Chapter 972: Little Umbrellas

“Thank you,” Jason said as he shook Velius’ hand. “You helped my family at a dangerous time, when the clan was being established and I couldn’t be there. You have my gratitude.”

“You should direct your gratitude to the Reaper. I serve at its pleasure. Speaking of which, the clan is now stabilised, and you are here. It is time for me to attend to other duties.”

“You’ve been here a long time. Did it bother you, being stuck in this place?”

“I do as is required of me. It has been an opportunity to give the Reaper’s other servants a chance at responsibility. I have been a prime vessel several times longer than most, but even I cannot hold the role forever. And my time here has not been without pleasantness. Such a low-magic world has been a relaxing place in which to stay.”

“You have some goodbyes to make before you go?”

“I am sure that you can explain,” Velius said, then burst into a cloud of rainbow smoke, his clothes falling to the floor.

Jason backed off waving a hand in front of his nose.

“Bloke, this is a hospital,” he complained, despite now being alone in Velius’ office. “Don’t just blow up your avatar like that.”

***

“…lived in the Storm Kingdom for a while,” Jason said, “and it’s where Zara is from. I thought visiting the Earth equivalent would be a fun trip.”

Yumi Asano looked to be in her early thirties, despite being Jason’s maternal grandmother. Her flesh-warping powers allowed her to look however she liked, along with a lifespan long even by essence user standards. She usually kept her apparent age a little older than the mid-twenties that most essence users appeared to be.

“Jason,” his grandmother said. “When you suggested a beach day, I was thinking something here in France. The beaches are empty and the vampires won’t go within a hundred miles of your territories. For you, in person, I’m guessing they’ll double that.”

“You don’t think it’s a little macabre, visiting beaches abandoned because everyone has fled or been killed?”

“I think you and your friends are a force that could take any country on Earth and wipe it off the Earth. I also think that the lot of you turning up on a beach in Aruba unannounced might cause an international incident.”

“It’s not illegal for me to go to the beach, Grandmother.”

“You have a visa? A valid passport?”

“Okay, yes, it’s technically illegal. But, and I know this is going to sound bad, but I’m kind of above the law.”

“You’re right,” she told him. “That does sound bad.”

“I know, but that’s just kind of how it is. I mean, I stole a couple of chunks of Europe. I didn’t mean to, but I’m not giving them back. Once you’ve reached the ‘seizing sovereign territory stage,’ you’ve pretty much left the life of a law-abiding citizen behind. Which reminds me, should I vacate my Australian citizenship? I’m definitely not going to bother with the laws there, and I’m technically a foreign head of state. And also, I am a foreign state. My universe doesn’t have a formalised government, but I count as an autocratic ruler, right? A de facto one, at least.”

“Jason, the world is watching you, and it’s scared. After you finally explaining everything and the visits to your own private universe, the world is still figuring out what to do about you. More precisely, it’s coming to terms with the fact that it can’t do anything about you, and that is not a position people with large armies and nuclear weapons are used to. We don’t know how well, or even if, they are going to accept it. This is not the time for you to use international relations as fodder for light banter.”

“I was raising serious issues, Grandmother.”

“Yes, which is why I know that you and Anna Tilden have already been discussing them for months, as she has with me. Don’t go pretending you just realised these issues right now.”

“Sorry Nanna,” he said, his contrite body language wildly unconvincing. She raised her eyebrows threateningly.

“Grandmother,” he corrected.

“Jason, you need to consider whether touring around with your friends is worth a potential international incident.”

Jason neither moved nor changed, yet Yumi felt an unmistakable shift. Her insouciant grandson was gone, and someone she didn’t recognise was in his place.

“Grandmother,” he said, his voice reverberating in her soul. “I brought my friends here specifically so we could tour around the world, which is exactly what I’m going to do. I would say gods help anyone who tries to make trouble, but I’ve met gods. They’ll need more help than that.”

The spell broke and Jason flashed his familiar impish grin.

***

The most powerful force the Earth had ever seen stepped off the double decker streetcar, dressed like they’d all raided Jason’s closet. Shorts, sandals, straw hats and garish floral shirts abounded. Jason watched Rufus and Humphrey with a disgruntled expression as they stood side by side, gazing out at the ocean.

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“We’re wearing the exact same clothes,” he complained to no one in particular. “How do I look like I just got fleeced at the local market, and they look like a tourism poster?”

Along with Jason and his otherworldly companions were many clan members. With around forty people having shuffled off the cloud vehicle disguised as a streetcar, they were already gaining attention. Their auras were all masked as normal people, but there was no hiding their athletic bodies and rank-polished features.

Even more attention-getting than what looked like a modelling agency on a field trip were the inhuman members of the group. Elves and celestines added compelling and unconventional beauty. The more overtly alien, like the handful of looming leonids, stood out most of all. None of this was unheard of, however, twenty years after the transformation crisis. Humans being changed into other species was a known, if unusual, phenomenon. More than any political movement, some of them getting internet famous normalised it faster than anything else.

“You might want to get rid of the streetcar before a real one comes along,” Itsuki pointed out.

“Good point,” Jason said. “I might let our army of sexy aliens head down to the beach and distract all the looky-loos first.”

Itsuki Tiwari’s family was one of two Japanese families taken in by Jason’s clan after being ousted from their own for helping him. Itsuki himself had travelled with Jason for a time, before three of their companions were killed by Jack Gerling. Not only had that shaken the then-young man, but Jason made for a grim companion after. The other family was part of the Network Asano clan, and Jason noted Itsuki’s longing gaze in the direction of Akari Asano.

“Still with this?” Jason asked. “Mate, what’s going on?”

Itsuki turned red and hushed him.

“Don’t worry, bloke; no one can hear us. I’m using my aura as a privacy screen.”

“You can do that?”

“Mate, I made a universe.”

“I suppose that would be harder.”

“What happened with you and Akari? She knock you back?”

“No! I mean, no. I mean…”

“What?”

“I haven’t, strictly speaking, asked her out.”

“What?”