ALL NOVEL 22: Three Things
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"Ah, yeah, ofcourse I remember!"
Tony pretended to have a sudden realization. "So, you can actually travel to other worlds?"
"Yeah, that's right." Lyon ignored Tony's exaggerated theatrics, knowing full well that Tony had just forgotten.
"My god, you're a genius! So the theory of parallel worlds, or alternate dimensions, has just been confirmed by you!"
Tony feigned shock but then looked at Lyon with genuine sincerity. "When you travel to other worlds next time, you have to take me along for the ride!"
"And! If you're going to find kryptonite, you have to take me too!"
Tony knew he couldn't convince Lyon otherwise, so he opted to join in instead. "At the very least, when kryptonite turns you into an ordinary person, I can seize the opportunity to kick your butt a couple of times."
Lyon was already used to this kind of awkward concern. After thinking about it for a moment, he didn't outright refuse. "We'll see when the time comes!"
"Alright, let's put the topic of power pursuit on hold for now."
Seeing that Tony wanted to say more, Lyon changed the subject. "Let's head back inside. We still need to talk about those things I've been wanting to do."
...
Half an hour later.
Lyon and Tony sat around the workbench in the lab.
Tony, now dressed in a bathrobe, listened to what Lyon had to say, his expression growing increasingly serious.
"This time, I've only come back to do three things."
Lyon raised three fingers, as if he were about to ask Tony to take the lives of three people.
"The first thing is to deal with Obadiah."
"Well.. That objective is already accomplished. I've been telling you all along that something was off about him, and now that's been proven true."
"The second thing is to take care of the Ten Rings! They kidnapped you, so I'll help you eliminate them! I'll start acting on that tomorrow."
"The third thing is to investigate the truth behind our parents' deaths!"
The first two points were fine, but when Lyon mentioned the third, Tony couldn't sit still. "The truth? What truth? Didn't they die in a car accident?"
Lyon couldn't directly tell Tony that he already knew the killer was the Winter Soldier, Bucky. There was no solid evidence, and he couldn't prove it. Besides, Bucky wasn't his only target.
Only when the entire Hydra was uprooted would it be worth revealing his full strength.
"I've always had my doubts," Lyon said, leaning forward with his hands supporting his chin, looking very serious.
"Doubts? If it was really just a car accident, why was I, the most vulnerable one, spared, while they died?"
"Lyon, that was because the car caught fire, and they couldn't get out. You were thrown clear, with your neck wrapped twice in baby swaddling," Tony said, unexpectedly clear-headed at this moment.
But deep down, Tony felt a subtle urge, a desire to instantly believe what Lyon was saying.
Perhaps he had been waiting for someone to tell him, "Your parents' death wasn't an accident," for a long time.
Eighteen years ago, when his parents passed away, Tony was out of town, in the midst of a disagreement with Howard. When he received the news of their deaths, he was still thinking that he would return to Los Angeles in a while because his father's face was just too annoying to deal with.
It wasn't until someone handed him that envelope containing the death notice that he realized some things were gone forever...
He wanted to vent so badly, filled with endless anger at himself and even at that death notice.
Over the years, Tony had accepted the reality of his parents' deaths and developed an odd habit of never accepting anything handed to him by others. But deep down, he had always longed for someone to tell him:
—"Your parents' death wasn't an accident."
That way, he might have a legitimate reason to seek revenge on their killer. The anger he had been hiding beneath his playboy persona, the rage he had once directed at himself, could finally be released.
But the more he wanted this, the more he knew he had to investigate everything thoroughly, ensuring that no innocent people would be caught in the crossfire.
In the cave in Afghanistan, Tony had learned more than just how to build a suit of armor; he had also gained a newfound respect for life.
"On the surface, it seems that way, but there's another possibility!" Lyon said, staring intently into Tony's eyes. "Me.. That baby was supposed to die too. The cloth wrapped around his neck should have strangled him, but the killer, who staged the accident and left, didn't know that this baby had Kryptonian blood flowing through his veins!"
In the past, Lyon had struggled to understand why he had survived that accident. The Winter Soldier, under control, couldn't possibly have had any thoughts of sparing the young. Unless it was a mistake. But how could a killing machine like that make a mistake?
It wasn't until Lyon awakened his Kryptonian bloodline that he realized it wasn't the Winter Soldier's error that saved him; it was the latent power within his own body. Even though the bloodline hadn't fully awakened, it had given him a stronger life force, allowing him to survive that ordeal.
Lyon's words struck Tony like a bolt of lightning, piercing through his mind.
"You… you mean…" Tony's mind was reeling.
Lyon, unfazed by Tony's reaction, continued, "When I was a kid, I also thought this idea was baseless. Every official investigation confirmed that it was just an accident, so why would I suspect anything else?"
"But after awakening my abilities, I realized that maybe that suspicion wasn't unfounded. Maybe it was my subconscious recognizing the truth all along!"
"The memories from the accident... Although my young mind couldn't retain them at the time, they left imprints deep within my subconscious."
This was indeed the truth.
After awakening his super-brain, Lyon had gained a vague sense of some events from before he was one year old, though the memories were still unclear.
Human memory is a fascinating phenomenon. It relies on neural transmission to engrain scenes in the memory storage regions of the brain.
At one year old, Lyon's brain was still very immature, with underdeveloped neural pathways, making it impossible to form complete memories.
So, even though he had awakened a super-brain now, he couldn't retrieve memories that simply didn't exist. He could only vaguely recall flashes of scenes and images in his mind.
But this was only a physical explanation.
In a world like Marvel, where mysterious forces exist, perhaps someday, Lyon would be able to recover all his memories from before he was one year old.
Lyon suddenly changed his tone: "In the past few days since I've returned, I haven't stopped investigating this matter... I've discovered the truth, Tony!"
"What you're saying is true!?" Tony shot up from his seat, his pupils dilating, filled with both suspicion and anger.
Lyon's tone remained steady: "I used my super-hearing to track them down! The culprits are their people!"
"Who are they!?" Tony's voice was now as cold as a blade, fully believing Lyon's words.
"Hydra!" Lyon finally revealed the answer.
"Impossible! Hydra was wiped out—it's a closed chapter in history!" Tony instinctively doubted, though he fully believed Lyon's words, still finding it hard to grasp.
"They were wiped out, but only temporarily. Cut off one head, and two more will take its place—they've already 'revived'!"
Lyon continued with a spoiler: "I've been digging through a lot of classified files from various secret departments over the past few days."
"I found that behind the major international official organizations in this world, there's a hidden organization that reports directly to the International Security Council."
"They call themselves the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement, and Logistics Division. I just refer to it as S.H.I.E.L.D., with its headquarters located in New York."
"This organization's predecessor was the Strategic Scientific Reserve, which our dad and others established together."
"After World War II, during Operation Paperclip, they recruited some of the talents left behind in Germany after Hydra's supposed demise."
"And these talents... they never lost their loyalty to Hydra!"
Tony could already guess what happened next: "So these people infiltrated S.H.I.E.L.D. and resurrected Hydra?"
Lyon nodded: "Exactly. That's the truth. Hydra assassinated our father because they needed to infiltrate S.H.I.E.L.D., and our father, being one of its leaders, was in their way!"
Tony slowly sat back down, pressing his lips together. "How many Hydra members are currently in S.H.I.E.L.D.? Does the director know about this?"
Lyon's next words made Tony jump to his feet again:
"S.H.I.E.L.D. has tens of thousands of people, the vast majority of whom are Hydra. The previous director was also Hydra. The current director isn't, but he's even more Hydra than Hydra itself."
"What?" Tony exclaimed, "So you're saying that this organization is basically under Hydra's control?"
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