Back to GatefoldIssue #1 by A. Crute
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"Astonishing Tales - Part One"
Central Park…
Central Park, the ‘little’ (843 acre) strip of greenery that stretched across Manhattan Island; it’s often said that it isn’t the sort of place you want to go at night but during the day it is filled with hundreds if not thousands of New Yorkers enjoying the greenery and sense of freedom whether they walking their dogs, taking carriage rides, playing Frisbee or, like the two friends where our story begins, jogging.
They had just jogged around the great running track surrounding one of the lakes within the manmade park. They were now jogging down one of the paths through the shade of the trees on the warm summers day and under a selection of bridges. “No two are the same,” offered Kevin with a slight nod back as he and his jogging partner, Maria, passed under it.
“I know…everyone knows,” she exhaled with a laugh as she jogged along next to him. Kevin was always fun of ‘interesting’ and wholly useless fact. She happened to know most of them by now. The two had known one another for close to a decade now, having met in the summer before they both started college. They had lived in the city practically side by side for their entire lives but had never met before that point, unsurprisingly.
They hit it off quickly and became fast friends. He had a slight crush on her when they first met but it passed quickly as their friendship grew. They had, with their small group of friends, seen one another through the good times and the bad. When they finished college they all began to get on with their lives, they couldn’t see each other everyday anymore like they used to but they made the effort to try, which was what counted. Every week they’d go to dinner or grab some lunch if they had the time.
Kevin and Maria had both had the day off today and decided to make the most of it. They met up about an hour ago for an early morning jog and then had some plans for the rest of the day.
“So, how’s Mike?” Kevin asked. He didn’t really know Maria’s ‘new’ (of about a year) boyfriend that well but they got on when they did meet up.
“He’s good, just got a new contract designing one of the new libraries,” she gasped and rubbed her mouth moving some of the sweat from the sides of her mouth. “How’s…Horse?” she laughed.
“Ha ha, yes, very funny. I’m single and live with my cat,” Kevin sneered as he laughed. “He’s fine and says to tell you ‘miaow’.”
Kevin waited for the little laugh she does when something is mildly funny but not exactly enough to stir a proper laugh but it didn’t come. He actually became aware that she had dropped back. He came to a standstill but continued to jog on the spot. She was still in the road and then lurched forward. Her knees bent and her body weight came down with them and then she slumped forward onto the ground.
“Maria!” Kevin was at her side in a second. He rolled her onto her side, forgetting in an instant all the first aid he’d been taught on that course he’d taken. He looked into her eyes but they were glassy and open.
His eyes were drawn from them instantly to the side of her head about an inch or two up from her eyes. He could see the ground through the hole. “Maria,” he shook her, the tears were filling his eyes by now and were begging to roll down his cheeks.
“Help me! For god’s sake someone help me!” he began to scream.
# # # # #
Hank Pym’s Apartment…
Hank sat at the desk in his study. He didn’t come in here much and it was generally just a spare room that he would come into to get some file or another and then leave to do whatever he needed to do somewhere else.
He would read books curled up in front of the roaring fire in the fully stocked five floor library in the west wing and would conduct research in one of the labs or in the walk in computer he had designed up on the seventh floor. The articles and journals which he was constantly been sent to critique, or those he took an interest in, he read in one of the smaller labs, as it seemed the correct place for their consideration.
His office was very much a room without a real requirement, some strange blank limbo that never really lived up to the function it was supposed to. There were no paintings on the walls, no stats or figures about his business interests or even a wall-chart diary. No pictures of his loved ones sat on the desk for him to gaze at lovingly between tasks as he sat at his desk. It was a blank room.
Blank and never really living up was how he felt as he sat there in the room. It was probably the reason he drifted into the room and sat down in the chair. It should have by all rights been dusty as he sat in it but it wasn’t for obvious reasons.
Hank was in a dark mood. He made a note to make a note of the time and the place so he could later relay it to one of his doctors. These came and went often. He opened the top draw and pulled out a bottle of pills. He briefly checked the date, he’d had so many of these secreted around the place he had to check the dates to make sure he wasn’t taking expired medicine…of course if it was expired he could just make some himself.
He toyed with that thought; it would give him something to do. He shook his head and sighed. He had plenty to do, he always had plenty to do, he just didn’t want to do anything. He had reports to file, experiments to conduct, research to catch up on and a few beta tests to run on a new programme he had programmed in a fit of manic work the week before. He just didn’t want to at the moment.
The flat effect was most certainly in full swing at the moment. He knew exactly why, too, his mind had been taken back a few hours ago when he was asleep. He dreamt fitful dreams, all the time really, this one was bad because it was so fresh. He was searching around the Avenger grounds looking for sign of Jan in the twisted mess. Falcon and the others were missing too but he was only looking for Jan. He was certain he even found the others at one point…the finer details escaped him.
It was a jarring and worrying dream and the reason he had woken up in this mood…he had felt good last night. Today not so much, the dream just brought back all the thoughts of the events of that day. He had been good then as he’d swung into action and came up with some solid evidence. Evidence which…he shook his head and pushed the thoughts from his mind.
He couldn’t afford to go down that route, negative thinking of oneself is only asking for trouble when you’ve got a history like his. It all worked out, but he couldn’t help but think he could have done something more…he could have been more use, could have lived up to what he was supposed to be.
He closed his eyes and tried to push the thoughts away. He thought over the ‘pep-talk’ he had been given on that day, which had amounted to ‘Stop Moping!’. It probably wasn’t the most thought through and well balanced psychological analysis ever devised, but it honestly was one of the most true.
The bottle opened with a click and he poured two pills onto his hand and took them with a gulp.
“Uncle Hank?” The voice boomed around the apartment. Hank was startled by it and he could feel his heart racing in his chest, but he composed himself quickly. He stood to his feet and smiled gently; he did always enjoy when Cassie came to visit. It often felt like a ray of sunshine through the dark clouds, which was especially true when the clouds were rolling in like today.
He got up and made his way to the door of the study into the hall. It too was mostly barren. Hank never really went in for decoration. He was more a functionality kind of designer, pragmatic in nature and pragmatic in design.
The hall led to a flight of stairs, which went up 9 floors and down three. He luckily only wanted the next floor up. He could hear Cassie calling; her voice fluctuated as she moved from room to room. He flew directly up the center of the stairs rather than walking. He didn’t know why he thought he should put his Yellowjacket costume on this morning after he’d been in the shower but he had. He flew down the hallway that he came into past labs 4,5 and 6 and passed the ballroom…why he had a ballroom, he had never known. A part of him always thought Jan would like it, even though she had never seen it.
He hung a left at the end of the corridor and began to grow. He didn’t even think about it, he just reacted on instinct. He was fully adult size after three steps, which was just enough to bring his hand to the door knob. The door swung open and Cassie took a surprised step back as she had been just about to try the door.
“Uncle Hank…woah?!” Cassie leaned past hank to look into the room he had just come out of. It looked like a giant doll’s house reaching from the floor to the ceiling about 12 feet up.
“What you thought I lived in a one bedroom apartment with a living room, kitchen, bathroom and lab?” Hank smiled to Cassie.
“I always just thought you knocked down all the other rooms to make room for the lab,” she smiled.
“Oh, I did,” he smiled back.
“Why did you never show me?”
“Because I knew the idea that is running through your head would be running through your head and your Dad doesn’t want you exposed to Pym Particles.” Hank motioned for her to come into the living room.
“Not even just a little look around?” She smiled widely whilst trying to pull off her puppy dog eyes.
“I’m not used to going behind the backs of my good friends to take their 13 year old…”
“…I’m 14.”
“Yes, I know…but you’ll be 13 to me at least until you’re 16. You have to let you’re uncles, even when they’re not really you’re uncles, hold onto the innocent youth version of you for as long as they like. So, what brings you around to see me?” Hank could feel his bad mood completely vanishing, slowly but surely.
“Can’t a ‘niece’ come and see her favourite ‘uncle’,” Cassie added air quotes as she spoke. Her button nose wrinkled as she smiled.
“Better than Tony and Steve?” He raised an eyebrow and pushed out his lower lip in acceptance with a little nod thrown in for good effect.
“Really. Plus, I need help with a Chemistry project,” she leaned against the back of the sofa and held out her book bag to emphasise.
“Well, I’m more than happy to be used in that case…shouldn’t you be in school?” Hank checked his watch.
“It’s Saturday,” Cassie smiled and began to unzip her bag.
“Not Wednesday?” Hank looked at the date on his watch and the insect of the day calendar on the wall.
“Nope, Saturday all day.”
“Then I’ve missed two critique deadlines…and may have drank some very questionable milk this morning,” Hank thought on it for a moment and then shrugged.
RING, RING…
Hank crossed the room and picked up the phone. “Hello, Yellojacket”. This phone was his Yellowjacket line.
“Oh Hello…I was expecting a secretary or a butler or something.”
“No, I don’t have one, you’re confusing me with another Avenger,” Hank laughed gently.
There was silence on the other end of the phone for a second, followed by “…um…”
“How can I help you?” Hank ventured in an attempt to move the conversation on.
“This is Agent Delta of SHIELD,” said the voice on the other end of the line. It was a male voice and a deep one at that but he had an uncertain quality almost like he was asking questions rather than giving information.
“Is that your given name, family name or codename?” Hank cut across; sometimes his curiosity short-circuited the politeness and protocol parts of his brain.
“Eh, family name… Anyway I’m here in Central Park and we’ve got something really weird going on. Someone has been found dead with a borehole through their head We’re picking up some weird readings on our scanners that we can’t make head nor tail of.”
“Well, you have indeed rang the right person,” Hank smiled. He checked his watch and the clock on the wall to see what time he thought he would get there.
“We tried the Fantastic Four first but they’re busy off…somewhere. But their computer receptionist scanned our conversation and suggested you based off some keyword…erm thing.”
Hank stopped for a second, he didn’t know why but the fact they tried the Fantastic Four first hurt him. It made him suddenly unsure of why they tried him at all. His confidence had been knocked. “Yes…well, I’ll see what I can do.” He nodded to himself. “It doesn’t really sound like Avenger business though, does it? Do you really think you need me?”
There was silence. “Uh…maybe not. Can you suggest someone?”
“Hold on, I’ll make some calls,” he sighed and put the phone down on the side bench.
“What’s going on?” Cassie asked. She had been listening to his side of the conversation intently.
“Someone is dead in Central Park, mysterious circumstances and the Fantastic Four suggested I might be able to help out…but we’re a bit busy with the Chemistry homework aren’t we.” Hank was sure he could help her with that.
Cassie was silent for a second. She watched her uncle Hank’s face. He had that slight look of loss and confusion mixed with a little sadness you sometimes caught him with. “Uncle Hank,” she smiled gently at him in a comforting way. “Screw Chemistry…lets go do that instead.”
Hank stopped for a moment and then smiled. “If you’re sure.” Cassie nodded enthusiastically and he picked up the phone. “Hello…yes, I can come down. I’ll be there shortly. Yes, no you’re welcome…bye.”
# # # # #
Central Park…
It took about twenty minutes to reach central park from the apartment of Hank Pym. Police were lining one of the walkways and directing people around. A group of photographers and general onlookers had however amassed trying to get a look at whatever was so important. All the police would say was there was an accident.
The flashbulbs went wild as Yellowjacket and Cassie approached the cordoned off area. Yellowjacket flashed his Avengers clearance card and waited for the cop to radio down to someone below.
“What is going on here, Yellowjacket? Do you have any comment for the readers? Does as Avenger on the scene mean this is some sort of danger to the general public? Whose your friend?” The questions were coming fast and loose from the journalists and seemingly interested onlookers who simply joined in with the interrogation.
“I’m being consulted as a scientist. I can’t go into more details now even if I wanted to…no comment,” was his only response as he waved the cameras off and waited.
There was a minute in which he just stared down the pathway which curved around and went under a small bridge, they could see nothing more than a few police officers. It would have been easy enough for him to either shrink of grow and simply move past but it was probably best just to wait for his liaison.
Cassie was looking around sheepishly; she wasn’t used to this sort of attention even though the majority of people knew she was the daughter of an Avenger, as she had made sure to tell everyone at school fairly shortly after Scott had joined. There was a minimal amount of danger in doing so, as her dad was never one to amass a rogues gallery since he was a generally affable guy.
A beefy black man came running, rather slowly, up the slope. He exhaled as he got to Yellowjacket. “I’m Agent Delta, Mr. Yellowjacket, sir. Do you want to go straight down?”
Hank nodded and Agent Delta indicated for the cop to let him through. The cop stuck his hand in front of Cassie. “She’s with me,” Hank added with a glance to Agent Delta.
“She your sidekick?” he asked with a surprised look “Ant-Girl or something?”
“You were expecting Rick Jones? He’s a busy man nowadays…doesn’t appreciate being referred to as a side-kick, either.” Yellowjacket smiled and exhaled slightly as he finished speaking.
Agent Delta searched the sentence for a joke. “I have no idea who that is sir.” He shook his head. He shrugged after a second and motioned for Cassie to join them. “But far be it from me to question you bringing an under-aged civilian into what could be a dangerous situation.”
Hank smiled broadly again. “You seem slightly flustered but I enjoy your perspective on the whole thing. Are you new to SHIELD?”
“No,” Delta shook his head. “Five years, but new to the field though. I’m a science officer; were very unlikely to be mobilized. This seemed like just the case for us.”
“So what have we got?”
“Jogger with a borehole through her head, a centimeter in diameter. The witness reports no loud bangs, no weird silences, no flashes…no anything really. A quick background check reveals nothing of importance about the victim so we’re near to ruling out assassination.” Delta flicked through the notes he had. “It looked to be some weird science going on…or some kind of accident. We’re hoping you could illuminate it a little for us.”
Hank nodded. “You said something about strange readings?”
“Weird energy fluctuations, higher than normal radiation in the area. Can’t really get a lock on anything.”
“What do you think…Ant-Girl?” Hank turned and looked down at Cassie, who had been walking quietly next to the two listening in.
“Uh…” she was clearly taken aback by suddenly being included. “I don’t know. I’m failing Chemistry, remember.”
“This is physics,” he corrected.
“I’m not doing grandly in that either…and I’ll never be called Ant-Girl. Bugs are sick.”
“What do you want to be called?”
Agent Delta now was the one who was taken aback. He had expected this to be going differently.
“What are my powers?” Cassie shrugged.
“Probably size changing like Wasp, your dad and I. Eventually, I have no doubt you’ll end up following your dad’s profession.” Cassie thought for a second. “Come on, Cass,” Hank prodded, “don’t pretend you’ve never thought about it.”
“I was thinking Stature,” she confessed with a blush.
“There is nothing wrong with that. I like it…much less on the nose than the ones I come up with, right? So, what kind of radiation in particular?” Hank repeated as he turned back, his mind focused back on the situation.
“Protons, alpha particles, beta particles and, heck, everything else for that matter. It’s strange…were even picking up free floating gravitons and a magnetic dispersion flare.”
The three came down to the scene of the crime now. There were a bunch of SHIELD agents crouching around taking photographs and scanning with various pieces of equipment. Cassie’s head couldn’t turn in enough directions at once.
“The body is over here,” signalled Agent Delta and moved towards what was obviously a body covered with a sheet. “Ca…Stature, you might want to stay here,” he indicated and took a step forward.
“I’m sure I’ll be fine, I’m not a baby,” sighed Cassie and walked up behind her uncle. The sheet over the body was yanked back. Cassie turned sideways and threw up a little, “I think I was wrong.”
“You okay?” he asked.
“I will be if I stay standing over here,” she coughed and gave a thumbs-up. “And get some gum or something.”
Hank kneeled at the body and twisted the woman’s head. She was pretty, or at least was. Hank examined the borehole carefully and then sniffed in gently. “It’s been completely cauterized…yet there’s decaying flesh.” He tilted her head away from him. “It’s spread out actually, flaking skin.” His hand moved towards the top of her head and rubbed his hand across it and a large clump came loose. “Radiation poisoning, too.”
“You think that killed her?”
“No, that was almost certainly the hole in the head. This is a side-effect and it gives us something to go on.” He nodded, thinking. “The radiation around the area isn’t a coincidence and it is most certainly caused by whatever did this, so we have to assume the others are too. So what gives off gravitons, Alpha and Beta particles and magnetic flares?”
Agent Delta was silent for a second. “Lasers, judging by the hole.”
“No,” Hank shook his head. “You’re not seeing the wood for the trees. You’re looking at the hole and wondering what could make the hole, as if it was intended. The only thing which gives off that sort off effect is…” He drifted off for a second and shook his head. “I don’t see how it could be,” his eyes panned up to the sky.
“Ow! Jesus!” Yellowjacket’s head snapped around. Ten feet down the track an agent had fallen to the ground. He was holding his arm and looked like he was about to scream.
Hank was at his side in a second. He pried the hand away from the arm and stared at the damage. The dark streak of singed meat was familiar, much like the borehole. It looked like a red-hot poker had been shoved through his arm. “Hold still, this is going to hurt.”
Hank held one side of the arm firmly and pushed some white mass into the other side and then held his hand over it. The agent braced and grimaced. Hank removed his hand, revealing that the hole had been completely filled with whatever the white mass was.
“I’ve dosed this medical gum with Pym Particles, it should stop any unforeseen bleeding and stop the muscles around it coming away. You’ll survive…well as long as you get immediate treatment for the bad case of radiation poisoning you’ve no doubt got.”
“What?” the agent asked, panicked.
“Don’t worry, the SHIELD hospital has a high store of my anti-radiation gas.” He smiled, remembering fondly when he came up with the formula. It was through this gas being stolen that he originally became Ant-Man. “I need to keep this area clear, ten feet in all directions. Drag this man away by his feet.”
Hank remained crouched and immediately began to shrink. It was only a second or two until he was little more than a tiny black dot, which no one could really see too well from ten feet back. They stood in a circle watching the empty space with bated breath.
“What’s he doing, Stature?” asked Agent Delta “Don’t you think you should join him?”
Cassie’s heart was in her mouth. These people seemed to actually believe that she was some kind of superhero, the jeans and T-Shirt didn’t seem to give up any hints she wasn’t. They were looking at her like she should know stuff. “I think it’d be best if I just stayed here and kept an eye on everything.”
They stood there for a few tense minutes until Hank appeared suddenly as he had disappeared, right in front of Cassie and the agents making them all take a surprised step backwards.
“I need everyone to get back further. I want a perimeter of at least 200 feet around this thing with only personnel I authorize within it. Get all the people up there out of the park altogether and I want SHIELD on constant standby in case the city has to be evacuated.” Hank reeled off the commands pointing at various members of the SHIELD staff as he did so. They made no effort to move thanks to the sheer shock they were experiencing. “MOVE!”
“Uncle Hank?”
“What’s going on?” questioned Agent Delta, superseding Cassie.
Yellowjacket held out his hands. A small device materialised and then grew to about the size of a palm held computer. “This is a video linked sub-atomic quark microscope. It’s like an electron microscope but better, as it forms a real time visual readout rather than just a wavelength.”
On the screen was a raging ball of plasma. “It looks like the Sun,” Cassie noted as she watched it arc and flame.
“That’s exactly what it is: a miniature Sun blazing in the centre of Central Park. It’s expanding out of the Micro-Verse. That poor lady was unfortunate enough to run into it. It managed to burn right through her head and give her a healthy dose of radiation as it went.”
“So what does this mean?” Delta questioned. He looked about ready to file a report.
Hank pressed an icon on the screen and the picture changed to a waving line. “These reading show the mass, diameter and energy output.” All three lines turned at a practically 90 degree angle.
The machine started to beep. Hank turned to face it, his arms stretched out to push Cassie and Agent Delta backwards. It wasn’t really anything too spectacular to watch but they couldn’t help but notice the shadows of everything in the park shifted slightly. The temperature also rose by a few degrees.
“There it is.” Cassie pointed past Yellowjacket. Agent Delta squinted and then could see it. A tiny point of light that he guessed it was no bigger than a pea.
“The star is growing, rapidly. It increased by over 40% in the time I was watching it…and just jumped from what it was to pea sized, a growth of a few thousand percent.”
“What’s going to happen, Uncle Hank?”
“It’s showing no sign of stopping and the energy output is only increasing…eventually it’s going to grow and grow destroying everything, the park, the city and then the entire world…unless we can stop it.”
Central Park, the ‘little’ (843 acre) strip of greenery that stretched across Manhattan Island; it’s often said that it isn’t the sort of place you want to go at night but during the day it is filled with hundreds if not thousands of New Yorkers enjoying the greenery and sense of freedom whether they walking their dogs, taking carriage rides, playing Frisbee or, like the two friends where our story begins, jogging.
They had just jogged around the great running track surrounding one of the lakes within the manmade park. They were now jogging down one of the paths through the shade of the trees on the warm summers day and under a selection of bridges. “No two are the same,” offered Kevin with a slight nod back as he and his jogging partner, Maria, passed under it.
“I know…everyone knows,” she exhaled with a laugh as she jogged along next to him. Kevin was always fun of ‘interesting’ and wholly useless fact. She happened to know most of them by now. The two had known one another for close to a decade now, having met in the summer before they both started college. They had lived in the city practically side by side for their entire lives but had never met before that point, unsurprisingly.
They hit it off quickly and became fast friends. He had a slight crush on her when they first met but it passed quickly as their friendship grew. They had, with their small group of friends, seen one another through the good times and the bad. When they finished college they all began to get on with their lives, they couldn’t see each other everyday anymore like they used to but they made the effort to try, which was what counted. Every week they’d go to dinner or grab some lunch if they had the time.
Kevin and Maria had both had the day off today and decided to make the most of it. They met up about an hour ago for an early morning jog and then had some plans for the rest of the day.
“So, how’s Mike?” Kevin asked. He didn’t really know Maria’s ‘new’ (of about a year) boyfriend that well but they got on when they did meet up.
“He’s good, just got a new contract designing one of the new libraries,” she gasped and rubbed her mouth moving some of the sweat from the sides of her mouth. “How’s…Horse?” she laughed.
“Ha ha, yes, very funny. I’m single and live with my cat,” Kevin sneered as he laughed. “He’s fine and says to tell you ‘miaow’.”
Kevin waited for the little laugh she does when something is mildly funny but not exactly enough to stir a proper laugh but it didn’t come. He actually became aware that she had dropped back. He came to a standstill but continued to jog on the spot. She was still in the road and then lurched forward. Her knees bent and her body weight came down with them and then she slumped forward onto the ground.
“Maria!” Kevin was at her side in a second. He rolled her onto her side, forgetting in an instant all the first aid he’d been taught on that course he’d taken. He looked into her eyes but they were glassy and open.
His eyes were drawn from them instantly to the side of her head about an inch or two up from her eyes. He could see the ground through the hole. “Maria,” he shook her, the tears were filling his eyes by now and were begging to roll down his cheeks.
“Help me! For god’s sake someone help me!” he began to scream.
# # # # #
Hank Pym’s Apartment…
Hank sat at the desk in his study. He didn’t come in here much and it was generally just a spare room that he would come into to get some file or another and then leave to do whatever he needed to do somewhere else.
He would read books curled up in front of the roaring fire in the fully stocked five floor library in the west wing and would conduct research in one of the labs or in the walk in computer he had designed up on the seventh floor. The articles and journals which he was constantly been sent to critique, or those he took an interest in, he read in one of the smaller labs, as it seemed the correct place for their consideration.
His office was very much a room without a real requirement, some strange blank limbo that never really lived up to the function it was supposed to. There were no paintings on the walls, no stats or figures about his business interests or even a wall-chart diary. No pictures of his loved ones sat on the desk for him to gaze at lovingly between tasks as he sat at his desk. It was a blank room.
Blank and never really living up was how he felt as he sat there in the room. It was probably the reason he drifted into the room and sat down in the chair. It should have by all rights been dusty as he sat in it but it wasn’t for obvious reasons.
Hank was in a dark mood. He made a note to make a note of the time and the place so he could later relay it to one of his doctors. These came and went often. He opened the top draw and pulled out a bottle of pills. He briefly checked the date, he’d had so many of these secreted around the place he had to check the dates to make sure he wasn’t taking expired medicine…of course if it was expired he could just make some himself.
He toyed with that thought; it would give him something to do. He shook his head and sighed. He had plenty to do, he always had plenty to do, he just didn’t want to do anything. He had reports to file, experiments to conduct, research to catch up on and a few beta tests to run on a new programme he had programmed in a fit of manic work the week before. He just didn’t want to at the moment.
The flat effect was most certainly in full swing at the moment. He knew exactly why, too, his mind had been taken back a few hours ago when he was asleep. He dreamt fitful dreams, all the time really, this one was bad because it was so fresh. He was searching around the Avenger grounds looking for sign of Jan in the twisted mess. Falcon and the others were missing too but he was only looking for Jan. He was certain he even found the others at one point…the finer details escaped him.
It was a jarring and worrying dream and the reason he had woken up in this mood…he had felt good last night. Today not so much, the dream just brought back all the thoughts of the events of that day. He had been good then as he’d swung into action and came up with some solid evidence. Evidence which…he shook his head and pushed the thoughts from his mind.
He couldn’t afford to go down that route, negative thinking of oneself is only asking for trouble when you’ve got a history like his. It all worked out, but he couldn’t help but think he could have done something more…he could have been more use, could have lived up to what he was supposed to be.
He closed his eyes and tried to push the thoughts away. He thought over the ‘pep-talk’ he had been given on that day, which had amounted to ‘Stop Moping!’. It probably wasn’t the most thought through and well balanced psychological analysis ever devised, but it honestly was one of the most true.
The bottle opened with a click and he poured two pills onto his hand and took them with a gulp.
“Uncle Hank?” The voice boomed around the apartment. Hank was startled by it and he could feel his heart racing in his chest, but he composed himself quickly. He stood to his feet and smiled gently; he did always enjoy when Cassie came to visit. It often felt like a ray of sunshine through the dark clouds, which was especially true when the clouds were rolling in like today.
He got up and made his way to the door of the study into the hall. It too was mostly barren. Hank never really went in for decoration. He was more a functionality kind of designer, pragmatic in nature and pragmatic in design.
The hall led to a flight of stairs, which went up 9 floors and down three. He luckily only wanted the next floor up. He could hear Cassie calling; her voice fluctuated as she moved from room to room. He flew directly up the center of the stairs rather than walking. He didn’t know why he thought he should put his Yellowjacket costume on this morning after he’d been in the shower but he had. He flew down the hallway that he came into past labs 4,5 and 6 and passed the ballroom…why he had a ballroom, he had never known. A part of him always thought Jan would like it, even though she had never seen it.
He hung a left at the end of the corridor and began to grow. He didn’t even think about it, he just reacted on instinct. He was fully adult size after three steps, which was just enough to bring his hand to the door knob. The door swung open and Cassie took a surprised step back as she had been just about to try the door.
“Uncle Hank…woah?!” Cassie leaned past hank to look into the room he had just come out of. It looked like a giant doll’s house reaching from the floor to the ceiling about 12 feet up.
“What you thought I lived in a one bedroom apartment with a living room, kitchen, bathroom and lab?” Hank smiled to Cassie.
“I always just thought you knocked down all the other rooms to make room for the lab,” she smiled.
“Oh, I did,” he smiled back.
“Why did you never show me?”
“Because I knew the idea that is running through your head would be running through your head and your Dad doesn’t want you exposed to Pym Particles.” Hank motioned for her to come into the living room.
“Not even just a little look around?” She smiled widely whilst trying to pull off her puppy dog eyes.
“I’m not used to going behind the backs of my good friends to take their 13 year old…”
“…I’m 14.”
“Yes, I know…but you’ll be 13 to me at least until you’re 16. You have to let you’re uncles, even when they’re not really you’re uncles, hold onto the innocent youth version of you for as long as they like. So, what brings you around to see me?” Hank could feel his bad mood completely vanishing, slowly but surely.
“Can’t a ‘niece’ come and see her favourite ‘uncle’,” Cassie added air quotes as she spoke. Her button nose wrinkled as she smiled.
“Better than Tony and Steve?” He raised an eyebrow and pushed out his lower lip in acceptance with a little nod thrown in for good effect.
“Really. Plus, I need help with a Chemistry project,” she leaned against the back of the sofa and held out her book bag to emphasise.
“Well, I’m more than happy to be used in that case…shouldn’t you be in school?” Hank checked his watch.
“It’s Saturday,” Cassie smiled and began to unzip her bag.
“Not Wednesday?” Hank looked at the date on his watch and the insect of the day calendar on the wall.
“Nope, Saturday all day.”
“Then I’ve missed two critique deadlines…and may have drank some very questionable milk this morning,” Hank thought on it for a moment and then shrugged.
RING, RING…
Hank crossed the room and picked up the phone. “Hello, Yellojacket”. This phone was his Yellowjacket line.
“Oh Hello…I was expecting a secretary or a butler or something.”
“No, I don’t have one, you’re confusing me with another Avenger,” Hank laughed gently.
There was silence on the other end of the phone for a second, followed by “…um…”
“How can I help you?” Hank ventured in an attempt to move the conversation on.
“This is Agent Delta of SHIELD,” said the voice on the other end of the line. It was a male voice and a deep one at that but he had an uncertain quality almost like he was asking questions rather than giving information.
“Is that your given name, family name or codename?” Hank cut across; sometimes his curiosity short-circuited the politeness and protocol parts of his brain.
“Eh, family name… Anyway I’m here in Central Park and we’ve got something really weird going on. Someone has been found dead with a borehole through their head We’re picking up some weird readings on our scanners that we can’t make head nor tail of.”
“Well, you have indeed rang the right person,” Hank smiled. He checked his watch and the clock on the wall to see what time he thought he would get there.
“We tried the Fantastic Four first but they’re busy off…somewhere. But their computer receptionist scanned our conversation and suggested you based off some keyword…erm thing.”
Hank stopped for a second, he didn’t know why but the fact they tried the Fantastic Four first hurt him. It made him suddenly unsure of why they tried him at all. His confidence had been knocked. “Yes…well, I’ll see what I can do.” He nodded to himself. “It doesn’t really sound like Avenger business though, does it? Do you really think you need me?”
There was silence. “Uh…maybe not. Can you suggest someone?”
“Hold on, I’ll make some calls,” he sighed and put the phone down on the side bench.
“What’s going on?” Cassie asked. She had been listening to his side of the conversation intently.
“Someone is dead in Central Park, mysterious circumstances and the Fantastic Four suggested I might be able to help out…but we’re a bit busy with the Chemistry homework aren’t we.” Hank was sure he could help her with that.
Cassie was silent for a second. She watched her uncle Hank’s face. He had that slight look of loss and confusion mixed with a little sadness you sometimes caught him with. “Uncle Hank,” she smiled gently at him in a comforting way. “Screw Chemistry…lets go do that instead.”
Hank stopped for a moment and then smiled. “If you’re sure.” Cassie nodded enthusiastically and he picked up the phone. “Hello…yes, I can come down. I’ll be there shortly. Yes, no you’re welcome…bye.”
# # # # #
Central Park…
It took about twenty minutes to reach central park from the apartment of Hank Pym. Police were lining one of the walkways and directing people around. A group of photographers and general onlookers had however amassed trying to get a look at whatever was so important. All the police would say was there was an accident.
The flashbulbs went wild as Yellowjacket and Cassie approached the cordoned off area. Yellowjacket flashed his Avengers clearance card and waited for the cop to radio down to someone below.
“What is going on here, Yellowjacket? Do you have any comment for the readers? Does as Avenger on the scene mean this is some sort of danger to the general public? Whose your friend?” The questions were coming fast and loose from the journalists and seemingly interested onlookers who simply joined in with the interrogation.
“I’m being consulted as a scientist. I can’t go into more details now even if I wanted to…no comment,” was his only response as he waved the cameras off and waited.
There was a minute in which he just stared down the pathway which curved around and went under a small bridge, they could see nothing more than a few police officers. It would have been easy enough for him to either shrink of grow and simply move past but it was probably best just to wait for his liaison.
Cassie was looking around sheepishly; she wasn’t used to this sort of attention even though the majority of people knew she was the daughter of an Avenger, as she had made sure to tell everyone at school fairly shortly after Scott had joined. There was a minimal amount of danger in doing so, as her dad was never one to amass a rogues gallery since he was a generally affable guy.
A beefy black man came running, rather slowly, up the slope. He exhaled as he got to Yellowjacket. “I’m Agent Delta, Mr. Yellowjacket, sir. Do you want to go straight down?”
Hank nodded and Agent Delta indicated for the cop to let him through. The cop stuck his hand in front of Cassie. “She’s with me,” Hank added with a glance to Agent Delta.
“She your sidekick?” he asked with a surprised look “Ant-Girl or something?”
“You were expecting Rick Jones? He’s a busy man nowadays…doesn’t appreciate being referred to as a side-kick, either.” Yellowjacket smiled and exhaled slightly as he finished speaking.
Agent Delta searched the sentence for a joke. “I have no idea who that is sir.” He shook his head. He shrugged after a second and motioned for Cassie to join them. “But far be it from me to question you bringing an under-aged civilian into what could be a dangerous situation.”
Hank smiled broadly again. “You seem slightly flustered but I enjoy your perspective on the whole thing. Are you new to SHIELD?”
“No,” Delta shook his head. “Five years, but new to the field though. I’m a science officer; were very unlikely to be mobilized. This seemed like just the case for us.”
“So what have we got?”
“Jogger with a borehole through her head, a centimeter in diameter. The witness reports no loud bangs, no weird silences, no flashes…no anything really. A quick background check reveals nothing of importance about the victim so we’re near to ruling out assassination.” Delta flicked through the notes he had. “It looked to be some weird science going on…or some kind of accident. We’re hoping you could illuminate it a little for us.”
Hank nodded. “You said something about strange readings?”
“Weird energy fluctuations, higher than normal radiation in the area. Can’t really get a lock on anything.”
“What do you think…Ant-Girl?” Hank turned and looked down at Cassie, who had been walking quietly next to the two listening in.
“Uh…” she was clearly taken aback by suddenly being included. “I don’t know. I’m failing Chemistry, remember.”
“This is physics,” he corrected.
“I’m not doing grandly in that either…and I’ll never be called Ant-Girl. Bugs are sick.”
“What do you want to be called?”
Agent Delta now was the one who was taken aback. He had expected this to be going differently.
“What are my powers?” Cassie shrugged.
“Probably size changing like Wasp, your dad and I. Eventually, I have no doubt you’ll end up following your dad’s profession.” Cassie thought for a second. “Come on, Cass,” Hank prodded, “don’t pretend you’ve never thought about it.”
“I was thinking Stature,” she confessed with a blush.
“There is nothing wrong with that. I like it…much less on the nose than the ones I come up with, right? So, what kind of radiation in particular?” Hank repeated as he turned back, his mind focused back on the situation.
“Protons, alpha particles, beta particles and, heck, everything else for that matter. It’s strange…were even picking up free floating gravitons and a magnetic dispersion flare.”
The three came down to the scene of the crime now. There were a bunch of SHIELD agents crouching around taking photographs and scanning with various pieces of equipment. Cassie’s head couldn’t turn in enough directions at once.
“The body is over here,” signalled Agent Delta and moved towards what was obviously a body covered with a sheet. “Ca…Stature, you might want to stay here,” he indicated and took a step forward.
“I’m sure I’ll be fine, I’m not a baby,” sighed Cassie and walked up behind her uncle. The sheet over the body was yanked back. Cassie turned sideways and threw up a little, “I think I was wrong.”
“You okay?” he asked.
“I will be if I stay standing over here,” she coughed and gave a thumbs-up. “And get some gum or something.”
Hank kneeled at the body and twisted the woman’s head. She was pretty, or at least was. Hank examined the borehole carefully and then sniffed in gently. “It’s been completely cauterized…yet there’s decaying flesh.” He tilted her head away from him. “It’s spread out actually, flaking skin.” His hand moved towards the top of her head and rubbed his hand across it and a large clump came loose. “Radiation poisoning, too.”
“You think that killed her?”
“No, that was almost certainly the hole in the head. This is a side-effect and it gives us something to go on.” He nodded, thinking. “The radiation around the area isn’t a coincidence and it is most certainly caused by whatever did this, so we have to assume the others are too. So what gives off gravitons, Alpha and Beta particles and magnetic flares?”
Agent Delta was silent for a second. “Lasers, judging by the hole.”
“No,” Hank shook his head. “You’re not seeing the wood for the trees. You’re looking at the hole and wondering what could make the hole, as if it was intended. The only thing which gives off that sort off effect is…” He drifted off for a second and shook his head. “I don’t see how it could be,” his eyes panned up to the sky.
“Ow! Jesus!” Yellowjacket’s head snapped around. Ten feet down the track an agent had fallen to the ground. He was holding his arm and looked like he was about to scream.
Hank was at his side in a second. He pried the hand away from the arm and stared at the damage. The dark streak of singed meat was familiar, much like the borehole. It looked like a red-hot poker had been shoved through his arm. “Hold still, this is going to hurt.”
Hank held one side of the arm firmly and pushed some white mass into the other side and then held his hand over it. The agent braced and grimaced. Hank removed his hand, revealing that the hole had been completely filled with whatever the white mass was.
“I’ve dosed this medical gum with Pym Particles, it should stop any unforeseen bleeding and stop the muscles around it coming away. You’ll survive…well as long as you get immediate treatment for the bad case of radiation poisoning you’ve no doubt got.”
“What?” the agent asked, panicked.
“Don’t worry, the SHIELD hospital has a high store of my anti-radiation gas.” He smiled, remembering fondly when he came up with the formula. It was through this gas being stolen that he originally became Ant-Man. “I need to keep this area clear, ten feet in all directions. Drag this man away by his feet.”
Hank remained crouched and immediately began to shrink. It was only a second or two until he was little more than a tiny black dot, which no one could really see too well from ten feet back. They stood in a circle watching the empty space with bated breath.
“What’s he doing, Stature?” asked Agent Delta “Don’t you think you should join him?”
Cassie’s heart was in her mouth. These people seemed to actually believe that she was some kind of superhero, the jeans and T-Shirt didn’t seem to give up any hints she wasn’t. They were looking at her like she should know stuff. “I think it’d be best if I just stayed here and kept an eye on everything.”
They stood there for a few tense minutes until Hank appeared suddenly as he had disappeared, right in front of Cassie and the agents making them all take a surprised step backwards.
“I need everyone to get back further. I want a perimeter of at least 200 feet around this thing with only personnel I authorize within it. Get all the people up there out of the park altogether and I want SHIELD on constant standby in case the city has to be evacuated.” Hank reeled off the commands pointing at various members of the SHIELD staff as he did so. They made no effort to move thanks to the sheer shock they were experiencing. “MOVE!”
“Uncle Hank?”
“What’s going on?” questioned Agent Delta, superseding Cassie.
Yellowjacket held out his hands. A small device materialised and then grew to about the size of a palm held computer. “This is a video linked sub-atomic quark microscope. It’s like an electron microscope but better, as it forms a real time visual readout rather than just a wavelength.”
On the screen was a raging ball of plasma. “It looks like the Sun,” Cassie noted as she watched it arc and flame.
“That’s exactly what it is: a miniature Sun blazing in the centre of Central Park. It’s expanding out of the Micro-Verse. That poor lady was unfortunate enough to run into it. It managed to burn right through her head and give her a healthy dose of radiation as it went.”
“So what does this mean?” Delta questioned. He looked about ready to file a report.
Hank pressed an icon on the screen and the picture changed to a waving line. “These reading show the mass, diameter and energy output.” All three lines turned at a practically 90 degree angle.
The machine started to beep. Hank turned to face it, his arms stretched out to push Cassie and Agent Delta backwards. It wasn’t really anything too spectacular to watch but they couldn’t help but notice the shadows of everything in the park shifted slightly. The temperature also rose by a few degrees.
“There it is.” Cassie pointed past Yellowjacket. Agent Delta squinted and then could see it. A tiny point of light that he guessed it was no bigger than a pea.
“The star is growing, rapidly. It increased by over 40% in the time I was watching it…and just jumped from what it was to pea sized, a growth of a few thousand percent.”
“What’s going to happen, Uncle Hank?”
“It’s showing no sign of stopping and the energy output is only increasing…eventually it’s going to grow and grow destroying everything, the park, the city and then the entire world…unless we can stop it.”