by Sam Maggs
The agent on the street pulled a large gun-shaped apparatus off his back and aimed it at Nadia. “Time to get squashed.”
Nadia rolled her eyes. Villains. You’d think they’d spend more time coming up with their snappy zingers, but no. They were always satisfied with the same garbage. Honestly, it was kind of disappointing.
The A.I.M. agent pulled the trigger on his weapon the same moment Nadia hit the trigger on her Pym Particles, shrinking instantly. She watched the ignition on his flamethrower like it was happening in slow motion.
NADIA’S NEAT SCIENCE FACTS!!!
Military-grade flamethrowers and flamethrowers for regular people* (???) use different flammable liquids. Regular people (who own flamethrowers…?), like the A.I.M. agent in this situation, use propane-operated flamethrowers. Military-grade flamethrowers use gel-like substances (napalm-esque) because they’re more viscous—they don’t soak into the ground or dissipate as easily. That means they can be left to sit sticky on surfaces for longer periods of time and can still be ignited later. They’re very dangerous!
Propane-operated flamethrowers are less dangerous, as far as flamethrowers go. Which is to say, still extremely dangerous. We are talking about flamethrowers, here. The propane gas escapes the tank via its own pressure. As it exits the nozzle, the gas undergoes piezo ignition. If you have ever lit a camping stove or even a lighter, you are familiar with piezoelectricity, which is the electric charge that can accumulate in materials like quartz under pressure. When quartz is struck quickly—by, say, a spring-loaded hammer—it releases an electrical discharge. When that high-voltage discharge comes into contact with the propane gas…
Kawoosh! You have your flames! I am assuming this A.I.M. agent’s suit is flame-retardant.
That is about to be very lucky for him.
Nadia narrowed her eyes. She zipped around the flames, the air warping around her from the heat, and flew behind the guy who was still under the impression that he was aiming his flames at her. Nadia centered herself behind his propane tank, and—
Zzzp zzp! From her wrists, Nadia let two of her Wasp’s Stings fly. The bioelectric energy shot from her suit straight toward the tank.
And remember what we just learned about propane gas and electricity?
The blast was so big that tiny Nadia was thrown backward, tumbling head over feet three, four, five times before she was able to catch herself with her wings and bring herself back upright. She was disoriented—which way was up? Everything was huge and her head was still spinning.
There. The huge ball of flames. That was enough to get Nadia situated. The A.I.M. agent whose gas tank she’d blown up was rolling around in the middle of the street, trying to put himself out. He’d be busy for a while. Nadia spun to relocate his friends. The one outside the office’s front door was frantically shrugging off his own propane pack.
First sign of intellect I’ve seen today. But wait…
The third A.I.M. agent had used the detonation as cover and bolted down the alley. Nadia shot after him. He wasn’t wearing a gas tank; he had on a normal backpack. A JanSport. So normal it stood out sharply against the black hazmat suit and matching black bucket helmet.
Nadia made a mental note to ask Janet if bucket helmets were perhaps going to be high fashion soon. She really hoped not.
When she caught up to the agent in the alley, Nadia wrapped one arm around the handle of his backpack before exploding back to her usual size. She used her momentum to lift the agent into the air by the handle, spinning him in a circle before releasing her arm. The bucket-head went flying into the metal dumpster at the back of the alley, sliding to the ground with a thump. Nadia was shocked to see him jump back to his feet—spry, she thought, narrowing her eyes. She landed on the ground in front of him as he pulled out a handgun.
“Oh, absolutely not,” said Nadia. She was miniature before the agent could even pull the trigger.
Nadia’s whole body shook with the force of the blast from the muzzle. But instead of rushing away from the gun, she flew right toward it. She passed the bullet in midair, twisting her body in a spin that would have made her old ballet instructors proud to avoid getting caught in its slipstream, and kept moving toward the weapon. She landed on the barrel—hot, hot, hot—tilting to the left as she did. When she reached the handle, just behind the trigger, she ran directly over the magazine release button, dropping the remainder of the bullets out of the gun. The magazine clattered to the sidewalk as Nadia launched herself off the back of the gun. She flipped over the agent’s shoulder, eager to get behind him—there was still one bullet in the chamber, after all.
Nadia zoomed into the side of the dumpster feet-first, pushing back off toward the agent and exploding back to her usual size while flipping head over feet. She used the momentum and force of her transformation to place a kick to the agent’s kidneys that was much more devastating than it would have been otherwise (for the record: already pretty devastating). He dropped like a sack of potatoes falling down a very steep set of stairs into a cold cellar.
Where they store the potatoes. You get it.
Nadia picked up the gun and racked the slide, clearing the loaded bullet from the chamber. Working quickly, she shrank, shrinking the gun along with her, then returned to size and crushed the weapon easily under her boot.
Just one more.
Leaping from the ground in a sauté* that would have made her handlers proud, Nadia let her wings take her the rest of the way off the ground. She emerged into the light of the mostly deserted street (thanks to Wendy’s quick thinking) and searched for the last remaining A.I.M. agent. There was his discarded propane tank; there was the toasty agent who had rolled himself into unconsciousness. But the third agent…was gone.
How did someone in such a bulky getup run away so fast? Thunderation.†
They must have been using a version of Monica Rappaccini’s phasing belt. Coincidentally, Nadia thought that “Monica Rappaccini’s Phasing Belt” sounded like one of Priya’s favorite bands. Still, not a very “devastating Super Villain” feeling.
A voice crackled to life over Nadia’s comms system as she touched down outside the office’s front door.
“Nadia!” It was Janet, and she sounded worried. “Are you all right?!”
“I’m fine,” Nadia confirmed. “Goth Devo, on the other hand…”
Janet stifled a chuckle. “How many did they send?”
“Three,” Nadia replied bitterly. “One got away. Phased. I should have had him.”
“You did great,” Janet assured her. “S.H.I.E.L.D. has a cleanup crew incoming and I’m on my way, too. Did they know that isn’t our lab?”
“That’s what I said!” Nadia poked the charred hazmat suit with her booted toe. The A.I.M. agent inside groaned. “Maybe S.H.I.E.L.D. can get answers out of them.”
“That’s the plan,” Janet agreed.
Nadia made her way back down the alley and found the second agent still out like cold potatoes. He’d fallen facedown and his bucket was slightly askew, his full backpack jutting straight up from the middle of his back. Nadia tugged on the black JanSport before she remembered—she was missing plans right now! “Oh, Janet,” she said in a rush, grabbing the backpack’s zipper, “can you please tell Ying I’m going to be late for Star Wars night tonight?”
“Star Wars night?” Janet repeated with a laugh. “Did your driver’s ed get canceled?”
Nadia froze while reaching for the backpack’s zipper. She flipped her wrist around and checked the date. Wednesday. Driving lesson night. Just like every Wednesday. Nadia whipped her phone out of its dedicated pocket on her thigh to text…Ying? her instructor? everyone? in a panic, when she saw she already had a text waiting for her.
TAINA: So we off for Bee-Boi testing, then?
Oh.
It was that Wednesday. The Wednesday Nadia had also promised to help Taina with her Like Minds project.
At the same time she was supposed to be watching Revenge of the Sith.
>
Which was the same time she was supposed to be taking a driving lesson.
“Janet…I’ll talk to you when you get here, okay?” Nadia switched off her comms before her machekha could respond.
Nadia tucked her phone away and decided the best course of action at the moment was to ignore the entire situation entirely. That usually solved things, right? She reached forward and tugged open the zipper on the agent’s JanSport.
The backpack, full to bursting, spilled its contents all over the pavement in the alleyway and across the unconscious agent’s back. It was a glut of different tech, all still in their packages, security tags still visible.
“Someone went on a five-finger shopping spree,” scolded Nadia. The agent didn’t respond, because she had kicked him until he wasn’t awake anymore. A.I.M. involved in petty theft? To what end? Nadia sifted through the items: a new iPhone, a few Fitbits, several heart-rate monitors, and…
“VERAs.” Nadia picked up a box with the familiar gold outline. Looks like A.I.M. was as desperate to get their hands on HoffTech’s new virtual assistant as everyone else.
And Nadia had one in a box at Pym Laboratories, untouched.
VERA.
How had she forgotten so completely about Janet’s name day gift? She’d packed it up with the rest of her belongings at Hank’s house and shipped it to G.I.R.L. weeks ago. But, like most of the boxes she’d sent over, it was still sitting in her room, sealed shut. She was going to get around to it…sometime. Soon! Definitely. But she hadn’t had the opportunity yet.
Nadia heard the telltale sounds of a S.H.I.E.L.D. tactical unit pulling up on the street outside Pym Philanthropy. Standing, she pulled her phone back out. Missed messages from her driving instructor, Janet, Taina, Ying, and, for some reason, Dedushka. And the journal and its list still waited on Nadia’s desk back at the lab.
VERA was the answer. Nadia was certain of it. It had to be. Because she wasn’t going to be able to balance all of this by herself.
* Mr. Stark always paid his taxes. Nadia had hacked into his financials when she’d first started on the Like Minds project just to be sure.
* Nadia would never forget the first time that Janet had showed her a Devo music video. She’d been amused by it, but it also made her feel like there were parts of American pop culture that she was never going to understand.
* Regular people should not have flamethrowers, for the record. Even the “garden-variety” non-military kind.
* Fancy ballet-speak for “jump,” not to be confused with a particularly delicious treatment of vegetables. With both your feet flat on the floor, bend your knees, then push yourself straight up into the air. Don’t forget to point your feet on lift-off!
† No one besides Nadia has used this term since 1850. It’s like a more vintage “drat.”
Nadia sat at her desk at Pym Labs the next day, staring at the white-and-gold package in front of her. A cardboard box stuffed with crumpled newspapers and kitchen utensils sat open next to Nadia on the floor. Its still-sealed counterparts were stacked in two other corners of the room. Nadia had slowly started to unpack, but that was just how it went—there was always more mess before it was tidy again.
Or so Nadia hoped. Dearly.
She could hear Taina out in the lab, hammering something aggressively. Priya hadn’t been around much lately—she’d either been at the shop or out in nature, trying to figure out the limits of her new powers. Shay and Ying popped in and out, but they were sort of…orbiting each other in a way that excluded all other heavenly bodies. Nadia found it endearing.
At least from a conceptual standpoint. Mostly. But she did miss her friends. Especially lately. Not that she saw friendship as transactional, but she certainly could have used help from the other G.I.R.L.s with the amount of work on her own plate. More than that, though, Nadia had come to depend on the G.I.R.L.s as a kind of stabilizing force. They each played their own valuable role in the lab: Nadia, the leader; Ying, the enforcer; Taina, the pragmatist; Priya, the dreamer; Shay, the spark that kept them all going. When even one of them was missing, it threw the entire balance off. With almost all of them missing, Nadia felt…adrift. Unmoored. She had more than enough to keep her occupied, of course. But she missed them. Priya’s big plans. Taina’s sardonic wit. Shay’s inventive spirit. Ying’s (occasionally alarming) dry humor and fire. What is a leader if she’s alone?
Still, Nadia didn’t want to begrudge her friends their happiness. She wasn’t selfish like that. But she was allowed to miss them. And she was allowed to seek balance from other places.
With that in mind, she popped open the small box in her hands and slid out the gold metal rectangle. She had put her Wasp suit on beforehand, just in case. She was never one to shy away from risk, but in moments like this, she often found herself erring on the side of caution.
Maybe it was because her own father had once accidentally invented a machine intelligence called Ultron, who was kind of Nadia’s brother-by-proxy, who became extremely evil and tried to destroy the entire planet, and therefore she had a difficult time trusting AI?
Could be.
But machine intelligence was also responsible for Nadia’s “nephew,” Vision, and her adorable “great-niece,” Vivian Vision. So she knew AIs weren’t all bad on principle.
Still. It never hurt to take some precautions.
Nadia poked around the HoffTech box for the instructions—none. They must have gotten lost in the chaos of the move.
Instead, she just tried to turn the virtual assistant on. She was a certified genius;* she could figure this out. Nadia flipped the golden brick around in her hands a few times before noticing a white light on one side. Had that been on this whole time? Regardless, she must have done something right, at least.
There was no interface, no touch screen, no nothing on the device at all. Nadia peered at it through one eye. She shrank to insect size in her seat and examined the rectangle close up. It was smooth and shiny and Nadia’s reflection made her look like she was bathing in a golden pool, like an Athenian goddess. It was a good look on her. She could get used to it! But more importantly (equally importantly…?), Nadia could find nothing suspicious on the surface of the device. Not on its walls; not when she gracefully landed on top of it after struggling for a few moments to climb the slippery side; not even around the bright red LED set into its seam, still glowing. Just…a normal, metal rectangle.
Nadia popped back to human size and eyed the device on the table. She poked at it.
Nothing.
She flipped it over.
Still nothing.
Certified genius.
Feeling very silly, she decided to try speaking to it. “VERA…” Nadia said, “hello?”
“Hi, Nadia!” the device responded, cheerfully. Nadia jumped in her chair a little.
“Did you say something?” Taina called from outside the room.
“No, Tai, it’s fine!” Nadia called back, scrambling for a way to turn down the volume. Nadia shushed it, hoping that might help, then waited a moment, hoping Taina would return to whatever she’d been doing without questioning further.
“VERA…” Nadia turned back to the device, whispering, “How do you…What do you do?”
“Thanks for asking, Nadia!” The device sounded like the host on an American children’s television show. Light, clear, bubbly. About as far from Romanian Sailor Moon as you could possibly get. “I’m VERA, your Virtual Executive Remote Assistant. I’m here to make your life easier.”
Nadia looked around her room awkwardly. There was something very strange about talking to an inanimate box. Maybe it was the fact that it had no screen. Ever the scientist, Nadia found it difficult to trust what she couldn’t see.
“Would you like a rundown of my features and functions? If yes, you may find it beneficial to enable my virtual display. Would you like me to do that?”
“Yes!” Nadia responded quickly. Just as soon as the word had left her mouth, the gold box sprang to
life. A beam of light shot out from the seam on its surface, straight toward the ceiling with a sound like an ocean wave. A shower of pixels rained back down. They settled into the shape of an animated woman. Her pixelated hair cascaded in soft waves down to her shoulders. She wore what Nadia would have called Janet-on-her-way-to-dress-down-an-unruly-investor business attire. She had a light smile on her blue-tinted face. Nadia thought she looked just like Sailor Neptune.*
“How’s this?” asked VERA.
“Much better!” Nadia smiled back at the hologram in front of her.
“Very good.” VERA nodded. “I modeled myself after your favorite show!”
Nadia swallowed. Right, she thought. AI. That’s what it’s supposed to do: Learn. Adapt. Build affinity.
Was it, though? Hadn’t she just turned it on? It couldn’t have been on already. That would mean that it had been on…for months? Nadia picked up the golden box and examined it from all angles. No matter how she turned it, the VERA hologram stayed upright.
“Oh!” VERA laughed. “Going for a ride!”
“What do you do?” asked Nadia, mostly to herself. “How do you work?”
“I’m so glad you asked,” said VERA. Suddenly, she disappeared. Nadia placed the box down on her desk carefully and sat back in her chair, waiting for what would happen next. The pixels reemerged and rearranged themselves into another image: a girl, close to Nadia’s age, hunched over a desk and scribbling away.
“Don’t you wish you had more hours in your day?” asked VERA’s voice. “There’s more pressure than ever on people today to stay on top of things. Have the perfect home and the perfect family. Keep up with self-care. Work the most impressive job. Graduate with the best grades.” The girl in the image crumpled up the paper in front of her and dropped her head onto her desk in frustration. Nadia related deeply. “Staying on top of the minutiae necessitated by our modern way of life can feel overwhelming and impossible.”
The image shifted again. It was a woman’s headshot. She had dark, shoulder-length hair that was just unkempt enough to give the impression that she was too busy to style it. She looked off to one side, apparently deep in thought. Nadia couldn’t tell if the icy blue of her eyes was real, or just the blue of the hologram.
