Chapter Three: Unexpected guests
New York Triskelion:
S.H.I.E.L. D'S Superhuman Response Unit HQ.
Nick rushed through the halls of the Triskelion before reaching Dr. Connors Lab, a squad of S.H.I.E.L.D agents following closely at his side. Undistinguishable sounds came through, alerting the Director and his squad of agents of the commotion going on inside. Nodding to his field captain, Coulson, Fury signaled his agents that they were entering in three… two… one.
The door to the Lab busted open, revealing the last glimpse of Spiderman. Spider-Woman, White Tiger, Power Man, Iron Fist, Venom, and Nova jumping through a swirling vortex towards the middle- back of the room
"What-" the man started, but was quickly cut off when Iron spider spun around, and gave a quick rundown.
"Loki-Taskmaster-and-Beetle-have-the-Siege-Perilous-but-Scarlet-and-Kid-Arachnid-have-the-Tesseract- got-dragged-in-the-portal -we're-gonna-follow-Loki-and-find -Scarlet-and-Miles!"
The words came out in a rush, and Nick didn't understand everything he'd hoped to before Amadeus shouted his goodbye and hopped into the wormhole right before it closed. Nick sighed, shaking his head while looking around what was left of the room. While he was frustrated, and once again forced to wait and hoping on others, he did feel better knowing that Spiderman and his team was after Loki. The kid had a knack for making things work out.
Turning to his men he motioned at the room and the caught henchmen before barking orders. "Clean this mess up. Coulson, call Connors and tell him what happened. And get these idiots into their cells!"
And that's even MORE paperwork for me to do.
"Sir!" a call from one of the agents caused the one-eyed man to turn around.
Noticing the man who called was looking down at something, Furry made his way over observing the floor. "What?"
On the floor surrounded by debris, lay the mysterious young man. The man moaned, his eyes still sealed shut.
"It's the young man sir, he seems to be waking up."
"Go get Connors now, I want a room prepared for him, he may still need medical support."
Nodding, the young agent stood from his crouching position, saluted and ran out.
Turning back to the you man Furry crouched, but as he turned to call for a stretcher, a movement and a loud groan caught his attention.
"Ow…" The red-haired man mumbled, pushing himself into a sitting position. He sighed before looking up, green eyes meeting a single narrowed black orb. He gave a start looking around in bewilderment.
"Who are you?" Furry question, looking intently at the boy. "How did you get here?"
The guy swallowed, trying to find his voice and get used to talking after staying silent for so long.
"What… Who-Where am I?
Earth Sixteen, The Watchtower:
The Justice League HQ. Seven minutes prior
"No. No no no no no no no. That's against the rules. Bart! You can't just place a settlement there ése!" Jaime Reyes protested crossing his arms over his chest glaring at his friend.
Bart Allen grinned sheepishly as he placed a settlement only one corner away from Jaime's. Usually you had to place it two corners away, as was the rules for The Settlers of Catan, the game they were playing.
"But I need the ore." Bart explained, still getting a glare from his best friend.
Bart, who was the new Kid Flash, previously called Impulse, Jamie, Garfield Logan a.k.a Beast boy, Cassandra or Wondergirl, and Lagoon Boy-also known as his Atlantean name, La'gann-were all hanging out at the watchtower. The rest of their team were either on a mission, at work, taking the day off, or doing something else, since they had a life.
But these five young heroes were bored and had nothing to do with their day. That left them playing games, eating, watching movies, eating, and waiting for something exciting to happen. And eating, but that was mostly Bart.
Since Jaime was the only one with an actual home and didn't live at the watchtower (since The Cave blew up), the teens couldn't do much. They were waiting for one of the older YJ members or a JLA member to supervise them spare. In the meantime, Settlers of Catan was the only board game they hadn't played twice.
"Yeah, Bart, that's cheating." Garfield put in, throwing Jaime out of his thoughts.
"Well, where I come from, we call that-"
"-scavenging, we know." Cassandra, or Cassie for short finished.
"Yeah. Exactly." Bart nodded triumphantly.
"That's still cheating." Jaime argued.
Bart groaned before moving his settlement another corner. "You guys are so boring."
"No," Cassie sighed. "We're just bored."
"Yeah, when is The Cave accessible?" Garfield wondered.
Jaime let a sigh escape, while slumping on the coach. "Aqualad's team's been gone all day, when are they gonna get back?"
"What I'm wondering is how long the Leaguers are gonna take in their mini-meeting. Superman said we could go see the new Cave after they finish." Cassie put in.
Just then, La'gann walked in, he had been in the showers after training with Black Canary before she went to the mini JLA meeting.
"Oh hey La'gann." Garfield called, rolling the die.
La'gann nodded back, replying with a 'hello' to the four other teens.
He was wearing the usual, but the others were currently wearing casual civi-clothes, except Cassie and Gar. He walked over and sat on the couch next to the green monkey boy.
"Whatcha playin'?" He asked in a bored tone.
"Settlers of Catan." Cassie replied absentmindedly as she traded a lumber card for a wheat card with Gar.
"When are we going to go see the cave?" La'gann asked.
"When the Leaguers finish they're meeting." Jaime replied in a monotone, slumping further down the couch then before.
"And everyone's out on a mission?"
"Or doing something with their life." Bart answered.
"So basically, there's nothing for us to do." The Atlantean concluded.
"Yuuup. We're living the normal life of a teenager. Speaking of which, Jaime, why aren't you with your family?" Cassie inquired.
"They're out of town with my sister, I think they went for my sister's sports tournament." Jaime responded, slumping again down the couch.
"Why didn't you go too?" Garfield wondered.
"I didn't need to, also I have school and my mom didn't want me to fall behind." Jaime spoke with a slight Spanish accent, almost too soft to notice. He ran his hand through his short-cropped hair and sighed.
"So what are you doing here if you have your-"
A loud thud made everyone jump. Jaime had slumped so far down couch that he had fallen off, landing on his rear. Very elegantly.
"A-a-a-owwwww!" Moaned the latino teen.
"That's just pathetic." La'gann commented. As Cassie leaned back in her seat with a sigh and a chuckle.
"We haven't done anything exciting in a while. I mean I'm glad we don't have a world crisis with aliens invading, but can't we have something to do?" Jaime complained.
Jaime didn't know how much he was going to miss doing nothing for a long time. The moment the words left his lips, the alarm went off, along with the computer blaring "Intruder alert" every five seconds.
The five teens automatically suited up-which didn't take long- and started to run towards the main room, preparing for orders from the League.
Instead all they got was a wormhole that suddenly opened up out of nowhere, and three figures tumbling out of midair.
Nothing exciting going on over there at all.
One of the three was yelling at the top of his lungs like a madman. Or a very mad man.
"-I BLAME YOU FOR THIS!"
"Well. Got your wish." Garfield said flatly, looking at Jamie.
Ben screamed the entire time they fell through the wormhole. Though it was more of a very-manly-very-long-cry-of-shock, as he liked to think. Which it wasn't.
Going through the wormhole was a strange experience. It made him dizzy and sick, it was almost like falling through a cloud, with what looked like a nebula of colors swirling around them.
The Tesseract, which had gotten sucked in with them, was falling down after them, but the boys seemed to have forgotten.
If Miles hadn't been hanging on to Ben and guiding him, they probably would have been separated, splitting up into the unknown.
"MILES!" Ben shouted at the top of his lungs.
"YEAH?" Miles yelled back.
"I JUST WANTED TO TELL YOU…!"
"YEAH?"
"I BLAME YOU FOR THIS!"
The duo was promptly dumped-Ben found that the appropriate word to describe their landing-on cold grey metal. The minute they hit the floor, the wormhole closed behind them, leaving them stranded, and the Tesseract clinked to the floor rolling to the side, forgotten.
Wherever they were, there was a loud alarm going off, with a computer automated voice saying there were intruders. That was them, Ben guessed.
"Owwwww…." Miles sat up and rubbed his head looking around for Ben. "Scarlet?"
"Yeah…" Came the struggled reply.
Miles looked briefly around for his older friend, then noticed that he landed atop the other spider.
"Erm… You okay?"
"No … hey punk." Ben gasped.
"Um Yeah?"
"GET OFF!"
"Oh, right!"
Miles jumped up, grasping Scarlets hand, pulling him up. When Miles was half way pulling Ben to his feet, he heard an uncertain voice to the left of him. Both Miles and Ben looked over and froze.
"Well…That just happened."
The girl who spoke had a slender yet muscular build with blue eyes and her blonde hair was kept behind a black headband, reaching down her back. She wore a red shirt with a 'W' across the front with red sweatpants and blue shoes.
The guy next to her reminded Miles of Triton, they both looked kinda like a fish, but this guy had black stripes on his shoulder, forearms, and calves, along with two tattoos on either shoulder.
In front of the group of strangers was another guy. He wore a suit identical to that of the strange man back home. With a start, Miles realized he looked like mystery man.
Next to the Speedy look alike, was a third dude. His costume was different, it resembled a beetle in blue and black full-body armor suit.
Another Beetle? Just great. Miles commented to himself.
The last individual looked like… a monkey. His skin was a pale green-along with his eyes, and dark green hair. He had a simian-like form, with dark green fur down his arms and legs, and a prehensile monkey tail.
The team, Miles supposed, was just around his age, or a little older. And both him and Ben stood staring back at the five other teens.
After a few moments of observing the other, the Fish-like boy looked up at Ben and Miles with a hard look. "Who are you? How did you get here?"
"Who are you?" Scarlets guarded voice rang loud and cold, taking to a defensive stance.
The Triton-looking guy stepped forward, fists curling up. "We'll be asking the questions."
Swallowing hard, Miles glanced at the other teens, noticing how they observed the Web Warriors closely.
"Scarlet, we should-"
"Well then, Fishsticks, I don't hear you asking."
Miles sighed; this is gonna get ugly real soon. I could practically cut the tension in this room with a knife.
"Fishsticks? Did you just call me Fishsticks?" Fish Boy asked incredulously.
Ben rolled his eyes at the question, of course I just did you dimwit. "Are you deaf? Or are you just stupid?"
Ben knew that provoking the strangers in front of him wasn't going to help the situation. But the pent-up frustrations and emotions from betraying and losing the trust of his friends, as well as the guilt and anger that went with being used by Doc Ock began to fester, bubbling to the surface after so long of being pushed down.
"What?" Too easily provoked, the fish guy stepped forward, only to be held back by the blonde girl next to him.
"Lagoon, don't fall for his taunts." Turning to Miles and Ben with narrowed eyes, she began to question their appearance. "Why don't we all cool off, all we want to know is why-"
Miles froze, watching as the all too curious monkey-boy reaching for the Tesseract.
"Ai, Shit!" Without a second's hesitation, Miles sprung, tackling the green kid away from the glowing square.
Surprised the monkey-kid shoved Miles off, jumping up ready to fight. "Hey!"
"What the-Stand down!" The blonde lady growled, thrusting her arm out.
"No no no no, you don't understand. If-"
Too late.
The girl didn't wait for him to finish, at a speed faster than normal, she rounded on him with a punch to the stomach, sending him flying across the room. All of a sudden Miles hit something hard, knocking the breath from his lungs. It felt like steel, but when he turned around, he saw a man with his arms crossed and a raised eyebrow.
"Kid!" Scarlet growled, taking a step forward with gritted teeth, preparing to fight back.
"Well, looks like we have some unexpected guests."
Miles gulped.
Why did it always go like this?
