Marvel Two-In-One #62
The Taking of Counter-Earth!
Following their defeat at the hands of Her and Moondragon, the Thing and Starhawk retreat to the Baxter Building so that they can get a spaceship to follow after them so that Ben can rescue Alicia. Inside the Fantastic Four's hangar, they decide to take the Skrull flying saucer that the FF have had in their possession since their first encounter with the Skrulls and follow after the three women who have left Earth in Moondragon's spaceship.
Meanwhile, the three women are on their way to find Adam Warlock's body, which was buried on Counter-Earth following his death. However, upon their arrival they have found that Counter-Earth has gone missing, however, it's moon is still intact. Providing Alicia with a space suit, the three women land on the artificial moon and enter the High Evolutionary's secret complex. There they find the inert body of the High Evolutionary himself, but before they can investigate further they are confronted by the Thing and Starhawk who attack Moondragon and Her.
During the battle, Thing faces Moondragon and finds himself woefully outmatched, while Starhawk battles Her. During the fight, Starhawk is unable to stop his wife Aleta's personality coming to the fore of their shared body and take over -- causing the body they share change into its female form who attacks Her with even more ferocity.
The battle is soon stopped, however, when Alicia calls for all the combatants to stop and explains to Ben that she came with the two women of her own free will. With the misunderstanding sorted out, the quartet of heroes then decide to band together to help find Counter-Earth and revive Adam Warlock. Moondragon uses her mental powers to revive the High Evolutionary, however, finds that his life force has left his body. Detecting that the High Evolutionary has become a higher being, Her uses her powers to brings his life force back into his body, reviving the geneticist and restoring him to his previous form.
The High Evolutionary explains what had happened to him: That Adam Warlock, thinking that Counter-Earth had been destroyed (even though that it clearly had not and something was making Warlock unable to see the world) struck out at the High Evolutionary with a blast of his Soul Gem. However, before it could strike him, the High Evolutionary advanced his evolution into a godlike form and his life force left his body before the Soul Gem could steal his soul.
After explaining about Adam Warlock's fate, the High Evolutionary is shocked to learn that his artificially created world has been stolen. Scanning space, the Evolutionary finds a unique radiation trail that they can track to Counter-Earth's location, and so they set a course to find the missing world.
Recurring Characters
Thing, Moondragon, Alicia Masters, Starhawk/Aleta, High Evolutionary
Continuity Notes
Moondragon glosses over how Adam Warlock's chronicles on Counter-Earth which were originally told in Marvel Premiere #1-2, Warlock #1-8 and Incredible Hulk #176-178.
Ben recognizes Moondragon when he helped the Avengers and Adam Warlock defeat Thanos in Marvel Two-In-One Annual #2, in that story Adam Warlock seemingly died. However, in reality, his soul was retained in the Soul Gem and he is late reborn into a new body in Infinity Gauntlet #1.
Her recalls how she used to have a male form, this is a reference to her creation back in Incredible Hulk Annual #6 when she emerged from her cocoon in a male form known as Paragon.
The High Evolutionary's flashback happens after he got the assistance of the Fantastic Four to stop Galactus from consuming Counter-Earth, as chronicled in Fantastic Four #171-175.
The High Evolutionary transformed into his hyper-evolved form, a feat he had done previously in Tales to Astonish #96.
Warlock believes his dark prophecy is coming true, as it was told in Warlock #15.
Continuity Errors
Ben refers to the spaceship they are using as a Skrull saucer, the narration states that this happened in Fantastic Four #2. However there were no Skrull saucers in that story, nor were any captured by the Fantastic Four between that story and this one. The ship is actually the vessel the Fantastic Four took from the Xantha back in Fantastic Four #7.
