3
"Daredevil, hey, good to see you buddy," Spider-Man stumbled, one hand rubbing the back of his neck. "Listen, about the Lizard there, I didn't want him to come to the Kitchen, we were following him in the sewers and he just came out here."
The crimson clad vigilante cocked his head towards Bobby and Kitty. "Who are these two?"
"We're X-Men," Bobby said proudly, though inside part of him was terrified of what this newcomer might do. What little he had heard about Daredevil painted him as a boogeyman, a creature that prowled the streets of New York that was merciless to his enemies. A drop of sweat dripped off Bobby's brow.
The cowled man gave the faintest hint of a smile in one corner of his mouth as he twirled the club once, resting it on his shoulder. His eyes were covered by dark lenses that matched the rest of his outfit, making it impossible to see where he was looking, or get an accurate hint at what he was thinking. But his head was turned towards the mutants, as if trying to get a sense of who they were.
"We're not here to cause trouble, if that's what you're thinking" Kitty asked, her voice not nearly as strong as Bobby's.
"And yet here you are chasing a villain through my streets. Your attacks have been erratic and irresponsible, having little effect on your opponent but causing a great deal of damage to the surrounding area. You are lucky that you didn't injure an innocent bystander."
"Look, lay off 'em Horns," Spidey spoke up. "It's my rogue, they're just trying to help. And now that you've taken care of him, we can get him locked up and return—"
"Don't be so sure," the Devil said, and he struck out to his side with the billy club. The Lizard had suddenly sprung back to life and pounced, only to have the club connect with the side of his head. He spun out to his right, his tail sweeping through the heroes. Spider-Man was able to detect the flailing attack and jumped over the tail, but the two mutants beside him had just enough time to notice Spidey leaping before the scaled clothesline hit them both in the small of the back, knocking them forward into Daredevil. The three of them tumbled to the ground, fortunately missing the tail's backswing as the Lizard tried to banish the pain in his head.
Spidey hit the Lizard with two web lines while still in the air, using them to pull himself into a drop kick. But before he could bounce away safely the big man backhanded him away. He landed with a crash into Bobby, knocking the other teen off his knees and back to the ground on top of the other two. The Lizard, hissing out a laugh, grabbed the discarded Neogenic Recombinator from where he had left it leaning against a building and darted across the alley to an inset door. Kicking hit down, he ducked into the building.
"I have to say," said Spidey, winded and laid out on his back on top of Bobby and Kitty, "this is a bit embarrassing."
"Agreed, get off of me," said Daredevil from the bottom of the pile. The other three scrambled to get out of the man's way. He quickly pulled himself back to his feet and stared at the building the Lizard had ran into. After a moment he spoke. "He's on the third floor, he's broken into an apartment on the far side and is taking hostages. We need to resolve this situation fast."
"How do you know that? Do you have x-ray vision or something?" Bobby asked, his fascination overwhelming any sense of skepticism he might have had.
Daredevil ignored him, continuing to focus on the building. "He is threatening to use that device. We don't have much time."
"I have an idea," Kitty said to them.
She quickly explained her idea and they agreed it would ensure the least amount of risk to the hostages. Bobby went into the building through the door the Lizard had entered while Spider-Man began to crawl up the wall, using quick shots of web line to pull himself quickly up to the roof. Kitty remained with Daredevil for the moment.
Twisting the bottom, the horn-masked man caused three metal grips to snap out of the top of the billy club. Pointing it towards an open window of the third floor, the end of the spring loaded club fired into the air and the grapple caught perfectly on the inside of the window sill. Tugging once, the line pulled taut and then began retracting at rapid speed, propelling him up to the window. As his feet left the ground he hooked his left arm around Kitty, pulling her with him. The approached the third story and lifting his arm he threw the thin girl higher in the air. She phased through the side of the building, landing a floor higher than Daredevil. His ascent finished and he slipped into the window head first, detaching the hook from the wood as he came forward into a roll on the hallway floor and snapped it back into the club.
He finished his roll in a crouch, his hands twisting once again to separate the long metal rod into two smaller clubs connected by the thin steel cable of the grapple. Springing into a light run, he ran past the broken door to the stairway Lizard had taken up to this floor and came to the last room along this hall, its door also broken off its hinges. He leaned up against the wall next to the apartment entrance and listen intently.
Though he had informed Spider-Man of his abilities, the two mutants did not know that he could perceive sound as sight, a powerful sonar-like ability that along with vastly enhanced senses of smell and touch allowed him to observe the world around him without the barriers of walls or other obstacles. Using the sound coming from the apartment ahead of him, he could hear the Lizard harassing several people.
"What do you want, leave us alone!" a woman with a Hispanic accent said. He could see the woman huddled in the corner of the room, standing between the Lizard and two small children.
The Lizard lowered the Neogentic Recombinator from where he had slung it to his shoulder and pointed it at the woman. "You will be the firssst to join my new order!" He began to reach for the activation controls.
Dropping his right arm at the elbow, Daredevil hit a metal heating vent with the right half of his split club. The aluminum rod sent a clanging noise reverberating through the hallway as well as the ventilation system. From the echo, he could see Iceman preparing down below. Kitty was in position on the floor above, and crawling into place outside the third floor apartment window was Spider-Man.
In the apartment, the Lizard froze at the sound, his eyes darting in every direction to find the source of the noise. The woman simply smiled at him as a second ring of metal tolled through the building. "The Devil comes for you beast, as he does for all who sin in Hell's Kitchen."
With one last strike, as both a signal and a final way to get the clearest picture of the scene possible, Daredevil ducked around the doorframe into the room. He stayed low to the ground, dodging underneath the beam of energy that erupted from the end of the stolen device wielded by the Lizard. The shot tore through the wall of the apartment, sending splinters in every direction and catching parts of the wallpaper on fire. One of the kids, a little girl, screamed. The mother wrapped her arms around them and held them close to her as they ducked down on the ground. Continuing the momentum of his turn into the room, Daredevil slung the right hand side of the club in mid spin towards the firing villain. It arched around the Lizard's legs, the metal cable wrapping around his scaled ankles and locking into places as the baton twisted itself around the line it was attached to. Gripping the end he still held with both hands, the Devil yanked hard, pulling the Lizard off balance and tumbling onto his back. A second beam shot from the Recombinator, this one firing wildly through the top of the doorway wall and continuing upwards, parts of the ceiling shattering or combusting as his arms instinctively rose in a vain and almost comical attempt to regain his balance.
"Now Lizard, if you aren't going to play nice with your toys we're just going to take them away," came a jibe from the window as Spider-Man snagged the Recombinator with a web and pulled it out of the Lizard's hands. He dropped out of site as soon as he had a hold on it.
As the Lizard crashed onto his back, Kitty fell out of ceiling and landed on top of him. With a grin she grabbed onto the shoulders of the villain and phased the two of them through the floor. They fell through the apartment below and into a dark laundry room on the first floor. As they made the long drop from the high ceiling to the floor below, Kitty brought her knees up and used them to kick off the chest of the body under her. With an arching, graceful flip she spun backwards and phased through a row of dryers, allowing the complexity of the parts she had to phase through slow her down until she stopped waist deep through the floor. Using her powers she rose out of the machines and floor to step gently onto the ground. The Lizard, who had unphased as Kitty retracted her touch, crashed through a folding table and landed with a thud on the floor.
Bobby rushed into the room from where he had stood in the doorway and began to form an ice block around the dazed reptile. For once since this misadventure had begun, the ice was not knocked away and the two mutants watched as the cold slowed the Lizard down. With a slump of his shoulders, Bobby let out a sigh of relief as Kitty grinned at him from the other side of the ice.
"Gotta say, glad your plan worked 'cat. Chasing this guy all over the city was getting old."
"Not exactly the date we planned huh?" she said.
"Nope. I don't mind the hero part though," he started.
"Naturally."
"But next date let's avoid the sewer."
"Totally."
"So now what?"
"Wait for Spidey, he said he could find a way to change Doctor Connors back."
"When did he say that? I don't remember that."
Kitty rolled her eyes. "Back in the sewer, how did you not hear that, you were standing right there, staring right at him."
"Must have missed that part. Of course you didn't tough," he said sarcastically.
"Huh? What's that supposed to mean?" she asked, her face scrunched up in confusion.
Bobby couldn't help but smile. Kitty was adorable when confused, and being as smart as she was, he didn't get to see that look to often. "Nothing, don't worry about it," he said shaking his head.
She held the confused look a moment longer and then opened her mouth in astonishment. "Bobby Drake, are you jealous!"
"What!" he looked incredulous. "No, of course not! What's there to be jealous of?" he added, trying to cover it as best as he could.
She saw right though it. "Well, he's super smart, agile, fantastic body, he's funny, do I need to continue?"
"I hate you sometimes."
"Uh huh, sure you do. Okay, so maybe I've flirted a little, but it's not every day that... Bobby, the ice!"
He glanced down and saw it too. Little cracks were forming on the ice, and the unfrozen head of the Lizard was beginning to move slightly.
"Holy crap!" Bobby exclaimed.
"This doesn't make any sense, he shouldn't be able to react like this!"
"Is he part Logan or something?" Bobby said as he began to send streams of cold into the forming cracks, sealing them up as quickly as they appeared and piling more ice onto him.. Somewhere underneath the frozen form, near the tail, they heard a large crack. "We need to get Spidey down here now with his magic cure."
"Right, I'm—"
Another ground shuddering crack echoed and they realized too late that it wasn't the ice cracking, it was the floor. The extra weight of the Lizard and ice was too much for the old tile and wood to take, and with a third crack the frozen body and a screaming Kitty fell into the darkness below. There was a crash, the sound of ice shattering, then silence.
Bobby ran to the edge of the hole and looked down. He couldn't see much. With little light streaming in from the dim laundry room, and seemingly no windows in the basement, he couldn't even see how far down the ground was.
"Kitty!" he called out, scanning the blackness for any sign of movement.
"Ugh," came an almost disappointed moan from down below. "I'm okay, phased to break the fall. This really sucks."
"Do you see Lizard?'
"I can barely see my own hand. I have no clue if – AHHH!"
"Kitty!" Bobby yelled out, diving into the hole and ice sliding to the ground. He hit the unseen floor at a sharp angle, stumbling into a roll and into a crouched defensive stance in his ice form. Once again thankful for his ability to both goof off and still pay attention during Logan's training sessions, he was somewhat used to fighting blinded. He calmed his breathing and attempted to ignore the rapid beating of his heart, focusing instead on sounds of the basement, taking in the dripping sound of melting ice, the creak of the broken wood above, and searching for anything that might alert him to danger.
Even training and alertness didn't prepare him from the swiftness of the attack to his back. Claws dug into his icy form, ripping long gashes from his right shoulder blade down to his left side. He cried out, more in surprise than pain, as he fell forward to the ground. Pain was a curious sensation when he was in his ice form; it was painful, yes, but detached as if he felt it happening from a great distance. Ignoring the burning sensation coming from his back, he rolled over to see the Lizard's outline standing in the dim halo of light shining from the gaping hole above them. He could see bits of ice dangling off of the tattered lab coat,
"You will not ssstop me," he hissed. "I will form my army of lizards to conquer the humans. We will show you who is sstrongessst."
Wincing, Bobby began to sit up. "And how do you plan on doing that without your gun?"
"I will get it back!" he said, kicking Bobby in the face. The teen fell back down, hitting his frozen head on the hard cement. It didn't crack, but it hurt worse then the claws and he instinctively brought his hand up to hold it. The Lizard walked out of the circle of light to stand over the X-Man, raising his foot to stomp down.
"Hey, what the? I thought you phased through things Kitty," Bobby heard above him through the hole in the floor and ringing in his head. The Lizard froze, turning his head back to the gap in the floorboards. The lips of his long snout pulled back to reveal his jagged teeth as he darted away from Bobby, scaling up the backside of the ice slide that lead down to the basement and latching onto the underside of the ceiling just inches from the opening. Bobby tried to call out in warning, but his head hurt too much to make more than a concerned, but quiet, groan.
Spider-Man had continued to talk as he crossed the room, appearing at the edge of the broken wood and peering down, the Recombinator lashed to his back with a strap made of webbing. "I don't want to know what naughty things you two crazy kids are doing down there, but since the building's on fire you might want to hurry up. DD and I got everyone else out through and it's only the top floors so far, so we have some—"
He suddenly pulled his right shoulder back as the Lizard swung himself out from under the floor and pounced at Spider-Man. He missed the web-strewn hero with the missile like kick, but as his momentum pulled him forward into the upper room he snagged the device on Spidey's back with a clawed hand, ripping through the webbing and pulling the Recombinator free. He turned the metal casing back towards Spider-Man, who was still reeling off balance from the dodge, and caught him in the face. Spidey flew into the side of a washing machine.
The Lizard grinned into the hole, waving the machine. "Gotssss it back!" he taunted Iceman, who was propelling himself from the basement on a column of ice.
"Not for long Lizard Breathe, I've got a ton of ice with your name on it!" He stretched out one of his hands towards the quickly approaching enemy and prepared to send a volley of ice shards at him. But suddenly there was a noise behind him.
"Oops, guess I phased too far. Hello?"
Bobby turned to the sound of Kitty's voice, ready to warn her to watch out, when he felt a sharp pain in his arm and he fell tumbling down the ice structure he had just made, landing in a heap at Kitty's feet. She screamed and ran to him, rolling him over as he tried to stand up.
Meanwhile, the ice Bobby had been firing hit their mark, pelting the snout and chest of the Lizard and sending the scaled monster onto his back. The still smoking Recombinator flew from his hands, spinning in the air once before a webline stuck to its side and it was pulled back into the waiting arms of Spider-Man. Lizard flipped to his haunches, ready to charge when the sound of sirens hit his ears. Added to that was the red clad devil that had just stepped into the room. Knowing that any fight would eventually leave him captured, he decided to cut his losses and escape. He scrambled to the side of the room, breaking a boarded up window and darting into an alley behind the burning building.
As Daredevil followed the Lizard, Spidey ran to the hole to check on the two mutants. "You guys all right down there? Need help getting out?"
He stepped back in surprise as Kitty phased out of the top of Bobby's pillar of ice, the translucent mutant hanging off of her with his left arm draped around her shoulders. They floated in air for a moment before coming to rest on the tile floor of the laundry room. Once they hit solid ground Bobby let go of Kitty, getting his balance as he rubbed his right shoulder.
"What happened? He didn't actually hit you with this, did he?" Spidey said, lifting the Recombinator to emphasize his point.
"Yeah, stings like hell, that thing's hot," Bobby said.
Spidey leaned in real close, taking a close look at the blackened area on Bobby's frozen form. "This thing's configured with Lizard's DNA. But you're not changing so I guess that's a good thing."
"Changing?"
"Yeah, it's pretty instantaneous, so I think you'll be fine. Maybe 'cause you're a mutant or because your all walking block of ice on us right now. Either way, something would have happened by now."
"Great, remind me never to come to the city again," Bobby said, turning to Kitty.
"Tell me about it, it's been an interesting day."
Daredevil poked his head through the window. "The Lizard has escaped, and the fire department is here. There is nothing more we can do here."
They all left through the window, using their various abilities to get up the building on the other side of the alley, and heading several buildings away from the blaze. They settled under the shade of a water tower and Daredevil turned to them. "If a villain enters Hell's Kitchen again, allow me to handle him. There has been enough damage done today from your interference."
Bobby stared at the masked man. "You were with us when he got away, don't go blaming this all on us."
"At lease we got the Neogenic Recombinator away from him," Kitty said, hoping to placaite the two.
"She's right, he might be dangerous, but he's a lot safer without this thing," Spidey added.
"And I thank you for that assistance. But I tell you again, stay out of Hell's Kitchen." He turned to the edge of the building, firing the grappling hook from the end of his billy club and swinging off the building.
"Well he's pleasant," Bobby said, crossing his arms and watching Daredevil leave. Only when the vigilante had dropped out of site did Bobby begin to unice.
"He has a lovely singing voice though, you should hear during the holidays," Spidey said, sitting down to fiddle with the device.
"What are you doing?" Kitty asked, joining him.
"Trying to see if I can reconfigure this to turn Doc back to his happy go lucky human self. Problem is I don't know much about this. I should probably get it back to my lab and take a look."
"Your lab? You have your own lab?" Kitty asked in awe.
"Oh yeah, it's pretty high tech, nothing but the best. Well, if you consider a desk in a basement the best that is. But I have I have some tools and the Internet and there's nothing you can't find with a little googling."
"Cool, need some help?"
"Probably, but, secret identity and all, best if I keep it."
"Oh," Kitty answered, dejection clearly audible in her voice. "I understand."
"Actually," Bobby said from the edge of the roof. "I think you might have to take us."
They lifted their heads to look up at him. He was standing facing them, his arms outstretched, his eyes opened a wide. His left arm was fine, the sleeve of the t-shirt he wore a little torn and his skin scratched a bit on his bicep, but the rest of the arm was its normal, lightly tanned flesh colored. In fact, aside from a few scratches and holes in his clothes, Bobby looked fine and like a normal teenager. But starting halfway on the right side of his chest, up his shoulder and down his entire arm, Bobby was made of ice.
"It won't change back," he said, with a sheepish, worried grin.
They just stared at him for a full minute before Spider-Man spoke at last.
"Well that's not good."