SUSAN STORM: NEW SPECIES
The New Genus
Chapter 5
Looking up from his seat at the kitchen table, Tony thought he heard something. A moan or a cry, he was not too sure which. After the others left the kitchen after having some coffee, they all looked flustered, like they had a fever. Sipping at his own coffee, he didn’t feel sick, looking down at the mug of coffee in his hand, he shrugged and took another sip. Lilith had left the table right around the time Clint and Hank left, she was certainly clingy with the two but when she turned to look back at him, she gave the man a dirty look just like before. Not that he hadn’t gotten that look from other women in the past, but usually it came AFTER spending a night with him. Now all alone with Vision at the kitchen table, the two occasionally looked up at the ceiling when they heard noises upstairs.
it was all he heard all around the mansion. Heavy thumping, the sounds of furniture breaking, and the occasional scream went off, but the automatic alarm did set off at all. Hinting that they were not being attacked. But all that left was a noticeably big and very LOUD mystery for the Invincible Iron Man. “Huh… I wonder what’s going on up there?” He asked, sipping at his drink. “I mean, I know I usually bring fun home after a gala or two but never thought I’d be hearing Tigra cry out like that.” Seeing Vision look up, Tony smirked and gave the android an inquisitive look. “You’ve got better ears than me, what’s going on upstairs?”
“Unknown, however pheromones detected in the air suggests our compatriots are in a state of physical arousal… An unusual concentration of pheromones actually.”
“Ha! First day of spring in October? Lilith probably put some Spanish fly in the coffee as a ‘thank you’ for Cap saving her, heh… Lightweights. I feel envious for them.”
Looking down at his own coffee, which he never drank from, Vision stared down at the hot, dark fluid and narrowed his eyes. “there does not appear to be an aphrodisiac in the beverage, only a lactate fluid mixed with a VERY complex genetic structure.”
“That’s cream Vision, pretty likely half’n half.” Tony explained, taking another sip.
“It’s human.”
Eyes going wide, Tony spat out his drink and placed the mug as far away from him as possible. Grabbing a napkin, he tried to wipe his tongue dry. “Human?!”
“Somewhat, the base code is human, but the genome is surprisingly complex. Humans have only 2 based pairs in a genetic strand, I’m reading over fifty.”
Stopping in his frantic reaction, Tony’s face went serious, putting the napkin down on the table and eyeing the mug of coffee like it was poison. “So… We are not talking human then.” Getting up from his seat, Tony outstretched his right hand behind him. With a whoosh of air, components from his Iron Man suit arrived and clamped over his shoulder and unfolded to wrap around his arm, wrist, and hand. Sticking out his metal clad finger, he dipped it into his coffee. “Friday, can you analyze this for me?” More components from his suit arrived, clamping behind his back, and attaching to his shoulder components. The upper portion wrapping around his neck just in time for his helmet to fly in and envelop his head with a final ‘clamp’ of the face plate closing shut and the eyes lighting up.
“Sure thing boss, going for an organic diet this time around?” The spunky AI chirped in an Irish accent. Waiting for a few seconds, Tony began to lose patience until he finally asked for what she found so far.
“Well?”
“… I think you’ve got trouble boss.” She answered cryptically. The sounds of more activity upstairs making Tony apprehensive. “The genetics are not completely analysed but some of the coding implies a viral nature, one that grafts to any gene seque…” Pulling his finger out of the coffee mug, Tony waved his other arm out and the rest of his armor flew to him from different parts of the mansion. One by one, individual armor plates clamped around his body, connecting seamlessly, and completing the suit of Mark 43 armor over his body. Getting the same hint of danger, Vision too stood from his seat and joined the man outside into the main hall of the mansion. Heading up the stairs, the noises were getting more and more hoarse, it did not even sound human anymore. Heading over to a closed door, Iron Man carefully turned the nob and slowly entered, only for Vision to phase right through without a second thought. Rolling his eyes in his helmet, Iron Man stepped inside and immediately wished he hadn’t.
“Fascinating…”
That was not the word Tony was thinking out loud when he staggered back and tried not to vomit. All around him the walls and ceiling sported over a dozen throbbing fleshy cocoons, all interlaced with the fleshy, veiny material they were made from and rooted to the walls. Not only that the floors and some of the bare spaces of the walls were coated in a thick resin that barely yielded to his metal clad feet when he stepped over it. “Oh GOD, what the hell are those things?!”
“Unknown… They appear to be lifeforms, rapidly developing.”
“Developing into what?”
“Again… Unknown…”
Stepping out of the room, Tony didn’t care anymore that Vision phased through the wall behind him. The two going deeper down the hallway, opening doorways, and finding more cocoons. A sudden ‘thump’ from the end of a hallway to Tony’s left had the two flying off to investigate. What they both found was Thor, crouched on one knee while trying to lift Mjolnir, and failing. He had a blanket around his waist being held up by his free hand, and his body and hair were slick with sweat as if he had just come out of a sauna. Continuing to try and lift his hammer, the Asgardian was oblivious to the two, focused on the task in front of him. “How… How am I unworthy?” The man asked to no one. “Was it… Was it HER? She… She demands much, but… Certainly this would not…”
“Thor? Are you doing okay there, big guy?”
Finally turning his head to look up at Iron Man and Vision, Thor’s eyes seemed glazed over, like he was drugged or in a trance. “She… She demands the power of Mjolnir, of Asgard… But the hammer, it wont…”
“Who’s SHE big guy?” Moving closer, Tony was startled when Thor got up to his feet and backed away, dropping the blanket around his waist, and sneering back at Iron Man like a cornered animal. Looking away, Tony covered his eyes with the back of his gauntlet. “Okay… Didn’t need to see that.”
“GET AWAY FROM ME! You are toxic! Diseased… Impure…”
“Thor, just… Put the blanket back around to cover that Norse sausage you got going on and let’s talk.” What he got as a response was what sounded like a mixture of a hiss and a reptilian growl when Thor began to transform before their eyes. His flesh quickly becoming a translucent murky green, developing spurs and spines that jutted out of his ankles and forearms, his back lurched as a row of spines lined down his back and thick chitinous plates developed over his brawny arms and shoulders. Tentacles sprouted from his scalp where his hair once was, crowning the sides of his face with a pair of gnarled horns while his eyes became yellow and reptilian and his teeth razor sharp. Lurching forward with the gait of a hunched over gorilla, his changes did not stop there when his chest developed the same chitinous armor and his lower jaw split open into a pair of jagged, toothy mandibles. Making eye contact one last time, the hideous abomination looked up at Tony and roared.
Blasting the monstrosity with a shot of repulsar energy without a second thought, the creature that used to be Thor was sent crashing through the wall behind him, revealing another room infested with cocoons like the one he came out of. But then, Iron Man looked around when the entire mansion came alive with the sounds of hissing and snarls, making him realise that he may have stirred a hornet’s nest.
“I believe a sound retreat is advised Mr Stark.”
“Yeah… That I can agree with.”
Flying down the corridor, the two could hear more activity rile up in the building all around them. Caught off guard, Tony was body tackled by something that burst through the wall to his right and sent him through three different rooms until colliding with an old fireplace finally stopped him. Looking up through a static filled visor, Tony gasped at the sight of the Hulk, now a towering, slithering mass of claws, tentacles and teeth that roared down at him with a maw filled with drooling mandibles like a cephalopod. “You threaten the swarm…” He snarled, raising his talons over his head to form fists, Tony did not give him the chance to strike before hitting him with a blast of his arc reactor and sending what used to be the Hulk up the next room overhead, causing debris to rain down over Iron Man. Brushing himself off, Tony quickly got up and flew out the chasm he was punched through, darting his way out to the main hall.
There he found Wanda, clutching at her side like she was injured and looking up just in time for Iron Man to stop in mid air and fall to his feet. Looking up at Tony, Wanda’s eyes went wide at the sight of him, shifting her attention between hallways to make sure it was clear. “Tony? What the hell is going on?” Helping the woman up and letting her drape her arm over his shoulder, Tony fired the thrusters in his feet to fly and carry the Scarlet Witch with him.
“I don’t know Wanda; all of this is insane! It has to be that woman Cap brought back, Lilith.”
Making their way to the main hall of the mansion, the two were given the sight of their friend Vision fighting for his life against the rest of the Avengers, now mutated and twisted into Lovecraftian horrors. The android phased out just in time to avoid a strike from one creature that looked like Steve, now completely nude and reptilian with chitinous plates growing from his right arm like a shield and barreling through the red and green android like he was a ghost. Turning his attention to another attacker, Vision fired energy beams from the gem in his forehead, fending off a female creature with six arms as she ducked, cartwheeled, and scurried out of the firing solution. Returning to a solid state, Vision kept his attention on his two attackers, believing he had the upper hand until a column of raw cosmic energy blasted through him and tore him apart from behind.
“VISION!” Landing where Vision’s upper half had fallen, Tony raised his hand and conjured an energy field to protect the three of them while he checked on the android. “Vision, talk to me buddy, let me know you’re still okay.”
“He was a threat to the swarm, and so are you.” Turning his attention to Vision’s attacker coming into view, Tony was surprised to find it was Carol, or what appeared as Carol floating just a foot off the ground. Completely nude and fully transformed, her flesh was a murky translucent green, her scalp alive with a sea of tentacles swaying behind her as long as her legs and horns framing her smiling face, sporting razor sharp teeth in her grin while she swirled cosmic energy in her talon in front of her. “Our Queen has plans for this city… And you’re not in them.” Her eyes were slit and reptilian, and yet glazed, just like Thor’s, almost as if SHE wasn’t the one he was addressing, but some thing that was influencing her, using her.
Caught off guard, Tony turned to the sight of Tigra attacking his forcefield, her body now more feline than ever, raking her claws over the energy field and trying to bite her way through, only to be pushed back and roll onto her hands and feet, padding and circling them like a prowling jungle cat. Her flesh too had become glossy and translucent with a filmy green colour, her scalp and back coiling with tentacles while a barbed tail swished angrily behind her. “Sick… Poison… Threat.” She hissed, allowing a prehensile tongue to slither out of her chops to lick at her fangs and mandibles. One by one the rest of the Avengers revealed themselves, each a twisted nightmare of their former selves.
Jennifer stalked out into the open, a talon at her hip and licking the claws clean of her other hand salaciously, just as her Cousin lumbered in behind her like a bear on all fours for her to caress his scalp like a loyal pet. Thor and Hawkeye appeared from above, the archer twitching as he scurried up the wall hissing back at Iron Man. “What the hell happened to you all?!
“I happened to them.” Spoke a woman’s voice, smooth and honey sweet as Lilith stepped casually down the stairs to stand at the center of the main hall of the mansion, smiling imperiously over at Tony as the Avengers gathered behind her. Unlike the others, she retained her human form, tossing her flowing blonde hair behind her and smoothed down the dress she wore, a dress Tony recognised as a gift he gave Natasha last year as a Christmas gift.
“Who are you? Really?”
Tilting her head with a smile, the woman rolled her eyes to look up at the ceiling and back at Tony. “My mother named me Lilith, I never understood the name in the beginning, not until I killed my fourth mate in a hotel room in Jersey and found a bible in the nightstand after bearing quintuplets.” Smiling wider at the confused looks of Tony and Wanda, she continued, slowly walking towards the two as Tony held Vision’s deactivated body close. “A demon that lures in men with the temptation of pleasures of the flesh… But I’m so much more than that.” Quickly transforming in front of the two, her body shifted and grew, her shoes burst apart to free splayed-out claws and a long saurian tail that dragged behind her. The sides of her dress tore open as did the rest of it when a second pair of limbs grew from her sides and she was forced to all sixes like an insect, her flesh becoming translucent and a sickly green as spines, tentacles and chitinous plates grew out of her inhuman body. Her neck lengthened to match the length of her meter-long tentacles slithering from her scalp while horns grew from the sides of her now serpentine head, flicking a barbed tongue out like a snake and smiled. “Lilith, Babylon, Echidna, I am ALL of those things, my swarms will consume this city, and then the world… Hmm, I could have overtaken your Avengers easily, overpower you with the might of my progeny, lurking in the dark bowers of your city… But to be invited? To be welcomed with opened arms and consume you from within, like a parasite, that’s FAR more delightful.”
“You’re not getting away with this Lilith!”
“Neither are you…”
Gasping from a sharp pain in his side, Tony turned to find Wanda driving her talons into his ribs, just as transformed as the others, and sneering back at him with fanged lips. “Poison…” Twisting her fingers in his chest, Tony tasted blood in his mouth and dropped Vision to the ground, his force field deactivating as the damage kept him from keeping it up. Seeing the Avengers close in on him, Tony raised his hand and fired point blank at Wanda, sending her back and ripping her claws free of his armor. With no way to fight, Tony fired off his flares to blind his friends and set his after burners to maximum power, firing through the roof with the speed of a rocket.
*
Gasping and coughing out a struggled breath, Tony’s eyes darted open to find himself staring up at the ceiling of the Richards family living room. Looking around and shaking in panic, the man found himself being checked over by SHIELD personnel who gently tried to calm him down while he recovered from his injuries. Looking down at his chest he found much of his armor had been disassembled and removed so they could stitch up his wounds. Realising he was not in danger anymore, the man slumped back down on the table, releasing a breath he had been holding for almost a minute. Turning his head, he looked out the open window he barged through for safety.
“I’m glad you’re okay Tony…” He heard a woman say out loud nearby, one he recognised as Susan’s as he heard someone move out of the way for her to approach. “You lost a lot of blood from your injuries, thankfully SHIELD was able to patch you up.” Feeling a pair of hands gently cup around his left hand and wrist, he squeezed his hand back in response.
“No thanks to my friends back at the mansion, you have to do something, that lady… She’s planning to…” turning to look up at Susan, the man went stone stiff when he realised, he was holding hands with one of the same creatures that posed as his friends back at the Avengers mansion. Her face framed by gnarled and branching antlers like a headdress with a sea of tentacles slithering behind it. Unlike their murky translucent green, her skin was a sky blue and her demeanor was gently, civil, caring. Her eyes, despite being slit and reptilian, had a softness to them he only recognised from the Invisible Woman… When she was still human.
“Susan?”
“Hello Tony, there’s a lot you need to be brought up to speed with.”
Looking up and breathing sharply through his nostrils, Tony darted his eyes across the living room to find three other creatures like the one gently holding his hand in the same room. One he recognized as the Wasp, mostly from her face when she turned and approached the table where he laid, she seemed taller than he remembered, she ALSO had blue scaly skin, horns, tentacles and two sets if diaphanous wings that buzzed behind her when she approached the table and gently rested a clawed hand over his chest. “Tony… You’re awake, how do you feel?”
Shifting his attention between the two creatures, Tony tried to sit up, his breathing still erratic until Susan gently pressed him down and shushed him to calm down, softly tracing her talons over his forehead. “It’s okay Tony, we’re not going to hurt you.”
“W-what happened? What are you…?”
Giving each other a sad look, the two women hesitated to answer until Susan took a deep breath and explained everything to the man. For several minutes, she went into detail on how she had been infected with some kind of parasitic DNA, how it changed her, manipulated her, and drove her to do terrible things before Reed managed to stop her. While she talked, Tony’s expression calmed down, soaking in all the information as Janet helped him sit up and make sure he was comfortable. Two other SHIELD agents checking on him helped make sure his stitches did not burst from the act as he was helped to his feet. “And that’s where we are now.” Susan sighed, letting the man sling his arm over her shoulder to help him up. “Reed came up with a gene trigger that pretty much shuts the DNA off.”
“But leaves you in the current hardware while your software is waiting for a patch it’ll never get.” Nodding to himself and pulling his arm away with a squeamish look on his face when her tentacles uncoiled from his arm, he gestured with his open hand to the rest of his armor near the table, the components flying to graft back onto him and complete his armor. “MY question is… Why did the infection not take in me?”
“What do you mean?”
“Your daughter… Lilith, she spiked our drinks with her DNA, turning the Avengers into creatures like her, but not me, why?”
Narrowing her eyes, Susan leaned back her head, as did Janet when she too inspected the man. “There’s something floating around in your blood, something toxic.”
“Yeah…” Nodded Janet, seeing what Susan was seeing, leaving the man confused as the two eyed him. “What IS that? Geez Tony, what did you put in yourself THIS time?”
Chuckling, Tony scratched the back of his bare neck while thinking on that. “Well Jan, that’s going to be a long list; there was that case of palladium poisoning I get a few years ago, the Extremis bio-hardware I injected into myself, there’s probably still nano-bot waste in there from my mark 50 suit and let’s not forget a couple decades worth of liver damage from alcoholism.”
“Yes, THAT I can see.” Folding her lower arms under her chest and taping her lip in thought with one of her free hands, Susan pieced it all together. “You weren’t a viable host, too sick.”
“So, I wasn’t infected?”
“OH! Yes, you were, but the DNA died the instant it tried to infect your cells. Reed and I determined that naturally, the DNA has a metabolism 500 times faster than a human’s body. If it were ever exposed to a viral agent or unhealthy DNA it would burn through it and die.”
Looking to the two woman and the window he barged through in his panic, the man got a better view of the living room and the damage he caused. “I didn’t hurt either of you, did I? I was pretty much seeing stars when I got here.”
“You tried to shoot me with a repulsar beam before you passed out.” Explained Susan, giving the man a look while biting her lip with her fanged teeth. “But I managed to redirect the beam with my forcefields.”
“To where?”
Pointing up with a talon, Tony looked up to find a gaping hole in the ceiling that led up five stories.
“Oh, sorry.”
“Don’t worry, something like that seems to happen once a month in here…” Helping the man down the hall towards Reed’s lab, the three entered the large space to find the rest of the Fantastic Four and another creature Tony did not recognise looking over a screen with what looked like a logistics readout being displayed. Seeing Iron Man back on his feet, Johnny and Ben approached, greeting the man, and making sure not to overwhelm him and make his injuries worse.
“It ‘s good to see you alright Stark.”
“Yeah, deh sorry about yer buddies at the mansion.”
Nodding back to Ben and wincing at his stone hand trying to gently pat his shoulder, Tony turned to see the other alien woman blink back at him in confusion.
“So THAT’s what you look like.” Whispered Alicia, catching Tony off guard when she approached him and gently cupped her hands at either side of his face. Despite her talons being razor sharp, her touch was delicate, cautious. Pursing her lips into a smile, her face turned to shock when she heard the collar around her neck beep threateningly, forcing Alicia to step back and fold her hands behind her, a sheepish look of embarrassment that despite her alien and predatory appearance looked almost attractive. “Sorry, I’ve heard you walk around her dozens of times in the past… When I was blind. I didn’t know you had a beard.”
“Alicia?! Alicia Masters? You can see!”
Looking away, he thought he noticed a dark blue blush on her face when she gathered a braid of her tentacles in her hands and stroked it to calm herself. “That and more…”
“Good, you’re awake.” Reed turned from his seat to stand and greet the injured man, shaking his gauntlet and explaining what had been going on. “I’ve had HERBIE synthesize more of the gene trigger I created so we can douse the city.”
“The city’s not what I’m worried about Reed, Lilith isn’t targeting New York, she was after the Avengers the entire time!”
“But why? There are millions of people in the city, this place is a buffet for her.”
“Yeah… But how many people in New York do you know can jump from Manhattan to Vermont in a single leap? How many can bulldoze through buildings like they were paper? How many can fly out into space? How many can control minds, or alter reality?” Getting the picture, the rest of the Fantastic Four worried. “She was after the Avengers the entire time, and now she has them!”
“If she makes off with their powers, she could flee Earth and infect the Milky Way Galaxy, she’d be a plague!” Gasped Susan, her four claws at her mouth in shock and horror. “I would have been a plague…”
“If we’re going to do anything, we’ve got to hit the Avengers mansion NOW while she still thinks she has the upper hand."
Nodding, Reed moved to one of the cylinders just now being filled by HERBIE and pulled it off the rack, screwing on a nozzle to the cannister’s top and hoisting it up in his arms. “Well then, lets get going.
*
Finally prepared and making their way to the hanger over top the Baxter building by the elevator, the doors open for them to find the remaining SHIELD force present gathered what they could from HERBIE’s shipment and flew off to load the Helicarrier, now coming in from the Manhattan bay. By the time the Fantastic Four were all top side, the two SHIELD transports were on their way out and heading to the flying fortress. Seeing the Fantastic Four arrive from the elevator, the lead SHIELD agent turned and approached them, stopping the group before they could enter the Fantasticar.
"Ah Professor." A SHIELD agent saluted Reed before turning back to watch a group of vessels leaving, “Your shipment of the chemical is being sent up to the Helicarrier now. Everything should be ready for distribution in just half an hour once you arrive to oversee its distribution to the city, Professor Richards.”
Reed noticed the agent turning his full attention back to the Fantastic Four and the four alien creatures with them.
“Good, good.” Nodded Reed, holding a cannister snaked around his arm and tapping a button on his belt that opened the walk ramp of the Fantasticar, “But we are not heading to the SHIELD Helicarrier, we’re heading to the Avenger’s mansion to stop Lilith.”
Reed was stepping forward to enter their personal vessel but stopped in his tracks when the man stepped to the side and stood between him and the walk ramp of the Fantasticar.
“I’m afraid I must insist Professor Richards, your wife’s… Demonstration at the entertainment venue and Mr. Stark’s arrival shows that the target is aware of your presence. Director Fury has made it clear that your wife and the other… Creatures are to be kept under tight surveillance at the Helicarrier until the city inhabitants have been protected,” The SHIELD agent held up a hand.
“The FUCK did you just call me?” Asked the Wasp coldly, giving the man a dirty look.
“We can’t just douse the city with the gene trigger without making sure she hasn’t left the city, or this planet!” Explained Reed. “Her target was never the city of New York, as of now the Avengers are the true threat and we need to get to them now!”
Lifting his hand in an aggressive gesture and barking out a quick command, the remaining SHIELD agents with the man quickly raised their weapons and aimed them at the Fantastic Four and the blue creatures with them.
“Please, we have to go!” Pleaded Susan, stepping up to stand shoulder to shoulder with her husband and convince the SHIELD agent of the situation. “I know how she thinks, the intelligence driving this species, it’s looking for the strongest hosts to spread and consume. If we do not go to the mansion now, they’ll escape, they’ll leave Earth!”
“They will be dealt with when the compound is released over the city. Please do not make me repeat myself, you will board your vessel and return to the SHIELD helicarrier for processing and for THAT one…” He gestured to the alien woman Susan freed from the empathic swarm link. “She will be fitted a collar like yourself until we can determine that either of you are not compromised.”
“Oh, come ON!” Scoffed Johnny, getting the same agreement with the others. The SHIELD agents present thumbed the safeties around to fire on their weapons and aimed at the group, forcing the Human Torch to raise his hands.
“This is bullshit,” Johnny muttered.
Pulling out the detonator from his pocket and raising it up to eye level for Susan to see, the man left his thumb over the trigger to make his point.
“Give me an answer now.”
Topic: Susan Storm: New Species (Read 4014 times)