MacTaggart Residence - Upstate New York
Ernst and Chris sat across from each other, surrounded by leftovers of a dozen conquered games.
Three hours had gone by.
For Chris, it was a revelation. He had finally encountered an intellect that didn't just match his own but eclipsed it entirely.
"That is enough for today," Ernst murmured, setting a gamepad onto the carpet.
"We will continue tomorrow."
Chris hesitated. The boy was starving for this level of stimulation.
"You haven't told me who you are," Chris stated, his voice flat but intensely probing.
"Or why did you break into my house?"
Ernst looked at the boy's face. He saw the cold, calculating intelligence.
He saw himself.
He felt a rare, heavy bit of pity. Kyle had grown up surrounded by the wonders of Skull Island with a loving family
Chris had spent ten years trapped in a mind that moved too fast for the primitive world around him.
"What if I told you," Ernst began slowly, "that I am your biological father?"
The room went dead silent.
Ernst watched the boy's eyes, anticipating a childish outburst, tears, or deep denial.
Instead, Chris simply processed the data.
"I believe it," Chris replied calmly.
Ernst blinked, genuinely surprised.
"The man who lived here was blood type AB," Chris explained, his voice devoid of emotion.
"My blood type is incompatible with that outcome. Furthermore, his micro-expressions consistently betrayed a deep, biological rejection of my presence."
Chris looked directly into Ernst's eyes.
"Our biometric similarities suggest a high probability of a genetic link."
Ernst let out a long, slow breath. The boy was terrifyingly brilliant.
"If you are my father," Chris asked, "why did you wait ten years? And why does my mother think that man was my father?"
"It is a complex web of altered memories and government espionage," Ernst sighed bitterly.
"Your mother's mind was tampered with by a powerful telepath. Your adoptive father was a CIA handler. I only discovered you existed today."
Ernst extended his psychic perception outward, sweeping the surrounding town.
He sensed a large, commercial structure a few miles away.
"Tomorrow, find an excuse to visit the local amusement park," Ernst instructed.
"I will be waiting for you. I have a special gift. Do not forget."
It was nearing five in the afternoon. Moira would be returning soon.
Ernst stood up and stepped out of the bedroom.
With a wave of his hand, a cleansing spell swept through the villa, banishing every speck of dust and erasing his physical presence.
He walked into the nanny's room. She was still frozen in the temporal stasis field.
Ernst pressed a single finger to her forehead.
He elegantly rewrote her short-term memory, planting the illusion of a quiet, mundane afternoon spent folding laundry.
Ernst dissolved into the shadows, shifting back to his phantom state.
But as he vanished, Chris had cracked his bedroom door open.
The ten-year-old genius watched the impossible magic unfold.
For a boy who lived entirely in the realm of cold logic, the sudden introduction of the supernatural was intoxicating.
- - - - - - - - - - -
Ancient Castle, UK
Ernst bypassed Skull Island entirely, apparating directly into his primary workshop beneath the British castle.
He stripped off his coat and went to work.
He summoned a block of pure, unrefined Vibranium.
He flanked it with the indestructible, mechanical servos harvested from the remains of the Golden Army.
He began to construct a machine.
Using a molecular forge, he fused the alien metal with the ancient, magical gears.
He wrote a bespoke consciousness algorithm, weaving the Red Queen's adaptable heuristics with the cold, Kryptonian logic of the Jor-El subroutine.
The chassis took the shape of a rotund, mechanical feline.
It was an homage to a certain blue, dimension-hopping cat from a Japanese manga in his past life.
But this wasn't a toy. It was an apex piece of techno-sorcery.
Ernst reached into a lead-lined vault and retrieved a handful of glowing, volatile spatial crystals.
He embedded them into a seamless compartment on the robot's stomach. Using the Undetectable Extension Charm, he folded spacetime in on itself, creating a true pocket dimension.
He began filling the limitless void with artifacts. Magical grimoires, advanced weaponry, protective amulets, and survival gear.
"Dr. Ernst," the Red Queen's voice echoed through the laboratory, laced with genuine concern.
"Is this the gift for Chris?"
"It is," Ernst replied, his hands glowing as he fused the final spatial rune.
"You are expending an astronomical amount of energy from the Reality Gem to stabilize that pocket dimension," the AI warned.
"This will significantly delay our cosmic defense initiative."
Ernst paused, looking at the glowing red stone around his neck.
"This initiative is your primary trump card against extraworld threats," the Red Queen pressed.
"Thanos. Galactus. Darkseid. The timeline is accelerating. You have hoarded the Reality Gem's power for years. To waste it on a spatial pocket is... tactically unsound."
"It is not a waste," Ernst said softly.
"It is compensation."
He picked up a soldering tool.
"I have missed ten years of his life. I cannot simply walk in and hand him a bicycle. I must ensure he is protected against anything this universe throws at him."
"Even so," the AI countered.
"The materials in that chassis, the spatial crystals, the bespoke AI... the total value could purchase half the industrialized world. If Kyle discovers this, he may perceive a severe bias."
"I have considered that," Ernst smiled.
He waved his hand. A small, sleek red box materialized on the workbench.
Ernst pressed a biometric latch.
The box hissed, and a soft, white balloon-like structure inflated, taking the shape of a gentle, oversized humanoid.
It was a medical companion robot. But its soft exterior hid a skeleton of pure Vibranium.
"It is an exceptional construct," the Red Queen admitted, scanning the white robot.
"Though not on the same tier as the feline unit."
"Kyle's situation is different," Ernst explained, sealing the red box.
"Kyle has me. He lived on an island surrounded by apex predators and protectors. He has everything he needs."
"Chris will be living in the human world with a mother who doesn't understand him. He needs a protector. Someone to talk to."
Ernst looked up at the central camera array.
"That is where you come in, Red Queen. You will interface with the feline unit. You will teach him."
"You are delegating the most complex psychological task to me, Doctor," the AI noted dryly.
"If you perform well, he will rely on you. You are my most capable assistant. Do not let me down."
"Understood, Dr. Ernst," the AI replied, her tone swelling with synthesized pride.
"I will oversee his development perfectly."
Amusement Park - Upstate New York
Morning broke over the American Midwest.
Ernst had worked through the entire night without a single second of sleep, sustained entirely by his vast magical core.
He stood at the front gates of the local amusement park, holding the feline robot in a specialized containment case.
A man in a sharp suit approached, looking absolutely exhausted.
He handed Ernst a thick manila folder.
"The deed, Master Ernst," the operative said, bowing deeply.
Ernst opened the folder. The ink was barely dry.
He now held majority ownership of the entire park, obfuscated through a dozen shell corporations.
"Excellent work," Ernst nodded.
"Kerry's efficiency is unmatched."
Ernst assumed it had been a simple financial transaction.
He had no idea what he had put his steward through.
Thousands of miles away, Kerry was nursing a massive migraine.
Securing a multi-million-dollar commercial property within eight hours without raising federal red flags was impossible through legal channels.
Kerry had been forced to deploy the absolute darkest facets of Ernst's empire.
He had dispatched telepaths to the park owner's home in the dead of night.
He had weaponized hypnosis and memory modification, rewriting the minds of the entire board of directors.
He planted false memories of a month-long negotiation. He forged digital trails, backdated bank records, and coerced legal signatures.
Despite the superhuman serum coursing through Kerry's veins, the sheer bureaucratic and psychological stress of the night had sprouted a cluster of stark white hairs at his temples.
Kerry sat in his office, staring at a blank wall.
He lamented his unfortunate fate.
Ernst, entirely oblivious to his steward's suffering, stepped through the iron gates of the park.
He had an amusement park to run and a son to meet.