The musty smell of the ventilation ducts still clung to his nostrils, mingled with rust and damp brick walls.
Lin Xiu had already slid along the cold wall into the backup server room on the second basement level. His fingertips brushed against the rough, peeling paint, like sandpaper scraping skin.
He leaned against an icy metal power distribution cabinet and tapped his chest three times. The Nanocore's heat seeped through his shirt like a liquid star melted in his palm, pulsing deep within his chest.
The heat seemed to spread through his blood to his limbs, bringing a strange, feverish restlessness.
"Data import, begin," he said under his breath. His voice was almost inaudible, but his retinal display instantly filled with streams of green data, flickering characters pouring down like a waterfall.
When the Oracle System's mechanical voice rang out in his mind, his pupils contracted slightly. Coordinates on the potential threat list were pulsing across the 3D map like a hornet's nest that had been poked apart, buzzing wildly.
Even the air seemed charged with the crackle of tension.
"Filter priorities: S.H.I.E.L.D. emergency response speed, intelligence coverage density, countermeasure activation threshold." Lin Xiu licked his dry lips, his right hand unconsciously rubbing a protruding lump of cement on the wall, gritty friction rasping beneath his fingertips.
The quantum computer he had stolen from Stark Industries three days ago was still tucked in his pocket. It now resonated with his heartbeat and the Nanocore, giving off faint vibrations like a living thing hidden in his clothing.
It was his only bargaining chip for bypassing S.H.I.E.L.D.'s firewall. After all, even Tony Stark had never noticed that the underlying protocol of the miniature computer he had developed had long since been rewritten with Nanobots.
When three blinking red dots settled on the