(Courtesy spoiler alert: the following segment takes place roughly 100 minutes into Iron Man 3, give or take a repartee exchange. Proceed at your own risk.)

[Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D., is somewhere far away from espionage — somewhere therapeutic, idyllic, free from strife and warfare and stimulation. Let’s say a random hotel bar in Charleston, West Virginia. Fury is required by company guidelines to take a vacation at least once every ten years. S.H.I.E.L.D. agents may consider most HR guidelines a joke, but HR wins one out of every 1,000 battles. Mandatory decennial vacations was one of them. Saving the world may be a 24/7/365/eternal vocation, but Fury for once has drink in hand and nothing on his mind but sweet, rare solitude.

His eye is fixed on his Product Placement Phone lying on the tabletop. Predator is streaming via Product Placement MovieStreamCloud App thing.]

FURY: Man, I haven’t watched this in ages. The scrawny, four-eyed guy is even stupider than I remember.

[The worst scene in the movie is interrupted by the S.H.I.E.L.D. Priority Alpha Mega Alpha One Supreme Alert shrieking-HD-klaxon app. Fury sighs and taps the SPAMOSA icon. Agent Dodge, a relative nobody of an underling, is on the other line.]

NICK FURY: You just lost two pay grades.

AGENT DODGE: Sir! There’s been a major incident!

NICK FURY: You know I’m not S.H.I.E.L.D.’s only employee, right?

AGENT DODGE: Sir, you don’t understand!

NICK FURY: Telling me that ever about anything is grounds for termination.

AGENT DODGE: But sir! This is really important!

NICK FURY: If it were, I’d be the one disturbing you.

AGENT DODGE: Sir, the President has been kidnapped!

NICK FURY: Be more specific. President Ellis, or one of the others?

AGENT DODGE: Ellis, of course!

NICK FURY: “Of course”? You should travel more, son. A lot more.

AGENT DODGE: But sir, the President! Some madmen infiltrated Air Force One in midair, killed most of the Secret Service agents on board, used the Iron Patriot armor to cart off the President, and now they have him strung up on live TV! These terrorists are threatening to kill him while everyone watches!

NICK FURY: Back up. Who’s “Iron Patriot”?

AGENT DODGE: That’s Colonel Rhodes’ new designation.

NICK FURY: I thought he was “War Machine”.

AGENT DODGE: Top brass liked “Iron Patriot” better.

NICK FURY: That’s terrible.

AGENT DODGE: I know! That’s why we’re calling in reinforcements to save the President!

NICK FURY: No, I mean “Iron Patriot”. Terrible name. Sounds like a wrestler with Washington’s face tattooed on his forehead.

AGENT DODGE: Sir, there’s no time for this!

NICK FURY: Really. Are any of our Avengers on it yet?

AGENT DODGE: We believe Tony Stark was initially involved, but —

NICK FURY: Well, there you go. Good as done. Don’t even know why we’re still talking.

AGENT DODGE: But sir! We have reason to believe Stark’s dead.

NICK FURY: Uh-huh. Do you have his body?

AGENT DODGE: Stark was inside his home in Malibu when it was destroyed by helicopter missile fire. The upper levels crumbled and fell into the ocean.

NICK FURY: A tragic waste of Frisbee-based architecture. Do you have his body?

AGENT DODGE: We’re still digging through the rubble and trying to reach the lower storage levels. His entire sportscar collection sank!

NICK FURY: Dodge. Listen. To. Me. Do. You. Have. His. Body.

AGENT DODGE: Uh. Um. I. Uh. Not yet.

NICK FURY: Well, there you go. Good as done. You should hang up now.

AGENT DODGE: What? Sir, Stark is nowhere in sight! And…and…and…the President!

NICK FURY: Son. Look. Gonna say this once. Shouldn’t even have to say it that many times. Stark may be a hopeless egomaniac, and who knows how many issues we’ll be sorting for him for years to come, but he’s also one of the most brilliant, resourceful minds on our side in the field. He’s like Super-MacGyver, only real and with less hair. If these guys made the mistake of engaging him, I can go back to resting easy because I know his day won’t end till he personally takes them all off the game board. Simple as that.

AGENT DODGE: Shouldn’t we at least call in the other Avengers?

NICK FURY: Kid, the Avengers Initiative wasn’t meant to solve every problem, cure all society’s ills, and respond to every single crisis from government overthrow to civil unrest to union negotiations. They’re not Earth’s nannies, and, much as some might prefer otherwise, they’re not our sled dogs. They’re the defense option for when all other options have been flicked off the table. Until we desperately need to exercise that option, they’re surrounded with plenty of their own work to do, bad guys to knock down, lives to glue back together, whatever. If we keep calling them for every little 25-cent chore, it just makes the rest of us hard-working, able-bodied do-gooders look like whiny tattletales who can’t even dress ourselves and need Hawkeye to tie our shoes.

AGENT DODGE: But…but…but the President?

NICK FURY: Say it five more times and see if it helps. Hey, I’m sure if Stark thought deep down that he was in over his head, he would’ve called us up front. He knows the number. Hasn’t used it. That means he’s got this. Might take a little longer without us, but that’s his call. It’s not like S.H.I.E.L.D. doesn’t have other forts to fortify or projects in progress, else we’d’ve been up in this in the first place. Our mission statement covers a lot more territory than riding shotgun with Stark. And even if we did show up uninvited, biggest guns loaded and ready for exploding, there’s a tremendous chance he’d save the day without us anyway. Don’t know about you, but mobilizing hundreds of agents just so they can have front-row seats for a live performance of “The Adventures of Tinhead” sounds to me like an astounding waste of our infinite funding.

AGENT DODGE: …

NICK FURY: Can I go back to my vacation yet? I need this one to count, or else HR calls “do-over” and I’m back here a month later, staring at this same gold-leaf Capitol dome all day until I achieve inner peace. Kinda tired of this dome.

AGENT DODGE: …I’m watching the scene on TV now, and there seem to be explosions and fighting now…

NICK FURY: See? Good man, that Stark. Begone. And next time, bug Maria Hill first.

[Fury taps his phone twice, once to end the call and once to resume Predator.]

NICK FURY: Yeah, I still hate this part. Product Placement A.I. Servant Lady, skip ahead to where Predator kills the scrawny guy.

[End scene.]