Fantastic Four (Vol. 3) #26
I am Doctor Doom!
In the aftermath of their battle with Taimut the Dreaming Celestial, the Fantastic Four are shocked to find that Doctor Doom was the only survivor of the Dreaming Celestial's destruction and that Mister Fantastic is apparently dead. As Doom's generals watch on, Valeria rushes to the man she thinks of as her father and hugs him. Doom hugs back willingly enough, something that is so out of character for Victor von Doom that his bodyguard, Lancer, takes notice. The Fantastic Four then demand to know answers as to what happened to their leader, Reed Richards. Doom tells them that he does not know what happened, a story which the Human Torch finds hard to believe. He flames on, but Lancer gets between them, ordering the Torch to stand down. The Thing then points out that there is more at stake right now and asks Ashema what the status of the world is. She conjures up an image of the a still flooded New York and tells them that the chaos wave has passed and everything is as it should be. Sue mistakes that for their Earth, but Ben points out that they're looking at the Baxter Building that is located on Counter-Earth. Lancer points out that millions of people on her Earth are dead now and puts blame on the heroes who abandoned her world, however, Ashema takes full blame as protector of Counter-Earth. When Queen Dorma demands Doom provides the world they were to conquer, Doom tells her that they will do so in due time. Suddenly they are contacted by the captain aboard Doom's ship. It turns out to be Wyatt Wingfoot and members of the Keewazi people. When Dorma demands they kill them, Doom says they will do no such them. Soon Doom's generals and the Fantastic Four are teleported aboard Doom's ship. Outside, Wyatt Wingfoot and his sister Wynona approach the ship but it suddenly cloaks itself. Finding this unidentified craft as suspicious, they send a report about it back to the Fantastic Four and the Avengers. Reviewing the footage at their headquarters, the Avengers recognize the ship as belonging Doctor Doom, confirming their worst fears: Doctor Doom is back!
Aboard his ship, Doctor Doom demands to be left alone in his quarters and sends some of his Servo-Guards to protect the door. Left to his own privacy, "Doctor Doom" lets down the charade. As it turns out this is really Reed Richards who was trapped in Doctor Doom's armor as a final jest by the Dreaming Celestial before its defeat. Still Richards believes that he can eventually crack the armor and gain his freedom. He then begins looking over Doom's data and realizes that Doom was indeed prepared to conquer the world. With his arsenal and army of troops, the entire human race could be wiped out. As he says this he is ambushed by Lancer who has been overhearing Reed's monologue and knows he is an impostor. Before she can attack she is stopped by Valeria who begs her not to. "Doom" tells Lancer that he wants to help her world as much as his own. When he cannot provide a good reason for her to trust him, he tells Lancer to strike him dead if she must, but she cannot bring herself to do it. Lancer leaves the room telling Reed that if he fails to follow through on his promises she will strike him down without mercy.
Meanwhile, the Fantastic Four and Doom's generals prepare for a rematch battle. While Sue takes out both Divinity and Technarx with an invisible force bubble, she is knocked out by Queen Dorma. The Thing goes up against Shakti who uses her magical powers to create a creature out of ribbon for him to fight. Enveloped in the ribbons, the Thing is saved from being smothered by the Torch who burns them off. Meanwhile, Dorma is pounding on Sue's force field in the hopes of shattering through it. Finally, Dorma get through and shocks Johnny and Ben by decapitating Sue. When Shakti and Technarx stop the battle, they protest that Dorma needs to work with them as a team in order to truly defeat their foes. She responds by beheading them as well. However, despite these fatal blows, the fight was nothing but a virtual reality simulation. While the Fantastic Four wait in their cell -- wearing inhibitor collars -- they await their fate. They are soon joined by Lancer, but Sue detects that she is not alone. Valeria makes herself visible revealing that she was trying to silently witness the proceeding moments.
Doom then joins them and tells Sue that she needs to send Valeria to "heaven" to be with Franklin. This shocks Sue as only Reed knows the true location of their son. When Valeria protests this, "Doom" explains that she needs to be safe while the deal with the dangers on two worlds. Despite the reservations of the others, Sue agrees to "Doctor Doom's" wishes and activates the special crystal in her possession, transporting Valeria to the same place where Franklin has been taken. After this whole exchange, both Sue and Ben are convinced that it is really Reed inside Doom's armor. When Johnny demands proof, Reed explains that he cannot remove Doom's mask because of the security locks that he still needs to crack. The group quickly realizes that they can take advantage of this situation by keeping Doom's generals in line while they figure out a way to deal with them and save both Earth and Counter-Earth from destruction. Just then, the door blows open and Queen Dorma attacks with the other Generals in the hopes of taking Doom's position as leader of this group of warlords.
Seeing the Fantastic Four without their inhibitor collars confirms to Dorma that "Doom" has grown weak. "Doom" states that he has made an alliance With the Fantastic Four and dares anyone to defy him. The generals oblige "Doom" to a battle. In a fast pace battle, "Doctor Doom" easily bests Divinity, Technarx, and Shakti in battle. When it comes to fighting Dorma, "Doom" easily disarms her and spares her life by mere inches with her own sword. With the battle over, Dorma concedes to Doom's superiority but tells him that if he is to make an alliance with their foes he must take the woman as his consort. "Doom" has no compunctions over this, taking Sue by the hand she accepts the offer. "Doom" then proclaims that they will be married and she will become the Baroness von Doom.
Recurring Characters
Fantastic Four (Mister Fantastic, Invisible Woman, Human Torch, Thing), Marvel Girl, Lancer, Queen Dorma, Technark, Shakti, Divinity, Wyatt Wingfoot, Wynona Wingfoot, Ashema, Avengers (Captain America, Iron Man, Scarlet Witch)
Continuity Notes
Although it seems that Doctor Doom perished during the events of last issue, in reality, he was transported back to Counter-Earth as seen in Doom #1-3.
Valeria von Doom is actually an adult version of Valeria Richards the stillborn second child of Reed and Sue. Valeria didn't survive the child birthing process as depicted in Fantastic Four #267. This is revealed in Fantastic Four Vol 3 #49. Franklin ultimately uses his powers to restore Valeria to her newborn state so Sue can give birth to her again in Fantastic Four Vol 3 #50.
There is multiple references to Franklin's Counter-Earth. Some facts about this:
When the Fantastic Four, Doctor Doom, and Avengers sacrificed their lives to stop Onslaught in Onslaught Marvel Universe #1, Franklin saved their lives by creating a pocket dimension with Counter-Earth where they lived "reborn" lives as seen in the Heroes Reborn event.
As seen in Heroes Reborn: The Return #1-4, eventually the Celestials gave Franklin an ultimatum: choose one Earth to continue and the other would be destroyed. Franklin helped returned his family and their allies to Earth and defeated the Celestials sparing both worlds. Doom tries to steal Franklin but was lost in the dimensional gulf between both dimensions.
Doom returned to Counter-Earth where he discovered that the Dreaming Celestial had altered reality to suit its whims. Doom gathered his generals and took over Counter-Earth, defeating the Dreaming Celestial. They brought Counter-Earth to the Earth-616 dimension in the hopes of cutting off the Dreaming Celestial's access to it. This was depicted in Heroes Reborn Doomsday #1, Heroes Reborn Ashema #1 and Heroes Reborn Doom #1.
The reason why the Thing can tell that the image that Ashema pulls up is Counter-Earth is that it depicts the Baxter Building. At the time of this story the original Baxter Building was destroyed years earlier in Fantastic Four #278 by Kristoff Vernard. During their tenure on Counter-Earth the Fantastic Four moved into that worlds version of the Baxter Building in Fantastic Four Vol 2 #4.
Much of Counter-Earth was flooded thanks to the machinations of the Dreaming Celestial as seen in Heroes Reborn Doomsday #1.
The Avengers recognize Doctor Doom's ship from when they first saw it in Heroes Reborn: The Return #4 when it was used to return to Earth from Counter-Earth.
Although referred to as "Heaven", Valeria is sent to Otherworld as revealed in Fantastic 4th Voyage of Sinbad #1. Franklin was sent there in Fantastic Four Vol 3 #24.
When Valeria's home reality was first glimpsed in Fantastic Four Vol 3 #15 it was believed that the Invisible Woman was married to Victor von Doom. This was evident by the fact that Alicia Masters was carving a statue of the Fantastic Four which included a statue of Reed Richards. However, when the Fantastic Four of Earth-616 saw the completed statue in Fantastic Four Vol 3 #16, it depicted a fully armored Doctor Doom instead of Reed. With Reed now trapped in Doom's armor as of this issue, this tosses into question if perhaps the same ruse was being perpetuated on Earth-99315 as it is now on Earth-616. It certainly leads to some questions about Valeria's true parentage. However as Reed is freed from Doom's armor in Fantastic Four Vol 3 #31 it diverges away from Earth-99315, and as such, any further explanation is left ambiguous.
