Chapter Four, War.

Author Note~~~~~

I couldn't sleep, so I released a chapter. It probably won't help with my insomnia, but at least I'll feel better about myself. Enjoy.

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As I arrive in the living room turned control room, Ben looks at the screens with a determined gaze. Johnny and Sue come in at the same time, just after me. They look at me, with grave expressions. They nod at me, and go check on the screens. I close my eyes, take a deep breath, and follow them.

While everyone check on the defenses, no one speaks, this stressful atmosphere deepening by the minute, as we have no news whatsoever. Two minutes ago, the UAVs that left Latveria suddenly disappeared from all radars, making my assumption more than real, so I asked the AI to focus on the North American airspace.

In other news, it appears someone at SHIELD took my warning seriously, and evacuation started in the neighboring buildings.

Like that, waiting for news, another twenty minutes pass. And then, "Sir, UAVs started appearing over the Atlantic airspace. ETA six minutes."

"Do you have visual?" Ben asks.

"Visual in two minutes. Evacuation of the surroundings should be done in three minutes. The authorities are saying that a Mr. Fury pushed for it."

"Keep us informed. Once you have visual, put it up on the large screen. I want to see what we'll be fighting against." I say. So, Fury believed me, that's good. Or at least believed that I was a threat and prepared for my capture.

"Yes, Sir."

"Guys, I'm sorry about all of this, I should have put redundancies in the pods. None of that would have happened if I did."

"It's alright, we were a part of it. If anything, we all share responsibility for leaving Victor there." Sue says, putting a hand on my shoulder. I put her hand in mine, and kiss it, closing my eyes.

"Thank you. Now is your last chance, you can still go to the parking lot underground, it should be safe enough."

"Oh you better believe we're fighting, stretch. All of us are in this together. Right, matchstick?"

"For sure, pebbleman. I wouldn't dream of a better evening, fighting flying robots sent by a man named Doom? That's what I'm talking about."

"I'm here to make sure none of you screw up. You can't send me away anymore."

"I love you." I say, hugging her.

"I know." she answers, reciprocating the hug.

"Yeah, we do," Ben says, joining the hug in his rock form. "Hey come here you too!" Ben hollers, pulling Johnny in the group hug. We all laugh a bit, until…

"Pardon me, but we have visual. 22 Robots are arriving in four minutes."

"Let's kick his ass!" shouts Johnny, followed by all of us, repeating that.

"LET'S KICK HIS ASS!" With that, we turn to the large screen, showing pictures of the robots from different angles, as well as a number tally on the upper right corner.

"Okay, as soon as more than two touch the building, electrify it. Let's see how the respond to that. After, you'll open up floor 12, 13 and 14's blinds and windows and power up the magnets when two robots passed the floor. We'll take care of the remnants in floor 15, as a group. Act as if those robots have cameras implanted in them, and that Doom can see us. Try to keep your abilities as a surprise as much as possible. You won't be able to hide your power, but do keep a few aces up your sleeves. I know it will make it harder, but it's better to have something that Doom won't know about. Alfred, I want you to keep track of every robot and robot parts that land around here. Once the 22 robots are down, tell us where to find them so that we can assemble them in a big pile and burn it down to kingdom come. He was able to activate his pod remotely from another dimension, let's not give him any opportunity with those robots. All clear? Any questions?"

"Can I at least keep one of them to study?" Johnny asks, while we go down to the 15th floor.

"I would love to as well, but unfortunately, Doom is to be taken extremely seriously, and if I thought of using them as spies that can be reactivated remotely, he will definitely have as well. Sorry Johnny."

"Evacuation is over, the authorities have sent a military convoy to keep the line. ETA one minute." Alfred reports.

"Well, let's put on our mean faces, and get ready for some action." As soon as I say that, the elevator's doors open, and a screen shows three robots latch onto the building, get electrocuted, and fall down to the street, unresponsive. Another three pull back, hovering, and start shooting the building, until one of them notices the open windows. Five enter on the 12th floor, with two of them stuck and electrocuted by the magnet. The same thing happens simultaneously on the 13th and 14th floor, but with only one robot on 13 and three on 14.

The robot that was caught by the magnet on the 13th floor detonated, destroying the magnet with him. The rest of the horde go through that floor, now that it's magnet-free.

We stand together in the middle of the room, looking at the elevator shaft and the staircase, waiting for them to climb to our position. One of them does, and like I asked him to, Alfred holds back the lasers until the bot is almost on us. The lasers destroy it mid-flight, and the rest of the robots now know where we are.

Five bots pop out of the elevator shaft, and it's like a Star Wars scene, with the bots shooting at us, Sue putting up a small psionic shield, the lasers retaliating, and a firefight starts between the two sides. After thirty seconds, the fight is over, the five that came up destroyed, but we only have two functioning laser turret left, with one defective, as it shoots slower than its counterpart.

The seven remaining robots all come together from both the elevator shaft and the staircase, and immediately destroy our lasers. They surround us, and we hear Victor Von Doom's voice from their speakers.

"So I was right. You have powers as well. What are they? Ben's looking like a rock, I assume strength and durability. I saw some sort of shield coming from Sue, maybe some kind of telekinesis. What about you Reed? What powers made you abandon me? What price was low enough that you decided on trading my life for?"

"We thought you were dead!" Sue shouts, but to no avail.

"Did you? Did you check on me before escaping like the cowards that you are?! Did you look for me?! Did you try to come back for me after escaping?! I think not! I was hurt, hungry, angry! I was stranded in another dimension all by myself, with only my wits to fight my way to survival. What did you do? You escaped, and built a fucking car!"

"It's not like that…" Sue tries to argue.

"Victor, it's not too late for you, yet. You can still work with us. Ben has his appearance under control, whatever power you got from the storm, we can help you control it. If you attack us, you might go to prison. We won't be able to help you there." I try to say.

"Prison? PRISON? HAHAHAHAHA! You think a mere cage will hold Doom! It's too late for that Reed! It's too late for that." He says, and the bots attack.

Two of them ram themselves against Sue's shield, pushing hard against it. She holds strong, though visibly struggling to keep it up, but blood starts dripping from her nose. "I can't hold it for long! Johnny!"

"FLAME ON!" Johnny shouts, turning itself into flames, preparing powerful fireballs in each of his hands, and shooting them towards the bots as soon as Sue releases her forcefield. The robots burst into flame and fall to the ground, with parts of them melting.

Ben goes against a robot, trying to fight it in a boxing match. The robot doesn't damage him in the slightest, despite the heavy suppressive fire.

I protect Sue, just the time for her to take a breath and turn invisible. As soon as she is completely out of my sight, I catch a downed robot on the ground. I use my hand and arm as a sling, chucking it at high speed against another one, before Johnny pins it to the ground and punches it repeatedly, while still being on fire.

Finally, Ben manages to hit his robot, disorienting it long enough to fight it in close quarters. One of his punches pass through the robot, but it still shoots towards Ben. Ben keeps it at a literal arm's length and cocks his left punch, before shouting his famous one liner: "IT'S CLOBBERIN TIME" and punching it straight in the head, detaching it from the rest of its body.

"Really?! Clobberin time?!" Johnny says, still punching the moving robot under him, before deciding it was enough and heating up his right hand against the robot, melting its armor, passing through it, and melting the interior of it.

A robot flies above my head, and I feel someone stepping on me, but I don't see anyone, so I push myself to grow tall enough, and the robot falters a bit, like something just landed on it. After a few seconds, cables get ripped off of it, and the robot crashes towards the ground, before exploding from the inside, as if a small object appeared in its interior.

"Ben!" I shout. "Slingshot!" I say, as I catch two sides of the building, and Ben runs towards me. He picks up a downed robot, puts it in front of me, and pulls me back, creating a human slingshot. He aims towards one of the two flying robots left, and let go of me. My body is launched, and the piece of scrap that was in front of me flies off, coming into contact with another robot, creating a small explosion.

Sue reappears, and holds the last robot in a force field. "You don't get to attack my family, Victor- no. Doom. I thought we were friends, but it turns out you're just obsessed. If you hadn't destroyed our pods, we would have looked for you. If you hadn't killed those innocent people, we could have helped you. But today, you crossed a line. Try and fight us again, and we will stop you." As she says that, she closes her fist, the forcefield compresses and with it, the robot. When it looks like a crushed can, she releases her fist, and falls to her knees.

I go to her, take her into my arms. "It's over, we won." I say, caressing her back, as I feel her slowly losing her force. "We won. Go get some rest, Sue, you deserve it." I whisper, rising to my feet, carrying her in my arms. "Guys, I'll meet you in a bit." I tell them, walking to my room to put her to sleep.

When I come back Johnny is pushing all the robots parts on this floor towards one big pile, and Ben is nowhere to be seen. "Johnny, you're good here?" I ask him.

"I -huh… I'm sorry, Reed."

"What?" I say, surprised by this turn of events.

"I mean, I understand why you didn't tell me about him. I would definitely have done something stupid, and those robots are the real deal. I could have been killed if not for you."

"Wow- I… I don't know what to say… I was asking about the floor, if you needed help, but I'll take this." He gets embarrassed. "Thank you, Johnny. It means a lot to me." I tell him, pulling him in for a hug. "And I'm sorry as well, I won't hide anything from you again. Except for birthday and christmas presents. That will stay a secret until the last minute."

"Don't think that an apology is enough. I want unlimited pizzas, from your bank account. I'll make you pay for this and for stealing my sister." He says, turning away quickly to return to work, hiding his face from me, but a bit too fast, as a tear falls from the sudden movement. I say nothing about it, and go check on Ben.

"Alfred, anything to report?"

"No, Sir. Not directly towards the building."

"What do you mean?"

"An insurrection started in Latveria, with Victor Von Doom at the helm. It seems he is planning on becoming the ruler of Latveria."

"And thus, getting diplomatic immunity. That's why he said it was too late for prison."

"I believe this to be the case. In other news, the 12th, 13th and 14h floor have been quarantined, waiting for Mr. Storm to burn the remaining robots. Mr. Grim is outside, guarding the robots that fell out of the Baxter building. I asked to do so, as the military have received the order to check on what was happening. You should probably head over there as well, Sir."

"Good idea. Ask Johnny to come down as soon as he's done with the 15th floor. Mind opening the window for me, since the elevator is down?"

"Of course, Sir." I jump, and let me fall for a couple of seconds before relaxing my form to become a human parachute, slowing down enough to just put my feet to the ground like I hadn't jumped from the 15th floor of a building.

"Show-off." Ben says, in his human form, with a smirk on his face.

"I mean, I didn't punch a robot's head off, so I don't know what you're talking about." I answer, with my own smirk.

"What the hell is this sh*t?" we turn to look at someone hunched over the robots, in a black overcoat.

"That's a pile of scraps waiting to be destroyed. If you could please put back whatever is it that you stole before announcing yourself to us to appear more mysterious, it would be appreciated. The technology in there is mixed in with some nasty unknown stuff, that allows its creator to access it remotely, from wherever in the world. So if you don't want whatever spy company is it you work for to have all of its secrets spilled to a nefarious individual, I would advise you to let it be destroyed here." I say, walking towards him, with Ben in tow, slowly transforming into The Thing.

"I'm the director of SHIELD. Nick Fury. Who are you punk that you think you can threaten me like that?" He says, turning around. And the man, the legend, the eyepatch, glares at me.

"I think you know exactly who we are, and you know exactly what transpired here tonight, thanks to the little bug your agent planted on my sleeve this afternoon." I want to say he's surprised, but since only one eyebrow is visible, it's probable that he's only mildly curious at what I said. "Someone ever told you that you looked like Samuel L. Jackson?"

"Yes. Multiple times. Now, what makes me so sure that you want to destroy this, and not keep it for yourself?" As he says that, Johnny flies down in flame, to us.

"Hey, what's up eyepatch? Reed, the bots on the 15th floor are all molten goo. Alfred told me to destroy the ones here before the other floors, is there something wrong?" I look Fury in the eyes, and we hold the contest for a few seconds, without saying anything, until he sighs, and pulls out an eye, a finger and part of a circuit board from his pockets, and putting them on the pile of scraps.

"Nope, we're all good here, burn as you like." I say, smirking, while Ben just laughs a bit.

Johnny melts everything down, while I go talk to Fury on the side.

"You know, Doom is probably going to win his insurrection, right?" I say.

"He already did. Two minutes ago. You're a bit late on the uptake, kid."

"Sure, let's go with that." I answer, snorting. "What do you want Fury? If it was just his technology, you would have left before we knew we were here." And with that question, his famous recruitment speech starts.

"I'm here to talk to you about the Avengers Initiative."

"Sounds like a fire mixtape."

"The hottest. Now, can I say my piece, or are you going to continue-"

"Interrupting you? I promise I won't anymore." I say, with a smirk, while I see him gnashing his teeth.

"Your intellect put you on our radar first. Then the Dimensional cluste*ck happened too fast, and we couldn't get to you before it happened. Then your powers, but since you hid yourselves from the world, we didn't know for sure. With this, we do. This world is bigger than you imagine. Aliens, powers, whatever. And we need a team to defend this world against otherworldly threats.

We already have several members in mind, and you are part of them. What do you say?"

"I say, we need to discuss about it more between ourselves, with my family. But that if a threat shows itself, we won't stay idle. What do we gain from joining your little boys band?"

"Resources that your foundation needs right now, talents working with you, and training. You're still young, and the fact that I managed to steal from under your noses shows you're not 100% ready. And of course, official recognition for your services to this country."

"We'll think about it. How do I contact you?"

"You don't. I will. Goodnight, Mr. Richards." he says, melting into the shadows.

"He's got to have powers." I grumble, returning to my team for a debrief, and a most needed rest...