Fantastic Four (Earth-21399)

Foundations
The events that led to the formation of the Fantastic Four began in 1962, in a college dormitory in Columbia University. There, three men lived as roommates: Reed Richards, one of the most brilliant young minds of his time; Benjamin Grimm, an engineering major on a football scholarship, and Viktor Domashev, an exchange student from Yugoslavia whose intellect rivaled Reed's own. Reed and Ben had been friends since high school, but Viktor, an imperious and narcissistic man, immediately disliked the both of them on their first meeting.

Reed and Viktor often compared their theses, but Viktor would often get offended whenever Reed tried to point out errors in his calculations. Reed's dream was of the day that mankind would break free of their earthly prison to make their way into the infinite universe – a dream to which Ben half-jokingly said that should Reed ever get a ship working out, he would want to pilot it.

The three roommates went their separate ways after college. Ben was accepted into the Air Force and flew as a test pilot after a brief sortie in Vietnam, Reed was hired by NASA as one of their chief researchers into manned space flight, and Viktor continued his research in private somewhere else in the United States. He never forgave the two for what he imagined were their slights against him.

Origin
It was at NASA where their lives changed forever. Reed had reunited with Ben, whom the prodigy held to his old promise from college to fly a ship, and was introduced to young Susan Storm through one of his coworkers, physician Dr. Franklin Storm. Despite a seven-year age gap between them, Reed and Sue began a romantic relationship soon after meeting.

In 1970, using instruments that were left behind on the Moon, Reed somehow discovered an unusual radiation signature emanating from the Fra Mauro Highlands, and requested another mission for the purpose of investigating. This request was granted after some deliberation, and Reed selected Ben Grimm to fly the shuttle. During the maiden flight of Apollo 13, Reed, Ben and fellow crew member Bentley Whitman landed in the Fra Mauro Highlands on the Moon. With Whitman in the command module, Reed and Ben went out to dig for materials to conduct experiments with, only to dig up a strange, glowing blue cubical artifact, which they transported back home in a containment unit.

Back on Earth, the Cube was moved in secret to the Baxter Institute, a secret government research center. Despite his best efforts, Reed and the other scientists at the Institute had trouble figuring out the Cube's true nature, so Reed called upon Viktor Domashev to help. Viktor accepted the offer only so that he could prove his superior intellect. Meanwhile, Susan moved into the Institute to work as Franklin's assistant, mostly out of a desire to continue her relationship with Reed. This left her younger brother, Johnny, feeling left out, prompting him to sneak into the Institute.

Reed and Viktor made significant headway in understanding the Cube, discovering it was a conduit for "some unknown form of radioactive energy". However, Viktor secretly began developing a machine to harness the Cube's power in the hopes of figuring out where his mother had gone and potentially freeing her, but his calculations were off by two crucial decimal points and the experiment quickly got out of control. Reed, Viktor, Ben, Susan, Johnny and numerous bystanders were zapped by the rampant energy unleashed by the Cube. Reed, Ben, Susan and Johnny were transported outside the facility, while Viktor was grazed in the head, leaving a single, glowing scar.

Reed and his compatriots woke up in the middle of a field in Nevada, and discovered that the Cube's radiation had altered their bodies - Reed was transformed into an elastic being that could remold itself into a variety of shapes. Sue was transformed into an "invisible woman", as Johnny put it. Ben was transformed into a large, rocklike creature with superhuman strength and durability, and Johnny was transformed into a flammable man; a "human torch", as he put it. Before any of them could come to grips with their newfound abilities, they were picked up by military officials under the command of General Walter Allan and placed under quarantine.