File:Fantastic Four Vol 1 182 001.jpg

Description
Reed Richards of Counter-Earth, still impersonating Earth's Reed Richards, is operating the Negative Zone viewer when he is interrupted by Thundra, Tigra, the Thing, the Human Torch. and the Impossible Man (who has changed himself into a rolling disc). Over his shoulder Ben is carrying the robot that he and Tigra just battled on the docks after it smashed up a bank. Reed tells Ben to place the creature on an immobilization couch, where he pretends to begin studying it. When Ben reminds him that the android was used to break open a bank, Reed seizes on that and sends Thundra, Tigra, and the Impossible Man to the bank to look for clues. Thundra and Tigra immediately suspect that Reed is just trying to get rid of them, and Tigra tells Thundra that she has a hunch that bears explaining. The Impossible Man, however, thinks the mission is great fun, and he changes into a replica of Sherlock Holmes in preparation for doing detective work. As soon as the others are gone, Reed fastens cable-belts to Johnny and Ben. He has been monitoring the Negative Zone, he says, ever since the "other" Reed Richards was hurled in. The android that Ben battled came from there, he declares, and now they must trace it back to its source. This is a dangerous mission, he continues, which is why he had to keep the ladies out of it. Firmly attached to the cables, Johnny and Ben step into the Negative Zone portal as Reed tells them that he will remain at the Baxter Building to reel them in in case something goes wrong. As soon as Ben and Johnny drift away, the Counter-Earth Reed gloats that Reed Richards will shortly be joined in exile by his companions, soon to be followed by Reed's lovely but suspicious wife. It is night as Agatha Harkness leads Franklin Richards through the halls of her Whisper Hill mansion. She has told him that certain "bad men" are searching for her, and he bravely declares that he won't let them get her. She replies that that is why she had to take him away, but before she can explain further, three shadowy figures appear at the top of a staircase. Agatha attempts to repel them with a mystic fireburst, but they absorb the flame unharmed. Then Agatha tells Franklin to stand behind her as she prepares another spell, but one of them fires a weapon that locks Agatha's hands in a mystic shackle. Franklin starts to scream, and at just that moment, Sue and Alicia land the Fantasticar outside. When they attempt to enter the building, however, it mystically attacks them as intruders. Sue erects a force field around herself and Alicia, but they get inside too late. Sue watches in horror as the three figures, Agatha, and Franklin vanish. As Johnny and Ben drift through the Negative Zone, it occurs to Johnny that the cable-belts were once considered too dangerous by Reed for Negative Zone exploration. Ben recalls a mishap caused some years ago by a similar device. It was why Reed devised their flying harnesses, which are much safer and allow for independent maneuverability. This, says Ben, clinches a thought that has been "fermenting" in his mind for the past several hours, namely, that the Reed at the Baxter Building is not the real Reed at all. Just as Johnny declares that they must return to protect Sue, Ben sees the real Reed, Annihilus, and the Mad Thinker's monster Android in the distance. The Android slams down its fist, but Reed leaps out of the way. Completely fatalistic, Annihilus declares that he and Reed are finished, because they both lack their powers. But before the android can strike again, the Thing slams it in the face. Little affected, it swats him away, and then the Torch circles the behemoth's head with flame. Reed tells Johnny to get them all out of there, and Johnny grabs Reed's hand and soars away. Ben leaps off the fortress-planetoid and Annihilus flies alongside. Annihilus and the three teammates regroup on a small planetoid some distance away. It is now totally obvious to Ben and Johnny that the Reed who sent them into the Negative Zone is the Counter-Earth Reed. Although they have some last-minute doubts because Reed seems to be associated with Annihilus, one of their greatest foes, these are quickly dispelled when Ben and Johnny tug on their belt-cables and find the ends severed. For the moment, Reed, Johnny, and Ben are at a loss for what to do, but then Annihilus points out that the android that he and Reed were battling has vanished from the fortress. None of the foursome can see that the Android has been plucked off Annihilue's asteroid at the speed of light and drawn, past the swirling center of the Negative Zone, by a tractor beam "of pure, amplified thought" toward an opening in negative space. The Mad Thinker, in his base on Earth, gloats that he was able to reimpose his will on the android that he created years ago, despite its present somewhat different form. Soon, he muses, he will gain access to the Fantastic Four's headquarters and defeat Reed Richards. With Richards's own devices at his disposal, the Thinker firmly believes that he will destroy the Fantastic Four. Meanwhile, Sue rushes into the Baxter Building wondering why no one answered her alert from the Fantasticar. The Counter-Earth Reed explains that he has been recalibrating some instruments and did not hear the alarm, while the others—Ben, Johnny, Thundra, and Tigra—are out. Frantic, Sue tells Reed that Franklin has been kidnapped, and when he fails to respond, she accuses him at last of being the false Reed Richards. When he tries to calm her down, she shoves him away with her force field. Then he admits that she is right, and that Johnny, Ben, and Reed are all adrift in the Negative Zone. Until now, he says, he spared her, because she is so much like the Sue who lies comatose on Counter-Earth. Than he changes into the Brute and advances menacingly toward her. Sue turns invisible, but unfortunately the Brute's heightened, animal-like senses continue to track her. He hurls a heavy piece of apparatus at her, but she ducks, wondering how she might be able to warn Thundra and Tigra to save Franklin. The Brute starts pounding her force field, weakening her with every bow, until at last she loses consciousness. Then he throws her through a window, and she plummets toward the street more than thirty stories below.