บท 79: Chapter 79 Declaring War on Shield
The following Sunday Morning, Harry felt a chill, he knew something was coming. Something horrible. The knock that resounded on the front door sent a shiver up his spine.
Bracing for anything, Harry approached the door and opened it. He was greeted by a terrible sight and knew his worst fears had come true.
A man where a bright red and black costume with twin katanas strapped to his back was at the door. In addition to the costume was a skirt, a beret, and a ribbon covered in badges.
"Hi! I'm selling Girl Scout cookies for Troop 69. Would you like to buy some?"
Harry narrowed his eyes and flatly asked, "What are you doing here Deadpool?"
"Well, besides congratulating you on your one year anniversary, I'm here to sell Cookies for a good cause!"
Harry decided not to ask about the blatant breaking of the fourth wall and instead asked, "Got Thin Mints?"
"I do not, but I have Caramel deLites and Shortbread."
Harry said, "No thank you," and closed the door.
Harry pulled up a security panel and confirmed that a few minutes ago, the cameras watching his place had been turned off. Harry doubted Deadpool did it, he simply used the opportunity to mess with him.
Harry returned to the breakfast table where Jade had just joined him and was loading up waffles. A few moments later, the door knocked once more.
Harry sighed and asked, "Jade, can you see who it is?"
"Huh? Oh sure Harry." Jade got up and headed for the door and opened it without preamble.
Jade took one look at the longcoat wearing eyepatched stranger and asked, "Do you know Captain Black?"
She got a similar feeling from this guy as her old babysitter.
The man at the door stated, "Captain Augustus Black works under me."
Jade seemed to be considering it and nodded, seeing that he did seem to be the same type. She asked, "Alright, what can I do for you?"
"I need to speak with Professor Potter."
"Kay, give me a second." She closed the door and headed back inside.
Still waiting at the door, Fury could only sigh at what he had to deal with. Potter's place was impossible to break into. It had a single door and the several attempts to pick the lock when no one was home had all failed. Fury had been informed the lock was likely a decoy and the door was opened using a different system they couldn't identify or hack.
Not that they hadn't tried, but every attempt to hack Potter's personal computer either failed or brought back designs for coffee makers. Stark's house wasn't this hard to hack, or it didn't used to be.
In the back of his mind he went over the report about Jade Chan. At a young age and without apparently training she'd shown herself naturally capable of feats only matched by Shield's best when it came to infiltration and extraction. Captain Black however Blacklisted her from the list of Shield Recruits because recruiting her would likely put strain on his partnership with the Asset Jackie Chan, someone with a track record that matched Clint Barton's.
The door opened once more but Jade was now wearing an expensive looking well fitted G-Man suit complete with black sunglasses and an emotionless stare. She stepped to the side and invited him into the house which Fury noticed did not look like a living room but a dark stone hallway.
Fury entered and with every other step, a set of torches to his side would illuminate the passage further and further. After a few rounds of torches lighting up, Harry Potter became visible at the end of the hall. He was sitting in a stone car with a very familiar looking orange cat in his lap, petting it while staring him down.
Harry then gave his best impersonation of a James Bond Villain's English accent and said, "Hello Director Fury."
Rather than giving Harry any reaction, Fury pulled a small device out of his coat's inner pocket and pushed a button on it.
The walls, torches, and Harry's chair started buzzing as if there were a picture on a tv with a bad reception.
Harry smiled and got up with Goose in his arm and said, "Well you're no fun. Though you should give your tech boys a raise." Harry then snapped and the Hard-Light vanished and the living room was back to normal.
Harry walked over to the couch and sat down with Goose again. Hard-Light was ridiculously complex and as with anything complex, had a lot of weaknesses. Fury's toy emitted a pitch which messed with the system that determined a location's size which messed with where the Hard-Light system tried to position the Hard-Light, causing it to get fuzzy. Harry could easily compensate for it, but then the tech guys who designed it wouldn't get their raise.
Harry asked, "Would you like some coffee? Normally I offer tea, but you seem like a coffee person."
Rather than answer and give Harry the initiative, Fury took out a sleek laptop and opened it up to show a video. He hit play and the video started with a eleven year old Harry Potter sitting at a table drinking tea while on the other side of the picture, a group of Death Eaters was being monologued at by Voldemort.
Fury asked, "This is you correct?"
Harry nodded, "A home video. What of it?"
Fury took a breath and said, "I think you're a wizard who can't do magic, a squib. But you can make tech that uses magic, and pass it off as Metaphysics."
Harry shrugged, "What of it?"
"I want to offer you a position at Shield. In return, I'll make sure the Magical Congress of the United States of America stays off your back."
"I'm satisfied where I am."
"You'd be able to help a lot of people."
"I'm already helping a lot of people."
"Is that why you paid Obscurus to rescue Stark?"
"No. You see that was the first time in my life an AI had asked me to do something. That had my interest piqued enough to do something."
Fury inwardly frowned at that though he maintained his stoic expression. He asked with a bit of pressure, "Are you sure you don't need any help with MACUSA?"
Harry returned a light smirk at the threat and answered, "Completely."
Three barks came from the kitchen. Fury turned and saw a floating golden Corgi with a tray in its mouth slowly hover in the air over to the table and set down a tray that had a cup of tea and a mug of coffee with '#1 Spy' printed on the side of the mug.
Harry nonchalantly picked up the tea cup and took a sip before setting it down.
Fury glared Harry down for a moment and decided to go straight for the point, "What can Shield do to get access to your Metagem Tech?"
"Well, first you'll need to answer a question. If I gave you a powerful weapon that granted you clear superiority over your enemies and it got stolen and used by the bad guys, what would you do? Ask me to give you something even better to counter it? Ask me to retrieve it for you? Or not inform me and keep the fact that you lost the weapon a secret while throwing lives away to recover it yourself?"
Fury obviously didn't like the question. The only acceptable answer was that Shield would not lose it, but he knew there was no way to guarantee that. Potter was basically pointing out that anything he gave them would eventually wind up in the hands of others who would not use it to protect others.
Fury stated, "I agree that keeping your tech out of the hands of others is for the best, but can you protect it without help? A lot of people have been eying your company due your monopolization of the internet. If you can help me than I can help you keep the pressure off."
Harry finished off more of his tea and said, "No thank you."
Fury leaned back and then flatly asked, "Are you a mutant?"
Harry didn't twitch of course. "Any form of testing shows I'm not." Which was true, most tests take longer to run that Harry's blood actually existed for meaning all tests were inconclusive.
Fury asked in response, "Then why did you attend Xavier's School?"
"My teacher who helped me lay the foundation of Metaphysics recommended the school to me. There were a large amount of students who benefited from my research into Metaphysics."
"Such as Wanda Maximoff?"
"Just so."
"Is your relationship with her why you helped her father conquer Genosha?"
"I've never been to Genosha and my relationship with his daughter has nothing to do with what I heard happened there." All true. Harry used a lot of portals and invisible drones, but he never actually stepped foot on Genosha and the reason Harry gave it to Magneto was because Magneto sacrificed Asteroid M, not because of his relationship with Magneto's daughter.
Fury did his best not to slam his fist on the table or show his anger. He took another look at Goose and said, "I used to know a cat that looked like that."
Harry said, "I found her in a pet store that sold strange animals when I was ten. The store owner said they got tricked into buying her because there were some strange stories about her, but the owner never saw anything strange and offered to sell her to me at a discount. I liked her and it was close to my birthday so I bought her then."
Goose meowed and Harry looked down at her and smirked. He said, "She doesn't like it when people pick her up and talk to her like a child. She's a lot older than she looks, you know."
Fury couldn't stop his eye from visibly twitching at that. He asked, "What's her name?"
Harry smiled, "Goose."
Harry was ninety-nine percent sure he heard Fury mutter under his breath, "mother flerken," which had Harry wonder where the Director of Shield had met his familiar before, but decided not to press the issue. Everyone had their own stories and even Lockheed the dragonkin had met Goose before.
Harry asked, "Why are you so dead set on me and my tech? Johnathan Silvercloud accepts commissions and Reed Richards is always up for a challenging project. Why not go to them?"
Fury remained silent. Shield had in fact made several requests for designs from Forge over the years but he, ironically, charged an arm and a leg for each one and the tech was always just barely at a level superior to what they already had. Reed was an option but there were a number of parties who decided Reed's time was better spent on other projects, their projects, instead of doing anything useful for Shield.
Deciding enough was enough, Fury said, "I won't be able to hold back the guys with designs on your tech and your company if I have nothing to show for it. Shield itself may force the issue and it would be out of my hands."
Harry's smile actually widened. He said, "If Shield, or anyone really, decides to declare war on me, I will respond in kind the only way I know how."
Fury narrowed his eye, leaned forward and asked, "And what would that be?"
"A Prank War of course."
Fury was unable to prevent his eyebrow from visibly twitching at that one. Was this kid serious?
Fury states, "This isn't a joke Potter."
"That's rather naïve as from a certain point of view, everything is a joke to someone."
Fury was getting more irritated so Harry just said, "Look, I'm not going to work for Shield since I already have a job and selling anything to Shield would do more long term damage than good. If you need something, you can hire me as a consultant. You don't even need to pay me, I just need one thing and I'll help if you call for something interesting."
"And what exactly would that be."
"I need a photo of you in an afro wig."
Fury stood up, turned and headed for the door without a word. Potter was pushing his buttons but he didn't intend to move against him for something like this.
Fury walked a few blocks to where a van was waiting for him and opened the door. The moment he did, someone walked out, put a hand in Fury's pocket, and pulled out a piece of paper. Fury didn't move or stop him, this was standard protocol when dealing with possible magicals. The color of the paper showed that Fury had been in close contact with someone who had a trace amount of exotic energy, consistent with a Squib. Of course, the main purpose of the paper was that should anyone cast a spell on Fury, the paper would clearly show it.
Harry was not aware that Fury carried such a paper on him but it would not have mattered if he did. Harry always kept his wizard Magic within him using the same technique he taught Hermione. It was second nature at this point and he only released it to use Wizard Magic when practicing while in the basement. Had Fury entered the basement, the residual magic from Harry's practice would have drastically changed the color of the paper.
The paper confirmed that no spell had been covertly cast on Fury which ensured he was not compromised.
When Fury stepped onto the van, the agent then pulled something off Fury's back with a strange look and then handed it to Fury.
It was a piece of paper that said, 'Kick Me.'
Fury almost growled. It was time for war.
Several weeks later, a bill was introduced in D.C. that would heavily limit Brilliance Incorporated. A lot of companies had been trying to hold Harry's company down, but until this point they had not been able to move. But now, not only did the government stop holding them back, they started helping them.
The following day, the bill failed with nearly every single congressman voting against it.
When asked why, every one had apparently been inundated and completely overwhelmed with calls, texts, and emails demanding them not to vote for it.
Apparently, every Brilliance Inc subscriber had been sent a message about the bill informing them what the bill did and that if it was passed, their monthly service charge would increase. Every subscriber was given a way to contact their local congressman and make their opinion about the matter known.
Had any congressman voted yes, they knew they would never win re-election, so they had no choice despite what they had promised to do beforehand.
This completely shocked everyone involved. There was no law against a service provider informing customers of something that was true. But such a tactic was usually used by companies to get customers to leave their competitors.
This was the first time a cell phone company used this means to control the vote of the government.
Fury was not pleased when he saw the report. Despite what others wanted them to think, the power of governments were given to them by the people, and if Brilliance Inc could turn the people against the ones in power, those elected officials would not be able to make a move against Harry Potter unless he did something the public could be convinced was bad enough to allow such sanctions.
Fury was currently on the Helicarrier which had only launched the prior week. It was the most advanced command center in the world and in times of crisis, could head over to wherever it was needed to directly enforce order and quell chaos. Had the Helicarrier been operational during the Mole Man Crisis, they would have had a lot more options than waiting for a bunch of super powered individuals to make them look completely useless.
"Umm, Director Fury? You're going to need to come and see this."
One of the men at a computer station in the main deck of the Helicarrier nervously pointed at the security monitor.
A more assertive tech looked over and saw the feed. He then pushed the new guy away, took control of the console, and directed the image of the security feed to the main screen.
On the feed were two distinct figures. One was covered in sleek black armor with a black helmet and familiar black faceplate. The other was dressed in loose brown robes. The pair each had what were clearly lightsabers, one purple and one red, and were fighting each other in what appeared to be the mess hall of the Helicarrier.
The tech zoomed into the combating figures on the screen and a number of heads turned as the one with the purple lightsaber had an eyepatch and clearly looked exactly like Fury who was standing in the room with them.
Suddenly the sound turned on.
The eyepatched robed fighter shouted, "Curse you Black Vader! You killed my Father!"
The dark armored foe answered back in a raspy but highly familiar voice, "No Fury. I am your father!"
The purple lightsaber wielding knight paused for a moment and shouted, "What?!" Then he leapt forward and screamed, "You Mother Fucker! You Said You Were Going Out For A Pack of Cigarettes!"
The purple saber clashed violently with more and more force against the red lightsaber as the Fury on the screen shouted, "You're Not Dead!? You Never Came Back and You're Not Dead!? You Bastard! Just Die! Die You Son of a Bitch!"
Everyone on the Command deck had done about a dozen double takes between the screen and the Director of Shield standing in front of them. The voice was the same, the shape and form were the same, and the way he shouted was the same.
The screen flashed and then returned to a normal looking Mess Hall just as the Agents on their way entered and confirmed everything looked normal.
Fury said, "Get me Widow and Hawkeye."
Another two weeks later, Natasha Romanoff and Clint Barton were standing before Fury with a report and Fury was not amused.
The few times they tried to tail Harry Potter or his girls, the intel they got was completely useless. Barton tried to break into the house of a member of the Board of Directors of Brilliance Inc and Natasha tried to seduce another one into giving him some insider details she could use, but Barton found nothing that made it look like the member even had anything to do with Brilliance Inc and Natasha seemed to think that the guy she was assigned to had no idea how the company actually worked because she got nothing from him.
During those two weeks, the camera feed to various Shield Sites had been hacked on nearly a daily basis. Usually the camera showed that the Helicarrier or a secure site was being invaded or assaulted by Storm Troopers. There was no protocol for hacking like this so they had to treat each incident like a real incursion which cost Shield a very large amount of money each time it occurred.
Natasha asked while doing her best to hide her amusement, "Will that be all Director?"
At that moment, the computer monitors on the command deck, even the ones not on cameras, suddenly pulled up a camera feed of a dark room with a woman in a leather dominatrix outfit and a man in only shorts tied to a large X. The woman in the shiny leather bore an identical resemblance to Natasha and the man bound to the X looked exactly like Barton, though he didn't have the scars Barton had.
The Natasha on the video feed used a small lashing whip and struck the bound Clint and said, "What do we say?"
He murmured something and she struck him again, and repeated, "What do we say?"
The Clint on the video said, "more."
Natasha struck him again and Clint groaned, "More!"
The shameless redheaded assassin in the command center gave the video an appreciative look before slowly turning to give a teasing glance at Clint who had already looked away from the monitor with a bit of a blush.
The video feed then cut to an image of the Whitehouse which was then shot from above by an energy weapon which caused it to explode.
The change caught everyone off guard and a few people screamed. Fury said, "Quiet! That's just a scene from Independence Day."
The next day, Fury met with the Liaison between the U.S. Government and MACUSA.
"Potter is one of you and he's displaying Magic to everyone and their fucking cats! What are you doing about it?"
The robbed man sneered and said, "No Magic has been detected from Harry Potter since his arrival in the states. He does not own a wand, dropped out of school before the end of his first year, and is registered as a squib. Do not waste our time with No-Maj problems."
That was all Fury could get out of him.
The following day, the Helicarrier was, somehow, filled with chickens. If that wasn't bad enough, over half of the Shield Agents on long term undercover missions received a fruit basket that contained produce from the region they grew up in.
No one knew how the chickens got on board. No one knew how the breach occurred that allowed someone to find the Shield Agents who were undercover and where they grew up.
When a policy was issued that told people to ignore the Storm Troopers on the security feeds, the hacked feeds changed to fiddling Xenomorphs from the Alien Movie Franchise. As in they were walking through the halls with actual fiddles and playing the Devil Went Down to Georgia with remarkable skill. Sometimes they would be followed by a line of chickens.
It was a week after that which had the craziest incident. Hawkeye and Black Widow were assigned to lead Strike Team Delta to rescue an asset held by a crime syndicate in Budapest, Hungary. The syndicate had obtained outside assistance far greater than the details of the operation suggested they could and the team was nearly wiped out while being outnumbered twenty to one.
The only plans they had to get themselves out of there alive involved actions which would get innocent civilians harmed but they were running out of options.
Then the chickens came. Over three hundred chickens flew in or simply ran into the fight and started viciously pecking at and scratching the enemy forces.
Barton and Widow used the chance to lead the injured members of Strike Team Delta and the asset out of harm's way while the chickens completely ignored them.
It was the very next day that Agent Coulson was knocking at Harry Potter's door.
Harry opened up and said, "Hello Agent Coulson of the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement Logistics Division."
Coulson smiled and handed Harry a photograph.
Harry took it with a smile. It was a picture of a scowling Fury wearing a large black afro wig.
Coulson said, "Good evening Professor. I've been instructed to ask you not to make or distribute any copies."
Harry nodded and said, "Understood. Would you like your copy in wallet size, photo sized, or a poster sized?"
"Poster sized please."
Harry nodded and invited Coulson in for tea.
Coulson asked, "What fields would you say you are best at when it comes to working as a consultant?"
"A lot of them to be honest. Tech, History, and the Occult could be said to be my specialties. But I also learned Chemistry, Biology and Genetics from Dr. Hank McCoy and I'm not weaker in that area than Professor Sterns or Professor Connors of NYU are."
"Is there anything you're not an expert in?"
"Probably. English Literature, Art, Nursing, Children, and a few other things. So I'm not a babysitter."
"Can I ask how you hacked the video feeds?"
Harry considered it and went over to a computer, typed a few things out, and got out a disk.
He handed it to Coulson and said, "Holograms over small, silent drones which made them pretty much invisible and undetectable. The drones broke in and allowed for remote hacking. You can have this program for your troubles. It makes indivisible things easier to see on a security monitor so if anyone tries to use hologram generating invisible drones to prank Shield in the future, this will let you match them."
Coulson seemed visibly relieved at the offer and took the disk gratefully.
"What about the chickens?"
Harry smiled, "What chickens?"
Coulson chuckled at that. If nothing else, working with the Professor wouldn't be boring.
*Author's Note.*
I released this story on Fanfiction exactly one year ago, so this chapter had a lot of fun stuff I'd been saving all that time. Next comes the filler until Iron Man 2. Don't ask me to help Stark make Badassium earlier. For those who don't know, the tesseract was basically Dormant when Shield got it out of Goose. They asked Stark to use his Badassium to 'wake it up' and they started using it for unlimited energy after that. In other words, it was the Badassium Stark created in Iron Man 2 that caused the invasion in Avengers, so nope, will not be making it early.
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