My name is...

[Arnold POV]

I wake up to the screams of people and the smell of something burning.

"Who's cooking shit right now?" I say as I wake up. Turns out parademons were cooking our planet.

"This is not what I had in mind when I said I needed something fun to happen." This is the worst. I slept in late for one day,and the world was invaded. FUCK. Talk about consequences.

'I can't just wait around. This is my time to act.' I said inwardly.

I say out loud, "I need to complete missi- I mean, I need to save the people."

Ahem, motives aside, I act quickly, opening a secret compartment of my wardrobe where a duffle bag is kept.

I quickly open it and change into my new set of clothes. It was a leather robe. Inside the robe I wear a vest of the same colour and a black shirt. I wear brown trousers, and boots. I look like a plague doctor, just without the mask. I finally put on a mask completing the look.

Just in time too. As a parademon crashes through my room's balcony, attempting to capture me and probably take me back to its hive. It charges at me aiming to grab me but before it can move any further, I launch a Slash at it, which perfectly cuts it into two.

"Bad doggy," I remark, before moving onto my balcony window.

'Ok now, how does one fly?' I ask myself. It was an ability I forgot to hone, while I trained in the use of cursed energy. But it's fine, I have shit tons of cursed energy. How hard can it be?

I channel cursed energy into my feet and jump. I launch into the air and zoom through the sky.

'I really did it on the first try. Haha…' or so I thought. I eventually come back down no matter how hard I try. I've basically turned into the hulk, which is good for now but definitely not as efficient as just flying.

'Oh well, this was expected. I just have the cursed techniques. Not the talent to use cursed energy to do anything productive. I'll need to purchase some talent or get some via a mission.' thinking this I continued to jump through the city aiming to find a hero or something.

But all I find is parademons. A lot of parademons. As in hundreds. The movies don't do it justice. And after I cut down a parademon trying to capture me, all of them took it a bit personally. And at the moment I was being swarmed

I'm not one to back down from a challenge though. I make good use of «Slash» and «Cleave».

It goes something like this. Parademon sees me. Parademon flies towards me. Parademon dies.

I constantly cut down waves upon waves of parademons. When they swarm me in numbers too great to Slash at, I use «Boogie Woogie» to transport myself to a new location and restart the cycle.

'At this rate I'll run low on cursed energy' I think to myself while cutting them down.

As this process continues, I hear a loud scream "SHAZAM!"

"Bingo" I say moving towards the voice's origin. I see a man wearing a red onesie and white cape struggling to remove a parademon off his back.I launch a «Slash» at it, killing it instantly.

I then walk towards him, as I call out his name, "My my, if it isn't the great Shazam. Pleasure to meet you. My name is A. Nostradamus. I'm here to help."

"Hello sir, it's good to meet you too… Just so you know, this isn't the 18th century" he remarked in a nervous manner.

"Says the man in a onesie" I retorted without missing a beat.

"Hey! This is the trend these days y'know. All superheroes wear onesies. Batman Superman… you name it" saying this he defends his clothing.

"Sure. You tell yourself that" I say dismissively.

Then Shazam starts to reprimand me, "What's your deal anyways. You should get to safety. This place isn't safe."

I calm him down by saying "Come on, it's fine. I'm here. That fact alone makes it the safest place on the planet. Unless you're an enemy of course. Anyways, that doesn't matter. What say we go get to the bottom of this."

"Yeah sure, where should we go?" he says, seemingly having decided to work with me.

"Metropolis square" I decided.

"Why there, of all places?" Shazam inquires.

'Because superheroes typically meet up at those kinds of places. But I can't tell him that.' I think to myself before answering.

"It's a central area,so movement will be easier." I quickly fed him a half-baked excuse.

"Oh that's smart. So let's move Mr. Nostradamus" he tells me before the both of us start moving towards our destination.

On the way we meet resistance, but I quickly dispose of them before Shazam even has an opportunity to act.

Before we get there however, we hear a scream.

"SOMEONE! PLEASE HELP!!"

"HANG ON! I'll get there!" Shazam says before I can even turn my head to see who called for help.

'Guess that's the difference between me and a hero' I think to myself.

Anyways, it turns out this young woman and her infant child were being abducted by our parademon friends. Shazam rescued the pair and killed the parademons in a moment. Guess he really does have the speed of mercury and the strength of Hercules.

"You done?" I call out to him.

"Yeah, I'll be there in a moment" he says. He then flies the mother and child to a hiding place inside a store before joining me as we continue to move.

"Thanks" he tells me.

"Why the thanks?" I inquire

"For believing in me enough to leave those guys to me. Some heroes I've worked with before treated me as a child, and i appreciate the trust" he explained.

"It seems you've misunderstood something" I tell him.

"Huh, what's that?" he inquired

"It's for you to find out." I told him.

'He really thought that I did it because I trusted him. Hah, I guess that's a hero's mentality for you' I thought. I didn't trust him. No. I don't trust anyone but my brothers.

I just didn't give enough of a shit about that parent and child to act.

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A/N: This chapter was written a couple days in advance so please remind me to update the image of Mr. A. Nostradamus.