Snuggles The Symbiote
Things were a little awkward on the way home. I mean, Doctor Strange said he explained everything to everyone and Mrs. Richards didn't seem angry but what I did wrong, to her especially, and I don't know how to... How did you apologize for violating the sanctity of someone's mind so you could harvest them for something that will give you their powers and memories?
Anyway, Doctor Strange came with us when we took Val's portal generator back to Earth Bet and, after a brief, assertive conversation with the clerk who was waiting for us he went off to go talk with some people about... About me getting therapy for my issues.
Lisa mentioned having to check in with her probation guy, and... well, Taylor and I went to Wards HQ... we were supposed to meet up with Mister Hebert but... we couldn't take Grace with us for several reasons up to and including that I didn't know if he was allowed to know if Grace was Riley. So I wanted to sort of... drop her off at HQ...
...Because I didn't trust most of the people who worked here.
And it'd be nice to have a chat with anyone who was there. Even Missy and Dean had come back early after Murder World and...
When we got there, Missy was hanging up a poster in a corner of the common room. It was like a photo from a drone or something. Missy in her Hulk form with a blood-red bonfire of an aura full of kirbons and Dean as Thor crackling with lightning to match, both firing massive blasts into a giant blue humanoid lizard thing while standing on a beach.
Missy was humming a happy song to herself.
I didn't quite understand what it was. I was going to ask when I noticed that Taylor was starring at it slackjawed.
Grace spoke up. "Please tell me that you got a picture of people starring at you and trying to if they should clap or not."
"No, but I got a renegotiated contract giving me 60% of my merchandise profits and the right to say 'fuck' once per public appearance as a belated birthday present."
"Please don't swear," Grace said almost automatically.
"Wait? When was your birthday, I would have got you something?" That was what you were supposed to do for friends birthdays, right?
"Day we got back, actually," Missy said, "and honestly it's not really something I normally look forward to so in all the recent excitement I kind of forgot myself, but it was the fourteenth. Same day Dean and I drove Leviathan away from Miami by ourselves." Missy sounded so proud of herself. she turned around and had a giant smile. "Less than a million property damage. zero-point-zero casualties. If my life was a book, it'd be less than a paragraph, that's how bad we kicked his ass."
"Please don't swear," Grace repeated.
Taylor pulled out her phone and started fiddling with it. "That can't possibly be right."
"What?"
"It's just, Ashley we met on April 11th. It's currently May 17th. It's been just over a month but... That can't possibly be, right? Too much has happened since then."
I blinked. "Are you alright? Do you need to lie down? Or go to the infirmary? Should I call your dad and tell him that it's gonna be a bit longer?"
"What? No... Never mind, I'll figure it out later."
"Okay... So, who is this Leviathan guy again?" I was still having trouble keeping some of the villains from here apart.
Now everybody was kind of looking at me. "Leviathan... The Endbringer?" Missy explained.
"The... Oh. Oooh! Those things." Wait, if Missy and Dean had beaten one of them by themselves then... Maybe, maybe I didn't need to worry about everything myself... Maybe Spider-Man was right, I should just take a break and trust my friends and... What am I talking about? Of course Spider-Man was right, he's Spider-Man!
Snuggles The Symbiote
So, two things I learned last night: The PRT's standard policy for psychological counseling for Wards amounted to mass malpractice and Doctor Strange threatened to see the organization burn if they didn't fix it... Apparently he takes the Hippocratic Oath very, very seriously.
I also learned that I can't sleep in a room where I woke up and there were two severed heads in my bed. I told everyone I'd be fine, it'd be okay... ended up awake all night. I thought I could keep it a secret, but Taylor could tell immediately that I hadn't slept so...
So until she and Mister Hebert finish deciding what to do about the house, I was back to sleeping on base. I told them it would be okay, but...
So now I was in mine and Taylor's room at PRT HQ trying to take a morning nap... It wasn't working and...
What's wrong with me? I used to be able to sleep at any time for any reason. Not that long ago I was passing out every time I exerted myself.
"A Godly body grants godly stamina, so you aren't exhausted enough to overcome the thoughts keeping you awake."
"Shut up Scream, I'm not a God!"
And now Scream and Mister Snuggles were arguing in the back of my head. There goes any chance of sleep any time soon.
There was a knock at the door. "Come in," I said while sitting up. It's not like napping was working.
Grace came in and, without a word, sat on the bed next to me and wrapped her arms around me. Either she was cold or it was force of habit.
"So," she said, "did you just say 'shut up Scream, I'm not a God?'"
"...No," I said completely straight and with an unbeatable poker face.
"Ashley, I've spent my entire life around crazy people," Grace deadpanned, "if you're hearing voices that aren't there then you need to get help with—"
"It's not that it..." Darn it, how did she see past my brilliant lie? "Look, Doctor Strange found another symbiote and cast a spell on her so that she would boost up my psychic defenses if I wore her in addition to Mister Snuggles. We're not exactly getting along."
"Ahh," Grace said in complete understanding. "And the doctor said something about something or other reaching into your head like a Master Power and pushing your buttons to make you go crazy, so that explains the spell..."
"That's not an excuse," I said. "Those were still my feelings. Maybe it was... Like, stronger than normal or my inhibitions getting lowered or something, but it was still my feelings. I still need to... I did bad things I need to make up for."
Grace let go of me and came around to look at me face to face. "What makes me so special?"
"I don't know what you're getting at?" I had a sinking feeling where my heart was supposed to be. This was gonna suck.
"Ashley? I killed you. I cut you open and took samples from all of your organs, stuffed spring-loaded blades set to go off and kill you if you so much as moved, injected you with so much of a mutagenic poison that I can honestly say you had a little bit of blood in your poison stream, and tricked your foster sister into triggering the blades." She was very clinical about it, even as her face turned greener. "I liked doing that. It was fun. Just like it was fun for the thousands of other people I killed or worse. But you forgave me for it."
"Yeah, becuase it wasn't really your fault," I explained, "it was Jack messing with your head and—"
"But it was still my feelings," Grace said. "I'm Bonesaw. I did all of that stuff. It doesn't matter why I liked doing it, what matters is that I liked it. So, tell me, what makes me so special that you can forgive me for the horrible things I did when you can't forgive yourself for going a little crazy. The doctor said that you didn't permanently hurt anyone and saved a couple thousand lives. Maybe a couple million."
"I ate a man's soul!" Why did nobody realize what a big deal that was?
"Did you wash it down with chianti or Amarone?"
"Actually, Chablis pairs best with sole but..." darn it, she tricked me into making a pun. "Don't joke about..."
"Ashley, you're a big fat hypocrite," Grace deadpanned. "Now come on, you need a nap and I've been up all night trying to talk Armsmaster into hooking me up with a lab where I can experiment with botany. He said no. Apparently, plants reproduce too easily and he figures that you'd commit mass homicide if I got a pre-signed 'make anything alive that reproduces too much and you're dead' kill order so he said no. So I need a nap too, and my blood's getting cold."
...The more and more I learned about the law in Earth Bet, the more it reminded me of home.
Grace got up next to me again, wrapped her arms around me again, and then used the fact that she was bigger than me and currently a hell of a lot stronger than me to force me to lie down and snuggle.
"One day, my powers are gonna be unsealed. And then you will be the one forced to snuggle."
"Promises, promises."
I think Grace was trying to help me, but really all it did was give me more to think about. Even hugs couldn't help me get to sleep.