Magicians Don't Need Superheros Pt19
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“Oh, God, he’s wearing a suit.” Marvin groaned when he saw the first Iplier step in through the door. He watched as they greeted Chase and Henrik with handshakes and slaps on the back. Marvin was in the kitchen with Jackie, looking around a wall and through the entrance into the living room. He wanted a peek at who he was supposed to meet before they got to see him.
“That’s Dark,” Jackie said.
“How is that…that’s his name, isn’t it?” Marvin put those pieces together in the middle of saying his sentence.
“Yeah.” Jackie pointed to the one that stood next to Dark. The one with bright pink hair and a mustache that matched. “That’s Wilford.”
“He looks like he reeks of cotton candy.”
“That and bubblegum.”
“Please tell me you’re joking.”
“Nope.”
“I’m not going out there. I’ll have an asthma attack.” Marvin and Jackie both quickly ducked away when Dark glanced toward them.
“It’s not that bad. It’s more like a subtle smell than like a stank of it.” Jackie said.
“What if I disappeared and didn’t deal with this? I’ve gotten some of my teleportation spells back, I can leave.” Marvin had just gotten used to all the Septiceyes and now more people are being thrown at him.
Yes, it was just two of them at that moment, but there were who knew how many other Ipliers to experience. He still had Mare, Phantom, Mad, and apparently another age-defying Ego named Blank to get used to as well. Marvin was far from an introvert but even the most outgoing extrovert needed some time to adjust to so many people.
“Chase would ground you so hard for that.” Jackie chuckled.
“Chase can’t ground me, I’m a grown man.”
“You underestimate his mom energy.”
“Then I’ll use Dad to distract him.”
“Who’s dad?”
“Henrik.”
“Oh yeah.”
They moved in silent unison to peek back into the living room, seeing that Chase was handed some papers by Dark and then he immediately gave those papers to Henrik. Wilford wasn’t paying attention to the conversation anymore by the looks of it as he perked up and looked down the other opening to the living room. He had a big grin and waved.
Following Wilford’s line of sight showed JJ and Anti in the hallway. JJ had a polite smile and was waving back while Anti had an evil-looking smirk on his face. A smirk that told anyone who saw that he had something on his mind that would end up being chaotic.
“So much for behaving,” Marvin muttered, but he wasn’t really complaining. He’d admit he was curious about what Anti was thinking about. Maybe he’d jumped out there and just start yammering away, giggling and saying something crude or-
Is that a knife?
“Darky, catch!” Anti shouted with a laugh as he threw the knife across the room.
Marvin’s eyes widened as he watched Dark only blinked as the knife went into the door beside his head. Dark then went from looking like an average man to changing, reminding Marvin of how Anti was that…blob of sorts. He saw Dark’s skin turn almost a decaying gray and there was a glowing of red and blue around his body, reminding Marvin of his magical aura but something about it felt off. The red and blue never overlapped, it was almost a sharp line of separation, two distinctive energies came from those colors.
“Anti!” Dark snapped and Anti only laughed.
“Did he just have two voices?” Marvin asked, looking at Jackie.
“That happens when he’s angry,” Jackie answered.
“How often is that?”
“Whenever he’s around Anti.”
“I can see why.” Marvin hummed.
Before Jackie could say anything, there was a sudden flash of pink between them. Marvin cursed and jumped up on the counter. He grabbed an apple from the fruit bowl and chucked it at the pink while Jackie held up his fists.
“A snack! Thank you.” Wilford said with a laugh, having caught the apple and bit into it. “Hello, Jackie.”
“Hey.” Jackie sighed and lowered his hands. “You gotta stop popping up like that dude, one of these days I’m going to swing.”
“If it happens, it happens.” Wilford shrugged. “Maybe you’ll send me flying farther than last time.”
“I’m still sorry-”
“Oh sport, you know there’s no bad feelings. It was a blast. Gave me a taste of what you got.” Wilford chuckled and then turned to Marvin, who was still hunched up on the counter. “I see, you have the cat energy while Jackie over here is the dog. A perfect match.”
“I will throw another apple at you.” Marvin threatened as he got off the counter.
“Could I request a banana? I like mixing things up.” Wilford did a little shimmy.
“You look and smell like questionable late-night decisions.” Marvin crossed his arms and leaned away.
“That’s the goal.” Wilford winked and Marvin found himself having no idea how to feel so instead he went around and stood next to Jackie. “Don’t worry, you’ll get used to my charms later and, speaking of charming moments.” He gestured with his half-eaten apple to the argument happening in the living room which was mostly just Anti and Dark shouting at each other with Chase trying to get between them and get them to stop. Henrik just pinched the bridge as it all happened.
“I can’t tell if they’re about to make out or punch each other,” Marvin said.
“Probably both.” Wilford shrugged before snapping his fingers and the next thing Marvin knew, he and Jackie were now in the living room with Wilford and a suffocating cloud of cotton-candy-flavored smoke.
“You got an inhaler, Henrik?” Marvin said with a fake cough, waving a hand through the pink fog.
“Wilford,” Dark said flatly.
“That’s annoying.” Marvin used a knuckle to plug one of his ears when he noticed a strange ringing sound coming from Dark. “You are an ADHD nightmare. Overstimulating and dull at the same time.”
“I beg your pardon?” Dark’s glare had gone from Anti to Marvin.
“You can beg all you want, but you’re not getting anything from me.” Marvin grinned when he heard Jackie snort as he tried not to laugh.
“When we were informed that a new Septiceyes was joining us, I was hoping for another Jameson, not another Anti.” Dark exhaled sharply through his nose.
“And I was hoping not to meet the definition of a Barbie wet dream and two-thirds of the primary colors.” Marvin placed his hands on his hips, eyes hard and showing he was not going to back down.
“I take mine as a compliment.” Wilford chuckled, casually eating the apple core. Dark just kept a flat face before looking at Chase.
“Control your people,” Dark said dismissively and turned to walk out of the house.
Like hell, Marvin was going to let that slide.
He cast a spell that would create a green, glowing rope of sorts. Marvin flung it, had it wrap around Dark’s ankle, and, as the front door opened, Marvin yanked and caused Dark to fall on his face.
“Hah!” Anti laughed loudly while Marvin smirked with pride.
The red and blue around Dark flared brighter and he threw an arm out toward Marvin, his shadow forming into a black spear and it went flying. Marvin jumped to the side and avoided the spear, the smirk from before staying on his lips as he held up his now glowing hands, ready for a fight.
“Nope, nope, nope.” Jackie scrambled over to Marvin and threw him over his shoulder.
“Jackie! Put me down right now!” Marvin snapped, knowing he could use magic to get out of the hold but there was a chance it would hurt Jackie so he stuck to the classic, kicking his legs and hitting his back, knowing his punches were literally nothing to Jackie.
“You need to lock him up until he learns how to control himself!” Dark snapped as Wilford pulled him up to his feet.
“And you need to trim your uneven beard!” Marvin snapped back. “You look like you were trying to make it into a mullet!”
“Marvin, that’s enough!” Chase snapped as well, putting himself between Marvin and Dark.
“No, let him keep going, I’m stealing some of those lines.” Anti was still laughing during all of this.
“We will contact you with decisions on this.” Henrik waved the stack of papers in his hands. “Now I think it is best for you two to go home. We will take care of everything here.” He stated before heading over to where some plants were hanging.
“I hope you do.” Dark huffed.
“You are being so grouchy.” Wilford clicked his tongue as he walked Dark out of the House.
“I am not-” Whatever it was Dark was going to say to Wilford was cut off by Chase closing the door.
“The fuck was that, Marvin?” Chase asked with a groan, rubbing his face with both hands.
“He was being a dick.” Marvin protested.
“You can put him down now, Jackie,” Henrik said.
“Okay.” Jackie placed Marvin’s feet on the ground and stepped back.
“He started-” Marvin stopped when Henrik sprayed him with water. “Excuse me!? Did you just-” He stopped again at more sprays. “Henrik!”
“We need to all get along and you trying to fight each other does the opposite of that,” Henrik said and sprayed the bottle one more time before turning and spraying Anti with the water. Anti flinched and hissed at Henrik. “You knew this was coming after you threw that knife!”
“I didn’t aim for him!”
“You still threw it!”
“What’s with the papers?” Marvin asked, using some magic to dry himself off.
“Work,” Chase answered. “Dark’s a workaholic and will organize stuff for everyone to do based on their abilities and whatever.”
“Am I going to be a part of that?”
“If something fits.”
“Gross.”
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FFxivWrite 2024
Day 18 - Hackneyed
With a curious expression A’viloh looked up to the giant statue of some saint in the middle of the plaza. It was beautifully crafted from a block of white stone and depitected a knight wearing cloak and armour. His face was hidden by a helmet.
“Don’t you think they all look the same somehow?”
“A bit. I assume this whole heroically fighting against the dragons story can get a little overused and repetitive in 1000 years…”, Rael offered and turned their attention to the statue in front of them too.
The Miqo’te furrowed his brows.
“But don’t you think each of them must have been a lot more individual than that with their own dreams and hopes? It doesn’t seem fair that they all look the same, their faces hidden by a mask…”
Somehow the idea of having all their stories reduced to almost identical, grey, expressionless faces of stone was a sad one. But Rael assumed that this was what time did to memories sometimes, once no one was left to remember their faces or how things had actuall happened.
“Maybe if our plan works, they one day built one of these for you or me too. The ears should be recognisable at least…”, Rael joked in an attempt to brighten the mood. “Saint A’viloh - he bravely fought against the dragon brood on the Steps of Faith and brought peace to Ishgard…”
But imagining that seemed to make A’viloh even more thoughtful. “I’m not sure I want to fight against the dragons. Vishap was already terrifying, can you imagine how horrible the great wyrms must be? Besides, don’t all saints die some horrible and painful death?”
“True…”, Rael mused. “But even though Iceheart may have a point, I don’t think this conflict can just be ended as easily as everybody seems to hope right now…”
“But aren’t they all tired of fighting by now? Isn’t all this talk of holy wars and heresy getting old?”, A’viloh asked and looked distressed, like he himself was already tired of it.
The Viera sighed and remembered their kins hatred for the Garleans. The conflict for Golmore was by far not that old yet as this war but had already produced so much bloodshed too.
“It’s not that easy, A’vi. A thousand years are a long time. One cruelty avenged by another and another and another. The Ishgardians? They were born and raised in this war, it’s everything they know. And the dragons? You heard Midgardsormr. They live long enough to remember all of this bloody war… It doesn’t matter anymore who was right in the first place. Neither of them are just going to give up and admit they were wrong. Both sides feel justified in their hate and this will make it difficult to find a peaceful solution…”
For a moment A’viloh was quiet, silently contemplating what Rael had said.
“But what can we do about this at all?”
“I don’t know. But you heard what Thordan said. And if the Ascians are involved behind the scenes, we can’t just ignore this. I have no perfect answer for solving this conflict but neither does Iceheart or Aymeric or anybody else… But we have to try anyway. Maybe together we can find a solution…”
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