170 The End of Fate

I-5, Oregon, December 26th, 16:14.

"𝘐'𝘷𝘦 𝘢𝘤𝘤𝘦𝘱𝘵𝘦𝘥 𝘮𝘺 𝘰𝘸𝘯 𝘍𝘢𝘵𝘦, 𝘩𝘢𝘷𝘦 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘢𝘤𝘤𝘦𝘱𝘵𝘦𝘥 𝘺𝘰𝘶𝘳𝘴?"

Across the country, thousands of people heard the woman's words from her broadcasted trial. The only ones she spoke at all, not that the trial was a particularly long one.

It took less than half an hour for Selene to be sentenced to the Birdcage after she entered the courtroom, and that is where she is now, in the back of a transport vehicle, covered shoulder to toe in containment foam and completely alone.

Yet, in the dark hold of the transport van, the woman, who seemed as if she was sleeping, abruptly snaps her eyes open, looking about the room as if she can see clearly despite the dark.

Slowly, a grin starts to form on her face, growing until it shows too many teeth as she suddenly 𝘣𝘶𝘳𝘴𝘵𝘴 into laughter. Her hysterical, 𝘮𝘢𝘥 cackles echo around the room, and if not for the foam holding her down, it's clear that she would have fallen to the floor, unable to control her body with the sheer 𝘦𝘶𝘱𝘩𝘰𝘳𝘪𝘢 running through her veins.

However, as she is laughing maniacally, something else strange seems to start happening, her face starts twitching, changing. Minute changes to her facial structure, becoming less aloof and more childish, seeming to de-age from her thirties to her early twenties until it is no longer Selene sitting in the dark, instead, it's-

-Me!~ A surprise Clown!~ Nyahahaha!~

Calming down from my joy, I finish transforming back into my normal body, and flex my neglected blood, spilling it out of my body and rotating it to shred through the foam containing me.

The first thing I do is some stretches, enjoying the way my bones crack at the return of flexibility. Then I simply walk to the front of the transport, the wall that separate's my carriage from my drivers.

Closing my eyes once more, I focus my senses on the two men up front, and in a sudden movement, I drive both of my hands like spears through the middle of the separating wall.

Metal creaks and startled shouts are let out as I rip the steel wall open like it's paper, sticking my head through with a smile, my glowing eyes filled with mirth.

"Surprise!?~" I yell before climbing through the newly made hole, quickly snapping both of their necks in the same movement that I roll forward into the front carriage, ending on my back with my feet on the windscreen, "are you surprised?~"

My two new friends unfortunately ignore my question, while I wriggle and maneuverer my body so that I am upright, letting out some blood to push the pedal so the truck doesn't slow down and another tendril of blood for the steering wheel.

"I mean, of course you are,~ you don't need to be shy to admit it, I did a pretty good job with my acting I think, though it was pretty hard to pretend to be a Stranger,~" I admit as I rip the passenger's arm off and take a bite, "I mean, it's not like I can turn invisible or anything."

I pause to take another bite as I check our surroundings, thankful for tinted windows.

"So to do the whole disappearing act I just had to run away really fast whenever someone turned their back y'know?~" I ask as I notice a sign for Salem coming up, "but I think it was worth it, like, I originally just planned to show up and pick a fight, kinda like back with Extinction- Oh! That reminds me, I need to redo my tattoos. Eh, I'll do it later.~"

I take another bite, and then another before speaking again as I take my spot sitting between the two corpses, using my blood to make a comfy seat in the middle.

"But then I got an idea right?~ And honestly I just wanted to see if I 𝘤𝘰𝘶𝘭𝘥, y'know? But as fun as it was, I feel so 𝘱𝘦𝘯𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘧𝘶𝘤𝘬 𝘜𝘗!~ Like, I've been walking 'round talking like some fuckin' old lady, and I've hardly even killed anyone! Well, except for everyone in the PRT building, but that was only one time so it hardly counts."

The turnoff for Salem comes up and I slam on the gas right before I would have passed it, using some more blood to change gears as I pick up speed. The escort trucks immediately start blaring their sirens at me, turning to chase.

"Shame I didn't get to fight Poe though, but it's not that big a deal, he's probably only about as strong as Extinction anyway, stronger thanks to his better control I guess, but his whole thing was gravity y'know?"

Some of my blood digs through the floor of the van before detaching and digging into the road. The moment before the van behind me is on top of it, my blood extends into a spike half as tall as the van.

"I feel like the fight would have just been him throwing me around for a while 'till I got a good hit in," I say as the van behind me crashes into my blood and dents inwards, the engine getting completely ruined in the process, "though I guess it'd be fun fucking up the city as we fight, seeing how much collateral I could force him to make. Heh, that'd definitely have been funny.~"

We hit Salem proper going far faster than is recommended for driving in a city, so it comes as no surprise to me when I find myself unable to properly make a turn, so I just don't bother trying and ram the armoured transport straight into some variety vegetable store.

At least, that's what I assume it was since there was an unnecessary number of cabbages lining the front stalls.

But cabbage stalls and mere brick walls are nothing on seven and a half tonnes of steel moving fast enough to be speeding on a highway.

Luckily for me, I can brace myself by making a cocoon of blood around me to absorb the impact. Unfortunately for my companions, they lack that ability, and end up snapping their necks against the windscreen.

Good job it's bulletproof, otherwise they would have gotten their blood all over the fresh fruits.

"But really, there will be plenty of times to have fun fights like that later, and I can always just come back to kick his ass at some point, so I'm not really put out by it," I say as I finish the arm and kick the driver's side door off it's hinges, "thanks for the ride!~ I'll be seein' ya!~"

With one last wave, I hop out of the transport and walk through the broken building, changing my face back to Selene's all the while ignoring the flickering lights and water dripping from the ceiling until I am out the front door and greeted by a crowd a few dozen strong, all staring at the scene, some with their phones out.

The crowd lets out a gasp as they see me, understandably afraid of a cape dressed in an orange jump suit, but I hardly even have any blood on me, so I'm basically harmless looking.

However, it seems that I'm in luck as there are a group of girls that seem to have been doing some shopping before I arrived, and I walk up to them with a smile.

None of them move, seemingly frozen in fear like a bunch of pussies.

"Thanks for the donation,~" I say as I liberate a pair of bags from them, quickly turning to walk away as I rifle through for some decent clothes to wear.

It only takes about half an hour from then before I arrive at the local arcade, dressed in a nice white woollen blouse and tight black jeans, as well as a new face.

Well, that was fun.

Now, if I'm not forgetting anything, it's time to go abroad!

I've never been abroad, but I hear it's good to travel, so I'm looking forward to it. Broadening my horizons and all that, not that my first stop will have a lot of culture to explore.

Unless I'm being racist again, but it just doesn't really seem like the kind of place that can have a lot of depth to it.

It's only as I'm walking through the Door to Boston that I remember that I actually 𝘥𝘰 have something else to do, and I hurriedly move to a different Door and arrive in Columbus.

The walk from there to James' place is conveniently short, and a simple flash of my eyes is basically a free pass through any doors so no one stops me as I start wondering through the halls that seem even longer and more complex than last time.

Seriously, I know James isn't hardworking enough to be expanding this much, so I assume it's just King having fun. Ah well, the more money he makes the more expensive shows we can make.

However, when I kick open the door to his office and personal lab, instead of being greeted with cheers and celebration as I had expected, I am greeted by a fist to the face.

The impact of the strike sounds out like a gunshot, shortly followed by the sound of my back impacting the opposite wall and cracking it.

Now that was just rude.

Sliding down from my place imbedded in the wall, I land on my feet without a scratch and turn glowing red eyes to the woman who punched me, idly noting that she's stronger than last time. Not a massive difference, but it's noticeable.

As soon as she sees my eyes, Queen's expression turns to one of deep regret and a fear that only grows when instead of yelling at her, I 𝘴𝘮𝘪𝘭𝘦.

Kicking off from the wall with far greater speed than her own blow, I return the favour by slamming my own fist into her face, controlling my strength to not kill her. Not that it stops her body from flying further into the room.

However, before she can even reach James' desk, I chase after her body and grab her leg, dislocating it as I force her momentum to a stop before rising her leg and rapidly lowering it, effectively forcing her to flip over so that I can busy my knee in her gut, knocking the air out of her lungs and making her spit out saliva.

To finish things, before the force of my knee strike finishes going through her body, I spin and roundhouse kick her airborne body right in the ribs, cracking a few of them and launching her body into a waiting sofa, whereupon she crashes into it's backseat and flips it over.

"Four out of ten, didn't stick the landing,~" I say before turning to James with a grin that makes him put down his pen with a sigh, just in time for my body to come flying over his desk to tackle him in a big ol' hug, "my darling boy!~ It's so good to see you!~ How are things?~ How is Chibi?~ Are you getting along well?~ Doing fun science stuff together?~"

As it seems, the answer too all of those questions seems to just be 'fine' which is rather all encompassing.

Teenagers.

With a roll of my eyes and a promise to visit again, I soon leave James be and move to where I can hear Riley talking.

This time, when I burst into the room I am not assaulted by violence, but the celebration I was looking for.

"Mommy!" Riley cheers out as she runs up to me, jumping to wrap me in a hug, which I return after catching her excitable little form, "you're back!"

It seems rather superfluous to say, but I guess it would make sense if she has a slight case of abandonment issues.

"Sure am!~ I wanted to see what you've done with the toys I sent you?~" I had to convince her that the goblins aren't real and that they merely simulate emotions and don't actually feel them in order to get around her weird sense of morals.

Otherwise I doubt she'd have been so happy to install an anti-suicide feature to them.

Oh shit, that reminds me of something else I was forgetting.

I'll ask about it later, I wanna see me some goblins.

"I think you'll like it! They are very interesting, their biology is so 𝘸𝘩𝘪𝘮𝘴𝘪𝘤𝘢𝘭 I love it!" Riley says as she hops over to what she was talking with before I arrived, and I vaguely recognise it to be the sex toy thing I grabbed first, "meet the new and improved Polka! I did what you wanted, but then I thought I could do more, and at first I just fixed it up a little to extend it's shelf-life, but then I found out it could excrete this slime-like substance and turned that into an ability to generate acid, and 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘯 used that as a base to make it capable of breathing 𝘧𝘪𝘳𝘦! Like a Dragon!"

....What?

As Riley goes on to explain all the modifications she did, including such highlights as rotary saw blades that can come out of it's back to honest to god finger-guns, I can only lament that leaving a Tinker alone for too long with a simple task is clearly not a good idea.

I just didn't want the thing to kill itself, I wasn't looking for a mini war machine!

Ah well, kids will be kids I guess. I'm just glad she's enjoying herself, and I like listening to her talk so happily about this stuff, so I don't mind.

It ends up taking her multiple hours to finish excitedly listing all the changes she's made, not just to Polka, but to all the other goblins, all of whom can now speak as well and are surprisingly well behaved.

Then again, considering their experiences, I doubt it should be much of a surprise.

In the end, she finishes her triad with a question that I saw coming from a mile away.

"Can I keep one?" She asks with a lethal pair of puppy-dog eyes, and I am pretty sure she's done some surgery on herself to make her puppy-dog eyes even more effective, not that I was ever going to say no.

"Of course you can darling.~"

"Yay!" She yells out as she leaps at me, wrapping me in another hug.

"But while I'm here, I was wondering if you could do something else for me?" I ask while stroking her hair, and she wiggles until she can point her head up at me from my stomach, tilting it slightly in question, "I was wondering if you could install some kind of device in my brain that would stop people from being capable of Mastering me?"

I'm like, seventy percent sure I'm mostly safe from being Mastered anyway, but there's no reason to play those odds when I can get a safety blanket.

"Oh sure! I already came up with something for that back when, uhm, back, you know." Her tone abruptly stops being so joyous as memories of the Nine come back to her, and I cringe slightly at the result of my words.

"Wanna go get some ice cream?" I suggest, changing the subject with the second thing that came to mind, and once she nods into my stomach I pick her up, hoisting her into a bridal carry with a smile, "let's just find one of James' subordinates to rob first, I don't have any cash on me."

My words cause Riley to let out a cute little giggle, even though I was being completely serious, and all is right in the world.

=================

A/N: He~llo! Dear readers!

Hahahahahahaha get fucked all of you! Hashtag StayMad+L+Ratio

So, there is no grand fight between Poe and Lusia, which was Literally the entire reason I had her go to Oakland in the first fucking place. She was supposed to go there, pick a fight, get thrown through a few buildings and fuck up the city, cripple poe and then leave.

But noooooo, I had to get 𝘪𝘥𝘦𝘢𝘴.

Ah well, next chapter should be a prelude to some intense fighting to make up for it, but knowing me that means that it will be delayed by another half dozen fucking chapters :(

Also, in all seriousness, I did the first poe chap with the intention of selene being lusia, then by the third I wanted to make selene her own character, but then I'd have to come up with an explination for what lusia would be doing for a month and I just couldn't do that

Also, FumiXi you are a real one fr fr, I feel like I've hit a milestone by getting my first ever fanart (you didn't say you made it but I'm like 90% sure you did) so thanks for that! I'll post it again here :) ....unless I forget. It's already in the discord tab for art and pics relating to the fic :)

(5+)Advanced chapters with the links below!

pat/reon.com/user?u=41732867 (get rid of the first slash or check the description)

Also, join the discord with this invite code! Pj3Dttwses