Sorcerer in the Marvel Universe

By the time dinner wound down, most of the food had disappeared and several rounds of drinks had come and gone.

Rumlow and his men had spent the entire meal enthusiastically praising Evenson.

They toasted him.

They applauded him.

They recounted the Battle of New York with increasingly exaggerated embellishments.

Yet despite all the flattery...

...they still hadn’t gotten to the point.

Evenson was beginning to wonder if they’d really come aboard just to drink and swap war stories.

Then he noticed something.

Several of the men were sweating.

Not from the alcohol.

From nerves.

Their conversations felt forced, and they kept exchanging furtive glances.

When the next toast came around, they silently communicated over the rims of their glasses.

Rumlow shot a look at the others.

Well? Which one of us is asking?

His teammates immediately demonstrated Hydra’s legendary spirit of teamwork.

You’re the officer.

You go first.

Rumlow sighed inwardly.

He refilled his glass, shifted his chair closer to Evenson, and cleared his throat.

Evenson didn’t mind.

Unless Alexander Pierce had completely lost his mind, there was no chance Hydra believed this handful of agents could do anything to him.

He might as well see what they actually wanted.

"Sir."

Rumlow spoke with genuine respect.

"The power you use..."

"...it’s magic, isn’t it?"

"It is."

There was no point denying it anymore.

Ever since the Battle of New York, his abilities had become public knowledge.

"You interested in magic?"

"Absolutely."

Rumlow nodded eagerly.

"Who wouldn’t be?"

Evenson watched him carefully.

"So..."

"Would you like to learn?"

The question was a probe.

If Hydra was truly after his power, Rumlow’s reaction should reveal something.

Instead...

Rumlow looked genuinely startled.

"No."

He shook his head immediately.

"I’m not qualified for something like that."

"And even if I were..."

"...I couldn’t make that decision myself."

"Something like that would need the Director’s approval."

Evenson relaxed slightly.

So that wasn’t it.

"You people really are tightly managed."

Rumlow chuckled, misunderstanding the comment.

"The tactical division has always emphasized discipline."

He assumed Evenson was simply making fun of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s bureaucracy.

"Actually..."

Rumlow rubbed the back of his neck.

"What we were hoping..."

"...was whether you might..."

"...show us a little magic."

Evenson leaned back into the sofa.

That’s the angle?

Testing his strength?

No.

Impossible.

S.H.I.E.L.D. already had enough footage of his battles to fill an archive.

Alexander Pierce could access all of it whenever he pleased.

There’d be no point sending field agents to gather information they already possessed.

Unless...

This really was nothing more than curiosity.

If that was the case...

He’d spent entirely too many brain cells overthinking it.

His expression softened.

"Sir."

Rumlow hurried to explain when he noticed the brief change in Evenson’s face.

"We mean no disrespect."

"We have enormous respect for magic."

"We’re just..."

"...curious."

"That’s all."

Evenson nodded.

He decided on one final test.

If they truly weren’t up to anything...

...he’d send them to have a midnight conversation with Johnny Blaze later.

That would be entertaining.

Green fel fire flickered across his fingertips before vanishing.

The brief flash alone made everyone at the table instinctively tense.

"I know quite a few spells."

He smiled.

"What would you like to see?"

Rumlow swallowed.

The tiny flame had lasted less than a second.

Even so...

It had filled him with an instinctive sense of danger.

Still, he pressed on.

"I heard..."

"...that you can summon creatures from another world."

"Is that true?"

Now Evenson smiled for real.

Perfect.

At last he understood.

This had never been an intelligence operation.

They simply wanted to witness real magic.

"Of course."

Rumlow’s eyes lit up.

"Could you show us?"

"No problem."

Evenson casually flicked a hand.

Space rippled.

A massive Felhound burst into existence.

It landed directly on Rumlow, knocking both him and his chair flat onto the floor.

Several agents instinctively reached for their weapons before freezing.

The monstrous beast loomed over Rumlow, jaws full of dagger-like teeth hanging inches from his face.

Instead of biting...

It simply panted.

Hot, sulfurous breath washed over Rumlow while the Felhound stared at him with unsettling enthusiasm.

Evenson smiled.

"So?"

"You like him?"

He snapped his fingers.

The Felhound obediently backed away, trotted over, and sat beside him like a particularly hideous guard dog.

Rumlow climbed to his feet, pale as a sheet.

"I..."

"...liked it."

"Mostly."

To his credit, he hadn’t screamed.

Most ordinary people would’ve fainted the moment something that ugly materialized on top of them.

Evenson dismissed the Felhound back to the Twisting Nether.

"All right."

"Clean up."

"We’re almost there."

With that, he left the dining area and headed toward the command center.

Neither Claire nor Melinda had enjoyed the noisy atmosphere in the dining room.

They had eaten in the command center instead.

The moment Evenson walked in, Melinda looked up from the tactical display.

"What was that about?"

She had watched everything through the aircraft’s security cameras.

"I didn’t think you were the type to show off."

"It was nothing."

Evenson shrugged.

"A little drinking."

"A little entertainment."

"No harm done."

Claire folded her arms.

"You call summoning an extraplanar monster ’a little entertainment’?"

"That hardly qualifies as a true summoning."

Evenson waved dismissively.

"It was just a temporary call."

"Not even worth calling a Lesser Summoning spell."

"That doesn’t make it safe."

Claire’s expression hardened.

"You cast it without any preparation."

"What if something had gone wrong?"

Evenson wasn’t really listening anymore.

His thoughts had already drifted elsewhere.

Claire’s eye twitched.

She reached over...

...grabbed his ear...

...and twisted.

"Ow! Ow! Ow!"

"I heard you!"

"I’ll be careful!"

Only then did she let go, thoroughly satisfied.

So this is why Master Olivan enjoyed lecturing people, she thought.

It really is strangely satisfying.

Evenson rubbed his aching ear before turning to Melinda.

"Did we find him?"

"We did."

She brought up a map on the holographic display.

"Johnny Blaze is hiding inside an abandoned factory in Belarus."

"We’re already changing course."

She paused.

"But something else has happened."

Her expression turned serious.

"A church in the mountains of Lithuania has come under attack by an armed group."

A flashing marker appeared on the map.

Claire stepped forward immediately.

"I know that church."

"It belongs to a very unusual order."

She looked at Evenson.

"I think there’s a good chance it’s connected to everything that’s happening."

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