Most who has read the Secret Invasion crossover of Marvel's comics must remember how much some of the skrulls inherited from the being they impersonated, to the point some had a hard time telling their cover's feelings from their own, when said feelings didn't become their own.
But if you remember correctly, most skrulls seemed to be perfectly aware they risked forgetting they weren't who they pretended to be, not really.
Couldn't they have used it as a way to force the few unwilling of them to help invade hearth? Couldn't they plant some instructions in their mind, so they would work for Queen Veranke, while convinced to act in earth's best interest, convinced to be the heroes they were impersonating?
It was the case in the universe we're speaking of today.
There, instead of trying to convince Lyja to join them, the invading skrulls brainwashed her into believing she truly was who she was impersonating, while placing some instructions deep in her subconscious mind, to make her follow them without being aware of anything.
Of course, with her past history on Earth, there was only one person she could replace for this to go flawlessly: Her ex-boyfriend and only true love, Johnny Storm, more known as the Human Torch.
Thankfully for that world, part of Lyja couldn't help but still consider the FF as her family, a sentiment only reinforced by her unwilling impersonation of her former lover.
So when she was about to kill Ben Grimm and the Richards kids, using Sue and Reed absence, her mind entered in shock, all the truth instantly revealed to her.
Of course, the would-be victims were quite shocked to see their friend and uncle slowly sitting on the cold floor before going into foetal position, especially when he simultaneously changed into a familiar skrull.
No one know if it was because of how distraught she looked, or her mad muttering, but even Ben, who's known to clobber first and ask after, didn't act violently toward Lyja beyond stomping on her alien gun.
It took some time, but with Franklin's help he was able to calm her down and think coherently. (When it comes to comforting peoples, Valeria is useless.)
After hearing how her kin forced Lyja to help them with their latest invasion scheme, making her believe she truly was Johnny, everyone was horrified, even the usually stone cold Valeria. Horror became fear when she spoke of how the skrulls where now able to imitate earth's mightiest heroes so perfectly they were virtually undetectable.
Except in Valeria's case, whose horror changed in sudden interest. “That process rendering a skrull able to become a perfect replica of a particular individual, they used it on you. That's how you can be Uncle Johnny, powers includes, right?”
Not seeing were Valeria was going with her question, the still confused skrull simply nodded.
“If you let me study your transformation, I should be able to force any skrull to revert to their natural form…” And with that, Val' took Lyja's hand, taking her to her father's lab. The two boys followed them, Franklin being curious, and Ben by fear for the kids safety.
Normally, the ever loving Thing wouldn't let Valeria do the research by herself. But things were far from normal, and while he would usualy ask Stretch or, failing that, Suzie to look at Val's theories and help/supervise/do the experiments, Reed was inexplicably missing and he didn't want to call Suzie during her conference in Vancouver, especially when she could be a Skrull in disguise…
In only two hours, Val' was able to make something capable to forcefully make the skrulls reveal their true nature. With more time, she could make it able to deprive said skrulls from their impersonations powers, but time wasn't a thing they had right now. (Plus, it could be problematic for the few skrulls wanting to protect Earth, like Lyja.)
So instead, she produced a lot of the tiny devices, distributing to both heroes still presents. “Remember, they only work on the skrulls new, more sophisticated transformations. Skrulls using their natural shapeshifting abilities aren't changed back by it, as our tests demonstrated,” she said pointing to Lyja, who currently looked disturbingly like a female version of Johnny Storm.
“The plans is to use them on any heroes you meet, and give one of our ‘Skrull Revealer’ to anyone that isn't affected. That said, since it could still be a skrull using their natural abilities, if you still have a doubt after using the ‘Skrull Revealer’, feel free to use more traditional means of skrulls busting.”
Then, looking directly at their skrull ally for the first time since she started her little speech, Valeria added “And please Lyja, don't make yourself look so much like the inexistent twin-sister of uncle Johnny, this plan can't work if you're discovered as a skrull before we repel this invasion!”
Ben grumbled something sounding deceptively like Laura Green and, while Lyja wasn't comfortable using her old Terran identity anymore, she couldn't help but agree with the blue eyed Thing. That said, before she could change shape accordingly, she got a sudden idea.
“Hum… Valeria? Couldn't we connect some of these to some antennae, like a radio-tower or something, to help us propagate your ‘Skrull Revealer’ signal on greater areas?”
At first, Val' was simply surprised. Until then, this Lyja acted every bit like an extremely shy version of her missing uncle. But suggesting something, and being serious about it? Without being asked to? That's definitely not something Johnny Storm would have done. “Uncle Johnny always think of himself as stupider than he truly his” often lamented Valeria.
Then, she realized that someone add suggested something she hadn't even considered, a good idea even. Rather than admitting it, she pretended this was the second phase of her plans, but wasn't ready for it yet.
Then she got back to work, enraged. Her uncle Ben only shook is head at this. Franklin, for his part was terrified. Seeing his sister furious like that, he couldn't help but think of her as a miniature Dr. Doom, a very pissed one, at that.
He couldn't decide what was worst, living with a mini-Doom, or being related to it…
For a time, things looked like they would end better than on Marvel's official continuity, called earth-616 by some peoples, and for the most part, they did.
But if you ask the local incarnation of the remaining Fantastic Four, then they didn't. Sure, they helped save the world, but it didn't take long for Veranke to guess who was that woman with powers identical to the Human Torch ones.
She retaliated by killing Johnny.
The queen knew how grief stricken Earth's heroes would be by his death. She also knew Lyja would be in the same mental state than them, and hopped it would make that traitor reveal her true self, causing distrust in the heroes she undoubtedly helped to unite.
What queen Veranke hadn't expected, would be for Lyja to go into an impressive fit of rage, incinerating every spaceship from the skrull armada, her only sign of fatigue being her slow return to her true form.
Only when all and every spaceship were atomized, did Lyja finally dare look at Veranke, and it was with murderous intent.
When the shapeshifting defender of Earth started to walk toward the now scared queen, no one dared to stop her. In fact, both heroes and invaders moved aside, fearing what would happen otherwise.
Finally having Veranke at arm length, she grabbed her, Lyja's hand tightening around the queen's neck. “I don't know what disgust me the more about you, Veranke,” she claimed, saying the name with an almost lethal dose of hate, “your choice to take earth by force, your choice to remove humanity from it, or the fact you forced some of us to help you do it against our will, Brainwashing us into what you saw fit.”
Then, slowly reigniting her flame, she added “Was it so hard, to simply ASK HUMANITY IF THEY COULDN'T SHARE THEIR HOME with at least some of us, after our home planet got destroyed? WAS IT?!?”
“Sure, after how much grief our kin caused them, they might have said no. But we are shapeshifters, aren't we? Couldn't we have secretly sent some of our stronger warriors to act as Earth's defenders, increasing the number of their champions? Do you think they still would have rejected us then?”
To everyone surprise, Lyja simply released her hold of Veranke, letting said Queen fall on her royal butt, before adding “For the longest time, I believed that us, skrulls, where all about adapting to new situations. I was wrong! Most of are unable to truly adapt, and the few who are as adaptable as we claim to be are either seen as heretics or traitors, when not both.”
“I was wrong, and you are the one who proved it.” That said, Lyja turning her back to Veranke, slowly walking away. After a few steps, she felt, exhaustion finally catching up to her, the Invisible Woman using her force-fields to catch the friendly skrull before she could hurt herself.
Queen Veranke looked around, wanting to see how her kin reacted to that latest development. She saw a lot of them doing the skrull military salute, but they were looking toward Lyja, not in Veranke's direction.
While the unconscious Lyja was taken care of by her human family, the remaining FF, you could hear one skrull after another saying “I surrender”, every last of them was on his knees, hands behind their head, until the former queen Veranke was the only one left, head lowered.
A week later, the matter of what should be done about all the skrulls prisoner was far from being decided. Not beside making them help rebuild everything they destroyed by their ‘secret’ invasion, at least.
Veranke, for her part, was detained in a cell specially designed by… Tony Stark, Dr. Reed Richards being, like the rest of his family, already taking care of Lyja while restructuring both the Fantastic Four and their charity foundation, all this on top of mourning Johnny.
Speaking of Lyja, now considered a hero by most, be it humans or skrulls, she had fully recuperated from the final fight against her kin, at least physically.
What worried the doctors was her mental state. Even now that she remembered who she truly was, because of what her kin did to her, she still acted like Johnny would half the time, and had difficulty in distinguishing her memories from Johnny's.
“Her mind is so jumbled, no one can tell where end Lyja and where start Johnny,” she could hear the doctor say to her human friends, from the other side of her door.
“Imagine if the both of you got merged into one being, body and mind, without loosing any of your memories.” Pursued the doctor, clearly speaking to Sue and Reed. “Under certain conditions, since that ‘fused’ being could still differentiate the memories from one of from those of the other, even if it saw both set as being his or hers, it could lead it to think he's more one than the other.”
“Mentally speaking, that's exactly your friend's situation. It's possible she hasn't all the memories of the late Johnny Storm or that some are inexact, but they aren't less a part of her. Under her circumstances, rejecting ‘the Johnny Storm in her’ like she tries to do isn't healthy and could have dramatic repercussions.”
“So, while her body is 100% Lyja the Skrull, I hope you can accept that, mentally speaking, she's both that and Mr. Storm fused into one being, and help her do the same.” After a pause, he finally opened the door, letting the Fantastic enter their friend's room.
The first one to speak was Sue, asking “You heard all that was said, didn't you?”
“I did, but that's something he discussed with me already. I know… I know things are hard enough for you with the real Johnny's death and all, but if you're fine with it, I would like to go home.”
The Fantastic knew by home she mean the Baxter Building, and smiled at her. “Of course you can, you are part of our family after all, sis.” Said Susan, tears of joy staining her cheeks.
The road toward recovery may have still been long for the skrull girl. But right then, between being accepted back in the Baxter, and Sue calling her sister even if they don't share any blood, (not anymore), not really, she couldn't help but hug her sibling, felling like the best day in her life.
When they finally broke the hug, the skrull immediately saw how mischievous suddenly looked Ben. “Ya know the skrulls call yerself ‘Queen Lyja’ now, yer majesty?”