The first thing he became aware of was that breathing felt different, and not in the way breathing felt different when you had a cold or when you accidentally inhaled water, but in a fundamentally mechanical sense that suggested the air he was processing was being filtered through something far more advanced than human lungs should require. The second thing he became aware of was that he was lying on something wet, cold, and distinctly unpleasant, and his body—if he could even call it his body anymore, because something felt profoundly wrong in a way he couldn't immediately articulate—was responding to the discomfort with a series of subtle system alerts that manifested not as physical sensation but as abstract data feeds that his brain somehow knew how to interpret.
He opened his eyes and saw the world through a heads-up display that hadn't existed thirty seconds ago, or perhaps it had existed, but the thirty seconds ago he was remembering belonged to a different person in a different body in what was increasingly feeling like a different universe entirely. The display showed him environmental data, threat assessments rendered in a script he shouldn't have been able to read but understood perfectly, power levels for systems he didn't remember having, and most pressingly, the biological readouts of three human males who were currently standing approximately four meters away and appeared to be in the middle of some kind of debate.
"What the hell is that thing?" one of them was saying, and the voice came through the audio receptors of his helmet—his helmet, when had he acquired a helmet—with crystal clarity that made the fear underlying the bravado painfully obvious.
He tried to move and found that his body responded, though not in the way his old body had responded to commands. This was smoother, more efficient, like the difference between driving a car with a stuttering engine and piloting something that had been engineered to perfection by hands that understood movement on a level human engineers could only dream of. He pushed himself up from the wet asphalt—because that's what he was lying on, the dirty wet asphalt of an alleyway that smelled like garbage and urine and the particular despair of urban neglect—and found that he was significantly taller than he had been, and the weight distribution of his body was entirely wrong, except it wasn't wrong, it was right, it was perfect, it was exactly how Sylux's body would feel if you were suddenly inhabiting it.
The thought hit him like a freight train made of pure existential crisis: he was Sylux. He was the bounty hunter from the Metroid series, the mysterious figure with the unexplained grudge against the Galactic Federation, the owner of the Delano 7 and wearer of the Shock Coil and Lockjaw and armor that was distinctly not of any human manufacture. He was standing in an alley that was very definitely on Earth, based on the graffiti visible on the walls and the English text on the dumpster and the extremely human muggers who were now backing away with expressions that suggested they were rapidly reassessing their life choices.
His last memory as his previous self came flooding back with unfortunate clarity: he had been eating a hot pocket, one of those cheap frozen ones that were somehow both scalding and frozen in the center, and his cat—may Mr. Whiskers rest in feline peace—had chosen that exact moment to wind between his legs while he was walking to the couch, and he had tripped, and the hot pocket had lodged in his throat, and he had died in what had to be one of the most pathetic ways a human being could possibly die. He had died by hot pocket, assisted by cat, in his apartment, probably alone for long enough that the smell would have been unfortunate before anyone thought to check on him.
And now he was Sylux.
In an alley.
With three muggers.
"Yo, yo, I think it's one of those freaks," the second mugger said, and this one was holding a knife in a grip that suggested he had used it before but was rapidly losing confidence in its effectiveness against whatever category of "freak" he thought he was looking at. "Like those Avengers assholes, or—"
He didn't let them finish the conversation. Not because he was particularly aggressive by nature—his previous self had been fairly non-confrontational, actually, the kind of person who apologized when someone else stepped on his foot—but because Sylux's instincts were now his instincts, and Sylux did not stand around letting potential threats strategize. Sylux acted.
The Shock Coil materialized in his hand with a thought, because apparently that was something he could do now, and the weapon hummed to life with an energy signature that made the air itself seem to crackle with potential. He didn't fire it—he wasn't actually interested in killing anyone, despite the rather intense combat programming that seemed to be suggesting otherwise—but he raised it with the kind of purpose that communicated very clearly that firing it was absolutely on the table.
The muggers ran.
They ran faster than he would have expected, actually, dropping their weapons and scrambling over each other in their desperate bid to escape the alley and whatever nightmare creature they thought had spawned in front of them. He watched them go through the targeting overlay of his HUD, which tracked their movements with predatory precision and offered helpful suggestions about optimal firing solutions that he deliberately ignored.
And then he was alone.
In an alley.
In a universe that was not his own.
He took a moment to process this, which manifested as standing completely still for approximately forty-seven seconds while his brain—or whatever was handling cognition in this new body—tried to reconcile several incompatible facts. Fact one: he had died. Fact two: he was no longer dead. Fact three: he was no longer himself, or at least not the himself he had been. Fact four: he was Sylux, a character from a video game franchise, complete with armor and weapons and apparently the full suite of abilities that entailed. Fact five: this was Earth, but the "Avengers" reference from the mugger suggested it was not his Earth, but rather an Earth where Marvel comics were not comics but reality.
He was in the Marvel universe.
As Sylux.
He should probably have felt something about this—panic, maybe, or excitement, or at least the kind of disorientation that seemed appropriate for the circumstances—but Sylux's emotional processing seemed to be somewhat muted compared to human baseline, which was either a feature of the armor or a feature of whatever he had become, and the result was that he simply catalogued the information and began calculating next steps with a clinical detachment that his previous self would have found alarming.
He needed information. He needed to establish where exactly in the Marvel timeline he had arrived, whether this was the comics or the movies or some hybrid universe that followed its own rules. He needed to determine what resources he had access to, because Sylux came with a ship—the Delano 7—and while he didn't see it anywhere in the immediate vicinity, that didn't mean it wasn't somewhere on this planet or in orbit or hiding in whatever pocket dimension video game logic stored vehicles when they weren't on screen.
He also needed to get out of this alley, because the muggers would probably tell someone about the armored alien creature they had encountered, and he would prefer to not be standing in the same location when whoever responded to that report arrived.
He moved toward the mouth of the alley, and the movement felt good in a way he wasn't expecting. Sylux's body was built for motion, for combat, for hunting, and every step was precise and efficient in a way that his old body had never been. He had been somewhat overweight in his previous life, prone to shortness of breath and the general physical decrepitude that came from a sedentary lifestyle and too many hot pockets, but this body was a weapon, was a tool, was a perfectly engineered instrument of pursuit and destruction that responded to his will like it had been waiting for him specifically.
He reached the end of the alley and looked out onto the street, and any remaining doubt about which universe he had landed in evaporated instantly because there, plastered on the side of a bus stop, was an advertisement featuring Tony Stark's face alongside the Stark Industries logo and some marketing copy about clean energy that he didn't bother to read because his attention was elsewhere.
A date. There was a date on a newspaper in a dispenser nearby.
He walked toward it, ignoring the startled looks from pedestrians who were suddenly confronted with a seven-foot-tall figure in obviously inhuman armor emerging from an alleyway at nine o'clock in the evening. New York, if this was New York, was probably used to strange sights—this was a city that had hosted alien invasions and superhero battles and all manner of impossible things—but Sylux was still sufficiently unusual that people stopped and stared and pulled out phones to record whatever was about to happen.
He ignored them. He reached the newspaper dispenser, looked at the date on the visible paper through the plastic window, and confirmed that he was in a year that made sense for the Marvel Cinematic Universe timeline, somewhere after Iron Man had gone public but before whatever events would next reshape the planet.
Information acquired. Timeline established. Next objective: find somewhere to regroup that wasn't the middle of a public street with increasingly agitated civilians staring at him.
Someone shouted something at him—a question, he thought, something along the lines of "who are you" or "what are you doing"—but he didn't respond because Sylux didn't explain himself to random civilians, and also because he genuinely had no idea what to say. What was he supposed to tell them? That he used to be a guy named Marcus from Ohio who died choking on processed food and was now a bounty hunter from a video game? That he was from another universe, or another dimension, or another existence entirely? That he was just as confused as they were but was handling it with significantly more composure because his current body didn't seem to experience panic in the traditional sense?
He started walking.
He didn't have a destination in mind, exactly, but movement was better than standing still, and his armor's sensors were already building a map of the surrounding area based on visible landmarks and accessible wifi signals and various other data points that it was harvesting from the environment with an efficiency that bordered on invasive. He was in Manhattan, specifically in Hell's Kitchen based on the neighborhood markers his HUD was identifying, and the map suggested several options for areas with reduced civilian presence where he could stop and think without being the center of a growing crowd of gawkers.
The crowd was following him. Of course it was. This was the age of social media and viral content and everyone wanted to be the one who captured the next big thing on video, which meant that his attempt to move discreetly through the city was being documented from approximately seventeen different angles by people who would probably have his image uploaded to every platform on the internet within minutes.
He considered this and found that he didn't care as much as he probably should have. Stealth would have been preferable, but Sylux was not a stealth-based operative in the traditional sense—he was a hunter, and hunters operated through intimidation and precision and the application of overwhelming force when necessary. If the world wanted to know he existed, then the world would know, and whatever consequences came from that would be handled as they arose.
He turned down a side street, then another, moving with purpose even though his purpose was nothing more than "get somewhere less crowded so I can figure out what the hell I'm doing." The crowd thinned as he moved into less populated areas, though he was aware of at least three people still following him at a distance, phones out, recording everything.
He didn't threaten them. Sylux might have had some rather aggressive programming when it came to threat elimination, but his previous self's morality hadn't completely vanished, and random civilians with phones weren't threats, just annoyances. He would have to establish rules for himself, he realized, guidelines for how to operate in this new existence without becoming the kind of monster that his new body's instincts sometimes suggested he could be. No killing unless absolutely necessary. No excessive force against non-combatants. No—
His sensors pinged a warning, and he stopped walking.
Something was approaching. Multiple somethings, actually, moving in a pattern that suggested coordinated tactical response rather than random civilian movement. His HUD was tracking them—seven contacts, coming from three directions, equipped with weapons and armor that read as primitive by his current standards but significantly more advanced than anything the muggers had been carrying.
SHIELD. It had to be SHIELD. Who else would respond this quickly to reports of an unknown armored entity appearing in Manhattan, who else would have the resources to mobilize a tactical team within minutes, who else would—
The first agent appeared at the end of the street, black-clad and armed, moving with the kind of professional precision that came from significant training and experience. More appeared behind him, spreading out to establish a perimeter, and within seconds he was effectively surrounded by a semicircle of people pointing weapons at him with expressions that suggested they were fully prepared to use them.
He didn't move. He assessed.
The weapons they were carrying would be minimally effective against his armor—his defensive systems were rating them as low-threat based on their energy signatures and projectile capabilities—but that didn't mean he wanted to get into a firefight in the middle of a city street with what were presumably government agents. That seemed like a poor way to establish himself in this universe, and it would probably result in escalation that would involve people who actually could damage him, like whoever this universe's heavy hitters were.
"Unknown entity," one of the agents called out, and his voice was professional but tense, "you are ordered to stand down and submit to questioning. Lower your weapons and place your hands where we can see them."
He considered his options.
Option one: comply, allow himself to be taken into custody, answer questions. This was problematic for several reasons, the most significant being that he had no idea how to answer most of the questions they would ask. Where was he from? Another universe. What was his purpose here? He didn't have one beyond not dying again. What was his technology based on? Science fiction from a video game series about space bounty hunters and parasitic alien organisms. These were not answers that would satisfy anyone, and they would probably lead to his indefinite detention while SHIELD tried to figure out what to do with him.
Option two: resist, engage the agents, fight his way out. This was possible—his combat systems were confident in their ability to neutralize these threats with minimal personal risk—but it would definitively mark him as an enemy and make his long-term existence in this universe significantly more complicated.
Option three: leave without engaging, demonstrate that he was not interested in conflict but also not interested in compliance.
He chose option three.
The Delano 7's location came to him suddenly, like a memory surfacing from deep water—it was in orbit, waiting, accessible with a thought and the activation of his suit's recall systems. He wasn't sure if this was information he should have had or if it was being provided by whatever cosmic force had dropped him in this situation, but he didn't question it because questioning it wouldn't change anything.
He activated the teleportation system.
The last thing he saw before the world dissolved into transit energy was the startled expressions on the agents' faces as their target simply vanished in front of them, leaving nothing behind but the faint energy signature of technology they had no frame of reference for.
And then he was on his ship.
The Delano 7 was exactly as the games had portrayed it, which was to say it was a sleek, angular vessel that looked like it had been designed by someone who prioritized function and intimidation in equal measure. The cockpit was a seamless integration of displays and controls that his new instincts understood perfectly, and as he settled into the pilot's seat—which molded itself to his armored form with disturbing precision—he felt something that might have been relief, or might have been satisfaction, or might have been simply the absence of immediate threat allowing his combat systems to stand down.
He was alone. He was safe, relatively speaking. He had a ship, weapons, armor, and apparently the full capabilities of one of the most mysterious figures in the Metroid franchise.
He had absolutely no idea what to do next.
The displays around him showed Earth floating below, beautiful and blue and hosting a civilization that was about to face a series of increasingly catastrophic threats if the timeline followed anything resembling the movies he remembered. Loki would come, eventually, with an alien army. Ultron would rise. Thanos would pursue the Infinity Stones with genocidal determination. The fabric of reality itself would be threatened, rebuilt, threatened again.
He could leave. The Delano 7 was capable of interstellar travel, and nothing was keeping him on this particular planet in this particular solar system. He could explore the galaxy, see what else existed in this universe, perhaps find somewhere quiet where he could exist without the complications of superhero politics and world-ending threats.
But even as he considered it, he knew he wouldn't do it. His previous life had been characterized by passivity, by letting things happen around him rather than engaging with them, and look where that had gotten him—dead on his apartment floor with a hot pocket lodged in his throat. This was a second chance, an impossible, inexplicable second chance, and running away from it felt like a betrayal of whatever purpose had put him here.
Also, his Sylux-instincts didn't run from challenges. They engaged with them. They hunted them. They won.
He began accessing the ship's systems, pulling up everything it knew about this planet and its inhabitants, which turned out to be surprisingly comprehensive—the Delano 7's sensors had been passively scanning since arrival, building profiles and threat assessments and strategic analyses that would have taken human intelligence agencies weeks to compile. He learned about the Avengers, about SHIELD, about the various superhuman individuals operating across the globe. He learned about Stark Industries and Oscorp and the various other corporate entities that were playing with forces they didn't fully understand. He learned about the incidents that had already occurred—Iron Man's public reveal, the events at Culver University involving the Hulk, strange readings from New Mexico that suggested Asgardian involvement.
He was early in the timeline. Early enough that the Battle of New York hadn't happened yet, early enough that the Avengers Initiative was still in its formative stages, early enough that the world had not yet learned to look up and fear what might come from the stars.
Early enough to make a difference, if he chose to.
He sat in his ship's cockpit, staring at the planet below, and for the first time since his resurrection allowed himself to actually think about what this all meant. He was Sylux now—not pretending to be, not wearing a costume, but actually inhabiting the body and possessing the capabilities of a fictional character made real. His memories of his previous life were intact, but they felt distant, like recollections of a story he had read rather than experiences he had lived. Marcus from Ohio, who worked in IT support and spent his evenings playing video games and eating junk food, seemed like a character from someone else's biography.
This was who he was now. And Sylux, whatever else could be said about him, was not the kind of being who sat idle while events unfolded around him.
He needed a plan. He needed resources. He needed to establish himself in a way that would give him freedom of movement without painting a target on his back large enough for every government and criminal organization on the planet to take shots at.
The bounty hunting angle seemed obvious—Sylux was a bounty hunter by trade, and there was certainly no shortage of targets on Earth who had prices on their heads. But he would need to be careful about which contracts he took and how he executed them, because this wasn't a video game where the player characters were assumed to be the good guys regardless of methodology. This was a world with real consequences, real ethics, real people who would judge him based on his actions.
For now, though, he just needed to not be immediately captured or killed. The SHIELD agents he had teleported away from would be reporting to their superiors, and that report would eventually reach Nick Fury, who was not the kind of person who let mysterious armored entities appear in his city without following up comprehensively. He had maybe hours, maybe days, before more serious efforts were made to locate and acquire him.
He needed to disappear. Not forever, but long enough to observe, to learn, to develop a strategy for existing in this universe without becoming a target or a pawn.
The ship's stealth systems were significantly more advanced than anything Earth possessed—even Stark's technology, impressive as it was, couldn't detect him if he didn't want to be detected. He could maintain orbit indefinitely, watching, waiting, learning, until he was ready to make his presence known on his own terms.
It wasn't much of a plan. But it was a start.
He settled back in his chair, watching the planet rotate slowly below him, and allowed himself to accept that this was his reality now. He was Sylux, in the Marvel universe, with power he had never imagined and absolutely no idea what to do with it.
But he would figure it out. He was a hunter now, and hunters were patient.
The silence of the cockpit surrounded him, broken only by the subtle hum of the ship's systems, and he realized that he hadn't spoken a single word since waking up in that alley. Not to the muggers, not to the civilians, not to the SHIELD agents.
It felt right, somehow. Sylux wasn't a talker. Sylux was a presence, a threat, a mystery that refused to explain itself.
He could work with that.
The universe might demand answers from him eventually, but for now, his silence would be his shield, his armor would be his identity, and whatever came next would be met with the cold, patient efficiency that his new existence seemed to demand.
Earth could wait to learn what he was.
He had all the time in the world.