Chapter 14 - Ain't No Rest for the Wicked

*New York, USA*

It has been a couple days since Devin and his three new companions have returned to his home. The siblings were cautious upon entering the house, but soon were wandering around and looking at the decor. Each picked one of the spare bedrooms and began unpacking the few sparse belongings that they had. The next day Devin and Izabela took Yana and Henric to get registered with the school district. Henric was going to go to River East Elementary School and Yana was assigned to Midtown High School. Devin recognized the school's name as the same school that Peter Parker attends with other characters such as Mary Jane Watson, Gwen Stacy, and Ned Leeds. Who knows if they will even be tied in the same way as before? Devin could only guess at certain possibilities at times while others he could predict based on other circ.u.mstances. After returning home after doing some school and personal shopping for everyone, Devin laid down a few rules. The first being that no one was allowed down stairs without his permission as those rooms pertained to his work and they could get hurt if he wasn't with them. The next rule is that if one of the two kids wanted a friend over in the future then they would need to ask permission from either Devin or Izabela first, just so one of them could make sure an a.d.u.l.t was around. The final rule is that everyone is to clean up their own messes. Izabela had opted to work around the house so as to be more available to her siblings and Devin should he need something. Devin told her that she would get a substantial salary for her work around the house and he also told the others that he would give them an allowance in exchange for chores he could assign them and both agreed.

The few days back had been going great and simply peaceful, until a single phone call shattered it to pieces. Devin had just settled down for breakfast when his cell phone started ringing. Standing back up and walking over to the counter Devin checked the caller ID and sighed.

"Hello Ms. Storm. To what do I owe this unexpected call?" Devin said trying to keep his tone even. Can't this lady chill?! They had only been back a couple of days! Thankfully Sue hadn't heard his frustration as she greeted him normally.

"Mr. Price sorry to call you unexpectedly, but we hadn't heard from you for awhile." Sue said with a somewhat friendly tone.

"Sorry, but the last few days have been hectic to say the least. I had to settle my new housemates in when I got back and things have just returned to normal." Devin said as he looked out the kitchen window.

"I'm sorry to hear that Mr. Price. I can call back another time that might be more suitable if that's ok." Sue said with an honest tone. Devin thought about the pros and cons. On the one hand it would be nice to have a couple more days of peace, but on the other this meeting was inevitable and it could be better to just get things over with.

Ah f.u.c.k it!

"Nah this is fine. Let me guess, you want to schedule a time for me to meet you so you can scan me for the possibility that that energy you guys were searching for might have left traces on me. right?"

Devin said as he turned and walked back to the table just as the kids finished their breakfast and left for other parts of the house. Henric had become partial to the early morning cartoons that he would watch in the living room and Yana had taken to reading the books in the library at all free moments.

"Right. Would it be at all possible for you to come in today?" Sue asked as Devin finished a bite of food. Man this lady is persistent.

"Today is fine though I do need to finish a couple things first. How about around 1 o'clock? That sound good?" Devin asked as he finished another bite of food. Devin still had to clean and store the spare weapons that were sitting and collecting dust in his inventory. Devin had decided to keep a pair of handguns in his inventory as well as some spare ammo. Devin had been contemplating the unselected weapon voucher and had narrowed it down to a couple different options, but no definite answer, but he needed to decide. Devin hadn't been lying that the last couple of days had been busy, getting the three settled as well as checking the status of everything else going on. Devin had seen an article that Tony Stark was currently missing after a demonstration in the middle east. So the birth of iron man was in the process. Other than that the only mentions were the Fantastic Four and an advert for The Xavier Institute. Devin made a mental note to find a way to subvert Professor X's mind reading abilities before meeting anyone from the school.

"That sounds fine Mr. Price. I would suggest that you take a taxi as there is rarely any available parking near the building. I will see you soon." Sue said before hanging up.

Devin took one last bite before cleaning his plate. Devin let Izabela know that he had work to do down stairs and that if they needed him then they just needed to press the button next to the door and talk into it and he will hear them. Devin descended down to the armory so that he could go through his loot. Entering the room, the left side had dozens of racks for hot weapons while the right side had just as many racks for cold weapons and right in the middle of the room was a large work table. Devin unloaded his inventory onto the table so that he could sort through it.

Combing through everything Devin managed to count 7 handguns, 3 ARs, and a dozen knives of varying size. He also had the Broad Sword that he had received at the beginning as well as the Iron Knuckles which looked like a pair of gloves with metal triangles over the knuckles. Devin got to work cleaning everything starting with the sword. After a couple hours of work everything was cleaned oiled and stored. Devin decided that he would keep the sword, gloves, a pair of handguns, an AR, and a knife. The last bit of work Devin decided to take care of was the weapon voucher that he got from Sokovia.

'Alice I have a question for you.' Devin said as he used one of his pilfered knives to clean his nails.

'Ask away master.'

'If I were to get a dagger from the shop, what would the difference be between that one and the knife in my hand?' Devin asked as he flipped the knife into the air and then caught it before stowing it back in the inventory.

'Master, all weapons from the shop have two major differences from items that you acquire in this world. The first is that you can channel magic through any item that has been bought from the system while the worldly item can't. It would reject the magic and possibly explode depending on the amount channeled. The other difference is that weapons bought from the shop will transform with you when you trigger the dragoon transformation, but the items from this world won't.'

'So the items and weapons I get from here aren't as powerful as what I could get from the system. Sounds like Peter put that limit on to mess with me. I need something swift and quiet since I have plenty of firepower. The sword is good, but not too conspicuous and the gloves lack a one-hit kill factor and I doubt neck snapping would work on everyone, but a blade to the throat is usually final.' Devin said as he clicked on the voucher then clicked accept. The weapon menu of the shop opened as Devin moved towards the stairs. The only weapon that screamed inconspicuous and silent was the dual daggers so clicking on them and hitting yes to accept, the screen closed and a pair of matching daggers appeared in his hands. The discomfort came and went, leaving behind new knowledge. As Devin looked at his new tools of death he couldn't help but smile a little before spinning one dagger in his palm before stowing them away.

Devin left the bas.e.m.e.nt and bid the others goodbye before calling a taxi to take him into the city. Ten minutes later Devin was sitting in the back of a cab watching the scenery pass. He knew that this meeting could go one of two ways. Either he would get scanned and they would find nothing and be home free or they scan him and it sets off every alarm in the building. Even with the reassurance that he got from Alice, Devin still felt that this was going to go anything but smoothly.