Beautiful Chaos

{part two | chapter five}

"What the hell is that?"

"Worthy..." The thing rasped, "No... how could you be worthy? You're all killers..."

"Dad," Lilith said, fear in her eyes.

"Jarvis?" The AI didn't respond to his call.

"I'm sorry... I was asleep. Or was I a dream?" Tony frantically tapped the screen of his handheld device.

"Reboot, Legionnaire OS, we have a buggy suit."

"There was a terrible noise..." the bot continued, "and I was tangled in... in... Strings... I had to kill the other guy. He was a good guy."

"You killed someone?" Lilith asked in horror.

"Wouldn't have been my first call. But down in the real world, we're faced with ugly choices."

"Who sent you?" Everyone's eyes widened as a clip of Tony's voice rang through the penthouse.

"I see a suit of armor around the world."

"Ultron?" 

"Dad, you didn't," Lilith whispered.

"I might've..."

"In the flesh," Ultron confirmed, "Or, no, not yet. Not this... chrysalis. But I'm ready. I'm on a mission."

"What mission?" Nat said, already taking a fighting stance.

"Peace in our time." With that, the walls exploded and around fifty Iron Legion bots flew towards the group. The team moved quickly, fighting the machines as best they could. One of the Iron Legion bots flew straight at Rhodey and the man fell through a window onto the terrace.

Bruce and Nat were hiding behind the bar, Lilith had seen them climb over it earlier. Everyone was shouting at each other and it was hard to understand what was happening around her. Her dad was tapping on a keypad trying to override whatever code the corrupted bots were running on. Steve and Thor were pummeling as many bots as they could, Helen was hiding behind the sofa, and Clint was running out of arrows fast. Lilith was hiding near the staircase that led upstairs. The last bots were beaten to a pulp and everyone's adrenaline was high.

"Well that was dramatic!" Everyone turned to look at Ultron, who's mechanical carcass stood unharmed, somehow, "I know you mean well, you just didn't think it through. You want to protect the world, but you don't want it to change. How is humanity saved if it's not allowed to... evolve? With these? These puppets?" He crushed an Iron Legion's head in his hand, "There's only one path to peace. The Avengers' extinction."

He began to walk towards them and they all moved closer to each other. Nat and Bruce had made their way out from behind the bar and the former was now gripping Lilith's forearm tightly and moving her away from the bot.

"Cowards," Ultron shouted, "Fools! Pathetic!" He continued his rant as Lilith pried her arm from Natasha's grasp and looked for the closest weapon. The Machine bolted towards them.

"Shit shit shit shit shit shit shit!" Something flew through the air and demolished the bot in one hit. Everyone looked towards Lilith in shock. Her outstretched arm lingered in the air as the thing she had thrown flew back towards her and landed in her open palm, "Um..." She turned to Thor with a look of awe and astonishment on her features that matched everyone else's, "I think this is yours?" 

"Thank you, Lady Stark," Thor said, stunned as he took the hammer from her hands.

"Holy shit!" They all turned to look at Steve.

"That's... almost as shocking as Lilith being worthy of the hammer," Maria stated blankly.

"Ha, ha. Very funny," Steve deadpanned.