Marvel: Terror Stream

As Maria Hill’s eyes fluttered shut and her body finally went limp, Veritas let out a satisfied hum. He released his grip, allowing the unconscious Agent to slump onto the floor, just like Natasha.

He cracked his knuckles.

He didn’t even need to touch them. A wave of black smoke wrapped around both women, and with a soft pop, they vanished.

He hadn’t killed them, of course. He had just teleported them to a dense, incredibly humid forest in Chennai, India. A lovely vacation spot. They’d wake up with a headache and a terrible case of jet lag, but they’d be perfectly fine.

With the pesky spies out of the way, the Jester spun his nice ergonomic office chair around to face the computer Hill was using to monitor the situation and through which she would control the Helicarriers’ targets.

The main interface displayed a highly detailed, 3D holographic map of the three Helicarriers. Helicarrier IN-01 was currently glowing green, while the other two remained a dull gray.

"Well look at that," Veritas murmured, resting his chin on his hand. "Team Alpha works fast."

A secondary screen displayed the positions of Fury’s as well as Hydra’s men. Veritas watched as several little blue dots leaped off the green Helicarrier, their altimeters rapidly dropping as they deployed parachutes to help the loyalist forces fighting Hydra on the ground.

But a few specific dots showed a very strange phenomenon. They vanished from IN-01 and instantly reappeared on the deck of IN-02.

"Ah, Nightcrawler," Veritas nodded.

It wasn’t exactly a surprise to see the X-Men here. When Veritas had ambushed Hill in her car a few days ago, she had reluctantly given him the names of the mutants Nick Fury was bringing in as reinforcements.

Now, sitting at the master console, he had a real-time God’s-eye view of the entire battlefield - every single casualty, every Hydra agent, every hero.

Suddenly, the comms console chirped.

"Hill, what’s the status on Delta?" Captain America’s voice echoed through the speaker, tight and focused over the sound of distant gunfire.

Veritas smiled under his mask. He casually reached over and hit the mute button. ’Let’s just ignore him for now...’

But who was Team Delta...

’Isn’t it obvious?’ Veritas mused, ’Since Nat was down here with Hill, that means Mystique is currently up on the top floor, disguised as one of the Council members. Team Delta is her and Nick Fury. Probably.’

As he waited for Team Cap to get to the other Helicarrier, Veritas brought his floating phone closer. He minimized the wildly cheering Patron chat to open the Terror Tool’s [Intermediate Hacking Portal].

Using this feature, he created a remote copy of Hill’s system on his phone.

Well, while [Intermediate Hacking Portal] did not have the capability to hack into SHIELD’s security system, it was another matter when the device was already unlocked and fully under his control.

’Hm, just have to wait 90 seconds to finish.’

As he waited, he opened the quest tab.

[Quest: Live Terror Stream]

Objective: Conduct a live-streamed event within any public, commercial, private, or restricted facility.

Conditions:

— 35+ minutes duration

— 25+ hostages

Reward: Terror Shop Gacha (Rare Guarantee) + 150 Terror Points

Bonus Condition:

— Engage in battle with a superpowered individual.

Bonus Reward: +100 Terror Points (Extra points awarded depending on enemy strength.)

[Attempts left before 1-Year Terror Shop Lock Penalty: 3]

When Luke had first met Hill outside of Gwen’s Dorm after that pool day, he hadn’t even planned to trigger a quest today.

His initial goal was simple: show up, cause some chaos, steal one of these flying fortresses for himself, and bounce.

But after his Patron viewers informed him that he could safely fail three quests before triggering the dreaded year-long shop penalty, he changed his mind.

Even if he completely botched the quest today, he’d still walk away with a stolen Helicarrier hideout and at least 500 TP from viewer donations. He was confident in his showmanship. And if he actually succeeded... He would be filthy, stupidly rich in Terror Points. Millions upon millions of TP.

’I probably won’t have to use Terror Stream again....’ Luke smiled wryly, ’It will be the end of my journey as Veritas.’

But Luke wasn’t delusional. This was going to be incredibly difficult.

For one, he would be fighting almost an entire roster of elite heroes by himself. And unlike Hill and Natasha, he couldn’t just teleport Cap and the X-Men to a random jungle in India.

If he did that, there would be no heroes left to stop him from activating Project Insight. And Luke strictly needed the heroes to stick around and eventually do something about it at the very last second.

He needed the heroes to win. He just needed them to take their sweet time doing it. Besides, Nightcrawler could just bring them back.

Then there was the matchup itself. Rogue was here. The Southern Belle mutant had the terrifying ability to absorb powers with a single touch. Luke distinctly remembered reading that she had once absorbed Captain Marvel’s ridiculously overpowered abilities.

He absolutely did not feel safe being on the same battlefield as her.

But to be honest. He could still deal with them. The heroes weren’t the hardest part of this quest.

The hardest part was the timer.

35 minutes.

If everything was in his control, then it would’ve been fine. But today, not everything was in his hands. After all, he was just taking over Hydra’s plan...

And their plan had holes...

A notification appeared on Luke’s phone. The copying of Hill’s system was complete.

It was more than just a copy... it was a perfect, functioning clone of Maria Hill’s master control interface.

Even if someone took a sledgehammer to the computer he was currently sitting at, Veritas would still have complete, uninterrupted control over the weapons system of Helicarriers with replaced targeting blades directly from his smartphone.

To test it out, Luke tapped a few buttons on his phone’s screen, attempting to access the weapon systems of Helicarrier IN-01 - the exact same Helicarrier that Captain America and his team had just fought so hard to secure.

The system responded instantly, granting him full manual override.

"Perfect," Veritas said as he leaned back into the chair...

"Right. Now for the part where I make everyone’s day considerably worse."

[Patron Comments:]

[The Fool Fan]: He has the face of a man about to commit a war crime.

[PrettyInRed]: He doesn’t have a face. That’s the mask.

[The Fool Fan]: Exactly.

[PPPPOTAH]: RIP whoever is on those helicarriers.

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A few moments earlier, high up in the sky...

"Alpha locked," Steve reported over the secure S.H.I.E.L.D. frequency, sliding the replacement targeting blade firmly into the Helicarrier’s mainframe.

"Copy that. Alpha is locked," Maria Hill’s voice confirmed through the earpiece.

Steve turned to his team. They had taken three casualties just to secure this helicarrier. The fight against Hydra’s mutant enforcers had been brutal.

"We move to the next phase," he said.

The soldiers moved out, following the planned route. 10 among the surviving 17 men of Steve’s team, already wearing parachutes, jogged to the edge and jumped off one by one, dropping toward the battle below to reinforce the ground teams.

7 men stayed with Steve.

"Team Charlie... Kurt, do you copy?" Steve said into his earpiece, watching the last of his men jump. "We need extraction to IN-03."

With a sharp BAMF and a cloud of purple smoke, the blue-skinned mutant materialized right next to Steve.

"Captain. Good timing," Kurt said, offering a quick mock salute. This place is very noisy. Team Charlie could use the backup."

"Start your work, Kurt," Steve said, keeping his eyes on the horizon.

Kurt nodded. He began grabbing the remaining soldiers one by one, vanishing in a cloud of smoke to teleport them over to Helicarrier IN-03.

As Kurt ferried the men across the sky, Steve tapped his earpiece again to check in on the rest of the board. "Hill, what’s the status on Delta?"

Nothing...

"Hill, do you copy?"

Steve furrowed his brows. That wasn’t like Maria. She never missed a comm check.

And why was Kurt taking so long to come back for him?

Just as a knot of worry began to form in Steve’s stomach, a loud BAMF sounded, and Kurt appeared, looking slightly out of breath.

"Sorry, I was late," Kurt panted. Without wasting another second, Kurt grabbed Steve’s shoulder. BAMF.

When Steve reappeared on the deck of Helicarrier IN-03, he immediately understood why Kurt had been delayed.

It was absolute chaos.

A group of around twenty heavily armed, brainwashed Hydra mutants had ambushed Team Charlie. Men were shouting, energy blasts were flying through the air, and explosions were rocking the deck.

Off to the right, Gambit was single-handedly taking on eight mutants at once. He was a blur of motion, spinning his bo staff and throwing glowing, kinetically charged playing cards that exploded with concussive force.

"Step right up, mes amis! Remy’s got plenty to go around!" Gambit laughed, ducking under a burst of plasma fire.

Steve didn’t hesitate. He instantly flung his vibranium shield. It ricocheted off a metal crate, slammed into the helmets of three mutants, and bounced back into his waiting hand, immediately drawing the attention of five heavily armed Hydra agents.

"Hold the line!" Steve yelled to the soldiers, rushing forward to join the fray. "3 of you guys, flank their left."

The fight was intense, but with Steve Rogers on the field and his helpful commands, the tide quickly began to turn.

But then, a shadow fell over the Helicarrier.

Steve looked up, his blood running cold.

Hovering directly above them was Helicarrier IN-01 - the ship Steve had just secured. And every single one of its massive, automated cannons and missile batteries was slowly swiveling around, aiming directly down at them.

Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat!

BOOOM! Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat!

The sky lit up with fire as a devastating barrage of heavy artillery and missiles rained down on the entire flight deck.

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