Chapter 30 : Inklings of Deal Made! (Patreon)

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The Sage of the Mind: Chapter 30 [December 2008]

Evacuated Police precinct

–Axle Riddle–

It was quite funny to see Fury narrow his one eye and gnash his teeth as he bluntly threw all of his cards right into the dustbin. What he was saying was true. There was no real proof that he had been the one responsible for hiding away Banner and more importantly, they didn’t even know who he was.

Basically, they were trying to pin a crime that they could not trace on a person they knew they couldn’t find, not without said person giving themselves up voluntarily. That was not going to happen.

Visibly gathering his thoughts, then Fury spat out, “What do you want, then? You contacted us for a reason and I still haven’t thanked you for the treatment you gave my agents,”

Ah, he snickered internally as Fury emphasizes the word thanked, so much so that he believed his gum had grown weaker simply due to the current gnashing session. 

He then went to work, typing on the phone screen. He was sure by now that Fury and Coulson had caught onto the fact that text-to-voice speech software was being used here, and a very crappy one at that, but it was not like he cared one bit about that.

“Ah, that. You see, Fury, say, hypothetically, I was harboring a fugitive wanted by someone high up in the Army. How would I go about getting a pardon for the wronged fellow? Wronged green fellow,” 

“So he is with you,” Fury said as he shook his head and leaned back in his chair, finally having something to pin down on the Invisible Man. “Look, the matter has reached up to the President and Ross has somehow convinced him that he will bring back Banner without any bloodshed, which is a fat load of bullshit, everyone knows that. But the President cares about the results and since he has deniability now, he has given Ross blanket approval to use whatever resources he can to reel in Banner,”

Uh-oh. That did not bode well, for anybody.

“Those resources are not just limited to government resources, by the way. I have credible information that Ross is monitoring all communications with his daughter. I am sure he won’t hesitate to use her as well. So, be careful about her. Now…” Fury said as he leaned forward, his eyepatch creating a small shadow-esque effect on his face, which was very cool if he was being honest.

“I want to ask you one thing. Are you an alien?” Fury asked him.

Wha- He reeled back in shock at his apartment and after a moment, so did his paper avatar as Fury accused him of being an alien.

“What? God no, Fury. I am a human, born a human, and will still remain a human until the day I die, at which point I will turn into a pixie and haunt you for the rest of your days on God’s green Earth,”

Ha, it was funny to see vein after vein pop up on Fury’s forehead as the phone spoke out the things he had typed in. Especially, after the Pixie part, Fury looked just about ready to strangle him. Well, this has been fun but he still had some work to do.

After all, he was the one who had made first contact, and also, SHIELD was a ridiculously useful ally, at least until it went kaput due to HYDRA’s schemes.

‘Alright, let’s be serious for a moment,” His paper avatar said as the very air in the precinct changed for a bit. Coulson was dragged much closer to the table. He took that sudden change remarkably well as he fluidly sat down on the chair that was also dragged in.

All the curtains and doors closed off on their own. For a moment, all Fury and Coulson must have heard was the sound of a high pitched wind movement before it all went…silent. 

After that, dozens of bugs, planted all over the precinct, the chairs and tables, some from Coulson’s and Fury’s suits were brought in front of them, floating on top of the table before they were crushed into fine powder.

“Now, we can talk without the risk of anybody else listening in,” He said as his paper avatar leaned forward on the table, the table groaning in protest due to the sudden weight he applied on it, from a distance. In his opinion, it helped showcase the seriousness of the situation.

“What did you do?” Coulson asked calmly even though he could see his gaze swivelling from one side to the other, trying to make sense of the sudden bout of silence they were plunged into.

“Well, Agent Coulson, this is the curtain of silence. It’s something I learned to do rather early in my career. It is a way of creating a soundproof barrier, such that no sound can come in or out. I do it by manipulating the very air around us. Anyway, that is not the main topic for the day,”

“Fury,” He pinned Fury with a look who glared back defiantly, “Yes, Dr.Bruce Robert Banner, is under my protection. Not just because of the litany of crimes that have been committed in bringing him to heel but also because of the sheer damage it would cause if Ross got his hands on him. You, of all people, should know what Ross is planning to do and what the President is tacitly allowing,”

“Yes, I am aware that Ross wants his own little army of Hulks and that is not going to end well for anybody but the matter stands, Banner is a fugitive and Ross will come for him. He believes that-”

“Let him come, then,”

“What?” Fury’s confused Pikachu face was cute, if you could consider a 50 year old man with a permanent scowl on his face…cute.

“Let Ross come then. He can come with all the weapons he can get but let me make one thing very clear, he will not be seeing Bruce Banner, green skin or not. I will obliterate his forces the moment they step foot in my city.” 

It was quite clear for everybody to see that his words rang true in that sense. Nothing that Ross could bring forth would be able to stand in his way. Besides, what was the President going to do? Authorise The Army to bring military grade ordinance into a heavily populated residential area, where billionaires and millionaires resided aplenty?

His rating would tank so hard, that he would be scrambling to make amends.

“Threat of military warfare and possible treason charges aside, what do you want us to do? We are quite aware of your strength but even you must realise that fighting should be the absolute last option,” Coulson interjected, seeing that Fury was about to explode on the spot.

“Ah, you would be right, Agent Coulson. I want nothing but peace but Ross wants Banner and that is not something I can permit to happen, in the name of continued peace, of course. So, I scheduled this meeting in hopes that you get help get Ross off Banner’s back, and in return, we could come up with some sort of deal that would be mutually beneficial,”

Fury jumped in here, “Assuming we even do something about Ross, what sort of deal are we talking about here?”

He rolled his eyes from far away. Trust Fury to jump onto that part almost immediately.

“Look Fury, I am sure your analysts already told you this but I am very limited in the areas I can act in. So, anything that I would have to do, would have to be in NYC. In the future, my range might increase but as of now, I am limited in this area. So, keeping that in mind, what sort of deal can you cut me here?”

“We are quite aware of that. For now, we will see what we can do about Ross at the moment. As for the deal….” Coulson said and then turned to Fury, throwing the ball in his court.

Fury mulled it over for a moment before saying, “Fine. I can’t make any promises, not without anything tangible to show to POTUS but once we have something solid, I can see about that pardon. For the moment, Coulson will be your primary contact. He will contact you once we have any update about the situation,”

Fury stood up, as did Coulson. He also made his paper avatar stand up and snap his fingers, dispelling the curtain of silence and opening up all the windows and doors, revealing the veritable storm of crushed bullets that the agents outside must have peppered the doors with. 

Fury and Coulson looked incensed as he simply made the paper avatar wave at them before it was dispelled in a shower of paper spaghetti, revealing the primitive phone used to generate the speech.

Back in his office, he thought about the meeting that had happened just now. He was hoping to get something concrete from Fury but it made sense, he hadn’t given them anything to work on, so far.

He would have to–

His thoughts screeched to a halt as he felt the wards around the New York Sanctum pulse before the form of Ancient One, standing on the rooftop, tending to the garden was made visible to his spatial awareness.

Well, it was about damn time.