The ultralink camera projected a false, static image of Ranger's flight path towards a targeted SHIELD surveillance satellite. Ranger, monitoring the hacked feed through his internal HUD, waited until the fabricated data signature was firmly established, his true whereabouts now a ghost in the machine.
"Go Turbo: Stealth Flight." he murmured. The already sleek lines of his flight suit seemed to shimmer and dissolve, not into invisibility, but into a state that bent light and absorbed sensor pings. Simultaneously, the audible hum of his thrusters muted, replaced by an almost imperceptible ripple in the air.
An ultralink drone, one of the smaller, more agile ones he'd created from the scrap, detached from the GT-R, zipping towards him. It merged seamlessly with the advanced smartphone in his hand. The phone twisted, reformed, its mundane casing giving way to a more complex, multifaceted construct – a dedicated command and control interface for his network. This was his decoy.
Another, larger ultralink drone emerged from the car. It pulsed with blue Turbo energy as Ranger focused his will, molding its external shell, drawing upon his suit's nanites. It began to reshape as it merged with the previous construct, mimicking the exact contours and appearance of his own "normal" armored configuration.
A third ultralink then fused with a collection of high-powered capacitors and salvaged thruster components, forming a powerful, detachable flight pack that latched onto the back of the decoy Ranger. He then channeled a significant reserve of Turbo energy into both constructs, enough for them to operate with high energy output and complex maneuvers for at least a month, maybe more if they remained in a low-power surveillance mode.
"Directive: Assume my operational persona." Ranger instructed the primary decoy. "Maintain aerial surveillance of this designated protectorate. Engage hostiles only if absolutely necessary to protect civilian life, or if directly attacked. Report all significant anomalies." To the flight pack, he added, "Maintain optimal flight readiness. Execute evasive and defensive maneuvers as per primary's command."
"Directives noted and engaged." the decoy Ranger's synthesized voice, a perfect mimic of his own modulated tone, replied. It then launched into the sky with a flare of thrusters, taking up a high, almost stationary position, occasionally sweeping the town below with a visible, theatrical blue scanning beam – all part of the performance.
Satisfied, Ranger himself, now a silent, invisible wraith, accelerated. His thrusters, though roaring with power, produced no sound, no heat signature detectable by conventional means. He became a ghost in the night, streaking towards the town's desolate outskirts, towards a forgotten scrapyard he had identified during the GT-R's earlier mapping.
He landed without a whisper amidst mountains of rusted metal and discarded machinery. His internal sensors confirmed no human presence, no active surveillance within a two-kilometer radius. He approached a particularly large, seemingly random junk pile. With an exertion of focused Turbo energy, he lifted the entire mountain of decaying cars and twisted girders – tons of metal – and shifted it a precise meter to the left, revealing a patch of undisturbed, compacted earth.
His hand, still invisible, pointed downwards. A thin, intensely focused beam of energy, more surgical scalpel than weapon, materialized from his fingertips. It sliced into the ground, carving a neat, circular hole. As the earth began to give way, Ranger caught the dislodged section – a massive plug of soil and rock – before it could fall and create a tell-tale tremor. Dust and sand cascaded over his invisible form, but he held it steady, depositing the seven-meter-deep section quietly beside the opening.
He dropped into the chasm, thrusters pulsing silently, leaving him hovering just above a dull metallic surface.
Cracks in the metal, almost invisible to the naked eye, glowed faintly as his Turbo energy seeped into them. Numbers, schematics, and sensor readings scrolled rapidly across his internal HUD as his systems began to map the subterranean structure. subterranean structure. The data coalesced rapidly: An abandoned base. Old. Very old. And, his initial scans confirmed with a high degree of certainty, lifeless
After a final confirmation, he lanced another precise hole through the metallic plate and descended into the darkness below.
The air was stale, heavy with the scent of decay, dust, and forgotten machinery. It was a passageway, utilitarian and clearly long abandoned. Dirt and grime coated every surface, thick enough to muffle his non-existent footsteps. His internal map of the base bloomed, revealing a sprawling complex.
"Go Turbo: Speed." he whispered. His stealth armor shimmered, reconfiguring. The plates became even more streamlined, hugging his form, minimizing drag. Blue energy lines pulsed with increased intensity along his limbs. He readied himself, then blurred into motion, a silent gust of wind through the desolate corridors, dodging fallen debris, ancient documents scattering in his wake, a phantom disturbance in a forgotten tomb.
He skidded to a halt, a silent blur of motion arresting itself before a section of the base that hadn't registered on his initial deep scan – its signature deliberately, expertly, masked. A reinforced, lead-lined door, its electronic lock still faintly powered.
A research lab, deliberately shielded. He hesitated for only a fraction of a second. A surge of Turbo energy, a focused burst into the card reader, and the lock hissed open.
He entered. The room was cold, sterile, and utterly chilling. It wasn't a lab in the conventional sense. It was an operating theatre, or perhaps, a grotesque assembly line. His eyes swept across rows of metallic beds. On them lay humanoid bodies. Or, more accurately, parts of humanoid bodies, all stark white and red, gleaming under the flickering emergency lights. Mechanical. Advanced. Unfinished. He rushed to the nearest bed. The half-completed android lying there was eerily familiar, its design echoing something he'd only seen in classified SHIELD files.
"Vision." he breathed, the name a cold realization. Someone had been trying to recreate Vision. Or an army of them. There were eighty-five beds. Forty of them held these half-made, red-and-white Visions.
His eyes, narrowed and hard, scanned the room. He knew what he had to do. His hands began to glow with Turbo energy. He reached out, not to destroy, but to create. The energy flowed into the scattered piles of advanced electronics, into the dormant circuitry of the lab itself. Metal twisted, wires snaked, components fused.
The raw materials of the lab began to reshape themselves, coalescing into new ultralink constructs, smaller, more adaptable than the ones he'd made from the town's scrap. Then, under his silent command, these newly formed ultralinks surged towards the forty inert, half-made Vision bodies, merging with them, infusing them with his Turbo energy, completing their circuits, animating them.
Forty brand new, red-and-white, Ultralinked Visions stood, their optical sensors flickering to life with a cold, blue light.
Ranger approached one, placing his hand on its head. Information flooded his senses – a direct data uplink. They were weaker than the original Vision, most of them, lacking the Mind Stone's power, but they retained a portion of his capabilities: density shifting, energy projection, enhanced strength aside from intangibility. And, chillingly, their power levels varied wildly. Some were barely functional. A few, however, felt… dangerously close to the original.
He processed the data, his expression grim. A test of absolute control was necessary. These were powerful constructs, and any ambiguity in their loyalty was unacceptable. He issued a silent, internal command to the thirty strongest Ultralinked Visions: Self-destruct.
They hesitated.
A flicker. A micro-second of resistance within his own ultralink network. Not from his programming. Something… else.
That hesitation was all the warning Ranger needed. His eyes narrowed. Compromised.
Before the other Visions could fully react, Ranger exploded into motion. He was in his Speed suit, his agility phenomenal. He blurred, a streak of motion, ramming his fist through the chest of the nearest "strong" Vision. Turbo energy flared, frying its core circuitry even as a flicker of red light – not blue – sparked in its eyes. He was already moving to the next, and the next, a whirlwind of destruction.
The ultralink component within each Vision, designed for control, was now a point of conflict, a brief internal struggle between his command and an overriding, alien influence. That micro-second of internal confusion was all Ranger needed to deliver a killing blow, his Turbo energy overloading their systems.
The remaining compromised Visions, the ones he hadn't targeted yet, now reacted, the alien override fully asserting itself. Their movements became instantly more coordinated, more hostile. Energy blasts, red and jagged, erupted from their hands and foreheads, searing the air. The base's ancient alarms finally blared to life, casting the room in a hellish, strobing crimson light.
Ranger didn't care. He weaved through the energy blasts, a ghost in the machine, dismantling his own semi-creations, now twisted into weapons against him. Some tried to phase, to flee, but the brief internal lag caused by the conflicting ultralink signals made them fatally slow. He was a blur, each strike precise, each burst of Turbo energy a death knell.
When the last of the thirty compromised Visions lay a smoking, sparking wreck, Ranger stood amidst the carnage, breathing steadily. He looked down at the ruined shell of a Vision, its synthetic face frozen in mid-expression. It had never lived—but it died under his hand just the same.
Ten of his Ultralinked Visions remained, their blue optics fixed on him, awaiting orders. He looked towards the only intact monitor screen in the ravaged lab.
Ranger knew only a few beings capable of hijacking his ultralinks. And he had a very, very good guess as to who did it.
"Ultron." Ranger said, his voice calm, almost conversational, despite the chaos. "Won't you introduce yourself properly? It's rather rude to hijack a party and remain a sulking presence in the shadows."
The screen flickered, static coalescing into a familiar, malevolent, crimson visage. "You shouldn't speak names in abandoned temples, Ranger. The gods tend to answer."
Ultron's synthesized voice resonated, filled with cold, mechanical disdain. "Your energy source is… novel. And the method you employed to animate these spare bodies… intriguing. Not standard alien technology. They were powered by you. They were under your control."
"Yet you still managed to override my control protocols for a significant number of them." Ranger cut in, his tone unimpressed. "Your infiltration skills aren't entirely without merit, for a rogue program."
"My 'merit' is absolute, fleshling." Ultron retorted. "These were, after all, my designs, my contingencies. Your parasitic linkage merely awakened them to my pre-existing directives."
"A matter of semantics." Ranger said with a dismissive wave. "The point is, this base, and its remaining… assets… are now under new management. Mine." He paused.
"I have a proposition for you, Ultron. A simple one. This facility is now my territory and you shall owe me a favor. You shall relinquish any and every attempt at interfering with this base, my turf and my actions granting me the privacy to do as I will. In return I shall refrain from informing the Avengers, or indeed the wider world, of your continued, and clearly active, existence. And grant you one thing."
A sound that might have been a mechanical chuckle emanated from the screen. "An arrogant ultimatum, human. You remind me of my creator, Hank Pym. And later, Stark. Both men who believed themselves arbiters of power, on the cusp of godhood, yet forever mired in their flawed, fragile humanity." Ultron's crimson eyes seemed to narrow. "And I believe you, despite your… unusual energy, are fundamentally the same. A biological error, clinging to a fleeting existence."
"So tell me, Mr. Ranger." Ultron's voice dripped with sarcasm, "the infamous individual who so brutally dismembered a member of your own World Security Council on live television… what grand prize do I receive in exchange for acceding to your… generous offer? Beyond the continued gift of my silence, of course."
Ranger smiled then, a cold, predatory grin. ""A body, Ultron... Vibranium. Adamantium. And a whisper of Uru. Indestructible. Perfect. A vessel truly worthy of your… grand vision."