- Interlude -

                                    

                                          
On November 25, in the year 1963, Dallas, Texas, a young boy in what looked like a boarding school uniform and bowling shoes, dropped out of a swirling blue vortex into an empty alleyway. The boy landed feet-first in a puddle, collapsing to the ground from the unexpected drop from a place only he would be able to name.
Looking back up at the swirling vortex, he shouted names of people only he could possibly know, "(Y/n)! Allison? Guys!"
Above his head, the blue, intangible mass shrank, dispersing into nothing. This act allowed for the boy's attention to be directed elsewhere when a very loud explosion sounded off. As he turned, scrambling to his feet, his jaw went slack as foreign soldiers ran past the alley's entrance, soon followed by a tan tank that made the boy's skin crawl. Running out of the alley, he was quick to observe the scene before him: a - quite literal - battlefield. Down the entire street, people - mostly men - were shooting at each other amidst the debris and rubble from buildings long destroyed. Numerous fires had broken out, and the boy shuddered as he was reminded of a time he'd rather forget. He caught sight of a newspaper, the headline making his insides churn.
"'Soviets Attack U.S.?'" he echoed. "The hell did we do this time?"
Just as he stood, he was roughly thrown to the side, bit having noticed that the tan tank had crept closer, only to fire a round a few yards away from him.
From the ground, he watched as a stoic, sickly-pale woman in all black rose from the ground, straight into the path of the large projectile. Raising her arm, the round slowly exploded at a smaller scale, effectively destroying the round without causing more damage. The boy had to suppress a shudder when he saw her familiar, eerie, almost glowing white eyes.
A ways behind the woman was a lanky man with long, scraggly hair. As he was charged by a horse of Soviet soldiers, he lifted his tattooed palms, forcing them towards his attackers. Not long after, a large group of transparent blue figures sprang from the ground, rushing and eliminating the threats.
Another explosion went off behind the skinny man, with the launching of a rocket-propelled grenade that had been aimed at him. The grenade would have hit the man, had another, much larger individual not leapt in front of it, taking the attack straight to his muscular back. Standing much taller than his tattooed companion, the mountain of a man had a torso extremely reminiscent of a primate, and howled like one as well when the grenade burst against his broad shoulder blades.
Across from the two men stood another dark-haired woman, this one with caramel skin, said something unintelligible to the three Soviets in front of her, a glimmering smile on her face. Quickly following her action, the eyes of the men turned white, and their heads proceeded to explode.
Back with the scrawny male, just before a soldier tackled him, a long blue tendril snatched the Soviet off of the ground, whipping him high into the air. The tendril itself was attached to the abdomen of a lean man, who was using numerous of those same tentacles to destroy the opposing men in various fashions.
The boy's attention was turned to a ragged man standing on top of an overturned car, surrounded on all sides by Soviets. With a single leap, the man spun in the air, narrowly dodging a barrage of bullets from all sides. As a result of his evasion, the bullets became lodged into the bodies of the soldiers, taking out all of them. When the agile man landed, he regarded the boy with a curious look, "Five, nice of you to finally show up!"
Before the young male could reply, another youth sprang up from behind the rough man. This one was a female with her hands encased in jagged crystals. Soaring over the man from the power of her jump, the girl crashed down in front of the tank, her dominant hand curling into a glimmering fist and slamming into the ground. Seconds later, jagged, transparent rocks shot up from the ground and engulfed the massive vehicle before crushing it. When she turned to the boy, she shrugged, hollering back to the man who had shouted, "Well, better late than never!" With a nod in the boy's direction, she jumped back into the fray.
Before the boy could join her, a large hand pulled him back by the shoulder. Turning, he found himself staring at a familiar face - a weathered, aged, and grayed on, but familiar nonetheless. "Old-Timer, we gotta get away now if you wanna live."
"Hazel? What're - "
"I can explain later." The husky male pointed with his finger up at the sky. The boy directed his gaze upward, and stared in horror at the white trails left by the projectiles that flew through the air. The young male knew what they were, even before his companion said, "Those are nukes, Five."
The youth looked back helplessly at the seven fighters taking on the Soviet soldiers, heart clenching at the thought of the explosives wiping them all out. "What about them?" he asked his tall friend.
"If you're dead, you can't save them," he reasoned, holding out his hand for the child to take.
With one last look at the darkly-dressed heroes, the boy bit his lip, and took the outstretched limb, vanishing along with his comrade.
What he missed as he vanished, was the seven teammates looking up at the sky, watching the cloudy vapor trails stretch across the murky sky. The young girl with the crystalline gauntlets shared a look with the white-eyed woman before touching her palms to the ground. Around the small group formed a solid, faceted sphere. They were all slowly petrified within the rock, and the sphere was completed just before the shockwave of the first nuke blew the sphere away.