The plan

Aniello woke up early that morning. Learning how to dance for the upcoming festival was quite tiring but good exercise. Amy and Joseph wouldn't wake up for another few minutes so it was a good time to go downstairs and get a drink before the pub opened. Aniello went behind the bar and stopped when he noticed the door to the back room was partially open. Aniello entered the back room and instantly knew something was wrong when he saw the concrete steps leading down underneath the island.

He rushed down the steps and reached the large metal door but it was shut tight. An alarm could be heard coming from the other side but it was very quiet. Aniello banged on the door with more and more force each time until the noise suddenly increased in volume. It was like some putting the noise through a megaphone a few times then into his ears. The alarm shut off on the other side of the door and a bloody Joseph was on the other side.

"What happened to you!?" exclaimed Aniello as he followed behind Joseph into the large room. Joseph pulled two chairs out from amongst the desks, placed them facing one another, and then gestured for Aniello to sit down. "Did you get into a fight?" Aniello looked around the room and saw scorch marks by the shelves and a few small triangular panels scattered on the floor.

"By the look on your face I can tell you know who Demitri is." said Joseph with a stern look on his face. "The people you work for are trying to track down this device and once they find it there'll be no stopping them. If this device is weaponized all they'll need is a single soldier to destroy an army. So for the sake of everyone... for Amy's sake, tell me everything you know."

"I've worked for my entire life trying to live up to my father and take his place in Dark Nebula's army. A month or so ago, I was meeting with one of the five top people in the army called Achille. They took a liking to me a took me with them to look at what is currently their most powerful weapon and key to their entire plan. A large quantity of anti-crystal. They plan to find a way to super charge it an cause it to fuse all the alternate timelines together so that we'll have infinite resources and space." Aniello looked down and paused but continued. "It was after Achille showed me the anti-crystal that Demitri arrived asking to see Achille. I went with her but should've stayed in my lane.

That's when I first met Demitri.

He was hired to track down that device I guess but when he saw me... he did something to my head. Every now and then I get nightmares and visions of a demon and he's always... ALWAYS THERE! SMILING AT ME! MOCKING ME FOR ABANDONING MY FATHER AND LETTING THAT GIRL DIE! I didn't know what I was doing when I helped them plan an attack on her planet. When I went down to get a closer look a saw them killing innocent people. After I tried to save just that one girl they called me a traitor and forced me to prove myself. I was the one who fired those cannons at this planet."

Joseph put a hand on Aniello's shoulder who looked up at him. Aniello felt a horrible crushing feeling inside himself and knew this was something he had to confess to Amy.

"Look. Now that Demitri knows the void engine is here, he's probably going to call for people to come and help. I was able to hold him off but he's not always going to attack while I'm down here with all my weapons. I'm going to need you and Amy to learn how to defend yourselves while I rig the pub up with defences. I don't know when he'll return but for now we'll focus on getting to the bottom of your abilities. And thanks to you being my personal alarm a few minutes ago I can conclude you don't just accelerate. I think your ability is more like... amplification. Making things bigger like velocity and noise. So Amy is something opposing that. Anyway, you get back upstairs and join Amy for breakfast while I clean myself and this room up."

Aniello left the room and climbed the stairs. When Joseph was sure he was gone, he got up and walked over to the glass divider. But rather than looking at the device, he instead looked at his reflection. The reflection of a large, mangled, red skinned monster with tall horns a blue eyes covered in blue fire.

"I'm willing to make a deal with you. You help me when Demitri returns and we'll make a deal on your control over my body afterwards. For now..." Joseph ignited into an aura of blue fire with tall horns of his own and an arrow headed tail sprouting out his lower back. "We go twenty eighty on control. And don't mistake this for me forgiving you. You will NEVER gain my trust again. We're finished here." the aura receded and the horns and tail disappeared.

Joseph began clearing up the mess from his fight with Demitri by picking up the baguette grenade launcher and throwing it back on the shelf.