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Chapter 76

Technomancer in MCU

Project Ark

–Frank Castle–

When he first saw Toby floating with the head of the Ancient One held in his right hand, he had resigned himself to losing another one of his once allies.

Contrary to what everybody thought, he loved each and every one of his allies and the people he could count on to watch his back could be counted on his fingers but with Toby, it was a contradictory relationship he had with him.

He could actually see where Toby was coming from. The things he must have suffered through while being in the hell dimension must have warped his worldview immensely.

Not to mention that Ed had once confided in him that Toby’s powers were not without flaws. As Toby took on more and more of the skills of other beings, the more his original essence would be replaced by the consumed species. In other words, the Toby that had been with Ed when they both died was not the same Toby that they found gallivanting through the Dark Dimension.

While he was not aware of the level of battle that Ed and the Ancient One fought when sealing Toby, the spells and the strength behind them used by Alfred was the most mind-boggling thing he had seen that day.

Watching the strongest fighters of the organisation giving it their all, even going so far as to injure themselves and only being able to stall or push Toby back was very much disheartening.

As much as he would have loved to use his abilities, he knew when he was thoroughly outclassed. If even the Diggle brothers were unable to put a dent on the monster, then using his aura would have a negligible effect at best, and at worst, he would just be tying everyone down as they tried to protect him.

He had thought that with Alfred using the spells of Vishanti, Toby would finally be defeated since the might of the Vishanti was something that was known to everybody in the organisation, and in a way, it did defeat Toby but left behind a dead husk piloted by Dormammu who started exerting more and more influence in this dimension as he got used to the laws of the place.

During one of their many mandatory meetings, they had been informed that Dormammu couldn’t enter the main universe due to some rules he was bound by. He can, however, suck in planets to his dimension through portals and while he was sure that it was not public knowledge, Earth was somehow the mystical hub through which Dormammu would be able to exert even more of his influence on the universe if he just captured Earth and all the beings with their mystical potential on it.

That was why protecting the Sanctums in case of an attack was an A-tier property of the organisation.

The same rules, however, allow Dormammu free reign when it comes to alternate, especially artificially created, dimensions. Dormammu must be exploiting that loophole to bring more and more of his powers through the once body of Toby. He could see the spell almost fizzling up, just like their hopes of dealing with this empowered version of Toby.

With almost all the combat power of the organisation here and with varying degrees of injury, he was unsure if turning tail and running was the best option here. 

As he was thinking of telling Alfred to just abandon ship and run away, something that he was sure Alfred was thinking about, he stilled as he felt an ominous gaze on him.

Cold sweat ran down his neck as he slowly turned his neck towards the black abomination that was once the body of Toby Mathers and found himself looking at two purple eyes staring down at him or rather, at someone besides him.

Next thing he knew, the severed head of the Ancient One had landed right outside the barrier that kept him and Ed safe, and Ed was looking right at it, his eyes blank.

Shit! He thought as his aura had been limited to himself because he was distracted and with Ed seeing this, he was bound to go berserk but before he could try and use his ability to calm Ed down, Ed snapped his gaze towards him and the next thing he saw was a metal whip coming towards him and the next thing he knew was darkness as he was knocked out cold on his back.

He could hear Alfred screaming in the background, “RUN!”

He came back to consciousness as Alfred nearly overloaded his system with CHI shocks to forcefully wake him up, “Gasp, what happened?” 

He asked Alfred who was looking up towards something. Following his gaze, his heart nearly seized in terror at what he was seeing.

The dark energy ball that was Dormammu manifested in this dimension had grown to tower over all of them and in front of that ball of darkness, stood a storm of matter that constantly shifted states with green lightning bursting out of it. 

At the center of it, with blazing green eyes and energy literally misting out of his body, stood Ed. But at that moment, it was not the Ed he knew and loved who was able to analyse everything calmly and make rational decisions.

The Ed he was seeing was something straight out of one’s nightmares. His face set into a rictus of pain and anger, he continuously molded his surroundings into all sorts of different matter before assembling them into machines and then disassembling the same components to form even bigger machines.

It would seem that today was the day he was going to witness Ed using his full might. All these years, he had heard from Alfred about the legendary powers of their leader and while he did believe him, he was never quite sure that Ed’s powers truly did make him the strongest person in their organisation since the Ancient One was also technically a part and now, even Alfred had ascended.

With that said, the sheer pressure that Ed gave off as he continued to glare at the rapidly ballooning presence of Dormammu was something else.

After just a few seconds that somehow felt like an eternity, as if a hidden command was given, all the matter that surrounded Ed that was rotating around him at untold speeds came to a screeching halt.

Then it happened. Even as he saw the matter liquefy and come crashing down towards Ed, forming a mecha suit that he had only seen in fantasy, he could scarcely believe his eyes.

It reminded him of a construct he had seen during one of the cartoons that was shown to the kids at the organisation.

Then, in front of his very eyes, the entirety of their surroundings, nay, the entire dimension began cracking as a huge ball of energy formed in front of Ed’s mouth which was surrounded by phantom arms that sprouted on Ed's back.

The green energy ball began sucking in air from its surroundings, including him. The only thing keeping him stuck to the ground was some of the modules Alfred had repurposed on the fly since Ed had, with a single strike, deactivated every single function of his suit, rendering him completely immobile.

With a pained roar, Ed’s phantom arms pushed the orb towards Dormammu and when it hit, the scenario this time was clearly different from when Alfred used a similar spell.

Was it because of Ed’s powers or because of the damage Alfred had already done to Dormammu’s form, he did not know.

But as Dormammu was trying to drown the green ball in his signature dark energy, Ed flew close to him, letting loose a barrage of energy attacks, and began crashing into him at high speeds, akin to a speedster.

It almost reminded him of the powerset of Makkari as Ed quite literally used his ever-increasing mass to ram into Dormammu’s form, distracting him from the rapidly destabilising space around them.

“He’s going to do it,” he heard Alfred whisper before he tried creating more portals, to no avail.

“What’s wrong?” he asked Alfred who seemed to become more and more frantic while trying to open new portals. He was clearly making progress as more and more sparks began emanating from the portal that Alfred was trying to create but it would seem that Alfred would not be able to open them in time.

“You will rue the day you did this, Dormammu,” He heard a whisper-like voice that seemed to come from everywhere as chills ran down his spine at the sheer hatred present in the voice.

“Alfred, what is happening?” He asked Alfred once again as the cracks in the dimension began spreading to the very edges and greyish mist began coming in through the cracks.

“Ed is destroying the very dimension we are in and while I am sure that I will survive thanks to my body and you probably will too, the shock of forced transport will kill Ed. Not to mention that we could be spit out into the middle of nowhere with no immediate way of getting medical attention to Ed,” Alfred said while he struggled more and more to open a portal.

Alas, it seemed as if it was actually becoming harder and harder to open one since the grey mist began seeping in through the cracks.

With a silent shockwave that seemed to rip everything apart in its way, Dormammu burst like a balloon and ripped everyone away from their positions, including Ed as the green suit around him began to fizzle out, leaving him in a coffin-like structure that he must have built in the heat of the moment.

The shockwave was the final shock that increased the rate at which the cracks began spreading throughout the dimension, making the sky look like a broken mirror.

“No!” Alfred screamed as he reached towards Ed’s coffin-like suit but the grey mist had long since suffused the surroundings and as if something had sucked him right out of the dimension, Ed was pulled through the starry sky and disappeared right in front of their very eyes.

Alfred slumped in resignation as he created a small barrier around both of them and even as grey filled their vision, Alfred kept on looking for Ed when finally, with a thunderous sound, the entire dimension collapsed and they were violently ejected out of Project Ark.

Both of them were rag-dolled through a series of Rainbow roads, the barrier popping like a balloon at the first crash, and were spit out and crashed on a hard surface.

Blinking the red spots out of his vision, he looked to see that they had crash-landed on a red surface, creating a crater around him. 

Just nearby, he could see Alfred already up and about meditating as dimensional energy crackled around him, probably already searching for ways to get off the planet and look for Ed before something bad happened to him.

It seemed like Alfred’s prayers were answered as a fiery portal manifested in front of them, although the sight of the portal was a little off.

Looking closer, both Alfred and he stiffened as the portal was not made out of dimensional energy but actually hellfire.

He raised his guard up and got ready to use up the remaining meager energy he had to actually be useful this time and not be fucking deadweight.

That was when he heard Alfred whisper, “Impossible!” and immediately activated all his weapons and spells, aiming at the portal.

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Word Count - 1953

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A/N - I don’t think I did the fight any justice and will strive to learn to write better fight scenes. That’s all I have to say.

Thank you for reading!

Toodles!