CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE

Superman, Spider-Man, and Batman re-materialized inside the prison. The first thing they noticed was how different everything felt. The air was thinner, making it harder to breathe. The light was dim and made everything appear hazy. As they each took their first cautious step off of the teleportation platform they noticed that the gravity was uneven, making it hard to balance. It was truly a foreign environment.

The second thing they noticed was how staggeringly big the prison was. There were corridors that branched off in six different directions from where they currently stood. Then they looked up, and saw that there were many floors above them as well. And every single wall was lined with the big, metal security doors of cell after cell after cell. The task they had agreed to take on was seeming more daunting by the moment.

Before they'd had any real chance to react, they were approached by a 6 foot tall green android with a red face. "Greetings, heroes," the android said. He spoke with the same English accent as JARVIS. "I am called the Vision. Mr. Stark informed me of your pending arrival. How may I be of service?"

Superman and Spider-Man looked at each other. Superman gave a slight nod, then put his hand on his friend's shoulder for a moment. Then, without another word, he lifted up off the ground and took off toward the ceiling far above their heads.

"That man just flew," Batman observed, a bit taken aback.

"Yeah, you never really get used to seeing that," Spider-Man replied. Then he turned to the Vision. "You may be of service, Mr. Vision, by making sure we don't get completely lost in here. We need to get these cells open A.S.A.P." He held up the card key that Stark had given him.

"Very well, sir," the Vision said. He gestured to the corridor immediately to their right. "Might I suggest you start with this row. You will find many of your allies from the Justice League. Releasing them first may give you an advantage over any inmates who may prove... difficult to control."

"Great idea," Spider-Man agreed. "I guess I'll start over here then. What about you, Batm-?" But when Spider-Man turned to address Batman, he was already gone. "Oookay, not one to wait for directions, I guess. I sure hope he can find his way back here when the maze reconfigures itself."

"The next reconfig is in 11 minutes, 37 seconds," the Vision declared.

"In that case, let's get moving," Spider-Man said, and he headed for the first row of cells.

High above Spider-Man's head, Superman had ascended to the prison's ceiling. He was feeling lightheaded, and was unsure whether it was from the thinner air in the prison, the beatings he'd been through, or a combination of both. He knew what he was about to attempt was nearly impossible. He also knew that if he failed, millions of people would die. Failure was not an option today.

He carefully placed the palms of his hands against the ceiling. He closed his eyes and gritted his teeth. And he pushed.

Back at The Ferry, it was all Iron Man, Green Arrow, Wonder Woman, and J'onn J'onzz could do but wait and stare at the teleportation pad, waiting for someone to come through. Iron Man had reversed the polarity of the teleportation unit now. Rather than the red rays that had blasted the other three heroes into the prison, the pad now had a constant blue beam emanating from it. The door was essentially open for anyone to come back through.

Iron Man was quietly mumbling something, and occasionally waving his hands in the air. Green Arrow raised an eyebrow.

"Talking to yourself, Stark?"

"Sorry," Iron Man replied. "It's been awhile since I had to do advanced calculus in my head. I'm trying to keep the prison as stable as I can, as long as I can. I'm having to adjust the stasis field almost constantly at this point."

"Can I ask you a question?" Green Arrow asked.

"Shoot," Iron Man replied.

"How could such smart guys like you and Reed Richards possibly think it was okay to build a prison that could potentially explode and wipe out an entire state?"

Iron Man did not seem pleased by the question. "Hey, look," he said. "Nuclear power plants are dangerous too, but they serve a purpose. The benefit outweighs the potential risk. You get the right guys doing the math, you don't have a meltdown."

"So, what happened in this case?" Green Arrow asked. "Didn't have the right guys doing the math?"

Iron Man's faceplate slid up revealing Tony's glaringly angry face. "We did the math. We checked each other's work. We were right," he insisted. "There was a variable somewhere that we didn't count on. Something we couldn't have foreseen." He stewed for a moment. "And it really pisses me off that I still don't know what it was," he added.

"Really?" Green Arrow was surprised.

"Well, not for certain, anyway," Stark said. "There's another gravitational pull from somewhere inside the Negative Zone. That's the only logical explanation I can come up with. But exactly what's causing it, I don't know. Not yet, anyway."

Green Arrow nodded. He seemed satisfied with this answer, at least for the moment. "Can I ask one more question?"

"Sure," Stark said.

He nodded at Tony's armor.

"I thought you said your 'cowboy days' were over?" Green Arrow said with a smirk.

Stark chuckled. "Yippee-ki-yay, Mr. Queen," he said with a wink. With that, his faceplate slid shut again.

Back inside the prison, Spider-Man stood in front of the first cell. He had been expecting to find traditional jail cells, with the metal bars and all that. Instead each cell was marked simply by a large metal door. There was no window to see inside the cell, and no name or indication posted anywhere as to who the occupant might be.

Spider-Man pressed the card key against a proximity reader just to the right of the door. There was a loud buzzing sound as the card was confirmed. The cell door clicked open. Spider-Man pushed the door all the way open. When he saw who was inside, he felt ashamed.

"Look," he said. "I know what you must think, Cap. But I swear to you. I did not betray the League. The Spider-Man who led the assault on the fortress, that wasn't me."

Steve Rogers, better known as Captain America, stepped confidently out of the cell. "It's okay, son," he said reassuringly. "Now isn't the time for explanations."

"What is it time for?" Spider-Man asked.

Cap smiled. "It's time to assemble the team."

Elsewhere in the prison, Batman approached a cell as well. He unclipped the small hand-held device from his utility belt and pressed it up against the prox reader beside one of the cells. There was a loud buzz as the reader accepted the mimicked the credentials of the keycard. The door opened and Batman stepped inside.

Doctor Otto Octavius was strung up in the middle of the cell. Each one of the four metal tentacles that protruded from his body was stretched out and locked into a magnetic restraint in a different corner of the room, effectively suspending Octavius in the center of the room. The doctor looked up in surprise at Batman.

"Am I dead?" Otto asked.

"No," Batman replied.

"Are you sure?" he asked. "I feel like I remember drowning." Octavius started rambling about something having to do with a tritium reaction, and sacrificing himself to stop it. He was not sure how much his memory could be trusted though, he explained. The inhibitor chip at the base of his skull had been destroyed when the arms were fused to his body, and his brain had been jumbled ever since. He was not totally sure how accurate his memory of the events of his past really were, and as such was not really making an attempt to reconcile them with where he currently found himself.

Batman was not really listening to Octavius's story. Instead, he was quickly going around to each corner of the room and disabling the magnetic restraint, freeing each one of Dr. Octopus's tentacles. In less than a minute the doctor was free.

He was a little unsteady on his feet, and Batman had to help the doctor to the door. Batman pointed back down the corridor. "Go!" he commanded. Dr. Octopus did not wait for further explanation as he began moving quickly in the direction Batman had indicated, using his metal arms to steady himself.

High above the rest, Superman continued to push on the ceiling, only to find... nothing was happening. The prison was not lifting up off the ground as he had expected. He stopped for a moment, relaxed his muscles, and took a deep breath.

"Dad," he whispered in a gentle prayer to his late father, Jonathan Kent. "I know you can hear me. I know you're always around me. I can feel you nearby every day." He exhaled slowly through his nose. "I need your help, Dad," he whispered. "I can't do this by myself. You taught me how to be Superman. I need a little help being super right now."

He clenched his teeth and braced his hands firmly against the ceiling once again. And he pushed harder. There was a creak, and a groan that seemed to come from the prison itself that echoed throughout the whole building. The prison shook, as if there were a very small earthquake just barely rattling the ground.

The prison still did not lift up off the ground.

Spider-Man pressed the card key up against the next prox reader. The door opened. What he saw in this cell was absolutely heartbreaking. Bart Allen, formerly the fastest man alive, a young man who could criss-cross the globe in an impulsive flash of speed, was confined to a wheelchair.

Spider-Man went to Bart and knelt down beside him. He took the young man's hand. "I'm so sorry for what happened to you," Spider-Man managed to choke out. There were tears stinging his eyes beneath his mask. "We'll find a way to fix this," he said. "The League has connections to some of the most powerful, most incredible people in the world... someone has to be able to..." He trailed off as he began to cry.

Bart barely reacted. He was not mad at Spider-Man. He was not much of anything right now. He was as he had been since the moment Bane paralyzed him: in a state somewhere between shock and depression. Without the ability to run, he was no longer the Flash. Without the Flash, he was nothing.

Spider-Man had to remind himself that the clock was ticking. He got up and carefully pushed Bart's wheelchair out of the cell and into the hallway where Captain America was waiting.

"Cap," Spider-Man said, clearing his throat and blinking away the tears beneath his mask. "I need you to get Bart through the teleporter. Maybe there's something that Tony Stark can..." He trailed off again, this time because of who he saw at the end of the hallway.

Dr. Octopus and Spider-Man caught each other's eye.

Something boiled up inside of Dr. Octopus. Another step or two and he would have reached the teleporter pad and been whisked back to The Ferry. But there he was. That accursed wall-crawler who had foiled his plans. Perhaps Ock could not clearly remember their history, but he did know one thing. He hated Spider-Man. And now was his chance for revenge.

"Spider-Man!" Dr. Octopus bellowed. He lashed out with all four of his monstrous metal tentacles. They shot down the hall, extending out from Otto's back. They grabbed Spider-Man in their powerful grip and yanked him back down the corridor, dragging him across the floor.

Captain America sprang into action, charging at Dr. Octopus. One of the tentacles released its grip on Spider-Man and swung at Cap, but Cap jumped right over it with the expert timing of a runner leaping over a hurdle. The tentacle swung back at Cap a second time, but he jumped on top of it and "rode" the tentacle straight to Dr. Octopus. He threw his arm around Ock's neck and grabbed him in a tight choke-hold.

Dr. Octopus's tentacles savagely smashed Spider-Man's head against the wall over and over again, even as their master grappled with Captain America. Cap squeezed tighter, cutting off the doctor's air supply. Dr. Octopus slapped and swatted at Cap with his own two arms as his tentacles flailed wildly. Captain America punched Dr. Octopus square in the face, knocking him unconscious.

But even as the doctor's body went limp, his tentacles still continued to do their master's bidding of their own mechanical will. Spider-Man was being held upside-down by one foot and swung back and forth. Captain America looked up just in time to see one tentacle heading straight for him. He ducked, but the tentacle looped around and snared him around the waist and pulled him away from Octavius's body.

Bart Allen watched the horrific scene playing out in front of him. The tentacles were ignoring him completely, obviously not considering a kid in a wheelchair to be any threat. What could he possibly do? He couldn't even stand up.

Then he spotted something. On the floor was the card key Spider-Man had used to open the cells. He must have dropped it when the tentacles yanked him down the hallway like that.

Bart wheeled his way over to the key card. He leaned way over, struggling and stretching to try to reach it. After a few awkward moments where he felt like he was nearly going to tip over in his chair, he managed to snag the card with the tips of his fingers.

Bart opened the closest cell that he could get to and silently hoped and prayed that it would be someone who could help. As the door buzzed and swung open, he found his prayers answered.

Piotr Rasputin stepped out of the magnetized cell. Now free from the limitations that the magnetic walls placed on his ability to use his mutant power, he smiled and gave a polite nod to Bart as his entire body began to "metal up."

In a matter of moments, the X-Man known as Colossus had torn Dr. Octopus's metal arms apart, ripping out their circuitry and rendering them absolutely useless.

Spider-Man lay on the ground, gasping for air and staring at the unconscious Dr. Octopus.

"Dude," Spider-Man said, leaning his head back against the wall. He looked out at the seemingly unending rows of locked cells that still remained. "They better not all be like this!"