24: Four minus one.
Sinclair looked at the newspapers on the store shelf.
The news of his reanimen's fight against Iron Man was on the front page, although the images were not in the best quality and had clearly been taken from far away, he could recognize his creations.
This was not how he wanted them to be presented to the world.
They were supposed to be the next step in evolution but now they were being labeled as one of those horrible monsters that had been appearing.
Sinclair gritted his teeth, threw the newspaper into his shopping cart and continued to walk around the place while keeping a low profile.
He was now a fugitive, he knew it wouldn't be hard to find him so he escaped, he had been planning to go underground for some time so he was prepared.
It wasn't hard to find a place to hide and he was able to sell some modified weapons on the black market to get money off the books.
That way he had been able to finance a private lab and created his two reanimen.
Though now he was in a bit of a crisis as he had spent most of his budget on their creation.
But he would soon solve it, version 2 of his reanimen was feasible, he just needed a new test subject.
As Sinclair was thinking the door to the store opened and several teenagers of Great height and athletic build walked in.
Their laughter flooded the quiet little store and their voice carried far and wide.
"You should have seen his stupid face, Parker didn't see it coming at all!" the one who seemed to be the leader of the group laughed loudly as he spoke.
"That nerd's glasses shattered into pieces, they should have been there, Flash was pretty accurate with his throw" a boy made a gesture as if he was throwing a ball.
The one called Flash smiled arrogantly.
"What can I say, not for nothing am I the best player on the team, there is no one stronger than me in the whole school" Flash flexed his muscles.
Sinclair watched and listened from the side.
Looking at Flash's body a sinister smile formed on his face.
It seemed he had a new test subject.
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New York.
Stark Building.
In his new private laboratory Tony looked with amazement at the new synthesized element.
A perfect replacement for the palladium that had been poisoning his body.
In an unexpected way his father had saved his life and taught him a lesson even when he was not alive.
"Congratulations sir you have discovered a new element" jarvis' voice rang out and Tony could only smile wryly.
"Re discovered jarvis, re discovered.
"Of course sir."
Tony began to replace his arc reactor in his chest and those of his mark 4 integrated into the armor.
As he did this he paid attention to the different world news, these days you could never know when a monster would decide to attack.
He wanted to be prepared for any inconvenience.
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Carol looked at her face in the mirror, her skin clear and perfect and her eyes shining in purple light.
She made a few grimaces, ran the lipstick across her lips making sure to do it like the guide she had read said.
The shade was a pinkish color that shimmered slightly, she had personally created it following some guidelines, its taste had to be compatible with the upper taste buds after all.
She didn't know much about makeup, she didn't think she needed too much so she just added the lipstick to test.
The sun's rays came through the window her face lit up and the golden hair along with it.
Looking at the previously dark locks Carol wondered if Daniel would be happy about this.
Would he be more receptive to her advances once he saw her in her new guise?
She was sure he liked the blonde color but if that wasn't enough she could change it to any other color, any color he wanted, didn't she say he got bored easily with women?
So she would change the color of his hair every so often so it wouldn't feel monotonous.
His birth mother had helped in that regard, human dyes could not dye his hair so he had had to seek her help.
It had been easy to get what I was looking for.
She combed her hair and went out, walked to Daniel's workshop, now also his workshop, sat down at the workbench and looked at the item she had been working on with her mother's help.
It looked like a belt, it was still rough and the S symbol was engraved on its "buckle" Carol was not afraid of many things, she had grown up in a world where everything around her was as fragile as wet paper after all.
She had never been afraid of being hurt but now she was, the phantom pain of her wounds sent a shiver through her body.
If she were to be injured by someone as strong or stronger than her then she could not do much, in such a situation she could only rely on fighting with all her strength and hope to win.
But her previous fight had not been such a situation, that werewolf was much weaker than her, in every aspect. Even when the Kryptonite sapped her strength and blocked several of her abilities she could still keep up, she could still fight and her fists could still break her bones.
The easy way Daniel killed her was a perfect example of what would have happened if Carol hadn't gradually lost her strength.
Carol looked at the green crystal behind a glass shield.
It was one of the samples Daniel had brought with him.
The radiation was not blocked and she felt a little nauseous just being in its presence, but it was not as bad as in the cave, her strength was not diminished and her abilities were still with her. Such an amount of Kryptonite could barely make her feel a little uncomfortable.
She couldn't do much when it came to facing enemies equal or stronger than her, only fight with all her strength.
But she would never again allow someone weaker than her to harm her.
She activated the belt's mechanism, a faint golden light glowed for a second and the discomfort Carol felt quickly vanished.
The Kryptonite crystal lost its luster and within seconds became a white stone without any energy.
Then there was a small crackling sound and a cloud of smoke came out of the belt and the light went out.
Carol furrowed her eyebrows, it still wasn't good enough, but it was getting there.
With the help of her mother and Daniel she had managed to create this way of defending herself against Kryptonite radiation.
The reason she did this was because her mother had warned her that with her arrival several meteorites containing Kryptonite had hit the earth.
This radioactive crystal was something that was born in the depths of Krypton, born near the nucleus and when Galactus began to devour the planet his parents had decided that the cosmic god would not get what he wanted.
And to say that their son's death had nothing to do with the decision they made would be a lie.
So they destabilized the nucleus and blew up Krypton, denied the god his food and dealt a mortal blow to his already wounded body.
Although Krypton died, it would not be without retribution.
For that reason the radiation from the Kryptonite had flooded all the debris of the planet.
And if the estimates his mother gave him were correct, there were at least several million tons of it wandering through space.
What had reached the ground was only a minuscule percentage.
Knowing that such a threat was not only on their world but also in space had not sat well with Carol.
Fortunately her mother had a solution.
When the Kryptonians began to spread through space their power shook the universe, their conquest of the stars created many enemies and those enemies sought ways to fight them.
By chance they had gained access to a certain amount of Kryptonite.
That day, for the first time since they left their home planet, there were casualties on the Kryptonian side.
Of course they would not stand idly by, so they developed different methods to deny the weapon to their enemies.
This belt was a crude and backward version of one such method.
Although she had help, making something like this was not easy, in fact she had to use some parts of the ship because there were parts that were impossible for her to create at the moment.
It would be difficult but she was sure she could finish it soon.
Her hands moved carefully, she manipulated the pieces and began to work.
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Daniel looked at the science fair, the time had come and came here to check it out.
The place was big, several schools were participating in this after all.
Daniel tried not to stand out too much, he looked around slowly hoping to find some good stuff.
The future of humanity was in the hands of these students after all.
Figuratively of course, probably only one or two people from this place could ever truly affect the future of mankind and that's being overly optimistic.
After all there were countless fairs like this all over the world, hoping to find the key to the future of humanity in one of them was like looking for a needle in a haystack.
Still, hope doesn't kill anyone, and Daniel had hope that he would find something good.
After all, in a world like this, geniuses would surely shine.
For good or bad reasons.
Daniel thought of Tony and Sinclair, both were geniuses in their own way but so different in their actions that to really put them on the same level was not right.
If Sinclair had been really smart he would have presented his project in a better way, instead of suggesting all those changes at once he could have started with civilian prosthetics, once he made a name for himself entering the military sector would be easy, he could have started the development of military prosthetics and then once he had the renown and trust of the military show his project reanimated.
The military would have welcomed Sinclair with open arms, they would have given him unlimited funding once his reanimators were out in the field.
After all these things were better than any super soldier, their strength, speed and endurance were unmatched, not to mention that they could be controlled from a distance like robots.
They would follow any order to the letter.
But Sinclair was arrogant, had no patience and saw no further than the immediate future and was now a fugitive.
Even if Sinclair wanted to surrender now and give himself up, his future would not be so promising, instead of working with the army and the government, he would work for them.
It might not seem different but it was.
Working for the government after being captured as a criminal would be no different than being a slave.
Of course Daniel would not let the government get Sinclair, putting such a power in the hands of a government would only create a disaster.
He didn't trust Shield either, although they didn't exactly serve a government they were undeniably tied to several of them.
Once Sinclair was captured Daniel would personally take him to a different prison.
Earlier I had talked to Tony and Fury about creating a special prison that project would still take a long time to complete.
Even now it was barely on the drawing board.
There was still no suitable prison on earth.
Fortunately for Daniel he had a crazy alien who called herself his girlfriend.
Thinking of Carol Daniel couldn't help but grimace again.
She had been too intense these days.
Still Daniel was able to deal with her easily, when she wasn't trying to get into his pants she was actually pleasant to talk to.
Carol also seemed to understand that she wouldn't accomplish much if she kept it up so she reduced her intensity a bit.
That aside they had talked about the things Carol had been learning from her mother.
There was a lot, Carol didn't hesitate to tell Daniel all about it, he of course didn't hesitate to listen.
That Daniel would give her his undivided attention in those moments further motivated Carol to reveal every ounce of information she had learned.
That's how Daniel learned about the phantom zone.
A different dimension that had been used as a prison by the Kryptonians.
The features of this dimension were incredibly useful for imprisoning people or creatures.
Carol's mother was a scientist and knew how to make a portal to such a dimension.
She had given the plans to Carol without question and Carol had given them to Daniel.
The knowledge and tools required to build this were insane.
Technology beyond anything on earth.
Daniel could not have created the gateway to the ghost dimension on his own.
Even if he had the plans, he didn't have the materials or the necessary tools.
He didn't even have the tools to create the tools to make the door.
Fortunately for Daniel, the ship that had brought Carol to Earth contained all of Krypton's technological knowledge.
Carol's parents had been the scientific leaders of Krypton, they had access to all the knowledge of their race and when they realized that they were going to perish they did not hesitate to store all that knowledge on the ships that would send their children off the planet.
Each of the ships had access to that knowledge, unfortunately Carol's brother did not.
Even so the knowledge was still there in addition to the artificial intelligence that possessed all the memories of Carol's mother, if that ship was practically a treasure of knowledge that thousands of races would kill to obtain.
And now it was Carol's, and consequently his.
Although his intentions were never to use Carol in this way.
And in fact it was Carol who was giving him all this knowledge without his asking for it.
So Daniel decided since things had come to this point to make use of that knowledge.
Daniel planned to get materials from space to start making the tools needed to create the door to the phantom zone.
Going into space would not be a problem for him, with Carol's mother's guidance he would know where to look and what materials would be useful.
Although he would have to do all the heavy lifting he did not complain, this prison would be a necessary thing for the world.
He had considered getting Tony's help but ruled it out in the end, alien technology was not something he could let people get just because.
Even though Tony was his "partner" he still didn't know him well enough to trust something like this into his hands.
More importantly this technology was not his, it was Carol's, although she seemed to be giving it to him easily and treating it as if it belonged to both of them Daniel knew this was not so.
Carol could trust him but that didn't mean he could give away the things she gave to others just because he wanted to.
Of course if he told her she would accept she had no doubt about it, she was too crazy.
But he didn't want to do that.
While he had said many cruel things to Carol, the reality was that he didn't want to use her.
That's not what he wanted to be in this life.
Of course that didn't mean he didn't have a grudge against her, he did of course but not to the point of giving away the inheritance of his dead race to just anyone.
There were lines he would not cross.
He could upset Carol in other ways.
Although Carol seemed to think things between them were fine Daniel knew that wasn't the case.
At least on his part it wasn't.
Daniel could be vindictive and spiteful and Carol had forced him into a situation that gave him a headache.
She was too naive if she thought things would go her way just because she wanted them to.
Of course Daniel knew Carol wasn't evil, at least not consciously, it wasn't her fault she was crazy.
She hadn't done anything wrong, at least not bad enough for him to make her his enemy.
He didn't want her to stray down a dark path.
She was too strong.
If he made her his enemy then definitely his disadvantage worthy opponents would come into play, he did not doubt that Carol was currently the only one who could kill him.
On the other hand he had come to a realization a few days earlier.
The situation with Carol, chaos was behind her wasn't it?
The more Daniel thought about it the more certain he became of this fact, it was all the fault of his handicap! For that reason Carol had gone crazy?
That's what Daniel wanted to believe, and once he realized this he knew what he had to do.
He had to control Carol, somehow.
If he could do that, maybe Carol would recover.
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In a higher dimension.
Chaos sneezed, looked at his son who blamed him for something he didn't do and cursed, what did this have to do with him? Wasn't it all his fault? Why did he have to blame his actions on others?
Feeling spiteful, chaos began to brew.
He would not be unjustly accused...
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Suddenly Daniel felt a chill and looked around in panic.
Something bad would happen to him in the future, he didn't know why he felt this but somehow he knew.
This made him a little depressed, his new life seemed to be not so simple.
But he cheered up quickly, what did it matter what would happen in the future? those were Daniel's problems in the future, Daniel in the present had a science fair to enjoy.
He began to walk around and looked at the students' booths, there were simple projects, some complex and others absurd or ambitious.
It was interesting to observe and understand the science behind each of them.
It was fun too, when he felt it was appropriate he would go over and have chats with the students, if possible he would share some of the information he had learned and give them some advice.
Daniel had not experienced anything like this before, it was an extremely enriching experience and made him appreciate humanity in a way.
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Peter Parker adjusted his broken glasses, felt a twinge of pain in his face and couldn't help but grimace.
Even though it had been a few days since flash decided that his face was a target it still hurt.
The worst thing was his glasses, they weren't cheap, he didn't want his uncles to worry too much about it, so he fixed them, somehow, even though they were a bit uncomfortable to wear since they weren't quite aligned they were still useful.
He looked at his booth at the science fair and grimaced, it wasn't what he had wanted.
His real project could not be completed due to the flash incident, Peter had not been able to finish it so he could only present one of the secondary inventions he had made in his spare time, it was not the best, it was barely finished.
Peter was disappointed, originally this day would be a great opportunity but it seemed that fate was not smiling on him.
Disappointed he looked at the floor, a broken tile reminded him of the shape of the spider's web, he looked at the cracks without paying attention to his surroundings.
Then a voice brought him out of his trance.
"A drone?" Peter looked over and saw a young man no more than 20 years old looking at the drone he had created.
Cheering up a bit Peter stood up, even though things hadn't gone his way he still had to keep going, giving up over a stumble wasn't his style.
"Its structure is quite solid, how much weight can it carry?" to the question Peter answered quickly.
"almost 8 kilos, I have created a propulsion system of seven propellers and seven engines which allows it a large carrying capacity as well as being capable of redundancy in case one of the engines fails."
The man raised an eyebrow slightly.
"it also has an extended flight capability of up to an hour, I designed a special battery using the remains of some starkphone parts it is quite reliable in that respect and I was able to create a special power management system for the drone so it can extend the return time if necessary by sacrificing some non-essential functions" Peter was actually kind of proud of it it had cost him a bit to do so as his funds were limited.
The man nodded, smiling as he looked at the drone, although it seemed small so far its capabilities were better than anything on the market.
Peter explained all the other features, each of them made the man's eyes light up a little.
"I think you and I can help each other, my name is Daniel, Daniel evans" looking at the hand that was extended towards peter he took it with some nervousness .
"Peter Parker"
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Looking at the number of the young man Daniel had met, he couldn't help but think deeply.
The drone was not far-fetched in terms of technology, at least not for him.
But in this world drones were not yet as notable or popular as they had been in their previous life.
Drone technology had been neglected throughout the industry and outside of the military there were almost no companies producing them.
And those that were on the civilian market were very expensive and unreliable.
But Daniel knew that this market had a lot of potential.
And the utility of drones was also quite broad.
Of course if he had wanted to, based on his previous life and his newly acquired knowledge, Daniel could have created a drone more advanced than any other.
But he hadn't bothered because although they had great market potential and could be of much use to humans they were of little use to him at the time.
Besides the capital needed to enter such a market was not simple, not only did he need to design the drone but also the infrastructure and raw materials to produce them.
And to have all of that, it needed a certain amount of money that it didn't have before.
So I had put that idea in a corner and it wasn't until today that I considered it again.
Now he was quite busy but the idea of creating a company to produce drones and other technological products had come to his mind when he saw Peter's drone.
With the help of Kryptonian technology overwatch was about to become a real artificial intelligence taking the experience he had gained from creating it he could create another artificial intelligence that would manage production and run such a company.
He wouldn't have to waste too much time.
It may be time to sell some of those stark industries shares.
Thinking about the guy who brought the idea back to him Daniel decided to get in touch and offer him a job if he decided to do the company.
Daniel was grateful when he had to be.
He saw the potential in the boy and believed that with the necessary resources and support he could go far.
Letting him design the drones he would sell and paying him a percentage of sales should be enough.
For some reason Daniel felt charitable towards the boy.
Had he met him somewhere?
But no matter how hard she searched her mind she remembered nothing.
Well it didn't matter for now.
He saw a group of people gathering in the distance and decided to go take a look.
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"very well everything should be in order" Reed Richards looked at his post and nodded in satisfaction.
He wanted this to be perfect, this was a rare opportunity that didn't come along many times.
This science fair had been organized by several of the most prestigious schools in and around New York, several important people would be attending and some of the representatives of the most famous universities would be among them.
Whether he could attend one of these universities and get a good scholarship depended entirely on his performance today.
He had been working on this since he was a kid so he had some confidence.
He had solved the major problems not too long ago and knew it would run smoothly.
With this he would begin his life, away from his stepfather's house, away from his family.
"If you keep looking at it it will explode, come on it's ready."
Ben, Rick's best friend arrived and patted him on the back.
Ben looked at the stand with Rick's invention and couldn't help but whistle, even the one who had seen it in action before was excited to see it in action this day.
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Daniel arrived at the place where people were gathered and saw a stand and the words written in the name of the project made his eyebrows raise.
Matter teleporter eh?
Interesting, daniel had been learning a lot about this subject these past few days due to his attempt to create the portal to the phantom zone.
He had learned entirely new concepts from Krypton's knowledge about teleportation.
They had many useful uses for this technology and although it was not their strong point compared to other races in the universe, it was still hundreds of years ahead of human understanding in the field.
He moved easily to the front of the observers and looked at the machine on the stand.
For someone with his vision and taking into account the knowledge he had he could tell that this was in fact a functional teleportation machine.
Stunned I looked at the design in disbelief not expecting to have encountered such a thing at this science fair.
He quickly began to memorize the design, now he regretted not bringing Carol, if he used his x-ray vision he could have completely memorized the design down to the smallest detail.
This could be very useful for him.
As Daniel shamelessly copied the design from the machine the presentation began.
Reed stood at the front and began his introduction.
"We have been working on this since fifth grade, it is now capable of transporting and bringing back non-biological matter with no problems" he smiled proudly as he spoke.
Although he had not yet reached the point of transporting biological matter he was sure he was not far off, the only thing limiting him was his resources.
"now I will give you a demonstration"
Reed quickly reached out his hand and Ben understood the gesture and handed him a small miniature car he had been holding.
Carefully Reed placed the car in the center of the machine adjusting its position appropriately.
He nervously checked the equipment one last time before continuing.
"all right you're going to want to cover your ears for the next thing."
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15 minutes before.
Dr. Franklin Storm walked through the science fair with his two sons.
The Baxter Foundation had been invited like many other places and normally only an ordinary representative would come to observe an event like this.
But on this day Dr. Storm had decided to come personally.
Not only because he wanted to see what the new generations were doing, but because he wanted to take this opportunity so that his most rebellious son could witness how those of his own age were doing their best to achieve incredible things, so that perhaps his son would understand a little of his vision of the world.
So far that had not happened.
"the world's biggest gathering of eggheads! I didn't expect to witness it with my own eyes" Johnny Storm laughed and looked around with a bored look on his face.
Everywhere he looked everything reminded him of the cold Baxter Building.
How boring.
His sister rolled her eyes and elbowed him in the ribs making him hiss in pain.
"Shut up, you'll embarrass us if you keep talking" Susan Storm was not happy with her brother, like her father she was quite the science geek.
Coming to observe was a rare opportunity to see what people her age were doing outside the Baxter building.
"what's the matter sis can't you stand a little attention?" johny scoffed, not heeding her sister's words.
"both of you don't make a fuss, we're here to observe not to draw attention to ourselves" Dr. Storm scolded quietly.
Both sons complained, Dr. Storm not for the first time wished his wife was still here, she was better at this than he was.
Soon they arrived in front of an interesting stall, as he read the name tag on the stall he couldn't help but raise an eyebrow.
Teleportation was actually one of the main research topics of the baxter foundation.
Although progress was slow it was steady enough to be considered viable.
Curious, he approached.
Susan Storm felt her father pat her shoulder and turned her gaze to where her father was looking.
With some surprise she followed her father, also interested in the subject.
"very well you're going to want to cover your ears for the following" the guy presenting the project said, the people around paid attention to him but Susan noticed a young man no more than 20 who seemed not to have listened and left his ears unprotected.
She wanted to warn him, as someone who spent all her time in the lab she knew there would always be some "dangers" when testing things like this.
But before she could say she watched in amazement as a copula of blue energy began to surround the miniature car.
People exclaimed all around then there was a loud light and a high pitched sound.
When he opened his eyes the car was gone.
"All right now bring it back, please cover your ears" Rick pointed to Ben who nodded and turned the Machine back on.
Before the people could react Ben turned the machine back on the light returned and at that instant Daniel who was watching noticed how an energy fluctuation shot out, it wasn't too strong but it could damage other students' equipment.
With a flick of his finger the kinetic energy was triggered and he intervened dissipating the energy released by the teleporter.
This happened so fast that no one noticed.
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Susan looked at the small sand-covered car that had disappeared earlier but now returned.
Her mouth couldn't help but drop open in amazement.
Next to her her father also looked on in amazement.
Her brother, who had been staring boredly at the whole place, also had his eyes open.
"great, very good, now if I can get your attention please, as you can notice the object is covered with sand, maybe from the Gobi desert in china or maybe from the Sahara maybe even from arabia, we are not sure yet" Rick's voice got a little weaker at the end.
The people around exclaimed in amazement.
Then a voice interrupted.
"it's not from any desert" Susan turned to look and saw that voice coming from that young man who didn't seem to bother to take care of his physical health.
"Excuse me?" Rick looked at him in bewilderment.
"sorry to interrupt but it's not from any desert, the interference of local gravitational fields in the surrounding space around the machine is not as it should be if it were a simple teleporter, if it were we would see minor and localized gravitational fluctuations. However, what we observe is a significant alteration of the gravitational fields in a coherent three-dimensional pattern." The man although speaking clearly was speaking rapidly, many of the people there could not keep up with his voice.
Only the most intelligent and wise could follow his words clearly.
His voice contained a childlike excitement as if he were talking about a new and amazing toy.
"furthermore that blue energy field was created by the electromagnetic radiation generated by the machine which indicates that it is producing completely new frequencies and spectra that do not correspond to any point on Earth. This is no ordinary teleporter, you are sending matter to another dimension, you are opening a hole in the fabric of spacetime without realizing it" the man approached the machine looking at it with childlike amazement.
Rick looked thoughtfully and the more he thought about it, the more he realized that the man's words might be correct.
"You created a tracking system to capture the frequency of the object sent which allows you to bring it back, but you can't locate the object no matter what you do can you? That's because you had no idea that the place where you send it is not on earth, the frequency of the dimension it goes to is not the same as our dimension, to be able to locate it you need a dimensional anchor that allows you to capture the frequency of this new dimension to be able to locate the object in this different space" suddenly the man stopped talking he seemed to have realized where he was, he looked around and scratched his head with some embarrassment.
"I'm just saying it's quite interesting"
Daniel had gotten too excited, he hadn't expected to find a machine capable of Dimensional travel in a place like this and got too carried away.
For his part Reed began to think about Daniel's words and ideas began to come to his mind quickly.
Some things he had not thought of before became clear and he realized that he could solve many of the problems he had had before.
Although Daniel had not gone into much detail his words were correct, they gave him the direction that Rick lacked and with his genius he could begin to think of ways to improve his machine quickly.
Rick, a genius without equal, when he got the missing direction it was like opening a door for his mind, his brain began to work quickly and the solutions to many problems quickly became clear.
Daniel stepped back, he didn't want to draw attention to himself that way so he decided to withdraw for now, he looked at the name on the student badge, Reed Richards eh... he would have to pay attention to it.
As Daniel stepped back a voice came from behind him.
"You seem to know quite a bit about Dimensional travel" Daniel furrowed his eyebrows.
He turned and saw a beautiful young woman with semi-short blonde hair looking at him.
She was beautiful, actually she was quite attractive, she had that unique charm that only intellectual women possessed.
"just basic knowledge, nothing really important" but Daniel responded without hesitation even if it was beautiful it was pretty silly if anything could make him stand still or get distracted.
This wasn't a novel people don't get stiff just because a beautiful woman is in front of them.
"Sure, basic knowledge" the woman narrowed her eyes.
Daniel knew her words had not deceived her.
She offered him her hand.
"Susan Storm, Baxter Foundation Representative" not wanting to be rude daniel took her hand.
"Daniel evans, Representative of Daniel evans" Susan laughed and daniel couldn't help but think about forming a company again, he also wanted to add more than just his name when he introduced himself.
Of course these thoughts were fleeting.
"I heard your explanation and I think we could help each other" Susan pulled out a business card, daniel took it and looked at it, it had Susan's name, a phone number and the address of the Baxter building.
The Baxter Foundation had heard of her.
He had even done some research on her.
It was created by Dr. Franklin Storm as an organization focused on advanced scientific research in different fields.
It also served as a support center for young scientific minds, it was quite similar to a private university although I had no idea how it worked properly.
Only that it offered scholarships to promising young students.
He didn't look so young, did he? For a moment Daniel ignored the fact that he was not yet 20 years old in this world.
He took the card and raised an eyebrow at Susan.
She smiled brightly.
The reality was that not only Susan was interested in Daniel, her father was too, although Susan had already decided to talk to him, her father encouraged her even more and he went to talk to Reed.
For that reason Susan quickly approached him.
Although others might not understand it, the Baxter Foundation had been researching dimensional travel for a long time without much success.
Today they may have found two people who could be the key to advancing interdimensional travel technology.
They could even help the foundation advance in many other scientific fields.
Maybe I could be exaggerating a bit but the hope was there.
"maybe" daniel replied, should he consider it? Although joining the Baxter foundation might steal a lot of his time it might also help him, but after some thought he decided against it, although there might be some benefits the time he would have to invest was not something he was willing to give.
He had even refused to give some of his time to Carol, who was his greatest ally and the basis for his greatest advances in the future thanks to the alien technology in his hands, with that in mind how could he give that time to others?
Susan didn't notice the hidden refusal in Daniel's eyes, she smiled and began to tell him about the foundation.
Daniel didn't want to be rude from what he heard, besides even if he didn't join learning more about the foundation wasn't a bad thing.
While they were talking Daniel noticed that a small commotion started to happen in the booth where the teleportation machine was.
Susan noticed it too and they both quickly approached.
"I think we both know that Star labs is the best choice for young Richards, Dr. Storm, your foundation has been in decline, such a place cannot support a genius of such caliber" a middle aged man with a crooked smile gave a blond haired man a dismissive look.
"I think that is for the young man alone to decide, trying to influence his decision with malicious words is pretty low even for you Spencer" Dr. Storm calmly responded to the man's provocative words.
"dad what's going on?" it was at that moment that Susan arrived next to her father.
"an idiot who talks too much" johny who was already irritated responded before his father, every word from the other party did not sit well with young Storm.
"you should watch your mouth brat" the one called Spencer almost shouted and gave johny an angry look.
Dr. Storm quickly tried to reassure his son.
Susan furrowed her eyebrows.
Daniel looked over from the side, his attention brought by a face he had seen earlier.
He could still remember the guy he tied up after he crashed.
The photo from that day had even made the news.
Carol laughed out loud when he told her the story.
"It's not your place to tell me how I should raise my children Spencer" daniel turned his attention back to the situation when Dr. Storm's angry voice rang out, it seemed the argument escalated.
"hmm! It's just advice Storm, after all you can't always get your son out of jail by relying on your name, he's sullied it enough" johny seemed to have been irritated by those words he almost lunged towards the man but his father quickly restrained him.
"Easy johny calm down don't listen to him he's just an idiot" Susan quickly tried to calm her brother down, johny furrowed his eyebrows, Spencer gave the young man a haughty look, obviously being contemptuous against him.
Johny snorted and stepped back a little.
Reed and Ben who had been watching the show let out a sigh of relief, a fight so close to the stall made them worry, they didn't want the machine they put so much effort into making to be damaged.
"Let's go we don't need to be here anymore, sorry for the commotion" Dr. Storm decided to leave along with his sons, he quickly apologized to the people around him and turned to leave.
Spencer looked at the group of three with obvious disdain, he moved a little closer to a handsome young man who came with him and spoke, his actions made it seem like he wanted to whisper to the person next to him but his voice was actually loud and clear to everyone around.
"watch them well Victor, remember not to be like them, especially that boy, don't waste your potential like him, you don't want to end up as a failure" johny who was about to follow his father stopped, burning fury clouded his mind, he moved quickly and in a few steps he arrived in front of Spencer.
Daniel, who noticed that the situation was not good, approached quickly, he had stayed behind Susan when he noticed Johnny and that had been a mistake, he had not expected the other party to be so loose-mouthed and provoke the young Storm.
Now he had to push Susan and her father out of the way to get to Johnny, this wasted a few seconds as they also wanted to get close to the young man to stop him.
Spencer who was not expecting johny to approach so suddenly became upset, before johny could do or say anything the man acted.
His fist struck johny's face.
Everyone's eyes went wide when this happened, no one expected that the first one to actually attack would be the older man.
Johny's body that had been walking towards Spencer fell to the side, he had not been in a steady position because he was moving so fast that he could not keep his balance when the fist hit his face.
His body landed on Reed's post, there was a moment of absolute silence then a blue glow flooded the area and everyone watched in horror as the machine began to release arcs of energy.
A stream of energy was released, due to the shock the energy went out of control creating an explosion that engulfed the young Storm's body in flames, his body flew away, then the blue energy continued to be released hitting the closest people.
This whole process happened extremely fast, Daniel who was behind Susan and her father did not have time to avoid this even with his speed.
The energy was moving so fast that even for him it was difficult to perceive.
Without time to think too much Daniel moved quickly, pushing aside the people who had not yet been hit by the energy.
But his speed was not as fast as the energy wave that was released, he had to use his body to cover the people before carrying them away.
Every time the energy hit his body Daniel felt his cells shake.
His internal organs churned and a feeling of nausea came over him.
But he didn't stop, once he got all the unaffected people out he looked at the center of the accident.
Susan, his father, Johnny who was flying through the air engulfed in flames, Reed and the young man next to him, that guy who hit Johnny and the young man named Victor.
All of them were hit directly by the blue energy waves.
He looked at Johnny who was on fire and flew towards him, lowered his body and threw some icy breath on him to extinguish the flames.
Then he went to Susan and her father and dragged them back.
All this took less than a second.
As he moved into the center of the energy flooded area Daniel felt his muscles twist, he actually felt weaker.
When he pulled Susan and his father out he lost his balance and time returned to its normal speed.
Strong gusts of wind began to flood the place.
Daniel looked at the two people he pulled out, they had lost consciousness.
He looked toward the center of the accident and his heart sank.
A crack opened up, the space twisted and large amounts of sand and rocks flew out and flooded the surrounding area.
The four people he was unable to get out in time were not in good condition.
The young man next to Reed had been hit and buried under the large amount of sand and rocks that came out of the crevasse.
The genius who had built the teleportation machine had all the limbs of his body twisted in a grotesque way, his limbs were stretched in impossible ways, it seemed that space had stretched his body.
The man named Spencer had half of his body charred, the explosion that engulfed Johnny in fire also hit him.
The young man next to him didn't fare any better, his skin was also burned and some of the metal from the machine had actually hit his face.
The situation did not look good no matter how you looked at it.
He looked at the space rift, the energy had stopped being expelled without control, even so the space was still twisting, Daniel felt how the gravity began to change around him, this change was quite easy for him to detect, his flying ability had allowed him to develop a kind of sixth sense that allowed him to feel the gravitational changes no matter how weak they were.
He also began to feel the air being sucked slowly through the hole in space in front of him.
He stood up, resisted the nausea and the feeling of dizziness and approached the crevice.
How do you close a spacetime rift without any equipment or tools?
He looked at his hands, looked at the size of the rift and a stupid idea came to mind.
But as stupid as it was, he had no choice, he could feel the suction force increasing and gravity starting to get out of control.
If the crack was not closed, it could expand to the point that the earth would be swallowed up.
He got closer and saw the four people he couldn't get out of the way as they began to be sucked in.
He would not let that happen.
He quickly approached the buried guy and tried to pull him out but when he dug his hands in he didn't feel the sensation of human flesh.
He furrowed his eyebrows, took a breath and blew, unlike before he did not do it with the intention of freezing but to move the rocks and sand away.
The air quickly blew away the debris, it didn't actually fly away too far, the crevice where it came from began to devour it again.
When he saw what was underneath, Daniel could not help but be bewildered.
"That doesn't look good..." looking at the large humanoid body covered in rocks he couldn't help but worry, he touched it trying to remove the rocks from the body but unlike the other rocks these were extremely hard which surprised him a lot plus they didn't seem to be able to detach from the body.
Without more time he could only move it away quickly, although it was big its weight was nothing for him.
Even so its size was cumbersome, he had to use both hands to hold it properly.
He quickly ran to where he left the family of three and set it down next to them, then returned.
He quickly ran towards the Spencer guy, although half of his body seemed burned he was still alive, he held him carefully, just as he was about to grab the boy named Victor the attraction power increased by several levels.
With no time to wait any longer he grabbed Victor and stretched towards Reed.
Holding him was actually harder than the huge guy covered in rocks, his body was like a spaghetti, touching him was actually a bit strange and when he lifted him up his limbs stretched even more, the suction of the rift didn't help, it was starting to pull Reed and stretch his body I didn't know if that was bad or not for his strange body.
He quickly realized that things were not going well, Reed's body kept stretching, closer and closer to the crevice.
The more force he exerted to hold Reed, the more his body stretched due to the suction.
With one hand he was holding Spencer and with the other Victor and Reed, it was an uncomfortable position, he had to start flying to avoid being dragged by the suction force as well.
Under normal circumstances he would have been able to hold on.
But his body was not in its best condition.
That strange energy had hit his body affecting him in an unknown way.
Even when he tried to activate his nucleus to help him recover it did not help, his body was not "injured" for the nucleus, there was nothing to heal, but he still felt bad.
It was strange.
With horror he watched as Reed's lower body began to enter the crack, his body stretching beyond anything possible for a human body.
Because of this Reed began to wake up.
"Aaaahhh!?" when he opened his eyes the first thing he saw was his deformed torso stretching impossibly and being swallowed by a rift in space.
Anyone would be upset, but this didn't help, when Reed stirred the grip Daniel had on him loosened.
"Easy!" daniel gritted his teeth, ignored the nauseous feeling as best he could and tried to improve his grip on Reed.
"What's going on!?" reed's eyes flashed with uncontrollable fear, sweat filled his face and daniel could feel the boy's panic.
"Listen! Calm down and let me pull you to me okay, you have to stop moving!"
Reed gritted his teeth and nodded, daniel began to slowly back away.
Reed's body continued to stretch and a cry of pain came out of his mouth, then he began to shake hard as if he was spasming.
"No!" Daniel screamed as he felt the part of Reed he was holding stretch so that it slipped out of his hand, slipping through his grip, he had to make a decision, he couldn't let go of Victor and he couldn't hold Reed again.
"Help me!" Reed screamed in absolute fear as he saw daniel's grip on him loosen.
Daniel could only watch in remorse as Reed was swallowed by the rift.
"Shit!" in anger he quickly backed away and left Spencer and Victor at a safe distance.
Then he turned back and quickly approached the rift.
He looked around, all the people who had been in the area had been pushed away by him earlier so the place was empty except for those who were hit by the strange energy.
He looked into the void, it was so deep blackness.
His gaze tried to see something, he tried to look for Reed, he looked at the emptiness but the emptiness did not look at him.
"Fuck!"
Angrily he stretched out his hands, his fingers did the impossible, they touched the edge of a spacetime rupture.
Something completely beyond all logic and human comprehension.
With strength he held the edges of the crack and using all the power in his body began to squeeze.
Slowly centimeter by centimeter the space began to close.
His muscles burned, the place where his hands squeezed began to burn and his skin tore.
He gritted his teeth so hard that he broke several of them.
Sweat flooded his entire body yet he persisted, slowly began to close the crack.
"Ha!" with a final cry his hands came together, the crack was forced to close and the space began to repair itself once the two ends touched.
Daniel exhaled almost falling to his knees on the ground.
His hands burned with pain and felt numb.
Large beads of sweat fell from his face, he looked into the now stable space and sighed.
I hear the sirens approaching the site.
I look at the six people who were still unconscious.
Wrong, five, Dr. Storm started to wake up.
I looked at the doctor and made a decision, I couldn't leave them here.
.
.
.
His name, what was his name? She did not remember.
She couldn't remember many things, how many days, weeks, months... years? How long had it been since she forgot?
She couldn't tell, time was passing differently since she changed.
Since he became strong.
The images of that time were vague, in a forest she was running, several figures were chasing her and her body ached all over.
Pain was one of the only clear things in her memories of that time.
Then she could not escape, the memory was more vague when she thought about it but the pain, the hatred, the humiliation...
All of that was clear in her mind.
Her broken and used body lying in the middle of the forest, the moon illuminating her face and something inside her roaring with infinite hatred.
Something woke up.
Her bones snapped, her skin ripped and her muscles twisted.
His form changed, fur grew on his body and a howl came from his throat flooding the night.
Then she hunted, each one of them she killed, ate them and made them feel pain.
From that moment on nothing hurt her again and she became the top predator of the forest.
No matter where she went, no matter what enemy she faced, no matter how much time passed, she always won.
She was the hunter and everything else her prey.
So she met him, was he a man? Was he called human? He was different, she tried to hunt him but he fought, she chased him but he escaped every time.
At some point they stopped fighting.
Time began to pass slower by her side, every day with him was something she could remember perfectly.
Then she left, he didn't come back but he left something of himself with her.
Her son, she took care of him but he grew very slowly.
Time passed quickly but the little wolf remained small.
She worried too much about him.
At some point she came to a strange place.
It was a cave with a strange smell.
It was a heady smell, his memories became hazy again.
Those glittering stones seemed to hypnotize his mind, he stopped paying attention to the little wolf.
She just ate, no matter what, she just consumed those glittering stones.
Her body grew bigger, her body grew stronger.
Nothing else remained in her mind but the desire to consume.
Then her son died, died in front of her and she did nothing.
She had heard his howl in the distance, she had heard his wailing and his pain.
She had smelled his blood.
But she did nothing, she just ate.
It wasn't until she saw him die in front of her that something awoke inside her again.
As if whatever was blocking her mind was destroyed came the fury and pain.
His son was dead.
And who killed him was right in front of her.
So she fought, bit and tore but for the first time in a long time she wasn't strong enough.
She lost.
She should have died.
But she didn't.
Eating the last green crystal in her hand the wolf woman looked up at the dark sky, her eyes burning with cold, intense hatred.
Her nose sniffed, her mind clearer than ever before, she lost so she needed to be stronger.
The only way to become stronger was to eat the green stones.
So she searched, she ran through the forest, the rivers and the lakes, she ran through the mountains and the valleys.
She searched for every one of them, every one of those green stones.
To win, to be the strongest.
To avenge her son.
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.
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Note
I'm not a scientist, I tried as hard as I could to make the science dialogues not just random crap but I don't know how well it came out, theoretical science loving friends don't lynch me.
I did the best I could and if it's not right or makes no sense I'm sorry, I don't know how to explain technology that doesn't exist at all.
I don't know whether to keep writing scientific dialogues this way or just be super lazy and not go into details at all.