Freaks and Geeks

by Starsinger

Let's just say you'll understand the title by the end of the story. Thank you all who reviewed. Here's the big reveal. How does Kitty stop the bullet from Earth. It's a combo of NASA, MIT, Kitty's brain, and a comet stopping theory that I heard on TLC. If you've figured it out now, congratulations! If not, read on, if you have, please still read on! Now, on with the show! Don't own them…

The day started auspiciously enough, Kitty awoke with her mouth tasting like something had crawled in and died during the night. Five rinses of mouthwash and two teeth brushings didn't help any. Classes were well under way when her iPhone rang. It was Peter Parker. The kids were studiously peering into their books as she answered the phone.

"Uh…Kitty. I don't know if you know what's happened with your team, but we have a problem," Peter informed her what had transpired up above. "Do you have any ideas?" he sounded desperate.

"Class dismissed. My class will not be meeting for the rest of the day. Go to your next class when it's time." The hurried exit didn't even attract her notice. Lost in thought she forgot that Peter was on the phone. She snapped out of it, "Peter, I'll get back to you."

Kitty took a deep breath and called Scott from her computer, "Can you get me the specs on this bullet?"

Scott sounded exhausted, Emma didn't sound much better, "Do you have any ideas?"

"I have some friends that might be able to help, I just need to know the dimensions," she whistled as she hit the print button. "Has it hit the Kuiper Belt yet?" Scott gave her a blank look. "The outer debris surrounding the solar system. It contains cometary debris and Pluto among other things."

"We calculate that it's another hour yet. You have three hours to come up with something."

Scott cut the connection as Kitty again reached for her phone, "Hey, Max, it's Kitty. Are you up for a challenge?"

At the University of Chicago Kitty had teamed with three other students known as the "Geeky Trio," needless to say, she fit right in. Her mutant power and dragon sealed the deal. Max was from Pakhistan, and his name was so long and unwieldy to Americans, that he went by "Max". He did, in fact, remind Kitty of "Raj" from "The Big Bang Theory." His field was Physics. Fred was a slightly taller black man whose genius IQ had gotten him and his family out of the projects in Fort Worth, Texas. Big rimmed glasses and a pocket protector completed his look, and he was meticulous in projecting that look. His field was mathematics. Susie, however, was not what anybody pictured as a geek, built like a Viking Goddess, she would have given Peter a run for his money in sheer height. The very picture of the "buxom blonde" she rose above the term "dumb blonde" she excelled in building rockets destined for space.

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is home to the best and brightest minds in the country. Kitty e-mailed her friends the information on the bullet, and had an answer for her within five minutes of her landing.

"I talked to Steve at NASA," Max told her. "He believes that you're right. If we attach engines at these points," he pointed to several points on the screen, "and fire them no later than just outside the orbit of our moon, it will deflect the bullet. If you have to wait that long, it should put it in orbit around the sun near Mercury. It's amazing how eager they are to learn if they're plans for a Near Earth Asteroid strike would work."

Kitty leaned back, "What kind of engines, jet, Saturn type engines? We'll have to use something that will work in the vacuum of space."

Susie looked slightly embarrassed, "We have been experimenting in a matter/antimatter engine, actually built five, that might do the job. You can understand that we haven't had a chance to test them. We'll set up remotes that will fire as we need them too. We are coming with you, you know?" The girl was so eager that Kitty smiled, it was difficult to tell her no.

"We have two hours to load the engines and get to the bullet. We have another team tracking the progress, so we won't have to go searching for a needle in a haystack. Let's go." They raced for the door and Kitty broke down laughing. When they had described the engines she had expected large, majestic engines such as they showed in Star Trek. What she found were five engines varying in size that barely fit in the cargo hold of the ship.

They watched avidly as Kitty deftly exited the atmospheric envelope and headed out, "Scott, where are you?" she radioed.

"We're out near Mars," came the reply, coordinates followed as Kitty adjusted course to meet them.

"We're on our way," she replied. A seemingly straight shot out as she proceeded to rendezvous with the other ship. "It's too bad Emma's not a teleporter, that would make this soooo much easier." She could hear Emma's glare over the comm. She barely held in the whistle when she saw the bullet. She matched speed with the bullet and, after turning on the autopilot, turned toward her companions, "Susie, you're in charge of the remote. Fred, Max, you're with me."

The three of them traipsed down to the cargo hold where Kitty made sure the hatch was sealed, "Susie, whatever happens, do not open the hatch until I tell you otherwise. We're getting into space suits because we'll have to work in the vacuum of space. Last thing we need is for you to suffer explosive decompression."

"Why can't I come too?" she asked, sticking her tongue out in a fake pout.

"Well, we don't have a suit to fit you. Peter's suit isn't here, and he doesn't normally use one, he doesn't need to breathe in his armored form." Kitty laughed as Susie let out a martyred sigh.

"Okay, but if we go to an alien world, I'm not staying inside!"

They quickly climbed into the EVA suits and Kitty started explaining what they would do while they strapped into their booster packs and atmosphere escaped the cargo hold. "These are magnetic grapples, let's just say we borrowed them from some friends." Fred whistled, without the weightlessness of space, he doubted he'd be able to lift them. She easily picked up a device that was the size of a kitchen table, there were three of them. "Remember, short bursts on the packs, you don't want to go zooming off into space. Anyway, you put this on the rocket and," she pressed the green button and the biggest of the rockets attached itself the lift. "Now, when you get to the spot on the bullet you want to attach this to, hit this button," she pointed to the blue button, "and it will automatically detach from the lift and magnetically attach itself to the bullet."

Max and Fred dubiously picked up the lifts and attached them to two more rockets. The hatch opened and all they could do was stare at the vastness of space. "Come on, guys, we don't have a lot of time," Kitty said, snapping them out of it. With short bursts on their packs, they moved into place on the bullet and set about attaching the rockets to the bullet. Kitty was on her way back before they were, but soon they were on their way back and it was Fred who got to the last rocket first before heading back out after Kitty to the bullet.

They sealed the hatch after finishing the job and repressurized the hold as Kitty called up to Susie, "How much time do we have left."

"A little over an hour," Susie replied.

Kitty sighed as she phased up out of her suit and hold and into the main area of the plane. The boys had to wait until the hold finished its cycle, much to their dismay, "That's cheating!" they exclaimed toward her retreating form.

Kitty on the other hand flung herself into the pilot's seat and maneuvered the plane away from the bullet. "Scott," she radioed. "We're about to see if this works."

"It needs to, Kitty, we're out of options," Scott replied.

Susie waited until Fred and Max entered the cockpit before she hit the sequence buttons for the rockets. They held their breaths as nothing seemed to happen. Then, one by one the rockets came alive, and slowly, very slowly, the bullet started to change course. The critical hour passed by and no one said word. No one seemed to breathe until the bullet passed the outer orbit of Earth's moon. Susie started making more adjustments with the rockets to make sure the bullet would settle into an orbit between Venus and Mercury. Kitty's sigh of relief was lost in the cheers that seemed to come from everywhere.

"Kitty, we're headed home. I'm sending you the coordinates for Breakworld, go get our friends. I think your friends there with you have earned a treat," Scott said of the whooping in her background."

"10-4 Scott, see you when we get home," Kitty replied as the coordinates scrawled into the computer. She turned the ship onto a new course out of the solar system. Kitty's friends never left the cockpit as they watched space unfold before their eyes. They landed at the coordinates Scott gave them on Breakworld and Kitty barely waited for the ramp to be loaded before she flew down the ramp and into Peter's arms.

Max, Fred and Susie came down the ramp and ogled, yes ogled. There was so much to see and take in that they barely felt Logan shaking their hands and congratulating them a job well done. Unfortunately, it lasted all of five minutes. The tension was so thick you could cut it with a knife. Peter and Kitty slowly walked back to the ship, Peter's arm firmly around her, their heads bent toward each other as the spoke. Logan took control of the plane as Kitty occupied Peter's lap after take-off. They all watched as she snuggled into his life and closed her eyes in the safety of his arms.

"Bout time," Logan said as he set a course for home, knowing that the people in the plane would always be bound this experience of saving the world. Besides, who knew when freaks and geeks would get together again?