94- Disruption

Mason probably could heal Professor X’s spine if he wanted to. It would probably take a little longer than most diseases, since those were actually rather easy to treat, but he did not offer, and the X-Men did not ask.

It was not that he was irremediably against it, but again, Xavier was not someone Mason could say he wholeheartedly trusted, so he would definitely not offer it during their first meeting. Xavier was dangerous enough without his legs.

Since that visit, Mason continued with his usual schedule, with most of his time spent in those Pediatric Palliative Care Units. The atmosphere should have been a depressing one, but due to the nature of Mason’s actions, it was a cheery one instead.

Besides, Mason's work there did not only include directly healing the children, but also simply spending time with them. Mason’s strongest means of healing was to directly inject people with his Chi, but it took time, and he could only do it one at a time. But even without that, his mere presence also helped heal.

It was to a lesser degree, but at the very least it stabilized the children, and for the less grave cases, it could even heal them completely, given that he spent enough time around them.

So whenever Mason would visit the children, they would all gather in the same room, often with the parents too, and the mood was naturally good.

It was a fulfilling activity. Mason was getting stronger, of course, but saving the children went beyond that. By the time the first of May, the number of lives Mason had directly saved was simply impossible to count because of the effects of his presence, but he had directly cured over two hundred children.

On a much more personal level, Mason also started a small garden on his roof. It had started out as an experiment to see if he could create ‘Sacred Fruits’ or whatever those cultivation treasures were in Xianxia stories, mostly through injecting them with tons of Chi, but he found himself quite surprisingly taken by the hobby. So much so that it made Mason consider getting himself a new apartment so he could make a bigger garden.

He could certainly afford it, especially with Doom’s new lessons. Although neither of them had said anything about it, since Mason had broken through, returned, and their lessons had resumed, Doom had increased the payment for each session by quite a bit. Enough so that Mason was not considering renting an apartment, but to buy one.

But Mason shelved that idea for the moment, since he could not move the Gravity Room and he quite liked his current apartment. And to return to his garden, while creating ‘cultivation resources’ seemed impossible, Mason’s Chi and Sunfire seemed to accelerate the growth of these plants drastically. Which was to be expected, considering he literally embodied the sun.

Unfortunately, all good things have to come to an end. And disturbingly enough, Mason found that this disruption often took the form of Nick Fury.

It was on May 3rd, and Mason was returning from Minx’s tattoo shop when he felt the spy’s presence on his roof.

Getting up there, he found him bent over his strawberries, examining them. Mason called out dryly, "They’re poisonous."

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

Fury smiled, replying, "We already had one of your fruits analyzed. They are over 50% more nourishing than others of the same variety. I’d be more worried if you started growing cherries."

He picked one of the strawberries and bit into it before turning to Mason and adding, "And they taste good, too. Any intentions of selling them?"

Mason, who had been irritated just a moment ago and been about to call out the baldy, instantly felt gratified, and although he knew there was an 80% chance Fury was saying it because he was a master manipulator and knew how to diffuse him, Mason still felt happy.

"So, what do you want? Surely you did not come all this way in person to discuss my garden. I’d be a bit flattered, but mostly concerned."

Fury was immediately back to his serious self. "Good, concerned is what you should be. Personally, I’m going with scared shitless."

"So I should assume that threat you spoke about finally arrived. One that would warrant the introduction of the Avengers? What about the X-Men, can’t they handle this?"

Fury looked frustrated as he replied, "The government does not have the best relationship with mutants, and involving them might bring more trouble than help. And also, the Avengers Initiative was officially scrapped by the World Security Council, so it would be best if you did not mention it."

Mason smiled cockily, "I’m sure they know they can go fuck themselves. But tell me more about this threat, I’m intrigued." Of course, Mason already had a pretty good idea of what the threat might be, considering the timeline. This world was a much more expansive one than the MCU, with many more villains, threats, and heroes, and they were not restrained by their writers either.

For example, if someone threatened to destroy New York City in what should have only been a Spider-Man plot, it would not just be him fighting it, but every hero available in New York City. This would be exacerbated by larger conflicts, which meant that the further they went, the farther away they would get from the MCU timeline.

But considering the events of Thor had taken place in pretty much the same way a few months ago, Mason guessed Loki was striking.

And sure enough, Fury explained, "A few months ago, we discovered that gods were a real thing. I am sure you are aware of that incident, but slightly before you forced them to show themselves, Thor descended to our world and destroyed a town fighting some large living armor. Thor belongs to a race called the Asgardians, who appear to be the Norse Gods from Scandinavia. And two days ago, Thor’s brother, Loki the God of Mischief, attacked a SHIELD facility and stole a source of infinite energy. One that, if weaponized, could destroy our world. We have tried to stop him, as we do with all threats, and got our asses handed to us."

Fury fished out a file from under his coat, passing it to Mason and adding, "The details are in there, but from what we’ve seen, he is a bulletproof magician capable of turning even the most loyal of men into willing servants with a mere touch of his scepter. And what he stole from us is an object that nearly got the Nazis to win World War II."

Mason curiously opened the file, and the first page was on the Tesseract. A quick look confirmed that they still had no idea that it housed the Space Stone of the Infinity Stones, but the file was pretty thorough, mapping out some of the uses Hydra had found, and some SHIELD had found by themselves.

Then was their account on Loki, which was scant. But even with the little information they had, they knew him to be extremely dangerous. Something Mason would not feel the need to correct, Loki was probably far worse than they even imagined.

"If you accept it, your mission would be to intercept Loki and take the Tesseract from him. The world depends on it, Mason."

Mason grinned, "No need for the convincing, Nick. I’m in. Do we have any ideas on his goals?"

Fury did not appear surprised he had accepted, nor did he show any other signs at Mason’s answer, but Mason was pretty sure he felt a faint relief with his Divine Sense. Fury said, "From what he said? Rule over us. But whether he is arrogant enough to tell us his true goal or not, I hope we will learn when you catch him."

Fury walked to the door, adding before leaving, "I would offer you transportation, but you have shown yourself more than capable enough to travel. The coordinates and time are in the file. And thank you for accepting, Mason. This truly is a threat like no other."