Caspian and I arrived at the apartment in the way we normally do, with Caspian going through the window and myself ghost modeing into the room, surprising everyone.
“Please stop doing that.” Brendan called out.
“No.” Caspian and I said at the exact same time.
“Show us the list please.” Alphonso asked, pointing at the coffee table in the middle of the living area.
Caspian pulled the list out of his pocket and placed it on the table, smoothing it out for readability reasons.
We all read the list on our own. It went as follows:
1. Sandra Saunders
2. Brody Stalwart
3. Anastasia Taylor
4. Benjamin Korke
5. Theo Nickel
6. Juniper Levinson
7. Shikoba Robinson
8. Ophelia Priest
9. Larry Thim
10. Jim Jeremy
11. Fernando Ortiz
12. Michael Holter
13. Tamicka Moore
14. Phoebe Rhodes
15. Ai Sonoda
16. Joy Nell
Once we all read the list, we came up to discuss next moves and such.
“Jim Jeremy... that’s me.” Gwen said.
“I... recognize my deadname.” I spoke.
“My deadname... is also on this list.” Caspian said.
“Sandra’s on here too. Joy was the name of someone we saw on the security tapes.” Alphonso said.
“Juniper... I remember her from our time travel adventure.” Jacob stated.
“Wait, Casp, if your deadname is on here then how did you do the rescue?” I spoke, making all eyes turn to Casp.
“Cause they didn’t catch me.” he replied instantly.
“That must’ve been why there was an empty room.” Mylo spoke, gasping.
“So where are the others? Who are they? After the rescue, they all went back to their friends and families, right?” Alphonso asked Caspian.
“Yes. I drove most of them home personally.” Caspian replied.
“Most?” I asked.
“Yes, Most. I drove you and Mylo straight to this apartment.”
“Why us?” Mylo asked.
“Cause Neo Cortex told me to.” Caspian replied.
“It’s The Quantum Brain.” Alphonso said, angrily.
“We were fighting flying pigs that day, not bandicoots.” Jacob chuckled.
“Wait, so are you saying that Jimmy Neutron knew about us ahead of time? How? We didn’t have the list at that point.” I asked Caspian.
“No, no, we had the missing persons reports at the time. We had investigated for a few weeks and found the location at the last second. I told Casp to bring you both here while we were on site.” Alphonso sighed before activating the teamline. “Hey,” He continued, “Sandra, you can see the list on the table, right?”
“Righty-O, Neutron.” Sandra replied instantly.
“Can you find out where the other people on this list are, and if they found out if they have powers?”
“It’ll take me a hot minute, but I can and will.”
The teamline went dead immediately afterwards, as everyone but Omnigirl was in the room.
“Okay, anything else we need brought to the table? Next steps, going after Matt? No wrong answers.” Brendan called out to anyone willing to listen.
“Y’know, as Casp & I were searching for the list, I met another God. Odin. He called me a phasewalker before handing me a replica of Mjolnir,” I said, placing the replica hammer onto the table, “from the halls of Asgard itself.”
“You went to Valaskjalf?” Caspian chimed in.
“That’s what they called it. Odin also said that he would only let me borrow that hammer under one condition, eventually coming back to fight Fenrir.”
“The WOLF? OF RAGNAROK?” Caspian shouted in shock.
“I’m sorry, so Odin loaned you a hammer on the condition that you stop the end of the world?” Alphonso asked, curious.
“Yeah, sums it up. Didn’t realize Fenrir was a wolf or that Ragnarok was the end of the world but yeah now I’m terrified.” I replied to both of them.
“Ragnarok is how the Norse beliefs of old viewed the potential end of the world. It starts with Odin fighting Fenrir, the wolf. Odin is destined to die to the wolf in the tale, avenged by his son, Vioarr. Following this, several disasters would engulf the world, including setting it aflame and submerging everything in water, and Thor fights a massive snake. If Odin is wanting you to fight Fenrir, then he must have his own idea of what a Phasewalker is. Which means it’s not as simple as what Anubis told you.” Caspian replied back, heavily interested in the conversation.
“So I have to save the world from total destruction? Casp, this is real life, not a bad marvel movie!” I shouted back at him.
“Casp is one letter off from Cap and you do swear a lot.” Jacob interjected.
“Fuck, fine you have a point, but still. I’m not a fighter, I’m just some dumb bimbo who works at a movie theater for minimum wage. I don’t know how to do shit.”
There was a brief silence.
“Can you take one of us with you?” Alphonso asked after a moment pondering his thoughts.
“I don’t know, I haven’t tried.” I replied.
“Try to take me with you, Back to Valaskjalf,” Caspian spoke up following the conversation, “Let me see this for myself.”
I groaned and nodded, then grabbed Caspian’s hands.
“Close your eyes,” I said, “Imagine a really long ladder.”
Caspian wasn’t one to screw around, so naturally he tightened his grip around my hands and shut his eyes. I did what I normally did, I climbed the ladder, imagining myself holding onto Caspian along the way, then finally found the rung labeled Asgardian Armory again. I held onto the rung, and opened my eyes.
I was back in the armory, and Caspian was there with me.
“Open your eyes, Casp.” I said.
For the first time, I saw some semblance of emotion on Casp’s face. He was overjoyed at the fact that he was in a mythological realm. His eyes widened as he gazed upon the hundreds of weapons within our currently inhabited room. Then, his amazement faded as we were, once again, surrounded by several Asgardian guards.
That’s really fun to say actually. Asgardian Guards. They were Guards in Asgard, them Asgardian Guards. It’s got a bit of a rhythm to it. Anyway, uh... we were surrounded, and Odin was nowhere to be seen.
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“Back once more, are we?” The head asguardian guard questioned.
“I wanted to bring a friend. Is that a problem?” I asked.
The Asgardian Guard motioned for the rest of his battalion to lower their weapons, since I’m now a familiar face, I guess.
“My name is Caspian. I’m humbled to be standing in Odin’s castle.” Caspian said, kneeling to the ground as if he were greeting a king.
Which, I mean, he will eventually meet Odin the more often he comes with me on these spontaneous trips.
“Is this your only business?” The asgardian guard asked, turning his head towards me.
“Yeah, he just wanted to see the place.” I replied, nodding.
“He has seen it. Begone until it is your time.” He finished, motioning his men to return to their positions.
“Sounds good.” I said, grabbing Caspian’s hand and throwing the both of us straight back down the reality ladder.
Within milliseconds, we were back in our base reality, Caspian struggling to get ahold of what he just saw. Everyone else was startled when we came back only a minute after we left.
“And?” Alphonso asked.
“Couldn’t get past those nasty asgardian guards, unfortunately.” I replied.
“Odin wasn’t there, and they-” Caspian started, before I interrupted him.
“Say the thing. It’s really fun, trust.”
“-The asgardian guards didn’t want us to stick around.”
The whole room took a minute before responding. They are fundamentally ignorant of the inner machinations of my mind.
“Okay, so no loose ends need to be tied up. Let’s get back to the list.” Alphonso said, directing our attention back to the coffee table, before speaking into the teamline, “Sandra, do you have anything?”
“I have quite a few something’s if you catch my drift,” Sandra started, “lots of really interesting information. Let me go down the list, excluding the people in that room, starting with Brody. Dude’s a part time stage magician who does a lot of kids shows-”
“Wait, hold on, you have information on everyone already? It’s been like, 5 minutes since we asked!” Brendan shouted, interrupting her.
“Hey, dumbass, shut the fuck up and let the near omni-visual work her personal magic,” she clapped back at Brendan, “as I was saying, Brody Stalwart is a stage magician for kids parties, a frat bro who goes to the gym far too often, and a right-wing social media icon. Best reason I could ascertain as to why he was captured, is that he’s definitely closeted. Dave is the only one who knew.”
“Right wing?” I asked.
“Yeah. Only right-winger on the list, however. Definitely a supervillain if he gets powers. Next on the list is... well, actually, I don’t wanna say the next name.”
“Why? What’s the deal with Anastasia Taylor?” Jacob asked, reading directly off the list.
“Because that’s the deadname of someone in that room.” Sandra replied.
“Mylo?” Alphonso asked, turning his attention towards Mylo.
“No. I wasn’t supposed to be there.” Mylo replied.
“Then...”
Everyone in the room, without thinking, turned their heads towards Caspian. Myself included, sadly.
“Yes. It’s mine.” Caspian said, serious and quietly.
“Cool! Moving on-” Sandra said before she was immediately interrupted.
“Wait, no, hold on,” Mylo started, “Back when I was captured, I remember hearing someone’s name after this Matt dude left. He called someone, called them ‘Mr. Taylor’ and told them that they could not catch someone. I didn’t think anything of it at the time, but if your last name is Taylor and you were supposed to be captured, then... who are you, Caspian?”
We all watched as Caspian struggled to ascertain exactly what Mylo was asking. He seemed like he really, really wanted to tell us, but just couldn’t figure it out.
“Hey, dude, it’s okay. There are two other trans people in this room and if anyone says anything, we’ll kick their ass.” I said, staring at Brendan specifically.
“My dad was the one that authorized my capture. He is the head of a secretive assassination syndicate and trained me specifically to become a female assassin, but when I started hormones, he kicked me out because he didn’t want a son. Matt’s goal is to cure queerness, and my dad has a lot of money. He’s probably funding the whole project.” Caspian said as quickly as he could, trying to hold back tears.
“I’m sorry you’re an ASSASSIN?” Brendan yelled.
“So, your motorcycle and everything?” Alphonso asked.
“Stolen from my dad.” Caspian replied, wiping the tears from his eyes.
Everyone else was silent.
“Shit, dude, I’ve heard of transphobic parents but that’s like, next level shitty.” I replied, trying to offer any condolences I could.
“Seconded.” Mylo agreed.
“Truly a piece of shit.” Jacob seconded.
“Seems as though we’re all in agreement. Thanks for trusting us with that, Casp,” Alphonso started, with a warm smile, before it faded a bit and he continued, “Though, a bit ago I talked with Sandra about someone named Ronald Taylor who was the one who started this whole ordeal. Is that your dad?”
“Yeah.” Caspian replied.
“Then everything makes sense. Sandra, are you still there?”
“Give me a sec, I just watched that entire reveal through Alphonso and I’m still tearing up.” Sandra replied crying over the teamline, before sharing more information “Ronald talked to Lang about trying to find his missing daughter a few days before I was kidnapped. Apparently she was never found. So, if Caspian was Anastasia... then everything connects. Ronald started the list to find Casp. Was he aware that you were no longer his daughter?”
“I had come out to him and left a couple months prior to the events of the kidnapping, so he likely hired Shapiro to attempt to detransition me, but I wasn’t found. I was hiding in an abandoned strip mall down in Tacoma. Dad would never go to Tacoma on purpose.” Caspian explained.
“That’s diabolical.” I replied immediately.
“Truly. But that does explain why everything happened. The rest of the list was likely brought by different people, as I found out from Sandra and Grace that Sandra was put on the list by Lang...” Alphonso started before being interrupted.
“You met with Grace and didn’t tell us?” Brendan interjected.
“Yes, I did. She's connected to Lang, and Lang’s connected to the list. She wasn’t exactly the most helpful, but it does explain why Sandra was kidnapped first. Caspian was supposed to be first, but they never found him, because Ronald was transphobic and still referred to him as his daughter. Anyway, Sandra, please continue.”
“Okay, so,” Sandra started again, trying to get back into it, “Next up is Benjamin Korke. Seems like an ordinary gardener. Thick, Swedish accent. Has a husband. No clue what’s going on in his head. Theo Nickel is a subway sandwich artist, and he’s already awakened to his power. He can make sandwiches. That's... yeah that’s pretty much the whole thing. Shikoba Robinson is an interesting case. I didn’t know exactly where they were, but they seemed to be in a plush office... with Matt.”
“So he probably has superpowered backup now. Shit.” I replied.
“Yeah, truly. I couldn’t ascertain anything else about them. I’ll see what more I can gather on them,” Sandra started once more, “Next up, Ophelia Priest. Lead singer of a heavy mental band. Gained the ability to cause supersonic waves with her vocals. Made it really hard on her overall, and her girlfriend’s been trying to support her ever since. Her gf plays the drums. Band’s name is ‘The Trans-Atlantic Flight’.”
“Top tier band name.” I replied.
“Truly. Next up, Larry Thim. He awakened to his power already, which turned him into a man made entirely of cotton balls. His boyfriend immediately left him. He’s been drinking at a Gay Bar in capitol hill ever since. Juniper Levinson works at a Boba shop. She hasn’t awakened to any powers yet. I couldn’t see the name of the restaurant. Will look a bit deeper. Fernando Ortiz is a hispanic baseball player who plays third base for the Mariners.”
“I know him! He’s a really good fielder, even if his batting average is lower than most of the team.” Brendan jumped in.
“Sure, yeah. Anyway he’s also a part time car mechanic, and he lives with his partner, Julio Ortiz. Next name on that list I will not read out loud, because it’s Serenity.”
“I appreciate you, Sandra.” I said sarcastically.
“Next name is Tamicka Moore. She’s a bar singer that’s only hired by lesbian and gay bars. She’s single, but a really fucking good singer. Valentina & I already made plans to check her out sometime.”
“I know of her. Been to a couple performances here and there. She is really good. How can you hear her through just her eyes, Sandra?” Gwen asked, not being fully aware of the situation.
“I know that I originally said I could only see through the eyes of other people, but after awhile, I could hear things on the other end as well. Hopefully it’s just those two senses, though. I couldn’t bear any more than that. Next on the list is Phoebe Rhodes. Apparently all she does is fish. I literally did not see her do anything else. Not even look over the water. Just fish. Ai Sonoda is an IT specialist at Lang Tech, a subsidiary of Lang Co. She oversaw a lot of the projects, including building the mainframe for the Nuclear Reactor. Lang didn’t fire her, though. She must be a protected asset or something to him. I don’t know, I don’t speak billionaire. Last name on this list is... weird, too. I couldn’t find her. I watched her security tapes back over and over, and I couldn’t ascertain why I couldn’t find her. I can connect to all human vision, the only way she wouldn’t be in my system is if she wasn’t human. But nothing about her indicates that she’s anything BUT human.”
“Why is her name on the list, then?” Alphonso asked.
“No clue. I’ll try to find out as much as I can.” Sandra finished.
“Understood. Thanks for your work, and keep us updated.” He replied, hanging up the teamline.
“Alright, what’s our next step, dexter?” I asked.
“We have to find Matt and stop him before he can realize his plan. After that, we can focus on finding the rest of the people on the list. Once Sandra figures out where he is, that’s when we’ll strike. We’ll send Caspian, Serenity, Mylo, and Gwen. Jacob, Brendan, and I will go to Sinister Headquarters and put a stop to them so they can’t send reinforcements. We’ll start more planning tomorrow morning, then... we’ll stop Matt. Meeting adjourned.” Alphonso spoke, ending the meeting.