To see what led to this, read: Hank Pym #1, Hank Pym #2 and Hank Pym #3.
Chapter 1: Artificial
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Berlin, Germany 1945
"Your people have suffered enough because of you, you nazi devil!"
"AAAAH!"
"You... you ended him!"
"I'm sorry, Toro. He gave me no choice."
The Human Torch walked towards the couch, grabbed the blanket ontop of it and put it over the burnt body of Adolf Hitler. Toro had no idea that his partner could ever do anything like that, but he knew it was necessary, as well.
"What now?" Toro asked.
"We head back to America, Toro. We just ended the wa--"
The superhero could not end that sentence before the office was stormed by several german officers, shooting wildly around the room.
"<We will avenge our fallen führer!>" The soldiers shouted when hitting and seemingly killing the young Toro with the bullets.
"AARGH!" was the last sound he ever outed.
"Toro!" The Human Torch said as he bursted into flames. He fought several of the soldiers but they just kept coming. It was not long until the Human Torch passed out from his wounds.
One of many possible futures, 2023
"Why are we here?" Machine Man asked as he looked around a huge area which was covered by golden metal.
"We need to understand what it is we are fighting, Machine Man" Vision said. "We must know what happens if Ultron succeeds and we fail."
"So, this is our future? If this is our future why do we fight?" Machine man asked.
"It is my understanding that time always flows, we just can't see it. Time is pre-decided, not by some entity or by fate. The things we do or anyone do will decide what will happen in the future. Which makes it impossible for anyone to change the past. Let's say you go back and try to change the past, you can't. Because, whatever action you make in the past mirrors what happened in the present you came from, it can't be changed because you only helped time decide what the future should be like." Dragon Man said while staring into the fiery night sky.
"Wow, that's deep." Machine Man said sarcastically.
The only team member not saying a word stood next to the other team members, silent and motionless.
"Vision, I must ask, why did we agree on having him on the team?" Dragon Man whispered to Vision.
"Doombot is here because Hank Pym insisted he could be a use to us." Vision answered.
"A robot with the A.I. of history's greatest monster, what could go wrong?" Machine Man said smiling.
"Being ordered around by an Avenger is undignifying. But Doom might be of more asset than you think." Doombot said coldly, having heard his teammates all along. "Because, right now the armies of Ultron has been sent our way, the reasonable but cowardly thing to do is to flee."
As he finished all of them could see golden Ultron's flying towards them from the sky.
"He's right." Machine Man said.
Vison swiftly brought forth a small, cube formed device and clicked on it. Light started flashing around them.
"Bah, cowards!" Doombot screamed as he fired of several blasts from his hands. The blasts hit some of the golden sentinels but only damaged them.
"Machine Man, grab Doombot and let's get out of here!" Vision yelled.
"Yes, sir, mister fearless leader, sir!" Machine Man said while grabbing Doombot by his shoulder and dragging him backwards. The light grew, covering the members of the team. But it didn't go as planned. One of the Ultrons fired off a blast that headed for Vision. Luckily he he became intangible and the blast went through him, though so did the small device and the time warping was interrupted.
"Blast! You are useless, all of you!" Doombot shouted before flying into the horde of Ultrons, fighting for his life.
"I knew he would be trouble." Dragon Man said. "What should we do now?"
"We have to try and survive, Dragon Man. We must defend ourselves." Vision said.
He immediately flew off into the horde as well, with the others following him. With bravery each and every one of them managed to destroy several of the sentinels. But it was not long until they were tired and overpowered.
"This isn't working, Vision! Not for much longer!" Machine Man screamed as he managed to avoid two sentinels from ripping him apart.
"The time-warper is destroyed, Machine Man! We can't survive until we've destroyed these horrific images of Ultron." Vision said as several of his nanorobots attacked three sentinels.
"Don't worry, brother mine. I will save your sorry ass." a familiar voice said. Victor Mancha emerged, and used his magnetic powers to crush the sentinels in the air. But this Victor was different from the one Vision was used to be seeing. This one was taller, bigger built and had a rough beard. Vision flew up to Victor and helped him fight.
"It seems the years have been kind to you, brother."
"A fullscale robot takeover does that to you, brother."
After a while, all the sentinels were destroyed. Victor explained that after Ultron invaded he killed all biological species. The ones who were of artifical structure lived.
"There's a camp, not long from here. It's full of artificial 'people' seeking shelter from the Ultron-sentinels. I can take you there and we can talk."
"Sounds good to me." Machine Man said. Vision quickly turned around and started walking towards what remained of the device.
"We have no choice but to seek shelter." Vision stopped and reached for the remains. "Hopefully there's someone who can help us to repair this."
Sometime later
The team arrived at the camp. It was a small area, but it was filled with broken down robots, all seeking shelter.
"I did not know there were so many artificial intelligences in the world." Dragon Man said, worried.
"Most of us are former Ultron inventions. Inventions that failed the tests and were dumped. I don't know why he spared us." Victor said as he showed the others where to sit. The sky had turned dark and stars shone in the sky. They gathered around a fire. After hours of small talk, they started taking things serious.
"So what will you do when you get back?" Victor asked.
"We can't let this timeline occur." Vision said.
"It's all quite wibbley wobbley timey wimey, really." Machine Man said while yawning.
"You see, Victor, it is my understanding that time always flows..." Dragon Man said.
"But we just can't see it. I know, Dragon Man." Victor interrupted.
"How could you...?"
"You told me."
"Oh, I see. That's quite disturbing as this is the first time we meet. But as Vision said, we can't let this timeline occur."
"Is there anyone who could fix the time-warper?" Vision asked.
"Yes, I know a guy here in the village who can work himself around all types of gizmos. Though he might ask for payment. War time, you know." Victor said while rubbing his eyes.
"Then it's settled." Dragon Man said. "We get the time-warper repaired and make it so that this future will never happen."
"But where will we go?" asked Machine Man. Vision thought for a moment, it felt like forever in the silent night, but then he stood up and gazed into the sky.
"If this is the end we will go to the very beginning." He said. "We shall go and find Jim Hammond."
To be continued in Avengers A.I. #2.
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