Fury
"It's not a bad proposal, sir," Maria Hill said as I stared at the tablet holding my outline for the World Council.
They had nearly unanimously accepted Dante's conditions, though with caveats. My Promethean and Super Soldier research would be put on hold rather than canceled, but Trask's mutant suppression research had to continue.
We had no reliable way of consistently neutralizing dangerous mutant elements without it. And it was already proving largely ineffective against the new breeds of mutants Dante was pumping out.
I'd run their stats.
The weakest of them was stronger than ten men—and that wasn't counting their powers. They were walking nukes.
Stark was years away from producing suits with that kind of power. Even if he worked with the Wakandans and shared the Vibranium found in Antarctica, maybe we could cut that timeline in half. But Wakanda wouldn't agree.
They held a grudge like no one's business, especially after the whole Klaue situation.
"If this deal goes through, we'll be wholly dependent on the kid for defense. He's connected to some asshole god who gets a kick out of ruining our lives," I said. "I'm not looking to get in bed with Shin."
"Aren't we already, sir?" Maria asked.
I gave her a sidelong look. "No need to make the hole any deeper than it already is."
"Fair enough."
"That's why this meeting is so important," I said. "Everything we know about the demons comes from Dante. His stories. His warnings. His agents. His enemies. I'd like an outside perspective and connections."
"What are you hoping to achieve?" she asked.
"You'll see soon enough."
Carol arrived thirty minutes later, lighting the desert in prismatic shades of yellow, blue, and orange as she touched down. The colors faded into her blonde hair, blue eyes, and pale skin. I might have thought she was human if I hadn't seen her stop an alien invasion single-handedly—and bleed blue blood while doing it.
"Long time no see, Fury," she said with a small, confident smile. "Wow. You look great for a guy pushing seventy."
Maria frowned at her. Protective, as always.
"I got my hands on something a few years after you left. Kept me in shape to continue the fight."
She pointed at my eyepatch. "Couldn't do anything about that?"
"Unfortunately, no. A wound from a Flerken is almost impossible to heal."
Her smile slipped, brows lifting. "Goose did that to you?"
"He's infamously unpleasant to anyone who isn't you."
"Huh. I'll just take him off your hands then. Wouldn't want anyone else losing an eye."
"A bit too late for that," Maria said
Carol glanced her way, and my deputy continued eagerly. "He's warmed up to Fury. I'm not sure he'd leave even if you wanted him to."
"Really?" Carol asked, looking at me.
"He eats my food and poops on my lawn. I wouldn't say he's in love with me."
Maria gave her a look that suggested otherwise, and Carol flashed another smile, this time showing teeth. She offered Maria her hand.
"Carol Danvers—but I guess you already knew that."
"Maria Hill, Deputy Director. And yes, I did. You look exactly the same as the pictures Fury has on file."
"Perks of superpowers. Age isn't my biggest worry anymore. Saving the universe is. Which brings me to the SOS. The communicator wasn't exactly forthcoming with details."
I sighed, deciding not to point out that she had designed it that way. "It was a full-on demon invasion. The situation has stabilized since."
"Wait—did you just say demon invasion?" The mirth drained from her face, and her eyes pinned me with unsettling weight. "How is half the planet not on fire?"
That was my cue to tread carefully.
"We had help from the mutants, and some new… allies," I said, setting aside the issue of Dante for the moment. "I'm guessing you're familiar with demons."
"Am I?" Her voice jumped. "The demons are worse than the Kree, Thanos, and the Necros combined. They're an expanding cluster of warring kingdoms ruled by beings they call Kings. Each one is powerful enough to split a planet in half."
My eyes widened. "That is… How have they not conquered the universe already?"
"Because they're all pompous assholes. And the universe isn't some backwater continent you can sweep over with basic energy manipulation. They hold massive systems spanning empires that nearly conquered the galaxy. Some of them even have gods."
I blinked. "I'm sorry—did you just say gods? As in the Christian God, or Norse mythology?" I thought that was an exclusively interdimensional thing. I wondered if we could find a patron of our own.
"Yes to the second, no to the first," she said. "Turns out a lot of Norse myths were based on actual visits from gods like Thor and Loki hundreds of years ago."
"Jesus…" Maria muttered.
"If a demon faction is moving on Earth, the universe has to know," Carol pressed. "The Lords alone could lay waste to entire cities."
"Dante must be a Lord then," I muttered. "Or at least he used to be."
"Dante?" Carol frowned. "As in Dante Sparda. Vergil's brother?"
"You know about him?" Maria asked, surprised.
"Everyone in the galaxy does. He's an egomaniac hellbent on revenge and power, willing to kill anyone who gets in his way."
"Sounds on brand with everything I've heard about him," I said, rubbing my forehead.
"Earth was the last place I expected someone like him to pop up. Nova theorized he was part Celestial or some other exotic species, but to think he's half-human?"
"He's not," I corrected. "At least not according to him. He's half Angel. And yes, I know how it sounds."
She looked even more confused. "Never heard of that. And I've been to the fringe edges of the universe."
"Not surprising," I said. "According to Dante, Angels are foreign interdimensional beings—the perfect counter to demons. Hybrids like him and Vergil possess both sets of energies." I handed her a tablet, showing Dante wielding his scythe, his shuriken, his fists, and finally the purple fire. "Apparently, the mixture makes their energy output several times more potent. Nothing has survived contact with those flames. And that's just one of the weapons in his arsenal."
Carol studied the tablet for a long moment, her expression complicated. "So that's why Vergil was so strong."
"You've fought him before?" Maria asked.
"Once or twice," she admitted.
"How did it go?" I asked, already dreading the answer.
"He cut me."
I blinked. "And?"
"That was the first time I was hurt in twenty years, Fury. None of my attacks touched him, and he still executed his target."
That was not a good sign.
"This Dante," she said, turning serious again. "You don't trust him, do you?"
"No, I do not," I admitted, explaining my history with the kid, the offer he'd made, and the World Council's current position.
"I understand your reluctance," Carol said. "An honest demon is like a sane serial killer. Possible, but rare."
"My feelings exactly. I was hoping to provide the World Council with a smarter alternative—high-tech weapons, physical enhancements for law enforcement, and access to the wider universe so we can catch up."
Carol frowned, crossing her arms. "That's complicated. Doing business with the big factions means drawing attention to Earth before it's ready to defend itself."
"No offense, Captain, but the universe already knows we're here," Maria cut in. "The Asgardians and the Kree have both been here, and who knows who else. A few thousand blasters, spaceships, and some advanced textbooks won't change much. We need the means to defend ourselves without relying on anomalies like you."
Carol glanced at me, then smiled faintly. "I like her. And she's right. Someone else will try eventually, especially since the Tesseract is here."
Maria flinched almost imperceptibly, and I steadied myself. "About that…"
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