The transition from the gritty, humid air of the Black Prison to the salt-tinged breeze of the California coast was instantaneous. One moment, Leander was looking into the desperate eyes of his crew; the next, he was standing amidst the skeletal remains of Tony Stark's Malibu mansion.
Construction crews were still crawling over the site like ants over a carcass. Yellow excavators roared, lifting massive chunks of reinforced concrete that had once housed the world's most advanced laboratory. Leander didn't linger. He didn't want to be spotted by the paparazzi or the SHIELD cleanup teams. With another flicker of blue light, he vanished, reappearing thousands of feet above the Atlantic.
He streaked through the stratosphere, a golden blur hidden by the clouds, toward the towering needle of the Avengers Tower in Manhattan. He landed softly on the private penthouse deck, his boots clicking on the polished glass.
"Dr. Banner? It's been a minute, hasn't it?"
Bruce Banner was hunched over a workstation, his fingers dancing across a holographic interface. At the sound of Leander's voice, he nearly jumped out of his skin. He whirled around, his glasses sliding down his nose, and stared at the teenager who had just materialized in his living room.
"Leander? My god, kid, when did you get back?"
Banner scrambled to his feet, a rare, genuine smile breaking across his weary face. He didn't hesitate to pull Leander into a brief, awkward hug. The scientist smelled of coffee and ozone, the scent of someone who hadn't slept in three days.
Leander laughed, nodding toward a small, meticulously polished model of a jointed mechanical hand on Banner's desk. "Got back a couple of nights ago. Where's the billionaire? I figured he'd be here tinkering with his new toys."
Leander settled into a deep leather sofa, the luxury of the tower a sharp contrast to the warehouse in Queens. Banner sighed, swiping his hand to collapse the holographic projection he'd been working on.
"Tony's at the State Council," Banner said, sitting on the edge of a nearby chair. "The Mandarin's attack on the President didn't just blow up a plane; it blew up the political status quo. The Senate has about a thousand questions for him, and for once, he's actually staying to answer them. He's been... a bit of a mess since you disappeared, Leander. He blames himself for the portal mishap."
Leander nodded. He noticed the blueprints for a massive, heavy-duty armored suit hidden in the background of Banner's files—the "Hulkbuster" project they were clearly co-developing. "And you? How's the 'other guy' treating you?"
Banner's smile faded, replaced by a shadow of hesitation. He gripped a small stress ball on his desk. "Hulk's getting stronger. I can feel it. During the invasion, he wasn't just defending the city; he was enjoying the carnage. It's becoming harder to find the line where I end and he begins."
He shook his head, clearing his thoughts. "But enough about my existential crisis. Where were you? Tony looked everywhere. Every satellite, every deep-space sensor... we thought you were gone."
"I was in the stars, Bruce. About a light-year out," Leander said simply.
Banner's eyes went wide. "A light-year? That's... that's impossible. Even for you. Did you have the Tesseract? Did you use the cube to bridge the distance?"
The scientist's inner genius was suddenly on fire. He leaned forward, his voice rising in pitch. "Did the spatial curvature distort your perception of time? Did ten months feel like ten years, or ten minutes? What about the radiation exposure? The Tesseract is a pure gamma source—if you were in close proximity without shielding, we need to run a full diagnostic on your cellular structure immediately!"
Leander held up a hand to slow him down. "No, no radiation poisoning. I was teleported into the vacuum. I spent ten months in the dark, just drifting, until I crossed paths with a scavenger named Jason. He's part of the Aiyue race. He helped me get my bearings."
"You drifted for ten months?" Banner's jaw dropped. "In a vacuum? Without oxygen, food, or water? In the absolute zero of deep space? Leander, the laws of biology say you should be a frozen husk."
"My body works differently," Leander said with a shrug. "It was... unpleasant. I had to deal with a malevolent alien captain, dodge some cosmic horrors that look like they crawled out of a nightmare, and navigate a few star systems I can't even name. But I found the coordinates for Earth and hopped back."
Banner stared at him for a long time, speechless. "I... I don't even know what to ask first. The technology required for a jump like that... the dark matter stabilization, the negative pressure density of a stable wormhole... how did the Aiyue ship handle the anti-matter fluctuations?"
"I have no idea," Leander admitted honestly. "I just pushed the buttons that looked like home."
Banner let out a shaky breath, leaning back. "You really are the strongest of us. Not even Thor has the constitution to survive a ten-month solo drift in the void. He'd have gone mad."
"Thor said the Tesseract was lost to the Bifrost during the explosion," Leander noted, watching Banner carefully. "He wasn't entirely wrong."
"Lost? So it's gone?"
"Not gone. Just... changed." Leander stood up. He turned his back to Banner and allowed his golden wings to manifest. They erupted from his shoulders with a soft hum, the metallic feathers glowing with a soft, purplish-gold light.
"Bruce, look at the center. Between the wings."
Banner adjusted his glasses, squinting at the luminescent energy. "There's an anomaly... a focal point of high-frequency energy. Did you... did you fuse the cube into your skeletal structure?"
"Into the wings," Leander corrected. "A human body—even mine—might not be able to contain a concentrated Infinity Stone for long. It's embedded in the energy construct."
Leander frowned, closing his eyes. He could feel the Stone now, a cold, heavy weight that hummed against his spine. It felt like a foreign object, a splinter in his soul. He focused every ounce of his mental energy on the point of light. I don't want you in me, he thought. I want you with me.
Slowly, his right hand rose into the empty air.
Banner watched, breathless, as the bright point of light on Leander's back began to pulse. The ethereal energy of the wings dimmed, turning from a vibrant gold to a duller, more metallic shade. The blue light that usually laced the feathers began to drain out, flowing toward the center.
A spark of brilliant, translucent blue emerged from the wings. It moved slowly, a perfectly round jewel the size of a large marble, glowing with an internal fire that seemed to hold the depth of the entire ocean. It floated through the air, trailing wisps of cosmic mist, and descended into Leander's open palm.
Leander exhaled, his wings looking noticeably weaker and smaller without the Stone's amplification. He opened his eyes and looked at the Space Stone resting in his hand.
In his mind's eye, the status panel for his Wings of Nirvana flickered:
Current Speed: Reduced to Mach 20 (Max Mach 30 with Stone amplification).
New Active Ability: Space Leap — Instantaneous movement up to 500km. Cooldown: 5 seconds.
Banner walked closer, his face illuminated by the blue glow. He looked at the jewel with a mixture of scientific hunger and pure, unadulterated terror.
"Is that it?" Banner whispered. "The essence of the Tesseract? It's... it's so small. How can something that fits in a pocket power a portal to the other side of the galaxy?"