RPM
Emma
Morden Man
KactusPunch
Dezuel
Guardian Angel Haruki
Antlers
Cyrania
Captain Uni
Introducing the miraculous Firestorm in: Inferno
Soundtrack
"C'mon man! Ketchup on a hot dog, really?"
Ronnie stared back incredulously at his friend as he sprayed lashings of the red sauce over his dinner. Putting just a little too much on if only to annoy his friend.
"What's your problem? Suddenly decided you're from Chicago over Queens?" He rebutted, raising the greasy fast food treat to his mouth as the two began walking away from the food stand.
"Nah, man. That's not the point! It's mustard or nothin'! Even relish would've been better!"
"He's right you know." The voice of Martin Stein, renowned scientist the world over and currently literally living inside Ronnie's head rent free rang out.
Ronnie opened his mouth to reply, then realising his mistake shut it quickly and thought his answer. "Oh, big surprise the Milwaukee native sides with the Chicagoans. What're you going to argue about next? That Jeffrey Dahmer was the best serial killer too?"
"Woah, woah woah! That's a low blow young man. Milwaukee has so much more than just serial killers and mustard!"
Ronnie shook his head, choosing to continue the argument with his friend over the elderly Jewish man living inside his brain. After an hour or so of arguing, long after their hot dog debate had subsided and their attempts at picking up any girls had fallen flat, the two sat on an old rusted bench near the water. They had their hands in their jacket pockets, New York never got any warmer at night.
"You sure you don't need a place to crash again man? You're always welcome at mine, I know what it's like arguing with parents. Hell, you should've seen how my mom shouted at me after I came back with that stolen Playstation."
Ronnie shook his head. "Nah, man, it's cool. I've stayed long enough. I've got another place to stay for the night anyway, thanks though."
"No worries, brother. I'm not sure I should let you in after those unsolicited opinions about hot dogs earlier anyway."
The two dapped each other up and went their seperate ways. His friend going back to the warm embrace of a proper bed, Ronnie disappearing into an alley where no one was watching. Ronnie glanced around the alley to make sure no one was watching. The streetlight at the corner flickered once, twice, and went out completely, probably a coincidence, probably not. He sighed.
"Alright, Doc. Showtime."
A low hum started in his chest, spreading out through his arms until his fingertips glowed like cigarette embers. Then the light bloomed, swallowing him in a sudden flare of gold and red. The air rippled with heat, and when it faded, Firestorm stood where Ronnie had been, his head burning with nuclear energy as two hoops of atoms circled his body and then faded into nothing.
"Still not used to that part." he muttered, shaking off any lingering chaotic energy.
"Nor am I!" Martin's voice replied inside his head, the tone halfway between pride and exasperation. "Please remember that we are currently sharing the same molecular structure. Try not to do anything reckless."
"You mean like this?"
Ronnie crouched, the pavement beneath his boots cracking as the air ionized around him. Then whoomph he shot upward, a comet of red and yellow arcing over the rooftops. The city shrank below, the Hudson becoming a dark ribbon lit by streetlights.
The wind whipped around him, tugging at the flaming trail above his head, carrying the faint smell of ozone. Higher and higher he rose until the skyline disappeared beneath a carpet of cloud. He hovered there, surrounded by silence and clouds.
"Y'know," he said, looking down at the sleeping city "I think I get why birds do this. It's peaceful up here. No noise, no people, no-"
"Oxygen," Martin interrupted sharply. "Ronald, we should not be lingering at this altitude. You require focus to maintain molecular cohesion. If your concentration slips-"
"Yeah, yeah, relax, Professor. I'm just gonna rest my eyes for a sec."
"Ronald..."
But he was already stretching out on the cloud, the vapour hissing faintly under his weight as he shifted his atomic density to nearly zero. It wasn't exactly comfortable, but it beat cardboard and concrete.
He folded his arms behind his head, eyes half-closed. "See? Perfectly fine." He let out a yawn as he spoke "Light as air. Feels like sleepin' on cotton candy."
"I must reiterate, this is not a sustainable-"
A snore cut him off. For a few blissful minutes, Firestorm floated among the clouds, glowing faintly like a stray ember in the dark. Then, as he drifted off into blissful REM sleep, his concentration wavered, and his atomic density began to skyrocket.
The cloud gave way with a gentle whoosh.
"Ronald!"
He woke with a shout and plummeted, tumbling head over heels through the mist. His flaming aura flickered wildly as he spun, cursing between screams.
"Okay! Okay! You were right! You were - ahh! - right!"
Martin focused his mental energy as they fell. Steadying both his and Ronnie's consciousnesses until Firestorm caught himself about twenty stories up, hovering shakily with his ego bruised.
"Alright, maybe sky-napping isn't my thing."
"Astonishing deduction, young man."
He sighed, descending toward the glow of the city. The fire dimmed, the golden aura faded, and when his boots hit the pavement in a narrow alley, he was Ronnie again.
He slipped between two dumpsters and down into the basement stairwell, pushing open the metal door to his makeshift home.
"Home sweet home..." he muttered.
The boiler room was just as he'd left it: wires, old abandoned machinery, a few pieces of cardboard he'd arranged into a makeshift bed.
"Perhaps next time you’ll consider sleeping on something solid." Martin said dryly.
"Yeah, yeah. Add it to the list." Ronnie murmured, pulling his jacket over his face. "Right under 'don't fall through the sky.' and 'no mustard on hot dogs'."
The faint glow beneath his skin pulsed slower and slower until the room went dark, save for one flickering bulb and the soft rhythm of a heartbeat that was no longer solely his own.
One of the lesser talked about negatives of being homeless is how boring it can be. Ronnie must have walked up and down all of New York two or three times now - or at least, that's what it felt like.
His old, battered sneakers were holding up against all odds, but soon enough he knew he'd need to change them. And that meant one of two things, either stealing, or going back to his mother. At this stage stealing seemed like the better option. He hadn't seen his mother for ages now, not since the experiment that altered him forever. He just couldn't bring himself to face her, not after accidentally transforming in his sleep and almost burning their flat to the ground.
She'd lashed out at him, blaming it on Ronnie smoking in his room. He'd allowed her to believe this, it was much easier to run away if she was mad at him.
He let out an exasperated sigh, resting his elbows on a railing overlooking the water as he pondered just how he was going to work his way out of this situation.
"You're thinking about your mother, aren't you?"
"Marty what did I tell you about rooting around in my head!"
"I wasn't. It's not exactly hard to tell."
"Well....yeah...I guess I am then."Ronnie admitted under his breath, staring out across the East River. The surface of the water shimmered faintly under the hustle and bustle of the city. "She probably thinks I'm dead, or in jail. Maybe both."
"You know, running away is rarely the scientific solution to a problem," Stein replied gently. "She's your mother, Ronald. I'm sure she'd rather have you home than out here hiding in the cold."
"Yeah, but she didn't exactly sign up for the whole ‘son who glows like a nuclear meltdown’ package, y'know?" He kicked a loose stone over the edge, watching it plop into the water. "How do you even start that conversation? 'Hey, mom, remember how you always told me to be something special? Turns out I'm a human atom bomb! Oh, and better yet I'm being hunted by corporate agents!'"
"You're hiding, Ronald." the older man said matter-of-factly. "And I don’t just mean under this bridge."
"Yeah well she already thinks I'm a burnout. Guess I just proved her right in a way she didn't expect."
A low rumble cut through their thoughts. Ronnie instinctively looked up to the sky, dreading the thought of rain. It wasn't thunder, instead it was something coming from much deeper, much older. The railing beneath his arms vibrated, and Ronnie frowned, looking down the river.
"...Did you feel that?"
"Indeed. Seismic activity. But not tectonic, I've felt enough earthquakes to know this feels different."
The water began to ripple violently, sending shudders through the dock pylons. A flash of orange illuminated the horizon, followed by another. Steam and heat radiated through the air like a dragon was emerging from the depths.
"That can't be good..."
The surface of the East River boiled. A column of fire burst through the waves, twisting into a shape that was far too large, far too alive. Then another followed, and another.
Martin was within the Firestorm Matrix - a name he had come up with himself for the consciousness he now resided within. It felt alien, yet at the same time oddly familiar. At will he could see through Ronnie's eyes or return to this place, where Ronnie's vision displayed on a huge screen like a 24 hour news channel.
Martin rushed over to the office chair in front of the huge keyboard, its keys a mixture between English, chemical symbols, and a third unknown language that he seemed to instinctively know. Behind him was a library full of uncountable books, which in his short time here he'd only just began to scratch the surface of.
"Ronald, those lifeforms are composed of molten silicate, their internal temperatures exceed 1,200 degrees Celsius!"
"So...not friendly then?!"
"Decidedly not!"
The ground split as one of the creatures hauled itself onto the bank, molten claws digging furrows through the concrete. Steam hissed off its skin, and the scent of brimstone filled the air.
Ronnie stumbled back, shielding his face. "Alright, okay, okay, that's definitely new! What the hell is that thing?"
"Unknown. But given our current situation, I would recommend transforming immediately!"
"For once, I actually agree with you!"
He threw his hands forward, heat spiraling from his fingertips. The air shimmered, atoms colliding in a bright, violent burst. A halo of golden plasma enveloped him as Firestorm re-emerged, flames roaring to life above his head.
"Alright, big guy..." he muttered, the nuclear glow intensifying around his fists. "You picked the wrong borough."
The Fire Troll turned, eyes glowing like a furnace. It let out a guttural bellow, something between a roar and a landslide and swung its huge arm at him. Firestorm shot upward in a burst of heat, the creature's molten fist smashing through where he'd been standing a second earlier, splintering a wall in a shower of concrete.
"Martin! Tell me how to beat lava monsters before I get turned into soup!"
"Direct combat would be ill-advised! Try reducing their heat! Absorb the excess energy, redirect it!"
"You say that like I know how to do that!"
"Now would be an excellent time to learn!"
He gritted his teeth, hovering over the burning street. He reached out, palms open, and the world seemed to slow. Heat surged toward him = into him - and he felt his entire body vibrate with power.For a moment, it worked. The nearest Fire Troll staggered, its blazing surface cooling to dull rock.
Then the second one struck.
A torrent of magma exploded upward, slamming into Firestorm midair. He was thrown back, smashing through a billboard and tumbling into the street below and skidding through a line of concrete until finally crashing into a wall.
"Agh! God damn, Marty!"
"Ronald, focus! You're losing control of your plasma field!"
His aura flared wildly, melting the asphalt around him. Panic and exhaustion blurred his concentration. The sky itself looked like it was burning now, smoke rising over Brooklyn's skyline, flames reflecting off the water.
"We didn't start the fire..." He sung to himself almost pathetically. Firestorm rose from his battered position and dusted concrete and dust from himself.
A small crowd of New Yorkers had begun to gather near him as they flee'd from the trolls. A portly looking gentleman glancing back and forward from where the monsters had emerged from, and Firestorms burning head suddenly jumped to an unexpected conclusion.
"Hey! He must be their leader! Look he's a fire-guy too!"
"Uh..."
"Yeah!" Called another voice from the crowd. "Lighter head ova 'ere must be controllin' them!"
"Guys, really, I'm one of the good guys!"
"Get 'im!"
Suddenly Ronnie was being pelted with anything that was laying around. Rubbish, skateboards, newspapers, hotdogs (without ketchup), you name it.
"C'mon guys I'm one of you!" Ronnie ducked as a half-eaten pretzel bounced off his shoulder. "For Pete's sake I grew up in Queens!"
"Oh it gets even worse! You're in Brooklyn now, hothead!"
"Ronald, perhaps we focus on the lava monsters and not the civilians?"
"My thoughts exactly, prof!" He rocketed upward, the shockwave scattering paper and garbage down the street.
He caught sight of one of the Trolls looming over an elevated train, a massive claw scraping against the track. "Okay, subway monster's top of the list. Let's go!"
Below, a flash of green tore through the smoke. Someone or something perhaps - was moving between the Fire Trolls like a fighter jet dodging through missiles. The figure seemed to create a wave from the harbour, the water casting towards the troll about to claw the train in half.
"That's new!" Ronnie murmured, already diving. "C'mon, Prof. Let's make a good first impression."
He streaked down beside the Martian, a trail of red and gold cutting through the haze. "Hey, Green Guy!" he called over the roar of boiling water and fire. "Hope you're not the one starting this barbecue!"
Without waiting for an answer, he hurled a concentrated blast of atomic energy at a Troll who had clambered its way up onto the track behind the Martian. The ball of concentrated energy colliding with the monster's knee. The creature stumbled, before Firestorm followed it up with an uppercut that sent the Troll tumbling down off the track and onto the street below.
"Finally, a sensible use of our abilities."
"Yeah, teamwork makes the dream work, Professor."
He hovered shoulder to shoulder with the alien hero, the light from their combined powers reflecting across shattered glass and molten pavement.
"What's the plan here, big Green?" He asked, trying not to show any nervousness through his voice. To tell the truth he'd never seen this guy before, but he had to have more experience than him with stuff like this, right?
Right?
