Chapter 330: The Fool and the General

17th May 2013, Baxter Building, New York

(Reed Richards POV)

Reed Richards was a genius, that was a fact that no one could deny. People may hate him, call him an idealist, a naïve man with delusions of grandeur, but no one would ever call him unintelligent. Even Victor Von Doom, his most hated enemy, would not deny his genius, and considering how arrogant that man was, it meant something when Reed was acknowledged by someone like him.

He was so much above these people. They just felt slow, in a way, and thought linearly. And sometimes Reed pretended to just dumb himself down for the sake of others. It was a curse, being the smartest man around. Even Susan couldn't challenge him intellectually. Honestly, the only person that was able to do so even slightly was Victor. Perhaps that was the reason that Reed ignored all the warning signs he gave off, just for the sake of finding a true equal. And Victor came very close, and it was a shame that the guy decided to become a supervillain and take over an entire nation.

Reed supposed that Stark was good enough, but he tended to waste his intelligence, at first with his ridiculous parties and weaponry, and then his whole charade as Iron Man and the Avengers. Honestly, Reed didn't care about any of that. He was a researcher first, not a fighter.

Even though publishing even a fraction of his findings would spread chaos to the world, Reed loved research, discovering new theories and laws of the universe. He was an explorer, a scientist, first, and superhero second. Johnny always complained about the fact that they could be doing more than just waiting for Doom's inevitable attack plan to prove himself superior to Reed. That guy really had an ego. Or maybe it was revenge for the accident that gave them all powers.

Speaking of powers, Reed had lied about his knowledge of them. He still had no idea how they gained their abilities, just a few theories without any proof. He still didn't even understand why the experiment failed in the first place. It should have worked, and to be completely frank, if his team hadn't gained any abilities from the accident, and made a name for themselves while dealing with Doom the first time, his career would have been over.

The project itself was why he would never collaborate with the military again. Exploring his theorized negative zone. It existed, he knew it did, and his calculations were perfect. Even then, when he activated the portal for the first time, he saw it for a fraction of a second, an otherworldly environment filled with darkness and chaos. Silhouettes of barren, floating islands everywhere. Giant storms of energy reigned in the background, capable of destroying planets and stars alike. It should have been Reed's crowning achievement, and in the end, it was his greatest failure. He had even depolarized his molecules to not be torn apart by the anti-matter. But even after all his precautions, a wave of energy was released and affected his entire team. He didn't know why; it was like there was an external barrier stopping him from entering the negative zone. It was driving him insane, and any other attempts at accessing it hadn't worked ever since.

As for the wave of energy, it had done something, he just didn't know what. Their genetic structure had mutated somewhat, but only as a defense mechanism to survive the energy wave. Even then, it was identical for every one of them, and yet their powers were different. It was driving the genius insane with theories and impossibilities.

Even years later, Reed could not let go of the negative zone, to the disapproval of Susan and the rest of his team. Yes, he was part of the Fantastic Four, but he was a scientist at heart. He didn't involve himself with the politics, especially with how messy they have been after the invasion.

Ah, speaking of the infamous invasion, Reed wished that they hadn't been in a conference out of the city when it happened. The Baxter Building was attacked but the defenses held. After years of Doom going after them, adding a forcefield around the building became a necessity. Who would have thought that Doom's constant attacks would be good for something? How that man keeps making evil plans and keeps running an entire nation was baffling. Seriously, he was working on rebuilding Latveria for years. He should have been far too busy to keep harassing Reed.

As for the alien tech, it took Reed a month or so to figure it out, outside the energy cells that is. It was surprisingly similar to Earth's technology, all things considered, just slightly more advanced. Honestly, Reed could have designed better weaponry in a slow weekend. It wasn't anything special. Even the physics necessary in making them were something he had discovered himself years ago. The existence of aliens wasn't really that surprising all things considered. It took a special amount of arrogance for humanity to believe that they were alone in such a large universe.

Still, Reed hadn't figured out how to reproduce the Chitauri energy core. Oh, he understood how it worked, he had the equations and everything. He simply needed to see how it could be manufactured, which was slightly more challenging than he thought.

He's been trying to figure it out for a week or so, and he's been making progress, just not as much as he would have wanted. Honestly, Reed had wanted to figure out all the tech he could get his hands on, in the vain hope that one of them would have physical properties that might help him solve what happened with the negative zone.

He was in the middle of his work when the alarm rang. Susan's voice entered, "Reed, Secretary Ross is here to meet you. He says it's urgent."

"Send him in," Reed answered, as he set aside his experiment and walked out to the main lab. He tended to have a hidden lab for his private projects, with the main one serving more as an office than anything else. He's usually expected to meet people in his lab, and he didn't want them to see some of the stuff he's working on.

However, what was curious was the fact that Thaddeus Ross was there to see him at all. The man was too rigid for Reed's taste, and when they worked together during the negative zone experiment, they got along like oil on water. The military had an interest in the experiment because of the potential resources that could be mined in the negative zone, as well as the potential of weaponizing anti-matter.

Soon after the accident, Ross went away to deal with some other mission that Reed honestly didn't care about. Although, he did know that the man had become the Secretary of State, a very powerful position in the United States government. He shouldn't have anything to do with Reed anymore. This impromptu visit was a surprise.

As expected, the former general walked towards Reed with an impassive face. He sat down in front of the genius, "Dr. Richards, it's good to see you again."

"And it's good to see you, Secretary Ross. But with all due respect, I don't understand why you're here," Reed answered.

Ross smiled, "Still not one for small talk, are you? I like that. I'm a straight shooter too, so I won't beat around the bush. Your country needs your help, son."

Reed raised an eyebrow, "Look, I'm just as patriotic as the next guy, but I'm a scientist, not a soldier."

"No, you're exactly the kind of soldier we need. We don't need you to fight or even invent anything for us. No, the problem is very difficult. What do you know about the mutant issue, son?"

"It deals with the place of mutants in our society. But I haven't heard anything about them for a while."

Ross sighed, "That's the problem, and it's one that everyone had started to forget. We were naïve about it, but mutants haven't disappeared or stopped being born. They have simply learnt how to hide themselves better. We cannot allow them to reign unsupervised, especially with that kind of firepower in their hands."

"You're talking as if they were weapons of mass destruction. Most of them are barely more powerful than a normal human."

Ross gritted his teeth, "Do you know what just happened in Greenwich a week ago?"

Reed thought back. He was busy all week trying to figure out the Chitauri energy cell, but he did hear Susan mention something about an alien invasion in England somewhere, which kind of ended in less than a minute, "You're talking about the small invasion."

Ross nodded, "Yes, on the 13th of May 2013, at around noon, a giant spaceship as tall as a skyscraper appeared out of nowhere, killing 26 British citizens and injuring 153 others. The ship was immediately destroyed by the combined efforts of Jean Grey, also known as the Phoenix, and Wanda Maximoff, also known as the Scarlet Witch, the daughter of the deceased mutant terrorist known as Magneto."

The elder man showed him security camera footage of the incident, that had two women in action, one casually telekinetically stopping the giant spaceship that was almost as big as the Baxter Building, and the other one turning it into dust with all its probable passengers still inside. The scene was shocking, terrifying. No one is supposed to have that kind of power, and Reed could easily see why people would be nervous at people with such abilities. The genius muttered, "People are afraid."

Ross nodded, "Yes, they are. We have ignored the mutant issue and its rise for so long. And for the first time, we have a solution."

"I don't see how you could solve something like this…" Reed responded.

The Secretary of State grinned, "It's not just the United States that's working on it, it's the entire UN. We're currently drafting a bill that would be signed internationally to regulate the enhanced population. This way, every person with superpowers powerful or not would need to register, and be thoroughly tested, the moment they develop their powers. This way, we will only need to survey the truly dangerous enhanced and leave the large part free of discrimination. Even then, the data will only be available to a new international task force that will deal with crimes committed by an Enhanced, which we're hoping the Avengers would lead. We still haven't talked to them yet. This way, they'll have prime suspects in case something like this happens."

Reed looked hesitant, "I don't know about this. The whole registration thing could cause a lot of complications."

"Don't worry about that, no single government will have access to the data, only the UN will be able to access it. It's a good way to limit vigilantism, by having them join the task force, and make them official employees that are accountable for their actions instead of just reckless idiots with a sliver of power beating up criminals to a pulp."

"Still, the registration itself is dangerous."

Ross let out a victorious grin, "Which is why we won't be in charge of it. We will leave it to the best hands available, your hands. You'll only need to report to the UN and no one else. You'll have a high level of autonomy."

"But why me? Why not someone like Stark. He's charismatic enough to lead whatever it is you're doing."

"Yes, but he has a murky past while yours in squeaky clean. We also want your team, your family, to be the representation of what we want to achieve, the pinnacle of the Accords that we want everyone to follow."

Reed gave him a questionable look, "What about the Avengers?"

"It'll be up to you to recruit them, but if they refuse and use their powers in public, they will be treated like criminals and arrested, it's one of the biggest possible laws in the accords after all."

"It seems a little extreme, teenagers are usually the ones who end up becoming mutants."

Ross visibly gritted his teeth, "Look, Richards, it's the best we could do. There's going to be amendments and modifications; the document is in its infancy. I'll be sending you a copy and you'll need to give me anything you don't like, but this is the UN not some corrupt government. If they put something in, it's probably there for a reason. But don't ask for too much, because trust me, compared to some suggestions, this is far better for the whole Enhanced population than what could have been chosen."

Reed spoke to protest, but was interrupted, "Look, read the draft, let me know what you think and tell me if you accept or not. But be very careful, if you refuse this, the consequences on the Enhanced population will be grave. It's not a threat, it's my prediction. You have 24 hours to give me an answer. Thank you for your time, Dr. Richards."

The former general turned around and left Reed's lab, leaving a pensive and nervous genius behind.

As usual, I generally post four chapters a week, on Sundays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays. (The month is over, so I'm going back to the usual schedule)

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