Opposites ➤ Johnny Storm

Chapter Six

Sitting in the medical tent, I had finally convinced Sue to let the paramedics take a look at her. When she shot some kind of force at the blast, the toll it took on her scared me a bit. It took a lot of convincing and guilt to get her to give in to common sense. Of course that means that now I get to go play referee for our brothers. Fun.

"Where are your ears?"

"Oh my god, Johnny. You can't just ask people where their ears are!"

"Why not it's a valid question?"

"It's not nice and since he could easily pummel you before, you really wanna risk it now?"

"Oh, he could not-"

"There are some folks outside that want to talk to you." Even though that wasn't good news, the timing could not be better. Something about Johnny Storm always brought out my immature side and now really wasn't the time to be acting like a bickering child.

"We're not going public. We're scientists, not celebrities." As usual, Reed spoke we were thinking, or at least the people who were usually mature. So everyone, but Johnny. He's a good person, but offering him fame is like offering a starving dog a steak.

"It's too late, son. Look." The tv in the tent was streaming footage of us using our new abilities on the bridge.

"When a New York Fire Department ladder truck became part of the tragedy. But the rescue itself is not the story. One of the five stretched to an amazing length-"

"That's what they're calling you-the Fantastic Five." That's a great name. They really couldn't come up with anything more creative than the Fantastic Five? Shockingly, I'd had more faith in the creativity of the media. Why, I have no clue.

During the time I had spaced off about everything that happened in the few days, I almost missed Johnny starting to walk off.

"No, wait! Where are you going?" Sue looked furious with her brother, which is honestly somewhat common. This time at least, I understand why she's so upset.

"I'm gonna go talk to 'em. Ror, come with me." He grabbed onto my wrist and tugged me along behind him. Of course, Sue wasn't giving this one up without a fight. Which is how I become the rope in a Storm tug of war.

"No! We should think this through."

"That's great. Brainstorm." Thankfully Johnny didn't just keep pulling, but removed Sue's grip from me.

"Get back here right now! Johnny!" I shot everyone a panicked look as he pulled me along with him. We've all learned from experience that there's no stopping Johnny Storm. The more you try, the more determined he is, but sometimes I can calm him down a little. Although this seems a little out of my league.

The rest of the Fantastic Five, followed behind us to go talk to the reporters wanting to know what caused the strange abilities we have. I really wished we didn't have to or at least that I didn't. I hate public speaking and still don't want to admit this is all real.

The fire chief was standing by the barriers was keeping the reporters in order. When he saw us, he waved us over to somewhat prepare us to be attacked by questions. "Which one of you is the leader?"

"That would be me." I rolled my eyes at Johnny, along with the rest of us including the chief.

"No, seriously." We all looked to Reed and he stood up straighter. As far as our little science trio went, Reed was the leader and I guess Sue felt the same. With his ego bruised Johnny put him his arm around around my waist and I was too tired to shake it off. "Okay, son, you're on."

Reed stepped forward and looked at all the cameras with a sliver of fear in his face. "Uh...during our recent mission to the Von Doom space station... we were exposed to as-yet unidentified radioactive energy." In his quick break to collect his thoughts, the vultures descended with rapid questions.

"What happened on the bridge?"

"How can you stretch?"

"Is it true you can fly?"

"Yeah, I'm working on it. It's actually difficult-"

"No, actually, we do not know much more than you do at this point. We will be going directly to our lab to diagnose our symptoms." Sue interruption to Johnny's babbling gave what would normally be a good explanation. Of course, these are reporters not the scientists she'd usually talk to.

"Symptoms? Is this some kind of disease?"

"If having special powers is a disease, then yeah, we got it bad." Is it bad to suggest we get him a muzzle so he'll stop talking.

"Excuse me. That thing doesn't look so fantastic." As quick as lightning, my entire body went rigid as they called my brother a 'thing'.

"Ben Grimm is a genuine American hero."

"What she means is, every team needs a mascot!" The second the words left his mouth, I moved his arm off of me. Usually Johnny knows when to draw the line, but the attention is making him think it's okay to insult my brother. The typical digs they throw aren't any where near as harmful and serious as this one.

With a slight frown at me, he turned back to the cameras and made one of his flashiest statements to date. "A new day is dawning. The day of the Fantastic Five!"

"Look, we went up to space to find a way to understand D.N. A., cure disease, save lives. Well, now it's our D.N.A., our disease, our lives on the line. Thank you. No more questions."

A/N: I've been really sick these last few days, so this is short and unedited. As soon as I get feeling better, I'm update more. I'm so sorry, but I just have to wait for the headache to stop then I'm good to write.