by Alex Irvine
Doom had a moment to think that it spoke well of him that he and Galactus had been repelled in similar fashion. A lesser being would have been annihilated by the Beyonder’s defenses—yet Victor von Doom was simply cast out, the same fate that befell the godlike Galactus.
I grow stronger here, he thought. There is something about this place that I do not understand, but I understand one thing:
The Beyonder’s promise is not idle.
Unimaginable power lay within Victor von Doom’s grasp. He would attain it. Nothing would stop him.
The planet below approached at incredible speed. Doom braced for impact.
SIX
SO MUCH for the light show,” She-Hulk said. She and the others watched Galactus and—was that Doctor Doom?—tumble away from the brilliant hole in the universe. They disappeared from sight as the light from the rift winked out, and she couldn’t see where they’d ended up. If that was the last they saw of Doctor Doom—like, ever— that was okay with her. And the same went for Galactus.
“Swatted back like flies,” Cap said.
Xavier nodded. “Whoever the Beyonder is, even Galactus might as well be an insect to him. Or it.”
Jennifer wanted to ask Xavier about his sudden ability to walk. She could tell everyone else on the team—they were a team, right?— wanted to ask the same question. But they had more immediate concerns on their minds: Both spaceships—theirs and that of the villains—were rocketing lower over the landscape of this newly created planet.
And then they weren’t rocketing over it anymore, and they weren’t on a ship. They were standing on the planet’s surface. No lurch, no sense of hitting the brakes. They were simply there, like they’d suddenly just been on the spaceship together. Jennifer had been at home getting ready for a day of depositions in her job as a lawyer when she’d appeared with the others. She was lucky to have shown up here in her She-Hulk outfit, because this planet didn’t look like a good place to operate in heels. Unlike her cousin Bruce, she could control her transformations, and they didn’t affect her intellect.
The terrain around them was distorted, like something out of an old movie. Strange rock outcroppings dotted the landscape. A line of volcanoes smoked in the distance, creating an overcast sky that dimmed the sun. Whoa, she thought. Where are we now?
“Be ready for anything,” Cap said, tactical awareness his priority as always. “Circle up. I’m twelve o’clock. Avengers at two, four, six, eight, ten. Iron Man, keep that radar working! What do we see?”
As far as Jennifer could tell, the X-Men ignored Steve’s orders, but the Fantastic Four and Avengers formed a circle, looking outward over the bizarre surroundings. Reed Richards stretched himself up, and those in the group who could fly did so, extending their field of vision. “No sign of any villain presence,” Reed said.
“What are you talking about?” Hawkeye said. He pointed at Magneto. “There’s one right there!”
Wasp was standing next to him. “Clint’s right,” she said. “I’d say Magneto qualifies. But as villains go, at least he can make conversation. And I love his color sense. Plenty of us have had our bad-boy—or bad-girl—moments.”
Magneto looked as surprised as any of them at this borderline flirtation from Wasp—surprised, but not at all displeased. Jennifer could have sworn she’d winked at him. Jennifer rolled her eyes. She loved Janet like a sister, but the woman had bad taste in men.
“Bad-boy moments are one thing. But we don’t need any murderers on our team,” Hawkeye said.
“You presume to judge,” Magneto said. “I have killed, and I will kill again, in defense of mutantkind. But I am no murderer. I have said it before, and I will say it again, though you are too hidebound in your safe little pieties to listen: Extremism in the defense of the lives of one’s kin is not evil. You would do the same.”
Hulk and Thor didn’t look persuaded, Jennifer noted. She wasn’t sure she was persuaded, either. She’d heard plenty of megalomaniacs justify themselves in similar terms.
But Xavier’s next words backed them all down. “This is neither the time nor the place for trials,” he said. “Magneto has been placed here among us. There must be a reason for that. Let us learn what that reason is before we make judgments.”
“We know Magneto better than the rest of you,” Cyclops added. “I’ll be the first to tell you I don’t agree with his methods, but we’re not going to—”
Hawkeye faced Cyclops, his mask just inches from Cyclops’ visor. “You taking his side doesn’t make you look too good. Think about what Magneto’s done in the past.”
“Back off, bub,” Wolverine said. His claws shot out.
“I can handle this, Logan,” Cyclops said.
“I can, too,” said Johnny Storm, who swept into view. “Look. We all know Magneto’s a bad guy. How about I take care of him and we’ve got one less problem to worry about? Flame on!” He rose into the air, fire blossoming around his body as he became the Human Torch.
“You dare—?!” Magneto gestured, and the Human Torch slammed down into the ground. His fiery form winked out, and Johnny lay stunned.
“I am Homo superior!” Magneto raged. “I stand above all of you. I can control the iron in your blood with merely a thought. Yet you presume to judge me?”
Iron Man and Spectrum were the other two heroes closest to him. With a flip of his wrist, he levitated a large chunk of ore torn free from the planet’s crust and smashed them both away. They sprawled in the dust, then scrambled to their feet. Spectrum shook herself off and took flight, and Magneto suddenly found himself flanked by the Hulk and the Human Torch, his flame reignited.
But three of the X-Men stepped in their way. “Stop!” Cyclops commanded. “You heard Xavier! This isn’t the time or the place! Right now, he’s an ally.”
“Shove it,” Spectrum said. “He’s already showing his true colors…and so are you, standing up for him.”
“I’m inclined to agree,” the Hulk said.
“You’ll have go through me to get to him, Green Genes,” Wolverine said. “Banner might be sharing your head, but he hasn’t made you much smarter.”
“Enough. I will not see mutant blood spilled on my behalf,” Magneto said. He lifted himself into the air using the planet’s magnetic field. “I leave you. All of you. Do not follow. Let none of you say Magneto drove a wedge between you. You seem perfectly capable of doing that for yourselves.”
“Quite a feat,” the Hulk observed as Magneto disappeared over a line of craggy hills in the opposite direction of the looming volcanoes. “He can integrate himself into the magnetic field of this planet’s crust. It’s amazing that this planet even has a usable magnetic field, if you think about it. After all, how many different bits of planetoid rubble is it composed of? How many different magnetic fields did those planets have? Either this new planet is remarkably cohesive, or Magneto’s powers are somehow enhanced by these surroundings.”
Jennifer still couldn’t get used to the Hulk talking like he was her cousin Bruce. She knew he was always Bruce, at least in part, but it was a strange thing seeing the green giant talk like the introverted lab lifer.
“Look, we need to stop arguing,” she said. “And yeah, before you say it, I know it’s funny that a lawyer’s suggesting we not argue. But seriously. We need to organize. We need a leader.”
“Reed?” Xavier asked.
Richards shook his head. “No,” he said. “I don’t want to lead this group. I…I am not at my best. Every moment, I’m wondering where Susan is, where Franklin is. You need someone more focused than I feel I can be. Wasp is leading the Avengers at the moment, isn’t she?”
“I am,” she said. “But a lot of you don’t know me, and I bet some of you only think of me as a fashion designer who happens to be able to shrink. I’m not going to put myself in a position where everyone’s second-guessing me. That’ll just get people killed.”
“You could do it, Professor,” Captain America suggested.
“P
erhaps I could,” Xavier said. “But I rather think the task is best left to you. I am perhaps better suited to an advisory role, such as the one I typically play with the X-Men. Battlefield leadership is another quality entirely, and one you certainly possess.”
“I dunno,” Wolverine said. “You saw what just happened. Cap can fight, but he’s a little too by-the-book for my tastes. He’s a government man—and last I checked, the government wasn’t a big fan of X-Men. We don’t need S.H.I.E.L.D. yes-men pretending to give a damn about us and leading us around.”
“He may lead me around, in your phrase,” Thor said, stepping into the middle of the group. As far as Jennifer could remember, those were the first words the hammer-wielding Asgardian had spoken since they’d all appeared on the ship. “I have fought with Steve Rogers across nations and worlds, and I trust his leadership as I trust no other mortal’s.”
Wolverine shrugged and spat on the ground. “Don’t guess it matters what the rest of us think if the Avengers are going to decide they know what’s best. I don’t care. Cap, it’s all yours. But you better know that if it comes down to it, I’m gonna do what’s best for the X-Men.”
“You know me better than that, Logan,” Captain America said. “I’m going to do what’s best for everyone. Including the X-Men.”
Wolverine didn’t look convinced, but the matter was settled for the moment.
SEVEN
CRUSHER CREEL thought all of this yammering about what they ought to do next was crap. The Beyonder had been pretty damn clear, hadn’t he? Kill your enemies, get what you want. Simple. Why are we still talking about it?
The villains were in a fortress built into the side of a hill not too far from where they’d all suddenly materialized on the planet’s surface. Doc Ock was digging through the base’s techno toys like they were the most important things in the world, but all Creel wanted was to get out there, find the other guys, and put them in the ground. He was the Absorbing Man! Just by touch, he could take on the characteristics of any object. With his wrecking ball, he was basically unstoppable. I should be leading this show, he thought. Then we’d get things done.
He was just about to slap someone around to make a point when, lo and behold, in walked Doom. He looked pretty good for a guy who’d just crashed down from space. The Wrecker just about fell all over himself, even dropping his crowbar to rush to Doom’s side. “We were hoping you were still alive!” he said. “You seem like you know what’s going on here. Someone’s gotta take charge. We all think you’re the guy.”
Not all of us, Creel thought.
“We’re gonna have to work together to win the Beyonder’s prize,” the Wrecker said, bending his thick body like he was a butler serving tea. It made Creel sick. “So let’s do it.”
“The prize?” Doom repeated. “Is that all you can think about? We have witnessed the power to destroy universes…and you dwell on your own desires? Listen! We must not fight among ourselves. That much should be clear to you. The task we have been set is to win…but there is yet a greater prize. There is more at stake than whose petty dreams come true. First, we must comprehend the nature of—”
“Oh, cut it out,” Molecule Man said.
Creel had never liked that guy. Skinny, scar-faced little punk always going on and on about how powerful he was, and then what did he talk about when push came to shove? His therapist.
But Molecule Man kept talking. “We sure better fight. All of us! That’s why we’re here! I want a life. A house, and friends, and you know what else? I want a woman who likes me. Not because I can do what I can do, but for me, you know—”
Doom backhanded Molecule Man squarely across the face, knocking him down. Huh, Creel thought. Maybe I like that guy more than I thought I did.
“Ignore your petty dreams!” Doom said. “To fight is to prove that we are as the Beyonder sees us: microbes on a slide. We must transcend ourselves. We have a chance to contact a being to whom the gods themselves are insects. The key to immortality itself is within our grasp…if we proceed with some caution.”
“Caution?” Creel said. He stepped right up to Doom. Piledriver was beside him, and Doc Ock was right behind him. “Caution? What’re you, scared?”
“Sure he is,” Piledriver said, flexing his muscles. “He saw Galactus get slapped down, and now he can’t find his guts anymore. I thought you were the guy to take charge, Doom, but maybe I oughta think again.”
“The next time you think will be the first. You would behave as bacteria,” Doom said. He stood his ground. “You wish to play the Beyonder’s game?”
“If that means fighting, hell yeah I do,” Creel said.
“Bah,” Doom said.
Creel could see things were about to get physical. He was ready. His ball and chain were itching to put some dents in Doom’s mask.
But he never got the chance.
If Doom had taken him on directly, things might have been different. Creel would have absorbed whatever Doom threw at him and given it back with a little extra hot sauce. Doom was smarter than that, though. He spread his arms, aimed his gauntlets, and blasted apart the beams holding up the front section of the fortress. The concussion stunned everyone in the room, and then they were all running to get clear of the debris as a huge part of the fortress came crashing down on them in a groaning, thunderous collapse.
Creel got mostly clear of it, but he was partly pinned, with one of his feet stuck under the wreckage. He saw Doom walk away, shouting over the sounds of the collapse. “I should have known you could never understand! In all the universe, there is perhaps one other who might comprehend!”
Oh, yeah, Creel thought. The brains always stick together when they can’t sucker us regular joes into doing what they want.
Creel knew who Doom was talking about: Doom’s old college buddy, Reed Richards. They were enemies, supposedly—but when push came to shove, the science types always stuck together. Creel watched through the collapsed entrance as Doom headed for a ship he’d spotted, some kind of sleek jet, parked on the open ground in front of the fortress. You go ahead, Creel thought. You go running to Reed Richards. That’s fine. The rest of us will be ready when you come back.
It didn’t turn out that way, though. Because from where Creel lay, stuck in the wreckage, he could see another guy who wasn’t a big fan of Victor von Smartmouth. That guy was Kang. He might have been a purple-faced freak, but he was also a time-traveling super genius who didn’t have any patience at all for being ordered around by Doom—or anyone else. To prove the point, he was firing up a big damn gun; when Doom got into the jet and worked some mojo to get it flying, Kang was ready.
Creel watched as Kang tracked Doom’s ship from a control seat in the turret, right above the collapsed part of the lower floor. And as soon as Doom’s ship was clear of the fortress, Kang blew the thing right out of the sky.
The pieces took a long time to fall all the way to the ground, and Creel loved every second.
EIGHT
MAGNETO made no attempt to measure the distance he flew, save when he passed over one of the places where two different sections of crust came together. There, magnetic fields were jumbled and unpredictable. He had to guide himself carefully to navigate the new field without losing control of his flight and plowing into a mountain. The variety among the new planet’s terrain was astonishing. Endless plains of mud and marsh lay next to rock formations thousands of feet high; rivers of lava met rivers of water resulting in roaring bursts of steam a mile high. Volcanoes vented the tectonic energies gathered during the creation of this…
Battleworld.
Was that what it was to be? Was that all? A place assembled to challenge them in battles from which only a few—perhaps only one—would emerge to claim the reward?
The danger was that the winner would be the kind of sociopath who would gleefully see the universe destroyed for his or her personal aggrandizement. Magneto knew others would believe that of him, but his intentions had nothing to do with vanity
or power. He wanted mutantkind to achieve its destiny, free of persecution. If that made him a villain to some, so be it. He had been cast out of the so-called heroic faction, and he knew that his initial placement with them would ruin any chance he had of building an alliance with the villains—none of whom, he noted with interest, were mutants. He had a singular status among all those brought to Battleworld. This was a conundrum, but it was also perhaps the first glimmering of an insight into how he would proceed.
The first thing he must do, he knew, was find his own base of operations. He had already flown over several pieces of villages, cities, and other installations of unknown purpose, magnificent in their ruination. Now he saw one option sitting complete: an immense, U-shaped, steel-like structure with two arms angling away from the ground. It rested on a central pillar built from the curve of the U and was surrounded by miles of vine-like growths that undulated over and around each other, apparently tapping their energy from widely spaced holes in the ground from which strange smoke curled. Magneto had not the slightest interest in the ecology of this interaction. What interested him was the building itself, and what he might find within.
He landed, found his way inside without difficulty, and began to explore. The accommodations were luxurious, with sleeping and living quarters the equal of anything he had seen on Earth. The technological level of the machinery and instrumentation was advanced, but not so far beyond his understanding that he could not put the building’s features to use. He chose for his quarters a space near the end of one of the arms, underneath a pair of enormous gun barrels. Its exterior wall was transparent, offering him a fine view of the surrounding area. It seemed almost custom-made for him, a thought that gave him pause. Had the Beyonder guided him here? Magneto knew he must be on guard against the subtle manipulations of which a being like the Beyonder was surely capable. Musing on this, he gazed out over the vines and considered his next course of action.