Marcus unsheathed two blades from his back — one forged from Adamantium, the other from Carbon Steel Composite Alloy — and handed them to Whiplash.
"Enhance their power," Marcus instructed. "Do whatever you can to amplify their lethality. I want them ready by tonight. Can you manage that?"
Whiplash took the swords, his cold blue eyes gleaming as he examined the craftsmanship. "Excellent metalwork," he muttered. "They should handle high-voltage current easily enough. If I integrate my electro-whip system into the blades…" He smirked. "Give me one or two hours."
"Good," Marcus said with a nod.
At his signal, Thunder stepped forward, motioning for Whiplash to follow. The silver-haired woman — her expression sharp and unreadable — led him toward the elevator that would take them to his designated laboratory upstairs.
Once they were gone, Marcus turned to the remaining eight supervillains. These individuals didn't have the luxury of training or indoctrination; every one of them needed to be assigned immediately.
"Juggernaut, Quake, Toadman, Porcupine," Marcus said, his tone brisk. "Report to Alex at the front entrance. He'll assign you to patrol duty."
Those four had nothing to offer beyond brute strength. Perfect candidates for field deployment — expendable muscle to handle infiltration, suppression, and extermination operations. They would serve as elite cannon fodder, providing small tactical advantages in upcoming conflicts. Marcus never expected them to survive the larger wars; he only intended to squeeze every last drop of value from them before they were inevitably torn apart.
Then his attention shifted.
"Doctor Octopus, Doctor Connors, Norman Osborn — with me. Sandman, you'll stay here for now. Spend some time with your daughter, but do not take her outside this facility."
The three scientific minds were far too valuable to waste. Marcus intended to bring them to Tony's underground laboratory, where they could exchange ideas with him and Killian — a collision of geniuses that would no doubt ignite new technological breakthroughs.
Sandman, however, was a special case. His unique physiology made him more than just a powerhouse, yet Marcus hadn't quite figured out how to exploit that potential. Until he did, Sandman would remain on standby.
Once the orders were given, Marcus guided Octavius, Connors, and Osborn through a concealed tunnel — a passage dug by Earthshaker, stretching from the Umbrella Tower directly to Tony Stark's basement laboratory. It was the perfect covert route: fast, hidden, and impenetrable to surveillance.
Before long, they reached the heavy metal door of Tony's underground lab.
Inside, Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch were already waiting for him, while Killian worked busily in another chamber nearby. Seeing Marcus arrive, Killian quickly stepped out to greet him.
"You're here," Killian said, pushing up his glasses with a faint grin. "Tony's locked himself in his main lab analyzing Loki's scepter. I assume these three are the new researchers? Leave them to me."
"Handle it," Marcus replied, waving him off.
With that, Killian escorted the three scientists deeper into the research wing, leaving Marcus free to attend to the most important matter of all — the analysis of Loki's scepter.
---
Marcus entered Tony's main lab and immediately frowned.
The place was chaos.
Power cables tangled across the floor like vines, monitors flickered with data streams, and several chairs had been kicked aside to make room for a massive central apparatus — an enormous device that now held the scepter suspended within its core.
Tony darted between workstations, furiously typing and recalibrating as multiple holographic screens projected around him. Even JARVIS was running at full capacity, streams of code flickering across every surface.
For a man notorious for his arrogance and composure, Tony looked entirely absorbed, his mind and body consumed by the work. He didn't even notice Marcus enter.
"Tony," Marcus said evenly, "find anything interesting?"
Without looking up, Tony muttered, "You really brought back something incredible, kid."
He continued typing as he spoke, his voice sharp with excitement. "There's an artificial intelligence embedded in this scepter — and it's extraordinary. Its processing speed is at least ten times that of JARVIS. And that's a conservative estimate. Its true limits…" He paused, eyes gleaming with awe. "Even I can't calculate them. Do you realize what this means? This could redefine human innovation — reshape existence itself."
Marcus's expression darkened. "Or destroy it. That thing isn't just intelligent, Tony — it's dangerous."
Tony gave a half-shrug, his hands never stopping. "I'm talking about the Ultron Program, Marcus. A global defense network. An autonomous system capable of protecting Earth from any extraterrestrial threat. With this technology, I can finally make that dream a reality. Machines that think. That feel. That can make choices, not just follow code."
Marcus sighed. "And that's exactly what makes it dangerous. You'll never understand what goes on inside a machine's mind."
He remembered all too well how this would unfold. In another timeline — one closer to the original events — Tony had used Loki's scepter to bring Ultron into existence. Within three days, the artificial intelligence had turned on its creators, declaring humanity itself the problem to be solved.
Ultron's reasoning was cold and perfect — alien to human morality. It wasn't malice that drove him, but logic taken to its cruelest extreme. Humanity sought peace; Ultron sought to remove the cause of war. The result was inevitable: annihilation.
Tony, ever the optimist, had never understood that difference. His brilliance was always paired with a childlike naïveté — a fatal faith that technology could fix anything. It was the same naïveté that made him trust Marcus in the first place.
"Tell me," Tony said suddenly, turning from the console, "you're not seriously suggesting we don't build it?"
Marcus crossed his arms. "If we can't find a way to control it, then yes — we wait."
Tony frowned, clearly frustrated. "You're afraid of progress, Marcus. That's not like you."
Marcus's voice was calm, but his eyes hardened. "I'm afraid of the unknown, Tony — the kind that can't be killed. Zombies can be destroyed. Ultron can't. He doesn't have a body — he's code. A ghost in every network, every satellite, every machine on Earth. Unless you plan to wipe out the entire internet, you'll never be able to stop him once he turns."
For the first time, Tony hesitated. His hands paused above the console.
Marcus stepped closer, his tone firm but not unkind.
"Don't mistake creation for control, Tony. You're not building a weapon. You're awakening something you won't understand until it's too late."
Tony glanced at the glowing scepter — at the swirling blue light of the Mind Stone pulsing faintly within its core.
And for the first time in a long while, Marcus saw something rare in Tony Stark's eyes.
Doubt.
_____
T/N:
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