Doors

[It starts as a rumor that most don't quite believe, but there's no arguing against the evidence. Dozens of pictures are uploaded via cell phones, undoubtedly of Harry Osborn and Gwen Stacy during various states of undress while in the Bio Lab at Midtown.]

[The news about students at Midtown continues to trickle through the papers and other news outlets. Reckless behaviour, out of control teenagers, authorities say it's gone beyond thrill-seeking to downright dangerous. Authorities are encouraging any students displaying any sort of strange behaviour that is new over the past week to seek medical help immediately.

"...four Midtown seniors were hospitalized Saturday evening and another two were pronounced dead at the scene following a high speed race between two vehicles. Both vehicles lost control after approaching speeds of over 120mph, colliding into an embankment. Local police are investigating. The names of the victims have not been released..."

"...a local convenience store was the site of tragedy this evening when a seventeen year-old junior from Midtown was killed during a botched robbery. The student apparently went to the aid of the cashier on duty when he was held up at knife point. The attacker fled from the scene after the incident and police are asking the public for any information regarding the individual..."]

[Late afternoon, after this, news stories start trickling down from Midtown High School.

“...an unexpected altercation between members of the debate team at Midtown. Three students were sent to the hospital with various injuries, including a broken hand and lacerations to the face. School officials are looking into the cause...”

“...a promising young member of the Track and Field team was taken to the hospital today from multiple strained muscles in the legs while attempting to break the school record in the long jump.”

“...the sixteen year old junior was taken by ambulance to a local hospital after eye witness reports of the student jumping off of the roof of the high school. Witnesses have been quoted as saying that the young man thought he could fly.”

“...a teacher in the art department was treated at a local hospital today for second and third degree burns to her hands after attempting to take pottery from a kiln that was still hot. The young woman was being held for psychiatric evaluation.”

“Three students fell ill during the lunch period at Midtown this afternoon. Reports of nausea and weakness in the limbs has been reported, and any student experiencing these symptoms is urged to see their primary care physician as soon as possible. Officials are looking into a cause for the sudden illness.”]

[Stark Tower makes the news early Thursday morning when 911 is called to the building, which has been relatively quiet since the death of Tony Stark two months earlier. Unconfirmed reports state that two teenage students from Midtown High School were removed from the premises by paramedics. Witnesses report that police spent hours removing illegal substances from the premises. One of the girls, an unidentified redhead, is said to be in critical condition at a nearby hospital, a victim of an overdose that might leave her with irreparable brain damage. The other teenager has been medically cleared and transported to NYPD holding, where she is expected to be charged.]

[Late Friday night, the news stations in the city are flooded with witness reports of a giant lizard seen in different areas of the city. The reports are all within 10 block radius of Oscorp, and other than a vehicle with damage to the roof by something impacting it, no other property damage is reported. Several photographs surface Saturday morning of a strangely-shaped shadow, a hulking figure, glowing eyes in the darkness. By Saturday morning, the city is abuzz with rumors of a giant lizard stalking the streets of the city.]

[Delivered to Pepper Potts: a sympathy arrangement and a fruit basket, both within a half hour of each other.

Included is a tasteful card:

Pepper,

I was very sorry to hear of Mr. Stark's passing. Forgive my lateness in offering my deepest condolences. If you need anything, at any time, please don't hesitate to ask.

- Norman Osborn]

[The power comes back not with a boom, or a crash, but with the flicker of electricity and the subtle hum of engines. Suddenly, everything is working again, like nothing at all has changed.

There were casualties, of course, during the month or so that the world lived without power. People died frozen in the streets in northern climes, people killed for food or supplies. For the most part, however, the casualties were much less than they might have been otherwise, and so says the message that flickers across every electronic screen when the power surges.

Your hospitals might have been shut down. Your nuclear plants might have been left to melt down and destroy your cities, your societies, your world. The secret places where your governments keep ancient diseases and terrible substances that could melt your flesh, they could have been shut down, breached, and allowed to flow freely into the air.

But I am not a cruel god. Not yet. And adequate worship might maintain your present peace. Ask yourselves - if Loki could achieve this, then what else might he achieve? Learn from your ancestors. Learn to kneel before a greater power, and accept a fate as happy slaves in peace.

There is no sign of Loki himself anywhere, however. Interested parties who go to the warehouse to check on the stone there will find it cracked with a fissure down the side, dark and ordinary.]

[Soon after this. A vial of green liquid from Wonder City's Lazarus Pit is, as promised, left inside Stark's lab. No note. He assumes it will be used sparingly, and that he'll be notified should more be needed.]

[The outage goes on throughout most of North America and Japan, but many of the usual expected outcomes of a prolonged lack of power haven't occurred. Gas prices spiked briefly, until people realized just how much fuel it took to get their generators to work, and that most of them wouldn't start at all.

Looting, of course, goes on right as scheduled. Dark storefronts without power are looted rampantly, as are homes, and the police in major cities are stretched absurdly thin, lacking any feasible means of communication by radio or phone. Danger is rife, and help is hard to come by without emergency services.

People begin congregating in the few places that still have power - government facilities, hospitals. Even though they can't charge cell phones or use electronic devices, these places at least have light, and those who fear the looting and crime can at least huddle together there, against the dark, like their ancestors once did around fires.]

[After this.]

[It's all gone dark.

The range of the disaster is at first completely unknown, since the entire grid has gone dark from coast to coast. Eventually, on cell phones with dying batteries, it becomes clear that North America, as well as some of South America, Japan, and the Pacific island nations, have all gone dark.

Things that run on their own power still run, but feebly, shutting down every few minutes. Generators work, but nothing wants to hold a charge for long. It's as if every piece of machinery sheds the electricity pumped into it.

It's a strange outage on many accounts. Planes in flight when the outage occurs retain their power until they land safely on the ground. Hospital generators hum to keep patients alive, but cell phones won't charge from hospital outlets. Clearly, it isn't so simple as a series of power plants going out. The outage is selective, and it fights any attempts to circumvent it.

Power stations refuse to turn back on, but radioactive containment units stay online. Army choppers won't start, but government laboratories full of dangerous chemicals have power. Car ignitions no longer work, so when the cars are turned off, they refuse to come on again, but there are no massive pileups on the highways. So perhaps the outage is benevolent, the work of an eco-terrorist intending to teach a lesson.

The peace and apparent mercy of it all is complicated by the prisons. Electronic locks go down with everything else, and soon there are criminals breaking out of maximum security everywhere.

And communications, such as they are, are most definitely down. Radios meet with heavy interference. The internet works only in fits and spurts for those people lucky enough to still have phones and computers with battery power, just long enough to spread panic through the populace with scraps of information over how widely spread the outage is. Only the highest of high tech still works, the most esoteric and out of range of normal human communication frequencies.

In the end, the outage is not so much selective as it is calculated, coolly and professionally, to create panic without pure demonization of the person responsible. It is a canny thing, creating mayhem and chaos just by turning off the lights, and giving the people of a third of the world motivation to hold their children close and pray for a savior, as, in the northern climes, it begins to snow.]

[The equipment that goes missing from Oscorp was designed to help find cold-blooded creatures for Dr. Connors. It is reported missing by one of the lab managers, but there are no signs of a break-in, and the surveillance cameras pick up nothing out of the ordinary. The equipment, it seems, it simply gone.]

[Locked to Bruce B]
Dr. Banner? Flash and I need something from SHIELD.

[Public]
Does anyone out there have Harry
[Not posted]

[As the storm rages on in the Eastern seaboard, Spider-man makes several headlines along with other rescue workers, firefighters, and volunteers. The blue and red mask means no few pictures pop up with him securing a broken crane and assisting the NYFD with the blaze in Queens.]

[Jane Foster is missing.

She was reported as such when a passer-by noted her home in New Mexico had been broken into and called the police. Jane was nowhere to be found, but the officer found traces of chloroform on the broken glass from the door. None of her things were removed from the apartment except her cell phone, but a note was left on the floor, near the door. Written in green ink, it states simply, I told you that you would regret.

It has only been roughly four hours since she was kidnapped, but there is still no sign of her anywhere.]

[News media explodes with coverage of an unidentified explosion at Stark Tower. Cameras are trained on the smoking wreckage of the top of the tower, drawing uncomfortable echoes of 9/11 footage, but before services can appropriately respond, more explosions (in white and in blue) rain more rubble on onlookers below. Things get even better for the media when a very visible silhouette of Loki blows Iron Man out of the side of a slightly lower level, and he is then caught in very heroic fashion by an out-of-uniform Captain America, shield and all. Cap joins the fight, but not for long, as after more explosions he retreats with an undeniably unresponsive Iron Man over one shoulder. Loki exits on a flying contraption to who knows where, and some time later the news stories update with the information that Tony Stark is in critical but stable condition at an unknown location. Nobody seems to really know what that means, but the story is on repeat.]

[Tony makes the news when he shows up without an appointment on the set of Larry King, boots a Twilight actor out of his slot, and gives an impromptu interview in which he flippantly refers to Loki as "a big picture maker, kind of like Michael Bay." He informs Larry that he is sure someone "who actually gets his hands dirty" will probably end up taking him down. He then orders someone off camera to "fetch Captain America's shield, maybe I have it stashed in my lab somewhere" which causes an uproar of the eyebrow-waggling kind.]