Marvel: The Awakened One

The Sentinel robot arrived at the Quantico military base via a heavy transport plane at exactly five o’clock in the afternoon.

Professor X, accompanied by Magneto and Jean, arrived shortly after.

The government had everything under control. Quantico was under total lockdown. Anyone coming in or out faced strict ID checks and needed top-level clearance. Even the presidential aide with Xavier’s team had to make several calls before the guards let them through.

The three-car convoy drove onto the base. In the last two years, Quantico had been rebuilt from the ground up. If not for the tall memorial, there would be no sign of the destruction Hawk caused.

The monument was a somber reminder of the soldiers who died here. Names covered the stone from top to bottom.

The presidential aide looked at the monument, noticing Jean nearby. ”Five hundred and thirty-two names. Not counting the families who lived on base.”

Jean understood his point. She didn’t react, just gave him a sideways look. ”Then you should consider yourselves lucky.”

The aide turned to her, shocked.

Jean just smiled. ”My dad could destroy a planet without a second thought. What happened here two years ago was him showing mercy. You’re lucky things didn’t go worse.”

A tremor ran down the aide’s spine.

Jean met his eyes. ”Want to know my dad’s favorite quote?”

”What?”

”I will destroy you. Why should I care?” Jean’s smile didn’t budge. ”Don’t try to judge my dad by your standards. You’ll only embarrass yourself—and maybe get people hurt.”

The aide’s face went still. Guilt weighed on him, and he felt like she could see through their whole plan. Still, he was only the messenger. The White House and Pentagon had made the plan to kill the Demon King; he was just following orders.

He didn’t realize that his own intentions didn’t matter. Only Hawk’s did.

Hawk had another favorite quote he never told Jean: No snowflake in an avalanche is innocent.

Hawk wasn’t a saint. He would forgive his enemies once, but if they crossed him again, there would be no speeches about ’only punishing the mastermind.’

He’d make sure none of them were left.

——————————

A short while later, the aide led Xavier and Magneto into one of Quantico’s main research facilities.

The Sentinel came into view at last. It stood five meters tall, with smooth, dark armor that looked utterly alien. There were no weld marks anywhere on its body.

Professor X, sitting in his wheelchair, sent out a telepathic probe toward the machine. He sensed no life at all, but he did notice a faint, familiar aura. He couldn’t figure out what it was.

Then he saw Jean. Her face had gone pale.

It hit him—the lingering aura was Hawk Phoenix’s.

Xavier’s heart skipped a beat. He looked at the dormant machine, surrounded by seven or eight scientists running tests.

Jean was stunned. ’Why does this thing have Dad’s aura?’

——————————

Meanwhile, back in Westview on Palm Street.

Wanda glanced at Hawk. ”Is the Sentinel Program really good enough to copy your energy?”

Hawk looked at the five-meter giant through the Chaos Magic mirror. He glanced at Wanda, then back at the Sentinel. ”I don’t know.”

Wanda blinked in surprise. ”You don’t know?”

”I don’t.”

She took a breath. ”Will this mess up your plan?”

Hawk kept watching the machine. ”No. The leftover energy is only a tiny fraction of my real power, but it’s real. It’s not a fake.”

A Sentinel could copy mutant abilities, but it was impossible to create his true cosmic signature. His energy was one of a kind.

Suddenly, Hawk realized something. His eyes lit up. ”Wait. This thing is made of pure Adamantium metal.”

”You said that before,” Wanda replied.

”No, last time I said Adamantium alloy. This is pure Adamantium metal.”

Wanda caught on. ”The Celestials?”

”Yeah.”

Adamantium alloy was made by mixing a tiny bit of the real metal with regular steel. True, pure Adamantium only came from one source: the Celestials. It was the actual material of their bodies.

If there was alloy, then the pure metal had to exist somewhere too.

”But even if it’s made from a Celestial,” Wanda asked, ”why does it have your energy?”

Hawk smirked. ”Do you want to take a guess where they harvested the metal for this Sentinel? They got it from Earth-616. It’s the corpse of the Celestial I killed. That signature is the exact aura I left behind in that universe.”

He could never mistake his own energy.

Wanda’s expression turned grim. ”The Celestials are here.”

While Wanda was tense, Hawk seemed relaxed for the first time in weeks. ”It makes sense. The only enemies worth worrying about are the ones you can’t see. Once they show themselves, they’re just another problem to solve.”

”I can’t even sense them,” Wanda admitted. ”Shouldn’t you be worried? You look relieved.”

Hawk smiled. ”I knew they’d show up eventually. Remember, you closed my time loop. After you fixed my timeline, I moved beyond the prime Multiverse. Eternity is the living embodiment of that timeline.”

Wanda frowned. ”I don’t get it. If Eternity really hates what you’re doing, why doesn’t he just stop you himself? You said even you would have to back down if all five cosmic entities came at you.”

”Exactly,” Hawk said. ”If the five cosmic entities get involved directly, all I can do is run.”

”Then why don’t they?”

”Because creating is difficult, but destroying is easy.” Hawk’s voice turned cold. ”Eternity could step in, but that would break the rules. If that happens, all bets are off. I’d do whatever it takes to wipe out the prime Multiverse.”

Right now, both he and Eternity were following the rules. Hawk was trying to transcend, and Eternity was trying to stop him. But Hawk hadn’t crossed the final line—he hadn’t chosen to destroy the Multiverse to reach his goal.

Because of this, Eternity couldn’t get directly involved. If he did, Hawk would have a reason to strike back with everything he had.

”Honestly, the fastest way for me to transcend would be to destroy everything in my path. If I wiped out the whole Multiverse, I’d still become the only one left. But I chose not to. So Eternity can’t act against me.”

Hawk’s eyes shone with dark amusement. ”Wherever he’s really hiding, he doesn’t want me to burn his timelines to nothing. I might not reach transcendence, but if he crosses the line, I swear I’ll destroy everything he cares about.”

”So Eternity won’t make a move himself. Instead, he sends the Celestials, his most loyal followers, to do his dirty work.”

Hawk let out a quiet sigh. ”That’s why I felt a bit of fear before, when I was about to face the unknown. Not knowing is what scares us most. Now that I know what’s coming, there’s really nothing left to fear.”

Hawk looked at Wanda, a wicked smirk spreading across his face.

”Besides, instead of dying to a glorified tin can, letting a Celestial think it won a round sounds way more entertaining, don’t you think?”

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