22. Avengers: Age of Ultron (2)

        "Clint, you've had a tough week, we won't hold it against you if you can't get it up," Uncle Tony sarcastically assured, and we all laughed.

"You know I've seen this before, right?" Uncle Clint said as he grabbed a hold of Uncle Thor's hammer. He wasn't able to lift it and spoke again with a laugh, "I still don't know how you do it."

"Smell the silent judgment?" Uncle Tony asked.

"Please, Stark, by all means."

Uncle Tony stood up and unbuttoned his suit jacket.

"Oh, here we go," Aunt Nat said while Uncle Rhodey added an "Uh-oh."

"Never one to shrink from an honest challenge," Uncle Tony stated while everyone made more small comments, "It's physics."

"Physics!" Uncle Bruce repeated as Uncle Tony was preparing to lift Mjölnir.

"Right, so, if I lift it, I then rule Asgard?"

"Yes, of course," Uncle Thor replied.

"I will be re-instituting Prima Nocta." Uncle Tony attempted to lift the hammer but failed. "I'll be right back." He walked away for a moment, and I spoke,

"Oh, boy."

Uncle Tony came back wearing his Iron Man hand and tried again. When it still didn't work, Uncle Rhodey put on his War Machine hand and tried with Uncle Tony.

"Are you even pulling?" Uncle Rhodey asked with a desperate tone.

"Are you on my team?" Uncle Tony retorted.

"Just represent! Pull!"

"Alright, let's go!" They both pulled as hard as they could but still couldn't lift it. Uncle Bruce then gave it a try, but when he couldn't do it as a human, he took a step back, roaring like the Hulk. Everyone looked at him warily, but Aunt Nat and I gave him small smiles. I then sat up so that Dad could get up and give it a try.

"Let's go, Steve, no pressure," Uncle Tony said

"You got this, Dad," I added with a smile and Uncle Thor's arm around me. Dad pulled, and I saw Mjölnir move slightly and stared at it with curiosity. Uncle Thor's grip on my shoulder loosened, and I realized he must have noticed as well. Dad tried to pull it up again but couldn't this time. Uncle Thor laughed with what sounded like relief and spoke,

"Nothing."

"And?" Uncle Tony said while Uncle Bruce added,

"Widow?" We all turned to her.

"Oh, no, no. That's not a question I need answered," she replied, taking a sip of her beer.

"Katie?" Aunt Maria asked, making everyone look at me.

"I'm fourteen, I'm good," I said, putting my hands up.

"All deference to the man who wouldn't be king, but it's rigged," Uncle Tony stated.

"You bet your ass," Uncle Clint added as he walked over to where Uncle Tony and Uncle Rhodey were standing.

"Steve, he said a bad language word," Aunt Maria pointed at Uncle Clint accusingly

"Did you tell everyone about that?" Dad asked Uncle Tony, and I giggled and put my arm around his shoulder.

"The handle's imprinted, right? Like a security code," Uncle Tony guessed, avoiding Dad's question, "'Whosoever is carrying Thor's fingerprint' is, I think, the literal translation?"

"Yes, well, that's, uh, that's a very, very interesting theory. I have a simpler one," Uncle Thor effortlessly lifted his hammer and flipped it as he continued, "You're all not worthy."

The whole team started disagreeing when suddenly, there was a loud screeching noise. I swiftly removed my hands from around Dad to cover my ears. As the noise faded away, I moved my hands to my sides. We then heard a voice speaking,

"Worthy... "

Dad and I stood up as we saw a misshaped robot from the Iron Legion come walking into the room, stopping in a spot across from where Dad and I had been sitting. "No... How could you be worthy? You're all killers."

"Daddy?" I asked, terrified of whoever or whatever was calling us killers.

"Stark," Dad sternly said

"JARVIS," Uncle Tony started as the robot kept talking,

"I'm sorry, I was asleep. Or... I was a-dream?"

"Reboot, Legionnaire OS. We got a buggy suit."

"There was a terrible noise, and I was tangled in... in... strings. I had to kill the other guy. He was a good guy."

"You killed someone?" Dad asked, and I grabbed his hand for comfort.

"Wouldn't have been my first call. But, down in the real world, we're faced with ugly choices."

"Who sent you?" Uncle Thor demanded the robot. The machine then played a recording of Uncle Tony's voice,

"'I see a suit of armour around the world.'"

"Ultron!" Uncle Bruce stated with realization. We all looked at him and Tony with confusion while Ultron continued,

"In the flesh. Or, no, not yet. Not this chrysalis. But I'm ready. I'm on a mission."

"What mission?" Aunt Nat asked him.

"Peace in our time."

Suddenly, the Iron Legion bots smashed through the walls from behind Ultron, one headed straight toward me and Dad. Quickly, Dad kicked up the table to protect us as I was too in shock to move fast enough. The bot slammed itself into the table and knocked us back. Dad grabbed a hold of me as we flew across the room and took the majority of the pain as we landed on the floor with groans, me on his chest and him on his back. I got up off of Dad and helped him up. Dad went over to attack one of the bots while I looked for anyone that needed my force fields. I saw a bot shooting at Aunt Nat and Uncle Bruce as they were running up the stairs and created a force field between them and the bot. Another bot was able to sneak up on me and started shooting. One of the bot's blasts hit my right calf, and I fell, yelping in pain. The bot continued to try and shoot me while I was down, so I put up a force field to cover myself. I tried to move away, but my leg stung.

"Help, please!" I yelled, hoping someone was free. I heard Uncle Clint shout,

"Cap."

I looked toward where I heard Uncle Clint's voice and saw that he had passed Dad his shield. Dad caught it and threw it at the bot shooting at me. I kept my force field up until all of the pieces had hit the ground, then sat up. All the bots were gone except for Ultron, who started speaking again,

"That was dramatic! I'm sorry, I know you mean well. You just didn't think it through. You want to protect the world, but you don't want it to change. How is humanity saved if it's not allowed to... evolve?" Ultron picked up one of the dismembered Iron Legion bots and crushed its head as he spoke, "With these? These puppets? There's only one path to peace: The Avengers' extinction."

Uncle Thor suddenly threw his hammer at Ultron, smashing him to pieces. After a moment, Ultron's singing could be heard over the P.A., "I had strings, but now I'm free. There are no strings on me."

After we were sure Ultron was gone, I carefully looked at my leg and saw that it had a burn where I was hit. I tried to stand, but it stung too much. Dad, Uncle Thor, and Aunt Maria rushed over to me.

"Are you ok?" Dad asked with worry lacing his tone.

"I'm fine," I said as I tried to stand again. Starting with my left leg, I was fine until I put too much pressure on my right leg and fell with a groan due to the stinging.

"You are not fine, Katie," Dad said sternly.

"Take her to the lab, I should have something to help!" Uncle Bruce called out from the other side of the room.

"Ok, come on," Dad spoke as he carried me bridal-style to the lab.

Dad sat me down on a counter, and Uncle Bruce inspected the back of my calf where my burn was located. He lightly touched it, and I winced from the sting.

"I have a cream that should soothe the burn and help it heal faster, and with the serum in your blood, it should heal around noon tomorrow," Uncle Bruce told Dad and me. He passed Dad the cream and some bandages, and I spoke,

"Thank you, Uncle Bruce."

He gave me a smile and went to help Uncle Tony sort out the problem we now had. Dad brought me into the other section of the lab area where everyone else was gathered and sat me down in a chair beside the island that was in the centre of the room. Once I was seated, Dad gently grabbed my leg and started to apply the cream. I let out a cry of pain,

"It hurts, Dad!" I wanted to cry. Dad used his free hand to wipe a single tear from my cheek and spoke soothingly,

"I know, Baby. Almost done."

When the cream was on, Dad wrapped the bandages around my leg, I let out a shaky breath of relief. A little while after, Uncle Bruce spoke,

"All our work is gone. Ultron cleared out. Used the internet as an escape hatch."

"Ultron," Dad whispered to himself while shaking his head.

"He's been in everything. Files, surveillance. Probably knows more about us than we know about each other," Aunt Nat stated.

"He's in your files, he's in the internet. What if he decides to access something a little more exciting?" Uncle Rhodey suggested, and Aunt Maria caught on,

"Nuclear codes."

"Nuclear codes. Look, we need to make some calls, assuming we still can."

"Nukes? He said he wanted us dead," Aunt Nat questioned.

"He didn't say dead," I said with a slightly shaking voice, "He said extinct."

"He also said he killed somebody," Uncle Clint added.

"But there wasn't anyone else in the building," informed Aunt Maria

"Yes, there was," Uncle Tony said, bringing up a 3D image of JARVIS' consciousness that was now destroyed.

"This is insane," Uncle Bruce stated.

"JARVIS was the first line of defence. He would've shut Ultron down, it makes sense," Dad thought aloud.

"No, Ultron could've assimilated JARVIS. This isn't strategy, this is... rage."

Suddenly, Uncle Thor grabbed hold of Uncle Tony by his throat and held him up. I gasped and sat up straighter.

"Woah, woah, woah!" Uncle Rhodey said as Uncle Clint spoke again,

"It's going around."

"Come on. Use your words, buddy," Uncle Tony said with a strangled voice.

"I have more than enough words to describe you, Stark," Uncle Thor assured when Dad interrupted him,

"Thor! The Legionnaire."

Uncle Thor released Uncle Tony and told us what he found,

"Trail went cold about a hundred miles out, but it's headed north, and it has the sceptre. Now we have to retrieve it. Again."

"The genie's out of that bottle," Aunt Nat told us, "Clear and present is Ultron."

"I don't understand," Dr Cho suddenly started speaking, "You built this program. Why is it trying to kill us?"

Uncle Tony then started laughing, and Uncle Bruce subtly shook his head at him, trying to get him to stop.

"You think this is funny?" Uncle Thor demanded.

"No. It's probably not, right?" Uncle Tony explained, "Is this very terrible? Is it so... is it so... it is. It's so terrible."

"This could've been avoided if you hadn't played with something you don't understand."

"No, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. It is funny. It's a hoot that you don't get why we need this."

"Tony," Uncle Bruce interrupted, "Maybe this might not be the time to-"

"Really?! That's it?" Uncle Tony didn't let him finish, "You just roll over, show your belly, every time somebody snarls."

"Only when I've created a murder bot."

"We didn't. We weren't even close. Were we close to an interface?"

"Well, you did something right. And you did it right here," Dad stated, "The Avengers were supposed to be different than S.H.I.E.L.D."

"Anybody remember when I carried a nuke through a wormhole?" Uncle Tony asked everyone.

"No, it's never come up," Uncle Rhodey responded.

"Saved New York?"

"Never heard that."

"Recall that? A hostile alien army came charging through a hole in space. We're standing three hundred feet below it. We're the Avengers. We can bust arms dealers all the livelong day, but that up there? That's... that's the end game. How were you guys planning on beating that?"

"Together," Dad assured.

"We'll lose."

"Then we'll do that together too."

Uncle Tony looked at him for a moment before turning away. Dad continued, placing his hands on the back of my chair, "Thor's right. Ultron's calling us out. And I'd like to find him before he's ready for us. The world's a big place. Let's start making it smaller."

I tried to stifle a yawn, but Dad noticed and picked me up to take me to bed.

I woke up the next morning with my leg feeling better. After I had finished getting ready for the day, Dad gathered the team to show us something. He showed an image of Strucker's dead body with the word "peace" spelt out in blood on the wall.

"What's this?" Uncle Tony asked, and Dad replied,

"A message. Ultron killed Strucker."

I let out a breath of frustration.

"And he did a Banksy at the crime scene, just for us."

"This is a smokescreen," Aunt Nat stated, "Why send a message when you've just given a speech?"

"Strucker knew something that Ultron wanted us to miss," Dad explained.

"Yeah, I bet he..." Aunt Nat looked at the computer monitor, "Yep. Everything we had on Strucker has been erased."

"Not everything," Uncle Tony assured, and we all started to go through the physical files that we had on Strucker.

"Known associates," Dad announced, "Well, Strucker had a lot of friends."

"Well, these people are all horrible," I stated bluntly.

"Wait. I know that guy," Uncle Tony said, reaching for the photo that Uncle Bruce had in his hand, "From back in the day. He operates off the African coast, black market arms."

Dad and I gave him an accusing look, and he began to defend himself, "There are conventions, alright? You meet people, I didn't sell him anything."

We looked at the photo that said the man was named Ulysses Klaue. "He was talking about finding something new, a game-changer. It was all very 'Ahab.'"

Uncle Thor pointed to the scar on the back of Klaue's neck in the photo and spoke,

"This."

"Uh, it's a tattoo. I don't think he had it-" Uncle Tony tried to say before Uncle Thor interrupted him,

"No, those are tattoos. This is a brand." Uncle Bruce looked up the brand on the computer and identified it,

"Oh, yeah. It's a word in an African dialect meaning thief, in a much less friendly way."

"What dialect?" Dad asked.

"Wakanada...? Wa... Wa... Wakanda."

Dad, Uncle Tony, and I looked at each other with knowing and concerned expressions as Uncle Tony started speaking to me and Dad,

"If this guy got out of Wakanda with some of their trade goods..."

"I thought your father said he got the last of it?" Dad asked him.

"I don't follow," Uncle Bruce stated, "What comes out of Wakanda?"

The three of us looked at Dad's shield as I explained,

"The strongest metal on earth."

"Where is this guy now?" Dad asked Uncle Tony. Once we figured it out, everyone geared up, and we made our way to the African Coast to find Klaue and Ultron.