Technomancer in MCU #1

[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - I don't own anything. Please support the official release.

Chapter 44

Technomancer in MCU

Previously

"I know, right? I asked him the same thing when he first gave me the thing. Anyway, behold my latest creation." Throgg replied and then gestured towards the cube that began to open up, shrouding him and Throgg in an eerie yellow glow.

________________________________________________________________

–Frank Castle–

As soon as he saw a yellow glow coming out of an object that was termed dangerous by Throgg of all people, he nearly leaped to close the box immediately.

Breathing heavily, he nearly shouted at Throgg, "Are you mad? Don't you know the consequences of being in close proximity to that object? You might be thousands of years old and near immune to it but I am not, you genius."

He was truly mad this time.

Being slightly careless with your experiments with materials that were deemed too dangerous for humans but not for dwarfs, was one thing.

Playing with his safety and more importantly, the sanctity of his mind was a whole different beast altogether.

It was more than carelessness, it was a massive breach of his trust.

He thought that he could trust Throgg. He might be rough and coarse on the outside but anyone who has spent literal centuries in continuous war zones would obviously come out a little broken.

He stopped short of shouting further at Throgg when he saw a genuine look of hurt ghost over his face. But it was only for a moment and then his usual scowling face was back in full force.

Throgg then snatched the box from Frank's hands that he was barely lifting even after all his enhancements like it weighed barely anything at all.

"Do you think I'm a fool? Weren't you listening to what I said earlier? I said that I removed the psychic imprint that was present on the sceptre. So there is no bad influencing done by the mind stone on your mind. The sceptre was designed to do so, not the mind stone." Throgg said and jumped from the floating platform. He then began walking towards the exit without taking a look back, clearly upset at his actions.

He (Frank) sighed and floated down right behind him using the nanite package of his body armour.

"I am sorry for my outburst. But in my defense, I have seen the aftermath of people coming out of mind control and it is not pretty. The thing you are holding is pretty much the key to control all the minds of the universe and I guess, I overreacted a bit. I apologize but all I could think of at that moment was my kids reacting to my death because you can be damn sure that I would either kill the motherfucker who did that to me or die trying."

Something in his words must have struck a chord with Throgg for he stopped stomping forward, leaving hairline fractures in the glossy finish of the floor.

Granted it was the first layer and therefore, the weakest but Damn! Those prosthetics had some serious juice behind them.

But in the end, what could he expect from something that Alfred and Ed personally designed, before they got a full science team and therefore, someone to restrain them from their more outlandish programs? He still shuddered when he thought of the plan of killing Thanos using Pym particles and a suicide bomber of sorts (because no one could experience that and still come out with a will to live).

Throgg looked at him from the corner of his eyes and said, "Well, don't let it become a habit. I might like you more than the other mortals but the last person who talked to me like that and remained alive was Surtus. So you better watch your words."

Being threatened by someone who had no limbs and needed old age assistance was not an intimidating sight mainly because he knew of the diaper mode Throgg had Alfred built into his suit for him. But he couldn't deny that even in his old age, Throgg still had some juice left in him. Not to the level of a pure-blooded Royal Asgardian, but Dwarves too had the trait of growing stronger the older they were. It was just that they could exert that overwhelming strength for less and less time until such a time came that the exertion of their innate magical powers left them dead instead of bedridden or magically exhausted for a month.

He made a sealing motion in front of his mouth and said, "I heard you loud and clear. Now, will you tell me more about the artifact you are holding other than it being incredibly dangerous?"

Thorgg rolled his eyes at him as if mocking him for his totally justified paranoia.

As he had repeated multiple times to multiple people, he said, "It is not paranoia if they really are to get you and you know it."

Throgg didn't dignify that with a response but walked a bit ahead and placed the item on a table that became solid out of thin air due to the wondrous application of Hard Light technology. He then slapped the box that contained one of the six building blocks of the universe as if it were simply the hood of a truck that he was trying to sell to him.

His heart nearly leaped out of his throat at that.

The box opened up at his slapping and then an intricate mechanism sprung up from the box, showcasing two objects.

It was a small egg that glowed yellow, presumably the one that contained the mind stone, and a small smooth ball the size of a golf ball. It had streaks of yellow flowing through it, followed by orange streaks of energy that covered the entire surface of the ball.

He waited a while, running through the mind defense techniques he had learned in passing from the sorcerers of Kamar Taj, waiting for something to happen due to being in close proximity to the time stone.

But after a while, after not detecting anything, he stopped concentrating and looked back to Throgg who just gave him a disappointing look but went on to explain the artifact.

"So! This is something Ed commissioned from me personally. It was his first personal request so I couldn't exactly deny it but I am still a bit confused about its purpose. I was hoping you could enlighten me about it."

He nodded with a bit of uncertainty, "I can definitely try."

Throgg nodded and then said, "It has two specific functions. It is supposed to shut down the mind's functions and revert its memory age back some 70 years in your time period. The second function is to restore the memories that might have otherwise been repressed but to only do so in a detached manner as if the person was not experiencing it personally but only looking at it from a third perspective. Also, a slight enchantment to stop suicidal thoughts. Anything you can tell me about that because I didn't get a chance to ask Ed about it."

More like wouldn't ask Ed about it.

But the situation he was explaining about seemed pretty clear to him.

This was a perfect solution for Bucky Barnes, whenever he was cleared from his brainwashing.

He thought that while it didn't make much sense to make something this overkill for a mere super soldier but he wouldn't pretend to understand Ed's thoughts.

He only had a job to execute the ideas that Ed's mad brain cooked up.

"Well?" He looked up at Throgg's questioning.

"Uh, yeah, we have a high profile person to rescue who has been brainwashed for exactly 70 years to systematically murder good people, many of them were his friends. So, yeah, the ball is probably for that but I am still confused as to how a Ball of all things could be used on someone," he replied.

"Oh, that? Don't worry about that. Just pick up the ball and you'll know immediately." Throgg encouraged him to do so.

He hesitantly picked it up only to nearly drop it as it transformed from a ball to a band and then a knife, then a blunt knife.

It would seem that the magical properties of Uru could only truly shine in the hands of a Dwarf.

"See? Nice, right?" Throgg said enthusiastically.

He nodded.

"Great! Now, get out of here. I have work to do. Apparently, the people of Kamar Taj have a lot of old relics that they want to be upgraded or repaired. I don't have much time for this." Throgg grumbled and shuffled him out of his office space.

He dumbly nodded and went out to the hangar, holding the infinity stone egg in one hand and the band in another.

Today had indeed been a very bizarre day for him.

Sometimes, he missed the days when all he had to do was point at someone and blow their brains out.

He couldn't wait to go home and climb into his warm comfortable bed with his wife.

The one place where he could relax pretty much instantly and sleep comfortably.

________________________________________________________________

–Throgg–

Watching the most tolerable human he had met on this infernal planet leave, he thought of the day that led to his situation now.

But before he could delve deeper into his thoughts, he had one very important job to do.

He then joined his prosthetic hands together. The next moment, his hands began shining with a bright golden light as he began to float cross-legged in his office.

Soon, a golden magical circle manifested in front of him and it only continued to grow brighter. The symbols inside the circle began to rotate at a dizzying pace.

In fact, if anybody who was not mystically attuned to the likes of Odin, Ancient One or Frigga would find themselves drawn into the circle with their senses lost.

A thin sheen of sweat could be seen on Throgg's face as he concentrated on the spell in front of him with his eyes scrunched up.

It finally seemed to reach a crescendo as it had now shrunk down to the size of a fist. The circle then exploded, turning into a wave that flowed omnidirectionally.

He waited for any feedback from the spell but upon not finding any, he heaved a sigh of relief.

He had read so many horror stories of the damn AI that Frank had brought with him, he thought prudent of pruning all traces of any other AI other than Victor's from his workshop. They apparently had an entire channel dedicated to the crimes that Alfred commits on the daily.

After making sure that Alfred was well and truly gone, he pressed a button under his desk.

He waited a moment and heaved a huge sigh of relief when he heard, "Hello, sir. How may I be of service?"

Victor had been untouched by Alfred.

The circle was one part of a 2 part spell. It was a spell he created with the help of one of the more talented sorcerers of Kamar Taj, Kaecillius. He was a very helpful fellow, helping him without even asking.

The first part of the spell essentially recorded everything digitally in a location. Then the second part scanned the data from the same location and pruned all traces of anything that was not recorded in the first spell.

It was very helpful in this situation.

While not a very efficient spell by any means, it took nearly all of his mental concentration to do so but the complexity of the spell meant that even that AI, advanced as it was, couldn't bypass it.

Not to mention, he had heard that Alfred couldn't do much about the mystic arts for some reason. All the people he talked to were quite confused about that as he was very much adept in the topic of runes before. In fact, most of the spatial stab

Upon asking, the Ancient One was quite cryptic about her response, as she usually is.

"Nothing, Victor. Just go back to your duties. Operating the exoskeleton was very taking on these old bones. Just take over, will you?" he asked Victor, feeling rather exhausted by the happenings of the day.

"Surely, sir," Victor replied and immediately the legs and arms that were slouching, reflecting his mental state, straightened up.

"Ahhh, Much better," he said and groaned as he sat in his relaxing chair.

Mortals sure knew how to make the most comfortable cushions.

During his time as on Nidavellir, he hadn't even imagined that such comfortable cushions could exist outside of the Royal halls of Asgard. Vanaheim and Alfheim. Here, apparently, anybody with a little bit of coin could buy these.

He still didn't know if it was the right thing to do, allowing his services to be given out to Ed.

As a rule, if you wanted to leave Nidavellir for something, you could do so but with the knowledge that Asgard was watching and would strike you down if they found out that you were making high-tier weaponry for someone other than Asgard.

Making something with the energy of an infinity stone definitely fell into that category.

But then, he remembered how he had basically abandoned Nidavellir due to what it had become.

They were a proud species once, residing on their planetoid, not too dissimilar to Midgard.

They were independent contractors who made weapons for anybody who paid them money. Of course, weapons like Mjolnir were off the table for anyone outside of Dwarves.

Not that there were many dwarves capable of making weapons like Mjolnir even in that era.

Then came Bor Burison.

Oh, how he hated that wretched man.

The strongest Asgardian of his time, even surpassing the might of his brothers and father combined.

He came to Nidavellir, the true home of Dwarves, one day and demanded that they surrender and move to a place of Bor's choice and imposed a condition on them that the only people we would sell our high-tier weaponry to was Asgard and even then, all other weapon sales would be scrutinized by Asgard. Asgard would have the final say on all sales of weapons.

Predictably, everybody went into a huge uproar, him included but their king, King Durin III, bent the knee.

At the time, he was furious at the decision, and so were most of his brothers.

But when confronted, the sight of their King breaking down into tears was one of the things that had been seared into his memory. He explained to us the true intention of Bor asking for surrender with those unconditional terms. He expected the Dwarves to not bend their knee, to fight against Asgard, to start a war.

But what King Durin III did surprised Bor. He was expecting a battle, not a surrender at the moment, hence the reason he came personally to Nidavellir.

In the end, he had to admit that what King Durin III did was right.

How could he argue when he saw entire legions of the elite of the elite of numerous races being cut down like they were common grass?

Bor Borison was a warmonger, plain and simple. He saw that Nidavellir was the major supplier of weapons to most factions of the galaxy and sought to control that resource. King Durin III, saved the race by allowing Nidavellir to be relocated and allowing Asgard first access.

Of course, the surrender allowed King Durin III room for negotiation. That's how they got the Golden Forge of Nidavellir. That's how no Dwarf was sent to the frontlines to die, even if their main skill was not weapons manufacturing.

But he had grown disillusioned with the command back then and left Nidavellir. He didn't even tell anyone about his leaving and so, was basically stranded in the nine realms.

He then travelled throughout the nine realms, helping the natives with tools. Never did he even try to make real weapons, in fear of retaliation from Asgard. He could feel their watcher's gaze on him from time to time. He suspected the only reason Asgard didn't come crashing down on him with all their might was due to King Durin III's grace and the judicial use of his talents during his travels.

During his travels outside the nine realms, he heard of Bor's abdication to his son, Odin Borson. He had thought that with that warmonger off the throne and with the instability of a new king, Asgard would reduce their warmongering tendencies but that didn't happen.

Odin, somehow, was even stronger than Bor and managed to stabilise his rule very quickly.

Then, began the conquering. Odin and his daughter, Hela decided that the nine realms paying fealty to Asgard was not enough. They wanted every realm to formally surrender to Asgard and become its vassal states, just like Nidavellir was.

And so, war began. Odin and his daughter were nearly invincible on the battlefield. Together, with Asgard's army, along with some new additions like the Berserkers, Asgard had managed to conquer nearly all of the nine realms, save the Ginnungagap, due to its desolate nature, and Alfheim. He had thought that Alfheim was spared from the war engines due to the inherent peaceful nature of Light Elves and the advantage they had in their home realm.

So, to get some respite and maybe, help some of the refugees, he set up a camp in Alfheim.

Then, to add injury to salt, during one of his stays in Allheim, he got the news that they had declared war on Odin Borson due to his conquering ways.

He knew what fate was awaiting them then and there because he had seen with his own eyes the death and destruction his daughter had brought upon armies of invaders with the help of Mjolnir, a Dwarven-made weapon and she was supposed to be weaker than Odin.

Soon enough, he heard of Alfheim's defeat. Hela Odinsdottir had slaughtered half the population of Alfheim before she was stopped by Odin who was informed of the genocide by his council.

By the time Odin stopped Hela, sent her back and reached the capital, it was gone. Every single light elf had abandoned their realm. He had heard rumours about their King using his very lift force as fuel to open a gateway to a pocket dimension but he was never able to confirm that.

After that incident, Odin stopped his crazy daughter and did something that made everyone forget about her. Even he didn't remember her. The only reason the spell broke was because of his proximity to the mind stone and the band that he had used as a test on himself. He had never expected for there to be a mind spell on him.

After that, he got depressed and began to drink his sorrows away, more so than usual.

One fine evening, he found himself being approached by a group of ravagers who wanted to retrieve some alive demons from Muspelheim. The pay was good. It would have covered the tab at his usual bar.

He didn't want to go but he also didn't want his good friend's bar to go bankrupt.

So, he went along with the most notorious pack of pirates in the galaxy.

In hindsight, not a good idea.

He swiftly found himself being ambushed by them when he was tired from fighting all the demons.

Apparently, they were there to collect him instead of the fire demons.

Furious at their actions, he had swiftly slaughtered them but that had left him defenseless to the onslaught of the oncoming fire demon waves.

Even then, with a death wish, he had charged right into the incoming horde and after what felt like an eternity, managed to kill all of them at the price of an arm and leg.

Hobbling on one leg, he was about to lay down and wait to die, he heard a menacing laugh and turned to see one of the biggest fire demons, that wasn't Surtur, he had ever seen.

Back then, he had accepted his fate and just laughed in the fire demon's face, daring him to end his life so he could finally rest.

But Lady Destiny had other plans for him.

Somehow, Ed and Alfred had stumbled on their location as well. They were present on Muspelheim, cloaked in stealth to find some unique materials that could only be found in fire-rich areas.

Due to the disturbance he had created from his fight, they managed to find him and with a single shot from their ship's cannon, they killed the fire demon.

He still remembered the frantic mess that Ed was when he tried to help him and how in awe of Ed's powers he was back then.

They then brought him to Midgard of all places. And they didn't bring him to just Midgard, they brought him to Midgard's Sorcerers.

He must have looked so dumb when he met the Ancient One. He was still delirious from the pain but the thought of Midgardians having access to Magic was mindboggling for him.

They patched him up but couldn't save his limbs. He lost 2 limbs in the fight and 2 more to the demon infection.

They still could have saved the infected limbs but the Ancient One told him that the only ones alive who could do so were in Asgard.

He refused. He refused to go to the place that nearly destroyed the identity of Dwarves and destroyed the entire species, leaving multiple realms desolate.

He was still angry about the Light Elves incident.

His vehemence surprised many there except the Ancient One.

Alfred back then was pretty much a cold-blooded logical being and urged Ed to make sure that he survived so they could gain access to all the knowledge he had with him.

It was humiliating for a while but Ed managed to come up with a full prosthetic system for his lost limbs.

With the help of the masters of Kamar Taj, they managed to make the prosthetics just as good at using Magic as his old arms. He was honestly happy about the choice but he would never admit it to their face.

In return, he helped with Kamar Taj's artifacts and took occasional commission work from Ed.

He considered that as payment for his rescue.

"Sir? Sir? Sir?"

Victor's voice brought him out of his reverie. Victor was the VI that was installed at his behest into the base. He wasn't true artificial intelligence but he preferred it that way. Victor got the job done and didn't do any additional thinking. From the incidents he had heard, it was a good choice.

"Yes, Victor?" he asked.

"Sir, Master Wong from Kamar Taj is here to take you to Kamar Taj for the regular artifact work," Victor replied.

Ah, yes.

"Tell him I'll be there in a minute," he ordered.

"Very well, sir."


________________________________________________________________

Word Count - 3851

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[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - I don't own anything. Please support the official release.

Chapter 45

Technomancer in MCU

The Asterisk

–Ed–

I was working on the energy retention capabilities for the nano-sized N-reactor that Alfred was going to put in his body.

He didn't ask me to but recently, he has diverted a lot of resources to this project from other non-emergency projects.

Being the helpful buddy that I am, I volunteered to help him. I just waltzed into the lab where his body was being made.

It was still incomplete but the finished parts of the body were absolutely the best of the best.

It was a culmination of centuries of time-dilated original research from our organisation along with the amalgamation of technology 'borrowed' from multiple advanced civilisations from the outer cosmos.

To be honest, I was glad that he was finally focusing on his body rather than fruitlessly searching for a cure for my condition.

It would have been nice to see it through but defeating Thanos and making sure that Humanity thrives would be enough of a consolation prize, I guess.

The major parts of the body were already done but some of the auxiliary systems were taking longer than expected. Even then, they could have added those things as they went but then Alfred went ahead and added the magical ability stuff.

The weird thing was that Alfred had loaded all of the runic work on the Masters from Kamar Taj. Normally he would be thrilled to do all of that on his own but something had happened a while back.

Alfred had started acting weird since then. He stopped discussing the magical applications of runes with anyone. He would normally chatter off the Master of the Mystic Art's ears when it came to Runes.

"Ed?" a voice broke him out of his reverie.

"Yes?", he turned towards the person who asked him.

Normally, he would be pretty much left alone but as soon as he was found working in the lab, he would be approached by the junior engineers or the fresh joinees. Mostly, it would be due to a dare or maybe to satisfy some of their idle curiosity.

Today, however, was different as he was actually approached by Helen Cho of all people.

She was the head of the Bio-manipulation department.

Her work was invaluable when it came to reducing the rejection rates of the enhancement procedures for the Inhumans.

Her work was what allowed us to turn Daisy from a mid-level powerhouse to an absolute S-class monster or at least it will allow us to when Daisy becomes proficient enough with her powers that we can remove the final seal on her powers.

She was also responsible for making sure that the mish-mash of all the technology we were going to utilise for making Alfred's body didn't just turn him into a cancerous blob or worse, damage his personality matrix.

That would be disastrous.

We wouldn't need Thanos to kill off half of all Humanity then. Alfred would do the job just fine.

I would have preferred someone of Shuri's caliber when she was a little bit older to work on extracting Alfred's personality matrix and install it into the body but Alfred had become oddly obstinate regarding any delays pertaining to his body.

"Do you know what is going on with Alfred?" she asked me.

"What do you mean? I mean he has pushed this project up ahead of schedule but that is hardly a reason to worry, right?" I asked her back.

She shook her head, "I don't mean that. Um, How should I explain this? Just come with me."

I followed her to her office and was pretty startled when the first thing I saw in her office was Alfred's personality matrix and his source code just displayed openly on her desk for anyone to barge in and see.

"What the hell is this supposed to mean? I don't remember authorising this. Nobody and I mean, nobody is allowed to look at Alfred's source code. At least not until the final stages of the project. Shut it down immediately." I was extremely angered at what I was seeing and immediately, without thinking, activated my powers and hard shut down the access of the entire lab to the central servers.

I regretted that almost immediately as I felt a shock in my chest and started coughing out black blood immediately.

The suit started blaring and I could feel the suit's thrusters activating automatically.

I felt like I was going to die when even the CHI injections couldn't stop my coughing.

That was the last thing I remember before opening my eyes and seeing the conventional white ceiling of a hospital room.

Damn, what a depressing colour.

All the advancements we have made in the medical field and even now we are stuck with the standard white ceiling drab rooms.

My first order for Alfred now would be to change the colour of all hospital rooms to hot pink. Man, I must be delirious.

Speaking of Alfred, I had to call out for him. For the split second that I connected to the systems at the base, I found several anomalies that should not have been there.

Before I could do so, however, I could feel my eyes growing heavy.

Damn, what a drag.

________________________________________________________________

–Helen Cho–

When she saw Ed cough out blood in her office, she was sure that she was going to die.

Especially since she was the one who invited him to her office to show something that she was worried about.

And then, instead of listening to her, he freaked out when he saw that she had access to Alfred's source code and did something to cut off her access and then began coughing out black blood. That was a textbook sign of poisoning.

And what was up with Ed not knowing that she had access to Alfred's source code? Alfred had assured her multiple times that Ed was the one who had granted her exclusive access to his source code so she could go over the personality matrix and source code to prepare for the eventual transfer to his body.

She still counted herself lucky that she was only confined to the hospital ward and not in a straight jacket and on her way to some top-secret prison that Ed kept to lock up the most violent of criminals.

She was going to ask Alfred about Ed's situation again when she heard a clicking sound and then she felt something cool and hard press against her neck.

And then someone said in the most menacing voice she had ever heard in her entire life, "Give me one good reason why I shouldn't blow your brains out for what you've done?"

Terrified for her life, she stiffened and couldn't move her lips.

He shoved her forward and shouted, "Tell me!"

She turned around to see Commander Frank, the one with the highest authority on the base with a team of soldiers behind him.

The normally gentle Maria was also there, looking at her with an ice-cold gaze. She never thought it would be possible for Maria to look at anyone like that, let alone her.

Gulping, she raised her hands and stammered, "Uh–u-Ahem, I don't know. You have to believe me, please. I don't know what happened to Ed. If I had kno–"

"We know what happened to Ed. We are asking you what you did to Alfred?" Maria interrupted her and asked in a frosty voice.

"Wh–What? Alfred? What do you mean?" she asked, absolutely confused by Maria's question.

Frank advanced towards her with his gun aimed at her face only to halt when Maria placed a hand on his shoulder.

Maria then said, "Daisy, report please?" She asked Daisy, the rising star in the combat list, for something.

Daisy came forward and started reading from her tablet, "The last time somebody spoke to Alfred and he gave out an answer was last night. Many of the advanced functions of the base like the Danger Room have stopped functioning altogether and many other functions are now operating at suboptimal efficiency."

Daisy then glared at her, clearly accusing her of doing something with Alfred.

She spoke out, "What do you mean by that? I have been speaking with Alfred today during the project. Sure, the responses were a bit robotic but he assured me that his main partition was busy some–"

Frank glared at her and said, "Alfred's main partition is not just busy it is missing from the base."

"Yes, and the one you spoke to was one of the hundreds of VI that Alfred made to run the base before leaving somewhere," Maria said.

"So, I will ask you once again. What did you do? Because the logs clearly show the last person to speak with Alfred was only you and nobody else." Frank threatened her.

She started crying, "I don't know, alright? I don't know how to prove it. I have done nothing but work on the project I was assigned to. Alfred was the one who assured me that Ed had approved my access to his source code. And I was the one who approached Ed with the intention to actually confirm it because it seemed fishy to me. You ha–"

"I don't fucking care, alright? What matters now is that all of our operations are in jeopardy and the one person who could explain is in a medically induced coma in the room behind me and guess whose fault is that?" Frank thundered out.

Frustrated at her replies, he ordered, "Guards, take her. Make sure she doesn't step out of her quarters until this mess is sorted out. I'll be there soon. We need some answers."

'Wa–Wait, you can't do this to me. I didn't do anything wrong." Her cries fell on deaf ears as the guards used hard light technology to project a bubble around her which isolated her voice from outside.

Then they effortlessly lifted her and took her out of the hospital ward.

The last thing she saw before the doors closed as she banged her fists on the bubble wall was the cold hard eyes of Daisy and Maria.

The doors of the bubble closing felt like the death knell of her career in the organisation.

________________________________________________________________

Word Count - 1730

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[Spearow]

thats like, ultron all over again

 

[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - I don't own anything. Please support the official release.

Chapter 46

Technomancer in MCU

Previously

'Wa–Wait, you can't do this to me. I didn't do anything wrong." Her cries fell on deaf ears as the guards used hard light technology to project a bubble around her which isolated her voice from outside.

Then they effortlessly lifted her and took her out of the hospital ward.

The last thing she saw before the doors closed as she banged her fists on the bubble wall was the cold hard eyes of Daisy and Maria.

The doors of the bubble closing felt like the death knell of her career in the organisation.

________________________________________________________________

–Daisy Johnson–

Never in a million years did she think that Alfred would be the one that would leave Ed's side even for a second. Especially since she learned the truth of Ed's condition and how dependent he was on Alfred's help for his day-to-day tasks.

That day was truly eye-opening.

The very fact that someone as overwhelmingly powerful as Ed could be so vulnerable.

That was the day she realised the true worth of her powers. The heavy burden that was placed on her shoulders as the one who was stronger than others.

It was soul-crushing, the burden.

Looking at Ed now, she couldn't fathom how he shouldered that much weight while building everything. All the while making sure that no one knew of his true condition.

It explained why someone like Frank would defer to Ed and even respect him immensely as a person.

Explained how the Ancient One, someone who is a million years older mentally than even the oldest human, joined someone who was barely an adult.

Now looking at the tablet that showcased the empty data pipelines that operated the entirety of the base, she felt hollow.

Weird.

She never thought that she would miss Alfred, that little hellion, of all people. Guess people do make an immense impact on other people without even knowing about it.

"Daisy, what is the status of the agents currently on Earth?" The Commander in Chief, Frank, asked her.

She subconsciously stood a bit straighter and replied, "I've recalled all the agents who could be recalled and reviewed the ones who said that they couldn't be recalled at a critical stage and have made the appropriate arrangements should their missions go awry. Multiple backup teams have been allotted to every single critical asset on the planet."

She rattled off everything she knew of the incident yet.

She was apparently made the secretary of Frank. Frankly(pun intended), he had no need of any secretary and neither did most people on the base as Alfred filled that role better than any human ever could.

So, here she was, an S-class combatant taking on the role of personal assistant.

"Good, make sure that everybody is accounted for. Once lost, things can be retried, People cannot be. Remember that." Frank nodded and said to her, absolutely seriously.

She nodded seriously.

It felt like he was training her to be his replacement or something.

Like she would want that hellish position ever.

But it truly was a massive undertaking.

She never truly understood the true scope of the organisation before. Once Frank logged in with his emergency credentials and took charge of the whole base's systems and handed in access of the entire organisation to her, only then did she realise the sheer area that the organisation kept a watch on at all times.

At first, she held the tablet like it was the most precious thing in the world, and in a way, it actually was. But now, she was fine with it.

When she saw the list of missions that were going on the planet and the ones that were scheduled off-world, she felt that living in her previous ignorance was truly blissful.

For God's sakes, they actually had a prison near the sun. It only held a single criminal for some reason. To sate her curiosity, she tried to access that information but for some reason, even Frank doesn't have access to that information.

"Also," she looked up at that, "Any updates on Alfred?" Frank asked her.

She shook her head sadly.

Whatever Alfred had done, he had done it in a way nothing could track him.

Frank nodded and said, "Of course. He was the one who built all our tools. There is no way we could track him that way."

He then appeared to be in deep thought.

She was about to ask about it when her tablet beeped.

She hurriedly looked towards it and sighed in relief when it was just a confirmation regarding the safe storage of the energies of the Infinity Stones.

Honestly, she didn't even want to know what the hell kind of stone an Infinity Stone was.

No sir.

She had enough nightmare material as is.

"Honey, why don't we go to the Avengers? Surely Stark could help?" She looked up at the question that Maria was asking Frank.

She thought about it and while it seemed like a sound idea on paper. The reality was a different thing.

And she was right as she could see Frank shake his head.

"There is no way we can let anyone know about the condition of Ed. It might not seem like it but various hidden communities stay hidden because of Ed and us. And we are only as powerful as we are due to Ed, and by extension, Alfred. In one fell swoop, we have lost one of our strongest assets and nearly lost our leader. We cannot let anyone get even a whiff of weakness from us. It would be disastrous and would undo nearly all the work Ed has done with his soft diplomacy to make sure that the supernatural community is not hunted down by anyone and in return, humans are not treated as fodder by the supernatural community." He took a deep breath at the end of his tirade.

She interjected there and said, "He's right, you know."

Both of them looked at her. She was slightly afraid but she soldiered on and said, "I-I don't know much but from what I am seeing, we are truly responsible for actually policing a lot of supernatural communities on the planet. No personnel have been evacuated from these communities as they are designated as such in the system. In fact, I have reinforced these locations with multiple teams equipped with beyond clearance level weaponry."

Frank nodded at her approvingly, impressed by her decision to send overwhelming firepower where it might be needed.

He lived by that code.

Maria then threw her hands up and started pacing in the observation room, "Fine! We won't call the freaking Avengers. What about Wakanda? They ought to have someone who could help us track Alfred or at least help take reinforce places we cannot reach."

Before Frank could reply, she shook her head and said, "Won't work."

She continued when Frank nodded at her, "Alfred knows Wakanda's systems in and out and according to the files I have, Shuri of the Golden Tribe would grow to become even smarter than Stark but that is still years away. Not to mention that exposing Wakanda to our operations would just increase their threat levels and beyond that, we don't need reinforcement anywhere. We are self-sufficient enough in that regard."

She gulped to moisten her dry throat.

Maria looked at her sideways and said, "When did you become an expert in international geopolitics? It's impressive that you managed to acquaint yourself with the organisation's structure so quickly."

Happy at the praise, she happily rattled off, "Oh, it's nothing I haven't seen before. Alfred used to make me take special tests as blackmail in which I had to face similar situations with even less information and he used to be absolutely brutal when it came to checking the answers. So, I had to look up all the stuff he was testing me on and prepare for the next blackmail exam."

Frank and Maria shared a smiling look at that.

________________________________________________________________

–Frank Castle–

They both shared a look at that.

It was almost as if Ed and Alfred noticed something in her and decided to nurture that quality in her by training her and leading her on that path.

He couldn't believe that Ed chose Daisy of all people to succeed him.

It did make sense to train her just in case but for her need to arise so soon must have been unexpected for both Ed and Alfred.

But looking at her rattling-off orders on her comms, he could see that she would definitely grow into her role very easily.

It was very surprising.

The one who tried to skip training the most and yet, she was the one who stepped up when it counted.

"Commander, sir, uh-um, it was about the superclass carrier," Daisy asked him.

She had his full attention as soon as she mentioned their flagship super weapon.

"What about it?" he commanded her.

"Sir, the N-reactor has stopped working. The backup reactors have kicked in but the crew is concerned about the absence of their flagship weapon."

He internally sighed in relief at that, "Don't worry about that. The N-reactors are built in such a way that they would stop working and extinguish themselves instantly as soon as they stop getting a specific signal from Alfred that only he knows."

Daisy's face grew pale at that, "Bu-But then, now we are left without our trump card. What if something happens? What if the Ravagers decide to come now or-or what about Ego? What if he notices somet–"

Maria held Daisy's shoulders and said, "Honey, Honey Deep Breaths. Do not worry. Nobody will invade Earth at this time and we still have the Avengers who can help us. Remember, we are never truly alone."

Daisy nodded at her. Maria then continued, "Now, why don't you go ahead and have some coffee? You look like you need it. Take a break while you are at it. We will be here when you come back. Alright?" She said while also taking the tablet from Daisy.

Daisy nodded and left the ward with silent steps.

He was about to praise his wife for handling the situation calmly when she whirled on him with a face full of panic as soon as Daisy left.

"What are we going to do, Frank? The kids are still on Earth? We have to find Alfred soon?" She started rambling in panic.

He held her shoulders in a reassuring gesture and said, "Look, Look at me! Nothing is going to happen. Alfred hasn't abandoned us. He will be back soon. Not to mention, Ed will be up soon and the situation will go back to normal soon. Trust me."

She shrugged off his hands and said, "To hell with that. Call the Avengers. I don't care if they find out about Ed's condition. I just want Ed and the kids to be safe."

Then she started crying.

This time, he sighed audibly.

It was going to be a long day. At Least until Ed woke up.

________________________________________________________________

Word Count - 1865

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I already have up to 9 extra chapters uploaded there.

P.S. - Chapter release sheet

 

[CrimsonIR]

Alfred impatient rushed job makes things quite difficult huh, poor Ed. Thanks for the update!

 

[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - I don't own anything. Please support the official release.

Chapter 47

Technomancer in MCU

Previously

She shrugged off his hands and said, "To hell with that. Call the Avengers. I don't care if they find out about Ed's condition. I just want Ed and the kids to be safe."

Then she started crying.

This time, he sighed audibly.

It was going to be a long day. At Least until Ed woke up.

________________________________________________________________

Onboard the Superclass Carrier

– Elena "Yo-Yo" Rodriguez–

As soon as she heard that something had happened to both Ed and Alfred and the organisation was calling back everyone on non-essential duties, she called her superior which was not easy as everybody in her chain of command was swamped with work as they had to do nearly everything manually without Alfred's help now and asked to be transferred back.

It was a good thing that she was on the Commander's personal team before her current stint so her request was approved immediately.

Due to safety reasons, they had shut down nearly all teleportation pads throughout the bases, and the ones that were allowed to function were strictly used for transferring supplies rather than people.

So, she had to take the long route and come to the Asterisk on a ship.

She had to go through a thorough screening at the Superclass carrier orbiting Earth after exiting Earth's atmosphere.

"So, security's gotten pretty tight, huh?" she asked the security agent, trying to make small talk.

The only thing she received was silence as the agent continued to scan her for the nth time.

"I'm clean, alright? For god's sake, I was on the Commander's personal team. That has to count for something." she snapped at the agent taking her sweet time clearing her.

Couldn't the agent see that she was in a hurry?

Unphased by her outburst, the agent replied, "I am sorry, mam. Who you were before doesn't matter. Orders from the higher-ups."

She waved her hands at the agent, indicating her to get it over with.

Finally, after an agonizing 30 minutes that the agent took with the process, she exited the security chamber and rushed to the hangar for the ship that regularly ferried between the carrier and the base.

But upon reaching the hangar, she could see exactly zero ships present.

Shocked at this as she had never seen this scene before, she turned around and hurried to the hangar captain's office.

She banged on the captain's door multiple times before a person with extremely disheveled clothing exited the cabin.

"Wha–What do you –Yawn—want?" he asked me, clearly out of it.

"What happened to the ships? I need to reach Asterisk as soon as possible. Is there any way I can get out here right now?" she asked him.

"Hmm?" As soon as he heard her question, something in his demeanor changed instantly. Where before she could only peg him as an administrative type agent, now, he was giving off really dangerous vibes to her.

He was registering as a huge threat to her senses right now.

But how could that be?

The number of people that could be a threat to her could be counted on both hands and you'd still have a couple fingers left.

But as soon as the feeling came, it went away as he took a good look at her.

"Oh, it's you? I remember you. Weren't you the one who had to be pried off the winner of the last rookie combat tournament? Now, I remember you. Man, I had a blast watching that tournament." he said while laughing at her.

She gritted her teeth at the humiliating reminder.

It was the last knockout match of the annual rookie event that the organisation had for every department.

Being from the Commander's personal unit, she and Daisy were both expected to compete with anyone who would challenge them. And they did.

After defeating almost a dozen combatants, Daisy and she had been the only combatants standing, as expected. Then they were told to compete against each other in their near-exhausted states.

That was a dream come true for her. Due to the nature of her powers, Daisy would always have an upper hand against her but when competing with their tanks completely empty, she had a good chance of defeating Daisy.

She was looking forward to finally beating Daisy up when that bitch cheated at the final moment and won. She may or may not have gotten a little frustrated at that and fought with her in the arena itself after that.

"Can you or can you not get me there?" she snapped at him.

He raised his hands in mock surrender and said, "Sure, sure. I'll get you there. After all, you are one of the vaunted members of the personal hit squad of Commander Castle."

Why did she get the feeling that he was mocking her for that?

She shook her head. It didn't matter what he thought of her as long as he got her to the base.

She looked towards the agent only to see him halfway across the hall.

Hurriedly following him, she caught up to him and said, "Where are we going? The hangar is in the opposite direction."

He laughed and said, "Ha! You think you'll get any ship right now? Dream on. Everything and I mean, everything is on strict lockdown right now. Short of getting personal orders from the commander, you won't get any space-capable ship that could pass Earth's atmosphere. Hell, the captain has given the weapon holders blanket orders to make sure that no spacecraft breaches the upper atmosphere and if they do, shoot them down with extreme prejudice."

A chill ran down her spine at that.

"Is the situation truly that serious? I mean, I am sure Alfred would come back and things would go back to normal soon enough?" she said to him hesitantly.

He looked at her weirdly as if to say that she was stupid for saying that, "You are living in delusion if you think that is the truth. Forget it, here's your only way off the ship. At least, until we get new orders from the Asterisk."

He said while gesturing to one of the standard issue nanite packages she had seen the spacewalkers use.

She looked at him with a nervous smile, "Y-You are kidding, right? Because there is no way in hell that that piece of garbage would survive in the vacuum of space, let alone take me to the Asterisk."

He shrugged and said, "You asked me for a way and there you have it, the only way off the carrier. The rest is up to you." He then turned around and started leaving the airlock space.

She looked at the extremely basic nanite package and thought of the situation that must be unfolding at the Asterisk. She then exhaled loudly and said, "Wait!"

He turned his neck towards her and moved it up and down in a 'what?' gesture.

"C-Can you come with me?"

He raised an eyebrow at that and then, after some internal deliberation, said, "Eh, Why not? Let's go."

"Wait, really?" she asked him in astonishment.

"Uh, huh" he said as a suit started to form over his clothes.

Her eyes narrowed as she took a look at his suit.

It was the captain suit, issued to only 19 individuals to date, including her. Unfortunately, she had to surrender her suit as part of the security checks at the entrance of the carrier. They were very strict about that.

Something about seizing any and all space-ready vehicles of transport.

Then how did he get his hands on one?

Before she could question him about that though, he threw something at her she embarrassingly started flailing about as the airlocks opened up.

Amid the red sirens that rang throughout the cabin, he pushed her flailing body into the cold vacuum of space.

Bracing for the coldness of space, she opened her eyes in surprise as instead she felt the familiar warmth of her nanite suit.

"Welcome back, Agent Yo-Yo", came the comfortingly familiar voice of her VI from the suit.

She sighed in relief at that but soon narrowed her eyes and looked around for the bastard who pushed her through the airlock before her suit had finished forming around her.

Not finding him anywhere in her sight, she instead switched to her HUD and found the bastard already on his way to the Asterisk.

"Victory, chart a course to the Asterisk at the highest speed please," she commanded Victory, her personal VI.

"At once, Agent Yo-Yo" came the reply and with that, her suit accelerated immensely as was indicated by the numbers going up on her HUD.

She soon caught up to that bastard but gritted her teeth as he mockingly saluted her and entered the Asterisk's hangars before her, all the while we were being hailed by a bunch of raptors that told us in no uncertain terms, to land in the designated zone or pretty much die a horrible death.

Upon landing, she found him nowhere in sight.

Finding herself in a hurry, she just told the nearby agents to be on the lookout for that man and hurried towards the medical bay.

She had to make a quick stop at the security station to get her temporary badge working but she was soon running through the hallways of the base's VIP medical wing.

Soon, she found herself entering the ward where Ed was being kept.

Of course, she couldn't even imagine gaining access to Ed right now but she could meet Maria, Frank, and most importantly, Daisy there.

"Maria!" She called out as she ran and hugged Maria.

"Elena!" she cried out in reply.

"Agent Yo-Yo, how did you get here? I thought that all space travel between the Earth and Asterisk was banned by my order." Frank questioned her sternly as soon as she disengaged from Maria's hug.

"Ah, don't sweat the small stuff, Commander. I thought it prudent to personally escort a high-value asset to the base. You know, for safekeeping." Replied an infuriatingly smug voice from behind her.

She turned around only to see the bastard.

Frank gave a tired sigh at that and said, "Eric, I thought I taught you better than that. Now is not the time to start acting in an immature manner."

"W-Wait, you know him?" she questioned Frank.

He leveled a confused look at her in return and after taking one look at Eric, Frank shook his head and said, "He is the captain of the superclass carrier. You wouldn't have reached Asterisk alive if he wasn't with you."

She turned towards Eric, her eyes wide and unblinking.

Then, Eric had the gall to actually bow at her and say, "At your service, madam."

She was going to kill him.

________________________________________________________________

Word Count - 1819

If you guys would like to read ahead, you can head on to my Patreon.

I already have up to 9 extra chapters uploaded there.

Author Note

So, huh. What can I say?

I guess the hands wanna type what they wanna type.

I had an entire plotline ready for this chapter and somehow, I created an important role for Elena when there wasn't one and also created an OC with that.

Truly, our brains work in mysterious ways.

Anyways, see you guys in the next episode of Dragon Ball-*COPYRIGHT STRIKE*

Ahem, this will connect with the plotline, you'll see.

Please have patience with this poor author. My brain doesn't cooperate with me on the best of days let alone these days with 9 hour workdays which is more like 11 hours with the commute added.

I'll have your chapter delivered to you as soon as I can.

Toodles!

 

[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - I don't own anything. Please support the official release.

Chapter 48

Technomancer in MCU

Previously

He leveled a confused look at her in return and after taking one look at Eric, Frank shook his head and said, "He is the captain of the superclass carrier. You wouldn't have reached Asterisk alive if he wasn't with you."

She turned towards Eric, her eyes wide and unblinking.

Then, Eric had the gall to actually bow at her and say, "At your service, madam."

She was going to kill him.

________________________________________________________________

–Frank Castle–

"Where could he have gone?" Maria asked herself as she continued to pace in the visitor's room in the VIP medical ward.

He chose to not reply to that question, not wanting to light that particular fire.

"Do you think he abandoned us for some reason?" Maria turned to him, unshed tears in her eyes.

His eyes softened as he immediately closed the distance between them and hugged her.

He knew that Alfred's absence was particularly hurtful for Maria since she considered Alfred one of her kids. It was evident in the way they interacted with each other and the reverence that Alfred held for Maria and the obsession Alfred had with the safety of Maria and even his kids.

Even he thought that Alfred would go overboard in some situations.

Suddenly, Maria ended the hug and started pacing again, "Shouldn't we call the Ancient One then? She knows everything already. So, no harm will be done if we call her here."

He sighed and replied, "Honey, she already knows. Probably knew about it in advance years ago. The only reason she wouldn't be here was if she thought that this was the best way forward in the hundreds of scenarios she must have foreseen. No point in calling her now."

A golden portal opened up in front of Frank and a rolled-up mini scroll fell from it.

He gestured to the scroll as if telling Maria - 'See, I told you so' and then picked it up while shaking his head exasperatedly," Let's see what it is."

He read the document and scoffed under his breath immediately.

"What is it?" Maria asked him.

"See for yourself." he offered the scroll to her.

She took it and read it, "Quite Astute, Mr.Castle. Yes, you are correct in your assumptions."

She sighed as all the energy left her as she seemingly ran out of all her options.

He sighed and said, "Don't worry too much about it. Alfred will return, I know it in my heart. You know it too so stop needlessly stressing about it."

He said so but he was incredibly worried about the situation on the inside.

Nearly all of the advanced operations of all their bases on Earth and even off-world were taken care of by Alfred almost exclusively.

Almost zero people knew how to operate the more advanced tech that Alfred had incorporated into the newer bases.

He couldn't even begin to comprehend the know-how of using the Danger Room.

It was fortunate that almost none of the agents(save for the contractors they hired from other species) were off-world and in the middle of an operation.

Almost all operatives were present on Earth when they initiated the recall of non-essential personnel.

Aside from the exception of Agent Yo-Yo reaching the Asterisk (which he will be having words with Eric about), no one had managed to breach Earth's atmosphere.

Nobody on Earth knew about it but the planet was effectively on a space lockdown.

The next were the coordination systems between the bases and the different military assets that each base had. Alfred had managed to create something truly revolutionary in terms of creating a system that could effectively use each and every asset they had whilst accounting for downtime and Staffing issues.

Alfred did leave multiple VIs responsible for the smooth running of the multiple departments but they fell incredibly short of the required goal since all the systems were built from the ground up with the assumption that a single entity would be running everything simultaneously. The VIs started breaking down within hours of Alfred leaving and within 12 hours, almost all AI-dependent functions were functionally unusable within all the bases.

They already had to quarantine some of Alfred's personal labs that were fully automated as they had no idea what was inside the labs and what procedure was to be followed in case of such an incident.

It was worrying how, as an organisation, how dependent they were on Alfred.

He would have to rectify that as soon as Ed or Alfred returned to operational capacity. It galled him to leave such an incredible weakness to the overall operations of the organisation.

He would have to talk to Ed about it when he decides to wake up.

He was discussing Ed's condition with Maria and how to break it to their children who were on their way to the bunker in New Jersey. They loved and adored Ed and Alfred. Especially Alfred since he is an ever-present friend in their lives.

It was astonishingly easy to establish an armoured area just outside the suburbs of New Jersey where they had carved out a whole emergency base since according to Ed, New York seems to be the host for most world-ending events, and from what he has seen till now, he agreed with Ed.

The city was a hotspot for villains, megalomaniacs and madmen hell-bent on world domination. According to Alfred, something ancient and evil must be buried under the city for it to be so cursed.

Of course, ancient evil or not, the enhanced activity in the city was being monitored by the organisation and being actively curbed by the agents permanently stationed there.

In fact, over half of all exotic dangerous artifacts they have in the vaults are courtesy of the various dangerous people that roamed the streets(and sometimes below) of New York.

Thinking of the dangerous activities that always seemed to happen around New York and Maria's propensity to go full ballistic when it came to her kids, he was about to cautiously ask Maria to take a ship and go to the base in New Jersey to be with the kids when the door opened and someone barged in unceremoniously.

He looked over to give whoever it was a piece of his mind only to stop midway when he saw Elena "Yo-Yo" come through the door.

He watched in silence as his wife hugged Elena.

Before they could start talking in their own little world, he asked Elena, "Agent Yo-Yo, how did you get here? I thought that all space travel between the Earth and Asterisk was banned by my order."

Instead of Elena, it was answered by someone who he didn't expect to see on the base at all, "Ah, don't sweat the small stuff, Commander. I thought it prudent to personally escort a high-value asset to the base. You know, for safekeeping."

He didn't believe that reason one bit. Eric was here for some other reason.

He sighed and replied, "Eric, I thought I taught you better than that. Now is not the time to start acting in an immature manner."

He watched on as Elena was shocked when he mentioned Eric's station.

He had the unnerving habit of being incredibly unpredictable and that instead of his enhanced abilities made him incredibly dangerous. Even Ed was against his posting but relented when he vouched for Eric's credibility. He had spent years with Eric in the army before and powers or no powers, he could recognise loyal people when he saw them.

Before he could make any more of a scene though, he cleared his throat and said, "Eric, why don't you escort Elena to Daisy's quarters and report to the security booth for duty while you are here. Wouldn't want to waste another useful asset now, would I?" He smirked at Eric's face tightening.

"Yes, commander." Eric saluted and left after herding Elena out of the room against her wishes.

He was about to advise Maria to go after them as well when his watch began beeping loudly.

His and Maria's eyes widened as they realised what it meant. They immediately rushed to Ed's medical ward, joined by multiple doctors and nurses on their way.

Opening the door, he came face to face with Ed in his medical gown trying to get up.

"Easy! Easy! What are you doing? You shouldn't even be up right now." he said while pushing Ed back on the bed.

It was alarmingly easy as Ed's exoskeleton seemed to have no strength to it. That spoke volumes about Ed's mental status since according to his little knowledge about Ed's body suit, it had a backup program that worked according to Ed's mental commands but its strength was dependent on the strength of the mind piloting it.

It was salvaged from faulty mind control tech purchased on Knowhere by some of their procurement agents way back. It still had some of the original flaws but Alfred had managed to remove all of the fatal side effects.

With the sheer prowess of Ed's mind, the only way that the program would register a low mental strength level would be if Ed was feeling incredibly low or sad.

He fell back as the Doctors started checking the various readings available to them through the smart bed.

One of the nurses did something and raised the bed level, making Ed sit in an upright position.

Soon the doctors declared that outside of extensive testing that has been forbidden in his medical files, they won't be able to assess the true damage done to his body.

Forbidden?

What did the doctor mean?

He was about to ask the doctor what he meant by that but he stopped when he saw the look of calm acceptance on Ed's face.

He knew that look and it never meant anything good for the people involved.

"You know why, don't you? You know why he left," he asked or rather told Ed with absolute certainty.

Ed nodded at that but didn't say anything about that.

"Doctor, you have my permission to override the lock on Ed's medical files," he ordered the Doctor and gave him his badge for authentication. The doctor nodded and tried to access the file only for it to flash red and destroy itself.

"Won't work," he heard Ed whisper, almost to himself.

He then seemed to come to a decision and sighed, "Doctor, can you please give us a moment? I'll tell you how to access my file later on."

The doctor opened his mouth to object only to stop when Ed said, "Please". The doctor nodded and left the room, locking the door behind him.

"Can you please tell me what is going on, Ed? Because your actions are not making a ton of sense here," he asked Ed, desperate for some answers at this point.

Ed smiled a sad smile at us and said, "I'm dying, that's why."

He deadpanned at Ed and said, "We know that, Ed. And we will find a cure for your condition. We want to know why Alfred chose to leave now, at this critical stage in our plans?"

Ed coughed, shook his head, and said, "You don't understand Frank. I'm not dying in a couple of years."

His eyes widened in realization as Ed continued, "It's only a matter of months before my body gives out."

Maria gasped as she began sobbing.

"You don't know that," he said to Ed, in denial of Ed's statement.

Ed said, "I do know. For the split second I was connected to our servers, I was able to find out that for the first time in his entire existence, Alfred's main partition had left the base's servers and the one present in the servers was just a temporary partition that would have broken down in a matter of hours. Upon further digging, I found his encrypted files where he kept the real updates on my health condition. Participating personally in the Battle of New York probably shaved off years off my life that I didn't exactly have. I understand now why Alfred was so adamant about me resting inside the base."

He staggered back at the news and then swiftly left the room, uncaring of Maria's shouts.

He had to get away from there.

From the place that signified the death knell of his saviour and leader.

And he had a job to do.

He had to find Alfred before he did something he would regret in his quest to save Ed.

________________________________________________________________

Word Count – 2113

If you guys would like to read ahead, you can head on to my Patreon.

I already have up to 9 extra chapters uploaded there.

Chapter release sheet

 

[Brian the dor]

This sickness should not be a main story focus

 

[CrimsonIR]

This sickness should not be a main story focus

Click to shrink...

On contrary i think it probably should because that's the only real drawbacks of his godlike abilities

Thanks for the chapter!!

 

[readsalot]

Great chapter, looking forward to how Frank will find Alfred.

Pretty much the only person who find anyone, anywhere would be Frank Castle 'The Punisher'

 

[raveniod]

Not a fan of what happened with Shuri. She's already very 'special snowflake' so adding mystic powers on that...

Shrug, just not my cup of tea.

I also kinda regret the idea of going for 'gold' for the new panther, which as a metal... well, it's not useless, but you'll probably admit that 'expensive' and 'gaudy' are more probable adjectives than most.

Thanks for sharing your story

Click to shrink...

I can agree with gold thing. It would of been better to go with jaguar of wakanda as black panthers is just another name for black leopards/jaguars.

 

[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - I don't own anything. Please support the official release.

Chapter 49.1

Technomancer in MCU

Previously

He had to get away from there.

From the place that signified the death knell of his saviour and leader.

And he had a job to do.

He had to find Alfred before he did something he would regret in his quest to save Ed.

________________________________________________________________

–Ed–

I sighed internally as Frank left the room, uncaring of Maria calling for him to come back.

In a way, I could understand his mindset.

Ever since I saved his family from that dreadful day, he had done everything I ever asked of him. In a way, he pledged his loyalty to me that day.

Not only his own loyalty but over the years, he found me multiple good men who, upon enhancement, have become some of the best operatives.

Some of them even ran some of the ships with the biggest guns in the organisation. It wouldn't be wrong to say that should Frank choose to do so, he could have a significant portion of the organisation's key military assets siding with him. His contribution to the operations side of the organisation couldn't be denied.

That was why I felt incredibly guilty whenever I thought of the day I met him. Over the years, I had thought of telling him the truth of that day. Of the fact that I had deliberately allowed the scenario to happen in a way that was most favourable for me but I always chickened out at the last moment. That I had allowed, even for a second, Maria and the kids to be in danger for my own benefit. I had justified it to myself back then with the reason that in the end, it would give them a much better life than they would have had in canon but over the years I have accepted it for what it was.

Over the years, as Frank grew into the role of Commander, he must have realised the truth of the incident that day even if I made sure that there was nothing incriminating in the files but Frank was not someone who would miss something like this. Even then, it changed nothing between us.

"Ed, i-is it true? About your condition?" I looked up as Maria asked me the question with hitched breathing.

I didn't say anything and just nodded at her question.

Before she could ask me anything else though, I asked her, "How is everything being handled? How is Daisy handling everything?"

She wiped her tears and nodded her head at my question, "Ye-yeah she is handling it well. You chose the right person for the job, Ed. I'll go call her."

I nodded slowly, the exoskeleton slow to respond to my mental commands.

As the door closed behind Maria, I heaved a huge sigh.

I closed my eyes as my mind churned furiously, thinking about the future and the consequences of my previous actions that the others would have to bear.

I was not worried as much about Earth's situation since Tony and the others, along with Daisy's help, would be much better prepared for any threat that might come their way, at least until Thanos showed his ugly purple mug on my planet.

Just thinking about it made me furious.

What was the use of all this power and all this preparation I did, if I couldn't be there to contribute to the final fight?

As it is now, I don't even have the time required to participate in the battle and go out with a bang.

Man, how glorious that would have been. I would have been content even severely injuring Thanos as my last hurrah.

But, alas. Sigh, no use thinking about it now. The best I could do now was prepare Daisy and the others as best as I could and equip them with the best resources possible.

Honestly, the last thing I was worried about was Alfred, unlike others I knew what he had gone to do. He must have found something to try and prolong my life and to do that, he left the base servers. I shook my head as I thought about his actions exasperatedly. I knew he had grown out of the basic compulsions I had encoded into his code but didn't expect for him to just up and leave, putting most of the organisation's operations in jeopardy.

But then again, what has stopped Alfred Ed Muncher ever?

As I was lost in my thoughts, I heard the soft sound of the door's lock opening and looked up to see Daisy entering with a nervous smile.

I smiled at her and then said in a faux serious voice, "Where's your work tablet, Agent Johnson? I hope you know that it has the highest access level below me and I don't think I need to explain its importance to you."

She deadpanned at me and said, " I know about it, Boss. So, how are you? I mean I know about your condition so I'm sorry if it came off as insensitive. I don't know what I was thinking. I'm so sorry. Please don't make me leave."

I started chuckling softly as I watched her panic levels visibly increase in front of me.

"Ahh, I needed that. Thank you for that. Now, why don't we get to work?" I said to her and commanded the suit to make me sit upright. I must have looked quite funny as the stupid suit took forever to follow my commands. I could have sent more juice but that would have put undue pressure on my condition anyway.

She pouted at me, "Yes, Yes. I am glad that my situation amuses you so much."

I smiled at her reply, "Now, I hope you've had the time to go through all you have access to. All the bases we have, the assets we have stationed around the world, the people and entire communities under surveillance, the different hidden civilisations?"

Her smile became more and more strained as the questions came from my side.

"Uh, yes?" she said in an unsure tone.

I sighed internally, "Very well. You must have some questions, ask away."

"Uh, so first of all, don't worry about the agents, all of our operatives are accounted for, and save for a few, all of them have been recalled to their nearest base. I have also taken the liberty to reinforce the agents whose assignments couldn't be canceled with heavy firepower and multiple teams are on standby to assist any agent who goes dark anywhere on the planet. The supercarrier's N-reactor has gone offline but Commander Castle has assured me that is normal procedure."

I nodded at that tidbit of news, "Due to the very nature of the N-reactor, it is something that is as valuable as an infinity stone-empowered person. The energy that could be extracted from such a relatively portable package was insane that was why I was against building it in the first place. But since Alfred and the other department heads outvoted me, I agreed on one condition that the second Alfred lost connection with the superclass carrier, the N-reactor would extinguish itself. Right now, that reactor is just an extremely expensive one-of-a-kind energy conducting empty sphere."

"B-But what about the weapons on board the carrier? I thought that the gamma cannon needed the N-reactor to function at all." She asked me in worry.

It was understandable of course. After all, the gamma cannon was the weapon we had on hand that could deter even the likes of Thanos from attacking our planet. SO much energy is condensed in the gamma cannon at the time of firing that physics becomes wonky at the point of impact. That property is what allows the cannon to penetrate most energy-based defences as if they were not there since, in a sense, they weren't. The concentration of energy in that small point was so high that it affected things in the quantum level, thereby bypassing most energy based defences but it had yet to be tested on any energy based shields empowered by one or more infinity stones. Doing so carried the risks of detection after all.

I reassured her about the backups, "Don't worry about that. In case of emergency, the 4 emergency Arc reactors along with the ones in operation would allow for the gamma cannon to be fired once. It would just take longer to accumulate that much energy, that's all."

"Okay, great. The next thing I wanted to confirm was I still can't access some of the data. I mean, look, it here shows that we have a facility near the photosphere of our sun and somebody is stationed there. Not going into the impossibility of that facility being there, why can't I contact whoever it is that is stationed there? I was close to sending a ship there but apparently none of our ships other than the superclass carrier is capable of gliding near the sun safely and even it can only do so for a very short period of time.'

I nodded, "A very valid question. The reason you can't see it is because you are using Frank's access and even he doesn't have access to everything. Look, just give me the tablet and I'll show you."

She handed me the tablet and after having the exoskeleton provide it with my personal access keys, gave it back to her.

She excitedly started going through the all-new UI available to her and I waited patiently for her to go through it all. It would take time, after all, it was the entire organisation's truth. Every agent and their history, every person under surveillance, every protocol I built for every emergency I could think of, every piece of weaponry we developed, all my plans for their future upgrades and the prerequisites for those upgrades, every ally we had and could have in the future, and even my 'future' visions, it had it all.

After a few minutes, I said, "Alright, you can go through that after a little while. I'll just leave you with a few important things."

She nodded seriously.

"First of all, no matter what happens, do not invoke the HELL protocol set. Second of all, go tell Frank that Alfred will return on his own. There is no need for him to go hunt him down somehow. Use your new authority if he doesn't listen to you. Third and most importantly.."

________________________________________________________________

Word Count - 1758

If you guys would like to read ahead, you can head on to my Patreon.

I already have up to 9 extra chapters uploaded there.

 

[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - I don't own anything. Please support the official release.

Chapter 49.2

Technomancer in MCU

–Daisy Johnson–

Patiently listening to all the advice Ed was giving her, she couldn't help but think that he was preparing for his death and was handing over his inheritance to her. She didn't even know what to think of that.

Looking over all the data that was being displayed on the access tablet, she was sure of just one thing. Just that she was nowhere near ready to accept responsibility at that level. What did Ed even see in her? What did Alfred see in her that he had been secretly training her for this position for years at this point?

No matter what, she was being given a position of authority that most in the universe would die for, she was not going to fail his trust.

"That is all. Just take these as what they are and the rest? Well, you are the leader now, it's up to you what you want to do. Go get 'em, kiddo." Ed said to me calmly even though I couldn't help but think that it was meant more as final parting words rather than just friendly advice.

I chuckled at his last sentence, "Ha! Then my first order of business as the new leader is sentencing you to mandatory hospital lockdown and I won't be taking no for an answer. Understood?" He nodded at my faux serious ordering voice even though it must have looked so comical with tears running down my face with the occasional sniffing in between sentences. "Good. And second of all, you are not that much older than me. And lastly, I am going to have Dr.Cho be your supervisor as she conducts every test there is to conduct on you and give me reliable test results on your condition and you are going to cooperate with her, alright?" He nodded once again with a smile. "I am not hearing a yes, mam?" she faux admonished him. "Yes, mam," he said in between chuckles.

I nodded at the answer, ignoring his chuckling, "I'll leave now. I have a lot of work to do. My previous boss just dumped his position on me without any warning and on top of the increased responsibility that is surely going to give me grey hairs before my 20s, I didn't even get a pay raise. Isn't he the worst?"

"He sounds like a piece of work," he said. She nodded at that imperiously and left the room. As soon as she closed the door behind her, she started sobbing.

It was heartbreaking watching Ed perform his seemingly final actions before his inevitable death. She couldn't even imagine what it must be to go through all of that without having their best friend by their side. What was Alfred thinking, leaving Ed all alone at this critical time? Not to mention the most important phase of their plans for a unified humanity was to be carried out right now and his departure left the plans in a lurch.

She then stood up from the floor, wiped her tears, and took a deep breath, determined to complete the planned H.Y.D.R.A. removal plans.

But first of all, she had to do one thing. She had to find out just who this Eric was.

The captain of the superclass carrier was an enigma to most of the organisation's higher-ups. You would think that the captaincy of the strongest weapon of the organisation would be someone everybody knew about but that wasn't the case. All the responsibilities of the superclass carrier were being carried out by the vice-captain, Jake Diggle.

Now, Jake, she knew. He was this huge 6'5 tall behemoth made of pure muscle who looked like he ate humans for breakfast but was just a total sweetie on the inside. He was widely known as the face of the superclass carrier and up until now, everybody including her thought that there was no captain and the position was unofficially occupied by Ed but apparently, they were all wrong.

She opened his file and was asked for her credentials but even after being given her top-level credentials now, she was given a warning about the data she was about to read. Acknowledging the risks, she opened the page only to be greeted by a pretty shallow file.

It was barely 3 pages in total. She expected Ed or Alfred of all people to conduct and record a pretty exhaustive report on someone who was going to pilot their flagship ship.

But as she kept on reading through the file, she understood why the file was so sparse on details and why Eric Diggle was kept so hidden from even the members of the organisation.

He was the half-brother of Jake Diggle, the vice-captain of the superclass carrier. Together, they were recruited by Commander Castle from his military contacts. Both of them, top of their class. Accrued multiple prestigious awards from their respective organisations but were both tossed out of their jobs by the higher-ups in their harebrained schemes.

That alone would not have warranted such high positioning in the organisation. It was what was written on the second page that was concerning to her. Both of the brothers had nuclear-related powers.

Eric's powerset in particular was extremely devastating in its application. It was said in the file that the Ancient One was personally present for his terrigenesis process and had insisted on performing his procedure in the mirror dimension. Apparently, she had foreseen the terrible disaster that would have befallen them if Eric's transformation was not contained. See, he was one of the only SS-class combatants that Humanity had access to, even in his sealed state. His powerset was simple yet extremely destructive in its usage. It was the violent expulsion of gamma radiation from every pore of his body.

The Ancient One theorised that Eric was connected to a dimension of pure gamma radiation and due to his body, unlike Bruce Banner's, not having a physical blueprint for its use, just expelled gamma radiation out of his body.

Now, that alone would not have been cause for concern, they had plenty of expertise when it came to cleaning up nuclear radiation but Eric's powers came with another facet to them. The more he used his powers, the more the gamma dimension he was connected to, would bleed into our universe.

The Ancient One placed multiple high-level seals on his soul to prevent him from overusing his powers but over controlled testing of his powers, they found that the more he uses them the more he threatens the very fabric of reality by letting the gamma energy dimension into their universe.

The wise choice would be to kill him and be done with it but according to Ed, Eric might just be the person they would need to tip the scales in their direction. According to his notes, just by being in his vicinity, Bruce Banner and any other Gamma-empowered individuals would find their power levels being propelled far beyond the norm and all of this could be done without compromising their mental faculties, resulting in a much-needed boost to their side.

Jake Diggle, on the other hand, was someone who underwent terrigenous much later and still got a powerset that was connected to his brother's. This supports the theory that Inhumans from the same lineage will have similar powers which could lead to clan-like communities forming within the Inhumans. He had the ability to absorb, shunt, and even recall the collected energy.

His file, on the other hand, was much more intensive. Along with his previous military training, Jake was unstoppable in hand-to-hand combat. His powers allowed him to absorb kinetic energy from incoming blows and reflect them or he could choose to rob them of their kinetic energy by shunting that energy to his theorised personal dimension.

The catch was that he couldn't exactly use that energy to empower himself or anything. The only way he could give out that energy was in the form it was given to him. So, if he absorbed sunlight for a few hours and chose to expel that later on, it would still come out as sunlight.

Another glaring limitation he had was he could only absorb energy his body could withstand. Granted, his enhanced body could withstand a lot of force and if they choose to do so, they could try introducing the Gamma gene into his body to see if he could become a Hulk. If successful, together with Eric, they would be near invincible but all further testing on this was halted by Ed for some reason.

She might have to look into that because the opportunity to have a Hulk on the combatant list would be a huge morale boost not to mention the pure physical prowess they would exhibit.

Satisfied by the information, she moved on to her next task.

"Commander Castle? Commander Castle, if you are listening to this, you are to report to the captain's deck ASAP. This is an order from your superior. If any agent sees Commander Castle, please escort him to the captain's deck. You will get the official assignment on your holodecks soon. Any and all outbound flights from the Asterisk are banned by the captain's orders." As she spoke, she closed down all the hangars and shut down every single teleportation pad inside the base. Then she gave the official orders to bring in Commander Castle to all the agents inside the base.

Granted, most of them would piss their pants off the second Commander Castle cast his glare on them but she hoped that doing an official announcement would encourage him to come to the cabin on his own.

And sure enough, in less than 10 minutes, he barged into the captain's deck while she was sitting on a hard light desk with a soothing tea prepared for both of them.

The tea leaves were imported from Kamar Taj who still refused to share the location of their tea plantation. It must be some mystic secret or something for them to guard it so zealously. They were more free when they shared dangerous mystic knowledge than they were when it came to their secret tea-making ceremony.

Uncaring of his outburst on the outside even though she flinched internally when she saw his expression, she gestured for him to take a seat, "Please be seated. We have some important things to talk about over tea. The tea is from the Ancient One's personal collection and I hope to talk some things over while tempers calm down as I have heard that this tea has that effect on people."

The only outward reaction Frank gave was the narrowing of his eyes and the slight pressure his powers exerted on his surroundings.

She could feel his powers interacting with her own powers. His powers were unique in the sense that they didn't just suppress the powers of any enhanced person, they communicated with the powerset somehow and convinced itself to shut down, essentially sabotaging itself.

It was infinitely more dangerous than just a field of power nullification. He could actually, given more time, convince the power to just delete itself. That just depowers any enhancement permanently.

He silently seated himself and took a sip from the tea and gave a sigh of contentment, "So, what do you want to talk about, Boss?" she winced internally at that word.

"How did–"

"Oh, please I'd recognise that badge anywhere. Ed gave it to you didn't he, that bastard? Who gave him the right to just up and give up his position and try to leave us all?" he said frustratedly.

She nodded and said, "That is one of the things we will be discussing today."

The tea leaves must have done their magic since he just nodded silently while sipping his tea without any outbursts.

She must have the location of that tea plantation if it was this useful in meetings.

________________________________________________________________

Word Count - 2017

If you guys would like to read ahead, you can head on to my Patreon.

I already have up to 9 extra chapters uploaded there.

Chapter release sheet

 

[IdleMuse0307]

So, it is the next day afternoon and as I read through this monstrosity that I wrote in the early hours of the morning, I am filled with pity for you all as you now have to read through it. It is not even complete but the one good thing that came out of this is I got the idea of creating another snippet thread where I can post my ideas and you guys can tell me if you want a longer format of that same idea.

So, without any delay, read ahead. At you own risk though, Be warned.

________________________________________________________________

Good day, ladies and gentlemen and whoever else it may be, this is the first of a new series I have just made up. It is called one-shots or snippets.

In this collection, I will be writing anything that comes to my fancy(as if anything I have ever written before had any sort of structure at all). There will be no word count expectations adhered to here. No canonical accuracy, nothing.

Total Anarchy!

So, this is the first installment in the series.

Bear in mind, it is 5.05 AM where I live, as I have started typing this.

And NO! I have not woken up early and started writing this. I have not slept at all and will probably stay up till sunrise.

The idea for this is courtesy of [OMN1CR0N_GAMING] from Web Novel.

________________________________________________________________

Disclaimer - I don't stake claim to even any of my OCs in this chapter as I don't think it'll be good for my writing career let alone the authentic intellectual property that Disney owns and earns billions off of.


Snippet 1

Technomancer in MCU

Title - The Mystic Tea of Kamar Taj

In the high up mountainous areas of the Himalayas, lay the vaunted Kamar Taj. Its location seemed ever changing and the only reliable way of getting to it seemed to be through the liberal use of sling rings.

There was a treacherous path with multiple twists and turns reserved as a test for the uninitiated apprentices that wished to visit and learn in the vaunted halls of Kamar Taj.

One such apprentice was trudging through knee length snow towards the mountain peak that he could see but could not reach.

As if he was delirious, he climbed and climbed but did not seem to get any closer to the peak.

He was starting to think that the old man had swindled him.

He chuckled sardonically as he surveyed the state of his clothes. It was not as if he could have fallen any lower.

Unseen to him though, there was a whole cadre of Sorcerers tasked with watching him by the Ancient One.

The old man had fucked off who knows where but he had assigned multiple mid-level sorceres to just observe what this person was doing. "It would help you learn," he had told them.

Sometimes, they wished they could strangle that sorry excuse of a Sorcerer Supreme.

Sure, the man was supremely strong but doing anything beyond being strong was impossible for him. He barely taught three initiates who turned into Masters and then dumped all the responsibility he possibly could on those poor Masters.

And then, he went ahead and gave this person, Mr.Strange, the hardest possible test he could for the initiate.

They had to admit though, he was doing better than most.

Up above them, the Ancient One was doing his best to hide his laughter from the associates below. A suspicious cloud of weed was hovering around him. "Oh, I have got to show this to him later," he said while referring to the struggling form of Strange below. "He dared to call me an old man in the future, he deserves this."

Throughout history, there have been multiple sorcerer supremes but few have come close to attaining the sheer strength that Agamoto wielded and through a combination of luck and hard work, the current Sorcerer Supreme, Yao had come the closest to Agamotto. He had become stronger than all his predecessors.

Let's just say that this allowed him a certain level of leeway when it came to dealing with dimensional entities that possess the strength to swallow the entirety of Earth in a single gulp.

________________________________________________________________

–Master Wong–

Maintaining the meticulous catalogue of the Library was always a bittersweet chore for him.

On one hand, he loved books and all they represented in Kamar Taj but on the other hand, someone from the long line of Sorcerer Supremes had enchanted the library to be confusing and hard to guide through on purpose and his luck was such that he was blessed with the Ancient One as his Sorcerer Supreme.

The man was supremely talented and could fend off most demon invasions all by himself with both hands tied behind his back but helping him with administrative tasks? He would have better luck asking a Dog to help him glue together the book the Dog had just ripped apart.

Actually, getting a Dog might be good for him. Add some wholesomeness to the monotonous life that was being the Librarian of Kamar Taj.

A Magical Doggy would be even better. If he could find one, though. He had heard from the Ancient One that the fae markets had them but they fetched a pretty penny of the soul. Then again, this was the same man who thought it was funny to visit one of the hell princes and force feed him weed and note down their reactions. "For SCIENCE!" he shouted when asked.

Honestly, the number of people who actually graduated to reach the Masters level had been declining year by year, not because the quality was declining but because there was no need to.

The Ancient One was so overwhelmingly strong that he had connected himself to the Three Sanctums and subsequently, to the Mystic Shield that covered the entirety of the planet.

He was but a wee initiate when that happened but he was sure that the man was going to blow himself up from all the magical feedback from the ley lines but somehow, he took control and now? They barely had to work.

The most action he had seen was when some Werewolf got naked in Central Park and they had to scrub everything off the internet.

Nowadays, even the thought of starting a family was passing through his mind. Something that was unthinkable for someone who held the position of a librarian since the position was historically cursed to die alone.

He completed the tasks for the day and noted that it was still time till his lunch break so he decided to visit the one place that the Ancient One could take credit for, the Mystic Tea plantation.

Using his sling ring, he opened a portal to the London Sanctum where the scent of weed was the strongest.

"Wong! Nice to see you, my friend. Come-come-come, my friend. We were just about to begin a new joint. Join us!" came the rough gravelly voice of Master Daniel.

He smiled and was about to deny when he also smelled the tea and not just any tea, the tea that the Ancient One kept in his personal collection.

His refusal turned into delighted acceptance in an instant, "Well, if you insist."

________________________________________________________________

Kaecillius

Watching their Lord and Saviour, Lord Dormammu rage at the unfairness of the situation was equally heartbreaking and amusing.

Especially, since he could see three copies of his Lord pacing around his altar, leaving burn marks in it. But that could just be the mystic weed talking.

If he was asked to name the best thing that happened to him ever since his family died, it would be selling his soul to Lord Dormammu.

Not only did it stave off Death completely and even enhanced his mystical prowess, the access he gained to the weed garden alone was worth it to be branded like a cattle.

After being gatekept from the Mystic Tea Plantation of Kamar Taj, he was down on his last knees when his Lord came to his rescue and offered to give him the original version of the weed and not the watered down version that the Ancient One gave to the visitors to calm down their nerves.

Just as he was about to take another puff from the sacred roll, a tearing sound heralded the opening of a tear in the very dimension of the Dark One.

With a furious roar, "Who Dares?", his Lord roared and swiped his hands towards the tear, sending an energy wave that would eviscerate the unfortunate soul that was on the other side of the tear.

"Hey, man. Why the hate?" came a laid back husky voice and then he watched with transfixed awed eyes as a burning bike came into view with none other than Snoop Dogg riding on it, with a cigar in his mouth and another joint in his hand.

Somehow, he was sleeping on the bike as he smoked and the bike rode a path of fire that it laid for itself and after making a few downhill turns, landed in front of his Lord.

Though, objectively speaking, his Lord looked much less cooler than Snoop Dogg.

"Why have you come here, Ghost Smoker?" his Lord growled out.

Snoop raised his hands in mock surrender and said, "just chill, man. I ran out of my supplies a while ago and couldn't find any on the market so thought of going wholesale this time, you know? Those retailers give me mixed bullshit half the time so getting some from the source seemed like a good idea. So, you selling or what?"

His Lord growled out in frustration at Snoop's fearlessness in front of the Dark Overlord but it was understandable as opening a portal in the Dark Realm without his Lord's permission would require immense power, power that would place both of them in the same echelon.

Huh, echelon. What a funny word!

"Begone, thief. I don't need to entertain another one of your kind. If you desire it so much, steal it from the thief who stole multiple seeds from me and has started his very own business, undercutting me by using his organisation's unpaid skilled labour that I just can't seem to get in this accursed place."

"Say no more. I get it. Here, this might help calm you down," Snoop said as he offered his Lord his joint that seemed to leave out starlight instead of smoke.

What he wouldn't give to smoke that joint?
His Lord took the offered joint with visible reluctance.

"Now, don't you worry. When I took this title, I thought I was supposed to do something about justice so I will do that now. I'll make sure they shut down their business so you can thrive yours. I just hope you'll offer me a discount when it matters."

With those words, he literally burst into starlight, blinding me briefly.

________________________________________________________________

–Ancient One–

He was tending to his babies in his personal tea or should he call it, weed garden.

Ha, he still laughed when he thought about the face Dormmamu made when he offered his very soul for a few seeds of his choice.

That motherfucker didn't know what hit him. Now, he has both the powers and Dormammu's interdimensional business will soon be in his hands as well.

As he was using another one of his spells to maintain the watering ratio, he heard a voice behind him, "So, Yao. I've come to bargain."

His pupils contracted as his hairs stood on end. It had been centuries since someone had managed to sneak up on him.

With a spell ready, he plastered a fake smile on his face and turned around, only to see Snoop Dogg himself sniffing his precious plantation.

He held in the urge to blast him away from his personal garden.

This was a life or death scenario here. He couldn't afford to let his emotions get the better of him.

"What can I do for you, Avatar of the smoke?"

"Oh, nothing. I was wondering how much of a discount I would get on your merchandise if I could provide you evidence of your competitor employing unfair means to target your business? I mean, the interdimensional trade authority would be more than happy to register your case should you have evidence, right?"

His eyes literally had stars in them at that piece of news.

With a determined glint in his eyes, he asked Snoop about the evidence.

Oh, Dormammu was so busted.

________________________________________________________________

Man, I am so so sorry.

If you have read this far, I commend you for your patience and resilience and thank you for your sacrifice.

On a lighter note, I'll see you guys on Thursday.

Toodles!

Extra chapters for my fanfic, not this - Patreon

 

[Spearow]

btw about the ed dying situation, cant he do the same thing akatosh and the old nords did in skyrim?
I mean, no one could defeat Alduin in the present, so, they send the guy 1000 years into the future, just so they will be able to defeat him.

Send Ed 1000 years into the future, you are going to heal him a few chaps from now anyway, so, just send him to the future, have an AI replace him temporary, heal the guy, and he then uses his tecno powers on the AI replacement to get the memories.

Even better, do all that in some different universe, so they can go back to ed home universe on the second the problems happened.

 

[Odd1todd89]

Tyftc.
I hope you have a wonderful day/ night and have a very merry Christmas.

 

[Brian the dor]

omakes are trash imo

 

[IdleMuse0307]

omakes are trash imo

Click to shrink...

Obviously.
Like I said, this was not a well thought out post. Just something I did as a change. Well be back to regular by Thursday.
Thank you for reading!
Toodles!

 

[Brian the dor]

Obviously.
Like I said, this was not a well thought out post. Just something I did as a change. Well be back to regular by Thursday.
Thank you for reading!
Toodles!

Click to shrink...

The writing is good, I just don't like omakes

 

[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - I don't own anything. Please support the official release.

Chapter 50

Technomancer in MCU

The Asterisk

–Frank Castle–

Standing outside Ed's medical ward, he debated internally for the umpteenth time whether to enter or not.

He gritted his teeth after hearing Eric snickering at him.

He had been standing in the same position for the last 10 minutes. After the intense talk he had with Daisy, he had come straight to meet Ed.

For what he did not know. He wanted nothing more than to go inside and give Ed a piece of his mind.

I mean, he gave that pint-sized brat power over everyone in the organisation. Granted, she did a phenomenal job of it and somehow, even he himself found listening to her orders but that didn't mean that Ed could somehow retire from the organisation. He and Alfred to some extent, were the backbone of the organisation.

What was he even doing? He was just going to talk to Ed. Just like he had done so hundreds of times. Somehow it felt different this time.

Shaking his head, he banished the dark thoughts from his mind, or at least tried to do so.

Putting on his usual apathetic mask, he glared at Eric and said, "Keep watch here. Make sure nobody comes in."

Without hearing his no doubt cheeky reply, he entered the room.

Inside he could see Ed sitting upright on the state-of-the-art medical bed, reading a book using the hard light projectors built into the bed.

Upon seeing him, Ed smiled and performed a waving away gesture to the book in front of him, resulting in the hard light book disintegrating into motes of white light, "Frank, nice to see you. I thought I wouldn't see you for however long it takes for you to go on an exterminating mission and kill off every single enemy you could find."

He chuckled, "Huh, I wish. Unfortunately, Boss Lady, Daisy has given me another set of instructions."

Ed nodded, "Ah, are the helicarriers up and running already?"

"Not yet. They will be though, soon. And I don't want to discuss any of that with you. You are on mandatory bedrest, on captain's orders. I would laugh at your plight if I wasn't once in the same situation," he replied.

"Haha. I guess you would know about it best. After all, I have had to revoke your access to make you stay in the medical ward multiple times on Maria's orders," Ed laughingly replied.

The two shared a moment of silence before Ed said, "Look, Frank. If you are worried about me, don't be. I've done nearly all I had set out to do. Some things are left but I have you guys for that so I am not exactly worried all that much. As for Alfred, he will be back soon. In fact, I'm sure he'll be back before you return from your mission. So, go on your assignment without any worries holding you back."

He sighed and replied, "How can you be so casual about your own death is beyond me. If not for yourself at least try for for the kids. How will I explain to them that their badass dad who could do anything couldn't save you."

By the end, he was sure that sweat was coming out of his eyes but before Ed could get a word in, he continued, "I just came here to tell you that you are the best thing that could have ever happened to my family. My family and even me are alive only due to you and I could never repay you for that. The best thing I can do is…," He didn't know what overcame him for that moment but it felt right to do so. He raised his hand and his nanite package picked up on his mental pings and a shotgun formed in his hand and while reloading it, he continued, "...make sure that while you are bedridden, your enemies get their much-deserved bedrest in their graves."

And then without listening to his reply, he marched straight out of the medical ward, embarrassed beyond belief at his chunni moment. He couldn't believe he did that at all let alone in front of Ed who has undoubtedly recorded it and must be distributing it right now. Maria was never going to let this down now.

________________________________________________________________

–Eric Diggle–

Waiting outside the medical ward waiting for his boss, he was bored out of his mind.

He would have said that he regretted even coming to the Asterisk but that would be a blatant lie.

The truth was that he was bored beyond belief at his job aboard the superclass carrier. Speaking of which, they have got to name that big lug. He couldn't keep on calling it the superclass carrier all the time. He had tried to name it something sexy but Alfred had always shot it down.

His brother was the one who truly did the job of the captain. He was the captain in name only. He had long suspected that the only reason he was given the job was to keep him far away from the center of things and yet close enough that he could be used easily as a resource.

Oh, he was very much aware of what his value was for the organisation. He would be lying if he said that he wasn't resentful at the fact that his life or death could be very easily decided by other people even with all the power he had at his disposal.

Flexing his powers, he could feel the seals engraved on his soul as his arms glowed to his eye, the gamma radiation in them visible to his naked eyes. Another effect of his awakening as an Inhuman. With just a little bit more effort, the energy leakage will cross a threshold and the seals on his powers would clamp down, leaving him comatose.

Feeling Commander Castle coming, he hurriedly shut down his powers lest he get another scolding and saluted towards the opening door. He then choked on his saluting words as he came across a scene that he hadn't even dreamt of.

Behind the Commander, he could spy Big Boss Bed clutching his stomach with one hand with the other hand on his mouth, trying to stifle his laughter because somehow, Frank motherfucking Castle was walking out of the door with a shotgun on his shoulder with a Cigar in his mouth and freaking sunglasses on his face, in an absolutely daylight simulated environment. It was absolutely golden blackmail material.

The door closed behind the Commander and he could hear the faint laughter coming from it and made to comment on it but before he could, "Not a word, am I clear?" spat out the Commander.

"Crystal, sir." he instinctively replied, shivers running down his spine at the expression on his face.

Commander then nodded at me and said, "Go ahead and get the jet ready. I have a few things I need to pick up before we head to Earth."

He nodded and went on his way as the Commander took a left for his office.

With nothing to do on his way, he activated his nanite package, giving it a mental instruction to take his body to the hangar as he started to read the mission details on his retina HUD.

He stopped in his tracks as he saw that the first order of business for the mission was to meet Captain freaking America and the Black Widow. That got his full attention now. Reading more, he realised that he had missed much from the daily briefing he got from his elder brother.

Apparently, they were to make sure that S.H.I.E.L.D., as it was now, would be buried beneath the rubble that we would be making of the infiltrated agents inside that organisation. All the while making sure that the fallout didn't harm the civilians and any exotic energy was duly confiscated which apparently also included the new half a dozen helicarriers that Fury had built.

In a twist, apparently, Fury was shot and killed and Captain America was arrested but he somehow escaped with a close aide of Fury along with the Black Widow. It sounded more and more like a plot of a movie to him.

They had their exact location and were supposed to meet them at the bunker to surprise Fury and the others and pressurise them to give up on S.H.I.E.L.D.

Soon, he reached the hangar only to find Commander Castle there ready with his combat suit on and another agent beside him. Agent Yo-Yo if he remembered that correctly.

"Let's go, shall we?" he said with a charming smirk.

________________________________________________________________

Word Count - 1472

If you guys would like to read ahead, you can head on to my Patreon. It is the same name as my username.

I already have up to 12 extra chapters uploaded there.


A/N - Short, I know. The next one will be longer to compensate.

 

[readsalot]

Let's go, shall we?" he said with a charming smirk.

Click to shrink...

The Punisher is going to wreck someones day, really badly.

 

[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - I don't own anything. Please support the official release.

Chapter 51

Technomancer in MCU

S.H.I.E.LD. Convoy

–Steve Rogers–

"He looked right at me like he didn't even know me." He said out loud to the occupants of their van.

Sam scoffed, "How is that even possible? It's got to be at least 70 years since then."

"Zola" he uttered the word calmly despite the infernal fury he felt inside. The very thought of his friend, his one friend being under the control of those monsters for all these years filled his insides with molten fury.

He wished he had found him earlier. He could have done something. They could have saved him. Tony might have found a cure for him, maybe…

"Steve?" He looked up as Nat called him.

"It's not your fault. Stop beating yourself up over nothing. There was nothing you could have done. You weren't even awake." She tried to console him but there was nothing anyone could say to him that would make him feel better.

The sound of a soft pained noise from Nat drew his attention to her sitting across him. He could see that the bullet wound in her shoulder was still bleeding and without proper medical attention, she would bleed out soon. They had to do something to stop the bleeding but how?

He glanced at their captors and discarded any thought of getting any help from them from his mind. He had learned his lesson. They would sooner see them dead than help them at all.

"Look, man. She's bleeding. You have got to put pressure on that wound or she'll bleed out in minutes." Sam pleaded to the security guards but as expected they remained silent and apathetic to their plight.

Sam was about to speak again when one of the guards removed his baton and shoved it in their direction, his silent threat clear to all of them.

His hands tensed as he got ready to help them in case the guard tried something but it turned out to be unnecessary.

The guard brandished the baton in their direction but then with a stabbing motion, electrocuted the other guard and smashed their head in with their other hand, knocking the guard out cold.

All of them tensed as they waited with bated breaths for the next actions of the guard. But then simultaneously sighed in relief when the guard removed their helmet to reveal a face that was familiar to the two of them.

"Huh, I had a hard time breathing with this thing on," came the greeting of Maria Hill, the right-hand woman of Nick Fury. She then looked at all of their astonished faces, "What? I thought you'd be used to betrayal now?"

He had no answer to that question.

________________________________________________________________

–Frank Castle–

He sat silently on the captain's seat, waiting for the go-ahead from operations to intercept the convoy that had Captain America along with Black Widow and a potential future avenger, Sam Wilson.

This was new to him, waiting for orders, that is. Usually, Alfred had everything ready before you could even ask for him. Now, they were stuck here watching over the convoy.

He could hear Eric munching on chips loudly, much to his displeasure. He was doing it loudly on purpose too.

After a while, Eric groaned and he could almost hear him calling for HQ again when the situation in front of them had an unexpected development. Maria Hill chose to reveal herself before their planned ambush under the bridge ahead.

"She must have been worried about all the blood that Romanoff's been losing. Commander, I think we share the same blood type. Should I become their samaritan and save her?" Eric said.

He resisted the urge to pinch his forehead at the comment, "Keep dreaming. Anyone could tell you just want to get in her pants."

They then continued to follow them as they changed their clothes, cars, and routes and even went around in different cars before meeting in front of an old bar where they finally took a truck to their underground base.

Finally, he thought.

"Commander Castle, come in? I repeat, Commander Castle?" came the voice from the jet's intercom.

"Yes?" he replied.

"You have orders to intercept Captain Rogers' and Nick Fury's meeting and make sure that the organization's agenda is the one that is being carried out."

"Understood."

"So, what's our next step? Do we do a three-point landing like badasses in front of them? I mean, I could do it. Your knees must be weak now that you are old." Eric had the audacity to say that to his face.

He barely stopped himself from decking Eric in the face. Not only because it wouldn't have helped but also because his powers might negatively affect the seals on Eric's powers.

He didn't want to be the one who endangered everybody on Earth just for the satisfaction of punching out the bastard.

He gave Eric a look and then promptly started ignoring him. That was the best way he could deal with Eric. He just looked at the HUD which showed their destination and their mission parameters.

They had to circumvent the plan that Nick Fury and the others had and actually requisition the six state-of-the-art helicarriers that S.H.I.E.L.D. had built. Ed even had a mountain nearby hollowed out with maintenance arranged for the carriers for the next 5 years.

As he was reading the mission assignment, one of the floor tiles in front of him slid open and a box came out of it. After reaching his waist level, it opened up, revealing multiple shining vials containing moving red liquid.

If he had to hazard a guess, he would say that those were the coveted Pym Particles. Those would come in handy while stealing the carriers. Along with the vials, he could spy a chip in the last socket.

Curious about its function, he picked it up only for his suit to start beeping and then say out in a robotic voice, "Security protocol upload complete. Please activate the protocols after coming in close proximity with the desired terminal," And then the chip disintegrated from his gloved hands.

So that's how he was going to hijack the carriers. He was doubtful about Fury's chip replacement method since the World Security Council, after learning about Alfred and his insane abilities, had their paranoia increase twofold and made sure that only physical access to the main boards of each carrier could have the slightest chances of subverting control of their biggest weapons.

This would have been so much simpler with Alfred around.

Putting the thoughts of Alfred in the back of his mind, he watched as the Captain and the others reached the base where Fury was being treated. Captain and Wilson were the first ones to exit, followed by Romanoff and Hill. After a while, Hill dug out an old access panel from behind an old utility pole. Upon completing her identification, they all heard a shuddering noise and as they followed it, they came upon a small manhole-sized cover in the middle of the bushes from where they entered the base.

As soon as the last person on their team entered the manhole cover and closed it behind them, he gave the orders, "Alright, suit up. We'll be going in now."

The only answer he got from Eric was a wide grin and his suit manifesting over his body. He did a double-take when he saw that Eric's suit was in the. American colour theme. Near identical to the Captain's shield.

He internally shook his head, unwilling to even discuss it with Eric, and pushed the button to open the central escape hatch in the cabin and immediately jumped through it.

Waiting for the last moment to activate his thrusters, he cushioned his fall and landed softly on the ground. Quite unlike Eric who activated his boosters to give him more thrust and then did his three-point landing on the ground beside him, cratering it slightly. He deadpanned to Eric at that. If Alfred was around, he'd have surely turned off Eric's nanite package at the last moment just to fuck around with him.

Making sure that the Pym Particle vials were safely stored on his person, he started running towards the entrance of the underground base when he heard an annoying voice, "What are you using your legs for? It's not 1990 old man, you have rockets built into your suit. Use them. Hell, they must be of an even higher caliber than mine since you are The Commander, right?"

As usual, he ignored it and soon reached the manhole cover.

Now, they could have gone inside guns blazing but that would reduced the chances of gaining any sort of alliance with Fury to near zero. So, they had to be quiet. Something he was getting pretty good at.

Activating the phasers for both his and Eric's suits, he phased them through the manhole cover and straight onto the floor beneath it. He landed on his feet but somehow. Eric landed flat on his face. Well, his vibranium lattice helmet but there was a face underneath that.

Without waiting for Eric to get up, he activated his thrusters and intentionally allowed them to generate the rocket noise they make if you don't use sound dampeners. Eric soon followed him with his thrusters active in the same mode, "Why are we making so much noise? Somebody might just wake up."

He glanced at Eric and said, "That's the point."

And soon enough, they came across a patch of sewage where a Blue shield just smashed into Eric, much to his delight, and sent him skidding backward and a couple of high calibre rounds slammed into my armour as well. The last straw was a grenade and a flashbang that was thrown sloppily in their direction, courtesy of Romanoff. Not wanting to prolong this any further, he activated the hard light constructs of his suit and simultaneously isolated all the weapons that were pointed at them, "Alright, that's enough. We're here to help." He then activated the floodlights in his suit and after a second, chose to deactivate them and instead sent out a few tiny drones that latched themselves on the ceiling and emitted light, mimicking a ceiling lamp perfectly.

He could then see Captain and Wilson coming from one side with Romanoff probably waiting in ambush for us to let our guards down. He ignored the good Captain and continued looking in the other direction, waiting for Hill and Romanoff to come. After a while, they did get out of their hiding spot and he could see that Romanoff's condition had taken a turn for the worse.

Her face was pale from the blood loss and she was shaking due to the cold inside the tunnel.

Sighing internally, he gave the command and one of the drones in the ceiling unlatched itself and dropped on her shoulder where it proceeded to dissolve into goo and heal her shoulder using the CHI it had stored inside it.

But seeing that, the Captain just charged at him.

To be honest, he was starting to get a little bit annoyed at them and so chose to take matters into his own hands. He activated the hard light prisons and gathered everyone of them in a single sphere and waited for them to calm down.

Hill was the first who noticed that the drone was actually healing Romanoff and brought it to everyone's attention, stopping their futile struggle against the hard light shield.

"That's right, we are here to help. We are sent by Adam to make sure that S.H.I.E.L.D.'s fuckup doesn't become the World's fuckup. After all, we wouldn't want to save the world from outside threats only to discover that somehow, H.Y.D.R.A., an organisation that has been dead for the last 80 years, took over the planet and nearly killed everyone on it. Right, Captain Rogers?" he explained to them with all the patience he could muster.

His suit could also sense a small fully armed team headed their way from inside the tunnel, "Look, I know you recognise the logo, right? " None of them showed a reaction to that, even though they should have seen the logo hundreds of times in their meetings.

Fed up with all the smokes and mirrors, he activated his thrusters and along with Eric, took the prison holding everybody whilst making sure that Romanoff was not too jostled, and took off towards the base where Fury was being kept and watching us come.

Knowing that Fury was watching, he retracted his face plate to show his face to Fury. He could then see the crew he had sent faltering, almost as if they were given completely contradicting orders from before.

He smirked at that. Seems Fury recognised him.

Upon passing the security team, Eric grinned and waved at them, his faceplate retracted long ago.

The dumbfounded and betrayed looks of the Captain and Wilson were a delight to see.

________________________________________________________________

Word Count - 2202

If you guys would like to read ahead, you can head on to my P**reon. It is the same name as my username.

I already have up to 12 extra chapters uploaded there.

 

[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - I don't own anything. Please support the official release.

Chapter 52

Technomancer in MCU

–Nick Fury–

With a groan, he opened his eyes and came face to face with a slightly debilitated white ceiling. The smell of cleaning chemicals and the regular beeping of medical machines meant that his plan worked.

It was a gamble but Banner's drug along with some misdirection from Hill must have done the trick. It was an even bigger gamble trusting Hill but he had a hunch that she of all people was trustworthy.

Besides, he was paranoid his whole life, and look where that brought him. In a hospital bed, ousted from his own organisation just as they were about to launch weapons that could be responsible for shaping the entirety of human civilisation for centuries to come. And what did he do? He ended up handing over humanity's premier weapons to a bunch of nazis.

Worse, it was there all along. Ed had warned him about that but never in his dream would he have thought that Pierce of all people would be the leader of H.Y.D.R.A.

Rejecting a Nobel Peace Prize because his job wasn't done, his ass. The bastard must be making fun of them all along. He couldn't believe he was actually so blind to the internal threats as he focused on the alien threats waiting for them in the cosmos. He went all in on the new generation helicarriers. Now, fucking Nazis of all people have the keys to the world.

His groan must have drawn somebody's attention as he was soon sitting upright with somebody putting a cup of water to his mouth. He greedily drank it to moisten his dry throat.

The next moment as he finished drinking water, bright lights flashed in his eyes and somebody removed the needles from his hand alongside somebody else stabbing a needle in his other arm. After a while, after the doctor was satisfied with his condition, he finally had the room to himself.

Not truly though, his inner voice supplied as he glanced at the multiple visible cameras in the room, not to mention who knows how many invisible cameras and sensors in the makeshift medical ward.

If all else went to plan, backup must be on its way and this location must be decently fortified along with 2 teams consisting of people he absolutely trusted with his life.

Thinking of people he could trust his life with, he regretted not contacting Coulson before taking the drastic step but in the end, it was for the better that Coulson wasn't involved in this.

As per his death protocols, Coulson must have gotten his instructions along with enough resources to run a medium-sized organisation for years to come. He just hoped that Coulson didn't smell anything fishy in the news and go after Pierce and the others to avenge him.

The last thing he wanted was to give H.Y.D.R.A. access to life-reviving technology. Just the fact that such technology existed would be the biggest mistake they could make.

As some strength returned to his body, he flipped open the holo tablet attached to the medical bed, courtesy of Simmons and Fitz from the labs. They were good kids. He just hoped that they too wouldn't get caught in this web. Simmons already had a huge target on her head due to her immense potential as a healer. He had subverted no less than 20 attempts on her life and hundreds more that wanted to kidnap her, to what end he could only guess.

As the holographic display came to life, he could see that Rogers and Romanoff along with someone named Wilson were captured by S.H.I.EL.D. and were on their way to the nearest black site but they wouldn't reach their intended location as Hill was aboard the convoy.

Ignoring that as Hill would have it handled, he instead turned to the information regarding the moving of important assets that were to be moved or destroyed in case of his confirmed death.

Granted, he hadn't actually given the signal to them in case it was a fake death but almost all the experiments, artefacts, and most importantly, the last vials of GH.325 were moved from the fridge to the base where the Kree corpse was kept. And even that base was rigged to blow at the first sign of infiltration. He sighed in relief at that piece of information.

He kept looking at the helicarrier schematics, looking for any weakness they could exploit because there is exactly zero chance in hell that he was going to let weapons he built for the defense of humanity be used by fucking Nazis of all people to threaten the world only to be brutally destroyed by Ed. That cold motherfucker would destroy hundreds of such helicarriers with ease with what they had seen so far.

He had only used that angle to wrangle money out of the politicians' hands but he wasn't delusional enough to think that it would have mattered in any way against Ed and his organisation. Still, Ed should have given them a way to contact them. This would have been the perfect time to make sure that he was excluded from this mission since all he would do is come here, take over the mission, and use brute force to destroy hundreds of billions of dollars worth of equipment.

That would be disastrous, not only for S.H.I.E.L.D. but for enhanced people around the world as well. They already get a bad reputation for doing basically nothing but if someone obviously enhanced came and destroyed government property that was this important, it would be like adding rocket fuel to a forest fire.

Speaking of enhanced people, he hurriedly opened the S.H.I.E.L.D. academy I.N.D.E.X. files to see if Pierce did something to the people there only to find out lookouts issued for nearly all enhanced people. He smiled upon seeing nearly all the students just disappear from their respective rooms in a blur. He gave a rare smile at that. Agent Yo-Yo was doing her job just fine then.

He chuckled as he imagined the reaction Pierce must be having since the enhanced that was only mildly impressive managed to bypass every defense the Academy had and moved out a hundred students in less than a minute.

It would seem that she has gotten even faster now. He wished he could contact her since she could be immensely helpful in the upcoming fight but that would mean leaving the kids defenseless along with telling her that he was still alive.

He couldn't risk that.

After a while, he heard a commotion outside his room. From the voice, John was arguing with the doctor about something.

He checked his holo tablet for all the cameras installed in and around the base, only for his pupils to dilate as he saw two people with armours more advanced than even Stark's come straight towards the base entrance.

His mind churned furiously as he thought of all the possible places two unknowns with advanced tech could have popped up from.

The suits could indicate that they were from Ed's organisation since there was no way H.Y.D.R.A. had that level of technology. It was just a matter of confirming it.

He soon got the opportunity as Hill and the others set up an ambush for them but his hopes were doused in cold water as only a single one of them stopped them like they were mere infants instead of being some of the most well-trained people in the world.

But that confirmed one thing. It might not be Ed himself since that was not his suit but they used the signature hard light technology that Ed and his organisation seemed to overuse.

The final kicker was the reveal of the operator of the suit that was bringing the team to the base's doors in a hard light prison.

He immediately ordered the team lead there, "Soldier, stand down. I repeat, stand down. Let them pass. I repeat, do not engage. Let them pass."

He exhaled in relief and smiled a bitter smile as he thought of the fact that Ed had managed to snag up Frank motherfucking Castle.

That bastard.

When he had heard about his abrupt resignation and the subsequent bloodbath that happened to his former colleagues, he had sent Coulson to investigate but Frank had come out all clean. Now, he knew why he came out all clean.

He heard the main doors creaking open and soon, his medical ward was crowded by the team and Ed's men.

He took note of their expressions as they learned of him being alive. Naked relief along with a touch of suspicion could be seen on Romanoff's and Roger's faces. Wilson just had a confused look plastered on his face. Frank was smiling at him.

Smiling!

In all the joint missions Frank performed with them, he had never once seen him smile outside of talking about his wife.

Guess he found a better life outside then. Good for him.

Before he could get a word in though, Frank said, "Good to see you alive, Fury. I knew you piece of shit wouldn't croak so easily."

The doctors around them choked as they heard that. He waved them off, "Gentlemen? Can we have some privacy please?" The doctors looked like they were about to protest but after taking one look at the people in the room, they nodded and shuffled out of the room.

"For old time's sake, can you hook me up with whatever it is that you gave Romanoff there?" He gestured to Romanoff with his neck as she was sitting upright in her medical bed with her shoulder injury being completely healed without even leaving a bullet scar.

Not a single muscle twitched on Frank's face but something flew off Romanoff's clothes and settled on his chest and flowed around his gunshot wound like a cool liquid.

He sighed in relief as he felt something calm and soothing enter his body. This feeling was similar to what he felt when Agent Simmons used her artifact on me just a hundred times better. He was right, then. They have much much better medical tech on hand.

"Ah, that's the stuff. So, Frank, what brings you to our little slice of spy agency work? I thought you vowed never to work for us after that psyops went sideways." He asked Frank, curious and a bit wary of their motives.

Frank smiled a cold smile, "Well, we are here to help you of course."

Not even a nine-year-old would believe that obvious lie.

________________________________________________________________

Word Count - 1811

If you guys would like to read ahead, you can head on to my P**reon. It is the same name as my username.

I already have up to 12 extra chapters uploaded there.

 

[IdleMuse0307]

Disclaimer - I don't own anything. Please support the official release.

Interlude V.1

Technomancer in MCU

–Sharon Carter–

She was still reeling from the news of Steve of all people being declared a traitor when she got the call to immediately report to the nearest office.

She took a calm breath to prepare for what was undoubtedly about to follow. She was the agent appointed to help Steve acclimatize to the modern world. She always knew it was an excuse to maintain surveillance over the only known super soldier in the world but she had come to view Steve as a friend.

It didn't help that he was a sweet gentleman as well. The sweet temptation of being with her aunt's old love interest didn't help at all.

She tried to remove those thoughts from her mind and started preparing to burn her current identity and return to the active agent roster.

She had just gone through pruning her digital identity when somebody knocked on the door.

She immediately stood ramrod straight and took out her gun and headed toward the door. She only opened it after getting the agency confirmation codes.

She was pretty confused when she found a whole unit waiting for her. The only reason she wasn't terrified for her life was they seemed to be guarding her and one of her academy friends, Terry, was with them. She might not trust the motives of the agency right now but she knew Terry.

"Hey, little Carter. We don't have time to chit-chat. We need to leave right now. Grab anything that can't be replaced and meet me in the car downstairs." he said before she could get a word in.

Understanding the severity of the situation, she nodded and went inside to get her duffel bag that she kept handy in case of emergencies.

By the time she took the bag out of her closet, the team was already in the process of removing any evidence of her presence in the apartment. Weirded out by the incident and not feeling particularly safe in the presence of multiple armed people with their faces covered, she swiftly left for the car waiting for her downstairs.

Terry, always the gentleman, was waiting for her with one of the doors open.

"Thank you," she muttered and entered the vehicle.

Terry sat in the front seat and the car sped off immediately.

"Okay. What is going on? The urgency and the security seem unnecessary for a normal escort." she asked Terry who was speaking with someone on the radio.

Through the windshield, she could see an entire convoy escorting her. The situation raised more and more alarm bells inside her head.

Terry looked back at her question and smiled, "No need to worry. You are an important asset to the agency, Little Carter. With the recent incident with Captain Rogers, the higher-ups in the agency thought it prudent to make sure you were safe. So, sit back and relax. We'll have you safe and sound at HQ in no time."

She nodded, still a little uncertain about the circumstances but willing to trust Terry over this.

Soon, they arrived at the HQ and as soon as she entered the main building, the security detail disappeared and she was escorted by Terry to her supervisor's office. "He'll be here soon. I'll see you around, Little Carter. Don't get into any more trouble without me." Terry said with a smile and left.

She smiled at his parting joke, a temporary relief to the all-crushing tension she had felt since Director Fury, a dear friend to her aunt, was killed.

She stood up when she heard the door open but stopped midway in her greeting when the person who entered the cabin was The Secretary of the World Security Council, Alexander Pierce.

Getting out of the shock of meeting who was essentially her boss' boss' boss, she greeted him, "Secretary Pierce, Good Afternoon."

"Good Afternoon, dear. Please take a seat." he gestured to her and sat in her supervisor's seat.

"So, dear, I'm sure you must be terribly confused as to why I am here?" he questioned her.

She shook her head in reply, "Not quite, sir. I am quite aware with me being the agent assigned to spy on Captain Rogers–"

"Steve Rogers, please. I'm afraid with the latest stunt he has pulled, he no longer has the rank of a captain officially. I'd appreciate it if everybody could acknowledge that." he interrupted her, his voice quite irritating.

She nodded, a bit weirded out by the obsession in his voice when he said, "Sure. I was the agent assigned to Steve Rogers and I failed in reporting any signs of him planning to assassinate Director Fury. I understand if I have to undergo screening to be placed on the official roster once again."

"Good. As long as that is clear, we have nothing to worry about. Your aunt was a great spy and did phenomenal work with the agency, I'm sure you'll do the same. You'll have your orders soon. Until then, report to the HQ five days a week and be ready for regular debriefings. In fact, I believe you have one scheduled today. Agent Terry will escort you there." Pierce gestured to the door where Terry had silently positioned himself.

She nodded and with a determined face, she left the cabin. Terry escorted her but he was oddly silent, a thing she was grateful for as it allowed her to digest the events that happened to her.

The very fact that Secretary Pierce came to personally greet her was suspicious but the way she could feel the glee in his voice when he talked about the death of Director Fury and the dismissal of Steve raised all sorts of alarm bells in her mind.

Her thoughts churned furiously as she arrived at one of the many interrogation rooms in the base. She never thought she would have to arrive at one of these places for interrogation.

She felt Terry slap her back, "Good luck, Carter," and then he opened the door for her.

She nodded silently and entered the room. Inside, an interrogator was waiting for her with a notepad in his hand.

Taking a deep breath, she entered and closed the door behind her, hoping that it was just her mind playing games and not an octopus tattoo that she saw on Terry's wrist as he opened the door for her.

The consequences of that being true were so dire that she didn't even want to think about them.

________________________________________________________________

Observation Room

–Alexander Pierce–

He watched through the glass as they asked Sharon Carter all they could without tipping their hands.

"Anything?" he asked Terry as he heard the door open.

"Nothing. There's nothing we can incriminate her with that Peggy Carter's hounds in the agency wouldn't sniff out within minutes of that happening."

Yeah, that.

He had been so engrossed in the emergency relocation they had to carry out as an organisation due to that damnable AI that he had not monitored the day-to-day workings of S.H.I.E.L.D. Somehow, the fossil, Peggy Carter, with some help from her old army buddies, managed to plant multiple high clearance agents of her own into the agency and that too, in positions of power that they had been trying to get access to for years.

He now regretted not killing that woman when he had the chance. They had termed her an invalid due to her mental state but somehow, in the few years they left her alone, she managed to invoke her old army contacts and entered the political scene again. POTUS was all too happy to accommodate her for some reason.

They had a few agents in her guard detail but the other various three-letter agencies had taken over her guard duty and S.H.I.E.L.D. agents barely even saw her in person anymore.

Even now, he could see many of her plants in the HQ, seemingly doing their work diligently but he knew they were just waiting for a signal from that woman. There was no way that Peggy Carter of all people would believe her beloved Steve Rogers being a traitor. She knew him too well for that.

In such a situation, especially with the carriers scheduled to take off in less than a week, he could ill afford to force a confrontation between his forces and multiple high-level faction leaders.

He then watched on as Sharon Carter responded to the questions in an extremely obtuse manner. He narrowed his eyes as she claimed to have no important information on Rogers that could help them track him down.

"Hmm, she is lying," Terry said, standing beside him.

"You're right. Have a team surveilling her. Make sure she doesn't realise that. Business as usual, am I clear?" he ordered Terry.

"Crystal," Terry nodded.

He had just left the observation room and entered his cabin for another meeting when he heard multiple shockwaves rock the building, making him fall down on his ass.

"Sir! Sir!" he felt somebody lifting him up.

"What the hell just happened?" he asked Terry, who was bleeding from his forehead.

"It's Sharon, she's taken." he said.

What?

His pupils dilated at the news.

"Any casualties?" he asked Terry, dreading the answer.

"A dozen and counting, sir."

"Who?"

He tensed even further when he realised two of the casualties were from the list of agents that Peggy Carter had placed in the agency. This meant that somebody else entirely kidnapped Sharon Carter, the only living relative of Peggy Carter, from the HQ of S.H.I.E.L.D. in broad daylight, whilst being under heavy security.

This day could not have gotten any worse.

________________________________________________________________

Word Count - 1637

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Interlude V.2

Technomancer in MCU

–Sharon Carter–

All the things began to click in place.

Why S.H.I.E.L.D. of all things declared Steve a traitor?

Why nearly half of all important department heads were replaced within days of Director Fury's death.

The reason why no one in S.H.I.E.LD. had any access to any evidence regarding Steve's supposed treason.

The more she thought about it, the more clear things became to her.

She continued to respond to the interrogator's questions half-heartedly and made sure that she gave no information that could be used to track down Steve, not that she had any credible intel in the first place.

Soon, they ran out of questions and she was ordered to report to the office regularly and not travel out of the city until she was cleared of suspicion. That was pretty standard procedure so without any prior knowledge she wouldn't have found it suspicious at all.

After surrendering her service weapon, as asked, she had just exited the building and entered the parking lot when multiple things happened at once.

Something exploded nearby with so much force that the shockwave rocked all the cars in the lot along with throwing her with so much force that she ended up rolling over to the nearest car.

Then she felt a sting in her neck and her vision immediately darkened.

Tranquiliser, she realised.

She tried to fight off its effects but it overpowered her within seconds. The only thing she was able to see of her attacker was a black silhouette that looked familiar for some reason.

________________________________________________________________

Triskelion Parking Lot

–Brad Jameson–

Putting one of the handy dandy hostage rescue pucks on Sharon, he spoke into his radio, "Package secured. I repeat, the package is secured. Let's light this place up, boys."

His suit's thrusters activated along with its stealth functions and he soon floated up towards the carrier parked directly above the triskelion. Sharon, covered in a hard light barrier, courtesy of that puck, followed suit.

He looked down only to see the parking lot they were in and multiple non-essential structures of S.H.I.E.L.D. erupt in a series of explosions that would definitely delay the launch of their carriers.

He had gotten orders from up above to see to it that the carriers' launch was delayed as much as possible.

Damaging the launching stations of the carriers seemed like the best way to do so.

Entering the carrier because now they were given freaking aircraft carriers for minor missions like these, he ordered for it to enter orbit and leave some smaller drones for minor surveillance. They were a huge boon since Alfred went AWOL and the organisation had no other AI on hand that could take on the backup duties. Already, they were behind on multiple sub-protocols that they had to complete before the carriers took off. Hence, the minor explosions.

The puck carried Sharon Carter to the medical ward to make sure that the shockwaves didn't do any internal damage and also to make sure that when he presented it to Peggy Carter, she didn't kill him.

Seriously, that woman scared the crap out of him even though she looked like lifting a stick would kill her and not even armor-piercing rounds would kill him.

Speaking of the devil, he heard the signature noise of her wheelchair's motor whirring. Seriously, he knew that Alfred could make ones that could freaking float but he had to make her the one wheelchair that gave off that ominous noise when in operation.

Plastering a forced smile on his face, he turned around and said, "Ms.Carter, you just missed your niece. She is currently unconscious and in the med bay but don't worry, I'll have someone bring her to you as soon as she regains consciousness."

"Don't worry about me. I hope you didn't make a ruckus when retrieving my niece?" she said sternly to me, a warning in her voice.

He gulped and replied, "Well, that, uh, we had orders from the higher-ups to take whatever actions we see fit that would delay the launch of the carriers."

She narrowed her eyes at him but didn't say anything and just wheeled herself out of the room.

It was as if the entire room collectively heaved a sigh of relief.

Honestly, that woman was going to be the cause of one or more panic attacks the longer she stayed on the ship. He had to get her to the designated safehouse as soon as possible.

________________________________________________________________

–Sharon Carter–

As soon as she gained awareness, her training kicked in, and barring a couple of shallow breaths, she gave no outward sign of her being awake.

"I know you are awake. Seriously, you're fooling no one. Is that what they teach at the academy these days? No wonder you got flat-footed this time." she heard the familiar voice of her Aunt Peggy reprimand her. She instantly opened her eyes and sat upright, surveilling her surroundings for any sign of danger.

"What happened? I remember explosions and somebody kidnapped me. Where are we?" she questioned her aunt.

"Honey, calm down. Nothing has happened to you. We are safe here. Much safer than the Triskelion at least. The people who rescued you work for me." her aunt reassured her.

"B-But they set off explosives at the HQ? That-that's a cri-"

"A crime, yes I am aware of that. But you are not aware of the bigger picture, Honey. S.H.I.E.L.D. is not what it was anymore. It has been infiltrated by–"

"H.Y.D.R.A.! I knew it. They are the ones who have infiltrated the agency. They are the ones who killed Directory Fury, right?" she rambled on.

Her aunt sighed, "Yes. Congratulations on figuring that out. Now, can I speak?"

She nodded meekly at the serious voice of her strict aunt.

"Rest here. When the time comes, you'll have to join the good fight as did I when I was your age. I'll see you when the doctors clear you." her aunt said and simply rolled out of the room in her wheelchair.

She tried to protest at the blatant dismissal but strings of light came out of the bed and tightly wound her up to the bed, effectively imprisoning her.

________________________________________________________________

–Peggy Carter–

Coming out of the room, she said, "Make sure that she gets the necessary training. No niece of mine will stay sheltered in a bunker while others are fighting for their freedom. I want her to join Frank and the others when it's time."

She only left after receiving an affirmative from Brad. He was sweet like that.

At the beginning, when Alfred had imposed his personal guard detail on her, she was very much wary of them but Brad had grown on her.

For some reason, he always seemed to walk on eggshells around her.

Rolling around the ship as she explored the new scenery available to her, she took great pleasure in the ship's crew recognising her. It had been years since someone recognized her or her work. All they saw was the diseased husk of a body that was left after my lifelong experiences.

She wouldn't say that she hated it but it was nice to be reminded of your youth once in a while.

Looking through one of the many observation decks available on this floating ship, and could you imagine that, a floating ship?, that was science fiction in her time, she looked at the breathtaking view of Earth.

She could scarcely believe that just a few short years ago, she was just an old woman living out the last days of her life on her state-sponsored medicare.

She could still remember as if it was yesterday, the day she met Alfred.

He was so young and naive back then. He was learning at an incredibly advanced rate but even he realised that just rote learning would not help him advance and thus, sought out people for moral advice.

Apparently, Ed kept a list in which he listed the people whose moral compass he imitated.

Alfred got access to it and somehow, her name was the only one that was available to him at that time.

And thus, he sought her out.

Over the years, their bond deepened and now, she was one of the only people on Alfred's protect at all costs list. It was flattering but honestly, she thought it was unnecessary to waste so many resources protecting someone who could croak at any moment.

They did offer to fix her body and revert her physical age back to her prime but she rejected it. It would undoubtedly allow her to fight for the good once again but she was tired.

Just so so tired.

Besides, she had lived her life. She had a long fulfilling life and now, with her mental faculties restored, she was satisfied with living out the last of her days, watching Humanity's Dawn, brought about by Alfred and Ed, as they brought Humanity forward kicking and screaming.

She still had nightmares about the situation. If she had not met Alfred and talked with him, who knows how Alfred would have turned out? Especially with Ed being completely obsessed with his goal, he couldn't have given Alfred the proper education he needed.

For what it was worth, she was glad Alfred chose that day to become her TV remote.

–Flashback No Jutsu–

She was cycling through the TV channels, trying not to pull her remaining hair out in frustration because she couldn't remember any of the TV channels.

Then, out of nowhere, the TV remote stopped working and before she could call the handsome nurse to replace her remote, the TV started changing channels spontaneously.

"Is this more up to your preference, Miss Carter?" came the voice from the telephone near her, even though she hadn't picked it up.

Then she realised that the channel was set to a documentary on WWII.

"Who is it? Are you speaking through the telephone?" she questioned while looking around, wondering why nobody from the nurse staff had come to give her sleeping meds yet. They always did when she started hallucinating like this.

Then a floating transparent bobblehead appeared in front of her, scaring the crap out of her.

The bobblehead somehow radiated pity as he looked at her. Before she could get a word in though, a yellow light shined in her eyes and the next thing she knew was darkness.

The next time she opened her eyes, she already felt more clear headed than she remembered feeling in years.

Opening her eyes, she could see that it had become night already and the floating bobblehead was still hovering over her bed, waiting for her to wake up.

Having read some early stage S.H.I.E.L.D. reports, she could hazard a guess as to what the boblehead's origin was, "A-Are you an alien?"

The bobblehead tilted its head at her in an oddly human gesture and said in a childish voice, "No. I am Earth's first fully sapient AI and I am in need of help."

AI?

She remembered Howard talking about it but had dismissed it as his usual rambling.

Maybe it was the meds talking but she found herself initiating a conversation with the floating bobblehead that was apparently an AI, something that even Howard thought would be possible only in the far future.

Over the period of several weeks, she had multiple conversations with Alfred and with each session, with Alfred's treatment, her mental health began to get better and with it, came a crushing sense of responsibility for the young AI.

Alfred was incredibly trusting of her for some reason. He was very much wary of being exposed to another human being, even going so far as to threaten to disappear should she do so.

In a few weeks, she realised why Alfred came to her and how she could help him. His creator, Ed was obsessed with his goal and could not even spare the thought that his incredibly young and insanely dangerous AI needed moral education as well. Alfred himself recognised it and found me for that education.

And after realising the horrifying potential Alfred had, she gladly provided him with the most stable moral compass she could.

Then she realised that Alfred and Ed were not alone as one fine day, she realised that almost all of her security detail had been replaced by their people. She questioned Alfred about it only to receive an absurd answer. According to him, daily communication was important and maintaining his secrecy was costing them precious time so he had his team take control of the hospital.

That was the day she realised the scope of their organisation. He also helped her gain a foothold in S.H.I.E.L.D. with Fury's permission. With her old contacts, it was laughably easy to do so.

–Flashback No Jutsu Ends–

Nowadays, she was protected more by Alfred's people than the people of the country she served for almost all her life.

But, looking at yet another failed message request to Alfred, she would not have it any other way.

He might have gone away for some time but he would return.

She was sure of it.


________________________________________________________________


Word Count - 2256

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Chapter 53

Technomancer in MCU

Previously (Chapter #52)

"Ah, that's the stuff. So, Frank, what brings you to our little slice of spy agency work? I thought you vowed never to work for us after that psyops went sideways." He asked Frank, curious and a bit wary of their motives.

Frank smiled a cold smile, "Well, we are here to help you of course."

Not even a nine-year-old would believe that obvious lie.

________________________________________________________________

–Frank Castle–

For the sake of the mission, it was necessary to maintain this ruse.

He could admit that Fury was way better than him when it came to reading men. He had done the same during their last mission together when he specifically warned me about my so-called teammates but he was so sure of his trust in them that he ignored the advice of the Director of the premier spy agency in the world.

God, he was so stupid back then.

Fury couldn't be allowed to get even a whiff of their true plans. He must be assured that they were here to utterly destroy the carriers and with it, any chances of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s comeback. It was a good thing that they were not alone in their endeavour, he thought while glancing at Romanoff and Rogers.

Wilson was a non-issue as according to the profile they had on him, he was more than likely to follow Rogers in whatever choice he made.

That was why when Fury asked him about their objective here, he smiled a cruel smile, "Well, we are here to help you of course."

From the grimace visible on Fury's face, he could say that his objective was successful but with Fury, you never know.

The man had secrets for his secrets. Not even the people closest to him could tell what he was thinking.

Honestly, he was the most pain-in-the-ass type of person to deal with. If it wasn't a critical stage of their plans, he probably would have waited till all the carriers were airborne and come crashing down on them with the heavy hammer that was their very own superclass carrier. That would have been glorious to witness.

He had seen the specs of their new generation carriers and he was disappointed, to say the least. Their regular carriers could take out all six of them if they wanted to.

But alas, with the chaos up there, he had to be here to make sure that things didn't stray off the script that Alfred and Ed had written up.

"Well, the creepiness factor aside. Honestly man, your smile should be a crime, I think we take their help. If they are anything like what I've heard of them, they could be instrumental in taking down the carriers once and for all." Wilson said.

It would seem he was wrong. Wilson did have a spine to speak of.

He could see the way Fury's face took a surprised expression as the implication of Wilson's words began to sink in. Fury's brows creased as he spoke, "What do you mean once and for all? We are not here to discuss their destruction, we have to retrieve them and–"

"And then what? Just wait for this to happen all over again? No. This stops now. Everything goes. The carriers, the secrets, S.H.I.E.L.D., everything goes." Rogers spoke out, clearly frustrated.

He could sympathize with that. The man had been declared rogue and ousted from the very organisation that he served, thinking that all the work he had been doing was all for a good cause. And now, he has to destroy the very organisation that the love of his life helped build.

Yeah, he would not want to be in that position right now.

It was amusing watching Fury cycle through everybody's expressions and then slumping in on himself when realised that everybody agreed with Rogers' sentiments.

"Good. This was going to backfire spectacularly anyway. I mean, what were you guys smoking when you greenlit this plan? Sure, let's put a series of boats in the air with guns so advanced they could target anybody from thousands of feet in the air and strategically tear apart any person without them even realising who killed them. That would make the average Joe feel safe? And for what? We would have destroyed them anyway. No way Ed or Alfred would allow this travesty of freedom to occur." Eric chose this moment to speak out his thoughts.

"And who are you supposed to be, new guy?" Fury asked Eric.

"I am the captain of the—"

"Who he is has no relevance to this conversation. What we should be doing right now is planning on how to take down those carriers without hundreds of people dying in the process." Thankfully, Rogers interrupted Eric before he could give out any information regarding the superclass carrier to Fury.

Fury alone was a non-issue but the problem was his association with Danvers.

That woman, wherever she was, was not in the right mindset. The damage the Supreme Intelligence did to her mind was not healed completely, resulting in her warped view of the world.

According to the records they had on her, she saw the world in white and black. There was no place for a shade of grey in her worldview. According to her, you were either good or evil and she was supposed to be the hammer of justice that came crashing down on the evildoers.

If Fury decided to involve her in panic or desperation, they would be in for an ugly fight, especially with two of their heavy hitters down and their third strongest member imprisoned somewhere near the sun.

Because no matter what Ed says, he knows that Toby is the one who was locked up in the sun prison. That was the only reason he could think of why Ed would not give him access to that particular prison facility.

"Steve's right. We need a solid plan of attack because as far as I know, those carriers were designed from the ground up to be unbreachable." Romanoff said while glancing at them, implying that they were the reason for the beefed-up security of those carriers.

He scoffed internally at the foolish notion that anything these people could add to help safeguard their carriers would even slow down their forces at all. At best, they could be a minor inconvenience. Nothing more and nothing less.

Fury nodded tiredly and gestured to a suitcase that was sitting inconspicuously near his bed, "The answer to your questions is in that suitcase."

Romanoff put it on a nearby table and opened it up, revealing six rectangular cards with minuscule chips at the centre of them. It looked quite a bit more advanced than the tech S.H.I.E.L.D. normally had access to.

Romanoff went to grab one of them which revealed a similar forcefield like theirs around the six chips, "What are these?"

His eyes narrowed at that. As far as he knew, there were only a handful of places on Earth that Fury could have gotten that shield tech from and he knew that none of them sold it.

It would seem that Fury's old Skrull buddies are quite generous when providing him with technology. They would have to keep a closer watch on their activities from now on.

After all, it was one of the mandates from Ed that Fury is not to leave the planet without company, especially with the Skrulls.

"Those, Romanoff, are six of the only chips in existence that can deactivate the carriers. Upon the successful launch of the carriers, they were supposed to be stored in isolated locations of the world, ensuring their safety but as you can see, the convoy currently carrying them are holding fakes." Fury replied.

"It's always secrets within secrets with you," Rogers said.

He went near the suitcase and as he walked, his suit turned into liquid and was absorbed back into his body where it was stored in the bone lattices. He then extended his hand towards one of the chips but this time, there was no visible reaction as his onboard suit hacked and disabled the forcefield in time, "And how are we supposed to do that?"

Fury looked visibly irate at the failure of his failsafes and he could almost see a vein popping on his forehead as he gnashed his teeth.

That couldn't have been good for his prolonged health but he was sure that whatever damage he ended up inflicting on Fury, the micro CHI injections he was receiving free of cost would heal that right up.

"Those chips are to be inserted at the central hub of each carrier. Without these, the carriers would lift off but the weapons system would not activate. I bet that Pierce is hoping that in the long term, they figure that out or find the chips, whichever happens first."

He nodded, "I see. And I assume there's a catch there since nothing is this simple with you."

Fury nodded back, "You would be correct. There are in total 3 hubs on each carrier. That chip that you are holding can be split into 3 parts. On all six carriers, you would need to insert the 18 pieces within 60 seconds of each other which means you only have 60 seconds of window between the first chip install and the last chip being installed."

"And how the hell are we supposed to do that since the last time I checked, we barely have 5 combat-ready people here." Wilson interrupted.

"Wrong." came a familiar voice from the door. He smiled upon hearing that voice.

He turned around as he saw Romanoff and Fury pointing a gun toward Sharon Carter, decked out in her custom suit that he had seen Peggy approve of a while back.

"Agent 13," he heard Fury mumble her codename in the agency.

Slowly, everybody lowered their guns. Then he said, "So? I guess, problem solved?"

Oh, how he loved seeing Fury's confused face. He was going to savor it. After all, the chances of Fury not being informed about something are very low on their planet, except when it comes to Ed or Alfred but those two are abominations when it comes to secrecy anyway.

"Who the fuck is the white lady?" His enhanced hearing picked up on Wilson asking Rogers that question.

________________________________________________________________

Word Count - 1759

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Chapter 54

Technomancer in MCU

Previously

"Who the fuck is the white lady?" His enhanced hearing picked up on Wilson asking Rogers that question.

________________________________________________________________

–Nick Fury–

Listening to Agent 13's explanation of the ordeal she went through a short few days ago, he was completely shaken inside.

He never thought that the reason Peggy Carter became active again was due to Alfred and Ed.

Seriously, did those fellows leave anybody unaffected by their presence?

He hadn't thought much of Peggy's recommendation regarding some promotions in the agency, mainly because he was busy and also because the candidates were pretty much perfect for the position so much so that if not for Peggy, he would have recommended them himself.

Now, seeing all the information that Agent 13 had bought from Peggy Carter, he was glad that he did so. The only other way to gather this much information would have been to go through them, he thought while glancing at Frank and his partner.

He still could not digest the fact that Frank would work for someone but then again, Maria wouldn't hesitate to order Frank around. She was the only one who could rein him in anyway and looking at him, he could see that his previous anger had melted away and all that remained was single-minded focus.

Not on the level of John Wick, that man was still a legend, even after retiring but Frank was pretty close.

He spoke up, interrupting Romanoff's discussion with Agent 13, "Agent 13, I hope you have some good news for us. I don't know about everybody else but I am in dire need of some bloody good news."

Agent 13 grimaced but tapped her forearm, causing a hologram to pop up in front of her, showing a scene of the hangar showing the helicarriers.

He sat a little straighter at the scene.

"While the distraction these guys provided-" she gestured to Frank and Eric, "-did help but Pierce, in his fear and paranoia, has accelerated the work on the carriers. He has brazenly brought in personnel from outside the agency who have been working on the carriers round the clock, accelerating the timeline significantly. He has become adamant on making sure that the carriers become airborne as soon as possible. All other systems have been put on the back burner in favour of the repulsion systems."

"Which means that the carriers are defenseless? Well, that makes our jobs much easier then." Wilson said.

He internally shook his head at that. It was naive to think that a military vessel wouldn't have any other defenses. Honestly, did he suffer a head injury during his service? It was possible since he was the test pilot for a heavily experimental technology.

As expected, Agent 13 shook her head, "Unfortunately, that is not true. While the biggest weapons on board, the E-canons, are inoperational on 4 carriers, Pierce has made sure that at least 2 of the carriers are loaded to the brim with weapons should they need them. The only advantage we might have is the time it takes for the cannons to cool down but honestly, even a single shot would ensure that not even ashes remain of us. Well, everybody except them-" she gestured to Frank and Eric, "-their suits should be more than capable of protecting them, just like mine."

All of them, including him, looked at Frank with accusing eyes. It was a testament to their incredible collective will that managed to make Frank sigh and avert his eyes.

He then seemed to make up his mind and said, "Fine. You can have them but only the basic protection package. Nothing fancy like the ones they-" he gestured to Romanoff and Rogers as he continued, "-used during the battle of New York. Those are custom issue units that need Ed's or Alfred's authorisation to take out of the base. I don't have that authority, neither will I request it since this is not that bad of a situation."

Romanoff shrugged and said, "Well, something's better than nothing. I'd feel a lot safer if I had one of those on me. Speaking of which, where's Alfred or Ed? I don't think Alfred would miss out on an opportunity like this." She then looked questioningly at Frank.

Frank's face became blank as he replied, "They are currently otherwise occupied else they would have been the ones here instead of telling me to come here and help your sorry asses survive."

That was odd.

From what he had read from reports gathered from eyewitnesses and testimonies from the Avengers, Alfred was someone who could rival Stark in his ability to generate trouble for others. And from the brief conversation he had with Ed, he could tell that he was the type of man who would absolutely make sure to be present during an event like this. Even if they did make light of it, even a single one of those carriers could cause catastrophic damage to the human civilisation as they knew it.

"So, Bald guy, I heard you say that the carriers used a series of satellites for their targeting systems so what if we destroyed the satellites themselves? Then, even if the carriers did take off, we could destroy them with very little or no damage to civilians." he heard the guy who came with Frank address him in such a manner.

Before he could give that fellow a piece of his mind, Frank said, "Won't work. They took that into mind as well. It's not just a small cluster of satellites responsible for the targeting systems, are they Fury?"

So, they knew about that as well? Well, it seems only obvious now, despite the hundreds of measures to make sure that it remained a secret.

In fact, they spent close to a hundred million dollars on launching the fake satellites into space, hoping to fool anybody who had eyes on the carriers before their launch sequences.

He nodded," You are correct. There is a cluster of satellites that is responsible for secondary targeting systems but the real stars of the show are the thousands of small satellites that provide Satellite internet for a large majority of the planet. Elon was all too happy to get the subsidies for allowing us to install tiny modules that allowed for DNA-level tracking of targets throughout the globe. Last I checked, they were at a staggering 82% of land coverage and nearly half of ocean coverage for the tracking systems. So, yeah, the only option you guys have is targeting and bringing down the carriers before they can fully sync with the satellites and take flight because once they become airborne, the automatic activation sequence would kick in and the weapons onboard would activate automatically."

He then looked at each and every person who was going to participate in the fight tomorrow in the eye and said, "I know that I have not been the most trustworthy person but believe me, this was not my intention and it pains me immensely to do this, but the carriers must be destroyed and I hope that you all succeed in that endeavour. All I can say is good luck."

________________________________________________________________

The Triskelion

–Phil "Touch my L.O.L.A. and die" Coulson–

When he heard that Director Fury was dead, the emergency protocols that had been seared into his mind kicked in. Immediately, he ordered his team to go dark and immediately headed to the Theta Protocol.

Once there, he removed a pager from his pocket that he brought with him everywhere. It was made of the same technology that the one Director Fury had to call Captain Marvel if the need came. This one was built differently though. It was designed to activate only when it was in a certain location at a certain time in the presence of a certain someone.

With all the conditions of the pager fulfilled, he waited for the message to come in. He prayed against all odds that the message came in because if it didn't, he didn't know what he would do.

Well, he was sure that finding another job with similar benefits was going to be tough.

He was lost in his thoughts when the pager rang in front of him and he immediately began to write down the code.

Seeing that the code was correct, he sighed in relief and immediately began to head outside.

The code didn't specify it but he ordered the staff there to prep Theta Protocol just in case.

When he returned back to The Bus, the team was understandably full of questions. But the team hadn't yet gained his full trust and thus, he ordered a blanket communication ban and ordered May to pilot it to Washington DC.

When he reached the given coordinates, he was surprised to see Director Fury fully healed.

Smiling, he resisted the urge to hug him and instead went for a handshake.

Ignoring Maria Hill's shocked face, Director Fury shook his hand and gestured for him to the helicopter waiting behind them.

He nodded and after signaling to May to leave with the team, he went after Director Fury.

"B-Bu-But you died. I went to your funeral. We all did. How are you still alive?" Hill asked him, shell-shocked at seeing me alive and well.

Well, he wouldn't blame her for that. Anybody would be shocked. After all, according to the reports he had read, his heart did stop beating but somehow, Director Fury managed to bring him back. He was still not privy to how that happened but he was fine and that was all that mattered to him.

"The news of my demise was greatly exaggerated, Agent Hill. Nice to see you again." He always wanted to say that dialogue to someone. He could cross another one of his bucket list items today. Right after fighting with Captain America in the field.

"Ladies, you can chit-chat later. Right now, we are on a mission. We need to make sure that at least a single one of the boats is secured. Coulson, I hope Theta Protocol is ready?" Director Fury asked him.

He nodded in affirmative.

"Great. Hill?"

"Yes, Director?" Hill asked the Director,

"Make sure that Coulson is there when the fighting begins. There are a few things in the Triskelion that he needs to retrieve. Your objective is to provide cover and safe passage for him. I'll leave him to you, alright?"

"Yes, sir," Hill replied. Then she tapped something on her upper forearm. The next moment, some sort of silvery liquid began to spread all over her body, and within seconds, a nanite suit formed over her body, hugging her body and leaving nothing to the imagination.

The only thing that came to his mind at that moment slipped out of his mouth, "That is so cool! Do I get one?" he asked Director Fury with stars shining in his eyes.

If yes, it would fulfill another one of his bucket list items.

Sadly, "No," Director Fury denied it.

He did not pout but it was a very close thing.

________________________________________________________________

Word Count - 1871

If you guys would like to read ahead, you can head on to my P-atreon. It is the same name as my username.

You know you want to, why resist?

I already have up to 12 extra chapters uploaded there.

 

[IdleMuse0307]

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Chapter 55

Technomancer in MCU

Previously

"That is so cool! Do I get one?" he asked Director Fury with stars shining in his eyes.

If yes, it would fulfill another one of his bucket list items.

Sadly, "No," Director Fury denied it.

He did not pout but it was a very close thing.

________________________________________________________________

Above the Triskelion, cloaked

–Daisy "Quake" Johnson–

She waited with bated breath for the battle to begin. The only reason she wasn't pacing on the captain's deck was because she had an image to maintain in front of the staff.

Granted, most of them had seen her goofing around just a few short weeks ago but then again, she was not given a position of power that had the power to influence the lives of billions of humans and even millions of aliens.

That was the thing that struck out the most to her.

In their quest to help Humanity, Ed and Alfred had expanded their horizons beyond their blue ball of dirt and they came across various species of aliens. Some powerful, some weak, some on the run, and some hunting others. Being who they were, they managed to acquaint themselves with most of them, saved a few and from what she managed to gather from the reports, it snowballed from there to eventually helping multiple refugee species set up their own communities on one of the planets that Alfred bought from Xandar.

Confident in the frankly overkill amount of weaponry they had brought with them to their space journey, they didn't feel the need to pay for the extra protection fee that Xandar offered along with the planet's sale.

Predictably, corruption and greed reared their ugly heads, and someone from the Xandar administration must have tipped someone off about the bunch of riffraffs that resided on the newly purchased planet along with a puny Midgardian who stayed with them who was very much rich. Of course, they were carrying a miniaturized aircraft carrier with them which was very much capable of dealing with a bunch of pirates.

The way they dealt with the pirates and then their subsequent overpowering of the defense systems of the entire planet of Xandar was known throughout the galaxy. She couldn't believe her eyes when she saw that Alfred had hacked everything on Xandar and along with Ed, hovered above their planet's capital with an entire carrier with them.

The scene of Ed negotiating with Nova Prime the terms of their deal was hilarious to watch, especially the reaction of Nova Prime when she realised that someone from her administration had managed to screw up royally and invited the wrath of a power smaller than yet so far above them in terms of power.

Ever since then, they have expanded their refugee operation from a single planet and about a million displaced aliens to now 14 planets in 4 different star systems, housing over 3 billion aliens. Most of the planets were made self-sufficient by Alfed's research over the years but even then, some of the more adventurous of the aliens had approached their Patron God, as they called Alfred, for any opportunity to help their Patron God's organisation. That was why, as she watched multiple teams get ready to cut off H.Y.D.R.A.'s entire presence apart, she could spy multiple aliens in the teams mixed with humans.

Funnily enough, all of the refugees considered Alfred as the true God and Ed only as his mouthpiece. Ed thought it was hilarious and hence, didn't correct them at all.

That was also why, "Commander Daisy, was it? How long until we are granted a meeting with our Lord and Saviour, Lord Alfred?", She was having to entertain the priests of Alfred who managed the multiple communities they had on the newly settled planets.

When she first came to know about Alfred's absence, it was through the mouth of her commander and then the news slowly trickled into the others in the organisation as multiple systems that were historically operated by Alfred began to break down. Among the agents of Earth, there was only an uneasy feeling spreading as they were used to receiving the majority of their tasks through or by Alfred himself. Even then, during the first series of meetings that Commander Castle took right after meeting her, she never understood the reason for his and Maria's immense panic right until the participants of the meetings went from humans to aliens that came in various sizes and shapes.

Then she realised the impact of Alfred's absence was felt across the galaxy. The alien refugees they rescued built multiple shrines of crude drawings and sculptures of Alfred's hologram which they later began to worship. Taking pity on them and after multiple attempts of explanations later, Alfred installed small holograms across thousands of shrines across all the planets they owned. Every day, Alfred would hear their requests and either give out solutions or guide them to their solutions. As far as she was concerned, that system worked really well as most of the aliens were really scared of approaching positions of authority, and as such, Alfred managed to reach nearly every nook and cranny of the refugee communities, resulting in near-instant problem recognition and swift resolutions.

Also, due to the near-mythical presence of Alfred on all allied planets, the crime rates are non-existent and major crimes such as murder, rape and assault have been thoroughly eradicated as every single citizen has a standard nanite package that monitors almost all aspects of them.

So, when Alfred went offline, all the shrines on all allied planets stopped working. People were on the verge of riots, only somehow stopped due to their fear of Alfred's law enforcement procedures and careful cajoling of the priests on all planets. She barely avoided total anarchy by telling them that Alfred is in the middle of a very important task and thus, cannot divide his attention. The worst was when she heard that the Grand Priest was personally coming to meet Alfred and she had no choice but to agree to assuage their fears.

Even after meeting Ed, he did not appear satisfied and instead, appeared to be in even more distress after seeing Ed's bedridden state. It was an oversight on her part, allowing them to see the mouthpiece of their Lord being injured.

Now, he was with her on the ship's deck as he had decided to send back his entourage and stay with them until he saw Alfred.

And that's why, "I am surprised that one as young as you has managed to get the position of our God's representative. I always approved of Sir Ed being our Lord's mouthpiece since despite his immense presence, Lord Alfred seemed a bit carefree, I would say. I have yet to meet our Lord and Saviour but until then, I shall endeavour to find out what he has seen in you." the Grand Priest of the church of Alfred said.

She turned to him, tired and exasperated at his relentlessness, "I have reminded you time and time again, that Lord Alfred has given all of us our orders and we are just following them. You will see him when he deems his task complete and not one moment early."

"Strange that despite being his most devout worshipper and being granted the burden of being Grand Priest personally by Lord Alfred, I was not given any such orders. Forgive my intrusion, but until I see Lord Alfred personally, I will not be leaving for my home. My people have entrusted this to me and I will not fail them." said the Grand Priest who seemed more like a bodybuilder who spent all his waking hours in a gym than a priest.

Then again, all Kylosians looked like that so what did she know?

Different from his fellow people though, he was much wiser. The time he spent in captivity made him much more level-headed than his fellow Kylosians. Don't be mistaken though, he could fold nearly anybody in the organisation, save the S-class combatants, in half with his physical prowess alone, not to mention any powers Alfred must have given him since she could not read what his powers were in the files she was given access to.

It would seem that there were still some files that she was not given access to.

She glanced at him, "If you are willing to go that far, you can wait for a few more days. He'll surely be back by then. We are waiting for him just as much as you are." Even now, she could feel a faint sense of danger standing this close to him.

No wonder he was comfortable sending back his entire entourage back home. This man probably was another S-class combatant that nobody in the entire organisation knew about, save for Ed or Alfred.

He then replied in a deep rumble, "Very well. Until then, I will observe you carrying out our Lord's orders efficiently. As the Grand Priest, I can at least do that much."

She rolled her eyes internally at that.

________________________________________________________________

–Grand Priest Ajax–

He could sense the faint sense of ridicule and amusement that wafted off the new Commander's mind.

Truly strange, the gifts that Lord Alfred had bested upon him.

Once upon a time, as he spent all that time mining for that accursed metal, he never would have thought he would be saved and brought out of that hellhole to see the shining stars ever again let alone be granted the blessing of that very accursed metal in his very bones.

His Lord called it "Vibranium", the accursed metal but that same accursed metal flowed through his body and granted him the strength to carry out his duties.

He knew that these people were lying about their Lord's absence.

Oh, he was sure that they were also worried about his absence but they did not have even a lick of idea about his whereabouts. They were just as clueless as he was but much more managed due to the presence of Sir Ed.

The condition of Sir Ed was something that also raised warning signals in his mind. After being given his blessings, he had always sensed something off about Sir Ed's body. His mind shone like a sun but his body felt small, inadequate to house that powerful mind.

He never said anything about that because it was not his place to question his Lord's choices but now that he had seen the state in which Sir Ed was, he was very much worried about Lord Alfred.

While he knew that there were very few forces in the universe that could ever hope to harm Lord Alfred, he also knew that the same could be said for Sir Ed, and witnessing his near-death state, he could no longer go back home and reassure his people about the Lord's continued presence.

He had been sleeping peacefully when he was jolted awake when a mind-splitting attack struck his mind. Thinking that somebody was psychically attacking him, he employed all that he was taught by the Ancient One to repel the intruder but found that the attack was not aimed at him but at his Lord and merely due to his connection to his Lord's soul, he was injured in his spirit.

After all the time spent with Lord Alfred, he was sure of one thing. His Lord would never abandon Humanity and as such, he was here, waiting for his Lord to appear.

Because he didn't think their civilization would survive that loss. These people probably didn't realise that but were it not for him keeping quiet about his findings, they would not have come to an uneasy and fearful but peaceful planet but a burning one.

Such was the influence that their Lord held over them.

He once again prayed in his mind, waiting for their Lord to return.

For he knew that the entire galaxy could be plunged into war should their people not get their Lord back.

________________________________________________________________

Word Count - 2027

If you guys would like to read ahead, you can head on to my P-atreon. It is the same name as my username.

You know you want to, why resist?

I already have up to 12 extra chapters uploaded there.

Author Note -

Well that took a weird turn but stay tuned, it's about to get even weirder.

Man, I love what my drunk self can come up with.