"What's wrong, Professor?" Brainiac's voice came through.
Shiller couldn't help but cover his forehead, "What are you doing here?"
"Came with you." Brainiac said, "I've heard about the Fusion Universe for a while, wanted to come and check out the scenery."
"How's the scenery?"
"Not bad," Brainiac said with an air of importance, "The coastline is beautiful, it's the first time I've seen the Gotham Lighthouse so clearly. The night fishing trip was thrilling, and that fish was really big."
"Are you hinting at something?"
"Not really," Brainiac said, "I just found some interesting things on the web, want to take a look?"
"No, I need to rest for a bit." Shiller shook his head, and after saying that, he changed his clothes and lay down on the bed.
"I often regret your lack of greed," Brainiac quipped with double meaning, "You've missed so many opportunities to find out the truth, curiosity should be mankind's most valuable trait."
"You don't understand humans enough," Shiller pulled up the covers, turned over, and closed his eyes saying, "Humans have a saying, 'Curiosity killed the cat.'
Shiller fell asleep quickly, but about two hours later, Brainiac's voice resonated in his ear again, "Sorry, Professor. Curiosity might not be the key to killing the cat. Peter Parker is calling, should I put him through?"
Shiller turned over, covered the phone with his pillow. But soon, Brainiac's voice came through the hotel intercom: "Ms. Carter is calling, the signal comes from the Rebirth Alliance Headquarters."
Shiller finally sat up, picked up the phone and answered: "Hello, what's going on?"
"Sorry, Professor, something happened, we may need your help to mediate," Carter sighed, "The car is already downstairs."
Shiller sat up to change clothes, but he really didn't have time to handle the creased linen suit, so he still wore the old black suit and grabbed an umbrella this time.
As he stepped into the Rebirth Alliance office, the air seemed to drop a few degrees. The classic look was still too intimidating, and at least Bruce, standing by the wall, took a slight step back.
"What's happening?" Shiller's tone was slightly impatient, mainly because there were a bit too many people standing by the wall now.
Bruce on the left, Peter on the right. Next to Peter was the Human Torch, next to him was Deadpool. Then on Bruce's left were two kids, Franklin and Aisha. And in the other corner of the room stood the group of X-Men. More importantly, nearly everyone was sporting some bruises; at the very least, their hair and clothes were a mess.
"This is completely a misunderstanding!" The Human Torch stepped forward and said, "I wasn't trying to cause trouble at the hospital, I was investigating the truth!"
"Start from the beginning," Shiller said, "Detail everything you did after you last left this office."
The Human Torch didn't feel guilty at all, he stepped forward and loudly said, "I said I was going to look for my nephew, and here he is."
He pointed at Franklin and then said, "He's a mutant with many abilities; anyway, he can travel through time and space. I just wanted to go back and see who was right in a bar fight."
"When I went to find Franklin, he happened to be playing with this little girl. Franklin suggested taking her along, and I didn't object, after all, Aisha didn't seem like an ordinary person."
"Together we traveled back in time and saw the conversation between that group of mutants and the waitress. The fact is..."
Logan, standing behind Professor X, seemed to want to say something, but Professor X, as if knowing everything, did not let Logan speak. The Human Torch, however, revealed a shocking fact, "That waitress was indeed unfriendly to the mutants, saying things like they love to skip out on checks, calling them shameless, so they deserved a beating."
"Yet you went to the hospital to give them trouble!" Logan said incredulously.
"I said I wasn't there to cause trouble!" The Human Torch raised his voice, "I originally planned to leave after seeing this, but Aisha sneaked into their kitchen and found something off about their seafood and someone acting suspiciously, clearly something was wrong."
"When we came back, we wanted to go to the hospital to see the medical records and tests of that sick mutant. Who knew, you guys insisted we were there to cause trouble and wanted to fight us!"
"I don't have superpowers, how could I fight with you guys, had to let my nephew handle it. My nephew was concerned about the number of people at the hospital, making too much noise, so he had Aisha speak instead."
"But she didn't have to latch onto me!" Logan looked down at his arm, hating his self-healing power, the little girl's bite nearly broke his arm in two, and because it healed too quickly, there wasn't even a scar now.
"If you hadn't hit us first, why would I bite you?" Aisha retorted, "And I didn't let go because your bones were too hard!"
Aisha was clearly also quite angry, she'd been biting people for years and finally met her match, this bite nearly knocked out a few teeth, adamantium is really hard.
"You knew my bones were hard, and you still bit me?!"
"What kind of talk is that?" Bruce also began to reprimand him, "I just came in and saw you throwing my daughter around, you damn child-abusing violent maniac!"
"I..." Logan was so angry his eyes nearly popped out.
"I also saw you mutants chasing Jonathan," Peter added, "He clearly doesn't have superpowers and wasn't there to cause trouble, so how could you treat an ordinary person like that?"
"That's right, that's right, I saw it too," Deadpool said. "If he hadn't called us in time, wouldn't you have been beaten into the hospital?"
"And fighting in front of the kids," Human Torch added, clearly aware of the high moral ground. "My nephew is just a few years old; can't you set a good example for him?"
"Come on, he barged in aggressively first; we were just defending ourselves," Phoenix explained. "Human Torch from our cosmos tends to cause trouble. How do we know he wouldn't set the whole ward on fire?"
"You know very well, you're the best at setting things on fire," Human Torch countered without backing down.
"Enough!" Carter shouted angrily. "What's all this racket? Haven't you quarreled enough?!"
Shiller sighed deeply. He usually didn't like to evenly blame both sides during mediation, but in this case, both parties were indeed at fault.
Human Torch doesn't quite grasp social nuances. He rewinds time, rushes into someone's hospital room at the first sign of trouble, not bothering to call first or speak more politely, leading to the mutants' reflexive reaction.
The mutants also overreacted, assuming when Human Torch barged in that he was causing trouble and immediately got physical.
Franklin must have been bored; he knew his uncle was impulsive but didn't stop him and even insisted on bringing Aisha along.
Aisha bit too quickly and, unfortunately, chose poorly. Had she not bitten Wolverine, she might not have nearly broken her teeth and been flung away.
Bruce, overly protective of his daughter, seeing her tossed aside, charged in fists flying without caring who started the fight.
Peter and Deadpool were too loyal, diving into the fray on seeing their friends being hit, without concern for right or wrong.
The only good news was despite the brawl, Forward York City surprisingly remained unscathed.
Naturally, Shiller was first concerned with what needed the most attention: "How's the hospital? No one else was hurt, right?"
"No," Carter replied. "Luckily, they didn't use their superpowers, just their fists. But some of them punched hard enough to damage beds, walls, and shelves."
Shiller's eyes swept over everyone, and without a doubt, those with the best close combat skills were former Spider-Man Peter Parker, professional mercenary Deadpool, and former Spider-Man Bruce.
But the first and last wouldn't smash things without using superpowers, so it must be Deadpool.
"Fine, I'll pay for it," Deadpool shrugged. "But I didn't intend on causing a scene at the hospital. It'd hurt my popularity. I was just sticking up for my buddies. I didn't even fire a shot."
"You were planning to shoot?!" Carter slammed the table.
"Alright, ma'am," Shiller consoled. "Since nothing serious happened, let's leave it at that."
Everyone in the room stared at him wide-eyed as Shiller continued, "Why not have them look into what's up with the seafood?"
"I was just about to mention that," Carter said, brushing her hair back. "The bass that jumped onto our yacht was found to have some unknown substance in its system, like a synthetic compound. Luckily, none of you were attacked."
"If the seafood from that bar restaurant's kitchen is also problematic, we need to trace where it came from and why it's in Forward York City."
Carter stood up, glanced over them, and said, "You all know that causing such a fiasco on Rebirth Alliance's territory is by no means honorable."
"But to accommodate multiverse tourists, we're short-handed, and I can't spare anyone to investigate this. If you're willing to help us, we'll let bygones be bygones. How about it?"
"I was just about to say," Human Torch stepped forward, "those fish in the kitchen were particularly large, had red eyes, and for some reason, were very aggressive. Aisha almost got bitten. This is clearly abnormal; maybe someone's been poisoning..."
Before Carter could respond, a mutant jumped in, Logan stepped forward and asked, "Does that mean mutants might have eaten tainted seafood?"
"Yes, that could very well be why they had stomach issues," Human Torch said. "But if the hospital's tests found nothing, the poison is likely not common, possibly a new type targeting mutants specifically, as no one else had problems..."
"But the other mutants had no issues," Phoenix said. "There were five or six mutants at that table, and only one had a stomachache."
"We'll investigate as thoroughly as possible," Professor X stated. "If we find any new leads, you'll be informed immediately. Also, send me that fish sample and compound report; I want to have someone else take a look."
"The seafood in Forward York City should all come from those two Aquaman, right?" Peter frowned. "We just need to find out which supplier that bar was getting from to see where the problem lies. We'll check it out."
"I still have to take Aisha to meet Thomas," Bruce said, picking up Aisha. "She's going to be the flower girl at the wedding and has a lot to prepare, so we'll bow out."
He left with Aisha, and Carter couldn't stop him since they were guests. Franklin was also let off the hook.
Finally, Carter looked at Shiller and asked, "Do you have any thoughts, Professor?"
Shiller shook his head, "It's not that I don't want to investigate, but there's a shortage of people here who understand traditional Catholic weddings. Once the venue setup starts, I might be invited to participate, so I won't have much time."
"I see," Carter nodded. "The wedding is the priority. Sorry for roping you in; please go back to rest. There's a bonfire party tonight, after all."