Space Itself vs. Ant-Man and his Amazing Friends!

Spider man writes in cursive with webbing on the black fortress: "The Ad-Hoc Coalition of Champions was here!"

(Spidey wonders if 'Spiderman and His Amazing Friends' would have sounded better. Hmmmm...)

Then he will swing to the other side of the black fortress. He sneaks inside and looks around.

Spidey wonders how much time has passed on Earth. Is the photo he promised J Jonah Jameson overdue? Is his rent overdue? Did his date Mary Jane overdue? Did he miss Professor Conner's take home do-over test overdue? Is anything else overdue?

Am I over due for a vacation?

Spidey feels bad for the name he picked, because now the pathetic superskrull he just met is the Superskrull for the Ad Hoc Coalition of Champions. What a lame thing to be a superskrull of!

At least it is better than being the superskrull of a nameless hodgepodge of random heroes. (Wait. Isn't that what the Defenders are...?)

(Super-Skrull Defenders has the powers of Dr. Strange, the Hulk, the Silver Surfer, and who the heck else even matters because DR. STRANGE, THE HULK, and THE SILVER SURFER! Not a bad thing to be Super Skrull of ... Ye Editor)

Spider-Man swings around the black fortress to see ... Ant-Man! Because Spidey has keen eyes.

Ant Man focuses his emotions on his family and prays for their safety and happiness. He will try and grab the mind gem.

At the same time, Ant Man covers his foot with ants, swells up to supersize so that his leg is already kicking Thanos in the head even faster than Ant Man can fall.

Once he has kicked Thanos in the head as the giant with giant strength he orders his ants to crawl sneakily down the purple head and neck of Thanos, along his arm, and grab the Space Gem. Thanos cannot increase the distance of his own arm, can he?

Ant-Man is precise and even somewhat acrobatic, but he's no Spider-Man. Thus it is that his attempts to kick Thanos AND grab the mind gem do not both succeed.

The kick, though, succeeds like gangbusters. THUDD! Thanos is knocked sprawling.

Thanos holds up his golden Gauntlet of Infinity, snaps the mind gem in place, and projects his thoughts throughout the universe!

DEATH IS WAITING, he sends. DO NOT MAKE HER IMPATIENT.

Which is demoralizing to people who had a firm belief in Death's patient inevitability. Everyone else just feels like they'd rather not be thinking about the speed of Death right now.

"Size is relative, young Earthman," Thanos intones. "It depends entirely on how much space you occupy ... and that is up to me."

He turns the Infinity Gauntlet, revealing the square space where the Space Gem was.

Thanos looks at his hand when nothing spatial happens.

The Space Gem lies at his feet, being borne away swiftly by a team of professional lifting-and-moving ants with months of experience.

"HALT!" commands Thanos, and the ants halt.

So does Ant-Man.

And Spider-Man, who hears him.

And everyone else on the patchwork deathworld of Mordemond.

Thanos wills the Space Gem to his hand. It doesn't move.

Thanos sighs and bends down to pick it up. He frowns, because his subjects and enemies are seeing him bow. It doesn't look good. He'll have to kill them all ... or remove their memories, which is an option now that he has the Mind Gem.

Both Ant-Man and Spider-Man hear Thanos' inner monologue, because as a newcomer to the power of the Mind Gem, he's broadcasting his thoughts all over the place.