Arthur took the Kree uniform from Winky and slipped into it. The suit’s communication systems were far more accessible when properly worn, the interface seamlessly integrating with the wearer’s movents.
He accepted the call with a series of practiced taps on his forearm panel.
"Arthur?" Carol’s hologram flickered to life above his wrist, her miniature form rendered in translucent blue light. "It’s Carol."
"Hello to you too, Carol. Been a while." Arthur settled into his chair, studying her tiny projection. "What, two years? Three? Thought you’d forgotten about your favorite wizard."
"Excuse ?" she shot back, folding her arms. "This is a two-way device. You could have called too."
"Fair point." Arthur smiled despite himself. "Let’s skip the bla ga. Why the sudden call?"
There was a pause, static crackling faintly across the cosmic distance. When she spoke again, her tone had shifted. "We need to talk."
"Now? Over this connection? Or would you prefer eting in person?"
"This is fine. It’s nothing serious, just—"
"Good to know." Arthur stood abruptly. "But having a conversation with a miniature version of you feels weird. I’ll co to you."
Carol’s brow furrowed. "Really. How? I’m not exactly down the street."
"Minor inconvenience."
"What do you an—"
Arthur grinned, then ended the transmission. The hologram flickered out.
—
On the desolate planet of K-42, thousands of light-years from Earth, Carol stared at her now-dead communication device in bewildernt. "Did he just hang up on ?"
Before she could fully process the insult, golden sparks materialized in the air before her. They danced and swirled, expanding into a radiant circle of light that humd with dinsional energy.
Carol instantly dropped into a combat stance, energy crackling around her fists.
A figure in a Kree suit stepped through the portal. In the split second before recognition hit, Carol’s combat instincts took over. She charged forward with devastating force.
Arthur barely had ti to conjure a mystic shield before her fist connected. The golden barrier absorbed most of the impact, but the residual force still sent him tumbling across the sand.
As he tried to speak, no sound erged. The thin atmosphere caught him off guard—breathing itself beca a struggle.
Without wasting precious seconds, he activated the suit’s helt systems. The visor sealed with a soft hiss, flooding his lungs with breathable air.
Seeing Carol approaching for another strike, her form blazing with golden energy, Arthur raised both hands in surrender. "Easy! It’s —Arthur!"
But she didn’t slow. Another punch rocketed toward him, fast as a cot. Arthur reacted on pure instinct, reinforcing his mystic shield. The impact resonated like a thunderclap, sending ripples through the sandy terrain.
"Carol, stand down!" he shouted, but she was already following through with a sweeping kick.
He dodged backward, Apparating several ters away. "If this is how you greet old friends, we really need to work on your social skills!"
Carol finally stopped, the glow around her fading slightly. A grin spread across her face. "Okay, couldn’t help myself. But seriously—how did you get here? You were on Earth five seconds ago. This planet is light-years away."
"Learned so new tricks since we last t." Arthur conjured an ornate chair and sat down with exaggerated casualness. "So, where exactly are we?"
"K-42. A dead world," she explained, gesturing at the barren landscape. "I’ve been scouting for a new Skrull howorld, but every habitable planet is already claid."
"That was always going to be a long shot," Arthur observed. "So you just fly around, planet to planet? Where’s your ship?"
Carol pointed upward. "Orbiting. Landing and taking off burns too much fuel, so I just leave it up there and fly down myself."
"Practical." Arthur stood, dismissing the chair with a wave. "So, what did you need to talk about?"
Carol’s expression shifted, a competitive gleam entering her eyes. "Let’s postpone that. I couldn’t help but notice you’re all healed up and fighting fit. You owe a rematch."
Arthur raised an eyebrow. "Eager for revenge, are we?"
"Can’t wait." Energy began crackling around her hands, casting dancing shadows across the gray sand.
"If you insist." Arthur rolled his shoulders, loosening up. "Ground rules?"
"No killing, no permanent damage, stop when soone yields?"
Arthur nodded. "Fair enough—"
Carol struck mid-sentence, moving at supersonic speed.
But Arthur was ready. He Apparated behind her and sent a blasting curse at her back. Carol spun with inhuman reflexes, deflecting the spell with a cosmic-enhanced backhand.
"Looks like you’ve gotten better at running away," she taunted.
"I prefer ’tactical movents.’" Arthur’s hands glowed with golden light. "The Tesseract exposure left behind so interesting gifts."
"Good. Otherwise this would be over too quickly."
"With winning, you an?"
Instead of responding, Carol charged again, closing the distance for close combat. This ti Arthur didn’t retreat. Dinsional energy flowed through his hands as he t her strike for strike, their impacts sending more shockwaves.
"This is new," Carol remarked, increasing her pace.
Arthur kept up, his enhanced reflexes and training with the Ancient One paying dividends. When Carol overextended on a cross, he found his opening. A palm strike enhanced with mystical force sent her crashing into the sand, carving a furrow twenty ters long.
Without waiting for her to recover, Arthur made a sweeping gesture. The ground responded to his will, sand and stone flowing like water to engulf her.
Seeing her struggling against the earthen prison, he layered an immobilization charm over it, then conjured reinforced cables that wrapped around her like a cocoon, leaving only her head exposed.
Arthur couldn’t help but smirk at the familiar sight.
"Not again!" Carol’s entire body erupted in golden light. Her Binary form engaged at full power, she shattered his magical restraints through sheer cosmic might. The sand around her turned to glass from the heat.
"You’re going to pay for that," she growled, floating above the crystallized crater.
"I think not."
The warm-up was over. The real battle began.
In Binary form, Carol was a living star. Each punch could shatter mountains, each movent faster than thought. But raw power ant nothing if it couldn’t connect with its target.
Whenever Carol rocketed toward him, Arthur simply Apparated to safety. He wasn’t foolish enough to engage her hand-to-hand in that state.
"Stop running like a coward!" Carol shouted, frustration bleeding into her voice as another charge t empty air.
Arthur remained unprovoked. When she unleashed photon blasts, he opened portals in their path, redirecting her own attacks back at her through dinsional gateways.
"Ready to give up?" Arthur called out. "You can’t hit what you can’t catch."
"No chance!"
This ti when Carol charged, she didn’t aim for where he was—she fired photon blasts at his likely escape points, forcing him to Apparate straight up. She was already there, having predicted the vertical escape, her fist connecting with his mystic shield hard enough to send him cratering into the ground.
"Still think you can just run away?" Carol asked, hovering above.
Arthur stood, brushing off sand. "No, I think I need to fight smarter."
Arthur raised both hands, and the air shimred. Dozens of conjured creatures materialized—wolves of crackling energy, birds of living fla, serpents of pure shadow. They converged on Carol from every angle.
Unlike the Ancient One, Carol couldn’t transmute them into harmless petals. But she didn’t need to—she simply punched through them, each impact reducing his constructs to dissipating energy.
"You’ll have to do better than that!" she taunted, vaporizing the last eagle with a casual backhand.
Arthur raised both hands, conjuring his army of creatures. Carol rolled her eyes. "Really? Again?"
But as she destroyed them, she noticed sothing different—they were reforming behind her, not trying to attack but creating a living maze. Every direction she turned, more appeared, obscuring her vision despite her cosmic awareness.
While she was blasting through them, Arthur appeared directly in front of her—she’d lost track of him in the chaos. His palm connected with her stomach before she could react.
Instantly, Carol felt herself separate from her physical form. Her astral self floated free, looking down at her own body in shock.
"What the hell?" she demanded. "Am I dead?"
Arthur didn’t answer imdiately. He was busy securing her physical form, summoning reinforced cables that wrapped her body like a mummy, leaving only her head exposed.
"Pushed your soul into the astral dinsion," Arthur explained. "You’re not dead, just temporarily displaced. Yield?"
"Like hell!"
Carol’s astral form dove back toward her body—she instinctively understood the motion, her flight experience translating. She slipped back in, but found herself still bound.
"These bindings are annoying," she growled, blue-white energy flaring anew.
Heat radiated outward—the planet’s surface began to smolder, sand fusing into glass beneath her.
Arthur paled. If she went full supernova, even the planet might not survive. In a swift motion, he slashed his hands through the air, unraveling the bindings.
Carol surged to her feet, glowing brighter, the desert air shimring with pent-up cosmic force.
"I’m not falling for that trick again," she said, eyes blazing. "Ready for round two?"
Arthur’s mouth quirked. "I’d say I just won. If you were an actual enemy, you’d be dead the mont I separated your soul."
"That’s not fair—I didn’t know such abilities existed! Now that I do, you won’t catch again." She charged forward once more.
Arthur Apparated away, sighing. "Your enemies won’t give you second chances. But fine—let defeat you more thoroughly."
He raised his arms, and dozens of duplicates split from his form. But instead of all attacking at once, they ford a rotating formation, each one casting binding spells in sequence, creating a continuous refresh that prevented her from building up enough energy to break free all at once.
Carol tried to go full Binary, but every ti she built up power, a new wave of bindings would disrupt her energy flow. It wasn’t painful, just frustratingly effective—like trying to fill a bucket with holes that kept moving.
"This is cheating!" she protested, though she was starting to laugh despite herself.
"This is magic," Arthur corrected. "Yield?"
Carol struggled for another mont, testing the bindings one more ti. She could break free eventually—go supernova and vaporize everything within a mile—but that seed like poor sportsmanship for a friendly spar.
"Fine!" she laughed. "You win. This ti. But I want a rematch when I’ve had ti to study your tricks."
He released the bindings and dismissed his duplicates. Carol powered down, looking more amused than exhausted.
"That was incredible," she admitted. "You’ve gotten much stronger. And sneakier."
"Had to. There was a certain Air Force captain who could punch through planets after for revenge."
"I couldn’t even land a solid hit on you!" She shook her head in disbelief. "And that soul-pushing thing is deeply unfair."
"That’s how wizards fight," Arthur explained. "In a straight brawl, I wouldn’t last ten seconds against you."
"Don’t get too comfortable. I’ll figure out a counter-strategy and beat you next ti."
"I wouldn’t dream of it." Arthur said, summoning a bottle of water and tossing it to her.
She caught it, cracked the cap, and took a long drink. The wind stirred, the desert silent.
After a pause, Arthur’s voice broke the silence. "So, what did you want to talk about?"
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