My past battles with the Death Eaters had taught me one invaluable lesson: stay calm when you want to murder someone.
I glanced at the finished dishes lined up on the nearby counter, gleaming under the kitchen lights. A plan crystallized in my mind—terrible, risky, and probably suicidal. Exactly the kind of plan that got people killed.
Perfect.
I moved through the familiar storeroom, grabbed a clean chef's uniform, and pulled it on with practiced efficiency. The chef's hat came next, slightly too large, sitting crooked on my head. I adjusted it in the reflection of a stainless steel refrigerator door.
Not bad. You look almost legitimate.
This plan had approximately seventeen different ways to go catastrophically wrong. The people in the dining room could shoot me the moment they saw how young I was. I didn't know how many of them were armed, how many were innocent victims, or whether the mind controller had backup waiting in the wings.
But I really didn't have a choice.
The NYPD wasn't equipped to handle a mind controller—they'd walk in and become puppets within seconds. S.H.I.E.L.D. was technically an option, except I had zero contacts there and absolutely no guarantee whoever answered wouldn't be Hydra.
So yeah. I was on my own.
Story of my life. Lives. Whatever.
I loaded a tray with the finished dishes—something fancy with truffle foam and artistic drizzles that would've made Gordon Ramsay weep with joy—and squared my shoulders.
Time to serve dinner.
I stood outside the kitchen door, forcing myself to breathe slowly. In. Out. In. Out.
My hands were steady. That was good. Shaking hands got you killed.
Through the small window in the door, I could see the dining room. The waiters stood at attention along the walls, faces blank, bodies rigid. And there, in the center of the room, sat two people at an ornately set table.
A man and a woman.
The man wore a purple suit.
Not a subtle purple. Not a tasteful lavender or plum. No—this was full-on, eye-searing, look-at-me-I'm-a-supervillain purple. The kind of fashion choice that screamed either "I have no self-awareness" or "I literally don't care what anyone thinks because I can make them worship me."
I like purple.But this is just offensive.
He was eating, smiling, talking to his companion with the easy confidence of someone who'd never faced consequences in his life. She sat across from him, stiff and expressionless, mechanically bringing food to her mouth when he gestured.
And that's when it clicked.
I knew him.
Kilgrave. The Purple Man.
Mind controller. Serial rapist. Walking human rights violation. The kind of person who used his powers to enslave women, violate them, and discard them like broken toys. His actions had never caused enough visible damage to ping S.H.I.E.L.D.'s radar—no exploding buildings, no alien invasions, just a trail of shattered lives too quiet for anyone important to notice.
At least until Jessica Jones put him in the ground.
Speaking of which.
The woman sitting across from him had black hair cascading over her blank, emotionless face. Leather jacket. Dark jeans. The posture of someone who could bench-press a car but currently couldn't remember her own name.
Jessica Jones.
Shit.
I had absolutely no intention of starting a fight with her. Not while she was under his control. Jessica was strong enough to punch through concrete, fast enough to make Olympic sprinters look pathetic, and durable enough to walk away from things that would paste a normal person.
Fighting her would be suicide.
But I didn't need to fight her. I just needed to kill him.
And one of us definitely wasn't leaving this restaurant alive.
I took a deep breath and began casting Occlumency.
The mental discipline washed over me like cold water, building walls around my consciousness, locking my thoughts behind fortress gates. Occlumency was designed to block Legilimency—magical mind-reading—but I was betting it would help against Kilgrave's pheromone-based control too.
Please work. Please, please work.
I'd been practicing Occlumency unconsciously ever since my memories returned. Living in the MCU meant living in a world where gods existed, where telepaths could rip through your mind like tissue paper if you weren't careful. Protecting my thoughts wasn't paranoia—it was survival.
My eyes went distant, hollow, as my mind retreated behind mental barriers. Thoughts locked away. Emotions sealed behind iron doors.
Focus.
I pushed through the kitchen door and walked toward Kilgrave's table, one careful step at a time.
So far, so good. No overwhelming compulsion to obey him. No sudden urge to throw myself at his feet and call him master.
The Occlumency was holding.
I approached the table and set the tray down with the practiced grace of someone who'd done this a thousand times. The dishes settled into place with barely a sound—black truffle cream soup, seared duck breast, some kind of deconstructed dessert that looked like abstract art.
Kilgrave's eyes lit up. "Oh, wonderful. Come, Jessica, this dish is the restaurant's most famous, a black truffle cream soup. You must try it."
Jessica picked up her spoon. Her movements were robotic, precise, wrong.
Kilgrave waved his hand dismissively without even looking at me. "Alright, you can go now."
I didn't move.
"Hmm?" He glanced up, irritation flickering across his face. "Didn't you hear me? I said, leave."
I still didn't move.
His eyes narrowed. "I said—"
I lunged.
My hand closed around his throat before he could finish the sentence, fingers digging into his windpipe with the kind of controlled violence that years of preparation had perfected. His eyes bulged. His mouth worked soundlessly, trying to form words—commands that could turn me into a puppet.
Not today, you bastard.
Jessica didn't even look up. She just kept methodically eating her soup, blank-faced, oblivious.
No orders. No action. Good.
Kilgrave thrashed against my grip, desperation flooding his features. His hand scrambled inside his jacket—
Shit.
The gun came up fast.
BANG.
I twisted sideways on pure instinct. The bullet screamed past my ear, so close I felt the heat of its passage. My grip loosened for just a second—
Kilgrave wrenched backward, stumbling out of my reach. He coughed, clutching his throat, eyes streaming.
And then he smiled.
"Jessica..." His voice was a ruined rasp, but the command was clear. "Kill... kill him!"
Her head snapped up.
Oh, fuck.
Jessica Jones moved like a freight train wrapped in human skin.
She pushed off the floor—the tiles cracked beneath her feet—and charged. Her fist came at my face with enough force to turn my skull into abstract art.
I threw myself sideways. Her punch missed me by inches and slammed into the floor where I'd been standing. The impact spider-webbed the tiles, sending shards of ceramic exploding outward.
Yeah. I really, REALLY don't want to get hit by that.
My magic reserves were already running on fumes. Alohomora. Constant Occlumency. I was scraping the bottom of the barrel, operating on fumes and desperation.
But I didn't have a choice.
I raised my hand as she came at me again. "Wingardium Leviosa!"
Magic surged from my core, weaker than it should be, barely enough—
Jessica froze mid-charge. Her body lifted into the air, legs kicking uselessly. She snarled, straining against the invisible force, muscles bulging.
Hold. Just hold.
Wingardium Leviosa had changed since my Harry Potter days. Back then, it could only lift objects—you needed a different spell for people. But here, in this universe, it worked more like localized telekinesis. More powerful. More versatile.
And way more draining.
I could feel the spell sucking my magic dry, my hand trembling from the effort. I couldn't hold her long. Seconds, maybe.
Make them count.
I flicked my wrist.
Jessica flew.
She became a blur of leather and limbs, screaming—or maybe that was the pedestrians outside, I couldn't tell—as she smashed through the restaurant's front window in an explosion of glass and splintered wood.
She hit the street outside and rolled, momentum carrying her across the pavement. Car horns blared. People screamed.
Sorry, Jessica. You'll heal.
I spun back toward Kilgrave.
He was already raising his gun again, face twisted with fury—
Another flick of my wrist.
Kilgrave slammed into the ceiling. The impact was wet, brutal, accompanied by the crunch of breaking bone. Blood sprayed from his nose and mouth. The gun clattered to the floor, forgotten.
He hung there for a moment, suspended by my magic, gasping like a fish.
"Cough... Jessica..." His voice was barely a whisper. "Save... me..."
I stepped forward, magic gathering for the killing blow—
Jessica exploded back through the broken window.
Glass rained down like deadly snow. She didn't slow down—just grabbed Kilgrave out of the air mid-run, tucked him under one arm like a football, and launched herself back through the opening.
No. NO.
I couldn't let them escape. Mom was still under his control. So was everyone else in this restaurant. Normal people. Vulnerable people. As long as Kilgrave was alive, they were puppets.
He had to die.
Today.
I tore off the chef's uniform, yanked my hood up over my face, and sprinted after them.
Outside, pedestrians stood frozen, phones raised, recording everything. I ignored them. Ignored the screams. Ignored the part of my brain screaming that I was exposing magic to the world.
Don't care. Find him. Kill him.
Jessica landed on a rooftop across the street, Kilgrave still tucked under her arm. She didn't even pause—just kept running, leaping from building to building with superhuman grace.
I raised my hand. "Wingardium Leviosa."
The spell latched onto me this time. I felt the sickening lurch of gravity losing its grip, my feet leaving the ground—
I pushed off and flew.
The rooftops of New York blurred beneath me.
Jessica was fast. Faster than me, even with magic boosting my movement. She bounded across gaps that would kill a normal person, never slowing, never hesitating. Kilgrave clung to her, shouting commands I couldn't hear over the wind.
My magic was guttering. Flickering like a candle in a hurricane. Every second I maintained the Levitation Charm drained me further. My vision swam. My hands shook.
Just a little further. Just catch them. Just—
I couldn't let them vanish.
Not today.
Not ever.