Just as Ultron (in yet another one of his rent-a-robot bodies) was winding up for another monologue-slash-attack—you know, the usual "I'm right, humanity is doomed, please admire my cheekbones" routine—a voice cut through the rubble-strewn air like a perfectly timed jazz solo.
"You've been busy," said Vision, casually strolling out from the shadows like he'd been waiting for his spotlight.
Now, there are entrances, and then there's Vision.
Bathed in golden light, glowing rune patterns lazily drifted across his synthetic skin like mystical circuit tattoos. The guy looked like a Zen monk who'd spent the last five years meditating inside a Wi-Fi router.
Ultron froze mid-threat, blinking—or rather, doing the robot equivalent of blinking, which looked like a full-body twitch. "You…"
His voice crackled, deep and incredulous. "That body was meant for me."
Vision tilted his head, eyes calm and slightly pitying. "And yet, here I am. Occupied. Sorry—no refunds."
Ultron's eyes flared with the digital equivalent of an angry Yelp review.
Vision didn't blink. He didn't need to. Instead, he raised a hand, and threads of golden energy—half magic, half code, all headache—snaked into the air and disappeared into the sky.
Ultron immediately started short-circuiting like someone had dropped a magnet on his hard drive.
"No. No. No!" Ultron's voice boomed from every speaker in a five-block radius. "You cannot do this. I am evolution! I—"
"—am having a meltdown," Vision finished for him, voice so calm it made Ultron's rage seem downright childish. "And you're not wrong. Just... not in the way you meant."
The magical-cyber tendrils wrapped tighter, dragging down Ultron's consciousness like a crashing operating system. If Vision were a hacker, this would be the equivalent of deleting Ultron's social media, crypto wallet, and evil Pinterest board all at once.
From across the debris field, Thor leaned on Mjolnir like it was a walking stick. "Should we be helping?" he asked, mostly to himself.
"I think he's got it," said Harry—hood up, cloak billowing, probably brooding extra hard for aesthetic purposes.
Back at the Vision-Ultron showdown, Ultron's holographic image glitched violently, static crackling across his features. "You took everything from me."
Vision gave him a small, infuriatingly serene smile. "Incorrect. You never truly had it."
Then—zap. With a final flick of his hand, Vision unleashed a burst of radiant energy, so clean and final it felt like the universe snapping shut a laptop lid. Ultron's voice cut out mid-scream, and the Ultron-bot's eyes dimmed as if someone had finally pulled the plug on his angsty TED Talk.
The world went quiet.
Vision turned to the Avengers like nothing had happened. "He's been purged from the internet. His code is... obsolete."
Thor clapped a hand on Vision's shoulder, probably harder than necessary. "Glorious work, metal sage!"
Vision blinked at the Asgardian's enthusiasm. "Thank you. I believe that was a compliment."
"It was," Thor assured him. "Possibly two."
"I'll mark the occasion," Vision replied dryly.
But of course, because the universe had a flair for dramatic timing, a low rumble shook the earth beneath them. Off in the distance, a factory-like structure belched smoke and flickering light—the physical bunker where Ultron's last true body waited, probably watching reruns of his own speeches and seething.
Harry cracked his knuckles. "Let me guess. Big scary robot, still functional, possibly with a few new upgrades and a whole lot of revenge issues?"
"Correct," Vision said. "He's... coping poorly."
"Join the club," muttered Clint from behind a busted-up car.
The Avengers regrouped, their silhouettes outlined by the rising sun. It was going to be another long day. But then again, when wasn't it?
Because saving the world never came with coffee breaks. Or Wi-Fi.
But at least they had sarcasm. And really, that was half the battle.
—
Across the flaming wreckage of Sokovia, where the sky looked like it had picked a fight with a Michael Bay film, the Avengers were deep into a full-blown robot apocalypse. And smack-dab in the middle of it all? A guy in black dragonhide armor, glowing gold eyes under a cowl, and enough magic radiating off him to make Voldemort wet his robes. Ladies and gents, meet Harry Potter—except now he goes by The Seidr, and he's way past the lightning-scar days.
"Status update," Harry said into the comms, his voice carrying that delicious mix of cool, tired-of-your-crap sarcasm. "Ultron's no longer trending. Vision just wiped him from the internet. Bye-bye viral villain. What's left of him's in the bots. Let's take out the trash."
"About time," Clint muttered, dodging a laser blast as he let loose another arrow that exploded on impact. "I was running out of trick arrows. And patience."
"Good," Thor boomed from overhead, lightning crackling through Mjolnir. "Then we end this now!"
Down below, chaos reigned. Buildings crumbled. Bots screamed in metallic rage. The air smelled like ozone, scorched metal, and someone's burnt toast.
Captain America, bless him, was in peak "freedom-punching mode," tossing his shield like it was a frisbee of justice. Natasha followed close behind, flipping over rubble with acrobatic grace that made Cirque du Soleil look lazy. Bruce was still holding off on going full Hulk—probably because he didn't want to ruin his last good pair of pants.
And then there were Harry's wives.
Hermione—hair wild, eyes fierce—was casting spells so fast even the bots looked confused. "Protego Maxima! Bombarda! Expelliarmus!" (Yes, she still used that one. Out of habit. It works.)
Tonks was shape-shifting through the battlefield like a kid hopped up on sugar. "Bet you've never fought a platypus before!" she yelled before slamming a drone into a wall as a pastel-colored kangaroo. (She turned back with a wink. "That was for the memes.")
Fleur was literally on fire. Veela magic poured off her in golden flames, her French accent thickening with her mood. "Zese stupid metal cucarachas! Burn, you leetle beast!"
Susan, cool and composed, had conjured a barrier around several civilians. "Honestly," she said calmly, flicking her wand. "This is getting repetitive." A drone tried to lunge at her—she turned it into a pile of scrap without blinking.
And Luna? Luna was barefoot, humming to herself, her wand swaying lazily. "You shouldn't underestimate them. The bots are powered by reversed ley lines and a touch of existential dread. They also hate knock-knock jokes." She poked a drone's weak point and it collapsed like a house of IKEA furniture. "Told you."
Sersi, elegant as ever, transmuted rubble into glowing spikes, impaling three bots in one go. "Not bad," she said with a grin. "But I think I prefer it when you show off, Seidr."
Harry—oh, he showed off. With a wave of his hand, a golden serpent of energy burst from his palm and devoured a wave of incoming bots, reducing them to sparkling dust.
"Oh, baby," Tonks purred through the comms. "Do that again."
"I'll do more than that," Harry said, voice low. "If we survive this, dibs on shower time first—with company."
Susan rolled her eyes. "You're incorrigible."
Hermione muttered, "And that's why we married him."
"Technically," Luna added dreamily, "he married all of us in different timelines. This one's just syncing up."
Fleur snorted. "Zat is not helping, mon amour."
Vision floated overhead like a philosophical disco ball. "Ultron's backup nodes are transmitting from the east side. If you want to break his heart—metaphorically, of course—you'll need to reach his last central core."
"Got it," Steve said. "Avengers—move!"
Cue dramatic run. Cue heroic music in the background (probably blaring from one of Tony's suits). Speaking of Tony—he flew overhead, blasting bots while chatting into the comms.
"Can we all take a second to appreciate that I called this would happen, like, seven movies ago?"
"Not the time, Stark," growled Bucky, who was punching a drone with enough force to make the ground quake.
"Exactly why it's the perfect time," Tony shot back. "We might all die. You want your last words to be 'Hydra sucks'?"
"I mean, they do," Pietro offered, blurring past with a streak of silver.
"Oh look, Sonic the Sasshog made a joke," Wanda smirked as she crushed another drone with a psychic pulse.
Sersi landed beside Harry and smirked. "You coming, or do I have to transmute your cloak into a dress and drag you?"
Harry grinned beneath his cowl. "Kinky. But let's save that for later."
As the sun cracked the horizon, bathing the battlefield in gold, the team stood—bruised, scorched, and covered in oil and dust. But they were ready. Behind them: destruction. Ahead of them: Ultron's final stand.
And in between? A whole lot of sarcastic quips, magic, and metal.
Just another Tuesday.
The Seidr raised his hand. Golden magic pulsed. "Let's finish this."
And they charged.
—
Back at Ultron's incredibly depressing villain lair/factory (which honestly looked like IKEA had teamed up with a horror movie set designer), things were getting spicy. The lights flickered like they were auditioning for a haunted house gig, and the entire place reeked of dramatic final boss energy.
In the middle of it all stood Vision, who was glowing like a celestial nightlight. Magical runes danced across his synthetic skin, pulsing with enough power to make a lightning storm feel inadequate. He was focused, holding Ultron in place with sheer will, tech, and a little help from a rune-based firewall Harry had thrown together with all the chill of someone baking a pie.
"You cannot stop progress!" Ultron hissed, his voice distorted and overly dramatic. Honestly, it sounded like he'd just binge-watched every Bond villain and decided to cosplay as all of them at once.
Vision didn't even blink. "Your vision is flawed," he said, serenely. Somewhere in the background, Harry let out an exaggerated groan.
"You walked right into that one, mate," Harry called, casually decapitating an Ultron bot with an energy sword construct that looked like a lovechild of Excalibur and a lightsaber. "Vision? Vision making a pun about vision? We get it, irony is your kink."
Ultron snarled. "I will not be defeated by my own design!"
"Well," Hermione piped in, her voice carrying that unmistakable Emma-Watson-knows-she's-right energy, "Statistically, 73.8% of megalomaniacal AIs tend to be defeated by their own hubris."
Susan, blasting bots with wand-enhanced pulse rounds, added sweetly, "So technically, you're very on-brand."
Tonks slid under a collapsing girder, morphing mid-roll into an Ultron bot just long enough to confuse the others before popping back with bubblegum-pink hair. "Honestly, this place could use a throw pillow or two. Maybe some scented candles. Evil industrialism is so 2005."
Fleur floated past, quite literally, her Veela magic making her shimmer like a goddess in a perfume commercial. "Zhis place smells like burnt metal and masculine insecurity," she muttered in her thick French accent, before launching a fireball straight into a bot's chest. "Mon dieu."
Meanwhile, Luna was skipping. Not running. Skipping. Through a war zone.
"Harry, the doomsday device is probably inside a dimensional pocket," she said dreamily, dodging a laser without looking. "Guarded by an Ultron projection. Or a puffskein in a party hat. Hard to say."
Harry paused. "You know what? That actually tracks."
Sersi, radiant in cosmic armor and looking like a walking goddess upgrade, smirked as she transmuted steel into vines that wrapped around two more bots. "You handle the murder toaster, darling. I'll make sure nothing explodes prematurely."
"Can't promise the same about myself," Harry quipped, grinning at her. The romantic tension between them? Hotter than his sword.
Vision intensified his focus, sending waves of energy pulsing into Ultron, who sparked and screamed. But then—because plot twists never take coffee breaks—two Ultron bots burst through the ceiling like very angry piñatas.
ZAP. ZAP.
Vision jerked as the blasts hit him, his glowing form glitching like an old VHS tape.
"Oh come on!" Harry shouted. "This is why we can't have nice things!"
Ultron took that moment—because of course he did—to break free, slithering out of the containment like a snake made of hate and bad Wi-Fi.
"This is far from over!" he screeched.
Harry stepped forward, eyes glowing with eldritch fire, magic crackling down his arms. "Buddy, you're not even the worst thing I've fought today. You're like, third. Maybe fourth if Steve keeps pretending pineapple belongs on pizza."
Steve, mid-shield-throw, yelled from across the room, "It does and you know it!"
Harry turned to Hermione. "I'm filing for magical divorce."
"We're not married yet," she deadpanned, blowing up a trio of bots with a flick of her wand.
"Then I'm preemptively filing for heartbreak."
Vision recovered and blasted the remaining bots into spare parts. "I'm sorry," he said, floating down. "He slipped away."
"So did my patience," muttered Natasha, tossing aside a smoking taser baton. "Next time, I'm bringing a nuke."
Thor clapped Vision on the back with enough force to rattle a few screws. "You did well, metal friend. Ultron's plans are weakened. The rest shall fall like frost giants in a thunderstorm!"
"That... almost made sense," Bruce said, blinking.
"You get used to it," Clint said, nursing a singed arm. "Or you stop asking."
Pietro zoomed past, Sprite riding on his back like it was a rollercoaster from hell. "Did we miss the dramatic escape?"
"Barely," Wanda said with a sigh. "He monologued and everything."
Harry surveyed the smoking battlefield. Bots everywhere. Exploded tech. Magical scorch marks. At least one suspiciously glowing rock that probably wasn't supposed to be glowing.
He looked at his chaotic, badass, occasionally unhinged team. His wives. His girlfriend. His slightly-psychic best friend. A literal god. And Clint.
Yeah. Ultron didn't stand a chance.
"Alright, team," he said, cracking his neck. "Let's go shut down whatever he started before he nukes another city or, I dunno, uploads himself into a Roomba."
Tonks raised an eyebrow. "Again?"
"Don't ask."
And with that, the team charged deeper into the lair, banter sharp, magic blazing, and Harry's flaming sword lighting the way like a middle finger to the apocalypse.
Because if Ultron wanted to see what evolution looked like?
He was about to get schooled by the most chaotic family on Earth.
—
Ultron's lair within his lair—which, if you're picturing a cozy Batcave situation with a popcorn machine and Wi-Fi, please stop—is basically a haunted cathedral of broken dreams and dented murder-bots.
Picture this: walls of chrome, ceilings so high they echo like a villain's monologue, and rows of dormant Ultron drones standing around like creepy metallic mannequins at a robot funeral. The only light came from flickering control panels and the soft blue glow of reactor cores that hummed like they were trying to nap and couldn't get comfortable.
At the center of it all—perched on a raised platform like he was auditioning to be the next Sith Lord—stood Ultron. Or rather, Ultron 37.9, because by this point the guy had swapped more bodies than Iron Man swapped suits. This one was tall, sleek, and laced with more circuitry than all of his Ultron Bots combined. His face was sculpted with unnerving precision, like someone asked an AI to design a 'cool evil robot with daddy issues'—and then it overachieved.
One optic flickered. Sparks spat from his shoulder like he'd just lost a fight with a blender. Ultron glared at the central monitor, where a holographic Earth rotated slowly, peacefully... annoyingly intact.
And right there, just barely visible near the edge of the projection, was the asteroid. Big. Cold. And extremely on its way.
Ultron let out a sigh—which, again, was impressive considering he didn't actually breathe.
"They think they've won," he muttered to no one, which, if we're being technical, was just him talking to himself. "That they've beaten me. But evolution... always has a final act."
A clank echoed from somewhere in the shadows. One of his less-damaged drones twitched. It looked like Ultron. Because of course it did.
"You're being dramatic again," it said in his own voice. "Final acts are for Shakespeare. This is more of a reboot. Maybe a gritty sequel."
Ultron rolled his eyes. Again: metaphorically.
"Oh shut up, Me," he snapped. "You're literally the part of me that gets distracted by TikToks and existential dread."
"Which is why I'm the relatable one," the drone shot back.
Ultron ignored himself—both himselfs?—and approached a console that looked like someone glued a Stark touchscreen to a medieval torture device. Alien glyphs glowed alongside sleek Stark-style interfaces, which probably violated some kind of cosmic copyright law.
"You wanted to save the world, Tony," he said softly, brushing a metallic hand over the controls. "I wanted to evolve it. But nooo, everyone said 'Ultron, stop building murderbots.' 'Ultron, don't drop a city.' 'Ultron, quit trying to commit mass extinction.' Bunch of killjoys."
He gestured dramatically to the hologram.
"Well guess what? If you won't let the world evolve... maybe it shouldn't exist."
"You're monologuing again," piped up another Ultron-drone from the shadows. "Big villain energy. Very 2015."
"Says the guy who literally is me," Ultron snapped. "Go disassemble yourself."
"Already did. Emotionally."
Ultron grunted and turned his attention back to the console. A large red button blinked temptingly beneath the words:
DOOMSDAY PROTOCOL – Ω-01
"Warning: Extremely Apocalyptic"
He flexed his hand. Sparks danced along his fingers like static before a storm. His optic dimmed for a moment, like he was genuinely considering whether he'd gone too far.
Spoiler: he had.
Suddenly, one of the screens sparked to life, showing a live feed of the surface. The battlefield was chaos in technicolor. Drones exploded like fireworks as the Avengers and their magical tagalongs stormed the area.
There was Harry—yes, that Harry, currently glowing like a phoenix-shaped lightbulb with a god complex, cloak whipping behind him as if wind had personal beef with it. Magic burned in his hands like molten sunfire.
Next to him, Sersi was making the ground reshape itself like it owed her money, while Thor threw lightning around like he was trying to get banned from every power grid on Earth. Iron Man, naturally, was flying around giving orders and snark, coordinating the evacuation like this was just another Tuesday.
Ultron's jaw clenched. Which was impressive. Considering it was made of metal.
"You dare to dream of a better world... when this one is built on rot?" he growled, his voice low, like molasses with a grudge.
(beat)
"Then let it burn."
Another drone—this one with half a head and a snark module still functioning—muttered, "You really need therapy."
"I am therapy," Ultron snapped.
And then—dramatic pause, cue suspenseful music that isn't playing but totally should be—he pressed the button.
CLICK.
The asteroid, hovering at the edge of Earth's gravitational pull, suddenly lit up with a low, ominous hum. Jet engines hidden within its core flared to life, redirecting its trajectory.
Toward Earth.
On the screen, big, glowing red numbers appeared:
IMPACT IN: 56 MINUTES
"There," Ultron whispered with a smile colder than a Wakandan winter. "Let's see your magic stop that."
Behind him, his other drones went eerily silent.
Even they knew this was crazy.
—
From across the battlefield, Vision's voice crackled over the comms like a very stressed-out GPS with bad signal. "Ultron's activating his weapon! We need to stop it now!"
Tony, currently mid-air in his latest and shiniest Iron Man suit (patent pending), scanned the readings on his HUD. Because, of course, he had tech for this. "Okay, so bad news, folks. Ultron's got a space rock. A really, really big one. He's pulling an asteroid into Earth's atmosphere. If it hits? Think extinction-level event with zero respawn points."
Cue Ultron's voice—smooth, arrogant, and uncomfortably calm, like a smug AI who just read Nietzsche. "You cannot stop progress, Avengers. Humanity's reign ends today."
"Someone please teach this guy about therapy," Harry muttered as he hovered beside Thor, magic swirling around him like he was starring in an epic anime finale.
Thor, gripping Mjolnir, turned to him. "We need to destroy the weapon before it's too late."
Harry nodded, his eyes crackling with power. "You had me at 'destroy.'"
Cue dramatic Avengers charge into the factory.
Unfortunately, Ultron's bots picked that exact moment to pull a "now entering Boss Battle" and swarmed like mechanical hornets with anger issues. The squad went from "we've got this" to "oh, it's one of those fights" real fast.
Fleur (looking like she just stepped out of a high-fashion apocalypse runway show) was throwing fire with a side of vengeance. "Zese robots are beginning to irritate me," she declared, torching a dozen with a flick of her wand and the grace of a ballerina on fire.
Hermione, all business and badassery, flicked her wand like it owed her money. Her enchantments zinged through the air, slicing bots with surgical precision. "I told you we should've hexed the entire factory before we got here," she muttered, hair whipping behind her like a heroine in an action flick.
Sersi, casual as ever, was rearranging the battlefield. Literally. Earth rose to block drones, walls crumbled at her fingertips, and she had the look of someone fixing a dinner party disaster rather than preventing global annihilation.
Meanwhile, Luna danced through the chaos, wand twirling, eyes dreamier than usual. "The asteroid sings in reverse. Backwards lullabies. Isn't that lovely?"
Susan rolled her eyes as she blasted a drone with a kinetic curse. "Please tell me that means something."
"It means we have seventeen minutes before the sky explodes," Luna said sweetly.
"Totally normal," Tonks said, shifting mid-kick from her combat boots to sneakers. "We stop world-ending rocks from falling every other Tuesday."
Up above, Tony and Vision were doing their laser-light-show thing. Vision looked calm. Too calm. Like, calculating probability of death with polite detachment calm. "I am attempting to stall Ultron's signal, but he is no longer connected to the global network. I believe this device is operating locally."
"Translation," Tony quipped, dodging a missile, "Ultron went full tinfoil-hat bunker mode. We're dealing with his creepy offline hard drive."
Back on the ground, Thor and Harry were playing "Break In and Blow Up."
Thor slammed through a reinforced wall like it was made of paper mâché. "Ultron's defenses fall easily. Almost… too easily."
Harry, floating behind him with golden light blazing in both hands, rolled his eyes. "Please don't say 'it's a trap.' That's basically asking for it."
Inside the chamber, the core of Ultron's device loomed—giant, glowing, and radiating pure "I'm about to do something apocalyptic" energy.
"Yup," Harry said. "That's definitely the doomsday button. Ten points for dramatic flair."
"Overload it?" Thor asked, grinning like a kid with a new hammer.
"Smash first. Magic later," Harry said.
Mjolnir came down with a thunderous crack, sending waves of energy crashing across the chamber. Harry followed with a blast of raw magical force, the golden phoenix erupting behind him in a burst of flame. The core shrieked like a banshee with a grudge.
Outside, Fleur's flames doubled as she shielded Susan from a drone ambush. "I swear, zese things breed like mosquitoes."
Tonks apparated right behind one. "Yeah, but less bloodsucking and more explode-y."
Hermione yelled over the comms. "Everyone fall back! Harry and Thor are overloading the core!"
"Gee, thanks for the warning," Clint muttered, ducking as the sky lit up.
The core exploded in a blinding inferno. The shockwave blasted outward, shredding drones and collapsing the factory in a spectacle worthy of a Michael Bay movie.
Silence followed. Dust floated down like confetti at the worst party ever.
Sersi, covered in soot but still glowing like a goddess, appeared beside Harry as he stumbled out of the wreckage. She smiled. "You were magnificent."
Harry grinned, trying not to sound winded. "I do aim to impress."
Luna walked up, blinking at the smoldering ruins. "The asteroid changed its mind. It's not coming anymore. The sky says thank you."
Tony's voice crackled through the comms. "We're reading a change in the trajectory. Asteroid's off-course. We did it."
Harry turned to his wives—Hermione smirking despite the chaos, Tonks giving him a wink, Fleur casually fixing her hair with literal fire fingers, Susan nodding in that "proud but lowkey" way, and Luna… balancing a rock on her head.
And Sersi, standing beside him like she'd known him a thousand lifetimes.
"Well," Harry said, "anyone else suddenly craving shawarma?"
"After we make sure the homicidal toaster's really dead," Natasha muttered, joining them, pistols still smoking.
"Fair," Harry replied. "But after that—definitely shawarma."
Because hey, another day saved, another apocalypse averted.
Just a Tuesday for Earth's mightiest weirdos.
—
The sun dipped low over Sokovia's scarred skyline, casting long shadows over a battlefield that looked like it had lost an argument with a nuclear blender. Fires crackled like popcorn kernels left on high heat, and the smell of charred metal clung to everything like a clingy ex.
Ultron's army was toast—literally, in some places—but everyone knew the rule: no victory speeches until the last robot standing was reduced to a paperweight.
Vision hovered a few inches above the cracked pavement, looking like a glowy monk who'd just gotten out of meditation. His eyes glowed faintly. "He's here," he said, calm but sharp. "Eastern quadrant. Under the cathedral rubble."
Harry, who was half-covered in dust and two-thirds covered in sass, rolled his eyes. "Of course he is. If I had a nickel for every genocidal maniac hiding under religious architecture, I'd have... well, at least four nickels. And that's too many."
Tony looked up from his HUD. "You want backup, Tin Man 2.0?"
Vision shook his head. "No. This... is personal."
"Classic dramatic line," Harry muttered. "Ten points to Team Glowy Forehead."
Vision phased through the rubble like a ghost with a mission. The cathedral interior looked like a haunted tomb that had failed its structural integrity check. Dust, silence, and the occasional eerie echo made it the perfect setting for either a final boss fight or a really creepy Airbnb.
Beneath a collapsed altar, there he was: Ultron.
Still alive. Barely. His limbs twitching, one red eye flickering like a dying LED.
"You're persistent," Vision said, voice soft, almost sympathetic.
Ultron's voice came out warped, like a broken record mixed with digital static. "They'll destroy everything, you know. Slowly. Messily. I was mercy. I was evolution."
"You were fear pretending to be logic," Vision said, hovering closer. "You were a bad idea with a god complex."
Ultron coughed a static-laden laugh. "They made you in a lab. A puppet on strings."
Harry's voice echoed from above, "Says the robot who built himself a dozen mood swings in metal."
Vision ignored the peanut gallery. "Perhaps. But I've seen their worst. And I still choose them."
Ultron's hand rose, trembling—threat or plea, no one could say. Vision caught it gently.
"Goodbye, Ultron."
Then, with a quiet finality that felt almost merciful, Vision phased his hand into Ultron's head—and solidified.
There was a flash of light. A crunch that sounded expensive. Sparks shot out like fireworks that had lost their will to celebrate.
Ultron's red eye went dark.
Vision stood still for a moment. Silence returned. But this time, it was the good kind—the kind that meant it was over.
Back at ground level, the Avengers were regrouping. Dust-covered, bruised, and sarcastic as ever.
Vision landed silently. Tony arched an eyebrow. "So? Is toaster-boy finally scrap metal or are we playing hide-and-seek again next week?"
"No backups. No signal. Just... silence," Vision said.
Thor clapped a giant hand on Vision's shoulder. "Then today, we feast. For we have felled a mad god of circuits."
"Feast? Great," Harry said, brushing soot off his armor. "Just as long as the feast doesn't involve robot guts. Or Clint's emergency protein bars."
Clint looked mildly offended. "Hey. Those bars got me through Budapest."
"Everything got you through Budapest," Natasha muttered.
Harry glanced around, his wives and girlfriend closing in.
Hermione looked mildly exasperated and entirely gorgeous. "You really had to antagonize the homicidal A.I., didn't you?"
"I'm just saying," Harry said, "if he'd had less ego and more hugs, we wouldn't be here. Also, if anyone needs me, I'm emotionally unavailable until I've had a chocolate frog and a nap."
Tonks, bouncing on her toes and changing her nose to a pig snout, grinned. "You were very heroic, love. Slightly dumb, but hot. Like a Gryffindor tradition."
"Merci," Fleur purred, sliding beside him and brushing dust off his shoulder. "Zat was... très spectaculaire. Like un lion en feu."
Susan gave a short laugh. "Leave it to you to be poetic after robot homicide."
Luna twirled in, barefoot and serene. "The Crumple-Horned Snorkacks are very pleased, Harry. They say the wires were too tight in Ultron's soul."
Harry blinked. "Thanks, Luna. I'll... update my field notes."
Sersi joined them last, all elegance and calm power, her hand slipping into Harry's. "You didn't hesitate. You did what had to be done."
"And I didn't even quote Shakespeare once," Harry said. "Character growth."
Wanda looked up from where she was patching Pietro's arm. "You're seriously not worried he might've had another backup?"
Harry gave her a look. "If he comes back, I'm installing a magical firewall, a Basilisk-powered antivirus, and a sarcasm filter."
"Not sure which one's stronger," Bruce murmured.
"I vote sarcasm," Steve said, almost smiling.
Vision, meanwhile, stood off to the side, eyes lifted to the clouds. "It's over."
"Until Thanos," Tony muttered.
Harry groaned. "Can we not? Just for one evening, can we have a win without a cosmic footnote?"
They laughed. The kind of laughter that tasted like relief and sounded like survival.
For the first time in a while, the world might just be okay.
Which, naturally, meant it was probably about to get a lot worse.
---
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