Title: Burn Phone After Reading
Summary: So Phil Coulson ended up on C-SPAN and Tony has put two and two together to get LMD. Now Nick Fury is going to need a new burn phone. In other words, an examination of how the human mind rationalizes what it cannot understand.
Rated T for language
MCU continuity: This is set after AOS episode 4.11 (I am also assuming that the events of Spider Man Homecoming have already happened, but that doesn't really play into this story). For obvious reasons this is not set in the same universe as I Hope You Have Unlimited Text Messages even if I am borrowing the storytelling style of clandestine text message exchanges.
My New Year's resolution was to do more short stories so you get this. If you want me to do more one shots let me know.
Me is Fury.
Red Malibu is Tony.
The Heart is Coulson
Everybody else is referred to by a code name. You get to guess who is who.
Red Malibu: Did you know that my girl Friday is an avid viewer of C-SPAN? At least whenever they're debating anything related to the Accords. You won't believe who was dragged in by security.
Me: You were the one that pushed for them. Point?
Red Malibu: For accountability, not whatever agenda the lady from New York has. Her discriminatory policies are wrong and dangerous. I'm so doing fundraisers for her opponent. Lots of fundraisers. Maybe I should run against her. We need more scientists in government.
Me: Don't. Is there a reason for this or are you just lonely now that Liberty is gone?
Red Malibu: Hey I have made lots of new friends. The type that don't keep things from me or choose brainwashed murderers over me.
Me: I am five seconds from tossing this phone down a toilet. Why the fuck are you contacting me? How did you even get the number for this phone?
Red Malibu: Liberty gave it to me for emergencies after the fuck up. So I just found out that you and your friends managed to perfect LMDs before Liberty exposed your squid problem. You are one sick bastard for bringing Agent back like that.
Me: What the fuck are you talking about?
Red Malibu: Agent Agent 2.0 was dragged in front of Senator Hateful after he tried to do spy things to her office. You really got the programming right with Agent Agent 2.0.
Me: You think that was an LMD?
Red Malibu: Well, I know you guys were working on the theory. I found that during my little fishing expedition the day we lost the original. Also, if you had just faked Agent Agent's death for motivation purposes, I think you would've told us by now. Well at least me, Agent Spider, and Purple Arrow.
Me: I did what I had to do.
Red Malibu: You do that a lot. As I learned firsthand, all-knowing robots become killer robots. I'm all for Agent Agent 2.0 taking down the senator, but this is going to blow up in your face. A Coulson bot could start an uprising real fast.
Me: He is not an all knowing robot! That's Coulson.
Red Malibu: I know that's what you tell yourself, but Agent is dead. Well he is dead unless you lied to us. It is totally possible with you.
Me: Loki did kill Coulson.
Red Malibu: And now you have Agent Agent 2.0 masquerading around as him. I did some crazy things to deal with my parents' murder like completely torpedoing my relationship with Liberty, but I didn't try mechanical resurrection.
Me: So it's just totally coincidence that you named your system JARVIS and modeled his speech after your childhood Butler? What about what you did with the fragments of said AI's personality?
Red Malibu: You are a bastard, Patches.
Me: Go kiss and make up with Liberty before we have to deal with something more serious like purple aliens
Red Malibu: I'm all for doing that literally, but I'm not sure I'm Liberty's type
Me: You couldn't stay off of C-SPAN, could you?
The Heart: It wasn't like I was planning on getting arrested. We had a leaky scientist, but it's been handled.
Me: Red Malibu now thinks that you're an LMD.
The Heart: Don't even say that acronym right now. It's been a long week
Me: How bad?
The Heart: We broke open that bottle of vintage whiskey. My replacement has been reduced to puppet king status, but at least I'm the one calling the shots. Androids now live among us and apparently the people you wanted to not know about me being back, now know. This is actually not even the worst but I can't tell you the rest over this line.
Me: They only think you have been replaced with a robot.
The Heart: Damn it. At this point, why can't we tell them the truth? It's been more than four years.
Me: No. Because being resurrected by alien DNA will get you locked up in a cell on the Raft in the current political climate. The fewer people that know the truth the better. You know that, otherwise you would've told Red Malibu and company yourself by now. Since you can't stay off the news, it's best that he just thinks you're an android now.
The Heart: Point.
Me: You also mentioned a leaky scientist?
The Heart: it's been handled, mostly.
Me: Be careful.
The Heart: You too.
The end