The modified aircraft hummed with energy as Danvers entered the last instruction into the system. Beside her sat Maria, and just behind them was Fury, carrying Goose in his arms, while Talos sat agitatedly in his seat.

"You know you really shouldn't be carrying that thing in your lap…" Talos said uneasily, fear visible in his eyes.

"As long as it keeps scaring the green out of your face, I'll keep doing exactly that," Fury retorted, snuggling the ginger cat with even more affection.

"Alright, buckle up." Danvers turned from the cockpit, drawing their attention. Looking at their bickering—one man and one alien—she had a feeling they would become good friends eventually, despite being from different species.

"Initiating launch sequence…"

"Space, huh… never thought I'd spend the New Year's holidays doing something this insane..." Fury muttered nervously, clutching the ginger cat tighter.

He was a soldier who had been through plenty of dangerous situations, but this was a whole different level of crazy—even for him, leaving Earth's atmosphere to track down, and likely fight off aliens. Goose, however, merely purred, the least bothered of anyone aboard.

"And… takeoff!"

With Danvers's last announcement, a hum of power filled the cabin—Vrrrrmmm—as if the ship itself were stretching awake. Then—

BOOM!

A thunderous blast shook the inside and outside of the aircraft. The twin turbines roared to life, thrusting the craft forward, and, slowly at first, it began to lift off the ground.

From outside, Maverick and Isabella watched as the craft shot straight up moments later, defying gravity without even moving forward. The rush of wind brushed against their robes, and before long, it pierced the clouds and vanished, leaving only the endless sky ahead.

"Are we not following them?" Isabella asked some time later, turning from the small dot in the sky to her fiancé, who seemed lost in thought.

"We will…" Maverick murmured without looking, his focus fixed on something else—specifically the figure near the cabin beside Maria's house.

There, Morex—disguised as Danvers—stood waiting, as if anticipating someone's arrival. Maverick, too, was waiting, certain of what was about to happen: Yon-Rogg would soon land with his crew, coming for Danvers.

In the movie, Yon-Rogg had killed this pitiful Skrull as soon as he realized it wasn't Danvers, and Maverick simply wanted to change that—partly because he liked the alien, and partly because he wanted Talos to owe him a favor.

They waited—half an hour, then nearly an hour—and sure enough, Maverick's magical sense finally detected something large, like an aircraft—or, in this case, a space pod—invisible and landing not far from the property.

Yon-Rogg soon emerged out from his spacepod hidden under cloaking technology and walked towards the cabin with a smile on his face, seeing Danvers outside there.

What followed next was pretty similar to what happened in the movie. The Kree commander didn't take long to realize it wasn't Danvers but a Skrull in disguise.

Boom!

"Where is she? What did you do with her?"

Despite the gun pointed at his face and having already been shot in the shoulder, the Skrull science guy didn't budge a word and looked defiantly at Yon-Rogg, who was threatening him to reveal the whereabouts of Danvers.

"She already knows, doesn't she?" he asked again, realizing that Danvers may very well be compromised by now.

Then, he gave one more glance at the brave, yet pitiful Skrull on the ground, and without even a hint of sympathy, pulled the trigger at his face.

Boom!

The Skrulls were he and his race's mortal enemies, so killing it was just adding another to his already countless tally. He didn't give it a second thought, then fumbled with the communicator in his hand and informed Ronan, a high-ranking member of the Kree Empire he served, to come to Earth, fearing the planet had been compromised.

All this was witnessed by Maverick and Isabella, who remained outside. When Yon-Rogg finally left and his spacepod took off, Maverick and Isabella canceled their invisibility and walked inside.

Inside, Morex—whom Yon-Rogg had just shot, or at least thought he had—was lying on the ground, very much alive and looking bewildered by what had just happened. At the same time, his eyes bulged; ever since that first shot to his shoulder, he had felt as if someone had their hands over his mouth, preventing him from speaking.

Yes, he wasn't dead, and just beside his head, there was an impact on the wooden cabin where Yon-Rogg's energy gun had fired and hit, clearly not Morex as the Kree had thought.

Mr. Science Guy raised his head, hearing the sounds of footsteps, and saw two Earthlings enter, walking lazily, the female with her hand tugged around the male's arm.

"You're welcome, by the way. I'm a friend of Danvers." He heard the male human speak some inexplicable words, then tsked pitifully before adding, "That's a nasty wound on your shoulder... are you gonna be alright with that? Do you have a way to treat yourself?"

Morex, despite feeling intense pain and having countless questions, nodded, bobbing his head like a chicken. Besides, he still couldn't speak, as if something had been shoved into his mouth.

"Good." He heard the male human nod and say, then snap his fingers. Subsequently, he felt the restraints covering his face and his body loosen. But just as he was about to question who they were, he saw orange sparks materialize behind the two humans and form into a large circle, making him stuck on his words. Then, while he was still wordstruck, they simply walked inside, and the orange circle—which was very likely a portal—disappeared altogether.

---

Meanwhile, some time earlier, as the quinjet ascended toward the edge of Earth's atmosphere, the blue sky gradually deepened to indigo, then to inky black. Stars emerged, impossibly bright without the haze of air to dim them, and Fury's breath caught in his throat.

Despite all he had seen and endured—as a soldier, facing aliens, mutants, discovering the existence of witches and wizards among them, and not to mention the strange supernatural horrors stored in the SHIELD database—the scene before him still left him baffled: the vast emptiness of space, the glittering pinpricks of distant suns, and the curve of Earth below, a flawless blue marble suspended against the void.

"Hell… ain't that something," he muttered, leaning his face closer to the window.

"First time in space?" Maria glanced back at him with a smug smile.

"This not your first time as well?" he countered.

She shrugged. "I've skimmed the edge in a jet. Close enough to taste it."

"So?"

Clearly, the argument wasn't going anywhere. She then turned fully in her seat to face Talos and fixed him with a sharp look. "Mr. Alien… can I ask you something?"

"Ask away," Talos replied warily.

"This shapeshifting… can you just turn into anything you want?"

"Ah, the eternal question," Talos sighed. "Well, I have to see it first. Get a good visual imprint."

"Can all you Skrulls do it?"

"Physiologically? Yes," Talos confirmed. "But doing it well… now that takes practice," he cleared his throat and puffed out his alien chest a bit. "And, dare I say, a certain degree of natural talent."

"Can you turn into a bird with wingspans of hundreds of meters?" Fury asked, an impish gleam in his eye.

"What's a bird? And are you suggesting there are creatures that large on this primitive planet?" Talos responded with genuine confusion.

"Fine… what about a cat?" he tossed back. "I'll give you fifty bucks right now if you can turn into a ginger cat…"

Talos sighed deeply, thinking Earthlings had some weird fetishes.

"Switching engines from scramjet to fusion," Carol announced from the front, cutting off the banter. "Buckle up, folks. Might get a bit bumpy."

The craft lurched forward with sudden acceleration, pressing them all deeper into their seats and flipping their stomachs as they finally broke free of Earth's gravitational pull entirely.

"Hey," Fury stammered, gripping his seat. "Is this normal… like, space turbulence?"

"Pretty much," Danvers replied, smirking without turning around.

The engines roared for minutes, pushing them through a nauseating surge of speed, then slowly cut back before going completely silent. There was still nothing visible in front of them—only endless stars sparkling against the darkness. It was both a breathtaking and utterly terrifying, unyielding vastness.

"Locking in on coordinate grid," Danvers scanned the emptiness ahead. "It's gotta be here."

"Is it in front of all that nothing?" Fury asked sarcastically.

Paying no mind to his jab, Danvers focused on the Kree technology on her wrist device, fumbling with it as she worked. Before long, the emptiness ahead began to shimmer. A massive structure materialized—a huge spaceship suspended silently against the starfield, and she recognized it immediately.

"Is that…" Fury mumbled, jaw dropped halfway.

"Mar-Vell's laboratory," Danvers said. "It's actually a Kree Imperial cruiser, likely the one she arrived on Earth in."

"Right then… everyone hold tight. I'm preparing for docking sequence."

Just as they thrust the craft forward, some distance behind them, an orange circle materialized out of nowhere, and out came Maverick and Isabella, enveloped in a magical construct like a dome surrounding them.

"Looks like we're just in time…"

"It's much bigger than that little spaceship you have heading to Mars, Ricky," Isabella said, eyes sparkling. She wasn't fazed by being in space—after all, this wasn't her first time—but the sheer size of the Kree Imperial cruiser left her breathless. It was, for lack of a better word, majestic.

"Let's go…"

"How long are we going to stay invisible before revealing ourselves?" Isabella asked, as the magical construct moved, following the Quinjet.

Maverick hummed thoughtfully at the question. "I'm waiting for something… but soon," he said ambiguously. He wanted to wait until Danvers fully unlocked her potential, broke free from the Kree control chip, and until then, he didn't want to interfere in the course of events. Though his butterfly wings had already made some changes, the general direction was still on course. More importantly, his target was now within reach, and at the thought, he couldn't help but tug a grin across his face.

"What's with that stupid smirk?" Isabella raised a brow. Her fiancée was doing that again.

Cough. "Let's keep following…"

---

Inside Mar-Vell's Lab

After docking their modified Quinjet, the group cautiously ventured into the space station. The corridors merged Kree efficiency with unexpectedly human touches—posters, personal items hinting at Mar-Vell's undercover life, and even children's belongings, whose presence none of them could yet explain.

Eventually, the three humans and one cat reached what appeared to be the main research chamber. And there it was—the object of their quest, glowing with an ethereal blue light: the Tesseract, resting securely at the center of the room, held in place by two mechanical arms extending from either side.

While the others were distracted by the surroundings, Maverick—still invisible and a little behind the group—also saw it for the first time and felt inexplicably drawn to the cube. He couldn't tell whether it was his own desire or something else, but the moment his eyes landed on it, an overwhelming urge to grab it surged through him.

Can't blame him—after all, it held the Space Stone, one of the six Infinity Stones. Yet he still held back, drawing on his magical energy and Occlumency shields to barely restrain the pounding temptation, waiting for the course of events in his mind to finish unfolding.

—————————

Author's Note:

🔥 Drop those Power Stones! 🔥

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