The attack on the Avengers Academy compound came with no warning.  An early adversary of the Avengers, the Executioner, had come to attack the academy and its students.  Fortunately, he had blustered on his way in, challenging Giant-Man to combat before he started destroying items.  Then he grabbed a student and threatened to slash her throat with his axe.

The problem was, the student he grabbed was Hazmat.  He had knocked Jenny Takeda out with a single finger flick from behind.  It wasn’t clear if he knew that slashing Jenny’s suit would potentially kill everyone there -- maybe even himself -- but whether he knew it or not, he now had to be stopped, and both quickly and delicately.

With a glance, Hank had told Tigra all she needed to know.  Now she was creeping with her feline silence behind the Executioner in an effort to break his grip and free Jenny.

Jan bristled as she worked to distract the evil Norse god.  Her strength was nearly as great as his, but she wasn’t quite strong enough to take out the over-muscled god.  A stealth assignment like Tigra’s was one she would have had in the past, but, since her return, it wasn’t possible now.

Jan’s return from death had come at a price.  The magics involved had mystically reset her base height to 512 feet.  She could no longer grow above that, and could only shrink to one-sixty-fourth of that height -- eight feet.  Hank had modified her wings to retract, and she could fly up to 12 feet tall, but now she couldn’t sneak up on a bad guy by virtue of tiny size, and she’d had a slight loss of flying speed as well.

Now, with her remarriage to Hank less than two weeks away, the Executioner had turned up, taken one of her bridesmaids hostage and was threatening to kill everyone at the academy -- and all she could do, for the moment, was be a distraction.

Tigra was in position.  She dived silently at the Executioner, but the experienced warrior heard the subtle sound of her rustling mane as she came down.  He spun around, extending his axe and slicing Tigra straight across her abdomen.

Several people, instructors and students alike, screamed, “NO!”  at once.  Tigra fell, writhing in agony.

But the Executioner had lost his grip on Jenny when he moved for Tigra.  She half-fell, half-pulled away from him.

Now Jan acted on instinct, her days as the Avengers strategic leader in mind.  While she was just as strong at 8 feet tall as at 512 feet, and therefore as strong as any Norse goddess, the villain was still stronger, but she knew she had a tactical advantage she could exploit.  It might mean a killing blow, but there were lives at stake.

All this Jan had processed in a fraction of a second.  She shot up to her maximum height and slammed down her fist full force on the Executioner, making sure to land her center knuckle directly on top of him, and to position her hand so Jenny was in a space between knuckles.

Jan moved so fast the villain had no time to react.  If he’d had time, he would have been shiocked;  the Wasp he remembered was a shrinker, not a grower, let alone one as big and strong as this.

Jan was already shrinking as she pulled her hand back.  She moved to Jenny.  “Little Sis, are you all right?” Jan asked.

Jenny and Jan weren’t sisters, but they’d come to call each other Little Sis and Big Sis respectively.  When Jan first got back and tried to sort out her place on Earth after her time away, Jenny had given her hope.  Jan, in turn, had given Jenny hope to someday be free of her containment suit, since Jan had been toxic like Jenny and had been cured.  The cure wouldn’t work for Jenny, but it meant there was a chance of a cure.  Then Hank had discovered Jan’s cure had left her as the only person on Earth immune to Jenny’s toxicity, and the twosome had become even closer.  Despite the difference in their ages, Jenny was now one of Jan’s best friends.

“I’m … OK,” Jenny said.  “Everybody else?”

Jan pivoted toward Tigra.  Hank was already beside her.

Jan was there in a second.  “Greer!  Hang in there, please!” Then  she saw the wound and knew things weren’t good.

Hank was caressing the furry face of his one-time girlfriend.  “Greer.”

“We need you at our wedding,” Jan said.  “Hang on!”

Greer shook her head.  “No good,” she said.  “Cats know … when they’re dying.  It’s my time.”

“No,” said Hank.  “Greer, we can get you to the med lab.”

“Nothing there … will help,” Greer said.  “Jan, sorry … ‘bout the wedding.  Wanted to … see you two… get it right this time.”

“Greer,” said Jan.

“Hank, Jan, … Tigra gasped.  “Take … care … of … William.”

Hank nodded.  The situation with Tigra’s son was complicated, but he was Hank’s son, even though he wasn’t.  “I promise,” he said.

“Me, too,” Jan said, tears streaming down her face.

“Love … you … both,” Greer said.  “Give … Will… my … love … always.”

Then Greer went limp, and her labored breathing stopped.

Tears were snagging in the cloth of Hank’s cowl even as Jan bawled on his shoulder.

Pietro came running up.  “Executioner’s dead,” he said.  “Jan’s blow pretty much broke every bone in his body.”

Hank swallowed hard.  He looked at Jan.  “He was going to kill a lot more people,” Hank said.  “It had to be done.”

Jan wiped away tears.  “Wish it had been in time to save Tigra,” she said.

“What now?” said Pietro.

Hank had pulled back his cowl and was rubbing his forehead.  “We’ll need to get her body to the Cat People,” he said.  “She was ‘The Tigra’ to them, the manifestation of one a great protector spirit.  They’ll want to have her there.  With their magic, they probably already know he’s gone.”

“And we’ll need to see William,” Jan said.  “He’ll need you now, Hank.”

Hank nodded and looked at Pietro.  “We’ll need you and Clint to handle things here,” Giant-Man said.  “Can you handle that?”

“If not, we can call for back-up,” Pietro said.  “We know who to call.”

Jan looked back.  Mettle had his arms around Jenny.  Lightspeed had darted up to Pietro, and was practically dissolving into tears against his chest as he tried to sort out what was safe to do as a teacher.

Lyra and X-23 were standing by Tigra’s fallen form.  “It was a good death.” Lyra said.  “She died a warrior, and saving her comrades.”

On Pietro’s instructions, Lightspeed had flown in and gotten a blanket.  She covered Greer with it.

Jan looked around at the shocked faces on the students.  “I wish we could stay,” she said.  “I wish you could stay.  They need us -- especially you -- here now.”

“I know,” Hank said.  “But we owe Greer this trip…. Greer and William.”

Jan nodded, and began to weep once again.