"Sir, I received an encrypted message from Mr. Tony. He said he just saw you on the satellite surveillance backup channel. He also advised you not to shower in space — it would affect the city's appearance."
"I knew it." Henry rolled his eyes. "That peeping Tom actually used a satellite to spy on me? Does he have any sense of privacy? That's a crime. Jarvis, put Tony through. I'm going to curse him to death."
"Sir, Mr. Stark cut off all external communication channels after sending that message."
"He runs fast!" Henry complained, then looked down at the planet beneath him. "Forget it. Since we've been discovered, there's no point in hiding. Let's go home."
He checked his suit and then the Earth below. "Jarvis, calculate return trajectory. I want to get back as fast as possible and give my stupid brother a scare."
"Yes, sir. Calculating."
In an instant Henry vanished from orbit, a black streak of light tearing toward Earth. His speed climbed until space itself seemed to ripple.
"Sir — current speed exceeds Mach 8 and is still rising."
"Too slow. Faster."
He plummeted like a meteor, the atmosphere and ozone layer tearing apart in his wake. He decelerated and stabilized inside the atmosphere; his maximum reentry speed registered at Mach 11.
"Good enough," he grumbled, then pointed home and shot toward Malibu.
…a few minutes later, Malibu Beach House.
Night had settled. A black figure landed silently on the lawn. Henry entered through the gate; Jarvis disassembled the armor into a suitcase and reassembled it on the sofa. Henry poured a glass of red wine and savored the quiet.
Then he heard it: faint metallic knocking from the basement, voices in hushed debate. He smiled.
"It seems my stupid brother finally remembered to do something serious," he said to Jarvis, sipping wine. "Let's see whether his party brain can handle complex biology."
He descended the spiral staircase. The conversation grew clearer.
"No, it still doesn't work. Jarvis, simulate again. Reduce solvent ratio and increase energy injection frequency—"
"Tony, maybe take a break? You've been at this for eight hours," Ethan suggested.
"I'm fine," Tony snapped.
"Hey, two hard-working scientists," Henry's voice cut in at the lab door.
Tony and Ethan jumped and spun toward him. Tony exhaled in relief, then launched into a verbal assault. "You sneaked back without making a sound? Weren't you out naked in space? How did you get back so fast? Did aliens eject you because your tech is garbage?"
"What about you?" Henry shot back without missing a beat.
"At least I don't need a tin can to go outside. Seriously, Tony, don't your armor smell of rust?"
They traded barbs, then Henry walked over to Ethan and shook his hand. "Long time, Ethan. You look… healthier than that cave in Afghanistan."
"Long time, Henry," Ethan replied. "Thanks to Tony, I'm now Chief Consultant for Medical at Stark Industries. It's more interesting than I expected."
Henry turned to Tony with a look that mixed amusement and irritation. "Enough nostalgia. Why drag me back from my delightful space nap? If this is to show me how failure breeds success, forget it. I have no interest in watching you fail."
Tony pointed to a complex molecular model on a holographic screen. "Of course it's business. Remember the serum we discussed? I've made an enhanced version of the super-soldier serum, but—" He trailed off, frustration written across his face. "We tried so many combinations, trying to blend different serums to make something new. They just won't mix. They're like oil and water."
Ethan added, "Every fusion sample collapses. From a biological perspective, these serums have conflicting properties. Fusion causes cell death."
Tony scrolled through failed data, a rare show of defeat.
Henry watched silently, then moved to the console and asked Jarvis to pull every raw dataset and simulation. He focused in a way that made Tony uncomfortable.
"Tsk, look at these experimental steps," Henry said, half-critic, half-instruction. "Directly mixing the inducer with the conversion serum? Tony, are you experimenting or cooking? Their energy signatures are mutually exclusive. If that didn't blow up in your face, you're lucky."
"I'm trying a new pathway!" Tony protested.
Henry's smile faded. He dove into the models and cross-referenced simulation parameters against in vivo reports. He probed the sequences, the kinetics, the conformational changes. The more he checked, the stranger it got.
"No matter how you simulate it," he muttered, "the fusion always collapses."
Tony rubbed his temples. "These serums coexist in your body perfectly. Why can't we replicate that in vitro? Was my success a fluke? An unrepeatable accident?"
Henry stared at the evolving gene map on the screen, the one that illustrated his altered pathways. He took a long breath and spoke slowly.
"Here's the thing. Theoretically these serums can't be combined. The lab results are consistent with that. The only reasonable explanation is this: what Hydra injected into me wasn't their finished product. It was an original formulation that, once inside my physiology, mutated in a way the database can't predict. Something in my body — genetic background, microenvironment, or an unstable intermediate — caused an unexpected mutation. That mutation is what transformed me."