Marvel Reborn: Gems Of Infinite Potential

Elektra was dressed to kill in a black and red pants suit, over her vibranium/adamantium body glove, as she stepped out of the SUV that had driven her from the airport to the Wolfram & Heart building.

As she glanced over her security detail on the way into the building she thought back on the conversation where Octavian had insisted.

"It has nothing to do with actually keeping you alive Elektra. Your bones, including your skull, has undergone the Vibranium lacing procedure and your Chi ensures that anything not instantly fatal is survivable. Combine that with your undersuit and anything that was going to manage to assassinate you was already going to take out half the city." Octavian said.

I had sighed "Then why have them? They would just get killed if anyone tries anything, its a waste of their lives."

"Appearance, Elektra. You are going to be a public figure and both the Hand and Chaste may well try and kidnap or kill you. You can't show off superhuman abilities or exotic technology that can't be explained away, so if the Hand attacks and you lose the entire team of bodyguards to deal with the attackers but don't have to show your enhanced abilities, then that is a win." he said.

I had wanted to argue the point, it didn't feel right letting people die for me, but I couldn't argue the logic and so I said "Fine, what kind of security set up did you have in mind?"

"Not me, Natasha. A four man close in team with two male and two female members, travel everywhere in a three car motorcade with six men in both the lead and chase cars. Two men stay with each vehicle while the other eight are the outer ring. You stay in the penthouse suite at the Wolfram & Heart building." he said.

"Seems a bit extreme but fine, I can live with it." I had said, only to find out that was just the first layer when he shook his head and said "Oh, no that is only the stuff that will be public knowledge and legal. Natasha is also putting one of the hot standby Black Thorn kill teams in NYC, they will use the cameras and drones to keep you under surveillance and be ready for a hot extraction if it becomes needed."

"And how do we explain that to them? Or Fisk for that matter, he is going to notice if we have a Thorn team active in the city for any kind of time. He will ask what they are up to." I snapped, thinking this was absurd.

Octavian had winced at my tone but his voice was flat when he spoke: "We tell Fisk that you are Sai."

"WHAT? I thought we were keeping our identities hidden from them?" I had shot back in astonishment, after all, Octavian was the one most insistent on keeping as much hidden as possible.

He just shrugged and said "The risk is minuscule given their oaths and he already knows that you are in charge of all Anti-Hand operations for the Circle. We tell him that you are coming in to kick the Hand out of the City and support him against them because we think they are trying to move in in a big way, he'll probably thank us for it. Besides, it never hurts to reinforce in their minds that we have resources they never suspect we possess."

I bit my lip and thought for a while "And Natasha agrees with this?"

"It was her idea. Her read on Fisk is that so long as we honor our deal with him and don't betray him then he won't move against us, that extending him a bit of trust will bind him to us much tighter. And to be honest, my read is that he is the one with the most potential out of all of our crime bosses." he replied.

So now here I was, two weeks later and walking through the lobby of my new headquarters. A glance at my watch showed that I was right on time and the firm's management team should be on their way to the boardroom right now.

When I entered the room, twenty two men and women were already seated down the long conference room table. Once at the head of the table, one hand resting lightly on the back of my chair, I looked them all over and said "Ladies, Gentlemen, I'm Elektra Natchios and as of six this morning I am the majority shareholder of Wolfram & Heart LLC and the managing partner of Wolfram & Heart LLP, with a majority stake. To be blunt, you now all work for me. Before we move on, does anyone have a problem with that?"

One of the men raised his hand slightly, "Yes Mr. Crane?".

Oddly he seemed surprised that I knew his name, as if I didn't have full profiles on everyone who worked in this building memorized, but after a moment he spoke "Miss Natchios, your ownership of the LLC part of our operations isn't an issue but under New York law you can't own a law firm without being a lawyer. Last I checked you aren't."

"Odd, I seem to recall a shiny diploma from Harvard Law School in my name among the things being moved into my office right now. And the New York Bar seemed to have accepted it when they gave me my Bar Exam in February of this year." I replied, only for him to shake his head in the negative.

"No, I looked two days ago when we found out about the upcoming change in ownership and you weren't listed." he persisted.

"Feel free to contact the Court if you want to check. I'm also a member of the federal bar if you want to check that as well, but to move this meeting along you can assume that I am legally this firms managing partner. Any other questions?" I said flatly.

When no one said anything I continued "Good, and for future reference Mr. Crane and everyone else, I prefer to go by my first name. Do keep that in mind.

"Now with a change in ownership inevitably comes changes in direction and operations, the biggest one is that I plan on significantly expanding our so called Angel unit."

"You want to do more pro bono work then?" asked the VP of PR, the department where Raith had stuffed his future bribe for my beloved. Not that it would be there much longer.

"Yes, but not just legal work. Wolfram & Heart is a corporation with diversified holdings and I see no reason that our charitable works should be limited to merely the legal field." I said with a smile.

Once the inevitable grumbling had passed my board had gotten down to making my ideas reality and I had retreated to my office where I said to my executive assistant "John, could you call Jessica Jones up to my office. I have a job for her."

"Right away Miss." was the response from the apparent office worker, although with my training it was easy to see in the way that he moved how well trained he was. A SEAL for two years before being tapped by the CIA only to be let go three years later after an op went bad and his career couldn't survive the politics of the "cover your ass" game his bosses were playing. He had been recruited to Black Thorn before being tasked with "infiltrating" Envoy and was now contracted as part of my security team.

He showed a young woman, dressed in ratty jeans with a leather jacket, a scarf around her neck, combat boots on her feet, and finger-less gloves on her hands into my office and said "Miss Jones, Ma'am."

I waved at the door "Thank you, John, close the door on your way out."

He hesitated for a second but then silently nodded and walked out, once the door was closed I triggered the rooms anti-surveillance tech and indicated the chairs set off to the side of the room as a sitting area as I rose "Good morning Miss. Jones. Coffee? Or would you prefer something stronger?"

She hesitated a moment, clearly not exactly sure what to make of this meeting, but finally said: "Coffee would be fine, Miss....?"

"Please help yourself." I indicated the sidebar where coffee and several stronger drinks could be found "And call me Elektra, as of this morning I am the majority shareholder and managing partner here at Wolfram & Heart."

She stumbled slightly at the last half of my sentence but got her drink, nicely laced with whiskey I saw, and joined me in a chair "Congratulations I suppose, not sure why you wanted to see me though. Especially not this early."

I waved a folder, which was quite thick, "That is your HR file. It makes for interesting reading and tells me that you are a woman who has a lot of problems with authority but is also an exceptionally good PI. And now I'm faced with a choice, do I continue to retain your services despite that record or do I do what a litany of people have recommended and end Wolfram & Hearts relationship with you?"

She winced, hesitated, and then opened her mouth to speak. Only to stop as I raised a hand and said "No, don't speak. The truth is that I should fire you if I just go by the bottom line. You are horrible to your co-workers, refuse to ever dress professionally, seem to spend most of your days drunk, and are generally a bitch most of the time. At least if I go by all of the various memos in your file. Luckily for you, I've decided on a different solution."

After I was silent for a while she said: "And that is?"

I went to my desk and picked up a small file before dropping it in her l.a.p "You are being moved to my personal staff for the moment. The move comes with an office, no need to interact with clients, and a pay raise. John will give you all the details when you leave and take you down to HR to fill out the needed paperwork." I pointed at the folder "That folder is your first task, find out everything you can about Matthew Murdock. The basics are in there."

She stood, the file in hand, but said: "Why?"

I c.o.c.ked my head and smiled slightly "Why what Miss. Jones? Why I decided to promote you instead of fire you or why I want you to investigate Mr. Murdock."

"Both" she ground out through clenched teeth.

"Ah, I promoted you because I want to be around you often enough to form my own impression of you and see if you will be a good fit for one of our new projects. As for Mr. Murdock, I'm thinking about hiring him for a management position and I want to know more before I make a decision. Now unless you want to quit I suggest you go talk to John and get to work, I want that report on my desk by Friday." I said in dismissal.

Once she was gone I laughed loudly for a long moment, games within games. What fun.

Come lunchtime I could be found outside Landman and Zack and I smiled as I saw my love walk out, still pretending to be blind even though he saw more than almost anyone, and with his friend Foggy Nelson at his side.

I noticed the moment he recognized me, leaning against my SUV with my guards a discreet distance away, because he froze and stumbled in shock. His friend caught him and started to ask if he was alright but I walked up and said "Hello Matthew" before he could.

My love, his voice filled with surprise, said "Elektra? What are you doing here?"

I laughed at the question, catching the conflicted undertones of longing and worry, "I'm living in the city now. Bought a new company and decided to make it my corporate headquarters."

His lips twitched into the hint of a smile and he said: "Done pretending to be poor I see, somehow I doubt this encounter is an accident though."

I chuckled a bit and said, "Well I have a tiny little favor to ask."

He stilled and looked like he didn't know whether to flee or just accept before I said any more, but I took pity on him and continued "I've been invited to a party, something of an introduction to the cities social scene I suppose, and I need a date."

Before he could say anything his friend pushed him forward a step and said: "He says yes, when would you like him to pick you up?"

I laughed slightly, "Not quite how it works Mr. Nelson. My security has all these annoying rules you see." I waved a hand at the guards "Besides, Matt looks like he could use a new tux. My tailor is waiting if you are willing Matthew." I held out my hand to him.

He sighed and took it "I would love to Elektra but I still have to work, this is my lunch break."

"Don't worry about it, just call and tell them that a personal emergency came up. It's not like they are going to complain, Wilson Fisk is hosting tonight's party and he is one of Landman and Zack's biggest clients. In fact, I believe that Alfred Landman is also going to be there tonight." I cheerfully explained.

He sighed again and placed the call before saying bye to Foggy and getting into my SUV. Once we were alone, my security team having gotten into the other vehicles per my previous orders, Matthew said: "Now what's this really about Elektra?"

"No 'how have you been Elektra'? No 'It's good to see you' Elektra. Just 'what do you want Elektra'. I'm not really feeling the love, Matt." I said.

Once it was obvious he wasn't going to take the bait I sighed, it seemed like rebuilding our relationship was going to be harder than I had hoped, "We'll talk tonight after the party, at your place, but the short version is that I learned something that has made me re-evaluate a lot of things. As part of that, I realized that you were one of the few really good things to ever happen in my life and I want that back, but it's not that simple and this really isn't the kind of conversation that we should have in the back of the car."

He was quiet for a bit, "Ok, fine. We will talk tonight. So how have you been Elektra, you sound as beautiful as ever."

I smiled "Up's and downs Matt, ups and downs. At the moment though, things are looking up. As of this morning, I'm the owner and majority partner of Wolfram & Heart."

He stilled, "You aren't a lawyer Elektra."

I waved a hand "Really Matthew. A little breaking and entering, some computer hacking, a few bribes, and as far as the world is concerned I graduated from Harvard Law school two years ago. I even went and passed the bar last month."

"You never change, do you Elektra? Always breaking the rules." he said, sounding sad.

"I did a lot of soul searching recently Matthew and one thing I realized is that you are I are never going to change one another. I love you, I loved you when I fled years ago, and I love you today. I might disagree with some of your principals and your moral code is one that I will never accept for myself but your conviction, your unwillingness to bend who you are. That I deeply respect and admire, enough so that I made the decision to emulate you. I am what I am and I won't change that." I said before gently laying a hand on his arm and continuing "I won't be trying to change you any more Matthew, but whether you can be as accepting of me is something I don't know."

He went to speak but I laid a finger on his lips "Don't speak, not now. I plan to tell you about my past after the party and until you know my story I don't want your answer."

As we entered the party, Matthew on my arm like he belonged there and wearing a tailored tux, Wilson Fisk came over. "Elektra, welcome."

I smiled at the crime lord, and one well on his way to being the Kingpin of New York, "It's a lovely party, Wilson." I said before introducing Matt "My date, Matthew Murdock. Matthew, Wilson Fisk. I believe he is one of your firms bigger clients."

Fisk held out a hand and I subtly directed Matt's arm towards it as he pretended to not know exactly where everything in this entire room was. "You work at Landman and Zack, Mr. Murdock?"

"Yes Mr. Fisk, under Charlie Knowles in the corporate division." he replied.

"Although not for much longer." I smoothly cut in, deciding to surprise Matt, "As of the first of next month he is going to be a partner at Wolfram & Heart, in charge of all of our pro bono legal work in our recently expanded Angel division."

"Oh, congratulations Mr. Murdock." he said before one of his other guests came up and diverted his attention.

Matt leaned down and hissed in my ear "What is this about me working for you? Didn't you think to ask me first?"

I smiled and shrugged impishly as I leaned into his c.h.e.s.t "I thought you would like the surprise, besides you aren't going to say no. Unless you really are going to turn down the opportunity to take whatever cases you want pro bono with a dozen attorneys reporting to you and a budget of thirty million a year."

He grabbed me to him and choked out a strangled "What?"

"I decided to drastically expand Wolfram & Hearts charitable works and I want you handling the legal matters. You will have full freedom to take whatever cases you want with no charge to the clients. Oh, and there is a job in our corporate division for Mr. Nelson if he wants it." I explained.

"Why are you doing this Elektra?" he asked quietly, and firmly.

"Because it is what you really want to do as a lawyer Matt and because I have the resources to give you your dream job. That it will keep you close to me is just a nice bonus." I said, and kissed him.