Nick Fury had been extremely busy lately. Ever since the Battle of New York ended, the entire political atmosphere around global security had shifted dramatically.
The World Security Council had finally realized something terrifying.
Earth was nowhere near as strong as they had once believed.
For decades, the planet's defense had depended on conventional militaries and intelligence agencies. But the invasion by the Chitauri had exposed a harsh truth. Against extraterrestrial threats, most of Earth's weapons were painfully inadequate.
Only a handful of individuals had truly turned the tide of the battle.
Ethan Blake.
The Hulk.
Thor.
And Iron Man.
Among them, Ethan's strength was almost beyond comprehension. Hulk and Thor were equally terrifying forces of nature. Unfortunately, none of those three could be replicated or controlled by any government.
Iron Man, however, was different.
Tony Stark was still just a human being beneath the armor. Strip away the suit, and he was no stronger than an ordinary man. In theory, even a random person pulled off the street could knock him down in a fistfight.
Yet once he put on the Iron Man armor, he became a devastating weapon of war.
During the Battle of New York, Tony had slaughtered thousands of Chitauri soldiers almost single-handedly.
That fact had sparked an idea within the World Security Council.
If one Iron Man could accomplish so much, what would happen if there were thousands of them?
Or tens of thousands?
Would Earth still need to fear alien invasions?
From that line of thinking, the Iron Soldier Project was born.
The concept was simple in theory. Create a massive army of armored soldiers modeled after Tony Stark's technology, each one capable of combat on the level of Iron Man.
In practice, however, the project faced one overwhelming obstacle.
Energy.
Tony Stark's arc reactor was the only power source capable of sustaining such armor. Without it, the entire plan collapsed instantly. Unfortunately, no one else in the world knew how to replicate the reactor's technology.
Because of this, the Iron Soldier Project had once been placed on indefinite hold.
Then, unexpectedly, fortune delivered them a solution.
S.H.I.E.L.D agents captured a terrorist attempting to illegally enter the United States.
His name was Ivan Vanko.
To everyone's surprise, Vanko was capable of producing arc reactors.
Although the design he used relied on an outdated element model that Tony Stark had already abandoned, it was still functional. More importantly, the Iron Soldier Project didn't require the reactors to be implanted inside a human body like Tony's original device.
They only needed the energy output.
With the combined resources of S.H.I.E.L.D and the powerful governments backing the World Security Council, the project advanced at an astonishing speed. Less than a year after the Battle of New York, thirty thousand steel armors had already been manufactured.
However, Nick Fury faced another serious problem.
HYDRA.
Even now, Fury knew the terrorist organization still had hidden agents within S.H.I.E.L.D. If he assigned human pilots to the armor, there was a very real chance HYDRA would infiltrate the army.
So Fury made a controversial decision.
Instead of human operators, the Iron Soldier army would be controlled by artificial intelligence.
Using technological frameworks secretly derived from Tony Stark's own systems, engineers developed an automated combat network capable of coordinating the entire armored force.
Thirty thousand Iron Soldiers.
A mechanical army waiting for orders.
Nick Fury himself served as the first commander of this force.
The position of second commander had been much more complicated.
Fury originally wanted Phil Coulson to fill the role. Coulson was someone he trusted completely, and his loyalty had been proven time and again.
But the World Security Council immediately rejected the proposal.
In their eyes, Coulson was essentially Fury's protégé. If the second commander were also one of Fury's closest subordinates, then the entire command structure would still remain under Fury's control.
That defeated the entire purpose.
The second commander existed specifically to balance Fury's authority.
Because of that, every agent directly connected to Fury had been disqualified.
Left with limited options, Fury eventually chose someone he believed could never possibly be a member of HYDRA.
John Garrett.
Garrett was an eighth-level S.H.I.E.L.D agent and one of the organization's earliest veterans. Like Fury himself, Garrett was part of the Zodiac group that had helped shape the agency's early history.
In Fury's eyes, Garrett's loyalty was beyond question.
And so, the man who had secretly just taken control of HYDRA's infiltration inside S.H.I.E.L.D quietly became the second commander of the Iron Soldier army.
At that very moment, Nick Fury was driving alone through the streets of Washington.
His mood was terrible.
Just minutes earlier, something extremely strange had happened. While walking down the street, a woman had suddenly approached him and bitten him without warning.
The attack had seemed almost random.
Moments later, Fury began to feel dizzy.
If he hadn't previously been injected with the Infinity Formula—a serum that dramatically enhanced his physical resistance—he might have died on the spot from whatever toxin had entered his bloodstream.
Someone had tried to assassinate him.
But who?
Plenty of people in the world wanted Nick Fury dead. The list of his enemies could stretch from New York to Washington without difficulty.
Still, very few organizations had the courage to carry out an assassination attempt in the middle of the U.S. capital.
HYDRA.
The possibility appeared in Fury's mind almost instantly.
Had he pushed too hard lately? Had his efforts to root out HYDRA forced them into desperate action?
No.
Something about that explanation didn't feel right.
Then Fury suddenly remembered the Iron Soldier Project.
His eyes widened slightly.
The project had already been completed. Killing him now would serve no purpose… unless someone wanted control over the army.
A horrifying thought formed in his mind.
John Garrett.
If Garrett were HYDRA, then everything suddenly made perfect sense. As the second commander, Garrett would automatically become the new first commander if Fury died.
Thirty thousand Iron Soldiers under HYDRA's control.
The thought sent a chill down Fury's spine.
He couldn't die.
Not now.
"Connect me to Ethan Blake," Fury ordered the car's onboard system immediately.
At this moment, the only person Fury believed could guarantee his safety was Ethan.
"Sorry," the system replied calmly. "Connection unavailable."
Fury's expression darkened.
"Then call Tony Stark."
"Sorry. Unable to establish connection."
Fury cursed under his breath.
Those two had apparently vanished from the face of the Earth at the exact moment he needed them most.
Just as Fury prepared to contact someone else, something strange appeared ahead.
Standing directly in the middle of the road was a man with a metallic arm.
The car slowed slightly as Fury stared forward.
At the same time, inside a hidden HYDRA base, four large monitors displayed the scene.
John Garrett scowled angrily.
"Viper, didn't you guarantee there would be no problems?" he demanded. "Why did I have to deploy the Winter Soldier?"
Viper's expression looked equally unpleasant.
She shot Garrett a cold glance.
"Didn't you tell me Nick Fury was just an ordinary human?" she snapped. "Why didn't the poison that could kill ten elephants kill him?"
Garrett frowned.
"How should I know? Fury has always kept secrets even from his closest allies."
Strucker raised a hand to silence them both.
"Enough arguing," he said impatiently. "Regardless of the details, Nick Fury is about to die. That means our objective has been achieved."
He turned to Garrett.
"As soon as Fury dies, you will become the first commander of the Iron Soldier Project."
Garrett nodded slowly.
"Yes."
"Good."
Daniel Whitehall leaned back slightly, a cold smile forming on his face.
"In that case," he said calmly, "the beheading operation begins now."
His voice carried quiet confidence.
"The world will soon belong to HYDRA."
He raised his hand.
"Hail HYDRA."
"Hail HYDRA."
"Hail HYDRA."
"Hail HYDRA."
....
Join my P@treon and get 60+ advanced chapters.
Link: p*atreon.com/0LordSilvere0 (Remove the *)
Free members get 2 chapters free.
Join Right Now