The party instantly got better by like fifty bajillion percent. “Welcome back!” Zek called out to Purple Is The New Pink as he toasted her with a slice of fruit and sugar. “Have some za, brah.” Sometimes it was nice sharing food with people you had fun with. It was always nice sharing food when somebody else was paying for it. Free food just tasted better, you know?

Wait, what was this about a new pizza place? “What’s this about a new pizza place? Lady Rho’s Halls of the Damned?” Zek thought and thunked for a moment. “Is that the new one on Second street? Haven’t tried it yet,” he said as he dipped his slice into a bowl of melted vanilla ice cream.

It was about then that Zek noticed the glare. Was it possible to glare with only one eye though? Zek blew Samtonio Banderas a kiss and made a suggestive gesture with his hands, which one of the chanting kids immediately copied, to her parents’ disgust and horror.

Then there was some kind of tension between Frostypants and Ms. Mauve and that’s when Zek got an evil grin. “Get a room, you too! But leave the door cracked open.” He stuffed more fudge and pineapple pizza in his face while pulling out a small pair of binoculars. Everything else was boring.

She was alive it seemed and she was unsure how she felt about that. She looked to Lenna and nodded. "Me and an unknown friend fought our way to the front of the train over the roofs. Near the engine car i was shot in the back with a beam of magic and fell into the water below. I nearly drowned when something grabbed me. " she said as much to herself as the others trying to mentally place the events in time. If our Frozen Friend believes they will do the job of cleaning the place out, that is enough for me. Saves me from having to take care of it. " she said trusting Sam's judgement more then her own right now.

Aura smiled a bit sadly at Sam considering the offered threat shaking her head again to try and clear it. "I was forced to kill a mutant an hour or two before you arrived. One every few days. So my Frozen friend if you want me dead, my powers are spent and we both know last time you arrested me the prison was flattened when my dad found out. Still i think you realize to just how many of our bloods young i save as well." she said offering in her opinion a decent defense for her actions. Mind controlled or not it had been her hand that done the deed. Ina way she had been more like a weapon then she had ever been when she thought herself one. She also could not help but mentally value mutant lifes higher then human ones, even if she had learned to tolerate them. Her kill counts had been at an all time low the past few years, measured in dozens then the hundreds she had once killed out of boardroom and stumbling on the right gang.

She watched as Lenna supplied the pizza slices. She looked a bit questioningly on the zek piece. it looked odd, but it was clearly eddable. "Their is no pizza in those halls, Friend Zek. She tortures the souls of those who fail in their role or the unworthy dead til she grows board and snuffs them out, never to be reborn." she tried to explain unsure if Zek would quite get it or care. She decided to start with the Zek slice. it was interesting, not good but it was a new combination. "Not good exactly but i have cooked worst tasting things." she said having the cooking knowledge of camp fires mainly.

"Thank you My Telekinetic friend and you two my Frozen and Portal friends. That was truly a fate worse then death, to know whats happening and yet be unable to stop your body from moving or drawing on your knowledge. I should fell enrages, want vengeance against them but....i just feel tired. Still our people must be defended from this new threat. Im assuming my Frosty Friend, you have objections to the simple plan of just wiping them off the earth to defend Us and even humanity?" she said pretty sure she knew the answer from cold steel. She was fishing for solutions to what she saw as a new threat but she was also not blind to the parallels between mages and humans in her thinking. Surving the hunt made the prey stronger.

Raising an eyebrow at Lenna’s ‘Sam’ voice he smirked. She nailed it but didn’t say she did. It would ruin the compliment. Even if she did it with one eye. ”Pretty much summed it up.” he waved a hand eyeing the food before them. He stuck to the meat lovers, pineapple didn’t belong on pizza but he kept his feelings on that to himself. They earned whatever toppings they wanted.

Sam ignored Zek, it was easier to just ignore him and the glares the party was now getting from the parents of the kids who were coping some hand gestures. ‘Dangerous times. Dangerous friends.’ Sam repeated in his head as he watched to gauge Aura’s reactions to everything. Having her around kids unsettled him and reminded the icemancer the first few times he had met Aura. Hopefully history didn’t repeat itself.

”Think you did enough for now. Proper authorities will take care of the rest. Who knows, maybe they will get some more information out of the ones that held you captive. Might help us back in the city.” Sam said hoping for the best and already prepared for the worst. All things considered this wasn’t the worst team for handling the situation. Most of them were untrained, at least to Sam’s standards but they held their own. Lenna would end up getting a X-team leader recommendation out of this as well. She earned it.

Taking a bite of his pizza he chewed over words he knew he’d regret. It definitely cause a problem within the team if Sam didn’t do what Aura suggested. She was right... it could have been easy. Zek probably would have helped with the body if he asked nicely. The icemancer shuddered at the thought. She had been doing better. How many chances was too many?

”It would be easy, but you aren’t the only one who has been controlled over the years.” his team gave him a second chance. His friends. Surely they’d tell him to do the same. Right? Another bite of his pizza and he ignored the side conversation about the halls of whatever god she worshipped. It was none of his business.

He knew the pain all too well still having nightmares about abducting the kids from the mansion and then flying around the world killing and or recruiting former allies for Amanda. Sam finally sighed, ”Not my call to make. However, if you can gather information on them for me and my team we will gladly deal with it. If they continue to try and kidnap our kind, harm us in anyway. They will need to be stopped.” he paused for a moment, ”By any means necessary.” he left it at that knowing Aura would take those as marching orders.

((Sorry for the delay. Life. Let’s try and wrap this up in a few posts so it’s closed? Hah.))

She ate, while silly people did silly things. And watched the stare down. Watched to see how Aura handled the new information. She processed it well enough.

Aura filled in a bit of the information leading up to her capture, things Lenna had been unable to fully investigate. Backstabbing and kidnapping. And she was fine with others taking care of what was left of that neat of kidnapping backstabbers. Lenna nodded.

Some wind left her sails, hearing how aura had been forced to kill someone. And not a couple hours before their arrival. And more, before then. She felt awful about it, did not seem to want to fight Sam, and was leaving it to him. Lenna also left it to his discretion.

He did not immediately arrest anyone: he sounded like he had been in similar situations. Lack of control.

Lenna nodded at the thanks given. ”You would do the same for me, I am certain.” She stated. And even more so, now.

Everything the woman had gone through… it made sense how she felt. Lenna would have been in similar straits if she had been caught. Shudder to think. Though, when she had worked for Cortez… she also would have had a lack of control.

Look at us all, a bunch of people who have been used.

>> “Im assuming my Frosty Friend, you have objections to the simple plan of just wiping them off the earth to defend Us and even humanity?" Aura said.

Again, Lenna looked to Sam.

>> “Not my call to make. However, if you can gather information on them for me and my team we will gladly deal with it. If they continue to try and kidnap our kind, harm us in anyway. They will need to be stopped.” he paused for a moment, ”By any means necessary.” He said.

Lenna nodded. Now that that had been settled. ”Maybe we can find a book or something. Some way to end this at its source.” She said, not really expecting anything of the sort to ever happen. Not by a long shot. Things did not neatly and conveniently work out like that, in her experience. They were messy. Often, very messy. She clapped her hands.

”Okay! Now that we have handled the heavy talk, let us for the moment attempt to forget about our troubles. We have pizza. Let us eat it and work towards moving on.”

Zek frowned. That didn’t sound like a great pizza place after all. It sounded a lot like a school, actually. “Eh, pass,” he said. He could admire Lady Rho’s work without ever having to see it. Besides, he wasn’t sure if there were any conflicts of interest there, since according to the charter of the Cult of the Flying Celestial Orb, his soul was already supposed to fuel the cosmic fusion machine that powered the Great Silver Saucer after he died. That sounded way more fun to him - there was always a chance it could go boom.

Of course, a cross-pantheonic war could be fun too. He opened his mouth to suggest something highly inflammatory and controversial when Pink & Purple cut him deeply and severely.

She didn’t care for the pizza.

Zek’s eyes widened. His mouth fell open. He stared at her in pain!

Then put more pizza in his mouth and washed his cares away.

“To each their own,” he shrugged. More for him anyways.

As the conversation switched to hemming and hawing about whether or not they as a group should commit genocide, Zek just steadily packed away his pizza. He figured he’d go along with whatever the group said - this lot was bound to be fun no matter which side they choose. Even peace. Because he felt like Snowman and Passionfruit didn’t really know the meaning of the word.

But Zek was rapidly growing bored. Now they were just talking about research or something. He’d devoured the last of his pizza and was slurping the last of the melted ice cream out of his bowl when there was a tap on his shoulder.

He twisted his head around and looked up.

A man, dressed in gray robes, a long white beard, and a pointed gray hat and a wooden staff in hand was standing there. He was flanked by a woman of Zek’s height and build and even a similar smirk. She had a hot pink mohawk, wore a leather biker jacket with spikes on the shoulders and was staring at Aura and Lenna like a rival predator. On the man’s otherside was a guy of exactly Zek’s height and build and exactly the same features, except he was standing up straight, had an outfit on that looked almost identical to Frosty Sword’s (including the eyepatch) and a no-nonsense military-esque bearing. He nodded at Cold Steel.

“What’s up?” Zek said, smearing the last bit of chocolate around his face.

“I am Hezekiah the Gray,” the bearded man said in melodramatic tone. “We have need of you, Zek Covington, of Earth 90210. The fate of the universes is at stake. Come with us, if you want to live.”

Zek cocked his head to the side. He licked the chocolate off his lips. He spun his head around and put the ice cream bowl back on the table. “Okay guys, I’m off,” he said to Eyepatch, Linda, and Aurora. “If you decide to kill a bunch of people, let me know and I’ll bring snacks, otherwise I’m off to whatever. Bye!”

Then he stood up and turned to the newcomers.

The man in the robes nodded gravely and tapped his staff on the floor. Light flashed from the tip of it, blasting through the room, and when it faded, Zek and the other three were gone.