Chapter 39 - Mind over Matter

Unknown POV

26th of May, 2012

Somewhere on the outskirts of Minneapolis

"Alright, we have a confirmation on the target's location. It's a small inn on the edge of the residential district, so orders from higher up are to treat this as a spook op: we go in quick, we go in quiet. Use the special issue equipment first, resort to regular firearms in life or death situations only. The first fucker that jumps the gun and makes a sound louder than a mouse's fart will get kicked straight back to bootcamp for remedial lessons in stealth, am I understood?"

After receiving a chorus of "yes sirs!" the squad leader turned back towards the front of the van they were hiding in, ignoring his subordinates as he thought about the upcoming confrontation. It had taken them several tries (and liberal use of existing S.H.I.E.L.D. networks and operations) in order to track down their target, a process not made easier by the scrutiny that their cover was under and the return of Peggy fucking Carter (which was said so often, it was almost her official name amongst their people), but they had finally managed to get a bead on the woman.

While they had certainly pushed their anonymity to its limits in hounding the target as thoroughly as they had, their boss had thought the risk more than worth it.

The moment Whitehall was made aware of Jessica Jones leaving the protection of Othrys, was the moment that Hydra would acquire the woman for its own needs.

As the inn slowly came into view after the van turned a corner, the squad leader reassured himself that, no matter how powerful their target, Hydra would get what it desired. He would make sure of it.

Turning back towards the other Hydra-agents in the van (a total of eight men and women, all clad in unassuming clothes and equipped with silenced tranq-guns and teargas grenades) the squad leader was pleased to find only determined faces and professional attitudes. Working for the glory of Hydra, thumbing their nose at their greatest enemy day by day by merely existing within their ranks, had the unfortunate tendency to make the youngest amongst them more arrogant than was appreciated (not that the arrogance was misplaced, they were Hydra after all, but it pays to fly under the radar when you're living with your nemesis). However, these agents were hardened, both from their Hydra training and S.H.I.E.L.D. careers.

They would deal with this in a mature and professional way, of that their leader could be assured.

He was drawn from his musings (though of course he had kept part of his attention focused on his surroundings at all times, as any spy ought to) when the van came to a halt on the parking lot of the small inn Jessica Jones (and sister, apparently, but at the moment she was of no concern to them) had taken their residence.

With a few simple hand gestures, and without a whisper of a sound, the team of Hydra agents filed out of the van and ghosted up to the second floor, easily making their way to Miss Jones' room unseen. They quickly stacked up next to the door, giving each other quick furtive glances as they waited on the signal from their leader.

Suppressing the thrill of excitement than ran through him with an ease born from decades of practice, the squad leader tightened his grip around his tranq –gun. The sedatives inside were experimental, an enhanced version of the heavier stuff in S.H.I.E.L.D.'s (and therefore Hydra's) arsenal, and was supposed to knock out an elephant within half a minute.

Supposed to.

He had faith in the scientists that came up with the stuff, but in combat, half a minute could feel like an eternity.

And Miss Jones was a hell of a lot more dangerous than an elephant.

Still, Whitehall had given his orders, and he would see them fulfilled, even with his dying breath.

So, after taking another deep breath in order to center himself, the squad leader gave a sharp nod, muscles tensed. The moment his head fell, the agents at the front started working on the simple lock of the door, which didn't even last a full twenty seconds. When the lock sprung open, they pushed open the door, their colleagues behind them immediately breaching the room, guns at the ready. They ghosted through the hallway and adjacent rooms at incredible speed, making their way towards the small living room.

Seeing a curtain of dark hair peek out from around the large lounge chair, the team of Hydra agents didn't even hesitate. Fanning out in order to avoid friendly fire, they all unleashed their sedatives as one, some of them even aiming through the back of the chair.

For a moment, the only sound in the cramped room was the hurried breathing of the Hydra agents, all of them poised for a possible counter-attack. The sheer amount of sedative they just pumped in the woman should have been sufficient to, if not knock her out completely, at least reduce her threat-level to manageable levels.

The entire squad couldn't quite contain a relieved slumping of their posture when the figure in the chair sagged in on itself, a deep sigh coming from Miss Jones as she quickly lost consciousness, though of course they were far too experienced to simply let their guard down completely.

Cautiously moving forwards, gun still at the ready and with his entire body poised to jump into action at the slightest hint of danger, the squad leader moved forwards, peering around the side of the chair at the woman that sat there, appearing dead to the world.

For a long moment, the Hydra leader simply stared at her, keeping an eye on the steady rise and fall of Miss Jones' chest and any possible fluttering behind her eyes. Only once he was absolutely, completely, definitely sure that the woman was in fact unconscious (without any apparent complications from the massive amounts of sedative that had been pumped into her) did he signal to the rest of the team to start securing the target and prepping their escape route.

They still hadn't spoken a single word to one another, and the only sound that had been made during this entire operation had been the soft hisses of their suppressed guns.

Grabbing heavy duty shackles from the inside of his windbreaker, which were designed to hold a being of Miss Jones capabilities (made out of tungsten and hastily reverse-engineered Chitauri and Destroyer technology), the squad leader carefully approached the knocked out woman.

While he would trust these manacles to hold most beings on the planet, he wasn't entirely sure if the superwoman in front of him could be counted amongst them. Hence why he was planning on using every single shackle in their possession, and keeping the woman sedated until they returned to base and managed to throw her into the most secure cell they had.

Moving quickly, he grabbed the woman by her slim wrist and made to clamp the shackle around it…

… when his brain registered that something was very, very wrong. He was looking at a slim woman's wrist, and yet he could feel something much larger and solid in his hand.

The sheer discrepancy was enough to halt his trained reflexes for the barest of moments, but even that would turn out to be fatal. Quicker that his eyes could see, there was a twisting underneath his hand, and he could feel something grab his own arm with enough strength that his bones immediately cried out in protest.

There was a brief shimmer over Miss Jones' form, before it broke away, like static that suddenly cleared, or a video that jumped to HD quality. And instead of the woman they had been chasing all over the country for the past two weeks, the Hydra agent found himself looking at a man in the prime of his life, who had a small smile on his face.

"We really need to stop meeting like this. That's the second time now that I have a secret rendezvous with you spooks in some random little inn. People are going to talk you know." Jim Harper, Head of Security of Othrys, smiled down at the ashen-faced Hydra leader in his grip.

Before his team could come to their leader's aid, three massive shapes seemed to melt out of the shadows behind them, going on a lighting fast attack that smashed bone as easily as a strongman might snap a toothpick. Within seconds, his elite team of Hydra-trained S.H.I.E.L.D. veterans were reduced to nothing more than groaning piles of broken bodies littering the floor, crippled at the hands of these… demons.

"Well. You're going to talk, in any case. You're going to talk… a lot."

Michael POV

26th of May, 2012

Othrys

"So, how's California treating you?" I asked the holographic projection on my desk, leaning back in my chair.

Jessica, now a blonde with green eyes and a rather chubby physique, smiled back at me.

"Well, the beaches are amazing, and the sun is doing Trish a lot of good. We do some sight-seeing occasionally, but most of the time we just lounge around and enjoy the weather and the food. And whenever we get tired of a place, we simply pack our stuff and move towards the next destination that seems like fun. I'm really glad we did this, Michael, Trish really needed this. I did too."

I give a smile back, finding myself genuinely pleased to see her so happy and lively. It has been a few years now that I have let myself become attached to people again, but actually feeling emotions for people that I have for so long merely considered to be fictional still tended to take me off guard occasionally.

"Alright, I gotta go, me and Trish are going to go to Universal Studios this afternoon, so hopefully that'll be fun. Trish really wanted to visit the theme-park, or whatever it's supposed to be, I just hope the fucking lines won't be too long." Jessica says with a grin, prompting one from me as well.

"Have fun you two. Stay safe."

"We will. Love you."

"Love you too."

And with another smile, Jessica cuts off the call. For a moment, I just sit there alone in my office, mulling over the last part of my exchange with Jess. It wasn't the first time we said the L-word to each other, but every time either one of us did it came as a shock to my system.

I had wanted to devote my life to the pursuit of power at any and all cost. I hadn't exactly gone out of my way to find love, and honestly, I hadn't expected to find it at all. The occasional fling at best, really, and even then it would've been inconsequential in the greater scheme of things. But this… loving a woman, becoming a father…

Was I growing soft?

Conceding that I probably was, I gave a sigh as I minimized the screen showing Jessica's position in Los Angeles (Phineas would be keeping a constant eye on her) and instead focused on the screen showing Harper's position in Minneapolis. A flick of my hand connected me to my Head of Security, and I only had to wait a few moments before Harper took the call.

Ignoring the way the walls were liberally painted red (was that a bit of intestine hanging from the ceiling fan?) I simply leaned forwards, pinning Harper with my burning gaze.

"I take it the trap worked?"

"It did sir. The holographic layer tricked them into breaching the premises just like Soter promised it would, though I still insist that the wig played a role in that as well." Harper calmly responded, absentmindedly toweling off his gore splattered arms.

"You manage to squeeze any information out of them?"

"I did sir. It was as you expected: Hydra, out to capture and retrieve Miss Jones. Decently sized team, well trained and well equipped. The tranquilizer and these advanced guns they were packing are powerful enough that it could've been a bit of a problem to deal with if I hadn't been clad in this new Spartan armor of yours. Good call there sir."

The Spartan armor was something that I had designed for my forces after the One Day War using the knowledge I gained from strip-mining the Chitauri corpses, and was a step up from the unbreakable leather armor that I sold to firefighters, police and the military. It basically amounted to the bare-bones version of my own armor, way back when I first recruited Sterns, with a few little extra's thrown in. Back then it had been thick Hammer-drone plating over a rough power-armored exoskeleton. The Spartan Armor, however, was made up out of thin, yet incredibly durable, smooth metal plating based off Chitauri-tech over a set of BlueBox powered servos, all connected by an Amber Armor leather suit. The Spartan armor had a dumb VI, which could link up with Phineas, allowing for smooth communication between me and my forces in the field. Each Spartan Armor also had special gauntlets somewhat similar to what Crossbones, Diamondback and the Shocker would end up wearing.

Despite the name, the regular issue Spartan Armor looked far more like generic Sci-Fi armor infantry grunts would wear than the iconic suit of the Master Chief, and while its defensive capabilities were through the roof it didn't offer much else (not that that was a problem, given the mountain of advanced weaponry currently in my basement), due to my forces already possessing superstrength, meaning that the increase from the Armor was marginal in most cases.

Of course, my elite forces were better equipped, and as such, Harper and the Hysminai wore what was basically my Spartan Mark II armor. Sporting thicker plating, an actual exoskeleton instead of merely servos and a host of onboard weaponry (such as grenade- and missile launchers, coil guns, machine guns equipped with exotic ammo, just to name a few) the Spartan II armor was heavy enough that a baseline human would kill itself trying to wear it.

Instead, it turned Harper and his team into living tanks, appearing less like generic Sci-Fi soldiers and more along the likes of what Stark would have built had he been a massive Warhammer 40K fan.

I already had idea's for a Spartan Mark III armor in place, which would sport a bio-suit underlayer, but that was still being researched by Burstein and Hansen as a little side-project, so I put it out of my mind for now.

"Submit your report ASAP, I'll look through it and determine our next step. Anything urgent I should be made aware of right now?" I asked, my mind already turning towards the headache that was Hydra and how I would deal with them.

"Not exactly urgent, sir. But I think you should know that it was Whitehall, again. Apparently, he's not just an important player within Hydra's hierarchy, in so far as they have one, but he's also part of a faction within their ranks."

A faction? I knew that Hydra operated in semi-independent cells in order to better blend in within S.H.I.E.L.D.'s command structure, but I hadn't known that this manifested itself into actual factions within their group.

Different factions meant different opinions.

And different opinions meant that there was an opportunity to sow discord amongst their ranks.

"Do you know how many factions there are? Which one is Whitehall a part of?" I asked, intrigued.

"No hard number on the amount of factions, though by the sound of it, there are at least three major ones. I don't think even Hydra itself knows how many sub factions there are, given that some parts of Hydra are unaware of the existence of some of the others. Smart move on their part, annoying as hell for us. As for Whitehall, he appears to be the head of the faction that's focused on enhancing the human body, specifically through alien tech, though he'll try to experiment with anything he gets his hands on. It's not that the others mind, per se, it's more that they are more focused on other means of fucking up the world. The biggest push-back seems to come from those that have infiltrated S.H.I.E.L.D. and the Government. You'll find the details in my report, sir."

"Very well. Scrub the room and get out of there. I want you back here, and the Hysminai ready to be deployed at a moment's notice. It's time me and Whitehall had one of your… talks." I say with a grin, my eyes lighting up the room.

Harper doesn't exactly smile, per se, but he stops toweling off the bit of viscera splattered across his pauldron in order to look back at me through the screen, the corner of his lips twitching upwards, while a gleam comes to his eyes.

"Very well, sir."

While it was annoying to find out Whitehall still had a hard-on for kidnapping my people (first Sterns, now Jess), in a way it was also rather convenient. With part of my Hysminai scouring the world for Gravitonium in order to finally entice the stubborn Franklin Hall to come work for me (I swear, if Gravitonium wasn't so ridiculously powerful, I wouldn't even have bothered with the man to begin with, but my other scientists were currently too wrapped up in their own projects to make the sudden switch in discipline in order to properly study the exotic material as he could), and the rest tied up with Harper in leading whoever wanted to kidnap Jessica on a merry goose chase across the country, I had been fine with simply sending Carter to nip at Hydra's heels.

However, with Whitehall pissing me off, and Harper and part of the Hysminai now free to take on their next task, I decided on a different course of action. Oh, I would still send Carter out to harass Hydra as much as possible, but Whitehall was mine. As repulsive as the man was, his research was sheer fucking genius, and I needed that for myself.

Selvig had just yesterday finished building his massive Tesseract-powered generator, and was already building a far smaller one per my request. When asked how small I wanted it to be, I had simply said "small enough to fit in a truck". Due to now having far larger amounts of energy to safely work with, Foster had started to move on from merely theorizing to testing, leaning heavily on both Sterns' research as well as the alien knowledge Loki shoved inside Selvig's brain.

It wouldn't be too long until the Space Stone would be ready for use.

As for the Celestial flesh, Jeri had taken one look at the report that Burstein and Hansen had submitted and had immediately phoned the Russian Government. Deals were still being hammered out, but by the looks of it, within the next five years, Chernobyl and its surroundings would be completely scrubbed of harmful radiation.

After Burstein was finally convinced that I wouldn't be trying to incorporate the flesh into myself despite his warnings, the research on Ego's Seed slowed down a bit from the frantic pace it had been in ever since I had it dug out. It became more of a side-project as both Burstein and Hansen started applying their newly gained knowledge to their respective main interests.

Hansen was trying (and somewhat succeeding) in creating plants with a far more efficient version of photosynthesis. The only problem was that they were occasionally too efficient, absorbing so much solar energy that they would heat up and explode in a ball of flames.

At least it gave me yet another type of grenade to add to my arsenal.

Burstein had returned his gaze to the animal kingdom, looking at the amazing adaptations that could be found there and looking for ways that they could be put to human use. Already he had ideas to use the matter-replication ability of Ego's Seed in a way that would vastly increase the amount of meat that could be harvested from animals. It would not only make a dent in world hunger, but it would also allow the meat-industry to become less polluting, thus helping the planet.

However, due to the sheer difficulty of his ambitious project, it would likely take years before he managed to isolate and replicate the matter-producing capabilities of a Celestial, so instead he had been working on other projects as well.

The last I heard, he was now researching spiders.

This left the Mind Stone, and the Kree-technology. Radcliffe was finally convinced that conditions would be as controlled as they were going to get, and had conceded to Skye to undergoing Terrigenesis. At my urging, Radcliffe had looked into who amongst my forces also carried the Inhuman gene (the work of mere minutes with Phineas' help). As it turned out, only two did, a mother and her son, interestingly enough, family of one of the people that Toomes had sent my way back when I still worked out of that old tannery before the Hand's attack.

The child, of course, had immediately jumped at the opportunity to gain superpowers. His mother, rather predictably, had at first tried to put her foot down. However, after assuring her (multiple times) that the procedure would be both painless and harmless, as well as pointing out that she gave the boy the Inhuman gene, whereas the boy's father was already superhuman (enhanced with Extremis, in fact) wore down her protests, until she finally relented and gave her permission.

It seems that living in Othrys for well over a year has worn down any instinctive aversion towards the superhuman she might have had by quite a bit.

She declined going through Terrigenesis herself though, which was somewhat annoying, but not exactly a setback. It would've meant more data for Radcliffe to work with, but between Skye and the child (Darryl, I recalled) we probably would have sufficient amounts of it anyways.

If not, I could always just find a bunch of Terrigen crystals and dump them in the ocean.

I was somewhat concerned with the fact that the only people in Othrys' employ that tested positive for the Inhuman gene were baseline humans however. Maybe the other enhancements messed with the DNA of the enhanced enough to remove the genetic markers. That still wouldn't mean that I couldn't give myself Inhuman powers, but if that turned out to be the case then I really wanted Whitehall's research on how he had integrated parts of Skye's mother into his own body.

Putting the vile Nazi out of my mind, I swiped my hand across the wall next to a door to one of my labs, quickly striding inside. While the lab was spacious, it was surprisingly crowded. There were two gurneys in the middle of the room, surrounded by heavy machinery and people.

However, the thing that immediately caught the eye weren't the people or the heavy machines, but the thick pedestal in the center of the room, connected to a legion of cables and covered in a host of alien writing.

It had taken literal days for Radcliffe and a team to travel to the center of the city (using the map created by the drones beforehand), find the room where Skye and Raina originally would've undergone Terrigenesis, and then perform deep scans of the obelisk there until an exact replica could be fabricated.

Of course, merely rebuilding the physical structure wouldn't have been enough, but we had decoded enough of the writing to understand how the thing had been powered and how it interacted with the Diviners. Thankfully, the Diviners did most of the work, so all we needed to do was rebuild the entire obelisk and underlying power structure, calibrate it according to the Kree writings, and then just place a Diviner on top of it in order to start Terrigenesis.

On opposite sides of the squat pedestal were the two gurneys. Sitting on one bed was Skye, surrounded by Radcliffe and Agnes of course, as well as Darcy, the two young women having become close friends ever since Jane's assistant moved in. They had bonded rather quickly over computers, Tasers and being the only 'normal' people in the madhouse that was Othrys.

Of course, after today that would change. I was unsure how Darcy felt about that, but if the young woman decided that she wanted to be superhuman as well, I'd only give her the Erskine formula. I shudder to think what would happen if Darcy ends up enhanced with Amber Armor, or God forbid, Extremis.

On the other bed sat Darryl, a lithe boy of around ten or twelve. He was surrounded by his own parents, as well as a few others, either family or close friends. Darryl was nearly bouncing up and down on the gurney with a huge grin on his face, one which was matched by his father (who, judging by the heat that was coming off of him, couldn't quite contain his own excitement as well). In contrast, the mother and a few of the others looked rather worried, though that worry melted away once their eyes turned to look at me.

Clapping my hands in order to get everyone's attention (adding the slightest amounts of chi to it, making it sound like a cannon shot), I let out a huge grin.

"Everybody, I think it's time to begin. There's a viewing area in the adjacent room, if you would all move there? Phineas, please help Radcliffe with making the final preparations, then the two of us will remove ourselves as well and start the procedure. From what we can tell from Kree writings, the actual change itself will only take a short while, though their powers might take some time to manifest."

A soft murmuring went up as the people went to the next room, Darryl and Skye lying down on their gurneys. While Phineas did a final check of all the monitoring equipment, Radcliffe wheeled in a small tray, on which something was covered by a cloth. Placing it in-between the two beds, the scientist removed it in order to reveal the Diviner my Hysminai had brought back from their first field-test.

Getting the green light from Phineas (literally. The lines on the ceiling flashed green after his check-up was done) Radcliffe and I joined the others, looking at Skye and Darryl through the viewing screen, on which rolling texts of information were displayed.

"All systems are go, Michael. We are ready to begin the procedure." Radcliffe said, not quite able to contain the nervousness in his voice.

Ignoring it, I simply nodded, leaning forwards and pressing one of the haptic buttons at the bottom of the viewing screen.

"Alright Skye, reach out and place the Diviner on top of the pedestal please? It should open, like a mechanical flower almost. Crystals will form from the inside, and they will start the process. All of us are here, and Phineas has got multiple platforms at the ready, so there's no reason to be afraid. Proceed when you feel ready." My voice came over the speakers in the room.

I didn't want the Mist getting out and causing havoc, so from here on out we would be observing the strictest bio-hazard protocols me and my scientists could think of. From the start of Terrigenesis, until both Skye and Darryl had undergone thorough decontamination, Phineas' platforms would be the only things the two Inhumans would be in contact with.

Taking a deep breath, Skye reached out to hold the Diviner, the alien artefact lighting up with an orange glow at her touch, in an eerily similar way to the Berserker-staff whenever I wielded it. Looking from the glowing Kree device in her hand to the pedestal next to her, Skye placed the Diviner on top of it, her and Darryl (and everybody behind the viewing screen) holding their breath as they watched what would happen.

For a few moments, nothing did, until the Diviner split open across invisible seams, it sides falling away to reveal bunched up, deep blue crystals sitting clustered together. Almost immediately, the crystals started growing, and shortly thereafter, a billowing mist was released from them. The monitoring equipment showed both Darryl's and Skye's heartbeats spiking, but even before I could try to reassure the Inhumans, Skye started talking, calming the child down, even as her own heartbeat kept climbing.

Of course, when the rocky cocoon started to form around their bodies, both of them lost their composure (as well as most people in the viewing area), but my voice cut through the general noise, also being broadcasted into the Terrigen Room.

"Please, everybody, calm down. This process is completely natural, and poses no harm to them. The cocoon is meant to protect them while they awaken their genetic potential, and will crumble away on its own once the process has been completed, leaving no marks of ever being there at all. Again, I must ask you to remain calm." I thundered, though my voice kept a neutral, professional tone, and (somewhat reluctantly) the viewers settled down again.

At this point, the cocoon had formed over most of Darryl's and Skye's bodies, leaving only parts of their heads visible. Darryl appeared to be scared, but I could see that Skye kept telling him not to worry, reassuring him that everything would be fine, continuing even as the last of their bodies were covered in the rocky substance, both Inhumans now completely hidden from view.

For a moment, nobody spoke, the only sound being a few of Phineas' platforms stepping up to the Diviner, ready to close it and secure it the moment Terrigenesis had been completed.

"So… now what?" Radcliffe eventually asked, his eyes fixed on Skye's cocoon.

"Now, we wait." I dryly responded.

As it turned out, we only had to wait for about fifteen minutes before our measuring equipment noticed spikes of activity from the two motionless cocoons.

"Talk to me Holden, what's going on?"

"Well, Sky's cocoon is… humming? And Darryl's is heating up quite rapidly-"

"Yes, I can see that." I cut in as I leaned forwards.

The little cocoon that contained the Inhuman child had begun to glow, dully at first, but already parts of it were glowing red-hot. I was about to tell Phineas to engage the fire-suppressant protocols, when the cocoon just… shattered.

"Holy shit…" someone murmured (hell, it might have been me) and I couldn't agree more.

Because I was looking at the child-version of Johnny Storm, the Human Torch. Sitting on his gurney, looking around in a slightly confused manner, little Darryl was a silhouette of fire, burning so bright most people would have trouble looking at him. I saw him look over his arms, and expected to have to calm down a panicking child that was literally on fire-

"This. Is. So. COOL!"

Ah. Right. Kid plus fire equals excitement. Forgot about that.

Darryl's excited exclamation did a lot to calm people down, a few of them chuckling as the exuberant child now stood on the gurney looking himself over (completely ignoring the Phineas platform that was urging him to lie down so that he could give him a check-up), the child's mother smiling in clear relief.

I suppose when your husband is running a high-enough temperature to melt steel with his bare hands, seeing your child turn into a ball of flame isn't too far outside of your comfort zone.

My attention shifted from mini-Human Torch to Skye's cocoon. Readings were showing that instead of merely humming, the entire cocoon (and subsequently, the gurney it sat on, and even the floor itself) were now vibrating quite strongly, enough to see with the naked eye, in fact.

Compared to Darryl literally exploding his own cocoon, Skye's emergence from Terrigenesis was rather… tame, actually. Her cocoon simply crumpled away into nothingness, the young woman inside slumping over a bit. One of Phineas' platforms came over to her, but she waved him off, stating that she merely felt tired, but otherwise fine.

As both Inhumans finally acquiesced to a medical check-up, I told Phineas to start decontamination procedures, before turning towards a relieved looking Radcliffe (I could understand the sentiment; after watching Darryl turn into a living ball of flame, Skye's human appearance certainly was a welcome surprise).

"Holden, I trust you can take it from here. Once Phineas is done with decontamination, and Darryl and Skye have had a bit of rest in order to calm down, I want you to perform whatever test you can think of on them. It's imperative for both their safety and ours that we understand the exact nature of their powers as soon as possible. Forwards any findings, especially about their DNA, to me as soon as possible." I told him, waiting for his answering nod before moving away from the Terrigen Room, making my way towards the elevators.

Phineas was still combing through the cache of alien weaponry we now had (which steadily started to include more and more Kree tech as well, the more we decoded their language and discovered from their city) but he was already coming up with new things almost on a weekly basis. Aforementioned elevators, for example. By using the anti-grav tech taken from the Chitauri Sleds, Phineas had created elevators that were both faster, safer and offered a smoother ride.

Considering that the height of buildings these days wasn't so much confined by building materials (especially not now that I was introducing Burstein's highly durable versions of concrete, steel, plastics and glass to the market) but by the capabilities of elevators, and I was sitting on yet another goldmine.

After all, what's the point of having a skyscraper with 300 floors when it takes a half-hour to actually get anywhere?

I was drawn from my musings after a few moments, a disgustingly cheery 'ding!' sound announcing that I had arrived (I hated the sound, Phineas insisted on leaving it in the designs, and Sterns had backed him up just to see me suffer I suspect).

It wasn't a written rule that I had in mind when I had Othrys built and furnished, but it just happened to turn out that, the more secretive and need-to-know the research (the Infinity Stones, Ego's Seed), the deeper the level the research was performed on.

Since people would be interacting with the now fully awakened Inhumans anyway, I hadn't bothered to put a high-level clearance on that part of the research, and as such I was only four floors down. Of course, once I start working with Whitehall's research the clearance level is going to go up rather sharply, and thus the research would be moved down by quite a few levels as well.

However, sub-level three was mostly open to many of my forces (though their families only had authorization to go down one level, and any unaffiliated people had no authorization to any of the levels at all). Here were some parts of the R&D that we did with other companies (such as everything involved with the creation of the PDF) as well as the testing area's for our weaponry, and the thing that I had come here for in the first place.

The Forge.

Basically the domain of Melvin Potter as he worked on producing more Amber and Spartan Armor, specialized tools and weaponry, and even some of the highly durable materials that Burstein had developed.

Today, he would be working on something special for me personally.

Walking into his wing of the level, my eyes roamed across the room. While everybody called it the Forge on account of three massive ones lining one of the far walls, with parts of the workshop looking like a modern-day smith's wet dream, it would be more accurate to call it a Foundry instead.

Massive high-tech machines were spread all over the massive wing, most of them automated to keep producing raw materials for Potter to use. People were working at a multitude of workbenches, either crafting large pieces, such as the leather parts for the Amber and Spartan Armors, or performing fine-tuning on whatever weapon my Think Tank had sent their way this time.

Looking past Potter's assistants, I saw the man himself at one of the enormous forges, hammering a white-hot glowing lump of metal into a long bar, before he folded it back in on itself, and began drawing it out again.

All with his bare hands.

Standing next to him, stood Elliot Randolph, the ex-Asgardian Berserker. The professor of Nordic Mythology stood bent over a workbench, a large drawing spread over it, studying it with a critical look. Across from Randolph stood Pangborn, my resident wizard leafing through a slim notebook as he occasionally looked up at the comments that Elliot was making.

"Ah, see here Mr. Potter? We heat-treated the blade at the wrong moment. I suggest that we lower the amount of folds and instead manually rub the blade with carbon as it is lying in the fire. I'm no blacksmith, but judging from these accounts, it should make for a sturdier metal that we can then work with. Here, let me show you." The diminutive man spoke with an excited grin, before he moved over to Melvin's anvil, the smith having stopped hammering and now peering intently at the Asgardian.

Without hesitation, the middle aged man clad in the stereotypical professor combo of shirt-sweater-jacket, reached out to the block of glowing metal, lengthened it with his bare hands, and then leaned into the kiln, his hands completely ignoring the flames as he took charcoal and started rubbing it across the blade.

If it hadn't been for the Amber Armor enhancement on his clothes, then they would've turned to ash in moments, probably leaving the out of shape Asgardian buck-naked in Potter's workshop. Thank God for Burstein's research, I suppose.

Clearing my throat, I grabbed the attention of the Asgardian, the wizard and the blacksmith, the three men looking at me with interest. It wasn't often that I went to the Forges personally, and this was the first time that I had asked Elliot to meet me here, though Pangborn had been here before in order to test his runework and enchancements.

"Hi there sir. What can we do for you?" Melvin spoke up with a smile.

"Gentlemen. I am here today, because there are three projects that I need your help with. One of them I require as soon as possible, the second should not take much longer than the first, but thankfully we have some time before the third needs to be finished. I wish to have you make me a helmet, a shield, and the blade of a scythe, in that order." I spoke up, seeing interest gleam in their eyes.

"Just the blade of a scythe?" asked Pangborn, getting a grin from me.

"Indeed. After all, I already have a hilt, don't I?" I reply, giving Elliot a significant look.

It doesn't take the Asgardian long to cotton on.

"You wish to use my staff as a hilt to a scythe? Why? Why alter it in the first place, and why make a scythe of all things?"

"Because I am Hyperion. And my weapon should reflect that. When Gaia wanted the Heavens, Uranus, overthrown, she gifted her youngest child with a weapon powerful enough to defeat him, the Harpe. When Uranus descended in order to lay with Gaia, me and my brothers held him down, while young Cronos castrated him. In turn, Cronos was overthrown by his son Zeus, and the Harpe was amongst the multitude of weapons used to shred my youngest brother into a thousand pieces. When the Age of Heroes began, Zeus granted his own son, Perseus, the Harpe in order to kill the Gorgon Medusa. Now that I am the New Titan of the East, it is only fitting that I regain a weapon of old." I stated solemnly, and I could feel that on some level, something strengthened as I laid claim to the legacy of Hyperion.

Judging by the sudden widening of Pangborn's eyes, it was definitely magical in nature.

"… Alright fine, as long as you don't go running around with my Staff in order to castrate people. Claiming a weapon based off of Odin's own is disrespectful enough, using it on genitals is just plain heresy." Elliot groused, though he couldn't quite hide his interest as he envisioned aiding in the creation of such a powerful weapon.

"The Berserker-staff is based off of Gungir?" I ask in surprise.

When I recruited Elliot we had spent hours and hours talking about Asgard, and yet almost every time the two of us had a conversation, he mentioned some interesting fact about the Nordic Gods that I had never known.

"Well, more on what he wielded before Gungir. In his youth, when Bor was still alive, Odin wasn't the wise king that he likes to portray himself as. He was hotheaded, and strong, monstrously so. He wielded a Staff as a weapon, though only because Bor refused to have the Prince of Asgard running rough-shod over the Nine Realms with a Club of all things. Eventually, I think it was about 5000 or 6000 years ago, Odin got fed up with Bor's careful dealing with the mighty Surtur and took a host of his loyal warriors down to Muspelheim. He struck down Surtur, though he did not manage to kill him, but the price was high; Odin was the only one to make it back to Asgard. Bor told him that if he ever wished to remain on Asgard, he'd have to find the wisdom to lead as a ruler, instead of merely having the strength to charge in like a Berserker. So Odin wandered the Nine Realms, spent quite a long time on Earth, in fact. That's where your tales of him as an old wise man with a staff come from actually. Eventually, he got his head straight, and returned to Asgard to take his place as King. While he wouldn't throw away the sign of the glorious fights in his youth, he felt that a Berserker's Staff did not a King's weapon make, so he went to the Dwarves, and asked of them much the same as you now ask for us; to use the Staff as a base for a greater weapon. The Dwarves fashioned a spearhead to it, and laid powerful enchantments over it, and Gungir was born. And, much the same, we'll forge a scythe for it, enhance it to hell and back, and you'll have your Harpe again." Elliot told me, his eyes distant as he recalled events millennia ago.

It was easy to forget, but sometimes I was reminded of the fact that the little man in front of me was older than every single person in Othrys… combined. As always, whenever Elliot reminisced about his time amongst the Asgardians, I gained a sudden insight into their motivations as I recalled from the movies.

No wonder Odin flipped his shit when Thor wanted to go rampaging on Jotunheim; it was a mirror to the follies of his own youth. Like father like son, eh?

"Thank you, Elliot. And no, I won't go around castrating people. I'll merely split them down the middle instead." I promise him solemnly, placing a massive hand on his shoulder, getting a smile from the Asgardian.

"Ah, thanks, that puts my mind at ease."

"Even so, you said that the helmet was first, right, followed by the shield?" Pangborn spoke up, getting a fervent nod from Melvin (who, during Elliot's little history lesson, had simply returned to the Forge in order to start molding the metal there with his bare hands).

"Correct. Phineas, could you show us the designs of Project: Armaments please?"

There's a blinking light from the workbench, before in a flash, a host of holographic models are hovering above it.

"I have certain specifications that I would like your second opinion on, regarding materials and design. The helmet shall be trickiest, as that shall be the one most crammed with technology, though I already have Phineas, Radcliffe and Sterns working on that. The biggest concern is energy containment." I say as I move the screens about as I talk, showing them what I mean.

The helmet is a sci-fi version of a Greek Hoplite Helmet, with a full faceplate and a visor instead of eyeholes, sporting stylized wings that rise from the sides, almost like a futuristic paladin or something. It will be stuffed to the brim with cutting edge technology, allowing for advanced communications, targeting systems, and a rebreather that would give me up to an hour either underwater or in the void of space. The shield is a kite-shield sized to my body-type, though with magnetic clamps instead of mere straps, and the inside will be capable of projecting holographic screens, including a feed from sensors hidden in the segments on the front of the shield (meaning that I can hunker down behind it without losing vision of my enemy). The magnetic clamps mean that I will be able to literally stick it to my back whenever I don't need it and due to being segmented it's capable of folding in on itself a bit, much like the weapons in the Mass Effect games. Both the helmet and the shield will be reinforced with Amber Armor leather, and spelled with general strengthening rune-schemes, both the ones that Pangborn was taught in Kamar-Taj as well as the ones that Elliot remembers from his time in Asgard.

The shield will also sport additional spells focused on strengthening, protection and absorption of attacks, whereas the helmet will be covered in spells aimed at increasing mental fortitude. Should the magical knowledge of Pangborn and Elliot prove to be insufficient to layer such enhancements on the objects, then Hansen, Sterns and I will use our knowledge of how magic works to invent the spells we need, though due to how experimental they will end up being, they might turn out somewhat underpowered.

In contrast, the scythe will be much easier to make, since there are no moving parts or electronics to worry about; in the end, it's merely a single large piece of curved, extremely sharp metal, tapering to a wicked point. The base of the blade will be a ring which will be slotted over the top of the Berserker-staff. In order to ensure that it will remain there and not go flying whenever I swing my weapon, we'll shrink the blade (and thus the ring) by the tiniest margins using Cross Technology, until it will be impossible to remove the blade without breaking the Staff.

All three items would be made out of a Vibranium-Chitauri alloy, which would nearly deplete the entirety of the stock of Vibranium that I had stolen from Klaue. But it was necessary in order to contain the energies that they would have to withstand. They all had circular indentations: the helmet right on the forehead, the shield in the upper middle and the scythe near the base.

Melvin didn't care to ask about them, he simply wanted to get started right away. Pangborn, I could tell, was curious, but ultimately decided it was none of his business and ignored the issue. Elliot, however, gave me a long, searching look, before he too decided not to press me on it, though of all the people inside Othrys, he was probably one of the mere handful that had an idea of what I intended to place in those slots.

Because the scythe was the easiest to make, due to it lacking any moving or electronic parts, Melvin convinced me to start with that one, instead of the helmet as I had proposed. I acquiesced, mainly due to another trick that I wanted to use in order to enhance the materials even further: I was going to pump the raw metals full of my Chi, and use Chi-fire in order to forge the objects. The quenching would not happen with merely oil as was usually the case, but in the same kind of suspension that we used to give people and armor the Amber enhancement.

After nearly emptying all of my reserves in the stack of Vibranium that would be my Harpe, I handed it over to Melvin and Elliot, who got to work in shaping the blade, with Pangborn fueling the flames. It would take them a day or two to finish hammering the blade into shape, grinding it and enhancing it before affixing it to the Berserker-Staff, so in the meantime I started on my own preparations for the helmet.

Which saw me back in my personal labs, Loki's staff in front of me.

I would place the Mind Stone in the helmet, and wield it without (hopefully) blowing up my own head. The major problem that I foresaw wasn't the power-issue though. If Ronan, an elite Kree warrior, was capable of holding the bare Power Stone long enough in order to transfer it to his hammer, and the subsequently wield that hammer in order to wipe out planets, then I was fairly certain that I could wield a single Stone in a container as well.

No, the real issue was that I feared the Stone subverting my mind. The Staff had already egged me on without me even knowing it back when Jessica and Sterns came to question me anticipating an alien invasion of all things, what would the Mind Stone do once I actually tried to wield the damned thing?

Ultron was born from the Staff and was pretty much insane. Yet Vision was born of Ultron's mind combined with the Mind Stone, and he became an Avenger, worthy enough to wield Mjolnir only minutes after being born. I was hoping that the Vibranium played a role, since if it did, then it should offer me some protection from the energy of the Infinity Stone, but I wasn't counting on it.

Instead, I had a whole wall full of screens showing exercises in meditation, mindfulness, yoga and tai-chi and just about every New Age holistic crap you could think of that dealt with clearing and fortifying the mind. Since people got superpowers form eating leaves in this universe, I'm ruling nothing out. I even got some texts that I believe are from K'un-Lun.

But the most important piece was the enormous amounts of data came from the research of Kilgrave's parents, the Thompsons, who were still confined to the residential area inside Othrys, and who were still unaware that Jessica had killed their psychotic son.

When Kilgrave's deeds became known to the residents of Othrys, as well as the fact that Albert and Louise had basically tortured their son from the day he was born, turning him into the slime that he had become, the two scientists became ostracized.

Nobody lifted a hand against them, but nobody talked to them either, except when absolutely necessary, and parents warned their children away from them. Faced with such isolation, the couple had thrown themselves into their work with a zeal that would be worrying if I actually gave a shit about their well-being.

As it was, they knew more about the human brain than just almost anyone outside of Othrys, but more importantly, they knew more about the human mind than those inside of Othrys as well (except maybe for Sterns. God knows just how smart my friend has made himself over the years).

I was going to use their research in order to fortify my mind to hell and back, and to make sure that there was no chance of me ever being influenced by an outside source, either overt of subtle, ever again. Using their notes, Phineas would keep a continuous eye on both my brain activity as well as my entire body, and would know the moment I was compromised. Which was why his Soter platform was here as well; it wouldn't stop me, but it should be strong enough to remove the Mind Stone from my possession long enough for me to come to my senses.

I hope.

"Right. Best get on with this. It won't be long until Pangborn, Melvin and Elliot will be finished crafting the shield and helmet, and I need to get this down pat beforehand." I said aloud, more in order to psych myself rather than to inform Phineas.

Now, first order of business…

My hand lights up with Chi and Extremis heat, the shimmering molten glow a comforting presence. And in a single smooth movement, I grab the blue gem behind the scepter's blade and rip it off completely. I only look at it for a moment, before I crush it in my hand, immediately turning it over my desk, allowing the shards to fall to the workbench.

As well as a small brightly glowing Stone, its yellow light immediately drawing the eye towards it. Looking at the positively tiny piece of primordial force lying on my desk (it's about the size of my knuckles) I can't help but give a wry chuckle.

"It is a strange fate that we should suffer so much fear and doubt over so small a thing. Such a little thing." I softly quote, before shaking myself.

I've got a job to do.

Taking a seat in front of the Mind Stone, I close my eyes, my mind flashing to all the instructional pamphlets, video's and the Thompson's research as I try and sink deep into my own mind. The practice reminds me of that point of focus that I tried to (and eventually did) achieve back when I tried to fly for the first time.

Then I had been out in the open, the snow beneath my feet, the wind on my skin and the sound of wildlife in my ears to distract me. Not to mention my own mind. It was like someone telling you to not think of a pink elephant, which would immediately cause you to picture it. But instead of merely trying to not think of a pink elephant, you were simultaneously juggling a bunch of angry cats, seated on a rusty unicycle, on a fraying tightrope, suspended above a gaping canyon, with spikes and hungry tigers at the bottom. Oh, and you were also on fire the whole time.

Yeah, needless to say, it took me hours before my mind finally started to empty, like a rippling pool that eventually becomes still and mirror-like. Once I had regained that clarity of mental focus that I had achieved when I had been trying to fly, I started fortifying my mind.

There were a lot of different theories out there, like the classic Occlumency (an actual skill amongst wizards, Pangborn told me, though they just called it proper mediation instead) which involved misdirection by suppressing only parts of the mind and emotions, and shoving others forwards which you wanted the other party to see. There was your standard Sherlockian Mind-Palace, though that was not so much for defense as it was for ordering one's one mind. And then there were the more out-there methods, scrounged from whatever source I could find (one of them advocating taking drugs like LSD or meth, thus sending any mental intruders on an acid trip as well).

Me? I simply did all of them (minus the ones that required drugs and the like). Connecting my mind to my body through breathing exercises brought my rational mind in contact with that animalistic Dark Side of me which I had fused with during Bast's trials. I briefly thought to employ it as a Guardian in my defense system, but I quickly realized that, as an avatar of my baser instincts and emotions, forcing that part of me into a rigid plan created by the rational part of my being would be counterproductive. Instead, it would be free to roam the entirety of my Mindscape at will.

It would come to my aid should we be threatened, of that I had no doubt.

Leaving the manifestation of my body be, I continued erecting the defenses of my mind. I began creating a Mind Palace in the shape of Othrys, layering Othrys in-built defenses with "spells" and filling the inside with mazes and traps, and then selecting a whole load of "junk" memories to surround the core of what made me me. It was in the process of this, my mind connected to my body through Chi and using Magic to fortify my mind, that I once again felt a connection to my soul.

Like in the Astral Plane, it was weird and had a feeling of weight and size that were frankly impossible. So naturally, I pulled on it, enveloping the structures that I had built inside of my mind with it, using the ethereal energy that I could just barely feel beyond the reach of my mental fingertips in order to suffuse that core-concept of me.

If it weren't for the Brain Booster of my weird-ass reincarnated soul, this would quite frankly be impossible.

Even after all of this, which felt like it took entire days to create, I didn't stop. I kept adding layers, I kept strengthening the bond between my body, my mind and my soul (coming up with some interesting theories about Chi, Magic and the difference between the two, mostly based on my memories of anime that I had watched) and I kept on fortifying my Mindscape.

It was after what felt like a week that I started noticing light impressions on the edge of my mind. I was curious, but cautious, and for the first two days since I noticed them, I instead focused on clearing and strengthening my own mind instead.

On the third day, the impressions got strong enough that I could see them for what they were: the minds of other people. They were like tiny flickering candles, something that I registered not with sight or with touch or by sound, but all three and yet none of them at once. Gaining a sixth (or is it seventh by now, considering my Chi and Herb enhanced senses of myself and my surroundings?) sense was something that's difficult to put into words designed around merely five.

I couldn't read their thoughts, though when I sort of 'leaned' against them there were impressions coming through, mostly smells, interestingly enough. Often there would be snippets of sound or emotions as well, and only a handful of times did I actually get any visuals, but they were brief and didn't make a lot of sense.

Then again, while certainly interesting, the flickering candles representing the consciousness of the others inside Othrys wasn't exactly my main concern right now, since two other things had caught my attention. One was a sort of general warmth that I felt surrounding both my own mind and those of the other Othrys inhabitants. It was a field that spread out vast from a single point, not projecting like I was doing, but linked, like appendages or skin. It took me a while to realize that the bright spotlight I was looking at was Phineas' artificial brain, the field permeating through Othrys his systems.

But there was one other thing that caught my attention as well. My fellow Othrys occupants appeared like metaphorical candles to my mind's eye, whereas Phineas appeared like those massive heavy duty flashlights that looked like a brick.

But the thing I was looking at… it was as if I was staring at the sun from mere feet away. It's sheer size, as well as the sense of age that I got from it defied all logic and understanding, and I felt my mind start to hurt when I stared at it for too long.

But after the pain faded, I tried again, more cautiously this time, not trying to peer directly into it, but sidling up to it instead, feeling waves of warmth wash over me much like the ebb and flow of the sea. The moment the first wave touched my mental self, I recoiled and immediately fled to the inner sanctum of my own mind, tightening my defenses around me until I couldn't feel the others inside Othrys, or Phineas, or the bright sun anymore.

Once I was sure that I wasn't about to be swept away at any moment, I crept out of my shell and once more approached the enormous ball of light on the edges of my senses. Again the wave of warmth washed over me as I sidled up against it, but this time I had made sure that there was a strong tether between me and my Mind Palace, and my defenses were all primed. Slowly but surely, I was starting to get used to the ebb and flow emanating from the sun, and the more time I spent in its presence, the stronger my own mind became. I could feel my fortress becoming more durable, and I could examine the consciousness of the other people inside Othrys more clearly.

Still no concrete thoughts, but the impressions I got were far clearer now, almost always including vision that I could understand and interpret. Casting out my mind and standing in the ebb and flow of the sun was strengthening my mental capabilities, much like working out would strengthen a muscle. I spent nearly a month on the edge of my thoughts there, leaning against the sun as my mind became stronger and stronger, day by day.

Sometime during that month, I had fallen into deep rhythm, the constant focus on my own thoughts as well as those of others, combined with an ever-present silence placing me in a deep medative state (my physical aspect didn't exactly talk much. Or at all, really). However, I was drawn from this zen-like state of being when a bright light, like those used in stadiums and the like, quickly approached me. Intrigued, my attention flowed towards the newcomer, my mind touching his. It didn't come as a surprise really to find that this massive amount of mental energy belonged to Sterns, but his emotions and thoughts were colored by worry.

Frowning, I first pulled myself out of the meditation I had fallen in, and then actively retreated out of the depths of my own mind, tiredly opening my actual eyes for what felt like the first time in almost two months.

Why hadn't Phineas woken me?

As the question rang through my mind, the doors to my lab hissed open, allowing Sterns to step inside. As I had gleaned from his mind, worry was clearly written on his face, his expression changing to one of shock as he looked up at me, coming to a complete halt. "Michael? Michael, are you alright?" he hesitantly asked.

"I feel fine, Sam. A bit tired. How long was I out for?" I replied slowly, my mind still booting up again after having spent so much time in meditation.

"Eleven days, Michael." Sterns replied, and the worry came back stronger now than before.

I frown at his answer. Sure, it was nice to find out I hadn't wasted entire months as I had feared, but the sheer discrepancy in time was worrisome. As well as the fact that I had apparently been mediating for eleven days straight, without food or water or bathroom breaks.

Whether that was a result of my biology or the meditation was unclear, but I wasn't eager to try it again any time soon.

"Why didn't Phineas wake me?" I ask, Sterns eyes flitting across the room before resting on me again.

"Because you didn't exceed the parameters that the Thompson research put forwards more than once, and even then it was gone so fast that it had hardly even been there. Of course, we immediately put you in solitary, but you didn't come out of your meditation. We thought you were trapped in your own mind by the object in Loki's Scepter, but your vitals remained steady and you still answered the safety checks. Of course, this just made us even more worried, but we honestly didn't know what else to do." Sterns explained, Phineas' Soter platform moving into view to stand beside the eggheaded scientist.

The combat platform didn't have any muscles to tense, but I could still tell that Phineas had it primed in order to jump to Sterns' defense at any moment.

"I see. Eleven days huh? Damn. Where is the Stone now?"

"Well, seeing what it did to you, none of us were exactly keen to touch it, so Soter here put it in a secure lock-box, which we hid in the Vault." Sterns told me, referring to the Vault in Othrys where I stored the items that were either too dangerous to leave in the Armory or that needed to be kept a secret from everyone. The only ones with access were me, Sterns and Phineas. Harper could access it too, but he would first have to notify either one of us three before he was allowed to open it.

"Good call. Missing eleven days is unfortunate, but it wasn't without benefits. I should be able to resist it now, especially if the projects I gave everyone have been completed. Where are we on that front?" I ask Sterns as I walk out of my lab, hearing his footsteps quickly following me, while the Soter platform stomps of the charging station where Phineas keeps the bodies he isn't currently using.

Even as we're walking, I can still feel Sterns mind like a presence pressing against my newly awakened senses, slight impressions and emotions coming through.

"Well, Selvig finished his smaller Tesseract containment unit. These past few days he and I have worked on placing it in Oliver; it now functions as his new engine and boy is it working like a dream! The power-output is insane, it dwarfs everything the Blue Box is capable of and the supply is virtually unlimited as far as we can tell! Oh, the things that Oliver can do now…"

"Sam? Sam! Please stop daydreaming about your truck if you could? What about the rest?" I ask, snapping my fingers in front of Sterns' face, drawing him from his reverie as he thinks about his worryingly souped up vehicle.

Sterns armed with the Tesseract and Arnim Zola's original research notes…

The universe was fucked.

"Oh, right! Well, Jane pretty much completed her theory about using the Tesseract in order to interact with Space-Time. Of course, the research of yours truly helped enormously with that, but we should be able to traverse space at FTL-speeds now. The next steps are abusing space even further for our own ends, so taking the inside-is-bigger-than-the-outside principle my "pocket dimension" operates on and actually anchoring it to structures, instead of merely pointing a Sonic Screwdriver at the air and causing a disturbance there. And, of course, Jane is working on creating our own Bifrost, though that process may end up taking a while."

I smiled at the news. With Jane's research implemented, and the Tesseract plugged into a vehicle, it would seem that I now finally have a way off this planet.

"Good, good. And the others?"

"Noah and Maya are still working on their own projects, though Maya has finally managed to stop her plants from exploding. Noah has been banned from working on spiders for a week after the one he had been experimenting on mutated to grow ten feet tall. At least Susan appeared to enjoy the snack. Holden has been looking through whatever records he can get his hands on, trying to find the same Inhuman gene-markers that Sky, Darryl and his mother have. It's a bit of a hit and miss for now, since some data isn't made available to the general public. Not that he lets that stop him mind you, but it certainly slows down his working speed, especially since he has begun reverse engineering the Kree-technology that we've been able to get from their City. As for the Inhumans themselves, Skye and Darryl are physically fine. Darryl is running around Othrys, on fire more often than not, and demands that people call him Flame Boy now."

I almost pause in my tracks, giving Sterns a raised eyebrow.

"Flame Boy? Really?"

Sterns merely shrugs.

"Kids, what are you gonna do? Anyways, he's perfectly healthy. As for powers, we've managed to scan beyond his flames to discover that he retains his physical body instead of being turned into a mass of flames, but that his body is in fact continuously immolating itself. How this doesn't kill him we don't know yet, but we suspect that it goes beyond merely setting himself on fire."

"Pyrokenesis?"

"Exactly. Judging from the control he has over his flames, we suspect he may be able to project, redirect and absorb fire. He might even grow powerful enough to fly that way."

He probably would, if his powers are truly similar to the Human Torch.

"As for Skye, well, she's basically living Vibranium."

That does halt me in my tracks, as I turn to fully gaze at Sterns.

"What? Living Vibranium?"

"Not literally, of course! She's still flesh and blood, it's just that her powers make her take on the same properties as Vibranium. She's capable of absorbing and releasing energy, down to minute vibrations in the air, and even in objects! Gave her quite the scare when her power absorbed incoming soundwaves, essentially turning the air around her into a perfect sensory deprivation tank. Holden just hugged her, providing her with sensory contact until her power subsided, returning her hearing to her. We did a simple test where we told her to clap her hands multiple times, but to try and absorb all impact from her hands meeting. The result was that there was a dull flapping noise whenever she clapped, and she told us she didn't really feel any significant impact. Then we told her to slap a punching bag and she tore it clean from its hinges!" Sterns says with an exited grin, prompting a considering hum from me.

Was this a different power than her original Quake power, or was this merely a variation on it, her Inhuman abilities slightly changed due to the different surroundings but in essence still the same?

Something worth looking into, I suppose.

"The Hysminai?" I asked, and Sterns immediately cottoned on, being one of the very few outside of me, Harper and Phineas that knew about my plan to kidnap Whitehall.

"Closing the noose, but they haven't made a move yet. Apparently, Whitehall's in some kind of fortress, and while they could breach it, Harper wants the Hysminai as much off the radar as possible. So they're lying in wait for now, looking for an opportunity to grab Whitehall in transit. They should have him any day now. As for the ones that you sent out to obtain Gravitonium, the first one has returned. However, back-tracking revealed that she massacred an entire research camp in order to obtain it, so it's too hot for now to use as bait for Dr. Hall. One of the others was doing pretty well in Asia, but they changed sites and he's now dormant, awaiting further instructions."

I frowned at the mix of good news and bad news. While it would've been nice to have Whitehall here already, I was currently far too busy to deal with him (not to mention, I was still somewhat groggy from my eleven-day long meditation spree) and I really didn't want to have a man like Whitehall inside my base for too long before I disposed of him.

The man would spell trouble if left alive for too long, I just knew it.

As for the failure of the Hysminai in retrieving the Gravitionium, it was unfortunate, but not unexpected. They were blunt instruments; extremely good at killing, but after my enslavement of them, honestly not much else.

"Fine. Have the Hysminai that returned take enough down-time to rest and resupply, then send her out in the field under a Jessica disguise. Whitehall isn't the only one who would benefit from capturing her, so it's best to keep the ruse up for as long as possible. The one in Asia isn't in any danger of being discovered?"

At Sterns' affirming nod, I continued.

"Good. Leave him there, for now. Once Harper and his team have secured Whitehall and that butcher is in my cells, I'll deploy Harper to reactivate the dormant Hysminai. If any further actions need to be taken, we'll deal with them as they come. How far along are Pangborn, Randolph and Potter in creating the items that I requested?"

"Finished just this morning, actually."

"Finished? How? We all agreed that we would get the best results if I added my Chi to the metal and the crafting process?"

"Well, that wasn't exactly difficult to do; you were practically glowing with Chi during the entire time that you were unresponsive. It's part of the reason you're feeling so tired, apart from the whole fasting thing of course, but then again we've long since speculated that you can go for longer times between sustenance than humans when needed, despite your higher calorie intake."

"So… what? Did they just rub Vibranium over me? Throw my ass into the Forge or something?"

"Kinda? They stacked the Vibranium in your lap, and over time it became saturated with your energy. Then they took the energized Vibranium to the forge, which was stoked by both Pangborn and Susan. Had to shrink her in order to get her all the way down there, and we're almost through our supply of treats, but she dutifully kept the fire burning when asked to. Once the helmet was finished, Holden, Phineas and I placed the electronics inside and fired her up, so she's all good to go. Power is supplied by miniature Blue Boxes, which look like gems next to the slot in the middle of the forehead."

I couldn't help but let out a massive grin, changing my course from the Vault to the Forges.

"Excellent."

"Ah, Michael, good to see you back on your feet! We were getting a bit worried about you there, you know?"

"Thanks for the concern Elliot, but honestly, I'm fine. A bit tired, but it's nothing that a good meal and some shut-eye won't fix. No, I'm far more interested in the end-result of your combined efforts!" I say with a reassuring grin, standing across from Elliot and Pangborn, while Melvin is bent over the Forge (he gave a cheery wave when he saw me enter, almost splattering Pangborn with flecks of molten metal).

"Alright then! Now, since we enlisted the help of… well, just about everybody on this floor, really, we were quite a bit ahead of schedule, and as such, we have also gone over your armor. If you'll follow me please?" Elliot says with an exited grin, leading me over to where something as tall as me is hidden under a white cloth.

"Now, your previous armor was certainly nothing to scoff at, but it was certainly… utilitarian in appearance. Thick and blocky and bulky, so we turned it into… well, to be honest, it's still thick and bulky, but it's a whole lot less blocky and it certainly isn't that boring dark grey you flew around in!"

"Elliot, while I appreciate the sentiment, I really just wanted you to create the items I asked for. I know that the armor isn't exactly the nicest looking, but I don't care, as long as it works-" I try to interject, but I'm halted by the Asgardian warrior wagging his finger and cutting me off.

"Hush, hush! Choosing function above form is all well and good, but wasn't it you who wished to claim the legacy of Hyperion? You said it yourself; as a New Titan, it is only proper that you receive a weapon that reflects that status. Your armor should be no different! And as such, I am proud to present, a Pangborn, Potter and Randolph creation, with special thanks to Susan, the fire-breathing dinosaur…!"

Elliot trailed off dramatically, as he grabbed the cloth with both hands, removing it with a proud flourish, a massive grin on his face.

"The Aurelion Armor!" he roared, and despite my earlier objections, I couldn't quite control myself when I saw the Armor in all its glory.

"Oh hell yes."

Remember how I said that the Spartan Mark II armor was something that a Warhammer 40k obsessed version of Tony Stark would create?

Yeah, I take that back.

The Spartan II armor was simply large, tough and sufficiently scary looking. However, they were also meant for my elite black-ops forces, and as such were colored in mute greys and blacks, and were completely unadorned.

The Aurelion Armor, on the other hand… Think something like the Legio Custodes, all shiny golden and with massive proportions, but assembled in a distinctly MCU fashion. It featured a heavy golden breastplate, with the logo of Titan Solutions stamped prominently in its center flanked by two wings and with rivets and folds all along the sides and stomach area. A thick neck guard sat on top, connecting the torso carapace to the large, gently arched pauldrons. It rose up higher at the back than at the front, ending near the top of where my skull would be. The pauldrons themselves were reminiscent of the classic Space Marine armor, but they were decorated with golden wings, matching the design of the helmet. It had thick arm guards (again decorated with wings, but only small ones) which clearly housed some of the on-board weaponry, as I could see multiple barrels extending a bit from the front of the plates. It didn't have gauntlets, since that would only get in the way of my Meteor Fist and the superheated Extremis knife hand I had used to relieve Klaue of an arm. The legs were less bulky, sitting smoothly over thick leather pants, with the shinguards and kneepads stamped with wings like my breastplate was. A glorious white cape with a golden trim fell to just below calf height, and a tabard hung to my knees from a thick belt with multiple compartments, the enormous buckle again stamped with the Titan Solutions logo.

The entire thing probably weighed about as much as an armored car, and as it stood before me, it's golden surfaces gleaming in the lights of the Forge, various parts of it glowing a pale blue (the logos and a few of the lines as well as the occasional gem-like structure which liberally studded my breastplate and pauldrons), it's pristine white cape and tabard slightly moving in tandem with the massive bellows…

I think I just fell in love.

Without further prompting from Elliot, I immediately began putting on the armor, aided by machinery created by Phineas, and Elliot himself. It was a matter of mere minutes to put everything on, and then Elliot continued his sales pitch, even as I stood there admiring myself in the mirror that Phineas created (basically just showing me a feed of myself from one of his many camera's).

"So, the Aurelion armor has 16 Blue Boxes inside it, most of them miniaturized. The weaponry on board is mostly energy based, since that saved on space, and is parts reverse-engineered Hydra weaponry, parts reverse-engineered Chitauri tech and parts just whatever monstrous concoction your resident mad scientists could come up with. Lasers, shockwave emitters, anti-grav guns, coil guns, you name it." Elliot said with a massive grin, which was mirrored by me as I stomped around, twisting and turning and admiring my shiny golden butt from every possible angle.

Floating upwards and making a few lazy loops showed that, despite its size, it only marginally impacted my maneuverability, and my sheer mass and durability with it on more than made up for the lost range in motion.

Descending back down again, I followed Elliot and Pangborn to another workbench, and this time Pangborn removed the cloth, though he was a lot more professional about it.

"The shield, much like your armor, is layered with enhancements which increase its durability, not to mention the Amber Armor treatment it received during quenching. As you requested, it is capable of folding in on itself and can be attached to your back through magnetic clamps. During durability tests, our kinetic weaponry barely even registered at all, and our energy weaponry only made it heat up, though nowhere near its structural limits. I honestly can think of only two or three items which are capable of consistently bypassing its defenses, and that's more due to their exotic effect rather than any fault of the shield itself." Pangborn explains as I lift it from the table.

While I can tell that it is fairly heavy, even for someone with superhuman strength, it isn't too cumbersome, as I'm still able to smoothly lift my arm and turn my body. Hunkering down behind it makes a holographic screen spring to life, showing me footage of what's on the other side of the field.

"Given how information dense your HUD is, we decided to leave that one on the shield itself, though if you want you can call it up in your helmet instead, of course. The VI that's running the OS in your Armor is capable of communicating with your equipment, and with me." Phineas speaks up from the nearest speaker, and I give a nod at his words, placing the shield on my back, watching with interest as seams split open, and the lower half folds in underneath the center, the two upper sides of the shield closing over it, essentially reducing it to only half its original size.

"Speaking about helmets, here it is." Elliot speaks up again, approaching me with a futuristic Greek helmet.

Placing it on my head, I'm greeted with darkness for only a moment before the HUD flares to life, showing me the outside world in perfect detail, as if I'm not even wearing anything at all. The Amber Armor leather skull-cap fits neatly over my bald scalp and is surprisingly comfortable. Before I can even ask for it, Phineas calls up a small image in my HUD showing me in full regalia, and I can't help but smile.

I looked the part of a Titan now.

Well, almost.

"And now, for the piece de la resistance, your weapon, Lord Hyperion." Elliot said with a mock-bow, extending his hand towards the final workbench.

On it laid the Harpe, and it looked wicked. The Berserker-staff was made out of an unnaturally smooth, dark grey metallic substance, with a flaring top end. Around the top, as a single smooth piece of metal, the scythe was wrapped. It was in proportion to the length of the Staff, meaning the curved blade was about as long as my entire arm.

Picking it up, I was surprised to see the familiar lines glowing across the Staff continuing smoothly across the blade as well. Turning towards Elliot and Pangborn, it was the wizard who answered my unasked question.

"While we couldn't break down the enchantments on the Staff to its basic components, we were able to trace exact replica's on the scythe itself, as well as layer several enchantments for everlasting sharpness and an increased cutting edge on top of it. Since its Vibranium though, the added enchantments have a rather marginal effect."

Nodding at the wizard´s explanation, I gave a few experimental swings with the Harpe. I was by no means an expert on melee weaponry, though I had occasionally practiced with the Staff, as well as a couple of training swords. Nevertheless, I could immediately tell that (somehow) the scythe was perfectly balanced, as all things should be.

I gave it a twirl, my nimble fingers spinning the fearsome weapon around with ease, the blade of the scythe making a keening wail as it cut through the air as smooth as silk. That familiar burn of the Berserker-Staff was still there, quite prominently, in fact, but either due to having a stronger mind or a stronger connection to the baser instincts of my body I easily controlled it.

I still wanted to go out into the world and cut things to bits, but I was in control over when I would do so, and to whom I would apply the cutting.

A certain Nazi scientist came to mind…

Giving another twirl, this time turning my body with the swing, I swept the scythe in a broad horizontal arc, the sound of brutally displaced air music to my ears. Straightening from my stance, letting the butt of the Staff rest on the floor, I turned to give Elliot, Pangorn and Melvin a massive grin, even if they couldn't see it through my helmet.

"Gentlemen. This is truly amazing work that you have done here. Expect a big bonus in your accounts, and feel free to take the night off. You've earned some down-time after crafting this in merely eleven days, well done indeed."

As the Asgardian, the wizard and the blacksmith turned to each other with tired grins and exubarent high-fives, I grasped my Harpe just below the blade, and stalked out of the Forge, nodding to the people that sat at their workbenches. Again, I could feel Sterns' massive mind close in on me, and I didn't need my enhanced hearing to know that he had fallen into step behind me.

Interestingly enough, while his mind was easy to spot, and Phineas' main core not exactly hard to pinpoint as well, the others that I had passed were far less bright to my senses. Again, the analogy of flickering candles came to mind, but now that I wasn't actively focusing on my mental power, most of them felt almost like the smoke that remained after you blow out the candle, wispy and intangible. Pangborn was another exception (thanks to his Astral Projection abilities, no doubt), though he didn't "shine" as bright as Phineas did. Elliot was also easier to spot with my new emerging senses, but mostly because of the sheer difference between his Asgardian mind and those of the others.

If the others were like candle smoke, then his mind was like stone, far more solid and unyielding, and not exactly made up out of the same stuff that the rest of the humans were. I very much doubted that, as I was now, I'd be capable to glean anything meaningful from his mind.

If my predictions were correct however, then that was about to change.

Sterns and I walked towards the Vault (located on the lowest level, alongside my personal labs) without saying a word, him lost in thought and me lost in examining my new Armor as I walked, marveling over the cutting edge technology stuffed inside of it and the sheer badass look of it.

It was a matter of minutes before we stood before the heavy door to my Vault. It appeared like your regular massive circular door to any bank vault, but hidden in the walls, the ceiling and the door itself were advanced security measures, such as advanced codes which were encrypted using a cypher of Sterns' creation.

And of course, there were the traps. Non-lethal for those that tried to breach the Vault, extremely lethal for those that appeared to actually be succeeding in breaching the Vault.

I wasn't taking any chances.

It took well over half a minute before me and Sterns had passed all the security check (they were operated by a VI on an isolated mainframe, meaning that even Phineas couldn't simply unlock the door for us) and then we finally managed to stride inside.

The interior of my Vault was… well, to be honest, it was rather underwhelming compared to its imposing security measures. Just a simply, rather small room with a couple of shelves. Part of the lack of grandeur to what was supposed to be my treasure hoard was the fact that it was simply empty. I wasn't in the habit of leaving incriminating evidence behind, not even as a souvenir, so much of the stuff that I had stolen over the years had been destroyed, rather than kept here.

Ignoring the shelves that were mostly barren, I moved towards the end of the rows, where a squat little safe-deposit box sat. It was built to withstand even my strength (supposedly, not that we had actually gone full out in testing it) and could only be unlocked by the person that had locked it in the first place.

Without my prompting, Sterns stepped forwards, pressing his thumb to the lid of the box. After a few seconds, a little light on the side switched from red to green, and the top popped up. Immediately, the glow of the Mind Stone spilled out, easily filling the room despite its small size.

While the minds that I had touched upon while stuck in my trance were much harder to spot and connect with now that I was 'awake', it seemed that this wasn't the case with the Mind Stone. To my senses, it appeared just as much as the enormous glowing sun of warmth that I had seen with my mind's eye.

It would seem Sterns could feel it to, judging from the small frown on his face as he took a step back, his thoughts now leaning more towards caution.

I could understand the sentiment; simply approaching the Stone with my mind had pulled be in a trance that had lasted nearly two weeks. And what I was about to do would be step beyond simply studying it from afar.

Still, there was no going back. Things were picking up speed, plans set in motion and coming together, not to mention the fact that if I wished to be there for my child, I should be getting my ass into gear and achieve godhood before it would be born.

No, I had taken risks all my life in order to gain power. And the power that I could stand to gain from this far out shadowed the possible risk.

So, before Sterns could speak up or move to stop me, my hand lashed out, closed around the Mind Stone (fire and pain and sheer fucking power thundering up my arm, crashing into my heart, the feeling of an entire herd of wildebeests crashing around in my brain), before I slammed it into the slot on the forehead of my helmet.

And my world turned white.

Fun Fact: Stan Lee's favorite Marvel film cameo was based on one from the comics. He said that his appearance in Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer (2007) was inspired by the story of Reed and Sue Richards' wedding in Fantastic Four Annual Volume 1 #3, in which he and artist/writer Jack Kirby attempt to crash the ceremony but are thwarted. Stan has also revealed in his memoires that he has never been to a barber, but that his wife has given him his iconic look. Joanie was also the one who destroyed the original typewriter that he used to create the Fantastic Four and Spiderman during an argument. Stan Lee's comment about that was that it was a shame it happened before EBay: "Too bad. I could've auctioned off the parts and made a mint."

R.I.P. Stan Lee (1922-2018) – I hope the world that you've gone to is as marvelous as the one that you have given us.

AN: Sorry for getting this out a little later than promised. I was going to upload yesterday, but as I've mentioned before, I'm helping my parents move and my dad had packed the router, meaning that I was stuck without Wi-Fi. Also sorry about the cliffy, but this chapter was simply getting way to long, so I was forced to cut it here. No promises on when the next chapter comes out.

As awlays, major shout out to my amazing Patrons, Miu, justlovereadin, Carn Krauss, ReapeScythe, Thordur hrafn, Daniel Dorfman and Samuel Carson! I'd also like to give a warm welcome to Fakhrurrozi, welcome to the club! I cannot thank you guys enough for willing to support me as you do, so thanks again!