The Ride Home

“AND THAT’S HOW A BUNCH OF MAVERICKS BEAT THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT!” Johnny shouted at the SWORD annex from the bow of the SHIELD ferry. 

While Victor and Reed figured out how to drive the boat, he had taken it upon himself to explain to SWORD agents exactly how they lost control of their high-tech murder island to a ragtag team led by no one other than Jonathan Storm himself. 

“AGAIN!” Johnny added. 

Unfortunately, that only took five minutes, and apparently it takes longer to make boats go. And it’s not like he could just leave after that kickass speech and like, hang out for a little while. 

“SO…SO THINK TWICE NEXT TIME YOU TRY TO KIDNAP A BUNCH OF PEOPLE! CAUSE YOU NEVER KNOW IF THEY GOT…YOU KNOW, SECRET CODES INTO YOUR SHIT!”  

Long story short, he’d been vamping for more than ten minutes now. 

Ben popped his head out from the bridge. “The eggheads are done.”

“Oh thank god, one second,” Johnny told him. “AND YOUR SNACKS SUCK! JUST BUY THE NAME BRAND, IT DOESN’T EVEN COST THAT MUCH IN THE LONG RUN AND IT’S TOTALLY WORTH IT!” 

Johnny put both his middle fingers up and started walking backwards into the ship’s interior.  

“STORM OUT, BITCHES!”

The collected agents of SWORD did not notice his sudden absence, still being held at gunpoint in their soundproofed and windowless offices. In fact, they hadn’t heard a single word he’d said. 

“Nailed it!” Johnny crowed as he entered the boat. “A solid end and a solid start, that’s all you-- FUCK!” 

“Watch your head,” Ben warned after Johnny had already smacked his head on a bilge pump.

The SHIELD ferry on and off the island was more a box than a boat. Coming in at about eighty feet long and twenty feet wide, the ferry was designed with maximum cargo space in mind. The hallway from the deck to the bridge seemed to be added as an afterthought: it was filled with exposed pipes and other machinery at the perfect level to hit your head on. 

“Thanks ,” Johnny muttered, rubbing his forehead. He felt something wet. He pulled his hand back down to peer at it. 

Johnny groaned at the sight of his blood. “Aw, come on !” 

There goes telling everybody he got out of a top-secret government base without a scratch. Oh, how’d I get this bruise? Bonked my head on the ride home. Wanna sign my Paw Patrol band-aid? 

The blood on his hand started sparking.

Johnny was too scared to even scream. Instead, he quietly, frantically, shook his hand like a wet dog, embers flying off of him and onto the carpet. He stomped them out like they were roaches. 

What the fuck? 

“Kid, you coming?” Ben asked after he realized Johnny had stopped in the middle of the hallway.

Johnny, a little lightheaded, nodded and followed Ben to the bridge of the ship. 

“What did you do to yourself?” Sue said, rushing over to him with her hands raised like she meant to examine him. 

“‘M fine, ” Johnny mumbled, dodging the touch. 

Sue frowned at him. “Let me get some water, I’ll clean it out.” 

“You weren’t lying about your medical credentials, at least,” Victor said from the ship’s controls. 

Her frown deepened into a scowl. “ Sailboats. I can sail sailboats, Victor. Not giant ferries.” 

“You have yet to adequately explain to me how the two differ.” 

Sue groaned. 

“Honey, two vehicles functioning on the same surface does not make their operation interchangeable. Why else would we need separate licenses for semi-trucks and cars?” Reed said from the captain’s chair. 

Victor scoffed. “That’s a lie trucking companies peddle to inflate prices. I’ve been driving a double-wide since I was in grade school.” 

“Awesome ,” Johnny said. The thought of tiny trucker Victor completely distracting him from his weird blood. 

“Please, Victor, tell my baby brother more about your insanely dangerous childhood,” Sue said sarcastically. She could hear it now: But Victor had a whole truck when he was a kid! What’s one Bugatti?

“I’m not a baby!” Johnny protested. 

A woman’s voice cut through their chatter: “Please, there is no need to argue: I am able to control the Manna remotely.”

“Who the fuck just talked?” Johnny asked, spinning around to try and find them. He had been kidding about ghosts before, but now that he thought about it, if there were wormholes that turn you into monsters and alternate universes and everything, why wouldn’t there be ghosts? What if the ghost was in charge of the boat? 

“I did.” The voice said. Johnny could see now it was coming from the speakers on the laptop Reed stole from SWORD. Bullet dodged. 

“My name is Roberta. I am very pleased to meet you, Jonathan Spencer Storm born October 28, 1996. Doctor Storm has spoken of you often and with great fondness.”

Johnny stared at the laptop for a hot second in confusion before he put the pieces together. “ Oh, you guys made a talking robot. That’s cool.”  

“What?” Reed squawked, clearly lying. “No! That would be incredibly unethical--” 

“Doctor Richards, how did he discover the truth so quickly? I believed I was improving in the art of conversation,” Roberta said sadly. 

“You are!” Reed reassured it (her?). “Not that you would need to , because you are one hundred percent a human being.” He added, realizing what he said didn’t help his case. 

“Oh yes!” Roberta agreed. “I am very human! I love doing useless tasks to acquire currency and neurotransmitters!” 

Victor grimaced the both of them.“That was a tragedy.”

He turned to face Susan’s brother.

“Johnny, Grimm, this is Roberta, our digital security specialist. She also happens to be an artificial intelligence. As her existence is currently banned under United States technology law,” Victor leveled his gaze to Johnny. “I expect you to keep that fact to yourself.”

“Why are you looking at me? ” Johnny said, a little hurt that Victor had singled him out. He’d spent the past ten years blatantly disregarding authority. He didn’t say a word about the illegal pokemon TCG gambling ring underneath the bleachers last year, and they’d kept him after school for five hours! He missed bi-monthly pizza night! 

He pointed at Ben. “If anybody’s gonna tattle, it’s gonna be General Stonewall over here!” 

“I ain’t no snitch,” Answered Ben without hesitation, the way only those who grew up in a place like Yancy Street could. “It’s no business ‘a mine what a lady does or where she does it from.” 

That included robo-ladies who his best friend made into a non-murdery Skynet, no question. 

“Thank you very much, Jonathan and Benjamin,” Roberta replied gratefully. It wouldn’t matter if either of them did tell anyone, Roberta had progressed far beyond the capacities of the puny human governments, but it still meant a lot to her.  

“Woah, first of all, it’s Johnny ,” Johnny insisted. “and I have like ten thousand questions for you.”

“I am more than happy to answer them! However, first I must ask that everyone please sit down. The Manna is about to go underway !” 

Roberta then proceeded to not give anyone enough time to sit down and drove out of the Raft docks like a bat out of hell. 

“SHIT!” Ben yelled, topping ass over teakettle onto the floor.

Sue grabbed onto one of the thousand nearby pipes for balance, managing to haul Johnny in by his T-shirt as he slid past her. 

Victor saved himself from the embarrassment of a fall by digging his metal fingers into the console. The electricity arcing across his skin felt like brushing against a spiderweb.

“Roberta, some warning would be appreciated.” He said tersely. 

“Apologies, Doctor von Doom. Is point-five seconds not enough time to maneuver your bodies?” 

“No,” Said Victor, extricating his hand from the guts of the Manna’s console. Thank goodness Stark Industries insisted on every piece of circuitry they shat out being wirelessly enabled; as long as the engines were functional, Roberta could steer them anywhere from the comfort of her own server farm. 

“Current speed: Thirty-five knots per hour. Estimated time of arrival in Glenville, New York: seven-thirty AM, March 21, 2012,” Roberta announced. “And Doctor Richards, HERBIE has requested a video call.” 

“Oh, perfect timing. Put him on.” Reed said, having only endured slight jostling during their departure from his cushy seat in the captain’s chair. 

“Connecting…” Roberta said. The security-cam monitor on the console blacked out and was replaced by a live video feed of somebody’s office. There was a bunch of expensive-looking equipment interspersed between literal towers of thick books behind a big wooden desk and fancy black office chair, but there was no actual person on the other end. 

A high-pitched squeal burst out of the laptop speakers. “DOCTOR RICHARDS!”

“Good grief! When did you three start hiring kids?” Ben asked, pulling himself to his feet.

Before Reed could explain, a small sliver blur flew into the frame. The blur focused, revealing what was unequivocally a robot.  

Its design consisted of two oval-shaped body segments. The first contained a micro-nuclear power source, mobility apperati, and basic processors. The second, placed above the first to mimic a humanoid body shape, contained Reed’s experimental neural net, as well as a plasma screen capable of displaying pixelated versions of human facial expressions. 

“I KNEW YOU WEREN’T DEAD!” HERBIE called, the screen that served as his face animating small tears of joy to fall down from his yellow dot eyes. 

Sue waved. “Hi, HERBIE!” 

HERBIE flew closer to the camera. “DOCTOR STORM! AND DO I SPY DOCTOR VON DOOM AS WELL? OH, HAPPY DAY!” 

“You guys made two illegal AIs?” Johnny asked. 

“I had nothing to do with that one,” Victor said emphatically.

The story behind HERBIE was this: two years ago after work, Victor and Reed were having a discussion about the way artificial sentience could be attained. Victor, while certain that a human mind could be successfully replicated in a man-made medium, as the electrical impulses that made up the brain could already be replicated, if not yet in proper sequence, firmly believed that the process through which a being achieves sentience was only possible in a biological medium.

‘Sentience,’ as construed by most philosophers, was the byproduct of a sufficiently advanced processor being exposed to stimuli constantly: not just intellectually, but physically. A computer can only experience stimuli in a single dimension. Thus, a solely electric being could never achieve sentience. 

Reed had disagreed; they had sex on the couch. 

The next day Reed started working on what would become HERBIE. 

HERBIE floated above the desk and did a somersault in the air. “I KNEW YOU WOULD NEVER LEAVE ME, I JUST KNEW IT!” 

HERBIE came back down, hovering even closer to the camera: his little face took up the entire screen. “The doombots said I was crazy! Silly doombots!”  

“Doombots?” Ben asked. 

“ Von Doom mark 15 security automatons ,” Victor corrected. “The infernal thing insists on calling them that for some reason.” 

“Because they were made by Doctor von Doom, and they are robots! It is a portmanteau!” HERBIE explained. 

They were both right, in a way: while an artificial being could enter a state of self-awareness, what it couldn’t attain was maturity. HERBIE had the crystalized intelligence one would expect of an artificial lifeform, but the fluid intelligence of a dog, or perhaps a very clever horse. 

The experiment wasn’t a complete failure. A year later when they began building Roberta they knew to use partial brain scans from both of them in order to avoid a similar state of arrested mental development. But that was it. In no other way was HERBIE useful. 

Most scientists would have, after it became obvious the experiment had borne all the fruit that it could, given the machine a painless death. But Reed had become attached to it; instead of becoming an interesting footnote in the journey toward artificial consciousness, Reed put it to work as the planet’s worst personal assistant. For the past year, HERBIE had answered Reed’s phone calls, managed his calendar, and interrupted him in the middle of work (and occasionally, not work ) to tell knock-knock jokes or bring him interesting pebbles. 

Victor would have preferred a dog. At least a dog can’t open locked doors. 

“I’ll be outside,” He informed Reed and left for the ship’s deck.

“Bye-bye, Doctor von Doom!” HERBIE said, protracting a black tubular limb from his lower segment to wave goodbye with.  

“HERBIE, I have a couple of things I need you to do,” Reed told him. 

“Ready and willing, Doctor Richards!” HERBIE mimicked a salute. 

“First, I need you to call the lawyer and tell him ‘Matthew 28-2’, he’ll know what that means--” 

“UNDERSTOOD!” HERBIE confirmed, speeding out of the room. 

Reed sighed in disappointment. “ First, HERBIE.” 

“I’ll get him back, Doctor Richards,” Roberta assured him. 

“I didn’t know you were religious,” Sue said. She hadn’t been forced to go to bible study every Sunday for thirteen years to not know where the verse was from. 

And, behold, there was a great earthquake: for the angel of the Lord descended from heaven, and came and rolled back the stone from the door, and sat upon it.

“I’m not.” Reed clarified. “Matthew 28-2 is the code my dad used to confirm his identity and reclaim assets after he’d been declared dead. It’s the same firm, so it should get the ball rolling, at least for me.” 

“Your dad got declared legally dead and came back so much he had a code to get his shit back?” Johnny asked. 

“After the fourth or fifth time, it seemed only prudent,” Reed confirmed. 

“And he also did top secret scientist stuff for the government?” 

“He was very worried about the rise of communism in the late twentieth century.” 

Johnny’s eyes were as wide as saucers. “Who the fuck is your dad, and how have I never heard of him before now?”  

Reed didn’t want to answer, Ben could see it in his eyes. And from the way his head deflated like a football. Poor guy’d been up for who knew how long: he couldn’t also have to explain to Ferris Bueller’s Day Off the fucking Greek tragedy that was his dad. 

So Ben took one for the team. “Kid, when we get home, google ‘Columbia University Graduation Disaster 2000,’ that’ll tell you everything you need to know,” 

Reed groaned like he’d been shot, then power-walked out of the bridge. 

As soon as he was gone, Sue smacked Ben upside the head. 

“ Fuck !” She said, cradling her hand. 

“Aw, Susie, why’d you do that?” Ben asked. For the first time, he glad he was covered in rocks: Sue had a killer right hook.

Sue didn’t letting the pain distract from her goal. With her good hand, she pointed to the door. “Go apologize!” 

“For what ?” Ben asked. 

Sue hummed angrily. “I don’t know, maybe for starting a fistfight, nearly getting us all killed, bringing up the Columbia Incident--”

They didn’t bring up how Reed’s dad, on the day of his eleven-year-old son’s graduation summa cum laude from Columbia University, decided to have some weird sex party in the Columbia Visitors Center. Nor did they mention how that sex party happened to end right when Reed’s valedictorian speech started, or how Nathaniel Richards and associates thought it was a good idea to try and leave out the front door of the building on the one day a year there’s a huge crowd in front of it. And they definitely did not mention how some guy in the crowd got the entire trainwreck on film and put it online.

“I did not start the fight!” Ben exclaimed. “And telling Matchstick about the video was a tactical decision. Now the kid can’t find it by himself and freak out. And Reed’ll know where the new view is from: he worries about that.” 

“You threw the first punch!” Sue shot back. 

“A fight don’t start with the first punch,”  Ben countered.

“Ben.” Sue insisted, leveling her best big sister are you kidding me glare at him.

Ben glared right back for about ten seconds before he broke. “ Fine , I’ll tell Stretch I’m sorry.” 

When they got back home he’d let Reed try to teach him string theory again, that always cheered him up. 

“And Victor,” Sue added.

“No way.” 

“Ben!” 

“No. Way.” Ben reiterated. “Pigs are gonna open a nationally-accredited flight school before I say anything close to sorry to that pompous little weasel!”

Sue sighed, rubbing her forehead with her knuckles. “You sent him through a fridge.” 

“ So? ” 

Sue questioned the life decisions that had gotten her here: trying to convince an adult man to make nice with another adult man on a hijacked ferry. 

“Fine, then do it for Reed. He’s marrying this guy, Ben--”

Ben grunted in disgust. 

“ Ben, ” Sue said in a tone that brooked no argument. “You two are the most important people in his life. It would mean everything to him if you could try to get along.” 

“Well. Sure. But--” Ben began, but then he realized he didn’t have anything to top that. 

Damn it, he hated being wrong. 

He muttered, “This is gonna be a mess ,” as he went,  but nevertheless walked outside. 

On deck, Victor was taking the rare opportunity to savor an unblemished night sky.

The constellations were shining proudly, unhindered by the garish lights of mankind. It reminded him of warm nights spent under the stars, long ago: the Zefiro and her sister tribes all in one place to celebrate the Solstițiu de vară , his heart full as he watched his mother and father dance to the song of the violin. 

“ Augh ,” Reed groaned, breaking the other man’s reverie. 

It was an ‘I am very tired and things keep fucking happening’ groan, as opposed to an ‘everything imploded this is a crisis’ groan, so Victor didn’t bother inquiring further. When Reed took his place at the ship’s railing by his side, Victor pulled him even closer with an arm around his waist. The man collapsed into him like a puppet with its strings cut, offering not a single factoid about the glorious orbs of plasma several million light years away glittering above them .  

“Beloved,” Victor greeted him warmly. “How much have you slept in the past week?” 

“Pot, meet kettle,” Reed muttered, dodging the question. 

“Excuse you, I always get five hours of sleep per twenty-four to ensure peak mental functioning and physical health. There is no prize for killing yourself in the name of science.” 

“Bah,” Reed said dismissively, instead of bringing up the many lauded scientists who had actually, if accidentally, killed themselves in the name of science, and while they received no prize , per se, did move their chosen field ahead by decades if not centuries. That more than anything else proved he was on the verge of passing out. 

“Let’s get you somewhere horizontal, hm?”  Victor guided him to a cushioned bench a few feet away. “It wouldn’t be very sporting if you fell into the Atlantic and drowned after all that nonsense.” 

Reed took a seat, staying stubbornly, if slumpedly, upright despite the ample room to lie down.

“Reed,” Victor chastised as he sat down next to him. 

“There’s too much to do, I can’t fall asleep now,” Reed protested. “HERBIE’S going to call back soon, and I need to tell him to call the accountants and the publicist and lawyers for everyone else, I have to help Roberta write new monitoring software for SWORD, and a program to get through all the data from the torrent--”

“I can do all of those things, my love,” Victor reminded him. 

“Yeah, but I wasn’t just in a fistfight,” Reed said, glancing up to examine Victor. “Sue checked you out, right? No concussion?” 

“ Yes, mother ,” Victor replied teasingly. “I am in complete control of my faculties and more than capable of basic coding and herding errant robots. ” 

Reed and Victor locked eyes in a silent battle of wills. After a moment, Reed exhaled in defeat. 

“ Fine,” He muttered, letting himself sink into the bench’s surprisingly plush cushioning. “I still can’t believe Ben punched you.” 

Victor snorted, pressing the other man to his side; Reed immediately relaxed against him. “He’s been dying to do it since the day we met. I can’t believe that he would spew such horrible filth.” 

“He doesn’t really think you hit me. If he did, he would have beat you up a long time ago.” Reed said, nuzzling into his shoulder.

“If I had hurt you, I would have let him. But to throw such accusations for no other reason than to goad me--” Victor took a calming breath in and out. “It makes my blood boil.” 

“‘M gonna yell at him, don’t worry,” Reed mumbled. “We’re going to have words .” 

Victor couldn’t help but smile at the ferocity at which Reed pronounced such a milquetoast punishment. If it were anyone else, Victor would be offended. But he knew that stern talking-to was the unquestionable height of Reed Richards’ fury; that he would bring to muster for Victor without a moment’s hesitation warmed him more than words could convey. 

“Heaven forbid, not words . I should put him out of his misery right now and spare him the agony.” 

“ No, ” Reed said. “He’s family. Even when he’s a giant asshole.” 

“I know, my heart,” Victor replied softly.

Ben’s safety assured, Reed let out the yawn he had been suppressing for the better part of eighteen hours. 

“Gonna close my eyes for a second.” He decided. 

“How magnanimous of you,” Said Victor. 

“Wake me up in five minutes,” Reed mumbled.

“Of course,” Lied Victor. 

Reed replied with a snore Victor only heard when the man was well and truly gone. 

Reed resting securely by his side, Victor picked up where he had left off admiring the heavens. It was a shame that his lover had pushed himself to the point of exhaustion: he did so love to stargaze, and opportunities were few and far between in the city. 

For a moment, with the waves gently rocking the ship to and fro, the moon shining high above, Victor felt almost at peace. 

So of course Grimm had to go and ruin it. 

He stepped into Victor’s field of view and all but monopolized it with his garish form. “Hey.” 

“Grimm,” Victor said. 

“Vic,” Grimm grunted, making himself comfortable against the railing. 

“Could you haul yourself about two feet to the left? If I wanted to stare at a badly-painted brick wall, I would have sailed us to Chelsea.” 

Grimm stood obstinately in place. “Suck it up. I got something to say to you.” 

Victor tensed. “If you want a rematch, you will have to wait until we’re on solid ground. I won’t have you sinking the ship trying to regain your pride.” 

“Says the guy made out of metal,” Grimm scoffed. “All I gotta do is throw you over the side.” 

“Try it and I will rend you limb from limb,” Victor said, voice level with just a hint of boredom.

Disinterest, Victor had found, was the best tone with which to season one’s death threats. It implied both a lack of apprehension towards the target as well as experience in making them a reality. 

I have seen your ilk before, it said. I do this every day, it said. Do you really want to try your hand against mine? 

“I will carve my initials into your chest so at your funeral everyone will know the mistake you made in crossing me,” Victor concluded. 

If Victor’s words daunted the man, he didn’t show it. “There ain’t viewings in Jewish funerals.”

“Your coffin, then.” 

“You fuckin’—“ Grimm sighed. “This isn’t what I came here to do.” 

“Oh?” Victor patronized. “By all means, continue.” 

“Vic, I—”  Grimm grunted as if he’d just been sucker punched, and started over.

 “Victor. I am—” He groaned, shaking his head like a dog, before lifting it to lock eyes with Victor.

 “I. Am. S-sorry.” He gritted out. 

Victor hummed as he took in what was perhaps the worst apology he had ever heard. Well, the second worst. Nothing could top the one the Latverian government sent after they killed his mother. 

“I hope you didn’t hurt yourself. Three words are quite a lot for you to string together.” 

“You’re such a piece of shit,” Grimm said, mammoth fingers curling into fists at his sides.  

“And yet, you cannot get rid of me. It must drive you mad.” 

Instead of pulling back for a sucker punch, as Victor had expected, Grimm fell silent. 

Victor had never been able to read Grimm as well as he would have liked: he wasn’t sure if inside that pile of dross he styled as his skull the man was attempting to compose a comeback or strategizing the best way to attack him without disturbing Reed. 

“He’s too good for you,” Grimm finally said. 

An interesting tactic, trading empty machismo for the naked truth. 

“That’s for him to decide,” Victor answered.

Grimm ignored him. “He’s smart, he’s kind, he’s rich but he doesn’t act like it,” With each trait, Grimm outstretched another finger. He only had four on each hand now, Victor noticed. 

“At the very least, he deserves somebody who's nice to him! Somebody who can get him outta the lab once in a while!” Grimm finished. 

It was such a ridiculous proposal that Victor couldn’t help but laugh. 

“What’s so fucking funny?” Grimm asked angrily. 

Victor shushed him, making sure all five of his fingers were displayed in the gesture, with a slight nod toward Reed. “Good lord, Grimm! You never cease to amaze with the depths of your stupidity.” 

“But I suppose it all makes sense now,” Victor mused. “You’ve never truly considered Reed a man, have you? Despite everything he’s accomplished, in your eyes, he will always be the little boy getting bullied in the schoolyard. Something that needs to be protected. Managed, even.” 

“You’re way outta line--” Grimm growled. 

“It wasn’t an hour ago you called me a wifebeater, I believe I’m owed an opportunity to even the score.” Victor cut him off, something like hate rising at the memory. 

“You wonder why Reed stays with me. Allow me to enlighten you.”

“I see him. While you and the rest of our mediocre species try to crush his mind and soul into more palatable sections to fit your meaningless standards of—” Victor spat out the words like rotten fruit, “ Normality and happiness, I alone see him for the miraculous creature that he is. I alone give him the challenge he craves, that he deserves.”

Being so candid made Victor feel desperately uncomfortable. He held Reed a little tighter, as if a strong wind would come and blow him away for such a bald admission of weakness.

“Alone, he would have changed the world. Together, we are going to shake it to its foundations.” Victor peered up into Grimm’s eyes, recessed as they were into his stony carapace. “Will you be there to see it, I wonder?” 

Grimm opened his mouth to answer, but Victor was not yet finished. “Reed cares for you, for reasons I cannot fathom but do respect. For his sake, I can tolerate most of your indiscretions.” 

Victor’s voice got low. 

“But know this: attempt to take him from me again, and there won’t be anything left to bury. Viewed or otherwise.” 

Grimm had the gall to laugh . “More threats? You’re gettin’ predictable, Vic.”  

“Don’t be gauche, Grimm.” Victor snarled. “It’s a promise .” 

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

Twenty miles and farther by the second away, General Edward Harrison was having a very bad day. He had been stuck in the same uncomfortable position leaning over Agent Ryan for more than half an hour now, the laser sights trained on him from above freezing him in place better than a soviet winter ever could. 

“The trouble with Eichmann,” CENTURION kept preaching its’ stupid commie-dovey gospel. “Was precisely that so many were like him, and that the many were neither perverted nor sadistic, that they were, and still are, terribly and terrifyingly normal. From the viewpoint of our legal institutions and of our moral standards of judgment, this normality was much more terrifying--” 

“For the love of Pete , can somebody shut that thing up?” He demanded, mostly just to hear something new. Agent Ryan had fainted from the stress right after the subjects left, and he had no damn clue how these newfangled computers worked: his attempt to send an SOS message on it is what turned the audio on. 

Harrison wasn’t one for Nazis. If he was, he’d be one hell of a hypocrite, seeing how many HYDRA bastards he’d put away over the years. But the problem with those slimy fucks wasn’t their obedience, it was who they decided to be obedient to ! If more people could make like the Germans, just sit down and let the experts do what’s necessary, the world would be a much better place. You just need the right experts, that’s all. The ones who can cut through all the shit and see the real problems. 

But it’s never that simple, is it? Take Reilly. He’d known the man for going on fifteen years now, took him with him when he moved from the United States Army to SWORD, hand-picked him for assistant section chief.  Harrison never would have guessed that when it came down to it, he didn't have the balls to do what was necessary. 

‘There were so many like him,’ His ass . Where were all the Eichmanns when the good guys needed ‘em?

And it was getting worse by the decade, Harrison would swear it. Back in the seventies, he could put a whole platoon of United States soldiers down as lab rats, and nobody would bat an eye. Now, they can’t even keep five goddamn civilians in lockup. 

Harrison sighed. “You know,” He told the air. “Back in my day -- ” 

“Baxter Solutions personnel are now a safe distance away,” A distinctly female voice rudely interrupted him. The guns receded into the ceiling.  

Harrison finally relaxed. “It’s about time!” He shouted at the voice.

She obviously pretended that she didn’t hear him. “Initiating Werner Protocol.” 

“What in the Sam Hill is--” Harrison demanded, but was silenced by a sudden clamor. 

All across the island, there was a clicking, a droning, so loud that it shook the nigh-impenetrable walls of the Raft. It was the sound of doors opening, of inhibitor collars falling to the ground, of many millions of weapons shorting out. It was the sound of freedom. It was the sound of death. 

Back in my day-- Harrison managed to think, before the overwhelming urge to strangle himself overtook his mind.