REGROUPING

Meanwhile, back in their sports box back in the Garden, the previously tranquilized Victoria Hand began to stir and soon regained consciousness, albeit still woozy.

Victoria's awakening is noticed by Gwen's robotic duplicate, who she saw Victoria awaken completely, gave her a pleasant, if somewhat unnatural smile. "Oh Ms. Hand, you're awake!" said the Gwen duplicate, sounding chipper.

"What?" asked the confused Victoria. "I've been asleep? For how long?"

"Through most of the sixteenth finals," replied the duplicate. "The half-time show is just starting."

At this point, Victoria felt embarrassed about how she, a former S.H.I.E.L.D. agent and now a government liaison to a team of superheroes 'fell asleep on the job. "Oh my, I'm sorry, Gwen. I didn't mean to doze off like that."

"Oh, it's no problem," said the Gwen duplicate, smile still present. "You seem like a busy woman, so you probably needed the rest. Besides, I'm having fun watching the tournament."

Seeing Gwen's sudden happy demeanor seemed to be off-putting for Victoria, for in the time she's gotten to know the girl, she appeared to be down and reclusive. "That's...good to know," Victoria replied with a returning smile, and as she watched the Gwen duplicate turn back to watch the show, Victoria gave her an unsure of her sudden change of behavior.

Meanwhile, back in the Avengers Mansion, both the REAL Gwen and Beast were standing in the main hallway after arriving via shrinking disc and were waiting for the Avengers to come, with Beast carrying a first-aid kit. Moments later, Spidey, Ms. Marvel, and the rest of the remaining Avengers enter the hallway via a built-in secret door on the after arriving through the hidden Quinjet hanger underneath the mansion.

Beast is the first to greet the team with a smile. "Welcome home, Avengers," said the furry X-Man, trying to sound positive.

As for Gwen, she immediately locked her eyes on Spidey, and with both happiness and worry, she cried out the Web-Head's real name. "Peter!" she exclaimed, then proceeded to run towards him.

Spidey, like the rest of the Avengers, was stunned to see Beast in the mansion, but upon hearing Gwen calling his name, he quickly turned and saw her running towards him. "Gwen?!" he asked surprised, happy to see Gwen's face again, but also confused as to how she and Beast got into the Avengers' HQ.

Moments later, Gwen finally arrived before Spidey and wrapped her arms around his upper body, hugging him happily though not as hard given his injuries from his match with Wolverine.

Meanwhile, a confused Ms. Marvel watched Beast walk towards Peter with his first-aid kit. "Dr. McCoy? How exactly did you get in here?"

"Well, through that small disc-like hovercraft, you used to save young Ms. Stacy here," Beast replied. "Mr. Stark radioed Nick Fury and suggested I'd come here to help any of you that are injured."

Spidey took a moment to pull away from Gwen's embrace so he could address Beast. "Okay, but did you bring Gwen here?"

"To see you obviously, my body," Beast replied. "And to also volunteer her services in aiding me with any Avengers who are injured. She made quite a persuasive argument on me needing assistance."

Spidey could see Beast have a look of uneasiness as he gave this answer, causing him not entirely to buy his story. "She gave you 'The Look,' didn't she?" he asked with a skeptic raised eyebrow behind his mask.

A discouraged Beast look down at the floor in shame as he gave the Web-Head this reply. "Yes, yes, she did."

Though she knew that Beast was telling the truth, Gwen couldn't help but feel slightly offended by Spidey asking the furry X-Man that. So much so that she couldn't help but give Spidey the infamous 'Look' in response. "Well, excuse me for being worried about you, Peter Parker!" she told him, then looked at his chest to see the cast underneath his shirt. "And wanting to make sure that those stitches are still in place.

Spidey smiled behind his mask, always loving Gwen's caring side for not just him, but for everyone else she cared for. Nonetheless, he removed his mask to reveal the damaged but smiling face of Peter Parker. "Don't worry, Gwen. I've been through worse," Peter told her as gently as he could, then gently touched his bandaged chest. "And trust me, I can feel these things still in place, and I promise that I'll keep them there."

Gwen wanted to believe Peter's words and know that he wasn't trying to sound fierce and brave. But seeing the cast underneath his shirt didn't ease her mind one bit, and looked at the floor sadly. "You better."

As for Ms. Marvel, she decided to keep things moving by address Beast himself. "And the rest of us are fine, Dr. McCoy," she told him in a reassuring tone, but then changed her expression to a more worried one. "But I am a little worried about you and Parker's friend being here. Especially that for all we know, Osborn might've tapped this place with wires and hidden cameras while we were gone. Hence why I'm confused as hell as to why Stark wanted to have us meet here."

Suddenly, the conversation is halted when everyone in the mansion heard a secret door in the ceiling open, and in came Iron Man, who gently hovered down and powered off his jet boots when his feet touched the floor. "Yeah, I wouldn't worry too much about that, Carol."

While Iron Man's answer left the Avengers confused, Ms. Marvel gave Iron Man a skeptic look. "Well, not to split hairs, Tony, but Osborn's proven to be a couple of steps ahead of us so far. How do we know that he doesn't have this entire mansion bugged?"

Before answering, Iron Man lifted up his face-plate to reveal the smirking face of Tony Stark. "Well, to that, I've got good news and bad news. The bad news is yes; I do detect allot of hidden cameras through my armor."

A clearly worried Peter is the first among his equally bewildered teammates to speak. "And the good news?!"

Tony calmly turned and gave Peter a look of reassurance. "Well, let's say I have the people at S.W.O.R.D. doing me a favor. Right J.A.R.V.I.S.?"

"Indeed sir," J.A.R.V.I.S. replied in his usual pleasant tone. "In fact, I do believe Ms. Brand and the rest of S.W.O.R.D. agency are giving Osborn the 'show' that you instructed."

Meanwhile, in space and in Earth's orbit was the spaceship, the Damocles, which now served as S.W.O.R.D.'s headquarters. Inside the main bridge, S.W.O.R.D.'s leader, the green suited, as well as a green-haired woman named Abigail Brand, is standing over a male Caucasian agent's desk and watching two icons on a computer screen. One icon showed the main bridge of the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helocarrior, and the other an image of Iron Man, Spidey and the rest of the Avengers sitting comfortably in the lounge, drinking water bottles and drying themselves off with towels, all in which was a computer simulation concocted by the Democole's computer technicians and was being fed to the secret cameras in the mansion to fool the people Osborn and the rest of the agents in the Helocarrior."

Seeing that the feed was going well, the agent looking at the screen reported to Abigail. "Simulation is running just fine, ma'am."

The calm and collected Abigail let out a sigh before she responded. "Good, make sure it stays that way until the half-time show is over."

"Yes ma'am," the agent quickly replied, then continued to monitor the simulation's progress.

As for Abigail, she walked away from the agent and went back to the captain's chair, all the while looking a bit annoyed. "Stark, you owe me big."