Chapter Four - An Enchanted Evening
By C.M. King
Nighttime falls around Avengers Mansion, finding its newest inhabitants also as its only occupants this evening. In a second floor room, Firestar finishes fixing herself in her street clothes in front of a full-length mirror. Just as she is satisfied with her ensemble, an excited cry breaks her concentration.
“Check it out, Angel! How cool is this!?” Vance Astrovik stands in her doorway sporting an Avengers bomber jacket from a time before they joined the team. “I found it in a storeroom, I think it was the Black Knight’s, but I’m sure he wouldn’t mind if I borrowed it just for a bit.”
“Vance, you are NOT thinking of wearing ‘that thing’ out with us tonight are you? I know how proud you are of being on this team, and all, but I really think you should curb your enthusiasm a little sometimes.”
“Ah, Angel! This thing is a classic,” replies Justice sheepishly.
“I suppose it doesn’t even bother you that it’s far too warm outside for a jacket like that?”
“Ok – ok, you win! But watch out when fall comes!”
Soon … the couple shuts the front door of the iconic mansion behind them as they walk out arm-in-arm toward 5th Avenue. “Frozen yogurt out with the perfect man, could this night be any better?” remarks Angelica as she squeezes Vance’s hand a little tighter.
After the enamored couple has passed, the figure of Othello (still disguised as Hawkeye) emerges out from the shadows around the mansion.
Smiling briefly at the backs of the distant forms as they continue to recede away, he then turns around and slowly makes his way up to the historic manor’s front door.
“It’s too bad that Hawkeye doesn’t have an Avengers ID card anymore,” thinks the villain to himself. “But it shouldn’t present too much of a problem for me.”
With that thought in mind, Othello touches a hidden ruby inside his pocket that begins glowing at the contact of his fingertips. A whispered incantation passes his lips moments before a bizarre transformation takes place.
The man’s body begins to blur and diffuse until it has changed entirely into a cloud of black smoke. With an eerie casualness, the smoke then moves slowly … yet purposefully … under the front door of the mansion itself.
Only to reform itself into a cloud again, once inside the foyer on the other side. And then finally back into the form of the impersonated Avenger.
With alarms going off, the arm of a mechanized security system pops out of a wall of the Avengers foyer and shines a spotlight on the false Hawkeye.
“Halt Immediately! Intruder Violation,” announces the menacing machine!
A series of lasers are trained on the archer as the sinister-looking device concentrates a small light beam that falls upon Hawkeye’s eyes.
“Retina scan initiated…Match registered. Identity confirmed as Inactive Member Hawkeye. Security Alert shutting down.”
A mischievous smile cuts itself into the corners of Othello’s mouth as the machines retract themselves back into the walls.
NEXT: Skill vs. Power!!
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