conquer • wanda maximoff

「 SIX 」

CHAPTER SIX; LOST & FOUND

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SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA

AYANA KEELED OVER as she attempted to catch her breath. Her surroundings were unfamiliar and signs all down the street seemed to be in Korean, leaving her feeling even more confused. What was she doing here? She'd attempted to go home, back to London to begin her search alone as best she could.

After taking a moment to recover Ayana began to walk down the street, ignoring the whistles and calls of a man over the road in her direction. For a fleeting moment she wished she'd been with the Avengers when Tony had designed her suit so she could have had some design input - it certainly wouldn't have been as tight.

Ayana turned the corner onto a main street, where she did her best to blend into the crowd. A car's horn blared at her as she jogged across the road, but she payed it no attention.

"Hey, can you tell me where I am exactly?" Ayana finally asked a well-dressed man, who gave her an odd look.

"Are you drunk, lady?" he asked her. She simply shook her head and he frowned more deeply. "This is Seoul. South Korea."

"Seoul? Why the hell am I in Seoul?"

He gave her one more bewildered stare before he hurried away.

"Seoul," Ayana muttered again. Her eyes widened in realization as she remembered what Tony had told her. "Shit," she cursed. "Doctor Cho!"

***

"SCREAM, AND YOUR entire staff dies."

Helen Cho watched Ultron silently as he spoke, attempting to seem confident although her heart was pounding against her rib cage.

"I could have killed you, Helen, the night we met. I didn't," Ultron told her. His eyes glowed red in the darkness of the room.

"Do you expect a thank you note?" she asked, a small smile playing on her lips.

"I expect you to know why."

Helen took in a short breath, her gaze falling to the device which lay between them.

"The cradle."

"This is the next thing, Tony," came her own recorded voice.

"This," said Ultron, placing a metal hand onto the cradle, "is the next me."

"The regeneration cradle prints tissue, it can't build a living body," Helen told him.

"It can," said Ultron menacingly, approaching her. She backed away towards the door. "You can. You lack the materials. You're a brilliant woman, Helen. But we all have room to improve."

She turned to see a sentry bot clutching Loki's sceptre beside her, and before she could react it had placed the metal spear against her chest. It glowed even brighter for a second before Helen gasped, and her eyes turned the same shade of blue as the energy of the sceptre.

***

AYANA PRESSED HERSELF further against a wall as a pair of scientists walked past, talking frantically in a language she didn't understand. It had taken her an hour and several awkward drop-ins before she'd managed to get to the right building, but now she was there, and she was sure Wanda was so close.