The food was perfect, cooked just how his grandmother had, honestly Xander was beginning to think he'd been right when he'd told Maisie he might be dead. How else could he explain the coincidences? His panic button being in the lab where he appeared, the other pieces of his tech the gnomes found, either, he was being messed with or... Xander was drawn back to the room by Maisie striking up a conversation with Eda.
"There is something we wanted to ask you."
Dabbing at her lip with a napkin Eda looked up and smiled at her.
"Of course dear, you know I'm always happy to help."
Reaching in to a pocket Maisie pulled out a round metal token with a crest of a drill and gear, before she could say anything, Eda chuckled.
"Little Bolt made another mistake, I see."
Maisie nodded at Xander, a satisfied grin plastered on her face.
"Despite knowing the rules, Uncle knew better as always."
Xander was taken aback by the sarcasm in Maisie's words wondering what had caused it, sure Bevelgear was pompous, but not enough to cause this. Maisie continued.
"The slag for brains was certain no one would find out he was trying to examine the property of our otherworldly guest. So, Xander here gets an all expenses paid stay, which brings me to my point."
Gesturing at Cam and her cohorts, Maisie flipped the token.
"Xan's decided to open a school of sorts and needs someone to feed the students, I thought uncle's money would be best spent here."
Eda cackled.
"I'd be happy to help, but I can't fit a school cafeteria in here, and you know I can't deliver."
Having assumed the young gnomes wouldn't be listening, Xander was slightly suprised when Crank jumped up from his chair and saluted at Eda.
"Mrs. Eda, I would be willing to carry food to and from."
"Really? Well, I can't have you work for free, what would you like, dear?"
"Cooking skills..., Ma'am."
A warm smile spread across Eda's face.
"That I can do."
Seemingly out of nowhere, a ginger cat landed in front of her, shaking as she reached down Eda took a signet ring from the cat's mouth.
"Thank you Sparks."
Holding her hand out to Crank she waited as he carefully took the ring placing it on his finger, there was a brief flash of rainbow light from the ring as multicoloured runes flared then settled to a gentle glow. Before Eda could explain, Maisie practically leapt for the ring, grabbing Crank's wrist she started examining the runes. For the small ring the number of runes was absurd, Xander couldn't help but lean in, sure he couldn't make sense of them, yet, but he may glean something, Eda sighed.
"My husband forged that ring, it's what he referred to as a nine-fold item."
Xander glanced at Maisie, but judging by the way she hung on Eda's words, she was as clueless as him.
"Making it took us from the beautiful elven valleys, all the way to the sparse Coyotian frontier. I can't recall all it can do, but..."
Handing Crank a cookie out of thin air, she tapped her finger. Crank confused, tapped the cookie on the ring, it vanished with a blue flash.
"It should help with the deliveries."
Crank stared at the ring, tears welling from his eyes, he brought his head up and holding Eda's gaze, he gave the best salute he could, though the effect was ruined as the tears rolled down his beaming face.
"Ma'am, I promise as long as I remain here, I'll protect you."
There was a chime and a yellow flash from the ring, Eda winced.
"Well my brave knight, you'll have to keep that oath."
Not noticing the severity of her tone Crank nodded happily.
"Thank you Eda, you're fine starting tomorrow, right?"
Maisie gave a cheeky grin, while Eda sighed.
"Well, I can't disappoint the kids can I? But you'll need to be off, I have to close to prepare."
Maisie nodded before turning to Xander and the others.
"Right, Cam, you three need to get your friends ready for tomorrow, can you do it?"
With a nod, Cam pointed at the door, started walking and in a joking tone yelled.
"All troops, move out."
The three gnomes ran off, leaving Xander and Maisie to decide on what to do next, Xander chuckled to himself as he thought about what he was going to ask, while Maisie smiled after the kids.
"They're adorable, aren't they?"
Xander Looked at her in slight surprise, she blushed.
"What? Oh yes they are. But we should get a move on, so my brilliant assistant, before we get back to the lab, Would you mind taking me clothes shopping?"
Maisie raised an eyebrow and gave him a look over.
"Sure, as long as you don't mind function over form."
Xander gasped in mook horror.
"How rude, I'll have you know my armour has both."
The two of them laughing, they left the restaurant in the direction of the market square.
They spent the trip talking about Xander's world, Maisie had endless questions and after such a nostalgic meal Xander was happy to answer, yes there were only humans there, well aside from one alien, no they didn't have floating cities, apparently in this world humans did though, technically there were abilities considered magic, but he'd explain that mess when there was more time. As they left the market, Xander carrying a package containing new cotton trousers and shirt, Maisie asked a question Xander had been dreading.
"So what were you stealing?"
"I don't know what you are referring to."
"Yes you do Xan, the flyer thing you showed me in the tavern."
Xander Sighed and seemed to deflate, in a quiet voice he started.
"I wasn't trying to steal anything I was trying to save my mum."
Five years earlier
Things had been going well for Xander, a self proclaimed anti-hero, priding himself on being a modern Robin hood, three major corporations forced out of Touchstone City in five months, it had been a satisfying challenge getting them to stoop to his level, before stealing their best stuff and giving it to small competitors, destroying both their reputation and unique selling points, besides that, Ultimax was ignoring him leaving Freeflow to "stop his silly tricks." But Xander had a deal with Freeflow, "no collateral? no casualties? no crime." Xander couldn't understand speedsters; both Freeflow and his descendant, Timeline. They had amazing powers yet they only ever reacted to events, at least Xander would have thought only a minute ago, that was before Timeline appeared in his lab, handed him two vials, apologised for Xander's bad day and left.
Placing the vials in a scanner, he opened his laptop and ruminated on his hatred of both time travel and superheroes in general, no-one should know the future, but if they do they should damn well fix it ahead of time, his screen finally came on, showing only an image and a line of text, the Image seemed to be The Vault, the supposedly secure storage facility underneath the headquarters of The Exemplars; Ultimax's "team", The Cornerstone, which would be ridiculous, but with the caption reading "The Mother of all Examples, Count" Xander decided it was best to confirm, grabbing his tablet from his Sleeping area, he used a back-door in the Exemplars camera systems, noting that they really should have fixed that by now, quickly searched the network to find The Vault's cameras.
Three hours later, and Xander was standing outside The Cornerstone, in his combat armour and full-face mask, hammering on the doors. A secretary opened door, and gave him a pitying look.
"What?"
"Take this to Ultimax, immediately."
Holding out a printed copy of the image, he glared at her till she sighed, grabbed the sheet and left him there. Fifty minutes later, and Xander was running out of patience, if he'd thought it would take this long he'd have gone for drilling the whole way into The Vault, but now Ultimax was here, for once taking him seriously at least. Without a word Ultimax gestured for him to follow and led Xander quickly through the massive office block styled building and down into the basement levels of The Cornerstone, finally they entered a large security office, down one corridor he could see The Vault, Xander broke in to a sprint, but before he made it three steps, Ultimax had picked him up with one hand, and started walking in a different direction.
"Really Xendrix, I am disappointed I know you have a problem with me, but trying to steal from The Exemplars, that's low. So, I think you should calm down."
Xander crashed into the wall of a holding cell, this was why he wore the armour, Ultimax enjoyed throwing anything he could after all. Clambering to his feet, he was about to make a comment, but the hero had already left. Well then, Xander thought to himself, let's see how this goes. Pulling up his sleeve Xander twisted the face of his panic button, it clicked open, revealing six small vials surrounding a single button, three were empty, but the other three were filled with a light blue liquid that cracked with energy, a small arrow on the outer edge pointed at one of the full vials, it was lucky he could refine the vials he received from Timeline so quickly, but super serums had been one of his main projects for a few months; pity it would likely only last a second, but it should get him out the cell at least.
Setting a stopwatch Xander pressed the button, and time froze, Xander touched the door and it gave way where his fingers pushed against it, as the door crumpled apart, he pushed off from the floor, as he shot through the remains of the door he had time to examine the serum's effects, aside from the processing speed, that allowed his mind to keep up, he'd say the extra features from Freeflow and Timeline's powers were the most useful part of the serum, sure he didn't get time travel but, perfect momentum control and nearly perfect prediction were great, rotating in the air he hit the wall and kicked off, by the time the serum's effects faded, Xander was at The Vault door.
Swaying on his feet he reached a fumbling hand into a pouch and dropped his new machine to the ground, it unfolded till it was a large rectangular metal box standing on four spindly legs, on the side facing The Vault were three beams of energy emanating from a circular groove that allowed them to reposition as needed, in the middle of them was Xander's unique crest, on the opposite side was a keypad and a window that seemed to emit darkness, leaning against the keyboard Xander started typing, he'd never intended to use the singularity drill like this, as he set it to "mine" the door, he heard a boom from above, followed by the rush of wind down the halls, half a minute more and the drill would be finished, but then Ultimax barrelled into the room, took one look at the machine before diving at it, Xander screamed at him to stop, diving away from the machine simultaneously he twisted the panic button and pressed, Ultimax hit the machine, and everything stopped, well almost everything, Ultimax was heading straight for him as the machine cracked open behind him. Xander ran, passing two guards in mid run towards The Vault and winced, with the artifacts in there, the singularity would be neutralized, and Ultimax would see he was right, he wouldn't have risked it if he didn't plan for problems, but odds were something would explode and a few people might be hurt, to late to fix it now though. Xander ran as fast as he could, making it all the way out of The Cornerstone and into a maze of alleyways, before the serum began to fade and tripping he fell into a crumpled heap on the floor and, as the sound of an explosion reach him, he passed out.