I was starting to think that I would need to terraform Mars for the mutants at the rate at which things were going. I felt its presence the first day here but it hid so well that we only found it in one of our overflights around the Pacific. Yelena and Irina shared my delight once we felt it below us. With it, the final piece of the puzzle was found! Krakoa.
We could subjugate the island on our own, one of my ultimate class maids could do it, but then the island would recognize us and not the future ruling party. I guess I will have to do what I didn't want. Talk with Xavier and Erik, or Max, whatever his name is now.
But first I will need to deal with Wanda, hopefully she can protect Magneto from a really possible beating by helping me build bridges with him, otherwise I will have to metal bend his ass. A long shot, honestly, but given that I have to fix Wanda's issue at some point, it's not a bother to do it in this order. Luckily Yao has already given me Agatha Harkness' location.
"Alright girls! We will start moving now, but first we need to visit a sorceress and a chaotic girl"- I wonder if I will not have to fight Chthon off her, but I don't count on it.
"As you wish Young Master"- Said my blue rabbit.
"Is this about the Wanda girl Spark told me about?"- Yelena and Spark usually gossip, apparently.
"Yes, I need to form a contract with her to prevent the crossing over of an elder god through the dimensional wall. A brother of Gaea."- Though unlike our lovely lady he is a piece of shit.
After that we flew over to New Orleans, we could portal but flying is nice, where we found the witch's swamp. The place was cover by countless barriers, all in an effort to mask the chaos magic that radiated from within. Alas, we could feel on our skin as we got close enough. We stood by the edge of the outermost barrier and announced our presence with the spell Yao gave me. We didn't wait long for an opening to appear on the barrier.
We levitated through it and came down to the outside of a residence that screamed 'Here you can find a Witch'. I knocked on the door and waited for her. The door creaked open and we heard her inviting us inside.
"Come in."- She said in a whisper, clearly powered by magic. Inside her home we could feel the chaos permeate through our skin. We followed the magic and we found her sitting at a coffee table with a girl trapped in a red mirror on the opposite side of the table. She was different than I expected, she wasn't the old woman I thought she'd be, the one that took care of Franklin Richards and worked as his nanny. She has this vibe of a young woman almost growing into a 'young mother'...
On the other side of the mirror I found a red-eyed girl with half of her forehead transformed into an almost horizontal grey horn, while the other half kept her human shape, although I could see the pain in her eyes.- Now I feel like a dick for not coming sooner.
"You're a new face!... Since you carry the Ancient One's seal I let you in but, What do you want?"- She said while keeping some distrust and carefully eyeing my horns.
"Hello Ms. Harkness, Ms. Maximoff. Nice to meet you both. My name is Aragorn, the blue rabbit is Irina and the white fox Yelena. I came to get rid of Chthon."- Not really get rid of it, as in terminate him, more like exorcise him.
"... You can do that? How do you plan to do it?"- Someone as old as her won't trust me with her daughter's safety just because of my brilliance.
"Yes! Yao and I created a soul and body contract that has the side effect of helping Ms. Maximoff, it will flood her with an energy that will act as a stopper or buffer. The energy will help her remove the elder god's influence, and since the energy is quite neutral it won't influence her personality."- So far none of my girls have develop any symptoms or shown any evidence of mental or physical tempering.
"Who's Yao?"- She said after thinking for a while.
"Sorry about that Ms. Harkness, Yao is the Ancient One."- I forget that everybody knows her as the Ancient One. Though after her evolution she now looks more like the Fluffy One, I should suggest an upgrade in her title.
"Won't Chthon use the contract to get ownership of a lordless dimension through Wanda?"- What?... Ah! She thinks that the energy won't influence her since the dimension where it comes from doesn't have a lord.
"That's a misconception Ms. Harkness, the energy is not coming from a lordless dimension, or any dimension for that matter. It's coming from me."- She looked at me with surprise that soon enough turned into disbelief.
"... Why would you create a contract like that and Why would you think that you alone are enough to push back Chthon? You do know that he is an elder god, with a whole realm backing him up, right?"- The distrust and disbelief could be tasted in the air.
"Yes I'm aware. The contract was initially created for a friend of mine, but it also works as a way of putting my excess of energy to good use. In regards to pushing back Chthon... I can bring you with me to the astral plane and show you my true form."- Better not tell her that it was created to fulfill Kitty's ambitions and my desires.
Astral forms are like psionic representations, you are depicted in your true form, in order for her to be astounded by my light I need to show her my true form, and since normally you don't allow a stranger in your head during the first meeting, it makes sense to take her to the astral plane.
"... What do you think girl?"- The witch asked the little time bomb on the other side of the mirror.
"... *Sigh* I think that this is the only option that we have left. We know that I won't be able to hold him back for much longer."- I really feel like a dick for waiting more than necessary. But like any self respecting adult, I will responsibly place the blame on Hydra and Emma, with their power addiction they have kept me busy, of course Emma gets a free pass since... Tails; but I will throw this ball of chaos, and soon void, to Hydra.
"Very well Aragorn, lets meet in the astral plane."- Saying so she closed her eyes before I saw her astral form fly in a flash to the golden sandy mirror in the sky, The Astral Realm. I spliced my consciousness in two and dedicated one of them to my astral form.
"Are you not going?"- Asked Wanda after seeing that I was not falling asleep.
"I'm there already. I can divide my mind and soul and tether half of it to my astral form."- It's more complicated than that, but basically I create a duplicate of my mind and soul and that duplicate looses consciousness instead of my body. That way I can talk with this girl while the witch marvels in my light up on the Astral Realm.
"That's not possible! You can't split your soul and sense of self. Either you die or create a separate life-form."- Normally that's the case, similar to Onslaught, the psionic child of Xavier and Magneto is a close example, not the same but close enough.
"I'm special! So it's not a problem for me."- I can feel the deride silently coming from my maids behind me.
"I split because I wanted to tell you about the details of the contract while my other half talks with Ms. Harkness."- I told her.
Astral Plane, Aragorn 2.0 (As Flamboyant as 1.0)
Less than a second after the witch went to the golden realm I, the superior half, followed her. After diving in to the golden mirror I follow the scent of the witch. When I found her I was about to present my bright self when I saw her flying away... away from me.
"What is wrong with you!? Please Stop! Don't run!"- I shouted while following her with leisure.
"Why are you running?"- She didn't answer but actually picked up her pace.
"Witch! Talk to me! Why are you running?"- Well she is running to Senior Sister's location so I will just follow her. It's not my fault that she is not listening, now she is going to have the fright of her life when she meets Senior Sister.
During our high speed persecution she looked back a few times before speeding up further. Sometimes she would send weak psionic blasts to my eyes. After a few minutes I started to get into it, something clicked in me with the situation, I felt like a final boss, like a Dragonlord, following the little mongrel, like a demon king shaming the weak hero.
"HUAHAHAHAH HUUUAHAHAHAHAH RUN LITTLE MONGREL!"- I think that this was the feeling that the predators get when they play with their food. The sense of superiority.
"GET AWAAAAYYYYY!"- Shouted the little mice while escaping my claws.- This is fun! I should try it back home.
Sadly things came to an abrupt end when the little mice crashed into Senior Sister's abode. Agatha was shocked in fear when she saw the massive scalding phoenix, but in her desperation she gathered all her resolve and shouted:
"Oh Mighty Phoenix! I implore you! Please listen to my heartfelt plea! I can't die here without saving my daughter first! Please help me escape this beast's claws so that I can protect my world from the destruction brought upon by Chthon!"- Senior Sister kept her silence and raise her sight from the witch before locking on my white eyes staring, unblinking, at her. With her infinite wisdom at play it wasn't hard for her to connect the dots, she said:
"Aragorn please stop tormenting the human!"- She is so fucking bright! Maybe I should bend some light through my crystalline body... but if it's not natural it doesn't feel right! You should not force the shine, you should bask on it.
"*Sigh* Fine Senior Sister, but I will obviously take my displeasure on Jean!"- It's my best offer, take it or leave it.
"That's fine Aragorn. She loves playing with you!"- She said with sneering mirth in her psionic voice.- Yeah! That padawan will suffer!
"Who's this human by the way?"- She derisibly pointed with her flaming wing at the witch.
"She is Agatha Harkness, the guardian of the Scarlett Witch in this reality."- My multiversal Senior Sister will understand with just that.
"I see... and Why were you tormenting her?"- See? She got it.
"It's her fault!"- I declared.
"WHAT!?"- Shouted the witch.
"I told her that I would meet her here, in the astral plane, to show her my true form, but upon witnessing my shine she ran. She wouldn't even stop when I politely asked her to and since she was running in your direction I just followed her. But later she awoke something in me and I started to enjoy the thrill of the pursuit, the hunt. It was a given that I was going to get into character and fan the flames of her fright."- In conclusion it's all her fault.
"...WHAT!?"- Shouted once more the witch.
"I see... you're always finding ways of amusing yourself, aren't you Aragorn?"- Of course my sadist Senior Sister understands.- That's not me making shit up, I've seen how much joy she feels when I beat Jean up during our friendly spars. Looking at it from a brighter side, maybe she finds joy in her avatar getting stronger, who knows?
"Hehehe! Yeah, I will find a way of reproducing this with the maids!"- Maybe I should tell them that I will shapeshift the ones I catch into children, I can already picture the looks of despair.
"Ms. Harkness, is this enough proof?"- Let's get this over with, I can't wait to get home now that I found a wonderful hobby.
"... Yes!"- She said while gnashing her teeth in rage before disappearing and going back.
"Bye Senior Sister! I will bring Jean with me the next time!"- She smiled(?) at that.- I felt her joy so I guess that expression on her flaming face means happiness from now on.
"Well then Aragorn, I will see you both then."
I went back to my body to merge back into one. Only to receive a blast of darkness to my face.
*BAAAAMMM*
"What's wrong Ms. Harkness?"- I looked at the seething witch in confusion.
"Don't "What's wrong Ms. Harkness" me! I just went through the most harrowing experience of my life! And it's your fault!"- The maids in the back had no idea what went on up there but they both nodded their heads in agreement with the witch.
"Don't sweat it Agatha! When I implied that I would show you my true form what did you expect? A Bicorn?"
"A devil! Or some spiritual being or maybe a god, but not a fucking crystal dragon that talks with the Phoenix Force as equals!"
"I'm in charge of her Avatar in this reality so we are friends."- I said while my maids were 'umu'-ing in the background. Naturally they watch anime with me because they have "no other choice", but that's part of my plan to slowly corrupt them into my and Kitty's side, The Fun Side!
After a while we were able to talk things through, Agatha seemed surprise enough after understanding about my existence, I could as well feel her happiness knowing that Wanda will be saved, mixed with a little annoyance and fear. It's safe to say that she was planning her revenge but cancelled her plans once she knew how outmatched she was against me.
The time for forming the contract arrived, with my girls the contract was built into the core, but with Wanda I have to form the contract outside and have her absorb it; so it stands to reason that we never saw the contract outside of a magic core or the hyper-psionic room where we designed it, seeing the grand hexacosichoron out in the flesh had a different impression.
The contract was so massive that we couldn't use magic circles, at the end we discovered that the shape that best fulfilled our demands was this one, it was made of crystal clear beams and milky joints, formed out of my void energy and my psionic energy.
With the contract floating on my hand I entered inside the mirror where Wanda was sealed. I looked into her frighten but resolved eyes and smiled to reassure her.
"Wanda, you just need to project the intent of accepting the contract and it will automatically fuse with your core. That's all, there won't be any risks for you. I take care of the rest!"- Afterwards I will have to fight off Chthon's influence, which is the hard part. But I already have my focus verses, or incantations if you may. Spark and I figured out that with these verses I should be able to concentrate my intent and remove the god's power over Wanda.
"... I accept!"- Said Wanda with pain, desperation, hope and relief.- The contract floated to her chest and fused with her body first, then it fused and synchronized with her soul. That's when I felt her as a new link available in my soul. Along with it I felt the push back and resistance from a powerful being, it was like trying force yourself straight under the weight of a massive waterfall, I had to fight back now or never. So I began with my incantation!
-"I'll be your protection against the wickedness and snares of the demon;
May the Shine rebuke him,
I Brightly declare;
And do thou,
O exalted Light,
by the power of the Shine,
thrust into your scalding Brightness Chthon and all evil spirits who wander through the multiverse for the ruin of little Wandas.
Shine Bright!"- I made intonation with my intent in the important parts and used my will, energy and mind in it.
As anyone could tell by the massive lightshow coming from Wanda's body, it was working. The demon fought back but it was futile! I had all the advantages, Wanda's will over her soul was on my side, I had a direct connection to her soul, my energy reserves were virtually inexhaustible, my void energy had the innate quality of nullifying energies and this was my home turf.
After the lightshow ended Wanda's physical appearance reversed to her teenager human beauty, her eyes were left crimson, but that's a side effect of the overexposure to the chaos magic.
"How are you girl?"- Asked Agatha after Wanda came back to be.
"Hahahaha! I'm fine!"- She chuckled softly at the beginning, not long before bursting into full laughter and tearing up. I could feel how her happiness was spilling over. The witch and the witch girl hugged and both teared and laughed. After a few minutes both finally calmed down.
"I'm glad that everything worked out. I will need both of you to move in with me though."- I declared.
"Why? We can protect ourselves."- The more experienced witch understood my concern.
"No. No you can't. This place is too dangerous, more than you know, and I won't allow Wanda to become, once again, another time bomb for me to deal with, or you become her liability. You will move in with me, you will get a shot of SSS and you will get trained like the rest of the girls. This is non-negotiable."- I looked at the witch into her eyes and held her sight, I needed to make her understand that if someone like me says that it's dangerous... It damn right is.
"... Fine. We will move in, but only until we are strong enough."- I understand that, someone as old as her must be used to living at her our rhythm and under her terms.
"If I may Ms. Harkness, if you want we could move your whole house to Halo. Also Spark said that there's a small clearing on a valley that we could assign for you, if you don't want to move to the Crystal that is."- Irina commented. I felt the 'agreement' from the witches once Irina said so. - I'm glad to have someone with better planning skills with me.
That's what we did, Agatha dispersed the barriers for Irina and Yelena and they warped the whole house to the valley that Spark selected. After the house we crossed the portal and on the other side Emma, Yao and Gaea were waiting for us. I walked in a skip to her and said:
"Hello my favorite goddess! What're you doing here?"- I asked while bringing my future child's mother into a hug and planting a kiss in her head. -Emma is obviously here because she is the Queen, Empress once the kingdom upscales to empire, Yao because she was our point of contact, but what about Gaea?
"Hehehe! Hi doofus dragon!"- She giggled in my arms before I let her go.
"I'm here because that child is my brother's avatar so I was interested in meeting her."- She pointed at the awestruck Wanda. Agatha was as well not doing good.- Sometimes I forget that Gaea, among mortals, is the Keanu Reeves of gods.
You can always find a point in time where one of the other 'great' divinities fucked up humanity in one way or the other, but Gaea has always had the welfare of Earth and humans in mind.
"Well here she is, Wanda Maximoff, also that is Agatha Harkness, she is her guardian and basically mother."- I pointed at the pair as I came closer with Gaea.
"Hello child. I'm sorry about the pain that my brother brought to your life."
"Yo-you don't have to apologize my goddess. I'm alright now and it wasn't your fault."- I left the trio to talk things over and moved to Emma's tails.- I already conquered Yao's but she usually has a spell on that makes them coarse, luckily I was able to stop her from teaching that aberration to the other girls, as long as I limit myself to only one fluff a month.
"Are you happy about the new witches added to your kingdom Emma?"- I asked while petting her tails.
"Normally it's hard to take you seriously, but now that you always talk to me from my back while buried on my tails it's impossible Aragorn."-... No excuses here, even I can tell how challenging that must be.
"But yes! Although the Ancient One will factually join us once she finds a replacement for her position, having these two official join, specially Ms. Harkness, brings a smile to my face. *Yelp*- Stop that! *Slap*"- Emma said while slapping the hand playing with her ears.- Hehehe! "Accidentally" some of the more animalistic behaviors were carried over during the evolution.
So I have purring catgirls and bunnygirls, yelping or whinning foxgirls, tail wagging wolfgirls. A purring Natalia was dangerous in a different way from the rest though. Sadly only the babies, kiddies and Kitty own it. The rest act like Emma so I rarely get to play with their ears.
After a few minutes the trio joined us.
"*GASP* Is that you? Ancient One?"- Gasped Agatha after she laid eyes upon Yao.- Well she had the most shocking transformation.
"Hello Madame Harkness. The path of life somehow brought me to a place that I couldn't foresee, not even with the eye."- Yao said with her mystic aura flaring out... But failed to mystify and instead it 'fluffyfied'.
"I don't know what you got, but I want in."- Agatha said with envy.
"Currently the procedure is only available for our citizens, you can talk about it with Emma, she is my Queen. I will leave you girls be since I need to have a possibly unpleasant conversation with Xavier. By the way Wanda, I will need your help pacifying your father, hopefully I won't have to beat him up, but we can talk about that later, after you had a much needed nap."- I gave Gaea a peck in the cheek and brought my maids to Salem, the X-Mansion.
Not long after I met Kitty at the door.
"Hello Kitty Vader! What's up?"- Kitty opened the door and beamed a bright smile after hearing my greeting. She gave me a tight hug and said:
"I'm almost there Aragorn! I can already reach supersonic flight and my current weight limit is about 5 tons. I'm still a ways away from holding back one of your raptors. But my elemental magic can already match alpha mutant abilities. *Purrr*"- Of course I petted the ears of the 4 tailed-cat.
"I'm glad Kitty! I will take you with me in one of the next expeditions to the Kuiper belt, if you do good we can do the oort cloud as well."- Based on my recommendation Emma has begun exploring around the Solar System, on their first travel they found a few vibranium rich asteroids.
"*Purrr* Really?! That's great!"- I love this cat.- I signaled my maids with my eyes to let them know what sort of behavior I expect from them, but all I got was a synchronized double eye-roll.
"Kitty-cat, Can you see if Xavier can receive me for a chat?"
The purring cat brought us to a waiting room before she left to find about my query, given that baldy now stays away from her head. Not long after, Ororo came back. The official Aragorn dealer of the X-Men, since she is the only teacher that greets me every time I visit here.
"Hey Aragorn! The professor is currently attending a guest, Do you mind waiting?"
"Is it about the director of SHIELD?"- I can recognize that aura of suspicion miles away.
"... Yes"- She was peeved by my question.
"Fury will probably like to participate in my conversation, as well as some of you teachers. It's a mutant related conversation."- She was surprised by my statement and closed her eyes, possibly contacting baldy. After a few seconds she said:
"Come, we will meet the rest on the professor's office."- We followed Ororo to the meeting room.
"Has Gaea helped you with your powers, Ororo? You feel more in synch than before and I can also feel Gaea in you more vibrantly than before."- Before I only knew about their connection because I knew where to look at, but now even a blind sorcerer could tell that there was something off about her.
"Yes my goddess has been helping with my powers. She said that soon I will qualify for your 'scuffles', if the annihilation wars, that my goddess described, you wage every Thursday can be call that."- I wouldn't say every Thursday since I've had times that they join Jean during our training only to try to beat me at the end.
"You will be a great addition to our lines Ms. Munroe, I will let the girls know about your future addition."- Yelena excitedly commented. At which Ororo could only smile.- She probably doesn't know what she just signed up for.
"You heard here Ororo, just let Xavier know before you join, since you will probably have to join their military exercises every Saturday."- After our planning of Ororo's future we reached the office were all the other 'adult' X-Men were waiting for us. Because no one will convince me that only because Scott is 18, he can be considered an adult.
"Hello Aragorn, I didn't know you'd be here."
"Hi Nick! We found the last piece of the puzzle today! We are ready for the next step but I was needing the help of the people on this room so here I am."- I shook hands with the master spy and my smile was reflected on his.
"About damn time!"- This is one of the few times that I've seen him smile, the other was when he opened his first portal.
"Hello Mr. Abner, I see that you and Director Fury know each other, no introductions will be needed. Take a seat, please tell me what is this about that has both gentlemen so excited. Specially since apparently it involves our kind."- As eloquent as a snake, like always. I sat on my place and said:
"Spark, show them Krakoa."
Spark projected a perfect 3D scale representation of the Island. Which draw attention along a few gasps from the crowd. I took my chance in the remanent silence to continue my presentation.
"Krakoa, a sentient living island, posses a psionic hive-mind with the vegetation and life-forms it creates, can absorb mutant energy allowing it to nullify powers, can use psionic energy for various purposes and can survive in space. We plan on creating a mutant country here. Which is why I need you help."
With that I started one of the most annoying conversations of my life. With the Arrogant Baldilocks who couldn't see his mistakes and hubris.