The Gap in Strength and the New Combat Suit

Boom! Terrifying explosions echoed around the Statue of Liberty, leaving every official agency staring at one another, because none of them had expected S.H.I.E.L.D. to act so decisively. That probably had a great deal to do with so much of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s information having been leaked, didn't it?

Although no one had started holding S.H.I.E.L.D. accountable yet, because The President still had not been rescued, an investigation into S.H.I.E.L.D. was bound to begin afterward. Under circumstances like these, every member of S.H.I.E.L.D. had to be holding in a bellyful of anger.

S.H.I.E.L.D. had originally been a privileged agency. Before the Avengers were formed, even organizations like the FBI and CIA could not compare to S.H.I.E.L.D. S.H.I.E.L.D. also had no need to report its work to anyone outside S.H.I.E.L.D. Only the World Security Council was nominally their superior, but even it did not inquire about their work in real time.

It was precisely this environment that had turned S.H.I.E.L.D. into soil suitable for Hydra to grow in. But even without villains like Hydra around, the way most S.H.I.E.L.D. agents did things was actually no different from Hydra's.

At most, one was a villainous organization recognized by the world, while the other had official status and could act without following the rules ordinary people cared about...

But now, everything might cease to exist. A great number of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s secrets had been exposed. Whether they were original S.H.I.E.L.D. agents or members of Hydra, they might all lose the power they currently possessed. How could they possibly endure that?

One had to understand that S.H.I.E.L.D. agents and the Hydra members hidden among them were not the same as ordinary office workers, or even openly official personnel. Nearly every one of them had undergone special training, and this style of behavior had already been carved into