The street split apart where the Executioner's axe had fallen. Asphalt smoked, storefronts crumbled, and cars lay scattered like children's toys. The bald giant straightened from the crater he had carved, runes burning along the haft of his weapon. His eyes glowed faintly red as he scanned the X-Men with cold indifference.
"You are not Asgardian," he rumbled, his voice carrying above the distant roars of Leviathans. "But you stand. Good. It will be more satisfying to break you."
Scott Summers clenched his jaw, brushing brick dust from his visor. "X-Men—form up!"
Storm descended from the smoke, lightning dancing between her fingers. Bobby skated onto an ice ramp, freezing plasma fire from nearby Chitauri that dared to approach. Kitty phased through the debris, pulling a trapped civilian to safety before vanishing back into the team's line. Jean floated just above ground level, psychic energy shimmering like a shield around them.
The Executioner smirked. "Children. Playing at war." He swung his axe in a lazy arc. The motion alone sent a gale of displaced energy, bowling Bobby from his ice ramp and hurling him into a wrecked taxi.
"Iceman!" Kitty gasped.
Bobby groaned, raising a shaky thumbs-up. "Still… cold…"
Scott narrowed his eyes. "Jean, shield up!"
The Enchantress's champion roared, charging with the speed of a predator far faster than his bulk suggested. His axe cleaved through Jean's psychic barrier with a crack of green fire, the feedback slamming her into the pavement.
"Jean!" Scott's optic beam lanced out, crimson energy tearing across the street. The Executioner raised his axe, the blade glowing as it absorbed the blast. He laughed.
"Is that all?!"
He twisted the haft, redirecting Scott's optic blast skyward where it detonated in a crack of concussive thunder.
Storm's eyes went white. Lightning cascaded from the heavens, striking the Executioner square in the chest. For a moment he staggered, runes glowing red-hot against his skin.
Then he turned his gaze upward and smiled.
"My axe drinks deeper than your storms, witch." He slammed the weapon into the ground, and the lightning flowed into it, coiling around the blade until the weapon blazed with stolen thunder.
Storm's face hardened. "Then I will drown you instead."
The skies opened at her command. A wall of rain slammed into the street, water hammering the Executioner's stance. Kitty phased through the torrent, hands gripping his armored arm.
"Scott, now!" she shouted.
Cyclops adjusted his visor, narrowing the beam. A surgical blast shot past Kitty's phased form, hammering the Executioner in the ribs. Armor cracked—just barely.
The Asgardian bellowed, shaking Kitty loose with one swing of his arm. His axe arced toward her—
—and was stopped by a wall of solid ice.
Bobby gritted his teeth, forcing every ounce of cold into the barrier. "You want her—you go through me."
The axe shattered the wall in two. Ice sprayed in shards across the street. The Executioner loomed over Bobby, raising his weapon high.
Jean's voice screamed in Bobby's mind. Move!
A telekinetic shove yanked him out of the way as the axe split the street like an earthquake. Bobby landed hard, clutching his ribs, but alive.
The Executioner snarled. "Enough games!" He spun the axe in both hands, runes flaring, and unleashed a shockwave that hurled the entire team back. Storefronts imploded, cars flipped, and Jean's shield barely kept them from being reduced to pulp.
Scott coughed blood, pressing a hand to his side. "We can't keep trading blows with him. We need to hit him together."
Jean's voice, tight with strain: "He's warded—my telepathy barely scratches his mind. But his focus wavers when he absorbs too much. If we overload him—"
Storm landed beside them, rain dripping from her cloak. "Then we drown him in power until he chokes."
Scott nodded grimly. "On my mark. Everyone—full force."
The Executioner stalked forward, axe dragging through concrete. "Pathetic."
Scott adjusted his visor. "Now!"
His optic blast slammed into the Asgardian's chest. Storm unleashed a cyclone of lightning, the bolts hammering down in rapid succession. Bobby froze the ground around his feet, ice climbing his legs like a vice. Jean hurled cars, lampposts, and slabs of concrete at once, the sheer weight of her telekinesis pressing down like a mountain.
The Executioner roared, axe drinking it all. His armor glowed like molten metal, runes screaming with light. His arms shook—not with fear, but with the strain of so much energy coursing through his weapon.
"MORE!" he bellowed, lifting the axe skyward. "Give me MORE!"
Scott's beam intensified until the air wavered with heat. Storm screamed as lightning flayed her palms raw. Bobby pushed ice faster than his body could handle, veins glowing faintly blue with frost. Jean's nose bled freely, her body trembling under the psychic strain.
The Executioner staggered to one knee. His grin faltered.
The runes on his axe began to crack.
Kitty phased through the ground beneath him, emerging behind with a jagged pipe in her hand. "You want more?" she hissed, slamming it through his side. The metal phased through his armor—and solidified inside his flesh.
The Executioner howled in pain. His axe flared once more—then shattered in a cascade of lightning and fire.
The explosion ripped the street apart.
---
Silence followed.
Smoke drifted across a crater where the street once stood. The X-Men dragged themselves up from the rubble, battered but alive. Scott coughed, visor cracked nearly in half. Jean staggered to her feet, wiping blood from her face. Bobby clutched his frostbitten arms, shivering uncontrollably. Storm descended, wings of lightning dissipating as she landed. Kitty emerged from the debris, her uniform torn, face streaked with grime.
In the crater's center, the Executioner knelt, bleeding from his side, his armor ruined, his axe destroyed. He looked at them with something new in his eyes—not fury, but respect.
"You… fought well," he rasped.
Then a green shimmer wrapped around him. A portal opened at his feet. His broken form collapsed into it, vanishing before any of them could move.
The street went silent but for the crackle of fire and the distant roar of Leviathans.
Scott exhaled, fists clenching. "We had him."
Storm raised her gaze to the burning sky. "And while we fought him… the invasion still spreads."
The X-Men turned as one toward the chaos of the city. The Executioner might have escaped, but the war was far from over.