The digital world was a garden Aryan had planted, but he realized early on that relying on the outside world to tend it was a massive security risk. To solve this, he moved to control the future from the ground up. He needed architects of the digital age who saw the world exactly as he did.
He began a massive acquisition of struggling private colleges and founded new universities across the world. Every curriculum was tailored to the specific needs of the Umbrella ecosystem.
Umbrella stopped recruiting from the open market entirely. Why hire a stranger with unknown allegiances when you can build a devotee from scratch? Now, if you wanted to work for the most powerful company on Earth, you had to be a product of its halls. Red Queen's algorithm identified geniuses in their freshman year, provided them with full scholarships, mentorships and a path to glory, ensuring that by the time they graduated, their loyalty to the brand was as strong as their GPA.
The world saw a philanthropic educational initiative… a visionary CEO investing in the youth of tomorrow. Aryan saw a factory for the most loyal and highly trained workforce in human history. He was raising a generation that viewed the digital world as their birthright and him as its benevolent architect.
To become the absolute controller of the digital world, Aryan knew he must first become the indispensable savior of the physical one.
He sat in his office, watching a live feed of the Red Queen's global heat map. Blue dots represented the high speed network nodes of his software empire, but new green icons were beginning to flicker to life in every major city, pulsing with activity. These were the Umbrella Care Centers.
"Public perception is at an all time high, Aryan," the Red Queen's avatar remarked, swinging her holographic legs as she sat on the edge of his desk. "They're calling you the 'Sovereign of Sanity' on Twitter. It's a bit dramatic, don't you think?"
"Drama sells, Red," Aryan replied, looking at the map.
He had split the medical initiative into two distinct tiers, a masterstroke of social engineering that balanced high end profit with grassroots loyalty.
In the world's elite capitals, he opened the Umbrella Apex Facilities. These were top of the line medical centers that looked more like five star hotels than hospitals. They housed the most advanced diagnostic AI and surgical robotics ever conceived. The ultra wealthy, the politicians and the celebrities flocked to them, paying exorbitant sums for the privilege of "Umbrella grade" health security and discretion.
Simultaneously, he flooded urban centers and impoverished neighborhoods with thousands of small Umbrella Community Centers. Here, the poor and the working class could get their health checked, receive vaccinations and access life saving treatments for a minimal cost.
He addressed the world in a televised broadcast that was piped into every screen connected to the umbrella ecosystem. His message was simple.
"You are the ones who built this company. Every time you buy an Umbrella product or use our software, you are investing in the future. This is our way of giving back. No one should go bankrupt because they got sick. If the digital world belongs to everyone, then health should, too."
The PR impact was nuclear. Aryan became the man who lowered the cost of a check up to the price of a cup of coffee.
But beneath the philanthropy lay the calculating mind of Aryan.
These medical centers served as the ultimate data collection points. Every patient who walked into an Umbrella center… had their vitals, their DNA and their neural patterns uploaded into the encrypted cloud. While the world saw "charity," Aryan saw a global database of human biology.
With his Omega Level Telepathy, he could even "tune" the atmosphere of these centers. He ensured that every person who left an Umbrella clinic felt a profound sense of peace and a subconscious gratitude toward the brand. He was building a world where the name "Umbrella" was synonymous with "Safety."
"You're giving them a reason to want us in their lives," the Red Queen whispered, her eyes glowing with the data of a million successful check ups. "Now, they won't just use our software because it's better. They'll use it because they love us."
Aryan leaned back, watching the green icons spread across the globe like a benevolent virus. By the time the world realized he controlled the very air they breathed and the medicine they took, it would be too late to rebel. After all, how do you fight the man who saved your life for five dollars?
The notification pinged on his encrypted terminal, a single line of text that carried the weight of a silent war.
"I'm coming back. Fury is watching. Be ready."
Aryan stared at the text from Sharon Carter for a long moment. A faint smile touched his lips. Sharon was playing a dangerous game, acting as a double agent to protect a debt of blood and a growing affection. But the message confirmed one thing. Nick Fury was becoming an annoyance. He had too much time on his hands if he was busy tailing his associates and trying to peer behind the digital curtain.
"Queen," he said.
"Yes, Aryan?" Her avatar appeared, flickering into her favorite 16 year old schoolgirl aesthetic, leaning casually against a holographic server rack.
"Director Fury is too focused on us. It's time we gave him a hobby. Something that makes him realize the ground he stands on is already hollow."
With his Omega Level Telepathy, Aryan had already felt the rot at the heart of the intelligence community. S.H.I.E.L.D. was a parasitic host. He could sense the hidden pulses of a thousand minds thinking in a language of "Cut one head, two more shall take its place."
Hydra.
They had spent decades growing inside S.H.I.E.L.D. like a cancer and Fury was blissfully unaware that seventy percent of his "loyal" agents were actually saluting a different flag in the shadows. Aryan could expose them himself, but that would be too simple. He wanted fire. He wanted a rift that could never be mended.
"Queen, search the deep storage archives of the SSR and early S.H.I.E.L.D. records. Look for the December 16, 1991, mission files," he commanded.
"Found it," she chirped, her eyes glowing as she bypassed encryptions that would take a human lifetime to crack. "The assassination of Howard and Maria Stark. It's... oh, this is juicy. It was carried out by a Winter Soldier asset under Hydra's command, but the file was buried inside S.H.I.E.L.D. servers. Fury's predecessors helped hide the trail to protect the agency's reputation."
Aryan leaned back, his mind weaving the threads of chaos. Tony Stark was his partner, his friend and a key member of the Tarot Club. If he simply told him, Tony might not believe the scale of it. He needed to find it.
"Prepare an anonymous data packet," he instructed. "Send it to JARVIS, but masked as a ghost signal from the decommissioned S.H.I.E.L.D. server in Siberia. Let Tony's own curiosity do the work. Let him see the video of the Winter Soldier. Let him see the S.H.I.E.L.D. stamps on the cover up."
When Tony discovers that the organization Fury represents has been harboring his parents' killer and the men who ordered the hit, he will burn the agency to the ground.
Fury will be forced to fight a two front war. A furious Iron Man from the outside and a resurgent Hydra from the inside. S.H.I.E.L.D. will collapse under the weight of its own secrets.
"You're being very mean today, Aryan," the Red Queen giggled, though she was already executing the micro burst transmission with lethal efficiency. "I like it. Does this mean Sharon is safe?"
"For now," Aryan replied, looking out over the horizon. "Fury will be too busy looking for Hydra heads to worry about what Agent 13 is doing in my office. By the time he clears the smoke, I'll own the fire."
As the data packet surged through the undersea cables toward Malibu, Aryan felt a tremor of anticipation.