Losing him was blue, like I'd never known
Missing him was dark gray, all alone
Forgetting him was like trying to know
Somebody you never met
Adelaide Herrmann has so many secrets and is good at hiding all of them.
Only one person knows the real Ad...
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Everyone sat around and watching through the monitors as Fury explained to Loki how he could not escape.
"A mindless beast. Makes play he's still a man." Natasha and Dr. Banner shared a glance. "How desperate are you, that you call on such lost creatures to defend you?"
"How desperate am I?" Fury repeated. "You threaten my world with war. You steal a force you can't hope to control. You talk about peace, and you kill because it's fun. You have made me very desperate. You might not be glad you did."
"Ooh." Loki whispered. "It burns you to have come so close. To have the Tessaract, to have power, unlimited power. And for what? A warm light for all mankind to share. And then to be reminded what real power is." Loki taunted.
Fury ignored Loki's attempt at mind games. "Well, let me know if "real power" wants a magazine or something." Fury said as he walked out of the containment room.
All their screens went dark and the room fell silent. "He really grows on you, doesn't he?" Banner folded his arms.
"Loki's gonna drag this out. So, Thor, what's his play?" Steve asked.
Thor, who stood facing away from them all, answered with unpleasant news. "He has an army called the Chitauri. They're not of Asgard nor any world known. He means to lead them against your people. They will win him the Earth, in return, I suspect, for the Tessaract."
"An army from outer space." Steve said.
"So, he's building another portal. That's what he needs Erik Selvig for." Bruce spoke up.
"Selvig?" Thor asked.
"He's an astrophysicist." Bruce told him.
"He's a friend." Thor corrected.
"Loki has him under some kind of spell, along with one of ours." Natasha told him.
"Like a magic spell?" Adelaide asked.
"I want to know why let us take him. He's not leading an army from here." Steve said.
"I don't think we should be focusing on Loki. That guy's brain is a bag full of cats. You could smell crazy on him." Bruce disagreed with the Captain.
"But he has two of your men. He'll know how to get inside and where to find everything." Adelaide cut in. "He may be crazy, but he has an upper hand. And army."
"Have care how you speak. Loki is beyond reason but he is if Asgard." Thor told them. "And he is my brother." Thor added.
"He killed 80 people in two days." Natasha informed him.
"He's adopted." Thor altered his statement.
"I think it's about the mechanics. Iridium... What do they need the iridium for?" Bruce asked rhetorically.
"It's a stabilizing agent." Mr. Stark stopped to talk to Agent Coulson. "It means the portal won't collapse on itself like it did at S.H.I.E.L.D. No hard feelings, Point Break. You've got a mean swing." He walked past Thor. "Also, it means the portal can open as wide and stay open as long as Loki wants."
Mr. Stark walked past Maria Hill and moved towards the place where Fury would normally stand.
"Raise the mizzenmast. Jib the topsails." Everyone stopped to watch him. "That man is playing Galaga." Stark pointed to a man at his computer. "He thought we wouldn't notice, but we did."
Stark suddenly covered his left eyes and looked at the monitors in front of him.
"How does Fury even see these?" He asked.
"He turns." Maria answered.
"Sounds exhausting." He moved to touch one of the screens. "The rest of the raw materials, Agent Barton can get his hands on pretty easily. Only major component he still needs is a power source of high-energy density."
Adelaide watched him pull his hand out of his pocket and he dragged it along the base of the monitor railing.
"Something to kick-start the Cube." He snapped his fingers together to play it off.
Adelaide would have to look at it after he left before she confronted him about bugging the computers.
"When did you become an expert in thermonuclear astrophysics?" Maria asked.
"Last night." Stark shrugged. "The packet, Selvig's notes, the extraction theory papers. Am I the only one who did the reading?"
"With the materials he's got and the team he has he could easily make one. Or as we learned he could steal one. No matter the consequences." Adelaide said. "Maybe his staff?" She suggested.
"We did learn that." Stark pointed to her. "Selvig of course would know where to get one. With the staff in our custody I don't he's getting anywhere with that."
"Does Loki need any particular kind of power source?" Steve asked.
"He would have to hear the Cube to 120-million Kelvin just to break through the Coulomb barrier." Bruce told them all.
"Unless Selvig has figured out how to stabilize the quantum tunneling effect." Stark added.
"Well, if he could do that, he could achieve heavy ion fusion at any reactor on the planet." Bruce continued.
"Finally, someone who speaks English." Stark walked over to Banner.
"Is that what just happened?"
"It's good to meet you, Dr. Banner. Your work on anti-electron collisions is unparalleled. And I'm a huge fan of the way you lose control and turn into an enormous green rage-monster."
Banner hesitated to say anything. "Thanks." He hung his head.
"Dr. Banner is only here to track the Cube. I was hoping you might join him."
"I would start with that stick of his. It may be magical, but it works an awful lot like a HYDRA weapon." Steve suggested.
"I don't know about that, but it is powered by the Cube." Fury said.
"Maybe because the Cube powered HYDRA weapons for a long time and the staff and Cube share the same energy levels." Adelaide thought aloud.
"And I would like to know how Loki used it to turn two of the sharpest men I know into his personal flying monkeys."
"Monkeys? I do not understand." Thor furrowed his brows in confusion.
"I do. I understood that reference." Steve spoke up.
"Is that the only thing you understood from all this?" You can take the guy out of the past, but you can't take the past out of the guy Adelaide thought to herself.
