Disclaimer: I don't own anything except my OCs, and this is my first fanfic. English is my second language. I welcome constructive criticism, but please be kind to me!
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3rd Person POV
At a Burger Mart near Reginald Vel Johnson High School, Max, Marie and Wendy were sitting together. The conversation flowed easily, full of spontaneous laughter, teasing comments, and that kind of comfortable silence that only happens when three people click right away.
Marie even noticed the Seance Dog shirt Max was wearing under his open dress shirt, which pulled them into a nerdy conversation about comics that Wendy couldn't really join.
Wendy was holding back more on the suggestive jokes now. The two of them seemed more focused on getting to know Max for real, while he did the same.
'I got lucky that they're easy to talk to. Things seem to have gone better than they would have if Marie were Mark.'
He thought while talking with them, when a question from Marie came up.
"So… I saw some people talking about The Midnight Deliveryman today…" She asked in a lower tone, just for Max, Wendy and herself to hear.
Max already knew what she was going to ask. The only thing he wondered was how to answer. He knew the attendant might get suspicious later, he just didn't know the attendant was the protagonist of this world. If he had known, he would have gone to another Burger Mart.
'The world is unpredictable. There's no way I can know everything right away. The most I can do is adapt to the situation.'
"…I wanted to know if it was you. You yourself said you were going to donate those forty burgers to homeless people, I just thought it would be in a more… normal way."
Wendy also got curious. So the person who ordered the forty burgers was Max after all. If what her friend was saying was true, the timing matched perfectly.
But she was more interested in something else.
'So, if this is true, does Max have some kind of power? Man, a friend with powers would be so cool!'
"Yes, it was me, but I didn't think it would get so much attention. Good thing the Mauler Twins attacked the White House, otherwise what I did would have stayed more in the spotlight." Max decided to tell the truth, not that he was going to tell absolutely everything, and even if he listed all his powers, one new Gacha would be enough to change the list anyway.
"SO YOU HAVE POWERS!!!?" Wendy stood up and exclaimed loudly, before Marie pulled her friend back into the chair and covered her mouth with her hand.
Even Max was a bit surprised by her reaction, more intense than William's in the original material.
The problem was that they weren't the only ones in the establishment. The place was packed at that hour.
"Huh?"
"What?"
"What was that?"
"I heard something… I just didn't understand it properly."
"Did you guys hear a noise too?"
Since it was crowded, even with Wendy shouting, her voice mixed with the crowd, so only the people closest heard something, but no one saw where it came from, and they didn't pay much attention, they were already distracted by something else before.
"Whisper. Are you crazy!? You can't just go around saying Max has powers like that! If he told us, it's because he trusts that we know how to keep a secret. He doesn't want this spreading around! Whisper." Marie said to Wendy. With a superhero father, she knew very well how to keep secrets, but what impressed her the most was Max telling the truth without beating around the bush. She expected him to lie or make up some excuse, but she was too curious to let that opportunity pass.
"Sorry, she didn't mean any harm. But why did you tell us? You could have lied." Marie was curious. 'It couldn't be because of trust, right? We've only known each other for less than a day.' She thought that if that was the reason, it would be too fast.
"There's no specific reason. I just don't like lying, and it doesn't bother me that some people know about my powers. But seriously, don't go around telling people. I don't want to be stared at like a rare zoo animal when I go to class." That would be the only part that would really bother him if people found out, the rest he could ignore.
"Ah, I thought it was something like- kyaa! Why did you do that!? Gross!" While Marie was talking, still covering Wendy's mouth, who wanted to join the conversation, Wendy did what she thought was most sensible to get out of that situation, she drooled and bit her friend's hand.
"It's not my fault! I also want to ask him questions! Can you fly?" Wendy, now free, started talking to Max and firing questions in sequence.
"Kind of. It's more like using telekinesis, actually, but flying that way gets really tiring."
"Uhm, so you can't really fly properly… wait, telekinesis? Cool! What else can you do with it?"
"Actually, that question would be more about what I can do in general. I also have pyrokinesis, teleportation, permeation, which lets me phase through things, and a few more I'm not going to tell. A woman isn't interested in a man without secrets, after all."
"So many powers! But what about the part where you turned into an angel and a demon? Is that some kind of shapeshift?" Marie had heard about that. Could it be some hypnotic power, illusion, or actual transformation?
"Thank you for thinking I'm an angel~ I'm not even that handsome~." Max said, bringing a hand to his cheek, legs crossed, sitting a bit sideways on the seat, in a theatrical exaggeration of shyness, as if he were a blushing maiden in a period film.
Which made the two of them laugh. He didn't want to say he was mentally influencing the homeless people to see him in different ways. He still didn't know what the limit of their morality was.
Especially Marie's. Her male counterpart, Mark, in the original material, was a real hero who at the beginning wouldn't even admit working with someone who had already killed. Only near the middle to the end of the story did his mindset change more.
Even if it wasn't real brainwashing, just an influence on how people saw him, telling that openly could push them away from him.
So he did the basic thing when there's a question you don't want to answer, he made a joke and changed the subject.
"By the way, do you know about Mr. Hiles? I found out he was involved in the disappearances of some students. He was kidnapping people and using them for some pretty strange experiments."
"Really!?"
"No way!"
They had been worried for a few months now, ever since some students started disappearing. The ones who had gone missing so far were only men, but there was no way to guarantee the kidnapper wouldn't change targets, and that they wouldn't be next.
Finding out a teacher had something to do with it would already be shocking, but even more so Mr. Hiles, whom they had always thought was a completely normal person.
"Really. I noticed he had been reported missing for a while and went to take a look at his house. I didn't find anything on the upper floors, but when I used [Permeation] to go through the floor, I found a secret laboratory."
"And what was there?"
"Did you find Mr. Hiles doing… doing what with the victims?…"
Max had captured the two girls' attention, successfully diverting from the subject of how his powers had mentally influenced the homeless people.
"Actually, he turned the students into biological bombs, but he ended up blowing himself up in the final test because of a mistake. Unfortunately, the kidnapped students died with him, and only the recordings saved in a kind of black box survived. He had some separate backup system, but all the research itself was lost."
Of course those students weren't that innocent. They were all bullies who picked on the less social students. Mr. Hiles hated them because his son had killed himself because of bullying, but turning them into bombs and leaving them to explode in public was a completely different story.
But he never got to that point. He blew himself up before he could leave the victims somewhere full of innocent people.
"Damn! Poor them. I didn't think Mr. Hiles would be capable of doing that." Marie was a bit incredulous, but she trusted Max wouldn't invent something like that.
It was also hard to process that someone who taught them could do something like that.
"…And what did you do after? Did you leave everything there or call the police?" Wendy was also processing, but asked out of pure curiosity.
"Yes, I called them. The police had already searched the house, but the real entrance was somewhere else. I think the news should come out in the next few days."
Marie and Wendy nodded and stayed quiet for a while, not wanting to leave an awkward atmosphere in the air. Max prepared to change the subject, but Wendy was faster.
"So, Max, you said you went through the floor using [Permeation]… ah, I wish I had powers too, it would be so cool, but I think I have to settle for just being a pretty girl in this cruel and dangerous world." She was trying to change the mood of the conversation. She didn't say that truly sad, there was a playful tone, especially at the end.
Even in a world full of powers, she knew she didn't have the profile to fight and become a heroine, but there was a little truth hidden in the joke. Who wouldn't want to have some power if they had the chance? Just telekinesis would already help a normal person a lot in daily life.
"Tell me about it." Marie said a bit melancholically. Wendy thought she had joined the joke, but unlike her, Marie actually had the possibility of having powers, they just hadn't manifested yet, and she was already starting to seriously doubt if they ever would.
"Actually, my power is to copy powers. If I train enough in the future, I might be able to give a copy of them to other people, but I don't know how long it will take until I reach that point." Max knew Marie wouldn't need that, but he liked the friendship that was forming with Wendy, so he was willing to give her some power in the future. Even if it were William in her place, he would probably still be tempted to give a flight power, just because he could.
"Really!? Please, if you manage to give powers to others, give me one, I've never asked you for anything!" Wendy's eyes lit up right away, as if that was everything she had always wanted in life.
Marie also found herself tempted to ask, but decided to wait. The deadline was until she turned 18. After that, the powers would hardly awaken, so she would still have time to ask later if hers didn't manifest.
"Hahaha, alright, don't worry, I can give you one as soon as I manage. But it won't be free. With great powers come great responsibilities. In exchange for giving you powers, you'll work for me, deal?" Max didn't intend to distribute power for free. Even if in the future he discovered Wendy had no talent for fighting, he would still find some role for her.
'After all, I'm not a charity… wait, actually I kind of am. The Midnight Deliveryman practically does charity… should I start charging the homeless people?' Max quickly pushed the thought out of his head. Charge what? The trash they picked up to sell? He was already having a lot of fun doing that, and that was reward enough.
"Anything for you, boss! So, will it be dinner? A bath? Or… perhaps… me?" Wendy said dramatically, bringing the back of her hand to her forehead like a devoted anime servant, almost falling to her knees, the perfect cliché of a lovestruck butler.
Marie just rolled her eyes. She thought Wendy had finally learned to behave. A terrible mistake.
.....
'I think I secured some super-friends now that I became friends with Marie.' With this networking done, it would be easier to get close to heroes in the future, and even copy the powers of those who were compatible.
Which weren't all of them. Darkwing II had a connection to the Shadow-Verse, something that seemed more spiritual than properly genetic, so it probably fell outside the range of [Copy]. Of the Guardians of the Globe still alive so far, only Red Rush seemed to fit the requirements for copying, the others simply didn't match the power's conditions. Who knows if that would change in the future.
Unfortunately, he had no way of saving the Guardians of the Globe from what was coming with Omni-Man. First, he had no idea where their secret base was, he only knew it was somewhere in a mountain in the state of Utah. Second, there was no reason for the Guardians to believe him, a complete stranger, warning that their friend, Omni-Man himself, would try to kill them soon.
The most that would happen was them becoming suspicious, and Max would probably end up captured by them before he even finished speaking.
While thinking about that, another unanswered question came back to his mind, something he had never managed to properly clarify.
'The Shadow-Verse and Midnight City were also things that were left open. I remember reading the Invincible Q&As, someone asked "When will we see more of Midnight City?", and the answer was something like "Later in the story." I think it ended up being one of those things the author forgot to develop. I just don't know if Kirkman put something new about that in the animation, my memories about this subject are pretty foggy.'
Not only that, there was also the place Omnipotus came from. Max was worried now that Invincible had become his real world. What if these interdimensional threats started appearing more frequently? At least he thought it wouldn't be anything on the level of an Anti-Monitor…
Now that he stopped to think better, he remembered it had been said that, because of crossing so many dimensions, Omnipotus was extremely weakened compared to his original form. And being a devourer of entire dimensions, would his complete form be able to rival something on the level of an Anti-Monitor?
Max sat down and let out a tired sigh just imagining what was ahead. It was going to be a hard life, not that he imagined himself losing, just that it would be full of sweat and tears… and blood.
'Not only that, how do you explain Invincible getting beaten regularly? Did he hold back a lot in fights? Yes. But Kirkman also already said he didn't care much about the power scaling of his own story. If that translates to my universe too, I'm going to have to be twice as careful.'
He decided to go out and rest. If he stayed too worried about the future, he would suffer twice, once thinking about what could happen, and again when it actually happened.
'I think it's time to deliver the presents to my kids.' He got a bit more excited just thinking about that.
…..
Marie POV
'Another day, another customer I'd like to punch until his teeth fly out of his mouth.'
I was already waiting for the time to go home. Honestly, if Dad didn't keep saying that working in a fast food place builds character, I would have already quit.
But now that I can buy my own magazines and action figures, I'm hesitant to leave. It's good to be able to pay for my own things.
Not to mention that today had been a good day overall, which left me in a good enough mood to put up with these customers.
'At least I got a cool friend, and with powers, and handsome…' I shook my head to chase those thoughts away. It wasn't the time to think about that, it was time to work.
And the work I had now was taking two heavy bags of trash to the big dumpster behind the Burger Mart.
'If I had powers, this would be much easier.' I sighed.
I felt a little envious, I won't lie, even if he didn't seem as powerful as Dad, or as powerful as I could be if my powers ever awakened.
When I got to the dumpster, with some difficulty, I managed to put the first bag inside.
"Hnf, just one more left."
I grabbed the last bag and, when I went to throw it in the trash, with almost no effort, it flew straight up into the sky.
I opened a smile and adjusted my cap.
"About time…"
Finally my powers had awakened. I wanted to jump for joy, but that would probably launch me into the sky too, and I hadn't even learned how to fly yet.
'I can't wait to tell Mom and Dad.'
I already had a silly smile planted on my face, imagining what my heroine costume would be like, thinking of names to use.
'Just wait until some pushy customer tries to flirt with me now. I'm not so easy to intimidate anymore.'
My shift continued quietly after that, until I saw Max walking into the Burger Mart. He seemed to be in a great mood, much more animated than usual, looking at the menu as if he already knew exactly what he was going to order.
'Max is here! Should I show off and tell him that I have powers now too?' The thought crossed my mind, but was discarded right away. My parents should be the first ones to know.
"Good evening, Max, good to see you!" I said, way more excited than the tone I normally used with customers, but I couldn't help it. It was as if the hidden happiness wanted to escape through any crack.
"Good evening, Marie, radiant tonight. Did something good happen?"
'The best thing that has ever happened to me in my entire life happened, and I don't even know how to properly explain how big this is.'
"Yes, something happened, but nothing worth telling you about."
"Congratulations then, for whatever you achieved."
"Hehehe~ thank you, then. What will you have?"
"Eighty Mart Classic burgers to go, each one individually wrapped like last time, please." Max said that excitedly.
When I heard the order, a vein popped on my forehead. Wasn't this too much? Didn't he feel sorry for the poor fast food workers?
'… I'm going to punch him.'
I didn't expect that the first customer I would want to punch would be my new friend, but his order was way too big.
Why didn't he just order a smaller amount at several different Burger Marts?
"What happened, Marie? Your expression did a full 360 out of nowhere." Max asked, looking confused, which I didn't even believe, he obviously knew exactly what he was doing.
"Max… this is too much… why don't you reduce the amount?"
Max then seemed to get serious, which I hadn't seen happen yet. He looked at me and said.
"Marie, once a certain wise man said 'There's no such thing as bad work, the bad thing is having to work.'"
"… And?…"
"… That's it, really. When I thought of it, it made more sense to say that, but now that I said it out loud, I realized this ancestral wisdom doesn't help you much, haha."
'… I seriously want to punch this guy.'
Wanting to punch my friend twice in a single day wasn't something I imagined would happen right after getting my powers.
'Calm down, Marie, breathe, 1, 2, 1, 2. I have powers now. Even if he has them too, I might end up hurting him, since I don't even have control over my own strength yet.'
While I was trying to control myself, he put his hand in his pocket and took out several 100-dollar bills.
"Here's the payment. You can keep most of the change as a tip. The smaller part you can split with your coworkers."
I took it and counted the money. There was a thousand dollars, and the burgers should cost around three hundred and something in total.
'My hero! I never criticized! And I will never criticize again!'
"Coming right up, boss!"
What was packing eighty burgers next to a tip like that? I even told the guys who made the burgers about the huge tip, so they wouldn't spit in anger on the burgers that were going to the homeless people, and they even got excited about the work.
Then the employees, motivated by the generous tip, worked faster than ever. The Burger Mart had few customers at that hour, so this didn't significantly impact the service.
What should have taken more than an hour, we did in about 20 minutes. I even went to help assemble the orders, since there weren't many customers arriving.
After we finished, Max grabbed two comically large bags full of burgers and left, leaving a very happy team of employees behind.
After he left, the movement stayed quiet, nothing worth noting, except for one customer who, before, would have left me a bit angry.
"So, cutie, are you single? If you want to get out of this place I'll help you. My dad has a lot of money, you wouldn't need to keep working in a fast food place if you were my girlfriend…" The guy didn't seem like he was going to shut up anytime soon.
Before, I would have imagined what it would be like to punch that kind of guy in the jaw so he would pass out right there.
"I appreciate the offer, but I'm not interested. If you could place your order soon, there are other customers waiting behind you." I answered, incredibly calmer than I had ever been in a situation like that. Now that I knew I had powers, it even seemed pointless to waste energy on some random playboy, so I just treated him in a neutral and professionally polite way.
'Just knowing I have powers, my mindset has already changed. Having powers is awesome!' I was so excited inside.
.....
I finally got home. As soon as I walked through the door, I already saw Mom setting the table for dinner.
"And a big welcome home to my favorite daughter. I made some chicken, but I also heated up some authentic German bratwurst flown in special today, just for you."
"I… had a pretty interesting day."
I said while sitting at the table.
"*Whoosh*"
Dad arrived with an afterimage behind him from how fast he had come, and kissed Mom on the cheek.
"Sorry I'm late. Honest to god, a dragon was attacking Hong Kong. I stopped it."
"Ooh, a dragon. Nice. Marie was getting ready to tell us how interesting her day was."
Then they stopped to look at me, waiting for what I had to tell.
"Guess who's finally getting her powers?"
I said excitedly, but still holding back a little.
Dad stared at me fixedly for a moment.
"Are you sure?"
I got a bit confused. I expected him to be happy with the news. I answered with an expression that mixed hesitation, apprehension and a slight discomfort, as if I was trying to understand why that hadn't come with the reaction I expected.
"Pretty sure. Threw a trash bag into space at work."
Dad continued staring at me seriously, without blinking.
Without me noticing, Mom gave a light nudge with her foot under the table, a discreet "relax" poke.
Only then did he suddenly leave that serious expression and answer, cheerful.
"Oh, that's great, Son… I mean, sweetheart, just great! If you're up for it, I'll make some time tomorrow for training."
"This is so exciting!" Mom said.
"Bright and early tomorrow, Marie. Make sure you get a good night's sleep."
I finally answered, excited again.
"Ha! For sure!"
.....
3rd Person POV
Another night, another full stomach, thanks to The Midnight Deliveryman. Max was already really liking this new hobby. He even thought about creating a costume inspired by the Burger Mark variant of Invincible, but gave up on the idea.
Being an angel and a demon judging homeless people was much cooler than just being another superhero delivering burgers.
'Really, doing good deeds fills my heart. Now I understand why there are people who live for this.'
He knew that what he did and what other people did weren't the same thing at all. He just didn't care much, actually. He was feeding the hungry and having fun in the process, that was already enough.
'Speaking of which, Marie was pretty excited before hearing my order. I think she already threw the trash bag into the sky. I wonder if what happens to the bag will follow the comics or the animation.'
It was kind of funny that the homeless people were already more informed about the Midnight Deliveryman, and even so their reaction was still one of shock when they actually received the visit. Some had been skeptical before, others hopeful, but all of them were waiting to see if it was true, and when it happened, they without a doubt became new people.
Those who received the demon's visit left much more motivated than those who received the angel, after all, no one wanted their own foot dragged into hell.
It was when Max was choosing the next victim- the next poor soul in a street situation, that Voice of All Things warned him.
'*Whispers* A presence approaches… ancient, cold, heavy with guilt. It is not evil, but it also doesn't seem to be at peace. *Whispers*'
Max felt the air around him suddenly cool. He blew a little air out of his mouth, almost by instinct, and saw his own breath come out in a white cloud, as if he had just walked into a freezer.
"I didn't expect to be the next one to receive a visit from the demon."
"Well informed. Few would notice my presence."
"Come on, you make the air so cold it should give people chills down their spine, and they just don't notice?"
'He probably likes scaring people with this entrance.'
Max turned to face him. The red-skinned, worn-trench-coat-wearing demonic detective kept his eyes fixed on his. Damien Darkblood was the perfect mix between a classic noir investigator and a demonic being.
"Investigating. Angel and demon case. But it's just a boy playing a prank."
Max raised an eyebrow when he heard that.
"I'm not playing any prank. I'm giving food to those who need it, just in a slightly unconventional way."
"You lie. You won't take them to heaven. To hell, neither. Just a lie."
"Well, then go ahead and tell them the truth. They'll just get disappointed, stop trying to change their lives, go back to the street and continue in that spiral of self-destruction, using heavier and heavier drugs, until they die on some dark street, with their family wondering if they're still alive."
Damien stayed silent. He wasn't an evil demon, and even knowing that the life change of those people had been born from a lie, he didn't intend to tell them the truth.
"Investigated. Found beggars with brain death. Some places. Asking if related. Visited many, last night."
"Yes, of course, I'm the one responsible for the brain death of the drug-abusing beggars. I'm also responsible for people not being able to get a girlfriend, for wars, for racism and for world hunger!" Max answered with mockery, the anger escaping through the edges of the irony.
Max was irritated. He had been accused right to his face, by Damien of all people, and even though he was actually guilty, he wasn't going to admit that to the demon.
'Just what I needed right now. Doesn't this guy have anything better to do? Some ritual to be summoned for? Dishes to wash?'
He knew that guy wasn't going to leave anytime soon, and that even if he told the whole truth, Damien would keep investigating anyway. The detail was that Damien had no way of proving that those few homeless people who had committed horrible crimes had been lobotomized by Max. He hadn't even gotten close to them, he stayed invisible at a distance the whole time while doing it.
They were lives that were already bordering on sudden death anyway, and he did it in a way that looked natural. He didn't expect Damien to come after him, but the precautions he took just in case turned out to be useful.
Damien also didn't have the ability to detect lies, even if he could expose frauds easily. That came from a combination of sharp logical deduction, demonic magic and psychometry, not from a built-in "lie detector."
"Curious." Damien took a step forward, his eyes analyzing Max from top to bottom, like someone reading a report written on the skin itself. "Family dead. Recent. Still hurts. Even so, plays angel. Plays demon. Why?"
Something in his voice, calm, almost clinical, hit too deep.
"That's none of your business." Max felt his jaw lock.
"Touches the right point, human lies. But body… body doesn't lie." Damien continued, impassive. "Doing good, to prove you didn't become a monster? Or to prove it to yourself?"
"Shut up." Max's voice came out lower, colder than he intended.
"Demon recognizes this. Seen it. Many times. Someone tries to buy forgiveness… with good deeds." A slight almost-smile crossed his red face. "Never works."
That was the last straw. Max couldn't say exactly which word was the wrong one, whether "buy" or "never works", but something in him snapped, and before he realized it, his fist was already flying toward Damien's face.
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Hello folks. I just started a Patreon. This is both to keep me motivated to write and to help me make some side income while I'm studying. If you want to read ahead and support my work, you can find me on Patreon searching for WorldHunger.
Lastly, please send me your ideas for Characters, Items, Perks, Gacha Mechanics, Powers/Abilities/Skills (Especially this, I need it), Consumables, and Worlds (for Travel Tickets). Even semi-useful powers are welcome!
Thanks for reading this far. Now, give me your Power Stones! They were promised to me 3,000 years ago! (And remember, everyone gets a free stone daily, for those who don't know).