CAPE CITY
Dr. Orion Memorial Research Center
Captain Alpha agreed to have Invincibelle take lead on investigating the stasis pod. She transported it back to Cape City and made some calls. It took a few hours to gather some of her contacts from the Xenoscience division. They built a containment facility, and began analyzing the atomic scans that Captain Alpha provided them.
Invincibelle’s first concern was that this probe was similar to the one that transformed her, and somewhere out there was another blue superwoman; but one under the influence of some alien agenda. But fortunately there was no sign that someone else had wandered across the pod, Metrocity Quick Response Authority was the first on the scene.
For a brief time, Eva was convinced that this was a false alarm, that the pod was empty when it arrived on Earth. There was no radioactivity, no cellular or biologic residue of any sort. But Dr. Constantin Ivankov found something that everyone else had missed. A slight vibrational tremor when he ran a neutrino scan over the interior compartment.
“There are traces of anti-energy.” he said.
“Anti-energy?” asked Invincibelle.
“Yes, that’s why we are not able to detect something. Because we are not looking for something that is the opposite of something.”
Invincibelle raised an eyebrow, “You mean nothing?”
“Of course not nothing, if there were nothing then we wouldn’t have not detected it would we?”
“I’ve missed these chats, Ivankov.” she muttered as she turned to the rest of the gathered scientists in the research lab. “Anti-energy people! Anyone have a theory?”
“Hold on a second, Belle.” Mary Pointer, one of the science leads sat at a computer terminal. “I remember something from Doctor Orion’s old notes. She began rapidly typing on a console and the holographic display in the center of the room began shuffling through files. One of them opened and spilled its virtual contents out. It was only a few paragraphs long but it had a crimson danger flag attached to it. “An… Ithornic Leech?”
There was a few seconds of silence as the researchers read the scant notes left by Doctor Orion then they all began talking at once.
“…parasitic organism cells powered by anti-energy…”
“Sheer speculation!”
“No known images, none in captivity, are we sure this isn’t a bogeyman?”
“…responsible for the destruction of an entire star empire!”
“It hides in a host and consumes life energy…”
“…but the amount of life energy it requires to sustain itself.”
“If this is correct, then a human would perish within seconds of…”
“It feeds on the collision of bio-cellular energy with anti-energy.”
“But if it were in the pod there would be a trail of dead bodies by now–”
“Superheroes…!” Invincibelle exclaimed solemnly. Everyone quieted down except for Ivankov who was calling one of his colleagues an imbecile. “Assuming this leech is real and that was what came out of the pod…”
“It definitely did!” stated Ivankov matter-of-factly.
Invincibelle ignored him, “…then we may not have found a trail of dead humans because it found a much more powerful source of energy. Maybe it landed near Metrocity on purpose. What have they got more of than any other city on Earth?” She stood across from the holo-display with her hands on her hips. “Mary, pull up the map of Metrocity and the crash site.”
A wire-frame map of the city spun into place. Eva began talking out loud to herself, “I’m a parasitic predator. I’ve been in stasis for a few million years. Once I’m out, I make a bee-line for the nearest food source… oh no.”
“What?” said Krieger. “What is that large building you are all staring stupidly at?”
“It’s the Superheroine Battle Arena.”