Blackest Night
The Irresistible Force Paradox (1.6)
“Your ex-boyfriend is Black Mass.”
I was swinging Sarah from behind in our backyard. My husband’s pronouncement made me pause for a moment. After giving it some thought, I pushed forward.
“Not how I would have put it, but I can’t argue the point.”
Paul smirked with our upside-down son Samuel in his arms. The little scamp was being squirrely. “That’s Larsen’s designation in the supervillain registry now, doofus. Just received word. The Void was already taken. Robert Reynolds owns the trademark.”
“Too bad Apocalypse was off the table.”
My husband didn’t see the humor in it. He put our son down in a huff. “This isn’t a joke, Jax. Alex Larsen is going to turn everyone on Earth into an extradimensional Deadite unless we terminate him with extreme prejudice. Plus, I earn a million-dollar performance bonus from Pen Bank if we can present a viable corpse. Preventing an extinction level event is a contractual escalator.”
“Way to prioritize, Paul.”
I started juggling kids. It was a pretty standard state of affairs in our household. Sammy and Sarah were suspended in midair above the swing set with gargantuan smiles etched on their faces. The null force created an invisible cushion beneath my cubs. They lightly undulated up and down with my every telekinetic command. It looked like they were floating in an activated wave pool. I sent them skyward to keep the kids out of earshot. The subject matter of our subsequent discussion demanded the utmost discretion.
“Alex Larsen saved our family,” I reminded Paul. “I plan to return the favor. Sightseer insists it’s a statistical certainty that I’m going to play savior, and she’s a cybernetic AGI with superpowers, so I don’t know what you want me to do at this point. The last time we disobeyed the bot it led to a causality violation. You want that reoccurrence on your conscience?”
Paul observed our pin dot children skyrocketing toward the stratosphere with mounting dread. “I appreciate what Larsen did for us, but that story arc was completed months ago. Now he’s possessed by a planet-killing pestilence. I know you swear the demon inside him lies dormant, but how long will that last? It’s our contractual duty to put him down before he ascends. Alex isn’t your ex anymore. He’s the Anti-God.”
The children were being chased by a surveillance drone. It barely registered given my festering rage. “No, he’s infected with the techno-organic Arkangel virus which is forcing him to serve as the Earth-bound emissary of the Anti-God because that string-pulling turncoat Moon Man revealed himself to be an acolyte in the eleventh hour with his own personal portal to perdition. Idiot.”
I sniffed with derision following my declaration.
Paul won on points. “Sorry for my lack of specificity. I forgot how much you secretly adored the Antichrist all these years.”
We had formally reached the button-pushing stage of our partnership. Having it all required us to manufacture acrimony. The stress of the situation wasn’t putting the skids on our pending separation. My face suddenly scrunched. “What the hell is that odor? It’s awful. You have the stench of extradimensional death about you, and that’s not hyperbole. Take it from me. The void has a very particular aroma—”
Paul sniffed his armpit. “You know that’s my sweat scent.”
“He who smelt it. Anyway, I considered all available options and concluded it had to be a coincidence. The flip side of that coin might have required killing you, so congrats, I guess.”
Our children slowly fell back to Earth like deflated party balloons. I kept their kicking legs just out of reach of their flailing father. It was a fun little game we liked to play as a family. I watched Paul’s frantic frustration unfold with great motherly pride. The clip-clop of his flip-flops against the wet grass only enhanced the hilarity.
“Look, I need to recenter if I’m going to snuff out my ex-boyfriend,” I said. “This had always been a theoretical thing before. Now we’re talking about doing it for real. I’m not saying no. I just need a moment.” Truthfully, I was desperately searching for excuses to prevent his assassination. Prolonging the inevitable was all part of the plan.
Paul began ascending the deck steps with a windswept child under each wing. “I’ll get the kids ready for bed. Go relax for a few minutes.”
“Thanks, babe. Think I’ll do my daily meditation.”
Paul scared the shit out of me while I was listening to Gwen Stefani.
“Sorry to interrupt your recentering but there are no stars.”
I pulled a single headphone free with a stink face. “Excuse me?”
He yanked me off the bed. Paul continued pulling my wrist all the way to the back patio. The pitter patter of my bare feet against brick pavers was soon replaced by the sound of screaming. Every neighbor within earshot appeared to be coming down with an instant case of cabin fever. I caught the unmistakable sound of a chainsaw whirring to life down the block. It only took a single whiff of the great outdoors to identify the source of the scourge.
We were floating in the void.
“This is no good,” I accurately assessed.
“Does it look like he’s still dormant, dummy?” Paul was shaking his head at me with both hands embedded in his hips. He reminded me more of my mother every day. It did not make him more desirable. “This is all because you couldn’t cut the cord—which means it’s on you to mop up the mess. I have to head to the Omega Mansion to oversee Alpha Dog activation across the globe. I’ll assign Sightseer to babysit the kids. What are you going to do?”
A soundscape of demented shrieking and shrapnel filled the air of the surrounding suburb. I suspected the entirety of New Metropolis would have the same atmosphere. There were no comforting sirens coming to the rescue. The entire world had gone mad. Cutting out the tumor seemed like the only logical way to cure the disease.
“This is the last time I’ll ever say this but tell every able-bodied Alpha Dog to get to Detroit on the double,” I demanded. “I’m going to need all the backup I can get to defeat Black Mass. Should have known the remission wouldn’t last.” I took three steps toward the driveway before Paul’s booming voice hit me in the back.
“Umm—are you forgetting something?”
His inquiry left me spinning. I lightly giggled at my forgetfulness.
“Right. Sorry. Good luck.”
I gave Partner-in-Crime 10% of my power before I departed.
Courts don’t consider superpowers to be marital property.
I recently confirmed that with an attorney for no particular reason.
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Blackest Night is the final arc of this story, but it’s (obviously) incomplete. There will be another two statements (I think?) to wrap everything up.
The story (so far) in sequential order:
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Alison Oliver is the shit:
The walking back and forth at the end is just….