Ten minutes after Nick Fury’s call ended, the heavy silence in the Sanctum had not broken.
Gwen stood near the mahogany coffee table, her fingers tracing the dull-silver amulet resting against her collarbone. A few inches away, the jagged fragment of the Tinkerer’s beacon sat beneath a thick glass containment dome, its weak green glow trapped safely behind three overlapping wards.
A few hours earlier, that same signal had locked onto her and turned every warning instinct in her body against her.
Now, the ugly pressure behind her spider-sense was gone. Her instincts still worked. The signal leaking outward did not.
She knew Ethan had not built the trap or wanted her anywhere near it. The thought still refused to leave. She looked across the foyer at Ethan. His usual smirk was gone. He stood near the archway, his hands resting in the pockets of his leather jacket, waiting for her to speak.
"What else exactly am I the last person to know?" Gwen asked, her voice steady.
“About Natasha, you should’ve known,” Ethan answered. “The rest is half-finished warnings and things I still can’t prove.”
Gwen searched his face. She dropped her hand from the amulet. "I'm going to New Mexico."
Ethan studied her for a moment. "You stay beside me until I know what fell, and you don’t touch anything without asking."
Gwen’s mouth tightened. "That’s not benching me?"
"That’s me expecting my partner to listen," Ethan said.
She held his gaze, then nodded. "Fine."
"Put on a clean suit," Ethan told her. "We leave in five."
By the time Gwen returned, she had changed into a fresh Spider-suit. She still moved a little stiffly, but she was steady on her feet.
Natasha was already waiting in the foyer. She had changed out of her torn, blood-stained clothes into a fresh, unmarked black tactical suit. Ethan had repaired the damage inside her ear, though her burned fingers were still wrapped beneath her gloves. She checked the slide of a pistol, holstered it at her hip, and looked at Ethan, ready to move.
Before Ethan could raise his hand to open a portal, his smartphone vibrated on the table.
He picked it up. This time, the caller ID wasn't blank.
"Tell me you are seeing the atmospheric readings over the Southwest," Tony Stark said the second Ethan answered. Wind and the steady, heavy roar of repulsors filled the background of the call.
Ethan glanced at the phone. "Are you already flying there?"
"JARVIS caught the atmospheric spike before Fury finished pretending this was classified," Tony replied. "I’m already over Oklahoma."
"Fury already called," Ethan said. "We're heading there now. And Tony?"
"Yeah?"
"Don't touch the hammer."
A loud, metallic clatter echoed over the line, followed by Tony's voice dropping into a dry, offended tone. " “Why are you immediately assuming I can’t lift a hammer? I built my first engine before puberty."
"Because this one is magic," Ethan replied, "and if it has a personality, it will absolutely hate you."
He hung up before Tony could respond and slipped the phone into his jacket pocket. He raised his right hand, two fingers extended. Sparks of orange Eldritch energy flared to life, cutting a jagged, spinning circle through the air of the foyer.
The cold, dry wind of the desert blew into the Sanctum.
Puente Antiguo was small, isolated, and currently surrounded by enough S.H.I.E.L.D. equipment to invade a minor country.
Ethan, Gwen, and Natasha stepped out of the portal onto a ridge overlooking the impact site. S.H.I.E.L.D. had swallowed the crater whole. Thick plastic walls sectioned off the dig, heavy industrial floodlights burned against the desert night, and armed agents had blocked every dirt road leading toward town. Communication relays were already rising beside the temporary command tents.
Nobody was panicking. Fury’s people had no idea what had fallen out of the sky, but they knew exactly how to lock down a hole in the ground.
Agent Phil Coulson stood near the edge of the crater, a tablet in his hand. He looked up as the portal snapped shut behind them.
"Mr. Williams," Coulson greeted smoothly, his professional smile perfectly in place. "Director Fury said you were coming."
"I thought Fury had you somewhere colder," Ethan said.
Coulson’s polite smile tightened slightly. "My team is continuing the search. Apparently, hammers falling from the sky require personal supervision."
"What's the status, Phil?" Ethan asked, stepping up to the edge of the excavation.
"Confusing," Coulson admitted, tapping his tablet. "Every scanner we put near it gives us nonsense. Ground-penetrating radar just bounces off. We hooked it up to a heavy-duty winch truck ten minutes ago. The winch snapped, and the truck blew its transmission. The object hasn't moved a millimeter."
Ethan looked down into the crater.
Resting on a pedestal of fused glass and cracked dirt was a short-handled warhammer. Its square, gray head was etched with intricate, ancient patterns that seemed to absorb the glare of the floodlights.
Ethan didn't step down into the crater, and he didn't try to touch it. He simply let his magic brush against the metal.
Old power answered.
Ancient, royal authority clung to the weapon, utterly unwilling to negotiate. At its center sat one simple, merciless condition, cast because of one very specific idiot.
The enchantment had been made for Thor, but it would judge anyone who reached for the handle.
Beside him, Gwen touched the amulet at her collarbone. Her spider-sense wasn’t screaming, but every instinct she had was fixed on the weapon below.
Natasha studied the ancient patterns carved into its gray surface, then looked at Ethan.
"Asgard?" she asked.
"Yes," Ethan said.
A high-pitched, repulsor whine suddenly tore through the quiet desert sky.
Coulson looked up as the red-and-gold suit dropped through the floodlights. Several rifles tracked Tony on instinct, then lowered when Coulson raised one hand.
A sleek, red-and-gold Iron Man suit dropped out of the clouds, landing heavily on the ridge beside them. The repulsors spun down, and the faceplate flipped open with a mechanical hiss, revealing Tony Stark’s grin.
Tony raised one gauntleted hand. A small white capsule sat pinched between two metal fingers.
"Relax," Tony told the tense agents, waving the hand slightly. "The expensive science equipment is still inside the tiny capsule."
He stepped up to the edge of the crater, peering down at the gray weapon resting in the dirt. "Alright, wizard. Let's see what this magic rock is actually made of."
Ethan didn't look at Tony. He kept his eyes locked entirely on the weapon.
"This isn't weight," Ethan said quietly. "It's judgment."