After some thought, Mike dialed Coulson's cell phone.
It rang a few times before connecting.
"Hello, who is this?"
A middle-aged man who was already starting to bald just wanted to get a good night's sleep. Was it really that hard? Coulson's morning temper was through the roof, and he was still groggy, otherwise he wouldn't have even seen the caller ID clearly.
"It's me."
"Mike!" Coulson jolted, mostly awake. Recently, anything related to Mike usually meant trouble, with a whole heap of messes to clean up.
"Just three or four minutes ago, I was ambushed by a gunman on the street about fifty meters from my supermarket. The sniping location was a room in a tall building about five hundred meters away from me, which then experienced a violent explosion. The gunman's motorcycle was suspected to be a Harley Universe Starship."
The motorcycle named "Universe Starship" was worth millions of U.S. dollars, hailed as the dream motorcycle of millions of people, but only a handful could afford it, making it a traceable lead.
"The gunman was 1.83 meters tall and weighed about 80 kilograms. He wore black leather and a motorcycle helmet, so his appearance was obscured. The gunman was able to easily hit someone suddenly lunging forward from five hundred meters away, meaning he wasn't an ordinary sniper."
"I also found two special custom bullet heads. There aren't many craftsmen with this skill, so that's also a lead. I'll take photos and send them over."
Even though he knew his expression couldn't be seen over the phone, Coulson still showed his signature smile, thinking, "He's asking for a favor, so this should be easy."
"Mike, S.H.I.E.L.D. isn't a private organization where I can just do whatever I want. Procedures, do you understand procedures? Retrieving surrounding public cameras, requesting police cooperation, even deploying military-grade satellites—all require applications, and the post-event reports pile up like mountains…" The other end of the phone was silent. Coulson couldn't help but ask, "Mike, do you know what I'm talking about?"
"Yes. You're explaining the difficulty of the matter to raise your price."
Mike sneered. These old tricks, left over from the ancestors of the Heavenly Dynasty, he had the nerve to bring them out and show off?
"Uh…"
I make an offer, you counter, then we haggle, and finally settle on a price we both can accept. That's how it usually goes, right? Why aren't you following the script?
Mike was quite displeased. It wasn't as if S.H.I.E.L.D. was the only one who could handle this. The key was obtaining surveillance footage and extracting useful information from the vast amount of it.
What S.H.I.E.L.D. could do, Tony Stark could also do. The only difference was that S.H.I.E.L.D. was legal, and Stark was not.
Maybe Skye could handle it with just a laptop.
Mike felt that letting S.H.I.E.L.D. help was an opportunity for S.H.I.E.L.D. to change its mediocre image in his mind.
"Are you helping or not? Just one word."
"Help!" Coulson gritted his teeth.
"Good, that's it. Let me know if you get any news."
Mike hung up the phone, thinking, "Consider it owing you a favor. At most, I'll save your life later. That's a big enough favor, right?"
"Whoosh ~"
Mike slowly walked back, the hundred-meter path taking a few minutes. It wasn't that he didn't want to go faster, but his ribs were fractured. Fortunately, his physical fitness was strong. Under the influence of soul energy and fate energy, Mike even felt a tingling sensation as the bones and muscles in his body repaired themselves.
An injury that would typically require two months of hospital bed rest for an ordinary person would probably only need three to five days of recuperation for Mike.
He pushed the door open.
He saw Skye covering her mouth, trying not to cry out loud, but tears still streamed down her face uncontrollably.
"You saw everything?" Mike scratched his head.
"Mmm," Skye wiped away her tears and nodded, "I was just about to close up and lock the door."
Even from a hundred meters away, with only streetlights, she recognized Mike just by his blurry silhouette.
She saw Mike hit the ground hard.
Then she heard gunshots.
In the United States, gunshots were like firecrackers in China; hearing them often made one naturally familiar.
At that moment, Skye felt her heart stop, her world spinning, everything turning dark.
Then she saw Mike stand up.
It was a good thing Mike stood up, otherwise Skye probably would have fainted from the heartache.
"I thought you were hit."
Skye cried as she rushed over, hugging Mike, then her lips, clumsy and unpracticed, explored Mike's lips.
Salty, the taste of tears.
Pain!
"I think you can be more confident and remove 'thought'." Mike winced in pain.
Why didn't it hurt so much a moment ago?
Could it be that men occasionally show a vulnerable side in front of women?
"Ah?!" Skye didn't react for a moment.
"I mean, I really was shot."
"Then, then… what should we do? Right, call an ambulance, go to the hospital!"
"No!"
Mike held back the flustered Skye, "No need to go to the hospital, go get a pair of scissors."
Slowly cutting open his T-shirt with the scissors, his chest was a purplish-black.
Skye's tears started falling again at the sight of it.
"Don't cry." At this moment, Skye had none of the heroic spirit she would possess after joining S.H.I.E.L.D. in the future. Mike wiped away her falling tears with his thumb and said, "The injury isn't as serious as it looks."
Mike had Skye get a large pack of wet wipes. With one wipe, the tissue was immediately stained red.
"This is your body automatically expelling the bruised blood."
"Really?"
"Really, look! Isn't the purplish-black on my chest a little lighter?"
"It seems so."
Oh, a balloon. Only a little has been expelled, so how could it look lighter? It's just psychological effect.
"So what should we do now?"
"Hmm ~" Mike thought for a moment, "How about… we continue the kiss from just now?"
Skye's face instantly flushed red like a tomato. "Just now, just now… Anyway, that… mm mm mm…"
"You're not going to say it was a friendship kiss, are you?"
"Yes, yes, yes, that's exactly what I wanted to say, that's right!"
Mike immediately covered her mouth—with his lips.
"Mm mm mm."
"What?"
"I can't breathe."
"Oh, friendship lasts forever, so a longer kiss is reasonable."
"Again… mm mm mm."
Ten minutes later, Skye glared at Mike, puffing out her cheeks. "You tried to stick out your tongue just now, didn't you?"
"No, I didn't." Mike looked innocent.
"Whether you did or not, don't do it next time, don't even think about it, it's disgusting!"
"Next time? What next time?" Mike played dumb.
"It's just…" Skye stomped her foot.
Mike caught her off guard, once again capturing Skye's lips, unwilling to part for a long time.
"You still want a next-next time, don't you?" Mike whispered in Skye's ear.
"I'll take you upstairs." Feeling it was very late, Mike said to Skye.
"No!" Skye shook her head, refusing.
"You're not…" Mike's smile was mischievously bad, "Would it be too fast?"
Skye raised her hand, as if to strike him. "What are you thinking?! Hmph!"
She took more wet wipes, wiped away the seeping bruised blood, and asked, "Are your missions always very dangerous?"
"Most of them are. This mission involves Vampires and mutated Vampires called 'Reapers'." Mike said gloomily, "The person who ambushed me just now might be an enemy. So not only are my missions dangerous, but those around me will also be in danger."
"You'll protect me, right?"
"Mmm!"
"Then that's fine. And I'll also become stronger and protect myself."
At this moment, red energy floated out from Skye's body.
What's going on?