HEARTS OF STEEL
by Gunman
Disclaimer: I do not own Colossus, The X-Men, Spaced Invaders (1990), or their characters.
Summary: Peter gets a new job in the not-so-normal town of Big Bean, Illinois, where he meets the female sheriff and her unusual friends and allies.
Inspired by 'Caught In The Web' by FrivolousThoughts, and 'Everyone Loves Spidey' by Maximus-Reborn.
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Chapter 10
Kathy Hoxley
Piotr 'Peter' Rasputin stepped off the bus and headed over to the Co-Op headquarters. Tall, athletic and with a build that suggested he either worked out or had previously lived on a farm, Peter walked over to the reception desk to start his new life.
"Hello?" he asked the woman behind the counter.
"Yes? Can I help you?" the middle-aged woman replied.
"Yes, I'm here about the job ad." he said as he handed the newspaper he had been carrying to the woman.
The woman behind the counter looked at the ad and nodded.
"Oh, yes. At Old Man Wrenchmuller's Farm. But... he passed away over 10 years ago." the woman said.
"What? But the ad is from this weeks paper." Peter replied.
"Yeah, the county took over the property after he died. Sam Hoxley now manages the farm for the Co-Op. They should have reprinted this a long time ago. His daughter can take you to him." she said as she picked up the phone and dialed the number.
Peter took a seat and waited while the woman came to the office.
A few minutes later, a blond-haired woman in a sheriff's uniform entered the Co-Op office.
"Sheriff. Thanks for coming over." the woman said.
"Not a problem. So where is this guy?" the female sheriff asked.
"Right over there." the woman said to her.
The sheriff looked over and stared at the handsome young man sitting on the bench.
Peter was a little surprised when he saw the woman, wondering why the sheriff was here. She had long blond hair, an athletic figure, blue-gray eyes, and a nice smile.
"Are you the guy who answered the ad for the farm-hand job?" she asked.
"Yes. I'm Peter. Peter Rasputin." he said to her.
"Kathy Hoxley, Sheriff of Big Bean." she said, holding out her hand.
Peter shook it.
"I came here looking for work." he said to her.
"Well, good. We need good workers nowadays." she said.
Peter stood up, towering over the woman.
"Oooh. Tall, aren't you?" she asked looking up at him.
"Compared to some people." he smirked.
"Come on, I'll take you to the Wrenchmuller Farm." she said.
"Thank you."
While the pair were driving out to the farm, they got to talking.
"So, your father was the sheriff before you took over?" he asked
"Yeah. I was only a kid when we moved out here from Chicago. That first year, though, was... pretty interesting." she said.
"Oh? What happened?"
"Uh, a group of out-of-towners came here around Halloween and caused a few, accidental, problems. They got the whole town shooting at them for it." she said.
"Wow. What did they do to get the whole town mad at them?"
"Oh, not much. Just... blew up a few things."
"Really?"
"Oh, yeah. But, fortunately we were able to correct the problem and get them out of town before anyone died." she said.
The pair arrive at the Wrenchmuller farm, where they see a gigantic machine spraying water over the fields.
"What is that? And who's driving it?" Peter asked.
"That's Vern Pillsbury. He invented that Farmzoid to help irrigate the farms around here."
"He built that thing?"
"Yeah. In less than a day. Or so I'm told."
"What? How is that even possible?" he asked.
"You wouldn't believe me if I told you."
Just then an older man in dirty overalls and a plaid shirt came over to them.
"Kathy." the man said, greeting them.
"Hi, dad." Kathy said, giving the man a hug. "This is Peter. He's here about the ad for the farm hand job." she said to him.
"Oh, good. Do you have experience working on a farm?" Sam Hoxley asked Peter.
"I was raised on my family farm in the former Soviet Union before coming to America." Peter said.
Sam Hoxley looked the man up and down.
"Well, you look like you're in good shape. Vern's just about finished irrigating the field. So we can start whenever you want." Sam said.
"Sounds good." Peter said.
However, when Peter saw what the farm was actually growing, he actually felt more at home than he should have.
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Meanwhile, high above the planet, an alien craft was heading directly to the growing farming town.
The reason for it's coming specifically to Big Bean, Illinois was simple: it was being drawn to anything that had a Martian presence on it. And Big Bean had a Martian presence placed upon it, over 25 years ago. During Halloween of 1990.
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Down in Big Bean, Illinois, Peter was making great progress with helping to grow the crops. Which he learned were six-foot tall Bean Pods, for which the town was named.
Sam Hoxley was actually impressed that Peter could lift one of the pods by himself. Even if it was only one at a time. And Peter's arrival was just in time. Harvest time for the crops was now and they were short-staffed, even if the impressive crops they were harvesting drew in a lot of attention.
"Good work, Pete. Even when I was younger I couldn't do that." Sam said as he was getting Peter's paperwork in order.
Aside from Vern and Sam, there were only two other workers there, just about everyone else in the town were tending to their own fields and farms. Which made Peter's presence a welcome one.
"How did you get such huge bean pods to grow here?" Peter asked as he helped load the trucks.
"Oh, that's a funny story." Sam said as he rechecked his paper work again. "A group of out-of-towners accidentally poured an unknown chemical mixture onto Mr Wrenchmuller's field. Surprisingly, it made the soil incredibly fertile and nutrient rich. Since then we've been able to grow these really huge bean pods. They've made the town pretty famous. We've been getting orders for them for years. Amazingly, the soil hasn't stopped being so fertile since..."
BOOM!
The group looked up as the loud explosion over their heads.
"What was that?" Sam asked.
"Up there. It looks like... a meteor?" Peter asked.
"Maybe." Sam gasped. "It looks like it's heading towards the Smith farm."
"Should we... investigate?" Peter wondered.
"My daughter will look into it, but... yeah, we probably should go to help out." Sam said.
"I Will Assist You!" a voice behind them said.
Peter and Sam looked back to see Vern, dressed in a black farmers/mechanics outfit, wearing black goggles and a dew rag on his head. He was putting his hands on his hips in a dramatic pose.
"Uh, thanks Vern." Sam said.
The trio quickly loaded up into the truck, leaving the other two farm hands to watch the crops, and headed towards the crash site.
The craft crash landed in the Smith field, which had originally been a corn field.
Sheriff Hoxley was already there.
"Well, this doesn't look suspicious." Kathy said as her deputy, Brian Hampton, were examining the crash site.
Brian was an African-American man with an athletic build, but was no taller than Kathy herself.
"What is it?" Brian asked.
"I don't know. But it doesn't look like a meteor." Kathy said.
"At least it's not moving." Brian said.
"Don't say stuff like that, Brian!" Kathy said sharply.
"Why not?" he asked.
Suddenly, a truck pulled up to the site.
"Dad? What are you doing here?" Kathy asked as the trio came over to the hole.
"We saw something crash land in the field and we thought we could help." Sam said.
"How could you help with this? We don't even know what it is." Kathy said.
The group suddenly heard the sound of metal clanking and moving parts coming from the crater.
Suddenly a giant robot-like creature stepped out of the hole it had made. It looked like a giant, black-colored, metallic Scarab Beetle with huge razor-clawed pincers.
"What is that?" Sam asked as the group stepped back.
"It's a Andronian Battle Insectoid!" Vern gasped.
The group looked at him in confusion.
"How do you know that?" Brian asked.
"It's part of my programming." Vern said.
"Programming?" Peter asked.
"Long story." Sam said.
"I was transformed from a human into an android slave by Captain Bipto of the Martian Army. I served my purpose and was granted my freedom. I am far more than I was, so many years ago." Vern explained.
Peter looked at Sam and his daughter, who gestured to the large Russian to not ask any further about it.
The Andronian Battle Insectoid attacked them.
Kathy and Brian pulled their guns and fired at the robot.
"Go for the antenna! That's its vulnerable spot!" Brian shouted.
"No! Go for the internal processor between it's mandibles!" Kathy shouted.
"We have to remove the access panel underneath it to get at it's control circuits!" Vern shouted.
"I'll stall it." Peter said.
"You? What can you do?" Sam asked.
Peter suddenly shifted into his metal-form right in front of Sam.
"What the..." Sam gasped.
"I'll explain this later. And call me Colossus." Peter said to his boss.
Colossus rushed towards the giant beetle robot, grabbing it's large pincers and stopping the robot from getting to the group. The robot shrieked and then pushed against the steel-skinned mutant, pushing him backwards as his feet tore up the ground.
"What the..." Brian gasped.
"We must remove the access panel underneath it's body in order to shut it down completely." Vern said.
"Right. Colossus! Get that thing on it's back!" Sam shouted.
"Colossus?" Kathy asked.
"I'll explain later." her father said.
Colossus grunted as he twisted the metal pincers around and slammed the giant robot on it's back.
"Wow. Impressive." Brian gasped.
Vern jumped up on the belly of the robot as Colossus tried to hold it down and keep it from moving. Vern ripped the access panel off the robot even as it twitched enough to throw him off. Vern jumped back to his feet and grabbed the other side of the large robot to keep it steady.
Kathy and Brian were on the robots belly in an instant, as Sam tossed them a hammer and a crowbar.
"Use these!" Sam shouted.
"Right!" Kathy shouted as she and Brain caught the tools and started mashing the exposed circuits.
The robot screeched as it violently shook the group off.
Brian landed hard on the ground as he looked over and saw a circular piece of metal lying next to him. He gripped the circular piece of metal and hurled it at the robot, striking it's leg and knocking it off balance. It crashed headfirst into the ground.
"Never mess with a Frisbee champion!" Brain said with a smile.
The robot struggled to get back onto its feet, then lunged towards Kathy.
"KATHY!" Sam shouted.
Colossus quickly jumped towards the large robot, gripping it around its head with his bare metallic hands before picking it up and arching backwards, and slamming the robot, head-first, into the ground.
The robot stopped moving,
"Wow." Brian said.
"That was impressive." Vern said.
"Really was." Sam said.
"You saved my life." Kathy said to Colossus as he shifted back into his human form.
"You're welcome." Peter said.
"But how did you... where did you get these powers?" Kathy asked.
"I was born with them." he said. "And where did you learn to fight alien robots?"
"That's a long story too." Kathy said with a smile.
"Hope this doesn't cause you to quit any time soon." Sam said to Peter.
"Oh, I think I'll be right at home here." Peter said with a smile.
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Authors Notes:
Some people might think it strange to add Kathy Hoxley to this kind of thing, but I did say that these were my choices. And 'Spaced Invaders' was one of my favorite movies when I was younger.
Kathy was 10 years old when the Martians came to Big Bean, Illinois in 1990. Now 35 years old, she is the Sheriff of Big Bean after her father.
There isn't too much interaction between Kathy and Peter, but this is mostly a meet-and-greet chapter.
And as I said, 'Spaced Invaders' was one of my favorite movies, so I wanted to write up a chapter or something for that movie. Also, writing up this chapter is another of my 'I want to write up another story no one has written before' attempts.