(NOTE: This issue takes place before Iron Man #36.)

On this day, Canada was unusually quiet. The summer was all but done and the fall season was creeping up on the public. To children, that meant that school would begin soon and to the adults, it meant that the work that had to be performed was going to get tougher and tougher each day.

It was high noon. The sun was brightly shining on the skyscrapers and a cool breeze brushed against the many people that walked the streets. As with all things, nothing lasted forever. Then, a man soared through the air on sheer willpower and the circlet of power he wore on his wrist, making a complete flip in the air, allowing anyone who was willing to watch this fantastic feat, and landed on the rooftop of the building. But, this was no ordinary man that just conducted this inhumanly possible acrobatic display.

This person was called Solarman. He was clothed in a yellow and orange garb with an image of the sun emblazoned on it. It was his job to save people from danger and bedlam. As a matter of fact, he enjoyed his life, to the highest degree of the word.

Solarman peered all around the building, to make sure that no one had spied his arrival. When he confirmed that the coast is clear, he touched the circlet of power and changed back into teenager Ben Tucker.

Ben had recently become a member of the up-til-now Canadian superteam called Alpha Flight. He was the novice and had taken the place of the dead Northstar. He would have to learn the ropes of being on a team because before now he was a solo act, fighting only Gormagga Kraal and Doctor Doom previously.

Suddenly, he saw a shadow looming over him. Knowing that danger was present, Ben touched the circlet of power and changed back into Solarman. Behind him were a crowd of Mandroids, with their laser guns pointed straight at him.

“Okay, you hotshots, you messed with the wrong super hero today,” Solarman said, with his usual glib humor. Out from the circlet of power came a blast of pure heat that could melt a thousand suns but instead barely dented the Mandroids armor.

Solarman had read in the Alphanex computer net files that the newer line of Mandroid armor were forged of a combination of vibranium and adamantium, making them virtually impervious to harm. He would have to use more than brute strength and heat blasts to knock them out, he would have to use his brains too.

One of the Mandroids placed shackles on Solarman quicker than the eye could follow. Luckily for them, a cloud had passed over the sun masking the hero-man’s power. Without the sun to power the circlet of power, Solarman transformed back into Ben Tucker.

“Now, you will take us inside, to Alpha Flight,” the lead Mandroid said through his voice imprints.

“Do I have a choice?” Ben shyly asked.

“No, now lead on, fool.”

Ben looked up at the sky, where the sun was still hidden underneath a cover of clouds. Here he was on his first mission with Alpha Flight, fighting American villains, and he came up with zilch.

---

A few hours later, the solitude of Canada gives way to the unnerving silence of Eastern Long Island.

"You jerks, I said this once but my answer is still no!!" Somewhere behind his almost grim facade, Frank Mancuso smiled. He relaxed in his chair as he watched Madame Masque's eyes flare with rage.

"Tsk, tsk. You will not listen to resaon, now, will you?" She felt her subordinate's hand rest on her shoulder. "A few days ago, we sent our agent, Hector, to try to convince you to accept our protection money. You refused, then, and you still refuse. Why is that?"

"Because," Frank barked out, "I don't need your money, when I can get all I want from the bank. Anyway, as I told Hector, I tried to ally myself with certain criminal agencies, but it didn't work. Everytime I ended up in jail or worse. I won't make that mistake again. Not with you or anyone." Frank turned around swiftly and headed for the door.

Madame Masque waved her hand. "Don't act hasty. Mr. Mancuso."

Frank stopped, but did not turn around. "Aw, stuff it, chromedome."

The Mandroid, one of Madame Masque’s partners, thundered, "You'll regret it."

"I'll take my chances." Frank opened the door and stopped short. He now knew why they warned him. In front of him, there stood a man, clothed in just the armor worn by the Mandroids, with his machine gun arm raised in protest. This man in the armor would do anything to kill Frank right now and he knew that the men in the Maggia would love to beat people up.

The Mandroid’s hand wrapped around Frank's neck and Mancuso was slowly lifted in the air. "Like my bosses said," the Mandroid whispered with malevolent fury, "don't act hasty." He let out a grunt. "We're gonna be pals, right, Frankie? You'll never cross me, right, Frank m'friend?"

Mancuso coughed heavily. "Sure, whatever you say." Fear gripped him like an iron vise.

"We think alike, Frank." The Mandroid relaxed his hand and Frank slumped to the floor.

Madame Masque laughed and cracked her knuckles. "Now, Mr. Mancuso, you were saying about our protection?!"

Frank Mancuso grabbed his throat, and sweat pouring down his face, turned to the gang leaders in front of him. He should never escape the fear.

---

Usually New York was a quiet city at night but tonight was different. In midtown Manhattan, Frank Mancuso, undercover cop, sat firm on a rooftop enjoying the view. But that joy would end soon enough. His ever-keen senses kicked into high-gear and snipers upsetted his enjoyment.

“Damn. Snipers in Manhattan?? Now, why ain’t I surprised? What’s going on? Another gang war but this time it’s in Manhattan?? Why do these things always happen to me??”

Frank somersaulted behind a chimney but the sniper destroyed it. He jumped to an adjacent rooftop escaping the line of fire. As Frank landed to the rooftop, he was shot in the head by a sniper. Caught totally by surprise, Frank fell to his down.

Meanwhile in Central Park, three Alpha Flighters— Guardian, Sasquatch, and Madison Jeffries—sat on a bench waiting for their contact, Frank Mancuso.

“Hey, Maddie,” worriedly said Walter Langkowski. “Where can the high an’ mighty Frank Nicieza be? He was supposed to meet us an hour ago. What happened? Ever since Solarman disappeared I’ve seen Frank act kinda weird like we were amateurs which we ain’t trying to teach us a lesson. Make any sense o’ that, Maddie?”

“Nope, W.L.. If he doesn’t come in another half hour, we’ll start combing the city for him.”

Guardian agreed and again there was silence in Central Park.

A half hour had passed, and the three Canadian agents decided it was time to look for their esteemed contact, Frank Mancuso. It wasn’t usually like him to be tardy. So, Guardian assumed that something was terribly wrong with him and the best thing for them to do instead of waiting him to come to them was for them to go searching for him.

“This waiting is driving me buggy,” Guardian said, standing up. “Let’s go after him.”

“Do any of you know where he was supposed to be before he left the precinct to meet us here?” Sasquatch asked.

“Probably patrolling out on some rooftop getting the bad guys,” Madison Jeffries offered.

“I’ll take a looksee,” Guardian said, as he vaulted in the air, bouncing from rooftop to rooftop until he saw a sniper pointing his AK47 rifle at a man in the street. This man was laying on the ground, unconscious and Guardian recognized him as Frank Mancuso.

“Oh, no, you don’t,” Guardian said, blocking the sniper’s view with his body, as the killer shot him in the chest. Seeing that the bullets had just bounced off his chest, the sniper pressed a computerized stud on his belt buckle and he vanished.

“That seemed too easy,” Guardian said. “I better see to Frank.” Guardian jumped down to street level and saw blood curdling from Frank’s forehead. He examined the flesh wound; he saw blood but no bullet ingrained in his skull. “It probably just nicked him.”

A taxi cab pulled up into the alley they were in. Out exited Madison Jeffries and Sasquatch. They raced over to Mancuso’s side, where they saw the blood and the wound.

“What happened here?” Madison asked.

“I think he was shot by a sniper,” Guardian said. “When I arrived on the scene, he shot me, but the bullets bounced off me, and he had a device on his belt that made him vanish.”

“It looks like we have a sniper to catch,” Madison offered. “But first, we have to heal Frank here.”

Frank groaned awake. “What happened?”

“We were hoping you could tell us,” Guardian admitted.

---

Years before…

Ryker's Island. Smoke filled the cellblock. A gargantuan chasm had been torn in the wall, haphazardly. Numerous prison guards lay dead all around. Some were curled up into a ball, others had their bodies torn asunder, with blood and guts oozing out from their stomachs and abdomens.

Footsteps were being pounded on the pavement. They came closer and closer, gaining in their celerity, impacting with the ground faster and faster. Screams of horror and terror echoed through the entire penitentiary.

Criminals, down in other sections, shivered when they first heard the female voice. It sounded more animal than human. Some crawled into a corner, wondering, with hot acid on the tips of their tongues, what kind of a person could scream such a thing.

"C'mon, men, I think she went this way...."

"Wait'll I get my hands on that bi---"

"Shut up, an' start movin'..."

Heart pumping a mile a minute, her lungs contracting, Madame Masque came to a complete stop at the end of the corridor. It seemed like she had been running for hours. It seemed that she would never recatch her breath.

Around twenty guards, in standard uniform, stood in her way, with rifles blazing. "Okay, Madame Masque ," one of them said, stepping forward, very slowly, "you've gone far enough. This is the end of your little escapade. If you come quietly, we may be able to reduce your sentence to thirty years, at the most."

"No thank you." She had taken out a circular device sparkling in the streaming beam of moonlight, and threw it at them.

They stood, partly confused, partly confident of their power, as the device spun in perfect arcs at their feet. One of the guards, the ugliest one, saw her manage a smile upon her petty face. There was a short ball of light and flame that burst from it. Metallic objects jumped up and started to coalesce into a single bubbling monstrosity. Where the device once stood, now something does. A robot, with a regular torso, but weird, tentacle-like arms.

From computerized neurons within its memory banks, it spoke. "It's time for..... maximum thrash!"

"Goodbye," she whispered to herself, as she walked to an adjoining wall.

She felt the cold embrace of the night as she stepped onto the cool grass of the island. From above, twin searchlights shone upon her and she knew that her timely escape could be quickly undone, if she were found out.

She-- and the three guards in the control tower-- saw a gray-colored helicopter enter their air space. She looked up at the design on its side. It was a picture of a white-hued "U". Her ticket home.

She began to smile, as-- when she looked back at the prison-- she could hear the remaining guards die like the tiny ants they are. Rover performed his duty, quite well.

A roped ladder descended, waving in the wind, from an open compartment within the base of the copter. The guards within the control tower revealed their .44 magnum and discharged, bullets singing in the air, at her. Before she was hit, she leapt into the air, knowing full well that this is a do-or-die stunt.

The waters buckled and crashed against the shoreline of the island. With one final effort, she caught onto the last rung of the ladder and she-- and the helicopter-- flew away.

Hmm, she thought as she was brought into the copter, these prison clothes will just have to go.

The pilot grinned as they sunk into the horizon.

---

Montreal, Canada. The sun started to bake her skin. Aurora was sprawled on a plastic lawn chair, with a green bikini on. She looked up at the heavens, through her dark sunglasses. She kept thinking back to Walter.

Then, it rained.

"What the--?!" she blurted out, jumping to her feet.

The sky grew dark for a couple of seconds, lightning and thunder flared above her. Two rocketing forms plummeted towards her. She instinctively leapt to her side to avoid the bombardment.

When a burst of energy struck the grass before her, her eyes nearly popped out of their sockets, as her shades crumpled to the ground.

Guardian and Vindicator stood on a plain of parched grass. "Greetings, Aurora," Guardian called out to her.

Aurora rushed up and embraced Guardian. "Ohmigod, what the hell are you doing here?"

“To rid you of some dire straits that I heard were troubling you at HQ."

Aurora smiled. "Well, thank you, for clearing that up."

Suddenly, and without warning, Aurora's micro-transciever began to beep. "Well boys, it looks like I'm being paged," she said, folding up her lawn chair.

"Let me help you with that," Guardian said wrenching the chair from her grasp.

"Thank you....I think." she muttered.