The Think Tank

The Unknown

Sam was tinkering with his computer and if anyone asked what he was fixing, it would take him way too long to explain what it was and why they needed it.

The room he was in was absolutely shining, as if the whole thing was part of a single machine and its wires passed through its walls.

"You done?" asked a robotic voice and, weirdly enough, Sam wasn't startled by the fact that it was so close to him.

As he nodded and took his hand off the keyboard, the device hovered away to the other side of the room, quickly latching onto the back of Machine Man, who absorbed it without looking away from his own task.

Tony walked into the room with a martini in his hand very calmly, partially because of how mundane that environment was for him but also because of all the drinks that preceded the one he held now.

On top of being tipsy, he seemed somewhat disappointed as he asked: "How is the teleporter faring?"

"All good. And I'm assuming that you won't be much help operating it."

"Come on, Sam. It doesn't feel right being relegated to a chair." he replied.

Another voice replied just as three people entered the room: "Sorry if we wanted to do this ourselves, for old time's sake."

Ben was wearing a white suit he had already seen once, the exact opposite of Sue's overcomplicated purple and blue uniform. Johnny had also been given a new look and he seemed to have a hard time getting used to it.

"Can I just ask why yellow?" he wondered.

"Since our suits don't match, we thought we should stay consistent and give you a new one." Sue replied, perhaps a little too concerned with such a small detail.

"But I liked the matching uniforms, it was old school cool."

"You know what else is cool?" a voice interjected "A brand new Iron Tech armour for outer space travel."

Sue just sighed and replied: "It's just for today, Tony. It's not every day that Johnny wants to join us."

"Not like I have much else to do these days..." Johnny pointed out, though everyone tried to forget he said that.

Machine Man walked some major disjointed steps over to the group as he announced that the portal was ready and that: "You should put on your helmets."

Johnny looked at the round helmet, just as shiny as the man that handed it to him and groaned: "As if we didn't already look like Power Rangers."

Afterwards, the trio shushed and walked to another room with a seemingly useless wall. Sam gave a careful countdown before a bright purple light appeared on that wall, confined from the rest of the world by pink sparkles.

"The memories, uh?"

When Ben said that, Sue thought he meant good memories and she couldn't help but think, as they walked through the portal, that there was someone missing.

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When they travelled to the N-Zone, years ago, they had managed to see some fantastic things, even in a universe that was on the brink of collapse.

They found relics of foregone life along with the small remnants of a persistent civilization and although they were dim and tired, there were still some stars.

This cold place they were in didn't even have that, not a single orb to shine some light but then again there wasn't any need for that.

Staring at the great abyss, like a blank gap between one edge and the other, Johnny felt like a kid staring at the night in a town where the pollution hid all the stars away. He felt like he was about to fall in the void.