Chapter Text
One moment, Carol Danvers—also known as Captain Marvel—was aiming a binary-charged fist squarely at Ultron Sigma’s smug, metallic face, hovering above the burning ruins of New Metro City. The next moment, before her strike could even connect, the Machine God countered with a blow that violently sent her crashing through the fabric of reality itself. She was instantly swallowed by a Breach, a roaring tear in space-time.
“Damn it!” Carol roared in frustration, tumbling head over heels through a tunnel of blue light. “Stabilise, Danvers!”
Had Ultron Sigma’s desperation created this rift to eliminate one of the few heroes capable of actually damaging his armour? Or was it merely fate throwing Captain Marvel a curveball the size of a Galactus-class headache?
The true culprit behind Carol’s sudden departure from her reality was not solely Ultron Sigma. It was a consequence of the ripple effect caused by the Earth-1 Singularity, a cosmic event that had unintentionally connected countless realities across the multiverse.
Due to this phenomenon, the multiverse had experienced wild and unprecedented connections. These included worlds filled with high-speed heroes clashing with realms of survival horror, a robotic dragon invading a reality that defies fate and gods, and sightings of an orange marsupial wearing pants, seen riding a giant yellow bird.
There was a connection between these universes, but none of them permanently merged into one. Their champions crossed paths, shared tales, and fought back the darkness together, but they eventually returned to their distinct realities.
However, Carol’s home—Universe-190917—was different.
Months ago, the AI tyrant Ultron and the Reploid commander Sigma had formed an unholy alliance. Utilising the reality-warping power of the Space and Reality Stones, they didn’t just open a door between their two dimensions; they forcibly crushed them together. They created a singular, distorted plane of existence where Avengers and displaced warriors fought side by side—a merged universe designed by the Machine God for one chilling purpose: the complete extinction of all organic life.
But there was no time to dwell on the hellscape Carol had left behind. Destiny had just inverted, and all logic was currently thrown out the window. As Carol tumbled through the slipstream, the tunnel functioned less like a gateway and more like a shattered kaleidoscope of infinite possibilities. The translucent walls of the Breach shimmered, projecting high-speed visions from across the multiverse.
The first vision showed Carol a version of herself in a black and gold uniform—an alternate version from Earth-199999. A moment later, another Captain Marvel from Earth-596 blurred past her.
The scenery shifted to a molten dungeon, where a small purple dragon and a glowing golden dragonfly were dodging attacks from a massive, hideous toad monster. Meanwhile, an anthropomorphic kangaroo hopped around the perimeter, waiting for an opening.
Another vision appeared, this time revealing a fierce woman with a braided ponytail, dual-wielding pistols as she expertly navigated the deadly traps of an ancient, celestial-looking tomb.
Then, the tunnel suddenly warped. The soothing blue hues turned into a sickly, burning orange, and the images that rushed by were sharper and more visceral. One showed a ruined, lava-flooded highway, with a blur of blue desperately boosting through the debris, pursued by a glowing silver creature that was telekinetically hurling entire cars at him.
“Give up!” the silver being in the vision yelled, his voice echoing as if from a great distance. “It’s no use!”
Carol reached out, instinctively trying to grab the edge of the vision to halt her fall, but her gloved hand passed right through the light.
“Shit!” she gritted out, her voice drowned by the deafening roar of cosmic displacement. “Focus, Carol! Level out!”
In a flash, one last vision appeared. Through the shimmering blue, Carol caught a fleeting glimpse of a dark, stormy void. Hovering within it was a colossal grey monstrosity that looked like a nightmarish dragon. It possessed six thick, stump-like legs capped with golden spikes, and its chest was banded with stark black and red stripes. Massive, shadowy wings stretched from its back, tipped with blood-red spikes, and an eerie, pulsating purple aura outlined its entire body. A golden half-moon crest crowned its head, framing a pair of glowing red eyes that seemed to stare directly into her soul.
“What the hell is that…?” Carol murmured, her eyes wide with a mixture of awe and genuine dread.
Before she could fully process the terrifying creature, the tunnel of visions ended abruptly.
There was no exit sign, no warning— everything simply vanished, replaced by a sudden, jarring shift in gravity.
Carol was thrown clear, plummeting into the unknown.
Universe-1991 (Future – Crisis City)
When spat out of the Breach, it didn’t take Captain Marvel long to make physical contact with something.
WHAM.
Carol smashed into the side of a battered skyscraper, tearing through three floors of steel girders and concrete, the collision sounding like an explosion, before shooting out the other side. She plummeted towards a suspended highway, twisting her body at the last second to take the impact on her shoulder and hip.
CRASH.
“Aah!”
Carol hit the road with enough force to register on a Richter scale. She didn't stop, carving a trench through the tarmac, abandoned cars, and the rusted remains of streetlamps. Sparks showered around her like fireworks as she slid for around three hundred metres.
She finally ground to a halt near the edge of a collapsed overpass, the toes of her boots hanging over a drop into a river of molten fire.
"Well... crap," she muttered, wincing as she pushed herself up. “Not my best landing…”
She cracked her neck and stood up slowly.
"Okay. Status report," Carol said to herself, tapping the comms bead in her ear. "Stark? Rogers? Does anyone copy?”
KRRR-ZZZZT.
“Hello, anyone? X? Chun-Li? Redfield? Dante…? Anyone?”
Radio silence followed.
“Strange, if you’re blocking my comms just to be annoying, this isn't funny!” Carol snapped at the empty air, half-expecting a portal to open and the Sorcerer Supreme to appear and smirk at her.
Again, no response.
"Great. Just great…” she moaned.
Carol’s eyes widened as she took in her surroundings. “Well… this is certainly new…”
It was a city, but it had 'CRISIS' branded all over it.
Around Captain Marvel stood a metropolis that felt like it had been merged with Hell itself. Skyscrapers twisted like melted wax, some leaning against one another for support. The sky was a suffocating blanket of grey, devoid of sunlight, replaced only by the ambient, hellish glow of the lava flowing below.
Tornadoes of fire danced in the distance, carrying debris into the upper atmosphere.
“Wait a sec…” Carol muttered, squinting at the fire tornado in the distance. “Is… is that tornado carrying a car?”
And sure enough… it was.
"Where the hell did he punch me into?" Carol mused, the dry wind whipping her blonde hair across her face, forcing her to move it out of her sight. "A nightmare? Next Tuesday? Or… something else entirely?"
She walked to the edge of the highway, peering down at the magma ocean below. The heat was intense enough to blister skin, but her energy absorption was already kicking in.
"Hello?" she shouted, her voice amplified by her powers, as she straightened and looked around the broken landscape. "Anyone alive in this toaster oven?"
Nothing answered back.
“Settling…” she muttered to herself, before letting out a big sigh. “How comforting…”
Suddenly, the ground beneath her feet trembled.
Carol spun around, dropping into her combat stance.
"Well, I guess someone heard me..." she said firmly.
Pulling themselves from the molten cracks in the highway were creatures that looked lizard-like, made entirely of red and orange lava. They were covered in hardened, dark rock armour on their heads, backs, and limbs, with the head armour resembling a distinct shark fin. Despite their reptilian shape, they manoeuvred more like canines as they stalked towards her.
These were Iblis Biters, but Carol didn’t know their names.
And they weren't alone.
From the grey above, a screeching noise tore through the air. Carol looked up to see a swarm of flying creatures that resembled phoenixes made of lava, crossed with bat attributes. They had dark green eyes, ears that curved backwards like horns, and long tails ending in pear-shaped tips. Their bat-like wings, equipped with a claw on the joint, beat against the smoky air.
Iblis Takers.
And finally, shaking the bridge as it pulled itself up over the guardrail was a large humanoid giant made of lava, its limbs encased in cooled rock like armour. It had an extra-large upper torso and massive arms, with a tiny, almost minuscule neckless head peering out from the armour.
It was an Iblis Golem.
They shrieked at once, all sounding like metal being shredded.
"You know," Carol said, her voice growing serious as her eyes glowed a bright white. "I was having a really bad day. I was fighting a robot god, missed lunch, and just fell out of a blue portal into this literal dumpster fire."
She clenched her gloved fist, photon energy igniting around her knuckles. “But you uglies might be exactly what I need to blow off some steam."
Carol’s smirk widened as the creatures screeched back.
"So let's get this over with, shall we?” she challenged, her voice dripping with confidence. “Who’s first?”
The Biters moved first, moving forward with feral speed.
Carol wasn’t even fazed.
She sidestepped the lead creature and delivered a brutal backhand that shattered the hardened armour on its shark-fin head, vaporising the beast instantly. Before the second could strike, she caught it by its molten throat and slammed it into a third Biter trying to flank her. Their armoured backs shattered, reducing them both to a pile of smoking, harmless rocks.
"Next,” Carol called out smugly.
The air whistled as the swarm of Takers dove towards her on their bat-like wings, spitting fireballs.
"You're fired!" Carol shouted, unable to resist the pun, as she launched herself into the air.
A golden streak marked her path against the grey sky. Performing a tight barrel roll, she effortlessly dodged the incoming fireballs before snapping both hands forward.
The resulting photon blasts were surgical. She tagged the flying hybrids one by one, blowing their red and orange lava bodies apart in mid-air, sending debris raining down like fiery confetti.
Carol landed back on the rusting hood of an abandoned sedan, crushing the metal under her boots.
"Is that all?" she asked in an open display of boredom.
“ROAR!” bellowed the Golem, the sound rattling the surrounding steel.
“Oh, right,” Carol deadpanned. “I forgot about you.”
Almost as if insulted by the dismissal, the monster slammed its massive, rock-encased fists into the ground. A shockwave of pure fire rippled through the concrete highway, lifting rusted cars and heavy debris into the air.
Carol smirked, her eyes flashing with reckless excitement. "Okay, big guy. You want to play rough? Fine by me.”
She flew straight into the shockwave, smashing through the airborne debris without shying away.
As Carol closed the distance, the Golem swung a fist the size of a wrecking ball, heavy with jagged, spiked armour. She met the crushing blow with her own glowing fist.
BOOM.
The kinetic force was thunderous.
The massive Golem was literally lifted off its feet, the thick rock armour encasing its tiny head crumbling instantly under the sheer weight of a binary-charged punch. It flew backwards, crashing through the rusted shell of an abandoned lorry before exploding into nothing more than gravel and dying embers.
“You’re too slow!” Carol quipped, hovering in the air with a teasing tilt of her head.
She paused, her smirk fading into a slight frown as she tapped her chin in thought. “Hold on... why does that sound so familiar?”
After a moment, Carol shook her head, dismissing the strange sense of déjà vu. “Meh. Must be my imagination.”
Landing softly back on the cracked highway, Carol scanned the perimeter. All the immediate threats were gone.
"Well, that was a workout,” Carol remarked, arms crossing, her head continuing to look around for an exit point. "Now, where is the—"
Suddenly, her instincts screamed.
Carol spun and unfolded her arms just in time to see a rusted and dilapidated yellow taxi hurtling through the air, aiming straight for her head.
“Oh, come on!” she called out.
On reflex, Carol thrust her gloved palm forward, discharging a concentrated photon blast. The airborne taxi met the energy beam and disintegrated instantly, showering the highway in hot shrapnel and burning upholstery.
"Okay… who the hell throws a taxi at a stranger?" she shouted, scanning the area with a frown. "Is that a local greeting here or what?"
The answer came in the form of an entire rush hour traffic jam.
“Seriously?!”
Three more cars—a blue sedan, a crushed delivery truck, and a burnt-out police cruiser—launched into the air, spinning with unnatural, guided precision.
"How annoying!”
Carol moved on instinct. She wove through the projectile vehicles like she was back in the cockpit of a fighter jet, banking hard left to let the truck sail past, then rolling right to avoid the sedan, before flipping gracefully to miss the police car.
"I’m getting real tired of this demolition derby!" she snapped, locking onto the source.
Hovering about thirty meters away was a small, silver-furred creature. He was surrounded by a teal aura that rippled against the heat of the city. His gloved hand was outstretched, controlling the flying debris with the intensity of an orchestra conductor.
“Telepath… great…” Carol sighed with annoyance. “Or they're using psychokinesis… either way, this is getting old fast.”
As she folded her arms again, something clicked in Carol’s mind, eyes suddenly widening in recognition.
"Wait a minute..." she muttered. "I saw that silver fluffball briefly in that rift. He was fighting that blue guy.”
The silver creature across from Carol lowered his hand, though his aura flared brighter, features becoming defensive and angry.
"You..." the being shouted. "You’re the source!”
"Whoa, easy there, porcupine," Carol called out, holding up a hand.
“I'm a hedgehog! And my name is Silver!”
“Right, Silver…” Carol replied, her tone becoming the standard mix of authority and arrogance as her hands stayed open, not showing aggression, yet. "I don't know who you are, but usually people buy me dinner before they start throwing traffic at me."
"Don't mock me!" Silver yelled, floating closer, features serious. "You've ruined my home!”
Carol blinked, genuinely confused. "Excuse me? Ruined? Kid, look around.” She gestured around the broken, sweltering city. “I’ve been here for like five minutes. This place was Hell on Earth when I landed."
"Don't play dumb!" Silver snapped. "I worked so hard to fix all this! The timeline was finally healing!”
“Healing?”
“After Eggman’s Time Eater tore time apart to drop me and my friends in White Space, I thought the scars were finally fading when the Sonics defeated him.”
“Okay... you’re not making any sen— “
“Don’t interrupt me!”
“Geez,” Carol scoffed, rolling her eyes and crossing her arms. “Dramatic much?”
“I’m not being dramatic! You’re an intruder, and the flames ignited immediately! You brought this nightmare back!”
Carol cocked her head, entirely unimpressed by the accusation. "Look, kid. I got punched through a blue portal while fighting a robot with a seriously annoying god complex. If your city is having a relapse, don't blame me."
"Liar!" Silver accused, his aura expanding violently, lifting huge slabs of concrete from the broken overpass until they hovered like meteors. "I can sense weird energy radiating off you. You’re a living trigger for this new disaster!"
Carol sighed, dropping her arms to her sides. The diplomatic approach was failing fast.
It was time to get serious.
"Okay, I get it," she said, her voice dropping into a commanding tone. "You're scared, confused, and you think I'm the bad guy. But I’ve dealt with stubborn, anxious, hotheads like you before, Silver.”
She flared her own aura, the binary energy turning her hair into a radiant, weightless flame of pure light.
The sudden heatwave washed over Silver, and for a split second, his defensive scowl faltered, replaced by wide-eyed wariness. The hedgehog didn't just see a woman anymore; he saw a living star, a force of nature.
"I don’t want to hurt you, Silver,” Carol warned, her eyes glowing white hot. “But if you force my hand, I will knock some sense into you."
"Your 'sense' looks a lot like destruction to me!" Silver retorted, his gloved hands glowing brighter. He gestured sharply, and three sedans levitated off the ground, orbiting him like satellites. "I won't let you burn what’s left of this world!"
"If you throw one more mid-sized sedan at me, I’m going to ground you. Permanently,” Carol stated flatly, unimpressed.
Silver hesitated. He glanced at the cars orbiting him, then back at Carol’s binary form.
He needed something bigger. Much bigger.
With a sharp exhale, Silver dropped his hands. The teal aura vanished from the cars, and they crashed uselessly to the ground, rolling away like discarded toys.
"You're right," Silver admitted, his voice surprisingly calm. "Cars won't stop you."
He slowly raised both hands, his psychokinetic grip bypassing the surface debris and sinking deep into the infrastructure itself. The bridge beneath them groaned as the steel rebar screamed in protest.
"But this might!" he exclaimed.
Silver yanked his arms back. The ground shook violently as a massive, thirty-foot slab of the highway tore free from the supports, concrete, and steel snapping like twigs. He held the massive section of road at his side like a tectonic shield, the sheer weight of it displacing the air around them.
"It's no use trying to intimidate me, interloper!" Silver shouted, his voice echoing with absolute defiance against the roaring wind. "I won't let you destroy my world!"
Carol sighed, shaking her head. “Doing things the hard way, huh?”
“I have to protect the future!”
Danvers moved her neck side to side, the crack satisfying and sharp in the tense silence.
"Alright… have it your way," Carol smirked, her fists igniting with the power of a white dwarf star. "Let's dance, fuzzy."
[Crisis City – Sonic 06 plays]
Silver didn't hesitate. With a grunt of exertion, he thrust his gloved palms forward.
“Take this!” he shouted as the massive slab of highway surged ahead, transforming into a thirty-ton projectile aimed squarely at Carol.
In response, Carol propelled herself forward, becoming a streak of golden light.
“Here I come!” she declared, driving her fist into the centre of the concrete slab.
A deafening crack resonated as the section of highway disintegrated around her. She punched through it, emerging from the cloud of dust like a bullet released from a firearm.
“Too easy!” Carol taunted.
Silver’s eyes widened. "What—"
The hedgehog didn’t have time to finish his sentence. In an instant, Carol closed the gap, her momentum sending her fist crashing squarely into Silver’s chest.
WHAM.
The impact hurled Silver backwards with the force of a railgun slug. He blurred through the air, careening through the shattered glass facade of a ruined office building, smashing through four interior walls before finally colliding with a support column on the far side of the skyscraper.
“Strike one,” Carol called out, moving towards the gaping hole in the building with a cocky confidence, her energy simmering down. “You’ve got spirit, hedgehog; I’ll give you that. But you lack the—”
Suddenly, she jerked violently, as if the air around her had turned to solid lead. Her arms were pinned to her sides, and her legs locked together. An invisible, crushing vice tightened around her body.
“Ghhk!” Carol gasped, her forward momentum halted in an instant.
From the hole in the building, a teal glow began to pulse as Silver floated out. Though he looked bruised and was clutching his chest from her earlier blow, his focus remained unwavering.
“I… told you…” He strained, the telekinetic grip around Carol growing tighter. She felt her suit creak under the immense pressure. “It’s no use!”
With a flick of his wrist, the hedgehog slammed Carol violently against the side of the nearby building. Another flick sent her crashing down to the pavement below, before dragging her back into the air, suspended and helpless.
“You’re tough,” Silver admitted, floating nearer to meet her gaze. “But physical power means nothing if you can’t move.”
Carol gritted her teeth, feeling the weight of his hold. He had her in a telekinetic bind, a brutal one at that. Yet Silver underestimated her resilience.
“Surrender,” he commanded.
“Sorry,” she wheezed, a defiant smirk fighting its way onto her face. “I don’t know the meaning of the word.”
In a flash of digital light, her eyes disappeared as a red-and-gold helmet materialised over her head.
“BINARY!”
The reaction was instantaneous. Rather than attempting to break free, she channelled her energy, unleashing a shockwave of pure force that erupted outward from her body.
“What?!” Silver cried out, shock and panic flooding his expression. “Gah!”
The feedback surged through his mind, the sheer output of energy slipping through his mental grasp. His aura shattered like glass.
“Oh, shi—”
BOOM!
Carol broke free from Silver's grasp and tackled him in mid-air, her speed doubling in an instant. They soared upward, blasting through the thick grey layer and into the upper atmosphere.
Silver attempted to escape, but Carol was relentless. She spun him around, grabbed his leg, and hurled him back towards the Earth.
"Going down!" she roared.
Silver plummeted like a meteorite, streaking down until he crashed into the suspended highway below. The impact caused the entire section of the bridge to collapse, sending him tumbling into a heap of rebar and concrete dust.
High above, Carol floated, her energy calming slightly as she descended. She watched the pile of rubble with her arms crossed.
"Stay down," she remarked firmly. "Don't make me do this again."
Suddenly, the rubble shifted.
Slowly, painfully, Silver managed to push a slab of concrete off his chest. He coughed and stumbled to his feet, battered and with singed fur, but his eyes still burned with a golden light.
"I'm..." Silver panted. "I'm not done yet!"
He reached into his quills—or perhaps a pocket of subspace—and pulled out a gemstone. It was cut like a diamond and pulsed with a deep, chaotic blue light.
Carol tilted her head and descended a few more feet to get a better look.
"A gemstone? Really? What are you going to do, bribe me?" she scoffed, her confidence returning. "It’s a pretty rock; I’ll give you that.”
Ignoring her taunt, Silver looked up, clutching the Chaos Emerald tightly. He closed his eyes for a moment, drawing on the positive energy of the gem.
"Chaos..." Silver shouted, thrusting the emerald skyward.
Carol raised an eyebrow. "Chaos—?"
"CONTROL!" he declared defiantly.
VWOOM.
The world around them froze, suspended in a moment that felt like an eternity. Carol hovered mid-air, her mouth slightly agape, her aura shimmering like a still photograph caught in time.
In this frozen tableau, Silver moved with precise intent. He floated silently behind the suspended Captain Marvel, his gaze fixed on the back of her helmet, calculating his next move. He spun effortlessly in mid-air, channelling his psychokinetic energy into his leg, and unleashed a vicious roundhouse kick aimed at the crown of her head.
“HAAH!”
Time snapped back into motion.
WHAM!
The impact struck hard.
Carol didn’t have a chance to comprehend the blow before she was sent spiralling from the sky, crashing face-first into the ground. She bounced once, leaving a fresh trench etched into the road before skidding to a halt.
Silver hovered above her, the Chaos Emerald glowing ominously in his grip.
Groaning, Carol pushed herself up on shaky arms, shaking her head as her helmet dissipated, revealing an expression of annoyance mixed with disbelief.
“Wait... hold on,” she spat, dusting herself off. “How? I was looking right at you. You didn’t teleport.”
“I told you,” Silver replied, his voice resonating with a calm authority. “Chaos Control.”
Carol narrowed her eyes, scrutinising the blue gem in his hand.
“Great,” she muttered, rolling her eyes. “Another McGuffin. Just what this day needed. Let me guess: it bends reality? Distorts time? Or does it just make you unbearably smug?”
“It turns thoughts into power,” Silver stated earnestly.
“Right. A magic rock,” Carol shot back, her body igniting with energy as her demeanour sharpened. “Let’s see how fast you are without that cheat code!”
Silver remained calm as Carol blurred towards him in a flash. He raised the emerald again, steadying himself.
“CHAOS CONTROL!”
Time froze again, capturing Carol mid-lunge, fist mere inches from Silver’s face, expression contorted into a fierce snarl of determination.
Inside her mind—powered by sheer will, even amidst the temporal stasis—a solitary thought screamed: “God. Damn. It.”
Taking a deep breath, Silver floated backwards to create some distance between himself and Carol. He studied her still form and then looked around at the destruction caused by their battle. He understood that he couldn’t maintain this strategy for long, as Carol’s resilience rivalled that of the Ultimate Lifeform.
He needed to bury her. Deep.
Silver flung his arms wide, and his aura exploded outward, encompassing everything within a city block.
“Here goes nothing!”
Debris ripped itself from the ground: twisted rebar, broken sedans, chunks of skyscrapers, and molten asphalt flew towards Carol. But instead of striking her, they wrapped around her. Layer by layer, tons of steel and stone compacted, imprisoning her in the centre of a massive, spherical prison of urban waste.
Silver floated upward, lifting the massive debris ball with his mind. He hovered over the edge of the broken highway, looking down at the churning ocean of boiling lava below.
“End of the line,” he uttered confidently, thrusting his hands downward.
Time resumed its flow.
The massive sphere plummeted, crashing through the surface of the magma with a sickening splash, disappearing into the seething molten rock.
“It’s done…” Silver uttered, wiping sweat from his forehead. “Now to find a way to—”
BOOM!
A pillar of magma erupted like an angry volcano.
Silver flinched, shielding his eyes. “What the?!”
The debris ball evaporated. A shockwave of pure, blinding golden energy blew the lava apart, creating a crater in the molten ocean.
Rising from the centre was the very alive Captain Marvel. But Carol wasn’t just glowing anymore; she was incandescent. The lava hadn’t hurt her; the extreme heat had supercharged her energy absorption. Her eyes were white voids of fury, and her binary aura crackled with fury.
Simply put, she was utterly pissed.
“You really…” Carol’s voice was distorted, vibrating the air around her, “…shouldn’t have done that.”
Silver’s golden eyes widened. “Oh, crap…”
Without a word, Carol launched herself forward. She broke the sound barrier instantly, the sonic boom shattering the windows of every surviving building for a mile around Crisis City.
Silver panicked and raised the Chaos Emerald frantically. “CHAOS—”
“NOPE!”
Captain Marvel slammed into the hedgehog before he could finish the command.
She tackled him with the force of a freight train, the Chaos Emerald flying from Silver’s grip, clattering away across the highway.
“No!” he cried out.
Ignoring him, Carol drove Silver backwards through the air, her momentum unwavering as they collided with the rusted shell of an overturned tanker. Like a golden battering ram, she crashed through the metal, pushing against him as they barrelled into the thick, curved hull. The impact was deafening, a terrible creaking sound echoing around them as the tanker began to crumple.
As they forced their way through the other side, intense friction and Carol's raw energy ignited something inside the tank.
BOOM!
A massive fireball erupted behind them, the shockwave acting like a cannon blast and violently hurling Silver out of Carol’s grip. The hedgehog skimmed across the cracked ground like a stone bouncing over water, tumbling wildly before coming to a halt against a barricade of cars.
Carol approached slowly, landing softly near the downed hedgehog, her energy dimming slightly.
"You're barking up the wrong tree, hedgehog," she warned, her tone deadly serious as she looked down at Silver sprawled on the road. "Just stay down before you get yourself killed!”
Silver groaned, his limbs shaking violently as he forced himself onto his hands and knees. Every muscle in his body screamed in protest, but his golden eyes burned with absolute defiance.
He couldn’t lose, not after everything.
"I won’t... let you... burn it all..." he uttered, defiant yet weakened.
Before Carol could respond, the air between them suddenly dropped by twenty degrees, catching her attention instantly.
“Great, what now?” she said, unimpressed.
A sudden, low, harmonic warble pulsed through the ruined city. Space folded in on itself just a few feet away, spiralling outwards into a violent, swirling rift of blue.
"Oh come on!" Carol groaned, her binary aura flaring defensively as she took a cautious step forward. "You've gotta be kidding me."
"That’s not... that’s nothing like the Time Eater's energy..." Silver muttered, standing up gingerly and positioning himself behind Carol. "This feels... inverted.”
“Inverted…” Carol repeated, features sharpening further.
“Yeah… it’s strange,” Silver replied, wincing, but trying to shake off the pain. “Don’t you feel it?”
Carol didn't want to say Silver was right, but she could feel the strangeness. The ambient heat of the molten magma around Crisis City seemed to be sucked away into the growing blue tear. Her eyes widened, recognition flashing in her mind as the rift violently expanded, shedding its soothing blue light for an oppressive, pulsating purple aura.
"No way..." she uttered, her glowing fists clenching tight.
From the depths of the rift, a new anomaly dragged itself into Crisis City.
It was colossal, easily towering over the wreckage of the highway. Its six thick, stump-like legs touched down on the battered concrete, and its grey, draconian body was banded with stark black and red stripes. A golden, half-moon crest crowned its head, but it was the glowing, malevolent red eyes that commanded the space. The moment it fully materialised, the purple aura surrounding it flared, casting dark, jagged shadows across the hellscape.
"What is that?!" Silver yelled, sensing the negative energy pouring off the beast. "Is that a dragon?!"
"I saw that thing on my way here," Carol replied, her voice losing its usual cockiness, replaced by the rigid discipline of a soldier assessing a major threat.
“Wait, you did?” Silver questioned, his chest heaving from the exertion of their previous skirmish.
"Yeah… I saw it in a vision just before I got spat out in this hellhole," Carol explained, her binary energy humming defensively as she tracked the creature's terrifying movements.
“But what is it though?!” Silver remarked, completely lost for words, in the ambient.
Neither of the battered warriors was aware of the creature's true name or origin. They did not know that in a distant, vibrant universe known as Earth-196, this entity was feared in whispered legends and ancient myths. It was the banished deity of the Distortion World, a creature born of pure antimatter.
The creature’s name was Giratina.
The Renegade Pokémon reared its head back and unleashed a roar—a terrifying, metallic shriek that resembled the grinding of gears mixed with a predator's bellow.
The shockwave didn't just rattle the highway; it warped the very environment.
Around Giratina's feet, the laws of physics shattered. Shards of concrete and rusted cars suddenly broke from gravity, floating upwards into the sky. The nearby rivers of lava turned a sickly, shadowy black, freezing in place as the Lord of Antimatter asserted its dominance over the broken reality.
Carol took a half-step back, her cosmic power flaring as she sensed the unnatural, chilling suppression in the atmosphere. She shot a sharp glance over her shoulder at the battered hedgehog, noting his singed fur, trembling limbs, and the exhaustion etched across his features.
To be fair, she wasn’t faring much better; her flight suit was scuffed, and her muscles ached deeply from the concussive force of their brutal telekinetic and cosmic battle.
"Okay, fuzzy. Listen to me," Carol commanded, her tone dropping its usual playful arrogance, leaving only the hardened edge of an Avenger facing an extinction-level threat. "We just spent the last ten minutes or so beating the absolute crap out of each other, but if we don't stop this thing, neither of us is walking away alive."
Silver coughed, clutching his heavily bruised ribs, but his golden eyes locked onto the towering nightmare as it began to step forward. The reality-warping presence was utterly suffocating, radiating an aura of total decay.
"Let's make a deal," Carol continued, raising her glowing fists as her eyes burned with a white-hot, stellar intensity. "We bench our fight right now. A total truce... until we deal with ugly here."
Silver didn't hesitate. He knew when a threat surpassed temporal anomalies and planetary destruction. This was an existential erasure standing before them, ripping his already ruined world apart.
Pushing past the screaming protest of his exhausted muscles, Silver's psychokinetic aura flared violently back to life. He levitated off the ground, floating up to hover shoulder-to-shoulder beside the glowing hero.
"Truce," Silver stated firmly, the very last remnants of their hostility evaporating in the face of the ultimate renegade.
To Be Continued!