By the time night came, Jackie was in her hero's mindset. Dressing up in her pretty snug uniform alongside her more fit daughter, she was ready to fly out into the city and take on Florida's crime scene. While most of the States were more normal with it's criminal life, Florida was a whole different beast, with the weirdest and most dangerous creatures compared to any other part of the country besides Darkport. Crocodile-men, partygoing succubi, the mythical Florida Man and his many clones...
The Owl though, she was able to handle it all on a regular basis thanks to living here. Taking to the sky, she'd breath in that cool Orlando air and watch her daughter Owlet rise even higher into the air, with her elegant wings. They were slightly smaller than her own, but a lot sharper and thus allowed her to fly faster than she ever could. For her to have wings like that when she was a bit younger... a girl could at least dream.
"Mom, let's go! I'm so excited to actually do this!"
"Be careful..." Jackie said nervously, looking as her daughter flew frantically through the sky ready to go. "This is still your first night out. You haven't even fought anyone besides me anyhow!"
"Oh please, that's plenty! Hey, is that the Gator Queen?" Pointing in a direction, Carol-Anne hoped to fool her mother so that she could get out there and do something without such a passive hero holding her back. She was absolutely fine to fight someone, but she absolutely did not like her mother worrying about her when she could show off how much she deserved this role as a sidekick!
"Wait seriously!?"
Taking the bait, Jackie turned around midair to try finding where her archnemesis was only to see nobodies. Well, not quite nobodies, as she recognized the rookie criminal Pastry Maker just casually walking across the street carrying a huge sack of cash. But in terms of criminals of actual note there was nobody actually down there. And unfortunately, by the time she turned back her daughter was already gone.
"...Damn it Anny! You come back here, before you get hurt or-"
*Ding ding ding*
All of a sudden, her phone rang heavily. Pulling it out, she'd listen only to hear the voice of her fellow hero Amaterasu on the other end.
"Jackie, you're needed at the Great Lodge immediately! We have an emergency that needs decisive action!"
"What!?" Falling onto the ground by Pastry Maker, the Owl casually beat up the pastry-themed villainess with just one hand while using the other to continue the call. As she walloped the small time crook, she was more concerned with what was going on with the Power Lounge than what her opponent was doing. "Is there some major threat to the planet? Are we under attack by the Atlanteans or the Galdians again? Did Celebrant get mind controlled? Please tell me Celebrant didn't get mind controlled..."
"It's not a threat to the planet, but it IS a threat to the entire hero community! I'm casting a spell at your location now, to bring you over."
Launching a knockout kick into Pastry Maker's neck, Jackie was at shock of what Amaterasu had said as her foe crumpled onto the ground unconscious. "Bring me over? But I need to find and rein in-"
In a flash, the Owl was engulfed in light and rocketed across the country in the matter of seconds without her consent. By the time she emerged from the golden cocoon that wrapped her up, she was in her spot in the Great Lodge surrounded by the rest of the team and witnessing in person Amaterasu hanging up with her.
"...my daughter. Ammy, you could have let me get my daughter first."
"Sorry, Ohio's orders."
With everyone accounted for and present, Jackie noticed Ohio approach the podium looking rather dour. Something serious was in his eyes, an expression that was rare considering how in control he usually was of a situation. This left her worrying a bit, and as she looked across the rest of the group to see the exact same expression on everyone besides Coffin and Celebrant, it only added on to her anxieties.
"Everybody here? Alright. Attention everybody... I am not a man of medical science, but when I learned about this... I knew I had to alarm you all. Dr. Armstrong, you have the floor."
Moving to the side, Ohio stood to the side as Ashley Armstrong waddled up in front of the podium. However, this was not the Ashley that Jackie was familiar with being treated by. She was a lot softer, with a huge beach ball sized gut and mammoth mammories. Her nurse's uniform absolutely strained to contain such a figure, actively struggling with each step and revealing a bunch of brown flab as she got into position. She was absolutely obese, something that she did not see on her two weeks ago.
As soon as she spoke, it became clear why.
"Power Loungers, before we begin know that I am streaming this to all of the heroics organizations of this world with Ohio's permission. Not just S.H.O.T.G.U.N, the Liberty Legion and the Vanguard in the States, but also other organizations such as the Rosebearers of Central America, the Round Table of Great Britain, the Free Oceans movement in Atlantis, and the various Sentai teams of Japan. That is how dire the threat is."
"This... is AdipoMetaToxin." Lifting up a pale blue vial, Ashley showed it to the world as a larger image of the vial lit up on the projector behind her. "It is a chemical derived from the Adyx, a carnivorous flower from the late Cretaceous Period thought to have been extinct until about 39 years ago, when the Chronomancer first opened the portal to the Primordial Dream."
At the hearing of the Chronomancer, Jackie went from anxiety to depression. That bastard was responsible for her mom being in stasis, so whenever he came up in conversation she got sentimental and sad for her mom.
"Now, on it's own the juices of the Adyx are supposed to be used to digest small raptors, turning it into energy for the plant to grow larger and stronger. However, someone had managed to clone the flower and bring it into the modern day. On top of that, by adding the juices and essence from a type of flower grown on Glucos V thanks to Sugar Rush's verification-"
"You're welcome!" Zoe answered, bowing a bit out of respect.
"Please stay quiet, Sugar Rush. Anyhow, this mix of Adyx and an unknown Glucosan flower have created a incredibly potent liquid pathogen that spreads both by liquid and by skin contact. This pathogen effects two kinds of people, namely those with Metagenes and those from Glucos V. Naturally, this does not affect those from other alien worlds like the Celebrant, but basically anyone else on the planet can be affected... including gods."
"What does it do?" Amaterasu asked, raising her hand. "If it affects those with Metagenes, how does it exactly affect them?"
"It's dangerously simple, actually." Flipping to the next slide on the projector, Ashley put the pale blue vial away as she got to demonstrating things. "It causes fat cells to bind with metagenes on the atomic level, turning them into a sort of hybrid between fat and metagene cells. While this doesn't remove Metapowers... it heavily weakens them for a year-long period, on top of causing you to gain a lot of weight and to become very gluttonous. And if your Metagenes are recessive... well, you can see how much worse a single dosage is."
"T-then..."
"Indeed. I have taken a dosage the day before. Do not worry about getting infected, as the infection period only lasts for 24 hours. Afterward, it exists solely within the body."
Almost as if on cue, a gargantuan roar came out of Ashley's gut, echoing out a fair distance. Trembling a bit, she'd fall to her knees and pulled out a small bar of candy to munch on before the growling stopped.
"For now, I am halting this hunger using a special medicinal bar meant to stall a person's hunger but it is proving inefficient. The worst part... is that this medicine is being mass produced by an unknown company, and is being spread across the entire world. I do not know how far it is spread so far... but I have heard reports of Gattaca being turned into a immobile blob while on a vacation in Japan, followed by Merline becoming a gelatinous mass in Britain after being infected and subsequently trying to create a cure through alchemy."
Waddling away, Ashley got on her way out of the room and towards the Power Lounge's kitchen hall as General Ohio retook his position on the mantle. "So... you have heard it. We have basically the biggest medical crisis in all of Cape history. At the moment, we have called a truce with our rivals at the Liberty Legion to find a cure. As much as I don't exactly trust a quick vaccine... we need a defense against a toxin like this. Especially with these debilitating effects."
With Ohio putting down the mic one last time, the meeting was over. As everyone started talking to each other, Jackie was thinking to herself on the implications of this toxin. If the pathogen was in Japan, did that mean it was in Florida? Was her daughter at risk of being turned into some immobile blob? What about her son Roger? Or her other son Joe? What's worse, what if she got infected herself? She was already so fat already, if she had gotten infected she could easily become immobile just like Gattaca!
One thing was clear. She needed to head back to Florida ASAP. Thank god Amaterasu could send her back as quickly as she had brought her here, or she would have strangled her about taking her here without a way for her to protect her daughter.
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