Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes and all related characters and concepts are the property of Marvel Entertainment and the Walt Disney Company. Please don't sue me, Mousy Overlords. :(
Undisclosed Location
Grainy images of the two quinjets disappearing over the horizon followed closely by a hammer-spinning Thor, played across a bank of grey monitors.
"Excellent." a voice whispered softly in the darkness.
The speaker was, by and large, an unimposing figure. Pale skin, dark bushy hair and a diminutive physique wrapped in a plain green jumpsuit, all combined to give an impression quite unlike that many would expect from one of the most wanted super-criminals on the planet.
Though the ignorant might call him 'mad', he preferred to refer to himself simply as… The Thinker.
He sat upon a plain stool, chin resting upon his fist. Behind him stood a row of half-complete android duplicates at silent attention. With a flick of a dial, the images upon the row of monitors changed.
Spider-Man struggled with Doctor Octopus and the newly formed Sinister Seven in lower Manhattan. In Mexico City, the mutant X-Men were currently locked in combat with the immortal warlord known only as Apocalypse. Meanwhile, the Baxter Building stood deserted as the Fantastic Four explored the Microverse.
The Thinker's lips curled upwards. He had waited months for this inevitable moment when all of Earth's so-called 'heroes' were simultaneously occupied or incommunicado. The perfect moment to set his 'Final Plan' into motion.
His thumb hovered over a crimson switch, savoring the moment. One flick and by the time the 'heroes' realized what was happening, it would be too late. He'd prepared for every contingency, calculated every possible outcome, factored in every conceivable variable.
In short, he'd done the math.
So naturally, the Thinker was completely taken aback to hear a chill high-pitched tittering coming from somewhere over his shoulder. He instantly spun around on his stool only to freeze in mute incomprehension.
Perched upon the shoulder of an inert android sat a creature unlike any the Thinker had ever seen. Barely two-feet-tall, spindly-limbed with a skin of ice-blue and a wispy beard of snow-white; the creature was clad in blood-red tights and a tiny forest green waistcoat bestrewn with bells of gold and silver.
Its manically grinning teeth champed down upon a jauntily-angled candy cane while clutching a dull grey Walther P38 in both comically undersized hands. It was unmistakably, undeniably, an elf…
An elf with a gun.
The Thinker watched in frozen fascination as the elf awkwardly raised its weapon. His mind whirred furiously, trying to decipher how such a creature could even exist, let alone penetrate his lair's defenses.
No answers came as the creature took aim, its tittering rising to a crackling crescendo.
It just didn't add up.
BANG!
[-]
Glastonbury Tor, Somerset, England
A sea of grey mist spread over the countryside under the light of a cold dim sun. The only feature to be seen was a looming green hill that rose island-like from the watery mist, crowned by a single ancient stone tower.
The air was silent save for a distant peal of thunder and the soft fluttering of tiny wings.
"So according to the guidebook I downloaded this is supposed to be where King Arthur is buried! How cool is that? King. Freaking. Arthur!" Wasp gushed, zipping through the sky. "Hey Thor, you were around back then, right?"
"Aye," the Thunderer nodded as he soared alongside her. "But the Gods of Asgard and those of these isles have a rather… fractious relationship. I ne're had many opportunities to visit these lands til-"
"RAAAAAAARGH!"
The Hulk plummeted out of the sky like an emerald comet, colliding with the thunder god.
"THOR!?" Wasp cried as both combatants where swallowed by the sea of mist below. She was about to give chase when a black leathery wing blocked her path.
"Mine apologies, Lady van Dyne," the Black Knight intoned solemnly from astride his winged mount, drawing his Ebon Blade from its sheath with a cold metallic hiss. "But I can't allow thee to pass!"
[-]
Tihuța Pass, Eastern Carpathian Mountains, Romania
Wanda stood in the shadow of a crumbling castle. It crouched atop the snow-capped mountain like some vast sleeping gargoyle, ready to awaken once the already low hanging sun finally sunk below the horizon.
"Figures Doc's maguffin would be back in the 'old country', eh sis?" Pietro snorted.
"Let's just get what we came for and leave." Wanda drew her crimson cloak close, failing to ward off a chill that had little to do with the crisp mountain wind. "I don't like this place. It feels… evil."
"Wanda, please don't get all superstitious on me," Pietro pleaded. "Bad enough I have to listen to Doc drone on about the Warbling Woollies of Wabadooshoo or whatev-OW!"
Wanda playfully thumped him on the shoulder. "You know, you might feel more at home in the Sanctum if you didn't go out of your way to alienate everyone around you."
Pietro rolled his eyes. "Oh, you mean like His Royal Saltiness?"
"Namor's actually quite affable once you get past... all that."
"Easy for you to say," Pietro muttered. "He likes you."
"Oh my God..." Wanda's eyes widened. "You're jealous!"
"I-I am NOT!" cried an uncharacteristically flustered Quicksilver.
"Maybe if you ask nicely, I'll set you two up when we get back," Wanda teased affectionately.
"Wanda, I swear if you breathe a word to Namor-"
Tick Tick… BOOM!
Before the smoke had even cleared, Pietro had already swept up Wanda and deposited her in the castle's courtyard before the rotted oaken doors.
"What in-," she gasped.
The twins looked up, only to be greeted by the sight of a purple-clad archer sitting astride what looked like a flying motorcycle. At his side hovered a ghostly transparent figure draped in a voluminous yellow cloak.
"That was a warning shot, kiddies!" Hawkeye drew a second arrow. "The next one won't be."
"Wanda, get the book," Pietro shouted. "I'll hold them off!"
"You and what army, Speedy Gonz-," Hawkeye's retort was cut off by the sound of a whizzing pebble piercing the sky-cycles fuel tank at near sonic speeds.
"AWCRUDAWCRUDAWCRUD!"
[-]
Aswan Dam Reservoir, Upper Egypt
"Vision, was that an explosion?" Iron Man asked into the com of his hydro-armor, jets carrying him through the silty Nile waters towards a semi-sunken island. "What do you mean Hawkeye is 'largely undamaged'? Never mind, just keep the twins away from… whatever they're looking for. Iron Man out."
"Ill tidings, I take it?" the Black Panther's voice spoke through the com. The Wakandan monarch swam alongside the armored Avenger in a sleek black wet-suit that rendered him all but invisible amid the murky waters.
"Kinda," Iron Man conceded. "Hawkeye and Vision have eyes on the twins, Wasp and Thor have already engaged the Hulk and Black Knight."
"Which only leaves Doctor Strange and… MOVE!" Panther shoved Iron Man abruptly aside as something shot past them, cutting through the water with all the vicious speed of a harpoon.
Iron Man and Panther spun in the water, reorienting themselves just as the savage visage of the Sub-Mariner loomed out of the murk; lips peeled back like a shark about to make the kill.
[-]
Glastonbury Tor, England
"HAVE AT THEE, TRAITOR!" Thor bellowed, bringing his hammer down only for the Hulk to sidestep the strike and respond with a backhand that sent the Asgardian flying across the mist-shrouded moors.
"You've really let yourself go, Blondie. Last time we fought, a tap like that woulda barely phased you. 'Smatter?" Hulk sneered, lumbering through the mist. "Feeling a little… burned out?"
The Hulk was answered by a roar of thunderous fury, and the sight of Mjolnir hurtling from the mist before impacting with his jade jaw.
[-]
Wasp let loose another barrage of bioelectric stings, only for the Black Knight to block them with his Ebon Blade. The jet-black metal looked less like a solid object and more like a sword-shaped hole cut into the very fabric of reality as it absorbed the bio-bolts.
"'Tis beneath mine honour to strike a maiden, fair Lady van Dyne!" intoned the Knight imperiously, sweeping across the sky on his winged steed.
"Yeah, well anytime you wanna give-up, feel free!" Wasp replied, before zipping about the Knight's head, loosing another blast that simply pinged off his night-black helm.
"Then you've forced my hand, milady… For a Knight of New Camelot never surrenders!" the Black Knight decreed, before unleashing the pent-up energy of Wasp's own bio-electric stings back at her from his Ebon Blade.
"Whoa…" Wasp cried, barely dodging her own redirected stings. "I did not know you could do that."
"'Twould seem we are at an impasse, milady," spoke the Black Knight. "Your magiks cannot harm me!"
"Maybe not you," Wasp smirked, zipping behind the Knight.
"What are you-" The Black Knight head turned, eyes wide as Wasp took aim at his flying steed's rump.
"Sorry, Horsey," Wasp cringed.
BTZAPP!
The winged equine bucked in mid-air, sending the Knight hurtling across the sky…
"AAAAAAAAAGH-uf!"
Only to abruptly stop mid-fall, a strained Wasp lowering him safely to the foot of the ancient tower below.
"Are you off your bloody rocker!? You coulda snapped my ruddy neck!" yelled the Black Knight, legs kicking mere feet from the ground.
"Oh, relax, I'm a professional," said Wasp, dropping him to the ground. "And happened to all that fancy 'milady' talk anyway?"
The Black Knight scrambled to his feet, awkwardly dusting himself off. "I mean… um… Forsooth, I doth verily…"
Wasp cocked an eyebrow.
"Yeah…" The Black Knight fell into a slump. "That's kind of an act. People don't really take you seriously if you just roll up on a flying horse all 'Oi, mates, fancy a lift?' Believe it or not, I'm actually a physicist."
"Yeah well… mind explaining what all this is about?" asked Wasp. "You're supposed to be a hero?"
"I am! But…" the Black Knight protested. "Look, Wasp… I just want to say that I'm sorry."
"For attacking me up there!?"
"Yes… and this!" Before Wasp could react, Knight raised his Ebon Blade and discharged one last bio-electric blast.
"Was saving that for an emergency," he sighed before dragging the unconscious Wasp a sheltered section of the weathered tower.
Once satisfied that she'd not be disturbed before awakening, he set off through the remains of the tower with furiously darting eyes before…
He found his prize clinging to a dirt-filled crack in the stone walls, barely distinguishable from a common weed at first glance. Yet no common weed had ever bloomed forth petals of such deep perfect obsidian.
"The Ebon Rose…" he whispered, before sounding off a high-pitched whistle.
Within moments, his night-winged steed came swooping out of the skies, alighting by its master's side with equine grace.
"Good boy, Aragorn." The Black Knight patted the beast's flank affectionately.
Just then, the ground beneath foot and hoof alike began to rumble ominously.
[-]
Thor was slammed deep into the soggy moors. He wrenched himself free only to be hammered down again by a cyclopean menhir, torn loose from its roots and wielded like a stone club by the enraged Hulk.
KRA-THUK!
"You're a joke! You know that, right? Acting like you're so much better than me when you're nothing but some clown who spends too much on shampoo!" the Hulk snarled, before raising the stone menhir over his head again.
"WELL…"
KRA-THUK!
"YOU'RE…"
KRA-THUK!
"NOT!"
The rocky bludgeon finally shattered in Hulk's jade fists, who contemptuously cast aside the stone shards.
The last thing Thor saw before darkness claimed him was the Hulk's emerald heel stomping down on his face.
[-]
Tihuța Pass, Romania
Wanda stepped through a weathered stone archway into the pitch blackness beyond, with only a tiny flickering candle to hold back the thirsting dark.
The vast chamber appeared to be a library of sorts. Towering rows of shelves stuffed with ancient tomes and other less describable curious stood either side of her, their tops lost in the upper shadows.
She came to a long reading table, strewn with papers that must have been at least a century old and half crumbled into dust. She squinted, holding the candle close to examine one semi-disintegrated page.
To her surprise, it was not a page torn from some arcane grimoire or piece of medieval genealogy, but merely what appeared to an old British train timetable.
Something whispered in Wanda's ear.
She spun on her heels, brandishing the softly flickering candle like a weapon only to be confronted by yet more silent darkness.
"Hello…" she spoke to the void. "Is someone there?"
She took a slow careful step forward into the darkness then another and another. Each step more strangely certain and confident than the last, as though she were merely following a path laid down especially for her long ago until finally… she saw it.
The Book lay upon a stone lectern. It was bound in some lustrous leather of deepest darkest crimson, like the skin of an antediluvian serpent. The cover bore no distinguishing marks nor lettering. Nothing to distinguish title, author or contents, yet Wanda knew at the first glance exactly what it was.
"The Darkhold," she whispered with fearful reverence.
The Doctor had warned them that under no circumstances were they to read a single word from the tome, lest they risk forfeiting their very souls.
So why did she find her hand moving towards the rusted iron clasp? Why did she find herself wrenching it open with a brittle creak? Why did her finger trace slowly down the red leather, like a lover's caress?
Why are you so afraid of one harmless peek?
Wanda hesitated for a moment. Not long, but just enough for a half-material specter to emerge from the stone wall behind the lectern.
Wanda dropped the candle. Its frail flame died as coruscating crimson energy wreathed her hands in pure chaos, casting the entire chamber in a blood-red glow.
"Perhaps we should talk?" spoke the cool monotone of the Avenger known only as the Vision.
[-]
Hawkeye leaped from one ruined battlement to another, letting loose one arrow after another. "Stand still, ya little-"
He fired yet another shaft at the silver blur that raced back and forth across the castle's weed-choked courtyard, instinctively aiming not at where the blur was but where it was going to be. He bit his lip as the arrow honed in on its target and…
Nothing.
The blur instantly vanished, the entire castle falling deadly silent.
"Did… did I get him?" Hawkeye asked no one before he felt something softly tap his shoulder. He spun on his heels only to find a nonchalant Quicksilver holding a bushel of arrows.
"I think these are yours," said the speedster, before dumping the entire passel in Hawkeye's arms and zipping off with a smirk.
Tick-tick…
"Aw crud."
[-]
"I have read your file, Ms. Maximoff," said the Vision, his voice cold and eerie. "How you aided the Avengers against your father's attempted abduction of the Wasp."
"What of it, machine?" said Wanda, hands raised and ready to unleash a hex bolt at the slightest provocation.
"It is never easy when one is forced to choose between one's creator and one's conscience," said Vision, his voice strangely softened.
Wanda snorted. "Believe me, Avenger. I owed that monster nothing."
"Still, you chose the ethical route over personal safety and comfort, which is why I find your current course of action so… incongruent," said Vision. "Please, I only wish to understand your logic?"
Wanda sighed. "If I told you, you'd think I was insane."
"Then you leave me no choice but to-" Vision loomed over Wanda, only to be cut off by the sound of an explosion somewhere in the castle's far reaches.
The split-second of distraction was all Wanda needed to strike, hitting the android Avenger dead-center with a hex-bolt.
"Error: density controls failing," said Vision, flickering in and out of wraith-like transparency as he sank into the stone floor. "Primary back-ups: failing. Secondary back-ups: failing. Tertiary back-ups: failiNNNNNZZZZZZCK!"
Wanda watched in horror as the seemingly emotionless android unleashed a cry of inhuman agony, twitching contorted limbs half materialized within solid stone.
"My God…" she whispered. "What have I done?"
Air wooshed past her ear as Pietro, skidded to a stop beside her.
"'Bout time, I spent the last three seconds searching this dump," said Pietro, glancing down at the prone Vision. "Hey, you took down the wind-up toy? Nice."
"He's in pain," Wanda spoke softly.
"It is a robot, sis. It doesn't 'feel' anything." Pietro rolled his eyes, jabbing the android with his foot. "Now let's grab the Doc's book and scram before the rest Stark's goons show up. I'll go scout out the exit."
Wanda stepped towards the lectern, wrapping her cloak about the Darkhold before turning to follow her brother's wake. She paused in the stone archway, looking back at the Vison's still twitching form.
"I'm sorry."
[-]
Aswan, Egypt
Iron Man collided with the riverbed, sending a cloud of silt flying in all directions. A hairline crack ran through the tempered glass dome of his hydro-armor, courtesy of Namor's fist.
Before Namor could strike again, Panther pounced upon him from behind, racking amphibious flesh with vibranium claws.
"This is wrong…" Iron Man groaned, pushing himself off the riverbed. "Where's Strange?"
"Scanning…" J.A.R.V.I.S' clipped tones spoke. "Sonar detects no other human signatures in the immediate vicinity."
"Dammit! This is all just a distraction." Iron Man swore before reopening his comm. "Panther, keep Namor busy!"
Panther made a gesture that might have been a thumbs-up as he clung desperately to the wildly trashing Namor.
That was good enough for Iron Man who jetted off for the semi-sunken island they had been approaching before Namor's attack.
"Talk to me, J.A.R.V.I.S. I need the deets on this hunk of dirt?"
"Partially flooded by the construction of the Aswan dam; the sacred island of Bigeh was believed to be the burial place of the god Osiris after he was murdered by his treacherous brother," J.A.R.V.I.S. chirped.
"Guess, there's one in every pantheon, huh?" Iron Man drawled. "Wait, if there's a burial chamber… J.A.R.V.I.S, re-calibrate sonar for a geophysics scan."
Iron Man pressed his metal-tipped fingers against the submerged coastline as his HUD gradually built up a three-dimensional map of what appeared to be an intricate subterranean complex just below the waterline.
"Jackpot!"
[-]
Black Panther was sent hurtling from the water, skidding across the rocky island shore with enough speed and force to tear the flesh from his bones if not for his suit's vibranium mesh.
T'Challa leaped to his feet. His teeth clenched behind his mask as pain stabbed through his skull.
Namor emerged from the river, wet rivulets shining like molten gold under the Egyptian sun as they traced the contours of rippling muscles beneath his bronzed skin like a lover's caress.
"You've fought well, Son of T'Chaka," Namor. "Yield now. There is no shame in admitting one is outmatched."
"Curious… Prince Namor," panted T'Challa, vision blurring. "I was… about to extend… the same to courtesy to you."
"If that's how you want it…" spoke Namor, before surging forward like an oncoming tidal wave.
[-]
Strange's hands moved in slow intricate patterns as he chanted softly in a tongue that had not been heard in this land since the days of Old Stygia. Before him, lay the body of a man almost eight feet tall and clad in the raiment of a king. The corpse-god's skin was a deep and beautiful forest green, perfectly preserved save for its missing Left Hand.
Unraveling the layers upon layers of wards and curses the Ennead had weaved about their God King was slow painstaking work. It was an operation as intricate and potentially deadly as any surgery Strange had ever performed. If he made the slightest mistake, he would not even know it until the flesh was already peeling from his bones.
Strange fell silent as the last ward dissipated, or seemed to. There was only one way to be certain.
He carefully phased his fingers through the body's chest, a minor cantrip rendering his hand partially immaterial. Slowly he moved through the body's interior.
Strange sighed with relief before allowing himself a small chuckle at Oshtur's boundless cunning. Where better than the body of a corpse-god to hide…
"The Sword of Bone!" Strange exclaimed with triumph, pulling the pale ivory blade from the unliving deity's form and holding it aloft like some macabre King Arthur.
"Neat! I'll be taking that, thanks."
Before Strange could speak, something like a strip of living steel wrapped about his mouth and sealed it shut. A second strip bound his hands together, causing the Sword of Bone to clatter to the dusty stone floor.
"Nano-titanium mesh," said Iron Man, his glistening golden form rising from the half-submerged entrance to the burial chamber. "I had a theory you couldn't do any of your hocus-pocus without all that fancy finger waggling and flowery poetry. Looks like I was right… again."
Iron Man stooped to retrieve the Sword of Bone, taking his eyes off Strange for little more than a split second.
Which was time enough for Strange to lunge for the Sword. As both men's fingers grazed the ivory blade, Strange reached out to the power hidden in the Cornerstone, not with word or gesture but with thought, as the burial chamber suddenly burst with blinding azure light.
[-]
Tony found himself floating naked and alone through a celestial kaleidoscope. All around him hyper-dimensional flowers boomed and died only to be reborn again. Stars tumbled forwards, backward and sideways in time; humming spectral symphonies.
Where the heck am I? He thought
The Astral Plane, a thought replied. The Dominion of Omnipotent Oshtur. A realm of pure consciousness, shaped only by one's will and intellect.
Tony's mind reeled, buffeted by the astral winds of cosmic awareness.
Now Stark. Strange's shimmering form coalesced from the singing stardust. Let's see how smart you really are?
Strange struck with a blazing ball of pure emerald willpower, totally engulfing Tony's frail astral form. Only for the green flame to dissipate an eternal moment later, revealing a form armored in plates of golden light.
Huh? Tony thought. Pretty darn smart after all.
[-]
"Strange, I-" said Namor bursting from the waters at the far end of the burial chamber, only for his eyes to widen in quiet awe. "Great Valka."
Before him stood Strange and Iron Man, grappling for what Namor could only presume was the Sword of Bone. Yet both surface dwellers stood as entirely still and immobile as two coral growths, their fingers locked about the ivory blade in a rictus grip.
Namor waved a webbed hand before the mage's dull lifeless eyes, lips curling in distaste. "Hrmm… Sorcery."
[-]
Stupid Magic! Stop existing! Iron Man thought, deflecting another paradox barrage by summoning a shield of symbolic logic. His mind raced, countering every attack by actualizing weapons and defenses that could only exist in a purely theoretical realm.
I'm impressed, Stark. You're not as hidebound as I first assumed. Few would able to adapt to an astral duel so quickly. Strange thought, his consciousness reaching out in all planes. Still, your vision is bound only by the possible…
Singing stars swirled about Strange, forming a phalanx of shrieking spears.
I have no such limitations.
With a thought, the shrieking star-spears were sent raining down on Iron Man's astral form, ripping away his logic shield, his shining armor, and his very consciousness until only the naked core of his very being stood exposed.
With each strike, another old wound was torn open afresh. Every secret shame, every bitter disappointment, every last failure of a lifetime came rushing back on Tony's mind in an instant.
And in that instant, Tony screamed.
[-]
Iron Man collapsed upon the burial chamber floor, panting, sobbing, and heaving. He lay upon the cold stone, barely moving, his will seemingly broken.
"What in Valka's Name did you do to him?" Namor asked breathlessly.
"Nothing he hasn't already done to himself." Strange replied. "Panther?"
Namor shrugged. "He'll live."
"Your restraint is appreciated, my prince," Strange said, retrieving the Sword of Bone. "Come, we should-"
Something tugged on Strange's cloak.
He looked down to see Iron Man's plated fingers feebly clutching the hem of his cloak.
"Y… you… bast…" The Avenger groaned.
"For what it's worth, I'm sorry you had to go through that," Strange said. "But we all have to confront our demons sooner or later."
A moment later Strange and Namor were enveloped by shimmering mist, leaving Tony as alone as he'd ever been in his entire life.
[-]
The Sanctum Sanctorum
Clea watched as the shimmering mist dissipated, revealing the shapes of her husband and his five comrades baring the remaining three relics.
"Welcome home, my love," she spoke, pecking Stephen on the cheek. "All went well I take it?"
"There were some slight… complications," Stephen said. "But we now have all four Cornerstones of Creation, and nothing left to fear from the Avengers."
"Uh… Doc?" the Black knight piped up uncertainly, bending down to examine the hem of Stephen's cloak.
Stephen arched an inquisitive eyebrow as the Knight plucked a tiny silver disc from the fabric, barely half the size of a penny.
"Looks like some sorta tracer," said the Knight.
Stephen's eyes narrowed dangerously.
"Stark."
[-]
A Quinjet, somewhere over the Atlantic.
"Triangulating tracer signal…" J.A.R.V.I.S. droned. "177A Bleecker Street, New York City."
Beneath his face-plate, Tony smirked.
"Gotcha!"
To be Continued…