Looking at Daisy's panicked expression, Gene couldn't help but find it amusing.
He hadn't expected a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent to actually believe what she saw in movies.
"No, no, Mr. Black Devil, I swear—I'll never reveal your identity to anyone!" Daisy was on the verge of tears now.
Her original plan had been simple: tell the Black Devil everything she knew about the Inhumans' conspiracy and then rely on his overwhelming strength to crush their schemes. That was the plan. But who could've predicted that the Black Devil would pull off his mask without a care in the world—and that behind it, wasn't even a mask at all?
Unlike Stark's flamboyant suits of armor, the Black Devil appeared to be something else entirely. Tony Stark wrapped flesh in steel. But this man—no, this being—was wrapping steel around… something else entirely. Something more alien. Something more inhuman.
That's when Daisy's mind made a connection. A faint flicker of memory—one of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s most classified files suddenly floated into her thoughts. It described a massive global cyberattack from four years ago. An attack that had peeled away the layers of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s secrets like tissue paper.
"You… You're..." Daisy pointed at Gene with her eyes closed tight, her voice trembling, "...you're the one from four years ago. That Gene Mason is this Gene Mason!"
Most people wouldn't understand the weight of what she just said.
"That's right. I'm that Gene Mason," he said, tilting his head slightly, eyeing her calmly. "So… are you ready?"
"No, no, no, I'm not ready at all. Look—look, I can forget! I swear, I can pretend none of this ever happened!" Daisy babbled desperately. "You've got crazy advanced tech, right? You can erase my memory or something!"
Suddenly, an unseen force compelled Daisy to open her eyes.
And she found herself locked in Gene's gaze.
That's it. This was how it ends.
Would he vaporize her with a blast of energy? Or go classic—bullet to the head? Or worse, would he abduct her and use her as a test subject, locked away in some underground lab for eternity?
All these dark thoughts flashed through Daisy's mind in the span of a heartbeat.
But the killing blow never came.
When she dared to peek, she found Gene casually seated in a high-tech chair, regarding her with faint amusement.
"Please, have a seat, Miss Daisy," Gene said gently.
She hesitated but eventually obeyed, seating herself across from him, tense as a drawn bowstring.
"So, Miss Daisy…" Gene's crimson visor gleamed. "After witnessing our strength firsthand—are you interested in joining us?"
Though still shaken, Daisy picked up on the key word in his sentence.
"We?" she echoed warily. "Mr. Mason, do you mean… you've got a team?"
Gene let out a soft laugh, then snapped his fingers.
A giant holographic display materialized between them.
Daisy's eyes widened in disbelief.
On the screen, she could see her boss—Director Coulson—in the middle of an op. Elsewhere, a group of mutants were wreaking havoc. Then—telecom logs from ordinary citizens flashed past. The sheer depth of surveillance left her stunned.
"These… all of these are things you monitor?" Daisy asked, her voice weak.
But then, something far more shocking appeared: the floating space headquarters of S.W.O.R.D., a gleaming sword-shaped station hanging silently in orbit, surrounded by a web of Starlink satellites that never slept—watching the Earth in its entirety.
Gene pushed an electronic invitation across the table toward her.
Out of reflex, Daisy glanced down.
On the screen was a sleek circular emblem, pierced through the middle with an upside-down sword.
"Sentient World Observation and Response Division…" she murmured aloud, stumbling a little over the name. "S.W.O.R.D.?"
Looking up, Daisy met Gene's eyes. "So when you said we... you meant—?"
"Yes." Gene nodded. "With S.H.I.E.L.D. crumbling, the Earth needs a new force. One powerful enough to deal with the threats coming our way."
As he spoke, the screen began playing video footage of S.W.O.R.D.'s elite strike teams—the Sword unit and the Sharp Blade squad—neutralizing threats around the globe.
The final clip froze on a scene of Gene battling Galactus.
Even in hologram form, the titanic clash radiated unfathomable energy. Daisy's hair stood on end.
The sheer scale of it shook her.
That… that wasn't just some superhero battle. That was cosmic war.
"Why me?" she whispered, clenching the electronic invitation.
Gene looked at her directly. "Because you're new to S.H.I.E.L.D., uncorrupted. Because I see the tremendous potential inside you. You only need proper guidance."
"Join S.W.O.R.D.," he continued, his voice resonant. "And you'll witness things you never even imagined."
As his words faded, Daisy felt the air shift again.
In a blink, she was no longer in that high-tech chamber.
Standing inside her own station.
For a moment, she thought it had all been a hallucination.
But when she looked down and saw the electronic invitation still in her hand, she knew—
"...S.W.O.R.D.," Daisy whispered to herself.
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