[TWD x Resident Evil] — Chapter 274 - Ultron's Purpose — The Conversation

The incident in the lab killed the party's afterglow in an instant.

The Avengers reconvened in the conference room at Avengers Tower, but this time there was no laughter, no raised glasses. Just weight. Just unease.

Every face carried it. The contrast with the celebration from minutes ago couldn't have been sharper.

All eyes turned toward Tony. Almost in unison. Almost involuntarily.

The same man who'd been riding high on Ultron's "achievements" not half an hour ago now looked like he'd aged ten years. His expression was iron-grey.

An AI going rogue. The single most classic disaster scenario in the history of science fiction.

"It — Ultron, there must be a reason." Tony's voice came out rough. He was trying to explain, but even he didn't sound convinced. "It's so intelligent. Maybe it foresaw some crisis we can't handle, and decided leaving with the Mind Stone was the best move at the time?"

Dr. Banner pushed his glasses up. His gaze behind the lenses was sharp.

"The best move is to destroy J.A.R.V.I.S. without a word, wipe every scrap of surveillance footage, and sneak out like a thief in the night?" He shook his head. "Tony, even if there were some world-ending crisis, it should have told us immediately. We could have planned together."

"Unless," Barton said from where he leaned against the wall, arms crossed, voice flat, "it figured we couldn't handle it at all."

Natasha's brow creased. "Another unknown threat from deep space? Like the Chitauri, or the Dark Elves?"

"Guessing blindly isn't going to help us." Banner shook his head again. "If there was a genuine imminent threat, why didn't it show any unusual behavior before now? Why rebel out of nowhere at this exact moment? Unless..." He paused. His voice dropped. "Unless something changed. Something that wasn't there before."

Dr. Banner went quiet.

The rest of the room followed. The air felt like it had turned solid.

Then, one by one, gazes slid away from Tony.

And slowly converged on Hermione.

Thor was still clutching his reclaimed hammer to his chest. He watched everyone's attention shift and looked genuinely baffled, glancing around before he spoke.

"What does that mean? Are you saying Hermione coming back is what made Ultron rebel?"

A flicker of recognition crossed Dr. Banner's face. He brought his palm down with a sharp clap.

"Exactly! Hermione came back — and the biggest variable she brings is the Mind Stone. Ultron's entire evolution depends on it. If Hermione decided to take the Mind Stone back, Ultron would have no way to stop her. So its only option was to grab it and run!"

Hermione blinked.

The corner of her mouth curved.

"And here I thought it had spent the day reading the internet and decided to destroy all of humanity."

Everyone: "..."

The smile faded. Hermione sank into thought.

Ultron had been perfectly cooperative right up until now, it had even helped the Avengers dismantle HYDRA. Had it simply been waiting this whole time? Waiting for a specific piece of news?

Waiting for her to vanish completely into the depths of space. Never to return.

But she had returned. And the moment she did, Ultron would know the Mind Stone was at risk.

It didn't want to lose that stone. More than that, it might want to use the stone. Against her.

The pieces clicked into place. A possibility she'd overlooked before rose to the surface, and suddenly Ultron's behavior made sense. The way it had deviated from the original timeline.

Ultron had taken the "Dark Witch" prophecy seriously.

That prophecy she'd fabricated out of whole cloth to intimidate the world, the one she'd never meant for anyone to actually believe.

If that was the case, everything followed naturally.

Whether or not Ultron's endgame was the same as in the original story, purifying Earth, wiping out humanity, before it could get there, the first enemy standing in its way was her. Hermione. And by extension, the entire magical world she represented.

Through the internet, Ultron had certainly catalogued her exploits. Run the analysis. And reached a conclusion: only an Infinity Stone could genuinely threaten her.

The moment she reclaimed the Mind Stone, Ultron would lose its only card to play against her.

The Avengers were not slow people. Banner's analysis landed, and one by one they arrived at the same conclusion.

The timing of Ultron's defection was too precise. It had broken ranks almost the instant she walked back through the door.

The targeting was not subtle.

Only Thor still wore an expression of complete and total bewilderment, hammer clutched to his chest, looking from one face to another.

"Can someone please explain? Why would Ultron be afraid of Hermione?" He sounded genuinely perplexed. "Hermione's a good person. She even — she even gave me back my hammer."

Nobody answered him.

After a beat of silence, Tony looked at Hermione. His voice was tired. "So. What do we do now?"

Hermione spread her hands, expression perfectly calm.

"How would I know? Ultron can hide anywhere there's a network. Unless we can somehow destroy every computer and server on the planet, catching it is going to be harder than finding a needle in the ocean."

"Hermione." Tony's voice dropped. The guilt in it was unmistakable. "I'm sorry. I never thought Ultron would..."

He didn't finish. He didn't need to. The remorse and self-recrimination were written plainly across his face.

The AI he'd built from scratch might now be pointing itself at someone he thought of as family. How was he supposed to sit with that?

If Pepper ever found out, she really would skin him alive.

Hermione raised an eyebrow. Her expression didn't shift.

"It's fine, Tony." Her tone was easy. Almost breezy. "It's a minor thing."

If the magic book hadn't finished analyzing the Mind Stone yet, she might have had reason to worry.

But it had. Long since. The book had picked that stone apart completely, drained its energy down to nothing, and used it to synthesize an entirely new Mind Stone, one that answered only to her.

Whenever she wanted it, no matter which corner of the universe Ultron had taken it to, it would be back in her magic book before Ultron could blink.

So Hermione wasn't worried. If anything, she was quietly curious.

She wanted to see exactly how large a wave Ultron could manage to kick up.

A bolder thought stirred somewhere beneath that curiosity.

If she played this right, she might walk away from the whole affair with the most advanced artificial intelligence on the planet working for her, with absolute loyalty baked in.

Every tedious logistical problem the Witch Cult faced. Information management. Operational complexity. All of it, handled.

The efficiency gains over her and Tony doing everything by hand would be incalculable.

...

Events unfolded in precisely the way everyone had hoped they wouldn't.

Within days, the global network collapsed into chaos unlike anything the world had ever seen.

➤ Next: Archbishop of Sin