Chapter 832

Three days ago, a group of mercenaries blew through the roof of the cafeteria at Havenworth Federal Prison and extracted a single prisoner.

His name was Edison Po.

A former Navy serviceman, Edison was known for his tactical planning and lightning-fast reactions. On paper, he sounded like a remarkably capable man.

He had disappeared in 2008 and resurfaced eighteen months ago at a restaurant in Boston.

For no apparent reason, he’d stabbed a man in the eye and blinded him.

Then, rather than flee, he’d simply remained at the restaurant and finished his meal.

As if he’d been deliberately waiting for the police to arrive.

The incident was certainly bizarre, but neither the military police nor the local authorities had managed to get anything useful out of Edison. The prevailing theory became that he’d crossed someone dangerous and deliberately gotten himself arrested to hide behind prison walls.

Eventually, the case was forgotten.

Until now.

The prison break itself was strange enough. The mercenary team consisted of only three people, and none of them carried weapons.

They didn’t need any.

They’d sent prison guards flying with their bare hands.

Security footage had captured something even more interesting: a device resembling a centipede wrapped around one mercenary’s arm.

That made their affiliation obvious.

Centipede.

The three men were enhanced soldiers created by the organization.

Since Coulson’s team had already encountered Centipede twice, the case naturally landed in their hands.

After a brief analysis, they reached a disturbing conclusion.

Centipede had obtained the platelets of Caleb Harlan, the fire-wielding Inhuman, and made a major breakthrough in their technology.

They had apparently solved the overheating problem that caused their enhanced soldiers to burn out and explode.

Centipede could now mass-produce them.

Faced with enemies of that caliber, Coulson decided his team wasn’t strong enough to handle the situation alone.

He requested outside assistance.

The obvious choice should have been Evenson.

Unfortunately, Evenson had already crossed paths with Centipede twice. Both times, the organization had successfully cut off its own trail, leaving him with no useful leads.

Now that Centipede had apparently solved its biggest technical limitation, there was no time to waste. They needed to destroy the organization before it could manufacture an army of super-soldiers.

Which meant they needed information.

More specifically, they needed someone alive to interrogate.

Coulson wasn’t convinced Evenson was particularly suited to that part of the job.

So he requested another operative.

Michael Peterson.

Michael had been one of Centipede’s earliest experimental subjects—the same man Skye had encountered when she first joined SHIELD.

He’d initially been captured by Mack. Moira, however, hadn’t been particularly interested in him. The drugs in Michael’s system were primitive leftovers compared with what she’d already worked with.

After SHIELD negotiated for custody, Michael was transferred without much trouble.

And Michael himself hadn’t exactly been difficult to convince.

His loyalties had never been especially firm, and his convictions weren’t much stronger. Under SHIELD’s generous offer, he’d abandoned his former allegiance and joined them instead.

He became a field operative.

With Michael’s assistance, Coulson’s investigation progressed considerably faster.

Centipede responded just as quickly.

They kidnapped Michael’s son and used the boy as leverage, forcing Michael to cooperate.

The situation ended badly.

Coulson was captured by one of Centipede’s key figures, Raina.

Michael disappeared in a massive explosion and was presumed dead.

"Things look pretty damn bad."

Evenson sat across from Nick Fury in SHIELD headquarters, his expression unusually serious.

"From what we’ve seen, Centipede coming out into the open this time was aimed directly at Coulson. This whole case was probably nothing more than an elaborate trap designed to capture him."

Fury’s single eye narrowed.

"It proves they know Coulson died and came back. More importantly, they believe the story enough to act on it."

Evenson frowned.

"But where did they learn about it? Could the doctors who treated Coulson have leaked the secret?"

"Unlikely."

Fury shook his head.

"You know how I run SHIELD. Compartmentalization. Nobody has the whole picture, which means nobody can leak the whole secret."

"The doctors were no different. Most of them worked on Coulson every day without knowing what they were actually doing. The only physician who knew the full situation has already been cleared."

Evenson sighed.

"I don’t want to comment on your management style."

He paused.

"But if you’re right, we’re back where we started. How did that damn organization get the information? Did they somehow divine it?"

"That’s not entirely impossible."

"...What?"

Evenson stared at Fury.

Was Fury seriously entertaining that possibility?

"Several recent mission reports, including reports from Coulson’s team, have mentioned someone called the Clairvoyant."

"The Clairvoyant?"

Evenson thought about it for a moment.

"Someone who can see really far?"

"In a sense."

Fury’s expression remained grim.

"Not distance. The future."

Evenson’s eyes widened.

"Future sight?"

There were people in this world capable of incredible things, but actual clairvoyance on that level?

"How far ahead can he see?"

"According to the mission reports?"

Fury paused.

"Everything."

"Impossible."

Evenson rejected the idea immediately.

"There may be people in this universe who could be considered prophets. There are beings with enough power and knowledge to glimpse the future."

"But even they can’t casually read everything that’s going to happen."

"At most, they see fragments. A single event. A possibility. Usually it comes to them like a dream, and they might not even realize what they’ve witnessed until the event actually occurs."

Evenson’s expression hardened.

"But someone who can deliberately choose what to see and clearly observe the future down to the smallest detail?"

"That’s not a power a mortal can possess."

There was no room for debate on that point.

Consider Nozdormu, the Bronze Dragonflight’s Aspect of Time.

He was said to possess dominion over the timelines themselves, yet even he had seen the End Time and fallen into despair because of what he believed was waiting ahead.

And he had been wrong.

The future wasn’t entirely within his sight.

If a being of Nozdormu’s caliber couldn’t completely comprehend time, how could an ordinary human?

The Ancient One was another matter. She was rumored to be capable of seeing possible futures, but that ability depended on the Time Stone.

Without the Stone, she couldn’t simply wield that power at will.

So if this Clairvoyant truly existed—and could predict the future without an artifact, ritual, or external source—then he wasn’t merely powerful.

He would exist above time itself.

To someone like that, the entire universe would be little more than a sandbox.

A game whose ending he’d already seen.

Why would such a being bother participating?

It would be unbearably boring.

"Regardless, I don’t believe anyone can predict the future with that degree of accuracy."

"Hmm."

Fury considered that.

"I don’t believe it either. If he really could do all that, he’d simply predict everything himself. Why bother kidnapping Coulson?"

"Exactly."

Evenson shrugged.

"So we’re back where we started."

"Who leaked the secret?"

"After eliminating every other possibility..."

Fury narrowed his eye.

"I have one suspect left."

Evenson waited.

"Coulson himself."

"You’re kidding."

Coulson didn’t even know what had happened to him. How could he leak a secret he didn’t know?

But Fury wasn’t joking.

"So?" Evenson asked. "How did you reach that conclusion?"

"Coulson’s behavior lately has been abnormal."

"How abnormal?"

Fury leaned back.

"If I told you Coulson had started smuggling stolen goods, would you believe me?"

"Absolutely not."

Evenson shook his head.

"Coulson smuggling contraband? I’d sooner believe Pierce had decided to confess everything and join SHIELD."

"But he did."

Fury’s expression darkened.

"Some time ago, a collection of priceless artifacts was stolen from France. They were later traced to a port in the United States, shipped through an ordinary logistics company."

"The cargo bypassed customs because Agent Hill personally made sure it did."

Evenson’s eyebrows rose.

"And when I questioned Hill, she told me she’d done it at Coulson’s request."

"No way."

Evenson’s expression changed immediately.

Coulson had actually learned how to smuggle?

Was this really SHIELD?

Had the organization finally collapsed while everyone was too busy to notice?

"What were the artifacts?"

"The banner and sword of Saint Joan."

Fury’s face had gone so dark it looked capable of producing oil.

"Authentic relics of Joan of Arc."

Evenson stared at him.

"And after that?"

"Further investigation showed that the artifacts never even passed through Coulson’s hands. They were sent directly to Los Angeles."

Fury stared at him.

"Who does that?"

Evenson had no answer.

Fury reached toward his desk.

"And there’s something else you need to see."

He pressed a button.

A security recording appeared above the desk.

The man in the footage was unmistakably Coulson.

The problem was that he didn’t act anything like Coulson.

He was sitting in an abandoned little town somewhere in the American desert, calmly eating green apples.

One after another.

That alone would have been strange enough.

Then Coulson picked up an apple the size of a man’s fist, opened his mouth, and swallowed the entire thing.

Evenson’s expression slowly went blank.

The town itself was a ghost town in the truest sense.

It had never had residents.

The U.S. military had constructed it during the Cold War as a training site for nuclear attack exercises. The place had long since been abandoned and forgotten, leaving it almost completely cut off from civilization.

The man responsible for managing the site was none other than Edison Po.

And Edison had a very specific objective.

He wanted to uncover the secret hidden inside Coulson.

There was only one problem.

Coulson himself didn’t remember it.

Edison had his own solution.

It was simple.

Brutal.

And, according to Edison, perfectly scientific.

Coulson had been strapped into a machine designed to stimulate the brain through electrical impulses. The theory was that stimulating the cerebral cortex could force forgotten memories back to the surface.

The process looked excruciating.

Coulson’s body shook violently against the restraints.

Edison stood beside him with an electrical prod.

"Remember yet?"

He jabbed Coulson again.

"Nothing?"

Another shock.

"Come on. Think harder."

Coulson gritted his teeth against the pain.

"Before you break me, SHIELD will find you."

"Hmm."

Edison smiled with the solemn confidence of a doctor who had performed the same procedure a thousand times.

"Stubborn, aren’t you? I’ve dealt with plenty of patients who refused to cooperate."

He raised the prod.

"They all eventually recovered."

"Increase the current."

One of his men reached for the controls.

"But remember."

Edison pointed at him sternly.

"For safety, absolutely do not exceed five milliamps."

Coulson’s entire body convulsed harder.

"Wait."

Raina, standing nearby in her flower-patterned dress, finally couldn’t take it anymore.

"At this rate, he’ll die before he remembers anything!"

Edison looked at her with almost saintly patience.

"That doesn’t make sense."

He gestured toward Coulson.

"My treatment is completely safe. If he remembers, he’ll tell us what he knows. If he dies, then clearly he couldn’t remember anything."

He smiled.

"Either way, keeping him serves no purpose."

Raina stared at him.

"...Oh."

She had absolutely no idea how to argue with that.

Coulson screamed.

Then his body went rigid.

Silence.

He stopped moving.

Raina’s face fell.

She looked at Edison.

"I told you."

Edison prodded Coulson’s body twice with the electrical stick.

Nothing.

He shrugged.

"Poor survival instinct."

He lowered the prod.

"My treatment had nothing to do with it."

"Not my fault."

Raina stared at him.

Then Coulson’s eyes opened.

His head lifted slightly.

"Disturbing someone’s sleep..."

His voice was different.

Edison immediately brightened.

"See? I told you my treatment was perfectly safe."

He pointed triumphantly at Coulson.

Then he noticed Coulson staring directly at him.

Edison walked closer.

"What are you looking at?"

"I’m not looking at you."

Coulson’s eyes slowly traveled up and down Edison, examining him from head to toe.

"I’m weighing you."

Edison blinked.

"What?"

Coulson’s jaw suddenly opened far wider than any human mouth should have been able to.

Something shot from his throat.

A snake.

It sank its fangs into Edison’s neck.

Edison’s entire body locked up.

He stumbled backward, managed half a turn, and collapsed before he could take another step.

Dead.

The venom had worked instantly.

Raina stood frozen.

Most agents might have hidden a poison capsule in their mouths.

Coulson had apparently decided that wasn’t ambitious enough.

He’d hidden an entire snake.

And then things got even worse.

Coulson opened his mouth again.

It looked like the entrance to a nest.

Snakes poured out.

Small ones.

Large ones.

Thick ones.

Thin ones.

Dozens became hundreds.

Within seconds, the floor disappeared beneath a writhing mass of serpents.

Everyone in the room except Raina was overwhelmed.

The snakes swarmed over them, biting again and again until every other person lay dead.

Then the snakes began moving together.

They twisted around one another, their bodies merging into a single enormous mass.

A gigantic serpent emerged, resembling an Amazonian anaconda.

Except this serpent possessed enormous venomous fangs.

It flicked its tongue.

Then swallowed Edison’s corpse whole.

Man.

Bones.

Clothes.

Everything.

The serpent’s body twisted.

Its form contracted.

The scales vanished.

The monstrous head reshaped itself.

A moment later, a handsome man in a perfectly tailored suit stood where the serpent had been.

His hair was slicked back, his features refined.

He took out a handkerchief and delicately wiped his mouth.

"I’ve been eating nothing but apples lately."

He smiled.

"Having some meat for a change isn’t bad."

"Damn it!"

Back in Nick Fury’s office, Evenson slammed both hands onto the desk.

"Nahash."

His expression was furious.

"No wonder you’re the Serpent of Eden."

He stared at the footage.

"I can’t believe I forgot about you."