Mark Snow woke up one day after he died to find he had been transformed into a cockroach.
What made this even more baffling, is that his last memories were of heat, and pain, and a certain smugness that he had managed to take Stanton with him as the two of them were blown to kingdom come. Apparently, the afterlife was...a smelly sewer? Mark wasn't too thrilled to find himself as a cockroach, but given what his afterlife could have been (if he had ever given it any thought) it definitely could have been worse. Fire and brimstone and eternal torment beat out bug-ness in his book any day. He flicked his new antennae and shuffled in place, getting the feel for his extra limbs. Then he set out to take stock of his surroundings. No sense just sitting around on his thorax moaning about his fate. Time to take charge and...
SLURP
...He never really saw what got him. Only a vague sense of motion and moving shadow and then pain as something gulped him down. He was frozen in place, wondering why he was alive (again) before it occurred to him that he was out in the open. He quickly scurried over to the concealing shadows and found a soggy leaf to hide under. He stayed there for a long time. This afterlife was going to be tougher than he thought. Eventually, hunger got to him and he cautiously left his hiding place. He scurried along, staying as close to the wall as he could and hoping that the shadows there would keep him concealed. He wasn't sure where he was going, but he felt some indecipherable pull calling him onward. The tunnel he was crawling through from time to time shuddered in sync with a distant rumbling. He suspected that his path would soon intersect one of the subway lines running beneath the city. On the heals of that thought the ground shook accompanied by a loud rumble like a howling storm and...
THUNK
He never saw the rock that shook loose and fell on him. Didn't even have time to realize he was being squashed before it was over. He had to wonder about this strange afterlife. He wasn't being born, or hatched, or whatever the heck it was cockroaches came from. Instead each time he "died" he seemed to return sometime later at a spot close to where he had expired. He wasn't certain of the time frame involved, but he didn't think that it was too long. He was just glad that he didn't return in the exact same situation as the one that had "killed" him. It was also hard to tell, but he thought he came back a little more himself (certainly a little wiser about the dangers of a bug's life). He didn't like to think about the implications. About how many times he might have already died as a bug before he regained some knowledge of who he was. He was certainly still having trouble adjusting. His CIA training in black ops didn't seem to be all that helpful in this situation. It was disappointing, although not too surprising.
As he followed the mysterious pull he came across a group of industrious ants. Without hesitation he relieved them of their hard earned food. He ate, and tried not to think about what it might be that he was consuming. He continued on for some unknown period of time. He became a bit better at being a bug, and could now forage for himself without resorting to mugging haplass ants.
Eventually his surroundings changed as he exited a drain into a subway tunnel proper. He paused for a moment, trying to decide on his next course of action. He still felt that vague pulling sensation. It seemed to be leading him in the direction of a platform further up the track. That was OK, platform meant people and people meant garbage and he was hungry from all this crawling around. There was bound to be more to forage there than the measly scraps he had found up until now. Not detecting any movement, he headed out into the open to cross to the other side of the tracks when...
ZAP
..Well that was stupid. Clearly this stretch of track was still in use. He should have known better than to crawl onto the third rail. Thankfully he had reincarnated on the other side of it, closer to the platform that was his destination. He scurried along faster and was relieved when he made it safely to the shadows under the platform. He took a moment to rest, until he was distracted by the "scent" of nearby garbage. He followed the smell, only to suddenly find himself confronted by THEBIGGEST DAMN RAT HE HAD EVER SEEN! Frozen for a moment staring into its beady red eyes as it munched on a rotten pickle he eventually broke and ran before the rodent decided it prefered fresher food...
SMOOSH
...That couldn't have been pretty. He doubted there would have been much of anything left for the rat after the subway car ran over him while he was crawling over the track. Fortunately the passing of the subway car seemed to have frightened off the rat. Maybe he could put this to his advantage. The pull seemed to be coming from further down the tracks. If he hitched a ride while the car was in the station he could probably cut a lot of time off of his journey to ...wherever. He would just have to pay attention so he could jump off when the pull led him in another direction.
The plan worked. He rode the subway car until the direction of the pull changed to away from the current route. He left the car and scurried under the new platform. Then headed off in the new direction. Down a drain, and through some tunnels into what he thought was an unused section of the subway. But no, as he entered another platform area he became aware of lights and people. And not just any people but someone he knew...John! He didn't know how he could recognize or understand the people in the subway but he had long since stopped worrying about all this metaphysical mumbo jumbo. In this new subway station the pull vanished and he decided this was where he was meant to be. Searching his tiny bug brain on anything he might remember about reincarnation, he had some vague recollection of repeating certain relationships with each incarnation. Huh. Seemed he wasn't finished chasing after John. He wondered if Evans was around. Probably came back as a mushroom. Heh heh heh.
He had already run across Stanton when he had first reached this subway platform. He shuddered at the memory.
BLEARGH
She had repaid him for killing her by slowly sucking the life from him. He made sure to stay away from the tunnel where she had spun her web. Fortunately she seemed content to stay there. Snow had always taken her for someone who enjoyed pulling the wings off of flies. Seems spider-dom was just the next logical step for her. He was surprised to be lumped together with John though. John had never really been one of them. Even Stanton hadn't been able to truly tarnish the gleam on the armor of his White Knight complex.
After a quick snack of garbage he settled into a convenient crack where he could spy on John and his companions. Seems as though they had some sort of guardian angel deal going on where they protected strangers from some kind of threat. Figures. What had he just been thinking about John wanting to play the White Knight? His musings were interrupted when he became aware of something. Something he hadn't encountered since his transformation. John and his friend were distracted by something on the computer, so Mark took the opportunity to break cover and scurry up the leg onto the small table where John had placed his cup. A quick climb and...
*GLUGG*
Aaaaaahhh! Heaven. He hadn't had coffee in so many lifetimes. He was filled with bliss even though he was drowning. As his consciousness faded he would have smiled if he could at the thought of John's reaction to finding his corpse in his cup (hopefully not until after he had taken a sip)
As time went by Mark became acquainted with more of John's co-conspirators. There was the Smart One who provided the intelligence. The Crazy One who reminded him too much of Stanton. And the Angry One, who had once impaled him with a thrown knife. She was his favorite, as she was responsible for most of his food: the leftovers of all those huge messy sandwiches she loved to eat. He would crawl into the garbage when no one was around to have a feast. After all the effort he made to get here he didn't want to risk being bagged up and carted away with the trash, then having to start all over again.
Listening in when he could Mark soon discovered that there was something else going on. It was difficult to sneak too close when the others were inside the subway car, as it was too well lit and the Smart One wasn't too thrilled with his company. An unfortunate run-in with a can of Raid had taught Mark that.
Snooping became much easier when he realized he could fly. FLY! Who knew! He had been crawling up the outside of the subway car when he lost his grip on a wet spot and tumbled off. He was expecting another unfortunate death but instead he instinctively started flapping his little wings and the next thing he knew he was rising instead of falling! He spent the next few minutes zipping back and forth outside the subway car enjoying his newfound ability. He was flying! Just like Superman! Or maybe Superroach in his case, but still it was pretty amazing...
*CHOMP*
Dammit he forgot about the dog. Guess he wasn't as enticing when he was just crawling around. Better designate the area around the beast a no-fly zone in the future.
Still, his new ability enabled him to crawl about on the roof and remain unobserved while listening in on the conversations of the people below. He soon learned about the threat posed by Samaritan. Although the evil Supercomputer was unlikely to affect him now, as he was literally a bug beneath its notice. Mark supposed in this form he could survive even a nuclear winter. But that didn't mean he wanted to see Samaritan take over. This was the kind of threat he had dreamed of thwarting when he had first joined the Agency when he was young and naïve.
But what could he do in his present situation?