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"I'm very much afraid that he might have escaped yes. I doubt he's in any condition to come back right away, but somehow I think we're going to see him again down the line," Harry replied wearily. "Listen, I'm going to have to hang up here, the team and I need to do something together for a moment. I'll call you tomorrow okay? Love you."
The 'love you' at the end came out so simply and so unplanned that it actually took Emma's breath away for a moment. She smiled somewhat wetly she was amazed to find and replied quickly. "That's fine, I love you too Harry. Give my love to Ororo as well, and I hope to talk to both of you tomorrow."
"Will do." Harry replied then hung up allowing Emma to close the phone as she stared at her computer screen blankly for a moment before sighing and shaking her head. It was still early in the evening and she had work yet to do. Getting maudlin and soppy would do nothing for anyone. Resolutely gathering herself Emma flexed her fingers, and then began to type away at her computer.
OOOOOOO
Up in High Note, Harry flicked his cell phone closed, smiling fondly at Emma's concern for him, and the backwards way she showed it. Much like someone else I know. Harry mused, keeping his thoughts to himself with ease while Hedwig continued to pull at his hair with her beak for a moment. "Yes, yes Hedwig, I'm sorry I was injured, it wasn't exactly like I was trying to be you know?"
Hedwig huffed irritably at him, but capitulated after a moment, butting her head against his cheek affectionately. Harry smiled faintly, raising up a hand to gently stroke at her feathers, allowing her to nip at his finger for a moment before she flew off to a nearby perch.
Harry laughed quietly then sighed and set his cell phone down on the bedside table. He then pulled out a large flagon of fire whiskey and several glasses before walking back into the room where the rest of the team was waiting.
Ororo was leaning against a wall, her eyes closed as she rested briefly. The rest of the team was sprawled out here and there on fluffy chairs that Harry had conjured for this purpose in the little area of jungle that served as a common room up here. All of them had the exhausted thousand yard stare of young people who had just seen far too much in far too short a time, their innocence blown away by the aftermath of battle. Not one of them had gone into this fight with it being their first sight of the elephant, but the aftermath was by far the worst of any of their missions, even Piotr's introduction in Russia.
Amara in particular looked like she was about to break down and cry, and Piotr was mumbling some kind of religious phrase in Russian under his breath. Betsy was holding her head in her hands, shaking it back and forth sending her purple hair cascading every which way.
To one side Balder looked on in concern for the younger people, not thinking it his place to try and comfort them but understanding even so. Harry spared him a nod, then went around, setting a single glass in front of each of them filled to the brim with fire whiskey. They all looked at him, and he raised his glass in the air. "To the departed." he said calmly, then threw back his glass of fire whiskey.
The teens and Asgardian did the same, Amara coughing for a moment as the fire of the whiskey hit her, but they all continued to watch him solemnly. "You all did magnificently." Harry began holding up a hand when one or two of them made to speak. "Could we perhaps have done better in the actual battle, possibly, but that's always going to be the case. After battle you will second guess yourself, that's what separates the professionals from an amateur. Amateurs always assume they're the best that they can be, professionals know that there's always room for improvement."
"But that is not a condemnation of our actions or any one of your actions in that fight. We did all we could do, all we could as humans or Asgardians could be asked to do." He said flicking his eyes over to Balder who was watching him, with a faint smile of approval for the way Harry was handling this. "And I'm not just talking about the battle, but afterwards. You all saved a lot of lives today, and I want you to know I am proud of you."
"But you're young, and you all probably think that you didn't do enough," Harry went on getting straight to the point. He watched Piotr and Amara in particular flinch at that, but went on calmly. "Sometimes no matter what you do people die. I've heard it called the deadly algebra, but I think that's a little too pat for it, simply call it the reality of combat. We didn't choose to fight in the center of Montréal, and we did all we could to protect the citizens of the city. We could not have gotten there any faster, we could not have done better against an opponent we had no knowledge of before he showed up."
"We are all of us still human, and I won't allow any of you to rip yourselves up about it. Betsy, you were fearless against enemies that could've torn you apart, jumping out with a Gauss rifle at somebody who had just smacked our physical powerhouses aside, knowing your powers were useless against him? Colossus, you fought on even after your arm in its metal form had been twisted and broken so badly it still makes me wince thinking about it." Harry had been able to heal the arm immediately after Piotr reverted, though the process had been incredibly painful for the large Russian.
"And Amara," he said turning to the younger girl, shaking his head in admiration. "You came back down the moment you could, and according to Ororo you worked through a concussion and phantom pains that should have crippled you! You all did everything that could've been asked of you. Take pride in that, take pride in the fact that you saved lives today, mourn for the ones that you could not save and move on."
The teens were looking at him, but he could tell that they were thinking of it, and were past the self-recrimination stage now. Seeing that, Harry moved on. "You have the next five days off, completely. No exercises, no classes, no nothing. Tomorrow morning I'll give you all credit cards, and you can do whatever you want for those five days, go somewhere, go on a shopping binges, do something you always wanted to do, whatever. Just know that at the end of the five days, it'll back to business, understood?"
The teens all looked at one another, then Betsy nodded, reached over and grabbed the bottle of fire whiskey taking a pull from it before setting it down and standing up, running her fingers through her magnificent purple hair as she did. She didn't notice, or at least pretended not to notice that she suddenly had the attention of every male in the room for a brief second, since standing there like that showed off her body to an excellent affect. "I hear a shower and my bed calling me. I'll see you all in the morning."
Ororo waited until the others had left, until even Balder had been teleported back to the military base in the United Kingdom where the trades were supposed to take place, then using the Rainbow Bridge to head home with quite a tale to tell the skalds. When they were at last alone, Ororo moved to Harry, throwing her arms around his shoulders and pulling him into a hug. "And you won't beat yourself up about it either, will you?"
"I'm the leader, I'm allowed to beat myself up about such things." Harry replied, nuzzling into the side of her neck for a moment luxuriating in simply having his arms around her. "That'll come later for me though. Right now, I just want to sleep. Where'd you stash Dr. Banner?"
"In one of the new asteroids we've hollowed out, one of the ones that we haven't done any work on other than making it airtight inside. I felt that was the best compromise. Abomination's body is also stored there in a separate area, and I have Cory waiting around to make certain that Banner remains asleep."
"Good," Harry replied grimly, turning and walking towards the bedroom with one arm around her waist. The good Dr. Banner has some rather stern questions he'll need to answer in the near future. If he can't give me the answers I need, I have little to no hesitation in killing him."
"Fury indicated that might be difficult, apparently he sometimes changes into the green one in moments of self-preservation."
"My dear I am a Wizard, I will find a way," Harry replied his voice even grimmer for a moment before sighing and nuzzling into her neck again as the two crossed the threshold into their bedroom.
Later that evening while Ororo slept on beside him Harry stayed up, ignoring the twinges of most of his wounds, the one to his lung having been healed, though even that had drained his magic badly. He was going over the fight with Thanos, going through what worked, what didn't and what he hadn't tried, which was honestly very little.
Illusions don't work, whatever I tried to cover them up with, and even the basilisk venom in the sword of Gryffindor didn't do anything. Sound based assaults did nothing but disorient him a little. Teleporting him around is a viable tactic, if he doesn't plan for it. As that thought streaked across his conscious mind Harry realized he had already decided Thanos was definitely alive somewhere. Fuck. Still, there are ways of preparing for him. And he showed me a lot of what he could do to. Knowledge is power Thanos, and if you ever threaten my planet again, I will by god show that to you.
OOOOOOO
"A pity about the Abomination, Blonsky was a good soldier at one point. And I believe you were saying something about my Hulk Busters not being authorized?"
The younger man turned to General Ross, smiling faintly though there was no humor in his eyes. "It depends on if our government will truly believe anything that comes from this Guardian's mouth. And even then, I bet we can lobby for at least some work continuing on my own project. It's evident that America needs a response to the superpowered menace."
"You think the purple skinned one being an alien was a lie?"
"I don't care if it was or not, he's evidently gone, and we're left with the planet killer in his place. We need to find a way to somehow combat mutants with that kind of power."
OOOOOOO
While Emma was forced to deal with Sebastian, Sandman had followed Buckman by the simple expedient of transforming back into several pounds of sand and secreting himself along the bottom of his limo. He couldn't hear anything down here over the rumble of the engine and the noise of the wheels over the asphalt, but it kept him out of sight for now. He wondered if Buckman was simply heading home at first, but he didn't. Instead the limo headed out of New York for several hours until they turned off into someplace with a gravel road.
Wondering where they were, Sandman formed an eyeball underneath the rear bumper, staring around them. He noticed a sign of some kind that from this angle looked like one for a national park or something. As the drive continued, they moved deeper into the park, the limo an incongruous car among the Jeeps and camper vans for a moment while it moved deeper into the park.
Finally the limo stopped for a moment deep in the woods having left behind the last of the other cars, cutting through roads that had authorized vehicles only signs on them until it came to a stop. Slowly Sandman reformed his arm and his head underneath the limo so as to hear what was going on.
He heard the crunch of gravel as Buckman got out of the car while Sandman moved slightly out from underneath the limo keeping hidden with difficulty, since the sun was still out for now.
"Why the sudden meeting? said a voice, which he didn't recognize, though the tone was angry and argumentative. "You know this is against procedure."
"I know, but the news was so bizarre I had to meet with you. I needed to know if the Sentinels could handle the Hulk, or the team of superheroes that suddenly showed up there. They were fucking mutants, but they were much more powerful than most. Are the Sentinels up to handling such?" asked Edward, his voice matching a small sample that Emma had Sandman listen to a few days ago.
"In enough numbers yes." The first voice replied. "We knew that fighting the Hulk might be a necessity. After all, we only have Banner's little bit of propaganda he got out that he was created by a military project gone wrong."
"When will you be ready to move? I'm going to be meeting with my lobbyists and public relations people as soon as I can to start to push the mutant control bill. This latest incident up in Montréal will work in our favor for that regardless of anything else. We'll be able to point out that we only have his word for the fact that this Thanos fellow was an alien rather than a mutant, and that there are mutants out there just as powerful as the Hulk even if he isn't one. But we might need to show we have a force ready to enforce that bill right away."
"A month from now the first run will be done, and that's a hard date, nothing can stop it now. The Master Mold is fully functional and busy creating the Sentinels already. I don't have to even be there now, though I will be to help her augment the targeting algorithms and come up with some new weapons after some initial testing. The first batch will be around 500 or so, but after that we won't have enough materials on hand for the Master Mold to build more for some time, so government funding will be a necessity at that point. I hope your lobbyists are as good as they should be."
"They are, and my PR people are some of the best in the business, outside of Paris'. We'll be able to find people among the displaced and of course survivors of the battle in Montréal that will be more than willing to attack mutants easily enough. I'll, I'll also try to talk to my fiancé. If we can get her on board, we'll be able to win enough public opinion to push the bill through easily."
"Why you haven't brought her on board before this I don't know." the unknown man replied tartly. "She could've been a help with that all along, and she would never have been a part of letting Potter put out his coexistence message. That did a lot of damage, hell I had to liquidate a few of my own men after that. I had thought that they were intelligent enough to realize such an idea was impossible, but his statements somehow convinced them."
Edward sighed audibly. "I've been loath to bring it up because Paris doesn't see the mutant issue as clearly as you and I, and because she's a woman, softhearted to a certain degree. Ruthless in business to be sure, but not in the social scheme of things. I'll try, but she and I haven't met eye to eye on that issue before, so I don't know if we'll be able to now. I should at least convince her to give equal screen time to both sides of the issue, and my PR people, as I said, are very good."
"Fine, but don't try to set up a face-to-face meeting like this again. I know we've had our concerns about someone tapping our electronic communications, but this face-to-face shit is just as dangerous."
"Agreed. Senator Kelly has that anti-mutant rally coming up at the end of the month, where he's going to announce his presidential campaign. Will your Sentinels be ready for that? That would send a powerful statement. I might show up to show public support for his campaign as well if my PR people think it's a good idea. Will you be there?"
"They'll be ready, but no. In fact this is the last time I am going to be out in public. The Master Mold doesn't like it when I'm away it's a security risk and I agree. We'll speak next month Edward. Do your part, and the Sentinels will do the rest."
Sandman's face had become grimmer and grimmer as the talk went on. He didn't understand what the Master Mold was or the Sentinels. He got the impression they were some kind of robot, a hunter killer kind of thing like in those Terminator movies. He was not happy with the thought, and struggled with the idea of simply killing both men right now. They could even make it look like some kind of accident if he had enough time, and there certainly weren't enough witnesses around to bother him.
But it was the second man's mention of the fact that he was no longer necessary for the construction of the Sentinels that made him stop. There was no point in showing himself if he couldn't cut the head off the snake, and it looked as if the Master Mold had become the head now. Dammit give me locations, come on!
He chanced a glance out past a wheel, frowning as he realized the second man's car was too far away for him to get to, and worse the two men were standing directly between the two cars, facing the second man's car. With the two men directly in the path he would need to take there was no way they would not notice his sand heading over to the other car.
The two men didn't give him any more information, instead stopping the discussion there. After exchanging farewells, the two men got into their different cars, and Sandman once again moved himself up into the lower workings of the limo.
Once he began to see more potholes and feel the car stopping more often. Sandman chanced forming an eyeball near the front, staring up and trying to get his bearings for a moment, not wanting to head back to Buckman's mansion. If the two men had been that careful about not giving anything away in person, Buckman certainly wasn't going to give anything away when he got back to his mansion.
By this point it was deep night, the streets lit up by the lampposts. With that in mind Sandman took a chance, and removed himself from underneath the limo into a sewer drain in a moment when the limo stopped at a red light. He waited there until there was no traffic along the street then reformed himself, walking away briskly.
Stopping at an intersection Sandman was about to pull out his cell phone and ask someone to come and get him when an all-too-familiar voice spoke up from above him. "Well, well Sandy, fancy meeting you here. You aren't up to your old tricks again are you? I was astonished that you got paroled, but when I looked into the details of it I figured this Frost woman might actually convince you to stay on the straight and narrow. Yet here you are, apparently scoping out a jewelry store?"
Sandman looked up in irritation, shaking his head as he saw his old nemesis hanging from an overhanging awning directly above him, sticking there upside like a damn spider. He had to fight the urge to lash out at him, he hadn't forgotten that it had been Spiderman who put him in jail in the first place. Still, he was happy enough with his job, and truly did wish to reform himself so he didn't start anything.
Instead he laughed. "Sheer coincidence Spidey, I was just doing a little job for my boss. And trust me, I'm getting paid more than enough that the idea of knocking off a jewelry store holds no appeal to me." He looked around shrugging his shoulders as he looked at the jewelry store Spidey was talking about. "I hadn't even noticed it until you pointed it out."
Spiderman leaned down, staring into Sandman's eyes for a moment. "You're really going to try to go straight? I know some of your history, so I'm not gonna say that's impossible and a tiger can't change his stripes. And may I say how happy I am that you're not wearing that revolting striped sweater. That thing was damn ugly. But still, you got to admit this looks kind of fishy."
"I'm supposed to take fashion tips from someone who goes around wearing red and blue spandex?" Sandman scoffed. "And like I said I'm getting paid more than enough to stay on the straight and narrow."
"And there are bigger things afoot here, bigger than I realized until this last job." Sandman stared off into the dark of the streets, running a hand through his short cropped hair, irritated anew at the fact that it still felt sandy even when he was in his human form. "There are changes coming to the entire world, and I'm afraid we're all going to have to choose sides. And I've just realized, that I've already chosen mine."
"That sounds ominous," Spiderman quipped, "and does not make me feel any less worried."
"It wasn't supposed to. How many people have accused you of being a mutant lately?" Sandman asked seemingly changing the subject. "I know I got a lot of that when I was in the clink."
"A lot," Spiderman replied honestly, feeling a bit weirded out about this whole situation. He had frankly expected Sandman to attack him right off, but having a conversation like this with the other man was, while surprising, much more pleasant than the battle he had anticipated. "The Daily Bugle's been harping on it lately, especially since that explosion in China that was caused by a mutant apparently. It stopped for a bit after that Magical Minds guy made his public announcement of support for coexistence. Still with the news today I bet it'll start up again. Why?"
"I'm proud to be an American." Sandman said, seemingly changing subject for a second time. "I've been proud to be an American even when I was living on the streets or when I was part of the damn mob. I've known that we had better rights and more say in how we lived our lives and in the government than most other nations. That we had certain rights as human beings, as citizens of America like the right to bear arms and the right to privacy, that others didn't. And I think if someone wants to take away those rights from one group, they might as well try to take it away from everyone. I'm not going to stand for that."
"I don't think I would either." Spiderman said after a moment. "Though I think I'm missing half this conversation." He shook his head from where he was still hanging upside down staring at Sandman. "I'll take your word for your not being here to cause trouble, but know I'll still be watching you whenever I get a chance. You step out of line, and I'll send you straight back to jail."
"Yeah, yeah." Sandman said holding up his cell phone. "Now bug off, I gotta call my ride."
Spiderman shook his head, then flipped himself up into the darkness of the buildings all around them, disappearing from Sandman's view though he figured Spiderman was still around for a bit. He had to wait about 40 minutes before a limo appeared, not the one that Emma routinely used, but another one from the mansion driven by one of the security men. As soon as he was in the car Sandman flipped up his cell phone and got in touch with his boss. "Boss lady, there's some shit going down that I think you need to know about. Your hunch paid off big time, though I don't know if it was in the way you thought it would…"
OOOOOOO
The next day Harry was as good as his word, giving each of the team members a credit card and sending them off from Camelot. He was happy to see that all of them went out together. Apparently both Piotr and Amara wanted to go to Disney World, and Betsy was fine with the idea and wanted to stay with them. That kind of unity was excellent, and would hopefully see them through even worse times than this.
After that, Harry went out in his civilian persona, making an announcement as head of Magical Minds and sending out a full shipment of potions to Montréal to help the injured in the tragedy. This earned him PR points of course, and the public opinion of his company, in Canada at least, skyrocketed. The fact the British military aided this effort by offering to send some of its cargo planes with those potions also aided the two governments' already pretty good relationship. Of course, Harry also assigned Cory and a few popping specialists to make certain the shipments were not diverted somehow, which thankfully they weren't.
Once he finished his announcement Harry turned off all of his electronics and returned to Camelot. There he spent half the day with Melody and the other children simply having fun. Ororo joined him after having slept most of the morning away, joining in a game of kickball gleefully and leading her team of the younger children to victory over Illyich and the other, older students. Then the two of them took a bath together in the couples only bathing area, making slow, gentle love to one another with Ororo taking the lead over the still injured Harry for more than an hour, only stopping when their skin began to prune. Then they joined Melody and Illyana for a movie marathon.
The next day though, unlike the rest of the team, the two of them got down to business once more. While Ororo talked to the teachers about what was going on with the children's education, and began to go over the list of agents that Dennis had added recently as well as speaking to Charles and calling Stephen Strange to inform him about what had occurred in Montréal, Harry took a moment to enter the vault where Krakaan's gem was housed.
He stood there a moment staring at it, his fingers flexing then shook his head. No, not now. Yes in the future I might have to if I fight someone like Thanos again or if it looks like I will, but I don't need more power now. And my magical core hasn't even begun to recover, which means rather than enlarging my reserves it would simply fill them up. Harry's wounds refused to be healed by magical means save his own internal, and they were healing even more slowly than the wounds he had taken during the fight with Mephisto. He had covered this in his public persona by a simple illusion, and not letting the camera show more than his face but he wasn't willing to try to battle an Elder God, not even a stupid one, unless he was one hundred percent.
For a moment the RoR changed, showing a blasted landscape and a giant model of Thanos, though it wasn't moving just yet. Harry scowled at it, motes of light appearing around his fingers for a moment until a cough from behind him interrupted his somewhat murderous thoughts. He turned to see Ororo standing by the door into RoR, one white eyebrow raised inquisitively. "And just what were you thinking of doing, injured as you are?"
Harry sighed and the Thanos lookalike disappeared, while he began to walk towards her. "I don't think I was thinking really, just, just the feeling of unfinished business I suppose. I thought you were talking to the teachers."
"I was, we're done for now. I thought you might be brooding, so I wanted to pass on something I overheard, another piece of a puzzle I know you've been worrying at." With that Ororo told Harry about the conversation she had overheard discussing Thor and the odd discrepancies between him and what legend dictated he should look like.
Harry frowned, then shook his head with a smile. "Well that gives me something new to think of certainly." He held up his hand, counting off points on his fingers. "Point one, no Norse runes exist in this world, at all. Point two, Balder and others don't quite match up to what they historically should be like, either in personality or looks. Personality could be excused, but since these beings were the center of religious belief, looks could not be. Worse, things that are specific to their legends are also missing or different from what they should be."
At that Ororo cocked her head, and Harry shrugged, a small smirk on his face. "The head of Mjollnir is supposed to be made of stone, not metal, and Balder is supposed to be married, but he certainly didn't act like a married man."
After a moment Harry went on. "Point three, Dani has some connection to them, which is unknown at this time, but which allows Hela, one of the goddesses of death of the Asatru religion, to summon her spirit. Point four, there is no record or sign of how they actually left or otherwise cut themselves off from what they call Midgard, and the records of the 'heathen religion of the Norse' have been destroyed, far too completely to be anything but part of a larger plan. Point five, Thor apparently regressed at a time when he needed greater strength, suddenly able to smash Hulk down, when before he was barely keeping up with him."
Harry waggled his fingers then smacked his forehead dragging his fingers down his face. "Why can't anything be simple? Well, this problem at least won't suddenly rear its head, and I think we can start figuring out what the problem might be easily enough. I was planning to head to Norway anyway in a few days."
After that the two of them spent a few minutes together, calling up Emma to see if she would be able to get free for dinner. Emma replied that she was looking into something but would have something major to share with him and Ororo that evening. Wondering what that meant Harry decided to delve into the business end of things. He filled out the paperwork to begin his own energy company following a suggestion Emma had made weeks ago about his arc reactor designs. The first would still be sold to the British government, which would be an excellent testbed for the future ones. But the others instead of simply selling them as generators, he would sell the energy coming from them, giving him another source of long term income at what amounted to very little in the cost of startup.
He then handled some of Jean's side of things. This meant he okayed the design for the hover ambulance, and dealt with some people who were still irritated about having to work under someone so much younger than themselves. He did this by sending out a memo that if they didn't want to, they could be shown the door rather easily. That first afternoon though Harry also had to field a surprise call from Dr. Doom. "Lord Doom, what can I do for you?"
"Tell me what I must do to not be forsworn," Doom said bluntly. "Our agreement was that I would aid you against extraterrestrial threats that threatened humanity as a whole. This Thanos individual seems to qualify, and I was not aware of the battle against him until you had already teleported to Mars. Congratulations on your victory, though I would warn you if he had teleportation abilities at all, he might've escaped."
"I'm afraid he almost certainly did. But I'll be better prepared for him the next time he shows up. As to what you can do to make up for not helping…" Harry paused thinking hard. In another universe Harry Potter might have simply said that he wasn't owed anything, that he had done what he had to, but this Harry was much more pragmatic about things, and had a very good read on Dr. Doom's personality. If he seemed to brush Doom's abilities off like that, as if they didn't matter he would no doubt take umbrage at the dismissal, and would look for little ways or possibly large ones to bother Harry in turn.
So instead Harry decided to toss a very worrying problem the brilliant doctor's way. "I had an interesting conversation with Reed before he and the others left on their mission, and we came up with a few problems that we are facing in terms of defending the Earth from many extraterrestrial threats. A few of them I've come up with solutions already, but two in particular could make or break any defense we put in place. Tell me Dr., have you ever thought of how to detect something moving in hyperspace? Or how to, for want of a better word, drag something out of hyperspace at a particular point?"
Doom got where he was going with those questions immediately and smiled faintly, though of course it was unseen behind his mask. "Yes, I can see where that would aid the defense of Earth easily. I will look into them, and have something for you by the end of next week. Will that suffice?"
"That and anymore construction androids you can send our way will do the trick," Harry replied nodding his head. "I can't fault you for not seeing Thanos coming after all, we didn't have any hint of his arrival until he showed up in the battle anyway, so yes, that will be enough. Until then Dr."
"Until then," Doom said, and the two of them hung up both of them pleased with the way the conversation went. Respect in their opinion was so much more important than actual friendship.
While the world reacted to the events of Montréal, Harry continued his work throughout the rest of that day. It took him another full day to finish up his work on setting up Elemental Energies , sending off the paperwork, hiring a manager for it and giving the man his marching orders, setting up the number of departments he'd need and even seconding some men from Magical Minds to work for him. Then he took some time to watch the news as the British military's cargo planes arrived in Montréal with the shipments of potions he had sent them, before starting on setting up more of his business ventures as separate companies. That work would continue for a while since he only had people ready to run the new energy company, but the groundwork would be done soon enough. More importantly, he began a hiring campaign of epic proportions to meet that need and others. It would take a while for that to bear fruit, but the think tanks, especially in the area of medicine and research, were things he was looking forward to.
Later that evening Harry and Ororo met with Emma as she came through the runic doorways. Both of them smiled, exchanging hugs with her, and if either of them noticed how her arms seemed to cling to them, making certain they were really there, neither commented.
"I'm starving", Emma said bluntly, "I hope you have a large dinner waiting for us, but I think that you two might not have any appetite after I'm done explaining what I've found out recently about the Sentinel Project. I also have a plan in mind, though we might need to talk to Charles about his getting involved."
Over dinner Emma explained what Sandman had passed on, adding, "I even scanned his mind, and saw the man myself. It was easy to match him up with Bolivar Trask. I could have wished that Sandman had been able to tail him instead, but..." She shrugged. "We have to deal with the realities, and Sandman couldn't have done so without showing himself."
"He found out enough," Harry replied grimly. "So, the Sentinel Project is already set up, and it's killer mutant hunting androids. That's bad. That's very bad. What are the odds that this Mutant Registration bill will go through as quickly as Buckman seems to think?"
"I don't know." Emma replied, her face showing worry, her habitual control gone now that she was among those she loved and trusted. "I also have no idea how powerful each individual robot will be, or anything about what they look like. The fact that the program was already moving, and could continue to move without Trask however is very worrying to me. That tells me that this Master Mold might have some equivalent of an AI, and that given what the Sentinels are being built for is a terrifying concept. We need to move on this, but I just don't see how we'd be able to before the end of the month at that rally, then maybe trace the Sentinels back to wherever they are being made. I have a plan there, but frankly at this point I'd be more inclined to simply rip the knowledge we need out of Buckman's mind even if he would figure out it was me doing it."
"As a threat, will Shaw keep while we deal with this?" Harry asked. "Or should we move against him now? I'd rather have Jean and the others back before we do that, but we can still handle Shaw and his group if we need to now, even having to use kid gloves against some of them, so long as we can take him by surprise."
"I'd like us to move against him soon yes, but I don't think he's as big a threat as the Sentinel Project frankly. Can you handle his powers?"
"Easily," Harry nodded. "There are spells that don't have any physical components to them, I think as long as I can stick to those Shaw himself won't be an issue. I'd like to move against him now, but that might warn Buckman about your involvement no matter what we do. Ororo, your vote?"
"No," Ororo said, shaking her head. "The furor over what occurred in Montréal needs to die down before we show ourselves again, and even with as far off the beaten path as Shaw's mansion is, we can't assume that the battle won't be picked up, especially if Shaw isn't doing what he can to keep it from doing so. If we attacked him, we might be seen as the aggressor which could lose us much of the goodwill our actions have so far earned."
After a moment Harry and Emma nodded reluctant agreement with the Weather goddess. "What's your plan to get us the information we need to move against the Sentinel project?" Harry asked.
Emma outlined her plan and Harry smiled thinly. It was precisely the sort of plan he had come to expect from her, sneaky, underhanded, with a very high probability of success and with little to no risk to herself or indeed his public persona. However Harry thought there was something else they could add. "I think that we need to continue our attempts to pit our enemies against one another. It worked well enough with Pierce, and I think we can do the same thing here with a little bit of work, and a bit of double dealing on our part.…"
OOOOOOO
"No."
"No?" Edward Buckman asked, looking across the dining table to Paris. She had been happy enough to have him over for dinner at her New York mansion, but since he had subtly directed the conversation to Potter, the need to give equal time to the other side of the Mutant Issue and that whole question, her enjoyment had soured. He knew she would never see the truth as well as he did, but still. "What do you mean no?"
"I mean no. Not only no, but hell no," Paris replied bluntly, her normally pristine face twisted into a grimace. "A, who the hell am I going to find that has the sheer charisma Potter was able to exude so effortlessly that wouldn't come off as a rabble rouser or a hate monger? Answer, no one. Oh, I know there are intellectuals out there who think that humans and mutants are going to have to fight it out like the Cro-Magnon and the Neanderthals, but those that are intelligent enough to actually defend their position have about as much charisma or empathy as a box of rocks!"
"If I put any of them on PNN, my ratings would plummet like no one's business. The only ones that might be able to meet both criterion are politicians like the Senator down in Texas who everyone thinks might be announcing his presidential candidacy soon. PNN has made a name for itself by reporting the truth and steering clear of choosing sides on either side of the political divide. I realize the Mutant Question seems to be able to jump that divide relatively easily, but it makes for ugly politics, and I am not going to soil my name or that of one of my major money makers with that kind of thing."
"You let Potter get his message out." Buckman said, accusingly, though he meant it to come out as a simple question.
"Because no one had any warning other than his hiring policy on his personal feelings on that point. And besides, it was such a small part of his total message to the world that it can be swept into the whole relatively easily. That battle up in Montreal should've made the world more aware of the danger we all face from outer space, but no, there's been no push in that direction ,while there are people like you and others who continue to cling to old problems, if they are problems at all."
And indeed that was the case. The populations of the various world powers were split as to how they saw the events in Montreal, but many groups, especially interest groups of various stripes, were trying to ignore the threats that might be out there to focus on old issues.
Those groups that did acknowledge the threats out there came in three stripes. One felt that humanity was somehow at fault and wanted to prepare a diplomatic delegation to talk to the next group of aliens that showed up, because 'of course interstellar species will have discovered that war solves nothing'. The second group specifically vilified Guardian, in particular decrying his destruction of Mars' surface and atmosphere, and agreed with the first group as to what humanity should do. The third group, which was centered in America and the UK, wanted a military response, but the moment the numbers of setting up such came up, none of them were able to think of where the money would come from.
And then there were those like Edward, who blamed the problem on mutants or other scapegoats. Thankfully this was actually a small, and very fragmented group, but it was vocal, in particular in the states.
"How can you say that, mutants have caused several disasters the world over in the last few years. What about the disaster in China a few weeks ago, or the Nuke Crisis that freak Magneto caused five years back? And besides, we only have this Guardian character's word that this Thanos was an alien. He could've just as easily been a mutant himself!"
That was actually what his own PR people were putting out as much as possible in as many ways as possible without it being traced back to him or his holdings. It wasn't being believed by everyone, but it was being believed by enough people to further polarize the Mutant Question.
"How about the Cuban Missile Crisis, or the Korean war?" Paris replied tartly. "Humans have caused far more disasters to ourselves than mutants have, but because some small percentage of mutants have abilities that go beyond what humans could ever achieve alone, people like you hate and persecute the entirety!"
With a snarl on her face Paris pushed herself to her feet. "You're fucking obsessed and I have no idea why! You spend so much damn time on your own projects, and talking about fucking mutants, do you have any idea..."
She paused for a moment to gather her self-control, then went on plaintively. "You've spent so much time and effort on these side projects, you haven't spent any time with me! For god's sake, we were supposed to be getting married sometime soon, but you keep on putting it off every time I try to bring it up! This is in fact the first time we've had a meal together outside the Hellfire Club in months! And what do you do, you spend most of the meal trying to get me to agree with you on the fact that mutants are a menace. Well excuse me, but I think there are more important things we should be talking about, like whether or not this relationship is going anywhere!"
Edward scowled angrily. "There are more important things at stakes than our relationship, can't you see that! Mutants are the worst threat humanity has ever seen, and if we don't…"
Paris turned away from Edward, grabbing up a little bell. She quickly rang it, and a manservant entered, one of many among her staff that doubled as a bodyguard. "Edard will be leaving us now Frederick, please see him out." She turned back to Edward, her eyes bleak. "Until you rework your priorities our relationship is over Edward. You've shown in the last few months you care more about running after shadows than us. I'm sorry Edward, but I want more than that from the man I'm engaged too!"
"But, but…" Edward said, then closed his mouth. There really was no way he could defend his actions in terms of their relationship after all, he had indeed been neglecting it for months now. It had been that long at least since it really wasn't important to him in comparison to his quest and in comparison to his business. "Very well Paris, if that's your decision, I can understand. I'm sorry we could not come to an understanding."
With that Edward left, leaving Paris to collapse in to a chair once more. She thought about reaching for the bottle of brandy that was set on a nearby decanter, but before the thought could finish travelling down to her hand the door opened once more and Amora entered. The woman was staying with Paris at her mansion these days because she was saving up money to buy a car, a Jaguar Low-Drag GT, which, Paris had thought was one hell of a car when she saw pictures of it. Amora had promised Paris she could go out on the first drive with her once she bought the car, and Paris fully understood the need for speed so had agreed to loan Amora a room for a few months.
Now however, Amora walked in bearing a large bowl of chocolate ice cream and some kind of dark red fizzy drink. "I heard you sent your now ex-fiancé packing? I also understand chocolate ice cream and sappy movies are supposed to be a balm for a wounded heart."
Paris grabbed the bowl and chomped down, nearly moaning in pleasure as the ice cream, homemade by Amora a few days ago 'as an experiment' hit her taste buds. "Ugh, I suppose so. I just, we had connected so easily for so long, and I thought, well I guess it doesn't matter. People change, sometimes not for the better. His obsession is consuming him, and I, I'm not going to let it drag me down too."
"Good response." Amora nodded licking her own spoon in such a way that any straight man who witnessed it would immediately have issues in the trouser department. "But one that is easier to say than to really understand. I would say though that the fault lies in him, not you. As such, I think that eating your own weight in chocolate would be a nice way of getting over it, as would possibly maxing out any joint credit cards you have which send the bill to him."
Paris looked at the other woman, then began to laugh. And if there was a bit of water on her face or a hiccup to her laughter, it was still a promising sound.
OOOOOOO
It was several days before Harry was healed enough to want to chance dealing with waking up Dr. Banner. That morning while he spent breakfast with the kids, going over some initial magical lessons with Illyana, most of which were simply visualization aids, Hedwig was sent out with a message for the mayor of Montréal. After browbeating one of the house elves to teleport her over to Charles' mansion, she made her way up from there into Canada, then into Montréal dropping the letter off on the mayor's desk. Neither the mayor himself nor any of his workers were actually there, out and about still surveying and directing the rebuilding of the city, which would take months even with all the aid pouring in.
That evening when he returned to his office for the first time that day the mayor was smiling however. The construction was going well, the people had responded heroically to the challenge, and his victory in the next election was almost certain due to how he had responded to the crisis. He paused however as he saw an envelope left for him on his desk. He was about to reach for his cell phone and call in a bomb disposal unit when he saw the owl perched on his coat hanger.
The bird was looking at him with the most penetrating stare he had ever seen and he shuffled his feet, moving away from a bird that he probably outweighed at least seven times over. Then he remembered that Guardian had said he would be sending an owl with a message. At the time he had thought it was an euphemism of some kind, or perhaps an inside joke. Now he realized it was simply plain fact, though he wondered how the bird had gotten in here. Even so, he had dealt with Snowbird a few times before, so it wasn't altogether surprising.
Under the watchful gaze of the owl the mayor moved over to pick up the message, reading it quickly. 'Have the government representative ready and waiting at Montréal airport on the furthest runway out from the airport's main building tomorrow. Please inform him he should not eat for at least six hours beforehand. He will be allowed to bring recording devices, but they must not be on until I say so. If they are, or if he has other listening devices on him, then he will be returned and you will lose the ability to have a representative there while we deal with Dr. Banner.'
The mayor frowned thoughtfully at the warning tone however he nodded anyway. Guardian had his secrets, and certainly whatever could contain the Hulk if he went berserk was probably one of them. He nodded at the bird and wrote out a small message on the back of the envelope. 'Agreed, he or she will be waiting.' With that he hesitantly held the message up, and the owl flew over, taking the message in her claws before flying out the window that the mayor hastily opened for her.
True to the mayor's word there was a government representative waiting at the designated point, a young man with a slightly chubby build but quick intelligent eyes and the name tag Ralph Emerson on it. But he was not the only one there. To one side stood another man, a young blonde man with a rather ridiculous looking goatee, wearing glasses and a SHIELD uniform. Both men were also carrying large recording devices in their hands. The two men were standing well apart, pointedly not looking at one another when Guardian flew out of the air above them to land lightly on the ground.
Guardian looked at the two of them, frowning angrily. "You must be the government representative, but I have no idea why you're here Mr.?""
"Agent Sanders of SHIELD," the man replied briskly. "Director Fury asked that I be sent along to watch the proceedings. We felt that having a neutral party present might be necessary to keep government interests happy the world over."
"Well that's nice, but…" Guardian paused thinking hard. He knew SHIELD had a lot of resources, and they were supposed to be handling issues like this, so in a way Guardian was fine with the idea. In other ways however, not at all, since who SHIELD actually answered to was still very much unknown. He also didn't like this young man, something about him just got under Guardian's skin. And Guardian didn't like that Fury had simply assumed that he'd be okay with this.
A sudden thought occurred to him however and he smirked. Fury's so used to hiding in the shadows, but this could help me bring the Hulk and everything involved with him and with what happened here in Montréal even more into the light. "Very well, I suppose I can accede to that request, though you'll have to submit to screening just as much as Emerson will for hidden listening devices or anything else. You're allowed a recorder, but only during the actual questioning, is that understood?"
The man looked as if he was going to protest, but Guardian went on. "You either go along with that, or I can dump your ass right here, I don't care which."
At that, the man's teeth ground audibly but he nodded. Guardian nodded in return then held out a small piece of paper. "You need to read this to understand where we're going. If you don't, you won't be able to function there."
The two men looked down at the message and saw that Guardian had scribbled 'the Hulk/Dr. Banner is being held in an unnamed cave'. They both looked at him quizzically and Guardian smiled. "Trust me, if you were taken to this place without that knowledge, you wouldn't be able to see the walls, you wouldn't be able to see anything but yourselves, you'd be feeling vertigo and a lot of other things. It's a magical protection."
The Agent scoffed but Emerson simply nodded. Two of the people who had died from Alpha Flight had practiced magic of a kind, and as one of the oversight committee that watched over Alpha Flight he was at home with the idea.
Guardian paused for a moment smirking a little. "By the way, when was the last time you two ate?"
"Since your message said that I shouldn't I haven't yet eaten today." Emerson replied while the agent simply said gruffly that he had eaten breakfast with his fellow Agents down in the city a few hours ago.
"Well this might get a bit messy for you then. Teleporting is always tough, especially for non-magicals." With a small smirk on his face Guardian reached out, grasping both men by the shoulder and suddenly the three of them were elsewhere. They appeared in a large cavern of some kind, which looked hollowed out from rock. The sides of it were rough, though the floor below them was smooth, but that was all they could tell about it, there was no clue to where it actually was.
Ben Grimm was waiting there, his arms crossed as he stared at a bed in one corner. On that bed lay Dr. Banner, still asleep from the Draught of Living Death that Ororo had given him. The normally good-natured hero was scowling angrily but he nodded as Guardian appeared. "I need to run these two through security." Guardian said brusquely, while behind him Sanders fell to his knees, trying desperately to not throw up his breakfast. "After that we're going to begin quickly, all right Ben?"
"You're the one whose running this show Guardian. Reed trusted you to do this so…" he shrugged. Of course Reed didn't actually know anything that had happened here, but sending that message even softly like this through the government representative and the SHIELD Agent might be a good thing.
Guardian waved the two Agents over toward a doorway, but they didn't go through it instead waiting there while he did and coming back with a small scanner of some kind which he ran over their bodies, a scanner Reed had made years ago. After a few minutes he frisked Sanders quickly and expertly relieving him of several small listening devices, including one video recorder which was set into the lapel of his SHIELD uniform.
The man grimaced angrily as all of his devices were found and removed, but Guardian smirked internally, even while giving the man back the one recorder he was actually allowed. Your day is going to go from bad to worse soon enough boyo. He looked down at the pile up shaking his head. "I'm going to go dispose of these, I'll be right back."
Guardian went next-door, where the rest of the team were watching events through the wall which Harry and Ororo had magicked to allow them to watch the action through it without being seen. This included both Johnny and Wyatt who were mingling with the rest of the team talking quietly when Harry entered. At her lover's smirk Ororo rolled her eyes. "I know that look, what do you have planned Harry?"
"Fury wanted to get some the information from this interview, I figure we might be able to take that to the next logical step." His smirk widened slightly, and Ororo rolled her eyes again. About twenty minutes later, everything was set up on his end, a process which made all of his team, even Ororo smirk evilly. Some very high up people were going to be very angry about this, if it went the way it might.
Soon after that Harry reentered the room with Dr. Banner and the others. "All right gentlemen I think we're ready to wake the man up."
"How exactly have you kept Banner asleep?" asked Agent Sanders, quickly turning on his one allowed recorder, having gotten over his anger at his devices being confiscated, while next to him Emerson did the same. Not a medic by any means, he still had some field training and had been trying to find the sleeping man's pulse only to fail miserably. He was obviously still alive, there was no smell of decay or anything, he was just in stasis somehow.
"A spell called the Sleep of the Living Death," Guardian replied politely. He didn't want to leave any more hints that could connect Guardian to his Harry Potter public persona just yet. That would come out eventually he knew, but not right now. The mutant issue had polarized too much already for him to want that to happen. "When Dr. Banner reverted to this form upon being knocked out, he lost all of his Hulk bodies built-in defenses against such things. I'll remove it, and he should wake up immediately."
He stood by the bed, waving his hand theatrically over the man's head while blocking both Sanders view and the view of the hidden camera that was now recording everything from near the doorway, and sending it out live via the system Magneto had created to override news agencies the world over. The megalomaniac had probably intended to issues some vague warnings or demands that way, but Harry felt this would be a far better way of using it.
Unseen he surreptitiously slipped a bit of them antidote into the man's mouth, then backed away nodding his head calmly. "Give him a few minutes, and we should be able to start asking questions. Mr. Emerson unless you have any objections, I'm going to start by asking him some questions about what the hell happened that could in any way lead to his being in Canada, and why he was working with the Abomination."
"That makes sense." Emerson replied looking around. "Would you mind if we got some chairs in here however? This might take a while after all."
Guardian nodded, and with a wave of his hands conjured up some chairs out of the air for all of them, while Bruce Banner began to stir.
OOOOOOO
Elsewhere Commander Fury was tapping a pen on some paperwork, frowning and wondering what was going on with the interview with Banner. He had been told in no uncertain terms that Banner had some secrets that the American government did not want to see come out in the open. Of course most of the American government itself didn't know those secrets, it was only a select few that did, and it was only those select few that would possibly be physically harmed by it. But the reputation of America would suffer, and that was enough for him to order Sanders to steer clear of any questions about the Abomination's creation, or General Ross's reaction after the Hulk had been created in that gamma bomb experiment. Or anything about that in general if he could.
Nick wasn't so sanguine about doing so, but those were his orders. More importantly from his perspective, he had been given the okay to look into any and all means to match or bring Guardian under control. While the public's opinion was still working itself out, and it looked as if his relationship with the Fantastic Four would help Potter there, the powers in the shadowy world that worked behind the scenes in America and elsewhere had already made its opinion plain: Guardian was too dangerous and far too powerful to let loose any longer.
Unfortunately, while Fury knew Potter's personal power came from magic, he had absolutely zilch in the way of contacts or information on that subject. He didn't even have any idea why he couldn't say or do anything to make others aware of the connection between Potter and Guardian, let alone what kind of questions to ask about shutting his power down. He had researchers looking into anything about magicians (and didn't that earn him some weird looks) in America or its allies, but wasn't getting anywhere.
Other areas of research were going much better. The Special Weapons project was going well, and SHIELD would soon have weapons superiority against AIM which might be enough to let them match Guardian's team. His people had also found a few weaknesses among Potter's known accomplices, and had even been able to find and recruit their own telepath, which would be a major aid down the road.
And the plans for the Avengers Initiative is… He frowned suddenly as his intercom buzzed. "Director Fury, you might want to get up to the bridge Sir, were getting a live feed of some kind that I think you might want to see."
Fury made it to the bridge within a minute, and then was waved over to a console which was showing the image of the inside of some kind of cave, Sanders, a man he didn't recognize, the Thing and Guardian sitting on chairs alongside a bed that held Bruce Banner. "So Sanders was able to actually get one of his devices in, excellent." Nick nodded. "I didn't think he would to be honest. Guardian is a cagey fellow."
"Er, no sir you don't, um, that is this video feed isn't coming from anything Agent Sanders had on him. This is coming in over the CNN news line."
"What?" Fury demanded.
The Agent shrugged but a few others around him raised their hands looking a little worried. "Um, sir," one of them said, speaking up for them all. "It's not just CNN, its BBC, NBC, several Canadian networks... It, it might just be every news network in the world Sir." The man went on, looking down at a message appearing on his own screen from some of his fellows deeper into the helacarrier's massive bulk.
Nick put his hand over his one remaining eye growling angrily. "Then I think we need to hope that Sanders is able to steer the questions away from certain topics. Or this could be a disaster." Inside however, Fury was smirking, even chuckling evilly. Oh, well played Potter. Well played.
OOOOOOO
Dr. Banner awoke, reaching up with one hand to scratch at his hair for a moment as he wondered why he had been asleep in the first place. Then it all hit him, and he groaned aloud, both of his hands covering his eyes and face for a moment. "No, please no! Don't tell me!" Images and flashes of when he was the Hulk came back to him when he changed back. This time as usual they were disjointed yet they were still horrible for all that. The violence, the death, oh god some of the deaths his other self had caused would stay with him forever. "Oh God why couldn't I just slit my wrists and got it over with!"
"Death is easy Dr. atoning is not." Said a voice he didn't recognize, causing Banner to remove his hands from his face and look to the side. Yet for a moment he couldn't see anything, it was like the voice had come out of a gray nothingness, and almost immediately his body began to rebel, his stomach coming up, his head beginning to pound. Before he could panic however, a piece of paper was held in front of his face. "Read this."
Reflexively Banner did so, frowning at the odd message but the moment he read it the feelings in his body receded swiftly, causing him to breathe a sigh of relief as he lay back on what he realized now was a bed. After a moment he opened his eyes again, and looked around him, concentrating on the four people sitting in somewhat comfortable chairs to the side of the bed.
Ben Grimm he recognized, but none of the others there. One looked like an accountant of some kind, another looked vaguely like an Agent of some paramilitary force, and the other was wearing a matte black suit of some kind that covered his entire body along with his face and head, save for a facemask that looked somewhat like a gas mask, but not quite.
The last spoke up gesturing to either side of him. "This is Mr. Emerson, he represents the Canadian government, and this is Agent Sanders of SHIELD. I am Guardian, and I assume you already know Ben."
"Where am I?" Banner asked looking around him. Having read the secret he wasn't feeling anxious any longer, but he was still feeling edgy from the effects coupled with his last memories as well as the disjointed ones from the Hulk.
"Understand Dr. that we are asking the questions here. Can you tell me what your last memories were? And where were you?"
Banner hesitated, and Guardian leaned forward. "Dr., we can do this the easy way of their hard way. I have a spell that could force you to tell me the truth, but even so you would be able to prevaricate and not answer as willingly as you would otherwise. So I don't want to resort to that, but I will if you don't cooperate."
"Thousands of Canadian citizens are dead because of the Hulk. The death toll is still growing even as we speak." Mr. Emerson said coldly. "My people have a right to know what happened, or as much as we can discover Banner."
Bruce Banner nodded, licking dry lips. "I understand, but, but I wasn't in Canada, I was down in Argentina, and even that was just a stopover. I was going into Chile, trying to keep ahead of anyone following me. Ever since that debacle with the Abomination, I've been determined to keep as far away from America as possible."
"Debacle?" Guardian asked. "You mean the fight between you and the Abomination in Hollywood?"
"That's correct," Bruce answered. He laughed coldly yet somewhat hysterically, like a man whose sanity was badly frayed. "How do you fight a monster, you create another one of course! Stupid. Why the hell they were still studying the Hulk's blood and even thought of injecting it into that soldier is beyond me. Let alone why he was so proud about it, bragging about being a monster!"
While Bruce held his head in his hands Agent Sanders quickly spoke up. "We're getting off-topic here, you say you were in Argentina, were you in a city, or were you out in the countryside? I've not seen any reports about anything Hulk related happening there."
Bruce looked up angrily at that, scowling before getting control of himself quickly with the ease of long practice. "You make it sound as if I transform into the Hulk willingly! My transformation is triggered by anger or excitement, not personal desire! I've determined that if my heart rate goes up past a certain point, I'll start to turn. I can come back down from that if I calm myself down, but sometimes, especially, if I'm being attacked at the time that's not possible."
"I want to be clear on this," Emerson said leaning forward now, his eyes narrowing. "You say you can't transform into the Hulk willingly?"
Bruce paused. "That's not quite true, I can will it to happen with difficulty, but why would I? I can't control the Hulk, it's just a raving beast."
"Beasts don't talk," Guardian replied coldly, frowning as he began to mentally compare the man in front of him with Remus Lupin from his old dimension. Yet he's not running from it, he's simply trying to control it, that's very different. Don't let your past experiences with a somewhat similar case color your reactions to the man in front of you Harry he remonstrated. Shaking his head he went on quickly. "In any event, please just tell us what you remember."
"I was working on a farm, just enough to get ends meet you know. I was just trying to keep under the radar, I didn't want to set up roots anywhere, just wanted to get enough money to pay my passage to someplace in Asia. I figured I could find some place there out of the way where I could work for a time, then start putting together my own laboratory to study myself and figure out a way to halt my transformation."
"What have you been trying to stop from transforming?" Guardian asked.
"Meditation, anger management exercise, some forms of martial arts. Anything and everything that I could use to keep my heart rate from going up past a certain point. Certain drugs as well, though unfortunately all of the drugs that are out on the market take too long to really affect me, and some of them are of course addictive."
Guardian frowned, though inwardly he was wondering whether the man had done enough to control his own emotions rather than his body. And why is anger the trigger anyway? From what I know about how the Hulk was created, a sense of fear or pain would make more sense.
"I'd been there for a few weeks, it was so far out of the way I felt safe when I arrived, though I was beginning to feel… well paranoid I suppose, but are you really paranoid when people are out to get you? Anyway, I felt as if I was being watched, especially when I wasn't working. There was… I don't know, something out there, then these small robotic droids began to appear."
"Droids?" Guardian asked quickly. "Could you describe them?"
"Small and spherical, with small pustules of some kind on their surface, about as large as my upper body say, they used some kind of anti-grav to float and always came down out of the air from somewhere. I have no idea where they came from, but they… they didn't seem to be of terrestrial origin, far too high tech for most agencies, and they didn't, the design wasn't one I'd attribute to a human for some reason, too bulbous and not uniform enough. They reminded me somewhat of some of the alien devices I've seen on newscasts about the Fantastic Four's adventures, in particular the Skrull, since they were painted the same green shade."
Guardian and Ben exchanged a glance, wondering if Thanos had been allied with the Skrull in some way, though it was doubtful they would ever find out.
"Were they attacking you, or were they trying to capture you?" Agent Sanders asked. "And did you ever see them around other people, were there any other witnesses to these probes?"
"There might have been, one or two amongst the workers who could've seen them I suppose, and the farmer's grandchildren almost certainly did. I don't think they would've been believed if they told anyone though. They didn't attack me with lethal intent if that's what you meant. They basically tried to grapple with me, and they shot out long metallic rope at me a time or two as well, as well as something that looked like a high powered taser."
"In any event, when they attacked me I decided it meant that someone had found me, I didn't have much clue who, and I moved on. I think I threw them off for a day or two, but then they were back, yet I noticed something at that point. They were very reluctant to appear in front of other people, they never attacked me when I was in among the crowd, or inside a building."
Dr. Banner sighed shrugging his shoulders. "It was a choice of either continuing to deal with them, or being around other people. I felt by that point I had really made some progress in keeping myself calm in any situation, even combat, so I decided to chance being around people. I made my way down to Port Galvan, hoping to work there until I had enough to pay for my passage to somewhere in Asia."
"I should've known better." Bruce shook his head sadly. "Everything was all right for a few days, then on my way home to my temporary apartment, I was mugged. I fought back, thinking it would be better to do so rather than become a frequent victim. A knife grazed my arm, and my heart began to pound more than I could control it. I started to Hulk out, but I stopped myself while running into an abandoned warehouse nearby. My attackers followed me though, and eventually I lost control. I have no idea what happened after that, only disjointed images carry over from my time as the Hulk."
"Agent Sanders you said your agency didn't have any report about any casualties down in Argentina that could be explained by the Hulk?" Guardian asked.
"None that I'm aware of, and I looked over the notes we have on him before taking this assignment," the agent replied staring hard at Dr. Banner.
"Ya think the 'bots jumped him?" Ben asked.
Guardian nodded, looking at Bruce hard. "Dr. Banner, do you know if the Hulk has any kind of mental defenses?"
Cocking his head Bruce frowned. "I, I don't know. It's not an issue that had come up before this. I, I've seen reports, more rumors really about mutant powers, and I understand telepathy is among them, but I have no idea, sorry. I would hazard to guess however that since the Hulk's brain is a very odd mix of a, well a caveman say, and an angry beast, that it would be very difficult to control."
"Mind to mind maybe, but mind control machines could possibly break through," Guardian murmured. "I'm not going to put anything beyond an alien's unknown tech base."
"Guardian, you said you had a spell that could force him to tell the truth?" Mr. Emerson asked.
"Oh yes, but I actually went one better for this session. This whole room is over, well call it a large scale magical spell. You see that crystal up there?" Guardian asked, pointing at a large crystal set into the wall by the bed. "If Banner had lied that would have glowed red. Since it hasn't, he's telling the truth, as far as it goes." The wizard shrugged.
As Sanders gaped at the crystal and Bruce frowned at the talk of magic, Emerson simply took it at face value, instead staring coldly at Banner. "Just because you're not in control of the Hulk does not mean you can absolve yourself of all blame for his actions. I realize you were leery of the American government, especially after the Abomination incident, but what stopped you from looking for aid from other country's governments?"
"Are you insane!?" Bruce demanded, pushing himself upright in the bed and glaring at the man. "Why in the world would I do that? The government created that god damn gamma radiation bomb, it was one of two experiments done that day! They were trying to create super soldiers like the Abomination, like Captain America used to be, that's why they didn't warn me or the others that the radiation might get to us even in the bunker!
"What they got was the Hulk, who could be better classified as a force of nature! And every other country in the world would've done the same damn thing! Besides, Ross and his access to the news had already given me public enemy number one status, no one would've believed me."
Ben and the others stared up at the crystal which continued to appear opaque. After a moment Guardian shook his head. "I could think of a few outside of America that would have believed you at least, but that is neither here nor there. So you have no idea why the Hulk was working with the Abomination, or with the alien Thanos?"
"None I'm afraid," Dr. Banner said, calming down slightly. "Alien, what alien?"
"Large purple skin and extremely powerful with various different powers. He was going to finish the job your attack on Montreal started," Guardian replied, leaning back slightly and staring at the man on the bed. "Do either of you have any other questions?"
Both men did, and so did the heretofore silent Ben. Sanders was allowed to go first, while Guardian leaned back, frowning thoughtfully and taking it in. The spook asked a few questions, trying first to crack the man's conviction that the Hulk had been somehow planned, and then, when that didn't work, reluctantly moving on to ask him questions about the identities he had assumed down in South America, which would allow SHIELD to backtrack his movements and maybe find some more witnesses to his story about the droids.
In contrast Ben only asked if Bruce had any idea why he had been so much stronger than normal. Bruce's theory on anger allowing Hulk to grow stronger over time came out, making Ben frown, knowing that it meant the Hulk might well have eventually overcome them all without Thor's heroism.
Emerson's questions centered around two things, what Bruce could remember from his time as the Hulk, and any reason why Montreal might have been chosen as a target. He watched the crystal closely as Banner asked those questions, and it didn't even flicker once, which it had when Banner tried to lie about his past false IDs.
After a moment he leaned back and looked at Guardian. "I want to punish him," He said honestly, frowning. "I want to blame him for everything the Hulk did. But this isn't like, like holding a druggy accountable for what he does while under the influence, or even someone with a temper who has lashed out once too often. This would be like, like holding a man who has been brain-washed against his will responsible for the actions he did while under the influence. I, I don't know if my government will agree, but I don't think we can in good conscience ask for the death penalty here. Yet some lighter but still harsh sentence is definitely necessary."
Ben nodded agreement, feeling rather sorry for Banner frankly. He had a lot of trouble with his body, but to turn into a monster and not be in control dwarfed any of that. Sanders however frowned, thinking that pushing for a death sentence in this case might keep several more government secrets from coming out, such as who okayed the Abomination's creation above Ross, but decided it would be counter-productive here.
For a moment Guardian was silent, his masked face staring over Bruce's head. After a moment hover he nodded "Mr. Emerson is right. But despite the fact that you aren't in control of the Hulk, you need to answer for what it did. I know you seem to feel grief for that, and that is mark in your favor, but Emerson wasn't using hyperbole when he said that thousands had died in this latest incident. They're still pulling bodies out of the wreckage all along your route into Montréal, let alone the city itself."
"And whatever you may say, there were ways you could've gotten your own story out, the Internet for one, and asking for asylum from other first world countries as well. That would have been taking a risk I'll admit, but you still should've asked for help rather than try to go the course your own. Now the world can no longer afford to allow you to try and solve this problem on your own."
"So what do you want from me?" Bruce asked, his eyes narrowing. "I'll warn you the first second I see a needle coming towards me I'm going to force myself to Hulk out on you."
"I don't want anything from you, and I don't really need your aid either Dr." Guardian replied coldly. "You will remain here. You will allow our resident telepath into your head." He held up a hand stopping Banner from speaking. "If you had become the Hulk entirely like the Abomination, that would be one thing, but something inside you plays a role in triggering that transformation, which doesn't even consider the fact the Hulk comes out to preserve your life. I think some psychoanalysis might help. You will also write out a public apology to the people of Montréal, Canada and anywhere else you 'Hulked out' as you put it, and read it out as part of a public announcement at a later date."
"I have tried to atone before," Banner said bleakly. "I've tried several dozen times to kill myself! If I slit my wrists, I Hulk out as I start to bleed out, and when I revert I'm healed. If I try to put a bullet through my mouth, the Hulk spits it back out. I've even tried certain types of poison, before I fall completely unconscious from them I Hulk out and I'm back to normal when I next wake-up."
"You didn't wake up from the magic I used on you," Guardian replied while Sanders and Emerson were both looking a little aghast and Ben was simply shaking his head sadly. The crystal hadn't even flickered, not once as Banner spoke there. "You will stay here, you will do as I say, and eventually after you are cleared to work in the company of others you will, if not atone, then make your life worth something. The choice is either that or I bind you, use the same magic I did on you to knock you out so that you'll never wake up again, then dump your unconscious body into the sun!"
By this point Guardian was standing up looming over Bruce, who shrank back, not feeling fear just yet but moving in that direction. "I don't care about you Dr., I don't care about your problems with the American government or your angst over the Hulk. What I do care about is stopping you from ever going out of control again. Is that understood?"
Banner nodded. "I agree, and thank you."
"Get that apology written Banner, I'll want it out and ready to go tomorrow," Guardian replied without responding directly to the thank you. He looked over at Dr. Emerson. "Are you satisfied?"
"For now. As I said it's evident that Bruce Banner was not a willing accomplice to this, and labor as you evidently plan would be the most we could ask for unlike apparently the Abomination, who is dead. So long as we are certain that a similar incident cannot happen again I believe that my government will be satisfied."
To one side Ben simply nodded his head, not having realized that Bruce Banner had actually attempted to kill himself to stop the Hulk from ever being able to rampage again. That made him sympathize even more with the man.
"I can't say the same about my agency, but we're more used to not getting our own way than governments are," Sanders said smirking a little. He was just glad he'd kept the particulars of Bruce's Hulk creation from getting out, not realizing that enough had been hinted at already to make both the American people and the world in general ask some very tough questions from the military. General Ross in particular would suddenly find that he didn't have any more time, or ability to help his new ally in the days to come, and said ally too would need to disappear for a time.
As Guardian teleported the two interlopers back down into Canada, Ben joined the rest of the team. He looked at Ororo quizzically. "I don't think that Bruce is going to go for twenty-four-seven psychotherapy, what else are you going to be making him do up here? I wouldn't recommend just lettin' him in there alone."
Actually Emma wouldn't be able to get free to see Banner for another week. What little free time she had these days, what with her businesses, espionage work, and trying to hunt up any information about the Sentinel Project, she used to spend time with Harry.
"Oh, we have several projects we'd like his aid on." Ororo replied with a smile. "Trust us, we'll keep him busy."