<div class="floatleft">(http://img542.imageshack.us/img542/4937/spjtehnoochness.png)</div><hr/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: arial;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 14pt;"><strong>  Name:</strong>       Jack Trenton<br/>  <strong>Title:</strong>          SpringJack<br/>  <strong>Affiliation:</strong>  Previously Vision...now praying for Resistance<br/>  <strong>Location:</strong>   Moscow, underneath Doom's ship<br/>  <strong>Tags:</strong>          Doom, Darkbird, Dynamo and Black Widow<br/><br/></span></span><hr/><br/><br/><br/><br/><em>Back in the USSR...</em><br/><br/>Jack's cold-numbed and frost-fevered mind ran through the lyrics to the Beatle's song almost on autocue.<br/><br/><em>Ya don't know how lucky you are, boy...</em><br/><br/>He giggled to himself. Lucky. That's what Jack was. Since the fall of the UK and his violent pressgang into Apocalypse's forces, now to his trek across half a continent in a desperate and pathetic "escape"...Jack Trenton's luck had run out since the Apocalypse.<br/><br/><em>BACK in the US, BACK in the US, BACK in the USSR!</em><br/><br/>His small life seemed so far away now. His cushty little flat in Soho, filled with drugs and girls and Banksy's (well, the guy HAD done a street-art special on SpringJack himself, it was only fair he have it on his wall). Now, here, staggering across...Moscow? Jack only knew Moscow in Russia. Fucking country was so<em>big</em>and he'd been jumping, then hitchhiking, then stealing rides, then walking, now finally staggering across it for...he forgot how long.<br/><br/><em>The Ukraine girls really knock me out...</em><br/><br/>He had failed to feel his feet for he didn't know how long now. In his SpringJack costume (apparantly Apocalypse's lieutenants thought it fitting for each of their super soldiers to be in some intimidating garb, and SpringJack's red glowing eyes were a must) he had come to the site of a gruesome battle a while ago, some Russian soldiers making a last stand around an old bunker. Jack had found plenty of their bodies, but none of their opponents. A familiar site no matter what country one was in, these days. There were, however, a bunch of massive Russian military-issue greatcoats lying around, no longer being used by their previous owners. Possibly the only reason the Terror of London hadn't frozen to death was because he was now hunched under one of these.<br/><br/><em>And leave the West behind...</em><br/><br/>Couldn't be long now, though. He had caught sight of a team of supers tracking him a while ago, back when he still had the energy to scale the intimidating Russian buildings and get a look around his surroundings through the snow. They couldn't be far behind now. It would be either them or the cold that got him. SpringJack was in the middle of nowhere, on his last legs, with no friends, and everything he took for granted gone.<br/><br/><em>But Georgia's always on mamamamamamamamama my mind...</em><br/><br/>Jack finally stumbled blindly into a mountain. No, wait, it was a building. Covered in snow. His mind wasn't working properly anymore, and he could swear that he felt<em>warm...</em>he blinked in the snow.<br/><br/>When he opened his eyes, he was on his back, and four heads were looking down on him.<br/><br/>"...comin' all the way out here just to make sure some limey punk dies. I mean, he shakes off this serum thing after a whack on the head. Apocalypse wants him back in the army or dead. What better way to make sure he stays dead than leaving him in Russia, for fucks sake!"<br/><br/>"We do our job, Scale. You know what happens to soldiers that don't."<br/><br/>"Tubes is right, Scale. Those that don't end up like this punk. Let's get this over with and get back home."<br/><br/>SpringJack could feel himself being lifted up. In front of him, one of the four heads swam into view clearer. It had its arms extended towards him, as if for a hug. SpringJack put his arms out to accept the hug.<br/><br/>"Fuck's sake. I was gonna offer him a place back in the army but I reckon this guy's got Russian snow for brains now. You hear me, ya freakin piece a shit? I bet you wish you had just stayed one of us."<br/><br/>The man's forearms opened, and out slid a collection of tubes, seemingly made of his sinews. The ends of them ended in holes, and they began to glow and hum, quietly. SpringJack found he could focus on the faint light with a morbid fascination.<br/><br/><em>Wait. I'm standing up straight. I'm on my feet!</em><br/><br/>SpringJack's misfiring mind paid no heed to the fact that what Tubes was about to do to him was a mercy, and that he was only putting himself through more agony by extending his fate. His life of villainy in London had given him a selfish need for life, to extort out of it what he could for as long as he could, and unfortunately for him, it was this instinct that somehow took over now.<br/><br/>That, and maybe somewhere in his mind, the last recollection of Captain Britain saving his life.<br/><br/>SpringJack snarled. It came out as song lyrics.<br/><br/>"Back in the USSR!"  Tubes fired, but SpringJack was already in the air, having taken off a few hundred feet from a standing jump. Shots echoed below him and sliced over his head as he came to the apex of his leap. Twisting, he dodged a few more, luckily, before he began his doomed descent downwards. Correcting his angle somewhat, the blood now pounding through his body, angered shouts rushing upto meet him, he landed straight on one of his aggressors, smashing him down to the floor. Without stopping, SpringJack took off again, this time at an angle, his would-be executors ending up shooting the guy whom SpringJack was on only nanoseconds ago. What SpringJack didn't know was that he'd landed on Scales, whose body was made of a scaly material that gave him limited invulnerability, but nontheless, he wouldn't be too happy at having his teammates shoot him instead of their quarry.<br/><br/>SpringJack didn't care. He was in the air and jumping again, flying for his life. For how much longer, he didn't know, but he was the Demon of Dalston. He was never gonna go down easy.<br/><br/><em>Ya don't know how lucky you are, boy...</em>