Chapter 3
Tommy really didn’t want to do this now that he was here. Standing on the treadmill, surrounded by Jean-Paul, Jeanne-Marie, and Lorna – each with stopwatches – he was very quickly reminded of the situation he’d been in before Billy and the others had saved him.
He really didn’t want to do this.
Well, not without help, anyway.
“Can someone get David?” he asked.
Jeanne-Marie nodded and zipped out of the room.
As Tommy went through the motions of breathing and stretching – the same stretches they’d had him do at the facility – he felt a narrow hand on his shoulders. He flinched and turned to see Jean-Paul’s worried gaze.
“Are you sure you’re okay with this, Thomas?” the man asked.
Tommy sighed and nodded, his mouth a grin filled with confidence that he didn’t feel in the moment. “Positive, JP! Now stop worrying, dude.” Hopefully, the “dude” comment would stun Jean-Paul into not asking any more questions.
Jeanne-Marie returned with David just in time. The two flew in swiftly and it only took David a few seconds to recalibrate his senses, which Tommy found impressive considering just how fast they were flying.
“What’s this about an experiment?” he inquired.
“We’re seeing how fast I can go,” Tommy replied.
David raised an eyebrow. “Are you gonna be okay?”
The white-haired speedster shrugged. “As okay as I can be.”
His boyfriend sighed, resigned and well aware of Tommy’s self-destructive tendencies. "Alright, but please stop us if you feel uncomfortable at any time. Okay?"
Tommy nodded. "Okay."
The experiments went about as well as Tommy expected – long periods of running on some superpowered treadmill with little results. Yeah, he'd gotten faster – topping out at 981 miles per hour – but nowhere near as fast as the others were expecting. He could tell that Jean-Paul was starting to get frustrated.
"I don't understand!" he exclaimed pacing. "He's as fast as Quicksilver, if not faster, but the numbers just don't add up!" His accent was coming on in full force, tainting his words with a thick Quebecois accent.
David hummed thoughtfully. "I think I have an idea." He rummaged around in one of the workbench drawers to pull out a few stop watches. He untangled the wrist straps and gave Tommy one, clutching the other in his hand. "Off the treadmill," he commanded. "We're doing something else."
"'Kay," Tommy replied, holding the device by his sternum as he fiddled with the buttons.
David grabbed his boyfriend's wrist lightly and held the watches up next to each other. "We're going to press 'start' at the same time and when we do, you're going to do a lap around the Boneyard with Northstar. Try to keep up with him, okay?"
"I'll try my best," the white-haired speedster said. Behind him, Northstar nodded his agreement to the experiment.
"Right." David counted down. "Three, two, one, go!"
The moment he said "go," the two speedsters shot off. David stared at his watch intently, not looking up even when the two speedsters blew through the lab, Tommy skidding to a halt before he could knock over an expensive and frankly important piece of equipment. David studiously clicked the "stop" button as soon as Tommy did.
"Fifteen seconds," David declared. "Not bad."
The look on Tommy's face was one of confusion. "What are you talking about?" he asked. "That wasn't fifteen seconds."
David smirked. "Okay, so what does your watch say, Tom?"
The speedster looked down at his watch. "Sixty-three seconds."
"I knew it!" The gleam in David's eyes brightened.
"Quoi?" Jean Paul asked.
"Tommy, you're warping time," David explained. "It's like you're slowing down everything around you instead of speeding yourself up!"
Tommy shook his head, not quite buying what David was telling him. "Then how do you explain the explosions? I make those by vibrating particles. And on the treadmill we could measure how fast I was going!"
David smiled at the speedster, a smile full of understanding. "Well, yeah. You're still a speedster, just a little extra special."
Tommy had just started understanding, excitement filling his body and soul at all the possibilities for his newfound powers, when Trevor burst in, Rachel hot on his heels.
"We've got it!" the blonde shouted.
"The soil analysis?" Polaris asked. "What's it say?"
Rachel responded, a frown twisting her lips down. "Some kind of foreign body. The chemical compound was similar to the stuff in husk eggs, only synthetic."
"So who could have made it?" Aurora inquired.
"Maybe X-Corp," Tommy offered. "They're pretty well-known for making chemical compounds like this."
"True," David agreed. "But how did this stuff get into our soil?"
Northstar crossed his arms. "That's something to ask them ."
Akihiro ran in at that exact moment, his brow furrowed. "We've got a problem."
"What? What's wrong?" his partner asked.
"The Five just called," he explained. "They've got zombies coming in from the Doctor's morgue."
Northstar hopped up and looked at the three youngest team members. "Suit up, we leave immediately."
Elixir did not look happy to see them. More specifically, he didn’t look happy to see Speed. He glared at him, even as he was slowly surrounded by zombified mutant corpses. Speed watched as his skin became a deep metallic black, his hands touching any zombie he could. He saw the once golden man maim the corpses, watching on in awe as the bodies bloated and swelled with organ failures.
“Speed!” Prodigy shouted, punching and kicking at any shambling corpses that strayed too close. “Focus!”
Right. Focus. He lifted a hand and aimed his pointer finger at a cluster of zombies away from any allies. He felt the particles around him and sent his quick vibrations through them to cause a massive explosion, bigger than any he’d made in the gardens. The resounding boom it created caused a light ringing in Speed’s ears – and likely in everyone else’s ears, too. Speed aimed at a different patch of zombies and was ready to set off another blast when a harsh hand gripped his arm. The glowing purple arm of Proteus was wrapped around Speed’s bicep, preventing him from doing any more damage to the corpses.
“What do you think you’re doing!?” the man asked, plasmic aura writhing furiously.
“Kicking ass,” Speed replied matter-of-factly. “What are you doing?”
Proteus hesitantly let the young superhero go. “No more explosions.” He narrowed his glowing eyes at Speed and gave him a gesture meant to mean he’d be watching the young speedster.
Fine, if he couldn’t blow them up from far away, he’d just do it from up close. Speed took off as fast as he could, now knowingly slowing down time as he went. One by one the zombies went down, each with their own personal explosion. The hoard of zombies was thinned out progressively as Speed, Akihiro, Polaris, Elixir, and Proteus each did their part in destroying. The last zombies were taken out by Speed and Elixir, the two boys practically ripping the bodies apart with explosions and organ failure. There were heaving chests and red faces all around.
“Who the hell set off that blast?” Hope asked, panting from exertion.
Akihiro answered, “That would be Speed.” He wrapped an arm around the speedster, jostling him. “Isn’t he awesome?”
Elixir scoffed. “If you call being a dangerous ex-con ‘awesome,’ then sure.”
Prodigy rolled his eyes and stomped over to his old friend. “Exactly how long are you going to hold this grudge?” He wrapped an arm around Speed’s newly vacant shoulder. “He saved you and all you can think to do is insult him!” The young man tugged the speedster closer to himself. “He lives on Krakoa, just like you and me and everyone else,” Prodigy stated. “You might as well get used to seeing him.” The sepia-toned male led his boyfriend away with their hands intertwined, leaving his old friend behind.
Northstar sighed as he watched the two go. He turned to Proteus, who still looked hesitant about the speedster and his newly introduced power of pyrotechnics.
“He’s a good kid,” the Quebecois superhero stated. “He has issues, yes, but he always does what is right. Please, just give him a chance.”
Trevor took the following awkward, contemplative silence as his cue to tell the Five about what they found in the soil sample analysis at the Boneyard. “We found this compound in the soil at the Boneyard. I’m betting it found its way into your soil too.”
“Any idea where it came from?” Egg asked. He was carefully studying the tablet Prestige was holding out to him.
“Speed thinks it came from X-Corp,” Northstar mentioned.
Elixir scoffed. “And why should we believe him?”
“I know you don’t like him,” Tempus began, “but he’s right to suspect them. They’ve done stuff like this before.” The woman looked to Northstar. “What should we do now?”
Northstar nodded, internally grateful for her professionalism. “We were going to go straight to Angel and ask if he knew what happened.”
“A good plan,” Hope commented. “Please, let us know what comes from it.”
“We shall,” Northstar replied.
Northstar had texted both Speed and Prodigy to meet them at X-Corp’s Krakoan headquarters. The rest of the group had barely gotten there themselves when a blur of green and yellow arrived, tumbling in a bundle of flailing limbs as they fell to a stop.
“We really need to work on that landing,” Prodigy commented, voice strained.
Northstar cleared his throat and the two sprung up instantly. He sighed and looked at the tall building with tired eyes. “Oh mon Dieu … Okay. Everybody knows the plan?” He scanned his team, noting everyone’s determined expressions. “ D’accord . I will lead, yes? Let’s go.”
The team burst through the doors, strutting past the secretary’s desk and into on of the many elevators. This one went all the way to the top floor, the same floor that housed Angel’s office. The blonde mutant’s personal secretary was there to greet them.
“Do you have a meeting scheduled?” she asked politely, though her smile was fake and strained with annoyance.
“Yes.” Northstar pushed past her before she could say anything else. He shoved the doors open and was met by Angel himself.
“X-Factor Investigations,” he greeted. “What a pleasant surprise! What can I do for you?” There was a strained grin on his face, as though he already knew why the team was there.
They told him about the incident at the Boneyard and in Dr. Reyes’s morgue. The strained grin took on a more pained look and it stretched further across his face until it finally turned into a firm grimace. The blonde mutant shook out his wings, ruffling his feathers. Tommy saw it as a sign of nerves.
“We’ll work on decontaminating the soil,” he promised.
Northstar raised a brow skeptically. “And how long will that take?”
“No more than a day or so.”
Back at the Boneyard, Tommy was back in the lab, this time with the entire team.
“What was it you needed to tell us?” Trevor asked.
Northstar spoke up from where he’d been leaning against a set of metal drawers. “We have some new information on Thomas’s powers. David?”
“Tommy here can’t run faster than 1,000 miles per hour,” David stated.
“Then how has he been getting around as fast as JP?” Rachel asked.
David grinned, looking awfully proud of his boyfriend. “He’s been warping time.” The man pulled out his tablet and started typing. “I believe that, with enough training, he can do other things to do with time.”
“Like time travel?” Trever asked, gasping in awe.
David shrugged. “Maybe. Or maybe he could stop time completely.”
Lorna put a pale hand on Tommy’s shoulder. “Maybe you should ask your mom about it.”
Tommy nodded, agreeing to at least think about it. In reality, he was excited. He hadn’t seen his mom in ages. And he couldn’t be more excited to finally have a reason to visit her again.