Fantastic 5 | The Storm is Rising | Where's June and Reed?

Sue sprinted into the Baxter apartment and immediately noticed the same thing as June had - the machine had been used again. Before she left earlier, she had already put Reed into bed after the messed up experiment he insisted he'd try on himself … without re-checking the systems for miscalculations.

But right now, she had a terrible feeling that was bad and good - one of them was confirmed when she saw Ben laying across fallen shelving units, over to the side of the room. The place was a mess, with broken furniture and machinery everywhere around the room – a fight had definitely broken out. Sue just didn't know by whom, but knew that Ben was involved somehow.

"Ben!" She yelled as soon as she saw him, rushing over to make sure he was okay. The full force of his new appearance hasn't fully come to her yet - her mind was still running way too fast to fully comprehend the notion.

As soon as Sue reached him, she bent down to take a pulse through the side of his neck – breathing a sigh of relief, she found it still beating strong. She smiled slightly when her brain caught up to the fact that the old Ben way laying there in front of her.

The machine was still spouting out a mist from inside, but less than before. She didn't know how this really happened, especially when it hadn't worked for Reed beforehand – but why did that have to matter right now? Ben was back to his normal self again!

"Sue?!" Johnny's familiar voice called out from the elevator, the one she had just gotten off. She felt a breeze flow through her hair, it was like a cold and windy draft. She didn't realize that there was a gaping hole in the glass window behind her.

"Johnny!" She beamed, still excited to see that Ben was back to Ben again - watching her brother cross the threshold, "The machine worked!" Forgetting about their earlier fight for the moment too.

Johnny started to jog over to her when he heard the tone of her voice - his facial features shifted between confused and surprised. His head turning side to side when he noted how destroyed the room looked, wondering what the hell happened. "Give me a hand - come on!"

Johnny picked up his speed, now heading over to his sister - he couldn't help but feel a sense of foreboding as he crossed into the room … it almost felt like he was missing something. His gut churned uncomfortably, he didn't exactly know why though. As he arrived next to Ben and his sister, he grabbed one of the big guy's arms while his sister held onto the other. They pulled him up from the wreckage but received a groan of pain in return.

Ben was starting to wake up.

Ben felt stiff as he drowsily woke up, his back was soaring with pain after having been thrown like a rag doll across the room. His face could still feel the indent of Victor's fist. He couldn't remember anything - only of what had happened when his body shifted back into his human body. "Put him on the step." He vaguely heard Johnny say, his body being moved into a sitting position. Pressure was painfully being pierced into his back from the step behind.

"So, what happened Benny?" Johnny questioned with a tease, his mind trying to get away from the mess of the room and the uncertainty his insides were feeling. "I leave you for five minutes-" He patted his hand on Ben's shoulder to make sure the man stayed up right.

Ben blinked when his mind started to fully work again – his body becoming more active towards his surroundings and the previous events. "June-" He croaked suddenly as the memory of what happened flooded back to him like a wave. His head twisting to every possible direction as he tried to find her, even in the midst of all the rubble. Any air in his body seemed to leave his system within seconds when he couldn't see her, even at the place Victor made her slam into a wall from.

"Where is she?" He continued, horror rising up from his stomach, temporarily forgetting about his own injuries. He remembered her flying across the room after being electrocuted by Victor; her chest ceasing in movement and the flares of blue lightning that flowed through her body with a bold glare. His heart thumped against his chest, salty liquid on the break of exploding from his eyes – praying to whatever God that was out there that she was still alive.

Sue's stomach dropped, "What do you mean?" Looking up at her brother, he stared at Ben's horrified features – his own skin paling several tones, finally seeming to realise where this bad feeling was coming from. Something had happened to his other half – something his heart unintentionally froze on.

"The machine," Ben started, trying to get his head more into gear, he couldn't see June anywhere - even as Sue and Johnny looked around too – June was gone. "Vic used it on himself … he was infected by the cloud like us." How did he not see it before? He should have noticed something when Victor showed up at the Café – Victor Von Doom never did anything for someone else … not if he had a personal gain. He should have known that before agreeing to anything.

He never should have agreed to go in that machine … at all! He knew that now - but now everything's screwed up beyond compare.

"Then where's June?" Johnny snapped, his fists clenching. His heart felt like exploding with worry, her pain filled eyes flashing through his own as a part of his mind started to imagine what could have happened to her.

What could have happened to take her away from him?

The big guy shook his head, a hand wiping over his face so hard that his nails scraped against the skin, "I-I don't know, the last thing I remember is her flying across the room – there was electricity flowing through her … s-she-" Unable to continue - even he knew that when someone was electrocuted that bad – the person would most likely dead or have had an early heart attack. Her chest was barley rising for what he could remember … that couldn't mean…?

Both Storm siblings looked sick with unwanted grief; June had to still be alive – where would her body be then if she were in fact dead? The dead can't move!

Sue suddenly remember Reed, "Wait, where's Reed?" He must be here somewhere! Reed would never have let anything happen to his sister.

Ben looked distraught, "Vic must have taken him-" It the only explanation that came to mind, "He must have June too because she would be here otherwise." He looked up as he spoke, his blurred vision catching the large hole in one of the big windows. He could feel the draft from here now that he thought about it…

…

Sue and Johnny climbed through the large hole in the window – Johnny was hoping to find June out there but he saw no one at all, just thousands of glass shards littering the ground. He couldn't take knowing that she might be dead … he wouldn't be able to take it knowing that she's dead either.

In union, they looked up at the hole from the outside and realised that Reed must have been thrown through it. The hole was big enough for someone as big as Reed to fly through. Each of them were growing in hate towards Victor; Johnny more so from the moment he found out that the bastard hurt his Junie.

…

Several blocks away from the Baxter Building; the water beneath the City bridge held something that would devastate the family of the Fantastic Five. On the seabed; a body laid upon it. Fishes and debris swam around the body, the female's hair flowing with the current as her eyes remained closed. The body drifted a little at the force of the flow; her skin was pale and white, cold and lifeless like a dead being would be.

And that body; belonged to June Richards…

CLIMAX! Oh, I am so mean. lol

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