Civil War Prose Novel (11 page)

Nervous laughter.

“See,” Spider-Man continued, “the Registration Act gives us a choice: We can go the route Captain America advocates, and leave people with powers completely unchecked. Or we can go legitimate, and earn back a little public trust.”

Come on, Peter,
Tony thought.
Do it.

“I’m proud of what I do. Of who I am. And I’m here to prove it.”

Spider-Man reached up and whipped the mask off his face. The crowd gasped; cameras flashed, folding chairs clattered as reporters shot to their feet. The man in the spider-suit looked briefly panicked, then smiled shyly.

“My name is Peter Parker,” he said. “And I’ve been Spider-Man since I was fifteen years old.”

Tony Stark stepped forward again. He put an arm around Peter and exchanged a long, grateful glance with the young man.

Then Tony turned to face the crowd.

“Any questions?”

“MORE
coffee, Mister Hendrick?”

Captain America frowned, adjusted his tie. The fake mustache felt itchy on his lip.

“Mister Hendrick?”

Cap looked up, saw the young waitress holding out a glass coffee pot. He shook his head quickly; she rolled her eyes and walked away.

Goliath laughed. He leaned across the table, tweaked the nametag on Cap’s work shirt.

“Better get some game,
Hendrick
.”

Four of them sat at the table: Cap, Goliath, Daredevil, and Luke Cage, all in various types of disguise. Goliath wore a worn leather jacket; Daredevil was almost unrecognizable in short white shirt, vest, and tinted, trendy glasses.

Cap frowned. “My name is Brett Hendrick,” he said for the fourth time, in a low voice. “I’m a security supervisor at a shopping mall in Queens.”

“That’s it,” Daredevil said. “Now, my name is Cooper Peyton, and I’m an electrical engineer from Long Island.”

“Victor Tegler,” Goliath said. “Community Outreach Worker, based in Harlem. Man, I’m still not sure about that. I’m a West Coast kid.”

Daredevil shrugged. “Bigger men than you have started out as community organizers.”

“Cage?”

Luke Cage looked up from his notes. His massive, muscular frame was crammed into a black suit, and he seemed distinctly uncomfortable.

“What kind of name is
Rockwell Dodsworth?
” he asked. “And sweet Christmas—I.T. consultant for a major international finance corporation? I asked you to get me somethin’
cool
, like a race-car driver. Music producer, maybe.”

Daredevil frowned. “This is what my contacts had available.”

“Matt risked a lot to get us these new identities,” Cap said. “He could be disbarred for this.”

“Oh, yeah.” Daredevil almost smiled. “
That’s
what I’m worried about.”

“Besides, the I.D.’s aren’t important. They’re just a place to go to ground when we aren’t doing the important work.”

“I’m actually getting into the new secret identity thing,” Daredevil said. “I’m experimenting with new foods, new favorite movies. New bands.”

Cap studied the blind adventurer for a moment. They’d been underground for almost three weeks now, a difficult time of adjustment. But the experience had apparently energized Daredevil. As long as Cap had known him, DD had been a dour, grim vigilante with a strong nihilistic streak. Now he seemed alert, purposeful.

Maybe change is good, sometimes.

“Ah, never mind.” Cage stretched his arms, grimaced. “I’m just still sore from that beatdown we gave the Sinister Six yesterday.”

“
You’re
sore?” Goliath clapped him on the back. “Man, I had to grow to eighteen feet to trip up the Rhino.”

“That was good work,” Daredevil said. “And we’re only just getting started. Right, Cap?”

“Hm? Sorry.” Captain America looked up. “Just thinking about an appointment I had to break, with a kid from the Make-A-Wish Foundation. I told him we’d play baseball in his yard today, but the place is probably crawling with Tony’s cape-killers.”

“Sucks,” Goliath said.

“It’s the little things they’ve stolen from us,” Cap said, “with this registration garbage. The little things that make us who we are.”

“What you said.” A sly smile crept across Cage’s dark face. “Hendrick.”

“Zip it,
Rockwell
.”

The waitress arrived, bearing food. The four men set to it, as if they hadn’t eaten in weeks.

“I still can’t believe Spider-Man,” Goliath said. “You think Tony Stark is
controlling
him or something? Through that new costume?”

“Tony wouldn’t stoop to that,” Cap said. “It wouldn’t satisfy his ego. He wants everyone to agree with him, to see the pure light of reason behind his actions.”

“And I know Peter. He’s impressionable.” Daredevil frowned. “That day in Stamford, I could already see he was under Tony’s thumb.”

“Strategically, it’s a brilliant move. Nobody’s guarded his secret identity more tightly than Spider-Man. His unmasking is a powerful message to all the costumes still sitting on the fence.”

Cap’s and Goliath’s phones beeped simultaneously. Cap glanced at the screen, rose quickly to his feet.

“’Sup?” Cage asked.

Goliath read aloud: “Petrochemical plant on fire, over by the river. Base says there’s three or four hundred people trapped inside.”

Cap intercepted the startled waitress. “Keep the change, ma’am. And thanks for a wonderful meal.”

She looked down at the hundred-dollar bill in her hand. “Wow. Thanks, Mister Hendrick.”

“Call me Brett.”

Cap gestured, and the rest of them followed him toward the back entrance. He thumbed a speed-dial number on his phone.

“Hawkeye, what’s your sitch?”

“Just tryin’ to train these kids. You want us on that call?”

“Yep. Bring everyone along.” Cap hung up, dialed another number. “Falc?”

“On my way. Got Tigra, Cloak, and Dagger with me.”

“Roger.”

Cage slammed open the door to the restaurant’s back alley. Strong smell of garbage and urine. Boarded-up windows on the houses behind.

“Emergency distress calls. Sneaking into alleys, changing into costume.” Goliath smiled, shrugging off his leather jacket. “I hate to say it, but I’m starting to enjoy this.”

GREEN
smoke rose from the Geffen-Meyers petrochemical plant, dark and ominous in the twilight gloom. Cap could smell it from blocks away. The plant building faced the water, so details of the disaster were hard to make out from the street. A ring of local police cars surrounded the building, lights flashing.

Cap hastily arranged a rendezvous in a parking lot across the street. When everyone was assembled, he pulled Wiccan and Cloak aside. They both looked nervous, unsure.

“You two are our teleporters,” Cap said. “People may be dying inside the plant, and we can’t get past that line of cops any other way. Can you carry us all, between the two of you?”

Wiccan frowned. “I can get my crew in. Prob’ly two or three more.”

“Cloak?”

Cloak looked around, scared. Dagger, his girlfriend, took his hand.

“I’ll do it, sir.”

Cap, Tigra, Falcon, Wiccan, and the Young Avengers materialized inside first. The plant’s roof had been ripped off, and several explosions had apparently torn up the floor. Small fires raged, water spouted from severed pipes. Walls lay half-toppled, obscuring parts of the complex; one whole side of the building had been blasted open to the pier, where a loading dock lay splintered and destroyed, its stump falling off into the water. Green smoke wafted through the air, forming toxic patches all over.

“Man.” Tigra held a furry finger to her sensitive nose. “This place
stinks
.”

In the middle of the room, a dark shroud swirled into being. Cap tensed—and watched as Hawkeye, Daredevil, Cage, Goliath, and Dagger all tumbled out, shivering with intense cold.

“It’s okay,” Dagger said. “The chill will wear off soon.”

The shadow swirled about, resolved itself into the dark form of Cloak himself. He staggered, dazed for a moment. Dagger walked up before him, glowing, and held out her hands. Light blazed from her into Cloak’s tired form, vanishing into the darkness of his being. Revitalizing him.

Cap shook his head. Those two had nothing but each other; Cloak relied on Dagger for his very survival. How could you ask two young people like that to register, to turn over their entire lives to the government?

“All present,” Falcon said.

Daredevil bent down, picked up something from the floor. Cap turned to him.

“Silver dollar,” Daredevil said.

“Something’s wrong.” Cap’s eyes narrowed. “How many workers did the report say?”

“Three or four hundred.” Goliath frowned at a handheld analyzer. “But I’m not getting any radio signals out of this place at all—”

Goliath stopped dead, staring down at the floor.

Falcon fluttered up behind him, Cap close by. “What is it?”

Then they all saw it. A fallen wall-stone with the chiseled words:

GEFFEN-MEYERS

A DIVISION OF

STARK ENTERPRISES

“
Emergency evac!
” Cap yelled. “It’s a
trap
—”

Too late. Tranquilizer darts rained down out of the sky. Tigra leapt away, Falcon took to the air. Hawkeye notched an arrow in his bow, quicker than the eye could see.

But the tranquilizers only struck two members: Wiccan and Cloak.

“Tyrone!”
Dagger screamed. She ran to Cloak, reached for his falling figure.

Cap whipped his head upward. Thirty feet up, silhouetted against the clouds, at least six heavy S.H.I.E.L.D. copters hung in the sky, their engines muffled by Stark stealth technology. One of the copters pivoted, and a gunman loomed into view on its side, moonlight flashing against his weapon’s nozzle.

“Of course it’s a trap. How else were we going to get you all in one place?”

Cap whirled, raising his shield. The gleaming figure of Iron Man wafted up over a shattered half-wall, his repulsor rays glowing with power.

Then Spider-Man was behind Tony, leaping and flashing his webs. “Don’t do it, Flags.”

Cap grimaced, motioned his people back. They fell in behind him and shrank back toward the open, river-facing side of the plant.

The rest of Tony Stark’s forces marched up behind their leader, looming into view through the slowly clearing green haze. Ms. Marvel. The massive She-Hulk. Three-quarters of the Fantastic Four: Reed and Sue Richards, and Ben Grimm, the Thing. Black Widow.

Dagger looked up from Cloak’s unmoving body. “What have you
done
to him?”

Spider-Man held up a hand. “Just a little tranquilizer, kid. To make sure nobody gets teleported away.” Spidey cocked his head, looked upward. “Skybird One, you got us covered?”

A gruff, filtered voice filled the air. “Oh yeah. Just give the word.
Please
give the word.”

Cap grimaced. He recognized the voice: his former “partner,” S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent Axton.

Then Maria Hill’s voice cut in. “Mister Stark. We are in position and ready to end this—”

“We do this
my
way, Commander,” Tony said. “Or you can abort right now.”

Hill’s sigh was audible. “Director Hill to all airborne units. Hold your fire. Repeat, hold your fire and await further orders.”

All eyes were on Iron Man and Captain America now. Cap squared his shoulders and marched straight up to Tony Stark.

“Going soft, Tony?”

“We didn’t come here to arrest you, Cap.” Tony gestured upward, at the copters. “I’ve talked S.H.I.E.L.D. into offering you one final chance at amnesty.”

“You mean surrender.
No thanks.
”

“C’mon, Cap.” Spider-Man leapt up next to Tony. “When we fight each other, the only people who win are the bad guys. This goes against every principle you ever believed in.”

Cap stared at Spider-Man. The new costume, with its gleaming metal eyes, gave him a much less human countenance than ever before. Cap could almost picture the young man inside transforming, like an insect in a cocoon, into a new version of Iron Man.

“Don’t talk to me about principles, Spider-Man. I saw your little stunt on TV. Is your Aunt May happy that the Vulture has her zip code now?”

Spider-Man clenched his fists. “Why don’t you ask the mommies and daddies in Stamford if they think
Captain America’s
still fighting the good fight?”

Spidey took a step toward Cap. Cap tensed, and the two men stared at each other for a long moment. Then Tony moved between them, slowly lifting his helmet up to reveal his face.

He looked very tired.

“Cap, please. I know you’re angry, and I know this is an enormous change from the way we’ve always worked. But we aren’t living in 1945 anymore.” Tony gestured behind Cap, addressing the assembled Resistance. “The public doesn’t want masks and secret identities. They want to feel
safe
when we’re around. We’ve lost their confidence, their respect. This is the only way to win it back.

“You’ve known me half my adult life, Cap. You know I wouldn’t do this unless I believed in it with all my heart. I don’t want to fight you—none of us does. All I ask…just let me tell you my grand plan for the twenty-first century.”

Reed Richards’ elongated head snaked through the air. “It really is extraordinary.”

Sue Richards, Cap noticed, was staring at her husband. She didn’t look happy. Neither did Ben Grimm.

“Five minutes.” Tony held out his metal-gauntleted hand. “Will you give me that?”

Cap turned to survey his troops. Cage looked very grim. Tigra’s eyes were wide, almost feral. Goliath had eased up to eight feet in height, but he was hanging back. Dagger still knelt over her fallen partner, and the Young Avengers had gathered around Wiccan’s limp form.

Daredevil leaned against a wall, alone. Flipping his newfound coin up and down, up and down.

Cap’s two closest lieutenants, Hawkeye and the Falcon, stood together. They both cocked their heads at him:
Your play.

He turned back toward Tony. “Five minutes.”

“That’s all I need.”

Slowly, Cap reached out and clasped Tony’s hand. Tony’s gauntlet felt cold through Cap’s glove.

Spider-Man’s smile was almost visible through his mask. “All right! Way to go, Wings! Didn’t I tell you this was all gonna work out?”

Then Tony yanked his hand back, stared at it. “What the hell?”

Blue lightning shot out of Tony’s hand, arcing up and around his metallic form. His limbs began to jerk, uncontrollably, and he screamed in pain.

Cap took a step back. “Old-line S.H.I.E.L.D. electron scrambler,” he said, pointing at a small device on Tony’s gauntlet. “Another thing Fury gave me, years ago.”

“Wh-why?”

“In case you ever went over to the wrong side.”

Spider-Man moved in. But again Tony motioned him back, grimacing in agony. The other power fighters on Tony’s team—She-Hulk, the Thing, Ms. Marvel—stood their ground, waiting for a signal.