Getting the message...

Sitting alone in the lab and sitting back to stretch his arms up to the ceiling and yawn, Reed checked his research notes from his findings. He had been straight to work as soon as he woke up, leaving the kids in Johnny and Ben’s hands playing games until he could have a talk with Susan… Whenever she’d come back home. To be honest, his mind wasn’t on his work at all, he had been worried about her the entire time since he woke up and didn’t find her there.

Wiping a gloved hand over his face, he turned his attention to his phone, perking up when he found a new voicemail since his attention was diverted.

“Maybe that’s her.” Picking up his phone and going to the message left behind, he listened in and paused in confusion when he heard a lot of background noise like crashing and… Some kind of animal screeching like an angry hawk or eagle. “What in…?”

“Spider-Man? What are YOU doing here? What am I doing here?” He heard a deep feminine voice that sounded eerily familiar on the voicemail message. “Twelve o’clock? GASP! My kids bake sale!” there was a second of silence until he heard the voice call out from further away from the phone. “Sorry! I got someplace to be… I’ll come back for you later.”

At that point the message beeped, indicating it was done recording.

“Huh…”

Getting up from his seat, Reed left the lab and headed into the living room where he found Ben and Johnny sitting on the couch with controllers in their hands while Valaria and Franklin sat on the floor. The four of them playing a racing game together.

“Ben, Johnny, can I talk to you for a minute?”

Johnny squinted one of his eyes as he leaned to the side in a sharp turn on the screen. “Sure, thing Reed, right after this last lap.”

“I was hoping NOW, and in private.” Reed said with a hint of urgency, forcing Ben to pause the game and have Valaria and Franklin cry out in protest.

"Eh don’t worry kids, how about youz have a two-player game while we’z talk to yer dad.”

Doing just that, the two kids ignored the three adults in the room as they stepped out of the living room and headed into the hallway.

“So, what’s up stretch?”

“I just got a strange voicemail from someone.” Turning on the message off his phone, the three listened in on the confusing series of dialogue and crashing in the background.

“Huh, that looks like Peter’s number.”

Hearing what sounded like Susan on the other end panicking just as the message ended, Reed looked to Johnny and Ben for a response. “So… What do you two think?”

“Sounds like’er.” Answered Ben, his brow furrowing. “Sounds like she’s in trouble too.”

“If this came from Spidey’s phone than he’s probably just in bad a shape, can you track the call?”

“I’ve got something in the Fantasticar just in case, let’s get to the hanger.”

*

Entering the hanger bay of their home where the assortment of Fantasitcars were stored, the three had suited up and informed the kids to sit tight until they got back. With a device at his hip pocket, Reed activated one of those vehicles as it thrummed to life and began to hover off the ground with a door opening and steps ready to embark. Against the wall, the hanger doors lurched as they quickly opened for the three to head out and go looking for the Invisible Woman.

“Spider-Man’s call was locale, if we’re lucky we can find Susan and help her within the minute.”

“Whoever’s the one causin trouble better be ready for a stone-knuckle…”

With the doors fully open, the three were given quite the surprise when they found a woman in white swing into the hanger and landed on her hands and feet. Her arrival gave the three a moment of pause as they looked back at her getting up to her feet and stand almost as tall as the Thing in front of her. Her hair flowed long and swayed like seaweed against an unseen current of water, her face was like the bleached surface of a jack-o-lantern, with a lipless maw of jet-black teeth and black splashes where the eyes would be. Opening her fists, they were talons, with fingers almost a foot long, with barbs and spikes sticking out of her ankles, forearms, and shoulders. The black emblem of a spider with elongated legs that traced down her thighs, around her shoulders and chest told the three instantly that they were dealing with the anti-venom symbiote.

But when she spoke up is when they were in for a far greater shock.

“Who are you… What are you doing in my home?” Susan Storm asked in her deeper voice, her maw opening to let her long, prehensile tongue slither out and lash at the air. “You’re tressssspassing.”

“Aww jees.”

“Please don’t be my sister…”

“Great Scott! Is that YOU Susan?”

“You! You know my name?!” Her eyes narrowing and head tilting to the side, Susan retracted her tongue. Raising a clawed finger to wag and chastise the three in front of her. “Nuh uh… You aren’t allowed to know my secret identity, otherwise my dear Reed and kids might be in danger!”

“What about your brother Johnny?” Asked the Human Torch, hesitant to get his sister’s attention as she smiled back at him like a shark spotting a minnow.

Shrugging, Susan chuckled. “Eh… He can handle himself.”

“Okay… Harsh.”

“Susan, its US, your friends, and family. Don’t you recognise us?” Looking at her chest at the spider emblem and the confused toothy smile she gave him in return, Reed stretched himself out, elongating his arms and legs. “How did you get the Anti-Venom symbiote? It was destroyed.”

“Heh… Nice TRY bucko, looking like my hubby and family to trick me, like my man would be caught DEAD in that black and blue number!”

Trading looks, Ben spun his finger around at the side of his head back at Reed before the trio made ready to try and deal with their loved one. “Okay der Suzie, I think you had dem duds on LONG enough.”

Brandishing her claws, Lady Anti-Venom gave a scream so intense it cracked the windows of the fantasticar, lunging towards Ben like a wild animal as he crossed his arms to bear the brunt of the strike and winced when he actually felt her claws cut into his orange, stoned skin. Reaching out and wrapping an arm around her waist, Reed tried to tug the woman off the Thing, and got her full attention instead.

“Susan PLEASE! It’s us!”

Turning her head around her shoulders like an owl back at Mr. Fantastic, the symbiote wearing woman pointed back at her husband with an accusing finger and made the man yelp in surprise as her fingers shot out to impossible length like spears. The man barely had the time to duck his head below his waist as the five white spikes dug deep into the steel wall behind him. Forcing Reed to let her go and get a better vantage to contain her.

“Yeah, yeah, you, you, you. You home robbers are ALL the same.” Susan hissed as she leapt off Ben and skittered onto the ceiling. “So, I guess you’re the smart one, HE’s the muscle and that dimwit over there is how you tricked HERBIE to let you in… He doesn’t even LOOK like Johnny, more like some man-whore you found on the street and dressed up like’em.”

“OKAY! THAT’S IT! FLAME ON!” Igniting into a living fireball, the Human Torch took to the air and blasted his sister in a column of intense heat. Jumping out of the way, the metal surface was red hot and warping under the cool air as Johnny followed her every move, becoming grossed out when she sprouted four sets of spider legs from her back and skittered across the ceiling and walls faster than he could catch up. Blasting her again Johnny hoped that his attacks would **** the symbiote off her, but she moved so fast it was hard to get a bead on her. “I CAN’T HIT HER!”

Getting up from the floor, Ben watched Susan dart back and forth as Johnny caused the hanger bay to heat up. Seeing the Fantasticar still hovering with the door open, he stomped over to it and grabbed the flying vehicle by its bumper. “Sorry about dis Suzie.”

Throwing the Fantasticar like a volleyball against the wall, the impact was enough to rattle everyone there, including Susan who dropped off the wall the instant the crash happened, and she clutched at her ears. Looking up with a snarl, she was met with another column of fire that finally engulphed her.

“JOHNNY!” Reed called out in fright as the Human Torch blasted his sister with flames.

“Don’t worry Reed, I know what I’m doing.” He did, he didn’t hit her directly, he simply surrounded her in flames in the hopes of shocking the symbiote off his sister without harming her. “If I’m right, the worst she’ll get is a bad tan.”

Something lunged out from the flames, wreathed in flames but completely unharmed as it grabbed hold of Johnny’s arms and hissed with a smile face to face with the surprised Human Torch as the fires died away enough to reveal Lady Anti-Venom completely unharmed. “Good to know, hot stuff.”

Head butting the man, the two fell to the ground where Susan landed on her feet and pinned the **** Johnny to the floor with her hand. Opening her mouth, she brandished her other clawed hand up as if to attack when she felt something wrap around her arm, finding Mr. Fantastic pulling her arm back. Narrowing her eyes, she noticed the Thing charge towards her. Her smile almost sinister, she aimed her arachnid legs at the man and fired cobwebs of jet-black webbing at his feet, tripping the Thing up and having him fall to the floor where she webbed him and johnny up, then pulled with her bound arm so hard Reed yelped as he was pulled towards Lady Anti-Venom and found her clawed hand around his throat.

“THERE WE GO!” Chuckled Susan as she extended her tongue and licked over the side of Reed’s face. “You bunch of knock offs aren’t so tough. I wonder if your BRAINS taste as sweet as those things in the sew…”

Blinking, Lady Anti-Venom turned Reed’s face back and forth, now close enough to see him better as he wheezed for air in her vice-like grip. Immediately her behaviour shifted as her jaws formed a pleasant grin and her eyes went wide.

“REED! Sweetheart, can you believe it? I caught a bunch of robbers who tried to get into our home.”

“Susan… The suit… It’s…”

A razor-sharp claw rested on the divot of his upper lip as Susan shushed him to calm down. “Ssssshhhhhh, it’s alright honey, I’ll deal with these pesky thugs.”

Sprouting her arachnid limbs, Susan reached out with her free hand and pulled Ben and Johnny over her shoulder as she scuttled her way to the door.

“Susan PLEASE, the suite is effecting your mind, you have to…” Thwipp. “hmmph, hmm, hmmmph HMMMPH!”

Keeping her husband quite with webbing over his mouth, Susan continued to bind her husband up in black webbing as she carried the three with her and entered their shared home.

“Wait until Reed sees what I caught.”