by Stuart Moore
He wondered when he’d see them again.
WAS it all sliding off a cliff? Tony Stark couldn’t tell. Public opinion had turned against Registration somewhat, after the chemical plant debacle; the latest polls were split pretty evenly. The defection of Susan Richards was a problem, too, one that he’d have to deal with eventually.
And the international community wasn’t happy. European Union leaders had been making speeches nonstop against the new policy, happy to have something to take attention off their own failing economies. Wakanda, the African nation that supplied Stark Enterprises with the valuable element Vibranium, was considering cutting off all diplomatic relations with the United States.
The sunken nation of Atlantis was another potential problem, since one of the dead New Warriors had been a daughter of their royal family. Prince Namor, ruler of Atlantis, had once staged a full-scale invasion of the surface world. Not much had been seen of Namor, or of the enigmatic blue-skinned Atlanteans, in recent years. Tony hoped Namor’s legendary temper had cooled with time.
The X-Men had practically walled themselves up in their school. Maria Hill was ready to assault the gates full-on with S.H.I.E.L.D. shock troops, arrest and detain everyone inside. Tony had persuaded her to hold off. The X-Men’s relationship with the larger hero community had always been uneasy; they wouldn’t give in easily to an invasion. The result would be a bloodbath all around.
But Hill was right about one thing: Every holdout added to the overall problem. For Registration to work, a critical mass of heroes had to comply. Otherwise the whole process would backfire. Instead of taking control of the problem, Tony and S.H.I.E.L.D. would seem helpless, ineffectual—and that would pave the way for more repressive, hostile forces to step in.
On the positive side, the training camps were really coming together. Intel continued to stream in from inside Cap’s Resistance. Project Thunderbolt had entered its alpha-test phase. And slowly but surely, more heroes were registering. Just this morning, Doc Samson and the Sentry had signed up.
Registration is the law, Tony reminded himself. In time, everyone will fall in line.
“Just over this hill, Happy.” Tony ducked farther under Happy Hogan’s big umbrella, stepping carefully around a mud puddle. Rain sheeted down all around, painting the cemetery in grays and browns.
“Whoa,” Happy said.
The hole was eleven feet wide by thirty feet long, and at least twenty feet deep. Six large industrial cranes whirred and strained, slowly lowering the wrapped, manacled body of Goliath down toward the ground.
People stood watching, grouped uncomfortably in twos and threes. Ms. Marvel and the Black Widow stood together; Carol looked tall and elegant in a gray suit, while Natasha wore a black trenchcoat. Reed Richards wore a corduroy jacket and tie, but his arms were stretched out protectively around Franklin and Valeria, his two children. They looked puzzled and uncomfortable in formal clothes.
“Reed brought the kids?” Happy asked.
“He didn’t want to leave them with the robots all day.” Tony sighed. “And there’s nobody else left at the Baxter Building.”
An older black couple held each other. The woman met Tony’s eyes for a moment, glaring at him. He looked away.
“Bill’s parents,” Tony said.
“This must be rough for ’em,” Happy replied. “Especially since you couldn’t shrink the body down again.”
“Hank Pym’s on leave right now. But I called him, he said it couldn’t be done. Something about electrical brain activity and organic tissue decay.”
“I wonder how much the family had to shell out for…what? Thirty-eight burial plots?”
“Nothing. I took care of the expenses. Least I could do.”
A crane lurched slightly. Goliath’s body slipped, and his arm banged against the edge of the hole. Tony grimaced.
“God, Happy. Is this all worth it? Do I have the…the right to do this?”
Happy said nothing. Just stood, holding up the umbrella, shielding Tony from the deluge.
“Stark?”
Maria Hill’s voice, in his Bluetooth earpiece, made Tony jump. He turned away from the grave, clicked it. “What?”
“Got a few people for you to meet.”
“Dammit, Maria. Let me get Bill Foster into the ground first.”
He cut off the call before she could speak again. That woman was really becoming a problem. If she had her way, all the capes, all the heroes would be shut down for good.
Tony looked around. “Where the hell is Peter Parker?”
Reed approached, towing the kids behind him. He looked like he’d been dragged through the sewer. “Tony.”
“Reed. Thanks for coming. Hey Franklin, Valeria.”
Happy crouched down, tried to ruffle Franklin’s hair. The boy turned away, hid behind his father’s leg.
Reed held a wet slip of paper, clenching and unclenching his fist around it. “What’s that?” Tony asked.
“Nothing,” Reed said, and hurriedly stashed the paper in a pocket. But Tony caught a quick glimpse of the signature at the bottom: Susan.
“Reed.” Tony reached out a hand, clasped it on Reed’s shoulder. “This is a rough patch. We’ll get through it. We’re doing the right thing.”
“Daddy,” Val said, “my shoes are growing sodden.”
Reed patted her on the back and turned away. The kids followed.
“See you at the Baxter Building tonight,” Tony said. “S.H.I.E.L.D. has a new batch of prisoners.”
“Of course,” Reed said. He sounded old, defeated.
With a dull mechanical noise, the cranes released their burden. The enormous body of Goliath settled to rest in its deep, muddy grave.
A speaker came on, and the Eurythmics song “Hey Hey, I Saved the World Today” filled the air. It sounded sad, dirge-like. A childhood memory sprang, unbidden, to Tony’s mind: Annie Lennox in a music video, dressed in a crisp man’s business suit, her hands waving and conjuring over a globe of the Earth. She looked like a machine, powerful and sexual, cradling the world like it was her own personal toy.
“Tone?”
Tony looked up. The cranes had moved back. Steam shovels groaned and creaked, lifting wet earth to dump into the grave. People scattered, shuffling slowly away.
Ms. Marvel and the Black Widow approached. Natasha had an odd look in her eye. “Everybody’s happy now,” she said, “the bad guy’s gone away.”
“What does that mean?” Tony snapped.
She waved a hand in the air, gave him her Stupid-American look. “The song,” she said.
“Mister Stark?”
Tony turned. Miriam Sharpe, the woman from Stamford, stood under a small umbrella. Happy tensed at the sight of her, but Tony held out a hand.
“Mrs. Sharpe. I’m sorry I haven’t had time to—”
“No no, don’t worry about it. I just came by because—I know you guys lost a lot of support in the super hero community, after…” She gestured at the gravesite.
Tony frowned. Behind him, Ms. Marvel and the Widow were listening, too.
“I wanted to say my piece,” Sharpe continued. “Goliath knew what he was doing, and what he was doing was breaking a law designed to save people’s lives. If he’d only gone legitimate, he’d still be alive.” She smiled at Tony, a tear starting to form in her eye. “This isn’t your fault. No more than, than a cop could be blamed for shooting a punk who pulls a gun on him.”
“Mrs. Sharpe…”
“Shh. I also wanted to give you this.” She reached into her purse. “It was my son Damien’s favorite toy since he was three years old.”
He took the toy, stared at it through the rain. A six-inch Iron Man action figure, its joints stiff, red-and-gold paint worn with age. He rolled the toy between his thumb and forefinger. Pushed at the arm; it swiveled upward.
Still works.
Tony looked up at Mrs. Sharpe, completely lost for words.
“Just to remind you why you’re doing this,�
�� she said.
He touched her shoulder once, a wordless thank-you. Then he turned away, still clutching the toy figure. It felt warm in his hand.
Tony jabbed a finger at his earpiece. “Maria? Talk to me.”
Brief pause. “About time, Stark. Meet me at the west entrance. But be prepared…your little funeral has stirred up some of the natives.”
NIGHT was just falling as Tony ducked his head and trotted through the cemetery gate, passing between two lines of demonstrators. From his right, a chorus of groans and boos erupted, punctuated with cries of “Fascist” and “Cape killer!” To the left, a smaller ripple of cheers rose up. “Keep us safe!” someone yelled.
Tony took a moment to study the two groups. Both sides were a mix of college students under rain ponchos, ordinary working people, and some grieving women he recognized from Stamford. If you were to pull out a random member of the protest, Tony realized, I couldn’t identify which side she belonged on.
One side hates me because I’m a super hero. The other side is cheering because I’m an authority figure.
State troopers had erected sawhorses to keep both groups back. But the cops looked nervous. Tony stopped to ask a trooper, “You have enough men here?”
“National Guard’s on the way.” The trooper grimaced. “We can hold out till then.”
“Stark,” Maria Hill’s voice said again, in his ear.
The S.H.I.E.L.D. Mobile Command Center sat parked along the street, jutting out into the first lane of traffic. A line of guards surrounded it, parting quickly when Tony and Happy approached.
Inside the War Room, two newcomers waited. Hawkeye stood grimacing, in full purple costume, his bow lying on a table nearby. With him was a tall blonde girl in red and black, wearing a domino mask. Tony frowned for a moment, not recognizing her.
“Stature,” Maria Hill said. “Formerly of the Young Avengers.”
“Of course.” Tony held out his hand. “And Hawkeye. Good to have you back, Clint. I know it can’t have been an easy decision.”
Hawkeye rubbed his neck. “Hardest I’ve ever made, Tony.”
“I know. Your head knows the right thing to do, but your heart just wants things to stay the way they’ve always been.”
“Yeah, but…we’re livin’ in a different world now. Guess it took Goliath dying to make me realize that.”
Tony studied the bowman for a minute, then turned to face Stature.
“What about you…Cassie, right? This is a huge step you’re taking here.”
“I know that.” She looked him straight in the eye. “My teammates don’t understand.”
“But you do.”
“People want us to be properly trained, sir. It’s not the 1940s anymore.”
“That’s the truth,” Happy said.
“All I want is to do my job, to the best of my abilities.”
Tony nodded, slowly. This was good news; two more recruits. And yet, something nagged at him. Something wasn’t right here.
Hill stepped forward. “We’ve got a lot to go over, Stark. Starting with Project Thunder—”
Tony raised a hand to his neck, made a slicing motion. Hill followed his gaze over to Hawkeye, then nodded.
Hawk smiled. “You don’t trust me, Tone?”
“Believe me, Hawk. There’s parts of this operation I don’t tell myself about.”
Stature’s eyes followed them, like a ping-pong game.
Hill gestured to a pair of agents. “Stathis, Roeberg. Take the new recruits back to the city by limo. You can fill ’em in on procedures along the way.”
“Roger.”
Hawkeye shouldered his bow and followed the agent to the door. He paused, shot Tony a last glance.
Pissed off at me? Tony wondered. Or is he pulling a scam, and wondering if I’ve seen through it?
Hill came up next to him. “You think Cap’s trying to put a mole in your operation.”
“We’ve got one in his, don’t we? And Hawkeye owes a lot to Captain America.” Tony frowned suddenly. “Any sightings of Spider-Man today?”
Hill gestured to the remaining S.H.I.E.L.D. agent. “Ellis, run the CapeSearch protocol. Subject: Peter Parker.”
The agent’s hands flashed over his controls. A dizzying number of surveillance-camera images flickered across his screens, blurring into a brightly colored super hero montage. The display halted on an aerial shot of Spider-Man, in his red-and-gold armored costume, swinging across the night skyline of midtown.
“Last sighting, yesterday 1834 Hours. Outside the Baxter Building.”
“1834 Hours. That’s right after I left him.” Tony frowned. “Nothing after that?”
“Not in costume, sir. The civilian-ID subroutines aren’t up and running yet.”
Tony turned to Happy. “Hap, you’ve got the suit, right?”
Happy held up Tony’s briefcase.
“Good. Maria, I hope you won’t mind me changing in front of you.”
“I’ve seen it before.”
Agent Ellis’s head snapped up in surprise. “Back to work, mister,” Hill barked.
“What’s up, Mister Stark?”
“I think I’ve got a big problem, Hap.” Tony snapped open the briefcase, stared at the Iron Man costume. “And it’s time I took care of it.”
“GOT it. Okay, thanks. Be there in half an hour.”
Sue Richards hung up the pay phone, turned back to her brother. Johnny was dressed in jeans and a jacket. A large bandage poked out from under his baseball cap, but he looked much healthier than the last time she’d seen him.
“Falcon gave me the address,” she said. “It’s in Harlem.”
Flames started to rise from Johnny’s head and shoulders. “I can fly us—”
“Put that out! S.H.I.E.L.D.’s got eyes everywhere.” She looked around, suddenly paranoid. “We’ll just hoof it.”
“Yes, big sister. At least the rain’s stopped.”
Sue started off up Eleventh Avenue. She and Johnny had gone straight to the Resistance’s former headquarters, only to find it boarded up and abandoned. For a terrible moment, Sue had thought: Did Tony round them all up? But no—they’d just relocated.
They walked in silence for a moment, past gas stations and low-profile nightclubs and auto parts stores closed for the night. Over here, on the far west side, new things hid among the old. A trendy restaurant was likely to open right next to an ancient bodega, then close up again one night, leaving no trace.
“How’s Reed doing?” Johnny asked.
Sue hesitated. “You know that thing he does when he gets totally wrapped up in a project?”
“No. No idea what you’re talking about.”
She laughed. “This is like that, times ten. He and Tony Stark are…they’re like two kids in a candy store. No, more like two kids building their own, giant candy store. With every kind of candy in the world under their absolute control.”
“Are we still talking about candy? ’Cause you’re making me hungry.”
She stopped under a streetlamp, turned to look at Johnny. Since she was fifteen, Sue had taken care of him. Now he was all grown up, a handsome young man, living his own life. And yet…
“Johnny, I have to do this. I made my choice when I helped the Resistance escape from Tony’s thugs. But…”
“Don’t, sis.”
“…but you don’t. You can still come in from the cold.” She rubbed both hands on his broad shoulders. “Go turn yourself in.”
Johnny gestured toward a large, blocky factory building. She followed him into a dark alcove next to the outer door. When they were hidden from the street, he held up a flaming finger to the brick wall. He traced the letter “A” in the air, leaving an afterimage trail before Sue’s eyes.
“A,” he said, “Registration, so far, has gotten me nothing but a fractured headbone. B, Tony Stark is a rich jerk.”
Sue giggled. “Well, go ahead. What’s C?”
“C?” Slowly, he traced the flaming letter in the ai
r. “C is that my sister and I have always faced tough situations together, and I would never abandon her. Never.”
She felt tears rising. She hugged him, hard.
Then they heard the cry.
“You—”
“Yeah,” he said. “Inside the building.”
He lit his whole hand on fire and ran it across the wall like a flash-light. The windows were boarded, the bricks chipped with decay and neglect. But the door…
Johnny pushed lightly at the door. It creaked inward. A big padlock on a chain lay on the ground, picked and discarded.
Again, they heard it. A distant call for help.
“Douse your light,” Sue whispered. Then she reached out, turning them both invisible. Stepped past him and started inside, holding up her hand to generate a protective force field in front of them.
They felt their way down a dark, dusty corridor. No power was on, not even emergency lights. But twice more, they heard the faint cries: “Help me!” and “What are you doing?”
The corridor opened onto a disused loading bay. High ceilings, smell of gunpowder and old newspapers. A single light shone from a portable electric lantern, placed right in the center of the floor.
On a large support beam, stretching from floor to ceiling, a man had been strung up tight with heavy cord. The lantern illuminated him from below, casting giant, rapidly jerking shadows on the ceiling. He struggled in panic, cried out: “Why? What do you want?”
The man’s briefcase lay open on the floor, papers spilling out in a fan pattern. Tablet computer, too, a long crack along its screen.
A few feet away, his tormentor crouched down, cleaning a big hunting knife. Muscular arms, thick legs, a fierce brow. Skull pattern on his shirt.
“That’s the Punisher,” Johnny whispered.
“Yeah,” Sue replied.
“Is he registered?”
“I sincerely doubt it.”
The Punisher’s head whipped up. For a moment, he stared straight at the door. Sue shivered; his cold eyes seemed to bore into her.
Even more quietly, Johnny said, “We’re still invisible, right?”
Sue nodded sharply, raised a finger to her lips.