It was a clear, warm night in the Utopian Parallel, the stars above shining down upon the island community. On any other occasion, people would be out late enjoying the beaches and playing music. But the usual laughter that permeated the air had been replaced with horrified screaming as an army of werewolves were currently ripping their way through the neighborhoods.

The invaders were known as the Patriot Pack, and were deeply involved with white-supremacist ideologies and far-right extremism. Hiding from the chaos in a basement was a young America Chavez, huddled with her mothers.

“We’re gonna die. We’re gonna die. We’re gonna die…” the girl was repeating in a terrified whisper.

“It will be okay, Mer-Mer. They won’t find us here,” Elena insisted, though the fear in her eyes betrayed her words.

“You grabbed the ring Miss Amora gave you like I asked, right honey?” Amalia asked. America nodded. “Put it on just in case, okay?”

“But it can’t make us all invisible, only me…”

“That’s okay, honey. Please, put it on. For us? It will make us feel better.” Elena added.

The young girl reached into her pocket and pulled out the ring, and was about to slip it on as they heard a loud crashing upstairs.

“I smell them!” came a deep, bestial voice from the floor above. “They’re hiding! Rip everything apart! Check every room!”

“Put the ring on, now. Put it on!” Amalia demanded in a loud whisper. Too scared to speak any further, the girl just nodded rapidly and slipped the ring on, vanishing from sight. A moment later, a group of werewolves smashed their way into the basement, and the poor child watched in utter horror as her mothers were slaughtered.

“NOOO!!!” she screamed out, unable to contain herself. The monsters spun around sharply and sniffed in her direction.

“Another one! In that corner! They’re invisible!” The wolves charged her position.

“No! No! No!” America scrambled to her feet and tried to run around her attackers to flee up the stairs, but they heard her movements. One of the wolves turned and backhanded the air, impacting the girl and causing her to stumble. She fell to the ground, the ring falling off her tiny finger and sliding away.

“She’s a little one. Only a snack! But meat is meat!”

America jumped back up and grabbed the ring, but she was knocked over yet again, pinned to the floor. Looking up at the drooling fangs as the monsters hovered over her, she felt herself overcome with a strong urge to escape. Just then, a warm energy began to bubble up inside her, exploding outward in a giant blast that knocked all the wolves back and ripped open a star-shaped portal directly under her.

“What?! AAAHHH!” she screamed out as she suddenly found herself falling through a blue sky, away from the star portal that showed her basement. The wolves looked out through the rift in shock as the girl continued to drop into an entire row of portals, passing between at least a dozen different Earths in quick succession.

She finally came to a stop in a dead forest underneath a reddish sky, and immediately noticed the air seemed dry and harsh, burning her throat and nose. Before she could fully take in her surroundings, she felt an energy source moving rapidly towards her location. This was a sensation she had never felt before, but she knew immediately that this entity was pure darkness.

Still gripping the ring tightly in a closed fist, she frantically slipped it on as she felt the strange being getting closer. It rushed into the sea of dead trees, and although America could not see this entity, she could feel it floating around just above her.

“Interesting…” came a booming, distorted, disembodied male voice. “You shield yourself from my view, but I know you are there. I can… taste your energy. A very young soul, yet so much power, laying dormant. You are not from this world, and I sense fragments of spacetime from multiple universes all around you. Come, show yourself to me, child.”

America stayed still and quiet, hoping the entity would go away.

“I promise, I won’t hurt you, little one,” he added, his voice gentler. “I couldn’t even if I wanted to. You see, some very bad people trapped me in a void between worlds long ago. They were bullies and very mean and unfair to me. Imprisoning me for ages in this… this Beyond-Realm… Able to see and speak into the Material Plane, but never to experience it directly again…”

The girl refused to speak, so the being continued.

“Are you still scared, child? Would it help if you knew me better? My true name cannot be pronounced in any mortal tongue, but you may call me… the Beyonder. Catchy, isn’t it? What’s your name? Still nothing? Okay, I’ll use a nickname for you as well. I’ll call you the Cosmic Traveler, since you hop across worlds. See? We’re friends now, right?”

America maintained her silence.

“I’m pouring my heart out here, at least say hello!” the entity was becoming agitated and impatient. “Maybe it would help if we could speak face to face! You know, I bet if you tried really hard, you could open a portal to me here in the Beyond-Realm! Then I can join you there in the Material Plane and we can be real friends! What do you say?”

There it is, the girl thought to herself. He wants to use me to free himself from his prison. He was probably put there for a good reason. I gotta get out of here!

Clenching a fist to keep the ring firmly on her finger, America got up and started running through the dead trees. She immediately felt the entity chase after her.

“Where are you going?!” he cried out angrily. “Don’t leave yet! Please, release me! It’s so sad and lonely here! Please set me free!”

The Beyonder came to a stop above a rapidly shrinking Star Portal, through which he could see an invisible person moving through tall grass on another Earth. He tried to dive for the opening, but it closed before he could get to it.

“AAARRGGHHHHH!!!” he screamed in utter frustration. “I will find you, Cosmic Traveler! I will find a way to rip open this scar left behind from your portal! One day your power will belong to me!!!”



A now-adult America was enjoying a morning coffee on the patio of a small diner in the metropolitan center of the planet Xandar. Once learning to control her powers, she had expanded her exploits beyond just alternate Earths, visiting many different worlds over the years.

“What’s going on?” she asked a patron at the next table as everyone began to panic looking at their personal holopads.

“The Nova Corps broadcasted an emergency alert. Apparently an unidentified ship has appeared in orbit,” the woman explained. Just then, a group of seven-foot-tall Stark-Tech Sentinels teleported down into the middle of a nearby park.



“This Traveler Scar is fresh!” one of them claimed in a mechanized voice as it scanned the area. America realized they were standing right near where her portal had opened just an hour prior. “The Cosmic Traveler must be close! Capture everyone within a one mile radius! Mark anyone within the designated age-group as a Traveler Candidate and send them to the Inquisitor! Send everyone else to Battleworld!”

Suddenly, hordes of additional Sentinels began teleporting down, accompanied by hover platforms carrying cryogenic stasis pods. They began restraining people and placing them in the pods, and the local police force responded swiftly.

“Shit!” America cursed as she jumped to her feet. People were screaming and running chaotically in every direction as the Sentinels were chasing people down and snatching them up. That name they used… The Cosmic Traveler... she thought to herself, then gasped as she remembered that encounter a decade prior. The Beyonder must have set himself free somehow and is looking for me!

As one of the robots came barreling in her direction, she almost slipped on her ring again to hide, but then she dropped it back into her pocket. No, I won’t run from this. He doesn’t know what I look like, so maybe I can get close enough to banish him back to his prison…

Turning back towards the Sentinels, she walked forward and allowed them to capture her. Soon she was placed into one of the cryopods, and everything faded to black…





Elsewhere in the Multiverse, similar incursions were occurring anywhere there was a Traveler Scar. Teddy Altman had been enjoying his eighteenth birthday party on Clearwater Beach when the Sentinels teleported down onto the sand and began capturing people.

“Let them go!” he screamed as he powered up and dove at one of the robots. Despite his strength, he couldn’t even dent their metallic exterior. He unleashed a flurry of punches, but the Sentinel was unaffected. It was then he realized his stamina was draining fast. Crap! They must have local power dampeners built into their bodies! I gotta hit them from a distance!

Turning and running the other direction, Teddy leapt into the sky and flew up sharply before turning around and preparing a massive energy blast between his palms. But before he could release it, the Sentinel he was aiming for fired up its own blast, causing Teddy’s to explode in his face.

The teen crashed back down onto the sand, and before he could catch his bearings, he was being shoved into a cryopod…





On yet another Earth, Loki Laufeyson was sipping a cocktail as he relaxed on the beaches of Ibiza, Spain. He lifted his sunglasses and looked down the shoreline as he heard a commotion, and noticed the Sentinels capturing people.

“Well, shit…” he groaned and sighed. He took a deep breath and then jumped to his feet, tossing his sunglasses on the ground. With a flick of his hand, the Bag of Holding sitting next to his beach chair flipped open and his scepter floated up into his grasp. He magically extended it to the length of a quarterstaff, summoned an ice spear in the other hand, and ran towards the robots.

“Bloody hell!” he cried out as he, same as everyone else who faced the Sentinels, got his ass thoroughly handed to him. He struggled as they restrained him and dragged him towards a cryopod. “Piss off you damn metal wankers! Oi! Are you listening to me? I bet your mother was a toaster, and a broken one at that! Let go of me! Release me straight away! Are you really that daft? Arrgh! Choke on rat dung you damn bloody sods!” He managed to swipe his things and cloak them before he was placed in stasis as well…

---

---

Martin Mancha hit the ground hard. A six foot two figure standing over him extended a hand down to the boy. “You get overwhelmed easily.” Captain America said as he helped Martin to his feet. “You are too hard on the kid Steve.” Tony Stark quipped from the side of the sparring room of the Avengers Compound. “You know damn well even someone as talented as me would struggle against the Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes tag team, and you are asking him to do it with one arm tied behind his back.” Tony continued. ”Its quite alright my Stark.” Martin really found these training sessions beneficial, even if it was mostly just getting his ass handed to him by Captain America and the Ex-Winter Soldier. It taught him resilience.

An Alert tone sounded and Tony checked the smart display on his watch. “An unidentified ship has just entered orbit.” He looked up at the other three. “We should get the team together, don’t want another repeat of New York.” Just as they began to move off to get ready, a Sentinel appeared. “Tony?” Steve asked cautiously, recognising the technology as being Stark made. “Not one of mine.” Was Tony’s response as he double tapped his watch and it extended out into a small repulsor glove. “I swear if this if Ultron again, I’m not going to be happy.” Stark said as he leveled his repulsor at the sentinel. Two more beamed in. “Stark, Steve? What do we do?” Bucky asked as he assumed a fighting stance. “Keep the kid safe.” Steve said just before the fight broke out. The three Avengers were no match for the advanced sentinels. They seemed to be able to strike every weakness they had. It wasn’t long before Martin was shoved in a Cryo Pod.

In a hidden pocket of Chicago’s underground tunnels, a young woman consulted a computer screen. On it was the face of a disheveled businessman, looking desperately into his webcam.

“Please, Origami. Those files can’t leak, it would end me.”

Kijani spoke into her microphone. It would digitally alter her voice, leaving a distorted masculine tone to hit this man’s ears. “I’m sorry, Mister Ross. But that is not my problem. My client paid me excellently for these files, and they will be public by tomorrow. Unless…”

“Unless?” There was a note of hope in Ross’s voice.

“Unless you can outbid my current client. Are you willing to pay the price?” She typed rapidly into her computer, knowing a hefty sum would now be blinking on Ross’s screen. It had better be; she had placed the hacking module in person.

His face fell. “That’s… a lot of money.”

“It is. How does it go, again? Ah, yes. ‘Your money, or your life.’” She chuckled, dryly. “You have 24 hours.” And she cut the connection. She waited 5 seconds before exhaling and removing her headset.

Her golden eyes were almost glowing with happiness. Shady businessmen were Origami’s bread and butter, and she was about to make a 10 million dollar sum. He’d pay to keep that secret. Most of them would rather sacrifice their cash than their ‘sterling’ reputations.

Kijani Ryane stretched, popped her back, and got up to make herself a latte. That’s when the screaming started. It was very muffled, due to her location, but with ears trained for danger, she could hardly miss it. She was going to ignore it, when several of her own personally set alarms went off. Something big was happening, all around the city.

“...shit. This had better be interesting.” She hadn’t even had breakfast yet. Climbing back into her computer chair, she pulled up the camera feeds from those alarms.

“What the hell are those?” She frowned at the silver robots amassing across all of her screens, snatching people up left and right. “Well, Chi-town just got too hot for me.” She pulled out her phone and started searching plane tickets. “How’s Miami this time of year…”

After grabbing her bug-out bag and her sword, she locked up the base and retreated from her underground lair to a higher level. The screaming was loud and panic was heavy. She slipped into a running crowd and tried to keep her head down.

She was just a hair too fast for the crowd, though. Her speed boost took over in her nervousness, and she found herself isolated and facing down 2 bots.

A stack of paper flew from her bag and attacked the first bot with the force of a thousand buzzsaws. It did absolutely nothing, not even a scratch.

“Huh. Usually that works.” Kijani nodded briefly and hoisted her bag, backpedaling and bailing from the battle. She knew a losing fight when she saw one. She took off running, legs pumping, pushing her speed to the highest it could go. If she could only find a good spot before her boost ran out…

That proved to be futile. There were far too many bots, and far too little hiding spots. All she managed was to do was flip them the double bird before she was frozen in place, and carried off.

Tommy Shepherd ran as fast as he possibly could. For months, he had been stuck in Superjuvie. Where he was being poked and prodded like a science experiment. Finally, he had a chance to escape, and he took it. Now he was just trying to get as far away from the building as possible.

It was going well, until he crashed into a group of sentinels. Tommy was not amused in the slightest. “Ugh, are you fucking kidding me? You must from the superjuvie… Well, fuck you, I’m never going back there! You hear me! If you want to fight me, you’re gonna have to catch me first!” Then Tommy zipped off in a flash.

There wasn’t much of a chase, or a battle that ensued. The sentinels shot a ray at the speedster that froze him in place, and they loaded him up in a cryo pod without saying a word.



Meanwhile, Billy Kaplan stepped out of a Video Game arcade. He had spent the day searching for the Scarlet Witch. He believed she had something to do with the powers he got, and he wanted to thank her. Unfortunately, she seemed to have vanished along with the rest of the Avengers. Every lead he had came up dead. So, he took a break to play some Video Games. When went outside, he saw a bunch of sentinels capturing people. You would think Billy would be nervous, but instead, he was excited to get the chance to do some actual superheroing!

He used his powers to magically change into the superhero costume he made for himself, and floated in to approach the sentinels. “Stop! I’m going to need you doing that. Or face the consequences from the magical Wiccan!” God that sounded awful.

Of course, the sentinels weren’t intimidated by Billy, so Billy was forced to fire some magical lightning at them. They weren’t phased by this, all it did was get the sentinels attention. They placed the young spellcaster inside of a forcefield. Billy tried to break it with his magical lightning, but it wasn’t working. All it did was make him tired. He eventually passed out, and was placed in a cryo pod as well.

Terra soared through the skies of Aries 7 at a modest pace, the smooth cruising-speed of an airliner as seen from the ground. Normally when she was working, Terra zipped from point to point faster than the eye could see. At the moment, she was hauling cargo, and needed to take her time. The industrial printer she gripped from convenient handles was about twenty times her size, and she didn't need it tearing apart or wrenching free of her grip in transit. However, a familiar sight gripped her, and she descended toward the ground.

Resting on one of the tropical planet's idyllic beaches was Ursaal, the representative of the Thraxxan-Viltrumites in the Empire. She sunbathed in a bikini, enjoying the planet's gentle yellow sun on a lounger. She scrolled through her holo-phone over her shades until a massive shadow loomed over her, blocking the sun. Terra laughed as Ursaal gave her an annoyed look, and set the industrial machinery down gently to join her friend. While one could not tell from looking at her, Ursaal was quite different from a normal Viltrumite. When she and Terra first met, Terra was five, a child, while Ursaal was two and practically fully grown. Now both in their teens, they seemed alike in age, and the purple color of her skin had completely faded to a hue more normal for Viltrumites. Ursaal had also been trying to kill Terra at that time, but now they were quite close friends.

"You're the last person I was expecting to find slacking off." Terra remarked, leaning against her heavy baggage.

"I'm not." Ursaal replied coolly, settling back down in her chair. "This is my time. You're the one who told me I never relaxed. Here I am."

Terra just smiled, surprised that she actually took her advice. Really she had just been annoyed with Ursaal lately, her perfect memory made her high-strung. "Well, good, I think you needed it." She rose into the air and began to grip the machinery again, when a disturbance ripped through the air.

The distinctive sound and disruption of matter-energy transfer was heard and felt, soon followed by the appearance of identical grey robots. Without a word they began to fire lasers at Ursaal and Terra, who ducked to avoid them. Terra's mind raced, wondering who these assailants could be. She distinctly remembered her father mentioning a nemesis on Earth that used robotic drones, but she was sure he had said he was dead, or something like that.

Ursaal flew away, dodging the robots' beams, while Terra leaped into the fray. Her impact onto the sandy beach knocked some off their feet, but one reached out at grabbed her. At once Terra felt her strength sap, and didn't have the force necessary to rip away its grip. She tried to fly away, but found that had failed her as well, and she merely jumped into the air impotently.

Seeing her struggle, Ursaal weaved between laser blasts to come help her. Seeing this, Terra waved her arms and yelled, "No, don't let them touch you! Go find my father! I'll hold them off! He'll know how to come find me!"

Ursaal hesitated, but now saw how they had made Terra vulnerable, and flew off rather than be captured as well. Terra watched her fly off with a strange mix of relief and resignation. She didn't know where these robots were coming from, but as she lost consciousness in some sort of pod they were shoving her into, she felt like she would soon find out.

The young mutant walked the halls of the Triskelion building, home of the Ultimates. This was technically the second Triskelion as the first had been destroyed by Magneto when he annihilated New York City. This new Ultimates HQ was located in Washington DC as New York was essentially a no-man’s land.

Jimmy had come to the massive building as the request of Tony Stark, the Iron Patriot himself, leader of the Ultimates. Jimmy knew it wouldn’t be a good meeting as he had to come all the way to Washington, meaning Tony would likely try to use the advantage of this being his turf. In fact Jimmy knew exactly what this meeting was about.

A month ago they had managed to capture Quicksilver, effectively destroying the Brotherhood of Mutant Supremacy. But Jimmy had gone against the Ultimates by offering sanctuary to the remaining members of the Brotherhood in the mutant territory. To Tony these people were terrorists, but to Jimmy they were just misguided fellow mutants.

So Jimmy steeled himself as he knocked on the door to Mr. Stark’s office. The voice of the JARVIS AI told Jimmy that he could come in. Inside was Tony Stark, looking disheveled with messy hair and a wrinkled suit. The leader of the Ultimates then looked up from his holo-display, noticing that Jimmy had entered his office.

“James, thanks for being on time,” said Stark.

“Well I wouldn’t want to slight the number one hero,” replied Jimmy, before adding, “Are you alright Tony? You look like crap.”

Yeah, just a lot of stuff happening. You know those Neo-Hydra guys are popping up all across the country, and Cap’s been off the grid for almost a year,” stated Tony.

“But you didn’t call me for either of those reasons, right?” questioned Jimmy.

“No, I did not,” Tony answered, “I called you to discuss what you did with those Brotherhood members. Look I’ve got the President breathing down my back. He wants to make an example of those terrorists.”

“But they are also mutants, so they fall under mutant territory rule,” responded Jimmy, “That was the whole point of the President giving us our own sovereign land.”

“Then why did you let us take Quicksilver. He’s also a mutant?” asked Stark.

“Because he’s insane. And we don’t have facilities in the territory to handle him, so we’re allowing him to be held in America,” stated Jimmy.

“But that’s clearly a double standard,” said Tony, “It seems like you guys are merely appeasing us-“

Tony was cut off by the blaring of the alarm throughout the whole Triskelion. Pulling back up his holo-display, Tony scanned the whole building.

“JARVIS, what’s happening?” Tony asked the building AI.

“Mr. Stark, it appears that a starship of some kind as appeared instantly over the city. Based on its current heading, it will arrive at the Triskelion in a minute,” stated JARVIS.

“Great,” said Jimmy as he popped his bone claws, “Guess we are teaming up again.”

“Looks like,” replied Tony as he summoned the nanobots that formed his Iron Patriot armor.

The mutant hero and armored hero rushed out of the building, waiting in the Triskelion’s parking lot. The unknown ship was massive, and from it machines began coming out. As they got closer to the Triskelion, Tony recognized them.

“That’s my tech! Who the hell are these guys and what are they doing with my stuff?” asked an incredulous Tony Stark.

“It doesn’t matter why they have your tech, we just need to know how to defeat it,” stated Jimmy.

The two heroes were soon joined in the parking lot by the other members of the Ultimates. While Jimmy had met several of them before, some, like the mech piloting Black Knight or Hulk-like Wonder Man, were completely new to him.

“Alright, Ultimates unite!” Tony cried out, as he blasted into the air.

With a mighty yell, Jimmy began running at these mysterious mechanical assailants. From beside him, Hawkeye fired several explosive arrows, which didn’t absolutely nothing to the Stark tech drones, or whatever they were.

As the Ultimates got closer to the drones, the machines began firing a stun ray of some kind. Within a few seconds Black Widow, Giant Man, and Falcon fell to the ground, unconscious. Jimmy made a note to avoid these rays, only for even more Stark drones to emerge from the ship.

The Ultimates were quickly overwhelmed, many of the unarmored members falling to the ground. Some like Wonder Man were able to shake off the stun rays with his massive power. Thanks to Jimmy’s healing factor, he too took a ray to the chest without going unconscious. But he immediately felt tipsy.

Jimmy lashed out with his claws again, only to be hit by another stun ray. While he managed to remain upright, his movements were now sluggish. In this weakened state, Jimmy couldn’t dodge anymore rays, taking several at once. Falling to the ground and into blackness, Jimmy wasn’t even aware of being put in a cryo pod.

---

---

Peter Quill stood on the viewing deck of the space station, gazing down at the blue and green Earth beneath his feet. While this was far from his first time viewing a planet from space, this was the first time that Peter could remember of really gazing at his home world from above.

As a key member of the Guardians of the Earth, Peter enjoyed a level of security clearance that allowed him to go almost anywhere in the Earth sphere. So here he was, on the newly built Excalibur space station. Following the Deviant invasion, the nations of Earth had decided that they need a means of defending the Earth from extraterrestrial threats. So in a few months they had built Excalibur.

Fortunately, there had been no incursions since the station was built, just peaceful talks with the other space faring species. In fact the only issue had was an unknown meta-human teleporting onto the station a few months back, before promptly leaving. Since then, it had been pretty boring aboard Excalibur.

But that was what made it such a relaxing place for Peter to come to. Down on the Earth below, Peter had to deal with supervillains, terrorists, and all matter of threats. But here in orbit, Peter could just focus on the blue jewel in an infinite sea of darkness.

“Mr. Quill, may I have a minute of your time?” asked a voice.

Peter turned around to see Abigail Brand, the green-haired commander of Excalibur, “Yes, what’s up.”

“Well given your history of dealing with the Skrull Empire during your time as a Shi’Ar Imperial Guard, I’d thought you could provide a second set of eyes,” stated Abigail.

“Sure, what are they up to now?” asked Peter.

“Well we received initial reports of a massive disaster on their throne world of Skrullos,” said Abigail.

“What kind of disaster?” asked a concerned Peter.

“One that destroyed the entire planet,” replied Abigail grimly.

“There are over a billion people on Skrullos,” stated Peter, “How did it happen?”

“Apparently it was done by something called a Galactus,” responded Abigail, “He’s some kind of ancient planet eater, from long lost lore. But this could all be bull, so I wanted your insight into the Skrull Empire.”

“While I don’t trust the Skrulls, I would imagine they would have a hard time faking the destruction of their throne world,” stated an emotional Peter, “God, I had friends on Skrullos.”

“Preliminary reports seem to indicate that the Kree, and possibly the Badoon, are planning to take advantage of the situation and reclaim lost territory,” said Abigail, “If you think this is real, we need to go to the UN Security Council. Earth needs to respond to this crisis if we are to be taken seriously on the galactic stage.”

“Right, right,” replied Peter as he gathered himself, “We should head to the command room and send a report.”

Peter and Abigail then left the observation deck, entering an elevator and taking it to the command room. Inside the room was several people wearing the black uniform of Excalibur, with the white sword detailed on the shoulders.

“Mr. Matsuya, is our link up to Earth currently up?” asked Commander Brand.

“Yes, commander. The signal is solid,” replied a man in a hover chair.

Both Abigail and Peter then walked over to an unoccupied terminal. But just as they booted it up, the klaxon of the Excalibur long range sensors went off. Agent Matsuya immediately pulled up the image being seen by the sensors. A massive ship appeared in Earth orbit, but Peter couldn’t place it.

“This is what we prepared for!” shouted Abigail, “Hail them now!”

“No response,” stated the comms officer.

“What kind of ship is that?” wondered Peter, “I’ve seen almost every ship there is in the galaxy and I have no clue what that is.”

“Commander, they are sending out some kind of drones,” stated Matsuya.

“Initiate code red,” replied Abigail, “Activate defense systems and send an alert down to Earth.”

The command room was immediately bathed in red light, the hum of the weapons activating becoming audible. But before they could engage them, the drones had already made their way to the side of the space station.

“Commander, they’ve breached the hull,” said an anxious Matsuya.

“Alright, I’m getting in on this,” stated Peter.

Pulling out the Raptor Amulet from his pocket, Peter prepared to send the thought to summon the Raptor Android. But before he could, the drones entered the command room and began firing some kind of stun ray.

Peter would be the first to be struck, immediately falling to the floor. Luckily the Raptor Amulet remained in his hand as he was loaded into a cryo pod and taken away.

“F.R.I.D.A.Y., what’s my schedule for today?”
Harley’s yell bounced down the hall and into the living room, where one of F.R.I.D.A.Y.’s many base stations was set upon the coffee table.
“Meeting at 9, boss,” she responded with an added boost from the television’s sound system. “The one about funding for the second Iron Legion.”
“Aaand what time is it now?”
“8:24.”
“Aaaah.”
Harley paused mid-scrub, the shower sponge that had blazed a trail of suds across his chest now still in his soapy grip. He could already tell it was gonna be a long day, wasn’t it?

Hurriedly, Harley rinsed himself off and hopped into a towel, clutching it closed as he dashed down the hall for the safety of his bedroom. Pants would be a big help, for sure. Funding meetings were pretty snooty, but not too snooty, so a pair of jeans would probably do. White button up too, maybe? Sort of a business casual type thing. And the sunglasses, so he didn’t look like he was trying too hard with the whole proper presentation business.

The shades were halfway up his face, resting on the bridge of his nose, when F.R.I.D.A.Y. called out to him once again.
“Boss? Multiple high power energy signals outside the building. Directly outside the window, actually.”
Harley paused. He chewed his lip, brow furrowed. What the hell was that all about? With his pointer and his thumb, he pushed the shades up his nose and turned towards the door. Buttoning his shirt as he went, he skidded around the corner on the heel of his plimsoll, turned to face the balcony doors.
He knitted his brow and drew his head back in confusion.

“Is that the Iron Legion?”
There were at least a half dozen of them, hovering ominously by the balcony. They stared their hollow, lifeless stare straight through the doors and right at Harley. No, this couldn’t have been his Iron Legion. The design was different, for starters, and his were only in the prototype stages—nowhere near this numerous, or this functioning.
Slowly, they each raised one hand, pointing their palms towards the door.
Ah, nuts.
“F.R.I.D.A.Y.! Wardrobe Malfunction Protocol, now!”
Taking one step back, Harley darted forward, tucking into a roll as the Repulsor fire sailed over his head and shattered the table behind him.
“Armour’s on its way, boss!”
First came the legs and hands, and that was just what Harley needed: Immediately, he hopped up and threw his hands down, blasting off from the living room and straight past the Sentinels. The robots pursued, and so too did the rest of the Mark X, each armour piece accelerating towards their wearer until he was finally fully suited up.

“Brrrr,” Harley trilled through pursed lips, shaking his head to stave off the morning sleepiness. “There’s a wake-up call for ya. Beats a room full of dead-eyed execs, anyways.”
Darting to the side, Harley barely dodged a hail of Repulsor fire from the pursuing Sentinels, earning a hiss through clenched teeth. “What are those guys? Are we gonna have to sue someone for plagiarism?”
“Not ours, boss. I scanned them: All I can tell is they’ve got some serious power readings—it knocks the Arc Reactor out of the park.”
Oh, that really wasn’t good.

Flipping around midair, Iron Lad returned fire with a volley of his own Repulsor blasts, aiming true for the dead centre of each Sentinel. Though their relentless pursuit was slowed somewhat, they were nonetheless undeterred, pushing through the fire with not a scratch on them to show for it. Soon, they returned fire of their own, far too much for Harley to dodge it all: A blast to the shoulder sent him tumbling back, struggling to regain balance midair.
“Serious damage to the armour’s structural integrity, boss! Servos are knackered in the right shoulder!”
Alright, enough of this. He’d have time to figure out what the hell these things were when he put them down. He had hoped to use his blasts as a distraction to gain further height above the clouds, but he had barely managed to clear the tops of the highest buildings. Looks like he’d have to stay and fight, then.

Pushing himself back upright with his palm thrusters, Iron Lad puffed his chest and faced down the oncoming battalion. Gradually, a glow began to grow from the Arc Reactor, energy crackling across the bright blue surface. Surely, this would do it.

The Sentinels stopped, lining up single file before him, and held out their palms. More and more energy began to coalesce in the middle of Harley’s chest, power levels rising further as it sparked and shone and…
Spluttered, hissed, and went dark.

The Sentinels lowered their palms. The inside of the Mark X was plunged into darkness, the displays disappearing and F.R.I.D.A.Y.’s voice now silenced. An absence most notable, though, was the hum of his propulsion devices—the propulsion devices that kept him in the air.

“Ahhh, nuts.”
Powerless as the suit seized up, Harley plummeted down from the Los Angeles skyline—and the Sentinels rocketed downwards alongside him, preparing a Cryopod.

---

---

Elsewhere, Jasper was passed out in someone’s garden.

Of course, if someone asked him, his story would be far more glamorous: He’d defeated the Sentinels, he’d say. Kicked their asses and hopped on board their ship to kick the ass of their boss. But the only one kicking any ass was the frankly asinine amounts of alcohol Jasper refused to metabolise, against his liver’s better judgement.
To be fair, he had kicked ass moments ago, at some party he had found his way to. He wasn’t really sure what it was for, or who was hosting it. An invitation sort of worked its way down the social chain of higher-ups to Jasper’s…sycophants, he’d call them if he knew what the word meant. Inevitably, he looked at someone funny, and they looked at him funny, and a few insults later they were punching each other out on the dance-floor.
Jasper won, of course. Because of course he would; he could take his arm off and slap it around like a prehensile baseball bat. But decorum demanded any brawlers take their fight elsewhere, so they had adjourned to the garden.

It was a very nice garden. From this angle—half-face down in the dirt—the primroses looked lovely. So nice a garden it was, that—through a combination of enrapturement by the petunias, and an inescapable sense of awkwardness that threatened to emerge should he walk back into the party—Jasper had decided he’d stay here for an extended smoke break. And then a smoke break became a drink break, and a drink break became a drinks, plural, break, and then he was half-face down in the dirt.
But no one had to know that. Because Jasper’s made up story was definitely what would have happened had he been awake.
Certainly.

And so, scooped up rather from his resting place in a bed of daffodils, Jasper was mercifully transferred by the Sentinels to somewhere more comfortable. Which, at this level of inebriation, was really all that mattered.
Well, at least someone was enjoying all this.

At a nexus point where dozens of universes converged, a space station sat amidst an asteroid field in orbit around a red sun. Hundreds of vessels were coming and going, mostly manned by Sentinels and collectively housing thousands of crypods from the various worlds where they had been tracking Traveler Scars. Empty ships were heading back out for their next run while others were depositing their pods at the station.



Any prisoners that fell outside the designated age-group were loaded into vessels bound for a place called Battleworld, while the Traveler Candidates were sorted into groups of twelve cryopods in the station’s hangar bay. Each group was moved onto smaller red spaceships, made from the metallic exterior of the dead Celestial, Arishem. These comprised the Inquisitor’s Fleet, and they soon departed the station and headed towards the Inquisitor’s Citadel in the Elsdamorae System of Universe A-109.



When the fleet passed the red planet Kabbayan, they knew it was time to start thawing out the Candidates in preparation for arrival at the Citadel. They had been sorted into groups of twelve to avoid too many of them being conscious at the same time on the same ship, just in case they might find a way to escape. However, one such ship, the Arishem-Exar, had yet to notice a cloaked vessel in hot pursuit…

“Ugh..” Teddy moaned as he placed a hand on his face. His head was killing him, and he was dizzy and disoriented. He opened and closed his eyes repeatedly, but everything was pitch black. He was laying on some kind of padded mat and he could hear faint voices, but it sounded like he was underwater. There was a chill in the air, and he felt weak and shaky. He tried to sit up and slammed his skull against a glass barrier.

“Ow! What the hell?” he started feeling around, and realized he was in some kind of pod. Then he remembered. The Sentinels!

“Hey, can you hear me?” America called out from her pod, having woken first.

“Yes! What’s going on? I can’t see anything!” he replied.

“A side effect of the cryo process!” she explained. “When you first awaken, it takes a minute for your hearing and sight to fully return. I only just regained my own senses.”

“Picked up by the Sentinels as well?” Teddy inquired.

“Yup,” she confirmed.

“Do you know why they want us?” Loki asked, now conscious as well.

“It’s my fault,” America revealed, then looked around to see everyone else waking up in their pods as well. “I’m sorry you all got caught up in this. These Sentinels are after me. They work for someone who calls himself the Beyonder, a being who was trapped in some prison realm and wanted to use me to escape. That’s because of my power - to open portals between universes. But if he was able to put all this together, I’m not sure why he even needs me at this point. All I know is that he is after me, and I allowed myself to get captured in the hopes of getting closer to him so I could send him back to his prison…”

“But none of us look like you,” Teddy pointed out. “We are all wildly different…”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Loki scoffed. “They don’t actually know what she looks like, only that she has a power the Beyonder wants. He probably at least knows that she’s a teenager, judging by the fact that we are all similar in age.”

“Bingo,” America smirked.

Suddenly, the glass lids of the twelve pods swung open upwards, and they could climb out into what appeared to be a cargo bay on the ship. They felt severely lightheaded and could barely stand on their two feet, a feeling that only strengthened if they tried to call upon their powers.

“We will be arriving at the Inquisitor’s Citadel in approximately fifteen minutes, Traveler Candidates,” came a computerized voice over the intercom. “Please use the washrooms located adjacent to your cryogenic stasis pods to clean yourselves up in preparation for your Soulgaze with the Inquisitor.”

“What the hell is a Soulgaze?” Teddy wondered out loud.

“Probably a method to deduce if one has the powers the Beyonder is seeking, I reckon,” added Loki. He then smirked as he realized Teddy was, like him, clad in only a pair of swim trunks. “They grabbed you on the beach as well, then?”

“Yeah, right in the middle of my birthday party!” he replied, chuckling.

“Don’t worry, I have some extra clothing in my Bag of Holding - you can’t see it, it’s cloaked, but it’s strapped to my waist right now.”

“How… How are you keeping it cloaked with the power dampeners?” Teddy was curious.

“The enchantment is built into the material itself, I merely triggered it with a tiny flick of Mana when they were grabbing me,” Loki explained. “Luckily I had just enough energy to pull that off before being captured.”

“Since we are not actively being attacked, we should probably use the opportunity to clean up and use the restroom, like the voice said,” America offered. “I, for one, don’t want to pass up the chance to pee. Then we can regroup and figure out a way to escape.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” Teddy agreed. As they all walked towards the washrooms, they noticed there were twelve of them lined along the wall directly across the cargo bay from where their pods were lined up.

“Oh, how nice of them to give us private facilities after kidnapping us. What lovely twats.”

Once they had a chance to clean up and take care of any needs in the washrooms, they grouped together in front of their pods to discuss methods of escape.

“Your fashion sense is… Well, it’s not really me,” Teddy said as he looked down over the extravagant shirt and pants Loki had given him. “But it beats the swim trunks, so thanks… What was your name?”

“Loki Laufeyson,” he replied. America raised her eyebrows. “What?”

“You’re the first Teen Loki I’ve encountered,” she smirked. “Most of your variants are much older and have a different face. In one universe a Loki became a film actor under the name Tom Hiddleston.”

“Wait, so by ‘portals between universes,’ you meant legitimate parallel timelines?” Teddy asked in shock.

“Yeah, does your world not know about the Multiverse yet?” America shrugged. “There are literally thousands of universes that exist at different vibrational frequencies. Some are nearly identical, while others vary drastically.”

“Wow, this is crazy…” he replied, then shook his head and looked up. “Sorry, we were giving our names, right? I’m Teddy Altman.”

“America Chavez,” she added, then looked at the others, prompting them to give their names as well.

Billy woke up first. At least… he think he did… It was still dark, and he could hear the mumbled sound of voices. Eventually, everything came into focus, and Billy realized his was in a pod. Another girl explained the situation. Billy hadn’t even made a name for himself as a superhero, and he was already being kidnapped by aliens… Even though this was supposed to be a scary situation. A part of him actually found this kind of exciting… The door to his pod opened.

Meanwhile a boy stepped out of the pod next to Billy, and he was freaking out. “No no no no no! Fuck damn it! I just got out of superjuvie. I can’t go back again!” He tried running, but only fell flat on his face. “Fuck, and why am I so slow?!”

Billy more calmly stepped out of his pod. “It’s ok, we’ll be alright. I’m sure there’s a way out of here…” Billy noticed the boy had white hair and green eyes. For some reason, it felt like he was looking into a mirror. He kind of looked like him. After hearing America talk about variants, Billy got excited. “Omg! Are you a variant of me from another universe?”

Tommy glared at Billy. ”What?! I don’t even know you loser!”

Billy walked away from the boy that called him names, and walked up to another boy that had gotten out of the pod. He wasn’t expecting to get kidnapped, and meet a hot guy today... “Um… I don’t know, I think the swim trunks suit you better.” Billy’s face turned bright red. “Oh my gosh, that was so cringe. I’m sorry! Um… My name is Billy… Billy Kaplan…” He backed up and nervously shuffled his feet.

Tommy wasn’t sure he could trust any of these people. “Oh no. We are not best friends yet. We just met, You all can call me Speed. You don’t need to know my real name right now…

“Um… I don’t know, I think the swim trunks suit you better.” Billy’s face turned bright red. “Oh my gosh, that was so cringe. I’m sorry! Um… My name is Billy… Billy Kaplan…” He backed up and nervously shuffled his feet.

Teddy smiled and blushed slightly at the compliment. He was instantly smitten with this gorgeous man standing before him, but didn’t want to lose sight of their current situation. “Well, Billy, maybe that calls for a pool party somewhere once we get out of here.” He winked at him and grinned mischievously.

Kijani came back to consciousness slowly. She felt like she was in the midst of a dream, and not a very good one at that. Blind, deaf, weak. She slumped forward when the pods were opened, landing on her hands and knees inelegantly.

She saw figures in front of her. As her vision came back into focus, she realized that they were all about her age. Interesting. Tensing a bit, she realized that her sword was still tucked neatly under her coat. Chicago winter was nothing to mess with, and her heavy woolen trenchcoat had kept her sheathed blade from being discovered. Her go-bag had been frozen along with her. That was either sheer luck or poor planning on the part of her enemy. Either way, she would gladly take the advantage.

She stepped forward, looking at some of the others who had gathered. Her golden eyes darted from person to person. They all looked decent, and she had the slightest instinct of danger from each. Some more than others. There was a young woman who seemed to know what the hell was going on, so she listened in as she approached the small group.

It seemed introductions were in order. The only one who had a lick of sense was “Speed”. She definitely didn’t trust any of these strangers. After all, one of them could easily be an enemy spy, or running the show entirely.

“You all may refer to me as Origami. You won’t be getting me to sing kumbayah anytime soon either.” Her voice was cool and neutral as she eyed the group with distaste, especially the two boys who were openly eyeing each other. Such trusting, idiot children. Already, she could sense that she’d have to make her own way. Oh well, what else was new?

Terra roused from her cryogenic slumber blearily, her head hitting the ship's deck being her only indication that she wasn't still unconscious or dead. She laid there with her face against the cold floor for a while, wondering what had happened to her and why. Until her senses returned, she had little to do besides ruminate on the events that had transpired. How long had she been unconscious? Where had she been taken? If the ship around her wasn't actively exploding with Viltrumites that had come to rescue her, she had to assume that she was very far away, or that she had not been gone long enough for Ursaal to bring news of her abduction to her father.

There were others here, she realized as her hearing returned, and her sight soon after. They seemed worse for wear than herself, as they stumbled around blindly. Terra rose to her feet, but not any further than that, as her ability to fly seemed restricted for some reason. Instead, she walked around, stretching her limbs. It was somewhat novel for her, having to walk, as she normally flew wherever she needed to go.

Terra, like several of the others, minded her own business as others talked amongst themselves. They posited that they had been abducted from their respective universes in an effort to find a specific person: the teen girl calling herself America, if she was to be believed. Terra had her doubts, but there were more pressing matters on her mind. If she was outside of her home universe, she was outside of the protection of the Viltrum Empire. Or worse, she thought as her blood ran cold, she was in a universe with an active and thriving Viltrum Empire, still led by Thragg, or perhaps an evil version of her father or grandfather. She glanced among the assembled teenagers as they introduced themselves, some using superhero monikers rather than their names to avoid being identified. They were right to be cautious, there was no telling if anything America had said was true, and this could all be part of some elaborate experiment, or a cosmic joke.

Terra treated herself to the sonic shower available, assuming that if whoever had captured her wanted her dead, they would have done it by now. As she did, she continued to go over the situation in her head. Making portals between universes was a power she had heard of before... One of her fathers' most dangerous nemeses had that same power, and used it to terrorize her father, Terra's family, and the Earth in general. However, her father had told her that he was dead, and had accidentally erased himself from the multiverse, so there was no reason to fear him coming back. But could this America be an alternate version of him from another universe? Was he the Beyonder that she had mentioned? Or was collaborating with that other guy her father had fought on Earth, the Robot-Man, to seek revenge? Too many questions, not enough answers.

Terra rejoined the group, and could feel her strength returning to her. She still couldn't fly just yet, but she seemed to be recovering from the cryo-stasis faster than the others, no doubt thanks to her Viltrumite constitution. She considered introducing herself to the others as Invincible, but reconsidered the idea after remembering that her father made more enemies than friends during his time as a superhero, and she was still considering the possibility that his villains were out for revenge.

Instead she said, "I'm Terra." She looked around at the others. They were kids, scared, desperate for anything to cling onto during a crisis. "I think we should take stock of the situation. Were all of us abducted under the same circumstances? I was also on a beach, come to think of it..." She didn't want to divulge more than that; she didn't know if these teens came from universes that still had a domineering Viltrum Empire, and it would shoot her credibility to ribbons if they connected her to such an empire. "Are all of you from the Earth? Sol system?" She felt the need to ask, since one of the assembled children was green, and Terra herself was part-alien.

"Boss?"
Harley groaned, squinting as the lights in his visor flickered back to life.
"Boss? Boss!"
"F.R.I.D.A.Y....?"
She chuckled, dryly. "Who'd you think?"
Harley shook his head, grimacing as he felt the shooting pain his shoulder. "Where am I? What...the robot things...?"
"They captured you, boss. I dunno where we are now, but we've got no wi-fi or phone signal, which means we're either in a Faraday cage, or..."
"Space," Harley interjected, sighing. "Ooof course. Ugh, I should have finished that Starwalker suit before I started the Iron Legion..."
"Vital signs stabilising, boss. Rise and shine."
Gritting his teeth, Harley pushed himself up and out of the cryo-pod."Yeah, yeah, alright mom, I'm going, sheesh..."

Harley's iron sabatons hit the ground with a weighty thud, the inner mechanisms stabilising his would-be stumble. Turning towards the blinking life signs on his display, the jaw of his mask slid open. His faceplate pulled back to reveal his true face, blinking as he brushed his fringe aside.
Oh, crap, yeah. The armour.

"Um...Hi," he waved sheepishly, the servos in his suit whirring with each movement."I'm...Iron Lad, if we're doing our made up names—" he gestured towards 'Origami' and 'Speed'. "From Earth," then towards Terra. "—And I know this," and then gestured down across his suit, acutely aware of the similarities between it and the Sentinels. "—Might be setting of some alarm bells in your heads right about now, but trust me, I've got nothing to do with them. Frankly, I don't even know what they are. Although if I were to make an educated guess from what you've said, I'm willing to bet they're belonging to one of my, or my predecessor's, variants. Just...spitballing here. So..."
He clapped his metal hands together, flinching slightly at the sudden loud clang.

"Since Tommy's got clothes now, I think it's fair to say the most pressing matter we have to attend to here is getting out. I mean, we've got plenty of time to work out how to stop the Beyonder when we aren't being ferried straight to him, right? So, I know we've just met and we could all be literally anyone, but I think if we've got murderous, thieving or otherwise unsavoury tendencies, we can agree to just leave all that at the door and concentrate on not dying or being imprisoned right now. Who's with me?" He grinned, disarmingly, sheepishly.
"Aaaanyone?"

---

---

As he had suspected he would, Jasper awoke later than the rest with a horrible pounding in his skull. Christ, that hurts. His fault for fiddling with his metabolism, he supposed—all that ethanol was hitting him at once. A hangover was like a full-scale war against his body: Endocrinal, vascular, gastrointestinal—it was like doing your A-Levels with someone doing you in the A the whole time. So much biology bullshit, so many reasons to collapse into a pile of misery and impulsivity and scream into the floor until it passed naturally.

Oh, terrific. He could see again. Thank god—he’d regenerated eyes once before, and now he needed contacts.
Clutching his head, Jasper grit his teeth and heaved his heavy body out from the cryo-pod. His steps were laboured, his feet heavy, his guts doing their own little performance of fucking Riverdance from the feel of it. There was a lump in his throat, the floodgates ready to open.
He wasted no time. He didn’t readjust to take in his surroundings, nor greet the strange blurred shapes that he was pretty sure were people. “Washrooms” and “adjacent to your cryopods” bounced around his skull until they hit a brain-cell not drowning in Carlsberg, and that was his cue.

Sluggishly, he darted to the side, awkwardly staggering past anyone in his way and straight for the restroom. He headbutted the door, pushing it open with his forehead, and stumbled in.
There was a soft thud, like something hitting the ground, a horrid retching, and what sounded vaguely like the great cascading of a mighty, malt waterfall. There was a brief panting, and a sigh of relief, and then a flush.
It was quiet for a moment, and then Jasper heard the most cringe-inducing flirty back and forth he’d had the displeasure of being present for. Quick to come in after Kid Hulk fired back his response, the washroom door swung open with a kick. In the doorway stood Jasper, head back up to heaven, leg holding the door open, and mouth open.

“AAAAAAAaaaaauuuuuugghhhhhh,”

he vocalised his displeasure quite plainly, head rolling on his neck back down to its usual angle as he grimaced.
“Guh.”
There was no way he was holding that in.

Patiently, Jasper cleared his throat and kicked the washroom door fully open, stepping out from the door-frame as it slowly creaked shut behind him. He reached both hands into his jacket pocket, producing a well-worn flip lighter from one and a hand-rolled cigarette from the other. Clutching it between his pointer and middle, he slipped the business end between his lips and flipped his lighter open. He brought the flame up and lit, and took a deep puff as he pocketed the lighter.

He stared at them for a moment as they—presumably—stared at him, taking drags of his cigarette. Finally, he relented, taking one last puff and slipping the cigarette out with his two fingers.
“Jasper,” he declared, his francophonic baritone hoarse from a dried throat.

His gaze flitted towards Origami, a brow quirked inquisitively. She seemed to be just as pleased with the whole situation as he was—good. They could both suffer in silent solidarity. His acknowledgement would remain unspoken for now, though: He'd have to feel things out first before he went buddying up with anyone. Unless they had French people in space, he figured his accent was sufficient enough proof of his earthbound status. "Does anyone have any plans for 'Iron Lad', or shall I start flushing bits of myself down the toilet?”

Considering the gravity of the situation, Jasper remained remarkably calm about it all—Partially because this wasn't the first time he had woken up somewhere strange with no memory of how he'd gotten there, and partially because that cigarette wasn't just tobacco.
This was tits, as far as he was concerned. Wicked way to spend a Sunday morning.

<Snipped quote by Crimson Flame>

Teddy smiled and blushed slightly at the compliment. He was instantly smitten with this gorgeous man standing before him, but didn’t want to lose sight of their current situation. “Well, Billy, maybe that calls for a pool party somewhere once we get out of here.” He winked at him and grinned mischievously.

Billy grinned. “It’s a date them!”

Tommy just rolled his eyes, but kept quiet. If these two really wanted to die, that was their problem. The Origami person was the only one in this group with any common sense. Besides, that guy that called himself Jasper voiced his displeasure better than he ever could have, and had to hold back laughter.

Billy wasn’t amused by it though.

"Um...Hi," he waved sheepishly, the servos in his suit whirring with each movement."I'm...Iron Lad, if we're doing our made up names—" he gestured towards 'Origami' and 'Speed'. "From Earth," then towards Terra. "—And I know this," and then gestured down across his suit, acutely aware of the similarities between it and the Sentinels. "—Might be setting of some alarm bells in your heads right about now, but trust me, I've got nothing to do with them. Frankly, I don't even know what they are. Although if I were to make an educated guess from what you've said, I'm willing to bet they're belonging to one of my, or my predecessor's, variants. Just...spitballing here. So..."

Billy nodded.“If we’re using our other names, I’m also called Wiccan. Yes, I use magic… I think it’s magic anyway… There’s no other explanation for it. I’d show you, but… um… you know… Yes, also from Earth. I’m with you dude. We really should be working together. We’re all in the same boat here. Soooo, Iron Lad huh? Any relation to Tony Stark?”

Tommy just scoffed, and waited for the unnecessary icebreakers to be over.

A boy emerged clad in armor remarkably similar to the appearance of the robots that had assaulted Terra earlier. He was apparently aware of this, and tried to dissuade their fears by blaming their appearance on an alternate-self, but Terra was not entirely convinced. So far, this one and America were the most suspicious in her mind. She tried to not let it show.

"Terra is my name, not, like, my superhero name." She paused, realizing what she just said. "Well, not like I'm a superhero, anyway. My dad would flip if I started calling myself one." Terra was hoping that these teenagers, seemingly teen superheroes, could relate to her experience of having a superhero for a parent. Might grease the wheels in getting them to open up about who they were and where they came from.

"Does anyone have any plans for 'Iron Lad', or shall I start flushing bits of myself down the toilet?”

Hearing this, Terra looked at Jasper incredulously, and said, "Good plan if you want to end up trapped in a septic tank. Or dumped into an incinerator. Does your Earth not have starships?" Looking over to the others, she asked aloud, "Anyone here ever been on a spacecraft? Show of hands?" She raised her own hand.

“It is quite odd that they have normal hinged doors on a spaceship, isn’t it?” Loki wondered out loud after they were done using the washrooms. “Anyway, I agree with Iron Lad, we need to focus on our escape.”

When Billy gave his hero name, Teddy decided to do the same. “I also go by Kid Hulk, but you might not be able to tell because… Oh shit…” He looked down and realized his skin was green, meaning his glamour ring was failing. But a second later, the illusion was restored again. Then it began to come and go in quick succession, and he looked over to see Loki’s cloaked bag was flickering in and out of sight as well. “Odd.”

“Yup,” America responded to Terra’s question about being on a spaceship, raising her hand. Teddy focused back on the group and raised his hand as well.

The group realized they could feel their strength returning, and then an alarm started blaring and the computerized voice returned over the intercom. “Warning! Warning! Malfunction detected in Central Power Dampener!”

“Shit, now’s your chance!” America cried out, realizing they had some of their powers back, yet she still could not summon her portals. “You all have to get out of here! Speed, I’m assuming you’re a speedster, right? Quick! Scope out the vessel and see if there are any escape pods! I still can’t seem to open portals, but you all can still get away!”

“What about you?” Loki inquired.

“I’m not going anywhere. I intend to face the Beyonder head on! Now hurry!”

Tommy eyes lit up as soon as he heard their powers were back. He took America’s suggestion. “See ya losers! I am out of here!” He zipped all over the ship in search of the escape pods. Admittedly, he wasn’t as fast as he was used to. But at least it was something.

Billy however stayed where he was. ”Um… If it’s alright… I’ll stick with you.” He replied looking at Teddy. “Safety in numbers and all that…” Of course his ulterior motive was to get to know the green guy better. But also, he addressed America. “But also, if the Beyonder is as bad as you say he is. Well, what kind of superhero would I be if I let you face him alone?” He said as he made his fist glow blue with magic.

---

---

Martin was up. Most of his internal systems were rebooting, or trying to calibrate to the sudden changes in environment. ”Martin.” He said rather abruptly, realising most of the others had already introduced themselves and he didn’t want to feel left out. He stepped up to America and Wiccan.

“I’m not going anywhere. I intend to face the Beyonder head on! Now hurry!”

Billy however stayed where he was. ”Um… If it’s alright… I’ll stick with you.” He replied looking at Teddy. “Safety in numbers and all that…” Of course his ulterior motive was to get to know the green guy better. But also, he addressed America. “But also, if the Beyonder is as bad as you say he is. Well, what kind of superhero would I be if I let you face him alone?” He said as he made his fist glow blue with magic.

”Is fighting a being that has access to power dampeners really a smart idea? I mean, I hate to shoot down a plan, but those things that brought us here wiped the floor with the Avengers of my universe.” He gestured at the group. ”I doubt us teenage knock-offs are going to be much of a threat.” he paused. Maybe for a little too long as he considered the best course of action. ”No offence.” Martin added on.

He surveyed the team. He decided Iron Lad would probably be one of their biggest assets considering his armour should be relatively immune to the power dampeners. Making him the most consistently powered if they were to get in a fight. The biggest red flag was probably Terra. Very reserved and secretive. Something about her rubbed Martin the wrong way. ”Iron Lad. That fancy suit still work here with the power dampeners? We could use a heavy hitter.” He turned to America. ”Come with us. Once we find out a way around these power dampeners we can come back for the Beyonder. I doubt you can put up much of a fight against a swarm of machines that can turn off your powers, before you even get close to Beyonder. There’s no glory in winding up dead because you got cocky.”

“Sure thing,” Teddy replied with a smirk when Billy mentioned staying with him. He then turned to America. “I agree, we won’t back down from a fight, no matter the odds.”

She listened for a moment to what Billy, Teddy, and Martin had to say, then sighed. “While I appreciate the help, you might want to consider fleeing with everyone else. I’m the one the Beyonder wants. I am at no risk of being seriously harmed in the short term because he wants to use my powers. Can’t very well do that if I’m dead or incapacitated, now can he? He won’t hurt me before he gets what he wants. The same can’t be said for you all. Once I reveal myself as the ‘Cosmic Traveler,’ as he calls me, they will ferry me straight to him.”

“Has it occured to you that he will be a bigger threat to us all if he gets your powers?” Loki inquired, crossing his arms. “Do you even have a plan?”

“I do,” she replied. “He will deactivate all power dampeners in our vicinity when he attempts to either steal my powers or force me to use them for his bidding. And that is when I’ll open a portal straight back to his ‘Beyond-Realm’ and chuck him in.”

“One thing I still don’t understand,” Teddy began, “is why he even needs your powers if he’s already escaped.”

“Look, you guys are running out of time to escape. Enough questions. Just go!” America insisted.

Teddy shook his head. “Sorry, but I’m not leaving you to face this threat alone.”

“Me either,” agreed Loki. “If you mess this up, we’re all bloody fucked, so I’m tagging along as well.”

Just then, they heard the sound of metal footsteps rushing through a nearby corridor, growing rapidly closer…

Kijani scoffed under her breath. Her instincts had been right, as usual. That “America” girl was not to be trusted. Even if she wasn’t an enemy, this was still her fault! And then she had the sheer audacity to think she could beat this Beyonder. If he had numbers enough to cross the universe, what kind of fool would try to take him on solo? Even as she listened, some of the other teens were teaming up. Idiots, the lot of them. They were on their own.

Kijani did not waste her breath with a goodbye, or even a quip. As soon as she felt her strength returning, she quickly dumped the heavy winter coat she was wearing. Then she pulled her sword free from the scabbard, eyes darting around for the nearest and clearest escape route. There was nothing around, so she started running. She hid her speed, mostly because she wanted to save it for an emergency. (Also, she didn’t want to look a poser around a real Speedster.)

She kept her gaze sweeping as she headed through the ship. Flashing lights, lots of metal – and one of those strange kidnapping robots headed in her direction. Taking a split second to quell the fear in her stomach, she put the sword away and picked up speed.

“Candidate detected. Moving to intercept.”

“Intercept this, tin can.” Kijani fell into a forward flip, her lean legs swinging upward. She hooked the robot around the head and used her momentum to swing herself right around. Then she used its back like a springboard, propelling herself forward. She landed in a loose tumble, righted, and started running for real.