AN: Okay guys, who's ready for the big chapter in which the Avengers meet the Guardians of the Galaxy?!

[audience applause]

AN: Yeah, I thought so. And if you're expecting the same line-up of Guardians as the one in the show, then clearly you've forgotten about what happened in the last story when Nova showed up on Earth and said that he was part of the team. And yes, just so we're clear, I mean Sam Alexander Nova.

Deadpool: Awe, but I wanted to see that Quasar chick kickin' Iron Man's butt again! Boo! Boo! You stink!

AN: {Sighs} I am not even going to dignify that with a response, or what I usually say when he shows up. [Hits control]

Deadpool: I guess that means you're finally accepting that you just can't ditch the merc with a mou...[gets cut off when a dragon suddenly swoops down and captures him in its large, fanged mouth, before thrashing him about and then tossing him into the air so it can blast him with fire and swallow him whole]

AN: Sometimes I actually scare myself with the things I do to deal with that maniac...but then I very quickly get over it. I swear, I've said it before, and I'll say it again and be proud of the fact. I hate Deadpool.

Hawkeye: Well, I'm actually glad he's back, because that means you can go back torturing him instead of me.

AN: Unless you try to give away a spoiler or something.

Hawkeye: Come on! What've you got against me anyway?

AN: Honestly? Nothing really. You're actually pretty cool, but at the same time, you also seem to be a source of comedic relief when it comes to the Avengers a lot of times, so...

Hawkeye: Fair enough...I guess. Aren't you going to answer some reviews or something?

AN: You're kidding right? We've only gotten two reviews for this story, and it's been a couple of MONTHS since the last chapter was posted. To those of you, and by those of you, I mean the only two who actually reviewed the last chapter, who did post a review, thank you for doing so, and glad you like the story so far. And to the rest of you, please, at least try to post something as a review for this story. Seriously, constructive criticism can be a good thing, or really just anything at all would be acceptable.

Although, in response to one of those reviews, namely the one from long-time follower of the Code Avengers Series, "Michael78", yes, there will be a sequel to Code: Avengers, one which will actually draw a bit of inspiration from the animated series, Avengers Assemble while still being a bit more original, so keep your eyes open for it after this story is finished.

And to the guest review that we received, thanks for all the glowing compliments, and you're right. It is hard to find a good Code Lyoko crossover on this site, and this is coming from a serious die-hard Code Lyoko fan. Hope you continue to enjoy reading the story as much as I do writing it.

Now, I've kept you all long enough, so let's get things started with a new updated version of that little intro sequence you all saw at the start of Chapter 1! Told ya you would be seeing it again. Avengers, to the chapter!

I do not own anything from any of either of the Code Lyoko or MARVEL franchises or any other franchise mentioned in this story.


And there came a day unlike any other, when Earth's mightiest heroes found themselves united against a common threat. On that day, they became the Avengers: the invincible, armored Iron Man; Hawkeye, the world's greatest archer; the Wakandan King, Black Panther; Thor, Prince of Thunder; the Wasp, size-changing extraordinaire; Ms. Marvel, kree-energy-infused defender of Earth; the Hulk, strongest hero there is; Ulrich Stern and Aelita Schaeffer, alias Sprint Samurai and Angel Guardian, the last Lyoko Warriors; and Captain America, the First Avenger. Assembled, they are strong, and forever, they fight as one. Avengers, assemble!


Chapter 7: Avengers and Guardians

It had been about a week since the Avengers stopped the Kree invasion and Ms. Marvel had joined the team, and in that time, there was not really all that much worth mentioning for some of them. Of course, Hank would easily disagree with that sentiment, as at one point during those few weeks gone by, he had returned to Greyburn College to discover that his spare Ant-Man suit and a prototype shrinking device he had been working on called the Pym discs had been stolen from his lab at the institute. He had considered telling the other Avengers the minute he had found out that the objects were stolen, but he ended up letting his pride prevent him from doing so, and instead, he ended up employing the services of Luke Cage and Iron Fist.

When the case began, Hank had of course expected someone that was a well-known criminal with the ability to circumvent one of the most advanced electronic locks on the planet and then figure out how his suit worked, but what he had not expected, was that it was actually the maintenance man for his lab at Greyburn, or that said maintenance man was actually a former convict who had only turned to crime as a way to pay for a surgery that his daughter needed. After hearing that the man in question had only stolen the Ant-Man suit to help save his daughter, who had been kidnapped by the criminals he had worked for before ending up in jail, Hank and the Heroes for Hire ended up helping the former thief save his daughter and stop the criminals in question. In the end, Hank refused to let the relieved father turn himself over to the police or return the Ant-Man suit, saying that Ant-Man was on an undercover assignment for the Avengers, and that he was happy to pass the mantle of Ant-Man on to this man who deserved a chance to prove that he was a good man to both himself and the rest of the world. While Tony was a bit upset at the fact that Hank had told Cage to send the bill to him, there was no denying that Hank was happy that he had found someone who was truly worthy to carry on the legacy he had built as Ant-Man, and that fact also went a long way in making Janet feel happy for her boyfriend as well, despite the fact that it showed just how sure Hank was that he would never be a superhero again.

Hank never really told anyone who it was that wore the Ant-Man helmet now, but everyone felt that they could respect his reasons for keeping that fact a secret, so they just let it be. At the moment though, Janet was honestly wishing that she could just go out and meet the new, fellow size-changer if for no other reason than to get her out of the irritatingly boring task that she and Aelita had to carry out at the moment: monitor duty. None of the team really enjoyed taking on this task, partly because whenever Hulk had monitor duty, one of them always had to take it with him for obvious reasons, but it was a necessary evil that they had to endure so that they could make sure they were ready for anything. That did not stop Janet from doing whatever she could to ease her boredom whenever she was assigned to monitor duty, and at that moment, that involved contacting the newest Avenger for a bit of girl-talk, which she somehow dragged Aelita into."Aren't you two supposed to be watching out for supervillians? Isn't that what monitor duty is," Ms. Marvel pointed out to her excitable friend.

"I told J.A.R.V.I.S. to let us know if anything blows up," Janet sighed in show of boredom. "Besides, I don't really see why all of us have to take up a monitor duty shift when Hank's on it 24/7."

"In other words, she's making our favorite computer butler do her work, while I'm actually trying to juggle my own work on monitor duty with this little chat we're having. Plus, she's gotta talk to someone about how her relationship with the former Ant-Man has been steadily growing other than me, because we all know that I'm just gonna relentlessly tease her about it," Aelita joked, getting a small smile out of Carol, but nothing more than that.

"You do know that I can get back at you by bringing up a certain web-head, right," Janet reminded Aelita with a sly look on her face.

"Why do you think I'm teasing you about you and Hank in the first place," Aelita pointed out.

"I'm surprised that it went that far at all, seeing as you two are so completely different," Carol remarked to Janet. "But are you really okay with him passing on his Ant-Man mantle to someone else?"

"Well, part of me is a little upset, sure. I guess I had always kind of hoped that Hank would eventually decide to join back up with us out there in the good fight again, but that idea's pretty much shot out the window now that he's turned it over to this new guy," Janet shrugged in admittance. "But if you could see his face every time he's been around since then, you'd be able to tell in an instant just how happy he is that he found someone to carry on in his stead. Sure it might be the end of whole 'Ant-Man and Wasp' thing we had going for a while, but if he's happy, then that's good enough for me."

Carol and Aelita both had to smile a little in response to Janet's rather mature attitude about the whole thing, but even so, the latter of the two could not stop herself from commenting on the matter as she said, "You know, I'm surprised that you could be so mature about this, Jan, considering how often you act like you're the youngest member of the team."

"Hey, I don't act that immature," Janet protested.

"Jan, I've got a list of times you've acted like you were the younger one in yours and Aelita's sisterly relationship just from the few days that I've actually been an Avenger, and that includes the stuff I've known about since you introduced me to Aelita. I'm pretty sure we both have a case that leans in our favor on the matter," Carol teased.

"Like that time when you threw a little temper tantrum like a three-year-old just because some average crooks got away from you and ended up being caught be me when you joined me on one of my patrols of the city," Aelita offered in example.

"Or how about that time when she nearly squeal like an excited fan-girl just because she and Ulrich saved some famous actor from being iced by Blizzard," Carol quickly added.

"No, no, that wasn't Blizzard. That was that mercenary who calls himself Crossbones," Aelita corrected.

"You two are both terrible," Janet snapped as she playfully shoved the laughing pinkette, but it did nothing to keep her from chuckling along with the other two as well. Before the three friends could continue their playful banter, the chime of the mansion's doorbell sounded on the speakers, leading Wasp to bring up an image of three people standing on their doorstep in response. "Hey, we've gotta run Carol. Someone's at the door. Hopefully, someone who is a little nicer to me than you two are," Janet playfully retorted.

"We'll call you if we need anything, or if we just want to continue this conversation," Aelita stated, to which Carol nodded before signing off, leaving the two heroines to ascend to the main floor of the mansion so that they could answer the door.

When the two finally opened the door to whoever was outside, they were both furrowing their brows in confusion at what they saw. There before them, were a pair of New York's finest, with a blonde haired man who had pale skin and was wrapped in a blanket, while the only clothes he had on were a pair of dark grey pants that were clearly just found from wherever the nearest supplier was. Looking the man over for a few minutes also allowed the two to see that he was rather thin, almost like he had not eaten anything in a while, and his eyes had the tell-tale black rings under them that could only mean that he had not slept in a while either. After another minute or so, there was really only one thing that Janet felt she could say. "Is this a drop-off, because he doesn't exactly look like a supervillain."

"We found him in a crater in Central Park, talking crazy. Thinks he's been abducted by aliens or something," one of the two officers said as he made the universal sign for crazy and then turned the man around so that the two could see his back once the blanket had been lowered a little. When the two did, they could see a variety of scars that were clearly not from ordinary injuries, seeing as they were in a clear pattern that was almost reminiscent of the patterns worn on some of the Kree's uniforms.

Seeing the man's back made the two girls gasp a little before Wasp looked to the officers and asked, "Have you contacted S.W.O.R.D?"

"What's that," the officer who had spoken inquired.

"There's your answer," Aelita muttered to her friend before turning to the officers and asking, "How well have you two been keeping up with the recent news? Particularly in regards to the incident that had taken place at the UN Building a few weeks ago."

Before either of the officers could reply, the blonde man looked to Janet and suddenly gasped, "Corrina? Corrina, we're not safe here."

"I, um…uh," Janet stuttered, not entirely sure how to respond to that.

"Th-they keep coming after me, you can't be here," the blonde stuttered as he went completely wide-eyed, making the two girls wonder for a minute if he was extremely traumatized or actually crazy like the officers seemed to think.

"Uh, sir, my name is Janet," Wasp finally said, hoping to get the man to calm down a little. "Are you okay?"

Once he heard that he had mistaken Wasp for someone else, the blonde man did seem to settle down a little, but still reached for the two heroines as he softly begged, "Please, you have to protect me."

Neither of the two really knew what to think at that point, but it was clear as day from the look in the man's eyes that he truly was frightened of something, and that was all the reason they needed to agree on their next course of action. "The Avengers will take it from here, officers," Aelita informed the policemen while Janet slowly guided the blonde man into the mansion. The officers nodded in response to that and then turned to leave, while Aelita shut the door behind them and broke into a small jog to catch up with Janet and the mansion's newest guest.

"Do you have a name," Janet asked the guest in question.

"Michael Korvac," the blonde stuttered in response.

Aelita nodded in response to this, and then said, "Don't worry, Mister Korvac. We're going to do whatever we can to help you."

This seemed to put Michael at ease by a very small amount, but as the three made their way to the elevator so that they could bring him to one of the mansion's medical labs, Aelita could not help but gain a rather uneasy feeling that was slowly building up in her stomach about what this man's sudden appearance at the mansion could mean.


It turned out that taking Michael Korvac into an elevator was probably not the best idea, as the man ended up having a panic attack as they were descending to the medical lab, which led to him lashing out uncontrollably, and Wasp then zapping him with her stingers in a panic when the man ended up swinging at her. Thankfully, her stingers had only been strong enough to knock Korvac out, and he ended up remaining unconscious until the two had brought him down to the med-lab, where Hank and Jane Foster were now doing what they could to examine him as he muttered in his sleep. While Thor was not with the team at the moment, Jane was still a very valued friend to the team, and was still more than happy to come by and help them out with any medical problems that they ended up facing when they called her, so she really had no problem with coming by the mansion to help Hank examine the man in question, seeing as Hank was not really much of a medical specialist.

While the two were running their examinations, the two girls were watching on from an observation room along with Hawkeye, Black Panther, and Tony, who had each rushed down to the lab the minute that Aelita had told them about what had happened since they met Korvac at the door. When he saw that Hank and Jane had been forced to tie Korvac down for his own safety, Hawkeye, in his ever insensitive nature, ended up commenting, "I'm pretty sure I've seen this movie before." His insensitive comment immediately earned him a scoff and a hard hit to the arm from Aelita, leading the archer to throw an incredulous look at the pinkette as he asked, "What'd you hit me for? Jan's the one who zapped him into unconsciousness."

"Which would more than likely be a better alternative than risking him hurting himself more than he likely already has been," Aelita argued, since she saw that Janet gained a rather downcast look at the reminder of her actions.

Hawkeye and Janet both had to nod in agreement with Aelita, but it did not stop the archer from continuing on where he left off. "Am I seriously supposed to buy that this guy got abducted by aliens and experimented on though? Come on."

"Right, because we all know there's no such thing as aliens. I mean, that's just as crazy as alternate dimensions and people actually coming from them," Aelita replied in heavy sarcasm that could only have been missed by someone who was completely oblivious or just a total idiot.

"Besides, you didn't see the look in his eyes," Janet added in a much more somber tone. "He's scared. He's been going in and out of consciousness. Jane, Hank, Aelita, and I have been able to piece together a lot of it together. He escaped from an alien ship, but more aliens are chasing him."

"We think he's trying to get back to whoever Corrina is. She could be his girlfriend, his wife, or a really important friend, but there's really no telling how long he's been gone at the moment," Aelita picked up.

"Obviously Earth is of interest to several alien races, but Mister Korvac's tale has problems," Black Panther stated, showing that he was willing to give the man the benefit of the doubt, but at the same time reminding everyone that there were still a few holes in what Korvac was saying that could prove he was crazy. "How could a normal man escape from an advanced alien race, much less return to Earth?"

"Well, he has been going on about how they were experimenting on him, so maybe those experiments ended up doing something to his body's physiological make-up, or just him in general," Aelita offered.

"We can always ask him once he wakes up," Janet suggested.

"When he wakes up, he's going to flip out. You realize you put Mr. Abductee here in a med-lab and strapped him to a table to get examined," Hawkeye pointed out.

"Oh. Good point," Janet admitted as she and Aelita both adopted sheepish looks in response to this.

"Well, crazy or not, there's a crater in Central Park. He didn't make that up," Tony reminded everyone, clearly showing that he had shifted into his leader mode. "Hawkeye, Panther, go check it out. Aelita and I will stay here with Jane and Hank and…"

"I'm going to find Corrina," Janet interrupted as she shrank down and moved to fly off.

"Uh, not exactly what I was going to say," Tony informed Wasp, halting her in her departure.

"But it is a good idea," Aelita reasoned. "She's probably been looking for him this whole time, and she may have a few more answers to what happened to him."

"We can use some facial recognition thingamajig and see if anyone put out a missing persons alert on him, because it's probably her," Wasp added to Aelita's reasoning, and she then flew off before anyone could say anything else on the matter, leaving the others to stare after her before the split off to carry out their assignments.


A few minutes later found Hawkeye and Black Panther at the sight of the crater in Central Park with the latter holding a scanning device in hand so that he could gain some readings from the crater, while Hawkeye kept an eye out for anything else that could have formed said crater. Of course, it also gave Clint a chance to voice the grievances he still had about the whole thing. "I still don't buy it. Maybe the guy did get taken by little green men."

"Or blue," Black Panther remarked in reminder of the fact that the Kree did in fact possess blue skin, and as a way to joke around a little, something that he had started trying to do to ease the tension a little more often recently.

"Stop it," Clint lightly snapped, knowing that T'Challa was joking when he said that. "What I'm saying is there's something off about this guy."

"Perhaps after weeks or even months of experimentation by alien creatures, anyone would be 'off'," T'Challa pointed out.

"Now you're just being difficult to mess with me," Hawkeye quickly accused his friend.

T'Challa could not stop the smile that had formed behind his mask as he lightly admitted to his friend, "You are right."

Once the two had finished the scans that they were performing, they turned away from the crater site and moved to leave, though neither of them noticed when a number of lights suddenly lit up the shadowed area underneath the nearby bridge, or the seven figures that had appeared once the lights had subsided. Even from the shadows they were standing in, it would be clear to anyone that not all of them were quite that human, but it became much more easily enforced when one of them stepped forward into the light to reveal that he had yellow skin and a green gem in his forehead, which glowed for a minute before he uttered one word in a voice that seemed to echo as he spoke. "Korvac."


After Hank, Jane, Tony, and Aelita had finished running the scans and tests that they wanted to on their new guest, the four were quick to move Michael from the med-lab and into one of the mansion's guest rooms, hoping that it would not aggravate him when he finally did wake up, despite the fact that he still fidgeted and muttered in his sleep, indicating that he was having a rather bad dream. It was only a mere few minutes after they had placed him in the bed and Jane left that Michael woke up, and the three Avengers immediately brought him to the kitchen so that they could get him something to eat. Michael ended up just sitting there though, looking down at his food with a blank look in his eyes, which left the three Avengers feeling as though they could freely talk about him with Hulk and Ulrich, who were in the midst of chowing down as well, the former with far more gusto than the latter.

"He seems okay, physically," Hank informed the two, taking the lead on the three scientists' explanation. "The scars on his back are rough, though there's no internal damage. Aside from that, he's malnourished and dehydrated, but those are both problems that should be easily resolved assuming he decides to actually eat some of the food we've just given him, or really any food at all."

"Here's where it gets weird though," Tony continued as he brought up a hologram of Michael from the palm of his armored hand for all to see, along with the readings that he had taken of the man. "He's emitting some kind of energy, something Hank and I have never seen before, and the same goes for Angel."

Hulk and Ulrich both paused in their eating for a minute to stare at the hologram, though Ulrich's look was decidedly much more blank than Hulk's was, which prompted Aelita to remind the team's leader, "You know, maybe it probably isn't all that helpful trying to explain this stuff to these two, Tony. I'm pretty sure it's gone over both of their heads."

"Right. I guess you have a point there," Tony sheepishly admitted as he shut off the hologram.

"It's a form of cosmic radiation," Hulk suddenly said once he had swallowed the food that was currently in his mouth, only to go right back to the large turkey leg that he was tearing into.

"What? It's not," Tony started to say as he reactivated the image he had just shut off, only to pause in shock when he saw that the Hulk was right in what he said, which resulted in him being able to say only one word in response. "Oh."

"I guess you both forgot that while the Hulk is more about smashing and muscle, he does share a body with Bruce Banner, a leading expert in radiation, which makes Hulk an expert as well," Hank reminded the two.

"Banner's an expert in gamma radiation, but he has done other work as well. Plus, you'd be surprised at the kind of things you can learn when you're always running from guys like Ross and S.H.I.E.L.D. I'm just relaying his words to you," Hulk corrected.

Aelita and Tony both had the decency to look sheepish at that, as they had both forgotten that Hulk and Banner did share a body, if not the same mind, much like Doctor Jekyll and Mister Hyde, prompting Ulrich to pause in his snack to say, "If it makes you guys feel any better, you completely lost me after weird energy that you three had never seen before."

"There was residual cosmic radiation at the site," Black Panther's voice suddenly said, which served to announce to the five that he and Hawkeye had just returned from their assigned task.

"It can't be a coincidence that we found the same kind of thing on both Korvac and at that crater," Aelita reasoned.

Tony immediately nodded in agreement of that just as Hank said, "Well, I've already contacted Ms. Marvel to let her know about all of this, seeing as she's the S.W.O.R.D. liaison, and they're supposed to be the ones who handle this alien stuff."

Hawkeye spared a skeptical glance at Korvac once again, still clearly thinking that the mystery man was a bit nuts, before he glanced around the room again and noticed that there was one other Avenger missing tonight aside from Wasp and Ms. Marvel. "So where's Cap?"

"You mean aside from doing his damned hardest to avoid that talk I had promised him we'd have after the Kree invasion," Ulrich practically snarled in response. He was not sure how the super soldier was doing it, but Cap had managed to evade the conversation that Ulrich had promised him they would have after the veteran of World War II had aggravated the already tense situation with the Kree in the way that he had, and needless to say, that had not helped improve Ulrich's mood towards Captain America regarding that in the slightest, nor had it made things any better in easing the concern and suspicions that Ulrich and Aelita both had in regards to their supposed friend.

"Maybe he's avoiding that because he knows that conversation will involve you using your sabers on him," Hawkeye lightly quipped.

"If he keeps avoiding it, I make no promises that it won't end up doing so," Ulrich muttered to himself.

Hoping to distract everyone away from the rather tense subject that had become the relationship between Captain America and Sprint Samurai, Tony quickly revealed, "Cap actually requested some time off. I think he's looking up a few more old World War II buddies or something."

That drew confused looks from both Ulrich and Aelita, as Cap had often let them know when he had found one of his old friends from the Forties and subsequently let them know if he wanted to bring them along with him or not. Plus as far as they knew, the super soldier had already tracked down all of his old friends from that time, and the only ones who were still around were Logan and someone by the name of Peggy Carter. That could have meant that he was probably visiting Logan or going out with Wanda, but considering how Cap had not really said much about his relationship with the Scarlet Witch recently, whether it be in regards to how well it was going or just to ask for some advice from anyone on the team, they could not help but feel that was also not a likely possibility, which only raised a few more red flags for the last Lyoko Warriors. The two ended up having to table the matter for later when everyone's ID cards suddenly rang out to let them know that someone was trying to contact them.

"Guys, I'm five minutes out. Meet me in the foyer, and bring Michael," Janet reported, and upon turning to their unexpected guest, everyone immediately saw that Korvac had perked up a little when he heard his name being mentioned over the communicator. Thinking that Janet had probably found who she was looking for, everyone just shrugged in response and grabbed what they needed before leading Michael to the foyer as Wasp had requested, arriving in said room right around the same time that Wasp walked in with another woman next to her.

The woman in question had brown hair that went a little past her shoulders, which was held back by a blue hair band, and green eyes, and she was dressed in a simple blue and white dress, which was worn beneath a reddish brown coat. The minute she stepped into the mansion and lay eyes on the team's blonde haired guest, the woman immediately became wide-eyed and quietly gasped, "Michael?"

"Corrina," Michael gasped after a minute, and the two were instantly running up to each other until they finally met in the middle of the room with a powerful embrace, bringing smiles to everyone's face at the warm, touching sight of the couple finally being reunited after who knew how long. "I did it. I got back to you," Michael happily proclaimed as he held Corrina tightly in his arms.

"Michael, you've been gone almost two years," Corrina exclaimed as she pulled back a little so that she could get a proper look at her long lost boyfriend's face. "I…I thought you left…I thought you weren't coming back."

"Two years," Michael exclaimed in surprise, while the Avengers kept their own shock well contained, happy to let the two hash things out at their own pace.

"Michael, what happened to you," Corrina finally asked, leading the Avengers to think that they would finally get some answers on that same question as well.

Sadly, it did not seem that they would be getting those answers that easily, as Michael's only response was to look around nervously for a minute before his face became hard and he said, "I'll never let us be apart again, Corrina. I will never let them hurt me again. Any of them."

"Who," Corrina asked, clearly just as confused as the heroes that were currently standing around her and her boyfriend, but before Michael could start ranting about his alien abductors again, a soft glow started to light up the room, putting everyone on guard for whatever was about to come at them. When the glow finally faded, the Avengers had to admit that they were not expecting what had appeared.

There before them all was probably the strangest group of seven beings that the heroes had seen since the X-Men, and that was not accounting for the fact that two members of said group were what looked like a raccoon and a giant, walking tree. The others seemed reasonably human, for the most part, aside from a few small details. First off was a man with dark grey skin, and red markings that almost seemed like scars all across his body, who was decked out in a pair of black pants, boots, and arm bands, while his torso was left bare. Moving on from him led the team to see another man with yellow skin and a green gem in his forehead, and pale blonde hair, who was decked out in a red and black outfit, which he wore under a long, dark blue coat. The third man of this group had a helmet with red lenses which covered his entire face except for his hair, and wore dark colored pants, black boots, and a dark red jacket, while what looked like a pair of strange blasters were strapped to either side of his belt. Next came the only female member of the group, who had green skin and black hair which had violet-red ends, and wore an all black outfit that left her arms bare, save for the fingerless gloves that she wore on her hands which reached her elbows, while a sword rested on the left side of her belt. The final, human-looking member of this group was a someone who looked like he was at probably only a year older than Ulrich and Aelita at most, and was decked out in a black and yellow suit with yellow shoulder pads, gloves, belt, and boots, while a black helmet with a red cross set on the forehead between the eyes covered his entire face save for his mouth and chin.

"Tony," Wasp nervously called, which led Iron Man to lower his helmet's mask as he moved to stand next to Wasp alongside Black Panther, Hulk, and Hawkeye.

"Avengers, protect Korvac," Iron Man ordered. When the green skinned woman drew her sword while the grey skinned man drew a pair of energy daggers from the back of his belt and the boy in the helmet suddenly lifted into the air as his body started to gain a faint, bluish white glow, Iron Man could not help but ask the team's archer, "Still think Korvac's making all this up?"

"I'm on the fence," Clint replied, not wanting to admit that he did in fact lose all doubts the minute these mystery beings appeared. At least, most of them were a mystery to a majority of the Avengers, but there was one member of the sudden arrivals that Aelita and Ulrich recognized with very little problems.

"Nova? Nova, is that you," Aelita asked the black and yellow suited man in the helmet in surprise, causing both teams to pause in their actions.

After a minute or so, a look of recognition dawned on Nova's face as he grinned a little and exclaimed, "Oh hey! You're Webs' girlfriend, right?"

"Uh…yeah. I'm Angel Guardian, and I'm sure you remember my brother Sprint Samurai, too, don't you," Aelita replied, feeling a bit put out that the guy only remembered her as Spider-Man's girlfriend. Then again, she figured that she could not fault him for remembering her that way since they only met once after Kang's invasion and the guy clearly kept interesting company that would make a pink haired girl with superpowers seem normal to him.

"Yeah, of course, considering how he and Tiger couldn't stop making lovey-dovey eyes at each other," Nova exclaimed after he had lowered himself back to the floor. "Sorry I haven't dropped by in a while so that we could really hang out more, but it is a big galaxy out there, and its part of my job to make sure it stays safe. So, I'm guessing these other guys are the Avengers I've heard about?"

"Well, some of them are, yeah," Ulrich nodded in response, though he still kept one of his sabers ready just in case, much like the other Avengers who were easing up but still standing ready just to be safe. "And I'm guessing these guys are your teammates from space?"

"Yep, that's them," Nova replied, while his teammates seemed to ease up a little as well. "But what're you guys doing here, anyway?"

"Uh…we live here," Aelita stated.

"Yeah, I got that from the fact we're in a mansion, but I meant why are you trying to protect Michael Korvac," Nova remedied, instantly drawing guarded expressions from all of the Avengers. "The guy's seriously dangerous, especially with everything that he's done."

Ulrich and Aelita both looked from Nova to the shaking, thin, pale man that they had been looking after ever since he had appeared on their doorstep, until they finally looked back with Ulrich saying, "This guy? A danger? You can't be serious. I mean look at him. He look's about as dangerous as a newborn baby."

"Do not be deceived by the coward's appearance," the grey skinned man suddenly declared as he brought his daggers back up so that they were ready for action again. "He is a threat, and he will face the wrath of the destroyer for his crimes."

"Whoa, hey! Easy Drax," Nova tried to say in an attempt to placate his teammate, only to have it drowned out by his team's target.

"No. No! Please, you have to help me," Korvac begged Wasp, who immediately threw a questioning look to both her two young friends and team leader.

"There's a tree and a raccoon scowling at us, man. Are we firing," Hawkeye asked Iron Man.

"Whoa, wait, let's all just calm down for a minute and see if we can work this out like rational, mature…" Ulrich tried to say, only for Wasp to freak out when she saw the man in the red coat suddenly reaching for his helmet, thinking that he was about to call in reinforcements, and the size-changer instantly fired on the man in question with her stingers.

The reaction that followed was instantaneous, as Nova's team was quick to go on the counterattack in response to Wasp's assault on their teammate, starting with the large tree and the raccoon making a beeline for the Hulk while the yellow skinned man summoned a staff to his hand from thin air, the green woman and Drax readied their bladed weapons, and Nova just rocketed back into the air while shooting out an energy beam from his fists. The Avengers' reaction to this was just as quick, as Iron Man immediately fired a pair of repulsor blasts to counter Nova's attack, while Hawkeye shot off some arrows at the large tree, Black Panther clashed his vibranium daggers against Drax's knives, and Aelita ended up intercepting the yellow-skinned man's staff with an energy infused hand. Wasp and Hulk were left to provide the team with covering fire so that they could keep the other helmeted man away along with the raccoon, who eventually pulled out a large pair of guns that unleashed a massive barrage of lasers, while Ulrich just intercepted the green woman's sword with the saber he already had out.

"Well, so much for reasoning," Ulrich muttered to himself as he pushed the woman off him and then whipped out his second saber. "So, we haven't really been introduced yet. I'm Sprint Samurai of the Avengers."

"And I don't care, especially if you and your friends are so determined to get in our way," the green woman snarled before charging again with her sword ready.

"Really? You don't want to at least inform the guy you're hoping to off what your name is before you kill him," Ulrich asked as he intercepted the woman's one sword with both of his.

The woman just stared at Ulrich for a few minutes, continuing to push down on his sabers with her blade until he finally pushed back, throwing her off balance until she managed to flip back to her feet. After regarding him for a few minutes, she finally said, "Gamora."

Ulrich nodded in response to this, and then immediately charged in to meet Gamora's blade with his own, hoping that he could get the woman to cool it long enough for him to regain control of the situation before the two teams ended up doing something to one and other that they would later regret.


In the chaos that had unfolded after Wasp's first attack, Hulk had somehow ended up covering the size-changer's retreat as she led Korvac and Corrina to safety per Iron Man's orders, which were the only orders he could give before Nova had managed to blast Iron Man out of the mansion through the sky-light, and from what Hulk could see, the two's attacks were probably making everyone in the city think that there was definitely a supervillain attack happening right now, that Thor was finally back, or that there were fireworks going off in the middle of the night, given how brightly the flashes of light and how loud the explosions were. After Wasp had left, the only ones that Hulk had been able to really notice departing in their own battle from the foyer were Black Panther as he continued to engage the one called Drax and Aelita as she faced the yellow skinned man. He was not sure what had happened to Ulrich or Hawkeye, but given that the only ones in the room with him at the moment were the raccoon and the giant, walking tree, it was not hard for Hulk to try and guess who they were probably fighting, assuming that the green woman and the other man in a helmet had not gone after Janet.

Why do I always fight the big and weird ones, Hulk wondered to himself as he managed to withstand the barrage of energy lasers that the raccoon was firing at him. When the barrage suddenly ceased, Hulk found himself raising his arms up over his head in order to block the giant tree's arm as it came down on him. Clearly this alien did not know that wood does not really stand much of a chance against the strongest hero there is, as Hulk managed to shatter the tree's arm into splinters without much difficulty at all, and he did the same to the tree's other arm when it swung said appendage around to try and hit Hulk from the side. What came as a mild surprise to Hulk was that the tree had instantly started to re-grow the smashed appendages after moving back a little, but before Hulk could react, the raccoon had run up to stand on his teammate's shoulder and start firing on the gamma giant once again. Having had enough of this little tag-team assault, Hulk just roared loudly and clapped his hands together to create a powerful shockwave that completely shattered the tree into nothing more than twigs, leaving the raccoon to drop down to the floor with a hard thud.

When Hulk stomped up to bring his fist down on the raccoon, he had to pause at the smirk on said raccoon's face as the oversized rodent said, "Better look behind ya, ugly." At first, Hulk thought that the raccoon was using one of the oldest tricks in the book to distract him, until the sound of plants growing at a rapid pace caused him to spare a glance just in time to see that the tree-like alien had completely regenerated, and was now sporting a rather angry look on its face. "So, care to formerly introduce yourself, buddy?"

"I am Groot," the tree roared, and the next thing Hulk knew, he was the one getting thrown around, right down through several floors until he landed on the same floor that Janet, Korvac, and Corrina were on.

Seeing her friend get thrown down in front of her like that immediately brought a major level of worry and concern to the forefront of Wasp's mind, and she was quick to fly over to check on the jade giant. Once she was directly over him, Wasp was about to breathe a small sigh of relief for the fact that Hulk did not seem to hurt, but she was quick to start panicking again when Hulk suddenly shouted, "Behind you!"

Wasp barely had time to react as the raccoon dropped down through the hole in the ceiling that Groot had made firing his blasters as he went, but thankfully, Hulk was able to put himself between the raccoon and Groot when he joined them on the same floor, and his teammates, and barely managed to send a silent signal for Wasp to keep moving while he handled these two. Once Wasp and her two charges had left, Hulk returned his gaze to his two opponents and growled, "Guess you haven't learned yet. HULK SMASH STUPID RODENT AND TREE!"

"Who're you callin' a stupid rodent," the raccoon hollered in response, only to scurry aside when he realized Hulk was charging at them again.


While she was not entirely sure what happened to the others, Aelita could not deny that she was more concerned about trying to get this situation under control before it got anymore out of hand, especially if these people were the same group that she and Ulrich had heard about from Nova when they first met him. Unfortunately, that was not an easily accomplished task, given that her current opponent was constantly evading or deflecting everything she threw at him like it was nothing. For every energy field she threw, he either leapt aside or knocked away with his staff, for every energy fist she swung at him, he either leaned to the side or back to avoid or just intercepted with that same staff, and for every normal attack she threw, he evaded just as easily or countered with an attack of his own. It honestly felt like she was having a sparring match with Spider-Man at the moment, a fact that suddenly brought her mind to her boyfriend and thoughts that were not really suited for a battle. When she realized what she was thinking of, Aelita had to pause for a moment, which prompted her to go on the defensive as her opponent took the opportunity to attack her, as she had never once thought of such distracting thoughts while on a mission with her teammates and new family. Seeing as this person was able to get through every defensive measure she was able to put up and deflect every countermove she made just as easily as he had dealt with her offensive, Aelita could only draw one conclusion.

"You're reading my mind," Aelita gasped out loud, only to receive a small look from the yellow skinned man in response as the gem on his forehead glowed in the same way that it had since this battle started. This served as all the confirmation that Aelita needed, and her face immediately morphed into one of pure, unbridled rage as she snarled, "Stay. Out. Of my. Head."

What followed next was a rather intense assault on Aelita's part as she went with nothing more than her instincts and anger with her attacks, and since it was not usually all that easy to read someone's plan of attack when they were fighting in such a way, Aelita was easily able to gain the upper hand on her opponent. Just before she could fire another energy field at the man in an attempt to knock him out for a reasonable amount of time, the man suddenly vanished in a flash of light, no doubt teleporting away, and giving Aelita a chance to finally calm down enough to remember what she had to do right now. Looking around and seeing that the man was nowhere in sight, Aelita immediately used her enhanced hearing to try and find the people she could most easily deal with. Once she had, she immediately spread her wings and flew out of the lounge as fast as she could, hoping that she could reach the two before either of them did something they would later regret.


Black Panther's battle had ended up being much more of a challenge than he had been expecting, as the grey skinned man was fighting him with a strength and ferocity he had not faced since his battle against Man-Ape. The only difference between that battle and this one was that T'Challa found the man before him to be someone who fought with much more honor than M'Baku ever had, and what's more, T'Challa was actually enjoying himself. While sparring with Ulrich or Captain America was quite relaxing, it had also grown rather repetitive as well, so to face someone new who was just as much of a challenge was something that the king of Wakanda found to be somewhat refreshing.

This was a fact that T'Challa intended to make well-known as he intercepted Drax's knives with his vibranium daggers. "Your tenacity is admirable, but it would not be wise for you to continue your attempts to subdue me. Many would tell you that facing the Black Panther is a grave mistake."

"Funny, I was going to say something similar to you," Drax admitted as he pushed T'Challa back. "You are the first real challenge I have had since Gamora, and considering how many of my enemies have ended up rather broken afterwards, the fact that you are still standing after this long is certainly a credit to your skills."

"Yet I sense you are still holding back," T'Challa finished for Drax as he merged his daggers together into an energy staff.

"As are you," Drax pointed out as his daggers flared to life with energy. "But I doubt our reasons are the same."

"Why is it that you seek Michael Korvac? I cannot let you bring harm to him without reason," T'Challa then questioned as he held his staff ready.

"Then you would doom thousands of more lives in addition to the ones that he has already taken," Drax snarled as he prepared to charge, only to hold his ground when he saw that Black Panther was pausing in his own assault a second later.

After another moment of staring each other down, T'Challa finally suggested, "Perhaps we should continue this later under less pressing circumstances. I believe that there is some information that my friends and I have yet to learn, and which you can provide."


Outside the mansion above New York, Iron Man was in the midst of a dog-fight against the young Nova, and despite the advantages that each of them had over the other they were turning out to be very evenly matched. Even Tony's unibeam had barely much of an effect against Nova's energy blasts, as the younger hero proved when he managed to intercept the blast with one of his more powerful energy bursts. Eventually, it had come to the point where the two were firing an energy blast at one and other in an attempt to overpower each other after their blasts had collided, and while Tony's repulsors were powerful, Nova's blasts were drawn from the powers that his helmet granted him, the extent of which even he was not fully aware of, so there was really no telling who would really overpower whom in this struggle of power. At least, that was the case until a third energy source disrupted the two connected streams of energy, causing a small explosion that blew the two back from one and other.

"ENOUGH, BOTH OF YOU," a very angry voice shouted, and the two immediately turned to the source to see Angel Guardian flying up to them with energy fields at the ready. "We're all on the same side, so if you two can stop trying to beat each other to a pulp for a minute and try using your heads, maybe we can talk things out and…"

Neither one of the two heroes were sure why Aelita had stopped mid-rant, but when Tony noticed the look of concentration she had on her face, which soon became replaced with one of extreme concern, he knew that the young woman had just overheard something via her super hearing that could more than likely be considered very worrisome. "What is it, Angel," Tony finally asked after a tense minute.

"We have to get to Wasp and Korvac, now," Aelita reported. "I just overheard a conversation between Hawkeye and…uh, Star-Lord, I think he said his name was, and the things that Nova's teammate said about the guy are anything but good."

"Well, yeah. I mean, I doubt that a guy who was experimented on by aliens brings good news with him," Tony reasoned.

"It's worse than you think, Shell-Head," Nova revealed. "Michael Korvac's abductors aren't the real threat, at least not at the moment. Korvac himself is which you would know if you had actually listened to us for five minutes."

"You want to go another round, kid," Iron Man asked as he charged a repulsor.

"Anytime, old man! The only thing that would make this sweeter would be kicking your butt right in front of Webs' eyes, seeing how he practically worships you."

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure that you've got me mixed up with Angel Guardian over there, since they're actually dating."

"HEY! You two can settle who the bigger man is later, or did you forget about the impending threat we're dealing with here," Aelita reminded them.

The two boys had the decency to look sheepish at this remark, and Iron Man immediately had J.A.R.V.I.S. track Wasp's ID card so that they could head directly for her location.


After the brief run-in with Hulk and the raccoon, Wasp somehow managed to get Korvac and Corrina down to the Quinjet hangar without any further incident, or at least no incident beyond hearing Michael continue his rantings while Corrina just did her best to keep up while ignoring the rather vicious grip her boyfriend had on her arm. All that was left to do now was board one of the available and functioning Quinjets and they would be able to get away from the mansion, and hopefully from whoever these people who were chasing Korvac were. Janet was a bit concerned about how someone that Aelita and Ulrich knew could actually align themselves with people who wanted to hurt someone that was clearly a victim in all this, as she knew Ulrich and Aelita were normally pretty good judges of character, but that was a matter she would worry about once she had gotten the two civilians to safety. Just as they were nearing the ramp that connected to the Quinjet's landing platform though, a flash of light brought the three to a hard stop and revealed the yellow skinned man that Wasp had seen Aelita fighting before they had to flee the foyer.

"I cannot let you do that," the man announced, but before he could make a move, Wasp was already firing her stingers on him while shouting for Korvac and Corrina to get away, only to stop short again when the raccoon with laser cannons dropped down in their path.

Before anyone could make another move, Hawkeye and the man in the red coat ran into the room, with the latter having since removed his helmet to reveal a very human looking face with Caucasian skin and blue eyes, and Hawkeye immediately shouted, "Jan, wait! You have to listen to what this guy's got to say."

Wasp was about to protest Clint's request when Iron Man, Angel Guardian, and Nova all burst up from the water entrance to the hangar, each looking no worse for wear, and the lone female flyer of the three said, "He's right, Jan. Just hear Star-Lord out. They've got the answers on Korvac that we've been trying to get all night."

"Okay, so Korvac here, he's a wanted fugitive and he's completely insane," the man who had now been identified as Star-Lord revealed. "He's already wiped out thousands of sentient lives and is now wanted by multiple different alien races and the Nova Corp."

Before anymore could be said, Hulk came down through the ceiling again, this time with Groot's head in hand, and he immediately snatched up the raccoon, who could only chatter like a typical raccoon in response while the tree snarled, "I am Groot."

A second later, Ulrich ran into the room too with Gamora in his arms, and the green woman immediately pushed herself out of said position before holding her sword to his neck and stating, "You ever pick me up like that again, and I will make sure you know just how skilled an assassin I am."

"Hey, you're the one who said we needed to get here fast," Ulrich pointed out, which Gamora seemed to concede if the fact she eventually put away her sword was anything to go by. The reason why Ulrich was now speaking with Gamora in this manner was because he had learned the same thing from the alien woman that Hawkeye and Aelita had heard from Star-Lord, and they had immediately put their little sword duel on hold until further notice. Though Ulrich would continue to insist that he had been winning it before they had put it on pause, which Gamora would gladly argue.

Of course, despite what her friends and these strangers were saying, Wasp was not willing to accept it. "I can't believe this. I won't. Michael is the victim here. He was abducted, experimented on. He…" When she saw panicked looks appearing on the faces of everyone else in the room, each directed at the man she was speaking up for, Janet quickly turned to Korvac and gasped in shock when she saw that he had started glowing while his eyes had narrowed in an anger that was a very far cry from the panic and fear that he had been displaying before. "Michael?"

The only response Michael gave was a loud scream of rage, which prompted both Nova's team, Aelita, Iron Man, Hawkeye, and Ulrich to ready their various weapons to try and subdue him, but they were not quite fast enough. All anyone was really able to register was a blinding flash of light, and when it subsided, everyone other than Corrina was lying unconscious on the floor, while Korvac stood over them all, laughing at the fallen heroes and only pausing in his laughter to declare, "I'm never going to let them hurt me again."


Wasp was not really sure how long she had been unconscious, but when she had finally woke up and remembered what had been happening, she was not sure she wanted to know, especially given her current location, if you could really give a name to said area. The only thing that Wasp could really register was that she was in a large, white void with nothing around her and the only sound being that of her wings. After glancing around for another few seconds in the hopes of finding anything, she noticed the area suddenly start to change until she found herself in Hank's lab at Avengers Mansion, while Hulk and the yellow skinned man from the other team were just a few feet away from her. Once she had let out a sigh of relief at finding one of her teammates, Wasp quickly flew over to Hulk, not noticing that the lab had suddenly become replaced with some desert area until she was right in front of her friend and back to normal size.

"I've been here," Hulk suddenly said after he had shaken off his dazed state, having recognized the area based off a few different landmarks as the desert near the same city where he was technically born.

"This is not Wakanda," T'Challa's voice suddenly said, confusing the two at their friend's words until they turned to where his voice had come from to see the Wakandan along with Iron Man and Hawkeye moving around an open field of a jungle that seemed very reminiscent of T'Challa's home.

"Where are we," Janet finally asked just before the area changed again, this time into what appeared to be the living room of an abandoned house, given the aged, cracked walls, broken windows, and dusty surfaces. Add in the scattered papers, dirt covered mirror over an old fireplace, and a few pieces of overturned furniture, and none of the Avengers could help but feel a little creeped out by their surroundings.

"This…looks like the Hermitage," Aelita's voice suddenly gasped, drawing everyone's attention over to where it came from just in time to see Ulrich helping the pinkette to her feet.

"Wait, you mean…this is the house where you grew up," Wasp asked.

"No offense, Angel, but this place is a dump," Hawkeye remarked, earning himself a punch from Wasp.

"It wasn't always like this, but this is how we remember it best, seeing as the place was long-since abandoned by the time we found the house again," Ulrich revealed. "More importantly, something about it just doesn't feel right, or at least, not like it did when we used to come here, or even when we came here the second time. I remember how Odd was so insistent on staying away because, and I quote, 'the last time we went in we got attacked by a desk, a lamp, and a gang of forks'. He wasn't entirely wrong, but…"

"Okay, well trip down memory lane aside, what the hell is going on here," the archer interrupted, hoping that one of them would have an answer.

"What's going on here is that you idiot Terrans need to knock it off with your shoot-first bit and try actually listening," a new voice said, drawing most of the team into ready stances as they turned to see the group they had been fighting before suddenly appear before them.

"Okay, trying to ignore the irony of you saying that someone needs to stop trying to shoot or blow something up," Star-Lord remarked. "And while we're at it, could someone please help our buddy Warlock wake up so that we're not jumping from one memorable place to another like this?"

"I'll handle it," Gamora said as she walked over and started trying to rouse the yellow skinned man that the Avengers were now assuming was Warlock.

"Okay, enough! I want answers," Iron Man snapped, showing just how thin his patience had started to become. "We know that the kid is someone named Nova, but who are the rest of you people? Who is Michael Korvac?"

"And where are we really," Wasp asked as their surroundings changed once again, but this time into a vast, open field with clear blue skies. "And why is it that you weird aliens are able to speak English so well anyway?"

"You mean aside from the fact that two of us are actually from Earth, originally," Nova asked. "It's this cool piece of tech called a universal translator. Definitely a big help when your cruising around saving the wider galaxy from evil."

"Not to mention Adam Warlock's Soul Gem also helps a bit with that," Gamora remarked.

Seeing the blank looks on each of the Earth heroes' faces led Star-Lord to sigh a bit as he said, "Okay, that obviously didn't help much with the big explanations. Alright, so, my name's Peter Quill, and I'm the leader of the Guardians of the Galaxy."

"Yeah, yeah, he's the Star-Lord, which is basically like this fancy prince of the planet Spartax, which he didn't even know about for a while. He just called himself that to try and make an impression," the raccoon stated.

"Rocket! They didn't need to know that," Star-Lord moaned, but he quickly schooled himself again, at least to the state of calm he had before, and carried on in his explanation. "Anyway, we're like an intergalactic team of peacekeepers that work together to keep all of the known galaxies safe and all that fun stuff."

"Guardians of the Galaxy…sort of like Space Avengers," Iron Man mused as he opened his mask as a show of his relaxing his guard at last.

"Yeah, I guess you could say that," Star-Lord shrugged. "Of course, given where we started, it's kind of ironic that we ended up being heroes actually."

"And how's that," Hawkeye asked with caution.

"Well when it started out, we were a group consisting of an assassin, a maniac, a couple of thugs, and a thief. Add in a Nova Corps recruit and…uh, whatever you'd want to qualify Adam Warlock here as, and you get us," Peter explained, which quickly gained looks of understanding from the Avengers in regards to why the situation was ironic. "Anyways, this is Drax, the Destroyer, Mister Personality over here is Rocket, the big tree is Groot, and the lovely beauty of our team is my girlfriend Gamora. It seems that you guys already know our boy Sam, and I think we're all now well acquainted with Adam Warlock."

In response to being called his girlfriend, Gamora was instantly raising her sword to Peter's neck and saying, "Call me that again, and I will tear your head off the first chance I get."

"I am Groot," Groot suddenly said.

"Yeah, we got that," Ulrich remarked.

"No idiot, he's not telling you his name again. The only words he ever says are 'I' and 'am' and 'Groot' in that order. You just gotta listen better for what he's actually saying behind that," Rocket explained.

"Right, the rodent with laser blasters is giving us listening advice," Hawkeye mused.

"Hey, I ain't no rodent, ya got that? Matter of fact, ain't no thing like me, 'cept me."

"Moving on," Star-Lord interrupted before the two started something. "Anytime we get a read on something bad going on, thanks to our buddy Warlock, we step in and deal with the situation, whatever it is, and in this case, it's Korvac. He's a threat bigger than anything we've ever seen."

"From what we have discovered, it appears he was a Kree test subject that had escaped," Gamora continued on, leading the Avengers to exchange some concerned looks amongst themselves, much to the Guardians' confusion.

"We're familiar with the Kree," Iron Man explained.

"And a lot of them are now familiar with the most secure prison on Earth after they tried to take over our world and turn us all into a lab experiment or worse," Aelita added with a small snarl. Ulrich had been right to say that she had been rather upset with Captain Marvel's apparent betrayal of them, and she did not seem willing to let it go anytime soon.

"You're not the only ones, I assure you, but whatever those monsters did to Korvac, it changed him," Gamora continued. "We're not sure, but it's believed that it involved some sort of latent genetic potential within your species. They had never seen anything like it, but before they could really study it, the Kree ship was destroyed."

"By the time we caught wind of it all, Korvac somehow had ended up on a space station. He destroyed it, too, along with a chunk of the planet's surface below. A Rigellian Recorder caught an image of Korvac in space, just hovering in the debris, laughing, and then he disappeared. We've been tracking his energy signature across the galaxy, finally to here, Earth," Star-Lord finished with a rather grim tone.

"I can feel him," Adam Warlock suddenly announced before lifting himself to his feet with his Soul Gem's power. "Korvac's power grows, as does his madness. He would have destroyed us all had I not pulled us into the Soul Gem."

"Can we beat him," Iron Man asked, bringing up the all-important question on the whole thing.

"Not physically," Adam replied.

"Our plan was to keep him occupied long enough to let Warlock pull him in here, into the Soul Gem, but, as you may have noticed, it didn't work out so well," Nova revealed.

"Uh…I don't suppose 'sorry' makes it any better, does it," Ulrich asked.

"Wait a minute, if we're in here, then where's Korvac," Hawkeye suddenly asked, and no one was sure that they wanted to know the answer to the archer's question.


Carol Danvers was quickly learning why showing up late for things involving superhero work was not always a great thing. Sure, it would often allow you to make a dramatic entrance or pull off a last-minute save that no one else in the area would be able to for one reason or another, but the downsides to showing up late to help with a situation, especially one that involves the Avengers, are that you are not always able to get a full read on what exactly was going on, and that often times, it can lead into a situation where you may be a little in over your head, like she seemed to be right at the moment. When Ms. Marvel had finally arrived at the mansion, she had found what was left of the foyer after the first few rounds between the Avengers and the Guardians, and when a sudden explosion from the sublevels shook the ground beneath her feet, the blonde, half-Kree heroine was quick to race downstairs to find out what it was that had caused it. Admittedly, she had moved down there a lot slower than she probably could have, given that she had just run like a normal person would when she could have just flown down at supersonic speeds, but since she did not want to try and see how well the mansion would hold up against her powers at the moment, Carol figured it would be better to just travel the normal route.

When she arrived in the Quinjet hangar, Carol found three things wrong with her surroundings. The first, and most obvious one, was that the entire Avengers team, minus Captain America of course, and another group of strange beings were all lying on the floor unconscious, and seeing this prompted Carol to immediately try and rouse one of her teammates so that she could find out what happened. Sadly, she had no such luck with that, but that did lead her to discover the second thing that was wrong with her surroundings, and that was the fact that there was a young woman, clearly a civilian, sitting in the corner with her arms over her head, crying. When the woman glanced at something behind her, Carol soon found herself greeted with the third thing that was wrong, and that thing was none other than Michael Korvac, who was still glowing with the same energy he had been emitting before, and was more than likely about to try and attack her.

Naturally, Carol's first instinct at seeing a glowing man sneaking up behind her was to attack him, and she did so using one of her energy blasts, but what she did not expect was for Korvac to suddenly stop himself from flying into the window on the opposite side of the room and then start absorbing the energy blast like the body does sunlight. Seeing him do this did not deter Ms. Marvel for long, and she immediately took to the air in an attempt to charge him, while firing her energy bolts in the hopes of catching him off-guard. Her decision to fire her energy blasts was a very poor one, as it only strengthened Korvac even more, until he was able to release a shockwave that sent Carol flying back across the room, the force of which ended up shattering every window in the hangar, until she collided with the Quinjet behind her, knocking the Avengers' transport into the water below. Before Ms. Marvel could hit the water as well, Korvac ended up swooping down and catching her in his arms, and he then flew over to where Corrina was still crouched down in the corner to grab her as well before vanishing from the hangar in a flash of light.

When the three had reappeared again, they were all the way back in Central Park, and while Corrina was left safely on a nearby bridge, Carol was thrown down to the ground like a sack of potatoes. Looking down on the blonde woman, Korvac immediately did not hesitate to raise his hands up and fire his own energy blast at the heroine. Thankfully, Ms. Marvel managed to roll to the side before the blast struck and then retaliate with her energy blasts, but in the end, she ended up being overpowered by a second blast from Korvac, and was sent tumbling across the ground once more.

"You're one of them, aren't you," Korvac snarled as he landed in front of Carol's prone form. "The Kree. You've come to take me, but I won't let you!"

"Technically she's only half-Kree, and even if that wasn't the case, I'm afraid I can't let you exercise your idea of self-defense against her, Korvac," a familiar voice interrupted, and it was soon followed by an equally familiar sphere of pink energy that struck Korvac from behind and sent him flying across the park, away from Ms. Marvel. A minute later, Angel Guardian swooped down to hover over the area, while the rest of the Avengers and the Guardians appeared around him in a flash of light, courtesy of Adam Warlock's teleportation powers.

"No. That's not possible," Korvac softly protested as the heroes slowly moved towards him.

"Michael, we can help you, but you have to stop this," Wasp said as she flew over to the Kree victim.

"No, no, no, no, no. What they did to me, I won't let that happen again, not to anyone," Michael insisted as the heroes moved closer, until Ulrich suddenly dashed in front of them with a quick signal for everyone to hold their positions for a minute.

"Okay, we get it. What the Kree did to you was wrong, but what you're doing in retaliation is just as bad," Ulrich informed the poor man. "You're taking out your problems with them on every alien and super-powered being around you when some of them are honestly trying to help you like we are. Is that what you want? To become the very thing that you're trying to stop? We can help you, but only if you let us."

"No, you're lying! I don't need anyone's help. I can stop them, myself! I can feel the power inside of me," Korvac growled in near hysteria.

Seeing as there was not likely to be any chance of getting through to Korvac, the two teams of heroes found they had no choice, which left Iron Man to give everyone the signal to attack. In an instant the area was lit up with Iron Man's repulsors, Nova and Ms. Marvel's energy blasts, Hawkeye's arrows, Aelita's energy fields, energy bolts from Black Panther's vibranium daggers, Rocket and Star-Lord's guns, and Wasp's stingers, but all of it just ended up bouncing off an energy field that Korvac easily erected around himself. The madman then released the energy that he had accumulated from the various energy attacks in one massive explosion that sent most of the heroes flying away, not entirely realizing that he had left himself open for an assault by Hulk, Gamora, Ulrich, Drax, and Groot. It did not matter in the end though, as Korvac was easily able to shrug off both Hulk's and Groot's attack, while sending Gamora and Drax flying with a simple wave of his hand, but thankfully, he was unable to keep Sprint Samurai from tackling him to the ground at super speed.

After securing the man in a reasonably strong hold, Ulrich attempted to appease Michael once again by shouting, "Korvac, we can protect you from the Kree, but only if you stop fighting us."

"You lie," Korvac shouted in protest as he managed to rise to his feet once again, but thankfully, he was not able to break free of Ulrich's hold before Hulk and Drax both moved in to help the samurai hero hold him in place. Even so, it was clear that they would not be able to hold him for long, and that meant there was only one option left to save both Korvac and the rest of the world.

"Warlock, now," Ulrich shouted, and Adam Warlock did not need any more prompting to run up and start focusing the power of the Soul Gem so that he could imprison Korvac within it. When he saw the Guardian coming towards him, Korvac instantly panicked, thinking that Warlock was going to inflict more harm on him, and his body immediately lit up more brightly than Times Square on New Year's Eve as he released one more powerful explosion of energy from his body that sent every hero flying across the field around them, rendering them all unconscious.

Seeing that everyone who was after him was now defeated brought a smile to Korvac's face until the sound of someone crying reached his ears. He turned around and saw that the person crying was the woman he loved so dearly. "Corrina," Korvac called out softly.

"Please, Michael, stop," Corrina begged as she took a small step back. "You're scaring me."

"Scared…of me," Korvac gasped in surprise. "No, no, Corrina, I'm going to protect you. I'm doing all of this for you, to make the monsters go away."

"You're the only monster here, Michael," Corrina sadly sniffed, saying the one thing she did not ever want to believe of the man she had once loved, yet could no longer deny after seeing everything that had just unfolded before her.

Hearing Corrina say this immediately caused Korvac to freeze in his tracks, tears quickly falling from his eyes as his heart shattered into pieces. He wanted to shout in protest to what he had just heard, to deny what Corrina was saying, but when he turned to look around at the various heroes who were struggling to stand up again, and saw the wounds that they had received because of him, Michael found that he, too, could not deny what Corrina had said. He had become the very thing that he had escaped from and was now trying to chase away, and when the memories of what he had done before now since his escape came back to him, Michael found his tears increasing in their rate of surfacing. Having finally realized all of this, Michael felt that there was now only one thing left for him to do.

"No! Stop him," Adam shouted to the heroes upon realizing what Korvac was planning, but by the time anyone had reacted, it was already too late, and Michael had disappeared in an explosion of light, leaving only a smoking crater in his place, and a heartbroken woman sobbing on her knees.

Wasp and Aelita were both quick to come to Corrina's side as she let her tears fall without any restraint, and after a minute or so of letting Corrina cry, Wasp finally looked to Adam and sadly asked, "Warlock, what happened?"

"He sensed the woman's fear of him, her doubt in him, and despite all his power, all he truly wanted was to be with her," Warlock sadly explained.

"Where is Korvac," Ulrich asked, hoping that the answer was not as bad as it seemed.

Sadly, Warlock found that he could give no other answer. "I cannot sense him on this plane of existence."

Everyone let the sad news that Warlock had just given them sit for a while in silence, the only sound disrupting said silence being Star-Lord retracting his helmet and Corrina's sobs, until Iron Man finally spoke up again. "If this is the kind of thing the Guardians deal with, then we should talk."

"Yeah, I don't think so," Star-Lord denied. "There are things out there in the universe you're better off not knowing about."

Given all that had happened today, none of the Avengers could feel that they were able to argue with Star-Lord's words, as what had happened to Michael Korvac was probably one of the greatest tragedies any of them had ever had to bear witness to. After letting Corrina cry for a few more minutes, Janet, Aelita, and Carol finally helped the poor woman to her feet and moved to bring her back to her home, while the rest of the heroes just turned to leave for Avengers Mansion, each hoping that wherever he was now, Michael Korvac was in a better place.


Ulrich: Hey Code Avengers fans! Ulrich, Aelita, and a few other members of the team here with a few words of wisdom for you. Despite what some may think, Michael Korvac's story, when you really look at it, actually isn't all that different from the story of victims of bullying.

Aelita: Michael was just a normal guy before what happened to him, but then these bigger guys came along and started doing horrible things to him until he finally snapped and started lashing out thinking that the whole world was out to get him, or the whole galaxy if you will. The reason why we say this isn't so different from the story of someone who was the victim of bullying, is because such things can happen in real life right here on Earth. A lot of times, good kids get picked on and pushed around by bullies until they eventually get pushed past their breaking point and lash out at everyone around them to the point of taking extreme measures, like by taking a gun to school in an attempt to hit back, or even considering things like suicide.

Wasp: None of this is something to be ignored, and anyone can make a difference in stopping such things before they happen. If you know someone who's getting picked on or bullied, the best thing for you to do is to speak up. One of the things you have to understand about most bullies, is that they usually back off when they see that their target has friends looking out for them, so doing something as simple as walking over and putting your arm around the person who's being bullied and then walking away can get them to leave the guy alone.

T'Challa: Of course, another good option is to speak up and let a grown-up, teacher, or really just anyone in a similar position know what it is going on. If they do not listen to you at first, then do not just stop trying, either keep trying to bring their attention to the matter, or go find someone else who is readily available to help. Do not just wait for them to notice, because it is more likely that the bullying will continue without them ever realizing something is wrong.

Hank: The one thing you should never do though, is try to fight against a bully, because if you try to take them on, then you'll be no better than them. It's always better to just take off with friends than it is to try and take on the person who's bullying them. After all, in some cases, the person who's doing the bullying isn't always really a bad guy. There could be a chance that they're having some tough times of their own, like trouble with their family, or just too much pressure to be something that their parents want to be but they don't.

Ulrich: Bullying can create a lot of victims everyday, some of which could end up the same way that Michael Korvac did, but you can always help prevent it by speaking up and being a friend to the person who's getting pushed around.

Aelita: It's just one other way for you to be an Avenger. Not by doing something super, but just by being a good person.


AN: Well, that's that. In my opinion, this is probably one of the saddest moments in The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes. Like that little PSA said, Michael Korvac's story really is similar to that of someone who was a worse-case scenario victim of bullying, and that's part of the reason why I included that little thing in there. Being someone who was actually picked on a bit when I was a kid, I know just how bad that kind of thing can be, but at the same time, I know that I'm actually one of the luckier cases, since I was able to find some good people who had my back and were true friends. So just keep that in mind for the next time you see something like that happening and just act like it doesn't affect you, because it can come back to haunt you later.

Now, on another, less serious note, the Guardians of the Galaxy line-up. Yes, I'm well aware that I made the group a bit more like the Guardians that we all know today, but that was actually the whole point. I wanted to go with a version that everyone most easily recognized, and before anyone asks, yes, Star-Lord, Gamora, Drax, Rocket, and Groot all look like they do in some of the most recent media regarding the team. If you want a better idea, then go watch The Guardians of the Galaxy movie, or just look up the animated series of the same name. I included Nova as part of the team, because, as I stated before, I had mentioned in the last story that he was part of the team, and as for Adam Warlock, his inclusion was not really optional. And just so we're clear, he looks exactly the same way he did in The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes.

Moving on, yeah, I skipped over "To Steal an Ant-Man", because really, that would've just played out like it had before. The only difference is that this time, the new Ant-Man did not steal Hank's regular Ant-Man suit, but a spare one that Hank had at the college, which means, as I'm sure you've no doubt realized by now, that I can give the new Ant-Man the same look he's now known for in the movies and more recent Marvel series. And before anyone asks, yes, the new Ant-Man is still Scott Lang, just to be clear, as if it hadn't already been made as such.

Well, here's hoping that everything in this chapter turned out okay for all of you, cause next chapter's going to be a little more original. What to know what I mean? Then move Onto the Preview!...

With the Korvac situation well behind them, everyone on the Avengers is hoping for some time to rest, but unfortunately, a certain samurai does not seem to be able to gain such a chance. Ulrich is in the midst of racing across New York City in a near panic, with White Tiger at his side attempting to do her best to help him, but just what is it that has Ulrich so worried? Is a supervillain threatening innocent lives and setting things up so that only he can stop them? Has someone found out his secret identity and he's now racing to stop them from revealing it to the world? Has someone discovered the secret to inflicting harm on him and Aelita? Just what could it be, and where are the other Avengers if they're not helping him with whatever this is? You'll just have to wait and see to find out, so tune in next time for…Chapter 8: Desperate Race.

Wow. I really know how to build up the suspense, don't I? Sounds like our boy Ulrich's going to be in quite a bit of a jam next time, huh? Well, I guess that you guys will just have to wait and see what happens to find out the reasons behind it, which will likely come a bit sooner if I feel like posting it soon, and I may be encouraged to do so by having you guys post a review or two. {hint, hint}, but until then, I guess this is where I'm going to say...

[record scratch, followed by a new set of music starting up]

Hey, HEY! Wait a minute! Are...are we starting up another preview? And for something that's in another story?! No, no, NO! We are not doing that! Hey! Stop, don't run that...And we're doing that anyway. Oh well...Hold on, I'm hearing music from The Flash TV series. I guess that's pretty cool, and a bit appropriate, but still...


Coming soon from lyokoMARVELanime...

If you enjoy the non-stop action of superheroes saving the world, and incredible team-ups, then you'll have to brace yourself for a moment of when worlds collide.

"How'd you do that," the speedster asked Carol.

"I'm Ms. Marvel," Carol replied like it was obvious.

The red-clad man just gave her a look of confusion before he asked, "You're who now?"

[jump to another point later on]

"Okay stop! Everyone just stop before we go any further! Who are you people," Iron Man asked.

"We're the Justice League," Flash replied.

Everyone was silent at that point, until the woman in yellow and black started laughing, drawing all attention to her. "Oh wait, you're serious," she said, upon realizing the speedster was not joking.

"Why wouldn't we be," Green Lantern inquired.

"I get the feeling we're on the wrong Earth," Flash stated.

Brace yourselves for an epic collision of legends that could only be a lyokoMARVELanime special, crossover event.

In a flash of gold, Sprint Samurai appeared on site of the heroes' destination, followed shortly by Flash, leading Ulrich to smirk and say, "For the record, I got here first.

"Yeah I let you get here first," Flash insisted.

That brings together two teams of heroes, who only have one thing, or rather, one person in common.

"So, you're Captain America, just not our Cap," Wasp asked, making sure she was understanding right.

"I...guess so," Cap shrugged in admittance, honestly having just as hard a time with keeping up as the size-changer was.

Coming soon to Justice Marvel, the Justice League joins forces with the heroes of Code Avengers in...

Another Code of Heroes!


...Well, I guess that's going to tease a few people who're also fans of Justice Marvel for a while. If you don't know this already, Justice Marvel, is basically my crossover story between Justice League and Captain America, though it also includes some other aspects of the Marvel Universe as well, so if you're interested, then by all means, go check it out. That chapter is actually a bit closer to coming than you may think it is.

Now if there's nothing else to interrupt the wrap up...

Please read and review, and I'll see ya next time, fellow true believers!