Victor straightened, cloak settling around him like a shadow given purpose. “You misunderstand, Benjamin. Doom does not win… Doom simply is.” His gauntlet crackled with emerald power as he advanced. “And you will kneel before inevitability.”

Doom’s mask tilts upward, just slightly, as if acknowledging Quill’s attempt to stare him down. The air around his armor hums with restrained power. “What am I trying to do,” Doom repeats, voice low and resonant, “is prevent you from stumbling blindly into a threat you are

A low, metallic hum rolls from Doom’s armor—something between a scoff and a warning. “Peter Quill,” Doom says, voice smooth as sharpened steel, “you mistake Doom for a creature that seeks to frighten you.” He steps forward, slow and deliberate,

his turned head, the stubborn defiance he wears like a cheap jacket. “But your bravado amuses Doom. It always has.” A faint tilt of the mask—almost a smirk, if metal could smirk. “You speak as though courage is the absence of fear. It is not. Courage is acting despite it.”

Doom’s posture shifts—not in anger, but in that subtle, dangerous way a predator adjusts when prey suddenly bares its teeth. The mask turns toward Quill. The air tightens. And Doom speaks with the calm of someone explaining reality to a child. “Scraps,” he repeats, unbothered.

He leans in slightly, voice dropping to a resonant growl. “Doom does not belittle the Power Cosmic. Doom belittles your perspective.” A beat. “To a man who has held the heart of a Beyonder in his hand… even the Power Cosmic can appear as scraps.”