A Strange Meeting

Carl had no idea how he’d gotten to the restaurant where he sat.  The decor was mid scale, or, in other words, somewhere his mother would never be caught dead.  The waiters were ignoring him.  He didn’t have to wait long before a man came and sat down in front of him.  The man looked vaguely familiar, and then it hit him:  If he’d been born with orc fangs, he’d look exactly like the man sitting there.

“Hello, Carl.  You might have heard of me before.  I’m the Beast.”

“Oh, wow, it’s and honor, I mean, I’ve been hearing about you for years, and when I heard you were a member of SAVIOR, well I thought we would meet, but it’s been so long and…”

“We don’t have much time, Carl, so save the fanboy moment for after.”

“Yes, sir,” Carl said with a mock salute.

“I said I’m the Beast…but what I should have said is that we’re the Beast.”

Carl’s smile faded and he began looking at The Beast in shock.  “Come again?”

“Normally, about this moment, you’d have a blackout.  I know they’ve been happening more frequently of late, because Trip, Alice and I have been around a lot more.  You even spawned a new personality.  When did we learn russian again?  I don’t remember doing that, even though we speak it quite well.”

“I learned russian when I was twelve…I think.  My head hurts.”

“I know.  You see, Carl, I am a safety valve for you.  So is Trip, Alice, and even Sasha.”

“A…what?”

“You couldn’t take being a mutant.  Our mother, well you know how she is.”

“So much pressure to be normal,” Carl said through gritted teeth.

“Yes.  So much pressure.  So…you are normal.  You have no powers.  You aren’t a mutant.  I on the other hand.”

“You are a mutant,” Carl said softly.

“Yes.  Yes I am.”

“But…how is this possible.”

The Beast chuckled softly.  “It would take a degree in psychology to answer that question.  The simple answer is that we have Dissociative Identity Disorder.”

“But…I’m looking right at you.”

“Well, we are a mutant, aren’t we.” The Beast paused for a moment or two before continuing, “We’re also a very powerful mutant.  As we gain life experience, we gain new powers.  Normally, that is paired with gaining a new personality.”

“Wait…we have…four super abilities?  I’ve only heard of the Beast being able to see Radar and, well, the obvious, he has four legs.”  Carl said looking at the person across from him with a little suspicion.

“I can also change my appearance.  Hence the reason I only have two legs right now.  Because of that, instead of all of our personalities inheriting your body…as would be normal for DID, each of the forms gains a different body…but each one only has access to one of the powers that we posess.”

“What can Sasha do?”

“Big metal wings.  You do the math,” The Beast replied.

“We can fly?”

“Sasha and I can.”

“You have access to all the powers, don’t you…because I have access to none.”

“You are taking this quite well,” The Beast said as he gave Carl an appraising eye.

“My head is killing me more and more the longer we have this conversation…but I’m not a teen who just wants his parents to be proud anymore.  I’m an adult.  I have a girl…had a girlfriend.  Wait…are you why I don’t have Cassandra anymore?”

“No,” The Beast said, “sadly, that was partially SAVIOR’s fault…but mostly Thanatos’ fault.”

“Who was thanatos?  I remember a dream…we killed him?”

“We kicked him out,” The Bast said with a laugh.  “He was a parasitic nanite infection that gained sentience, and then tried to take over the city.”

“Wait..what?” Carl said with a laugh.

Quickly, as he knew he was running out of time, The Beast ran through the events of the past few months, including things that Carl remembered, and things he did not.  When he was done, he noticed time was about up so he said, “I’m sorry to cut this short, but we only have 13 minutes a day we could do this.  I’ll record a number of video messages on your computer so that you can get up to date on the full story…or Alice or Trip will.  Still, we’ll get you up to date.”

“Ok…this is a lot to…” he began and then disappeared as the last of The Beast’s ISP ran out.