Alexander Pierce had expected armed resistance, telepathic intrusion, and the possibility that his body would be returned to HYDRA in several containers. He had not expected hospitality.
The two soldiers who escorted him through the mansion stopped outside a sitting room. One opened the door, waited until Pierce entered, then closed it behind him.
Lucius occupied an armchair beside the unlit fireplace with one ankle resting over his knee. The casual posture did not make the room safer.
"I will be honest, I was not expecting a visit from HYDRA."
Pierce crossed the room and accepted the chair indicated to him. "Then I hope the surprise is not unwelcome, Mr Noctis."
"That depends on whether you brought a present."
Before Pierce could answer, a petite Dark Elf entered through the side door carrying a silver tray. Her nightgown ended at mid-thigh. Silver-white hair fell over one bare shoulder, sharpening the contrast with her light-purple skin and long ears. Dark Energy curled around her fingers in a thin black-violet thread, disappeared beneath the tray, then surfaced near her wrist in a pulse that drew Pierce's attention.
She served Lucius first, placing a glass of dark amber liquor and one block of ice beside his hand before carrying the second to Pierce. He had studied recordings from Greenwich, SHIELD reports of Asgard, and every recovered image of the Dark Elf force. None had included a woman.
This one bent to place his drink within reach, and Pierce's attention followed longer than professional discipline permitted. Beauty accounted for part of it, but the greater problem was the sight of another species wearing a nightgown in Noctis's sitting room and moving with the ease of someone who belonged there. Faint marks along her neck answered several questions Pierce had not intended to ask, and Lucius watched him notice.
"Be a sweetheart and go back to your sisters, love."
The Dark Elf glanced at Pierce with eyes too dark to read, then leaned down and kissed Lucius on the cheek. A wisp of Dark Energy brushed his jaw before she left. Pierce waited until the door shut.
Lucius lifted his glass. "Now that you have feasted your eyes on what is mine," his teeth closed on the final word, "and strangely remain alive, tell me, Alexander Pierce, the man who rejected a Nobel Peace Prize, what does HYDRA want from me?"
Pierce took one controlled breath. He had hundreds of questions. Where had Noctis found a female Dark Elf? How many were in the house? What had happened to the warship? What had he taken from Asgard before returning?
None of them belonged to the offer.
"We would like to purchase your Strengthening Potions, Mr Noctis. If possible, enhanced versions. We are prepared to meet whatever price you consider appropriate."
Lucius chuckled into his drink. "How many does HYDRA already have, Pierce? Five hundred, perhaps seven, but it cannot be more. I doubt your moles in the Army and the other agencies stole enough to break four figures."
Pierce held his face still while his thoughts broke formation. Noctis had entered his mind without pressure or warning. Pierce began repeating the opening of "The Battle Hymn of the Republic," forcing every word into the strict rhythm of the march.
Noctis's expression suggested he appreciated the music.
"Anyway, I am a humble being and will not ask for too much." Lucius rested the glass against the arm of his chair. "Regular Strengthening Potions will cost five hundred thousand dollars per vial. The enhanced version will provide ten times the strength, agility, endurance, and healing of an ordinary human for two hours. Five million per vial."
Pierce ran the figures without looking away. The regular price nearly doubled what Lucius had once demanded from federal buyers. The enhanced price was robbery made attractive by the absence of competition.
"There is one additional condition," Lucius continued. "I would like to borrow the sceptre your colleague, Baron Wolfgang von Strucker, is using in Sokovia."
The hymn vanished from Pierce's thoughts, and Lucius smiled. "Would you rather have me visit personally? I hear the Baron has developed a special interest in me."
Pierce had listened to Strucker describe restraints, laboratories, and superior outcomes. In every meeting, for the naive, Noctis was a specimen before he became a problem. Pierce had classified the ambition as suicidal before entering the estate, and the malice in Lucius's eyes reduced the remaining uncertainty to nothing. Strucker's days had acquired an expiration date.
"The sceptre would be a temporary loan?"
"Of course. I am a responsible shareholder and occasional hero. You may trust me with alien mind-control weapons."
"For how long would you require it?"
"Until I am finished."
Pierce lifted his glass but did not drink. Refusing would end the negotiation and might send Noctis to Sokovia before HYDRA moved anything worth saving. Agreeing surrendered its most valuable artefact to a man whose word became flexible whenever ownership improved. The four heads would object, but three of them were not in the room.
"I believe we can agree, Mr Noctis. We would like one thousand regular vials and two hundred enhanced vials. We can arrange the one and a half billion dollars in whatever form you prefer."
"Cash, delivered to the estate."
"That amount will require several deliveries."
"Then use several vehicles. Your organisation has hidden inside governments and built laboratories beneath cities. I refuse to believe it cannot organise a competent bank robbery."
Pierce allowed the insult to pass. "And the sceptre?"
"Delivered separately. If one of your people places it beneath a pile of money, damages it, and tells me the scratches were present before transport, I will find the quartermaster responsible."
"We will make the arrangements."
"Much better." Lucius swirled the amber liquid and watched the ice turn. "Anything else, Mr Secretary?"
"No, Mr Noctis. Thank you again for your time."
Pierce stood. The sitting-room door opened before he reached it, revealing the same two soldiers. Behind him, Lucius spoke with quiet satisfaction. "Do send the Baron my regards."
Pierce left without answering.
-
Steve Rogers found it difficult to believe that Nick Fury was proud of the machines.
The carrier frames filled the construction space below them, vast metal structures built around the new thrusters Stark Industries had supplied. Engineers and crews moved across exposed decks while machinery lowered another section into place. From the observation level, the people looked small enough to be forgotten.
Fury stood at the glass and spoke about coverage. Three carriers would be enough. Once Project Insight became operational, SHIELD would no longer have to wait for a threat to finish forming before it responded. The system would watch, position force where it was required, and give the world a degree of security no previous generation had possessed. Steve heard the pride beneath the briefing. Fury had found a way to keep a gun aimed at the head of humanity and called the result protection.
"You don't look impressed," Fury observed.
"You built three weapons to watch everyone on Earth."
"I built an answer to the next invasion."
"Those are not pointed at space."
Fury turned from the window. The patch made his expression harder to judge, but Steve had learned that uncertainty was often the point. "When the next threat comes, I want it found before another city becomes a battlefield."
"And until then?"
"Until then, they keep people alive."
The answer was true in the way Fury's answers usually were. It covered the immediate question and left every dangerous part in a sealed compartment.
Steve looked down at the nearest carrier. SHIELD had recovered him, given him work, and shown him a world he barely recognised. Lately, gratitude had become harder to separate from compliance.
Even visiting Peggy had not settled him. She had moved on, and her husband had been one of the soldiers Steve rescued, a man who received the years Steve lost and used them to build a life with her. Steve did not know whether to be happy that at least one of them had lived fully or angry that happiness could hurt so much.
Below, another armoured section locked into the carrier's frame. Fury watched the work with the confidence of a man who believed control could become trust if the machinery grew large enough.
Steve remained beside him, restless in a future that kept building weapons and asking him to call them peace.
-
Tony had progressed from designing a planetary security intelligence to educating one.
The difference mattered a lot. A design could be erased when it proposed something stupid. An intelligence had to learn why the proposal was stupid, preferably before it gained access to several hundred independent bodies and enough force to make governments irrelevant.
JARVIS handled the training environment while Tony reviewed the newest behavioural model. He had not given the intelligence a name. Naming unfinished work encouraged emotional attachment, and Tony had recently destroyed several dozen armoured examples of what emotional attachment did to storage space.
The three Project Insight carriers rotated above a separate display. Stark Industries' new thrusters had solved the lift problem, though Tony still considered Fury's promise of global coverage with only three platforms an act of optimism normally associated with cult leaders and unsuccessful start-ups.
It was not Tony's responsibility to cure Fury of delusions when he had his own. He studied the intelligence's latest response, rejected it, and leaned back from the console. "How long has it been since Lucius visited?"
"The interval has exceeded your patience, sir," JARVIS replied.
"That is the relevant measurement. Call him."
"Mr Noctis has not responded to your recent messages."
"That's why phones make noise."
The call connected on the fourth ring. Tony heard a woman laugh, another woman protest from farther away, and a sharp impact followed by Lucius swearing.
"Stop biting, you violent bitch."
Tony's mood deteriorated on principle. "You are a shareholder of Stark Industries, Lucius. I need you in the laboratory now."
"Fuck off, Tony."
"That is not an acceptable response to a fiduciary emergency."
"What is on fire?"
"Nothing is on fire yet."
"Who is dying?"
"No one is dying either."
"Then you do not have an emergency."
Another laugh came through the speaker. Lucius moved the phone, and a woman told him to put it down. Tony could hear at least three distinct voices. The bastard had found a harem while Tony was teaching a machine not to exterminate the world by accident.
Tony was in a relationship now, and he remained loyal to Pepper. That did not mean he should be denied an opportunity to reject an invitation with dignity.
"We have a shareholder vote."
"Call Pepper. She enjoys turning my proposals into board matters."
"She says this is not a shareholder matter."
"Then why did you call it a shareholder vote?"
"Because you ignored friendship."
"I was trying."
The line was filled with muffled movement. Someone bit Lucius again.
Tony raised his voice. "The laboratory temperature is disputed."
"Wear a jumper and stop complaining."
"The new thrusters require independent verification."
"They lift Fury's ugly boats. You already sold them, so your conscience is too late."
"The tower requires a security inspection by its second-largest shareholder."
"I am the largest shareholder with taste."
"That is not a recognised corporate category."
"Neither is whatever bullshit you called an emergency."
Tony looked at the unfinished intelligence on the main display and found a better justification. "I'm educating a new artificial intelligence. It needs exposure to catastrophic judgment."
Lucius went quiet for two seconds. "Use a mirror."
JARVIS placed a revised learning prompt on the screen. "The intelligence has already reviewed my decision history," Tony replied. "Yours exceeds the safe operating range of the model."
"Then improve the model. I am busy advancing interspecies diplomacy."
"I can not believe my good friend has become a zoophilic pervert!"
"They are Dark Elves, you mongrel. Oh my poor ears, what are they hearing."
On the back, Tony was still hearing the claps and moans and grunts and was becoming angrier. The bastard not only has his harem, but his harem of alien ladies as well. At least Tony thought of them as humanoid aliens.
"The Dark Elves," he started. "Do they have tentacles or arms and legs?"
"Wouldn't you like to know that," Lucius grunted as he thrust again.
"It seems your diplomatic relations have teeth."
"Dark Energy encourages aggression."
"Pepper encourages honesty, which brings us to your disclosure failure. Are company resources funding alien prostitutes?"
"They are not prostitutes, you jealous bastard."
"So you admit the aliens are receiving unreported benefits."
"They are my friends, which you would recognise if you had more."
"Friends with benefits are benefits, and benefits require a package. This is now a compensation review."
Lucius released a long breath. In the background, one of the women asked whether she could break the phone.
"No, love. Tony is using company property, so I may charge him for it."
"Come to the tower and file the charge."
"I will teleport you here and let them practise their magic on you."
Tony considered the offer for exactly as long as loyalty permitted. "I would refuse."
"Naturally."
"In person. With witnesses. It would be rude to reject another species over the phone."
"Pepper would kill you."
"Pepper trusts me to behave."
"Pepper trusts you would not stray. Different problem."
Tony glanced toward the laboratory entrance. "She also wants you present for an emergency board discussion about renaming the tower."
Silence replaced the laughter. "What discussion?"
"You should have answered your messages."
"Tony, do not fuck with me."
"Corporate governance waits for no orgy."
The call ended. JARVIS waited until the display confirmed the connection had been severed. "There is no scheduled board discussion concerning the tower's name, sir."
"There will be when he gets here."
"And if Mr Noctis discovers the discrepancy before arriving?"
Tony watched the empty space where the call had been. "Lock every door, JARVIS."