"Why… why is this happening…?"
The Phoenix Force shrieked in furious protest, its voice echoing from the deepest corners of Martin's mind.
But no matter how loud it cried, it remained shackled, trapped in the furthest depths of his soul. Its immense power was completely suppressed, siphoned off at Martin's whim and forcibly converted into his own energy.
The Phoenix thrashed against its bonds, but the chains only tightened.
Endless chains, extending from the very AllSpark, bound it in place.
These were not merely restraints, they carried with them the weight of a law, a metaphysical force far beyond anything it had ever known.
They didn't just bind; they subjugated.
"I just broke free from Charles' suppression... escaped the prison of Jean's mortal form... only to be trapped again in this psychic abyss..."
This time, the force imprisoning it far exceeded anything it had ever encountered. And as Martin drained its power without resistance, wielding it with dominance, the Phoenix only grew more enraged.
"Give up, little bird. There's no way out of here."
A foreign voice cut through the psychic void.
"Who's there?"
The Phoenix turned sharply, then froze.
Before it floated a flickering flame.
The Eternal Flame.
Or rather, the will, soul, and lingering power of Surtur, the Fire Giant.
The Eternal Flame was also a prisoner, but unlike the Phoenix, it wasn't chained. It was manipulated remotely by the AllSpark, controlled and harvested, yet left intact.
Enslaved, yes, but not crushed.
"I've tried everything," the flame said, flickering gently as Surtur's voice echoed from within. "The architecture of this black cube… it's vast beyond comprehension. Escape? Impossible."
"You're content to remain trapped forever?" the Phoenix snapped, refusing to yield.
There was a pause.
"Oh, don't get me wrong," the Eternal Flame replied. "My core may be stuck here… but my true self still roams free in the cosmos. I'm not like you. Besides, the AllSpark's energy nurtures the flame. There are worse prisons. Give it a few million years, who knows? I might ascend to a self-contained cosmic deity."
Surtur had resigned himself to his fate, and even seemed to be enjoying it.
The Phoenix howled again, furious.
"Tch. Temperamental as ever."
Martin muttered, mentally silencing the noise.
In truth, no matter how violently the Phoenix struggled, it would never escape.
A Skyfather-tier entity, or one wandering the boundary between sub-Skyfather and Skyfather, was still far beneath what Martin now wielded.
If he ever let something like this slip through his grasp, that would be the real absurdity.
"Still," Martin murmured, holding up a hand as golden energy rippled from his palm, "the enhancements the Phoenix Force brings to a host… are nothing short of remarkable."
The energy wasn't from the Mind Stone, though it bore similarities. This was raw, primal force, something that tapped directly into the essence of the multiverse itself.
"I'll need to collect more Phoenix fragments in the future. If possible… I want all of them."
With a clenched fist, he opened a spatial rift and stepped through, vanishing into the swirling vortex.
The next moment, Martin emerged at the Earth base.
"How's the Dark Phoenix personality?" asked Professor X, barely holding himself upright.
"There is no longer a 'Dark Phoenix personality,'" Martin replied calmly. "The Phoenix Force now belongs solely to me."
He glanced around at the gathered X-Men and Brotherhood mutants. His voice was level, but carried an overwhelming authority.
"Jean's mind has taken some damage," Charles said, checking on the unconscious girl. "But she'll recover, in time."
The tension in the room eased slightly.
Magneto eyed Martin with conflicted emotions. He opened his mouth, hesitated, and finally sighed. "You and I… we were never meant to walk the same path."
"I said it before: your vision is too narrow," Martin replied. "You obsess over what appears vast, but is ultimately meaningless."
The future of mutantkind? If Martin had taken charge of mutant evolution, he wouldn't have debated politics. He would've just moved the entire mutant population to their own planet.
Problem solved.
Martin's gaze swept across the room, pausing, ever so briefly, on two individuals.
No one noticed.
They were Azazel and Juggernaut.
Azazel was of little concern, an ancient teleporter who'd survived millennia, but whose true body was sealed in an extra-dimensional rift. He was more smoke than fire.
Juggernaut, though… was different.
His power didn't come from within, but from an external, malevolent source, just like Wanda Maximoff.
The Crimson Gem of Cyttorak.
The master of the Crimson Cosmos. The one entity that Mephisto himself had feared when Martin stormed Hell.
Cyttorak, Marvel's first demon.
A being of confirmed multiversal stature. A being whose rank rivaled the Celestial Trinity.
Martin's eyes narrowed.
"This meeting is over," he said flatly. "You're not welcome here anymore. I'll send you back to New York."
With a wave of his hand, a vortex of space-time opened. All the mutants vanished.
All but one.
Yuriko.
Also known as Lady Deathstrike.
Her body contained beta adamantium, exactly the kind of self-repairing alloy Martin needed.
"Ratchet," Martin called. "Extract her blood immediately. Use it to develop a self-healing metal formula, and upload the results into the Protoform Pods. I want our next-generation Cybertronian hybrids built with this tech."
"Yes, Creator!" Ratchet beamed with excitement. He knelt, activating a series of scanners over Yuriko's body, drawing several vials of blood before rushing away.
Now, only Martin and Yuriko remained.
He glanced at her unconscious form.
A smile curled across his lips.
He walked toward her, lifted her effortlessly, and swept everything off the table with one motion. The crash of scattered equipment echoed through the chamber.
With a low thud, he laid her down.
With a flick of his fingers, her black bodysuit shredded apart, torn cleanly from her frame.
"Well now," he murmured, voice smooth, deliberate. "It seems tonight… is going to be another beautiful night."
Unhurried, Martin loosened the buttons of his suit, the dim glow of ambient circuitry casting long shadows over his satisfied expression.
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TN: Holy shit, is he gonna grape a sleeping woman?!
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