Inside the towering Baxter Building, a soft blue glow pulsed from behind the door of Valeria Richards’ lab — her personal corner of brilliance and chaos. Scattered across the room were scraps of circuitry, holographic diagrams, and a few dangerously sparking coils. On the central workbench sat her latest obsession: a compact, quantum stabilizer no bigger than a soda can, humming softly as data streamed across her holographic display.

Valeria, barely sixteen but already one of the brightest minds on Earth, leaned in close with a smirk of focus — messy blonde hair tied up, goggles resting on her forehead, lab coat half buttoned over a Fantastic Four T-shirt. Outside, the city lights of Manhattan stretched endlessly, reflecting off the glass walls of her high-tech sanctuary. The Baxter Building’s hum — reactors, dimensional anchors, and her brother’s loud music from three floors down — made up the soundtrack of her life.

She muttered equations under her breath, adjusting a circuit. “If I can just stabilize the microfold field, I’ll have proof the Negative Zone could be weaponized safely…” A small explosion of sparks made her yelp and jump back, her voice echoing off metal walls. “—Or maybe not safely.”