The Soulmate Initiative: Book 3: Next Generation

6. The end of a hectic year

REGINA POV:

After moving back home, everything fell into place. We were happy. My arm got healed, so I'm able to do everything without help now. Ash, Candice and I can now enjoy retirement, they may come a time when we're needed to help protect our planet, but we're staying out of the action if we can help it, we get to spend more time with the kids and it means none of the Avengers have to stay home to look after them. Jessica Rhodes has moved into New Asgard, across the road, so Ash gets to spend a lot of time with her. We extended the list of people who know the location of our home, to those we had invited to the party when we moved back in, they've all agreed to never tell anyone else our location, that they'll contact us if someone is trying to reach us or if they heard word that someone's attempting to attack us. HYDRA are no longer a problem, we completely wiped them out, so we don't have to worry about them trying to hunt us down. And Thanos is more than dead, he got snapped, so he and his minions aren't a worry. We've got friends out in space, the only other people actually, who know of our location, but we didn't invite them because they could be anywhere right now and agreed to visit from time to time, besides, who would they tell?

My favourite thing about retirement definitely has to be spending time with our children, I dont regret not having a child of my own, because we got blessed with 7 incredible children, who we're learning more about all the time.

Lucy, not the first born, but the oldest, due to being the only one to survive the snap. Throughout the five years, she grew very unwell, we learnt it was to do with the infinity stones and a connection to her, to all our children. A mini Suzanne, even taking on her short height, though only 5 now, Maria is already the same height as her, but a year behind. She had never displayed any powers, but now, after the snap, they've started to show. When scared, annoyed, irritated, angry or upset, her eyes glow purple and when she's like that, if she hits something, she usually breaks it, which always alarms us, but whenever I check her over, she's never injured. I'm worried that she's going to turn out like me, if she is truly linked to the Power Stone, it's going to be dangerous, possibly for her, but definitely for other people. We trying to teach her to calm down, but that's not an easy thing to teach a 5 year old. She seems to get annoyed and angry pretty easily and she's definitely rebellious, but she's also a softy, loving animals. Since Anna and Stacey built a new, huge jungle gym for the older of the children, we've been making sure to get Lucy out on it as much as we can, to burn some of her energy off, she doesn't get tired quickly, but she does seem to love playing on the equipment.

Maria, the first born, the big dream of Ashley, that came at exactly the perfect time for her. Though the same height as Lucy, who's 1 yesr older, we still think Maria is quite short for her age, so we think she gets her height, along with her hair, from her mother, while she gets the rest of her appearance from Nian. Having revealed her powers to us in her sleep when she was only 6 months old, we have a pretty good understanding of them. Come from the Reality Stone, her dreams and nightmares are broadcast out into the world in red whisps, though sounds are also around, but a little disoriented. We've noticed that if she is making physical contact with someone else who's sleeping, at the same time as her, both their dreams are broadcast, weaving in and out of each other. But if someone's asleep, touching her, and she's awake, nothing happens. She's quite the little dancer, she dances around more than she runs, getting easily distracted by her non-existent, or existent, music, not noticing if someone calls for her. Nian and Anna have started taking her to our dance studio when they're doing ballet together, and she's started joining I'm, they'll probably start teacher her soon. One more thing we've discovered about Maria, is something she inherited from her mother, that isn't to do with appearance, but instead, from her brain. We don't know just yet if she's a genius or not, but she learns things very quickly, is always wanting to learn new things and gets very bored in class, telling Ash that she 'gets it'.

Braden, our first boy,
and already quite the troublemaker, but we saw that coming, because he's Candice's son. He's Candice's son for sure, he has his mother's eyes, attitude and natural hair colour (she dyes it dark blonde now to hide the greys, though she assures us all that she's never had a grey hair, but we all know she's just insecure, and grey hairs aren't going to put us off), though he's of average height, so may be following his father with the height. Now 2 years old, but very clingy, never wanting to be far from someone, it doesn't matter who it is. We were a bit concerned, especially when he wouldn't really react to us, we then started to notice that he doesn't come when called, if you call him to follow you, he'll follow you, but not because he was called, but because he doesn't want to be left behind. We also noticed, he's never said a word to us, we've been trying, but he's never said anything, we were at first thinking a learning disability... But then we discovered why. He's deaf. Not completely deaf, thankfully, but he has about 35% hearing in his left ear and 45% hearing in his right ear. Candice was distraught, Candice is deaf and she didn't want her child to be deaf, too. We've managed to get him used to wearing hearing aids, it's only sometimes that we find one laying around the house and have to hunt him down to tell him to keep them in. With the hearing aids, he can hear pretty much everything, unlike Candice, since she has a lot less hearing. But being the troublemaker he is, he's not so easily caught, since he was 6 months old, he's had the ability to teleport, thank you Space Stone. At first, we were terrified that he'd teleport away somewhere and get lost or hurt, Nian was considering chipping him like a dog, but we've discovered that he can only teleport to where he can see. So as long as he doesn't look out of a window and decode to teleport into the forest surround our home, we'll be alright, but with him wanting to be close to us, we don't think that will be a problem.

Joseph, the golden boy, who always follows his mother's example. Stacey is an amazing role model and though Joseph is only 1 year old, he already seems to understand how amazing and influential she is. He looks a lot like his mother, though his blue eyes could have come from either parent. The one thing we were expecting would happen, is that he would gain the super soldier enhancements, definately the case, but since he was born with them, he doesn't look like a muscle-baby and he doesn't lose control of his strength, it just comes natural to him. We have yet to find out if he has the other enhancements, like sight and hearing, but he's definitely got the speed, he is not easy to catch when it's bath time, unless you're a super soldier or Prisha. Then after the snap, we were waiting for his powers, unsure of what they'd be coming from the Time Stone. Stephen Strange even sat in a room with him for a while, neither did anything, though Joseph did babble a bit, not on top of talking just yet. Then something happened, he looked at Strange's mobile phone, not taking his eyes off it, and about a minute later, it rang. We weren't sure if maybe he did that, or of something else was going on, so we all sat in the lounge, in silence. Such a good boy, he didn't try to leave, we even gave him a picture to colour. But then something happened again, he hadn't looked at anyone the whole time, just colouring. But he slowly looked at Braden with wide eyes, like he had just experienced a very traumatising event, then two things happened simultaneously, Joseph giggled and Braden farted. So we're pretty sure he can see the future by 1 minute, we still have more to discover there.

Frigga, born in 2021, but still only 1 year old. Die to her mother being an Asgardian, it's changed her ageing, she is seeing slower than her siblings, which is a bit upsetting that she won't be able to grow up with them, but it means we get to spend more time with her while she's young. She looks just like her mother, such a little Princess, which she actually is. She didn't have any powers before the snap, but afterwards, the Soul Stone apparently contributed. We have absolutely no idea what affect it's had on her, we keep a close eye on her, but we haven't noticed anything. We're not even sure what powers she could gain. She's loved by everyone, always smiling and babbling.

And then we have the twins, born just 2 months ago. Both with eyes that could be from either parent, but one blonde and the other brunette. So far they're showing no power signs, but since they're both linked to the Mind Stone, we have no idea what to expect.