Marvel Superheroes - Heroes of Silverage City UPDATED 5/19

[Dr Midnight]

The Fantasticar is constructed partly with extragalactic technology given to Mr. Fantastic as a birthday gift from the Silver Surfer. The result is a flying vehicle that isn’t limited by our laws of physics… at least not as much. The “Coencic Actuator” bends the rules of our reality and sets them aside for the time being, allowing the Fantasticar to travel anywhere from four times the speed of sound to close to half the speed of light.

They reached the heart of Manhattan in no time and parked in the Baxter Building.

Reed gave them a brief tour of the Fantastic Four’s home. They wound up in the main lab area, a cavernous room that served as a living room and had something for everyone in the group. Here, Johnny Storm, the Human Torch, was slumped on a couch, playing xbox. He didn’t acknowledge them.

Hex quickly took a picture of them all with his camera phone while Reed wasn’t looking.

“So,” Reed said. “The reason we’ve invited you here is that several metahuman organizations, chiefly the Avengers, like to evaluate the up-and-coming talent. Captain America wants to make certain you’re not a threat to national security. I think we can write that off. Thor is curious about your origin- he likes to know if any new heroes have mystical origins, as he does. Iron Man would like to know more about Constructor’s powers for his own research. For my own research, I’d like to know as much about your abilities as you can tell me… including your origins, if you don’t mind revealing them.”

The New Legends each gave descriptions of their powers to Reed. They kept their identities to themselves for the time being. Reed was very interested in how Constructor made his suits, but didn’t press the issue just yet. Hex hesitated and simply said “I can do anything.” He didn’t want to reveal too much about himself, it seemed.

Reed said “I plan to put you through some tests if that’s your claim. Are you sure you want to say that?”

“In that case, I do nothing.” He walked over to where Johnny was sitting and watched as he played some new beta version of Street Fighter. Frenzy joined him. “Whatcha playing?”

“Street Fighter 4,” Johnny said without much interest.

“Whaaat? There is no Street Fighter 4.”

“Not yet,” Johnny smiled. “I get to play all the games while they’re still in development.”

“No way,” Frenzy said.

“I’m playing.” Hex jumped onto the couch and grabbed a controller.

“Me too!” Frenzy joined them.

Pixie turned away from them and told Reed “Ignore them, they’re idiots. Anyway, about our origin, we share the same.”

Reed’s eyebrows went up. “Really? Tell me more.”

Pixie laid out the entire scene for him, leaving out names and dates. She told about the Transatomic Superconductor and what had happened, then what followed that very evening.

Reed typed everything into a keyboard as she spoke it. “All right,” Reed said. “The others that were in the room with you when the Superconductor was struck by lightning, have they developed similar powers?”

Gridiron said “It doesn’t look that way. All my friends seem to be sick or something. I dunno. My friend got really sick and wound up in intensive care with some kind of scaly-skinned body cast disease. It didn’t seem to be good for everyone.”

Reed seemed to think about that. “Was this at Romita Memorial in downtown Silverage?”

“Uh. Yeah.”

“About a half an hour ago, a report came in of an intensive care patient going into some kind of rage. He apparently stood up and smashed through the wall, escaping into the night.”

“What??” Gridiron sat down.

“Perhaps the Superconductor gave him powers after all. Maybe the ‘disease’ was some kind of incubation period.”

“I guess.”

“You don’t seem overjoyed that your friend is going to live.”

Gridiron said “No, no… I’m happy he’s going to live. I’m just worried that he’s got powers. He was never the nicest guy, y’know? He’s not the kinda person I think should get superpowers.”

“I see,” Reed said. He cleared his throat through the uncomfortable silence and asked “Would anyone like to give their secret identities for posterity?”

The New Legends all seemed to tense up. “Why would we want to do that?” Pixie asked.

“I understand your hesitance, Pixie, but it’s really a help to the metahuman community to do so. We have a number of heroes’ identities on file, and it’s enabled us to contact them or otherwise watch out for their friends and family when they couldn’t.”

“I don’t think it’s a good idea,” Pixie said.

Reed shrugged. “That’s up to you, but consider this. I now know that you were on a school field trip to the Silverage Science Museum when the Transatomic Superconductor was struck by lightning. You were all in the room and suffered from an M.T.E…. a metahuman trigger event. I know that you, Gridiron, are a friend of Jeremy Mullen, who was among the people in the room at the time. It wouldn’t take much detective work to figure out who you are, and then the rest of you would follow."

He continued. “If you don’t want to give your identities, that’s up to you and I respect that. However, I’m going to keep looking into it. Knowing things like this forearms us against the occasional metahuman that turns bad, and helps us to keep our names out of the papers- at least in a negative light. Giving us your identities of your own free will means we can help you with legal troubles and aid you when we can if you’re falsely accused of a crime. Do you see?”

Pixie looked aghast. “Where does this information go?”

“Three places,” Reed said very matter-of-factly. “SHIELD, The Avengers’ metahuman database and my own computer here in the Baxter Building. All are impossibly encrypted. Your identity remains safe, but is shared with a few high-profile heroes and government minds across the country. We’ve never had a problem with the system.”

Pixie looked like she was going to argue the idea again when Gridiron took his helmet off. “My name’s Jacob Jones. JJ for short. I’m not sure I like these powers, but I’ve got ‘em and I’ve managed to help people with ‘em. One thing I do know is that I like the feeling of helping people. Never thought I would, but… it feels good.”

Reed typed. “It does, doesn’t it? Thank you Jacob. Anyone else?”

“BOOOM!” Johnny yelled from the couch. He had just beaten Hex with a deadly combo. “Old school beats new school! You just got TORCHED, son.”

Hex laughed. “I just got ‘torched’? Do you work on your hack dialogue when you’re not cheating? Step up and see if you can do that again.”

“Frenzy’s got next, sore loser.”

“Yeah, I’ve got next!”

“Dammit.” Hex handed the controller to Frenzy.

Everyone except for Hex wound up giving their secret identities to Reed. They discussed how they felt about their powers at length, and when that was done, Reed announced that it was time to begin tests on their powers. It was nearly 1:30 AM and everyone felt awake and deeply alive.

Frenzy milled about as Pixie’s tests were conducted. The Thing approached him and said “Hey, kid.”

“Hi.”

“I, uh, wanted to talk at ya about what happened earlier in the week. I understand you kicked a guy hard. Real hard. Thought you’d killed ‘im and it turned out you didn’t.”

“Yeah,” Frenzy said, avoiding eye contact and shuffling his feet. “I didn’t mean to take him down that hard. I’m not used to this strength yet.”

“I understand. I’ve been there. Us strong guys, we gotta be smart about how we deal with normal people, y’know? We gotta pull our punches more and be real careful.”

“I know,” Frenzy nodded.

“I just wanted to say that. Now that that’s over… wanna arm wrassle?”

Frenzy paused. Arm wrestle The Thing? Who ever gets an invitation like that? Also, who ever is unsure that they’d lose? Herbie felt like he might be able to take him. He nodded. “Let’s do it.”

Reed, Johnny, Pixie, Hex, Constructor, Gridiron and Savant all gathered around to watch as The Thing and Frenzy squared off over a huge titanium block with a seat on either side of it. There was a deep, ground-in groove on Thing’s side, where he’d apparently done this a few times with visiting strong guys.

“Come on, Frenzy!” Hex said.

Gridiron nodded and pumped his fist. “Yeah, go Frenzy!”

Johnny Storm laughed. “Take him down, big ugly!”

Pixie said “I know you can do it, Herbie.” She touched his shoulder lightly. Herbie’s chest swelled- Cat had called him by his real name, and she believed in him. He tightened his grip on The Thing’s huge hand.

“Ready?” Thing asked. “One, two… GO!”

The building thrummed briefly as the two heroes’ bodies locked up and their arms pushed against each other. Johnny and The New Legends began cheering raucously for their respective teammates. The Thing’s hand and Frenzy’s hand trembled. Neither moved. The arms strained. There was a stone-on-metal squealing noise as The Thing’s elbow scratched against the titanium block. He began to make some headway, pushing over on Frenzy. Frenzy grimaced and gave everything he had, and the arms came back up a bit. “Give it up… kid…” The Thing grunted through clenched teeth. “I’ve… GOT IT…” The clenched fists slammed down with a booming echo. The Thing had won.

They stood up as the others clapped. “You did great, Frenzy,” Gridiron yelled.

“A respectable performance,” Savant added.

“Don’t worry, chuckles,” The Thing said, slapping Frenzy playfully on the arm. “Look on the bright side- you did better than Luke Cage did.”

Frenzy smiled.

Next: Trouble at the Oscorp Building

 

[Dr Midnight]

After the evaluating tests were completed running on all of the New Legends, it was around 2:45 AM. Reed stood up from his computer seat and said “All done, JJ.”

Gridiron released his arms from the twin rotating pillars, which for the last ten minutes had been completely stretching him out, trying to find his tensile breaking point. He had only broken twice, at a pull of around eight hundred pounds. He rubbed his sore arms and felt quite pleased with himself.

Reed brushed his hands off and announced “I believe that’s it, everyone… it’s been fun, but we should really get you back to Silverage. We’ve got to get up at a semi-respectable hour tomorrow.”

Johnny looked up from the video game screen. “No we don’t… Huh?”

“Congress luncheon.”

“Ahh crap.”

“So. With one further to-do, we offer a gift to welcome you to the metahuman community.” He pressed a button on a console and the wall opened up, revealing four mannequins wearing the costumes of Pixie, Savant, Frenzy and Gridiron.

“Costumes made entirely of unstable molecules,” Reed explained. “Much like we in the Four wear. I noticed that yours look homemade… you’ll find that these will last longer.”

“Uh,” Hex said. “I don’t get one?”

“No, your costume is magical in nature.”

“What? How do you know that, I never mentioned-“

“I did a radiogenic scan on you. You don’t really look like that.”

“Okay, I guess you’ve got me.” Hex shrugged his skinny skeletal shoulders.

Reed went on. “And of course Constructor makes his costume wherever he goes, so that leaves the four of you. I upped the design quality, I hope you don’t mind.”

The four heroes looked at their new costumes in awe, then took them off to the restrooms to change into them. When they emerged, they looked fantastic. The suits were tailored exactly to size.

“One question,” Savant asked as he flexed his hand in the perfectly fitting glove. “We only put our costumes on for the first time tonight, a few hours ago. Until then, no one would have any idea that they would look like this. How did you assemble these costumes in that short an amount of time?”

“The answer involves quantum replicant theory.”

“Really? I thought that was all untested.”

“You’re familiar with the theory?”

“Oh, yes. I read about it last night. I don’t sleep anymore, you see. I’ve been doing a lot of reading, and at fifteen pages a minute I get a lot done. “

They got into the Fantasticar and headed back to Silverage from New York. By car it’s a three hour drive if conditions are optimal. With the Fantastic Four it’s a seven minute flight.

“Where do you want to be dropped off?” Reed asked.

“Back on Miller street would probably be f… wait! Down there, what’s happening?” Pixie pointed. Maybe three hundred feet below was the top of the Oscorp Technologies building, the tallest skyscraper in Silverage City. There were several men wearing black and carrying submachine guns through the access door on the roof. Four more stood behind, keeping guard.

Savant thought for a moment. “Looks like they were dropped off by a helicopter and waited until the shift change in security before moving in.”

“A break-in,” Hex said. “Coool. Looks like we’re going in… are you coming, Reed?”

Reed killed the Fantasticar’s lights (and most of its sounds as well) and hovered down to about a hundred feet over the skyscraper’s roof. “No, thanks,” he smiled politely. “It’s your city. You have to make a strong show of force. Go to it, and good luck.”

Constructor, Savant, Pixie, Hex, Frenzy and Gridiron jumped out. Savant flew headfirst downward, tucking into a tightly and perfectly executed roll just as he hit a diagonal slope made by a cooling vent. He rolled four times to a crouch, whipping his staff out as he did. He hit one of the thugs in the back of the knees and he went down, cracking his head. He was out.

At the same time, Frenzy landed solidly in front of a thug. His feet smashed into the roof, and his invulnerability saved him from the impact. Before the man could react to his attacker, his gun was bent upwards at the barrel and he was punched in the face. He went down immediately.

Hex floated down and reached into his top hat. He pulled out an immense, bright red boxing glove. It shot out on an extending contraption of crisscrossing slats and struck a thug in the face. The thug was knocked out from the blow before he hit the ground.

The one remaining thug alone had time to do anything. He fired on Savant with his submachine gun.

Savant did a quick double cartwheel, tucking and flipping as bullets ricocheted all around him. He landed and spun in a quick backhand circle. He threw his quarterstaff and it flew the length of the roof to strike the thug in the chest, disabling him with yet another single blow.

“Wow,” Pixie said. “You just dodged bullets.”

Savant shrugged. “All I really did was correctly estimate where his shots would wind up based on his angles and the gun’s rate of fire, adjusting for recoil and wind resistance. It’s all just simple probability, really.”

“The others went through this door,” Frenzy said, standing at the open door and looking in. “Stairs, leading down.”

“Let’s go,” Hex said, “but be careful. The others have heard gunfire, they know we’re here.”

Frenzy, the least likely to be hurt by bullets, went down first, with the others following close behind. He stopped and they flattened against the wall as gunfire tore up the stairs they almost walked down. “Big room, a lab,” Frenzy said. “Pillars and lab tables with those propane gas outlets on top. Four thugs hunched around behind them firing this way. An open safe vault door at the back of the room. Entire left wall is made of windows.”

“See, this is exactly what I was saying a few hours ago about strategy and teamwork,” Hex said. “Nice work, Herbie.”

“Thanks. What do we do?”

“Propane, eh?” Constructor asked. “I’ll draw their fire.”

Pixie groaned. “A pun. Ugh. Are you going to be one of those pun-quipping heroes?”

“You’re no fun.” Constructor lurched into the room, blasting an enerby beam from his hands as he did. He hit the desks and columns of fire burst from the melted propane spigots. The thugs started shouting and panicking, firing wildly. Bullets bounced off of Constructor’s hull.

Savant flipped into the room and hid behind a desk, waiting to make his move.

Pixie crawled up the wall, becoming a chameleon version of herself as she did. She sprouted a tail and slowly ambled along the ceiling with her tongue flicking out… then her skin mottled and turned the color of the ceiling panels, rendering her effectively invisible to the casual eye. Her new unstable molecule costume turned the same colors she did.

Hex leapt into the room, conjuring forth a mass of swirling cream pies from his top hat. They whirled through the air in front of him. The tin pans of the pies blocked several incoming bullets.

Savant was mere feet away, crouching by a table. “I notice you’re going with a magician angle. Pranks and tricks. Why?”

“Hey, I’m keeping things thematic. Slayer could make songs about adorable puppy dogs, but they don’t.” Hex pushed outward with his arms and the pies blasted out, smashing several of the thugs in the face and temporarily blinded them.

Frenzy ran towards one that was still firing. He took several bullets to the chest- each bullet bounced off harmlessly. “Awesome,” Herbie muttered to himself. He slammed into the thug with both arms and smashed him into the wall.

Gridiron’s fist shot from across the room, cold-cocking a thug. The gun clattered to the ground.

Savant pole-vaulted over the field of lab tables toward the thugs. He landed and cracked the thug’s face with his quarterstaff. He was twirling it and moving toward the next thug when something flew out of the open vault door.

It was jet black and sleek. It tumbled like a ball through the air and punted off of Savant’s face with two feet, jumping from there through the rest of the room to land twenty feet up on the far wall with a SPLAP sound.

It was a small humanoid shape, sticking to the wall with its feet and hands, facing the rest of the room. Its hands were oversized and its fingers were plump at the ends like a tree frog’s. The thing was covered entirely in a shiny black suit with only two white circular eyes staring at them from the face. The head swayed to the left and right, like a cobra’s.

“Well well,” the thing said. “The New Legends. Silverage’s new heroes. I didn’t think you’d catch up with the competition so soon. Not that we’re not ready…” He yelled. “HAVE YOU GOT IT?”

“I’ve got it,” a female voice called back from the vault. “Just a moment.” The wall adjoining the vault door burst apart in a shower of cinderblock, dust and shattered drywall.

When the dust began clearing, a woman was standing in the huge hole. She was holding a technological device of some sort- putting it into a fanny pack at the small of her back. “Oooh, The New Legends!” She was wearing tight leggings and a ratty black leather jacket. A domino mask covered a small portion of her face and blonde hair spilled over her shoulders. “Shall we show them who we are?”

The thing on the wall seemed to chuckle. “Certainly. New Legends, you’ll regret the day you crossed THE CREEP…”

The woman held her arms up and slammed them down into the ground. They landed with a boom- her arms had tapered up to immense metallic meat tenderizer shapes… anvil heads about five feet wide. She clanged them together. She laughed. “…and HAMMER!”

There was a pause as each side waited for the other to move. “Bring it,” Frenzy said.

The room exploded with action.

Next: Slugfest

 

[Dr Midnight]

All at once, several things happened.

Pixie dropped from her position on the ceiling, directly over one of the gun-toting thugs. She knocked the gun out of his hand as she changed quickly from lizard to girl to girl with gorilla arms. She picked the thug up and hurled him at a glass wall separating gas testing chambers. He flew through three glass walls in total before he rolled to a stop.

Hex pulled out a voodoo doll that happened to look just like another of the thugs. He stuck a pin in it and aimed its arms. The thug’s gun arm came up and fired a long burst at the Creep, who was so surprised to have his own henchman turn on him that he didn’t manage to dodge in time. The wall around him erupted in bulletholes, and he took several hits.

The Creep grunted “Go, Hammer! Get the device to him!”

Hammer’s smile faltered. Would she really have to run out on a good brawl like this? She turned and ran for the immense wall of windows that looked out over a skyscraper drop to the street.

“The Tenderizer’s getting away with the… the thingie!” Hex yelled.

Pixie and Savant started sprinting for Hammer before she could crash through the window. They only had two, maybe three seconds.

Constructor fired an energy beam at the Creep, who nimbly cartwheeled along the wall to dodge it.

This gave Gridiron time to wrap his arms around two pillars and push back with his feet. He stretched, held, then released, firing at the Creep like a tight ball of putty. He altered his density to that of stone so that he was effectively a cannonball rocketing through the air. The Creep, distracted by Constructor’s fire, didn’t notice Gridiron until it was too late. He was struck in the gut by a rock-hard sphere that was traveling at maybe forty miles an hour.

Ka-THOOOOM!!! They crashed through the wall into the room beyond and rolled three times over on the ground. An arm rose from the roiling cloud of dust, stretched twenty feet up to the ceiling, and slammed back in. THWACK! Again. THWACK!! Gridiron was in his element.

They separated as the Creep flipped to a crouch, ten feet away. Gridiron slurped up to his feet in one quick fluid curl. The two circled each other.

Gridiron lashed out with a fifteen foot punch that the Creep side-flipped over, kicking Gridiron in the face as he did so. The Creep landed crouched against the wall and sprang back out. Gridiron dodged the punch by turning his entire upper body to the consistency of really thick oatmeal. The Creep splashed through to the other side and landed in a series of complex flips that evaded Gridiron’s immense, sweeping haymaker punches.

Gridiron’s arms shot out on either side of a pillar that stood between them and grabbed the Creep by the ankles. He yanked hard and the Creep was flying crotch-first at as column of stone. He reared back and punched through the pillar at the last moment. He landed against Gridiron with a double kick that sent him flying back against the wall. The Creep backflipped gracefully to his feet and swayed, ready for the next attack.

Gridiron stood and dusted himself off. He tilted his head to his left shoulder, then his right. Crack, crack. He lunged at the Creep. The Creep jumped high, avoiding Gridiron’s grabbing arms- which was the very idea. Gridiron quickly reached up, where he’d expected the Creep would go, and grabbed him solidly. He flexed his rubbery arms and slammed the Creep to the stone tiles of the floor, shattering them with the blow.

The Creep gathered his legs under him with frightening speed and jumped to Gridiron’s shoulders, where he slapped his large-fingered hands against the heroe’s football helmet.

All at once Gridiron gulped for air and it felt like his lungs were not only fully exhaled, but what little air was there was made of swamp water. He felt like he was emptying. His face pulsed with writhing veins as he felt his blood cells die by the thousands. He couldn’t scream. It ended mercifully when the Creep released his grip and flipped through the room’s window.

Forty seconds ago, in the main laboratory, Gridiron and the Creep bashed through the wall. The remaining heroes turned their attention to Hammer, and to keeping her from escaping. She was running toward the window in long strides.

Pixie scrunched her eyes and concentrated on something new. She held out her arms and ordered them to turn into spitting vipers. Her fingers flattened and grew scales in the span of half a second. Teeth folded out and eyes opened, and Marjorie Tibbits’ daughter had vipers for forearms. She wasn’t just thinking of vipers, though. She was also thinking of spiders.

The vipers spat and a thick webline shot out from each mouth, thwapping firmly onto Hammer’s back as she ran. There was a fierce moment of triumph for the Pixie. That was the hardest thing she’d ever tried to do- combining two animals’ talents to get one effect. The moment was gone as Hammer’s mass wasn’t even slowed by Pixie’s thin frame. Pixie was yanked off her feet and trailed behind Hammer like a cat toy.

Hammer smashed through the window and launched out over a one hundred and ten story drop. She began to fall.

Savant, close behind her, jumped after her. He began climbing, hand over hand, down Pixie’s weblines. He quickly reached Hammer and tried to pluck the gadget from her pack. He loosened it and almost had it... Hammer noticed him there and swung back with an immense arm that he barely ducked beneath.

Just then, a violent jolt- the weblines had gone taut. Hammer grunted as she was jerked to a stop. Pixie, above, was gripping the two weblines in her mighty trunk. Her new elephant form had outweighed Hammer’s and stopped her fall.

The loosened technological gadget shot out of Hammer’s pack and continued to fall. Savant wasted no time and jumped from Hammer. He pressed his arms against his sides, trying to create as little wind resistance as possible in his fall toward the gadget. He devoted some part of the back of his mind to worrying about how to stop falling, and would get to that when the time came.

Hammer, at the end of the weblines, swung backward and bashed through the windows on the floor below Constructor, Hex, Pixie, and Frenzy, who watched the fall from above. “That is so Die Hard,” Hex mused.

KSSHHHHHH!!! A window up behind Savant shattered outward and something black was arcing out into the night. It was the Creep, and he was quickly making sense of what he saw before him. He began to fall even more rapidly than Savant, as he could make a sleeker, smoother form. He began to catch up with Savant around the sixtieth floor. Both hero and villain began straining forward, still maybe ten feet from the falling gadget, reaching as far as they could. They weren’t quite close enough to fight.

Constructor said “He’s not going to make it… he needs help,” and fell forward through the shattered window like a high diver, with his arms tapering above his head. As he came to point downward, the rockets in his metal boots fired to life and he shot toward the street at an incredible speed. He began catching up to the Creep and Savant. He grabbed Savant around the waist and held him, giving a final boost to his rockets.

This boost gave Savant the push he needed, and held by Constructor, he reached and snatched the falling gadget from the air. The Creep cursed as the two New Legends began curving back upwards with their prize. He continued to fall.

There was a streak of something through the air, and the Creep was gone. The streak arced up and flew past the building close to where the other New Legends stood- it was too fast to catch any kind of glimpse of what it may have been. Pixie felt the weblines go slack- whatever that streak had been, it had taken both the Creep and Hammer.

Pixie dropped the webs, turning human again. Her legs trembled. “Whatever, I don’t care. I just want to go to bed.” The others agreed. Now that the battle was over and the adrenaline was subsiding, a very human weariness was settling over them like a shroud.

Sirens on the street, flashing lights. Soon the police would arrive on the top floor with guns and questions. The heroes weren’t in the mood. They left the device and flew several blocks away, landing on street level in Silverage’s famous Stark Square. The first hints of daylight were in the sky and the heroes were bone-tired. “Is everyone all right to find their way home?” Constructor asked. “I could drop everyone off.”

Before anyone would answer, the lights of all the billboards and neon signs fluttered and dimmed. The immense monitor at the center of Stark Square stopped showing an ad for Samsung products. The picture flickered to snow then showed a hulking figure, silhouetted black against a dull red, from the shoulders up. There were odd angles jutting from it, as though it had bones or horns protruding from its shoulders. Its eyes were glowing red slits. Its gravelly, booming voice rang out over the monitor’s sound system.

“Heroes of Silverage City. Hear me. I will not tolerate your meddling, and the time of your doom is upon you. The item you took from me was the Transatomic Subreplicator. I do not need it to achieve my goal, but my plans are now delayed. Enjoy the little time you have left before my work is revealed. This is the age… of The Unholy.”

The screen went dead. “We’ll be ready,” Savant said. The others nodded, feeling beaten up but confident. They began to find their ways home.

Next: Issue 3

 

[Dr Midnight]

Issue 3

Constructor was smashed in the face.

He flew forty feet back, straight through a light pole, embedding himself partially in the mortared walls of the Silverage Post Office before falling to one knee. He quickly stood and brushed dust off of his armor- today he was wearing a Silverage police car. “In the service of the people” was the slogan painted under the town’s golden seal on the door.

The New Legends stood ready to fight. They were battered already- the fight had been on for a full two minutes now and everyone would have a bruise or two in the morning. They really didn’t look any worse than the enemy of the day.

Across the intersection were three men, all costumed. One wore purple and green insectlike body armor. One wore a green and yellow costume that was set off with a lightning bolt theme, including a star-shaped face mask. The last wore a solid green suit that had a thick, swinging tail at its rear.

They were The Beetle, Electro and The Scorpion, respectively. Each was a recognizable supervillain, though none had recently had any great success in the world of crime. They’d each faced off against Spider-Man in their prime but they weren’t real threats- they were considered nuisances among the superhumans of New York City. Perhaps that’s how they found themselves in Silverage City hijacking an armored car- they thought the typically hero-less town would be an easy gig. More likely, they wanted to test the new kids in town.

Savant, ever looking for a tactical advantage, decided to test Beetle’s armor. He theorized that the joints couldn’t possibly protect his body that well, as there had to be some greater allowance of give. He did a double somersault forward and lashed out with a kick that struck Beetle in the side of his right knee. The metal buckled a bit. The Beetle grunted in pain.

Electro fired a blast of lightning at Constructor, who dodged quickly. Savant was hit hard with Scorpion’s clublike tail and was sent caroming into a nearby car. The hit was a good one- Scorpion had almost broken three of Savant’s ribs.

Hex stepped up and took off his top hat. “Hey, Scorpion! You’ll regret that one.”

“I doubt it, noob,” the seasoned super-crook grinned as he swung his tail from side to side. “Take your shot, though. I’ll wait.”

Hex reached into his top hat with his skeleton hand and brought out… a sleek black cat. It purred as it was placed on the ground, then darted off in front of Scorpion. It ran past him and disappeared behind a building. Scorpion watched the cat run away, muttering to himself. “What the hell?”

Then, a truck hit him. CRUNCHHHhhhhBGSHHHH It struck a wall with Scorpion flattened against the grill. His modified body chemistry and armor protected him from any real injury, but he was hurt. Badly.

Hex placed his top hat back on his head with a flourish. Some people in the crowd that dared to get close enough to watch began to cheer.

Taking advantage of the distraction, Constructor flew at Beetle with his rockets. He smashed Beetle back against a panel truck and attempted to weld him right to the metal with concentrated heat blasts from his palm emitters.

Scorpion was crawling from the wreckage of the truck when a roar shook the downtown intersection. A tyrannosaur with pink pigtails was lurching towards the green villain.

The Scorpion wasn’t as badly hurt as he seemed, and leaned back, dodging the immense biting T. Rex teeth. He used this motion to counterbalance his tail and send it whipping around into The Pixie’s jaw. CRACK!!! The thirty foot tall tyrannosaur rocked back on her feet from the blow. A tooth had been knocked free and flew into a nearby phone pole, where it stuck as if thrown by a master knife thrower.

The Beetle was wrestling with Constructor- two power suit heavyweights were going at each other with down and dirty streetfighting moves. Constructor was grabbing Beetle around his waist and attempting to pick him up when Beetle hit him with both hands clasped as a golfer swings a club. The blow knocked Constructor up over a low building and into the distand. The Beetle grinned behind his mask.

Gridiron swilled a Pepsi for the crowd, then wiped his mouth with a refreshed “Ahhh!” He held the can so that the logo could be seen. Dropping the can, he reached out with elongated arms and grabbed Electro from across the street. He then turned and leaned forward, pulling his arms over his head and Electro with them. He slammed Electro against a fire hydrant. The hydrant cracked but didn’t burst, as Gridiron was clearly hoping it might.

Electro responded with a fierce arc of lightning that Gridiron dodged by coiling his body around it. He didn’t’ see that behind him, Frenzy had chosen his moment.

Frenzy swung with a roundhouse punch… at the fire hydrant. The punch completely shattered the hydrant into flying metal pieces and a jet of water shot high into the sky. Electro’s back was to the water but he wasn’t yet touching it.

The Pixie regained her balance and lunged again for Scorpion with her immense tyrannosaur jaws. This time she saw the counterstrike coming and timed his swing just right. She pulled back and snatched his tail out of the air, taking him with it. She shook her head back and forth like a terrier with a chew toy and released her bite, flinging him seventy feet southwest through the wall of an evacuated Starbucks. He smashed and rolled through debris, landing comically in a chair. He was out cold. The tyrannosaur with pink pigtails roared its defiance at the intersection of 87th & Main.

Gridiron whipped a long arm around Electro’s body, binding the villain’s limbs in place. He turned his arm hard and snapped if off at the elbow, leaving Electro effectively tied up… but still dangerous.

Savant walked up and gently pushed against Electro’s chest with his staff, tipping him back into the vertical jet of water. As he touched the water he screamed and there was a crackling sound like bubble wrap in a deep fryer. Lightning sizzled around him as the blast of water shot him up into the air, already reddening and unconscious.

Frenzy ran up to the Beetle, who braced himself for the attack. The Beetle had seen on the newsclips that Frenzy was the strong member of the group. Beetle was no slouch himself- with his power armor he could lift up to around two tons. He planted his feet and readied for the slugfest.

There was no slugfest. Frenzy’s skinny frame conceals a degree of strength only known in maybe two hundred metahumans worldwide. Frenzy’s brutal running punch knocked The Beetle up into the air, where his body smashed into a wide green road sign and froze there as if molded into the sign.

The Beetle began to stir. “Okay, so you’re tough. I’ve fought tough guys like you before. Only trick is to stay out of your grasp. Stay in the air. Blast you from…” he stopped and looked up in time to see something blurring towards him from the skyline. It was Constructor, flying with both fists out as fast as his rockets could push him.

Constructor shot straight through the sign, taking The Beetle with him to the ground and below. The pavement exploded as the two pierced it. Dust and asphalt flew into the air. From below, in the sewers, there was a sound of metallic thunking, as if two metal men were embroiled in a fierce fistfight. There was a sharp clang, like a frying pan on the fender of a Peterbilt, and silence. Constructor hovered out of the smoking hole in the ground, dangling a limp Beetle from his hand like a bag of garbage.

The crowd screamed and cheered- the home team, The New Legends, had won the day against a few supervillain tourists. The Legends gathered the super-crooks for the police and listened to the cheers of their city.

“Want to take some questions?” Pixie asked with a smile. The news crews were swooping in like vultures to carrion.

“Why not,” Gridiron answered. “We saved the day, let’s get some face time.”

The others agreed. It had been one week since the incident at Oscorp Technologies… one week since choosing names, revealing costumes, and fighting their first throw-down with other superhumans. It had been the best week of any of their lives.

Gridiron cracked another Pepsi, took a sip and smiled for the cameras.

The first reporter to outsprint the others to the scene shouted “Savant, Channel 4 news! As the leader of the New Legends, what do you have to tell the people of Silverage about your plans to deal with ‘The Unholy’?”

Savant almost frowned, but caught himself in time. A week’s worth of investigation hadn’t turned up any information on this “Unholy” or the people they’d fought at Oscorp. Some research into the Transatomic Subreplicator had told a few details, but pursuant to his better judgment (and Oscorp’s wishes), he wasn’t about to reveal these to the media.

“We have everything under control,” Savant said calmingly. “We cannot reveal our plans at present, but rest assured that we have things well in hand.”

“Should the citizens of Silverage evacuate? Can you tell us anything for our own safety?”

“We will protect you. Don’t worry.”

Hex cut in with “What kind of threat could ‘The Unholy’ be anyway? They don’t go to church on Sunday. Big deal.” This won a healthy round of laughter from the appreciative crowd.

“Hex,” one of the reporters said. “Action 10 news. What do you say to parents’ groups that claim that your skeletal appearance is inappropriate for children?”

That took Hex aback. “I’m inappropriate for children?? Have these parents ever been inside a high school?”

Gridiron cleared his throat and announced “Man, that battle sure was tough. I’m glad I had my Nike game cleats and the refreshing power of Gatorade.”

A man with a mustache said “Constructor, Channel 7 news… What do you have to say to rumors that you were photographed by Steven Piercey, the boy who named you, during your first uncostumed outing?”

“We understand he lost his camera, so there’s really nothing to back up his claims.”

“But do you deny he took the photos?” The man asked. “Just forty minutes ago the police returned to Steven Piercey a camera that had been found in a brownstone flowerbed. It had his name on it.”

Frenzy stiffened noticeably. “What?”

Next: Confrontation

 

[Dr Midnight]

Savant quickly took control of the situation. “Young master Piercey found his camera, eh? I wouldn’t worry too much about that. We are and have always been very cautious about revealing our identities.”

The press seemed to accept this as truth.

All at once, the reporters put hands to their ears and listened. They were all hearing their various producers call speaking to them through earphones. They looked excited and rallied their cameramen, moving away from the Legends towards their news vans.

Pixie pouted. “Was it something we said?”

“It’s not us,” Constructor said. “There was just now a police call that came in about a major theft that was discovered.”

“How do you know?”

“I get the police band wired straight into my earpiece with this suit… the benefit of wearing a cop car.”

At that moment, a police sergeant who’d been taking down the details of the defeated supervillains approached. His face was dark and somewhat irritated. “Hey, is that one of ours you’re wearing?”

Constructor faltered. “Uh. Let’s go!”

Hex conjured a flying carpet that he, Frenzy, Savant and Gridiron rode on as Pixie and Constructor took to the sky. The cop below yelled about how cars like that come out of the taxpayers’ pockets and tend to not grow on trees.

Inside his car suit, Emerson blushed. He hadn’t really taken much time to consider just where the cars had been coming from lately. He’d have to be more careful in the future… the cars were useless once he sloughed off his armor.

“Where are we going?” Hex asked.

Savant thought. “Steven’s probably headed to the site of the robbery to cover it. We should intercept him there, get the camera back before he gets a chance to develop the film. Where’s the robbery?”

“Where it all began,” Constructor said as they picked up speed. “The Silverage Science Museum.”

As they circled in over the Science Museum, they could make out a commotion below. Police cars and news vans were crowding the parking lot, and a large throng of officials were around the back area. The New Legends flew lower and saw that the entire west wall of the new wing was completely shattered outward. The people below looked up and some began pointing. Most began waving.

“Anyone see Steven?” Constructor asked.

Pixie looked with an eagle’s eyes. Her eyes scanned over each face, looking for the familiar features of the diminutive newsman. “Nope. Don’t see him yet.”

They flew into the destroyed exhibit hall and looked about this room was familiar- this was the Transatomic Superconductor room. The room that housed the scientific marvel that had given them their powers. The marvel that was now missing.

A twenty foot wide circle of ripped-free bolts and cables showed where the Superconductor had stood. It had been torn from the ground and, judging from the two immense clawed footprints that sank deep into the concrete leading to the hole, carried out through the wall. Something with two legs had smashed in, picked up a twelve ton hunk of machinery and walked out.

The police in the room looked annoyed to have people just walk into the crime scene, but on the other hand it was the city’s new superheroes and no one was really willing to say anything. They were told that there wouldn’t be a problem as long as they didn’t tamper with anything.

Savant followed the deep tracks outside- the creature or whatever it had been had three-toed reptilian clawed feet with a “toe” on either side of each foot. “The tracks only show up once it’s picked up the machine- it’s not that big. Maybe four hundred pounds at most. It’s incredibly strong, though- maybe stronger than you, Frenzy.” Outside, the tracks continued to the blacktop parking lot, grew deeper at the very end and disappeared. “The tracks disappear- it jumped. Carrying a twelve-ton Transatomic device, it jumped from here. Pixie, can you scan from the skies and find where it might have landed?”

“Gotcha.” Pixie sprouted her ever-handy hawk’s wings and took to the sky. She landed shortly afterward. “Nothing nearby. I could fly a wider perimeter, try to-“

“We should try to find Steven,” Frenzy said. He was shifting from foot to foot. He looked nervous.

Savant thought for a moment. “Frenzy’s right. We should probably take care of that first. Steven’s not here, so it looks like he went straight home from the police department.”

“Crap,” Frenzy said. “We have to get there. Let’s go.”

The New Legends flew off for Steven Piercey’s home. The suburbs weren’t far away, and they streaked across the sky to reach the bright yellow house at the end of Bluebird Terrace.

Once there, they hid in a nearby grove and discussed what to do. “We can’t just burst in wearing our costumes,” Savant suggested, “So Herbie you should change to plainclothes and try to get inside and destroy the film before he develops it.”

“What if it’s too late?” Pixie asked.

“Let’s try to avoid thinking of that,” Savant said grimly. “Go.”

Pixie changed herself into a field mouse and scurried up into Herbie’s pocket while he walked into the house. He didn’t spot her.

Herbie knocked on the door and a kind looking model of the classic nuclear housewife opened the door. She looked genuinely surprised to see the bookish young man on her doorstep. “Oh! Hello! Are you a friend of Steven’s?”

“Uh, yes,” Herbie said as he shuffled his feet. “Is he here?”

“Of course, come in, come in! STEVEN, YOU’VE GOT A LITTLE FRIEND!” She looked thrilled. “Steven doesn’t get that many playmates over, he’ll be so happy to see you! He’s in his darkroom, last door on the right.

Herbie wasted no time and strode right over to the door. He didn’t even knock- he just turned the knob and opened the door.

The red light of the room washed out with the white light of the hallway. Steven stood with his back to the door. A row of photos hung drying on lines above a few tubs of red-lit liquid. Herbie cleared his throat. “Uh. Hi Steven. So I heard you got your camera back.”

Steven turned away from the photo he’d been staring at and faced Herbie. The photo was fading into gray from the light of the hallway, but the image was unmistakable for just a moment more- it was Herbie, dumping an unconscious man into a large trash container. Behind him stood Constructor in his black and gold Trans Am suit.

The look on Steven’s face was deadly serious, like nothing Herbie or anyone else at school had seen before. “Yeah, Herbie. I got my camera back.”

Next: The Steven Problem

 

[Dr Midnight]

Donovan, Gustav, Emerson and JJ waited outside in a copse of trees, listening to the conversation through their earpieces. The consversation they were getting from Herbie’s transmitter had them all holding their breath as they hung on every word.

“That’s you in the picture,” Steven said. “I can make everything out clearly now. That’s you and Constructor is made of JJ’s car.” The boy’s face was white and calm. He gazed at Herbie. “You’re Frenzy.”

Herbie shifted from foot to foot. “Now, Steven, let’s not jump to… um… there’s an explanation.”

“You almost killed that guy. You thought you did, and you were ditching the body. Did you think no one would find out?” A cloud of disgust passed over Steven’s expression, then it passed and the elated calm returned. “So it’s you and JJ… he’s Constructor? Who else? What happened? Can I be a superhero too?”

Herbie tried to speak up. “Listen, Steven…”

“How cool! I want to help. I don’t have powers, but I can be your human sidekick… or like that guy that helps The Punisher. Micro or whatever.”

Herbie sighed. “At least the photo’s destroyed. No one will believe you.”

“Right, like I don’t still have the negatives. So how about it? Can I be a hero too?”

“No Steven. We went through a one of a kind accident and became different.”

“An accident… was it the thing at the science museum?” Steven’s face lit up as he put together the pieces in his head. “Of course! Cat… Emerson… Donovan and that Latverian kid. Along with you and JJ. Wow. Wait.” His brow scrunched as he thought. “If JJ’s Constructor, then who’s Gridiron? Seems it makes sense if he’s the football-themed guy, right?”

Herbie set his jaw and raised his voice. “LOOK, Steven. You’re going to keep this to yourself. I mean it.”

Steven blinked at him. “Are… are you threatening me?”

“If I have to. We can’t have you spreading this around.”

“There’s such a thing as freedom of the press, Herbie. What kind of a hero would you be if you beat me up to keep me silent?”

Herbie stepped forward, clenching his fists. “I never asked to be a hero.”

“What are you going to do, kill me and toss my body in a dumpster? I don’t think you’ve got it in you, Herbie.”

Just then, something jumped out of Herbie’s pocket and landed on the floor. It was a field mouse with tiny pink pigtails. It grew into Cat, who glared at Steven menacingly while at the same placing herself between him and Herbie.

Steven scowled. “Are you here to threaten me too?”

“You can’t tell people, Steven,” Cat said. She couldn’t quite bring herself to muster the threatening tone that Herbie was managing, but she tried.

“Then I want powers,” Steven said. His voice went soft and he spoke like a child talking about Christmas morning. “I want to know how you got your powers and I want some too. What happened in the room at the museum?”

“Lightning struck the Transatomic Subreplicator. It was a once in a lifetime event and at any rate the damned machine’s been stolen by now. We couldn’t give you powers if we-“

Steven interrupted again. “Wait- the science museum.” He tapped his chin thoughtfully. “Wasn’t JJ’s group with you when the incident happened? Mace, his girlfriend, Dick Jacques, Glenn Bristol, Jeremy Mullen?”

The sudden change of subject threw Cat, but she regained her footing quickly. “Uh, yeah. They’ve been MIA since the incident.”

“I saw them last night. At the science museum.”

“What?”

“Yeah! Everyone except Jeremy. I was doing a story on night watchmen at the museum and I passed them by. It was maybe nine thirty, they were standing outside in the parking lot. Something was in the back of Mace’s pickup. Something really big. It was making noises. Almost sounded like it was… breathing. Or something.”

Cat thought for a moment. “Steven, what else were they doing? Did they look like they were…”

“Can we talk about them later? I want powers! I want to join the New Legends!”

“Steven. I already told you. We can’t give you-“

A flash of orange-colored light and suddenly Donovan was standing there. Steven gasped, then grinned. “Donovan! You’re Hex! Oh, it makes so much sense now.”

Donovan smiled. “What Cat means is that she can’t give you powers because I’m the one who gives out the powers. Isn’t that right, Cat?”

Cat looked confused, but played along. “Yyyeah. That’s right.”

“Well then. As a member of the Legends, it would be in his own best interests to see to it that those negatives were destroyed. Maybe if he gives them to me, I can see clear to giving him his powers.”

Steven’s eyes went wide. “Really?”

“Really. Of course, it’s up to you.”

Steven walked over to a drawer and took out a small strip of film. He handed it to Donovan. Donovan placed it in his pocket and said “And the backup negative, if you don’t mind.”

Steven looked disappointed. “Oh. Of course.” He fetched that too.

Herbie leaned toward Donovan. “What are you doing?” he whispered. “You don’t give out powers.”

Donovan simply kept smiling as he took the backup negatives from Steven. “Okay, ready?”

Steven looked like he’d been told that he’d won the lottery. His entire body wriggled with nervous energy as he stood there nodding vigorously. “Yeah, hit me! Oh man. Oh man!”

Donovan took out a magician’s wand and waved it twice with a flourish. He tapped Steven’s forehead with the wand and Steven fell to the floor, sound asleep. Donovan held the negatives in his hand. They were consumed in a flash of orange fire. The three New Legends walked out of Steven Piercey’s darkroom. “He won’t remember a thing when he wakes up,” Donovan said. “He’ll think it was a dream.”

Cat grinned. “Well done. I almost… oh!”

Steven’s mom was standing between them and the front door, looking delighted. “Well, another friend of Steven’s has dropped by… and a GIRL! Oh my goodness. Oh my goodness! Oh, blessed day! Would you kids care for some nachos?”

“Yes ma’am, we would, thank you,” Donovan replied. Steven’s mother turned to the counter and began preparing some nachos. She was about to ask them questions about themselves as Donovan’s wand tapped the back of her head. She sank to the floor, asleep. The New Legends quietly left the house.

Some minutes later, Steven walked groggily into the kitchen and saw his mother rubbing her eyes, awakening on the linoleum. “Mom, I had the most wonderful dream. I dreamed that the New Legends were here and that they wanted me to join them.”

“Oh, Steven,” his mother said sadly as she stood up. “I dreamed that you had friends.”

Next: The Unholy Agenda

 

[Dr Midnight]

And now, the first actual UPDATE in two months...

 

[Dr Midnight]

As the group walked from Steven Piercey’s house, Gustav ran a hand through his hair. “All right. That was quick thinking, Donovan. Sadly, we’ve only solved the least of four problems.”

Donovan snorted. “Good to know. Okay, what are the other three?”

“Well, it looks like Jeremy Mullen may well have become something beastly after all. If he’s at all like Herbie’s said, he may apply his new powers to ugly ends. We need to find him.

“The third problem is the supergroup we encountered at the Oscorp break-in. They haven’t resurfaced, which coupled with what ‘Unholy’ threatened means they’re working on something big. That something is most likely linked to the fourth and biggest problem: The Superconductor.

“Its theft is a possible catastrophe. This ‘Unholy’ character could have anything in mind with it. There’s really no limit to the ill that could be done with such a device.”

Cat hugged her shoulders. “Like what? It changed us into superheroes. That’s not all that bad.”

“With proper calibration it could turn us into mud. It affects material reality at the atomic level. It could turn the seas into stone and the air into fire. It’s also not inconceivable that the Superconductor could be calibrated just so, so that our enemies’ powers are magnified ten thousandfold. They could become gods, in a manner of speaking.”

Herbie asked “The Unholy’s goons tried to steal that thing last week- it had ‘transatomic’ in its name, right? Could that doohickey have been used to modify the Superconductor?”

Gustav nodded. “I’m betting it could. The only thing that’s working in our favor at this point is that there are very few places out there where one could run a Superconductor- the power supply needs are too great. Only a handful of locations throughout the state are equipped to run that much electricity at once.”

JJ said “What are those locations?”

“I don’t know, offhand. If we can get to my computer, we can find out.”

They went to Gustav’s home. “Nice place,” Cat observed. “Do you live here alone?”

“No, I am an exchange student. I have exchange parents and an exchange annoying brother.”

“So where are they?”

“No idea. Maybe out at the Wal-Mart or McDonald’s or some other appalling U.S. mainstay of commerce.” He led them to his room. The room was sparse, with his American counterpart’s decorations placed neatly aside. The bed was made and the walls were bare.

“Not a very fun room,” Emerson remarked.

Gustav sat down at the computer desk and began typing. “Fun does not interest me. Here I can tap into the main electrical grid and cross-reference locations with the amperage required to run a Superconductor. I just need a moment.”

Gustav typed and paused, typed and paused. Browsers flashed by on his screen. He opened them and closed them in a rapid shuffling movement, taking information from one page and applying it to the next. The process gained speed and before long the others could barely see a page before it was replaced with another.

“You can’t possibly be reading those,” JJ said.

Gustav’s reply was detached and very calm. “I can, and am. Silence please.”

A moment later and he had a short list of seven locations throughout the state. “There we go… but which one?”

Emerson thought for a moment and piped up. “Gustav, can you access local seismography sites and data?”

“Of course, but why…” A smile spread on his face as he understood. “Find the small-scale richter nudge that would be caused by something so heavy landing after a jump of that range and triangulate the likeliest of the locations. Genius, Emerson.” Emerson smiled proudly as Gustav’s fingers flew back into action over the keyboard.

Donovan’s phone began buzzing in his pocket. He took it out and looked: DAD CELL. He sighed and considered declining the call, but with all that had been happening over the last week he really hadn’t seen his father at all. Checking in now and then would surely be a good way to keep the old man off his back out of questions. He took the phone out of Gustav’s room into the hall and answered the call. “Hi.”

“Hey there kiddo- how’s stuff?”

Donovan shrugged. Not that his father could see the gesture, but somehow it wouldn’t have felt right not to shrug at the question. “I dunno. Good I guess.”

“Gonna be home later tonight?”

“Uh, not really… we’re studying late again.”

“You’ve been doing a lot of studying lately.”

“If you say so.”

“..and you haven’t been home for more than ten minutes all week.”

Donovan rolled his eyes and shuffled his feet. “I’ve been busy.”

“Don, I’d like for you to be home later. I want to talk to you about all these late hours you’ve been keeping.”

“Oh c’mon!”

“We haven’t had a good talk in a while, kid. Look- you’ve been acting weird lately, and over the phone is the only way you’ll talk to me at all- We need to discuss how things are going.”

“Whatever. I’ll be home in a half hour I guess.”

“No good- I got a call about some clowns getting into the park and running around. It’s supposed to be closed for renovations so I’m heading over. I’ll be home around eight. I’m pulling into the lot now so I gotta go… see you soon kid.”

“All right.” Donovan shut the phone and groaned. He walked back into Gustav’s room. Gustav’s computer monitor showed a location on a map with blinking red words: MADDOX AMUSEMENT & THRILL PARK.

“That’s it,” Gustav said. He tapped the screen. He turned around. “Donovan, doesn’t your dad own that-“

Donovan whipped his phone open again and called his father’s cell phone. He didn’t even wait for his dad to say hello before he was yelling. “Dad you have to go, stay away from the park, there’s-“

“Hiya Donovan,” The voice was not his father’s.

Donovan froze. “Where is he?”

“We have him. He’s safe. That was good advice: ‘stay away from the park’. I’d follow that advice. Best way to save your dad is not to come.” The phone line clicked dead.

The others were looking at him. Donovan had gone pale. He slowly closed the phone and put it back in his pocket. “They have my dad. They say the best way to save him is not to come.”

Gustav immediately shook his head. “If they’re taking a hostage at such an insecure location, hat means they’ll be putting their plan into action with the Superconductor soon- tonight, perhaps.”

Cat looked around the room. “What do we do? We can’t go and endanger Donovan’s dad…”

Gustav shook his head again. “If we don’t go, we could be endangering everyone else. If the Superconductor is improperly used it could vaporize the entire northern hemisphere.”

JJ said “We should focus our efforts on getting to the southern hemisphere.” Everyone stared at him. “It was a joke. Relax. So what do we do?”

Donovan set his jaw. “We suit up.”

Next: Throwing down

 

[Reis_Thunderwood]

I'll post instead of lurking. I didn't read this the first time through, and I must say I was seriously missing out. Nice story!

Reis.

 

[Richards]

Great writeup as always, Doc. Fantastic to see an update -- I missed this Story Hour!

Johnathan