Location Undisclosed

The room was dark and silent, save for the breathing of its three occupants. All sat up straight in their swivel chairs, and none of them looked at each other as they waited. Positioned at different spots around a square conference table, the three stared either at the door or blank projector screen on the opposite wall.

The door cracked open slowly, spilling white light from the hallway into the room. In stepped a third man, staring now at the expressionless two men and the woman.

The man pulled back his sunglasses. "Oh, here already?" he smiled. The other three were not amused by his flippant nature. "Good, then let's get started."

Walking over to the screen, the man pulled a small remote from his pocket. Pressing a button, the projector screen came to life, featuring a scene from Normandy Beach. "Let's take a trip back in time to World War II. The Axis powers were scaring the living hell out of the U. S. of A., and no one knew what to do to keep the folks at home's morale up. White House PR were trying just about everything they could to get people to keep buying bonds and supporting their boys overseas from posters to live demonstrations. Still, nothing quite seemed to be enough, you know?"

*Click!* The screen changed to a close-up of the image, zeroing in on a single soldier from the previous image. He wore a full bodysuit, complete with wings sprouting on either side of the "A" on the middle of his forehead. Flanking him, just barely distinguishable from the side, was a teenage boy in a domino mask.

"So they invented the Super-Soldier program. Why not put some of that bond money into making better soldiers? Then, when we succeed, we dress 'em up in red, white, and blue, and send them out into the field so that everyone can cheer for 'em at home," the man continued. "You're a—forgive me for not using the euphemism—spin doctor, right Mr. Higgins? Tell me, is anything I'm saying false?"

Higgins, a burly man with wire-rimmed glasses and a handlebar mustache, coughed into his hand before answering. "So far everything you've said is true," he confirmed, coughing again afterwards. "However, we do prefer to be called public relations officials, if it's all the same to you, Lieutenant."

The man gave a smile laced with malice. "It's not all the same, Higgins. Please refrain from calling me by title or name again. This room is secure, but not foolproof." The Lieutenant turned to the other two in the room and flashed a reassuring smile. "But let's put all that aside for now…"

*Click!* The screen flashed again, this time to a slide featuring a cascade of stars-and-stripes-themed heroes and heroines in flight around the Stature of Liberty. "Unfortunately for the United States, putting its heroes in a faraway setting didn't quite cut it for the majority of the populace. They needed heroes they could practically touch, not just ones they could see on the screen in the theaters." The Lieutenant paused.

*Click!* A new screen popped up, featuring pictures of the Destroyer, Rockman, Patriot, and other heroes of the forties. "Lucky for the White House, the problem began to take care of itself, as an odd series of fluke accidents led to the creation of at least a couple dozen self-made heroes. Things couldn't have worked out better."

"Except once the war was over…" said the second man, a fossil with thin gray hair and shaking hands.

"Exactly, Cartwright," said the Lieutenant. "What do you do with a good thirty heroes that don't have anything to do once the bomb was dropped? Back then, the government was aware that having heroes could very well create a super-villain problem, as it seems to have done today."

The woman, an expert on the history of super-heroics, spoke up for the first time. Adjusting her horn-rimmed glasses, she spoke in a nasal tone. "You send them to Hiroshima for clean-up efforts, and conveniently never hear from them again." Her voice was almost accusing in that regard.

"That's because they never got to Hiroshima," the Lieutenant said, once again with his sideways smile. "You see, Ms. Windsor, we put several of these so-called heroes on ice, in psychic conditioning, and we prepared to use them again in the future. That's what we do here in my division—we put the leftovers away until it's fit to bring them out for the next big war."

*Click!* A slide popped up with the Phantom Reporter shooting out Korean antagonists at a rural airstrip.

*Click!* Mister E tackled a Vietnamese soldier to the ground in the forestry of the Ho Chi Minh Trail.

*Click!* The original Black Widow attacked a huddle of Iraqi insurgents during Operation: Desert Storm.

"Wait—why doesn't anyone remember this happening? When anyone who remembers these heroes thinks back, they only think of them as World War II heroes—not as recurring wartime soldiers," Ms. Windsor interrupted, wiping her glasses as if to make sure some smudge wasn't altering her vision.

The Lieutenant narrowed his eyebrows at her. "We're a very careful group here at the Division. As soon as the war was over—as soon as the 'morale boost' was unneeded—we wiped out all trace of their involvement. History books prefer to look back at soldiers and ranks, rather than heroes who, through some act of God, could take care of more than the rest."

"Okay, we understand that," Higgins broke in. "What are we here for?"

"There's a war going on," said the Lieutenant. "The War on Terror has all but lost the support of the American people. You're here because we're going to activate one of the sleepers."

"That's the problem," Higgins coughed. "In the modern age, most Americans are beyond the flashiness of super-heroes. They see them on a daily basis. What does your sleeper agent have that lifts the morale of the masses?"

The Lieutenant chuckled. "Oh, no. You're not getting it at all. He's not supposed to excite the world—he just needs to distract it…"

Young Avengers Prelude #1: Sleeper Soldier, featuring the Secret Stamp

By Hunter Lambright

Remington Preparatory School

St. Louis, Missouri

The sun's rays trickled pleasantly across the tree-covered grounds of the Remington Preparatory School just outside St. Louis. Summer was just beginning to trickle into fall, and the trees began to reflect that change in shades of orange, yellow, and red. Boys and girls from age twelve to eighteen dashed about the grounds or sat in groups of two and three, enjoying their lunch hour before heading back to class.

On one of the cement walks that led to the school stood a lone boy, staring at the rest. Dressed in the khaki slacks and black sweater over white dress shirt that composed the school uniform, the boy yearned to be socially accepted among his classmates. There were multiple reasons that he couldn't, ranging from the fact that he came from another time to the sad truth that the Handler had forbidden it. Life had never been the same for Roddy Colt since he received his "gifts."

"Hey, kid! Kid! Watch out!" shouted another voice from across the lawn. Roddy turned in time to see a football spiraling toward his head. Reacting with inhuman reflexes, his forearm shot out, deflecting the pigskin missile.

The boy who had shouted raised a curious eyebrow. "Goddamn, you're fast!" he said. "You should play with us sometime."

Roddy shook his head. "No hand-eye coordination," he muttered. Don't draw attention to yourself! he scolded himself inside.

The boy raised his eyebrow again before rejoining the game without question. Roddy gave a sigh of relief. No one needed to know about him. It would screw things up, and he didn't want to "go away" again. The fact of the matter was that Hell was indeed a place on earth, but rather than flames, it held a cryogenic freeze.

Roddy shook his head and continued walking toward his chemistry class in the science wing, reflecting along the way. He hadn't had a normal life since he was fourteen. Technically, he was now in his seventies. As a hero who emerged toward the end of the war, he'd been active for no more than two years before the "Hiroshima Cleanup."

Like most other "hometown heroes" of the age, he'd gotten his powers from a freak accident. Instead of receiving a shipment of polio vaccination, his doctor received vials of super-soldier prototype. Out of twenty-three mistreated patients, only Roddy survived. No one had ever told his story because it was likely even the government didn't remember it anymore. It was one of those things that ended up in the bottom of a shredder or a stack of unused comic book scripts so that there was no record to check in the future.

The fact of the matter was, so many things had changed. Life was so much more relaxed—no one seemed to have to work for anything. It was like you could get anything at a snap. Not only that, but Roddy was discomforted that there were so many girls in school with him. The first time he'd seen one of them in the clothes they wore when school wasn't in session, his face had gone beet-red and he'd had to excuse himself from the room rather quickly.

As he walked in the room, Roddy's chemistry teacher, an old fellow by the name of Mr. Cartwright, clapped him on the back. "Grab a lab apron and a pair of goggles, son. I'm going to be demonstrating the volatile nature of the alkali metals today, and those things are our best precaution in case things get, well, heated, shall we say?"

Roddy did his best to ignore the old man, who was arguably one of the creepiest teachers in the school. He was the kind who spent his time dropping papers on the ground in front of the table of a girl wearing a skirt. The biggest difference between him and the rest of the teachers like that was that he hadn't been written up yet.

After he tied the back of the apron, Roddy placed the goggles on top of his head. His schoolbooks rested on top of the lab table next to his stool. Slowly, other students began to trickle into the room. Several minutes later, the room was full and the bell sounded. Class was in session.

"Good afternoon, class," said Cartwright, pulling a pen out of his white lab coat. Everything about him screamed that "mad scientist" look. "I trust you all had an enjoyable lunch?"

There were a few unenthused mumblings from the rest of the class. Cartwright narrowed his eyes in disappointment, but continued onward nonetheless. "Well, if your lunch was merely ho-hum, I have a demonstration for you today that's sure to knock some flare back into your day!" He walked over to the fume hood, where a vise gripped a solid block of some white substance. "This right here is pure sodium. As one of the alkali metals, it is one of the most reactive—and you'll see just what I mean by that momentarily!"

He walked back to the storage room and emerged with a large beaker teeming with boiling water. Steam poured heavily from its surface, condensing in Cartwright's eyebrows. "I'm going to place this under the sodium. As the water vapor begins to condense on the sodium, you'll notice that the sodium will begin to react very strongly to the contact. But I'd rather not spoil the surprise—see it for yourself!"

He placed the beaker under the sodium. Almost right away, a flare sparked up on the side of the sodium, followed instantaneously by several more that were more powerful than the first, rocking the vise. The class sat and watched it like a fireworks show.

Roddy watched as, with each spark, the vise jolted left and right. He saw the screw turn slightly. "Um…Mr. Cartwright?" he asked worriedly.

"Yes, m'boy?" Cartwright asked, turning his attention away from the experiment onto Roddy.

Roddy's expression turned from concern to horror as he saw the sodium block begin to slip from the vise. "Sir! It's going to—"

The sound of shattering glass interrupted Roddy's warning as the sodium dropped directly into the water. Flames shot outward as the sodium reacted strongly to the full-on contact with the liquid, sending the students in the front seats scrambling.

"Everyone out! Pull the alarm and get everyone clear!" Cartwright shouted, instantly taking charge of the situation.

Something was wrong with the situation, but Roddy had trouble thinking straight while the sodium continued reacting with each fresh layer that was exposed after each subsequent reaction. He waited until most of the class had left before it finally clicked—he heard a hissing noise. Roddy had only heard that noise once before, during an experiment a week ago where the group had used Bunsen burners to heat a nitrate solution.

"Sir! Something's—" Roddy started. His words caught in his throat as, out of the corner of his eye, he caught a flaming piece of sodium catch the ceiling tile. This was getting out of hand, and fast—and he knew exactly what needed to be done. He was just sorry that it had come this far.

Cartwright reappeared from the storage room with a fire extinguisher—which, in reality, only gave the highly-reactive metal something else to react with. If anything, the suddenly blast caused the reaction to spread itself across the room. Soon the old man began coughing, falling to his knees.

Now the fire alarm was ringing, the flames had spread from the fume hood, and all of the current efforts to quell them had failed. As the fire inched across the ceiling, it was soon obvious that, without some kind of help—and fast—the entire wing would be up in flames.

Roddy emerged from the storage room in time to see Cartwright fall to the ground. His hair was now spiked up hastily while the rest of his body was clothed in yellow spandex. A red, white, and blue badge was splayed across his chest, with a single stripe extending from this badge down each limb.

As he'd done several times decades ago, Roddy slung Cartwright over his shoulders, carrying him out of the classroom. Smoke had long since filled the room, so Roddy struggled to stay as low as possible while sacrificing the time it took to get out of the building.

He made it to the first door in the hallway in less than a minute and kicked it open, running as best as he could under the weight of the older man. He lowed Cartwright to the ground in front of the gathered populace of the school. "Get this man help!" Roddy ordered.

A teacher in the front of the crowd—a large man with glasses and a bad toupee—stepped forward. "Um…who are you?"

Roddy sighed inwardly. Still, he had a façade to put on. "I'm the Secret Stamp, protector of hometown America!" he exclaimed.

The teacher groaned. "I guess we should be thankful that it took this long before these guys came to Missouri…" he said to himself.

Another teacher spoke up. "We're missing two students from Cartwright's ros—"

Without waiting for another word, Roddy turned tail and sprinted back into the building. He burst into the chemistry room and shouted, "Anyone in here?" He was rewarded with a lungful of smoke. Creeping low to the ground, he coughed before trying again. "Is anyone here?"

"Here…" said a weak voice from the front of the room at the opposite side of the initial explosion. "We're over here…!"

Roddy scrambled across the heated floor to the corner where he saw a girl he thought he remembered as Lisa, and—to his dismay—his roommate, Evan. Lisa knelt over Evan's prone form. "I couldn't drag him," she explained. "He passed out when it exploded!"

Despite having an athlete's physique, Evan had a weak heart and few friends. There was no telling what kind of damage such a shock to his system combined with the smoke in his lungs could do. "I'll take care of him," Roddy said, making his voice deeper so that Lisa wouldn't recognize it. "You just take care of you!"

While Lisa crawled toward the door, Roddy slung Evan easily over his shoulder—a feat made easy by the super-soldier serum that ran through his veins. Holding his breath, Roddy made a run for it—before he realized that he still heard the hissing noise.

"Oh, Jes—!" he began as a stream of fire burst from the hose on the nearest lab table. His suspicion earlier had been right—someone must have bumped the gas handle in the confusion on the way out.

At the speed of thought, he turned his body so that the blast caught him in the chest rather than catching Evan in the back. He dove forward, out of the way of the makeshift flamethrower, groaning from the excruciating pain from his chest. Still, he had priorities—he would heal. If he spent much longer in this room, Evan might not.

With one last mad burst of speed, Roddy tore through the door of the chemistry room and dashed down the hall through the double doors with Evan on his back. He then lay his unconscious roommate on the grass, panting.

Behind him, from the sudden influx of fresh air let in by the now-open doors, the back-draft roared outward, fueled further as the fire from the gas lines at the lab tables finally traveled backwards along the lines into the tank held in the basement.

The explosion launched fiery debris and rubble that caused the crowd to cringe. Teachers watched onward solemnly as the science wing went down in flames. Still, there was a light in the solemnity of the crowd as Lisa, still coughing up a lung from smoke inhalation, told the story of the masked hero who came back to save her and Evan. Cartwright would later identify him as a throwback from the forties—the Secret Stamp.

Roddy was gone from the scene thirty seconds after the explosion. The fire department arrived seven minutes later—but all they could do was cool off the ashes. Everyone knew that someone had saved no fewer than three lives that day—and Roddy was destined to pretend to guess at who was under the costume while his mask gained the respect and popularity that he so desperately needed…

Boys' Dormitories

That night, Roddy reclined on his bed in his dorm room, trying not to move lest he disturb the already-healing burns on his chest. He rolled his neck to rid himself of the crick that had formed as he struggled to read the book that, due to his injury, he could only hold at his abdomen.

Roddy sat up with a start as the doorknob began turning to his room. He relaxed slightly as Evan sauntered in. "What's the diagnosis?" Roddy asked with a crooked, lopsided grin that masked his concern.

"The usual," Evan responded, his mood instantly going sour. "Lisa said I went pale the second the experiment exploded, and really, that's the last thing I remember. I wish I remembered the medical term for 'chronic fainting,' don't you? Sucks, too. I mean, I'm built to be a swimmer like my brother, but…I kinda lack in the cardio zone, if you know what I mean."

"You can't help it," Roddy tried, knowing it was no use. Evan's heart condition had always been a source of bitterness, so Roddy pressed no further.

As Evan continued toward his side of the room, his left leg gave at the knee, causing him to stumble. Roddy jumped to his friend's aid, ignoring the pain in his chest. "Are you sure you're fine?"

Evan paused, regaining his bearings. "Yeah." He paused. "Still a little woozy, I guess. Wh—is that blood?"

Roddy glanced down at his chest, shocked to see the reddish-brown blood billowing across the front of his shirt. "Oh, man!" He started to pull away and head into the closet-sized bathroom attached to their room.

"Wait—Roddy, what's going on? What did you do?" Evan asked, his brow furrowing in worry. "I'm gonna go get the nurse."

"No!" Roddy cried emphatically. "You can't do that!"

"Why?" Evan asked, as an epiphany washed his features from concern to horror. "You're a cutter?"

"No!" Roddy repeated. "Not that! It's just—you can't! I just can't tell you why, though!" Evan now watched nervously from the doorway as Roddy stripped off his shirt and unraveled his blood-soaked bandages.

"Well, what do you want me to do, then? I can't just stand here!" Evan said in exasperation. Roddy fiddled with clean gauze as Evan's eyes focused exposed wound. "I-is that a burn? Did you get burned in the fire?"

"Yeah…no…uh, sorta," Roddy amended. He couldn't think straight and take care of himself at the same time. Cartwright was going to kill him for this.

"Then…why didn't you go to the nurse?" Evan asked in bewilderment. He turned to the door. "Look at you, you're bleeding all over! I'm getting her down here now!"

Roddy, angry at the situation and frustrated with all the questions, blurted, "Because I wasn't supposed to be in the fire! Because no one knows I was in the fire! Because everyone thinks someone else was in the fire saving your sorry butt!"

"But…you didn't save me. Lisa said it was a super-hero—the Secret Stamp," Evan protested, his hand on the doorknob.

Roddy turned quickly to Evan. "You're my only friend here, man, but you can't add two and two to save your life. I am the Secret Stamp!"

Evan's jaw dropped before moving to make words that wouldn't come to him. Roddy suddenly slumped against the wall, having used all the strength he'd built up since the fire. His back squeaked against the wall as he crumpled to the ground.

"Roddy?" Evan asked hesitantly.

He nodded his head weakly. "I…please. Help me."

Finally stopping with the questions, Evan grabbed the gauze Roddy dropped and pressed it to the half-scabbed wound. He then wrapped it in place and, as soon as Roddy felt he could move, lifted him to his bed.

"You really need to get that checked out," Evan said, in an almost scolding tone.

Roddy rolled his eyes weakly. "Yeah, right, Mother."

"Just thank God tomorrow's Saturday," Evan replied. "I don't know how you're going to make it through next week, though." He shut off the light before undressing and crawling into his own bed.

"I heal fast. It's part of the whole super-power package," Roddy explained.

Evan chuckled. "I don't know whether to believe you and become your sidekick or doubt you and tell the headmaster."

"Seriously?"

"Nah. There was always something weird about you. This just explains it," Evan said.

"Well, as long as you're still my friend. I have trouble making 'em, if you couldn't tell. The Stamp, though…he's always stolen my show. It sucks, being at war with your alter-ego, y'know?" Roddy reflected.

"I've never had any experience with that, personally," Evan said. "It's kinda cool, actually, being the only one who knows. Besides, you did kinda save my life back there."

"Well, we're even now," Roddy said. "I don't like leaving debts unpaid."

He saw Evan roll over in his bed. "If you say so. I'm struggling to stay awake right now, though. I think the meds they gave me are…" he yawned, "…kicking in…" He got in one last jibe before drifting off. "But seriously…the hell were…you thinking? Naming yourself…the Secret Stamp?"

Roddy laughed a little before turning his head and closing his eyes. He felt a hundred-eighty degree turn from his earlier train of thought. Somehow, despite the fact that everything went to Hell, he'd come out better because of it.

Yeah, he thought, as his mind rolled into dreamland. This is what this "super-hero" thing is all about…

Two Days Later

Roddy walked down the hall of the old English wing, where the school had temporarily relocated the science classes while the science wing was cleared out and rebuilt. It was after class hours, and Roddy had been forced to come up with an excuse as to why he was going into the school so late.

"Remedial chem. lessons," he explained to Evan as he headed out the door, but that couldn't be further from the truth.

Now, Roddy opened the door to Cartwright's temporary room, poking his head in the door. Cartwright sat at his heavy wooden desk, looking up from the papers he was grading. "Roddy, m'boy, come on in. Have a seat!"

Roddy took a seat in one of the desk chairs in the front row of the class. "So, how've things been going since the big event? Catastrophic, wasn't it?" Cartwright asked.

Shaking his head, Roddy gave a little chuckle. "Let's cut straight to it, Cartwright. You may be a government-trained handler, but you sure as hell don't know how to make things subtle. That 'mishap' was a set-up. I'm willing to bet that wasn't even sodium—or water."

Cartwright took off his reading glasses and fiddled with them in hands that shook slightly from age. "Perceptive, aren't you?"

There was a momentary silence before Roddy spoke again. "What? That's all you have to say about it?"

"We defrosted you, boy, so you do what we tell you to—and even things that we don't. That's the deal. If you don't like it like that, we could always put you back in the freezer—or, if you seem to care so little for the well-being of people around here, we could arrange an accident where that friend of yours—Evan, right? He might some sudden shock to his system, and I doubt his poor heart would be able to take it…"

"No! Stay away from him!" Roddy shouted. "Your problem's with me, not my friend."

"There shouldn't be a problem at all," Cartwright spat.

Roddy sighed. "Sorry. I'll do whatever I need to do. Just stay away from him. He's not part of this."

Cartwright nodded, as if appreciating the speed with which they'd reached the foregone conclusion. "Good. Now, we have other business than that of the past to deal with. You are aware, I take it, that your United States history class is taking a field trip to the Gateway Arch for a deeper look into Jefferson's life and influence blah-blah blah?" Roddy nodded. "Well, you won't be there for that," Cartwright continued.

"What do you mean?"

"Wear your uniform under your school clothes," Cartwright said with finality.

"Wait—why?" Roddy protested.

"You'll need it," Cartwright said simply. He gestured to the door. "Good night, Roddy."

Roddy said nothing as he stepped outside, fuming. It was bad enough that the government he started his career for had put him in a cryogenic freeze, but now they wanted him to run in blind? He swore to God, if he got out of this whole mess, he was getting out of this whole business—as long as it meant he wasn't going back in the Freezer.

***

The day Roddy had dreaded all week arrived with rain clouds and thunderclaps. Students taking U.S. History at the Remington school lined up to get on the buses that would take them to the Gateway Arch, huddling under raincoats and umbrellas.

All the way there, Ms. Prentiss, the history teacher, rambled on and on about the Louisiana Purchase and the Declaration of Independence. Evan's eyes glazed over less than two minutes into the lecture, but Roddy stayed alert during the entire ride. Cartwright had never specified when on the trip another so-called accident would occur.

The buses pulled up to the historical park with screeching brakes and a slight shudder. It figured that the problem would occur here, with the historical significance of the Arch, the fact that it stands out as a national landmark, and the complications that might arise from a situation within such an oddly shaped monument.

Stepping out of the bus, Roddy shielded his eyes against the rain to get a better look at the monument overhead. It was hard to believe that the landmark could support its own weight, let alone that of the spectators that traveled to its peak. He shuddered, imagining himself swaying back and forth in the top level. He quickly pushed the thought from his mind.

No sense in getting queasy now, he thought to himself. The funniest part of the entire deal was that the campaign to get the Arch built didn't even start until 1947, two years after Roddy conveniently disappeared along with the rest of the Hiroshima Cleanup Crew. This marvel in engineering hadn't seen the light of day before Roddy's eyelids had been frozen shut.

"Now, you'll have to pass through security checkpoints," Ms. Prentiss warned, "and anyone who fails to get through will be getting at least two weeks of detention from me, and god knows what else from the school itself. This is your final warning. Your pocketknives, drugs…I don't care that you have them. I don't need to know. I don't want to know. Just don't do anything that would embarrass me or the school, got it?"

Several students nodded, so Ms. Prentiss turned and took the lead as the student body marched toward the Jefferson Expansion Park entrance. They went through the customary metal detectors and the girls were asked to run their purses through the type of scanner typically seen in an airport.

One girl, who looked particularly naïve thanks to her double ponytails and buck teeth, raised her hand. "Excuse me, Mr. Officer? Are we in any danger here from, like, terrorists or something?"

The security officer, a black man in his early forties, just smiled. "Believe me, young lady. We check everyone who comes and goes through here. You are all completely safe." Inwardly, Roddy squirmed at his confidence.

Ms. Prentiss waited for the group to get through the security checkpoint before dividing the class into three different groups, each led by a different school sponsor. Roddy and Evan were both put in the group led by Prentiss herself, which was a guarantee that the tour would be boring and filled with impertinent questions about Jefferson, Sacagawea, and the Louisiana Purchase.

Their guide was a short, pudgy woman with a wrinkled nose. "Thanks for visiting us here at the Jefferson Expansion Memorial Park. I'll be taking you through the entire park today," she began in a drawling tone that made Evan swoon sleepily on his feet. "The first stop for your group is the Arch itself, you lucky kids!" Her false enthusiasm was almost sickening.

The group was too large for a single elevator trip—although the guide took the time to correct the notion. "You're not going up in an elevator," she said. "This is a tram system, base largely on Ferris wheel cages so that you stay upright as you go up the Arch." Evan yawned dangerously, and Roddy had to prod him twice on the way up to the top of the Arch to keep him awake.

At the upper platform, the guide spoke while the group looked around, taking in the views around them. While everyone else was astonished with the sight of the city sprawling out hundreds of feet beneath them, Roddy paid careful attention to the room.

They were the only visitors currently visiting the Arch thanks to the prearranged field trip, but they were not the only ones in the Arch itself. A Hispanic cleaning woman pushed a broom across the floor, and a white-bearded electrician worked on some wiring near the elevator—or rather, tram.

The electrician stepped back from his electrical work before turning to Roddy. His nameplate read U. Sam Abrams. Initials U.S.A.—Uncle Sam Abrams.

Roddy struggled to maintain his cool, but very obviously shuddered at the realization. The electrician noted this before giving Roddy a malicious smile and hurrying down the stairs. He held in his hand a small detonator, complete with its own little red button.

Evan registered what was going on just before Roddy sprinted to the fire alarm and pulled it, lighting up the signs over the stair exits. "Everyone, get the hell out of here!" he shouted, emphasizing Roddy's point. Then Evan, too, scrambled for the staircase. While the class group marched down the stairs on the side they came up, Roddy shed his school uniform for something more yellow before diving down the opposite staircase after the electrician.

Klaxons now blared throughout the Arch and the Memorial Park complex. Evan pushed past several students to where Ms. Prentiss struggled down the stairs in her high heels. "Ms. Prentiss! Someone's gonna blow up the Arch!"

"Evan! Someone just pulled the fire alarm—don't jump to conclusions!" Prentiss sputtered. "Threats like that are felony charges!"

"But—" Evan started. Roddy had told him what Cartwright had implied that night.

"No buts, Evan," Prentiss snapped, just as one of her heels did. Even though he hadn't convinced her, he felt some small triumph at that, despite the fact that it was lost in the chaos around him.

On the other side of the Arch, Roddy took the stairs downward three at a time. The fake electrician didn't have much of a lead on him. He sprinted downward, careful that his feet caught the stairs. He couldn't stop this from happening if he was flat on his face.

Roddy turned and was shocked to see the man standing right there, holding up the detonator. "You know, they told me to try to get away from you if I could, but you know what? I wanted to see the look on your face when I pushed the button."

"If you push it, then I won't have any mercy," Roddy said before kicking himself for using another 1940s line.

U. Sam Abrams laughed at that, shaking his head. "The thing about standoffs is this: they only work if both sides are afraid to pull the damn trigger." Then, he pushed the button on the detonator.

For a second, nothing happened. Roddy looked to see if there was confusion or worry on Abrams' face, but there was only pure, violent glee.

KABOOM!

Roddy was knocked to his knees by the blast as it shook the whole Arch. Before he got up, Abrams was running down the stairs again. Roddy took a few seconds to regain feeling in his right ankle before scrambling after him.

He tackled Abrams from behind, wrapping his arms and legs around the larger man's torso. Abrams wrestled back and forth before snapping his head back onto Roddy's forehead. Roddy loosened his grip as his head flashed white with pain. The electrician shook off the teenage hero and began running again.

There was a much louder cacophony now. The fire alarms still raged, but now there were police and fire sirens in the distance, brought on by screams and tears. They reached the bottom only for Roddy to look up and see just how bad the damage was.

The two legs of the Arch remained intact for the most part, but the adjoining centerpiece that held the platform was now ripped apart. Little held the two legs of the Arch together. Roddy prepared to dive for the electrician when he heard a newfound roar of screams and saw spectators pointing upward. There hung the Hispanic cleaning wmoan for her life, grasping two twisted metal beams with her arms.

The earpiece of Roddy's costume crackled to life for the first time. Roddy heard Cartwright's voice on the other end and seethed with hatred. "Your choice: save the woman, or catch the culprit…"

Roddy couldn't contain his explosive anger. "You bastard! You're just coveringyou're your man!"

"Maybe," Cartwright said, "Or maybe I'm testing your usefulness in the field rather than the Freezer. You get to decide whether I'm telling the truth or not…"

But Roddy had already made his choice. His quadriceps burned as his legs dug into the staircase, ripping upwards at the same speed he'd dashed down.

"You know, people are going to ask how they managed to get that much explosive material past security and onto the Arch," Cartwright reflected in the earpiece. "They'll probably never figure out that it was us."

"Shut up!" Roddy hissed, breathing heavily. His race was against the clock; he could deal with Cartwright later.

"Of course, we'll pass this off as something that it's not. Terrorist attack, I call it. That way, we can keep that buffoon in charge by saying that, had he had his chance to act the way he wanted, this terrorist attack couldn't have happened in a million years," Cartwright said idly. "And, of course, we could use this to cover up what's going on in the Middle East as we speak…"

Roddy wasn't listening anymore. He reached the smoldering platform and heard the cries of the woman. "Dios mio!" she screeched. "Ayudame!"

"I'm coming!" Roddy shouted, dodging holes in the crumbling metal of the platform.

"You know, the Arch has been structurally damaged beyond repair," Cartwright informed him. "The trajectory is leaning towards the statehouse."

Roddy leaned across the twisted metal, reaching for the woman's arm. "Give me you hand…uh, tu mano!" Spanish had been his worst subject at Remington's, and now it was coming back to haunt him.

The woman pleaded with him with her hazel eyes, reaching for him with her right arm. As she did this, her left slipped. Roddy snatched at her right hand, grunting in triumph as he caught her at the wrist.

Triumph turned to horror when her weight shifted as her shoulder dislocated. One second, her hand was there. The next, the crowd was silent, shying away from the landing zone. Very few were optimistic enough to inch forward to help. "NO!" Roddy screamed. He felt like his screamed lasted for full minutes.

Cartwright's laugh was maniacal. "Did you seriously think we expected you to succeed?"

Roddy was beside himself with his failure that the words didn't hit home. "You're the Secret Scapegoat, and a damn good one at that!" Cartwright slammed.

Without the support of a full structure, the Arch swayed dangerously in the wind. Roddy didn't seem to realize this. He knelt there at the edge, somehow in shock. The good guys always win, he kept telling himself. That's how it had always been.

Roddy's world had been turned upside down, but the Arch began to literally tilt, taking Roddy from vertical to eight-five degrees, seventy-five, sixty-five, forty-five, thirty, fifteen…one-hundred and eighty with the ground.

As the Arch crashed to the ground, Roddy offered one last prayer up to a God he wasn't sure existed anymore. Please, please…don't let them take me back to the Freezer when this all is over…and don't let my friends forget me this time around. See you soon…

Amen.

Epilogue

"This is Thom Arthur with BCN Broadcasting, and our headline story tonight comes to you from overseas," said the overly groomed newsman on the television. "Reports have trickled in of an American raid on an Iraqi village, leaving behind only the bodies of forty-two women and children in the proc—"

Thom Arthur grabbed his earpiece with concern. "Please, bear with me for a moment," he said, though it was obvious that whatever he heard disturbed him. "There's been breaking news on a terrorist attack in Missouri. I repeat, there has been a terrorist attack on the Jefferson Expansion Memorial Park. Terrorists reportedly planted bombs on the main platform of the Arch that, after detonation, weakened the structure to the point that the Gateway Arch has fallen. Casualties are estimated in the hundreds. We'll now switch over to Terri Jacoby who is on-scene. Terri?"

***

Evan walked back into his room on a mission of both bargaining and denial. He denied the idea that Roddy was dead and gone, and bargained that, if someone else picked up the mantle of the Stamp, maybe Roddy would somehow be brought back from the dead.

He dug through Roddy's clothes in the closet before coming across the bright, familiar spandex suit. Evan pulled the mask over his face and stared at himself in the mirror.

"Come on back, man," he whispered to Roddy's ghost. "Come on, man…"

***

The Lieutenant and his council met in the back room of god-knows-where once again. This time, however, the projector was off, and the light in the room was on.

Holding out his hands, the Lieutenant wore on his face what must have, for him, qualified as a real smile. "Congratulations, lady and gentlemen. Project: Secret Stamp was an unqualified success."

He then pulled from his bag on the floor a stack of manila folders. He scattered them across the conference table.

"So, who do we defrost next?"

END

Author's Note

First off and foremost, I have never been inside the Gateway Arch in my life. Neither the Park's website nor Wikipedia could give me the information I needed. And no, sorry, Giant-Man did not pick it up for a game of horseshoes with the Washington Monument. But that would have been fun, admittedly.

Second, a huge thanks to Dave Golightly for dusting off Agent Axis and inspiring me to take a look at a Golden Age hero who could use a new coat of paint.

I'd also like to say that, for the record, Roddy Colt and the Secret Stamp identity are real, and not original concepts of my own. I know, none of you have ever heard of this kid, but I think I did him justice.

So I know you're asking yourself why I wrote this issue if I was just going to kill off the main character at the end. The point I had in mind was opening the can of worms involving the Golden Age and introducing a couple of toys that I hope to see in the future, whether in a title of my own (should I ever get the balls to write up a pitch) or in someone else's, should they find these ideas worthy enough for use. The Lieutenant, Cartwright, U.S. Abrams, and the new Secret Stamp were all fun to write, and you know someone's gotta mention the fact that the Gateway Arch is no more.

Oh, one more very, very important thing. This is my first work for Marvel 2000, so let me know what you think. If you liked it, maybe I'll swing back around for more.

Thanks for reading this far,

Hunter Lambright