S.H.I.E.L.D.
Trident Wing Building.
"The test results are not optimistic, sir." Nick, who rushed back with the wounded and manpower and monitored the entire process of the infected agents entering the testing room, heard a piece of news that was not unexpected to him.
"Tell me about it." Nick's emotions had calmed down. The biggest threat, the hill-like octopus monster, had vanished, and it might be hard to see him again in the future. The impact of this crisis hadn't had time to spread; it was nipped in the bud. The only casualties were a few manpower.
This was acceptable to Nick! Even if the sacrifice was greater, he was still willing to accept it. What else was there to be dissatisfied about? If they had encountered such a monster unprepared, without the super-powered equipment of Heberon, it wouldn't be unthinkable that they would be completely wiped out by that monster in one wave. Even if he had many life-saving methods, he couldn't guarantee that he could truly survive a disaster with the same destructive power as a small-scale disaster.
"There's a powerful consciousness in their bodies." Maria Hill handed over the test report.
"Mental pollution?" Nick looked at Agent Hill standing in front of him with his one eye.
"Psychic parasitism," Agent Hill said seriously. "They still have all their memories, experiences, and knowledge. If you're simply communicating with them, unless you're extremely familiar with them and are extremely sensitive, you won't even be able to detect any suspicious abnormalities in their words and actions.
They're still the same agents, but they're not the same agents they once were."
At the end, Agent Hill gave her conclusion in a roundabout way, and Nick had no misunderstanding of her conclusion.
"In other words, it's a parasitic infection similar to that of a symbiote? But it's more serious." Nick immediately thought of another kind of alien creature in the universe - the symbiote!
Symbiotes also parasitize their hosts, gaining their memories and abilities, and even being able to influence their will and control their actions to some extent.
However, symbiotes have weaknesses. They are afraid of fire and sound waves, and these weaknesses can be exploited to expel them from the host's body. Without a host and in isolation from any living organism, the threat of symbiotes will be greatly reduced!
According to the symbiote on Luke's side, symbiote communities are generally friendly, preferring to parasitize hosts with good character and a sense of justice. They also have a set of parasitic rules, which they regard as parasitic laws they must abide by. These include not being able to influence or control the host's actions, or to violate their will and do things they don't want to do.
As for those problematic symbiotes that came here?
They were just a group of exiles who had violated the laws of parasitism. After all, no matter which ethnic group, there would always be a group of people who were relatively difficult to control.
From what we can see right now, the Hive's parasitism is clearly highly invasive and controlling. This is a parasitic method that is clearly different from symbionts. Nick is not even sure whether these Hive parasites truly need their hosts to be alive.
"Yes, this kind of parasitism is more secretive and more difficult to detect. If our equipment had not been constantly updated in recent years, and if Heberon and the mages had not provided some technology, it would not be easy for us to detect abnormalities." Agent Hill's eyes revealed a lingering fear.
If the infection goes undetected, will those infected turn others around them into parasites? Will those parasites who have been turned into parasites then be able to infect even more people?
At that time, will SHIELD still be the original SHIELD?
Are these people still considered normal human beings?
Just imagining it, Agent Hill could imagine the suffocating panic. If this were to spread to society as a whole, trust between people might no longer exist, and order would be shaky.
"How are they doing now?" Nick rubbed his forehead and asked suddenly.
"Very calm and honest, we have quarantined them." Agent Hill understood who Nick was asking about and what the so-called status meant.
"Is there any way? I mean, how to isolate them from the parasites." Nick said without much hope: "What are the weaknesses of those parasites?"
"Surgical separation is possible, but the procedure is demanding and the success rate is low. The accompanying surgical equipment requires special customization, and there's no guarantee of complete eradication," Agent Hill reported. "As for weaknesses, we haven't found any yet. The reversal crystallization has merely rendered the parasites somewhat inert, making them less able to control the agents."
"What about the other agents? Everyone involved in the mission will be tested, myself included," Nick asked. Those who survived the attack were almost all elite agents wearing the Mind Ring. That energy suit not only amplified their power but also shielded them from external dangers. In Luke's words, wearing the energy suit allowed them to operate in the vacuum of space for extended periods without any protection.
But out of caution, Nick was also willing to come for peace of mind.
"Yes, sir!" Agent Hill understood Nick's caution. If possible, she would even like to check all the agents working in the Triskelion Building today.
…
"I smell something familiar on you." Luke, who returned to the Heberon Laboratory from the Silent City in the data dimension, was immediately attracted to a foodie symbiont that came to a certain location at a fixed time to ask for food.
The quiet big head poked out from Gwen's shoulder, stretched out, and sniffed around Luke up and down, left and right, with a suspicious look in his eyes.
"What's that smell?" Luke was a little confused by the suspicious silence. He had just gone to his own silent city.
"It smells like a bug I've eaten before." An Jing retracted her head and looked at Luke with eyes full of eagerness to try. "You must have secretly made something delicious, right? Let me try! I'm willing to be your gold medal taster forever."
"Beehive?" Luke thought for a moment and came up with a name. Of all the insects he'd come into contact with recently, the only one that seemed remotely resembling a beehive was this one.
"Honeycomb?" An Jing looked bewildered. "Is that the name of the new food you created? I don't really care about that. I only care about whether it tastes good."
"What are the names of the bugs you eat?" Luke didn't get an accurate answer from An Jing, and he realized that they might not be talking about the same kind of bugs.
"Brud! A species of insect known as the Scourge of the Universe. This species was first discovered by the Kree Empire's biological science team while exploring collapsing dark matter streams. They named it the Brud. Their research revealed that it was an extremely aggressive and highly adaptable species of insects.
These bugs prefer to nest in the ruins of destroyed universes. This environment, deadly to other creatures, is perfectly comfortable for them. The Bruder Zerg possess parasitic abilities, making them one of the two most parasitic species in the universe, alongside us parasites. They can also absorb the memories and experiences of their hosts, gaining vast amounts of knowledge from their minds, using this as fuel for their evolution! An Jing answered without hesitation.
This is not a secret on the planet Klyntar where the symbiotes live, or rather, the symbiotes have a hive consciousness, and almost all knowledge and important information are shared.
"Have you eaten it?" Luke glanced at An Jing, momentarily baffled. Truly, this strange symbiote always managed to give him a face when he thought he knew her well enough. And if you asked her about information about creatures in the universe or planets, she would tell you the truth. Of course, those mixed comments like "I think this one is delicious, that one isn't" when introducing a creature in the universe were perfectly normal. Because she was genuinely sharing her own take on delicious food and ingredients. And at most, a few "cooks" who cooked delicious meals.
"One of my former hosts has eaten it. Rounding it off, that should mean I've eaten it, right?" An Jing blinked her big gray eyes and said uncertainly.
"That host was my first host, a professional gourmet. Well, those are his own words. He took me on a culinary adventure across several star systems, but in the end, we provoked some enemies and were forced to flee to a very dangerous place.
It was there that I first encountered the Bruder Zerg. They lay dormant in an abandoned laboratory. My host recognized this legendary Zerg," An Jing recalled with a look of nostalgia.
"You have such a good appetite." Although An Jing didn't continue, considering her current personality and the fact that the symbiote was heavily influenced by its first host, Luke could already imagine what would happen next. As for An Jing's claim of being a professional gourmet, Luke automatically changed it to a crazy gourmet.
"What a pity. My host probably hadn't mastered the skills to properly cook the Bruder Zerg at that time, so he felt a little unwell after eating it, and those bugs started fighting with me in his body." An Jing looked regretful.
"Dead?" Luke and Gwen, who were listening to the story, were both stunned.
"Of course he died of a stomachache! He and I still had a lot of planned things to eat." An Jing clearly had a great fondness for her first host. "Then I parasitized a certain cosmic agent who came to track us. I controlled her to do things she was very reluctant to do, but she couldn't resist me. So she became schizophrenic. One part is my original consciousness, and the other has become a crazy woman even crazier than me. I was forced to go from being a cosmic gourmet to a cosmic wanted criminal. What bad luck!"
Luke and Gwen were both speechless at An Jing's sudden turn of events.
"It's true that the symbiote can control a person's body, but if the host resists, it has the power to resist, right?" Gwen was a little skeptical. An Jing rarely forced her to do anything while she was conscious, unless it was time to restock her rations.
"Yeah." An Jing nodded in agreement.
"What about the other party?" Gwen was a little confused.
"I ate Bruder! It has the characteristics of forcibly controlling and influencing the host through some kind of obsession." An Jing smiled widely.
There seemed to be a faint thread connecting Luke's head.
After studying part of the hive, it can be seen from the somewhat fragmented thoughts and memories extracted that the other party was originally a product of the Kree's experiments. It was only after being abandoned by the Kree that he was feared and dreaded by his own kind, who found a way to teleport him to a remote planet.
How did they manage to teleport the hive away when technology was not as advanced as it is today?
Where did the Black Stone Gate technology that can be used to teleport people come from?
Cree!
The only possibility is that the Kree who left at that time did not take all the items with them, and the technological products left behind were in the hands of the aliens. The distant star that the Hive was transported to must have been a Kree experimental star.
In Beehive's memory, during a certain period of time when he was in prison, some terrible disaster occurred on the distant planet where he was!
"What's the name of the planet you went to?" Luke asked An Jing with a frown.
"Which planet?" An Jing asked quickly.
"The one that saw the Bruder Zerg."
"I don't know. It's just a remote planet. All the creatures on it are almost extinct." An Jing said nonchalantly.
"So, you've seen any living creatures up there?" Luke keenly grasped the key point in the quiet words.
"I think I've seen them before. A species similar to your octopus. Not many." An Jing tilted her head back and thought carefully. Because it was so long ago, her memory was a little hazy. It wasn't anything important. The only reason she could remember it now was because she felt a little regretful when she left, not being able to experience the thoughts of those octopus heads.
Okay, Luke shrugged.
The natural disaster in the hive's memories was most likely caused by An Jing, her host, and the tracker. It might have also damaged the laboratory's hibernation system, causing some of the Bruder Zerg to slowly awaken from their slumber.
After An Jing parasitized the tracker and left together, the awakened Bruder Zerg chose to parasitize the surviving octopus head, combining with the original abilities of the hive. Through this powerful alliance, a more powerful hive evolution was formed.
This also explains why the reversal crystals are so effective against other Inhumans with Inhuman genes, but their effect on the Hive is somewhat unsatisfactory. Because the other party is not a pure Inhuman at all, but a new Inhuman with the characteristics of the Brud Zerg!