More insane than Charles' ideals, more destructive than Erik's extremes.
It was a complete control... viewing all beings as pawns, and oneself as the sole player.
A ridiculous, cold laugh suddenly bubbled up from the bottom of her heart.
No matter how good it sounds.
No matter how clever his mind, isn't he still just a toy in my hand right now?
However... Raven unconsciously stuck out her tongue and licked her dry lips.
In her golden pupils, that ridiculous suspicion and doubt had, unknowingly, been replaced by a more intense, more excited, predatory... interest.
She was indeed very curious.
What new, enjoyable tricks could this exclusive 'power bank' who always brought her 'surprises' come up with this time?
Raven leaned languidly against the headboard, her blue arms crossed over her chest, and haughtily raised her chin, striking a pose like a queen listening to her ministers's report.
"Somewhat interesting."
"Tell me about it."
"Your 'capital game,' how do you play the first step?"
S.H.I.E.L.D., Triskelion.
Deepest underground.
The air here was colder than a morgue, the only sound of life being the ceaseless hum of the supercomputer's fans.
The eerie blue holographic screen reflected Natasha Romanoff's bloodless face.
Her fingers danced on the screen, not typing, but dissecting.
Every line, every string of data, was precisely stripped away and pulverized under her fingertips.
"Target: Lynt, Social Security Code 404-187-9527."
"Bank account... interesting."
"Three days ago, it was a standard spendthrift rich second-generation flow. Three days later, two deposits of sixty thousand U.S. dollars, source... as clean as a virgin."
"Now, only ten thousand remains in the account."
"The other fifty thousand went into an offshore ghost account twenty minutes ago. Textbook money laundering."
Clint Barton's muffled voice came through the earpiece.
"Natasha, before the Pier 9 incident, his social records stopped for a full three days. Like he vanished into thin air."
Natasha didn't reply.
Vanished?
No.
Her gaze fell on the file of that used car dealership in Brooklyn.
Surveillance, conveniently broken.
The boss, passed out drunk.
This wasn't vanishing; this was someone using a surgical tweezer to precisely pluck the name "Lynt" out of New York City's existence records, one by one.
The technique was clean, sharp, and even carried a hint of... a show-off's provocation.
"Heh."
Natasha snorted softly, and with a swipe of her finger, all data instantly cleared.
On the screen, only a photo of Lynt laughing like an idiot at a party remained.
Pretend.
Keep pretending.
This guy named Lynt was just a white glove pushed to the front, a pawn used for probing.
The so-called boss behind him was using this crude yet elegant method to hand S.H.I.E.L.D... no, to her, Natasha Romanoff, a resume.
Somewhat interesting.
Natasha felt her rusty combat instincts being gently licked by something, both numb and itchy.
She suddenly remembered something and pulled up a recording that the tech department had marked as "invalid noise."
First, Lynt's voice, laced with tension:
"...Ghost? It's me, I need the latest news on 'Fireworks.'"
Immediately after, a woman's voice sounded.
Hoarse, impatient, like a disturbed mother beast.
"Hurry up, Lin! I hate waiting!"
That's it!
Natasha isolated, amplified, and filtered the female voice.
One second.
Two seconds.
In her mind, a constantly changing face covered in blue scales instantly overlapped with this voice.
Raven Darkholme.
Mystique.
The woman who had just fallen out with Magneto two weeks ago, whom all the World's intelligence agencies couldn't find.
So... she was hiding in this little mouse's hole.
S.H.I.E.L.D., the Brotherhood, Magneto... now, there was another player hiding behind the scenes on the chessboard.
This was going to get lively.
Natasha's scarlet lips curved into a cold arc.
She dialed the encrypted line.
"It's me, set the bait."
"Tell the informant that General Red Square is very dissatisfied with the last transaction. He has new goods."
"Time, tomorrow night. Location, Brooklyn, Pier 19."
The voice on the other end of the phone tensed.
"Natasha, this is false intelligence, it's a trap! People will die!"
Natasha walked to the bulletproof glass, looking down at the chessboard-like New York night view below her feet.
"I know it's a trap."
Her voice was as flat as a flatline on an electrocardiogram.
"I just want to see if that clever little fish..."
"This time, will it still dare to take the bait."
Two days later.
Queens, a dilapidated apartment where you could clearly smell curry from next door.
Lynt was slumped in the sofa like a corpse, contemplating life.
Suddenly.
The counterfeit phone in his pocket vibrated ever so slightly.
Just once.
Lynt's eyes snapped open, a sharp glint flashing.
He pulled out his phone, his finger randomly tapping the screen seven times, and a crude black-background, green-text dialogue box popped up.
{"Ghost": "New job. It can make you rich, or it can kill you. Old rules, money for goods, your life is your own."}
Below it was an attached message.
{"Target": "General Red Square, with new goods. Location: Tomorrow night, Pier 19. Note: Black Widow is fishing."}
Lynt raised an eyebrow.
"Heh, so impatient already?"
He mumbled, closed his eyes, but his mind was racing madly.
Go to the rendezvous?
Is that a death wish!
That's Black Widow, a top Agent from the KGB, the ancestor of mind games.
His meager skills were no different from running naked in front of her.
Then he'd get his legs broken, locked in a dark room and tortured, and Raven, to save him, would charge into a net, get caught, and be injected with suppressants... a dead end!
Don't go?
Even dumber!
She would immediately label him as timid, incompetent, and worthless.
And then? S.H.I.E.L.D. would abandon this precise fishing and directly start the dumbest carpet search.
It wouldn't be long before he and Raven would be squeezed out of their hiding place like rats in a sewer, and what awaited them would be Hawkeye's ubiquitous arrow.
Slow death!
Lynt's eyes snapped open, his gaze terrifyingly cold.
Bullshit!
This wasn't a multiple-choice question at all!
That crazy woman, Natasha, had him over a fire, just waiting to see if he'd jump left or right, either way was death!
"Damn it, just handed in a resume, and already starting with the stress test?"
Lynt ran his hands through his hair in frustration, pacing back and forth on the creaking floor.
Why?
Why should I be so completely controlled by a woman like her?
"What are you worried about?"
A cold, lazy voice drifted out from the shadows of the room.