"And finally we have confirmed sightings of the three escaped fugitives known as the Thunderbolts in New Mexico were they stole an undisclosed amount of Aluminium Ingots. The team's whereabouts is as of yet unknown." Lazily the man in the arm-chair reached for the remote and turned off the news as he blinked in the twilight that the tea-lights scattered around the living room created. While he didn't look like much Dr. Neil Wren was at the cutting edge of his field and peering at the clock he noted the time and stumbled towards the kitchen. His head pounded and personally he blamed his co-worker Leslie, the pair of them had been celebrating his latest discovery with several bottles of wine, the empty vessels clumsily shoved in the recycling bin. Leslie was still there sleeping on the table, naked save the black bra and panties and Nathan realized that save for his boxers he was in a similar state of dress.
"Some coffee should help solve this problem." he mumbled reaching for the kettle. As he grasped the handle, the earth begun to shake and Nathan collapsed, crawling on all floors to the table and grabbing Leslie before taking shelter in the open doorway. The ground kept rattling for a further twenty seconds before stopping, Nathan wasn't overly bothered he had been a student at the University of Los Angeles and earthquakes were commonplace there although he hadn't expected such a thing in Newcastle, Colorado. As he stood he placed the still sleeping Leslie onto the sofa back in the Living Room the sprinklers activated causing her to wake up with a splutter.
"I thought you had these things fixed last week." she yelled wrapping a sodden blanket round her shoulders.
"I did." Neil growled, "My god the cure." Desperately he half ran and half slid to his lab and put his hand on the glass windows, the doors were time-locked, he sure as hell wasn't getting in. Whatever the case the cure had been in a cylinder rimmed with vials on the main work surface, and while the cylinder was still present, it was cracked open and his precious cure was draining into a puddle on the floor with the water running off into a crack on the floor. Neil banged hopelessly on the window desperate to get through the reinforced cure as the last drops of the cure went down the drain.
Across town another man stirred in his sleep, his dark hair framing his clean shaven face as he opened his eyes. He was alone in his room at one of a number of a seedy motel he and his friends had been staying at on their travels. Walking to the window he looked out to see police cars rush past heading for one of the houses in the hills. The police made him feel nervous and he pulled on a jumper and walked to the door looking out through the spy hole to see a busty blonde, her breast barley contained by the black leather bustier while her arms decorated with tattoos of ivy morphing into barbed wire running up to a dove on each shoulder. Opening the door she stalked in, the black platform boots she was wearing giving her an extra six inches of height. Closing the door she reached to his face and he went for hers before pulling the synthetic masks off to reveal their true faces.
"Abe I'm worried." the woman announced as she flew a fleck of pink hair from in front of her eyes. "I have been hearing sirens for the past twenty minutes."
"Don't worry Mel they said on the news that we're in New Mexico, not Newcastle." the man replied sitting on the end of the bed. "Besides we can't leave until the morning, all we have to do is keep heading north and we can probably slip into Canada and restart our lives."
"Can we really do that?" Melissa asked
"Well do you really want to keep fighting super villains who are out to kill us, do you want to run the possibility of loosing somebody that you love?" Abe asked. "We should have quit the business a long time ago."
"You're right." Melissa sighed, "Thanks for that." she added.
"Love the look by the way Mel." Abe announced as she turned back towards the door, her body swaying seductively as she went back to her room.
"That's it I'm changing masks again next time we're on the road." Melissa purred as she reached for the door handle. "So make the most of it while it's around." Abe grinned and grabbed her from behind before kissing her on the neck. "Oh don't worry 'Melody' I will." he replied as they both toppled backwards into the bed.
Abe opened his eyes once again and looked over to see Melissa curled up in a nest of blankets as the alarm clock reached seven thirty and started beeping before being sonically swatted off the stand. Silently the pair of Thunderbolts got dressed, their backs to each other until it got time to put their ID masks on. Turning to face each other they watched as the familiar features were swallowed up by the faces of strangers. Still in silence they headed for the dinner across the street scanning the crowd for anyone they recognized. Reclining outside the restaurant was a gothic young woman dressed in dark purple jeans and a tank top playing on her I-Pod, a normal sight unless you knew the woman was a biological super-computer.
"Morning Diana." Melissa chirped as the Goth followed them in. "How did you sleep?"
"Okay I suppose." Diana replied, "I decided to randomly generate my own dreams tonight. They were interesting."
"Let me guess there was a boomerang throwing coyote and an impossibly fast Roadrunner again" Abe suggested. "That one seems to be recurring dream especially when you watch cartoons late at night." Diana shot him a sneer before the group sat down in the booth and picked up menus as one of the waitress trotted over.
"What are you folks having?" she asked tapping a pencil against a pad of stained paper.
"Two orange juices and a black coffee." Melissa answered, her words accompanied with the scribbling of an order being written down.
"Hey does that guy look familiar?" Abe asked jabbing a finger towards the man emerging from the toilet. Melissa looked and saw that the 'guy' in question had shoulder length blonde hair and was wearing a chequered shirt and blue jeans with worn trainers finishing off the image of a back-road cowboy. Still Abe was right the face looked familiar yet she couldn't place it. Her musings were shattered when the door to the dinner opened and a unit of police officers walked in. Almost immediately she tensed up until either Diana or Abe on the other side of the booth kicked her.
"Okay we have some bad news for you." one of the officers announced. "There was a robbery in the early hours of this morning and a vial of experimental drugs was stolen. We still believe the person responsible is still in town due to the way the theft occurred so we're setting up cordons along the highways out of here. We're sorry for any inconvenience but only your assistance can help us speed up the process. If anybody knows anything comes to the local Sheriff's office and we'll do what we can." he finished. "Again we're sorry for any inconvenience but it is essential that the chemical is found." With a nod to the man at the till the officers retreated and the dinner erupted into conversation, loud enough to drown out the Thunderbolt's conversation.
"This is just great." Abe hissed as Melissa kicked him back on the shin. "We're stuck here now."
"Well we can't stay." Melissa replied, "If they look too hard who knows what they'll find."
"Well we could help them find the chemical." Abe said cautiously. "Without them actually knowing it was us of course."
"You said to drop the heroics last night." Melissa hissed as Diana bobbed her head from one to the other. "Now you want us to start up again."
"This is survival not heroics." Abe lectured, "It's different. We're already being blamed for a heist down in New Mexico; I don't want them to add this to the list of our offences as well."
"Fine but on your head be it." Melissa snorted folding her arms together as the waitress brought them their drinks. "So where do we start?" she asked.
"I've already started while you were arguing." Diana said smugly, "I remotely hacked into the police database and watched the security footage of the crime and then copied it to my hard-drive."
"Oh god." Melissa groaned, "You were careful right?"
"Hacking through the fire-walls was child's play." Diana answered. "Once we've finished breakfast I'll download it to Abe's laptop and you can watch as well. Right now I feel like cinnamon waffles."
Abe and Melissa watched the cleaned up footage of the theft of the chemical for the fifth time, watching as the water swept away the chemical from the vials, all of which seemed to have been cracked open by the earthquake that had happened only a few minutes before. They had also watched footage from the rest of the house and had identified Dr. Neil Wren and had deduced that the stolen chemical were vials of an experimental flu vaccine that the doctor had created.
"Okay I heard it that time." Melissa announced, "There is a weird acoustic as the shaking starts. I know I've heard it before but I still can't put my finger on it."
"We know that Dr. Wren had his sprinklers fixed a few days before." Abe deduced, "What if the thieves rigged them to go off when the earthquake cracked the vials?"
"Well that suggests that our thieves could either trigger the quake or were very geologically savvy." Melissa finished for him.
"You know I've seen the footage the cameras shot a few days ago of the repair men that were sent." Diana announced, "Eddie and Axel judging from their name tags. The only problem is that Axel goes back to the truck alone, Eddie as far as I can tell stayed on the premises. I can bring up their faces if you want?" she added sweetly.
"You're evil." Abe stated before handing her the computer as Diana extended a USB cable into the device. After a few awkward moments of interaction she retracted the wire and handed the computer back, the screen of the laptop showing two stills of the repairmen. Melissa realized that the guy in the diner that Abe had recognized was Axel, that one of the potential thieves had been only meters away from the police and slipped away unnoticed. Looking over at Abe she saw him squinting at the images before putting his hand over his mouth.
"You know who that is." Melissa stated, "Spill."
"The reason that Eddie didn't leave with Axel was due to him being in the sprinklers." Abe announced watching as realization creped over Melissa's face. "Eddie is really Hydroman. He stayed in the sprinklers and when the quake went off he squeezed into the lab absorbed the vaccine and went down the crack into the sewers."
"That would explain the harmonic and why we thought Axel looked familiar." Melissa added. "Who do we know who A has connections with Hydroman and B can create a designer earthquake."
"Shocker damm it." Abe cursed, "I hope that thick piece of crap would stay on the straight and narrow."
"So we know who are thieves are but we still have a problem." Melissa interrupted, "Hydroman and Shocker are just Mercs, they probably have been hired by someone who wants the vaccine for themselves. For all we know Bench had already swum the cure out to them."
"He hasn't." Abe announced getting to his feet. "If that were the case then they wouldn't be here. I say we catch them and see if we can extract the location of the vaccine and the names of their employers."
"And I know just how we can do it." Diana said with an evil grin as she turned to look at Melissa.
Abe and Diana stalked after the couple infront of them, sticking to the shadows as the suicide blonde shivered visibly in the cool of the evening. Abe had to hand it to Diana; she had figured out that it was easier to get Shocker to talk to an attractive woman rather then a gathering of irate super-powered outlaws such as himself. He had chosen to wear his prototype armor, the hardened carapace offering some protection from whatever Shocker could throw at him. Diana had also suited up, deciding for a skin-tight black bodysuit that made Abe think of Seven of None from Star Trek. As for Melissa, she was stuck in a tiny leather tank-top and skirt as well as her platform boots from earlier. Abe felt sorry for her especially when she shivered either from being embraced by Schultz or from the cold north wind. Eventually Shocker stopped outside a construction site and whispered something in Melissa's ear and she giggled before watching as he disappeared inside. Looking around she gestured nervously before squeezing in after him.
"Okay remember we need Shocker alive and able to talk." Abe told Diana, "As for Hydroman well." he shrugged, "Be as rough as you want."
"Are you telling me or yourself?" Diana asked, "You have history with them I know I looked at your SHIELD file when we were watching 'Melody' over there flirt with Shocker."
"Figured you might do that." Abe grunted as he reached the place where Melissa and Shocker had squeezed through. "Find anything interesting?"
"You and Melissa." Diana whispered before slithering through the hole, her form flowing over the wooden panel like liquid, "Made a cute couple." Abe cracked a smile before heading through the hole himself. The construction site on the other side was pretty standard although it looked like somebody had done some digging. Possibly Shocker creating access holes for Hydroman although somehow Abe doubted it. Up ahead he heard Shocker curse and picked up speed as Diana gave the pile of dirt one last look and hurried after him. Reaching the Forman's Office Abe saw Shocker bleeding as Melissa stood over the slumped villain giving him swift kicks to the chest.
"For the last time lady I'm not telling you where it is." Shocker snarled grabbing Melissa's legs and pushing her away. He looked over to where Abe and Diana were standing and cracked his knuckles. "Who are these you're back up dancers?"
"Surrender Schultz." Abe commanded, "You don't have you're suit so don't make it hard on yourself. Tell us where the vaccine is and we'll be lenient on you."
"Lenient. Who the hell are you? Even without my suit I'm more then a match for some bumpkins in Spandex."
"One last chance Shultz don't make me set Sky Lark on you." Abe warned pointing at Melissa as Shocker picked up a dropped pickaxe.
"After tonight they'll make me a honorary member of the Wrecking Crew." Shocker sneered. "They'll call me Pickaxe or something like that."
"You asked for it Schultz. You and Bench are going down and then we're going after you're employers too." Abe said sternly unholstering the wing-blade sword.
"Me and Bench." Shocker roared. "You're fucked if you think it's the two of us." Behind Abe the recently excavated sand exploded and the armoured form of the Scorpion erupted from the dirt slamming Abe to the ground before throwing him to lie at Shocker's feet. "I've got an entire Sinister Syndicate at my back. By the end of the night we'll be burying three no-name hero's right under where you're standing.
Thunderbolts #6
It's the Thunderbolts vs. Shocker, Scorpion and Hydroman and that's just half of the Sinister Syndicate. Just who are there employers and what do they want with a super vaccine to the common flu? Find out in the next Issue.
Reviews/Comments left by Readers
Capyle wrote;
A nice story taking place between issues of the ongoing series. The story flows and there's a good narrative voice. I like seeing Songbird and Mach V in the spotlight again too.
Thank you for the really positive review. As for Songbird and MACH V (or Skylark and Iridium as they are now using) being the focus of the story, I find that they and as a whole the entire Thunderbolts cast is underused. I also personally find the Dark Avengers thing really tedious, of all the characters I only really like Songbird, MACH V and Ai Apaec, and they don't get enough face time, a fact that I plan to remedy. Again many thanks.
Impurest Cheese
For everyone else out there, please comment, query or critic I look forward to all reviews, be they positive like the one above or otherwise.