Marvel: The Awakened One

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Inside the penthouse office of the Baxter Building.

The elevator doors slid open.

Gwen followed her guide out of the cab, locking eyes with the man this world hailed as Mister Fantastic: Reed Richards.

Reed was a child prodigy who flew through Caltech, Harvard, Columbia, and Empire State University, earning doctorates in engineering, mathematics, and physics as if they were just routine achievements.

A space expedition gone wrong had given him Superhuman Elasticity—the ability to stretch and reshape his body at will.

Kind of like Bruce Banner.

Both got mutated by cosmic radiation.

Gwen ran through the mental dossier she had compiled on Richards as she watched him sit behind his massive desk.

While she was sizing him up, he was doing the exact same to her.

The assistant who escorted her slipped out of the office.

Reed Richards broke the silence. ”Ms. Stacy—”

”Phoenix.”

”Excuse me?”

”I’m married. My husband’s last name is Phoenix.” Gwen didn’t hesitate to correct the smartest man on the planet.

Reed studied her deadpan expression, glancing at the digital dossier on his monitor before letting out a dry chuckle. ”According to my files, you’re single.”

Gwen offered a polite smile. ”Your files are wrong. I’m married.”

To prove her point. She held up her left hand, flashing the wedding band on her finger.

Reed nodded slowly. ”May I ask for Mr. Phoenix’s full name…?”

”Hawk Phoenix.” Gwen dropped the name and watched as Reed turned back to his keyboard. ”Don’t bother searching. I already tried. He doesn’t exist in this world.”

Reed stared at the blank search results on his screen, then looked back at Gwen.

’Is this some kind of scam?’

As if reading his mind, Gwen cut off his suspicion before he could voice it. ”Hawk is very real. He’s just not in this universe. Because, frankly, I’m not from this universe either.”

”...” Reed Richards fell silent.

His first instinct was to classify the woman in front of him as insane.

But a twenty-year-old with a Ph.D. didn’t exactly fit the profile of a raving lunatic.

Reed adjusted his posture, lacing his fingers together on the desk as he gave her his full attention. ”I’m listening.”

”Hawk and I met at Midtown High…” Gwen laid it all out. She walked him through how they met, how they fell in love, and finally, the reality-warping temporal shift that dumped her into this alien dimension.

Among his mountain of academic achievements, Reed Richards held a doctorate in psychology.

So, while Gwen spoke, he analyzed her micro-expressions, looking for any sign of deception or delusion.

By the time she finished, he’d reached a conclusion.

Either Gwen was having a psychotic break.

Or she was telling the truth—she wasn’t from this Earth.

The first option? Reed couldn’t detect a single behavioral marker of insanity in her.

But the multiverse? Even the smartest man in the world frowned at that. He had to ask the obvious question.

”Dr. Sta— Phoenix. You claim you aren’t from this world and that you traversed the multiverse. Can you prove it?”

”With this.” Gwen raised her hand. The wedding ring on her finger shimmered with an unnatural luster.

She slipped the band off her finger and, under Reed’s watchful eye, set it gently onto the desk.

”Your ring?”

”Yes. Try picking it up, Dr. Richards.” Gwen gestured politely, inviting him to try.

Reed let out a soft scoff and reached across the desk to grab the small piece of jewelry.

But it didn’t budge...

What the—?

Reed blinked, caught off guard as his fingers strained against the immovable object on his desk.

No luck... Even when he stood up and used both hands, the ring wouldn’t budge, as if it were glued to the center of the Earth.

Reed let go and stared at Gwen.

Gwen just smiled. She pinched it between two fingers and lifted it off the wood, then tapped it back down.

Reed tried again. It didn’t move. ”How is this…”

”My husband gave me this ring during our honeymoon,” Gwen said, smiling wider. ”He made it from a real diamond planet. That means this little ring holds the mass of an entire world, and it’s connected only to me. I’d say that’s proof enough, wouldn’t you?”

Thor’s hammer, Mjolnir, boasted similar specs, forged from the heart of a dying star.

The difference is, Odin turned a star into a hammer, but Hawk took an entire diamond planet and made it into his wife’s wedding ring.

THE MASS OF A PLANET??

Reed stared at Gwen. Then the ring. Then Gwen again. ”May I run some tests on it?”

”Be my guest.” Gwen nodded. ”I came here to earn your trust. Once I have that, I hope you can help me find a way back home.”

Reed’s face grew serious. ”Mrs. Phoenix, if you really are from another universe, we’ll do everything we can to send you back.”

Gwen stood up from her chair and extended her hand across the desk.

”Thank you.”

”Don’t mention it.”

After a firm handshake, Reed waited for her to put the ring back on, then quickly left the room, eager to take her to the main lab.

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One hour later.

The diagnostic readouts finished printing.

”Holy cow—”

Ben Grimm let out a sharp breath. He used to be a tall pilot, but cosmic radiation turned him into The Thing, giving him an indestructible body made of jagged orange rock. He stared at the data pad. ”This defies all known laws of physics. The density of this ring is…”

Johnny Storm crouched next to the containment field. He was young, hotheaded, and blonde, with the power to control fire. He looked through the reinforced glass, amazed. ”So you’re telling me that’s not a diamond ring… that’s a literal diamond planet?”

Susan Storm, Johnny’s older sister and Reed’s wife, frowned. ”How is something like this even scientifically possible?”

Compressing an entire planetary mass into a jewelry setting?

What kind of human is capable of that?

Susan shot a glance over at Gwen.

Reed finished looking over the telemetry data. He was convinced now, but he had one last question for Gwen.

”Dr. Phoenix, just one final question.”

”Go ahead, Dr. Richards.”

”You came in here, told us you’re from another universe, and gave us an incredibly powerful artifact. Did you ever think I might not be one of the good guys? That I could try to take advantage of this?”

Gwen listened to his concern.

She smiled. ”My husband is Hawk Phoenix.”

”And?”

”And if anything happens to me in this universe, trust me, Dr. Richards, this whole Earth and its universe will burn to ash. My husband is known for his short temper.”

It wasn’t an empty threat.

For those who actually knew him, describing Hawk’s temper as ’short’ was the understatement of the century. The man was a walking nuclear warhead with a hair-trigger.

Reed looked at her, flashing back to the feats she had attributed to Hawk during her story.

He had a feeling she wasn’t bluffing.

If she bled on this Earth, the whole dimension would bleed with her.

Because—

According to Gwen’s debrief, her husband had gone to war with their native universe’s consciousness over control of another dimension, and the universe itself had been so enraged that it banished her here out of spite.

The universe couldn’t kill Hawk. All it could do was relocate his wife to annoy him.

’Jesus...’ Reed gulped hard and looked at Gwen. ”The multiverse is purely theoretical on our end. Cracking the math… It’s going to take time.”

”Time is the one thing I have plenty of right now.” Gwen reached her hand out again. ”Besides, I might be able to help speed up the process.”

Once again, even stranded on an alien world, Gwen was financially bulletproof.

There was no Oscorp or Stark Industries here, but the Regenerative Serum still existed, and she held all the patents to her own research.

She had plenty of money. Honestly, the main reason Reed agreed to the meeting was that he needed her investment for the Baxter Building’s R&D. However, he hadn’t expected her to arrive with a multiverse-level surprise!

But now, Reed thought about the terrifying, unseen force known as Hawk Phoenix. He did the only thing that made sense and shook her hand. ”Welcome to the team, Dr. Phoenix.”

He didn’t have a choice.

He couldn’t afford to gamble against those odds...

Hawk would wipe them out without even thinking twice!

Best-case scenario: extinction of the human race!

Worst case: total atomic annihilation of reality itself!

A guy who fights a sentient universe over real estate... Just thinking about this Hawk guy made Reed break out in a cold sweat.

So, if Gwen got into trouble while they were responsible, it wouldn’t be a normal Earth-level crisis. It would be a disaster that could destroy reality.

Just to be safe, even if Gwen hadn’t asked to stay, Reed would have kept her under constant watch inside the Baxter Building to make sure the universe stayed safe.

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