Archangel

Chapter 10

Nyx followed Johnny to the lab, her brother had decided to start the testing once Sue had woken up which meant waiting a few days. At the moment he was collecting data on Ben and Sue's powers but had called them down to test them.

            "What do you think he's going to make us do?" Johnny asked.

            She shrugged. "Use our powers."

            "Don't try killing me." He joked. "I prefer my blood to be moving like normal."

            Nyx smirked. "Then don't make me mad."

            "Did you kill Victor? I haven't noticed you sneaking out."

            The mood changed abruptly. "No, I'm sure it would be on the news if he died... and if you noticed me leaving why didn't you rat me out like the snitch you are?"

            "Because I was sneaking out to have fun." Johnny replied casually.

            They walked in and Reed looked away from the others' results, some of his papers were scattered across the room and Reed himself had a look on his face like he was hiding something painful.

            "What happened here?" Nyx asked as she looked around. "Don't tell me you made Ben go off on a Hulk rampage."

            "No some testing just got a little out of hand." Reed told her in a higher pitch than usual.

            Johnny started laughing and Reed glared at him, "What... what happened to your voice?"

            "Just get in the fire proof chamber." Reed commanded.

            Nyx turned to the computer screen to see what was going on, from where she was standing flames were only coming out of the vents. The temperature readout on the computer though showed the flames going from 2000 then jumping to 4000, when she glanced back at the chamber she saw it was glowing red. Curious about how all the water in his body didn't just evaporate she concentrated on trying to find his blood, it was like she could feel it burning, never hurting but still burning. For a millisecond she thought the water in his blood had been replaced with fire but then realized that would mean he couldn't be near water at all. Nyx stopped concentrating and let out a faint gasp of relief, she hadn't even noticed that her own blood felt as if it had started to boil or that Reed was now yelling at Johnny.

            Johnny's response came from inside. "I can still go hotter!"

            "That wouldn't be a good thing." Reed muttered to himself as he made the fire extinguisher go off inside the chamber.

            Johnny came out steaming and covered in the white foam while glared at Reed. "You are really cramping my style you know that?"

            "I could probably find some water to dump on him." Nyx whispered to her brother. "Maybe that would cool him off."

            Reed didn't answer but a small smile appeared on his face. Sue came over from where she'd been watching with Ben. "You were at 4000 Kelvin. Any hotter, you're approaching supernova-"

            "Sweet." Johnny interrupted.

            "That's the temperature of the sun."

             Reed decided to explain to Johnny what that meant. "Not only could you kill yourself, but you could set fire to Earth's atmosphere and destroy all human life as we know it."

            "Okay. Got it, supernova is bad." Johnny replied still smiling like an idiot.

            Nyx patted him on the shoulder and Johnny winced in pain as more steam rose off him, she ignored it. "Good to know we have an idiot who can essentially kill all of us."

            "Watch who you call an idiot Water Girl, other wise I might just evaporate you." Johnny laughed.

            Nyx turned around to make him think she gave up, then hit him in the face with her wing. Reed saw where this was going and decided to put a stop to it. "Okay Nyx... your turn."

            "What am I going to do?" She asked.

            Ben sat a bucket of water in front of her and Reed explained. "I want you to boil that, freeze it, and try to manipulate it."

            "Fun." Nyx muttered. "Do I get to fly around?"

            "After this."

            Nyx heard Johnny complain about something but concentrated on the water in front of her, she let anger course through her and watched as the water began to boil a little, thinking of more things she didn't like it began to steam. Then to make ice she calmed down and thought of things that worried or scared her, which was harder, she didn't really know what she was scared of and it was in human nature to hide their fears. Then she remembered what she had done to Sue and how worried she'd been, the water froze quickly after that. Reed nodded his approval and she unthawed it, manipulating the water was easy, all she had to do was concentrate on what she wanted it to do and it bent to her will.

            "Okay I want you to fly around the building as fast as you can." Reed instructed as he put a monitor on her wrist. "This will track your speed."

            Nyx left the building and took off, deciding that flying around the Baxter Building would take too long to build up speed she just flew off to circle the entire city. Her monitor went from ten to 700 in less than five seconds, then a thought crossed her mind: how would she stop? To see how fast she could stop she spread them straight out, wincing as the wind slammed into them at full force, but it did stop her completely. Nyx flew back to the Baxter Building at a slower speed so she didn't crash into the building itself and saw Reed still looking at the computer.

            "I told you around the building." Reed lectured.

            Nyx shrugged. "You still have your data, anything else you want me to do?"

            Reed hesitated. "I want you to use your blood bending to spar against Johnny and Ben."

            "Are you sure...? Sue, remember what happened?"

            "Just be careful."

            Nyx turned to face her opponents and focused on knocking Johnny out of the way first, when she locked onto the water in his blood she waved her hand to the side and sent him into a wall. Johnny groaned and caught fire to retaliate but was sent flying into the opposite wall, this time he stayed there dazed. Doing that to Ben however was impossible, Nyx tried to locate any water in him but there was nothing, almost like he didn't have any blood. She barley managed to dodge when he charged at her like a freight train, then she decided to actually use water around her to attack, she found the water vapor in the air around her and started to use that to form actual water and sent it into Ben's face to blind him temporarily. What she didn't expect was the nausea that followed, she swayed in the air before her wings stopped and she crashed into the floor, the lab around her turned into a bright light before everything went black.