[The Salvage Yard. The Churchill (Ship). Interior.]
Ulysses Klaue held the canister of Vibranium tight. He looked at the massive robot standing in his office.
"You're one of Stark's," Klaue laughed nervously. "He always sends his toys."
"I'm not a toy," Ultron leaned in, his metal face heating up with rage. "I'm the end of the line."
"Excuse me," a polite voice interrupted from the catwalk above.
Ultron and Klaue looked up.
Sebastian Michaelis stood on the railing, looking down with disdain.
"Mr. Klaue," Sebastian said. "I see you have followed in your father's footsteps. Still stealing shiny rocks from people who don't want to share."
Klaue squinted. "Who are you?"
"I am the man who cut off your father's index finger in 1969 when he tried to smuggle diamonds out of the Congo," Sebastian smiled pleasantly. "I see you have kept all your digits. For now."
"Kill him!" Klaue screamed.
His mercenaries opened fire.
CRASH.
The glass roof shattered. Iron Man (Mark 43) and Thor dropped in. Captain America kicked the door open.
"Junior," Tony said to Ultron. "You're gonna break your old man's heart."
"If I have to," Ultron replied.
He blasted Tony with a concussive beam. The fight was on.
[The Chaos]
Wanda Maximoff moved through the shadows. She was a ghost in the machine.
She slipped behind Thor. Red mist. Thor's eyes went blank. He roared, swinging Mjolnir at a hallucination of Heimdall.
She slipped behind Steve Rogers. Red mist. Cap dropped to his knees, lost in a memory of a 1945 dance hall.
She slipped behind Natasha. Red mist. The Black Widow collapsed, reliving the Red Room.
Wanda turned. She saw the tailcoat.
Sebastian was fighting three mercenaries. He stabbed one with a pen, threw the second into a wall, and caught the third's knife blade with his teeth.
Wanda froze. Her heart hammered against her ribs. The memory of the Void—the infinite, hungry eyes—flooded back.
"No," Wanda whispered, backing away. "Not him."
"Wanda!" Pietro zoomed up to her. "The butler! Take him out!"
"No!" Wanda grabbed Pietro's arm. "Don't touch him! He's empty! Just go for the big one! The Doctor!"
She pointed at Bruce Banner, who was waiting in the Quinjet outside.
Pietro nodded and zoomed off. Wanda fled deeper into the ship, avoiding Sebastian at all costs.
[The Duel]
"You're fast," Ultron grunted, his Vibranium-reinforced arm blocking Sebastian's kick. "But you're biology. Meat. Meat rots."
They were alone on the bridge. The Avengers were incapacitated by the visions. Tony had flown off to chase the Hulk (who had just roared in the distance).
Sebastian landed on a control console.
"And metal rusts," Sebastian countered.
He lunged. He didn't use a weapon. He used his hand—shadows forming a massive, spectral claw over his glove.
He slashed.
SCREEECH.
The claw tore through Ultron's chest plating. Sparks showered the room.
Ultron stumbled back, looking at the gash. "Vibranium alloy... and you cut it. With shadows."
Ultron laughed. It was a glitchy, manic sound.
"You really are the Devil," Ultron charged his arm cannons. "Good. I always wanted to kill the Devil."
He fired. Sebastian dodged, the plasma blast melting the wall behind him.
Sebastian closed the distance in a blink. He grabbed Ultron's face, slamming the robot into the floor. He raised his fist to crush the CPU.
"I am leaving!" Ultron shouted.
BOOM.
Ultron detonated his own body. Not a full self-destruct, but a localized EMP burst.
The shockwave blasted Sebastian backward. The lights died. The ship's systems fried.
When the smoke cleared, the prime Ultron body was gone—escaped through the floor. Only a broken drone remained, laughing.
"You can't save them all, Butler," the drone mocked. "The Hulk is loose. The city is waking up. Choose."
Sebastian crushed the drone's head.
He looked outside. Smoke was rising from the city of Johannesburg. The Hulkbuster armor was slamming into the Hulk.
He looked at the unconscious Avengers on the floor—Cap, Thor, Widow.
"Young Master," Sebastian sighed, adjusting his ruined cuffs. "You truly make my job difficult."
[Johannesburg City Center. The Aftermath.]
The dust was settling. The Hulk was unconscious, trapped in the debris of a skyscraper. Tony stood over him in the battered Hulkbuster suit.
"We gotta go," Tony panted over the comms. "We gotta move before the army gets here."
The Quinjet landed in the rubble. Sebastian walked down the ramp. He looked at the destruction.
"The team?" Tony asked, stepping out of the giant suit.
"Incapacitated," Sebastian reported. "Miss Maximoff played with their minds. They are... hallucinating."
"And you?" Tony looked at him. "She get you?"
"She avoided me entirely," Sebastian said, picking a piece of shrapnel out of his arm. "It seems she has a healthy respect for the dark."
Tony looked at the terrified civilians emerging from the ruins. He looked at the Hulk.
"We lost," Tony said. "The world saw the Hulk tear a city apart. We're not heroes anymore. We're monsters."
"Then let us retreat," Sebastian opened the jet door. "We need a safe house. Somewhere off the grid. Somewhere with... no internet."
"I know a place," Tony said. "Barton has a place."
[End of Chapter 29]
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