Lynn rolled over in bed and stared at the ceiling of his room in the Sanctum.
Outside, the streetlight shone through the blinds, their shadows dividing its light into neat squares on the ceiling. He had been staring at them for almost half an hour.
Coulson was in New Mexico now. The hammer had already fallen. Lynn knew what would appear in the small town near that hammer. He also knew that, in the not-too-distant future, Coulson would aim a phase gun adapted from alien technology at the God of Mischief's back, without even having gotten the autograph he had always wanted from Captain America. A dependable, reliable man who always showed up on time in the most dangerous places and never complained would die on the eve of the Tesseract's first true display of power to this world.
When Lynn had called Coulson before leaving, he had intended to lay his cards on the table when they met tomorrow. Coulson had spent so long at S.H.I.E.L.D., yet he was one of the few people there who could stay rational rather than blindly follow orders. But after returning and lying in bed for half an hour, Lynn grew less certain the more he thought about it. Would telling the truth only make things worse? He had never seen firsthand how extensive S.H.I.E.L.D.'s internal surveillance was, but he could infer something of it from the movies he had watched before transmigrating. Once he said too much and the information was classified as an "unverifiable but unignorable potential threat," what awaited him would not be cooperation, but surveillance, interrogation, and endless probing. Even his legal identity had been sorted out with Tony's help. He did not want to disrupt his current peace. But if he said nothing, Coulson might not survive the next few days.
He closed his eyes, then opened them, threw the covers aside, and sat up. He could not sleep, and staying in bed would not help.
He raised a hand and drew a circle in the air. Orange sparks bloomed in the darkness, and a portal opened directly onto the stairway down to Tony's underground laboratory.
The laboratory was still as bright as day in the small hours. A cross-sectional diagram of the Mark VI's thruster nozzle slowly rotated on a holographic screen. Tony stood to the left of the workbench with a stylus in his hand, his safety goggles pushed up above his forehead. Ivan Vanko stood on the right, his dog-eared notebook open at the edge of the workbench and an empty coffee cup beside it. Both were in exactly the same positions as when Lynn had left, though their argument was somewhat less heated now. It felt more like an exhausted stalemate after a fierce clash. They were locked in a tug-of-war over the layout of an energy transmission line. Neither spoke loudly, but the sense of "I think there's something wrong with your brain" was unmistakable in their voices.
Hearing him, Tony turned to look at Lynn coming down the stairs and broke off. "Didn't you go back to get some sleep?"
Lynn slowly descended the stairs and sat in a chair beside the workbench. Resting his elbows on his knees, he interlaced his fingers and stared down at the floor. Tony set his stylus on the workbench, turned, and glanced at him, then picked up the coffeepot, poured a cup, and handed it to Lynn. Lynn accepted it and cradled it in both hands. The heat of the coffee seeped through the cup into his palms, making him feel at least a little more clearheaded than when he had been lying awake in bed.
"If something's wrong, say it." Tony took the goggles off his forehead and set them aside. "You didn't come over at this hour just to mooch coffee."
Ivan Vanko closed his notebook and stepped back to lean against the edge of the lab bench, one hand resting on its surface. He said nothing, waiting for Lynn to speak as well.
Lynn raised his eyes to Tony and Ivan.
"Tony, you know I know some things about the future."
His voice lacked its usual nonchalance, his tone instead very level. "Right now, there's a chance to stop a disaster that could kill or injure thousands upon thousands of people. Do you think I should do it?"
The laboratory fell quiet for a moment. Tony lowered his hand from the workbench and turned to face him squarely. "What kind of disaster?"
"Fury has been studying something he doesn't understand at all."
Lynn rested the cup on his knee. "He thinks it's an endless source of energy. He thinks he can protect Earth with it. But he has no idea what it is. In the near future, his blind research will set off a series of chain reactions. The eventual outcome will indeed make you and the others famous and establish your status as Earth's heroes, but the price will be hundreds, even thousands, of ordinary people's lives."
Tony said nothing. He leaned back in his chair, tapping his fingers sporadically against the armrest. Vanko was silent too, but he tilted his head slightly, his gaze settling on Lynn's face.
"I called Coulson before I left. The S.H.I.E.L.D. agent you know, the one I saved at the factory complex."
Lynn looked at Tony. "I was going to lay my cards on the table when I met him tomorrow. He's one of the more rational people in S.H.I.E.L.D. He doesn't just act on orders. I've dealt with him a few times. He's one of the few people who can calmly hear me out."
He lifted his coffee cup and took a sip. It was no longer quite so hot.
"But I thought about it for a long time after I got back. Even if Coulson believes me, he can't possibly keep everything secret for me. You know S.H.I.E.L.D. better than I do. The most likely outcome is that S.H.I.E.L.D. starts watching me, investigating me, using his whole 'for Earth's safety' spiel to pressure me. I've only just gotten used to my life now. I don't want to ruin it."
He raised his eyes to Tony.
"But if I don't say anything, Coulson might not have long to live. And thousands upon thousands of people will die."
He set his cup on the workbench and tapped a finger lightly against its rim.
"Tony, I've always thought you were the one cursed with knowledge. You understand better than anyone the weight of knowing too much. I can't make this decision alone. All I could do was come to you."
The laboratory fell silent again. Tony did not answer immediately. He leaned back in his chair, his fingers unconsciously rubbing the edge of the reactor in his chest as he looked down at the surface of his workbench. After everything he had been through over the past two years, he understood better than before how to process this kind of sudden weight.
Vanko had been leaning against the edge of the lab bench the whole time, but now he suddenly spoke. His English still carried a thick Russian accent.
"In a Siberian prison-you should know how brutal Siberian prisons were back then-I once knew a fellow inmate named Sergei. He used to be a teacher. He secretly tutored a jailer's child to earn black bread for his own child. One day, the guards found textbooks in his cell and beat him mercilessly. I could have told him, had him hide the books beforehand. But I knew that if I warned him and it was discovered, everyone in the cell would be implicated. I said nothing... They beat him to death. Someone adopted his child. When the child left, the most valuable thing they had was a pair of padded shoes full of holes. It's been over a decade, and I still wonder whether things would have been different if I'd spoken."
He looked at Lynn. Beneath those eyes, marked all around by burn scars, was a candor that time had kept pressed down for years.
"You can't control everything. Since you're agonizing over it, that proves the consequences must be something you don't want. You can control how much information you reveal, who you give it to, and when. If Coulson is rational, tell only him first. Tell him the most necessary parts. You don't have to lay everything out. You should know that no institution can ever be completely monolithic."
He paused and lifted his hand from the edge of the lab bench.
"Back then, I thought revenge was all I lived for, and I nearly missed what might have been my only chance. Now... perhaps there can still be something else. At least you have more room to maneuver than I did."
Vanko opened his notebook again, as though he had exhausted his entire allotment of sentiment for the night, and reverted to the researcher who cared only about data and equations. Lynn looked at Tony. Tony took a deep breath, then lifted his hands from his knees and leaned forward a little.
"Vanko's right. You can't control everything, but you can at least control the first step. I've dealt with Coulson a few times too. He really doesn't seem like the kind of person who would turn your words straight into a surveillance report. If you trust him enough to have called him specifically, then tell him. But only him. Tell him what the central threat is. You don't need to explain where the information came from. Let him judge for himself."
Lynn held the coffee cup in both hands, looking down at the faintly trembling surface of the coffee.
"Only tell Coulson. Don't say too much. Let him judge for himself," he repeated, as though he had made up his mind.
"Right. If all else fails, have him come to me. S.H.I.E.L.D. has been looking for an opening lately anyway, and I could use a liaison who understands plain English. Give them a way to save face." Tony leaned back in his chair, the corners of his mouth lifting slightly. "After all, his greatest talent is turning impossible missions into logistics requisition forms."