Lois awoke to someone shaking her and the sound of her name being called softly.
"Lois! Lois, wake up!"
Lois slowly rolled to her back and half opened one eye. "If the worlds not about to end, someone dies!" Lois said; her voice harsh and heavy with sleep.
"It's an emergency!"
Lois opened both eyes wide, blinking out the sleep. She looked up at the man standing over her. Jeremiahs face was serious and full of concern.
"What is it?" Lois asked sitting up on her elbows. "What's happening?"
"In the labs…" Jeremiah began, his voice hushed. "Dr. Stangin… Peter… something's wrong. I need your help."
Lois was on her feet and pulling on her jeans before the rest of her body was truly awake. "What's wrong with Dr. Stangin?" she asked.
Jeremiah shushed her and glanced down at her still sleeping roommate. "Get dressed." He answered; his voice hushed and urgent. "I'll tell you everything on the way. Bring your coat." He ordered. And without another word, he disappeared out the door.
Lois's head was spinning. She frantically threw on her shirt, quickly pulled on her boots, tied her hair back in a loose ponytail and grabbed her goose down overcoat.
"Off to get another 'exclusive'?" her roommate said, her back to Lois, her head against the pillow.
"Bitter. Party of one!" Lois mocked. "Oh… I think your tables ready." And with that, Lois left the room.
"Slut." the older woman muttered as she went back to sleep.
Outside, Jeremiah was pacing frantically and looking at his watch. He was wearing his own heavy overcoat and carrying a long, black, cylindrical case. It resembled something you'd carry a two piece pool stick in. As Lois approached, he rushed over and grabbed her by the arm, and then began walking quickly down the hall, almost dragging her behind him.
"Jeremiah?" Lois asked, trying to keep pace. "What the hells going on?"
"There's no time." He answered. "We have to get up to the motor-pool…"
Lois snatched her arm away. "What!? Why?! It's fifty below up there! Where's Dr. Stangin?"
"He's waiting for us." Jeremiah said, reaching for her. "Lois, please. We have to hurry."
All types of alarms and buzzers were going off in Lois' head. Even through the haze of sleep, jet lag, and early morning hours, her instincts were telling her something was terribly wrong. "I'm not going anywhere until you tell me just what the hell is going on, Jeremiah!" Lois said fiercely, bringing herself to her full height.
"He screwed up, Lois!" Jeremiah said; his heart pounding.
"What? What are you talking about?"
"He made a miscalculation. His math was off. The reactors not stable! It can't hold the amount of energy it's producing. We have less than an hour…"
"Until what?" Lois asked; her voice near panic.
"It's going to blow, Lois." Jeremiah said plainly, his eyes full of truth and urgency.
"But… but he said it was stable." Lois stammered, her mind trying to wrap itself around what was happening. "He said there was no radiation. He said that it was stable!"
Jeremiah was suddenly in front of Lois, his arms on her shoulders. He was crouched so they were eye to eye.
"Lois…" he began, his voice solid and even. "In less then forty minutes, the reactors storage units are going to overload. The explosion will cause a chain reaction that is going to ignite the reactor core. The explosion will be almost ten times that of Hiroshima! It won't be a traditional nuclear explosion, but this facility, everything in it, and everything within fifty miles will be destroyed. If we don't leave now, we won't make it. Do you understand?"
Lois was shaking. Her heart was beating so fast, she thought it was going to burst out of her chest. Her mind was moving furiously through the events of the last few days. Her exclusive interview with Stangin was playing over and over in her mind. He had seemed so sure of his equations, so sure of his math. He was so confident. Could he have been so wrong? Could his math have been so flawed that dozens of people were now going to pay for it with their lives?
"Lois!" Jeremiah shook her.
Lois blinked.
"We have to leave. Peter and his staff are waiting for us in the motor-pool. The helicopter is waiting…"
"What about everyone else?" Lois heard herself ask.
"What?" Jeremiah blinked. "There's… There's not enough time to save everyone, Lois."
Lois shook her head. "We… we can't just leave these people to die…" she said softly.
"Lois… there's not other way. There's no time! The helicopter can't hold them all!"
"Bullshit!" Lois said in a near shout. Jeremiah pulled away slightly. "We're not leaving these people here! I don't care if we have to share seats or sit in each other laps! We have to get these people out of here!"
"Lois…" Jeremiah pleaded.
"NO!" Lois shouted, pulling free. "If you're not going to help me, then I'll do it myself!" she said, her face full of determination.
Jeremiah looked at her. His forehead was covered with beads of sweat and he was breathing very fast. He opened his mouth to speak, but no words came.
"Fine!" Lois said finally. She turned back towards the hall, but Jeremiahs hand on her arm stopped her.
"You're right." He said. She looked at him and could see remorse in his eyes. "You're right, Lois. If we all can't leave, then none of us do!"
Lois nodded at him slightly, resolve setting in.
"You get everyone in the woman's dorms. I'll get the men. No luggage! No laptops! Nothing but what they need to stay warm!" he said fiercely.
Lois nodded.
Once again, she turned towards the hall and set of at a jog.
She made it three steps before and arm wrapped around her waist, pulled her into the air, and a sharp pain slammed into her neck.
"Ow!" she screamed. "What the fugghhh…" her mouth went slack and her tongue felt as if it was no longer there at all. Her entire body suddenly seemed far from her mind, for all the control she had over it. Her legs and arms went limp and her entire body went slack. She was completely paralyzed.
"I'm sorry, Lois…" she heard Jeremiah say. She felt herself being scooped up into his arms. "We really don't have time for this."
She couldn't move her head, and her eyes seemed to take hours to roll from one side to the other. She was looking up; Jeremiahs face was a grim mask of determination. His upper body took up most of her field of vision. The vaulted ceiling moving past quickly was the only indication of movement she had.
Jeremiah was breathing heavy when they reached what Lois assumed was the elevator. He jostled her slightly as he leaned forward and pressed the panel to open it. The large steel doors opened and he carried her in, knelt down, and laid her on the floor. He then disappeared from view. A moment later, Lois heard the steel doors close and the muffled sound of the elevator rising towards the surface.
He was back in her field of vision then, kneeling over her. He looked down at her blue-grey eyes, now filled with fear, rage, and confusion. He brushed a lock of her hair from her face and caressed her cheek gentle. He then reached down and, using both hands, zipped up her overcoat.
"I wasn't lying about the storage units, you know…" he explained as he bundled her up. "In…" he looked at his watch. "About thirty-eight minutes, this entire facility will be destroyed. I may have exaggerated a bit on the yield, but trust me, we really don't want to be anywhere near this place when it goes." He looked around the elevator, then back down at Lois.
"I see why he picked you…" he said softly. "I'm mean, you're not hard on the eyes by any means, but there are prettier women. Smarter women. But you… you were willing to sacrifice yourself for the lives of three dozen people you don't even know. Now that is heroic. I don't know if he rubbed off on you or the other way around."
And even though his voice sounded like it was coming from very far away; even though it seemed he was speaking at half the normal speed, Lois understood everything he had just said. And even thought she was completely paralyzed, her body totally numb, she felt a very real chill run down her spine.
The elevator stopped and the doors opened with a grind.
"Here we go." Jeremiah said. He pulled her close to him, and awkwardly lifted her again, this time in a fireman's carry. It was only know that Lois noticed he was still carrying the long cylindrical case she saw earlier.
Lois watched the cement floor go by beneath her has he carried her through the motor-pool. She heard the doors to the elevator close as they went. Silence then, only the sound of Jeremiahs labored breaths and his foot steps echoes throughout the large space. They crossed the room quickly and Lois saw the steel double doors out the corner of her eye as they approached.
Jeremiah carried her to a panel on the wall and pressed a series of buttons.
The outer doors opened with the sound of powerful motors and the roar of the snow and wind outside. Jeremiah hefted Lois on his shoulders and braced himself against the wind.
Lois couldn't feel her arms. She couldn't feel her legs. She couldn't feel Jeremiahs body beneath her as she struggled through the snow towards the helicopter. But she could feel the cold. Down to her bones, she could feel it.
Lois couldn't see more than five feet in any direction out the corner of her eyes. The driving snow was like a vale. For a moment, she wondered if her fate was to be found frozen in the snow atop the shoulders of a mad man; if indeed there was anything left to find after the explosion.
Jeremiah walked for what seemed like forever to Lois. The tingling numbness throughout her body was struggling against the bone-chilling cold. Lois was almost grateful for whatever chemical concoction Jeremiah had pumped into her body. Almost. The desire to leap from him shoulders and punch him in the face was to overwhelming to ignore.
"Here!" she heard him say over the roar of the wind and snow.
A few labored steps later, the smooth gray surface of the helicopter entered her field of vision. Jeremiah made his way around the side of the helicopter and opened the hatch. He unceremoniously dumped Lois into the copilot seat.
"Ugh!" Jeremiah said, arching his back and messaging his neck. "How much did you say you weigh?" he asked over the roar of the wind.
Lois tried, willed, pleaded, and begged her leg to fly up and into his face. But it didn't so much as twitch.
He quickly buckled her harness and closed the door. Lois sat there, her head slumped forward and to one side, the howling wind slightly muffled outside the craft.
It was then that she realized how bad things really were. Even thought her hearing was still distant and muffled, the wind and snow was all she heard.
No voices from frightened passengers. No calming words from Dr. Stangin and his staff. No -orders from the pilot or co-pilot. For that matter, why was she sitting in the co-pilots seat?
The pilot's door opened and Jeremiah climbed in. He began flipping switches, pressing buttons, and turning knobs. "Let's hope the fuel lines aren't frozen…" he said absently. He pressed a button and Lois could here the muffled sound of the engines roaring to life.
"Yes!" He exclaimed.
He continued to press buttons and make adjustments as the sound from the engines continued to increase.
Finally, he grabbed the yoke and pulled, and with a lurch that shifted Lois to the point her head was leaning against the window of the door at an odd angle, the craft slowly rose into the air.
Almost immediately, the strong winds began to batter and jostle the helicopter. Jeremiah made a series of rapid adjustments, and continued to raise the craft. The powerful engines battled against the winds and the copter rose higher and higher.
Lois watched the ground fall away beneath them, and soon, all she could see was the thick vale of snow.
The crafted dipped and swayed as it rose, and even in her paralyzed state, Lois felt as if she was going to vomit. A few moments later, she felt her position change again, the force of their momentum pushing her back in the seat as the copter speed forward. The ride was a bumpy one.
"We're not out of the woods yet." She heard Jeremiah say. "If we're don't clear fifty miles, the EMP from the explosion will knock out all our systems. We crash into the ice at over two hundred miles an hour. If we survive that… well… we'll be really glad we brought our coats."
But Lois wasn't listening anymore.
She was too busy thinking about the three dozen people below her that were about to die.
Natasha was used to waking in the middle of the night to an empty bed. She had even went as far as suggesting Peter keep a cot in the lab, since he spent most nights there anyway. But he always refused, saying that if he was going to sleep anywhere, it was going to be in the bed next to his beautiful fiancé. The problem was, he didn't sleep that much.
She was walking down the hall that lead to the Labs in a red satin robe and bright pink fuzzy bunny slippers; a gift from Peter.
She pressed her hand against the DNA reader.
"Good evening, Dr. Nickilovich." Alisa said as the doors slid open.
Natasha rolled her eyes. "Alisa." she said flatly. "Are you keeping my husband from his warm bed with another system diagnostic?"
"Dr. Stangin is in the lab," Alisa answered. "But he is not working on any of my systems."
"Then what is he working on?" Natasha asked.
"Nothing." Alisa answered. "He is resting on the floor."
Natasha looked down through three layers of transparent floor and saw her future husband lying on his back on the bottommost floor. Her heart dropped.
She screamed his name and ran down the stairs as fast as her bunny slippers would allow. She was on her knees cradling his head in her lap. "Peter! What's wrong? What happened?"
He tried to say "Jeremiah", but the sound he made started with a 'Z' and involved a lot of drool.
He was still crying and his eyes darted around the room frantically.
Natasha cursed in Russian. "Alisa!" she shouted. "Alert every staff member! I want everyone in here right now!"
A few moments of silence passed. Natasha was crying and rubbing Stangins' head and face. She was speaking softly to him in her native tongue. He was crying and trying his best to speak, to warn her, to tell her about the inevitable explosion, but the best he could do was make odd sounds and drool freely.
"All staff members have been alerted and are on their way to the labs." Alisa reported.
Natasha looked around the lab again. Her eyes feel on the open casings and the exposed kryptonite rods housed within. She noticed one rod was missing.
"Alisa, who was the last person in the lab?"
"You and Dr. Stangin are the last people in the lab."
"Prior to me, you literal thinking bitch!" Natasha shouted.
"Such insults are not appreciated, Dr. Nickilovich." Alisa responded.
"JUST ANSWER THE DAMN QUESTION!"
"Prior to you, the last person in the lab was Jeremiah Kuttler." Alisa answered.
"Locate him and tell him to get down here right now!" Natasha screamed.
"Negative." Alisa responded. "Jeremiah Kuttler is no longer in the facility."
"WHAT!"
"Jeremiah Kuttler left the facility twenty-four minutes and seventeen seconds ago." Alisa reported.
Again, Natasha let fly with a string of Russian swears.
"What's going on?" a man asked as he entered the room. He was followed by the entire science team. They all rushed to Stangin's side, checking his pulse, flashing a penlight into his eyes.
"It's some type of neural paralyses." One doctor explained. "His heart rate is strong and his breathing is steady. We need to get him upstairs!" They began to lift him.
To his credit, Stangin tried for the hundredth time to say the words "Storage Unit", but he only managed something that sounded more like "Toy wedge tunic."
"Uh… guys…" a woman said loudly. She was standing in front of the large display screen, rapidly typing commands into the virtual console before her. "We have a big problem."
The team turned and saw what she saw.
"Oh God." Someone said softly.
"No." a man whispered.
"Cancel the transfer!" someone shouted.
"I did!" the woman shouted. "But the reactions already started!"
"Vent the reactor!" someone ordered. "Start the reverse fusion process!"
"There's not time!" the woman said, still punching commands into the console. The display blinked once, twice, and then disappeared completely. The virtual console vanished a second later. Then, all the lights in the lab went out. The entire room was bathed in the red glow from the reactor core. A glow that was pulsed ominously and grew more intense with every passing second.
"How much time do we have?" someone asked.
"Minutes maybe…" the woman answered.
"Should we tell the others?" someone asked.
"Tell them what? 'Sorry to wake you in the middle of the night, but we just wanted to tell you that you only have about six minutes before the reactor explodes and we all die. Have a good night.'"
Silence followed.
One of the lab techs turned into the man next to her and buried her face in his chest. She was sobbing freely. He wrapped his arms around her and held her close as his own tears began to fall.
Another; a tall man of African decent felt his knees buckle and collapsed to the floor, landing on his rear. He pulled the glasses from his eyes and just looked at the pulsing light.
On the floor, Natasha was rocking back and forth and crying. Stangin's head was still in her lap and she continued to caresses his face and head gently. Stangin laid there, still unable to move, but he could feel her touch, gentle and soothing against his skin. His eyes were only for her, now. He looked at here soft features, her full lips, her bright eyes, her smooth skin. And he wished more than anything he could smile at her.
"I… y-yove… y-you…" he managed.
Natasha sobbed a little harder at that. She leaned forward and gently kissed his lips. She kept her face close to his and whispered "I love you", in Russian.
And with a final pulse of bright crimson light, the reactor exploded.