The pocket realm groaned like a living beast.
Walls pulsed in a slow rhythm, as if breathing. The air shimmered with heatless light, tainted by shadow. Across the broken hallway, Amy—no, Nisanti—hovered in her twisted glory. Her wings spanned nearly the length of the corridor, every feather a writhing wisp of star-dark energy. Her skin glowed faintly gold beneath crawling rivers of black that traced like veins of ink.
Below her, Paige coughed and forced herself to her feet, armor sparking where the impact had cracked her metallic form. "When did Amy get powers…"
"Yeah, about that," Ethan muttered, propping Rachel against the wall with practiced care. "That's what happens when your god-mode friend gets body-jacked by an eldritch leech."
Paige stood beside him, eyes narrowed. "So, what's the play, Brainiac?"
Ethan didn't answer immediately. He was calculating again—angles, probabilities, terrain. But even with his Sage-empowered mind firing at full speed, there was no easy answer. Amy-Nisanti was rewriting the laws of the space around them. Nisanti didn't seem able to access any new powers, but there was no telling when he'd gain access to Nut's power.
The demon spoke through Amy's body, its voice slithering across their minds like oil. "You fight to delay the inevitable. But she let me in, and soon you will too. Your hearts call out for strength. I can answer that. Soon your bodies will mine."
"You talk a lot," Felicia snapped, stepping forward, claws gleaming. "Let's see if you bleed."
She sprang, her motion a blur. For a moment, she was everywhere—slashing from multiple angles, flipping off broken lockers and walls. Her claws struck Amy-Nisanti's barrier in rapid succession, creating a flurry of sparks.
But the barrier pulsed, and a wave of force blasted Felicia back into a half-melted column. She hit hard, rolled, and groaned.
"That was rude. I was in the middle of talking," the demon purred.
Paige let out a sharp cry and charged again, fists glowing from internal friction. She drove both hands forward into a double hammer strike, her diamond knuckles slamming into Amy-Nisanti's barrier.
This time, it cracked.
Amy's head twitched. Her black eyes blinked once—just once—and flickered with faint gold underneath.
"Yes! Did you see that? That was Amy!" Ethan shouted. "She's still in there! Keep attacking, it'll affect his control, and maybe Amy can purge him."
Paige narrowed her eyes. "Then I'm bringin' her back."
Amy-Nisanti responded in kind. Shadow surged from her hands, forming a jagged, six-pointed spear that struck like lightning. Paige brought up her arms just in time—the impact launched her across the hallway. She crashed through a door, splinters and shadow trailing behind her.
Felicia picked herself up, wiping blood from her lip. "So, Plan A didn't work. Got a Plan B?"
"I'm out of letters," Ethan muttered. "We're improvising now. Just keep dodging and attacking."
The floor cracked again. From the fractures, long, thin shadows rose—too many to count. They took shape slowly: humanoid forms with no faces, made of pure mirror-like glass and shadow. The same kind that had hunted them in the real world.
"You've gotta be kidding me," Felicia whispered.
"Round two," Ethan said grimly.
And then—Thwip!
A web line snagged one of the shadow creatures and yanked it into a wall, shattering it into reflective shards.
Peter Parker swung through the breach in the air, flipping over the battlefield in his Ricochet suit—black leather, crimson disks flashing from his belt.
"Okay, so which one of you guys summoned the goth goddess?"
Felicia grinned. "Took you long enough, Spider."
"Blame Strange. Magic Uber's never on time. Gotta always stick with taxis."
Peter flipped midair, launching dual web shots that bound two more shadow creatures. He landed beside Ethan.
"I'm guessing that's the big bad, right?" he asked, nodding to Amy-Nisanti.
"Yes," Ethan said. "She's a student possessed by a demon. So, do you have a 'don't die' plan? We could really use one now."
"We stall her long enough for me to draw some weird sigil. Once that's done, we get her inside it, and then everything should work out."
Ethan blinked. "So, draw a sigil? While... she's trying to kill us?"
"Welcome to my week. All right then. Let's dance."
Ethan grabbed Peter's arm. "Wait. I can't fight, so let me draw it. We'll have a better chance if I do it. That way, you three can distract her."
Peter looked at the boy for a moment, "Are you sure you can do it? It has to be very precise."
The room erupted into chaos. Amy-Nisanti blasted Black Cat away with a red energy blast and flew toward a wall, but Spider-Man webbed her and pulled her over, jumping to catch her mid-air, and spinning as they landed to reduce the force of the throw.
Paige rejoined the battle, her body now glowing faintly from heat and stress, her punches cracking air. Each blow she landed on Amy-Nisanti's barrier weakened it—but every time, the demon countered harder.
Ethan walked over to Peter, dodging the debris from Paige's fight with Amy-Nisanti. "I'm sure, and I think this is our best chance. Please let me help."
Peter studied Ethan for a heartbeat. The kid's face was smeared with soot, eyes sharp behind the dirt. Whatever he was, he wasn't just some unlucky student anymore.
"Fine," Peter said. "You draw. We'll keep her busy."
He handed over a pouch of enchanted chalk, glowing faintly blue with runic patterns pulsing across the surface. Then he handed Ethan a diagram of the sigil and charged with Black Cat to help Piage deal with Amy-Nisanti.
Ethan dropped to one knee and began sketching furiously on the warped floor. The sigil had to be perfect. One mistake and all this would be for nothing. He didn't have time to decode the spell entirely and understand it, but his Sage-enhanced cognition easily committed the image and instructions to memory. He soon adapted rapidly, memorizing angles and spacing from memory.
Concentric rings, mirrored triangles, Watoomb runes… don't mess this up.
Overhead, Amy-Nisanti screeched, launching a spiral of red-black tendrils in every direction.
Peter danced through the air, flipping to intercept them mid-flight with bursts of webbing. Each shadow-shard splattered against the flesh walls.
"I thought demons were supposed to be subtle!" Peter yelled.
Felicia dove back in, claws glowing. "This one's more theater kid than demon!"
Paige rammed her shoulder into Amy-Nisanti's back, sending her crashing into the melted lockers. She landed hard, wings fluttering erratically, the shadows around her fraying at the edges.
Amy's head jerked sideways. For a flicker, her mouth moved—but her voice didn't match the demon's.
"Help… me—"
Then it was gone.
Nisanti reasserted itself with a scream, the hallway warping around her in a visual pulse that cracked reality at the seams. Light bent. Gravity twisted. Peter landed sideways on a wall, struggling to maintain orientation.
"We're gonna need you to speed it up, kid—make it fast!" he shouted.
Ethan didn't respond. He was already moving on the final symbols—etching two mirrored loops and connecting the inner lines. The chalk burned cold in his fingers, draining energy. His muscles trembled. Blood dripped from his nose.
Almost there. Almost—
Amy-Nisanti suddenly spun, wings flaring wide, and her eyes locked onto Ethan.
"You seek to bind me?" the demon roared. "You are an insect scratching glyphs in the dust."
Shadow spears erupted from the ground, racing toward him.
Peter lunged, intercepting one with a barrier of webbing, but the other—
Paige roared and body-slammed into the ground beside Ethan, taking the full brunt of the blow.
She cried out as the shadows punctured her armor, gouging deep into her side.
"Ethan!" she gasped. "Don't know what this is, but finish it quick!"
With a final sweep, Ethan closed the final arc of the sigil.
It pulsed once—twice—then began to glow.
He stepped back and took a look. "It's done! Get her in the center!"
Felicia snarled. "Then let's drag it back to Hell!"
She vaulted over a ruined desk, slashing at Amy-Nisanti's arm. The demon flinched, hesitating for just a second. Paige, bleeding, shed her diamond skin, healing her body, and switching to a metal form. She then grabbed the corrupted Avatar's other side.
Together, they pulled her toward the circle.
Peter fired a webline at Amy's chest and yanked hard, flipping backward and dragging her through the air into the sigil's center.
The moment she hit the center, the floor exploded in light.
Ethan raised his hands instinctively, shielding his face.
The rune blazed skyward like a beacon.
Amy-Nisanti shrieked, clutching her head. Her body convulsed. Darkness erupted from her mouth, her fingertips, her eyes. The shadows peeled away, layer by layer, like rotted skin melting under a holy sun.
Inside the maelstrom, Amy could be seen struggling within the shadows. A flicker of celestial gold surrounded her like a cocoon. And outside, being torn away, was the true form of Nisanti.
A creature of roiling shadows, crowned with twisted horns and eyes like bloodied mirrors. Its form clung to Amy's like oil on water—resisting, even as the circle burned its essence.
Peter dropped beside Ethan. "That's it. I'm surprised you managed it on your first try. I was expecting to have to do this maybe three times. Well, now time to play the seal."
Peter pulled out a phone and tapped the screen.
From the tiny speaker, Doctor Strange's voice echoed—calm, resolute.
"By the Seven Suns of Cinnibus, by the Shield of the Seraphim, I bind thee—forsaken spirit—to the void between worlds!"
Nisanti screamed, its form disintegrating inch by inch, forced upward.
"Let thy name be forgotten, thy will undone, thy power sealed beneath the sky!"
The demon's cloak tore free from Amy's body, lifting into the air, writhing, sentient, and enraged.
All eyes turned from it, focusing on Amy—except Ethan's.
He already knew what it was.
The Cloak of Nisanti.
The future artifact of the criminal boss named The Hood.
It vanished with a final shriek—escaping beyond the veil of the realm.
The light vanished.
Amy collapsed in the center of the sigil, her body scorched and smoking, eyes closed.
Rachel remained slumped against the far wall, still breathing.
Paige dropped to her knees. Felicia collapsed beside her, panting. Peter let out a long breath.
Ethan stood in the silence, smiling faintly.
They'd won.
But as always in the Marvel universe—every victory had a cost.
And a future consequence.