The jogging session lasted two hours, and we both stopped several times, Rin to recalibrate his energy levels and me to meditate to refill my Angel Energy.
We hit the weights next. I found out my new maximum bench press was over 5000 pounds easily. Considering that was what I could accomplish with just my chest muscles alone, I tried not to be too disappointed. My deadlift was more than double that, and all of my lifts had shot up considerably.
With the seals, even calisthenics became intense. When I really ramped them up, each push-up really had me sweating buckets, and each crunch had me wincing, but it was all worth it. That training session lasted three whole hours. I didn't see any bump on my stat screen quite yet, but I was sure a few days of it, paired with the dedicated skill training and spars I had in mind every evening, would put me in another stratosphere of power in a few weeks.
Now that I was done with the morning training, I started with the first phase of our plan--finding somebody brilliant enough to prepare the ingredients for the Uber Serum. I arrived at a familiar name—Dr. Maya Hansen, creator of the Extremis formula and the indirect cause of the most uninteresting Iron Man movie to date.
Speaking of movie superheroes, Peter Parker was 18 and right around the time he got his spider powers. The Oscorp visit was right around the corner. I wondered if I could contribute to that.
Daredevil had also surprisingly made his debut. He was still in his mask and sweater phase, but I was confident he was on the right path. I was seriously considering supercharging him and setting him loose on the Hand. Jessica Jones was in her late teens, bright-eyed and full of life, and her friend, the child actor, Trish, orbited around her. She desperately wanted to be a hero. I was considering granting her wish and letting her loose on the Hand, but I wondered if it would be too unethical.
Luke Cage just got thrown into Prison, while Danny Rand was still MIA, but his future paramour Collen Wing just opened her Dojo where she unknowingly trained Hand soldiers.
I grinned. It's time I changed all that.
But first, I needed to complete my Uber formula. I had one Dr Hanson to track down.
It was surprisingly easy to locate her once you knew her future trajectory. She was in the San Francisco office of a start-up that would later become AIM. I followed her after she left her office and slipped into a local diner where she usually had her dinner sometime after her.
I was in my mask, of course, but strangely, my eyes remained purple; something about them shone through the disguise.
I settled down in the booth behind her, ordered some coffee and pie, and pretended to peek my head out and scrunch my face as I noticed her.
"Oh my god," I began, "you're that famous scientist, aren't you?"
She looked up from her papers.
"Dr Hanson, right?"
"Yeah," she said with a polite smile before turning back to her work, but I was determined to have a conversation with her. I got up from my seat and approached her. "I've read your paper on DNA biological coding. You're the Tony Stark of genetics."
She looked up from her work once more, finally taking the time to look at me. "I've met Tony Stark. That's not the compliment that you think it is."
I settled down in the seat in front of her. "I've met Stark as well, and I'll beg to differ. Sure, he thinks with his dick, but there's no denying his genius."
She sighed but did not refute me.
"It's probably why you showed him your Extremis Formula."
I watched in slow motion as her mind shifted from finding me mildly attractive but annoying to wary.
"He told you?"
"Not in so many words, but in my line of work, you get pretty good at reading in-between the lines."
"Who are you?" Hanson asked, hand slowly reaching for the Mace in her purse.
I smiled, pointing at the TV, which was running yet another story of my superheroics. Some news anchors had dubbed me the savior of New York and the Campus, claiming that people should be grateful that I was fast enough to reach Culver University in the first place.
It was the most flattering interpretation I'd seen so far, which was more than a bit concerning. A lot of people online couldn't seem to get past the fact that I might not be human. In fact, some crazies theorized that mutants were a long-lost relatives of the demons.
In their eyes, it'd explain some mutants' inhuman appearances.
"No," Hanson shook her head. "You can't be him." Fear and disbelief warred with pure curiosity. She was about to ask me to prove it when I let a stream of demonic energy flow from my hand and set it alight. My signature Nether flame flickered deep red and black. The fire lasted long enough for her to gape at the display before it vanished.
"Oh my god," she covered her mouth. "It is you. I have a million and one questions."
"I'll be happy to answer all of them. Hell, I've even throw in DNA samples, but I need your help, Doctor," I said. "The New York attack is just the beginning. More are coming, and your research and skills could help me prevent another tragedy.?"
"How?" she eagerly asked, leaning forward ever so slightly.
"You already know, Doctor. Extremis."
Her smile vanished. "The research is not even public yet. How did you even know about it?"
I tilted my head slightly. "Come on, Doctor. We've already established I don't operate within conventional parameters."
"That's not an answer," She insisted, and I relented. She would not trust me unless I gave something away, however small.
"I'm Clairvoyant," I said. "I see the future sometimes, and that's how I know of the Extremis and its potential."
"Clairvoyance," She scoffed. "You can't be serious."
I shrugged. "It's no more ridiculous than manipulating Hell fire. My eyes foretold of the New York attack and this meeting. Believe what you want, but it's the truth. And before you ask, I don't get to pick and choose what I see. I just see it. Oh, which reminds me, you want to get out from under your boss, Killian. He's dangerous."
Maya's eyes went wide at the last bit, and her breath hitched. A voice at the back of her head had doubted Killian all along, but the offer to work for AIM, had been too good to pass up at the time.
My words seemed almost prophetic. "Clairvoyance is undocumented among mutants. What you're claiming you're able to do should be impossible."
I smiled. "Come on now Doctor. What is it that scientists always say? Magic is what science can't explain?"
"Now you're just patronizing me," said Maya.
"I'm really not," I said. "My clairvoyance is the least magical thing about me. The world is far more complex and stranger than you can imagine, and I can show you the bits that the secret societies and the government keep to themselves. Who knows what you'll find," I shrugged. "The answers you've been searching for all of your life could be closer than you think."
Hansen pretended to deliberate, but I knew I already had her.
"I'm going to need more proof that you're who you say you are before I agree to anything…but if you're right..."
"Welcome aboard Ms. Hanson," I said with a full-faced grin and slid a card over to her. "I'll be in touch."
I turned intangible when I was sure no other eyes were on me but hers and chuckled internally as she lost her shit.
Any doubt she had evaporated with that little trick. She called Killian immediately, telling him that she needed to talk.
I didn't expect her employer to let her go without much of a fight, especially since she was the head of the genome project, but I planned to have Jean him.
Slowly but surely, I was building up a powerbase, and Hanson was only the beginning.
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