She thought her life of crime was over, but when her recently reformed cohorts THE GRAPPLERS drifted apart, Melissa Gold needed something to belong to. Little did she know she would end up battling Earth's Mightiest Heroes in Baron Zemo's MASTERS OF EVIL! Now she and other ex-Masters have banded together in the THUNDERBOLTS to repay their debt to society--whether society likes it or not! Team player and loner all in one, she is SONGBIRD--never straying from her flock, yet ever singing solo in her heart...

Born with a silver spoon in his mouth and an "x-factor" in his genetic makeup, Warren K. Worthington III had everything handed to him in life, including two large, feathered wings growing out of his back. Realizing he was a mutant, he set forth to use his gifts to help those who would come to scorn him for being different! Since then his life has centered around the uncanny X-MEN, the band of mutants who have mentored him, befriended him, fought him, lost and redeemed him, and even loved him. Once known as the Angel, he has risen in stature and carries the scars of his moral victories as the avenging ARCHANGEL...

Next Best Thing
The fanfic that pulls crazy crap like this installment!

by Jim Smith

Chapter 5! "Business is Fixin' to Pick Up!"

***

"Kansas City, Missouri! Please welcome, at nearly eight feet and over _five hundred_ pounds, the largest athlete in the world, Big!...Mick!...Finn!"

The crowd in the Kemper Arena erupted, as a catchy entrance theme blared over the PA system to herald the arrival of "Big Mick" Finn. The hype about Finn was that he was an Irish goliath; the truth was that his name was Doug Templeton and even his thick black hair didn't quite reach the seven-foot-six mark on the measuring tape. None of these details had stopped the Unlimited Class Wrestling Federation from successfully promoting him with a completely implausible gimmick. The fans in Kansas City knew better, but didn't care; Big Mick made the Hulk and the Thing look like midgets, and if pretending he was Irish meant he'd give you his autograph, so be it.

"CA-BER-TOSS! CA-BER-TOSS!" The familiar chant that roared from the audience referred to the "Irish" giant's finishing maneuver which--in the grand wrestling tradition of slight inaccuracy--was named after a Scottish sport. Once he and his manager, the Lovely Delylah, had entered the ring, Big Mick answered the fans by miming the act of hurling a man across the ring like a tree trunk. The crowd popped with overwhelming approval, and Finn got down to the business of cutting an interview with commentator "Angry" Steve Zangre.

"All right!" Zangre began. "Big Mick, we're only a few weeks away from INFERNO--live on pay-per-view--and you've got the chance of a lifetime: A shot at the UCWF championship!"

His reply bellowed from massive lungs that could carry his voice throughout the Kemper Arena, even without a microphone. "That's right, Steve...when I came to UCWF, it was for one reason, and _one reason only_! And that...was to become...the heavyweight...champion...of the WORLD!" Like Pavlov's dog, the fans' reactions built up right along with Finn's emphasis. "Delylah and me, we've been through thick and thin together, throwing guys left and right, and there's only one guy left, and that's _you_, Styx."

"Yes, on that subject--Delylah, your thoughts on managing this mountain of a man all the way to becoming the _number one contender_ to the world title..."

Delylah moved up to speak into the microphone, and upon becoming the center of attention got her own share of cheers. She was easily one of the more beautiful female personalities in UCWF, but beyond that, she had a dignified, calm sensibility about her that made even the rowdiest mark in the audience refrain from catcalls or lewd chants. She smiled and simply said, "I'm just thrilled, Steve. I've always known Mickey had the talent to get here, and it's exciting to be with him for this moment." Delylah was a pro, and she knew she didn't need to say much; the story was towering above her.

Turning back to Finn, Zangre continued. "It certainly is an historic milestone for your career, sir, but getting back to the added complication. The man you'll be facing will indeed be Styx, and that means you have the Coven to contend with as well!"

"You think I'm worried about the Coven, Steve? You think I'm worried about a bunch of _jabronis_--guys who'd still be losing in the opening match in some bingo hall if they hadn't ganged up and started working for Styx? The truth is, they'd better be worried about _me_, because when I _take_ that UCWF _belt_ from that lanky-ass Vincent Price _wannabe_, I _may_ just decide I haven't had my fill, and give the whole lot of them a good... old-fashioned... CAAAAAAABER TOOOOOSS! ARRRRRRRRRGGHHHH!!!!"

With that final thought, Big Mick's music was cued up again, signaling his egress. The color commentator began shilling the next segment, featuring a match between two of UCWF's vast array of female competitors. Where most promotions had downplayed their ladies' divisions, UCWF founder Ed Garner had relished the challenge of making his show a truly "equal-opportunity ass-kicking," and had built a major success over the years on a foundation of talented, eye-catching, and occasionally notorious women.

One of them was sitting inside of a mountain in Colorado watching the show.

***

They were selfish, Warren Worthington reasoned. The Thunderbolts, for all their good qualities that he'd discovered since he'd gotten to know them, were basically looking out for themselves. All of them had ulterior motives in being superheroes; even Hawkeye, a respected ex-Avenger, had a personal stake in convincing the public to accept a team that had once very nearly conquered the world. And although the Thunderbolts, by and large, _wanted_ to do what was right, they were still jaded by their criminal pasts and instinctively sought whatever was in it for them.

That had to be, he decided, why Atlas, Jolt, Charcoal, Moonstone, and Hawkeye had all balked at the notion that they should try to talk to Songbird about whatever was bothering her. They all respected her as a teammate--some of them might even have been close friends with her--but deep down, the whole lot of them was inexperienced with actually helping one another out with a personal crisis. If Songbird had been captured by the Jury or the Imperial Forces, they'd know exactly what to do. But right now she was distraught and bottling up her angst, and only one Thunderbolt had been in the X-Men long enough to know what to do about that.

The question that went through his mind, on his way to Songbird's quarters, was what his role would be on this team. It seemed all the Thunderbolts had been pulled together by their mutual use of superheroics to achieve their own ends. Now he was on the team, so what were _his_ ends? To win back the public's trust and charity, like Moonstone? He was a mutant and heir to a family fortune; he'd never had trust and needed no charity. To have a cause to be loyal to, like Atlas? If that were it, he'd have reformed the Champions, the Defenders, or X-Factor. To create a surrogate family, like Jolt? He had one with Cyclops, Phoenix, and the rest of the founding members of the X-Men--there was nothing to stop him from staying with them instead of inside of this mountain with the T-bolts. Certainly he wasn't running from an even worse background, like Charcoal from the Imperial Forces. And whatever it was Hawkeye was trying to prove to Captain America and Iron Man by reforming these fugitives, Archangel wasn't out to show the same thing to his own mentor, Professor Charles Xavier. What _was_ he doing here?

For the moment, he was trying to help a new friend, and opening the door to her room. "Songbird?" he asked, reassuringly.

Melissa Gold was huddled up against the pillows at the head of her bed, flipping channels on a monitor that transmitted TV signals via the T-bolts' jerry-rigged satellite dish. The look on her face when she turned to Archangel was angry and spiteful, and implied she wanted him to leave. But she didn't tell him to. "What do you want?"

To help, to find out what's wrong, to get her back in the sky with the rest of her teammates. But Warren figured that if Songbird really wanted to deal with this, she wouldn't have ran away when he presented her with her sonic carapace. "I just...wanted to hang out," he answered. "If that's okay."

"I...sure, why not?" she shrugged, and pointed to the opposite end of the bed. "Make yourself comfy. Just be quiet when I tell you to."

He complied, letting his large, mutant wings hang off the edge of the mattress as he sat down. "Got it. What are we watching?"

She stopped channel-surfing just in time to catch the show returning from a commercial break. "Wrestling."

"Ah."

"If you don't like it, there's the door..."

He stammered, trying to keep his small foothold on this newfound connection to her. "Hey, no--I just don't follow wrestling, is all. It's fine. A friend of mine used to perform, a long time ago..."

"Who?" she asked, somewhat intrigued by the idea. The enthusiasm died as she decided she already knew. "The Thing? Yeah, I guess he's everybody's buddy..."

"No, no--I don't know Ben Grimm much besides the superhero stuff," he shrugged. The gruff and monstrous cornerstone of the Fantastic Four was a good ally, but hardly the friend he had meant. "I was talking about another guy. Hank McCoy. Wrestled as 'The Beast' a few times. You probably wouldn't remember him..."*

[* You would've if you'd read the dynamic X-MEN (vol. 1) #8!]

"Probably before my time," she confirmed. "I didn't really pay attention to any of it until I started competing..."

"You? A wrestler?"

She smiled a bit. "I met someone in prison who got me connections. I wasn't some big mark who always dreamed of being a wrestler, but I had nowhere else to go, so I made it my dream pretty damn quick."

Warren was now fascinated. "Were you any good?"

"The first thing I found out about the business is nothing's simple in wrestling, including whether you're any good. I was in a stable--" she stopped, realizing Warren didn't know the jargon "--a group with my friend and a couple of others, called 'The Grapplers.' I guess if we'd been over with the crowd they would have had us each go solo. That's what they do with the Horsemen--"

"Excuse me?"

Melissa looked at Archangel as he went as pale as his blue skin could. "Uh...the Four Horsemen? It's another stable...in some fed you wouldn't know." She saw how visibly he relaxed, as if the mere mention of the word had set him off. Weird. She'd encountered Ric Flair in her career, and she was pretty sure she'd know if she was talking to the Angel of Death or something.

"Uh...where was I?" she continued. "We were sick of just getting by in a man's world, really, so the Grapplers took a job sabotaging some super-secret facility in New York called Project: Pegasus**. By the time we got out of prison for that, there wasn't anywhere else to go but back to wrestling. By then the Orange Goblin had about killed the whole business."

[** Potential Energy Group/Alternate Sources/United States; a government research operation raided by Roxxon Oil in the classic MARVEL TWO-IN-ONE #53-58]

Warren furrowed his brow in confusion. "You mean the Thing?"

"Yeah, him," she said with some contempt. "UCWF was already starting up and promising super-types in their roster when Grimm came looking for a job. He put the whole fed on the map, and nobody wanted to say no to a guy who'd already decided he didn't want anything to do with the Fantastic Four.*** So when he refused to 'work'--uh, to put on a show and agree to the pre-arranged finish--the whole promotion had to become some 'shootfight' competition because poor little Benjy wouldn't let wrestling be fixed like it's supposed to be. One way or another, I think that killed my career. Baron Zemo's Masters of Evil were there when the Grapplers fell apart, and...yadda yadda yadda...I'm talking to you."

[*** After a falling out with the team in FANTASTIC FOUR (vol. 1) #277 and THE THING #23]

The mutant nodded. "So, what name did you use?"

"My...mother's." Warren noticed the young woman stammer noticeably. He hadn't thought about the Thunderbolts having families; Songbird probably hadn't seen her mother in years. "I was 'Screaming Mimi' Schwartz--my nickname inspired them to give me a bionic larynx before we went into Pegasus. Yeah, I had my hair bleached white and wore a green tutu, some face paint to cover my scars..."

"But...you don't have any scars," Warren interrupted. "In fact, you look--"

Melissa lightly kicked him in the side, cutting him off and directing his attention to the monitor. "Whoa! Quiet, Wings--this looks important..."

***

"Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen, and in case you missed what happened before the break...well, I'm just speechless, Liz."

"The Grand Lizard" Danny Zucker, Steve Zangre's broadcast partner, portrayed himself as a world-class jerk on "UCWF Monday Maelstrom." The color commentator, when in character, was never at a loss for words. "Then shut the hell up and let a _real_ man do the talking, Zangre! Styx has sent the Coven to Big Mick Finn's locker room, and they've clearly given her a chance to ditch that idiot and manage the world champion..."

"Now cut that out!" Zangre snapped. "They've _abducted_ Delylah, and it doesn't take a rocket scientist's granddaddy to figure out why! Styx _knows_ he can't beat Big Mick in the ring at Inferno, so he's playing mind games..."

"And there's no way Mick Finn can beat Styx at mindgames, Zangre," Zucker shot back, completely ignoring the fact that this statement contradicted his previous one. Color commentators were probably required by law to make huge leaps of logic, just as play-by-play announcers seemed incapable of pointing it out with any competence. "Come Inferno, that big moron is going to go berserk at the title match, and get himself disqualified! Styx is a genius!"

"He's a damn dirty son of a bitch, is what he is, and I hope my mama didn't hear me say that back home, but it's true! I'm told the Coven has holed up in the boiler room, and we may be able to get a look at it..."

"See, Zangre, there's Delylah, nice and safe down there, nothing for Mick Finn to worry about--"

"The hell there isn't, Lizard! You can plainly see Styx's huge bastard of a brother, Grendel, is standing right there next to her! She might as well be held at gunpoint..."

"Well," Zucker pouted, "what's a camera doing in the boiler room, anyhow!?"

"I'm not sure, Liz...I think one of our cameramen was trailing the Coven into the boiler room, and he may have left it there--yes, I'm being told the rest of the Coven is chasing our cameraman out of there, that explains it..."

"Who's telling you this stuff? Nobody tells me anything in _my_ headset..."

Zangre changed the subject and prepared to segue to the next match. "We will do our best to keep you folks at home updated...hopefully Big Mick and security can get down there and help Delylah out of there..." The play-by-play man was like a circus ringmaster, diverting the TV viewers' attention from one subplot to the next. He had to convey the importance of Delylah being abducted and the sheer terror fans were supposed to feel for her, but then he had to move on to the next segment of the program as if it was no big deal. "I...I really don't know what else to do but go to commercial. When we come back, Styx will be in the ring shortly to defend his title against Jonathan Chance..."

***

Songbird felt ready to jump off of her bed when the commercial break finally started. Instead she shot her hand onto the nightstand to grab her remote and began channel surfing frantically, trying to quietly send Warren the message that he could continue with his train of thought. She surprised herself in doing that--it seemed more in line with Moonstone to try to manipulate the man instead of talking to him--and she couldn't help it. She liked having him here, listening to her, hanging on her every word like it was all that mattered to him.

After several agonizing seconds, she decided she was indeed better off being direct. "So...what were you saying?" she asked. She knew, of course--or at least, she had a pretty good idea. He was about to say she looked beautiful. It startled her to realize that, and she'd played it cool by trying to seem more interested in the Big Mick/Coven angle, but she couldn't resist any longer. She had to hear him say it.

"I..." Warren himself was on the verge of panic. He couldn't believe he'd almost said that. Wasn't it enough to just point out she didn't have any scars on her face? Certainly she also had large, beckoning green eyes and soft, quivering lips, suggesting an innocence that was offset by a tensed brow and a thin little nose that seemed used to being wrinkled in disgust. She didn't need him to tell her she was beautiful. "I was just saying I don't see any scars on your face."

"Oh." Melissa felt her heart sink, and she scolded herself for even thinking about it. A man was just trying to be a friend and she was all but tearing her clothes off for him. She'd practically expected Archangel to save her life back in San Francisco, thinking of how she'd repay him. Now this. She was such a slut, she thought, such a...a...

"I had my face lifted," she finally answered, with a slight waver in her voice, "I think Techno called it a 'bio-plasmic disguise.' Techno was the one who made all the gizmos we used to hide our identities from the public when we posed as superheroes.*"

[* As seen in THUNDERBOLTS #1-10 and the THUNDERBOLTS '97 annual.]

"I remember him, "Warren mentioned. "Wiry guy with scruffy hair? Whatever happened to him?"

"He just wasn't interested in turning on Baron Zemo like the rest of us. He...his neck was broken when we were fighting the Elements of Doom, and we thought he was killed, but...this is complicated, but..."

"It was really a clone that died?"

"No--"

"He had a shapeshifter impersonating him when it happened?"

"Uh, no, he--"

"Discovered he had a freak genetic mutation that made him immortal?"

"What? No! It--"

"He'd been selected as the emotional template of a cosmic entity that left him in a cocoon somewhere?" Warren was by now grinning slightly.

"No, now shut up!" Melissa smiled and threw a pillow at him. "He had a failsafe in his equipment that downloaded his consciousness and he made it into a robotic body!**"

[** In the kick-ass THUNDERBOLTS #8.]

Warren shrugged. "Oh. Is that all? I might like being a Thunderbolt..."

"Do they die and come back that much in the X-Men?" she asked.

"Probably no more than anyone else in such weird situations," he considered, "but just enough that it's become kind of a running gag with us. It stops being funny when it happens to you, actually."

"Uhhhh, right."

"Well, all that happened was that I was supposed to be on a plane that exploded, and everyone just _thought_ I was dead.*** I've had closer scrapes with the Defenders. But no, no, we have to make this big deal about how mutants have some 'pearly revolving door' in heaven. To tell the truth, I've been thinking we should get over ourselves, you know?"

[*** In the slightly less kick-ass X-FACTOR #15.]

Songbird stared at him blankly. "Uh...soooo...wonder what wrestling is up to right now..."

***

"The following contest, scheduled for one fall, is the _main event_ of the evening, and is for the Unlimited Class Wrestling Federation World Heavyweight Championship! Introducing first, the challenger, from Chicago, Illinois, weighing in at 236 pounds...Jonathannnnn _Chance_!

Chance had no fancy music, no pyrotechnics, no frilly gimmicks. All he had to his credit was a pair of tights and some underappreciated wrestling skill. The scruffy young man paced intently around the ring, oblivious to the dead silence of the fans he was supposed to elicit cheers from. In the early days of UCWF, when the competition was legitimate and the athletes were required to possess ungodly strength, Chance wouldn't have made it to a world title shot--as it was, nobody expected his character to make it through the night.

The lights dimmed. A fog began to roll out of the main entranceway to the locker room, and covered the ramp leading out to the ring. The effect was oddly effective for a wrestling promotion, creating a morbid river for Chance's opponent to "float" upon. His skin was pale, his leather and spandex attire was black, his eyes were an inhuman hue of red. He stared straight at Jonathan Chance as he glided across the mist, dragging his title belt as if he wished it were Chance's spine. "His opponent...representing the Coven, from parts _unknown_, weighing in at 312 pounds...the Unlimited Class Wrestling Federation World Heavyweight Champion..._Styx_!"

Chance wasted no time, immediately leaping to the top turnbuckle and leaping into the air, crashing into the champion the second he'd entered the ring. It staggered the larger man, but as Chance got back to his feet, he looked up to see Styx--always in character--barely "selling" the pain such an aerial maneuver would cause a wrestler who wasn't touted as an undead satanic mystic.

Styx grinned maliciously at the challenger, more a warm-up before the pay-per-view than a serious contender to the title. The real threat, of course, was Mick Finn, whom his followers would surely keep detained. The man in the black costume was more concerned with putting his kids through college, but as Styx, he was confident this night would be all too easy.

***

"You look like you recognize him," Melissa told Warren. "His real name is Mortimer Roth..."

"No..." Warren answered, somewhat fascinated with the overall impact of Styx's grand entrance. "No, he doesn't remind me of anyone...nobody I wouldn't like to forget, anyway..." He abruptly changed the subject. "So, I take it Techno built your sonic carapace?"

She was beginning to suspect the real reason he'd come here. "Uh...yeah. My larynx was shot when I was recruited for this team, and the best he could do was modify what was left of the bionics into an adapter. The carapace receives sonic input from this node on my throat--" she gestured to the smooth red plate "--and makes the force fields and stuff according to what I 'sing' for it to do."

"Sounds complicated."

She nodded. "It was. I learned a _lot_ about controlling the sound of my voice as Screaming Mimi, though. If I know what I want the sonic field to look like, I can generally work out the frequencies to shape it how I want. The wings are easiest, because I was practicing them as soon as Techno suggested the name 'Songbird.' Everyone but me thought a songbird should fly."

Warren smiled. "Must have been confusing. I remember when the x-factor in my genes kicked in, and my wings began to emerge. When they got big enough that I could fly with them, it was exhilarating, but it was a while before I stopped thinking 'holy crap, I have friggin' _wings_ on my _back_ and I'm _flying_!'"

"Something like that. I had a good teacher, though."

"Who, Moonstone?"

"Huh? Oh no, she just defies gravity or something--she couldn't help me learn to handle the wings. Abe--MACH-1--had been wearing flying suits of armor for years, so he knew what to show me."

And I fell in love with him, she thought. It didn't come out.

"Oh, I forgot about that one," he replied.

She shrugged. "You never met him, I guess. He turned himself over to the authorities when Hawkeye joined the team. It was his way of proving we want to redeem ourselves, but on our own terms."

And it was his way of giving everything up for me, she thought more forcibly. Again, she couldn't bring herself to say it.

***

"Folks, this title match has gone completely berserk! Styx must've disqualified himself fifty-seven different ways by now, to keep Jonathan Chance from upsetting him to win the gold!"

"You know it, Zangre! The title can't change hands on a disqualification! I told you Styx was a genius!"

"I can't deny Styx has saved his own ass, but there's no need for this level of brutality--my god! My god! Lizard, it's Mick Finn! Mick Finn is here!"

"Oh no, what's that idiot doing out here?"

"_Big_ Mick Finn must've decided to find out where Delylah is by going straight to the source--BOOM! Knife-edge chops from a five-hundred-pounder are sure to make the demented champion talk!"

"Here comes the Coven, though, Zangre! What the--oh no!"

"Jonathan Chance! The headstrong rookie is running interference so Mick can have Styx to himself! After that vicious assault, Chance is giving all he's got, five-on-one, to help his fellow man!"

"This is terrible, Zangre! This is _none_ of Jonathan Chance's business!"

"Styx is being broken in half across Big Mick's mighty shoulders...I think he's talking! Telling Mick where to find his closest friend, Delylah! Oh...oh my--Mick's gotten what he needed, and it looks like he's giving Styx a rain check until Inferno..."

"No, no, NOOO!"

"CABER TOSS! Son of a..._bitch_! Three hundred pounds of the world champion just got flipped head-over-heels and landed _head first_ on the mat! Styx may need to be stretchered outta here, but the real story is heading out into the crowd, as Big Mick Finn heads for the boiler room!

"Aw, this is _terrible_, Zangre..."

***

The soap opera on the TV was becoming more distracting, but Warren wouldn't let it divert his attention from helping his friend. "Hey, look...Melissa? I understand what it must've been like, when your carapace blew out on you in mid-air. There were times when my wings acted up on me, or caused trouble for me just by being there. I guess sometimes I wished I could take them off and never look back--for a while there I..."

He stopped short of telling the story. How could he tell her that a band of mercenaries, the "Marauders," wounded him so severely that his wings had to be amputated? The point was valid--Warren had occasionally wished he could be rid of his cumbersome mutation until he got what he wanted--but it made no sense now. His wings were right where they'd always been, and he couldn't explain _that_ to Melissa without telling her about...

"...Well, it's not important. What I'm saying is, life always ends up showing me I'm better off for being able to soar through the sky on my own power. I'd--I'd hate to see someone choose to give that up...especially you."

Melissa's expression seemed almost frightened. She wanted to run, to scream, to get away from the powerful emotions brought on by a generous offer to help with a paralyzing fear. She'd fled from Abe when he first tried to show her such deep compassion. But this time...something was different...

She reached over and threw her arms around him, sobbing in his embrace. "I--I'm sorry I blew up at you before, Warren," she sniffled. "It's just that...I'm afraid to go back up there..."

He hugged her back and consoled her. "It's all right, I understand. Look, I know I'm not MACH-1, but if you want I can go out with you and get you flying again. If you fall, I'll be there to catch you, I swear."

Songbird didn't have to think about it. "I'd...like that..."

***

"Folks, we apologize, this is _live_ television, we weren't prepared to get a camera to follow Mick to the boiler room, but...there! Mick is in the boiler room! Mick is in the boiler room!"

"Ahhh! Grendel, do something!"

"Grendel is 350 pounds of come-getcha-some, and I don't think he'll let Big Mick have Delylah without a fight--what the..."

"Zangre, is Delylah trying to _separate_ them?"

"I...I think you're right, Liz! Mick and Grendel are staring holes in one another, but it's almost as if they're both trying to protect Delylah...the Coven! They must've followed Mick to the boiler room! And they're beating the holy _hell_ out of the number one contender, with Inferno just weeks away!"

"Look...look at Grendel! He's keeping his own guys away from Delylah! What is up with that!?"

"This story is heating up, but we're out of time!"

[next part]

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