Hidden Dangers

"I disagree."

In the living area of Avengers Tower's top floor, Steve Rogers clasped his hands under his chin and flatly rejected Tony Stark's proposal: "We can't let Spider-Man join the Avengers."

"You were the one who agreed to this initially, Captain," Tony tapped the table with his knuckles. "You said he was well-trained, determined—"

"I said he was trained. But I didn't know the person under that mask was a minor," Steve retorted immediately. "Tony, we're facing war. We can't let children participate in war."

Tony looked down at the tabletop, then quickly looked up to argue, "Will war spare a child? Captain, you've been through war, and you know what kind of war we're facing. We need an army, not a squad. That kid can be useful."

"I know better than anyone that a soldier without conviction is a ticking time bomb on the battlefield, Tony. We're talking about a child here, a teenager who's only had his powers for a few months. Does he really know what he's fighting for? He might just be acting on his good instincts to fight evil, but the things the Avengers face? He's not prepared at all."

The New Avengers Initiative—Tony's expansion plan after the Battle of New York, aimed at building a defense line capable of repelling the next interstellar invasion. After all, this time the Chitauri army only invaded through a portal. If next time, their fleet arrived directly in the outer solar system, could the Avengers, numbering only five, stop a vast alien army?

It wasn't just the Avengers; Nick Fury also knew that the five of them couldn't stop another large-scale alien invasion. After the Avengers separated from S.H.I.E.L.D. to become an independent organization, S.H.I.E.L.D. formed a super-powered team called the Thunderbolts, with Hawkeye, Clint Barton, as captain, as a backup plan for the Avengers. Tony and Captain both knew this. Tony and Steve tacitly avoided cooperating with Nick Fury, the one-eyed man who hid too many secrets.

But now, the dispute over whether to recruit Spider-Man into the Avengers filled the meeting room with the smell of gunpowder.

Bruce Banner crunched on potato chips. As the "nuclear deterrent" of the team, he mostly stayed in the lab. Unlike in the movie universe where everyone was more focused on their personal lives, the Avengers in this world were more like a close-knit combat unit (even though Thor was always absent). He was currently watching the argument, and also thanked Wasp, Janet, who brought him a fruit platter.

"What are Tony and Captain arguing about?"

"Uh, they're arguing about whether a high school kid should join the Avengers." Banner, his mouth dry from eating chips, picked up a piece of apple with a toothpick. "Honestly, I think this proposal is pretty ridiculous too."

Wasp looked at him with a face full of question marks.

"High schooler? Good heavens, you're considering recruiting a high schooler and not even considering me?"

Janet van Dyne, girlfriend of Ant-Man, Hank Pym, Wasp, was merely the manager of the Avengers, not an Avenger.

"Yeah, he's just a kid, young, doesn't know anything," Tony popped a segment of orange from the fruit plate into his mouth. "But at least he wants to do good, and he's taken action, hasn't he? We can train him, guide him into becoming a qualified hero. Captain, if you think it's not suitable, we can always ask him if he's willing to join first."

"I don't think that kid would refuse," Tony said with a sly smile.

But this was exactly what Captain was worried about.

"That kid will idolize us, imitate us, and then rush to the front to prove himself," Captain pushed the fruit plate away, his knuckles leaving white marks on the table. "He'll die in your arms or mine, asking us if he did what he was supposed to, just because we gave him expectations beyond his capacity. He'll die in front of us."

"We can protect him, have him operate behind us—"

Captain interrupted Tony once again, directly.

"How can we protect that child in a war where we ourselves might be sacrificed?"

Janet twirled the cherry stem in confusion, while Banner rubbed his temples, feeling a headache coming on. He finally offered his first suggestion: "The aliens aren't going to attack anytime soon anyway, why don't we discuss this in a few years?"

"Thanks, Bruce," Tony pointed at Banner. "Can you help calculate when the alien invaders will arrive? I need to arrange my schedule."

"I take it back."

Banner rubbed his jaw, like someone with a toothache, and then asked Janet, "What's Hank doing?"

"He's holed up in the lab studying the Vibranium samples you guys got, hasn't slept in two days," Janet rolled her eyes. "I have to bring him his meals."

"Maybe you're underestimating that kid, Captain," Tony was still trying to persuade Captain, or rather, trying to prove his point, but Steve was equally stubborn. "No matter how highly you think of him, he's still a fifteen-year-old kid, Tony."

"I got my doctorate at sixteen, when did you get your first doctorate, Bruce?"

"Uh, sixteen, my first doctorate in experimental physics."

"Hey, guys, you absolutely won't believe what I discovered..." Hank Pym emerged from the lab, his hair messy and dark circles under his eyes, holding the Scarecrow launcher they had captured earlier. Before he could finish speaking, Tony interrupted him: "When did you get your first doctorate, Hank?"

"Seventeen? Why are you asking?"

Tony grinned triumphantly. "Aha, I was a year younger than you."

"You studied engineering, I studied theoretical physics, quantum mechanics. Of course, you could finish at sixteen."

"Regardless," Tony wisely chose to return to the topic, continuing to say to Captain, "Fifteen is not that young anymore."

"We're not discussing age, but psychological fortitude..."

"Guys!" Hank forcefully interrupted their conversation again. "You have to hear this. You absolutely won't believe what I discovered in the lab."

"We'll listen to your scientific creation later, Hank."

"This isn't a scientific creation, Tony," Hank's expression turned serious. "This concerns our operations."

A few minutes later, schematics of the disassembled Scarecrow launcher appeared on the projector. The Avengers sat around, looking at the structural diagram, waiting for Hank Pym's explanation.

"This thing is quite primitive and crude. At first, I thought it had to rely on Chitauri technology to be used," Hank said as he operated the projector, replacing all the Chitauri parts in the structural diagram with existing Earth parts. "But look at this, guys. The person who invented this is an excellent engineer. It can be manufactured entirely with pure Earth technology."

This was clearly not the main point, but after spending so much time together, they all understood Hank Pym's personality. They patiently waited for him to finish explaining how incredible the device was and how much fun he had researching it, before finally getting to the point.

"The problem is, this system has a fatal flaw. As the usage time increases, the energy utilization efficiency will continuously improve—yes, you heard me right, it keeps getting higher. This means the device that originally regulated the launch intensity will gradually fail, causing the output power to uncontrollably increase, and increase."

Everyone thought of the final result: an explosion.

"Can't it be improved?" Tony leaned back in his chair, resting his chin on his hand as he stared at the blueprints, trying to offer a solution from the perspective of a fellow engineer and inventor. But even he had to admit that this system had a fundamental flaw in its underlying logic, which was irreversible.

"This is a fundamental logic issue. To design such a simplified and efficient system, this is a necessary price. We need to warn the police about the imperfections of this technology, to prevent them from using it as a riot control weapon..."

"What's the explosion radius?"

Poor Hank Pym was interrupted once again, but he still truthfully told Tony, "If Chitauri parts are used, the power is greater, reaching a diameter of two to three kilometers. The explosion diameter with Earth technology is smaller and more controllable, basically within a one-kilometer range."

"J.A.R.V.I.S., what was that person's name again..."

"Herman Schultz." Captain remembered it very clearly. Hank hadn't reacted yet to what the problem was, but Tony and Captain exchanged a look, both realizing the situation was dire.

"How long has he been out of prison, Captain?"

"Almost a week."

"But we don't know how many of these flawed weapons he can build in a week," Tony sighed. "This is the biggest problem."

After the Spider-Man of the old Ultimate universe died, Captain America had indeed blamed himself for not leading Peter well.