Chapter Ten, Press Conference N°2.

This was a very long week for Sue and I. Sue didn't catch a lot of sleep or rest, almost always working on her machine, and I became unbearable really quickly, losing my nerve for anything in no time. She got productive at the start, but her productivity declined by the day with her lack of energy, but still tried to work. After the third day, I decided to isolate myself, to avoid fighting with everyone and saying things I didn't mean. At that point we realized that the side effect was real, but we weren't sure that they were caused by the radiation until the results of the measures were calculated.

After that week, we went to the training room and spent a couple of hours overusing our powers like never before. Sue lasted a couple of hours before fainting from exertion and sleep deprivation. As she fell down, she still became invisible, but fortunately her sweat was visible, so I was able to find her 'relatively easily' and bring her to our bed before coming back down and transforming again and again until I fell unconscious as well.

The next morning, after Sue woke up and turned visible again, we went to Walt's lab to get the results. During this week, while Ben and Johnny's radiation level went down steadily the more they used their powers, our radiation level doubled as each day passed without using them. We didn't find any negative side effects with them, but ours were definitely real.

"Whelp, now you know. The less you use your powers, the more you get affected by the radiation. The more you use them, the less radiation you emit. Since using your powers is not that much of a hassle, I imagine, I don't think I can do much more to help you guys. I've gotten plenty of inspiration though, so I'll go back to my home lab and do some stuff again."

"Thank you again Walt, we loved having you here. Those few weeks were pretty fun." Says Ben, shaking Walt's hand. "Will you be coming back?"

"I don't see why not? I mean, I'll probably be cooped up for a while, but if I take a vacation or you need my help I'll be there. I had fun as well!" Walter answers.

"And to you as well, if you need a hand in something, I've studied a bit the gamma radiation after learning about Dr. Banner, so don't hesitate to call me." I say, with the idea to keep an eye on him with that. I don't think he will call, but better ask than not.

"I'll be sure to do that. I'll pick up my things and leave soon, while everything is still fresh. Alfred, do you mind booking me a flight?"

"It's done, a taxi will be taking you in about an hour."

"God I want one of you." he says, muttering under his breath.

"You know, we still have a couple of AIs we could give you. I tend to overdo it sometimes…" and an AI in his lab could be very useful indeed.

"I'll think about it, but I appreciate the thought. Alright, see you guys. It was a pleasure." he says, shaking everyone's hands before leaving to pack up his room.

"So, we use our powers? That's it? That's the cure?" Johnny asks.

"Well, basically yes. You can consider it a muscle, so you need to use it, but don't overdo it and pass out from exhaustion." Sue answers, looking once more over the data. "A good thing to do would be like that small exercise they tell you to do to help have abs, tensing your abdominal muscles every time you take stairs or pass through a door. Take a small gesture that you can do easily and quickly, and add fire to it. What I'm doing is basically turn my foot plant invisible as much as I can. No one can see me doing it, including me, but I know it's there. For you you can turn your hair fiery or something. Ben can take a few hours everyday turned to stone. I've seen Reed take his arm and twist them around his body to have them in a knot but still use them."

"That's stupid." Says Johnny, whose hair is now on fire.

"It looks better than your head though. Be careful not to burn the building down by passing through doors, please." I say, the hint of a smile on my face. While he leaves the room grumbling, I turn to face Ben. "I'm really sorry, Ben. I hoped I would be able to help you get your powers under control, but it seems I can't do anything against a parasitic radiation yet. It doesn't mean I'll stop trying, though. You can bet on it."

"Yeah, Reed. Don't worry, I know. Thanks for trying anyway. Don't put your head in a knot for me, It's good enough that I can turn human for most of the day. If the price for it is using my powers a bit, then that's not too bad. Can you imagine a world where I'd be forced to live like that for a whole year? That would suck! Haha," he laughs with a small sad undertone.

"I'll do my best so that it doesn't happen, Benjamin. You have my word."

"And mine as well," Sue adds.

{[AN: and my axe…}]

"Thank you guys, I appreciate it. I'm gonna go clobber some stuff real quick in the training room. I'll see you later." As we watch him leave, sue turns to me, a serious look on her face.

"We need to help him."

"I know."

"No, we have to help him. Right now. He doesn't show it, but it affected him way more than it should have. He's ready to go break some stuff instead of going to meditate which would have been his first thought a few days ago. He's going into a destructive behavior, that's a sign of depression."

"Sue."

"What?"

"I know. Learning that all we did with his meditation turned out to be almost useless and detrimental for him put a dent in his confidence. But that's not all there is to it."

"What is it then?"

"His crush just left."

"His crush? I don't get- oh. OOOHH. His crush! Walt is!"

"Yup."

"So… Ben is.."

"Yup."

"I'm so happy! When did he tell you?"

"He didn't. He hasn't told anyone yet. I'm pretty sure Nat has hard suspicions if not complete certainty though."

"Should we do something?"

"Why would you do something? He has to be ready. If you come onto him too strongly he might not appreciate it. Let's just give him a bit of space for now. If he's not back to his usual self in a few days we'll see if we need to do something. Right now, he needs space and time."

"Okay. I guess you're right. How long have you known?"

"I've had suspicions for a while, but seeing his reaction to Steve and Walt made me certain."

"Understandably. Those men are just-..." she sees the look I give her. "Just delightful individual, who wouldn't like discussing science and combat with them like colleagues?" I sigh.

"Sure. Anyway, I'll go set up the patents and ask Nat to get ready to do a new press conference."

"What for? Isn't it a little lacking just for the Riski Rad?"

"I told you we wouldn't call it that… And no, it's about time we show the unstable molecules to the world. The Ris- The device will also be presented at the same time." she smirks.

"You almost called it Riski Rad."

"Yes I did, it's your fault, you're all repeating it over and over like a bunch of Koahlas or something."

"Koalas don't talk? What are you saying?"

"I don't know. I'll set the patent and go train a bit, my brain is getting muddled," I say, leaving the room. As the elevator doors close, I shout: "And we're not calling it Riski Rad!!!"

A few days later, the press conference was at full blast. After a short introduction by Natasha, I once again took the floor to present the first invention, the RDU, short for Radiation Detection Unit.

"Mr. Richards! Mr. Richards!"

"Yes, Ms. Everhart."

"Can you tell us why this device is better than anything else in the market? And more importantly why it has a Koala symbol at the back of it?"

"The device detects radiations of pretty much all nefarious kinds with a range of around fifty meters for the least dangerous, and a couple of kilometers for the more dangerous. And for the koala, which should be a detail and not the most important part of your question, it's just a small design choice. The belly fur of a koala can reflect solar radiation after all, so it's like a good luck charm." Some journalists chuckle at my reply. "The most important point is that the device will be sold at cost price. This is Dr. LAngkowski's sill as well as mine. We hope that this way, more people will be able to buy one and protect their loved one from radiation. As always, if you have questions, I would like to redirect you to our automated mail, inquiry@baxter-foundation.com with the subject PressSept2010, as written behind me." I say, leaving a small blank for a few seconds. "Now, I know that some of you won't be satisfied with just a life saving device sold at cost price, so we prepared something else for this conference." I gesticulate, asking Sue to bring a couple of clothes racks on stage. "While I'm not well versed in fashion, I am somewhat of a scientist. Lately, I've made great strides towards researching a specific molecule which has an unlimited number of use."

"Is it linked to the paper on unstable molecule that was released in your name a few weeks ago?"

"As I said, please direct your question to the mailbox. But yes. The paper I've written was about the theoretical existence of such a molecule. A couple of weeks ago, that molecule became a reality. I'm here to present to you the first real-life application of such a molecule, the unstable molecule clothing. While they don't look like much, the clothes here could all be considered to be 'smart' in some ways. This one for example," I point to a school uniform, "is resistant to scratch, tear, and grime to an unfathomable point. Should it be dirtied, though, it can just go in a washing machine like any normal piece of clothing and come back to its original clean state. This one," I say, pulling on a small baby onesies, "changes color around certain areas when detecting humidity or abnormal odors, while not releasing them in the atmosphere, making it so that you can know your baby needs to be changed without needing to put your nose in it. It is also tear resistant and can go in the machine. Basically, most of the clothes here are tear resistant and can go in the washing machine easily. Some of them have certain particularities, like for example, this uniform," I point to the fire-fighter uniform "is capable of resisting fire up to the melting point of stainless steel, which is around 1500° Celsius, or around 2700° Fahrenheit. The most peculiar piece of clothing though, is this here." I take out the highlight of the show. "This gray suit is not only tear resistant and washable, but it grows with its wearer. If you don't like the design, the suit comes with an integrated port that connects it to an application. On the application, you can choose between several included designs, create your own or purchase other creators and brand's designs. Here, let me show you." I say, pulling out my phone, whose screen is also projected behind me. "By going into the app, touching the connection port with your device, the two of them are now synchronized." I touch a small point on my shoulder, and my suit turns from dark blue to light blue for less than a second. "This means the suit and app are connected. Now, if I were to say that this suit is too formal, I would just tap on the suit I like, download it, and once it's downloaded, ask my suit to take the design. "I wait for the download to finish.

The download would be instantaneous if not for the fact that we're giving some time to the reporters here to breathe and take notes. The last few minutes since I presented the suits were frantic, with some of them unable to stay silent and audibly gasp or try to call their boss to get an exclusive.

"Sorry about the delay, it seems the WI-FI here isn't what it used to be, haha." After a few more seconds, when most of the reporters calmed down, the download is finished. I install the design on the suit, press 'Deploy', and my suit now transforms into a comfortable sportswear. "As you can see, the installation takes only a few seconds. The few designs that we have on the app are the ones we came up with, and are all included in the price of the suit. If you lose your phone, the suit won't turn off. The suit is linked to the account which you'll be given when buying the plain suit. Losing your phone only means reconnecting the account to a new phone, and syncing the suit to the new phone. The suit will come in three sizes. The first will be infant, the second adolescent, and the third large. The price will be different between infant, adolescent and large. $250, $450 and $600 respectively. While the price is steep, it aims at reducing the number of clothes bought by everyone. For poorer countries, a different suit is in production which will be sold at cost price later next year. These clothes are created to grow with their wearer, as I've said multiple times. The cotton production is a very resource intensive process, using gargantuan amounts of water and producing enormous amounts of pollution around the world. Same for all synthetic kinds of clothes. Ours uses recycled plastic and electricity. The plastic is transformed using electricity into this unstable molecule, capable of changing with small electronic inputs. Buying three or four suits, even just two for that matters, is theoretically all you would need from your infancy to your old age, instead of the hundreds or thousands of items of clothing you would buy during your lifetime. We aim at reducing consumption, pollution, and give everyone a chance to wear whatever they want for a fixed price. The different clothes we have on stage are destined to different types of institutions. School uniforms will be for those private schools which usually prefer one or two types of uniforms, the firefighter uniform will be for, well firefighters. We have other kinds of uniforms in mind which we'll soon be discussing with the specific institutions. This includes in priority all emergency services, the Firefighters, the Police, and the medical community. More information will be available concerning the publically available suits on the automated mailbox and on our website, which is behind me right now. I'll leave you tonight with a bit of an insight into what my team is working on. Ms. Susan Storm is working on a medical device, while Mr. Johnny Storm and Mr. Ben Grimm are working on a device to reinforce infrastructures. Sorry, I know it's very cryptic, but where would be the fun of those press conferences otherwise?"

"Dr. Richards! Why do you refuse questions during those press conferences? They seem more like press releases than conferences to me," said a journalist.

"You are..?"

"Ben Urich, New York Bulletin."

"Well, Mr. Urich, thank you for your question. I'm not a doctor, yet, the university has yet to pass their verdict. I tend to refuse questions because I found that they are a waste of time for me and my team, who could be working on our research. The information you would want to know would be available to you and anyone on our website, and specific questions can be answered by our mailbox, it's redundant at this point to add questions to that. But you're right, it does look more like press releases. I'll allow a few questions at the end of the next press conference," he raises his hand and open his mouth. "And yes, I'll see with my assistant to book a few interviews in the next few days. Thank you everyone, have a good night." I say, leaving the stage, taking a few of the clothes with me while Sue took the rest and followed me.

"Well, the first conference went better. Should I contact Mr. Ulrich for an interview? He seemed more insightful than Ms. Everhart."

"Sure. I have a good feeling about the Bulletin anyway. Yeah, tell him to come up right now or when he can next week."

"Alright." Nat says, giving me a glass of water before going to talk to the man in question. A few minutes later, Alfred informs me that he is willing to do an interview right now. I tell Nat through Alfred that I'll meet him in the lounge.

"Well, I wasn't expecting you to accept an interview so quickly, what changed your mind?"

"HOnestly and off the record, I find that most of the journalists are only interested in the sensational and are not as dedicated to subjects as you are, Mr. Urich. Though, I must admit that I'm curious as to why the Bulletin would send someone like you to out press event. I would assume that you would keep working on Hell's Kitchen and the criminal empires around it."

"Well, my editor was pushing me to take your story, and since we've been fighting between us for months, I said I would do him a favor in exchange for me continuing my crime ring story. So, here I am."

"And despite 'my story' being a favor to your boss, you are dedicated enough to actually take the time to research the paper I released despite not being in the scientific field, or know that I applied for a Doctorate. That's what changed my mind, Mr. Urich."

"And I'm surprised as well that you would know of me."

"Your name holds weight in the Bulletin, which all of us here in the Baxter building read. And it helps that I have an assistant well versed in information gathering." I laugh.

"Shall we get started?" he says, pulling out a recorder and his notepad.

"Let's do this."

"I'm Ben Urich, for the New York Bulletin, here with Mr. Reed Richards, from the Baxter Foundation after the latest press conference in which you unveiled a device to detect a high number of radiation from a large range, as well as revolutionized the field of fashion and clothing at the same time as proving your paper on unstable molecules. Where should I start?..."