The Strategic Scientific Reserve took the safety of its researchers very seriously.
Especially major contributors like Dr. Brad, who consistently produced results while taking almost no payment.
After Brad expressed an interest in exploring Captain America's past, they specifically assigned an agent to accompany him as both driver and guide.
Brooklyn had won the bid for the rights to build the Captain America Museum, and work on the project had recently been proceeding at full speed.
Brad sat in the car arranged by the Strategic Scientific Reserve as it drove slowly through the streets of Brooklyn.
Many roadside shops advertised themselves as being in Captain America's hometown, hoping to attract tourists.
For instance, Brad saw a restaurant where he had once worked brazenly displaying a Captain America poster and claiming that the young Captain America had often eaten there.
Brad scoffed at that.
Still, it hardly mattered. His real goal was not to visit the places where Captain America had supposedly lived.
What he wanted was the Vita-Ray technology.
The laboratory in Brooklyn where Captain America had undergone his transformation had also been converted into a tourist attraction that people could buy tickets to visit.
After patiently sitting in the car for most of the day, Brad finally reached his destination.
The moment he got out, Brad saw a large plastic foam board standing by the entrance. It depicted an NC Agent with his hat brim pulled low, a suitcase in one hand and a pistol in the other, posed as though running out of the building.
"What the... why did they turn it into a theme park?"
Brad almost laughed, but in the end, only the corner of his mouth twitched, and he said nothing.
As he walked inside, he saw many illustrated plastic boards like the one at the entrance, including a bare-armed, muscular Steve Rogers charging out in pursuit, an agent standing at the bar disguised as an ordinary elderly woman, and a guard hurriedly making a phone call.
Continuing downstairs, he reached the laboratory. There were fewer illustrated boards here; they had not depicted all the officers and officials caught up in the chaos that day.
There was only Rogers, grief-stricken as he cradled the fallen Dr. Erskine.
Brad glanced at it once, then looked away.
The equipment used for the Vita-Ray technology occupied a huge area, and more than half its precision components had burned out after it was used on Steve that day, all those years ago.
So they had simply left it there for future visitors to see. No one could haul away that enormous heap of junk anyway.
Howard had only removed the few most critical Crystal Chips and the data storage components.
Brad watched quietly, as though paying his respects.
But that was not what he was doing at all.
Any structure that fell within his understanding had nowhere to hide from his eyes.
Before long, Brad had used his mutant ability to obtain all the structural details he wanted throughout the area. He had also reverse-engineered the damaged components, reconstructing complete models of them in his mind.
He no longer needed the little bit of remaining technology Howard had sealed away.
Brad could reverse-engineer it in his laboratory.
He was even confident that he could improve it.
As though coming out of a long reverie, Brad nodded to the agent serving as his bodyguard, then turned and left the old laboratory that had become a tourist attraction.
He spent a few more days back at the Strategic Scientific Reserve, attending meetings large and small and reporting on his work. When Director Peggy asked whether he wanted to transfer back to New York, Brad pretended to think for a few seconds before declining her suggestion.
In truth, Canada was now Brad's main base of operations. If he stayed in New York, he would end up like Doctor Zola, hamstrung and heavily restricted.
Brad returned to Canada and immediately began reconstructing and optimizing the Vita-Ray laboratory.
Winter arrived, bringing snow as far as the eye could see. News came from New York that Doctor Zola had suddenly developed a strange illness causing heart failure.
Medical personnel took turns examining him, but ultimately could only conclude that something had gone wrong with his genes.
Yet the Strategic Scientific Reserve's research into genetic medicine was not sufficiently advanced.
Zola panicked. With little time left, he begged Brad every day to hurry up and help him develop Human Consciousness Uploading Technology, while also contacting Hydra's forces in the Soviet Union, hoping they would assassinate Howard.
The Soviet Union activated the Winter Soldier Program, and a mysterious assassin with a metal arm departed aboard a Private Plane.
After learning of this through Hydra's information channels, Brad flew out of Canada that very night.
In the night sky, Brad met the plane head-on. He pointed a finger, and the aircraft spiraled down from the sky.
Half an hour later, the Winter Soldier crawled silently out of the wreckage on the ground, covered in wounds. Seeing a figure descend from the sky, he drew a dagger and charged.
"Your arm has electricity, mechanical components, and a microcomputer..."
"Are you sure that arm will work properly in front of me?"
Brad waved his hand. The heavy metal arm detached from the Winter Soldier's body, the blue light in its seams went dark, and it dropped into the snow like a piece of scrap iron.
Brad flew high into the sky and watched as the Winter Soldier tried everything he could to attack him, only to lose consciousness from massive blood loss.
The Winter Soldier vanished. Both he and the plane disappeared completely, without even a black box signal to be found, as though they had simply ceased to exist in the snowy darkness that night.
Zola grew desperate. He actually attempted to use the Hydra members he had cultivated at their New York headquarters to carry out the assassination. But with too few men and no convenient way to relay information, the Strategic Scientific Reserve eventually discovered the plot.
Fortunately, the assassin had not been stupid enough to shout Hydra's signature slogan before dying.
The Strategic Scientific Reserve's headquarters erupted in fury. They stripped Doctor Zola of every position he held and launched screenings and purges from headquarters all the way down to the branches.
Brad did not care how thoroughly the other branches were purged. Under his leadership, the Canadian base had long since pulled back its activities.
There would be no more idiots like Calvin openly flaunting Hydra's name.
Zola panicked. Locked in prison once again, he tried every means available to get a message to Brad, pinning his hopes on Brad saving him.
Brad informed him that he had actually mastered Human Consciousness Uploading Technology long ago. But Zola was no longer of any use, so Brad would keep the technology in his own hands and put it to good use.
Despairing and utterly alone, Zola froze to death on a bitter winter night.
That same night, Brad stepped onto the enhancement platform, where the Vita-Ray technology he had amplified many times over worked in tandem with the Human Optimization Serum.
A tall figure emerged from the enhancement chamber, young in appearance and extraordinarily handsome.
Brad also discovered an unexpected bonus: under the effects of the Human Optimization Serum, the range of his electromechanical sensing had expanded to ten kilometers.
Judging by the increase in the strength of his brain waves, he could now easily command more than two thousand Ultimate Nullifiers to perform complex, intelligent operations.
Taking a finger-wide metal testing device from a T800, Brad used the High-Frequency Adamanium Alloy Blade to draw a drop of blood for testing.
Now, he was truly a member of a long-lived species, capable of living beyond the thirtieth century.
Howard's son would be born soon, and Brad decided to launch the manufacturing program for the next series of Ultimate Nullifiers.
Thanks to Brad's gesture that night, which had effectively amounted to an overture of allegiance to Howard, an entire research team from Stark Industries was helping Brad conduct meticulous research from thousands of miles away, with Obadiah's private approval.
By pooling their expertise, they made major advances in biomimetic materials science and alloys.
Production of the T1000 could begin.
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