Revenant would have lied if he said that he wasn’t afraid of Onslaught’s reaction to what she saw. It was far from the worst thing he ever did, pretty tame by all standards to be honest. The things that he promised to Weber, though…
He still didn’t show that fear. Hiding that particular emotion from the world around him was one of the many lessons that the Villain Academy taught him. It was automatic at this point. But… it was there.
Hypothermia was unreadable as always, but Revenant had a pretty solid opinion on what she was feeling. It was nothing nice. What surprised him was that Kitsune appeared to look all serious.
That was… not even rare, that was unheard of. She must have really treated her friendship with Onslaught seriously, didn’t she? Then again, it was a part of their common arrangement concerning Revenant and that was romantic. Peak romantic, all things considered.
Onslaught is sitting in her wheelchair in the observation room. In silence and a look on her face that’s almost worryingly calm. Hypothermia and Kitsune enter the room, without saying anything, Revenant walking in behind them.
Murray takes that as his cue to leave.
Revenant grabs his arm when he tries to pass by.
“Keep Weber under suicide watch.” He tells him quickly, Murray nodding in response. “He will likely try to kill himself both to test whether death is truly reversible here and as a last-ditch attempt to stop himself from divulging corporate secrets. If he tries that, let him die and have Overhaul resurrect him.”
“Yes, sir.” Murray nods again. “We keep him monitored 24/7 already, but I’ll tell the people to instantly contact Overhaul if they see him try to kill himself and to not interrupt it in any way.”
Revenant met a few supervillains who considered elite mooks… expendable. Much more so than their villain lieutenants. While also listening to the latter more and considering the former as part of the decoration/weapons more than people. In his genuine opinion, those people were absolute clowns who deserved everything that happened to them.
He treasured not only the elite mooks but even the regular mooks. Each of them were an asset worth preserving (otherwise he wouldn’t hire them to begin with). Murray here?
The only reason why he was still slightly less valuable than Revenant’s past villain lieutenants was because he only recruited the best of the best to that group.
Benefits of leading a decentralized organization like the Villain Alliance of America. He had everyone who wasn’t top notch seconded to sub-organizations, and still worked for him through proxy. His elite mooks were more valuable to him than most villain lieutenants of the sub-organizations. He trusted them. And he listened to them.
It’s funny how that entire reflection was born entirely out of him not wanting to think about facing Onslaught right now, isn’t it? He's fairly sure that this wasn't the first time that he went mentally on that exact same tangent.
Overhaul has already left the area after resurrecting Weber. That leaves confronting Onslaught as the only remaining thing to be done. Before Revenant can leave the cellblock and go home.
Ugh, it’s really awkward.
“Oni?” He ends up asking. At least that doesn’t come out shaky, he would absolutely hate that.
“First things first, Revy.” Onslaught replies calmly, still staring into space. Normally, she at least faced the rough direction of voices. “Foxy, come here.”
Kitsune gives Revenant a worried look before approaching Onslaught. Revenant would lie if he said that he knows what to expect and that makes him… confused? Worried? Scared? Just as Oni once told him, he has issues when he is facing something he cannot predict and make preparations for.
Sure, she said it about relationships and emotions, but… it was applicable here, right?
“I’m here, Cutie.” Kitsune announces as she stands. “What do you want me to…” She is cut short when Onslaught begins to stand up from her wheelchair.
She can do that. She always could do that, even without her individuality. She was just extremely prone to tripping over and couldn’t do a single step without falling onto the floor. Now, with Humility’s initial microsurgeries, she could easily make at least a few dozen, it was just… still pretty shaky. That’s why she preferred still using the wheelchair (and maybe because pushing it around made Hypothermia happy).
Kitsune is kind of frozen in place, which lasts until Onslaught stands up properly, figures out where Kitsune actually was (by waving her hand and catching her shoulder) and then gives her a tight hug.
“E-eh?” Kitsune lets out.
“I’m not stupid.” Onslaught says quietly (but not too quietly for everyone in the room to understand her. “Just torturing him wouldn’t let you understand him. It wouldn’t let you do the full-immersion transformation to copy his memories. And I don’t think that you were bluffing Weber about it. So my theory is: the torture would be to make him feel something that you can relate and immerse yourself in.”
Revenant says nothing. There is nothing about it that he feels like talking about. Hypothermia says nothing. Because she doesn’t know what to say about it. Kitsune… Kitsune hugs Onslaught tightly. As tightly as possible.
“You sure that you aren’t a small angel after all?” Kitsune says quietly.
“You got me, I’ve lent my wings to Virtue to work undercover.” Onslaught replies. Kitsune giggles. Faintly. The tight hug is still there, Kitsune doing her best to bury her face in-between Onslaught’s shoulder and head.
The look on her face, at least the part of it that he could see was… sorrowful. Pained. Relieved? Revenant says nothing about it once again. It’s best not to interrupt the moment.
Villain Academy didn’t produce a lot of supervillains. People like him, Nemesis or Judgment were exceptions to the rule, Archvile’s special pet projects. What it produced en masse were villain lieutenants.
Broken, traumatized or completely insane people with a feeling that they could never return to who they were, so habituated to violence that it felt natural to them. Following supervillains just as they followed their ‘teachers’ in the Academy.
Fuck Archvile and fuck the Villain Academy.
Worst of all, it was only a matter of time before Onslaught would demand to know details about their time there. How is he supposed to deal with that? How is he supposed to tell her no?
He has no idea.
Onslaught keeps hugging Kitsune for at least a minute.
“If you want to talk with someone about something, or another hug, I’m always there.” She says while pulling back a little, managing to stay upright despite her legs being what they were. “But for now I have to deal with the other two dumbasses.”
“I get it, I get it.” Kitsune replies. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
Why does Revenant feel as if the friendship between the two just bloomed into the ‘heterosexual life partners’ field? As in, they were going to be as close with each other as it was possible on literally any field aside from the romantic one? Like what Onslaught and Hypothermia had?
Kitsune takes a step back. Onslaught keeps standing there, right in front of her wheelchair.
“Alright, next person. Thermy?” Onslaught says. “Come here.”
Hypothermia approaches her adoptive sister. Even Revenant can recognize how worried and stressed she was right now. Once again, however, the worries are completely unfounded.
Onslaught holds her hands for about three seconds, before sighing loudly. Then her hands run up, reaching the top of Hypothermia’s head… just to lightly dope slap her there.
“Why are you so worried? Thermy, you dummy.” Onslaught shakes her head. “I know that you’ve done nasty things while I was away. I also know that your deepest desire is to live peacefully with us all and never do anything like that again, and that other than that one thing you’re the same person I always looked up to as my older sister.”
“S-so why am I a dummy?” Hypothermia stammers out nervously. That’s… more emotions on her face than Revenant remembers ever seeing there.
Aside from their nights together (she really can’t keep her face straight while they’re at it, which Revenant considers to be a sign of a job well done).
…
He has to be really worried himself to go on a mental tangent like this one, despite keeping that part of life locked tightly behind his bedroom door, even in his mind. His mental discipline was one of many assets, with Onslaught being perhaps the only person to be able to overwhelm it completely.
“Because you were worried about my reaction to all that!” Hypothermia looks to the side, avoiding the eyes of a completely blind girl. Classic Mia. “Have more faith in me! I absolutely can’t imagine you doing anything that would make me hate you. Get the clue! I’ve seen my father wage a civil war, then while knowing that the second one was worse and you took part in it, I’ve still had my dad adopt you. Got it?”
“Y-yes.” Hypothermia nods faintly. “I got it. S-sorry for that.”
“You apologize for too many things.” Onslaught sighs. “We’ll deal with that and do some mandatory hugs after that. Alright, you’re free for now. Revy? Come here.” This time, she does fall back to her wheelchair, without standing up again. Unlike what she did with the other two.
Uh-oh.
Hypothermia takes a step back before retreating from Onslaught to rejoin Kitsune. Kitsune looked as if she was about to cry now, but not out of sadness or traumatic flashbacks brought by Onslaught’s earlier words. No, this time it was mostly about how romantic the scene in front of her was.
Okay, maybe not romantic (at least while it was between Oni and Mia), but love is love. And while romantic love was the bestest love ever, Kitsune ‘loved’ wholesome familial scenes as well.
This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.
Revenant obediently comes closer. Onslaught points towards her lap.
“Your head, here.” She announces. Revenant sighs quietly, before kneeling and resting his head on her laps. “Worried?”
“That you’ll crush my head now?” He asks. The side of his head is resting on her lap, letting him see Kitsune absolutely meltdown in the background. “Not really. But it does give me flashbacks to Decay and Steelfang and that ‘God I wish that was me’ line that got me shot.”
That makes her chuckle.
“I never took you for a bottom, but I guess we learn new things our whole life.” She then says. Revenant isn’t a bottom, nor is Decay. The latter especially is about as vanilla as you can get - Revenant would know, they might have… exchanged some links and short numerical codes back in their time as teenagers in the Villain Academy.
He can then feel her fingers starting to play with his hair. Lightly, gently. Kitsune reaches a completely new level of cuteness overload in the background and that is so distracting to watch that he closes his eyes.
“You absolute dummy.” She says softly. “I can’t believe that you got this worried about my reaction. What about the whole cool brooding edgelord mastermind aesthetics you have going?”
“First of all, please don’t put it that way.” Revenant replies. He can survive cool and mastermind, but brooding is questionable at best and edgelord is a big fat no. “Second of all, I think that we’ve already established that I’m much less concerned with the aesthetic when I’m only with you three.”
He doesn’t say ‘especially you’, because he doesn’t want the others to feel bad. To feel like they were an addition to Onslaught. He… if you considered their history together, it would be understandable. But wrong.
“We did, we did.” Onslaught admits, her fingers still playing with his hair. “It must be a relief to be able to stop acting in front of someone, doesn’t it?”
“Yes.” Revenant replies. He wonders where it is leading to. “Yes it is. At least now. At the beginning, I… it felt awkward. I just didn’t have the need to do that. Analyst appeared to be a thing of the past. Now I feel comfortable being him.” He stays quiet for a second, Oni clearly waiting for something more. “I wouldn’t say that Revenant is me acting, though.”
Onslaught sighs.
“Yeah, I figured that out already.” She says. “How often did you do things like that?” It’s not hard to realize what she meant.
“Personally, only a few times.” He replies. “Mostly when I was building the Villain Alliance. I had to get my hands dirty quite often back then. Later on I had… professionals on my bankroll to do it for me. Like Songbird.”
Although to be honest, Songbird did it because she enjoyed it, not because she was paid. And Revenant considered that to be a good reason to keep her around as his chief interrogator until the war began to rapidly approach its end and he needed to erase Demiurge out of the picture. She was both good and cheap.
“What was the worst case?” Onslaught asks. That was… a good question.
“In the end, probably Thunderbolt.” Revenant replies.
“The Top Hero of Michigan?” She asks. Revenant lets out a loud ‘m-hm. “What happened to him?”
“I… forgot about him.” Revenant replies. So many things were happening back then, it was the period of most intense fighting on the frontline. The later march towards District Columbia was much easier than those battles. The Government barely had anything left after all. “Songbird had her way with him for a bit too long. Way after he told us everything he knew. He was an empty-eyed, drooling moron by the time I realized what happened.”
“Isn’t that her fault, though?” Onslaught asks.
“It technically is.” Revenant admits. “She went past the orders she received from me. But I still missed it happening. What’s the issue is that… I had no issue with that. My response to what happened was to shrug and act as if it was my idea from the start to make Quicksilver more happy and loyal.”
“You and your constant work to prevent loyalty issues that caused more problems than said loyalty issues would.” Onslaught sighs. “Was your lack of concern due to Thunderbolt being this much of a dick or were you just completely unconcerned about tortures at that point?”
“Well… the former.” Revenant replies after a short while of self-analysis. “Quicksilver was his daughter. She volunteered to join the Villain Academy and get an individuality from Archvile just to get a shot at killing him. Does that tell you everything you want to know?”
“Yes.” Onslaught sighs painfully. “You’re planning to resurrect him?”
“That would just have Quicksilver kill him again.” Revenant replies. “He is on the list of people that I don’t plan to resurrect, ever. With Archvile and Jormungandr, but for different reasons.”
Jormungandr was evil and dangerous enough that the last time he was around, the Government and the Villain Alliance of America actually cooperated (for the first and last time) to kill him.
And they did it by direct nuclear detonation. Uragan-B should do the trick, but Revenant refuses to bet his (and theirs) life on that.
And while Revenant would enjoy watching Destro and Invincible play basketball with Archvile’s head (or even his still screaming, mangled and limbless corpse), even a 0.5% chance of the man escaping meant disastrous results to the world.
He isn’t taking that chance for no other reason than his own petty enjoyment.
“And Quicksilver?” Onslaught asks.
“Funny you’ve mentioned her, she’s currently growing up in the tube.” Revenant replies. He wants to get as many of his former lieutenants up and running. “I don’t expect you two to become friends, she’s a bit too… kill-friendly, and I also don’t think that a mute person and a blind person mesh up well.”
“Right.” Onslaught sighs loudly. “Did you figure out already that I asked my dad to make you involve me in this?”
“I suspected it heavily.” Revenant admits. His head was still resting when it did. It’s not exactly a comfortable position for his back, but he fails to imagine his back ever hurting him more than his constant migraine-level headaches did (he is looking forward to being free of that issue… in up to two weeks, he believes). Then again, Onslaught’s thighs are a reward enough. “Did you get what you expect out of it?”
“Yes.” Onslaught replies. “It reinforced my suspicions that you’re a complete dumbass but you’re my complete dumbass. And a great example of the old saying that behind every great man stands an even greater woman that rolls her eyes in exasperation.” He would have rolled his own eyes at that, but it’s hard with closed eyes. Also, to be honest he is moderately surprised that Kitsune didn’t straight-up faint after the ‘my dumbass’ bit. “You know what, I think that you’re the sort of weirdo that will feel better about the whole issue if I punish you for it somehow.”
“If I say yes, you’ll joke that I’m a bottom again.” Revenant replies. The loud groan from her is a sign that his prediction was spot on. “What is it going to be? Am I going to sleep on the couch?”
“Yeah, right, because that would be a punishment for you.” Onslaught groans again. “Thermy would wait until I fell asleep then sneak out of the bed to join you on that couch in case you were lonely. Leaving me alone or with just Foxy.”
“I would.” Hypothermia says very, very quietly. Revenant (unlike Onslaught, perhaps) catches it. And promises himself to give her some extra attention when possible. Mostly to celebrate the fact that she was ready to do something against Onslaught.
“Well, whether the people you did the worst things to actually existed and whether you actually did all of that is a question best left for philosophers.” Onslaught continues. “And to be honest I had the whole joking line in my mind! I’d laugh about the bottom bit, then I’d tell you that the best punishment for you will be the fact that at some point in the future you’ll end up having to take care of anywhere between one to three pregnant and thus hormonal women that can easily break your spine like a twig. Now the whole scheme is ruined! Ruined!”
It was… fair. Hypothermia could kill him with a snap of her finger (but she never would). Onslaught could at least theoretically survive fighting in her current state, depending on the surroundings and preparation time - but by the time they settle down anywhere, she should be able to move faster and see. If this happens, he’s boned.
Kitsune would just transform into Hypothermia and end him with a snap of her finger.
“First of all, don’t reveal the whole scheme at the first opportunity, instead try to find a way to achieve your initial objective around it.” Revenant informs her. “Besides, there is an easy counter to that. I’d have to…”
“Involving Chronoshift in helping you and using her general cuteness to have us spare your life is forbidden.” Onslaught cuts in immediately, instantly finding a counter to his counter. What the…
He opens his eyes in surprise, just to see himself, standing there.
“In my defense, we both know I can’t say no to her.” Kitsune quickly says. Revenant understands what happened immediately - Onslaught told her through the commplants to morph into Revenant in full-immersion mode, then tell her (also through commplants) what Revenant would do when faced with such a dilemma.
Revenant sighs loudly as Kitsune returns to her natural form and does her best not to look in his direction. Onslaught got him this one time, he has to admit that much.
“You really want to get that villainous mastermind cookie, don’t you?” He then asks Onslaught.
“Absolutely! You promised me and didn’t deliver on that.” Onslaught says. He isn’t looking up but he is still certain that she was pouting at him. Adorable.
He’ll have to ask Decay for one of his wife’s cookie recipes. Unexpected benefits of Steelfang being around. Sure it wasn’t going to be useful in any of the major plans and schemes that he had going (there were exactly two of those, and both were technically on hold until Aesculapius was secured), but… well, it was Oni.
“Fine, fine.” Revenant sighs. “So, am I forgiven for what I did out there?”
“Interrogation bits, yes.” Onslaught replies. “I still have a lot of questions for the future. I still want to understand what exactly you went through while I was away. And what Thermy went through that time. And what Foxy went through in general. But for now…” She sighs. “... I think I can genuinely say that you’re getting better.”
That’s what he suspected from the start. Onslaught asked her dad to get herself involved in the interrogation just to see Revenant at work. Because she wanted to make sure that he was getting better. Not just the knight on the outside but also Onslaught on the inside, eh.
He can only wonder what Destro is up to - but he is certain that he is getting back at him for this. Simply because he can, and because his pride as a villainous mastermind demands it (and because he can’t get back at Oni, right?).
***
“You know we never really talked about it…” Virtue says. Their lengthy series of meetings over dinner to talk about good old times continued. He missed other members of the old PLF. “... but I must say that your wife must have been a wonderful woman.”
“Yes, yes she was.” Destro says solemnly. “I can’t believe that it has been almost two decades.” He sips his drink, staring past Virtue for a moment. Then his eyes return to her.
She’s missing her wings… anatomically speaking. She had Overhaul neatly amputate them (or, to be exact, made it as if they were never there) before replacing them with her light constructs. She also modified her combat armor to - while she was in combat - let her focus on said combat by generating appropriately shaped holographic wings.
It was a bit odd to Destro. Then again, she was constantly complaining about the wings being a bother, and she seemed to feel better and more comfortable about it, so… why not?
“Yes, two decades.” Virtue nods while staring at the wine in her glass. “That’s a long time, isn’t it?”
“Yes, yes it is.” Destro replies before sipping his own drink (whiskey with ice, drunk in very small doses to not get inebriated too fast - the fact that Revenant/Analyst had similar tasted in alcohol really reinforced the fact that Destro looked at him as the son he never had).
“And you’ve never considered… moving on?” Virtue asks. Destro gives her a questioning look. “Too personal?”
“No, not really.” Destro replies. “I mean, we fought side by side in the war, right? We’re pretty much comrades from the same trench. I don’t think there is anything too personal in the face of friendship such as this.”
“Right, war-forged friendship and camaraderie.” Virtue sighs. “Beautiful thing.” She looks surprisingly… disappointed? He isn’t sure why, but he should certainly amend her bad humor!
Destro raises his glass.
“We could certainly drink to that.” He announces. Virtue somehow looks even more disappointed. Is all his experience as a politician failing him in the real world? “What is it?”
“Nothing, nothing.” Virtue shakes her head before raising her own glass. “I didn’t sleep too well last night, this… sometimes makes me a bit grumpy. Anyway, to friendship forged by war.”
He wonders what Revenant is up to and how Onslaught's little scheme went through. He agreed to help her because he understood her logic and figured out that this could be highly beneficial in their relationship.
He had some experience in it, it was great to be able to put it to good use.
***
This has been a very old pic tbh and imo it looks less cool than most of my new ones, but... hey, as long as it works, k?
Besides, she just really went for simplicism in design.
Obraz [https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/1143287032496541821/1143289080973623357/00039-3043594971.png?ex=6549546e&is=6536df6e&hm=a7c438bea546cc52fc5d167adfb890ab90d09851cb859976df669791bf350174&=]