Moral of the Story

Chapter 10

"What are you doing, Mr. Stark?" Fury came in yelling.

"Uh...kind of been wondering the same thing about you." Tony replied.

"You're supposed to be locating the Tesseract."

"We are. The model's locked and we're sweeping for the signature now. When we get a hit, we'll have the location within half a mile." Bruce said, barely batting an eye.

"And you'll get your cube back, no muss, no fuss. What is PHASE 2?" Tony prodded.

Steve dropped an old-looking assault rifle, "PHASE 2 is SHIELD uses the cube to make weapons.

Sorry, the computer was moving a little slow."

Am I mistaken or is the Nick Fury backed into a corner, "Rogers, we gathered everything related to the Tesseract. This does not mean that we're..."

The blue crystal looked too familiar. I got up and pulled it out of the gun.

"I'm sorry, Nick." I looked up to see Tony turning his monitor, filled with weapons of all kinds.

"Why were you lying?"

"I was wrong, director. The world hasn't changed a bit." Steve and Bruce looked pissed, while Tony seemed to be as calm as one can be. Fair enough, he's always held the cards.

Natasha and Thor entered the lab. Poor timing, really. Bruce looked at Natasha before asking, "Did you know about this?"

I phased out Bruce and Natasha's conversation to look at the Director. "The same thing you used to rain hellfire on us." I held up the crystal, "Blue fire and brimstone."

The director shifted his focus from me, "Because of him."

"Me?" Thor was stunned.

"Last year earth had a visitor from another planet who had a grudge match that leveled a small town. We learned that not only are we not alone, but we are hopelessly, hilariously, outgunned." Fury defended.

"My people want nothing but peace with your planet." Thor appeared, understandably, offended.

"But you're not the only people out there, are you? And, you're not the only threat. The world's filling up with people who can't be matched, they can't be controlled.

" Like mutants, Fury?"

"Like you controlled the cube?" Steve contested.

"Your work with the Tesseract is what drew Loki to it, and his allies. It is the signal to all the realms that the Earth is ready for a higher form of war." Thor explained.

"A higher form?" Steve asked.

"You forced our hand. We had to come up with something." The director still played diplomat, always coming up with excuses.

"Nuclear deterrent. 'Cause that always calms everything right down." Tony laughed.

"Remind me again how you made your fortune, Stark?" Fury pushed.

"I'm sure if he still made weapons, Stark would be neck deep..." Steve criticized.

"Wait! Wait! Hold on! How is this now about me?" Tony asked.

"I'm sorry, isn't everything?" Steve said sneeringly.

"I thought humans were more evolved than this."

"Excuse me, did we come to your planet and blow stuff up?" Nick asked the god.

"Did you always give your champions such mistrust?" The god responds.