A black beanie falls to the ground in Arcadia Bay Cemetery, as does its fallen owner: the zombie Chloe. The living Chloe stands over her alternate self and kicks the corpse in disgust.

She and Max are the first line of defense for Arcadia Bay and much of the undead have already rushed past them on the way to town.

Standing beside disturbed graves, Bedlam bellows, "Charge, my soldiers! Lay waste to the future for all roads lead to death!" He raises his fist and laughs maniacally into the cold night air. "Everything is going accordingly!"

With two zombies in her grasp, Max crushes their rotting skulls in her fists and tosses them aside, just as William's ghost erupts from a mausoleum with another zombie trapped in a chokehold. "Hey, I'm pretty sure this guy used to skate down our street." Chloe jumps to her father's aid and hits the zombie with a branch, knocking his head off.

The zombie's ghost hovers over the corpse and jovially adds, "I did!"

William dusts off his ethereal hands and laughs. "Well, sorry, pal!" He glares at Bedlam, waving a fist in the air angrily at the villain. "I should've known you'd be an evil jerk!" He hovers over to Max and asks, dropping his upset demeanor, "What's the plan, Super-Max?"

Swatting away three zombies with her staff, she says to him, "The plan is to fight off the zombies until Kate comes back, or until someone else shows up who can really beat Bedlam."

Chloe tells her, with an arm around her shoulders, "I figured it'd be the two of us."

Max shrugs and briefly explains, "Well, it will. Just not all the way." She looks over to town as she sees zombies march forward. "We need to get back into town. Like, town town." She pats Chloe on the back and, with a smirk on her face, leads the two Prices forward into battle. As she runs alongside the two past zombies ignorant of their presence, Max looks into the palm of her right hand and sees her blue butterfly tattoo.


SPRING BREAK 2014

Max looks into the palm of her right hand and feels that it is blank. What with her skin having become a literal pale canvas after her ascension to godhood, she wonders what is next. And yet the first thing she can think of is very apparent: Chloe Price. She holds Max's right hand and smiles at her. Max looks up at her and laughs, happy as always to have her back.

Standing by the beach with the two lovers, Victoria tells them, "Me and Katie are gonna go grab some lunch at Wendy's. Are you coming with?"

Max turns her attention to her friend and tells her, "Yeah, yeah, no worries." But suddenly, another idea comes to mind as she looks at Chloe's smiling face. "In fact… Chloe, we need to get tattoos!"

Chloe raises an eyebrow at this but she shrugs it off, not feeling many doubts. Still, she only asks one: "Will Bedlam get jealous?" She looks at her left arm and Bedlam puts his hands up. "That looks like a 'no'. Let's get them!" As Max pulls her along by the wrist, Chloe tells Victoria and Kate, "We'll meet up with you guys in a bit!"

Victoria crosses her arms, naturally annoyed by Chloe considering past experiences. "Fine. Don't be too long. Or trashy for that matter."

Kate playfully slaps Victoria's back and wags a finger at her, saying, "Hey, no. Bad Vic!"

The two walk back into town, hand in hand, with Victoria asking in an equally playful guilty tone, "'Baaaad Viiiic'? C'mon." She giggles happily with Kate.

Max pushes past through the door into the town's local tattoo parlor, located on the piers, and says, "Hi! We'd like to get tattoos together."

The older artist in charge of the place looks at Chloe like she's seen a ghost. Shocked, she asks, "Wait, aren't you dead?"

Chloe laughs heartily before explaining simply, "I'm back, and I'm here to stay."

Max taps her chin and thinks, as if she were in a fast food dive or something, "We'd like… hm. What would we like?" She looks at Chloe, with her bright blue hair, as a butterfly flutters past her. A blue butterfly, to be specific. And suddenly, it hits her: "I have an idea."

Two blue butterflies for Max and Chloe in the palm of their right and left hands respectively. Chloe gets her tattoo first and almost cries getting it, but Max is there to comfort her, holding her free hand with care. Chloe unfortunately cannot show the same restraint as she is getting a tattoo on the palm of her hand!

Max gets her tattoo and reacts surprisingly well, barely even flinching. Perhaps it is knowing the pain from the future as it happens to her in the past. Perhaps it is her weird pale white skin. But Chloe is feeling peeved, natural for her rather petty attitude towards life. She pokes her several times with her fingers, not enough to disrupt the process but enough to get a giggle or two out of Max. "Girl, how did both you and Rachel do this so easily?"

Max shrugs her shoulders and tells her, "Maybe our tattoos aren't, uh, like Pokemon or something. No offense, Bedlam."

With time and the filling in of the sketch, the tattoos are set and ready for the world to see them. It is also something that hurts like hell (which is, funnily enough, empty).


THE PRESENT

Reflecting on how little the tattoo's impact has been on her life up until this point, Max thinks on its impact at this point in time: " If Bedlam came from Chloe's tattoo, what will come from this? "

Another impact comes in the form of a "STOP" sign that Max blindly runs into. She falls to the ground and Chloe worriedly asks, "Max! Are you okay?" She slides to her girlfriend's aid on the snowy streets of town.

A new voice speaks, oddly enough within their heads: "I think I can answer that first question."

Chloe looks around and asks, "Who said that?"

Max sees her hand, where a blue glow is emanating from its palm. "Chloe, look at your tattoo."

The glow grows stronger, but for all the worst reasons as a shadow overtakes the town. Looking up, Chloe asks. "Which one?"

Blotting out the moonlight, Bedlam's face becomes the sky as he grows to the size of a mountain. As it was prophesied once and forever (in applicable timelines that is), death reclaims the skies of Arcadia Bay. Bedlam bellows:

" The bell tolls for Arcadia Bay! As it always has, and always will! I am its architect, its vessel! I AM THE ONE TRUE LORD OF DEATH! FEAR MEEEE! "

Chloe helps Max up to her feet and tells her, "Dude, you have to get up! We need to stop him!"

The voice tells them both, "And you can. Together as one."

Chloe frowns and remarks, "I swear to god, if this is Dolly-"

Max holds her hand and tells her, "No, Chloe. It isn't." She points to a blue butterfly fluttering around them.

The Butterfly explains, "That's right. Her real name is actually Samantha Derr-"

Max stops her and explains, "No, I mean you're not Dolly."

With a raised eyebrow, Chloe asks, "Sooooo the fuck is that?" She points at the Butterfly, with its strange inky blue skin.

"She's something of a protector for the town."

"In a manner of speaking, yes. My name is Fricepield."

Chloe looks at Max and sighs, laughing in between her annoyed gasp. "Y'know what, maybe my parents were right about tattoos being bad life choices."

Fricepield flutters onto Chloe's eyebrow and tells her, "The time is not one for jokes, Chloe. Your love for Max, and hers for you, transcend universes. As does the storm to come. But like that storm, only you have the power to save everyone."

Regrettably coming to the conclusion she came to when the storm hit her home Bay, she bluntly tell Fricepield, "Pass. I died once and that was enough of a pain."

"Chloe." Max holds Chloe's tattooed hand in hers, and the two feel energy surging through their body. "You felt that, right? We need to hold hands and something will come of it. Something good, I hope."

"Max, given our experience with Bed-lame, I'm not in the mood for having a SECOND tattoo monster screw us over!"

Max looks at Fricepield and says, "She won't hurt us. I… can't see what happens immediately after we merge here, but I can see afterwards. We save the day. We live good, long lives with our friends. And they'll… survive. It's like a tunnel. This is the only way we can beat Bedlam."

"Yeah, yeah, trust and all. I trust you… I really do." Chloe looks at Fricepield, and looks at Max. With a smile and some thoughtful consideration, she tells her, "Then, through the tunnel we go." The two hold their tattooed palms together and she continues, "I'm so haunting you if this goes badly."

Max giggles, "Likewise." The two hold each other's hands together as blue energy surges through their bodies. With this much power and the fate of the world on the line, the two lovers can't help but to unify their energy with a kiss.

Seconds later, they are gone, taken elsewhere to prepare their assault on Bedlam.

With Max and Chloe are gone, the fighters on the ground and in the sky fire futilely on the giant Bedlam, much to his attention and anger. He inches towards them as they fire on him, and he sings:

" YOU'LL ALL DIE

AND WOOORDS WON'T MEAN ANYTHING

IT'LL PERMANENTLY BE NIGHT

AND IIII WON'T FEEL ANYTHING

I'LL ALWAYS BE LAUGHING AT YOU WHEN YOU- "

With a flap from the sky, blue wings descend upon Bedlam's one-fisted figure and four clawed arms stab into his back. As he screams, the giant blue Price-Field-Fricepield Butterfly yells back in offended aggression:

" DON'T YOU DARE BASTARDIZED MGMT, YOU BASTARD! "

The giant Price-Field-Fricepield Butterfly fusion flaps backwards, pulling Bedlam away from their allies, much to their cheering.

" WHAT ARE YOU- AGH! "

Bedlam is knocked off of his feet and the Price-Field-Fricepield Butterfly flutters into the skies above. The tattoo tyrant falls back on his back with an enormous clatter, crushing many of his undead cronies in the process.

As Bedlan writhes on the floor, scratching away his minions from his back, the Price-Field-Fricepield Butterfly lands on Bedlam's chest and screams into his face:

" YOU'RE GONNA DIE, MOTHERFUCKER! "


Being dragged lower and lower into the depths of the Agency Headquarters, approaching the General Holding Cells of the base, Kate begs to the dozen black-clad Agents, with her wrists cuffed together, "Please, you have to let me and my wife go! We're the good guys!"

"We know, Kate."

She asks the talking Agent, "You know my name?"

The Agent giggles and tells her as they approach several empty cells, "I know. You killed me with your lasers and trespassed onto the Missouri part of the Yuletide Evil Scheme - AS PLANNED, of course - so you're going to a cell, just for time-out, and for time-in with our captive brothers and sisters."

The Agents show Kate her cell - blocked off by a thick metal gate - and she yells at them all, knowing that Dolly is in control of them all, "You're evil!" They open the cell and push Kate into the white room. As the gate closes on her, her handcuffs detach and fall to the floor.

Collectively, the dozen Agents shrug their shoulders and say in unison, "I'm just doing my job." They start walking away and add, "And also committing an act of terrorism likely punishable by death or Gitmo, so let the good times roll!"

Kate bangs on the gate and tries shooting at the gate with fists of light, but they harmlessly bounce off due to albedo. "Me and Victoria will stop you, you maniac!"

"Of course you will. NOT! Toodles."

Kate paces around in circles, thinking over her situation. She thinks of Victoria and whatever might be happening to her. Feeling overwhelmed by the anxious fear she has for her well-being, she sits against a wall and looks at the gate, thinking of a way to get out. One that is actually possible.

Another prisoner, her neighbor behind her, asks, "What's happening, you?"

Kate sighs. "The place is under attack by supervillains."

Another neighbor, one above her, declares angrily, "They're giving us a bad name!"

"I suppose so." Kate rises to her feet and tells the prisoners around her, "We need to stop them."

Much of the prison populace laughs at the idea of a revolution by their hands. One asks, "'We'? We're not superheroes or something!"

Kate smirks to herself and tells the doubters, "Well, we can all be heroes. Just for one day. It's Christmas after all!"

One prisoner deludedly proclaims, "Woohoo! Lucky number seven anniversaryyyyy!"

Someone else asks, "That short of a time here?"

"We're all getting out." Kate looks down at her hands and claps them together to produce light. She aims at the door and blasts at the gate holding her in captivity, denting it just a smudge. Seeing her attempt at freedom pay off, she continues blasting and blows a hole right through the barrier. She pulls herself out of the hole and dances a happy jig for a few seconds.

She isn't out of the clear however. From the shadows above, Dr. Court climbs down on metal tendrils and tauntingly says to Kate, "No. You're not." Kate attempts to fly away, only for the Doctor to grapple onto her ankle and pull her back to the ground. "What did I juuuust say?"

Rolling her eyes in annoyance, Kate aims her palms at the Doctor and blasts her in the face with two beams of light, knocking her backwards.

She cautiously walks over to the Doctor and, expecting another attack, keeps her hands up in case she'll have to use them. Thankfully for her, that is far from the case as she sits up and asks, disoriented as can be, "What happened?"

Sitting in a locker room, Colin holds his wife's hand, hoping for their daughter's safe return. Thankfully and conveniently, their prayers have been answered as Victoria walks in. She tells the Agents with their hands gripping her arms, "Get your hands off me."

She shakes them off and one responds gleefully, "Fine. Big baby." They wave her gun in the air and place the contraband on their belts before walking away.

Victoria's parents run up to her and hold her in a strong bear hug. Colin asks, "Victoria, are you okay?"

She smiles and tells them, "I'm fine. Just got lost. Are you two fine too?"

Zara tells her, "Yes, of course. Without doubt." The three break apart from their hug and take a seat on one of the benches. "Victoria, you wouldn't happen to know why these supervillains are here, would you?"

She clicks her tongue and explains, "Having hung out with Max for a long enough time, she tells me things. These guys were involved with Teddy Iris, that drug dealer w- she stopped back in July. Bunch of terrorists, the lot of them."

Thinking back on their actions then and now, Zara shivers. "Oh god, they're so scary."

Victoria holds her mother's hand and tells her, "Not really. I actually met Dolly back when I first got with Katie. But she was… a lot nicer back then."

Colin asks aloud, "Wonder what changed in her? Turning her into this evil being."

Victoria shrugs her shoulders and tells him, "Who knows."

Looking over her shoulder, Zara tells her family, "Maybe he does."

Standing behind the Chases, the Jumper tells them, "I've been sent to-"

Shocked by the young man's sudden appearance, Victoria jumps away and shrieks, "Agh, Christ, dude! Don't sneak up on people like that!"

Colin snaps his fingers upon realizing, "Oh, this is that hero who saved you and Kate! Hi, we're her parents."

Victoria groans, rolling her eyes behind a facepalm. "Oh, brother."

"I'm Colin and this is Zara." He extends his hand to the Jumper, who shakes it awkwardly.

Zara smirks at the metahuman. "Wow, a real superhero in our midst."

Placing his hips at his sides, the Jumper tells them, "Thank you, citizens. Just doing my duty with my God-gifted powers."

"He's not as cool as Max, if I may say. Plus, I don't think God gives people superpowers, you just, like, get them."

The Jumper crosses his arms at Victoria and asks smugly, "Eh, how would you know?"

Colin and Zara hold Victoria's hands and tell him, "Our daughter is very smart."

"So I've heard." The Jumper takes hold of both elder Chases' shoulders and tells them, "Now, let's get you two somewhere safe."

Victoria backs out of the hold and chuckles nervously. "Uhhh, let's not."

Zara asks, "What's the matter, sweetie?"

"My gut is telling me that this wouldn't be a good idea."

Annoyed, the Jumper asks, "Did your gut stop several metahumans from disrupting the peace outside of this base back in 2012?"

Confused at this odd info dump, Victoria remarks, "Uh, literally not relevant."

The Jumper steps closer to her and asks coldly, "Then, tell me, what would be more relevant? You and your parents making it to safety, or you and your parents being victim to a metahuman maniac?"

Victoria raises an eyebrow and steps up to the special Agent. "Which one would you provide? Personally speaking, that is. But then again, I know you're not a very personal person. Y'know, 'nothing personal'?"

Colin looks around and asks, "Victoria?"

Victoria leans closer into the Jumper, prompting him to take a step back. "Hanging out with Max for a long enough time, she's obviously told me all about you, Dolly. I know you well enough to know you're a liar. One who needs superpowers to make up your truth."

"Sounds like the pot calling the kettle black."

"At least I can live in my own skin."

The Jumper huffs, looking into Victoria's soul with a fiery rage. But he drops the matter and laughs heartily while loudly cracking his neck. He even sheds a tear before proclaiming, "OUCH, WOW, you're kinda mean! Looks like you could use a time-out!" He reaches for Victoria but she steps back and pulls her parents away from the villain in disguise. The disgruntled Jumper cracks his knuckles and teleports behind the three.

The Jumper grabs Victoria's parents by their shoulders and teleports away with them… but not Victoria. She feels their presence leave and sighs. They'd let her go so that she could be spared.

The Jumper returns and tells Victoria, "Now that I've got your family, you're gonna tell me your secret."

"If you've hurt them-"

Jumper shakes his hands and points at Victoria, saying, "No, no, it's all about you. Not that I figured you'd care, considering how for the past few months, you've wanted to live your own life your way with Katie-Kat."

Shocked at the notion of an uncaring attitude towards her parents, she asks, "What does that have to do with anything?"

"It's ALL about YOU!" Rubbing his hands together, Jumper asks again, "Now, tell me: Why can't I control you?"

Seeing Dolly's frustration burst through the Jumper's voice, Victoria teases, "Maybe you're just not good enough?" She flashes a wide grin at him, just to anger Dolly even more.

Pointing at her, the Jumper exclaims, "I've got control of more people than you think!"

Victoria shakes her hands in faux fear and sneers at the villain. "Ooh, a bunch of grunts! Wow, I could've done that with some nice compliments and pot!"

"I take it that's how you got Katie to like you?" The Jumper cackles, even though Victoria feels more confused by the accusation than enraged. "You're so easy to mess with. Probably because you've got so much on you! Your years of bullying, your years of sucking up, your hours spent soaking in wet paint!"

"You were going somewhere, and then you lost it."

"It doesn't matter! None of it does."

Victoria smirks, "You're right on schedule."

Looking over his shoulder, the Jumper asks, "What's that supposed t-" Kate shoots a beam of light at the Jumper, knocking Dolly out of him and knocking him into the doors. She leads Dr. Court into the locker room and runs up to Victoria to hold her in a tight hug.

Victoria beams at Kate's return and exclaims happily, "You're alright!"

"Why wouldn't I be?" The two kiss and smile at one another.

Looking at the Doctor with a confused glare, Victoria asks, "So is she on our team or something?"

Kate nods her head and tells her, "Yep. And so might the porcupine guy and the clothing guy." She steps out of Victoria's grip and says, "Now, we need one more group and then we'll have a certified army to take down Dolly!"

Victoria points to the unconscious Jumper "Well, we've got this guy too, mayb-"

A pink origami moth falls out of his grip and floats onto Victoria's shoulder. She unfolds it and reads it:

If you want to see your family alive, you'll want to come on down to the Victoria do not listen to her she wants to use Come to the surveillance center in the unguarded Northwest Comms Tower alone. Don't bring anyone else, you're very importaS he's right about that but please don't come Victoria it's aGAY OLD TIME, COME OR I START TURNING PEOPLE INTO EMUS

Sincerely, Dolly and co. 3 3 3

Victoria puts the paper away and has only one thing to say: "What the fuck?"