Avengers Forever 1
"Times Up"
He was on his knees, barely able to stand, his sheer determination hanging onto life with is battered body. The rain poured upon his broken body as he looked at his five assailants.
Do you know who I am!?! Do you know what you've done!?! (Avengers vol4ish6) Immortus' cry fell on deaf ears as the sound of thunder filled the area. The already darkened skies turned a deeper shade of black, only making the arcing energy above a harbinger of death. There was but a tiny spark, but in that fraction he could see the electrical discharge form a lance of death which raced downward for its assault. He could feel the energy begin to take its effect upon his body as it felt as every single strand of hair stood at attention. His eyes widened, his life beginning to flash before his eyes and that is when he saw it. A small flicker out of the corner of his eye. A temporal butterfly from Limbo occupying the same space in which he now resided.
The lightning had stopped, or to explain it better, had slowed to the point where the naked eye could not notice the minuscule advancements it made just centimeters from landing its strike as the butterfly continued its journey across his vision.
"Quite the predicament you managed to get yourself into here."
Immortus' eyes widened. He knew the voice too well and hated it more now even though his life had been spared. "What are you doing here?" Immortus' brow arched, "How exactly did you find me here, Pym?"
"First off, the name is Yellowjacket. YJ if you want to keep it short. Second, you sure are the ungrateful one aren't cha? Yellow smiled, the utter joy of seeing Immortus in such a moment was more than his mind could fathom. "You really should air out the hair more. I think the weight of it damages your brain."
"I do not have time to coddle your weak attempts of humor, especially when the humor is originating from you," Immortus snapped. "Who has equipped you with the ability to find me in such a moment - Kang? Rama-Tut?
"Your family tree was always quite confusing if not narcissistic," Yellowjacket replied with a smirk. "That is why when you yourself sent me to retrieve you at this moment I too realized the complexity of the paradox in which you sent me. The enemy of my enemy is my....well I guess you are still my enemy but I have a reason."
"I sent you? To retrieve me? Tell me why would I, Immortus, master of time, do such a thing?"
Yellowjacket bent down to lock eyes with Immortus, "If you sent me should you not know the answer, but if I were to place money I assume it would be because of that."
Immortus' eyes turned to the direction he had been gestured only for his eyes to widen even wider than they had when death had attempted to land its fatal strike. Figures, scenery, everything that his eyes could see was being washed over with pure white nothingness - he knew it as the erasure of a timeline. It was...
"There came a day, a day unlike any other, when Earth's mightiest heroes found themselves united against a common threat - to fight the foes no single super hero could withstand!
There was but a shutter in the air of Limbo as Immortus and Yellowjacket appear in the center chambers of the Master of Time's domain.
"That is what the destruction of a timeline looks like Avenger. Be grateful that you were in my presence to escape its wrath." Immortus said as his cape flapped in the rear.
Yellowjacket crossed his arms in dismay, "I hate to break it to you, pal, but I have already seen the destruction of a timeline - my own!"
"Do not be absurd," Immortus questioned. "It takes precision...
"...of immense proportions to eradicate a timeline," Yellowjacket completed. "You told me that when you sent me after you once you yourself happened to be erased...right in front of me. I shed no tears."
"You saw me eradicated from the timeline?" Immortus said aloud. "The paradox ramification of such an event..."
"...Would mean that the timeline was destroyed with a blunt power rather than a precision stroke. Me. You. Had this conversation. Please stop repeating yourself."
Immortus contemplated every action and counter-action of inevitable outcomes.
"This is when you say we have to form the Avengers. I will take Thor, Hercules, and even that douche bag Stark to help with this situation."
Immortus laughed aloud. "Apparently my future self did not fully inform you the meaning of such a ramification of bashing a timeline so brutally.
"Please, Im all ears."
"Time is a complex situation, one that has taken me centuries to master. Every action taken and not taken splinters the road of possibilities creating different divergent timelines and so on and so forth. It eventually leads to something like a giant temporal spider-web. If one were to just bash the divergent timelines it creates a just crash, where what you knew is no longer there- Each timeline spraying across the temporal highway creating a cascading crash until there is nothing."
"Please, in English."
"I cannot just selectively pull Avengers out of the timeline. I can only pull people that are time anomalies such as yourself. They have a weaker connection to the timeline in itself.
"Will they be Avengers?"
"Of course but..."
Yellowjacket stopped the ranting Immortus mid sentence, "Just make it happen."
-----------
"No, my love!" Mantis cried with tears flowing heavily onto the wounded Swordsman, who she grasped with an immense strength as death knocked on the door. "This one must right the wrongs she has done you! She was young-proud-and she used you so badly she sees it now!"
"We are...only what we are darling...I tried...to be worthy of you...of the Avengers..."(Avengersvol1GiantSize2)
A loud applause entered as time itself stopped in the area. "Im digging all the emotion, but we have to go."
"Yellowjacket, how did you get here? Mantis said confused. "Do you have no compassion to see a fellow Avenger has fallen. Have you no heart?"
"Im all heart Mantis, its just that I can guarantee you two that all will be fine, but we really have to go- like now."
--------
"Yes! The aura over Lincoln has vanished---(Avengers Spotlight 37) and if Im any judge of car styles, we're back in 1990. So apparently are the people.
"I heard that woman say he was an Avenger, Darling."
"Avenger! That's what I want to hear, Yellowjacket exclaimed."
"Doctor Pym? In your Yellowjacket garb? How may I be of service?"
Yellowjacket smirked in dismay. "Listen guy, I have no idea who you are, but I need your help. Who are you?"
"I am Anthony Druid," he pondered curiously. "Harbinger to the Sorcerer Supreme." Druid locked onto the Avenger curiously. He had a strange aura that irradiated from himself. Dr Druid wondered if it was some odd side-effects from being thrust through the Nexus of Time."You are not from this timeline, Doctor Pym...
"...Its Yellowjacket. Just call me Yellowjacket." Yellowjacket interrupted, hating the name being spoken in his presence. "I'm glad you know we are not part of the same time but I have to fill you in later. You coming?"
"Please lead the way."
------
Hank Pym remained silent, hands crossed with his head buried deep in thought in them, as nothing but deep breathing signaled any form of life. He had just witnessed a stunning revelation which made him question who he was as a person and what actual use he was in life.
"I cannot believe Iron Man is Tony Stark," he mumbled aloud. "Im nothing next to him. What can I do as Ant-Man." He looked over some schematics on his desk and looked at his Pym formula. "Maybe if..."
"Trust me, dude, you don't want to go down that road." Yellowjacket said , grabbing his past self's arm. "I cant believe I'm saying this, but the Avengers need you Hank Pym. I for one can guarantee you that."
"Who...who are you?"
"You can call me the 'ghost of Christmas future,' and right now that future needs you right now."
to be continued
Log in to comment