The basement of the Triskelion smelled of stale coffee, ozone, and the slow, dry rot of bureaucracy.
Felix Arvid sat behind a desk that was too small for him, staring at a box of files marked SSR Logistics: 1948-1951. His job title was "Junior Archivist, Clearance Level 2." In the grand hierarchy of SHIELD, Level 2 meant he was allowed to know that Captain America existed, but he wasn't allowed to know what Captain America ate for breakfast.
"Digitize," Felix muttered, scanning a crumpled receipt for tank treads. "Archive. Repeat. Die of boredom."
He spun a pen between his fingers. Above him, sixty stories up, Nick Fury was probably debriefing Avengers or fighting space gods. Down here, Felix was fighting the urge to nap. He looked at the clock: 11:42 AM.
Then, the world tilted.
It wasn't an explosion—not yet. It was a hum. A frequency so low and powerful it rattled the fillings in Felix's teeth. The fluorescent lights overhead flickered and died, plunging the archives into darkness.
"Hello?" Felix called out, his voice cracking. "Is this a drill?"
A headache split his skull open. It wasn't a migraine; it felt like someone was trying to shove an entire library into a mailbox. Felix fell out of his chair, clutching his head, curling into a ball on the linoleum floor.
White light exploded behind his eyelids. It wasn't just light; it was data.
[INITIALIZING...]
The words didn't appear on a screen. They were burned directly into his retina, glowing with a soft, authoritative gold hue.
[CANDIDATE: FELIX ARVID]
[DESIGNATION: SUCCESSOR (PROVISIONAL)]
[CALIBRATING PROBABILITY MATRIX...]
[COMPLETE.]
Felix gasped, scrambling backward until his back hit a filing cabinet. He blinked. The text remained floating in his vision, overlaying the dark room.
"What..." He rubbed his eyes. "Okay, skipped breakfast. Low blood sugar. Hallucinating."
"ATTENTION ALL AGENTS." The PA system crackled to life, but the voice wasn't the calm, automated tone of the SHIELD AI. It was Crossbones. "CAPTAIN ROGERS IS A FUGITIVE. WE ARE LOCKING DOWN THE BUILDING. NEUTRALIZE ALL RESISTANCE."
Neutralize?
The heavy blast doors at the far end of the archive hall hissed. They began to open.
Felix's heart hammered against his ribs. He scrambled up, hiding behind a row of metal shelves. Through the gap in the files, he saw them.
Three men in tactical gear. No SHIELD badges. Just black armor and assault rifles. They moved with a terrifying, silent synchronization.
"Clear the floor," the lead soldier whispered. "Leave no witnesses."
Felix covered his mouth with both hands. He was going to die. He was going to die in a basement next to a receipt for tank treads.
He looked at the soldiers. Suddenly, the golden text flared again. Numbers cascaded over the soldiers' heads like a waterfall.
[TARGET: HYDRA OPERATIVE A]
[ACCURACY: 94%]
[HOSTILITY: 100%]
Felix looked at the door to the stairwell—his only exit. It was thirty feet away.
[PATH: STAIRWELL EXIT]
[CHANCE OF REACHING UNSEEN: 0.00%]
The number was absolute. Zero. A cold, hard fact.
The lead soldier turned. He raised his rifle, aiming directly at the gap in the shelves where Felix was hiding. He hadn't seen Felix yet, but he was sweeping the room. In two seconds, he would fire.
Felix paralyzed. "I don't want to die," he whimpered internally.
[SYSTEM ALERT]
[DO YOU WISH TO ALTER THE PARADIGM?]
A bar appeared at the bottom of his vision.
[CURRENT DIVINE WILL (LUCK): 100/100]
"Yes!" Felix hissed. "Do something!"
[CALCULATING INTERVENTION...]
[OPPORTUNITY DETECTED: STRUCTURAL FAILURE.]
[COST: 45 POINTS.]
Time seemed to slow. The soldier's finger tightened on the trigger.
[EXECUTE?]
Felix didn't think. He mentally screamed YES.
[CONFIRMED.]
[LUCK: 100 -> 55]
Across the room, a rusted bolt on a heavy ventilation duct—a bolt that had held firm for forty years—suddenly sheared off. It defied the probability of rust dynamics. It just... let go.
CLANG.
The heavy metal grate fell from the ceiling, swinging on its last hinge. It swung down like a pendulum, slamming directly into the lead soldier's face with a sickening crunch.
The soldier went down without a sound.
His rifle hit the floor and discharged—BANG!
The bullet didn't hit Felix. It ricocheted off the metal filing cabinet, sparked, flew across the room, and struck a fire extinguisher mounted on the far wall.
HISSSSSS!
The extinguisher exploded, filling the room with a thick, white chemical fog.
"Contact!" the second soldier screamed, firing blindly into the smoke.
[PATH: STAIRWELL EXIT]
[CHANCE OF REACHING UNSEEN: 88%]
The odds had flipped.
Felix didn't question the miracle. Adrenaline, primitive and electric, hijacked his legs. He bolted. He stayed low, sprinting through the white fog while bullets zipped through the air above his head, biting into the paper files.
He slammed his shoulder into the stairwell door, bursting through it and stumbling onto the concrete landing.
He collapsed against the wall, gasping for air, his chest heaving. He looked back at the door. No one followed. They were too busy choking on the chemical foam.
Felix looked at the floating gold bar in his vision.
[DIVINE WILL: 55/100]
"Holy shit," Felix whispered, staring at his shaking hands. "I just... I just edited reality."
BOOM.
A massive explosion rocked the upper floors of the Triskelion. Dust rained down on him.
[OBJECTIVE UPDATED: SURVIVE.]
[CURRENT SURVIVAL PROBABILITY: 12%]
Felix swallowed hard. "Twelve percent? I can work with twelve percent."
He began to run up the stairs.
--
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