"What the hell is this?" Ivan muttered, glancing around. The glowing panel floating in front of him seemed to be visible only to him.
"Not a hallucination, then."
After a few quick tests, he figured out he could control the damn thing with just a thought.
Queen Maeve was still standing right next to him, striking one sexy pose after another for the cameras.
"Analyze," Ivan commanded silently.
The panel instantly projected a detailed 3D model of Maeve. A line of text popped up underneath:
[Please select the ability you wish to analyze.]
What powers did Queen Maeve even have? Ivan blanked for a second, so he just picked the most obvious one — strength.
[Talent Ability: Super Strength]
[Analysis Condition: Maintain skin-to-skin contact with Queen Maeve for two full hours]
[After fusion, the player's genes will gradually change. Once strength reaches a certain threshold, additional abilities will be required to break through the limit.]
Ivan read the requirements and his brain short-circuited. Two hours touching Maeve's skin? Fuck, even two minutes felt like a suicide mission.
Before long, Queen Maeve wrapped up her fan service and headed off to film her scenes for the day.
Today's shoot looked like one of those standalone episodes for her. Simple, dumb plot: a bus gets hijacked by armed robbers, and Queen Maeve has to swoop in and save the hostages. Classic Vought bullshit.
Too bad Ivan couldn't see the actual filming. He might've tried analyzing a couple more of her powers if he could get a better look.
By noon the sun was beating down hard over New York. The crowd of screaming fans had finally started thinning out. Ivan glanced at the watch on his wrist — twelve o'clock sharp.
Lunchtime.
He followed Blitz and the other guys to a shady patch of grass under some trees and sat down with the fast food that had just been delivered from a nearby fried chicken joint.
"Man, Maeve's outfit today is fucking killer," Blitz said, already drooling over the picture of Queen Maeve printed on the side of his chicken bucket. Die-hard fan behavior.
"If you're not gonna eat that, don't waste it," Ivan shot back.
He reached over, snatched a chicken wing from Blitz's bucket, and shoved it straight into his mouth. After three years of living off glucose drips, the second real food hit his tongue it felt like heaven had opened up.
At the same time, his face hardened with fresh determination. People always crave what they once lost, right?
Right now, Ivan had only one goal burning in his gut: get stronger. Strong enough that nothing — not accident, not disease, not even these psychotic supes — could ever take him down again.
He was done with being helpless. Done with that paralyzed hell.
"Shit, my wing!" Blitz wailed, lunging to steal the chicken back from Ivan's hands.
But Ivan wasn't about to let him win that easily.
He demolished the rest of the fried chicken in record time, then sucked down the entire cup of ice-cold Coke in one long pull.
"Burp… Fuck, that hit the spot." Ivan flopped back on the grass and let out a proper New York-style belch.
Right then, the sound of clapping echoed from across the lot. Big, bulky Al came striding over. "Alright, boys. The set just decided they don't have enough robbers for the scene. Anyone wanna volunteer as a bad guy? Extra hundred and twenty bucks in it for you."
Blitz's eyes lit up like a kid on Christmas. Being in a scene with his goddess Queen Maeve? That was straight-up dream material. He was already raising his hand.
Old-timer Hank next to him quickly yanked his arm back down.
"Boss, you sure this isn't just Asia thinking the robbers are getting their asses kicked too fast and she needs more meat shields to make the supes look strong?" Hank asked, face twisted like he'd bitten into a lemon.
"Exactly right. And you just earned yourself a spot in the reward pool."
"Aw, come on, boss…"
Al ignored Hank's whining completely. His eyes swept over the group and he pointed at three guys — including Ivan.
"Boss, I volunteer!" Blitz shouted, thrusting his arm up again like a maniac.
Al gave him a sideways glance. "Kid, wipe that creepy fucking look off your face. It's disgusting. Forget me wanting to punch you, if Queen Maeve swings at you, you'll be eating through a straw for at least two weeks."
"Getting beaten up by the Queen is actually one of my dreams too," Blitz said, completely shameless.
"..."
The second those words left his mouth, everyone around him got the chills and scooted their asses away as fast as possible.
Al just shook his head, rubbing his forehead. "I still don't know how the hell you got hired. Fine, you're in too. But when we get on set, keep your eyes to yourself. If shit goes sideways, even I won't be able to save your sorry ass."
Under Al's lead, the group headed back to the set and got suited up in proper robber gear.
They went full tactical: tactical vests, goggles over their eyes, knives on their belts. Ivan hefted the gun they handed him — heavy, solid, real steel.
Is it real?
"Putain, this is hardcore as fuck," he muttered under his breath.
Once everyone was ready, they climbed onto the bus with guns in hand. Inside, they found over a dozen other guys dressed exactly like them… and only three actual passengers including the driver.
What the actual fuck? This was ridiculous.
With this much firepower they could've robbed an armored truck instead. Who the hell hijacks a goddamn city bus?
There were so many things wrong with this scene that Ivan didn't even know where to start ripping it apart.
"Action!"
A little girl huddled in her mother's arms, doing her best scared-shitless face, voice all shaky. "When is the superhero coming to save us? I'm so scared…"
One of the robber actors glared at her like a cartoon villain and laughed maniacally. "We've got too many guys here! Even the Queen won't be able to save your sorry asses!"
The dialogue and acting were so bad Ivan's toes curled hard enough to dig a luxury villa straight out of the concrete.
Suddenly the ground shook like something heavy had just dropped from the sky. Ivan glanced out the bus window. Queen Maeve was landing in a perfect one-knee crouch, dust exploding around her and cracks spiderwebbing across the pavement. Gotta admit — it looked badass.
At least that's some serious super durability, he thought.
He tried analyzing it anyway. The conditions popped up even worse than super strength: two full hours of skin contact plus ten milliliters of her blood.
Ivan almost laughed. Good luck getting a regular needle through her skin.
The second Maeve appeared, every fake robber in the bus opened fire. Gunshots cracked loud — bang bang bang — brass casings clattering all over the floor.
Maeve didn't even flinch. She just walked straight into the hail of bullets like it was a light drizzle.
This wasn't movie CGI. This shit was happening right in front of him.
Then she raised her sword and casually sliced the incoming bullets in half.
Coach… I want to learn that.
[Talent Ability: Swordsmanship Talent]
[Grants the player exceptional skill with bladed weapons, superhuman sword talent, and a slight boost to reaction speed.]
[Analysis Condition: Touch Queen Maeve]
In the comics Queen Maeve really was a sword monster. The show barely showed it, but scoring this ability was still a solid win. Compared to super strength, the conditions looked almost reasonable.
The panel made Ivan's eyes light up.
All he needed was one quick touch — even half a second — and he could analyze and steal that sword talent for himself.
Of course, actually cutting bullets out of the air like she did was still a pipe dream. He'd need her super reflexes and super durability fused on top of it first. And getting those? Yeah, that was going to be a massive pain in the ass. Something for later.