[Edward POV]
I built a fort in my living room, hiding inside with Vader and the kitties while the two girls stared at me with disbelief from outside.
"Edward! Stop ignoring us!" Haley snapped, kicking the fort down.
The east wing collapsed, revealing me hugging the kittens in my arms.
"Hey! You need a permit to demolish this fort!" I scolded her.
Vanessa joined in and said, "Why are you ignoring us? It's been two days since we came here, and you've avoided us every chance you got."
"Okay, you want me to be honest with you?" I stood up begrudgingly and confronted them.
Yesterday, I had to get on a conference call, but Haley and Vanessa crawled under my table and messed around. I had to cut the conference short.
Then, they kept asking me to put suntan oil on them as they were sunbathing outside by my swimming pool—wearing only teeny tiny bikinis.
The attacks never stopped. They kept coming.
"It's because you two are driving me nuts," I told them. Instead of reflecting on their actions, they giggled.
"Why don't you just go along with it? I mean, we're both fine with it," Vanessa scolded me back.
"Because it's dangerous," I told her with a serious expression.
After being away, I never checked what the evolution seed had done to my genetic makeup, whether my sperm carried radiation or potential world-ending viruses.
"I'm afraid I'll hurt you again," I muttered.
Both of them swooned instead and glanced at each other. Ness took a step forward and said, "Hey. The world is on pause right now. Why don't… we pause too? Like everything that happens in this period of time—it won't count."
Haley nodded. "Yeah. This doesn't count at all."
[Haley's commentary]
"I know it looks like we're throwing ourselves at him," she squinted her eyes, acting annoyed as if she had been caught in the act and was trying to defend herself, "but this is for his own good."
"Frankie called me and Ness, asking for our favor. She was afraid for Edward's mental state and wanted us to help him get through this difficult time. That's… why we came here."
Her tone was unconvincing at the end.
[Commentary ended]
"Doesn't count?" I looked at them weirdly. "Is that seriously coming from the two of you?"
They smiled awkwardly.
"None of us is mature enough to do this so casually," I told them.
"So we don't have to do anything. We can just hang out," Ness said.
"Yeah, no strings attached. No friends with benefits. No Ashton Kutcher and Mila Kunis–style relationship," Haley said with a giggle.
I snorted, admiring the movie-name pun and that solid dig at the celebrity couple.
"We don't know how long this lockdown will last, so let's just try to make the most of it," Ness said.
"I agree," I said with a slight nod. "It'll be nice to slow things down a little after everything."
"No studying how to cure cancer?" Haley teased sarcastically.
I suddenly froze. "Oh damn. I forgot about that. Um…" I became restless and immediately started to call Robin, Frankie, and Bernadette.
The two girls looked confused. "What are you doing?" Ness asked.
"I kinda had a breakthrough in my research for cancer cure, so I'm going to let my lab take it on while I get some rest," I said casually.
Both of them widened their eyes in shock.
"WHAT?!" Haley snapped.
"You… you really can't shut down your brain, huh?" Ness muttered with a heavy sigh. Haley turned to her and asked, "Is this how he usually is?"
"He gets worse by the day, but yeah, this is pretty much how he usually acts—even when we were together," Ness replied.
"No wonder you broke up with him," Haley said empathetically.
"I heard that. Piss off, I have some work to do here," I told them. My T-bot rolled over to the desk and pushed the two girls away—nudging their legs.
"Hey! Stop—stop that!" Haley tried to object, but T-bot was adamant.
"Hey, we'll wait for you by the pool. Come by after you're done," Ness said.
"It might take hours though," I told her.
"It's fine. That'll give me a good tan."
Haley whispered to her, "There's no sun today."
"Just—just come with me." Ness pulled Haley's hand and dragged her away exasperatedly.
Frankie, Robin, and Bernadette answered the meeting call, and Bernadette immediately asked, "What—what happened? Did another virus break out?"
"There's nothing being reported," Robin added. "So it's not another virus."
Frankie, who was six months pregnant, said, "Edward, this is a peculiar group you've gathered. Why did you call us?"
"Ah, I have some research I need to pass to the lab. I need to get clinical trials started soon, so I need your help."
"I can destroy the FDA so you won't have to get their approval ever again. Just say the word," Robin said in a serious tone.
Bernadette giggled, thinking it was a joke, and added, "I wouldn't mind the FDA getting destroyed. They've been a pain in my ass these days."
Frankie ignored them and asked, "Research on what?"
"Cancer."
In the Zomworld, they had cured cancer in the '90s. I read their research in the disease database while I was there, and I could understand the gist of it.
"So—cancer, diabetes, HIV, and alien pox. You're… you're not human, are you?" Bernadette said jokingly, her eyes full of admiration.
Robin nodded slightly. "No. He's a god."
"No! I'm not a god—Robin!" I admonished her before turning to Frankie. "This time, say it comes from the lab instead of me. I don't want the attention on me anymore."
"I'll make sure of that," Frankie replied. "I guess after everything, it's time for you to take a long rest and do what you want instead."
I nodded. "Yeah. I'll do that. I already did everything I wanted with disease research, so it's time to close that chapter and move on."
Bernadette was alarmed. "Wait. You're done? You're not going to study medicine anymore?"
I shook my head. "No—not until I have to. If there's another plague, I'll try to find the cure for it. But I'm not going to research until I absolutely have to."
Bernadette sighed, then smiled. "I get it. You deserve to rest."
I nodded in agreement.
During the lockdown, I wanted to catch up on movies I'd missed, TV series I'd put on the back burner, read novels, cook good food, garden, play with the kittens, and maybe hang out with my friends online.
I didn't want to work at all. I just wanted to enjoy this short retirement.
Han and Robin could handle the tech company, so I didn't have to.
Oracle managed the day-to-day trading and stocks, so I didn't have to.
I had already built up Entertain's talent pool—the new writers, directors, animators, showrunners—so I didn't have to supervise everything anymore.
Right now, I still had the Black Widow movie to produce, but after that, I had nothing planned for a long while.
"I guess I should put my all into the Black Widow movie and then take a few years off."
I returned to the swimming pool after sending over the research and saw the two girls lying on sun chairs, bikinis on, sunglasses perched, and suntan lotion gleaming on their skin.
The only problem was—there was no sun. Just dark clouds.
"Aren't you cold?" I asked them.
"A little—I mean, no. We're fine," Ness said, accidentally blurting out the truth before catching herself.
"Are you done with your work?" Haley lifted her sunglasses and sat up to look at me.
I sat down in the other chair and replied, "Yeah. I'm done with the medical research."
I confessed to both of them about how I felt after finishing, and how my businesses could run without me.
"So, you're done after the Black Widow movie? I thought you had more lined up—the esper movie, the fantasy knights-and-dragons thing… Are you just going to stop developing them?" Ness asked.
I thought about it. "I'll check up on them once in a while, but I'm going to let my people take the reins now."
"So, retired man, what are you going to do with all your free time?" Haley teased.
I shrugged. I didn't really have an answer.
Before Zomworld, I spent 20 hours a day planning—the next big project, the most money I could make, how to improve the world.
But after coming back, I lost all of that motivation.
It was like an empty void had opened in my chest.
It wasn't that I missed Tiga, Suna, or anything else that had made me like this—though I did miss them a little.
I was standing in the end zone. I was at the top of the world.
Everyone knew my name—yet I still couldn't slow down.
Is this what I really wanted? I wondered. What do I actually want to do?
Maybe I should focus on Cuba? But I already made a ten-year plan. Sado just needs to follow it.
Space travel? Han is handling all of that. Maybe I'll go to the moon for a bit, but I'm not focusing on it.
There's the new football club. I could buy a basketball team too. But other than feeding my ego, I don't have much to do with the sports themselves.
Hell, I can't even enjoy playing sports with anyone since I'm too strong.
I guess I should just focus on my next album and act in some movies.
"So what do you want?" Haley asked softly.
I shrugged again. "Honestly?... I don't know."
Dinner time. Vader dropped her kittens into my lap one by one as I was eating.
As their babysitter, I watched them while she took a break out on the catio—munching on catnip and treats like she needed a vacation from her own children.
The kittens cried when she wasn't around, but with me, they were calm. They all curled up and fell asleep on my lap.
I snapped a picture and posted it on my Instagram story, finally checking social media after weeks offline.
I frowned as I saw the memes I'd been tagged in, the Twitter threads, the chaos.
Turning to Haley, I asked, "Is this why people told me not to get back on social media?"
"NO!" Haley immediately tried to snatch my phone away. "You promised not to look!"
I expected blame for the virus. Instead, the trending topic was people begging me to create a sex-bot—referencing T-bot, my housekeeper robot, as the "prototype" until I reached the 2B android level.
Sure, there were some thank-yous for the cure. People saying they never doubted me. Some even demand I assassinate the Boravian president for world peace.
But all of that was drowned out by sex-bot memes.
People were literally crying online, begging me to make one. Filming themselves with tears, snot, everything.
The girls around me were adamant I shouldn't look—so I wouldn't be influenced.
"You're not going to make any, are you?!" Ness shot me a glare.
Startled, I quickly said, "No."
I could practically hear tens of thousands of wails from the internet as I said it.
Aside from the sex-bot thing, there were plenty of people with alienpox who tagged me in videos thanking me for the cure.
I finally responded—leaving comments, sending replies.
"Let's see… a lot of them say they're bored of staying home. They want me to create a new series for them," I muttered.
"The audacity," Ness said with a smile. "Are you going to do it?"
"Do what? A TV series? The lockdown is only two months. Pre-production alone would eat that time. Unless—"
"Unless what?" Haley pressed.
I remembered something. Zomworld. The ruined city. The zombies. I didn't have to build a new one. I could just use that as the setting for the show.
If I used Canvas to recreate it, I could turn it into a TV series. Maybe even one episode a week.
Filming was still allowed during lockdown. There'd be no problem.
"Damn it," I whispered, shocked at myself.
"I just vowed to rest, but my brain is already planning how to shoot a weekly series in lockdown."
Ness cackled. I turned to her and asked, "What?"
"You know, I never actually thought you were going to take some time off. You aren't built for that."
Haley added, "Instead of getting burned out, just do something you really want to do. Not something you need to do to grow the company or anything else, but your passion. Something you really enjoy doing."
I mused on that thought for a bit before saying, "Alright then. I'll start writing the script now. Ness, you're going to be the Fallout survivor. Haley, you want in on this?"
"NO!" Haley immediately rejected me. "I don't plan on being an extra for a shitty TV series," she added teasingly.
"Unless it has kissing scenes with you." She batted her eyes at me.
"Really?" I looked at her with disbelief, chuckling along with the girls.
"Wait, how are you going to film it when you're under house arrest?" Ness asked with slight alarm in her tone.
I just smiled and said, "Do you really think that's going to stop me?"
That night, I wrote the outline for the whole 20 episodes of the TV show, which I named Zomworld, and also wrote five episodes of the show—the initial five that showed the worldbuilding of that universe.
I called a few of the actors I knew to take part in the show. Most of them agreed to star in it, and the contracts were settled in just one day.
I also gave them the script to get ready for the filming, which would start in two days.
"You're really crazy, aren't you? Did the stress from studying the virus break your brain?" Selena Gomez asked irritably.
"My brain is fine. Are you doing it or not?" I asked her again.
She paused for a bit, reading part of the script I sent her. "So I'm only going to appear in the beginning of the show, act as a hateful character, and then get killed off?"
"Yeah, but there will be a heavy makeout scene between us at the beginning where I will act all lovey-dovey to you."
"I'll do it." Selena agreed without hesitation.
I'd start the show with the confrontation with the White Witch of the North Zombie. The first real threat I met at the beginning of my travel to the Zomworld.
I also established a team of writers to help me with the task: Paige Swanson—my go-to writer, Geneva Robertson-Dworet (wrote Fallout), Craig Mazin (wrote Chernobyl, Mythic Quest, Superhero Movie, etc.), and Drew Goddard (Daredevil Netflix series).
They were startled when they received my script and my job offer, but they took it since they were curious to see if I could actually make the 20-episode show in just 20 weeks.
Joke's on them, I was planning on finishing it within 8 weeks.
I would direct the show myself using Canvas studio.
At the beginning of the plot, I would become part of the team who would go to the northern city to gather some supplies since the fallout shelter I was in was having difficulty managing the situation.
My girlfriend at that time—Selena Gomez—promised me we would get married when I came back from the dangerous outside world.
However, the team, which would consist of me, Charlie Cox, Vincent D'Onofrio, Finn Jones, and Chris Evans, would get targeted by the witch, and we would be trapped inside the city and killed one by one.
By that time, the whole evolution seed and the origin of the virus would've been explained by Vincent D'Onofrio, the team leader.
Two squads, 16 people, all dead from the witch except for one. Me. The first few episodes would've been really intense.
I survived for 6 months in the city, using guerrilla techniques to kill off the zombies, build my strength, and finally confront the Northern Witch.
At that time, I would starve, only to alleviate it by eating cockroaches and bugs, see my comrades turned into zombies and have to fight them in order to get the rations inside their backpacks, and a lot more psychological and traumatic episodes.
I guess the show would have a mature rating for the gore and violence. I didn't know yet whether to include some nudity in it.
That alone would take five episodes. At that same time, the other protagonist would be introduced: a pair of sisters played by a couple of new actresses with great acting ability who would get their debut in the show.
Finally, after burning the witch alive, I rushed back to the fallout shelter, only to realize that I had been sent to my death by the fallout leader.
My girlfriend, Selena, was pregnant by the leader's son, and told me why the hell I came back—showing that she was in on the plot.
Turns out, the leader would do that once every few years to cull the numbers inside the fallout shelter to ensure the survival of everyone else.
Vanessa read a couple of the scripts and said, "This story is so dark."
"It's common in the post-apocalyptic setting," I told her.
"By the way, where would I come out in the episodes?" Ness asked with slight intrigue.
"Episode 8. You will be the first survivor I meet, and we will fall in love for 5 episodes, until you're tragically eaten by a mutated beast."
"I'M GOING TO DIE?!" She was shocked.
I shrugged and said, "It's the post-apocalypse. Romance storylines don't work well there."
As I began to build up the setting of Zomworld in my Canvas program to model the city and the zombies, suddenly my left eye began to burn.
"Huh? Is it my mangekyo ability? Why is it coming out now?"
I was confused by the sudden burst of power coming from my left eye, and even more stupefied when I realized what kind of power it was.
The power I got from my left eye was Copy and Paste.
The limitation was, I could only copy what was on me, and put it on something else, or someone else.
That included bloodlines, IQ levels, talents, memories—basically everything I could get from the gacha.
"This… is quite interesting," I muttered.
I tried the first one, putting all of my memories of the Zomworld setting into the Canvas model.
Months of work were completed in just one second. From abilities to the mutated beasts and zombies, everything was built up in the Canvas program, where I could just pick the setting I wanted for the filming.
I planned on doing the fallout scenes and the Northern Witch meeting, while keeping the set limited to part of the city, but now I didn't have to anymore.
Then, the ability was locked until the next two days before I could use it again. It seemed that the more important the thing I copied and pasted, the longer the cooldown period for the next one.
"I could actually build an army of myself. Also, maybe give my siblings some of my talent."
Since the mangekyo was influenced by my own personality, this might've been the result of the gacha draw I usually did.
I had some fun talking about the show with the other writers, and before the first filming started, I was reminded of something else.
"Aren't you forgetting something?" Vanessa asked.
"What?" I asked back, confused.
"You are a singer-songwriter." Ness looked at me with disbelief.
"Oh. Right." I was taken aback by it.
I added another plan to my list: 8 songs, one for each week of the lockdown.
The album would be called Pandemic Anthem, and I would collaborate with a few singers for this one.
Haley snorted when she saw my plans.
[Haley's commentary]
"Edward thinks he's a complicated man. But he's really not that complicated."
She added with an affectionate smile, "He loves validation, and he loves entertainment. Most of all, he loves his family and fans. So taking a rest? That's not possible unless he no longer has any fans supporting him."
"I don't know when he will finally be finished with his work, or if he will ever stop, but I do know this—I love what he is, and I wish he could be happy, even if he's not working at all."
[Commentary end]