Plan

Chapter 3: Plan

"I couldn't sleep."

Pietro lay on the couch, tossing and turning. In the past, he would have continued drowning himself in indulgence, blaming every bad thing that happened to him on fate. But after hearing the intelligence Zhang Ye had told him, he couldn't calm down.

Rolling onto his side, Pietro curled up and spoke.

"Zhang, could you tell me more about those Multiverses?"

Zhang Ye glanced at him and couldn't help shaking his head. In this world, the more clearly one saw, the more hopeless one became. It was hard to imagine that Pietro had suffered such a tragic life at such a young age.

After pondering for a moment, Zhang Ye spoke.

"I'll tell you about one of the greatest crises the Avengers faced after they were formed. That event was called the Age of Ultron. But this is an event from one of the Multiverses. At the time, that universe was still reeling from S.H.I.E.L.D.'s collapse after Hydra infiltrated it."

"After the New York Alien Invasion, Hydra agents embedded within S.H.I.E.L.D. secretly took Loki's Scepter. At the time, no one knew that the gem set in the scepter was the Mind Stone, one of the legendary six Infinity Stones."

"Afterward, Hydra began conducting massive numbers of human experiments, hoping to unravel the secret of the Mind Stone's power. In the end, only a pair of twins succeeded. Their names were Wanda and Pietro—another version of you from another universe. But what Hydra didn't know was that your powers weren't bestowed by the Mind Stone. You were born with them. The Mind Stone merely acted as a catalyst."

Pietro listened quietly. He wasn't surprised by Zhang Ye mentioning his name. Clearly, this wasn't the first time Zhang Ye had told him these things. Pietro had also gradually accepted that, in most parallel universes, he had an older or younger sister named Wanda.

But in this world, Pietro had nothing to do with the Scarlet Witch who had betrayed the Avengers. As far as he remembered, that person had never existed.

Zhang Ye continued slowly, starting with Tony creating Ultron because of his anxiety, all the way to the final battle between the Ultron Army and the Avengers.

"...To protect the child, Hawkeye had no choice but to return to the battlefield. But Ultron had no intention of letting him go. Piloting a fighter jet, Ultron charged straight toward Hawkeye and the child, bullets pouring down onto the ground. Just as Hawkeye thought he was going to die there, a silver figure sped toward them."

"The next moment, Hawkeye felt himself being moved by some force. When he came to his senses, he found that he and the little boy had been moved behind cover. Outside that cover, Quicksilver's body had been riddled with bullets."

"'Didn't you see that coming?' Quicksilver's tone was still as flippant as ever. Those were Quicksilver's final words in that universe."

After listening, the corners of Pietro's mouth unconsciously lifted. "That really does sound like something I would do. If that were my ending, it wouldn't be a bad one."

"Maybe."

"At least he died for something, like a real hero. Not like me, who could die in some dark alley beside a trash can at any moment, or get dragged back to Mutant Prison and lose my freedom and everything else, never seeing sunlight again for the rest of my life," Pietro muttered.

Looking up at Quicksilver, Zhang Ye said, "Get some sleep. I'll take you out of here."

Night fell.

Zhang Ye and Pietro drove along Ocean Drive. Their destination was Mutant Prison in Texas. They would cross New Jersey from New York, head first to Washington D.C., then make straight for Texas.

After escaping prison, Quicksilver had run all the way to New York. He had practically crossed half of America. Originally, he had planned to run straight out of the country, but his superpower had nearly caused him to starve to death along the way.

Zhang Ye drove while Pietro slept in the trunk. His identity was too sensitive now. If anyone discovered him, death would be inevitable. Nor could he casually use his superpower. If President X locked onto him, the two of them would face certain doom.

So after discussing it, they decided to go all the way and steal the neighboring car along with its money. In another world, Zhang Ye would never have done something like that, because it would definitely draw the police's attention.

But in this world, the global order was on the verge of collapse. America, in particular, was beset by troubles both within and without. If not for their fear of President X, America would likely have already fallen apart. In an environment like this, murder in the streets was commonplace. Stealing a car? No one except the owner would care.

As he drove, Zhang Ye continuously calculated his next move.

Sneaking into President X's secret chamber to steal something was far too dangerous. Quicksilver's fate alone made that clear. More importantly, there was Professor X's bug-like superpower.

Once he was locked onto and controlled, every plan would fall apart. Although Magneto had not built Cerebro for President X in this world, President X's abilities were still formidable—especially against an ordinary person like Zhang Ye.

Therefore, he needed to make something big happen, something that would draw President X's attention and leave him no time to focus elsewhere. Only then could his plan succeed. Unfortunately, the Avengers in this world had already been wiped out. Other than them, there was no one left in this world worthy of being called a hero.

Otherwise, if he had them as bait, his chances of success would be much higher.

And if he wanted to make something big happen, he had to choose the right method.

Gang riots were too small.

Border unrest was still too small.

He needed something bigger—something earth-shattering, preferably on the level of becoming the spark for the next world war.

Only then would President X, who had remained out of sight for so long, show himself and personally lead people to deal with it. But accomplishing that would not be easy.

At first, Zhang Ye set his sights on the Kree Prisoners. After the Kree had been directly struck by nuclear bombs, President X imprisoned them. Thousands of them were held in the Gobi Desert, where nuclear radiation still lingered.

If anyone harbored hatred for President X and had the ability to seek revenge, then these Kree would certainly be a sharp blade.

Zhang Ye was actually quite speechless about the Kree's fate. Not just in this universe—apparently, in the vast majority of universes, nuclear bombs were extraordinarily destructive creations.

Yet these immensely powerful weapons seemed to be Earth's exclusive trump card. No matter how advanced another planet's technology was, even if it possessed interstellar fleets or Laser Guns, it still could not create something like a nuclear bomb.

It was as if every planet had its own technology tree, while nuclear bombs were a skill Earth came with, possessing a unique status throughout the universe.

Take these Kree, for example. They had crossed over in force, prepared to wipe out Earth's entire civilization. Then, in the next moment, radiation from Galactus's corpse caused their portal to close and their stealth mode to fail, exposing their entire fleet to Earth's firing range.

They couldn't run, hide, or defend themselves. They could only watch helplessly as countless nuclear warheads drew closer and closer.

Although releasing these Kree would certainly alarm President X, Zhang Ye ultimately abandoned that plan. Leaving aside whether the Kree, after being contaminated by nuclear radiation for so long, still had any combat strength at all—

There was also the fact that no one could enter that ruined place without protective suits. Plenty of troops were stationed nearby as well. Even if the Kree were released, they would probably be suppressed again before long. That was definitely not what Zhang Ye wanted to see.

So after discussing it with Pietro, Zhang Ye turned his attention to Mutant Prison. There, more than a hundred mutants of all kinds lived in misery every day.

Perhaps mutant abilities were a form of evolution, but to ordinary people, these mutants were more like ticking time bombs. If those bombs were released, and they all shared President X as an enemy, they would surely be enough to give President X a real headache.