A/N: Hey guys, sorry about the extremely long delay. Things have been hectic for a while, and I kind of lost the drive to write this particular story for a time (problem with an overactive imagination and itchy writing fingers). Blame Mass Effect and Dragon Age and above all Star Wars... As for explicit sex scenes, well...no. While this is an adult story, and there will be (and already are) mentions of sex in character dialog and thoughts, it's mainly an adventure/romance story, not a smut-fic. Sorry. For that kind of stuff you'll have to brave that other site and writers who aren't me. The M rating is mainly to make sure no-one can complain about raunchy dialogue. This might change, but probably won't.

As for Noh-Varr's snarky self...he actually was that arrogant and snarky in his first appearance in Morrison's Marvel Boy (and very, very funny). People (current Marvel writers) tend to forget that No-Varr is from an alternate universe's Kree Empire, one that is much more powerful and pompous than the broken one in 616. Mar-Vell he ain't. Now, with no further ado, on with the show...

Any chemistry or physics mistakes I make are because I failed Science. Twice. (I fixed it in evening school later, but still...I'm an art-monkey, not an egghead!)

…

…

Modern Day. Thunderbirds Are Go For Launch.

It was a strange vehicle, for sure. Picture a standing platform, eight by eight feet, the top of which has had four seats affixed by crude welding, and the exposed high-tech underside covered in sturdy radiation-shielded armor glass. No, that's about it. Oh, apart from the hubcaps and fuzzy dice welded or tied to the rails that would ordinarily allow AIM personnel to maintain their balance in flight. Jen sighed as she looked at them. So childish. Immature.

Usually, I make the jokes. Dammit.

"So this thing will fly?"

Noh-Varr, standing upside down in the ceiling in a way that reminded her slightly of Peter, nodded. "Yes. Not well, mind you, but 'beggars can't be choosers'. I heard that one a week ago, on Jerry Springer. I like Jerry Springer. He manipulates the human pack mentality for his own personal gain in a most intriguing way. But more importantly, the platform will serve as a temporal displacement unit. Not spatial, only temporal. If it moved us in space as well, oh, I'd say we'd be in serious trouble. Might even cross the dimensional barriers. That never ends well. Any way, does everyone remember how this is going to work? Johnny, you're the least intelligent one in the room, mind telling us all if you have understood the concepts involved?"

Johnny, holding a duffel over one shoulder and a small device reminiscent of a pocket-computer in his other hand, gave the Kree a very unfriendly glare. "You're a douche, you know that? But yeah, I got it. Whatever time displacement thingy took Peter worked on different principles and probably dumped him somewhere far from modern North America, most likely an area that's part of Southern Europe today. Since this time platform will mainly move us through time, it won't move as such, and to avoid dying in the vacuum of space you're gonna have to account for passed time both there and here. Basically, we'll arrive here roughly twelve days after he landed there."

"...doesn't this mean we'd technically be moving through space too, unless we accounted for the Earth's movement while moving through time? Which would also move us through space?"

Noh-Varr gave Jen an annoyed look. "Nobody likes a smart alec."

Victory! I knew I took Physics 101 in college for a reason...

"So what are we waiting for?"

…

Time travel.

It's really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really...

...really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really, really...

...really complicated.

Paradoxes alone aside, when you're living in a pantheistically solipsist multiverse where every single incident, thought, dream and idea sprouts another universe with minor to massive differences and every single possibility is a possible universe, traveling through time ain't exactly like dusting crops.

For one thing, get a single calculation wrong and instead of visiting your grandpa you find yourself staring into the fanged maws of dinosaurian Waffen-SS of the Fifth (not Fourth) Reich in a universe where intelligent dinosaurs from the Savage Land were converted to National socialism in the 1930's and conquered the known world. Or find yourself smothered in an infinity of smelly, rotting shrimp in a universe made entirely of such creatures.

We're not even gonna mention the ones with zombies or Lovecraftian undying entities.

Fortunately for Jennifer and the others, Noh-Varr was an experienced cross-dimensional traveler and rarely if ever made such mistakes.

Unfortunately for all of them, they didn't have the genetic modifications necessary to travel painlessly through the space-time snowflakes (each and every one having 196,833 facets of which each facet is a multiverse with its own rules and laws of reality) that he possessed.

Which is a very long-winded and mildly pretentious way of saying that Noh-Varr didn't warn them that unshielded time travel hurts like being repeatedly punched in your most sensitive areas by John Sumbitch's second cousin, Snake Gandhi.

...don't ask. Pantheistic solipsism, remember? Go ahead and look it up.

…

By the time they had stopped screaming, the time platform had stopped moving. If moving was indeed the proper verb for what it did. Jennifer slowly pried her fingers loose from the railing, noting that she had turned a sizable portion of it into something resembling thin, wrinkled metal wiring. It had been solid molybdenum steel when she'd grabbed it.

Noh-Varr turned to them all and beamed cheerfully. "Well, that wasn't so bad, was it?"

She gave him a glare. Behind her she heard Johnny throwing up in some bushes, and Sue was looking decidedly dizzy, but all in all they were fine. "So, did we make it?"

"I have no clue. We'll have to run some scans, do a little dance, sacrifice a goat to the mad, bald Scotsman and possibly-"

Sue interrupted. "Just run a system scan and send a ping to the timekeepers in the Savage Land. They'll interpret it as just a routine check and tell us what time it is relative to the next visit by the Eternals, and since we...oh, that did not sit well with my stomach...since we know the exact point in time the Eternals are coming by next between now and modern day, we can just-"

Jennifer tuned it out as Noh-Varr actually followed orders instantly without a hint of snark. Oh, right. Military. She glanced over at a green-looking Johnny, who was staring into the fern bushes where he'd been praising Ulik the troll repeatedly.

"...carrots? Why are there always carrots? I haven't even eaten any carrots..."

Ignoring him as well she turned to the bio-scanner. Sue had showed her how to use it before they left, and it was actually pretty easy. Certainly simpler to use than her latest iPhone. Now, all she had to do was exclude the antarctic landmass, and set it on-

"...never mind, you guys. He's here. About...if I'm reading this right, four hundred miles from here. Let's go."

The platform didn't move.

At all.

Three pairs of eyes turned to Noh-Varr, who shrugged with a faintly embarrassed look on his face. "Ah...no clue. I'll have to check the turbines."

"We're stuck?"

"No, no, not stuck, just temporarily without a means of mobility, just let me check the...huh. Well, that's not supposed to be...oh. Ah, mips."

Sue sighed. "We're stuck."

…

…

Four hundred miles south...

"They're breaking through the outer doors! What are you doing in there?"

Peter ignored the increasingly upset redhead. Okay, these were primitive tools, but they'd been enough to pull his webshooters apart, so they should be enough to...there. And that, and the final screw...

"Out of the way, red!" He didn't wait for her to move before he raised his arm and aimed. Sonja managed to duck the very split second before a huge glob of webbing struck the door, and he lowered the half-finished webshooter. "That'll hold them for an hour, or until Gath can get his hands on something more powerful. You said he doesn't do any major spells?"

She shook her head. "Mostly alchemy, but he is skilled enough in that. Apparently whatever spell he had intended tonight was meant to grant him the power he held in his youth."

He smirked. "I seriously doubt he was ever young. Can you picture him in baby clothing?"

Sonja stared at him, her eyes widening in horrified amusement. "Oh, gods, that's just wrong!"

Grinning, he turned back to his disassembled gear. "Excellent. My work here is now complete. I shall mess with the heads of every single hero of the ages!"

"You're strange, you know that, don't you?"

He just mm-hmmed in reply. Okay, those springs went there, and the canister clips in that, tighten that screw, bend the trigger back into shape... "Damned amateur. Did he have to try and break them? I'm gonna have to fine tune them again when I get home..."

If I get home. I have to find a way of telling everyone where I am...

How do you send a message across thousands upon thousands of years? And expect it to last in any way? Let's see...parchment wouldn't last more than three or so millennia without starting to get illegible. Stone? Would take a lot of time. Clay tablets...now there was an idea. Who here would have clay tablets? A scribe. What kind of tablets would be kept around? Religious texts, or...accounting. Everyone kept records of money. Sometimes two sets, to keep the tax collectors off your back.

"Done. Now, you mentioned he's an alchemist? That means he has a laboratory somewhere around the castle..." He grinned as he strapped on the webshooters on his arms. "Time for us to stop being reactive and start being proactive..."

…

Sonja only made token complaints as he grabbed her around the waist and crawled out the formerly barred window. He tried to once again ignore the fact he was holding a half-naked woman in one arm and focused on finding the lab, though it was kind of difficult considering she was holding on in a very intimate fashion. The woman was seemingly infinitely fascinated with his gluteus maximus.

Let's see, Gath would need somewhere with plenty of ventilation, somewhere he could quickly dispose of experiments gone wrong, and somewhere isolated. Not near the ground. The towers. A tower with chemical stains on the side.

There.

"Hold on, red!" She let out a squeal of delight as he leaped from the side of the wall he'd been moving on the side of, a jump of at least thirty feet up onto the slick side of one of the towers. Careful not to touch the waxy-looking green and blue stains on the wall lest he slip off (chemicals messing with the sticky-feet had happened before), he quickly made his way up to the window and slipped inside, setting her down.

She brushed an errant curl of crimson hair out of her face and beamed at him. "That was fun! Again!"

Adrenalin junkie. Figures.

He shook his head and started rummaging through what turned out to be a surprisingly complete collection of chemicals, metals and fun by the cartloads. He started to smile.

Then grin.

Finally, he chortled, rubbing his hands together with glee. "Oh, boy...he thinks he knows chemistry? I'll show him chemistry..."

…

The hybrids who served as Kulan Gath's elite guard were created by alchemically and magically forcing animal traits onto big, dumb brutes skilled at one thing and one thing only: hurting people. It was a technique that had been fairly common in the heyday of Atlantis to manufacture foot soldiers from the common, low-born barely human stock, and one that he could successfully reproduce in this primitive era...but that didn't mean they were as efficient as actual high-caste Atlantean warriors had been. Heightened senses and increased strength did not make up for low intelligence.

"Out of the way, fools!" A carefully prepared vial of acid was thrown hard at the door, quickly eating through wood and metal and a foot of stone below it, as well as the strange web-like substance that had so frustrated his guards. They rushed in, roaring, and...

"Great Lord, they are not here!" One of his hybrids poked its head out through the doorway and snarled the words through broken, jagged teeth.

"What?" He pushed the nearest guards aside and peered inside the dungeon. Nothing. One of the racks was torn to pieces, the chains that had held them both broken...apparently the man had been far stronger than he appeared. No matter. Brute strength could never avail against the superior mind of an Atlantean.

Then he noticed the thick iron bars on the small window had been torn out, removing a large portion of the masonry they had been attached to. They were loose!

"Gather as many of my elite guard as you can! Search the castle and the nearby premises, they can't have gotten too far yet, and remember that I want them alive!" He glared at the guards, still staring dumbly at him. "Now!"

…

"What are you doing? Why are you gathering up...is that soap?"

Peter grinned at Red. "Not quite. This is what Kulan Gath throws out after he makes soap. Funny, he smells horrible for such a cleanly guy. Anyway, this...is glycerol. And with this, I can make something very funny."

She gave him a suspicious glare. "Funny how?"

"Funny boom. Big boom. Keep an eye on that while I mix the acids."

"Acids?"

"Oh, don't worry, I'm a scientist! I've done this...well, once. In a lab. Which was better and safer than this one. But hey, if an Italian guy could do this in the 1800's with their facilities, I should be able to do it here. Oh, and, if you could open his ice box? Thanks. We need a lot of ice water for this."

"...are you sure you know what you're doing? He must be searching for us even at this very moment!"

He shrugged. "Hey, he'll never think of looking in his own lab. In fact, I think they'll assume we escaped the castle altogether."

"...so what's this thing you're making called?"

The smile he presented did not appease her. "Nitroglycerin!"

…

"...this is boring."

"You've said that. Now be quiet, this is delicate work."

"...I want to bash their heads in, not watch you tinker with his potions!"

"Shush! By the way, why is Kulan Gath ruling this area, I thought you said he was an Atlantean relic, not a local-"

"He's a sorcerer. They tend to live for a very long time. About a year ago he usurped the throne from the local duke, started a reign of terror, the usual. It's why I'm here. Well, I'm being paid a vast amount of gold to be here. I did not expect his guards to notice me so soon or to run into someone as odd as you."

"Heh. Old Parker-luck strikes again..."

"What?"

"Nothing. Mind handing me those tongs? Yeah, those. Thanks. So what happened with the duke? Dead?"

She shook her head. "No, just vanished. Gath likes to torment people, so he's probably still something akin to alive and wishing he wasn't. Why?"

He shrugged, carefully apportioning solutions and watching over the cooling process, using his spider-sense to warn him about anything getting too volatile. "Oh, just thinking that if we manage to get you your paycheck, this place could use someone in charge that isn't, you know, a bad person." Pausing to gather up a strange, oily, clear liquid in one of the vials he turned to give her a look. "...the duke wasn't a bad person, was he?"

"No worse than most lords. In his defense, the torture chamber Gath was keeping us in was used for storage during the duke's reign, so at least he wasn't using it. That could simply mean he preferred to have anyone he convicted executed instantly instead, though."

He snorted. "So cheerful, you are. Reminds me of a blind lawyer I know."

"...I have no idea what a 'laahyah' is. Or a 'peichik', for that matter."

"It's the accent, I know. Us Queens-residents have trouble communicating with people in our own borough, let alone other places or time periods. Now stand back, I need to test this."

"Test? What do you me-"

BAM!

"Whoa! A little too big a drop, that. But it'll do!" He grinned cheerfully at her stunned expression. "Told you it makes big booms. That was just a tiny drop, too..."

…

…

412 Miles To The North.

"Remind me again why this was a good idea?"

Jen smirked, holding the thing that was a cross between a T-Rex and one of those Australian lizards with a collar in a firm headlock. "I never said it was a good idea, just that this was the only shot we had at getting P...Spidey back home. Behind you."

Johnny only just managed to dodge what looked like some sort of arboreal Velociraptor trying to leap on top his back from above. "Get off, clawfingers!" A quick burst of flame sent it yelping in pain, and he kept the hand burning just in case. "You gonna keep that one?"

She shrugged. "I dunno. He's kinda cute. But I doubt I could afford feeding it, and if he ate a mailman or two it'd be such a pain with the lawsuits and all. Hang on, I'm gonna tell him to stop being frisky."

She shifted her grip, bunched up the fist that was now free, and then punched the thing solidly on the nose hard enough to make it roar each time. Each punch emphasized the scolding she was giving it. "You - do not - get to eat - my clothes! Bad dino!"

With that she let it go. The creature glared at them, tilting the head this way and that for a proper look, then decided they weren't worth the trouble and lumbered off.

A slow, sarcastic clap rose above the noise of the jungle.

"You could have helped, Noh-Varr."

The Kree interdimensional traveler had a disgustingly smug and condescending look on his face. "Why? You were dealing with the beasts quite efficiently. Though none of the human books on this era suggested there were dinosaur remnants around. Poor research, truly. Actually, I'm just here to tell you that we have restored flight capacity. Slow flight, but flight nonetheless. Unless you want to stay and work out more of your primate aggressions on the wildlife?"

"I can always work them out on you if you like?" She gave him an innocent smile.

"Yes, yes, you're very scary. Now let's leave."

…

…

The Villainous Villain's Villainous Lair (which is villainous).

"Master! Master! We found them, master!"

Kulan Gath sighed with relief. "You did? Where?"

"The east tower, master!"

The corpse-like Atlantean paled, which was no mean feat for someone who looked like a prune. "...the...east...tower?"

"Yes, master! We heard noises from within!"

My laboratory!

"Quickly, gather as many men as you can! I no longer care if the male lives, just make certain the Hyrkanian does!"

…

"...now what are you doing?"

Peter grinned. "Ever played Jenga? No, sorry, silly question. Hand me those. Yeah, those. Know what happens when you mix certain substances? The reactions can be both explosive and...amusing. Wait and see. Now, the knapsack with the vials. Careful!"

He'd wrapped them thickly in gauze, but even with that they would be highly volatile. Given enough time and effort, he could probably make something less hazardous to handle, but that would ruin the intention of this batch. He wanted it volatile. Once he had webbed the knapsack securely to his back, he turned back to the window, aimed carefully and let a web-line fly. Sonja's face lit up.

"Are we going swinging again?"

"Not yet." He fastened the still-sticky line to the window-sill, then carefully aimed a couple more lines inside the room. "There. Now we wait."

"For what?"

There was a heavy thump on the door. "That."

…

Sonja stared at the odd foreigner as he told her to stand on the window sill, He soon joined her there, after arranging the glassware and things in the alchemical laboratory even more precariously. She felt her face flush a little as he wrapped his free arm around her, holding onto the web-like line leading to the opposing tower with his other. "What are you up to?"

He grinned at her. "Know what's worse than someone messing up your laboratory?"

She frowned. "No?"

The grin became wider, and she found herself wanting to kiss him. "When you mess up your own lab."

There was another thump on the door, and he yelled out in an exaggeratedly frightened voice. "Oh, no! I hope they can't break down the door before we're done in here, that would be disastrous for us!"

Three things happened. He leaped out the window, Sonja in his arms, then Kulan Gath's over-excited troops smashed the door in, which in turn caused the carefully rigged hyper-thin web-lines to pull on the surfaces they had been attached to, which in turn made the precariously, delicately balanced laboratory apparatuses crash to the floor. Glass and earthenware pots shattered, dozens of volatile chemicals and concoctions mixed together, some of it dangerously, some of it...amusingly.

The wizened sorcerer had time to pale and begin turning around by the time the potassium and sodium struck water.

There was a solid, bone-shaking WHUMP, followed by a shockwave, mortar and stone and roof tiles careening wildly, shrieks of half-men running desperately to save themselves and the infuriated, angered howl of sheer outrage of the Atlantean sorcerer whose laboratory was just repeatedly set to exploding into smithereens.

…

He had to admit, soaring through the air on a thin web-line with a hot chain-mail bikinied red-head in your arms while something exploded behind him made him feel vaguely like he was in a Michael Bay movie. Better lines and plot, though.

Sonja was laughing, which was both a bit intriguing and very, very disturbing in more ways than one. As he let loose another web-line, remembering that he was going to be unable to produce more of it in these conditions, he took the opportunity to ask. "What direction is the city? I think I have another idea..."

She grinned madly, red-faced with excitement. "I can't wait! It's that way!"

…

…

Somewhere above the Hyrkanian Steppes.

"Are we there yet?"

Noh-Varr glared at Jen, who was beaming at him in perfect harmony with Johnny Storm. "No. Just like the last twenty-eight times you asked that very same question."

"Gee, he's cranky. You think he's cranky, Johnny?"

"He's a sour-puss. Maybe he needs a Hostess fruit pie?"

"Oh, yes, with the crisp crust and rich fruity filling and the-"

"That's the one! Even Galactus can't resist Hostess fruit pies."

Noh-Varr's glare turned confused, then he shook his head and turned to the eldest member of the impromptu rescue force. "Susan, they're mocking me. What do I do?"

She gave him a serious look, pursed her lips, then nodded. "I could go for a Hostess fruit pie right now..."

The frustrated shriek of Kree origin was joined by three people laughing evilly. Revenge was sweet as a fruit pie.

…

…

To Be Continued...