Origin: The Element

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Origin: The Element

Post by Notorious »

15 years ago, shortly after the final battle against the Chrell…

“Dr. Wraxter, are you suggesting… what I think you’re suggesting?”

“Friends, colleagues, every super has an origin. Every super has a reason for being who they are. We can explain scientifically exactly how that super evolved,” Wraxter replied.

“And mutants?” a man in a white coat near the back of the room posed a question.

“Again, through genetics a cure was devised, thus the gene was found. Mutants, although anomalies in their own right, are still consistent with scientific theory.”

“So… what? You want to… make more heroes?”

The room was becoming stuffy. It was a small auditorium, lit mostly by a projector in the back. Men were scattered about in the seats, most of them leaning to one side with a pencil behind the ear or in the mouth. Some tapped idly on their clipboards. Wraxter was at the front, standing behind a podium speaking his proposal.

“In the wake of the Chrell invasion we have been left vulnerable,” Wraxter said.

“At least the world is in our hands,” another scientist noted.

“And if the Chrell come back?” Wraxter let the silence in the room linger in order for his coworkers to better get his point. “I’m not suggesting we add to the chaos. The Initiative, super-hero registration, was already nearing effect before the invasion. If we have the heroes working for us - then no chaos. All we have to do is make them ourselves.”

“We’ve tried many times to re-create the super-soldier serum. It must have been a fluke we ever got it to work in the first place. We’re not trying that again.”

“That’s not a part of my proposal. I am well aware of the failures associated with the super-soldier projects. What I am suggesting is an approach not of the human body… but of an entirely different… element.”

The scientists leaned forward, squinted their eyes, and listened intently.

______________________________________________________________


“Explain to me one more time where our tax payers dollars are going?” General Harrison said stiffly, looking quite reluctant to be in the lab. “This is the last super-soldier program the United States Government is prepared to support. I’m not too fond of your idea of taking advantage of the fact all the supers are dead - otherwise you would never have gotten your money. If this doesn’t work, Wraxter, you’re losing your funding - permanently.”

“I’m not worried,” Wraxter replied, observing his team through an impenetrable, radiation shielded window. “This program has nothing to do with the super-soldier serum. General, you recall chemistry, correct?”

“Yes, Wraxter.”

“Then you remember that all existence is made of matter. And you’ll also recall that all matter is composed of molecules. Molecules are composed of electrons and neutrons…”

“Yes, Wraxter. I asked for an explanation, not a lecture,” the general grumbled. A few eerie blue lights flashed from the other room.

“Very well. If you change the composition of a molecule, a single electron or neutron, then the matter changes as well. Life giving water into toxic gas. Heavy stone into acid. Breathable air into metal. The possibilities are endless, general. The blue prints of all life are right here, for us, in the elements. All we have to do is… figure them out.”

“So what is this? A gun? A bomb?”

“No, general. Harnessing the energy of the universe is step three.” Another flash of light caused both men to blink. “First we must attempt to understand. Then we control. Then we turn it into a weapon.”

“I hope those three steps don’t take a life time, doctor,” the older man said threateningly.

“I agree,” Wraxter said softly, staring into the marvels of the other room. The scientists were working with very sensitive equipment - coils of electricity, fusion and fission reactors, chemicals in very carefully measured proportions, and a very special machine meant for a very special purpose.

“We have come a long way already,” the doctor continued. “We are attempting to create our own… element.”

“I thought this sort of thing has already been done… some where.”

“Not like this. This new molecule will be the shape-shifter of the element world. It’ll be versatile, containing the aspects of all elements into one. It’ll be so advanced it might as well be alive. The whole universe… in one cell.”

“That sounds like science fiction to me,” the general said. “And dangerous.”

“Not dangerous,” Wraxter said with a shake of his head. “My hypothesis is that this cell can be used to create any matter or antimatter we so desire - granted that we can figure out how to use it. It might even turn out to be a new-age serum… create any power inside of a creature that we want.”

A voice came through a radio on the wall, one of the scientists working with the equipment.

“Sir, it’s ready. All preparations have been made. It’s show time.”

“One slip up, Wraxter…” the general drilled him with his eyes. Wraxter was under the suspicious that the general wanted him to fail, just so he could have some foolish pride in being a skeptic.

“Proceed,” Wraxter said.

The reactors pumped their power, the electricity flowed, the coils ignited with light, and the machines began to roar. Power surged through out the place, radiation of all kinds in very dangerous levels (but contained), and it all flowed to one spot of heavy molecular activity. They were harnessing the elements, controlling them to the best of their ability. They spliced atoms, fused atoms, morphed atoms, mutated them into something. They took a lifeless piece of nothing and forced it to be something - forced it to change into something new. Something… special.

Blindingly bright lights flashed, and energy washed over the complex. The radiation levels began to reach unexpected highs and the containment fields started to stress.

“We’re losing control, sir. We can’t keep this up…”

“All those reactors are contained! That’s impossible!” Wraxter became excited very quickly.

“What the hell is going on?” raged Harrison. Wraxter ignored him.

The room was suddenly growing loud with noise. A deep, powerful rumble was coming from the center of the research facility.

”There’s a new energy radiating from the center of the molecular chamber! We can’t contain it, it’s overloading our systems… we have to shut it down, we’re already in the red…”

“Fine, damnit. Shut it down. Damnit!” Wraxter slammed his fist against the wall in anger. The doctor expected the surreal lights to shut off, the noises to stop, and the experiment to die, but instead they all increased. The noise was overwhelming now, the vibration beginning to create a rumbling deep inside their brains. The lights flickered, electricity stormed over the coils, and with every flash of blue there was the sharp sound of thunder within the chamber.

“Shut it down!!!” Wraxter screamed over the noise. General Harrison said something but it wasn’t important. Their legs grew weak, their energy disappearing for unknown reasons, and with the rumbling in their brains they felt a sudden urge to sleep. What appeared to be lightening bolts were bursting out of the chamber and striking the insides of the experiment room. Sparks flew and pieces of the structure collapsed.

”We did… it won’t stop… the experiment… it’s powering the reactors… we can’t… shut them…”

Wraxter opened his eyes, not realizing that he had even shut them. The noise was gone and the lights were off. He felt around for the switch, but upon finding it discovered that the power was completely gone.

“General?” Harrison groaned but said nothing.

Wraxter used the wall to try and get to the door but on his way found that the window was missing. He pulled a flashlight from his pocket to be surprised that the batteries were dead. Luckily, Wraxter also had an emergency light. He fumbled with it in the darkness, feeling its smooth edges for the crank that powered it, cranked it up to create a charge, then turned it on.

The light was weak, but in the pitch blackness of the secure lab it was a beacon. Wraxter gasped at the sight - his entire lab had been destroyed from the inside out. However, oddly enough, only pieces of it were gone. There was no explosion, no fire, just missing items all over. Metal beams, wooden tables, glass windows, steel doors, all kinds of random things - including parts from the reactors. The chamber itself - the molecular housing - it was almost completely gone.

More of the scientists were gaining consciousness now, activating their own emergency lights. From the look of it, all of them were perfectly fine. The room, one second completely silent, was now beginning to fill with ambience from the scientists’ soft voices all asking each other, “What happened?”

That’s when he heard it. A faint… whimper. The cry of a newly born child. Everyone heard it - and everyone grew silent. The scientists, all creeping forward as if thinking in a hive mind - approached the soft crying coming from inside the chamber. Wraxter was the first there, shinning his light down on the naked form of a baby with no belly button.

“It’s a boy,” Wraxter said, completely dumbfounded, utterly astonished, and ridiculously excited.
Posts: 1306
Joined: Sat Mar 15, 2003 10:02 pm
Location: Place farthest from the brightside of the universe

The Fate of a Child

Post by Notorious »

“This is an incredible breakthrough in modern science! This is a-”

“An abomination!”

“Abomination?” Wraxter looked offended. “We have created life! LIFE! We never even dreamed that our experiment would take us this far…”

“The experimentation has failed,” replied Wraxter’s superior with General Harrison sitting next to him with a smug look on his face. “The goal was to find a way to create supers out of volunteers - not literally create a being! For all we know this child is mentally retarded - how can we tell if it has super powers? And even if it did, do you know what legal red tape we are getting ourselves into here?”

“Just give me some time with the child,” Wraxter pleaded, completely convinced that the experiment would yield some kind of positive results.

“Absolutely not!” Harrison piped up.

Bradley, S.H.I.E.L.D.’s representative in the branch of super-human experimentation and also Wraxter’s superior, continued where Harrison left off.

“None of us have any right to touch that child. He has no parents and he was… born… on American soil. He must be treated as such and not as a test subject. This is the law - as fascinating as this boy is, he has the right to a normal life just as any other orphaned American.”

Wraxter looked disappointed.

“Do you understand me, Dr. Wraxter?”

“Do you understand what we’re truly dealing with here?” Wraxter said desperately. “Just give me one week to…”

“Dr. Wraxter!” Bradley stood up now, his voice growing stronger with every word. “I understand completely! I believe it’s you who is in the dark here! S.H.I.E.L.D. must wash its hands of this entire project, effective immediately! The legal repercussions of creating a human being inside of a lab would be crippling to our organization. As far as our records go…” Bradley took a file out of his brief case and dropped it into a trash can next to him. “…S.H.I.E.L.D. has never worked with you before.”

Wraxter grew deathly pale. General Harrison grinned sadistically.

“The child goes into foster care right now. And you,” Bradley pointed directly at the doctor, stared him down even. “If you want to have a job by the end of this meeting, you had better submit a new résumé and start kissing our asses.”
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