A few minutes after Batman left the safe house, Nick Fury swiftly departed as well.
Nick Fury was certain that with Batman's ability to infiltrate the safe house without a sound, the place was no longer secure.
Every word he spoke here, every move he made, could already be under Batman's surveillance.
He had to abandon the safe house immediately, even leave New York.
"Agent Hill, assemble the S.H.I.E.L.D. cyber engineering team right now to run a full sweep of our firewalls."
Nick Fury left Manhattan under cover of night, stripped down to nothing in another safe house, and repeatedly scanned his entire body to confirm no listening devices had been planted before heading to the Adirondack Mountains base.
Nick Fury didn't even enter the base itself. Instead, he used his authority to arrange a helicopter straight to the airborne Helicarrier, and issued the order from the aircraft.
"Affirmative, Director." On the Helicarrier, Agent Hill—on 24-hour standby—responded quickly without asking for reasons.
Several hours later, Nick Fury returned to the Helicarrier's command center. After another full-body scan and confirmation from Agent Hill that S.H.I.E.L.D.'s firewalls were clean, he issued his second order:
"Where is Agent 19? Patch me through to her encrypted comms."
A few minutes later, Nick Fury stood in the command center, headset on, voice barely above a whisper as he spoke to Agent 19 on the other end:
"Barbara, head to designation 'D-4' immediately. Ensure the Tesseract data analysis is in an absolutely secure environment."
D-4 was the codename for the Cube prison in Wyoming, and Agent 19's full name was Barbara Morse—one of the few agents whose existence was known only to a select inner circle at S.H.I.E.L.D.
Batman had never once asked Nick Fury anything about the Cube prison.
He still didn't fully trust that Nick Fury wasn't Hydra, and he had doubts about the S.H.I.E.L.D. director's competence.
Hydra had stolen the Tesseract data from the Adirondack base and sent it to the Cube using their human courier method.
Batman found it hard to believe the Cube hadn't been infiltrated by Hydra.
If it had truly become a Hydra stronghold, any direct inquiry from him would tip them off.
Whether Nick Fury was Hydra or knew about it, anything he did could ruin Batman's plans.
The same reason he hadn't moved on Obadiah yet: Batman wanted to uproot Hydra completely—at the very least, purge every trace of them from the Cube.
Not just chase leads the moment they appeared. Running east one day and west the next wasn't his style.
Besides, compared to the Cube merely possessing the Tesseract data, the other piece of information Nick Fury had let slip was what Batman cared about more.
The gamma bomb research facility in New Mexico had been reactivated. Hydra was closing in.
"Based on my earlier leads, Norman Osborn was taken by General Ross and has ties to Hydra."
"With Ross's obsession with the Hulk, he won't abandon research into the Super Soldier Serum."
After leaving the safe house, Batman used a series of countermeasures to confirm Nick Fury hadn't planted any bugs on him, then returned to the Batcave in Manhattan.
"Next: continue gathering intel and prepare for New Mexico."
Batman glanced at the containment unit. Venom was still curled up obediently inside, watching children's programming.
Catching Batman's gaze, Venom immediately perked up its little head:
"Dad, got a mission for us?"
Batman gave a slight shake of his head:
"No."
If he let Venom bond with him, Batman could cover a thousand miles in a day—run from New York to Wyoming on foot, even New Mexico.
But Batman refused to become dependent on Venom, just as he had never used the Fenrir armor—capable of taking on the Justice League—against Gotham's criminals. He wouldn't allow himself to rely on any weapon, any person.
The suit he wore was still the relatively standard batsuit. He needed to ensure that even if he lost everything, he could rise again—just as he had after arriving in this world.
"Barbara, how long until the geological survey equipment arrives?" Batman's voice was low.
"Tomorrow afternoon, Bruce," Oracle AI replied.
Batman said nothing more, falling silent as he began mentally reviewing the prototype purchase, modification plans, and component sourcing.
The Batmobile could be built from a frame up—Batman buying parts and assembling it from scratch—but the Batwing was different. Both were vehicles, but not the same beast.
Sourcing fighter jet components purely through purchase wasn't feasible. What Batman could do now was acquire a prototype and modify it himself.
Only when Parker Industries upgraded to the Parker Group, with its own heavy industry divisions, could Batman manufacture a true Batwing from the ground up.
The night passed in a flash. After completing his daily regimen of rigorous training, Batman took the vibranium and headed for South Brother Island.
S.H.I.E.L.D.'s internal files had nothing on vibranium. Batman would have to analyze this unknown metal himself.
On South Brother Island, as the nuclear fusion research equipment arrived piece by piece, Dr. Banner and Dr. Octavius grew increasingly busy. They needed to overturn prior calculations and validate the new formulas.
Professor Connors sat cross-legged in a corner not far away, eyes closed in meditation. He didn't open them even when Batman arrived.
Batman didn't disturb them. He took the vibranium and dove into research using the equipment on hand.
There were no specialized tools for analyzing metal composition, but that didn't stop Batman.
He had once deduced kryptonite's structure through pure theory without a sample. Studying vibranium posed no great difficulty.
Starting with basic chemical and physical tests, within hours Batman had compiled most of the data on vibranium.
"Absorbs nearly all kinetic energy. Zero corrosion when exposed to chemical agents. No expansion or contraction under extreme heat or cold, and no thermal conductivity—its molecules are relatively static."
"Physical force, even nearly all of Peter Parker's strength, cannot deform it in the slightest. Its unique molecular structure makes it virtually indestructible."
"Vibranium is also known as 'sound-absorbing steel,' but tests reveal weaker resistance to specific vibrational frequencies. Captain America's shield being shaped into a disc may be based on this principle."
The string of research data was saved to Oracle AI's system. But this was only preliminary—practical application was still a ways off.