn't really matter.
He would not be getting in this car again at all if it could be avoided.
"Do you have any idea how angry I am right now?" Leslie's mother certainly did not sound calm. On the other hand, this was the first time she'd spoken directly to him since he'd replaced her son.
That... Could end up being a problem.
"About what?" Was he expecting an actual answer? No. Did he think asking that would help? Also no.
"About what? About what!" She started shouting at him, her eyes barely on the road. "Tiffany calls me crying because she's been arrested and she's terrified about her parents finding out! She said you got everyone arrested!"
That was more than he expected, just... Who was Tiffany?
'Childhood friend since kindergarten. Loved her with all of his heart, and then...'
Ah, the girl. Seems the pedophile had been using drugs and alcohol to groom and condition her. And she'd picked that over Leslie.
Okay then. He was not fixing that last part.
"Well, yeah. That's pretty much true." His mother was breathing harder and harder. Her hands were trembling on the wheel. "Figured this was better than letting..."
Who even was that guy?
'Tommy's cousin, Dave'
"Dave keep molesting Tiff." Did Leslie ever call Tiffany, Tiff? Well, it didn't really matter.
They pulled over near a park. His mom's trembling had gotten worse, but her face had gone from red and blotchy to stark, stark pale.
"What do you mean Dave was molesting her? Sweetie, this isn't something you joke about." Her voice was pleading as she stared directly into her son's eyes. She didn't know when they'd faded from beautiful baby blue to soft grey. And he didn't flinch or look away.
They sat there in uncomfortable silence for one minute. Then two. Then five.
"Leslie? Honey? Tell me everything."
He had to pull up a lot of memories from the hole left by Leslie's Soul, but he told her. Everything.
Except for who he was.
The woman cried. Maybe a lot. He really couldn't blame her. The story took the better part of an hour. Almost half of that made up of awkward pauses on his end.
--QUEST COMPLETED!--
--Leslie's Suicide has been avenged!--
--You used Communication! It was Super Effective!--
--Reward: 1000GP!--
--Intelligence +1!--
--Wisdom +1!--
Leslie closed the notification and sighed. Looking out the car window as the sun was setting, he found it difficult to think about that aspect of this... Rebirth. He needed to stop, take a moment and just list out everything. His situation, his resources, his needs and wants and goals.
Even as they pulled into the driveway at his... Leslie's home, he didn't know how long this situation could last.
"I don't think I can cook tonight sweety." Leslie's mother said. She'd pulled a pamphlet off the fridge of their cramped kitchen, some Chinese place.
"Just get my regular. I'll be in my room." He had no idea what his regular even was. It probably wasn't important enough to ask, either.
Leslie's room was... It was a typical kids room. Over his bed he had a -very- artistically rendered Batman poster, more animal than costume. A laptop sitting on a small desk, currently turned off. He wasn't sure of the model, but the emblem was a large 'L'.
Maybe Lenovo or something.
A backpack was sitting on the desk chair, schoolbooks still in it. There was a bookshelf with a combination of figurines, video games and books on it.
No pictures though. Nothing like that anywhere in the room.
He pulled a notebook out of the backpack before he moved it to the bed and sat down at the desk. Turning to a fresh page, he took a pen out of one of the desk drawers and put it to paper.
'Changeling'
An apt enough description of his situation. He'd have to check the story here, but in the real Earth there had been stories of children being replaced by Fae duplicates.
Tragedies, if he recalled correctly.
A few lines down, he tapped the pen against paper for almost a solid minute as he tried to distill the next concept into as few words as he could manage.
'Game'
'GP'
'Esuna - level conditions?'
The game was absolutely a resource. It could put out as much as you could put into it, it could turn time and energy into anything!
That... Actually, that was an idea worth exploring.
He opened up the shop menu again and this time he searched for 'Alchemy'.
Like last time, the shop list was populated incredibly fast. And like last time, almost everything was outside of his price range.
Oh, basic materials like Potions Vials were available, but he was looking for a very different kind of alchemy. It took him a few minutes to find it, but he did eventually come across what he was looking for.
-The Basics of Transmutation-
"A primer on the incredibly complex art of magically manipulating materials. Utilize MP to manipulate the size, shape and density of objects! Some materials are more resistant to transmutation and suffer a cost penalty."
It was one-thousand GP. Everything he'd gotten from the quest about Leslie's circumstances.
And the book itself, after he purchases it, is significantly denser than the spellbook had been. If he started right now, he still wouldn't have the skill understood by tonight.
Rather than closing the shop afterwards he makes two more purchases. A pair of spells from the same series as Esuna had been, ones that start off especially weak but, with a lot of work, could scale decently.
Cure, a spell that would restore his HP, but not VP, had been incredibly inexpensive at one-hundred GP. Protect, too, had been relatively inexpensive. Three-hundred GP, leaving him with nothing in the bank, but at least he could directly improve his defense.
So that was a handful of tools that offered him a lot of survivability, especially in Gotham. Three of the major villains here could be, not prevented, but he could counter their tools. Scarecrows fear toxin, the Joker's... Laughing gas? Smile vapor? Leslie couldn't remember the actual name.
And Poison Ivy's... Actually, would Esuna even do anything about her at this point? If her pheromones counted as a Charm condition instead of Poison, it wouldn't do anything at level one.
Leslie tapped a pen against the paper. He needed to be smart about this. Flailing around and reacting was a valid option, but not necessarily a successful one. He needed to figure out a source of GP. He needed to improve the tools he had. He needed...
"Sweety, dinner's here!" His stomach clenched and he realized he needed to eat.
There weren't a whole lot of words shared over dinner. Black pepper chicken and fried rice for him. Sweet and sour pork with fried rice for her. He wasn't terribly hungry, not really. After a few bites his appetite completely disappeared, but did nothing about the twisting and churning in his gut. He set his chopsticks down and just stared at the food for a moment.
"Hey mom?" She was only picking at her food too. Probably too stressed to be properly hungry. "Could you call Tiffany's parents and tell them what's going on? I need to... Not smell like today."
Like beer, cigarettes, marijuana and sweat.
"Yeah." No energy in her response. Likely depressed over the whole mess, or at least she's emotionally exhausted. "I'll put away the leftovers. And Leslie? If you need to talk about this, I'm always here, okay?"
"Yeah. Thanks mom." He got up and went to his room. A few minutes of rummaging through the dresser and closet, he had a change of clothes.
In the bathroom, with the shower running he stripped down. Looking in the mirror, he could see things were different. That he was different.
Leslie looked a lot like him. Similar curly brown hair. Similar eyes. The scars were missing though. Leftovers from accidents, from fights. The callouses on his hands were -wrong-.
He stepped into the shower, letting the hot water cascade over him. He stood like that for a moment before he pushed himself against the back wall and slid.
Here, private and alone, he choked down a sob. He put a hand over his eyes, and he could tell what was water and what was tears.
This was wrong. Everything was wrong. He was -Wrong-.
And being a gamer didn't change that. Being the victim of some god-things power trip didn't change that. The only thing he could do was move forward.
But right now? Right now he was trying to keep his uneven, shuddering breath's from making too much noise. He was trying to keep the roiling, churning turmoil in his stomach from coming up. Keeping that broken, empty, sucking feeling in his chest from dragging him in.
Right now, he was human.
And he was never going to let that go.
Project: Gamer Ver. 2 Alpha Build 0.0.4
Disclaimer Me Do: I own nothing you recognize. And most of what you don't recognize, I still don't own.
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Elbows go out. Chest goes down.
Hold that pose for a moment, and then reverse.
Leslie had hated doing intentional exercise in his past life. It was time he'd prefer to spend either relaxing after work or catching up on a project. Either his amateur and expensive attempts at working with a metal foundry, or his equally amateur and less expensive attempts to learn how to code.
He was not exercising terribly quickly. His goals for this Saturday morning were flexible, especially after his incredibly depressing and distressing entry into this reality yesterday.
"Menu" The teenager muttered as he went back down.
--Party--
--Quests--
--Messages --
-- 1 Unread message!--
--ERROR--
"Messages?" He asked when he came back up. It opened a secondary menu, where he selected the bouncing closed envelope.
--FROM: Ultra-powerful best goddess Terra-Tan!--
--Only losers cry in the shower. That was sad. You made me sad. Here's a handful of pity GP, loser.--
It was five GP. Not a lot, but it was basically free. It only came at the cost of his dignity.
--TO: Ultra-powerful best goddess Terra-Tan!--
--You're watching a thirteen year old kid while he showers?--
He could've included more, of course, but did he really need to?
Standing up, Leslie started doing squats.
"Party."
The party menu opened, but it only had two buttons.
--INVITE--
--DISMISS--
Not terribly surprising. Still, he clicked on Invite.
--Either select a nearby individual to invite, or input their name here!--
Well, there wasn't anybody nearby to test that with, at least not in his bedroom. So he tried to input a name.
Ultra-powerful best goddess Terra-Tan!
--Pending--
--Pending--
--Ultra-powerful best goddess Terra-Tan! has accepted your party invite!--
Wait, seriously?
--Who dis?--
Leslie wasn't sure what to say. He hadn't expected to get this far.
--How do I mine for fish?--
--Fkn noob--
--Ultra-powerful best goddess Terra-Tan! has left the party--
--You have been blocked by Ultra-powerful best goddess Terra-Tan!--
Leslie paused in doing his squats. That was either really, really good. Or incredibly bad. Nothing for him to worry about right now, he supposed. Probably going to bite him on the backside next time he dies though.
Well, nothing to do for it.
"Quests."
There were two options here. A completed tab, and a pending tab. He checked the pending tab. Most of the options here were... Less than savory.
Defeat twenty bandits. Collect a dozen rat tails. Those sorts of things. Although Leslie noticed as he was looking through them all there was something missing from the rewards section.
Experience.
Most of them had a notice for a stat reward, including a notice that it was a one-time bonus for the repeatable quests... But none of them offered experience. And although he hadn't paid much attention to it, he'd noticed an EXP bar under his name in the status menu.
Which meant combat was the only means of leveling up. That was going to be... Problematic. Risk might equal reward, but he knew first-hand that the equation was never exactly equal.
Leslie picked two quests and pinned them.
--Quest: Saitama! Someday--
--Do 20 Pushups!--
--Do 20 Squats!--
--Run 2 KM!--
--Reward: 200 GP!--
--One time bonus!--
--+1 Strength--
--+1 Vitality--
--+1 Agility--
--Repeatable: Daily--
That was a quest chain, it could be done every day and there were similar names for each part. Completing the full set would add nine points to each stat the first time around, and net a solid nine-hundred gp every day.
The other quest he'd picked out was not glamorous in the slightest, the reward wasn't fantastic, but he was pretty sure he could get some solid mileage out of it.
--Quest: Civic responsibility--
--Pickup ten pieces of litter!--
--Reward: 50 GP!--
--One time bonus!--
--+1 Intelligence--
--+1 Wisdom--
--+1 Luck--
--Repeatable: Yes--
There were actually a lot of quests like that, more than he'd been expecting. Planting trees, cleaning parks and rivers, all sorts of nature related things. Shutting down a coal power plant was apparently worth a jaw-dropping fifty-thousand GP.
Instant riches and rewards! Just become an eco-terrorist.
He'd stick to exercise and trash duty. Might take a month and a half, maybe two, but he'd have the same payout.
Leslie finished out his squats and headed to the kitchen. For whatever reason they had a water dispenser, which was odd since there was perfectly good tapwater, but he'd figure that out later. He stuffed yesterdays leftover chicken in his inventory, alongside a bottle of water, and headed out.
Apparently Leslie and his mom lived in a cul-de-sac near the outer edge of Gotham, just two blocks closer to Slaughter Swamp and they'd be in a trailer park instead. It was easily five kilometers from here to the recognizable parts of the city. Leslie was pretty sure he could jog the distance.
An hour later, Leslie was regretting jogging the distance.
"Hey kid, you okay?" A clerk asked him as he stumbled into a store, red-faced, soaked in sweat and struggling to breathe. Calling the last kilometer a jog would be a lie.
A terrible, awful lie.
"I'm trying-" Leslie paused to inhale all too deeply, hands on his knees. "To be less fat."
He hadn't received any stat points for his effort, and no Running or Sprinting skill either.
"Well, good luck with that." So saying, the store clerk went back to restocking the cold soda in the refrigerators next to the cash register.
Minutes later, when Leslie could no longer feel pain rising from deep within his lungs, he went to the back of the store. Then back to the front. Then back around the back, coming back finally with a small bag of catfood and a laser pointer.
"Ooh, gonna play with your cat tonight?" The clerk was actually pretty happy at the moment. She'd been shadowing the boy as he walked through the store and he hadn't bothered shoplifting anything!
"Nah." He handed over the money for his things. "I'm actually gonna recruit a bunch of strays to do my work for me."
The nice woman (Her name was Shannon) just stared bemusedly as he left. It was hardly the weirdest thing she'd ever seen.
And the supervillains did most of their shopping at the retail chains anyway.
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"Alright kid. This? You're gonna have to explain this." Bullock was flummoxed. Confused. Off center.
They'd gotten another nine-one-one call, seventh one today, but this one involved two things that managed to get everyone in the station moving all at once.
Police were canvassing the entirety of the alley the kid had been in, and Commissioner Gordon was busy talking to some paramedics.
"Well, I was in here playing with a bunch of stray cats." The kid, Leslie, waved in the general direction of the alleyway. "And then I heard a kind of fwumping noise. Like someone tossed a bag of trash in the dumpster. Except heavier? Denser maybe? Anyway I went and took a look since it scared the cats off of me. And I forgot this is Gotham."
Bullock dutifully wrote down what he heard. The kid was even using descriptions, which were going to be helpful when he had to explain this to the chief.
"Turns out it'd been a person instead of trash. Tall, but I'm not sure how tall. He was laying down and his fursuit had ears on it." There was a sharp click as the detective pushed down on his pencil hard enough to snap the lead.
"Could you repeat that last bit?" There was no way the kid had called the caped crusaders costume a-
"The fursuit? Was black and gray, had tiny little ears right on top, spray-on abs and he had a thick yellow belt. Probably full of, uh, supplies. I asked the guy if he was alive, or at least awake and he groaned. So then I asked him if he needed an ambulance." Bullock almost grinned as he wrote down what he was hearing. There was definitely going to be a copy getting passed around the bullpen tonight.
"Then this other dude drops down from a nearby building. Which is a little nuts, 'cuz the shortest apartment on one side here is four stories tall, and this giant walking slab of Mexican muscle says 'Run along, Nino. It is not wise to interfere in my affairs'. I'm talking six and a half feet tall, leather pants, leather vest and an honest to god gimp mask. With spikes."
"Can you describe the placement of the spikes, kid?" The detective needed a moment. He wanted to laugh, but that wouldn't be professional.
"Yeah. You know those dog collars drug dealers get to make their pitbull look mean? With spikes going all around it? The giant was wearing one of those around the base of his neck." The kid was fiddling with his phone as he talked. The screen looked like it was cracked to hell and back, how Leslie was using it Bullock would never know.
"Alright kid, got it. And then what happened?"
"Well, I did the smart thing and started backing away. I don't know what the beef is between furries and the BDSM guys, but I didn't want to be in the middle of it. And then I made the stupid mistake of opening my mouth." Leslie grinned sheepishly, but Bullock got the feeling this is where his headache would start.
"Alright. What'd ya say?"
"I asked him if the guy in the fursuit had hired him as a professional dom, or if he just had a thing against furries."
Bullock had to stop. This was gold, pure gold.
"So the guy says to me "Nino, I do not think you understand what is going on." and I told him "I'm thirteen. We covered this in health class.". I think he was a bit confused. Then he picked up a dumpster. I mean that literally. This dude picked up a freaking dumpster. Lifted it right over his head. He said "You should look away. This will be messy." and I guess he was right. 'Cuz he tried to turn back to the other dumpster and well... He sort of dropped it on himself?"
"An' that's when you called nine-one-one?" Bullock didn't figure there was too much else to the story. Though, that didn't explain why they'd found Bane and not Batman.
"Well, yeah. After I stopped recording." Leslie handed over his phone, the video already up and ready to play.
Bullock took it and pressed go.
It started with just a video of the kid scratching a cat under the chin, another one trying to fight for some attention and, honestly, Bullock is a little surprised. He was half expecting to see the kid torturing a cat or somethin' else grim and awful. Then there was a crash from somewhere off screen and the cats bolted off.
The kid had walked up to the dumpster, just like he said, and lyin' in there in a heap was the Batman. The kid poked him in the face a few times and asked if he was alive. When the Bat groaned and struggled to move instead of breathing out a death rattle, Bullock would admit he felt relieved.
After that, it all went just as the kid said. Down to asking those same weird questions and Bane being his usual, weirdly genteel self.
One thing the detective caught, but couldn't explain, was why he could hear Leslie snap his fingers just before Bane's legendary strength failed him.
Although it seemed the kid hadn't actually stopped recording to make a phone call, like he'd said. He was definitely sounding panicked while he was on the phone with the operator and looking over Bane to describe his injuries.
The phone was jerking around and unstable, but he could easily see it when Robin showed up, likely in the kids blindspot, and with way more ease than the detective would expect from a kid his size, carry the Bat out of the dumpster in a fireman's carry.
"Oh... That was really, really stupid." Bullock looked up when Leslie spoke, apparently as surprised as he was about the extra footage.
"Why's that?"
"The guy in the fursuit fell at least four stories. If he had a back or neck injury, that kid coulda just killed him."
"Not gonna comment on his outfit?"
"He's dressed up in every color of clay pigeon?"
The rest of Bullock's questioning was pretty standard and, after getting the kid to sign a sworn statement and getting a copy of the video he let him go.
As he was reviewing his notes an all too ugly grin spread across his face. Yeah, the commissioner might have a bit of a man-crush on the Bat Man, but everyone else in the station? They were gonna love this.
-----
Leslie stumbled home in a bit of a daze. Today had gone... Today had been... He didn't even know. He'd only completed the first four of the exercise quests, but he didn't feel motivated to do the rest. He'd picked up enough litter to cover the difference in GP, so that wasn't a total loss.
And then there was this...
---Enemy Defeated!--
--Eduardo Durrance X1!--
--You have gained 7000 XP!--
--You have gained 5000 GP!--
--You have reached Level: 6!--
--You have 25 unused stat points!--
--You have 3 unused perk points!--
All he'd done was cast Esuna. That, that was all he'd done. A half-baked idea while he was panicking.
He checked his stat page. His attributes had gone up from the minor quests he'd done, which was nice. He also had twenty-five points to distribute where he wanted. He put ten into intelligence, bringing it up to seventeen and giving him a total of sixty-five MP. Ten also went into wisdom, bringing it up to seventeen as well, which meant his MP would regenerate by seventeen percent per hour.
The other five went into vitality. With that, and the four he'd gained from the exercise quests, he had fourteen points, which equated into two-hundred and eighty HP.
He had five-thousand, nine-hundred and five GP.
He'd worry about spending it and his perk points tomorrow. Today, he needed today to be... Just not today.
AN/ I'll be posting a quick rundown of Leslie's information every five chapters. If anyone notices a discrepancy, please say so. I'm trying to keep things straight, but I'm not letting the numbers get in the way of writing a story.
Name: (????) Leslie Winters
Race: Human
Level: 6
GP: 5905
Stats-
HP: 280
MP: 65
-STR: 9
-VIT: 14
-DEX: 5
-AGI: 9
-INT: 17
-WIS: 17
-LUK: 6
Abilities:
-None!
Spells:
-Esuna (1)
Inventory:
-Skillbooks
-- Transmutation (Unread)
-Spellbooks
-- Esuna (Read)
-- Protect (Unread)
-- Cure (Unread)
Project: Gamer Ver. 2 Alpha Build 0.0.6
Disclaimer Me Do: I own nothing you recognize. And most of what you don't recognize, I still don't own.
Also, has anyone figured out where I'm pulling the spells from? It was never a popular game, at least here in the West, but it did manage to get a port and a pair of remakes.
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Compared to the sweaty, beefy Hispanic nightmare Saturday had been, Sunday was almost a disappointment.
Leslie woke up.
Had an existential crisis.
Got over it.
Burned the MP he had to get Esuna and Protect up to level four and three respectively.
Made breakfast.
(Mom's gone. Church? Should probably find out.)
And then picked up the rest of the spells he could afford from the game Shop.
Teleport had been both an offensive and utility spell in the original game, though it had a major drawback. When used by the player in the game outside of battle, it teleported the party outside the current dungeon. And left them initially on the verge of death. After leveling up it did progressively less damage to the party until it hit level sixteen and stopped harming them at all.
He needed to experiment with that. If all it did was get him out of danger, it'd be worth every scrap of effort he put into it. If it could do more than that? It would be worth the thousand GP it cost a thousand times over.
Blink was a spell that increased evasion regardless of his agility. Three hundred gp.
Shell mitigated magic damage. Another three hundred gp.
The next spell had been the source of his existential crisis earlier in the morning.
Life. It, well, it brought party members back to life. Barely, at level one, but still. It was changed a little bit to fit the current game system, restoring one point of VP per level alongside a pittance of HP... And in the flavor text for the spell it did mention that it could be cast on the recently deceased.
Death may have been a revolving door in this part of the multiverse, but it still wasn't supposed to be easy. If it ever got out what he was capable of, he doubted he'd ever be safe again.
And the final spell he purchased was Toad. With Circe hanging around in this reality and making animal-people, it might not have been an optimal choice. On the other hand, Leslie just didn't feel comfortable grabbing offensive spells that could burn, freeze or electrocute someone to death. He'd suffered all three to varying degrees in his former life. While he wouldn't say murder was off the table, he drew the line at torture.
So that was Three-thousand and six-hundred GP he was short. Unfortunately, that was the affordable half of the spell list from the game of Shadow Over Palakkia. The spell to turn flesh to stone was five-thousand GP. A spell to multiply his speed was ten-thousand. So too was the spell to multiply his strength and a curse to halve the stats of someone else. The spell that would drain the MP of others to give to him cost twenty-thousand, and one that called down Holy light to smite ghosts, ghouls, zombies and all other manner of evil was the same. Forty-thousand for the next spell, one that was pure offense.
And then the last one. It was listed at sixty-five-thousand, five-hundred and sixty-five GP. And it was important because it caused True damage.
It was also a gimmicky piece of crap that was plain-old broken on its initial release, causing five hundred damage -at best- when it was fully leveled and drawing power from a completed list of fully leveled spells.
Hilariously enough, he could actually purchase the bugged version for fifty GP.
Moving on from his growing list of books he needed to read, he also had three perk points to spend.
That had actually left Leslie stumped for a good bit. The list was legitimately massive, easily holding a few hundred different perks, modifiers and feats. Oh, what he could actually get was significantly less, being that the list was populated by trees and progression tables, but he still had to take everything into account.
He'd finally settled on getting the first part of the Bright and Shining Soul pair.
--Bright Soul--
"Power thrums from deep within your soul. Magic is a part of you, and it's a part you'll cherish, ever and always."
"MP regen +50%"
He'd also gotten the first part of the Metamagic series of perks. Everything in it was situationally useful, some more than others, but he was really after the final perk.
Entanglement.
A level twenty-five perk that would let him cast a spell or use a magical ability on the entirety of an object even if he only had a small, separated part.
But that was for later. Right now he'd have to enjoy having Metamagic: Extend, letting him either double the area of effect of applicable spells, or doubling their duration.
He'd save his final perk point for later. Nothing else really stood out except for Magically Apprenticed, but that was a level ten perk, and he was a level not-ten.
By the end of Sunday, Leslie had successfully finished reading the book on alchemy basics and the spelltomes for Life and Teleport. Everything else was still sitting in his inventory, unread and waiting. Esuna had reached level five, and was starting to critically slow down due to the minute but steadily increasing cost, and both life and teleport were sitting at an unhealthy level of four and three respectively.
Teleport, unfortunately, left him drained and exhausted but it did make for good practice with either of his two healing spells.
Thankfully, or perhaps thanklessly, Monday was more... Interesting.
Leslie had gotten up at four in the morning, got himself ready and did what he could to not be visibly disgusted at the thought of going back to middleschool. Even if only for a week before a very long summer break.
And then high school. That was... Well, he wasn't quite sure, but he had months to figure something out.
"Leslie? Sweety? Are you ready?" His- Leslie's mom yelled from down the hallway. He stopped closing the notifications that had piled up from a project while he was asleep.
Was he ready? Backpack, notebooks, pens and was he dressed? He looked down, yes he was dressed.
(A tiny ritual, just a small thing. Asking his wife if he had both of his workboots on. Never again)
"I didn't even have to get you up today! You must be so excited for summer break!" The overweight office worker handed him a bottle of pills and-
Leslie stopped listening to read the label.
Adderall. Forty pills. He held it up to a nearby light.
Half of them were missing.
"Don't forget, you need to take two of those with your lunch today and two after school." The instructions also mentioned breakfast and dinner, but she seemed to have forgotten that. Leslie self-medicating with weed was making a lot more sense now.
What was he even supposed to do with these?
'Sell them to Mrs.Kwan at lunch.' Whispered Leslie's echo from the back of his mind.
He puts it out of his mind. He puts a lot of things out of his mind. Like how uncomfortable it is to ride a city school bus again. Or that girl from the pedophile incident staring at him.
He'd already forgotten her name.
The first morning class had been Math. Half of it he'd long forgotten. The other half he could do mentally. The second class was Gym. Dodgeball with the old, heavy rubber balls.
Cure reached level two then. And the scrawny black-haired kid who'd beaned him was seriously good.
At lunch he took a detour to the art classroom. He walked out with an extra hundred dollars and a pill bottle full of candy. Both of which disappeared into his inventory as soon as he put them in his pockets.
He didn't really pay attention to what was on his lunch tray, mechanically eating instead of looking at the food. He did notice a pair of security cameras, but he didn't think much on them.
Was this seriously the life he'd been inserted into? A kid who was buying and selling drugs at school? Whose mom had probably gotten him diagnosed with attention deficit disorder so she could get free amphetamines?
He needed to find a way to deal with this. He had enough information to know that-
"You rat bastard!" Leslie started to turn around in his seat when his vision was filled with metal tray.
--Critical Hit!--
--Headshot!--
-- -50 HP!--
-- -2 VP!--
He fell to the ground, dazed and foggy. He tried to get his hands under him but a kick to the side knocked him back down.
-- -10 HP!--
"You think it's funny?! Huh?! They're sendin' my uncle to jail 'cuz of you!" Leslie found it a bit difficult to feel bad about whoever was yelling at him, seeing as they continued kicking him in the ribs.
-- -10 HP!--
-- -10 HP!--
-- -10 HP!--
Leslie tried to roll away, but just ended up hitting the table he'd been sitting at.
-- -10 HP!--
The kicking stopped, and Leslie finally managed to get a good look at who'd been trying to beat the stuffing out of him.
The gym teacher?
No, no, Mr.Kemp was holding someone. That made more sense.
Tommy! That was it! He'd been one of Leslie's friends, at the stoners house.
While he was shouting and teachers were all storming in, Leslie pulled out his phone.
"Gotham City Police Department, how may I direct your call?"
"Hi. It's Leslie again..."
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"I don't like you fighting." Karen was worried for her son. He'd been distant and sullen lately, and seemed to be getting involved with the police almost every other day. He'd been a sweet, quiet boy before but there was a sense of distance lately she just couldn't understand.
"I don't think I actually got to do any fighting." She looked over, wincing at the red mark covering more than half of his face. He was just looking straight ahead at the road, seemingly thinking about something.
She missed the days when he would tell her what that was.
"Principal Nettle said you were fighting in the cafeteria."
"And Officer Johnson said it was a clear case of assault after he pulled up the security footage." He was even talking back more lately!
She knew the teenage years were supposed to be rough, but she really didn't think it was supposed to be this bad.
She'd seen the security footage too, so she couldn't completely argue with him. She just needed to make sure he knew she didn't approve of what happened. And she wouldn't admit it out lout, but she had a hard time conveying that without sounding as though she disapproved of him, too.
"I haven't seen Tiffany come over lately. Are you and her still friends?" Leslie and she had known each other since they were just little kids! The two of them used to be inseperable.
"Don't think so." She glanced over as they pulled into their driveway. He was poking at the bruise on the side of his face. "Only person to talk to me today was Tommy."
"You should call her. Make sure she's okay after the whole... Dave... Thing." And that had been a bitter pill to swallow. She'd trusted that man, just as Tiffany's parent did and he'd... He'd...
Better not to think about it.
"She doesn't want to talk to me." Leslie reached back, grabbing his backpack. "And I'm not going to push it."
He was the first out of the car, stumbling slightly when he fully stood up but pushing on with a minor limp. She was right behind him a moment later. Close enough to hear him exhale heavily in frustration when he tried the door and found it locked.
She'd never given him his own key.
"Well I still think you should call her. After everything, this can't be easy for her. Maybe she's just waiting for you to talk to her first?" She unlocked the door and stepped in.
Too dark. Too cold. Too quiet. Days like these, she missed her husband more and more. Especially with Leslie growing up and seeming more and more like him every day. He'd been another victim of that damned clown. Another smiling face among countless others.
"Then she can wait." She winced at how cold he sounded, saying that. "If she needs an emotional support pet, I know a lot of very friendly cats. Otherwise my ribs are busted and I'm not up to listening to people complain about what they won't fix."
He brought his hand up next to his ear and snapped his fingers as he passed by her. She felt something strange in the air, almost warm and comforting before it was gone in an instant. Karen stared as he closed his bedroom door behind him.
Something was very wrong with her son. He'd never said a bad word about that girl in the past.
She hoped he'd come around, maybe she just needed to give him some time.
-----
He breathed out heavily once he was back in Leslie's room.
Five in. Five out.
Stop. Pause. Think. Do.
He needed to stop -Reacting- and calm down. He was stressed, and he was getting pissy and short tempered.
That was fantastic when he wanted to ruin things and hammer his way into the heart of the matter, but it was distinctly unhelpful in literally every other situation.
He breathed in again and then sighed explosively as he sat down on the bed. Everything draining out of him and leaving a hollow, empty feeling in his chest.
Pause. Put what he's doing, what he's thinking on hold for a moment. He pushed down the subject of Leslie's stoner friends. Former friends. Whatever.
Shoved aside the discomfort of being in someone else's life. The kid may have agreed to the Fae deal that had him stuck here, but that was an entirely separate issue.
For a brief moment he pondered about Terra and the incomprehensible things watching from the dark. Were they amused? Bored? Flipping to a different gamer channel?
Inconsequential. Worrying about what he couldn't impact would just pile on even more stress.
Alright. Okay. He was good now. He was in control now.
He needed to think. He needed to either integrate himself into Leslie's life, or he needed to get out.
Getting out was looking more and more tempting. He needed a plan for that.
He had healing magic. He had a plan for that. He just needed a safe way to market that. Either it or transmutation would see his financial issues resolved.
Hiding away to practice was looking less and less viable, too. He'd already had plot literally drop in on him.
He didn't want to throw his lot in with the heroes, not directly. They put in a lot of work to keep the world turning, sure, but it wasn't getting any better. It might've had something to do with the fact that most of the heroes worked off of physical superiority and most of the individuals who had brains were also infected with stupid-evil.
No, no, he had to stop that. Social commentary could wait. He needed to figure himself out first. He just, he needed more time.
--Quest Alert!--
--Your party member: Kay-Tee the cat has been captured!--
--Save her or let her suffer a violent death!--
--Time Limit: 12:00:00--
--Reward: 4000 GP!--
No, that was the opposite of what he needed!
"Son of a bitch!"
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Disclaimer Me Do: I own nothing you recognize. And most of what you don't recognize, I still don't own.
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Leslie's game system allowed for a party limit of six. Himself, and five other people or potentially self-animated things. Such as robots and golems, though he had no idea where to find either of those without potentially making them himself.
Before the Bane incident, he'd found a handful of older looking stray cats and used a laser pointer to make them attack the 'Accept' button for his party invites. He might have some serious qualms about casual murder, but he wasn't going to complain about cats being cats and decimating the local vermin populace.
It had honestly worked out pretty decently. Those five cats had, over the last two days, gotten him a solid amount of experience and another thousand GP in dead rodents, birds and various small insects.
Their success rate was curiously high, but he attributed that to the cats all being level six and drastically outperforming the other nearby animals now.
And now, two days later, one of those stray cats had been captured by parties unknown and was apparently going to die.
He was... Not entirely sure what he was expected to do about that. He had no actionable information, such as a guilty party or even a general location.
"Map?" Did nothing.
"Locate Party?" Also did nothing.
"Highlight party?" Still did nothing.
"Settings." This did something! Dozens of screens popped into existence with large, flashing warning signs in red and his ears were filled with screeching static! The volume got progressively louder and louder until putting his hands over his ears did nothing to help. The pressure continued mounting, ever more painful until-
-- -5 VP!--
--ERROR! System settings has crashed!--
--A defect ticket has been automatically generated.--
--Please contact your local administrator if you need further assistance.--
Leslie cast Life on himself twice, restoring the lost VP and burning eight MP. There wasn't much he could do about the blood leaking out of his ears, nose, his eyes...
Actually there was. He checked to make sure Leslie's mom wasn't in the hallway and he cleaned that up in the bathroom.
Awesome. Great. Not doing that again.
"Alright. Eleven hours and change left. I... Got nothing." He wasn't a detective of any measure and his people skills were poor.
Leslie began pacing around his room. He wouldn't know the first thing about interrogating people who'd been near the alleyways he'd picked up his party of strays, so that wouldn't work. He didn't have any training in picking apart a crime scene quickly, so he wouldn't be divining any... Answers.
"Shop." He demanded suddenly.
He'd been working at a specific plan, but he knew he was handicapping himself to follow it. He didn't have to stick to a single source of magic. It was a universal toolbox! Not just a means of healing and fighting.
Wasn't that why he'd picked up the Transmutation skill in the first place?
And now he had eight hours to learn how to use Scrying.
No pressure.
-----
Robin watched the warehouse in the docks from a building almost two blocks away. There had been a growing number of reports of break-ins, muggings and beatings in the area. Nothing abnormal had been stolen, no chemicals, not a rash of jewelry heists which left everything -except- diamonds untouched. Not even fertilizer.
Just cash and shiny, hard to move valuables that professional thieves wouldn't bother with.
After two weeks of collating reports and tracking suspects, they'd found that those were minor thieves, debt collectors and leg-breakers working for a larger, though still minor, organization.
Current intelligence suggested it was a small offshoot of the Falcone crime family. Either a younger family member or mid-level boss trying to open up a new income avenue.
The Junior caped crusader hadn't managed to get inside to take pictures or collect evidence yet, but he had seen a lot of kennels, cages and cat carriers being brought in. Bruce's contact in the police department had confirmed there had been a recent spike in missing animal reports, but they were too swamped with violent crimes to dedicate any resources to it.
In short, a gambling den focused on dog-fights.
Robin zoomed in, snapping pictures of people either entering or exiting the building. He stopped and stared for a moment after he caught someone in frame wearing a blue hoodie, welding goggles of all things and a blue surgical mask.
He scrolled back. Somehow that person had appeared in the millisecond between photos he'd been taking of the bouncer.
Robin zoomed back in. The two were talking, he thought. The bouncer definitely was. Robin started to move when the overweight man pulled a pistol out of his jacket, but froze when the man disappeared, his clothes and gun dropping to the ground.
The person in the hoodie reached down, into the pile of clothes and pulled out a -Robin zoomed in closer- toad of all things. He hadn't been able to see earlier with the persons hands in their pockets, but he was wearing gloves.
He did something with the gun, too. Causing it and the mans clothing to just disappear before he stuffed the toad in his hoodie. With the bouncer out of the way and the evidence -disappeared- the person strolls right into the building.
Robin hesitates for only a moment, stuck between the decision to follow the metahuman vigilante and Bruce's orders to hang back until he was healed enough to take the lead.
It barely took a second for him to choose to scale the building and follow the man in blue.
Robin's in fantastic shape and trained incredibly well, but two city blocks is still a good distance to travel.
He was expecting chaos and mayhem when he got to the warehouse, but all he can hear is the thumping bass of music from inside. No screaming or gunshots.
He doesn't know if that's worse.
A side door that he knew had been guarded earlier is cracked open, yellow light splashing across the dim alley. Robin creeps next to it, straining his ears to listen over the thum-thump-thumping of the tasteless, soulless music.
"-Sh-sh-sh-sh-shh, it's okay. I've got you." Can barely be heard, muddled with the hissing and whimpering of too many animals for Robin to make out. He pushed the door open a bit more to get a look inside.
Blue hoodie is in the room, unharmed, and sitting on the floor next to him is an animal carrier with easily half a dozen toads, likely more. He's talking at the animals, but most of them remain absolutely terrified.
Robin starts taking pictures. Batman will want to build a profile on this new meta, and he'll want everything the boy wonder had seen and then some.
"A-a-a-nd next up to face our reigning champ-" Robin watches Blue rush to the door, placing himself just behind where it would open. "-we'll have the Bitch of Birmingham! One of our newest acquisitions, see how she fights to protect her litter!"
"...Hey Larry! Larry?! Idiot's probably taking a smoke folks! Daryl, Murry, go get the bitch! And grab the dog while you're at it!" Robin pulls back, cutting down his vision but hiding him in the dark.
The first man to enter the room, obscuring Blue behind the door, is tall and lanky with straw colored hair and cigarette stained lips. The second one is shorter, burlier and wearing a ball-cap for the Metropolis football team.
They both spot the side door that's cracked open and start heading towards it, but the door into the main building shuts silently. They don't even see Blue before they're both a pile of clothes on the ground. It's a matter of moments before the meta has another pair of toads in hand, and shortly after has them put in the animal carrier with the rest.
Looking at it, Robin wonders if the announcer is the only member of the staff who's still human.
For however little that's worth.
An instant later and the piles of clothing have disappeared too.
Blue continues to walk around the room, making a bag of dog food disappear just like the clothes. Then he does the same to various empty kennels. Soon enough the room is basically bare but for the occupied cages.
"Sorry folks! It looks like we're having some technical difficulties. If you'll all hang tight for a minute, I'll go get this sorted personally!" Once more at the announcers words Blue hides himself behind the door.
Moments later, this appears to have been a good idea. The announcer, a fat redheaded man, slams through the door with a pump shotgun in his hands and a wild look in his eyes. Robin can see it when he notices the missing cages and the door that's propped open.
"One of you bastards grow a conscience? That it?!" He's heading for the open door, moving faster than Robin was expecting.
He starts to scramble out of the way when he knows he's been seen. The announcer fires off a shot, blasting the door open. Robin hears the ker-chick of the shotgun being reloaded and dives for cover, but then it gets quiet.
He manages to take a look from beside a dumpster.
Blue is pulling a toad out of the announcers emptied clothes. The shotgun and clothing disappearing an instant later.
Robin is looking directly into his eyes. He's staring back. Probably. Robin can't actually see behind the welding goggles.
And then he slams the door. Robin tries it, but the door is locked. He runs, trying to get to the front of the building when he hears gunshots and people start screaming, running through it in a panic.
By the time Robin can get into the building, Blue is gone. So is the safe.
And so are the animals.
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Disclaimer Me Do: I own nothing you recognize. And most of what you don't recognize, I still don't own.
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"Hello?" It had been a bit of a trick, but Leslie managed to swipe answer on his phone one-handed.
"WHERE ARE YOU?!"
"Hi Karen!"
"Leslie Anthony Winters, you tell me right this instant where you are!"
"I'm about... Fifteen minutes outside of Hartford." And it'd taken two hours to get even this far!
"Hart? Hartford?! What are you doing in Hartford?! How did you even get to Hartford?"
"Well, in the order you asked, this is the only place I could find that had an animal shelter that specialized in abused animals. And I got here by stealing a car." He looked up, squinted a moment, and then turned on his right turn signal. This was his exit after all.
"You turn right around this instant young man!"
"I can't."
"What do you mean you can't?!"
"U-turns are illegal, don't you know that?"
"Leslie Winters!"
"Relax. I've got the owner in the car with me."
"Put him on the phone!"
"I can't."
"What do you- Leslie!"
"He's in the trunk."
For the next few moments the only thing he could hear was half-started words and heavy breathing.
"Leslie. Sweety. What in the nine hells has gotten into you?!"
"Well, depending on what you want, I've got two possible answers for you. So, what are we shooting for? Comfortable lie, or really, really unpleasant truth?"
"This isn't a game, Leslie!"
"I mean, you're not just a little bit wrong. You're a whole lot wrong."
"Goddamnit Leslie, do you have any idea how much trouble you're in?"
"Huh. You sound like my mom."
"What? Leslie, I am your mom!"
"Yeah... About that. You remember I mentioned a really unpleasant truth?" This was every kind of a bad idea. Unfortunately, the right thing often is.
"Leslie, what? Leslie, what's going on?"
"It's Tuesday by now, right? Well... About Five days ago, Leslie decided he was going to... He chose to kill himself."
"If this is some kind of joke, I am not laughing mister." She sounded confused, maybe just a little desperate.
"Really wish it was. On the other side he met someone who made him a deal. Not sure what the right title for it is. Goddess, Titan, Eldritch half-wit. You'd have to ask Wonder Woman which is appropriate. Bitch is called Gaia, if you're curious." Leslie flipped back over to his directions and made a left turn. "Way she told me, she did a little imaginative filing and got the suicide erased, but she got to use his body for her own project."
"And... What? You were just waiting to, to puppet my sons body? Is that it? Some, some disgusting body snatching-"
"I'm gonna cut you off right there. Real simple reason Karen. I want to be here about as much as you want me here. I was dead and ready to pass on when Gaia got a bug up her ass about making a champion, or avatar, or whatever word she wants to use instead of -Victim-." There were two cars in the parking lot when he pulled in to the shelter. Which was good, he didn't want to have to wait.
"My, my boy. My baby boy..." She was sobbing on her end. Leslie couldn't blame her, his eyes were burning too.
"I can't offer a whole lot of advice Karen. I... Can't even begin to tell you how sorry I am. For this, for the last few days, for your son. I-"
"Shut up! Just shut up!"
He just sits there and silently lets her cry and scream over the phone.
"...I need to hear it. I need to hear his voice. I want..."
"...What do you need me to say?"
"I'm sorry mom. I love you. Just, I need, one more time. Please."
"...I'm sorry mom. I love you."
-----
AN/ I was going to make this a bigger chapter. Whole scene with Batman and Robin planned. I just didn't feel it appropriate to go back into silly notes after that.
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Disclaimer Me Do: I own nothing you recognize. And most of what you don't recognize, I still don't own.
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Donald wasn't sure of many things right this moment.
He didn't know where he was.
He didn't know the time.
He didn't know the day.
He didn't even know if he was human.
What he did know is that it was currently dark and pleasantly cool wherever he was. The vibrations that had been running through his body were uncomfortable, but he'd gotten used to it.
But everything changed suddenly. He could feel himself being moved, jostling against the others.
And then he was falling! He was crying in distress, and so too were his fellows. The ground was uncomfortable, rough and cold where before it had been smooth and cool.
Suddenly things changed! The ground became painfully hard, and the others (They had names! He could remember names!) were a tangled, jumbled pile of naked flesh and limbs.
"Mornin' gents." Donald looked up, someone was standing in front of their dozen strong pile of writhing, struggling men. He had to pull someone's elbow out of his kidney before he could really get a good look.
The kid, and it was definitely a kid, he was just a little too short and his voice a bit too high, was just casually standing there in a pair of ratty jeans, a dark blue hoodie and the dumbest looking goggles Donnie had ever seen.
"The hell'd you do to us!" Larry had finally pulled himself free and rolled off of Murry to stand up and try to menace the kid.
A little difficult when he's hunched over and holding his wedding tackle, but still, the man tried.
"One of you grabbed the wrong cat. I came to get 'er and one of your boys thought it'd be smart to pull a gun on me." Donnie doesn't know how, or why, but a dozen pairs of pants drop into the kids outstretched arms. Then shirts, socks, shoes... The underwear just drops straight to the ground though.
"You have any idea who we are, punk? Who you're messing with?" Giuseppe was practically yelling before he'd even gotten up.
Thinking on it, Donnie figures he would'a been on door duty.
"Jesse, shut it!" Paulie is pulling himself out from the bottom of the group, the red on the man's face would put a tomato to shame. Either the man is furious...
Or he got a wiener in the eye.
The kid just leans back against a brick wall, apparently he'd done whatever he'd done with all of 'em in an alley. Donnie thinks he might know where it is.
"Kid. You got a name?" Paul is getting his pants on while he asks, apparently deciding to just go with things.
"Alchemist."
"Alchemist. Alright. Whatever you want it to be. On behalf of myself and my boys here, I would like to apologize for bothering you." Donnie has to stare at Paulie when he says that. This guy storms their operation, catches all of 'em with their pants down and...
Suddenly, what Paulie's doing is making a lot more sense.
"I'd say we're even." The kid, Alchemist, is looking over the now much more clothed and subdued group. "Your guns and the take are at the bottom of the bay. Next time I have to come asking after my property, let's not do this again."
The boys are digging through their pockets, checking phones and wallets when the kid speaks up again.
"Who drives the '97 Ford, the green one?" Donald raised his hand. He wasn't proud of having the oldest car of the group, but he was trying to save up, send his girl to school.
He almost fumbles when the keys hit him in the stomach.
"Oughtta be a full tank of gas." The kid just waves and then... Disappears. Donnie's staring at where he had been, and he knows he ain't the only one.
"Yeah, like that ain't just goddamn terrifying." It takes Donnie a moment before he realizes it's Paulie talking.
"What the hell?! Why'd you apologize to 'im boss?" Giuseppe is getting into the smaller man's face. Right up until he's falling flat on his ass, his nose busted and bleeding.
"I tell you to start talkin' Jesse?" Paulie pulled a phone out of his pocket and pressed speed dial.
There's only one person he'd be calling after a night like that.
"Hey honey?"
...There's only two people he'd be calling after a night like that.
-----
Batman reads over the reports Robin had brought him. He'd done a passable job reviewing the warehouse where the dogfighting had been happening.
He'd only failed to take pictures of a few locations Batman needed to see. A vast improvement from his earlier days, and likely it would continue to improve as the young man got more experience.
None of the mobsters had shown up in missing persons reports, either on Tuesday or today. One young man had been reported as a runaway yesterday, but against organized crime or the likes of The Joker or Two-Face, he just couldn't dedicate any time to tracking down hormonal teenagers.
"Incoming Call" The computer terminal announced. The geographic ID for the source indicated it was coming from Washington, D.C.
Batman pressed enter, accepting the call. He waited one heartbeat, then two.
"Who is this?"
"Uh, Sir? Batman? Sir? It's, uh, it's Janice. From the Hall of Justice? We got a letter for you and, uh, we think it's a code but it doesn't match any of the normal profiles." Batman almost grinned. Almost. The poor girl sounded terrified.
"Send me a copy." He could hear her clicking a few things through their connection and moments later he could see the words 'File received' onscreen. "Janice. Good work."
The caped crusader disconnected immediately. If this was another threat, or if Calendar Man had come up with a new cipher it would require his immediate attention.
It was, probably, neither of those things.
'To: Dumpster diver in bat condition
Saw you take a tumble over the weekend.
Wanted to offer help, but had to leave when I saw the Bane of my existence.
Left a little present to help Clean his conscience.
Still sore? Give me a call and we'll work things out.'
It had no signature, but it did include a phone number. One with an area code that would indicate northern Gotham.
That could potentially be a feint, Nygma could easily have come up with such a plan. On the other hand, if he had, the letter would have been much less obvious.
Frankly put, that was the most vexing part. The letter simply didn't match the complexity Gotham's villains worked at. The closest could have potentially been Catwoman, but she would have added several layers of innuendo referencing her Kitty multiple times.
The dark knight read the letter again, and then a third time for good measure. Nothing changed, nothing new stood out. It read like it had been dumbed down as much as possible while still maintaining the presumption of subtlety.
Batman actually felt a little bit insulted.
That didn't stop him from setting up a private network and creating a temporary number. If there was a new force in Gotham, he needed to know.
The phone rang once.
Twice.
A third time.
"Hello?" The person who picked up sounded young.
Another kid, then.
"I received your letter." Batman wasn't sure what he was hearing in the background. It was a series of short clicks before shifting to one long tone and then back to clicks.
"Oh! Bart! Awesome." Really? "How've you been?"
"What is it that you want? Why were you trying to contact me?"
"Nah, I'm at the library right now. Give me just a second and I'll get somewhere more private." The Batman resisted the urge to sigh. This. This was why he was adamant about the Justice League actually doing some form of training.
The trace running in the background confirmed the boys statement.
"Alright. Looks clear. I'm a healer."
"You're a... What?" There was no way someone had gotten it into their head to just advertise that fact.
"Healer. Broken people, I can fix 'em. Why do you think Mucho-Muscles lost his mojo? Cleaned the poison out of his system at range." Bruce could hear the kid flipping through papers before he made a dissatisfied sound. "You need some help, give me a call. We'll call that first time a consultation. Just give me a time and place and an hour heads up."
And then, the kid hung up.
Bruce was bemused. On the one hand, he had a kid claiming to be a healer of some sort. On the other, that same kid was claiming he'd weaponized that ability to take down what was possibly one of the most dangerous mercenaries outside of Deathstroke on Earth.
He had a few options on how to play this out, but all of them relied on information. To that end, he picked up his league communicator.
"J'onn? Something's come up and I could use your assistance. Here are the details..."
