The Nega-Rover floated quietly through the void of space. Outside the stars seemed to move by at glacial pace, having a drowsy effect on the ship’s four passengers.

Only one aboard remained aware at all times of the reality. Propelled by a massive anti-matter engine of his own invention, the Nega-Rover was in fact racing through the darkness at a speed close to light.

This did not alarm the man, for it was hardly the first such trip. Reed Richards had been to the Negative Zone more times then he could count. It never ceased to be dangerous, but then most of his adventures were.

In the seat beside him, Ben Grimm occupied himself with the ship’s controls, keeping a keen eye on every gauge and readout. He’d been a great pilot in his youth; still was, in fact, although his rocky body and three-fingered hands prevented him from using most conventional aircraft. Reed had to specially modify all of the Fantastic Four’s vehicles to accommodate him.

Reed still felt guilty for Ben’s deformity. He always would and that, he felt, was proper. Of course, it was just one among many such blames that fell squarely on his shoulders. A bad way to think of things, he realized, but there it was.

In the backseat sat his other teammates, among them his wife, Susan Storm. She smiled faintly as he caught her eye, before returning to the magazine she was reading. Her brother Johnny had stretched out next to her, his eyes closed as he rocked to the tune of whatever song was playing in his I-pod.

In other words, they all looked comfortable. Just another day’s adventure. Why did he feel so out of sorts then? Somehow listless and jittery at the same time. Uncomfortable.

Reed glanced at his reflection in the silvery metal of the ship’s bulk head. His face looked worn, haggard, like it had after the stroke.* Maybe he should have kept up with the medicine the doctors prescribed.

* (M2K Fantastic Four #44)

I don’t feel sick though, he reflected. That wasn’t it. Just distracted after that damnable interview and the nonsense outside the Baxter Building.* What really worried him was much simpler.

* (Last issue)

The were headed into a sector of the Zone he was unfamiliar with, towards a mysterious planet, the source of an unlikely radio signal picked up by his probes. SOS it had read. Yet none of the various creatures in this dimension used Earth languages, let alone something as obscure as Morse code.

The likelihood that this was a trap was extremely high. If so, their lives would all be in danger, in a land very far from home. Once again the dice would be rolled, with the fate of his friends and family in the balance.

There was no choice in the matter though. If there was any chance the call for help was genuine, they had to respond.

That was what the Fantastic Four did.

“Aw, man, c’mon,” Johnny moaned as the team gazed out the window. “Why do we get all the ugly planets?”

As the Nega-Rover broke the upper atmosphere of 32-I, the planet’s surface came into view. Ugly, Reed had to admit, was a pretty good description. Long stretches of craggy, barren rock, most of it charred and blackened as though a great fire had swept over it. The few trees and bushes in sight were little more then scrubs and dead branches.

“I’m signing up with Doc Strange next time. He gets all the cool sets. I mean this place looks like Ben’s face.”

“And howsa about we check if the air’s breathable by throwin’ you out the airlock, smart ass?”

“Save the fighting until we land boys,” Sue told them, folding up her magazine and slipping it under the seat. “Punchlines are a lot funnier when you’re not being scrapped out of burning wreckage.”

“Fah,” Ben replied with a scowl, “like there’s any chance of that Suzie. You’re flying with the pros here.”

True to his word, the ship touched ground with only the slightest bounce as the rockets shut down. A mist of fine red dust rose into the air in a thick cloud, obscuring their vision from the windows.

“First readout’s positive gang. A surprisingly high concentration of oxygen in the atmosphere. Nor am I picking up anything toxic,” Reed said, already working the ship’s array of scanners. “It should be safe to breath without a mask.”

“Sounds good, boss.” Johnny had unbuckled his harness and was already on his way out of the cockpit. “First one spots a Dairy Queen, it’s on me.”

“Actually, it might be better to wait until I finished my readings. There’s no point in wandering around if we’ve set down in the wrong spot. What we’re looking for may be on the other side of the planet for all we know.”

“Ah, let the kid stretch his limbs Reed. I’ll keep an eye on him,” Ben said, working the kinks out of his own bulky limbs as he followed Johnny towards the rear of the ship. “Or throw him down the nearest crater I find. Whichever strikes my fancy.”

Reed looked towards Susan and she shrugged. They’d both had the experience of leading the Fantastic Four in the past and one thing you learned early on was lead could be a relative term with Johnny and Ben.

He turned back to the consol screen. “Still no sign of any radio signals, although this is approximately where they were transmitted. How are we looking on life readings? Anything out there?”

“The scan’s not complete but my intuition says yes.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning,” Sue answered, pointing towards the windows, “take a look for yourself, dear.”

The dust, he discovered, had started to clear and the bleak terrain became visible again. The first shapes he spotted were Johnny and Ben, standing just a few feet in front of the nose cone. Then other shapes came into view, humanoid figures--dozens of them--arranged in a semi-circular pattern around the Nega-Rover.

They appeared to be armed.

“Ah,” Reed said. “I see.”

By the time Reed and Sue disembarked, the figures had drawn closer, keeping low to the ground as they studied the team. They had human proportions and features, differing only by their large yellow eyes and the tufts of silky fur that grew from their forearms. Their skin was a reddish bronze, mostly exposed save for a few scraps of loose cloth around their waists.

They had a primitive look, Reed decided, but that didn’t mean they were harmless. Most were carrying long metal javelins held at the ready, and he had no doubt they could do the average human body fatal damage if thrown by an expert.

“You know,” Johnny was saying, “I almost feel sorry for these guys. On Earth, they’d know better but these poor scrubs don’t even realize who the Fantastic Four are.”

Ben cracked his knuckles. “Guess they’re about to learn the hard way, kid.”

“Easy, gentlemen, we’re not here for a fight. Sue, maybe you should put a shield around us before any of our friends here decide to try out those spe-”

Before he could finish, a new figure broke from the ring and strode in their direction. A long green cloak whipped around its shoulders as a twinkle of light reflected off the silver casing of its right arm.

Johnny reacted first, a burst of flame instantly engulfing his body as his powers switched on. Several of the natives leapt backwards at the sight and a few tossed their javelins, bouncing them harmlessly off Ben’s skin.

“You,” Reed said.

“Yes, old friend, me,” a familiar voice replied. Reaching up the figure removed the hood from its face.

She smiled.

“…this is Ben and Johnny, and of course my wife, Susan. Allow me to introduce Professor Andrea Wells of Empire State University.”

“How do you do?” she said politely. “I’m glad to see that your team received my radio signal.”

“You two know each other, I take it?”

Andrea smiled, an action that encompassed her whole face. She was an attractive woman, perhaps ten years Reed’s senior but easily passing for younger. She had dark caramel-toned skin with curly auburn hair, pulled back into a practical pony tail. The patched remains of a white flight suit hugged her toned body while the frayed green canvas from a pop tent provided the cloak.

“Yes,” Wells answered, “Reed and I met back in college, during the Subspace & Time Anomaly Con, if I recall. Quite an occasion that.”

“Hum,” he answered with a thoughtful smile. “I’m not certain Doc Matthias would have agreed with you.”

“If he did, it would have been a first, hmm?”

The two shared a laugh, drawing mostly blank expressions from the rest of the team. They had never heard of a Prof. Wells and, given the visual, it seemed a strange omission even for Reed.

“So we came here to rescue Reed’s old flame?” Johnny joked, before smirking at Reed. “Nice, by the way. I had no idea you were getting that kind of action at those nerd cons of yours.”

“It wasn’t that way at all. Andrea was several semesters ahead of me when I arrived and the top of her class. I respected her work tremendously.”

“Don’t let him fool you,” she said, smiling slyly as she squeezed Reed’ forearm. “He always had a bit of crush on me I think.”

Sue pasted on a fake smile. “Really? How funny.”

“Of course. But I never had time to reciprocate. How I was to know then that he’d go on to be the Mr. Fantastic?”

“Believe me, no one was more surprised then myself,” Reed said, ignoring the teasing as he glanced down at her left arm. It appeared to built out of polished steel. “And how did this happen? I don’t remember it the last time we met.”

“A nasty little mix of rotten luck and damned stupidity. Remember the Maklov Time Sphere experiment the Albino Twins use to always talk about? Well, one of the crazy bastards finally convinced me to give it a try. Should have known better,” she said, shaking her head ruefully, “lucky to lose just the arm.”

“Ah. I always did say their methods rather dangerous.” Reed recalled Andrea had always been interested in the riskiest experiments though, even back in their college days. It didn’t surprise him to hear that one of them had finally left it’s mark on her. “Still, it looks like good work.”

“The best.” She raised her hand, flexing the surprisingly nimble metal fingers. “My ex worked development at Stark Labs. He was a real prick about it, but it got done all the same.”

“You could have contacted me, you know. Our labs are always open to friends.”

She smiled. “That’s sweet. Believe me I considered it too, but hated to bother you. You’re usually so busy saving the world and all. I wouldn’t have done so now but it seemed like the only option.”

“Only option for what?”

“Getting off this rock, of course,” she clarified. “Which reminds me…”

As the five Earthlings became reacquainted, the natives had grown increasingly agitated. Their eyes kept straining towards the horizon, as though expecting something terrible to appear there any minute.

“…we’d best clear out of here. They’re bound to show up soon. We don’t want to get caught out in the open.”

“Caught by who?”

“I’ll explain as we go,” Andrea replied, pulling the hood of her cloak back in place. “Can you hide your ship?”

Reed touched a button on his belt and the Nega-Rover immediately faded from view. For added precaution Sue stretched one of her densest fields around its hull. Between the two, an army would have been needed to find and break into it.

“Impressive…”

“The camo works on the same principle as my wife’s powers. She can-”

“Of course. I know. The Invisible Woman, yes? I still read the papers.” Andrea spared a cool glance back at Susan, who returned her look with equal coldness. It did not appear to be love at first sight.

“Shall we go then?”

Andrea made a circular motion with her right hand and the natives seemed to take this as a signal to filter out of the clearing. The team quickly followed in their wake.

“So are there more hot chicks in meta-science or is this a fluke? ‘Cause I’m starting to think I majored in the wrong subject at Metro…”

“And that one?” Andrea asked Reed, indicating Johnny. “He’s the one that explodes, right?”

“Only in our dreams lady,” Thing mused. “Only in our dreams…”

As they traveled up the jagged bluffs of 32-I, barely keeping pace with their nimble guides, Andrea explained the rest of her story. It was pretty much as Reed guessed. She had, some time back, been part of a research project recording wave patterns within the Negative Zone’s Distortion Field.

It was hoped a reason could be discovered for the abnormal energy emissions Reed had once recorded there. A whole range of half-baked studies had been humored by the team, everything from proving superstring theory to using the Zone as means for a commercial teleportation service on Earth.

Unfortunately, the funding fell through and the project went belly-up. Nonetheless, Andrea had gotten the bug and she continued to explore the Zone on her own time. The last few months she’d spent mapping the so-called Uncharted Area when disaster struck. Her ship--designed on a similar pattern as Reed’s old Explorer model--crash landed on Planet 32-I, damaging most of its equipment.

Through the entire story, Reed marveled mostly at how full of energy Andrea was after all this time. While she might have technically been older then him, she didn’t show her years at all. He, on the other hand, seemed to feel the weight of every last one these days.

“At first,” she explained, continuing her narrative, “I made the best of it, especially when I ran into our friends here. They seemed peaceful enough, if a tad primitive. I figured my work among them would be purely anthropological, at least until evidence of a more advanced civilization began to surface.”

“Really?” Reed said, his voice betraying his skepticism. They’d seen little on this planet so far to suggest that its advancement went much past the flint and fire stage.

“Indeed. A possible Type II.”

“That seems unlikely. Such a society would never let their planet fall into such a state. They’d have the technology to create a virtual Utopia.”

“Yes,” Andrea noted grimly, “it would seem that way. Unless someone made that choice for them.”

The party they’d been following had drawn to a sudden stop and the team paused as well. They now stood in the midst of a wide valley peppered with imposing mesas. There was no sign of life beyond the blowing sands and sharp rocks.

Extending her mechanical arm, Andrea pointed towards a distant canyon. “There. Look.”

Reed widened his hand, using it to shield his eyes as he squinted through the dust. A single red sun supplied just enough light to lend the landscape a dusky hue. Finally, his vision focused enough to see what Andrea was indicating. Cut into the sloping rock, barely noticeable to the naked eye, were the imprints of stone buildings.

This, he realized, was where the tribe lived, in a series of caverns carved into the sheer rock. Similar to the cave palaces of the Anasazi in the American Southwest.

As Reed studied the city, he spied another group of natives approaching from the canyon area.

“Someone’s coming.”

Andrea climbed onto a nearby rock for height and nodded as she recognized their banners. “It looks to be the Queen’s entourage. She’s come to greet you personally. I’m afraid I made some fairly big boasts about you gentlemen.”

“Oh, man,” Johnny said, taking a look for himself, “some kind of alien, Amazonian Queen? You just know she’s going to be smoking hot too.” Ben shot him a wry look and he scowled back at him. “What? You know that’s how these things work.”

Andrea slid back down from his perch and joined Reed. “We should move forward to meet them.”

“Anything we need to know beforehand?”

“Just-”

Suddenly an earth-shaking boom sounded from the sky above them. The whole landscape seemed to tremble and a look of wild-eyed terror overtook the natives. Dozens of searchlights sliced through the clouds in saber-like beams.

“I’m guessing that ain’t the rest of the welcomin’ committee…”

“No,” Andrea replied, the harsh winds tearing savagely at her cloak. “It certainly isn’t.”

As the first large craft came into view, a swarm of smaller shapes broke free, filling the air with a paralyzing hum. As one flew closer, Reed identified it as a small personal hover-craft, similar to the Avengers’ sky-cycles. The thing at the controls, however, was like nothing human. It stood over eight feet tall with four long chitinous arms and a head like a black widow spider.

And its weapons, Reed reflected, looked a lot more dangerous then javelins.

Next Issue: The Fantastic Four vs. the Ghosts Gods of 32-I!

Author’s Note:

At this point, some of you may be wondering what exactly is going on. Fantastic Four Volume 2 isn’t shaping up to look a whole lot like Fantastic Four Volume 1. What happened to Pittsburgh, Club 4, and Lyja?

Allow me to explain.

There are two reasons for this gap. The first was my own reluctance to write another author’s stories. The previous run in Fantastic Four ended in several cliff-hangers. As eager as I was to sign up for the title, I didn’t feel that I could do them justice. My own material gives me enough trouble; I didn’t want to do anyone a disservice by writing a shoddy conclusion.

The second reason is that someone else had already signed up to finish Volume 1. This situation sounded ideal to me. After taking a look at that writer’s notes, I proceeded to do up a proposal set to follow his story. Sadly, that story never got written. As a result my proposal took for granted several events that never happened--such as the team returning to NYC.

Which is all starting to sound like a big mess. Luckily, there’s a silver lining.

A third writer, Stephen Crosby, has stepped in to finish up Volume 1 after all. Not only does his issue complete the previous writer’s run but it ties in nicely to Volume 2 as well. Amazingly, despite the restrictions, he also managed to write a fun little story that stands on its own merits.

So I urge anyone reading this to go check out Crosby’s Volume I finale and let him know what you think.

- Alan Strauss