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#2
MAR 09 |
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“Hot Time in the City” Part Two
Hydrobase Submarine Bay
His suit was cycling to full capacity while Walter Newell kissed his wife good-bye and tried to cover the glee that was building inside of him at getting to become Stingray again. Diane had not given him any grief as he’d raced through the main laboratory to the side hallway that lead to his private workspace and the tank containing his Stingray armor. Even as he triggered the activation codes and began shucking his clothing she had come up behind him holding his bio-sheath undersuit and helped him don it in silence.
She’d walked with him down to the submarine bay and helped him attach the removable side-fins on the suit and now she pulled away from him as he settled his helmet onto his head with the facemask up. “I love you, Walter,” Diane said, blowing him a kiss.
“I love you as well, my love,” Walter said as he turned toward the tank and dove into the ocean without a second look back. In the silence that he left, Diane Newell wiped a tear from her eye before turning and sprinting for the upper deck monitor room.
Los Angeles Dock
Hitting a Lava Man turned out to be a much harder and foolish idea in practice that it had in his head as he’d fallen toward them after Namorita had thrown him toward the dock even as she plowed into the horde pouring from the ocean and power-bombed them back into the water. Uncertain if his boots would be strong enough to land a drop-kick, USAgent had altered his trajectory enough to land beside the lead Lava Man and came out of his crouch shield-first and smashed the head of the molten monstrosity into a million shards of super-heated rock that, fortunately, spewed away form his own face.
His hand, however, nearly shattered as well.
Only the innate ability of the Vibranium in his shield and the wide strap he was holding saved him from a bad break and also from being burned alive. Though the Vibranium absorbed most of the impact and heat-energy from the strike, the intense heat radiated from the body of the creature was so hot that it penetrated his chain-mail uniform and he was instantly feeling dehydrated. Submitting to his own limitations, USAgent leapt upward and free of the closing-in horde and landed atop a forklift nearly 25 feet away, his enhanced and powerful muscles allowing him to gain a moment’s reprieve.
It was fortunate in another way, as it enabled him to be clear of War Machine’s arrival.
He came out of the sun at a steep angle with all weapons ports open and spitting fire. Cognizant of the nearby civilians, Rhodey did not employ his most powerful rockets but unleashed his lowest-yield, high-impact loads from his shoulder toward the rear of the crowd. For the front he sprayed them with high-speed rounds from his shoulder-mounted chain gun, his wrist mounted Vulcan cannon and from both palms shot lances of repulsor rays. He wished the pulse bolt emitter on his left arm was working but he’d deal, as the more conventional weapons fire seemed to do the most damage, with the repulsor rays doing little more than bowling the lava creatures over.
The bullets and rockets, however, were devastating. As he completed as low a pass over as possible and dropped concussion grenades from the launchers on the sides of his back carapace, he observed how the spent-uranium shells had successfully penetrated not only the heat generated by the Lava Men but also their dense hides, blasting through their joints on the programmed firing pattern and basically lopping their appendages off. The rockets with their targeted yields just popped them like balloons, creating initial fissures that the explosive after-affect shattered apart. The grenades, being of a lower velocity and load, did less damage but still scattered the flood and allowed the other Avengers to regain their footing.
As he landed, cycling down his rocket launcher and bringing up a second chain cannon, he retracted his wrist cannons and extended two long blades at the end of each wrist. One was a foot and a half long vibroblade that could cleave through steel, and the second was a broadsword of solid iron that was bisected along with center with a hydrolic release that forced the blade apart if it became hung up inside an object, as it was when he slammed it into the head of the nearest Lava Man, his superhuman mechanical might driving the sword in deep, then triggering the release and the head exploded as the sword forced itself free, dropping the Lava Man to the dock, which it quickly began burning through.
Slicing through the center of another foe and spraying the next line with targeted, devastating bullets, War Machine toggled his external microphone. “You going to sit around watching the big boys play, Agent, or are you going to start putting out these fires?”
Hunched behind his shield to avoid flying super-hot rock or ricocheting bullets, USAgent sneered. “Ever hear of ‘friendly fire’, Rhodes?!” He did, however, realize that War Machine was correct in that the dock was beginning to burn rapidly and he needed to find a way to either stop it or a way to allow the firefighters keeping their distance to assist without getting killed. His eyes circled the dock before he saw what he was looking for atop an older warehouse near the middle of the inferno…a watertower.
Praying it was still full of water, USAgent leapt from shipping container to shipping container until he got near to where Hercules was demolishing Lava Men by the dozen, being assisted by the big black guy, who USAgent realized now was Rage, that kid who’d been an Avenger for about a minute a few years ago. The kid looked like he’d had enough of punching the superheated creatures and was using a length of steel rebar to knock them around like tenpins. His strength, at least, was impressive, even if his invulnerability apparently had limitations.
Hercules, however, had no such problems or if he did he was too pissed off to notice them. His golden mace sang through the air with a whistle and pulverized every Lava Man he hit instantly, but he didn’t limit himself like that. He punched, kicked, body slammed, wrestled and bit every creature that got near to him, screaming the whole time about some bar maid who’d died and how ‘The Gift’ was wasted on their soulless carcasses.
Hesitant to break Herc’s concentration given his success at holding the horde back, Jack knew only the demigod could make the throw he needed. “Hey, Hercules!”
It took two more attempts to get his attention before Hercules turned toward him, receiving a brutal punch to the face in the process that knocked his headband off. Snarling, Hercules reached out with his hand and sank his fingers into the eye and mouth sockets of the Lava Man, wrenched his head off and chucked it through the bodies of three other creatures. “What, mortal, do you want? I am in the midst of a lesson of decency!”
“I hate to interrupt, really, but have you noticed the dock is completely on fire?”
Hercules headbutted another Lava Man and then took a second to glance around. “I had not,” he admitted, marching through a pair of Lava Men to where Rage was being surrounded and tossing his attackers back into the ocean more than a mile distant. “Here, boy, use this, you’re embarrassing me,” he said as he handed his golden mace to Rage, who nearly dropped it when he misjudged how heavy it actually was. It felt as if he were holding up a tank, but he set his feet and two-handed the beautiful weapon and rejoined the battle.
Nodding approvingly, Hercules turned to the Agent, who had taken an interest in the shipping container he was squatting upon. “Fine, you have my attention, USAgent, but be quick about it. What is it you wish of me?”
“You’re kind of the gold standard with one of these,” USAgent said, flipping his most prized possession to Hercules, who caught the shield almost reverently. He understood among the mortals who had possessed these weapons that he’d met, including the USAgent and Captain America, how much they revered them. “That water tower up there,” Agent continued pointing at the top of the tall warehouse more than a half-block away, “hopefully contains enough water to at least slow this blaze down. Take out that front support and bring it crashing down. I could maybe hit it but not break it from here, but I know you can.”
“It has been several hundred years since I attempted such a feat, but am I not the Lion of Olympus?” Hercules said, smiling and using the edge of the shield to decapitate a half dozen Lava Men closing in on him. He then tucked the shield under his arm, crouched, spun and threw Jack’s heart away too fast to observe. It blurred through the air on an arc that Jack at first did not think was the correct one, but impossibly it seemed, the shield banked in the air and came slicing down at the support and sliced through it neatly and destabilizing the obviously full tower which began to teeter forward toward the dock, just like Jack had hoped.
What he didn’t hope for, however, was the speed which the shield was moving skipped it down the face of the warehouse, where it angled off just enough to catch the edge of the concrete sidewalk just before the dock started, digging a furrow into the concrete and sending the shield on a spectacular rebound on an angle that shot it over the dock and out far and away into the ocean. It was just beginning to reach the peak of its arc as it faded from view, miles from land.
It took the impact of the wave of water from the water tower to knock the breath back into the heartbroken USAgent, as well as his head when he tottered off of the shipping crate and landed face-first in a puddle of hot water on the dock. He pushed up, sputtering and felt a pair of strong hands help set him on his feet again. He looked up to see a sheepish Hercules standing there grimacing at him, and Jack acted without thinking, punching Hercules as hard as he could, nearly succeeding in breaking his hand again, which set him to cursing.
Hercules, for his part, did not react as he normally would have to being punched, but instead rubbed his chin with a sign of respect for the Agent’s blow and said only, “I am sorry.” He then turned, plucked his mace from the sagging Rage’s hands and plowed into the immobilized Lava Men, who were recovering slowly from their bath, their heat temporarily abated.
Rage stood with his hands on his knees gathering his breath and only reacted when he heard a gravely voice say, “You, Manchild, get over here.” Elvin looked up to see that the USAgent had gotten over his grief for the moment and was kicking in the side of the storage container he’d been standing on, spilling out onto the deck hundreds of fire extinguishers. “Help me put out some fires.”
With that, USAgent picked up one of the extinguishers and crimped the sides a bit until a small stream of gas began to escape and then he chucked his homemade ‘live grenade’ a the nearest Lava Man. The impact ruptured the canister and it blew up quite spectacularly, the released gas not only cooling the heat of the creature but with the force of the Agent’s throw it succeeded in shattering the creature’s body as well. Smiling, thankful for something fun to do, Rage scooped up an armful of the canisters and set to work.
Plowing into the horde of Lava Men on the dock, Namorita Prentiss wondered how the stubby creatures were reaching the dock in the first place, since she didn’t believe they could swim. As the ocean water cooled her smoldering skin she realized what should have been obvious from the beginning: they had built a human ladder. It was impressive, really, that the Lava men were standing nearly a hundred feet high at this point, though it did crack Namorita up to watch them tumble over and fall thanks to her impact.
She was less pleased, however, when she felt hands grasp her ponytail and drag her down into the ocean backwards, causing her to loose her ‘balance’ in the water for a pivotal moment and then she was buried in hot, scorching bodies that sizzled her skin even under the water. The tower of Lava Men entombed her as they fell, their weight and heat roasting her like a turkey despite her superhumanly powerful punches and kicks and she screamed as the boiling water was pulled into her lungs.
As fear caused her heart to beat harder than it ever had before, a new kind of heat and pressure began spreading across her chest and sharp, spiky pain lanced through her head and down her back and into her legs. A blinding white light encompassed her vision and suddenly her arms were free and as her sight returned she saw the murky water around her littered with sinking Lava Men who had been dislodged physically from her body and she realized that was not the only change even as her sharpened vision easily picked out the Lava Men closing in on her from above.
Her fingers were webbed and the skin turned blue, she noticed, and she then realized that it was her entire body that had changed. Her hair had turned white and broken free of her barrette, spilling over her elongated, rigid ears and her tongue snaked around her razor sharp teeth. Her muscles tensed in preparation for the fight and the rational mind of Namorita Prentiss sank away from the revulsion of realizing what was happening to her…
Kymeara had returned…and all intruders to her oceans would die this day.
The battle on the docks was almost over when the four Avengers finally worked their way to each other, finishing off all Lava Men near the entrance to the city and driving the remaining attackers back toward the ocean. “Any idea why they quit attacking?” War Machine asked as he loosed a stinger missile at the last grouping on the end of the dock, blasting all six back into the water.
“Namorita, probably,” USAgent said as he stood and stared longingly out toward the ocean. “She hasn’t come back up yet, so I assume she’s been busy.”
“Should someone go check on, uh, her?” Rage asked, rubbing his scorched hands.
“Any of you breathe underwater?” War Machine asked. “I hate to say my own oxygen supplies haven’t been installed yet.”
“You put bullets and missiles in before life support?” USAgent asked. “My kinda armor, Rhodes.”
“Great, I have a fan,” War Machine replied. “I guess we’ll just have to…”
He was interrupted by a splash and they turned to see that Hercules had leapt into the water after the Lava Men. “Hercules!” Elvin shouted.
“Easy, Manchild,” USAgent said, raising his hand. “Guys like Herc, Thor and the Hulk can hold their breath for anywhere from 20 to 60 minutes. He’s fine. What we need to do is…”
He was stopped when a wave of water came cresting up in the distance and was suddenly hitting them in the face, the sea water salty and cold. Spitting out a mouthful, USAgent was about to loose a curse that would make a sailor blush when he noticed the smoking hot blonde in skin-tight yellow spandex holding his shield in her hand looking at them frantically.
“Are you Avengers?” she asked, even as she realized USAgent was looking at either her breasts or the shield she held and took a chance, handing him the shield. He nodded and she sighed. “This yours? Good, nearly took my head off. Look, I need your help. The Human Torch is being held prisoner of the Lava Men.”
“Johnny Storm’s involved in this too?” Rage asked.
“No, the other one,” War Machine said, recognizing who he was talking to. “You mean Hammond, don’t you, Spitfire?”
“Indeed, Iron Man…or whoever,” Spitfire said, nodding and dismissing him. “If we don’t save him soon, the Master of the World is going to use Jim to transmute all the lava under the world into Lava Men, which will destroy the Earth!”
Sailing through the watery depths of the ocean, Stingray was closing in on the LA harbor area when the speaker in his helmet activated. “USAgent to Stingray, you out there, Walter?”
“I’m here, Agent.”
“We have, at least temporarily, stopped the Lava Men invasion on LA but we’ve received some new information that this was just a cover for something else, a distraction. Somewhere beneath the ocean some kook named the Master of the World has captured Jim Hammond, the Original Human Torch, and has some plan to use him to transmute all of the lava in the world into Lava Men, which I don’t have to tell you is a really, really bad idea.”
“To say the least,” Stingray replied as something appeared on his scanners a few kilometers away and about a mile from the dock. “The disruption of the flow of lava through and around the heart of the world would cause disruption of all the tectonic plates, unimaginable earthquakes, tidal waves, volcanic eruptions…Jack, this is terrible!”
“Well, duh,” USAgent replied sarcastically. “Any idea how an antique fossil who waves a little fire could ever possibly bring lava to life? Hey, quit super-slapping me!”
Walter smiled, imaging Spitfire was none-to-pleased at having her friend spoken of as such, and adjusted his speed as he closed in on the structure coming into his view. “Technological marvel that he may still be,” Stingray said politically, “I can’t begin to imagine how one could lead to the other, and I have no idea what a ‘Master of the World’ is capable of. I do, however, have something to report. I’ve located what must be the entrance of the Lava Men into the ocean.”
He activated the light in his mask and a flood of luminescence shot forward to display the stone formation. It was nearly 150 feet tall and hooked over at the top, somewhere around 50 feet across and open horizontal to the water on the downward lip of the ‘candy cane’ formation. Walter realized that the hook worked like the electronic pressure seal he used in the submarine bay of Hydrobase, creating a pressure front of heat and air from the subterranean levels that prevented the water from pouring down into the earth and draining the ocean dry.
After he described the shape, Stingray rose into the open end and climbed stealthily up the inner lip until he could peer down the long end into the ground, the bottom of which was much more than 150 feet deep and emitting a red, glowing light but nothing else. When he didn’t get a response from USAgent, he dropped back into the water. “…ray! Walter!”
“I’m here, Agent, sorry. I poked my head into the formation and it must block our radio transmissions. How do you wish me to proceed?”
“I’m going to send you some reinforcements, somehow, and we’ll have to find Hammond if we can,” USAgent said. “We also may need to find Namorita, Walt. Hercules has been looking for her beneath the docks but so far no luck.”
“Nita’s missing?” Stingray said, turning in a circle and scanning the water around him. “I’m not picking her up in the water surrounding my location.” He looked back at the candy cane. “But my sensors don’t appear to be penetrating this rock formation either.” He paused for a moment then toggled his radio again. “I’m setting a transponder at the lip of this formation, Agent, and I’m going in. I’ll continue to attempt to contact you at regular intervals. Stingray out.”
With that, Stingray jetted up into the formation and, once reaching the crest, extended his glider wings and began his descent into hell.
On the still smoldering dock, USAgent was screaming into his Avengers Communicard and nearly shattering the small plastic device. “WALTER! Godamnit, don’t you dare go in there alone! WALTER!”
The sound of gasps behind him drug USAgent from his angry shouts and he turned to see Hercules pulling himself back onto the dock with his own eyes turned toward the sky. Jack looked up as the others were and saw a naked blue body descending from the sky above him to land within a foot of him, white ankle wings matching the white hair piling around the bare shoulders of the woman who he thought might have once been Namorita, but her muscles were more pronounced and her stature more menacing, not to mention her womanly assets more exposed though reduced to match the more aerodynamic body.
The black eyes of the woman burrowed into his own as her thin lips parted to expose rows of razor sharp teeth. “Unkl Wltrrrr in dngrrr?” she said, obviously strangled by her ability to pronounce words and frustrated by her struggles. “Whrrre issss heeee?” She reached forward with her long, webbed fingers and curled them into talons with sharp claws at the end. “Kymaera will avenge him!” she finally said, clearly.
Swallowing the lump in his throat, USAgent knew this day was destined to do nothing but suck ass.
Several miles below the ocean a short while later…
“Take that ridiculous helmet off,” the man sitting on the throne of smoldering rock said, his white and red costume protecting him from the intense heat of the domain he now ruled completely. The Master of the World watched through his own helmet as the man he knew was named Stingray was forced to his knees before him by the hands of two of his pet Lava Men and his helmet ripped from his face, exposing Walter Newell to the nearly intolerable heat of the subterranean world.
His hands were bound behind him and his suit showed some serious damage from his fights with various Lava Men during his descent. He had attempted to put of a fight but his Stingray armor just did not have the offensive capability to stand up to wave after wave of Lava Men and he’d fallen before he’d found any evidence of Namorita or Jim Hammond. He had failed everyone, especially his beloved Diane, in his arrogance.
“Ah, an African, what an unsurprising find,” the Master of the World said, sighing. “Other than a Canadian I can’t begin to name a more predictable race. Tell me, ‘Stingray’, did Luke Cage send you to betray me as he did? Or are you just stupid on your own?”
“Luke…Cage…?” Walter said, sweat choking him as he tried to speak. “No…Namorita… Hammond…” His breath was robbed from him by the oppressive, unrelenting heat; his suit was trying to compensate and feeding him intravenously, but he knew he could not last long in this environment.
“Hammond…” the Master said, sitting back and lacing his fingers beneath his chin. “Interesting. So you came after the android, hmmm? Well, let it be known that I am a gracious host.” He waved his hand to the right and the Lava Men holding Walter turned him in that direction and he saw a portal of stone iris open like a metal door and within was the body of Jim Hammond, the nearly 100-year old android Invader, Avenger and hero, was laid bare.
He was pinned to a slab of stone set up at a 45 degree angle with his entire chest cavity open and dozens of wires attached to various parts of the internal systems of the android, with the wires leading to many different alien pieces of technology that Walter, trained scientist that he was, had no idea what it was. It was so alien that in his frazzled state of mind he couldn’t ever have been able to figure out. All Walter knew was the meaning of the words that his friend Jack Daniels had said to him a little while ago kept ringing in his head…
They were all going to die.
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To Be Continued...
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