Disclaimer: I do not own Sky High or its characters, settings etc, all of which belong to Disney.
A/N: If this was a TV series I'd start this 'episode' with a "Previously On" from Phoenix Emergent, from the end of chapter 1 and beginning of chapter 2. So if you haven't read those bits recently, I recommend that you go back and re-read them.
Chapter 5: Cold-Fire and Phoenix Rising
It was a good thing Ethan had been foresighted – or paranoid – enough to get Zach to bring the van to the wedding, complete with all their uniforms and equipment.
Despite the fact that everyone was dressed in fancy clothes, they still managed to gear up in their usual time and they were on their way back to Maxville in the van in a few minutes. Their first problem was how to locate the super villain, considering they didn't have a ransom phone call to trace this time, and the second was how to deal with him without a having repeat of their last experience.
Magenta had a solution for the first one. "Look at how the rainstorms are in a circle around the blizzard," she said, pointing to the weather satellite image on her screen. "He can always be found at the very center of the weather formations he's creating."
"Which is where, exactly?" asked Will.
Maj zoomed in on the image and pointed. "The multi-storey parking garage next to the Max Mall."
"Are you sure it's not the Mall itself?"
"No, this satellite imagery and the calculations are really accurate."
"Wait a minute, who says he's always at the center of the storm?" Ethan wanted to know, sharing a confused glance with the others. They'd all read the file on the weather villain, after all.
"The NCS's private file on him has a lot more info than the one that they distributed, as per usual." Like many top secret government organizations, the National Council of Superheroes operated on a strictly need-to-know basis, which meant that they often withheld information apparently in the interests of national security.
'Aren't those files, like, über top secret?' commented Zach from the cab where he was driving the van.
Magenta just looked smug, an expression that was totally lost on her boyfriend considering he couldn't see her.
"Any other useful information the NCS didn't see fit to share with us?" Kate asked.
Maj looked even more pleased with herself. "Apparently he's mortally terrified of fire."
"Why? He can just extinguish it with a rainstorm," said Ethan.
"Not Sparky's little pets," Warren pointed out, referring to Kate's flame constructs in his usual style. "We found out last time they're waterproof, remember?"
"That might also explain why Weatherman left so suddenly that time, even though he really seemed to have the upper hand," put in Will.
"So basically our plan is to keep Kate warm enough to power up, right?" said Layla.
"I'm also going to need to know exactly where he is in that huge parking garage," the pyro-constructor replied, "It's not like I can use a flame construct to be my virtual 'eyes' to search for him, and it could take hours for the constructs to find him on their own."
"The city could be half destroyed by floods by then so we really don't have that long," Ethan stated.
Warren added, "Plus, if this is going to work, we're gonna need the element of surprise. If he sees a swarm of little fire dragons buzzing around, he might just disappear like he did last time before we can get to him."
"So, there's nothing else for it – we're going to have to go in there and find him." Will looked at each of them in turn, silently urging them to be careful, "Okay people, let's go find a parking space next to the Mall."
Will, Layla and Warren were cold, wet and tired, but at least they weren't frozen. For some reason, Weatherman had ceased the blizzard as soon as he seemed to realize he had their attention. Instead he appeared to be trying to drown them, and any civilians who happened to be around, with small cloudbursts every minute or so as they searched the parking garage.
"Okay, next upgrade on the sunglasses, make sure they have windscreen wipers," said Will, trying to wipe his lenses with his gloved hands yet again. It's a little difficult locating super villains – or anyone – when your glasses are wet.
'Copy, Blue Leader,' responded Zach who had evidently been watching too much Star Wars recently. The van was parked on the lowest level of the parking garage. There were 15 storeys in total, seven above ground and the rest underground.
Five levels down from Will, Warren smirked at the conversation he overheard on the comm, and pushed his damp hair out of his eyes with one hand. In the other hand he held his Zippo, ready to light up the moment he saw any sign of his quarry. He'd soon found out it was pointless even trying to continually absorb fire from it, because every time he got hit with the freezing cold rain, any heat he possessed just dissipated. And there wasn't enough fire in a cigarette lighter to raise his temperature enough to power up.
He saw a group of civilians trying to outrun a whirlwind which was fortunately not strong enough to hurt them seriously, just enough to blow them around a bit and lift the girls' skirts, which probably suggested something about Weatherman's sense of humor. It seemed out of character, though, that the villain was more keen on irritating people than seriously threatening them.
Warren went around a corner and a sudden burst of rain knocked him off his feet. Picking himself up with a groan, he muttered a few things that would have caused Layla to string him up in those fire-proof vines she kept trying to grow, if she'd been able to understand Chinese.
'He's using the security cameras to see where you guys are!' realized Magenta, who had tapped into the parking garage's security system in the hope of finding the villain. 'As soon as you appeared on U1-F28 he got you.'
Warren glanced briefly at the nearest surveillance camera out of the corner of his eye. "Great, so can you do something about his all-seeing eye?"
'Already done it,' answered Maj. 'I've jammed his signal so he's completely blind now.'
"Thanks, R2-D2."
Layla found Weatherman a few moments later. Based on what Magenta had said earlier, she'd searched the exact middle of the top three levels of the parking garage. The weather villain was sitting in his car on the highest level, strategically parked where the driver's seat was hidden from the security cameras. Through his open window, she could see him typing furiously on his laptop, probably trying to find out what had happened to his video signal that Magenta had just scrambled.
Now it was Kate's turn. She threw off the Mylar space blanket from the first aid kit that had been Ethan's idea of making sure she was warm enough to use her powers. Carefully keeping clear of Zach, Maj, Ethan and the equipment, she created a flame construct and gave it instructions where to go and what to do.
The little firey dragon arrived on the top level a minute later, and Layla could see Weatherman was still busy trying to fix his surveillance problems. So it came as quite a shock to him when a burst of fire suddenly flew right through the open window into his car. He screamed, and when he couldn't extinguish it with a miniature rainstorm inside the car, he went into a complete panic.
Layla saw him struggling with the door handle while the construct continued to harass him. He finally managed to get the car door open, and she ducked behind the pillar she was standing next to and slid down to the floor with her back against the concrete. On the security camera footage that Zach had routed to her heads-up display, Layla could see Kate's construct herding the villain towards her pillar. He was trying frantically to freeze it with an ice storm around himself, but it had no effect.
Layla took out a neutralizing bracelet and waited with it ready in her hand. In its 'dormant' state the neutralizer looked like a thin straight strip of silvery metal. As Weatherman neared the pillar, Layla held out the neutralizer horizontally a few inches from the floor, hoping he would be too distracted by the pursuing fire creature to notice. The moment the villain's leg touched the neutralizing bracelet, it automatically wrapped around his ankle and snapped shut. The ice storm around him disappeared.
'Good job, Dryad, he's neutralized,' reported Maj who could see from the satellite photo that the villain's weather formations were evaporating.
Layla left the construct to guard Weatherman, who was screaming even more now that he was entirely unable to defend himself from it. She made her way downstairs to join the others, knowing there wasn't anything else she could do here.
She crossed paths with Will who was going up to take care of the villain. He squeezed her shoulder and grumbled good-naturedly about not being able to fly and needing to take the long way up the stairs. She gave a tired smile which gave way to confusion when it suddenly became clear that their day wasn't over yet.
Pure white flames had appeared in long narrow strips that were winding their way around the parking garage. Some of the fire was quite close to them, but there was no heat coming from it. If anything it seemed to be cold. There was a trail of frost wherever the flames had touched the pillars, instead of the scorch marks they would expect.
The strange walls of fire were all over the parking garage, reaching all the way to the ceiling in most places. On the ground floor, Warren stretched out a cautious hand to the white flame. As soon as he touched it he jerked his hand back with a hiss of pain. He inspected his fingers which had a light dusting of frost on them, and realized that he knew what they were dealing with, something he'd heard of but none of them had ever come across.
He announced grimly, "It's cold-fire."
There was a chorus of 'What?' on the comm.
Ethan launched into an explanation. "I can't really go into detail right now, but cold-fire has very similar properties to normal fire except that the flames are extremely cold, as the name suggests."
Kate was confused. "I don't understand. White flames are usually the hottest."
"Yes, but super-powers have a tendency to disregard the laws of physics," he replied. "The bottom line is you get severe frostbite if you touch it, only it feels like its burning. It's even worse than dry ice, and it can definitely kill you. The Kevlar won't be able to protect you much either."
Meanwhile Magenta had been searching her database. "Arctic Flame!" she exclaimed as she realized who the most likely culprit was.
'I thought she was in the Ultra-Max,' commented Layla. Like the others, she'd heard of the notorious super-villainess even though she didn't know anything about her powers.
"She got paroled last month," replied Maj, fingers still at work on her keyboard. "They've been keeping really close tabs on her … oh. Until two days ago."
'I suppose it would have been too embarrassing for them to let us know they'd lost her,' Warren put in sarcastically.
"Dude, she's got, like, civilians in her web as well." Zach could see from the surveillance footage that there were walls of cold-fire surrounding citizens in the parking garage and even in the Mall.
Will quickly found out that he couldn't fly yet. His strength couldn't do much damage against fire of any kind unless he could smother it, and a short experiment showed that his invulnerability would only protect him from the cold-fire to a certain extent. Layla, however, was completely vulnerable and it didn't help that the white firewalls kept moving and changing, creating safe passages and then closing them up again.
Kate got out of the van and created a flame construct which she flew towards the nearest cold-fire barrier. When the little fire dragon connected with the white flames it lost its coherent shape and deteriorated into sparks. Kate yelled in pain and collapsed onto the floor, clutching her temples, while the others could have sworn they heard the sound of a woman laughing coming from the white fire.
Ethan helped her up to a sitting position as the pain eased slightly.
"Let me try sending one into the cold-fire on autopilot rather," she whispered between gasping breaths. But she soon found that she couldn't create a construct in her current state, not even a handful of sparks.
Ethan reported this to the others, adding that Kate was otherwise mostly okay.
'Can any of us even fight her the way we are at the moment?' asked Will. He was understandably concerned about his girlfriend, but he forced himself to focus on the bigger problem at hand.
Kate spoke up weakly, "Knight-Fire can still…"
'No, I can't,' replied the pyro. 'My lighter's gone.' He realized he must have dropped it the last time Weatherman rained on him.
Magenta looked at the monitor screen that showed their homing beacons. "It's one floor below you, near one of the pillars that reads F28," she told him.
'Thanks, R2. I'll try to get there.'
'If you can,' put in Layla, concerned. 'I think she's trying to turn us into lab rats in a maze.'
Warren wasn't far from where Maj told him he would find his lighter, but the white firewalls kept changing and trying to force him away from his goal. He was getting annoyed, but he knew better than to let the super villainess know that. There was some compensation in the hope that this little game might go on long enough for him to be able to warm up enough to power up. Not that he was sure what he'd be able to do, even if he got his pyrokinetic powers or his lighter back, considering that ordinary fire didn't seem to dent the white flames. Nor was he sure whether he'd be able to absorb the cold-fire even at his normal temperature.
Suddenly a woman's voice seemed to come out of the fire. "Are you enjoying my labyrinth, Knight-Fire?"
"What do you want?" he asked.
"The criminal underworld has placed a price on your head." Her voice seemed to ripple with the flames, passing along the firewall next to him as he moved.
"And that makes me different from any other hero, how?"
"It's a hell of a price. I could retire on what they're offering."
"Dead-or-alive, huh?"
Her voice sounded amused as he reached another dead end. "Oh, they want you alive, probably so they can have the pleasure of killing you themselves. I don't know what you've been up to the past 10 years I was inside, but you've definitely annoyed the Battle Clan."
"Speaking of you being in jail," Warren replied, "Don't you think this stunt counts as violating your parole?"
"Go ahead, arrest me," mocked the voice. "You don't even know where I am. And we both know you're too cold to use your powers now; that's what I hired Weatherman for."
Warren realized that could explain why Weatherman had stopped the blizzard – he was getting paid to make them cold, not dead.
Arctic Flame continued, "You know, it's a pity you didn't inherit anything from poor dear Zoë – I expect that's because her powers were too similar to your father's. Just think, if I'd been your mother, you probably would have inherited my powers as well. And you wouldn't be powerless now."
'Whoa, scary thought, dude. She was into Warren's father!' said Zach before Maj could stop him.
Warren replied with a calmness he certainly didn't feel, "If you'd been my mother I think I'd be my own worst enemy."
"Your powers would have found a way to co-exist."
'Your lighter should be about three feet ahead of you,' directed Magenta and a moment later he spotted it.
"I wasn't just talking about whose powers I'd have inherited," he said, picking up his Zippo and checking that it still worked.
The white flames around him flared. "Watch yourself, Knight-Fire. There are a lot of so-called innocent citizens that will pay for your insolence."
Now that he had his lighter back, all he needed was a target.
Ethan seemed to be thinking along similar lines. 'You won't be able to fight the cold-fire itself,' he advised, 'You need to get her to show herself.'
Easier said then done, Popsicle, thought Warren, and he decided to try the oldest trick in the book for dealing with ego-driven super villains (apart from tricking them into monologuing, that is).
"Threatening hostages, huh?" he goaded her, flicking his lighter and absorbing the fire into the other hand. "That's a really cowardly way of dealing with your problems."
'Knight-Fire?' Layla tried to caution him but he ignored her.
"Show yourself, Arctic Flame," he challenged. "Or are you scared of me?"
A figure stepped out of the white flames just ahead of him. For someone who was apparently the age of his parents, she looked remarkably ageless in her long white robe. Her flawless skin and hair, and even her lips, were pure white, while her eyes were pitch black and they were glaring at him.
"How dare you suggest I would be scared of someone completely defenseless?" she spoke with cold condescension. "As if you could warm up enough from that little lighter to get your powers back!"
In response Warren threw a handful of absorbed fire at her to show just how 'defenseless' he really was. The fireball wasn't anywhere nearly as big or powerful as when he was able to create the fire himself, but it was enough to char a black mark on her shoulder and make her stagger back. She was also caught completely off-guard, so he was able to follow up with another shot to her arm before she managed to recover enough to raise a defensive wall of cold-fire.
"Hiding behind your powers again?" he taunted her, wondering how much damage he'd been able to do. Maybe, rather than attacking her, he should have tried to get close enough to cuff her with a neutralizer. Then again, she definitely wouldn't have let him get anywhere near her, even if she thought he had no powers.
Another cold-fire wall sprang up suddenly underneath his feet, throwing him a few feet up and sideways. He landed hard and the lighter went flying out of his fingers. He scrambled after it but a wall of cold-fire cut him off and he jerked his hand back from it quickly.
Warren got to his feet and turned around to face Arctic Flame who had dropped the cold-fire barrier between them. She didn't seem to be in any sort of pain, and the only evidence of his attack were two black blotches on her white robe.
"Before I turn you over to a slow and painful death, I want you to witness the depth of your failure as a so-called Guardian of this city. You will rue the day you chose to turn your back on your family and your true calling. Those people you are sworn to protect will all know you were responsible for this, and without even trying you will have accomplished the deaths of as many citizens as any super villain, more successful in that regard than your own father."
Having delivered her super villain speech as required by tradition, she raised her hands with a cold triumphant smile and he could hear the sounds of screaming people in the distance.
'Man, she's sweeping the cold-fire away from us … into the Mall where all the people are,' reported Zach in a worried voice.
'There're also firewalls outside the Mall,' added Maj, equally concerned, 'Moving towards the crowds of onlookers.'
Arctic Flame's smile became even more evil as she saw Warren's disturbed reaction. "You will remember this for the rest of your life, hero," she smirked, "However long that might be."
Desperately trying to do something, anything, to halt the tide, Warren flung out his hands to either side, palms facing outwards towards the walls of white flames. The villainess started slightly as Warren briefly gained control of the cold-fire wall which had remained around the two of them. She took control of the flames back from him a second later, but for that short moment he knew he had touched the fire with his mind.
She shook her head with a condescending expression. "You won't be able to stop me. You cannot control other people's fire properly and you know it."
Warren didn't dignify that with a response, knowing she was just trying to cover her own growing apprehension. Closing his eyes in intense concentration, he crossed his arms across his chest and with a roar he powered up, palms outwards. This time he could feel the cold-fire, all of it, all throughout the Mall and even the firewalls that were outside.
He opened his eyes slowly, triumphantly, to see Arctic Flame with her hands pressed to her temples, cringing with pain. A moment later she gave up and relinquished control of her flames.
Now he had absolute command of the cold-fire. It was all available to do his bidding; it would move, flare or extinguish at his beck and call. This was what pyro-psionics was actually all about. What they (and the textbooks) had assumed all along was incorrect – being able to absorb and use fire was nothing on this. This was something else entirely. Now he truly had his mother's power, possibly even stronger than she had been.
For a moment he just stood there, indulging in the feeling of having so much power at his fingertips and ignoring the growing headache that was trying to get his attention. He was vaguely aware of Zach asking 'Are you guys seeing this?' over the comm but he disregarded that too and focused on simply enjoying having all the fire at his disposal.
He smirked at Arctic Flame, but to his surprise she didn't look afraid of him, as she should be. Instead she was smiling and there was something in her expression that actually seemed to be trying to encourage him. Why would she be so friendly towards him when he was about to defeat her? Couldn't she see how much he was reveling in taking control of her fire? Unless … unless she could see … and she was hoping that having all this power would –
"Why do you limit yourself as a law-abiding hero when you could be free to choose your own destiny?" her tone was almost musical now, "No one can stop you. They're weak and pathetic, nowhere near your level."
'Warren?' Layla's uncertain voice over the comm snapped him back to reality.
He narrowed his eyes at the super villainess. Slowly and deliberately he closed his hands into fists, extinguishing the cold-fire all at once.
Now Arctic Flame looked terrified, and she ran for it. Warren tried to give chase but the act of extinguishing the firewalls had compounded his headache to almost a debilitating level and he sank to his knees.
'She's gonna get away!' exclaimed Ethan.
'I'm on my way,' replied Will, who unfortunately was still too cold to fly, 'I'm only two floors above her.'
'You won't get there in time, Eagle,' Zach answered, 'She's on the same level as the exit already.'
Warren pressed his hands to his temples and squeezed his eyes shut, but it didn't help the pain at all. He opened his eyes and spotted the lighter on the ground near where he was kneeling. With a certain amount of difficulty he picked it up, although he wasn't sure what he was going to do with it.
'Can't Flame-Archer send a – ' started Layla.
Kate cut her off. 'No, I already tried, but I can't create one yet. Sorry, Dryad.'
Still not entirely certain he knew what he was doing, Warren flicked the lighter and absorbed a handful of fire. He opened his hand and released a small cloud of sparks that coalesced into a flame construct … shaped like a phoenix. He stared at it for a moment, mildly surprised that it had actually worked, and then he pulled himself together and sent the construct after Arctic Flame.
He sat back in exhaustion and rested his head on his knees, closing his eyes to listen to the others' commentary of what was taking place on the next level of the parking garage. From what he could tell, his construct had stopped the villainess from escaping and Will was almost there to apprehend her.
Fortunately Arctic Flame wasn't trying to defend herself from either the construct or Will with her powers – she was probably convinced that Warren would simply quench any cold-fire she created. Little did she know he was as washed-out as Kate now, and just to add to his headache, he was starting to get a painful sensation on the skin of his chest. It was that awful feeling of getting burnt, which he had felt only twice before in his life…
Warren opened his eyes and glanced up at his hair which had fallen over his eyes, watching as a lock at the middle turned red. He unzipped the top of his Kevlar catsuit and it all made sense when he saw the tattoo that was forming across his chest.
His last thought before he passed out was that Ethan was going to be thrilled…
'Man down,' reported Zach from the security cameras.
With both Weatherman and Arctic Flame safely neutralized, Warren was their next concern. Will and Layla made their way quickly to the next level, and Ethan headed there too, guessing their friend would be in need of medical attention.
Layla and Will got there first, and they ran over to where Warren was lying, unconscious and looking very pale but his pulse and breathing were stable.
"Warren?" she tried to rouse him, and ran her fingers through his hair. With amazement she touched the new red streak in his hair which was right at his center parting and shared a glance with Will, and then realized she shouldn't be so surprised considering what she'd just seen him do via the security camera.
Ethan arrived at a run just as Layla noticed Warren's unzipped catsuit. As the other two watched, she pulled his uniform slightly open and…
Oh. Wow.
There was no mistaking the new tattoo across Warren's chest. Magnificent in red and yellow, a phoenix rose triumphantly from orange flames just below his sternum, spreading its wings in fiery tendrils across his pectoral muscles.
For a moment, none of them said anything.
Then Ethan spoke up.
"Guys, I've been telling you all along he's a fire elemental!"
A/N: Sorry you all had to wait so long for this update – hope it was worth the wait! Unfortunately that's how it's going to be for the next little while. Thanks for all the reviews and PMs and for your continued support for my story.
