Through Hawkeye, his ever-loyal informant inside S.H.I.E.L.D., Marcus was already aware of every move Nick Fury had made. The sheer scale of the operation being mounted against him—the massive deployment of U.S. military forces, the number of superheroes joining the offensive—was unprecedented, even by Marvel's standards.
At dawn the next day, the combined might of the U.S. Armed Forces and the superhero coalition would launch a full-scale assault on Queens, New York—Marcus's stronghold.
For Marcus's still-developing zombie army, it would be their greatest challenge yet. It was precisely to prepare for this day that he had been relentlessly gathering power and subordinates across the globe. If he lost this battle, Professor X would surely locate him by tracking the genetic traces of the zombie virus left behind. Once that happened, it would be over—for both Marcus and everything he had built.
To prepare for the coming war, Marcus dispatched his operatives on one final mission: to recover the five cryogenically frozen HYDRA assassins—super-soldiers created under the same Winter Soldier Program—from the Siberian bunker featured in Captain America: Civil War. It was a simple assignment, and Marcus had entrusted it entirely to the Winter Soldier himself. With Tony Stark's private jet at his disposal, the round trip took only a few hours.
By noon, Marcus had another engagement to attend.
At a luxurious five-star international hotel in Manhattan, Deadpool—clad in his signature red-and-black bodysuit—was enthusiastically piling food onto a plate at the buffet counter. Steaks, lobster, abalone, crab, caviar—his plate looked like a battlefield of excess.
"Hah! A perfectly good buffet, ruined by my impeccable taste in chaos!" he laughed, gleefully snatching a bottle of fine red wine. "Oh, look! Wine! Classy, baby!"
Satisfied with his mountain of gourmet food, Deadpool strutted toward his table, where Marcus sat quietly, eating nothing more than a simple plate of fried rice and a glass of water.
"Seriously? You had all these chefs prepare a royal feast just to eat fried rice?" Deadpool asked, pointing at Marcus's plate in disbelief. "Man, that's… that's just offensive. Do you have any idea how poor people feel?"
Marcus took a calm sip of water. "It's just lunch."
"Yeah, sure," Deadpool muttered. "Class warfare, that's what this is." He then tilted his head. "Anyway, Mr. Brooding Antihero, you left me a note, told me to meet you here, and treated me to the most expensive buffet in Manhattan. I'm flattered. You trying to hire me, or date me?"
Marcus ignored the jab. He knew better than to argue logic with someone who was aware he was in a comic book. Prolonged conversation with Deadpool was a guaranteed way to lose sanity.
He stood, handed Deadpool a check and a USB drive, and said flatly, "Follow the instructions on that. Consider the check an advance."
Without waiting for a response, Marcus turned and began to leave.
"Hey! I didn't say I was taking the job!" Deadpool called after him.
Then he glanced at the check.
The numbers on it made him freeze. His eyes widened behind the mask.
"Holy mother of tacos… is that—no, that can't be—" He checked again. It was. The figure written on the check was over ten billion U.S. dollars.
He lowered the check slowly. "…Damn class divide," he muttered again, stuffing both the check and the USB drive into his belt pouch without hesitation.
Then he ripped off his mask halfway and began shoving food into his mouth like a starving man. "You're lucky I'm corrupt, rich boy!" he mumbled between bites.
Ten billion dollars was an irresistible temptation even for someone as chaotic as Deadpool. But for Marcus—backed by Stark Industries' hidden wealth—that sum was pocket change, barely noticeable in the vast ocean of Stark's untraceable private assets.
---
When Marcus returned to New Umbrella Corporation, the Winter Soldier had already completed his mission. The five HYDRA assassins—his former comrades from the Winter Soldier Program—had been successfully retrieved.
Like Bucky, they could all be controlled using a specific trigger sequence—a set of words designed to override their free will. This meant Marcus didn't even need to "convert" them; a few spoken commands were enough to bring them under his complete control.
Their primary value lay not in combat strength, but in the DNA enhancement points their acquisition granted. After absorbing their genetic data, Marcus now possessed 16 DNA enhancement points in total. Only four more were needed to unlock the next tier of evolutionary upgrades for his zombies.
But there was no need to rush. Once the war began, superheroes would fall by the dozens—and so would the DNA points that came with them.
If Marcus could win this battle, four more points would be the least of his gains.
The five HYDRA assassins—before their transformation into super soldiers—had been HYDRA's top operatives, each fluent in multiple languages, and masters of infiltration, assassination, and subversion. Their combat ability was formidable, but their true strength lay in their stealth and adaptability.
To distinguish them from the Winter Soldier, Marcus assigned them new code names drawn from fragments of his past life's memory.
"Code Name One: Snake."
"Code Name Two: Sam."
"Code Name Three: Altair."
He pointed to a bald man among them. "You—your code name is Agent 47."
Then, turning to the only woman in the group, he smirked slightly. "And you—well, that's unfortunate for you. Your new code name is Lara."
Thus, Marcus gained five shadow operatives—superhuman assassins bound to his will. Each possessed a newly awakened X-gene, though none of their powers were particularly useful—at least, not yet. Whether they'd prove valuable in the future depended on how creatively they applied those abilities.
Marcus's plan was to have them disperse globally, infiltrating key nations and organizations. Their mission: prepare the groundwork for his long-term expansion. How they managed to bypass border security was their problem; if they truly were as skilled as the Winter Soldier claimed, something as trivial as border patrols wouldn't slow them down.
Once embedded, they would find ways to ascend politically and militarily, becoming assets Marcus could call upon in the shadows. It would take time—but Marcus was patient.
After finalizing the assassins' assignments, he ascended to the top floor of New Umbrella's central tower, entering the high-security laboratory that served as the heart of his empire.
Inside, Wanda stood waiting for him, her crimson eyes glowing faintly beneath the lab's sterile light.
Beside her were two of Marcus's top scientific advisors—Aldrich Killian and Doctor Octavius—both busy calibrating a cluster of advanced instruments.
Whatever they were working on, Marcus could tell at a glance—it was something dangerous.
_____
T/N:
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