Chapter 1

“Look honey!” the auburn haired, sun-kissed woman said as she stood directly between Bryant and the centerpiece of the Museum of Super History. On the one hand, Bryant had been waiting in line to see the Omni-Spark for at least thirty minutes. On the other hand, this whole field trip was still time spent at somewhere marginally more interesting than math class. On the third hand – which his best friend L’oquan happened to have ... there were worse things than looking at a redheaded MILF.

“What is it, Mom?” the redhead’s daughter asked, bouncing and trying to peer around the gauzy screen that kept most people save those standing directly in the observer’s plinth from seeing the Omni-Spark bounced and tried to crane her head around. Her father, going prematurely gray, picked her up with a grunt, holding her so she could see.

“That’s what the nice men from the government dragged off our farm, Amy, when you were real small, just a baby.”

“Whoa...”

L’oquan, whose species had three arms, two hearts, and had been refugees on Earth since the 1960s, was a bit less willing to be patient than Bryant. “Lady, some of us want to see the fancy glowy orb too.”

“Dude!” Bryant hissed.

“What, we’ve been waiting in line for thirty minuets,” L’oquan whispered back.

The woman turned back to shoot them a glower that could have shriveled them to ash in a metaphorical sense – you had to be careful with that kind of metaphor in a world with people like Lady Luck and Baron Beast. Or Krazy Klown. But despite her glower, the woman was chivied away by her daughter saying: “I want ice cream!”

And so, perforce, her parents took her off to get ice cream and Bryant and L’oquan were able to step up to the viewing platform. The gauzy shield that separated Bryant from 0.5% of all the observable energy in the universe seemed pathetically thin – and yet, there was the Omni-Spark, humming and buzzing and throbbing and pulsating. L’oquan read off the placard next to it. “After crashing in a Kansas farm, the Omni-Spark was isolated and studied by the United Nations and has served as the basis for all modern energy and technological progress.” He shook his head. “And now it’s a museum piece.”

“Well, based on what Dad says,” Bryant said, his voice pitched low. “No one can actually tap the Spark for actual energy. If we could, it’d be in a reactor. But by studying how the dark energy interacts with observable matter, we built a bunch of amazing things. But we’ve built all the things, figured out all the basic math. Now it’s just a big ... glowy hood ornament.”

“I mean, that just seems wrong, it’s more energy than a hundred big bangs!” L’oquan whispered.

“Uh, no, it’s half a percent of-” Bryant started.

“Not the beginning of the universe, the time my homeworld exploded. Dude.”

“ ... oh...” Bryant’s face colored.

L’oquan laughed. “Hah! Dude, my homeworld is Earth, I was born here. You fuckin’ nerd.” He punched Bryant’s shoulder with his chest arm, while leaning forward to look in at the Omni-Spark. Then, cheerfully, L’oquan added. “I am shocked more super-villains don’t try and steal it, though.”

Bryant sighed, stepped away from the case, then started to look around for a shelter. Several other people in the line were already starting to step out of it hurriedly. L’oquan looked around – then his triangular face and three eyes all fell at once.

“Ah cra-”

The windows to the museum exploded. Glass shards fell and tinkled around the guests, while the big statue of the 1990s lineup of Shield Squad were sent wobbling and crashing over. In a particularly ironic moment, the head of Legacy managed to land directly on the diorama of Hitler’s last stand at Atlantis, and crush the wax figure of the cybernetically augmented Fuhrer. Bryant grabbed L’oquan, but the crush of people meant they were both only able to get a few feet away from the display area when the first of the goons came swinging in.

They were primarily made up of pretty tough looking customers with normal guns – save that they had been forced to dress in pretty remarkable fursuits, with a wide range of predators. Wolves, lions, a few jackals. They landed on the ground and managed to bring their guns to bear on the crowd despite wearing large foam and cloth paws – though, by Bryant’s terrified quick glance, he was pretty sure a quarter of them were looking totally mortified. The clack and rattle of their weapons getting readied – ominous clicks of metal on metal – was enough to freeze the whole crowd in their tracks.

“Everyone, freeze!” one man shouted.

Bryant gulped and lifted his hands. L’oquan did the same.

“Check the alien, is he a super?” A lion headed merc said, stomping forward.

“That’s speciest!” L’oquan said. “Only purple Triellians have superpowers, I’m a green Triellian.”

“Yeah, and no one’s ever heard of body paint before,” a wolf said, as he walked over to push L’oquan to his knees, pressing his gun barrel against the side of his head. “Anyone got a scanner?”

“I do!” A hyena said, jogging over.

“We gotta work quick, secure this place before the Impossibles show up,” Lion Head said, his voice grim as he gestured several of his fellow animal themed goons forward. They started to sling rucksacks off their shoulders, tossing them to the floor and opening them up to reveal tools required for any proper robbery these days: Point to point transport emitters, laser cutters, transport emission buffers, power cells, fusion batteries. Bryant, who recognized most of it from shop class, shot L’oquan a dirty look as the scanner that Hyena Head was holding chirruped, blatted, and bleeped.

“He’s two third green Triellian, one third purple,” Hyena Head said.

“Ah, don’t shoot him then,” Lion Head said.

“Yeah, I doubt Baron Beast is going to give you raises for killing an eighteen year old,” Bryant said, glaring at Lion Head.

“You got some lip,” Lion Head said, frowning down at Bryant. “Let me guess, you read all the comic books. Well, in a real super sitch, you are a greasy stain on the floor if you don’t shut the fuck up and do what we say.” He glared down at him. “Baron Beast doesn’t give a shit if some twerp kid gets merked.”

Trumpeting fanfare blared from the windows.

“Ah shit,” Lion Head muttered.

Fluttering eagles and hawks came in through the windows, carrying in their claws long trailing red banners, which were marked with ... okay, Bryant had only gotten a C+ on his civics course, but he was fifty percent sure those were the flags of the Wyld Court, the fae country that existed/didn’t exist in Yellowstone National Park and technically laid claim to most of California, Wyoming, Utah, and Montana. The trumpets were played by baboons that leaped through the windows after, and the triumphal march ended with a flourish as a sleek, black furred male lion sprang through.

The difference between a lion fur-suit and the actual, factual Baron Beast was quite remarkable. There was no falsehood, no separation between fur and flesh, between the sleek humanoid form and the swishing tail, the paws, the claws, the beady black eyes. Also, comic artists had lied to Bryant – they had never, once, painted Beast’s massive, pendulous ball-sack or his sheath. The completely naked would be king and dictator of the Wyld Court spread his arms wide, wearing nothing but a golden circlet and a crimson cape with golden clasp around his throat.

“My people!” he said, cheerfully. “Never fear, your rightful ruler is here to claim his prize.”

“Can you please put on pants!?”

It was the redheaded MILF from earlier, her hand clasped over her daughter’s eyes, cowering in the corner near the concessions stand.

“Your petty human morals do not apply to the Baron of the Wyld!” Baron Beast said, dramatically, flicking one hand. “Now, my humble soldiers, my men at arms, how goes the capture of the betrothal gift.”

“It’d go faster, sir, if you let us work!” Wolf Head said, the laser cutter buzzing as he sawed through the restraints at the base of the Omni-Spark’s housing. Bryant frowned, looking for some way he could possibly delay things.

Wait.

He knew one way.

“Betrothal gift?” he asked, jerking his head up. “Are you still trying to marry Mrs. Impossible? Lady Luck?”

The Baron turned to face him. This did mean that Bryant, kneeling as he was, was now on a direct eyeline to the baron’s leonine balls, but he supposed it was a sacrifice that he was willing to make.

“And who is this human being? This ... this ... sproutling!” The Baron said, tucking one paw under his chin in the most camp gesture that Bryant had ever seen on a man whose driving goal had been to marry a woman.

“Bryant DeWitt, high school student, A+ in my Supers class.” Bryant said. Which was not quite true, he had gotten a B+, because the final test of his final senior year had involved a ton of stupid trick questions involving dead superheroes who had come back to life and sorting when and how and where they had all shuffled and then deshuffled the mortal coil was hard, even for experts. But that was because Mr. Yelarin had really believed that ‘we’re preparing you for college’ line that every teacher in senior year gave.

“Ah, well, my virginal, pimpled lout, I will have you know that I am not trying to marry Mrs. Impossible. I am going to marry her. And that will knock my pathetic half-brother off the throne of the Wyld Court, and make me King of the Forest! Ahahah!” He laughed, flicking his hand.

“How?” L’oquan asked, looking at Bryant. “Mr. Impossible is the King of the Forest, like, Lady Luck isn’t in the Fae court, she got her superpowers when she hit a leprechaun with her SUV.”

“That’s ... not the...” Bryant flushed. L’oquan loved teasing him about having a crush on Lady Luck. It wasn’t that he had a crush on Lady Luck. It was that he was male and lived in Century City. If L’oquan found human women attractive, he would have gotten it too.

“Well ... you see ... the...” Baron Beast spluttered, his tail swishing. “The under ... the ... the Fae Court never adopted Salic descent ... of ... shut up!”

“No, no, keep going, this is really funny.”

Bryant jerked his head around so hard that he almost gave himself whiplash.

Standing in the entrance of the museum was Lady Luck. She was just as gorgeous in person as she was on the TV shows and in the comic books – even the off model ones that refused to draw her with her actual bust size. She was dressed in her skintight spandex outfit of white and red, with her crimson cape fluttering behind her, her domino mask letting her wild mane of bright blond hair spill along her shoulders like a waterfall of gold. She was also checking her handheld, frowning as she tapped at the holographic interface with one thumb.

“Lady Luck!” Baron Beast actually slicked his paw along his mane, trying to get it to floof more impressively. “I see you’ve come to speak to me without your ... husband ... how inappropriate.”

“He’s putting out a fire downtown, takes a surprising amount of elephants for that,” Lady Luck said, cheerfully. She flicked her handheld shut with a click, then slid it into ... a ... Bryant was honestly not sure. There was no way she had a pocket on that uniform. He could swear he could see her belly button. Then she blinked, her eyes widening behind her domino mask. “God, Baron! Remember what we said at the last rehab session! Pants! You have to wear pants.” She smacked a gloved palm against her knuckles to emphasize each word.

The Baron sniffed. “And deprive you of the glory of my beauty?” he asked.

“Mmm!” Lady Luck said, waggling her hand. “I kinda have a thing for prey animals.”

“Prey animals!?” The Baron gasped.

“Did she just say she fucks horses?” L’oquan whispered to Bryant.

“She’s married to King of the Forest,” Bryant hissed back. “Remember, KOTF can only become prey animals, like how BB can only become predators.”

“God, you are a nerd,” L’oquan whispered.

“This is important, we’re gonna freaking die if we don’t remember this shit!” Bryant snarled.

“Ah, good point!” Baron Beast said, his clawed finger hooking on Bryant’s collar and yanking him to his feet, then swinging him around, his naked body pressing to Bryant’s back – his right hand reaching around to press a bared claw to Bryant’s throat. “If you take one step closer, Lady Luck, then this childling ... will die!”

Lady Luck raised her hands, slowly, palms spreading, fingers outstretched. “Lets not get too hasty, Beastie...” She looked right into Bryant’s eyes. Then she winked at him.

Oh shit. Do I have to do something? Bryant thought wildly. He looked left. Right. Left. Up. Down.

“I saw that wink!” Baron Beast snarled. “If you try anything-”

“My powers are totally off right now, promise!” Lady Luck said, clasping her hands behind her back as she did so. This had the side effect of making her back arch in a remarkably distracting way. Like. It would have been distracting if she had been in a nun’s habit, but as she was in white and crimson outfit that looked less like clothing and more like particularly well done body paint, it was so distracting that Bryant barely noticed when Hyena Head dropped his laser cutter.

The laser cutter’s safety interlock was supposed to keep the trigger from being depressed unless the cutter was pressed to some metal. However, due to an unforeseen flaw in the design, if the cutter fell at the exact angle (42.3 degrees, to be specific), the interlock failed and the trigger could be depressed by the force of the sudden stop. The cutter fired off a single pulse of invisible laser light. It crossed the space of the museum, zipping past several civilians to cut one of the guide-wires that kept the small awning that leaned over the gift shop.

The wire snapped.

The awning fell and struck a dolly that had been parked there, carrying heavy tanks meant for the superconducting exhibits. The tanks were full of highly pressurized gasses, and designed to handle being hit by Major Earthquake – in that, literally, Major Earthquake often went to testing facilities to slam the bottles against the walls with his patented ‘sledgehammer rocker’ power move. However, one of the bottles landed edge on to the ground, snapping one of the nozzles open and letting a gout of high pressure gasses spurt out of the end of it and sending the bottle shooting off like a rocket.

Baron Beast, by now, had realized something was happening.

“Shoot her!” he shouted, flailing his free paw at Lady Luck.

His fursuit clad goons snapped their guns up.

And the rocketing bottle shot past Lady Luck, hit the Omni-Spark containment unit, rebounded off it, and knocked every single gun out of their hands at once. The guns flew up into the air, their actions working due to the sudden jostling as their safties failed. Their bullets struck the ground, ricocheting off harmlessly in every direction – and causing the men to flail and dive for cover. They all managed to land precisely where the guns came back down, their arcs sent into chaos by their firing. Kinetic reactions and all that.

Each gun butt cracked into the back of each man’s heads, knocking them instantly and relatively painlessly unconscious.

“Youuuuu!” Baron Beast lifted his knife, about to slit Bryant’s throat.

The flying bottle hit the wall, rebounded, smashed into a lighting fixture, which immediately plunged down. Baron Beast screamed, jerked backwards as Bryant flung himself away with a frantic leap. The knife went skittering along the floor as the fixture crashed down between the two of them. The electric cable that was yanked down by the lighting fixture fell in a perfect loop around the Baron’s ankles just as the rocketing bottle came back down, lodged itself in the tangled mass of metal that had been the lighting fixture.

The whole assemblage shot off as Lady Luck stepped aside, her hands still behind her back.

“I’ll get youuu for thiiiiiis!” Baron Beast shrieked as his ersatz rocket sled yanked him – via the cables, which drew taut around his ankles – out of the museum and towards the police van that had parked across the street so the overfed cop within could buy doughnuts at that exact moment. The bottle ran out of pressurized fuel at the exact right moment to land safely before the police van and send the Baron whipping into the back of the van, which slammed and locked its doors.

The cop, with his doughnut in his hand, blinked and turned back to the museum.

“Thanks Mrs. Impossible!” He called out.

“Please, the PTA calls me Mrs. Impossible, you can call me Lady Luck!” she said, giggling and then turning back to Bryant.

“So!” she said. “Are you okay, citizen?”

“Well, I...” Bryant, at that moment, noticed that the Omni-Spark’s housing was cracked. The impact had shattered something deep inside and the chunk of raw cosmic energy that had catapulted humanity’s technology forward a century overnight was beginning to throb and hum. Lady Luck blinked, then turned around and shouted to the crowd.

“Everyone, out now!” she said, hurriedly. “Now, come on, just run, you’ll make it!”

People started to stand and run – and coincidentally, nearly every direction they chose to run ended up being a shockingly safe place to go. Lady Luck’s brow was furrowed and Bryant wondered, exactly, which was harder: a single obviously improbable event that took out a few goons and Baron Beast, or nearly a thousand random events that guided nearly two hundred people safely out of a jam packed, panicky museum.

Then he realized that all of that attention was focused away from the Omni-Spark.

Which was why Lady Luck did not notice that the edge of the containment unit was glowing and straining and beginning to melt, directly at her.

“Lady Luck, get-”

Bryant leaped.

“-down!”

His shoulder slammed directly into the spandex clad super-heroine. He had a moment to think: Oh, hey! I’m her lucky d-

And then 0.5% of all the observable energy in the universe got crammed into his body at once.

Pain.

Fire.

Noise.

And through it all, Bryant DeWitt. A tiny shell of potentiality, a barely noticeable twitch on the skein of space time. Measurable impacts: Nill.

In short, the galaxy would never notice him, if he was missed.

Against that, the pain and the fire and the noise seemed unstoppable. He felt every atom of his being starting to tear apart, screaming into hissing quarks. The Higgs field, the immensely complex assemblage of primeval forces that created gravity and magnetism and all the complexity of the atomic and strong/weak forces, blazed through his body. His soul was flensed apart. Torn asunder, leaving a hazy array of connective neural patterns, suspended in thin air for a tantalizing second.

It would have taken an Nth level genius to use the powers that that neural pattern had access to to save itself. Former President Madeline Deinhardt might have done it – but she was currently serving at least one consecutive life sentence in maximum security for using her immense intellect to first, get elected as the President of the United States at age sixteen despite several laws and at least one constitutional amendment ... and then turning Mount Rushmore into a combat mecha that nearly destroyed New York City.