"Can I come with you guys?" Peter asked Stark as he led me to the elevator.
"I guess. Suit up first, and don't just barge in. It could end very badly."
"Where are we going?" I asked.
"We have some people for you to meet," Stark explained.
He and I watched Peter's suit literally unfold from his bracelet.
"New invention." Peter smiled, holding the mask in his hands.
"Did you cut it up to do that?" Stark asked.
Peter frowned. "Pfft, no."
"Great. I spent a full four days working on that!" He exclaimed.
"Will someone please tell me what the fuck is going on?" I asked.
"Woah, there will be no swearing around them." Stark glared at me.
"Fine. Tell me what's going on. And what the fuck happened."
"Alright-" He groaned, leaving the elevator. We were on the conference floor.
"Mr. Stark-" Peter slid his mask over his face. "Don't you think you should prepare her a little bit?"
"I don't have time." He pushed open the first door, entering a large room. There was the basic table in the middle, with six people sitting around it. I didn't recognize any of them, though they all had a slight familiarity with them.
The first one, a girl with dark brown wavy hair, and a soft brown skin tone sat closest to me. She looked very confused, and also very tired. Next to her, was a pale girl with long blonde hair, a scowl on her face, and her arms crossed. Then there was a boy with small eyes and spiky black hair. After that, was a girl with shoulder-length brown hair, and her hair was slightly darker at the tips like it was burnt. The last two were boys, one with a black floppy middle part, and the other with mousy brown hair, that looked like he just woke up. The only similarity between them all was they all had the same hospital gowns I was in before I changed upstairs.
"Um-" I looked at Stark. Peter hadn't come in yet.
"Everyone, this is Max. More well known as number one." Stark announced. "Max, sit there." He nodded to the seat next to the last boy, the one with messy brown hair.
"What's going on?" I asked. "Who are all these people?"
"Max, sit down. No one here knows each other." He explained.
I frowned but sat down.
"Everyone," Stark began. "I am Tony Stark. There's a lot to talk about today."
"Are you the one who saved us?" The dark brown-haired girl asked.
"Hold on," Stark muttered. "Uh, as you all see, you're all in the same situation."
They all looked at me, who wasn't dressed anything like them.
"You all came from a sub-group of HYDRA workers." He stood up. "You each were tested on as children, under extreme care and supervision. The facilities working on you all were very bad and went against HYDRA themselves-"
"Hold on, hold on." The boy with the black floppy hair interrupted. "What's hydra?"
"It's a very, very bad organization," Stark said. "Assuming you guys know all of what Max was taught when she was first here, you all know how to read and write, and speak, right?"
Everyone nodded.
"Perfect." He smiled. "I can't exactly brush over the traumatic parts of all of your guys' backstories, because you all had the same ones. You were all kidnapped as children, born with strange genetic mutations, whether physical or mental. The sub-group of HYDRA took you all and raised you. Then, a few months ago, HYDRA found out about you all. And HYDRA didn't like it."
Someone shuffled their feet under the table.
"From our knowledge, HYDRA took you all exactly four weeks ago and removed any mutations you guys had. So now, there was nothing unique about any of you. Then, they began pumping you with kill methods, believing that if they were to harm you enough, your bodies would create a non-human way to counteract the life-threatening treatment, and thus create superhumans."
"I know him." The pale blonde girl pointed to the boy with floppy black hair. "You said we didn't know each other, but I know him."
"Yeah, they had us train together." The boy added. "Three and Six."
"What's that supposed to mean?" I asked.
"What?" The boy looked at me over the boy in between us.
"The numbers." I frowned.
"What do you mean, numbers. You've got one, I think." He held up his arm, which was uncovered, thanks to the hospital gown. There were three numbers tattooed on his left wrist. 006.
"What the f-" I caught myself. "Uhh."
The blonde girl raised up her arm, showing a number three.
Slowly, the rest of the group picked themselves off the table and showed me their arms. They were lined up by number order at the table, two through seven.
I looked at my own wrist, to find 001 written on it.
"Oh, what the actual fu-"
"Max!" Stark shouted.
"When was this here?" I exclaimed. "I don't remember getting a tattoo."
"They gave it to you a few days ago." He explained.
"Then why does it look fully healed?"
"That is another thing to talk about." He cleared his throat. "Anyways, to continue the story. Hydra experimented on you kids for three and a half weeks, Max, you only had two days. Then-"
"She had two days?!" The boy with black spiky hair shouted. "How does that make any sense-"
"Calm down," Stark muttered. "She was taken away from the facility three months ago. Then ran away, where HYDRA captured her again. She had the largest mutation, so somehow, she was more susceptible to the treatment. We don't know how, or why."
"So-" I muttered. "I only experienced a tiny bit of what they had?"
"She got out of it?" The boy continued. "Seriously? Her?" He was shouting, and I was covering my ears. "That's not fair at all!"
"Sit down," Stark ordered. "I was unaware of other facilities, and I would've taken you all if I had known."
"Oh, so she got special treatment, just because you didn't know?" He exclaimed. "We didn't deserve that-"
"I am fully aware of that fact!" Stark shouted. "Now sit down and stop interrupting."
The boy sat down.
"It was only two days ago that we realized there were more kids like Max," Stark said. "We infiltrated the building you guys were kept in and killed everyone there. We took everyone out and left. Then, we were stuck assessing everyone. We don't know what went down in the base, but we do know that you all have changed greatly, and we need to all work together and figure out how."
I clenched my fists as the lights flickered again. "Stark, fix your lights, for the final time."
"Max, I need to have a private conversation with you outside." He said. "Come on." He motioned for me to get up, then left the room.
"Oh my god." I pulled myself to my feet, annoyed at having found the most comfortable position ever, then being forced to move.
He shut the door behind us. Peter was in the hallway.
"Look, Max, you need to shut up about the lights!" He muttered. "I've got a few working theories about you, and it most definitely involves the lights. You need to sit down and listen, just like every other scared, confused, and tired kid in that room for the next hour, then you can leave."
"Mr. Stark-" Peter added.
"Fine," I said.
"What?" He looked at Peter, who was staring at the conference room through the small window on the door.
I looked in as well, to find a coffee cup floating above the table. The blonde girl, three, and the boy, six were whispering to each other while the rest of the kids watched the coffee cup go higher and higher until it bumped the ceiling.
"Hey hey hey!" Stark opened the door and walked back in. "Sit down!"
The cup crashed onto the table, and the girl scrambled back to her seat.
"Looks like we got a real-life Carrie, folks!" Stark smiled. "Max, did you get that?"
I nodded.
"You all will have a lot of time to socialize later." He said. "For now, we need to go over what's gonna happen."
I fell asleep for most of it.
I didn't dream, thankfully.