All throughout December, we will be examining comic book stories and ideas that were not only abandoned, but also had the stories/plots specifically "overturned" by a later writer (as if they were a legal precedent). Click here for an archive of all the previous editions of The Abandoned An' Forsaked.

Today we feature the second of three "Abandoned An' Forsaked" installments where the story in question was "overturned" during Avengers Forever...

Enjoy!

During the Avengers event known as "The Crossing," a mysterious young woman from the future shows up a lot, along with her "cousins."

Here is the young woman...

And here are her cousins...

The implication throughout the series is that the young woman is a grown-up version of Luna, the daughter of Avengers Crystal and Quicksilver. This, then, would make her cousins the long-since-lost sons of the Scarlet Witch and the Vision.

However, in Avengers #392 (where the twins first showed up), we are introduced to their "mother." It is the former Avenger known as Mantis!!

The whole thing was quite confusing and when the Crossing ended, nothing was really explained, including what Mantis was up to.

So in Avengers Forever #8, when Kurt Busiek explained away various inconsistencies in Avengers history, he also explained away the entire Crossing storyline as an attempt by Immortus to distract the Avengers long enough for Onslaught to show up and take them out of the picture (Immortus' plans all revolved around avoiding a dystopic future where the Avengers become universal tyrants - if the Crossing did not take place to distract them, they would have been compelled to outer space by their new member, Deathcry).

So no, that wasn't the real Mantis and those kids were perhaps MEANT to appear like they were related to the Scarlet Witch, but they were really just shapeshifting Space Phantoms.

One more "Crossing" abandoned an' forsaked storyline coming up!