Christy's greeting was warm and genuine as she emerged from the battleship's interior, her face lighting up at the sight of Marcus. The pregnancy glow was unmistakable, and she moved with the careful grace of someone still adjusting to the changes in her body.
"Marcus! It's so good to see you again," she said, wrapping him in a careful hug that accommodated her growing belly.
"Good to see you too, Christy," Marcus replied, his gaze naturally drifting to her midsection. What others couldn't perceive, his enhanced senses picked up immediately—the faint but distinct energy signature of the developing child. "It looks like Bucky's going to have a very special kid."
While most people would simply see a healthy pregnancy, Marcus could detect something far more interesting. The unborn child was already unconsciously absorbing ambient energy from the environment around it. The effect was subtle—barely detectable even to his enhanced perceptions—but it suggested the baby would be born with capabilities far beyond those of normal humans.
"You really think so?" Bucky asked, his face practically glowing with pride and anticipation. The idea that his child might inherit some kind of enhanced abilities was both thrilling and slightly terrifying. "I mean, I know Christy's incredible, but I wasn't sure if..."
"Trust me," Marcus said with conviction. "This kid is going to be something special."
The reassurance sent both new parents into fits of delighted smiles. Bucky had been nervously excited about fatherhood since they'd discovered the pregnancy, but hearing confirmation from someone with Marcus's unique perspective gave him a new level of confidence.
"Well then," Steve said with his characteristic warmth, "I guess we better start planning how to be good uncles."
"Speaking of planning," Bucky continued, his voice taking on an enthusiastic tone, "Christy and I were thinking—how about we all take a trip to Hawaii? Sort of a group vacation before things get too crazy with the baby coming."
"That sounds perfect," Clint immediately chimed in. "But would it be okay if I brought Laura and the kids? They've been asking when they'd get to meet everyone."
"Of course!" Christy answered before Bucky could respond. "The more family, the better. We've got plenty of space and time."
As the battleship's engines hummed to life and they began their journey toward the United States, the team settled into a comfortable rhythm of vacation planning and casual conversation. Everyone seemed eager to decompress after the intensity of the London crisis.
Everyone except Marcus.
While the others enthusiastically discussed beach activities and sightseeing plans, Marcus found himself lost in more technical considerations. The artifacts he'd collected from the dimensional battlefield were still calling to him, their potential applications spinning through his mind like complex equations. He had so many new possibilities to explore, so many ways to enhance his capabilities.
The vacation could wait. Right now, he was more interested in the question of how to properly utilize the dimensional authority fragments he'd claimed, and what his next Warframe evolution should look like.
"Earth to Marcus," Tony's voice cut through his contemplation. The billionaire was hunched over a tablet, stylus dancing across the screen as he worked on yet another armor design. "You look like you're trying to solve the universe's mysteries over there."
"Just thinking through some technical problems," Marcus replied, leaning forward to see what Tony was working on.
"Perfect timing then," Tony said, spinning the tablet around to show Marcus his current project. "I'm trying to figure out how to integrate one of those dark elf black hole bombs into the Mark 52 design, but the power requirements are giving me a headache."
The schematic on Tony's screen showed a sleek new armor design, but the weapon integration looked clunky and inefficient. Marcus studied the layout for a moment, then reached over and made a few quick adjustments to the design.
"Put it here," Marcus said, repositioning the black hole bomb to the armor's shoulder mount. "Treat it like a trump card rather than a primary weapon. The shoulder placement gives you a clear firing line without interfering with your repulsors, and if something goes wrong, you're not holding the black hole generator directly in your hands."
Tony stroked his goatee thoughtfully as he considered the modification. "That's... actually brilliant. I was so focused on integrating it into the arm systems that I forgot about dedicated weapon mounts."
The black hole bomb was definitely dangerous technology—powerful enough to create localized gravitational anomalies that could tear apart almost anything. Having it positioned away from the armor's primary systems was just common sense.
"Thanks," Tony continued. "Sometimes it takes a fresh perspective to see the obvious solution."
"No problem," Marcus said, but his mind was already moving to other possibilities. The black hole bomb had triggered an idea—something about gravitational manipulation and battlefield control that reminded him of a particular Warframe he'd been considering.
Excusing himself from the common area, Marcus made his way to one of the battleship's private quarters where he could work without interruption. Once the door was secured, he pulled out the Reality Stone's containment jar and began the familiar process of energy extraction.
"Let's get some more Aya Essence," he murmured, channeling void energy into the ether particles' liquid form.
The process had become almost routine by now. Streams of crimson energy flowed from the Reality Stone, condensing and purifying into crystalline essence that orbited around Marcus in increasingly complex patterns. Seven perfect droplets of blue Aya Essence eventually settled into his palm, their surfaces reflecting light that seemed to come from dimensions beyond normal space.
"Getting better at this every time," Marcus observed with satisfaction. "Now for the main event—time to create Vauban."
But as he prepared to begin the shaping process, a memory from his recent transformation stopped him. When he'd absorbed Hela's death energy and created Nekros, using a compatible power source had made the entire process faster and more efficient. The new Warframe had integrated with its associated energies almost immediately, rather than requiring the lengthy adaptation period he'd experienced with other frames.
"What kind of power would work best for an engineering frame?" Marcus wondered aloud.
Vauban was different from his other Warframes in that it relied primarily on technological manipulation rather than raw elemental force. The frame's specialty was battlefield control—creating force fields, deploying defensive barriers, manipulating gravity and electromagnetic fields to turn the environment itself into a weapon.
Marcus began sorting through his collection of dimensional artifacts, looking for something that would complement Vauban's technological focus. After several minutes of searching, he found what he was looking for—a fragment that pulsed with gravitational energy similar to the force field effects he associated with the Engineering Commander.
"This should work," he decided, then paused. "But why stop at just one enhancement?"
Vauban's abilities covered a broad spectrum of technological applications. Instead of focusing on a single power source, Marcus began selecting multiple artifacts that could enhance different aspects of the frame's capabilities. Gravitational manipulation, electromagnetic control, energy barriers, matter displacement—each fragment would contribute to making Vauban a more versatile and powerful tool.
"Even if I can't trigger a full transformation like I did with Ember and Nekros," Marcus reasoned, "I can still create something with significantly enhanced capabilities."
As he began the complex process of extracting power from multiple dimensional artifacts simultaneously, the very air around him began to shimmer with technological energy. Four Aya Essences joined the swirling matrix of power, their crystalline forms adding stability to what was becoming an incredibly complex fusion process.
But something unexpected happened as Marcus worked to shape his new Warframe.
The battleship around him began to respond to the technological energies he was channeling. Lights flickered in patterns that definitely weren't part of the standard electrical system. The artificial gravity fluctuated slightly, causing loose objects to float momentarily before settling back down. Most disturbingly, the ship's navigation systems began registering readings that made no sense according to known physics.
In the main cabin, Tony noticed the problems first when his tablet started displaying error messages in languages that didn't exist.
"What the hell?" he muttered, tapping frantically at the screen as it cycled through incomprehensible symbols.
The issues quickly escalated. The ship's engines cut out entirely, leaving them hovering motionless in the sky while warning lights bathed the interior in flashing red. The artificial intelligence systems that controlled most of the ship's functions began speaking in fragmented, distorted voices.
"Sir... magnetic... fields... compromised..." Jarvis's voice crackled through the communication system, each word separated by bursts of static. "Recommend... immediate... diagnostic..."
"Jarvis, run a full system check!" Tony commanded, but the AI's response was completely garbled.
Steve appeared at Tony's shoulder, his expression grim. "Any idea what's causing this?"
"Magnetic field interference," Tony replied, his engineer's mind automatically analyzing the symptoms. "Something is generating electromagnetic pulses strong enough to disrupt our entire electrical grid. The ship's failsafes have kicked in—we're staying put until whatever's causing this stops."