Within the Apple Ch15B

*****

With his calls made, Xander stepped out of the little expanded area space he’d made in the old abandoned super-tanker and enjoyed the feel of the sun on his face for a moment before turning back to the city.

The endbringer fight, such as it was, had been something of an eye opener. Whatever the locals were dealing with, it was clear that they were outmatched. He’d seen a few Cthuloid horrors in his day, you didn’t exactly have much choice about that when hanging with Superheroes, let alone Wednesday, or even just living in Sunnydale.

What he was looking at here, however, seemed beyond the norm in a significant way. The Simurgh was well beyond the power level these people should be dealing with. Honesty, he wasn’t certain that even the DC or Marvel universes, despite their higher power levels, would be able to handle the threat, so there was basically no chance for the locals with their more limited power levels.

Which makes me wonder about the locals… so far I’ve only seen two of them close enough to analyze, but I’m not sure Taylor should count or not since she appears to have magic.

That didn’t make a lot of sense either, however, so he didn’t know what the hell was going on. That a local would have magic wasn’t that crazy, but she way she seemed to have ‘triggered’ in keeping with the local way of gaining powers made Taylor a puzzle in more than one aspect.

What he’d learned from the Wards was something else again.

I’ll need to examine more Parahumans to determine if it’s the norm here or not, but Kid Win certainly seemed to have a Planar Contract.

On its own, that wasn’t all that odd. Plenty of heroes in the universes he’d come from acquired their powers in similar ways. Shazam, Doctor Fate, The Phoenix, many others… they all had that in common. A supe with a contract that allowed for inventing crazy tech was unusual, but he’d seen and heard of a few linked to God’s like Hephaestus.

However, the implication of an entire class of Tinker type Parahumans left him rather puzzled.

There can’t be that many Gods of the Forge kicking around, and last I checked they tended to prefer a single Avatar at any given time… Not to mention that those types of Gods are big on the whole standing on your own two legs thing, they wouldn’t just givepeople plans with no context. Defeats the whole point of having an Avatar in the first place.

A War God might do things this way, but they weren’t as chaotic as what he was seeing. They liked their armies, and while not every War God was all about discipline they didn’t tolerate the sort of near pure chaos he was looking at.

Xander sighed as he stepped up to the edge of the deck and over the side, letting his flight harness take over as he lifted off and headed in toward town.

*****

Hebert’s Home

A knock at the door caused Taylor to jump to her feet, school and most non-critical businesses were taking a day off after the Endbringer attack, so she’d been lucky enough to avoid school for one more day.

“I’ve got it,” She called out to her father.

At the door she paused only briefly to check who was there before she unlocked it and pulled it open.

“Magus!”

“hello my cute little apprentice,” Magus said with a tip of his head, “Mind if I come in?”

“Of course,” She stepped aside, “Please come on in.”

Magus paused, mid step, then sighed.

“Ok, I know you mean well, and this probably isn’t a problem locally,” He said, “But just in case, I have to insist that you neverinvite anyone into your home again.”

Taylor stared.

“What.”

Magus sighed, stepping past her, “There are things out there that are… not friendly… some of them can only cross the thresholds of your home if you invite them. It’s actually a good bit of advice when it comes to dealing with all manner of supernatural types. An invitation can actually cripple your defenses against them.”

“I… see?” Taylor said, clearly confused.

“Vampires, for example.”

“Vampires are real!?”

Magus shrugged, “Locally, not that I’ve seen, but I haven’t been here long and they definitely existed in the last three universes I’ve been too.”

“Vampires are what now?” Danny asked, stepping into the room with a bemused look on his face.

“Magus says that Vampires are real and need to be invited in before they can come into your home,” Taylor explained. “He was annoyed when I asked him to come in.”

Danny looked curiously to Magus who simply nodded.

“It’s not just Vampires either, a lot of supernatural and other similar creatures have similar limitations,” Magus informed him. “It’s just good practice not to incidentally lower your protections.”

“Huh. And are there Vampires here?” Danny asked skeptically.

“Not that I’ve seen so far,” Xander admitted. “but I haven’t looked really thoroughly so…”

“Hmm…” Danny nodded thoughtfully. “Well, I certainly hope that there aren’t any, but I don’t see the harm in taking simple precautions. You say inviting people in is a problem?”

Magus nodded, “Back home we generally just smile and step aside, anyone who makes a big deal about being old fashioned and such is automatically under suspicion.”

“Can’t say I’ve ever run into anyone like that,” Danny chuckled, “though there are a couple Parahumans with unusual… let’s say OCD type behaviors… that I’ve heard of. Back in the day, Marquis had a code of personal honor that tread into those lines, actually, and then there’s Accord in Boston, plus a few others.”

Magus nodded, “Interesting.”

Taylor smirked at him, “You don’t think they’re Vampires do you?”

The young man just chuckled, “Not likely, no. Parahuman abilities have things in common with Magic, but it’s not quite a perfect match.”

“They do?” Taylor perked up, “Like what?”

“Powers read almost identical to magic use, aside from one thing,” Magus said, with consideration, “the emotional content has been stripped from them, assuming it ever existed.”

Taylor frowned, “And that’s… important?”

“That’s impossible,” Xander told her firmly. “Magic and emotion are inextricably tied together. Seeing magic without emotion is… creepy, honestly, like the first time I saw a zombie. Just… wrong.”

Taylor stared at him.

The first time??

“At any rather, that’s enough about that,” Magus said as he fished out his spellphone, “Time to get back to your training.”

*****