"What exactly is going on? We still haven't figured it out, and now we're leaving? Is this how you call me out into the field?" Inside the car, Melinda questioned Coulson with an unhappy look. She had not wanted to embarrass him in front of Shen Fei earlier, but there were no outsiders here now.
"Could everything he said be true?" Melinda immediately realized.
"There are things you don't know. Don't ask yet. We'll talk after we see the Director." Coulson's words stopped Melinda from asking further. S.H.I.E.L.D.'s rules were clear: without reaching a certain rank, one could not access more intelligence. Though Coulson was technically the same rank as her now.
Coulson drove them to a private airfield in New York, where they boarded a Quinjet and flew toward Washington D.C.
Washington D.C., S.H.I.E.L.D. Triskelion Headquarters.
After getting off the plane, Coulson and Melinda headed straight to the Director's office.
"Come in." Hearing Fury's voice, the two immediately entered. Inside the office, Fury was listening to a report from a beautiful female agent—Maria Hill, one of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s few elite female agents and Nick Fury's confidante.
"The mission's complete? What happened?" Naturally, Fury knew what Coulson and Melinda's assignment had been. In his view, it had not been difficult. If it had not involved superhuman abilities, Stark Group, and Sherry, there would have been no need to send two of his trusted subordinates together.
As for superhuman abilities, what were those? Nick Fury even knew Captain Marvel, who could traverse the cosmos with his physical body. Not to mention that he kept a terrifying Flerken by his side.
Like Coulson, Fury had not really believed in magic after hearing Rebecca's report.
"This..." Coulson glanced awkwardly at Hill. Even though Hill was already a Level Nine agent, Coulson did not know whether she should be allowed to hear this. He himself had only learned of it because he had been involved.
"I'll head out first." Hill nodded to the three of them, picked up the documents, and left.
"So, what's the problem? Did Stark interfere?" After Hill departed, Fury leaned back in his chair and smiled. In his eyes, Stark's involvement was the most likely complication.
As for Shen Fei, Coulson had thoroughly researched his background before going there. Overall, he seemed harmless for now. Besides, Shen Fei was a billionaire now. He was nothing like those impoverished people with powers. He had no need to rob anyone.
Only after looking at Melinda did Coulson speak. "Sir, he knows about Planet C-53." Coulson then repeated Shen Fei's earlier words verbatim.
The office immediately fell silent. Fury's expression did not change in the slightest. That was only natural—he was Black. It had to be said that Black people had a natural advantage as Agents: they were harder to read.
Melinda stood to one side with her hands behind her back. From the atmosphere alone, she could tell that this was no simple matter.
"I'm stepping out. Hill." After a long while, Fury sent Hill a message, then tapped his desk a few times. A door immediately opened along its side, revealing an elevator.
"Let's go meet him." After entering the elevator, Fury motioned for Coulson and Melinda to follow.
By rank, Coulson and Melinda should never have been involved in this matter. But first, they were already involved, and second, Fury trusted them deeply.
Rank? The right to know? Didn't Fury have the final say on all of that?
"You're back so soon?" Shen Fei looked surprised as he watched Coulson and Melinda return. He had expected them to come back, but not this quickly—especially not with someone following behind them.
"This is our Director." Coulson respectfully introduced Nick Fury to Shen Fei.
There was a reason Coulson respected Fury so much, although that reason was merely Coulson's own assumption. In Coulson's understanding, Fury had once been captured and interrogated by aliens, losing an eye in the process. Yet even then, Fury had revealed nothing.
Little did he know, Fury's left eye had simply been scratched by a cat. If it had been an ordinary cat, it would not have been a big deal—but that orange cat was not ordinary.
"Coulson has told me everything. What else do you know about Planet C-53?" Fury stared at Shen Fei for a long time before speaking in a low voice.
If not for the designation Planet C-53, which ordinary people could not possibly know, Fury would never have come in person. After all, he was the Director of S.H.I.E.L.D.
"Then what do you know?" Shen Fei countered.
Shen Fei's words made Fury's body stiffen, and his eye widened involuntarily.
"Humanity cannot even leave this planet yet. Knowing too much is not necessarily a good thing." Before Fury could speak, Shen Fei continued.
Although black technology emerged endlessly in the Marvel Universe, progress in spacecraft had always been slow. At present, humanity's farthest reach was still within the solar system.
Even lunar exploration, on the nearest celestial body, suffered frequent failures. Though that was not Earth's people's fault. No matter how wildly they imagined, they could never imagine that the Moon had an owner. That was why lunar probes kept malfunctioning, while astronauts who landed there found nothing at all.
"You told Coulson earlier that mages are scientists, and that Newton and the others were all mages. But as far as I know, he changed his beliefs in his later years." Fury immediately changed the subject.
"That is the greatest difference between us. You always impose your own ideas on others. Our understanding of this world is fundamentally different. Who told you that faith and science conflict with one another?"
Shen Fei's words made Fury's face darken at once. Of course, since it had already been dark to begin with, no change could actually be seen.
"Let me give you an example." A golden beam appeared in Shen Fei's hand. "Our understanding of the world and the universe is like the difference between ancient people's understanding of lightning and modern people's understanding of lightning."
The moment he said that, Coulson and Melinda's faces darkened as well. Wasn't he plainly calling them primitive people?
"If you're so formidable, why has no one heard much about you?" Fury kept telling himself to stay calm, yet his tone remained steady.
"Because humanity is ignorant." Seeing the expressions of the three people before him change again, Shen Fei immediately amended his words. "Of course, I mean before modern times. You know what the Middle Ages were like, so most of our predecessors left this planet. Still, this was once their home planet, so they occasionally return to take a look—and to seek successors."
"You had the ability to leave this planet in that era?" Fury's voice was filled with shock.
"Didn't I tell you before?" As Shen Fei spoke, a star map of the solar system appeared before him. It then exploded with a bang, becoming countless rays of light dancing above the living room.
"Our understanding of the world is different."
"You can leave this planet too?" Fury asked curiously.
"My strength isn't sufficient yet."
Not sufficient yet meant it might be sufficient in the future. Fury and the other two all understood the implication.
Naturally, Shen Fei had made all this up. As for whether it would be exposed in the future, he did not care. By then, S.H.I.E.L.D. would no longer exist, so what did exposure matter? Besides, there would be ways to explain it—different schools of magic, for example. In any case, they had no way to verify it.
"Can ordinary people learn to become mages?"
"Of course not. Becoming a mage depends entirely on talent. Otherwise, our predecessors would not have needed to leave. They could have simply opened a mage school." Shen Fei shook his head.
Shen Fei was not lying about that. Kamar-Taj's magic could, at most, strengthen an ordinary person's body.
"Then do you have anything to say about Planet C-53?"
"One thing." Shen Fei raised his index finger and waved it before speaking. "It isn't from me. My predecessors asked me to pass it along: tell those idiots constantly broadcasting signals into outer space to behave themselves. Do they know how idiotic it is to actively reveal their planet's coordinates in the universe? Are they trying to attract marauders?"
"What are marauders?"
"Interstellar pirates. People who commit every kind of evil." Shen Fei spoke gravely. "And let me tell you something else: the slave trade is extremely prevalent in the universe."
If Earth had not been under Asgard's protection, marauders would likely have arrived long ago.
Just because Star-Lord was a marauder did not mean all marauders were good people. Star-Lord was merely an exception. Even Yondu had killed countless people.
"I see. Thank you." Shen Fei's words made Fury even more determined about an idea he had long held.
Shen Fei had always misunderstood one thing. He believed that since Fury was friends with Captain Marvel, Fury must have possessed a deep understanding of the universe. In truth, he had overthought it.
They were indeed friends, but Captain Marvel was extremely busy. The Kree Empire was immensely powerful and vast, and Captain Marvel had far too much to do. Otherwise, he would not have given Fury an Emergency Pager.
S.H.I.E.L.D.'s technological level alone made that clear. If the two sides had truly been in close contact, Fury could have obtained more advanced technology from him.
There were no laws in this universe protecting lower civilizations. Without sufficient strength, entire races being wiped out was commonplace.
On some planets with even lower levels of civilization, marauders alone were enough to drive a civilization to extinction.
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