Chapter 212: Piercing the Heart
16th March 2012, New York City
(Jasmine Sayre POV)
While I was daydreaming about Hydra’s inevitable demise, Pierce walked into the room in an overly expensive suit, like he owned the place, and he sat down in front of me.
I could see his eyes widen in recognition and horror when he looked at me. Pierce had no idea who Morgan Evanshade named as her heir. The letter with the meeting was sent to her attorneys. He had no clue that Jasmine Sayre was her niece, or that she was the one who inherited the empire that is Marvel Media. Looking at him now, I stifled a chuckle; Nick Fury must have told him about our little conversation a few years ago, where I scared the crap out of him, Barton, and Romanoff.
The man couldn’t help himself and cried out, “You?”
I gave him a cheeky smirk, “Yes, me.”
This was going to be so much fun. I watched as the man in front of me, Hydra’s leader, tried to compose himself and not flinch every time I made a move. It was funny, in a way, to see one of the most powerful, at least politically that is, men in the world, try not to act intimidated by me.
Truth be told, I actually read SHIELD’s report on me, and I have to say that it was hilarious. They painted me into some sort of demon from hell, who could erase any information on the planet, be it physical, digital, or even memories, although it doesn’t seem to work on mutants. I guess erasing Wanda’s past would freak out any intelligence agencies.
Add in the fact that they suspect me to be a telepath, that I can do some kinds of illusions, and had some kind of danger sense, since I caught Barton’s arrows, they labeled me as a high class threat to be approached with caution.
That was the problem, they didn’t have any understanding of my presumed powers, which means that whatever they have is pretty much pure speculation and they knew it. Still, I could imagine Pierce freaking out when Nick Fury gave him a report of my confrontation against him. They think that I had some sort of master plan that involved me playing teacher to some of the most powerful mutants on the planet. A plan that unfortunately, or fortunately for SHIELD at least, backfired causing my disappearance during the Asteroid M event. They assumed that I had been killed by Magneto, since I hadn’t been seen since.
Now, put yourself in Alexander Pierce’s shoes. He tried to gain control over the most powerful media company in the world, probably hoping to add in some Hydra propaganda that would slowly get the population to accept their ideologies, and he ended up killing the former owner who was interested in the politics of things, and accidentally got a very dangerous woman to take over instead, a woman he had thought to be dead, and he just gave her control over a company worth at least tens of billions of dollars.
I could see it in his face as he realized that he won’t be dealing with an ignorant new heiress that he could easily manipulate into giving him the company. I just upped the stakes. He now had something to lose if he doesn’t manage to take control over Marvel.
All of this reflection took place in a few seconds, where he analyzed the current data and got a conclusion. He took control over himself and started talking, “Ms. Sayre, I am happy to see that you are well, I didn’t know that you were related to Ms. Evanshade. My condolences for your loss.”
I stifled a snort, “Thank you. She was my aunt. We didn’t talk much, but she was family. Although, I have to say that I’m even more surprised to see you, Mr. Pierce. I had thought that with the trouble coming your way, SHIELD’s way, you would be busier and not try to enter negotiations with my new company.”
“Your new company?”
“Ah, yes. Aunty Morgan gave me control over the company in her will. I have to say that I didn’t see that coming. I’m sad that the world will be deprived of anymore of her books. I have to say that the woman had a very active imagination, and a certain way with words.”
Hydra’s current leader leapt at the chance in front of him, “Now that you bring it up, I wanted to speak with you about your aunt’s company. The truth is that Ms. Evanshade and I had come to an agreement months ago with me purchasing her shares of the company.”
“I would have thought that with her passing away, that whatever agreement you had with her would be null and void.”
“Well, fortunately, there was a clause in the contract in case any accident should happen to either of us. The next of kin, would end up completing the contract.”
He threw the fake contract in front of me, and I took a good look at it. It wasn’t bad per se. It was actually pretty clever from his perspective. If I had been a bit more naïve and thought the document to be authentic, it would look like a standard contract with a reasonable buying price. Anyone would be a fool to not just accept, especially if they had no idea if they could run a business as big as Marvel.
Unluckily for Pierce, I knew that Morgan Evanshade never signed anything with him, and thus could extrapolate what he really wanted from the agreement. I raised an eyebrow and looked around. The lawyers and security detail were trying to pretend not to listen to our conversation. I raised my voice, “Everyone out.”
They looked confused for a moment, “Everyone that isn’t me or Alexander Pierce, get out of the room.”
The spectators to mine and Pierce’s meeting slowly got up and left one by one. With everyone who left, I could feel Pierce getting even more nervous, until there was no one left but me and him.
I raised an eyebrow, “So, first, you kill my aunt, and then pretend that she had some agreement to get her company. I thought you were a scumbag first, when you decided to nuke one of the most populated cities on the planet, but even then, I thought that you made a simple mistake and had humanity’s best interests at heart. But fraud on this level isn’t something I expected from the Secretary of the World Security Council.”
The man tried to look smug, but I could still feel the fear emanating from him, “these are very serious accusations, Ms. Sayre, are you sure you can back them up?”
I chuckled, “I don’t need to back them up, Mr. Pierce, do you truly think that there’s a reason I cannot erase this little scheme of yours like I did with Wanda Maximoff’s paper trail. Fury told you about me, of course he did, you’re his superior, and in what way did he ever allude that I was an idiot or a pushover?”
Pierce looked like he swallowed a lemon, he didn’t expect someone like me opposing him. He stayed silent and I continued, “Really, what do you expect from an organization like yours? You’re barely functional and soon to be destroyed anyway. There’s an expiration date on your job, Mr. Pierce. I wish you good luck in your future job hunting.”
“SHIELD is a peace keeping organization. No matter what mistakes we made in the past, the UN will still keep us, because in our absence, chaos will reign in the world.”
I chuckled, “Not if the public pressures them. For now, the world sees you as an organization that made a mistake, a costly mistake, but a mistake nonetheless, but all it would take is a single whistleblower, a person who has seen something they shouldn’t, and SHIELD starts becoming a malicious organization. And we both know how deep the rabbit hole goes, Mr. Pierce.”
“I don’t have anything to hide, Sayre.”
Oh, so, we’re done with the pleasantries, then, “You have a lot to hide, Alexander. Your allegiance for one, is to be questioned, because if you tried this with my aunt, how many times have you bought out companies by assassinating their predecessors. There are countless tech companies that mysteriously got sold just after their former owners got caught in various accidents, and their next of kin decided to sell. You do see the similarities, don’t you?”
The man stayed silent and didn’t answer. I continued talking, “But that’s not the bad part, how compromised is SHIELD, today? How many SHIELD agents are actually SHIELD agents and not your own little private soldiers?”
He stiffened at that, “I don’t…”
I interrupt him, “Shush, don’t try to deny it. I know about Hydra. I know how you’ve been growing inside of SHIELD for decades. Honestly, it’s none of my business, so I kept out of it. But now, you just killed a family member of mine, one that was very dear to me, because you got greedy. I take exception to that. But, I still don’t consider you to be my problem, until you make me that is. This is your first and only warning, stay out of my way, or you better hope the next attack kills me, because I will hunt down every member of your pathetic organization one by one until there’s no one left.”
He scoffed, “Cut off one head, and another shall take its place. Do you seriously think that you’re ready to face all of our might?”
I nodded, “Yes. Hydra is an idea. In its essence it’s to give up your freedom for security and order. People say that ideas never die. I disagree, ideas die when it shows that believing in them will only bring misery. People will denounce them, then they’re going to forget, and the moment that no one in the world even remembers what Hydra is, it is dead. Now, imagine if I could do what I did to Wanda’s paperwork to your entire organization. No one will remember Hydra, no one will remember its values, its goals, not even you. What will you do then?”
Pierce started to look pale, “You can’t…”
He’s right, I can’t. Hydra is something massive with millions of followers, and with how cemented its history is in the world, it would take an absurd amount of power to change this using reality magic. With Wanda, all of the people who knew about her were less than a hundred people in total and a few files. Changing this wouldn’t be a problem, but something this massive will take a ritual similar to the one I made when putting up the Statute of Secrecy. It would take years if not decades to achieve this. But he didn’t know that did he? Pierce might be a dead man walking, but making him act erratic will help start the fracturing of Hydra. Which is exactly what he will do when he keeps trying to find out if I changed something in the world again without him knowing.
I grin at him, “But, I can. And wouldn’t it be glorious, for Hydra to die in such a pathetic way?”
The man looked terrified out of his mind now, “What do you want?”
I chuckled, finally, we’re getting somewhere, “What I want is quite simple. Stay away from my family, stay away from my company, and I won’t crush you and your organization like a bug. And believe me, I see you, who you truly are and how you truly act. This has never been about Order or Peace; this was about power. That’s what Hydra seeks, no matter how nicely you try to put it when you recruit people. And as a show of power, I have taken your little asset, your Winter Soldier as restitution for your act against my family. Like I said, this is your one and only warning. We’re done here.”
I stood up from the room and walked out grinning like a loon. This really was fun.
Chapter 212: Piercing the Heart
16th March 2012, New York City
(Jasmine Sayre POV)
While I was daydreaming about Hydra’s inevitable demise, Pierce walked into the room in an overly expensive suit, like he owned the place, and he sat down in front of me.
I could see his eyes widen in recognition and horror when he looked at me. Pierce had no idea who Morgan Evanshade named as her heir. The letter with the meeting was sent to her attorneys. He had no clue that Jasmine Sayre was her niece, or that she was the one who inherited the empire that is Marvel Media. Looking at him now, I stifled a chuckle; Nick Fury must have told him about our little conversation a few years ago, where I scared the crap out of him, Barton, and Romanoff.
The man couldn’t help himself and cried out, “You?”
I gave him a cheeky smirk, “Yes, me.”
This was going to be so much fun. I watched as the man in front of me, Hydra’s leader, tried to compose himself and not flinch every time I made a move. It was funny, in a way, to see one of the most powerful, at least politically that is, men in the world, try not to act intimidated by me.
Truth be told, I actually read SHIELD’s report on me, and I have to say that it was hilarious. They painted me into some sort of demon from hell, who could erase any information on the planet, be it physical, digital, or even memories, although it doesn’t seem to work on mutants. I guess erasing Wanda’s past would freak out any intelligence agencies.
Add in the fact that they suspect me to be a telepath, that I can do some kinds of illusions, and had some kind of danger sense, since I caught Barton’s arrows, they labeled me as a high class threat to be approached with caution.
That was the problem, they didn’t have any understanding of my presumed powers, which means that whatever they have is pretty much pure speculation and they knew it. Still, I could imagine Pierce freaking out when Nick Fury gave him a report of my confrontation against him. They think that I had some sort of master plan that involved me playing teacher to some of the most powerful mutants on the planet. A plan that unfortunately, or fortunately for SHIELD at least, backfired causing my disappearance during the Asteroid M event. They assumed that I had been killed by Magneto, since I hadn’t been seen since.
Now, put yourself in Alexander Pierce’s shoes. He tried to gain control over the most powerful media company in the world, probably hoping to add in some Hydra propaganda that would slowly get the population to accept their ideologies, and he ended up killing the former owner who was interested in the politics of things, and accidentally got a very dangerous woman to take over instead, a woman he had thought to be dead, and he just gave her control over a company worth at least tens of billions of dollars.
I could see it in his face as he realized that he won’t be dealing with an ignorant new heiress that he could easily manipulate into giving him the company. I just upped the stakes. He now had something to lose if he doesn’t manage to take control over Marvel.
All of this reflection took place in a few seconds, where he analyzed the current data and got a conclusion. He took control over himself and started talking, “Ms. Sayre, I am happy to see that you are well, I didn’t know that you were related to Ms. Evanshade. My condolences for your loss.”
I stifled a snort, “Thank you. She was my aunt. We didn’t talk much, but she was family. Although, I have to say that I’m even more surprised to see you, Mr. Pierce. I had thought that with the trouble coming your way, SHIELD’s way, you would be busier and not try to enter negotiations with my new company.”
“Your new company?”
“Ah, yes. Aunty Morgan gave me control over the company in her will. I have to say that I didn’t see that coming. I’m sad that the world will be deprived of anymore of her books. I have to say that the woman had a very active imagination, and a certain way with words.”
Hydra’s current leader leapt at the chance in front of him, “Now that you bring it up, I wanted to speak with you about your aunt’s company. The truth is that Ms. Evanshade and I had come to an agreement months ago with me purchasing her shares of the company.”
“I would have thought that with her passing away, that whatever agreement you had with her would be null and void.”
“Well, fortunately, there was a clause in the contract in case any accident should happen to either of us. The next of kin, would end up completing the contract.”
He threw the fake contract in front of me, and I took a good look at it. It wasn’t bad per se. It was actually pretty clever from his perspective. If I had been a bit more naïve and thought the document to be authentic, it would look like a standard contract with a reasonable buying price. Anyone would be a fool to not just accept, especially if they had no idea if they could run a business as big as Marvel.
Unluckily for Pierce, I knew that Morgan Evanshade never signed anything with him, and thus could extrapolate what he really wanted from the agreement. I raised an eyebrow and looked around. The lawyers and security detail were trying to pretend not to listen to our conversation. I raised my voice, “Everyone out.”
They looked confused for a moment, “Everyone that isn’t me or Alexander Pierce, get out of the room.”
The spectators to mine and Pierce’s meeting slowly got up and left one by one. With everyone who left, I could feel Pierce getting even more nervous, until there was no one left but me and him.
I raised an eyebrow, “So, first, you kill my aunt, and then pretend that she had some agreement to get her company. I thought you were a scumbag first, when you decided to nuke one of the most populated cities on the planet, but even then, I thought that you made a simple mistake and had humanity’s best interests at heart. But fraud on this level isn’t something I expected from the Secretary of the World Security Council.”
The man tried to look smug, but I could still feel the fear emanating from him, “these are very serious accusations, Ms. Sayre, are you sure you can back them up?”
I chuckled, “I don’t need to back them up, Mr. Pierce, do you truly think that there’s a reason I cannot erase this little scheme of yours like I did with Wanda Maximoff’s paper trail. Fury told you about me, of course he did, you’re his superior, and in what way did he ever allude that I was an idiot or a pushover?”
Pierce looked like he swallowed a lemon, he didn’t expect someone like me opposing him. He stayed silent and I continued, “Really, what do you expect from an organization like yours? You’re barely functional and soon to be destroyed anyway. There’s an expiration date on your job, Mr. Pierce. I wish you good luck in your future job hunting.”
“SHIELD is a peace keeping organization. No matter what mistakes we made in the past, the UN will still keep us, because in our absence, chaos will reign in the world.”
I chuckled, “Not if the public pressures them. For now, the world sees you as an organization that made a mistake, a costly mistake, but a mistake nonetheless, but all it would take is a single whistleblower, a person who has seen something they shouldn’t, and SHIELD starts becoming a malicious organization. And we both know how deep the rabbit hole goes, Mr. Pierce.”
“I don’t have anything to hide, Sayre.”
Oh, so, we’re done with the pleasantries, then, “You have a lot to hide, Alexander. Your allegiance for one, is to be questioned, because if you tried this with my aunt, how many times have you bought out companies by assassinating their predecessors. There are countless tech companies that mysteriously got sold just after their former owners got caught in various accidents, and their next of kin decided to sell. You do see the similarities, don’t you?”
The man stayed silent and didn’t answer. I continued talking, “But that’s not the bad part, how compromised is SHIELD, today? How many SHIELD agents are actually SHIELD agents and not your own little private soldiers?”
He stiffened at that, “I don’t…”
I interrupt him, “Shush, don’t try to deny it. I know about Hydra. I know how you’ve been growing inside of SHIELD for decades. Honestly, it’s none of my business, so I kept out of it. But now, you just killed a family member of mine, one that was very dear to me, because you got greedy. I take exception to that. But, I still don’t consider you to be my problem, until you make me that is. This is your first and only warning, stay out of my way, or you better hope the next attack kills me, because I will hunt down every member of your pathetic organization one by one until there’s no one left.”
He scoffed, “Cut off one head, and another shall take its place. Do you seriously think that you’re ready to face all of our might?”
I nodded, “Yes. Hydra is an idea. In its essence it’s to give up your freedom for security and order. People say that ideas never die. I disagree, ideas die when it shows that believing in them will only bring misery. People will denounce them, then they’re going to forget, and the moment that no one in the world even remembers what Hydra is, it is dead. Now, imagine if I could do what I did to Wanda’s paperwork to your entire organization. No one will remember Hydra, no one will remember its values, its goals, not even you. What will you do then?”
Pierce started to look pale, “You can’t…”
He’s right, I can’t. Hydra is something massive with millions of followers, and with how cemented its history is in the world, it would take an absurd amount of power to change this using reality magic. With Wanda, all of the people who knew about her were less than a hundred people in total and a few files. Changing this wouldn’t be a problem, but something this massive will take a ritual similar to the one I made when putting up the Statute of Secrecy. It would take years if not decades to achieve this. But he didn’t know that did he? Pierce might be a dead man walking, but making him act erratic will help start the fracturing of Hydra. Which is exactly what he will do when he keeps trying to find out if I changed something in the world again without him knowing.
I grin at him, “But, I can. And wouldn’t it be glorious, for Hydra to die in such a pathetic way?”
The man looked terrified out of his mind now, “What do you want?”
I chuckled, finally, we’re getting somewhere, “What I want is quite simple. Stay away from my family, stay away from my company, and I won’t crush you and your organization like a bug. And believe me, I see you, who you truly are and how you truly act. This has never been about Order or Peace; this was about power. That’s what Hydra seeks, no matter how nicely you try to put it when you recruit people. And as a show of power, I have taken your little asset, your Winter Soldier as restitution for your act against my family. Like I said, this is your one and only warning. We’re done here.”
I stood up from the room and walked out grinning like a loon. This really was fun.
