Author's Note: I own nothing.
8 New Allies
Glen flipped through the book Jay had given to Kevin.
"There's no way I'm gonna be able to do most of this. I keep telling her I can only do elemental magic." Kevin frowned sipping his second hot chocolate.
"But have you ever actually tried?" He parroted Jay's question from the night before and Glen looked up at him frowning.
"The charm…"
"You haven't even worn the charm in years. And I mean she's clearly got powers, so maybe it's genetic?" Kevin pointed out and Glen frowned.
"You'd think someone might have mentioned superpowers being genetic. I mean your dad did." Kevin shrugged.
"Your family is a little odd." Kevin pointed out and Glen rolled his eyes.
"Yes, we are. But at least life is always interesting." Jay said slipping into a chair across from Kevin, next to her cousin. She set down a small stack of books in front of Glen who whistled.
"What is all this?"
"Basic primers. Sadly I'm just borrowing them, so be careful with them. What are we up to today?" Kevin glanced around, with the school day ended it had gotten quite a bit busier here.
"Let's head out." Jay shrugged and followed Kevin and Glen out of the coffee shop. They loaded into Jay's car and Kevin pulled out a Plumber badge from his pocket.
"That your dad's?" Jay asked as she pulled out of the parking lot.
"No, Magister Labrid's. But I've been thinking about it." He tapped the badge and the dull grey of the hourglass lit up silver. A holo-map popped up above the badge. "My dad taught me how to use the badges. This map should show us any other active badges." But there was only the map of the streets. Kevin frowned running a hand over the holo-map which expanded to all of Bellwood but still nothing. Jay shook her head.
"Could have told you there weren't many Plumbers on Earth. It's why it's so easy to get illegal shit done here." Kevin's face fell. Jay checked the clock in the console of her car. "If you two don't have anything better to do we could widen our search, head out of town and see what we can find." Kevin glanced at Glen who shrugged.
"Let's do it."
With that they headed out of Bellwood, ending up in a nearby town called Grovers Mill. They wound up getting separated chasing down a kid who looked just like Heatblast. Glen and Jay ended up leading the police away from Kevin and the alien kid. Jay grinned as the police pulled away.
"That could have gone worse." She commented and Glen glanced over at the piece of her paper in Jay's hand.
"That's a six hundred dollar speeding ticket!" She shrugged leaning over and popping open the glove compartment, there were several crumpled tickets there.
"Probably a personal best. Besides the paperwork for it will mysteriously go missing soon." She restarted the car and backed away from the piece of farm equipment they'd been backed up to. Glen frowned.
"This has nothing to do with Kevin's dad does it?" Glen asked rhetorically. Jay shrugged.
"No, probably not."
"So the badge belongs to the Heatblast kid, but he doesn't act like a Plumber." Glen said frowning. Jay shrugged again.
"Too young anyway. Probably a Plumbers kid." She pointed out as she turned the car up onto the road and out of the corn field.
"What kind of cop gives their kid their badge."
"The intergalactic kind. Stops them getting arrested for interplanetary trespass. Badge makes it easier to get around than a passport. I've been trying to get my hands on one for years." Glen raised an eyebrow at his cousin. She shrugged. "It doesn't let you get away with stuff but it's nice to have if you can get one. Technically we're entitled to one, good old granddad was a Plumber after all. Who knows what Grandma was." She grumbled that last bit and Glen frowned.
"What do you mean?" Jay shook her head.
"Magic exists in the universe, but most people can't use it. Most of those who can use it can trace their lineage back to aliens who can access the energy of the universe without charms and spells and the like." She glanced over at Glen who looked shocked. "You thought we were completely human?"
"Well yeah. No one ever told me otherwise." Jay shook her head slightly.
"There's a lot our family hasn't told us. But from what I've learned it has to be Grandma. I mean think about it we've only met her the once, or at least I have."
"No, me too. At Grandpa's funeral."
Ten Years Ago
A woman had stood by the casket dressed in black, just like everyone else here. She had red hair, like Glen with big blue eyes that were filled with tears as the casket was lowered into the ground. She came over to Frank after the service ended and hugged him. She placed a hand on the head of her grandchildren, Ken and Glen. But when she tried to speak to Carl she was crowded away from his wife and daughter.
"Did you know he was still active?" The question was blunt, hissed low so that his daughter didn't hear him.
"Max always needed his space."
"Did you know!"
"Carl."
"You knew." It wasn't a question anymore.
"Yes I knew, he didn't know that I did, but I did. And he never wanted me to help him with his work. I must have offered a hundred times." She shook her head.
"You could have saved him?" Carl's question was cutting.
"I don't know. Maybe. Maybe not. Max was never one to let himself be saved by others, he preferred doing the saving." Carl stepped away from his mother. She reached out to him and he stepped further back.
"I need time mom." He walked away scooping up his daughter and taking his wife's hand as he led them away.
Present Day
Jay had to track Kevin her way but they found him easily after that, hanging in a partially destroyed barn with the Heatblast kid. He smiled as they pulled up and got out of the car.
"Glen, Jay, this is Allen. His dad's a Plumber." The kid smiled at them waving slightly. In human form he looked very ordinary, short, with dark skin and bright eyes, wearing a tank top and jeans. Kevin stood and grabbed a stick off the ground nearby. "I saw something when I was flying over the field." He scratched a pattern in the dirt. "It looks like a crop circle."
"Those things aliens use to find their way arounds." Allen asked and Jay laughed.
"Those things country folk make to mess with city people." Glen raised an eyebrow at his cousin.
"It's not like we don't know a bunch of aliens."
"Yeah and they all have better ways of getting around than making a pattern in corn." She pointed out as she tilted her head at the design frowning. "Also definitely not what this is. Come on I'll show you." She took them outside and lifted a hand. Platforms of deep pink light appeared and Allen balked.
"We have to go up?" He asked his voice shaking slightly.
"You can fucking fly." Jay pointed out as she stepped onto the first platform.
"Not well!" Allen argued and Jay shrugged.
"Ok stay on the ground, where the cops can find you." He grumbled as he stepped onto the platform. A stairway of platforms materialized and they headed up. Once they were about as tall as a two story house Jay stopped and pointed out over the field. "That's not crop circles, that's a circuit board. Someone's making something." Glen frowned as they looked out over the field.
"Yeah actively!" He pointed towards the center of the field where there was a crackling white light.
"Let's get down there!" Kevin declared and a stairway down towards the field materialized. Allen was the first one down it as quickly as he could go. They crept through the corn field to see what was happening. There were two beings, wearing what looked like high tech hazmat suits. They waved to each other and the circuits lit uprising from the ground into a large machine. Lightning crackled from the top of the machine followed closely by clouds that immediately began to drop snow on them. The temperature dropped rapidly leaving everyone who wasn't on fire shivering in a matter of moments.
"The tower's some kind of weather machine." Glen pointed out as the group stepped a bit closer to Allen. Sirens sounded and cop cars quickly pulled up to them. The sheriff was accusatory, claiming that Allen had set up the weather machine so he could keep all the heat for himself. But when he pulled his weapons Jay raised a hand. Every gun that had been drawn went flying out of hands, glowing deep pink just like Jay's eyes as they disassembled themselves midair.
"They're all freaks!" The sheriff called out.
"Slow down, we're not here to hurt anyone." Kevin's pronouncement lost a bit of its weight when two of the cops were struck with light and frozen solid in what looked like metal. Jay threw up a shield blocking several bolts of light from striking the sheriff and deputy. Glen pulled a bottle out of his pocket and threw it into the corn near the creatures in hazmat suits. They immediately began to grow at an alarming rate, wrapping around the beings which shrieked. Kevin twirled the dial on the Omnitrix and transformed into Swampfire. The fight didn't take long but Kevin accidentally ripped off the helmet of one of the beings revealing the gruesome face of a DNAlien. Once they had them all down and out Kevin, still Swampfire, frowned.
"Remember how cold it was on their ship?" He directed his question at Jay and Glen, though Allen, the sheriff and deputy were all listening too.
"Are they trying to terraform Earth?" Glen asked rubbing his arms. Jay shook her head.
"There are more effective ways to terraform than with a weather machine. Whatever they're doing though it's something big if they're willing to change the climate to do it." She pointed this out as she scanned the stalks of corn a frown on her face. Her eyes narrowed and she threw up a shield behind Kevin deflecting another blast. But no one saw the one aiming at her from the other side of the path cut into the corn field. The bright white light struck her, freezing her solid. The shield she'd thrown up vanished and more bolts of light sailed out of the corn at them. Glen cried out as he too was struck and frozen, the sheriff and deputy falling quickly too. Kevin lasted a bit longer but he too fell to the blasts. That left Allen alone against the aliens who couldn't seem to freeze him. He was more than happy when the metallic substance melted off of Swampfire and Kevin helped him take down the aliens and the weather machine. Then the question became how to help the others.
"Heat seemed to work." Allen pointed out stepping closer to the statue that had been Jay. He seemed to be right too, the material whatever it was melting the closer he got. He ran his hands close to the metallic material forcing it to dissipate faster. In a moment Jay was free and wobbling slightly.
"Oh I hate suspended animation. It always makes me nauseous." She did look a little green around the gills as Allen excitedly moved on to Glen, then the deputy and sheriff. Glen too wound up nauseous, but the deputy got it the worst excusing himself to go be sick in the stalks of corn. The sheriff held it together better thanking Allen for his help and apologizing for ever accusing him. Kevin offered him a place on the team but he turned it down, wanting to stick around to help take care of any other DNAliens that might be hanging around. But he did give Kevin his phone number in case he was needed.
They headed back to Bellwood as the night grew darker. This time Jay dropped them both off at Kevin's house. It sort of surprised her that he trusted her enough to tell her where he lived. But she dropped them both off, not wanting even the chance that her uncle or aunt would see her. She drove off to her warehouse and sighed as she went inside. Her burner phone began to ring and she pulled it out of her boot, contemplating if she should answer or not. It was Frisk though so she clicked the button to answer the call.
"What?"
"You should do lottery numbers. Like we'd all be rolling in money if you just gave us the lotto numbers. Cause you called me yesterday wanting to deal in Plumber tech and what do I find out today." Frisk laughed as Jay grinned.
"You found Plumber tech."
"On the money again, lovely lady Sorceress. Nothing big but if you want in there's a meet tonight at the Black Hole. It goes down in about an hour if you wanna go."
"I'm interested, what's the buy in?"
"Solid tech deal, tech for tech. The meet up at the Black Hole is really just for info sharing. Formal wear a must." Frisk said and Jay blew out a breath.
"Fine." She hung up and grumbled as she made her way to her closet. This was going to be a pain in her ass no matter how it went down.
