Elisa's only regret was that she had never found the Darkhold. There had been a lead- a laboratory that claimed to test cutting edge technology but reeked of dark magic, but when she tracked the magic down to its source, she'd found only ashes.
Zola had encouraged her obsession, and now she could see why. She'd wasted the better part of a year following that rabbit hole. He hadn't wanted to act quickly- always pushing for diligence and caution. Even though she commanded his loyalty, the devious bastard had found a way to get what he had wanted.
But now that she saw the fruits of that decision, she couldn't fault him for it. Despite the Darkhold coming to nothing, the past year had been… productive. She and Zola had two of the greatest talents Hydra had ever been gifted with- hers magical, and his technological. With her expertise and his, along with Potter's runes and the technology they borrowed from Wakanda, they'd been able to work wonders. A harmony of magic and science. What they had made went far beyond mere weapons, beyond enchanted jewelry and suits of armor.
No, what they had created was nearly alive.
The body of this was approximated a human. It had been crafted from vibranium, each piece of its pale-white body was minimalistic- slender and smooth. The thing had no joints, the pieces of its body did not attach to each other. What approximated the things' hand hovered an inch away from its forearm, which similarly was separated from its upper arm. While not physically welded to each other, they were connected by something far more powerful- magic. Each piece was inscribed with runes- runes that held the thing together, that shielded and strengthened, runes that would allow it to bind, choke, weaken, shock, and burn. They glowed only faintly now, as the construct was not active. Then there was the technology. Wakandans had made some truly impressive weapons, and Zola had not been shy in utilizing them.
"Can you control them?" She asked.
"For now." He informed her "Though I cannot utilize them to their full extent, the bandwidth is simply impossible. Once you possess the mind stone, you can use them far more effectively than I can now."
Elisa smirked. It was perfect. Since she would the wielder of the mind stone, she would be the sole controller of this power. "Well, my friend." That was a lie, they weren't friends, but it felt nice to say, "I think it's time."
This day had been delayed long enough. Her search for the Darkhold, and Zola's insistence on perfection had pushed back her timeline, and she'd grown anxious. She had a suspicion that if she didn't act soon, the opportunity to achieve anything would be taken away from her.
"If you're certain." Zola said doubtfully.
"We have the power to strike down our enemies right now." She scoffed "Even if I waited another year, you would not be satisfied, you never would be. I did not get to where we are now by being cautious."
She did not contemplate that her current situation- a fugitive on the run with only mind-controlled servants for company- was far less enviable than she'd like to believe. Nevertheless, Zola relented- he had to. "I cannot argue with that."
It took a not inconsiderable amount of power to break through the jewel of the scepter. Von Strucker, had he dared, probably could have mustered the technology to do so. But naturally, he had shied away from breaking what seemed to be the source of the artifact's power. It was to his loss and her benefit. Shattering the jewel was nearly trivial to them, here and now. The larger challenge had been constructing something to hold it, and Zola had come through. She'd considered a few of his proposals, until settling on a vibranium locket. It would be discrete, yet available to her whenever she needed it.
For the sake of caution, Zola had alerted their base's security- both the warm bodies and the cold- and had situated themselves in the central room of the compound. It was a large, circular area that acted both as a research space and a home base for her new constructs. With its central location and reinforced walls, it would be the most secure part of the base.
This was important because she knew that this was the moment of greatest danger for her. The minute the staff was destroyed, so would her hold on everyone around her- including Zola. Zola, who she knew would stab her in the back if he had the freedom to.
Perhaps that justified her reaction, though she admitted that her own safety had been the furthest thing from her mind. The beam had pierced the scepter's jewel, creating fractures along its surface that glowed yellow to contrast with the blue of the jewel. Finally, it shattered, sending a tiny yellow gem clattering to the table, wobbling unnaturally as it settled. The instant she saw it, she knew, she needed it.
Elisa didn't think and didn't hesitate. She reached out and grabbed it.
She'd spent a lot of time, speculating and fantasizing about what it would be like to wield an infinity stone. She hadn't expected it to hurt.
Not physically, it didn't, but her mind felt like a supernova- burning, churning, billowing outwards. It wasn't just a sensory overload, it was a processing overload, and it was driving her insane. She screamed, clutching the gem in her hand in a death grip. Her awareness radiated outward- touching Zola, then the Hydra guards- reasserting her control. She should have been happy with that, but she couldn't stop- she felt the people in the nearby town, and then in the city, on further- all flickering living minds with internal lives of their own. It was too much, but there was more.
She needed more.
Her mind exploded further, shattering, surging away from the planet, accelerating across the vast gap of space. She was being spread thin, but she couldn't stop. She grasped and reached for a presence, large, old and slumbering. It awoke, and it felt like the sunrise. Its mind burned like the sun and she could help but grab and claw at it like a rabid animal- a deep insatiable hunger answered her. She was out of control, splintering in all direction out into the cosmos. Further… further…further beyond reason and without end.
Until it ended. Until the woman who was once Elisa Sinclair was back in that little round room on Earth. She'd fallen to her knees. The cool metal of a construct's hand was closed around her own, which in turn closed around the cool metal of the locket, which in turn housed the tiny, powerful infinity stone.
Zola had used the construct to guide her hand. He had saved her.
Though he hadn't, truthfully. Because whoever she was, she wasn't the Elisa Sinclair of five seconds ago. She was different.
-----
Far, far away, Thanos felt a tiny psychic flicker against his mind. He immediately recognized it for what it was.
It appeared that something had come of the staff after all.
Sending Loki to Earth had been a mistake, as had sending Ronan. With Odin still on the throne of Asgard and guarding the Tesseract, he had not wanted to be too overt in his movements. The god-king was one of the few that was powerful enough and had the ability to organize a large enough response to stop him. But clearly, half measures were not sufficient.
There were rumors circling, however. All was not as it used to be on Asgard. The court was turning inward uncharacteristically. There was weakness there, decadence.
Perhaps it was time. If he wanted to gather the infinity stones, he'd have to do it himself.
-----
Wanda felt it, shining, burning clear into her mind. She knew instantly what it meant. She staggered away from the table, clinging to the signal even as it receded.
Instantly, all attention was on her. A good portion of the Avengers were with her for lunch, but the meal was instantly forgotten. "Wanda, are you okay?" Harry approached her, putting his hands on her shoulders.
"I know where she is." Wanda gasped. No one needed to ask who 'she' was.
Steve took over "Suit up everyone. We're going to strike with overwhelming force. We need to reach out to Wakanda-"
"On it." Hill replied.
"May I?" Harry asked, brushing his hand against her cheek. She relaxed into his touch, nodding wordlessly. Harry tapped into her mind, his presence was comforting.
"It's close enough for me." He announced. "I could try following it…"
"Absolutely not." Natasha said "No one is going alone."
Harry grinned wryly "Of course. I think its north of here… maybe 300 kilometers."
"Jarvis, look for any unusual energy spikes in the Canadian wilderness, would you?" Tony snapped. Stark Industries had satellites for such a purpose.
"Of course, sir." A moment "I believe this is what you are looking for. The property belongs to oil CEO Steven Bouchard. It appears to mostly be forest, however…"
"Forests don't typically erupt with blasts of radiation." Bruce surmised "The spectra is similar to the Tesseract's, but different."
The team was remarkably efficient in equipping themselves. In no more than fifteen minutes, they had gathered outside, where Thor was waiting for them. They were better, stronger, more prepared than they had ever been. Harry and Wanda had spent months training together. Skye was equipped with newly crafted vibranium gauntlets. Stark had ceaselessly worked to upgrade his armor. They had also become a better team- having many missions against Hydra and other terrorist cells under their belts.
They had even picked up new heroes, though neither were present. Tony had taken a young hero, 'Spider-man', under his wing (but had insisted that he was too young to run a real op with the team). Meanwhile, Sam Wilson had a contact with a man on the other side of the country- one Scott Lang, who was calling himself 'Ant-man.'. Skye had been happy to rib Natasha about the abundance of bug themed heroes. Wanda watched the assembly with only half attention, most of her focused rooted on keeping ahold of her link to the mind stone. Even if they had identified a location, Madame Hydra could teleport away at any time, and Wanda would be needed to track her down again. She hoped that wouldn't be the case.
-----
The Bifrost was completely unlike what Harry had been expecting, different from both apparition and portkeys- the kaleidoscoping cascade of color was disorienting… but also beautiful.
Harry honestly would have liked to see more of Asgard, but they didn't have time. After He'd only gotten a glimpse of the magnificent golden city while Thor had recruited some of his old friends 'Lady Sif and the Warriors Three' and T'Challa had been brought up with a contingent of the Dora Milaje. One of the Asgardians had said, they were a 'our enemies will shiver at the sight of our mighty host', and while Harry thought that optimistic, he did agree that the size of the group was impressive. "Avengers! Asgardians! Wakandans!" Thor boomed, winding up to give a speech "We're here today to-" Their world exploded into light as Heimdall reactivated the Bifrost.
They landed, predictably, in the middle of a boreal forest. There was a moment of silence as they took in their surroundings, before Clint said "Well, I don't know what I expected."
"It's here." Wanda insisted, stretching her hand out into the air. "Close, its just…" The air rippled as her hand passed through it, as if it had penetrated film.
"That is Wakandan technology." T'Challa said. "What we use to hide Wakanda from the rest of the world."
"Its an insult." Okoye, the head of the Dora Milaje, sneered.
"We have no idea what's behind the barrier." Steve said in a measured tone "We should be prepared for anything… Sam?"
Wilson needed no further prompting to detach the drone from his pack and send it across the barrier "Oh yeah, they've got an entire facility." He winced "And they know we're here."
"We all know the plan." Steve barked "Get in there and do what you do best, remember to be flexible and help others out if they need it."
They had talked their strategy to death for this scenario. Clint and Natasha would work with the Dora Milaje would secure the perimeter, Pietro, Tony, Rhodes, the Hulk, and Falcon would be more mobile and spread chaos. But the bulk of the team would follow Wanda straight to the Mind Stone.
Immediately upon crossing the border, they came under fire. The facility was impressive- a series of buildings, bunkers, gates, and towers. The team leapt into action. Harry put up a shield to block the bolts of energy be sprayed at them from the nearest set of towers. Behind him, Harry heard the telltale sounds of Banner transforming. Tony, Sam, and Pietro all took off. Moments later, the Hulk charged the fortification, tearing down both towers.
"I was hoping to use one of those." Clint muttered.
"Oh, go climb a tree." Natasha joked.
Meanwhile, Wanda's eyes narrowed. "Follow me."
Harry, and most of the rest of the team, did, ripping through the defenses with relative ease. Hydra's technology had clearly advanced in the past year, but it seemed that they had nothing that could truly compete with the Avengers… at least at first. Vehicles, gun emplacements, bunkers, all here torn apart by Harry's spells, or rent by Skye's blasts of concussive force, or just fried with Thor's lightning, if they were even still intact by the time the group had reached them.
The first warning sign came from Sam "Be advised, there is… something guarding the central building." He told them over comms.
"You got a description?" Steve asked.
"They aren't letting me get close… but it looks like drones, of some sort."
"They're copying me again, I should be flattered." Tony snarked.
"No, this is different." Harry could feel Tony's indignance to that response, even over the comms.
They would soon see what Sam meant. Arrayed in front of them was a formation of them. They were each a collection of elegantly shaped metal pieces suspended in the air as if they'd been cast in a jello mold. Each one roughly corresponding to part of the body- hand, forearm, upper arm, chest, head, torso, thigh, calf, foot.
As one, the constructs turned towards them, looking at them with faceless heads. "Okay, that's freaky." Bucky muttered.
"They're using runes." Harry grimaced. Indeed, inscribed upon each body part was a set of glowing runes.
"They're made of vibranium." Skye added "I'm… not sure how useful I'll be." They would not be given any more time to strategize, as the constructs had not only taken notice of them, but had begun to rapidly advance. They moved with inhuman speed and an uncanny grace- approximating the movements of a human, but just slightly off.
It took seconds for them to close the gap. Thor cast his lightning at a construct, causing no apparent damage. The thing returned fire, by launching the lightly right back at them, which Harry blocked with a shield. "Right." Steve grunted, throwing his shield. The construct lifted itself up slightly, so that the shield passed through the gap between its chest and torso.
From there, the battle escalated. Thor and the Asgardians charged headfirst into the fray. While Thor's hammer could easily knock the things back, that alone didn't seem to do damage to the Vibranium. The things fought to kill, swiping with dangerously sharp appendages, forcing their opponents on the backfoot. They had Wakandan beam weaponry, which they had prepared for, but also a set of magical attacks that were modelled after Harry's own repertoire. Bucky found himself deflecting a barrage of stunners with his vibranium arm- just like old times. They were also surprisingly strong- able to engage the Asgardians one on one.
And Harry's repertoire of spells? He had the ominous feeling these things were just absorbing his magic. Stunners and binding spells only half affected them for a moment, before a complex network of runes lit up, followed by the thing throwing his own spell back at them. More physical spells didn't have that problem, but he wasn't about the crack through vibranium with blasting curses.
Their only weakness was their reaction time. They were fast, but it was almost like they were suffering at lag- something that Steve had picked up on. "It looks like whatever's controlling these things has too much on their hands." Steve shouted, ducking another swipe. So, despite the fact that they struggled to damage them, dodging their attacks was easy.
"Focus on taking out the runes, even a small amount of damage will cause them to fail!" Harry shouted.
T'Challa engaged another- swiping and toying at it from a distance. "You will not be directly damaging Vibranium." He warned "You will need to find another way."
Right, time to get creative. Merlin, Harry wished he'd taken ancient runes. "Aguamenti!" He sent a torrent of water streaming across the battlefield and engulfing three of the constructs. He followed that with "Glacius!" Encasing them in ice would barely slow them down. Not only were they just too strong for that, but he could already see that runes associated with heat and fire had been activated as they began to carve themselves out of their prison. Grimacing, he shot the block of ice far up into the air, taking the constructs with it. It'd at least give them a few minutes.
"Well." Harry breathed "Any suggestions?" He might be able to just brute force his way through their protections, but that would take time, and it wouldn't be a good use of his abilities. There had to be a better way.
"We go for what we came for." Wanda said "Madam Hydra is controlling them. We take her out, we stop them."
That… was a good plan. "Good call." Harry nodded "Skye, cover for us. Kick up some dirt"
Skye had been standing in rearguard, knowing she wouldn't be able to help against anything made of the most vibration absorbent material in existence. She was all to happy to contribute, and promptly sent a magnificent barrage of muck, dirt, and dust across the battlefield, generally obscuring everything.
"Thanks for that!" Bucky called sarcastically.
Harry grabbed both Skye and Wanda by the arm and apparated them to the top of the building. "Just like old times?" He grinned at Skye, who mirrored his smile. Her vibranium gauntlets allowed her to focus her power more effectively than ever before, the highly focused concussive blast rent through reinforced concrete with ease. They dropped through one level and then another, landing in the center of a large circular room.
Wanda hadn't let them down.
The room's lights had all blown out, but that hardly mattered, the mind stone was light enough, casting the room in a warm, yellow glow from its spot hanging around Madam Hydra's neck. Opposite of her, still enclosed in shadow punctuated by the glow of runes was another of those constructs, except this one was different, larger. Harry couldn't quite decide on its shape, it had more limbs all sprawling out from a central node like some sort of octopus.
Or a hydra.
The thing lashed out, one of its appendages going for Skye, who dodged, jumping over it and rolling away. Another limb thrust towards Wanda, nearly stabbing her with the rapier-like tip, but Wanda stopped it inches from her face- the faint red glow of her telekinetic energy belying her intense focus. A second limb shot a beam of energy at her which she also blocked, while the thing oriented itself around her ominously, as if evaluating her for weaknesses. Wanda's gaze shifted towards the offending appendage, and the weapon shorted out with a small explosion.
Harry wasn't about to waste this chance. If they took out Madame Hydra, then her little army could possibly fall apart. He launched a set of stunners at her, and while she deflected them, they had merely been a distraction. In an eyeblink he apparated up to her, grabbing her wrist. "No getting away this time, Madame."
"Oh?" She replied distantly, giggling. "Are you sure?" Harry felt uneasy. He heard the room begin to cave in as Skye brought the ceiling down on the hydra. She and Wanda seemed to be holding the thing off for the moment, but something was off with Madame Hydra. She didn't seem to be entirely there. "Because you're exactly where I want you." He felt his skin crawl, and suddenly didn't want to be anywhere near the woman. What was wrong with her? His eyes fell to the mind stone, and he thought he had the answer. A horribly powerful burst of psychic energy crashed against his skull, and the bracelet grew warm from the sheer power it took to absorb it. Madame Hydra frowned, perturbed.
Yeah, it was time to get that thing away from her. He reached out, knowing that the protections on the amulet would prevent him from summoning it directly, and Madame Hydra snarled. "MINE!" She clutched the amulet in her hand, a beam of energy seared from the Mind Stone and straight at Harry.
Harry had an instant to react. He had no idea if his shields could hold against the power of an infinity stone, but he had a better plan in mind. He apparated them both away, but purposefully excluded the amulet holding the mind stone. Madam Hydra thrashed against him, both physically and with her magic, and it sent them both off course. Instead of landing across the room, they crashed down in the middle of the forest with a crack.
"NOOOO!" She howled rabidly, her magic forming up to apparate her back. Not a chance. Crack! Harry latched on with his magic, and what followed was a battle of wills that dumped them in another patch of forest. "NO! I need it! Getoffgetoffgetoff!" She scratched and gnashed her teeth while his hastily cast stunner deflected against the runic wards in her clothing. Moments later, her magic was again welling up to take them back.
Crack! Harry fought her, and they went careening into another patch of forest, but no sooner had the landscape formed in front of his eyes was it wiped away. Crack! If he could separate her from her clothing… as perverted as that sounded, it would allow him to just stun her and be done with it. He just needed a moment to breath and focus.
He wouldn't get that breather. This time they were dumped in a lake, and they both choked on chilled water as she thrashed wildly in his grip. Crack! They collided with a tree. Crack! They landed in the manicured front lawn of a house. Crack! They hit pavement. A car swerved to avoid them, but they were gone too quickly for him to see what befell it. Crack! His vision was swimming, he couldn't even focus before they were somewhere else. Crack! "FUCKER!" Madame Hydra belted. Crack! Crack! Crack! Crack!
And then it stopped.
Harry didn't dare let her go, but he welcomed the reprieve. That was easily the third worst apparition experience of his life, and he wasn't keen on it going any higher up the list.
It was only as his vision cleared and he got his bearings that he realized that Madame Hydra was dead. He wasn't holding onto her; he was holding on to what was left of her corpse. He closed his eyes and turned away, not wanting the image of her mangled remains to linger. Splinching was a horrible way to go, Harry knew.
He was covered in her blood.
He blinked, looking around… where was he? A city? They had gone further than he'd thought.
Then he noticed he wasn't alone. He looked the new arrival up and down from his position on the ground. He looked… like a wizard. Well, he didn't follow the fashions of the wizarding world that he knew, but he was dressed much like a muggle would perceive a wizard to dress.
"Who the hell are you?" He asked the man, feeling somewhat vulnerable. He wasn't exactly in the right state to fight another magic user.
"Mr. Potter, my name is Doctor Stephen Strange, and I think it's time that we talked."