Working for Myself

[Myself]

Explanation:
This is going to be the long-awaited story of NB from the perspective of Myself's assistant. It will explain many things, including the workings of the organisation he heads and possibly some mysteries such as what caused all the Myselves to appear at an NB party and begin to fight, as well as why it is so problematic for him.

Chapter 1: An average day.
I walked into my office, at which point a cat climbed onto my shoulder. My boss, to be precise.

"You are the weirdest person I've worked for. Ever." I said.
"So?" A telepathic voice asked.
"So, couldn't you be more, you know, normal?" I replied.
"I can shapeshift, bend reality to my whims and acquire new powers on a regular basis. I am not your average person; to start, I spend most of my time in the form of a cat. I am just a tad different." He replied.

Point heard, I walked around with my boss literally peering over my shoulder.

"What is it this time?" He asked.
I began to reply, but noticed that the mass on my shoulder was becoming lighter. I looked at him just in time to see him vanish into this air. While he can teleport, I doubt it is the case, given that it was done mid-conversation. The more likely scenario was that he was pulled to a specific point in his history, his past these days.

I waited for him to return, until one of the sensors in a cargo bay sounded that an anomaly had occurred. I rushed over, beating the containment teams to the site. I looked through the window to see my boss in human form, clutching a stump of a left arm, turned away so that I could not see the damage.

"Don't worry guys, this one's 'armless." I told the control team.
After peering in, they replied in a slightly annoyed tone "Really? You had to make that pun? Our boss is injured and his powers are probably weakened."
"Don't panic; his healing factor, even when weakened by his condition, is strong enough to regenerate a limb in minutes." I replied calmly.

Sure enough, shortly after our argument, our boss teleported into the room, still in his human form.
"I heard that pun." He said. "I approve."
"So, that wasn't too bad this time, was it?" I asked.
"No, it went smoothly." He replied. He noticed my concern. "If you are wondering about the arm, one of my past selves decided to rip it off to stop me. I was sent back shortly after, never even encountering the other me from that night. I quickly regenerated in the cargo bay, got my bearings, then teleported here."
"As for you." He pointed at the leader of the control team. "Your job is to control anomalies and your station is half the distance Jennifer had to travel, yet she beat you. Do better next time; the next anomaly may not be so friendly."

[Myself]

Chapter 2: Myself's Hidden Weakness
My boss seemed to have stabilized a bit now. We were walking through a hallway talking or more accurately, I was and he was engaging in a silent telepathic conversation from parts unknown.

I read the notes given:
-Celadon's protective fleet: Nothing suspicious. Crew went down for some social interaction with the locals, which was apparently a positive interaction for both parties.
-Earth's protective fleet: Mostly fine, but had to put down a rebellion in India led by a reasonably powerful overlord, who had used his gifts to get to his position. His powers were not detailed in the document.
-Research arm: New propulsion system developed, but seems to drive psychics to insanity when exposed. Further testing is needed, especially before allowing my boss within a few lightyears; he was already nuts.

I stopped reading the notes, as I was told to turn left into a room. Inside was a black cat with a party hat on, playing with a sphere I recognized as a small-scale nuclear device.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING? DO YOU KNOW WHAT THAT IS?" I screamed in horror, attempting to snatch it away, before remembering his physical capabilities.
"Of course I do. I helped develop this. It's not that powerful; it'd barely leave a hole in this craft." He replied, far too calmly.
"Not all of us can survive exposure to the vacuum of space." I said, voicing obvious concern.
"Don't worry; if it was about to detonate, I'd wrap around it and absorb the blast without injury." He replied in a futile attempt to lower my concerns.
"Honestly, working for you is like caring for a child. You barely take care of yourself."
"Why do you think I'd be concerned. Ever since I was 16, I've had a substantial collection of powers, many making me resistant or immune to certain or multiple threats. I've lost almost all concern for my well-being."
"Well, what if..." I began, my sentence cut short.

A loud sound rang through the ship. Someone was using the PSA system as a sonic weapon, against my boss. They knew of his weakness to sound, but clearly did not know what happened when he was in a loud environment.

My boss leaped to the ground, grew to almost two meters, became covered in plates, spikes protruded from his back as his lower jaw split in two like a snake's, with teeth the length of my forearm pointing toward the middle of his face, oriented outward. He was a deep black colour and began to drool foul-smelling saliva from his open mouth. He took this form in a fluid motion, all the while emitting a telepathic scream.

He was autistic, you see, meaning he had the potential for a meltdown -in his case, due to sound. Unfortunately, superpowers did not go well with this. Therefore, I sounded the alarm, but was tossed aside as he ran, panicked, to get to the quietist spot. I heard screams of horror in the hallway. I knew that if it were not shut down, everyone on this craft would die from explosive decompression; he was not in control of his actions. Running to the control room, I saw men thrown accross the room from unseen force, presumably Myself's telekinesis out of control.

I reached the power core for this part of the station and decided to cut the power to give him some quiet, to allow him to calm down. I was attacked by some attackers, who were roasted alive by an uncontrolled burst of energy. I saw the very fibers of the natural laws begin to flex. As I worked to disable the power, another person was calling for vessels to assist, another giving orders to the understandably panicked crew and the final one trying to reach other MPU to at least contain the person I worked for.

Shutting down the power, everything went dark. It became quiet. We were weightless. We had several hour before the oxygen ran out, under the assumption other parts of the craft had failed, which were likely in tact. Myself teleported to me, halfway through entering his human form. Upon completion, he hugged me, hyperventilating. We then began repairs to the craft and called off need for help.

(So, that was this segment. Feel free to use the call for help if you want, as well as a telepathic scream. I decided to create an interesting plot while simultaneously explaining what it is like for an autistic person in a meltdown; utter panic.)

[Myself]

Chapter 3: New Recruit
I was sitting in an office, talking to my boss. He had informed me that we had a new recruit. We were simply awaiting his arrival.

"So, who is this new recruit and what position does he want?" I asked.
"He hopes to join the research team. He's doing a TAFE course in my home city and wants to receive some experience. He'll be doing laboratory work for the next 6 months."

I walked into the docking bay and saw our new recruit. He was rather tall and lean, looking around in wonder.

"Hello." Shouted my boss, in human form. "Welcome to my primary vessel. I hear that you are studying to be a laboratory technician. We're going to get you to do some work studying supernatural microbes. If you maintain your aseptic procedures, you'll be fine."

You see, almost everyone here was volunteering. Some were getting experience in certain areas, some had it as a hobby, others were hiding from those trying to harm them and others simply wanted an adventure. I had been found after a superhuman attack devastated the town I was in, killing everyone I knew. I joined up and developed a new family among the crew of the vessel, even having short-lived romantic relationships.

"Here we have our main paranormal microbiology laboratory, which you will be working in. For the next few weeks, you'll be under instruction from others on what to find and the special tests we do here. Then you will move on to working by yourself. To start, put on the PPE and streak some agar plate for me. This particular one has rather nasty infectious properties, so be careful with it." My boss said.

We walked back, our new recruit settled in. I turned around and saw a pale, ghostly figure behind me. I aked my boss as to what it was.

"Oh, they are the psionic echoes of children. They follow their parent/s around, but often travel through time. They only really occur if the children have psionic powers, often only visible to those with psionic powers. You might have latent powers; I'd see them regardless of their ability to appear to mundanes. We're still studying them." He said.
"My family was killed after a superhuman destroyed my town in rage. You came to imprison him and found me, remember." I replied.
"Well, if you did not have psionic children, this must be from the future."
"I am 35. I highly doubt that."
"I am a talking superpowered cat. What is your point?"

[Myself]

Chapter 4: Protective Instincts

Today has been uneventful so far, a minor attack by a few pirates who were disabled with ease and brought on board into prison cells, a minor containment failure (but fortunately not a containment breach) as well as rather nasty cafeteria brawl over a particularly attractive coworker.

That is, of course, until one of our enemies decided to act.

We had suppressed his trade of slaves for several months, freeing them and sending them all home. We expected his empire to fall within a week.

Then, a teleport from a cargo vessel found floating in deep space, seemingly abandoned. A man was holding an infant girl in his arms, who appeared in no state of distress. However, he shouted at us all to freeze, otherwise he'd kill her with ease. Hearing this, my boss, who calls himself "Myself" walked over and looked down, calmly saying "put the infant down and settle this matter politely".

Then he laid eyes on the little girl. He breathed deeply. He suddenly jumped forward, breaking the railing and smashing to the floor. In the blink of an eye, he rushed forward, grabbed the girl and threw him across the room. I do not know if he did so physically or telekinetically, but either way he told me to take the girl to his office. As I walked away, he told everyone to continue about their day and that he'd deal with the matter.

"How dare you lay your hands on my niece!" He shouted. "You will wish I was the type to murder."

As I walked through the hallways, the halls were filled with the screams of the perpetrator. My boss was clearly very protective over the little girl I held in my arms. I waited in his office for a few minutes, when my boss appeared, still in human form. He thanked me for minding the little girl for him and picked her up, a grin spreading across his face. She had been asleep this whole time.

"The man has been dealt with. He was angry that we'd dismantled his empire and decided, despite knowing my capabilities, to kidnap my niece and use her as bargaining power. I will be taking her back to Earth myself." He said.
"You can't just fly through space; we may be close to Earth, but she'll die quickly; she's mortal." I reminded him.
"I am going to teleport her there of course. I may enjoy flying through space, but I can teleport as well." He reassured.

With that and with a child in his arms, he teleported away, leaving empty space.

(Huzzah! Stupidest criminal of all time!)

[Myself]

Chapter 5: Military Intelligence

Today had been a rather unusual day, in that nothing strange occurred. No containment breaches, no villain attacks, no unusual displays of my boss' capabilities. He even pent most of the day as human.

That was, of course, until I walked away from him while he was busy helping with a new device. I heard a loud explosion, reflexively turned my head in the direction of the noise, then, after hearing nothing else, I looked ahead once more and saw a man identical in appearance to my boss's usual human form -tall, lean, Caucaian, male, apparent age of 16 with blue eyes and dirty-blonde hair. However, there was one key difference; his face was scarred and his clothe burned. I initially thought that my boss had been hurt in the explosion before teleporting in front of me, but then he appeared behind me and saw the figure.

"Looks like a future me!" He shouted, excitedly.
"It could be a past you, you know." I reminded him.
"No, I'd remember being here."
"I wouldn't trust that. Your mind can be unreliable after your...temporal...seizures. You could easily miss it. Who knows, perhaps he'll vanish in a moment or two; it happened with the last one."
"I will not. I remember seeing this from the point of my past self. Well, technically present self." The figure mentioned.
"Well, do you need anything? You seem injured and I know how unreliable our powers can be immediately after a temporal slip." He said. He seemed intent on asking the question, so I'd figure I'd just watch.
"I...need...medical attention." The figure gasped, immediately before falling to the ground.

"I NEED A MEDICAL TEAM!" My boss shouted.

Minutes later, I was watching a surgery underway by a team of medics. They were requiring assistance from my boss, as while his future self had some powers evidently functioning poorly, his durability was still functioning and therefore imposible to operate on. Fortunately, it seems that due to perhaps the time spent here and/or the surgery, his healing factor was returning, enabling him to heal himself.

Almost an hour later, the three of us were talking in a private room. My boss was holding a discussion with him and in a manner quite unusual for him, had kept me out of part of the conversation. I had remained in the room, but they had been in telepathic communication. Currently, they were using sound, however.

"So, how exactly did you end up injured? You shouldn't have been harmed at all and if you were, you should have rapidly regenerated. Evidently, you did neither, yet still had your powers."
"Indeed. They have already returned in full. I would return to my own time now, but I have decided to allow myself to return in due time instead."
"You seem to be avoiding the the question."
"Sorry. It is complicated to explain it all without sharing a large volume of telepathic data, but it was a combination of highly specialized weaponry, the Technari and exploitation of our...illness."
"Yes. The same reason I am not fighting those horrors myself; if I vanished mid-battle, I would be removed from battle and after returning, have weakened abilities. The unpredictability alone would make me a greater burden than assistance."
"Aren't our vessels fighting at this point in time?"
"Of course. Regular fleets go out to fight. Unfortunately, a lot of them end up with crew escaping via teleporting here as the ships are destroyed, often with hysterical crew members. Strangely enough, high-end weaponry just does not meet the standard in battles in which being of our caliber fight."
"In future, we try to. I've had some success."
"Really? These occurrences become less common in future? That is promising. As much as I love doing military research for everyone, I'd love to help my friends in battle, despite not being a violent person as such. Speaking of which, I think that the Penultimate may be interested in some of the latest research on those robotic...corpses. I believe a few others may be interested as well."
"Well, thank you for the medical assistance. In future, you will learn many things, including, with ome accuracy, when you are about to vanish. I feel I am about to return to battle. Use this information to assist your fight and hopefully end this war early." He closed hi eyes, bowed his head and formed an expression indicating concentration on his face. He soon looked up and said "I have added some valuable information to your computer system. Use it well." With that, he went pale, his eyes rolled back in his head, he collapsed to the floor and vanished before hitting the ground."

My boss seemed alarmed. "THAT is what it looks like when I vanish?"
"Yes, although there is a degree of variation." I replied.
"I just feel cold, find it difficult to move if able to do so at all and feel my powers leave me." It is horrible sometimes.
"Well, I had better send today's find to the others after sorting through it. No doubt our foe will update themselves to make this knowledge useless."

(Well, in this edition, we get a description of the time travelling Myself suffers, both the technical details and what it looks and feels like, the basis of the latter being my now-managed epilepsy. I have also described at least one of his human forms, based upon my own physical appearance. Above all, we discover the reason for his suspicious absence in the main New Beginning story -at least in-universe; the real reason is primarily that I cannot keep up.)

[Myself]

Chapter 6: Christmas Time
It was a rather standard Christmas, I must say. We had several cultures among the crew, so the celebrations were tailored for us all. I liked it being inclusive. We all got a fantastic meal, gave gifts to each other, received presents from someone (secretly my boss, using his powers) and in general had a rather calm, peaceful and uneventful day.

Then the telepathic screams were heard.

You see, even non-empowered people could give of panicked screams of telepathic energy, detectable by a sufficiently powerful and experienced telepath. Needless to say, we had agents teleport to the homes from which the scream were detected.

Inside, what they found was a home relatively undamaged, but fires in fireplaces extinguished and blood all over the walls. The people had clearly been devoured. Testing weapons used found that bullets had been fired, but the absence of many bullets indicated they hit. Knives were also missing and there was some damage, indicating a struggle. There was, however, no sign of any forced entry or weapons not already found in the home. Rare samples of mysterious fabric was found. Surveillance footage was inconclusive, merely displaying interference. We found, oddly, gifts left behind.

Outside, gardens were trampled, with plants devoured by a decent-sized pack of large animals, with damage indicating large horns or antlers. Analysis indicated a grazing animal. Another anomaly was reindeer fur and feces in locations with no indigenous populations of said animals. Then again, this was in the very far north, close to the arctic, so there were few people. We found native peoples massacred by an unseen force.

We were puzzled, especially due to the seemingly simultaneous attacks. It then clicked. In this world of myth, legend, magic and superpowers. We had Santa, a murderous version at that. We realized that tracking him down was the only solution, before he killed again. Labs suggested a form of anomalous quantum superposition, so if we observed one, it'd collapse into a single, mortal entity. We found the anomaly, travelling at great speed above frozen lands, who noticed us immediately after being observed and became threatening. An aerial attack fleet fired, sending the large sleigh plummeting to the ground.

Both aircraft and ground crew fired upon the anomaly, but it shrugged off most damage and regenerated from the remainder, including its clothing. This was impossible; even for an anomaly, this should have died. Even most MPU's would take a beating from this, at least being knocked down. We could try an anti-planet weapon, but if it missed we'd lose the Earth and that was an unacceptable risk. I used my authority to call in the city-ships, which were due to arrive in minutes.

The anomaly charged at me, knowing I was the general of this group. As I ran, I saw a cat, sitting in the snow. I wondered where the men were, but heard their screams and heard "The elves! We forgot the elves!". Overhead, the aerial crew were in a dogfight with flying reindeer. It was ridiculous, as well as terrifying. However, as I looked back to see it catching up, I tripped and fell in the snow. I turned around to see it reach me, when a blur hit it from the side. It flew off the side of a ravine.

I looked down, to see my boss in his teenage form, but with three long claws in each hand. He said to me in a telepathic message to order the men to prepare for movement and that he had called in the other MPU's, but said that they were an unlikely source of help due to prior occupation with the Technari. Fortunately, others of him appeared, almost certainly from the future, also attacking the anomaly. There were at least three on it, one with claws sticking through where its heart should have been.

"Jennifer" I heard, telepathically "Send forces to the true north pole. I am from the future and I know that it keeps its weakness there. Destroy it and we stop it."

I sent the order. The reindeer knew and flew after the aircraft, but the ones behind shot them to pieces in their moment of distraction. Meanwhile, about 13 of my boss, constantly appearing and disappearing, were attacking the anomaly, with claws, telepathy, telekinesis, fire, lightening, reality manipulation, empowered objects and much more. Suddenly, with a pulse, it threw him off; he was rumored to be among the most powerful of his kind, yet he was thrown off easily by this thing. It laughed, blood from prior victims still seeping through its' beard. It went for my boss, the one from the present and tore him in half, ready to eat him. No wonder the people had failed to fend it off; it seemed to be the impossible -a physical being who was truly invincible.

Then, it collapsed, unconscious. I heard on the radio that the anomalous object was taken care of by a mysterious, clawed figure in a hood, who grabbed it and vanished.

My boss's body lay lifeless in the snow, in two pieces, blood everywhere. His powers must have been cancelled when he died; he was not regenerating. I collapsed to my knees, crying; this was someone who'd brought me from a hopeless situation, saved my life countless times and rewarded me well for the tasks he did ask for help with. I'd seen him at his best and his worst. I'd seen him in a rage, seen him turn violent to protect those he loved, seen him become a threat himself and personally helped him manage his time travel-related disability. It was hard to believe such a person lay dead; a seemingly impossible thing for his kind. His future selves now had an unknown fate due to his powers, but almost certainly no longer in existence.

Then, from behind me, I heard a voice. A familiar voice, saying "Tell me when you're done crying over me. Work needs to be done."

I stood up, wiped the tears from my face and hugged him. It was weird, of course, him frozen at 16, but he hugged me back. "How" I asked "your powers were gone when you died" he laughed, then replied "I am one of the hardest to kill of the hardest to kill. It takes more than Santa to kill me. My powers were irrelevant; I revived anyway, using them after I'd died."

I looked at his new body. It was identical to his previous one, the claws-free version, but composed of entirely new matter. "You see, my consciousness survived and I used Power of Imagination to make a new body. What do you think?" He asked. "I think we should get down to our Santa here. He's waking up." He turned and said "You're right. I'll fly you down."

He grabbed hold of me and rose, moved forward, the slowly descended. When we touched the ground, he let go. We walked over to him. "It seems the artifact, now somehow contained, brought Santa to life. However, the only things dependent on it, at least thanks to the more fluid physics of New Beginning, were the abilities not present in the normal myth.

The being stood up, hand on forehead, obviously with a headache. My boss smiled and said "I assume you know who I am. I assume you know my capabilities." The figure's head nodded. "You put up quite a fight. I could very well have been defeated."

"What...what do you want? For Christmas?" I was asked. "Mind you, I am limited to things produced by humans, as the myths suggest."
"I do not know. Surprise me." I replied.
"Alright. You'll find it at home." He said.
"I, too, am unaware. I struggle with this due to my abilities ruining it." My boss said.
The figure grinned and said "I can provide knowledge, such as the fact that the object in your possession which randomly charges before reviving all humans who perished during its charging period was active during my rampage. All the victims just returned to life; it is as my rampage never occurred. They still have the gifts left behind, however."
He turned away, looking to the sky, before looking back to my boss "I gave you something else. It is at your home. It is my first night of actual existence; I must set about the job I was set. I will give to all, however, regardless of faith, wealth, family, age and other factor of normal influence. The world will understand little of it, except young children, with all other likely believing that your kind were being unusually generous."

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Merry Christmas everyone, from the SPL! Sorry if it is late for you. If you do not celebrate Christmas, have a happy celebration of whatever kind you have.

[Myself]

Chapter 7: The Other
My boss' time travel condition was in a time of stability. He only traveled through time once a fortnight or so. It was decided that we would head out on a covert mission to target rogue superhumans, usually merely to bring information and register their existence. This began in no unfamiliar fashion.

We had heard reports of a superhuman. Gender, age, race and power/s were unknown, but rumors suggested a powerful, brilliant and cunning individual.

We arrived, surprisingly, on Earth. We found a few structures, constructed in a steampunk style, with no humans around, although a few odd organisms around, suggesting a powerful superhuman.

Eventually, we entered a large building, after my boss's powers detected a superhuman within. Inside, in the middle, facing away from us, was a young girl, apparently in her late teens or early twenties. She wore gothic clothing, a corset and had metal gauntlets, no doubt with supernatural properties of their own. She was either a vampire or albino and was, by the standards of anyone in the Western world, would be considered extremely attractive. I wondered how much of this was her power/s at work.

She heard my footsteps and turned around. My boss leaped up from cat form into human form, seemingly for better use of powers and generated a storm of lightening in each hand. She thrust her hand forward, as if throwing powder, but seemed shocked when nothing occurred.

"That should have wiped you from existence. What mechanism do you use to protect yourself?" She said.
"You are not the only one of your caliber. I thought you were a generic superhuman, but now that we are in the same room, I sense you are far more. You are what some of us call an MPU." My boss replied.
"Who do you speak of? I am above you all. You seem to be merely a creation of mine." She responded.
"I am no result of your actions. We are both of a class of beings of almost infinite potential."

Suddenly, a voice appeared in my head. It was my boss's third mind.
"Mind number two is adding various wards and safeguards to you in case she tries something else like that."

Suddenly, she realised something. I looked up, seeing an aircraft carrier fall through the ceiling on top of us. Piece of brass fell, stopped mid-air, then were thrown telekinetically in her direction as the large ship was caught as my boss flew upward.

After an extended battle involving throwing each other through walls, various creations being summoned before being defeated and various other events taking place, she seemed exhausted. My boss stood above her, victorious. Unfortunately, his condition decided that this was a perfect time for time travel and the two of us were left alone. Fortunately, she seemed to be a minute or two away from being ready to attack me, so I decided to talk to her.

"If you want, you can end all this fighting and join your kind. There are many adventures to be had and times that your assistance shall come in great use. They will be able to train you in the use of your powers, to become more adept." I said to her, hoping that I could keep my promise.
"In any case, what is your name? Code names are fine; I just need something to refer to you as; my boss's name is Myself." I asked her.
"He has a funny name." She replied.
"What's your's?" I asked again.
"I call myself BruiseViolet." She answered, then smiled.

Behind us, I heard a voice.
"I'm back, Jennifer."
"Is it true, that we aren't the only ones of our kind? That I can do all sorts of stuff with others of my kind?" She asked my boss excitedly.
"Yes, actually. I am glad that Jennifer explained everything to you." He replied.

He extended a hand toward the first new member of his kind to appear in a long time. She took it.

[Myself]

Chapter 8: The Collection
A lot had happened recently. My boss, being who he was, got into a pun fight with The Narrator, which seemed to have ended in a tie. He'd held a good record with time travel, as he had not fallen through time for two weeks.

Currently, it was silly hats Friday. I often worried over his sanity, really. I didn't care, because I could pick out a top hat covered in LED's of multiple colours while doing important containment duties for him. We had reverse-engineered an old Technari robot and were trying to understand it. The current one was malfunctioning, but still trying to break from containment. Needless to say, it was ill-equipped for the task.

He took me aside and told me to follow him. We went through a series of secret doors and were teleported several times. Finally, we ended up in a hallway, which ended in a large metallic door. He handed me a key, directed me to a lock on the side opposite to his and on the count of three, instructed me to turn it.

As it opened, I asked him "why didn't you just teleport here yourself and walk through the door? For that matter, why not teleport right in this vault?" to which he replied "its more fun this way". We walked in, to see rows upon rows of shelves containing all sorts of items.

"This is my collection" He said "You are the first person to see it".
"What are these things?" I asked.
"Interesting and cool object, but mostly thing which could doom the entire human race within 24 hours should they break containment."

Understandably, I stepped back nervously. He laughed "don't worry, it is under incredible protection. I'll tell you what, you point to one item and I'll tell you what it is".

I picked out a small block, not much larger than a few LEGO blocks, but thinner. He told me it was nothing less than part of the brain of the Technari. I tried to pull it out to destroy it, but couldn't budge it.

"You've seen Thor, right?" He asked. I confirmed that I had.
"Each of these items is similar to Mjolnir. Few can move them from their containment."

I then saw a test tube in a normal-looking test tube rack. I asked him about it.

"Are you aware of the Celedonian Plague?" He asked me.
"Yes. I read the file. Everyone knows about it. You cured it, didn't you?" I answered.
"Well, not ME, specifically, but people here, certainly. That is one of, if not the last vial. I keep it here for research due to its interesting properties, particularly as to how it came about in the first place." He explained.

I had decided that I had enough of this place and decided to leave. I felt scared merely being in the presence of these items; what other horrors were held here? He could explain later when the vault was sealed.

[Myself]

Sorry for the LONG delay everyone; between the main site going down, the super resume ads being around and a few other minor things, I lost the motivation to do it. I am back.

Chapter 9: The Reunion
After my boss had vanished, I was now more or less in charge. Some other of his high-ranking agents who were aware of what he was were helping me run the place.

However, now we were investigating a ruin on a moon about 20 lightyears from Earth. It was currently unknown in origin, but it is believed to have been built by either MPU's or future humans travelling through time, perhaps afflicted with the same condition sending them through time and space. There was an atmosphere of tolerable pressure here, but it was cold and the air was less than breathable. Neither problem was of concern.

I heard on our communication link that team 4 of 5 had been attacked. We, team 1, were the closest and charged into the room, with weaponry powerful enough to blast a hole in most spacecraft. However, the lifeform -likely a synthetic organism- was being defeated by something too fast to see, evidence of which then vanished into thin air. Upon inspecting the remains, the skin was found to be laced with a sheet of several layers of graphene about 8 milimeters thick and the bones were reinforced with truly alien materials.

However, whatever had attacked them had punched through the skin and bone like wet clay. I gave out an order for the teams to regroup, for the teleportation technicians to prepare for a large-scale teleport, called for greater alert and requested reinforcements.

We regrouped and after several hours of walking through the labyrinth, we encountered a hooded figure in the far corner, too dark to make out and with too much interference for scanners to work properly. In our minds, a voice ordered us to stop, which only encouraged one of my officers to fire at the creature.

The projectile merely stopped in midair. The creature turned around, to reveal my boss.

"I came to this place to try to refine my abilities and in particular, learn to control my time travel." He said, verbally this time.
"How's that going? Any better with the time travel?" I inquired.
"It depends. What is the date?" He asked in response.
"You've been gone almost a year now." I answered.
"Hmm. Strange. I thought I was in the temporal equivalent to 1978. I must have been taken forward in time. One nice thing about this place is that it is so old the environment does not change much over time; I ended up about 70 000 years in the past for a few days and did not realize for quite some time."
"That does not answer my question. Are you any better?"
"I think I am, yes."

One man then proclaimed that this individual was an imposter, as displayed by his powers and that he should be terminated. Before I could speak, he fired a blast at point blank range.

Without even breaking eye contact, the arm of his reached outward at incredible speed and held the blast in midair while throwing the soldier against the wall. I had no medical expertise, but I was already figuring out who was best to call for cracked ribs, concussion and possible spinal injury.

"My apologies, but you should not have attacked me. I think I will return you all to base. I will be with you in a few minutes."

With that, we all found ourselves in the teleport chamber. He had either activated the teleporter for all of us at once -bypassing the technicians- or teleported us all himself, with a possibility of a combination of the two. Sure enough, he appeared once more, only to walk to his quarters.