"Are you guys done with your conversation now?" Alex asked.
Tony's head whipped back toward Natasha as he immediately winced, though his suit immediately powered up, ready to attack.
"Easy, Mr. Stark," Alex said. "Don't get whiplash."
"I think I'm good," Tony said, rubbing his neck. "Can you just appear anywhere at will?"
"With the Space Stone in my hands, yes," Alex nodded.
"It's technically ours," Tony said. "Asgard took it from Earth."
Alex chuckled. "The one I have isn't from your universe."
"But you did take the Time and the Mind Stones, didn't you?"
"I did," Alex nodded.
"Hence leaving us helpless in the face of an invasion."
"You say that like you would have had a chance otherwise. At this moment, this Earth is one of the weakest ten among the forty."
"I'll take those odds."
"How?" Alex asked. "Together? Then lose together as well?"
Tony frowned, glancing at Natasha.
"I'm giving your planet a chance at safety, Tony," Alex said. "And I am also giving you the chance to have a voice in how I implement that safety. And if you are doubting my capabilities, then I will prove myself to you."
"If you're so strong, why go so far?"
"I have a theory," Alex said. "One that requires you to make me something."
"She said something about that."
"It is something that most likely requires your presence and input."
"Flattery will get you nowhere with me," Tony said. "I still need to consider and consult with people."
"I'm serious. This involves high-level metaphysical concepts like fate. This is both a way for me to get you to do something for me and a test to see if it works."
"This is the first I'm hearing of this," Natasha said from beside Alex.
"I had that doubt only recently. Wanda's got a lot of free time on her hands after I brought her to Gaia."
"Is that our Wanda?" Tony asked.
"How'd you guess?"
"You're preparing for something, right?" Tony said to Natasha. "A nuke like Wanda is someone he would give everything to recruit. Especially since ours isn't nearly as dangerous as the ones my scanners have picked up. He can control her."
"Not dangerous, he says," Alex scoffed. "My Wanda is the strongest of all her variants in the multiverse. The shit we went through to get her to that point…"
"So you made that mural we saw back in Wundagore real, huh?" Tony asked. "To think you've been acting in the shadows since then."
"I'm curious," Alex said. "You have already caught up to most of my covert actions. Can you tell me when I showed up on this planet?"
"Off the top of my head, before the Avengers broke up. Specifically, when Wanda succeeded in containing the explosion. She was not that strong at that time."
"See, that's why I want to recruit you. Despite your limited information, you formed so many accurate conjectures," Alex said appreciatively. "If you don't have any other commitments, shall we go over to Wakanda?"
"I'm cutting off support for the Widows."
"It was good while it lasted," Alex said casually. "One of my four planets will handle their resource needs."
Tony growled.
"Follow me, I have an arrogant mutant and his kingdom to beat up and subdue."
"Our world doesn't have any mutants," Tony interjected.
"Debatable," Alex said. "Considering the incubating Celestial in your core, this planet possesses the full potential to awaken Mutants and the X-gene. Maybe it's dormant for some reason."
A Mystic Arts portal appeared in front of Alex as he and Natasha stepped toward it.
Tony's hesitation only lasted a moment before he took to the air and flew through the portal right before it closed.
…
In the Royal Palace of Wakanda, Alex had left a clone that was still using Killmonger's identity to rule the country, maintaining the original status quo that Wakanda had with the rest of the world.
A portal appeared in the courtyard where Alex in Killmonger's skin was already waiting. He was draped in royal Wakandan garb, with everything from the fabric to the ornaments made with Vibranium.
"Welcome, Stark, to my humble country," he said, looking at the two figures that walked through the portal.
"Hm?" Tony turned to his side, raising a brow at seeing Alex disappear despite walking right beside him.
"Nat doesn't like me playing around with clones," Alex said.
"Does it invoke certain traumas from your past?" Tony asked instinctively, only for Nat to scoff at him and approach Alex.
"Not cool, man," Alex extended his arm toward Natasha, only for her to duck under it.
"Nope," she said.
Alex sighed as Tony finally registered the situation and stared at his face for a few seconds. "Your Majesty, N'Jadaka?"
"Please, call me Apex. I am merely using N'Jadaka's identity for the sake of convenience."
"We never even had a chance, did we?"
"The moment you estranged Wanda, letting me take her away, all possible chances of your resistance dissipated into nothingness," Alex said. "Strange might have had a chance, were he not a moron."
"I really want to shoot my cannon at that fucking cluster right about now."
"Is that supposed to be a euphemism?" Alex looked weirded out.
"No, I remember him mentioning something about a planetbuster," Natasha said. "I thought it was going to be a suit."
"Did you make a Death Star cannon?" Alex asked Tony with shining eyes, mentally commanding Gaia to covertly break through Friday's firewalls to access all of Tony's data.
"Something like that," Tony nodded. "I completed it only recently. Before I could fire it, she…a variant of hers came in to sabotage it, setting me back by a couple of days."
"That is useful information. That means they have someone with precognition or an adjacent ability on their side. I will have to be cautious in dealing with them."
"How do you know they didn't just infiltrate my systems?"
"I've observed the leaders on that side. The Illuminati, they call themselves, mostly a rebrand of the Avengers. They aren't interested in conquering this planet, and simply found out about the dangerous weapon that you built. To them, these actions were self-defense. They wouldn't target you for no reason."
"Quite an unreasonable group of people."
"Forget about those guys for now. Do you know that the US government has been looking for Vibranium?"
"They have been looking for it since my father built Rogers' shield. What's your point?"
"I pulled a few strings and helped them find a fifteen-year-old who could create a specialized detector for Vibranium. They found it in the Atlantic."
"Friday, why is this the first I'm hearing of this?" Tony frowned.
"I cannot find any information about such a detector, Boss. Shall I make a call to Mr. Rhodes?"
"No, I'll let him finish," Tony said, looking pointedly at Alex.
"Every single person involved in the event was killed in less than an hour after they sent a dive team down to verify their findings," Alex said.
"It wasn't Wakanda?"
"I gave them that machine in the first place. Why would it be Wakanda?" Alex said speechlessly.
"Entrapment."
"I don't care for feigned civility, Mr. Stark. If I want to do something, I will do it. I don't use fabricated reasons to justify my actions. It's not Wakanda. But a country whose scale is just as large, if not larger."
"No…" Tony trailed off, realizing that Alex was serious.
"They don't go by Atlantis, but refer to their nation as Talokan," Alex said. "Their leader has specialized powers that grant him an inordinately long lifespan. Over five centuries, he has led his people to establish themselves in the bottom of the ocean."
"That certainly comes in the top ten weirdest things that I have heard about this week."
"Just like Wakanda, I am going to take over Talokan," Alex said bluntly. "Follow me."
Alex formed another portal, this one made using Chaos Magic that left the other side hidden.
"My suit isn't built for such a high-pressure environment."
"Don't be a baby, Tony," Natasha spoke from the side. "If he wanted to kill you, he wouldn't be trying so hard to recruit you."
"It's like I don't even know you anymore, Nat," Tony sighed.
"I have spent ten years away," she said. "This was bound to happen."
The three of them soon passed through the portal, emerging on the other side to a breathtaking sight. Ironically, they were underwater right now.
Enclosed within a translucent bubble, the three of them bore witness to a massive underwater city in front of them, with hundreds of mermen swimming around, going about their day. Unlike Wakandans, who were isolated but were still surface dwellers, these mermen possessed an entirely different culture. From the way their bodies functioned to their modes of entertainment, everything was different.
The most glaring thing that stood out was a bright light high up above the city that served as an artificial sun, illuminating everything far and wide, allowing the mermen thousands of meters underwater to bask in its brightness. The light source sat at the top of a spire emerging from the palace at the center of the city. It was glaringly gaudy and grandiose, standing out even among the unique architecture of buildings in Talokan.
Tony was still stunned at the sight when a faint whirring caught his attention, and he turned back, only to see a Wakandan aircraft emerge from a portal behind him. His eyes widened as he realized that it was only one among hundreds that were all flying within the enormous bubble that Apex seemed to be sustaining. As the portal closed, he counted at least five hundred such crafts floating menacingly in the bubble, awaiting Apex's command.
***
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