Heroes Assemble!

Finance Is So Weird

The command centre of Avengers Tower was already a hive of activity when Maria Hill strode in. Tony, Bruce, Peter and even Bucky were standing at consoles, sifting through information, streams of data or news stories, there was even a map up on one of the screens. Steve stood back, his arms crossed but with one hand up, his finger tapping his lips as he watched. Clint was off in the corner on a mobile, while Nat, Harry, Thor and Sam sat at the tables, eating breakfast.

"Well, Ultron's all over the globe," Maria said, announcing her presence. "I'm getting reports from my contacts telling me that robotics labs, weapons facilities, jet propulsion labs, even scrap metal yards if you can believe it, are all reporting a metal man, or men, coming in and emptying the place."

"'Man or men', you said?" Nat asked. "But there was only the one Legionnaire that got away."

"Obviously Ultron is replicating himself," Bruce said. "Building new bodies."

"Bodies?" Steve asked.

"Well, sure, all the code is going to be linked if he wants to control all the robots that he's building otherwise we'd end up with a whole host of robots all with their own agendas," Peter said.

"If that isn't a scary thought for so early in the morning, then I don't know what is," Sam stated.

"How would Ultron be controlling all of the different bodies?" Harry asked.

"The same way Jarvis controlled the Iron Legion: radio, satellite, the internet," Tony replied.

"The internet? Ultron's in the internet?" a concerned-sounding Nat asked. "He could do a lot of damage using that."

"Like access nuclear codes," Maria added grimly.

"What I do not understand is how these metal men were constructed so quickly," Thor stated. "It was not many hours ago that Ultron was a single robot."

"Point Break's got a good point there," Tony said. "To have been able to construct so many new robots so quickly, he would have had to have known exactly where to find a well-stocked robotics lab lying around somewhere simply not being used."

"Ultron started here," Bruce stated. "He would have gone through our files first before he did anything else. Tony, you don't happen to have a robotics facility, do you?"

"Stark Industries actually has a few but I would have heard about it if one of them had been taken over by a rogue robot," Tony replied "And the only other place that we've encountered anything remotely like that recently was ... Sokovia."

"Sokovia? Ultron's gone there?" Steve asked.

"That could tally with something from some of the reports," Maria said. "There haven't been any fatalities except when the robots were engaged. Mostly the reports are of guys left in a fugue state going on about old memories, worst fears, and something too fast to see."

"The Maximoffs," Steve nodded. "That makes sense if Ultron has indeed gone to Sokovia; they have someone in common."

"Not anymore," Maria said, tapping her pad to bring up the relevant footage and turning it around for all to see. "von Strucker was found murdered in his cell this morning."

Clint moving from his corner to join the conversation caught everyone's attention.

"Who was that?" Steve asked, nodding to the mobile still in Clint's hand. "Anything relevant."

"Nah, just my girlfriend," Clint replied nonchalantly and Maria had to suppress a smile at the lie that wasn't.

"If Ultron is using HYDRA's base in Sokovia which, from what I saw, was packed with tech to make more robots, then what's he doing sending his robots all over the world?" Harry asked.