"Okay, how will we present ourselves to the world and its heroes?" Anya asked, tilting her head.
"Wait... we didn't go over that before? Why did you not remind me?" Eli asked back in shock.
"I... just thought you had a great plan and didn't need any input," Anya replied with narrowed eyes.
"Ugh. Okay. Let's see. They know Thor, so calling ourselves Asgardians will probably be enough. There's way more powered people here, so we'll fit right in, and nobody will ask questions anyway. S.H.I.E.L.D. might be a problem, and apparently, there's even some splinter organizations here, including a strangely open Hydra. We'll hold off going to Asgard for the time being unless they come to us, I don't want to give the Odin of this reality a wrong impression. He should sense my All-force after all," Eli began explaining as he looked through the info on his phone.
"So... just Anya and Eli, two friendly Asgardian gods looking to do some good? Will you tell Thor who you are to him? Well, a version of him?"
"Not sure about Thor yet. I mean, if he looks just like my father, it will be hard to hide. And doing good is a nice image to present, but remember. We're looking for ways to get stronger here. Our goal isn't to get rid of all their problems and becoming celebrated heroes beloved by all," Eli concluded.
"What will we do first?"
"Hmm, turns out even here everything happens in New York. Stark exists, and he built a giant tower for the Avengers instead of moving it upstate. That's where we go first."
Anya nodded. This was their first world. She didn't really know what to expect anyway. So, for now, she would just follow along and see what's different and what advantages she could find for Eli.
"Weird that nobody came looking for us. Did you hide our entry into this reality?" Anya asked as the both of them walked toward the cliff to enjoy the scenery.
"Yeah, my mom made the spell circle like that. She loved scheming almost as much as she loved me - uh, that's what she said - and how could you scheme if you just tell everyone, 'Hey, I'm here now. Come and get me,' you know?" Eli showed a wry smile, and Anya snickered.
"Will you look for the Amora of this world? If she exists, that is. I know how much she means to you," Anya softly spoke as she held his hand.
"Of course! I'll have to play it by ear, but I wouldn't miss this opportunity for anything in the world. My mom even left me a little mission, helping the Amora's of other realities see the light if I don't exist here. And from the 19 Elias Collins still alive on Earth, it sure doesn't look like I exist," Eli chuckled as he turned his phone around to show the 19 Eli's his phone found. None of them came even close to his looks. Though that wasn't a guarantee he didn't exist here, of course. He could be on any planet, have any other name... last name. It was just a disguise, after all.
Under the guise of his magic, Anya and Eli made their way to New York without teleportation, just to get a feel of the land. Once they arrived, Eli used magic so the two wouldn't be too conspicuous. Both of them were a head taller than the average New Yorker, muscular and way too well dressed. Well, in Eli's mind, they were.
Usually, Anya would wear a black suit with either a red, purple, or green blouse. But after months of dating Eli, Anya started wearing more and more feminine clothes instead of her butler chic she had going on. For the occasion today, she had worn a green sleeveless dress that would look great on a red carpet. Had she asked Eli, he wouldn't have minded even if she came in her armor. But since she was hidden in his All-Force, he could make sure she was safe, no matter where the spell landed them.
Anya's armor was hidden in a chain with metal and leather links like Eli's belt. She had balled up the chain to look like a clutch handbag. Her new vambraces were hidden in fashionable bracelets. Her protective headband was hidden in her earrings, just like Eli's. Her sword and shield hung from neck combined into one necklace with miniature versions of the items lying above one another, like a knight's emblem.
All in all, she still looked like a warrior goddess because of her figure and toned arms, but her look matched Eli's. He wore a dark grey suit with a dress shirt the same color as Anya's dress with all his armor and weapons hidden away like Anya's. His pauldron was simply retracted, and his metal hand was barely visible when he put it in his pants pocket.
To make some quick cash to use for a hotel, Eli and Anya strolled into Hell's Kitchen. He had checked a few minds and learned that even in this reality, this part of New York was a shithole teeming with organized crime. It didn't take long for Eli to find some goons and follow them to a safehouse.
Eli casually released three girls that were held there against their will, made the goons turn themselves into the police and looted all their cash. These goons likely wouldn't live long in prison for what they were about to confess to and against whom they would testify, but Eli didn't care. He could have killed them himself, but he wasn't sure if someone could see or scry into his actions. He was hidden from technology and magics. But these mutant abilities were a wild card, and it wouldn't do to immediately paint himself as a killer.
With the money they 'earned' here, Eli and Anya booked themselves a penthouse suite in Upper Manhattan, close but not too close to the Avengers tower. On their way over, they saw a whole bunch of heroes and villains fighting, and Eli couldn't believe just how much crime happened here out on the streets. During their walk from Hell's Kitchen to Manhattan alone they saw Spider-Man stop a robbery in cash loan office and a few blocks over the red and blue hero stopped a woman in a sexy easter bunny cosplay with painted egg grenades from a jewel heist. That last heist might have taken Spider-Man a little longer to stop, but Eli made a giant man with a hippo's head trip over his own three-toed feet with a spell and Anya made the thread ends of a woman's costume catch fire. The woman's powers were clearly some kind of control over those threads.
At the hotel Eli had chosen, a hero group with fours written on their outfits was fighting... a moleman? Clearly, they had interrupted whatever plan that moleman had early because the fight ended before it started. But Eli was shocked how different this world was. Was New York on the verge of anarchy nonstop 24/7? And... who would live here by choice if that was the case?
When they were properly settled in their expensive hotel room, Eli and Anya began their research into this world. The publically known deeds of the Avengers, who they had fought and how they won, all this could help Eli figuring out what he needed to do in his travels or what he needed to find to grow. It was all muddled by the mutant problem, though. Hidden by spells, Eli and Anya saw tens of abductions that no police officer seemed to take seriously. They saw labs getting demolished by other mutants to break free those that were tortured and used for experiments. But never once did he see an Avenger, except for Spider-Man, on the scene.
Two days into their research, Eli's cosmic awareness flared up. And just like he suspected, it all started in New York. It appeared nobody had noticed Eli's and Anya's arrival or bothered with them, and sadly, Thor was off planet. So they were unbothered until now, like tourists.
Eli gave Anya a look, and they both changed into their armor. On the penthouse balcony, Tuuli landed on Eli's shoulder and softly cawed her findings into his ears. A giant ship showed up over Avengers tower, as if in challenge and slowly drifted over to Central Park. And that's where the three were headed now, invisible to everyone.
With a whole lot of mind reading, Eli found out that the 'enemy' appeared to be Apocalypse. One of the oldest mutants alive and a firm believer in survival of the fittest. Meaning he was a mutant supremacist who would stop at nothing to further his cause. However, Apocalypse was more than just a would-be tyrant. It appeared he had a connection to Celestials, too, if the technology he wielded wasn't somehow stolen, which made him even more dangerous than his vast pool of powers and unending combat and life experience.
Instead of just blindly being on the Avenger's side, though, Eli wanted to wait and see. From his research, he had seen what happened to mutants in this world, and it wasn't pretty. And for whatever reason, the Avengers in the two decades of their founding have barely helped mutants from getting killed in the streets, sent to concentration camps with fancier names, and tortured in experiments all over the world. Whatever the mutants were here for, Eli would not think them villains just for confronting the Avengers.
"Hear me, Avengers. I have come to declare the suffering of mutantkind over. I have come to declare the end of human supremacy," a blue skinned and blue lipped giant of a man in futuristic armor declared after he floated down from his ship with six figures at his side. Apocalypse, Lorna 'Polaris' Dane, James 'Wolverine'-'Logan' Howlett, Dani Moonstar, Quintavius 'Kid Omega' Quire, Moira Kinross, and Autumn Rolfson. These were the names that Eli picked up from the minds of those around him.
"I can get behind the first cause, but what's up with the second?" Iron Man asked with his face uncovered.
"You can get behind the first cause?" A woman with a native american complexion stepped forward. Her eyes turned a misty white, and an energy projection formed in the air. It showed proof of Tony Stark willfully ignoring mutants being experimented on in labs of his own company. It showed him flying away from a facility with mutants kept captive. It did not show a pretty picture.
"Hey, these are taken out of context!" Tony protested, but because of his bias against the man, Eli could only scoff.
"The world will never change if you force it to change," Captain America offered in response to these pictures, but all seven mutants disdainfully sneered at his naive viewpoint.
"Oh? What will you do then, Captain America? You fight the good fight. You save countless lives on a weekly basis. Yet right here in New York, your home, we have uncovered and ended thirty-two laboratories that held and experimented on mutants against their will in just two days. Should we just wait then for when you are done saving the rest of the world until it is time for you to save the mutants?"
A young woman with green hair stepped forward, from next to the blue man called Apocalypse.
"Lorna... what do you mean with 'ended'?" Captain America answered in a worried tone.
"Of course, we killed them all. No worries, we checked. We only killed those who were responsible for killing or torturing at least one mutant. Turns out that was all of them. Man, for most of them, we could have set the bar to ten dead mutants begging for their lives, and they would still be all dead," a teenager with a pink mohawk replied, sounding almost bored.
"Uh, Kid Omega... we... don't kill people. That's like lesson one with the X-Men, is it not?" Spider-Man asked in a tone just as worried as Captain America's.
"And then what would ever change, bub?" A short, hairy mountain of muscle spoke from next to the only ordinary looking woman from among the people this Apocalypse brought.
"Logan, you took such a long time to change. What happened?" A huge muscular black man from among the Avengers spoke up, Eli recognized the man and the woman that stood next to him. Luke Cage and Jessica Jones, though they both had different hair cuts and slightly different looks, Eli had seen them in their research before. It seemed them getting together was...fate. Even in a world so different to his.
"I've had my eyes opened, Luke. This world spits on mutants, and it's time we spit back," Logan, also known as Wolverine, countered.
"We don't need to fight, you know we're on your side here, Logan," Captain America tried to reason.
"Oh yeah? Want to know how many of those thirty-two labs we busted were under Shield orders? Four, Rogers. Four of them were run with Fury's permission. And how many were funded directly or indirectly by your government or your government's officials? Sixteen! More than half of these labs weren't run by criminals. They were run by the people you defend. Right under your nose here in New York. Since you're Captain America, in my book, you are just as guilty as those monsters," the ordinary looking brunette called Moira next to Wolverine spat in anger.
Before they could argue back, Apocalypse lifted his hand, and everyone became quiet.
"You supposed heroes have ignored the mutants' peril for far too long. The world we will build will not need you. No, you would only fight us when you learn of our ambition. It is why we are declaring war on all of you now," Apocalypse said as his momentum rose. The air gained a certain static that would soon ignite this barrel of oil, and all hell would break lose.
Eli was torn. Naturally, he could see that the Avengers would at first fight with the intention to arrest, while it looked like the mutants were ready to kill. The two forces went into this with completely different mindsets. And yet the Avengers thought they had the numbers adventage. But they were wrong. He could see that tens of mutants not only surrounded this place, there was even a 'Raven' in the midst of the Avengers posing as a man with bow and arrow. He learned that everyone around them thought of this figure as Clint or Hawkeye, but he looked decidedly different from the Clint Eli knew.
If this Raven was allowed to stay where she was, people would die almost immediately. And while he thought himself a hero at the best of times, Eli did agree with killing the people responsible in those labs. Especially those who forfeit their rights to a comfortable life by killing and torturing others.
With a nod from Apocalypse, everyone on his side shot into action. The blue giant himself floated up to deal with a much more scantidly dressed Carol Danvers, who looked to be wearing a black one-piece swimsuit and a red sash with latex boots and gloves instead of the full body suit Eli knew. Raven was pretending to shoot a few arrows, but she was eying for an opportunity to take out a bigger threat.
"Are we helping?" Anya asked softly.
"Yeah, but who?" Eli shot back with furrowed brows.
"We could end this fight and offer the mutants our power to help them kill the rest of those responsible," Anya replied while in deep thought.
"That's a pretty long list, you know that. And the powers of this world will not be our friends," Eli argued.
"Do we need them to be?"
Eli stiffened. That... Anya was right. Sure, he'd like to be on the good side of everyone, but if he stayed true to his principles, what would he care about the governments of the world branding him a criminal. He could just leave. The Allfather of this reality would likely care very little if an Asgardian was known as a murderer on Midgard, especially if these murders were not random but with a purpose.
The young Allfather's eyes began glowing in pale green, his and Anya's invisibility lifted just as Raven tried to stab Black widow in the back with an arrow, and everyone froze.
"Mutants! I would like to offer you my assistance in cleaning the filth that has tortured your kind for centuries. However, if possible, I would like for you to leave alone the heroes of this world. I'm afraid this world will still need them. Unless, of course, you unrealistically plan to kill all non-mutants in the next 5 years and get every mutant woman pregnant non-stop," Eli shouted as he drew every combatants eye. There were some who could still freely move. Like Apocalypse and Captain Marvel, for example.
"And what is your assistance worth?" Kid Omega, the teenager with the pink mohawk shouted. He seemed pretty casual about a flying dude appearing out of nowhere, ending a fight between these two forces.
"Well, I can only see seven of you still moving. And that's me using my telekinesis, the second weakest power I own. I don't want to sound cocky, but I'm faster than Thor and can deal much more damage than him in a short time. Is that enough?" Eli quipped with a smirk.
"What purpose would that have? Humans will still fear us once we are done, and they will start building weapons against us in secret. And once they are built, they will try to wipe us out anyway. Even if we show mercy now," the brunette woman holding a futuristic rifle, Moira, shouted.
"You make them the villains. It's what I did when the government abducted my partner and scooped out her brain. I killed them all, yet the public was on my side," Eli offered with an arrogant, domineering smirk.
"The public would never side with us. They think us less than humans," Dani Moonstar, the native american looking woman said with a thoughtful frown.
"And whose fault is that?" Eli said as he looked toward the blue skinned man.
Apocalypse frowned. Could it be that some random man was able to read his mind?
"What do you mean by that?" Mystique shouted while slowly turning back into her blue skinned form with the small golden skull at the top of her forehead.
"Apocalypse isn't doing it alone, but he's been fanning the flames between the two species for a long time. He wants this war to happen to weed out the weak," Eli revealed.
"You talk too much," Apocalypse angrily shouted with an ever-deepening frown. He didn't know why he didn't just deflect the argument, but his shout pretty much admitted to what he did. How could that man have known? Why didn't he just lie? Apocalpyse was getting angry.
"Yeah, you talk too much, bub," Wolverine agreed as he trained against the bindings Eli had on him.
"Do I talk too much?" Eli asked as he turned to Anya. She solemnly nodded.
"Well, in that case I'll just wipe the floor with that blue dude and I'll take the mutants that are willing on a spin around the globe to kill everyone who's tortured and killed mutants for fun," Eli decided with a shrug.
"Insolence!" The giant figure shot toward Eli together with his shout. Apocalypse hands lit up with energies, and he aimed a fist straight at Eli's head. In response, Eli's right destroyer arm lit up with green energies, and the two fists met. Everyone's eyes widened, Eli didn't shoot to the other side of New York like most expected, and the shockwave of the two fists meeting in a standstill didn't shatter the windows all over Manhattan.
When En Sabah Nur, Apocalypse's 'earthly' name from his time posing as a Pharaoh in Egypt, was still thinking about how his attack was negated, a blade shot out of from beneath the fist that was still resting against his. With a swift move from Eli, the blade wedged itself into a link in the mutants armor and cut deep. Apocalypse floated back with a grunt and looked at his arm. Only he knew the wound was already closing because of his self-molecular manipulation, but it was doing so much slower than it should.
"Who are you?" Apocalypse asked with wary eyes.
"I'm Eli. God of Storms."