"Hawk is back."
"..."
In the S.H.I.E.L.D. New York Combat Command Center beneath Times Square, John Garrett, who was leading the second attempt to help Hydra successfully occupy it, sat in Victoria Hand's office, listening to the electronic voice coming through the earpiece and took a deep breath.
A foreboding feeling, one only held by elite agents, crept into his heart.
"Sir..."
"You know what to do."
After Dr. Zola said this in a digitized voice, he went offline, and at the same moment severed any relation between himself and the New York S.H.I.E.L.D. System.
Although the data showed that Hawk wasn't very adept with computer technology, his cellphone was a second-hand piece replaced by his fiancée, and his laptop was purchased from a second-hand forum.
But...
Better to be safe than sorry.
Listening to the complete silence after Dr. Zola went offline, John Garrett's originally suspended heart finally died completely.
Just then.
The office door opened.
Upon looking up.
He saw a dapper Grant Ward, looking righteous in a suit and tie, walking in with a black-haired Asian woman, Skye, whose hands were cuffed behind her back and whose expression screamed defiance.
John Garrett snapped back to reality, looked up at Grant, his adopted son, who walked in, and a faint smile appeared on his face. Then his gaze fell on Skye, who had been brought back.
"You're Skye, would you like to join us?"
"Pah!"
Bound and captured, Skye spat at John Garrett, who sat behind the desk, expressing her defiance with an angry look.
John wasn't angered, just chuckled, and pressed a button on the desk.
Soon after.
A Hydra Agent walked in.
"Take her away."
"Yes."
The Hydra agent who came in nodded in response and took Skye from Grant's hands.
Skye attempted to wriggle free, resisting.
The next second.
"Bang!"
"Hiss!"
Without mercy, the Hydra agent punched Skye in the stomach, coldly admonishing, "Behave."
John Garrett smiled, watching the bent-over Skye, slightly smiling: "Sooner than later, you'll all be free."
Skye thought John was about to kill her, glaring angrily at him.
"S.H.I.E.L.D. will stop your evil plans."
"And you..."
"Grant, I was blind back then."
Thinking back to when she just joined S.H.I.E.L.D., being enamored with Grant Ward, who was S.H.I.E.L.D. in name but Hydra in reality, made Skye feel filthy.
Grant remained expressionless, not sparing a glance at Skye.
John waved his hand dismissively.
The Hydra agent grabbed Skye, turned, and left the room without a word.
Skye's angry voice faded until it was barely a whisper.
John observed the fleeting subtle expression on his adopted son Grant's face and chuckled.
"What, feeling sorry?"
"No."
Grant shook his head: "Any obstacle to our great cause will be eliminated by us."
John laughed at this.
The next second.
He changed the subject.
"You must leave."
"...Target?"
Though confused about being sent off just after returning, Grant Ward didn't speak up. Instead, he quickly focused, asking about his next mission target.
John didn't immediately reveal the next target's name.
"Leave New York City, first go to Japan, you will receive your next mission target on the plane."
"Understood."
Without hesitation, Grant Ward nodded and left the office.
At the office door, he instinctively glanced in the direction Skye was taken, pondering something, but soon snapped out of it and headed for the exit.
John Garrett, however, watched his adopted son walk towards the exit through the surveillance on the computer, his gaze equally contemplative.
Next target?
There might be a next target.
But there were no targets left here, not since Dr. Zola severed communications.
So...
A tiger, no matter how ferocious, would not eat its offspring.
Despite adopting Grant years ago and training him into an outstandingly cold and professional Hydra Agent,
Grant was still his adopted son.
So, he chose to send Grant away deliberately.
Because his sense of unease was growing stronger.
Agents' instincts are quite sharp, particularly as a Hydra Agent inside S.H.I.E.L.D., trusting one's instincts is a must.
So this was probably not a false alarm.
Hawk is coming.
No!
Hawk is already here.
Just as Grant was crossing the hall, about to head toward the elevator, he suddenly noticed the space in front of him distorting. His professional instincts kicked in, instantly drawing his gun and firing at the figure emerging before him.
"Bang!"
"Buzz!"
Just having teleported here from the hospital room, Hawk saw the bullet flying toward him and, with a thought, stopped it right at the distance of 0.1 millimeters from his forehead.
Immediately after, he looked at Grant Ward who appeared somewhat handsome but was now pointing a gun at him, flames still bursting from the muzzle, and smiled slightly.
The next second.
Eyes flaring red!
"Boom!"
"Spurt!"
Grant Ward, who should have had at least two more seasons of appearances, froze in shock, then vaporized on the spot before he could react.
"Hiss!"
"Holy shit!"
"Enemy attack, enemy attack!"
"Demon King, it's the Demon King."
At the moment of Grant Ward's vaporization, the surrounding Hydra agents also reacted.
Some who didn't know Hawk's identity immediately drew their guns and pulled the trigger, seeming to want to kill Hawk right there.
Those Hydra agents who knew Hawk's identity cried out in terror before quickly running toward the emergency exit.
But...
No soul escapes Phoenix Beam!
"Buzz!"
"Spurt!"
"Buzz buzz buzz."
"Spurt spurt spurt—"
Standing still, Hawk didn't move, as two Phoenix Beams shot out from his eyes and began to circle the surroundings.
Where the Phoenix Beam swept, tables vaporized, items vaporized, Hydra agents firing guns and attempting to flee also vaporized instantly.
In just a blink of an eye, dozens of Hydra agents in the S.H.I.E.L.D. combat hall were completely wiped out.
Physically wiped out.
The next second.
Hawk looked at the Hydra agents not far away, hearing the commotion and heading over, crowding the passageway. At that moment, as Hawk flickered into the passageway, the Phoenix Beam shot again toward the densely packed Hydra agents.
In just a blink of an eye, dozens of Hydra agents in the passageway instantly experienced a real-life version of evaporating into thin air.
He now finally understood why both Icarus and the DC version of Superman were fond of thermographic vision.
No other reason.
Thermographic vision seemed.
Unlike punching, where one punch can take out just one, thermographic vision, when faced with ordinary people, could sweep and kill all it touched.
And it saves energy!
While Hawk thought this, his facial expression remained icy cold.
Having experienced the massacre by General Ross, the genocide in Wakanda, Hawk, already having the mindset of a traveler, had completely raised his threshold for slaughter.
This is why you should never provoke a traveler.
Because—
They really dare to kill.
Hawk dared to kill too.
He came here to kill.
Thus, with the aid of Hawk's new skill, the Phoenix Beam, he reversed the takeover that Hydra had spent nearly five hours achieving at the S.H.I.E.L.D. branch in less than five minutes.
Moreover, in those five minutes, he spent four minutes searching for any loose ends.
By the time he appeared at Victoria Hand's office door, ninety-nine percent of the Hydra agents in the base had been vaporized by him on the spot.
Hawk directly pushed the door open and entered.
In his sight.
John Garrett sat calmly behind the desk, hands on the table, holding a cigarette in one hand.
Upon seeing Hawk walk in, he took a deep drag, exhaled it after reaching his lungs, glanced at the newly lit final cigarette in his hand, and looked at Hawk.
"Can I finish smoking this last cigarette?"
"Seeing as you haven't committed suicide, you may."
"Thank you."
John Garrett thanked him and then, under Hawk's gaze, took another deep drag.
Hawk seemed tempted to indulge in the pleasure himself as he watched Garrett's blissful expression.
But no.
Smoking is harmful to health, and it's rumored to affect the baby, so Gwen had told him that if he wanted to smoke, he could, but he should wait another two years until they're twenty-one, have a baby first, and then smoking and drinking wouldn't be too late.
Very soon.
The cigarette began to burn out!
With the last puff being deeply inhaled into his lungs, John Garrett showed a relieved expression and looked at Hawk.
"Thank you, Mr. Phoenix."
"No problem."
Hawk smiled slightly, resisting the urge to join in, and looked at John Garrett before him.
"Did you give the order for those three Hydra agents to go to my house?"
"Yes."
"May I ask why?"
"Sharon Carter is a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, I'm a Hydra agent tasked with taking over the entire New York Branch. If she escaped alive, it would make me seem incompetent."
"Makes sense."
Listening to John Garrett's explanation, Hawk nodded, then laughed.
"Didn't you consider that doing this would make you offend me?"
"Yes."
"And then?"
"Sharon Carter must die."
"Alright."
Hawk chuckled lightly, looking at John Garrett leaning back in the chair, seemingly ready to face death in a comfortable position: "You have one last chance to say your final words."
John Garrett stood up from the chair, adjusted his suit and tie, and then, under Hawk's gaze, made a gesture that is now banned by various European countries.
And then—
...