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Every single armor stored in the lab emerged from their glass container. Ultron knew that there were over three dozen, and not a single one was under his father's control, aside from the one he was currently donning.
Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted Pietro dashing away, but there wasn't much he could do. Pursuing him was possible, but it was a smarter idea to take care of the robots bearing down on him.
He lifted his arm, and a small missile emerged and blew up three of the attacking armor. As one of their heads rolled past, Ultron idly thought that it was weird. It was like he was fighting his own underdeveloped siblings. Still, they weren't alive in any sense of the word, meaning that he wouldn't need to feel any guilt when destroying them, aside from the fact that his father would have to pay for the damage. Oh well.
Once again out of the corner of his optics, he spotted Pietro enter Stark's personal elevator, the one that led straight to his room. Father will definitely want to know about this, Ultron thought, right before he felt himself get thrown halfway across the room. Grunting, Ultron shook his head as he realized that it was his father's "Power Armor". Not quite as big as "Veronica", but it was still sizeable.
"You know, it's time I test my vibranium armor against a bruiser like you." Ultron ran a few steps towards the larger robot before activating the boosters in the soles of his feet, raising him up as he delivered a solid punch, just as the big one did the same. Both punches landed against each other with a solid thump, sending both fighters reeling back. Before the larger one could recover, Ultron fired a repulsar blast from his eyes, aiming for the circuits around the large one's neck.
"Heads up," Ultron snickered as the huge head made a small crater on the ground where it landed. He wished that someone had heard his joke, but the only response he got was a loud buzzing sound. Turning his head, he was barely able to dodge a jackhammer being thrust at him.
"Man, Striker, you really didn't like my joke," Ultron groaned as he ducked to avoid another blow from the hammer, and delivered an energy blast to its center. Without Tony piloting them, they went down pretty fast. It was a small comfort.
"Ultron, grab Wanda!' Ultron immediately complied with Tony's demand, searching the room for her. When he laid eyes on her, he could see that two of the armor were converging on her location. One of them had a strange exo-armor, and the other was painted mostly blue and gold.
Ultron quickly flew in front of Wanda's body, and pointed his arms in both directions. As they lunged at him, he fired, shooting straight through them.
After what seemed like an agonizing wait, the elevator doors finally opened. Pietro entered Stark's room before the doors had even opened all the way.
"Sir, what am I looking for, exactly?" He was fast, but it was no use combing a room for something that he didn't even know. He heard Strucker sigh.
"You'll know when you see them." Them? Pietro wondered if Strucker could be after something as petty as money or jewels. Mentally shrugging, Pietro zipped around the room, checking every single dresser, and then searching through each closet, making sure to check every single pocket of every single article of clothes.
After that, he scaled the walls in case there was any chance of discovering a secret entrance (it was mildly disappointing when he found none), and poked and prodded at the floor.
It all took about a minute, and Pietro had come up empty handed. Frustrated, he kicked the large, silk-sheeted bed – uncovering a dresser built into the wooden foundation. Rolling his eyes at the stroke of dumb luck, Pietro slid the dresser open, finding a black box. Curiosity was pecking at him now; he opened the box, mouth gaping as a burst of multicolor light sprung forth, almost blinding him with the intensity. He could feel power radiating from the objects inside.
It took him a few moments to collect enough oxygen to speak. "Strucker? I believe I have found what you wanted."
After laying Wanda down in a relatively safe spot away from the majority of the fighting, Ultron flew towards his father, who was fighting against an armor with an obscenely large particle cannon on its shoulder.
And that's when something grabbed his ankle and slammed him against the ground. Quickly getting back on his feet, Ultron swiveled his head, searching for the perpetrator – but there was no one to be seen. Whoever it was must have scurried away, Ultron thought with disgust, before feeling someone strike him in the back.
Ultron whirled around to catch his opponent in the act, but his sight met only with the walls, floor, and ceiling. Deciding that he had gotten sick of the farce, Ultron began blasting energy wantonly, hoping to hit something. It wasn't to be, as something else kicked him in the knee, forcing him to stumble.
Ultron slapped his forehead as he realized what an idiot he had been. Of course! Father made a stealth armor that could go invisible! He switched his eyes to infrared mode. The grey room turned blood-red, except for an armor creeping up to the left, which showed up as bright yellow.
Ultron merely punched through the sneaky sibling, turning his attention back to his father, who was fighting a green armor. He wondered how many colors his father had used.
The only indication that something was rushing towards him was his own sensors, warning him of an approaching object with high velocity. He jumped to the side, but he wasn't fast enough; he felt something tackle him against the nearest wall; it was of course yet another armor, one with a large power core.
Its core began to glow brighter and brighter, and started to make a whirring noise. As the hands grabbing him began to get higher in temperature, it hit Ultron that the robot was going to self destruct by firing off as powerful a uni-beam as possible.
If he was struck point-blank by a beam that powerful, vibranium or no, even he wouldn't come out unscathed. Ultron began to struggle wildly, but the robot's grasp wouldn't weaken. Thinking hard, Ultron quickly played a wide variety of martial arts videos, searching for videos that could help him escape a powerful hold.
Sighing, he decided to take the only course the videos seemed to give him, crude as it was – he leaned his head back, and then slammed it against the other armors face as hard as he could. The armor stumbled back, but fired off its beam moments later.
The beam slid through the almost impenetrable wall like butter; Ultron flew out of the way, but half his body was damaged; smoke wafted from the left side of his armor. His left leg and arm were useless. Fortunately, it only took a glance at the room to tell that the battle was over.
"Ultron? Dang, you look like a mess," Tony muttered as he limped towards his robot. Ultron ran to his father's side to hold him up, but Tony motioned him away. "I can walk."
"Father, I have decided that I do not need an allowance. I'm pretty sure you'll need the money to pay for all this damage." Robot body parts littered the entire room. The actual ground couldn't even be seen. The walls that weren't broken were filled with burn marks and scratches. Most of the lights on the ceiling had broken, and some were flickering.
Tony winced. "Yeah, don't remind me. Oh yeah, we should probably go see if the others need our help." Tony grabbed Wanda and placed her over his shoulder before flying up through the whole in the ceiling, with a very unenthused Ultron following close behind.
Steve's shoulders heaved up and down, in tune with his harsh breathing. The man took a look around the room. Stark wouldn't be happy; it was a mess. Every single window in the room was broken, and the bodies of the HYDRA agents littered the room so that one had to step carefully when moving anywhere.
"We should have left one or two conscious, to grill them for any info they might have," Steve informed the others, chastising himself for the oversight. Natasha shrugged, using her foot to nudge a body out of the way so that she could access a cold drink from Stark's fridge.
"I doubt these grunts had any important info. The real juicy details would probably come from the two powered characters. Hopefully Stark was able to apprehend them." Almost as if waiting for his name to be spoken, Tony flew in from the large hole in the ground, holding an unconscious Wanda. Ultron followed closely behind.
"Speak of the devil," Clint jeered from his place on the couch. Banner was timidly sitting next to him, his hands folded on his lap.
"I missed the party. From the looks of it, it got pretty wild." Steve narrowed his eyes as he noticed Tony's pale complexion, not to mention the purple bags under his eyes.
"We even captured one of the intruders. See, we didn't need any help." Ultron had his hands on his hips, looking both indignant and proud at the accomplishment. Tony placed Wanda on the nearest flat object, which turned out to be a marble counter. Banner rushed over to give her a brief check-up.
Steve addressed Tony. "Any idea why they attacked your tower?" Tony started, as if he hadn't noticed Steve, before rapidly replying, "Yeah, turns out my legacy of creating weapons has come back to haunt me. It just never ends, no matter how much good I do as Iron Man."
Steve laid his gloved hand on Tony's shoulder. "At ease, soldier. No one had the right to doubt your morality; you've done more to help the world than many people have in their whole lives." He could see Tony brighten up a bit, which was good. Being in bright spirits was what the billionaire needed to be.
"I doubt they just came here for a simple revenge mission," Natasha spoke up, interrupting the moment. "After all, if that was it, they would have instructed all the agents to go after Stark." It was a valid point.
"Now that you mention it, they also wouldn't have needed to hack into my computer system," Tony muttered. Ultron chose that moment to sheepishly raise a hand.
"Um, I'm afraid I forgot to mention this earlier, but I saw Pietro escape into your private elevator, the one that goes straight to your quarters." Ultron was staring at the ground, probably worried that Tony would scold him. Instead, the inventor dashed over to the nearest console, trying in vain to boot it up.
"I need to search through the camera feeds," he said desperately, slamming the computer with his fists when the screen refused to light up. Ultron perked up again.
"I can check the cameras. I'm connected to the system, after all." His eyes began to shine for a few moments, and his finger changed, disassembling so that it resembled a USB drive. He inserted his transformed finger into the side of the console. The screen lit up, showing Tony's room, and a familiar white-haired youth rushing around the room at breath-taking speeds. No one could follow his movements, except Tony, who was looking for something.
"Oh my god, no." The horror in Tony's voice caught everyone's attention. "Father, what is wrong?" a concerned Ultron asked. Tony stumbled away from the monitor, flopping down on the couch next to Clint.
"He stole the Infinity Stones."
Author's Notes:
So starting here, it will heavily diverge from the film. I mean, this was obviously already an AU, but now it'll be completely different, but I'll explain more in the next chapter.
The first reviews for Ant-Man (the next MCU film) are out on Twitter, and they're mostly positive. A good sign!