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Chapter 7
Technomancer in MCU
–Previously–
Breaking the silence, I say, “I know you will not like my answer but here it is anyway. For a lesson. It was all for a lesson…..”
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New York City (Outside the Barrier)
–Ed–
The silence that followed my statement was deafening.
Even though I couldn’t see everybody’s reaction, the change in the very nature of the air and the scent of ozone in the air was unmistakable.
“YOU DARE!”, Thor boomed, as he advanced towards me.
I remained calm even as Steve stopped Thor and calmed him down.
He then turned to me, “Explain.”, he demanded.
Even though he sounded calm, I could tell he was just as if not more angry than our resident Asgardian prince.
With a mental command, all of our face plates melted away, allowing the members to see my face for the first time.
Not that it would help them since it was one of the dozens of fake holographic projections I had on hand for situations like this that required a bit more personal touch.
Visibly surprised at the change, they all looked at me for further explanation.
Grinning sardonically, I said, “This requires a bit more touch of a face-to-face conversation.”
“To answer your previous question, Steve. It’s simple. The world needed to know.”
“It needed to know about the true dangers it faces and not the artificial ones that have been created to keep the general populace distracted.”
“That all of it won’t matter if some galactic overlord comes over and takes over all of our forces in a day.”
“And before you say it, I’ve seen it happen. It is not as unlikely as you think it is.”
“Just ask Thor here, what happens to the unfortunate civilisations that gain the attention of Pirates or Warlords and are not fortunate enough to be in the sphere of influence of an advanced civilisation such as Asgard.”, I said, gesturing to Thor.
They all look at him with questioning looks.
“Aye, it is far more common than I would like.”, he replied somberly.
Steve interjected, “Still. There is no reason you needed to do this just to prove a simple point. You, with all your resources, would have had your voice heard. All of this could have been avoided. We could have–”
“Who is this ‘We’ you are talking about Steve because as far as I remember, you all were just about at each other’s throats just a couple hours ago. There was no unification anywhere. No singular body that I could approach that would treat the threat as planetary rather than just to their own nations.”
“They would just hoard the information and any technology I would have given them to advance their own goals. The funny thing is I once entertained such thoughts.”
This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.
“I thought of approaching Fury and telling him everything, getting it all off my chest. Just dumping all the responsibility on him. Take away all the mental load of it all and just become a weapon. Fire wherever someone tells me to fire.”
“It was actually Alfred who shattered my delusions. He ran a model with a staggering 96% accuracy that without a common tragedy, something world-shattering, the chances of humanity unifying even under a loosely built agency rather than true unification would be only 15% and even then it would have been too late to make any actual difference.”
I could see it on everyone’s faces, they didn’t believe me.
“Alfred,”, I called out.
Two screens popped up in front of Stark and Banner, who had turned back from the repeated calming CHI injections.
They showed all the parameters regarding the future modeling.
While Stark and Banner were busy verifying the authenticity of my claims, I gave a mental command to Alfred.
They were all startled as the suit just fell down from all of their bodies like water and into one of the drainage ports opened under them.
I gestured to the medical seats that emerged from the ground, “Let’s get seated. I am sure anytime now you will start the effects of CHI withdrawal.”
Natasha and Clint staggered back onto their seats. The rest sat slowly on the seats.
By that time, Tony and Banner had both gotten through the reports and were both sporting equally haunted faces.
The Avengers didn’t ask them anything. They didn’t need to.
Their faces said everything.
Tony was the first to ask, “Even if we do believe you regarding the alien threats, what makes you so certain that they will arrive anytime soon and even if they did, as you said, we have Asgard protecting us.”
Rolling my eyes, I replied, “Odin is old. Asgard’s current strength is a shadow of what it once was. There are foes just as mighty as Odin that are unaging and have the benefit of time on their hands. I suspect that many of these forces are just waiting for Odin to kick the bucket to start moving in the Nine Realms again.”
They all listened with rapt attention even though I saw Thor’s face tightening at my perceived insult to Odin.
“They know Thor will not be nearly as powerful as Odin anytime soon and with this incident, the royal house being reduced to just 3 members now, it sends a signal of weakness to the outer cosmos.”
“Even if Asgard was at its heyday, why should we be reliant on them for our protection. Humanity needs to evolve.”, I was breathing heavily at this point.
“You still haven’t answered the question.”, asked Steve.
Slumping slightly, “Look. You just need to trust me. This is the better way.”
“Yes, there will be chaos for a while but if we want to prevent what I have foreseen, this was necessary.”, I mumbled, mostly for my own benefit.
“Foreseen?”, questioned Natasha with a sharp glare in my direction.
Not willing to discuss this any further, I shake my head, deactivate all the screens of the platform, and turn around.
Just in time to see Alfred holding an energy prison holding Loki in a face-down position.
From the corner of my eye, I could see Thor tensing up to intervene.
“Don’t worry. The sphere makes sure that he can’t use any magic as there is no one around to prevent him from slinking away using his magic if he wants to.”, I warn Thor.
In the background, the Leviathans and the Chitauri keep coming out of the portal and not being able to exit the barrier, they begin thrashing the surroundings, felling entire skyscrapers.
The noise attracts their attention as Tony says, “So, mystery guy? Any way you can close that hole to hell back there?”, he pointed at the portal.
Nodding, I replied, “Alfred was able to track down Dr.Erik Selvig in his addled state. With the CHI infusions, they were able to calm him down and the last thing he said before falling into a coma is ‘It can’t fight against itself’.”
“It’s the sceptre, isn’t it?”, questioned Natasha with a sharp glance towards Loki.
I nodded, answering her question.
“Alfred was able to figure it out by comparing their energy signatures.”
“According to him, the crown of the sceptre can be used to breach the pure energy barrier surrounding the cube and stop the energy flow between the cube and the machine powering the portal.”
“Well then, what are we waiting for? Get the sceptre and close the portal Mr.Person-whose-name-we-don’t-know.”, snarked Tony.
Agreeing with him, I said, “Alfred, will you—”
“...Mayday! Mayday!.. Tactical Nuke headed right towards us.”
“What?”, they shouted, aghast.
“ETA - 2min 13sec”, came the warning from Alfred.
“Well, shit”, Tony surmised our situation correctly.
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