Just outside of the Earth's atmosphere, a girl wearing a skin-tight suit and a white sashgazed forlornly at the planet before her. She had golden blond hair that flowed effortlessly in the vaccum of space, and her features were as flawless as the light that reflected from her skin. She was a beauty of a different world, existing without even a slight barrier to protect her from the dangers of open space. She stared at the green and blue planet with a strong sense of nostalgia, but she had seen too much to be sentimental. 

  Without any perceptable movement, she flew down into earth's atmosphere and let the air slowly sorround her. The feeling of resistance felt good after coasting so easily through open space. Her hair was pulled back as the girl broke the sound barrier, then she slowed down as she came close to the familiar territory. What she saw didn't make much sense, because a once sleepy rural village had been replaced by a sprawling city. The girl came flying in close to another building, when a group of people suddenly came flying out from the city as she lowered herself. 

  "Stop right there," commanded the apparent leader. He was tall and strong with a manly moustache and slightly graying sideburns. He wore a suit with an omega symbol on the chest. "What business do you have with earth?" 

  "I'm coming home," said the girl, "though it doesn't look like home anymore." 

  "You must have been one of the heroes who used to live in the retirement village," the moustache man said. 

  "My parents lived there," the girl corrected. 

  "I didn't want to assume. Welcome back to earth, and to Pheonix City. Do you have a name, stranger?" 

  "Archit Drakon," the girl answered, "but my earth name was Artemis Nardok." 

  "Would you mind coming with us to confirm your story?" 

  "Of course," Artemis said, floating closer to the man. The entire group flew together down to the city as the moustached man explained what had happened. 

  "It was seven years ago when the top secret retirement village for superheroes was hit by some sort of megaton yeild explosive," he began. "The only survivors happened to be those impervious to the blast, but the death toll stretched for miles around. The person behind the blast happened to be a young boy with mutant powers that he couldn't control. He was seen as being the most powerful mutant ever to exist, his power wasn't even on a scale that we could register. The boy was on the run after that, but the Hero Agency tracked him down and was tried to incarcerate him. He broke out of every jail until one was made especially for him. 

  "You'll probably want to visit the memorial. You'll probably see some people you used to know. I'll take you there personally once the paperwork is done." 

  "If you don't mind," Artemis cut in, "I was hoping I might find someone specific. I want to know whether he made it or not." 

  "We can look it up in the database while the paperwork is being processed," said the man as he approached the helicopter pad for the tallest skyscraper. The entire squadron of fliers landed gently on the pad along with Artemis. The inside of the building was almost too ordinary, just a normal office building where people worked on computers. Artemis was looking around until she was led into a meeting room with just her and the moustached, omega man. 

  "This is a special meeting room that will telepathically read your mind and fill out your paperwork automatically. Sorry about all of the hostility with your reunion, but we've had various issues with some unsavory character flying into our atmosphere. The name's Omega Man, it's a pleasure to make your aquiantance." 

  "Thanks, and it wasn't the most unsavory greeting I've ever gotten," Artemis joked. 

  "So, did you happen to know the hero identities of your parents?" 

  "Yes, they were Amazing Guy and Warrior Woman." 

  "Ah, so you're a Taurine?" 

  "Yes, I am not human."   

  "That's good to know," Omega Man said with a slight smile. "How long do you plan on staying?" 

  "I guess that depends on my friend," Artemis admitted. 

  "I suppose it would. What's her name?" 

  "His name is Mark House," Artemis said, and Omega Man suddenly stopped as though time had frozen. There wasn't a hair on his moustache that twitched as his mind processed what Artemis had just said. 

  "Come again?" 

  "Mark House," Artemis repeated, "my friend that I'm looking for is Mark House." 

  "Oh no," Omega Man said, suddenly looking at Artemis with a strange stare. 

  "What? What is it?" 

  "You're sure that Mark House is your friend? Mark 'Madhouse' House?" 

  "That's not his middle name, but he's the one I'm looking for." Omega Man put his head in his hands and slicked back his hair. 

  "This is not going to be pretty," Omega Man said with a sigh. He looked at Artemis almost apologetically, then breathed in deeply. "The boy who set off the explosion, it was isolated to Mark House. He was the one who set off the reaction that killed millions. The friend that you're looking for, he's being held in the most impenetrable prison ever made by man." 

  The door to the meeting room opened and a strange man stepped in until he noticed the people inside of the room. This new stranger was wearing a gentleman's top hat along with a pair of welding goggles that covered his eyes. There was a nice suit and vest underneath a brown trench coat that had an absurdly high collar, giving them new man a very mismatched appearance. Several spots on his trench coat had patches over worn areas, inexpertly stitched into the fabric. His hair was a light auburn color that stuck out as though he hadn't showered in a week. 

  "Sorry," he apologized with a cooky smile, "wrong room." He looked at Artemis, and smiled sincerely to say, "You look good, Artemis." 

  "MADHOUSE!" Omega Man shouted, causing the stranger to panic and close the door. Omega stood up suddenly and opened the door, looking out of it to see if the strange man was still there. "DAMNIT!" he shouted as he slammed the door. 

  "What is it? Who was that?" Artemis asked in confusion. 

  "That was Madhouse," Omega Man said through clenched teeth, then he glanced down at Artemis. "Sorry, that was Mark House, also known as Madhouse." 

  Two hours later and Artemis was in a facility located at the center of the earth under thousands of miles of liquid metal. The only way to get there was a portal that had to be constantly maintained. Omega Man was furious, marching through the facility at the point of breaking every door from it's hinges. Eventually, Omega Man led Artemis to a door that had more security in front of it than the doors of hell. 

  "This is Tartarus," said Omega Man, pressing a button that made the doors whir. "It's a void where nothing exists, not even dark matter. It was expensive to make and even more expensive to maintain, but it was all supposed to be worth it to keep Madhouse contained." 

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

  "What exactly is his power?" Artemis asked in confusion. 

  "We don't know, but it's on a scale that we've never seen before. We only have hypothesis at the moment, but we think he can manipulate space, hence the void. No space to work with, Madhouse should be powerless. I can't even imagine how he could have escaped." 

  The heavy doors opened one by one, forcing Artemis to count how many there actually were. It only started to scare her when she reached fifty and there was no slowing down. 

  "Wow, this seems excessive," Artemis commented. 

  "I thought so, too," Omega Man said, "until he escaped." 

  The final door opened, leaving a hallway that stretched farther than a football field. It was almost comical how long the walk was, but Omega Man still trudged through. As they got closer to the containment field, they both noticed bright colors inside of the room with streamers and confetti falling from the sky. Upon reaching the prison cell, they found it filled with birthday decorations and a table with a cake in the middle. The candles were still lit, implying that they had been set on fire recently. Sitting in the middle of the room was the same man wearing the crazy ensemble of suit, trench coat, top hat, and welder goggles. 

  "It's so nice to have visitors," Madhouse greeted enthusiastically. "I have three birthday parties to celebrate, two christmases, and three valnetines days(if you know what I mean)." 

  "How did you get out?!" Omega Man roared angrily. 

  "I made a door," Madhouse said with a smirk, pointing directly upwards. Omega Man looked up to see that a door had somehow been installed in the cieling. "It's got a terrible draft, I was thinking of calling a repairman to replace it. Do you know if Maker is still working?" 

  Omega Man lunged forward, his eyes aglow with energy that flowed into the palms of his hands. He punched Madhouse across the face, sending the welding goggles across the room. 

  "What are you doing!" Artemis shouted in shock, stepping between the two. 

  "Don't protect him!" Omega Man shouted, "he's a menace to all life! You have no idea how close he came to almost destroying all life in universe!" 

  "My glasses," Madhouse wheezed, feeling around blindly for the welding goggles. Artemis saw them next to her foot, so she grabbed them and offered them to the helpless man. 

  "Here," she said to give him a direction. When Madhouse looked up at Artemis, she saw that his eyes were missing. He didn't have empty sockets, the skin had just grown over where his eyes should have been. Artemis saw this and drew back, the sight of his face terrifying her. 

  "Sorry," Madhouse apologized, "I suppose that was too much." He covered his face with his hands, then pulled away to reveal regular old eyes. 

  That was when Omega Man shot a beam of energy at Madhouse, piercing the mismatched man through his torso. When the beam ended, Madhouse had a perfect circle where his intestines should have been. 

  "Woah," he said at the sight of his own inards, "I don't remember eating that!" 

  "Stop this at once," Artemis demanded, causing Omega Man to look her way. 

  "Don't even think about protecting him," growled the angry man. Without warning, Artemis moved at hypersonic speeds to get behind Omega Man, putting him in an armbar. 

  "Calm down before you hurt yourself," Artemis threatened. She looked over at Madhouse who was putting his arm experimentally through the new hole in his body. That's when she noticed he wasn't bleeding, Madhouse was just repeatedly fisting his stomach. He wasn't even in any pain, not reacting at all the way someone who had their insides vaporized would act. 

  "I'm sorry for the reunion to end this way," Omega Man said, his body starting to glow, "but I won't let that psycho out of here." Omega Man started to become hot as he turned his body into a form of pure energy. It was a last resort that could potentially destroy the core, so Artemis let go of the suicidal man and raced to Madhouse. 

  She grabbed him and flew out of the room at speeds that would baffle any physicists if they could even record her speed. By the time Omega Man was ready to burst, Artemis was speeding past the moon. 

  'That was close,' she thought, 'but at least I got Mark out of there.' 

  But when the super girl looked at what she was carrying, all she saw was a white mannequin wearing the same clothes as Madhouse. Her confusion was evident, so she looked back at the earth expecting some sort of explosion. She watched for an entire cycle of the sun, then she slowly started to approach once again. Once she made it to the entrance of the prison, she forcibly opened a door that didn't lead where she was expecting. 

  One moment she was near the core of the earth, the next she somehow found herself inside of a house with blue walls and wooden floorboards. She could see a stairwell in front of her and two adjacent rooms. Light was flowing through the windows, natural light from the sun that shouldn't have reached a hundred miles underground. 

  A figure wearing a trench coat and top hat appeared around the corner, playing a game on a small device in his hands. He looked up at Artemis, then waved nonchalantly. 

  "What?" Artemis asked, stepping into the house with superb confusion. 

  "What's the last thing you remember?" Mark asked. 

  "Omega Man hit you, then he started glowing, then I picked up some white thing," Artemis recounted. 

  "Okay, yeah, I've got it," Mark said confidently. "I calmed down Omega Man after that by sending his power somewhere else. Nothing happened." 

  "Where am I?" Artemis asked, stepping inside to look around the colonial style house. It was upscale middle-class with some flashy decorations to wow the visitor, but how did she get here from a prison complex. 

  "This is my house," Mark said with a smile. "The location was perfect, hardly any state taxes when you build off planet. The summer's here feel like they last forever, but when it gets dark, it gets cold." 

  "Off planet?" Artemis questioned. Mark pointed to the side room where the windows were letting light into the house. Artemis stepped into the carpeted room to witness something she couldn't accept. 

  Outside was not a cheery rural community with white picket fences, but a grey desert with some mountains off into the distance. There wasn't a sign of life for miles, or thousands of miles from what Artemis could see. On the horizon was a large ball in the sky colored green and blue, half of it was shaded due to the position they were in. 

  "We're on the moon," Artemis said in awe. 

  "The real estate market is just starting here," Mark explained with a smile. "In about three hundred years, this house is gonna be worth thirty cents. Accounting for centennial fluctuations, that's quite a fortune." 

  "How did this- What did you-" Artemis didn't know which one of the millions of questions to ask first. 

  "I think I know what you mean," Mark said with an understanding smile. "The contracting was insane, but I like it how it is. I've got breakfast in the stove if you're hungry." He paused then ammended, "Maybe it's lunch?" 

  "Mark," Artemis said with a hard edge to her voice, causing the top hat to look at her. She was gritting her teeth as her mind tried to think, tried to explain what she was seeing. 

  "Sorry, I guess this was all too much," Mark apologized once again. "I'm sorry, I just wanted to show off." 

  "How are you doing this?" 

  "My power, it's really something," Mark said simply. "I can alter reality, bend space and time, create or destroy matter, anything that you were ever told was impossible to do. What you're seeing is not an illusion, we're actually in a house on the moon. It's a bad habit, I know, but I enjoy messing with people." 

  There was a long silence between the two as Artemis reeled from the revelation that her friend was now an all-powerful being. She wanted to say something, anything, but the only thing that came to mind was an apology. 

  "Mark, I came back to say that I'm sorry," Artemis said, having recited this repeatedly. 

  "About the Tuarine's attacking the hero's village and killing everybody?" guessed Mark. 

  Artemis literally had no words. She had been trying to think of how to say it, whether to Mark or to Mark's grave. Her confusion was evident so Mark decided to explain. 

  "When I first started to get my powers, I went back to the moment in time before the explosion," he said solemnly. "I was able to stop time and see what had happened, the guy who had run into the earth at nearly the speed of light. I recognized the symbol on his clothing. Plus, I was able to meet alternate versions of us that explained the situation. Not all of them were friendly, but parallel universes aren't always 100% parallel." 

  Artemis still had no words, she just couldn't even wrap her mind around this situation. 

  "I got you a welcome home present when I realized this reality had you returning," Mark said with some excitement. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a single rock that had next to no hidden meaning behind it whatsoever. "Just take it and you'll understand." 

  Artemis reached out and let Mark drop the rock into her hand. Once contact was made, a memory surface suddenly and without warning. 

  It was like a still picture of Mark and Artemis as kids at the creek, trying to skip rocks. The scene didn't move and the point of view didn't change. It was a pure nostalgia trip that put tears in Artemis's eyes. It had been so long since the girl had been able to just enjoy her time, the memory of a better period in her life. That was the last moment Artemis got to feel like a child. 

  When the scene faded, Artemis was standing in a house on the moon with an old friend, but she was crying her eyes out. 

  That wasn't how she had pictured her reunion with Mark, but hey, you know what they say about 'the best laid plans'.