Pierce kept staring at Fury. Fury stood near the open door with one eye fixed on him. Seeing him alive changed Pierce's face.
Natasha stayed at the computer.
Fury moved closer and looked at the access scanner. Natasha did not ask him to hurry. Her hands stayed over the controls while Fury gave the system what it needed.
The scanner accepted him. Natasha's screen opened.
Pierce's jaw tightened. "You cannot do this."
Natasha did not answer.
Pierce lifted one hand and pressed the control linked to the council badges. One of the council members jerked in his seat as electricity ran through the device on his chest.
The man fell back with a strangled sound.
Pierce looked at the others. "Nobody moves."
The doors opened again. More soldiers entered the room and aimed their guns at Fury.
Pierce looked at Fury over their weapons. "You cannot stop this now. No matter what you do."
Before Fury could answer, the whole room shook. Glass trembled around them. The floor moved under their feet, and the lights above flickered as the base tore open outside. Everyone turned toward the windows.
Outside, the top of the facility split open. Rubble broke apart and slid down the side of the structure. A head rose through the broken place.
Then a huge hand came out of the rubble and closed around part of a rising Helicarrier.
The soldiers on the carrier froze when that hand caught the metal near them. Some of them stumbled back from the edge, unable to understand what had grabbed their ship.
The giant body rose higher.
It was Adam.
He stood over the base with one hand locked around a section of the carrier. The ship was still massive. It reached from near his head down toward his chest, so Adam was not holding the whole thing like a toy. His fingers had caught only one part, and the rest of the carrier still hung above him.
Adam looked at his own size for a second.
'The height output is lower than I expected,' Adam thought. 'This size will still work for now, at least.'
He did not want to grow larger than this. Even this size was already shaking the base under his feet, and the broken structure below him was not steady anymore.
A short while earlier, Steve had looked at him and given the order.
"If you do this," Steve had said, "save as many as you can. Kill as few as you can."
Adam had nodded.
Sam had looked at Adam, then at Steve. "Could we not have done this first?"
Steve had not answered him.
Now Adam pulled.
Back inside the council room, Natasha looked down at the badge on her chest. Sparks moved over it.
She grabbed the device herself and forced the charge through the suit before Pierce could use it again. Her body stiffened for a second. The device shorted out.
Fury moved at the same time.
He struck the closest soldier and knocked the gun away. Natasha turned from the computer and kicked another soldier's leg out from under him. Fury took the fallen gun and hit the next man before he could fire.
Pierce stepped back and fell near the table.
Outside, Adam tightened his grip on the carrier and twisted it in his hand.
The metal screamed under the pressure. Adam swung it sideways and slammed it into the next carrier. He did not drive it down into the base. He pushed the hit away from the building so the broken mass would fall farther from the people below.
'Most of these ships should be automatic,' Adam thought. 'People can still be inside those ships.'
That was why he kept pulling the carrier away instead of crushing it straight down.
Another Helicarrier kept rising.
Adam lifted one foot and kicked the side of it. The impact sent the ship away with force. Its front section bent first. Then the rear part tore open as the carrier spun out of its path.
The first carrier was losing balance in Adam's hand.
He released it before it dragged him toward the building. His other hand caught the next damaged carrier and pushed it down toward the far side of the base, where the land opened into trees and water.
Adam wanted it farther away. It was still clear of the main building.
The last carrier was still in the air.
It had already been hit once, and it was shaking as it tried to hold its line.
Adam crossed his arms.
He remembered Way Big firing a beam by making that shape. He did not know if his version could do it the same way. The thought was enough.
Energy began gathering around his arms. Adam's eyes widened as the light kept building faster than he expected.
'No, no, launch it now,' Adam thought. 'Launch it.'
His control was not good enough yet.
The beam burst out.
A wide line of light shot from his crossed arms and struck the carrier. Adam had expected the beam to push it down or cut through one part.
It did more than that.
The beam tore through the carrier and continued past it. It struck the ground beyond the base, near a slope where water ran between the trees.
Adam shut it off almost as soon as it fired. Even then, the damage was already there.
The carrier broke apart under the blast. Some sections burned. Some pieces melted at the edges. The ground below was scorched, and steam rose from the place where the beam had touched the water. The trees near that line burned while the soil around them cracked open from the heat.
The light had been too bright to miss. Fury saw it from the council room. Pierce saw it from the floor. Steve and Sam saw it from below the giant shadow.
Nobody spoke after that. Adam had said he was an alien. They realized Adam was dangerous on a cosmic level.
Far away in the cosmos, the Celestials noticed that energy wavelength.