"Nobody," Shaw repeated my words, as if he felt the need to hear it twice.
He looked over me once more with an appraising gaze, which, to be honest, I found pretty uncomfortable. The dude was looking at me like he had just pulled a five-star character from a gacha.
Anyway, even though he was clearly stronger than me, and in fact pretty much impossible to take out for the current me, I didn't think I was in too much danger. The guy thought I was some kind of immensely powerful telepath beyond the level of Emma Frost, so he wouldn't do anything crazy.
Plus, from the looks of it, he was trying to recruit me.
"A man with your abilities, operating alone in New York." He made eye contact with me. "Doing what, exactly?"
"Getting by, laying low, the usual." A partially true statement, though my stint in New Mexico couldn't exactly be described as laying low.
"Is that so?" He seemed unimpressed. "And is that all you want for yourself?"
"No, but I doubt you'd be able to fulfil my wants to begin with."
Unless this guy could somehow deliver me a million FP on the spot, I didn't think that it was particularly worth joining him.
If I were to ally myself with him, I'd definitely be in a position far above whatever I had with Fisk, but the issue was being tied down to a troublesome organisation like the Hellfire Club.
Shaw raised an eyebrow at my response, probably unused to the idea of being told he couldn't offer someone something.
"That's a bold assumption. Perhaps you aren't fully aware of just who exactly I am."
I wasn't exactly interested in hearing him flex his rank of level 100 pro on me, so I shut him down.
"It's not an assumption, and I'm aware of who you are. I'm simply being honest." I didn't mince my words towards him in the slightest.
"I'll give you this," his tone shifted slightly, although not in an aggressive way. "You're rather direct for someone in your position."
"And what position is that?
"Someone alone in a room full of people who would very much like to know who and what you are."
I glanced around the hall briefly.
He wasn't wrong. I had caught several sets of eyes drifting our way throughout the evening. People who noticed that Shaw had pulled a complete stranger aside for a private conversation were quietly filing that information away for later use. In a room like this, being interesting was its own kind of danger.
"I appreciate the concern," I said flatly.
Frankly speaking, I couldn't give less of a fuck if some random politicians or businessmen came after my ass. I already had S.H.I.E.L.D. chasing after me, and whatever power any of these people held wouldn't be able to compare.
Right, there's also Hawkeye to remember. Dude would probably love to shove an arrow up my ass.
Hearing my uninterested response, it seemed that Shaw began to move on to a different pitch.
"The Hellfire Club exists precisely for people like you, Marcus. Individuals whose abilities place them outside of the regular bounds of society, those who lack the infrastructure to make full use of what they have."
"And you'd provide that infrastructure."
"Among other things, yes."
The pitch was smooth, I'd give him that, but there were plenty of problems with it.
'Infrastructure', what exactly did that mean? Would I get my own grunts to do work for me? Would I get skilled people like world-class hackers and financiers to assist me at every turn? The answer would be yes, but they'd all report to Shaw at the end of the day; none of them would be 'my' people.
But at the same time, did that really matter? A massive organisation like the Hellfire Club would be able to keep S.H.I.E.L.D. off my back far better than someone like Fisk. Sure, Shaw would probably expect some nonsense from me, but I'd also get access to their resources. Resources that would allow me to create large-scale plans to farm fear.
Since we were speaking plainly, I popped the question.
"So, what do you want from me?"
At my question, he smiled, knowing that he had made at least some progress.
"Straight to the point. Good," He nodded his head before beginning again.
"Emma is invaluable to what we do; her ability to read a room and to extract information forms the backbone of a considerable portion of our operations."
By this point, we had shifted to a private room, a place fit for a serious discussion of this nature.
"What you did to her tonight, whatever you want to call it, demonstrated that you possess something beyond her. A counter, if you will."
It wasn't hard to understand what he was suggesting.
"You want me to act as a check on her," I said.
Shaw neither confirmed nor denied it immediately, a confirmation in and of itself.
"I want balance," he said carefully. "Any organisation that relies too heavily on a single asset becomes vulnerable the moment that asset becomes unreliable."
What I got from his spiel was that Emma was growing out of his control.
Judging from her appearance, she seemed to be a woman in her twenties, though to be fair, she could be far older than that, and I wouldn't be able to tell.
Anyway, he clearly wanted insurance against her. The Hellfire Club did not need to be afraid of outside threats; Infighting was a far more dangerous issue.
Emma probably already knew that Shaw was plotting against her, but she had still whispered into his ear when he had helped her up, probably warning him that I was dangerous.
I wonder if she had expected that the guy would try hire me.