Mist of Shadows
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Reluctant Villainy Part 13
🕑 Added 2021-05-22 06:06:12 +0000 UTC"Do you know what time it is?" Caleb demanded as he opened the door to his hotel so he could stab the person that was knocking on his door at three in the morning. He blinked when he saw the short blonde teenage girl dressed like a naughty Girl Scout holding a basket of Girl Scout cookies. "Does your mother know where you are?"
"Nope!" the girl replied cheerfully as she looked at the man that bore a passing resemblance to a certain actor. "I'm selling Girl Scout nookie, are you interested?"
Caleb stared at the girl for a couple of seconds as he tried to figure out if she'd said what he thought she said before coming to the conclusion that her outfit was promiscuous enough to deserve a lecture. "I'm not interested though if you'd like I have a sermon about the Whore of Babylon you should probably listen to."
"Shit, just my luck, I picked a fucking priest," the girl complained.
"Careful or I'll wipe your filthy mouth out with soap," Caleb warned her.
"Meh," Myst replied as he stepped forward and punched into Caleb's chest, wrapped his fingers around his aorta and ripped it out in a shower of blood and bone. "Rot in hell."
Caleb stared in disbelief at the girl that had just killed him for a second before he collapsed.
Myst dropped the bits of his heart and circulatory system that he'd ripped out then turned and waved at the maid that was screaming bloody murder. "If you keep stealing things from the guests, you'll be next Ms Frys."
"Ring around rosie, pocket full of posies, ashes, ashes, they all fall down," he sang loudly as he set the basket of cookies on the ground next to the dying ex-priest then turned and walked towards the corner of the building, ignoring the horrified look the woman was giving him. 'Yeah, that should be creepy enough,' he mused as he walked around the corner, opened a portal to Faith's prison cell and stepped through after changing back to his normal appearance.
"Demon or sorcerer?" Faith asked in a whisper as she sat up in her bed and studied the stranger, ready to hit him if he proved a threat.
"Technically, I'm an ex-genie and a wizard," Myst explained in a whisper as he closed the portal behind him so that no one would find it. He used his Projection power to surround them with a bubble of silence so they wouldn't be overheard as he didn't want to cause her trouble with the guards or the rest of the inmates.
"Ex-genie, like Aladdin?" Faith asked with a raised eyebrow, wondering if this was one of the Mayor's contingencies.
"Basically," Myst replied with a grin.
"Wicked. What brings you to my humble abode?" Faith asked as she gestured around her cell.
"I was curious if you wanted to do something more productive than sit in a cell," Myst admitted.
"Like what?" Faith asked, playing along so she could figure out what his angle was.
"Rampage through the underworld in another world killing demons for magical powers, attend a school of magic and mystery while you finish getting your head on straight or possibly relax on a beach while you try to figure out what you want to do with your life," Myst suggested.
"Witchcraft? That's more Willow's thing though I admit that rampaging through the underworld sounds like a good way to scratch the itch," Faith admitted. "Or I could stay here and try to make amends by serving my time."
"In other words, you don't want me to snap my fingers and bring the professor you killed back to life so you can get on with your life?" Myst asked.
Faith stared at Myst for a couple of seconds. "I thought genies couldn't bring people back from the dead."
"Eh, technically I can't but I can reach back through time and save the professor's life by replacing him with a temporary duplicate which means they'd probably end up letting you go," Myst offered.
"What about Finch?" Faith asked, thinking about the Assistant Mayor.
Myst shook his head. "Just because he didn't want the Mayor to eat the town doesn't mean he was a nice guy though I should be able to frame a recently dead ex-priest for his 'tragic' death which would clear your name."
"Except for the fact that I killed him," Faith argued.
"Technically but that was mostly Buffy's fault for not checking that he was a vampire and for him trying to meet you and Buffy in a dark alley," Myst pointed out.
"I should have checked," Faith argued.
"Maybe yes, maybe no, you were a teenager and in the middle of a fight with vampires when Buffy tossed him at you. Considering how fast some of the vampires can move, I can't really blame you for staking him," Myst said as he used his Precog to review the fight so that he could duplicate it and frame Caleb for Finch's death and the disappearance of the history professor.
"I'm still guilty," Faith pointed out.
"And you'll have to live with that the rest of your life, that doesn't mean you can't try to fix things," Myst pointed out.
"What would it cost me?" Faith asked, wondering what it would take to bring the professor back to life as he hadn't deserved what happened.
"How does one hundred hours of demon hunting community service sound?" Myst asked, figuring that would keep her busy for a couple of weeks.
"I was expecting a lot worse," Faith admitted.
"I generally save the fun or kinky stuff for deals where I'm not holding all the cards," Myst admitted. "It's one thing to offer someone the chance to get a new car if they run through the street naked when they don't need a new car and are already prone to that type of behavior, it's quite another if they really need a car because they just lost their old one and they need to get to work."
"Makes sense, does that go for motorcycles?" Faith asked thoughtfully.
"Let's get you out of here first," Myst replied as he had two of his duplicates open portals to the alley in Sunnydale the night before Finch died to start faking the evidence he was going to use to clear her name. "You should get released in a couple of days at worst when the professor turns up and they find evidence of someone else killing Finch."
"No one is going to get hurt, right?" Faith asked warily, wanting to make sure it wasn't a twisted deal that would cause trouble for innocent people.
"Not if I can help it," Myst assured her as he used his Precog to check everything his duplicates were going to have to do in order to spring her. "Nah, we're good. The worst thing I'm going to have to do is threaten a corrupt judge to speed things up."
"This isn't some type of soul deal, is it?" Faith asked.
Myst shook his head. "I'm not a demon."
"That's not a no," Faith pointed out.
"I don't trade in souls, I trade in favors. You agree to help me with demon hunting for one hundred hours and I agree to save the professor and get you out of jail. I can even toss in a job and decent food when you're done with your community service if you want a job."
"What type of job?" Faith asked.
"That depends on what you want to do for a living, I'd happily pay you to hunt demons or to go to school, I'd even pay you to be a waitress or to take care of a bunch of teenage magic users during the summer if you just want a summer job that pays enough to live on all year," Myst offered.
"Why so much?" Faith asked suspiciously.
"I can create gold, it's not exactly hard to wave my hand and create a couple of pounds of gold," Myst replied with a grin.
Faith relaxed a touch. "In other words, you're cheating."
"Pretty much," Myst admitted.
"You realize this isn't going to change anything, right?" Faith asked, unconsciously hunching her shoulders. "I'll still know that I would have killed him."
"I'm not saying you should be forgiven or that you should forget what happened but rotting in a cell doesn't change that," Myst pointed out as he used his Precog to check to see if the Mayor had used magic to influence things. 'Nothing specifically against Faith but his general influence spells, sheer charisma and her situation would have certainly pushed her over the edge.'
"I'll make the deal, if only because the professor didn't deserve to die," Faith said, hoping she wasn't making a mistake.
"In that case I'll pick you up when they let you out, with any luck it won't take more than a couple of days to get you out of here." Myst opened a portal to the hallway in front of the door to Minerva's office and stepped through, trusting his duplicates to frame Caleb for everything and make sure Faith was 'legally' released from prison.
"Thanks," Faith offered, still not sure what to think of the stranger.
Myst turned and smiled at Faith. "Stay safe." He closed the portal then stepped up to the partially open door and knocked on the doorframe.
Minerva looked up from her paperwork. "Come in."
Myst glanced around as he walked into Minerva's office, not terribly surprised that it didn't actually match the movies though it was close he wouldn't have noticed without his memory perk. "Do you have a few minutes? Albus mentioned that you had some concerns about my class."
"I can spare a few," Minerva admitted. "What are you expecting the students to accomplish?"
Myst pulled the syllabus his duplicates had finished out of his inventory as he walked over to her desk. "That depends entirely on the students and how much work they're willing to put into things but anything from enchanted flashlights in third year to vanishing cabinets in seventh year. With any luck I'll have some of the fifth or sixth years creating extra-dimensional storage devices like my watch or flying brooms to replace some of the older school brooms."
Minerva shook her head. "I think you're overestimating the general skill level of the students and the secret of creating vanishing cabinets was lost in the war against Grindelwald."
Myst handed her the folder. "It's entirely possible but I'm an excellent teacher and it's an elective which means I can kick people out of my class that are being disruptive or lazy. As for the vanishing cabinets, look at the year seven material."
Minerva flipped through the syllabus, surprised that it was typed up and surprisingly complete considering he'd had less than a day to work on it. "Have you considered writing a book on the subject?" she asked after a minute of looking through the concise notes, wondering where he'd unearthed that particular secret.
"I have," Myst replied with a grin as he pulled the leather bound book out of his inventory that he'd had his clones create using his Literary Manipulation power while using Cosmic Inhuman Skill in Enchanting, Writing and Editing. "You're welcome to keep the book, I have more copies."
"How much is this going to cost the students?" Minerva asked warily, thinking about Lockhart.
Myst laughed. "Nothing, I'm not Lockhart. I don't need the money, nor do I care. I'd rather just hand the books out to the students when they walk into my class. They're more than welcome to keep the books if they make it through the year with an acceptable, call it an incentive to put the work in. Speaking of which, do you have a list of acceptable detentions to give people?"
"We generally use points but I have a list," Minerva said as she grabbed the packet off her desk that she'd prepared for him.
"No thanks," Myst replied as he accepted the packet.
"What do you mean, no thanks?" Minerva asked.
Myst shrugged. "If Snape steals points for answering questions and being a bit verbose, is there a point in trying to work hard and win when you have assholes on the teaching staff that don't care? I mean I guess it helps people learn to deal with the corrupt ministry but honestly, I'd rather just skip the social pressure experiment and reward people for hard work, it normally gets better results. Either way, how do I find my office and classroom?"
"I'll show you, I could use a break from dealing with the mountain of paperwork Albus dropped on my desk," Minerva said as she stood up and headed for the door, not seeing a reason to try to justify Snape's behavior when she agreed with Myst.
"Thank you," Myst offered as he followed the older teacher out of her office and down the hall, looking forward to starting the school year.
0o0o0
Harry pulled his attention away from the naked girls playing on the slip and slide in front of their cabin when Hermione walked over with a stack of books. "A bit of light reading?"
"I wanted to get started on enchanting," Hermione admitted as she sat down in the folding chair next to Harry.
"Anything useful? What did you trade?" Harry asked, fairly sure she'd had to trade something to get her book early.
"It's one of the best books I've ever read and I got to play with Pandora's breasts while Poppy took pictures," Hermione replied, her cheeks slightly red as she thought about how much she'd enjoyed the attention.
"Pictures?" Harry blurted.
Hermione opened the top book and handed Harry a stack of pictures before closing the cover of the book. "Here."
Harry stared at the moving pictures that showed Hermione in a pair of shorts and a 'Norse Flowchart' t-shirt in various mostly innocent poses with a naked Pandora. "I think you got the better deal, I have to show some of the new students around the castle."
"Probably, Pandora is strangely adorable," Hermione admitted.
Harry glanced at Hermione when he noticed that one of the pictures ended with whip cream on Pandora's breasts and the last picture started with Hermione licking whip cream off her lips. "Should I ask about the missing photos?" he asked as Mione walked over.
Hermione shook her head, her blush getting worse. "It's not what it looks like. The last picture was actually taken first, I was eating pie and then Pandora grabbed the whip cream container and framed me."
"Disappointed?" Mione teased as she conjured a chair next to Hermione with Conjuration and a wave of her hand.
"Would you believe me if I said no?" Hermione asked as Mione sat down.
"Considering how much I enjoyed watching the Paradise twins clean up the whip cream, not really," Mione replied with amusement.
"How was your date?" Hermione asked, trying to change the subject.
Mione grinned at Hermione. "Relaxing, we grabbed burgers and had a walk on a tropical beach."
Harry stared at Mione. "Burgers? Seriously? You could go anywhere in the multiverse and you picked burgers?"
"To be fair, they were really good burgers and we got to watch an amazing fireworks display," Mione explained, rather happy with the low key and relaxed date.
"Sometimes simple is better," Hermione agreed as she watched a pair of teenage girls walk towards them, trying to look like they weren't staring at the girls playing on the slip and slide.
Willow glanced between Mione and Hermione. "Sisters?"
"Alternate timelines," Mione replied with a grin. "How can we help you?"
Tara held up the slip of paper with her cabin assignment. "Cabin three, right?"
"At least for a couple of days," Mione replied as she gestured and conjured two more folding chairs.
Harry shook his head when Willow looked at him. "Nope, I'm just keeping my friend company."
"Makes sense," Tara agreed as Willow and her sat down on the conjured chairs. "What's Hogwarts like?"
Harry handed the stack of pictures back to Hermione. "It can get a bit cold during the winter but most of the teachers are decent enough other than Snape and Binns."
"Potions and History, right?" Willow asked excitedly, not really paying attention when Hermione slipped the photos back in her book.
Harry nodded. "Yeah, I'm hoping we can get into one of the other Potion classes and I'll be dropping History at the end of the year."
"Where in America are you from?" Hermione asked, curious about the new people.
"Sunnydale California," Willow replied.
"Sounds pleasant," Mione offered.
Willow shook her head. "It's not a bad place if you ignore the demons that are attracted to the hellmouth."
"Hellmouth?" Harry asked warily as Myst walked over with a brown haired girl that he didn't recognize.
"It's basically a partially closed portal to a hell dimension that leaks corrupted magic which attracts warlocks, demons and vampires," Willow explained.
"Can you close it?" Hermione asked, looking at Myst.
"Not without destroying the town," Myst admitted as he glanced over at Pepper, Rain Lily and the red haired Irish twins one of his duplicates had recruited who were playing on the slip and slide he'd conjured. 'At least I should have everyone recruited by the time school starts, after that I just have to make sure I count as a villain on the off chance that taking over the Ministry doesn't count.'
"Let's not avoid that, that's where I keep my stuff," Dawn said as she headed for the cabin to put her stuff away.
"I wasn't planning on it," Myst assured her. "Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to wander off before Buffy starts screaming at me again."
"To be fair, you sprung Faith from prison," Willow pointed out.
"Considering the Mayor's tendency to use dark magic at the drop of a hat and the fact that Buffy tossed the assistant mayor at her then blamed her for the entire mess, I'm inclined to give her a chance to prove that she's not a monster, especially since I can scry the past and I know for a fact that the Mayor had spells for unnatural charisma and influence up." Myst dark orbed back to Sirius' house when he noticed Buffy heading towards the group.
"Faith?" Mione asked.
Willow sighed as she realized she owed Faith an apology. "It's a long story."
"We've got time," Mione pointed out.
"Fair point," Willow admitted.
0o0o0
"End of the line bitch," Artemis Giovani snapped as he aimed his gun at the red haired thief that had plagued his casino and other less than legitimate businesses for the last six months. "You don't have enough to bribe all of my men."
"Ten thousand to anyone that shoots him," Ivy offered as she looked at the half a dozen goons the annoying bastard had brought with him.
"We're not going to turn on him," one of the guards said.
"Can I borrow your gun?" Myst asked from right behind one of the man's bodyguards.
"Shit!" the bodyguard spun then blinked when his gun was pulled out of his hand before he could even blink.
Myst smiled at the guards that turned and opened fire on him. "Eric Valdez, rapist and murderer," he said calmly then shot Eric in the head as the rest of the group were trying to reload. "Jackson Mortimer, Mortimer? Really? Eh, whatever you like torturing small fluffy animals."
He shot the short skinny man in the crotch then turned his attention to the leader when the weasel faced man shouted, "Put down your gun or I'll shoot her!"
"Shit!" Ivy Potter cursed, wishing she wasn't on the edge of a three story building so she had somewhere to dodge.
"Go ahead and shoot her, she'll just come back as a ghost and cut you apart while you're sleeping piece by piece…" he trailed off when Artemis shot Ivy causing her to stumble backwards in surprise.
Artemis stared at Ivy's feet which were floating in mid air. "What the fuck? You're flying!"
Myst smiled slightly when Ivy dropped like a stone when she noticed that she was indeed hovering in place. "That never gets old. Or maybe it's funny because it's old," he mused then shot Artemis in the head then shot one of the other bodyguards, leaving two of them uninjured.
"We give up!" one of the remaining bodyguards screamed.
"Meh," Myst muttered as he crushed the gun he was holding then dropped it on the guy he'd shot in the crotch. "I suggest you turn yourself in and serve your time. If you don't, I might have to come find you."
"Yes sir!" one of the men blurted.
Myst turned and walked over to the edge of the building and jumped. He landed on the ground and flashed Ivy Potter a smile. "Want to grab lunch?"
Ivy stared at Myst. "What the hell? How did you survive?"
Myst sighed. "Is that a no?"
"Is he dead?" Ivy asked warily, wishing the streetlights weren't broken so she could see his expression.
"Yeah, I shot him in the head," Myst replied as he conjured a chocolate milkshake in a large glass.
Ivy stared at Myst's glass. "Is that your trick?"
"One of them," Myst replied with a grin then took a drink.
"Screw it," Ivy complained. "I don't care that it's a quarter to twelve, let's grab lunch, you can explain what the hell is going on and why I survived falling off the building."
"One of my powers lets me give people temporary powers, including extreme levels of durability," Myst replied as they started walking down the street.
"Is it magic or biology?" Ivy asked, wishing she had a better idea where her tricks came from.
"It's a bit of both as our type of magic is genetic," Myst explained as they headed down the alley. "How would you like to go to a school of witchcraft and wizarding and learn to make physics your bitch?"
"I'm listening," Ivy replied, figuring learning real magic would make stealing things a lot easier.
