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Scarlet Witch and the Three Spiders

Wanda liked to think she had at least been getting used to the idea that she could communicate with her other selves in the first place, but she had also grown to expect the idea that she would encounter them when she was asleep. Suddenly finding herself in the 'dream realm' where she had met her other selves in the past, facing the other two Wandas, would have been worrying under any circumstances, but finding herself there when she had been in the middle of a fight just a moment ago raised several worrying questions.

"What-?" she began, looking anxiously at her other selves.

"Where did-?" Wanda Two asked.

"Were we just-?" Wanda Three cut in, the three Wandas falling silent as it became clear they were all equally confused.

"Right," Wanda said at last, after it was clear none of them were ready to say anything more right now. "So… were we all in a fight?"

"With some strange new person who was talking about hunting Peter?" Wanda Three asked.

"You too?" Wanda Two looked between them in surprise. "Did you get his name?"

"His?" Wanda Three seemed more surprised now. "I was facing a woman, and she had… she called them her Hounds, but they were people… and one of them looked like Pietro."

"Pietro?" the other two Wandas said in surprise.

"You mean-?" Wanda began.

"He looked like our Pietro," Wanda Three affirmed, before she lowered her head in regret. "I… he was not even a variant of Pietro- Verna said his name was Sergi or something like that- but he looked so like him… I was trying to reach his mind-"

"And then you were here?" Wanda interjected, looking over at Wanda Two with a contemplative expression. "And… you were doing the same?"

"I was… actually, I hit some kind of energy webbing from this… spider woman…"

"You too?" Wanda said, only to look at Wanda Three incredulously as she registered the echo. "As in there was a Spider-Woman in your world?"

"For all of us?" Wanda Two said in surprise. "And… your Peters didn't know about them earlier?"

"He seemed surprised, certainly," Wanda Three noted. "And she mentioned…"

"I sent them."

Spinning around, the three women jumped in shock as Cassandra Webb once again appeared in the middle of the void that was their current location, smiling nonchalantly at the group.

"So… you sent those… Spider-Women… to us?" Wanda Two looked at Cassandra in surprise, clearly deciding to deal with the situation and worry about the wider problems later. "As in… they are from your world?"

"How did you do that?" Wanda Three asked. "This is… it can't be that easy to travel between worlds…"

"It was only possible due to my insight into the Great Web," Cassandra explained with a smile. "It took me a while to determine how it worked, or even what I was seeing, but once I became aware of the web, I was able to reach along the strands to others who act as its agents in other realities… and, with time and training, those who share that sensitivity to the web could travel along those strands also."

"So… we couldn't do this to get home because we aren't spiders?" Wanda Three asked.

"Unfortunately not."

"But what are we doing here?" Wanda asked, waving a hand at her surroundings. "We were only here before when we were sleeping-"

"When you attempted to make mental contact with beings from outside your universe, it created an opening that allowed me to send this message to you through the Web," Cassandra explained, a nonchalant smile on her face as she 'looked' between the three Wandas. "Their influence is… particularly potent; they throw off many of the usual rules just by being in your universe."

"They're from… outside the universe?" Wanda repeated, her mind suddenly flashing to some of the monsters she'd nearly unleashed while under the influence of the Darkhold.

"It would be more accurate to say that your opponents come from a… very particular world in the multiverse," Cassandra explained, her smile fading as she looked around at the three Wandas with a more solemn expression. "They call themselves the Inheritors, and they hunt totems."

"Totems?" Wanda Two repeated in confusion. "Isn't that… something to do with totem poles?"

"In this context, 'totem' refers to the notion of great forces existing in the world that bridge the gap between humans and other species," Cassandra explained. "The Inheritors feed on the energy of certain totems, targeting those empowered by animals in particular even if they can also feed on other forms of energy… but their favoured target is the energy of spiders, due to a particular prophecy."

"Prophecy?" Wanda Three shook her head in confusion. "There are prophecies now?"

"Your teammates have travelled in time, and you question the idea that someone can predict the future?"

"…Fair point," Wanda conceded. "So why would they be targeting Peter because of a prophecy?"

"From what I understand, the prophecy states that the Inheritors will be vanquished by the Spiders of the Multiverse at some distant date which ends their reign of power for good," Cassandra explained with a slight smile. "And with the recent contact between the Spiders as the Peter Parkers of your current worlds first met each other…"

"They're basically treating that as a sign that the spiders are coming together and going after these three Peters now to stop other spiders going after these Inheritors later?" Wanda finished.

"That seems like a foolish decision," Wanda Two noted. "Why would they not assume that going after Peter like this will be the reason they are defeated by the spiders as prophesised?"

"Because the Inheritors, for all their power, are essentially feral animals walking upright," Cassandra responded, a mocking smile on her face under her large glasses. "They cannot conceive of any plan more sophisticated or elaborate than killing the potential threat, even if past experience tells them that they should do something to actually plan for the current fight."

"So they're stupid?" Wanda Two asked.

"They can talk perfectly clearly and give the appearance of human habits, but their long-term planning ability is basically compromised, yes."

"But they're powerful?" Wanda Three asked.

"Physically, they are only slightly lesser in raw strength to your allies such as Bruce Banner and Thor," Cassandra affirmed. "And that is not even the most dangerous thing around them."

"What else could there be?" Wanda Two asked.

"They cannot be killed for good," Cassandra explained. "Even if you can physically kill their bodies, their minds will be automatically transferred to cloning banks located back in their homeworld."

"Cloning banks?" Wanda asked.

"Whole buildings dedicated to holding dormant, brain-dead clones of each Inheritor, ready to receive the signal whenever one of them dies," Cassandra explained. "No matter how far away they are, once an Inheritor dies its mind will transmit to a new body."

"Oh," Wanda Three said, a glance between the other two Wandas confirming that they weren't sure how to react to that news either. "So… we can't stop them?"

"Not on your own," Cassandra said with a more reassuring smile. "But I wouldn't have sent my girls to you without a wider plan."

"To save Peter?" Wanda asked.

"And stop the Inheritors for good."

"That's possible?" Wanda Two asked. "How?"

"You will need to open your minds to me, so that I can share the plan with you on a level beyond mere conscious thought," Cassandra explained. "If I simply explain the instructions to you, you may not be able to do everything exactly right, but if I plant the knowledge of the plan within you…"

"We'll know how it all works on instinct?" Wanda asked. "Like how I just… learned how to use my powers after Hydra's experiments?"

"Essentially," Cassandra nodded. "You will be operating on a very specific time limit to get everything together to make this plan work, but once you have all the facts… and with my girls to help you…"

"We can stop the Inheritors?" Wanda Three asked.

"And save Peter?" Wanda Two added.

"And get yourselves back together into the bargain," Cassandra said, reaching up her hands to look warmly at the three Wandas. "You have come so far already, but you need to overcome this final hurdle before you can complete your journey."

"…We're up for it," Wanda said, even as a glance at her other selves left her assured that she wasn't the only one wondering if this woman was telling the truth; could 'they' really be able to become a 'me' again soon?

"Let's go," Cassandra nodded, as Wanda felt a complex set of instructions enter her mind (she felt like she'd just tried to listen in on one of Stark's descriptions of his latest invention, except that she actually understood this) before she felt the sensation of being forced backwards-