Inconceivable Ch. 10 & 11 (Invincible AU) (Patreon)

(Every character depicted in the story below is a consenting legal adult over the age of 18)

A/N: The second Flaxan Invasion.

[Hey guys, for the next three days (yes this includes Saturday) I will be releasing two chapters of this story a day! This is so that I can release the first chapter publicly on Monday and not Friday next week. Enjoy!]

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“Shit, fuck, shit, shit!”

Maya squirms against the gunk that the aliens have blasted her with, trying to find a way to leverage her super strength to break free but not finding much luck.

This was not going the same way it had last time, but then from what she’d been told, that made unfortunate sense. The aliens, who had only first invaded three days ago, were called Flaxans according to what the GDA had been able to learn from prisoners before they’d expired.

Their dimension existed in a completely different state of time than Earth did, meaning that when they originally came through the portal to Earth, they all began to rapidly age and die within minutes of their arrival. This had been what forced their retreat the first time around and thanks to the timely intervention of the Guardians along with the Teen Team and Maya herself, there were minimal casualties.

However, this also meant that what had been three days for Earth had been decades for the Flaxans, or so Robot had said. Decades that the Flaxans had used wisely to not only advance their technology but also prepare countermeasures for their opponents. It wasn’t just laser rifles and laser tanks anymore. No, instead they had a different tool for everyone they were fighting.

Maya wasn’t the only one currently pinned down by this grey oozy gunk for instance. The Immortal was trying to fight his way free of the same stuff. Meanwhile, War Woman was still ambulatory but had lost her signature mace to some kind of magnetic device that had yanked it from her grasp entirely. Frankly, Maya hadn’t even known what metal the mace was made of, so she was shocked the Flaxans were able to identify it after one encounter.

And that wasn’t even mentioning the deaths. Rex Splode had had his signature power thrown back in his face and been so distracted by it that one of the laser tanks had hit him and bisected him, cutting him in half down the middle in a single second.

Darkwing, meanwhile, had suffered a similar fate, taking multiple laser rifles to the chest when he’d been caught out of position. And Red Rush had been taken out by a well-timed blast of the same grey gunk that got Maya and the Immortal, before being perforated by Flaxan lasers.

Atom Eve, when she’d registered Rex’s death, had gone into a rage that the Flaxans had been quick to take advantage of, and now rolled around on the ground with some device attached to her face, cutting off her line of sight and steadily suffocating her.

From what Maya knew, Eve needed absolute concentration to use her powers… kind of hard to do so when you’re being asphyxiated and can’t even see.

Things were looking dire. People were still fighting, but Maya couldn’t break free. The aliens nearby were laughing at her, though they’d already tried to kill her with their laser rifles to no effect. Not that that meant much. She might still be fine, but other people were still dying.

Even the Guardians weren’t going to last much longer at this rate.

It’s when one of the Flaxans moves to put down Eve that Maya truly sees red though. The other woman had all but taken Maya under her wing in the past three days, especially after they figured out they’d gone to school together just last year. They’d graduated with Maya never even knowing she had a bonafide heroine at her school despite Eve not even wearing a mask.

The conversations they’d had, the dual flights… they’d been really nice. And now she was going to watch Eve die right in front of her because she was too… damn… weak!

“NOOOOOOOOO!”

With a roar of rage, Maya suddenly finds herself on her feet. The grey gunk and the laser tank she was stuck to are blasted away, leaving her in the clear. The Flaxan standing menacingly over Eve whips around just in time to take Maya’s fist to his stupid green face, sending him flying back away and his gun scattering across the pavement.

Maya doesn’t follow up though, she immediately kneels over Eve and rips the device off of her face, freeing the other woman. Eve sits up with a gasp, finally able to breathe again.

“T-Thank you.”

Maya smiles as much as she can in these circumstances and nods.

“Of course, I’ve got you!”

She’s able to prove it a moment later too, as a laser blast arrives from another nearby soldier and she deflects it with her forearm to keep it from reaching Eve.

Unfortunately, they’re far from out of the woods. Maya might have managed to escape the Flaxans’ countermeasure for her, but they were still surrounded on all sides and more alien invaders were swarming through the damn portal by the second.

… Should she run? She’d promised her mom she would after last time. To say Debbie Grayson had been upset when she saw Maya fighting aliens on the news three days ago would be an understatement. She’d been apoplectic.

They’d had a huge row over it, one that had almost ended with Maya leaving and trying to find a friend to stay with for the night. Because ultimately, that was what it came down to at the end of the day. Maya wasn’t a kid anymore. She was eighteen years old and she could make her own choices.

So no, her mother couldn’t ground her no matter how much she might have wanted to. And while Debbie could threaten to tell her father when he got back all she wanted, Maya was confident that her dad would understand that she’d done what she had to, in order to keep Earth safe and hold down the fort while he was gone.

When it became clear to her mom that she was ready to walk out the door on her, Debbie had backed down and they’d reconciled, after a fashion. The one promise that her mother had extracted from her was to ‘not die’ though. That if the situation was ever so bad that it looked untenable, Maya would retreat to fight another day.

Obviously Maya had never intended to actually follow that promise. Not really. But as she’s looking out at the battle, at the Guardians, half dead and half pinned, and at the advancing Flaxan forces, she wonders if she might just scoop up Eve and fly away as fast as possible. Even if the other woman hated her for it for the rest of time, at least she would be alive to do so.

“The wristbands! They’re wearing wristbands that protect them from our universe’s timestream. Destroy the wristbands!”

What? Maya’s head whips around to see Robot, who had been taken out by a specialized EMP early in the fighting, has recovered enough to lift himself halfway off the ground. He’s pointing and when she follows his finger, its to see him pointing at a particular device on one of the Flaxans’ wrists.

Its shorting out… and Maya watches as the Flaxan in question begins to panic and age in real time as a direct consequence.

“He’s right! Guardians, on me! Form up and focus on the wristbands!”

War Woman’s strong, stalwart voice carries on the wind as she too hears Robot’s words. Aquarus has just finished freeing The Immortal from the grey gunk with high-pressure water blasts, and they along with the other living Guardians quickly form up on War Woman. Even without her mace, the female Guardian exudes strength as she lunges forward along with the Immortal and the two begin to take out wristbands with nothing but speed and their bare-hands.

Feeling no small amount of shame over the fact that she’d been about to run away, Maya shares a look and a nod with Eve before both of them burst into action.

The next few minutes are filled with them disabling as many wristbands as they can get their hands or powers on, until finally Robot lets out a specific screech on a certain frequency that makes Maya’s head swim for a moment before every single wristband in the city center shatters and the Flaxans are forced into total retreat.

War Woman, The Immortal, and the rest of the Guardians once again make sure many of the Flaxans don’t actually escape, until finally the portal is shut from the other side and the second invasion is over at long last, same as the first.

Except unlike the first, things really hadn’t gone well this time. Maya looks around and all she can see is blood and gore in every direction. Way more civilians had died this time… and heroes too. The Teen Team had lost Rex Splode and the Guardians had lost Darkwing, Red Rush, and Martian Man to boot, the latter of whom has Aquarus crying over his body.

Maya, quite frankly, couldn’t remember the last time that the Guardians had lost anyone on a mission. This was a disaster.

“Hey… you okay?”

Maya looks to Eve and swallows thickly. She might have tried to laughed it off three days, but all things considered, she just shakes her head.

“Shouldn’t I be asking you that? I… you and Rex Splode had something special, r-right?”

Eve had mentioned it once or twice in their chats. The two heroes had been dating. And now Rex… Rex was dead. Eve’s face falls at the reminder and her eyes begin to slowly trace over to where his body lies in two pieces, seemingly of their own accord.

Before they can land on his corpse, Maya moves without thinking, imposing herself between Eve and the body and startling the other heroine.

“Hey… you don’t need to see that.”

Eve looks like she might argue for a moment but ultimately swallows and nods.

“Shit, what a fucking mess… how did we even survive that? They were totally ready for us this time…”

Maya and Eve both look over as Dupli-Kate walks up, grimacing and rubbing her arm. She looks untouched but that’s ignoring the hundreds of her copies who were killed in the battle they’d all just survived. Before either of them can reply, Robot walks up as well.

“They used their time wisely, it would seem. Analyzing our attack patterns, turning our strengths against us. Atom Eve, I am sorry for your loss. Rex… will be missed.”

Eve swallows thickly and slowly nods.

“Yeah… yeah, he will be.”

Maya doesn’t know what to say. She likes to think her and Eve are friends now, but that doesn’t stop her from feeling like a bit of an outsider. She’s not a member of the Teen Team, after all. Should she just… leave?

“All of you fought well again today. That said, I would ask that you stick around despite your loss. Given the severity of this second attack, the Director of the GDA would like us all to debrief together.”

Maya blinks as War Woman once again walks up to them in the battle’s aftermath. It’s like a dark, twisted mirror of three days ago. This time around, War Woman isn’t nearly as celebratory and her mood is black. Sure, she acknowledges their efforts, but… well, the Guardians had lost three members. Maya doesn’t know what else she’s really expecting.

That said, she also doesn’t know if she should be going to this debrief. None of the Teen Team seems all that put out by the idea, but one of the other things that her mom had tried to convince her to agree to was avoiding Cecil Stedman, the Global Defense Agency’s Director, at all costs.

According to Debbie, Cecil was bad news and not someone that Maya’s father would want her associating with. Even though Maya knew full well that her dad and Cecil went way back and had been working together for longer than she’d been alive.

Still, it had been easy enough to follow her mom’s decree… until today. Because just as Maya is opening her mouth to take a rain check on the debriefing, a bunch of black vans pull up to the scene and begin to disgorge men in suits, both hazmat and otherwise.

And one of those men is exactly who she’s supposed to be avoiding. As Cecil steps free of the car, his eyes lock on Maya almost instantly and he makes a beeline for her, ignoring everything else.

“Invincible, right?”

Swallowing, Maya nods. She knows from her mother’s overheard phone call with the man that Cecil already knows who she is… but he seems to be maintaining the façade for now at least.

Sweeping his gaze across the battlefield, Cecil sighs and runs a hand down his face after a moment.

“What a damn mess…”

Then, he looks to them.

“Get in a van, all of you. Let’s get back to base and discuss what the fuck happened today so we can make sure it never happened again.”

War Woman scowls a bit at that.

“Cecil…”

But the GDA Director is already turning away.

“Get in the damn van.”

When even War Woman wordlessly obeys that second order, Maya isn’t sure if she’s allowed to say no or not… so she goes along with the others. At least she gets to sit next to Eve. Though her bisexual disaster of a crush on the other young woman is probably something she should shelve for the time being until there’s a little bit of distance from the bloody and violent death of her boyfriend…

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A/N: Maya is a mess, but tbf, so is the situation!

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Chapter 11

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A/N: Debriefing!

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The debrief goes about as well as Maya expected it to go. That is, not really that well at all. Nobody wants to be there, obviously. All of them lost someone today. Well, except for Maya herself. Sure, Darkwing had gone to her birthday party one year, but outside of that she hadn’t really known him or any of the others who’d perished today.

Still, they all sit and talk through what had happened and what went wrong. Unfortunately, what it really boils down to is mostly factors outside of their control.

The Flaxans had literally had decades to plan their next invasion. Earth had three days to prepare and no way of truly knowing if it would ever even happen again. Of course, now that it had happened twice, it did seem a lot more likely that it would happen a third time.

Still, nobody could have been ready for the Flaxans to have advanced their technology and come up with multiple counters to their most likely enemies. War Woman’s mace was still attached to the Flaxan’s countermeasure for her for instance. She’d just ripped the panel it was adhering to off of the Flaxan machinery and bent it so it was mostly out of the way while GDA scientists took the rest of the machine for study.

There were questions about Maya’s ability to escape the grey gunk they’d trapped her in as well, especially since The Immortal hadn’t been able to get free without help, but Maya couldn’t really explain it to them. It was like seeing Eve about to die an ignoble death at the hands of some Flaxan grunt had awakened something primal and furious in her. She’d dug deep and come up feeling like the fury of a thousand suns was coursing through her.

She wasn’t sure she could repeat the feat if she had to do it again, but she was sure of one thing… she needed more training. She needed to get faster, stronger, and tougher. She needed to be more like her dad, rather than the weakling she was now. She had the power… she just needed to grow it into something like what Omni-Man was capable of. Something worthy of the name… Invincible.

Eventually, the debrief ends but before Maya can depart with Eve, Robot, and Dupli-Kate, she finds herself called out by Cecil.

“Invincible. Stay behind for a moment.”

Obviously that’s the last thing Maya wants to do, and not just because her mother had forbid her from interacting with the GDA Director directly. But… she really doesn’t have a good excuse, so in the end she just gives Eve a nod when the other heroine glances at her curiously. As Eve and everyone else files out of the room, Maya turns and braces herself for whatever Cecil is going to say.

Is he going to read her the riot act? Is he going to tell her she fucked up today and could do a whole lot better? He could-

“You did the best you could today. But we really could have used your father.”

Oh. Maya is caught off guard by the compliment, only to realize from the second sentence that it was backhanded in nature. She’d done the best she could… but obviously, her best wasn’t good enough. Cecil was thinking the same way she was… put simply, he was thinking that everything would have gone better if only they’d had Omni-Man instead of Invincible.

Maya’s jaw clenches and her hands curl into fists at her sides. She tries not to take it too personally… after all, she knows full well that she exists in her father’s shadow. Maybe she always will. At the same time…

“He’s not here right now. So I’m doing the best I can to fill in for him.”

Cecil nods, a mild look on his face that gives him away just a little bit. Maya has heard enough stories about the GDA Director from both her parents to know he’s never truly mild about anything.

“I know it’s not easy, stepping into shoes that big. The GDA will be happy to help you out, if you need it. Training, for instance.”

That… Maya hesitates. She was just thinking she needed to train harder. And it would certainly help to have a planet-sized agency with unlimited funds backing her up on that front. Her interest wars with her mother’s warning and pleading demands to stay away from Cecil though.

“… My dad will be training me. Once he comes back.”

Cecil tilts his head to the side.

“Yeah? And when will that be?”

Maya scowls and crosses her arms over her chest, looking away.

“I don’t know. He was called back home by his superiors.”

She doesn’t even realize she might have said too much until the sudden silence lingers for a moment too long and she looks back to see Cecil looking distinctly unsettled. He catches himself quickly enough, but Maya’s eyesight is enhanced now… she sees more than she’s ever seen before. He looks downright concerned by what she’s just told him, though he does try to play it off.

“Superiors, huh? Well let’s hope they let him come home to you and your mother sooner rather than later. Especially if the Flaxans try to come back a third time any time soon.”

Maya grimaces at that. Fuck, if the Flaxans tried to invade again… would she even show up to fight? No, that was a foolish question. Of course she would. Not just because she suspected Eve would be there no matter what, but also because it’s what a hero would do… and she was a hero if nothing else. Even in the face of certain death, a hero had to stand tall.

Of course, that idealistic thought runs headfirst into a brick wall of her memories from the battle earlier and the corpses of the heroes who had died ‘standing tall’ in the fight against the Flaxans.

“Thanks for the update, kiddo. You should probably head out though now before your mother shows up with a battering ram. We’ll talk again soon… if you’re really serious about being a hero.”

Maya bristles a little at that, scowling slightly.

“Of course I’m serious!”

Cecil doesn’t even smile as she rises to the bait though. He just looks at her, long and hard, before nodding.

“Good. Keep it that way.”

As she leaves the GDA Headquarters behind and begins flying back home, Maya doesn’t know what to think about the interaction. She does know one thing though… today was absolutely fucked. She’s not sure she’ll be able to hold it together once she sees her mom. The tears are welling up just thinking about it.

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“Sir, the psych write-ups are finally done.”

Cecil Stedman grunts as his loyal right hand man walks into the room with a fresh set of files, setting them down on the desk as Cecil pours over what he already has.

It’s been two more days since the second Flaxan invasion. Will they show up tomorrow and make ‘every three days’ a pattern? Cecil doesn’t know, but he does know one thing… shit is absolutely fucked.

Losing even one Guardian was always a hassle. As the most popular, most public Hero Team on the planet, the Guardians of the Globe were supposed to be untouchable… or at least, they were supposed to appear untouchable. They didn’t lose. They didn’t falter. And they certainly weren’t supposed to die.

And yet, they’d lost Red Rush, Darkwing, and Martian Man two days ago. To a fucking thirty minute alien invasion that didn’t make it beyond a single street. Red Rush was definitely the worst loss of the bunch by Cecil’s estimation, but losing any of them was rough. Losing all three of them? It was a travesty.

Of course, the show must go on. Which is precisely why Donald has just put a whole bunch of files on his desk containing psychology evaluations for their potential replacements. Not all of which were done… consensually.

Glancing over at the files, Cecil just grunts… but Donald lingers.

“Sir… what are we going to do if the Flaxans come back a third time?”

“… Probably nuke the city and hope they aren’t stupid enough to come back a fourth.”

Donald has enough experience not to voice his horror at that idea. Oh, he’s definitely horrified… he’s just smart enough not to openly fret. And yet, still he remains.

“Maybe Omni-Man will be back soon enough to be there for the next time. If there is a next time. Both War Woman and The Immortal have been asking after him. His presence is sorely missed.”

Cecil scoffs at that, causing Donald to furrow his brow in confusion.

“Sir?”

For a moment, Cecil keeps staring at the papers strewn across his desk. Then, he straightens up and turns to look his second in command in the eye.

“I’m not so sure we’d be better off with him here. Might not be a bad thing if he never comes back.”

Donald’s eyes widen behind his glasses, a confused noise leaving his throat. Cecil just crosses his arms over his chest and shrugs.

“Omni-Man is a powerhouse, don’t get me wrong. I’m more than happy to use the hell out of him to protect this planet. But I have never trusted him. Twenty years, Donald. Twenty years since he and I first met on a beach where he ripped a damn kaiju to shreds with his bare hands. Where he told me he’d been sent as an ambassador of his Empire to help us out. About the ‘world betterment committee’. And even back then, you and all of our other analysts said the same thing that my gut told me… he was lying through his teeth.”

Just as quickly as he’d turned away, Cecil turns back to his desk, back to his work.

“I don’t know what Omni-Man’s true motivations are. That’s the problem. I don’t know what he’s planning, if anything. What I do know… is that his daughter doesn’t have to be cut from the same cloth.”

Reaching over, Cecil snags the file containing Maya Grayson’s psych eval from the pile with pinpoint accuracy. He flips it open and his eyes scan the first page for a moment before he nods in grim satisfaction.

“Our analysts agree with me too. She means it when she says she wants to help people. She’s actually in it to protect the planet. Not like her father. But then, she is half-human… she has every reason to stand by Earth and protect it. And that’s what I want to focus on. Making sure her loyalty is to our side of her genetics first and foremost.”

Donald nods slowly.

“So then… you’re going to move forward with offering her a place on the Guardians?”

Inclining his head, Cecil grunts.

“Yes. Preferably before her dad comes back and vetoes it. She’s already proven flexible when it comes to disobeying her mother, but something tells me she’s a lot less likely to stand up to Omni-Man if we don’t already have her signed up and part of the team.”

“Are we still going to use War Woman and The Immortal to make the pitch?”

“… Probably for the best. Doubt she’ll sign on for my sunny disposition, but they are some of her idols. After her father of course.”

Donald makes note of this on his tablet, tapping away for a moment before continuing.

“And Atom Eve? Are we extending an offer to her as well?”

Cecil grabs for the all-pink heroine’s file next, flipping through it for a moment before nodding.

“Good to go. So long as seeing her boyfriend bisected hasn’t broken her will to fight, she’ll make an excellent Guardian.”

“… That just leaves us with one last slot unless we’re expanding the roster, sir.”

Grunting, Cecil spreads the rest of the files out across the desk in front of him for a moment. Dupli-Kate, Robot, Darkwing II, and several more potential recruits lay before him, all boiled down to words on pages to describe their personalities and whether they’re fit to be Guardians or not.

He huffs after a moment.

“… Let’s give it a few more days so we can see if Darkwing’s protégé shows back up or not.”

Darkwing ‘Junior’ had gone missing in the twenty-four hours after Darkwing’s very public, very gruesome demise. To say Cecil was concerned about that would be an understatement, but frankly he was already managing too many fires to put too much focus on it for now.

“Does that mean we’re holding back on the other pitches for the time being as well, sir? It would be better if all three offers went out at the same time. It also might be good to give the Guardians a bit more… space to mourn as well.”

Tch. Space. Time. They had little of either, especially if the Flaxans were going to show back up again any time soon. To say nothing of the rest of the problems Earth dealt with on a daily basis. Fuck, sometimes Cecil wished he could have a hundred Omni-Mans, just to be able to deal with it all. But considering he could barely trust the one, that probably wasn’t a good idea.

And why was he still unsettled whenever he thought about what Maya had said about her father being ‘called home by his superiors’? Obviously, Cecil had always known that Nolan was an alien from a clearly advanced alien empire… so why was it sending a shiver down his spine now?

“… Fine. But not too long. The end of the week at most. And for fuck’s sake, let’s get a proper cordon around where the Flaxans keep coming through, alright? No more being surprised… next time they show up, I want the first wave to be blown the hell up by tank shells.”

“Yes sir.”

Donald departs and Cecil is left alone with his thoughts. He hates being alone with his thoughts, but it’s also when he does some of his best work…

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A/N: Poor Cecil, the stress is only just beginning…

Throw me a comment if you can but please leave a Like if you don’t want to, it’s the main metric I use to track whether a story is doing well or not!

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Chapter 10 Google Doc Link: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1j1Xv_hhRL1WiYCTqCscIBNgC3Vb0cZViFVUo8ebwQRc/edit?tab=t.0

Chapter 11 Google Doc Link: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Xt925ggTcWnXsIvn7XvmmHoGQ0TGTpwoINhf3Er2NPE/edit?tab=t.0