The old employee and Thor

Clark Gregg.

It was the name of someone who had once worked for Dad.

John had heard Dad mention him a few times, though never in a flattering light.

Thanks to his terrible advice, Dad had given John's sister teddy bears for several Christmases running, sending his standing in the family plummeting.

"Oh, right. Should I be calling you by another name?"

John walked past the S.H.I.E.L.D. personnel who wanted to stop him.

They tried to intervene, but Coulson held them back.

John stopped in front of Coulson and smiled. "Phil Coulson."

"You're..." Coulson stared at the person before him, the information from Fury flashing through his mind. "Wick?"

Having worked for the Wick family for ten years, Coulson had never made it into their inner circle, but he knew quite a few things.

For example, the Wick family's son and daughter.

He had once tried to find out where the family's son had gone, but unfortunately, he had failed.

It was after that attempt that S.H.I.E.L.D. realized the assignment had dragged on far too long.

After returning to S.H.I.E.L.D., Coulson had received a promotion and a raise.

He had also handled matters concerning Iron Man for a while.

Now, faced with a member of his former employer's family-and their most mysterious son, at that-he put on his trademark affable smile.

"Just call me Phil Coulson."

He extended a hand to John. "Hello."

John glanced at him. His expression seemed sincere.

After a brief handshake, John looked around.

His gaze settled on the furious Jane and her two companions, and he said in surprise, "Has the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division started stealing things?"

"I'm surprised you can remember that name. It took me quite some time to memorize it myself."

Hearing John's teasing remark, Coulson said helplessly, "We're merely requisitioning them."

"Requisitioning? This is theft!" Dr. Selvig held Jane back, while her intern Daisy stood nearby, equally worried that she might do something rash.

Coulson said, "We'll compensate you."

He took a check out of his pocket.

But Jane wasn't having it. She snatched the check and said angrily, "I can't buy replacement equipment at an electronics store! I made most of this equipment myself!"

For a scientist, nothing was more infuriating than having their work stolen.

"I'm sorry, Ms. Foster," Coulson said sincerely, "but we're the good guys."

"So are we!" Jane gestured agitatedly. "I'm on the verge of finding answers to some extraordinary phenomena!"

Holding her notebook, she said, "All my research is either in this lab or in this notebook. You can't take it away!"

Seeing this, a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent walked over and casually took the notebook from her.

Jane froze for a moment, then immediately lunged forward to grab it back.

"Jane, calm down. Calm down, Jane!"

Selvig held Jane back. Otherwise, who knew what those agents might do to her?

Dr. Banner, whom he knew, had been in contact with these people, and his whereabouts remained unknown to this day.

The agent turned to put the notebook in the vehicle.

When he raised his hand and looked, the notebook was gone.

Coulson looked at John, who was leafing through it.

"I have to say, you're an excellent astrophysicist," John praised as he browsed the notebook.

The agent immediately stepped forward to snatch it away, but John caught his outstretched fingers and bent them back.

A scream rang out alongside the crack of bone.

The surrounding agents immediately turned and drew their guns.

Even the agitated Jane calmed down at that.

Her intern Daisy ran behind Selvig to hide. The old man was certainly a big fellow.

Coulson sighed. "Don't do this, John."

"John?" John glanced at Coulson. He didn't remember being that familiar with him.

"All right, Mr. Wick." Coulson held out a hand to John. "Please return that to us."

"If I remember correctly, this belongs to this lady."

John scoffed. "Under New Mexico law, a robbery took place right in front of me ten seconds ago."

He raised an eyebrow and asked mockingly, "Any objections?"

Coulson's expression grew serious. "Don't force my hand."

"Force your hand?" John's interest was piqued. He moved closer to Coulson. "My father trusted you once, Coulson."

"And this is how you repay him?"

Eyeing the weapons in the agents' hands, John said unhurriedly, "That lousy suggestion of yours made my father very unhappy."

"Lousy suggestion?"

Coulson was still wondering what lousy suggestion he had made. Had he ever been trusted in the first place?

"Sir, give it to him."

Just as John was considering how to make this agent who had betrayed Dad squirm, Jane spoke up.

After her life had been threatened, she had gradually calmed down.

Seeing that John might get shot for trying to help her, her kind nature won out, and she gave up on her research.

"Don't get hurt because of me," Jane pleaded with John.

Hearing that, John nodded.

He pressed the notebook against Coulson's chest and said pointedly, "I don't like having weapons pointed at me. There won't be a next time, Coulson."

"Understood, Mr. Wick." Coulson took the notebook and led the S.H.I.E.L.D. team away.

John turned and gave Jane a casual glance.

"You have kindness, Ms. Foster," he said. "That's something more precious than gold."

With all her research taken away, Jane was heartbroken.

She wasn't in the mood to listen to him, either.

Then, a moment later.

She watched John turn around, open the door of Coulson's car, and get in.

Jane: "?"

Daisy: "?"

Selvig: "?"

Coulson: "?"

Wait, buddy, what are you doing in my car?

Coulson and the agent at the wheel exchanged bewildered looks.

"Drive," John said, as though it were perfectly natural.

"Mr. Wick?" Coulson hesitated.

"I happen to be interested in what you're doing." Thinking that the Asgardian The Ancient One had mentioned was probably Thor, John said distractedly, "Even if you don't take me there, I'll just break in. Same result."

Coulson: "..." That makes far too much sense.

Killing him was out of the question.

Thinking it over, he really had no way to deal with John.

Coulson looked at the hesitant driver and sighed. "Drive."

The convoy rolled out of Old Bridge Town, traveled fifty miles west, and arrived at the meteorite crater secured by S.H.I.E.L.D.

John opened the door and got out first. He was surprised by how quickly S.H.I.E.L.D. worked.

In just half a day, they had already established a basic secure perimeter, and plenty of personnel were moving around inside.

Coulson got out, and John held out a hand. "Give me an access card."

Coulson sank into thought again. For a moment, it felt as though he was still working for the Wick family.

Still puzzling over exactly when he had ever been trusted, he told an agent nearby, "Give him a temporary pass."

He told John, "You can walk around this area, but you can't enter the center..."

John looked at Coulson as though he were an idiot. "If I'm not going into the center, what am I doing here?"

He walked inside.

Coulson raised a hand, but couldn't stop him.

"Get me a cup of coffee." John paused. "No sugar."

He swaggered around S.H.I.E.L.D.'s territory as though nobody else were there.

Even Coulson could do nothing about it.

Having lost count of how many times he had sighed, Coulson pulled an agent aside. "Get him a cup of coffee. Add ten sugar cubes."

The agent was dumbfounded. Ten sugar cubes, and he still called it coffee?

John didn't need directions.

Because he could sense it.

That energy and magic, compressed to the utmost limit.

He blinked, and his pupils became vertical slits.

He was special.

Because he was different from all his classmates.

Some curses and spells were incredibly ancient, resembling chaos itself.

And John could keenly sense them. To his eyes, that chaos hovered in the air.

Chaotic particles carrying tiny sparks of lightning flowed toward the center of the base.

His pupils widened back to normal, and John strode forward.

He entered the center of the heavily guarded meteorite crater.

A hammer stood there.

It had a hefty head, with a cord made of some unknown leather wrapped around its handle.

John stepped onto the dirt and circled the hammer.

Coulson was already seated in front of a monitor, contacting his boss, Fury.

"Let's see why you're here."

Coulson stared at the screen.

On the screen, John approached the hammer.

"Thor's hammer."

John stopped, studying the hammer thoughtfully.

He knew the stories about Thor.

Among the Avengers, Thor was someone who could go toe-to-toe with Hulk.

What interested John even more was the magic from Asgard.

He reached a hand toward the hammer.

The sight made Coulson, watching through the surveillance feed, focus all his attention.

Rumble!

Low thunder rolled across the sky.

The equipment suffered electromagnetic interference.

Coulson reached out and thumped the monitor. It had better not quit on him at a moment like this.

John noticed something.

There was a rune on the head of Mjolnir.

As John drew closer, the rune became increasingly visible.

Magic from Asgard.

He sensed it.

Electricity formed out of thin air, reaching from the handle to touch his fingers, and John sank into thought.

Thunder cracked across the sky.

Just as his fingers were about to make contact, John stopped and withdrew his hand.

The electromagnetic interference vanished, and John looked up at the camera.

"Is my coffee ready, Coulson?"

The picture returned to normal. Hearing his voice, Coulson's expression shifted between surprise and uncertainty.

After John left that spot, he sat in a chair inside the base, drinking coffee.

Coulson sat opposite him.

"What did you just do?" Coulson watched John drink the coffee without so much as a change in expression. "Did you pick up the hammer?"

"Take a guess." Holding his coffee, John was as relaxed as if he were at home.

Suddenly, he looked up at the ceiling and said meaningfully, "It's going to rain."

Outside the base.

Thor, banished to the mortal world, broke into the S.H.I.E.L.D. base alone.

S.H.I.E.L.D. wasn't to be trifled with, either. Upon detecting a perimeter breach, they immediately sounded the alarm.

Thor put on the raincoat he had snatched from an unlucky agent and evaded the people searching for him.

Sensing its master's arrival, Mjolnir released energy that triggered electromagnetic interference, briefly disrupting S.H.I.E.L.D.'s equipment.

Thor charged into the base, setting off a massive commotion.

Coulson could no longer spare any attention for John. He went over to take command.

When he saw the blond man treating the agents like punching bags, he immediately called for heavier support.

"I need armed backup."

A man picked up a bow and arrows and headed for an elevated basket, where he drew his bow and nocked an arrow.

His arrows were more reliable than bullets!

A voice came over the comms.

"Barton, report."

"Do you want me to take him out, sir?"

Barton aimed at the running man through the rainy night and responded calmly.

"Wait for orders."

Coulson did not immediately give the order to kill. Instead, he waited for an opportunity.

He wanted to see what this man was trying to do.

At the same time, John's image surfaced in his mind.

An even more troublesome individual was still inside the base.

It had to be said that even without his divine power,

Thor was still a battle-hardened warrior.

Asgardians were physically superior to ordinary humans.

Under his attacks, the well-trained agents fell one after another.

Only a step away from his hammer, Thor smiled as though he had spotted an old friend.

Rain soaked his face, and mud clung to his body.

Coulson also wanted to see whether the man could lift the hammer.

Besides him, someone else was watching the scene unfold live.

In the magical world, aside from the Invisibility Cloak,

there was also a spell called the Disillusionment Charm that could conceal a person's form.

Casting the Disillusionment Charm felt like cracking an egg, with the liquid inside coating his entire body and making it invisible.

He stood on the framework over the Meteorite Crater, watching this historic moment with interest.

"A god of Asgard?"

A strange look flickered in his eyes. This god did not seem as powerful as he had imagined.

Of course, that was also because he had been stripped of his divine power.

In terms of physical ability alone, Thor could not be considered superhuman at that moment.

John was more curious about what kind of power a true Asgardian god possessed.

Smiling, Thor reached for Mjolnir's handle.

His solid muscles were enough to make men envious and women scream.

The moment he gripped the hammer, he seemed to already envision himself becoming the God of Thunder again and flying out of this place.

But when he pulled,

the smile vanished from his face. As he roared with exertion, his features twisted.

And the hammer...

did not budge.

John's gaze shifted as he sensed someone else watching.