"You know? What I hate most is people who only say half of what they mean..." Schiller held Pikachu in both hands, set him on the desk, and stared at his chubby face. "...And rats."
"Cough, cough..." Pikachu put his tiny paws to his mouth and deliberately coughed a few times like an old man. "You'd better show some respect. I'm the only one who can solve your problem now."
"Oh, really?" Schiller stood and walked over to the office bookshelf, scanning back and forth across its contents. "Let's see, where did I put my cookbook? God willing, there'd better be a recipe for braised rat in here..."
"Do you know how terrible you look right now?" Pikachu was completely unafraid. He flicked his lightning-bolt-shaped tail, braced one paw against the wall, and put the other on his hip. "Poor little mastermind finally exhausted himself with a stupid plan. How long have you been working overtime without a break? Four days? Five?"
As he spoke, Pikachu walked back to the desk and held out his paw to Schiller. "When you came up with this plan to toy with Hydra, did you never consider they might latch onto you?"
Schiller took a deep breath, seeming to suppress his anger at being mocked. After a while, he sighed helplessly. "I knew it would be troublesome. I just didn't know it would be this troublesome."
That was right. By now, Schiller had been working eighteen hours a day for five straight days, not even counting the time he was woken by phone calls in his sleep.
As everyone knew, Hydra was a spy organization. Stark and Steve had both been right: anyone who went to bed at nine at night couldn't do the work of a spy or an agent. And a spy