Just as Marcus was lost in the grand vision of his plan to destroy the world, a sound broke his thoughts.
Tony Stark—who had been snoring loudly on the couch beside him—stirred from his drunken slumber. He stretched lazily, groaning, and then blinked blearily at Marcus for several long seconds before suddenly jumping in surprise.
"Whoa! Why the hell is there a guy sitting next to me?" he exclaimed, rubbing his eyes. "Don't tell me you did something to me while I was asleep."
Marcus's expression darkened. "That's not really the question you should be asking, Mr. Tony Stark. You're the one who knocked me out and dragged me to your house. Honestly, I thought I'd wake up in a prison hospital, not your living room."
Tony smirked and waved a hand dismissively. "Sorry, kid. When I need something, the government gets in line behind me."
He said it casually, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, his tone revealing just how much influence he wielded. After fumbling around under the couch, he pulled out a clipboard filled with medical notes, rubbing his temples to chase off the last of his hangover.
"Taking care of you hasn't been easy, you know," he said. "For a whole week, I've had to pump you full of nutrient solution—ten times the standard dosage just to keep your vitals stable. You should thank me. No hospital doctor would've dared to do that. Oh, and I've been sedating you with a heavy anesthetic—also ten times the normal amount. Seems to have worked."
Marcus glanced down at his body. Though his muscles felt weak from the drug-induced paralysis, he could sense that his bio-energy had fully replenished. A hundred percent.
"So," Marcus asked evenly, "what did you find out about me?"
Tony scanned the papers, his voice thoughtful. "Well, your body's completely abnormal. You heal way too fast. I tried cutting you open once—wound closed right before my eyes. Not exactly polite, by the way. On a cellular level, you're… weird. Your nuclei are shrunken, but your mitochondria and centrosomes are off the charts. Your blood has no platelets, your red blood cells are huge, and everything else is just… wrong. To be honest, your biology is more complicated than my Iron Man armor."
Marcus let out a quiet breath of relief. Tony hadn't discovered the virus.
If the billionaire genius had found the truth—that Marcus carried the zombie plague—Marcus would have killed him without hesitation, no matter the cost.
For now, things were going perfectly.
He just needed to wait until the anesthetics wore off. Then he could infect Tony with Virus Touch and turn him into the most powerful zombie ally the world had ever seen.
"Alright, kid," Tony said, tossing the medical file onto the table. He slipped on a sleek transparent visor and tapped it once. "Now we can talk about what really matters—what the hell happened last week? Why'd you kill all those people?"
Marcus met his gaze, voice calm. "Because they tried to kill me first."
He gave a straightforward account of being ambushed by the gang members but carefully omitted any mention of the virus serums.
Tony nodded slightly, then pressed a button on his visor. "Jarvis, lie detector results?"
"All readings stable, sir. No signs of deception detected."
Marcus smirked faintly. A lie detector built for humans… Tony was clever, but not clever enough. Marcus wasn't technically human anymore. He was something else—an evolved organism that only remembered being human.
Unaware of the truth, Tony relaxed. Having once been kidnapped by terrorists and forced to build weapons before fighting his way to freedom, he felt a strange kinship with Marcus's story. Still, he couldn't ignore the sheer brutality of Marcus's actions.
"I get it. They deserved it," Tony said slowly. "But the way you killed them—didn't it scare you? Even a little?"
Marcus tilted his head. That was actually a useful question.
A lie formed in his mind—a story so big, so horrifying, that it would make Tony believe every word.
He kept his face perfectly blank as he began.
"That wasn't cruelty, Tony," he said softly. "That was survival."
He spoke in a calm, detached voice—like a man reciting a nightmare that had long since lost its meaning.
"If you'd been trained to kill with a gun at age eight… forced to murder your best friend at ten… sent on assassination missions alone at eleven… and then escaped your captors only to be gunned down in the street by thugs… then you'd understand what real cruelty is."
Tony froze. The glass of whiskey in his hand trembled slightly. He swallowed hard, eyes flicking toward Marcus with visible shock.
"That's… horrific," he muttered. "What kind of organization would do that to a child?"
Marcus gave him the perfect answer—one that no one in the Marvel world could easily dispute.
He leaned forward slightly, his tone low and deliberate.
"Hail Hydra."
The three syllables hung in the air like a curse.
Of course—Hydra. In this world, whenever something sinister, mysterious, or unspeakably cruel needed a scapegoat, Hydra fit the bill perfectly. And the beauty of it was that they'd never show up to deny it.
It was a flawless lie, wrapped in truth.
If Marcus ever needed to justify his knowledge of future events, he could easily claim it came from his time with Hydra.
Tony's brows furrowed. "Hydra, huh… I've heard the name. Thought they were just a bunch of old war fanatics."
'That confirmed it—the timeline hadn't yet reached the Avengers era. Tony had no idea of Hydra's true scale yet.'
Fascinated by Marcus's supposed powers, he asked, "So Hydra can create superhumans now?"
Marcus didn't hesitate for even a moment. "No. My powers awakened after I escaped them. But before that, I knew of two other enhanced subjects—a pair of siblings. The brother could move faster than sound, and the sister could manipulate minds."
Every word he said was true—borrowed straight from the future. There was no way Tony could disprove it.
The lie was perfect. Every detail verifiable.
And the truth, ironically, was what made it so convincing.
Tony nodded slowly, his eyes narrowing with intrigue.
"I see," he murmured. "Looks like Hydra's bigger than I thought."
Marcus leaned back against the couch, concealing his quiet satisfaction.
His first great deception in this world had succeeded.
He'd planted the seed of trust—and more importantly, misdirection.
From this moment on, Tony Stark would never see Marcus Vale as the threat he truly was.
____
T/N:
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