Chapter 793

So the warning was real?

Evenson practically danced with excitement as he hurried toward the source of Ward’s scream. Could an extinguished candle really herald a supernatural encounter?

Behind him, Skye remained rooted to the spot, alone in the cold, dark passage.

A drop of water fell from the ceiling and landed on the back of her neck.

The icy touch sent a shiver down her spine, finally snapping her out of her stupor.

What if there really is some enormous, rotting corpse down here?

She stared into the darkness. Any second now, something dead and horribly decomposed might come shambling toward her.

"Wait for me!"

Skye spun around and hurried after Evenson.

Meanwhile, Ward had been exploring the catacombs alone. Given his combat training, he was the obvious choice for a solo search. He carried a device about the size of a smartphone, a specialized radiation detector designed to identify extraterrestrial artifacts.

With any luck, it would lead him straight to the missing piece of the Berserker Staff.

Evenson had objected to the arrangement beforehand.

"Why does everything have to involve high-tech equipment? Where’s the fun in that? This is supposed to be archaeology—er, treasure hunting!"

His objections had been less about principle than personal grievance.

"And why didn’t anyone give me one of those devices? What, are you afraid I’ll steal it and sell it on the black market? I wouldn’t do that!"

He paused.

"Probably."

The agents had wisely chosen not to entertain his complaints.

Ward, meanwhile, was making steady progress through the tunnels. His enthusiasm was gradually being tested by the cobwebs hanging from the ceiling and the rats scurrying over the damp stone beneath his feet.

He was busy brushing another spiderweb from his face when Fitz’s voice came through his earpiece.

"Ward, I’m detecting an extraterrestrial radiation signature moving in your direction."

Ward immediately stopped.

He scanned the surrounding passage, alert for any sign of movement. The tunnels were narrow, winding, and poorly lit. He could barely see beyond the reach of his flashlight.

"I don’t see anything," he reported.

Then, just as he finished speaking, a dark figure darted past the far end of the corridor.

Ward caught a glimpse of it disappearing around a corner.

"Correction. I’ve spotted someone suspicious!"

He broke into a run.

SHIELD agents didn’t head into the field without preparation. Ward had studied the catacombs’ rough layout before arriving, so he knew enough about the passages to navigate them without losing his way.

His target was fast, but Ward gradually closed the distance.

When he finally caught up, he reached out and grabbed the figure by the shoulder, intending to drag him to the ground.

The stranger’s strength was astonishing.

A sharp twist of his shoulder knocked Ward’s hand away as though it were nothing.

The man turned.

Even in the dim light, Ward recognized his face.

Nastrond.

The investigation had taken longer than expected. Coulson’s team had first traveled to New York to consult Evenson, then waited for the Warlock to finish his bizarre preparations before heading to Spain. That delay had given Nastrond and his followers just enough time to reach the artifact first.

And Nastrond wasn’t merely holding the Berserker Staff fragment.

He was still under the influence of its magic.

The fight was brutally one-sided.

Ward was a trained operative, but his opponent possessed strength far beyond that of an ordinary human. Nastrond struck with the ferocity of an enraged beast, forcing Ward onto the defensive almost immediately.

During their struggle, Ward’s hand brushed against the Berserker Staff.

The runes carved into its surface suddenly blazed red.

Then the darkness came.

Memories surged into Ward’s mind with such force that he could scarcely breathe. They weren’t vague recollections or distant impressions. Every detail was painfully clear, as though the events had happened only moments ago.

The fear.

The helplessness.

The things he had spent his life trying to bury.

Ward threw back his head and let out a furious scream.

A moment later, he collapsed unconscious.

Nastrond wasn’t stupid enough to linger. He had no idea whether Ward had come alone, and he had no intention of waiting around to find out.

He fled the catacombs without another glance at his fallen opponent.

Evenson arrived shortly afterward, with Skye close behind.

Unfortunately, the sight awaiting them wasn’t nearly as exciting as he’d hoped.

Ward lay unconscious on the stone floor.

Evenson looked around.

"That’s it?"

He checked the surrounding passage, visibly disappointed.

"Where’s the undead monster? Did this idiot eat it before I got here? What did you put on it, sugar or salt?"

Skye shot him an incredulous look before dropping beside Ward.

"Ward? Can you hear me?"

She checked him anxiously, then glanced up at Evenson.

"What happened to him?"

Evenson examined Ward with the casual air of someone diagnosing a minor inconvenience.

"Grade-three mental shock. There may be some serious aftereffects."

"Aftereffects?"

Skye’s face paled.

"Could he lose his memory?"

"Memory loss? Have you been watching too many soap operas?"

Evenson shook his head in disbelief.

"Come on. I have a special physical rehabilitation technique for this exact situation."

He positioned himself beside Ward and began giving instructions.

"Grab him by the shoulders."

Skye obeyed.

"Now use both arms. Sixty to seventy repetitions per minute. Don’t exceed an angle of eighty degrees. Back and forth, nice and steady."

Skye stared at him for a moment, but he looked completely serious.

She began shaking Ward by the shoulders.

"Wake up, Ward! Come on, wake up!"

Following Evenson’s instructions, she gave the unconscious agent a vigorous back-and-forth shake.

"Don’t you remember me, Ward? Wake up! You still owe me twenty dollars from that board game we played! Forget the money! I don’t even want it anymore! Just wake up!"

Apparently, that was the magic formula.

Ward’s eyes rolled back, and he abruptly regained consciousness.

Unfortunately, he wasn’t exactly in a stable frame of mind.

He shoved Skye away and scrambled backward on his hands and knees until he reached a corner. He curled up there, breathing hard and staring at everyone as though they were threats.

It took a considerable amount of time before he finally began to calm down.

The team returned to the aircraft empty-handed.

Their immediate objective had failed, but the broader investigation remained intact. Nastrond had obtained the Berserker Staff fragment, and SHIELD would have to find another way to recover it.

Coulson’s more pressing concern, however, was Ward.

The agent seemed to be in a state of constant agitation. His face was pale, cold sweat kept breaking out across his skin, and the smallest inconvenience could provoke a furious reaction.

It was as though someone had left him permanently wound up and removed the key.

Unless Ward had somehow entered premature menopause, the most likely explanation was that the Berserker Staff’s magic was still affecting him.

The magic drew strength from rage and pain. It forced its victims to relive their most terrible memories, dragging buried experiences into the light and transforming the emotional turmoil into raw physical power.

Everyone had days they would rather forget.

Some memories were merely embarrassing. Others were painful enough that a person might spend the rest of their life trying not to think about them.

The Berserker Staff didn’t care about the distinction. It tore open those wounds and made its victims draw strength from them.

Ward had plenty of wounds to reopen.

His childhood had been a nightmare of abusive parents and an older brother who delighted in tormenting him. At his brother’s urging, Ward had once pushed his younger brother into a well.

It was a memory he desperately wanted to forget.

Eventually, the years of abuse had driven him past his breaking point. He set fire to the family home, killing both of his abusive parents.

Whatever else might be said about that act, it was difficult to understand the boy’s life without understanding what had driven him to it.

"I’ve never really understood SHIELD’s recruitment policies," Evenson murmured to Coulson outside the laboratory.

He had read Ward’s file.

"Someone with a history like his ends up becoming an agent, and nobody thinks that’s worth investigating more closely?"

Coulson sighed.

"Everyone deserves a second chance."

Ward had been recruited directly by John Garrett while being held in a juvenile detention facility.

Burning his own parents alive was hardly an ordinary crime. But knowing what those two had done to him made it difficult to condemn Ward without reservation.

Morally, the situation was complicated.

Psychologically, it was worse.

Someone who had suffered so much could carry serious emotional scars, hardly ideal qualities in an operative expected to make sound decisions under pressure.

Of course, such people could also be manipulated and conditioned. With the right methods, they could be persuaded to follow almost anyone.

Perhaps Ward’s worst day hadn’t been the day he pushed his younger brother into the well. Perhaps it hadn’t even been the night he burned down his family home.

Perhaps it had been the day John Garrett took him away from juvenile detention.

If the man who had approached him had been a responsible SHIELD agent rather than a Hydra operative, Ward’s life might have turned out very differently.

Inside the laboratory, Ward suddenly shouted.

"Quiet!"

He yanked his arm out of the blood-pressure monitor Simmons had been using to examine him.

"We have to find that staff!"

Evenson watched from outside for a moment before walking through the automatic doors.

Ward was jabbing at a tablet computer with such force that he looked ready to punch straight through the screen.

"Something tells me he isn’t getting any better," Evenson remarked.

Ward jabbed the screen twice more.

Nothing happened.

"Damn it!"

He snatched up the tablet and hurled it to the floor. It shattered on impact.

Fitz hurried over, attempting to calm him down.

"Ward, take it easy. We’re trying to help you—"

"Shut up!"

Ward shoved him aside.

"I told you to fix this, you useless little monkey! What happens if I’m still like this when something goes wrong? Do you think you can handle it?"

He pointed furiously at Fitz.

"Or am I supposed to jump off the plane again to save Simmons?"

The words hit the room like a slap.

During an earlier mission, Simmons had been infected by extraterrestrial bacteria. The infection caused static electricity to accumulate inside her body until it threatened to erupt in a devastating discharge.

Fitz had been working on an antidote, but Simmons had begun to lose hope. Convinced she would endanger everyone aboard the aircraft if the infection reached its final stage, she’d chosen to end her life by jumping out of the plane.

Ward had reacted immediately.

With the antidote and a parachute, he had jumped after her and managed to save her life.

It had been an extraordinary act of courage.

Now, under the Berserker Staff’s influence, Ward was throwing it in everyone’s face.

"Hm."

Evenson glanced toward Skye, his expression thoughtful.

"So you’ve all been enjoying some quiet time lately? Recovering, no missions, just taking it easy?"

He raised an eyebrow.

"Sounds like things haven’t been going particularly well around here."

His gaze settled on Skye.

"Did you do something you shouldn’t have? You don’t have to tell me. I’ll figure it out myself."

Skye’s expression immediately turned miserable.

Does cooperating count as mitigating circumstances?

Ward, meanwhile, had apparently decided that he wasn’t finished insulting people.

He turned on Evenson.

"Honestly, you’re the most useless person on this aircraft! Every time you show up, something goes wrong. You’re always fooling around, never taking anything seriously. If you’d just do your job properly for once, this whole situation wouldn’t have happened!"

Evenson slowly rubbed the corner of his eye.

"Finished?"

His expression remained almost indifferent.

"Then let me offer you a little advice."

He looked directly at Ward.

"Watch your language, boy."

The change was instantaneous.

Evenson’s presence became oppressive.

There was no flashy spell, no explosion of magic, no visible force pushing against Ward. Yet the atmosphere in the laboratory seemed to grow heavier by the second.

Ward, still caught in the Berserker Staff’s unnatural state of agitation, suddenly found that he couldn’t bear to meet Evenson’s eyes.

His knees weakened.

He stumbled backward and caught himself against a table, too frightened to move.

The other agents were equally unsettled.

They had become so accustomed to Evenson’s lazy demeanor and irreverent jokes that it was easy to forget what he actually was.

Now, confronted with the cold menace radiating from him, they remembered.

This was a man who commanded powers most people couldn’t begin to understand.

For one terrible moment, they felt as though they were standing before something that embodied fear itself.

"Calmer now?"

Evenson gradually withdrew the pressure.

"Good. Don’t forget that we’re not close enough for you to speak to me like that."

He straightened his sleeves.

"Even Alexander Pierce doesn’t raise his voice at me."

Ward swallowed hard.

"I’m... I’m sorry, sir."

He slowly moved away from the table. The fear had done what several minutes of pleading hadn’t: it had forced him to regain control of himself, at least temporarily.

Simmons finally worked up the courage to speak.

"What’s happening to him?"

She glanced at Ward, concern overcoming her uneasiness. After all, he had saved her life.

"Would a sedative help? I think we should try one."

"The Berserker magic is still working on him," Evenson said.

He considered her suggestion, then smiled.

"A sedative? No. When magic is the problem, you fight magic with magic."

He snapped his fingers.

A familiar figure appeared before the assembled agents.

Hobus, Evenson’s hellhound, had arrived.

There was just one problem.

The enormous dog was sitting cross-legged, its front paws resting on its knees in a posture of perfect meditation.

For several seconds, everyone stared in silence.

Even Evenson looked confused.

"What are you doing? Trying to achieve enlightenment? Planning to become a monk?"

"Hmph!"

Hobus turned his head away with an expression of deep resentment.

Then he raised his two front paws.

Both were wrapped in bandages.

Evenson finally understood what had happened.

The small protective charms he had distributed to the team earlier had been made from Hobus’s claws. Since there hadn’t been enough claws on a single paw to provide everyone with a charm, Taylor and the others had held the hellhound down and used pliers to pull out every claw on both front paws.

Hobus had not taken the experience well.

And now, without his claws, even standing on all fours was painful.

"Hey! What’s with the act?"

Evenson showed absolutely no sympathy.

He gave the hellhound a solid slap on the back of the head.

"Have you been living as a dog for so long that you’ve actually forgotten you’re a demon? With your regenerative abilities, this is nothing. Your claws will grow back in a couple of seconds!"

"Hmph!"

Hobus let out a wounded whimper.

"They still hurt when you pull them out!"

"Fine, fine. I’ll make it up to you."

Evenson pointed at Ward.

Hobus sniffed the air.

His eyes suddenly lit up.

He ran his long tongue across his muzzle.

"Magic..."

For a hellhound, magic was a delicious meal. It ranked just below premium bacon-flavored kibble on his list of favorite things.

The next instant, he let out a ferocious howl.

"Arrooooo! Woof!"

His body began to expand.

The agents had barely recovered from the surprise of seeing a dog sit cross-legged and speak when it began transforming in front of them.

A few people stumbled backward.

Apparently, shapeshifting wasn’t restricted to superheroes anymore.

Was this the canine version of the Hulk?

Hobus rapidly grew to the size of a young bull. Black bony spikes emerged along his back, and two long, fleshy appendages resembling the tendrils of a carnivorous plant unfurled behind him.

They writhed through the air, each ending in a grotesque, flower-like maw.

Skye and Simmons both took several hurried steps backward.

Evenson watched the transformation with satisfaction.

Then he pointed at Ward.

"Now, eat him!"

"What?!"

Ward’s face drained of what little color remained.

His legs nearly gave out as he tried to turn and run.

Hobus was faster.

The hellhound lunged, knocking Ward to the floor. His powerful, split-toed paws pinned the struggling agent in place while the two fleshy tendrils whipped overhead.

Their gaping mouths opened with eager, almost joyful cries.

Then they plunged toward the man beneath them.

"Ah...!"

Ward let out a strangled groan, caught somewhere between agony and relief.

Nobody in the room wanted to look directly at what was happening.

The agents turned away almost in unison, as though the sheer intensity of the scene was physically painful to witness.

Even the light seemed determined to spare them the details.