Episode 87: Scarlet Hex Distortion!

As Wanda flew around Westview, she could hear the cries of her Marémon Witchlet, Wikkid, and Spedfoal in her head. She followed these cries to the town square, where Agatha was holding her Marémon hostage using purple energy wires to bind their necks. The people standing around were either too afraid to move or slowly backing away.

"Took you long enough, dear," Agatha remarked as Wanda landed on the ground. "Looks like you took up flying lessons the last time I saw you."

"Enough of your games, Agatha!" Wanda snapped. "Let my Marémon go, and I'll give you whatever you want."

"Does that include your power?" Agatha asked.

"Yes," Wanda nodded. "I don't even want it!"

"Really?" Agatha looked at the Darkhold held in Señor Scratchy's fist-shaped ears. "There's a whole chapter about you in this book. And by you, I mean the Scarlet Witch."

"I'm not the Scarlet Witch! You're just using me to justify your crimes."

"Oh, no, dear, you've got it wrong. I actually admire the Scarlet Witch a great deal, and wanted to be her. That's why I killed my entire coven and those other Witches for their power, because I thought I could become the Scarlet Witch. But when you showed up, I knew you were going to be stiff competition for the title."

"So you did all of this to get rid of me, thinking I could become the Scarlet Witch instead of you?" Wanda shook her head. "I guess you really are crazy."

Agatha frowned. "You still don't get it. The only one who's crazy is you, for not realizing how dangerous your power could become if left unchecked. But if it's in my hands, I have the knowledge to use it well."

Chuckling, Wanda said, "Even with your knowledge, you fell into my trap."

Then the Wanda standing in front of Agatha vanished. Before Agatha could turn, she felt two hands press against the sides of her head with the real Wanda standing behind her.

"I thought you would know from seeing my memories how my hypnosis works," Wanda said while red energy flowed from her fingertips. "First, I trick them into thinking they're talking to me when it's actually a false image of me that I implanted in their mind through eye-contact. Then I walk up behind them and touch the sides of their head so I can take full control of their mind, forcing them to see their worst nightmares until they scream from insanity."

Señor Scratchy threw down the Darkhold and became a bigger version of himself with larger ears than before.

"Don't think just because you used Shift to make yourself bigger that you can attack me, Señor Scratchy," Wanda warned, glaring at the large rabbit-shaped Marémon. "I will let your mistress go if you give me the Darkhold."

Reluctantly, Señor Scratchy picked up the Darkhold book with his ears and gave it to Wanda.

"Now run along and find a better Marémon Wielder out there," Wanda urged, taking the Darkhold with one hand.

Wanda used her telekinesis to flip through the Darkhold pages, trying to find a spell that would free her Marémon from the purple ropes that bound them. But to her surprise, Agatha wrenched the Darkhold out of Wanda's hand and backed away. Her eyes, which were red from Wanda's hypnosis, changed back to their normal black color.

"I gotta admire your courage, dear, but I placed a magical block on my mind before you got here knowing you might try to use your hypnosis," Agatha said while clenching her blackened hand, causing the purple energy ropes to tighten around Witchlet, Spedfoal, and Wikkid's necks. "Now I'm going to kill your Marémon and take your — "

Before Agatha finished her sentence, Wanda rammed into her sending them both flying into the clouds above the town. This made Agatha drop the Darkhold, but she teleported out of Wanda's grasp and floated nearby. She sent a purple energy beam at Wanda, causing Wanda's face to become more sunken. Wanda then retaliated by sending her own beam of red energy, though Agatha blocked it.

"You're a fast learner, Wanda," Agatha complemented. "Though my knowledge of magic is greater. So I will make you suffer as I drain every last drop of power from you!"

Agatha stretched her hands, expecting the same purple beam of energy from before to shoot out. Yet to her surprise, it didn't.

"What?" Agatha exclaimed.

She tried stretching her hands two more times, only for nothing to happen.

"How can this be? My magic…it's not working!" Agatha looked at Wanda, who had a sly grin on her face.

"The real reason I probed your mind wasn't to make you suffer from nightmares," Wanda said quietly. "It was so I could learn how to make Magic Runes."

Nervously, Agatha looked around. The red walls of the Hex Barrier were visible up here, but what drew her attention was the giant symbols on them.

"Now assuming what you said was true, about how spaces with Magic Runes allow the Witch who cast them to manipulate the magic in that space, then I should be able to get my power back and render you powerless." Wanda's eyes then glowed red.

Behind Agatha floated Witchlet, who had come from the ground after the purple energy ropes that bound her and her children dissipated after Agatha's magic stopped working. Wanda and Witchlet then made identical hand gestures where their fingers were flexed into a 'W' shape.

"Hex Distortion!" Wanda cried as her and Witchlet trapped Agatha inside a miniature hexagon made of red energy.

Inside, Agatha screamed in agony as red energy poured out of her and into Wanda. Not only did the red energy restore Wanda's features, making her less sunken and wrinkled, but it also created a red crown above her head.

"Eyes the color of blood, and a red crown shaped like a 'W'," Agatha murmured, looking at Wanda. "You really are the Scarlet Witch."

To be continued…