An Ever-Changing Chronology
When the Young Avengers made their activities public, Avengers founders Steve Rogers, AKA Captain America, and Tony Stark, AKA Iron Man, resolved to shut them down, confronting them at Avengers Mansion. Iron Lad’s future self, longtime Avengers foe Kang the Conqueror, arrived shortly thereafter. During the ensuing battle, Iron Lad was forced to return to his native era to save the timestream. With Kang defeated, the Avengers ordered the would-be heroes to give up their adventuring; but Kate Bishop, AKA Hawkeye, supplied the youths with new uniforms and other resources, and they defeated such criminals as Herman Schultz, AKA Shocker, and Calvin Zabo, AKA Mister Hyde. Despite their successes, the Avengers once again ordered their youthful counterparts to give up their costumed identities for their own safety.
Shortly afterwards, Kl’rt, AKA Super-Skrull, attacked the teens, kidnapped Teddy (killing Teddy’s foster mother in the process) and revealed his true Kree/Skrull heritage. This exposé nearly ignited another Kree-Skrull War before Super-Skrull opted to pose as Teddy, whom both races claimed as their own, and departed Earth in the guise.
After the Super Hero Civil War erupted, Hulkling was instrumental in breaking incarcerated heroes out of the 42 Negative Zone prison while posing as Henry Pym, AKA Yellowjacket. Though Hulkling and most of his teammates refused to join the Initiative in the aftermath, an Earth-721 “Earth-A” counterpart of his did so before being caught and sent back to his home dimension. Learning that his father apparently was pulled forth in time, Teddy confronted Captain Marvel (actually a brainwashed Skrull posing as Mar-Vell), though their meeting ended abruptly. During the Skrull Invasion, Teddy was targeted by Skrull extremists, but was protected by his teammates and the members of the Runaways.
When Wiccan’s reality-warping powers spiraled out of control, Teddy and the Avengers sought to help him by searching for the missing Scarlet Witch. They allied with her father, the mutant terrorist Max Esienhardt, AKA Magneto, and her brother Pietro Maximoff, AKA Quicksilver, and found Wanda without her memories and engaged to the Latverian dictator Victor Von Doom, AKA Doctor Doom. Doom captured Wiccan, leading to a war with the Avengers, the Young Avengers, Quicksilver and Magneto, though Iron Lad appeared and teleported the Young Avengers and Wanda to safety, and into the past. While there, Wanda remembered everything and regained her powers. Upon returning to the present, Iron Lad met the new Vision and seeing him as a threat, instantly destroyed him. Meanwhile, Scarlet Witch was horrified by the sins of her past, and about to reverse the damage she caused on M-Day when the majority of mutants lost their powers. However, Patriot intervened, allowing Doctor Doom to claim Wanda’s powers. A battle followed between the all-powerful Doom and the combined forces of the other teams, with a giant-sized Stature, and the heroes saved the day but lost Stature in the process. Counting their losses, the Young Avengers disbanded.
Months passed, and Teddy watched as Billy spiraled into a depression as he blamed himself for losing control of his powers in the first place. Teddy supported Billy but when enough was enough, he encouraged his boyfriend to talk to him, and proposed marriage as long as he would get off his butt and do something. They were soon called to Avengers Mansion on the orders of Captain America, and the remaining team of Young Avengers were dubbed official Avengers for their heroic deeds.
Though both Teddy and Billy agreed to retire from that hero's life. Teddy secretly continued being a hero and the couple fought about it. Billy then accidentally summoned the interdimensional parasite known as Mother who had the power to control parents and resurrect dead ones too, including Teddy’s. America Chavez, AKA Miss America, saved them and they were soon met by Loki who wanted to borrow Wiccan’s powers to stop her. When that didn’t happen, Loki suggested to Teddy that Billy had manufactured their love with his reality-warping abilities and so Teddy spent some time away from Billy. He saw a therapist, Leah, who turned about to be allied with Mother. Teddy was imprisoned in Mother’s dimension with fellow Young Avenger David Alleyne, AKA Prodigy, who made his feelings known for Teddy with a kiss. The pair were soon rescued and the team reconvened. The team decided to return to Mother’s dimension and stop her. Teddy and Billy reconciled, which helped Billy become his true self, the Demiurge, and they defeated Mother. After saving the world, Teddy and the Young Avengers partied and David talked to Billy over his kiss with Teddy, smoothing things over between the friends. Billy then told Teddy he loved him for the first time.
Hulkling and Wiccan soon received bids to join the New Avengers led by Roberto Da Costa, AKA Sunspot, who was heading a new, altruistic spinoff of Advanced Idea Mechanics (A.I.M.). Though Hulkling was abducted by the Knights of the Infinite, a group of Kree-Skrull hybrids who believed that Hulkling was destined to become their king, and Wiccan used a spell to tag along. Taken to the Light of Truth, Hulkling was instructed to enter the light and find his destiny. Hulkling entered and emerged from the light, having pulled the Star-Sword from a stone, and with it became the King of Space. While there, Hulkling and Wiccan encountered a sinister space wizard named Moridun summoned from a previous reality by an evil Reed Richards, AKA The Maker. Meanwhile, their fellow New Avengers teammates launched a rescue mission to get them back. With the team at his back and both Wiccan and the Star-Sword by his side, they drove the wizard away. But secretly, Moridun possessed Wiccan’s subconscious and planned to destroy reality. Hulkling intervened and helped drive Moridun’s consciousness away. The New Avengers splintered and disbanded soon after, with Sunspot giving Teddy and Billy a luxury Central Park apartment as a parting gift—the couple’s first cohabitation. With their new digs, they chose to forgo heroics and focus on themselves.
While Teddy and Billy attended a concert, Death’s Head attacked the crowd. So, they stepped in and stopped him. They took him back to their apartment where Wiccan had secretly been storing an “upgraded” version of Death’s Head stolen from an A.I.M. lab. Wiccan believed that the two bots were closely tied to the future of the Avengers. The couple notified their old pal Kate Bishop to watch over the robots so they could get some shut eye. Once they did, the party returned to the lab to investigate the origins of the “young” Death’s Head, nicknamed “Vee. There, they found Vee’s creator, Dr. Evelyn Necker—a name familiar to Death’s Head from another universe. Necker had been building version after version of Death’s Head, searching for perfection. But now seeing the original, Necker wanted both DH and Vee, even if it meant breaking them first. A battle followed, and escaping, Billy apologized to Teddy for causing the mess they were in and Teddy offered him some tough love, encouraging him to see it through. Kate backed Teddy, noting controlling the future was possible, she’d have done it. Teddy followed other robots in disguise as one himself, hoping they’d lead him to Death’s Head and it worked. Reunited, the team realized that Necker gave all the robots independent thought but planned to destroy them all with an E.M.P. The group decided to set the robots free so they could leave lives of their own and they did as Death’s Head defeated Necker at her own game.
While Billy was off helping Strikeforce, Teddy learned that the Kree and Skrulls had finally come together against their common enemy, the plantlike race known as the Cotati. This Kree/Skrull Alliance asked Teddy to lead them as their figurehead and Emperor, with Tanalth the Pursuer and Super-Skrull as the real leaders. Before he left, Teddy and Billy married in a last-minute wedding ceremony in Las Vegas where their closest friends, the Young Avengers, were in attendance.
Teddy’s new position as the King of Space was demanding, so the super-spouses put their honeymoon on hold and had a long-distance relationship. When the Skrulls and Kree attacked the Cotati at their base on the Blue Area of the Moon, the Avengers and Fantastic Four intervened as the Cotati had been known as a peaceful race. But the Cotati fought back and using their deadly vines, they invaded earth with plans to eradicate the life there, and turn it into their own Empyre. Teddy was encouraged to use a weapon known as the Pyre to destroy Earth’s sun to stop the Cotati, but his love for humanity was enough for Tanalth (who was Teddy’s grandmother R’Klll in disguise) to imprison and replace him with a lookalike.
Teddy was soon rescued by his husband, Billy, thanks to help from Carol Danvers, AKA Captain Marvel, and Johnny Storm, AKA Human Torch. Together, they faced R’Klll and eventually Hulkling defeated her and Tony Stark stopped the Pyre from detonating. The Cotati were ultimately defeated as well, and Hulkling became more than just a figurehead to the Kree/Skrull Alliance. Teddy and Billy then had a formal wedding on the Alliance’s flagship and Billy, taking Teddy’s last name, was named Prince Consort and Court Wizard.
The newlyweds went on their honeymoon with Accuser Lauri-Ell as their security guard, and stayed at a beachside resort on the Shi’ar’s Little Chandilar. When a horde of Symbiote dragons attacked, they leapt to action to save Little Chandilar. Teddy checked in with home where reports confirmed that Knull, God of the Symbiotes, and his army of dragons were attacking their way across the galaxy. Teddy and Billy led an effort to evacuate Little Chandilar.
The super-spouses soon split up to protect the galaxy from a Dormammu-possessed Ego the Living Planet, who attempted to gobble up five planets. Though apart, they fought the Mindless Army and used their wedding rings, the Nega-Rings, to switch places with each other in a time of need—their rings were forged and recast from what was left of Teddy’s father’s Nega-Bands.
Teddy and Billy were later ambushed by Teddy’s half-brother Genis-Vell, who was being controlled by the Undone, a cosmic-energy eater, who was targeting Marvels and desired Teddy’s Nega-Rings. The ensorcelled Genis-Vell easily disarmed Hulkling’s Chief Accuser Lauri-Ell and got close enough to Teddy to take the ring but touched the Star-Sword and corrupted it. Wiccan teleported Genis-Vell away and they sought Carol Danvers for answers. She, too, was being targeted by the Undone and they teamed up against their common foe. Though the Undone soon caught Hulkling in their grasp and drained his energy, charging herself up. Wiccan cast a spell to return Hulkling to him. Meanwhile, Genis-Vell’s former Nega-Band partner Rick Jones tried to save him from the Undone’s brainwashing to no avail. Genis-Vell’s body then broke open a gateway, letting the Undone through. With help from allies and the Nega-Bands, Carol then defeated the Undone. She used the remaining energy of the Nega-Bands to resurrect Hulkling’s half-brother. Though he was grateful, he was unforgiving that the Nega-Bands were gone and asked for space. Hulkling and the others rejoiced and celebrated their win.
