Chapter 77
I rushed to Peter almost immediately after his call, spending only five minutes on a quick upgrade to my security system. As I listened to his confused but surprisingly detailed account of the thief who'd dropped by, I found my attention fixed on a small device Peter was casually spinning in his hands, something my dragonfly-spy had missed entirely.
"Still, where did you get Gwen's web-shooter?" I asked, nodding at the device.
"This is... well... it's my web-shooter," Peter said, awkwardly scratching his head. "I made it back when... well, when I started suspecting that Gwen was probably Spider-Woman. I just got curious about whether I could replicate the technology. I wanted to see if I could create the same device and webbing as hers."
I nodded, accepting the explanation. A genius's curiosity is a terrible force. I knew that firsthand.
My thoughts returned to the main problem: the Black Cat. Judging by Peter's description of her behavior and flirting, this was almost certainly Felicia Hardy. She'd tried to steal the medallion, clearly on someone's orders, and had run into a defensive mechanism. A defensive mechanism made from my Iron Blood?
It was amusing.
I honestly hadn't suspected my miracle-biology had such passive properties. Though I should have. Considering that the Iron Blood had played no small role in my assimilation of the Technomancy and had passively supported my body, it shouldn't have been so surprising that it had its own defensive protocols.
Especially considering its recent "saturation" with spiritual energy from the crystal containing the Web of Life and Destiny essence. The medallion had essentially become part of the spider essence. And Peter, already partially assimilated with this essence, had become "friendly" to the medallion, roughly speaking. That was why the spikes hadn't reacted to him, but had reacted to Felicia instantly.
Tsk. It was time to stop calling this "Iron" and start calling it "Smart."
"You know, by the way, you've changed a lot," Peter said, finally noticing the elephant in the room as he looked me over attentively. It was forgivable, though. He'd been meditating for several days and had been rudely awakened. "Well... externally."
"Yeah, you're not the only one who's getting stronger," I chuckled, not going into any details. This was going to be a long conversation, and now wasn't the time for it. "But let's get back to our guest. What do you think about her?"
"Well..." Peter yawned heavily. "The whole situation is extremely strange. I wasn't drawing attention to myself. The medallion doesn't look like anything valuable. And... wasn't S.H.I.E.L.D. supposed to be guarding our home?"
"Exactly," I lowered my voice to a whisper and gestured for Peter to keep it down. He blinked at me, questioningly. "The thief is a professional. But she simply shouldn't have had that much information. She bypassed S.H.I.E.L.D. security. She knew the exact timing. She knew you were meditating. This isn't just a matter of luck. There's someone backing her."
I only had one suspect, I thought grimly. Hydra.
Hardy wouldn't have contacted them voluntarily, of course. Most likely, the client had remained anonymous. But why did Hydra need the medallion? And how closely were they watching to notice something like this?
Wait. If they were so well-informed... I felt a chill. Obviously, Peter's apartment was also bugged by those snake bastards. The one Felicia supposedly "disabled" to infiltrate the place and bypass S.H.I.E.L.D. surveillance could have been bait. Or there could be another, better-hidden one. I needed to watch what I said very carefully.
"Did they order a hit on me?" Peter asked quietly, catching on to my thought.
"More like they ordered a hit on me," I answered, just as quietly. "More precisely, they ordered a hit on another one of my..." I tapped my finger against the medallion around Peter's neck meaningfully. "...'technologies.' At least, that's probably what they think."
The question now was what to do with Hardy. What were the odds she'd try again? High. This was the Black Cat. She was a real daredevil, and failure would only provoke her further. I needed to resolve this with her, but I had to handle it as delicately as possible. Still, she was the daughter of a multi-billion-dollar foundation owner. Overall, as a character, she wasn't the worst option in all this madness. She was definitely more pleasant than the local version of Mary Jane.
And Peter... He would probably have to continue his meditation in the company building. There, at least, there would be some semblance of real security.
But before I could even voice this idea to Peter, my smartphone vibrated in my pocket and emitted a piercing alarm.
I snatched it out. A single word burned on the screen: "BREACH."
It was a red notification from my laboratory's security system. Before leaving for Peter's place, I'd managed to link it to my phone and configure several alert scenarios. This one was the worst. It was the "Omega" variant. It meant a complete building blackout.
Someone hadn't simply broken in. They had cut everything off. They had even taken out the backup generators. On top of that, they had done it instantly and professionally.
Everything clicked into place instantly. This alarm and Felicia's visit to Peter. The picture formed itself.
It had been a failed attempt to steal the medallion. Whether it had failed or not didn't matter. Peter would have called me anyway. I would have gone to him anyway.
This was bait. It was perfect, calculated bait. Hydra, definitely their handiwork, had found a brilliant way to smoke me out of the laboratory. They had found a way to leave the production line for S.H.I.E.L.D.'s most valuable orders unguarded.
More precisely, it was "attended." The S.H.I.E.L.D. agents were watching the building around the clock. And they had obviously screwed up. Again.
Honestly, S.H.I.E.L.D.'s incompetence didn't even amuse me anymore. It infuriated me. Especially now, with technologies worth hundreds of millions of dollars at stake. I was hoping that, after the thief's visit, they had at least increased protection for the Parkers. Because right now I needed to get over there immediately.
"The lab has been broken into," I said shortly to Peter, who was staring at my smartphone with a questioning look. "You stay here. Sleep in the living room with your relatives watching. It's unlikely the thief will return today. I'll be in touch and brief you later."
I summoned the Chimera and immediately realized there was a problem. The suit had become unbearably tight.
Damn. I had expected this, considering the changes to my body, but it had somehow completely slipped my mind. The armor plates wouldn't come together over my chest and shoulders. Using the Iron Blood, I had to forcibly rip several Proteus segments to make them stretch. I somehow managed to pull the tattered thing on, noting how awkward it looked.
I didn't care about that. Right now, mobility was what mattered.
I jumped right through Peter's room window, spread my plasma wings, and, soaring higher, engaged the afterburner and shot toward the company building.
Meanwhile, I pulled the secure S.H.I.E.L.D. smartphone from my pocket and dialed Fury. Silence. He wasn't picking up. As expected. That meant it was definitely Hydra.
It was time. Time to finally do something about them. Alexander Pierce... It was time to take him down for real. I'd dig into his brain, extract the names, and use them to reach the others. I'd take down as many heads of this bastard organization as I possibly could.
A plan began forming in my head on its own. Crude, inelegant, and probably too hasty, considering the organization's power. They wouldn't take this lying down. But it was time to show these bastards my teeth. They couldn't just leave me in peace. Damn it, give me at least a couple weeks of respite!
If I didn't make it in time and they cleared everything out of the lab, I'd charge the losses to S.H.I.E.L.D.'s account. This was their screw-up. But judging by the timing, it seemed I'd still make it.
I flew up to the familiar building and shot into the underground parking lot like a bullet. Aside from a couple of nondescript S.H.I.E.L.D. vehicles, there was a small minivan. Five figures were bustling around it, briskly throwing fabric rolls and containers inside.
They were my rolls. They were my pills.
They were stealing my free time. The time I should have had after quickly closing this order.
That last thought was the one that mattered most. No wonder I was furious. They were stealing my time. I began mentally 'marking' targets, and immediately spotted several familiar faces among them.
The first was a man in a skull mask and gray hood. He was short but solidly built, which showed even under his dark blue tactical armor. He carried a round shield engraved with a skull on his back. And was that a sword on his hip? Seriously?
Well, yes. It was Taskmaster. No doubt about it. In some versions of the story, he was depicted specifically as a master swordsman.
The second, who was less familiar to me personally, wore a red robe that extended into a hood. Two pistols hung from his belt, and I could easily sense the metaphysical aura radiating from them. But it wasn't just the pistols. The robe itself, and even his boots, were radiating as well. He had at least three artifacts on him.
He was the Hood. He was a meta-villain I didn't know much about, but I'd already taken notice of his artifacts. They were interesting trinkets. The cloak obviously granted invisibility, the boots gave him flight, and the pistols, judging by their appearance, were connected to the element of fire.
The third, and the one I knew best through my meta-knowledge, was a girl clad in a futuristic white suit. It had a hood and a series of ominous red visors on its mask. It was Ghost. I had to thank the fact that I had watched the Ant-Man and the Wasp movie back in my time.
The two remaining men were unknown to me. But it was notable that both of them were... half-naked. The first was a very big, downright unnaturally big, bald man in some bloomers. In one hand, he casually held an iron chain, and at the end dangled a huge metal spiked ball. It weighed at least one hundred kilograms.
The second guy was jacked too, but more proportionally built. He wore a black robe, his sculpted body covered entirely in tattoos. A katana rested on his hip, and dark sunglasses hid his eyes. With his slicked-back light hair, he slightly resembled Albert Wesker.
"Should we talk for a bit?" My voice cut through the silence of the parking lot.
As a sign of respect, at the very least toward Taskmaster, I even stowed the battered Chimera back into my inventory.
But a moment later, I realized I'd been naive. What could I say? Some part of me probably still believed in comic book conventions, where they rarely killed anyone unless it was Peter's relatives. Why did he have to suffer so much? It was a place where, before a battle, you could always talk for a couple of pages.
Here, however, the situation was different. As soon as they realized who had arrived in the parking lot, the meta-mercenaries immediately dispersed, taking up combat positions. The Hood pulled out his pistols. Ghost raised the rifle from her back. The conclusion was obvious. Hydra had decided to eliminate me.
My thoughts raced. They had a dossier on me. They knew about my vibro-gauntlets, hence the distance. The weapons were ready. This was their Plan B, in case of my return. It was meant to be my death.
It wasn't surprising. My existence directly strengthened S.H.I.E.L.D. And if they couldn't control me, they weren't about to let anyone else control me either.
How timely that I'd enhanced myself with Extremis. And Thank God they didn't know about it. Though, given my changed dimensions, they might have suspected something.
Meanwhile, Ghost and the Hood had already vanished from my sight. They were using their invisibility.
"Guys, I really don't want to kill anyone," I said, giving them one last chance. They were just mercenaries, foot soldiers who probably didn't even know who they were really working for. "You can definitely try to attack me. But if you do, there's no going back for you. So..."
At that moment, I distinctly felt someone forcing their way into my mind. It wasn't a polite 'knock.' It was a brazen, violent mental intrusion.
The nanobots in my brain reacted instantly, erecting a Faraday cage against the directed psychic attack. I shifted my gaze to the left. The local version of Albert Wesker had already assumed a combat stance, leaning slightly forward with his hand on his katana. Judging by his focused yet confused expression, I knew he was the one attacking me mentally. He must have been shocked that he couldn't brute-force his way through my defenses.
I hated telepaths!
I didn't have time for games. With a quick, almost imperceptible flick of my wrist, I struck. A brief surge of concentration drove a narrowly directed thermal wave, a plasma beam of several thousand degrees, straight into the target.
The Wesker knockoff simply... vaporized. He never even managed to draw his katana.
There was one less of them.
"Think again. Carefully," I said, my voice absolutely calm in the ensuing dead silence. I shook my head in warning, looking at Taskmaster. His posture had changed instantly as he shifted into a combat stance.
"What do you mean, 'you cannot provide'?" Stephen Strange's voice dripped venom, even as he gripped the telephone receiver with a trembling hand. He was talking to someone he had disdainfully called "support staff for real doctors" until recently. "Do you even know who I am? I don't give a damn about your 'order from above'! I am at the very top!"
After this outburst, a series of short beeps sounded on the other end of the line. The young nurse had simply hung up on him. She had probably even added his number to the hospital's blacklist.
It was the same hospital that, a month ago, had fawned over him. They had begged him to speak at a local medical conference. He had refused. Now they were refusing him.
Interestingly enough, the case of Ben Parker's anomaly, just one of hundreds of similar cases, had been pushed to the back of a desk drawer. Stephen didn't intend to seek a real meeting with the man and risk drawing unwanted attention.
Having reached the top of the social hierarchy, he had been initiated into some of this world's dirty secrets. He had understood that, if something was being hidden from you, it was better not to get involved. He especially wanted to preserve some semblance of his freedom.
And freedom... for Stephen, it was perhaps his highest value. To grovel before the bastards above him, who were conducting obviously illegal and unethical experiments, merely for a chance to recover his hands, wasn't something he intended to do. Those bastards would demand an exorbitant price. And the price Stephen was willing to pay was measured in anything but his freedom.
One case. Then another. Dozens of calls. Hundreds of scientific articles read through a veil of despair. Periodic quarrels that turned into personal attacks. With trembling hands, Stephen sorted through one possibility after another. He sought an option that his mind, his ego, could understand and accept.
There was science. There was experimental medicine. There were metahumans with healing abilities. There was possibly even... the Mutants.
But alas. Almost everywhere, there was a dead end.
In some places, they told him directly that it was better not to get involved. In others, they dropped veiled hints about a 'personal meeting'... in another country, without any guarantees. Sometimes, it ended in an emotional outburst, and the person on the other end simply hung up, as had happened with Ben Parker. But there was a chance, a minuscule chance. It had to exist, right?
His damaged, trembling fingers struggled to obey him. He fumbled his phone from his pocket and called a taxi to the nearest coffee shop. He just needed some air. Strange pulled on a plain gray hoodie. It was as faceless as he himself was now.
He left his luxurious private residence in the New York suburbs, the house he'd once considered his pride and joy, a symbol of his achievements. Now it evoked nothing but a bitter, shameful reminder of his former greatness.
The taxi driver arrived several minutes early, an Indian man who barely spoke. He quickly realized it was better to let this nervous client ride in silence.
Stephen, though, was lost in his own thoughts. He rested his head against the car's dirty window, something he would have considered disgusting and unhygienic just a week and a half ago. He watched the billboards drift past indifferently as they entered New York.
"Cosco Hypermarket: A Choice for the Whole Family!"
"The Best Shoes at Macy's, Even Olympic Runners Admit It!"
"Healer Hector Grainger. Metaphysics Capable of Curing Anything. Call This Number!"
At the last billboard, Stephen jolted so abruptly that he hit his head on the car's ceiling.
The driver didn't react, and they passed the billboard. Stephen noted with surprise that he'd memorized the number in that brief glance. Not that he'd ever complained about his photographic memory.
Metaphysics... It sounded like charlatanism. But what if there was even a minuscule chance? What if, through this charlatan, who was rich and successful enough to afford a billboard at the entrance to New York, he could reach a real meta-healer?
The thought dug into his consciousness like a splinter. Desperate, yes, but it was the only one he had. He could no longer ignore it.
Unfortunately, Strange never asked the driver to turn back to look at the billboard again. He would have been surprised to see that, where the Healer's ad had just been, there now stood a banal cigarette advertisement.
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