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Gwen had just discovered something incredibly amusing.
Standing in the living room of 521A Palm Street, she looked out at the backyard.
Hawk was currently stuck.
Literally. Half of his body was protruding from a shimmering portal in mid-air, while the other half remained stubbornly out of sight, as if he were jammed in the fabric of reality itself. She blinked, utterly bewildered.
Just as she was beginning to wonder if this was some bizarre new training technique, the rest of him finally popped through.
Gwen's face lit up. She slid the patio door open and was about to rush out to meet him when she caught the look on his face.
She hesitated for a split second, her smile faltering, but then quickly closed the distance.
The moment Hawk saw her, the heavy, brooding tension on his face vanished, replaced by a warm smile as he pulled his new wife into a tight embrace.
They held each other in the quiet backyard.
"Hungry?"
"A little."
"Let's eat first."
"Okay."
Hawk murmured softly, keeping his arm around her waist as they walked back inside.
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Two hours later.
Hawk was about to head to his study when he stopped in the doorway of their bedroom. Gwen was sitting on the bed, propped up against the pillows, reading a book. He looked at her, curious. "You're not going to ask me what I was doing today?"
Gwen looked up from her book and offered a serene smile.
"Nope."
"Why not?"
"Because I know that if my husband thinks I need to know something, he'll tell me without me having to ask."
"..." Hawk's eyebrow arched. He looked at her knowing smile, thought for a moment, then stepped into the room and closed the door. Leaning back against the wood, he crossed his arms and recounted his trip to Norway, his meeting with Odin, and the terrifying truth about the traps of Time.
Odin couldn't tell Thor or Hela the truth about Ragnarok. If he did, they would become active participants in the prophecy, and their fates would be sealed within the inescapable conclusion Time had written for them.
Ragnarok meant the consumption of the World Tree cosmos by the primary universe. Millions would die, but there would be survivors.
If Odin remained silent, Thor and Hela had a chance to be among those survivors.
But if he spoke the truth, that chance vanished. They would be locked into the apocalypse.
Gwen's situation was fundamentally different.
First, even if she knew the cosmic truth, she had no power to alter it.
Second, she was a native inhabitant of the primary universe; her timeline was already woven into its fabric.
So, Odin couldn't tell his children, but Hawk could tell his wife.
Gwen listened intently, her eyes widening in shock.
"He fell into a temporal trap? Just like the Ancient One?"
"Yeah."
"Holy..." Gwen breathed out, closing her book and sitting up straight. She looked at Hawk, who was still leaning against the door. "If you fall into a temporal trap, is there really no way out?"
Hawk shrugged. "It's Time. No one beats Time."
Again, time exists simultaneously in the past, present, and future.
A temporal trap uses a guaranteed, inescapable future to sever your past. It's an attack that cannot be dodged, blocked, or outrun.
Gwen's expression turned dead serious. "Hawk."
"Yeah?"
"You have to be careful. If Odin went out of his way to warn you, it means something."
"I know." Hawk nodded. Then, a thought struck him, and he shook his head with a bitter laugh. "It's all Zeus's fault."
"..."
Gwen blinked, completely thrown by the sudden hostility toward the Greek god. "What does Zeus have to do with this? I thought you said he transcended Time?"
Hawk nodded, looking at her. "Exactly. Because he transcended, Time is absolutely determined never to let it happen again."
In a word:
Zeus had pulled the ladder up behind him.
It was like the first guy to marry into a rich family, inherit the business, and then immediately change his kids' last names back to his own, ruining the setup for every opportunistic son-in-law who came after him.
The pioneer planted the tree, and everyone else burned in the sun.
So—
"It's all Zeus's fault."
"Then you need to be even more careful."
Gwen didn't join him in cursing Zeus. She looked at him with unwavering intensity. "You said it yourself. Slow and steady. As long as you don't rush, as long as you don't lose your cool, Time can't touch you."
Hawk smiled warmly at her words. "Stay true to myself."
Gwen nodded firmly.
"Exactly. Stay true to yourself."
"Don't worry. I won't give it the opening. I'm going to the study."
"Okay."
Gwen nodded and returned to her book.
Hawk turned, opened the door, and stepped into the hallway.
But...
The moment the door clicked shut behind him, the smile vanished from his face.
In the study.
Hawk sat cross-legged on the floor. His consciousness plunged inward, descending into his Cosmo until he stood upon the shores of his own River of Time.
He looked ahead.
In the distant reaches of his 'future,' a specific section of the timeline was pulsing with a brilliant, almost blinding light. It was like a siren singing in the dark, constantly, relentlessly trying to seduce him into taking just one little peek.
Even just a glance.
Hawk remained completely unmoved. He slowly raised his gaze, his cold eyes settling on the two cosmic artifacts that now served as the eyes of his spectral Phoenix: the Reality Stone and the Mind Stone.
"The traps of Time are omnipresent."
"Omnipresent?"
"Yes. In fact, you might already have one foot in a trap right now, Phoenix. And you wouldn't even know it."
Hawk recalled the final exchange he'd had with Odin on the cliffs of Norway. As the memory echoed in his mind, he stared deeply at the two Infinity Stones he had collected.
Just then—
Deep within his mind, a door to his past life's memory palace swung open. A single image drifted out, floating to the forefront of his thoughts.
It was a picture.
A picture of a gauntlet.
The Infinity Gauntlet!
But not the left-handed one worn by Thanos. This was the right-handed gauntlet displayed prominently in Odin's vault on Asgard.
Odin wasn't the type to keep a useless trinket on display just to show off.
So...
There was only one logical reason the Infinity Gauntlet was in Odin's vault.
Odin had tried to use the Infinity Stones to break free from his temporal trap. But in the end, he had abandoned the plan.
Maybe it was because of the Soul Stone, which required a horrific sacrifice.
Maybe it was because the Reality Stone had been hidden away by his father, Bor.
But!
For a Chief God facing the total annihilation of Ragnarok, was a sacrifice for the Soul Stone really a dealbreaker? Was a hidden Reality Stone an insurmountable obstacle?
Again, Odin might be a benevolent, weary old man now, but never forget: his throne was built on mountains of corpses and rivers of blood.
A single general's success is built on ten thousand bleached bones.
Every Chief God's throne is soaked in blood.
Odin was no exception.
So—
There was only one conclusion.
Odin had forged the Infinity Gauntlet. He had planned to collect the Stones to save himself. But during his quest, he had discovered a fatal flaw in the plan, and he had ultimately chosen to abandon it.
But what was the flaw?
Odin hadn't said.
But he had given a warning.
The traps of Time are omnipresent...
Hawk's mind raced. He stared at the Phoenix's eyes, glittering with the power of Reality and Mind, and slowly closed his own.
His original plan had been crystal clear.
After comprehending the Eighth Sense, he would merge with the physical Phoenix star system that already existed in the primary universe. He would use the immense power generated by manifesting his Cosmo to trigger the Reality Stone, thereby forcing his Phoenix Universe into complete, physical existence.
He had run the simulations.
It was flawless.
The logic was sound.
But now...
Thinking about Odin's discarded Infinity Gauntlet and his chilling warning about the omnipresence of Time's traps, Hawk suddenly realized a horrifying truth.
His entire goal was to manifest the Phoenix Universe to transcend the primary universe's timeline.
But if he followed his original plan... the exact moment he manifested the Phoenix Universe would be the exact moment he triggered the ultimate temporal trap.
The reason was terrifyingly simple.
The Reality Stone!
As everyone knows:
The Reality Stone is a relic born from the singularity that predates the universe itself. It is a fundamental building block of this reality.
Hawk could use the Reality Stone to project the power of his Cosmo.
But he absolutely could not use it to manifest his actual universe.
If he did, he was completely fucked.
Learn from history!
Hawk recalled a profound truth from the history books of his past life.
He who rises by the sword, shall fall by the sword!
If he used the Reality Stone to birth his Phoenix Universe, then the Reality Stone possessed the fundamental authority to destroy it.
Right now, because Hawk's Cosmo hadn't fully manifested into physical reality, Time couldn't touch him.
But the moment he used the Phoenix star system and the Reality Stone to make it real...
To put it bluntly, All his hard work would become nothing more than a wedding gift to Time itself. He would be handing over control of his own reality to the very force he was trying to escape.
But—
Wait.
Hawk frowned. He thought of Frigga, who had died because Time issued a lethal warning when Odin tried to let Malekith use the Reality Stone to plunge the World Tree cosmos back into darkness.
If his new theory was correct, Time should have been thrilled with Malekith's plan.
If Malekith used the Reality Stone to rewrite the World Tree, the World Tree would have fallen completely under the jurisdiction of the Reality Stone, and by extension, into the absolute control of Time itself.
Why would Time issue a warning against that?
Hawk's mind whirled in a furious brainstorm.
Just then, his brow shot up.
"Eternity is Time, but Time is not Eternity."
"Eternity has consciousness. Time does not."
"Time is a cold, mechanical force."
"Ragnarok was the conclusion assigned by Time."
"Even though using the Reality Stone to plunge the World Tree into darkness would have brought it under Time's control, it would have fundamentally altered the assigned conclusion."
"And doing so would have completely unraveled the established past."
"Time itself would have fractured."
"So..."
"Even if using the Reality Stone served Time's ultimate purpose, it was a violation of the mechanical rules of reality. Time couldn't accept it. That's why it retaliated."
Hiss!
The Mind Stone flared with blinding light.
Bathed in the illuminating glow of the Mind, Hawk's thoughts crystallized. Having finally unraveled the cosmic puzzle, he sucked in a sharp breath of cold air.
The next second, a new daunting question surfaced in his mind.
A pop quiz for survival!
If using the Reality Stone to merge with the Phoenix star system was a guaranteed death sentence, a trap set by reality itself... what was his next move?
Give up on manifesting his universe entirely?
With his current power, he was more than capable of protecting himself and the people he cared about.
Or—
Acknowledge the dead end, turn around, and forge a new path?
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