A Month

Days turned into weeks. The Fantastic Three grew increasingly frantic in their search. Alicia Masters spent most of the time with the children, and answered questions about "Where's mommy?" and "Is mommy ever coming home?" well as she could. Ben Grimm traveled around the world, hunting down every lead, no matter how small, and calling in every favor he had. Johnny Storm flew from superhero team to team, hunting down every psychic, tarot card reader, and super-scientist there was.

Government departments were put at their disposal. Doctor Strange muttered incantations. Aliens whose entire civilizations had been saved probed the Earth with rays that caused a slight but noticeable uptick in cancer screenings.

Reed Richards spent long, sleepless nights staring at the screen. Processing data. Letting his beard fill out and grow wild.

When they found the hiding-spot—an old nuclear bunker, partially phase-shifted out of time by one second—Sue and Porkum were no longer there. MRE wrappers, frozen pizza boxes, empty beer bottles. A dog dish with SUE marked on the side, covered with layers of dried semen.

And a series of six holographic cubes. Data recorders. Simple. Intuitive. High definition video and audio.

Reed did not show Johnny and Ben the contents of the cubes. They didn't need to. The door to Reed's lab wasn't sufficiently soundproofed. The moans and screams, grunts and filthy words permeated into the corridor. Johnny and Ben made sure the kids didn't go anywhere near there.

Mister Fantastic saw the Invisible Woman taken in ways he never had. Saw her ass stretched to almost inhuman degrees but a mutant cock, only her own superhuman anatomy preserving her from rupturing her colon. Or her airway. Or her vaginal canal.

There were long sequences when Sue Storm stared dull-eyed at the camera; a junkie's gaze, sucking on Porkum's dribbling dick as he slept. He saw the bruises on her body, the way her hair and skin paled from lack of sunlight, from insufficient nutrition. Calculated pregnancy chances, and then realized that the sheer volume of semen Porkum had pumped into his wife's cunt would swarm and destroy any egg, unless someone took precautions.

Someone. That was what held Reed Richard's attention. Porkum, for all of his sexual dominance of Sue, the way he coaxed orgasm after orgasm out of her, the way he taught her to talk about how Reed had neglected her needy pussy and she was glad to have a real man to fill it—those showed a small mind. Uncreative outside of a narrow sphere. No technical aptitude beyond that necessary to operate a remote control.

Porkum was doing his wife, but he couldn't stay a step ahead of Reed Richards. Mr. Fantastic was certain of that. His true enemy was whoever was using Porkum. Aiding and abetting him. Providing for his—

Mister Fantastic did not smile. There was a narrow list of his enemies who were capable of what Porkum was doing. Only one of them had the means and motive, which told him a great many things. How to find Sue Storm—and how to get his ****.

When Reed Richards emerged, there was a look in his eye that made Ben Grimm's heart still for a moment. He had seen the Punisher stare like that. It was the look of a man who had solved a calculation that ended in ****. Reed just hadn't pulled the trigger yet.

"I need the two of you to keep looking," Mister Fantastic said with eerie calm. "Redouble your efforts. Focus on supervillains. Be rash. Make a mess."

Johnny and Ben looked at each other.

"Sure, Stretch. We waz gonna do that anyway. But what are you gonna do?"

Reed Richard's smile was terrible.

"Someone's playing chess with me," he said. "I'm going to flip the board."