Chapter Text
It was supposed to be a simple mission.
It was really only supposed to be a mission for Reed. Some lab off the coast was having trouble with a fusion core and the rest of them tagged along, mostly in case any structural damage occurred or if evacuation had to happen.
But as they arrived at the research facility, and they were greeted by one of the lead scientists who immediately began rattling off the physics of their current problem, Johnny internally mused that Reed was indeed the only one they needed.
He caught snippets of the conversation – fusion overload, structural integrity, and an alarmingly high Kelvin number – and instead focused on their surroundings as they were led down to the lower levels. He took in all of the different glass labs, offices and the different kinds of people, some in lab coats while others wore normal clothes, and even some were clad in navy uniforms from top to toe. On almost every face he spotted some degree of mild panic etched into their features.
Maybe it was a good thing they all came after all. He tuned back into the conversation in front of him, just in time to overhear the scientist say, “… no signs of a nuclear explosion.”
Johnny couldn’t stay quiet at that. “I’m sorry, did you just say ‘nuclear explosion’?”
“Why do you think we’re here, Johnny?” Reed turned his head slightly his direction as he spoke. “If a fusion core has a meltdown, it can cause a nuclear explosion.”
“But as I was saying,” the scientist hurriedly supplied. “The core itself isn’t unsteady yet. We’ve detected no high levels of radiation, nothing to suggest a meltdown. It’s just… burning.”
“But at dangerous levels?” Sue interjected. She never did like when someone downplayed dire situations and Johnny couldn’t exactly blame her response. If it was just burning as it should, none of them would be here.
“Let’s just see what we’re dealin’ with,” Ben firmly stated. He sent a stare over at Reed. “We don’t know what we have until we see for ourselves.”
Their small group huddled into the elevator, which groaned a bit as Ben shuffled his way inside. The scientist didn’t look utterly concerned as she simply inserted her passkey into a lock and pressed the button for the lowest floor.
“Look at that, Ben. A custom elevator, just for you,” Johnny remarked casually as they descended rapidly.
As the elevator stopped its motion at the destination floor, its occupants had to lightly shuffle to maintain their balance. Ben let himself swing backwards, his large, rocky back squeezing Johnny’s body into the wall.
“Oops,” Ben muttered joyfully as he heard Johnny’s airless groan.
Johnny spotted Sue rolling her eyes as she followed Reed down the concrete hall, but he didn’t let that stop him from imaging the possible ways he could get his revenge later on.
The fusion core was in a sealed chamber at the end of the barren hall. The reinforced door on the left was still securely shut but the thinner door on the right was open. It led into a control room with various controls and equipment lined up against the walls. A large enforced glass frame filled up almost the entire wall on the left. Behind the window, a concrete room splayed out. It was completely barren except for the two machine components on each side of the room. In the middle was a burning ball of light, so bright Johnny had to shield his eyes and look away. He could hear its deep vibrations through the thick walls. It almost sounded alive – like a heartbeat. An angry heartbeat.
Reed went straight for the controls, eyes taking in every number and value that it spat out. Sue followed right behind him, more as a support than anything else, while Ben and Johnny stayed in the background.
Johnny surveyed the lab. Tiny cracks spiderwebbed the concrete floor, mostly concentrated in the other room with the fusion machine but it had clearly begun to spread into this room as well.
A sudden ill feeling about the whole situation settled into Johnny’s stomach. It didn’t get any better as Reed began to mumble, first to himself then just out loud.
“This can’t be right. It’s emitting massive amounts of light energy, but there’s not really any signs that it’s growing unstable. It like it’s just… powering up, almost.”
“What does that mean?” Sue tentatively asked. Everybody in the whole room was tense in the silence.
“It means it’s growing hotter and hotter, until it expands with the energy and swallows us whole.” Reed looked up from the console to Sue. “It will swallow this whole facility, and who knows what else, until it becomes so unstable, it bursts.”
“So, what do we do?”
“I’m not sure. We need to siphon its energy but I’m uncertain, I have time to construct such a thing. We would need power cables, large ones, and…” Reed lowered his voice into a mutter as his mouth struggled to keep up with his mind, spurting thoughts and ideas as they came to him.
Johnny eased forward to look at the burning ball again. It was like a little sun, its surface flickering with warm fire. Fire…
The thought struck him then and like with most of his ideas, he didn’t hesitate to voice it immediately.
“I could absorb the energy.” He turned around to look at Reed, who had completely stopped in his tracks. “It’s basically fire. Right?”
Johnny could practically see Reed’s gears turning at the idea. Over his shoulder, Sue’s eyes were flickering between the two of them, something Johnny couldn’t decipher growing in her gaze.
“Theoretically, yes, I suppose you could. But, Johnny, the temperature in there rivals that of a small sun. You’ve never burned that high.”
“Tell me there is another option, then. That you know exactly how to build a device that can absorb that much light energy within whatever timeframe we have here.”
A beat of silence followed.
“… I don’t.” It looked almost like it physically hurt for Reed to utter those words. Johnny wasn’t entirely sure if it was a lack of confidence at his own skills or Johnny’s.
It didn’t matter regardless.
“Then I’m doing this.”
-------------------------------------------------
A few minutes later, Johnny was standing in front of the reinforced steel door. Ben stood by his side, while the others remained in the control room.
“You sure about this?”
Johnny rolled his shoulders in preparation and with all the bravado he could muster, he said, “Absolutely.”
“Then good luck, kid,” Ben said sincerely. Then he grabbed the door and swung it open. As the heat blasted out of the doorway, Johnny let his own fire loose. Even as the familiar heat enveloped his body, he could feel the intense temperature shift as he stepped inside.
Here, the roaring thrum of the burning fireball was deafening. Its light was blinding and stung in his eyes. The heat of it sucked all the air out of his lungs and Johnny gasped at the sensation. Since gaining his powers, he hadn’t really felt warmth the same way. He was never cold, but it was rare he wasn’t the warmest thing in the room. This was something else entirely. His flames almost felt cool in comparison to those that comprised the small ball in front of him.
For the first time, he wondered if this had been a stupid idea.
At the edge of his vision, he spotted the window and the worried faces that watched him behind it. He didn’t have the heart to properly look at them. To see Sue’s worried gaze glued onto him. Johnny swallowed and shoved the thoughts out of his head immediately.
He had a job to do.
Instinct drove him on. He went into that intuitive place inside of himself, where his body knew how to breathe, his heart beat on its own and where he had learned to control his flames to adapt to the situation. He felt the fire around him grow in intensity and temperature to better match those flickering in front of him. His fire beckoned the other closer, reaching out to lure it in.
Johnny felt the moment the strange, hot flames connected with his body. For the first time in a long while, intense, strong heat engulfed his entire being.
He became a void of searing, hot fire.
His vision swam with light, turning brighter and bluer until it was pure white.
He had no idea where he stopped and the fire began, melting together into one combined creature of blazing nothingness.
He thought he might be screaming but that quickly vanished as the roaring sound increased until that was all he could hear.
Vaguely, he caught the crack of concrete, the shatter of thick plexiglass, high-pitched voices.
All of it drowned out in the cacophony of the fiery inferno that was his entire being. He felt hot and cold all at the same time and he couldn’t determine if it was actually working or if he had become the catalyst for the explosion instead.
Time stood still. Or it moved by quick. He had no idea anymore. He remained trapped in that blazing state of nothingness where only hot fire roamed and he was its conduit.
Eventually, some of the color blended into the white field before him.
Structural lines swam into view as little by little a dark concrete room materialized around him. The deafening clamor died down until all he could hear was his own heartbeat pounding in his ears.
The fire left him and he felt utterly hollowed out.
His feet hit the ground – had he been flying? – and as soon as they did, the rest of him crumbled. He felt like he was made of Jell-O, unable to lift even a finger or simply turn his head.
Muffled words echoed through the cotton that had wrapped around his mind and colorful shadows danced above him.
Everything blended together and Johnny swore he had Sue’s voice before darkness came and swept him away.