What has gone before:
http://www.hcrealms.com/forum/showthread.php?t=425709

That arc is actually supposed to be part 11. I'll have to ask a mod to fix that.

Here's where it all started if you're brave enough to tackle the whole story:
http://www.hcrealms.com/forum/showthread.php?t=299729

Day 17: Early Morning, An alternate Earth, near a replicated Smallville.

The Man-Thing was drawn inexplicably to the nexus of realities. Something was emanating from the Nexus that was tailor made to attract the Man-Thing's curiousity, limited though it was. The Man-Thing was an Empath and felt the emotions of others some were pleasant to him and some were abrasive, The harsher emotions, like anger and hatred bothered him but nothing irritated him more then fear. Fear made him lash out, whatever knew fear burned at the Man-Thing's touch.

But other emotions were pleasant and made him reach out. The emotion he sensed now was love. He rarely encountered love, and he liked it. It drew him, drew him toward the nexus of realities which he was the guardian of.

Eventually, he entered the Nexus and was transported.

M.O.D.O.K. was extremely angry. He'd evidently been completely abandoned by A.I.M. as every agent had disappeared several days earlier, and now he was somehow brought to the outskirts of a strange midwestern town without his permission.

He sat in his hover chair in a state of indignation. In several directions he saw nothing but wheat fields. in the last direction he saw a small midwestern town with a large futuristic facility apparently in it's center.

He attempted to enter the small town but was rebuffed by an invisible force field he couldn't penetrate.

Angered further by this setback he lashed out with his mental powers at the Force Field. Failing to penetrate with those powers, he assaulted the field with weaponry installed in his chair. These also failed.

As he was doing this, he failed to notice the arrival of the Man-Thing behind him. His rage and anger drew the Man-Thing closer to Modok while Modok was distracted.

Modok finally calmed down a little, and whirled his chair around in a fit of peak. It was then that he saw the horrific image of the Man-Thing converging on him. Horrified despite himself, Modok lashed out with his mental powers. Unfortunately for him, the Man-Thing was nearly mindless and the attack was to no avail.

The Man-Thing; however, now sensed fear and was determined to stifle it. And whatever knew fear, burned at the Man-Thing's touch. Modok knew this -- intellectually, but emotionally, he couldn't help himself. He unleashed a barrage of attacks using the weapons from his chair, but they were useless against the Man-Thing as well except for a few small fires ignited on the Man-Thing's person that quickly died out.

The Man-Thing reached his goal and the mighty M.O.D.O.K. screamed as the Man-Thing burned the flesh on his huge mishapen face.

Suddenly a cadre of A.I.M. agents emerged from the nearby wheat fields and drove the Man-Thing back using flame throwers, and rescued their leader. They'd been watching and hoping that someone would arrive to force Madame Hydra to back off in trying to direct A.I.M. traffic.

They loaded M.O.D.O.K. into a special ship and escaped with their cargo.

Meanwhile, a severely dehydrated Man-Thing barely clung to life.

The Swamp Thing broke off from his battles with Nemesis the Warlock. He sensed a new presence in the green. A presence that seemed similar to him yet different. He had Nemesis at bay, he could afford to break off from the fight and travel to the midwestern area that would be Kansas to investigate.

He travelled through the green and found a severely dehydrated creature baking in the hot Kansas sun. He gathered the form into him and rushed him back to the Everglades.

In the murky swamp of the Everglades the creature swiftly reconstituted.

What the Swamp Thing saw, was a bizarre parody of himself. The Swamp Thing tried to communicate but received no response. He soon realized the creature was mindless and abandoned him to renew his battle with Nemesis. He would check in with the creature off and on later.

The Man-Thing, having recovered from the attack of the flamethrowers, moved out to get closer to this realities Nexus of Realities.

Meanwhile, the Aim agents were frantically treating Modok's burns. They needed him badly to put down Madame Hydra's attempts to govern both Aim and Hydra.

Meanwhile, places like Wakanda found their population was complete. The Black Panther and Storm had more freedom to look into the new atmosphere of Africa. They made a surrepticious reconnaissance of Gorilla City first.

Paragon City got it's first influx of citizens and the Statesman was brought back briefly to help quell agitation. Moscow, London and Toronto received their second wave of newcomers and the Rocket Reds (for Moscow), The Vindicator and the X-Men (for Toronto) and Captain Britain (for London) were kept busy trying to pacify their terrified newcomers.

Batman slept longer then he wanted to today. Encountering a warped vampiric version of himself managed to take the wind out of his sails.

When he woke up, he contacted Zatanna, He wanted her there when he met with his vampiric doppleganger again. Zatanna decided if she was going to be there, so was the Ghost Rider. She wasn't going to take any chances with a vampiric Batman, even if the Batman himself was going to be there.

Professor Xavier was trying to get a handle on what was going on. Of the key Marvel leadership in his world, only Nick Fury, Hank Pym and the Black Panther were here besides him. There wasn't any Reed Richards, Tony Stark, Dr. Strange, Namor or Black Bolt. On the plus side, there was no Dr. Doom, Mandarin, or myriad other threats.

But Magneto was here, and it was only a matter of time before they clashed again. He knew that Ororo had engineered a truce between the X-Men and Magneto's Brotherhood, but he knew that could not last.

His X-Men seemed to be essential in this new world and he was having a hard time keeping them together. There were many different problems that kept cropping up.

Saturn Girl had sensed the Psychic barrage that had occurred earlier and Lightning Lad with Cosmic Boy went out to investigate it. No one was there but they saw the traces of the flamethrower attack. They sent for Saturn Girl and she obtained a strong psychic impression of Modok still lingering, including the fear he felt. She obtained a psychic impression of the image of Man-Thing as the most vivid encounter Modok had before he disappeared.

She mentally contacted Professor Xavier to relay this information. Xavier recognized both Modok and the Man-Thing. It was now obvious where today's arrivals were appearing and that; once again, they were from the Marvel Universe.

Ms. Marvel and Hercules were sent to aid the Legion members in dealing with the new arrivals.

The AIM techs had portable teleporters and rushed Modok for treatment of his burns. Madame Hydra and the Hydra agents decided not to stick around to lock horns with Modok and used their navy to escape and leave the Azores to AIM.

The resident AIM agents did nothing to stop them, glad to be rid of the Hydra presence.

Some Lizardmen observed Man-Thing and attacked him, to their lasting regret. The surviving Lizardmen rushed to report the presense of a second shambling swamp creature to Nemesis The Warlock.

Meanwhile, the Man-Thing settled down comfortably in his role as guardian of the Nexus of realities, unaware that he was no longer residing in his own reality.

Professor Xavier considered the impact of the new arrivals. According to the briefing from Nick Fury, AIM (along with Hydra) was already represented in this reality. Now they had distinctive leadership. It probably wouldn't be long before they tried something now that Modok was here. For that matter; Viper/Madame Hydra would very likely take the leadership reigns of Hydra and be her own problem.

Colossus had briefed Fury about Madame Hydra so Shield knew about that. It was up to Xavier to tell Fury about Modok.

When Fury was briefed about Modok and the Man-Thing, he actually seemed more interested in the Man-Thing then in Modok. Xavier asked him why.

"Something you don't know about the Man-Thing Prof." Fury puffed on his cigar. "He's the guardian to the Nexus of All Realities. That might mean we have one here. We might have us a ticket back home. I'm sending Hank Pym, the Wasp and the Scarlet Witch to look into it."

Xavier explained to him that he'd contacted the Avengers to send representatives to Smallville to help the Legion members deal with whatever was likely to appear since his X-Men were busy helping Vindicator defend Toronto.

They agreed to stay in contact for further developments in case Xavier's help might be needed. Xavier set up a psychic link with Fury's Mandroid division to keep Fury up to date.

Beta Ray Bill had gotten word of Black Adam's rough treatment of Doc Samson and was looking for him to have a reckoning. He'd been warned of how dangerous Black Adam was but he'd fought the SoD Superman to a standstill so he wasn't cowed.

He connected with Mar-Vell, Quasar, Moondragon and Adam Warlock who were basing themselves on Earth for now and requested their help in locating Black Adam. They found him in his kingdom of Khandaq and confronted him.

Black Adam looked at them coolly and demanded to know why they dared to trespass on his domain.

Mar-Vell chose to address him. "Let me introduce ourselves. I am known as Captain Marvel to Eart---"

Adam cut him off. "Captain Marvel! Captain Marvel! Speak not to me of Captain Marvel!" He shouted. "I have fought Captain Marvel on many, many occassions and you are surely not he!"

He looked Mar-Vell over contemptuously. "You are no Captain Marvel." He spat.

Stunned at the unexpected outburst; Mar-Vell could only think that Black Adam was even more arrogant then Namor, if that were possible.

Moondragon found herself inexplicably attracted to Black Adam while feeling repulsion, similar to the feelings she had for Thanos and Darkseid.

Beta Ray Bill stepped forward. "We care little for your opinions. You are hereby warned. If you brutalize anyone else the way you did Doc Samson in Capital City, You will have me to deal with."

Adam stared at him incredulously. "Who are you? You look like that foolish American show. What was it called? Aahh yes. Mr. Ed." Adam broke out in derisive laughter.

Bill had no idea who Mr. Ed was but he knew he was being mocked and didn't like it. He lunged at Black Adam. Adam responded and the two locked up in a fierce embrace.

Mar-Vell and Adam Warlock were appalled at how quickly this encounter went south and moved to break the combatants up.

It was a long struggle but they managed to separate them. Black Adam was more then a little surprised at the power the three others possessed. He had dismissed them as weaklings. He would not make that mistake again, though it was obvious the one that resembled a horse was the strongest.

Adam decided to become diplomatic.

"I --- apologize. I too am under some stress since not only myself, but my people have been brought over to this strange reality, and the perpetrator of this atrocity, is too cowardly too come forward."

Adam Warlock spoke. "We're looking into that. We hope to locate this being and come to terms with whoever it is and convince this individual to return all of us to our own reality."

"Really? If that is true, please agree to bring me along for this confrontation and I will promise to completely stay out of all of your affairs."

They considered. A hothead like Black Adam was not what they needed if they managed to locate the entity that had brought them here. They were only intending to include John Stewart from the DC universe if they succeeded.

Mar-Vell spoke up. "We agree."

Black Adam leered at Mar-Vell. He still deemed him a coward for not taking the bait when he taunted him.

The others looked at Mar-Vell in consternation except for Bill, who looked steadily at Adam.

Mar-Vell continued, "If you attack anyone else unprovoked outside of your nation, this offer is void. Is that understood Mr. Black Adam?"

"Agreed." Adam leered at Bill. "Talking horses are always welcome in Khandaq. We have so little sources of amusement."

Bill surged at the mocking tones but Mar-Vell and Adam Warlock held him back.

Moondragon finally spoke. "We'll be in touch Black Adam."

Adam looked at her for the first time. He sensed a challenge in this one and intended to meet her again.

The others left.

Day 17: Dawn, An alternate reality near a replicated Smallville, with a twist.

Silver Sable had heard about the problems the superhero community had been having in America. She was grateful that it had not affected her native Symkaria.

She was more alert though, her country was at peace with neighbouring Latveria but she well knew about the dangerous nature of Dr. Doom. If he sensed even a moment of weakness in her native land, Symkaria would be absorbed into Latveria without a single tear shed. And Doom's most famous enemy was currently under a handicap. It was rumored the Fantastic Four were now only three. Doom might well be plotting another coup though he ostensibly was lending his services toward solving the problem of the newky missing.

Word was, the mutant population was taking a huge hit. Very few of the X-Men had been heard from and nothing had been heard from the terrorist Magneto in weeks now.

All this musing caused Silver to not notice the rift she walked directly into and she suddenly found that she was not in Symkaria anymore.