Three miles outside of Moscow:

"Gentlemen, please, let us make this quick," General Ivan Kreiger asked politely (for him, at any rate) in his native Russian of the two armor-clad fellow Soviets entering the secured section of the secret, underground bunker the general called his office. "I have new, more urgent matters to attend to, and this should only take one moment."

"YOU called US, General, need I remind you?" the green-armored brute known as Titanium Man responded scornfully. "We were prepared to embark for the United States--as had been planned for weeks--and now not only do you notify us of an unexpected change of plans, but you speak to us as if we were pathetic dogs."

"You are on thin ice as is, General," the other metal mass, Crimson Dynamo, seethed.

"Yes, yes, I know," the General replied, as unconcerned with the two men's troubles as he could be. "Hydra is knocking down your door with job offers, you're disenchanted with the sad state of our clandestine Communist rebirth, blahblahblah, correct? Well, allow me to ease your worries with the arrival of a new Soviet Super Soldier--"

At the strained hum of hydraulics sliding a thick, steel door into the wall, Titanium Man and Crimson Dynamo turned their heads at the woman standing in the newly-lit doorway, her long, raven hair hovering around her glistening, black leather jumpsuit, which held an arsenal of hi-tech espionage devices, and her eyes obstructed by a black strip that hugged her face over the eyebrows above her eyes and just above her cheekbones below the eyes; she stepped toward them, out of the light, where her darkened features all but melted together with the near lightless room, and yet her presence could still be felt--partly due to the knocking of her thigh-clutching, high-heeled boots against the cement floor, but mostly it was the air about her that told them that she was a formidable agent, and that she meant to complete her mission before anything else.

"--the Black Widow."

***

"Awesome Adventure, Part 2: Maximum Pressure"

***

When Natasha Romanoff--the Black Widow--awoke, she still struggled to fight the blinding light that filled her eyes--whether the light resulted from the extra-dimensional wave of energy that enveloped her and the other Avengers--along with the mutant known as Cable--moments earlier*, or from the fist of one the uniformed A.I.M.** troops that she discerned to be surrounding her, she was unsure. (*see last issue, **Advanced Idea Mechanics--Sam)

Nor was she certain of why she was being assailed by this handful of technological terrorists on what she perceived, between blows to her jaw with the butt of a laser rifle, to be a Manhattan rooftop. However, this information, fuzzy as it was in her less-than-attentive state, was all that she needed in order to hold off these A.I.M. troops long enough to escape and continue her mission to stop Baron Zemo and his Masters of Evil from misleading the public into believing that they were the heroic Thunderbolts.

As another rifle-end crushed a tooth, she kicked blindly into the air, feeling that familiar impact of foot hitting face--or in the case of the A.I.M. troops, foot hitting mask.

"She appears to be the Black Widow, based on Soviet documents I've seen, unit one," one of the frantic troops spoke into a communication device on his wrist, apparently contacting his command base. "She just appeared out of nowhere!"

"Stop her, and don't let her damage the sample," replied another, muffled, static-rivaled voice through the wrist device.

The troop threw a fistful of charged pellets at Black Widow, and she could only guard her eyes from their stinging sparks. As the troop prepared another swarm of pellets, she struck him with three electro-static Widow's bites from her wrist gauntlets, sending him reeling back. In his absence, she sensed four more A.I.M. troops approaching, and she knew that she could kill each of them with hardly a strained breath--but no, it would not be right...it would take too much time--time she did not have as long as the Thunderbolts were still a threat.

And so she ran toward the edge of the rooftop and jumped down to the building below her, landing on a rumbling, boxed generator. When she looked back over her shoulder, two A.I.M. troops were still tailing her, firing bolts of energy from large, handheld cannons. She had to keep running.

In her sleek, grey kevlar bodysuit, and the troops in their bulky "beekeeper" outfits, she had the advantage of stealth and swiftness in this chase--and she had to keep running.

She leapt down onto another rooftop, sparks of energy from the cannons smoking at her just-grounded feet. Just now she was putting two and three buildings' distance on the terrorists, but it was not enough. They would continue to hound her, to threaten her mission. She had to continue away from them, and toward Zemo's end.

Another rooftop, and they were out of sight. But she was not about to stop, not with their presence looming just a few buildings away. She started off of this rooftop to another, but, for once in her life, she lost her footing at the edge, and began to descend toward the ground, two-hundred plus feet down.

But, with weary fingers, she took hold of the edge of the rooftop before she could fall any further.

And as her long legs dangled lifelessly, nothing but space separating them from the ground, she remembered the last time she was in this predicament--it was months ago, and days before she made the cruel discovery that the Thunderbolts were, in truth, the Masters of Evil--and that they had to be stopped...

...they had to be stopped...

The A.I.M. gunfire had gradually ceased, and now she only heard booming footfalls above her, unable to see over the edge to discern how many troops were coming for her. Not that it mattered--one or a hundred troops, she was helpless either way. If she was to escape their grasp, her only choice was to make the fall to the ground and hope for a miracle--hope that she could continue her fight.

She began to ease her fingers from the edge, but as she did, they were somehow held tighter, as if locked in a large fist.

"Natasha! You are safe now!"

In a swift rush, she was pulled to the top of the building by her Avengers teammate--

"Hercules!" she exclaimed. "You saved me!"

"Of course, fair Natasha," the Greek behemoth smiled proudly.

"I guess I should thank my lucky stars."

"Luck has little to do with it--I told you I would never leave your side, and now I renew that promise."

"Thank you," Natasha beamed, admiring Hercules' nobility. She looked around. "What happened to the A.I.M. troops?"

"Those that did not fall beneath my mighty fist ran like cowards, never to do harm again."

"Who doesn't?" Natasha jested. "Do you have any idea if Cable's dimensional teleportation device was successful or not?"

"I'm afraid not, no. While we are not where we once were only minutes ago--doing battle with those most foul shape-changing villains--we are still in grand New York City. Whether or not it is the New York City of OUR world, I cannot say."

"Then I think we should assemble the team--"

"--all three members--!" Hercules noted sarcastically.

"--and get some answers."

"And where could Carol be?" Hercules asked.

"The way she's been acting lately, it's hard to say where she's at, or what she's up to."

***

"I think she's waking up!" Janet Van Dyne called out to her lover. "Hank, Hank, come here, quick!"

Doctor Henry Pym stepped briskly into the recovery room of the Avengers Mansion, and stood next to Jan, observing the mysterious, half-conscious, blonde, costumed woman lying on the cushioned bed before them.

"It's been a good thirty minutes since she showed up on the front lawn," Hank said quietly, as to not disturb the visitor. "What could have put her out for so long?"

With a few gurgled moans, the woman on the bed opened her eyes halfway, and then shut them again.

"Agh...the light..."

Hank rushed to her side. "What light? What is it?"

"To blazes with you...Natasha...YOU...ruined every...thing!" the visitor shouted, her eyes now clenched shut.

Hank looked back at Jan in confusion, and she returned the emotion.

"Miss, please, wake up. My name is Henry Pym--"

The woman's eyes immediately opened wide, despite any light she may have complained about earlier.

"--and this is Janet Van Dyne. We found you outside the--"

The guest shot up and leaped out of the bed, most frightened by her two caretakers. "Pym...and...and...the Wasp? Jan? But you're--"

"Uh...she knows our names, Hank..."

"You're dead!" the woman shouted. "You died months ago!"

Hank held out a cautious hand to ease her back onto the bed, though she was hesitant to follow his lead. "We're obviously alive, miss, and so are you. This is the Avengers Mansion and--"

"My God," the visitor gasped. "My God! Cable's blasted scheme...it worked! You ARE alive!"

"Miss, do you have a name?"

"Of course I have a name, silly! I'm Carol...you know me!"

"And the costume, is that part of--?"

"No jokes, Hank," Carol replied to her familiar friends, who, somehow, were not quite as familiar with her. "It's my 'Binary' get-up, though I'm thinking about getting rid of it."

"'Binary'? I don't understand?" Jan admitted.

"YOU should understand more than anyone, Jan!" Carol replied with a broad grin on her face. "You change costumes more than Hank here changes codenames!" She poked Hank in the ribs. "And what IS it today, Hank? 'Giant-Man'? 'Yellowjacket'? Or maybe just plain 'Doctor Pym'?"

Being out of costume, Hank was surprised that she deduced that he was a superhero. "'Ant-Man', actually. I've never heard of--"

Before he could finish, things got more strange, as 'Binary' began to beep. She pulled a small, plastic card from a pouch in her white, skin-tight costume, looked down at it with disappointment, and proceeded to snap it in half.

"What was that?" Jan asked.

"Oh, nothing," Binary replied.

With a gesture of permission, Hank took the two halves of the card and examined them, gaining an awkward look on his face.

"This is...strange. This identification unit--" he pulled a similarly-sized card from his pocket, "--is nearly identical to the one the Avengers use!"

"Yeah..." Binary said, "...I AM an Avenger, Hank! Don't you remember?"

Hank replied with a stone-face and summoned Jan to a corner of the room to talk privately while Binary marveled at her return to the Avengers Mansion--or, at least, to an Avengers Mansion.

"Hank, this is weird," Jan whispered.

"I know," he replied in an equally hushed tone. "Look, I'm going to alert Cap and the others, but I want you to be careful around here. After our ordeal with Loki,* I'm finding it harder to trust anyone. And between this 'Binary' and our other guests, I'm suspicious that some malice is intended for the Avengers...again." (*see AVENGERS vol. 2, #9-11)

And, from across the room, Binary announced, "I KNOW you guys have something to drink in the place," as she started out of the room on her search.

At that, Hank and Jan shot each other weary looks.

***

Meanwhile, back in the former Soviet Union:

Cable nearly cursed his luck.

After hundreds of attempts to transverse the dimensions and return to the world where he had unexpectedly found a living, breathing Captain America--THE Captain America*--he was ambushed first by the Black Widow's secret band of Avengers, and then by a pair of world-conquering, shape-shifting aliens,* yet he was still successful in his journey--he had still managed to return to the place the heroic victims of Onslaught called home-- (*see CAPTAIN AMERICA vol. 2 #6, **see last issue)

--only to find himself in the middle of an underground Communist bunker. Moments after he had appeared, he had been taken prisoner by the guards and locked in a dank, closet-sized room to await interrogation.

And just as he began to condemn his misfortune, he realized that he, of all people--having been tossed across time once as a small child, and again as a grown warrior--should have known that there was no such thing as luck--that man made his own destiny.

Even now, as he sensed three men walking his way, an opportunity presented itself. The large, metal, creaky door to his cell gracelessly swung open, and a tall, uniformed man stood in the light of the doorway, as Cable sat in the cell's darkness.

"Guards, lights," the uniformed man barked, and moments later, the lone bulb hanging from a thin chain high above the ground came to life.

"No," Cable said as he mentally turned the light off with his telekinetic abilities. "I like the dark."

The two guards standing outside scurried around in confusion. "What in the--?"

"I like privacy, as well," Cable added as he almost magically shut and locked the cell's door, trapping the uniformed Soviet in the cell with him, while the guards were left outside.

"How is this possible?" the man asked as Cable scanned his mind for information.

"I'm a mutant...General Kreiger, is it?"

"A mutant? What do you mean?"

Cable smiled, sensing Kreiger's fear as he continued to probe his mind. "I'll put it this way: I can destroy everyone and everything in this base with a thought...and I will."

"What?! Enough! Guards, let me out!"

Kreiger continued to squealed into the darkness for what seemed to him like an eternity.

At last, his pleas ceased once his prisoner's left eye slowing began to glow with gold, illuminating the rest of his battle-scarred face, including the child-like grin that stretched from ear to ear.

And then, Kreiger could only gasp. "God...help me..."

***

Avengers Mansion:

The shape-changing alien known the galaxy--and now the dimensions--over as Gorrin basked in the fading sunlight as night began to cover the Avengers Mansion.

If Gorrin had his way, the nighttime sky would not be the only darkness to fall on the heralded team of heroes this day.

"How fortunate we are, Gruff," Gorrin noted, turning to his brutish, blue companion sitting across the room, shoving cookies--courtesy of the Avengers--into his large mouth.

"True! That Scarlet Witch, she's quite a baker!"

"I'm referring to our overall situation," Gorrin replied, impatient with Gruff's simple response, though he had come to accept that he would always be the more sophisticated of the two conquerors. "For years, we have sought to find and destroy the Avengers, that we may subsequently do the same to the planet Earth. And now, not only do we discover that the Avengers--thought dead--our alive, and in another dimension, but we are delivered into the very living quarters of one of their members! And since then, in the past few hours, they have cared for us, and served us."

"I'm pretty sure the one called Hawkeye wet the bed when we appeared in his room," Gruff snickered. "But this can't last long. I think they are already growing suspicious of our presence."

"Oh, of course they are," Gorrin nodded, stroking his chin with his long, slender fingers, "which is why we must act against them soon...very soon..."

***

Downtown Manhattan:

Black Widow and Hercules had stood atop the same building for hours, desperately awaiting Binary's unpromised arrival.

"Still nothing," Black Widow sighed as she examined her Avengers ID card. "We've been trying to reach her for hours. Now, it's as if her card is disabled."

"Perhaps it is," Hercules remarked, as he stood, admiring the view of the starlit city, though he could not say whether this city was his or not. "I must admit to frustration, that we know not whether we are in our own dimension, or another. I should go down to the city and search for answers."

"No," Black Widow replied, still eyeing her card. "I don't want us to split up. If, somehow, we ARE in another dimension, then we have to return to our own sometime, and I'd rather we all return together. That's why I have to get through to Carol."

Hercules approached Black Widow from behind and gently took her card from her. "Fair Natasha, I'm certain she has received your summons, but wishes not to come. I fear she will never return to us."

"I know she's been at my throat through this whole ordeal, Herc, but this is business--this is our mission."

"Then perhaps the 'mission' is not as important to Carol as it is to you," Hercules said.

"How can that be, though? Zemo...he's evil. He has to be stopped."

"Indeed, but through what means?"

Black Widow eyed Hercules annoyedly. "We've had this discussion before, Herc. And it didn't end well last time."* (*see #142--Sam)

Hercules, ever placid despite Natasha's anger, said, "I'll not try to convince you of what we can all see--what the Hulk fell victim to, what Carol fought you over, and what I've tried to warn you about--no I realize that, somehow, you will have to see it inside yourself--see it, and defeat it, so that the kind, compassionate Natasha I know may return."

She snatched her card angrily from Hercules' large hand. "Curse you, Carol," she moaned into the card, attempting to ignore Hercules' hurtful--but truthful?--words. "Where are you?"

Moments later, the roar of a jet engine separated itself from the rest of the constant, background noise of the city, and attracted the attention of the two rooftop Avengers.

"That jet, it's approaching us, Natasha!" Hercules warned, staring into the bright lights of the approaching jet.

"It's got Soviet markings, but it must be A.I.M. itching for revenge. Let's get out of here."

"No need for alarm, Avengers," a voice from the cockpit of the jet radioed out. "It's Cable."

Black Widow eyed Hercules curiously. "Cable? Where did you--"

"Long story. I located you by finding the frequency of your ID cards," he replied through the radio as the jet hovered above the building. The bubble-shaped cockpit cover slowly flipped open, and he said, "Get in. I'm sure there's room."

Black Widow and Hercules stepped toward the low-hovering conveyance. "What's going on?" she asked.

"Nutshell: Communists are about to invade the Avengers' Mansion."

"The Mansion?" she inquired. "But which Avengers?"

Cable merely looked down at her with a smug grin that said, "I told you so."

She couldn't help but return the smile--the heroes were alive!

***

The Mansion:

It was only monitor duty, and normally Clint Barton--the avenging archer known as Hawkeye--hated monitor duty, but today, he had to appreciate that Captain America scheduled him for the task. After all, it showed that, despite Hawkeye's recent betrayal to the villainous Loki, and subsequent injuries,* Cap still trusted him enough to put him on active duty so soon. Yes, it was only monitor duty, but it boosted his morale, as Cap would probably put it. (*see AVENGERS vol. 2, #11--Sam)

When it came down to it, Hawkeye HAD to respect Cap as a leader--as THE leader.

Nonetheless, he was still anxious for his shift to end, so that he could find the mysterious blonde visitor and talk it up with her. Cute thing, she was--at least, what he had seen of her in her brief stay so far this day. He always did have a thing for blondes...and brunettes...and redheads...and--

CHEEP!CHEEP!CHEEP!CHEEP!

"What the skuz?"

Hawkeye glanced over the security displays that monitored activity just outside of the townhouse, and found two armored attackers launching an assault on the Mansion.

He switched the intercom on. "Avengers...we're under attack...again!"

In the dining room, many of the Avengers had just sat down to dinner, but quickly rushed away from the table in preparation for battle.

Captain America, Thor, Iron Man, Scarlet Witch, Hawkeye, Vision, Ant-Man, and the Wasp all met while dashing down the hallway for the door leading outside.

"I think it's about time we took the big neon sign that says 'I'm the Avengers Mansion, blow me up!' down from the roof, guys," Hawkeye chided.

"More battle is fine by me!" Thor declared. "I have need to work up an appetite for Wanda's prepared meal!"

"Was that a compliment?" the Scarlet Witch wondered aloud.

"Okay, Avengers, there are only two of them, according to Hawkeye," Captain America said in his always-authoritative tone. "This shouldn't be too difficult, but don't let your guard down--it could be a trap."

Thanks to their training and experience, each Avenger knew what to do--

--but thanks to the two bodies standing in their path, none of them would get to do it.

"Greetings, Avengers. It is my pleasure to inform you," Gorrin announced as he stepped into the passageway while Gruff stood behind him, "that you are all about to die!"

***