Chapter 1391: Good Service Att.i.tude and Reappearance of the Test Subjects
Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations
The test subjects charging at them looked intimidating, but s.h.i.+ELD’s guns weren’t ordinary either.
The net was made of a special alloy, and five bullets could be fired consecutively shotgun-style.
Phil had brought more than 20 agents with him this time. With over 100 net bombs, the test subjects were turned into dumplings.
Luke and Phil observed the scene for a few minutes. Everything was over before they could do anything.
Seeing that, Luke shook his head. He had underestimated s.h.i.+ELD; their best technology still wasn’t as good as Tony’s, but they could still easily make some practical tools.
Then, the agents went forward and tasered each test subject for a minute until they were nothing more than soft pulp.
s.h.i.+ELD’s subsequent backup also arrived. The special prisoner van was full of individual metal cages, and the test subjects were stuffed inside.
From beginning to end, the agents didn’t give the test subjects any chance to counterattack.
After that, Luke said goodbye to Phil and disappeared into the night.
…
Half an hour later, his clone was sitting in Williamsburg Diner, eating the cranberry cupcakes that Max had made as he pondered s.h.i.+ELD.
Today, s.h.i.+ELD had dispatched almost 50 people.
From the way these people addressed each other, they were made up of a few cooperative squads, and all of them addressed Phil as “Boss.”
Phil had been promoted recently, but according to information he had revealed before, s.h.i.+ELD didn’t have enough manpower.
As a veteran agent, Phil usually only had ten men under him; most of the time, the extra manpower would be borrowed temporarily from the local branch for the duration of an a.s.signment.
So, the New York branch might have expanded.
Was it to deal with Batman, Big Dipper, or V? They all seemed possible.
On the surface, it was to deal with the frequent incidents in New York.
There were in fact a lot of Hydra members in s.h.i.+ELD; there was no way Luke would believe it if they said that they were here for peace.
It made sense for them to expand their influence by taking advantage of the chaos.
After spending decades recovering and planting the seeds, Hydra was ready to create a new world order.
Only by fis.h.i.+ng in muddy waters would they seize more power and be able to launch more schemes.
Luke wasn’t too worried about that.
If the sky collapsed, there would be someone to hold it up.
The problem for Hydra at this stage wasn’t superheroes like Batman, but the similarly paranoid director of s.h.i.+ELD and the Avengers he had been secretly putting together.
Tony had complained before about a certain ugly person wanting him to do all the work, but only giving him the t.i.tle of consultant. There was no way he would join some Avengers or whatever.
It was just lighthearted grumbling since the tyc.o.o.n trusted Batman, and also because the Avengers was nothing more than an idea.
As for the Avengers, only Black Widow and Hawkeye were confirmed partic.i.p.ants. These two were originally the subordinates of the director.
The bald director, on the other hand, had said that he wanted to recruit a leader who would be their pillar of hope, but hadn’t said who.
He then said that he would try his best to pull Thor into the Avengers, which was even more of a pipe dream.
Of course, Tony knew that Thor had returned to Asgard a few months ago.
The Bifrost which Thor’s group had taken back had only been a few hundred meters away from Stark Tower.
However, Tony’s intent in pa.s.sing this information along to Batman wasn’t so simple.
With his Mental Communication, Luke roughly understood what the tyc.o.o.n was trying to get at.
Firstly, if Batman joined the Avengers –
Tony trusted Batman and was used to gathering allies.
Nick Fury, on the other hand, might try to influence or even fool Batman into working for him, and at the same time control this unknown factor and cut down on a lot of problems.
Secondly, Tony and Batman could form their own team.
Whichever option it was, Tony was unwilling to yield.
Even if it was the second option, he still wanted to be on par with Batman.
This had nothing to do with power struggles; he was just unwilling to defer to others by nature.
It doesn’t matter what the tyc.o.o.n or Nick Fury thought. What mattered was that they could indeed make Hydra fear them and want to prevent them from messing things up.
If these two were willing to fight Hydra, Luke would naturally welcome it, and wouldn’t even mind giving them some support.
His own small alliance wasn’t much better than Fury’s Avengers. It could be said that he had three “temp” members, which couldn’t compare with full-time agents like Black Widow and Hawkeye.
It seemed that he had to keep a low profile! He set some benchmarks for the next few months.
After cleaning up, Max walked over and stood behind him. “What are you looking at?”
Sensing the pressure on the back of his head, Luke couldn’t help but smile. “Nothing. I was just thinking. Also, there’s n.o.body outside.”
Max looked out the window. She nodded in satisfaction. “It seems you’re not lying.”
Pondering for a few seconds, Luke said, “I don’t think it’s good for us to have Caroline occupy the bathroom every time.”
Hearing that, Max couldn’t help but nod. “That’s right. The water bill actually went up 30% this month, all because of her. She isn’t afraid of her skin peeling off.”
“Ah ah ah~”
Before Luke could say anything, shouts rang out on the street.
Three or four tramps staggered down the street outside the gla.s.s window, screaming like they had lost their minds.
Max frowned, unhappy that someone had disrupted their private time. “Are these guys taking sh*tty drugs again? Going crazy in the middle of the night? Hm, thank G.o.d they didn’t take off their clothes.”
Luke’s expression, however, changed. He got up and walked to the door. He opened it and took a deep breath, and his face immediately changed. It was the smell of blood!
As the tramps approached, the thick smell of blood wafted over, and he heard faint screams.
With a thought, several drones quietly appeared in the shadows not far away and quickly took off.
Ten seconds later, the alley that the screaming was coming from was projected onto his lenses.
Luke was stumped for a moment, before his expression darkened. Test subjects?
On the screen, several test subjects were holding a homeless man down and biting him. A few meters away was an open manhole cover. The unmoving mangled bodies of two homeless men lay nearby.
It was clear that the test subjects had come out of the sewers and attacked the homeless who camped on the corner. The few tramps who had run over were survivors.
Without any hesitation, Luke grabbed Max and walked over to his car. He opened the door and pushed her inside.
Max was surprised. “Wow, wait, I’m not off the clock yet..”