Marvel: Tomorrow Initiative - Chapter 11
Title: Marvel: Tomorrow Initiative
Chapter 11: Meditations on a Dystopia
Disclaimer: Marvel's, in terms of the base I'm operating from, not mine.
Fandom: Marvel Universe
Characters: Knights (OCs), Avengers (OCs), Niles Gyrich
Rating: PG-13
Summary: A house divided cannot stand against itself.
When the Knights returned to the clock tower that was their headquarters, Arachne whirled to glare at Fearless. “What else are you keeping from me?” she asked bitterly.
“That was a long time ago,” Fearless replied. “A lifetime ago, in fact. That’s not who I am now. Not anymore.”
“I thought you trusted me . . .” Arachne murmured, her mask sliding beneath her skin to reveal her face, the hurt clearly visible in her eyes.
“Audrey . . .” Fearless murmured, reaching out to her. Arachne slapped her hand away.
“Don’t come near me. Just don’t. I gotta get home.” Arachne climbed out of the clock tower through the roof access, standing before the giant clock face, and fired a strand of web to swing away on it. As she swung, silent tears streamed down her face. She moved aimlessly toward home, just relying on instinct to safely guide her away from the clock tower. She was moving too fast for the surveillance drones to spot her and the stealth technology in her suit would keep them from picking her up, anyway, so she would be safe.
Back in the clock tower, Nightshade pointedly kept her distance from Winter Soldier, who was simply scowling. Finally, Nightshade began to speak. “You tried to kill him,” she said. “I know you hate him for replacing Captain America, but you tried to kill him!”
“He doesn’t deserve to call himself Captain America,” Winter Soldier hissed. “Captain America stands for liberty, for justice, for democracy. That fake stands for nothing more than his fascist paymasters. I wasn’t going to let him continue to desecrate the memory of Captain America.”
“Even if you had to kill him?”
“Yes. We’re an anti-registration force. That means we’ll come into conflict with registered superhumans. That includes the fake, and I was hoping for this chance, anyway.”
“Is that the whole reason you joined us?” she wondered. “So you could get your revenge on him?”
“He’s a pretender to the shield,” he answered bitterly. “But you know what they say: You get the leadership - or in this case, the ‘heroes’ - you deserve. And these people don’t deserve a true hero like the real Captain America. They killed him. They killed him the moment they chose to value their own security over a man who knew what freedom meant and who was willing to fight for it to his end. Benjamin Franklin: ‘They that would give up liberty for a little temporary security deserve neither and will soon find themselves without either.’ That’s what’s happened. The super-criminals are still rampaging out there, and anybody with abilities beyond the human norm is forced to become a government slave.”
Nightshade looked at Winter Soldier with sad golden eyes. “I think this hero worship thing you have going on for Steve Rogers is a little out of hand.”
“Tell me about it,” Iron Cage grumbled. “Boy’s damn near psycho over that guy.”
Winter Soldier flipped Iron Cage off, provoking the strongman’s anger. “All right, soldier-boy! You’re going down!”
Iron Cage lunged at Winter Soldier, only for Winter Soldier to easily sidestep Iron Cage’s charge and add his own force to Iron Cage’s momentum, sending the strongman crashing and rolling to the ground. Iron Cage rolled to his feet, glaring at Winter Soldier, who glared back through his domino mask.
“Anytime you’re ready,” Winter Soldier spat.
A more-or-less awake Iron Fist moved between Winter Soldier and Iron Cage, using chi barriers to keep the two from coming near each other. “Dammit, you two, this is not how to settle things. Lucas, try to respect his feelings about the original Captain America. Winter, try not to let your feelings about the original Captain America cloud your judgment when you get into another fight with the current.”
Iron Cage let out a snarling sigh. “This isn’t over, soldier-boy. Not by a long shot.”
“You’re not my enemy,” Winter Soldier answered. “Don’t cause me to treat you as such.”
“I think there’s a question none of us have really taken the time to ask aloud,” Tsukikishi said.
“What’s that?” Artemis asked, her green eyes looking into Tsukikishi’s masked eyes.
“Say we do make the public lose faith in registration,” Tsukikishi explained. “What then? What’s going to stop the government from just going Project Wideawake on us all, registered and unregistered alike?”
“That’s a good question,” Fearless mused, taking off her mask.
“Your girlfriend seemed freaked,” Iron Cage remarked to her. “Wanna tell us what that’s about?”
“Iron Man,” Fearless spat. “He called me by my original name and told Arachne the more sordid details of my past.”
“I suppose this Iron Man learned how to be a dick from the original,” Iron Cage remarked. “You think she’ll still stick with us?”
Fearless sighed. “There’s a chance. At least, I hope so.”
Once Arachne neared her house, she dropped into the shadows between houses and willed her costume to change into what she’d been wearing before she put it on. She opened the door with the spare house key and entered the house. She walked somberly upstairs to her room and fell facedown on her bed, her clothes reverting to her costume and her costume retracting beneath her skin, leaving her naked. She got up to throw on an oversized T-shirt and brush her teeth before returning to bed for a troubled sleep.
Morning found Audrey just as troubled as she’d been when she went to sleep. She staggered to the bathroom, where she brushed her teeth and showered. She walked back to her room and dressed herself, this time in an oversized T-shirt and loose jeans. She slipped on her usual pair of slightly worn-out sneakers and brushed her slightly frizzy hair before tying it back in a ponytail. She walked downstairs, only to find her parents sitting at the dining table with unusually soft yet worried expressions.
“Mom? Dad? Something wrong?” Audrey asked.
“Sit down, Audrey,” Mrs. Hopkins replied.
Audrey sat down, bewildered and worried. “What’s wrong?”
“Your mother and I talked this morning and we have some questions to ask you,” Mr. Hopkins answered.
“Go ahead,” Audrey said, feigning ease.
“It’s about the time you’ve been spending with Karin,” Mr. Hopkins explained. “Are you just studying?”
“Uh, yeah,” Audrey replied.
“It’s ok,” Mrs. Hopkins said. “You don’t have to keep it from us.”
“Keep what from you?” Audrey asked.
“We figured out you and Karin had gotten close,” Mr. Hopkins replied. “As in, ‘more than just friends’ close. It doesn’t matter to us; as long as she treats you like the lady you are, we have no problem with her.”
“Thanks,” Audrey answered. “But . . . I’m not sure it’s going to work out between us.”
“Why’s that?” Mrs. Hopkins asked.
“When we were going out together last night, some people who used to know her spotted us,” Audrey explained. “One of them mentioned some things about Karin that . . . that really unsettled me.”
“Such as?” Mrs. Hopkins asked.
“They mentioned that she used to do bad things,” Audrey replied, “and then ran off.” She carefully neglected to mention that those people had pursued her and Karin and ultimately forced them into a fight in lieu of escape.
“Is that the person she is now?” Mrs. Hopkins asked. “Is that the person you know?”
“I’m not sure what I know about her,” Audrey admitted. “She’s so secretive sometimes.”
“Whatever secrets she has, she truly does care about you,” Mr. Hopkins said. “That much we’ve seen for ourselves. She wouldn’t have visited you in the hospital if she didn’t care at all.”
“Yeah, I suppose you’re right,” Audrey mused. “But I kinda ran out on her. I was just startled by what I’d found out about her.”
“Well, you’ll see her in school today, so that gives you the chance to make it up to her by listening to what she has to say,” Mr. Hopkins said.
“You’re sure about that?” Audrey questioned.
“Yes,” Mr. Hopkins answered. “Now hurry up and eat your breakfast or you’ll be late for school.”
“Thanks, Dad.” Audrey kissed her father on the cheek, then her mother, and picked up her toast, running out the door. She ate her toast and went to the rail station to make her ride to school. Once there, she waited for her rail to come and rode it to school when it did come. Upon reaching the stop near her school, she got off and walked the rest of the way to Midtown High.
Inside the school halls, she found Karin waiting for her by her locker. “Karin?”
“Audrey,” Karin answered somberly.
“We have to talk,” Audrey said.
“I know,” Karin replied. “But not right now. Not here.”
Audrey looked at Karin searchingly. “When, then?”
The leather-jacketed girl stared back at Audrey, dark eyes giving away nothing. “After school, when we’re alone.”
“Sure,” Audrey conceded.
If the Knights thought they had it rough after their fight with the Avengers, they would be surprised at just how hard the Avengers were taking it. Of course, the Knights didn’t have someone like Niles Gyrich overseeing them. Furthermore, the Knights had technically won the fight, which had plenty to do with Gyrich’s fury, a fury that Gyrich was turning on Captain America, the leader of the Avengers.
“What the hell was that, Stephens?!” Gyrich yelled.
“We had them outgunned,” Captain America answered, “but we underestimated their resolve . . . and their rage.”
“Obviously,” Gyrich sneered, “judging by the condition you were in when you got back here.”
“We’re all alive, fortunately,” Captain America went on. “Blitzkrieg’s well on his way back to good health, Iron Man’s nanite-based regeneration saved him, resizing Sting allowed her body to burn out that neurotoxin more easily, Arcane and Thor are awake, and Hulk and Warbird were fine as soon as we cut them out of Arachne’s webbing.”
Gyrich glared at him. “Not good enough. You should have won.”
“I know that.” The super-soldier was somber.
“Even worse, the surveillance drones happened to catch your embarrassing defeat,” the Avengers’ overseer went on. “That in and of itself wouldn’t be so bad, as we could easily erase that footage, but someone hijacked every television signal in the country and showed it on every television set regardless of whether those sets were being used or not. Now it’s impossible to take back. We’re going to have to explain to the public how a crack team of superheroes could be beaten by a bunch of unlicensed renegades.”
Captain America pondered that for a moment. “I’m sorry. We can’t win every battle, though.”
Gyrich sighed. “True enough, but it’s public perception that’s going to be the problem.”
Just then, a dark-haired young man - Toshiro Kurosaki, a.k.a. Iron Man - walked in. “I don’t mean to interrupt, but I think I’ve found a way to wrangle a silver lining from this cloud.”
“Go on,” Gyrich prompted.
Toshiro guided Captain America and Gyrich to the supercomputer. “Here goes.” He concentrated, psionically connecting his armor’s operating system to the supercomputer’s operating system. He mentally manipulated the supercomputer to display the armor’s recording of Arachne from the previous battle.
“What’s this supposed to be?” Gyrich asked.
Toshiro willed the supercomputer to display a diagram of Arachne’s suit’s operating system. He then willed it to display a diagram of the operating system of the Scarlet Spider Armor. He manipulated the two diagrams into overlapping, the supercomputer highlighting the parts that matched each other. “What do you see, Gyrich?”
“The same person who designed the original Scarlet Spider Armor designed Arachne’s costume,” Gyrich deduced.
“And that would also be the man who originally created the armor from which mine was ultimately derived,” Toshiro added.
“Stark,” Gyrich growled. “He’s still around after all this time.”
“Tony Stark?” Captain America asked.
“Yes,” Gyrich hissed. “I never would have anticipated him to resurface like this . . . aiding those ridiculous children.”
“What do we do?” Toshiro asked.
“We find him,” Gyrich answered. “And we find those children. We find them and we put them away.” He stalked away, leaving Captain America and Toshiro alone. As he walked out, Warbird stepped in.
“Something’s been bothering me,” Warbird said.
“What is it?” Toshiro asked.
“Are we sure Arachne is the one who killed the Power Broker?” Warbird asked.
“The camera caught her entry and it was definitely spider webbing that suffocated him,” Toshiro answered.
“There’s just one problem with that,” Captain America brought up.
“And that would be?” Toshiro questioned.
“We still have samples of Arachne’s webbing from our fight with the Knights,” Captain America replied. “And we have samples from the web cocoon the Power Broker was wrapped in. We can compare the two, see if they match.”
“That shouldn’t be too hard,” Toshiro said. “Let’s do it.”
The three Avengers went to the Initiative Science Division. “Hey,” Warbird greeted. “Mind if we check out some webbing samples?”
“You sure?” a scientist asked.
“All we need is to make a simple comparison of the webbing found to have killed Power Broker and the webbing used by Arachne to tie up Warbird,” Toshiro replied. “I can do that with a scan from my armor.”
“All right,” the scientist conceded.
Toshiro stripped down, revealing the nanotech under-sheath that allowed him to mentally interface with his armor. He summoned the armor, allowing it to attach to him piece by piece. Finally, he donned the helmet, becoming Iron Man. The scientist showed him the two samples of webbing, allowing the armored industrial heir to scan them.
As Iron Man walked out to compare the two webbing samples, Warbird and Captain America followed, Warbird aiming a searching look at the armored industrial heir’s back. “She could have killed me. She had me bound and that stuff would have taken a long time even for me to get out of. But she didn’t kill me.”
“I know what you’re thinking,” Captain America added sadly. “What if we’re wrong about these kids? What if they’ve got good reasons to not register?”
“There isn’t a good reason not to register,” Iron Man cut in. “Law’s the law. People with power have to be accountable, no matter what. Not everyone’s an upstanding citizen.”
“True, but . . . those kids,” Captain America murmured. He closed his eyes, remembering the look of sheer rage and hatred on Winter Soldier’s face as the bio-cyborg pummeled him.
“Scan’s finished,” Iron Man replied. “The samples aren’t identical. The webbing we got off Warbird was not the same webbing that asphyxiated Power Broker. That in itself proves nothing, though; Arachne was wearing a red costume at the time of Power Broker’s death and when we encountered her, she was wearing a black costume. The chemical makeup of the webbing could have changed along with her sense of fashion.”
“You still think she killed Power Broker?” Warbird asked.
Iron Man looked at Warbird. “It doesn’t prove she didn’t do it, but it doesn’t conclusively prove her guilt, either. I think we’re going to have to look a little deeper into this whole thing.”
“What about the security footage?” Captain America asked.
“What about it?” Iron Man asked.
“The surveillance drones caught Arachne on her first night out,” Warbird replied. “Back when she was just wearing a Halloween costume. We can compare that footage with the one of her infiltrating the jail.”
“On it,” Iron Man said, mentally accessing the surveillance drones’ recordings. He sifted through them, going back to that very first night that Arachne had appeared. Simultaneously, he accessed the security footage from the night of the Power Broker’s murder. He compared the two images of Arachne he saw. They moved similarly, with the same spider-like agility and grace, but their movements were not identical. In fact, the Arachne wearing a Halloween replica of Spider-Man’s costume moved just like the Arachne he had fought, while the Arachne that was breaking into the jail moved differently, with a more womanly gait.
“What is it?” Captain America asked.
Toshiro removed his helmet. “Arachne didn’t do it. The one who came in to kill Power Broker moved more like a woman, while the one that fought me moved more like a teenage girl. But if she didn’t do it . . .”
“Could have been a granddaughter of one of the Spider-Women,” Warbird said. “Would have inherited similar powers.”
“An unlicensed vigilante killing someone like Power Broker,” Captain America uttered, more to himself than his two colleagues. “Too convenient, anyway.”
“What are you thinking?” Warbird asked.
Captain America looked gravely at Warbird and Iron Man before he spoke again. “I’m thinking . . . that someone within the CSA set this up.”
“Assuming we were to entertain this lunatic notion of yours, who and why?” Toshiro asked, half scoffing and half genuinely curious.
“The Knights struck a blow to the idea of licensed superheroes when they were able to capture Power Broker while we - with all the resources at our disposal - could not,” Captain America explained. “Or, in the minds of some radicals who think we’re all fascists for making people with powers register with the government, would not. To avenge that blow, someone with powers similar to Arachne’s killed the Power Broker, most likely someone sent by the CSA. Then we went after the Knights and we got the crap beaten out of us. As if that wasn’t enough humiliation, but somebody broadcast that fight on every television set in the nation, and it’s probably found its way to the Internet now.”
“Wait a second,” Warbird said. “Are you saying that Arachne’s framing was done as a matter of getting back at the Knights for capturing Power Broker?”
“Yeah, that’s exactly what I’m saying,” Captain America replied.
“But who’d have the wherewithal?” Toshiro asked.
“A female Scarlet Spider, for starters,” Captain America suggested. “The Scarlet Spider Armors can duplicate the original Spider-Man’s basic abilities, which Arachne would also have, and they can look like other types of clothing. Another option is that Codename Arachnis didn’t stop just because an unlicensed vigilante got the spider-powers.”
“If that’s true . . . how are we going to prove it?” Warbird asked. “I mean, we could ask Gyrich, but I don’t think he’s going to actually confess to framing an unlicensed vigilante for murder, whether he did it or not, or rat out whoever was involved, and that’s assuming he knows.”
“We could ask him in my presence,” Toshiro proposed. “I have biometric scanners that could determine whether he’s telling the truth or not.”
“If we ask, he’ll deny it,” Captain America stated. “We need to come at him with proof. Hard evidence that someone set up Arachne.”
“You do realize that if it looks like we’re taking up the case of someone who technically is violating federal law, we’ll look disloyal,” Toshiro brought up.
“She’s still an American citizen and she’s entitled to the same rights as any other,” Captain America answered. “Just because she has powers and isn’t using them for the government doesn’t mean she deserves to be railroaded.”
Toshiro sighed. “Let’s do this.” He mentally dived into layers of encrypted data, deciphering those encryptions and passing through each layer. He searched through the data and he . . . blinked.
“What is it?” Warbird asked.
“Codename Arachnis is still working on creating another Spider-Man,” Toshiro replied. “The first try was cloning, but their first viable clone resisted the conditioning process and escaped. The second try was using a retrovirus derived from the original Spider-Man’s DNA and mixed with spider venom to duplicate the original Spider-Man’s powers in the subject. Of course, that spider escaped and bit some poor high school girl . . .”
“What are they trying now?” Warbird inquired.
“They’re trying direct gene splicing,” Toshiro answered.
“Wait a second,” Captain America said, peeling off his mask to reveal the handsome, all-American face of Robert Stephens. “They wouldn’t give the mission of a frame-up to an operative who was known to the public. It’d have to be covert ops. Or black ops.”
“Black ops?” Warbird repeated. “Does that mean . . . ?”
“Yes,” Captain America confirmed grimly. “Justice Like Lightning.”
Chapter 11: Meditations on a Dystopia
Disclaimer: Marvel's, in terms of the base I'm operating from, not mine.
Fandom: Marvel Universe
Characters: Knights (OCs), Avengers (OCs), Niles Gyrich
Rating: PG-13
Summary: A house divided cannot stand against itself.
When the Knights returned to the clock tower that was their headquarters, Arachne whirled to glare at Fearless. “What else are you keeping from me?” she asked bitterly.
“That was a long time ago,” Fearless replied. “A lifetime ago, in fact. That’s not who I am now. Not anymore.”
“I thought you trusted me . . .” Arachne murmured, her mask sliding beneath her skin to reveal her face, the hurt clearly visible in her eyes.
“Audrey . . .” Fearless murmured, reaching out to her. Arachne slapped her hand away.
“Don’t come near me. Just don’t. I gotta get home.” Arachne climbed out of the clock tower through the roof access, standing before the giant clock face, and fired a strand of web to swing away on it. As she swung, silent tears streamed down her face. She moved aimlessly toward home, just relying on instinct to safely guide her away from the clock tower. She was moving too fast for the surveillance drones to spot her and the stealth technology in her suit would keep them from picking her up, anyway, so she would be safe.
Back in the clock tower, Nightshade pointedly kept her distance from Winter Soldier, who was simply scowling. Finally, Nightshade began to speak. “You tried to kill him,” she said. “I know you hate him for replacing Captain America, but you tried to kill him!”
“He doesn’t deserve to call himself Captain America,” Winter Soldier hissed. “Captain America stands for liberty, for justice, for democracy. That fake stands for nothing more than his fascist paymasters. I wasn’t going to let him continue to desecrate the memory of Captain America.”
“Even if you had to kill him?”
“Yes. We’re an anti-registration force. That means we’ll come into conflict with registered superhumans. That includes the fake, and I was hoping for this chance, anyway.”
“Is that the whole reason you joined us?” she wondered. “So you could get your revenge on him?”
“He’s a pretender to the shield,” he answered bitterly. “But you know what they say: You get the leadership - or in this case, the ‘heroes’ - you deserve. And these people don’t deserve a true hero like the real Captain America. They killed him. They killed him the moment they chose to value their own security over a man who knew what freedom meant and who was willing to fight for it to his end. Benjamin Franklin: ‘They that would give up liberty for a little temporary security deserve neither and will soon find themselves without either.’ That’s what’s happened. The super-criminals are still rampaging out there, and anybody with abilities beyond the human norm is forced to become a government slave.”
Nightshade looked at Winter Soldier with sad golden eyes. “I think this hero worship thing you have going on for Steve Rogers is a little out of hand.”
“Tell me about it,” Iron Cage grumbled. “Boy’s damn near psycho over that guy.”
Winter Soldier flipped Iron Cage off, provoking the strongman’s anger. “All right, soldier-boy! You’re going down!”
Iron Cage lunged at Winter Soldier, only for Winter Soldier to easily sidestep Iron Cage’s charge and add his own force to Iron Cage’s momentum, sending the strongman crashing and rolling to the ground. Iron Cage rolled to his feet, glaring at Winter Soldier, who glared back through his domino mask.
“Anytime you’re ready,” Winter Soldier spat.
A more-or-less awake Iron Fist moved between Winter Soldier and Iron Cage, using chi barriers to keep the two from coming near each other. “Dammit, you two, this is not how to settle things. Lucas, try to respect his feelings about the original Captain America. Winter, try not to let your feelings about the original Captain America cloud your judgment when you get into another fight with the current.”
Iron Cage let out a snarling sigh. “This isn’t over, soldier-boy. Not by a long shot.”
“You’re not my enemy,” Winter Soldier answered. “Don’t cause me to treat you as such.”
“I think there’s a question none of us have really taken the time to ask aloud,” Tsukikishi said.
“What’s that?” Artemis asked, her green eyes looking into Tsukikishi’s masked eyes.
“Say we do make the public lose faith in registration,” Tsukikishi explained. “What then? What’s going to stop the government from just going Project Wideawake on us all, registered and unregistered alike?”
“That’s a good question,” Fearless mused, taking off her mask.
“Your girlfriend seemed freaked,” Iron Cage remarked to her. “Wanna tell us what that’s about?”
“Iron Man,” Fearless spat. “He called me by my original name and told Arachne the more sordid details of my past.”
“I suppose this Iron Man learned how to be a dick from the original,” Iron Cage remarked. “You think she’ll still stick with us?”
Fearless sighed. “There’s a chance. At least, I hope so.”
Once Arachne neared her house, she dropped into the shadows between houses and willed her costume to change into what she’d been wearing before she put it on. She opened the door with the spare house key and entered the house. She walked somberly upstairs to her room and fell facedown on her bed, her clothes reverting to her costume and her costume retracting beneath her skin, leaving her naked. She got up to throw on an oversized T-shirt and brush her teeth before returning to bed for a troubled sleep.
Morning found Audrey just as troubled as she’d been when she went to sleep. She staggered to the bathroom, where she brushed her teeth and showered. She walked back to her room and dressed herself, this time in an oversized T-shirt and loose jeans. She slipped on her usual pair of slightly worn-out sneakers and brushed her slightly frizzy hair before tying it back in a ponytail. She walked downstairs, only to find her parents sitting at the dining table with unusually soft yet worried expressions.
“Mom? Dad? Something wrong?” Audrey asked.
“Sit down, Audrey,” Mrs. Hopkins replied.
Audrey sat down, bewildered and worried. “What’s wrong?”
“Your mother and I talked this morning and we have some questions to ask you,” Mr. Hopkins answered.
“Go ahead,” Audrey said, feigning ease.
“It’s about the time you’ve been spending with Karin,” Mr. Hopkins explained. “Are you just studying?”
“Uh, yeah,” Audrey replied.
“It’s ok,” Mrs. Hopkins said. “You don’t have to keep it from us.”
“Keep what from you?” Audrey asked.
“We figured out you and Karin had gotten close,” Mr. Hopkins replied. “As in, ‘more than just friends’ close. It doesn’t matter to us; as long as she treats you like the lady you are, we have no problem with her.”
“Thanks,” Audrey answered. “But . . . I’m not sure it’s going to work out between us.”
“Why’s that?” Mrs. Hopkins asked.
“When we were going out together last night, some people who used to know her spotted us,” Audrey explained. “One of them mentioned some things about Karin that . . . that really unsettled me.”
“Such as?” Mrs. Hopkins asked.
“They mentioned that she used to do bad things,” Audrey replied, “and then ran off.” She carefully neglected to mention that those people had pursued her and Karin and ultimately forced them into a fight in lieu of escape.
“Is that the person she is now?” Mrs. Hopkins asked. “Is that the person you know?”
“I’m not sure what I know about her,” Audrey admitted. “She’s so secretive sometimes.”
“Whatever secrets she has, she truly does care about you,” Mr. Hopkins said. “That much we’ve seen for ourselves. She wouldn’t have visited you in the hospital if she didn’t care at all.”
“Yeah, I suppose you’re right,” Audrey mused. “But I kinda ran out on her. I was just startled by what I’d found out about her.”
“Well, you’ll see her in school today, so that gives you the chance to make it up to her by listening to what she has to say,” Mr. Hopkins said.
“You’re sure about that?” Audrey questioned.
“Yes,” Mr. Hopkins answered. “Now hurry up and eat your breakfast or you’ll be late for school.”
“Thanks, Dad.” Audrey kissed her father on the cheek, then her mother, and picked up her toast, running out the door. She ate her toast and went to the rail station to make her ride to school. Once there, she waited for her rail to come and rode it to school when it did come. Upon reaching the stop near her school, she got off and walked the rest of the way to Midtown High.
Inside the school halls, she found Karin waiting for her by her locker. “Karin?”
“Audrey,” Karin answered somberly.
“We have to talk,” Audrey said.
“I know,” Karin replied. “But not right now. Not here.”
Audrey looked at Karin searchingly. “When, then?”
The leather-jacketed girl stared back at Audrey, dark eyes giving away nothing. “After school, when we’re alone.”
“Sure,” Audrey conceded.
If the Knights thought they had it rough after their fight with the Avengers, they would be surprised at just how hard the Avengers were taking it. Of course, the Knights didn’t have someone like Niles Gyrich overseeing them. Furthermore, the Knights had technically won the fight, which had plenty to do with Gyrich’s fury, a fury that Gyrich was turning on Captain America, the leader of the Avengers.
“What the hell was that, Stephens?!” Gyrich yelled.
“We had them outgunned,” Captain America answered, “but we underestimated their resolve . . . and their rage.”
“Obviously,” Gyrich sneered, “judging by the condition you were in when you got back here.”
“We’re all alive, fortunately,” Captain America went on. “Blitzkrieg’s well on his way back to good health, Iron Man’s nanite-based regeneration saved him, resizing Sting allowed her body to burn out that neurotoxin more easily, Arcane and Thor are awake, and Hulk and Warbird were fine as soon as we cut them out of Arachne’s webbing.”
Gyrich glared at him. “Not good enough. You should have won.”
“I know that.” The super-soldier was somber.
“Even worse, the surveillance drones happened to catch your embarrassing defeat,” the Avengers’ overseer went on. “That in and of itself wouldn’t be so bad, as we could easily erase that footage, but someone hijacked every television signal in the country and showed it on every television set regardless of whether those sets were being used or not. Now it’s impossible to take back. We’re going to have to explain to the public how a crack team of superheroes could be beaten by a bunch of unlicensed renegades.”
Captain America pondered that for a moment. “I’m sorry. We can’t win every battle, though.”
Gyrich sighed. “True enough, but it’s public perception that’s going to be the problem.”
Just then, a dark-haired young man - Toshiro Kurosaki, a.k.a. Iron Man - walked in. “I don’t mean to interrupt, but I think I’ve found a way to wrangle a silver lining from this cloud.”
“Go on,” Gyrich prompted.
Toshiro guided Captain America and Gyrich to the supercomputer. “Here goes.” He concentrated, psionically connecting his armor’s operating system to the supercomputer’s operating system. He mentally manipulated the supercomputer to display the armor’s recording of Arachne from the previous battle.
“What’s this supposed to be?” Gyrich asked.
Toshiro willed the supercomputer to display a diagram of Arachne’s suit’s operating system. He then willed it to display a diagram of the operating system of the Scarlet Spider Armor. He manipulated the two diagrams into overlapping, the supercomputer highlighting the parts that matched each other. “What do you see, Gyrich?”
“The same person who designed the original Scarlet Spider Armor designed Arachne’s costume,” Gyrich deduced.
“And that would also be the man who originally created the armor from which mine was ultimately derived,” Toshiro added.
“Stark,” Gyrich growled. “He’s still around after all this time.”
“Tony Stark?” Captain America asked.
“Yes,” Gyrich hissed. “I never would have anticipated him to resurface like this . . . aiding those ridiculous children.”
“What do we do?” Toshiro asked.
“We find him,” Gyrich answered. “And we find those children. We find them and we put them away.” He stalked away, leaving Captain America and Toshiro alone. As he walked out, Warbird stepped in.
“Something’s been bothering me,” Warbird said.
“What is it?” Toshiro asked.
“Are we sure Arachne is the one who killed the Power Broker?” Warbird asked.
“The camera caught her entry and it was definitely spider webbing that suffocated him,” Toshiro answered.
“There’s just one problem with that,” Captain America brought up.
“And that would be?” Toshiro questioned.
“We still have samples of Arachne’s webbing from our fight with the Knights,” Captain America replied. “And we have samples from the web cocoon the Power Broker was wrapped in. We can compare the two, see if they match.”
“That shouldn’t be too hard,” Toshiro said. “Let’s do it.”
The three Avengers went to the Initiative Science Division. “Hey,” Warbird greeted. “Mind if we check out some webbing samples?”
“You sure?” a scientist asked.
“All we need is to make a simple comparison of the webbing found to have killed Power Broker and the webbing used by Arachne to tie up Warbird,” Toshiro replied. “I can do that with a scan from my armor.”
“All right,” the scientist conceded.
Toshiro stripped down, revealing the nanotech under-sheath that allowed him to mentally interface with his armor. He summoned the armor, allowing it to attach to him piece by piece. Finally, he donned the helmet, becoming Iron Man. The scientist showed him the two samples of webbing, allowing the armored industrial heir to scan them.
As Iron Man walked out to compare the two webbing samples, Warbird and Captain America followed, Warbird aiming a searching look at the armored industrial heir’s back. “She could have killed me. She had me bound and that stuff would have taken a long time even for me to get out of. But she didn’t kill me.”
“I know what you’re thinking,” Captain America added sadly. “What if we’re wrong about these kids? What if they’ve got good reasons to not register?”
“There isn’t a good reason not to register,” Iron Man cut in. “Law’s the law. People with power have to be accountable, no matter what. Not everyone’s an upstanding citizen.”
“True, but . . . those kids,” Captain America murmured. He closed his eyes, remembering the look of sheer rage and hatred on Winter Soldier’s face as the bio-cyborg pummeled him.
“Scan’s finished,” Iron Man replied. “The samples aren’t identical. The webbing we got off Warbird was not the same webbing that asphyxiated Power Broker. That in itself proves nothing, though; Arachne was wearing a red costume at the time of Power Broker’s death and when we encountered her, she was wearing a black costume. The chemical makeup of the webbing could have changed along with her sense of fashion.”
“You still think she killed Power Broker?” Warbird asked.
Iron Man looked at Warbird. “It doesn’t prove she didn’t do it, but it doesn’t conclusively prove her guilt, either. I think we’re going to have to look a little deeper into this whole thing.”
“What about the security footage?” Captain America asked.
“What about it?” Iron Man asked.
“The surveillance drones caught Arachne on her first night out,” Warbird replied. “Back when she was just wearing a Halloween costume. We can compare that footage with the one of her infiltrating the jail.”
“On it,” Iron Man said, mentally accessing the surveillance drones’ recordings. He sifted through them, going back to that very first night that Arachne had appeared. Simultaneously, he accessed the security footage from the night of the Power Broker’s murder. He compared the two images of Arachne he saw. They moved similarly, with the same spider-like agility and grace, but their movements were not identical. In fact, the Arachne wearing a Halloween replica of Spider-Man’s costume moved just like the Arachne he had fought, while the Arachne that was breaking into the jail moved differently, with a more womanly gait.
“What is it?” Captain America asked.
Toshiro removed his helmet. “Arachne didn’t do it. The one who came in to kill Power Broker moved more like a woman, while the one that fought me moved more like a teenage girl. But if she didn’t do it . . .”
“Could have been a granddaughter of one of the Spider-Women,” Warbird said. “Would have inherited similar powers.”
“An unlicensed vigilante killing someone like Power Broker,” Captain America uttered, more to himself than his two colleagues. “Too convenient, anyway.”
“What are you thinking?” Warbird asked.
Captain America looked gravely at Warbird and Iron Man before he spoke again. “I’m thinking . . . that someone within the CSA set this up.”
“Assuming we were to entertain this lunatic notion of yours, who and why?” Toshiro asked, half scoffing and half genuinely curious.
“The Knights struck a blow to the idea of licensed superheroes when they were able to capture Power Broker while we - with all the resources at our disposal - could not,” Captain America explained. “Or, in the minds of some radicals who think we’re all fascists for making people with powers register with the government, would not. To avenge that blow, someone with powers similar to Arachne’s killed the Power Broker, most likely someone sent by the CSA. Then we went after the Knights and we got the crap beaten out of us. As if that wasn’t enough humiliation, but somebody broadcast that fight on every television set in the nation, and it’s probably found its way to the Internet now.”
“Wait a second,” Warbird said. “Are you saying that Arachne’s framing was done as a matter of getting back at the Knights for capturing Power Broker?”
“Yeah, that’s exactly what I’m saying,” Captain America replied.
“But who’d have the wherewithal?” Toshiro asked.
“A female Scarlet Spider, for starters,” Captain America suggested. “The Scarlet Spider Armors can duplicate the original Spider-Man’s basic abilities, which Arachne would also have, and they can look like other types of clothing. Another option is that Codename Arachnis didn’t stop just because an unlicensed vigilante got the spider-powers.”
“If that’s true . . . how are we going to prove it?” Warbird asked. “I mean, we could ask Gyrich, but I don’t think he’s going to actually confess to framing an unlicensed vigilante for murder, whether he did it or not, or rat out whoever was involved, and that’s assuming he knows.”
“We could ask him in my presence,” Toshiro proposed. “I have biometric scanners that could determine whether he’s telling the truth or not.”
“If we ask, he’ll deny it,” Captain America stated. “We need to come at him with proof. Hard evidence that someone set up Arachne.”
“You do realize that if it looks like we’re taking up the case of someone who technically is violating federal law, we’ll look disloyal,” Toshiro brought up.
“She’s still an American citizen and she’s entitled to the same rights as any other,” Captain America answered. “Just because she has powers and isn’t using them for the government doesn’t mean she deserves to be railroaded.”
Toshiro sighed. “Let’s do this.” He mentally dived into layers of encrypted data, deciphering those encryptions and passing through each layer. He searched through the data and he . . . blinked.
“What is it?” Warbird asked.
“Codename Arachnis is still working on creating another Spider-Man,” Toshiro replied. “The first try was cloning, but their first viable clone resisted the conditioning process and escaped. The second try was using a retrovirus derived from the original Spider-Man’s DNA and mixed with spider venom to duplicate the original Spider-Man’s powers in the subject. Of course, that spider escaped and bit some poor high school girl . . .”
“What are they trying now?” Warbird inquired.
“They’re trying direct gene splicing,” Toshiro answered.
“Wait a second,” Captain America said, peeling off his mask to reveal the handsome, all-American face of Robert Stephens. “They wouldn’t give the mission of a frame-up to an operative who was known to the public. It’d have to be covert ops. Or black ops.”
“Black ops?” Warbird repeated. “Does that mean . . . ?”
“Yes,” Captain America confirmed grimly. “Justice Like Lightning.”