1968 Bad News

September arrived, but Werner still had yet to show his face after taking the Inhumans away. The only person who appeared was Gordon.

The multifaceted system picked up on him after he was inadvertently caught on camera buying food at a 24-hour diner in Rome, Italy.

But it was useless.

Gordon's teleportation was on a global scale.

With him around, Werner could eat delicious food from all over the world even if he camped out in the mountains.

This also proved that Werner hadn't gone silent. He had just left the external contact to Gordon.

Luke had been wary of Gordon before, and had even thought of a way to leave nanomites with a tracking and control function on him.

But when Skye was ambushed previously, there had been no signal from the nanomites on Gordon. Werner had probably eliminated them beforehand.

Luke had also already studied the members of Afterlife whom he had temporarily locked up in Space 2 several times.

They all had that special parasite in their bodies.

After Shriek 'ate' the parasites, the people of Afterlife returned to normal.

The clear memory of being controlled almost made Jiaying explode with anger.

Luke had only acted passively with his trump card, Skye, while Werner had taken all of Jiaying's capable subordinates with him.

If it wasn't for Big Dipper's interference, Jiaying would've lost everything herself.

Luke didn't need to convince these people as Jiaying took the initiative to explain the situation to them.

This woman had been in charge of Afterlife for more than ten years, and was good at putting on a show. She still had enough credibility for now.

So, the people of Afterlife were very cooperative.

Nobody wanted to become a puppet, much less one which didn't even have the will to resist, nor would hesitate to court death.

Things were much easier for Luke.

Unfortunately, the results weren't good.

Most of the Inhumans in Afterlife had already been controlled even before they saw Werner.

What was even scarier was that there was a small chance that the Inhumans under his control would suddenly awaken.

Of the 200 or so Inhumans who had yet to awaken in Afterlife, five had done so on the spot.

Secondly, these awakened Inhumans immediately knew how to control and use their superpowers.

Nothing like being burned to death after awakening a fire power would happen.

Of the ones who had already awakened, Skye could easily control her shock waves.

The long scar on Jiaying's face completely healed after she was controlled.

The unlucky b*stard who had turned into a green tree turned back into a human on the spot, but his hair was still bright green.

This wasn't good news; it seemed to prove that the 'god' inside Werner wasn't purely controlling the Inhumans.

At the very least, Luke had never heard of a crowd control skill that could optimize the abilities of the people under control.

Thankfully, with Jiaying's vigorous lobbying, everyone in Afterlife avoided this 'good thing,' and had no objections to staying at the 'secret base.'

Big Dipper had already made his stance clear: Whether or not he found Werner, they would only need to go into hiding for three months at most.

He was quite familiar to the people of Afterlife — an uncle who liked to chat with the girls and women but never made any moves on them couldn't be too bad.

…

After carrying out an investigation, Luke pushed a report in front of Jiaying. "This is an expert's conjecture. You need to tell me what you're hiding."

Jiaying picked up the report and quickly skimmed through it.

She couldn't help but look back at the evidence.

She read the report at least three times and pondered its reliability, knowing that it was very likely to be true.

She slowly put down the report and took a deep breath. "What do you want to know?"

Even at a time like this, she was still up to no good. Luke shook his head at the woman inwardly and said indifferently, "What made Werner willing to use Gordon? What information are you hiding?"

Jiaying's heart skipped a beat. After a long silence, she said, "Most Inhumans need to go through an awakening ritual. A very rare item is required for this ritual."

Luke had already guessed this, but even the people who had awakened in the last two years didn't know exactly what it was.

The reason was very simple.

Could an ordinary person in the 1980s say what a smartphone was after seeing one? Obviously not.

Inhumans only needed to awaken once, and most of them only had one chance to touch this 'item.'

Jiaying didn't need to explain herself to Inhumans who weren't her trusted subordinates.

But Gordon was different.

As Jiaying's trusted subordinate, he knew too many secrets about Afterlife.

Looking for this item in the outside world was one of his biggest responsibilities.

After Werner took control of Gordon and Jiaying, not only did he obtain all of Afterlife's inventory, he also obtained leads on the outside world.

So, not only did he steal Jiaying's team, he also stole her 'bargaining chip' for her continued position as the leader of Afterlife.

Luke's expression didn't change. He simply nodded at her to continue.

After another brief silence, Jiaying said, "Whitehall had me touch an alien metal block back then to awaken me. This thing was seized and locked up by the SSR, and might still be in SHIELD."

Luke asked, "What does it look like?"

Jiaying casually drew it out in a notebook.

She had a deep impression of this life-changing thing, and was quick to draw it out.

Luke frowned when she was halfway through her drawing.

By the time most of it was done, he had already contacted Tony.

After a minute, the tycoon picked up, and Luke immediately said, "Send me item number BW382 which I gave you to study… Hm, forget it. Where's the warehouse? I'll go get it myself."

…

A moment ago, Tony, who was sound asleep at home, subconsciously woke up when he felt a familiar poke in the butt.

WTF! Cursing inwardly, he looked at the bedside clock — 02:13am.

Holding back the urge to curse, he turned to look at the side of the bed.

The robotic arm, Dummy, was there. A small virtual screen floated above it, and on it was one sentence: "Sir, there's an emergency communication from Mr. Wayne."

Tony rolled his eyes and knocked away Dummy's robot arm. He raised his hand and pointed, telling the guy who had disturbed his sleep to get lost.

Then, he drew away from Pepper and slowly got up.

Little Dummy waved its robotic arm to indicate that it got it, and left soundlessly.

Tony slipped out and went downstairs to the lab.

At that moment, Friday finally turned on the voice system. "Sir, do you want to contact Mr. Wayne?"

"This d*mn Bat always acts up in the middle of the night." Tony rubbed his face angrily. "Put him through."