Chapter: 52
I was thankful when Karen handed me some earplugs. Holy crap, this crowd was absolutely deafening. It took me a moment to realize that Matt had not followed us out of the trailer. All this loud noise was probably agonizing for him.
"It's this way to the stage, Layla," Karen said. I followed behind her with some nervousness stirring in me. There were a lot of people out there. I hope I don't screw up and say something embarrassing…
[You won't; your acting skill will prevent it. You know what they say, fake it till you make it!]
"You're right, System." I was able to bullshit Voldemort himself not even an hour into this world. What's a few million people compared to that – right?
I stepped out from behind the curtain and walked onto the stage. The roar the crowd let out upon seeing me was insane. I actually felt the air around me vibrating from the sound. Looking forward, all I could see was a never-ending sea of people in every direction. "Holy shit…" I stepped forward and grabbed the sole microphone that was left on the stage for me. As soon as I did, an impossible silence broke over the entire area. I wouldn't have ever thought it was possible for that many people to go absolutely silent at once, but it happened.
"Allow me to introduce myself properly to the world this time. I am Layla of the Fallen. Nice to meet you all," I said into the microphone. The crowd once again erupted into cheers that didn't die down for a good 30 seconds.
"We love you, Layla!"
"It's an actual Angel!"
"Marry me, Layla!"
Hundreds of thousands of people cheering all at once made it hard to make out much even with my enhanced senses. "Thank you all so much for welcoming me!" I spoke again. "I had originally planned this conference to inform everyone about my recent acquisition of Oscorp, but I have been informed that that's boring news. So instead, how about I turn to the panel of journalists below me and answer any questions they throw at me as truthfully as I can." I said once again to cheers from the crowd. It seemed that Matt was correct; no one wanted to hear about business when they could ask me other things. "You there," I pointed to a woman with a CNN badge pinned to her chest. "You go first. What's your question?"
The woman stood up and took one of the microphones that had been passed out to all the major journalists so the crowd could hear their questions. "Hello, everyone, I'm Barbara Walters with CNN. So, Layla of the Fallen… Is Heaven real?" She started off with one of the biggest questions.
"Hoh, boy…"
…
[Acting has leveled up to 3!]
"I think that went pretty well," I said to myself aloud as I plopped myself down on my living room sofa. I had chosen to fly back to my place considering all the city streets were packed with people still. I stood on that stage for around an hour answering question after question as best as I could. Of course, there were some questions I had to bow out of because I just plain didn't know or they were questions that probably would have caused people to riot.
[If you had mentioned the Great Sundering, there is a 99% chance you might have started World War 3 right then and there.]
'Well good thing I didn't then.' I listened to Coulson and steered completely clear of that topic. I still had no idea how we were going to spin the Earth doubling in size and population in the future to the public without causing mass panic. That was a problem for future Layla though… The Layla of today was just happy she answered all the questions given to her in a way that didn't start city wide riots.
I told the CNN reporter about Heaven and that it indeed was real. Or at least, it would be soon once the world returned to its rightful size. I wasn't exactly sure what was actually going on with the souls of people who passed away on this side of Earth. Did they just directly go to Lady Death to be placed into the cycle of reincarnation? Was Odin taking the souls into Valhalla? I honestly had no idea. I decided it was better to fib a bit and just say that Heaven was real to everyone here as well. After all, it would be in a few years anyway.
I imagine there's going to be a wave of baptisms sweeping the world pretty soon. When the two Earths merge again, the believers of this world will actually grant a pretty large power boost towards the Heavenly faction. Michael, Gabriel, and all the other archangels will owe me for that one. It's a little-known fact that the more believers and the stronger people's faith, the more power the Angels can draw from the Heavenly system. As a Fallen, I'm technically cut off from that power. Other Fallen might be upset by this, but I see it as a good thing. Azazel would probably agree with me. A stronger Heaven meant that the Devils would be kept better in check. With double the amount of followers, Michael should easily be able to overpower Sirzechs Lucifer. I'd like to see the Devils act so arrogant when they're no longer on top of our pantheon anymore.
"Well, that wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. Not bad, Layla."
"Eep!" I startled at the voice that came out from the corner of my room. I turned and saw Nick Fury of all people making himself comfortable sitting in a lounge chair by the corner. I have a pretty good memory, and I don't actually remember that chair being in that corner. In fact, it was on the other side of the room sitting next to its matching pair. He really went out of his way to drag that chair into the corner just so he could make a dramatic entrance…
"How long have you been there?" I asked him. "And how did you get in here?"
Fury scoffed. "Oh, please, I trained some of the greatest spies in the world. The criminal Fisk might have installed some pretty good security systems, but SHIELD cracked the codes to all of those the day they were released. There's nowhere our agents can't go. As for how long I've been here, it's been about 2 hours now," Fury shamelessly admitted. He'd just been sitting in my penthouse for 2 hours straight waiting to startle me… I had to admit that there was some patient dedication. I wondered what he wanted though. There had been pretty much radio silence between SHIELD and I since the AIM fiasco.
XXX
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