Synopsis / Summary / Plot
The issue opens with Iron Man trying to stop a flaming asteroid hitting Earth. He's pushing against it while his boot jets thrust but it's not really slowing down. He uses his armour's thermocouple to convert some of the asteroid's heat to extra thrusting power but it's still not enough. But suddenly his efforts fragment the rock into pieces which continue their cluster of trajectories towards a village in Norway. It's people start to flee but 1 woman stays because she is convinced Shellhead will save them. And she watches as he continues pounding the fragments into smaller pieces.
Later men in hazard suits are collecting the meteorite bits. Apparently our hero stopped anything hitting the village but some of the surrounding animal life got killed.
But we find IM lying exhausted at the bottom of a fjord. He wakes to see a giant fish examining him. We are privy to its thoughts as it apologises for almost eating him but says it can't understand his speech. It doesn't communicate like that. It could produce fluorescent patterns but that tends to startle the Freds. But it *can* do telepathy, and eventually it gets Tony Stark to exchange thoughts with it. And Tony 'says' that it should go far away unless it wants to die. The fish takes this as a threat and starts to attack. Stark is working out how best to fight back when it suddenly gives up the fight and says "Just kill me already" - it thinks it deserves it for all the Freds it's eaten. It takes some time for Tony to convince it he doesn't *want* to kill it.
Tony now explains that there's a large piece of dangerously radioactive asteroid in the water. He's trying to find it but he repeats that the big fish would be better off staying away. But it replies that it can show him where the rock is. As they walk and swim along it sees Stark's armour glowing and it fluoresces in reply. Tony tells it that his thermocouples are extracting heat from the water to keep him alive.
Then a shoal of fish that the creature calls Freds rush past them all thinking loudly "Flee". The big fish says that Freds (which we know as sardines) are simple-minded creatures with only 5 thoughts all beginning with F - flee, fight, frolic, feed and Tony interrupts the list before the last entry. So it wonders why they're *all* thinking 'flee' and what they're fleeing from. As they head to where the sardines are coming from they meet a whale swallowing down lots of them, and at the same time the giant fish points to the chunk of asteroid and claims that it grants super-powers.
As if to prove the point the whale emits a telepathic command which draws Freds to it, and the big fish responds too. The Golden Avenger tries to stop it but the big fish says it *has* to obey because it too used to be a Fred (before the asteroid changed it). It advises IM to take the meteorite and leave it to its fate. But our hero instead with 1 punch sends the ex-Fred (I think) to the surface and then threatens to do the same to the whale if it doesn't leave. The whale doesn't believe he's that powerful, and Stark knows he's nearly out of power. They have a face off. Tony recites in his head p to many decimal places and the whale retreats(?!).
Iron Man falls down into the water but the ex-sardine catches him and deposits him on the sea-bed leaning against a rock. Tony slumps, knowing that if his armour loses enough power his heart will stop.
Later divers sent by SHIELD Director Nick Fury find him alive and rescue him.