17-Cake and Porn

I sometimes wonder if Hydra has any real members. For an organization that is the boogie man of most intelligence agencies, most of whom are riddled with Hydra double agents, my experience with them may be a little slanted. In the time I have been dealing with Hydra I have found almost as many members of other groups inside their ranks as actual Hydra members. I suppose it is like anyone else who spends their entire existence seducing people into betraying their loyalties, sometimes you come home off a five month deployment to find your wife four months pregnant. I mean, you can’t live and breathe deception and treachery and expect loyalty to be the result. Hence the brainwashing of the lower levels. They have no choice but to obey.

The higher you go, the less the conditioning holds, and the more murky the waters get. These people are monsters by choice and dangerous with it. The primary defense of Hydra from the information age and the existence of both telepathy and truth magic is the cell structure. Cut off one head and two more spring up, it isn’t just dogma, it’s doctrine. The many heads of Hydra have only the vaguest idea what their peers are up to. Theoretically the high council shares all and knows all, but how much of that you still believe depends on how your own conditioning is holding up.

Why am I thinking about that right now? Well, it might have something to do with standing in full Hydra uniform with sidearm, my holographic disguise changing my handsome blue tentacled refinement for the brutish Prussian sword scarred thuggish countenance of Baron Strucker. The Hydra uniform I am wearing boasts a tacky red skull and tentacles on a gold disk, indicating he was the original lacky of the Red Skull and source of the original Hydra merger with the Nazi’s in WWII. I had to spend an evening tinkering with my beloved Kree blaster to make a shell for the damned thing that turned its martial efficiency into a knock off of a Nazi officer’s Luger. I had to make another mock up for Jessica that also looked like a Luger but served only to channel her bio-electric blasts into something that looked like Hydra bolts. Her disguise was mostly in the uniform, the mask covering half her face and the chest baring three quarters of her tits, a green Hydra jade pendant hung between them. The real thing protected Elisabeth Strucker with magic from The Hand’s demonic master to protect her from age, poison, disease, bullet, blade and just about everything else. Here it just explained why she looked like Elisabeth Strucker, Hydra’s CFO, money laundress, mistress of assassins, and the Baron’s beloved wife, yet was kicking SHIELD ass in the street like a common thug.

What I love about Hydra is they are all about deception. Nothing is what it seems. Everything is a plot, a trick, a trap. That is why I can get away with something this stupid and look like I am smart.

Jessica and I, in full Hydra drag, were standing at parade rest on top of four Allen blocks, for those who don’t know, think one ton concrete Lego blocks. We are doing this in the middle of 11th avenue, just past Brock, as three screaming SHIELD SRU M1117 armoured transports come screaming at as at 50 miles an hour. Now a civilized human being would say 80 kilometers per hour, but this is America, and for some reason you feel compelled to use the single worst and least scientific measuring system devised by man when literally the entire rest of the planet does it the easy way. While this will make the exact energy of the impact hard for imperial math challenged accident investigators to calculate.

Now the surviving SHIELD agents will claim that the four tons of concrete and two posing dress uniformed Hydra agents were invisible, but their dashcams, the street traffic camera’s and the drone footage show us clearly. The use of both telepathy and truth sorcery made matters worse as the SRU agents were revealed to have untampered memories, and be telling the full and complete truth.

Mind Flayers are ambush predators, SHIELD agents are compelled to secrecy and shadows, but the Kree love a parade. They are true fuckboys. The inner Kree in me decided that if I was to rescue Doctor Octopus as Hydra, I would do it with such style that the idea I was hiding anything would be ridiculous. If I could play the trumpet, I would have sounded my challenge like a knight of old. I asked Spider Woman if she could play a trumpet and she suggested shoving it up my ass before she tried it. Reading her mind at that instant gave me an image that made going to the bathroom afterward somewhat nerve racking. Baron and Baroness Strucker of Hydra in full uniform with optional half capes attached by enough gold braid to make a Hilton bellhop or third world dictator green with envy, stood proudly atop our concrete wall in the middle of 11th avenue watching the charging M1117 modified MP armoured personnel carriers with SHIELD logos charge at us in full speed. Why full speed. Ah well, that may be my fault. Being a telepath you can do lots of cool things that require a lot of precision and control. Then there is stuff that can be done with almost no effort at all. Telling someone who has not seen you that you aren’t there is simple. They will look at you, but the mind behind the eyes just shrugs and can’t be bothered to notice.

There was perhaps half a second while the impact sensors screamed a warning about the clearly open road before they hit the concrete barriers and flipped. One APC full of enforcement agents went airborne and flipped in mid air before turning turtle and sliding into a wall. Baron and Baroness Strucker (that being us) ducked low to allow the first vehicle to fly over them, as we knelt, we brought out Luger’s to bear and bolts of Kree particle projection fire and Spiderwoman’s bio-electric lightning lanced out at the third vehicle which swung left as the second vehicle swung right. Our bolts riddled the runflat tires, and while they will run flat with bullet hole, they cannot run flat with a quarter of each tire blasted into exploding gas and flame.

The second vehicle, wobbled through a turn and might have been fine if the third vehicle had not lost all control and begun rolling like a log when we blew away its tires as it slid sideways, rolling into the rear of the second vehicle, making it ring like a bell and roll on its side. Two truckloads of highly trained SHIELD agents wearing power armour that made them the equivalent to a low tier superhero were now in need of an ambulance, alive only because of the advanced life support systems in the armour. If you are curious, 13.5 ton armoured vehicles that roll are not healthy places to be. Those that roll half a dozen times will reduce even powered armoured SRU commando into a mass of breaks, dislocations and concussion.

I was imitating Baron Strucker, who had this handy gadget called Satan’s Claw on his right arm, which would be great to blast the door off the middle APC. I don’t have that. I can tweak my holographic projector to make cool costume flames around the gauntlet as I reach out my mind and telekinetically turn the door handle from the inside. Yes, given cosmic power, the door knob is still the go to answer to a locked door. Don’t laugh, an armoured personnel Superhero Response Unit prisoner transport door is freaking solid. My telekinesis is good, but I’m not Phoenix. To the outside world, my flaming Satan’s Claw reached out and ripped the door open.

I was met by a hail of 5.56mm from a chain gun mounted underarm on the SRU agent’s body armour. Honestly, using a minigun in the middle of a city was questionable at best. Sure putting a few thousand rounds down range will generally ruin the other person’s day, but firing a few thousand rounds of 5.56mm in the middle of New York city was begging for civilian casualties. There is a limit to how far I was willing to carry the whole Hydra cosplay. While Baron Strucker would have dodged and let the bullets go where they may, I was here to defend humanity, not shred innocent men women and children who just happened to be a few hundred yards behind me when SHIELD got trigger happy.

My telekinesis swung his gun onto his partner’s torso and hollowed him out like someone poured hot coffee on a man made of sugar. I took sixteen rounds through my shield, none of which penetrated more than two inches, but all of which hurt like a mother fucker. I grabbed the shooter by the arm, and rolled backwards out of the APC.

Spiderwoman rolled in, dressed as Baroness Von Strucker. Two blasts of bioelectricity lanced out through the Luger shaped focus I had crafted for her, and whatever they looked like, they struck like the living lightning they were and shocked the two remaining agents into unconsciousness. Turning to Doctor Octopus, she smiled sweetly and said. “Ah, my dear doctor. You will find more congenial quarters and more worthy employers when you wake up. Hail Hydra!”

Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit.

She put three bolts into him, to make sure the supervillain was indeed down and out, before tearing the steel clamps apart with her bare hands, and detaching the locks from the doctor’s tentacles. Pulling him over her shoulder, she strolled out of the APC to find me astride the gun happy SRU idiot.

“You do not fire chainguns in cities you ill disciplined punk!” I shouted as I battered through his armoured visor and broke his nose and cheekbones with repeated punches.

“Come, my baron. We have our prize.” Spiderwoman said, striking a pose with Doctor Octopus slug over her shoulder as a new adornment for her cape. She had not forgotten this performance was for public scrutiny.

The two of us walked from the tumbled vehicles and I fired a totally unnecessary flare into the air as a Eurocopter EC725 Caracal troop transport helicopter in Hydra green and gold dove down to collect Baron and Baroness Strucker, and the newly stolen Doctor Octopus, and whisked away into the night. The very real ECM units in the Eurocopter were actually upgrades from Frost International, and the helipad we would be rerouted to was indeed on Frost Towers. Unfortunately for tracking agents trying to figure out where Hydra took Doctor Octopus, the skin of the Eurocopter was electrically more similar to cuttlefish skin than to conventional armour. What it lacked in ballistic protection, it more than made up for in active camouflage. Within two banks we had been switched to more or less standard corporate navy blue, then another bank, and into Coast Guard white with orange stripes, before the last turn turned us into a white and silver Frost Industrial corporate helicopter for the landing. Between the ECM jamming beyond visual tracking, the flying low and between high rises to block line of sight and satellite tracking, and the frequent shifts in colour scheme, coupled with the flight plan that had been filed by Frost Industries that covered our last approach, SHIELD would be able to eliminate our actual aircraft as being involved. Just one of a hundred perfectly legal flights in that region in that time frame.

As Jessica and I in our Hydra costumes pushed Doctor Octopus towards the medical wing, she finally broke down and asked the question that had been bugging her.

“Why did you have us imitate Strucker? Baron Strucker will know it was not him, and he is the kind of dangerous psychopath who might just have your skin removed to make a new shaving kit for the crime of impersonating him. Strucker is loyal to Hydra; he is a true believer.” Jessica asked seriously as we wheeled the doctor in to where Emma Frost in a labcoat and scrubs was talking to a team of her staff physicians as we handed over the unconscious doctor for a full “post SHIELD incarceration” medical complete with X rays, blood work, and extensive photographs to provide a full documentation of what had been done to him. For Emma’s work it would be important.

I stroked my tentacles, like stroking your beard, but more relaxing, and shared a little secret I picked up.

“Baron Strucker is not going to tell Kraken and Lady Viper that he wasn’t involved. Baron Strucker is not going to help Kraken, warn Kraken, or protect the Hydra operation against Invictus Life Labs, because I leaked something to him that I got from Jake Fury. I may have been terrified to read his mind, because I didn’t know if the Mk XIV anti-telepathy sensors would work with the helmet off, but I did take a full data dump from its video storage. Any Kree battlearmour will respond to an officer level sitrep request with a data dump unless it has been specifically directed not to by a superior Kree officer. Since that one has been in Hydra hands since WWII I knew there weren’t any Kree officers to give the order. I got all his video.” I said smugly.

Jessica stared at me. “Kraken, whether the original or Jake Fury is another Hydra true believer. Nothing in his video files is going to make Baron Strucker hang Kraken out to dry for us.” She said with the weariness of a long suffering shadow warrior, a spy and assassin of the shadow wars where Hydra was the beast in the dark everyone was terrified of.

“Not even the sex tapes Jake Fury made with Baroness Strucker? The file collection is listed under “Hydra Gone Wild” and my favorite “Many Head of Hydra” are particular favorites.” I said smugly.

That stopped her. “He did not!”

I waggled my blue eyebrows and made a come hither gesture with my tentacles. “Want to join the girls and I for movie night? Bring popcorn, it gets pretty salty when the furry handcuffs and floggers come out.”

On one hand, it was a little low to use someone’s private porn stash to enable their future murder. On the other hand, it was amusing that I was going to use the sex tapes of one of the original Hydra Nazi’s with a black SHIELD traitor to bring down Hydra and save SHIELD. The irony of it pleased me on so many levels. On the other hand, Baroness Strucker had lived for 117 years, been the lover of kings and presidents, and was one of the most dangerous agents of seduction in world history. You can see why Jake Fury was stupid enough to record it secretly. I mean, you have to watch it on temperature stable screens, it is that hot. I was going to kill Jake Fury, assume the role of Kraken to infiltrate Hydra and establish contact with independent teams of SHIELD agents I could vette for myself to make sure they were both capable and free of Skrull control.

Along the way I was going to gut as much of Hydra as I could, set the many heads of that toxic beast to eating each other, and deliver to SHIELD, the bits of it I could trust, as much as I could about Hydra’s every scheme that Jake Fury had locked in his evil little brain. The cost for this bonus gift, not only the knowledge of their Skrull infiltration, but their Hydra problem, would be the redemption of one man.

Doctor Otto Octavius tried to bring down the fire of the gods for the salvation of man, and his own creation had destroyed him. He was now a slave, trapped in a mind meld with four sentient AI that had no concept of morality beyond immediate survival and Doctor Octupus own drive to harness the cosmic powers of fusion. I was Kree, I knew what it was like to find yourself enslaved by your own creation. Like him, I wasn’t even aware I was a slave to the Kree Supreme Intelligence until a Mind Flayer tried to make me a slave of their own Overmind.

Doctor Octopus was a brother. A brother of the tentacle, a brother of the chain. We were both unknowing slaves to AI, his created by him to bring the world safe and pollution free energy, and the Kree because we wanted to be the perfect conquerors. His goal at least was noble. I was freed by fate. I would be damned if I would let him who only ever strove to be a hero should be left chained and damned while I walk free. I couldn’t fix him, but I knew who could.

So. Step 2 Save Doctor Octopus. Step 3 Save Invictus Life. Step 4 Make SHIELD listen. Step 5 War with the Skrulls.

I didn’t realize I had spoken aloud until Jessica poked me (super strength, I had Kree healing, but those bullet holes still hurt like a bitch). “Ow!” I said.

“What is step 1?” She asked.

Oh. Right.

“Step one, is cake and porn. Since Strucker has the sex tapes, Marge, Destiny and Echo wanted to see them. Emma said if I could rescue Doctor Octopus without getting identified or eating anyone I could have cake. Care to join us for cake and porn?”

Jessica seemed shocked, and not sure whether or not she should be offended. Echo had been listening to my mind through the conversation and grabbed Jessica’s arm and dragged her off.

“Lets get you changed into something less Hydra. They wear a lot of that at the start of their scenes and it get’s weird fast. Those old time Nazi’s had issues.” Echo said, dragging off a bemused Jessica. She stopped and looked at her seriously. “He isn’t lying. Marge made cake. It is at least as sinful as the porn. If the porn isn’t great, well, at least you will have cake.” Echo said with the gravity that made the comments so much harder to resist. Echo was my perfect woman, but being a Stepford Cuckoo raised by the Hellfire Club as a living weapon against Emma Frost, now her adopted mother, she was at least as odd as I was.

I could feel cold rage seeping off Emma Frost. She was looking at a toxicology report on Doctor Octopus, and a listing of his injuries, his long, long list of injuries, and from the timeline of the healing, the worst of which he had suffered while incarcerated in the loving custody of SHIELD. For a mutant, the fear of being taken by such agencies as SHIELD and treated as a lab specimen, slave, and weapon is a soul destroying thing. As powerful as she was, she knew that there were plans on various desks for her to be disappeared into such custody the second her own network of contacts and perceived usefulness no longer offset what they thought they could gain from taking her apart to see if they could make more like her, only trained to hunt and heel like good dogs.

My Echo and the Stepford Cuckoos showed that her fears were real. The Hellfire Club did it first, but SHIELD, Hydra, the CIA, the Hand, and a dozen other organizations would love the chance to try it themselves. Doctor Octopus medical records were a window into her nightmare, not only for herself, but her adopted clone-daughters.

I may have planned on using Doctor Octopus as a tool to advance my revenge, but in bringing him to the White Queen, I was bringing him to not only the chance of healing, but also the chance for redemption. Cold as she was, the White Queen looked after her own.

That was for tomorrow. Tonight; cake and porn.