(Maggie POV)
Gotham City - an American city rife with corruption, crime... and darkness. It's where my sister Selina and I were born, and some of my friends were also born there. Friends... a word I didn't know until a few years ago. Selina and I were born there, and she was all I had for a long time. Selina was always stronger than I was, maybe because she's older than me, but she always fought against our situation, while I was helpless against it. Father was always abusive to Mom. He shouted all the time and hit her, making her cry. I also had to cry, and it was usually Selina who held her hands over my ears to stop me from hearing the loud sounds.
I still remember the moment when I found Mom in the bathtub... There was so much blood... the entire bathwater had turned red and it was spilling over onto he ground. It was horrible. I remember that I screamed and cried, and that it was Selina who pulled me out of there. I experienced this differently than Selina did, and we both reacted to this differently, trying to process it.
After Mom was dead, Father focused more on both of us and started drinking even more than he had before. Selina began to talk back to Father and distract him from me, taking all the punishment. I remember that I cried a lot during those days, but I kept it hidden from Selina; she shouldn't see my weakness when she was so strong.
After a few months, Father died as well. He drank himself to death. It was once again I who found him. But this time, I didn't cry. Selina wasn't around this time. She had started to disappear more often and did what wasn't allowed. But it made her smile, so I didn't say anything. When she did come home, I told her everything. The first thing Selina did was not cry or be happy; she went all around the apartment and took all the small valuables out of hiding places. After that, she hid them in another place.
It was a terrible few weeks after Father's death. The government arrived and took us away. We were placed in a horrible orphanage, at least that's what they told us. No one there liked it, and the matron used all of the children to steal and do their terrible bidding. Sometimes, during the night, terrible sounds came from the room of the matron and her male helpers. Sometimes screaming and crying, and sometimes... other sounds. Selina tried to protect me from other children, but mainly from the male helpers. Before things got any worse, help arrived. The only shining light in all of Gotham appeared at the entrance of the orphanage.
'Calm child. Everything is going to be fine,' he said as the man placed his hand on my head. I calmed down after that.
I'm not sure what he told the matron, but a while later, the entire orphanage was swarming with policemen and officers who looked angry for some reason. Selina and I, and also other children, were all taken away from that place and brought to another one, the Reynolds Home for Extraordinaries. It is a school at the same time. I have never seen anything prettier in my entire life. I am unsure what happened when I got there the first time, because I was entranced by everything. I tried to look at it as well as possible, because I was sure it would disappear the next day.
I got a real bed, just for me and one for Selina, in the same room. Two other girls were also there, who welcomed us and started explaining things. They must have had the same reaction when they arrived because they told us not to be scared and that it was real.
And now, two years later, I am here on this 'holiday' as Mr. Reynolds calls it. I don't know where we are precisely, but it's so beautiful. The sun is shining and we are on a green field, playing baseball against a local team of boys. It's an all-boys team, but I think we will win.
"Go, Selina!" I shout as she goes and picks up a baseball bat.
She winks at me and swings the bat around, playing with it. The older man throws the ball towards her, and Selina smashes it hard. The ball flies high into the air, and Selina starts to run.
"Go!"
She is so quick and agile. She moves around the boys on the field like a cat and makes her way to third base. Our team cheered her on for such a good hit, at least some of them. A few people here haven't yet fully arrived at Reynolds Home/School for Extraordinaries mentally. But I'm sure that'll work out eventually.
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(Anna Marie POV)
I was born in a back-to-nature hippie commune in Caldecott County, Mississippi. My mother told me that my aunt Carrie delivered me. Carrie didn't like my mother marrying my father; she thought he ruined my mother's life. We visited the family's ancestral farmhouse often. I can still remember how my father used to push me on the swing in our garden, how I would play with our dog and how my mother used to tell me stories. It was all so nice and special. Then, we didn't go to see my aunt anymore for a long time.
I still don't know what happened, but I do know that my mother simply disappeared. After that, my father brought Aunt Carrie to see me. I was sad at the time, truly sad as I wanted to see Mom again, but Father wouldn't tell me where she was. Owen then left, and I was placed under Aunt Carrie's care. She was a strict and authoritarian guardian. I was punished for a lot of my mistakes, and that led me to become a rebellious child. My poor relationship with my rigid aunt and distant father prompted me to run away from home when I was still very young.
I shouldn't have done that. As a young girl, I had to fend for myself as a loner. The locals nicknamed me 'Rogue'. Eventually, I was approached by a seemingly warm-hearted woman called Mystique. She was an outcast herself, and so I trusted her immediately. Mystique and her partner Destiny were my surrogate mothers for a time, but it wasn't to last. I found out that I, like them, was a mutant. And I found that out rather harshly and suddenly.
I met this boy Cody Robbins, who was 12, the same age as I was, and I grew close to him. Mystique feared our relationship and spoke badly about him. But I wouldn't listen to her. One day, we were just talking, and during that, I impulsively kissed him. At that point, my latent mutant powers to absorb the life energy and psyche of others with skin-to-skin contact emerged. Cody Robbins was left in a coma from which he would not awaken. I was traumatised by this experience and finally found out that Mystique only took me in to use me in her mission to become a terrorist like her. I was heartbroken... and I don't know what might have happened if he had arrived.
Mr. Reynolds is a strange man. He is calm, always friendly, gives off a warm and comfortable feeling when he enters a room, and he is strong. I don't know how strong, but he is very strong. I was about to lose my mind after the revelation of Mystique when he appeared behind me and placed his hand on my head. 'Calm down, child. Everything is going to be fine,' he said to me.
And everything did turn out all right. He took me away from Mystique and Destiny and brought me back home to Aunt Carrie. I was even more sad and angry, and thought he had betrayed me, but he managed to calm me down again and explained everything. He spoke with Carrie and me, and had her tell me the truth about why she was so strict with me and why she did what she did. I found out that Carrie loved my Mom dearly, and me as well. She would have been willing to die for my mother and me if she had to. But she was too proud to say it and instead raised me strictly. So when I ran away, it was the same thing that happened before, when she was left alone by Mom.
It turns out, this talk was good for both of us, and I moved back in. Aunt Carrie even agreed to attend the Reynolds School for Extraordinaries to learn how to use my powers and to study for school. I met so many new friends here who weren't scared of me and my powers, and I even got to come here and play baseball. I like to play baseball, despite being a girl, but we're mostly girls today anyway, and the opposite team doesn't like that we're absolutely destroying them. After Cat hit her ball, it's now my turn.
"Go on, Anna. Hit it far and wide!" I hear my friends shout.
"For sure," I say.
I take the bat and get ready. The man nods and throws the ball towards me. For all of us who study and train at Reynolds, this is far too easy, but we have to give our all. Otherwise, the other team wouldn't get to have any fun. I smash the ball into the right field and start running. I don't run as fast as I can, since I am a bit older than the opposite team, but Cat doesn't care; she makes it to the last base.
Oh, no. Now it's Edward's turn. Well, he will at least give the opposite team a chance.
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(Edward POV)
"Edward, it's your turn." I hear Mr. Reynolds' voice as he stands next to me.
"Ugh, do I have to? This is pointless. There is no finesse, no puzzle to solve here. Hit hard and run fast, that's it." I say.
Usually, an elder would be appalled if a small boy spoke to him that way, but not Mr. Reynolds. As long as we are respectful to those who work at the Reynolds Home/ School for Extraordinaries, he doesn't care. There are more rules, of course, but most things work automatically, without him having to say anything.
"That's true, but in a way, it is a puzzle," he tells me.
"In what way?"
"Can't you see it? Look at the field, Edward. Look closely, the people, the path and the tools you can use... do you see it?"
I look at the field and try to picture what he tells me to.
"Riddle me this, Edward: Why is corn hard to escape from?" he asks.
A riddle? For me? I think about it, and then I understand.
"Because it's... a maize."
"Exactly. Using a bat and hitting the ball are calculations you can do in your head, and finding the fastest path to the end is a maze. The unpredictability of the field makes the game harder, depending on who you're playing. I'm sure you will find it amusing if you give it a try."
I look at Mr. Reynolds and see him smiling at me. He isn't making fun of me, I know that now. He also doesn't think that I'm stupid or a cheater, like my father always did. My father used to beat me physically. Every time I scored 100s on a test, he accused me of being a cheater and beat me up. I tried to show him, prove to him, that I wasn't a cheat, that I didn't need to cheat. It never worked. Mother didn't care about me either. She was as neglectful as they came, drinking herself to sleep and into comas. I can't really blame her for it, with such a man as a husband, I might have done the same.
I started out with nothing, with nobody, and I told myself that I didn't need anyone. At a school puzzle contest, I won first place and received a trophy. It was the first time I received undiluted positive attention, which I wasn't getting at home. I deserved respect; I felt as if I meant something. I thought that proving to everyone that I'm smart and could solve riddles the fastest would make others like me, just like it did when I won that trophy. But it didn't.
No one liked it. I found out that being that much smarter than everyone else was not the way to make friends, and the other kids bullied me. I know why they did that. That isn't a tricky riddle to solve. I was alone until Mr. Reynolds arrived. He came to my school and stopped them from hurting me further. I hated that someone saw me that way, but as he touched me, all my pain and bruises disappeared. That was the first time that something I couldn't logically explain happened.
Mr. Reynolds accompanied me home and told my father that he would take me with him to live at the Reynolds Home and School for Extraordinaries. The only pay he required was that my father never came to visit, unless I wanted to. Mr. Reynolds' presence had sobered up Mother and struck fear into my Father, so they agreed to it. I was certain I would be used to work or slave somewhere sinister, as was usual in Gotham, but it didn't happen. I was brought to a beautiful place, full of other children and teenagers who laughed and smiled, and spoke with one another kindly. It didn't make sense to me and still doesn't.
Why would anyone help others that way if he or she had access to such powers? Mr. Reynolds is so far above everyone, and it's not just physically. I have been testing him and trying to find a riddle he can't solve, a riddle I can't solve... but I haven't had any luck yet. He is a genius in his own right, and now that I think about it, there is one riddle I haven't been able to solve.
"Riddle me this: Why would someone who could achieve anything he wants, have anything he wants and be anyone he wants, create a home for children and adolescents with seemingly nothing in return?" I ask.
He looks at me and smiles. Then he places a hand on my head.
"Because I want to."
"..."
"Now, go and hit that ball as precisely as you can. Show the girls that you aren't as physically helpless as they think," he tells me, and I nod.
"Swinging wood to hit a ball... how hard can that be?"
"Go on, Edward! I'm sure you can hit it." I hear Anna shout.
I look back at the other boy on our team who hasn't really done anything yet. He sits on the bench and looks at the game, with Ms. Rose at his side, trying to give him company and encourage him to play with us. Brooding all the time, I'll show that I can do it. I take the bat in my hands and feel the weight. I try to do the math in my head and think about how to hit the ball when it arrives. Shouldn't be that hard...
I swing the bat and almost miss the ball. It bounces off and falls to the ground just in front of me.
"Oh..."
"Run! Run Edward!!"
I am pulled from my thoughts and start running towards first base. I have to make it at least to the first one...
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(Rose POV)
"Don't you want to play, Bruce?" I ask the boy sitting next to me on the bench.
"No," he answers.
Bruce is one of the newest members of our Reynolds School for Extraordinaries. Huh, 'our'. It seems I have been here for too long; I am starting to think of it as ours.
"I'm sure you will find it fun to do, Bruce. Look, even Edward is trying his best." I say, seeing Edward barely making it to first base.
Edward, the genius child. I noticed that he had been observing me for weeks, trying to hide it, but I knew. At first, I thought he was just smitten, as was the case with all young boys and men... at least almost. But it turned out that wasn't the case. He was observing me, and then one day, he confronted me. He told me that he knew. I was confused and asked him what he was talking about, and he said that he knew I was a spy.
I laughed. It was hilarious.
The little boy told me that he knew I was a spy and tried to get me to leave the school and go 'quietly' so that no one would have to find out. I told him that he had an extraordinary imagination and shouldn't lose it, but he brushed me off brusquely, telling me that he wasn't an idiot and had been observing me. He told me that the way I moved, walked, and held equipment showed that I was a very skilled fighter. My language spoke of russian descent, despite hiding the accent marvellously, it wasn't quite away in very few instances. He also guessed the phone I kept in a drawer somewhere on my desk, which I used to notify my contact and give reports. He went on and on, about the things he noticed and smiled at the end, as if he had solved a puzzle and was now happy with himself for doing so.
I was clueless about what to do, so I told him he was wrong in the end and walked out. I didn't kill him, and as it turns out, that was good. He had hidden a camera, recording our talk the entire time. If I had done anything to him, I would have been dead right away, I reckon.
I went to my office, which Mr. Reynolds had furnished and designed for me and waited. I waited for the moment when he would enter and confront me about the words of Edward Nygma, the boy genius. Robert Reynolds was also a genius, so he would either believe him or already know about me. If a young child could find out so many things, then he would surely do so as well.
But he didn't come. I got a call from him to come into the laboratory. I should have taken out the phone and called my contact, notifying them I was compromised. But I knew it was useless, we weren't even in the same dimension. I walked down into the lab, willing to accept my fate and fight to the bitter end. I was ready to fight when he gave me a gift.
...
He gave me a present. He had created special clothes and had designed a series of clothes for me to wear. I was flabbergasted. No one had ever given me a present. I broke down... It's true, as hard as it is to admit that, tears rolled down my cheeks.
I was raised from very early childhood by the U.S.S.R.'s "Black Widow Ops" Program in addition to Ivan Petrovitch's care, who took care of me my entire life and became my 'foster father'. Petrovitch took me to Department X with 28 other young female orphans, where I was trained in combat and espionage. 'Red Room' is what the facility is called. We were bio-technologically and psycho-technologically enhanced, which has allowed me to live up to this point and not die or grow weak due to old age. I have memories of training in the Bolshoi Theatre, but I am no longer certain whether those are true or not. Some things have changed since I arrived here and have been working under Robert. I have started to lose specific memories and experience clarity more often than not. And my sleep has gotten deeper and enjoyable.
After that, I was drafted into the KGB and became their best operative, excelling at fighting and information gathering. I went on many missions, killed many people and was brainwashed several times. Eventually, after meeting Clinton, things turned around. I was chased by SHIELD and ultimately employed. It was either that or be killed, and I chose that. My work didn't change all that much; only the targets did.
Eventually, I was ordered to investigate a new hospital which had emerged, capable of healing anyone and anything. And it was so cheap that Fury believed something fishy was going on. None of his other spies had managed to get a job at the hospital, and infiltration also didn't work. So he had me try to get close to the CEO, Robert Reynolds. I was surprised that my application for a job was accepted, but Fury and I, as well, thought it was because of my looks. He is a man after all.
I got a job as his secretary, but didn't immediately accept. I acted as if I had to think about it for a while so as not to appear suspicious. He smiled back then, for some reason, and agreed. But he seemed genuinely happy when I accepted. As it turned out, I wasn't prepared for what it meant to be his secretary. He didn't just run a hospital... he was the CEO of a construction company and a home and school for children and teenagers. It was chaotic at first, and I had a lot of difficulties adjusting to my role.
He was so different compared to all the other targets I had to observe and report on. There was no dirt on him whatsoever. And then, I found out he was the Sentry. He hadn't died, but simply moved to another dimension where he had a school and hospital as well, and was gathering and helping children from different dimensions. I knew The Sentry was dangerous, but I didn't see it. I continued to work and work and eventually found myself enjoying what I did. He actually seemed to care for the children and even me, for some reason.
I haven't told him my secret, nor has Edward, as I found out. Edward was only interested in solving the riddle and not telling others the solution. Eventually, I will tell him. I know he knows it already, but I want to tell him myself.
Наталия Альяновна Романова - Natalia Alianovna Romanova, that's my real name. It's all I want to hear him call me someday.
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(3rd Person POV)
Robert looks at the baseball field and smiles. He is content right now. The arrival of Omni-Man, as Nolan calls himself now, was good for the world. He solved many of the world's problems. He was a heavy hitter, though, so not everything was solved, but that wasn't a bad thing. Relying on others too much would hinder Earth's progress. Robert walks forward and stands next to the man in question, who happens to also be there today. He has his arms folded and looks at the field stone-faced, with a stiff posture.
"Is that your son?" Robert asks, pointing at the boy who has just taken the bat in his hands and tries to hit the ball.
"Yes."
"You don't seem very happy about this? Did you have a bad day?" Robert asks.
"What's it to you?"
"Well, I think it is a bit weird for you to stand here and look at the field all brooding like this. Do you find it boring?" Robert continues.
"It's a waste of everyone's time. These children will forget all about this within a month or less. There are so many more productive things I could do in the meantime."
"Like saving the world, eh?" Robert smiles.
The man turns to Robert and looks at him in surprise. He suddenly clenches all his muscles and is ready to kill Robert, but the latter laughs.
"Haha, come now. No need to get your panties in a twist. It was easy to find out who you are. You don't wear a mask after all." Robert says.
"Are you threatening me?" Nolan asks with narrowed eyes.
"You must have strange customs where you come from, to believe that that was a threat. We call it small talk. It's perfectly harmless after you know how it works. Basically, it's a senseless few sentences we say to one another that don't really mean anything but fill the time."
"Like this game," Nolan says.
"What's your name?" he asks again.
"Nolan. Nolan Grayson and who are you?"
"Robert Reynolds, nice to meet you. And about the game, it's not as useless as you might think." Robert says after they shake hands.
"Explain."
"Between the ages of 6 and 10, children learn a lot. Sports like this? This is like a training ground. Not just for the body, but for the mind as well. They develop discipline, repetition, build teamwork, and learn how to handle success and loss. It's quite useful. Besides, you get to go out and enjoy the lovely sun and spend time with friends."
"You believe this game is essential, then?" Nolan asks.
"Not the game itself, but the playing of it. Your son will remember it when he scores his first home run, and if he finds you brooding here or celebrating together with him, it will matter then." Robert says.
They watch Nolan's son miss his second swing. At that moment, a woman walks towards them and grabs Nolan's arm.
"What are you doing here, dear? Who is this?" she asks.
"We are just exchanging dad-talk. Robert Reynolds, nice to meet you." Robert says.
"Deborah Grayson, nice to meet you, Robert. Wait, you're not the Robert Reynolds from the Reynolds School for Extraordinaries, are you?" she asks.
"I am indeed."
"Oh, look, Nolan. Mark's going at it again," Debbie says, and they watch Mark hit the ball and get it wide.
Both of them cheer for Mark as it looks like he is about to achieve his first home run, just like Robert said he might. Even Nolan starts to cheer, but suddenly stops when the dream ends and Mark doesn't achieve a home run. Robert's kids are far too good to allow such a thing to happen.
"Well... better luck next time," Robert says, walking away.
Their team would win, for sure, and since he had promised ice cream, should they win, he would have to prepare that. There might be a bit too many children and adolescents for him to deal with.
"Phew..."
"Tired?" Rose asks him.
"No, but I think I might lose quite a bit of money shortly, with all that ice cream they'll consume," Robert says.
"Haha, indeed. They are insatiable. Which is strange, since the food at home is incredible," she says.
"It's probably the occasion and the fact that they get to explore the city outside," Robert says.
He has been back to the Marvel Universe and the DC Universe, which he found, and has done the same thing he did here. He didn't want to get them to mix all too much, but occasionally, he would have them 'visit' and spend time together. It got their minds off things.
Robert looks at Bruce, who sits next to him on the bench. He has created the Reynolds School and Home for Extraordinaries in the DC Universe in Gotham. This means that he only had children and adolescents from Gotham as of yet, but that would surely change in the future. There were so many miserable people in Gotham, especially, but all over the world. Both Marvel and DC were hard for powerless people, and sometimes even harder if you had powers. The Mutants especially had a hard time.
Robert would work against this as well as he could, and maybe those who are already living at the Reynolds Home and School for Extraordinaries would help make the world a little bit better.
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Introduction of a few new characters and how they came to be that they're here. Don't worry, action will return soon.
Also, time flows differently in the Marvel and DC universes compared to the Invincible Universe. So if the characters are still young now, they will grow older quicker when they're back in their respective Universes, for the sake of this story.
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