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Rhyolite ghost town wasn't actually called Rhyolite Ghost Town.
Its real name was Rhyolite.
It was in Nevada. And ever since the last resident died back in 1923, the town had been completely abandoned.
Hence the "Ghost Town" nickname.
But that was all ancient history.
Back in 1904, massive rhyolite deposits were discovered here, and the town was founded. By 1908, the population had peaked. Then the economic crisis hit, people started leaving, and eventually, once the mines were tapped out, everyone cleared out for good. Now all that remained were crumbling ruins and desert, desperately clinging to the memory of past glory.
But tonight, the place was lit up like Times Square. Especially around the entrance to the old mining shaft—people were constantly going in and out, hauling stuff from deep underground.
If you didn't know any better, you'd think some company had picked this godforsaken place for a team-building retreat.
It wasn't far off.
These were SHIELD agents. And the reason they were here was, naturally, HYDRA.
Even though Hawk had recently made a lap around the continental United States and wiped out HYDRA operatives across the country, he'd only eliminated the ones operating in the open.
HYDRA had been embedded in SHIELD for years, quietly training agents in the shadows. The sheer number of sleeper agents was staggering.
So, SHIELD had been running operations all over, following leads and rooting out HYDRA remnants.
And this place was one of their recent discoveries.
Leading the operation was none other than Tony Stark.
At the moment, Tony was having JARVIS contact Gwen to ask her to tell Hawk—if he was free—to swing by.
Just then—
Gwen, still on the call, interrupted him.
"Uh, Tony, Hawk already left."
"Left?"
Tony blinked at Gwen's words. "Where'd he go?"
The moment the words left his mouth, a voice answered from directly behind him.
"To see you."
"..."
Tony instinctively spun around. Seeing Hawk—who had somehow appeared right in front of him without any warning—he jumped slightly, reflexively said goodbye to Gwen, then hung up. His gaze dropped to Hawk's current getup.
White T-shirt.
Black shorts.
Left arm in a cast, suspended in a sling.
Tony's faceplate lifted, and he looked at Hawk with genuine curiosity.
"That injury—"
"Don't ask."
Hawk raised his good right hand and cut him off immediately.
He'd originally considered just smashing the cast off his left arm. After all, showing up like this didn't exactly look great, and it limited his combat effectiveness.
But...
When Hawk thought about the treatment he'd been getting ever since the "injury"—
He figured one arm was more than enough. His left arm could stay broken. Hell, he was even considering ways to extend the recovery period once the hundred days were up.
After all, if lounging around felt this good once, it would feel even better if he kept it going.
Physically speaking.
But that was something he obviously couldn't tell anyone.
Hawk decisively cut off Tony's question and asked with curiosity, "What are you doing out here?"
Tony's expression turned serious. "Fighting HYDRA. It's everyone's—"
Hawk turned and walked away.
Are you kidding me?
The world's biggest capitalist talking about civic duty?
You're probably just bored at the office, sick of Pepper Potts dragging you through company business, and used "fighting HYDRA" as an excuse to escape.
Hawk kept those thoughts to himself, ignored Tony behind him, and headed straight for the entrance to the underground mine tunnel.
The moment his Sixth Sense had expanded upon landing, he'd detected something interesting down there.
Deep in the underground mine, someone had carved out a massive space. At some point, they'd built a base—covered in dried blood and littered with corpses—and in one of the rooms deep inside that base—
The moment Hawk materialized in the room, his gaze locked onto what sat on the table in front of him.
His Saint Cloth.
Or more accurately, the remains of the Saint Cloth he'd worn when fighting the Dark Elf Malekith—the one that had been completely destroyed.
That was why Tony had mentioned detecting his energy signatures over the phone.
Hawk stared at the painstakingly reassembled armor with genuine amazement.
There was no nostalgia in his eyes for his first Saint Cloth. Only pure curiosity.
This armor had been completely shattered at Stonehenge in London. Pulverized into fragments no bigger than a fingernail.
And yet—
"Damn."
"HYDRA's got some serious dedication. My Saint Cloth was literally ground into dust, and they still had the patience to put it back together?"
Hawk blinked, genuinely impressed.
Just then, Tony Stark walked in from outside. Unlike Hawk, he couldn't teleport. He had to run the old-fashioned way.
That's when Hawk learned how Tony and SHIELD had found this place.
After Maria Hill was promoted to SHIELD Director, she'd launched a massive internal audit.
And boy, did she find some surprises.
Turns out the black site prison holding cloning expert Dr. Merrick—code-named "The Fridge"—hadn't just lost Merrick. Over a dozen other criminals SHIELD had captured had been swapped out too.
The Sandbox, SHIELD's secure warehouse for dangerous artifacts, had also lost a lot of items that had been logged in their inventory.
Among those missing items were the fragments of Hawk's first Phoenix Saint Cloth, collected from Stonehenge in London and stored in the Sandbox.
The bad news?
SHIELD had lost a ton of stuff.
The good news?
Because facilities like the Slingshot, the Sandbox, and the Fridge were all located in remote, uninhabited parts of the world, the HYDRA operatives embedded there didn't even know HYDRA's second uprising had failed.
So, SHIELD got leads. They could track the missing items.
Originally, Maria Hill had wanted to prioritize finding Hawk's Saint Cloth.
SHIELD's systems were compromised, and the Insight Helicarrier systems needed complete rewrites. JARVIS was helping SHIELD rebuild from the ground up.
So when Tony found out Hawk's Saint Cloth was missing, he volunteered to take the job.
He was curious about Hawk's armor. Simple as that.
And sure enough, With Marvel's rare genius Tony Stark and his top-tier AI on the case, they'd tracked it down pretty quickly.
"But when we got here, it looked like they already knew they'd been exposed."
"All the systems inside were destroyed. JARVIS is seeing if he can recover anything."
"..."
Hawk listened to Tony's explanation, thinking about the dried blood and the corpses with bleeding eyes and ears his Sixth Sense had detected earlier.
Still—
Hawk glanced at the reassembled Saint Cloth and couldn't help laughing. "Why the hell would they study a broken suit of armor? Were they planning to replicate it?"
Were Saint Cloths important?
Of course they were.
But what made them important wasn't the armor itself—it was the connection to his Cosmo.
The moment this Saint Cloth shattered, its link to his Cosmo was severed. Without that connection, it was just a suit made of unusual materials.
The armor of a Saint... Only when worn by a Saint did it earn the title of "Saint Cloth."
If it wasn't worn by a Saint? Heh.
It was just fancy clothing.
So, Thinking about what HYDRA had most likely been planning, Hawk let out a derisive snort.
Tony, standing nearby, noticed.
"You're not worried they'll replicate it?"
"Worried?"
Hawk raised an eyebrow, turned to Tony, and his expression turned completely serious. "Tony, if you want, I can lend you my current Black Phoenix Surplice. If you can replicate it—no, scratch that—if you can build a suit that's even remotely comparable, I'll grant you one favor. Any favor. No conditions, no restrictions. You can call it in anytime, anywhere, and I'll honor it. How about that?"
Tony heard Hawk's words and smiled.
"Really?"
"I rarely joke around."
Hawk smiled back, giving Tony his definitive answer.
If Tony could actually build a suit on par with the Black Phoenix Surplice through his own efforts, granting him one favor was nothing.
Forget one favor—he'd grant ten.
The reason was simple.
He'd just found his future dedicated Saint Cloth craftsman.
So, He'd be making out like a bandit.
Just as Hawk was thinking this, Tony laughed and agreed without hesitation.
"Deal."
"You don't want to think about it?"
Hawk looked at Tony—who'd agreed way too quickly—and smiled. "If you succeed in replicating it, I'll unconditionally grant you one request. But I haven't mentioned what happens if you lose yet."
Tony extended his hand.
"Name it."
"If you lose, you give me a hundred million. How about it?"
"...Are you seriously hurting for cash?"
Tony had expected Hawk to make some major demand. He hadn't expected something as simple as a hundred million dollars. He looked at Hawk curiously.
Hawk shrugged.
"Can't help it. I've got a virtuous wife at home. I said I'd borrow some money from the Big Five, and she told me no. Said we should be good people."
"Thank God for Gwen."
Tony silently thanked Gwen in his heart, then stepped out of his Iron Man suit, walked over to Hawk, and extended his right hand. "Deal. If I lose, I give you a hundred million. If you lose, you grant me one request."
Hawk looked at Tony—who seemed afraid he'd back out and was rushing to seal the deal—and smiled as he extended his own right hand.
"Deal!"
"Deal!"
The two men shook hands. Brief but firm.
The next second, A strange smile spread across Tony's face as he looked at Hawk.
"Follow me."
"..."
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~# 70 Advanced Chapters Available on my Patreon!
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