It took about forty minutes to count the full amount.
Another twenty were spent moving it all out. The armed transport detail handled the transfer with careful professionalism. Every major step was recorded, and every case was tagged.
When the last dollar left the suite, Mercer reviewed the receipt schedule with Hart and the compliance officer, then placed the final document on the low table for signature.
Lucius signed, and Mercer signed after him.
"Funds will be credited once final verification clears through our process. Your order is scheduled for market open tomorrow."
"Good."
They left with the cash, the records, and enough professional stories to dine out on for years without ever naming the client.
News of the handover still spread through the hotel before the last lift returned.
It started with security, moved to staff, leaked into the lobby, and by the end of the hour had reached every guest with functioning ears and an interest in money. Natasha and Clint heard about it.
Lucius stood by the window for a moment after the suite fell quiet again.
His inventory was much lighter in cash now, but it was also much heavier in a new product that was going to make him richer, stronger, and even more offensive to several branches of government.
That naturally brought him back to SHIELD.
His business with them was not over. Not remotely.
They had broken into his life, his house, his business, and his body. Fury had attempted to collar him like an animal, take what he wanted, and then call it procedure. The debt remained unpaid.
Lucius smiled slowly.
There were many ways to remind an organisation that it had made a mistake. Destroying its internal network again had merit. So did tearing through the servers they had so painfully rebuilt. Beating the shit out of some agents and guards and stacking them in Fury's office like failed delivery parcels had a certain elegance, too.
He considered the options for another few seconds, then reached the only sensible conclusion.
He could do all of them.
Lucius vanished with an innocent smile on his face.
--
Nick Fury was standing outside the door of his office when he decided that perhaps the universe had finally grown bored of subtle warnings and moved on to direct mockery.
His morning had begun with a call from maintenance, which was already an insult.
A senior systems chief had met him outside the secure lift, looking half dead and fully offended. The man had not even tried dressing the report up.
"Every new server is fried. Every backup array we installed after the last incident is dead. The cameras are gone as well. Workstations are dead. Pagers are gone. Internal relays are cooked. We've got blank screens, blown boards, and a building full of people suddenly remembering what paper feels like."
Fury had listened in silence.
He hated the silence from the engineers. When they were calm, it meant a problem existed. When they sounded personally insulted, it meant the problem had achieved shape, direction, and a preferred victim.
The man had swallowed and continued.
"It wasn't random damage, Director. It was selective. Whoever did it knew what to hit, where to hit it, and what would take longest to rebuild. We are currently operating below the standard of a second-rate county sheriff's office. This is the second wave, and we are not even close to finding out the method of the attacks, let alone defending against them."
Fury had started walking after that; standing still increased the chances of murder.
Two armed agents fell in behind him. Another officer kept pace on his left, reading out the effects from a paper clipboard; digital reports were now a luxury for other people.
"Emergency comms are being rerouted through hardened external lines. Field divisions are going to be partially blind for a few days. Maybe longer... Most probably longer. Data recovery says some drives weren't just wiped. They were physically burned through the board."
Fury kept walking.
"How many teams do we have on repair?"
"Everything we can drag in on short notice."
"That answer irritates me."
"It irritates all of us, sir."
Fury reached his office door, keyed the lock, and pushed it open.
Then he stopped.
Over two dozen agents and guards had been stacked in his office like a badly organised monument to his failing patience.
Some were conscious enough to groan. Most were not. Uniforms were twisted. Suits were torn. Faces had swollen into abstract art. Black eyes, split lips, bruised ribs, broken noses, at least one arm hanging wrong, and one unfortunate bastard whose ankle was bent at the sort of angle that made even professionals briefly reconsider breakfast.
Fury's desk had been knocked sideways. One chair was missing a leg. Another had been used to hit somebody or something hard enough that the frame had bent. His shelves were a wreck. Paper lay everywhere.
On the far wall, arranged with perfect spite, a huge middle finger had been built out of bright yellow sticky notes.
The finger was anatomically sound. That, somehow, offended him even more.
Nobody spoke for three seconds.
Then one of the groaning piles shifted, and a guard near the bottom let out a weak noise that sounded like somebody trying to complain through three broken decisions.
Fury looked at the heap. He looked at the finger. He looked at the hole where a side cabinet had once been.
His good eye twitched.
"Tell me," he said very quietly, "that this is not my office."
No one was stupid enough to attempt the lie.
A field agent came running up the corridor with a new tablet in hand; it still had protective plastic on its screen, and the engineers only peeled it off when they had a grudge against you.
"Director." The man was breathing hard. "You need to see this."
Fury took the tablet with the sort of care men usually reserved for grenades.
Fox TV filled the screen.
The anchor was trying and failing to look responsibly shocked.
"...yes, secret SHIELD files, which by definition should have remained secret, have now been transmitted to foreign intelligence services and major broadcasters across multiple jurisdictions. Among the recipients confirmed at this hour are MI6 in Britain, the FSB in Russia, MIT in Turkey, and the MSS in China. They were not the only recipients, either. We are told copies were also routed to intelligence, defence, or internal security bodies in France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and several other allied and non-allied states. Copies were also routed further south, including to organised criminal networks and cartel channels. International television stations received the same files in parallel."
The camera cut to London first.
Outside a government building, reporters were packed against the barriers while a suited official delivered the driest public humiliation SHIELD had received in years.
"The United Kingdom takes any undeclared foreign intelligence activity on British soil extremely seriously. Relevant personnel have been detained where identified, properties are being secured, and liaison with the United States government is ongoing."
The man paused just long enough to suggest that the liaison was not going pleasantly.
"We are conducting an immediate review of all unauthorised SHIELD operations touching British nationals, institutions, and infrastructure."
The clip cuts to Paris. Then Berlin. Then Madrid. Then Brussels, where an EU spokesperson with the face of a patient undertaker announced that member states were exchanging information regarding "unauthorised intelligence penetration by a nominally allied external actor".
Translation was unnecessary. Europe was furious and trying to sound civilised about it long enough to finish making arrests.
The Paris correspondent sounded almost pleased.
"French internal security sources tell us that several suspected SHIELD cutouts and safe locations in the greater Paris region have already been raided. One official, speaking off camera, described the files as 'a gift wrapped in arrogance.'"
Berlin was even less polite.
German federal authorities are reviewing evidence of covert recruitment, unauthorised surveillance, and compartmented networks allegedly run without host nation approval. One member of the Bundestag called SHIELD 'a private espionage circus with a diplomatic passport.'
The screen shifted to Moscow.
The Russian presenter did not bother with diplomatic caution.
"FSB units have acted across multiple locations after receiving what one senior source called 'a very helpful delivery from someone with excellent timing and understandable contempt.' Several persons believed to be linked to SHIELD front activity have been detained. Secure materials, communications gear, and false identities were seized. Russian authorities are now demanding a formal explanation from Washington as to why an American strategic organisation believed it could operate an undeclared espionage architecture inside the Russian Federation."
The footage behind him showed men being marched into vehicles with black covers over their heads while uniformed officers carried crates out of an apartment building.
It cut again.
China this time.
The studio anchor spoke in a tone so controlled it had crossed into cruelty.
"State security authorities have initiated immediate operations following the receipt of foreign espionage files exposing unauthorised SHIELD personnel, logistics, and contact chains. Several individuals are in custody. Additional actions remain ongoing. Officials state that hostile intelligence penetration under humanitarian or security cover will be dealt with firmly."
The camera showed a street sealed off by police, plainclothes officers entering a business office, and one black SUV leaving with the sort of finality that suggested its passengers would not be enjoying the evening.
Then Turkey.
The correspondent stood outside a government building in Ankara with barely concealed delight.
"Turkish intelligence and police units have already moved on named assets and support nodes identified in the leak. Officials here are particularly angry over evidence suggesting unauthorised monitoring of military, academic, and political contacts. One senior figure, speaking unofficially, called SHIELD 'a guest who forgot the difference between cooperation and burglary.'"
Back in the main studio, the anchor adjusted her papers and continued with the steady excitement of a person who knew ratings had just been handed to her by divine intervention.
"As of this hour, over four hundred SHIELD operatives, assets, facilitators, and suspected support personnel have reportedly been taken into custody around the globe. Those numbers are expected to rise. In several capitals, local services are still working through the files line by line, and officials describe the leak as unusually organised, highly specific, and professionally humiliating."
She looked into the camera with the sort of solemnity that only made the insult worse.
One of Fury's agents made the mistake of exhaling too loudly.
Fury turned his head.
The man straightened so fast it nearly counted as self-harm.
The broadcast rolled on. The anchor moved to Washington's reaction next.
"The State Department has declined direct comment on operational questions and referred broader inquiries to SHIELD. Which has not yet issued a public response, which may be due to, among other factors, widespread reports of internal systems failure at SHIELD facilities this morning."
The corner of the screen filled with a smaller image of the Triskelion.
"Unconfirmed sources describe severe technical disruption affecting communications, surveillance, and data systems. We should stress that this has not yet been officially verified."
Fury looked up slowly from the tablet.
The engineering chief standing at the door chose that exact moment to speak.
"It is verified, sir."
Fury handed the tablet back without taking his eye off him.
From somewhere inside the heap in Fury's office came a pained moan that sounded suspiciously like a man trying to say "help" through a broken lip.
Fury stepped into the room at last, moving round the bodies with the careful contempt of a man who knew at least two of them had probably deserved being hit for something else entirely.
He stopped at the sticky note finger and stared at it.
"Who was on watch outside my office?"
Nobody answered immediately.
Then Hill came through the doorway. She understood clearly that hiding was not an option. Her expression hard and perfectly controlled, she had already been angry for some time and was now using discipline as a weapon.
"Whoever it was is in the pile."
Fury looked at her.
"How bad?"
Hill folded a paper report once and kept it in her hand.
"We are rebuilding communications by hand. Field teams are checking in through backup channels, commercial lines, and in one case, a pay phone. Three foreign liaison desks have already demanded clarification. The British want names. The Russians want apologies they can reject in public. The Chinese want explanations they can use as evidence. Half of Europe wants to know how long we thought we could get away with this. The other half wants to know why they weren't told sooner, so they could be offended on schedule."
One corner of Fury's mouth tightened.
"Anything else?"
Hill handed him a paper.
Fury read the first page in silence.
Then the second.
Then he looked up.
"A new potion."
Hill nodded.
"Initial reports indicate a strengthening variant. Temporary enhancement. Noctis's rough description to his clients suggests around fivefold gains to strength, agility, endurance, and recovery for approximately half an hour, though the duration and the effects are yet to be confirmed. Local chatter got to multiple parties before it got to us, because our electronic systems currently rank below a banana republic and just above shouting out of windows."
One of the bruised agents in the pile made a strained sound that might have been a laugh, a cough, or a death wish.
Fury ignored it.
"Who else has the intel?"
"Private buyers are already sniffing. Several foreign services. Criminal intermediaries. At least one corporate acquisition team, because apparently the world is full of idiots who hear 'temporary super soldier' and immediately ask about margins."
Fury read the line again.
A strengthening potion.
As if healing and stamina had not already been enough of a disaster.
He pictured Noctis somewhere comfortable, smug, offensive, and very likely enjoying himself. That alone was enough to turn the inside of Fury's skull into a furnace.
Another officer hurried to the doorway with a fresh paper in hand.
"Director, we've got confirmation from London, Moscow, and Beijing. More arrests are coming. The Chinese have sealed at least three nodes we know of. And Fox just put a retired British intelligence man on air to explain why SHIELD has apparently been running around Europe like it owned a skeleton key."
Fury took a slow breath.
He did not calm down. He simply organised the anger into cleaner shelves.
"Get every surviving counterintelligence lead into one room. Paper only. No network dependence. Pull legal, analysis, and," he gazed at the room. "Whatever remains of operations, and tell medical to start sorting that pile before one of them drowns in his own stupidity." He jabbed a finger at the sticky note on the wall. "Take that down."
No one moved for a second.
Fury's voice dropped another degree.
"Move."
The room came alive.
Agents started hauling the injured out. Medics rushed in. Hill turned to relay orders. The engineering chief fled before someone gave him more work out loud.
Fury remained where he was in the middle of the wreckage, breathing through the sort of fury that wanted property damage and names.
He looked once at the ruined office, once at the empty door, then up at the ceiling as if Noctis might be hiding there out of spite.
When he finally shouted, it came out of him like a pulled wire and hit the corridor hard enough that people outside stopped moving.
"NOCTIS!"