Trampling Sincerity (Nolan si/oc-insert)

[Boing]

PROLOGUE

Was that his name?



The syllables making it up didn't come to mind, they were like void, something insubstantial, forever out of reach, what little he could make out didn't seem like it fit, it was like words in a language he'd never learned, with a phonetic alphabet so very foreign to him.

Or maybe that was exactly what was happening. Maybe he wasn't.

He didn't, couldn't, something about this situation -him waking up he hadn't been asleep on a sofa in a strange house, in a foreign space, in a-, a different life he realized, but it slipped away the more he tried to grasp, to understand it.

He was seventy-five 2000-something years old.

He was a conqueror, a Viltimite, a soldier, a warrior, a- an engineer?

He was on Earth-Viltrum-New York-Chicago.

He was, he'd been in-

The numbers, the calendar meant something, didn't it?

Or was it just noise, fragments of a dream of a life dissolving in waking confusion?

His head pounded, yet did not, ached yet felt far away, contradictions not bearing any weight, the impossible weight of being no one and everyone at once, one and two, 75 and 2000, of having lived and not lived, of existing in a way that made no sense at all.

He'd gone to sleep, gone to sleep… on February 20th something, 2078. He remembered that clearly. The date only added to his list of things that didn't fit.

But now he was here, in this body, younger, stronger, alien, it's not me with memories -so much blood, how will I ever be clean, should I jump in a bath of acid? That would clean dissolve my skin, no?

Memories, memories, memories-

He punches his cheek, oh it ached, sweet sweet burn tapering into a dull sharp thing.

He cupped his cheek, index passing over his upper-lip-

"A moustache ?" he murmured voice full of wonder.

His hearing was the second thing he'd noticed.

The first had been that it was night, that he was in a stranger's home, that he was too many horrible -oh sweet mama Jesus- things to ever accept being.

He wasn't was a soldier

Hearing. Too sensitive. Too overwhelming.

He'd come to awareness to the sound of breathing, two sets -and so many so far away but why were they less important? why was his hearing so-, deep and regular, coming from somewhere else in the house. Not in this room. The living room he'd played so many board games with his family in, he'd later understand. Debbie and Mark, the photos would tell him.

But before the photos, before the names, there were the other memories.

Years of war played in his mind like a corrupted mp4 file, glitching and making buzz, buzz in a way that captured his attention like a moth to a light.

Campaigns across worlds he'd never imagined never thought he see with eyes that were ,had been?, human.

Human. He was supposed to be human.

Service to a holy empire, to the Viltrum Empire, to a cause he felt in his bones was righteous, had been though brainwashed trained to believe in make a part of his very self. He remembered believing in Viltrumite might with a fervour that terrified him.

He'd been a soldier. A warrior. An alien.

He was learning- a part of him never belonged anywhere, was only there to hurt.

But no- oh he cared, cared and was cared for but he couldn't, couldn't-

Except he also remembered being human. Being a failure, being alone.

Being old.

He blinked, though of his life, thought of his youth, that girl Greta something voice echoing in his mind, 'You stole my dreams'.

And they had been hadn't they? In both lives.

Why was he so alone? No children to call on holidays. No grandchildren sending crayon drawings. Just him and the TV in a one-bedroom apartment where the thermostat was always set too high because his joints ached in the cold. The kind of solitude that came with outliving your friends, with never quite connecting, with the fluorescent lights of a grocery store at 3 PM on a Tuesday being your main source of human interaction.

The cashiers knew his face but not his name. Knew his quirks yet wouldn't care if he just-

He shook his head like a dog, banishing the thought. He couldn't wouldn't allow himself the opportunity to-

Re-centering.

His youth, the end of his childhood tapering off during-

COVID-19.

The world stopping.

The stress of choosing a career path when all seemed hopeless, dark grey, worthless, dim, distant like a half-remembered dream. It was-

Witnessing the bulk of the twenty-first century unfold, had been something he'd taken pride in, not giving up, like so many had in his situation. Living through that mess. Growing old in it.

Two sets of memories, two lives -one that wasn't really a life, one where he was never thought to be anything more than a weapon despite what had once felt like freedom, occupying the same brain.

Neither felt more real than the other.

What a lie he told himself.

His face went blank, the image of the cartoon dog sipping tea in a burning house, a chipper "Everything is fine." in a speech bubble.

I got isekai'd into an alien body and now I have two different sets of trauma competing for space in my head, spawned in his mind.

"That could be a bad fanfic or light novel title," he grumbled as he stood up with too much ease.

With ease that was inhuman.

He wasn't fucking human.

He walked towards the kitchen, a half-conscious glance at the fridge's blank surface, he imagined an insta meme he must have stumbled on too many times to count, before AI made the platform unusable. An image of a cat bundled in a fluffy blanket, holding a coffee cup with existential dread crazed in it's eyes, a sharp unable to be ignored "COFFEE: Because questioning your entire existence is easier with caffeine." under it.

He'd found the paper calendar just under where he'd been looking after a blink, small notes dotted it's squares. Mark's vacation started in two days, one note reminded him, reminding this Nolan? -was he Nolan? Was his name Nolan? That's such a shit name, at least it's better than that Musk kid with a weird ass name, poor guy changed his name the moment he acquired emancipation- not to forget, even if he didn't care to remember school holidays, hadn't even when he'd been a kid.

The handwriting was feminine, well he assumed it was with how rounded and applied even the shortest note was, Debbie's, according to the signature under a message written on a post-it.

The next day, because a god wanted him to appear and have an existential crisis before midnight, he'd spent hours with the family photos. There were boxes of them, and frames on every surface. A baby held by a man with a moustache, a man he slowly, reluctantly acknowledged was him, because why the fuck not?, or rather, as the body he now inhabited. A note on the back, in that same feminine handwriting 'The first time Nolan hugged Mark - July 21st, 2001'.

Mark. The boy was Mark. Born in 2001. Which made him seventeen now, if his maths was right, which it was, because damn it quick mental maths had been a big part of his carrier, it did not mean he was too lazy to type it on a calculator damn it, Debbie.

Oh fuck…

He couldn't use that name like that anymore, his wife -shit he had a wife- was called Debbie.

And seventeen years old.

The boy was seventeen years old.

Seventeen, still a goddamned child.

His child apparently.

He'd ruin the child-

What will he say ? 'Oh, hi! Btw, I'm still a piece of garbage' despite acquiring a retired human's memories?

Which meant he'd been here -Nolan had been living here, in this where had he- oh Chicago. Why Chicago of all places? - for over a decade. Living this life. Being a father. Being a husband.

Over a decade, nearly two, of memories that should exist but didn't, or rather existed, but only as imprints in the dirt, like half-formed impressions of someone running away from a hunter, blurring all marks despite leaving an easy trail to follow, this, whatever it was, felt more like an educated guess than actual memories.

He set down the photo where he'd pulled it out of the photo album, his eyes didn't leave the picture, tracing the still image of Mark at maybe -toddler age ? no a tad too big for that- , gap-toothed and grinning, held aloft on Nolan's shoulders, and pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes.

The pressure helped.

Briefly.

It didn't do shit.

I don't know them, he thought and damn it did the admission made something twist painfully in his chest. I should know them. I'm supposed to know them. But I don't.

It was like trying to debug code written by someone else, no comments, no documentation, just spaghetti logic and undefined variables everywhere.

Error 404: Family.exe not found in memory banks.

He should be Nolan, had clearly been, a part of him was.

A shitty traumatized part that masked like his existence depended on it. A part that worked like running a system with two conflicting operating systems simultaneously, both throwing critical errors, both demanding priority access to the same fucking hardware when you had only run one.

Os : 'Lonely_Old_Man_v75.0' and Os : 'Alien_War_Criminal_v2000.legacy' not compatible with the current runtime environment of 'Suburban_Dad.exe'.

What the fuck was his life? A DLC expansion pack no one wanted yet came preinstalled, a shitty thing called 'trauma and emotional unavailability' that automatically unlocked the Marriage, Have a child and Become a suburban dad achievements?

Status: Critical system failure.

Kernel panic imminent, BIOS fuckin' corrupted, be fucking proud chum you just bricked a perfectly working computer. No backup fucking available. Please contact your system administrator- oh wait ! There isn't one, he thought cheerily, because apparently whoever designed this clusterfuck of an existence never bothered to include failsafes.

Two lifetime's worth of psychological damage, now available in one convenient meat suit! Buy one existential crisis, get the second free.

The fridge hummed, low and constant until the compressor started its cycle.

He also noticed he'd been standing still for forty-seven seconds, had been counting each tic of the analogue clock in the neighbour's house.

He needed coffee.

The thought arrived with the clarity of a system alert, Caffeine levels critically low. Performance degradation imminent.

He moved to the kitchen, his feet silent on the tile floor despite his size. The cabinets yielded coffee grounds easily enough, but when he looked for the espresso machine his muscle memory seemed to expect, he found only a standard drip coffee maker.

Filter coffee. Basic. Pedestrian.

Well, it will do, he thought, measuring out grounds with hands that moved too precisely, too efficiently. The Viltrumite part of him didn't care about coffee quality, the body, it, his body barely registered the need for caffeine at all. But the old man's memories craved it, that morning ritual -even if it was only starting to get dark- that had been one of the few reliable pleasures in a life of quiet isolation.

He watched the dark liquid drip into the carafe, counting drops because he couldn't help it, because his brain was processing everything at a speed that made waiting feel like punishment.

Forty-seven seconds until the pot was full enough to pour.

He poured himself a mug, black, no sugar, because both sets of memories agreed on that much at least, and took a sip.

It was terrible.

Weak. Watery. The kind of coffee you made when you bought the cheapest grounds at the grocery store and didn't particularly care about the result.

These weren't cheap grounds, he just wasn't human enough to register the taste-

He took another sip anyway.

This is fine, he told himself, channelling that stupid dog meme again, because apparently that was all he could muster at the moment. Everything is fine.

The coffee was bad, he didn't know his own family, he'd nearly punched a hole in the wall earlier when he realised the dosage needed to be upped, and he was having an existential crisis in a body that could probably definitely bench-press a car.

But the coffee was warm, and it was something to hold, and for now, that would have to be enough.

It wasn't the worst, far from it-

A ringing sounded, it came from his pocket. Nolan pulled the object out, it was an odd gold bracelet with an ugly red disc.

He reacted before he could think.

One moment he was standing in the kitchen, mug halfway to his lips, the next he was moving, a blur of motion that should have been impossible but felt as natural as breathing.

Upstairs.

The bedroom he shared with Debbie. His hands were already pulling open the closet, slowly, soundlessly, a glance was shot her way on instinct, as if he was afraid to wake her. Hand reaching for something that should have been there, that was there-

A suit.

Red and white, sleek and form-fitting, with a design that screamed comic book superhero in a way that made him cringe.

This wasn't an instinct from either set of memories, not the elderly man who'd spent his twilight years alone, not the Viltrumite warrior whose recollections were all violence and conquest.

This was, this was something else.

Something from the years Nolan had spent on Earth, the decade-plus of life that existed only as impressions and half-formed shadows in his mind.

Was he a superhero?

The question was tinged with a strange sense of detachment, like a disquieting realisation that was behind a veil of dissociation, like he was far away, observing someone else's revelation. But his hands were already moving, stripping off his clothes with efficient precision, pulling on the suit that fit like a second skin.

It felt right. Wrong in every conceptual way -what the hell kind of life had Nolan been living?- but physically, tactically, it felt like coming home, like a ritual, preparing for battle. It felt like before every break ended during campaign, during advances, it was the quiet moment before violence, it was when you checked your yourself over one last time and steeled yourself for what came next.

It was when you prepared yourself to have your blood pumping in your veins, adrenaline sharpening every sense, the weight of expectation settling over you like armor. It was the moment before the doors opened, before you stepped into whatever chaos waited on the other side, and you had to be ready. In every way that mattered.

Because if you didn't, because if you faltered… You didn't have your place amongst the Viltrumite anymore.

The bracelet on his wrist, the red pulsing with light, began vibrating more insistently. He moved to the corridor, softly closing the door behind him and touched it without thinking, and a voice crackled through, urgent and clipped.

"Omni-Man, we have a situation. Alien invasion, Shanghai. Multiple hostiles, class-four threat level. We need you there now."

Omni-Man.

The name settled over him like a weight, familiar and foreign all at once -and what the fuck Omni-man the alien conqueror guy that massacred superheros during the first episode?!

"Copy," he heard himself say, his voice steady despite the chaos in his head. "En route."

He moved to the window, opening it with hands that knew exactly what to do even as his mind scrambled to catch up. Shanghai. China. Halfway across the world.

How am I supposed to- oh, that easy?

And then he was flying, flying without having to pay any particular attention to his body, to his movements, flying with the same mindedness that it took one to just stand on his two feet, in a way it was the most familiar feeling, the most freeing thing he'd lived, done, since coming to awareness in this body not an hour ago.

He flew higher first, breaking through the cloud layer where the air thinned and resistance dropped to almost nothing. Up here, the curvature of the Earth was visible, the planet spread out below him like a map, and he could see the distance he needed to cross.

The Pacific Ocean was a dark expanse beneath him, sunlight catching on waves that looked frozen from this height and speed. He pushed harder, faster, feeling the air temperature rise around him from friction that would have incinerated anything less durable.

His body didn't care. The heat was nothing. The speed was nothing. He was built for this, it was horrifying, it was fact.

The Americas disappeared behind him.

He'd crossed the international date line without noticing, crossed into Asian airspace without clearance or concern, because who was going to stop him? What could stop him?

Minutes later, Shanghai's skyline emerged from the blue hues of the horizon ahead, but it was wrong. Smoke rose in the sky, dark clouds of dust rising in the air, stark against both city and sky.

When he came closer, close to the origin of the disturbance, he saw a giant crimson portal, a swirling vortex of alien infantry pouring through like a bleeding wound in the sky. Other superheroes were already there, clustered into what his eyes registered as two distinct groups, local heroes perhaps, -this world seemed to work with a logic close to DC comics- their costumes a mismatched collection of colours and designs that screamed that's-all-I-had-on-hand and another team that moved with more coordination, more precision and wore tailored uniforms.

Seven of them, formations practised, their movements synchronized in a way that told him they were used to working together, could anticipate the other's movements with ease.

He didn't know who they were.

Didn't recognize them as the thirty of so comic book superheroes he knew of the top of his head.

Didn't know their hero names, didn't their powers other than the most obvious ones.

He didn't know what they called themselves.

Nolan dearly hoped it wasn't some sort of Justice League variant. Really hoped this wasn't DC or Marvel.

Not that he'd know, most of his knowledge coming from fanfiction and whatnot.

He just knew that they were there, and they were fighting, and he was supposed to help.

Because he too was a hero conqueror-protector of a planet fated to Viltrum's collection.

The aliens were insectoid in appearance but did not posses a hard shell, disgusting beings that fell in their dozens, sent thew the air one by one by the heroes, their bloodied armor gleaming under the city lights as they poured through the portal in seemingly endless waves. They wielded weapons that crackled and hummed with some kind of energy he couldn't identify, couldn't classify against any technology he knew.

They moved in tight coordinated swarms, formations disciplined and deliberate in a way that reminded him of Earth's ancient Greek phalanx formations, overwhelming their opponents through sheer numbers and relentless forward advance, pressing their advantage with mechanical precision.

One of the more coordinated heroes, the green mace glanced up as he descended, her expression flashing with relief before she turned back to the fight.

"About time!" she shouted over the cacophony of battle. "We could use the help!"

Nolan didn't respond. Couldn't, really. His mind was still catching up to his body, which had already moved into action, fists connecting with alien armor with a force that sent bodies tumbling through the air like rag dolls, sending a trail of blood in their wake.

His Viltrumite side stirred, recognizing the rhythm of combat, the efficiency of violence, and for the first time since waking up in that body, he couldn't think.

Buildings crumbled. A chunk of concrete the size of a car broke free from a tower's facade. Nolan caught it mid-fall, fingers punching through rebar, and hurled it towards a large group of invaders crushing the aliens in it's wake.

"Fashionably late!" someone shouted.

Nolan barely looked at them.

An energy blast streaked past his ear.

He twisted, dodging the ray, caught the shooter by the throat, and drove them into the pavement hard enough to make it's head explode on impact.

"Could've used you five minutes ago!"

The words reached him. Didn't stick. His fist was already connecting with another target, then another, bodies tumbling through smoke-choked air, red droplets splashing him and the surrounding area.

He frowned when one fell into his eye, he didn't feel it only saw the red red red red red vision of one of his eyes, red like blood, red like conquest, red like everything he was, a bloodied warrior, telling him, showing him all his wrongs, bringing hundreds upon hundred or massacres and genocides conquests he'd committed don't think about it don't think about it, and somewhere beneath the steady rhythm of his breathing, beneath his perfect control over his Viltrumite body, a body that didn't flinch, didn't panic, didn't care, there was something screaming, something human and small and terrified clawing at the inside of his skull, but his hands kept moving kept killing kept fighting because that's what this body did, that's what it was for, red red red filling his vision like a promise like a warning like the truth he couldn't escape.

A building groaned, steel twisting as its facade began to crumble.

Nolan was there before the first chunk of concrete hit the ground, arms outstretched to catch a woman clutching a child. The impact should have shattered her ribs, his speed, his momentum would have caused their death, but he adjusted his hands, microseconds, to slow down just enough that she she'd survive, perhaps bruised.

But alive. Alive for her child.

He set them down three blocks away, on stable ground, before they'd even registered what happened, their synapses' signal transmission and their civilian reaction time not allowing them to even react, their breathing paused by the violent acceleration through the air..

Back.

Another building.

An elderly man frozen at a windowsill, hands gripping the railing, eyes bulging as the floor buckled beneath him. Nolan caught him mid-fall, cradling him like glass, like something precious that might break if he squeezed too hard. The man's heart hammered against Nolan's chest, rapid and terrified, breaths gasp like things, Nolan murmured something, something that may have been reassuring, he didn't remember the moment it left his lips.

A flash of blue in his peripheral vision.

One of the heroes, young, inexperienced, stepping directly into the path of an energy blast that would crackle with lethal intent, the light travelling faster than sound would.

Nolan moved, hand shooting out, fingers closing around their uniform, yanking them backward -he felt the cloth tear around his hold- with just enough force to clear the blast's trajectory. The beam seared past where they'd been standing, close enough that Nolan smelled burnt ozone of the blast despite all the smells around him.

"I've got you," he said, tone firm, solid, carrying a surety he would not feel the moment he stopped moving.

The young hero stared, stared for a fraction of a second, eyes wide and mouth agape, fumbling over a phrase of thanks.

Movement above attracted his gaze.

Another spandex wearer plummeting from the sky, body limp, shoulder smoking and leaking red ichor, life blood, arms windmilling uselessly as they lost control of their flight.

Blood across their face, through cracked lenses seeping in their eyes, blinding them. An arc of red painted through the air, behind them.

Nolan, tensed his muscles, shot upward, caught them before they hit the pavement, felt the crack of bone, the wrongness of their weight, the scream that spawned from their very core. He felt a too loose, too shattered, body, ribs grinding against each other in ways that made his stomach turn.

Their head lolled against his shoulder, consciousness flickering as they groaned in pain.

He touched down near the triage zone, lowering them on a free gurney with the same impossible gentleness he'd used for the humans civilians. A medic rushed forward, already shouting instructions, and Nolan's hands came away slick with blood that wasn't his.

He wiped them on his costume.

I feel like a damn clown.

Then he was back in the fray, moving, always moving, because stopping meant thinking and thinking meant confronting what he was doing, what he was, what he didn't want to to become, not again.

What he didn't want to return to.

What hadn't really been him.

"Omni-man!" A voice called making him turn his attention towards them.

Paf!

Smoke in his vision, quick to dissipate.

An energy blast had hit him, an impact to the side of the head, as if taken by long ingrained instinct, his head snapped towards the trash that had dared to shoot him, his mind blanked, his hand was on the green invader's face, holding it meters up by its cranium.

A squeeze.

The alien's limbs jerked uselessly, fingers clawing at Nolan's forearm, nails digging into his costume's fabric, legs kicking at nothing.

A sharp pop, of bone fracturing under the pressure he exerted. The skull giving way after little resistance, barely a fraction of a second where the bone buckled, fractures forming along the plates that made it, not even making the skin of Nolan's fingertips give before it collapsed inwards, blood vessels spider-webbing turning green skin a dark purple around the points of pressure as it did so.

Most of the skin stayed intact, until it wasn't, green skin turning purple in places, staying green in others, as it tore.

The grip tightened, barely, desperately.

Huh, still alive?

There had been a moment, a terrible drawn-out thing, where the alien's, the invader's eyes bulged in its sockets, the positive pressure exerted on the skull building with nowhere to go. Then the orbital bones fractured with a series of small, wet clicks, and the eyes seemed to edge forwards, advancing, escaping the collapsing cavity they occupied.

Where the twitching worsened, lost coherence, losing all purpose, merely muscle reflexes, fingers grasping at air like it would save the thing.

Then finally, as if to finish a macabre piece of art, the thing gave all at once, it's structural integrity failing under the power a Viltrumite of his calibre-

Nolan willed the thought away, banishing it, banishing this sense of superiority that seemed to want to crush the human he had been, had once been.

The eyes popped out, forced from their sockets by the building pressure within the collapsing skull, trailing stringy optic nerves that stretched and then snapped with wet, fibrous tears. The ocular organs didn't fall cleanly, they hung, hung for a moment, suspended by those last threads of tissue, before gravity and momentum sent them tumbling down the creature's face, leaving dark trails against green skin.

It caved it like a crushed can, sending warm cerebrospinal fluid coloured red by its blood, it was a sudden heat, a sudden wet spreading across his palm, between his fingers, through his skin oh my god oh my god oh my god, resulting in a misshapen, grotesque thing he promptly dropped.

He dropped it, dropped the thing's body, its arms slayed at odd angles, joints no longer tethered by what the central nervous system ordered it, its remains, the invader's falling to the ground as if dragged by a leash, trailing droplets of red and flesh behind it.

A whip like movement of the hand, chunks of tissues, red blood and viscera was sent through the air in an arc, a parody of what he would have preferred.

The trash hit the asphalt with a wet thud, crumpling on itself.

Nolan stared at it, then at his hands.

His breathing hadn't changed all throughout, heart-rate still the steady thing it had been earlier.

This really doesn't change a thing, huh?

Killing.

Somewhere, deep inside, buried by the situation at hand, something was screaming.

---

A voice cut through the unceasing sound of battle, sharp and commanding.

"Omni-Man, left flank!"

His body was already moving before the words fully registered, punching through three invaders in a blur of motion. Their carapaces cracked like eggshells.

"We need to push them back to the portal!"

He didn't acknowledge. Didn't nod. His fist connected with another alien, sending it careening into two more.

"Red Rush is exhausted! Someone help him cover his sector!"

The words floated past him, meaningless. His hands caught an energy pike mid-swing, crushed the shaft, drove his elbow into the wielder's face.

"Can you reach the ones on the buildings?"How did they even get there, Nolan thought brows twitching, the things can't even fly, "We're dealing with the ones advancing along the main street!"

He was already airborne, tearing through the swarm clinging to a collapsing tower. Bodies fell like rain.

"Omni-Man, status?"

Someone was waiting for a response. He could feel their expectation, hanging in the air between explosions and screams. His mouth didn't open. His focus didn't shift.

A green being lunged from his blind spot, energy pike crackling. His hand shot out, caught the thing mid-thrust. The metal crumpling in his grip. His other fist drove forward, punching through chitin and viscera in one smooth arc. The creature was dead before it could process what happened, sent as it was towards other beings like a ball at a coconut-shy.

"Nice shot!" someone called out, but there was an edge to it. Not quite irritation, but something close. Like he'd early stepped on their toes without meaning to.

He caught the slight tightness in the woman's voice when he'd pulled a civilian from danger she'd been moving toward.

The way the man in dark armor had to redirect his team around Nolan's movements rather than with them.

Small tensions, barely there, like static electricity.

Let's hope Nolan wasn't the hydrogen in the situation.

It reminded him of something. Something from his life on earth, his life amongst the other Viltrumites.

Children bickering over who got to sit in the front seat, petty and quickly forgotten when the destination mattered more than the friction.

He was already moving to the next target, and the next, and the next, ignoring the others as much as they were him.

Somewhere to his left, that same batman wannabe, black cape flowing, movements precise, was coordinating the others. "War Woman, high ground! Aquarus, contain that fire! Martian Man, hit them from behind!" There was a pause, barely perceptible, where Nolan knew an instruction for him should have been. It didn't come.

The names meant nothing to him. The tactics the man spouted were sound, but he wasn't a part of their formation, he noted once more, and they accounted for it.

The invading insects were retreating, Nolan shot forwards the retreating green-skinned trash scattered in all directions before scrambling trampling their fallen brethren towards the nearest portal after he impacted a few of them, asphalt cracking beneath the exploded bodies, bone shattered and fleshy innards spilling out.

One stumbled, its weapon clattering against pavement, and was immediately crushed beneath the boots of those behind it.

Nolan stared, a part of him horrified another used-trained to expect such behaviour from those who dared resist against Viltrum.

Another portal collapsed the sound it made suddenly disappearing felt like void, like absence, like relief, trapping a cluster of stragglers on this side.

The last few turned to send last potshots, before turning back, trying to escape, but War Woman's mace found them first.

The sounds of screams, grunts felt like music to his ears

Above, Martian Man phased through a squadron attempting to regroup, his intangible form disrupting their flight patterns. They scattered like startled birds, diving for the remaining portals.

Nolan hovered before one of the remaining portals, he couldn't see through its red swirling opaque center. But Nolan was certain of one thing, that beyond the gate way there were more of theme, thousands, millions, an entire planet's worth.

An entire planet, an entire world wanted to invade what was his to claim, to conquer.

Nolan didn't want Conquest to come anywhere near earth,near the family he was rediscovering.

His fists clenched.

He could do it. Could plunge through that portal and end them. Every last one. Tear through their world the way they'd tried to tear through his-

No. Not his.

Nolan tilted his head, staring at it.

No. No, that's not- that's not right. These are people. Sentient beings with lives, families, homes-

Earth was his to conquer.

His mission.

His purpose.

These insects had dared to invade what belonged to Viltrum, what he was here to claim in the Empire's name.

They're not insects. They're not. They may be aliens but they have eyes, hands, they feel pain- he fucking felt the skull collapse, give under his fingers, felt the life leave-

The rage -what even was he feeling?- that surged through him was clean, pure, right. It would be so easy. Follow them through. Show them what a real invasion looked like. What happened when you touched something that belonged to the Empire.

No, it's not right! It's not- it isn't right! Slaughtering an entire planet because they dared to exist, because they tried to invade your planet- that's what monsters do, that what some humans wished but damn it Nolan wasn't human he should be above that. He was supposed to stop them not, stop the invaders not-

His body tensed, ready to shoot forward-

Please don't. Please, he didn't want to do this, he didn't want to be this, he was not- he was never- he couldn't-

Then the portal he was aiming for collapsed, winking out of existence with a wet pop that left only smoke and the smell of ozone.

The decision was made for him.

Thank god.

Thank god thank god.

Silence fell over the battlefield, broken only by crackling fires and the groans of the wounded.

They had won.

All the portals collapsed inward, closing, one after another, the scattered few left behind were dealt with swiftly. And sooner than he realized -how long had it been? Tens of minutes? An hour? Hours?- the emergency, the battle, the incursion was dealt with. The tensions dissolved from the air, forgotten in favour of the bigger picture; they'd won, and that was what mattered, but they all knew.

This wasn't the last fight.

He returned to the group, flying through the air at a slow leisurely pace, landing, feet barely making a sound as he landed, among the heroes as they regrouped. They were battered, bloodied, several supporting injured teammates. One, that batman wannabe, had a gash across his chest that was already starting to heal, though the blood remained.

Nolan was barely winded, standing straight and untouched.

He could feel their eyes on him, assessing, perhaps grateful, perhaps something else. He didn't know these people. Didn't know if they were friends or just colleagues. Didn't know what Nolan's relationship with them had been.

"Good work," the man bearded man said, costume black blue and yellow, extending a hand. "Thank you for the help Omni-man."

Nolan looked down at his hands, something cold twisted in his chest, in his gut, in his very marrow.

The gruff gratitude in the man's voice. The relief in the others eyes, both teams eyes.

They thought he was their ally.

They thought he was their friend.

A protector of this world.

But he wasn't.

He was Nolan Grayson. A Viltrumite. Here to conquer this planet, because that was what Viltrum did. That was what he was for.

No matter what this borrowed- it's not borrowed it's yours it's ours- mind wanted to believe.

The woman with the mace stepped forward, wiping blood from her face. "You okay? You seem... off."

Questions. They were going to ask questions, and he couldn't… he couldn't-

"I'm fine," he said, the words coming out too fast, too sharp. "I have to go."

He didn't wait for a response. Didn't wait for the confusion or concern that was already forming on their faces. He just launched, shooting upward so fast the air cracked behind him, leaving them standing in the wreckage below.

Let them think what they wanted. Let them wonder. He wasn't their friend, wasn't their teammate, wasn't whatever they thought Omni-Man was supposed to be.

He was a conqueror.

And the sooner he remembered that, the- the better.

He nodded at her again, not trusting himself to say much.

His hands were steady.

His heart rate was already returning to baseline.

The other heroes around him had looked like they'd been through a war.

Because they had.

And he'd barely felt it. because he wasn't like them anymore.

---

He flew back barely paying attention to the journey.

The sky blurred past him, clouds and stars and the curve of the Earth reduced to meaningless streaks of colour, the Pacific darkening into night beneath him as he flew. His mind wasn't on the flight. Wasn't on the wind caressing his costume pulling the still wet blood along the fabric, it wasn't on his knuckles.

He was here, he was on earth-

Not protect. Not save. No, conquer.

The disjointed thought, muted, it sat in his chest like a stone, cold and immovable, and he couldn't think around it.

Couldn't process it.

Couldn't, couldn't, couldn't- couldn'tcouldn'tcouldn't-

The house was dark, quiet.

Both Debbie and Mark were asleep.

He landed in the garden, his feet hovering above the grass before he hovered above the ground as he moved through the air towards the door window.

His hand reaching for the vertical latch with a kind of mechanical precision that felt wrong, too deliberate, too different from the force he'd have had to exert in his human body, in his 75 year old body.

The lock clicked open, click too loud in the quiet house, and he slid the window up.

Cool night air rushed in, carrying with it the smell of grass and distant rain. He breathed it in, letting it fill his lungs, grounding himself in the sensation of it.

The sounds from outside grew sharper now, unfiltered. That dog still barking. A car passing on the main road. Somewhere, wind chimes.

He stood there, one hand braced against the window frame, and stared out into the darkness of the suburban night.

Before he knew, he stripped the suit off in the bathroom, peeling the bloodied fabric away from his skin with shaking hands.

The suit fell to the floor in a heap, red and white now stained with dark ichor that smelled of copper and something else, something wrong. He left it there, couldn't bear to look at it anymore.

Couldn't bear to look at the blood covering the thing that had felt like second-skin.

He washed his hands for what felt like an eternity, hands under the spray of water, unmoving as his gaze met his reflection's.

He studied his face in the mirror.

His moustache, his nose, his blue eyes, features he was learning to recognize as his own.

The reflection was familiar, and yet he was still expecting an old wrinkled face, his old human self's face, piece by piece, quicker than he expected, like furniture in a new house that gradually it, his face, stops feeling odd.

His eyes darted to a small scar at his hairline, a barely visible thing unless you knew to look for it.

The moment he noticed it, the moment he traced it with a wet finger, the memory surged to the fore of his mind, sharp, immediate.

A battlefield.

An assassination attempt from a weak Viltrumite.

A thousand years ago. 195 years after his parents died.

His scalp had been nearly torn off, peeled back by a fellow recruit's hand. The pain had been excruciating and the scar that remained was a testament to how close he'd come to-

To what? Death? No, Viltrumites didn't die that easily.

But to be written off as weak, to be scorned by his peers, to lose what little favour being a full-blooded Viltrumite brought him… what a fate it would have been.

Failing to prove your strength.

Being seen as a sinner. A shame.

Being wrong.

Meant being fodder.

An Nolan? He was anything but weak.

Every test, he had passed.

He had beaten every challenge.

Hadn't shown weakness nor hesitation, not before, not before-

Earth.

His lips parted, the memory came in a blinding flash, synapses firing all at once, a 'strength assessment', a culling of the weak, Nolan had survived him, proving his strength, had proved he had a right to exist.

A thousand years of scars and battles, the remnants of which could not be seen on his skin anymore, that were as much a part -one he felt he could deny- of him as the face staring back from the mirror.

He traced the scar with his fingertip once more, feeling the faint ridge of tissue that had healed centuries ago. This body had a history, his history.

This is mine, he thought, meeting his own eyes in the mirror. This is who I am.

Nolan ignored the hand trembling under the water faucet.

---

He walked to the bedroom, their bedroom, his and Debbie's, on autopilot. His feet made no sound on the carpet. His hands were still trembling.

Debbie was asleep, curled on her side, her breathing slow and even. The covers were pulled up to her shoulder, her hair spilling across the pillow.

He slid into bed beside her, careful not to wake her, and curled around her like she was an anchor. Like she could keep him from drifting apart.

His lips pressed together so hard they ached. His fists clenched in the sheets, knuckles white, trembling despite how hard he tried to still them.

She stirred, making a soft questioning sound that resembled his name, half-awake.

"Alien invasion in Shanghai," he said, his voice barely above a whisper.

She hummed, turning around in his arms, facing him, a hand moving up, cupping his cheek. A gesture of comfort, automatic and unthinking.

She pressed her lips against his, falling back asleep in his arms.

He curled around her, his body trembling despite how tightly he held himself together. His lips pressed into a thin line, his fists clenched in the sheets until his knuckles went white.

This was the time, alone in the dark, with only Debbie's sleeping form for company.

If he was going to break, it should be now.

There would be no consequences for falling to baser needs here.

Not with Debbie.

Not on earth.

He didn't want to hurt anyone, the thought screamed through his mind, desperate and raw, desperate and raw because whist he had chosen, had decided- He still needed to grieve. He was not human. Why was he not human? Why was he isekai-ed into Omni-Man? Why was it so hard to accept what he had to do?Why did he miss the uncomplicated life he had as an old lonely man? Why could he just not feel? Nolan didn't want to-

The questions spiralled, each one cutting deeper than the last, and he trembled even as he held Debbie's soft body in his arms, trying to not hug her closer, fearing to lose control, fearing to hurt his wife. Her pyjamas did nothing to shield him from the warmth of her against his naked chest, against his bare legs.

The intimacy of it felt wrong, like he was violating something sacred by being here, by existing in this space that belonged to someone else, that belonged to him.

He wanted to cry. Needed to cry. But tears didn't fall.

Because he was Viltrumite.

Viltrumites didn't cry.

No release, no catharsis, just this building pressure behind his eyes that had nowhere to go.

What came instead was a sound, a high-pitched keen that started low in his chest and clawed its way up his throat. He tried to smother it, pressing his face into Debbie's hair, his hand clamping over his mouth.

Tears fell.

Oh did that make him feel weak, make him hate what he was.

Hated that part of him, that human part, that needed to express-

But the whine escaped anyway, thin and broken, the sound of something dying.

His wife, Debbie stirred against him, her body tensing slightly, and he froze, terrified that he'd woken her, that she'd see him like this, this weak, falling apart in the dark like the human child he'd never been allowed could not remember being to be.

But she only mumbled something incoherent, her hand sliding up to rest against his chest, a soft questioning sound that made him hold her closer, and settled back into sleep, in his arms.

He held, another of that broken sound still caught in his throat, and wondered how long he could keep it together.

Nolan closed his eyes, breathed in the smell of rose scented shampoo.

And before he knew it-

Sleep came like a shutdown, mechanical and inevitable.

His last conscious thought was of Debbie's warmth against him, the steady rhythm of her breathing, and the terrible knowledge that he didn't deserve this comfort.

That he was lying to her just by being here.

Then darkness swallowed him whole.

___

A/N:
If this story tickled your brain, you're welcome to leave a comment (I'd love if it's some type of constructive critisism) that challenges my persepctive on what I wrote /(°w°)/!!!

 

[NickNock]

I'm really looking forward to seeing what the reactions of his family are when they realize that Nolan has become a stranger to them overnight.

 

[MorbiIIionaire]

They thought he was heir friend

Click to shrink...

"their"

Either way, great start, cant wait for more!

 

[Boing]

"their"

Either way, great start, cant wait for more!

Click to shrink...

Thanks for catching this XD, I'm glad you enjoy the story :3

 

[Lillie Jones]

Watching
Saw QQ net also on Ao3 and reading about This Nolan Grayson Omniman SI Invincible verse , which things are getting interesting for Nolan Grayson Omniman SI and Mark Grayson and family.
Continue on
Cheers!

 

[Blame]

This was so well written.

 

[readsalot]

Then darkness swallowed him whole.

Click to shrink...

Ooh it here, looking forward to the next one

 

[Boing]

CHAPTER 1

He woke to the shift in her breathing.

It was subtle but he was close enough to catch it in his near unconscious state. The change from the deep, steady rhythm of sleep to something lighter, more conscious. Her body stirred against his, a small movement, her hand sliding across his chest as she stretched.

For a moment, he kept his eyes closed, listening. Her heartbeat was picking up, slow but steady, moving from rest into wakefulness. The rustle of sheets. The soft sound of her breathing becoming less even.

Then she moved again, turning in his arms, and he opened his eyes.

The room was still dark, the first hints of dawn just beginning to lighten the edges of the curtains. Debbie's face was inches from his, her eyes still half-closed, hair messy from sleep.

"Morning," she murmured, her voice thick and drowsy.

He tried to respond, but his throat felt tight. Instead, he just pulled her closer, his arms tightening around her like she might disappear if he let go.

She looked at him, concern or maybe even confusion in her eyes, her hand came up to cup his face. "Nolan? You okay?"

"Yeah," he lied, his voice barely above a whisper barely hiding his sense of loss.

She didn't believe him. He could see it in the way her thumb brushed across his cheekbone, searching his face like she might find answers written there. But she didn't push, didn't demand explanations he couldn't give, and somehow that made it worse.

Who was he, who did he want to be? He didn't voice. Who was he to her?

The sound of an alarm rung on Debbie's side of the bed. She turned in his hold, trying to shut it off only to be stopped by his arms, he loosened his already loose but not loose enough hold, letting her do so.

---

Nolan was sat at the counter, dressed in a grey t-shirt and jeans, staring at the cup of coffee Debbie had placed in front of him. Steam rose in lazy spirals, dissipating into the morning air. The kitchen smelled of brewing coffee and something sweet, pancakes, maybe, or waffles.

Normal.

Domestic.

Something straight out of an American movie.

He wrapped his hands around the mug, feeling the heat seep into his palms. It didn't burn, couldn't burn him, but the warmth was grounding somehow.

Debbie moved around the kitchen with practised ease, humming something under her breath. She was already dressed for the day, her hair pulled back, makeup done. She looked worried, about him, sending him glances here and there as she prepared a plate for Mark.

"You sure you're okay?" she asked again, glancing at him over her shoulder as she flipped something on the stove.

"Just tired," he said. Another lie, easier than the first.

She didn't look convinced, not one bit, but she nodded anyway, turning back to whatever she was cooking, still turning towards him, sending him concerned looks. The sizzle of batter hitting the pan filled the silence between them.

Mark would be up soon. Their son, his son, would come down those stairs any minute now, probably still half-asleep, and Nolan would have to look him in the eye and pretend everything was fine.

He'd have to pretend he knew how to be a father to a boy who was half-human, half-Viltrumite, and entirely unaware of what that really meant.

"Nolan, you aren't usually this subdued," Debbie started, plating pancakes, she turned to the toaster, the bread jumping up not a second later, "You can talk to me."

Nolan stayed silent, not wanting- no, rather he didn't want to say anything.

She set the plate down with more force than necessary, the clatter of ceramic against counter-top sharp in the quiet kitchen. "You've been off since you got back last night. Did something happen?"

He looked up at her, meeting her eyes. She was watching him with that expression she got sometimes, the one that said she could see right through whatever mask he was wearing.

"Nothing I couldn't handle," he said, which was true, technically.

"That's not what I asked." She crossed her arms, leaning against the counter. "I asked if something happened."

He wanted to tell her. Wanted to explain that he didn't know who he was anymore, that the man she'd married felt like a stranger wearing his skin, that every time he'd looked at an image of Mark he felt like an imposter playing at fatherhood.

But the words wouldn't come.

"Just a lot on my mind," he said finally before taking a sip.

Debbie studied him for a long moment, her expression softening. "You know you can talk to me, right? Whatever it is."

"I know," he said, he stated. Because he did, he knew.

The sound of footsteps on the stairs saved him from having to say anything else. Mark appeared in the doorway, still in his pyjamas, hair sticking up at odd angles.

"Morning," their son mumbled, shuffling toward the table.

Nolan felt the beat of his heart quicken at the sight of his son, his son, safe, at home. With him and his mate wife.

"Morning, sweetie," Debbie said, her attention shifting immediately. "I made your favourite."

The boy- Mark brightened slightly, sliding into his chair. "Thanks, Mom."

Nolan watched them, watched as Mark took a bite of the food his mother prepared him, watched as Debbie sipped her own cup, watched the easy way they moved around each other, the casual affection.

This was his family.

His family.

He just had to figure out how to deserve them.

He was sad.

Nolan smiled.

His hands around his warm mug, grounding him, distracting him.

---

Mark looked up from his pancakes, fork halfway to his mouth, and stared at his father.

Something was off.

His dad was smiling, but it wasn't the usual smile. It was too wide, too fixed, like someone had told him what a smile was supposed to look like but hadn't quite gotten it right.

"Dad?" Mark said slowly, setting his fork down. "You okay?"

"Fine," Dad said, still wearing that strange smile. "Why wouldn't I be?"

Mark exchanged a glance with his Mom, who was watching his dad with that same concerned expression she'd had since Mark came downstairs. She gave a small shrug, like she didn't know what was going on either.

"You're just... acting weird," Mark said carefully. "Like, way weird, weirder than usual."

"Weird how?" Nolan asked, and his voice was too casual, not blinking once, like he forgot humans needed to blink, forgot he'd been trying to blink as much as a human, like he was trying too hard to sound normal, Dad never tried to sound normal, not like that at least.

"I don't know, just..." Mark gestured vaguely at his father. "You're being all... ugh…" his fork danced through the air as he searched for the correct word, "Intense? Idon'tknow. And you keep staring at us like you've not seen us in a millenium."

Dad's smile faltered, just for a second, before he smiled again, it looked forced, like he didn't want to smile. "I'm just tired."

"Yeah, but you don't get tired," Mark pointed out. "You're Omni-Man. You can literally fly into space and fight aliens for hours without breaking a sweat."

Dad's smile disappeared completely now. Dad looked down at his coffee, his jaw tight.

"Mark," Mom interrupted him quietly, a warning in her tone.

"What? I'm just saying-"

"It's fine," his father interrupted, his voice flat, before he stood abruptly, his chair scraping against the floor. "I should go. There's... I need to patrol."

He left before either of them could respond, the back door closing with a soft click behind him.

Mark stared after him, then looked at his Mom. "Okay, seriously, what's going on with him? He didn't even go upstairs to put his suit on."

Mom sighed, setting down the spatula. "I don't know, honey. But your dad's…" She frowned looking at the front door, "He has something on his mind, he will talk about it when he's ready, Mark."

---

Mid-evening, Nolan was somewhere in the middle of Chicago, walking mindlessly since the morning, not stopping his walk, without any particular direction in mind, people watching. His ugly bracelet buzzed, something made sound in his pocket, an earbud, he slipped it in his ear.

"Omni-Man, we need you in Hong Kong. Now."

"What is it?" Nolan asked, his voice steady despite the turmoil still churning in his chest.

"There's a dragon. A big one. It came out of the harbour about twenty minutes ago and it's tearing through Kowloon. We've got local heroes on the scene but they're not making a dent."

A dragon. Of course.

"I'm on my way," Nolan said, and accelerated east.

He flew back to the house, dressing quickly in his clean spandex-like costume. The other one, the one he'd left crumpled in the bathroom yesterday, was gone when he'd checked this morning.

Debbie must have taken care of it, washed it, folded it, put it away perhaps.

Perhaps this was that very suit.

Cleaned, had been folded, not covered by viscera like it had been the day before.

Nolan should have flown in orbit, burning the organic material off of it, should have flown fast then stopped brutally, deceleration enough to pull the gore off, to clean the suit- but he hadn't.

He shook his head.

This was another small kindness he, Nolan, didn't deserve, another reminder of how Debbie was his wife, his partner.

The flight to Asia took less than five minutes. He broke the sound barrier twice, the sonic booms echoing across the ocean below. By the time Hong Kong's skyline came into view, he could already see the smoke rising from the city, thick black columns against the morning sky.

The dragon was impossible to miss.

It was massive, easily two hundred feet from snout to tail, with scales that gleamed like polished emeralds in the sunlight.

Its wings were large and leathery, torn in places by the heros attacking it. The creature moved through the streets with a lack of care, its tail whipping out to demolish buildings, sending cars flying at escaping civilian and building, uncaring of the damage it made as it passed.

Nolan descended rapidly, coming in low, barely two stories above the water, surveilling the harbour.

He watched, surveyed scene, the situation, the people fleeing in every direction, cars abandoned in the streets, emergency vehicles trying desperately to evacuate civilians from the dragon's path.

The police and emergency services were redirecting people away from the danger zone, trying to form a perimeter around the rampaging dragon.

Nolan flew quickly, faster than he knew the human eye could follow. A vehicle sent flying by a flap of the dragon's wing hurtled through the air toward a fleeing family. He intercepted it, two palms pressing against its hood, stopping it just before it hit them. The metal denting from the momentum that had carried it forward as it he brought it to a halt mere feet from a woman clutching two small children. She stared up at him, eyes wide with terror and relief.

"Get to safety," he told her their eyes locking for an instant, his voice steady despite the chaos erupting around them. "Head down that street. Away from the dragon."

He could see her nodding frantically in his peripheral, scooping up both children and running without looking back. Nolan set the car down carefully, then turned his attention back to the creature.

He turned analysing the two local heroes that were trying to flank it from opposite sides, one wearing purple and black with what looked like energy blasts coming from their fists, the other wearing green and yellow, goggles covering his eyes, seemed to be moving with enhanced speed -slow too slow to have the speedforce more of a quick silver than a flash then-, slower than the red flash wanna be from the day before.

Neither was making much of an impact.

The dragon batted the speedster aside with a casual swipe of its tail head turning towards the other ray sending hero, sending him crashing through a storefront window, or well would have if Nolan hadn't caught the person.

He set the pitifully weak hero down, setting them sending them a kind look, "Focus on evacuation and getting your friend out of the dragon's sight," he smiled, small and tight lipped, "I'll take it from here."

The hero straightened, they had quickly found their balance after stumbling once trying to find their footing, two feet planted on the ground.

They gasped when they saw him, quickly nodding, a tad frantically, at his orders, staring at Nolan with the starry eyed look he was used to be the target of -it sickened him, that human caring side, to remember younger Viltrumites looking up to him, the conqueror of hundred of worlds-, "Thank you sir, Omni-man sir," they said a tad too quickly before they turned to run off to save their friend and rejoin the evacuation effort.

Nolan stared at the green and yellow blur before he shot forwards, a blur of white and red against Hong Kong's buildings, he felt the pleasant caress of the wind against his hair at the sudden acceleration, flattening them a bit more against his scalp.

The dragon's head swivelled in his direction, a roar sounding out, near deafening Nolan, it's massive eye not yet focusing on him when his knuckles connected to it's cheekbone, the force of the impact made the bones and flesh of the creature's head ripple, buckle. A thunderclap and a cracking sound emanated from the point of impact, as if telling all how weak it was, how it's scaly skin flattened, cellular membrane rupturing, the blood filling the capillary veins of it's demurs leaving it's intended paths, colouring it's green a red tinged yellow.

The thing's neck snapped sideways, cutting off its roar as its massive legs buckled as its center of gravity shifted to the side, its four legs, it's four clawed feet losing their footing, each confused stomp making the earth rumble and the asphalt crack.

The dragon crashed to its side despite trying to use a bat of a wing trying to counter it's fall.

It resulted in the joint of its wing popping as it dislocated, a sharp, too loud disorienting roar sounded from it, making Nolan's ears ring, made him stumble, losing his grasp on his flight capabilities, gravity briefly retaking it's hold on him.

He turned spun in the air, staring at the downed dragon beneath him, did not give himself time to pity the thing, did not give himself time to consider that small voice in his head. This creature had dared attack the humans the people living in this city.

The dragon lunged at him, pushing itself off the ground with it's body, tail slamming on the ground destroying what little intact windows there were, long neck reaching up to him, maw open, fire building up in the back of it's throat.

Nolan was faster, he flew thorough the air in a horizontal 'U', building up speed and hitting it through the underside of the jaw, teeth snapped as slammed its jaws shut before flames could erupt. its head, its neck whipping back from the force of his blow. The dragon thrashed widely, turning on its back, legs slamming into a building, curling in on itself.

Nolan, Omni-man, waited a beat, a second, then appeared at its back, "I'm sorry," he mumbled as hand, fingers sunk into the base of its still intact wing.

It tried to open it, to shake the Viltrumite off, tried to stand.

But Nolan pulled.

Skin, muscle, tendons and arteries tore.

The sound was sickening as he wrenched it from its back.

Blood sprayed across the street, across the dragon's back, on Nolan chest.

The dragon shrieked, whined, the sound piercing, disorienting Nolan, messing with his inner-ear.

He let go of the wing, hand going to his ears and stumbled backward loosing his footing as the dragon streaked trying to strand back up.

Disoriented as he was Nolan jumped down to the ground- ignoring the feel of his ankle nearly giving beneath him, landing forcefully standing straight, moving his hand- fists down to his sides. He shook his head, trying to clear his vision, but another shriek sounded.

It cut through the air again, making Nolan's vision swim. He forced himself to focus, blinking away the disorientation as the creature writhed before him, blood still pumping from where its wing had been ripped out.

It lunged forward despite its injuries, survival instinct overriding pain. The ground shook with the weight of its massive body, the tremor nearly throwing Nolan off balance.

Its jaws snapped toward him, movements slower now, increasingly sluggish from blood loss. Nolan sidestepped its attack, feeling the rush of fetid air as teeth the size of his torso closed on empty space where he'd stood a heartbeat before.

He couldn't let this drag on.

Nolan shook his head.

He couldn't let this drag on.

Every second the creature could struggle, every second it remained alive, was another second it had to damage the surroundings, one more second it could potentially ruin people's lives.

Nolan shot upwards, gaining altitude, his vision still swimming a bit, then he dove straight down, aiming for the dragon's head, fists extended. He let go of his restraint, and accelerated, tension that phantom like muscle that helped him fly, propelling himself forwards nearly fast enough to breach the sound barrier.

The impact drove the dragon's head into the pavement, it's bones shattered, skin tore, the structure of it's cranium giving.

Nolan sunk into the creature, traversing it all at once, all the way through. The asphalt buckled, split under his fists, letting them lodge inched beneath the surface, hugging his forearms.

One fist was pulled from the ground gravel following it, shooting towards his face, then another.

Nolan pushed himself off the floor, fingers pressed on what remained of the asphalt, letting himself float away from the asphalt, the inside of the remains of the dragon's head visible as he slowly rose in the air.

It was slow, it was gradual, once free from the head, the hole he had made through it, he spun in the air, righting his position.

Blood dripped down from his hair to his face, to his neck, to his suit. It was red red red, red like part of his suit.

Nolan shook his head like a dog, dislodging bits of flesh from his now messy and still matted hair.

He hovered there, feet high, perhaps 2 stories up, still in the air. The sudden silence deafening, despite the still ringing sirens of emergency services.

Nolan's jaw tightened, he frowned, looking around slowly, ignoring his trembling hands.

He could have dealt with the dragon so much more quickly. Why had he hesitated? Why did he try to avoid killing it?

He looked down at his suit, his now completely red suit.

Would Debbie wash it this time also?

The thought came unbidden, unwelcome, because Nolan didn't know.

He looked back up, he could feel the eyes on him. That Fury wanna-be's eyes on him as a team of what seemed to be SHIELD like special forces in full body armor appeared out of thin air, securing the perimeter, guns pointed around the dragon, waiting, watchful.

One approached, scanning the creature.

Nolan felt an unnatural shift in the air and turned looking behind the armed team.

There, an old man, younger than he is, younger than he had been, with long white hair and a growing balding problem.

Next to him was a younger man, blond, balding, glasses wearing, perhaps forty, a crisp grey suit.

A part of Nolan told him this man, this man was dangerous, was- was something, was like Waller in DC comics. The older man with the white hair stood with military posture despite his age, while the younger held a tablet, fingers already moving across its surface.

The white-haired man stepped forward, waving off the armed personnel who immediately lowered their weapons. He looked up at Nolan with a calculating expression, one that suggested he'd seen things far stranger than a man hovering in the air covered in dragon viscera.

"Omni-Man," the older man called out, his voice -the same as the one that had called him to go to Hong Kong not an half an hour ago- carrying authority that made something bubble in Nolan's chest. "It's not your best work, You've been more efficient."

This- this made Nolan grind his teeth.

The blond man beside him, adjusted his glasses, studying Nolan with an analytical gaze that felt uncomfortably thorough. He murmured something to his apparent boss, who nodded slightly.

Nolan descended slowly, his boots touching the blood-slicked pavement with a wet sound that made his stomach turn, made him want to clean himself off. Up close, the old authoritarian seeming man's face was weathered, scarred on one side, with a severe look in his eyes.

A look that said 'I know everything and if I don't yet… I will soon'.

The man too something out of his suit's inner pocket.

"Nice work," the man continued, not looking up from lighting a cigarette despite the blood-soaked scene around them. He gestured at the dragon's corpse with the unlit cigarette. "Messy, though. Not your usual M.O." He finally looked up at Nolan, one eyebrow raised. "Something I should know about?"

Nolan's jaw tightened, teeth inter-locking.

The question, the question felt- he tightened his hands into fists, trying to stop the incoming trembling.

"The dragon is dead," Nolan says flat, flatter, deader than he had intended to, the words felt like ash in his mouth, it wasn't because he had killed it, not because of the civilians that had dies he couldn't care less about them, he did care tho, It was- it was- "The civilians are safe. That's what matters"

The old man takes a drag of his now lit cigarette, eye meeting Nolan's, "Sure. That's what matters," the old man says with smoke leaving his mouth, gesturing at the dragon's remains, "But you hesitated. Multiple times. I've got video footage, satellite footage of you playing with that thing for nearly three minutes when we both know you could have dealt with it in thirty seconds."

Nolan doesn't answer, he wanted to answer but knew, knew a growl would be all he'd vocalise in this moment, in this moment where he felt his anger self-hatred rising.

The blond man with glasses spoke up for the first time, his voice clinical, measured, "Your combat efficiency has decreased by approximately forty-seven percent over the past two days. Response times are down. Collateral damage is up." He says tapping on the screen of his tablet. "The data suggests-"

Nolan interrupted the man, he didn't like being questioned, being seen as weak, "The data suggests nothing," he said tone hard, tone harsher than he had intended. He didn't like feeling this- this fear. Something the anger he had barely forced back coiled in his chest, burning it's way out- "I neutralised it. End of story."

The old man took another long drag of his cigarette, Nolan could feel the man studying him, studying him like a ticking time bomb -But isn't that exactly what you are?

"See, that's where you're wrong, Omni-man. It's never just 'end of story' with you. You're Earth's most powerful protector. When you start acting off, when you start hesitating, when you start looking at your own hands like they don't belong to you-" Cecil gestures at Nolan's everything. And Nolan knew, knew his every movement these last two days had been studies, had been examined by this man, this man's organization, "-that becomes everybody's problem."

"I'm fine," Nolan says calmly, as calmly as he could. Tone a tad forceful.

"Exactly. So why'd you hesitate? Why'd you treat it like it did?" the old man said his scarred face stretching, pulling into a semblance of a smile.

Nolan could see the blood on his costume in his peripheral, could feel it sink into his skin, could-

A slow blink, a return to a semblance of control.

The pause stretched, Nolan keeping quiet, not reacting to the old man's words.

"Take a week," the old man said finally, crushing the cigarette beneath his heal"Get your head on straight. We'll handle things stateside."

"I don't need-"

"That wasn't a request." the old man's voice went flat, cold. "You're no good to anyone like this. Take the week. Talk to your wife. Sleep. I don't care. But figure out whatever this is, because next time, people might not be able to afford your hesitation."

The two suits turned to leave, the younger blond falling into the elder's steps, already typing something on his tablet. An account of the confrontation?

The armed personnel continued working, moving with practised efficiency, helicopters hovered up above, lines dropping slowly, ready to be secured around the corpse.

The old man paused, looking back over his shoulder. "Oh, and Nolan? Clean yourself up before you head home for dinner with your family. You look like shit"

Then they were gone, disappearing through some kind of teleportation effect that left Nolan standing alone.

Leaving Nolan to thing, to try to remember who he was supposed to be.

He looked down at himself. His white suit was completely red, saturated with blood and viscera. Steam rose from the dragon's corpse behind him. The destruction stretched out in every direction.

He wondered how many clips of this, of him hovering there, drenched head to toe in gore, trembling hands clenched at his sides, were already circulating online. How many angles had captured the moment he'd punched through the dragon's skull. How many slow-motion replays would dissect every second of his hesitation.

How many people were watching him fall apart in real-time.

Nolan took a shaky breath and rose into the air, leaving Hong Kong and its wreckage behind. The wind at altitude did nothing to clean the blood from his suit, just dried it into a stiff, cracking shell against his skin.

He didn't go home.

Instead, he flew aimlessly high above the atmosphere, further, higher than the satellites, oceans and continents under him, trying to outrun the feeling that something inside him had broken when he'd woken up the day before, trying to ignore that he didn't know how to fix it.

Trying to outrun the question that echoed in his mind with every mile:

What do I want?

By the time he finally turned toward home, the sun was setting over the American Midwest, painting the sky in shades of red that reminded him uncomfortably of the dragon's blood.

Debbie was going to ask questions, and Nolan… Nolan, he didn't have answers.

And for the first time in longer than he could remember, Nolan wasn't sure he could lie convincingly enough to make them go away.

---

She heard him before she saw him. She'd learned long ago to recognized when he was home.

The displacement of air in the backyard then the sight of him through the window above the sink, oh… him staring up at the house, a lost look on his face. His suit, the usual red and white kitchen light cast on it made it apparent to her-

Oh, Nolan what happened?

His suit was stained pink, not torn, just saturated pink, like he'd made a cursory attempt at seeming presentable, clean… and had failed.

This… lapse.

Most people wouldn't have thought much of it… wouldn't have noticed, but she'll learn to recognize over 20 years, when Nolan wasn't acting like himself.

Her Nolan was home and he was hurting.

She'd seen him hurt at times, it had happened but it was rare… and it never made him look like this. Being physically hurt always angered him, made him want to get back up and-

But this look, this hurt that couldn't be physical, was never never physical, that hurt that one shoved deeper as one tried to ignore the thing way no amount of Viltrumite invulnerability could shield one from… It was the kind of hurt she'd always known him to have, to carry, the hurt he'd always shoved deep, deep enough he could ignore it and wouldn't stare at their home like he was looking through glass.

She carefully set down the now filled kettle on it's base, soon enough the water started to bubble.

Nolan wasn't himself, hadn't been himself since yesterday.

Debbie looked at the clock. He'd arrived later than his text had promised, but that wasn't unusual. Superhero schedules were unpredictable by nature. She'd made her peace with that long ago. Her gaze returned to her husband, a tightening sensation around her heart, a heavy feeling in her stomach.

What happened Nolan?

He wasn't moving, hadn't since she'd first seen him after he landed.

It, the sight scared Debbie.

The twist in her stomach felt heavier, tighter, more present. That feeling she been… had tried to bottle up since this morning, since yesterday, yesterday night. When he'd wakened in the middle of the night, holding her in his arms as he'd cried, his arms, always so gentle, tightened around her, making it a bit harder to breathe.

But that look, the one he'd had yesterday night… He hadn't said a word, had tried to keep quiet, had cried head buried in her hair, small keening sounds leaving him, small sounds he'd tried to quiet as to not wake her…

She dried her hands on the dish towel and moved toward the window again, unable to stop herself from checking on him one more time. He was still there, standing motionless in the backyard, staring up at the house with that lost expression that made her chest ache.

This was their life.

This was what they'd built together.

She turned away, forcing herself into motion, drying her hands on a dish towel. "Mark!" she called up the stairs. "Set another plate, honey. Your father's home."

When she looked back through the window Nolan was still standing there, in their backyard, staring unmoving, like he didn't know if he was allowed to come inside. Like he was afraid of what he might bring with him.

"Nolan," she said softly, moving through the kitchen to the back door. She stood there, still for a second, observing her husband of twenty years, hand on the opening mechanism, slid it open and stepped out into the cooling evening air. "Honey?"

He blinked, his gaze finally focusing on her, eyes wider than usual. The lost look didn't leave his eyes, but something shifted in his posture, a slight straightening, like he was remembering the role he was supposed to play.

"Sorry," he said, his voice rough, lacking it's usual assuredness. "I was just-"

"Come inside," Debbie interrupted gently, sadly, worried about this big oaf. "Dinner's ready and Mark is setting the table."

He nodded, but didn't move immediately at her prompting. His eyes drifted back to the house again, to the warm light surely spilling from Mark's window, and for a moment she thought he might refuse, might turn and go fly in the high atmosphere like he usually did when emotional but not wanting to show it.

Might even tell her he couldn't do this, even unlikely as it was, maybe even tell her he couldn't sit at that table and pretend everything was fine.

So instead she decided to redirect the conversation in a way that would let him regather himself, "Rough day?"

He opened his mouth briefly before closing it and nodding, not looking at her.

"Go take a shower," Debbie said gently, a small smile on her lips as her eyes met his, reaching out to touch his hand, "Mark and I will wait for you."

He nodded, finally breaking free of whatever spell had held him frozen. As he moved past her toward the house, she caught his hand briefly, squeezing it once before letting go.

I'm here. Whatever this is, we'll figure it out together, Nolan.

A few seconds later, she heard Mark's voice from upstairs, bright and casual. "Hey Dad! Finally done saving the world?"

"For today, at least," came Nolan's muffled response, his voice carrying that same rough quality.

"Cool. Dinner smells awesome, Mom!" Mark called out as he hopped down the stairs, the soft stomp of feet hitting wood a reminder of her joy in life.

Debbie wiped her hands again, smoothing down her shirt, composing her expression into something warm and teasing, "Ready to set a plate for your father?"

Mark gave her a quick grin, already moving to grab the extra plate from the cabinet. "Yeah, yeah. I got it."

She watched him work with practised efficiency, setting Nolan's place at the head of the table where it always was, and felt that twist in her stomach tighten again. Upstairs, she could hear the shower running, the pipes humming through the walls.

Whatever was happening to her husband, whatever weight he was carrying. She'd help get him through it.

They'd weathered twenty years together, raised a son, built a life.

They could weather this too.

---

He could hear dad walking down the stairs.

Mark couldn't stop grinning as he pulled back his chair, practically bouncing on his feet. His phone was face-down on the counter where Mom had made him leave it, house rules during dinner, but he could still see it in his mind's eye.

The videos. The comments. The dragon.

His dad had taken down a dragon. In Hong Kong.

That was so cool.

And everyone was talking about it.

And why wouldn't they Mark had the best dad.

"So," Mark said a tad louder than usual wanting his dad to hear him, unable to contain himself as he slid into his chair, "Hong Kong looked pretty intense."

His Mom shot him a look from where she was bringing the serving dishes to the table, that not now look she sometimes got, but Mark was too excited to not talk. Because, come ooonnn, dragon.

"I saw the clips," he continued, facing the living room waiting for his dad to visible. "That thing was massive. Like, building-sized."he spread his arms above his head trying to really communicate the size of the thing, "And you just-" He punched the air. "Right through its skull. That was so cool."

Mark looked, like really looked, at his dad when the man was suddenly there, pulling back his own chair, his enthusiasm fell when he looked at his Dad's face, "You okay Dad?"

"Fine," Dad said, his voice flat. "Just a long day."

"Yeah, I bet." Mark couldn't help himself. "That dragon looked insane. How tough was it actually? The Reddit thread was saying its skin was probably harder than tank armor, and someone calculated that your punch speed had to be-"

"Mark." His Mom's voice was gentle but firm as she set the casserole dish down. "Let your father sit down first."

"Right, sorry." Mark grabbed the serving spoon, loading his plate. But he couldn't stop the words from tumbling out. "It's just- I mean, it's not every day you see something like that. And the way you moved, Dad, it was like you knew exactly what to do. No hesitation."

Something flickered across his father's face at that, something Mark couldn't quite read. His dad reached for the serving dish, movements careful and measured.

"There's always hesitation," Dad mumbled as he served Mom first, looking at her silently asking her if she wanted more.

Mark blinked. That wasn't the answer he'd expected. His dad never talked like that, never admitted to doubt or uncertainty. His Dad, Omni-Man didn't hesitate, never hesitated.

"But you handled it," Mark said, trying to recapture that excitement, that pride. "Everyone's saying so. You saved thousands of people."

"Did I?" He said tone neutral, controlled, so different from the look in his eyes. It had made Mark feet something cold settle in his stomach when he saw it. "Or did I just..."He clenched his jaw, frowning before continuing quieter, more sombre, "go through the motions?"

"Nolan," his Mom said softly, reaching across the table to touch his hand.

His dad blinked, seeming to snap back to himself. He nodded, setting his hand on Mom's for a short instant before picking up his fork. "Sorry. Long day, like I said."

Mark pushed his food around his plate, was this Dad's default excuse today? His earlier excitement now tempered with confusion and worry.

His dad never acted like this.

Never seemed so... hollow.

"Well," Mark said, trying to inject some levity back into the conversation, "at least I've got something cool to tell you."

Both his parents looked at him, his Mom with curiosity, his dad with what might have been relief at the change of subject.

Mark took a breath, unable to keep the grin from spreading across his face again. "So, uh... funny thing happened today at school."

His Mom tilted her head. "What kind of funny thing?"

His dad's fork stopped halfway to his mouth, a teasing look in his eyes before he smiled, a real one not like this morning. "Finally asked William out?"

"What dad? No!"

I got my ass beat by the school's jock dad!

Dad shoved the fork in his mouth, chewing thoughtfully before swallowing. "I'm just saying, you two are close. It wouldn't be a problem if-"

"I'm not gay, Dad! Why would you even think-" Mark felt his face heat up, hand covering his face.

His dad shrugged, something almost like amusement flickering in his eyes. "You two spend a lot of time together. I just thought-"

Mark slammed his fork on the table cutting Dad off. "Well, you thought wrong." Mark turned to Mom, desperate. "Mom, you don't think I'm gay too, do you?"

Mom's lips twitched, clearly trying to not smile, "Honey, I don't think anything. Don't pay attention to your father, he's just teasing you."

"Is he though?!" He exclaimed frantically glancing at his parents, his dad looked proud of himself and Mom just kept smiling at the two of them. Mark leaned against the back of his chair, crossing his arms, "William's my best friend," he insisted, "That's it. That's all it is."

He must have said it too quickly, or in a way that seemed to resemble an excuse with how Mom laughed and how Dad smirked at him.

"If you say so son." Dad said in a forcefully calm tone, wiping the smile off his face and stared at him with complete calm.

Shit.

---

Nolan was really acing that Dad thing, he though an arm around Debbie, his wife, and oh did it feel unbelievable, to finally have a person filling this role in his life, lives. To finally have a mate.

Outwardly, that was.

At least he hoped.

Teasing Mark with what little information he could remember from the Invincible show earlier had been… Nice. Natural even, it was the light teasing his own dad, his human one had subjected him to during his youth, it was the light teasing that couldn't, wouldn't have it's place on Viltrum.

Not when-… If those words had been said there… Nolan daren't think of it.

For a moment there, watching his son's -And how incredible was that? He hadn't thought he'd have one in either lives, and here he came to, one near out of Viltrumite infant-hood- face flush red, the indignant protest, the genuine embarrassment, it had felt real. Natural. Like something he'd done a thousand times before…

And yet.

Nolan couldn't remember any of it…

The problem hadn't gone away. It still sat there in his chest. Like a stone, a rock, one so big nature itself had yet to find a way to move it, that disconnect between what he should know and what he did know, was still there.

But for those few minutes, watching Mark squirm, he'd been able to pretend it didn't matter.

Pretend that he was an amalgam of both his lives, one that had found peace, one that was no longer so… empty. Void of purpose, of anything other than to continue surviving living.

A blink.

A recalibration.

Analysing, recalculating, shoving that thought process down, down down.

They were on the couch, him, Debbie, Mark. The three of them. His family. One he knew he loved without having ever learned to. One he was proud of without the recollection as to why. One he wanted, desperately wanted to see survive and flourish, to watch grow and thrive, to be at their sides living in the moment, unburdened by that terrible, devastating knowledge that they would die all too soon.

One he would one day have to let go.

His eyes burned.

His eyes remained dry.

It was inevitable, inescapable…

One day.

He would be alone again.

More alone than he was in this moment, far from all he knew, close to those that knew a part of himself that remained a stranger to him.

A blink, eyes refocusing on the screen.

Mark had picked the movie, some animated thing about a superhero dog, one he vaguely remembered from the show he watched in that other world.

As if prompted by this knew knowledge, by this new stimuli, the knowledge of that barely remembered show's arcs came to the fore of his mind. It came fragmented and disjointed, the quality different for each piece, like old medieval stained glass, the lead holding them together having already succumbed to gravity.

He had forgotten so much, had expected to really, it had been a show like any others one he'd slowly forget and he had. Even now he could barely recall more than a few scenes, more than him beating his child, Mark, his son so much so so much

too much like how his own parents had done with him, too much too inhuman.

It pained Nolan to recall that, to know that this had happened, would perhaps happen.

He recalled a small purple child, one his counterpart had had with a bug like being, one that was more insectoid than that population that seemed to have its eyes on earth.

Nolan knew what would happens to that child if it were to ever exist if Viltrum ever found out Nolan hadn't respected Viltrum's reproduction directives on top of-

Deserting his post…

A blink, a breathe, a glance shot at Debbie, at his mate.

Something heavy pooled down in his stomach, a heat blossomed in his chest, it was searing it burned it hurt.

Every breathe felt painful.

Nolan stopped breathing.

But it didn't stop the pain.

Nolan couldn't desert his post.

Nolan was loyal to his empire of provenance.

Nolan…

Nolan-

Nolan was lying to himself.

Nolan couldn't-

His eyes refocused on the screen. Back on the animated movie Mark had chosen, back on the room, back on his mate, his child, these beings the mere thought of hurting hurt deep in his chest despite the void memories where his memories of them should be.

Eyes following the dancing images, the bright colours, the rounded animation.

He smiled when Debbie looked at him, he kissed her crown.

Nolan let himself lean on her the tiniest bit.

Nolan didn't let himself breathe.

___
A/N:
If this story tickled your brain, you're welcome to leave a comment (I'd love if it's some type of constructive critisism) that challenges my persepctive on what I wrote /(°w°)/!!!

 

[Savinkov]

Text color is fucked

 

[Boing]

Text color is fucked

Click to shrink...

alright, I think I fixed it :3

 

[Savinkov]

alright, I think I fixed it :3

Click to shrink...

No.

 

[Boing]

No.

Click to shrink...

OoO then idk how to fix it

 

[Boing]

Text color is fucked

Click to shrink...

fixed now

 

[Lillie Jones]

Thanks for the chapter
Continue on
Cheers!

 

[MorbiIIionaire]

You got this Nolan., youre prolly gonna need to get stronger if you are going to fight Thragg thou lol.

 

[Boing]

CHAPTER 2

"Don't fall, uwaaa," a voice pierced through Nolan's sleep - distant, muffled, trying to be quiet. The pure blood Viltrumite's eyes snapped open, his sensitive hearing, his training already making him parse through all sounds he could hear. The voice sounded juvenile, not in the way a child did but in that the being, male, had not yet passed their second decade be they human or Viltrumite.

Nolan slid out of bed, silent careful to not disturb his wife. The voice was familiar, not familiar in that he knew that voice, but rather that he knew it, had subconsciously categorized it as important. Like something primal had been struck-

Mark?

The name, the question came to mind even as his body moved on autopilot, following human instincts from that short, too short life where he hadn't been Nolan, where he had been human, a life where the concept of being immortal only brought bad jokes to the fore of his mind. Instincts of that short, sad pathetic husk of a human man driven by logic and a distaste for suicide. His hands found the panel, sliding it upwards before letting himself hover, stare for a second remembering who, what he was here. Not the monster in his memories, not the one that followed cruel orders, culled populations-

A blink, a breath.

The beat of his heart calmed.

He opened the window, the panel sliding upwards, the chill of the night air not as biting as he expected, not as and flew outside. He was greeted by laughter as he closed the window behind him.

The wind blew, temporarily deafening the sound of-

Laughter.

Pure, unbridled, joyous laughter that made the stone in his chest crack just a little bit more.

And then he saw him.

His son. Flying.

Mark's form was silhouetted against the moon, bathed in silver and distant artificial yellow light that seemed to emphasize his youth, his humanity, his vulnerability even as he defied gravity itself in that awkward, clumsy way only new fliers had.

Mark's form was silhouetted against the moon, bathed in silver light that seemed to emphasize his youth, his humanity, his vulnerability even as he defied gravity itself. The boy, his boy- his son - when had Nolan started thinking of him as a boy instead of a hybrid, a half-breed, a tactical asset? Had he ever seen the boy as one? Perhaps in the beginning… Nolan didn't know, wouldn't for a while if ever. Nolan hadn't been feeling like himself, not since he woke on this planet, in this country in that house, since he got that pathetic human's memories- Stop circling over the issue, Nolan-

Nolan.

Nolan-

Nol-

Mark wobbled, - Nolan's eyes widened, his body tensed, readying himself to catch Mark - through the air with all the grace of a newborn fawn learning to walk after being born.

It was cute.

It was awkward.

Nolan relaxed.

It send pride in his chest.

Fear in his veins, chilling his blood.

Nolan watched, watched as his son, this being that was half-him, half Nolan. How wondrous, never in the last thousand years had he thought he'd ever make the choice to have an offspring. An heir.

Nolan watched, partially hidden from his son.

Nolan remained suspended in the air, chill caressing his skin through cotton sleeping garments, instinctively positioning himself far enough back that Mark wouldn't notice his presence, but close enough that he could intervene if his son's inexperience led to a fall. The calculation was automatic, born of something, something inherently paternal he'd never imagine having, had never thought a Viltrumite could feel, perhaps it came from that human life? Nolan couldn't tell, wasn't sure there was a difference anymore.

Human. Viltrumite.

Mark is flying.

The thought, the miracle and disaster of a thought reverberated through him like a shockwave, carrying implications that cascaded through his mind faster than he could process them. His son had manifested his powers. His Viltrumite heritage had expressed itself, had proven dominant enough to overcome the human genetic material, had transformed Mark from a fragile mortal into something more.

Exhale.

Nolan…

Nolan-

A blink and he found himself retreating.

Something so uncharacteristic for Nolan, Nolan blinked, a scene appearing in his vision.

Of being in Mark's place, smiling at his father, pride in his small chest. Warmth for a being he didn't remember the face of. A being he knew was important. A being he knew he had to make proud-

A being that he logically knew was not someone he'd known after-

The phantom feeling of harsh hands gripping his arms, him fighting "Mom! Dad!" "Nolan! No-!"

"Take- …" "Yes son." "Ar-" "Yes sir."

A blink, the blurry cloudy scenes disappeared.

Nolan clenched his jaw.

His eyes turned back to the young flier.

Mark.

Mark's flight was clumsy, unpractised. He dipped too low, then over-corrected, shooting upward with a yelp that became more laughter. The sound carried across the night, unburdened by the weight Nolan carried, by the knowledge of what those powers meant.

What they would mean to Viltrum.

What not having them meant-

Nolan's hands clenched at his sides. In the show, in that other world where all of this had been fiction, Mark's powers had been the catalyst, had appeared in the first episode.

Here too they were the beginning of the end of this peaceful lie Nolan had been hoping he'd live.

His counterpart had used it as an excuse, hadn't he? To finally begin the conquest. To stop pretending.

Would Nolan do the same?

Could he?

The questions felt hollow because he already knew he didn't want to. That realization should have terrified him, it was treasonous, it went against everything he'd been taught, conditioned to believe, bred for- but instead it just made him tired.

So very tired.

And angry.

It felt like fire in Nolan's veins.

Mark looped through the air again, this time managing a complete barrel roll before losing control and tumbling briefly. He caught himself, righting his position with visible effort, and pumped his fist in triumph.

Nolan found himself smiling despite everything.

Eighteen years.

That's how long he'd been here, the least possible time he'd spent on this pitiful rock. Eighteen years of pretending, of playing house, of being Omni-Man instead of a Viltrumite conqueror- Eighteen years Nolan couldn't remember.

The wind shifted, carrying Mark's voice clearer now. He was talking to himself, giving himself instructions, encouragement. "Okay, okay, just like Dad described. Lean into it. Don't think about falling, think about where you want to go-"

Nolan's breath caught.

Like Dad described.

When had he taught Mark about flying? He must have, at some point, in preparation for this moment. But the memory wasn't there, just another void where something precious should have been, something precious he only felt the echos of.

No it had to simply have been him answering a child's questions, his son's.

Another piece of his son's life that existed only as absence, or perhaps not absence but as a shadow casted on the wall Nolan couldn't but face. His only medium to the forgotten part of the life he must have lived.

He could see Mark getting more confident now, his movements smoother. His boy flew in wide circles, testing his speed, his control. Still wobbly but less than before by a small yet no less consequent margin.

The joy, the happiness, the wonder that permeated his movements was palpable, infectious.

And temporary.

Because Nolan knew what came next, or rather what could come next. The training. The gradual revelation of what Mark was, what he, Nolan was on Earth for. The moment when Mark would have to choose between the empire in his blood and the planet he'd called home.

The moment when Nolan would have to choose what role he would play in that decision.

Conqueror.

Or father.

Nolan's son had gained his powers.

The thought, unbidden as it was, should have filled him with pride, and it did, truly did, somewhere beneath the layers of confusion and displacement and fear and conflict-. His son had manifested his powers.

Around the same time his other universe's show's counterpart of the child had.

Seventeen.

Watching Mark wobble through the air, laughing with pure, unfiltered joy, Nolan felt that stone - that weight of knowledge of consequences and choice - in his chest grow heavier.

Denser.

More crushing.

This changes everything.

Because it did, this moment. This manifestation of Mark's Viltrumite powers. It meant Nolan did not have much time left before things changed.

It meant this existence, this lie he was still learning he'd woven , was still pretending he knew-

The board will change, and Nolan-

Nolan-

This changes nothing.

The thought came unbidden, desperate, a lie he wanted so badly to believe it hurt. Because in another sense, it changed nothing at all. Mark was still Mark. Debbie was still Debbie. This family, this life, this bizarre domestic existence that felt simultaneously foreign, and pathetic - and disgraceful for a Viltrumite of his stature. Oh stop lying to yourself - and precious - it was all still here, still real, still his even if he couldn't remember claiming it, making it.

The only thing that had changed was the timer.

The countdown.

The inevitable march toward a reckoning Nolan could feel approaching like a freight train in the distance, growing louder with each passing moment, unstoppable and catastrophic.

He hung there in the night sky, suspended between two worlds, two lives, two versions of himself that couldn't seem to reconcile.

Watching his son fly. Watching him laugh. Watching him experience pure joy in a moment that should have been simple and perfect and uncomplicated.

Knowing it couldn't last.

Because it hadn't lasted for Nolan.

Mark having his powers meant his son, this child with a part of him that yearned to help others, humans. The weak. A part of the boy, Nolan should know as his father, a part he only knew through another life he simultaneously felt he'd lived yet not, one in another world, through hazy memories of an animated series, a fictional series.

One made to entertain.

Something, someone, a higher being had brought Nolan here, something wanted him to doubt Viltrumite superiority, and Nolan, Nolan Nolan-

Nolan watched Mark attempt a landing on a nearby rooftop, overshooting it by several feet and having to circle back.

This boy, his son, was laughing at his own mistake, completely unaware of his father's presence, of the weight of worlds pressing down on this single perfect moment.

Tainting it.

Darkening it.

Nolan stayed back, hidden in shadow and distance.

Paralysed.

Let Mark have this. Let him have tonight, this discovery, this pure uncomplicated joy before everything would become complicated.

Before Nolan made it so.

Before Nolan figured out who he was. Before Nolan figured out how weak he was. Before Nolan realized he'd gone native.

A blink.

A held breath.

Thoughts near deafening as he watched, surveyed, no don't say that like your son is a mission Nolan- Everything I do is for Viltrum. He was loyal to Viltrum. He was loyal to humanity. To the idea of it. Nolan was a Viltrumite.

Nolan hung there, in the air, uselessly. Likely observed by the Shield wannabes. His every move documented. Analysed.

His fist clenched.

His brow furrowed.

Nolan was battling himself. Nolan hated himself. This weak part that just wanted to lay down, abandon the mission Viltrum had given him. Hated that part that wanted to go to Viltrum and destroy that which he served for millennia. That part of him that was weak, human, pathetic.

He didn't want to do this.

Didn't want to be the conqueror, the harbinger, the destroyer of worlds.

Nolan huffed at the thought, half remembered comics of another life lived coming to mind. "Galaxus, Darkseid, Brainiac," and so many others.

Nolan's eyes fell on the garden, on the tiled parts of the backyard, to the kitchen then back to the room he shared with Debbie. He didn't want to look at his son, didn't want to look and see a weapon, a Viltrumite that had yet to be forged. Didn't want to look at his wife, his mate a woman he adored and was curious to find out why he did, and see a temporary distraction from his true purpose.

The mission that had sent him here.

Nolan didn't want to look at this planet, this planet he called home yet not and yet still saw as just a resource to be claimed.

He wanted, God, what did Nolan want?

His son's flight was clumsy still, unpractised as he learned to fly, he shot upwards, up to the atmosphere, laughing all the while. It sounded like small bells muted by distance even as Nolan watched his son become a mere pinprick in the distance. It was unburdened, unburdened by the weight Nolan felt on his shoulders.

The Viltrumite's jaw clenched.

When he'd first witnessed this moment, in that other life, with that distance you could only have with a character you were persuaded was mere fiction, it had felt like a catalyst.

And now Nolan felt the same. This was a catalyst. What would start everything. Had his counterpart welcomed this moment, this growth? Or had he felt as if he too did not have much time left? With the eyes of Viltrum on him as they no doubt were on Nolan in this world.

It felt like a weight.

A punishment for something Nolan had yet had not done.

The moment Mark became Invisible…

He shook his head.

Fingers somehow ending up tangled in his hair as he looked over his son worriedly.

Stomach twisting with nervousness.

He gulped.

It hurt.

Had that other Nolan seen the apparition of Mark's powers as permission to finally drop the pretence, was it a pretence?, to stop playing human and return to what he was?

Is that what I'm supposed to do?

His eyes remained fixed on the dot the was his son, zooming through the air. Unknowing, ignorant of what layed ahead- that his father, the father that couldn't remember raising him.

Nolan was a fraud.

Is that what I want to do?

The questions felt wrong even as they formed.

Hollow.

Because somewhere beneath two thousand years of service- beneath millennia of absolute certainty that strength was everything, that conquest was purpose, that loyalty to the empire was the only truth that mattered-

Somewhere beneath all that, he already knew the answer.

He didn't want to.

The realization sat in his chest like lead. Heavy. Undeniable. Treasonous.

It should have terrified him.

Should have triggered every alarm system drilled into him through centuries of loyal service, through cullings and strength assessments and the constant brutal winnowing that defined Viltrumite culture. Weakness was death. Hesitation was failure. Doubt was-

But all he felt was tired.

So very, very tired.

Mark executed another loop, this one smoother than the last. His control was improving by the minute.

Natural talent combining with Viltrumite physiology. He'd be combat-capable within weeks. Within months, he'd be formidable.

A perfect soldier.

The thought made something in Nolan's throat close.

He watched his son laugh, pure, unburdened, joyous, and he felt the weight of what he had to do pressing down on him. Multiple timelines, multiple possibilities, all converging on this single point in space and time.

"Am I Atlas, holding up the sky?-"

Mark flying. Nolan watching. The moment before everything changed.

Or didn't change.

Because Nolan didn't know. Couldn't know. Didn't remember the last eighteen years, couldn't access whatever decisions his past self had made, whatever path he'd chosen or been forced down. All he had were impressions. Feelings. The ghost of love for a family he couldn't remember building.

And fragments of a show that might or might not be his future.

Mark attempted a sharp turn, overcorrected, windmilled briefly before catching himself. He whooped in triumph at the recovery, completely unaware he was being observed. Completely unaware of the war he would be forced to join in the future.

Viltrum will expect a report.

The thought came automatic, instinctive. A thousand and eight hundred years of protocol and service asserting itself.

Mission updates.

Status reports.

Confirmation of genetic compatibility.

Proof of concept for the re-population initiative.

Had his past self chosen to hide his son from an empire that would see him only as a resource to be utilized.

Why? Why not?

The questions echoed through the void where his memories should have been. Why would a loyal Viltrumite warrior, after a near two millennia of faithful service, suddenly decide to conceal critical mission data?

What had changed?

What had broken?

Had earth's culture done this to him?

Had he gone Native?

He did-

Nolan's hands clenched into fists at his sides. His Viltrumite physiology meant the gesture was meaningless. Nolan could shatter mountains with these hands, what did tightening his grip on empty air accomplish? But the human part of him, the one that had lived 7 decades on that other earth, the part that remembered being seventy-five and dying alone in a one-bedroom apartment, the part that understood futility and helplessness and lonely-

Loneliness-

Hands on him, pulling him away, "Father!" hand extended towards a figure wearing white a metallic- a sword piercing his chest, blood covering it "Nolan!" "Mother"

"Cease this weakness Nolan. You don't want to end up like them." "It was just a nightmare-" "don't be weak" "I won't."

"good. us orphans have to stay together." "We can't use that word Jord." cutting the elder boy off, the fabric at his waist whipping through the air as he turned to snap at the other orphan "You can." "I can't." He snarled "You're a full blooded Viltrumite Nolan. That has to mean something." Green eyes staring at his, full of misplaces conviction. 'It doesn't, Jord'

An illusion of control.

Mark was climbing higher now, testing his altitude limits. The boy's laughter had faded to concentration as he pushed himself further, faster. Learning his capabilities through trial and error, hoping not to fail, hoping you won't be seen in a moment of weakness, the way all young Viltrumites did.

The way Nolan must have, though he couldn't remember that either.

Two thousand years.

The number kept surfacing, kept demanding acknowledgement. Two thousand years of being Viltrumite, of living and breathing and being the empire. Two thousand years of identity, of purpose, of absolute certainty about his place in the universe.

How could eighteen years seventy-five compete with that?

How could Seventy five years of memories as a human competed with that?

How could this brief flickering moment of domesticity - this pretence, this lie - possibly outweigh millennia of who Nolan was?

It shouldn't be possible.

It wasn't possible.

And yet.

And yet here he was, hanging suspended in the night sky above his suburban home, watching his son fly for the first time, and feeling his chest crack open with something that had no name in Viltrumite language because Viltrumites weren't supposed to feel this-

This terror of losing something precious.

Of losing what because your reason to live.

This desperate, clawing need to protect rather than conquer.

This absolute certainty that if he had to choose-

Empire or family, Viltrum or Earth, conquest or this-

He didn't know what he would choose.

He had to choose.

Mark started descending, his movements showing fatigue now. The boy had been flying for nearly an hour, impressive for a first attempt, but he'd need to build his endurance. Would need training. Guidance. Would need his father to teach him how to use these abilities properly.

Would need Nolan to prepare him for what came next.

The thought settled like ice in his veins.

What does come next?

Nolan didn't know. Couldn't know. The show had been entertainment, fiction, a narrative constructed for dramatic effect.

This was real.

His son was real.

His family was real.

The choices he made would have real consequences that couldn't be undone by narrative convenience or plot armor.

Mark landed - rough, stumbling, but successful - on their back lawn. The boy stood there for a moment, staring at his own hands with wonder, before letting out a quiet laugh of disbelief.

Then he looked up.

Nolan froze.

For one unending moment, he thought Mark had seen him. That his son's gaze had pierced through the darkness and distance to find his father watching from above. That the pretence was over, that he'd have to explain-

But Mark was looking at the stars.

Not at Nolan. At the sky beyond. At the infinite expanse of space that held Viltrum somewhere in its depths. At possibilities Mark couldn't begin to imagine and futures Nolan desperately wished he could prevent.

His son looked hopeful.

It made something in Nolan's chest compress so violently he thought his sternum might crack.

Mark stood there for another long moment, then turned and flew, clumsily but deliberately back toward his bedroom window. Back to his normal life, his human life, the life he'd built without knowing what he truly was.

Let him have this, Nolan thought desperately. Let him have tonight. Let him have tomorrow. Let him have as much time as possible before-

Before what?

Before Nolan had to make a choice he couldn't unmake?

Before Viltrum came calling?

Nolan didn't move.

Couldn't move.

Hung there in the sky like a satellite in decaying orbit, pulled between competing gravities that would eventually tear him apart.

His son disappeared through the bedroom window.

The night was quiet again.

And Nolan remained suspended between earth and stars, between duty and devotion, between what he was supposed to be and what he was desperately, impossibly becoming.

Still watching.

Still unable to look away.

Still not breathing.

__

"Did a fly land in your coffee or what?"

Nolan's head snapped up, blinking at his son in confusion. "No." He managed after a second.

"Could have fooled me," his son continued dropping on a chair like a sac of potatoes, elbow on the table holding his head up with his hand he yawned.

"You should cover your mouth or you'll be the one eating flies, Marc."

"Ha. Ha. Very funny Dad."

"You're father is right," clink a plate of pancakes is places in front of Marc by Debbie, "Now eat while it's hot, you'll need the energy for school." She pat him on the back, rubbing him back and forth on the shoulder before leaning back on the counter sipping her cup of coffee she picked up from the table, sending Nolan a small smile.

Marc mumbled something before eating a few bites then fell face first in his plate making Nolan pause, widening his eyes, watching his son for a second, then two.

"Uhm. I'll make him a cup of coffee."

Nolan pours a cup in a clean cup he takes out of the cupboard.

"you have school Marc." Nolan said after placing the steaming cup next to his son's head.

"oh, let him sleep Nolan, he's gonna need it." Debbie said

"fine." Nolan says returning to his chair.

minutes passed.

"You know," Debbie started, she had that particular tone that felt like a trap, "Cecile called."

Who?

"And what did he say?"

"That you're on vacation."

"Am I really?" Nolan said something worming it's way in his voice, it felt like the ash that settled after a world was conquered. His voice had been flat, measured in a way that made things sound like facts.

His wife set down her coffee cup, ceramic meeting the counter with a soft click that managed to sound deafening to Nolan's viltrumite senses. "Cecil seemed to think so-" she paused, searching for the right words, "He said you needed a breather. That you'd been stressed-" Nolan's gaze meets her eyes, "-lately."

He stared at her for a beat, then back down at his coffee, not making a sound before seemingly coming back to life and taking a small sip from his mug. He set it on the counter before picking up his cutlery, "Thank you for the breakfast dear."

"You don't sound happy," oh no, Nolan thought hearing the tone the words were said in, she sounds worried.

A soft grunt left his son's lips, making the pure blooded viltrumite look at his progeny as the boy shifted, cheek raising from the plate full of food to be laid on his arm.

"Nolan, most people are glad to get time off-"

"I'm not most people Debbie-"

"-And I'd be glad to go to France, eat at that nice restaurant you told me about." His mate finished, making the man pause.

"I-" He near spluttered, "We…" He slid the chair back, standing up, "Could do that."

Debbie's expression softened, a smile pulling at the corners of her mouth. "Really?"

"Really," Nolan confirmed, though something in his chest tightened at the hope in her eyes, at how easy it was to make her happy with such a small promise.

Small promises… Wasn't that what a human life was made of? Tiny accumulated moments of affection and commitment, stacking like sediment into something they called meaning. Birthday dinners and school pickups. Coffee shared over breakfast tables.

Trips to France.
Nolan smiled, leaning forwards. Debbie as if reading his mind rose to her tiptoes meeting him halfway, lips pressing against lips, soft, compassionate, loving.

When they parted, Debbie was smiling - a genuine, unguarded upturn of the lips that managed to make butterflies flutter in Nolan's stomach, making him feel as if he were letting himself free-fall towards a planet's crust, pulled by gravity. She touched his cheek, thumb caressing his cheekbone softly before returning to her coffee.

That brief touch, that small contact…

Felt like waking up.

Felt like forgetting his anxieties for the briefest moment, made him forget his situation, his dilemma.

It felt like making a choice.

To his surprise, as Nolan sat back in his chair, pulling it to the table, he found himself smiling, a genuine smile that felt like peace, mind quiet, unbothered by that impossibly corrosive divisiveness he'd been feeling the day before.

Mark stirred again, lifting his head slightly, pancake residue stuck to his cheek. The boy blinked groggily, reached for the coffee cup without really looking, and took a long sip before his face contorted.

"Ugh, still hot," he mumbled, setting it down.

"That's generally how coffee works," Nolan said, the automatic response coming easier than the spiralling thoughts.

Mark managed a weak glare before his head drooped again, though he at least kept it hovering above the plate this time.

"Late night?" Debbie asked, amused.

"Couldn't sleep," Mark said through another yawn.

Nolan's fingers tightened imperceptibly around his fork, the peace momentously shattered. Because you were flying. Because your powers finally manifested. Because you're becoming what I am, whether you understand what that means or not.

"Stressed by exams?" Nolan asked, "You know you're at an age where the grade you get define how you'll live the next couple of years of your life."

Mark's expression shifted slightly, becoming more guarded. "Yeah, something like that." He took another careful sip of coffee, eyes not quite meeting his father's.

"Mark, it's just to say…" Nolan's gaze rose from the table, "I know how it feels to hide how afraid you are of failing," being in line with other children, being assessed, those around him falling because they were too much of a failure to be considered redeemable, of having to stare forwards, hide the relief the boy felt as the boy was directed towards those with most potential, carefully not thinking about the boy once named Jord laying dead on the ground immobile a fourth of his head missing, blood, pieces of his skull and brain matter splayed on the smooth ground in a macabre continuation of the line his dead body made on the ground. "It's just to say…"

The lines had been straight. That's what he remembered most clearly. Perfectly straight lines of children - three-quarters Viltrumite, seven-eighths, fifteen-sixteenths, the fractions that supposedly mattered - standing in the training grounds under a sun that felt too bright, too hot with even with his still nascent powers.

Numbers had been called.

Forty-seven had cried. Nolan remembered that because it was the only sound in the silence, this wet desperate thing that made the instructors' faces twist with something like disgust. Forty-seven hadn't been fast enough in the strength trials and had known it. Weak.

Resources were finite. That's what they'd been told. Resources were for those who could become*.*

Forty-seven hadn't become.

"…that it's natural," Nolan continued, his voice steady even as his mind wasn't, even as he saw Jord's skull the wet crack sounded in his ears, deafening, final like it had been- "to feel pressure."

Eighty-three had been stronger. Had almost made it through the trials. Nolan had trained next to eighty-three for months. The boy had been quiet, focused, desperate in a way that felt familiar.

But almost wasn't enough.

The ground had been smooth where they'd stood. Smooth and easy to clean. Efficient. Everything on Viltrum was efficient.

"School's important," Nolan said, and part of him was there at the breakfast table with his son, with his wife's warmth still lingering on his cheek, and part of him was staring at that smooth ground, at the way blood looked almost artistic when it spread across polished stone, at how quickly the bodies were removed so the next group could be assessed… a part of him that small human part remembered school years fondly.

One hundred and twelve.

112.

Nolan's trainee number.

He'd passed. Had shown strength, speed his pureblooded blood granted him, had demonstrated the right level of brutality when ordered to demonstrate combat proficiency against ninety-six, who hadn't been fast enough to block.

Ninety-six had still been breathing after. For a few minutes.

No one had helped ninety-six.

"But it's not everything," Nolan finished, and his hand was steady on his fork, and his face was calm, and somewhere deep in his chest something felt like it was fracturing along old fault lines that had never properly healed.

Mark was looking at him with an expression Nolan couldn't quite read. Debbie had gone still by the counter.

"Dad?" Mark said quietly. "Are you okay?"

The line had been straight. The children had been resources. The weak had been discarded.

That was just how things were.

"Of course I am," Nolan said, and managed something approximating a smile. "Just… I want you to know that failure isn't the end of the world. Not with me."

Except on Viltrum, it had been exactly that.

You have the choice to be weak, son, he didn't say expression softening as he saw Mark and Debbie's worried faces.

__

The rest of breakfast had passed in a comfortable manner. Debbie asked Mark the day to come - what classes he had, whether he had a shift at that fast food place in the evening, if William was driving him to school.

Once the boy left, the clink of keys as he swapped them from the key-holder before slipping them in his pocket, Debbie turned to Nolan. Her expression shifting from maternal warmth to something more worried, searching.

"What was this earlier?" she asked.

"Nothing." Nolan said, reaching for his empty mug, he didn't have much hope of his response reassuring his human wife. Nolan had a feeling he'd need coffee for the conversation he was about to have.

"Nolan." Her tone was confirmation enough that this feeling was correct. Did Nolan have precognitive abiliti- "You know that doesn't work with me."

He set the cup back down on the counter, staring at the dried coffee stains in it. He considered deflecting again, maybe make a joke, talking about that French restaurant she'd brought up earlier. But his mate was watching him, waiting.

And maybe it was that human part of his soul that seecked to tell her something, anything. Let himself be weak.

Just this once…

With someone he trusted.

Debbie didn't deserve to be lied to. She deserved a good husband. A good father to her son, their son. Nolan's son.

"My childhood was…" he started, then paused, choosing words carefully. "Rough. You know I was raised in a-" He paused momentarily unable to think of the words to describe the environment he'd grown in. Viltrumite and human upbringings clashing, "strict- environment…" He trailed off.

Debbie's brow furrowed slightly, skin wrinkling above her nose. God was she beautiful. "You've always talked positively about Viltrum… Like it was perfect."

Nolan's jaw tightened, the sound of teeth scraping against each-other a reminder to loosen it, to calm himself. The suction like sound that echoed as he opened his mouth to talk made him pause. Anywhere is a utopia if you grow up being told it is, came from that small, buried part of him that had learned human history, had learned what tyrannises where like, had seen some come to life and fall be it first hand or through second or even third hand testimonies.

"It was- is," he said automatically. "Viltrum is… advanced. Peaceful. But when one grows up where I did. When one grows up- in an orphanage…" His gaze dropped to the floor as he admits this painful truth, knowing what it would sound like to a human that lived on earth in the United States of America, his voice quietened, "There were expectations, expectations that met every single time. And those who didn't meed them were simply-," He shook his head, eyes meeting Debbie's black ones, Let's not think about what didn't happen to me, he thought as he finished.

"Nolan," Debbie started, coming closer, warm had coming to his cheek, "what happened if you didn't meet these expectations?"

Her question rendered him mute, stealing his voice.

What did it mean to not meet expectations.

Flashes of red interspersed with dark strands of varying length filled his vision.

"They simply failed the program Debbie," he caressed the back of her hand, "It's just like on… earth, yes Earth. here if you fail a program, it doesn't mean much more than that."

"Nolan," she said face falling, "Yeobo, please don't lie to me. I know things were different on Viltrum, and I know there are some things you don't want to say, things you think I won't understand. I know you don't tell me things because you think I won't be able to help, but sometimes talking about it is all you need." Her fingers traced his jaw, her tough gentle, fleeting, as if she was ready to pull away, "If you don't want to talk about it it's fine, we're married Nolan, we're supposed to help each-other… and seeing you like this-" She pulls away, although he didn't let go of the weak hold he had on her hand, nor did she attempt to shake it off, "It's painful to see you like this."

Nolan's throat tightened. The words turned to dust just as quickly as they came to him, their residue pressing against the back of his teeth like ghosts, like they needed to be heard despite being no more.

Weakness is death. Vulnerability is failure. Emotions are liabilities. They all share something in common, 'they have no place in a Viltrumite's life'.

Nolan's throat tightened. The words caught there, sharp and jagged like broken glass. How do you explain that children died so you could live? How do you make that sound like anything other than what it was?

"Failure required punishment, Debbie." The admission came out rough, scraped raw. "They were... removed. From the program. From-" From existence. From mattering.

He saw her expression shift, saw the horror beginning to dawn, and something in him lurched forward desperately, trying to catch the words before they could fully land, trying to reshape them into something more palatable, more justifiable.

"It had to be that way," he said quickly, grip tightening on her hand, his other clenching into a fist. "You have to understand, Debbie. Resources were limited. The population had been decimated by the Scourge Virus; they couldn't afford to waste time and energy on those who wouldn't contribute, who couldn't become strong enough to help rebuild civilization." He said firmly, each word adding weight to his heart, making it the harder to breath unencumbered.

His mouth was filled with the taste of ash.

Debbie pulled her hand free, and whatever it was, whatever resided in the deepest part of his mind, that dark savage thing burned as it broke out, the world around him narrowed.

"Every child who passed the trials went on to become a guardian of peace. A protector. We've brought order to hundreds of worlds, saved billions of lives across the galaxy." His voice gained strength, conviction borrowed from centuries of repetition, centuries of service, of justification. "What we went through - what they went through - it made the survivors, it made us strong enough to prevent wars, to stop suffering on a scale you can't imagine."

If it wasn't necessary, then Jord died for nothing. Forty-seven died for nothing. Ninety-six bled out for nothing.

All these dead children he'd never let himself learn the names of.

If it wasn't the only way, then what does that make Nolan?

"The alternative would have been worse," Nolan continued, and he wasn't sure anymore if he was talking to Debbie or to himself. "Chaos. Weakness spreading through the population like a disease. Complete societal collapse." His voice wavered slightly, he'd long been unable to look her in the eyes. "These events taught us to be strong. That to be strong was the only way forward."

Debbie's face had gone pale, but Nolan pressed on, desperate now.

He took a step back, took a deep breath in an attempt to calm himself, let his hand go up in front of him in that supplicating posture he hated, in a bizarre, weak, half-hearted attempt at making her understand, "I know it sounds harsh by Earth standards." He started gentler, softer. "I know your species does things differently. But Viltrum brought peace to countless worlds. We've eliminated war, poverty, disease across entire sectors of space. Doesn't that justify-" He stopped, the question hanging incomplete because he couldn't bring himself to finish it, to try to convin-

Doesn't that justify anything? Everything?

Doesn't that mean it was worth it?

Doesn't that mean I don't have to feel sick when I remember the way the blood looked on that smooth ground?

-to convince his wife, his mate, the mother of his child, of something he didn't fully believe, of something he tried to continue to believe because it was the easy thing to do. The weak thing to do.

Nolan took another step back, then another, letting himself stumble back, letting himself fall backwards onto the floor. Staring at his feet, carefully avoiding to look at his hands.

The kitchen floor tiles were cold, cold in that soft gentle way he'd rarely known in his life as a human, cold in a way that felt like air. If it weren't for the pressure of his skin giving under his weight, of his fingers as they toughed tile, he would doubt their existence.

He couldn't breathe.

He didn't let himself breathe.

The blanket of distance, of numbness surrounded him, filtering the world around him. It felt slower, lesser, his awareness more sluggish, more awkward.

Debbie was speaking to him, her tone was worried, concerned, fearful - had he scared her? Nolan didn't want that. He watched as she knelt next to him, watched as she brought a hand to the side of his face. Watched concerned as she continued to talk to him. He tried to tell her something, to not worry, tell her he hear her words but only that they slipped from awareness the second a new one arrived. Tried to tell her his diaphragm would simply not move.

Tell her he wasn't really her husband, tell her he was barely the man she first met. Tell her he was 75 and 2000 and he didn't remember arriving to earth, didn't remember being assigned this planet, didn't remember falling in love with her but felt it all the same, didn't remember this family and yet fell apart the moment he realized the feelings he felt for them. Tell her he-

Weak.

Was Nolan shaking? When had that started?

Nolan looked at Debbie, she had a phone in her hand, to her ear. Who was she calling?

Nolan brought his hands up, let them be held by Debbie's, stared at them - these hands that had torn through starship hulls, that had reshaped continents, that had ended wars with their strength, and watched them tremble like leaves in a storm.

He couldn't make them stop. He couldn't make anything stop.

The world spun around him, he pressed his back further into the island's cabinet,heard the crack as the handle and wood gave under his strength.

His eyes widened as he froze in place.

Every attempted breath felt like something attempting to suction his chest.

His nose itched, tingled, burned.

He tried to pull his hands from Debbie's.

He sneezed, his violent movement an involuntary convulsion that sent him curling inwards before recoiling backwards, a desperate attempt at sparing Debbie from him then shoving. His head cracked against the counter with uncontrolled force, wood splintering and diorite cracking under the viltrumite's power. The shards of broken materials flew through the air.

The sound echoed in his deaf ear again and again as if his mind was an echo chamber, a pale version of Sherlock Holmes' mind palace.

A blink.

Nolan's nostrils flared.

He smelled blood.

His ichor froze in his veins. The cold irradiated from his heart as it clenched, as the stone that reminded him how human he had been - still was - human.

Debbie.

___
A/N:
If this story tickled your brain, you're welcome to leave a comment (I'd love if it's some type of constructive critisism) that challenges my persepctive on what I wrote /(°w°)/!!!

 

[Speedshot]

One of my favorite invincible si fics, happy to see it posted on QQ

 

[Boing]

One of my favorite invincible si fics, happy to see it posted on QQ

Click to shrink...

Did you first find it on SB? :3

 

[Speedshot]

Did you first find it on SB? :3

Click to shrink...

Actually found it on ao3 first then read it on sb on subsequent rereads and checks for new content.

 

[Boing]

Actually found it on ao3 first then read it on sb on subsequent rereads and checks for new content.

Click to shrink...

OoOOO , welp i can say with certainty chapter 5 is all planed out and just need to be written n full :3 so you won't have to wait too long XD

 

[Lillie Jones]

Thanks for the chapter
Invincible season 4 was fire and Thragg gave Mark Grayson Invincible an impossible choice and thr potentially lasting consequences, unfortunately Allen has been keeping the secrets about a new Scourge virus that even more devastating consequences for half Vultrimite ,Thragg Vultrimite army and Humans on earth if Allen is going to make the hard choice in defeating the Vultrimites permanently.
Waiting for Season 5 sucks ,talk about season 4 cliffhanger and Mark Graysons and Atom Eve little bun in the oven.
Sorry if the spoilers for anyone, please don't hate me
Continue on
Cheers!