by Greg Cox
Without warning, the saurian skull swiveled atop a nearly-nonexistent neck. Red eyes, now suffused with an unnatural red radiance, fixed with impossible accuracy upon the invisible mutant. -‘Infrared tracking initiated,” the Sentinel announced. “Target located.”
The bedframe crashed to the floor as, discarding its weapon, a scaly hand reached out for Nightcrawler with unexpected speed. Before Kurt had a chance to react, a vise-like grip closed around his ankle, squeezing his leg with bone-crashing force!
Something was scratching at the shutters. Something large and very persistent.
Perversely, the same opaque metal blinds that protected Moira and Bobby from whatever was outside the Centre also prevented them from seeing what exactly was trying to get at them. Considering that this particular lab was three stories above ground level, Moira MacTaggert realized, the would-be invader could either fly or was very, very tall. How else could it reach the now-barricaded window?
“What do you think it is, doc?” Iceman asked. Even though the temperature of the laboratory was a comfortable fifteen degrees Celsius, his crystalline anatomy showed no sign of melting. She found it vaguely unnerving that she could see all the way through his translucent skull and torso, unlike the old days when he simply coated his flesh-and-blood body with frost or snow. Recently, however, the youthful X-Man had mastered the trick of transmuting the whole of his organic substance to living ice. A biological oxymoron if ever there was one, she thought, her scientific curiosity intrigued despite their present peril.
“I cannae say,” she answered him. “If only I can get these bloody monitors to work the way they’re supposed to ... !” Row upon row of empty screens, displaying nothing but static, frustrated her. Putting on her reading glasses to better see the display panels, she fiddled urgently with the controls to the security cameras, trying to compensate for the inexplicable burst of gamma radiation that had scrambled the cameras’ transmissions. If I reverse the polarity of the neutron flow, she thought, maybe I can filter out of some of this electromagnetic rubbish. Lord knows it always worked on Doctor Who. .. .
To her surprise and immense satisfaction, a few of the screens cleared at once, permitting her and Iceman a peek at what was going on beyond the besieged laboratory. The Centre’s interior cameras were still thoroughly bollixed, but at least they could now see the grounds outside the building, including the region on the other side of the large, shuttered window. Her moment of triumph evaporated, however, once she got a look at the bizarre and frightening entity struggling to gain entrance to the lab.
The creature had the graceful head, shoulders, and arms of a beautiful woman, albeit one colored in various shades of green. Lustrous emerald tresses, abundant and unrestrained, framed an attractive face whose unblemished skin was tinted chartreuse, a few shades lighter than her jade-hued lips. If only her head and shoulders were seen, Moira decided, this barbaric-looking green beauty might easily be mistaken for Jennifer Walters, the celebrated She-Hulk. Below her bare shoulders, though, her womanly appearance gave way to the shape and semblance of an enormous bird of prey. Dark green feathers, the same hue as her flowing mane, covered a stout, avian body of roc-like proportions. Colossal wings, at least three meters across, flapped vigorously as the creature clawed at the metal shutters with the scaly talons of a colossal raptor. Verdant tailfeathers spread out nearly a full meter past the bird-woman’s hindquarters. Sea-green eyes held a glassy, insane sheen. Sharpened canines jutted from beneath her chartreuse lips.
Having devoted her life to the study of human mutation, Dr. Moira MacTaggert, Ph.D., recognized the strange hybrid creature from her research. “Och,” she exclaimed,
’tis the Harpy!”
“Like on Xena‘1” Iceman asked, his gaze glued to the startling image on the security monitors.
Moira rolled her eyes. Trust an American to learn his classical mythology from a silly TV show! “Sort of, but this Harpy was bom of gamma radiation, not Olympian mischief.” The symptomatic green coloring was a dead giveaway. “Betty Ross Banner, the late wife of Bruce Banner, a.k.a. the incredible Hulk, was transformed into the Harpy several years ago, after similar exposure to concentrated gamma radiation. She was cured eventually, but the case is well-documented. I’d recognize her anywhere.” “Late wife?” Iceman asked, sounding understandably puzzled. He scratched his glacial skull, producing tiny shavings of ice that dusted his shoulders like dandruff.
Moira shrugged. “She’s supposed to be dead.”
“Yeah, aren’t they all,” Iceman remarked. Flippant as he was, the lad had a point, Moira conceded; if she had ten pence for every time a reportedly dead super-villain resurfaced, she could finance a chain of Genetic Research Centres throughout the British Isles and beyond.
None of which did anything to alleviate their current plight. Could the fearsome Harpy actually breach the lab’s defenses? Moira was distressed to see the Harpy’s talons digging deep scratches in the chrome steel shutters. How is that possible? she wondered. The shutters weren’t adaman-tium, but they were the next best thing, and the Harpy was shredding them with nothing more than a pair of gamma-spawned chicken legs!
“That’s not going to keep her out for long, doc,” Iceman stated, reaching much the same conclusion as Moira. “Okay if I fortify things a bit? It might leave a bit of a mess to clean up later.”
Moira winced at the thought of gallons of melting ice flooding her expensive laboratory equipment, then consid-
ered what the ferocious Harpy might do to that same equipment. “Go ahead,” she replied. Certainly, it wouldn’t be the first time these facilities ended up the worse for wear after some heated hostilities. “Do whatever ye have to do,”
“Thanks, doc,” Iceman said. “You won’t regret this.” He slid across the floor atop a frictionless plane of ice that formed ahead of his path. Coming to a halt directly in front of the wide picture window, he placed his palms against the huge pane of glass. And just in time; even as fresh ice began to flow from his fingertips, spreading over the window like a protective glaze, the impact of the Harpy’s assault on the metal shutters sent cracks racing through the thick glass. Iceman hurriedly shored up the splintered window by pouring on the ice. Moira felt the air within the lab grow dryer as the frozen X-Man drew the moisture from the atmosphere to construct his wintry bulwark. A thick layer of bluish ice formed over the entire window', muffling the grating sound of the Harpy’s talons scraping against the disintegrating steel shutters. “There,” Iceman said confidently, stepping back to admire his frigid handiwork. ‘ ‘That should do it.”
“G-g-good work,” Moira said, shivering. She drew her white labcoat closed and hugged herself to keep warm. The sheer accumulation of ice had turned the sealed laboratory into an oversized icebox. She envied the internal thermostat that rendered Iceman immune to the chilling effect of the environment he had created. He must be very popular on hot days, she thought, not that we ever have any of those over here.
She’d gladly suffer a little discomfort, though, if it meant keeping the Harpy safely outdoors. She looked away from the imposing wall of ice to check on the security monitors keeping watch over the fierce bird-woman’s activities. Moira was pleasantly surprised to see the Harpy drawing back from the shuttered window, flapping her mighty wings as she hovered about a meter away from the shredded metal barricade, which now glistened with condensation brought about by the icy coating on the opposite side of the window.
Could it be, the Scottish scientist hoped, that the Harpy was abandoning her efforts to gain access to the laboratory?
Not in the slightest. Before Moira’s horrified gaze, the bird-woman raised her slender arms and pointed her fingers at the fortified window. Blazing orange fire discharged from her hands, striking the Centre with the force of an exploding bomb. The blast could be heard and felt all the way through the steel, glass, and ice that stood (if not for much longer) between the flying monster and her potential victims. Great chunks of ice crashed onto th
e floor as fissures worked their way through Iceman’s defensive wall. Streams of melting frost ran down the newly-formed crevices, pooling onto the floor before Iceman’s feet. “Hey!” he protested loudly. “You didn’t tell me she could do that!”
I forgot, Moira thought; after all, the Harpy had not been an active threat for several years. Now that the full particulars came back to her, however, she recalled that the Harpy’s so-called “hellbolts” supposedly packed the explosive punch of several kilograms of TNT. According to the original report, the bird-woman’s energy bursts had proved sufficient to subdue the Hulk. They had also destroyed an Air Force fighter jet, resulting in the death of the pilot.
I wonder how a hellbolt stacks up against Cyclops’s eyebeams, Moira couldn’t help speculating, even as she realized that anything that could knock out the Hulk was not going to be stopped by a sheet of ice, no matter how solid or self-sustaining.
Nevertheless, Iceman worked hard to reinforce his arctic embankment, filling the cracks and crevices with fresh ice, even drawing on his own substance to hold the icewall together; the frozen spikes along his arms and spine dissolved away as Iceman sprayed the window with frigid mortar. * ‘Step back, doc,” he warned Moira. “I’m not sure how long this is going to hold.”
Nodding, Moira gingerly dashed to the questionable safety of the far end of the laboratory. She had to watch her step to avoid slipping on any patches of frost left behind by Iceman’s trek across the floor. Her gaze fell on the sample of Legacy Virus still resting inside the airtight containment cylinder.
I better put that someplace safe, she realized. The last thing she wanted was for Bobby to get infected with the lethal virus, which was typically more dangerous to mutants than to ordinary human beings. She grabbed the plexiglass cylinder, stamped with the universal symbol for biohazardous material, and ran toward a circular, cabinet-sized adamantium vault filled with several identical cylinders.
For that matter, she thought, I don’t want to infect the Harpy either. She had no idea whether a gamma-irradiated entity like the Harpy would be vulnerable to the deadly virus, but she didn’t want to find out the hard way; if this really was Betty Banner, somehow returned from the dead, then there was an innocent woman trapped inside the distorted body of a mythological monster.
Tucking the cylinder carefully beneath her arm, Moira lifted the lid of the vault, releasing a gust of frosty mist from its refrigerated interior. An empty slot awaited Sample #17/102. Too bad there’s no room for me in there, she thought. She could use a protective vault right now.
Another explosive blast rocked the laboratory, sending bits of broken glass and ice flying like shrapnel. Iceman shielded them from the rocketing fragments with a hastily-erected iceshield, but the shock of the detonation knocked Moira off-balance. She clutched onto the rim of the vault to keep from falling, the cylinder slipping from beneath her arm. Moira’s heart virtually stopped as she heard the vial crack upon the hard steel floor.
“Bobby!” she shouted frantically. “The virus!”
The urgency in her voice caught Iceman’s attention. His translucent blue eyes widened as he spotted the fallen cylinder. Turning his back on the crumbling barricade, he threw out his arm toward the cracked vial. Gelid moisture jetted from his fingertips, encasing the compromised cylinder within a solid sheath of ice. “Thank heavens,” Moira exclaimed. With any luck, Iceman had reacted swiftly enough to keep the virus from escaping into the atmosphere.
I should test Bobby anyway, just in case, she thought, assuming the Harpy leaves any of us intact.
Iceman spun back toward the rime-covered window, but the momentary distraction had critical consequences. The combined heat and force of the Harpy’s hellbolts had reduced his icewall to an avalanche of slush. With an ear-piercing screech, the crazed bird-woman crashed through shutters, window, and ice alike, invading Moira’s scientific sanctuary amidst a cacophony of shattering glass and cracking ice. Her outstretched talons struck Iceman in the chest, bowling him over before he had a chance to defend himself.
“Beware the Harpy!” she squawked. Her harsh, unpleasant voice sounded like a cross between the ravings of a madwoman and the caw of an angry crow. “Surrender or be eliminated.”
Bobby Drake slid on his back across the debris-covered floor of the lab, the smooth planes of his body sending him sledding like a toboggan out of reach of the Harpy. Splinters of steel and jagged shards of ice and glass littered the floor, but Iceman didn’t need to worry about getting sliced or stabbed as long as he maintained his ice-form. Ice doesn’t bleed; one of the distinct advantages of a frozen body over ordinary flesh and blood.
Thank you, Emma, he thought with just a trace of bitterness; he had never understood the full potential of his mutant powers until a ruthless telepath named Emma Frost took over his body—and showed him how to convert that body into ice, through and through. Since then, physical injuries had held a lot less terror for him.
A bank of computers brought his unplanned slide to a jarring halt. Iceman sprang to his feet and glanced down at his chest; the Harpy’s claws had left deep rents across the crystalline surface of his torso. Ouch, he thought, mostly from force of habit. With a thought, he repaired the wounds by constructing frosty scabs out of the ambient moisture.
Thus restored, he quickly scoped out the scene, just like Cyke had taught him. Moira had taken shelter behind the containment vault while the Harpy flapped overhead, her predatory gaze shifting from Moira to Iceman and back again. Obviously, his first priority was to distract the berserk bird-woman from the defenseless human scientist.
“Hey, Ms. Rodan,” he taunted the Harpy, “over here!” A snowball formed within his grip. Iceman gave the icy sphere a second to get good and hard, then pitched the snowball at the airborne intruder. The missile smacked against the Harpy’s chartreuse cheek, and her head swiveled toward the offending X-Man with a jerky, bird-like motion. He was disappointed to see that the rock-hard snowball had not so much as bruised the Harpy’s deceptively elegant features; she was even tougher than she looked. Oh well, he thought, at least 1 got her attention.
“Identified: mutant designate: Iceman,” she screeched. “Compensating for cryogenic interference.”
Compensating how? he wondered. He took a second to further survey the scene. The sturdy ceiling, no more than fifteen feet high, hampered the Harpy’s aerial abilities while a gaping hole in the demolished window let in a cool night breeze. Good, he thought approvingly; the great thing about the U.K. was that there was never any lack of moisture in the air, which meant he had plenty of ammo to draw upon. “Compensate for this!” he challenged the enraged bird-woman. A second snowball slammed into the Harpy’s face, and she swooped at Iceman, talons extended.
Iceman skated out of the way, sliding atop a selfgenerated sheet of ice. Better keep moving, he decided, not wanting to present the Harpy with an easy target for those nasty energy blasts of hers. He’d seen what the Harpy’s blazing bolts had done to his icewall, never mind the steel shutters, and reached the not-too-complicated conclusion that he’d just as soon not end up on the receiving end of her personal pyrotechnics. With that in mind, he picked up speed, almost but not quite outpacing the slick, blue track he projected before him. In a matter of minutes, the floor of the laboratory resembled a full-sized skating rink.
But the Harpy was surprisingly fast, too. Her claws raked his back as she dived from above, briefly intercepting Iceman’s path, before ascending for another run. This time Iceman barely ducked beneath the slashing talons.
Hmm, he noted, no more energy bolts. Maybe she’d used up all her firepower breaking into the building? If so, he might never have a better time to go on the offensive. Let’s go for it, he decided.
The tips of the Harpy’s wings brushed the ceiling as she circled several yards above the ice-coated floor, apparently out of reach ... or was she? His speed and efficiency honed by countless drills, plus plenty of genuine combat experience, Iceman instantly erected a froz
en stairway that he ran up pretty much simultaneously, generating each new step only a moment before his crystalline feet came down upon it, “Surprise!” he shouted at his flying foe, who suddenly found herself eye-to-eye with the cocky, young X-Man. A second later, heavy sheets of blue-white ice formed over the Harpy’s feathered wings and, unable to stay aloft, she plummeted to the floor, landing with a crash upon the ice.
“Hah!” Iceman laughed, pleased at the effectiveness of his ploy. And why shouldn't it have worked? he asked himself triumphantly. He had once grounded Sauron, the human pterodactyl, much the same way.
A convenient ice-slide delivered him promptly to the floor, where he confronted the downed Harpy, who glared at him with wide, unblinking eyes. Not about to take any chances with the dangerous mutation, Iceman encased the bird-woman within a solid block of ice that merged inextricably with the thick layer of frost upon the floor, leaving only the Harpy’s head free of an artificial snowdrift. He didn’t want her to suffocate, especially not if Moira was right and the Harpy was just an innocent victim of some kind of radiation accident. What a shame, he thought compassionately. With the bulk of her avian body obscured beneath the ice, it was easier to think of his captive as a woman and not a monster.
“All’s clear,” he called out to Moira, letting her know the worst was over. It occurred to him that Nightcrawler had been gone for awhile now without checking back in with them. I hope he’s okay, Iceman thought. There was a person-to-person communicator built into his belt, but he’d have to unthaw to use it; at the moment, his uniform, constructed of unstable molecules designed by Reed Richards, was made of solid ice just like the rest of him. He was reluctant to de-ice, though, until he was sure the danger was completely over. Hadn’t Kurt said something about multiple intruders?
As if on cue, something pounded at the entrance to the lab. A massive, armor-plated door had slid into place when Moira first sealed off the lab, but now the door shuddered in its frame with each heavy blow delivered against it from the other side. The impressions of mighty, clenched knuckles bulged outward from the steel plating.