Synopsis / Summary / Plot
Last issue Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch called in the Avengers to investigate a Hydra base in Japan. Black Widow, Bruce Banner, Captain America, Hawkeye, Iron Man and Spider-Man responded. Wanda sensed something ominous deep below. The Avengers fought their way through a nominal guard of Hydra goons, and found a time machine in a basement. But what the Witch sensed lies much deeper.
Tony Stark is trying to figure out what the time machine has been used for (helped by the fact that Hydra are using a Starkware computer). Steve Rogers has left the comedy duo of Hawkey and Spidey in case he needs help (or probably just to get rid of them). But they spend all the time trading impersonations of Tony.
Banner has deduced that this is a monitoring station for whatever Wanda senses. Stark has found that the machine is a portal to only 2 times, the mid-20th Century and 11,700 years ago (the beginning of the Holocene), but static means he can't narrow it down better than that. Banner thinks Hydra planted something back in the stone age to give it time to grow.
Cap splits the Avengers into 2 teams:- Hawkeye, Hulk, Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch back to prehistoric times; himself, Black Widow, Iron Man and Spider-Man to the last century. They dive in (all together, so I don't know how they were supposed to split into the correct teams) and are grabbed by a time-whirlpool and hit by time-lightning. Hawkeye pukes into the Dark Ages.
Clint Barton finds himself in the deep past. He's joined by Pietro, who's scouted the immediate area at hyperspeed with no sign of his sister or Bruce. But Cap is here. They just hope that everyone else arrived at the other destination.
Widow, Shellhead and Spidey have arrived in relatively modern Japan. They just worry that Cap isn't with them.
Meanwhile Bruce and Wanda have arrived somewhen else - a wasteland that isn't the prehistoric jungle they expected. Topping a dune they realise that they are in a post-apocalyptic future and the ruins of a city.
Back in the stone age Clint and Steve watch 2 tribes at war with axes and spears. Hawkeye also sees 1 stone age man looking speculatively at a curved wooden branch. Pietro has explored further and found 3 Hydra agents - and a bigger problem. (Clint asks if it's dinosaurs. Exasperated Steve reminds him that dinosaurs died out long ago - despite what popular cartoons [and the misleading cover of this issue] might say. Clint reminds him that they fought dinosaurs last week in Manhattan.)
Quicksilver leads them to where Hydra have a transmitting station. They are controlling animals with chips in their heads (pretty modern bears, elephants, lions and wolves). Cap sends the speedster to find and disable any automatic defenses whle he and Hawkeye tackle the men and beasts. Quickie seems to actually find some Hydra snipers. The archer destroys the control tower with some blast arrows. And the animals turn on their Hydra masters. Until Cap KO's beasts and men (or at least 1 lion and 1 Hydra guy).
Quicksilver discovers a recently filled-in big hole. They've obviousaly arrived too late - Hydra have already buried whatever it is.
The captured Hydra agents tell them that there is no way home. A Hydra station in the future is sending a signal back through time to disrupt time travel to here. (Which is why the Avengers didn't all go to the right destinations, and arrived at slightly the wrong time.) The agents had accepted a 1-way trip, expecting to set themselves up as rulers in this primitive period.
6 days later Pietro returns from a far-ranging exploration trip. Clint is thinking of joining a tribe - teach them archery and learn to hunt with them. But Steve Rogers has a plan.