Nick Fury treated Locke as prey, but Locke viewed Fury the exact same way.
Moreover... Locke's greatest skill was knowing how to transform from the hunted into the hunter. It had been that way at the textile mill, and S.H.I.E.L.D. would be no exception. The only difference was that he probably wouldn't exterminate the entire agency like he did the Fraternity.
At the courthouse entrance, three eyes met.
Literally—because Nick Fury only had one.
Locke looked at Fury, who was being swarmed by reporters. In the face of a gaze that looked ready to tear him apart, Locke offered another brilliant, dazzling smile.
"Let's go," Buson Laun reminded him, nudging him forward. "Mr. Broughton."
Locke snapped back to the present and nodded. The curtain was rising. He never cared for pointless banter; if they were going to clash, then words were secondary to actions.
Half an hour later.
Inside a small, private courtroom for the closed-door hearing.
Locke was already seated at the plaintiff's table. Hearing the door push open behind him, he turned to see Nick Fury entering with an expression like he had just swallowed a fly. Locke's brilliant smile returned instantly.
Clearly, those chaos-loving reporters had already relayed Buson Laun's "impassioned" defense to Fury and his team outside.
"Innocent?"
"He's a well-disguised sociopath."
As Fury walked toward the defense table, his eye lingered on Locke. In his heart, he was 100% certain of Locke's guilt. But he also knew he had zero evidence.
'Damn it, I should have snatched him secretly the moment we had a hunch.'
These days, not everyone who gets detained makes the news—especially terrorists, who are usually disappeared into "Black Sites." The CIA had their underwater prisons; the FBI had Guantanamo. S.H.I.E.L.D., naturally, had their own secret facility.
Codename: The Fridge.
It housed world-class criminals—those the agency was certain were guilty but lacked the evidence to convict in a public US court.
"Don't get cocky," Fury thought, exhaling slowly as Judge Knott took the bench. He was mentally calculating his next move. 'The world doesn't run on the rules you think it does.'
Below the law, there are legal rules. Outside the law, there are rules of order. And S.H.I.E.L.D. was the one who wrote the latter.
*Bang!*
Judge Knott struck his gavel and looked at his clerk. "This is a closed-door hearing to determine if this case shall proceed to a public trial!"
At the defense table, Ms. Wright—the Assistant Attorney General acting as lead counsel—stood up abruptly. "Your Honor—"
Judge Knott held up a hand. "Counsel, perhaps you've forgotten your place. Let me remind you: you are the defense, not the plaintiff. Get used to it. If there is a next time, I will hold you in contempt!"
Ms. Wright: "..."
Son of a—!
The judge was fuming. Even his daughter had asked him at dinner if he was taking bribes from the FBI. She had questioned why such an obvious case of abuse wasn't public.
His old friends at their poker game had made similar "jokes." For a man who prided himself on integrity, being accused of colluding with federal agencies was the ultimate insult.
The law might be impartial, but judges are human. And if Knott wanted to be strict, he could bury Ms. Wright in procedural penalties.
The lawyer bit her lip and adjusted her glasses. "Apologies, your Honor. My mistake."
"Of course it's your mistake," Knott snapped. He turned his attention to Buson Laun.
"Thank you, your Honor."
Laun adjusted his tie and stood up with practiced ease, radiating confidence. He handed a file to the bailiff. "Your Honor, the defense's intent to suppress this case under the guise of 'national security' is simple: they made a mistake, and they are trying to cover it with more mistakes. This document proves that without any court-authorized warrant, the defendants conducted illegal wiretapping of my client's residence."
At the plaintiff's table, Locke sat perfectly upright, looking every bit the victim.
Across the room, Fury's expression shifted slightly.
Ms. Wright stood up. "Your Honor, the opposition has no proof—"
"Your Honor," Laun interrupted, his voice flat and authoritative. "This file contains a deposition from the NYPD. One of the listening devices found has a traceable serial number. That number leads directly to the New York FBI office."
In reality, after Agent 83 disappeared, S.H.I.E.L.D. had swept the apartment and removed the bugs once the NYPD got involved. But Locke had been prepared from the start. He had ensured one bug was "missed" during their cleanup.
Why hadn't the tech agent reported the discrepancy? He actually had. But the bug was hidden inside a vase that had "gone missing" along with the bug. S.H.I.E.L.D. assumed it had been destroyed or taken by whoever took the agent. They didn't expect it to turn up in a courtroom.
Fury stared at Locke, wondering if he should just send an extraction team tonight and dump the kid in the Fridge and be done with it.
Judge Knott flipped through the NYPD report. He looked up at Ms. Wright. "Ms. Wright, the evidence is clear. This is yet another case of federal agencies ignoring the law and violating a citizen's privacy. Now, I want to hear your explanation."
'Go ahead,' the judge's eyes said. 'Perform. Show me how 'national security' justifies this.'
Actually, it was a national security issue—federal agencies ignoring the Constitution was a high crime that threatened the very security of the US.
Ms. Wright took a deep breath. She glanced at Fury. She had asked him yesterday what cards the kid might play, and he hadn't mentioned a missing bug.
"Your Honor," she said, pulling out her own prepared file. "In fact, this surveillance was granted under a special DOJ authorization. The plaintiff is not the 'harmless student' he portrays. He is intricately linked to a missing federal agent."
Locke remained expressionless.
Beside him, Laun exchanged a quick look with Locke. A spark of triumph flashed in the lawyer's eyes.
'Predictable. They're going for the classic character assassination.'
"Two years ago, a hitman known in the underworld as the 'Peerless Assassin' appeared in Texas," Ms. Wright began.
"Two months ago, this killer—nicknamed the Sin Hunter—surfaced in New York."
"One month ago, a gunfight erupted at a textile mill in the suburbs."
As she mentioned the textile mill, the actual FBI Senior Supervisor sitting at the table looked incredibly uncomfortable, glaring at Fury. He hadn't known she was going to bring this up.
The NYPD had taken all the credit for "discovering" that the mill was a front for a group of assassins, and the FBI had ridden those coattails to arrest high-profile clients from the ledger. By bringing this up, they were reopening a closed, "successful" case in a messy way.
But his orders from D.C. were clear: as long as the blame didn't stick to the Bureau, he had to let S.H.I.E.L.D. run the show. Besides, this was a closed-door hearing. Ideally, this wouldn't leak.
But S.H.I.E.L.D. was effectively burning bridges with the local FBI office.
"...To prevent public panic, the case was settled that way. However, the FBI continued its investigation. Mr. Locke Broughton, who was kidnapped by the Assassin but returned completely unharmed, became a person of interest. According to confidential files, the dates and locations of the Assassin's activity overlap significantly with Mr. Broughton's movements."
"Therefore, the FBI initiated a project codenamed 'Assassin Junior.' We embedded an elite graduate from Quantico, Megan Walsh, into Midtown High."
Ms. Wright handed Megan's (fabricated) Quantico file to the judge. "A few days ago, Agent Walsh disappeared. Her last known location was the 28th floor of the Star Tower, where Mr. Broughton resides. In a room on the second floor, we detected traces of blood. It was a match for Agent Walsh."
***
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