The blissful state of sleep was ripped away from me no more than just 2 hours later by the blasted alarm clock that was just begging to be smashed apart by me. It is lucky I am a reasonable man and know when to spare lives and when to take them, and for now it is still useful to me.
Reluctantly, I climb out of bed to get started with another day. Following me, Gali and Jeff also rise from their slumber. I take a shower, brush my teeth and get some food made quickly. Since I don't have anything special for Jeff, yet, I just make 12 scrambled eggs and throw it on a plate for him before turning on the TV for the day in case he wants to watch and leave the apartment.
Gali assured me he'll be fine by himself, and while I'm skeptical, I'm forced to trust that.
Like me, Gwen is also pretty tired, more so mentally from almost dying, but she is hell of a lot better than me. It looks like the beating she took has mostly healed thanks to her healing factor, outwardly, you wouldn't be able to tell she'd been in a fight last night.
On a rare occasion, George was also home at this time and decided to take us both to school.
"So, what's got you both so tired? Usually the both of you are much more morning people than me, but that claim is hard to believe even for me seeing you right now." He asked when we all climbed into his car. He had evidently noticed our lack of sleep and didn't want to let us sleepwalk our way to school.
"Spent the day studying for the mid-terms coming up and then played some video games." Gwen answered quickly, as if she had already made up an excuse beforehand, expecting such a question. Good going.
"Mmm, studying is good." George says sternly before becoming smug. "Just remember, if you're doing any other kind of winding down, use protection."
"Dad!" Gwen yelled, waking up from her half asleep state. "Can you not be like that so early in the morning?"
"What? I'm just joking around with you two. You should hear about what me and your mom got up to back in our heyday…"
"I really don't want to hear that." Gwen muttered, slumping back down in the car seat.
I know when to be quiet and appear like a ghost. If I speak now, I will undoubtedly become the next target of George's teasing, so I will channel my inner Drax. As the two speak, I drown out their conversation and stare out the window at the city.
The traffic was pretty normal for an early morning in New York. Lots of cars, people rushing to get to work, sirens in the distance cause there is always an emergency somewhere… little green creatures running around causing property damage and chasing people down… wait what was that last one?
I snap out of my thoughts and notice we were fully stopped on the road along with many other vehicles, some were trying to hit the gas and get out of here in a panic, but there was barely any room to move unless they rammed other cars out of the way. Had I dozed off there due to my lack of sleep? Maybe, but the creatures were very much real and had put a stop to us and everyone else.
With a click, George locked the doors. The man was, surprisingly, calm in this situation. A stark contrast to Gwen who was leaning in-between her door and the looking out the rear window at the creatures in worry. I could tell she was considering going out and helping people right now, despite the fact that she had no costume or probably even her web slingers with her.
"Just keep your head low and sit tight. Just another day and another attack by Mole Man." George says, sliding down his chair to make himself smaller, just as he had guided us to do. "This is going to make you late for school, I hope your teacher accepts being delayed by super villains as a reasonable excuse."
"He will." I say, sliding down my chair and grabbing hold of Gwen's shoulder to pull her down as well. No need to be heroic here, I can already see the people coming to handle things as we speak.
Gwen calms down and her breathing steadies as I pull her down into the seat beside me. One of the ugly green creatures runs past her window just as I do, stopping beside the taxi diagonally in front of us, beginning to rock it back and forth violently as the woman inside screams her lungs out. Fair reaction, really.
"Stay calm, they are cowards and run away easily." George mutters calmly. "With the four here, they usually don't stick around for long."
"Usually?" I echoed. "That's comforting."
A sudden crackle fills the air, a strange hum of a vehicle up above, followed by a voice amplified for everyone to hear.
"Hey Harvey, can you not mess up the Queens before breakfast?"
All heads, including the monsters', tilted upward toward the voice. A second later, long stretchy blue noodles wrap around dozens of cars on the street, lifting them high off the ground seconds before a living bulldozer runs through the street, absolutely wrecking all the creatures in its way.
"IT'S CLOBBERING TIME!"
Chunks of cracked pavement flew up into the air and clanked against the sides of buildings and the bottoms of cars as The Thing barreled through. His giant orange rock body did not slow down by even a little no matter how many creatures he hit and grabbed with him as he kept running. You could feel the shockwaves even while being tied up in the air by Mr Fantastic's noodle limbs.
As The Thing kept running, vehicles in front of him were lifted and those he had passed were put back down, gently, causing no damage to the cars. We were barely up for a few seconds before being placed back down on the now cracked pavement.
"Oh wow, is that…" Gwen whispered, looking out the window with stars in her eyes.
"Yep." I replied. "The Fantastic Four. I've only seen them on the TV."
And in comics, but I won't mention that.
High above us, Reed Richards floated in midair, his body stretched out between all the buildings, warping in unnatural ways as if he was a sentient, moving, zip line. Somehow, not a single thing he did caused any property damage, not as much as a dent. Almost as if he was carefully calculating every move he made.
"It always amazes me how cleanly they handle stuff," George says from the front seat, peeking over the steering wheel.
The creatures that were not already grabbed and brought along by The Thing's momentous charge began to panic and scatter. The smarter ones burrowed underground, but the majority ran around like headless chickens.
One would think this meant they would be a pain to clear up later as they all scatter, but pretty quickly it became apparent that they were being guided along in a planned, invisible maze. Instead of spreading out like cancer, they had grouped up into a dozen smaller spaces where they would not be able to escape from as fire rained down upon them from high up in the air.
Despite the windows being closed, the air in the car soon smelled terrible as the creatures caught in Invisible Woman's trap were burned to ash by the Human Torch's flames.
The majority of the threat had been cleared up in a few quick moves, just like that.
Then came the thudding. Rhythmic and steady. From right below the street, it moved quickly, causing a trail to form behind it as the pavement was pushed up everywhere it moved. Finally, just a little ways away from us, a large metal platform unearthed itself from the ground.
And atop it stood the man himself, short, stout and fully clothed in green with his dumb little goggled and oversized cloak.
"This city will tremble before the might of-"
"Mole man." came the dry interruption of Reed Richards, his voice still amplified by tech as he slingshotted between buildings, heading toward the villain.
The Human Torch was flying lazily above the metal platform, leaving a trail of glowing embers in the sky. He did not look super impressed or happy to be here. More like me and Gwen, as he was still half asleep and just going through a routine.
"I Shall bind the surface in chains of dar-" Mole man shouted, only to vanish mid-rant as the platform he stood on shook violently upon being hit by a massive orange fist at its base. The vibrations from the hit were enough to cause the man to lose his footing and fall down.
"You were saying?" Ben Grimm's booming voice could be heard even without being amplified by tech. He was standing proudly at the bottom of the metal platform, which had a deep fist sized dent in it.
"So much for the dramatic speech…" I couldn't help but mutter, causing George to lightly laugh.
"Yeah, this is how it usually goes. I've seen it plenty of times in my line of work. Honestly have to admire the persistence of him to keep trying." He says. "I would have given up by now if I was in his shoes."
"You good there, big guy?" The Human Torch said to the Thing as he swooped in low. It was hard for me to catch his exact words, but it was something like that. We had managed to get a good view of the action as Mole Man unearthed himself fairly close to our car, but not right underneath us. Should I consider that lucky?
"Like squashing bugs." The Thing replied, plucking Mole Man, who was now more dazed than dangerous, up by the hem of his cloak. "Say hi to Riker's for me, ya mole-faced punk."
Above, Reed snapped his body back into a human shape, as if he hadn't just covered most of the sky and lifted hundreds of tons of vehicles. "Crisis solved. Let's clean up and get out of here."
At his words a strange flying car came down from the sky, picking up Reed, Invisible Woman and The Thing, as Mole Man was thrown in Johnny's seat, probably to be taken to prison. Johnny himself would be left to fly along with them in the sky.
As The Fantastic Four Mobile or whatever it was called took off, he drew a flaming 4 in the sky before they all disappeared into the distance.
"Honestly, that was kind of… fantastic" I say, watching them leave. They were like a machine, precise, fast, and practiced. Minimal damage and, from what I could tell, no civilian casualties.
Gwen had also very clearly been influenced by the spectacle, as she leaned in and whispered. "I'm gonna be like them one day."
Slowly, the traffic began to once again move. We would be late for school but considering the circumstances they better accept the excuse. The only one who was sighing was George.
"And I was hoping for a more relaxing day for once. No doubt some are gonna try to take advantage of the chaos caused, and it will be another long day."
"Is there ever a relaxing day in your field of work?" I ask, remembering almost no occasions where his job could be called even remotely relaxing. At least ever since superpowered individuals started appearing more often.
"Hey, there is always hope. The past week, we have had this masked independent detective helping us clean up case after case at lightning speed." George says, focusing on avoiding the larger potholes that were formed by The Thing during the fight. "Calls himself Mister Knight, very weird guy but gets the job done and allows me to go home earlier, so I'm not complaining."
***
Author Note: Sorry for the late chapter today. The Oblivion remaster caught me fully off guard and consumed my time. I'm diving right back in. Tomorrow might be late too.