New Avengers, The (2025 series) #10

The New Avengers have been battling the Killuminati, evil clones of some of the Illuminati created by (clones of) the Jackal for a mysterious boss represented by a glitchy hologram.

This issue starts with a flashback labelled 1 week ago (relative to the end of this issue) which continues directly from a flashback in #8 where Black Widow (Natasha Romanoff) allowed Winter Soldier (Bucky Barnes) to interrogate her with a truth drug so he would believe what she said. There she admitted that she has a 2nd personality that she calls the Other Woman who has been working with the Jackal. Now she feels the OW surfacing and asks Bucky do do what she can't and make her tell him what's really going on. The OW admits that she's a sleeper agent that's been programmed into Natasha's brain with an agenda to clone Baron Zemo, the heir to Hydra who stole his team and left him for dead.

The main story then continues from the end of last issue, now labelled 2 days ago. The NAv have invaded the Killuminati's 3rd base in the Hungarian Bukk Mountains. Both sides think they're in control of the situation. The K-gang deliberately led the NA-gang here but the NA-gang know they did and are ready for them, but our team is missing Black Widow and claiming they've left her in a deep pit. They fight while Jackal has nearly finished cloning Zemo and the hologram AI is now more clearly wearing his hood.

Back in the fb the other Natasha explains that the Agenda, including this 2nd personality, is a contingency that Zemo set up years before he was killed - when it automatically came into play. All the necessary ingredients have been collected, including the hand of Zemo from Tony Stark's vault last issue. The good thing for Natasha and Bucky is that this personality will fade away when the Agenda has succeeded, but not until then.

In the main story the battle continues:- Wolverine (Laura Kinney) vs Luke Charles (Black Panther clone). Sub-Mariner vs Tony Stark clone Iron Apex. Clea vs Guru Strange, the clone of her husband Dr Strange. Carnage (Eddie Brock) vs Rapunzel, clone of the Inhuman Medusa. Winter Soldier vs Mr Fantastic clone Mr Ouroboros and Captain Britain clone Lord Britain. Bucky's voiceover tells us that they're deliberately *not* attacking the cloning tank. The Avengers start winning by teamwork. Bucky throws LB's sword to cut off lots of Rapunzel's weaponised hair and Eddie Brock allows his Carnage symbiote to send tendrils down her throat to kill her. Namor slams IA into GS giving Clea the chance to use a very nasty spell on him.

But then Black Widow appears with her bad side in control and she and Bucky start to fight. Bucky is losing because he can't hurt the woman he loves. LB sends Wolvie hurtling towards the tank but Clea stops her before she can damage it, and then magically hurls her back at the foe pushing him towards Subby who decapitates him with a blow. Luke Charles slashes Laura K with his sword but her adamantium and healing factor save her. Carnage attacks him and LK uses her claws to cut him in 2.

That leaves only Iron Apex and Mr Ouroboros still standing. But the cloning is complete. However the 2 villains fear that of Zemo emerges they will never be free of his control, so *they* attack his birthing chamber. But the hologram AI triggers their biological kill switch and they dissolve into goo. Baron Zemo emerges and other-Nat exults in her successful Agenda, and as predicted collapses into Bucky's arms.

But Bucky's voiceover tells us this was all part of the real Natasha's plan. And Zemo too starts dissolving into goo, and real BW wakes with bad Natasha gone. Back in #8 she explained to Bucky how bad-Nat used BW's abilities to steal most of the ingredients needed for the cloning. Now similarly she tells the hologram how she HALO dropped through this sites defences, slipped like a ghost past the super-battle, KO'd Jackal and disguised herself as him so she could introduce a DNA virus into the clone tank, and also hacked the AI's system so it too now dies. Zemo is still dissolving but she shoots him in the head just to make sure. The end.

But we get an epilogue 2 days later, ie now, at Bucky's safe house in the New Mexico desert where they're explaining what happened to Captain Marvel and Iron Man of the Avengers (and maybe of the current Illuminati as suggested in Iron Man (2026) #1). They aren't too happy with their methods, reckless and dubiously moral. They also don't like them using the name Avengers, dismissing the claim that Bruce Banner named them that (in #3). Carol Danvers says they should have alerted them as soon as they knew about the Killuminati. Tasha counters that Tony didn't warn *her* about the missing ingredients' usefulness in cloning when he asked her to look for them (in #8). But Stark is now more interested in knowing how Zemo succeeded in stabilising neurogenic clones, whicc makes Namor realise that Stark himself had been trying to do the same thing. He says *this* is why they didn't contact the Illuminati because they can't be trusted (conveniently forgetting that he used to be in that group). Danvers stops all the arguing and says she's shutting their team down. Widow counters by effectively saying 'you can't fire us, we quit' because most of them can't stand each other. But they reserve the right if they think it's necessary to get back together as Avengers without asking permission!

Much later when everyone else has finally gone Bucky and Nat get back together in his shack and his bed. They promise themselves no more missions, no more teams - at least for now.