Plot Swap: Celestial Madonna and Dark Phoenix

[Shellhead]

Jason Wyngarde (aka Mastermind) of the Hellfire Club wants to use his powers to seduce and corrupt a beautiful mutant, so obviously he chooses his former teammate, Scarlet Witch. Even in the early days, he was intrigued by the potential of her powers, and he assumes that she has gained greater control after being an Avenger for so many years. So Wanda starts having these weird visions of the past around the same time that Mantis is putting the moves on Vision. Then the armored Hellfire Club dudes show up at the Avengers Mansion in an attempt to kidnap Wanda. In effect, the Hellfire Club takes Kang’s place in Avengers #129. The Avengers at the mansion at that point are Thor, Iron Man, Scarlet Witch, Vision, Mantis, and Swordsman, but let's say that Thor gets called away to deal with a threat to Asgard. What happens next?

Kang is contemplating the mystery of the Celestial Madonna, and decides to check his math one last time. In the process, he notices the emergence of an extremely powerful female mutant shortly after the anticipated discovery of the Celestial Madonna and determines that his previous calculations were off. So instead of taking his Macrobots back to the 20th century to kidnap Mantis, Scarlet Witch, and Agatha Harkness, he instead travels to a certain mansion in Westchester. In effect, the story set-up for X-Men #129 is replaced with the story set-up for Avengers #129. The mutants at the mansion at that point are Cyclops, Storm, Wolverine, Colossus, Nightcrawler, Phoenix, and Professor X. What happens next?

If possible, both plot lines will persist in continuing along the lines of the originals. So the Hellfire Club will make a second attempt to get Wanda (like their attempts to get Kitty Pryde and Dazzler), and Wanda’s full reality-shaping powers may get unlocked along with the nasty side of her personality. The Imperial Guard may still make an intervention, etc. Likewise, Kang will make at least two more attempts to get Jean Grey, with the Legion of the Unliving and his own temporal duplicates.

[Phoenixx9]

A very interesting idea for two of my most favorite storylines!!

I guess Jean would not have gone Dark Phoenix without Mastermind and White Queen messing directly with her mind.

Not sure Wanda would have displayed reality warping powers though, as she had just unleashed an unprecedented fourth hex in issue #128. Also the idea that Wanda had reality warping powers was not a thing that long ago. It was just mutant hex energy powers back then.

[Beadle]

Wyngarde encourages Wanda to release her chaos magic (which was totally a thing then) and Chthon is freed on Earth, destroying much of it.

Jean as Celestial Madonna mating with the Cotati would presumably have a son who was some sort of ginger root or something. Or since Jean's son is in space, he'd have to be called Satellite instead of Cable.

Mantis successfully seduces Vision. A bitter Swordsman nonetheless survives.

[theoneandonly]

maybe SW will copulate with mastermind tony Steve and anyone else she takes a fancy to when the hellfire club are having a party having imprisoned the avengers and then deny it was her confusing everybody. Then it will be revealed it was chthon manipulating her through mastermind who was having his own agenda of bringing chthon in this reality separate from the hellfire club agenda and rule the world as one of his princelings but he is transformed into a being of pure chaos by SW as she no longer needs him because the ceremonies of hellfire club has unwittingly given chthon access to Wanda who is now manipulating reality through chaos magic. She will then turn all of them into her puppet captives and feed upon them but the helfire club with the heroes consents offer themselves to shuma goroth who makes them their vassals and the SW and the avengers clash together rendering the firmaments asunder. Shumagroth and chtonic magics merge together but the merging awakens the demigurge who proceeds to earth and devours the entity and anybody touched by him which makes earth a apocalyptic waste and Thor returns to lament the tragedy lighting the skies all over in his grief.
Kang comes to the past to kidnap Phoenix and finds a barren world and suddenly finds himself being in danger of erased so he moves into limbo outside of time space and sends subliminal messages to Dr. Doom in the past to kidnap the X men and the Phoenix. Doom lures them into a trap and then tries to use a hellish ceremony on all of them to open a portal to mephstos realm but instead mephsto enters this world hungry for all the souls but Doom sends forth a celestial spell which summons the dark Phoenix which prompts mephisto to retreat but jean runs smock and the X men and doom have to team up and fight her. Doom is successful in capturing her and is subliminally prompted by kang to imprison her in limbo where kang is successful in using Marcus technology to revive her and convince her of the impending doom and of killing SW to avert said doom. The Phoenix goes forth and at the crucial moment arrives and kills the chton and shuma goroth before they can possess SW. Chtons and shuma goroths death transcends SW into a elder goddess due to the released energies taking shelter in her who clashes with Phoenix and with the help of avengers and X men frees jean grey from the Phoenix as it has weakened after the celestial battle. She leaves for the chaos magics realm taking the Phoenix with her and the avengers and the X men return to their respective headquarters grateful for avoiding two menaces. kang curses in disapointment and leaves for his timeline to plan anew while doom is revealed to be engaged in the process of hatching a phoenix egg....

[Shellhead]

Great comments, everybody.

Wanda displayed some major power in the mid-'80s, midway through the West Coast Avengers, around the time that Vision got disassembled and bleached. She hadn't received any explicit power-up other than some mystical training from Agatha Harkness that began in Avengers #128, so the potential was probably always there.

Even without Thor, the Avengers should easily manhandle the armored Hellfire Club dudes, until Emma Frost hits them all with a mind whammy. At this point, Iron Man has not yet developed psi-defense for his armor, so none of the Avengers are able to resist Emma's attack. They are all taken prisoner by the Hellfire Club. Emma Frost scans all their brains, and discovers Iron Man's secret identity, but becomes confused while scanning Vision's thoughts. Wanda is corrupted by Mastermind, and unleashes her powerful reality manipulation abilities. She goes on a rampage that also happens to free the captive Avengers.

The Avengers face off against the Inner Circle, as Wanda slips away into the night. Henry Leland uses his gravity control to pin Iron Man to the floor. Emma gets ambushed by a sneaky Vision, while Iron Man KOs Leland with repulsor rays. Swordsman fences with Donald Pierce and his cyber-arm. Mantis meets surprising resistance from Sebastian Shaw, but eventually subdues him with judo throws, arm locks, and pressure point strikes. Wanda does some damage in Manhattan, though not enough to attract attention from the Shi'ar Empire. Eventually, the Vision finds Wanda and manages to calm her down with his logic and love. It helps that she has just recently been getting mystical training from Agatha Harkness, which gives her greater focus and discipline to rally her thoughts.

In the long run, this experience brings Vision and Wanda even closer together. Mantis gives up on Vision and Swordsman wins her back over. Eventually, Mantis becomes an official Avenger, though she and Swordsman are both tossed out by Henry Gyrich. Iron Man struggles with a blackmail threat from the Hellfire Club, until finally he leverages his membership and wealth to buy them outright. Stark tries to use the Inner Circle as a force for good, but Emma is slowly but surely corrupting him with subtle mind games, pushing him into alcoholism.

More thoughts later on the other half of this plot swap.