umm??? thank you guys for 60k??? invincible fandom rise up

I made an official playlist: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6mFqWTNMZRA91q0ZDP3d46?si=CmSQTPGOTP6axK-2o29xkA&pi=u-Ebzb2sZiS6mf

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Infinity

•••

I was out the door immediately, before Minta could even think to stop me. Despite my swirling thoughts, my mind was set on one track.

The first place I went to was Mark's house, to tell Mark, but nobody was home.

If he wasn't at home, I didn't have time to be running around town looking for him. I couldn't fly - all I had was the teleporter. If I couldn't find him, I just had to trust he was safe.

Omni-Man was his dad, I had to remember. No father would kill his own son. That's flesh and blood.

And yet... it was impossible not to think about Minta.

As I did so, I repeatedly signaled Cecil through my watch. I was met with busy signal after busy signal, but I convinced myself that maybe if it didn't work on the fiftieth try, it would go through on the fifty first.

Naturally, it didn't. All I managed to do was freak myself out more.

The second place I went to was Guardian HQ, the only other place I could think of to go. They would be able to help me.

"Guys!" I exclaimed, teleporting into the room, a blissfully familiar environment on top of everything I didn't understand. Everyone's eyes locked onto me, my face set in a frantic look of shock. I had to look like I'd seen a ghost. "You guys-"

Everyone but Black Samson stood in a cluster, with Samson at the screen fiddling and fooling around with it. Before the words could leave my mouth, my vision scanned to a figure that was unfamiliar to me.

"Who the hell is that?" I asked, momentarily catching my breath to point an accusatory finger at the young man. I squinted, gazing from one person to the next. "Rex, I didn't know you had a little brother."

The perfect image of young Rex stood before me. The same tan skin, the same reddish brown hair, the same playful face (admittedly much more innocent). Really, the only difference between them was about two feet in height.

"I don't!" Rex exclaimed, throwing his hands in the air. With as much snark as he could muster, Rex stated, "This is Robot."

I scoffed, shaking my head.

"Real funny," I commented, looking at them both sideways. "That's Robot." And I pointed to the man of metal.

"They're both Robot!" Rex complained. "Right, isn't that weird?"

Rex looked pointedly at the young boy, putting his whole body into it. The boy, apparently Robot, backed away slightly.

Everything was overwhelming me, and I didn't have time to process what implications that might possibly have. Beside the boy, Robot stood unmoving.

"Okay, great, two robots," I said, pretending like that made any sense. As best as I could I pushed that out of my mind. I had bigger and better fish to fry.

"No, it's not great!" Rex's whine touched my ears, but I paid it no mind. That was not the biggest problem now.

While the attention was still on me, I ran a hand through my hair and took a deep breath. Running my hands along my suit for some sense of security, I stated, "There's worse stuff in the world than two Robots.... You guys, Omni-Man killed the guardians."

For a moment, everybody was silent. Staring at me.

Rex was the first to speak, as per usual. "This just keeps getting better and better," he said sarcastically.

"Omni-Man?" Monster Girl asked. Her look of confusion was nothing but expected, her head cocked slightly to the side. All I could do was nod.

"Are you guys seeing this?" Black Samson asked, turning from the screen to face us. On screen, he'd pulled up a satellite image of Omni-Man flying into space... only to destroy a very expensive looking piece of equipment.

"What the fuck is going on today?" Rex sighed.

With whatever was going on here, plus Omni-Man, plus Minta, I had a handful of things to be worried about. I scoffed. "Tell me about it."

Once again, I tapped on my watch, trying to get through to Cecil. Once, twice, several times. Not even a peep.

And then finally....

"I guess you figured it out too, huh?" Cecil's voice was patchy and out of breath through the transmitter, just as worked up over it as I was.

"You knew?" I screeched, my mind swimming.

"Not any sooner than you did," Cecil replied, somewhat dejected. "Although I had my suspicions."

"What's he saying?" Rex hissed at a voice level that was much louder than a whisper. I waved him away, my eyes pleading, and I stepped away from the group.

It wasn't to keep any secrets. I had nothing to hide, and the new Guardian team had every right to know as I did.

But I also knew I had Cecil's favor in a way likely none of them did. I'd been there from the start, the last remaining Guardian (other than Black Samson). If he was going to tell anybody, it was me, and me alone.

This time, I was more hushed.

"What're you doing about it?" I asked, hunched over my wrist.

"I sent the reanimen at him," Cecil stated.

"You did what?" I asked, my eyes wide. There shouldn't be any more of those to even be fighting Omni-Man.

Jesus.

"And they did nothing." I thought my eyes could've popped out of my head. What??

"Oh, my God." The words came out in a rushed breath. And then, "Where's Mark?"

Cecil paused, likely annoyed. "We've got eyes on him. We need him."

"Where?" The question was immediate.

"Affinity..."

"I said where," I said, much more forceful this time.

"Affinity, there's a reason I haven't called you yet," Cecil stated. "We can't risk you going out there. If Invincible fails, we have nothing else. It's you and the baby Guardians."

"I can do it," I insisted, even though I really didn't know that. "Mark and I together are strong enough."

I thought about mentioning Minta, mentioning that there was an exact copy of me back at my house, able bodied. But I still didn't trust her, not enough for this. Not enough to risk Mark.

"No. I can't risk that. You're not strong enough yet, and you can't fly. We can't risk it," Cecil insisted. "We need you to be stronger."

The weight of his words dawned on me and I felt my whole world rock.

"You're waiting for Invincible to die before you send me out there," I whispered.

"Exactly," Cecil confirmed, like he wasn't talking about two people's real lives. "If you're like your mother, the emotional turmoil it would put you through would skyrocket your powers. I've seen it before and I'd see it again. That is our last hope."

I understood, on some level, where he was coming from. It made sense, I guess, to use my power to its full extent, but I hadn't even began to fully understand it. Ever since Minta, I'd been having all these strange glitches and weird fire ups.

I didn't trust myself enough to know the opposite wouldn't happen - that for some reason, my power might just disappear. Or worse, I couldn't control it.

And one thing Cecil seemed to forget - if all of the other Guardians couldn't do it, there wasn't a chance in hell I could do it alone. No matter what the circumstances.

"You can't do that. Don't you hear yourself?" I shot back, hot anger coursing through my blood. "You're sacrificing him, and you're sacrificing me, when you could risk sacrificing us both together. You don't care about us. You're insane."

"I care about the fate of the world," Cecil countered. "Two supers for the price of every human on Earth is nothing. Mark might come out unscathed. It's just a precaution."

"You don't know that!"

"(Y/N), trust me."

"Fuck you, Cecil," I replied. "I don't."

And with that, I slammed the disconnect button and walked, with my shoulders as proud as possible, back to the Guardians.

"Are we sure he killed the Guardians?" Black Samson's voice was hushed. "Why would he still be doing all of this if he wasn't with us?"

"I don't know, it kind of makes sense," Monster Girl said, somewhat sadly. "Who else could?"

On screen, Omni-Man was engaged in battle with a large green monster. Tentacles sprouted from its face, and with each step it took, the world shook. It growled at him, roaring.

"Should we help him?" Dupli-Kate asked. The large monster stomped on Omni-Man, knocking him out - something which I'd never seen happen before, admittedly.

"What did he say?" Rex asked, seemingly the only person who believed me with full faith.

"He said-" I began.

"I'm going to tell you all the same thing I just told Affinity." Cecil's image flashed on screen, his face dead set and determined. "Stay there and wait. If things go south, you're my last defense against Omni-Man."

As soon as he appeared, his photo blinked away.

"He said that," I finished.

"Damn," Black Samson said with a soft exhale.

Damn, indeed.

Just when I thought it couldn't get any worse, the last person I wanted to see appeared on the screen, closing in on the monster.

"Invincible..." the word slipped through my lips as my jaw dropped. I placed a shaking hand over my mouth. "Mark..."

Invincible came in swinging, straight for the head of the monster. To protect his father, no doubt, the way any good son would. To protect his father, who I had to doubt was going to protect him.

I sighed, grabbing my head. "You guys, I'm going."

"Going where?" Monster Girl exclaimed.

"Yeah, no offense, Affinity, but you saw what happened to the last 'last defense against Omni-Man'," Rex added.

'Well, then, I complete the collection'. The thought crossed my mind as funny in the moment, in some sort of backwards way, but there was nothing funny about that. The only thing that was 'funny' was whatever was happening with Robot, and even that was stressing me out.

"Holy shit, is that Immortal?"

My eyes shot back to the screen, wide. 'There's no fucking way' I thought, and then just to prove me wrong, there absolutely was a way. There he was, flesh and blood, flying in the air and trading punches with Omni-Man.

I guess his name really fit.

I was frozen in place, watching the fight. It was like something took over me, disabling my body.

Until I watched Omni-Man split the Immortal in two.

I gasped, all of his intestines dropping out of the sky. Omni-Man threw the two halves of his body in separate directions, allowing them free fall.

"I'm going," I said immediately, tapping my teleporter. "I need to do something."

I didn't let anybody try to convince me out of it.

I couldn't save the Guardians once. I couldn't save the Immortal twice.

I wouldn't let Mark be next.

And, for your information, let me be clear...

Did I think attacking Mark's dad was going to make things weird in the relationship? Probably. Did I think I was going to kill Omni-Man? No, and I didn't really want to. Did I think I could stop him for long enough to reason with Mark?

Maybe. And a maybe was all I need.

Cecil was going to be real mad at me, but at that moment, he was the last of my worries. As best as I could, I spotted myself to the exact coordinates of Omni-Man.

I had a plan, a horrible, horrible plan, but it was a plan.

I readied for a punch, starting the swing through before the teleporter. I felt that oddly sickening feeling of floating through space and time again, trying to catch the exact moment the room changed into open air. All at once, I was seeing red and white.

"What the-"

Omni-Man's voice was muffled in the air, cut off with a groan as my fist connected with his... something. I didn't really know, because I was immediately falling.

"Invincible!" I yelled, searching frantically for him. Probably confusing him to Hell and back.

"What the hell are you doing?" I could hear Cecil's voice faintly, falling away from me.

And then I was falling faster, the wind knocked out of me. Omni-Man chased just after me, murder in his eyes. My stomach dropped out of my chest and I thought I might hurl.

Just barely, I swore I could see a blue streak out of the corner of my eye. Invincible.

"Affinity?" Mark's worried voice was impossible to miss.

The ground was unforgiving when I hit it, and I felt my body bounce. I choked, all the breath knocked out of me. I could swear my organs shifted, and if it wasn't for my resilience, every bone in my body would've broken.

Probably a couple of them did.

But I felt that familiar feeling again, and when Omni-Man came back down to meet me again, picking me up by the collar, I was ready.

I swung again. This time, I could feel it land. Right into his solar plexus, knocking the breath out of him.

"Who do you think you are?" Omni-Man questioned, shooting us back up into the sky. Tears formed in my eyes. His voice wasn't as booming as usual, oddly enough. Only loud enough for me.

"You know who I am," I replied with a cough. "You should've killed me when you had the chance."

Omni-Man rolled his eyes, throwing me up in the air again, only to volley me back down to the ground.

This time, when I hit the ground, my vision swam and faltered. Whatever I was seeing, it wasn't a memory of mine, and it sure wasn't right in front of me, either.

Eve, sitting in a gorgeous tree house. Looking out over open land.

She held a cup in her hand, filled with something, and she looked happy. Content. And still, there was something in her eyes that looked missing.

Soon after, another vision took its place. Minta embracing me tightly, as if we really were sisters, her in her Vakilian form and I as a human. I swear I could almost feel this one, a warmth inside me.

I only came back into myself when Omni-Man reappeared, just managing to hit him again. This time I gave it all I had, aiming for the same spot again. I could swear a faint hue coated my hands.

This time, I broke skin.

I could hear Mark's voice somewhere in the background. I swear I could. But nothing sounded right.

"Invincible, you have to stop him!" I wasn't even sure if any of those words were in English leaving my lips.

"Stay out of this!" Omni-Man shouted, and at this point I wasn't even sure if it was to me or to his son.

This time, we shot through the air, somewhere far away. I took the seconds I had to throw one more punch, for whatever it was worth.

And again, back down to the ground.

Another vision, this time one of my mother, sobbing at the edge of a bed. Her head was in one of her hands, her whole body hunched over a photo I couldn't see.

It made my heart ache, same as my body.

I was surprised I was still alive.

The next punch was stronger than the last, but still not enough. My hands powered up that horrible green, but the seconds of contact hardly phased Omni-Man.

I had to wonder what Cecil thought of this - and part of me wondered why he never pulled me out of it.

I didn't have much time to wonder. The descent toward the ground removed everything from me, all except for the excruciating pain spreading throughout my entire body. I could feel my bones breaking, my organs shifting, my little brain bouncing around in my head.

Internal bleeding would be the least of my problems. The healing time for this, if there even was one, would be near infinite.

This time, hitting the ground, I saw a scene that couldn't be too far from now. Whether I was hallucinating or seeing some strange end of life sequence I didn't know, but this one took place right in this area. It was by far the most lucid of them all.

The same field, the same sky, the same people. Mark, and his father.

This one even had audio.

"I didn't even bother." It was Omni-Man's voice, clear as day. Mark looked at him through pained eyes, and I swore there were tears running down his face. "She wasn't a threat. She never has been. If anything, she's more of a pest. A grain of sand, from a race that coats a beach."

"If she wasn't a threat, then why did you kill her?" Pain and anger flashed through Mark's voice.

"She's not dead," Omni-Man dismissed.

"She looks pretty dead to me!"

"She plays support, Mark," Omni-Man explained, as if that helped anything. "Nobody plays support. I'd expect you of all people to know why. Because they're useless - and they're weak."

The next time I threw a punch, I knew it hurt. I felt ribs crack - at least one - and Omni-Man's face turned into an expression I'd never seen before.

I didn't have time to process it however, as this time, Omni-Man picked me up and instead of dropping me, held on as he descended. Picking up speed, gaining, moving at least twice as fast toward the ground as before.

God, there was still so much I never got to do... I was going to die a virgin.

This time, when I hit the ground, I was not getting up. This time, the impact would be swift and heartless. This time, when my body hit the ground, it disappeared from underneath me. The sky faded away before my very eyes, into something beautiful. Something I'd never seen before.

All at once, I saw



season 2 coming soon...