DoorMan (MCU SI)

Disclaimer - I don't, and have never claimed to, own Marvel or its Intellectual Property. This is all just so that I can take my maladaptive daydreaming and turn it into something so that it does not ruin the rest of my day.

DoorMan #87

Washington DC [February 23, 2008]

–Colin Baxter–

It was odd, having nothing for arms. It kinda made all his T-shirts look droopy, with the sleeves just hanging. Well, no matter what, it looked way better without the mutated flesh he had going on before.

The day he went to the Red Hearth, he stopped whatever it was that Banner was doing and tasked him with scanning his arms because whatever scans that Jin'Ya and the Water Dragon might have run on his hands, they were magical in nature. A scientific look was necessary in his opinion, as Banner gave him the same answer as the others did.

Amputation was necessary and inevitable, in his case because his hands no longer looked like functioning hands and instead began looking like weirdly mutated energy and meat combos that had potential in other fields, according to Bruce anyway.

Despite the actual real life pouts he got from Bruce and Hansen who swore up and down that his arms were actually the key to getting Exrtremis working, he took the executive decision to lock his arms away safely.

He had a lot of work to do and in some corner of his mind, it was being argued that the reason he was throwing himself into work was because he was procrastinating dealing with the loss of his arms but he just shut down that part of his mind and focused on stuff that would help them.

Authorising research on his destroyed arms that contained the energy of an Infinity Stone was not high on the list he wanted to do these days so once he got a proper proposal from the Mad Scientist combo back on Mars and he agreed with them, he might consider giving them access to his former body parts.

So, once the amputation process was done, which was completely painless, he moved on to the next task that was present in his list before he was all sucked into the whole almost dying and potentially killing everyone who was in Ta-Lo because he was such an idiot.

God, it felt like such a long time despite it barely being a couple of days for the events to go from start to end, with the end result in him coming out with two extra pieces with him.

The next task, on hand, before he left for Ta-Lo was…Ross.

General Thunderbolt Ross, someone who was given cancer by yours truly, because the man really did deserve it, and yet, after that, instead of retreating from public life, taking voluntarily retirement and enjoying the medical perks and pension that came with serving Uncle Sam, he found Ross giving press briefings, creating a certain media presence about himself.

All hale and healthy, without an ounce of cancer showing anywhere on his body. No weakness, no trembling body, nothing. Instead, what Colin saw was a healthy man doing tasks people his age should not be able to do, no matter the training they took to remain healthy at that age.

At the same time, he found that the Leader, the other part of the gamma menace, was dead, on paper anyway. The dots connected and which is why he was here, floating high above a very posh locality in Washington, surrounded by security because most of the top brass of the Army lived in this place, cloaked under spells.

Jin'Ya was with him but as was the case with most of his outings, he was going to remain hidden and away from him and would only intervene if there is a credible threat to his life.

Ross was certainly not going to be a threat to the life of the person who just survived being bathed inside out with the energies of an Infinity Stone. Compared to that, Ross and even Leader for that matter seemed like harmless people to him.

So, with a mental flex, the Air Doors situation all across his body calibrated their air output as he slowly began to float down. Usually, doing something like this would go against the spirit of stealth since sensors could track the flow of air and find out that there was an artificial flow around him but for now, it would suffice. 

This was not Wakanda, despite the clear show of opulence all around him.

With ease, he slipped into Ross' office, knowing full well that the man was somehow working well into the night, despite working the entire day. It was as if the man had suddenly become a workaholic, which he was before but he was obsessed like this with only his own projects, not the work he was doing right now, which was cleaning up.

Yup, Ross was disbanding his own team, making sure that the people under him got out safely and were redistributed into other teams while his current projects were either wound down safely or transferred to his peers.

It definitely raised some eyebrows and honestly, if anyone on the outside looked at Ross' actions, they would definitely be confused but if someone knew who exactly was pulling the strings here and why, they would definitely know why this was happening.

The Leader was having Ross clean up his look. He would bet his non-existent arms that soon, there won't even be a paper trail showing Ross' litany of issues and accidents along with his most vocal opposition either quietly disappearing or blackmailed into submission.

All so that Ross could gain more power and provide it to the Leader, who probably had not set his sights on higher pursuits and was content with gaining the power of the President by having a puppet sit on the throne of POTUS.

Well, good for him actually.

"Jin'Ya, got anything?" He mentally asked the Dragon as he casually lounged in the man's chair. There was nothing digital in the man's house, even in his office as even the single computer was hardlined, with no cameras, no sensors, and no wireless networks. Even cellular did not work in this place.

Well, clearly, Ross forgot to include jammers for psionic communication.

"Yes, I have the last known location of the Leader and you were right, Ross was being manipulated with such ease, he really is an idiot."

"Chances of Leader still being there?"

"Pretty high. From what I saw, the Green one was very confident and Ross last met the guy a week ago."

Still, that gave the Leader plenty of time but it wouldn't hurt to check out the base for now.

"In your range?" He asked Jin'Ya who only replied with a short, "Hold on," Before the line went silent. A second later, Jin'Ya was back on the line, "The big Head is knocked out. He was in the process of figuring out that something was wrong with Mars and would have probably figured out the location of the Red Hearth soon enough."

He sighed in relief. "We'll collect him later on." Finally, something that went his way. He had the Leader knocked out and once Bruce was mentally stable enough, he could introduce him to the Gamma Menace and then they could work on getting the Leader depowered.

As he was now, the Leader would just manipulate Bruce into escaping together and despite his boasts, he knew that the Red Hearth would get damaged if Bruce tried to escape and he would have to then find and save Hulk and the Leader from getting themselves killed.

So, indefinite imprisonment for Leader, which, technically, was not illegal on Mars since he was the sole authority on that palace and he was fine with that, for now.

Plus, what Bruce didn't know wouldn't hurt him, so win-win.

With that secured, he moved the vase with the Door and dropped it, such that the voice echoed throughout the home, which was in an eerie silence, only shattered by his actions.

Ross, confident in his current body and paranoid bastard that he was, pressed the alarm button that he had installed within arm's reach in every single room of this giant home, headed straight up, not before acquiring some firearms obviously.

Jin'Ya stopped the alarm from ringing, disconnecting that single button from the network of alarms as Ross headed straight up to his office.

Jin'Ya had taken a look inside Ross' head and transferred the data straight to him, showing what Ross had planned to do. 

Slowly, bit by bit, he planned on gaining authority and his initial step was going to create an artificial encounter with the Hulk, one that would preferably include civilian casualties and then, instead of coming after the Hulk with the power of the military, he was going to resign and rally against the government and the army, portraying himself as the hero who hunted down the Hulk but was stopped by the evil government who clearly don't care for the lives of its citizens.

It sounded like a cliche plan but people were predictable and it had a pretty good chance of succeeding. Obviously, events like the New York Invasion would put a wrench in his plan but then again, it would also introduce newer targets for Ross to rally against, to create an atmosphere of fear, that he would get elected.

Well, clearly, all of that was never going to happen because Ross was not going to remain alive for that.

With his senses, he could feel Ross approaching, despite his commendable attempt to be silent.

He was about to begin with a snarky comment ready, along with the classic villainous pose of reclining into a very expensive chair while being in a semi dark office but his phone vibrated at the last moment.

With an application of his powers, he opened his phone and saw that it was a message from Shuri, which was kind of sad because the contents of the message were innocuous, if taken without any context but since he knew what was happening behind the scenes, he did not reply to the message.

"Hi! I hope you are doing fine! I checked everywhere but you have just disappeared. Hope you remember our agreement. Get back to me once you have time."

It's like she was acting completely out of character and no one even noticed.

He sighed as the door creaked open. Just in time.

"Hello, Ross." He said as the man probably recognised him, judging by the now lowered gun as the orange onesie was the same one that he wore the day he and Ross officially met.

Welp, time to act like a Bond Villain.

Another item off a mental checklist he was never going to show anyone. Ever.

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