Author's Note:
I wasn't super happy with how the mini arc in the Familiar of Zero world turned out, so it has now been made into auxiliary chapters. I posted all of them there if you want to read them, go ahead, but if you don't, you shouldn't be too lost, key word being TOO lost. So take this chapter to replace those. Until next time, Ciao.
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POV Rio
After healing my back and making sure my house hadn't been broken into, I checked the date and saw that almost four months had passed. Specifically, it was October 1st.
'Okay, so given I was gone for just about sixteen months, that meant it was a 4:1 time ratio. Four days there is one day here.'
The next thing I did was start sorting my inventory. My stuff had been badly damaged and would be out of commission for a while, which really sucked, but at least they would slowly repair over time. Besides the broken equipment, I had a sizeable amount of materials, specifically lots of blocks. Then there was the gear I had gotten from the various templates, with the most recent ones being Ron Weasley and Katara. Ron was quick to be assimilated and didn't give me anything new. In terms of gear, it wasn't anything noteworthy.
The same could almost be said for Katara. I got a set of Water Tribe clothes, or really her usual clothes and accessories, and some Water Bending scrolls. And that was about it. Except for one interesting item, a Vial of Spirit Water, which could heal some nasty wounds, including some soul damage. Honestly, it was mostly her abilities that were interesting and useful. First was Water Bending, which gave me some fantastic advantages, as Earth has a lot of water. Then you have the more advanced versions of said bending, such as Plant Bending, Steam Bending, and, most interestingly of all, Blood Bending. With Blood Bending, I could cause a lot of damage to specific targets. Now, it wasn't perfect, as from what I can tell, there is some interference with most creatures when you try to bend their blood, but it is possible. Her template also gave me access to Chi and the ability to manipulate it, which gives me another source of energy I can use.
Then there was the research I had done. I had managed to make a stable reactor powered by Volatile Promethium. It's completely safe and, from my predictions, should be able to run for thousands of years without interference. It was where Rome got its power. I also forged some Depleted Promethium and had plans to use that to make some armor. But for now, that could wait.
Other than that, I had managed to fully replicate the Stimpak, though when you actually think about the Stimpak, it isn't that crazy. It can heal wounds rapidly, but it can't exactly save everyone. Good for emergencies at least. I was really close to replicating Plasma Grenades and had fully replicated the Pulse Grenade. The only issue was creating them. The materials were not easy to come by in the FOZ (Familiar of Zero) world. But now that I was home, I could hopefully create many more of them.
I had given up on trying to replicate Thermal Detonators and Bacta for the time being, as I was fully aware that it was just not feasible to create them. Even now that I was back on Earth, it would be quite difficult to replicate them, if not impossible in the case of Bacta. It also was a bit related to my slow progress on recreating Plasma weapons, both the Fallout kind and the Star Wars kind. Turns out, despite having the knowledge and understanding of how something works, replicating it with subpar components makes things much harder.
'I'm sure with more advanced technology, I can replicate it.'
I was exhausted from the battle I had just gone through, so I chose to go to sleep and leave the rest of the things for tomorrow.
The Very Next Day... (Waddle Waddle)
"Ahh! That was a nice rest, just what I needed, and looky here, I even woke to a pleasant surprise," I say cheerfully.
[Katara: 100%]
[Getting New Template]
[New Template Found ---> Batman]
[Batman: 12%]
Yes, everything was feeling swell. The version of Batman I got was my favorite. Batman from the DCAU. The man was the most human person I had ever seen on television. And I was beyond happy to get his template.
'Hmm, maybe Batman can help Gotham here as well? New York City is also called Gotham after all.'
That was a consideration, but for now it was time to look at the equipment. And it was some darn good stuff. There was a wardrobe of various Batsuits with the unfortunate lack of the Batman Beyond Suit, but that was okay; I was always a bit more partial to the classic suits. I got a varitable arsenal of bat gear. Grappling hooks, smoke pellets, and batarangs of all sorts of varieties. Then there were the other vehicles. The Batwing, Batboat, Jet-wing, Whirlybat, Batglider, and Batmobile. Then came the surprise of a lifetime. The freaking WATCHTOWER!
'Holy peanut butter and jelly, Batman!'
Now, it wasn't perfect; it was unarmed, like most versions are. But it was highly durable and very spacious. It didn't have a teleporter either. Nor a spaceship to get to and from the space station, but I was willing to let that go, as instead I got the fully up-to-date Batcomputer, which should be far beyond anything this world has. This is the DCAU version, not the one that got hacked, but a highly sophisticated Quantum Computer. And as for the limitations I was speaking of, they were at most temporary setbacks, as Batman had the knowledge of the machines and tech needed to make all those changes. I just have to get the materials together and build it. That is, once I assimilate that info.
'Everything's coming up Rio.'
I was so happy that I ate some breakfast and turned on the news.
"We have confirmed reports, I repeat, confirmed reports of nuclear detonations. My god," the news broadcaster says before the channel is interrupted.
My face dropped, and I was frozen in... Confusion? Horror?
[Image Of What Look Rio Has]
'I was gone for four months, and they managed to destroy it the literal day after I got back!'
I pull out the token that Genie gave me and contemplate using it. But I make a call first.
"What? Who is this?" Tony says.
"Tony, what happened while I was gone?" I ask.
"Rio? Oh my god, you picked a really bad time to come back," Tony says.
"You don't say, is what the news is saying correct that a Nuclear War has begun?" I ask with barely contain frustruation.
"Uh, well, technically yes? It's just that they aren't attacking each other. It's a bit of a long story, but basically, Africa, the Middle East, and parts of Europe were infested with a massive parasitic alien problem. They were pushing somewhat normally until yesterday, when they suddenly released a massive plume of gas or something and started attacking far more quickly," Tony explains.
"How the hell did you lose an entire continent in only four months?!" I complain.
"Hey! Don't blame me, I've been in a god damn arms race with a race of alien creatures that constantly adapt to any weapon or armor I develop. I've lost 14 armor sets to the damn things. Not to mention the trillions of dollars the world has been spending on bombing those things out of existence. Though I don't think we have to worry about that anymore, seeing as all that smoke, ash, and fallout is about to send us into a Nuclear Winter," Tony complains loudly.
"How many nukes did they launch?" I ask worriedly.
"All of them," Tony answers bluntly.
"WHAT!? Are they bloody insane?!" I scream.
"Well, they figured it was better to go out on their own terms than be devoured by the aliens and become incubators for them. I've seen several of their hives, and how they reproduce isn't a pretty way to go. I even got cornered enough that I considered killing myself rather than letting them do that to me," Tony says darkly.
"For the love of. Fine. I'll fix this. But this is a one-time thing. I can't do this again," I say before taking the coin and biting it.
The coin dissolves, and I wait for anything crazy to happen, but I don't notice anything.
"What in the! What the hell did you do?!" Tony yells.
"I don't know. I used a Reality Warping item to hopefully fix whatever negative consequences would come of the world using 15k nuclear weapons all at once," I reply with annoyance.
"Well, it sure just saved our asses. The smoke and fires are all gone, though uh, it sort of looks like so are the cities. Not sure what else might have changed. I'm not picking up any radiation either. So, crisis averted? I think," Tony comments uncertainly.
"Well, that's good, but that was a one-time thing. I can't do that again, so if it happens again were screwed. Royally. Now, can you come over and explain what the heck I missed during my journey on another world?" I ask almost plead.
"Sure, be there in like 30 minutes... So uh, did you make a massive harem?" Tony asks.
"I'm hanging up now," I say before ending the call.
'Boy, that escalated quickly. I mean that really got out of hand fast.'
I sent messages to Selene and Lara letting them know I was safe, and we chatted a bit before they said they would come and visit. They also complained about my automated defenses. Which was odd, as I could have sworn I set Selene and Lara as accepted guests. I didn't do so with Tony, as it honestly slipped my mind, and we had only just recently become friends. But by that point, Tony arrived, and I was able to deactivate the automated security before it was too late.
"Okay, so here's what you missed," Tony said before launching into an explanation.
Tony basically told me how it started, which was a spaceship that crashed on Earth, and it was believed it was carrying a Queen Xenomorph for whatever reason. Interestingly enough, they came up with the right name based on the Xenomorph's properties. They were a Xeno or Alien, and they constantly morphed or adapted to their environment and their prey. Shield was in charge of the site, but they didn't even know that there was something missing until it was far too late. Even Tony wasn't told until nearly a month after the crash.
South Africa and Lesotho fell first. From what was described, it was clear that the world didn't even know there was a threat until Namibia, Botswana, Madagascar, Eswatini, Zimbabwe, and Mozambique had fallen. That was on Shield for concealing the threat and underestimating the threat. And they did an awful job at containing it as Xenomorphs spread across the sea to basically everywhere a ship could go. As far North as Canada and as far East as China. Though most of those were put down after extensive losses.
However, that wasn't the end of it, as people quickly learned how they reproduced, which was horrifying. People who survived attacks would report chest pain and abdominal discomfort. Then, hallucinations and finally their chests were burst with newly born Xenomorphs. The only thing that prevented Earth from falling within weeks was the odd weakness to water. They couldn't swim and would dissolve if submerged. Which made no sense to me as I had never heard of a Xenomorph with such a glaring weakness.
Regardless, the world was quick to realise the threat, so the UN actually agreed upon something and formed a coalition to protect Earth. They started by blockading the entire Continent of Africa. And then... Uh... They did a lot of air strikes. Turns out most countries didn't want to risk their people on the ground, and as much as I would like to condemn them, they couldn't really do much. Anything under a 50 caliber would be useless against them.
"It was horrible. I was working nearly nonstop. Everytime I developed a good weapon against them, they would adapt and develop a countermeasure. For instance, I used to have wrist lasers; they would slice through them like perfectly cooked fish fillets. Then one day, I used that strategy and nearly lost my arm when they reflected the laser right back at me. They had developed the ability to make their chitin into a reflective substance that bounced my lasers back at me. They nearly killed me that day. I only managed to escape thanks to diving into the sea. I still have the nasty burns to show for it," Tony says while looking at his left arm.
I started using Twilight Healing while he continued to talk about how much of a nightmare dealing with the Xenomorphs is. Like how you can't study their remains because upon death they dissolve themselves into a puddle of highly corrosive acid. Or how they could and would eat anything inorganic and use it to make massive hive networks that are nearly impossible to navigate. Or the nearly two billion people lost to the Xenomorphs.
'Yeah, never mind if anything, I should be impressed how long Earth lasted.'
It was a literal miracle they survived this long against a full-blown Xenomorph invasion. I knew Xenomorphs better than most, as I had already assimilated one, so I could say for certain, by all logic, they should be dead. Earth that is. With basic firearms and a severe lack of laser, plasma, or anything insanely heavy-duty, they wouldn't even be able to kill the Drone Class, and don't even get me started on the Warrior Class.
"I... Suddenly, don't blame them for launching all those Nukes, but why did they agree?" I ask.
"They had actually been considering launching them for over a month now. When Africa fell, many were terrified of what that would mean for the rest of the world, but it took them a long time to finally agree to launch the nukes. Then they had to plan out who would launch what and target where. They even signed a new treaty. The Rule of Three Treaty. Only 30 nukes can exist on Earth at any given time. 10 for the USA, 10 for Russia, and 10 for China. They only launched the nukes early due to the weird actions of the Xenomorphs yesterday," Tony said.
"What exactly did they do?" I ask.
"Well... I'm not fully sure. I was in my lab at the time, but from the recordings, they suddenly froze all at once, and in sync, they roared at the sky before releasing a massive wave of pink gas. I've never seen them act like that before. And neither had anyone else. So everyone panicked. They thought they might have just released some sort of mass infection gas or a virus. So they attacked before it was too late," Tony said.
"Does anyone know what the gas did?" I ask.
"Well, some say that it made the soldiers fighting drop their weapons and walk towards the Xenomorphs with confused or dazed looks; others say it could have been some kind of pheromones. Or perhaps a hallucinogenic gas. Nobody's sure," Tony says while shrugging his shoulders.
"Do they know for certain if it infected everyone?" I ask.
"Hell if I know. When I said that the Xenomorphs were constantly evolving, I meant that literally. In the beginning, we could detect if someone was infected and, in some cases, save them. Other times, we had mercy kill them to prevent them from becoming a danger. Of course, not everyone thought like that, which is why you get infections in landlocked countries. But the Xenomorphs adapted fast. It became harder and harder to detect infection. And survival odds dropped to zero. It was actually that adaptation that made us realise they were a hive mind. And any actions or weapons we use on them, they would learn about it and adapt. I've gone through hundreds of different weapon designs, all to keep up with their adaptations," Tony says with an exhausted voice.
"Jeez, well, I'll be here to help you. As no offence, but I highly doubt you had enough nuclear weapons to hit every last Xenomorph, but with any luck, you got the Queen," I reply.
"Yeah, with any luck. But forgive me if I don't hold my breath. Now, do mind if I crash here for a while. I haven't slept in days, and I'm hallucinating," Tony says with some messed-up pupils.
"Sure, but uh, what are you seeing?" I ask.
"You're a talking Centaur shooting rainbows out of your ass, and there's a Spanish talking monkey on your shoulder who I'm pretty sure is cursing me out," Tony says, deliriously.
"Yeah, that's not good," I say, and Tony is ejected out of his suit and onto the floor.
That was when the smell hit me.
"Gag! Dear lord, that reeks!" I say while holding in my vomit.
"Oh, yeah, I forgot to mention, I haven't bathed in a few weeks," Tony says.
"You don't say!" I say before casting a bubble face spell to save my nose from that stench.
I don't even dare touch Tony and choose to levitate him to the bathroom. Where I enchant the bathtub into a bed and turn on the fan before leaving.
'I might need to burn those towels.'
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Author's Note:
So I imagine a few will dislike this development in the story, but I will say that even if Rio were present, he could do very little to help. Honestly, I feel I was conservative on the losses when it came to a Xenomorph invasion. Especially when you consider the ship was transporting a Queen Xenomorph. Not eggs, a full-blown Queen, well, a juvenile Queen. And in case it wasn't obvious, these Xenomorphs are modified from the original. There is an in-lore reason for that, but to give you a basic idea, you can assume someone wanted to try to develop a counter to Xenomorphs and maybe create a weaponised and controllable variant. Obviously, that didn't work out, and humanity likely figured out that trying to contain them is basically impossible. So, without that water weakness, humanity would have been screwed, and even with it, they still saw losses of over 2.5 billion, which is nearly a third of the Earth's population, as I place this world's population at a bit over 8 billion compared to our world at the same time due to various alt timeline changes.
As for the Ancient One or Odin getting involved? The Ancient One did get involved, but not in the way you might think. She is a bit busy dealing with her coming mortality and has to conserve her power as best she can. The Sorcerers are not great in number and carry a serious risk of making the Xenomorphs capable of using magic. Which would be really, really, really bad for not just Earth but the entire Universe. Moreover, Kamar Taj doesn't get involved in the affairs of the mundane world; even if the interdimensional threat is gone, that doesn't mean they will suddenly change thousands of years of tradition and precedence to help fight an alien invasion.
Odin, on the other hand, doesn't care about Earth nearly enough to risk an infestation or infection in Asgard, and Xenomorphs adapt based on what they reproduce from, so Odin could cause the problem to become even worse. As for stepping in personally? He's too old and tired to weaken himself like that, and again, Earth is not worth it to him. In Asgard's eyes, Midgard is a backwater planet that is only nominally under their dominion. If they didn't stop the Kree from invading in the past or experimenting on Earth, they sure as hell don't care enough to stop the Xenomorphs. And in my eyes, only Asgardians with unlocked divinities are immune to Xenomorph infection; the average Asgardian is just as susceptible to infection as a human. Anyway, until next time, Ciao.