Christmas Eve 2006
Ezekiel prepared for Christmas like normal, except this year he had a helper with him. Next to him stood Hulk, who was currently dressed in an oversized elf outfit which made him look ridiculous. Ezekiel took a bunch of pictures of him just to capture the moment properly. Hulk himself didn't mind the costume and was even happy about it. Ezekiel was henged into a Santa costume himself which just made everything more over the top.
While most everything Ezekiel planned to give out was stored in a seal, Hulk insisted on carrying stuff. So both Hulk and Ezekiel had decent sized bags tossed over their shoulders as they portaled to their first stop for the night. They stepped out into the main hidden base which was pretty much asleep at this point. While it could be pretty active, around the holidays most people visited family or took vacations.
As for the kids, ninjas and other adults who lived at the base? They were normally asleep by midnight and even if they weren't, the base and living section were separated so they wouldn't be disturbed. Ezekiel led Hulk through the base to where the mess hall was and pulled out a large Christmas tree. The hulk excitedly placed his bag down and opened it up which was filled with ornaments and other things needed for the tree.
As Hulk started to decorate the tree, Ezekiel started to pull out presents and arranged them off to the side. The amount of presents he brought expanded since last year and he wanted to make sure it was easy for people to find their gifts. So as Hulk placed lights around the tree, Ezekiel set up different piles of presents in alphabetical order. The piles were placed against the wall where Ezekiel posted the letter for each pile.
By the time Ezekiel finished with the presents, Hulk finished with the Christmas tree. Ezekiel looked at it with its haphazard placement of decorations and chuckled slightly before he said, "You should spread them out more evenly."
Hulk glanced at the tree from a moment and moved a few decorations around before he turned back to Ezekiel with a proud look on his face. Ezekiel gave a thumbs up as he said, "Close enough, besides it's your first Christmas tree…"
Hulk nodded as he said, "I'll do better with the next one."
Ezekiel and Hulk quickly packed up before they headed to their next stop which was the Xavier mansion. They already had a tree set up, so they only placed presents there before they headed to Genosha. There they set up a tree at the orphanage there and Hulk managed to make it look halfway decent. Once finished they headed up to the penthouse area where they placed another tree and set out presents for Tao, Agatha, Hela and Ebony.
From there they headed to a few other places like Tony's and dropped off gifts for people. Adrian and his family also received some gifts along with Fisk, Aleksei and his family. Once that was finished, Hulk and Ezekiel traveled around to different orphanages the remnants of the Hand worked with and left gifts for the kids there. While the gifts were all the same, since he didn't want the kids to fight over them. He was sure none of them would complain about a tablet. They were set in a kids mode, but the older kids had more unlocked privileges.
Once finished Ezekiel took Hulk back home and gave him his Christmas presents as he said, "You can't open them till tomorrow morning."
Hulk frowned as he looked at the small pile of presents under the tree he had before he said, "Okay…"
Ezekiel nodded before he made a shadow clone and said, "Alright, I need to get out of here, but I'll leave a clone with you and I'll bring you some treats tomorrow night."
Even though it was pretty late, Hulk and his shadow clone went to play video games. Ezekiel bid them goodbye and went home to sleep since he had a big day tomorrow with his family. The next morning Theo awoke after two hours of sleep to find his parents already up making coffee. Theo froze in place as he noticed what his parents were wearing and said in a horrified tone, "Oh no."
His parents turned to him with big smiles on their faces as Jacob said in a cheerful tone, "Oh, yes."
Theo shook his head as he said, "No, no, no, I am not going to wear something like that again."
His mom approached and pulled him into a hug as she said, "Come on, it's just for a few hours. It'll be fun."
Jacob nodded in agreement as he poured out a cup of coffee and said, "Come on buddy, everyone else is doing it."
Theo gave them both a flat look as he said, "Don't try to peer pressure me into wearing something like that."
Daniel took the offered cup a moment later with a nod of thanks before she said, "Don't be like that, it'll be fun."
Theo shook his head and was about to reply when Milly entered the kitchen followed by Isaac. Both of them are in the same ugly looking Christmas sweater as his parents. The worst part was it wasn't even the one from last year, but an entirely new one apparently for this year…
Milly smiled brightly as she saw Theo and said, "Get ready so we can go eat breakfast, Theo!"
"I am ready." Theo said in a deadpan tone of voice.
Jacob lifted up a sweater from the kitchen table as he said, "Not yet. You are missing something important."
Theo started to turn around to walk back downstairs as he said, "I'm not feeling good, I probably have a fever since I seem to be hallucinating. You guys go ahead without me and I will rest in bed for the day."
Daniel caught him by the shoulder and said, "Here, let me check your temperature."
Theo was completely fine and after some more back and forth the family finally walked over to Ben and May's home. Before they had breakfast, everyone gathered together and took a family photo. Including Theo who was in the same terrible looking sweater that everyone else wore.
Besides the sweater incident and the fact he was forced to wear it all day… Well the rest of Christmas wasn't bad at all. As far as gifts went, Theo received some new clothing, a cell phone since his parents wanted an easy way to contact him and his sister. Sure they spent a decent amount of time either in school, at the shop or at home. But they also went out with their friends in the neighborhood a few times a week.
Milly also received a cell phone of her own, but the stand out gift for her was a decent kitchen mixer. It wasn't a super high end one, but it would be perfect for Milly to use in baking. Isaac turned out to be a little jealous of the gift since he had a sweet tooth just as bad as Milly. But Milly promised he could use it whenever he wanted. Even though Theo and his parents knew it didn't matter, since Milly and Isaac always cooked things together.
The rest of the day was spent just hanging out, cooking and playing games. Theo made sure to sneak a couple extra plates of food away along with a good bit of extra desserts for Hulk. By seven or so, everyone helped clean up Ben and May's house before they left for their own homes. Theo was quick to change with a clone and then hid the new ugly sweater in the back of his closet next to the last one… He really hoped this wouldn't become a thing.
Theo changed into Ezekiel and his first stop was Hulk's where he created a new clone and dropped off a large plate of desserts, along with homemade cookies and a few other things. He hung out with Hulk for about half an hour and made sure Hulk enjoyed his Christmas presents before he portaled to Hela's.
He stepped out of the portal to the hallway and found all of the presents he dropped off last night gone and a handful of new ones in their place. He checked them out and found they were all marked for him, so he collected them before he went and knocked on Hela's door. She answered it in a Gundam themed Christmas sweater and pajama pants. She smiled at Ezekiel and waved him inside as she said, "Merry Christmas, come on in."
Ezekiel walked in to find that Hela had collected her presents, but placed them on the coffee table and left them unopened. As Ezekiel sat down on the couch he asked, "Why didn't you open your gifts?"
Hela sat down next to Ezekiel as she said, "I wanted to wait for you."
Ezekiel smiled slightly before he started to pull out his gifts and said, "Well in that case, let's open our gifts before we eat dinner."
Hela received some limited edition Gundam model kits along with a custom made sword made by one of the ninja weaponsmiths. It was also enchanted by Tao and Agatha so it would most likely never break or dull. She also received some limited edition clothes mostly Gundam related, but a few were also from other anime she liked.
Ezekiel mostly received books on magic from Tao and Agatha, along with a customized Gundam model kit from Hela. She also gave him some figurines from some of the anime she knew he liked. With the gifts out of the way, Ezekiel pulled out a couple plates of food, along with desserts and some drinks before they settled on the couch to watch a Christmas movie.
After hanging out with Hela till well past midnight, Ezekiel finally called it a day and headed home to sleep. The next few days passed without incident and after the start of the new year, Ezekiel met up with Tony to check in about a project they were working on which was the next part of project Revival and the insurance company he started. Ezekiel stepped out of a portal into Tony's lab to find him in front of his desk as he worked on his computer.
"Yo."
Tony glanced up from his computer as he said, "That was quick."
"Welcome Ezekiel."
Ezekiel nodded in reply as he said, "Thanks JARVIS."
Ezekiel stepped up to Tony's desk as he added, "What did you expect, this will change the world."
Tony leaned back in his chair as he asked, "Do you really think they will let you take this public?"
Ezekiel shrugged as he asked, "It doesn't matter what they think and I won't let them stop me anyways… How long until you have a working prototype?"
"Maybe six months but it won't be as effective unless you can provide me with some Vibranium."
"Vibranium? Why do you need that?" Ezekiel asked.
Tony pulled up some testing data on his computer screen and showed it to Ezekiel as he said, "For some strange reason the pod works at least forty percent better in the theoretical tests with it replacing some of the main components…"
Tony let out a sigh before he said, "If we could replace the entire resonator with Vibranium it increases to over one hundred percent. But that would make them ridiculously expensive to make and I doubt there is that much Vibranium on the planet."
"How much Vibranium would be needed per machine if you replaced the resonator?"
Before Tony could find the information on the schematics JARVIS said, "Three pounds, six point two ounces."
Tony nodded after a moment as he added, "Or just over one pound for the other version."
Ezekiel pulled out a large block of Vibranium from his storage seal and placed it on Tony's desk as he said, "This is twenty five pounds. Make a normal version without any Vibranium, the two modified ones and then see if you can figure out a way to use more Vibranium in another model that improves its efficiency with the rest of it."
"It's gonna take me almost six months to build one of these… And you want three more? That's almost two years to complete them before we even start testing them."
"Can't you build all of them simultaneously?" Ezekiel asked as he glanced over the plans on Tony's screen.
Tony rolled his eyes as he said, "I'm making everything alone, in my lab with some robot arms for help…"
"Tell me what you need and how many people for help and I will get them for you."
"Do you know some competent engineers who you can trust with this project?" Tony asked as he turned back to look at Ezekiel.
"You're helping me terraform Mars…" Ezekiel said in a flat tone.
"I retract my question."
Ezekiel pulled out his tablet and started to type on it as he asked, "If you had three or four people and some more equipment, how long do you think it would take?"
"Two or three months if we build all of them at the same time."
Ezekiel smiled as he glanced up from his tablet and said, "I'll have people and equipment for you in a week."