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Reap What You Sow

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Side Chapter: Reap What You Sow

It's funny. All of this really started with you, Gabe.

You tried to do the right thing by your family. You were struggling, your world centred around your two boys. _Hero Taco_wasn't doing so well and you were in desperate need of a fresh start. The Gene Stealers approached you and you took their offer. But then that world got bigger. You 'adopted' another son, Caleb Hale. He opened your eyes. Made you aware that there was a whole world around you that your actions were impacting. You were never a villain. You weren't even misguided. You were the hero of your own story. It just so happens that sometimes, heroes have to make tough choices and someone has to get hurt. It's even worse when we're forced to make those tough choices.

As I stand now on the western shore of West California Island in the wake of Mary's psychic scream, I can't help but reflect on those tough choices.

It was never a question of whether or not I would take this mission. It had to happen. That much was certain. When the request came to help shepherd your broken soul through this chaos, I had to heed the call. Naturally Rhiannon asked in the most chaotic and obnoxious way but she always had more foresight that Arcturus and perhaps even some of the gods of this universe. Despite being the Hound of Destruction, she cares deeply for the people whom are hurt from all the pain and suffering she causes. The mask of the puckish destroyer she puts on hides her true feelings. Knowing that the gods were likely to destroy the souls of people like you - those infected by the Gene Stealers and whom they could not 'see' - she negotiated for my interference. I'm honestly surprised she even knew who I was.

That aside, I heeded the call. At first, my role was just to help you recover. But as with what happened with you, things quickly spiralled out of control.

Guys like us, we can't just sit around and watch people suffer. We have to do something about it. That's why you approached Caleb that first time he stopped in front of your shop, wasn't it? You saw he was hurting and went to help him. This world was hurting. It helped that Arcturus had his own plans in motion and he was the one that suggested I mobilise alongside Gwen to fight the Genesians. At the time, it wasn't obvious why he had promoted us from coma nurses to active superheroes but I wasn't arguing. It was a chance to activate AEGIS.

You wouldn't know this but I brought the furs into this universe. Bizarre, I know, and frankly most people won't believe me. I don't think Caleb even really believed me when I told him. The gods of your universe are, frankly, fickle and irresponsible. Two of them got into a fight and brought about the apocalypse all because of an 'accident'. The entire dragon race had to be sacrificed in one of their ill-fated attempts to stop the end of the world. I guess that's the thing about having omniscience; you get to know when you'll die.

That's a theme that'll reoccur, by the way; foreknowledge and trust.

When people know how they'll end, they'll either approach it in one of two ways: they'll do whatever they can to fight it or they'll accept it. There's no hard and fast rule to say which way someone will tackle this conundrum. Sometimes even the most experienced and most powerful of deities will say 'I'm too powerful to succumb to my fate. I'll fight it!' and ultimately end up fulfilling the prophecy. Then there are the young and inexperienced who will shrug and say 'so be it but I'll make the time I have left worth it'. Then there are the cases where it's the other way around; the old and experienced accept their fate and the bold and young decide to fight it.

Sadly, the gods of the fur-universe decided to do whatever they could to fight their fate and ended up killing billions.

That massive amount of death is what attracted the attention of one of my fellow No ones, N9 the Neutral. He told me about about what was happening and brought the case to the rest of the No Ones. We argued for a while about what to do. Eventually, I stepped in and gave the furs an 'out'.

Before you say anything, think of the composition of your universe like cells in a huge body. Every cell is a different universe with its own rules, own people and own singular timeline. Generally speaking, everything within the cell must remain within the cell's walls. Nothing can break in or out. Most of the time. Despite being in it's own universe, however, that cell must still adhere to the general laws of the wider body. Like think of your reality as a skin cell. You must adhere to the rules of a skin cell. But beneath you, there are blood cells that have different laws but are still part of the bigger body. Whether you realise it or not, you all are bound by certain universal laws in your vast multiverse. Laws like there is only ever one singular timeline or there must always be a planet Earth.

Suffice to say, like in your own body, cells have a certain lifespan and when that lifespan is up, the cell gets shed and replaced. It starts over to keep the wider body running. The fur universe had reached its end but they were still fighting. It took some negotiating with the Creator of the vast multiverse but I eventually got permission to transport the survivors from one reality to another, assuming the recipient dimension was willing. I found this version of Earth whose deities were more than willing to accept the furs especially since their universe was likewise crumbling.

I know, I know. It's unbelievable. Downright far-fetched. But it's the truth. The guys had pretty much the same reaction.

There is one thing I didn't tell them, though.

This is the first time the No Ones have been involved but not the first time the furs crossed dimensional boundaries to Earth.

I've seen how this universe works, Gabe. I don't like it. I once mentioned that this entire reality is a play of superhero tropes and you know one of the most overused superhero trope there is? The hero_always_ comes back. Transpose that into the idea of the furry universe dying and merging with this one. There is a cyclical nature to everything within this vast organism. Everything is constantly being recycled. Sure, the minute details are always different but there are always constants that cause the same pain, same drama and eventually the same events.

This world is trapped in a cycle. A circle. A ring. There is only one timeline but it constantly goes in a loop with slight variations between each iteration.

Clark Kent will always lose his father.

Bruce Wayne will always lose his parents.

Tony Stark will always be Iron Man.

Uncle Ben will always die and Peter Parker will always become Spiderman.

The furry universe will always face an apocalypse and somehow make it to Earth. It might be that the sacrifice of the dragons allowed that bridge to be made. Sometimes, it's because the gods themselves took the stick out of their asses and sacrificed themselves to make that exodus possible. There's even another instance where the death of the fur universe was so epic that it became like a cancer cell and the furs started invading other realities as zombies.

This iteration, however, was the first time a No One got involved.

I think if I hadn't intervened, this iteration would have seen a single god sacrifice themselves to make the bridge possible, only transporting about fifty thousand furs, to Earth but his soul and power would pass on to a mortal who would embody his virtues and become a superhero.

Oops.

When I spoke with the Creator about this and asked why this system was in place, I wasn't quite happy with the answer.

Remember what I said about different people approaching their fates differently?

I accepted the fact that my interference might end the cycle.

So when I brought the furs to Earth, I planted a seed. I spoke with one of this world's gods, Athena the Greek Goddess of Wisdom. Together, we decided to found an organisation that would make sure that when I intervened again - and we were sure that I would - I'd have a running start. That's what Allied Extreme Global Intelligence Service or AEGIS was. Centuries after its initial founding and after I had left, the call came for me to take care of you and eventually Arcturus' escalation.

AEGIS had been secretly active but it was only at that point when it was time for me to fully take advantage of it. There were certainly some tensions and I'm pretty sure Caleb was a little jealous of me at the beginning. I'll admit, the conditions of my interference were quite... stifling. Like you, I don't like watching people suffer and it irritated me to no end that I couldn't use all my powers. But I've been limited before and I knew how to be patient. There were ups and downs. But eventually, Caleb and I got along.

You'd be proud of him.

Things quickly came to a head recently, however.

Remember when I said Arcturus had his own plans? Yeah. Those aren't the same plans the gods have. Best I can tell, the Legion of Pain was only meant to have five members. Arcturus was the one that brought in Tibia.

Backing up a bit, the Legion of Pain is what I like to call the Gene Stealer's debut onto the world stage. Their entire purpose was to elevate the Gene Stealers to that sweet spot between being a world-wide threat that'd bring every superhero and government bearing down upon them and local nuisance. Enough so that General Vernon Washington would be compelled to forcibly acquire the Reacher Corporation. If you didn't already know, Reacher is that investment bank that had been the target of the Gene Stealer's activities for a long while now. Gnoll's initial attacks - the construction site, the factory - were all Reacher assets. The art gallery that Minos made his final stand was a Reacher_sponsored building. You, yourself, infected a member of _Reacher's staff. These were all efforts to weaken Reacher for Washington's eventual takeover.

Why?

Because the Gene Stealers had infected assets within Reacher and when Washington brought them in to the fold, they would infect him and his troops and gain access to the Genesis Device; the mass-mutation device that Washington has been using to create Genesians. Washington's initial idea was to use the Genesians as a substitute Gene Stealers to propel himself to the mayorship of the Island and thus conscript all the supers and Outsiders in the Island, turn them into _Genesians_and deploy them as empowered supers under his command. He would have an army of loyal supers that would destroy the Gene Stealers and thus increase his standing not only across the United States but the world.

But the Gene Stealers had other plans, naturally.

Reacher was their bait and Washington was eagerly lapping it up.

The Legion of Pain was designed to support Washington's plan by ensuring that Arsenal, the supposed 'last line of defence' against the Gene Stealers and the Elemental Alliance were severely crippled. When doubt was cast on their defenders, who else could the public turn to but the military? Everything the Legion has done thus far has been for this singular goal.

As I mentioned, Arcturus had other plans, however. He injected Salazar Shin AKA 'Tibia' into the Legion of Pain for the explicit purpose of his endgame. More on that later.

Needless to say, I wasn't very pleased with Arcturus' games but I wasn't in a position to argue. I didn't have any leverage at that point. I played his game even though it hurt not only me but Caleb and those I cared about. When I heard that Lars and the rest of Arsenal had been transformed into elephants by Tibia, I admit that I snapped. It may have been a little excessive to unleash Sturmspalter at that point but I was furious. Arcturus was the one that told me about Tibia's immediate heist at the corner shop and it was ultimately my interference alongside Caleb's that had put Tibia in the same van as the rest of the Legion of Pain. I'm sure if he hadn't been there, Tibia wouldn't have been transformed. Knowing what I do now, I'm fairly sure it would have happened anyway - maybe the Gimp would have been the first to turn Arsenal - but I still couldn't help but feel responsible.

So I was pissed.

I saved Caleb but the rest of Arsenal... Well, they weren't doing so well. Particularly for those who hadn't been transformed into another species like Ben, Mary or even Rhiannon. How Arcturus could allow his fellow Hound to be turned like that is beyond me. Then again, love makes you do crazy things.

Caleb was shaken. The best thing for him to do was to focus on fighting and moving forward. Organising that assault on Tibia's fortress was no mean feat but again, that was what AEGIS was for. Caleb did a lot of growing on that mission. Saw a bit of a dark side from him as well. That was good. He's been struggling with his 'boy scout' image for a while and when he acknowledged those feelings, he grew. Life is not just light and dark, after all. You're a prime example of that.

Perhaps it was this growth and realisation that eventually prompted him to gain further control of his powers. He kicked Tibia's ass. You'd definitely be proud. Messing with Spider Queen was a bonus for me and certainly was recruiting Felix, one of Tibia's henchmen, alongside the rest of the elephant's squads. In hindsight, the missing fourth team should have rung more alarm bells but I had honestly thought the Gene Stealers were purposefully escaping with the fourth teams for the purposes of using them later on. Which they did... except it was one particular Gene Stealer that utilised them. More on that later.

After that, Caleb showed some rapid growth and development. He even started cooking. Can you believe that he hadn't really cooked anything decent up until that point? Such a jock. Speaking of which, this might be a bit of TMI, but Caleb actually went all the way with Lars for the first time. Admittedly it was a threesome with someone else but still! Progress! I mourn the loss of my couch which went from a beautiful brown leather to looking like it had been covered in a white glaze but still, it was sweet. No it was salty. No I didn't taste it. It was a play on words.

Speaking of character development, Madman got some harsh lessons from Gwen about his own abilities. As it turns out, his 'superpower' was resistance to anti-super fields and the maintenance of his hyena form. I'm sure he was pleased with that. I like to think the other members of Arsenal grew as well with the experiences of being transformed. All of them.

That includes Elliot.

See, apart from Caleb, he was the only true Outsider left after Tibia's attack. Like Caleb, he was missing the baseline superpowers whereas the others had some degree of it. Even Mary, who had started off an Outsider, had started developing regenerative abilities and supernatural strength, endurance and speed. Perhaps it was this development that had sparked Elliot's bitterness or maybe it was something earlier. I only wish I had caught his betrayal sooner so that I could have helped him steer away form it.

The first time I learned we had a traitor in our midst was when the Gimp attacked us for the first time. Somehow, the Gimp knew that my powers in this world was the inability to feel pain. No one outside of Arsenal knew that. Not even the members of AEGIS. To the rest of the world, my ability was to summon supernatural weapons thus my superhero name of 'Legion'. But somehow, the Gimp knew... and that warned me that we had a mole in our midst.

Together with Gwen, I systematically began looking for this mole. I purposefully laid out traps and fed information that was far too tantalising for the mole not to use. Revealing the abilities of Mugen Kosetsu was one of them. It made fighting the Gimp all that much harder but I had trust and faith in the team that we had formed, Assault.

I will say that the Gimp is quite a character. There have been countless others who had tried to break me. Many try to trick me by cornering me into making an impossible decision. Others try to out-philosophise me. Then there are others that are just downright suicidal. The Gimp is the latter. He was willing to let himself be incinerated in nuclear fire just to watch me fail. It's... commendable. If anything, the Gimp is committed. Obsessed, maybe, but certainly committed. That's something I admire about him. Finding some way to turn that commitment into something constructive is the difficult part.

But that's neither here nor there. Certainly not in this lifetime.

Of course, rescuing Arsenal after the Gimp's attack too priority. Pity that in order to break Assault and particularly Caleb, he had already transported Arsenal into Migraine's hands. Remember how I mentioned foreknowledge and trust? The Gimp totally played on that. He dangled the future of saving Arsenal in front of us, even making a sick game of our loved ones being tortured so that it was always about them. Then he took it away at the last minute. If there's one thing the Gimp got right, it's that hope is both powerful and cruel. When hope is taken away at the last moment, most people get crushed under the weight of failure.

Not Caleb. He's a trooper. A fighter to the end. He pushed on and saved thousands of people when he turned that nuclear missile into... Well... I'll let him tell you yourself.

Now I wasn't here for all of the next part but I will say it was one of my proudest moments and at the same time, the most infuriating moments of my career in this world. As a quick aside, I was nearly raped by David who had gone full-on werewolf on me. Caleb stopped us from mauling one another but I came very close to showing David just who was 'Alpha'. I can't help but wonder what kind of future that would bring and if David would actually be subservient to me. While that would be hilarious to some extent, I couldn't do that to the guy... no matter how much of a pain he is.

Before we could actually assault Migraine, our good old friend Arcturus approached us.

The gods wanted an audience. The coach was pulling me from the final play. Every fibre of my being wanted to defy them. I wanted to be right beside Assault, I wanted to fight on the ground alongside the people I cared about. But I knew my duty and as Arcturus took me away, I had to remind myself that this wasn't my story.

Let's turn to a positive note first.

Migraine turned out to be a kind, considerate soul who was remorseful over what he had done. The poor guy was just thrown into a world where he couldn't control his powers and caused pain to all those around him. He did his best to cope and had to turn to villainy when no one else would be there to support him. If this world was more willing to listen to people's stories instead of just pigeonholing them into roles, perhaps we'd have less of those like Migraine.

Either way, he had fully intended to hand over _Arsenal_and make one last stand against his own henchmen but Spider Queen - that bitch - intervened once more and spirited them away, purposefully dropping them in select places in Toronto to wreak havoc. Lars' parents had actually been captured as well and were rampaging alongside our favourite doberman. Again, this was all part of the Gene Stealer's plot to inch into the world stage.

But Caleb really stepped up. He really took the role of leader and organised the rescue to great effect! To that extent, I can't be mad at Arcturus pulling me from the battle because if I hadn't been absent, I'm fairly sure Caleb would have turned to me for leadership. You really would be proud. I'll replay the events to you in real time one day. Just ask.

I guess now comes the negative.

You know the gods hate my interference even though they asked and sanctioned it. If the multiverse is a complex organism and your universe is just one cell within it, you can think of me as the experimental mutagen formula that changes up the status-quo. I'm like the Gene Stealers of the cosmos. The gods wanted me out. They were rejecting me but only wanted me around for so long as they could use me. A date had to imposed. Conditions for my departure. The fact that my stay was contingent on factors outside of their control and sight scared them.

I will admit that there were times when I was tempted to stay in the universe at least until Caleb and his immediate family passed on but I've played the role of the 'immortal guardian' before and honestly, it ends poorly. One of the reasons Gwen is beside me. She always grounds me from my idle fantasies like that.

Despite all assurances, Athena - who was representing the gods because she had dealt with me previously - forced me to set a deadline. Except it's not exactly traditional and I walked away with some pieces of information myself.

Remember the idea of foreknowledge and trust? Yeah. Going back to that.

You must certainly be aware of the prophecy surrounding Caleb, right? The one that Martha Connors mentioned? Someone in Caleb's life will betray him. He will experience heartbreak and then someone close to him will die.

I knew that with a mole in Assault, the betrayal was likely to come from there.

The heartbreak... well, there were five possible sources for that. Caleb and Lars were still together and at the time, I thought their relationship was going strong. I wasn't aware of Lars' transformation fetish - not only being turned but turning other people. For someone like Caleb who has been fighting against the Gene Stealers for so long, that was a big turn off. Caleb had also been at odds with David for a long time. The pup was holding in a lot of resentment for his father and I could see all of that leading to heartbreak just like when David was kicked out of his home by his dad. At this time, I had narrowed down the suspects of traitors to Leon and Elliot so I wondered if the prophecy was going for a double-whammy by getting Leon to not only betray Caleb but also cause the heartbreak. The fourth - and this was a long shot - was Lance's relationship with Corey. Caleb and Lance did have a thing for a while and there was a scenario in my head that suggested Lance might ask Corey to marry him and that'd get Caleb to play the uncomfortable role of best man.

Then there was the possibility that _I_could be the source of the heartbreak.

Not going to lie, when Caleb kissed me, I was a little shocked. Despite all my abilities, I didn't see that coming. Certainly didn't see him thinking he was my kid! For the record, never had a child. I don't even want to go into thinking how two guys could ever have a baby even if they are the masters of Reality and Existence. I may have said some harsh things to Caleb to prepare him for that eventuality.

But back to the prophecy.

The person that was meant to die.

For the longest time, I was priming myself up to be that sacrifice. I'm expendable. If I die in this world, there's really no consequence for me apart from my absence. I was confident enough in Caleb, Arsenal, Assault and the others whose hearts I've touched that they would be able to weather any storm. If the gods were insistent on making this prophecy come true, I could at least take control of how it played out.

I was_not_ prepared for what Athena told me.

Mary was meant to die.

Yes, that Mary.

As the child of a goddess, it was all part of their divine plan to ensure that she died only to come back later as some avatar of the gods. Remember what I said about a cyclical nature of this universe? That.

I was pissed.

This was Athena the Goddess of Wisdom, willing to have her own child killed so that they could be reunited in the afterlife and then used later on to once more make the gods supremely relevant. They actually wanted the Gene Stealers to succeed and make everyone into supers so that only the gods could grant divine powers. After all, Gen 5s could effectively cover all other sources of superpowers apart from the divine and when everyone was a super, the only other source of power would be from the gods. The gods themselves could dictate who would be special and who wasn't and that would bring the entire universe under their control once more.

And Athena wanted me to ensure that happened.

While also making sure I give them a deadline of when I'd leave.

Well, I wasn't walking out of there without something. I gained access to my wings again and a little bit of my foresight, my 'Eyes of Chaos' as some would say. She was a little hesitant to grant me this but they eventually relented when I reasoned that I couldn't make sure things happened if I couldn't see all the possibilities of the future. This was a lie of omission, of course. Just because I could see the future, doesn't mean I'd do anything about it. So they gave me that.

And I gave them the day I'd leave.

Sort of.

I've got a technique: Infinity Blade. I won't go into details about it but it's basically my 'I win' button. I get to use it once and after that, I'm gone. No coming back. Not even if I'm asked.

I agreed to those terms because I already had everything I wanted.

See there's something that the gods failed to realise; they forgot to account for the time before I entered this world and the time after. Remember when I said that I stand outside of Time and Space? While the clock is ticking away in this world, while Earth is rotating around the sun, even while I'm here standing on this beach, I am also standing back in my homeworld of Naught having a drink with my best friend and husband at my favourite interdimensional bar while simultaneously being in countless other realities doing work there. Who do you think has been throwing all my weapons to me?

I know how this story will end because I've seen it before I entered this world.

At the same time, I'm also working to ensure its ending.

I never said I didn't have my own plans.

Still... even if you know the ending, the journey is what makes the experience... and it can still hurt like hell when it happens. At the same time, there are things that will still surprise you.

When Caleb took a sort of suicidal route when confronting his father, I couldn't help but feel guilty. This was a direct result of my actions. There is no describing just how dirty I felt leading him to that resolution even though I knew it was the best way he would evolve as a person. Him and David. Doubt is a miserable thing and there was a fraction of doubt in my heart that Caleb's story would have ended there and then even though all the assurances said otherwise.

That was just one example...

The other was that Elliot turned out to be the true traitor. Turns out that he was jaded over the stereotypes of superheroes and turned towards the Gene Stealers to become bigger and stronger. He had been spying on us, feeding the Gene Stealers information and even hacked the shields around the tournament grounds that David had organised. I will admit, I had purposefully set up that shield as one last attempt for Elliot to redeem himself. Too bad he still went ahead and turned against us. I doubt we've seen the last of him even though Gwen had fused his flesh with his power armour and I ejected him into the Pacific Ocean.

He is Neptune after all.

Of course, it was Leon's betrayal that stung the most. Not because I didn't see it coming but because I knew we were rapidly approaching the end.

I'm actually proud of Leon. He recognised the bigger picture, the greater problem. He broke the cycle. If we had just fought the Gene Stealers like we always would have, we'd just follow the same cycle. Gene Stealer comes in, infects people, cure is made, villain shakes their fist and shouts, 'I would've gotten away with it too if it weren't for you meddling kids' and then we'd come back next week at the same Bat-Time, same Bat-Channel. He saw this and decided to end it.

He joined the Gene Stealers to be the mole in their_ranks. He learned their plans and decided to act upon them. Sure his actions would lead to thousands dead but it would make the Gene Stealers a global terrorist organisation that would instantly invoke the ire of _the entire globe. Regardless of their power and influence, the reason the likes of Spider Queen and Chimera remained in hiding was to avoid being assaulted from all sides by the world's powers. Even they couldn't stand up against that kind of assault.

Thelakosia was a testament to that.

He was actually very clever in finding a way to neutralise all of us.

Pity things rarely go according to plan... or maybe they do.

Foreknowledge... and trust, remember?

Now, as I stand in the wake of Mary's psionic blast... I can't help but wonder.

... what kind of world did you wake up to?