Marvel: The Sandman Chapter 5

Chapter 5: A Fiery Situation

“Oh shit.”


The words that left my mouth precisely described my situation. 


A moment ago, I was in stress and now I am straight in the shit.


“Hey there, hotshot! Going out to cause some trouble?”


And a much bigger shit.


He sounds like he already considers me to be the bad guy. Is it my getup or my physical appearance?


But well… Whom am I kidding? I know, it is a mixture of both. 


“Look man,” I said, “I don’t want any trouble. I am just trying to figure out what the hell is wrong with me.”


It wasn’t a lie but it was also a subtle way to hint that I wasn’t evil and was just a guy trying to figure out what was going on with me.


“The hell’s wrong that you are causing trouble, pal.”


But I remembered that sometimes being calculative is also a bad thing. 


Johnny Storm or the Human Torch wasn’t someone who was capable of high level thinking. He was a simple guy.


Simple being the word that I am using as a synonym for dumb.


And dumb he was.


“So, what are you? A runaway mutant? An alien disguised as a human or some mutate?” 


He didn’t consider the probability of me being a good guy or someone that recently awakened his powers even for a second.


Now, I did not look like your average Joe but my build shouldn’t have been a reason to be termed as a bad guy.


“Reed said that he sensed a power spiking around this area,” He mumbled the first part, "And you know what? I notice you're using your sand to shift those trash cans and heavy stuff out of your path. That doesn't seem normal to me."


Now, I believe I should have been more subtle with my powers. But, I also know that geniuses tend to overestimate the capability of others and it was most likely the case for Reed Richards as well.


If this Reed Richards is the same guy I've read about, he's not the type to jump to conclusions and label someone as a bad guy without even meeting them.


And so what does that mean? That means that he overestimated the capability of Johnny and forgot to brief him about the situation.


“Look fireboy or torch, I am not the bad guy.” I said, trying to put on a persona that sounded strong and confident.


The worst part in this was that Johnny was possibly the worst opponent that I could face right now.


A, his power is fire based and he can use it to turn my sand body into molden slurry -which will obviously leave me immobile.


Or possibly even turn the silica in my body into glass.


B, while Marko later learned to control glass, I am different. I just got this power which means that I barely have any control over the sand -much less glass.


These two were the biggest possibilities and issues if I decided to fight him. But it seemed like there was no other option as Johnny’s body flared up in flames by this moment.


“Every bad guy says that, pal.” He sounded certain, “But they always end up causing a ruckus.”


And with that he shot an orb of flame towards me. 


Being a newbie with these powers, I had no clue how to use them for offense or defense. Changing my clothing came naturally to me as changing clothes was a daily thing for humans.


But I wasn’t able to use my powers to defend and instead I ended up jumping to the side. 


Most likely sensing my flight response, the sand gave me an extra push which helped me to dodge the flaming ball.


“Knew it!” He grinned seeing me dodge his attack. “You have the ability to fight!”


I didn’t know how to react -whether to laugh or to cry. 


I legit dodged his fire attack because I wasn’t certain of how to use my ability to defend and here he believes that I am capable of fighting him.


My power is certainly strong enough to face the Torch but me as of now with absolutely no control over the sand is in no way or form capable of facing him.


Yet I couldn’t stay without doing anything either. 


Torch most likely wasn't going to kill me. He was a hero and heroes didn’t kill.


Unless they had no other choice. And I don’t think that the current situation calls for a measure such as that.


However… when heroes didn’t kill, they did something much worse. They would break every bone of their enemy and I did not want to suffer such a fate. 


Besides, I think my ‘body’ understood that well. As when the hero started to throw the orbs composed of flames, the sand around me started to move violently.


“Sheesh man!” Torch expressed, “Didn’t know that sand could be used like that.”


I wasn’t any less surprised than he was as instead of pushing or propelling me to safety, the sand started to rise in a way that created a thin layer of protection around me.


Of course, Torch was able to exert a temperature that started to melt the sand. And while sand didn’t simply turn to glass by the process of heating, it still made the sand unstable.


This however allowed me to create some distance between us.


“Which hero starts to attack people without even listening to their story?!” I nearly shouted from frustration.


The Human Torch was an immature hero and his weakness was his low intellect. And from our interaction it is also clear that he is more of an ‘act now and think later’ type of guy -which for a matter of fact is never good.


“The hero that doesn’t want any trouble in his neighborhood!” He hurled the flames toward me in an attempt to surround me.


Worst of all, he was impatient.


While he had good qualities, my mind could only think of the negatives as not many were able to look at the good when the person in question was out to hurt them.


Yet surprisingly, even in this messed up situation I was able to notice something good –Not about Torch but about me. And that was the fact that even if my ‘body’ and mind are subconsciously able to manipulate the sand in a way that I am unable to do so actively -the continuous action gets implanted in my consciousness. 


Which means I am now able to use the sand to form a protective sheath of sand to protect myself from the continuous fireballs. 


"Why did you come here?" Johnny asked, curious about my origins.


But then again, my origins were extraordinary.


"I was born here."


Unfortunately for him, I wasn't dumb enough to reveal such things to him.


"And I have lived here my whole life."


I was lying.


Kind of.


This body or well, Lukas has lived here for the entirety of his life. I do not know how I ended up as him but he had a story of his own which I might learn later.


For now, that should be enough to quench his curiosity.


I saw another flameshot flying towards me and this was much bigger than before.


I was ready to create another layer of sand shield in front of me alongside jumping away from the place.


It was pretty clear that this was too big of a flame shot for me to handle and if I stayed in its radius, I might get hurt pretty badly.


But to my utmost surprise, I didn't have to worry about it.


I didn't even have to move from my spot.


"Johnny!"


Because a person as big as a truck decided to interfere.


"That's enough!"


Or well…


It wasn't a man.


It was a THING.


…

…


[Central Base, Latveria]


The world of the supernatural was always looked after by a certain few figures.


And among the ones that looked after the safety and the movement of the world, there were a few that stood out.


Not cosmic level entities. But beings that stayed on Earth and looked after the people –protecting them from harm and keeping the world of the normal humans and superpowered ones separate.


Out of these, the most famous ones were the mutants which were looked after by two major groups –The X-Men and The Brotherhood.


Then there were the Inhumans who were a responsibility of the Inhuman royal family.


The magic users were looked after by Kamar-taj, Vishanti, Hand, Mordo, The Fallens and many others.


But there were a few others who were technically not incharge of regulating or controlling such beings but were responsible for taking charge when something that might harm the innocents or break the general balance were to occur.


Such a group was the Fantastic Four that protected the weak and helped the ones that were helpless.


But currently, the one that stared at a video of the Human Torch and a man controlling sand was none of the mentioned people.


He was someone that did not have the moral ground that the Fantastic Four had. In a way, many would consider the man to be a villain.


Few knew that the term hero and villain depended on the position they themselves were at, the moment and the place from where they looked at him.


And depending on those factors, the man could either be described as the most heinous criminal or the most respected hero.


But as of now, he had a neutral stance.


"So he is the one that was affected by the radiation…" He muttered, his voice deep and echoing. "He learns fast…"


While no one knew about the origin of Sandman.


This certain man did.


"He may be worth the effort."


Victor von Doom did.


The one whom they called –Dr. Doom.