The lights were too bright.
Too sterile.
Too perfect.
Max sat alone in the reinforced interrogation room, arms strapped to a cold metal chair. His body still hummed with suppressed energy, like a caged thunderstorm waiting to break.
The walls were gray. Smooth. No seams. No windows. Just a single security camera fixed above the one-way glass. It blinked once. Then the door opened.
He entered like a shadow — calm, deliberate, untouchable.
General Dreykov.
Tall. Thickset. Dressed in a dark military coat with Red Room insignia stitched over his heart. His face was unreadable, a mask of patience and cruelty honed over decades.
Max's eyes narrowed.
"So," Dreykov said, his voice heavy with an almost fatherly Russian accent, "you've finally stopped running."
Max didn't respond.
"You've been busy. Stumbling around my country, making a mess of things, playing dress-up. But beneath all that fabric and attitude…" He leaned closer across the table, voice sharpening."You are Pietro Django Maximoff."
The name hit Max like a gut punch.
"That's not me," he muttered.
Dreykov tilted his head, almost amused.
"Oh, but it is. No matter how many masks you wear. You think the world forgot him? A mutant… an Avenger… a ghost caught in the gears of something bigger. You were dead — and yet, here you are. Running. Pretending."
He pulled out a small datapad and tossed it on the table. It slid to a stop in front of Max.
Security footage.
Max saw himself on the screen — zipping through the prison, tearing through snow, dodging bullets. A ghost in green and yellow. Untraceable. Unstoppable.
"Your speed… is divine. Beyond what even the Maximoff twins could access. That's power I can use."
Max gritted his teeth. "I'm not for sale."
Dreykov chuckled.
"Everyone is. Some just cost more than others. You, Pietro… Django… Maximoff… you cost blood."
He stood up slowly.
"But think of what you could become with purpose. Not just a vigilante in secondhand tights. With my resources, my reach — the world wouldn't just fear you. It would obey you."
Max spat on the floor.
Dreykov's smile faded.
"A shame. I hoped you would be smarter. Perhaps you need a reminder of what helplessness feels like."
He turned toward the door.
"Break him," he ordered, just as it hissed shut behind him.
The Escape
They sent two guards.
Big mistake.
Max let them drag him out of the chair, feigning compliance. His eyes flicked to the side — every shadow, every vent, every seam in the corridor. Red Room design was efficient, but predictable.
He counted the steps.
Then exploded.
In a blur of motion, he twisted free, arms breaking the restraints as he torqued into a spin. Elbows slammed into jaws, knees into ribs. The first guard dropped — unconscious before he even hit the floor. The second tried to reach for a baton — Max ripped it from his hand and sent him flying into the wall with enough force to dent the metal.
The hallway flashed red.
Alarm klaxons began to blare.
Max didn't wait.
He sprinted through the labyrinthine base, dodging security lasers and lockdown shutters. His mind calculated a thousand outcomes at once — where the cells would be, where Natasha and Yelena might be held. He moved like a bullet through a barrel, ricocheting off walls, dropping soldiers with single, surgical blows.
He found a weapons locker and kicked it open.
Inside, a standard Red Room stealth suit — black, tactical, high mobility. He tore off the remains of his Kick-Ass costume and slipped into the new gear, adjusting the gloves and boots for tight fit. He looked into a cracked mirror.
"Not Pietro. Not Django. Just Max."
He blurred out of the room.
Down a corridor, he found the main detention block.
Two guards stood outside a reinforced cell. He didn't stop. He was a green streak — a blur of fists and momentum. Both guards collapsed. Max ripped open the door controls.
Inside: Natasha, chained to a wall, bloodied but alert. Yelena, handcuffed but still scowling defiantly. She blinked in surprise.
"You again?"
Max smirked. "Miss me?"
Natasha raised an eyebrow. "You came back."
"Told you I'm not going anywhere."
He stepped forward and tore the chains from the wall like paper, breaking Yelena's cuffs seconds later.
The red lights turned white again. The security lockdown was lifting.
"We have maybe five minutes before Dreykov sends the entire base after us," Max said. "I know a way out."
Yelena grinned. "Good. Let's burn this place to the ground."