Time for a Change
By Les Bonser
This is a work of non-commercial fan fiction. The characters used in this story remain the trademarked property of their respective owners. No trademark infringement is intended and no profits are made by the author for writing or distribution of this work.
No permission is given to anyone other than the author to archive this on any website. No permission is given to anyone other than the author to repost this on any newsgroup.
Chapter 5
New York City, the street outside Sotheby's
Selina Kyle walked slowly on the sidewalk in front of Sotheby's. The world famous auction house was hosting the Princess Diana Charities latest fund-raising event. An auction of the late princess's personal effects and various other items; all to benefit the charities Diana had championed. One of the items was the Lion's Soul.
The Lion's Soul was an almost mythical cat's eye gem. The origin of the gem was lost in the mists of time. It had somehow made its way into the Spencer family sometime in the late 18th century. The Princess acquired it as a wedding present from her father.
Selina had tried to steal the gem during its exhibit in Gotham City. But she'd been thwarted by Batman. Tonight would be the last chance she'd have before the gem was purchased by some as yet unknown buyer. Eventually, she'd be able to track it down, but she wanted the gem now. She had already arranged for a buyer and didn't want to delay the deal.
With the practiced eye of the world's greatest cat burglar, she studied the possible access points of the building. She noted weaknesses to exploit and strengths to avoid. Tonight, she'd be back. As Catwoman.
James Bond enjoyed the sunny morning as he walked toward Sotheby's New York office. He enjoyed the weather. When he'd left London, it was overcast and drizzling. Here, it was clear and bright. Just the sort of weather that brought out certain feelings in a man.
Bond casually watched the various women that walked along the same sidewalk with him. He enjoyed the view, both coming and going. He enjoyed the sight of the women's bodies and their smiles, but Bond didn't happen to see any women that struck his particular fancy.
That was, until he neared Sotheby's. A tall, dark-haired woman walked slowly in front of the building. Bond slowed also, to watch her. Something clicked in the back of his mind.
Bond had survived many years in the Cold War by listening to that little voice in the back of his mind. He wasn't sure what exactly it was about that woman; was she triggering his innate spy's survival instinct or was it something far baser. He studied the woman for a moment. She was wearing a well tailored suit. Although the garments covered her nearly completely, it was apparent that the suit was meant to enhance the woman's considerable figure. She had more curves than a winding mountain road.
Bond smiled at the thought of seeing her naked.
The woman was looking closely at the building. Was she a tourist? Bond wondered. He looked at the building himself. His practiced eye noted a couple of potential security risks. He reminded himself to discuss this with the security people this morning. But he couldn't see what was so interesting to the woman.
A moment later, the woman slid her sunglasses back on and strode past Bond without looking at him or acknowledging him in any way.
Bond waited a few moments and then headed into the building.
Outside Sutheby's, New York City
Iron Man banked through the New York skyline. He had missed living in New York for so many years. Although he'd enjoyed his home in Malibu, he was glad he'd relocated back to New York when he'd formed Stark Solutions.
The eye slits in his helmet were closed, the lexan lenses shielding his eyes from the air blast of his flight through the air. The HUD, or heads up display, on the inside of the lenses showed various critical bits of information.
Iron Man triggered his boot jets to slow down. He angled his flight downward and he headed toward the ground. His memory of New York's layout remained intact--he saw the Black Widow waiting for him in front of the Sutheby's building.
There were here to persuade the Latverian officials to reconsider their attempts to kick start their ailing economy by selling Dr. Doom's inventions.
The Black Widow and Iron Man had barely started their discussions with the Latverian Science and Economic ministers when the air was filled with the sounds of alarms.
"What does that alarm mean?" the Widow demanded.
"I'm ... not sure," the Science Minister stuttered. "Sutheby's lent us this office," he tried to explain in his broken English.
"Security alarm," Iron Man explained, as he stood and started to stride out of the room. "You both stay here where it's safer," he told the officials.
The Black Widow sprinted behind the Gold and Red Avenger. She had worked often enough with Iron Man to know that he'd probably tapped into the local police or alarm agency radio channels and gotten a direct answer to her question. As she and her fellow Avenger hurried down the hall, she wondered, was this just an over anxious potential bidder handling the merchandise or something more serious.
The office where the two Avengers had been meeting with the Latverian ministers was on the third floor of the building. Doom's equipment up for bid was in the main hall on the first floor. As they reached the main staircase, Iron Man didn't stop; he vaulted over the edge of the staircase and used his boot jets on their lowest setting to lower himself to the first floor. This was much faster than waiting for an elevator or running down the stairs.
As quick as Iron Man was descending to the first floor, the Widow as quicker. She had been the Soviet Union's most decorated gymnast and ballet dancer in her youth. She still had the strength and flexibility to complete at Olympic levels if she choice to. She likewise vaulted over the edge of the stairwell. Her body was a lot lighter than Iron Man's armor; she didn't have to cushion her decent quite the same as he did. She literally bounced off the walls of the stairwell and then killed most of her downward momentum by doing a backflip right before touching down on the first floor stairwell landing.
She crouched at the bottom of the stairs, in a battle-ready position. Her hands where raised in front of her; she was ready to strike with either her hands, feet, or to use her "Widow's Bite." The Widow's Bite was an electro-shock device built into the bands she wore around her wrists. At a flick of the wrist, she could send a plasma bolt nearly 25 yards. The bolt would degrade quickly, but at 10 yards, it packed nearly 10,000 volts. Not as powerful as Iron Man's repulsors or Thor's hammer or the Scarlet Witch's hex bolts, but powerful enough to down almost any foe.
As soon as Iron Man touched down on the first floor, the two ran toward main hall. As they rounded the corner of the hallway to the main hall, they saw several security guards laying on the floor. What they had feared appeared to have come to pass. Someone was trying to steal the advanced technology of Dr. Doom!
New York City, outside Sotheby's, about 1:00 am
Bond stretched and looked at his watch. He was still on London time and was feeling tired. He told himself he wasn't as young as he used to be. Leave the all night stuff for the younger agents, he thought. He had better ways to spend the time if he was going to be awake all night.
He was stationed in the anteroom outside the small gallery where the Lion's Soul was on display. So far, it was a quiet night. He checked in with the hired security guards downstairs every half hour and every fifteen minutes, he walked through the gallery just in case.
Although he was trying to stop smoking, Bond found the urge to smoke strongest in situations like this. He hating waiting. He absent-mindedly reached inside his sport coat for the cigarette case in the inner breast pocket. But the case wasn't there. He'd stopped smoking the Chesterfields ages ago. But old habits die hard.
Maybe a breath of fresh air, Bond thought. He had about 20 minutes before having to check in with the security desk. He walked down the short hallway and was about to open a balcony door when he noticed that it was already slightly ajar. The hairs on the back of his neck started to tingle.
The door was supposed to be locked shut. And it was on a security circuit. The alarms should be ringing if the door was opened. He knew how to bypass the alarms from the small control panel on the wall; only three people knew the security codes and they'd been shared with him just that afternoon.
Bond had been studying security systems, and the ways to bypass them, for nearly thirty years. He quickly determined that the wires around the frame had been bypassed from the outside and the door opened with setting off the alarms. Obviously, a professional.
He reached his hand into this jacket again. This time, the item he desired was there: the PPK. He slid the small gun out of the shoulder harness and flicked off the safety. Bond then turned and slowly and quietly begin a thorough search of the second floor. He was almost back to his station outside the gallery when he saw something. Or maybe he just sensed it; there was someone in the other side hallway. He moved quickly to the corner, gun ready. He peeked around the corner, leading with the gun.
At the far end of the other hallway was a window. This one opened to the inside courtyard, but was still wired to the security system. There was a person, a woman, in a black skintight suit trying to bypass the security wires.
"Stop, or I'll shoot," Bond said, firm and loud.
The woman spun around at the sound of Bond's voice. Although the top half of her face was covered by the cowl she wore, he had the sense that this was the same woman he'd admired on the street earlier that day. Her figure was even more stunning in the skintight costume she wore now.
"You look like a gentleman," the woman said. Her voice was almost a purr. "You wouldn't hurt little ol' me."
Bond gestured slightly with the gun, "Move away from the window or I'll shoot."
"No guns," came a gruff voice behind Bond. He started to turn and was startled to see a mass of black envelope him. Strong hands grabbed his forearms and jerked the gun away from its target. Only Bond's years of training and experience allowed him to recover from the surprise and control the gun. A less experienced agent might have accidentally discharged the weapon.
Bond tried to lean forward and judo throw his unknown opponent, but the man was obviously a skilled fighter. Bond felt his balance falter as the man twisted his arm and somehow applied pressure to the back of Bond's legs.
As both men struggled, the alarm suddenly went off; the woman had literally run and smashed the window, apparently falling to her death outside.
"You let her get away," both men said, almost together. Bond relented and released his grip on the PPK. The other man immediately kicked the gun away from Bond and relaxed his own grip on Bond.
James Bond turned to confront his attacker. The man was as tall or even taller than Bond, and covered in black. A black cape draped around the man and a black cowl covered his head and most of his face. Only the whites of the man's eyes were visible through the slits in the mask.
"You're that Batman bloke from Gotham City," he stated.
"And that's Catwoman. And she's stealing your gem," Batman said, his voice still gruff and low.
Bond bent over quickly to scoop up his PPK. "No guns," Batman told him again.
"Fine," Bond said, sliding it into its shoulder harness. The gun would do little good now anyway without a target.
Batman moved quickly to the smashed window. He grabbed the edges of the frame in his gloved hands and started pulling away the broken parts of the frame to make room so he could squeeze through.
"What are you doing?" Bond demanded.
"Going after her."
Bond shook his head and followed the Dark Knight through the window.
Iron Man and the Black Widow burst into the main auction hall of Sutheby's to find Iron Man's long time nemesis the Mandarin standing in front of Doom's inventions.
The oriental turned and considered the two Avengers as they burst through the heavy oak doors. Iron Man hadn't even bothered to open them; he simply ran right through them like a juggernaut. The Mandarin was almost casual in his appraisal of his foes. He merely raised a hand and aimed a finger at the Armored Avenger.
A blast of intense cold shot out for the alien ring the Mandarin wore on his index finger. Iron Man dodged the blast, as did the Widow. They moved to either side of the room; forcing Mandarin to divide his attention. It was a standard Avenger's maneuver. One that was practiced over and over again under the watchful eye of the Avenger's master strategist, Captain America.
The lexan shield slide down over Iron Man's eyes as the Armored Avenger shifted the suit into battle mode. A head's up display reflected off the lexan and informed Stark that the suit was at full power. The suit began running on internal oxygen, started monitoring Stark's heart rate and breathing, and a number of tactical subroutines started running.
The suit began to record it's own internal status as well as a visual and sensor record of the environment around it. More than once, Stark had benefited from a routine review of this record--it provided him a continually updated database of his opponents' fighting styles and power levels. Just as in business, effective use of this information allowed him to remain one step ahead of his opponents.
The suit would continue in this mode until Iron Man specifically turned it off or the suit ran out of power. Stark had designed the systems to work this way in case he was ever knocked unconscious during a fight--the suit would automatically do it's best to protect him.
Satisfied with the suit's status, Iron Man returned the offensive with his own offensive maneuver. He raised one of his arms, palm out and a repulsor blast caught the Mandarin square in the chest. The silk of the oriental's robes began to smoke and the force of the blast knocked the man off his feet and backwards into the exhibits.
Stark had fought the Mandarin in several different incarnations. He knew that his Iron Man armor was the equal of the Mandarin's alien rings and they could fight each other to a standstill. The only way to stop this immediately was to press the attack.
Iron Man launched himself at his enemy. The Mandarin dodged the missile coming at him and Iron Man found himself flying into one of Doom's machines. That was stupid, Stark told himself. You're letting your hatred of this silent Mandarin get to you.
The Mandarin had bonded to his amazing rings and could transfer his mind into the rings. Although the previous Mandarin had died, the mind of Iron Man's greatest foe had survived and had transferred itself into the young man before them. Only this version of the Mandarin wouldn't hardly talk.
In the good old days, Mandy was so busy telling me how he was going to rule the world, I'd have time to deal with him, Iron Man thought to himself. This guy's way too cool.
As soon as she had cleared the shattered door behind Iron Man, Black Widow had ID'd the Mandarin from the Avengers files. She knew that she was outclassed to confront the rings by herself, but she knew that she could call for backup and then distract the Mandarin. She touched a stud on her belt and send an automated message to Avenger's Mansion. Whoever was on monitor duty would determine her location from the GPS signal in her message unit and any other Avengers on duty or available would soon arrive.
In the meantime, she decided to make herself useful. She raised her left hand and let loose with one of her Widow's Bites.
10,000 volts should have scrambled Mandarin's brains and left him laying on the floor in a puddle of his own wastes. But it didn't.
Natasha was dumbfounded. Great, she thought, the rings must protect him.
She leapt to the other side of the room and tried to flank him. Iron Man was still untangling himself from the machine he'd crashed into. Mandarin was advancing on the Armored Avenger, ready to move in for the kill.
Iron Man raised his right hand, readying another repulsor blast directly at this opponent. The Mandarin likewise raised his hand to unleash his rings' fury. The Widow raised her right hand and tried a Widow's Bite again; if only to distract Mandarin one split second.
All three fired at the same time. The Widow's Bite enveloped Mandarin just as Iron Man's repulsor hit him in the chest. Mandarin's shot went wild, striking the machine that Iron Man was now standing on.
In a blink of the eye, Iron Man realized what he was standing on. Doom's time machine. And Mandarin's shot somehow activated the machine. The last thing he saw was Mandarin slumping to the floor from the combined effect of the Widow's Bite and repulsor. And the surprised look on the Black Widow's face as Iron Man faded from view.
New York City, not far from Sotheby's
"So what did you think? Good play, huh?" Lois asked. She had her arm nestled in the arm of her husband and they were walking back to the hotel after the play and a late dinner.
"Yes," Clark agreed, opening his tie. He almost never wore his shirt unbuttoned at the top and his tie loose. Most of the time, he had his Superman costume on underneath and wouldn't risk having it show. Lois had talked him into leaving the costume home for the weekend. "But who would have imagined Pee-Wee Herman as Jean Val Jean?"
"Oh, he didn't do *that* bad," Lois said. He leaned her head against her husband's broad shoulder. "And the important thing is that we're together, no super villains popping up and ruining the day, and I've got some more lingerie to show you tonight."
Clark laughed. He laughed out loud, for the first time in days. The two walked slowly toward their hotel. They sort of wove back and forth, as lovers are wont to do when trying to walk and talk, and lean on each other all at the same time.
"She went this way," Bond argued.
The man in black was almost invisible to the British agent. That cape allows him to just melt into the night, Bond thought. There had been a number of times in the past when Bond had wished he had the same power.
A moments hesitation. "Yes," the man in black agreed. The two of them started to run through the inner courtyard of the building, toward the alley.
This thing must be cursed, Catwoman thought as she sprinted down the alleyway. The Lion's Soul gem was stashed into a small pouch inside her costume. My luck's been bad ever since I laid eyes on the damn thing, she told herself. "Don't know if it's worth it," she muttered. She slid her hand into the pouch and grasped the gem. She pulled it out, thinking about stashing it somewhere and circling back to get it after she lost her pursuers.
She was nearing the end of the alley. Catwoman would have to run across one of the main New York streets to continue her escape to the alley in the next block. Normally, she'd have stayed to the rooftops. But in this part of New York, there was an odd mix of older two and three story buildings and the occasional five or six story building. It was just too much work to climb to the roof again with Batman and the English guy with the gun on her tail. She was willing to risk the dash into the streetlights. This was the theater district. Who knew, Selina thought, seeing me might just be the highlight of some theater goer's night.
Iron Man was conscious, but he had no idea what Doom's time machine had been set to. Why was the damn thing even powered up? he wondered.
There was little to see in the timestream. Only flashes of light and a sense of falling. Unlike the movies, you didn't actually see events passing by at top speed.
Luckily, Stark's previous adventures with Doom to the time of King Arthur had left him with a little experience with Doom's time travel technology. He was confident that when the machine settled to a stop his armor would protect him from whatever harm might present itself and his skill as an engineer would allow him to reset the machine and return to the present time. His present time.
Lois and Clark had stopped on the street. They stood below a street light and embraced. Clark leaned down to kiss his wife. Had his mind not been on the prospect of that new lingerie, his enhanced senses might have heard the woman coming down the alleyway. As it was, she caught the lover's by surprise.
Catwoman sprinted down the alleyway and almost plowed into the two people standing there kissing. Tired from her run and still aching from her exertions two days before, she stumbled.
The gemstone fell out of her hand; but amazingly the big guy grabbed it before it hit the ground.
"That's Catwoman," Lois yelled. "Stop her!"
Clark reached out quickly and held onto Catwoman's arm with his other hand.
Catwoman had never seen anyone move as quick as this big guy. She tried to pull away, but the guy's grip was like a steel vise. She heard the sound of two sets of footfalls coming down the alley. This damned gem is bad luck, she told herself. I don't know why I even tried to steal it.
Batman and Bond emerged from the alleyway. Batman instantly recognized the Kents. He saw how hard Selina was struggling, to no avail, in Kent's grip. He almost cracked the smallest of smiles knowing Kent's little secret and enjoying the irony that even when the Big Blue Boy Scout was on vacation he was still a force for good.
Bond paused for a moment to catch his breath. He was amazed that the Batman was barely breathing hard. 007 dug his SIS identification card out of his breast pocket and presented it to the big guy holding Catwoman. Kent didn't take the card; he had his hands full with the gem in one hand and Catwoman in the other. His wife snatched the card from Bond. "I'm with the British Government," he panted. "Catwoman, you're under arrest." He reached over to the captive thief and pulled off her cowl. Her thick black hair tumbled out.
"You don't have jurisdiction here," Catwoman protested.
Lois recognized the name on the ID. She'd done an extensive article on the aftermath of the Cold War a couple years before. Although she couldn't dig up all the secrets around this guy, she knew enough about Commander Bond to know that he was a very highly placed spook in the British Intelligence Service.
"Actually, Catwoman, I think he does," Lois started to say. "According to this ID, he's with the British Secret Intelligence Service. Isn't that right, Mr. Bond?"
"Yes," Bond replied, taking back his ID and putting it back in his inside jacket pocket.
Clark remembered Lois' article also. "James Bond?" he asked.
"Yes," Bond said.
Clark handed Catwoman to Batman. As Clark let go of her arm, Catwoman made a break for it. All three men immediately took chase and reached her before she'd gotten more then about 10 feet.
The night air was interrupted by a shrill sound. Clark and Batman both looked upward to the source of the noise; Bond, Lois, and Catwoman all covered their ears at the piercing sound. None of them saw the gem still in Clark's hand begin to glow.
Iron Man and Doom's time machine exited the time stream about fifty feet above the ground. Iron Man struggled to twist the machine away from the small crowd of people directly below him, but even as the machine was about to hit the ground he sensed that it was cycling again.
The time machine never reached the ground. Still energized by Mandarin's blast, the time machine automatically cycled again. This time, however, it was caught up in a strange mix of energy from the Lion's Soul gem and the stored solar energy of the Kryptonian holding it.
When the police arrived two minutes later, responding to reports of a loud noise and a crash, they would find no evidence of anyone at the supposed impact site. They questioned Lois and took statements from several people along the street who had witnessed the whole incident.
Inside Sutheby's
The Black Widow stood stunned. Iron Man had just disappeared before her eyes. She paused for a moment, considering her options. She readied another Widow's Bite charge just in case Iron Man's repulsor hadn't taken out Mandarin completely. But so far, the villain seemed content to remain defeated.
Mandarin laid sprawled on the floor amidst the broken furniture and associated debris of the fight.
Black Widow was still breathing hard from the fight when she heard the sound from the entrance. "Let me have at thee villain." She smiled. Only Thor, the Norse God of Thunder, would announce his arrival in such a boisterous manner. That meant the rest of the Avengers couldn't be far behind.
A moment later, Thor strode into the room, following in a quick succession by Captain America and the Scarlet Witch. The three Avengers joined Natasha.
"Looks like we got here too late," Captain America said. He had surveyed the entire room with a glance and determined that the Mandarin was not going to be a bother to anyone. "Good work, Natasha."
"Iron Man was the one that took him down. I just ran diversion," she explained.
"Where is Iron Man?" Thor wondered. "I must congratulate him on a battle well fought and a villain soundly defeated."
"Well..." Black Widow said, "That's the hard part."
Captain America instantly tensed. His years of experience told him something was wrong the second he heard Natasha's voice.
"What happened?"
"Iron Man disappeared," Black Widow explained. "He was thrown into Doom's Time Machine during the fight. Somehow it got turned on and the next thing I know, he's taking down Mandarin with a repulsor blast and then in a blink of the eye, he's gone."
Thor and the Scarlet Witch assisted the New York Police Department with securing the Mandarin while Captain America and the Black Widow discussed Iron Man's fate. They stood off to one side of the room and kept their voices down to avoid eavesdroppers. "If anyone understands that damned time machine other than Doom, it's Tony. If he was able to, I'm sure he'd program the thing to return him here the split second after he left," Natasha argued. "Something must be wrong. Seriously wrong."
"I agree," Captain America said. "Unfortunately, none of the rest of us have Tony's experience with this sort of thing."
The leader of the Avengers took out his Avengers ID card. It had a built-in two-way video phone built into it. He pressed the number pad several times and was soon connected with the leader of the Fantastic Four, Dr. Reed Richards.
"Hello, Dr. Richards," Captain America said.
"Hello, Captain. What can we do for the Avengers today?"
"We need some assistance with Dr. Doom's Time Machine. Aside from Doom himself, you're probably the most qualified," Captain America said. He continued to explain what had happened to Iron Man.
"I'll be right over," Dr. Richards said.
Dr. Reed Richards was one of the nation's foremost scientists. He was also the head of the Fantastic Four. The FF was one of the superhero teams that called New York City home. Unlike the other teams, the Fantastic Four was more of a family. The team was composed of Richards, his wife, Sue, her brother, Johnny, and Richards' best friend, Ben Grimm. The four had been exposed to cosmic rays during an early test flight of a spacecraft Richards had designed. Instead of killing the four, the radiation changed each of them.
Benjamin J. Grimm, now went by the code-name of "the Thing." His skin had become rock hard and he'd actually developed stony interlocking plates in a dull orange color. His strength, already formable for a man of his age and size, was increased to nearly the level of the Hulk. The former test pilot had become the teams grumpy strong man.
Susan Storm-Richards, had developed the power to turn herself invisible. She initially adopted the code-name "Invisible Girl," but eventually changed it to "Invisible Woman" after the birth of her first child. She later discovered the ability to project transparent force fields of virtually unbreakable strength. Although perceived by many as the weakest member of the group, she was actually the strongest. With the power of her force fields, she could defend herself against even the strongest opponent. And she was continually trying to find new ways to use her invisibility and force fields in offensive ways.
Sue's brother, Johnny, had developed the power to control fire. He had the ability to turn his entire body into a mass of flames. This allowed him to fly and to control fire, both his own and others, natural and artifically generated.
Richards himself found that his body could bend, stretch, and mold itself into nearly any shape he could imagine. He had the ability to reach an arm or his entire body across the Hudson river if he choose to. He could mold himself into any number of shapes, including becoming a human rubber ball or a human elastic band. Johnny, the youngest of the group, has christened Reed "Mr. Fantastic." The moniker stuck, but unlike most other superheroes, the Fantastic Four didn't bother hiding their real identities. These days, about the only person that called him "Mr. Fantastic" was Mrs. Richards when she was in a amorous mood.
Instead of feeling sorry for themselves, the group determined to make the best of their misfortune and formed the first of the modern super teams: the Fantastic Four.
Dr. Victor Von Doom, the Baron of Latveria, was one of the Fantastic Four's first and most tenacious opponents. A brilliant scientist on par with Richards, Von Doom had scarred his face during a failed experiment. Turning angry at the world for his accident, Von Doom had spent his life trying to conquer the lands neighboring his native Latveria. Although he'd been viewed as a terrorist by the world at large, Von Doom was the beloved leader of his native land until his apparent death a year ago.
Von Doom's greatest invention was a time machine. The time machine had figured prominently in the Fantastic Four's first conflict with Doom and in many since. Only two men in the world besides Von Doom understood the function of the machine: Reed Richards and Tony Stark.
And now, Stark was apparently lost to the sands of time because of the machine.
The Fantastic Four was headquartered in the Baxter Building in the middle of Manhattan. It took Reed Richards only moments to reach Sutheby's. When he arrived, he found a number of reporters and photographers trying to get in. Instead of trying to wade through the crowd, he simply stretched up and walked over the entire group. Planting one foot on the steps of the building beyond the police barricade, he was over the crowd in a flash and then he returned his body to it's normal shape. The stunt didn't just speed up his entry into the building, it proved his identity to the police officers guarding the crime scene. They waved him in.
Richards stood at the entrance to main hall of Sutheby's and surveyed the mess. His plain blue jumpsuit with the white "4" in a circle on the left side of the chest seemed almost understated compared to the bright red, white and blue of Captain America's costume, or the flowing red cape and silvery helmet of Thor, or the provocative and exotic native Gypsy dress of the Scarlet Witch. The only costume perhaps plainer than Mr. Fantastic's was the Black Widow's unadorned jet black leather full-bodysuit.
"Reed," Captain America yelled from across the room, "Thanks for coming." The Captain waved the scientist over.
"My pleasure," Richards said. He stretched out his free hand and shook that of the Avengers' leader. As he maneuvered through the debris, he retracted the length of his arm to match he distance he was from the living legend. "I brought some equipment. I hope you don't mind." He held up the case in his other arm.
"Whatever you require," Captain America said. He knew Reed would have gizmos that would assist the investigation. The only person with more gadgets than Tony Stark was Reed Richards, Captain America thought.
"Where was the time machine before it was activated?" Richards asked.
"Over here," Black Widow motioned.
Richards cracked open his case and pulled out a complex piece of equipment. To Captain America the device it looked like something Rube Goldberg would have invented for his newspaper column.
Dr. Richards activated the device and several lights began blinking. He remained standing beside Captain America and Black Widow, but stretched his arms to scan around the room with the device. He eventually returned the device to the spot Natasha had pointed out. "Yes, that's the distinct signature of one of Victor's devices," he said.
Another few minutes of scanning. His malleable face carried a frown by the time he was finished. "Do you have any idea what activated the time machine?" Richards asked.
Black Widow shook her head. "No. Unless Mandarin turned it on before we got here. And he's not talking right now." She nodded in the direction of the unconscious Mandarin as Thor carried him out of the room to the waiting high security ambulance.
"So we have no idea of the time it was set for," Richards said. "The past, the future, no idea?"
"None," Natasha frowned.
Richards turned off his device and returned it to the case. "I'm afraid I can't help much. I have another of Victor's time machines in a vault at the Baxter Building. But without an idea of where, or rather when, Iron Man went, it'd be nearly impossible to track him down."
"I was afraid of that," Captain America said. "Then, there's nothing we can do. It's up to Iron Man to figure out a way to return." It wasn't often that Captain America admitted defeat.
"I'm sorry," Dr. Richards said.
"So am I," Black Widow said.