"Skrulls?" Thor said, his expression shifting to something more serious. "That is a really dangerous race. I've heard stories about them across the Nine Realms."
He stepped closer to Fury, his cape swishing behind him. "Some time ago they attempted to take over one of the Kree Empire's main governmental planets. They infiltrated the entire leadership structure by transforming into their leaders, their generals, their administrators."
"But after being caught, after the deception was discovered," Thor continued, his voice carrying the weight of cosmic history, "they were directly wiped out. The Kree showed no mercy. Entire colony worlds, civilian populations, everything—obliterated."
He looked at Fury with genuine curiosity. "How did they even get to Earth? The Kree should have hunted down every last refuge, every scattered remnant."
Fury felt a little embarrassed suddenly, heat rising to his face despite his legendary composure.
He'd always thought that the Skrull shapeshifting ability was incredibly useful, a valuable intelligence asset. That's why he'd never fully understood why the Kree Empire wanted to wipe them out completely even after the Skrulls had surrendered, even after they'd stopped being a military threat.
It had seemed like overkill, like genocide driven by hatred rather than strategic necessity.
But no—now, after hearing it from Thor, after seeing what the Skrulls had just done to Earth, he finally understood completely.
They were fucking snakes who would bite at any moment, who would betray anyone who showed them kindness the instant it became convenient, Fury thought with cold clarity. If he was in the Kree's position, he would have wanted to wipe them out too. No question.
Wait—something's wrong with that thought, Fury corrected himself. He IS in that position now. He IS dealing with the Skrulls right now. And he DOES want to wipe them out.
But first, he needed to deal with Asgard before he could properly handle those green-skinned bastards.
Anyway, even though he felt distinctly embarrassed by Earth's naivety, by his own failure to properly vet the refugees, Fury continued with the explanation.
"It happened like this," he began, keeping his voice professional. "While they were being chased across the galaxy by Kree strike forces, they came to Earth seeking sanctuary. They claimed they were victims of unprovoked aggression, that their homeworld had been destroyed without cause."
"They told us the Kree were hunting the remaining Skrull population for genocide, for sport," Fury continued. "We felt... sympathy for their situation. We agreed to let them hide here, to give them refuge."
Because we were idiots, he didn't add aloud. Because we saw ourselves as the good guys helping the underdog and didn't do proper threat assessment.
After hearing the explanation, Thor nodded slowly, his expression understanding.
"I understand. I understand how it happened," Thor said, his tone surprisingly gentle. "Although the situation developed in this unfortunate way, we can overlook this matter. It was a mistake born of compassion, however misguided."
"But," he continued, his voice taking on a formal quality, "as long as you return our soldier unharmed, we can negotiate on all other points. Asgard is not unreasonable. We understand miscommunication and accidents."
Although Thor suspected they might be lying about some details, that the full story was probably more complicated, he really didn't care about the complete truth. As long as there was a plausible excuse to avoid fighting with Earth, that was fine. Hela had been clear: find a diplomatic solution if at all possible.
Fighting Elric and Borgin would be... problematic. Costly.
"The soldier has been killed," Fury said quietly, the words falling like stones into still water.
BOOM!
A massive thunderbolt directly struck the building above them, the concussive force shaking the entire underground facility. Dust and debris rained from the ceiling. Alarms began blaring as structural sensors detected the damage.
Thor's eyes were literally glowing with electrical energy, arcs of lightning dancing across his armor and beard. His hand had moved to Mjolnir's handle, white-knuckled with barely controlled rage.
For a long, terrible moment, nobody moved. Nobody breathed.
Then Thor took a deep breath, the lightning slowly fading from his eyes, and spoke through gritted teeth.
"Explain. Now."
Emergency Security Council Meeting - Virtual Conference
"So what is the final result, Fury?" one of the Council members asked, his face appearing on the large screen.
"Anyway, let's just hand over the troublesome Skrulls to them," another member suggested dismissively. "Maybe the Asgardians can solve the Skrull problem for Earth permanently. Clean up our mess."
"We can't let the Skrulls stay here after what they've done anyway," a third agreed. "They're a security threat, an infiltration risk. We should have killed them years ago."
Fury's face darkened, his expression grim.
"They have agreed not to declare war," he said slowly, "as long as we agree to their conditions. Asgard is willing to negotiate a settlement."
"Yes! Fury, I definitely knew you could do that!" one of the Council members said with visible relief. "I never doubted you could pull off a diplomatic solution!"
Several other faces showed similar expressions of satisfaction, of disaster averted.
Seeing their happy, relieved faces, a strange feeling of satisfaction suddenly grew in Fury's heart. Not pleasure—something darker. The satisfaction of watching people who'd ignored his warnings finally face consequences.
"Their condition," Fury continued, his voice flat, "is to hand over everyone who is responsible for this incident."
"Yeah, Fury, we heard you the first time," one member said impatiently. "Catch all the Skrulls you can find—every single one on the planet. Round them up and hand them over to the Asgardians. Let Thor's people deal with them however they see fit."
"No," Fury interrupted. "You don't understand. They mean ALL the people who are responsible."
He didn't finish his verbal explanation, but his eyes naturally drifted toward five specific people present in the virtual conference—the five members of the World Security Council who had directly approved and pushed for the operation against his advice.
The five who'd overruled his objections and made this disaster inevitable.
"Impossible!" one of them sputtered, his face going red. "Absolutely absurd! Who do they think they are?!"
"We're not criminals! We didn't attack anyone!" another protested.
Before they could continue their outraged denials, Nick interrupted with cold professionalism.
"They have a way to determine who was responsible," he said. "Some kind of magical truth-seeking method. So I strongly recommend against sending scapegoats or trying to substitute other people. It won't work."
"Although I don't know the exact mechanics of how their detection works," Fury added, "I don't think it's a good idea to test whether you can fool Asgardian magic. The consequences of failure would be... severe."
"And also," he continued before they could formulate new objections, "they will take the current faction leader as a prisoner for life, as a guarantee of good behavior. A hostage against future aggression."
"That means the President," Fury said, looking directly at the screen.
The President's face had gone completely white.
Silence fell over the conference.
The implications were sinking in. This wasn't just about punishing a few intelligence agents or blaming some refugees. This was about the most powerful people on Earth being held personally accountable by a cosmic power.
"This is outrageous," someone finally whispered. "We can't just... we're world leaders. We have sovereignty. We have—"
"We have nothing," Fury interrupted bluntly. "Nothing that matters to Asgard. They could reduce this planet to asteroids if they wanted to. Our sovereignty exists at their pleasure, and we just attacked them."
"So the question isn't whether their demands are fair or reasonable," he concluded. "The question is whether we prefer to hand over a few people or condemn the entire human race."
Internet - Global Information Network
While the high-level negotiations were ongoing behind closed doors, a strange rumor had started to float around the internet.
It began in obscure forums, conspiracy theory websites, the kinds of places where people discussed alien abductions and government cover-ups.
The rumor claimed that Earth had attacked an alien civilization unprovoked, and that these aliens were now demanding Earth hand over specific people to them for punishment.
It might have been dismissed as just another weird rumor floating around the internet, the kind that appeared and vanished within hours, forgotten as quickly as it emerged.
But this one was different.
Almost like this particular rumor had some kind of magical power behind it, some force pushing it forward, it spread quickly—going viral across every social media platform simultaneously.
And its effect was even more tremendous than anyone could have predicted.
Within hours, it had millions of views, hundreds of thousands of shares.
Within a day, it was trending on every platform, discussed on news networks.