Snuggles The Symbiote

Taylor was acting weird lately. Like, I got addicted to alien cannibalism, went on a rampage, and became an Elder God that almost released another Elder God to go on a rampage across the universe, so acting like none of that had happened was out of the question, but it was like she didn't know what to do with me now...

Like, she didn't hate me... I think... I was pretty sure, but I wasn't sure what she was thinking... and it's not like I could read her mind, my psychic powers were sealed... and also because reading people's minds without permission is wrong, unless they're bad guys.

I was relaxing on the couch in the Wards office after my latest attempt to teach myself capoeira—I had the Jinga down, but I was still having trouble with the flips—when a blast of blue-white tore open a portal in the middle of the room.

This not being particularly unusual, I did not react until Val Richards, with a shorter, wavier haircut than she had the last time I saw her, stepped out, grabbed me by the wrist, pulled me up, and said "I'm borrowing you."

Then she slapped a piece of paper with some ordinary-looking scotch tape on it on the couch where I'd been sitting. It said "Borrowed Ashley, Love Val," and dragged me back through her portal.

"Okay, so this is the fourth time I've been kidnapped," I observed. "You're not gonna prod me with needles, cut me open, or make me fight robots, are you?"

"Well, now I feel bad," Val admitted sheepishly. "But, no... I just want your help with a couple of things. First... You're a reality warper now, right?"

"No, not right now... Doctor Strange sealed most of my powers till I'm fully over my uh, power high. Then I'm gonna have limiters to keep me from going full 'Power, Unlimited Power!' again. Playing God with the fundamental forces through which the narratives of creation are made manifest is probably the last thing I'm gonna get back."

"Okay, plan B: You nabbed the memories and powers of at least one sorcerer, right?"

"I can't cast spells. I've tried it. Doesn't work. Either that's sealed too or I just can't do it."

"...Well, there go all of the easy solutions for fixing Franklin's problems... Now I have to figure out how to find X-Man... Anyway, the other thing is... You're a brainy kid, right? Like me, got some... Enhanced, intellect?"

"A couple of different kinds, yeah."

"And you've... Got my Dad's memories? Dr. McCoy's? Mr. Stark's?"

"And some other people's."

"Well, that means that you're almost as smart and educated as me," Val concluded with a nod... "This means that you are the ideal fourth research partner for what I'm working on right now."

I took a look around. We were in what appeared to be a bedroom full of gadgets. On one desk was a green hologram of Doctor Doom's metal masked face, and on the sidewall was a big monitor with a bunch of blueprints and a little dragon avatar in a corner.

"On holo-call from Latveria," Val gestured to the Doom hologram, "Uncle Doom."

I bit my tongue to stop myself from calling Doctor Doom 'that loser' to his face when he wasn't in groin punching distance. I didn't want to insult him if I wasn't in a position to counter any possible retaliation.

"It is so weird that you're on friendly terms with your father's archnemesis," was what I said instead.

"Bah!" The man on the other end of the call scoffed. "Even the fool Richards knows that the Great Doom would not lay hands on the child whom he delivered safely when Richards himself had failed to see to the safety of both wife and child."

So... He cared for Val because it was an ego thing? I held my tongue on that, and instead said "Okay, if I'm gonna be working with you I'm just gonna say that my foster sister defeated an evil clone of Squirrel Girl in the time it took me to blink."

Doom was silent for a moment. "Duly noted."

"And over here we have an Extradimensional E-Call from some lady who calls herself Dragon," Val continued. "Apparently she's the best 'Tinker' there is in that world you've been living in and after the initial panic attack she had when I hacked her channels from another reality, she's agreed to help me figure out how the heck Tinkertech works."

"...And you want to know this why?" I asked. "I'm pretty sure anything that you can make is better than anything on Earth Bet."

"Because there is something that I don't know and that frustrates me," Val said sternly. "I know how my Dad feels about magic now and I hate it."

Val looked me right in the eyes. "I combined a dozen different technologies from at least two universes to make a Forever Gate to anywhere or anywhen. Uncle Doom can just make Power Cosmic." I started to itch at the idea of having that kind of power without being a Herald of Galactus. "This Dragon Lady is apparently the only one in all of Earth Bet with any idea how this stuff works, and between all of your stolen memories, you might as well have a Ph.D. in Yes. The four of us together are the best chance of understanding how this... Stuff, works, so... Help me, please?"

She was somehow older than me. She shouldn't be able to make puppy eyes work on me. It wasn't fair.

"Okay, fine... As long as you get me back home in time for dinner."

The way Val smiled made me immediately regret agreeing to help.

Snuggles The Symbiote

"Okay... This laser gun seems to make a D-battery work like a Parker particle generator..."

We'd been at this for two hours and my head was starting to hurt. We'd started by going over everything that was known for sure about Tinker-Tech, then going over individual devices and blueprints and we'd figured out how some of this worked and made a whole lot of no progress on a Unifying Theory derived from what we knew.

Doctor Doom had signed off on his end ten minutes ago because he was on a different continent and had a country to run. This did not stop Val in the slightest, even though I was getting sorta-tired, pseudo-hungry, and headache-y. Like, I didn't need to eat or sleep anymore but I still had cravings and needed rest of some kind and stuff.

I started rubbing my eyes. "Miss Dragon? Can I ask you a question?"

"Of course."

"Are you an Artificial Intelligence?"

Dragon was silent for almost a minute. "Why do you ask?"

"In the last hour I've learned that you mostly stay at home, only contacting the outside world via the internet or remote-controlled drones, that you're really, really smart, and you're apparently really good at multitasking since you've gone through about twice as many gadgets as Val and I. Sounds like an AI to me."

"...Never let anyone crush your brilliant imagination," Dragon replied.

"No, no, that makes sense," Val added... "Look, if you are that's fine. I supported the Robot Uprising. AI of humanlike or greater functionality deserve all the same rights, privileges, and responsibilities as organic beings."

"Yeah," I added, "I don't have anything against machine-people... Except Sentinels, but that's a bit like saying that you don't have anything against German people except for the Nazis. If you're not a murderous, racist cúl tóna then I don't care what you are."

"I'm going to have to cut this short," Dragon said. "I'm getting a call and I just remembered that I forgot to wash my hair last night. Goodbye."

There was an exaggerated click as the monitor she was using turned itself off.

I looked at Val with a raised eyebrow. "So, was I off, or is she in the closet about being a robot?"

Val shrugged and opened up her portal. "There's not really much point if it's just the two of us working," and then she escorted me back to Earth Bet.

Where we were met by a glaring Taylor.

Immediately, my survival instincts kicked in. I pointed at Val and with superhuman quickness shouted that "she asked for help and wouldn't take no for an answer!"