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Chapter Text

As Nick Fury’s consciousness came back into focus, he made sure that he was safely on the sidewalk, after almost being run over by a car that clearly wasn’t there seconds ago. As he looked around, the cars were vastly different than what stood before. He looked up to the building where he swore a Helicopter crashed into it moments ago – yet there was no sign of damage.

“Nick?” came the concerned voice of Maria Hill.

Fury turned to see her standing there – Wait! He thought. Didn’t she just turn to dust moments ago? Though maybe I turned to dust as well.

Fury checked the roads. They were surprisingly clear. This enabled him to scan the road for where he dropped the Pager – the one connected to Carol Danvers. But it was nowhere to be found.

“Hill?” Fury asked.

“Check your watch!” Maria said.

This, Fury did.

October 2023!

What the hell? Fury thought desperately. He could have sworn it was May 2018. No! No! This is a mistake.

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

Explosions rang off in the distance. The sounds were distinct enough to conclude that but quiet enough for Fury to deduce that they were a distance away.

“Hill, do you have a phone or communicator on you?” Fury asked.

“I do!”

“See if you can call someone,” Fury said as he looked around. “Maybe Agent Kline.”

The people around them seemed to be just as confused as Fury was. And to his alarm, he was able to catch certain individuals suddenly materializing from dust.

“Something big just happened!” Fury mouthed to himself.

It wasn’t long before a black vehicle showed up. The backdoor opened revealing Agent Kline.

“Director!” Kline called out before Fury and Hill entered the vehicle.

A few silent seconds after the vehicle took off, Fury asked “What… the… hell… is going on?”

Kline hesitated. “Where do I begin?” he sighed. After taking a couple seconds, he finally answered. “Five years ago, half of humanity vanished into dust. And we assess that you two were amongst the people that vanished.”

“Is that why our watches are saying it’s 2023?” Hill asked.

“Yes!” Kline answered.

“How did this happen?" Fury asked.

“It was the work of an alien called Thanos,” Kline said. “When Loki invaded New York, he was also after the Tesseract. The Tesseract housed what’s called the Space Stone. The Space Stone was one of Six Infinity Stone Thanos collected to basically cull half of the populations everywhere.”

Fury sighed. “I’m going to need to hear that, again,” he said. “But sometime later,” he added as Kline prepared to repeat himself. “Normally, I would find that claim to be Bullshit, but given the circumstances…”

“Can we go to Avengers headquarters?” Hill asked.

“I’m afraid we can’t do that, mam!” the Agent sitting in the shotgun said. “We’re getting reports that the compound has just been bombed by alien craft.”

“Mother-Fu…”

Over the next few hours and days, Fury took in any news he could about the situation. First, he heard reports about some sort of large fight between unknown entities and the Aliens that bombed the Avengers Compound. Then he learned that those “unknown entities” were the Avengers, with reinforcements from New Asgard, Wakanda, Kamar Taj (What? Fury thought), and Space.

Eventually, he learned that Natasha Romanoff and Tony Stark were dead, and he was able to catch up with Steve Rogers regarding the matter. Steve revealed that they had undergone a mission that involved Time-Travel and that they had managed to undo Thanos’ snap from 2018. Then Fury heard his account about the arrival of a past-Thanos and the battle they underwent to defeat him.

“Any news on the funeral for either Romanoff or Stark?”

“The body of Romanoff is in another timeline and Stark has already been cremated,” Steve said. “We’re hosting a memorial for the two on the 29^th at Stark’s Forest Home.”

At this point, Fury was familiar with the fact that Tony Stark lived in the woods and that he had a daughter named Morgan.

“What are your plans for the future?” Fury asked.

At this, Steve Rogers got up and looked at a wall, hesitating.

“You, okay?” Fury asked.

“It’s,” Steve sighed. “I’m thinking about going back to the past. To the 1940’s.”

Nick gasped silently. Two of the original Avengers were gone and now a third one is considering leaving.

“Is that a safe thing to do?” Fury asked simply.

“Yeah!” Steve said. “We go back in time, the worst that will happen is I create a new timeline. And that will happen if I do something that adversely affects my life path in such a way that my past self won’t reach the same destination I did. And in any case, the Infinity Stones we hold all come from different timelines, and someone needs to return them. I figure that when the time comes, I’ll be the one to undergo the mission.

“Are you okay with that, sir?”

“Well…” Fury started before thinking. It seemed that there was no danger in him doing so, and Steve likely knew more about time travel than Fury did at this point. And while it had certainly been jarring to find that five years went by without warning, it was undoubtedly more jarring for Steve when he found himself seven decades into the future. And if anyone deserved to relive that lost time, it would be Steve. “I am!”

On October the 29^th, the Avengers gathered at Tony Stark’s house. Fury himself avoided interacting with people. He wondered if he should, but he was getting ready to go up to the S.A.B.E.R. station later that day. Eventually, most the attendees moved outside between the house and the lake. The starks, alongside Happy Hogan and Colonel Rhodes, remained inside so that Morgan could see a pre-recorded message Tony left behind for her.

While Fury remained on the porch, he noticed most of the Bartons stand close by while Clint went down near the deck. Most of the core Avengers were nearby. Eventually, Pepper and Morgan Stark walked outside alongside Colonel Rhodes and Happy Hogan. They stopped shortly before the core Avengers.

Clint Barton walked onto the deck before turning around and addressing the crowd.

“Natasha Romanoff started out with a rough start in life,” Clint said. “She was abducted into the Black Widow program, a program she would later help to shut down. I met her on a mission in Budapest and had been ordered to take her out. And I can confidently say that I’m glad I made a different call. Natasha had proven herself loyal to the cause of protecting our world and ensuring everyone could live in relative safety.

“When the blip began, it was she who dedicated herself to holding the fractured Avengers team together – a dedication I wish I had shown. Even then, she reached out to me and welcomed me back into the Avengers when plans were being made to reverse the blip. When the day came to finally retrieve the stones, we found ourselves having to choose who gets left behind to get our stone.

“I tried to ensure that she would be the one to return, but her will won out. Her last words to me were ‘it’s okay!’ I wish I knew that to be true. Maybe it is…. I lost my family in the blip. Thanks to Natasha, I have a family again.”

Nick watched as Clint then placed what Fury knew to be a Black-Widow Style container featuring some of her prized weapons. As Clint walked past Pepper Stark, she placed a hand on his shoulder and Clint returned the favor. Eventually, Clint made his way back to his family, by which point, a massive hologram depicting Natasha Romanoff’s face (with her final style).

The Stark party then made their way down to the dock where Colonel Rhodes said some words, most of which was what Stark himself had recorded before the Time Heist. Happy then placed what Fury knew to be a wreath complete with one of Stark’s early Arc Reactors, with Proof Tony Stark has a Heart on the Reactor. The entire assembly watched and waited for the wreath to float out far enough for the hologram of Tony Stark’s face to join that of Romanoff.

After a minute of both faces hovering in the air, Fury approached Carol Danvers (currently sporting a short hairstyle). “I take it you got my signal!" Fury said.

“I did!” Carol answered. “Though I wasn’t exactly equipped to handle the crisis I found upon arriving. I didn’t realize Thanos would ever get this far.”

“You knew of Thanos before all of this?” Fury asked, gesturing towards the Avengers scattered around Stark’s home. Off in the distance, Clint Barton was standing next to Wanda Maximoff.

“It might be better to get you to SABER before I explain everything,” Carol said. “That said, I think I reignited the war between the Kree and the Skrulls.”

Chapter Text

SABER was a space-defense organization formed shortly after Fury’s first encounters with the Kree and the Skrulls. While he found some colleagues of his willing to support and participate in the organization, Fury himself had focused more on Earth based missions, especially after 9/11 happened. As a result, he was in the dark regarding Carol and the Skrulls.

Maybe that should change, Fury thought, during the journey up to the station. It had been a while since he was last in contact with the majority of the Skrulls. And Captain Marvel for that matter. She would have been very useful in the fight against Loki, Ultron, and the first Thanos.

Once he landed in the docking bay of the SABRE Station, he was greeted a familiar face – Talos in the form of his old boss R. Keller.

“Director Fury, it’s been a while,” Talos said.

“Talos!” Fury said. “How’s your family doing?”

“They’re residing on Emperor Dro’ge’s personal Colony at the moment,” Talos said. “In a few days, I plan on visiting them.”

“Do you guys have an evacuation plan?” Fury asked.

“Sorry?” Talos asked, confused.

“Carol Danvers suggested that your war with the Kree might reignite,” Fury whispered.

“Oh!” Talos muttered. “There are plans in place, but we don’t want to inadvertently evacuate our people to where their doom turns out to be. And we don’t currently have any intelligence on the Kree’s activities. Rest assured that we are prepared.”

Within hours, Carol Danvers also arrived on SABER and sought out Fury.

“I believe you wanted to know about my dealings with Thanos?” Carol asked.

“That would be nice to know,” Fury said.

Carol escorted Fury to a private room aboard the space station.

“Well, to start out with, we were able to establish a few colonies out there,” Carol said. “After we set up a few Skrull Colonies, I was eventually able to get the Kree to back off. At that time, I learned of Thanos and his campaign of going planet to planet and wiping out half of the population present. Naturally, I set out to cripple his war machine. Unfortunately, his armada was nearly limitless, and he threatened to wipe out all the Skrulls I was charged with protecting. 

“We eventually came to an agreement,” Carol continued. “He and all of his allies would leave me and the Skrulls alone if I left his forces alone.”

“But you intervened during that Battle involving him and the Avengers,” Fury said.

“Violating the agreement?” Carol agreed. “It wouldn’t surprise me if Thanos’ allies saw it that way. Especially if the Enhanced Chitauri are still out there.”

“You don’t think Tony Stark’s snap would have taken care of it?” Fury asked.

“The stones would place a heavy burden on your mind,” Carol said. “It’s possible that Tony Stark could only focus on the Chitauri they were actively fighting. Normally, the Chitauri need a beacon – usually hosted on a massive warship or a tower – to operate. Otherwise, they would shut down. The fact that the Chitauri didn’t shut down after I took out Thanos’ warship signals to me that there is existing Chitauri infrastructure elsewhere. It’s possible that Tony Stark’s snap might have missed it.”

Fury took a moment to contemplate this. “Enhanced Chitauri?”

“After your six original Avengers held off regular Chitauri over a decade ago, Thanos and his team began researching ways to make the Chitauri more dangerous,” Carol explained. “They came up with what are known as Enhanced Chitauri. They are stronger and tougher than regular Chitauri and their foot soldiers have the aim of snipers. They were first spotted during Thanos’ months long assault on Korbin, albeit they were not very numerous. But by the time Thanos went to Xandar – which was right before he attached Asgard and Wakanda – most of the Chitauri were Enhanced Chitauri.”

“So how come they weren’t in Wakanda?” Fury said.

“I’m not sure,” Carol said. “I suspect that the tower controlling them was destroyed. Unfortunately, Xandar was left in a devastated state and the trail for that particular question went cold.”

Fury noticed that Carol started to sound distant and indeed, she stood up and turned to the window – looking out into the deep reaches of space.

“You, okay?” Fury asked.

“It’s just…” Carol quivered. “Maybe I should have worked to bring Thanos to his knees. All of the carnage he was able to get away with, maybe I could have stopped it.”

Fury thought for a moment. At first, he agreed, and that Thanos is the type of individual she could have dealt with. But then, he thought about the nearly limitless armada she mentioned. She probably wouldn’t have been able to protect the Skrulls if such an armada was brought to bear against them.

“It sounds like a pretty hard choice,” Fury acknowledged. “It seems like Thanos could have caused just as much devastation had you decided to try bringing him down – and you might have been left wondering if you should have made the choice you actually did.”

“Hmm!” Carol muttered before opening the door and leaving the room.

Senior Accuser Dar-Benn sat at a council meeting, alongside a few other Accusers, ministers and the Kree Emperor. They were actively watching footage of Carol Danvers destroying Thanos’ flagship, the Sanctuary II. As the Sanctuary II descended into the lake below it, the hologram of the footage started to phase away.

“Was that the actual Sanctuary II?” one of the Ministers asked.

“I do not believe so,” an accuser said. “One of my scouts picked up a broadcast audio from someone purporting to be one of the Avengers – specifically, the one that grows and shrinks. Apparently, they went back in time and used Infinity Stones from alternative timelines to undo Thanos’ quest. The Sanctuary II that Carol Danvers took out was likely from one of these alternative timelines.”

“So,” another Accuser interjected. “Does that mean the Betrayer has violated her agreement with Thanos?”

“The Supreme Intelligence assesses that it does, in fact, constitute a violation of the agreement on Veers’ part,” the Emperor said.

“So, does that mean that our war with the Skrulls should resume?” another Accuser asked.

“The Intelligence is not yet ready to make such a call without more information,” the Emperor said. “Dar-Benn, do you have any updates on the hunt for the Quantum Bands?”

“We are right now looking at three leads,” Dar-Benn said. “The first lead suggested that it’s being held under the protection of Emperor Dro’ge on Tarnax IV. The second lead are runes that, upon translation, suggest that the Asgardian called Odin collected them and held them in his vault – meaning that they could be scattered amongst the ruins of Asgard. Finally, my scouts have uncovered a diagram that suggests the far-side of Terra’s moon.”

The Emperor took a few seconds to process what she said.

“At this point, it’s a little risky to go after Emperor Dro’ge,” the Emperor said. “The other two leads, though, you have my full backing to investigate. Are you confident that your forces are sufficient in investigating these leads?”

“It has been half a decade since Asgard was destroyed,” Dar-Benn said. “If a Quantum Band was on Asgard, my forces have assessed that they could be up to 3 jump-points out from the origin. We’re going to need at least another Accuser’s help to scout out ruins at such a range.”

“Accuser Dar-Rogg? Would you be willing to assist Accuser Dar-Benn in the search?” the Emperor asked.

“Yes, my lord,” Dar-Rogg answered.

“My contact on Amorgoth has indicated that the Chitauri tower is undergoing massive upgrades,” the Emperor stated. “It will be several months before the Enhanced Chitauri are ready for deployment.”

Chapter Text

Within a couple months of the blip’s end, Monica Rambeau would fly up to the SABER Station and both Fury and Danvers waited for her arrival.

“Monica Rambeau,” Fury said. “It’s been a while. If it makes you feel any better, I too was blipped.”

“And yet, you somehow got up here before I did,” Monica laughed before shaking his hand.

“SHEILD had different SABER related policies than SWORD did,” Fury reasoned. “And do you remember your Auntie Carol?” he asked as Carol held out her hand.

Monica, however, declined to shake Carol’s hand but said, “I do.”

“So, what have you been up to?” Fury asked, deciding not to press Monica on whatever issues she had with Carol.

“What do you know about the Westview anomaly?” Monica asked.

“That there was some sort of energy field preventing SWORD and the FBI from entering,” Fury said. “That apparently, there was some sort of CMBR associated with it, and that it involved an Avenger or two.”

The Avenger was Wanda Maximoff, who was struggling to cope with the loss of Vision in Wakanda – right before the blip began,” Monica said. “A spell she cast would cover the entire town, making the areas affected resemble the setting for some old sitcom – which sitcom varied from day-to-day.”

“And what about the people there?”

“SWORD has recruited therapists and radiation experts to make sure that those inside would not have any long-term side-effects and that they can move on with their lives,” Monica asked.

“What about Maximoff?” Carol asked.

A pause. “She flew off somewhere,” Monica said.

“Shouldn’t we hunt her down?” Carol asked. “She sounds like a threat.”

“That might be the worst thing to do at this point,” Monica gasped. “She could destroy you and the surrounding area in desperation.”

“How about this?” Fury suggested. “If we start seeing reports of Westview residents getting radiation sickness, or if another Westview-like anomaly were to pop-up, then we could think about hunting her down.”

“Fair enough,” Carol said.

Monica hesitated. She couldn’t protect Wanda forever. “Very well,” she conceded.

“I’m going to do another scouting mission,” Carol said, running off.

“So, what’s new up here?” Monica asked.

“We’re trying to keep tabs on the Kree Empire,” Fury said. “We were able to find twenty colonies for the Skrulls to reside in, and Carol was able to get the Kree to back off. However, she did it through Thanos.”

“Thanos?” Monica gasped.

“When Carol found out what Thanos was doing, she started tearing into his armada,” Fury explained. “But when Thanos, whose armada was near limitless and far larger than what we saw on Earth, threatened to wipe out the Skrulls she was protecting, they made a deal that Carol would leave Thanos alone and all of Thanos’ allies, including the Kree, would leave the Skrulls alone.”

“So, she could have prevented all of what we just went through?”

“It was a difficult choice, and I don’t envy her for having to make it,” Fury said. “Given his resources, Thanos might have ended up killing way more people than he actually did. As it happens, it’s possible that her actions over a month ago might have been considered a violation of that agreement – so we are anticipating a move by the Kree to resume their war against the Skrulls.”

Several months passed. So far, neither Carol nor any of the experts on SABER picked up evidence that the Kree were going to make a move. To his and Monica’s relief, there had been no reports of radiation sickness stemming from Westview and no similar anomaly was reported. There was no need to hunt down Wanda Maximoff yet.

And yet, it concerned Fury that Monica continued to be distant with Carol. So much so that when a strange anomaly was reported in Ixtenco, Mexico, Fury decided to remain in S.A.B.E.R. and have a Skrull impersonate him on Earth. To that end, he reached out to Talos.

“I don’t know,” Talos said. “If the Kree decide to attack, I should be able to play some defensive role.”

“Well, I believe that Monica has gained some powers comparable to Carol Danvers herself,” Fury said. “Curtesy of her time investigating Westview. I think the two could make for quite a formidable pair, more so than they could be on their own. Unfortunately, they are not on good speaking terms, and I think it’s time I see what I could do to rectify that. Besides, the Kree haven’t attacked yet.”

“But if they do while I’m on Ter… Earth,” Talos said, “I’m not going to be all that happy, especially if my wife and daughter get caught up in such an attack.”

“Can we arrange to bring them here?”

“We could,” Talos said. “Though I am a high ranking General and getting Emperor Dro’ge to send them here might lead to cries of nepotism. Though, if my cousin Krolos were to take them on a vacation…”

“Would that be a better option?” Fury asked.

“It would,” Talos said. “Though my wife will insist that she accompany me.”

Fury thought for a moment. “Maria Hill is really going to hate me!”

Indeed, Maria was cross when she was brought up to SABER.

“Fury, I had important business to do on Earth!”

“Talos insisted.”

Meanwhile, he met with Monica to get an update on her work, albeit making sure Carol would join him early in the meeting.

“I do think we are observing a star that’s getting flaring up more so than usual,” Monica said, when Carol entered the room.

“Oh, sorry,” Carol said.

“Actually, it’s my mistake,” Fury said. “I must have had our meeting schedules overlap.”

“Isn’t the system able to prevent such a mistake?” Monica asked.

“Okay, maybe it wasn’t a mistake,” Fury said. "Maybe we could combine our meetings? I don’t think either of you has information to report that must be kept from the other.”

“I’m okay with it, and I do have an update,” Carol said.

“I… I guess I’m okay with it,” Monica muttered.

“So, what’s your update?” Fury asked.

“Most of the places I’ve patrolled were pretty empty,” Carol said. “No sign of the Kree. But then I passed by the Guardians of the Galaxy and, last I heard, Thor was travelling with them. So, I figured I’d explore the remnants of Old Asgard. And there was a massive Kree presence there. I got the sense that they were trying to salvage something from the destruction there.”

“Did they detect you?” Fury asked.

“They did, unfortunately,” Carol admitted. “I floated for a few seconds in space before taking a long alternative route back here. Located an expert on Asgard, updated him, before heading here.”

“That is momentous news,” Fury said. “Which is why, I need to know – Monica – if you happen to have beef with Carol.”

“What?” Monica gasped, a look of annoyance on her face. “No!”

“It kind of seems like you do,” Fury said.

“Why do you care?”

“Because it seems the Kree may finally make a move soon,” Fury said. “If Carol’s update is to be believed. It seems like you both have light-based powers and you two could really make an impact together if or when the Kree formally declare war.”

“I haven’t exactly flown with my powers,” Monica said.

“It took Carol Danvers six years before she started flying with hers,” Fury said.

“Yeah! Six years!” Monica retorted. “I can at least understand her absence during that time. But the Twenty-three years since?” She started looking at Carol. “I doubt that whatever deal you made with Thanos occurred towards the end of that period.”

“It… it was four years into that period,” Carol said softly.

“Four years?” Monica gasped. “What about the other nineteen years after that? You waited until Thanos wiped half of humanity, including me, from existence.”

“Okay, Okay!” Fury gasped. His plan was going sideways and maybe required a bit more time, if was wise to even attempt this again. And given the news about the Kree and Asgard. “I didn’t realize what I was getting myself into. And if not for your report, Carol, I might have let those play out a little longer.

“As it is, we do need to know if the Kree are looking for anything,” he continued. “Would you be willing to fly down to New Asgard and get an assessment on what the Kree might be able to find?”

Chapter Text

Carol Flew toward Earth’s Norway, making sure it was daytime for the nation, before descending to Tønsberg where New Asgard was located. She could see that while there was a docking station for Cruise Ships, another one nearby was under construction. To Carol’s surprise, there were also Viking Ships flying around the place.

Eventually, she located the town hall where she assumed she would find King Valkyrie. As fortune would have it, she was at her desk speaking with some official.

“Hold that thought,” Valkyrie told the official once she caught sight of Carol. Getting up, she walked over to Carol. “I take it you’re here on official business?”

“I’m afraid so,” Carol said. “Since we’re talking about sensitive information, is there a secret room we can chat?”

“There is,” Valkyrie said, escorting Carol further back into the building until they came across a steel door. “Room is completely soundproof,” she added as the two went in. “I’m hoping to make a deal regarding marble structures surrounding the location of Mjolnir.”

“Do you know if Asgard had anything of value on it that might have survived Ragnarök?” Carol asked.

“I don’t think so, why do you ask?”

“I flew by the sight recently and the Kree Empire was exploring the place,” Carol said. “I imagine that they were searching for anything useful.”

“It’s possible that the Eternal Flame might be recovered,” Valkyrie said.

“What’s that?”

“It’s an artifact that can power weapons like Surtur’s sword,” Valkyrie said. “It can also be used to animate the dead, though unless the person just died, it can’t be used to revive the dead.”

A shiver went down Carol’s spine. How powerful could the Kree Empire be with such an artifact relative to how powerful they are now?

“Are there any other artifacts we need to be worried about?” Carol asked.

“Listen, I was away from Old Asgard for a long time,” she said, a haunted look on her face. “When I did return, I was mostly on the Rainbow Bridge fighting reanimated soldiers. Ragnarök started almost immediately. If there are such artifacts, I would not be privy to them.

“If you want, I could ask some of the veteran Einherjar,” she added. “They might know something.”

“Thank you,” Carol said, getting up.

“You know, in a couple weeks, the play Onset of Ragnarök is set to premier,” Valkyrie said. “If you have any interest in seeing it.”

“Maybe, if I’m not too busy.”

“It’s still holding strong!” Dar-Benn noted.

She and the other Accuser (Dar-Rogg) were observing a container that seemed to provide power to external devices. Within, an orange flame could barely be seen.

“According to legend, the Eternal Flame is said to never run out,” Dar-Rogg said.

“We can make our ships impervious to attacks from the Betrayer,” Dar-Benn said. “That said, I feel that it is time for me to check out the lead on Terra’s moon.” Moving to take the Power-Source, she removed the wiring from it.

“Do you think the Betrayer might show up on the moon?”

“I’m almost certain of it,” Dar-Benn said, walking away. “She’s been seen around Terra and she does have ties to the system.”

Once Dar-Benn was out of the room, Dar-Rogg summoned a nearby aide. “Get me in contact with High Command.”

“Accuser!” one of the Kree said. “We are detecting large energy readings on the Moon on Terra!”

“Head towards the location,” Dar-Benn commanded.

They were in a smaller Kree craft, with the interest in not risking the larger Accuser Warships should the Betrayer arrive, as Dar-Bann expected her to at some point. Given that the EF-Batteries (batteries powered by the Eternal Flame) have not been truly tested against the powers of the Betrayer, it seemed safer to use them for smaller shields.

As the Ship descended upon the dark side of the Moon, Dar-Benn made sure to have the ship land right on top of the point to dig. As various Kree workers got around to digging into the Moon, Dar-Benn had a shield generator brought out and attached to the EF-Battery, prompting a shield to cover the field of operations.

She’s got to show up at some point, Dar-Benn thought. There’s no way we would go undetected.

Eventually, the workers were able to extract a large stone that was clearly buried within the Moon rather than being part of the Moon itself. Dar-Benn used her Universal Weapon to break the stone to pieces.

The bright glow of the Betrayer appeared right as Dar-Benn shuffled through the small stones, finding a Bangle, and putting it on her wrist.

“Fall back to the ship!” Dar-Benn ordered as the Kree obliged. Dar-Benn herself walked towards the edge of the Sheild where the Betrayer was already trying to fire her Photon-Blasts into the Kree Party but was actively being thwarted by the Shields.

“You are intruding in Terran Space and given Ronan’s attack here decades ago, you are not welcome here!” the Betrayer said.

“We were just exploring for a bit,” Dar-Benn said. “In fact, we’re getting ready to leave.”

“Except it looks like you’re up to something sinister here,” the Betrayer said.

“Fine!” Dar-Benn snarled, pointing her Universal Weapon towards the Shield Generator, turning it off.

Carol seized her opportunity to try blasting Dar-Benn. But Dar-Benn held out the wrist holding the Bangle. As the Betrayer started groaning, as if under strain, Dar-Benn felt a flood of energy flow through her.

Eventually, the Betrayer ceased her attack and staggered around. Dar-Benn realized that the Bangle was absorbing the energy flowing through the Betrayer, weakening her.

“This could be seen as an act of War by the Kree,” Dar-Benn said.

The Betrayer appeared to contact her allies stationed on some nearby space-station. “Kree Accuser has the ability to drain my power,” she gasped.

Dar-Benn watched as the Betrayer waited a few seconds, receiving an answer. With that the Betrayer retreated and Dar-Benn entered the ship.

“You’re letting her go?” one of her aides asked.

“We’re going to need her to find the other Quantum Band,” Dar-Benn said.

Chapter Text

Carol staggered the moment she landed in SABER. Nick Fury was present and rushed up to support her. Once the two were in a hallway, Carol disengaged from Fury and decided she had enough energy to walk on her own. The two proceeded to the briefing room where they were when Monica was with them.

“So, tell me,” Fury said. “How did that encounter go?”

“I encountered a party of Kree on the moon, and they were protected by the strongest Force-Field I have ever seen,” Carol said. “Normally, I could blast past such a shield, but this one was strong enough to hold me off. The Accuser I faced off with then deactivated the shield, so I blasted her. But then she revealed that she had acquired a Quantum Band and used it to not only deflect my attack but to absorb its energy, and mine. Not once have I started to feel like I might faint – until that point.”

“Do you think that this effect is permanent?” Fury asked. “Or will you recover from it?”

“I,” Carol thought. “I think I’ll recover, but I definitely need to be weary of these Quantum Bands.”

“What exactly are they?” Fury asked.

“They are of Kree legend,” Carol said. “Supposedly, there are two of them. They enable all sorts of manipulation of light energy. Converting light particles into regular particles and vice versa. Creating portals that enable regular matter to travel at the speed of light – portals that persist but can be masked. Much of our galaxy is covered in these portals that we call jump points. They built much of the commerce of our galaxy and neighboring galaxies. But they vanished from public records thousands of years ago.”

At that point, there was a knock and Fury invited Talos in.

“The meeting with Emperor Dro’ge is due to begin in ten minutes,” Talos said. “Do you think you’ll make it?”

“Yeah!” Fury said. “We’ll make it.”

As Fury and Carol got up, Carol walked out of the room while Fury stayed behind for a bit. “What do you know about the Quantum Bands?” Fury asked Talos.

The meeting with Emperor Dro’ge was uneventful. It was little more than reaffirming the evacuation plans to implement depending on how the Kree attack, concerns over whether Carol Danvers would be able to protect the Skrulls, and what Fire Power Monica Rambeau could bring to the table. Carol mentioned one of the Accusers having a Quantum Band and admitted that she had little knowledge of all of their capabilities.

Several months later, Carol was asleep when the alarms went off. As her consciousness came into focus, a deep pit in her stomach formed. She had a hunch she knew why the alarms were going off. Rushing to get dressed, she ran through the hallways of the SABER station, trying to get to the command center – as were many Skrulls and humans aboard the station.

Once Carol reached the Command Center, her worst fears were realized. There were holograms showing various Skrull Colonies being Assaulted by Kree Craft. And there were so many colonies to defend. While the Skrulls have undoubtedly been building up their defenses in the almost two years since the blip ended, Carol had no doubt that unless she got involved soon, the Kree would be able to wear down the Skrulls’ defenses.

“How long has this been going on?” Carol asked.

“We just got the alert several minutes ago,” Monica, who had taken on night-time monitoring watches, answered.

“Any idea which colony needs my help the most?” Carol asked.

“Still trying to figure that out,” Monica said. “I’d head out to space in the meantime. Get a head start.”

Carol then donned her earpiece and headed straight for the nearest airlock. Once out into space, she headed towards a location where it would be easy to fly towards most of the colonies.

“Most of the attacks are lighter than we thought, but the Colony at Lorthax 24 is clearly facing the worst of it,” came Monica’s voice through the earpiece.

Carol groaned. That colony was furthest away from the others, and it required her to turn around. She did so, attempting to fly even faster than she did when scanning space for Tony Stark. Once she arrived, she was greeted by a series of smaller Kree Craft flying high above a desert-like environment and attempting to bombard fortifications below.

As Carol got to work busting up Kree Craft, anxiety started to fill her. There were twenty colonies in total, and it seemed as if all of them were under assault. And there was no way Carol could defend all of them at once.

After several minutes of fighting, Carol suddenly noticed that most of the Kree craft remaining were evacuating and heading out into space.

“Assault on Lorthax 24 appears to have been stemmed for the moment!” Carol said into her communications device.

“Good, because now the Kree are focusing heavily on Hy’lt Minor,” came the voice of Talos.

“Is that where I should go?” Carol asked.

There was a pause. “Yes!” Talos gasped.

Hesitant to leave in case Kree forces returned to Lorthax 24, Carol dutifully made all haste to fly to Hy’lt Minor.

Once Monica told Carol to head towards Lorthax 24, she noticed that another colony, located on Hy’lt Minor, suddenly had new Kree assault craft appear and that many ground troops were being deployed. While Carol Danvers seemed to be a great counter to Air Support, her effectiveness against Ground forces wasn’t as potent. Monica and Fury theorized that Monica’s phasing ability would be useful in getting through enemy lines and unleashing hell upon the enemy.

“Time to put our theory to the test,” Fury said, looking at the graphs depicting the assault on Hy’lt Minor.

Thanks to the Skrulls, SABER had a few craft that could travel through galactic jump points. Monica – who had spent the past couple years training to fly such craft, use Skrull weapons, and utilize her phasing power – rushed to one such craft and took off to Hy’lt Minor.

Once there, Monica made sure to land close to the Skrull fortifications. The landscape was mostly barren cracks in the dried up ground with occasional patches of grass.

Once out of the vehicle, she surveyed the location where the Kree were situated. Firefights had already broken out between the Skrull defenders and Kree attackers. The Kree had assembled massive lines ahead and there were even discussions of trenches being dug.

Up ahead, Kree craft were flying towards the Skrull base – prompting the Skrulls to raise the force-field. Monica decided to finally do what she has been training to do. Walking towards the edge of the force-field, she calmly phased through it.

As she kept rushing towards the Kree lines, they began focusing their fire on her. But their Fire simply phased through her and her gun, sending a jolt of confidence through Monica.

Once she was a few meters from the nearest Kree, Monica noticed that Carol Danvers had arrived to confront the Kree’s air-defenses. As Carol engaged the Kree in the air, Monica began firing her weapon at the soldiers on the ground.

One drawback was that in order to fire her gun, she had to be solid and thus vulnerable to enemy fire. The good news was that Monica was able to switch between offense and invulnerability very swiftly and had good instincts as to which mode was better for her at a given second.

As she gunned down various Kree soldiers, she came across fallen Skrulls, who were probably patrolling the area when the Kree’s surprise attack began.

ZAP!

As Monica phased through and resumed firing, she suddenly noticed that the environment around her had completely changed. She was on the hull of a Kree flight craft, although Monica could tell that she was still on Hy’lt Minor – just now flying high above it.

As she prepared to resume fighting, she suddenly felt her body go numb. She froze in place, unable to move. Looking ahead, she could see a female accuser, holding the Universal Weapon. The weapon she was holding was glowing purple and Monica could see that the Accuser was wearing a glowing Bangle – the light of which Monica could see connecting to the Universal Weapon’s light.

“Check her!” Dar-Benn ordered a Kree soldier who was standing next to her.

Chapter Text

As Monica Rambeau struggled to move, the Kree Soldier padded down her wrists, and scanned her body.

“Negative!” the soldier said.

Dar-Benn sighed. “We’ll have to try again in the future,” she groaned.

Just then, Carol flew up and into view.

“I don’t know what you just did,” Carol snarled. “But it’s not going to get you off easy!”

“Maybe not,” Dar-Benn said. “But this will!” With that, she slowly swung her Universal Weapon and knocked Monica off the ship.

Carol immediately rushed down, even as Dar-Benn’s shuttle flew off. Carol almost reached Monica when she felt the environment around her lurch, and she was suddenly falling – Monica suddenly above her.

But then Monica fell beneath Carol, prompting Danvers to try again.

ZAP!

The same thing happened. For the third time, she and Monica swapped places and it was unclear why this was happening.

“Carol!” Monica called. “Fly up!”

“What?” Carol gasped.

“When we swap places again, I’ll be flying up!”

They were getting close to the ground at this point, and it seemed like it was worth a shot.

 Carol flew up!

ZAP!

Within seconds, Carol smashed hard into the ground. Grunting and struggling to get up, she was able to look up in time to see Monica fall down, screaming before she abruptly began floating, inches above the ground.

Gasping, Monica floated a couple inches above the ground for a few seconds before landing safely. “That was way too close!” Monica gasped.

“Every colony was assaulted!” Emperor Dro’ge said through a hologram. “We have no choice but to consolidate. Talos! Krolos! I need you two to find some faction willing to reinforce us. It is clear that we will not be able to hold out against the Kree forever.”

“As you wish, your majesty!” the two Skrulls said as the hologram faded. They, alongside a few other Skrulls and SABER officials (including Maria Hill) were present. Fury, Carol, and Monica were noticeably absent.

“Any thoughts on who might come to help?” Maria Hill asked.

“None come to mind,” Talos said.

Krolos seemed to hesitate. “Maybe the Frost Giants of Jotunheim!” he muttered.

“The enemies of Asgard?” Hill asked.

“And enemies of Thanos,” Krolos said. “Thanos, who also has ties to the Kree. And there is wide-spread belief that they were close to beating him.”

“Except that they were powered by their Queen,” Talos said, “who mysteriously vanished right as the tide on Korbin turned heavily in Thanos’ favor. They haven’t been active against Thanos since they were kicked off of Korbin. And their Queen hasn’t been seen since and there are rumors that she is dead.”

“And also,” Hill said, “given that SHIELD is allied with Thor and Asgard, reaching out to Jotunheim might be seen as a betrayal of our alliance. We should at least see what Asgard is prepared to do, first.”

“I don’t think Asgard is in any position to confront an Empire like the Kree,” Krolos said. “But if you insist on reaching out to Asgard before any contact is made to Jotunheim, then it would be unwise to mention Jotunheim to them.”

It was decided that Monica would take Talos and Krolos down to New Asgard, while Carol Danvers would be on stand-by in the event the Kree attempt another assault. It was also decided that Monica would refrain from using her powers during this time, due to speculation that the swaps the women have experienced occurred when both of them used their powers.

Because Carol had already reached out to Valkyrie, she was ready to receive the three visitors. To their surprise, Valkyrie was flanked by what appeared to be a female version of Thor, sporting a cracked Mjolnir.

“I hear there is a war that broke out recently,” Valkyrie said.

“There’s always a war going on, isn’t there?” Talos said.

“That there is,” Valkyrie nodded.

“What would you say is the state of New Asgard?” Monica asked.

“As a tourist destination it’s pretty vibrant,” Valkyrie said. “As a militaristic Empire, it’s a shell of Old Asgard. We still have Einherjar, old veterans who were locked up in Latveria for five years before being compelled to fight Thanos. But maybe a thousand soldiers at most.”

“And me,” the woman Thor said.

“Jane, this is a conflict that has lasted a couple thousand years,” Valkyrie said. “We’re not in a state where we could tilt the war that much.”

“Can’t I come along?”

“I have to make sure we’re not putting New Asgard at risk,” Valkyrie said. “You’ve been standing by my side for a couple months now. If the Kree link you to me, what’s to stop them from Firebombing all of New Asgard?”

“Carol Danvers could,” Monica said.

“I thought you hated her,” Krolos said.

“I don’t hate her,” Monica hissed.

“If you were confident that Carol could protect New Asgard from the Kree, would you even be here?” Valkyrie asked. “Look, I am desperate to help. But at the same time, I have to weigh that against the dangers I might be subjecting New Asgard to.”

“You will look into it, won’t you?” Monica asked. “It seems like you want to help us, but you feel that you can’t. Maybe your research will assure you that the risks aren’t as great as they appear?”

“It’s possible,” Valkyrie said. “Perhaps, as someone who has seen the Kree attack Earth before, and as someone who works with SWORD, maybe you can brief me on whatever defenses Midgard has.”

Valkyrie remained hesitant to commit support for the Skrulls. Monica was not able to convince her that SWORD could protect New Asgard from the Kree and there were details Monica wasn’t sure she was allowed to disclose. By the time the team got back to SABER, Krolos was able to use this set-back to secure clearance for trips to Jotunheim.

The Kree launched at least three rounds of attacks onto the Skrulls. Each time, the Kree were able to force both Carol and Monica onto the battlefield, and cause swaps to occur – increasing the rift between the two women.

Talos journeyed on occasion back to New Asgard while Krolos reported from Jotunheim. During a meeting with the two Skrulls reporting from afar, Nick Fury, Carol, Monica, and Maria Hill took into account what they had to say.

“New Asgard is currently in disarray,” Talos said. "Last night, they came under attack by very strange creatures and a lot of kids have been kidnapped. Even though the main Thor has returned alongside this newer Thor, I imagine that New Asgard is going to be focused on their own internal issues.”

“That’s unfortunate,” Fury said. “How’s their military looking?”

“Well, I heard one guy blurt out that half of their soldiers are dead, but then another woman blurted out that half their soldiers are always dead, so I’m not sure how reliable such claims are.”

“Very well,” Maria Hill said. “Krolos? How are things looking on Jotunheim?”

“I am actually more optimistic on this one,” Krolos said. “They managed to come to Vanaheim’s aid while the latter realm was being terrorized by what they call Marauders – and that was during the Blip. They’ve since secured an alliance with the Realm and they long for the opportunity to secure more alliances.

“I’ve briefed them over the nature of the threat,” Krolos continued. “Given that they have a history of fighting Thanos, I often invoked the ties the Kree have to Thanos.”

“How is their government structured?” Fury asked.

“Between the genocide someone named Loki attempted to do to them and during their conflict with Thanos, they were led by someone named Sylene,” Krolos said. “But Sylene mysteriously vanished and it’s a council set up in her place that I’ve been speaking to.”

“Do they expect anything in return?” Hill asked.

“Well, they do hope to be allies with us Skrulls,” Krolos said. “It’s hard to think of anything that we can give them that they can’t get for themselves.”

“Are they likely to help us out?” Carol asked.

“I’ve been shown training grounds of Frost Giant soldiers undergoing drills,” Krolos said. “Easily thousands of them. They can summon portals, Shields, and Ice Spears in combat. There were easily a couple thousand of them in this one camp I was shown, and they hinted that there were many more throughout Jotunheim. One council member told me that they should be ready to deploy in a week or a week and a half.”

A week later, Monica was fighting Kree soldiers on the Front lines when suddenly, storm clouds condensed overhead, and lightning began striking various fortifications throughout the Battlefield. As Monica looked up, she was astonished to find Thor flying overhead, holding a cracked Mjolnir. Not long behind him, there was a much smaller figure wielding an ax roughly her size.

As Thor landed and sent shards of Mjolnir at the soldiers, the girl wielding his ax Stormbreaker sent violet lasers towards a nearby tank.

That girl seems awfully young for war, Monica thought.

Fortunately, the Kree seemed to have decided that a retreat was in order. Monica wasn’t sure if it was a planned retreat or if Thor’s arrival convinced a commander that retreat was in order, but was grateful it came regardless.

“Glad you could make it!” Monica gasped.

“Well, better to show up late than not at all,” Thor said.

“That’s, never mind,” Monica said. “Do you know if others are coming?”

“No, it’s just me and Carys here,” Thor said.

“What about this other Thor I saw a couple weeks ago?”

At this, Thor grimaced. “Yeah!” Thor gasped. “She’s not going to show up.”

Monica, realizing that she somehow touched a nerve, decided not to pursue the matter but instead escorted Thor back to the base.

“So, Thor,” Fury said when the two finally met. “Are there other Asgardians not far behind?”

“Sadly, no,” Thor said. “Just me and Carys,” he added gesturing towards the dark-haired girl with markings on her face.

“I see,” Fury said, turning his attention the girl. “Where are you from, little one?”

“Rapolla!” Carys said.

That’s a planet whose star was flaring up a year ago! Monica thought.

“I am sorry to hear about Jane Foster,” Fury said.

“Thank you,” Thor said.

Wait! What? Monica thought. Her focus on the attacks by the Kree left her little time to focus on what New Asgard was up to. Fury, though, seemed to have no problem. Was Jane Foster the other Thor that Monica encountered back in New Asgard? If so, what happened to her?

As Fury escorted Thor, with Carys and Monica a distance behind, Fury asked, “Is Carys considered an adult where she’s from or is she considered a child?”

“I believe it would be the latter,” Thor admitted.

“Okay, because I cannot sanction sending a child into battle,” Fury said. “It’s heavily frowned upon on Midgard.”

Thor stood there for a moment. “So, if I fight the Kree for you guys, I can’t take Carys with me?”

“Obviously, I can’t stop you, but I will be giving you a lot of heat for it,” Fury said. “I don’t know what the rules were on Asgard but Midgard has strict rules against it. Besides, whether you can fight alongside the Frost Giants might become a bigger issue.”

“Frost giants are coming?” Thor asked.

“They might be, soon,” Fury said. “One Skrull ambassador thought it would be a good idea to reach out to them for aid. He said that they should be ready to deploy in a week or week and a half. And that was a week ago.”

“Yeah, relations between me and the Frost Giants are going to be an issue,” Thor said, pausing his walk, prompting Fury to pause his own walk.

“Do you believe that we were wrong to reach out to Jotunheim?” Monica asked. “We did try reaching out to you first.”

“Not at all,” Thor gasped. “Given how much territory you guys are defending, a large army is certainly more useful than a couple fighters, no matter how strong said fighters might be. I actually attacked them a while ago against my father’s wishes and they probably still bear a grudge against me over that.”

He then turned around. “Sorry, Carys, we have to leave.”

“We can’t do anything here?”

“We can’t help everyone,” Thor said. “But there is always someone out there we can help. What if we explore Alfheim for a bit?”

As Thor and Carys ended up out of earshot, Fury and Monica kept walking. To their surprise, a Blue-lighted portal opened up and Krolos walked through, followed by three armored Frost Giants, all of which were just barely taller than Nick Fury.

“Dang!” Fury said. “That power looks pretty useful.”

“Thanks,” the Frost Giant in front said.

“Director Fury, this is Lieutenant Rorzan of Jotunheim,” Krolos said.

Chapter Text

One theory that Monica and Carol agreed to test was whether or not their swapping would occur when one of them started using their powers or whether the swapping would keep happening if they somehow managed to keep their powers active. Even as Frost Giants have poured into the Skrull Colonies and helped the Skrulls hold off Kree attacks to great effect, Carol and Monica were still seen as vital to the Skrulls’ defense.

On one such grassy colony with a glassy tower (known as Aks’lo), Monica found herself being briefed on the strategy for what they believed to be the Kree’s next attack. Various Frost Giants and Skrulls patrolled the room. Monica would start the battle from above and attempt to activate the swap as Carol hovered very close to the ground and the two would attempt to persist their powers so that they could fight normally.

Once the briefing was over, Monica watched from high above the ground below. She looked over as another woman she hadn’t seen before. Her hair was raven colored and she sported green armor on her neck, a green battle dress, and black leggings.

“You’re not Sif, are you?” Monica asked. While Monica had never seen Lady Sif, she had heard of her and what little she has seem of the Asgardian warrior in briefings, this woman seemed to highly resemble her.

“Actually, no,” the woman said. “I’m a… I’m a Skrull. I just like this appearance.”

“Oh, so like a Sif/Loki hybrid?” Monica was well familiar with Loki.

“I guess,” the Skrull replied.

At that point, the sirens began to go off.

“Serena?” the Frost Giant known as Rorzan asked, causing the Skrull to turn around. “You want to fight?”

Serena responded by rushing down the stairs with the Jotun Lieutenant. Monica herself walked over to a door leading to the balcony and waited for Carol Danvers to signal that she was hovering. After a few minutes, she got that signal and she leapt and immediately activated her phasing.

It worked!

Monica felt a small thud as her feet touched the ground. The extra dense soles on her shoes ensured that there would be some matter solid enough to prevent her from phasing through the ground. As she adjusted to her footing, she made sure to keep her phasing active, even as she saw Carol Danvers flying high above and scouting the skies for Kree warships.

Meanwhile, Frost Giants behind her began igniting blue shields larger and brighter than (but similar to) the Shields used by Sorcerers during the battle against 2014 Thanos. Much larger shields appeared over the base.

As Kree warships appeared, some of them engaged Carol, while others went straight for the tower. Some of them ran straight into shields the Frost Giants conjured up at the last minute. Others ended up having blue portals open on them and directing them straight into the ground.

Dang! Monica thought. These are brutal tactics!

She couldn’t dwell on that, though, as she engaged in a firefight with Kree soldiers, even as fire from the Skrulls behind her hit some of the soldiers. As Monica looked back, she noticed the Skrull called Serena get hit in the shoulder and fall back, even as a couple Frost Giants rushed to cover her.

Several minutes of combat continued to go by before the Kree decided that the assault wasn’t worth the losses they were incurring.

Several days later, the grassy colony of Aks’lo was considered secured by both the Skrulls and the Frost Giants, enough that Emperor Dro’ge saw fit to settle on Aks’lo. Both Nick Fury and Maria Hill were invited to a ceremony where Emperor Dro’ge presented both Krolos and Rorzan on a stage. Most of the attendees were Skrulls, though there were Frost Giants and SABER officials in attendance.

“It is, a stroke of genius, Krolos, to have reached out to the Frost Giants,” Dro’ge said. “For they have proven themselves to be invaluable.”

At this, there were a mix of cried of “Krolos! Krolos! Krolos!” mixed with cries of “Jotunheim! Jotunheim!”

“As I understand it, there is something we can offer our new allies in return,” Dro’ge said, handing a mic over to Krolos.

“I believe you have the authority to explain,” Krolos said to Rorzan, holding the mic up to him.

“It has recently come to my attention that our Queen, Sylene, has returned,” Rorzan said, prompting cheers from the Frost Giants in attendance. “And earlier today, has shown herself to be more powerful than Thor Odinson by besting the god of Thunder outside the palace of Vanaheim.”

At this, the Frost Giants in attendance began chants of “Ura! Ura!” prompting Fury and Hill to look at each other nervously.

“The Queen has a vested interest in taking down a trafficking ring on Sakaar,” Rorzan continued. “She has Frost Giants on Jotunheim ready to heed the call.”

Krolos took the mic back. “In order to help such a mission go as smoothly as possible, she has requested a few dozen Skrulls to travel to Jotunheim and use our abilities to perform reconnaissance. This trafficking ring is run by an Elder of the Universe known as En Dwi Gast – or the Grandmaster.

“Now, do we have any volunteers?” he added, as scores of hands went up.

Dar-Benn, Dar-Rogg, The Kree Emperor, and a couple officials were standing around holograms of the Frost Giants demolishing Kree Craft. Once the hologram finished playing, they each turned to a screen presenting the Mad Titan Thanos, a full Gauntlet on his left hand.

“My Lord,” the Emperor gasped nervously. “How did you deal with the Frost Giants the last time they got themselves involved like this?”

“I took out their Queen, though I do not foresee that being a feasible solution this time around,” Thanos said. “After Sakaar, she will undoubtedly be more conscientious about her personal safety.”

“I heard reports that the Frost Giants are also going to attack Saakar,” one official said. “Where they’ll run into Thane. Perhaps Thane can keep the Frost Giants pre-occupied?”

Thanos frowned. “Do not rely on a single savior to win your battles,” he said. “Those who do have already lost the war.”

“Then, how long will it take for Armorgoth to finish their upgrades?” the Emperor asked.

“The Enhanced Chitauri will be ready to deploy tomorrow!”

Chapter Text

Given how successful their maneuver was on Aks’lo, Monica and Carol decided to use it again, this time during a Kree Assault on Yirb. Yirb was a mostly tropical planet with 80% of its surface covered in water. Its gravity was also noticeably greater than that of Earth – making Monica grateful that she had her phasing powers.

The first several minutes of the battle went just as it had on Aks’lo, with Carol hovering over the ground before swapping places with Monica high in the sky. They concluded that the swapping occurred whenever one of them started using their powers, so they made sure to keep their powers active – with Carol keeping her flight and her photon-blasts in either a firing or a ready mode.

But then, Carol started to feel faint, similar to how she felt during her first encounter with the Accuser with the Quantum Band. Meaning that she was somewhere in this battle. Trying to weaken her.

ZAP!

It felt as if her head was hit with a ton of bricks as it seemed like she zoomed through a tight long tunnel. Eventually, it stopped, and Carol realized that her powers were not active at the moment – save for a tiny bit of glowing on her fingers that faded within seconds.

But neither was the battle around her, for there was no battle. Instead, it appeared that she was in some girl’s bedroom. Right next to her was a closet door sporting a massive hole in it. A bit of torn poster paper at her feet caught her attention. Picking it up, she saw that it was her face upon it.

Carol then looked around, seeing a ton of posters focused on her.

It then dawned on her that whoever lived in this bedroom was now entangled with her, and possibly Monica – and was currently somewhere on Yirb – either falling high from the sky or being shot at by Kree soldiers.

For a split second, she considered flying off. But would she then swap with either Monica or this random girl (Carol couldn’t imagine a boy having a bedroom like the one she found herself in)? Could she unwittingly make the situation even worse?

Deciding to walk outside, she contacted Monica. “Monica, are you still on the ground?”

“Yeah! Why?” Monica asked.

As Carol was rushing down the stairs, she said, “I swapped places with a third person.”

At that point, she ran into some other inhabitants of the house she was in. There was a woman with dark hair wearing a red shirt facing her. Standing next to a couch was a man with a thick dark beard and further back was an older man with a lighter beard.

“What’s going on?” the woman gasped. “Is Kamala up there?”

Kamala! That’s the girl’s name! Carol thought. “No!” she said. “She’s likely on the planet Yirb!”

“Yirb?” the woman asked.

“Yeah! Yirb!” Carol admitted.

“What’s going on on ‘Yirb’?” the younger man asked.

Kamala Khan fell down upon her bed, exhausted.

“Kamala, that does not sound like Science homework!” came the voice of her mother downstairs.

“Okay!” Kamala called out.

Stirring, she came to notice the Bangle on her arm act up and glow. Pulling it to her face, Kamala sat up and got out of her bed, attempting to examine the Bangle closely.

ZAP!

It suddenly felt as if she were being squeezed through a tiny whirling pipe, and Kamala felt her body colliding with something for a moment before that feeling passed. When it was over, she was alarmed to find herself high in the sky, propelled upwards for a moment before gravity began to take hold of her.

“AHHH! OH MY GOD! OH MY GOD!” Kamala shrieked before attempting to conjure a platform with her powers in order to catch herself. It took her a few tries before she was eventually able to stabilize herself, though it was hard to get up – gravity seemed to have intensified for some reason. That said, she was able to put her head up and look around. There seemed to be a lot of alien craft in the sky – some of which were slowly inching towards her.

One of the craft that was approaching had an opening large enough to fit Kamala and her platform in it. Within this opening stood a woman in a turtle green outfit with a hammer-like tool with a long handle. Kamala noticed that this woman wore a bangle on her left arm similar to her own.

“Come with me!” the woman yelled.

“Who are you?” Kamala yelled.

“Someone who knows how your Bengle works,” the woman yelled. “It seems your powers have become a liability. If you keep using them, I cannot predict where you’ll end up.”

Kamala was unsure. She had no idea who this woman was, but everything she said appeared to be true. As the woman’s ship closed in around Kamala, she pondered what might happen if she were to use her powers again. Would she swap again? If so, where would she find herself then?

As Kamala and her platform hovered next to the woman and clearly was within the ship, she decided to allow her platform to fade, prompting her to fall. The woman reached out with her long hammer and Kamala caught it.

Walking fast outside, Carol waited for updates on how to proceed.

“I’m making my way towards our lines,” came the voice of Monica.

“Carol, while we figure out how to proceed,” came the voice of Fury, “see if you could find out more about this third person. There ought to be some clues in your surroundings.”

“I’m somewhere in Jersey City, on Earth,” Carol said. “The girl is a sixteen-year-old Pakistani American named Kamala Khan.”

Looking back, Carol noticed that her family was on the porch, looking at her.

“Kamala Khan recently appeared on Damage Control’s radar,” Fury said. “She apparently has the ability to conjure solid objects that appear to be made out of light.”

Carol thought back to the Quantum Band that the Kree Accuser was wearing. Knowing that there are two of them, Carol thought to ask, “does Kamala happen to have a metallic bracelet that can cover much of her arm?”

“Are you talking about that Bangle she inherited from her grandmother?” Muneeba Khan asked.

Chapter Text

Dar-Benn escorted Kamala Khan down the hallway of her ship.

“That’s quite the outfit you’re wearing,” Dar-Benn said in a friendly manner.

“Thanks, my mom made it!” Kamala said.

“Is there any inspiration behind its design?”

“Yeah, my Hero, Captain Marvel!”

Dar-Benn raised an eyebrow. “Captain Marvel?”

“Yeah, she’s this lady superhero who has the ability to glow yellow and can fly and shoot yellow beams from her hands,” Kamala said.

“Oh!” Dar-Benn said, trying to suppress her shock. “She sounds very familiar.”

“You know her?”

“We used to have someone like that in our ranks,” Dar-Benn said. “But a long time ago, she… deserted us – to put it mildly.”

“What was she like?”

“I’ve never met her personally,” Dar-Benn said. “However, I am curious as to what you know about the Kree and Skrulls.”

“Not much,” Kamala said. “I mainly know her from her battles with Thanos. She plowed through Thanos’ massive spaceship before proceeding to beat the big guy up.”

They reached a control room, with holograms playing in the middle.

“Is that how that battle played out?” Dar-Bann asked.

“Well, I might be hyping her up a bit, but not even Thor was able to destroy that ship,” Kamala said. “And he’s supposedly a god.”

“Do you see this Captain Marvel as flawless?”

“Well, she probably has a flaw or two somewhere…”

Dar-Benn decided to have the hologram show a diagram of a Skrull.

“Do you have a mother and a father?”

“Uhh!” Kamala said, starting to get bad vibes from Dar-Benn.

“Imagine your mother is being held captive somewhere and the woman you thought was your mother turned out to be one of these creatures,” Dar-Benn said, causing the Skrull in the hologram to shape-shift. “Unfortunately, Captain Marvel saw fit to join with these creatures and help them terrorize the galaxy. She is, shall we say, far from flawless.”

“So, what are they called?” Kamala asked.

“Skrulls,” Dar-Benn said. “They, alongside Carol Danvers, also saw fit to ally themselves with the Frost Giants not too long ago. You mentioned Thor, and I imagine you see him as a hero. I trust you know of the relationship between Thor and the Frost Giants?”

“Yeah!” Kamala said, wanting to get more information out of Dar-Benn before deciding to trust her or not. Deep down, she felt that Dar-Benn was being manipulative. “Do you see the Skrulls as inherently bad? Or…”

“I don’t see them as inherently bad,” Dar-Benn said. “I imagine that most of them are as upstanding as any other galactic citizen. But this faction of Skrulls Captain Marvel has aligned herself with is of a more militant group. And their abilities make them particularly dangerous.”

There was something vaguely familiar with the way Dar-Benn was describing the Skrulls, and Kamala got the sense that Dar-Benn did see all the Skrulls as inherently bad. Kamala also suspected that Dar-Benn wanted to take her Bangle – given that she already had possession of the other one.

“And I have no doubt that they will soon run into conflict with Thor, given their alliance with the Frost Giants,” Dar-Benn diverted, noting that her approach might not be working. “This is not the kind of situation you should be in, and I fear that the Quantum Band might drag you into this again.”

“Yeah!” Kamala muttered, deciding what to do next. This woman definitely wanted her Bangle, and Kamala could tell that it would not end well if she were to acquire it.

Kamala abruptly summoned a shield around herself made out of light, insulating herself from the soldiers around her.

Dar-Benn, however, merely charged up her own Bangle and struck the shield with her Universal Weapon, shattering the shield to pieces.

“I CAN HELP YOU!” Dar-Benn shrieked. “You swapped places earlier. Imagine finding yourself in the vacuum of space.”

“Stop lying to me!” Kamala spat before recreating her shield and having a fist pop-out of the shield and knock Dar-Benn back.

Dar-Benn got up and moved to strike the shield again. But when it shattered, Kamala Khan was no longer in it.

Monica Rambeau, however, was.

The second time, Kamala Khan felt as if she was being squeezed through a pipe, though it wasn’t quite as dramatic as the first time around. This time around, the destination was not as hectic, but there were a few Skrulls standing around.

“Kamala Khan!” came a voice, prompting Kamala to look towards the source.

“Oh my God!” Kamala yelped in excitement. “It’s Nick Fury!”

“Yes!” Nick Fury said, exasperated. “Right now, don’t do anything.”

“What?”

“Don’t use any of your powers,” Fury elaborated. “Otherwise, you’ll pop up in Lord knows where!”

“Okay!” Kamala said.

Nick Fury waited a few seconds before deciding that Kamala was not going to do anything. Pulling out a communicator, he said to it, “Carol, we retrieved the girl.”

“Understood!” came Carol’s voice through the communicator.

“What’s going on?” Kamala asked.

“Carol Danvers is going to retrieve Monica Rambeau,” Fury explained. “Monica is the woman who took your place when you teleported here.”

“You mean Captain Marvel is involved?”

“I guess!”

“And you know who I am!”

“You were all over the news a week ago,” Fury said.

“Do I get to join the Avengers?”

“Last I checked, you’re not 18!”

“But when I become 18?”

“Potentially!” Fury said, “But right now, you’ve become entangled with two women I’ve been working with. I need to get you three together.”

At this point, Kamala’s Bangle started glowing again, prompting Kamala to look at it.

“Don’t do anything!” Fury warned.

“It’s doing it on its own,” Kamala said. “Just like when I first swapped.”

“Did you do anything in response?”

“I shook my wrist a bit,” Kamala said.

“Don’t do that!” Fury said.

“Okay!” Kamala responded when, to her relief, the glowing stopped.

Monica gritted her teeth as Dar-Benn held her in place.

“Was this planned?” Dar-Benn growled.

“Possibly!” Monica grunted.

Dar-Benn stared at Monica for a few seconds before looking at her wrist. “Well, I got her here before, I can do it again.”

“You know, if this girl you’re after swaps with Veers and Veers is currently in space, you’ll just put that girl into space, beyond your reach,” Monica grunted.

Dar-Benn paused, before undoing what she was doing with the Quantum Band.

“Very well,” Dar-Benn said. “I trust that Veers is travelling as fast as she can to get to your location. Know this, your Frost Giant Army will soon be countered.”

“Veers could just leave me here,” Monica said.

“When I myself don’t plan to?” Dar-Benn said.

What? Monica thought.

There was a thud that indicated that the ship they were on had just landed. Dar-Benn led Monica out to the ground below and released her, before having the ship take off.

It was clear that she was still on Yirb, with its intense gravity, so Monica almost used phasing to counter it. She then remembered that Carol was likely in space and that she might cause swapping to occur.

Kneeling over, Monica spoke into her communicator, “They released me! I’m on Yirb, and the gravity is overwhelming.”

“Carol?” Came the voice of Nick Fury. “How close are you to Yirb?”

“I’ve just entered the system,” Carol responded.

“Just land in the base!” Fury said. “I’m sending out a transport for Monica!”

Chapter Text

It wasn’t long before Carol Danvers landed on the base.

“Oh my God!” Kamala squealed in excitement. “It’s Captain Marvel!”

“Hey kid,” Carol said. “You alright?”

“I am now that you’re here,” Kamala said.

“Okay,” Carol said nervously. “Glad my presence assures you so much.” Turning to Fury, who was a few meters behind Kamala, Carol asked, “is Monica back yet?”

“She’s been picked up and should be arriving here shortly,” Fury said. Turning to a communicator, he said, “Hill, meet me in the docks!”

Within minutes, a small transport carrying Monica floated by, with Monica getting off and walking over to them.

“That Accuser!” Monica gasped. “She’s dangerous!”

“She tried to play nice with me, but there was clearly something off about her,” Kamala said.

“Yeah!” Fury said, “Once Hill arrives, we can meet up with Talos and discuss this Accuser.”

“Any word on Krolos?” Carol asked.

“Not that I’m aware of but we can ask Talos if he’s heard anything,” Fury said.

It wasn’t long before Maria Hill arrived, and Fury led them to a room Talos was hanging out in.

“So, I hear that there is a new Light-powered individual within our ranks,” Talos said.

“I’m afraid she can’t fight in this war,” Fury said.

“I can fight!” Kamala said.

“Physically, maybe,” Fury said. “Legally, I can’t allow it. Besides, fighting agents of Damage Control – which, for the record, I highly advise against doing in the future – is nothing like fighting soldiers of a genocidal alien regime.”

“Okay,” Kamala said.

“Out of curiosity,” Carol said, addressing Talos, “any word from Krolos?”

“It seems like most of Sakaar is secured and most of the power players are returning to Jotunheim,” Talos said.

“Did you ever find out what they were doing on Sakaar?” Monica asked.

“No!” Talos sighed. “Krolos himself remained mum on that issue. I do know that Queen Sylene had been captive on Sakaar for some time so revenge may be a partial motivating factor.”

“Okay, could we talk about the issue at hand?” Hill asked. “We have a situation where a minor from Earth got caught up in a brutal war and if we keep doing business as usual, could very well happen again.”

“Right!” Fury said. “Bear in mind, this conversation will be recorded. Kamala, do you want to tell us what happened with you?”

“Well, it all started when I was making plans with my friend Bruno to go to the first-ever Avenger-Con,” Kamala said. “You see, my parents were…”

“I’m going to stop you right there,” Fury said. “Let’s start with right before you first swapped with Carol Danvers here.”

“Okay, well,” Kamala resumed, before she explained how she was suddenly teleported to the air of this outer-space colony and was rescued by a Kree Accuser. She then skimmed over the conversation they had before ending with the Skrulls and Nick Fury appearing.

“When I first noticed I was in Kamala’s room, I realized that something had gone awry,” Carol said. “I thought about immediately flying away, but it dawned on me I didn’t know where I was, and that whoever I swapped with, or Monica, could find themselves high in the sky or in space. So, I reached out to Monica to let her know what happened. And then I ran into the other Khans. I then had to explain where Kamala Khan likely was – in the middle of an ariel battle with the Kree.”

“I instructed Monica to return to the base while advising Carol to learn more about the person she swapped places with,” Fury continued. “Monica, who had been swapping with Carol Danvers for months now, was willing to take the place of the person, whom Carol later reported as Kamala. We had to have Monica phase in and out vigorously in the hopes that Kamala Khan would use her powers and swap here. It was a desperate ploy but thank God it worked! Once Kamala was with us, I had to make sure she did not use her powers, lest she swapped again. Then I let Carol know to rescue Monica.”

“This rescue, ultimately, was not needed,” Monica said. “The Accuser, whoever she was…”

“She called herself Dar-Benn,” Kamala said.

“Dar-Benn immediately held me in place using her Quantum Band,” Monica said. “And then, for some reason, she decided to release me.”

“Quantum Band?” Kamala asked.

“Yeah,” Carol said. “That thing you call a Bangle is actually one of two Quantum Bands of Kree Legend. They can manipulate energy, specifically light energy, which may explain why Dar-Benn is such a huge threat to Monica and I.”

“And she’s just a threat with one Quantum Band,” Talos said. "What could she do if she were to acquire the other one?”

“It’s hard to say,” Carol said. "I imagine that her energy manipulation powers will rival or even surpass that of the Frost Giants. She might be able to establish regions where their magic is hard to maintain at best and at worst, doesn’t even work.”

“What about your powers?” Hill asked.

“Well, they already start to fail me against her when she had one,” Carol said. “Hard to predict.”

“It’s clear that we can’t allow Dar-Benn to get Kamala’s Bangle,” Fury said. “Kamala, are you able to leverage your powers without your Bangle?”

“I mean, I have my powers, but I’ve always channeled them with my Bangle,” Kamala said.

“Then,” Fury began, before pausing to give it some thought.”

“If we send her home,” Hill suggested. “We can’t be sure she won’t get caught up in this again. The swapping, the…”

“Quantum entanglement?” Monica suggested.

“Quantum Entanglement has not been resolved,” Hill said. “And to expect a sixteen-year-old girl to not use her powers is folly. Even if Kamala could restrain herself, it seems that Dar-Benn caused the Bangle to act up on its own. Who knows if she could cause Kamala to swap even without the Bangle.

“Are you saying Carol and I need to be removed from this conflict?” Monica asked.

“I cannot risk letting a sixteen-year-old fall into enemy hands again,” Fury said. “Wherever you two go, Kamala should be with you.”

“What are you going to say to her family?” Hill asked.

“The truth!” Fury said. “I also don’t want to send the Bangle Back to Earth lest Dar-Benn assault the planet. Carol, your powers stemmed from the Tesseract, right?”

“Yes,” Carol said.

“Then I know the person to reach out to,” Fury said.

After the meeting, Fury requested an update on an alien craft that went straight for Earth without hailing SABER a couple weeks prior. He then asked Hill to look into the matter, to which Hill agreed. Once back on SABER, Fury took Monica to visit Erik Selvig’s apartment in Norway.

“Let me guess,” Erik said when he answered Fury’s knock. “You need me for something.”

“One of these days, I won’t,” Fury said. “But we have a situation where Carol Danvers, who was powered by the Tesseract that you once studied, has been swapping with Monica here. Recently, a sixteen-year-old girl also started swapping places with them, which put her life in severe Jeopardy. I’m hoping you might be able to help us resolve the situation.”

“That sounds like quite the situation you have,” Erik said. “Why don’t you come in?”

Fury and Monica followed Erik to the living room. When Monica saw a photo of Jane Foster and a painting of Jane as Mighty Thor, she said, “I’m sorry about your loss.”

“Oh!” Erik said. “Thor came by to deliver the news, and it wasn’t that surprising. At least she got to go out on her own terms! How long has this swapping been going on?”

“For a few weeks,” Monica said. “Only earlier today did this sixteen-year-old start swapping with us.”

“Where is this Carol and where is this girl now?” Selvig asked.

“Right now, they’re with a Skrull base, which is not on Earth – I should add,” Fury said. “We’re getting ready to send them to some remote place, and hoping you can look into the matter.”

Erik sighed. “Alright, I’ll help.”

“You will?” Monica asked.

“It’s what Jane would have wanted.”

Monica suggested reaching out to Darcy Lewis, but Selvig refused to support the suggestion. After Selvig gathered some equipment, Monica then escorted him to New Asgard so that Selvig could look at the Mighty Thor statue one last time before heading off into space.

Fury, meanwhile, took the time to visit the Khan family to explain the situation – during which time he was reminded by Kamala’s mother that “Damage Control goons shot at her a week ago.” Fury was eventually able to persuade them to allow his mission to proceed by invoking the specter of a Kree invasion, “and we already saw an alien attack on New York over a decade prior.”

Eventually Monica, Fury (who assured the family that he will watch them personally), and Selvig met up with Carol and Kamala.

“So, you’re the one that got dragged into all of this?” Selvig asked Kamala.

“You’re one of Thor’s friends, right?” Kamala asked.

“Well, yeah!”

They eventually made their way over to a transport which began taking them to a remote desert planet. During which Selvig told the Marvels Thor related stories. Once they parked the ship, Selvig had Kamala hand him the Bandle so that he could begin studying it.

Once night had fallen on the location, Nick Fury received an emergency Communication from Talos.

“The Kree have launched a renewed assault on our bases, and they were joined by the Enhanced Chitauri. Seven bases are currently evacuating. Even the Frost Giants couldn’t hold off the onslaught.”

Chapter Text

“God! I want to fight them so bad!” Carol, who had overheard the message, said.

“I know,” Fury responded. “Maybe once the Frost Giants are finished with whatever they are doing on Sakaar, they can mount a counter-offensive. Do you know if the Enhanced Chitauri have a weakness comparable to Loki’s Chitauri?”

“They have to have that weakness,” Carol explained. “They are sentient creatures that have the potential to think for themselves. But if a mothership or a large tower is broadcasting commands to them, they are forced to work for their masters. When such signals are removed, the Chitauri might rebel against their masters. To prevent this, the Chitauri armor basically rips them up once the signal goes out.

“I don’t think we’ll be looking for a ship,” she added. “If it’s a ship, it would have to be larger than the Sanctuary II to support the level of precision that the Enhanced Chitauri are known for. If anything, there is probably a tower out there, whose owners the Kree are working with.”

“Your Chitauri Reinforcements have made quite an impact, my Lord,” the Kree Emperor said.

He was standing before a hologram of Thanos. Dar-Benn stood off to one side and a couple Chitauri soldiers stood to the other side.

“Given how much of an impact they have made, you guys come across as reliant on them,” Thanos said. “At this point, the Frost Giants will be looking for a way to destroy them, and they have a non-zero chance of succeeding.”

“Is Thane not keeping them pre-occupied on Sakaar?” the Emperor gasped.

“He is not,” Thanos said. “Sakaar is now fully under Jotunheim’s control, and En Dwi Gast will soon be apprehended by them.”

“My Lord?” Dar-Benn spoke up. “If you know so much about how this is going to play out, surely you can give us some pointers on how to ensure that our enemies don’t regain the upper hand.”

Thanos thought for a moment. “Sergeant!” he said.

“Yes, my Lord!” one of the Chitauri said, both of them bowing.

“Go forth and meet up with Colonel Yon Rogg,” Thanos said. “Warn him that Thane is our enemy and that the accomplice with him is really the daughter of Thor.”

“It will be done, my Lord,” the Chitauri said before both of them got up and left the room.

“The Kree still need to pull their own weight in this conflict,” Thanos said. “That second Quantum Band will ensure that you can finish off your enemies if the Chitauri survive, or it can ensure that your Empire can survive Jotunheim’s wrath if the Chitauri were to fall.”

With that, the hologram faded.

“You had that Band in your grip,” the Emperor snarled, still looking at where the Thanos Hologram was. “And you let it slip away.”

“The situation was volatile,” Dar-Benn said. “My current plan seemed like the better approach.”

“Current Plan?” he said, finally turning to her.

“Yes!” Dar-Benn said. “Now that a young girl has been brought into the mix, they will do everything they can to avoid fighting. If they are intelligent, they will remove themselves from this conflict. There is a station outside of Terra that’s been coordinating the efforts against us from the beginning. While we have the upper-hand, I plan to go to this station. Either I will find out where the Marvels are, or I will force them to come to me.”

Selvig had Kamala’s Bangle in a contraption, and he was in the process of aligning it precisely when the machine began to glow and blue lights illuminated the Bangle.

Selvig stepped back from the machine and turned to the rest of the crew. Carol Danvers had a device attached to her head that emitted white light between it and her head. Monica was reading a book and Kamala Khan was lying on her back on a couch, clearly daydreaming.

“Okay,” he said, as Carol removed the device from her head and both Monica and Kamala looked up. “I just began scanning the Quantum Band, or Bangle, and should have readings on it within an hour. In the meantime, I am curious as to what your powersets are and how you came to acquire them.”

“Who would like to go first?” Fury asked.

“OOH!” Kamala said, raising her hand high. “I would!”

“By all means,” Selvig said.

“My abilities chiefly come in the form of manipulating a type of light energy, I think it’s called Noor – my friend Bruno can explain it better than I can,” Kamala said. “Anyway, it manifests in my ability to create objects that look like crystalized light. I can have these objects float in mid-air, have them take any shape I can think of, although I don’t think I’ve ever conjured anything larger than a house. Bruno thinks that I’ve always had these powers, or at least some of them, but they were dormant and the bangle is what activated them.”

“Have you used any of your powers without the bangle?” Selvig asked.

“Well, no, not exactly,” Kamala admitted. “Should I?”

“That’s up to you,” Selvig said.

“Given that Dar-Benn was able to activate the Bangle’s powers remotely,” Fury said, “It would be a good idea. It’s hard to imagine her being able to cause your powers alone to activate.”

“Oh, okay!” Kamala said, getting up, prompting Fury and Selvig to raise their hands in defense.

“Maybe once we’re done,” Fury suggested.

“I’ll have to renew Jane’s…” Selvig began before pausing. “Jane’s papers on Noor. She actually got a Nobel prize for her research around the time of Ultron. Okay, who’s next?”

Carol and Monica looked at each other, though there was clearly tension between the two still.

“I’ll go,” Monica said. “I first started noticing extra abilities going through a reddish hex spawned by witch magic.”

“Was this in Westview, New Jersey?” Selvig asked.

“Yeah!” Monica gasped. “How did you know?”

“I’m a close associate of Darcy Lewis, who was heavily involved with those events,” Selvig said. “Perhaps you’ve met her?”

“I did, actually,” Monica gasped.

“I’ve been following her research closely,” Selvig said. “What did the hex enable you to do?”

“Well,” Monica said. “I first went through it, and pretended to be a woman named Geraldine. Wanda Maximoff eventually found out and she expelled me from the hex. Eventually, I made an effort to enter the hex again. And it was after this second entry that I was able to see different spectrums of light and later discovered that I can control my density – courtesy of Heyward’s bullets.”

“Seems like phasing and seeing various spectrums of light are two distinct powers,” Selvig said.

“Well, there’s a bit of a blue glow when I do phase,” Monica said.

“Okay, there’s a link,” Selvig said.

“Could your phasing be due to Wanda Maximoff being into Vision, who was famous for phasing?” Kamala asked.

“Maybe?” Selvig said, without certainty.

“Very plausible!” Fury said.

“Oh my God!” Kamala said. “Nick Fury liked what I had to say.”

“Yeah!” Nick said, a little annoyed. “Let’s not read more into it than what it actually is. Carol? Do you want to tell Dr. Selvig about your powers and how you got them?”

“It started with a plane crash I was in in the 90’s,” Carol said. “There was an energy source being developed that could transport the Skrulls away to new places in the universe – far away from the Kree Empire. It was based off of the Tesseract. I shot into it, and absorbed much of the explosion.

“Ever since then, I’ve had the ability to shoot photon blasts and fly around using photon energy for propulsion,” Carol said.

“The Tesseract gave you those powers?” Selvig said.

“Indirectly, but yeah!” Carol said.

Selvig paused for a moment.

“You alright there, Dr.?” Fury asked.

“Yeah,” Selvig gasped. “Just thought I’d never have to deal with the Tesseract again.”

Selvig retreated and began to read some papers he brough with him, all the while waiting for the readings on Kamala’s Bangle to be available. Kamala herself, kept trying, without avail, to conjure Noor-shapes without the Bangle.

After some time, Fury noticed a light in the night sky that appeared to be getting closer.

“Defensive positions,” Fury said, as both Carol and Monica stood in position.

The light soon revealed itself to be a Skrull vehicle and it was clear that it was damaged. Once it landed, the doors popped open and Talos exited, followed by Soren and G’iah.

“What’s going on?” Fury asked.

Talos staggered up to Fury.

“The SABRE Station,” Talos gasped, “has been attacked.”

Chapter Text

“Attacked?” Fury gasped.

“We barely escaped the destruction,” Talos said. “Communications in our shuttle was down.”

“How freaking bad was it?”

“The entire station was destroyed,” Talos said. “Most of the Skrulls onboard escaped to Jotunheim.”

“Monica!” Fury turned. “I need you to monitor all Skrull and Kree Frequencies. See if the Kree are trying to send us a message.”

“If the Kree attacked the station, they may invade Earth itself,” Carol snarled, as Monica rushed over to a nearby computer.

“Does anyone know where Thor is?” Kamala asked. “Maybe he could provide a line of defense.”

“I haven’t spoken to him since he told me about Jane,” Selvig said.

“Guys!” Monica gasped. “I’m getting a signal!”

A massive hologram appeared, depicting Dar-Benn sitting on a throne-like chair, holding her universal weapon.

“The Kree Empire has been engaged in a war with infiltrators for hundreds of years,” Dar-Benn said. “Known as Skrulls. A race of beings that have been known to abduct individuals and masquerade as them. For months, it was clear that beings from Terra – or Earth – have elected to provide arms and aid to these creatures. I know that not everyone on Terra is complicit in this act of war, but the organization known as SABRE is – and we have responded accordingly.

“Our war is with the Skrulls, not with Terra,” Dar-Benn continued. “And to the Terrans who have provided aid, how can you trust that they will not infiltrate your organizations? You know what the Skrulls are capable of. You know what we Kree are capable of.

“My superiors have left me in charge of navigating our response to Terra’s interference. I’ve also been burdened with finding an artifact last known to be in the possession of a Terran named Kamala Khan. We believe she is currently in league with Veers, a former Kree soldier turned traitor to our cause, as well as a phaser. To Kamala, Monica, and Veers, reveal your locations within three days of the timestamp, and Terra will be spared. Keep hiding like cowards, and Terra will face the wrath of the Kree Empire.”

With that, the hologram ended.

Maria Hill waited outside the steps of a Los Angelos Courthouse. The trail of the mysterious ship has largely gone cold, though Hill suspected that it was related to Bruce Banner and the sudden stardom of Jennifer Walters – who could now take on the form of a feminine Hulk. Banner could not be reached (not even on his island), so Hill decided to track down Walters to see if she knew anything.

As people started to walk down the steps, Hill caught sign of the woman who looked like how Jennifer Walters’ human form is supposed to look.

“Jennifer Walters?” Hill asked, approaching the woman.

“Hey, you’re the woman who’s always with Nick Fury, aren’t you?” Jennifer asked.

“I’m not always with him,” Hill gasped.

“Well,” Jennifer said. “I have no desire to join the Avengers or any super-powered group you might be overseeing.”

“Don’t worry, I’m not here to recruit you,” Hill said. “The Avengers are currently disassembled and I’m not closely tied with any other super-hero group. I just happen to have a few questions.”

Jennifer paused.

“I’m not in trouble, am I?”

“No!” Hill assured her. “I don’t think I should ask you in public, though. We can talk in my van and take you to wherever you were heading.”

Jennifer hesitated. “Alright,” she said. “I’m currently heading home; you probably know where that is.”

As the two women walked towards Hill’s van, Hill asked, “Any update on the dispute regarding the title of She-Hulk?”

“Yeah,” Jennifer said. “I just won the rights to use it again.”

Once they got in the van, they took off.

“So, you do know where I live!” Jennifer said.

“There’s a mysterious craft that entered Earth’s airspace a couple weeks ago,” Hill informed her. “We’re not sure what it was. Have you had any encounter with an alien craft recently?”

“Yeah, it’s actually how I got the She-Hulk persona, and my life changed drastically, though for better or worse, I’m not sure,” Jennifer said.

“Do you know anything about this ship?”

“Bruce told me it was from Sakaar. I don’t know how much you know about that.”

“I’m somewhat familiar with Bruce’s experience on Sakaar,” Hill said.

“He told me about Sakaar during the couple days he kept me on his and Tony’s island. I think it picked him up again a couple days later while I was being asked to represent Emil Blonsky.”

At this point, the phones started to send an emergency signal, prompting both Hill and Walters to check them. Hill’s phone had a notification related to the Kree destroying the SABRE station.

“SABRE station destroyed by alien craft?” Jennifer gasped, as she made a few taps on her phone. “Article is very short.”

Hill imagined that as a member of SABRE, she would have access to a lot more information than Jennifer and the rest of the public did – and that it might not be safe to read the information she was provided until Jennifer was dropped off.

After a couple of minutes after the shock wore off, Hill asked Jennifer to describe the encounter with the craft. After hearing that it led to Bruce and Jennifer crashing the vehicle they were driving, Hill started putting pieces together – though she was unsure if her analysis was correct.

She knew that the Frost Giants sent a force to invade Sakaar and that they were tangentially allies with the Skrulls. They were also successful in taking Sakaar and thus would have access to Sakaarian craft. But given the hap-hazard way in which the craft entered Earth and approached Bruce and Jennifer, the Frost Giants were clearly not on friendly terms with Earth.

 Once Jennifer was dropped off, Hill checked the notification, which had way more details than Jennifer’s notification did. She also watched the ultimatum Dar-Benn sent.

Kamala looked at a glowing sphere she had made.

“Oh my God,” she gasped. “I finally did it.”

Her Bangle was still held by Selvig’s machine, although the scanning was over. Selvig himself was studying a computer screen. This meant that Kamala had summoned the sphere by her own power.

“Progress,” Carol muttered. “I’m curious as to whether or not we’re entangled with your power or that of the Quantum Band.”

The sphere vanished. Kamala felt that her powers without the Bangle were as unstable as they were when she first started using them with the Bangle.

“I’m not ready to try that yet,” Kamala said. “You get used to it.”

“Any insights on removing the entanglement, Dr. Selvig?” Carol asked.

“I think there is a way,” Selvig said, his face a little gaunt. “But were going to need to get the other Quantum Band.”

Chapter Text

“In that case,” Monica said. “We may have no choice but to try it. At the very least, we need to know if it is you who is entangled with us or the Bangle.”

Kamala hesitated. “Okay, give me a few seconds,” she said, bracing herself.

“You want to swap or should I?” Carol asked Monica.

“I’ll swap!” Monica said firmly.

“Okay!” Carol said as Monica faced Kamala.

“Ready,” Kamala said, conjuring another sphere.

A couple seconds later, Monica made herself phase.

SWAP!

“Darn!” Kamala said, now standing in Monica’s previous position.

“Looks like we’ll have to get used to swapping,” Carol said. "And incorporate it into our strategy.”

They first began jumping around the area, trying to jump and swap mid-air and then land perfectly. More often than not, they ended up staggering upon landing on the floor. They then looked into doing jump-rope.

With Bruce Banner missing and Jennifer Walters unable to provide anymore information about what the Sakaarian ship was up to, Maria Hill relocated to SABER’s ground base. She became overwhelmed by just how devastating the attack was. During her time on SABER, Hill became familiar with many of the people who had now fallen. She even had to provide contact information to relative of two of the fallen.

Eventually, she saw Colonel Rhodes standing near a window, where she figured the survivors of the attack were being held.

“I take it the President has been briefed on the attack?” Hill asked.

“Yeah!” Rhodes gasped after a pause. “He expressed an interest in meeting with the survivors, but…”

“But what?”

“The four we were able to recover are experiencing strange symptoms that suggest a danger to the President that the Secret Service will object to,” Rhodes said. “One of them has a disturbingly high fever, another one is experiencing skin that’s getting crusty – and rusty, another is showing sever skin sagging but not in a manner that suggests aging. The woman, well her body is giving out electrical magnetic pulses.”

“Alright,” G’iah said. “Kamala, Monica, on three!”

Kamala was currently in the middle of a jump-rope set-up, Monica and Carol holding the handles while G’iah (currently in her skrull form) watches.

“One!” G’iah said as Kamala eyed Monica’s hand movements and prepared to intercept the ropes Monica was currently holding.

“Two!” Monica phased slightly, but not enough to cause the ropes to slip from her grasp. She began to jog in place.

“Three!” G’iah called, prompting Kamala to conjure semi-solid spheres and prompting her to swap with Monica. The spheres intercepted the jump-rope handles, enabling Kamala to easily get a grip on them.

“Turn around, Monica, you’re swapping with Captain Marvel next,” G’iah said.

Monica took a few hops before she was able to turn around and face Carol.

“See,” Kamala said. “G’iah likes the Marvel brand.”

“I’m not calling myself Professor Marvel,” Monica said.

“One… two…” G’iah said, prompting Monica to brace herself. “Three!”

SWAP!

Carol managed a few steps before she tripped, ending the jump-rope spree.

“Come on, Carol!” Monica groaned.

“Sorry,” Carol gasped, getting up. “I’m just anxious. In a day and a half, Dar-Benn is simply going to bombard the Earth.”

“Well,” Talos (who along with Fury, Selvig and Soren were in the background, either reading or chatting) interjected. “It certainly doesn’t help that we are blind to what’s going on. What if I were to travel to Jotunheim, and provide you all with updates as they come in?”

“Are you sure?” Soren asked.

“My cousin is on good terms with the Frost Giants so surely he could look out for me,” Talos said.

Apparently, a few hours were enough for Talos to reach Jotunheim, for he quickly informed the group that Amorgoth was the suspected location of the tower controlling the Enhanced Chitauri.

“Queen Sylene is currently mustering a force of her troops to assault Amorgoth,” Talos said. “She’s planning on personally overseeing the tower’s destruction and bringing not only Frost Giants but Thena Thorsdottir and Thanos’ son Thane. Apparently, Thor had a real daughter at some point and Thanos had a son.”

“And Sylene, the leader of the Frost Giants, is commanding them?” Fury asked.

“Officially, Thena is a Princess of Vanaheim, which currently has an alliance with Jotunheim,” Talos said over the screen. “And in any case, Sylene and Thena often fought Thanos together on the planet Korbin while you and the Avengers were dealing with Hydra. As for Thane, even Krolos isn’t sure how Sylene managed to win his allegiance.

“Either way, I expect my next update to touch on the aftermath of Amorgoth,” Talos concluded.

“Very well,” Fury responded. “Keep us updated.”

“Stay in touch,” Soren said.

“I will,” Talos responded, tilting his head forward as Soren did the same.

Once the communication ended, Fury turned to Carol. “Well, this should reassure you.”

“It is a positive development,” Carol admitted.

“Okay, I don’t know what is more noteworthy,” Kamala said, excitedly. “The fact that Thor has an actual daughter.” Her tone shifted in a more apprehensive direction. “Or the fact that Thanos has a son. And the fact that their names are presumably spelled very similarly to each other.”

“If Thane was following in Thanos’ footsteps, surely he would be fighting with the Kree,” Monica said.

They then discussed how the showdown with Dar-Benn would play out. They quickly agreed that Kamala was the one who could get the best hits in against the Accuser. Carol would have to either aim her photon-beams near Dar-Benn or focus on any soldiers she brings with her. Monica noted that Dar-Benn would have to focus on her in order to subdue her and that Kamala could keep that from happening.

They then resumed practicing with their swapping, using various exercises: jump-roping, juggling, book-on-head balancing – and more jump-roping – until each of them were satisfied with the level of skill they had obtained.

Shortly afterwards, Talos contacted them with another update.

“Well, good news,” he said. “The assault on Amorgoth has succeeded and the Chitauri are no longer a threat.”

Chapter Text

“It might be prudent to call Dar-Benn soon before she attacks the Earth,” Carol said. “We’re close to ready to confront her.”

“With G’iah and Soren with you?” Talos said. “Let me send for a transport to pick them up.”

“How soon will it get here?” Monica asked. “We are running out of time.”

“Should be there in three hours. Just make sure that when you call Dar-Benn,” Talos said. “That Soren and G’iah are long gone.”

With that, the communication ended.

“Where are you two going?” Fury asked them.

“Probably Jotunheim,” Soren said. “And one of the colonies once it’s liberated.”

Monica and Kamala decided to take the opportunity to nap while they waited. Eventually, the ship Talos sent came and took his family. At this point, Carol opened up a channel intended to reach Dar-Benn.

“Dar-Benn!” Carol said. “Two days ago, you attacked the SABER station outside of Terra and threatened to attack Terra if we didn’t reveal ourselves. We know what you want. Come and get it. To uphold our end of the bargain, we are attaching location information to this transmission.”

There was a ding! Carol pressed the lit button, causing the screen to present Dar-Benn, sitting in her seat.

“I was wondering if you guys were up for another rematch,” Dar-Benn said. "The fact that it took you two days to respond has me concerned that you may not be the threat you used to be. Unless the message reached you very recently.”

“We were trying to protect this girl whose name you blasted throughout all of Terra,” Carol said. “Especially given the aim of the Enhanced Chitauri. Now that they are gone, we figured it was worth a risk.”

Dar-Benn sighed. “So, you were waiting for the Enhanced Chitauri to be removed! As Kraven as I would expect from a Betrayer. Where would you be today if the Tesseract had not empowered you as it did?”

At this point, Monica woke up and drifted over to where Carol and Dar-Benn were talking, with Nick Fury watching a couple of feet away.

“It was not the efforts of Terrans that brought low the Chitauri,” Dar-Benn said. “It was the efforts of the Frost Giants – to whom many Skrulls will undoubtably feel allegiance to. Have you looked into the leader of the Frost Giants? Have you looked into Sylene? Why she currently sits on their throne?

“It’s a throne that should have gone to Loki,” Dar-Benn said. “Ahh! That name is ringing a bell,” she observed as Monica and Fury gave an expression of shock. “Yes, Sylene is Loki’s daughter. And after he attempted to take over Terra, how can you be sure she won’t attempt the same thing? She and her allies were able to scare Thor away, and now, he is nowhere to be seen.

“Keep the Quantum Band hidden from me, and I will attack Terra,” Dar-Benn said. “Reveal it to me, and I will spare them. And if you were to hand it to me, I can protect Terra from an even worse fate than any the Kree would have imposed.

“If Sylene were to use the Skrulls against your people, I want you to remember that I warned you!”

With that the communication ended.

“Do you think Queen Sylene could be Loki’s daughter?” Carol asked Fury.

“I’d like to think that if she were, Thor or Sif might have mentioned something,” Fury said.

“So, you don’t think that Sylene will send the Skrulls after us?” Monica asked.

Nick Fury was silent for a moment. “I imagine that Talos or someone from his family would alert me if this were to happen. He’s high enough that they’re not going to keep such an operation secret from him.”

“What about Kamala’s Quantum Band?” Carol asked.

“We’re going to have to show Dar-Benn that we do have it,” Monica said. “Maybe once we do, you can fly it away.”

“While that would have been an ideal solution with the Stark Gauntlet,” Fury said, rolling his eyes towards Carol, “That probably would backfire on us here. Dar-Benn already changed her ultimatum. Before, she said that we just had to reveal where you guys were. Now, she said that we need to show that we have the Quantum Band. You fly away with it, I have no doubt she’ll order her forces to strike Terra. I’m afraid that you guys are going to have to beat her here.”

Four hours later, they heard the humming of ships indicating that Dar-Benn and her forces had shown up.

“She here now?” Kamala asked once Monica woke her up.

“I’m afraid so,” Monica whispered, handing Kamala the Quantum Band.

“Shouldn’t we hide it somewhere?” Kamala asked.

“Dar-Benn changed her ultimatum,” Monica explained. “She needs to see that we still have it. Plus, it will be harder for her to get it if it’s on you.”

 Reluctantly, Kamala put it on.

“Okay!” Kamala gasped as she forced herself out of bed. Once assembled, Monica made herself phase to the point where she was invisible, and the Marvels collectively went outside the craft where they were greeted by a couple of ships hovering outside. As they left the ship, it took off in the hopes of avoiding being bombed in the expected struggle.

“Strange!” Carol said. “I thought she’d bring a whole fleet.”

The smaller ship landed and let down a ramp, down which Dar-Benn walked.

“Do you have the band I’m looking for?” Dar-Benn called.

Slowly, Kamala raised the arm with the Bangle on it.

“Hand it over!” Dar-Benn ordered.

“Come and get it!” Carol taunted.

“I do not have time to waste!” Dar-Benn snapped.

“Too bad!” came Monica’s voice from behind Dar-Benn, before Monica materialized and punched her hard enough to propel her forward. Carol fired up her fists, prompting her to swap with Monica. Once the swap took place, Carol aimed the blast at Dar-Benn’s back propelling her further.

With Dar-Benn flying towards Kamala and Monica, Kamala conjured a giant hand and swatted Dar-Benn to the ground.

Both Carol and Monica rushed towards where Dar-Benn was being subdued and once both women got to her, Kamala thinned out her crystalized hand, exposing Dar-Benn’s sides. Carol got to work with grabbing Dar-Benn’s Quantum Band while Monica attempted to take Dar-Benn’s Universal Weapon.

Face-down and held to the ground, Dar-Benn endeavored to keep either of her weapons from leaving her grip. But for the time being, she was on the ropes, giving all three Marvels confidence that they might pull this off.

But then, Dar-Benn pulled her Quantum Band arm against Carol’s efforts and aimed it at Monica, causing Monica to kneel down and lose her grip on Dar-Benn’s weapon. In complete control over it, Dar-Benn swatted it at Carol, knocking her back.

As Carol glowed in order to sustain herself, she swapped places with Kamala, allowing Dar-Benn to get off of the group. As the Kree Accuser staggered, she snarled “This could have been so much easier.”

Kamala then sent a blast of glowing platelets at Dar-Benn, causing her to block them. Kamala then used her powers to slide by and flank Dar-Benn – throwing one more platelet at her as Carol jumped up on one of them. Carol then sent a photon-blast at the Universal Weapon, knocking it down.

Dar-Benn then sent a blast at Kamala who blocked it before swapping with Monica (who had gone towards Dar-Benn’s left). Monica sent a blue blast at Dar-Benn, who blocked it before turning around and swatting an attack from Kamala.

But this left her open to an attack from Carol, who punched her in the head, sending Dar-Benn flying back as bit. But Dar-Benn was apparently ready for that for she landed on her feet.

Swiftly, Dar-Benn aimed the quantum band at Monica, subduing her and prompting Carol to rush towards Dar-Benn. Dar-Benn quickly used her Universal Weapon to knock Carol to the ground before bashing Carol’s head a few times.

Once Kamala renewed her attack, Dar-Benn swatted it aside once again and decided that the other two were subdued for the time being. Dar-Benn rushed over to Kamala as the young girl attempted to swat at Dar-Benn. Dar-Benn dodged it and attempted to punch Kamala.

Kamala conjured a shield against the punch but then Dar-Benn grabbed the shield and smacked Kamala’s head with it, knocking her to the ground. Dar-Benn then held her weapon against Kamala’s head. She then reached down and pulled Kamala’s Bangle arm up, forcing the Bangle off of Kamala.

Dar-Benn then stepped back and slowly put the second Quantum Band on her free arm. As Kamala quickly crawled away from her, a surge of power flowed through Dar-Benn. By this point, both Monica and Carol began to recover. Once they did, Carol spat, “Oh no!”

Swiftly, she rushed at Dar-Benn, who quickly X’d her forearms, causing a vibration to emanate from the collision between the Quantum Bands. At this point, Carol flew backwards a considerable distance away and it took her time to regain control over the flight she was in. Kamala tried to summon another weapon but she could not summon anything.

Dar-Benn, for her part, simply walked over to her ship and boarded it through the ramp. The ramp retracted and the two ships left – both Quantum Bands now in the hands of the Kree.

Chapter Text

“We have to go to Jotunheim!” Carol breathed.

“What? Why?” Kamala asked.

“Because they have served as the backbone in the fight against the Kree and they are no doubt planning on launching many major offenses,” Carol said. “Dar-Benn is going to put a halt in their plans.”

“They are going to be really angry with us,” Kamala said.

“And they’ll be even more so if we don’t tell them,” Carol said.

“Jotunheim is going to be very cold,” Monica said. “Are we going to be able to survive Jotunheim’s environment?”

“I have a few outfits that should resolve the problem,” Carol said, walking back towards their ship (which, thankfully, Dar-Benn didn’t bomb).

“Let me guess,” Fury said once the Marvels boarded. “The Kree have both now?”

“Unfortunately,” Carol muttered. “We’re heading to Jotunheim.”

During the journey, Carol had the ship on autopilot while she searched and prepared outfits for Monica and Kamala to wear once they arrived. Fury and Selvig decided that they would stay on the ship where it was warm (and neither of them wanted to introduce themselves to Thor’s foes).

Before long, they arrived at the planet and descended downwards. They came across various snowy mountains and icy plains. By the time a large tower came into view, the Marvels had their outfits prepared and they landed on the massive balcony of the massive tower.

The tower itself, entirely made of stone, had three major sections. The bottom was the widest portion and served as the base for the other two portions. On top of the base was a wide platform that acted as a balcony – surrounding the second portion of the tower. The second section was just as high as the first but not quite as wide.

A similar relationship exists between the second and third sections of the tower.

“Carol Danvers!” said one of the Frost Giant guards. “This is an unexpected visit. We trust you have a good reason for your arrival!”

“We experienced a major setback in the war that your leaders need to know about,” Carol said.

“You are fortunate that Queen Sylene bids you entry,” the Guard said as they beckoned the Marvels to follow them. The hallway, large enough to fit the giants, had archways holding up the stone walls and ceilings.

Eventually, they came to a large throne room where a bunch of armored Frost Giants and a handful of Skrulls (including Krolos) were assembled. One of the Frost Giants, though not the largest, seemed to be one of the only ones that was not entirely blue but had a violet hue to him as well as hair that was tied in a ponytail.

Was this Thanos’ son Thane? Was Thanos a Frost Giant?

Close by, there was a white woman close to the size of Carol Danvers (albeit with more muscle showing). The woman sported decent sized dirty-blonde hair, a red diadem, red armor, and chain-mail leggings. Her arms were fairly muscular though not quite as large as Thor’s arms – a comparison Kamala made as the woman sported an intact Mjolnir in one of her hands.

Is this the daughter of Thor Talos mentioned? Kamala thought. Thena? Athena? ARGH! What was her name?

 Kamala wasn’t sure what shocked her more. The presence of Thor’s possible daughter and possibly Thanos’ son? Or the fact that Queen Sylene (who was sitting on a stone throne towards the back of the room) looked just like a female Loki (albeit with a bluish tint to her skin).

Sylene sported raven black hair, eyes not quite as crimson as those of the other Frost Giants, golden armor with blue armor on her neck. What alarmed Kamala was that Sylene’s golden diadem sported the kind of horns that Loki was known for wearing.

Monica couldn’t help but think of the Skrull who called herself Serena once she laid eyes on Sylene.

Carol stepped before Sylene’s throne while Kamala and Monica remained behind her.

“Queen Sylene, we know that you and your forces have recently knocked the Chitauri out of commission, and for that, we are eternally grateful,” Carol said. “Unfortunately, our own mission, involving the Kree Accuser named Dar-Benn has taken a turn for the worse. With just one Quantum Band, Dar-Benn was able to subdue Monica easily and would drain my own power when I used them.

And now she has the second!”

There were gasps throughout the room and Sylene herself expressed mild shock. Once the sounds died down, the Queen spoke.

“I do appreciate you for bringing this to my attention,” Sylene said. “You mentioned something about being subdued with Dar-Benn wielding just one Quantum Band. How is her having the second one affecting your ability to stand with her.”

“I can still use my powers,” Carol said. “I just have to be careful to not aim them at her. My companions, on the other hand…”

“Before,” Monica said. “I just felt like I was really heavy. Now, it feels like I’m having my very essence ripped out of me.”

“And I can no longer summon my solid light things,” Kamala said. “And I just finally started doing so without my Bangle.”

“Bangle?” the Thor-like woman asked.

“She had the second Quantum Band,” Monica said. “Until Dar-Benn took it.”

“Dar-Benn might be able to disable all magic within her vicinity,” the purple Frost Giant said.

“Which means we’ll need some tech to deal with her,” Sylene said. “I’ll see what I can come up with, and if I could, I’ll have one of the Skrulls reach out to you.”

Carol waited a bit before realizing that they were done here. “Very well,” Carol said, making a quick bow. “We will await your contact.”

With that, Carol turned to leave. Monica and Kamala followed her – with the latter sneaking another glance at the Thor-like woman. She was certainly different than Jane Foster’s mighty Thor and Fury surely knew something about that. Once they were on the ship, Fury asked, “Well?”

“They seemed concerned though Sylene suggested that she might have a solution to our problem,” Monica said.

“It seemed to have gone better than you all thought,” Fury observed.

“So, where are we going now?” Selvig asked.

“To the one Skrull colony the Kree haven’t touched,” Carol said as the ship took off.

“Is that wise?” Fury asked.

“The Chitauri were the main force behind the Kree offensive,” Carol said. “I strongly believe Dar-Benn will be more focused on protecting the Kree against Jotunheim.”

“Hey, Mr. Fury?” Kamala asked. “Are you familiar with a Thor-like woman?”

“Are you talking about Jane Foster, or the Thorsdóttir Talos mentioned?” Fury asked.

“I think that was Thor’s daughter,” Kamala answered. “What was her name?”

“Thena?” Fury suggested.

“That’s it!” Kamala gasped.

“Monica, did you also see Thena on Jotunheim?” Selvig asked.

“I did, actually,” Monica said.

“What did she look like?” Selvig asked.

“She had a red diadem, large bare-arms – but not too large – dirty-blonde hair, red-painted armor, red cape,” Kamala said.

“She’s not Jane Foster,” Monica said sadly.

“I know,” Selvig conceded. “It’s just, Thor never mentioned her. Maybe I can ask about her.”

“Or we can ask Talos the next time he contacts us,” Fury suggested.

Chapter Text

A day later, Talos contacted the group.

“Krolos told me that they should have three outfits fitted for you within a day,” Talos said.

“Are you going to be the one to come and deliver them to us?” Fury asked.

“Probably not,” Talos responded.

“Hey, do you know anything about Thena Thorsdóttir?” Kamala asked.

“Thena Thorsdóttir?” Talos said, pausing for a second. “What do you want to know?”

“Why Thor never mentioned her to those of us at SHIELD or the Avengers,” Fury said.

“Previously, Thena went by Amorasdóttir before the blip,” Talos said. “But she started identifying as a Thorsdóttir post-blip.”

 “But again, how come we’re only just hearing about her now?” Kamala asked.

“Because she’s not been active on Earth?” Talos said.

“But Thor has!” Kamala insisted.

“Well, I don’t know what’s going on within that family,” Talos said. “And I don’t want to risk my neck for your podcast.”

“I’m sure more information will come out soon,” Fury told Kamala.

“And Fury, I need to speak with you privately,” Talos said.

“Alright!” Fury said. Turning to the Marvels, he added, “you should go.”

Once Fury was alone with Talos, Talos said “I need you to meet me at Terran hideout 34.”

The Skrull colony the Marvels retreated to was known as Aladna, which was covered mostly in water, though it did have a few large islands where the Skrulls resided. The Marvels were walking along the beach, where there were Skrulls in the background enjoying themselves.

“So, Goose was a cat, but not a cat?” Kamala asked.

“A Flerken,” Carol said. “Looks like a cat but has a large pocket dimension in her stomach. And can use tentacles to draw you in.”

“Is Goose still around?”

“I believe so,” Monica said. “She was owned by Fury for a time before he handed her to my… mom, in 2009. Goose was with her for a time before she handed her over to SABER.”

“She wasn’t on that station when Dar-Benn attacked it, was she?” Kamala asked.

“I assume she was on a ground base,” Monica said.

“Okay,” Kamala said, still not convinced.

Just then, there was a sound high in the air – partially like thunder, partially similar to a jet flying. There was a blue light, with a shade of green, high in the air, before a bolt of light stuck the ground nearby, leaving behind Thena Thorsdóttir, holding a large metallic briefcase.

Kamala could barely contain her excitement. “Oh my god!” she breathed.

“You alright?” Thena asked, looking a little weirded out.

“It’s nice to finally have an edge against that Accuser,” Kamala said.

“Where did the equipment come from?” Monica asked.

“The answer to that question is what you Midgardians would call classified,” Thena said, handing the briefcase to Carol.

“We’d better head up and get ready,” Carol said. “Hey, do you mind walking with us? I’m curious as to how the rest of the war is playing out.”

“Okay,” Thena said as the four began trekking towards the exit of the beach.

“Is there any reason to believe the Kree might get another Chitauri army soon?” Carol asked.

“Not as far as we are aware,” Thena said.

“What are the Frost Giants planning now?” Monica said.

“Operation Rousing Giant has enabled Sylene to send five million troops to the Front Lines,” Thena said. “Though I’m not privy to when or where they’ll show up.”

“Five million?” Monica gasped.

“Where were they when the Chitauri first appeared?” Kamala asked.

“Well,” Monica said. “Armies of that magnitude aren’t available instantaneously. It probably took time to assemble. The U.S. military, for instance, doesn’t have millions of troops available, but after some time, it could.”

“Makes sense,” Kamala asked. “How did you guys enlist Thanos’ son Thane to your side?”

“Thane is not Thanos’ son,” Thena said. “He’s actually Sylene’s son, and his father was a Frost Giant named Hailroth, whom Thanos killed… towards the end of his campaign on Korbin. He was raised to believe he was Thanos’ son on Sakaar.”

Carol and Monica exchanged concerned looks.

“And you can just tell us this?” Monica asked.

“Sylene made that information public,” Thena said. “In fact, she revealed this information a few minutes before you guys showed up.”

By the time they reached the barracks, an alarm rang in the distance and in the sky, Kree warcraft came out over the ocean. Various Skrulls started running around, clearly attempting to prepare for the attack.

On the beach of Aladna, scores of blue portals opened, causing heavily armored Frost Giants to begin pouring out and forming a line upon the beach – clearly ready to stand against the fleet of Kree ships. In front of the line, and in the center of it, marched a Frost Giant sporting a violet cape, a Loki-styled Helmet, and a double-bladed sword attached to his back.

As the Kree ships got closer to the island, the Frost Giants started conjuring massive blue Eldritch shields over the island – large enough to daunt an Aster-Class ship.

The fleet stopped hovering, instead opting to send a smaller ship towards the beach where the Frost Giants were assembled.

As the ship reached the shore, it dropped a ramp down which Dar-Benn walked.

“You are not the first god-like being to betray the Kree, Thane!” Dar-Benn called.

“You must be Dar-Benn,” Thane said. “Know that I never pledged allegiance to your Empire.”

“Surely you must be concerned with Thanos’ wrath,” Dar-Benn said.

“Thanos was never my father,” Thane snapped. “He killed my father. If anything, he should be afraid of mine.”

“Really?” Dar-Benn smirked. “And what power do you have to override these?”

With that, she X’d her arms and a massive blast burst forth from her two Quantum Bands, sending shock-waves throughout the island.

To Thane’s horror, all of the Eldritch shields he and the Frost Giants have conjured up faded in a light-burst of smoke.

Chapter Text

Dar-Benn jumped off of her ship and charged towards Thane. Thane made a fist, but then made a face of surprise as he leaned more heavily on his sword than he initially planned to. Dar-Benn swatted at Thane for a bit and Thane proved to be strong enough to block her attacks. But while having a double-bladed sword allowed Thane to quickly counter-strike, Dar-Benn was able to use a Quantum Band to cause the sword to bounce-back whenever Thane counterstriked.

While the Frost Giants appeared lost for a moment, one of them noticed that he was able to conjure a fist of Ice upon his natural fist.

“Ahhh!” The Frost Giant growled. “Ice powers still work!”

The Frost Giants began to surround the duel between Thane and Dar-Benn, to the point where Dar-Benn jumped back to the ramp. Thane, after noticing that Ice Powers were still possible, attempted to send a large spear of Ice at Dar-Benn.

Dar-Benn twisted her forearms, causing small vibrations to emanate from her Quantum Bands. These vibrations, whatever they were, prevented Thane’s Ice attack from meeting its mark. Even worse, Dar-Benn’s ship began firing its guns on Thane and his soldiers, causing them to quickly conjure up an Ice Shield and continue to maintain it (as the Kree fire was causing pieces of Ice to break off.

“Assault the colony!” Dar-Benn ordered, as Kree ships began to fly over the civilization, dropping bombs randomly.

“Quick!” Thena yelled as the brief case was opened and suits came out. “Change!”

“What about you?” Carol asked.

As blue-aqua sparks jumped across Thena’s fists, she remarked, “My native powers still work. I’m going to hold off the ships. You guys need to take Dar-Benn. Otherwise, the Kree might still win this war.”

With that, Thena jumped onto the side of a nearby tower, and almost immediately, storm-clouds gathered in the sky and lightning flashed in the background. Within seconds, the bombings occurred at a substantially reduced rate.

Once the Marvels managed to get their suits on, the suits had a shiny effect upon their existing suits.

“I’ll fly around, locate Dar-Benn, then try to get a good view of her,” Carol said. “Once in position, I’ll fire a beam into the sky. That will be your signal to attempt a swap. We’ll repeat the process again so that we’re all in position. Then we’ll figure out where to go from there.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Monica nodded as Carol took off. Within a minute, they saw a photon beam fly into the thunderclouds. All three Marvels swapped such that Monica was the one left overlooking the location.

She saw that she was on a cliff with Thane and his crew at the beach where they previously met Thena on about a hundred meters away. From where she stood, she could see Kree craft shooting at the Frost Giants.

As Carol flew by and sent the photon beam in to the sky, Monica thought, “Okay, Carol should try to flank Dar-Benn and fly her over to us! As Kamala appeared, Monica continued. Hopefully, these suits work.

Indeed, Monica and Kamala watched as blue-aqua lighting seemed to try striking the Kree craft firing on the Frost Giants. However, Dar-Benn presumably found a way to deflect the lightning a few meters above her forces position, as no lightning strike broke through.

Kamala hissed as she watched the Kree craft at work.

“Wait until Carol gets here,” Monica said. “I think she can fly Dar-Benn over to us.”

“Yeah!” Kamala gasped. “Good plan!”

Within a few seconds, Carol landed.

“Carol, see if you could drag Dar-Benn over to us,” Monica said.

“Umm!” Carol muttered. “Sure!” With that, she flew far back behind the Kree craft, around and far to Dar-Benn’s other side, clearly not wanting Dar-Benn to see her until it was too late. They could barely see Carol collide with Dar-Benn before Dar-Benn was being thrown to where Monica and Kamala were. But once Carol landed and Dar-Benn came to, lighting began striking the ships Dar-Benn was previously protecting.

“NO!” Dar-Benn shrieked, before furiously aiming one of her fists at Monica. Monica cringed, expecting to be brought low, but to Monica’s pleasant surprise, nothing happened.

Dar-Benn gasped. “So, you’ve thrown in your lot with the Frost Giants? You really think that once you beat us Kree, that all will be well?”

“It might be better,” Kamala said. “Most of the danger I faced came from you.”

“Foolish girl!” Dar-Benn snapped as she furiously ran towards the beach, attempting to swat aside Kamala’s large, crystalized hand (Yay! I can conjure these again! Kamala thought). While some pieces broke off, Kamala was able to conjure another fist and bunch Dar-Benn back.

“You really think the Frost Giants will stop with the Kree?” Dar-Benn spat. “You’ve seen Queen Sylene! You must realize who she’s related to! The being who tried to conquer Terra.”

“He tried to use the Chitauri to conquer Earth,” Monica said. “Sylene and her forces brought down the Chitauri not too long ago.”

Dar-Benn shrieked. Looking around, she noticed one of her ships had gotten struck by lightning and noticed the tower over which the storm clouds were the most threatening. The Kree Accuser X’d her arms once again, aiming at the tower, causing a massive vibration and in the distance, a figure could be seen falling down from the tower.

Though the storm clouds didn’t dissipate, the most violent center of the storm did retract a bit. But it wasn’t a complete victory for the Kree Accuser as she held her Universal weapon (while knocking the storm-goddess down from her tower) – presenting Kamala an opportunity to snatch it with a large crystalized hand.

Dar-Benn gasped as she turned around, even as Kamala handed the weapon to Monica.

“You know Asgard can no longer protect you from Jotunheim,” Dar-Benn snarled. “Thor himself, was subdued by Sylene.

“But if the fear of a rogue Jotunheim doesn’t scare you, then Thanos surely will,” she added.

“Thor killed Thanos!” Monica said.

“Yeah, I was there!” Carol said.

“And you don’t think he, with a full Gauntlet, could have fake what you saw there, betrayer?” Dar-Benn said. “You are confident that Thor beheaded the real Thanos?”

A shiver went down the spine of both Carol and Monica. Kamala, however, said, “eh! We’ll beat him if he comes.”

THUD!

Dar-Benn turned around to see that Thane had jumped onto the cliff and was getting up from his landing. As he began to walk towards the group, Kamala noticed the color leave Dar-Benn’s face – looking absolutely petrified. Slowly the Kree Accuser turned to face Thane, taking a glance back at the Marvels before turning back to Thane and falling to her knees.

As Kamala noticed the look on Thane’s face (and connecting him to the violet Frost Giant back on Jotunheim), she suddenly had the urge to join Dar-Benn and fight Thane. But the instinct of what might happen if she did fight Thane kept Kamala’s feet firmly planted where they were.

Dar-Benn turned to Kamala one last time. “You think you can beat Thanos? Now’s your chance to find out.”

Monica subtly crept over to where Kamala was, and Kamala knew that she wasn’t about to jump between Dar-Benn and Thane – though the temptation to do so has never been stronger. Dar-Benn fearfully turned to face Thane, who at this point was a couple meters away from his target.

“Are you confident you can beat him?” Dar-Benn groaned as Thane reached down to pick Dar-Benn up by the throat.

“Well!” Thane growled as thunder rippled and there was a flash of light before Thena landed a few feet away from both where Monica and Kamala stood and where Thane held Dar-Benn in the air. Thane glanced at Thena before turning to Dar-Benn. “I am!”

Thane tilted his wrist, and a snap could be heard coming from Dar-Benn’s neck.

Chapter Text

Immediately, Kamala turned away, nausea filling her up. She momentarily wanted to vomit, but the feeling passed. She was still horrified by what she had just witnessed and wondered if she would ever get the image out of her head.

Thane, meanwhile, continued to hold Dar-Benn in the air with one hand and examine one of the Quantum Bands with the other hand.

Monica looked at Carol nervously and Carol nodded to her before addressing Thane. “Uhh! Thane?” Carol asked. “What do you plan to do with those bands?”

“These were pretty effective against us,” Thane said, yanking the Band off of her. “Their powers might very well be needed in the near future.” He held it in his left hand (which Kamala suddenly noticed had a white glove on it) and examined the Bangle.

“W-We kind of need it,” Monica muttered. “In fact, we kind of need both of them.”

“For what?” Thane asked.

“The three of us have been swapping places with each other,” Carol said, lighting up her fist. Monica lit up hers causing a swap to happen. “And we need both of them to end it.”

“How long will this take?” Thane asked.

“Unsure, we weren’t really told how long this would take,” Monica said. “Or how this would be done.”

“Can this be done within ten days?” Thane snarled.

“Well, I imagine it shouldn’t take that long,” Monica stumbled.

“W-Why ten days, sir?” Kamala stuttered.

“Because that’s when we expect Jotunheim to go to war against an enemy much more powerful than the Kree,” Thena said.

“Thanos?” Kamala asked.

“That would make things a lot simpler,” Thena said. “No. Zeus, and some of his friends. Although, my father did show him up so maybe they will be easier to beat than the Kree.”

“Even so, I cannot let these fall from my grip,” Thane said, tossing the Quantum Band to Thena and yanking off the other one. “Especially if doing so proves to be Jotunheim’s undoing.”

“Please sir,” Kamala said. “We need them to deal with this swapping issue you just saw. And one of them was given to me by my grandmother. Dar-Benn stole it.”

Thane strangely responded by letting Dar-Benn fall to the ground and revealing that he was wearing a necklace underneath his armor, one with a golden S attached to it. Kamala looked to Thena and noticed that she was staring at the necklace, deep in thought.

“I’m also considered a minor where I’m from,” Kamala said.

“Then what are you doing here?” Thane responded.

“I was dragged into this conflict,” Kamala said. “By way of swapping.”

Thane kept looking between the Bangle he held and Kamala, unsure of how to proceed.

“Thane, what if you just absorbed some of its properties?” Thena suggested. “They need the Bangles; we just need their abilities!”

“Very Well,” Thane said as Thena tossed him the Bangle she held. He then muttered a few incantations in a language none of the Marvels were familiar with. A surge of power emanated from the Bangles and flowed through Thane, causing his eyes to glow red and then violet for a moment. And then it was done.

Thane then tossed them to Thena, who handed them to Kamala. He then turned and left, presumably to regroup with his troops.

Thena turned to the Marvels. “You guys have a way to end the swapping?” she asked.

“Yeah, Erik Selvig,” Kamala said as they began walking towards the buildings – the battle coming to a close. “He’s a friend of your dad’s. Hey, you’ve met your dad, right?”

“Twice,” Thena said.

“Only twice?” Carol asked.

“It’s a long story,” Thena said. “And one I’m not really in the mood to tell.”

They arrived on the streets where there was clearly structural damage done to the buildings, but overall, the town seemed intact.

“You did a good job holding them off,” Monica said.

“Thanks,” Thena said.

“Hey, why are the Frost Giants and the gods going to war?” Carol asked.

“Well, it started when the God-Butcher attacked New Asgard and abducted some of their kids,” Thena said. “My father went to Omnipotence City to seek the help of the other gods, and there was a skirmish there involving my father. Zeus sent Hercules after him, and because my father was missing, Hercules came after me on Armorgoth – thinking I participated in that skirmish. Things happened, Sylene came along and killed Dionysus, one of Zeus’ sons, and the two are going to meet in ten days.”

There was an uncomfortable silence as the four continued walking through the streets. They eventually made their way to the home the Marvels were staying in, and Erik Selvig soon emerged and Kamala held up the Bangles.

“You got them!” Selvig exclaimed.

“With some help,” Kamala said.

Selvig turned to Thena. “You must be Thena Thorsdóttir,” he said, attempting to shake her hand. “I kept hearing your name pop up over the past few days.”

“I’m told you know my father,” Thena said.

“Yeah, we met around a decade and a half ago – god has it really been that long,” Selvig exclaimed. “I am curious as to what you’ve been doing during that time.”

As Selvig prepared his equipment, Thena told a tale about being on a planet called Korbin before Thanos eventually invaded. She mentioned how the Frost Giants showed up, led by her adoptive cousin and childhood playmate Sylene, and rescued Thena from a duel with Thanos that went south. Although the war stalemated for a few months, Thanos eventually won the war and Sylene was presumed dead.

Thena then spoke about being on Xandar for a couple years with Lady Sif (Sylene’s mother) before Thanos would attack again. Thena was sent to a different planet called Sanct-Shift to take out the Chitauri Tower there.

“So, you’re the one who removed the Chitauri during that time,” Carol said. “Can’t wait to tell Fury that.”

“Well, we weren’t entirely successful that day,” Thena said. “Sif and I failed to stop Thanos from devastating the region and escaping with the Power Stone that day. Then we both blipped. Sometime after we returned, Sif and I went our separate ways. Months later, Sylene revealed herself to me, sometime after the Frost Giants had entered the war with the Kree and prepared to go to Xandar to see if Sylene had a kid – which turned out to be Thane. And you guys know the rest.”

“Did Thor know what you were up to during that time?” Monica asked.

“No,” Thena said. “In fact, while he knew of me, he didn’t know he was the one who sired me until recently.”

“That must be why he never mentioned you to us,” Selvig said. “Speaking of which, the machine is ready.”

The machine Selvig built was a large capsule large enough for the three Marvels to fit in. The Quantum Bands were connected to wiring at the top and situated as if they were antennae. After the Marvels entered the machine, Selvig activated it, causing it to hum for a minute or two. The door opened and they stepped out.

“Well,” Selvig said. “Did it work?”

Carol responded by activating her hands and Monica did the same. To their relief, both women remained in place. Kamala also conjured a crystalized sphere over her hand and also remained in place.

“Oh yes,” Kamala said.

“Good! We can finally go home,” Selvig said.

Thena stood up and slowly began walking towards the door.

“Hey, Thena!” Kamala called. “Before you go, could you flex one of your arms?”

“Umm,” Thena muttered, before turning around. “Okay, she said, flexing her right arm.”

Kamala walked over to it and attempted to squeeze it – only to find that it might very well be made of stone.

“Wow!”

“Okay,” Thena said, relaxing her arm and turning to the door. “I have to get going.” With that, she left the house and Kamala watched as Thena conjured a green misty portal and disappeared through it before the portal itself vanished.

It took a day before Kamala returned home to her family and they immediately pestered her for details on what she went through. Kamala knew this was coming so she spent the journey home preparing what details to share and what details to leave out.

The details she kept were her days in exile, while getting to know Captain Marvel and Monica, and the fact that they would have to get the second Band from Dar-Benn. She also decided to admit that they fought Dar-Benn and that Dar-Benn would take the Bangle for a time. She also admitted that she went to Jotunheim and decided that very few details there were worth omitting.

What she did omit was what the conflict between the Kree and Skrulls looked like. They didn’t need to know about the bombing run and she was certainly not going to tell them what Thane did to Dar-Benn. She did, however, mention how crazy it was that Thor had a daughter.

“So, how does this affect your super-hero career?” Muneeba asked.

“Well, I still want to be a hero, but I’m also thinking that I shouldn’t rush into it,” Kamala answered.

While Kamala decided not to mention Thane to her family, she was willing to mention him to Bruno. He came over to her house to work on some homework with her and to try to tutor her on some of the material.

“I’ve never seen you this invested in homework before,” Bruno remarked.

“Well, seeing a cross between Loki and Thanos snap a woman’s neck will do that to you,” Kamala said.

“Eigh!” Bruno groaned. “What happened?”

Kamala then told Bruno about her adventures and even included the part where Dar-Benn stopped fighting once Thane arrived on the scene.

“I mean, she previously tried to tell me that the Skrulls and Frost Giants were dangerous to us and that fighting with them was a mistake,” Kamala said. “But when Thane appeared, Dar-Benn was petrified – and at that point, I kind of believed her. I also don’t know why she stopped fighting like that.”

“Maybe she decided that she lost and that fighting more was futile,” Bruno said. "She seemed cornered at that point and desperate, based off what you told me. She must have given up once Thane showed up.”

“She met the same fate Loki did at Thanos’ hands,” Kamala observed.

“Did Dar-Benn try to strike Thane right before she died?” Bruno asked.

“No!” Kamala realized. “She didn’t! She seemed resigned to her fate. Part of me actually wanted to protect her from Thane. Should I have?”

“Kamala, I wasn’t there, so I can’t say,” Bruno said. “Though I am leaning on the side of you being right to stay put. Who knows what might have happened had you fought him.”

A little over a week later, Monica waited on a bench in D.C. in the dark evening. She had been contacted by Nick Fury and was expecting to meet him outside one of his D.C. apartments. Eventually, the door to the building behind her opened and Nick Fury walked outside.

“Hey Nick, what’s up?” Monica asked.

“Before we proceed, could you demonstrate your ability to phase through that bench?”

“Excuse me?” Monica asked.

“I need to know who I’m talking to,” Fury said.

Confused, Monica stood up and walked through the bench, blue light glowing where the bench was phasing through her.

“Okay,” Fury breathed a sigh of relief. “How are things going?”

“Well, I guess,” Monica said.

At that point, there was a bright yellow light that descended from the sky before Captain Marvel materialized and ceased glowing.

“Any updates?” Monica asked.

“The Kree have surrendered,” Carol said.

“That’s good,” Monica said.

“That it is,” Fury said. “Why don’t you two come inside?”

Carol and Monica obliged as Fury led them up a couple floors before unlocking the various locks (high tech and traditional) to his door. He seemed like he feared being followed as during the trip, he kept looking back over his shoulders.

Once inside, he moved around his table.

“Nick, why did you have me phase through the bench outside?” Monica asked.

“I needed to make sure you two weren’t skrulls,” Fury said.

“What?” Carol asked.

Fury took a deep breath before sighing and looking down.

“Dar-Benn was right!” Fury said. “Sylene has turned the Skrulls against us!”