Avengers Forever Part 3: House of A (Unofficial)

This is the third in a series of three movies meant as a capstone to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It involves time travel, which should be introduced in a prior installment in the cosmic movies, Limbo, which functions as a membrane connecting all possible realities and paradox, a phenomenon created when the main timeline diverges and which can be wielded with the Forever Heart to change the prime timeline permanently.

Please note I do not own any of the following intellectual property and this is only for my own amusement. If you own this property and would like me to remove the post, please contact me and I will be happy to comply. Thanks for inspiring me.

Avengers Forever Part 3

House of A

Act1

Open with the last scene from Masters of Evil then fade back from white to:

Coulson is lying on his side. The wounds are healed and scarred and as he hears Dr. Strange yelling 

Wake Up! He starts awake to reveal he is sleeping in a bed, with the cellist. He reaches up with his good arm and wipes sweat from his brow. She asks if he had another night mare and he nods. His son runs in the room and they do something cute. He also has a baby daughter now. After breakfast Coulson says he’s going down to his workshop. When he gets downstairs, he opens a wall to reveal a uniform, eye patch and cybernetic arm. It’s based on Jim Steranko’s SHIELD run and after he gets changed he takes a hidden elevator down into a subway system peopled with SHIELD and Avengers all in the style of Steranko. Everyone on the platform is portrayed by actors whose character died in the past, but it isn’t the focus of the scene, an Easter egg for sharp eyed watchers. Coulson rides a train to SHIELD Command and when he steps off, he is greeted by Dr. Strange, also in a similar styled SHIELD uniform. The hundred mile commute took about two minutes.

They are chasing Scorpio of the Zodiac with a fleet of “Cape-Killer” agents outfitted with Stark and Pym weapons. Avengers stand at the ready to move in on their signal.

Good guys have become despots in the wake of the Masters of Evil, or so it seems, actually Coulson used the Infinity Gauntlet to change reality to give The Masters of Evil heroic souls and this is actually the last remnants of the badly battered and dying prime reality. Strange, Ant-Man and Coulson are the only ones who have any memory of the original timeline and they are fractured. Only Ant-Man knows what Coulson did and he is hiding his knowledge because of it. Phil has flashes of other realities keyed to the phrase “Wake Up!” as spoken by Dr. Strange in the finale of Masters. He not only sees the timeline where the Masters ruled the Earth, but he gets glimpses of the Age of Ultron reality, Star Wars, and Big Hero 6. The last one greatly disorients him and he vomits whenever he sees it.

Red Skull is now Iron Cross

Johann Schmidt was a German Soldier who turned on the SS when he discovered what was happening to the Jews. He racked up massive body counts first as an assassin within Hitler’s organization and then as a guerrilla fighter leading a group of death camp escapees including Jewish families, GIs and other repressed people. Unfortunately he was captured and experimented on. His body was fused with metal and energy from the tesseract. His lower jaw is completely replaced with metal and his mouth is a controlled arc reactor. When he separates his jaws (they open like mandibles) a blue cross of flame is visible and he can breathe it out like dragon-fire. While he was being experimented on, Captain America (Now Chester’s choice, Hodges instead of Rogers) and the Howling Commandos broke into the lab and mistook him for a Nazi super soldier and he fought them. Schmidt ended up powered down and left for dead in the lab, but seven decades later, a lightning strike jumpstarted the reactor in his skull and he awoke to find Captain America installed as a dictator just as cruel as Hitler.

The Zodiac, led by Alexander Lukin, Libra, are a group of freedom fighters trying to win the release of political dissidents imprisoned by the Avengers and SHIELD. Iron Cross is meeting with them in secret to coordinate a strike against the Avengers.

Coulson receives a report telling him this and he cautions the “Micro Avengers” to stay in miniature size to avoid detection until the “Mighty Avengers” squad can join them in support.

Micro Avengers:

Scott Lang, Ant-Man, Leader
Yellow Jacket, science officer and assassin
The Wasp demolitions and assassin
Stature logistics and assassin
The Vision (operating a remote microscopic drone with no size changing powers) Communications

Mighty Avengers:

Captain Marvel Leader
Hulk
Ares Asgardian dignitary and heavy hitter
War Machine (Armor based on Ultimate Avengers run) piloted by Rhodes or Black Widow
The Vision

The Micro Avengers are detected and a fight breaks out. During the operation, as the Avengers act with increasing brutality including lobotomizing members of the Zodiac, Coulson begins to flash to other realities and begins to understand something is amiss. He has visions of the Age of Ultron reality, Star Wars (Not immediately recognizable) and even weird colorful spells where he sees San Fransokyo in all its brilliant color. When Dr. Strange shouts at him to “Wake up!” he suddenly remembers the events of Masters of Evil and comes to the conclusion that the skull has changed realty somehow, though the results seem highly unlike any of the fantasies Schmidt has used the gauntlet to create in the past.

Act 2

Coulson manages to snap Strange out of the “House of A” amnesia and it is revealed that Lang is already aware and trying to disengage from his blood thirsty teammates and abandon the mission. The three of them manage to band together and escape the op, but not before Col. America is made aware.

Hodges is now Colonel America

Private Hodges was a man’s man and Col. Phillips insisted he be chosen as the next test subject when Rogers dropped out before the procedure to marry Peggy Carter and serve as a spy in the SRI.

Hodge managed to complete all the missions that Rogers did in his reality, but every Howling Commando died in the line of duty, often intentionally sacrificed by Hodges to ensure his own personal glorification. After the war, he served as a senator, then president after retiring as a full bird colonel from the US Army. He’s a two-faced, self-involved, manipulating, lying bastard. Think House of Cards style politics. His hands are soaked in blood, but he managed to hide, bribe or bully anyone who came forward to question his record. When the Rogers came after him, he killed both their careers, but they were able to adjust to civilian life and live happily in a retirement community in Queens together, well into their nineties and still in love like kids. He remains combat capable on regimen of super science procedures, drugs and suspended animation naps.

Hodges is the senior SHIELD operative on the council and Coulson’s direct supervisor.

When Col America takes command, he immediately orders Coulson and the others branded as traitors and hunted as vigorously as the Masters of Evil and Zodiac. Most of the Zodiac is decimated as Libra escapes into limbo, abandoning his body completely. Iron Cross escapes for a moment, but when cornered by cape killers after slowing down to save an innocent child, he is left only with a last stand. His daughter, Virtue, escapes with the child, but one of the Micro Avengers hitches a ride with her to the Masters hold out.

Sin is now Virtue

Schmidt had no idea the mad scientists who captured him took so much of his precious bodily fluids. Decades later, Hydra used his DNA to artificially inseminate an egg. Raised by Hydra to be a freedom fighter against the Avengers, she infiltrated the organization and served as Hodge’s sidekick and became his lover. When Virtue was discovered, Hodge locked her up as a political dissident and ruined her good name by revealing her origins as a Hydra (Schmidt’s freedom fighters, branded Nazis by Hodge to cover his botched mission into the labs holding Iron Cross) weapon and the daughter of the notorious Johann Schmidt. When Iron Cross returned from his quasi-death, he found out about her and rescued her.

After pausing to save a child endangered by the Avengers, they are surrounded.

VIRTUE: Oh god, father, they’re so many of them. Take the child, I will hold them!

SCHMIDT: Nein, Liebchen, you are all I have left to fight for, I will not spend your life for anything, let alone to give that bastard the satisfaction of your death as a mere diversion. No, child, keep fighting. It’s time someone killed this tyrant and put an end to his madness. I will not fail again.

Blaring “Flight of the Valkyrie” from his onboard communication systems, (Like Iron Man and his AC/DC) Cross smashes through the Avengers and SHIELD vehicles directly towards Col America.

SCHMIDT: HODGES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

An epic battle begins and just as Iron Cross is about to make the decisive blow, Hodges calls in all the Avengers to take him out. With no regard for the surrounding innocent bystanders, they demolish an entire city block. Schmidt damns them for using him as an excuse to murder thousands and with a damaged Arc Reactor burning through his body, he flies into the sky and explodes safely away from the civilians.

Back at the hold out, Virtue meets up with Justin Hammer, Obie Stane and Al Killian, best friends and resistance fighters who use Arc Reactor tech and the Extremis process (without the explosive side effects and dead test subjects) to run a network of bolt holes for the rest of the Masters of Evil.

Justin Hammer
A true genius on the same level as Tony Stark, but his business was destroyed by industrial espionage and sabotage perpetrated by Stark. He is aware of the fractured reality and has been studying it, though he has no memory of any other reality.

Obie Stane
Howard Stark’s best friend and the only one who knows Tony arranged his own parents’ death to get their fortune. He is heavily scarred from repeated battles with Iron Man. Justin and Al help maintain the Iron Monger suit that he pilots.

Al Killian
Infused with Extremis, but a safer version that grants him enhanced strength and speed, but no energy powers or regeneration. Unfortunately, Iron Man has severely beaten him and he is once again, physically impaired with a prosthetic leg and a cane for his limp. His enhanced strength is still quite useful, but his reflexes aren’t connected correctly anymore. Despite this, he is an eternal optimist and counterpoint to Hammer’s cynical nature.

HAMMER: You came here? Oh god. This is bad, this is so bad. I just saw you on the news, god not even twitter, on the damn news fighting Col America and half of SHIELD. So you came here? Yeah, that makes sense.

KILLIAN: We have to go now.

STANE: Get me booted up, I’ll hold them back.

HAMMER: There’s no point, they’re…

KILLIAN: … already here.

Yellow Jacket lobotomizes Virtue and calls in the rest of the Avengers to attack. Hammer watches his best friends die to protect him as he leads Coulson, Lang and Strange out. Lang lingers back to shut down the Micro Avengers tech. Obie gets riddled with bullets and seems to die. Moments later he lurches the last few inches into the Iron Monger suit as Killian boots him up while fighting off SHIELD Agents with his super strength. Killian dies just as the Iron Monger (now hulk-buster sized) stands and lays into the Avengers. He succeeds in holding them off and Scott Lang witnesses him hitting the self-destruct on his suit and taking out the Mighty Avengers in a massive explosion.

In the escape tunnels, Hammer explains how reality has been frayed and nearly destroyed by the Destiny War and ongoing abuse of the Infinity Gauntlet and its Gems. He leads the trio safely to a gathering of the remaining Masters of Evil at their hidden lair in (can’t call it Latveria, but its Castle Doom goddamnit!) an undisclosed country in Europe.

Masters of Evil

Not a name they chose for themselves, the Masters are hunted criminals. All of them have heroic and tragic twists on their prime reality counterparts’ origins. A plan is formulated with the assumption that someone in SHIELD, Col America is the prime suspect, is using the Gauntlet to destroy reality or destroying reality by using the Gauntlet for personal gain. They plan to find it, take it and destroy it.

STRANGE: You cannot destroy it.

COULSON: Try and stop me.

STRANGE: No, I mean it is literally impossible to destroy. It exists beyond this reality or any other. There is always an infinity gauntlet, there are always infinity gems. IN-FIN-ITE. Without them, the universe would cease to exist.

COULSON: I don’t believe that, there’s always a way!

STRANGE: I’m sorry, there just isn’t a Mt. Doom for this precious… oh. Damn.

COULSON: What?

STRANGE: The Eye of Agamotto has just informed me I have forgotten something quite relevant.

COULSON: It talks to you?

STRANGE: More like it shows its rightful bearer truth. There, indeed, is a way, though it carries grave consequence for failure.

COULSON: How grave?

STRANGE: Everything dies.

LANG: That’s pretty grave.

STRANGE: Please understand what I’m saying when I say “everything.” There are countless, infinite worlds that exist beyond this plane we know as “reality.” If we manage to destroy the Gauntlet and Gems, and that is an incredibly large “if,” we may very well unmake every single plane of existence ever conceived, dreamed, created, wrought, born… you get it. Everything dies.

The Gauntlet is being held in a high security SHIELD facility. After an “oceans 11” style heist shifts into a massive brawl, Coulson is left confronting Col America who reveals the truth.

HODGES: Are you crazy, Phil? Have you lost your goddamn mind? That thing is yours! You locked it into that vault all by yourself, I never had any idea what you kept in there. I just knew it was the one thing on this planet you would kill me to keep. So I let you keep it. Never needed it. I didn’t do this, nobody you’ve accused has done… THIS. This is your world, Phil. If that Gauntlet made it this way, you were the one wearing it.

As Phil remembers locking the Gauntlet up, with Strange and Lang’s help designing the vault, using it to erase their own memories, (against Lang’s wishes) he also remembers what he did with the Gauntlet in the Masters finale. He gave the Masters of Evil heroic souls at birth, undoing their evil lives. And to do that, the Gauntlet took the heroic souls of the Avengers, leaving them ordinary and much more subject to corruption and selfish behavior. Call it balance, call it a Monkey’s Paw. Before Phil realized where the Masters of Evil gained their heroism from, he erased his memory and settled into the House of A.

The reality quakes come faster and now everyone can perceive them as well as Coulson, Strange and Lang. Other intellectual property owned by the Disney Corp gets mixed in as Coulson screams and the world turns to white as they destroy the Gauntlet.

Act 3

Coulson wakes up in a huge bank of human bodies connected to “Matrix” style batteries. For a moment, he thinks (and maybe the audience too) that Ultron manufactured the entire mad scenario to keep humans sedated and in the “Matrix.” (That’s a WB property though, so it’s more of an homage than a crossover)

After a short episode in the Age of Ultron reality, he slips again and wakes up on Princess Leia’s cruiser in the opening of episode IV. He is now the rebel soldier being choked by Darth and just before he dies, he shifts again into Big Hero 6.

Now Coulson is animated and no longer vomits and seizes when he interacts with this reality. After another short scene, he slips again, into Limbo where pieces of reality are floating adrift. Libra appears and explains that this is all that’s left.

Coulson, Strange and Lang fight their way through pieces of other realities to reach the moment in Avengers 2012 when Coulson is killed by Loki. Coulson figures if he stops Fury from bringing him back with the LMD plan, he can head all this off. He also has another motive that he doesn’t reveal to Lang and Strange, who leave to get the LMD and a spare Loki to replace the one Coulson is about to kill.

Avengers 2012

In a piece of reality from the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Coulson manages to cross into the moment of his death at the hands of Loki. House of A Coulson has an identical spear from Limbo and stabs Loki in the same manner as Loki was about to do to the 2012 Coulson. He kicks the body out the hole.

HOUSE OF A COULSON: You’re going to have to explain it to him.

2012 COULSON: Explain what, obviously evil twin?

HOA COULSON: Thor’s about to find his brother’s body. You’re going to have to convince him to destroy it and pretend it didn’t happen. And I’m not evil. I’m just tired.

2012 COULSON: How’s that going to work?

HOA COULSON Another Loki will be along shortly…

HOA Coulson suddenly gets aggressive and starts screaming through tears.

COULSON: It’s all my fault, you see! You see what I am! I did this. We do this. It’s all our fault. You can never come back! I’ve got it all worked out, you won’t be missed. You can never come back. PROMISE ME! YOU WILL NEVER COME BACK!

2012 Coulson, obviously shocked by the situation and his future self’s severe mutilation, nods dumbly as HOA Coulson shoves a parachute in his arms and throws him through the hole.

HOA COULSON: GO TO PORTLAND YOU SON OF A BITCH!!!!!

HOA Coulson picks up the copy spear, braces it against the wall and leans back into it, slowly impaling himself just below the edge of the screen. He looks content when he settles down into a sitting position. He rolls to his side, slowly, so slowly pulls the spear back out again with his good arm. He kicks it out the window and rolls up into a sitting position. Fury arrives.

HOA COULSON: Don’t bring me back, Nick. I don’t want anymore. I’ve seen too… I’ve seen all I can stomach. You just need… good pair… of eyes. He can… he can do it. Keep him secret… ‘til its time.

The LMD enters the room as Nick lays Coulson to rest.

Months later in the 2012 reality…

The Coulson LMD (using footage from the SHIELD television premiere) is walking out of the hanger and says “Don’t touch Lola” after that, he continues a conversation on his phone.

LIFE MODEL DECOY COULSON: You settling in? We could trade once in a while if you get bored.

Cut to 2012 Coulson, now living happily in Portland and holding his son.

2012 COULSON: I’m good. We’re good. Besides, I don’t think my wife is into swinging, even if you are pretty good-looking and totally her type. We’re good. This is your show, now. It’s what we wanted.

LMD Coulson smiles and hangs up. Then his eyes turn "ULTRON RED" as the screen fades to black.