We hit D.C. just as the sun started coming up.
The city was already a mess. The data dump from Camp Lehigh had been live for hours, and the fallout was everywhere. News choppers circled the airspace around the Triskelion. The roads leading to the headquarters were jammed with military vehicles and confused federal agents.
Steve headed straight for the hangars to make sure Pierce's Helicarriers never left the ground while Natasha went to find Fury, who was preparing to breach the system from the inside.
I took the front door.
The main lobby of the Triskelion was pure chaos. Analysts were sprinting down hallways with armfuls of hard drives. Sirens blared over the intercoms. A squad of STRIKE mercenaries in heavy tactical gear blocked the security checkpoints, trying to lock down the building.
They spotted me walking through the glass entrance. The team leader shouted an order, raising his rifle. The rest of the squad followed, aiming their laser sights at my chest.
I kept walking.
I pushed their blood pressure past the limit.
It took less than a second.
One of the men gasped. Another stumbled backward. Then they all collapsed at once, dropping heavily onto the marble floor in a pile of armor and rifles.
Unconscious.
I stepped over them and took the private elevator to the top floor.
The Council Chambers were quiet. I pushed open the glass doors. Inside, Alexander Pierce stood near the large windows overlooking the Potomac. Four members of the World Security Council sat at the table. Two STRIKE guards stood in the corners with rifles ready. Pierce held a silver pistol, pointing it loosely at Councilman Singh.
Pierce turned when the doors opened. His eyes widened as his arrogant mask cracked instantly. He actually took a step back.
"You," Pierce breathed. The silver pistol in his hand wavered, his knuckles going white. "You were at Camp."
"Yes," I said, walking further into the room.
Pierce swallowed hard. The control he always projected was gone, replaced by raw fear. He reached into his suit jacket with a trembling hand and grabbed a small fob.
"Zola warned me you were a variable," Pierce said, his voice tight. "I built a contingency just in case."
He pressed the button. The ceiling panels above me slid open. Four heavy, metallic drones dropped down, locking onto my position. They vibrated with a violent, bright blue light, reverse-engineered Tesseract technology. It was a localized containment field, designed to vaporize whatever was caught inside.
The beams fired, converging directly on me in a blinding flash of blue heat.
The STRIKE guards flinched away from the sudden brightness. Pierce just stared, his chest heaving, desperate for the trap to work.
When the light faded, I was still standing there. My clothes weren't even singed. The blue energy bled off my skin and faded into harmless heat.
Pierce's mouth opened slightly. His backup plan had failed entirely.
I didn't wait for the drones to recharge. I raised my hand and swung it to the side.
The air in the room warped violently. The four heavy drones were ripped out of the ceiling and crushed into scrap metal against the far wall with a loud crunch. The shockwave of the movement didn't stop there. It hit Pierce like a physical blow. He was thrown off his feet, sent flying backward through the air before crashing hard onto the polished conference table.
The STRIKE guards froze for a split second before trying to raise their rifles.
I looked at them.
Their vision went white and they collapsed to the floor before their fingers could find the triggers.
Pierce groaned, rolling off the table and dropping heavily to his knees. He looked at the fallen guards, then back up at me. The pragmatism finally gave way to pure, blind panic.
He raised his silver pistol and pulled the trigger.
The gunshot was deafening in the enclosed room. The bullet didn't even reach me. It hit a wall of condensed space a foot from my chest, flattened like a coin, and dropped uselessly onto the carpet.
The room went completely silent. The Council members stared at the flattened lead on the floor, their breathing shallow.
Pierce lowered his shaking hand. He dropped the gun.
Pierce understood power. And he knew when he had lost it.
"It's over, Pierce," I said.
Pierce looked at his fallen weapon one more time. He finally realized that all his plans meant absolutely nothing.
He pulled himself up, pulled out a chair, and sat down at the table.
He didn't say a word.
I left him there with the Council and walked back out the glass doors.