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The figure stood in front of the two like some forgotten prophet dragged from the earth itself. He was draped in layers of worn leather and deep green cloth. His long, mottled coat hung open, revealing a tunic of strange, sage fabric beneath. A thick, tangled ginger beard spilled down over his chest, streaked with gray. His skin was pallid, almost translucent in places, as though the sun hadn't touched it in decades.

His eyes were hidden behind a pair of oversized green-tinted goggles and his nose was slightly flattened, his upper lip curled in a permanent sneer. His hands were what Sue noticed first. They were gnarled, clawed, thick-nailed, better suited for digging than handshakes. The figure only came up to Reed's waist, but he carried himself like a man ten feet tall. He smiled as he approached them.

Sue instinctively recoiled, meanwhile Reed observed the man. He felt cautious, but despite the situation something about him felt familiar. The man's smile twitched, his long front teeth catching the light in a flash of yellowed enamel. The sneer didn't drop so much as it spasmed, his upper lip quivering with involuntary motion, like a rodent sniffing the air. His head jerked slightly to the side in a sudden tic, a shiver of movement that made the folds of his hood rustle. He quickly regained his composure.

"You don't remember me." the man said. "That's all right. Time, after all, changes everything. Especially down here." His head tilted up to meet ther eyes, Sue was trying to avoid his gaze as if it was a prison spotlight. For a moment, there was silence. Just the slow drip of water and the soft shuffling of the creatures that loomed at the edge of the pit. "I remember you, though." the man continued. "Both of you. Brightest minds in the Think Tank. Reed Richards...Susan Storm..." His clawed hand gestured toward each of them like he was naming pieces on a chessboard. "You were always too clever for your own good. You especially, Reed. I used to think you'd surpass even me." He let out a high pitched laugh.

Suddenly memories flocked to Reed. The voice. The way he stood. The cadence of his speech. It hit him all at once. "Professor Elder?" he asked. He was sure he already knew the answer.

The man beamed, spreading his arms theatrically. "Harvey Elder, yes!" He laughed  "Or...I suppose that name doesn't quite fit anymore, does it?" He chuckled. "Still, it's good to hear it spoken again, I suppose. It's been so long since I've had intelligent company."

Sue's tried her best not avert her gaze again. "What happened to you?" She let her hand drop to her side and took Reed's in hers. It gave her some small comfort as she glanced at the creatures in their tunnels around them once more. "I can't remember when we last saw you. After you were fired no one could track you down. God knows dad spent so long trying to find you."

His smile faltered for a moment. "Hm, yes, quite." For a second he looked pensive, lost in thought, before he spoke up again. "Do you know why they fired me? They said my work was dangerous, an affront to god. As if religion has any place in a lab!" He laughed again. "I remember it differently. I remember a lab full of breakthroughs, of beautiful questions...and a boardroom full of cowards. I pushed boundaries, yes, but only because no one else would. What I was building - what I am building - could've changed everything."

Reed stepped forward slightly, gesturing to the creatures around them. "Professor Elder, what are they? What happened to you? How have you managed to live down there?" A hundred other questions had flooded Reed's mind over their short conversation, but these three felt the most pertinent.

Elder smiled back to him, walking passed the two and gesturing for them to follow. "All excellent queries Reed! But I'd have expected as much from you. I'm glad to see the years haven't dulled your curiosity. They say age is the enemy of invention, I've never found truth in the saying! Come, come now. This is no place to talk. If you'd be so kind as to follow me I can answer any and all of the questions you have at my home."

Reed and Sue looked at each other. Sue felt a pit in her stomach, none of this felt right. She felt like she wanted to get out of here as soon as possible and hide her head in the sand, try to forget any of this had happened. Let Elder have his [i]'Hills Have Eyes'[/i] commune down here on his own. She glanced back at the way they came. More security would surely be waiting to meet them at the top of the lift. She realised quickly this was a decision between possible or certain death. 

Reed shrugged back at her, decidedly less nervous about the situation. The more he thought about it the more fondly he remembered Elder. The rumours surrounding the reasons he was stricken from the think tank were numerous, and grave. The young folk at the time revelled in the drama, gossiping and inventing new stories of why their old professor was removed without ceremony. Reed never felt comfortable with this. Too many questions had been left unanswered, and in some small part he felt partially responsible for Elder losing his position. Although this was never the case, he knew about as much as anybody at the time and he still didn't know now. 

For a while refusing to join in on the mockery made him a bit of an unpopular figure among his friends. In fact it was the only time that he and his rival, Victor Von [color=007236][i][b]Doom [/b][/i][/color]had ever agreed on anything. Neither of them had laughed when Elder was gone. Neither of them liked how fast the others moved on. Neither of them felt comfortable seeing eye to eye with one another.

Reed turned his eyes from Sue back to Elder, watching the man descend further into the cavern. He moved with a strange, almost gliding gait. Despite his height and his use of the walking stick he moved fairly quickly.

"Let's go." Reed said softly. "If there's even a chance he's telling the truth, we owe it to ourselves to find out."

Sue didn't answer, just gave a small nod and followed beside him, hand still gripped in his. Her every instinct was screaming to turn back, but she didn't let go. She trusted Reed, and more importantly trust in herself to be able to escape from here if need be. She'd have liked to call back a memory of worse situations the two of them had gotten out of, but hiking through the Amazon was nothing compared to this.

The two of them walked in silence behind Elder, deeper into the veins he and his 'children' had carved into the earth. The deeper they went, the more alien the world became. Rock formations twisting in impossible spirals, massive root systems humming faintly as if they were breathing, and the occasional distant groan of the earth itself shifting.

All the while, the creatures followed. Mole-things with their huge blinking eyes and twitching noses. They didn't speak, but their presence was constant, scuttling along the walls and ceilings, some moving like spiders, others like burrowing rats.

Eventually, the narrow passage curved and sloped into a low, earthen chamber. No taller than eight feet at the center, with walls that bowed inward like the inside of a ribcage. The walls glittered faintly with mineral growths and what looked like scavenged tech. Old lab equipment, control panels, antennae, shattered bits of drones, all reassembled into makeshift structures. Glowing cables wound through the rock like veins, pulsing with a dim, greenish light.

Elder's "home" felt oddly cosy despite it's location. There was an improvised lab in the corner, with a workbench housing a few broken terminals from various eras standing beside shelves of cracked books and journals. There was a small stove fashioned from what looked like the guts of a ruined repulsor engine. A tin kettle sat on top, whistling gently. Nearby, two chairs, one clearly salvaged from a subway train, the other hand-carved from limestone sat facing each other over a table made of repurposed plexiglass bolted to support beams. To their right sat an armchair.

"Make yourselves comfortable." Elder said, sweeping his arms as if he were unveiling a royal hall. "It's not quite the Ritz, but it's home." He moved over to a raggedy old armchair and climbed onto it. One of the mole-creatures entered through an entryway at the back of the room. He was taller, more humanoid than the hunched beasts from before. He seemed more refined, wearing scavenged clothing and walking with a straight back. He wore a belt stuffed with tools under a tattered lab coat slightly too small at the arms.

He stopped as he entered, catching sight of Reed and Sue. "Father, you have guests?" he spoke with a shocked expression. 

Elder nodded, turning toward the tall, lanky creature at the chamber's entrance. "Belo!" Elder called, his voice rising in a melodic tone. "We have guests. Old friends of mine. Be a dear and bring us some tea - and the honey loaf, if those greedy twins haven't devoured it all."

The Moloid, Belo, straightened at once, nodding with stiff formality. "Of course, Father." His voice could almost be described as regal, like someone who had learned English by mimicking old British academic tapes. He quickly made his way over the stove, grabbing some mugs and never taking his eyes off of the couple.

Elder gestured over to the two chairs in front of him. The two cautiously made their way over and turned the chairs to face him before sitting down. Sue broke the silence. "You have tea down here?" As if that was the most pressing question.

"Tea, dear girl is the basis of any good civilisation. And I may be many things now, but a barbarian I am not."

Reed replied. "Please, Professor Elder-"

"Please, Reed, call me Harvey. We've enough history to eschew seniority."

"Alright, Harvey. You have to understand this is all very confusing for us. We'd appreciate an explanation for what is going on here."

Harvey adjusted in his seat, taking a moment to breathe as Belo brought over the tea and stood at his side. "I suppose I should start at the beginning. Tell me Sue, do you know why your father had me removed from the board?"

She shook her head. She'd like to have said her father never told her, but she'd honestly never thought to ask. Professor Elder was never one of her favourite teachers, in fact, quite the opposite.

"Hm, I shouldn't think so. Genius is so often seen as madness by the un-initiated." He took a sip of his tea, gesturing to the two to drink theirs. Reed took him up on the offer, and was surprised to find the tea to be delicious. Sue declined, she was met with a scowl that lasted half a second from Elder. "Your father and I disagreed on very few things, besides the one thing that mattered. My great work was to create life itself, to manipulate existing cells and molecules to create something entirely new. I wanted to skip evolution entirely and instead be the first to discover the greatest invention of all - life itself."

He began to start speaking again, but caught himself as he opened his mouth, glancing up at Belo. "Belo, I'd greatly appreciate it if you could find your sisters. God knows what trouble they're getting up to unsupervised." Belo began to argue, but was quickly silenced by his father. He left the room shortly after. As strange as this whole thing was, Sue couldn't help but see the family dynamic she grew up with between Harvey and his 'children'. He continued speaking.

"Your father saw things differently. He and the others thought it was unethical, that such things shouldn't be questioned. He feared the technology being used for eugenics. I, however, saw a different future." He gently placed his mug down on the table in front of him and leaned back in the chair. "After I was excluded from the Think Tank I was at a loss. You may not know this, but I am an orphan. I had no one and nowhere to turn to, all my ties were tangled up with the Storm Foundation, after what happened I'd managed to burn all my bridges without intentionally lighting so much as a match." He laughed to himself, a sad chuckle and looked down at his clawed hands.

"It wasn't too long after that when The Reach came. Everything changed as I'm sure you're well aware. I won't mince words here, you know as well as I what the meta-bomb did to many of us." He gestured towards the two. Both of them kept shtum about the true origin of their powers, it was best to let him believe what he wanted now. "Unfortunately I wasn't turned into a dashing Superman. I suppose it's ironic isn't it, I'm sure you all thought you were very sneaky referring to me as the [i]Moleman[/i] back then. Well..." He spread his arms out, his claws spreading. "I suppose fate has a wicked sense of humour." Reed looked down in shame, Sue averted her gaze. There was silence in the room for a few moments, neither of them wanting to fess up or feeling like an apology was appropriate. The look on their face was apology enough.

"The transformation changed my biochemistry to such a level that I became more mole than man. You'll have noticed my flash new spectacles" He said tapping them with a claw "They are more than just a fashion statement. I'm quite blind in the light,  they allow me to see in the deep darkness underground, and on the off chance I ever go onto the surface they protect me from the sun." He smiled. "Anyway, enough of the past, I'm sure the pressing question on your mind is less about the [i]moleman [/i]and more about his [i]moles[/i], eh?" He rose to his feet, gathering up the two finished mugs of tea and the untouched one before moving over to the sink and leaving them there. "I count what happened back at the Baxter Foundation as a blessing these days. Because of it I was able to continue my research under duress, when all the greatest discoveries are made. I continued my work in these tunnels, and what I found would astound even the most tenured of archeologist." He moved back to the two. "These tunnels are in part dug by myself and my children, but many of them were here when I arrived. I found ancient fossils, bio-matter of an ancient underground race never discovered before. Once I'd sapped enough energy from the Baxter Building it only took salvaging the right equipment and voilà - life again!"

The couple sat in stunned silence for a moment. Absorbing all of the information they had been given as best they could. Before the invasion they would have called Elder a madman and locked him away. Nowadays anything seemed possible. Reed cleared his throat, standing up from his chair.
"Harvey, this is remarkable, you're saying there was sentient life before humanity?" 

Harvey smiled back. "Humanoid, yes, sentient possibly." He continued "You'll have noticed the [i]Moloids [/i]as I've taken to calling them - the ones back in the pit were decidedly more...feral than dear Belo. They display some semblence of free thought, but are closer to a dog than a human." He rubbed his face for a moment, choosing his next words carefully. "I'm not sure if this is their natural inclination, or it's as a result of the process - reviving a species from scraps and marrow is hardly an exact science. Most emerged simple, instinctive. Only Belo and his sisters have retained or perhaps developed a higher awareness. Language, logic, even emotion. It's as though I've reignited an evolutionary spark that had long since died out."

Sue felt a stirring in her stomach. This all felt oddly wrong, although she couldn't put into words why. Maybe the thought of bringing life into the world they lived in felt cruel in the first place, let alone life that would so obviously be beaten down by Lord's regime. She remained silent, this whole ordeal felt fun at first but the joke wasn't making her laugh anymore. She felt more dismay when her partner spoke up.

"Fascinating..." Reed exclaimed, scratching his beard. "And you've been down here all this time? Was the blip we found yours then I'd presume?"

Harvey looked puzzled. "What blip?"

Sue spoke up. "We didn't come down here by chance, Professor." She stood up from the chair, sidling up beside Reed. "Our scanners picked up a beacon at this location, you're telling us it wasn't you that triggered it?"

Harvey stood in silence for a moment, collecting his thoughts. "Even if I had the resources to create such a device why would I waste my time? The entire reason I'm down here with my Moloids is so we [i]don't [/i]get found? Such an act would be counter intuitive to everything I'm working on!"

Reed nodded, arms folded. "That's what I thought. Something isn't right. It looks like someone else is tracking you, Harvey - and that makes this urgent. We need to find out who, and fast." Reed reached into his jacket, pulling out a small notepad. He scrawled a string of numbers and frequencies onto a page and tore it off. "This is our comm frequency. If you or your Moloids find anything - any equipment, any traces, don't hesitate to contact us. We'll do the same on the surface. We'll find whoever’s behind this."

Harvey took the paper, eyes scanning it briefly before nodding. "Very well. I'll assign Belo and the twins to comb the tunnels. Thank you both for your help."

Harvey guided the two through the tunnels and up into one that opened into a concrete spillway beneath what looked like an abandoned maintenance station. Rusted metal slats covered half-collapsed grates above them, and a faint trickle of daylight leaked in through the cracks. Harvey did his best to avoid the beam of sunlight.

"This one leads out," Elder said, his voice low and serious now. "It was a runoff channel once. We've kept it mostly clear for emergencies...or, in your case, exits."

"And entrances." Reed noted, running his hand along the tunnel's frame. "That hatch isn't sealed. If we leave it marked in our system, this gives us a clean way to return without drawing attention."

Elder nodded, but said nothing. He simply stood at the base of the stairs, his clawed hands folded over his staff. "I'll keep to the shadows, as always. But if you find who sent that signal... please come back. I would like to know who threatens my children."

Reed turned back to the mole-man, a faint shadow of guilt in his eyes. "You deserved better than what the Foundation gave you, Harvey. I know it's too late to fix that, but if this threat is real, you won't face it alone."

Harvey gave a crooked smile, and for a moment something very human flickered behind his goggles. "That almost sounded like an apology."

Reed smiled back, Sue was already making her way onto the surface.