Rory sat in stunned silence, staring at the data report showing the fusion between Captain Steve Rogers' DNA and the Celestial Gene.
Ultimately, he came to a conclusion, it was too risky to inject the Celestial Gene into his own bone marrow without a live test subject. If things went wrong, regret wouldn't bring him back.
He filed the report away and stepped out of the lab. It was already deep into the night.
Crossing the military base's grassy field, Rory was on his way back to the luxurious quarters Ross had arranged for him. But halfway there, he stopped.
He turned his head, eyes locking onto a small mound just outside the base perimeter. After a moment of silent observation, he changed course and headed in that direction.
The perimeter fence and barbed wire stood about three to four meters high, but Rory simply leapt and cleared it with ease.
"You here to see me?" he asked.
"That's right," Clint Barton replied calmly. "I want to know how I can kill you."
Hawkeye sat on the ground with eerie composure, his tone flat and devoid of emotion.
Rory chuckled and sat down beside him. "Why would you want to kill me?"
The two of them looked like old friends catching up after years apart.
Clint's weathered face carried traces of deep weariness. "You killed Steve and Sam. So you should stand trial."
He was one of the few non-superpowered members of the Avengers, and ironically, he'd ended up with one of the happiest fates. His wife and children, wiped out by Thanos, had been brought back. Though his wife had once been a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, they'd built a warm family together. He even had a successor lined up for the mantle of Hawkeye.
He should have been enjoying a quiet retirement. Yet here he was, face-to-face with Rory.
Rory gave a mirthless laugh. "They tried to kill me first. I was just defending myself. If you're weak, train harder. Don't come crying to me about it."
Clint tossed aside the pebble he'd been toying with. "You'll lose, just like Thanos. You can never beat the Avengers. We're a team. A family. Unless you kill me now."
Rory raised an eyebrow, curious. "So... you came all the way out here hoping I'd kill you? Let me guess, you've hidden a camera somewhere. You die, the footage leaks, and boom, the military is forced to disown me?"
He wasn't wrong. That's exactly what Clint had in mind.
Rory had grown too powerful. Not even a combined force of Captain America, Doctor Strange, Hulk, and Spider-Man could stop him. As a powerless Avenger, Clint saw only one move left: offer up his death to spark public outrage and give the New Avengers a legitimate reason to strike back.
He just didn't expect Rory to call his bluff so easily.
Clint remained silent.
Rory chuckled again and leaned back against a rock. The night sky was unusually clear, no light pollution, no choking smog, just stars stretching wide and far.
"Hey Clint, remember Natasha?" Rory asked casually. "Natasha... from Vormir."
Clint's hand paused mid-motion, fingers frozen over another pebble. His brows furrowed. "Why are you bringing her up?"
"No reason. Just think she died for nothing."
The words were spoken plainly, but they lit a fire in Clint's eyes.
"No," he snapped. "She died for everyone. She saved us all."
"Did she, though?" Rory asked, glancing at him. "Why was it her that had to die?"
Clint's face tightened with barely contained emotion.
Natasha had died for him, for the Avengers, and for the countless lives lost in the Snap.
To Clint, no one had ever made a more noble sacrifice.
Rory's soft laugh was like a bucket of ice water.
"Let me ask you something. When you and Natasha went to Vormir… did either of you ever think of just killing the red-faced guy?"
Clint blinked. Stared at Rory as if he were mad.
"Only the death of someone you love can grant the Soul Stone," he said coldly. "You clearly don't understand her sacrifice."
The "love" didn't have to be romantic. It could be familial, platonic, anything heartfelt. A soul for a soul. That was the stone's rule.
But Rory pressed on.
"Who told you that?"
"The... the guide," Clint stammered. "The one who guarded the Soul Stone."
"So," Rory asked, "why did he tell you any of that?"
The moment the question left Rory's mouth, Clint froze like a statue.
"But Thanos..." he began.
Rory burst out laughing. "Oh, come on. Think about it. If Red Skull hadn't made up that story, don't you think Thanos would've just thrown him off the cliff?"
Red Skull had played them all, Thanos and the Avengers alike.
If the rule was simply 'a soul for a soul,' then anyone's life should've worked, especially the guardian himself. But by weaving in that whole "sacrifice someone you love" angle, Red Skull had guaranteed he'd never be the one pushed off that cliff.
Sure, maybe offering up a "beloved" soul gave you a nice little bonus, like seeing your loved one again in a vision, but it was never actually required.
Rory stood up, still chuckling, and began making his way back to the base.
He left Clint Barton sitting there in the dark, stunned and silent, his mind spinning.
Back at the base, Rory's quarters were absurdly luxurious, fully furnished two-story housing, regularly serviced with fresh groceries, beer, and firewood for the hearth.
The only downside?
He wasn't allowed to bring any lab notes home. Not because it was forbidden, because the damn place didn't even have a door lock.
Rory cracked open a beer and turned on some mellow jazz.
He dropped into the leather lounge chair by the fireplace, letting the warmth seep into his skin, though his mind was elsewhere, mulling over the upcoming experiments.
Running human trials inside the base wasn't hard. All it took was finding inmates willing to volunteer for sentence reductions or disabled veterans looking to leave something behind for their families.
Plenty of people were willing to sign up.
Rory planned to test the bone marrow + Celestial Gene fusion on two subjects first, one normal human and one enhanced by serum, before risking it on himself.
He got to work the next day.
First, he called Secretary Ross and explained the plan.
Ross gave immediate approval. The test subjects would arrive in three days.
And for those three days, Rory threw himself into studying the Celestial Gene.
It was incredibly difficult, but not entirely fruitless.
Meanwhile, no one was having a harder time than his lab assistants.
They were technically spies, meant to monitor Rory and smuggle out his research data.
Problem was... Rory wrote everything in Foreign text.
Not just normal foreign text, dense, interconnected cursive that even native speakers struggled to decipher.
Good luck copying that.
After three intense days of prep, Rory was ready.
But the subjects didn't arrive.
He called Ross.
Turns out, Ross had run into trouble.
S.H.I.E.L.D. and the Avengers had formally accused him in Congress under the guise of "national security." They'd succeeded in freezing all related experiments.
They weren't trying to fight Rory anymore.
They were trying to bury him in politics.
A congressional hearing would be held in seven days. Even if Ross won, Rory wouldn't see those test subjects for at least ten days.
He chuckled bitterly.
If you can't beat him, just drown him in red tape.
Classic Nick Fury.
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200 P.S = 1 Extra Chapter
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