Issue #1: "For Every Action..." Pt. 1

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Firestorm
Issue #1: "For Every Action..." Pt. 1
Written by: Alex Vasquez Romero
Cover by : Borize
Edited by: Mark Bowers

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Ronnie Raymond ran into his house and slammed the door. He turned the lock on the door knob, the deadbolt above it and placed the door chain in its slot. He tugged on it a few times to assure himself that the door was locked. He began to stare out of the small window in the middle of the door, looking for any unexpected visitors.

“Ronnie, is that you?” Edward Raymond asked from the living room. He ran to the door and saw Ronnie apprehensively staring out of the window. He rushed to his son and gave him a ferocious bear hug. “God, I’m so glad you’re okay.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine, Dad,” Ronnie said as it felt like he was being squeezed to death, but keeping himself looking out the window. He wondered why he even ran here from the Hudson Nuclear Power Plant in the first place.

“Maybe we should get you to a doctor?” Ed asked as he began to look over his son for any injuries.

“Dad, I’m fine, I don’t need a doctor,” Ronnie insisted.

“The accident is all over the news. They think it was terrorists and that Martin Stein might have a connection to it.”

”I’m sure it was,” Ronnie said.

“Did you see anything; did you talk to the police?”

“No, I was on my way there when I saw the explosion, and then I ran here.”

“We should contact the police after we get you to the hospital.”

“I told you I’m fine. Will you leave me alone?” Ronnie screamed at his father. He ran upstairs into his room, locking the door and moving his dresser in front of it. He sat down in front of the dresser wrapping his arms around his knees, that were curled up to his chest. God, they’re going to come after me, he thought as he replayed the events of the day in his head.

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Earlier in the Day…

Am I dead? Ronnie asked himself in his mind, remembering the impending wave of nuclear energy that he assumed would have taken his life. Ronnie felt different, real different. He felt hot, like he had been baking in the sun working on a construction site (which he did for a summer), but the heat wasn’t uncomfortable or intolerable. It felt normal, like sitting at room temperature. He also felt more energetic than he ever had in his life, as if he were made of energy. Any physical confinement that his body ever caused was gone now, as he felt as if he could leap out of his skin and shoot for the stars.

Ronnie’s vision began to clear and focus and he began to recognize his surroundings and he wasn’t in heaven. In front of him was the doorway to the reactor room of the Hudson Nuclear Power Plant, behind him was the plant’s reactor damaged from the explosion and the room was charred as a result. Ronnie began to think about Professor Stein and looked around for him but he was nowhere to be found. He then looked over himself and found he was naked. His skin had a bright orange hue pulsating around it, concentrated around his hands. He turned behind him and could see the nuclear energy coming out of the damaged reactor and being absorbed by his body.

What the hell… Ronnie began to think.

“…happened to me?” Another voice in his head finished his thought.

“Who’s there?” Ronnie yelled out, startled at the sound of another voice.

“What’s going on young man? Where am I?” the voice said in Ronnie’s head. “What’s happened to my body?”

Oh my god, now I’m hearing voices in my head, Ronnie thought to himself.

“Son, I don’t know what’s going on, but I can assure you I am no figment of your imagination,” the voice said.

Riiiight… Ronnie thought. “Okay, just to humor myself I guess, who are you?”

“My name is Martin Stein, former Nobel Prize winner and the person who designed this power plant.”

“Okay, I know what’s happening. My subconscious is creating this due to me feeling guilty about not saving Professor Stein.”

“Son, I can feel what you feel and you don’t feel guilty about my ‘death’.”

“Yeah…alright… if you are really Martin Stein… prove it.”

“Are you serious? How do you expect me to do that, when you are obviously in control of our physical form?”

“I don’t know; say some physics stuff?”

“Christ, this is ridiculous…Okay ummmm… The starting point for most thermodynamic considerations are the laws of thermodynamics, which postulate that energy can be exchanged between physical systems as heat or work. They also postulate the existence of a quantity named entropy, which can be defined for any system. In thermodynamics, interactions between large ensembles of objects are studied and categorized. Central to this are the concepts of systems and surroundings. A system is composed…”

“Alright, I believe you. I’m not smart enough to know or make that stuff up.” Ronnie sighed. “So Professor, what’s happened to us?”

“I don’t know, son, but since I became conscious, images and information, all alien, have been flooding my head? Isn’t it coming into yours?”

“No it’s not. I’m just getting your voice, and my name is Ronnie. Calling me son all the time is getting irritating.”

“Ronnie… Ronald Raymond? You are the student that was supposed to interview me for the Hudson University newspaper?”

“Yeah, that’s me.”

“I expected someone interviewing a physicist to know something about thermodynamics.”

“Yeah, whatever...” Ronnie said. “We gotta find out what’s happened to us.”

“Agreed, but first we need to do something about the reactor that’s about to go critical.”

“What?”

“The reactor behind us, it’s about to go critical. We’ve been absorbing the nuclear energy radiating off of it, but it’s not fast enough. We have to do something about it.”

“What are we supposed to do, eat it?”

“Ronald, this is not the time for smart-aleck comments. We have to do something before we have another Chernobyl here in New York.”

“What’s Chernobyl?”

“You don’t know what Chernobyl is? God, I feel old.”

“Professor, this isn’t the time to reminisce. What can we possibly do to stop this from happening?”

“Just a moment Ronald… information is rushing into my mind at a rapid pace.”

“Professor, I’m not feeling so well,” Ronnie said, going down to one knee.

“We are at our saturation point in terms of absorbing the radiation and it’s beginning to have an adverse effect on us.” Alarms began to go off around the power plant, urging the non-existent personnel to evacuate the premises. “Ronald, change the Uranium into another substance.”

“How do I do that? Why don’t you do it?”

“If I could, don’t you think I would have?”

“So what am I supposed to do? Twitch my nose, say something backward or some kind of magic word?”

“Don’t be ridiculous Ronald. Just will it.”

“Will it?”

“Yes, Ronald, just will it.”

“Into what?”

“I don’t know… Lead maybe…”

“I guess that’s good. I mean, it’ll prevent Superman from seeing what a bunch of amateurs we are.” Ronald pointed his hand toward the reactor, but brought it down in frustration. “This is so stupid.”

“What’s wrong?”

“How am I supposed to just change it into lead? I don’t know what lead is made of?”

“Ronald, you should’ve done your homework in high school physics.” Professor Stein gave Ronnie any pertinent information needed on lead, atomic number, electron configuration, and arrangement of electrons in each shell, etc. Ronnie, feeling faint, extended his arm again and a bright orange cloud began to materialize from his hand, surrounding all of the Uranium in the reactor. The cloud began to condense around the nuclear material and penetrate it and in the blink of an eye all of the material turned into a grayish block of lead.

“Oh my God. I can’t believe that worked,” Ronnie said. “Do you think we can change my father’s Accord into an M3?”

“These powers aren’t supposed to be taken lightly, Ronald.”

“How did you know we could do that anyway?”

“All of this information is coming at me: things we can do, images of past lives, experience and wisdom that have come from beyond the limits of our scope of understanding… I’m surprised that none of the information has reached you.”

“Well, maybe each of us has control over different aspects… I mean, you don’t have control over any of the physical properties as of yet.”

“Excellent observation, Ronald, I think we need to get to one of my colleagues at the University and…”

“Hold on a minute, Professor,” Ronnie interrupted the voice in his mind. “Before you sign us up to become guinea pigs for the rest of our lives, we should probably get out of here before the police come and we become some part of some secret government project.”

“I suppose you’re right.” Ronnie began to walk towards the exit that the terrorists had used to escape. “Ronald?”

“Yes, Professor?”

“Perhaps we should do something about procuring some kind of clothing?”

“What?” Ronald looked at himself and was reminded that he was naked. “Right, well, can’t we make some?”

“I suppose so, but what?” Ronnie closed his eyes in thought and the same orange cloud that turned the uranium into lead surrounded his body and condensed around it. A yellow costume with red arms and leggings appeared around Ronnie’s body. An image that looked like a red sun with a white corona appeared over his heart and had six white lines originating at the symbol’s center going left and right across his chest and in every ordinal direction. On the three white lines going across the right side of his chest, each one had a red circle, one below his clavicle, one at his right pectoral and one on the right side of his abdomen.

“You have got to be kidding me?” Ronnie said, looking over his new outfit. “I look like a super-dork.”

“I don’t know why this design entered our subconscious, maybe it’s a standard issue…”

“A standard issue?” Ronnie interrupted the professor. “What are we, part of some intergalactic peacekeeping corps?”

“I don’t think so, Ronald, but we are a part of something; something that has existed before the beginning of sentient life in this universe, some kind of…”

“Professor?” Ronnie interrupted.

“Ronald, it’s not polite to keep interrupting people, even if they no longer exist in the physical realm and now only exist as a part of your consciousness…”

“But, Professor, who are those guys?” Ronnie pointed at the two identical brown-haired men in their thirties approaching them.

“Danton?” The Professor said in Ronnie’s head. “That’s my former assistant Danton Black.”

“So what’s he doing here with his twin brother?”

“That’s the odd thing, Danton was an only child.” The hands of both Danton Blacks began to become enveloped with the same orange cloud that Ronnie and Professor Stein used earlier.

“Help me.” both Dantons said at the same time, reaching out their hands to Ronnie/Professor Stein. Ronnie jumped back and shot his arm out, which glowed with a cackling yellow energy.

“Ronald, what are you doing?”

“I don’t know, but this situation is freaking me out.” Ronnie screamed as he now had both arms pointed at the incoming Dantons. “Maybe I should change him into a frog or something?”

“Ronald, I don’t have any information on the effect of our power on biological matter. It leads me to believe that we maybe cannot affect it.”

“We need to do something, Professor,” Ronnie screamed

“Help me,” both copies of Professor Stein’s former assistant said as they reached forward and grabbed the lapels of the new costume that the Professor and Ronnie had created for themselves. The orange glow from the hands of both Dantons quickly enveloped Ronnie’s body. Ronnie countered by grabbing both Dantons and enveloped them in his own orange glow. The feedback of the two conflicting forces caused an explosion that engulfed all three men…

Ronnie lost consciousness for only a few moments and, when he came to, he was shocked at what he saw. He was sitting on the floor of the reactor room leaning against a wall, dressed in the same clothes he had worn before the accident. Across from him, laying face down was Martin Stein, who was groaning in pain. Ronnie stood up and patted himself down, then pinched himself to assure himself of his existence. He looked to his left and saw Danton Black begin to move around. Ronnie looked around for the other Danton, but did not find him. Hearing sirens in the distance, Ronnie ran out of the Hudson Nuclear Power Plant and towards his home.

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Later in the evening…

“So I saw the explosion and I just ran,” Ronnie said, as the waitress placed a pitcher of beer on the table. Doreen Day, who was sitting on Ronnie’s lap and Jefferson Jackson, who was sitting across from them, both stared at him wide-eyed. Ronnie had stayed in his room for hours, waiting for the police or some superhero or secret government organization to come and take him away, but no one came.

“I’m so glad you’re okay,” Doreen said, leaning over to hug Ronnie, who had been her boyfriend since her junior year of high school at Bradley. They were typical high school sweethearts and had been each other’s firsts for many things. She wrapped her arms around his neck and rested her head on Ronnie’s shoulder. Ronnie got a whiff of the Pantene shampoo she used in her blonde hair, which was a smell he enjoyed.

“AA, you a wuss dawg,” Jefferson said as he poured another cup from the pitcher. Jefferson was a reserve on the Hudson Basketball team and Ronnie’s roommate. Jefferson was responsible for Ronnie’s nickname on the team, which was AA. AA stood for Affirmative Action, since at the time, Ronnie was the only white player on the team. Jefferson was the first person Ronnie met at Hudson and they quickly became very good friends and chose to room together.

“Yeah, like you would’ve done any different,” Ronnie shot back, throwing a crumpled up napkin at his friend.

“Man, I woulda ran right in there,” Jefferson said.

“Yeah right,” Ronnie replied as he snaked his arm around Doreen to grab his beer.

“Damn right I would. I’d probably getta superpower out of it.” Ronnie spit out his beer in a manner any Looney Tunes character would’ve been proud of.

“Dammit, Ronnie, you got beer on me,” Doreen complained.

“Sorry, baby,” Ronnie said, coughing a bit. “So, you think you’d be a superhero if you ran into that explosion?”

“Hell, yeah, dawg. Radiation has to be a big cause of superpowers,” Jefferson said. “Hopefully I’d become a mind-reader… help me with my game and get more lady-friends.”

“God, you’re such a pig, Jeffy,” Doreen said. She always called Jefferson Jeffy in honor of the Family Circus character. “Figures you’d be a super-sellout anyway.”

“Come on, Doreen,” Ronnie said. “No rants about superheroes.” Doreen was very anti-superhero, organizing petitions and attending rallies that protested their presence and demanded that cities end their reliance on them which inadvertently endorsed vigilantism, which she saw as the beginning of the end for society.

“Alright, Ronnie, but for spitting beer on me, you’re going to have to read my latest letter to the Mayor of Gotham City.”

“As long as I don’t have to hear it,” Ronnie said as Doreen smacked him in the back of his head.

“Man, that was cold as ice,” Jefferson said, finishing his beer. He grabbed his vibrating cell phone and read his new text message. “Well, lovebirds, I gotta go. Some fine-lookin’ honey is callin’ and Dr. Jackson makes house calls.”

“Alright, Bro,” Ronnie said, giving his roommate a hand pound. “I guess I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“No doubt, son,” Jefferson said. “Bye, Doreen,” he said in a mocking white accent.

“Bye, Jeffy,” Doreen said, mimicking the accent.

“So what do you want to do?” Ronnie said, putting his cup down on the table.

“Well, we know Dr. Jackson makes house calls, but what about Dr. Raymond?” Doreen said with a smirk.

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4 a.m. the next morning…

Ronnie left Doreen’s dormitory and began to walk towards his own which was across campus and housed mostly student-athletes. He looked down at the ground and began to think about what had happened earlier in the day at the Power Plant and how he was going to break it to Doreen, or even if he should, fearing how she might react with her anti-metahuman attitude. Both of them felt it was a matter of when, not if, they were going to get married, but this thing Ronnie had become might drive a wedge between them.

Well, Ronnie thought, [/i]it may have been a one time thing and have no long term effects, but if it isn’t… maybe if I don’t fight crime or anything, she’ll be cool about it. I should tell Jefferson first; he always gives good advice on these types of things…[/i]

Ronnie didn’t notice two disheveled-looking men walking up behind him. One grabbed him by his shirt collar and dragged him into an alley, throwing him against a dumpster. Both men pulled out guns and pointed them in Ronnie’s face.

“You know,” the taller one in a tattered trench coat began. His face was dirty and had a beard that looked like he hadn’t shaved in a couple of days. “We heard that college students are well off.”

“Yeah.” his partner said fidgeting a lot and shaking the gun in his hand. He was wearing a ski cap and his face was covered in acne.

“So we figured we’d ask a couple of you to donate to our ‘Help a brother out’ foundation.”

Ronnie didn’t know how it happened, but an orange cloud began to flow from his hands and swirl around his body. The cloud began to condense as beams of light came out of Ronnie’s eyes and mouth. In a burst of light, Ronnie Raymond no longer stood in front of the two derelict men that had tried to rob him. As their eyes began to refocus, they saw an red and yellow clad figure with fire blazing from his head and white, pupil-less eyes. He looked at the two men, and the fire on top of his head, and his eyes, began to glow with more intensity.

“Cool,” Ronnie said, clenching his fists.

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To Be Continued!

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