Apocalypse Redux

Chapter 155: Explosions and Christmas Trees

Isaac’s insanely high Perception let him figure out the thread count of a bedsheet at a casual glance, feel every bit of comfort provided, drink in every amenity he’d purchased for his home.

Amenities his childhood bedroom lacked.

Yet he hadn’t slept this well in ages, even choosing to extend his time in the barely large enough bed well past what he could ever need, though he’d still planned on waking up at 5 am, plenty early. Or so he thought.

What he hadn’t entirely put together was that when he’d made it so every direct blood relative of his shared his [Bloodline], he’d also massively boosted their Fortitude. Hence, what had been astoundingly, smash the alarm clock or clock the person waking you, early, was now a perfectly normal time to get out of bed for his family.

And they did try to let Isaac sleep in, but for someone as paranoid as him, having people marching around right outside his room while his level of tiredness wasn’t “dead to the world” wasn’t an environment conducive to him sleeping.

Another thing he really needed to get used to was that everyone in the house had a high degree of superhuman hearing.

Sure, Isaac himself might have been stealthy enough that he could walk without being noticed, but he was still a decently heavy adult man shifting his weight in an old and somewhat creaky bed.

It took all of two seconds for Isaac to figure out exactly what he needed to do with his sisters tomorrow. He’d be teaching them that while they might be able to walk through walls, this didn’t mean that concepts like “knocking” ceased to exist.

“Merry Christmas.” He announced in a grand tone as he rose to greet them, sweeping them up into a huge hug as he phased to take the three of them into the kitchen down below, where he could already hear breakfast being made.

“Let’s visit Mom, shall we?”

Before, this would have resulted in the two little ones banging into the floor, but they could now phase as well, and he’d used [Flight of the Poltergeist] to slow his decent to give them time to engage their own phasing abilities.

The three of them fell into the kitchen, accidentally scaring their mother half to death. The twins fled, while Isaac valiantly took the admittedly well-deserved lecture on the chin.

Apparently, there were rules on phasing in the house, it was just that those little hellions had clearly decided that those didn’t apply when the person they were popping in on didn’t know about said rules.

With that knowledge in mind, Isaac chased after the twins. They’d clearly decided discretion was the better part of valor and fled outside into the snow. Bad idea. Really bad idea.

By the time Isaac heard his mother finish up breakfast and the trio went back inside, all three of them were half covered in snow but grinning ear to ear. Of course, Isaac had been holding back, which had then ended with what felt like a metric ton of snow stuffed down the back of the pajamas he was still wearing.

“Good morning.” His mother said, looking them up and down “Now, breakfast is ready, so change quickly before it gets cold.”

Tanja pouted at her before heading up the stairs, but Viktoria ran up so fast she might as well have teleported, moving so quickly that when she closed her room’s door behind her, it slammed shut with a bang that rattled the floor.

Their mother sighed and Isaac caught the irritated look she gave him.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, but his mother made a “shush” gesture, then pointed at her ears and then the ceiling above.

Of course. [Perception Block] went up a moment later and he explained that now, she could say whatever she wanted without everyone else in the building overhearing it as a matter of course.

Instead of speaking, his mother just shook her head and sighed. Again.

“I’m sorry I left so quickly after giving you these abilities. It couldn’t have been easy.”

This time, it was Isaac’s time to sigh.

“I was … I really wasn’t in a good headspace back then.”

Knowing his mother as he did, Isaac was aware that he hadn’t been about to receive a stern talking to, just something along the lines of “it hasn’t been easy but we’re managing”. He’d even predicted what happened instead, yet when she did wrap him in a wordless hug, he realized he’d vastly underestimated how badly he’d needed this.

After maybe thirty seconds, though, he decided that it had gone on for long enough and she let go as he stepped backwards.

She chuckled softly.

“What’s so funny?” he frowned.

“You’ve acted so grown up since this [System] appeared, like a real adult. But now, you’re just as embarrassed by a hug as your little sisters.”

“I …” Isaac broke off whatever he was going to say with a strangled cough, but then, he couldn’t help it. He just burst out laughing and couldn’t stop. His mother tried to keep a reasonably straight face, but just as he’d nearly managed to regain control over himself, she finally lost hers.

So when Isaac’s father came looking for them, already a little worried because he could normally always hear where his wife was if she was in the house, that was how he found the pair of them.

“What’s so funny?” he asked, curious.

“Oh, it’s just that our six-year-olds are as just as mature as our adult son.”

“Funnier with context, I’m guessing?”

“Yeah …” Isaac said cautiously. He then dropped [Perception Block] and a few seconds later, Tanja and Viktoria came tromping down the stairs.

Breakfast was a lively affair, and yet it was a lot less chaotic than it could have been. Isaac had been to shared meals with children who had [System] access and it was usually a zoo. Telekinesis stealing food, phasing into the table to reach stuff that was just a little too far away, running around at speeds which created drafts that whipped napkins or even cutlery of the table … not here, though.

Sure, the twins were still rowdy as all get out, but that was just how they were. A pair of little hellions, and he loved them for it. But they were still a lot better behaved than he’d expected. Then again, maybe he should have given his mother more credit. She was a kindergarten teacher, vastly more knowledgeable about raising young children than basically any other parent. So as much of a handful as his sisters were, they’d still turned out good kids.

After breakfast, their parents went to read books on the couch and an armchair, respectively, while the “children” spent more time playing in the snow. This time though, they were properly dressed. Sure, they could have run around in swimsuits and been just fine, but not getting the ice and snow directly onto one’s skin was nice, as was not having one’s clothes freeze to one’s skin moments after getting wet.

They could have probably stayed out there for a couple of hours, but one of their neighbors yelled at them to get back inside because apparently, they’d woken him up. Sure, seven in the morning wasn’t inordinately early, but today was a holiday, so it wasn’t that out there to have people still asleep.

That left them stuck inside, at least until it was time for the family Christmas hike.

As usually, the twins were roaming around ahead of them, exploring woods and climbing on everything that looked even remotely interesting.

Isaac’s mother made a little circle-gesture that he didn’t understand, so she whispered “Can you put up the sensory barrier again?”

He promptly did so, yet she was still speaking far more quietly than normally, as if she didn’t entirely believe that the [Skill] was working.

“How did you get that [Skill]? Is that something that isn’t linked to a [Class]? Because in a house where everyone can hear everything …”

Yeah, nope, Isaac was pretty sure he knew where this was going, so he theatrically stuck his fingers in his ears and proclaimed “It’s an Aspect [Skill], I’ll get you one after New Years and I don’t want to talk about this anymore.”

“That’s not what she was talking about.” His father said.

“Does it matter?” Isaac asked as he dropped the [Skill] and began to hurry towards his sisters “This conversation is over.”

***

Christmas day passed normally, with all the usual family stuff being done. The adults were happy enough with the situation as it was, but the two six-year-olds were practically bouncing off the walls form excitement, barely able to wait to tear into their presents.

And then, finally, as darkness fell outside, the lights on the Christmas tree lit up.

From that point onwards, the twins’ presents didn’t survive for more than a few minutes, the two of them diving onto the pile of cardboard boxes and paper-wrapped objects like a pair of starving wolves tearing into a steak dinner.

Meanwhile, the adults in the room would wait to open their own presents until the children were done, and then open them individually and thank the person who’d given it to them sincerely.

“Thank you, Isaac.” Viktoria beamed at him, looking at him over the top of a child-sized “lady of the castle” costume that could also double as a mage’s robes with stars in her eyes.

He flashed her a grin “Check the jacket pocket.”

With a look of surprise and glee on her face, she dove into the costume, digging around the depths of the cloth in what was probably the least efficient way of searching for the pocket that was humanly possible.

“You too, Tanja.”

By the time Viktoria had decided she was well and truly stuck, forcing her to phase out of the cloth prison with an envelope victoriously, his other sister had retrieved the envelope from her “ren-fair pantsuit”.

The envelopes joined the packaging paper in the great paper recycling plant in the sky a moment later and the twins beamed up at him.

“What did you get them?” Isaac’s dad asked him.

“Tickets for a few renaissance fairs, complete with costumes and a promise that I’ll take them there. And don’t worry, I made sure the dates don’t conflict with anything you, they or I have coming up.”

And that was only the start of things. In hindsight, Isaac realized, he’d gone overboard with the gift giving. By a lot. Puzzles, games, books, a couple of one of those “junior scientist” kits.

But things wouldn’t stop there, he’d be getting them quite a bit more stuff before he left on January first, though that would be exclusively useful things.

When it came to gifts for children, Isaac had a rule for himself that he wouldn’t give gifts just because they were useful. If a kid needed something, they’d get it because it was required, not because it was Christmas.

Therefore, the massive pile of useful training gear, high quality, damage resistant clothing and the pair of starter swords that he’d have to talk his parent into not locking away the second they saw it, all of that would wait until later.

Once the children were done, Isaac and his parents unpacked their gifts, though those were mostly on the useful side. The kinds of things you might think about getting for yourself, but decided against because it was too great an expense to buy casually.

But when it came to his own gifts, it had become rather apparent that his parents were no longer quite sure what to get him. He’d received a couple of books on medieval history, a nice suit that he’d have worn to meetings if he hadn’t already bought himself a much better one …

It was nice to see them putting in the effort, yet all it did was serve to remind him that he was no longer the person they’d known for so long, make him remember just how much he was keeping from them. And that hurt.

So when he went to sleep that evening, he wasn’t feeling all that great. The memory of the looks on his sisters’ faces when receiving the gifts he’d gotten for them had been nice, but had nothing in the bone-deep sadness that rested on his shoulders.

***

The rest of the holidays went pretty well, with Isaac not doing anything that constituted “work” for a whole seven days. No summoning, no fighting, no nothing. Even though he did end up getting a little antsy near the end, staying put and calm did more good for him than he ever could have thought possible.

The holidays were filled with delightfully mundane things, like getting stuck on the sofa after watching a movie with his sisters because they’d fallen asleep, or getting chased out of the kitchen by his mother because she needed make dinner. Sure, given that they could both phase, it would have worked on a technical level, but somehow, that argument failed to get him anywhere.

It was only on New Year’s Eve that he properly used his powers. They’d gone to the square in front of City Hall to watch the fireworks and some jackass had decided to throw firecrackers at the crowd.

Every. Single. Bloody. Year. Someone would decide to pull this crap, sometimes the targets would be the cops in riot gear who showed up when “parties” went way too far out of hand, but civilians in winter clothing, which tended to be flammable …

The look on those little turds’ faces as Isaac suddenly teleported in front of them, snatching the first firecracker out of the air then holding it up in the air as he kept eye contact with them until it blew was something he’d treasure for a good long while. They’d run, though Isaac had read their IDs’ using his [Aura] and then passed their names along to the police. That shit just wasn’t on, though it was also not quite on the “ass-kicking by a third Evolution combat [Class] holder”, not when they’d run and never come back.

Yet on January 1st, all of that was over. Isaac bade everyone goodbye and left for his home in the woods near the university. It was time for him to go back to work, yet … he was going back to it. War, strife, bloodshed. That was what was required to save the world, yet it wasn’t what he wanted to be doing for the rest of eternity. But that was what things were starting to look like.