Karl was watching Tony Stark's cave workshop feed when something caught his attention.
A dismantled missile casing lay beside Stark.
Stamped clearly on the metal shell:
STARK INDUSTRIES
Karl's eyes narrowed.
A memory surfaced.
A war-torn apartment.
Two terrified children hiding beneath a table.
A Stark missile lodged in the floor in front of them…
unexploded.
Wanda and Pietro Maximoff.
In the Marvel Comics universe, Wanda Maximoff and Pietro Maximoff are natives of Sokovia (later retconned to various origins), and — depending on continuity — were once believed to be Magneto's children. In modern canon, their parentage is more complex, but their childhood in a war-torn Eastern European region remains consistent.
Karl leaned back.
Stark Industries weapons… failing to detonate?
Highly unlikely.
Tony Stark's weapons were engineered to detonate reliably under battlefield conditions.
Karl's eyes darkened.
A more plausible explanation:
Wanda.
Even as a child, Wanda Maximoff possessed latent mystical potential — a connection to Chaos Magic, an ancient force linked to the Elder God Chthon in Marvel lore.
Reality distortion.
Probability manipulation.
Subconscious hex effects.
If her fear had surged…
she might have unconsciously prevented detonation.
Chaos Magic did not follow physics.
It rewrote it.
Karl recalled the timeline.
Before Stark shut down weapons manufacturing…
Before Iron Man was born…
Stark weapons flooded global conflict zones.
Including Sokovia.
If the missile incident had already occurred…
then Wanda and Pietro might still be trapped beneath the rubble.
Alive.
Or barely clinging to life.
Karl stood immediately.
"Speed. Check Sokovia for active conflict zones. Locate Wanda Maximoff and Pietro Maximoff using surveillance networks."
Speed's voice responded through the earpiece.
"Yes, boss."
Seconds passed.
Then:
"Boss, Sokovia is experiencing sustained artillery bombardment and militia activity. Last footage places the targets inside a residential structure now collapsed. A Stark Industries missile impacted the structure three days ago. Life signs uncertain."
Karl didn't hesitate.
Shadow energy gathered beside him.
He stepped into the Shadow Realm.
He was going.
Sokovia
The air smelled of smoke, dust, and burnt concrete.
War had reduced entire blocks to skeletal ruins.
Inside the collapsed remains of an apartment building, beneath splintered beams and broken masonry, two children lay trapped under a warped table.
Pietro clutched his sister protectively.
"Wanda… don't be afraid… it will stop soon…"
His voice trembled despite his effort to sound brave.
They had been trapped for three days.
No food.
No water.
Too weak to cry anymore.
Through a gap in the rubble, Wanda could still see it:
the Stark missile lodged in the floor.
Unexploded.
Her small fingers tightened.
Hatred flickered behind her exhaustion.
Karl emerged from shadow atop a nearby ruin.
His gaze locked onto the missile.
Then the debris field.
"Move everything," he ordered.
Three hundred shadow ninjas materialized and began clearing rubble with supernatural efficiency.
Concrete slabs lifted.
Twisted metal peeled away.
Within moments, the table was exposed.
Two unconscious children beneath it.
Alive.
Karl exhaled.
"Take them."
The ninjas lifted the children gently and withdrew into the Shadow Realm.
Before leaving, Karl ordered:
"Speed — erase nearby surveillance and satellite logs."
"Yes, boss."
The shadows swallowed them.
New York — Farmhouse
By the time Karl returned, May had already come home.
She turned as the shadow ninjas emerged.
Two injured children lay in their arms.
"Oh my God… Karl… where did they come from? What happened to them?"
"They're from Sokovia," Karl said quietly. "Terrorist bombardment. Their parents are likely dead."
May's expression softened immediately with grief and compassion.
"Poor children…"
Karl gestured.
"This is Wanda."
He placed the girl carefully into May's arms.
May carried her upstairs without hesitation.
Karl had Pietro placed gently on the sofa.
He cleaned the boy's wounds, disinfected cuts, and applied bandages.
The shadow ninjas assisted silently.
Upstairs, May washed dust and dried blood from Wanda's face and hair, changed her into clean clothes, and tucked her beneath warm blankets.
When she came downstairs, she immediately began cooking thin porridge.
"They haven't eaten in days," she said. "Their stomachs can't handle solid food."
Karl nodded.
He drove to a nearby pharmacy and returned with glucose solution.
They mixed it into the porridge for hydration and energy recovery.
Night fell quietly over the farm.
Two rescued children slept upstairs.
The house, once peaceful, now held new lives…
and new destinies.