"What happened?" Wayne asked
"GAIA had tasked the spaceships to be scattered in the non-human region to look after the animals of Mars and thus most of them were separated. I got the information from FOS that we just lost two spaceships. FOS was able to blast a spaceship as it was leaving. The ship opened the phantom drive and escaped though I am sure it wouldn't be able to survive the travel. But the world engine successfully escaped. GAIA and FOS weren't able to track it." John said as he lied a bit here but this was closest to the truth. He still didn't want anyone to know that he could transform himself to other characters when required so he brought out the name of FOS.
Tony clenched his fist when he heard that. He loved machines. Especially the machines which he had given life to. Now they lost two.
"How did this happen?" Steve asked.
"Two unknown men came flying by in suit towards the spaceships very fast and before both of the spaceships could react the two men touched the spaceships. The next moment they lost connection to me and were taken over in a matter of seconds. I am sorry they didn't survive this sudden attack. My calculation tells me that this was the work of another AI. Possibly Ultron." GAIA said.
"So they were real men in suits. Did Ultron transfer himself to a living being? Is that even possible?" Banner asked.
"It is possible if they reconfigure the med pods." Dr. Helen who too came for the sudden meeting said.
"Huh! So Ultron now could transfer himself to human beings in med pods. Don't Umbrella have full inventory and control of all the med pods?" Barry asked.
"We do but we lost a med pod for a few days in one case in Japan last month. Umbrella was able to get back the med pod but said that the records on the med pod suggested that it was operated on two people. It never mattered to anyone but I guess now we know what had happened. Ultron was able to reconfigure and insert himself into two men." Victor said as he was scouring the internet for information.
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"Let me guess these two men were chosen for colonisation on Mars." Tony said.
"Yes. Probably this had happened. After reaching Mars they were able to make a cheap exoskeleton suit for themselves. Ultron knew it couldn't hijack any spaceship so it approached a diabolical way to get to Mars. He must have known about the Kryptonian spaceships on Mars from the government's files. " John said.
"And after reaching the two spaceships they were able to successfully erase the sentience of the spaceships. This was one last desperate shot to get away from here as he would never get anything on Earth. We are too powerful and John had already taken measures to resist Ultron. Now the question is where is the world engine now?" Vision, who hadn't spoken yet, finally said.
"Hal. Inform the green lanterns to scour the galaxies for the world engine." John said.
"Already informed the Guardians. They are taking the matter seriously as AI had once plagued Oa." Hal replied.
"I know. The whole incident of the Manhunters faced by Oa once." John said as before the lanterns there were Manhunters who were tasked with the work instead of Lanterns. But later the Guardians understood that at the end AIs could do only so much, and they didn't understand actual emotions. So they decommissioned Manhunters later. In the future when the Green Lanterns were at play, the Manhunters rebelled and Oa suffered from the attack.
"The manhunters? Who are those?" Clint asked.
"A story for another day. Right now we need to search for the world engine before he does more damage." Wayne said. As they were talking there was an alarm at the headquarters.
"What happened? Did Ultron come back?" Pietro asked.
"The world engine has appeared in the exosphere near Earth. Ultron has appeared." GAIA said.
"Huh. Ultron could have escaped easily and come back much later. Why did he come back now?" Wanda asked in a confused manner.
"No idea. There must be a deeper plot to it." Tony said.
"Whatever it is. We need to prepare ourselves. Since the world engine has appeared, Vision now has a physical entity to purge Ultron away from the internet. This might be our last chance in defeating Ultron. He doesn't know of your existence yet. So he might not have calculated your presence." John said.
"Yes." Vision replied.
"The world engine is coming down to earth. From the location it's coming down it's probably Sokovia. The same place where it all began." GAIA said.
"So everything is coming full circle." John murmured.
"We need to go to Sokovia and stop whatever he is planning." Wayne said. "Avengers, we have a mission to finish."