Ambition {𝟙𝟛} | Marvel √

prologue

JUNE 2012; On a construction site, shortly after the events of The Battle of New York took place, a man and his co-worker were looking over a child's drawing of the Avengers. The man shook his head, finding all of this ridiculous. "Things are never gonna be the same now. I mean, look at this. You got aliens. You got big green guys tearing down buildings. When I was a kid, I used to draw cowboys and Indians," he said.

"Actually, it's Native Americans, but...whatever," his co-worker murmured.

"Yeah. Tell you what, though...it ain't bad, is it?" the man said and his co-worker nodded.

"No. Yeah. Kid's got a future."

Yeah, well... We'll see, I guess," the man said before he glanced up at a damaged Avengers Tower before him, scaffolding covering the tower's lower floors. Helicopters passed the tower, right past a ruined building across the street.

A clean-up crew worked around a giant, deceased Chitauri alien creature with pointed teeth. Alien artifacts laid among the rubble. Walking through the site, the man from before gave a worker a thumbs up before he turned to a man named Herman Schultz, who was attempting to saw through one of the Chitauri chariots. But it wasn't working.

"No, hey!" the man said, quickly stepping towards Schultz as the man backed off, "You can't saw through that stuff. These alien bastards are tough. You gotta use the stuff they use."

He picked up an alien object from the ground and used it as a tool to break down the Chitauri chariot. And with that, he was easily able to pop off the gems on the chariot. "See?"

"Alright."

"Alright," the man repeated before he spotted one of his workers finally arriving to the site, "Oh, hey! Glad you could join us. Afternoon."

"Yeah, my alarm didn't go off," he said.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, your alarm," the man muttered, "Look, just go stack that armor plating like I asked you. This is a huge deal for us." His worker walked past him and deeper into the site as the man watched him go until his attention was drifted elsewhere.

"Attention, please!" He turned towards the site entrance, finding a woman with white hair walk in, along with a crew of men in suits with her, "In accordance with Executive Order 396B, all post-battle cleanup operations are now under our jurisdiction. Thank you for your service. We'll take it from here."

"Who the hell are you?" the man asked.

"Qualified personnel."

"Look, I have a city contract to salvage all this, okay, with the city, so—"

"I apologize, Mr. Toomes..." the woman said, "...but all salvage operations are now under our jurisdiction. Please turn over any and all exotic materials that you've collected, or you will be prosecuted."

All the workers looked puzzled as Toomes was stammering on words. He quickly walked towards her when she tried to leave. "Ma'am, what am I— Please. Come here. Hey, lady, come on," he said and finally, she turned to him, "Look...I bought trucks for this job. I brought in a whole new crew. These guys have a family. I have a family. I'm all in on this. I could lose my house."

"I'm sorry, sir. There's nothing I can do," the woman said before she turned and left, leaving Toomes with nothing left but to stare at her.

Behind him, a Damage Control Agent said, "Maybe next time, don't overextend yourself."

Toomes slowly looked back at him, grinning confused. "What'd you say?" he asked. He glanced back at his crew of workers as one of them awkwardly whistled. "Yeah, he's right. I overextended myself." He then, without hesitation, punched the agent right in the jaw as the other agents quickly pulled their guns on him.