“Not the black,” she whispered vehemently, her lips echoing the constant refrain of her thoughts. “Not the black.”

The wheel froze in place and the sphere tottered on the brink between adjacent red and black wedges. Crossing her fingers figuratively, if not in reality, Wanda waited anxiously, already stiffening in expectation of another fierce burst of pain. Which would it be, suffering or salvation? Red or black?

Red.

She exhaled slowly, grateful for her deliverance. Granted, the odds had been only one out of two, but she felt certain that her powers had tipped the scales in her favor. Before she could savor her temporary triumph, the wheel resumed its relentless spinning. The game commenced again, and she grimly set about repeating her success of moments before, for the second in who knew how many trials.

Here we go again, she thought, as she petitioned the 145

laws of chance as only she could. Not the black, not the black, not the black. . ..

Red. Red. Red. Red.

So far, so good, but the strain was telling on her. The unseen experimenter allowed her no respite, starting each new round fast on the heels of the previous victory. Her head began to pound, mildly at first, but growing more painful and distracting by the minute. The queasy throbbing threatened to supplant the reassuring tingle that heralded the exercise of her power. The constant clicking nibbled away at her nerves, like a leaky faucet that, left untended, could drown all her hopes. The virtual roulette wheel swam before her eyes, and she had to blink repeatedly to keep the game in focus. Beads of perspiration ran down her forehead, dripping from her nose. She could taste the salt upon her lips, feel the fatigue creeping up on her. Beating the odds time after time was hard work, and still the ball kept rolling.

Red. Red. Red. Red. Red.

I can’t keep this up much longer, she thought, wondering if the faceless instigator of the game was pleased or disappointed by her consistent string of victories. What were the odds of coming up red a dozen times in a row? The Vision could tell her if he was here; his computerized mind was good at that sort of thing, even if he couldn’t figure out how to save their marriage. Is he worried at all about what’s happened to me? Can his memory banks call up some vestige of the love we once shared?

Red. Red. Red.

Black.

Her concentration slipped for a moment, and she was rewarded with a brutal shock that seemed to set her entire nervous system on fire. The searing jolt came from nowhere and everywhere at the same time, sparing no part of her convulsing body. The pain faded quickly, but the ceaseless game gave her no time to recover. Shaking off the lingering after-effects of the jolt, she collected her faculties and focused on the virtual game with renewed determination yet depleted strength. A blinding migraine pulsed without mercy within her skull, squeezing her aching head like one of Moon Dragon’s vicious telepathic attacks. Her breathing grew ragged. Sleep beckoned, and she had to struggle to keep her eyes open.

“Not the black,” she whispered over and over like a mantra. She heard another desperate moan, but couldn’t tell if it was coming from Rogue, Wolverine, or herself.

Red. Red. Red.

Empathy warred with exhaustion, and she found herself wondering what sort of ordeals the two unlucky X-Men had been forced to endure.

If they were anything like this, she thought sadly, then heaven help both of them.

Red. Red. Red. Red. Red. Red ...

‘ ‘Excellent. I could not have asked for better results, from any of our subjects. I look forward to the next round of tests, which should bring us even closer to the culmination of our plans—and the destruction of all who oppose us.”

A gloomy hush hung over the Avengers’ elegantly appointed reception room as Captain America stared at the ornately framed portrait mounted over the marble fireplace. The color photo captured all the founding members of the Avengers, only days after the team’s historic inception—there was Iron Man, in his original golden armor, along with the mighty Thor, Ant-Man, the Wasp . . . and the Hulk.

The green-skinned, gamma-spawned behemoth glowered from the portrait, a surly expression on his Neanderthal-like features, angry emerald eyes glaring out from under heavy brows that always reminded Cap of Boris Karloff in the movie Frankenstein. His brawny arms were crossed defiantly atop his massive chest. Even in those halcyon days following the Avengers’ debut, the Hulk looked uncomfortable and irritated to be part of the team.

Too bad, Cap reflected. They could use the Hulk right now, or at least his human alter ego, Dr. Robert Bruce Banner.

“Shame the Hulk never worked out as an Avenger,” Iron Man said, echoing Cap’s own sentiments. His gleaming faceplate was elevated, exposing Tony Stark’s dashing features. His pale blue eyes followed Cap’s gaze to the portrait above the mantle. “I remember the day we took that photo. The Hulk was in such a bad temper that Jarvis could barely look at him without trembling, let alone hold the camera steady.” He raised a crystal champagne glass filled with sparkling ginger ale to his lips. “It wasn’t long

after that he teamed up with the Sub-Mariner to try to destroy us, and things went downhill from there.”

True enough, Captain America thought. Over the years, the Hulk had fought against the Avengers more often than he had fought beside them. It was more than a little tragic, he mused; all that awesome strength, not to mention Bruce Banner’s unquestioned genius, wasted on a pointless, never-ending war with the rest of the world. Just think of all the good the Hulk could have done if only he had been capable of obeying his duty and conscience instead of his unquenchable rage.

“You don’t think he has anything to do with Wanda’s disappearance?” he asked.

Iron Man shook his head. He paced away from the fireplace, his heavy boots leaving deep impressions in the Persian carpet. As if to compensate, the Vision hovered weightlessly not far away, the soles of his feet barely grazing the floor.

“I doubt it,” Iron Man said. “There wasn’t enough damage at the museum. I mean, animated puppets? That’s hardly the Hulk’s M.O.” His futuristic armor looked out of place among the antique furnishings, and Cap noticed that the armored warrior took care not to brush against the Ming Dynasty vase resting atop the small lacquered end table beside him. “For another thing, he’s never had any particular grudge against Wanda. He’d quit the team long before she and her brother joined the Avengers, and before that she’d mostly fought the X-Men.”

“I can confirm,” the Vision stated, “that Wanda bore the Hulk no special animosity.” His immaterial body passed through a polished mahogany coffee table on his way to join Cap and Iron Man; the Vision was one person who never had to worry about breaking anything. “I cannot recall that we ever had a significant discussion on the subject of the Hulk during the years of our marriage.” He says that so coldly, Cap thought, struck by the syn-thezoid’s unemotional demeanor, so unlike the android Human Torch whom Cap had battled beside during World War II; that artificial man, constructed decades earlier, had possessed the same feelings as any other man or woman. By contrast, the Vision’s implacable calm hardly struck Cap as progress. Poor Wanda, he thought.

As team leader, Cap couldn’t be unaware of all the pain that the Scarlet Witch had endured during the dissolution of her marriage. Sometimes he wondered about the wisdom of keeping the estranged couple on the same team, although, to their credit, neither Wanda nor the Vision had ever let their personal difficulties interfere with the performance of their duties. All the more reason, he resolved, to use every resource at their disposal to recover Wanda safely; it was the least they could do for a valiant teammate who had always been willing to put her life on the line for the sake of the Avengers, America, and the world.

“We can rule out the Puppet Master, too,” Iron Man reported. “I got an e-mail from his niece a few minutes ago, confirming her uncle’s alibi. Seems she was with him this morning, around the same time Wanda was apparently abducted.”

Left unspoken was the grim possibility that the Scarlet Witch was no longer alive, but Cap refused to accept that she might have already paid the last full measure of devotion. As long as there’s hope, he vowed, the Avengers will never abandon one of their own.

“Even if the Hulk is innocent,” Iron Man added, “I wouldn’t mind a chance to ask Banner some pertinent questions about those traces of gamma radiation at the museum. I like to think that I’m a pretty savvy engineer, but I’m not ashamed to say that I’m stumped when it comes to figuring out how in the world you could use gamma rays to bring a bunch of puppets to life.”

“All available databases report that the Hulk’s whereabouts are presently unknown,” the Vision reminded them. Cap knew that the Vision remained in contact with the mansion’s ultra-sophisticated computer systems via a direct cybernetic link. “Every search engine is now engaged in searching for clues that might lead us to the Hulk, as are as many of our auxiliary members as I have been able to contact.”

That’s good to know, Cap thought, but was it enough? As Iron Man had so astutely pointed out, the Hulk’s connection to Wanda’s abduction was an extremely tenuous one, even if it was the only lead they had. Their lack of progress frustrated him. They also serve who only stand and wait, he knew, but it was hard to just cool their heels in the opulent comfort of Avengers Mansion when another team member was in jeopardy.

His resolute gaze drifted to another portrait, occupying a place of honor on the west wall of the reception room. The framed photograph depicted the second wave of Avengers, consisting of himself, Hawkeye the Archer, Quicksilver, and the Scarlet Witch.

Those were the days, Cap thought. It had been his privilege to sponsor and train both Wanda and her brother when they first resolved to turn their backs on their criminal pasts, and he had never had cause to regret his decision to give the homeless young mutants a second chance. That reminds me. I should probably try contacting Pietro again. Previous attempts to notify Quicksilver of his sister’s disappearance had proven useless; neither the Inhumans nor the Knights of Wundagore knew where Pietro could be found. Given the speed at which the superfast mutant traveled, he could be anywhere in the world at any given moment, making him a hard man to catch up with.

An electronic beep distracted Cap from his somber ruminations. He extracted his Avengers I.D. card from the flared cuff of his right glove. An emergency signal flashed upon the laminated card.

“It’s S.H.I.E.L.D.,” he announced to the other heroes. “A priority transmission.”

He aimed the card at the framed photo above the fireplace and clicked twice on the touch-sensitive card. The portrait slid to one side, gilded frame and all, revealing a largish monitor not unlike the one in their communications center upstairs; thanks to Tony Stark’s renovations, the venerable mansion was full of such hidden technological surprises. With another click, he transferred the incoming message to the screen above the mantle. For the second time that day, the Star-Spangled Avenger contemplated an over-sized close-up of Nick Fury’s grizzled features.

“Captain America here,” he addressed the screen. “What’s up, Nick? More about that UFO you mentioned before?” He would have preferred news of Wanda, but duty called.

Fury chomped down mercilessly upon a cigar. “Yeah, you might say we had a bit of a close encounter ourselves.” He had obviously seen recent action; a dark purple bruise discolored his unshaven chin while a fresh bandage was wrapped around his shoulder. “At approximately 2100 hours, Eastern Standard Time, the Helicarrier was attacked and boarded by the X-Men.”

The X-Men? Cap couldn’t believe his ears. Their unsavory reputation notwithstanding, he knew that the mutant heroes generally fought on the side of the angels. “Are you sure, Nick? I know the tabloids make them out to be the biggest threat this side of the Masters of Evil, but I’ve stood by them in the line of fire and I can tell you that their hearts are in the right place. The Beast even served as an Avenger once.”

“I know where you’re coming from, Cap,” Fury admitted, “but take a gander at some of this combat footage, captured by our own security cameras.”

Fury’s scowling visage surrendered the screen to chaotic images of desperate S.H.I.E.L.D. agents fighting back against brightly-costumed invaders wielding fire, ice, flying blades, and what looked like telekinesis. The pictures were several orders of magnitude clearer and more vivid than the security videotape Cap had watched earlier that day; obviously, S.H.I.E.L.D. could afford better equipment than the American Museum of Folk Art. Despite frequent gusts of flame and steam, Cap easily recognized the faces and distinctive uniforms of the intruders: Sunfire, Banshee, Archangel, Phoenix, and Iceman. All mutants, right enough, and all linked to the X-Men. Watching the footage, he could tell that the apparent X-Men were clearly on the offensive; he winced in sympathy as one of Archangel’s barbed feathers struck the Countess Valentina, rendering her unconscious. Moments later. Fury himself succumbed to the mutants’ onslaught; S.H.I.E.L.D.’s irascible director dropped face-first onto the floor of the Helicarrier, multiple flechettes jutting from his punctured body.

He went down fighting, Cap noted, impressed by any strike force that could overcome Fury' and his people on their own turf. He watched with growing concern as Banshee’s supersonic scream, which registered upon the videotape as an ear-piercing squeal, knocked a massive steel airlock off its hinges. The X-Men stormed over the fallen bodies of Fury and his people to enter what was clearly labeled as a top-security laboratory. What are they after? Cap wondered.

The security footage blanked out, replaced by a very unhappy Nick Fury. “It’s just as bad as it looks, maybe worse.” Having shared some of the darkest hours of World War II with Fury, Cap knew that the old war horse wasn’t prone to exaggeration. “Not only did we get our butts kicked, but your mutant buddies also absconded with some choice classified hardware, zipping away in their flying saucer before we knew what hit us. We figure it’s got some sort of stealth capacity, that’s how it got in past our defenses.”

“What kind of classified hardware got stolen?” Iron Man asked urgently, his metallic faceplate back in place. Cap recalled that Tony Stark had provided S.H.I.E.L.D. with much of its state-of-the-art technology. The thought of his own discoveries falling into the wrong hands surely preyed on the armored Avenger’s mind.

An uncomfortable look came over Fury’s face, like he didn’t much like the taste of the words in his mouth. “Well, that’s kind of a problem, actually. I can tell you already that you’re not going to like what I have to say.” “What is it, Nick?” Cap asked, puzzled by Fury’s visible reluctance to spit out the truth. He didn’t always approve of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s more clandestine operations, but he knew that Fury was a man of integrity, stuck in a dirtier job than Cap would have ever chosen for himself. I always want to give America’s officially-sanctioned defenders the benefit of the doubt, even though I’m sometimes disappointed by what our own leaders can stoop to.

Fury could not conceal his distaste for what he said next. “Turns out a handful of our resident science whiz-kids had just finishing assembling the prototypes for a new generation of Sentinels.”

The black sedan rolled through Westchester County, down tree-lined avenues that led toward the quiet suburban community of Salem Center, New York. Behind the wheel, Scott Summers resisted the temptation to put on the gas now that they were almost home. After the Beast’s narrow escape from the police, the last thing they needed was to be pulled over for speeding.

Impatience gnawed at him, however. For all they knew, Rogue could be in desperate straits at this very minute. He was anxious to get back to the Institute and continue the search for her. With any luck, Wolverine would have returned from his solitary roaming in time to help with the hunt; they might have need of his tracking skills.

I just hope Logan’s not slumming in Madripoor again, Cyclops thought. We might not see him for weeks.

If it was anybody else, Cyclops would never tolerate an X-Man going AWOL as often as Wolverine did, but he had learned from hard experience that there was little hope of getting Wolverine to change his ways, and the diminutive Canadian was too valuable an asset to the team to do without. Over the years, he had grudgingly come to accept Logan’s singular idiosyncrasies, just as the habitual loner had adjusted to being part of a team . .. sort of.

If necessary, we’ll have to make do without him, Cyclops decided. With or without Wolverine, there was no time to spare.

Keeping his foot firmly on the gas pedal and his eyes on the lonely road ahead, he called back to his companions. “Any luck?”

“Not yet, I’m afraid,” the Beast replied from the back seat. Scott heard Hank tapping away at the customized keyboard of his portable computer, handcrafted to accommodate the Beast’s gorilla-sized digits. “I’m searching the Internet for any new developments concerning Rogue, gamma radiation, or even the Hulk, but so far there’s been nothing worth noting, although I did stumble onto a couple of intriguing new scientific treatises that I’ve bookmarked for later study. Purely of academic interest, alas; nothing that points the way to our comrade’s safe recovery.”    :

“Didn’t I read something recently about the Hulk’s wife dying?” Cyclops asked. As team leader—well, coleader—he tried to stay abreast of current events in the superhuman community. You never knew when some obscure old villain might suddenly stage a comeback in your own backyard.

“Yes,” Hank said, his tone somewhat heavier than usual, “from an overdose of gamma radiation. There was considerable controversy over whether she could have been irradiated simply through prolonged contact with the Hulk.”    - . . -

“How tragic and unfortunate,” Ororo sympathized. The X-Men, too, had known their share of sorrow, and controversy as well. If anything, the Hulk got even worse press than they did.

“All the more reason to try to contact Banner,”

Cyclops declared. “If anybody can explain what the radiation on those shirts means, it’s him.’’ He steered onto a back road leading toward the Institute; no need to attract attention by driving through the town proper during the wee hours of the night. “I just hope he’s in a, well, approachable state if and when we find him. I don’t relish another run-in with the Hulk.”

Might be just as well that Ix>gan 's trekked out for parts unknown, he reflected. Wolverine and the Hulk had an adversarial relationship that dated back years, to way before Logan even joined the X-Men. Cyclops scowled at the thought; he didn’t want their search for Rogue to get derailed by yet another grudge match between the volatile Canadian and Banner’s monstrous alter ego.

“1 know what you mean,” Hank agreed. Strong as he was, the Beast was nowhere near the Hulk’s weight class. “Here’s hoping that Dr. Banner is not looking notably chartreuse when we come calling.”

First we need to find him, Cyclops remembered. With luck, that wouldn’t take long; there weren’t many places where a thousand-pound green monstrosity could avoid attracting attention. Unlike Scott Summers, Banner could not conceal his curse behind a simple pair of quartz glasses.

Besides being merely elegant in appearance, the luxurious limousine came equipped with all the latest features, including sophisticated night vision technology. An infrared heat sensor mounted in the front grill scanned the darkened road ahead for over five hundred yards, five times farther than the sedan’s headlights could reach, and projected a long-distance image onto a ten-inch screen above the steering wheel and just below the top of the dashboard. Consequently, he spotted the barricade well before it came within ordinary sight; on the photonegative screen, the blockage on the road registered as a long white cylinder, glowing warmly against a dark background.

A fallen tree, Cyclops wondered, or something more sinister?

“Eyes up, folks,” he urged his passengers as the limo slowed to a stop along the side of the road. It was probably nothing, Scott realized, but X-Men couldn’t afford to take chances. Too many of their enemies knew their home address, even if the world at large did not; an ambush was always a possibility.

He relaxed only slightly when the car’s high beams bounced off the gnarled trunk of an elderly maple tree. Judging from the fresh dirt coating the ruin’s exposed roots, the tree had crashed onto the road within the last few hours.

Just what we didn’t need, Cyclops thought impatiently. They had lost too much time driving back from the city already.

“Better step out while I handle this,” he advised the others; even if there was nothing amiss, he saw no reason why Hank and Ororo should remain sitting ducks within the car. He stepped from the car and walked along the side of the road until he was only a few feet away from the imposing wooden barricade. Gravel crunched beneath his feet and he heard both rear doors of the limo open and shut. A pondful of frogs croaked somewhere behind the remaining trees.

“Do you require assistance, Scott?” Ororo volunteered. A few well-placed lightning bolts, he knew, would clear the road quite effectively.

“No thanks,” he replied. Storm had already done her share back at the police station, airlifting the Beast away from those trigger-happy boys in blue. Time for him to pull his own weight on this expedition.

He glanced around to make sure no one was watching, but the silent woods appeared deserted nor were there any approaching headlights in either direction.

Perfect, he thought. Taking hold of his glasses with one hand, he carefully lifted the red-tinted shades off his nose.

It was like removing a dam from the mouth of a rushing river. Unchecked by the ruby quartz lenses, crimson energy poured out of his eyes, merging to form a single incandescent beam that raced toward the toppled maple at the speed of light. Raw power, beyond Cyclops’s conscious control, slammed into the tree trunk, reducing it to splinters. A violent crash violated the quiet serenity of the countryside, momentarily silencing the steady murmur of the frogs. Only fragments of the shattered obstacle remained upon the pavement.

“That should do it,” Scott said, lowering the glasses back onto his nose. He took a deep breath; although his mutant eyes tapped into a seemingly inexhaustible reservoir of extradimensional energy, he always felt slightly depleted after channeling that much power through his mortal flesh. He blinked rapidly behind the protective lenses; his eyes burned a bit, but it was nothing he hadn’t experienced hundred of times before. I wonder what’s harder on my system, providing a conduit for all that energy—or holding it back the rest of the time?

Thankfully, his eyes could be used for more conventional purposes as well. Cyclops scanned the empty stretch of road, half expecting Juggernaut or the Blob to come barreling out of the woods at any moment, but only the rustle of wind through the trees hinted at life behind the still nocturnal tableau. Apparently, the fallen tree had been just that, not the opening move in another unprovoked assault on the X-Men. Scott shrugged his shoulders.

Better safe than sorry, he thought.

“Okay, everyone, back into the car.” He bent over to pick up one of the larger pieces of the broken wood off the pavement, then flung it into the shadows. Slipping back into the driver’s seat, he was gratified to see that the Beast was already back at work on his laptop. At least somebody was getting work done while Scott played chauffeur. The limo pulled back onto the road and Scott mentally counted the miles remaining back to the Xavier Institute for Higher Learning.

“Voila!” the Beast exuberantly declared, only minutes after their trip resumed. ‘ ‘My humble hacking has borne fruit at last. CNN.com reports that an individual believed to be Dr. Robert Bruce Banner has been spotted at Niagara Falls, not far from the Canadian border.”

“Good work,” Cyclops said. Hank’s breakthrough was not enough, however, to remove the worried expression from his face; they were still a long way from locating their missing teammate. “Anything about Rogue?”

The Beast shook his bushy head. “Not a word.” His gaze bounced between Storm and Cyclops. “What now, o’ glorious co-leaders?”

Cyclops glanced at the dashboard clock. It was close to two in the morning. Niagara Falls was several hours away by car, but if they used the aircraft hangared beneath the Institute, they could be there before sunrise.

“What do you think?” he asked Storm, peeking at her pensive features in the rearview mirror. “The Blackbird?”

“My thoughts exactly,” she said.

Sentinels! Cap’s jaw dropped in dismay, much as he imagined Tony’s mouth must have fallen open beneath his gilded mask. / don’t believe it.

Sentinels, in whatever form, had to count as one of the U.S. government’s most shameful ideas: a species of powerful and implacable robot policemen specifically designed to track down and apprehend mutants. Mechanized discrimination ... he could scarcely imagine a more blatant violation of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. He had hoped that, after the last Sentinel-inspired orgy of strife and destruction, the whole pernicious notion had retired permanently.

But apparently not.

“Don’t give me that look,” Fury grumbled, spitting out his stogie in disgust. He stared down at the Avengers from the color monitor. “I don’t like this any better than you do. Mama Fury didn't raise no bigots.”

“Then how did S.H.I.E.L.D. end up in the business of manufacturing Sentinels?” Iron Man asked indignantly. No doubt he was wondering whether any classified Stark technology had gone into the construction of the new robots.

“I’d like to hear the answer to that myself,” Cap said. The government’s occasional efforts to pander to all the anti-mutant hysteria out there invariably reminded him of the relocation camps that Japanese-American citizens were herded into during the last big war. He had personally toured several of those camps, and it remained a lasting source of regret to him that he had never been able to persuade President Roosevelt and his advisors to reject that ignoble enterprise.

And now here we are, he thought, fifty years later and heading down that same sad road. As far as he was concerned, building Sendnels to round up mutants was no different from imprisoning innocent men, women, and children simply because of their ancestry.

“Blame bureaucracy in action,” Fury snorted. “After Senator Kelly shut down Bastion’s little witchhunt, the Sentinel development program was folded into S.H.I.E.L.D.’s larger robotics R&D department. I never cottoned onto what those busy little techies were up to because the whole project showed up on the budget as just specialized Life Model Decoys.”

Cap nodded, comprehending. S.H.I.E.L.D. frequently used artificial LMDs to impersonate both agents and adversaries, not to mention the occasional targets of assassination plots. There was a world of difference between LMDs and Sentinels, especially where their objectives were concerned, but he could see where the basic robotics technology would tend to overlap.

One man’s defense is another man’s weapon of destruction, he reflected. Even his own shield could be used for offensive purposes.

“I hate to point this out,” Iron Man commented, “but the existence of these new Sentinels gives the X-Men a plausible motive for attacking the Helicarrier. They could have seen it as a preemptive strike against a new antimutant crusade.”

Or maybe that’s what someone wants us to think, Cap considered. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time villains impersonated heroes to destroy the reputations of their enemies; less than a year ago, an alien Skrull had briefly taken Cap’s own place as part of a plot to deceive the American public. To my mind, the X-Men are innocent until proven guilty—just like any other citizens.

The Vision spoke up, his sepulchral voice practically lowering the temperature in the room. “Given that the express purpose of Sentinels is to apprehend mutants, perhaps there is some connection here to the unexplained disappearance of the Scarlet Witch.”

“Good point,” Captain America said. He tersely informed Fury of the circumstances surrounding Wanda’s abduction. “The only problem is that she was attacked by the puppets several hours before the prototype Sentinels were snatched from S.H.I.E.L.D. Still, I can’t help feeling in my gut that there’s a link between these two incidents. A missing mutant. Stolen Sentinels. It’s just too much of a coincidence.”

Iron Man raised another question. “You said these were a new type of Sentinels. What exactly was so special about them?”

Fury shrugged. He was a soldier, not a science whiz. “You’d have to ask the eggheads for the real nitty-gritty, but what they told me is that these tin woodsmen have gamma reactors for hearts. Supposed to make them a whole lot stronger than the last batch.”

“Gamma reactors?” Cap asked, incredulous. He exchanged meaningful glances with Iron Man and the Vision.

“You bet,” Fury confirmed. “More government restructuring—seems covert research into gamma weaponry got lumped in with this new Sentinels initiative as part of a campaign to simplify government spending. Blame A1 Gore.” He glanced down at notes or reports below the view of the screen. He paused for emphasis and Cap leaned forward, wanting to know all he could about what the Avengers might be running up against.

“That’s even what they called these blasted things,” Fury said ominously. “The Gamma Sentinels.”

A few hours before:

Close to a hundred thousand gallons a minute poured over the two great Falls at Niagara. Multicolored lights, projected from both the American and Canadian sides of the Falls, cast a brilliant radiance over the vast cascades of roaring water as they tumbled more than a hundred feet to the breakers below. Defying gravity, a constant spray of polychromatic mist rose from the rocky base of the American Falls, reaching all the way up to where awestruck spectators stood on the shore, looking out over the brink of the precipice, watching the Niagara river plunge furiously over the crests of the Falls with irresistible force.

Bruce Banner knew all about irresistible forces, having shared his life with one for over a decade now. The damp mist cooling his bearded face, he paused upon the lighted walkway running along the southern shore of the river and leaned against the guardrail. Preoccupied with other matters, Banner nonetheless spared a moment or two to take advantage of the spectacular view. Closest to him, the American Falls stretched over eight hundred feet across, while farther away, on the other side of Goat Island, the Canadian Horseshoe Falls, so named because of their distinctive shape, could be seen streaming down into a deep, mist-shrouded pool. The muted roar of the Falls filled his ears. People came from all over the world to witness the Falls, he reasoned, so he might as well take in the show while he could. And, to be perfectly honest with himself, he didn’t mind stalling a bit before facing the ordeal ahead.

I wonder if this is really such a good idea? he thought.

Newlyweds and other tourists strolled leisurely along the path, their hushed oohs and ahs barely audible over the crashing water. None of them took any heed of the solitary individual, clad in a navy blue windbreaker and faded purple jeans, leaning upon the rail. Unlike his alternate persona, Banner was of average build and unexceptional appearance. A cheap box of hair coloring, purchased only hours before at a local drug store and applied at a convenient public restroom, had lightened his customarily brown hair to bleached blond. Only the haunted look of his eyes, and the weary shadows beneath them, distinguished him from the gaily-chattering vacationers also visiting the Falls tonight. That and the fact that he was conspicuously alone.

Taking one last look at the breathtaking magnificence of the American Falls, Banner sighed and pushed away from the rail. Time to get it over with, he decided as he continued on toward the Rainbow Bridge farther on down the river, past the Falls. Getting past Customs was going to be tricky, but, all his doubts notwithstanding, he didn’t have any better options. With General Ross and his Hulk-busters back on the warpath, now struck him as an ideal time to get out of the country for a while; God willing, Ross’s battalions wouldn’t be so gung-ho as to pursue him beyond the Canadian border, which might at least buy him a little time to figure out what to do next.

The longer they leave me alone, he mused, the longer / may be able to keep the Hulk under control.

Sometimes that was the most he could hope for.

The American customs station was far from impressive, being basically a one-story aluminum shack flanked by a wire fence to keep people from skipping around it on their way to the bridge; it looked like a temporary shelter intended to make do until the real station was built, but Banner remembered it looking much the same the last time he passed through. Not exactly a triumph of public architecture; he’d seen DMVs with more grandeur and gravitas. Impressing visiting Canadians, it seemed, was low on the federal government’s list of priorities.

He trudged up the wooden steps to the front door, doing his best to affect a jaunty, carefree attitude. Just another tourist out for an evening excursion, he thought. Nothing suspicious here, nope, not at all. He wished he was really as confident as he hoped he looked, and that his heart wasn’t racing so fast. Maybe he should have bought some false glasses as well, to go along with the dyed hair. His baggy purple jeans, held up by a cheap leather belt, were several sizes too big, just in case.

A bored-looking customs official, seated behind a desk to Banner's right, waved him on. Apparently, you didn’t get the third-degree until you tried to get into the country. Breathing a sigh of relief, he exited the shack at the rear and stepped onto the pedestrian walkway on the Rainbow Bridge. Traffic across the bridge was light; only a few stray vehicles drove past him. A hundred-some feet below, the coursing river continued on its way to the Whirlpool further north. Banner would have been more impressed had he not once beheld another Rainbow Bridge, the one that stretched across the heavens to fabled Asgard, home of the mighty Norse Gods.

Now that was a bridge, Banner thought. If nothing else, his tumultuous career as the Hulk’s saner half had taken him to some interesting places. Meager consolation, perhaps, for a life spent on the run.

It was perhaps a reflection of some deep-rooted national inferiority complex that the Canadian customs station, at the opposite end of the bridge, was as opulent and imposing as the American station was minimalist. Surrounded by impeccably landscaped gardens, the white marble facade looked like it should house the sacred remains of some historic figure instead of what was basically an ornate tollbooth; it was like going from a low-rent mobile home to the palace at Versailles. Taking a deep breath to steady his nerves, Banner opened the door to let a party of Norwegian tourists through, then stepped inside.

Easy does it, he cautioned himself. Just another tourist, remember?

The Canadian border guard, a big man with a stem expression, looked Banner over more thoroughly than his Yankee counterpart. “Purpose of visit?”

“Checking out the sights,” Banner said casually. He considered shrugging, but decided that might be pushing it. “I hear there’s a pretty good view from this side.”

“Uh-huh,” the Mountie granted. The name on his badge read craigie; Banner assumed that was his surname. The guard glanced at the clock over the door. “Kind of late,” he commented.

Banner’s mouth went dry and he fought an urge to gulp. “Don't tell me the Falls close at midnight,” he said with a smile, trying to make it sound like a joke. He jammed both hands into the pockets of his windbreaker to keep them from fidgeting nervously.

Let it go, he silently begged the Mountie. Don’t make me get too upset—or I might not be responsible for what happens.

“Just saying it’s late,” Officer Craigie said, not cracking a smile. He eyed Banner suspiciously, his gaze intermittently dropping down to inspect something below the edge of the counter. A wanted poster, Banner fretted, or some sort of alert? Beneath his jacket and calm exterior, sweat began to soak through his cotton shirt, gluing the fabric to his back. “May I see your passport, sir?”

Something’s wrong. Banner was convinced of it. He glanced back over his shoulder, hoping to see more travelers approaching. Maybe a line of impatient tourists would speed the process up, but, no, he was on his own. The Mountie held out his hand, waiting for the passport while Banner fumbled around in his pockets. I should have waited until morning, the fugitive scientist castigated himself, when there was more of a crowd.

It was too late to back out now, though, not with this overeager Mountie already watching him like he was the second coming of A1 Capone.

“Here they are, officer,” Banner said, handing Craigie the phony papers he had bought in Times Square with nearly the last of his hard cash. They had looked convincing to him, but what did he know? I’m a nuclear physicist, blast it, not an international smuggler.

The border guard inspected the fake passport longer than Banner liked. Long, sweaty seconds ticked by.

“Is there something the matter, officer?” he asked. He probably should have kept quiet, he realized, but maintaining the semblance of calm was rapidly turning into a losing battle. His heart pounded in his chest, raising the terrifying prospect of an unplanned and very unwanted transformation.

No, not now, Banner prayed, even as a dozen familiar sensations alerted him to the change commencing within his body. His skin felt raw and exposed, stretched tightly over rebellious, rippling muscles, and burning as if being roasted from within by a tremendous inner heat. His teeth and gums tingled while an angry pulse started throbbing behind his eyes. His breathing grew shallow at the same time that his lungs expanded against his ribcage. The collar of his shirt felt tight around his neck, choking him. His belt dug into his waist and too-small shoes squeezed his feet. Not now, he wished fervently. Anything but this. He stared at his hands in alarm. Was he only imagining it, or was his skin already starting to take on a greenish tint?

Maybe it wasn’t too late to halt the metamorphosis! He tried counting backwards from one hundred, in hopes of calming his agitated nervous, but it was growing harder and harder to think clearly. Counting back, he never got further than ninety before losing count and having to start over again. The very nature of his thoughts seemed to be changing, growing thicker and harsher and more elemental. How dare this puny human soldier interfere with him anyway? And why did he want to stop the change? Banner had obviously failed. He had been too weak again, as usual. Banner was always too weak.

“Sorry, sir,” the Mountie said, still squinting at the forged passport, “but I’m afraid you’re going to have to come with—”

Officer Craigie’s stem declaration fell silent as he looked up from the papers in his hand to the man he meant to detain. His jaw fell open in astonishment, nothing he might or might not have read about the stranger preparing him for the shocking and grotesque sight before him.

Less than a foot away, Banner was changing into ... something else. His light brown beard shrunk into his face as his head expanded outward, the features of his face melting and reforming into a visage far more brutish and inhuman, the nose a flattened snout above a mouthful of large, jutting teeth. Pale pink skin darkened to an unnatural shade of yellowish green. Dark pea-green hair spread like fresh grass through the faux blond hair until only a shaggy, emerald mop remained atop an immense, box-like skull. Banner’s eyes receded beneath heavy, hanging brows so that only a pair of glinting emerald marbles could be seen where his haunted brown eyes had been.

“Ohmigod,” Craigie exclaimed, his eyes wide. He backed away from the counter, his ruddy face going pale. “It really is you. It’s actually happening!”

Agonized grunts and gasps escaped from Banner as his entire body rebuilt itself with frightening speed. Mundane clothing came apart at the seams, exposing bulging green flesh that ripped through fragile garments that were suddenly many sizes too small. The blue windbreaker was tom into shreds, along with the plain white shirt underneath; both hung in ribbons from impossibly broad shoulders. Immense green feet pushed their way free from the sneakers that tried unsuccessfully to confine them, leaving scraps of rubber soles and broken shoelaces upon the floor. Only the worn violet trousers, deliberately purchased to accommodate Banner’s increasing dimensions, hung together, even though the cheap belt snapped like a rubber band stretched too far.

Hunched over in pain, clutching his head in his hands, Banner’s posture partially concealed the full extent of his transformation.

Stop it! he thought desperately, already forgetting why as another personality subsumed his own, forcing its way into his thoughts like a rampaging invader from the darkest depths of his unconscious mind and shoving his own hopes and fears into some desolate psychological limbo. Anxiety gave way to defiance—and a seething sense of anger at the entire world.

Stop it? Stop who? Nobody stops the Hulk!

With a deep, full-throated roar, a colossal green ogre, nearly three meters tall, raised his monstrous head high and shook fists the size of anvils. The last tatters of his shirt and jacket fell off his massive frame, to be trampled beneath Sasquatch-sized feet. His hairless chartreuse chest was at least a meter across and looked constructed of solid muscle. Disordered, emerald hair scraped the ceiling as the Hulk rose to his full height, towering over the flabbergasted border guard, who stammered incoherently and reached for his revolver. Banner’s ersatz passport slipped from the Mountie’s fingers, fluttering unnoticed to the floor.

Sergeant Cameron Craigie considered himself a large man and a tough customer, fully capable of handling himself in a tight spot, but the genuinely incredible Hulk would have dwarfed even the most steroid-enhanced bodybuilder. His looming shadow eclipsed the guard. Photos and film clips of the legendary monster, which Craigie had occasionally seen on the news, had failed to fully convey just how intimidating the Hulk was in the flesh.

I don’t believe it, Craigie thought, part of him sincerely wishing that he had never recognized Dr. Banner from the fax pinned behind the counter. Just look at him. Even his muscles have muscles!

The Hulk’s head swung slowly atop a neck that looked as squat and wide as a fireplug. Beady green eyes swept the customs station, as if he were newly orienting himself to his surroundings. A thuggish sneer suggested he didn’t like what he saw, not that he looked terribly worried about anything.

“Hmmph!” he granted. Without giving Craigie a second glance, he took one enormous step toward the exit, leaving the remains of his wrecked garments and footwear behind him. His heavy tread shook the floor.

“H-hold it,” Craigie ordered, an atypical quaver in his command. He barely recognized his own voice. Just my luck somebody spotted him in town earlier, he thought. Nervously, he raised his gun and aimed it right at the back of the Hulk’s head. “Stop or I’ll shoot.”

With ominous indifference, the Hulk turned his head and eyed the Mountie balefully. Bushy green eyebrows met above his nose. Hostile green eyes narrowed ominously. “Go ahead,” he rumbled in a deep baritone that made James Earl Jones sound like a castrato. “Try it.” “Just stay where you are,” Craigie insisted, backing farther away from the gargantuan monstrosity. His gaze darted quickly to the phone on the desk behind the counter. If he could just call for help, maybe someone could send an army or two to deal with the Hulk.

Yeah, he thought, let the Yanks handle it. They’re the ones who wanted him caught. He inched closer to the phone, keeping the Hulk safely between his sights. Just because the bloody brute was as big as house didn’t mean that he was bulletproof, right? Heck, at close range, he was practically impossible to miss!

“Don’t go anywhere,” he warned, his voice sounding a trifle more confident this time. “I’ll fire if I have to.” “So what?” the Hulk grunted, a smirk upon his prehistoric features. Without warning, he spun around and brought down a heavy fist to crash against the counter. The blow shattered both the counter and the desk as well, leaving nothing but a pile of splintered debris between Craigie and the Hulk. Echoes of the deafening impact hung in the air, and the Mountie almost forgot to breathe. He staggered backwards, barely managing to hang onto his revolver. Suddenly, he wished devoutly that he had never heard of Bruce Banner.

The Hulk snarled, baring enormous incisors, and Craigie feared for his life. The Hulk’s thunderous footsteps rattled the floor as he stepped toward the Mountie. Craigie squeezed the trigger and fired three times, only to watch in dismay as the bullets bounced harmlessly off the Hulk’s bare chest, ricocheting around the room. Panicked, Craigie ducked his head, hearing glass and plaster explode as the deflected bullets wreaked havoc on the walls and furnishings. A framed photo of the Prime Minister crashed to the floor, symbolically assassinated by a stray shot.

Please, Craigie prayed, let me get out of this alive and I’ll never hassle another tourist again!

“Give me that!” the Hulk bellowed. He snatched the smoking gun from the guard’s quaking hand and fumbled with it awkwardly. The blue steel service revolver looked like a toy in the Hulk’s massive grip. For a second, Craigie thought that the Hulk was going to shoot him with his own gun, then the looming green-skinned titan raised the gun over bis left shoulder, pointing the muzzle between his own oar-sized shoulderblades. Unable to stick a meaty finger past the trigger guard, the Hulk simply squeezed the entire grip so hard that it collapsed into a flattened wad of metal at the same moment that gunpowder ignited, blasting live ammo at the Hulk’s spine.

“Ah,” he rasped in satisfaction, acrid wisps of smoke rising from his clenched fist. “The only way to scratch those hard-to-reach spots. Thanks a heap,” he said disdainfully, tossing the crumpled revolver at Craigie’s feet.

“You’re welcome,” the border guard whimpered weakly, but the Hulk wasn’t listening. Turning his back on Craigie, and ignoring the clearly-posted exit sign, the Hulk walked straight through the solid stone wall across from the smashed counter, leaving a three-meter tall, one-meter wide hole that opened onto the previously tranquil garden outside. Fallen chunks of marble and concrete were crushed to powder beneath the Hulk’s bare feet as he casually brushed a layer of dust and plaster from his shoulders. Screams of panic erupted outside as dozens of startled tourists witnessed the Hulk’s first steps onto Canadian soil.

Nerves frayed almost to the breaking point, every muscle quivering, Sergeant Craigie got down on his hands and started rooting around in the ruins of his office. Through the newly-created door in front of him, he heard the Hulk stomp through the landscaped garden, to the accompaniment of frightened shouting.

Help, he thought numbly. We need help. Lots of help.

He knew there had to be a phone buried somewhere in the rubble.

By the time the X-Men arrived on the scene, the Hulk’s arrival at Niagara had become a full-fledged media event. Competing news helicopters circled overhead, jockeying for the best perspectives on the telegenic crisis. Both the American and Canadian armies lined their respective shores, holding back crowds of excited onlookers and scoop-hungry reporters. The nightly light show had been replaced by glaring spotlights, all focused on the wooded island between the Falls, where the rampaging Hulk roared his defiance.

“Leave me alone!” he shouted, his huge feet planted on the northern tip of the island, facing the Falls. He pounded his fists against his chest. “Get outta my sight or you’ll be looking at one less national landmark!” Viewing the chaos from a video monitor in the cockpit of the Blackbird, Storm felt her spirits sag. “It is far more ... public ... than I would have preferred,” she commented.

The Blackbird, a sleek black aircraft equipped with the finest in stealth technology, closed on Niagara. Cyclops manned the helm, no doubt watching carefully for the copters occupying the airspace ahead. To the east, Storm glimpsed the first rosy hints of dawn and held back a yawn. By car or by plane, they had been traveling all night in their thus-far fruitless search for Rogue. She rubbed her tired eyes. Lack of sleep did nothing to ease her anxiety. How can we possibly confer with Banner under such volatile circumstances?

“That’s why we wear masks,” Cyclops stated. He took another look at Storm and the Beast. Like Cyclops, they had shed their civilian garb for their X-Men uniforms, but only Scott’s face was covered by his costume; specifically, by his polished gold visor. The Beast, in fact, was wearing nothing more than a pair of black shorts and his own furry pelt. “Well, some of us do. In any case, we might not get a better chance. If the military actually manage to apprehend the Hulk, there’s no way they’re letting us anywhere near him.”

“Perhaps,” the Beast suggested, peering over Storm’s shoulder at the television footage, “our favorite gamma-spawned gargantua might appreciate a timely lift at this particular juncture?”

“Perhaps,” Storm agreed. Aiding and abetting the

Hulk in an escape from the authorities would hardly help the X-Men’s embattled reputation, but, realistically, they had very little to lose in that regard. And it might make the Hulk more inclined to assist them in their quest. “What do you think, Scott?”

Cyclops kept his golden visor fixed on the Blackbird’s instrumentation. “Let’s go for it—if we can get the Hulk to cooperate.”

That, Storm knew, was a very big if. Compared to the Hulk, Wolverine was a gentle pacifist. She leaned back into the passenger seat and closed her eyes, the better to concentrate her powers. “I believe a degree of cloud cover may help ensure a measure of privacy.”

At her command, a heavy fog abruptly rose from the river below, blanketing the small island entirely and shielding the Hulk from curious eyes. Forced to retreat by the instant lack of visibility, the news copters turned their floodlights on the roiling mist, but their beams failed to penetrate the dense gray fog, as did the powerful searchlights upon the shore. The mist crouched atop the island like a living entity.

Shrouded by the mist, the Blackbird touched down on Goat Island, executing a pinpoint VTOL descent onto a wide stretch of paved roadway near the center of the island.

“Hurry,” Storm urged her teammates as they vacated the plane. “The conditions here are conducive to fog, but I cannot sustain such an opaque atmosphere indefinitely.” Even now she could feel the early morning breeze attempting to dissipate her fog; it required conscious effort on her part to redirect the winds around the island.

They rushed through the forest, Cyclops in the lead, clearing a path through the brush with his eyebeams, whose incandescent glow also provided a beacon to follow through the clammy mist and shadows that made the woods a murky tangle of flailing branches and clotted undergrowth. Storm almost tripped more than once, her heels sinking into the mossy loam, but managed to maintain a steady pace that still fell far short of the Beast’s rapid progress through the branches overhead. He swung nimbly from trees, as much in his element now as Storm would have been soaring above the clouds.

To each his own, she thought.

Her rough trek neared its end as she saw the densely planted trees begin to thin out ahead. Beyond the obedient fog, she sensed the newborn sun rising above the horizon, casting its warmth upon the early morning hours. Cyclops shut off his beam, their way now clear, only to drop speedily to the forest floor, surprising Storm.

“Watch out!” he warned her, flattening himself against the damp, dewy earth.

Storm glimpsed a full-sized tree swinging toward her like a club and took to the air. A hasty gust of wind carried her aloft, safely above the uprooted spruce tree that swung in a wide arc through the very space that she and Cyclops had occupied only a moment before. The branch-strewn log whooshed beneath her and over Cyclops’s prostrate form.

“Holy moley!” the Beast exclaimed from his vantage point in a nearby bough. “Where in the name of Paul Bunyan did that come from?”

The answer emerged from the fog, still clutching the base of the spruce in one capacious fist.

“Thought you could sneak up on me, didya?” the Hulk thundered savagely. Green eyes squinted through the haze, fixing on Storm and the others. “Well, well. If it isn’t the world’s most famous mutant misfits.” He tapped his leafy cudgel upon the ground threateningly, not far from where Cyclops cautiously rose to his feet, his visor at the ready. “Where’s that sawed-off Canuck, Wolverine?” The Hulk sneered at Cyclops, seemingly unafraid of the X-Man’s potent eyebeams. “He’s the only one in your bunch worth brawlin’ with.”

“Believe it or not, Hulk,” Storm declared, “we are here to help you.” A tamed breeze swelled the cloth wings beneath her arms as she gracefully descended to earth. I had forgotten quite how large he is, she thought, contemplating the Hulk’s tremendous physique. Not even the Juggernaut was as imposing in his proportions, nor as grotesque in countenance.

“Who asked you?” the Hulk growled. His manners were comparable to Cain Marko’s as well, it seemed. He peered about him suspiciously, an idea forming within his misshapen skull. “You responsible for this pea soup muck, weather girl?” he asked her, sweeping his free hand through the fog.

Although still worshipped as a goddess in parts of Africa, Ororo chose to ignore the Hulk’s disrespect. The savage creature could not help his lack of common courtesy, or so she decided to assume. “I had thought that you might appreciate the seclusion,” she explained. “Free from prying eyes.”

He threw the uprooted tree to the ground with surprising force, startling Storm with his sudden fury.

“You thought I needed to hide? From a coupla wimpy armies?” Indignation distorted his already primeval features. Titanic muscles flexed along prodigious arms, the veins standing out like heavy cables. “Listen to me,

X-Lady, and listen good. The Hulk don’t hide from nobody!”

Two gigantic hands slammed together, producing a shock wave that tore apart her carefully constructed fog bank like a child’s birthday candle blown out in a single huff. The congealed mist blew off the island, propelled by a hurricane-strength force that also sent Storm and Cyclops tumbling backward, somersaulting out of control through the brush while the Beast hung onto to a sheltering tree trunk with both hands, flapping like a furry blue flag above the forest floor. Branches and brambles whipped past Storm, but more than the physical impact buffeted her; a portion of her consciousness had been intertwined with the foggy atmosphere she had fostered, and the violent disruption of her creation sent a psychic shock through her mind that left her dazed and speechless.

Goddess! she thought, ending up sprawled upon the ground, dozens of tiny scratches and scrapes stinging her skin, her brain aching from the neurological trauma. Cyclops groaned nearby, but she lacked the strength to lift her head right at this moment. He’s like a force of nature all his own.

“That’s more like it,” the Hulk grunted, placing his hands upon his hips. His cataclysmic clap had cleared all the foliage from a spit of land at the northern tip of the land, exposing him further to the armed forces mustered on both sides of the Falls, as well as to the hovering news copters. The Hulk clearly couldn’t care less; beneath the bright morning sun, surrounded by a stretch of blasted earth, he roared a challenge to all within earshot.

And then the Avengers arrived.

“The Hulk—and the X-Men? This can’t be a coincidence,” Iron Man blurted through his metal mask. “Gamma rays. Gamma Sentinels. And now this.” His automatic vocalizer amplified his voice, making him easily audible over the roar of both the Hulk and the Falls. The motile metal of his gilded faceplate allowed a semblance of his grim expression to come through the mask. “I don’t know about you, Cap, but from where I’m standing two plus two sure doesn’t equal an innocent misunderstanding.”

“I concur,” the Vision intoned. “According to my computations, there is a 98.76 percent probability that this incident is related to Wanda’s disappearance.”

The trio of Avengers had taken a position upon the Robert Moss Parkway, overlooking the American Falls. Their Avengers Quinjet, designed by Tony Stark, was parked at Niagara Falls airport, a few miles away. A brigade of U.S. soldiers, led by their commanding officer, Colonel Arturo Lopez, shared the parkway with the newly-arrived heroes. The colonel himself looked more than a little relieved that Captain America had shown up to take charge of the crisis.

“Confound it,” he shouted into a handheld walkie-talkie, close enough for Cap and the other Avengers to hear. “Somebody get those news choppers out of there. Threaten to revoke their FCC licenses if you have to, but clear that airspace!”

Shaking his head angrily, he handed Cap a pair of field binoculars that Cap used to scope out the situation. The Hulk’s bestial visage came sharply into focus, looking more savage than ever. At least two of the X-Men were down on the ground, looking like they’d experienced the Hulk’s infamously bad temper firsthand. Cyclops recovered first, and hurried to check on Storm, who appeared somewhat worse off, perhaps in a state of shock. He was quickly joined by the Beast, who dropped from the tree-tops onto the rocky soil. Cap wished he could hear whatever the Hulk and the X-Men might be saying to each other. That way he might feel a little less in the dark.

“I don’t know,” he said cautiously, lowering the binoculars. His unbreakable shield was strapped to his back, just as ready as Iron Man and the Vision, who stood nearby, awaiting his instructions. As immobile as a statue, the synthezoid kept his unblinking eyes fixed on the Hulk while Iron Man listened to Cap confer with the colonel. “Let’s not rush into anything before we get our facts straight.” It was practically a tradition for costumed heroes to bump heads whenever their paths crossed, with the X-Men and the Avengers being no exception, but Cap saw no reason to let this stand-off devolve into an out-and-out free-for-all if there was any way to prevent it. He handed the binoculars back to Lopez. ‘ ‘Tell your soldiers not to fire except in self-defense.”

“I understand,” the colonel said. His lean, prematurely furrowed face was grave. “I have my orders, though. Not only has General Ross ordered me by telephone to engage the Hulk, but the X-Men are also wanted for an attack upon a high-security government installation. I cannot allow them to escape without making some effort to take them into custody.”

“Perhaps I can persuade them to turn themselves in for questioning,” Cap suggested. Despite the Sentinel connection, and the X-Men’s surprising appearance alongside the Hulk, he was not convinced of the mutants’ guilt where the assault on S.H.I.E.L.D. was concerned. There was something fishy about everything that had happened

since the Scarlet Witch was abducted from the museum.

Maybe if we all work together, he thought, we can get to the bottom of this. If nothing else, he knew he could count on the Beast to cooperate—if that really was Hank McCoy on the island.

“I can hold off for a while longer,” Lopez admitted. He peered through his binoculars at the drama unfolding at the once-wooded tip of the isle, where the Hulk still faced off against Cyclops and his team. “I’m in no hurry to throw my troops up against those freaks and their powers.” He shook his head, scowling. “Give me a good natural disaster or bomb scare any day.”

“Thank you, Colonel,” Cap said sincerely. With luck, the Canadian troops across the river would show the same restraint. He turned to Iron Man and saw his own face reflected in the sheen of the golden Avenger’s helmet. “Iron Man, can you amplify my voice so that the Hulk can hear me over there? I want to try to reason with him.” “Are we thinking of the same Hulk?” Iron Man said dubiously. Cap knew what he meant; the Hulk was hardly the most reasonable of individuals.

“Worth a try,” Captain America said. Before resorting to force, he always made sure that all peaceful avenues had been explored; that was the American way.

“We are losing valuable time,” the Vision announced brusquely. The soles of his canary-yellow boots began to lift off the pavement as he made his artificial body lighter than air and assumed a more aerodynamic posture, arms stretched out in front of him as though he was merely diving upward into the sky. His cape rustled softly in the wind as he wafted away from the parkway, toward the Falls. “I will confront the Hulk,” he stated.

“Stand down, Vision,” Cap ordered firmly before the synthezoid could put too much distance between them. The Vision’s impatience and impulsiveness surprised Cap; it wasn’t like him to jump the gun like this. Maybe he’s more worried about Wanda than he lets on, he surmised. The Vision paused in midair, his saffron cloak billowing around him, then reluctantly returned to the side of his fellow Avengers, but not without a lingering glance over his shoulder at the Hulk’s island refuge. His waxen expression never changed.

“Here, Cap.” Iron Man removed a capsule-shaped component from the neckpiece of his armor. His voice suddenly acquired a more human, less amplified tone. “Just speak into this.”

The miniature mike fit easily into Cap’s palm. Raising the mechanism to his lips, he addressed the distant green giant. “Hulk, this is Captain America. I know we’ve had our differences in the past, but there’s no need to make things any worse. From one Avenger to another, I promise you that we just want to talk to you and the X-Men. Give me a chance to straighten things out.”

Hoping for the best, he lowered the mike and waited expectantly. “You really think you can get through to him?” Iron Man asked skeptically. “I doubt that old Avengers ties cany much weight where the Hulk is concerned.”

Confirming Iron Man’s worst expectations, the Hulk responded by digging his hands into the soil of Goat Island and tearing out a large, gray boulder the size of a washing machine. Raising the colossal rock above his head, he hurled the boulder at the shore, sending it soaring over the entire width of the American Falls, nearly clipping the propellers of one of the buzzing TV choppers.

“Watch out!” Captain America warned Lopez and his soldiers. “Incoming!”

The rock came whistling at them, descending in an arc from the sky above. Snatching his shield off his back, Cap raised it above him and braced himself for the impact. Iron Man had another idea. Bright orange repulsor beams issued from his metal gauntlets, twin streams of accelerated neutrons pulverizing the boulder only instants before it crashed down upon Cap and the others. Bits of stony debris rained down on Cap instead, deflected by his upraised shield.

So much for peaceful negotiations, Iron Man thought. The Hulk was clearly in no mood to talk.

The unprovoked attack was the spark that set off a wildfire of retaliation, and drove the intrusive helicopters away from the Falls. Artillery fired on both sides of the river, all targeted at the berserk, green-skinned monster on the island. The unleashed firepower was deafening; romantic Niagara, the honeymoon capital of the U.S.A., suddenly sounded like Omaha Beach on D-Day. The smell of gunpowder filled the air, along with the rat-ta-tat-tat of machine guns. Neither the Canadian nor the Americans, it was obvious, intended to give the Hulk a chance to launch another projectile assault. Cap couldn’t much blame them.

Unfortunately, their efforts generated more sound and fury than results. Missiles and automatic weapons fire exploded all around the Hulk, raising clouds of dust and smoke, but leaving him entirely unscathed. Rockets detonated against his chest, and the indestructible behemoth merely bared his teeth and shook his fists at the armed forces doing their best to destroy him. He broke off another chunk of island and catapulted it into the air, this time at the Canadian forces assembled on the other side of the Horseshoe Falls. With no Iron Man to defend them, the flying boulder smashed into the armored chassis of a tank, smashing the gun turret to a pulp while nearby soldiers ran for cover.

Hopefully, nobody in the tank got hurt, Cap thought. But it was only a matter of time before someone was seriously injured or worse.

The X-Men were also under siege from both armies. Cyclops’s ocular energy beams swept in a wide swath, shielding his comrades from the deadly fusillade while the Beast helped the stricken Storm limp toward the partial safety of the beckoning woods. Was he trying to defend the Hulk as well? Captain America couldn’t tell. The crimson beams, similar in effect to Iron Man’s repulsor rays, blocked whatever firepower came their way.

Almost. As the Beast pulled away from his visored leader, one hairy blue arm supporting Storm, an errant shell detonated less than a yard away from him. The Beast took the brunt of the blast, sparing Storm, but the shock wave slammed the one-time Avenger into the base of an old maple so hard that the tree crashed down on top of him, pinning the agile mutant to the ground.

Watching from the shore, Cap was distressed to see the Beast lying immobile beneath the downed tree. Was he just unconscious or. . . ?

“Blast it!” Captain America exclaimed, his words lost in the din of the battle. “This is just what I didn’t want!”

The Vision gave Captain America a questioning look. The Captain nodded solemnly, and, without a word, the Vision launched silently off the parkway once more, leaving Captain America and Iron Man to defend the American troops as best they could. The artificial Avenger flew over the Falls, rockets and live ammunition passing harmlessly through his intangible body.

A curious urgency compelled him. The prospect of engaging the Hulk in combat seemed vastly preferable to continued inaction, especially while the Scarlet Witch remained unaccounted for. It was only logical, of course, to desire the safe return of a valued team member, but was that the only source of such uncharacteristic haste? A rigorous self-diagnostic could not ignore the potentially significant factor that the Avenger at risk in this instance was, as a matter of biographical record, his former wife.

Wanda. His emotional responses were not what they once were, having suffered significant degradation over the course of various episodes of major repair and reconstruction, but he could not rule out the possibility that some residual subroutines, left over from an earlier generation of himself, might still linger in his software, lending additional impetus to his current priorities. Wanda is in danger. Wanda.

An intriguing hypothesis, but now was the not the time for further introspection. The Hulk loomed before him, glaring at the Vision’s spectral form with unconcealed antagonism as the synthezoid descended from the sky by minutely increasing his mass. The Vision’s plastic face was as impassive in appearance as the Hulk’s was fierce.

“Do not attempt to resist, Hulk,” he warned. “Willingly or not, you will answer our questions.”

“Questions?” the Hulk echoed. For a moment, he looked more puzzled than aggrieved, as though unable to imagine what manner of questions the Avenger might have for him, then his customary belligerence returned. A contemptuous sneer further marred the aesthetic of his primordial features. “What do I look like, an information booth?”

It was difficult to comprehend the Hulk’s words over the cacophonous tumult of the military armaments deployed against him, so the Vision adjusted the sensitivity of his auditory receptors, filtering out a statistically significant portion of the explosive background noise. His boots touched down lightly upon the soil of Goat Island, directly in front of the Hulk. The green-skinned goliath towered over the slender synthezoid by more than a head, but the Vision was undaunted; as long as he remained intangible, the Hulk’s physical strength, however formidable, could not touch him.

The Vision glanced quickly to the left, ascertaining the current status of the X-Men. Captain America would want to interrogate the mutant adventurers as well, he knew, but they did not appear to be in danger of escaping in the immediate future; Cyclops remained fully occupied by the task of fending off the barrage from the two armies while the Beast and Storm had not yet recovered from previous injuries. I will deal with them shortly, he resolved, giving the Hulk his full attention.

‘ ‘I require data, Hulk, which either you or Dr. Banner may be able to provide. What do you know of the Gamma Sentinels and/or the abduction of Wanda Maximoff, also known as the Scarlet Witch?”

“Don’t talk to me about Banner!” the Hulk snarled, saliva spraying from his prognathous jaws. He tried to bat the Vision away with the back of his hand, but the slap passed through the synthezoid as if he wasn’t there. The Hulk glared at his own splayed fingers with open annoyance.

“I am waiting for your answers,” the Vision said with 1 9 1

implacable calm. His arms were crossed below the yellow diamond symbol on his chest. His boots left no impression in the ground below. ¹ ‘Will you surrender them voluntarily, or will I be forced to resort to physical coercion?” The amber gem embedded in his crimson forehead started to glow forbiddingly.

“Don’t pull your spooky act on me, robot!” the Hulk growled. He walked straight through the Vision, effectively leaving them back-to-back instead of face-to-face. “Get real enough to fight, or leave me alone.” He strode arrogantly across the tiny spit of land, not giving the Vision so much as a single backwards glance.

But the artificial Avenger declined to be dismissed. Turning his head, he tapped into the solar energy absorbed by the amber jewel and redirected it out through the projective lenses in his eyes. Red-hot thermoscopic beams streaked toward the Hulk, intersecting at the base of his neck. For a nanosecond, the chartreuse flesh turned red and raw, before the Hulk’s legendary invulnerability asserted itself, restoring the damaged skin to a healthy green hue. With the sun now shining brightly overhead, however, the Vision kept up the bombardment of concentrated photons, his gaze literally burning into the back of the Hulk’s neck.

It was enough to make the Hulk slap a Brobdingnagian paw over the afflicted area.

“What the—!” he exclaimed, than yanked his huge mitt away in a hurry as the Vision’s thermoscopic vision seared the back of his hand, which healed almost instantly. “Cute,” he said sourly, giving the Vision a dirty look, “but you’re goin’ to have to do better than that.”

Before the Vision could reply, a new voice called out, significantly complicating the situation.

“Hulk!” Cyclops shouted. He rose from the Beast’s side, where he had knelt only seconds before.

From Cyclops’s behavior, the Vision deduced that the X-Men’s leader had not discovered the Beast’s injuries to be life-threatening. This is well, he concluded. The Beast has been a valued comrade in the past, albeit with an unnecessarily active sense of humor. The Vision further noted that a shaky Storm stood once more upon her own feet, although with obvious effort.

“It’s not too late to make a clean getaway,” Cyclops urged, daring the fusillade to approach the Hulk at a run. “Our aircraft is nearby. Come with me. Now.”

Fascinating, the Vision observed, extinguishing his heat beams. His initial analysis of the situation had suggested that the Hulk and the X-Men were pitted against each other as adversaries, but perhaps that assessment needed to be revised. Cyclops now appeared to be siding with the Hulk, despite their earlier confrontation. Regardless, the Vision decided, he could not permit either party to depart before their role in Wanda’s abduction could be determined.

Wanda.

Without warning or conscious volition, a picture-perfect recollection of his wedding to Wanda, conducted years ago in the garden of a Vietnamese temple by none other than Immortus, the enigmatic Master of Time, surfaced in his mind, momentarily disorienting him with its vivid clarity and unexpected emotional resonance. For approximately .791 seconds, he could almost smell the overpowering fragrance of the tropical blossoms, sense once more the joyful camaraderie of their assembled friends and allies.

Happy, he recalled with a twinge of regret, the bitter-1 93

sweet jolt of remembered emotion threatening to disrupt the ordered procession of his computations. We had both been so happy....

Cyclops’s forcebeam swept harmlessly through the Vision, leaving the synthezoid untouched but successfully deflecting another hail of bullets and missiles. Ricocheting rockets detonated at a safe distance from the determined X-Man, who tugged on the Hulk’s mighty bicep. “Hurry,” he exhorted the immovable green goliath. “Let us help you get away from this chaos.”

The Hulk was no more interested in Cyclops’s assistance than he was in the Vision’s questions. “Bah!” he grunted loudly. “This island is getting too crowded.” Shrugging off Cyclops’s grip as easily as he might a flea, the Hulk squatted upon bended legs, then leapt into the air, his tremendous strength propelling him over thirty feet above the Vision and Cyclops, who had to tilt back their respective heads to follow his ascent as he rose like a rocket into the clouds. His departure left gallon-sized footprints in the ravaged soil.

“Wait!” Cyclops yelled after him. His blazing eye-beams chased the Hulk, who quickly outdistanced them. “I need to talk to you!”

No less than I, the Vision thought, resolving that the Hulk would not elude him so easily. It seemed he could still smell the flowers in the garden of a temple many thousands of miles, and a lifetime, away....

From the shore, Captain America took in every detail of the Vision’s confrontation with both the Hulk and Cyclops. If nothing else, the Vision had distracted the Hulk from his attacks on the various military personnel, freeing him and Iron Man from the challenge of defending Col-

onel Lopez’s troops from soaring boulders and the like. He tapped on Iron Man’s crimson shoulderplate, attracting the armored Avenger’s attention. Holding the miniature microphone before his lips, to ensure that Tony could hear him over all the racket produced by the artillery and the Falls, Cap pointed toward the tiny island where the Vision had established a beachhead of sorts.

“Get me over there,” he requested, before handing the mike back to Iron Man, who replaced it in his neck assembly while Cap strapped his shield back onto his back.

The golden Avenger nodded. “You want a ride, you got it,” he said, his voice mechanically amplified once more. He clamped his iron gauntlets around Cap’s wrists and ignited his boot jets.

Cap felt the wind rushing against his face as Iron Man carried him into the air with impressive speed and much more volume than the Vision had produced in his takeoff; it was like hitching a ride on a man-sized 747. Cap’s own red boots dangled above the rushing Niagara River for only a second or two, then he spotted dry land beneath him. Working together like a piece of flawless Stark technology, Iron Man released his grip on Captain America, who somersaulted through the air, landing on his feet just in time to see the Hulk hurling back to Earth, with the Vision flying away in hot pursuit of Bruce Banner’s green-skinned alter ego. Iron Man circled overhead, keeping a careful watch over both his teammates, ready to intervene wherever he was most needed.

Cap looked around him, appalled at the devastation. The northern tip of the island looked like No Man’s Land, with flattened trees and gaping craters, the latter where the Hulk had yanked his boulders from the ground. Shield in hand to defend himself from the whizzing rockets and gunfire, Cap raced across the battlefield, nimbly evading every pitfall, until he came to face-to-face with the X-Men’s youthful leader.

“All right, son,” he informed Cyclops sternly, raising his voice over the hubbub, “I’m giving you a chance to explain what this is all about.”

The scarlet glow behind the X-Man’s visor made it impossible to read the younger man’s eyes. Cap waited tensely for Cyclops’s reply, ready to raise his shield at the first sign of hostile action on the X-Man’s part, but hoping sincerely that further violence could be avoided. Bombs exploded in the background, as, beneath his shining visor, Cyclops’s lips moved urgently.

Cap couldn’t make out a word he said.

The Hulk had become nothing more than a faint green speck in the sky before gravity finally caught up with him. As the Vision tracked his quarry’s progress via artificial eyes, the Hulk accelerated downward almost as steeply as he had climbed, landing feetfirst midway across the crest-line of the Horseshoe Falls. The splash created by his semi-seismic return drenched onlookers all along the Canadian border and soaked the super-powered occupants of the island as well, all except for the Vision who let the inundating spray of droplets pass through his immaterial form.

I cannot allow obsolete and outdated memory files to distract me from my task, he affirmed, letting the unsolicited recollections of his wedding slip back into his memory banks. Instead he carefully considered the Hulk’s latest tactic.

The raging current rushing over the Falls would be more than enough to push anyone else over the brink, but not the Hulk. He stood hip-deep in the cascading foam, adamantly immobile despite the countless gallons of water surging past him.

“You clowns want me?” he hollered at the Vision and the X-Men, as fixed in his footing as the ancient cliff itself. Surging white water was forced to flow around the pillars of his legs. “Come and get me!”

Cyclops’s mouth gaped open, only half of his startled expression concealed by his gleaming metal visor. Wet brown hair lay plastered atop his skull and water dripped from his soaked blue uniform. Obviously, there was no way the X-Man could follow the Hulk out into the river; the torrential current would wash him over the Falls almost instantly, eyebeams or no eyebeams.

The Vision was not so readily thwarted. Leaving the X-Man behind, he reduced his weight as well as his density and floated off the ground and out over that fork of the river which flowed between Goat Island and Ontario. “Stay where you are, Hulk,” he commanded coldly, the wind blowing through his face. “I do not fear to join you upon the very precipice you have chosen.”

As easily as he could make himself lightweight, he could also increase his density until he became as hard as diamond and as heavy as solid neutronium. Sinking into the frothing white water only a few feet away from the Hulk, he let his swiftly-accumulating mass anchor him to the rocky riverbed no less steadfastly than his emerald opponent, until his boots were deeply embedded in the silt and stone below the rushing current. Epidermal sensors in his legs registered the lower temperature of the icy water as opposed to the open air, but he experienced little discomfort; the solar energy that powered him also helped his more heat-sensitive components resist the sudden chill.

His lengthy yellow cloak, composed of unstable molecules, remained selectively intangible, the better to avoid becoming tangled in the rapids.

“So, just can’t take a hint, huh?” the Hulk rumbled, his words almost lost beneath the clamor of the Falls at their feet. He leered barbarically, savoring the prospect of physical violence. “Okay, let’s do this the hard way ... just the way I like it.”

He reached out for the Vision, presumably with the intent of breaking the synthezoid in two, but the Vision grabbed onto the Hulk’s wrists, holding him back for a few moments. His gloved fingers failed to reach all the way around the Hulk’s thick wrists, making it difficult to keep his grip as the Hulk leaned forward, pushing against the Vision’s defense with all the force of oncoming bullet train. The Vision had to increase his corporeal density to its utmost limit, his feet sinking deep into solid rock, just to keep the Hulk out of arm’s reach.

“You’re tough, robot,” the Hulk grudgingly admitted, “but not tough enough. Get ready for a really big fall.” They grappled like mythic champions above the awesome spectacle of the Falls, the dark green of the Vision’s skintight costume contrasting against the chartreuse hue of the Hulk’s coarse hide, the synthezoid’s spectral cape spreading out from his shoulders like a streaming yellow banner. Despite his considerable mass, the Vision felt his heels sliding backward, digging parallel trenches into the stony riverbed. He fought to regain his footing, only to realize that he could not long resist the unremitting pressure of the Hulk’s advance. But perhaps his opponent’s overpowering momentum could be turned against him?

With an instant’s thought, the Vision shed his dense solidity, becoming vaporous once more. The sudden evaporation of all resistance caused the Hulk to topple forward, falling face-first into the foaming water, which rolled him inexorably toward the crest of the awesome cataract—and a staggeringly rough descent.

Weightless and watchful, The Vision levitated in the air a few feet past the brink, not to mention over one hundred and fifty feet above the misty pool below. He had no fear that an unwanted trip over the Horseshoe Falls would kill or even seriously injure the Hulk, but perhaps the rocky plunge would knock some of the combative spirit out of the ferocious malefactor, making him more amenable to the Vision’s planned interrogation. There was even some slight possibility, which the synthezoid estimated at approximately 15.64%, that the arduous plunge would be sufficient to trigger the Hulk’s metamorphosis back into Bruce Banner, who was, in fact, the very individual the Avengers most desired to question.

I can only hope for such a fortuitous development, the Vision thought, looking on dispassionately as the Hulk clung desperately to the crest of the cataract, struggling to keep from washing over the edge. The Vision began to descend slowly toward the pool, readying himself to fish either Banner or the Hulk from the churning water at the foot of the Falls.

But, to the Vision’s surprise, the Hulk did not plunge as promptly as the android Avenger expected. Instead, the Hulk fought back against the relentless current, rising slowly to his hands and knees amidst the savage torrent, throwing back his head to gasp for air above the waves crashing against his head and shoulders. He sputtered, coughing out great mouthfuls of water that ran down his chin and back into the river. Even the Vision’s imperturbable plastic face displayed a degree of astonishment and open wonder as, defying all probability and reasonable expectation, the obstinate green titan rose again to his feet.

“Gutless coward!” he accused the hovering Vision. Water streamed from his matted emerald hair, irrigating the crevices between his bulging muscles. ‘ ‘A cheap trick like that can’t stop the Hulk! Come back and fight me like a man, you chicken-hearted mannequin!”

The Vision felt no need to defend his man-made masculinity, but acknowledged that his ploy had failed to overcome the Hulk’s truly remarkable perseverance and stamina.

Very well, he cogitated. I have other strategies to employ.

Reversing his gradual descent, the Vision floated back to the Crestline. “This conflict is unnecessary,” he reminded the Hulk, regaining sufficient mass to immerse his legs in the current a second time. He waded across the rapids, waist-deep in the spewing water, until he came close enough to thrust an intangible arm deep into the Hulk’s inhumanly broad chest. His right forearm disappeared entirely within the Hulk. The tips of his ethereal fingers emerged from the monster’s back. “All we desire is information, followed by your peaceful departure from this venue. Spare yourself further discomfort.”

“Spare this!” the Hulk bellowed, throwing a gigantic fist at the Vision’s face.

Simultaneously, the Avenger resorted to his most aggressive, and consistently effective, offensive tactic, partially materializing his arm within the very substance of the Hulk’s body. As two solid objects could not occupy the same space at the same time, the subject of such an invasion invariably suffered intense and incapacitating pain. It was a delicate procedure, requiring acute concentration; if he allowed his arm to become too fully solid, he could easily kill even so indestructible entity as the Hulk.

Said concentration was not made any easier by the physical shock of the Hulk’s fist smashing into the Vision’s face. Knuckles like concrete slammed into a diamond-hard mask, although some portion of the force of the blow was sapped at the last minute by the convulsive agony that spread from the Hulk’s chest to the rest of his Herculean body. Even still, the punch rattled the Vision’s cybernetic synapses and knocked his entire super-hard body back a few inches, dangerously dislodging his precarious footing upon the watery ledge. On the other side of the Hulk’s thick torso, the Vision’s extended fingers sank back into the chartreuse flesh as it were a pool of quicksand.

“Arrgh!” the Hulk howled, throwing back his head in agony, his emerald eyes bulging from their sockets. He clutched at the phantom arm invading his flesh, but his beefy fingers passed through it fruitlessly. “What are you doin’ to me?”

“Surrender,” the Vision said concisely, declining to explain the precise nature of his attack. Still reeling from the Hulk’s single blow, he considered rendering his entire body as insubstantial as his arm, but feared that he would not being able to hold his position without the excess mass weighing him to the rocky floor below. No matter what other blows he might endure, he could not allow the Hulk the slightest chance of dislodging the synthezoid’s invasive arm before it had completed its task of subduing the bellicose colossus.

Already the Hulk had resisted his transcorporeal assault longer than the average organic being. Most foes succumbed almost immediately, the acute systemic shock reducing even the most intransigent of adversaries to unconsciousness within a matter of seconds. As with the Hulk’s triumph over the current only moments ago, however, the verdant giant’s astonishing recuperative powers again undid the Vision’s carefully reasoned calculations. To his confbundment, the very substance of the Hulk’s being seemed to resist the synthezoid’s intrusion on a cellular, even a molecular, level. The Vision grimaced in unaccustomed discomfort as the Hulk’s atomic structure refused to give way to his own synthetic flesh and bone, squeezing his semi-solid atoms all the way down to their collapsing nuclei. A surprisingly human gasp escaped the Vision’s sculpted lips.

“Hah! Didn’t expect that, did you?” the Hulk gloated. His enormous body quivered in pain, but the Hulk somehow managed a malignant sneer, as if daring the synthe-zoid to push the fight further. The surface of his skin seethed and bubbled where it intersected with the Vision’s ethereal limb, a visible symptom of his flesh’s tireless straggle to expel the foreign material. Irrationally, or perhaps not, the Vision imagined that he was trying to subdue an unusually malignant, humanoid form of cancer. “Give me your best shot!” the living green cancer dared him.

Wanda is in danger, the Vi sion recalled. I cannot fail. The Hulk’s gamma-charged body had become a battleground upon which the Vision knew he dared not lose. The Hulk defied logic, overthrew all standards of rationality; if unreliable emotional responses could provide him with whatever extra capacity he required to vanquish this indefatigable beast, then for once the Vision welcomed them. He thrust his arm so deep into the Hulk’s breast that his gioved yellow hand penetrated straight through the monstrosity’s spine and came out the other side. Wanda, my wife...

“You don’t get it, do you?” the Hulk mocked him. Spidery tracings of green streaked the Hulk’s bloodshot eyes. “You can’t beat me. You can just make me mad.” The Hulk glared at him with gleeful malice, a rictus-like sneer distorting his bestial countenance. His hot, foul breath offended the Vision’s olfactory sensors. Stubborn green flesh writhed at the point of contact between the Vision’s untouchable limb and the Hulk’s palpitating muscles. “And you know what? The madder I get, the stronger I get... !”

That is scientifically improbable, the Vision thought, with something resembling desperation. Nonetheless, the Hulk’s endurance indeed appeared to be increasing at a geometric rate; new muscles, unseen in any anatomy text, formed atop preexisting layers of sinew. The Vision willed his arm to near full substantiality, exceeding every humane safety limit he had ever maintained, yet the Hulk remained standing. Beads of greenish sweat broke out on his sloping brow, and his rippling thews pulsated convulsively, but he stayed fixed in place like some solid green outcropping of the cliff beneath him.

The Vision looked no less unbending, his arm thrust out in front of him, buried up to his elbow in the Hulk’s breastbone, a yellow hand protruding between the monster’s shoulderblades. Spasms of pseudo-pain ran up the Vision’s arm, triggering his innate programming for selfpreservation, but he did not withdraw his arm or abandon his attack—until the Hulk, grinding his teeth together loud enough to be heard over both the Falls and the artillery, grabbed onto the not quite solidified arm at the shoulder, right where it connected with the rest of the Vision’s uitra-dense body, and ripped the entire limb from its socket.

Sparks flared from the ruptured torso. Oily lubricants and hydraulic fluid sprayed from severed tubing, disappearing rapidly into the constant flow of the river. The Vision’s head jerked spastically, his overloaded circuits struggling to process the full effect of his arm’s brutal amputation.

‘‘W-w-warning,” he stuttered, like a malfunctioning tape recording. The jewel in his brow flashed on and off. “M-m-major damage to structural integrity. Im-imediate repair is nec-necessary—”

The severed arm, semi-liquid in appearance, dangled like a tendril of green and yellow jelly from the Hulk’s chest. He raised a dark green eyebrow and, with a surly wince, plucked the invading arm out of his body, producing a slight sucking sound that the Vision was in no position to hear. He carelessly tossed the gelid limb over the Falls, then shoved the tottering, sparking synthezoid with the flat of his hand.

“W-w-waming,” the Vision repeated automatically. He was dimly aware of gravity seizing him as he toppled over the brink of the Horseshoe. “W-w-w-warning—” The Hulk vanished from his field of vision, supplanted by a kaleidoscope of rotating images that spun in front of him as he accelerated downward through empty space, unable to stabilize his internal systems fast enough to discard the weight that was pulling him toward a rough landing in turbulent waters. His yellow cloak wrapped around him like a cocoon.

My apologies, Wanda, the Vision thought, as he hurtled toward the churning surface of the pool. This mechanism has failed you again....

“I’m not sure this is such a good idea,” the cameraman said as he climbed aboard the boat, stepping awkwardly off the gangplank onto the riveted steel deck. He stared nervously at the looming Falls, towering above them at the far end of the pool. His blue rain slicker was already damp from the spray.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” the anchorman replied, a note of impatience marring his mellifluous baritone. He paced impatiently toward the prow, leading the way. “This is the biggest story to hit Niagara since Marilyn filmed that movie here in 1952.”

Not to mention my ticket to the big time, Cliff Barron thought; he’d spent enough time paying his dues at that dinky local station in Buffalo. This was his chance to impress the bigwigs at the networks, maybe even land a spot on the evening news. “This story belongs to me, and I want to be live on the scene, right at ground zero!” “Yeah, sure,” the cameraman said unenthusiastically. His name was Muckerheide, but everyone called him Muck. His portable camera sat poised upon his shoulder. “But what about the cannons and stuff?” Even as he spoke, shells exploded at the top of the Horseshoe Falls, adding to the chaos in the distance.

The flunky’s foot-dragging just annoyed Barron, who was anxious to be underway. What if the Hulk surrenders before we get there? “They’re firing at the Hulk, not us,” he insisted. “Besides, they wouldn’t dare put us in danger. We’re the press. We have a First Amendment right to be here.” He paused and looked to the west, toward scenic Ontario. “Um, they do have a First Amendment in Canada, right?”

Muck shrugged, apparently resigned to his fate. He 205

dabbed at the lens of his camera with a dry cloth while Barron nodded at the ship’s captain to set sail. The grizzled boatman muttered under his breath, like he was already regretting his decision to ferry the avid newsmen in exchange for a generous bribe, but took his place at the helm, a deck above his two passengers. A few minutes later, the all-steel, double-deck tour ship chugged away from the dock, with Barron and his one-man film crew standing at the prow. A matched set of American and Canadian flags waved from the back of the small craft.

The Maid of the Mist was the latest in a string of vessels, all bearing the same name, that had taken sightseers for a close-up look at the Falls since the middle of the nineteenth century. Under ordinary circumstances, the ship could carry up to six hundred passengers, but Barron and Muck had the boat to themselves, given that the Hulk crisis had pretty much curtailed tourism as usual.

Nothing like a berserk monster and frightening mutant terrorists to put a damper on a vacation, Barron thought. As the Maid sailed upstream toward the Horseshoe Falls, carefully skirting the rocks below the American Falls, the ambitious reporter experienced a troubling moment of anxiety when he recalled that he had forgotten to get a receipt for his expense account. Maybe I can get the boat guy to write something up later, he speculated.

The crescent-shaped curtain of water that was the Canadian Falls grew larger and more impressive as the Maid came within a few hundred yards of the wide, cascading spume. Staring upward through the thickening mist, Barron could barely see the superhuman figures of the Vision and the Hulk fighting it out at the brink of the Falls, close to two hundred feet above him. From where he now stood, upon the increasingly slippery deck of the prow, they

looked like a pair of dueling green action figures. Barron assumed that Muck’s telephoto lens was getting a better view of the action; after all, that’s what the fainthearted cameraman got paid for.

It took a few minutes for Barron to decide on the ideal spot for his soon-to-be-historic broadcast, with just enough mist and spray to look dangerous and authentic, but not enough to mess up his hair or make-up. The Falls providing a magnificent backdrop behind him, he carefully adjusted his own blue slicker, now bedewed with condensation, while he waited for his cue, smugly noting the absence of any other boats on the river. He had this scoop locked up tight.

Eat your heart out, Dan Rather, he gloated Muck signaled him they were about to go live, counting down on his fingers, so Barron cleared his throat, slicked back his dyed chestnut hair, held onto his microphone, and launched into his spiel:

* ‘This is Cliff Barron of WDRP, on the scene beneath Niagara Falls, where an apocalyptic confrontation with the incredible Hulk and the infamous X-Men has escalated into open warfare, transforming this otherwise peaceful and romantic vacation spot into a veritable battleground, and pitting an unholy alliance of mutants and monster against the armed forces of two nations, as well as the Avengers themselves.”

Not a bad intro, he congratulated himself, although describing the Hulk as “incredible” was a bit of a cliche. / probably should have used another adjective. The crashing water and ear-splitting explosions were making quite a racket, he fretted; hopefully, the sound guys back at the studio could filter out most of the background noise. If not, he vowed, heads will roll.

“As this exclusive live footage shows, Earth’s Mightiest Heroes are leading the fight against the ... dreaded ... Hulk and his mutant confederates, but whether their unquestioned courage and power can prevail remains to be seen. Even now, the ... stupendous , . . Hulk is locked in mortal combat with the android Avenger known only as the Vision.”

He winced inwardly at his own words. Mortal combat? That sounded too much like a video game. Probably a licensed trademark, too. Just what I need, he groused. Another whiny memo from Legal.

Muck took advantage of his pause to tilt his camera back up toward the top of the Falls, where the fighting was. “Make sure you’re getting all this,” Barron whispered to him urgently, placing his hand over his mike. Should’ve had two cameramen, he realized. One for the action footage and one for his close-ups. But what could you expect from a mom-and-pop operation like WDRP? I won’t have to put up with shortcuts like this after I make my move to the networks. Then it’ll be first-class production values all the way. Maybe a couple of Emmys, too.

The cool, misty air was refreshing and invigorating; Barron recalled that the Falls supposedly produced ‘ ‘negative ions” that were highly conducive to romance, part of the region’s claim to fame as the honeymoon capital of the U.S.A. Maybe I should bring the wife up here for a weekend, he thought idly, while Muck kept his telephoto lens focused on the ratings-grabbing spectacle above. Better yet, maybe I should bring Tiffany. Why waste all those ions on the spouse?

Squinting through the viewfinder, Muck kept his camera rolling—until his jaw dropped unexpectedly and he scurried backward upon the deck, almost losing his balance atop the slippery metal. Lowering his camera, he started shouting at the captain in the wheelhouse.

“Back up! Back up!” he shrieked in panic, waving his free arm wildly in a desperate attempt to attract the boatman’s attention. “We have to get out of here!”

Barron was shocked by the cameraman’s unprofessional behavior, and right in the middle of Barron’s big break. What did this clown think he was doing? Who the heck did he think he was to decide when the broadcast was over? Barron saw his future Emmys going down the drain and wanted to shoot Muck. He was spoiling everything!

The Maid sluggishly began to turn around, but not quickly enough for the hysterical photog. Clutching the camera under one arm, Muck pointed frantically at the Falls and yelled at the indignant anchorman, practically jumping up and down in his anxiety.

“Look out!” he cried.

A sliver of urgency penetrated Barron’s frustrated ambitions and preoccupations. Still fuming indignantly, he turned around and looked up, his telegenic blue eyes widening at the sight of a green-and-yellow figure plummeting toward them.

“Ohmigod,” he whispered, unintentionally sharing his surprise with countless TV viewers. “We’re all going to die!”

Instantly abandoning any semblance of journalistic dignity, Barron darted madly away from the prow, colliding with Muck in his frenzied stampede to safety. They tottered upon the deck, grabbing onto each for balance while the expensive camera crashed upon the wet steel flooring, accompanied by the ominous sound of something crucial breaking inside the apparatus.

A moment later, the ultra-dense form of the Vision smashed through the deck, leaving a gaping hole in the prow. He tore through the bottom of the hull as well, as evidenced by the huge gush of water that came spewing up from below deck. The river poured through the Visionsized rupture, swamping the deck, which tilted beneath Barron’s feet as the Maid of the Mist rapidly reenacted the last moments of the Titanic.

“Abandon ship!” the captain cried, giving Barron a murderous stare before leaping from the forecastle to the relative safety of the river. Muck merely shrugged once more,' too much in a hurry to even say ‘ ‘I told you so” as he climbed over the rail, dutifully reclaiming the dropped camera before he splashed into the water, leaving the distraught anchor man alone aboard the sinking tour ship.

Afraid that it would make him look fat, Barron had declined to wear a life jacket under his plastic wrap. Now he groped desperately for a donut-shaped life preserver, his dreams of network glory supplanted by eyewitness imaginings of drowning beneath the waves.

So help me, he thought, scrambling off the stem just before it slid beneath surface of the river, the freezing water swallowing him up to his head and shoulders, I knew I should’ve taken that sportscaster job in Poughkeepsie. . . .

“Good Lord,” Iron Man exclaimed, shocked at what he beheld through the rectangular eyeslits in his faceplate. The Hulk had ripped the Vision’s arm off! Or ripped the Vision off his arm, which amounted to the same thing.

Iron Man watched in horror as first the severed mechanical arm, then the rest of the heroic synthezoid, went plummeting over the Falls without so much as a barrel to protect him. Thank goodness, he thought, that the Vision wasn’t remotely human; there was always a chance that he could be salvaged and repaired, unlike a flesh-and-blood human being suffering the same fate. I’ve helped rebuild the Vision before, he remembered. I can do it again.

But first he had to stop the Hulk from hurting anyone else. Already the Hulk’s titanic temper tantrum had yielded collateral damage in the form of what looked like a small tour boat, now foundering below the Falls.

“That does it,” he decided, diving to the rescue, his arms rigidly held out above his head to maximize his aerodynamic potential. “No more Mr. Nice Guy.” As far as he was concerned, the Hulk had used up whatever sympathy or special consideration he might be entitled to from his days as an Avenger; that karmic investment had been spent. The mutated missing link was a menace, pure and simple, and Iron Man wasn’t afraid to take him on.

To his relief, the torpedoed ship had apparently carried only three passengers, all of whom were now floating down the river toward the Whirlpool waiting beyond the Rainbow Bridge. Wondering briefly who in their right minds would pilot a boat toward the Hulk, he plucked all three survivors from the current, grabbing a soggy refugee by the collar with each hand while lifting the third victim, who held onto a circular life preserver for dear life, by means of a tractor beam issuing from the projection unit in his chest. The glowing purple ray held the pale, dripping castaway suspended in the air while Iron Man flew toward the nearest shore. Was that make-up, the Avenger

wondered, running down the unlucky man’s face?

It took Iron Man only minutes to deposit his three hitchhikers safely on the Canadian shore, where cooperative soldiers quickly took custody of them. Iron Man’s boots barely touched the ground before, his mission of mercy completed, he doubled back into the sky above the Hulk. Going into a power dive, he jetted toward the Falls headfirst, the palms of his gauntlets held out in front of him. Display panels before his eyes charted his acceleration and energy output, the latter spiking dramatically as he unleashed his repulsors from both metal gloves.

“Okay, Hulk,” he murmured to himself. Laser targeting systems drew a bead on his gargantuan target. “Here’s what you get for mutilating an Avenger, even an artificial one.”

Orange beams of force struck the Hulk head-on, staggering him. Iron Man upped the intensity, diverting power from secondary systems into the neutron projectors in his gauntlets, each one costing close to two million dollars.

“Let’s see how you like a trip over the Falls, sans barrel,” he said, wishing now that he had joined the fight against the Hulk immediately, rather than conducting an aerial reconnaissance first. If he had gone on the offensive earlier, maybe the Vision would still be intact. But how could he have known at once who required the most immediate assistance, Cap, the Vision, or even the Beast? He had also wanted to scan the vicinity for the rest of the X-Men, particularly Banshee, Iceman, and the other mutants known to have invaded the S.H.I.E.L.D. Helicarrier. Even now, he kept expecting more of Xavier’s renegades to appear on the scene. If Wolverine shows up, a major brawl is almost guaranteed.

More provoked than punished by Iron Man’s repulsors, the implacable Hulk struck back, leaping at the golden Avenger as if fired by a cannon, his open hands reaching out for his foe. But Iron Man’s forward proximity sensors detected the oncoming threat even before it registered on Tony Stark’s human brain, and the computerized armor automatically took evasive action. Retro rockets surged in his starboard boot, causing him to execute a sharp left turn at the last minute. Prodigious as the Hulk’s leaping abilities were, he could not change course in midair, so the enraged brute zoomed past Iron Man, missing his intended target by several feet.

That was a close one, Iron Man thought. If he had been only a few seconds slower, the Hulk would have grabbed him for sure. Have to keep out of his hands or I’ll end up like the Vision. The latest generation of his armor was pretty dam indestructible, but he knew better than to underestimate the Hulk’s phenomenal strength. After all, not even the mighty Thor had ever managed to surpass the Hulk where raw physical power was concerned—and Thor was a bona fide god! Iron Man’s armored exoskeleton amplified his strength a hundredfold, but that wasn’t enough to put him in the same class as the Hulk, so the Avenger intended to take full advantage of his aerial abilities and long-distance weaponry in this particular contest of arms. Against the Hulk, I’ll take every edge I can get.

Howling in frustration, the thwarted Hulk landed right back where he’d started, at the very crest of the Canadian Falls. His face contorted with savage fury, he glared at Iron Man with crazed green eyes; even though he knew better, Iron Man found it hard to accept that a brilliant physicist was locked away somewhere inside the bestial creature he saw below him. The Hulk looked more like a sub-human evolutionary throwback than a mutated scientific genius.

Iron Man decided to keep the Hulk off-balance by varying his attack. Giving his gauntlets a chance to cool off, he activated the vari-beam projector at the center of his chestplate. Incandescent blue pulse bolts fired at the Hulk, gaining in power as they accelerated through the open space between Iron Man and his foe. One after another, the plasma bolts hit the Hulk, releasing all their accumulated energy on impact with his head and shoulders. Bright cerulean flashes briefly obscured the Hulk’s face, only to fade within heartbeats, leaving the man-monster looking even more frenzied than before. Bristling green eyebrows, seared away by the hot plasma, grew back instantly while the Hulk rubbed watery eyes with his huge fists. The bolts had hurt him, obviously, but had not succeeded in budging him an inch closer to the steep, watery drop-off behind him.

“Good God,” Iron Man whispered within his helmet, impressed despite too many past encounters with the Hulk. “What’s it going to take to faze him? A couple of low-grade nukes?”

The pulse bolts were too energy-expensive to employ for a prolonged period of time, so he switched back to his repulsors, swooping in closer to the Hulk in hopes of increasing their impact. He wasn’t thrilled about getting any nearer to the Hulk’s destructive wrath, but it was a calculated risk; hopefully, his superior maneuverability would still keep him out of range of those piledriver fists.

“This would be a lot easier if you’d just change back to Banner,” Iron Man muttered with more than a trace of irritation in his voice. Repulsor rays battered futilely against the Hulk’s impervious hide.

Right now, Tony Stark wished Bruce had never passed high school physics, let alone heard of gamma rays.

The flattened forest swam before Storm’s eyes. The pounding of explosives, coupled with the continual tumult of the nearby Falls, matched the throbbing in her head. Blood trickled from numerous small cuts and scratches on her head, arms and legs, stinging every inch of exposed skin.

What is happening? she wondered, teetering upon rubbery legs as she tried to orient herself. Who is firing upon us, and why? The last thing she remembered was summoning a fog to hide the Hulk from his tormentors. That’s right, she recalled, the painful memory gradually resurfacing through the haze within her mind. The Hulk... he hurt my fog, hurt me. . . .