Back at the Savage Land base, morning came slowly and reluctantly. Like it knew better than to rush them.

  Jay woke first, his internal clock pulling him from sleep despite his exhaustion. Domino was still pressed against him, her breathing deep and even. He stayed still, not wanting to wake her, taking the rare moment to just exist.

  Eventually, her eyes opened. She looked at him, and a slow smile spread across her face.

  "Hey," she said softly.

  "Hey, yourself."

  "We fell asleep outside?"

  "Yeah."

  "My neck's gonna be pissed about that later."

  "Mine too."

  They stayed there a moment longer before finally getting up. The waterfall continued its endless cascade behind them, prehistoric birds called in the distance, and for a brief, precious moment, the world wasn't demanding anything from them.

  They sat on their balcony, watching pterodactyls fly by in herds, their wings catching thermals, massive shadows crossing the valley floor. The coffee was strong, the toast was perfect, and the Savage Land stretched out before them in all its impossible glory.

  Domino spoke first. "So..."

  Jay smiled. "So..."

  A comfortable silence stretched between them. The kind that came from not needing to fill every moment with words. Domino sipped her coffee; Jay watched the jungle, and neither rushed.

  Finally, Domino set her cup down. Her voice dropped, quieter and more vulnerable than she usually allowed.. "Jay, you don't have to worry about me all the time. Like yesterday. I hate it when you get all worked up and rage out on my account. That's not you. That's not the guy I fell for."

  Jay set down his coffee. His hand found her chin, gently tilting her face toward him, letting their eyes meet. "Dom, look at me. I love you more than anything in this fucked-up multiverse. You brought excitement and actual happiness to my monotone, always-anxious, always-planning existence. I wouldn't know what the hell to do if you suddenly disappeared." His thumb brushed her cheek. "I'll always worry about you. Especially when some bastard hurts you and nearly kills you hundreds of times in minutes."

  Domino's eyes went misty, and she hugged him quickly and tightly, like she could hide the tears by pressing her face into his shoulder. "Yeah, it's all that asshole Jamie's fault anyway." She shifted the topic; she didn't do sappy well. "When he called you those things, those racist fucking things, I wanted to put a bullet in his skull. I'm surprised you let him off so easy."

  Jay recognized the deflection, but he let her have it. "Although my blood boiled, Jamie had been through a lot. Especially after what Selene did to him and his brother. With me taking away his power and not returning it, he wasn't in his right mind."

  Domino tilted her head, studying him. "Yeah, about that. It's not like you to take others' powers so blatantly. Usually, you at least pretend to have a reason."

  Jay sighed. "The Ancient One specifically directed me not to give him his powers back. To avoid a very, very dark future. And seeing his attitude toward others before he was kidnapped by Selene, it was best I kept them."

  Domino moved closer, curiosity evident. Her knee brushed against his "But don't you have Mad Jim Jasper's power? From what you've told me, Jamie's powers are only weaker versions of that. Why keep both?"

  Jay's smile turned mischievous look she both loved and was wary of. "Who said anything about me needing this power?"

  Domino blinked. "If it's not for you, then..." Her eyes widened as it clicked. "Jay, you are not thinking what I think you're thinking?"

  Jay laughed. "Oh, I'm thinking exactly what you think I'm thinking."

  "Jay, that's too fucking much. I can't handle reality-warping powers. I don't think..." Domino protested, her voice rising slightly.

  Jay put a finger to her lips. "Shh. You always put yourself down too much. You're ready for this, although I'll have to mold and change it to let it acclimate to your body."

  Domino wanted to protest more, but just as she opened her mouth to rant, Jay stole a kiss from her lips. Long enough to shut her up and calm her down. When he released her, there was only blush and heavy breathing on her face.

  Jay smiled, enjoying her flustered state. "Choose one. Healing factor or tachyon field. Which one are you willing to keep?"

  Domino caught her breath, still buzzed from Jay's assertiveness. Her cheeks flushed hot as she hated that he could do this to her. Loved it, but hated it. "You know that's not fair. But I guess safety first, so... healing factor, I suppose."

  Jay hummed and, holding her hand, took the tachyon field back gently. It flowed into him like coming home.

  Then he activated his Adaptive Power perk and drew on new reaches of his Power Theft ability to put restraints, limits, safeguards and conscious control over Jamie's Quantum String Reality Warping. Made it something a human mind could handle without fracturing, and with another kiss, longer this time, deeper, he transferred the power into her.

  He watched carefully, scanning her with his healing aura, constantly checking her cellular structure, neural pathways and genetic code. Looking for rejection, corruption and a thousand other ways this could go wrong.

  Ten minutes passed like that.

  Domino sweated profusely. Her skin flushed hot, then cold, then hot again. Her breathing went shallow, then deep and erratic. His healing aura pulsed around her, adjusting, compensating, guiding the power as it integrated into her biology.

  Finally, he sighed in relief.

  Domino's eyes opened, and they now held hints of scarlet light within them like embers under ash.

  Just as she let out a breath, scarlet strings emerged from around her, then spread from her fingertips, her eyes, her very presence, reaching out, touching and connecting to everything. Jay immediately reached out with his Null Field to suppress the power, but before he could act, the threads shifted. They wove, melted together and finally transformed.

  A dress wrapped around Domino. It was red and flowing with the fabric looking like liquid silk touched by starlight. It hugged her curves perfectly, elegant and alluring at once. The neckline plunged dramatically, almost scandalously low, showing pale skin and the curve of her breasts. One shoulder was bare, the dress draping asymmetrically across her body. The skirt flowed like water, slit high on one side to show her leg. Behind her, the fabric extended into an Art Nouveau pattern. This was the kind of dress you'd see at a high-stakes casino or exclusive gala. It made her look absolutely stunning.

  The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  Domino looked down at her new dress. "What the fuck? This is... I was just thinking about..."

  Jay could only stutter, completely infatuated by Domino's appearance, his brain short-circuited.

  Domino caught it. She grinned, confidence returning as she teased him mercilessly. "Oh, looks like someone likes the dress? Now, roleplays could be more fun." She struck a pose, hand on her hip. "Like what you see, handsome?"

  Jay coughed, and Domino laughed. He changed the topic to regain some composure and from being called a total simp. "Dom, now that you have these powers, you'll need a crash course on how to use them properly."

  He took a breath, organizing his thoughts. Also trying not to stare at how that dress hugged every curve. "So, reality manipulation. It's not as universal as you'd think. Every multiverse has different rules for its fundamental forces."

  "Wait, every multiverse?" Domino leaned back in her chair as the dress shifted with her movement. "How many are we talking?"

  Jay beamed at her curiosity, letting her inner nerd flow, "Countless. For example, DC, a close neighbor of this multiverse, has equations like the Creation Equation or Life and Anti-Life Equations. Other equations represent forces like Speed or Stillness, or even emotions like Will or Fear. These are the fundamentals of how their reality works, how The Presence made it."

  "Wow, that's some lore building," Domino said, laughing. "Did the writers in your world seriously come up with all that?"

  Jay held up a hand. "Honey, please focus. Then we come to multiverses like the Nasuverse where reality bends to forces like Gaia and the Counter Force. Then there are beings like celestialsapiens who are just too abstract. They do whatever they want yet are bound by their own fractured psyches, creating universes in seconds and changing how reality is perceived on multiple occasions."

  Domino got serious, and the teasing faded. "Jay, that's too much responsibility and too many different ways for something as abstract as reality to be bent and broken."

  Jay smiled. "Don't worry, those are for different multiverses. We're fortunately in the Marvel Multiverse, where reality bends through atomic and subatomic manipulation. Telekinetics with fine enough control can technically warp reality. Energy manipulators to matter transmutators. Even you, Lady Luck herself, change reality by altering probability fields."

  Domino blinked. "Seriously? Just anyone can change reality? What kind of half-assed rules did that One Above All make?"

  Lightning flashed outside with a deep rumble. Ominously close enough to rattle the windows.

  Domino leaped into Jay's lap. "Oh God! What was that?"

  Jay said nervously, wrapping his arms around her. "Maybe don't curse the All-Knowing and All-Seeing Creator."

  Domino just nodded quickly. Very quickly.

  Jay extended his hand, taking hers as their fingers interlaced "Now you have Jamie's power, which affects the quantum entanglement of different particles and energies, but they're limited locally. You can pull, push, and even cut those strings representing these entanglements to change their reality."

  Domino looked confused. "What are you talking ab—"

  She suddenly stopped as multiple red strings flooded her vision. Millions of them were connecting everything to everything else. It was Quantum entanglement made visible.

  She could see how particles related, how energies flowed, how reality itself was just a web of connections waiting to be plucked like guitar strings.

  She barely understood it. The sheer information overload to her brain, but instinct guided her. Her probability manipulation, her luck, meshed well with this new power. She could feel which strings to pull, which to cut and which to leave alone.

  Then she looked at Jay.

  Around him, there were no strings connecting to him or originating from him. All she perceived was a vast, dark space, and within that void were flickering stars. Billions of them, each pulsing with power. They threatened visually, daring anyone, anything, to try changing or bending reality around him. The message was clear: he was immutable and unchangeable. A fixed point in reality itself.

  Suddenly, her vision snapped back as normal sight returned. She was sweating and hyperventilating as her heart raced and hands shook.

  "Jay, what the fuck was that?"

  Jay calmed her, holding her steady. His hands on her shoulder grounded her. "That was the quantum world you perceived. What you saw around me was a mixture of my resistance to reality-bending and my new universal reality-warping powers taken from Mad Jim Jaspers."

  Domino processed that and could only think of how much of a gap. The sheer difference in scale still existed between them.

  He was walking around with the power to rewrite existence, and she'd just gotten a taste of what that meant. It should've been terrifying and made her feel small. But instead, she felt trust. He'd given her this power and trusted her with it. Made her his equal in a way few people could ever be.

  Jay smiled, explaining different applications of her powers with childlike, bubbly energy. "You know, if we can merge your probability field with Jamie's power, we can achieve something truly amazing. And even then, if you use your endless stamina from the healing factor..."

  Domino just watched Jay return to his sunny self, the version he only reserved for her to witness. This was her Jay. Not the Power Broker or The Doctor who brought back the dead. Just Jay. The man who got stupidly happy explaining quantum mechanics like a kid with a new toy.

  All she could do was kiss him, still in her exquisite red dress that reality had woven for her, wanting to be with him and give him something worthy of this gift he'd just given her.

  She straddled his lap, the dress's high slit allowing her to settle against him. Her hands slid up his chest, feeling the warmth of his skin through his shirt. The kiss deepened and turned hungry. She rolled her hips deliberately, feeling him respond beneath her.

  "You have no idea what you do to me in this dress," Jay breathed against her neck, his hands sliding up her bare thigh exposed by the slit. His fingers traced patterns on her skin, each touch sending electricity through her.

  Domino's breath hitched as his lips found the curve of her throat. "I have some idea," she managed, her voice husky. Her hands tangled in his hair, pulling him closer. "The way you've been staring at me like you want to devour me."

  "I do," Jay murmured against her collarbone, his hands gripping her waist through the silk. "Fuck, Dom, you're perfect."

  She pulled back just enough to look at him, her scarlet-touched eyes meeting his. "Take me inside," she whispered, her lips brushing his with each word. "I want you. Now."

  Jay stood, lifting her with him. She wrapped her legs around his waist, the dress pooling around them like liquid starlight. He carried her inside, her mouth on his neck, her hands exploring his shoulders, his back.

  They barely made it to the bedroom. Domino's back hit the wall first, Jay's body pressing against hers. His hands found the dress's single shoulder strap, fingers tracing the edge of fabric against her skin.

  "This dress," he breathed, his lips trailing down the exposed slope of her shoulder. "Watching reality itself dress you in something that makes you look like a goddess..."

  "Less talking," Domino demanded, her nails dragging down his back. "More touching."

  The dress shimmered, responding to her desire, the fabric loosening, shifting and making way for his hands. She gasped as his fingers found bare skin, his touch igniting every nerve.

  They stumbled toward the bed, a tangle of limbs and desperate touches. Domino pulled his shirt over his head, her hands immediately exploring the planes of his chest, the muscles of his shoulders. Jay's mouth found hers again, the kiss deep and consuming.

  "I love you," he murmured against her lips, his hands reverent as they traced her curves. "Every perfect, dangerous, incredible part of you."

  "Show me," she challenged, pulling him down with her as they fell onto the bed. "Show me how much."

  And he did.

  Hours later, they lay tangled together, sweat-slicked and satisfied. The red dress had pooled on the floor, forgotten. Domino's head rested on Jay's chest, listening to his heartbeat slowly return to normal. His fingers traced lazy patterns on her back, his other hand playing with strands of her white hair.

  "That dress is dangerous," Jay said, his voice rough.

  Domino laughed, the sound content and drowsy. "You're just saying that because I can make it appear anytime I want now."

  "Exactly. How am I supposed to get anything done when you can just..." He gestured vaguely. "Do that?"

  She propped herself up on one elbow, looking down at him with a wicked smile. "Who says I want you to get anything done?" Her finger traced down his chest. "We could stay right here. All day."

  Jay caught her hand, brought it to his lips. "Tempting. Very tempting." He pulled her closer, kissing her properly. "But eventually, the world's going to move on again."

  "Eventually," Domino agreed, settling back against him. "But not right now. Right now, the world can fuck off."

  "Right now," Jay echoed, wrapping his arms around her. "The world can definitely fuck off."

  As the day passed, two wounded souls finally rested and found peace in each other. The world could wait. The threats could wait. The villains plotting in submarines, the cults forming in cities, the missing returnees, the complications from New York, all of it could wait.

  For now, there was just this. A man who could rewrite existence, giving his girlfriend god-like power because he trusted her. And a mercenary who'd spent her life trusting only luck, now trusting him.

  It wasn't perfect. The scars from London still ached, and exhaustion still lingered. But it was real peace. The kind you fought for and earned and held onto with both hands because you knew how rare it was.

  And in the Savage Land, where the impossible became normal, they held onto it together.