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Artist interpretation of the Main Character
Dial is a Marvel Cinematic Universe Self-Insert fic written by DesertChocolate.

Mahmoud Schahed was just writing fanfiction one evening when a guy named Professor Paradox drops him into New York City, with an Omnitrix on his wrist. He has no idea why he's there, or why the Marvel characters he knows so well are played by famous actors he also knows well, with events having occurred that he has no idea of. Soon after settling down, he receives an alert that Captain America is now a wanted fugitive, and starts seeking them out to save the world, as the shapeshifting hero Dial.

As such, this story is about the Self-Insert and his arsenal of alien species becoming heroes in the MCU.

Also posted on Royal Road (here), Sufficient Velocity.com (here) and FanFiction.Net (here). The story is complete as of Sept 2, 2021.

It has a sequel called Dial: Call Resumed which is ongoing and can be read on SB, SV, RR, and FFN.

Has a character page that could use some serious love.


Dial contains examples of:

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     A-F 
  • Accidental Misnaming: After she and Bruce meet again and she has time to get used to the Hulk being nice, Betty Ross still ends up calling the Hulk Bruce one time. Though it visibly upsets Hulk, he doesn't lose his temper.
  • Ace Custom:
    • Out of the recovered Insight Helicarriers that were created by HYDRA, Dial ends up Upgrading one to end the Battle of the Triskelion. Later, this one is refurbished into the Enterprise, the main base of the new organization BRIDGE.
    • Fury gives Dial his own personal Quinjet, and he uses Jury Rigg and Upgrade to enhance it into one which he names the Defiant.
  • Actually, I Am Him: When Christine Everhart confronts Tony and Pepper about the new suit-wearer Rescue, what her purpose is, and if Pepper knows about "the woman on the side", Pepper steps up, and just like her boyfriend a few years ago, states that she is Rescue.
  • Actually Pretty Funny: Kulan Gath, in the sequel, hears Dial in NRG form crying out "CRY SOME MORE" as a reference to Team Fortress 2's Heavy Weapons Guy. Even though Kulan doesn't get the reference, he still finds the words amusing on their own.
  • Adaptational Heroism:
    • Crusher Creel/Absorbing Man had already undergone this from his original comics self to his depiction in Agents of SHIELD, due to his crimes being done brainwashed, but takes it a step further by actually being a reserve member of the Avengers, which no other version of the character has become.
    • General Hale and her daughter Ruby started off loyal to HYDRA, until they underwent a Heel–Face Turn after accepting a deal to join SHIELD/BRIDGE following HYDRA's fall.
  • Adaptive Armor: Using Jury Rigg and Upgrade's abilities, Dial develops Armor Gear, Powered Armor made out of catoms that can coordinate with X for assistance, can be compacted into clothing and can adapt to form weapons and other devices, like arm blades, tower shields or an agents' weapon. And since these are standard issue, they are usable by everyone, from the baseline human agents to the Enhanced soldiers and full-on Avengers.
  • The Adjectival Superhero: Alongside the Invincible Iron Man, the Mighty Thor, the Incredible Hulk and the Sensational She-Hulk, the Avengers now have the Universal Dial as part of their roster.
  • Alcohol-Induced Idiocy: In a party with drinking and superheroes, this was bound to happen sooner or later. In this case, Tony, Fitz and Jury Rigg challenge each other to a build-off to make non-lethal guns. Fitz's gun shoots air, but Tony's and Jury Rigg's shoot tomatoes and cake. Guess what happens next.
  • Aliens of London: Some members of the Russian Winter Guard are not exactly happy when Dial unlocks NRG, the Russian-accented nuclear alien, thinking Dial is doing the accent on purpose.
  • All of Time at Once: A city-wide example happens to Rio De Janeiro. In addition to a mundane, intense earthquake decimating the city, the city is then festooned with creatures and characters from different points in time, from dinosaurs and direwolves, to medieval knights, to literal demons.
  • Amazon Brigade: The Grapplers are present in this fic as mercenaries under employ of HYDRA, wanting to defect.
  • An Arm and a Leg:
    • One of the winged people of the Savage Land lost one of her wings.
    • In this world, Ulysses Klaue loses his arm after Black Widow makes an experimental rifle blow up in his hand.
  • Animal Superheroes: After the Graveyard incident, where several HYDRA-experimented animals are rescued and had gained powers from the aftermath, Dial throws around the idea of the Pet Avengers.
  • Armor Is Useless: Averted hard, as Dial works with Tony to make sure everyone has access to power armor, even the more agility-focused Avengers like Hawkeye and Black Widow, though tailored to their needs.
    • Even after Dial's armor is wrecked by Anti-Metal, he still keeps it, which ends up saving his life during the velociraptor ambush.
  • Ascended Epithet: During the discussion to eliminate the HYDRA moles within SHIELD, and the decision to dismantle SHIELD as well, Mahmoud proposes another solution, to rebuild it into something better, the organization that SHIELD was meant to be, "the bridge between what people consider normal, and all the weirdness out there", to not only protect the innocent the misuse of power, but to also assist those that gain powers. Afterwards, SHIELD is indeed disbanded and reformed into the Bureau of Reconnaissance, Intelligence, Development, and General Enhancement, a.k.a. BRIDGE.
  • Ascended Extra: Isabelle Hartley and Bobbi Morse, mere SHIELD agents, become the full-on Reserve Avengers Warrior and Mockingbird.
  • Ascended Fanboy: It's a Self-Insert fic, it comes with the territory. Hell, Tony's nickname for Mahmoud is "Fanboy".
    • Mahmoud later embraces it whole-heartedly, buying a whole load of Avenger merchandise on one jaunt through NYC and then a load of Winter Guard merch after a mission with said Russian Super Team.
    • In-Universe, Tony Stark and Steve Rogers are forced to sit down by Mahmoud and watch Avatar: The Last Airbender. By the time the sequel rolls around, the two like the series quite a bit, with Tony having bought the company that makes it and revealing that he voices a character in the final season of Legend of Korra.
  • Awful Truth:
    • Leo Fitz doesn't take the reveal that Grant Ward was always HYDRA well, and one of the first things he asks Mahmoud when he meets him is if the Hercules app made a mistake.
    • Letha delivers this fact to the Maximoff twins about the truth of their employer HYDRA and their grudge against Tony Stark.
      Letha: We need to tell you something, about Strucker. About HYDRA, and their role in Sokovia. Because after all this time being pissed at the blacksmith for making a sword, you've worked with the knight who wielded it.
  • Aw, Look! They Really Do Love Each Other: Ruby Hale may snipe at Mahmoud and kick his ass around the sparring ring more often than not, especially for his part in taking down Hydra, but when Mahmoud gets lost in the Savage Lands, Director Hill has to keep Ruby from running off to find him, and when Mahmoud does return, she is visibly relieved he is well.
  • Badass Bureaucrat: Boris, consulate for the Russian Winter Guard. Though jovial and cheery, he doesn't hesitate to knock one of his colleagues' heads with his briefcase when they're being stubborn over some red tape.
  • Badass in Distress:
    • HYDRA kidnaps Antoine Triplett and Sharon Carter and brainwashes them into agents.
    • Dial for most of the Savage Land Arc.
  • Badass Longcoat: Hawkeye gets one with his version of BRIDGE's standard issue Armor Gear.
  • Bait-and-Switch:
    • The Avengers party is winding down, the six original members are shooting the breeze, then an unexpected robot walks in, everyone gears up to fight... and then Jarvis speaks up within his new dedicated robot body.
    • What would be the alien that Dial would unlock in the Savage Land? Humongosaur? Nah. How about Ball Weevil instead?
    • For one mission, the Avengers head to Greece to meet a new superhuman who claims to be one of their gods, and whom Agatha Harkness calls the son of Zeus. Dial is betting on The Incredible Hercules, but they instead meet Ares, God of War.
  • Bash Brothers: There are a few two-person teamups in this fic:
    • Dial and Alloy fight alongside each other against the Wendigo.
    • Captain America and Nomad, natch, after the latter has his HYDRA brainwashing removed.
    • Against Abomination and Aberration, each holding one half of the Berserker Staff from Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., the Hulk gains a partner for the fight: Iron Man + Hulkbuster armor.
  • Beam-O-War: Iron Man gets into one with Blackout during their first encounter.
    • During their second encounter, they both get into another one, and then Iron Man and his new heat-based weapon gets into one with Blizzard. Neither Blackout nor Blizzard walk away from those wars.
  • Berserker Tears: Both Rana Phillips/Aberration and Mary MacPherson give these during their final brawls. For symmetry, both are super-strong women with major baggage, and both brawls are against hulks (Hulk for the former, She-Hulk for the latter).
  • Best Served Cold: Even after finding the HYDRA agent who ordered the hit on his parents, Tony didn't do more than just let Vasily Karpov stew in near poverty in Cleveland trying to keep his head down, keep tags on him, and slowly work his paranoia up to a fever pitch. Months after HYDRA fell and Karpov finally let his guard down, Tony showed up in his house to dismantle his hiding place and drag him into custody.
  • Big Bad Duumvirate: After being ousted from SHIELD by the Avengers, HYDRA and Baron Strucker ally with Samuel Sterns a.k.a. the Leader, who helps them develop even more Gamma mutates.
  • Big Damn Heroes: Thor arrives just in time to both assist Tony with a barely-recovering Abomination, and save Dial from a nasty plane crash.
  • Bilingual Backfire: Some members of the Winter Guard are surprised when Dial shows he can understand their Russian. Of course, they don't know about the universal translator in the Omnitrix.
  • Bleed 'Em and Weep: With the Omnitrix on cooldown, Dial has to resort to his sidearm and knife to deal with a threat, and ends up having to kill a HYDRA agent. Afterwards, he doesn't shout his Transformation Name Announcement, only whispers it.
  • Bling of War: Creel at one point turns into solid diamond. Subverted, since he only does it to show off and isn't actually fighting.
  • Body Horror:
    • The failed HYDRA experiments in the Graveyard, which the Reserve Avengers have to clear out, a good chunk of which are human. Even after Dial activates the genetic reparation function of the Omnitrix to restore them, some of them are left with animal or artificial limbs grafted to their human bodies.
    • When Upgrade interfaces with the cybernetic-enhanced Centipede soldiers, he ends up flowing through someone's eye into their cybernetics. It's enough to make Hawkeye go Green Around the Gills.
  • Boxing Lessons for Superman:
    • Beyond his Omnitrix and being a casual weightlifter in his old world, Mahmoud isn't exactly groomed to fight, so he gets training from his superhero peers and invents Adaptive Armor to make up for it, especially when his Hour of Power times out.
      • Later, he gets Mentoring from Ares to increase the potential of his alien powers.
    • Creel makes sure to brush up on his old boxing skills to augment his material-absorbing powers. Later, he and X look into getting some high-power firearms in the cases where raw strength and durability are insufficient.
  • Bratty Teenage Daughter: Ruby Hale comes across as this to Natasha. Having been groomed and praised by HYDRA all her life to be trained to become the best assassin, she is taken aback when Nat chooses to walk away instead of accede to Ruby slacking off. And when she gets petulant and violent about it, the Black Widow is more than skilled enough to give her a reality check.
  • Breaking the Fourth Wall: When She-Hulk tells Mahmoud, Nat and Thor about her own mission while Dial was in the Savage Land, she speaks in first person. This at first seems like a Mythology Gag about She-Hulk's breaking of the fourth wall in the comics since no-one except Dial has their POV segments written in first-person. Then at the end, Mahmoud begins telling Jen about his extra-dimensional origins, and She-Hulk concludes her story by speaking directly to the fic's readers: "Which is how I learned about you all."
  • Brought Down to Normal: The Savage Land Arc begins with Dial falling off a cliff into a river, encountering Anti-Metal that ruins his armor and gear, and damages the Omnitrix, and is captured by the Saur-Lords. Bereft of his powers or gear, he has to rely on the skills his Avenger peers have taught him to get out of his new mess.
  • Brick Joke: One time, Dial made a joke that the activation phrase for his new catom-based Adaptive Armor Gear was "Moon Prism Power, make up!" Later on, Skye uses this for her personalized armor's activation phrase.
  • Building Swing: Snare-Oh does this one time. Despite him using bandages, as he is in the Marvel Universe, he explicitly refers to it in his mind as "web-swinging".
  • Bullying a Dragon: When Dial converses with Agatha Harkness, he makes a deal to tell her some of his timeline knowledge in exchange for her help with reforging his sword, but he warns her that if she misuses his knowledge to cause death or suffering, he'll end her.
    Agatha: Really? Do you have any idea who you’re threatening, young man?
    Mahmoud: I absolutely do... How about you? [Looks at the Omnitrix]
  • Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Klaue is this for the Intelegencia. Sure, he's... eccentric at the best of times, and he's the least out-and-out intelligent member of the group. However, what he has is experience. Leaving out that he was able to avoid the agents of the most technologically advanced nation on the planet for literal decades (until an Outside-Context Problem got him caught), neither Stern nor Kragoff has any real experience with actually leading other people or with interacting with others. Klaue, on the other hand, managed to figure out what was going on with Stern within five minutes of being woken up and got himself a position of authority in his organization with a single conversation, as opposed to "Join or die."
  • Calling Your Attacks: X calculates that 25% of Mahmoud's fighting style involves wrestling moves and anime techniques, while yelling the names of the attacks out loud.
  • The Cameo: Stan "The Man" Lee and his wife Joan appear in Chapter 54 traveling the multiverse, a few days after the former's passing in real life.
  • Character Development:
    • For the first part of the fic, Dial, despite pragmatically making armor and learning skills to defend himself when the Omnitrix times out, still thought that the watch and his alien forms were the only reason he is in the Avengers in the first place, and without his powers, he is worthless. It takes going through the Savage Land with an Omnitrix damaged by Anti-Metal for Dial to affirm that he does have worth on his own.
    • Similarly, She-Hulk was reluctant to untransform and return to being shy, wimpy Jennifer Walters, not doing so once since her introduction. She finally untransforms after taking too much damage in a brawl with Mary MacPherson, and finds that being herself (who is now also ripped) isn't so bad after all.
  • Cherry Tapping: Downplayed. After the whole super-strong Cat Fight between She-Hulk and Mary MacPherson, the latter finally goes down to a punch from the de-transformed Jennifer Walters. That said, it was a liver shot.
  • Cliffhanger: Chapter 88 ends with the BRIDGE expedition landing in the Savage Land and fighting off a horde of dinosaurs... and then one of them knocks Dial off a cliff where he disappears.
  • Comes Great Responsibility: Even though Jury Rigg just gave her the Rescue Armor so she could fly with Tony, Pepper soon finds Rescue on the receiving end of criticism in the news, talking about how she has all the armor but is not getting into fights and all but calling her a spoiled coward. Eventually, after being confronted by Christine Everhart, she decides to step up and actively help people.
  • Comic-Book Fantasy Casting: One way that Mahmoud is able to tell who's an important person in this version of Marvel he finds himself in is that every significant person coincidentally looks exactly like a famous actor from his world. He notes that Fury looks like Samuel L. Jackson, Stark like Robert Downey Jr., and Maria Hill as Colbie Smoulders, for a very abridged list.
    • He's extremely confused during the Mind War segment, when the Avengers are facing enemies of their past, and finds that Jeff Bridges is attacking Iron Man (for the record, Dial shows up shortly before Iron Man 3, while Jeff Bridges' character was only in Iron Man 1).
    • This even applies to other characters that haven't shown up in MCU canon yet, like the Grapplers, or She-Hulk.
    • Zigzagged in Call Resumed; Mahmoud is confused when he meets the X-Men, and the first few he meets - Wolverine and Storm, specifically - are not this case, but more resemble their appearances in X-Men: Evolution as opposed to Hugh Jackman and Halle Berry (as they were played in the X-Men Films). Then he feels better seeing Professor Charles Xavier looking like Patrick Stewart.
  • Composite Character:
    • After Bucky Barnes is freed from the brainwashing he suffered from HYDRA, he renames himself Nomad, an identity taken by other individuals from the comics, such as Steve Rogers himself and Jack Monroe (a former Bucky from when "Bucky" was the title of Captain America's sidekick).
    • Galactus here is the combination of his comic counterpart, and his movie counterpart. He retains his humanoid form rather than being a space cloud, but like his movie self, rather than use technology to absorb a planet's life force, he is massive enough to reach down and absorb it with his bare hands.
  • Cool Versus Awesome: Dial's thoughts run through how he's always wanted to see this matchup when he gets the chance to spar with the Hulk as Fourarms.
  • Crossover: While travelling across the multiverse, Dial ends up in a world similar to Pound the Table.
  • Cuteness Proximity: When Dial, Darkstar and their handler run into a pack of Precious Puppies in Chernobyl, Dial as NRG only spares a moment to cleanse them of radiation before they commence with the petting and the cooing. Later, Hulk is seen playing with the puppy that Dial adopts, and Fantasma completely melts when she sees her.
  • Cursed with Awesome: After Dial performs a DNA repair on the failed HYDRA experiments in the Graveyard, a number of them are turned back to normal with either superhuman physiques or limited versions of Creel's absorption powers. See Body Horror for those that aren't so lucky.
  • Dare to Be Badass:
    • Mahmoud gives what he sees as a "draft notice" to the Wakandan Royal family, that they can choose to join BRIDGE and be part of the conversation as the world accelerates into the future, or eventually be left behind when their vibranium-based technology can no longer keep up. They eventually agree to trading talks in Chapter 63.
    • He gives a similar, if toned-down message to the X-Men in the sequel, pointing out that there were lots of opportunities for them to come clean in the past and that they need to start stepping up to help the world if they want to be accepted. This is then zig-zagged as Professor X admits that he has helped before in limited ways, but part of the problem is that a good chunk of the mutants under his care are children, who wouldn't be able to defend themselves nor should they be going on missions.
  • Death by Adaptation: Grant Ward, the resident traitor in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., is shot dead following HYDRA's exposure, a long while before his canonical death takes place.
  • Delayed Reaction: When Tony is looking for a refill, JARVIS obliges. Tony thanks him... then realizes JARVIS doesn't have a body to pour him one.
  • Detect Evil: Technological variant: Jury Rigg and X distilled Arnim Zola's Insight algorithm into an application named Hercules, which is sent to the phones of all loyal SHIELD agents during the Battle of the Triskelion to identify all the HYDRA moles lurking among them.
  • Deus Exit Machina: While Dial is stranded in the Savage Land, one would think that the wild man, Ka-Zar, whom BRIDGE had made contact with recently, would be able to assist. He was busy rescuing another village from Saur-Lords while everything was going on.
  • Didn't Think This Through: Deadpool is aware that the world is based on comic-books just like in his own movies, and he's aware that something is preventing those who are aware of it from remembering or talking about characters that haven't shown up yet via inducing splitting headaches. When he yells Mutants at Dial in order to induce headache and get an opening on the alien hero, he didn't consider that the same thing would happen to him.
  • Dirty Communists: Ivan Kragoff a.k.a. the Red Ghost has a touch of the bad sort of Patriotic Fervor. He views Russia as weak for having accepted capitalism, and has began demonstrations of his own version of superweapons on Russian citizens, intending for the Russian government to accept his weapons and establish their true place at the top of the world, or to force the issue if it doesn't. To contrast, he is introduced in an arc where the Avengers meet the newly-formed Winter Guard.
  • Discard and Draw:
    • After the Winter Guard Arc is over, Fantasma is transferred to the Avengers as a show of camaraderie, while Ursa Major and Darkstar are unveiled as her replacements.
    • Fitz and Simmons decide to enter Stark's employ to better utilize their skills and only work with Coulson's team part-time. Their replacements are the cybernetics engineer Otto Octavius and the reptilian biologist Melati Kusuma.
  • Do-Anything Robot: Averted with X's new robot body. Tony is upset that his chassis was built for great strength and insane durability (and not even to the level of the Hulkbuster) and nothing else, with no extra bells or whistles.
  • Doing in the Scientist: Sort of; Wanda's powers, granted by HYDRA's experiments and exposure to Loki's scepter, allow her to affect the same arcane energies as actual mages. With Agatha Harkness' tutelage, they can be controlled and honed to allow the Scarlet Witch to wield actual magic.
  • Don't Make Me Destroy You: During Iron Man and Dial's second clash with Blizzard a.k.a. Donnie Gill, the latter is pumping more and more power to destroy the Avengers after Blackout is overloaded. Dial yells for Donnie to stop and let them help him, and that Fitz misses his friend, but Blizzard is too far gone, leaving Iron Man no choice but to lethally overpower him when he aims for a vulnerable Dial.
  • Don't You Dare Pity Me!: Once She-Hulk realizes how broken her opponent Mary MacPherson is, simply trying to control everything around her with brute strength, she just looks at her and says she feels sorry for her. Mary does not take that well.
  • Dramatic Irony:
    • The natives think that there is no way out of the Savage Land, which works in Dial's favor when he waits for a rescue mission.
    • When Dial notices Trish Walker's slight envy at her foster sister Jessica Jones talking with the Avengers, he thinks that if destiny has its way, Hellcat will someday make her appearance, not knowing how badly that went in the original series.
  • Drill Sergeant Nasty: Given that Ares, God of War, is given the job of training the Greek military, he is definitely much this.
  • Dysfunction Junction: Mahmoud and Jen discuss this trope on how they both need therapy, along with everyone else on the team. Then it devolves into a joke on how they should just ignore their issues in favour of everything else that's weird cropping up and it ends with both of them laughing depressively.
  • Early-Bird Cameo: An interlude in Chapter 105 shows Peter Parker and Ned Leeds (13), Kamala Khan (12) and Humberto Lopez (10) just acting like regular kids in the Marvel universe.
  • Eat the Bomb: NRG does this to the Red Ghost's nuclear bomb.
    • And later, he does the same to the Elephant's Foot in Chernobyl.
  • Enemy Mine: Dial teams up with Hauzer to kick off a slave rebellion in the Savage Land.
  • Entertainingly Wrong: For whatever reason, Christine Everhart was under the impression that the new armor-wearer Rescue was one of Tony's newest paramours and was effectively cheating on Pepper. The thought that Rescue is Pepper Potts never crossed her mind until Pepper told her so to her face.
  • Even Evil Has Standards: Sauron's reaction to learning of HYDRA's resurgence is to voice a hope that they were destroyed quickly. This is from an unrepentant tyrant and slaver.
  • Even the Guys Want Him: It's mentioned multiple times that Steve Rogers and Thor are enough to make even straight men question their preferences.
  • Exact Words: Due to international pressures, BRIDGE is forced to withdraw from Rio... but the Avengers are BRIDGE contractors...
  • Expecting Someone Taller: When Dial goes up against the Hulk as Fourarms for the first time, he is surprised to find that the 8.5 ft tall Hulk is only waist-high to the Tetramand.
    • A kid makes this comment to Tony Stark when he stops in at Pops', leading to Tony joking that "this is why he needs a haircut," since apparently he's unrecognizable.
  • Fastball Special: Frankenstrike pulls this off against the Wendigo, using Alloy's metal body as a railgun projectile. He even calls the move "Fastball Railgun".
  • Fire-Forged Friends:
    • Despite his reservation about Alloy being a past criminal, Vanguard soon finds himself warming up to him after the battles with the Red Ghost's forces, especially after Creel saves his life.
    • Dial and Fantasma are this after the Winter Guard Arc, though they were friendly even before.
  • Fish out of Temporal Water: All around during the Rio Arc due to the timequake.
  • Flat-Earth Atheist: Not many people believe in magic, despite all the other weird stuff around.
  • Flat "What":
    • Mahmoud has this reaction when Maria tells him that his next mission is... a talk show.
    • And again when he sees puppies in Chernobyl.
  • Flaunting Your Fleets: What the Russian government intended when they invited a BRIDGE team and some Avengers over - to show off their new Super Team, the Winter Guard. At least on the surface; there is a problem that the Russians need BRIDGE's assistance with, but a propaganda-style meeting was needed for some prideful higher-ups to save face.
  • Food Fight: What happens when three drunken engineers build guns that shoot tomatoes and cake.
  • Foreshadowing: At the end of the Savage Land Arc, Hauzer meets with the Hag of the Pits, who makes oblique references to several world-shaking threats: the Great One Who Sleeps, the One Who Consumes, and the Fallen Titan.
    • The Hag also mentions that the Savage Land must make its own champions, noting a power linked to Hauzer's own essence. Later, she watches as Humberto Lopez finds an odd red stone.
  • For Want Of A Nail:
    • In the backstory: The Fantastic Four has disappeared some years ago in mysterious circumstances.
    • With Dial's alien tech providing a secure, unhackable phone line, Captain America calls in Hawkeye, Iron Man and War Machine to assist in excising HYDRA from SHIELD.
    • After co-opting Arnim Zola's Insight algorithm, Dial as Jury Rigg re-purposes it to identify all HYDRA agents instead, leading to a few changes down the line:
    • Ava Starr and Bill Foster are rescued by BRIDGE before HYDRA can get to them, and get their assistance in fixing Ava's condition. During a healing session Ava is contacted by Janet, which clues BRIDGE in to her predicament.
    • Frank Castle is recruited into BRIDGE as an Elite agent, where he can get to see his family on a regular basis.
    • Dial gives King T'Chaka a tracker keyed to Ulysses Klaue, and the Black Panther and the Dora Milaje successfully capture him. At least until the Leader sticks his nose in.
  • Fountain of Memes: Chernobog is an In-Universe example, as befitting a God of Evil with access to the internet and is a massive Troll. Ned shows his friend Peter a few such memes, and even the Avengers have some.
  • Friendly Enemy: Applies even if the 'enemy' part is implied. Dial finds himself on friendly terms with some of Russia's Winter Guard, but it's no secret that a main reason the Guard was formed in the first place was precaution if the Avengers ever invade Russia or go rogue. Dial even calls himself and Fantasma frenemies in light of this.
  • Fun with Acronyms:
    • After SHIELD is disbanded to be reformed, Tony and some others have a lot of fun suggesting replacement organization names, like Government Agency of Super Powers (GASP), Supreme Military Agency of Super Humans (SMASH), Government Goon Gallery (GGG) and even Dynamic Action Intelligence Liaisons (DIAL) and Public Legion United by Mission to Bridge Education for Races (PLUMBER).
    • One of Dial's first creations for StarkTech is a fabricator to make anything out of catoms called the Claytronics Object Creator. After Dial realizes the acronym and what letter could be juvenilely added to it, he renames it to the Claytronics Nanoforge.
  • Fusion Dance: Two of Dial's aliens, Upgrade (Galvanic Mechamorph) and Blight ( Klyntar symbiote) allow him to do this with other people- though in different ways (the Mechamorph can only combine with non-organic things, like power armor or cybernetics, while the symbiote can only combine with organic matter). So far, as the former, he has combined with War Machine and Iron Man, and as the latter, he has combined with Alloy (and Doctor Forster, but only as a test).

     G-L 
  • Genre Savvy:
    • Having become used to famous actors like Robert Downey Jr. and Samuel L. Jackson portraying important Marvel characters, on one mission, Dial immediately pings a HYDRA merc who looks like Michelle Rodriguez as someone important. He's right; in this universe, she's Titania.
    • While looking for a man-eating horror creature in the Graveyard, Dial thinks about where no-one looks. Then he looks up to find the Wendigo.
    • Ulysses Klaue thinks that today will be a good day, then instantly tenses up when he realises he just tempted fate. After nothing happens, he relaxes... a moment too early.
    • Dial notes that every visit to the Savage Land ends up with somebody separated from the main expedition.
  • Girl's Night Out Episode: The women go out on one in a "Comedic Interlude". It ends with Fury having to bust them out of jail.
  • Giver of Lame Names: Mahmoud thinks this about himself when he names his Asgardian form "Asgarditen". He renames it later to Sandrass.
    • He defends some of the alien names that the show gave his aliens when they're insulted, pointing out that Ben was 10 when he came up with some of them.
  • A God Am I: Strucker believes he has become a god through the power of the Mind Stone. Mahmoud dissuades him of that notion by showing him Chthon, his future, and The Devourer .
  • Gold-Colored Superiority: Averted. Creel hates turning into gold, as even though it makes him look awesome, it also makes him both heavy and weak.
  • Gone Horribly Right: Titania attempts to use her love powers on Rath. This works. Unfortunately, Rath, as an Appoplexian, believes that the most traditional, romantic thing you can do to someone you love is to beat the tar out of them in a battle.
    • Tony and Thor work together to fight Ulik, who just defeated Fourarms and is trying to finish him off. They end up overdoing it and turn him into A Twinkle in the Sky.
  • Good Cop/Bad Cop:
    • Or Bad Dog in this case, as Daredevil and Wildmutt respectively interrogate a sex slaver about more information on his operation.
    • Implied when Tony pops into Pop's barber shop for a haircut, with Jessica Jones and Luke Cage present. After his haircut, Tony says that if they keep hiding every time he shows up, Nick Fury will be along shortly and he doesn't play those games.
  • Good Thing You Can Heal: Since he's the only one who knows about Deadpool and his healing factor he knows that he can't attack him with anything less than lethal damage if he wants to take him out of the fight. Luke Cage is shocked to see the normally so in control Dial brutally kill a man without a second thought until he sees Wade get up and regenerate the hole in his chest.
    • Ulik (and Mahmoud's Troll form) are both shown as having healing powers.
    • In the mind war, Mahmoud sics SCP-682 on Strucker for precisely this reason.
  • Grew Beyond Their Programming: Jury Rigg took the computer containing Arnim Zola and his algorithm and rejiggered it into a device with a VI named X. Eventually, X became a full on Artificial Intelligence within a manner of days.
    • Defied with the VIs in various armours. Everybody makes absolutely sure they don't pass the sapience treshold.
  • Gunship Rescue: The Battle of the Triskelion comes to an end when Upgrade descends on the HYRDA convoy controlling an Insight helicarrier.
  • Hate Sink: Stend the slaver for the Savage Arc.
  • Headbutting Heroes: In additional to all the canon examples:
    • After being rescued, Ava Starr/Ghost takes issue with working with Dial, since she views him as too naive and arrogant for his power level, while he reciprocates simply because he doesn't know why she dislikes him.
    • Bucky/Nomad has a few problems working under Falcon as his team superior, simply because he'd prefer Captain America in charge and not someone less skilled who was only put in charge for publicity.
    • There is a fair bit of friction when some representatives from the Avengers (Dial and Alloy) meet their new Russian contemporaries, the Winter Guard. Of particular note is Vanguard, who dislikes the idea of working with ex-criminals like Creel, let alone a God of Evil like Chernobog.
    • Creel accidentally hits a berserk button for Matt Murdock, as Creel was the one who fought Matt's father in his last bout. Mr. Murdock was supposed to take a dive, but didn't, and was killed by the mob. Creel expresses remorse over this and wishes that Mr. Murdock had taken the dive, as Creel liked him. Matt is furious by this and storms out.
  • Heel–Face Turn:
    • Crusher Creel and Bucky Barnes are captured after the Insight incident, successfully deprogrammed by Jury Rigg and Upgrade's device, and become the Reserve Avengers Alloy and Nomad.
    • General Hale and her daughter Ruby turn themselves in to BRIDGE, allowing Ruby to be trained.
    • While HYDRA is trying to regroup, putting more effort into their Gamma enhancement experiments, the Grapplers and the Maximoff twins decide to defect to BRIDGE. Later, they along with Deathlok are put into the Initiative, a sub-team working for BRIDGE for superheroes who deserve a second chance.
  • Heroes Gone Fishing:
    • One chapter shows the Avengers men having a movie night.
    • Chapters 62 and 63 have Mahmoud and Steve just acting like regular tourists in New York City. And then they buy over $2,000 worth of Avengers merchandise just to mess with Tony.
  • Heroic Bystander: A bar full of earthquake victims in Rio de Janeiro that the Avengers have to rescue are this; when the ceiling collapses on them, a few of them catch the falling roof, and everyone inside helps support it, trading off in 20-minute-shifts for 5 whole hours, until they are finally rescued.
  • Hero of Another Story:
    • The Artificial Intelligence X, when not helping Dial and the Avengers, has been working with Maria Hill and Jarvis to clear out the seedier places in the Dark Web, and saving innocents from the monsters that lurk in cyberspace.
    • With the advent of the Avengers and BRIDGE, and after the Rio time quake causes several other powered characters to appear, other countries are forming their own Super Teams, from Russia's Winter Guard, to Canada's Alpha Flight, to the South Korean Celebrity Superhero Girl Group of Luna Snow, White Fox and Crescent.
    • Most of the Avengers are off pursuing their own missions during the Savage Arc.
      • Coulson's BRIDGE team in particular investigates an abandoned SHIELD/HYDRA base in Citrusville that has them running into the Man-Thing.
      • She-Hulk had gone on a BRIDGE investigation alongside the Punisher.
  • Hidden Depths:
    • Frank Castle's first impression when working alongside Captain America was of a rather carefree and naive greenhorn soldier. It's only in the field that he goes from Nice Guy to the ideal military commander the world knows him as.
    • When Dial compares some remains found in a Russian warehouse to Servitors from Warhammer 40,000, Crimson Dynamo of the Winter Guard recognizes the reference.
  • Hoist by His Own Petard: The algorithm that Arnim Zola created to track down anyone anywhere in the world for HYDRA's benefit is taken by Jury Rigg and re-purposed into an algorithm to instead identify all HYDRA agents worldwide, allowing SHIELD to precisely excise them from their ranks.
    • Stend throws Dial into Hauzer's pit to coerce him into giving up and revealing his knowledge. Instead, Dial releases the Earth Dragon and starts a slave rebellion.
  • Hollywood Tactics: The Punisher breaks down the HYDRA tactics use to kidnap Audrey Nathan (confront her in the middle of her run with military backup) as showy and idiotic; the better solution would be to spirit her from her bed in her sleep. He justifies it as the HYDRA cell being in command of Blackout, an Enhanced with no proper military knowledge - just an obsession with Ms. Nathan and a bunch of goons to command.
  • Homeless Hero: Mahmoud spends the first few months of his time in the MCU as a New York squatter. It's downplayed since he can Jury Rigg all the amenities he needs, and it isn't too long before the Call to Adventure is heard.
  • Hope Spot:
    • HYDRA has one during the battle of the Triskelion. As SHIELD is making progress, one of the crystal mountains blocking the hangar shatters, and an Insight helicarrier is launched. HYDRA cheers... and then everyone sees the glowing green lines and Dial's Omnitrix symbol on the side.
    • Vasily Karpov finds out that Tony Stark (whose parents he ordered to be assassinated) waiting in his safe-house, and things get violent when Vasily tries to flee. In the midst of things, he manages to get ahold of a gun, aims it at Tony... and finds out to his despair that Tony remembered to unload it.
    • Downplayed. Luke Cage and Jessica Jones are on edge when Tony Stark himself walks into Pop's barbershop, but he does nothing but get a haircut and fill Pop's Swear Jar to bursting. Then he walks out and says to them that Nick Fury will be along in a few days and he won't like the hiding game as much as Tony does.
  • Horrifying the Horror: As scary as a gang of roaring demons are, even they are taken aback by a yelling Punisher blasting one of their own to bits with auto-shotgun and bayonet. Later chapters reveal that they've started fleeing as soon as they see him coming.
  • I Can Still Fight!: By the time X has arrived in the Savage Land to search for a lost Mahmoud, Creel and Fantasma have been working themselves to the bone trying to find him for two days straight. X has to order them to get some rest while he takes over the search.
  • I Choose to Stay:
    • After defecting to BRIDGE, the Maximoff twins were put on a probationary team with the Grapplers while they work off their sentence. Partway through, Wanda jumps at the chance to transfer to the Avengers and become a provisional member, but Pietro chooses to remain with the Grapplers.
    • After the events in Citrusville, Dial finally reaches the Nexus of All Realities. Though the thought of going through and seeing his family again is really tempting, he thinks about all the bonds he has made in the MCU and decides to hold off for now, until he can find a way to travel back and forth reliably.
  • I Do Not Like Green Eggs and Ham:
    • Ruby Hale is recommended a book by Natasha, though she has doubts when she sees Santa Claus on the cover. After Mahmoud lends her his copy and tells her to give it a try, he finds her sleeping on his couch the next morning having finished the book and in the middle of watching the film.
    • Tony, when told about how Steve and Mahmoud are going to watch "Avatar: The Last Airbender," dismisses it as a kid's show. By the time of "Call Resumed," Tony has bought the company that makes Avatar and announces he'll be voicing a character in the final season of "Legend of Korra."
  • I Have Your Wife: Hacking into a Centipede soldier's cybernetics, Dial finds out that some HYDRA soldiers are operating under duress because of hostages.
    • As in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., Deathlok works for HYDRA due to them holding his son Ace hostage. Once Skye rescues him, Deathlok turns on HYDRA and helps wipe out the remaining forces, turning himself in afterwards.
  • Inertia Is a Cruel Mistress: Fasttrack finds this out during the party attempts to lift Mjolnir. His attempt is getting a running start, then grab the hammer and let his inertia take care of the rest, only to find out that Mjolnir's inertia is greater.
  • Inherently Funny Words: Klaue bases his operations out of the bowels of a ship partly because he thinks "bowels" is this.
  • Instant Humiliation: Just Add YouTube!: When Bruce walks in on Jen and Mahmoud with their shirts off and making out, he proceeds to chase Mahmoud through Stark Tower, chucking things after him, through hallways that are lined with cameras (Mahmoud is bemused to note, Bruce is the one chasing after him, not the Hulk). Tony can't help himself, and he takes the time to ensure that the moment is recorded for posterity, much to Bruce and Mahmoud's dismay and Jen's amusement.
    X: Mr. Stark is attempting to save the footage and post it to Facebook.
    Jarvis: He has added Korean pop as background music. I believe he’s also ‘cackling’.
  • Interrupted Intimacy:
    • One time, Jen and Mahmoud accidentally walk in on Creel and Hartley getting frisky in a lesser-used hallway.
    • Then, Natasha directs Bruce into a room... where Mahmoud and Jen are making out.
  • Irony: After Frank Castle breaks down the latest attack by Blackout as a self-driven rampage, Dial mentally notes the irony of The Punisher saying something like that.
  • It's Personal: After Ananastasia Rinaldi reveals her true colors and guns down one of the BRIDGE agents under Frank's command in the back, the Punisher chases her down and takes no prisoners.
  • Jerk with a Heart of Gold: J. Jonah Jameson is on fire when he appears in one interlude, slandering Dial as an unknown, overly-powerful and possible danger who came out of nowhere and inserted himself into the Avengers, Alloy as an ex-criminal and Fantasma as a Russian transfer with clear national loyalties, and even makes hints that BRIDGE is becoming its own superpowered army, and how all of that makes him worried. But then he finishes by saying that he has hope, that Captain America trusts Dial, and that if he, BRIDGE and all their superpowered resources are on the up-and-up and protecting democracy, then it's all damn well worth it.
  • Jerkass Has a Point: J. Jonah Jameson, in his interview, delivers his opinions in a highly skewed rant. However, he does make points that are reflected in the story at large. He mentions that Dial came from nowhere and has absurd amounts of power, which were plot points early on when trying to find who is and is not HYDRA, and the Superpowered Arms Race specifically points to Dial's powers as one thing nations are scrambling to counter. He mentions that Carl was a former mob enforcer, and asks if he can be trusted... which comes back to haunt Creel multiple times, including with Matt Murdock and Vanguard of the Winter Guard. He mentions national superhero teams, and mentions Fantasma, stating that the circumstances around meeting her look suspicious from the outside, and that she could refuse to fight against Russia's interests... which again, are concerns that BRIDGE mentions having.
  • Jumped at the Call:
    • The story proper starts when Mahmoud hears that Captain America is an outlaw (the Winter Soldier storyline) and leaps into action.
    • The moment a request comes in for assistance to track/hunt down someone in the untamed wilderness of the Savage Land, Kraven the Hunter jumps on the first flight there before anyone can say aye or nay.
  • The Knights Who Say "Squee!":
    • As established a hero as Dial becomes, he still is starstruck when Thor finally enters the story.
    • Coulson gets really giddy when Fitz gives him a working copy of Judge Dredd's Lawgiver, voice-activated variable ammo and all. The movie was a Guilty Pleasure of his.
  • Laugh Themselves Sick: Tony cracks up when Dial introduces Big Chill and tells him that his species reproduces asexually.
    • Gets a Call-Back when Dial unveils his symbiote form.
    • And once again, for both Tony and Jen, when Swampfire's blooming turns Mahmoud into the Rise of Zitboy.
  • Locked Out of the Loop: Director Hill deliberately keeps Dial's disappearance in the Savage Land quiet, since she knows the Avengers would just abandon their current assignments to search for him and she can't allow it.
  • Loophole Abuse: Midway through the Rio timequake rescue efforts, the World Security Council informs Director Hill that BRIDGE is ordered to pull out of the city due to international pressures. However, they also point out that the order only applies to BRIDGE, not contractors like the Avengers, and Maria also mentions that the withdrawal will take time, time to continue helping people as long as they can.
  • Lost in Transmission: Discussed amongst the Reserve Avengers and explicitly averted by Dial while they are cleaning out HYDRA's Graveyard. While his colleagues are concerned that their comms might suffer a cliche cutoff, Dial says that with the robustness and efficiency of his alien-based quantum comms, if HYDRA could cut off his signal, they'd already rule the world by now.
  • Love Makes You Stupid: Once the HYDRA commander commanding Blackout and Blizzard decides to scrap the operation to kidnap Audrey Nathan, the love-obsessed Blackout kills him and goes after Audrey directly, heedless of the Avengers in his way.

     M-R 
  • Meaningful Name: In Classical Mythology, the Lernaean Hydra was slain by the hero Hercules. Here, Hercules is the name of the app that identifies and excises HYDRA from SHIELD's ranks.
  • The Mentor:
    • Black Widow takes this role to two characters: Dial, as his primary fighting instructor, and Ruby Hale, HYDRA's ex-pet teenage assassin. Later on, Natasha has a conversation with one of her old contacts about passing on the Red Room's teachings, which although are now used for a better purpose, have some lessons that should best be forgotten.
      • Later, Dial goes looking for a mentor that can push his alien forms to the limit, and finds one in Ares, the God of War.
    • Fury has also gotten Agatha Harkness' help to teach Fantasma and Wanda more about their magic, with an interested Tony and Bruce looking on.
  • The Mind Is a Plaything of the Body: Most of Mahmoud's aliens don't have this issue, though it does happen. Justified because his brain is physically being altered to a new form every time he transforms. The most obvious example is Rath, who makes Mahmoud turn into, to quote Sam, "A Wrestlemania Jackass," but NRG makes Mahmoud talk in a stereotypically Russian fashion unless he catches himself.
  • The Mole: Ananastasia Rinaldi shows up as an FBI agent assisting BRDIGE, She-Hulk and the Punisher with a case involving a superpowered bank thief. Later it's revealed that she's actually working with the thieves herself.
  • Moment Killer:
    • The heartwarming moment that Rath feels after saving a little girl from an apartment fire is broken by a jittery cop pulling his gun on the tiger-man.
    • As the BRIDGE expedition is marveling at the unblemished prehistoric wilderness that is the Savage Land, Creel starts humming the Jurassic Park theme music. Everyone, even the soldiers and scientists, complain he ruined the moment.
    • Mahmoud and Jen have just begun to reconcile after Mahmoud shares his origins, until Ruby pipes in asking if they're going to kiss.
  • Monumental Battle: She-Hulk's battle against Mary MacPherson ends up in Madison Square Garden, where they crash right through the arena roof and into - appropriately - an MMA octagon.
  • Monumental Damage: The Rio timequake toppled the giant statue of Christ the Redeemer; the statue's broken form is shown in many a news bulletin afterwards.
  • Motor Mouth:
    • Ulysses Klaue. T'Challa is visibly discomfited by it, and it drives Samuel Sterns up the wall.
    • Mahmoud runs into Luis at a bar, and his summary of the timeline up to then is fascinating.
  • My Sister Is Off-Limits: Or cousin in this case; Bruce doesn't take it well when he walks in on Jen making out with Mahmoud, and ends up chasing the latter through the complex. Much to Tony's glee.
  • Mythology Gag:
    • Dial's first major metahuman opponent in this fic is Carl "Crusher" Creel a.k.a. the Absorbing Man, who later becomes his rival and comrade. Now think about Ben Tennyson and Kevin Levin.
      • Later, the two of them are put on a sub-team with Scarlet Witch, who corresponds to Gwen Tennyson in this analogy. And later on, Fantasma of the Winter Guard is transferred to the Avengers as a more permanent female mage.
    • Dial mentions the idea of having superhumans deputized to assist law enforcement while having their identities protected as a "Secret Warriors" program. Later, he mentions that Daredevil is one of the Marvel Knights, to cover that he is not from an official Avengers team.
    • Ulysses Klaue feels that working with robots feels sort of familiar after he is rescued from the Wakandan mines.
      • From the same film, an Avengers party where the participants took turns trying to lift Mjolnir to no avail ends with a robot showing up. Not Ultron thankfully, but Jarvis showing off his new robot chassis.
    • Nat has a bit of deja vu when Fantasma and Mikhail meet Bruce and Steve. Fantasma has the same conversation with Bruce that he had with Steve during their first meeting, and Mikhail also reveals that he owns Captain America trading cards.
    • When May encounters Man-Thing, she hears Dr. Octavius call it "Swamp Thing" and can't help but think that that name just sounds wrong (Swamp Thing is from DC, Man Thing is Marvel).
    • She-Hulk tells her story of her BRIDGE mission with the Punisher to her audience (Mahmoud, Nat and Thor) in first-person. This could be a reference to her propensity to Break the Fourth Wall in her comics, by speaking directly to the readers of the fic. Then later, Dial tells her of his origins, and she starts speaking to the fic's readers and breaks the fourth wall for real.
    • Jen can't help her giggles when Creel and Izzy walk in and the topic of Creel's love life comes up. This is because Dial just told her about their comic book origins and Creel's regular wife in the comics, Mary MacPherson, whom She-Hulk fought recently.
    • Under the magical tutelage of Agatha Harkness, Wanda creates a magical focus that resembles her signature red "M" headpiece in the comics.
  • Neutrality Backlash: Mahmoud spells out to King T'Chaka, Prince T'Challa and Ayo that this is the future that awaits Wakanda if they choose to remain neutral and hidden. He and BRIDGE are planning on bringing the world into the future, and if they remain out of the conversation, the world will eventually become advanced enough to both leave Wakanda behind and find out the truth, and the results won't be pretty. He gives a similar speech to the X-Men.
  • Noodle Incident: Apparently while the ladies were having their Girl's Night Out Episode and having to be bailed out of jail (a Noodle Incident in its own right), Sif went on an adventure of her own and somehow turned a luxury yacht and its rich passengers into treasure hunters.
  • No One Could Survive That!: Iron Man ends up blowing Blizzard to smithereens after the latter undergoes a Villainous Breakdown and attempts to drop a cold storm over the West Coast, and makes this comment. Of course, some twitching ice is unnoticed by the heroes.
  • No-Sell:
    • After his deprogramming, Creel's old HYDRA control phrase does absolutely nothing to his mind.
    • The Life Draining Blackout finds his Touch of Death completely useless against Snare-Oh.
  • Not His Sled: While captured in the Savage Land, Dial has to watch a battle involving a massive fire-breathing dinosaur referred to by the locals as a Devil. Dial is expecting Devil Dinosaur, but is shocked to see that it's Hauzer instead.
  • Not So Above It All: When Melinda May gets the chance to fly an Upgraded cargo jet, Mahmoud offers to keep everyone inside grounded with gravity control to allow her to have some fun doing some aerial acrobatics. However, the shifting view from the windows makes Simmons airsick.
  • Odd Friendship:
    • An unlikely teenage girl friendship forms between Shuri, princess of Wakanda, and Ruby Hale, former heir apparent to HYDRA.
    • Likewise, one forms between the bombastic She-Hulk and the straight-laced Punisher after they are put on a BRIDGE mission together. Post-mission, he even extends an offer to her to have dinner with his family.
    • After being imprisoned in the Raft, Karl Lykos befriends, of all people, a Warhammer goblin, also able to somehow interpret the latter's unintelligible "Waagh!"s.
    • Kraven takes an interest in Simmons after she's able to spot patterns in herd movement. After the mission with the Winter Guard, he offers to stay in contact with her to help teach her the ways of nature.
  • Oh, Crap!:
    • After the Omnitrix scans a new alien in Rio de Janeiro, Dial checks his roster and finds two new profiles. The Unexpected Character? A Klyntar symbiote.
    • The Asgardians have a tiny one when it looks like Steve might be able to lift Mjolnir.
    • Dial, when he realizes the Omnitrix was disabled by Anti-Metal.
    • Dial, when the Methanosian sample in the Omnitrix begins its blooming, causing him to turn into Swampfire... hundreds of feet in the air.
  • Oh, Crap, There Are Fanfics of Us!: Steve and Bucky practically go Green Around the Gills when they're told of the fanfics written about the two of them - specifically the Captain America/Bucky dating ones.
  • Old Flame: Chapter 65 has Bruce and Thor meeting back up with Betty Ross and Jane Foster, with Dr. Samson and Darcy tagging along.
    • Similarly, Coulson has a reunion with Audrey Nathan, the cellist he was dating before his death. It doesn't go well.
  • Omnidisciplinary Scientist: Discussed and Lampshaded when Darcy asks Jane if she wants to get into a discussion on the Gamma gene, and Jane answers she's an astrophysicist.
    Darcy: Oh come on, all you geniuses say that, and then you guys start, like, hacking the Pentagon with a biology degree, or cure diseases with an engineering Ph.D.!
  • One Degree of Separation:
    • Dr. Karl Malus didn't just have Jessica Jones as his patient/test subject, he also treated four women that would become the Grapplers.
    • Mikhail Uriokovitch a.k.a Ursa Major knows Natasha from both their dealings with the Red Room.
  • One-Steve Limit: A few aversions:
    • There are two Marias introduced so far, Maria Hill, director of BRIDGE, and Maria Castle, Frank Castle's wife.
    • Two different characters who claim the name Titania show up in this fic, Davida DeVitonote  of the Grapplers and Mary MacPherson. When the latter shows up and introduces herself as Titania, She-Hulk decides to let Davida contest that aspect of her boasting after she hauls this wannabe villainess in.
    • In the above incident, She-Hulk meets a BRIDGE agent named Frank Simmons. Since she already knows both a Frank (the Punisher) and a Simmons (Jemma from Coulson's team), she mentally labels him as "male BRIDGE soldier".
  • Only Sane Man: Victoria Hand finds himself in this role during the BRIDGE strength testing session, given the attendees include Thor, Hulk and She-Hulk.
    • In the Leader's group, Klaue serves this purpose. While the Leader is dangerous on his own, Klaue is able to point out that not only does the Leader not get people, his tactics tend to lack practicality. In many of their scenes together he seems to be the one pulling the Leader back from going full-on scenery-chewing ham and toward actual, tangible progress. In one of the final scenes of the first volume, he's telling the Leader to not talk to himself in a dark room, since it makes him look crazy.
  • O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Tony is completely polite and serious when he requests to be on the protection detail for Coulson's old girlfriend Audrey Nathan.
  • Opponent Switch: Snare-Oh and Iron Man exchange opponents against Blizzard and Blackout respectively, when it becomes clear that Snare-Oh's cloth regeneration is stalemated against Blizzard's ice, and Iron Man's suit is stalemated against Blackout's Darkforce.
  • Order Reborn: After the Battle of the Triskelion, SHIELD is disbanded and reformed into a new organization: BRIDGE, the Bureau of Reconnaissance, Intelligence, Development, and General Enhancement, and the bridge between normal and weird.
  • Out-Gambitted:
    • Despite the Grapplers' attempts to double-cross HYDRA, Baron Strucker saw through their ploy.
    • Samuel "The Leader" Sterns always planned to betray HYDRA and abscond with most of their tech, but Baron Strucker saw it coming from a mile away and made sure everything the Leader was teleporting away was replaced with explosives.
  • Parody Sue: Deadpool calls Mahmoud out as a wish-fulfillment self-insert for having so much power, becoming friends with the Avengers and dating She-Hulk. Dial doesn't completely deny any of this.
  • Passing the Torch: Along with the above Order Reborn, Director Fury steps down as Director of SHIELD and Maria Hill is instated as Director of BRIDGE.
  • Perception Filter: When he first arrives into the world and starts looking for information about the Marvel world he's in, Mahmoud wonders why he can't find anything about mutants or the X-Men, but then something comes over his mind and makes him dismiss it as unimportant.
    • It shows again during later chapters, like him losing a train of thought while discussing abnormal genetics or not remembering which hero group was most involved with the Savage Land. Comes to a head when Sauron outright asks him if he is a mutant, which gives Dial a blinding headache that leaves him unable to remember the question.
    • Something similar may be going with the Fantastic Four, since he apparently forgot the time he tried to look up any information on them.
    • And of course his inability to remember MCU, despite occasionally quoting various movies.
    • After the final battle against Hydra, in which Mahmoud managed to remove the mental block placed on him, he discovers that Emma Frost put a filter on him (and several other people) to prevent them from even thinking about Mutantkind in any way, shape, or form. After Strucker's death (he had a similar block placed on him), Charles Xavier contacts Dial to arrange a meeting.
  • Percussive Therapy: When Dial tells Bruce that HYDRA has abducted his cousin Jennifer, he has to transform into Fourarms and beat some sense into the Hulk.
  • Pokémon Speak: The only thing the HYDRA monstrosity called the Wendigo can say is his own name.
  • Post-Victory Collapse: Dr. Otto Octavius has just stared down the Man-Thing, uttering scientific theories to keep himself calm and free of fear, so that the being's touch does not burn him. Once the Man-Thing leaves, Octavius passes out.
  • Power Copying: Just like in Ben 10, Dial's Omnitrix can scan alien DNA and give him new forms based on them. Thus far he's gained Asgardian (Sandrass), Klyntar symbiote (Blight), troll (Grendel), and assorted Savage Land Dino-men forms.
  • Powered Armor: Iron Man and War Machine are a given, but Mahmoud goes one step further, using Jury Rigg and Upgrade to create armorsuits for everyone, superheroes and agents alike. See Adaptive Armor above for specifics.
    • Jury Rigg's first armor project is to build the Rescue Armor for Pepper.
  • Power Loss Makes You Strong: Through the first few arcs, Dial had been grappling with the idea that the Omnitrix is the only thing that makes him worthwhile, and all the skills he learns and tech he invents doesn't help shake that idea off. It takes him getting lost in the Savage Land with busted Armor Gear and an Omnitrix damaged by anti-metal and him having to use those skills to survive, including getting captured by slavers, that helps him work out of that mindset.
  • The Power of Friendship: Discussed between Natasha and Ruby Hale when talking about what makes Steve so powerful and successful. Ruby views him as idealistic, naïve and predictable, but Natasha corrects her by saying that Steve's idealism is what allows him to gain and keep other people's trust, as well as inspire them to do better, and it is what makes it so that no matter how many times he's knocked down, he'll always get back up and keep on coming.
  • Precious Puppy: While Dial is helping clean up Chernobyl as NRG, he, Darkstar and their liaison come across some Caucasian Shepherds that are slightly irradiated by the atmosphere. NRG cleans them of radiation and he and Darkstar take a couple home.
  • Real Men Love Jesus: Mahmoud is Muslim and an active member of the Avengers, and as such is a huge inspiration for Kamala Khan (even though She-Hulk is her favorite). Her mother, though, thinks about his more mixed reputation in the overall Muslim community, given that no-one has seen him go to prayer and he dates outside his religion, yet is an out-and-out superhero and doesn't drink.
  • Recognition Failure: Played with. Tony Stark drops into Pop's hair salon for a haircut, but one of the kids there says that Iron Man is taller. Tony just snarks to Pops that that's why he needs the haircut; he's unrecognizable.
  • Reed Richards Is Useless: Dial is actively working to avert this; as the world gets weirder, more people with abilities show up, and Earth becomes more appealing on the cosmic scale, he plans to use all the resources available, including Jury Rigg and Upgrade's powers, to upgrade Earth's technology to match it. Giving all BRIDGE agents Adaptive Armor is the first step.
    • As the story progresses, Stark Industries starts releasing new pieces of technology to the public sector, from the hologram-projecting StarkRigg phones and new video games and consoles, to highly-upgraded batteries and power banks for buildings and even ICER guns to law enforcement.
    • Dial also shares his rather uncomplimentary thoughts to the Wakandan Royal family about their country's choice to hide their technology away instead of sharing it.
      Dial: You turned your back on the rest of the world. But I won't have BRIDGE do the same.
    • Played with when Tony asks why he doesn't want Upgrade or Jury Rigg tech in a potential spaceship to scout out threats to Earth. While it is incredibly advanced, a) Any ship out there ought to be able to be fixed with human hands rather than stranded a thousand light years from the nearest service stop, and b) Jury Rigg tech is... unpredictable, as shown when the DNA sequencer will randomly show Godzilla films. Or the dimension blocker that switches people's genders. Or another device that randomly turns people's hair blue.
    • Oddly enough, the Trope Namer hasn't shown up yet.
  • Refusal of the Call:
    • Dial reaches out to Jessica Jones and Luke Cage, but both decline his invitation. It takes a bit of pushing before they agree to talk.
    • Similarly, when BRIDGE approaches Hank Pym after making contact with his old associate Bill Foster, he slams the door in Coulson's face.
    • Dial calls out Wakanda on this in the face of extraterrestrial and world-ending threats.
    • Downplayed example; while Wanda jumps at the chance to join the Avengers and do more for the world, Pietro chooses to stay with the Grapplers.
  • Remake Cameo: Mahmoud realizes this when Alfred Molina shows up as an engineer replacing Fitz on the team when Fitz goes to work for Stark. Who is he playing? Dr. Otto Octavius.
  • Remember That You Trust Me: Maria Hill has a conversation with her predecessor director Nick Fury to this effect, about why he chose her for the job if he doesn't trust her. Fury acquiesces and starts sharing a few secrets.
  • Right Behind Me: Chapter 65 has Mahmoud and Jen in a new quinjet chitchatting about Natasha's training sessions and her new pet assassin. Midway through the conversation, Natasha and Ruby slide off the jet's roof from where they were eavesdropping, much to Mahmoud's shock.
  • Rise of Zitboy: Chapter 119 has Mahmoud experience a Methanosian's blooming, restricting his Omnitrix choices to Swampfire for the time-being and giving him a very bad case of acne.
  • Roaring Rampage of Revenge:
    • Dial did this one time during his first few months vigilante-ing in New York, when he failed to prevent a woman from being raped and beat her attackers within an inch of their lives. Later, while heading to break up a Russian Sex Slave ring with Daredevil, he tries to remind himself to not go overboard again.
    • Sauron claims that Dial is doing this against him, with his subjects as collateral damage. He might have a point, kind of...
  • Robot Maid: Applies when JARVIS reveals his new dedicated robot body. Complete with butler suit.

     S-Z 
  • Sadistic Choice: Baron Strucker pulls this during his Villain: Exit, Stage Left after the final HYDRA confrontation - Dial's group (containing the defecting Scarlet Witch and the Grapplers) can either stop him, or go after John Garrett, who is in the process of spiriting away Quicksilver, Letha and Jennifer Walters in another direction.
  • Samus Is a Girl: In this universe, the pilot of the Crimson Dynamo suit (which is bulky and deep-voiced) is Galina Nemirovsky.
  • Sand Blaster: The power of Sandrass, Dial's Asgardian form.
  • Scars are Forever: After Dial's adventures in the Savage Land where the Omnitrix is temporarily damaged and he is left to fend on his own for a while, the scars he receives remain, even on his alien forms.
  • Screw This, I'm Outta Here:
    • Tony walks into a room where Thor, Bruce and Coulson are all moping about their fraught love lives. He turns around and walks right out.
    • After a Ship Sinking conversation with Skye, Mahmoud abruptly walks off because he is in no mood to deal with an Asian chef named Mr. Foom.
  • Secret-Keeper: X becomes this for Mahmoud when he decides to let X in on his origins, and tell him of all his Marvel knowledge in the event of his death. Mahmoud later decides to also confide in Jen about the truth.
  • Secret Test of Character: When Dial delivers the offer to Wakanda to join BRIDGE in the endeavor to protect and improve the world, T'Chaka delivers a counteroffer for Dial to join them instead, offering riches, land and women for his exclusive help. Dial sees through his test instantly.
  • The Sheriff: John Daltry of Citrusville. He joins Coulson and Skye in fighting off his deputy and other men when he learns that they've been looting weaponry and are gunning for the BRIDGE investigators.
  • Ship Tease:
    • As the main character, Mahmoud has many moments of this.
      • Partway through the story, he starts getting a little of this with Skye. Unfortunately, due to Skye's recent issues with Ward, it doesn't work out.
      • Early on in the story's lifespan, some of the fans made a hobby out of pointing out unintentional Ship Tease(es) with Black Widow and Dial, though their relationship is more of a mentor-student one. Later, the fans has moved onto Fantasma.
      • After Dial's Winter Guard mission, he hooks up with Jen.
    • Creel has a few moments with Isabelle Hartley. Eventually, the two start sleeping together.
    • Maria Hill and Sam Wilson start to bond over being thrust into leadership roles from the second-in-command post.
  • Shout-Out: Seeing as how the story is a self-insert fic, and the author is quite active on the Sufficient Velocity and Spacebattles forums, there are quite a few shoutouts.
  • Skilled, but Naive:
    • Ruby Hale counts, since she has all the deadly skills and mindset of a trained assassin, but so little real-world experience that Natasha views her as adorable.
    • A few of his hero colleagues are starting to view Dial as this after working with him for some time. For all that Mahmoud is powerful, personable, and genuinely heroic, he still isn't a soldier and has trouble following orders to the letter, isn't as disciplined, and still goes off on vigilante runs without informing anyone, which could get him killed if he isn't careful.
  • Snark-to-Snark Combat: While testing each other's strength with a measurement machine, She-Hulk and Letha can't help but be catty to each other to spur the other on.
    • Also Stark and Dial in most of their scenes together.
  • So Last Season: A gang of looters are cocky when they challenge Coulson's team with state-of-the-art weaponry looted from a SHIELD base. Unfortunately for them, Coulson and Skye are armed with the best that BRIDGE, the organization formed after SHIELD/HYDRA crumbled, has to offer.
  • Spared by the Adaptation:
    • Alexander Pierce, the head of HYDRA in the MCU, is knocked unconscious and arrested during the battle at the Triskelion, rather than being shot by Nick Fury as he was in Captain America: The Winter Soldier.
    • Isabelle Hartley does not die in her first appearance, as she did in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., allowing her to become a reserve member of the Avengers.
  • Spotlight-Stealing Squad: Tony Stark is his usual attention-grabbing self at one of his regular gala events, where he gives a speech in the place of the guy who was actually supposed to give a speech. Much to Pepper's exasperation.
  • Spring-Loaded Corpse: With a dash of Waking Up at the Morgue:
    • War Machine, Mockingbird and Nomad enter a room filled with Hammer drone remains that HYDRA was attempting to piece back together, only for the one they're inspecting to jerk back to life. Though they gun it down, it's quickly followed by its fellows trying to follow their programming to kill the allies of Tony Stark.
    • When BRIDGE comes to Russia to assist with a situation, a handful of half-monkey half-robot corpses that were collected turn out not to be corpses after all.
  • Straight Man and Wise Guy:
    • When seeing Victoria Hand and She-Hulk interact, Dial starts thinking of sitcom ideas with the former as the serious one and the latter as the party girl.
    • This becomes the first dynamic between the The Leader, and his rescued, irreverent ally Ulysses Klaue.
  • Superhero Sobriquets: The Universal Dial himself calls out the phenomenon when Stilt Man addresses him as such, mildly annoyed that he doesn’t remember if Stilt Man himself has one.
  • The Swear Jar: Pop's jar from Luke Cage (2016) shows up, with Jessica falling afoul of it several times. And then Tony Stark drops in for a haircut, sees the jar, gets delighted, and proceeds to tell the raunchiest stories he knows of him and all the calendar girls he knows (pausing whenever one of the kids pop in). And when he's done, he pays with exact change!
  • Swiss-Army Gun: Using his alien know-how and all the genius assistance available, Dial's developed Weapon Gear, now standard issue for all BRIDGE Elite agents. The Model 1 handgun can switch between bullets and ICER rounds; the Model 2 BCW rifle is similar but has more variety, ranging from laser to repulsor fire and shotgun and automatic configurations.
    • As of the Nexus of Realities storyline, Phil Coulson's Lawgiver copy works much the same way.
  • A Taste of Defeat: Dial had been on a winning streak in actual fights ever since arriving in the MCU, but the streak is finally broken when Ulik the troll beats him as Fourarms like a drum. The fact sticks in Mahmoud's craw for quite a while after, and he doesn't like it.
  • Team Member in the Adaptation:
    • The reserve Avengers team includes two canonical characters who have never been Avengers in any medium (though largely drawing from their Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. portrayals who've never met the MCU's Avengers), Isabelle Hartley and Absorbing Man (the former taking on the new codename Warrior and the latter renaming himself to Alloy). The former was an Ascended Extra, adapted from a SHIELD agent whose only comic appearance was in a single issue of Dark Avengers, and whose more fleshed-out Agents of SHIELD depiction died onscreen in her first appearance (largely appearing in flashbacks if she was ever seen again). The latter is a supervillain in the comics whose Agents of SHIELD depiction had undergone Adaptational Heroism, but was largely confined to working with Glenn Talbot and thus alternated between siding with SHIELD and with the enemy depending on the story.
    • Frank Castle, best known as The Punisher, is recruited by BRIDGE (the reborn SHIELD), a team he never joined in the comics.
  • Teeth-Clenched Teamwork:
    • This is what Dial tries to teach to the Hulk and Bruce Banner during his Percussive Therapy session with them, as they need both the Hulk's power and Bruce's logic to save their cousin Jenny, no matter how much they dislike each other. Indeed, their mutual hate for one another is what finally triggers the Hulk's famous rage-strength boost during his next encounter with Blonsky.
    • A few other heroes with the Headbutting Heroes relationship have this problem - see the trope above for specifics.
    • A one-sided example with Kraven and X, since the latter doesn't appreciate the former's quirks and attitude during the S&R mission.
  • Tempting Fate:
    • After BRIDGE successfully rescued Audrey Nathan and driven HYDRA off, Simmons comments that they should simply attack and get it over with. Guess what happens next?
    • Ulysses Klaue thinks that today will be a good day, immediately censures himself for thinking it, then relaxes when nothing happens. Cue Black Panther.
    • When asked to head off to Russia for an assignment, Mahmoud asks how cold it could be in April.
    • Dial thinks how every visit to the Savage Land involves a plane crash or people getting lost with no resources. Guess what happens to him.
  • Terrible Interviewees Montage: Implied when Steve and Bucky tell Mahmoud about all the potential Avengers nominees they'd been talking to around the world. Some were good people unable to be Avengers for tangible reasons, and then...
    Bucky: There’ve also been overconfident jackasses who you had to beat up, one woman who demanded you kick the ‘blacks’ off the team, two women screaming we were anti-feminist for not accepting them, a scientist that tried to kidnap me for my arm, and a rapist that Jarvis exposed.
    Steve: ...Well, yes, but at least we caught the last two.
  • Terror Hero: Snare-Oh drops into this alongside Daredevil as they go on a nighttime patrol, and end up breaking up a sex slave trade in progress. Fittingly, that chapter was published on Halloween.
    • It says something when actual literal demons from hell, who regularly sacrifice people and engage in casual brutality, start running scared from Frank Castle, AKA The Punisher.
    • Shortly before Jessica Jones and Luke Cage meet with Sam, Dial, and Maria Hill, a maid sees Dial in his Big Chill form and makes the sign of the cross as he passes.
    • Chernobog plays this up to the maximum, partially because, well, he's a god of Evil, and partly because he's a massive troll.
    • When confronting the Brotherhood, Nick Fury and Dial point out that the Brotherhood are tough and have strong powers, but if BRIDGE was having difficulty, they could just drop the Hulk on the Brotherhood... or "The Doomslayer Of Rio," AKA Frank Castle. Toad notably pales at the mention of the later.
  • That's What She Said: She-Hulk comments that Fourarms is a big one when she first sees him, and when Thor says the same thing, Dial says the line. He immediately regrets it.
  • Textual Celebrity Resemblance: This is how Mahmoud (and by extension the pic) describes most of the characters of importance that he meets, from those that have appeared in the MCU (e.g. Chris Evans as Steve Rogers), to those that haven't (e.g. Dolph Lundgren as Ursa Major).
  • Token Evil Teammate: The Winter Guard has a couple:
    • Kraven the Hunter, who is the only one who relishes being a potential guard against the Avengers;
    • Chernobog, a literal God of Evil that was put on the team for his divine powers.
  • Transformation Name Announcement:
    • BRIDGE Agents or heroes wearing the catom-based Armor Gear say their codename to materialize it.
    • Dial copies Ben in doing this. And later, Hulk copies him.
  • Trash the Set: The SHIELD Bus gets destroyed at the hands of Red Ghost's cybernetic monkeys.
  • A Twinkle in the Sky: What happens to Ulik when Thor and Iron Man hit him with a combination attack, much to Hill's chagrin as it meant that they lost him.
  • Ungrateful Bastard:
    • After Upgrade removes a Centipede-enhanced HYDRA agent's nanites to save her life after her HYDRA handlers try to self-destruct her, all she does is scream about how he stole her powers once she recovers.
    • Happens again with gamma-mutated HYDRA operatives- well, some of them. Others, like Rana, actually take to prison well and start getting rehabilitation.
  • Verbal Backspace: Midway through his gushing about his new Lawgiver pistol, Coulson notices Skye's reaction and sheepishly comments that she doesn't care.
    Skye: I care! (Sees that Coulson isn't fooled) I mean, I care... that you care?
  • Villain: Exit, Stage Left:
    • As the final HYDRA assault is going on, Baron Strucker manages to escape with a few resources while BRIDGE and the Avengers are diverted rescuing other hostages.
    • The Red Ghost manages to escape in a rocket after BRIDGE and the Winter Guard manage to foil his plans.
  • Villainous Breakdown: Blizzard pulls out all the stops after Iron Man and Upgrade eliminate Blackout.
  • Villain with Good Publicity: To the people of the Savage Land, Sauron is their leader, protector and hero. To anyone he enslaves and any outsider looking in, Dial included, he is a tyrant to be deposed.
  • Welcome to My World: After Pepper makes the decision to do more and protect people in her Rescue suit, Tony finally understands what she feels about him going out, doing good, and getting shot at in the process.
  • What a Piece of Junk: War Machine, Mockingbird and Nomad come across a HYDRA prototype armorsuit drone that was cobbled together from Tony's Igor suit, Ivan Vanko's Whiplash suit, and the Iron Monger, held together with Chitauri tech. Despite looking and acting like a clunker, it still gives the group a run for their money.
  • What the Hell, Hero?: Sauron gives one to Dial and Avengers for sowing chaos in the Savage Land by trying to overthrow him just because they don't like his rule and because Dial wants revenge for being enslaved. It falls flat due to Sauron himself being an outsider and his rule deliberately stunting the people and maintaining slavery, although it snaps Dial out of his revenge mindset.
  • Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?: During a council meeting in Wakanda, where T'Chaka and his advisers discuss Dial's intent to improve the world's technology and his invitation to bring Wakanda into the fold (which would mean exposing their secrets), one council member gives a cynical suggestion to eliminate Dial before his developments surpass Wakanda's. Even if Dial's invitation wasn't to Wakanda's benefit, T'Chaka pragmatically points out that taking into account Dial's power, versatility and connections with the Avengers, a successful assassination would require so much of their power that it would reveal their capabilities to the world anyway.
  • Willfully Weak: Black Widow orders Dial to not use his alien forms during their assault on the suborned SHIELD Academy, both to conserve its power until they encounter a major threat, and so that Dial doesn't use the altered mentality of his aliens as an escape from dealing with his first kill.
  • Wonder Twin Powers: Whatever was done to Blizzard and Blackout to boost their powers seems to grow stronger the closer their physical proximity to each other.
  • Worf Had the Flu: Dial spends the Savage Arc with busted armor and the Omnitrix, no backup and injured after being tossed off a cliff and coming too close to Anti-Metal.
  • Wrestler in All of Us:
    • Rath. His whole race is a race of wrestlers.
    • Titania used to be a wrestler, to Rath's delight.
    • The Hulk starts using wrestling moves, having picked it up from Rath.
  • Wrong Genre Savvy: Mahmoud has only knowledge of the general Marvel universe from comics, making him rather bemused by all the famous actors portraying the Marvel characters he knows.
    • As an example, he knows Scarlet Witch as the reality-warping badass in the comics, so he is slightly surprised at how scared she is when he first meets her.
  • You Have Failed Me: When the super-strong bank robber Mary MacPherson hears that one of her accomplices was seen by BRIDGE agents, she crushes his skull, mostly as a means of exerting power and control over her world.
  • Young Future Famous People: Dial makes sure to keep track of any such person, including Peter Parker, Kamala Khan, and Doctor Doom.

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