Doom's arcane strike met the descending meteor head-on.
The burning mass shattered with a deafening crack, splitting into dozens of incandescent fragments that scattered across the sky like a broken star. Molten rock and fire rained downward, the air screaming from the sudden release of pressure.
For half a second, it looked like Doom had won that exchange.
Then Apocalypse lifted his hands.
The fragments stopped.
Every blazing shard froze in midair, trembling, glowing brighter as Apocalypse clenched his fists. The chunks reversed course in unison, ripping backward through the air and reforming into a swirling storm of fire and stone around him.
"This is the end!" He snarled and hurled them forward.
The sky turned into a corridor of destruction.
Doom reacted instantly. Green energy flared around him as he raised layered shields, but the first wave slammed through them like cannon fire. The second wave shattered what remained. Doom was driven backward, boots carving lines through the air as fragments detonated around him in violent bursts of heat and force.
"Enough!"
Doom dropped the shields and spread his arms.
Lightning erupted.
Blinding white bolts lanced outward in a continuous barrage, tearing through the incoming debris. Each strike pulverized stone, vaporized flame, and split the sky with thunderous cracks.
The burning storm vanished piece by piece, reduced to glowing dust that scattered harmlessly into the ocean below.
The lightning did not stop.
Doom drove it forward, the bolts converging into Apocalypse's chest and shoulders. The force slammed Apocalypse backward, carving furrows through the air itself. His energy cloak flickered as he absorbed the damage, but this time it cost him. His movements slowed. His regeneration lagged. Cracks spread across his body.
Doom finally stopped the attack.
Something was wrong.
Multiple cracks appeared on Doom's new armor.
Apocalypse noticed.
For the first time, the imbalance was undeniable.
Doom was weakening.
The lightning faltered. The glow around Doom's armor dimmed, and his breathing turned ragged inside the mask. The stolen Celestial technology pulsed erratically, its rejection no longer subtle. Doom steadied himself through sheer will, but it was clear now that time was no longer on his side.
Apocalypse smiled.
"You weaken," Apocalypse said, voice low and satisfied. "You took what was never meant for you."
Doom straightened, forcing his posture rigid. "You mistake inconvenience for defeat."
But Apocalypse could smell it now... The hesitation and instability.
He surged forward, hands wrapped in crackling kinetic energy, and slammed a blow into Doom's face. Doom flew backward, armor screaming under the impact. He barely caught himself before tumbling into the ocean again.
Apocalypse followed, instantly. A second strike hit Doom square in the chest and sent him spinning. Doom coughed hard, blood splattering against the inside of his mask.
The rejection worsened.
Systems screamed warnings that Doom tried to separate the Celestial tech, but failed to do so. The technology wasn't following his command even when he was using his technopathy magic.
'What the hell is going on here? Something is very wrong. First my Power Gem, and now this... A third party is involved, but where? In my current condition, I won't be able to take on this new threat. I must find a way to escape.' Doom thought.
Apocalypse hovered in front of him, towering, scarred, but grinning like a predator that finally saw bone through flesh.
"Your magic falters. Your stolen power rejects you," Apocalypse said. "And now you bleed."
Doom's hands shook as he raised them. The energy came slower this time. Well, it was useless at this point.
Apocalypse raised one hand, then the other. Black and crimson energy wrapped around his palms, dense and ancient, coiling like living flame. He reached inward, to the core of his own power, and called forth something far more dangerous.
A burst of orange energy erupted as an Infinity Gem appeared between his fingers.
The Soul Gem.
The moment it fully formed, Apocalypse's grin widened.
Then it vanished.
Gone.
It simply blinked out of existence with a soft blue flash, like a candle snuffed by unseen fingers.
Apocalypse froze.
He stared at his empty palm, disbelief ripping across his face.
"What…" His voice cracked with pure confusion. "What did you do?"
Doom had not moved.
His eyes flicked instinctively to his wrist. The Power Gem was still missing. The space around him was still locked and his portal magic wasn't working.
Apocalypse looked around wildly, scanning the sky, the sea, the air itself. His rage spiked, but underneath it was something new.
Uncertainty.
"No," Apocalypse snarled. "That is mine."
He blinked before Doom and grabbed his head with his giant hand and hurled him into the sky.
Doom barely had time to raise his arms before Apocalypse slammed into him like a living extinction event. A mutation rippled across Apocalypse's body and his fists multiplied mid-swing, six arms striking at once. Doom's armor absorbed the first impact. The second cracked it. The third sent him tumbling end over end through the sky.
Apocalypse did not let up.
Bone spikes erupted from his shoulders and drove forward like spears. Doom twisted, but one tore through his side. Green energy sputtered uselessly around the wound. Apocalypse followed with a concussive roar and unleashed a sonic blast point-blank. Doom's head snapped back. His vision went white.
Another mutation. Dense muscle layered over Apocalypse's frame, doubling his mass. He grabbed Doom by the leg and swung him like a flail, smashing him through a cloud bank and into open air again. Each impact sent a sonic boom through the air.
Doom tried to cast a spell. Nothing came.
Apocalypse's eyes burned as he fired twin beams of crimson energy. They carved into Doom's chest, melting armor plates and sending fragments spinning away. Doom screamed as the suit failed in sections, locks disengaging, systems dying one by one.
Apocalypse grabbed him again and slammed his knee into Doom's stomach. Something inside Doom cracked. Blood sprayed across the inside of the mask.
Rage drove Apocalypse faster.
He struck Doom again and again, each blow warping air, shattering what little remained of the stolen Celestial tech. Doom's armor finally gave up entirely.
It exploded outward.
Shards of metal scattered into the sky as Doom's body was flung away, spinning helplessly. His mask cracked down the center. Apocalypse seized him by the throat midair and tore the mask free.
For the first time, Doom's face was exposed.
His face was scarred—one eye swollen shut. Blood was pouring freely down his jaw.
Apocalypse hit him again.
Doom crashed downward like a meteor, punching through clouds and slamming into an unknown island far below. The impact split the shoreline and sent water surging inland. He skidded across stone, tore through trees, and finally came to rest in a shallow crater.
He coughed.
Blood splattered across the sand.
Apocalypse descended slowly. The ground cracked beneath him as he approached.
"You are the first mortal to push me this far," Apocalypse said, voice cold and reverent. "I take back what I said before. You are strong. But not enough to surpass me."
His right arm shifted, forming a glowing bio blade.
Apocalypse moved in a blur.
The blade flashed once.
"Gaaaaahhhh!!!!" Doom screamed as his right arm was severed cleanly at the elbow.
A second flash.
His left arm fell next.
Doom collapsed, screaming again as Apocalypse slashed both legs. Blood flew everywhere.
Apocalypse stood over him, blade dripping red.
"Hand over my Gem and I will end you painlessly," Apocalypse said. "I will even create a tomb in your name. Refuse, and I will torture you for eternity."
Doom coughed violently.
More blood.
"Hahaha... Cough! Cough! Haaaa... Hahaha!"
A wet, broken laugh that scraped out of his throat.
"You arrogant fuck," Doom rasped.
Apocalypse's eyes narrowed.
Then his head vanished.
At the exact same instant, his heart ceased to exist. Like there was a gaping hole in his chest. Then a beam of pure blue energy tore through him from behind. It was so bright that Doom was forced to close his eyes. Apocalypse's body froze for a fraction of a second before disintegrating.
Every atom unraveled, erased in a cascading wave of light until nothing remained.
When the beam faded, Doom opened his eyes.
Before him stood a familiar armor. The nanite mask retracted, revealing Tony Stark's face.
"Hahaha! You bastard!" Doom cursed. "It was you, controlling the entire thing from the shadows like a coward. I should've gone for your head first."
"There is no cowardice or bravery when it comes to survival," Tony said with a cold expression as he opened his palm.
Doom's eyes widened.
The Power Gem, the Soul Gem and the Space Gem were floating over Tony's palm. Tony smirked at Doom as he removed the nanites from his hand and grabbed the Gems together without any protection with his bare hand.
"Any last words?" He asked.
"Impossible. How are you touching the Gems? I've travelled the Multiverse, learned everything about the Infinity Gems. No mortal can touch them with bare hand," Doom asked after a painful cough. He has lost too much blood, his internal organs were ruptured and his vision was getting blurry.
"You don't know, huh?" Tony said with an arrogant grin.
"TELL ME, STARK!" Doom yelled with his last bit of strength. He travelled the multiverse, and yet, Tony has more knowledge than him? To Doom, that sounds impossible.
"Nope," Tony aimed his fist at Doom and released a beam of Infinity energy that vaporized Doom.
"Well, that was boring... I expected more from him."
Tony looked around the destruction around him.
He mumbled to himself. "But good to know that I can use space locking to isolate and nullify magic."
Just then, a green portal opened and a blast of crimson energy flew toward Tony at a blinding speed. "Humf!" He simply threw a beam of Space energy to redirect the attack toward the portal. But it stopped midair as if frozen in time.
"Interesting."
Tony used the Space Gem to hide the other two Gems in an isolated space. The space around him rippled as if someone were playing with reality. He tried to move, but his body was frozen as if something was holding him there. "Reality Gem!"
From the portal, walked out Doom.
He was critically injured, but his legs and arms were still there and he was holding an oval lantern-like artifact.
"Hahahaha!" Tony laughed loudly. "You have the Reality Gem! You escaped after crashing on this island, didn't you? But why didn't you use that power to run away? You could've healed, maybe learn some more spells, and then attacked." His grin widened. "Could it be that you are forcefully using its power?"
"Your arrogance knows no bounds, Stark. Laughing and talking in the face of death... I'll take those Gems you collected and then erase you from existence," Doom said in his rasped voice as he tried to bend the reality around Tony and unravel the other Gems.
But it didn't work.
Tony clenched his fists and summoned his cosmic energy, mixed with the power of the Infinity Gems. Then he blinked before Doom and grabbed the artifact. "Surprise motherfucker!" He crushed the artifact just like that as the glowing red Gem willingly flew toward him. He opened a tiny portal, and the Gem flew inside.
"Who in the hell are you?" Doom's eyes widened.
"I am Ironman," Tony simply flicked Doom's forehead.
His body turned to dust.
Doom finally died... with too many questions in his mind.
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Quick info dump if you forgot the rules of Infinity Gems: they appear to counter specific threats, they often materialize in unexpected ways rather than just being found. And they are kinda sentient like the one in Tony's head.
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