Return Of The FF, Pt. I: Comings And Goings!

CHAPTER TWO: THROUGH THE OPEN DOORWAY

In walked the living pile of animated orange rock which they all knew as…

"The prodigal son returns!" Peter said wryly.

"Uncle Ben!" Jade exclaimed.

"The ever-lovin' blue eyed Thing is back!" Announced Jon Prophet, bounding out of his chair and giving the senior member of the New Fantastic Four a hug.

"Hey git yer mitts offa me, yer gonna ruin my cigar!" Ben said gruffly. He was fooling nobody. He was glad to be back, glad to see there were people who were glad to SEE him back.

Both Petr and Jon assaulted Ben as soon as he got in the room, but Jade hung back shyly. Ben noticed. "Hey you," he said to Jade, "what no hugs for yer Uncle Benjy?"

John and Peter looked embarrassed. Jade gave him a quick, self-conscious hug. "Awright," Ben said, "what gives, you two?"

It was Jade who spoke up. "These two jerks were giving me a hard time about my coming up here all the time. They said it was to see you." Jade blushed again.

"Naw?" Ben said, but sounded less confident than he should have. He scratched his noggin, as if the thought never occurred to him. She was after all about half his age. The two of them looked at each other's eyes for a moment, then quickly looked away. They found themselves for the first time feeling awkward around each other.

"Um, so how's everything been?" Ben asked, recovering his momentum.

Peter's tone became accusing. "Hey, did you tell somebody we were on a recruitment drive before you disappeared on me?"

Ben was taken aback. "No, not at all. I wanted to do this as soon as I got back. Calling up people, doing the personal touch thing…why?"

"Well," Peter said, "It's been off the hook ever since you left. All kinds of people showing up from out of nowhere - you sure you didn't tell anybody?"

"I told you, and I mentioned it to the guy I wanted to recruit for this, but that's it."

"Nobody else?" Peter said, incredulously.

"Nobody," Ben insisted. He recapped the events of that morning. "I went from here, to the mail room, saw…hey that's right, I saw Mr. Lumpkins, the mail man. I told him that if anything came for any other heroes at this address not to send it back, that there might be new people taking up residence…" Ben became indignant. "DAGNABBIT!! Do you think he might have taken this as a scoop to one of the local rags, or told somebody who told somebody who did?"

"I don't know," Peter analyzed. "It could have been that, or perhaps somebody overheard you talking to Mr. Lumpkins. Oh well, what's done is done," Peter reasoned.

Ben became curious. "So who have we had show up?" He asked.

"Well let's see," Peter said dryly. "THIS morning's memorable entries so far have to have been Captain Zero and Too Much Coffee Man."

" 'Too Much Coffee'…? You're kidding, right?" Ben Grimm looked at Peter Parker, saw he wasn't cracking a smile. He turned to John Prophet, who was. "He's kidding, right?"

"Nope." Prophet confirmed. "I was here, eavesdropping most of the morning. We had one guy show up who thought he would be great for the new team because he had a flaming head."

"Who? Ghost Rider? I've worked with him before."

"Firestorm."

"Never heard of 'im."

Ben considered Jon Prophet. "How's it going, Jon? I don't think we've met. You worked with Pete before. You had some issues to work out, last I heard."

"That's right, but everything's working out right as rain."

"Glad ta hear it." The Thing plopped down on one of the reinforced couches next to Jade. "Boy, am I pooped."

"Where did you go?" Peter inquired of the Thing.

"Up north," Thing answered, "near Canada. Tried to find a guy I used to know back when I was a pilot. One of the best. I'd heard he was available. He was, but he wasn't interested in working with me."

Peter asked delicately. "One of those variant-memory things?"

Ben couldn't avoid answering. "Yeah, something like that."

"Sorry to hear it," Peter replied.

"Me, too," Ben responded. "But I don't blame 'im. It's like being prejudiced against, then waking up one morning and all that animosity was gone. I wouldn't want to risk undoing that either."

Peter Parker and John prophet didn't really understand what Thing was walking about, but they let it go. They understood in theory what he meant.

Ben Grimm turned to Jade. "So, kiddo, tell me - what's new?"

"We got back from the JLE a couple of months ago. I'm not sure if I mentioned that the last time I was here when you were around."

"Adam Strange's adopted planet, right?"

"That's right." Jade congratulated. She knew about Thing's variant memory problems, knew that a lot of the history she took for granted he had had to learn over the past few months. She placed a hand on his forearm as encouragement.

Ben Grimm smiled. She continued speaking. "It was a chaotic situation, but we assisted the local authorities in getting the situation under control.

Peter turned to John Prophet "Jeez, she even talks like a cop.

Jade shot them a dagger of a look. "ANYWAY," she began emphatically, "after that I took some time for myself. Try to see how my father and brother were doing. I came back around right after you left. This makes my first time back since then. Pete's right - he has been going out of his head over here. It's become like the latest gossip-column thing - who's been here, how they fared, who's in the running, who's hot, and who's not. Tabloid nonsense."

"That's what all the news is these days, anyway. There are barely any legitimate independent resources out there anymore." Thing griped.

"You should try the internet." Peter whispered under his breath.

Prophet heard him. "Oh yeah, you can always believe everything you see on the net," He said sarcastically.

"More choices, that's all." Parker replied.

"So how have YOU been?" Ben asked Jade. "Not what have you done or how everybody else is doin', but how YOU are doin'? How about it, kiddo?"

"It's been… tough," Jade answered truthfully, after a moment. "My father is distant. Mr brother is a mystery to me, and I suspect to himself as well."

"I've been doing this for most of my life, Ben. I take things seriously, perhaps TOO seriously. You've been doing this all your life, too. I wonder how you do it sometimes."

"I never thought about it," Thing said candidly. "I was always among friends, family. Heck, even the enemies came around so often THEY even seemed like family sometimes."

"Now all of that is gone," Ben said. "The only memories I can trust as being shared are those that have happened since the heroes of THIS world helped to find Reed and me and the others in this other-dimensional Earth where we found ourselves. I was free, but when I came back, I discovered that my memories were at odds with most of those around me. That was the case with the person I contacted about joining. He didn't know me, didn't remember me, and therefore didn't trust me."

Ben looked directly in Jade's eyes. As literally rough as he was on the outside, his eyes belied his inner warmth and sensitivity. "That's why I like it when you come around Jade," he said. "You're the last bit of family I got left."

"Ahem," said Peter, embarrassed. "Ben, I think you have company."

The short, stout, powerfully-built Canadian man in his Dolce & Gabana shirt, Pierre Cardin pants and hand-sewn Italian shoes looked at the man he didn't claim to know and said:

"Mr. Grimm, I've reconsidered your offer."

Jon Prophet was at attention, Peter Parker was wary, Jade was apprehensive; the three of them looked on as Ben Grimm approached the undersized agent.

"Welcome aboard, Logan."

There was barely time for the offer to sink in as the room erupted in a flash of light. Prophet flashed his sword, Logan bristled with weapons, and Jade had constructed an defensive emerald shield around them. The Thing opened his mouth. He recognized the source of the (now-dissipating) light. "Lockjaw!" He exclaimed.

***

Interlude

Iron boots rang out once again in the ancient stone castle of the former King of Latveria. Slowly, purposefully, he walks to the dungeons of the castle. He unlocks one of only two locked doors in the entire castle. He entered the jail cell. All around the castle, robot servants, guardians, automatic diplomats and AI-programmed heads of industry, ran about performing their duties without incident. In the jail cell, the presumed-dead head of state looked at the four corpses in the cell. "Soon," he whispered in his hollow voice behind the metal helmet. "Soon, the world will come to know about the death and rebirth of the Fantastic Four!"

Don't be. More will be explained next issue.

Be here for Part Two of "The Return Of The Fantastic Four!" The Invisible Man joins Mr. Fantastic, The Thing, Jade, John Prophet, Logan…and one more! Wait, that's more than Four! Oh, well!