One of the things that Myles Alfred had always hoped for after he obtained his doctorate was a slew of job offers. He thought that his degree in biotechnology and genetics would make him a hot commodity, a real, shiny object for every gene-firm to take a look at. What he had not counted on was being put on the blacklist by his own father.

That’s what happened when his father hated the mutant community even more than he hated the gay community. It was one thing to be caught kissing a boy. It was another entirely for his father to figure out that it was not the dog who had been shedding so much. Myles had been afflicted with the mutant ability to shift into a lupine form when angry, something he had struggled his entire life to control. If anything, Myles’ interest in science came from an intense desire to prove to his own father that everything about him was completely natural.

Myles swiped the rejection letters off his desk. “At this point in time we are not looking for applicants in our blah-de-blah department!” he shouted, quoting nearly every one of the letters. He felt his teeth begin to elongate and his back begin to itch. Then, with a series of short, quick breaths, slowly changing to longer exhalations, Myles calmed himself down. He felt his teeth return to normal size and the hair retract into his follicles.

“Can’t have that, can we?” he said. “Daddy dearest would love to add ‘prone to random fits of violence’ to his list.”

Only one letter had come in for a job offer, but it was menial. Who would want him to teach? Teaching was beneath him, wasn’t it? Eyeing the even higher stack of bills on the other side of the table, Myles hoped he would not have to reconsider that line of thought. Life in Southern California came with its high cost of living. With so many superheroes making their way to SoCal in the last few years, he figured the San Francisco lifestyle was only going to get more expensive, especially of Los Angeles’ spiking insurance rates were any indication.

Myles steadied himself as a shockwave rattled his duplex. See? That was exactly what he was talking about. Superpowers were always screwing things up, he thought, steadying the off-kilter framed degrees on the wall.

Another shockwave. This one was closer and had Myles on his knees just to stop himself from completely falling over. “Not good,” he muttered. He got up and bolted for the door, only to see yellow electricity, pillars of mud, and spurts of debris shooting into the sky less than half a mile away.

“Damn it!” he muttered, running back inside. Where was the letter from the academy? “Damn it damn it damn it.”

The third shockwave send him to the ground, but he rose in triumph, clutching a crumpled envelope with a business card inside. He pulled out his cell phone and dialed the number on the card. “Hello? Academy X? It’s Myles. Myles Alfred. Yeah, yeah, right. No, not about that. There’s a super-incident happening outside my house, and I think I need your help…”

THREAT LEVEL GAMMA

By Hunter Lambright

The Damocles Foundation
Future Home of Academy X

Dani Moonstar shuffled through assorted curricula at her desk. Teaching was something that had come naturally to her; paperwork was something that had not. Lesson plans and all sorts of things required by the state were tedious and prevented her from saving the world. History was her forte, but she was having trouble locating the right set of lesson plans for her Pre-Civil War U.S. History class from when she taught up at Xavier’s.

She growled at the desk, threatening to take a swipe at the stacks of papers before catching herself. “Watch out, Moonstar, or your temper’s going to make a mess out of your life,” she told herself.

“Talking to yourself is the surest sign that your life’s already a mess,” said Roberto DaCosta, standing in the doorway. He wore his trademark mischievous smile. “Is everything okay, Dani?”

“Oh, you know, the usual,” Dani said. “Have you ever tried to launch a school? It’s really kinda hard. I don’t know how the Professor ever did it.”

“Secretly?” Roberto suggested, walking over to the desk to peer over her shoulder. “I’m just saying. Everything you’re doing, trying to get this Academy X thing off the ground, it’s noble. It’s also the hard way.” He elbowed her in the ribs. “But when have you ever not done something the hard way?”

“Oh, stop you,” Dani said, a smile breaking out on her face. “I do things the easy way…sometimes.”

“Like when you told all your friends about the end of the world, right?” Roberto asked. “Oh, wait, nope, you ran off and formed a secret team. Or how about the time you wanted to teach Hellion the error of his ways by sitting him down and having a frank discussion? Heh, that’s right, you did it by giving him an illusion of his greatest fears associated with the Hellion codename. And then there’s the time—”

“I get it, I get it!” Dani said. “I’m stubborn. What’s new?”

“Don’t worry, you wouldn’t be the Dani Moonstar I know if you weren’t a little stubborn sometimes,” Roberto said. “So what’s the latest obstacle?”

Dani sighed and held her hands out over the assembled curricula. “Teachers. Without anyone signing on to teach, we’re having trouble getting a curriculum going for each class. The state’s giving me a tough deadline, and I can only recruit so many kids for a school that may or may not exist.”

“Understandable. Anything I can do to help?” Roberto offered.

“Do you want to teach personal finance?”

“Er, I meant like, with money. I could hire someone to write the curriculum…” Roberto started.

Dani returned his elbow. “Everyone’s going to be a little out of their comfort zone on this one, Bobby. Might as well start now.” She tossed a file marked “Finance 100” at him.

“This is a terrible idea.”

“Aren’t they all?”

“Hey, Dani?” A voice came in from the doorway. Warren Worthington filled the frame of the door with his wings stretching out into the hallway. Dani’s eyes lit up at his presence, but they narrowed in focus as she noted the urgency in his voice.

“What’s up?” she asked, standing up. Roberto put the file down on the desk, realizing that something was going on.

Warren cracked his knuckles on the doorframe subconsciously as he spoke. “We just got a phone call from Myles Alfred, the guy we were trying to hire to teach the sciences here. He said there’s a super-incident going down near him, that needs some help. He seemed pretty rattled about the whole thing. What do you say?”

Dani mulled this over. “Even if it’s not mutant-related, it could go a long way toward getting him in our corner. Rally whoever’s around and get us some coordinates.” She marched out of the room, completely oblivious to the staredown between Warren and Roberto.

“Be prepared to bodyslide in T-minus three minutes.”

“Police scanners have picked this up. We’re going to have a problem.”

The yellow-skinned Axon looked to her fellow members of Gamma Corps Black. Electricity race around her body as her teammates Aberration and Morass dug through the street in search of their objective. “If local police get here before we get the hard drive from the Leader’s mainframe in this old Hulkbuster base…before we even find this Hulkbuster base, that problem will be double.”

Morass said nothing, pulling up mud and dirt from the street. She had no mouth and twice the good soldier for it. The dirt she pulled out loosened the stone and concrete for Aberration to knock more of it out of the way. Modeled off the genetics of the Abomination, Abi had more strength than anyone would guess for her size. The pint-sized powerhouse pounded through the next layer of concrete. “I’m starting to think we’re digging for fool’s gold.”

“Our directive says the Hulkbuster base was located beneath this neighborhood in San Francisco, and our scan showed this to be the location of the most gamma radiation. If it’s anywhere, it’s here,” Axon said. “Keep digging. I’m going to do recon.”

Axon lifted off from the ground, powered by electricity drawn from the poles and lines around the neighborhood. She rotated 360 degrees and, seeing nothing, dropped back to the ground. “We have at least sixty more seconds clear before police arrive. If we can get into the base, we should be clear long before that happens.”

“We’re trying!” Aberration yelled, throwing another fist into the ground. Morass gurgled the same sentiment. Aberration was taken to the ground by a mass of fur and claws. “Get out of my neighborhood!” Myles shouted. He had taken on his Vivisector form, complete with blood-red eyes and lengthy claws jutting from each finger.

“A little help, Axon!” Abi yelled, struggling under Vivisector’s weight.

“Got it,” Axon said. She held her arms toward Vivisector and wiggled her fingers. A series of electric bolts shot out, singeing Vivisector and sending him scampering with a whine. “Move it, people. I didn’t think there were any supers in this part of town.”

A flash of blue energy filled the street as X-Force bodyslid in. Moonstar, Sunspot, Archangel, and Elixir stood there, getting their bearings as the energy cleared. Moonstar pointed toward Gamma Corps. “Those are our bogies, X-Force! Take them down!”

Josh scratched his neck. “Bogies?”

Morass held her hands up. Guttural noises came from her throat, but Sunspot was on her before she could sign anything out. “You can talk later! Right now, you’re fighting the power of the sun!”

“Brilliant move,” Axon said, rising up into the air. “Fight a mass of dirt and, oh yeah, plants with solar power.”

Bolstered by his punches, Morass reached out with the thick, spiked vines that covered her arms. The vines covered his biceps, pulling them back behind his arms. Sunspot had super-strength from the sun, but unlike many super-strong heroes, he had no enhanced durability. The vines cut into his arms and restrained him completely.

“I’m coming!” Archangel yelled. He took flight, only to be knocked for a loop by one of Axon’s electrical surges. The smell of singed feathers filled the air.

Axon continued to shoot miniature lightning bolts at Archangel. She was beginning to get frustrated. This was supposed to be a simple in-and-out mission for Gamma Corps Black, but instead it had become a huge misunderstanding.

“What are you doing, Axon?” Abi yelled, and Axon realized that Morass’ voice had begun to come from Archangel’s mouth.

The illusion shimmered away, and Axon saw that she had let herself drift back to the ground within the illusion’s confines. “Sorry, there’s a reason they used to call me Mirage.” Moonstar appeared right next to Axon and delivered a deft punch to her jawbone.

“STOP!”

Every head turned as Myles reappeared, bounding forward. “They aren’t the bad guys!”

“You aren’t?” Dani asked.

Axon turned up her nose. “You would know if you guys had asked questions before starting to punch us!”

“No! They aren’t! They are!” Myles yelled. He pointed his clawed fingers to the pit that Morass and Aberration had dug. There, poking out of a hole edged by broken metal and piping, was a gigantic, gray fist that, at the wrist, was covered in tattered, green spandex. “I put one down at the manhole over there. They’re Hulks!”

Aberration narrowed her eyes. “If you took them out, they’re not full-strength Hulks.”

“And you aren’t a full-strength Abomination, lady!” Myles shot back. The ground shuddered as the fist doubled the size of the hole. “Does it freaking matter? They’re about to get out!”

Underlining his point, the size of the hole double again and the man, a Hulked-out HYDRA agent, climbed out. “HAIL HULK!” he shouted, bringing a fist to bear toward Morass. She dissolved to half-size, using her liquid mass to trip the agent around the legs.

Two more Hulked-out HYDRA agents emerged from the hole. “HAIL HULK!” they shouted, arms stretched out in a salute.

“Nobody make the obvious joke,” Warren warned.

Elixir shrugged. “It’s like we took one down and two more took its place.”

Dani groaned, pulling her bow off her back and knocking an explosive arrow into place. “That was the joke.”

Warren swooped low for a two-fisted punch on the female HYDRA agent. “There’s that or that two teams of good guys had to fight before meeting the real bad guys.”

Axon mounted the trapped agent’s shoulders and delivered a heavy electrical shock into each of its ears. The agent collapsed, freeing Morass to take on another. “Smash,” she said dryly.

Clapping a solar-powered palm over either ear of the female agent, Roberto laughed. “Sunspot strongest one there is.”

Myles kicked the other standing agent toward Aberration who, in turn, swung her leg around to catch the agent across the back of the legs. The super-strong kick took the agent to the ground where it was in easy reach for a series of quick punches. “These terrible jokes are making me angry. You won’t like me when I’m angry.”

Aberration pointed to the hole that the HYDRA agents had emerged from. “Something is smashing stuff inside. We have to get to that mainframe!”

“Abi’s right,” Axon said. The sound of metal on metal echoed from within the hidden base. “Gamma Corps Black, move in!”

An arrow whizzed past Axon’s nose, freezing her in her tracks. “Wait,” Moonstar said. Her bow still vibrated from the shot. “We’ll help you get what you need, but first you have to tell me why it required you to terrorize a neighborhood to get it.”

Electricity crackled around Axon’s fingertips. She tensed up, ready to unleash the power on Dani. Then, with a sudden exhalation, she lowered her hands. “You’re right. We screwed up. It’s part of the genetics we have. I can get you in touch with General Fortean if you need his word.”

“Fortean?” Dani recognized the name. Bridge had mentioned him before.

“Yeah,” Axon said. “I get that you have your doubts. But if we don’t get down there, there’s a good chance more people will get hurt. Are you with us?”

Dani lowered her bow. “Let’s go.”

Dr. Geoffrey Crawford painstakingly typed at the computer screen, scrolling across pages and pages of files for any kind of information that would save him. He had spent most of his life in a wheelchair before he had discovered a way to imbue him with the same powers and strength of the Hulk. What he hadn’t counted on were the consequences.

As Ravage, Crawford had attacked his colleagues in an enraged state, leading to a confrontation with the Hulk and the U.S. Army. When he had awoken in captivity, that had been everything. He had been quietly convicted, given two meals a day and allowed a few books a week. If that wasn’t excruciating enough, he had slowly realized that the same formula that had given him Hulk-powered legs along with the rest of his body was slowly starting to wear off. He still had the Ravage body and persona, but it was destabilizing. He had lost too much musculature and weight for it to be a temporary occurrence. Something had gone wrong in his calculations.

The Army base they had taken him to was built to house Hulks, but they always kept the cell built for Banner himself open. That was how Ravage had made his way back out into the wild. After years of good behavior, his jailors slipped up. He had broken his way out of a cage made for someone much stronger and made his way here, to the abandoned, misconceived urban Hulkbuster base. If anywhere would have the information he needed to survive, it was them.

More smashing ensued behind him. He knew that he had little time before the HYDRA agents who had arrived before him found him at this console. They were mere grunts, imbued with power far beyond them. If it had been him in HYDRA, he would have made sure that all able-bodied men were the last to receive a Hulk upgrade.

There! The file flashed across the screen, forcing him to go back as he overshot it. Everything he needed on gamma-irradiated blood and its effects on human beings, including research on potential stabilizing agents…it was all here. Plugging in his portable hard drive, Ravage waited, growing nervous with every smash that came with growing intensity…

“Does anyone need healing?” Elixir offered the assistance as X-Force and Gamma Corps Black trekked into the darkness.

Vivisector looked up. “Oh, is that what you do? I was going to ask what your powers were, but I’m a little out of my depth here. Do you, uh, do cracked ribs?”

“Ribs?” Elixir laughed. “Probably the easiest thing I’ve fixed all week.”

Elixir placed his hands on Myles’ rib cage. Myles tensed up at the touch, wincing from the pain. Then Josh’s hands glowed and Myles felt only relief. He rapped his knuckles against his ribs, but the pain was gone. “You’re a lifesaver. Are you single?”

Dani cut in between the two. “He’s jailbait. And straight.” She frowned. “I think.”

Sunspot whistled. “This awkward moment was brought to you by…”

“Shove it,” Dani said. “Stay focused. The last thing we need is any of us getting taken down by a Hulk just because we were distracted.”

Josh’s golden ears were tinged pink with embarrassment. “She’s right, by the way.”

Myles bared his lupine teeth in a smile. “Damn.”

Aberration slowed her pace until she was in step with Archangel. “Underground have your wings clipped, Angel?”

“I’ve gotten used to traveling in underground corridors, bases, that kind of thing,” Archangel replied. “You stop getting claustrophobic when Magneto has you on an asteroid or in a volcano or underwater. It’s something we all get used to.”

“HAIL HULK!” Two more gray-skinned Hulked-out HYDRA agents appeared directly above them, leaping down from their hiding places in the ventilation shafts with a clatter of metal and pairs of giant fists.

Archangel shielded Aberration from the falling ventilation with his wings, taking the brunt of the hit. With one flap, the pair were forced six feet down the corridor and out of the way of the agents’ fists. The first agent found himself covered in Morass’ body, struggling move as the gene-imprinted agent tightened her grip.

Dani released her grip on her bowstring, dropping an explosive arrow into the second agent’s throat. The agent gulped, smiling. Dani didn’t move, watching the agent’s eyes widen as the arrow exploded in his throat. He stumbled back, smoke coming out of his open mouth. Axon bolted over to him on lighting streaks. “He’s alive,” she confirmed. She pressed her hand to his head, delivering a light electrical shock. “This will keep him down. We don’t want to be attacked from behind.”

Aberration knocked the second agent square in the jaw, freeing Morass to return to her normal form. “Same with this one. Where do we go from here for the mainframe?”

They had reached a crossroads. Axon looked at each of the possible directions in confusion. “This wasn’t in the briefing. I have to call in.”

She pulled out a small holo-communicator and pressed the button in the center. Within seconds, a miniature version of a middle-aged black man in full military garb appeared on the device. His jaw was set in a deep frown and he held his arms behind his back. “What’s wrong, Axon?” he asked. “This should have been an in-and-out mission.”

“We ran into trouble, but we’ve teamed up with X-Force and we’re nearing the objective, General Fortean, sir,” Axon said. “Can you pull up the map of the facility? We’ve reached a crossroads that the blueprints in the briefing didn’t mention.”

“X-Force?” Fortean asked.

Axon nodded. “Moonstar’s mutant strike team. They saved New York and a good handful of places around the world a few weeks ago from the Children of the Vault.”

“I’ve heard of them. I just didn’t approve.” Fortean’s frown grew deeper. “You’ll need to travel north along the main line. The holo device will function as a compass after I sign off if necessary. And Axon, don’t forget the termination orders. Fortean out.”

The hologram disappeared, and in its place a compass rose appeared. The red arrow wavered until it pointed to true north.

“Termination orders?” Dani asked, breaking the silence.

Axon grimaced. “We have orders to terminate anyone who has beaten us to the information we’re after. You weren’t supposed to hear this call, clearly.”

“Clearly,” Dani echoed.

They made their way down the hallway. Twice, they were forced to stop as they encountered more of the Hulked-out HYDRA agents. Whoever had been there before seemed to have left them trapped there, forced to fend for themselves in the abandoned base. The agents were left unconscious and bound, ready for recovery whenever Gamma Corps’ handlers arrived.

“This is it,” Axon said, pointing to the door. The heavy bolt was in place, keeping them outside. “We just have to get inside. Abi, if you could do the honors?”

Aberration stepped forward, cracking her knuckles. “Gladly.”

With a punch that echoed through the hall, Aberration knocked the door in offs its hinges. The strength of the Abomination raced through her muscles. When their eyes adjusted the light from the computer screen, the only thing visible was Ravage unplugging his external hard drive.

“You have your orders, Gamma Corps Black,” Axon said, launching herself into battle. Aberration and Morass followed.

“Wait!” Dani shouted. She frowned, and then she went to work. Touching her temples, Dani began to weave an illusion drawn from the Corps’ greatest desire of the moment—success in their mission.

Sunspot and Vivisector pulled Ravage to the side, out of the zone of conflict where Gamma Corps Black was winning a fight with the wall, watching as Axon, Aberration, and Morass pounded on the wall.

“Who do we have?” Dani asked, speaking to a voice in her ear.

G.W. Bridge responded. “It looks like we have Ravage. You were right. Something’s not right here. Dr. Crawford was a researcher who ingested a formula that gave him the ability to walk again. If we terminate him, we have to turn around and do the same to the Lizard.”

“Make the call, sir.”

Bridge grunted. “Your girlfriends should be getting a little wake-up call here in a moment. They’re not going to be pleased with you at all, Moonstar.”

As Gamma Corps Black pounded against the illusion that Dani was projecting, Axon’s communicator began buzzing with increasing intensity. “Stop!” General Fortean’s hologram shouted, visible only as Axon slid it out of her belt.

The three female agents quit throwing punches as Dani dropped the illusion. “Sorry. I showed you your greatest desire at that moment. I showed you filling your orders and killing Ravage.”

“What? Why would you do that?” Axon demanded. Morass gurgled with similar intensity.

Fortean answered for Dani. “Your ‘friend’ here didn’t like the way things felt. She had George Washington Bridge listening in on everything as soon as you stopped fighting on the street. It was her suspicion that you knew exactly who you thought might also be after this information.” He coughed. “That we knew who was after the information. She was right.”

Ravage stepped forward, Hulk-like rage displayed on his face. “You were sent to kill me?”

Archangel put himself between Ravage and Gamma Corps Black. “You haven’t heard the best part yet.”

Fortean continued, shifting uncomfortably with the next thing he had to say. “Moonstar confirmed that we had the information with her handler, Bridge…who outranks me. Gamma Corps is a division of S.H.I.E.L.D. and as such, cannot be called to terminate another agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.”

Moonstar stepped forward and offered her hand to Ravage. “That’s why Bridge has hired you for the Gamma Research Division, Dr. Crawford.”

“How did you do that without us finding out? We were with you the whole time,” Aberration said.

Moonstar shrugged. “The same way I made you think you were killing Ravage. Illusions are getting easier and easier. It’s a nice way to have a private conversation.”

“Separate transport will be coming for Gamma Corps Black and for Ravage—excuse me, for Dr.

Crawford. Retrieve the mainframe. Complete the mission. Ignore X-Force. Those are your new orders.” Ravage turned to Moonstar. “You don’t know the things that I’ve done. I don’t deserve this.”

“You were beaten down verbally by co-workers, or as we like to say, ‘hated and feared by society,’” Dani said. “There’s not much different between you and mutants, Dr. Crawford. If we can give Magneto a second chance, we can do the same for you.” She paused, then added. “Just don’t make me regret it.”

“If S.H.I.E.L.D.’s resources can help me stabilize the transformation, you won’t,” Ravage responded.

Dani accepted this. “Bobby, Warren, Josh…why don’t you guys get Dr. Crawford upstairs and ready for transit?”

The four left, leaving Dani and Myles in the room adjacent to the mainframe alone. “Have you reconsidered my offer, Myles?”

Myles shifted his weight. “Well…yeah. Possibly. I’ve been having trouble getting a job. If I’m going to work with anyone, what you did today…I don’t know. My lupine side is hard to control. What you did for Ravage, I need to know that if I ‘hulk out,’ that you’ll hunt me down.”

Moonstar nodded. “I wouldn’t have it any other way. When we say we take care of our own, the X-Men mean that in more ways than one.”

“So you really think I’d be a good teacher?”

“I think you’re smart. I think you have a personality that wants to pass that along,” Dani said. “Plus, you remind me a little of me, and I never thought I could teach. But look at me now.”

Myles nodded. They started to walk out of the building, passing by Gamma Corps Black at work on the mainframe on their way out. “You made some powerful enemies today, doing what you did, didn’t you?” he asked.

“Not everybody is going to like you,” Dani said. “But not everybody is making the right choices. I didn’t like what I was hearing. I made the call. Now GCB gets their computer. Bridge has a new brilliant scientist. We didn’t have to clean up any dead bodies. Everyone wins.”

Myles grinned, finally seeing the opening to the question he’d been dying to ask. “About that…do you think S.H.I.E.L.D. has any openings in their biotechnology department?”

Hours Later—Hulkbuster Subbasement J

Sitting in a chair with his fingers pressed together, the man called Venger watched the monitors carefully, making no change of expression even as his own men were pulled away. The research conducted here had been done on a volunteer-only basis. He had kept to his promise to Captain America of keeping his cell of HYDRA as legal as possible. In fact, he would never have expanded into genetics research if health insurance for his agents wasn’t so expensive.

One of Venger’s agents stepped inside. He had followed the heroes in the shadows to confirm that they had left the premises.

“They’re gone, sir.”

“Thank you. Dismissed, agent.” His eyes followed the agent out of the room as he eyed the map of his grand plans for Southern California. “Hail HYDRA.”

Next: Bridge calls X-Force in on the favor Dani owes him! Another new teacher will join the school and team! Plus: Magma vs. the Underworld as Resurrection/Insurrection begins!