EVEN THE NAME SEEMED PRIMITIVE AND SINISTER: the Black Forest, nestled deep in the German countryside in the southwest corner of the state of Baden-Württemberg, not far from the more modern and graceful Baden-Baden. It was a crowded sea of pine trees and mountains, secluded in its forestry and peppered with villages and small cottages more than three hundred years old. The dense forest made the landscape seem otherworldly, cast deep in its shadows, hidden from the modern world. The land held a rich, ancient mythology. Stories had been passed down for generations about the werewolves and witches that haunted the dark woods, living among the thick trees, scratching their names into the ruddy trunks.

Yet for all the mysterious creatures that supposedly inhabited these woods, none were as powerful as the silver alien walking through them now. The bright morning light barely penetrated the sheath of trees as the Surfer made his way through the forest, oblivious to the austere and awesome sight of the ancient growth around him. He listened intently to a sound coming deep from the living Earth, following its mysterious song until he had passed through a copse of trees into a flat, shadowed clearing. The area was darker here, in one of the most remote sections of the forest. He closed his eyes for a moment, lost to the song, and raised his hands. The air surrounding his hands began to move, the molecules trembling in his presence, as a strong wind began to stir around him. The blowing wind began to glow, silver specks of dust becoming radiant, small stars in a cosmic cloud that began to pulse and grow. Everything the cloud touched wilted and shuddered, the leaves browning in an instant, the trees bowing and shriveling as if acknowledging their defeat at the hands by something older and stronger than they were.

The surrounding forest and muddy floor seemed to fall away as the Surfer began to bore deep into the timeless soil, hollowing it out, destroying every living thing in his path. Replacing the living greens and browns with his silver hue, remaking the world in his own likeness.

His actions did not go unnoticed. A few miles away, a new, more modern village had been erected. United States military-issue green tents were already in place, housing centers for communications, combat, and surveillance. Squads of soldiers stood nearby, armed to the teeth with the latest in heavy artillery. Empty crates of guns and ammo were cast aside as useless timber. The guards stood as sentinels outside the tent of General Hager, alert in mind and body, waiting to receive their orders to move out.

Inside the tent, the general and his associates monitored the Surfer on sophisticated radar equipment, enhanced by Reed’s radiation sensors. The air inside the tent was as thick as the surrounding forest, and each member of the team was on heightened alert, ready to do what he must to save the planet. Each person in the tent had experienced the awesome power of their foe, and knew the consequences should they not be able to defeat him. Reed monitored his equipment as best he could, keeping one eye on the signal given off by the Surfer. You’re not getting away this time, he thought.

Captain Raye looked up from her viewing screen, the green light casting shadows on her angular face. “He’s holding his position north of here.” Her voice was even and calm, covering the anxiety that was lodged in her gut.

“Good,” General Hager said. He was poring over combat strategies and weapon lists, ignoring the others in the tent. Reed approached him, ready to take the lead.

“General, give us a one-mile perimeter,” he said, nodding to Ben. Sue and Johnny gathered near, ready to begin their attack.

“Forget it,” General Hager answered, getting in Reed’s face, causing him to stumble back a step or two. “You had your chance, and you blew it. This is a military operation. You jam the signal and then get out of the way. We’ll handle the rest.” He turned dismissively away from Reed and went back to his paperwork, surrounded by his minions in their Kevlar vests and other combat gear.

Reed was taken aback by the general’s outburst. It was a bit much, even for the gruff commander. “You don’t understand…” Reed began.

General Hager turned to Reed, fire shining in the whites of his eyes. His raised voice filled the entire tent. “No, you don’t understand, so let me make it clear for you and your pack of freaks here. I am the quarterback. You are on my team. Got it?” Reed shrunk a little at the tone and volume of the general’s voice. Aside from Ben, they all did. But the general wasn’t finished. In a tone dripping with snide condescension, Hager added, “I guess you didn’t play a lot of football back in high school, did you, Richards?”

The tent fell silent in the aftermath of General Hager’s childish insult.

Reed felt a strong emotion rising inside of him. It all finally caught up with him: the stress and frustration of fighting an elusive opponent like the Surfer, the endless nights without sleep, the tension brewing within his own group over his decision to leave the Four with Sue — not to mention the irascibility of an increasingly arrogant blowhard like General Hager. This plan wouldn’t exist without Reed or his great intellect; Victor had done very little to help with the creation of the jamming device. It was all on Reed’s shoulders, just as it always had been: the future of the Four, the future of his life with Sue, and now the future of the planet. Mr. Fantastic was fed up. And Hager was starting a high-school pissing contest?

Reed’s voice was strong and clear when he finally spoke. “You’re right, General. I didn’t play sports. I stayed inside and studied like a good little nerd.” In his growing anger, he emphasized the last word. “And now, fifteen years later, I am one of the greatest minds of the twenty-first century and I am engaged to the hottest girl on the planet. And the big jock who played quarterback in high school? He’s standing right in front of me, asking me for my help. And I say he’s not going to get a damn thing if he doesn’t do exactly what I tell him to and start treating my friends and me with some respect.”

Reed’s usually flexible body was rigid with anger and his hands shook with fury. His eyes bored into Hager as the general’s had so often bored into him. Somewhere within himself Reed knew that there was no time for this, no time for a fight of egos with enough sparks to burn down the immense forest around them. Maybe it was the landscape, the deep, brooding forest imbuing them with an almost prehistoric sense of battle and hierarchy. But there could be only one leader. A line had been drawn. Reed had snapped, and there was no going back.

The face of General Hager remained solid and unmoving, like the trees around them. His eyes betrayed no emotion, nor did his erect posture falter. The only part of his body that moved was his mouth, as his lips parted to speak. “Give him what he wants.”

The general left the tent with Victor following him.

The rest of the officers continued with their duties, monitoring the Surfer and the presence of the new crater. The Four gathered once again around Reed, their undisputed leader. Sue leaned into her fiancé and whispered into his ear: “I am so hot for you right now.”

Johnny embraced Reed from behind in a mocking, brotherly hug. “Me too!” he cheered.

Reed smiled, but only for a moment. They had a job to do.

The deep forest seemed endless and swallowed the Fantastic Four entirely. Daylight could be seen gracing only the tops of the trees; the carpet of the forest was cool and clammy under their feet. What struck Reed first was how intensely silent it was; no sound existed outside of the small twitter of their own movements through the brush. Each member of the Four carried a small metal container the size of a suitcase. The hard, silver metal barely let off a glare, having little sunlight to reflect. Reed was going through the calculations in his mind once again, looking for any holes in his theory. He could find none. It was up to them now, each member of the team ready to perform the task that would help them take the Surfer down.

Reed once again consulted a small GPS device in his hand. “All right,” he said. “This is it. Set up your post then rendezvous back here.”

Each of the Four carried a similar GPS device. They exchanged a quick look and then went off — four cases, four members, four separate directions.

Reed watched the others leave, silently wishing them all luck. His gaze lingered the longest on Sue, as he watched her disappear into a thicket of trees. She was soon lost to him, invisible in the density of the forest. He once again consulted his GPS device and made his own way to the designated location.

The cool air of the forest followed Reed closely as he darted through trees and brush. The shadows of the trees fell far, appearing to stretch and lengthen on the forest floor. Reed reached his point, near two large tree stumps, and set the metal case on the ground with a delicate thud. He hit a keypad on the side of the case and stepped back to let the machine activate. Legs emerged from the bottom of the case, raising it above the floor of the forest. The top of the case opened silently, allowing a small transmitter to rise into the air above it. The entire device was not unlike a large tripod, with a pulse emitter on top instead of a camera. A blinking light at the top of the post let Reed know his device was operational. It was ready.

Elsewhere in the expansive forest, Johnny followed the readings on his GPS and soon reached his own destination. He felt a shiver travel up his spine, and he marveled at how a forest so thick with heavy pine trees could inspire in him such feelings of isolation. He shook the thoughts away and punched the keypad on the side of his device. He watched it spring to life and then stood by, waiting.

Meanwhile, Ben Grimm crunched his way through the brush in another part of the forest, squeezing his way through the trees. He stopped to scratch his back against the side of a thick trunk, rubbing himself as the leaves fell around him. His GPS device started beeping, signaling that he had reached his destination. He set the case down and used a thin branch he found on the ground to trigger the keypad. He looked up to see a large bear nearby, scratching its own back on a tree a few feet away. The bear paused, making eye contact with Ben. “What do you want?” Ben asked.

Just then, Ben heard Reed’s voice come through the com link on his wrist. “What’s our status?” Reed asked him.

“I’m good to go,” Ben replied, noticing that the bear had disappeared.

Johnny’s voice soon came through on the line. “Same here.”

Sue heard her friends’ voices coming through her com link as she struggled through a twisted copse of trees. She reached a dark clearing in the woods filled with underbrush and fallen trunks. It was noticeably cooler in the shadowed clearing than it had been just a few moments ago, and she smirked at her luck, having landed in the coldest and most barren part of the woods. The Black Forest indeed, she thought as she set down her case.

She heard Reed’s voice call her name over the com link. “Almost there,” she replied, triggering the keypad on the side of her metal case.

Just then she heard a rustling behind her. She felt heat on her back as the darkness around her became illuminated by an ominous, silver glow. Suddenly, the massive trees wiggled and bent, warping unnaturally to create an opening. She felt her heart start beating faster. “Guys,” she said softly. “We may have a problem.”

She had barely heard Reed asking “What’s wrong?” when she saw it. The Silver Surfer, luminescent in the dark woods, flew through the clearing, causing the leaves to rustle and the trees to shake and wither.

“He’s here,” she said. Her voice held a tremor of fear.

Reed’s urgent voice flew out of the com link. “Get out of there now!”

Sue turned back to the metal case. She hadn’t activated the keypad. “It’s not set up yet,” she said into her com link.

Reed’s reply was immediate: “Forget about it! Just get out of there!”

But Sue could not hear him. She stood transfixed, unable to turn away from the glowing figure before her. It was the first time she had seen the entity up close. The surrounding woods were bathed in the Surfer’s glow. This time, the light gently caressed the trees, warming their trunks with its radiance. The chill in the air departed and Sue felt deep inside of her a sense of everything growing, everything breathing, alive. Her hands fell listlessly to her sides, the com link crackling and going dead in the radiation put off by the glowing silver entity.

The Silver Surfer stood atop his thin, elegant board, a few feet from Sue and the metal case. He looked resplendent as he hovered there in the warm air. She could see his powerful legs humming with energy and his arms gracefully suspended, gliding atop air currents she could not see. She could feel her face turn warmer, and as she basked in the Surfer’s presence she suddenly had a sense of how every living thing was made of energy, how everything felt connected. The roots in the soil, the unseen insects carefully trawling through the trees and brush, the endless streaming light that was now all around her. She took in a deep breath of air and that, too, was alive, filled with molecules and motes of life-sustaining oxygen. Even the trees seemed to breathe, contributing to the swirling, thriving system all around her. It was almost euphoric; her limbs trembled and her mind danced. She understood that everything in the world held its purpose, connected by one and the same.

She did not flinch as the Surfer lowered himself on his board, meeting her unblinking gaze. She noticed that his face was calm and smooth, his eyes filled with light. It was the most gentle and radiant visage she had ever encountered and deep inside she felt no fear, no hesitation. She felt only comfort and companionship, as if all her aching questions about the world around her were suddenly and finally being answered. She did not fight the small smile that grew on her warm face, and as if by instinct she reached out to touch the celestial being in front of her.

The Surfer silently returned her gaze; the connection was not one-sided. The same hand that had doomed planets reached out into the infinite space between the Surfer and Susan Storm. He reached out into that abyss and touched her cheek.

Sue leaned into the gentle, caressing touch. Her cheek flushed, bathed in his radiance. Unafraid, she looked into his face, his eyes like two deep pools of liquid silver. She held his gaze and asked, “Why are you destroying our world?”

The Surfer appeared startled, genuinely surprised by the directness of her question.

“If you are going to do it,” she continued softly, “we at least have the right to know why.”

The Surfer furrowed his silver brow as if contemplating his actions for the first time. Sue saw his face turn sad, a bit of darkness tarnishing the silver luster of his skin. His voice, deep and trembling, matched hers in its softness: “I have no choice.”

It was then that Sue saw it, just underneath the radiant glow in his eyes. His gentle face did not hold the hunger for power she had so often seen in Victor’s face, nor did it hold the posturing and authority she had seen in the gruff scowl of General Hager. The Surfer’s face held only aching regret and contrition. She could suddenly feel the sadness overcome every inch of her body.

Before she could reply, Sue heard a crashing in the woods behind her. She heard Reed’s voice echo across the clearing: “Get back!”

She turned to face him, her arms no longer listless but held out before her. “Wait,” she said, watching as Ben and Johnny also reached the clearing. They were surrounded. The air around them once again turned charged and aggressive. “Wait.”

Sue turned back to the Surfer. His eyes were tentative, suddenly fearful at the arrival of the others, at the radical change in their environment. She tried to calm him using an even tone. “What do you mean you have no choice? There’s always a choice.”

The Surfer looked heartbroken when he met her eyes, his ethereal voice catching in his throat. “Not always.”

Yards away, General Hager’s hands shook with anger as he watched through binoculars the Four in front of the silver alien, just standing there. Are they talking to it? he thought, flabbergasted. “What the hell is going on there?” he said under his breath. “C’mon, Richards, just jam the damn signal!” He couldn’t let another chance to kill this alien slip away from them. He was the leader responsible for this mission. Combat decisions were his alone to make. He lowered the binoculars in disgust.

He turned to see Victor standing next to him, holding a missile launcher. “Maybe he could use a little persuasion,” Victor said, his voice low and deep.

Sue remained adamant, keeping the Surfer locked in her gaze. He was growing more skittish as Ben, Reed, and Johnny inched closer to them. His glow had receded and the air around them once again felt cold. But Sue couldn’t let him go. Not yet. “Why do you want to destroy our world?” she asked again.

The Surfer looked confused, then almost childlike. “I am not the destroyer.”

“Then who is?” Reed asked, keeping his eyes on Sue, his heart in his throat as he inched closer.

The Surfer’s mouth opened slightly, hesitantly, as if he were afraid to answer. He looked at Sue with a face tinged with sorrow, as if he knew the answer would cause her pain. Just then, a high-pitched whine coursed through the air. The group turned to see a barrage of heavily armed missiles heading right toward the Silver Surfer. And Sue.

The Surfer immediately grabbed Sue and pulled her behind him, moving to the other side of a ridge of trees. Assured that she was out of the line of fire, the Surfer sped off toward the incoming barrage of flying missiles. He raised his hand and turned the weapons to ash. They crumbled, carried harmlessly away on the cool wind of the forest.

General Hager could not believe his eyes. Through the gaze of the binoculars, he watched the Surfer dismantle and destroy their most sophisticated land-to-air missiles. The floor seemed to give way, and his stomach dropped when he saw the Surfer heading directly toward him. “Open fire!” he yelled, releasing the flood of weaponry at his disposal.

Suddenly General Hager was surrounded by his troops, who unleashed their ammunition at the glowing silver being. Bullets, grenades, concussion blasts, even flares. Nothing touched the alien. The Surfer reached the military space and flew overhead, raising his hands. With his simple gesture, all the guns and launchers burst into flames. Soldiers watched their gear explode in their hands, sending flames up their arms and into the air. Medics scrambled to put out the fires on the fallen soldiers while others dropped of their own accord and rolled around in the dirt in an attempt to extinguish the flames. The air held a distinct smell of ash.

Hager and Victor dove into the brush for cover as the Surfer flew back, his board parting the air just above their heads. The Surfer continued back to the clearing where the Fantastic Four still stood.

Reed could hear the explosions and screaming coming from Hager’s command post. It didn’t take much imagination to know the Surfer had eliminated the threat to himself. Reed was eager to learn more about what the Surfer could tell them, but Hager’s aggressive act had ruined all attempts at diplomacy. The Surfer was too powerful to be left to his own devices; Reed needed to disarm him.

He reached down to his PDA, which was linked to all four metal cases. He punched in the command to activate the posts but the controls only flashed the word ERROR. Something had gone wrong. “It’s not yet working. The last post isn’t set up,” he yelled.

Sue sprung into action. “I’m on it!” she yelled.

She raced back to her metal case and activated the keypad. She watched the legs sprout out, but the transmitter did not rise from the top of the case.

In the meantime, Johnny and Ben had gathered around Reed. The Surfer flew around the clearing and hovered, ready to charge the three of them. His face showed anger and betrayal; his silver fists were clenched. He grew brighter, causing the air to shimmer and ripple around him.

“Reed…” Ben began.

“Wait,” Reed said. “He’s not in range.”

“Just let me…” Johnny said.

“Wait!” Reed repeated.

“Sue,” Johnny yelled, “get that thing going!”

“That’s what I’m doing,” she said over her shoulder.

“Then do it faster!” her brother snapped back.

“Okay, shut up!” she yelled. She smacked the side of the metal case, and the dish sprouted up from the transmitter. “It’s up!”

The Surfer hovered menacingly, radiating a furious glow. He threw his arms back, unleashing a small tornado of dirt behind him. The back of his board tipped up slightly, then thrust itself forward. He charged like a bull straight toward Reed and the others, a glowing cloud of debris trailing in his wake. Reed looked down at his PDA and triggered the posts again. They all linked online and created the energy field Reed had designed. A quick flash permeated the forest clearing as the posts jammed the signal between the Surfer and his board. The Surfer stopped instantly, and his board began to wobble in the air as his entire body seized and convulsed. The Surfer grew limp and sank through his board, falling hard to the dirty ground below. The once powerful and hovering board fell next to him with a thud.

“Wipeout,” Johnny said with a grin.

Sue threw a force field around the lifeless board, making sure it was out of the Surfer’s reach. The Four walked over to the fallen Surfer, who lay limp in the dirt and brush. With his power diminished, he no longer radiated energy and his glow disappeared. He appeared tarnished, dirty. The Surfer looked up at Sue with pleading, helpless eyes.

Victor stepped out of the woods and walked toward the fallen silver being. The Surfer turned his head quickly, his eyes narrowing at the sight of Victor Von Doom. The Surfer raised his hand to no effect, the useless digits hanging in the air, his tremendous power gone.

“Not so tough now, are you?” Victor said in a menacing tone before unleashing his powerful electricity on the helpless Surfer. Thick fingers of powerful lightning flew into the Surfer and he writhed in pain, clutching his side as the shock ran through his whole body. Victor’s power was scorching the ground around the Surfer, blackening the green leaves and ferns, and still he did not yell out. Nor did Victor stop his barrage of electricity.

“Victor!” Reed yelled, trying to stop the inhumane beating of the fallen Surfer. Reed could see that Victor’s eyes were glazed over and shining as the electricity was reflected in them, caught up in the moment of unnecessary violence. Reed stretched out and grabbed Victor’s hands, pulling them upward. A few fingers of electricity shot up out of the forest before Victor regained his composure. His steely eyes looked at Reed without a trace of remorse.

Finally, Victor ceased his assault, and actually shrugged, as if the entire affair made no difference to him. “You’re the quarterback,” he remarked.

Sue carefully approached the unconscious Surfer. His silver skin was now pale, defaced, almost blemished as he lay there, defeated, in the scorched and ruined earth. A shiver ran through her entire body. He looks so helpless, she said to herself and the image of a fallen angel flooded her mind. Something broke inside of her and she couldn’t stop the tears that swelled in her eyes. They had defeated their foe. The planet was, in theory, safe. But a feeling lingered deep inside of her, an instinct only heightened by the sight of the prone figure on the ground before her. Something told her that their actions today had only made things worse.