Theoretically, when Captain Marvel handed him that retrofitted pager, her instructions had been crystal clear: Do not use this unless it is an absolute, unavoidable emergency.
Over the ensuing decades, Nick Fury had faced countless crises. He had stared death in the face more times than he could count, but he had never once entertained the thought of pushing that button.
To him, none of those situations had crossed the threshold of a true, planetary emergency.
But a full-scale alien invasion? A war that would inevitably cause tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of casualties just from the initial bombardment?
If an orbital mothership fired a devastating energy weapon at every major American city, the death toll would instantly surpass a hundred million.
A crisis of that magnitude absolutely met Carol's criteria. There was no doubt about it.
However, Fury hesitated. Even if Carol Danvers possessed the power to traverse the cosmos unassisted and single-handedly destroy an alien armada, how long would it take her to get back to Earth?
She could be hundreds, or even thousands of lightyears away. Even traveling at faster-than-light speeds, by the time she received the signal and made the journey back, she might be too late. The ashes of New York would already be cold.
Because of that agonizing variable, Fury couldn't decide whether to preemptively summon her or hold off.
"Let's stick to our working hypothesis: the Ancient One is stationed permanently on Earth to protect it," Fury said, forcing his mind back to the current briefing. "Viewing it from that angle, Earth must possess something fundamentally unique. Otherwise, it wouldn't attract endless waves of Demon Gods."
"But that creates a massive logical discrepancy," Agent Hill noted, swiping through a holographic display. "According to Lucas, the corpses of the Demon Gods she has slain could wrap around the solar system. That implies a ceaseless, apocalyptic war of unimaginable scale. Even if humanity hasn't achieved interstellar travel, our orbital observation tech is incredibly advanced. The Hubble Space Telescope can see deep into the cosmos."
Hill looked at Fury, her expression serious. "Why have we never recorded a single magical battle? Isn't that bizarre?"
As the absolute apex of the world's intelligence community, S.H.I.E.L.D. had unrestricted access to the surveillance networks of the UN Security Council. If the top five global superpowers had seen an apocalyptic magic war in space, S.H.I.E.L.D. would have the files.
But throughout the entire modern history of astronomy, there was absolutely zero data. It wasn't a cover-up. It simply wasn't there.
The S.H.I.E.L.D. agents frowned in confusion. They didn't doubt Lucas's words. His diary entries often contained sarcasm and internet jokes, but the foundational lore drops were never outright lies.
If the battles were genuinely happening every single day, they had to be occurring somewhere entirely hidden from physical observation.
"Maybe it's exactly like how we operate," Coulson hypothesized. "What if the Ancient One has a massive logistical organization backing her up? Think about it. Every time S.H.I.E.L.D. engages in a firefight or a covert operation, we send in a massive clean-up crew. We pose as the FBI, the CIA, or local law enforcement. We scrub the data and alter the public record. Is it possible the Ancient One's magical faction has their own version of that?"
Coulson tapped his pen. "They might have a shadow organization embedded within human society, dedicated to hiding the truth. They could be operating right under our noses, and we just don't know it."
"An organization... like 'Snake S.H.I.E.L.D.'?" Nick Fury uttered, the strange term rolling off his tongue.
Ever since Lucas had casually mocked a group called "Snake S.H.I.E.L.D." in one of his earliest diary entries, Fury had been quietly obsessing over it. As the diary's prophecies were proven true one by one, Fury had become increasingly convinced that "Snake S.H.I.E.L.D." wasn't just a random joke.
Considering Lucas's morbid sense of humor, the fact that its name was an exact mockery of S.H.I.E.L.D. meant the two organizations were intimately linked.
Previously, Fury had tried to analyze this from a realistic, geopolitical perspective. He thought perhaps it was a rogue splinter cell or a rival intelligence agency with a similar acronym.
But Natasha's recent breakthrough had completely shifted his paradigm.
If you looked at it from the real world, a similar name could just be a coincidence. But if you looked at it from the perspective of a Hollywood screenwriter? There were no coincidences.
"Snake S.H.I.E.L.D. is a critical piece of the puzzle," Natasha agreed, her eyes gleaming with realization. "Let's apply the standard formula of a blockbuster movie. Characters are broadly divided into protagonists and antagonists. Without mincing words, we—S.H.I.E.L.D., Hawkeye, myself, and the Avengers—are clearly the protagonists. The 'Good Guys.'"
The agents nodded. While S.H.I.E.L.D. operated in the gray, and the agents in the room had plenty of blood on their hands, their ultimate goal was the preservation of humanity. They weren't boy scouts, but they certainly weren't the villains of the story.
"The Law of Narrative Symmetry dictates that if there is a protagonist, there must be an equal and opposite antagonist," Natasha explained smoothly. "Superheroes require Supervillains to exist. It's the only way to create dramatic tension."
"So," she continued, pacing the floor, "if the narrative demanded the creation of the Avengers Initiative—a super-team of 'Good Guys'—it practically guarantees the existence of an equivalent team of 'Bad Guys.'"
The room fell into a grim silence as they processed the flawless, terrifying logic.
Every superhero needed an archenemy. An entire team of superheroes would naturally attract a sinister syndicate of villains.
"And if S.H.I.E.L.D. serves as the logistical base, the funding, and the command center for the Avengers..." Natasha's voice dropped to a near whisper. "Wouldn't a syndicate of supervillains require their own massive logistical base? Their own dark reflection?"