File:Fantastic Four Vol 1 163 001.jpg

Description
The Thing confronts Gaard at the inter-dimensional nexus in hyper-space. Armed with special weapons and footgear, Gaard resembles the goalie of a hockey team, and he proclaims that he will destroy Ben in milliseconds. Attached to Ben's chest is a device that Reed Richards built to seal shut the nexus and keep the warlord Arkon from using the energy released in a massive, three-way inter-dimensional war. But Ben has to actually get the device into the nexus for it to work, so he circles Gaard unsteadily on his anti-gravity soles, testing Gaard's defenses. Gaard, however, is far more experienced than Ben at hyper-space fighting, and he uses his hockey-slickshaped Cosmic Sceptre to easily fend off Ben's attacks. When Ben realizes that he cannot break through Gaard's defense, he unstraps Reed's device from his chest and hurls it at the nexus. But even his strongest pitch seems molasses-slow to Gaard, who catches the disk-shaped object and throws it back at Ben's stomach. Gaard arrogantly declares that he can skim light-rays themselves in hyper-space. As Ben prepares for another pass, he imagines that he has heard Gaard's voice before, but he cannot identify it through Gaard's mask. Ben tries to tear the mask off, but Gaard stuns him with a bolt from his Cosmic Sceptre. Ben is about to give up his mission as hopeless, but Reed's image suddenly appears to exhort him to continue. Reed, Sue, and A. E. DeVoor have been watching the battle on the D-scanner at the Baxter Building. Ben stands little chance against a foe specially trained to fight in hyper-space, comments Reed. Earlier, DeVoor told Reed that only one other living being can inhabit the same sector of hyper-space as Gaard, so unfortunately Ben must battle by himself. Arkon arranged things this way because it amused him that a champion from some world would be hopelessly outmatched having to fight Gaard alone. Reed declares that the war among the three universes is largely DeVoor's doing, and if the worlds destroy themselves in a nuclear holocaust, he swears to make DeVoor pay. But DeVoor shifts the blame to Arkon. He was once a scientist and a businessman, he says, but his ventures tailed and he was on the verge of suicide when Arkon came to him. Arkon had learned of certain theories developed by men working for DeVoor, and he planned to cause an inter-dimensional nuclear war to save his own dimension, whose energies were depleted. DeVoor became Arkon's client, buying and using weapons to ensure that conflict. Reed angrily accuses DeVoor of selling out, and DeVoor replies that everybody eventually sells out, although some have higher prices than others. Then Sue says she has located Johnny and the Earth-A Reed Richards in Arkon's world on the D-scanner. On the viewscreen are Johnny and the other Reed dodging energy bolts and battling Arkon's soldiers. Because the Earth-A Reed is used to doing sedentary work in a laboratory, his muscles are not as strong as the Thing's, but he is still extremely powerful, and he tears machinery apart and hurls the chunks at the soldiers. As he keeps the men at bay, the Human Torch flies out across the city to search for Arkon himself. Reasoning that Arkon's egoism would lead him to reside at the top of the tallest building in sight, Johnny quickly finds him. Unfortunately, Arkon is prepared for him, and he knocks Johnny down with a thunderbolt. He asserts that his knowledge of warfare has made him master of one world and imminent annihilator of three others, and he cannot understand why men such as the Reed Richards of two worlds oppose him when they would be far better off serving him. The cost of doing that, says Johnny as he staggers to his feet, would be their souls. As Arkon aims another bolt at Johnny, Earth-A's Reed shatters the wall behind the warlord and hurls him off his feet. He says that he used Arkon's voice to determine his location. Then Johnny warns him about the thunderbolts. With a quick blast of flame, Johnny burns the thunderbolt quiver off Arkon's back, and the other Reed slams Arkon into a wall and knocks him unconscious. He is pleased to have finally left the "ivory tower" of scientific research and weapons manufacturing and done something more productive. Then he says that Johnny's Earth-A counterpart, Sue Grimm's brother, was killed in Vietnam a year ago. Using Arkon's D-scanner, Johnny soon contacts Reed and Sue, but Sue says that there is little hope for any of them unless Ben defeats the guardian of the nexus. And, she adds, Ben is losing. DeVoor tells Reed and Sue that he would be glad to help, but he can do little because of Arkon's restriction on the number of opponents who can battle Gaard at one time. If a second opponent enters hyper-space near Gaard, the newcomer will siphon off the life-force of the first and kill him. This gives Reed an idea, and he starts to adjust one of his devices. He asks his otherworld counterpart not to leave until he finishes, and he hopes Ben can hold out against Gaard for a short while longer. Meanwhile, Ben swings around for another attack at Gaard. Just as he is about to collide with him, the images of both Reed Richardses appear in his mind to tell him to keep away from Gaard. This distraction allows Gaard to hit Ben with an energy bolt, but Ben recovers and readies himself to throw his device into the nexus when the opportunity arises. Suddenly a second Thing appears. Gaard is surprised, for Arkon declared that he would never have to face two opponents simultaneously, and he throws his sceptre at the newcomer. But then the second Thing vanishes, leaving Gaard weaponless. Ben quickly punches Gaard out of the way and hurls his disc into the nexus, which implodes and rapidly shrinks to nothing. Exulting that he has just saved three worlds, Ben turns to face Gaard. But Gaard asks Ben to leave him so he can face his exile for failure in peace. Thus Ben does not learn that Gaard is actually Johnny Storm of Earth-A. Arkon snatched him from a battlefield, salvaged his war-torn body, and restructured his mind into that of a servant-warrior. Soon Johnny and the Thing return via inter-dimensional transport to the Baxter Building, and the other Reed returns to Earth-A. Ben finds himself even less able to use his anti-gravity soles on Earth, and he is glad he can remove them. He is not particularly interested in how Reed created an image of him to confound Gaard. Johnny declares himself willing to return to the Fantastic Four, and he asks about the fate of Interlocking Technologies, Unlimited. DeVoor affirms that I. T. will fade away on all three worlds. When Alicia enters carrying Franklin, whom she hands to Sue, Ben greets her with a hug.