Become a Homelander and a Marvel superstar

"Where's Fury?" Steve asked.

"I am here."

From the shadows, the man in the black trench coat and eye patch emerged.

Nick Fury looked more somber than before, with his single eye bloodshot.

"Unbelievable." He slammed a stack of documents onto the table. "Those bastards even froze my backup account in the Cayman Islands!"

Steve Rogers didn't look up, but simply said, "I didn't think the Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. should have secret overseas accounts."

"That's emergency funds!" Fury pointed to the front page of the newspaper, which featured his one-eyed photo and was titled "S.H.I.E.L.D. Rat: Nick Fury's Billion-Dollar Corruption Empire."

"That son of a bitch Pierce, he not only wanted to kill me, but he also wanted to make me infamous forever. Now all the filth is being thrown on my head. Those captured Hydra agents? Their testimonies are surprisingly consistent now—it was Director Fury who ordered us to do it."

"Me? Embezzled? I have to go through the reimbursement process even to buy an eye mask! Now I'm a reclusive billionaire with twelve private islands? Holy crap, if I had those islands, I'd be sunbathing in the Bahamas right now, not drinking instant coffee in this moldy hole!"

Clint Barton, who was adjusting the arrow in the corner, couldn't help but chuckle, but was immediately glared at fiercely by Fury.

"That's not funny, Patton."

"Sorry, boss," Barton shrugged. "I just remembered my wife is pregnant."

Fury turned his head and looked at Steve, who remained silent.

"Listen, Captain. We need to fight back. Public opinion is overwhelmingly against us, but I still have a card to play."

"What brand?"

"You," Fury pointed at Steve, "you're Captain America. Pierce tried to smear you, but nobody believed him. Especially after you signed with Vought, even President Ellis publicly supported you."

"If you just stand up," Fury leaned closer, "stand in front of the camera and say to the whole world, 'Nick Fury is innocent, I believe him,' the situation will be reversed."

"What if we don't?"

Steve finally raised his head to look at Fury, but his eyes held no eagerness that Fury had expected, only a chilling calm.

Fury paused, his one eye narrowing. "What did you say?"

I said, no.

Steve lowered his shield and stood up.

"I won't vouch for you, Nick."

"Why?" Fury's voice rose several octaves. "We're comrades! We fought aliens together! You know what kind of person I am!"

"Yeah?"

Steve stared straight at the single eye, his gaze unwavering.

"Do I know you, Nick?"

"Just now, you were complaining about those secret accounts that were uncovered. Was that money really for emergencies? Or was it used for some 'second phase' or 'third phase' weapons development that I don't know about?"

Fury opened his mouth, wanting to explain, but was interrupted by Steve.

"Even with me, you only ever tell me a third of what you mean. You have so many secrets, Nick. So many that you probably can't even remember which are true and which are lies."

Steve took a step closer, and the two were less than twenty centimeters apart.

"Perhaps Pierce is lying. But dare you look me in the eye and say you've never used public funds to do anything... shady?"

Fury fell silent.

Because he actually did it. He did a lot of dirty work to protect the Earth.

"Look," Steve took a step back, a hint of disappointment flashing in his eyes, "this is the problem."

"I cannot use my reputation to endorse someone I don't understand. That would be irresponsible to the people who trust me."

"If you want to prove your innocence..."

Steve picked up the shield and slung it over his back.

"...Then prove it with actions. Be a man, instead of hiding behind the scenes doing public relations."

A deathly silence fell over the air-raid shelter.

Natasha sat on the table, swinging her legs, watching the two men confront each other with a smile on her lips.

She knew that this was Captain America, as stubborn as a rock, but that was precisely why he was the captain.

a long time.

"call……"

Fury let out a long breath, as if to release all the frustration in his chest.

He straightened his collar, reverting to his aloof and dignified demeanor as the king of spies.

"Okay. You're right, old fogey."

Fury walked to the tactical map and pointed heavily at the location of Washington, D.C.

"Since public relations won't work, let's go back to the old ways—staging a coup."

All eyes turned to them.

“Pierce wanted to play dirty, so we played along. But he forgot one thing…” Fury’s single eye flashed with a dangerous light, “…the S.H.I.E.L.D. we built from scratch.”

"I know every brick and tile, every surveillance camera, and every ventilation duct there better than he does."

"There is still humanity."

Fury looked at Barton.

"Barton, come with me. We're going to infiltrate the Tri-Wing Building."

"Just the two of us?" Barton raised an eyebrow. "Sounds like a suicide mission."

"No!" Fury sneered. "We're going to take over S.H.I.E.L.D.'s internal communications system. I'm going to tell every agent still in the building by heart what Pierce really is. I'm going to wake up those agents who've been kept in the dark and let them know who they should be pointing their guns at."

"As for you..."

Fury opened a high-tech briefcase and pulled up a holographic map.

His finger slid across the map, locking onto a hidden coordinate in Virginia.

"My inside source has sent back the latest intelligence."

"That old bastard Pierce kidnapped four members of the World Security Council to ensure the plan would go perfectly."

"He brought them here. Pierce intends to subject those council members to forced 'neural remodeling.' In other words... brainwashing."

A blurry photo appeared on the screen.

In the photo, three burly men are escorting several blindfolded hostages into a building.

One of the three men had a metal arm that gleamed with a cold light.

Steve suddenly stood up, causing the chair to fall to the ground with a loud thud.

"The Winter Soldier?!"

“Yes,” Fury said, looking at Steve. “And more than one.”

"They slept in cryogenic chambers for decades. Now, Pierce has woken them up."

"But the good news is," Fury explained, "that most of the newly thawed Winter Soldier were extremely unstable and unable to even execute complex commands. Pierce had to put them back in the freezer."

"Therefore, only three are usable."

Fury held up three fingers.

"Three super soldiers. One of them is your old friend, Bucky."