Fury visits the Richards family.

Staggering out the back door of the gym, the man who was with Susan in the men’s change room gasped and clutched at his stomach while he guided himself down the alley, knocking over a trash bin in the process as he leaned against the brick wall. “What the fuck… So hungry… So, fucking hungry!” After he had sanitized the bite wound on his hand, he was surprised to see it healed so quickly before his eyes, then he was wracked with intense hunger like he had never felt in his life. It was like he was starving, like he had not eaten in days, WEEKS. Stumbling through the alley and knocking over another garbage bin, it revealed a rat squeak and flee from his presence, scurrying to find shelter.

Maddened by hunger, he fell to his hands and knees and struggled to catch the small animal before it disappeared into a sewer grilled man-hole at the center of the alley, wincing and fallen into a hunger induced panic, the man gripped at the grilled man-hole plate and pulled with all his might. All to get at a filthy rat to eat… Then something happened. Gritting his teeth as they grew into fangs, the man’s skin turned deathly pale, surging with muscle, and growing larger as he pulled at the manhole. Prying the 100-pound iron plate out of the ground and the brick work with it, the man growled, his shirt bursting open at the seams and his shorts tearing as he swelled to three times his mass. Rapidly growing well past 7 feet tall and still going, white fur began to sprout and spread across his back and down his body. His shoes bursting open to reveal clawed toes and his hands sprouted claws of their own. Roaring out in rage, the man ignored the whine of metal twisting in his claws before he snapped the grill in half, becoming hunched over at 8 feet tall and snarling as what remained of his clothes fell from his burgeoning frame, a tail grew out from where the hem of his shorts would have been and grew long enough to curl around his hulking mass, just as his transformation finished and he darted his blood red eyes back and forth, sniffing the air with his feline nose.

“Wendigoooooo….”

Crouching, the horned, albino furred monster leapt into the air, propelling himself up high and gripping the edge of a nearby building to leap again, jumped to the roof of a ten-story building and make his way deeper into the city. Practically drooling at the scent, he drew closer to.

*

Returning home after running some errands across town, Reed Richards sighed and sat heavily on the couch in the living room, rubbing his hand through his beard and leaning back against the couch to rest his head. Stepping through the hallway with the kids in tow, Ben and Johnny found the man draped on the couch just as Franklin and Valaria startled their father by jumping on his lap to greet him home. “Hey Stretch, long day?”

“Sigh… Yes, HERBIE, can you turn on the news please? And set a pot of coffee, I think I need a drink.”

“Yes, Professor Richards.” Chirped the mechanical voice through the building as the wide screen television flickered on and a pot of coffee began to brew from the kitchen. Looking up from his seat, the man blinked his eyes wide open. There being broadcast by the local news while the Avengers fought hard to contain what looked like an 8-foot-tall wendigo rampaging through the streets downtown.

“HERBIE! TURN UP THE VOLUME!!!”

Watching the fight, Reed and the others cringed when he saw Captain America hold back a backhand from the feral monster with his shield and was sent reeling into a car with enough **** to bend the driver’s side door concave, the news anchor spoke up through the broadcast just as the monster found a new opponent in Scarlet Witch who caused a car to wrap itself around the beast like foil paper and Iron Man using what appeared to be a sonic disruptor to stun the wendigo. “No one knows where this creature came from, but as soon as it crashed down into Time’s Square it has been pandemonium! The Avengers arrived just minutes after the creature’s arrival and started attacking civilians, but…”

Carefully separating himself from his children, Reed got up and tried to make his way to his lab. “Hey Reed, where are you…”

An explosion rocked the front door of the apartment building as did all the windows, just as a squad of heavily armed and armored SHIELD agents charged into the building with guns trained on the Richards family, barking orders to them to stay where they were while each room was kicked open and secured. Quickly stretching himself back to the living room, Reed hugged his son and daughter close as the SHIELD agents continued to keep their weapons aimed at him and his family. Several of the agents were screaming at him to open the lab while his son and daughter shivered in his arms.

“WHAT IS THIS ABOUT?” Yelled out Reed over the SHIELD agents losing their patience with him before he heard a familiar voice call out from the door, telling the agents to stand down. Looking up to the front door, Reed found Nicholas Fury enter the Richards home, glaring down at Mr. Fantastic before crouching to meet the scientist eye to eye.

“You’ve got a LOT to explain Richards.” Answered the eye patch wearing man, just as he pulled out a small iPad showing a second wendigo contained by the Avengers from earlier. The creature was bound and heavily sedated like the one being contained at the Raft. Blinking in shock, Reed looked between the iPad and the television screen.

“There are TWO of them?!”

“Three… The Avengers caught this one this morning, the one on the news is happening NOW!” Fury pointed back at what was being broadcasted on the news. Pocketing the digital device back into his jacket, Fury looked over to the other agents who were still trying to get into the lab and failing as the metal doors were locked and sealed. “Hey eye patch, wanna tell yer goons to let up on the pea shooters? Especially around the kids?” The rest kept their weapons trained on the Thing and Human Torch before Fury waived a hand and they stepped back.

Rolling his shoulder, Ben gave the SHIELD agents the stink eye before sharing a nod with Johnny. The hot head giving the stern SHIELD agent a dirty look in return. “Assholes…”

“I gave you samples of the freak back in the raft to study, then out of the blue we got a few of those things running around trying to eat people… I’m thinking you have a hand in it, Richards.” Declared Fury, looking over his shoulder with his good eye at Mr. Fantastic still holding his children.

“That can’t be possible! My findings came back as human, even Dr. Strange couldn’t find anything off the same samples.”

“AND YET WE HAVE A COUPLE WENDIGO STALKING THE STREETS TRYING TO TURN FOLKS INTO GOD DAMN HAMBURGERS!” Yelled the man, pointing back at the Avengers over the television just now containing the beast on live tv. “NOW I WANT SOME ANSWERS RICHARDS! WHERE ARE THEY COMING FROM? BECAUSE THE ONE WE HAVE IN CONTAINMENT SURE AS HELL DIDN’T GET OUT!”

Reed was at a loss for words, he had no idea how this had happened. He had kept his samples properly contained, and all his findings shown him that the teeth, hair, and blood were all human. What was he missing?

“Susan! Have you found Susan?”

“The Invisible Woman?” Snorted one of the SHIELD agents, just before being silence by Fury with a single look.

“We haven’t found her yet, we were HOPING she was with you in here, on account that its hard to see her when she doesn’t want to be seen.

The SHIELD agents and Richards family snapped their attention to a buzzing phone from Reed’s pocket. Bringing his hands up, Reed slowly plucked his phone out of his pocket which was quickly snatched up by the SHIELD director. “Hello? This is Ni…”

“REED! It’s Susan! She’s gone NUTS!” Cried out Greer Grant on the other end of the phone line. “She and Jen were arm wrestling at the gym and she tried to kill someone!”

“Tigra, this is Nicholas Fury, where are you and where is the Invisible Woman?”

“We don’t know, after we tried to calm her down, she went invisible and ran off, we’ve been trying to find her since.”

“Miss Grant, Miss Walters, come to the Richards residence, I want you to share everything you know about Susan Storm while my agents go looking for her.” Turning to one of his agents, the man gave a nod and the agent darted out of the front door, the static of a walking talking echoing in the hallway just as Fury pocketed the phone and sat at the couch waiting for his men to get into Reed’s lab. Crossing his leg and pointing over to where three agents tried to jury rig the lab open, Reed got the hint.

“HERBIE… Open my lab for our guests.”

“At once Professor Richards”

With a hiss of air, the blast doors were opened, and the three agents stormed into the lab, only stepping out a few seconds later giving the all-clear to the director.

“What are you going to do with Susan if you find her?”

“Well that depends on where and how we find her then.” Answered Fury, sitting up from his seat and making his way into Reed’s lab to find the samples he gave Reed. Watching Fury and the agents re-enter his lab, Reed hugged his children close.

“Daddy, where’s Mom?”

“I don’t know sweetheart, I don’t know…”

*

Meanwhile, across town…

“Hey, you want a brisket, you wait in line like everyone else bucko!” Called out the deli cashier just as a surly patron stormed off and sat at one of the tables near the window. “Some people are always tryin to cut in…”

Hearing cries from the line up of people, they all looked like they were being shoved out of the way by some invisible **** before the customer at the front cashier gasped and found himself being flung across the deli and a woman appeared in his place. Easily 7 feet tall and so pale she looked chalk white, her blood red eyes glared down at the man behind the cashier desk and her sneer revealed fangs.

“Give me something to eat!”

“Hey lady what’s your…”

Slamming her fist on the table, her strike folded the two-inch-thick wooden surface like it was cardboard, startling everyone. “RIGHT THE FUCK NOW!!!”

Shivering with fear, the man thumbed the security button under the cashier as he nervously looked up into the eyes of the Amazonian albino woman. “G-get out of my kitchen lady, or…” Just as the man pointed at her accusingly, Susan snatched up his arm and bit his hand. Crying out in pain and panic, Susan tossed the man into the crowd of customers who by now huddled towards the exit in fear.

Roaring at the crowd around her in rage and giving everyone a scare, Susan stomped over to the meat display cabinet and grabbed both ends of the glass display, ripping it off the counter and tossing it behind her where several people cried out and got out of the way of the heavy glass and metal, before it crushed a table. Prying out what appeared to be a 10-pound steak in the display, Susan bit into the raw cow’s meat and her eyes fluttered. Tearing whole chunks out of the meat, she chewed and purred at the taste and sensation before swallowing. Not even caring that she stained her blue top with juices. She was in bliss, the ache in her stomach ebbing away as she filled it. Then she heard the squeal of a police cruiser outside the deli, followed by the vox of a megaphone, telling her to surrender with her hands up.

Growling with her prize still in her teeth, Susan turned invisible and barrelled out the window, escaping the scene and heading towards home.