A dark cavern, a glowing Scepter, Hydra in chaos.
The twins clasped each other's hands tightly, emotions churning in their eyes.
"Report to your posts immediately! This is not a drill! We're under attack!"
Hydra's armed squads swarmed out of the cavern. In the main control room, Baron Strucker saw the attackers' faces on a monitor.
"The Avengers... and a few children?"
"Intercept them! Intercept them!"
Several silver robots chased an off-road vehicle, firing laser blasts at it, but Black Widow dodged every shot with her superb driving skills.
The vehicle raced through the snowy woods. A blast grazed its side and struck a large tree, punching a huge hole straight through the trunk.
"Whoa! Natasha, watch out!"
"Everyone, duck!"
Crash! The tree, its trunk half as thick as a person, slammed into the snow, throwing up a cloud of white powder.
The vehicle slipped through a gap beneath the falling trunk by the narrowest of margins.
"Whew, that scared me to death."
Paimon pressed a hand to her pounding heart, thankful that the Traveler had stopped her when he got into the vehicle. If she had been flying in the air at a time like this, she really would have become a live target for those Hydra robots. Staying put in the vehicle was definitely safer.
"Tch. Noisy."
The Wanderer pushed Paimon, who had been sticking her little bottom out as she kept looking behind them, down onto the seat beside Nahida. Impatience flashed in his eyes as he warned in a low voice, "What good are you? Sit still and stop getting in the way!"
Tony blasted two robots apart with shots from his palms. His red armor soared into the sky, and his flippant voice came through their earpieces.
"Paimon, sweetheart, our friend in the hat