VELOCITY

Part Four: The Grand Entrance

"I'm back with your coffee you asked for Nate, and some donuts." Madison walks out of the elevator onto the training floor that I was at. I was practicing more fighting techniques with my suit the whole day and ever since my fight with the guy, it's been a whole week since then and I still haven't been able to find some closure. "Hey Madi, you could set it down on the table over there." I say, "Of course, have you gone to see that therapist I told you about?" She asks as she sets down my food. She knows how hard it's been for me and went out of her way to set up therapy sessions but I haven't been going to them. "Yeah, I went yesterday and it helped a bit." I lie but she sees through it, "Nate, I know it's hard to get over the loss of your loved ones but-" I interrupt her by landing right in front of her as I was practicing my flying. "Have you ever seen your loved ones die right in front of you? Reed and Karley both died right before my eyes and I could have saved them, I just don't know what to do anymore." I explain, she quickly understands and gives me some advice. "No one could do everything on their own, it's not bad to ask for help once in awhile. Reed and Karley wouldn't want you all sad and mopey like this, they would want you back to the way you were." I've been trying and trying but it's too hard, I grab my water and head back to my training. I make sure to thank her for the advice and the food before she left, I feel bad that she now has to worry about me but I can't really do anything about as she insists on getting food for me and helping me more with the whole situation. She's like my assistant, but she's not, maybe I should get an assistant. "I'm going to be out for most of the day trying to figure out where they could be hiding now, be careful Nate." She wave's goodbye as she heads back into the elevator with nothing else to say, before I could say something she was already gone. I train a bit longer letting her advice sink into my mind with everything else until unexpected news had appeared on the T.V. I turn and look to see that a real villain has appeared, he has the same suit as the rest of the other villains but his power was something that could pose a problem, concrete. I wouldn't be able to absorb as it was a solid which is something that Jacob's AD would be able to absorb. This villain was attacking random buildings but it was clear that it was heading straight towards my building, no matter how much I don't feel like fighting I must. I activated my suit and transformed into the lightning form, I hurried towards the emergency stairs and ran outside. I was quick to notice a giant boulder flying right at me, I dodged it and looked at the concrete villain to see shards flying to me as well. I blasted them all with some lightning and tried to run away as more started to appear. "Hello! I guess this is the first time you've actually seen me like this but it's not the first time I've seen you. I'm Blitz, the boss told me to finally introduce myself and give you some action." The villain introduces herself, she seems to be a bit nice but I'm sure that isn't true. She covers herself up in her concrete and starts to juggernaut her way through some cars at an unbelievable speed, I give her a quick lightning punch and that sure does the trick as it shatters her concrete instantly leaving her stuck with her suit. She tries to fight me head on but it really isn't a fair fight as my incredible speed is too much for her to handle, I can start to tell that she's starting to get annoyed. "Why can't I hit you?" She blurts out as she jumps back and throws more concrete shards, all of them miss but one of them exploded creating a smokescreen, I wasn't able to spot her. I was standing in the smoke, cautious of my surroundings, waiting for her to strike at any moment. All of a sudden shards came at me at every direction faster than I could dodge, static wave was able to break the tips of most of them but it wasn't enough as some were able to penetrate through and cut me. I was sliced all over, bleeding a bit from most of them, I felt like I couldn't do anything anymore but I had to do something as I realized as the smoke cleared that she created these huge concrete boulders that could kill me if I didn't move from where I was standing. I was holding back that power I received from the mystery guy for a reason, if I were to use it I would win easily but it reminds me of that night too much, I already have enough guilt to carry on my shoulders but I don't see any other way around this without using that power. "Hey, I'm really not in the mood to fight so is there anyway we could postpone this until I feel up to it?" I ask, "Oh really? That's alright you take as much time as you need, I'll wait." She responds, I felt a bit glad as she said that but my worries quickly came back as the next that happened was something I should have seen coming; she threw the boulders straight at me. I tried to not use this form but it seems as though I have no choice, as the boulders landed at me she thought she had killed me but she soon realized that she couldn't have been more wrong as I transformed into my purple flame form, the power was so overwhelming it destroyed the boulders instantly. She was shocked, she also might have been a little scared. I was preparing to charge at her full speed until a shouting voice was heard from behind me, "NATE! WHAT'S GOING ON?" Madison says at the worst possible time, I don't worry about my identity being revealed as I'm positive that a lot of people were soon to find out. Her voice was a distraction, I turned back giving Blitz the opportunity to strike me as she did by running at me head on throwing a nasty punch to my back that sends me flying towards Madison. It feels like my back is shattered, but I still have to keep worrying as Blitz decides to try to get a hold of Madison, the feeling of losing another life shoots through my body, the feeling makes me run at her full speed. She turns back and receives a punch to the gut, I added an explosive flame to the punch which made her fly towards the direction of the Statue of Liberty, I made sure to not kill her as that would make me even worse than these people. I ignored Madison and flew straight to her, once I arrived to where she landed I noticed that she was nowhere to be found, I looked around to see any clues to where she could have gone but no luck. I realized a little too late that she was behind creating something that I knew I wouldn't be able to destroy; she was making a giant out of concrete. I couldn't shoot any blasts due to the fact that there were many civilians around that could be hurt, some of them were unable to get away. She took off her mask to reveal a surprisingly beautiful woman, but not as beautiful as Karley, she was bleeding a little from her head but the only thing that I really noticed was her angry expression. "I've had it, the boss never told me that you would be this strong, if I would have known I would have used this from the start. This is where your day of being a hero end." She shouts as all of a sudden concrete sprouts out of the floor, trapping me in place. Her giant is finally done being constructed, she was placed inside as the giant was built around her so she would be protected. She lifts her right arm and prepares to slam it right on me, the concrete that has me trapped is too thick and hard for me to bust out of, I don't see any other way to get out of this situation. "Bye bye!" She says as she then slams her fist straight at me, I thought I was dead but it appears I black out, I was in my mind in complete darkness. "Nate let me give you some advice." I'm turned around by a hand that belongs to Madison, "No one could do everything on their own, it's not bad to ask for help once in awhile. Reed and Karley wouldn't want you all sad and mopey like this, they would want you back to the way you were." It was a flashback to back when Madison gave me that advice when I was training. I regained consciousness to see that I was not dead but instead saved by someone in a suit like mine, the person deactivated their mask and looked at me, at that moment I understood what the secret message in Madison's advice meant, doing everything yourself is indeed hard but with two people makes it easier. "Hey Nate, it's been awhile, I'm glad I decided to come early as a surprise." Jacobs says, I'm in complete shock to see Jacob let alone the fact that his suit looks like it's consumed by this darkness, it looks pretty scary. He also has these arms spewing out from his back, two of them are the ones that caught the giant arm. "Jacob?" I finally utter out, he shushes me and responds by saying, "Let's save this gushy reunion until after I destroy this giant rock monster okay?" At first, I doubted that he would be able to take care of this but then I realized that superstrength is this girls weakness as the next thing that happened shocked me even more. His two other arms that were attached to his back threw a punch to the giant's fist; he destroyed the arm instantly and sent the giant flying towards the Statue of Liberty. I was in total shock again, Jacob broke me out of the concrete and prepared to head back into the fight. I was going to help him until he stopped me, "The main reason we became superheroes was to protect people, I still see a lot of people around that could be injured, go around and save all of them, I'll handle her." His words inspired me a bit, who knew that my little brother would be so wise. He started to run towards Blitz to start fighting again leaving me to take care of the people, so I did exactly that, I went around saving everybody I could and made sure they got to safety. I looked up to see that Jacob and the giant were brawling, every punch he threw lead to a part of the giants body exploding, his strength in that form must be extraordinary. I finished my end of the deal and decided to go and help Jacob out but before I could I was able to witness the fatality of the battle as Jacob converted to of his back arms into these wings, he used them to leap all the way up into the sky. He then dived straight into the giants head and destroyed the whole thing leaving no concrete behind, Blitz fell out all damaged and was forced to surrender as Jacob still had plenty left in him. I made my way to them so I feel like I also defeated her, "So, what's the deal with you? Why did you join that guy you call your boss?" Jacob asks, I remember after the funeral we had for Reed, Jacob did say that he had the same trouble with these guys like I did, I guess they want something from the both of us. "We both had a common goal, to get payback against you two," She responds, I had to think a bit hard for this one as to what she could have meant until I remembered where I saw that beautiful face from before. "She's Dr. Mikes, the one with the invention that could build anything faster than a thousand men who are working at the same time. You must want payback after we declined your offer to work with us." I was right, she looked furious and I felt her hatred as she then went on to say, "You declined one of the most brilliant ideas in the world, I wanted to make the world a better place." Jacob and I knew her intentions were good but there was a problem with her idea. "We turned you down for the reason that many people's jobs could be lost, we knew that we would have backlash for it, so we decided to not be involved. Don't get me wrong, it's a good invention but people need jobs in order to live." Her emotions sky rocketed out of control, we thought she was going to go on a frenzy but luckily she decided to walk off her path of revenge and onto the path of redemption. She was a nice lady in the first place but had lost her way due to losing her spirit. "Forgive me, I only wanted revenge, I shouldn't have gone so far but that man persuaded me into doing it, telling me that he would have helped me expand the potential of my invention." She explained, we assumed that the rest of the other villains in his group were also persuaded into fighting, I felt as though we were almost there to solving this mystery. The police arrived and surrounded us, I got a little freaked out thinking that we were in trouble too until Madison came out of one of the police cars, after I sent Dr. Mike's flying with my punch earlier she must have gone to get the cops, after all this is done I'm going to offer her the job of being my assistant. Dr. Mikes was taken into custody with no struggle, she did destroy a lot of things around the city so she has to pay for her evil deeds, but when she's out I'll offer the job of being on our team. "You guys did good, glad your back Jacob." Madison says as she winks at him, Jacob looked like he was about to faint as he deactivated his mask, I didn't want any part of it. I snapped him out of his trance and told him to come back to the lab with me so we could talk, he wanted to but said that he also came early for another reason, that he needed to get something. I wanted to know what it was, so I decided to tag along with him, he didn't have any problems with me coming but he initially wanted me to come from the start, which is why he came to the lab first instead of going directly to this "something." After walking a couple of blocks I realized that we were at Reed's place, I was a little confused so I turned to Jacob and asked why we were here. He said that he may have figured out something that Reed was keeping secret. We walked in to see it empty, I guess no one wanted to live here since someone died inside. "What are we looking for exactly?" I ask, he looks around a bit, rummaging through his drawers and underneath his bed but doesn't find anything, it's like he didn't hear me. I start to walk to his desk that he would use all the time to notice a tiny slit of paper underneath his drawer. "Jacob, I think I found what you were looking for, I don't understand as to why you didn't come check his desk first." I tell him, "It's too obvious, I thought it would be some weapon of mass destruction or something so why would he put it here?" He responds with a stupid point. I open the drawer to see two boxes with our names on them, each one had a letter on it that went with the box. We both opened our boxes to see a prototype attachment for our AD's, I wondered what it could be so I decided to read the letter. "HAPPY BIRTHDAY! It feels like you were just 13 a few years ago but now you're 26, soon you'll be as old as me but not as smart. I didn't know what I should get for you because you pretty much own everything so I thought about making something for you. I also didn't know what to make for you until you guys came up with the AD, I thought I could do something cool with that. Then the day came when Matt had blueprints for additional absorption slots, I had the same idea but was outshined, but that idea inspired a new idea that I think is even cooler, I call it the Coalescence device. It gives the ability to fuse together your-" as Jacob and I are almost done reading our letters I receive a text from Madison. She explains that there is someone in the lobby standing on top of the stairs and that he's wearing a suit like ours but he hasn't done anything dangerous. She then sends a picture to reveal the one person that I never wished to see again, the murderer of Karley. *1 week ago* "Nate, I'm back" Madison says as she wakes me up from slumber, she walks over to my hospital bed to tell me the news. "They haven't found the body, they did find her blood on the floor but that's all." I try to take in her information without shedding a tear. "Then after she died they took her body, that's...can I be alone for a second?" I ask her, she respects my wishes and steps outside. "I'm not going to start hoping that she could still be alive or I'll have to be placed in an asylum due to how crazy I would become but there's a chance. I'll get that bastard if it's the last thing I do." As soon as Madison sent me that picture of the mystery man I started to panic and freak out as I thought about him killing Karley, Jacob noticed this and slapped me. "OW! WHAT THE HELL!" I shout but he looked at me like I was the one who was crazy. "I can't say anything about you not being over Karley's death because I'm still not over it, when you guys first started dating I remember how happy you started to be so I tried my best to make her feel like she was wanted with us, I'm sure Matt and Reed thought the same. She became very close to us and became our best friend, she was family, but she's gone now, which means we have to suck it up and be happy for her now that she's in a better place. I'm not saying to forget all about her but to just....how do I put this...be okay with her being gone." His speech is moving, it was good enough to make me realize that he's right, I can't move on right away that's impossible for me to do but what I can do is try. I take a deep breath and respond to Madison with a "We're coming." Jacob and I will wait until after to finish our letters, but just in case, we both put on the attachment to our ADs. We both start heading out but I grab his shoulder before he gets passed the door, "I just want to thank you for what you said, it may not have been much but now I have the clarity to start trying." I tell him, he gives me a look that Reed would give me and starts telling me not to get all emotional around him; I walked away. We quickly rushed over to our building and stopped in the front to create a plan. "I'll create a diversion and you will head around and attack him from behind capeesh?" Jacob said but I thought we should come with a somewhat nicer approach that didn't involve fighting straight off the bat. "We should talk to him, get his reasoning behind on why he wants to fight us." I replied, he gave me another Reed look and said straight back to me, "You know you wouldn't last ten seconds talking to the guy after he says something about Karley." I agreed to his plan on attacking him from behind and ran to the back entrance. We sent up a comm system to create communication between us so we could know each others every move. "Ready?" Jacobs asks, "Ready." I reply as I open the door and head in.