Tales From the Marvel Universe Neo
Issue 25
"The Verdict"
Even considering how important his job was, the silver surfer was a pretty demanding person. He and Peter flew to three other countries over the course of that night; the United Kingdom, France and Switzerland. In each of those nations, the most common mentalities of its citizens seemed to differ. The UK, for instance, seemed to suffer from rare, but strong prejudices against some of the more pacifistic religions, while the French had a surface-level respect for morality and ethics, and even for religion, but very little for outsiders. Switzerland, by contrast, was relatively peaceful, though very set in its ways. In every nation, the surfer translated the words of its inhabitants, having apparently mastered their languages beforehand, and asked Peter questions about the less-forgivable conduct that he observed. Every so often, Peter would be able to offer some clarification about something they saw or overheard, but for the most part, things were just as bad as they looked.
Touring those three nations took about six hours by board, and at the end of that time, Peter knew that he wouldn't be home in time to keep his aunt from worrying, so he politely asked the surfer if he could make another call. The surfer looked distracted and uninterested, but agreed to it, returning Peter to New York in what seemed like the blink of an eye.
Peter's call was picked up by the answering machine at his house. Aunt May shouldn't worry because Peter was on another brief trip, but he'd be back by Monday morning. Yes. He'd make sure not to overexert himself.
With that explanation, Peter hung up the pay phone he'd been using, having left his cell phone at home, and thought about making another brief call to Widow. However, that might have been too much to hope for. Peter was lucky that the surfer hadn't noticed the first call he'd made to her, if he could really read electronic transmissions as easily as he'd said.
After hanging up the phone, Peter Parker accompanied the surfer on a tour of Russia and China. The first was full of such desperation and need that very few philosophies or opinions circulated en masse among the public, while the second was filled with suffering and repressed hatred of its dictator. The surfer's expression grew sour as he visited those countries, but after that, Peter noticed that he was starting to get hungry.
Once again, Peter's request to the surfer was met with some disappointment, but he eventually acquiesced, returning Peter to a small-scale pizza joint in Midwestern America. He even waited patiently as Peter finished eating and eventually met up with him again. From there, the two proceeded to spend the next six hours visiting Canada, Mexico and Spain. The surfer expressed deep sadness over one holy man who'd been arrested for preaching what he believed in in Canada. His family and friends were still talking about it, even after months, and that was, Peter had to admit, somewhat understandable. Other, similar occurrences seemed to dominate the surfer's thoughts as he recognized them for what they were; oppression.
In Mexico, there was much suffering and abuse of power by the mighty. People lived in fear of death, but it was also the first nation they'd visited where Peter saw the surfer smile. The familial mentality and devotion among many members of its population was something, the surfer claimed, that could continue on into the next generation.
Again and again, Peter and the surfer traveled across the world to different nations and different social climates. Some areas of the world had less-powerful collections of nations that all shared a similar average mentality, and the surfer made sure to visit those as well. At last, almost two days after he'd first arrived, the silver surfer returned to New York, looking despondent and scared. Peter had never seen him quite like that before.
The silver surfer eventually deposited Peter outside of his house, and for a moment, didn't seem sure what to say. When he finally spoke up, it was with one last look of hope on his face.
"Peter Parker, I fear you've done a great deal of harm to your people by maintaining this silence. Too often in all this time, you've insisted that you can't explain the behavior of mankind. I give you one final chance to do so before I make my decision."
Peter almost shuddered when he heard those words. If the surfer was really all that he claimed to be, an explanation like that could spell disaster and doom for the human race. However, Peter had to say something.
"I was afraid that you might not like what I had to say." Peter admitted.
"No explanation could be worse than this silence." the surfer replied, "Tell me the truth."
For a moment, Peter hesitated, but although his explanation might have been seen as incriminating, he knew he had to give it anyway. He doubted very much that anything would make the surfer any sadder.
"The truth is, people have flaws." Peter admitted, "They have weaknesses, and they can be easy to fool into thinking their way's the right one, but not everybody's like that. There are lots of people in the world that are humble enough to recognize that serving themselves isn't enough, or else wise enough to realize that worshiping themselves won't make them happy. Maybe those people aren't common enough to make much of a difference in society, but they do exist, and if any of them are lost because of what others did wrong, that's tragic."
For a moment, the surfer seemed to consider Peter's words, and his expression of grief started to deepen a little as he did so.
"There's wisdom in what you've just said, Peter Parker. In a sense, you're quite correct. It's definitely a tragedy when a good soul is lost from this universe, no matter what other factors come into play. However, there are worse things."
"Worse things?" Peter asked, fear growing within him all at once, "You're not seriously considering...?"
"Worse things, such as the loss of a dozen star systems, each with deserving, intelligent life." the surfer said, "You can't know the horror of witnessing that. It's beyond description. Furthermore, when a good soul is placed among wicked ones, inevitably they suffer and grow discouraged, year after year. If your problems consisted of only a few bad souls, I wouldn't react so strongly, but whole sections of your world seem dominated by wicked, selfish, and cruel mentalities, which are then preached to the young, so that the suffering and impurity can continue in the following generation. You know that you can do nothing to prevent that from happening."
It was just what Peter had been afraid would happen. The surfer was reacting to what he'd seen from a perspective that viewed end results as all that mattered, much like Doctor Doom, and he wasn't done talking.
"To weigh the worth of one race of beings against a hundred potential star systems that also need my help would have been a difficult enough decision." the surfer said miserably, "but at this point, that's no longer the issue. I genuinely find myself wondering if I would be doing the human race any kind of favor to spare it from extinction. The good people that you spoke so wisely on behalf of... Do you think they share your idea of mercy? Do they plead for their lives to continue? From what I've seen, the only people who request a longer life are people who are aging, ailing, starving, oppressed, or about to be executed. When humans are freed from concern about their immediate, animal needs, they become just as obsessed with attempting to impose their own kind of lifestyle on the entire community to which they belong, whether it's truly best for the whole community or not. Then, they start to suffer the results of such belligerence, and pine for more peaceful times. In truth, humanity is divided. Your people don't know what they want."
"It takes time to figure things like that out." Peter objected, but the surfer just shook his head.
"Listen to this." the surfer said, holding up one hand for silence, and in just a moment, a new voice emerged, speaking aloud, seemingly from all around the two of them.
"Is that really how you feel?" a female voice asked.
"It's the only way I can feel." an older, male voice replied, "What happened to Sophia's enough to back me up in this. Even if she'd been injured or killed, it wouldn't have upset me like this. All this time, I tried to help her learn what it means to be a responsible adult, and now... Now she's lost her honor, and she doesn't even care. No one does anymore, except me."
"I wish I could say something to make you feel better," the woman said, "but people just don't see the family concept as being important anymore."
"Then they're fools. Family is one of the most important things in life."
There was a pause of several seconds before the man spoke again.
"At this point, even if she wanted to recover from this, I don't see how she could. Not without meeting Jeffrey again and convincing him to atone for what he did. She's dishonored herself, and she's dishonored her child, and me too. She's brought dishonor on her whole family. I don't see how this kind of thing could ever be fixed. It kills me inside, Samantha. It tears me apart to think of what Sophia did, and the kind of thoughts that went through her head before she did it, and since then. We used to be such a good family. We loved and respected each other. Now all that's destroyed, and there's nothing I can do to fix it, and the worst part is that the same thing happens to girls her age all over the country."
"Is there anything I can do to help?" Samantha asked, attempting sympathy.
"Not unless you can change the past." the man said miserably, "But I'll tell you something, Samantha. If I'd known how this was all going to turn out, I would rather have destroyed the whole world than let this happen to my daughter."
Peter was horrified by those words, but he was even more horrified of what the surfer was trying to say.
"Sometimes..." Peter tried to explain, not sure how to explain it best for a moment, "Sometimes, when bad things happen, people say things they don't really mean..."
"Comments like that one are not unique." the surfer replied, "I chose it as merely the best example. That man valued his family. He treated them with love and respect, and a member of that family betrayed his trust, because your society taught her that her father's ways were intolerable and old-fashioned. These words were spoken in Tennessee, but the desire for any kind of global change, and even the craving for the end of the world can be found in any state in any nation. Some are motivated by religious reasons, desiring a supernatural reward. Others genuinely believe that mankind will do less damage if it is destroyed now. These kinds of extreme reactions are not absurdly numerous, but there are enough of them that my own thoughts strayed, for a moment, to that same question; would the human species be better off dead?"
"Would any species?" Peter asked, frustrated, "Come on! That's ridiculous!"
"Of course it is." the surfer replied, looking somewhat frustrated himself, "Yet, many of your own people seem to have answered that question incorrectly. That isn't something I can just ignore. The very fact that I bothered to ask myself that question troubles me, however. The question has such an obvious answer when I pause for a moment to apply logic to it. Your people's argument must have simply been very eloquent to be able to give me pause like that. I have seen existence in a twisted light for just a moment, and only the greatest horrors have ever been able to make me do that. You know that for horror to exist, two things are needed; a fiend to cause tragedy, and an innocent victim. This world has both in abundance, and it shows no sign that things will get any better. The things that I have seen and heard..."
"You can't let it happen, Emissary." Peter objected, "You can't let Galan destroy this whole world."
"I'm sorry," the surfer said sadly, "but I have no possession that is mightier than Galan's trust. If I lose that, I lose everything. That trust could mean the salvation of a hundred thousand inhabited systems if I choose not to discard it trying to save the planet Earth. I can't; I won't take that risk."
"So what are we supposed to do?" Peter demanded to know, "Just sit around and let him tear the whole planet apart?"
"If you think that you have something to offer him in exchange for sparing it, you can attempt to barter with him, as I once did." the surfer replied, "but this is such a large and rich system that I doubt he'd listen. Still, I will give you some advice. If you want to make a bargain with Galan, don't address him by that name. He'd consider it too familiar. Call him Galactus. He only answers to the name Galan in the company of his peers, and he would certainly not consider you a peer. Even I've only addressed him three times by his true name, and in all three of those instances, he chose not to respond. If that information doesn't prove useful to you, then there's no reason for me to even say good-bye."
It was obvious that the silver surfer was feeling miserable, but that didn't mean a thing to Peter Parker at that moment, or to Spider-man. As the surfer started to rise into the air away from him, Peter didn't even care whether he was overheard or not anymore. He pulled the Avengers transmitter from his pocket, and spoke into it as quickly as he could.
"JJJ five-ten-four. This is Spider-man. It's really bad, Widow."
However, it seemed that the person on duty in the monitor room wasn't Widow, but Captain America.
"What is it, Spider-man?" Cap asked, concern growing in his voice. Peter was shocked and worried by that for a moment, but he could tell that Captain America and the others had been told as much about the situation as he'd been able to safely tell Widow. The sound of dread in the voice of one of Earth's most famous heroes clearly indicated that he understood the threat.
"Our alien buddy just decided we don't deserve to live." Spider-man replied into the communicator, "He's going to call his big, bad master Galactus, and the big guy's planning to tear the planet apart. Sound like a good idea to you?"
It wasn't a real question, and didn't need a real answer. Captain America's reply was swift, and got to the point.
"Don't worry, son. With Doctor Richard's assistance, we've been tracking the alien for almost a day and a half. Help's on the way."
"Help?" Spider-man asked, feeling like something was being kept from him, "What kind of help?"
The Emissary was taking his time as he traveled upward through the atmosphere; moving at only about fifty miles an hour. He'd made his choice, and there was no way he could have made it differently, but he wasn't in any great hurry to see that particular task finished. Try as he might, he'd gotten attached to the humans; especially the guide he'd chosen. In his childhood, the Emissary had been mortal, and his soul still burned with a mortal's passions. He lacked the immortal convictions of his master, but then, maybe that was the reason why he'd been able to do so much good in the past. On that day, however, in spite of all he'd said, the Emissary felt that what he was doing wasn't good at all. He just didn't have any alternative.
The Emissary was fully preoccupied with thoughts like that as he ascended through the air. In fact, he was so preoccupied that for a moment, he didn't notice the information that his cosmic senses were sending him. It was a brief period of distraction, but it was still more than he could afford. In just a moment, something very, very fast collided with his face with incredible force, breaking through his cosmic matter shield like tissue paper, and impacting on his armor.
For the first time since he'd gained the power cosmic, the Emissary found himself needing to lean away from the force of the blow he'd been dealt, which struck with such power and momentum that for a moment, it knocked him and his board downward through the air. By the time the Emissary was able to stop his downward descent and look back up, however, it became clear that his job was going to be even more difficult than he'd feared. There was a blond, human woman floating in mid-air just above him, wearing an outfit made of black and yellow, with a black mask, and a depiction of a yellow bolt of lightning running down her torso. It was the hero that everyone recognized as the symbol of hope for the new century, as Captain America had been for the twentieth. The Emissary recognized her from internet sites about Earth's heroes. It was the champion of mankind; Miss Marvel.
"I know what you're planning." Miss Marvel said sternly, "I can't let you do it."
"I can't attempt to protect your world, nor can you defend it by any attempt to hold me here." the Emissary said angrily, "Take up your grievances with Galactus; the Ancient One."
"This isn't just about what I want." Miss Marvel exclaimed angrily, "You've just decided that a whole planet full of people doesn't deserve to live! How can you make that kind of choice?"
"How would you have me make it?" the Emissary demanded, "Sacrifice a hundred star systems in a futile attempt to save one?"
"Don't sacrifice anyone." Miss Marvel insisted, "It's wrong."
For a moment, the Emissary looked flabbergasted and stunned, as if something about Miss Marvel's words had been completely unexpected, but he knew enough about her to understand that she, at least, seemed to have a fairly balanced world view. Still, as refreshing as her idealism might sound to other ears, the Emissary knew things that she didn't about the nature of the being who was approaching that world. The Emissary never liked to fight, but in that instance, he had no choice. If he didn't at least try to complete his mission, it might be seen as a sign of betrayal by Galactus.
The Emissary's fists tightened, and the power cosmic flared up all around him, as his determination grew. He would prove his loyalty to Galactus, and in doing so, he would save countless billions.
"Foolish child!" the Emissary exclaimed, as he rushed forward, towards Miss Marvel, his whole body once again shining with the energy of creation. In just a moment, his fist had made firm contact with her stomach. She was clearly shocked by just how much the blow had hurt.
In a flash, however, Miss Marvel seemed to have recovered, falling backwards through the air, then rising up again, and lashing out at the Emissary. However, by that point, he knew what she was planning to do. In a second, he'd blocked her first attack, lashing out with a swift kick to her side, which she, in turn, blocked with some kind of impressive martial art. The Emissary was definitely surprised by Miss Marvel's combat proficiency when faced with a being of great force, but not so surprised that he forgot his own duty, or lost his concentration again.
Blows were thrown, blocked and driven home for several seconds, like thunder in the air. The two beings fought with both speed and power that would have shattered any grown man, but in the end, only one of them could be the victor.
"Miss Marvel?" Captain America asked into his transmitter, "Miss Marvel, are you there?"
"She's not going to respond." the Mole Man replied cynically from nearby, though in that instance, it was a fairly obvious fact.
"Watch us, and coordinate efforts from the monitor room." Strange said to Captain America as he and most of the others headed for the mansion's exits, "We're going to find Miss Marvel and see if we can salvage this situation."
The Emissary frowned as he watched Miss Marvel fall towards the ground for just long enough to convince himself that she was truly defeated. It was possible that she would survive the fall, but it didn't really matter. She and everyone on her world would be dead very shortly anyway.
After only that brief fight, the Emissary traveled further and further up, away from the Earth's gravity, closer to space, where his message would be more clearly heard, and began to emit a high-frequency, organized pulse along his own power cosmic. In moments, he felt the presence of Galactus in his thoughts.
"Great Galactus..." the Emissary transmitted, "There is a star system in this galaxy that you'll find satisfying."
"Satisfying?" Galactus asked, only mildly surprised, "Transmit your data."
At once, the Emissary complied, sending all the data he'd gathered on the solar system and its contents to Galactus, except for any specific knowledge of the behavior and abilities of the human race. That data would have seemed trivial and suspicious to Galactus anyway, and it seemed that he'd learned what he'd really wanted to know without it.
Finally, the Emissary heard Galactus' reply, and for the first time since he'd come into the service of that mighty being, the Emissary thought that he noticed a hint of emotion in his master's words.
"Your findings are good, as before, my Emissary. If this data is reliable, the Solar System will sustain me for many years to come. Knowing the prize that awaits me, I have increased my speed, and will arrive shortly. When I reach the Solar System, you may leave it to undergo a new search. You have done well."
What could be said about that? Certainly, the Emissary didn't feel as if he'd done well. It had been a hard choice, and he'd made the decision that he thought would cause the least damage, but had it been right of him to make that choice? There was no telling. In spite of the conviction with which he'd made his decision, the Emissary was haunted by what he'd just done, and yet, he had to make his final reply.
"As you command, Mighty Galactus."
The Emissary sighed as he let himself drift downward slightly, back into the atmosphere of the planet Earth. His armor was capable of transforming chemical elements within his body, thus making it unnecessary for him to breathe, but he still felt some pleasure over being within a planet's atmosphere at times. Maybe it was just an old prejudice from the days when he himself had been mortal, but there was a comforting sort of feeling to being within the atmosphere of a world. Few people knew the beauty of the stars as the Emissary did; spinning around them at speeds close to that of light, then ducking in and out of the normal gravity continuum by using his power cosmic to warp relativity and travel across whole light years. The Emissary had used those abilities to navigate the fantastic universe of stars and planets in which he lived, zipping freely and easily from star to star, and he'd thrived on the level of freedom they'd given him, allowing him to move easily from one place to the next in the universe; from galaxy to galaxy. Even so, nothing ever quite felt like a haven or a home of any sort amidst the stars; not even in the depths of space, or on the massive ship of his master. It was strange and surprising, but it was the truth. In a sense, the surfer preferred to relax on a world of some kind.
Of course, he didn't travel too close to the ground, but he did manage to descend just far enough, that he was within about three thousand feet of the Earth's surface, and that was where the Emissary continued to drift through the air, waiting in miserable dread for the moment when Galactus would arrive. That would be the moment when he would have to leave that world, and everyone in that star system would die. It wasn't something that he was looking forward to, and his only consolation was that it might earn him the chance to find more uninhabited systems, and plot more courses away from the habited ones. After all, if Galactus would really be as satisfied by the Solar System, then the surfer was going to have a lot of time to plan his own next move, before any further reports were expected. That was a relief period that the Emissary had no intention of taking for granted, especially considering how bad Galactus' hunger had grown recently.
Galactus had spent a great deal of time traveling to the Milky Way after consuming the star systems that the Emissary had last recommended to him, and the distance between the two galaxies had been greater, and required more power than most trips. He wasn't in danger of dying immediately, of course. In fact, it would have taken at least another century before the lack of energy would impact his heath that badly, but the Emissary could tell that Galactus' body was already reacting to the effects of his energy withdrawal. He'd grown a lot weaker over the past few months, and his concentration was starting to lose its edge at times. Nothing was harder on him than the transition between one galaxy and the next.
However, as the Emissary thought about those things, he remembered the importance of not allowing his own focus to slip just in time to sense several organisms and flying vehicles approaching him at high speeds. Quickly, the Emissary raised his guard, as he had before. The many beings were recognizable as they got closer to him, but he was surprised to see most of them. They were the Avengers.
Namor was the first to make contact, rushing in and lashing out with his fists. The Emissary blocked his first attack, but wasn't prepared for the sharp kick that followed, and by that point, Iron Man had appeared as well, firing repelling beams at him. Soon, the air around the Emissary had started to spin and twist, as if the wind itself were attempting to throw him off balance, and the Surfer saw the Human Torch, and the Avenger called Hawkeye approaching him through the air, with Hawkeye riding a small, flying vehicle, as he took aim at the Emissary with an odd-looking arrow. In just a moment, the Human Torch started giving off bright, glaring light, though the Emissary had seen worse, and Hawkeye fired his arrow.
The moment that Hawkeye let go of his bow string, every nearby Avenger flew backwards, away from him, and the Emissary realized that something about that arrow would have been dangerous to them. Namor, in particular, seemed intent on putting distance between himself and the arrow, and although the surfer tried to move out of the way, the arrow still wound up nicking one of his shoulders, and the machine on its tip activated.
A shattering, piercing cacophony shot through the air in that moment, projected from the tiny machine on the end of the arrow. It was like a massive, ungodly screech, that filled the atmosphere, and rang through the Emissary's ears, like having a pair of cymbals clapped against the sides of his head. He wasn't sure how much of that blasted noise he could endure.
Miss Marvel had briefly lost consciousness on the way down, after her fight with the silver surfer, but that loss of consciousness had only been for a few minutes. A short while later, she'd woken on a medical bed in the Avengers Mansion, with Doctor Strange standing nearby. He had a sad, sour expression on his face, even once he'd realized that she was waking up, which didn't speak well for how things had gone.
"Plan B?" Miss Marvel asked.
Strange clearly knew what she was referring to. Plan A had been for Miss Marvel to attempt to defeat the surfer through sheer speed and strength, which had failed pretty badly. Plan B had involved an assault by the flying members of the Avengers against the surfer, in order to distract him from the sonic arrow that Hawkeye had been hoping to use to knock him out.
"The second plan only worked for about an hour." Strange replied with a dejected shake of his head, "We managed to knock him out, but as soon as he recovered, he just passed right through all our restraints."
"Why didn't you use the spell of restraining bands?" Miss Marvel asked, a little surprised, though Strange looked away sadly before replying.
"There are several reasons, but the biggest is that it hinges upon the cooperation of Cyttorak, and I've had problems with his requests in the past."
"Where's the surfer now?" Miss Marvel asked, slowly getting up.
"Still flying over New York." Strange replied, "Most of the Avengers are starting to pull back, though. I think Black Bolt is going to try to destroy him."
"So what are we supposed to do in the meantime?" Miss Marvel asked, "Just stay out of earshot and hope there's still some way to save the world when the vibrations stop?"
"Something like that." Strange admitted, the expression on his face still grave, "The fact is, there may be another threat that we need to consider. Even if we all survive this, our old enemies could very easily seize the opportunity to rush in and pick us off while we're exhausted, and don't forget that the Avengers still have one enemy we've never been able to track down before; the girl who killed Thor, Jan and Hank."
Those words drove Miss Marvel into silence for a few moments. She knew what Strange was talking about, though she'd expected most people to be supportive of their attempts to defend the world from destruction. However, there was also a meaning hidden in Strange's words. He knew something that he wasn't saying directly.
"You know where she is, don't you?" Miss Marvel asked in amazement.
"Yes." Strange replied, "While you were unconscious, someone made contact with me. Apparently, they managed to capture her a while back. The person who contacted me was the leader of the X-men."
"But what can we really do about that?" Miss Marvel asked, "Especially now?"
"We have to do something." Strange replied, "All the clues seem to point to the idea that she at least has the same powers that Thor did. Apparently, she was claiming that some stalker had come after her, and some form of writing had appeared on the wall of the cell she was being kept in. That could indicate that her imprisonment isn't sufficient, but we'll only need a minute or two to check it out. We should be able to return to the fight just in time to learn whether Black Bolt's attempt succeeded or failed."
Miss Marvel nodded a little, as she got to her feet, but she knew it wasn't really going to be that easy.
"We'll need to take somebody else with us." Miss Marvel said, "Somebody who knows their way around machines."
"I was planning on having Widow join us, if you feel comfortable with that." Strange replied.
"Alright." Miss Marvel agreed calmly. There wasn't, as far as she could tell, any reason for not feeling comfortable around Widow. After all, the two had known each other for quite a while, and were on very good terms. They weren't friends per se. Widow didn't really make friends with anyone, but they had a professional working relationship that neither of them felt bad about. Very little about Miss Marvel's relationship with Widow could have been called uncomfortable. Widow had a few reasons to feel uncomfortable herself, but she never seemed nervous about much of anything; at least not openly, and there was no point in discussing it anyway. They still had a lot to do.
Only a few moments later, Strange and Miss Marvel had met Widow in the hallway nearby, and Strange was casting another spell, to teleport them to the location of the one who'd brought the first Avengers to an end.
The surfer hadn't looked the least bit scared when he'd first escaped from the containment area that the Avengers had designed, but when his pursuers began to fall back again, he started to look warily around. Obviously, he was expecting another sonic arrow attack, but that was definitely not what he was about to face.
Soon, the silver surfer could see Black Bolt approaching from below; probably the most dangerous of the Avengers when all was said and done; traveling towards him through the air like a human cannonball. When the two of them collided with each other in mid-air, the thunderous impacts could be heard for miles.
Black Bolt knew that his punches were just as strong as the ones that the Thing or Miss Marvel might be able to deliver, but the silver surfer had defeated her. He understood that he couldn't afford to wait too long before executing his plan of attack. His attacks at that point just weren't hurting the surfer enough, and the surfer's blows were only growing stronger as the two fought. He needed to make a move, and that move would involve using one of his greatest techniques.
Backing off for just a moment, Black Bolt began to gather passing vibrations into the tuning fork embedded in his head, absorbing them and strengthening his own vibrational control, then moving all of that kinetic energy into his left fist. Finally, with one swift lunge, Black Bolt drove that fist into the surfer's midsection, and was gratified to notice that as his fist vibrated in place, delivering blow after thunderous blow at lightning speed, each one reinforcing the damage of the others, something sounded like it had broken inside the surfer's body. It was Black Bolt's Master Blow, and he'd met very few beings, in the past, who could withstand it completely. The only problem was that it drained his body almost totally of usable kinetic energy, making it difficult to generate vibrations. He wouldn't be able to perform another attack like that for a while, though being drained of kinetic energy had another advantage; it reduced the destructive range of Black Bolt's whisper to a mere twelve feet away from his body. That was part of the inhuman king's plan as well. If the Master Blow had defeated the silver surfer, then no further effort was needed, but if not; if the surfer still had the strength to fight, then Black Bolt was willing to use his voice, and they were high enough the air that nothing would be destroyed by it except the surfer himself.
For a moment, it seemed that the surfer was badly injured. His face had contorted in agony, and he was clutching what would, on a human body, have been his ribs, but after only a few seconds, he started to straighten back up, the pain fading momentarily from his face. He definitely didn't look injured anymore. In fact, the look on his face was more like anger than anything else, which was a little worrying. He'd never shown real anger in all the time that Black Bolt and the other Avengers had been fighting him.
"You can't save your world that way." the surfer spat out, enraged, "You and your people will all perish to feed Galactus. If you think that makes me happy; if you think that I can just change my mind at this point, you're fooling yourself. I've only done what I thought was best for the..."
However, in that moment, the surfer's words were cut off by the sound of the front of his board tearing itself apart, as vibrations on a microscopic level began to shake the cohesion from his molecules. Black Bolt had whispered, and that always led to destruction. The surfer could feel the strange attack tearing apart his armor and his insides with abandon, rupturing the parts of his body that contained the power cosmic, and disrupting his concentration. Black Bolt felt terrible as the surfer plummeted from the sky, the edges of his body eroding visibly as he fell, but it was still an encouraging sight. It proved that if all else failed, his power could still be used, even against cosmic beings.
However, just as Black Bolt was turning around, to return to the Avengers Mansion, he started to feel a source of massive heat approaching him from behind, and didn't even have enough time to turn around before the blast hit him.
The attack was hot, bright, and it drove into Black Bolt's back with terrible speed and force. It burned through his skin in just a second, and he could feel something in his bones and organs suffering terrible damage as well, before the heat of the blast began to fade, and Black Bolt started falling. Like the surfer, he wouldn't be hurt by a mere fall, but he wasn't certain whether the damage he'd already suffered would be enough to finish him off. The pain was growing rapidly worse, even as Black Bolt lost consciousness.
Jennifer Walters was more scared than angry as she ran towards the spot where Black Bolt and the surfer had both fallen. As physically the strongest Avenger, it was her job to try to intercept the surfer if he was grounded, but still active at any point. Fortunately, she was able to reach the spot just a few moments after they'd landed. Each had fallen relatively close to the other; Black Bolt in the front yard of a suburban house near New York, and the surfer lay in the street a short distance away. Black Bolt had a very nasty-looking injury in his back, that he was obviously losing a lot of blood through, and the surfer's whole body seemed to be in the process of tearing itself to shreds, board and all. It looked like the Avengers had won that particular victory, but at a terrible cost. Furthermore, none of them could be sure that a victory over the silver surfer was going to make any difference for the rest of the world, in the end.
Quickly, Jennifer rushed over to Black Bolt. He'd landed face-down, so his loss of blood wasn't receiving any help from gravity, but that still made it a lot harder to look the inhuman king in the face in the hopes of determining whether he was still breathing, by the motions of his nostrils. Jennifer's knowledge of medicine was legal and theoretical, but not very practical. She wasn't even sure where to feel on a person's wrist, in order to check their pulse properly, and there was no guarantee that Black Bolt's anatomy worked the same way anyways, so that knowledge might not even have done her any good.
Of course, despite Jennifer's poor practical knowledge of medicine, she knew better than to move an injured person, so she quickly pulled out her communicator, and started talking into it at once.
"B-3-5, green way She-Hulk. Come in, Iron Man."
"This is Iron Man." said a voice on the other end.
"Black Bolt and the surfer are both down, and they look really badly injured." She-Hulk explained, "What should I do?"
"Just stay where you are. I'll be right there."
Jennifer felt pretty nervous as she closed up her communicator. She was scared for Black Bolt, and what his death might mean for future relations between humans and inhumans, but her worst fears were still about the alien. What if he'd already summoned his master? He'd had plenty of time to. What if the whole world was doomed, no matter what she did? They were hard questions to answer, and unpleasant to even think about. Jennifer was feeling so edgy, that she was about ready to snap at the first sign of anything unexpected happening, and as it turned out, that tendency to overreact was exactly what Jennifer needed a moment later, when she heard the sounds of someone or something getting to it's feet behind her.
She-Hulk spun on her heel at once, to face what looked like a half-human wreck with specks of silver all over him, just barely managing to stand upright, though how he could stand at all was a mystery, since nothing about him looked complete. Over half of his necessary parts seemed to have been forcibly removed, although his body had stopped tearing itself to shreds, at least. Whatever that thing was, it looked more like a zombie covered in glitter than a man of any kind. She-Hulk was both disgusted by the sight, and scared beyond reason.
The being seemed to be trying to say something, but its mouth just wasn't complete enough to form words, so it quickly aimed one skeletal hand at a nearby telephone pole with a open-palmed gesture, and in moments, bright light shone out at the pole; enveloping it. That was when She-Hulk saw, in dismay, that the telephone pole was disappearing; the wires attached to it being left to hang just a little lower, as the wood, metal, and glass of the pole and associated street light faded away, as if some kind of acidic substance were causing it to erode. At that same time, She-Hulk could see bones, muscles, and other tissue growing all over the strange being's body; filling out and gaining size and density, as if it were adding the mass of the telephone pole to its own.
At last, the being started aiming its beams at a few small sections of the sidewalk, causing them to also disappear. With that, the figure regained its previous, healthy-looking physique, and a thin, silver-like substance started to spread all over its body from the tiny spots it had had only moments before. By the time She-Hulk reached the silver surfer, he'd regained his previous health and appearance completely, making her feel that much more helpless, as she clamped her arms around his shoulders from behind.
The surfer let out a distracted gasp as She-Hulk seized him, and spent several moments struggling to break free. However, she was growing so angry with him by that point, that none of his struggles meant a thing. As strong as he was, she was stronger.
"Give it up." She-Hulk said after a few moments, "You can't beat my strength, no matter what kind of energy you're powered by."
For a few seconds, the surfer continued to writhe, until he seemed to have realized the truth of her words, and relaxed a little.
"Yes." he admitted, "Your strength exceeds that of any mortal creature I've ever met. I hadn't realized that such creatures could exist with this level of brute force. You're most surprising."
However, as the surfer spoke, Jennifer Walters suddenly found herself getting extremely tired, making it difficult to hold onto her anger, and as her exhaustion grew, she gradually realized that it was, in fact, the surfer who was causing it.
Furious, but helpless against her own building fatigue, Jennifer fell backwards into the street with a crash, as the surfer started aiming his beams at other, nearby sections of road and sidewalk, absorbing the energy that made the matter solid, until it was sufficient to completely regenerate the remainder of his body, armor, and at last, his board, which the surfer caused, in one final motion, to fade into existence at his feet. Regeneration, it seemed, was his final defense from even the most damaging attacks. He just needed energy to do it.
In the pivotal moment when he'd been exposed to Black Bolt's voice, the surfer had realized that he was in danger, and started using his remaining power cosmic to regenerate his vital areas as fast as he could. The result was that while his entire original body had been destroyed by the attack, firing one last blast of energy on the way down, a new body had been partially built for him while he'd been falling, containing his full memory and knowledge, self-sufficiency, and enough resilience to survive the collision with the ground, as well as small bits of his armor, with which to rebuild the rest of his body, when he got a chance to start absorbing fresh energy from the matter around him. In all the time that the surfer had traveled through the cosmos, he'd only needed to use that level of regeneration twice before, because very few things could truly penetrate his armor.
Again and again, the people of Earth were showing the Emissary that their champions were just as tough as their internet fans thought, and just as dedicated and clever too. In spite of the unnatural power the Earthlings possessed, there was something endearing about their continual struggles against him, as if doing so would in some way save their world from destruction. Then again, there was the possibility that the humans knew their fight against Galactus was hopeless, and just wanted him to pay for his victory by killing his Emissary before he could leave, or some such thing. Barbarians often thought about things that way. There was nothing rational, civilized, or calculating about it, but like the determination to fight on for survival, there were things about it that were endearing. In spite of how close to death he'd recently been brought, the surfer felt just as sad as ever over the impending, inevitable fate of planet Earth.
Regardless of that sadness, however, the Surfer managed to get back onto his board, and start flying upward again, just as Iron Man arrived on the scene, horrified by the injuries that had been caused to his teammates.
Even as another flash of light deposited three people into the area just outside of her cell, Anna knew that she couldn't move. She barely even had enough will to recognize the people. One of them was graying slightly, and had a mustache, and a red cloak, held in place with a large, metal eye that was, at the time, closed. The second was a red-haired woman, dressed all in black. The third was perhaps the most recognizable of all the modern superhumans. She had a black mask, long, blond hair, and a large lightning bolt symbol along the front of her uniform. Two of the beings were obviously Doctor Strange and Miss Marvel, though Anna had never seen the third before.
"Widow." Strange said in a commanding tone, "Look over their security measures. Are they good enough to hold her?"
The woman who apparently referred to herself as Widow spent only a couple of seconds examining the machines, before she nodded.
"There are about four people in the world who could set up a better containment system than this one. Two are Avengers, and the other two are Doctor Richards, and Doom."
"What about the message on the wall?" Strange asked curiously. Widow seemed to have barely even glanced at it, but she already had a full evaluation ready.
"It wasn't written by anything solid. Those words were burned into the wall by some kind of explosion of high-friction energy."
"High-friction?" Miss Marvel asked, confused, "Wait a minute. Wouldn't that melt the metal too?"
"Part of it is melted." Widow replied, "However, in this instance, friction within the wall was accelerated to the point where the wall itself burst open in small areas. That's how the words were created. Obviously, we're dealing with someone who can create intense friction in the air, and even inside of objects."
"Now the question becomes; who could do that?" Strange said, looking distracted, as he thought it over.
"Again, it's a short list." Widow replied, "Most of them are Avengers. Yourself, the Human Torch... Namor might be able to, if he were to really get creative. Any of the technological experts we work with could probably have rigged something up; Doom, Richards, Iron Man, Mole Man, myself..."
"Ah... Ah could've done it."
At once, all three Avengers, who'd paid so little direct attention to Anna up to that point, turned to face her as one. They all seemed surprised that she'd spoken up at all. After all, they knew who she was, and she must have known who they were. Even so, she was trying to help them. It caught them off guard.
"You?" Strange asked, "How?"
"Ah just have to create atmospheric friction inside the tiny air pockets in the wall." Anna said, though she was still too exhausted to get up, "Problem is, ah couldn't do it while ah'm drugged, so it couldn't have been me."
"You have the power to create atmospheric friction?" Miss Marvel asked, astonished.
"Ah get the powahs of everybody ah touch..." Anna said miserably, "All of 'em. Ah get their powahs, their thoughts, their memories... Everything."
The moment that Widow heard that, her eyes widened, and she turned to face Strange quickly.
"I know who's responsible for this," Widow said, "but don't make snap judgments about this girl. She might not be as great a danger as she's been in the past."
"What?" Strange asked, barely able to believe what Widow was saying, "Widow, this girl killed three members of the Avengers. She has to face justice for what she did."
"Right," Widow replied, "but don't try to attack her. I think she's already facing justice for what she's done, and we can't afford to devote too much manpower to her at the moment, anyway."
Strange glanced at Widow once, then at Anna, then back at Widow, but her answer clearly hadn't satisfied him. Miss Marvel, though, seemed a little more satisfied by Widow's answer, even if she didn't understand all the reasoning behind it.
"What is it, Widow?" Miss Marvel asked, seemingly determined to get to the heart of the matter, "How's she facing justice?"
Widow looked up at the ceiling for a moment, as if struggling to come up with an answer to that question, but at last, she said, "Aside from the fact that she's started to feel guilty over her crimes, real justice is what happens when each person gets exactly what they deserve. Because of that, it's very difficult and rare for a murder case to result in a just outcome."
There was no reply to that for several seconds, but at last, Strange had started to look very confused, and a question finally escaped his lips; a question he couldn't hold in anymore.
"I'm not following you." Strange said, "What are you suggesting, exactly?"
"I'm suggesting that you don't try to punish her until this investigation is complete." Widow replied, "We don't have enough information about her stalker to make snap judgments. If it's who I think it is... We can't afford to make assumptions, though."
Widow's reply hadn't satisfied Strange or Miss Marvel, but she clearly wasn't going to explain herself any further, so Strange started moving his hands into a number of new gestures, causing Widow to vanish again. A moment later, Strange had placed one hand on his forehead, and closed his eyes, then opened them again. That was when he and Miss Marvel also disappeared, leaving Anna to wonder what they had planned for her, and what, exactly, they were trying to accomplish, that was demanding so much of their time.
Miss Marvel, Widow, and Strange returned from the central base of the X-men, materializing in the medical center, which was definitely not the best place to be at the moment. Iron Man was desperately trying to mend the wounds that had been suffered by the king of the inhumans, who was laid out on one bed, while She-Hulk; apparently just exhausted, dominated another. Doctor Strange's mouth fell open at the sight, horrified by what it signified.
"Iron Man..." Strange asked quietly after a moment, "What happened?"
"He got away." Iron Man replied, "Black Bolt's injured, and She-Hulk's exhausted. I didn't take much time to look her over, but if you want to help out, you can try to figure out what happened to her with that eye pendant of yours."
The sight, though unfortunate, was all that Miss Marvel needed to see to convince her not to go charging right after the surfer just yet. Both Black Bolt and She-Hulk were physically capable of doing more damage, and summoning more power than her, and they'd both failed, just like she had. Clearly, they needed to rethink their strategy.
However, it was just as clear that Widow wasn't, at the moment, thinking about the battle strategy, or about anything that the silver surfer had done or said since he'd arrived. There was a mystery in her head; the mystery of who was stalking the killer of the original Avengers, and it suddenly occurred to her that there were at least two possible culprits who she hadn't mentioned while she'd been at the X-men's base.
"I think the silver surfer may have had the power needed to burn that message into the containment chamber wall," Widow admitted aloud, as she and Miss Marvel left the medical area together, "but I doubt he's responsible. According to her, she's been stalked for over a week. The surfer has been on Earth for only a few days. Besides, he has no interest in Anna. It doesn't add up."
"So who do you think is responsible?" Miss Marvel asked.
"That's what I'm hoping to uncover." Widow replied quickly, "There is one last suspect that I can think of. I'm almost certain it was him. I can't prove it, of course, but I'll want to confront him about it anyway, and under the circumstances, I'd prefer if you were there as well."
"Alright." Miss Marvel agreed casually, "I'll come along. I just hope all this doesn't wind up being a useless waste of time."
Miss Marvel didn't recognize the address that Widow had guided her towards. The two had gotten there by the swiftest available method short of teleporting; Miss Marvel had flown there, carrying Widow. The flight wasn't long, or particularly difficult, but the place that they'd found themselves at didn't look like a stalker's home at all; just an ordinary house on the outskirts of the city. Miss Marvel wasn't sure what to expect as Widow looked up and down the house from various sides, listening carefully near the doors and windows until she seemed satisfied. It was only then that she bothered with saying anything to Miss Marvel at all.
"I'm glad you were able to get us here so quickly, Carol." Widow said, "That was very helpful, and on some level, I also appreciate your support in a difficult time like this, but your presence here might not be of any further use. If I'm right about this, and it comes to a fight, even your strength and speed won't mean anything against his, and if I'm wrong, and he has no supernatural powers, then your power won't be needed to subdue him. I could accomplish that myself. Do you know what I'm trying to say?"
Miss Marvel nodded, though she showed no sign of returning to the Avengers' headquarters at the moment.
"It's pretty obvious that you're trying to get rid of me," Miss Marvel admitted, "but at this point, you've piqued my curiosity. I can't just go back, until I find out more about your theory. Who lives here? How could he do all that amazing stuff? What's his problem with Anna?"
"If I'm right," Widow said, "he wants Anna to feel fear, and then die at his hands, just as he did at hers."
"What?" Miss Marvel asked in amazement, "You don't mean...? Are you seriously thinking...?"
Instead of responding, Widow removed a small device from her belt, and slid it into the nearest lock. In just a second, the lock clicked, and Widow flung the door open, revealing a short hallway that led directly into several adjacent rooms. Miss Marvel just followed in bewilderment, as Widow lead the way into the house, and silently opened the door to the back room, where Doctor Donald Blake was resting on a sofa.
For a few seconds, the three just looked at each other. No one spoke.
"What's going on?" Don asked as he got to his feet, "Miss Marvel? What are you doing in my house? Who's your friend?"
However, even as he asked those questions, he could see the look of sad sheepishness in Miss Marvel's eyes, and realized that it wasn't her doing. The other woman was the one behind the break-in, and she was determined and angry-looking, as she got closer to him. There was something she wanted from him.
"Can I... uh... help you, miss...?" Don started to say, but Widow just glared at him angrily.
"You can drop the act, Mister Blake. I know what you're involved in, and apart from the fact that you're endangering the whole world by continuing this meaningless little game of cat and mouse, I don't see how you can take an active role in murdering someone; even if they've wronged you in the past."
Doctor Blake's eyes widened, and as they did, Widow's narrowed. She'd been absolutely right in her assessment of the situation. There wasn't any doubt anymore. All that was left was to learn the specifics, and put an end to Blake's escapades.
"How long have you been tailing Anna?" Widow asked angrily, "How long have you had your powers, and kept it from the other Avengers?"
However, Blake didn't respond. In a flash, he held out one hand to the side, and a thick, wood and metal hammer had seemed to hurl itself from halfway across the room into his grasp. Widow backed off just a little when he did that, afraid of what was about to happen; having never witnessed Blake's transformation before. In just a second, though, he'd stamped the hammer against the floor, and his whole body was transforming, in a vast burst of electrical energy. Only a short time later, a large, long-haired warrior in Norse armor stood before them, looking furious over having been found out.
"None can stop this now." Thor said in the purest wrath, "The power of the god of thunder is mine alone to wield. Meddle not in the affairs of gods, little one, for they are quick to anger, and impossible to deny."
With those sharp words, Thor moved forward a single step, and then suddenly, as far as Widow could tell, he'd just disappeared.
"Gone." Widow muttered, doing her best not to sound upset by the fresh development, "He's probably already headed for the Xavier Institute. Damn."
Miss Marvel, of course, had seen Thor disappear as well, but her own speed was great enough that she'd recognized the vague blur as he'd brushed past her. Widow's eyes hadn't been quick enough to follow Thor as he'd made his move, but it seemed that her mind had been. In just a moment, she turned to face Miss Marvel again, new plans already brewing in her thoughts.
"We still have one chance. I'm not sure how Captain America managed to penetrate all that pomposity, but if he did it once, he might be able to do it again. I need you to call Iron Man. See if he has any ideas. We should also call Doctor Strange. If we move fast, we might be able to beat Thor to the Institute."
Miss Marvel wasn't sure what to say. After what she'd just seen, the situation looked about as bad as ever, and her head was full of questions, but she soon decided that it would probably be best to just nod and do what she could, so in a moment, she and Widow had both pulled out their communicators.
When Anna woke up, it was still very early. In fact, the sun hadn't even come up. It was probably something like two in the morning, but she'd been woken by the sound of a loud thumping noise in her room.
Though she was still feeling groggy, and emotionally-overwhelmed, Anna struggled to sit up in bed, and see what the problem was. There, she saw the most shocking and astonishing thing that she'd seen in months.
Anna's window was letting warm air into her room, having been opened noiselessly during the night, and there were two figures standing in the darkness of her room. Both were tall, and one seemed to have grabbed the other from behind. However, the one in front was wearing an expensive-looking suit, while the other was holding what appeared to be a large hammer made of wood and metal.
More than one thing about that situation worried Anna. The suit looked just like a hundred other expensive suits of its type worldwide, but the hammer was quite unique, and it was very familiar to Anna, though she couldn't make out the faces of either man distinctly.
"Fool!" she heard one man exclaim, "You've woken her!"
"Bite thy tongue." Another voice replied, and in moments, the two had moved with speed that rivaled Anna's own, shooting back out through the window together. In under a second, Anna had begun using her own powers again, rushing to the window with as much speed as she could summon. Once there, however, she could see that the man in the suit seemed to be disintegrating, or rather, transforming. From his posture, he looked mainly furious, and badly disappointed by the turn that things had taken, but even so, his whole body seemed to be changing into a cloud of bats, that started to fly away from the institute grounds.
By that point, the other figure was looking away from Anna, but despite the lack of sunlight, she could see enough of him to understand what was going on, and all of her muscles tensed up in preparation for the fight that she was definitely about to be forced into. The man standing there on the institute lawn was dressed in large armor, to match his powerful build. There was a helmet on his head, and a long, brown cloak hung from his armor at the shoulders. In his right hand, he held a powerful-looking hammer, and his hair was long and blond. Anna wasn't sure how it was possible, but she knew who the new arrival was, even before he turned to face her. It was Thor; the Norse god of thunder.
For a few moments, Anna was speechless, though she herself flew out through the window, to meet with the thunder god. She could see that he was watching her warily, as any true warrior would, and yet, when she descended to the ground, he didn't seem tense. In fact, he looked very relaxed, which probably meant that he wasn't afraid of her, and wanted her to see him at his best.
For nearly fifteen seconds, the two circled each other on the lawn of the Institute. Thor obviously expected Anna to say something, but Anna didn't know what to say. Finally, Thor seemed to be getting bored with the silence, and spoke up.
"Thou dost wish to know how I survived our encounter." Thor said aloud.
"You didn't survive." Anna said, a little anger rising in her, though she was mainly just worried as she spoke, "Ah absorbed you completely. Nobody ah do that to survives. Even now, ah've still got your powahs, your thoughts, your memories, and philosophies..."
"To kill a god is not so easy a thing." Thor replied, his expression becoming stern, "A god is not made up of merely flesh and blood, nor was my presence in this body dependent upon the power that thou didst steal."
Anna made no sign of wanting to hear Thor's explanation, but he started to explain nonetheless.
"My power is bestowed upon mortal beings who are worthy, through this hammer," Thor explained, "but my true essence, at present, is within the hammer, as a force of great energy. When thou didst conquer me by treachery and deceit, the body that was a manifestation of my powers was drained away under thy touch, and my true force was badly diminished as well. It has taken a great deal of time to replenish it, and re-establish my physical form. My restoration was completed a mere month ago, and almost at once, I decided to take back what was mine; to remove thee from the world, so that once again, I might be the only bearer of the power of Thor; its true owner."
"You were the one that knocked me right outta the sky," Anna realized aloud, "and you wrote that message on the wall near mah cell. Were you the one who broke into mah room a while back too?"
"Nay." Thor replied, "My first intrusion into thy quarters was tonight. I think, perhaps, that the fiend who I've recently chased from thy room has been following thee for a long time, though it makes no difference now."
"No." Anna replied, looking at the ground for a moment, "Ah guess not."
Thor could hear a motor vehicle approaching the Institute from a ways away, but aside from that, there was nothing to interfere with his next move, and Anna's glance at the ground had afforded him the ideal opportunity to strike.
Digging one foot into the ground, Thor shot forward, swinging his hammer with a level of speed and power that few other living beings could duplicate. Anna caught Thor's attack square in the chin, and her whole neck was thrown into massive discomfort, as the force of the blow knocked her backwards across the institute grounds. However, in a sense, the pain had done her more good than harm, because it had woken her up to what was really happening to her, and what she was doing wrong.
Before Thor had appeared, Anna had been consumed by guilt and sorrow, and she'd lost most of her willpower while she was surrounded by that grief, but when Thor had begun his attack, her baser instincts had started to kick in; the same instincts on which Thor himself depended. Anna quickly realized the danger that she was in, and straightened up in mid-air, hoping that she could react in time to block Thor's next attack. She may not have been Thor himself, but she'd felt the spirit of a warrior inside of her, ever since she'd absorbed his powers, and no true warrior could just lay down and die when faced with a strong opponent.
Quickly, Thor charged to the attack again, striking Anna in the stomach with his hammer; refusing to let up, but as he did so, Anna had seized a joint in his armor with one hand, and swung the other around into his face. She could feel her fist straining to maintain its force, and to stay in one piece when she made that punch, but it was obvious that Thor had felt her attack. As strong as he was, her strength was precisely the same, and there were, she realized, other advantages that she could count on in a fight against him.
As fast as she could, Anna swung one leg around, in the hopes of knocking Thor back, while he was still disoriented by her punch, but he recovered too quickly for her, blocking her kick, and knocking her further up into the air, with a vicious backhanded assault.
As Thor and Anna fought, each sped up, increasing both the speed and force of their blows, and the height at which they flew. The fight grew more intense with every moment. Each blow was like thunder itself, and the two combatants rose further and further into the air, neither willing to give in to the other. Anna was starting to show a strong resolve at that point, although if Thor saw that resolve in her, he gave no sign of noticing it. Anna had determined not to try to absorb Thor's powers again. Whether she won or lost, she was going to do it through her effort; not by stealing from her enemy, like she had before. She was going to win or lose with the honor of a warrior.
At last, however, Anna started to increase in size and mass, as she called upon the power of Henry Pym. She continued flying through the air with enormous speed, trading earth-shaking blows with Thor, but at a hundred feet tall, she was in a much better position to endure his attacks. In fact, she was starting to feel them more as low-level nudges, than genuine punches and kicks, and although she was still hurting, and still having trouble fighting Thor, she'd definitely gained the upper hand. The entire thing was immensely exciting. Hank's ability to become a giant was one that she'd never needed to use before, and she wasn't used to aiming for very small targets with her fists. That, of course, was how it felt to her at the time. She'd grown a great deal larger than Thor, but that really only made him seem smaller and harder to hit.
After each struggled for a while against the other in that manner, however, Anna swung one fist at Thor, and found, to her surprise, that he seemed to have vanished. In moments, she heard his voice from directly behind her, and he sounded more disappointed than furious.
"Thou hast done me honor in showing me thy full powers, and in abstaining from petty tricks, like the kind that thou didst use to fell me two years ago. I salute thee for doing me that honor."
"Ah didn't want to trick you anymore, Thor." Anna replied sadly, "Ah don't want to hurt anybody anymore, and ah especially don't want to kill anyone. Ah've killed folks before, but ah don't want to live like that anymore."
"After today," Thor replied, "thou shalt never live that way again. Thy honor has been commendable. Continue to display it, and I shall grant thee the great honor of a warrior's death in battle, and the greater honor of seeing the true power of the thunder god."
"True powah?" Anna asked, confused, "Ah've got all your powahs."
"Nay." Thor replied, "Did I not tell thee that a god is more than mere flesh and blood? In turn, the power that thou didst take from my body was great, but only the true Thor of Asgard possesses the soul of a god. Within that soul, other powers are concealed. Now, witness them, and die with honor, and I shall hold a ceremony in thy name. In the eyes of my people, thou shalt have been redeemed by that, and we may meet again in Valhalla."
Anna didn't like the sound of that very much. It was probably still the human desire to live, that remained a part of her, in spite of all she'd done, but still, even if Thor wasn't bluffing, Anna knew that she couldn't cheat, and try to trick Thor again, or remove her gloves, and try to absorb his power a second time. The combined honor of three founding Avengers had become a part of her, and she couldn't ignore it anymore. She had to hold herself up to a code of conduct; of principle. Anna couldn't attempt to atone for her sins, unless she was willing to honor the memories of those she'd killed. All that was left of Janet, Hank, and Anna's father was a part of her, and she needed to do what they would have done in her situation; she needed to defend herself fairly.
However, the power that Thor was using was pretty terrifying. Although Anna couldn't see Thor at that point, she had the distinct feeling that there was something very large nearby, even by her standards; something much bigger than her, in fact. After only a moment had passed, Anna saw the storm clouds gathering in the air, and realized with dread that her own dominion over the weather was slipping. Thor was regaining control over his domain, and in another second, she heard a voice so loud, that it seemed to shake the sky. She recognized it quickly as the voice of Thor, but it was so much louder and more commanding, that she was shaken to her very bones by it.
"Stop what thou art doing and look up. Face the god of thunder and be judged."
In spite of herself, Anna found that she was indeed looking upward, into the rapidly-gathering clouds. The rain poured down onto her face, and then, as lightning flashed across the sky, Anna caught the glimpse of a monstrous figure; at least ten times her own size. It rose up into the clouds, and it was definitely Thor.
Thor had said that his true powers were a manifestation of his immortal soul. If that were true, then it seemed unlikely that the vision Anna had just seen was accurate. If Thor could have transformed into a giant, he would probably have kept pace with her own increase in size. Undoubtedly, what he'd just shown her was an illusion; a trick to attempt to convince her that he was much larger and more threatening than he actually was. The problem was that as much as she tried to tell herself that it was just an illusion, Anna still felt her body shaking with every new sign of Thor that emerged; every word spoken with such volume and conviction; every image of a monstrously-powerful being that was placed before her. She was in helpless awe of Thor, and would have been, even if he'd had no other powers at all. Whether he was a genuine god of thunder or not, his soul was proving to be stronger than hers, and it was shaking her resolve.
"Think not" the image said, "that thy size is truly an advantage."
When she heard those words, Anna felt an extremely hard blow come down on the small of her back. She wasn't sure how Thor had managed such a powerful attack. Maybe he'd used his hammer to turn the electrical energy of the storm into kinetic force, but however he'd done it, Thor's attack had hurt her physically, just as his loud announcements were hurting her spiritually and emotionally. In moments, her size was decreasing again. She just couldn't keep it up. She'd been struggling with her guilt before, and with Thor striking right at the heart of her self-esteem, she couldn't keep up the fight. He'd been right. She couldn't have won against him. It was over for her.
As Anna's will abandoned her once again, she found herself plummeting to the ground. She needed concentration to remain airborne. Whatever Thor was doing, it was robbing her of all her feelings of hope; feelings that had become much too rare already, thanks to her recent revelation about her past crimes. Without hope, she couldn't concentrate, and without concentration, she was headed for the ground, picking up speed fast.
Anna knew that the impact with the ground wouldn't hurt her much. The only thing nearby that could do real damage to her was Thor himself, and since she'd lost the will to fight back, she was helpless against him. Anna closed both eyes in resignation. A moment later, a sharp, powerful impact hit her right in the stomach, and she blacked out.
A strange mixture of feelings passed through Thor as he stood on the grounds of the Xavier Institute, having driven his hammer into Anna's stomach from underneath. Because she'd possessed all of his strength, she'd been a very powerful opponent. He truly had needed to use his full abilities to defeat her. At the same time, her existence was an obscenity, not only to Thor himself, but to the Wasp, to Giant Man, and to anyone else that Anna had killed. She made a mockery out of life and death, and Thor knew that he had to put an end to that mockery.
The problem was that although Thor knew what he had to do, he wasn't feeling quite as furious with Anna any longer. He reminded himself of the underhanded trick that she'd used to ambush him, to murder two members of his team, and to nearly do the same to him. He reminded himself of the great wickedness that she'd used his powers for, and yet, the thirst for her blood was fading from his feelings. When he looked at her, lying on the ground at his feet, he was starting to see something more than a perversion of everything he was, and everything he believed in. He was looking at the warrior that she'd become; the fighter who attacked her enemies with her full power, but refused to resort to treachery. Thor knew that he had to finish her, for the sake of those she'd killed, but having seen the kind of person she'd become, his own rage towards her had diminished.
"Thou hast grown to become an honorable warrior." Thor muttered, as he stood over Anna's unconscious body, though he knew she couldn't hear him, "Perhaps thou shalt be forgiven for thy treachery in the halls of my father."
With that, Thor raised his hammer into the air, feeling it crackle with electricity. No foe, he realized, had ever brought him so close to true death, but to honor the memory of his comrades, he needed to finish her.
However, just as Thor was about to bring his hammer down on Anna's head, he heard another voice from behind him; a voice he recognized.
"I won't try to stop you, Thor, but do you really think that's what Jan and Hank would want?"
Thor had sensed that someone was approaching him, but he was still surprised by the number of people who'd gathered so nearby. He was just as surprised that he had, for the most part, failed to notice them, however. He could see that Doctor Strange was there, and Iron Man, in a type of armor that Thor had never seen before. There was also a short, shaggy-looking man, who seemed to have approached the group from the mansion. A bald man in a wheelchair was also gradually getting closer from the mansion's front door. However, none of them had asked Thor the question he'd just heard.
The one who'd spoken to Thor was a figure who'd stepped forth from amidst the others. He was dressed in red, white, and blue, and he had a disc-shaped shield slung over one arm.
"Captain." Thor said, looking stunned for a moment, "Is it not what thou wouldst want, in their place?"
"I may not believe in everything America's done over the last sixty years, but I still believe in the American dream." Captain America said only a few seconds later, "Maybe that doesn't mean as much if you've been around longer than America has, but it's a big thing to me. One of the things we always believed in was that people deserve the right to a fair trial. It's one of our most basic laws. I know Jan and Hank respected the law in that regard. They wouldn't have wanted you to become an executioner in their names, just like I wouldn't want you to be one for me."
"This girl killed our comrades!" Thor exclaimed, looking lost and abandoned, but Captain America just sighed.
"Yes, she did," he said, "and she's going to stand trial for that, but there are more important things than how a person dies. I have to admit; for a while, I was driven by the memory of how our friends died, and that was a mistake. I should have paid less attention to how they died, and more to how they lived. Janet Van Dyne was a social being, who found joy in works of art, and creative thinking. Hank Pym was a scientist who preferred to spend his time doing research, rather than fighting. Even so, they both recognized the need for good people to take direct action whenever something threatened the innocent; not for revenge, but for protection. If I honor the way that they lived, I have to follow their example, but killing Anna won't bring them back."
"There are things which thou hast not considered." Thor replied, lowing his hammer for a moment, "No matter what sentence this girl receives, she will survive it. From me, she gained an agelessness, which shall last for millennia; perhaps even until the universe itself ends. Further imprisonment may feel like punishment to her at first, but years are something that she can now afford to lose. How can she be made to suffer as I have suffered; as thou hast suffered? How can she be made to feel the pain of loss?"
"She doesn't need your help to feel pain."
Those words had come from the bald man in the wheelchair, who'd finally reached the scene. He didn't look afraid, in spite of how many powerful people surrounded him, however. In fact, he seemed mainly sad, as if sharing in Anna's misfortune at that very moment.
"Just recently," the bald man said, "Anna Marie came to grips with her guilt over the murders that she committed. Since then, her mind has been full of disturbing thoughts. She remembers all the pain and misery that her victims experienced in the moments before they died, and I can't think of anything that could more efficiently remind someone of their guilt in a murder. In fact, I'm sure that there are only a few worse punishments for a crime. If you're afraid that Anna might not be suffering sufficiently for what she did, I think that I can lay those fears to rest."
Thor looked frustrated and annoyed, but he looped the strap of his hammer around his wrist again, clearly intending not to strike out with it anytime soon.
"I feel badly cheated." Thor muttered, "By right, her deeds against me entitle me to her life. Thy ways may have been well-respected by the Wasp, by Giant Man, and by thyself, Captain America, but to me, they make little sense. Out of honor to my fallen comrades, I shall respect their wishes, but I do not believe I shall ever agree with them."
"I'm glad that's settled." Doctor Strange remarked, finally taking a deep breath in relief, "We need to get back to New York. We can't afford to stay here long."
"Why?" Logan asked, not having heard anything about what had happened to make the Avengers so busy.
"From the looks of things," Strange replied, "the world might be coming to an end. Some kind of being surfaced in New York recently, who has some unbelievable powers. I've never seen anything like them. He says he's made the Earth's most pivotal judgment, and he may already have summoned some destructive cosmic being, even more powerful than himself. He's already done a great deal of damage, and we haven't been able to stop him."
"Then my assistance is needed." Thor said, straightening up, with the look of a veteran soldier who'd just been called to battle.
Captain America nodded, saying "It's good to have you back, old friend."
However, as Strange was starting to make the gestures needed to establish a portal back into New York, there was the sound of dirt being scraped aside, and an exhausted, shaky female voice said "wait."
Strange stopped what he was doing in that moment, and all eyes turned to gaze in the direction of the voice. Somehow, Anna had already recovered somewhat from the pounding she'd taken just moments earlier, and was scrambling to get back upright, though it was obvious that she was still very woozy and disoriented. Even so, the time she'd spent drugged, sorrowful, and learning to cope with a warrior's spirit dwelling inside of her had given her the strength that she needed to face her exhaustion and misery. Some might have said that she was growing up for the first time in her life; learning to face reality like an adult, but Thor could see what was really happening. Anna was becoming more than just an adult; she was becoming a warrior.
"Sounds like... Sounds like..." Anna gasped as loud as she could, while scrambling to her feet, "Sounds like y'all need mah help."
No one there was certain that they liked the idea, but they didn't snap at her either, giving her a moment to explain herself.
"Look, you said there's a guy in New York who might be able to end the world somehow..." Anna tried to explain, "Suppose you're right, and he pulls it off, because ah didn't help out. Nobody's gonna be helped by that, and if things don't work out, it might be mah last chance to do the right thing for once. You gotta let me in on this. Ah know it's what Jan and Hank would want. They'd want their powahs used to help folks."
"If you try to betray us," Doctor Strange said, after considering the matter for only a few moments, "it won't help you at all. As long as you remember that, I don't see any reason why you can't help us out in this one mission. Is that a problem for anyone else?"
Most of the people gathered remained silent when that question was asked. It was only Iron Man who spoke up.
"We need all the help we can get right now." Iron Man said a little nervously, "It doesn't make me happy, but it's better than dying."
"Aye," Thor concurred, looking at Anna warily, "but if this crisis can be averted, we promise thee no reward in exchange."
"Ah don't want one." Anna said, and indeed, she didn't seem to have any obvious ulterior motive, to judge by her facial expression, which was very despondent.
Nodding once, Strange spread his hands out again, in another sequence of mystical gestures, and in moments, most of the people in that yard had vanished, leaving only Logan and the professor behind.
It had been hours since any of Earth's champions had made any attempt to attack the surfer, and the night sky had already unfolded before him; a sight he knew all too well. It was his life; his path to travel. To roam the stars was his greatest joy, though his duty was a dark one at times. The surfer looked up into those stars, and was pleased by them. They made him feel a little better about his lot in life, and even about the terrible deed that he'd done. Though he'd come to dislike mankind as a whole, their loss was still a tragedy, and one that he was most eager to put behind him.
What, the surfer wondered, was the time by human reckoning? Two in the morning? Maybe two-fifteen at most. The surfer paid the question only a second of thought. Galactus had said that he would arrive soon, and his sense of honor was as inhuman as everything else about him. Galactus never broke his word. For him, the word 'soon' meant 'before the world-ship can give a single rotation,' which was about the equivalent of a day and a half of Earth-time, at the very most.
Even for Galactus, space was a vast distance, and growing more so with each passing day, becoming more and more chaotic as it moved. It took time and energy to travel the stars; particularly since conveying the intergalactic power of the cosmos was such a difficult task. Over the eons, Galactus had explored the limits of science and technology, and had reached the extent of what they were capable of, but the challenge of maintaining the cosmic balance was as difficult as ever.
The surfer thought about that for a few moments, wondering if that was why Galactus had chosen to appoint an emissary to journey out into the cosmos and find star systems fit to be devoured. He never would have presumed to make such an assumption when he'd first begun working with Galactus, but it was seeming more likely as he thought it over.
However, as the surfer allowed his thoughts to drift for a moment, there was a sound nearby, as if the atmosphere around him was changing. He looked towards the noise sadly, because he knew it meant a fresh onslaught of attacks, but the kind of attack that sprang forth from the rapidly-forming portal that had appeared to one side of him was far beyond what he'd been expecting. One of the attackers was a girl named Anna, who apparently had the full powers of the original Avengers. The other was an Avenger who, previously, everyone had thought was dead. It was Thor; the Norse god of thunder.
In only a moment, both had rushed forward through the air, and struck the surfer simultaneously. As they hit him, he could feel electric energy dancing through his armor, yet he wasn't able to absorb it as he usually did. Some stronger being's will was keeping its energy out of his reach.
The surfer started to fall backwards for a moment, but his enemies were as strong and swift as he was, and they were lashing out with a ferocity and eagerness that shook his very soul to its core. The sight terrified the surfer; those barbaric creatures, wielding such power, with so much fervor in a desperate, futile attempt to purchase their own survival. Something about the sight shook the surfer's convictions for a moment, and in that moment, both Thor and Anna spoke together, in voices that sounded almost identical.
"Thou art strong and fast, but thou art no warrior!"
Then, each seized him by one arm, and he could feel the electric charge rushing through his body again, picking at the power cosmic within him, like a hoard of angry crows gobbling up corn from a field. It was painful and upsetting, but the experience was as emotional as it was physical, and when the two beings let the surfer fall to the ground again, beaten, he had no real desire to get up. He'd made his decision to doom the Earth, in exchange for the ability to save countless other star systems from Galactus, and although it was a barbaric sort of response, the Earthlings were making sure that he would never get that chance. The trust of Galactus would mean nothing when he was dead, and the beings gathered there did have the power to kill him. Doctor Strange was nearby, as well as Thor, Anna, and Miss Marvel. They had all the muscle they needed to destroy him. In their eyes, there was no greater or lesser good. There was only good or evil, and they couldn't have said more directly that they thought his actions had been evil. The human race had been doomed by the silver surfer, and they were determined not to let him doom anyone else.
"This is the end of it." the surfer realized silently, "I'm no longer the Emissary of Galactus. I'm no one that important, and my final act was to doom a habitable planet, and fight for my life against its people. There's no justifying this."
It was true, of course. The surfer had been doing his job for so long, that he'd never considered the possibility that he might just die one day. He'd been planning for a future that he wasn't guaranteed to have, and a whole world had been cost its life in the process. Suddenly, his struggle to nobly choose the lesser evil had become a futile one. His plans had fallen apart, which was a worse punishment for him than simple death. He was about to die, of course, but worse yet, the planet Earth would die for nothing. It was such a terrible thought that the surfer started to cry.
For a moment, both Anna and Thor stopped where they were, when they saw the real, wet tears emerging from the surfer's silver-colored eyes. Anna wasn't sure what to think when she saw that mighty being crying like that, but Thor clearly knew what he wanted to think of the Silver Surfer.
"No sort of warrior at all." Thor said, just as the surfer was struggling to rise to his feet again, though his board lay motionless on the ground.
"No." the surfer said, as loud as he could without using his power cosmic, though there was pain still ringing in his head, which he was just too sad to even try to heal, "I'm no warrior, even though my power is great. I'm just an emissary, or at least, I was. I'm sure you'll kill me in a few moments, and your world's death will have meant nothing. I despise what you humans have done to your world, and to one another, but I wouldn't have wished such a meaningless end on you."
"Buffoon." Thor muttered, "The end of a man's life hath meaning only to the one who takes it. To the man who dies, there is no meaning. To others, who know nothing of the dying man, there is no meaning. Only to the warrior who takes a man's life is there meaning, because only the warrior finds glory in the kill, especially in battle with a worthy and renowned foe. That is the truth of life and death. Make of it what thou will. The people who thou hast killed will not thank thee for it, nor will the inhabitants of any other land. It is thy responsibility to find meaning in the death that thou hast caused. That is the way of the warrior."
"I don't want to be a warrior!" the surfer exclaimed angrily, looking at Thor with absolute contempt.
"Yet thou dost refuse to live in peace." Thor rebuked him, "Thou dost take the lives of..."
"I've never killed anyone!" the surfer exclaimed angrily, but by then, clouds were starting to fill the night sky.
"Indeed thou hast!" the voice of Thor echoed through the clouds, drowning out the surfer's voice completely, and even, from the looks of things, scaring him a little, "Thy path through the cosmos has been written in blood, armored one. Think not that thy actions have gone unnoticed in the halls of my father Odin. His domain is not an Earthly one alone. For many centuries have I known of the world devourer Galactus, and for many centuries have I known of thee. Thy place in the service of Galactus was unenviable, but thou couldst have left it at any moment, and suffered no repercussions. Why didst thou stay?"
"I don't expect you to understand, barbarian." the surfer replied in loathing, "I did it for the greater good."
"Greater good?" Thor asked, sounding amused by the notion, "There is no such thing as a greater good. In this universe, there doth exist good, and there doth exist evil. Good doth not divide itself into greater and lesser portions. Thy centuries of bloodshed are founded on lies."
"So if a hundred planets die, that's not a more terrible evil than one planet dying?" the surfer demanded to know, "Can you honestly tell me that the life of one planet isn't a fair price to pay for the salvation of hundreds?"
"Thou art treating death as if it were a business." Thor replied in contempt, "Death is a very different sort of thing than gold. It repeats itself, multiplies itself, spawns hurt and misery, and at times, the glory of victory is also born out of that. When a man kills, he must recognize and honor such things. The deaths of mortals, and of planets cannot be traded so easily for one another. In matters of death, no compromise is acceptable; no half-victory reasonable. There is no dishonor in attempting and failing to protect others, but to actively take the side of the enemy in the hopes of saving more lives is different. There is no honor in that. To be knocked off thy feet is honorable. To step aside willingly is not. I say this not as one who knows the people of the Earth well, but merely as a warrior and a sentient being. Thy choices up to this point have been made in error."
"Then I really am a fool." the surfer replied, "I've felt compassion for all living things. I was taught that by the people of my own homeworld, a long time ago. Even so, I allowed myself to think that it was my duty to protect as many people as possible."
"Tis a man's duty not to compromise himself or his honor, and to never participate in something that he knows to be wrong." Thor replied, "All other duties are secondary."
"You may be right," the surfer admitted, "Maybe I can't really stop what Galactus is doing, and maybe minimizing the damage isn't enough... It's a lot to take in. If you don't intend to kill me, I may need some time to think this over before Galactus arrives."
"It may be too late for that." Thor replied sadly, a moment later, as he looked up into the sky, and sure enough, as the surfer started to focus his attention upward, he could feel what Thor was referring to. There was a presence there; just beyond the clouds that were swiftly dissipating from above New York City. With a final flash of lightning, the clouds were broken through, and the shape that emerged through them was unlike anything that the people of that city, or indeed, the people of planet Earth had ever seen before. It was early in the morning; almost three A.M. Eastern time, but people all over the world were being woken up by those who were awake, and soon, everyone on Earth was looking up at the sight that surrounded the Earth, and dominated the sky.
Cold metal and bright beams of light shone down onto every city on Earth. People who only barely believed in God started praying, and even people who didn't believe in the divine were trembling in their shoes at the sight. Then, all over the world, the same voice was heard, echoing through the sky like thunder.
"This is the final day of the planet which these beings call Earth. It will be marked in my records as such."
To be continued...