"All right, we can help you with that" Wong replied after listening to the explanation. After all, they were only being asked for preventive support in case something went wrong, and Amora, while dangerous, was not difficult to handle for those who understood her abilities.
Harley thanked him, after saying goodbye he stood up and was about to leave when his communicator vibrated suddenly.
"Is something wrong? Has the team already been app...?"
"Agent Keener, the target is less than one hundred meters from your position" a worried voice interrupted on the other side.
Harley's expression hardened.
"Direction?"
"North."
Harley left the sanctum through the door facing exactly that direction.
And there he saw her, Amora, walking toward the very same building with absolute indifference, as if she were not being tracked by SHIELD, or as if she simply did not care.
Harley drew immediately and fired.
But before the attack reached her, reality itself shattered.
The air vibrated without cold, the lines of the environment bent, the colors became intense to the point of looking artificial. Everything resembled a defective copy of the real world.
The blast Harley had fired remained suspended in midair, trembling as if it were liquid trapped inside an invisible barrier.
CREAK.
A dry sound like glass giving way echoed above their heads. A black fracture opened in the sky. The suspended blast veered sharply toward it at an impossible angle. Objects, debris, leaves, everything began to rise, drawn into that dimensional rupture. The only exception was people, the fracture rejected them, as if something did not allow them to get too close.
Voices came from inside it. Some human, others not. Overlapping whispers, ownerless echoes. Black strands of energy stretched outward, smearing everything they touched into a mosaic. Shadows moved even without light to project them, as if the hierarchy of object and shadow had inverted.
Harley memorized every detail without losing control.
Then, magic circles formed around the fracture. Strange, intricate. The world snapped back to normal in a blink, except for the rip in the sky, which was now closing slowly.
He did not fully understand what had happened, but he assumed Kamar Taj must have considered scenarios like this before. He discarded the phenomenon for the moment and returned his attention to Amora.
She was gone.
She had disappeared without a trace.
Harley contacted support.
"Are you okay? We lost your signal completely" Avery asked, noticeably anxious.
"Yes. Minor extradimensional invasion, but Strange contained it. Can you track Amora?"
"Extradimen—? Whatever. I am checking… Wait. This is strange."
"What is it?"
"There is no record of her leaving. Cameras in the immediate area failed, but she does not appear anywhere else in the city either. She either vanished or never moved at all."
Harley frowned.
If she came all the way here, leaving without doing anything made no sense. He did not lose sight of her for more than a second and still did not see her leave.
"The only possibility would be…" he murmured, looking at the fracture that was still closing.
He had looked away only to see Strange rise and enter the dimensional rupture. When he refocused on the ground, Amora was no longer there.
He had no time to theorize.
The fracture snapped shut. Suspended objects fell violently. And in front of him, out of nowhere, Amora reappeared. She looked at her hands like someone who does not understand where she has been.
Harley did not ask. He fired again.
The electric discharge knocked her down, leaving her unconscious.
After handcuffing her, he did not take her to SHIELD.
He went straight to the Sanctum.
There he found Strange collapsed on the ground, protected by his cloak, descending slowly from where the fracture had closed. Wong was beside him, checking that he was breathing.
"What happened?" Harley asked.
Wong answered calmly.
"He is stable. He made contact with the Dark Dimension and was affected. He will wake up in a few days. I checked everything, he did not lose anything."
His gaze paused for a moment on the Time Stone. Even unconscious, Strange continued to protect it with layered, automatic spells.
Wong pointed at the unconscious woman Harley carried.
"Who is she?"
"Amora the Enchantress."
Wong narrowed his eyes.
"What was she doing here?"
"I do not know. Asgard will handle the interrogation. SHIELD has no authority over her."
Harley then explained Amora's temporary disappearance.
Wong shook his head firmly.
"Impossible. Dormammu rules the Dark Dimension. No one enters without his permission."
"Then it was deliberate."
"More than suspicious. Her arrival, Dormammu attacking New York, the disappearance inside the rupture, none of it is coincidence. Interrogate her as soon as possible. I will get the medics. Strange must wake up as soon as he can."
Harley nodded and stepped out. Something in his chest told him this was only the beginning.
"Avery, did you record everything?"
"Everything. I already reported it to the higher ups. They are sending a unit to receive her. The interrogation will be accelerated."
Minutes later, a black car stopped in front of him. Someone familiar stepped out.
"Director Coulson? You came in person?"
"This case demands it," he replied while they entered the vehicle toward the base.
Coulson spoke directly.
"Thanos' arrival is imminent. Every entry into the planet is under strict surveillance. And in months, the only entry was Amora. A hundred years imprisoned in Asgard, isolated, she seemed clean. But today she proved we are not seeing the full picture."
Harley nodded.
With little time before Thanos arrived,
Amora was the first external entity to approach an Infinity Stone.
And not by accident.
Suspicious is an understatement.
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