Grand Central Terminal, New York
Two thousand pounds of alien metal crash through the ceiling, and the Talos falls to the ground with the sound of a bomb.
Most of the windows are already in pieces, thanks to the recent near miss of a meteor, otherwise they would’ve exploded by now. Still, people are understandably freaking out and fleeing the scene.
Vesta flies in, passing through the hole left by the robot, saying nervously:
<I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to send it here…I was aiming for Central Park!>
<Hestia, daughter of Kronos. Do you claim this planet as your dominion?>
<My name’s Vesta now. Look, this world doesn’t belong to anyone, okay? Tell Hephaestus to choose another one or…>
Vesta hesitates, as the Talos walks towards her. The black and white robot is significantly heavier and taller than her.
<Or what?>
<Or…or we’ll…we’ll stop you> she answers timidly, visibly intimidated.
<Challenge accepted. Activating battle mode.>
The robot punches Vesta in the stomach, with enough force to be louder than an explosion. Vesta had braced for the impact, which is the only reason why she isn’t flying over to the next state.
Instead she kneels in pain, unable to do anything except attempting to breathe. It’s quite hard to do, even for a goddess, when your internal organs have been subject to a shockwave the size of a tsunami.
<You have been away for a long time, Hestia. Technology has caught up with the power of the gods: you cannot hope to defeat me.>
The Talos grabs Vesta by the hair, holding her steady for a second punch. This time even the ground shakes for the sheer force of the impact.
<What you are feeling is pain. You may not be familiar with it, dwelling in this primitive wasteland. You must have thought yourself invincible. You were mistaken. Let me show what invincibility really is.>
Another punch, this time right on the nose. And another one. And another one. When the robot stops, it leaves Vesta lying on the floor, curled up in pain.
<You can surrender now.>
<Go to Hades> Vesta answers, her body suddenly wreathed in flames.
The Talos takes a step back.
Vesta stands up, slowly and painfully, grinning her teeth. She’s hurt, but she doesn’t have a scratch.
<You think you can scare me? I’m the firstborn of Kronos the Harvester. I’m the older sister of the Lord of the Dead and the Supreme Ruler of the Universe. Tell Hephaestus what I’ve already told them: NOBODY touches Earth!!!>
Once again, Vesta shoots fire at the robot, but this is no ordinary fire. It burns so hot that the air turns into white hot plasma just by touching it. The floor melts, and it’s a good thing that civilians have already fled the scene, since anybody standing within ten feet of her would be burned alive.
Luckily for him, Quantum appears in holographic form.
<Sorry I’m late.>
<You move at the speed of light, how can you be late!?>
<Had to stop a dozen car accidents and a couple of robberies. People will take any excuse to steal stuff, won’t they? Blackouts, crazy robots…Hey, what’s up with the giant barbecue?> he asks, pointing at the sphere of flame right in front of him
<Oh, that. Turns out I’m too hot to handle.>
<Is that why you’re on fire?>
<Sorry. It happens when I’m upset> she answers, making the flames surrounding her body disappear.
Quantum turns back to flesh and blood, giving her a puzzled look.
<What?>
<How come you still have clothes? Shouldn’t they burn when you do that?>
Vesta is even more puzzled than him, looking at herself. Her orange tube top and jeans are still perfectly in shape.
<I have no idea. How can you turn yourself and your clothes into energy?>
<How am I supposed to know? You’re the one who gave me super-powers. Hey, do you mind turning down the heat just a little bit here?>
The sphere of fire is still burning. Vesta simply wills it to vanish, and the fire disappears leaving only a trail of black smoke rising to the roof.
And a Talos.
<Oh cραπ> she exclaims. Suddenly, her stomach starts to hurt again.
<This body is composed of neutral matter, capable to withstand the heat and pressure of star cores. You cannot harm me.>
<That…that was my best shot>– Vesta admits.
Quantum smiles, cracking his knuckles.
<I’ve got this.>
He turns his body into a laser, shooting right at the Talos’ visor. It’s a sound strategy, since it’s the only spot not protected by its indestructible shell, but Vesta whishes she had the time to discourage him.
Max Black alias Quantum doesn’t really have much experience with his energy transformations; in fact, he’s only been able to do it for a few days.
His senses take a completely different form once he’s no longer composed of matter. He just feels other things, some sort of instinct; he’s already learned to associate certain feels to certain types of energy, but the robot’s power core is completely alien to him.
There’s something inside its core that defies his senses. It’s placed in his chest, where a human heart would be, and it’s constantly generating new power.
Max tries to overload it, merging with the energy which is already there. He finds himself absorbed by the veins of power that run through the robot’s body, then sucked back into his visor, until he’s finally released.
All of this takes a microscopic fraction of a second. From Vesta’s perspective, the Talos simply looks up and releases a massive energy blast towards the roof.
“That’s a cheapshot!!!” Max protests, without a voice to shout. Right now he’s just a stream of photons, a living laser running straight towards the vacuum of space.
“Well this sucks. I can’t slow down, at all. Why can’t I slow down? Maybe that’s because I’m in space…I think. I can’t see anything when I’m made of light. I don’t even know how I’m able to think! Okay Max, calm down. You just need to change into something else”.
He tries to turn himself into a different wavelength, with no success. Then he tries electricity, then radio waves, but without success: he’s stuck in light form.
“Don’t panic. Once I reach the Moon or some planet I’ll be able to bounce back. Unless there’s nothing in my path, in which case I can go on forever. Right. This may be the best time to panic after all, now, wouldn’t it? No! I have to keep thinking! Why can’t I change? What’s different from before? I’m in space, and most of this energy isn’t mine. It’s from the robot! As long as I’m in the middle of this light stream, I can’t turn into anything but light! Which means…”
Time passes. Not much, but even in a second light can shoot past the Moon.
“Which means I’m screwed. I can’t move, I can’t turn into energy, what can I do? What would Captain Marvel do?”
Then he understands. In the blink of an eye Max Black is in space, flesh and blood.
The light that came from the robot continues its flight into infinity. Max doesn’t stay in human form for long, for obvious reasons, but he’s now free to come back to Earth.
Ten seconds later, he lands on the collapsed roof of Grand Central Terminal, where Vesta is rising the ruins shaking pieces of bricks from her hair and giving him a dirty look.
<I don’t got this> he admits.
While all this is going on, Noriko Null is busy dismantling the radio inside one of the police cars wrecked by the Talos. Not an easy task, since she didn’t bother to take any instruments with her.
A man in his early forties is looking at her expertly fidgeting with wires.
<Kid, we’ve managed to clear the street; we can get you home now.>
<This will only take another couple of minutes, officer O’Malley> she answers, without caring enough to look at him as she keeps working.
<You are unusually cooperative>– she adds.
<What?>
<I am dismantling your car. I was expecting the need to explain why, but you don’t seem to mind.>
<You look like you’re the only person around here who understands what’s going on.>
<Of course; I am Null. I know everything.>
O’Malley puts an hand on her shoulder, causing her to look him in the eye for the first time.
<That robot is dangerous, kid. If you know anything about it…>
<It decoded human language in a matter of seconds; I plan to use that against it. If you let me finish, I may be able to do it before more people die.>
<Okay, I’ll buy it. What the heck are you talking about?>
Noriko sighs.
<It was on the Internet one minute after it happened. When the Talos landed, it didn’t speak English. It just grabbed a phone, connected to the web, and learned the language. This means its artificial intelligence is able to process vast amounts of data in a fraction of a second; I can use this to shut it down.>
<How?>
<Exposing it to an highly complex mathematical formula…an arithmetic description of a paradoxical geometric design. Its mind will try to decode it, diverting more and more processing power into spawning an infinite number of anomalous solutions until its mind is overloaded.>
<And you’re planning to do it…with this?>
<No. This is to get its attention> Noriko answers, turning the radio on.
When she talks, her voice is amplified a thousand times by every single radio in the city, talking at the same time as loud as possible.
<ROBOT. I CHALLENGE YOU FOR THIS WORLD.>
His ears still ringing, O’Malley looks at Noriko. Her silver eyes are shining, meaning she’s devoting a significant part of humanity’s knowledge to fixing the problem.
<That’ll get its attention. Do you have a pencil and a sheet of paper? I need to write down the formula before the Talos kills me.>
Discussion ¬