[center][img]http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-YYRw8fNlTMc/WS7os0sjymI/AAAAAAAA1CU/0U37v2bqWSEARLAtl1DJmlJf1-erLHrAACK4B/s1600/ted_kord____the___real___blue_beetle_by_spidermanfan2099-d4qhf7q.jpg[/img][/center] [B][i]Run…[/i][/B] “Run, Ted! Run! You’re gonna miss the bus!” Carter yelled from the school bus! Ted’s legs pumped like pistons, he slapped on the door. The driver sighed and hit the brakes, pausing to make a point before he opened the doors. [color=SKYBLUE]“Thanks, Mister Ditko. Sorry, I’ll be early next time!”[/color] Kord said, climbing the steps with big strides. The driver gave a tilt of his head, gesturing to the seats. Ted waded through the aisle past rows of younger children in seats before slumping down into one at the back of the bus from the g-forces caused by Ditko’s lead-foot. “Man, I thought we were both gonna miss out there! You know you’re my only ticket in, dude!” Ted had aced a privately set science test competition called 'The Children of Tomorrow' provided to all schools along the Eastern seaboard. The top 25 students would be permitted to bring a friend for an all expenses paid trip to the Baxter Building at Four Freedoms Plaza in New York City. When the Principal discovered that Ted had won and intended to take Carter Johns, “All-expenses paid” became a “hitching a school-bus already on a set excursion to the Amtrak station, train ride there, train-ride back, fully chaperoned at all times, I’ve got my EYE on you two, don’t you DARE make us look bad” trip. [h3][color=SKYBLUE][i][b]# “In New Yoooooork! Con-crete jungle where dreams are made of, There’s nothin you can’t dooo!” #[/b][/i][/color][/h3] “Stop that. You’re setting a bad example for the fifth graders.” Scolded their supervising teacher. Ted turned to Carter and whispered. [color=SKYBLUE][sub]“In school bus. Me-tal death trap where dreams are a no show… where singing’s a no-no…”[/sub][/color] The pair broke out with laughter. [hr] The Blue Beetle sprinted up 7th avenue. Past West 36th… 37th… He turned over his right shoulder and saw Wonder Woman and the metal-clad menace fighting far above the city. Ferocious marauding citizens infected by drones were in pursuit, and even if they hadn't been he had no time to stand around and watch. Spotting another pack ahead of him, he started to run to the left side of the street and then made a hard cut, veering back to the right. He slid over a parked car and turned down West 38th never breaking stride, with this new pack merging with those already giving chase. His legs burned, his cheeks puffed as he turned a deep scarlet. He was nearly halfway there, but he certainly was not out of the woods yet. [hr] The pair stood in the lobby meeting one of the benefactors who had paid for their trip. The chaperoning teachers had long since been ushered away. They would be notified at the conclusion of the day’s activities, so they could once again return children home. Reed Richards. He looked maybe in his late 30s. Slender. Spoke crisply. There was never any hesitation prior to using large or awkward words. Which suggested to Ted both a lack of pretension and condescension, although many would suggest the presence of those words was evidence enough of the former. Ted wasn’t sure what to make of the man, he’d certainly never met anyone like him. A large tank of a man who was built like an NFL linebacker said something in his ear. Richards smiled and clapped him on the shoulder. [b]“Welcome, Children of Tomorrow! I’m just being notified that necessary preparations are complete and they are now ready for us upstairs. If you’ll line up by the express elevators, we’ll all proceed to the laboratories in four groups.”[/b] [hr] Ted looked over his right - aghast with what he was seeing - but never slowed for a second. Wonder Woman and Stryfe had plowed into the Empire State Building with a force strong enough that the foundation girders themselves had begun to rend themselves asunder. There was a monstrous echoed creak of steel and cracking concrete, as if a colossal metal beast had yawned. The Blue Beetle urged his legs onwards, his chest ached. The sun was eclipsed as he crossed Broadway. For a second Ted thought the building had bent back on itself and might have defied physics by collapsing on him, but then he realized the sun had disappeared for another horrifying reason. The sky just behind him had turned black from the swarm. Ted screamed. He fell to the street. He slammed the button on his glove. The darkness engulfed him. Swallowing him whole. [hr] Ted and Carter stepped out of the express elevator into the bright light of the laboratory. Ted stood agape. Carter looked nonplussed. “Maaan, I’m getting the sense that we skipped out of school for a school of a different kind.” Ted’s friend whined. [color=SKYBLUE]“Whoa, is this…?”[/color] [b]“Gamma converter, for the internal super-thermal conductive high-fission engines. There’s four, surrounding a vacuum-diffusion cooling core.”[/b] [color=SKYBLUE]“You’re going to space? What about the redundancies?”[/color] Reed was slightly taken aback. [b]“Redundancies?”[/b] [color=SKYBLUE]“Well, yeah. This will be all well and good for space travel. But what if it overheats prior to breaking orbit. Surely you have redundancies? I mean if you try and use that cooling system prior to escaping the atmosphere-- sure, maybe you get up to high altitude where the air is thin, but you’re still going to be sucking in oxygen. Oxygen and nuclear fission… I mean what nutcases are going to be crazy enough to be flying this thing—?”[/color] The large man walked past again, hearing little Ted get worked up. He looked to calm him. [color=orange]“Hey, Hey! I’m going to be one of those nutcases. It’s OK, kid. Reed here thinks of everything.”[/color] [color=SKYBLUE]“Oh [b]YOU’RE[/b] going to be flying that thing?”[/color] “Hey, Ted… Calm down.” Carter pulled on his friend’s arm. [color=orange]“Well, yeah. Me and the Doc’s wife, her kid brother and his ball 'n chain to be…”[/color] Ted pulled his sleeve free, and shoved a finger in the large man’s face. [color=SKYBLUE]“Well, hopefully one of you makes it back to tell the world what it’s like to get up to 2,150 Kelvin… because if those engines overheat before you breach the upper atmosphere, what you’ve got here is an expensive Three Mile Island in a can!”[/color] A college aged kid walked over, seeing the commotion. [color=red]“Hey kids, who likes robots? You want to see the robot we lent out to NBC when they made H.E.R.B.I.E’s Kids Hour?”[/color] Ted Kord and Carter Johns were diverted away, much to the former’s chagrin. Reed looked at the engine component and rubbed his chin, deep in thought. [hr] Ted very gingerly got to his feet after convulsing on the bitumen for a few seconds. The whole swarm had rushed past. ‘Dead’ drone bugs fell to his feet as he swept them off his Blue Beetle suit. He hurt like hell and still felt twitchy. [color=SKYBLUE]“Note to self: I have to put more insulation in this suit if I’m ever going to run a current that strong through the metal-mesh ever again...”[/color] He cracked his neck and back and started jogging onwards until he felt limber enough to return to his full sprint, quickly turning up 6th Avenue. He took the opportunity to glance back over his left shoulder to check on the progress of Wonder Woman’s fight with Stryfe. He could no longer hear the creaking groan of steel and glass. They were gone. Wonder Woman. Stryfe. The top of the Empire State Building. [color=SKYBLUE]“Oh… Oh no.”[/color] As he began to realize what had happened. What [b][i]WAS[/I][/b] happening. He’d rushed past the corner of West 39th, and broke into full sprint. He knew he didn’t have long. He heard the terrifying crash which confirmed his worst fears. He saw the dust rise. He saw the dust race towards him down 6th. The distance between the Blue Beetle and the 40th Street junction shrank. The distance between the dust cloud and the blue hero shrank even faster. He jumped and slid across the front of a parked car as he looked to cut the corner for the sanctuary of 40th Street. He felt the car lift from the rushing air beneath him. He pushed off and dived, rolling behind the protection of a building as the dust cloud billowed past, rattling store fronts and triggering car alarms as it enveloped everything in a brown haze. He panted, sucked up air as fast as he could, looking across the street at Bryant Park. He got back to his feet and lumbered on, cutting through the park. [hr] Ted and Carter were sat at a desk in the laboratory. Ted looked around. All the twenty-five winning students and their friends were seated in pairs in a five by five setup. Carter wasn’t wrong. Looked like a classroom of a different name. With Reed supplanting himself at the head of the class in a teaching role, speaking to them all. “Ted, this-- this is not really for me, dude…” [color=SKYBLUE]“Shhh… At least let’s hear them out.”[/color] A fresh-faced blonde woman walked around the tables, distributing equipment. She looked young, perhaps a post-grad college age, but couldn’t be much older. She piqued Carter’s interest briefly when they interacted, but he quickly returned to distraction once she had gone. “Teeeeeeeed…” He whined and put his head on the table. [b]“Thank you, Susan.”[/b] Richards said from the front of the class once she was done. [b]“Today, my Children of Tomorrow, we’ll be experimenting with some applied chemistry to actually solve some problems that are often relevant in--”[/b] Ted tuned him out. [color=SKYBLUE]“You’re right. Class by another name. What do you want to do?”[/color] “Wanna get tossed out? We might even have time for gaming by the time we get home.” [color=SKYBLUE]“Catalyzed decomposition of Hydrogen peroxide?”[/color] Asked Ted. “Is that--?” [color=SKYBLUE]“Yup.”[/color] Ted smiled. “That thing you just said, then.” Carter pointed, with a smile crossing his face. [color=SKYBLUE]“We just need a place to sit and watch.”[/color] Ted said. “I’ll get on that. You get on the science.” The two friends winked and set to work at their own tasks. [hr] The Blue Beetle ran onwards, he was only a few blocks away from Four Freedoms Plaza now. He’d been there years earlier. When it was owned by Reed Richards and his wife Susan Storm. Before the Storm/Richards Scientific Society took over the estate in their stead. Before the accident which saw them never return. Ted was intimately familiar with the layout of the building. Reed Richards had planned on significantly upgrading the in-house security measures, but Ben Grimm had been busier with his other training roles in preparation for the exploratory mission, just as Reed himself was kept too busy with the logistical requirements and research required for such a mission. As it was, they had indeed taken their experimental new craft of Reed Richards' own design. It combined super-thermal conductive nuclear fission engines and a design-based vacuum diffusion-cooled core. In order to maintain optimal temperature, the ship could vent using the vacuum of space itself to rapidly cool the core intermittently. It was a revolutionary new idea, but Ted’s prediction had been eerily close to the mark. As the ship neared a cloud of rich cosmic radiation, the automated regulatory cooling function activated. Pockets of oxygenated nitrous had been captured within the cloud and were practically injected into the core by diffusion. It was at this point the remaining life expectancies of everyone aboard the craft dropped to a period that could best be measured in seconds. Thinking quickly, Reed Richards jettisoned their holdings - a Negative Aperture the craft had been carrying for safe off-world experimentation - in the hope that the craft could get clear. The idea being that once beyond the cloud they could again cool the core through diffusion in open space, and safely re-gather their instrumentation once the danger had passed. However they were too late. Scientists believing the oxygen sent the core’s temperature spiking to meltdown, as the diffusion cooling system also drew in cosmic radiation. What effect the cosmic radiation would have had interacting with the gamma converter, or if there was even time for the entire situation even came to that are questions that few have even acknowledged beyond the broadest speculation. Containment was certainly breached, and the five explorers would likely have either perished from the rapid rising heat, or some flammable internal materials in the heavily oxygenated environment seeing the structural integrity of the craft itself compromised with de-pressurization and exposure to the extreme cold from the vacuum of space becoming another possible cause of death. Gruesomely ironic, given the means of their ship's propulsion. Potentially meaning the five involved may experience drastic rising heat for a fraction of a second before suddenly finding themselves unprotected in open space in extreme cold, floating in the cloud of curious cosmic radiation that brought about their demise. At least those remain the best working theories… It was considered the worst space related disaster since the Space Shuttle Challenger Mission - with many believing they were already tempting fate by giving the ship that name after the initial mission of Challengers which had seen such questionable luck - Barely managing to defy death themselves, back in their 1957 mission. It also did a lot to end the magic of manned space travel of that era. With drones, robots, rovers and robots doing the bulk of the work in the funded missions in the years beyond. But Ted had hoped to change that. He staggered out of the greenery onto West 42nd Street near the New York Public Library, and kept running. Only a few blocks to go. [hr] Ted had snuck his materials over to his station, and Carter had found the perfect place for the pair to watch it all unfold. Ted poured out hydrogen peroxide with oil and detergent, he then mixed some rich green dye to potassium iodide and kept them separate. He took a string of caps that Carter Johns had brought from home tucked away in his boot and carefully arranged his selection of apparatus. He elevated the test-tube containing more than enough potassium iodide using a ring-stand, over the large volumetric flask containing the hydrogen peroxide solution. He repeated this several times until he had a row of several tall containers taking up space all over his desk. Finally, he took a long length of string and cut it into several sections. Placing one end of each piece of string in the test tube and dangling the other ends in the opening of each the volumetric flasks. He set his fuse for the caps Carter had brought and the pair walked quickly away from the table, making sure not to run and raise suspicion. But not quite doing a good enough job. The large man from before looked over and saw Ted’s work as the pair rushed away, and wrongly assumed they were going to fetch Doctors Richards or Storm. [color=orange]“That’s that smart mouthed kid who was giving Reed grief before. Hey, Johnny! Come get a load of what this whizz kid’s been doin’."[/color] He stood over the desk and looked down at all the flasks. The one who had suggested they all check out the robot started to walk over, but then recognized something on the table. Not the experiment itself, but the string of caps they had run around the desktop. He opened his mouth to callout to the larger man, then thought better of his warning, closed his mouth and smiled. [color=orange]“Now what in the name of Aunt Petunia do you s’pose these kids were doin’ over here?”[/color] Ben Grimm exclaimed, deep in thought. He watched little green dribbles of potassium iodide slowly siphon out of the test tube and roll down the strings towards the flasks, and tilted his head in contemplation. Then the caps went off. [center][h3]BANG! BA-BANG! BA-BA-BA-BA-BANG! BANG! BANG![/h3][/center] Ben Grimm staggered back from the desk and then his focus sharpened, looking for the culprits. ...just as the first drips of potassium iodide hit the hydrogen peroxide. The chain reaction worked swiftly, as the catalyst hit the highly concentrated hydrogen peroxide. Green silly string-like foam shot up the necks of the long flasks and covered the big man. [color=orange]“Johnny! Reed! Suzie! Help! The little monsters slimed me! Ahh! It’s hot! What’ve they done?!?”[/color] Reed rushed over to check on his friend. He furrowed his brow. [b]“Oh. I see. It’s the rapid decomposition of hydrogen peroxide.”[/b] Reed mused, quickly evaluating the situation. [color=orange]“It’s hot! What’ve they done to me?!?”[/color] [b]“It’s exothermic, Ben.”[/b] Reed said, carefully stepping back. [color=orange]“What does that mean? Am I going to be OK? Why are you backing up? Where are those brats?!”[/color] Ben fired rapid questions. [b]“You’re going to be fine. It just means that the reaction releases energy through heat. That is to say, the foam will be quite warm. I’m backing up because I don’t want green dye all over my clothes…”[/b] [color=red]“And as for the culprits…”[/color] Johnny said, pointing to a vent. “Cheese it, Ted!” Carter stopped laughing long enough to give the signal to bolt. The pair quickly crawled on hands and knees through the vent, bypassing an adjoining room, they came out near the elevator bay. Carter hit the button and Ted pried the elevator doors open. The elevator was only one floor down. “You’re kidding me? You’ve seen Die Hard too much…” [color=SKYBLUE]“Are you going? Cos I am.”[/color] Ted said, holding the doors open. Carter sighed. “To the end of the line, Ted.” He dropped into the darkness down the shaft and landed with a thud on the lift below. Ted stepped through and dropped just as the four hit the elevator bay. The elevator went up a single floor and dinged, Ben Grimm stepped inside, flicking the switch to stop the lift. He climbed up the handrail and opened the ceiling panel... [color=orange]“Ah-Ha!”[/color] He exclaimed, poking his head through. [color=orange]“Huh… I coulda sworn they’d have been up here.”[/color] Ted and Carter clung to the counter-weight as it raced down to the express elevator floor, as the lift it was connected to went to the top floor of the building. “Yeah, this is incredibly dangerous.” Carter uttered. [color=SKYBLUE]“So’s letting that big guy catch us after what we just did.”[/color] Ted replied. “So what’s the plan now?” [color=SKYBLUE]“We wait until another lift pulls up right by us. We drop on that one. We ride it to the express elevator stop. Drop through the ceiling panel, then go down to the lobby and out.”[/color] “You make it all sound so simple… I know you’re just making this up as you go along.” Ted shrugged whilst clinging to the counter-weight. A few minutes later, the pair of friends dropped through a ceiling panel, and stepped out of the lift. ...right in the path of one very unimpressed Dr Susan Storm. [color=SKYBLUE]“Aww Hell… I didn’t see you there...”[/color] [hr] The Blue Beetle ran across Madison Avenue and found himself in the lobby of the Four Freedoms Plaza. He crossed the floor to the elevator bay and pried a set of doors open. He looked up. The elevators were locked off on one of the top floors of the building. Ted stepped back from the shaft and considered what this could mean. [hr] [b]“What’s your name?”[/b] Reed Richards asked. “Carter Johns.” [b]“That means nothing to me.”[/b] Reed rebuffed bluntly, turning and pointing at his partner in crime. [b]“You! What’s your name?”[/b] [color=SKYBLUE]“Ted Kord. He’s here with--”[/color] [b]“Ah. There it is. Engineering leaning. Your test suggested a favour towards practical science application over the theoretical. One of the few high scores to do so, in fact. It made me wonder if we tilted the test too strongly towards the theoretically minded-- Hey! I’m still talking!”[/b] Ted’s attention wavered. He looked beyond the scientist at the things that were happening behind him, as the other three tried to make sure they got all of the foam off of the large one. Ted stifled a laugh. [color=SKYBLUE]“Yes. You are. You’re still talking. And you haven’t said anything since we got here.”[/color] Carter Johns looked on at his friend in shocked amusement, disbelief at his friend’s boldness. Sensing how impressed his friend was spurred Ted on further. [color=SKYBLUE]“I win some science competition that my school makes me take, and the ‘prize’ is I get to be stuck on the Amtrak with my teacher for a day, for what? An extra chemistry lesson? To see a robot and the deathtrap you plan on trying to go to space in? No. If that’s what this is, I don’t want it and I don’t need it. I’ve been to museums at home. My Dad’s taken me to the Kennedy Space Center before. All of this…? This isn’t a prize to me. I’m being punished for doing something successfully. You’ve set broken incentives, if I were back home we'd be playing video games by now.”[/color] Carter stifled laughter at the audacity of Ted telling off the renowned scientist. Reed looked at Carter, considering him and his part in the fact this adolescent was speaking to him in this way, and then smiled knowingly. [b]“Johnny, could you come and take Carter here to the gallery? Show him the simulation center. Maybe fire up some games. I’m going to speak with Ted alone for a few minutes.”[/b] The college aged young man led Carter away. Ted threw him a reassuring confident grin. [b]“Why did you do that to Ben and to the lab?”[/b] [color=SKYBLUE]“I just told you, I don’t--”[/color] [b]“I heard what you said in front of your friend. And I saw you keep glancing at him for his approval. And I saw how his impression of you affected what you were saying. Ted, you care far too much what other people think about you.”[/b] Ted closed his mouth. [b]“Do you want to know what I think? Because a lot of people do, generally. I think you’re used to being the smartest one in the room. I think you’re used to dealing with teachers who you’re quite possibly smarter than. Which I empathize with, it’s not an easy situation to deal with either as student or teacher. And I think-- well, you told me yourself, that you’re used to taking every test with the mentality of what success in it can do for YOU. Not every test in your life is going to work that way. Finally, I don’t think you respect what you have. Which is probably the greatest failure in your education so far.”[/b] Ted opened his mouth again and nothing came out. [b]“The testing process is for gathering information. Data. Nothing more, nothing less. Incentives, generally, can tamper with results. No. You’re not getting any kind of scholarship here. Or cash prize. Or ‘Storm-Richards internship’ that would pave the way to a fast-track career in science that would allow you to slack off. It was to identify bright young talents, and to provide a place for free thought and open experimentation without the same shackled structure of the school system.”[/b] Reed dug his hand into his pocket and pulled out a fistful of carefully made pins. [b]“These pins are electromagnetically coded. They operate the magnetic security readers on the doors and elevators throughout the building. Including to the fully stocked, unmonitored laboratory for the Children of Tomorrow.”[/b] Ted was staggered, he couldn’t move and was speechless - generally a new experience for him -, Reed Richards walked on. [b]“I’ve gathered my data. For a while I was curious, your test results were interesting and you even had my attention for a while with your comments regarding our spacecraft. But now, upon further evidence I see that you’re just a loudmouth seeking attention. Striking at anyone you see as being viewed as an authority figure in order to garner further approval from your friend.”[/b] [b]“So thank you, Ted Kord.”[/b] Reed Richards lobbed him a pin. [b]“Congratulations on joining the [b][i]LAST[/I][/b] class of the Children of Tomorrow. Thanks to you, I think I’m quite sure I’ve received all the information I need from future generations. If you’ll please wait here in the elevator bay, we’ll have your friend sent out.”[/b] Ted couldn’t remember feeling more alone than at that very moment. And Ted’s memory was impeccable. [hr] Ted jogged down the steps from the second floor, back to the first. He’d have to work fast now, he'd used his old pin - usually kept as just a bitter reminder - to force the call on the elevator down to the floor above. He quickly pried open the elevator doors, holding them open with his foot. He fumbled inside his belt pulling out a second grapple line. He heard a “Ding!” as the elevator finally hit the floor above. He reached up and attached the grapple line to the undercarriage of the lift. He heard feet shuffle back inside the lift. The Blue Beetle couldn’t see, but it seemed a fair bet by his assumption that they were armed, checking on who had managed to call the lift down to the second floor in the first place. Yes, he knew the Four Freedoms Plaza. And he knew that nobody who worked in this place would willingly have had anything to do with any of this madness. The lift carried the Blue Beetle onwards and upwards. Hopefully to answers and a resolution to all of this.