-Who’d they pick as brides?- I had to /ask.

-Well, they tried to take me, and that got a bunch of them dead, so they decided Set had spoken and fled with Cindy.- I frowned immediately at Dealer’s /reply. -Then they snatched Susan Richards and Jennifer Walters both, somehow managed to grab Wanda, pulled a relic out of their arse that neutralized Fury and took her down, overloaded Laynia over in Europe with a mystical Darkness device, dessicated Amazonia, and somehow managed to pick off Emma Frost outside of Cynosure.-

I blinked. -Damn, they have balls. Or are desperate as fuck.- They had just managed to piss off every major supers organization in the world... except for us up here. -I have the impression they tried more and failed?-

-Oh, they went after Sunny, Storm, Kwannon, Jean Grey, Isabella, and Ursula, and they nearly made off with Volcana and Titania both. Thundra and Mr. Hill and the boys stopped them. There is so much pain coming down on them. It’s going to get nasty and bad.-

Well, there I went, fighting interstellar abominations, and missing all the fun stuff at home. -And right in the middle of the SHIELD purge of the Skrulls and Wraiths. The fuckers got their timing down, for sure.- That operation was taking a bunch of Peggy’s time helping to coordinate from up here, and involving Shielders and Widows around the planet, in addition to any heroic recruits close by. I think Peggy mentioned the Castles had gotten involved...

-Yeah, they found Lemurian agents in Europe and the States, no surprise, in addition to a few scattered around the Pacific Rim. The festivities are going to start in an hour, and everyone is pretty sure Sama is just hoping and waiting to see if Set chooses to manifest.-

The serpent god Set, one of the eldest spirits of Terra, and supposedly the first murderer. I could easily picture Sama’s opinion of him.

-Well, if you need a nuclear option,- I /hedged, sorely wishing I was invited along.

-Oh, ho, we got this, yeah,- Dealer /sighed with me. -Killzone is gonna take a quarter of their city solo.-

-Killzone? OH. Wow.- She was all grown up. Huh. Just like me. Not Skrulls, but just as bad... and so like them as Deviants. Maybe racial conflict ran in the blood. -How big’s her Zone now?-

-Two hundred yards active radius.- I winced at that. Damn! -She can juice it to four hundred if she sits in place and concentrates on pumping out the poison. Nice way to reduce a large area to dust in no time if you need to clear it.-

-And every Druid alive is debating if they should gank her, no doubt.- Yeah, there she was with the Cynosure forces going down to the Lemurian enclave, Kwannon with her. Kwannon felt me looking down, gave me a subtle wave and a thumbs-up sign.

Yeah, they totally had this. I could only give myself a lop-sided smile at missing the fun stuff down on the planet.

Poor little me. At the heart of the scientific and engineering revolution, the sensory core of the overarching military objectives and defense of the world, facilitating the diplomatic integration of five worlds into a mutual protection alliance that hopefully would last for many years, card-carrying and highly valued member of the High Guard with doubles of myself enjoying multiple lives around the world, and what I really wanted now was to be down there with my buds beating up on some seriously bad people who needed to be beaten up on.

-How’s your Core doing, by the way?- Dealer /asked. -We haven’t linked up in a while.-

I glanced at it. -93%. Not far off from the big final jump. I don’t even want to picture the sheer volume of energy it takes to fill one of those. No wonder no Novas ever get to Ten. The energy demands are just insane.-

-Then we all get to update for free!- she /chortled.

-You all verified you can do Core dumps and not lose your progress?- It was a weird question for me. I was going to make the Ten Core, which would cost me everything in my Nine Core to make, so I’d basically be filling the Ten Core from nothing, albeit at a higher speed than before... except everything was going to be getting refined and condensed even more, too.

The others would dump the contents of their Nine Cores, and simply take them back once they updated with me. They’d actually start their Cores higher than I would be!

-Yes, we can do it. No complaining. None of us fill our Cores at the speed you do,- Dealer /reminded me.

-Yeah, yeah. Prime person slaving away for her poor, neglected doubles.-

-Hey, I know the feeling!- she /wagged her finger at me.

-Meh!- I /shot back aloofly.

I had left this alternity, which meant the balance range of the Duplicates Spell. The same way I’d been able to leave Dupes and Clones in the Prime Kids time and in the Guardians’ future world time, Dealer had suddenly been promoted to Prime for this dimension.

That meant she could issue her own Clone, and create her own set of Dupes... which she promptly had, because why not, it would be fun!

Her Clone called herself Anning Munroe, and had already taken over all the brewing operations, blown them wide open, and the various Dealer’s Best Labels were now some very high-end alchemical brews, indeed, with some fanatic followers in a LOT of places... as well as being the #1 place to train commercial Alchemists in the States. Some Talented Natural Brewers were even being sponsored with their own custom labels, getting them off to a nice start.

Freya Munroe had promptly flitted off to the Tribal lands, given all this up, and was farming and watching over the forests out there.

Chef Julia Munroe had promptly run off to the Colosseum and taken over all operations there, feeding the Combicha addicts and trying out cuisines from every alien culture that they ran across... and not incidentally continually building up trading and potential mercenary contacts literally across the universe as she did so, as well as overseeing the people rotating in and out to take advantage of the training opportunities there, including the Asgardians. She also maintained the Terran-style gambling operations, although it wasn’t her first love.

The Alchemical Brews at Bar None up there had basically no limit on the number we could provide. Brewing operations down on Terra were expanding accordingly.

Researcher Curie Munroe had set up her own labs as a Baxter Foundation Annex, and was going deep into Isotopic Research and alternate production means there, and unsurprisingly was already starting to set the world on its ear, since she could generate any needed Isotope and had the brains to suss out all the good stuff with incredible speed.

Dealer’s last Dupe was a Performer, called herself Neferi Munroe, and promptly flitted off to LA and the West Coast to go into acting. Her first movie would be out within six months, and exotic looks and force of nature Charisma combined with ungodly Intellect did their things. Drooling producers were chasing her with job offers even now.

She was also VERY determined to make some good sci-fi and fantasy entertainment, although actually they didn’t do too bad, probably Sama and Briggs driving that scene...

I kind of scratched my head that there was a part of me that gloried in people and attention, and just shrugged. It wasn’t like Neferi didn’t have plenty of personality examples to use on demand... and she was still a total geek.

Nobody was going to associate Dealer’s Dupes with either of us, of course, because they all looked like Ororo Munroe on a coloration basis. Slight adjustments to the faces, different hair styles, and suddenly Rain Queen descendants were everywhere, I guess?

Whatever, she was hardly out of place in the Tribes, and the truth was that exotically beautiful African women weren’t going to be unwelcome even in the States, especially with their choice of killer accents.

Naturally, Dealer still had all her potential Madrox-Ur’d Ability Dupes available. I could only wonder what six more of me/her running around would find to do...

Dealer being a Prime also meant she could now gain and keep her own Karma. Updating one another didn’t exchange Karma, but it did keep us very current with one another regardless, and if nothing else, we still shared rep count experience. Given how different the things we did were, it was still a Good Thing.

Also, she didn’t get the Pact, that traveled with me. The Underweb extended across time and dimensions, so me bopping around didn’t affect it. That was good, as I didn’t want Dealer or any of the others bound to the Widow in the Web if I could help it.

-So, did you make your six yet?- I had to /ask her, after glancing around Markspace and not seeing any unexpected Twenties sitting around there.

-Um!- she /replied, and I rolled my eyes. -They aren’t Marked for the moment...-

Of course she had found a Madrox and Copied his ability. I had, so why wouldn’t she?

-Dish,- I /prodded her.

-You’re going to love this batch,- she half-grinned to nobody. -Well, Cleo promptly larked off to Madripoor. Seems she has this crazy idea of taking it over and making it her personal fiefdom.-

-Mithar help them all.- It was a pirate, smuggler, and druglord-infested port city in the isles near Indonesia. Criminals, murim, and terrorist organizations from all over the world had footholds and interests there. The place was violent and deadly, and the hereditary lord of the city only survived by trying to play everyone against everyone, which was only going to end in death at some point.

-She must be a Warlord.- Because that was totally a conquest thing, rooting out a source of Evil and doing something about it.

-Yeah, that was my thought. They don’t have a clue what a Twenty coming in can do to them,- Dealer /agreed.

-A Twenty with connections,- I /pointed out. -Not that I think she’ll want to bother us...-

-Can you imagine how ashamed one of us would be if we failed at something like that? I’d go hide my head under my pillow for a week.-

-Who else?-

-Danica is going for the Road.-

-Explorer or Adventurer?- I /asked, picturing that. Driver or Rider was important, too...

-Explorer. The, uh, Adventurer is Medea. She has decided that she doesn’t like the Askar or the Crux.-

I slapped my forehead. Well, MJ would just smile, and probably help her out. -Well, we don’t think small, and they’ve got to go. What is she going to do when they are all running in terror from her?-

-Find some other totally crap organization to pester? Rhetorical question, right?-

-Right, right.- It so was. If it meant shaking up the Egyptian and African Pantheons, so what?

-Royale is taking over my terrestrial gambling interests and connections there. She’s a Fatale, so she’s definitely going to get involved in the espionage games, too.-

-Working with the Widows or Felicia?- I /asked. Felicia couldn’t very well be running around as the Black Cat as much if she was being Thundra.

-Oh, Felicia Duped off Thundra as soon as you left and went back to being the Black Cat full time,- Dealer /informed me, and I sighed. Yep, there it was, Thundra close-Marked in Felicia’s Allegiance. Looked like Titania and Volcana were Marked under her, too. Probably doing merc work... -She has far too much fun at it. She and Royale are going at it like proper thieves.-

-Your criminal empire is going to be extensive,- I /noted to her.

-I learn from the best!- she /agreed smugly, and I nodded seriously. -Hao totally has it in her head to be a starship captain, so you’ll be hearing about her pretty soon. The last is Uhura, who is taking over management of Grimm Materials, which is undergoing some major expansions.-