Amazing Spider-Man #520
Acts of Aggression
From their secret underground headquarters, the new Supreme Hydra reveals their key to victory, four Hydra agents who have been biologically engineered to counters to the super-heroes that have always opposed them. He unveils Bowman, Hammer, Militant, and Tactical Force, operatives who are based on Hawkeye, Thor, Captain America, and Iron Man of the Avengers.
The following morning, May Parker wakes up after her first night living in Stark Towers.[1] She goes into the kitchen and is surprised to see the Edwin Jarvis, the Avengers butler, is already making breakfast.[2] When she learns that Jarvis has cooked breakfast for the Avengers ever since they were first formed, she tells Jarvis to take a seat and let her cook.[3] While not far away, Peter and Mary Jane have just woken up and while Peter can get used to this he is worried about Aunt May and Mary Jane adapting to this new lifestyle. Mary Jane assures Peter that they’ll be fine. They are soon joined by the other Avengers who suggest they hurry to the kitchen before Wolverine wakes up and eats everything.[4] When Wolverine wakes up he is shocked to see that Aunt May is cooking breakfast instead of Jarvis. When he tries to tell her how things are done around the Avengers headquarters, May yanks his cigar out of his mouth and puts it out in his glass of whiskey and tells him that drinking and smoking will no longer be tolerated in the breakfast room until noon at the earliest. Completely emasculated by May, Wolverine tells the other Avengers that he’s going out for donuts. Witnessing this for himself, Peter kisses his Aunt May and tells her that he loves her. Before they can all sit down for a meal, Tony Stark comes in and tells them that the Avengers are needed at four different locations. As they leave to get into costume, May tells them that there will be egg sandwiches ready for them on the way out.
Iron Man is the first Avenger to arrive on the scene and witnesses Hammer on the rampage. The electricity fired from Hammer’s weapon has little effect on Iron Man’s armor and the two come to blows. Elsewhere, Luke Cage and Spider-Woman arrive at the next scene and are confronted by Tactical Force. The pair work together to take down this Iron Man imitator in mere moments. Meanwhile, Captain America catches Militant attempting to rob a jewelry store. Ordering Militant to put the jewels down, the pair start coming to blows. Spider-Man arrives at the pier where Bowman attempts to ambush him. [5] Realizing that Spider-Man is too fast for him, Bowman then turns his weapon on the innocent people below, forcing Spider-Man to save them alive. Militant has the same idea when he realizes that he’s no match for Captain America and tosses his shield up at the skylight, forcing Cap to shield innocent people from the falling glass. That’s when the Hydra super-operatives get a signal to retreat. Adding insult to injury, the Avengers are all photographed in a way that makes them look bad. These photos are then flashed across the front page of the Daily Bugle.
When Peter sees these pictures he' becomes suspicious and calls his friend Joe Robertson at the Daily Bugle to find out how the Bugle managed to get photographers at the scene so quickly to get the shots of the Avengers. When the Avengers have a meeting later, Peter tells them that the Bugle was tipped off. Comparing notes, they realize that these Hydra super-agents didn’t steal anything and that perhaps all of the attacks were distractions keeping the Avengers busy while Hydra went after their real targets. Peter has deduced that Hydra were really targeting the shipping yard as he learned that the Bowman only destroyed the records of which ships were searched by customs.. He figures that this was the real target all along. At that same moment, Hydra operatives are moving a shipment of missiles off one of the cargo ships.
Recurring Characters
Spider-Man, New Avengers (Captain America, Iron Man, Wolverine, “Spider-Woman”, Luke Cage), Hydra (Edgar Lascombe, Bowman, Hammer, Militant, Tactical Force), Mary Jane Watson, Aunt May, Joe Robertson
Continuity Notes
The Parkers all moved into Stark Tower when Aunt May’s home was destroyed by Charlie Weiderman in Amazing Spider-Man #518. They will continue to live there until Civil War #5.
This is not the real Jarvis, but a Skrull spy as we’ll learn in Secret Invasion #1. The real Jarvis was replaced prior to New Avengers #3 as revealed in New Avengers #42.
Jarvis has been depicted as the Avengers butler dating back to Tales of Suspense #59. However, Avengers: Timeslide #1 revealed that Jarvis has been a butler for the Stark family since Tony Stark was a boy. Based on the Sliding Timescale of Earth-616, Jarvis has been making breakfast for the Avengers for nearly 11 years. (Minus the times he was seriously injured, the Avengers were disbanded, and the whole Skrull thing, but those are details for another time)
The woman that is identified as Spider-Woman here is actually a Skrull spy named Veranke, as revealed in Secret Invasion #3. She took the real Spider-Woman’s place in Giant-Size Spider-Woman #1.
At first, Spider-Man mistakes Bowman for Hawkeye until he reminds himself that Hawkeye is dead. At the time of this story, Hawkeye was killed by the Scarlet Witch in Avengers #502. He will be resurrected during the House of M reality warp as we’ll see in House of M #3.
