[Perspective: Aryan Spencer]
I stood on the balcony of the Presidential Suite. I rested my forearms against the ornate stone railing.
A streak of luminous crimson was shrinking into the distance, weaving between the gothic spires and terracotta rooftops like a comet that had forgotten how to fall.
I watched Wanda fly away, the sheer power of her chaos magic leaving a faint afterimage in the atmosphere.
"You know," I murmured. "Magic is always so fascinating to me. It truly is. I stand here, a man who currently possesses the localized power to fold the entire solar system into a paper swan with a stray thought."
"And yet," I continued, leaning my chin on my folded hands. "There is this irresistible attraction to what she does. My power is like opening the developer console of the universe and typing in a new command. But her magic? It is emotion made manifest. She grabs the universe by the throat and paints it red. It is wild, and it is beautiful, and I am entirely captivated by it."
I sighed, pushing myself off the stone railing and turning my back on the breathtaking view of the city.
"However," I muttered. "I really, really hate it when people disturb my peaceful life. I had a perfectly romantic evening scheduled. And now, my girlfriend is flying across Eastern Europe because an aggrieved ex-employee with a fishbowl on his head wants to play dress up."
I walked back into the suite.
I pushed my perception out of the hotel room. I searched for the encrypted bandwidth signal of Stark Industries drone technology.
There.
I found them.
Hundreds of them.
They were submerged in the Vltava river, hidden in the bell towers of the old town, clinging to the shadows of the alleyways surrounding the main plaza.
They were networked together, waiting for a command to project a holographic nightmare and rain localized destruction on the
civilians.
I targeted their internal motherboards, specifically the central processing chips and the power relays.
Action: Increase voltage capacity by ten thousand percent.
Duration: One microsecond.
Deep inside the chassis of every single drone, the microchips flashed white hot and instantly melted into useless slag. The motherboards were fried beyond any hope of repair, while the external casings remained absolutely pristine.
I walked over to the minibar, pouring myself a glass of sparkling wine. I took a slow sip.
"Do you believe in coincidence?" I asked. "Humans love coincidence. They love to believe that the universe is just a series of random events bumping into each other. But I don't believe in coincidence. I believe in probability."
I set the glass down on the counter with a soft clink.
"And right now," I murmured, reaching out into the probability matrix hovering over the city square where the confrontation was about to take place. "I am setting the probability of a very lethal mechanical failure on a certain fishbowl wearing fraud's suit to one hundred percent. It will happen when the time is right. Let's see how karma plays out."
I walked over to the massive bed, kicking off my shoes and lying back against the pillows.
[Perspective: Wanda Maximoff]
The wind whipped past Wanda's face, as she soared above the winding streets of Prague.
She navigated by the coordinates Fury had sent to her phone, her eyes scanning the gothic architecture below.
She spotted the designated plaza… a cobblestone square surrounded by towering cathedrals and centuries old statues.
She slowed her descent, the red mist of her chaos magic flaring brilliantly against the night sky before she touched down silently onto the roof of a flat building adjacent to the square.
"Miss Maximoff!"
Wanda turned, her hands instinctively raising, the red energy pooling in her palms.
A figure was crouching on the edge of the cathedral tower a few yards away.
He shot a thin line of webbing, swinging across the gap and landing gracefully on the roof beside her.
It was Peter Parker. He was clad entirely in matte black tactical gear, complete with a dark mask and flip up goggles.
"It is you, Peter," Wanda said, letting the red energy dissipate from her hands. She offered him a warm smile. "Why are you dressed like a shadow?"
Peter reached up, pulling the dark mask off his face.
"Mr. Fury made me wear this," Peter explained, tugging uncomfortably at the collar of the suit. "It's a stealth suit. He said Spider Man can't be seen in Europe, so now I'm supposed to be... I don't know. It's honestly really chafing around the shoulders, and the goggles keep fogging up."
"It suits you," Wanda offered politely. "It is very... stealthy."
"Thanks," Peter beamed, clearly thrilled just to be standing next to her. "I'm really glad you're here, Miss Maximoff. Mr. Beck and I were supposed to handle the Fire Elemental together, but having a heavy hitting Avenger here makes me feel like, a million times better about our chances of not dying."
"We will handle it, Peter," Wanda assured him, stepping to the edge of the roof to look down at the empty plaza. "Where is the threat?"
Before Peter could answer.
"Maximoff, Parker, do you read?" Maria Hill's voice echoed over the comms channel.
"We are in position, Agent Hill," Wanda replied.
"We have a situation," Hill reported, the sound of rapid keyboard typing audible in the background. "According to our orbital satellites, we just recorded a massive electromagnetic pulse fluctuation centered directly over your coordinates."
Peter frowned, looking around the quiet rooftops. "An EMP? But… the streetlights are still working."
"That is exactly the problem, Parker," Hill said, her voice tight with confusion. "With a fluctuation of that magnitude, every piece of unshielded electronics within a five mile radius should be completely fried. But we can't detect any structural or infrastructural damage. It's as if the EMP targeted something incredibly specific and ignored everything else."
"Maybe the Fire Elemental emits an electromagnetic field before it manifests?" Peter suggested, his scientific mind racing for an explanation.
"Stay sharp," Nick Fury's gruff voice broke into the channel. "Beck, what's your status? Do you have eyes on the Elemental?"