It was Sunday — which was, by any reasonable measure, the best day of the week.
It was quiet. Wanda and I were on the couch, working through books on magic we had found in the library upstairs. Jean was sprawled across the armchair, humming absently to herself as she flipped through channels, thoroughly bored. And Felicia...
"THIS IS SO BORING!"
I sighed, lowering my book and looking over at my Kitten. She was sitting cross-legged on the floor in the far corner of the room, attempting to meditate. Attempting being the operative word.
"You could use this time to actually learn some magic," Wanda said dryly, not bothering to look up from her own book.
"Yeah, but — ugh! Come on! Even you must be going a little stir-crazy by now!" Felicia groaned. "It's been what — a whole month since we got here? And we haven't been outside once!"
I smiled. "Well... I am an internationally wanted felon, you're wanted by both HYDRA and SHIELD because of your association with me, and Wanda is a former HYDRA asset. Going out on our own isn't really a great idea."
"Then why can't we find a spell to disguise ourselves or something?" Felicia pouted, folding her arms. "There's only so much magic practice and... other activities a girl can handle before she's climbing the walls, Tiger."
"Really? Based on the noise coming from upstairs, I thought you three were only just warming up," Wanda said flatly, turning a page.
I coughed into my hand. "I... didn't realize you could hear us."
"Blame Red," Wanda smirked. "She's the screamer."
"Yeah she is," Felicia grinned. We both looked at Jean, who made a very deliberate show of ignoring us — though the color rising in her face said otherwise.
"She's not wrong, though," Wanda said, snapping her book shut. "We could all use a break every now and then."
"Agreed." I nodded. "We could use the UMF suits if you want. The disguises aren't perfect, but—"
"Absolutely not," Felicia cut in. "No offense, but those latex masks are suffocating, Tiger. They're a disaster for your hair, and I genuinely don't know how you manage to wear one for hours at a time. They're so... claustrophobic."
I shrugged. "You get used to it with practice."
"We could try a spell, like Felicia said," Jean offered, turning to face us. "Something light-based, maybe? A basic illusion should be easy enough to maintain."
"Does anyone actually know one?" Felicia asked, perking up.
Every head in the room turned to me. I raised an eyebrow. "Why is everyone looking at me?"
"Because, regrettably, you're the most accomplished of all of us," Wanda said.
"Thank you for that, Wanda. Truly inspiring." I sighed. "And no — most of my focus has been on conjuration and accessing extra-dimensional energies. Illusion magic isn't really my area."
"We do have an entire library full of magic books upstairs," Jean pointed out with a shrug. "We could just go and look."
Felicia was already on her feet. "Well then what are we waiting for? Let's go!"
Jean and I shared a look and a smile. Some things about Felicia were simply never going to change. We got up and followed her to the library. I glanced back at Wanda and waited. The woman rolled her eyes, grumbled something under her breath about hyperactive women, and got up.
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The library was on the second floor of the sanctum. Wanda's room occupied one corner of the space, while the library-and-relic room spread out beyond it — sharing much of the same architectural language as the New York sanctum, the seal of the London sanctum set as a skylight into the far wall of the room.
"Where do we even start?" Felicia asked, taking in the rows of shelves.
"There's no organizing system I've been able to identify," Wanda said. She had spent more time up here than I had in my lab, and that was saying something. "From what I can tell, the previous master kept their own personal catalogue system."
"I'd expect as much," I said. "We should split up and look." Everyone agreed and went their separate ways.
I took the shelves to the right and began working through them one by one. The books were old — some of them older than entire nations. Rare copies. Texts that had been banned from polite society, or that in the wrong hands could be used to invoke demons, which was a frankly terrifying thought on a quiet Sunday afternoon.
I traced my fingertips along the spines, skimming titles as quickly as I could, when my eyes landed on one that made me stop.
*The Legend of Sir Percy and His Many Conquests During the Reign of King Arthur.*
Well. What was this?
Sir Percy — the man for whom the Ebony Blade had been forged by Merlin himself. The man who, according to legend, had never been defeated while wielding it. I didn't believe in coincidences. Not anymore, and not with good reason. They simply didn't happen.
"Found it!" Jean called out from across the room.
I glanced back at the book and then took it off the shelf. No point in looking a gift horse in the mouth.
I walked over to the others, who had gathered around the main table and were bent over a large tome. Wanda was leading the search with Jean helping narrow down the correct spell. I looked down at the book in my hands, curiosity already winning.
"It looks straightforward enough," Wanda hummed as she read. "Even Felicia should be able to manage it with her level of control." She said it as a matter of fact, not a jab — though the line between the two was blurry.
"Watch it, Maximoff," Felicia warned, puffing her cheeks. "I can still take you apart in a hand-to-hand fight and you know it."
"Peter, what do you have there?" Jean asked, eyes drifting to the book in my hands with that familiar look of hers.
"A biographical record of a Knight of Camelot," I said. "A man named Percy. By everything written here, he was... frankly extraordinary."
"Why does he interest you?" Wanda asked, her attention shifting fully to me now.
"Because I have his sword." I mentally activated my suit and materialized my bag of storage. I reached inside, dug around, and after a moment pulled out the black blade — the one that could cut through magic itself.
Felicia gave a low whistle, her eyes going wide. "That looks vicious. What do you think it's worth?"
My eyebrow twitched. "It's a priceless artifact, Felicia."
"Oh, he used your full name," Wanda said pleasantly. "You're in trouble."
"You used it during the fight with Kaecilius," Jean noted, studying the blade with a more analytical eye. "It let you deflect those mirror dimension constructs he was throwing at you."
"Exactly," I said. "It has a sort of... dampening effect on magic. And I've never been able to identify the enchantments on it. Science hasn't helped. I'm wondering if history might."
"Then while we sort out the illusion spell, you read that," Felicia said simply with a shrug.
"Are you sure? You won't need my help?"
Felicia smiled at me — the kind of smile she reserved for moments when she thought I was being endearing. "I'm sure. You've got that look, Peter. I've known you long enough to recognize it. At this point you'd be useless to us until you get your fix anyway."
I smiled. "Thanks, Kitten." The others chuckled and gave me my space. I took the book and settled into a chair away from the group, resting the Ebony Blade on the table before me, and opened to the first page.
It took a while, but eventually I found a passage about the blade itself. An eyewitness account of Sir Percy in battle.
*Seeing him fight was akin to watching a God of War descend onto this earth. He cut through the barbarians with both grace and precision, and at the center of every advance was the Ebony Blade. Legend has it that Merlin forged it from a fallen star and gave it into Percy's keeping. With it in hand, the Knight seemed incapable of defeat. I watched him be run through by a spear more than once and simply keep going. I later learned the blade carries an arcane charm that prevents its wielder from falling to any enemy fighter.*
*I cannot begin to fathom the skill required to wield such a weapon, nor explain how naturally it seemed to answer to him. The Holy Knight never faltered — he carved a path through the grounds of Camelot, leading us citizens to safety from Mordred's forces. He was only stopped when the dark king himself stepped down from his throne to face him.*
*Mordred the Cruel — for that is the traitor's rightful name — fought Sir Percy to a standstill. I remember being very small, hidden behind my mother's skirts, when I saw Mordred knock Sir Percy to the ground and send the Ebony Blade skidding from his hand. I feared death had finally come for the unstoppable knight — but instead, as if drawn by invisible wire, the blade flew back into Percy's grasp.*
*Looking back now, yes — I believe it was magic. Another of the Warlock Merlin's many enchantments upon the blade. I was never able to find any further information on its capabilities, which is why this biography, however thorough, will forever remain incomplete.*
I put the book down and picked up the Ebony Blade, turning it slowly in the light. I'll admit — I was impressed. This thing was more powerful than I had originally given it credit for.
*Skt!*
I slowly pressed a single stinger against the blade's edge and tried to cut it. To my genuine surprise, it didn't give. It resisted my proto-adamantium stinger entirely — a perfect deadlock, neither able to overcome the other.
I retracted the stinger and set the blade back on the table. "What are you?"
And then I felt it.
My mind began to rumble.
"ARGH!" I clutched my head, crumpling out of the chair and hitting the floor. A brain-splitting pain tore through me. I began gasping, dropping to my hands and knees as the agony overwhelmed everything else.
"Peter!" Felicia cried out. She and the others rushed to my side, pulling me up as my mind seemed to fracture from the inside.
"What's wrong with him?!" Felicia spun to Jean.
Jean pressed her palms to her temples and reached out — then yanked back with a cry of pain. "I can't get to him! Something is blocking his mind!"
The Infinity Core on my chest began to blaze, a piercing shriek radiating out from it in waves.
"Sexy! Shut it down!" I gasped.
"I can't, sir! The Infinity Stone is reacting to your mind — it's responding to a massive spike in theta wave output from your neural patterns!"
It was worse than before. Much worse. I could feel my brain screaming at me, demanding I do something. Gritting through the pain, I forced myself to activate Web Vision — praying the enhanced sight would show me what I was dealing with.
I looked inward. I saw everything. My core was tied to threads that stretched outward into what seemed like infinity — the Web of Life. Woven through it were other strands. Blue, shot through with rust-brown: Magneto's powers. A thin thread of green: Jessica Drew. The bright yellow of the Mind Stone, sitting directly above my heart.
And then, spread over my brain like a crown: a network of glowing golden strings — Franklin Richards' power.
But it was different from the rest. The other strands were anchored, tightly bound into the web around me. The crown was tearing itself apart. Untethered, violent, and growing worse with every second.
I had to contain it. I had to pull it into something. I looked toward the Dark Tower. That would work — it had to work.
I opened my eyes and looked up at the panicked faces around me. "M-mindscape. I need to — get into the mindscape — argh!"
The pain was too much. I couldn't hold onto the thought.
"What is he saying?" Felicia cried out. "Jean — what does he want?!"
"Mindscape? Mindscape?" Jean repeated, confused.
It was Wanda who figured it out.
"His new powers. The ones he was trying to adapt — they're activating. He needs to reach his mindscape to bring them under control."
"How do we make that happen?" Felicia demanded.
"We need to make him sleep — something to knock him out, anything," Jean said, pressing her hands to either side of my face.
Suddenly Felicia's eyes snapped upward. "The meditation room! Those dried herbs — the ones with narcotic properties! Get them!"
"On it!" Jean reached out a hand. The bag of incense came sailing across the room toward us. I grabbed it out of the air as it arrived, tore it open, stuffed a handful of the dried herbs into my mouth, chewed, swallowed — and dropped flat on my back.
"Peter?" Jean's voice came as if from the end of a long corridor. "Peter?! Peter..."
And then — nothing.
I was pushed inward.
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My mental landscape looked like a city that had been struck by an earthquake and then collided with another city entirely. New York — the city of my memories, all its buildings and streets built from the places and moments I had lived — was warped and compressed, crowded now by intrusions from other places. Kamar-Taj had apparently merged with it wholesale, the architecture sitting in strange harmony with the familiar New York skyline.
I turned. The Dark Tower was still standing, solid and intact. Good.
Then the sky turned gold.
The city began to shake. A massive bolt of lightning came crashing down from the yellow sky and struck the memory road below with a soundless flash that was nevertheless blinding. Then another. Then another.
My entire mindscape was becoming a lightning farm — bolt after bolt hitting the ground in flashes of growing frequency, each one more violent than the last.
I threw my arms up to shield myself, but there was nothing to do. The thunder kept coming. One bolt struck close — too close — and impacted the top of a memory version of the Baxter Building. I watched with dread for structural damage and sighed in relief when I found none.
But as I looked at the impact point, I noticed something strange. The lightning had left behind a residue — not scorch marks or soot, but something that looked like fine yellow circuits spreading across the surface of the building before slowly fading.
I looked around. Every strike left the same pattern. I inhaled sharply.
The lightning was trying to imprint. Every other power I had absorbed was primarily physical — with the exception of Magneto's. But Franklin's powers operated on an entirely different level. They weren't attaching properly because there was nothing in my mental landscape for them to anchor to.
They needed something like the Tower.
I grinned. Perfect.
I launched myself toward the Dark Tower, turned around, and faced my memory city with both hands outstretched. I had almost no experience with direct mental manipulation — though it was a practiced discipline at Kamar-Taj for focus and bodily regulation. But there was always a first time.
I focused. I extended my awareness outward, sending feelers into the storm — searching for patterns, which weren't hard to find because the lightning kept targeting the same points again and again. I opened my eyes and threw out mental web lines toward the bolts, aiming to anchor them.
The webs moved like water, coiling around the lightning as it came down. It took everything I had just to hold them together. I pulled and held on with everything I had.
But they were too strong.
*THANG!*
The webbing snapped. I was thrown backward.
*KABOOM!*
The lightning grew more agitated — drawn together now, they intensified. I growled at myself. I summoned the mental webbing again and threw it out. Wrapped them. Pulled.
*THANG.*
*KABOOM.*
I hit the ground hard. My mind was starting to tear. The pain was becoming something I could barely think through — almost bad enough to make me want it to stop in any way it could.
And then I felt something different. Something warm.
A pair of arms wrapped around my neck from behind. "Peter. I'm here."
I turned. Jean was there.
"Jean — h-how?"
She smiled and helped me back to my feet. "We told you, didn't we? We're not leaving you." She took my hand. "We're in this together."
"We?" I started, and then felt two more hands touch my back. I turned.
Wanda and Felicia were there too — floating in my mindscape, right beside the Dark Tower. "Kitten? Wanda?"
"Right here, Tiger," Felicia smiled. "Just tell us what to do."
"And make it quick," Wanda said, looking out at the storm. "Because it is genuinely not looking good."
She was right. The lightning was accelerating — hitting faster, harder, more violently than before.
"Peter," Jean said, steady and warm. "What's the plan?"
"We need to pull all of it toward that Tower," I said, pointing behind me. "It should be able to hold and compile the energy."
Wanda whistled at the Tower. "That's some structure you've built in here, Peter. What exactly are you keeping inside it?"
"The kind of things that need to stay kept," I said. "Is everyone ready?"
"Ready," Felicia and Jean said together. Wanda gave a single nod.
I took a deep breath. "Third time's the charm." I threw out the mental webbing — larger this time, a much wider cast — and began coiling it around the streams of lightning. "Argh—" I held on with everything I had.
"We've got it," Felicia said as she and Wanda grabbed the webbing on my left, Jean taking the lines on my right.
"On three — pull! One. Two. Three — pull!"
"ARGH!"
All four of us cried out as one, and the lightning began to move.
"This is incredibly hard!" Felicia gasped. "Why is your brain so messed up?!"
"You think this is bad — you should see what's in my heart!" I laughed, and somehow the absurdity of it made everything slightly easier to hold onto.
We dug in. We held ground. And slowly — slowly — the lightning was pulled inward.
As the bolts converged, the raw plasma energy seemed to take on a life of its own — each arc reaching for the others, joining, networking, forming structures in the air that looked almost like a web.
I knew what was happening. I had no choice. The energy had to encode onto something — and that something was me. I had to let it in.
And then they began to thrash.
*BOOM.*
Several of the lines tore loose. Wanda was yanked forward, nearly pulled off her feet.
"I've got you!" I shot a mental webline around her ankle and hauled her back.
"I don't understand," Wanda hissed through her teeth. "How can it be this powerful?"
"It just is," I grunted. "Stay close — I won't let anything happen to you. Don't go dying on me, Witchy."
Wanda managed a smirk. "Terrible nickname, Spider."
*BOOM.*
*BOOM.*
*BOOM.*
"ARGH!" All four of us screamed as the lightning collapsed inward, forming a cage of crackling plasma around us — closing in slowly, each second narrowing the space.
We all let the web lines go. They weren't needed anymore. The lightning was already here.
It tightened around us, each pass closer than the last, the pain intensifying with every pass.
"Peter — what's happening?" Jean asked. We were pressed together now, all four of us huddled in the shrinking eye of the storm.
"I don't know — it should be working, it should be — why isn't it working—" The lightning was no longer just striking. It was trying to break through. Break in.
I could see the girls around me, trying to put themselves between me and the pain. And I knew, with a certainty that cut straight through the agony, that if they stayed — they wouldn't survive it.
I knew what I had to do.
I grabbed Felicia and Wanda by the shoulder. Wanda turned. "What are you—"
I focused everything I had left and banished them both. Gone — back to their bodies, outside my mind, safe.
"Peter!" Jean cried out. "What did you just do?!"
"They're back in the physical world," I said. "I couldn't let them stay here."
"And me?!" Jean looked at me with something like horror. "Peter — why won't you ever let anyone help you? You would die for any one of us without a second thought — but you can't let a single person do the same for you. Just this once — please. Let me save you."
"If you stay here you'll be hurt!" I said.
"I don't care!" She launched herself at me, throwing her arms around my neck and pulling tight, and I didn't have the strength — or the will — to push her away.
"Jean, please—" I whispered. Tears on my face. "I don't want to hurt you."
"Oh, Peter," she whispered, as the lightning cage closed in around us. "You could never hurt me."
The circuits began to converge. I felt heat building in every part of me — something volcanic, growing from inside. The yellow circuits I had seen before began spreading across the air around us, faster and faster and more chaotic with every second.
I held Jean against my chest with everything I had. One thought, over and over: *Please let her live. Please let her live.*
And then — warmth.
Not the pain of the lightning. Something else entirely. Something that grew and grew until I heard it — a cry in the distance, majestic and ancient, like a bird calling across the whole sky.
And then there was an explosion.
It tore through the lightning circuits and scattered them. A ring of fire erupted around us, and out of its center descended a glowing figure in a cascade of red flame — dressed in living fire, hair wild and burning, her eyes blazing with something immense and untameable.
She didn't look hurt. She looked powerful.
"J-Jean?" I whispered.
"Peter..." she looked at her own hands, then at the ring of fire holding everything at bay around us. "What's happening to me? Am I — is this me? Am I doing this?"
"Yes," I said softly, getting to my feet. "Yes, Jean. You are."
"Are you okay? Are you still in control?"
Jean looked at me steadily. "Of course I am. Why wouldn't I be?"
I took a quick step back. "Because you're on fire. Not that I didn't think you were remarkable before, but now... well. You're positively smoking."
The joke landed. She laughed — actually laughed — and something in her flames gentled.
"Oh, Peter." She floated down, and I pulled her into my arms. Her flames didn't burn me. I felt only warmth. She put her arms around my neck and kissed me with an intensity I felt all the way to my bones.
Around us, the fire began to do what the web lines couldn't. It controlled the lightning — redirecting it, channeling it outward toward the Dark Tower. I felt the Tower accept it. The strings of power inside me found their anchor at last, and the lightning struck home with a tremendous, final explosion.
Jean pulled back and smiled. "I told you. I'm never leaving you. Not ever."
And then — white.