The sun rose over Brooklyn with a relentless glare that Raizer found personally offensive. He sat at his kitchen table, staring into a cup of black coffee that had gone cold. On the screen of his phone, a grainy video was playing for the hundredth time.
It was him. Or rather, a version of him that the internet had invented. The Manhattan Sphinx. The video captured the moment his King Engine had roared to life in Harlem. Even through the low-quality mic of a smartphone, the 'thump-thump-thump' sounded like a rhythmic death knell.
"Troublesome," Raizer muttered, his voice raspy.
He had spent years building a life of calculated invisibility. He was the man who blended into the grey wallpaper of corporate America. Now, he was a global trending topic.
[Cheer up, Host!] The System chirped, appearing in a flurry of pixels. [You're a star! Your fame is through the roof. You could probably walk into a bank and they'd give you the vault keys just to make the noise stop!]
"I don't want the vault keys. I want my commute to be quiet," Raizer replied.
When Raizer stepped into the lobby of his office building, he braced for the usual friction of the morning rush. Instead, he found a red carpet of fear.
As he approached the elevators, the crowd of harried interns and executives parted like the Red Sea. A man who usually elbowed Raizer aside to get in first now held the door open with a trembling hand, staring at the floor as if Raizer were a solar eclipse that would blind him upon direct contact.
Walking through the accounting firm was even stranger.
"Good morning, Mr. Raizer!" his manager chirped. This was a man who usually communicated in grunts and 'as-per-my-last-email' memos. Today, he was standing by Raizer's cubicle with a box of premium donuts. "I noticed your chair looked a bit... ergonomic-deficient. We've ordered you the executive mesh-back. It should be here by noon."
Raizer sat down. His desk was spotless. His inbox, usually overflowing with urgent errors from other departments, was suspiciously clean.
He looked around and realized the truth: They weren't being nice. They were being accommodating out of survival instinct. Because of King's Aura, his colleagues weren't seeing 'Raizer the Accountant.' They were seeing a predator who had stared down a Gamma-monster and won. To them, a typo in a spreadsheet was no longer a clerical error; it was a potential trigger for a city-level disaster.
'They're treating me like a bomb that might go off if the coffee is too cold,' Raizer realized, a warm feeling rising up in his heart. 'Cool! No need to strike up conversations anymore!'
The accommodating atmosphere didn't stop at the office. On his lunch break, Raizer sat on a park bench, trying to enjoy a sandwich in peace. He noticed a woman in a jogging suit sitting ten feet away. She was stretching, but her eyes never left his perimeter.
Through his senses, Raizer sensed the rhythmic, trained breathing of a soldier. He saw the shape of a subcompact pistol hidden in her small-of-back holster.
'S.H.I.E.L.D. or Hydra or Secret Service... Man, Marvel has a lot of shady organizations.' He thought, 'They don't know what I am, so they're measuring the wake I leave behind.'
Naturally, it was SHIELD. The teammate that got more kills through friendly fire than enemy kills.
To Nick Fury and his team, Raizer was a Black Box. They couldn't see his inhuman stats or his Orario history. All they saw was an "Abnormal"; a man whose heartbeat could shatter glass but who chose to spend his days calculating depreciation assets for a mid-sized firm. In their eyes, he was either the world's most dangerous sleeper agent or a brand-new category of threat that required immediate neutralization.
By the time he reached his apartment that evening, Raizer was mentally exhausted. Pretty satisfied by the day. But as he reached his landing, he sensed a presence.
Standing by his door was a man who defined the word 'unassuming'. He wore a sensible suit, had a slightly receding hairline, and carried a polite, practiced smile that didn't quite reach his eyes.
"Mr. Raizer," the man said, holding up a sleek tablet. "I'm Phil Coulson. I represent a strategic division of the government."
Raizer didn't move. "I don't need insurance, and I already contribute to the police fund."
"This is about a different kind of fund," Coulson said, tapping the tablet. "Specifically, the $350,000 in housing loans that you've been carrying for the last five years. As of ten minutes ago, my organization has purchased those debts in full. You don't owe the bank anything anymore."
Raizer's eyes narrowed. In the world of finance, there was no such thing as a free lunch. "And the catch?"
"We're interested in your... unusual skills," Coulson replied. "Join S.H.I.E.L.D. Put that 'power' of yours to work for the good of the planet, and we'll erase the debt. You start fresh. Zero worries."
Coulson specified the word 'Power', despite SHIELD having no clue on what it was. But they knew that this man wasn't ordinary.
Raizer looked at the tablet, then at Coulson. To any other man, this was the dream. Freedom from the crushing weight of interest rates. But Raizer knew better. Joining a government agency meant meetings. It meant team-building exercises. It meant more people in his personal space.
"You've miscalculated," Raizer said, his voice cold and final.
"Excuse me?" Coulson blinked.
"Peace is an asset that doesn't have a price tag. I'd rather be in debt to a bank than in debt to a man who keeps secrets for a living. Don't come back."
- SLAM!
Raizer shut the door, the sound echoing through the hallway. He leaned against the wood, listening to the silence of his apartment. Outside, he heard Coulson sigh and the soft rustle of a suit jacket as the agent walked away.
[HOST!] The System screamed, appearing in a flurry of red pixels. [THAT WAS THREE HUNDRED AND FIFTY THOUSAND DOLLARS! WE COULD HAVE LIVED LIKE KINGS AFTER PAYING THE DEBT!!]
"Because," Raizer muttered, walking toward his kitchen to put on the kettle. "If I work for them, I have to answer the phone when it rings. I don't pick up calls after timing out, personal policy."
[HMPH! Fine! But don't complain when we're eating instant ramen for the rest of the month!]
Raizer could only shake his head at the system's chiding. The AI didn't understand how world worked.
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Deep within the Helicarrier, a series of monitors flickered with Raizer's biometric data—or rather, the lack thereof. Nick Fury stood with his arms crossed, staring at the playback of Raizer's heart rate during the Harlem incident.
"Talk to me, Coulson," Fury barked. "What did we get from the house call?"
"He's... uncooperative, sir," Coulson replied, standing at a stiff attention. "And he's not an easy read. When I stood in front of his door, I felt a physical pressure on my chest. It wasn't telekinesis; it was more like my own body was telling me I was standing in front of a predator. But the lab results are a mess."
He swiped a finger across a tablet, bringing up a graph of the King Engine's acoustic signature.
"His heart doesn't beat; it pounds. It resonates at a frequency that shouldn't be possible for human anatomy. Yet, he lives in a walk-up, pays his taxes, and hasn't shown any active 'super' abilities like flight or energy projection. He just... stands there."
"An out-of-the-ordinary human," Fury narrowed his eye, "Or not a human at all?"
As one of the only ones privy to the secrets of the world, he knew that there were various monsters out there.
Mutants, Inhumans, Sorcerers... And Aliens.
"If we can't recruit him, we need to know exactly how to neutralize him if he decides to stop being an accountant."
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.
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Raizer stepped out of his building, hoping the viral fame would be a one-day wonder. He was wrong. At least, he learned to minimize the pressure that his King's Aura emitted. Now, he won't be making babies cry anymore.
The local barista, who usually barely acknowledged his existence, handed him his black coffee with trembling hands, refusing to take his five-dollar bill. A group of teenagers across the street began whispering and pointing their phones, clearly debating whether to ask for an autograph or run for their lives.
Raizer pulled his collar up, feeling the King's Aura vibrating under his skin. Because he was annoyed, the Aura was inadvertently loud. As he walked, a stray dog on the corner stopped barking and whimpered, tucking its tail between its legs. A cyclist nearby lost his balance and wobbled into a parked car just from catching Raizer's gaze.
[HOST! WARNING!] The System flickered into his vision, its red text pulsing. [Your 'Trouble' metric is rising! You're currently emitting enough 'Main Character Energy' to be detected from orbit! If you don't find a way to lower your profile, the paparazzi are going to be the least of your concerns.]
"I'm trying to control the trait," Raizer hissed under his breath. "But the more they stare, the more I want to destroy their very existence."
As he entered the subway station, he noticed a woman in a sharp business suit reading a newspaper. She didn't look up, but his Absolute Control-enhanced senses picked up the concealed holster under her arm and the earpiece tucked into her hair.
S.H.I.E.L.D. wasn't taking "No" for an answer. They were watching. They were measuring. And they were terrified.
[Host...] The System whispered, for once sounding almost empathetic. [You realize that by slamming the door on S.H.I.E.L.D. last night, you just moved from their 'Recruit' list to their 'Priority Watchlist', right?]
"I know," Raizer said, loosening his tie. "But at least I'm doing my own taxes."
If one asked him about his fears, Raizer wouldn't answer SHIELD. He was say IRS. Those bastards were like roaches, stomp one of them, another one pops out. More importantly, evolving at an insanely rapid pace.
Shivers ran down his spine as he snapped his head around, 'IRS? Is it you? I know it's you!!'
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High above the Nine Realms, in the golden halls of Asgard, the atmosphere was thick with divine contemplation. Odin Borson sat upon Hlidskjalf, his lone eye narrowed as he stared into the void. His gaze, which usually traversed galaxies, was currently snagged on a microscopic speck of blue, Midgard.
"Ho…" Odin rumbled, his voice like grinding tectonic plates. "A mortal whose 'Truth' even my eye cannot read? A soul shielded by a rhythm that echoes the drum of the universe itself."
He leaned back, his fingers tracing the cold metal of Gungnir. "Perhaps this 'Accountant' holds a clue to avoiding Ragnarok. Or perhaps he simply knows how to balance a budget better than Thor."
He looked up at the crystalline ceiling of the throne room. His thoughts drifted to the shadows—to a daughter hidden in the dark and a prophecy of fire.
"She will be returning soon," he whispered. "I wonder if my two sons will be enough to stop her. I only hope Loki isn't hurt too badly by my choices. He has a delicate constitution." He paused, his eye shifting toward the training grounds where a certain blonde thunder god was currently being hit by lightning. "As for the older sibling... Thor can tank a hit or two. He'll be fine. He's sturdy."
Thousands of miles away, Thor suddenly dropped his hammer, a look of profound, existential confusion crossing his face. "Why do I suddenly feel as though I was found in a frost-covered basket?"
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Back on Earth, within the hushed, incense-heavy halls of Kamar-Taj, a bald woman sat in deep meditation. The Ancient One held the Eye of Agamotto between her palms; the relic glowed with a rhythmic, emerald pulse that matched the beating of a heart in Brooklyn.
"What are you searching for, Sorcerer Supreme?"
Wong, the librarian, approached with a stack of scrolls, his brow furrowed. He watched as the woman smiled a mysterious, knowing smile—the kind that usually preceded a massive magical headache for everyone else.
"I was wondering if someone had learned to control Time better than I," she replied, her voice airy. "It seems this man isn't ordinary. He doesn't move through the flow of time; the flow of time negotiates with him."
As if sensing a gaze from the stars, she tilted her head back and gave a polite, mocking wave toward the ceiling—specifically toward a one-eyed, God King on a different planet.
"I hope Strange grows quickly," she sighed. "We're going to need someone with a very high patience threshold."
"Who is 'Strange'?" Wong asked, looking around the empty room. He leaned in closer, his voice dropping to a whisper. "Master, are you... feeling alright? The age, the isolation... is it finally getting to your mind?"
- SSSHHH-WHIP!
A spark-filled orange portal snapped open beneath Wong's feet. Before he could let out a second syllable, he plummeted through.
"AASHHH—!"
The portal closed with a satisfied pop, leaving behind a faint scent of snow and yaks. The Ancient One adjusted her robes, her expression serene. "I am not that old, Wong. And the Everest air is good for discipline."
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In the quiet suburbs of Westchester, the air was suddenly punctured by the excitement of a young boy.
"Professor! Professor, look at this!"
The boy skidded across the polished wood floors of the study, shoving a smartphone under the nose of a man sitting in a high-tech wheelchair. Charles Xavier turned, the sunlight reflecting off his remarkably smooth scalp with a blinding intensity.
"What is it, Bobby?"
He looked at the screen. It was the grainy footage of Raizer. Even through a digital recording, Charles felt a psychic 'hum'—a wall of mental static so dense that it tore through the video and struck him.
"Do you think he's one of us?" Bobby asked breathlessly. "He stood there and the big guy just... left!"
Charles went silent. He reached out with his mind, searching for a signature, only to be met with the rhythmic 'THUMP-THUMP-THUMP' of the King Engine. It didn't feel like a mutation. It felt like an inevitability.
"I... may need to check that," Xavier murmured, his expression grim. "The winds are changing, Bobby. The future of our kind is already bleak, but this man... by the sound of those beats and the sheer terror he exudes, he is clearly Omega-level."
He sighed, rubbing his temples. It seemed the world was entering a new era. An era where every powerful, bald-headed visionary in the multiverse was suddenly, simultaneously, very interested in an accountant from Brooklyn.
(In Asgard: "I'M NOT BALD!" Odin screamed, shaking Gungnir at the sky. "It's a receding hairline caused by divine stress!")