So... I said I was taking a week of, my muse didn't quite agree. She gave me a day off after I returned from my trip (Monday) then she made me write like crazy the next day, enough that I actually finished the first draft of this chapter in one single day (that hadn't happened in a very long time!) I've also finished the second chapter already and am almost halfway through the third (which is good, since I'm still hoping to finish this before the second season begins).
This part will focus on the last episodes of the series, as well as CA2. I'll also begin paving the way for a few crossovers I've planned for the third part (minor ones, but still). I won't rewrite all the episodes so if something is mentioned, even if only a little, it happened (most likely, as in the series), if it's not mentioned it probably never happened), I will only go into it, if t changes, or if I needed to point something specific out).
Here is where the romance actually comes into place! Enjoy!
Avery
(Part 2 of the Menel Series)
By: Lalaith Quetzalli
They called themselves Agents of SHIELD, but what was SHIELD anymore? They were the Protectors of the Earth... until the serpent revealed itself. When the end of the world they all know comes, the Family is all the Team will have, as long as the Coward and Traitor don't tear them apart before the beginning.
Chapter 1. The End
Not a word was said, by anyone, instead all the Agents in the Control Room of the Bus could only watch in silence the message appearing on the main screen, the message Agent Avery had just managed to decode from all the 'noise' on S.H.I.E.L.D. channels:
"Out of the Shadows, Into the Light..."
And if that weren't enough to raise red flags in everyone's heads, the final word of the message certainly clinched it:
"HYDRA"
It was all a hell of a mess, it had been for the last couple of weeks in fact. Two months after Skye rejoined the team in her new guise as 'Agent Astrid Avery', AC had decided that as dangerous as it was to look for certain things... it was even riskier not to have the information when they so clearly needed it. In their particular case: where it pertained to how exactly Phil Coulson's body had been 'brought back to life'. While Menel's talk with Hela certainly served to answer a few questions, there was a lot they did not know, and as their confrontations against Centipede's soldiers grew in frequency and seriousness, it was quite clearly they needed to know what had happened exactly, and why the information was so important to the Clairvoyant.
In the end, it was Skye who offered a solution.
"I am a mess of a person, due to my heritage." She informed Phil crisply one afternoon. "While I mostly got my looks from my mother, my abilities are mainly those of my father... with some very specific exceptions. I did not actually inherit my mother's precognitive abilities, at least not where the future is concerned, but I'm quite capable of 'reading' the past, of a person or at times even objects, when they are specially charged by a person's power or an especially relevant event. Also, somehow, combining the abilities of both of my parents, I'm capable of something we call 'Astral Walking'. Humans who believe in psychics call it 'astral projection' or 'remote viewing' at times. I can project myself, or at least my mind, to another location, and see what is there in real time. Also, because it's just my mind... or my spirit, depending on how you wish to interpret it, no one will see me, they won't actually know I'm there, unless they have among their number a particularly powerful psychic, or a sorcerer..."
"So, you propose what?" Phil wanted to confirm his theory before giving the go ahead. "That you go 'mentally' or whatever to this 'Guest House' FitzSimmons identified through the records borrowed from the Triskellion and find whatever the GH-325 is?"
"Exactly." Skye/Astrid informed her superior brightly. "Though, to be more precise, what I am proposing is that 'we' go do that." She offered a hand to him. "I can take one person with me on my 'astral trips'. It might be a bit disorienting, since you're not psychic, or a sorcerer, but I'm quite sure your own changes will allow you to adjust. So, what say you?"
"What are we waiting for?"
They decided not to tell the team anything about their little trip until they got back, not wanting to worry them or anything like that... after what they discovered, they decided it was probably better not to tell them anything at all for what they'd found... it went far beyond anything they could have ever imagined. And really, a blue alien's body-fluids being processed into the drug that had, for lack of a better term, regenerated Phil's heart after it was practically torn in two? It was nothing like what any of them could have ever imagined.
Maybe it was luck (whether good or bad they knew not) that made it so one of the guards (not S.H.I.E.L.D.) in the facility marched into the last room of the facility, where the drugs were being kept under lock and key, went through a door labeled T.A.H.I.T.I. And to an industrial sized freezer with the initials: G.H., which contained none other than the aforementioned blue alien... or what was left of it, in any case.
Skye had been so absolutely shocked by the discovery that she couldn't help but cancel her 'astral walk' throwing both of them back into their bodies rather abruptly. Leaving Phil with a feeling similar to whiplash.
"Agent Avery?" Phil called to her formally. "Astrid?"
It had taken some effort, getting used to calling her by a name so different from the one he'd first known her by, but knowing that it was the only way she could be with them, he'd forced himself to do it and not complain about it.
"Skye?!" When, after several minutes, she still wouldn't answer, she finally resorted to her old name. "What is wrong?"
"That..." She was so shocked her words failed her. "That was..."
"You mean the blue alien?" Phil tried to guess. "It sure was a shocking sight but..."
"That was no alien... no more alien than me, in any case..." She whispered, forcing herself to speak past the knot in her throat.
"What...?" That, her boss wasn't expecting.
"That was a Jotun..." Skye finally blurted out.
And as if to make the message all the more clear, she allowed her arms to shift into the pale-blue haze Phil had only ever seen in one individual: her father, Loki, on that day when the truth about her was explained to the team...
And suddenly Phil understood her shock. For her it was not an unknown alien being used to restore human lives... it was a member of her own race (or one of them) possibly even someone who could have been, might have been, family, being experimented on, and used, as if he were nothing more than an animal, or maybe even less than that. Phil felt abruptly sick at the thought. While he was very thankful for being alive, the idea of S.H.I.E.L.D. using a sentient creature in such a manner... it was despicable.
They hadn't actually talked about her feelings regarding what they had discovered that day, or his for that matter. Phil had felt nauseous enough when understanding everything he had to rush to the bathroom, and by the time he'd returned Skye simply refused to talk about it at all. Then there had been other missions.
It was a week before they could actually seat together, in private, and talk about it all:
"I've been meaning to talk to you." He declared as soon as the door to her bunk finished closing behind him. "About what we found out last week..." His voice, his words, failed him, he had no idea how to explain himself without sounding like an idiot. "I... Skye... I..."
"You don't have to do this, you know." She told him calmly, pulling the band from her hair, releasing it from its tight ponytail. "I know you feel like you've gotta apologize for what we found out, for what S.H.I.E.L.D. or whoever it is that the Guest House actually belongs to, for what they've been doing with the body of that Jotun... but their actions are not your fault AC, and I do not hold you liable for them."
Phil couldn't help but think he liked her much more like that, it, she, looked more natural with her hair down and loose, rather than in the tight ponytail her 'Astrid Avery' persona usually used (it was part of the idea, so she would look different from Skye...). He also couldn't help but let out a breath at her words, she knew him so well, even when he at times doubted how well he knew her, and himself... she still somehow knew him. It was exhilarating, humbling and even downright terrifying by turns.
"I cannot believe SHIELD would do something like that to a sentient creature." Phil admitted after a while contemplating things.
"To be fair, they probably don't know that." Skye pointed out. "I mean, really, their only example of an alien was with the chitauri, and they were not what I would call sentient, hive-mentality, or whatever it is that was being used by their true leader to control them notwithstanding... and it's not like the Jotun was actually alive when they found him so..."
"How do you know that?" He actually was curious about her confidence on that.
"Because, according to what I learnt while on Asgard, the Hidden Paths that connected Midgard (Earth) to Jotunheim were collapsed during the last war with the Aesir, over a thousand years ago. No Frost Giant could have crossed here since then. So, logic would indicate that what's in the GH is a decently preserved corpse that SHIELD, or whoever is in charge of that facility, found at some point... probably preserved in the ice."
"You're taking this awfully calmly..."
"Well, I will admit I was pretty shocked at first. But that was mostly because I'd never actually fully seen a Jotun. Adar hates that form of his and hardly ever shifts. I myself have never done a complete shift into that form, I'll even admit to be a little bit afraid of how I might change while in it, after everything I've heard about Frost Giants and their nature..."
"You don't change that much when you take your elven form. Your speech-pattern alters a bit, and you move more fluidly, almost as if you were floating, but aside from that and the obvious physical differences, you don't really change..."
"True, but since that was the form I was born with, it's much more natural to me than the Jotun visage. My hands have gone blue a few times by now, but never my whole body."
"Still, going back to the matter at hand. You're not upset by what has been done to that Jotun?"
"Like I said before, I understand that SHIELD did not know they were dealing with a sentient creature, they were studying an alien, trying to learn from it. And, to be perfectly honest, just knowing you are alive because of that, I'm willing to let it all go."
"I know nothing fazes you, but I would have expected this to..."
"Maybe if the Jotun were alive and being experimented on against his will... or if the experiments were just out of greed and helping no one... but if those experiments hadn't been done you would not be here AC, and I cannot say I regret that. I would regret if it were the other way around."
Phil could only shake his head, yet another confirmation that he probably would never fully understand the girl standing before him.
He knew she hadn't given up yet, on her pursuit of him, she'd told him that much; but he still harbored the same doubts he'd had that day. How can any two people love each other when they did not know the other, when they did not even fully know themselves... it was impossible.
"So, to summarize, the Guest House is a non-SHIELD facility and they're using fluids of an alien being to experiment... one of those experiments, a project they apparently decided to call T.A.H.I.T.I. includes a drug, the GH-325 which pretty much regenerates the cells, which should be impossible, to a point where it can restore even a dead body." The young woman shook her head at the insanity of it all. "This is beyond insane. As thankful as I may be for some of the things that have been achieved. Do we even know the full scope effects of it all? I mean, you've had that drug in you for... a while now, and from what I talked with Hela we know it's allowing your body to adapt to the abilities of an Eihenjar, which are far superior to those of a normal human but... well..."
"Does that apply to anyone the drug is used on, or is it doing that to me because of the very specific circumstances of my return?" Phil finished for her.
"Exactly."
"We're completely in the dark about is."
"It's pretty much where we live nowadays." She snorted. "It would seem that the more we find out about any given topic, the more we need to learn still. I mean, first there was the whole 'I'm an 084 thing'... and we've seen how that turned out. And now, with the GH-325, and the Jotun, and the Clairvoyant, and Centipede..." She let out a breath. "There's so much we don't know, too much we don't understand..."
"But not for long." Phil countered, his voice turning strong and intense. "To hell with any protocols or any code I used to be bound by. We have a long list of questions we need answers for, and we're going after them ourselves."
"Well," She wasn't expecting that, but wasn't about to back down either, she would always go where he lead. "If the team's up for it..."
"No." His denial was immediate. "No, listen to me. I trust them, but we need to protect them from this." He could still remember the security measures he and Skye had noticed in place during their 'tour' of the Guest House. "Fury went to dangerous lengths to keep this under wraps lied to me, lied to S.H.I.E.L.D. This is a powerful secret... a secret men are willing to die for. Until we know why, we can't share this with anyone, for their safety and ours. Got it?"
"Got it." She agreed with no hesitation. "So, what'll it be, AC? Who do we go after first?"
"The person responsible for this." He signaled to her middle, and the scars they both knew were beneath her blouse. "And we make him pay."
That was how it'd begun. Days later Phil had had a meeting in the bus with some of the top-ranking S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents (Fury was off, as he was off-grid... again), as they discussed a plan to find and catch the Clairvoyant. Astrid was instrumental for the plan, as she would be guiding the teams from the Bus. She was even promoted to Level 7 (with added temporary Level 8 security clearance) so she could get into the necessary files and communications channels legally (though they all knew she could have hacked her way into them).
The mission, which was planned thoroughly enough it should have been a piece of cake, was a mess. Something Astrid was deeply disturbed about. The Agents had trusted her! After what she'd managed when leading the mission that had taken down the Rising Tide once and for all they had all trusted her to be just as effective in finding and catching the Clairvoyant, and she had failed... spectacularly... it was enough to make her cringe. Especially when Agent Blake was seriously injured by Deathlok (Mike) during the mission.
The turn came when they realized Agent Blake, before his injuries became too much, had made use of a special bullet created by Fitz, meant to be used as a tracker. It allowed them to track Deathlok to an old, abandoned, factory in Pensacola, Florida. There, with some help from Fitz's dwarves they found the Clairvoyant: a self-named psychic, quadriplegic reject of the Index called Thomas Nash who had the gall to mock Phil and his team about Skye's death and the things he would do to the rest of them... until Ward put a bullet in his chest.
The shock Astrid felt by the action was such she had no idea what to say, and she knew neither did AC. Ward was taken into custody in the Bus, awaiting review by the higher ups, they would be the ones to decide on what consequences should befall him for killing a technically defenseless man when he was supposed to be taken in. Of course, the fact that he pretty much declared he'd done it for her didn't help matters any.
Astrid was not naïve, she knew perfectly well what some people were capable of; knew what her Adar (father) would have done to the man who ordered her shot just to further his own plans, nearly killing her in the process. And yet that did not mean she had to like it. Because someone killing because of her, in her name, it was like she had that blood on her hands too, like it's her fault that person died; and no matter how bad they might have been, she didn't like feeling that way. It also didn't help when they realized he might not have been guilty after all...
The brunette could still remember, with painful clarity, the conversation with her AC after the team were back in the air:
"Mind if I talk some stuff through with you?" Astrid inquired after knocking softly on AC's open door. "Are you busy?"
"I'm worried." Phil said for all response.
"About Ward?" Astrid nodded grimly. "I know."
She had confronted Ward about the matter, but she didn't believe it had done much, in the grand scheme of things, her former SO had been acting odd, ever since her return, it seemed, since his failure to recognize her right away... though it had become even more pronounced after his former SO had joined the team, along with a few others, to help in the hunt of Deathlok.
While Ward might want to bring his old SO in, tell him the truth about Skye/Astrid, she hadn't wanted to, too afraid of an unknown knowing the truth about her, and AC had declared it was her decision to make. In the end, and because she didn't want to seem cold, she had told Ward they would decide after the current situation was over; and Ward couldn't just ignore her wishes and tell Garrett everything anyway thanks to a nifty little protection spell Loki had cooked up, where no one could reveal the truth about her, except herself, and whoever she gave express permission to (AC was the only one who had such permission, he was the only one she trusted absolutely, and he'd promised only to do it if her life depended on it).
Still, the whole situation with Ward was putting her on edge, so much she hadn't been able to relax from her 'Agent Avery' persona even though the mission had been over for hours, and only the team was on board the Bus at the time.
"I can't believe he just killed someone like that." She finished her thought.
"I'm worried he killed the wrong man." Phil replied.
Astrid wasn't expecting that, the idea left her stumped.
"How do we know it was him?" AC insisted. "He never spoke. The computer spoke for him. How do we know he was the one controlling it?"
"Are you saying Nash could have been pretending to be the Clairvoyant?" She tried the idea out-loud, it sounded insane, and yet fit their situation all too well...
"I'm saying Nash could have been a prop." AC said in return.
"And now he's dead." She could see where he was going with that line of thought.
"After the attacks led us right to him." He nodded. "The investigation all wrapped up in a neat little bow. I feel like he could still be out there right now, in our heads..."
"Or in our files." She corrected abruptly, activating the tablet she'd been holding all along, the collection of files she hadn't closed even after the mission was finished. "When you told me to check into the psych evals, you said something, you said, 'read his mind' and it got me thinking." Her voice got faster as she began connecting all the dots in a way she hadn't before. "And Ward said that the Clairvoyant knew how to push all the right buttons..."
"Raina did that to me, too..." He admitted.
"Did she mention your father's death?" The change in expression was enough of an answer as she explained. "Your psych evaluation called it a 'defining moment'." She offered the tablet to him, regardless of protocols. "These aren't just personality tests, they're surveillance on every agent; pictures, stats, where you've been stationed, who you visit, where you like to eat..."
"Dinners at the Richmond." Phil muttered, mostly to himself, before turning to her again. "He's been monitoring us. Think about it. The Clairvoyant only knew you'd be at Quinn's villa..."
"After I dropped a tracker." She finished for him, understanding where he was going. "And the only thing he's had trouble seeing is what happened to you after you died..."
"Because Director Fury wouldn't release that file to anyone." They were on a roll.
" We've been wrong all along, then." Astrid murmured. "The Clairvoyant... he's not a psychic like some of the mutants, or like Naneth...
"The Clairvoyant doesn't have abilities... He has security clearance." Phil finished the part she still had trouble processing. "He's an agent of S.H.I.E.L.D."
That was when things truly got insane: with Phil wanting to know if Ward had decided to kill the Clarivoyant's decoy or if he'd been ordered to do so, Fitz finding May's secret encrypted hard-line and disabling it (under Astrid's orders), the confrontation in the hangar when May discovered what Fitz had done... it was worse than a bad Cowboy movie... and then the Bus, which was supposed to be taking them to the Triskellion, abruptly changed route, apparently without anyone on the plane directing it!
The tension kept mounting, until Phil decided to knock May out with an ICER, while Astrid connected her laptop to the systems and tried to decode the strange 'noise' she kept finding in all the S.H.I.E.L.D. channels. Then came the call from Garret, who was being targeted by a couple of drones, and Fitz got working on overriding the weapons systems so Coulson could give a hand to his old friend (all while May continued unconscious and Ward in their cell).
Phil was pretty handy with the guns, and in no time at all Garrett was on board. He was still pretty strung-up when he entered the Command area of the bus, where Astrid's hands flew across the keys of her laptop as she worked out an algorithm to decipher the code she'd found hidden in the strange 'noise':
"Can I ask the obvious question?" Garret demanded as he joined the others. "What the hell?!" "We don't know." Phil admitted grimly. "We don't even know where our plane is headed."
"Oh, I saw your trajectory." Garret informed him darkly. "You're being tractor-beamed straight to the Hub. Those drones were launched out of there for sure."
"Victoria Hand." Phil murmured, shocked at the mere posibility.
"Hand?" Leo repeated in disbelief. "Can't be."
"It can't be what, now?" Garrett asked, realizing he was missing something.
"The Clairvoyant." Astrid clarified from her spot.
"I thought Ward capped that guy." Ward's old SO commented, confused.
"We don't believe the man Ward killed was the Clairvoyant." Phil summarized their conclusions for him. "We think he was an unwitting decoy meant to end our investigation."
"That's a lot of trouble to go through for a red herring, don't you think?" Either Garrett didn't believe it, or didn't want to.
"Because the Clairvoyant is a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent using high-level clearance to stay ahead of us, make it seem like she's got psychic abilities." Coulson elaborated.
"'She'?" Garrett repeated, still in disbelief. "You think Victoria Hand's the Clairvoyant?" He scoffed then. "I don't mean to pee in the punch bowl, but that doesn't make a lot of sense. I was stationed with Vic in Lisbon. She's a hard-ass and a buzzkill at parties, I grant you, but do you really think she's capable of that?"
"Excuse me. Didn't she just try to blow you out of the sky?" Phil couldn't believe his old friend wouldn't believe him.
"Don't get me wrong she's definitely gone nuts, but her actions prove she's not the Clairvoyant, right?" The other Senior Agent insisted. "I mean, if she's been hiding in plain sight all this time, why reveal herself now?"
As if on cue, the answer began appearing on the screen right then, as Astrid finally finished the key to decode the hidden message:
"Guys." She called the men's attention. "Look."
"Out of the Shadows, Into the Light..." Phil read out-loud grimly.
When the last word came out Astrid wished she could curse out-loud in all the languages she knew (which, granted, weren't many, but the intent was there). Still, Garrett's reaction, while not quite that vocal, reflected their situation well enough:
"Well, I'll be..."
And there, in full caps, was their worst nightmare shown:
"HYDRA"
Leo seemed to still be processing the implications of everything that was going on, and the fact that Simmons was alone for an unknown (Agent Triplett) in the midst of a place controlled by one they believed might be the real Clairvoyant. Garrett offered to take care of explaining things to his old subordinate, while Astrid followed Coulson to where May was.
"You look thoughtful." Phil commented, stopping on the way.
"I wonder if this was what Naneth warned me about." Astrid admitted quietly.
"What warning?" Phil asked, immediately on alert. "Why is this the first I hear of any alert?"
"Because I had no idea what to think of it." Astrid admitted. "Naneth will be the first to say that prophecies most of the time are only understood after they've come to pass. In this case, the day before I left Asgard she told me: 'Beware the crows among the ravens... keep an eye out for the foxes pretending to be wolves... may the bonds of family be as bright as the stars and as strong as the earth itself, may the coward and traitor not tear them apart...' Endquote."
"Crows? Ravens? Foxes? Wolves?" Phil recited, obviously not understanding a thing.
"Well, if you mix a number of cultures and their beliefs, you get this:" Astrid explained her own theories: "Crows are considered bad omens, while ravens, on the other hand, are seen by some as birds of light, and of magic. Hence, the crows among the ravens would be bad. Also, they are both so similar that it can be hard to tell them apart, unless you know what you're looking for. Foxes are tricksters, while wolves are known for their loyalty, their packs... so, like with the birds, foxes pretending to be wolves wouldn't be a good thing. And it doesn't matter that it's not logical in reality, since in prophecies they're almost always metaphors."
"So you think your mother's prophecy was a warning about this?" Phil guessed. "About the traitors in S.H.I.E.L.D., Hydra?"
"Well it fits, doesn't it?" She shrugged. "I've been trying to understand what it meant for the last three months, even when I began mixing the meanings the animals had in different cultures, I could have never imagined it would mean this exactly, not until now..."
"What about the coward and traitor, or was it cowards and traitors, as in all of Hydra inside S.H.I.E.L.D.?" Phil inquired, more of the same.
"Possibly? I don't know exactly." Astrid shrugged self-consciously. "Since she said it all in elvish and I'm still quite new at handling the language I'm not exactly sure if she said those words in singular or plural, or if she was being purposefully ambiguous. She may have been talking about all of them, or even one specifically."
"One that will threaten your family's bonds..."
"Our family's bonds. I think she meant us, our team, as a family. It's not like my parents have anything to do with this mess for the prophecy to involve them. No one outside us knows a thing about them, and they won't tell anyone else..."
"So we're at risk... as a part of S.H.I.E.L.D., or as our own team?"
"I don't know."
It was frustrating, having such a prophecy, yet no idea what it might mean.
"I suppose if something happens we can consider we at least had a heads up, for now we need to handle the current situation." Phil decided eventually. "Otherwise we will all end up dead in the next hour and worrying about the rest of the prophecy will be pointless."
Astrid knew he was right, therefore she did not insist on the matter; she was happy someone else knew about the prophecy at least; hopefully that would help any.
Things only got more complicated from there. Right as they were about to reach the 'cell', Astrid's personal phone (not the S.H.I.E.L.D. issued she used most of the time), began ringing.
"What's that?" Phil asked, confused.
"That's my personal line." Astrid announced grimly, bringing her secondary phone out. "This cannot be good."
The moment she finished reading the message on the screen she cursed in a mix of English and Chinese (elvish wasn't that good for cursing in the end). She did so for a handful of seconds before breaking off and making to run back the way they'd come.
"What was that?!" Phil called before she could move.
"That was Tasha." Astrid informed him stoically, barely looking at him over her shoulder. "Shit just hit the fan in Washington. I have no idea what the hell is going on, but for whatever the reason all the information on S.H.I.E.L.D. is about to go online. She's giving me five minutes to take and seal everything I consider too risky for our team before the rest goes up."
"Why the hell is Natasha making highly classified S.H.I.E.L.D. information public?" Phil asked, beyond confused at everything.
"I haven't the slightest idea." Astrid shrugged. "But unless you want the cross-hairs to be pointed at us, and especially at you, I need to get to work, right now."
"Go." Phil waved her on. "I'll handle May and her hard-line."
It was all she needed to hear before rushing off.
Nearly five minutes afterwards, Astrid was still typing on her laptop at top speed, in a battle against time, and whatever the hell was going on in the Triskellion, trying to make sure her team, her family, would still have a life, a real, private life, when it all ended; and mostly, make sure that the whole 'making public the information' thing, wouldn't put them at risk; they still had enemies trying to kill them after all: like Cybertek, Centipede, the real Clairvoyant, and whoever else he/she might be working with...
An alarm on her phone sounded, immediately followed by one on the laptop, as Natasha finished whatever it was she was doing, releasing everything that was left in the digital archives of the Triskellion, to the public.
The whole thing made Astrid wonder briefly what the point had been in taking down the Rising Tide, if they were making it all public anyway...
That line of thought vanished abruptly from her mind when the shooting began and Astrid reacted instinctively by throwing herself to the floor and crawling beneath the table, curling into a ball and waiting in silence for the bullets to stop flying.
Eventually the firing did stop, though Astrid din't get that much of a breather, as Garrett realized Hydra probably would want to preserve the plane; so they would be sending a strike team against them. Leo fused the hydraulics of the cargo bay to buy them some time, while the others tried to find a way to get out without being caught. Astrid, for her part, got working on backing up everything she could from the systems while at the same time wiping them clean. They were leaving nothing for Hydra to use (especially considering the kind of information they had on the hard-drive of the bus, all the things they'd encountered during their missions).
Astrid even took the liberty of using a little time-warping spell on her laptop and the external hard-drive she was using to back up the files. It was one of the more complex spells Loki had taught her while in Asgard. Hell to use on living beings, as one had to take a lot of variables in consideration: like food, water, oxygen and many other things; however, with inanimate things it was pretty easy, mainly because, most of the time, it didn't do much, only this time it allowed her to copy a lot more than she would have been able with her limited time.
She was releasing a virus in other, lesser areas of the Bus's mainframe so things like the cameras' feed, GPS records and such would be erased as well, when something caught her off guard: it was as if someone had punched her in the middle of her stomach suddenly. The young woman could not help but double over, barely managing to hold back her pained moan; she felt all her air being taken from her, along with something else, like a sudden void in the center of her heart.
"What the...?" She didn't understand.
And then, in a second, it all became clear. She was a bit empathic, like her mother had told her, it was a common gift in their family. It was one thing that hadn't surprised her that much, since she'd always been pretty much at 'reading' the moods of the people around her. Most of the time they didn't really affect her, but the level of intensity she was sensing in that moment, it was superior to anything a human could feel, anything a hman could process. The answer came to the front of her mind in the next second.
"AC..." She murmured to herself.
Yes, something was really wrong with her AC, and she had no idea what... neither could she go and find out, since they were in a pretty precarious situation! And she had to be logical, it would do no good to try and help Phil if they weren't alive to do something about whatever it was that had upset him that much...
Somehow Astrid managed to finish with her own duty, right in time to rush after the rest of the team into the vents, and down a 'mouse hole' with help of one of Leo's most clever inventions (one that, apparently, had never reached distribution, though he'd sent it to the higher ups for consideration a year before).
The team had a plan. Most of them did not like the idea of splitting, but knew it was necessary. So while Phil, May, Leo and Garrett went to the surveillance rooms, from where they hoped to locate Jemma and Agent Triplett, so they could then go and get them out; meanwhile Ward and Astrid went in search of the control rooms, where they would cut down the power and disable whatever was keeping the Bus locked (it was their best chance at getting out after they'd rescued the missing member(s) of their team).
Things seem to be going fairly decently, at least until Ward and Astrid got out of the ventilation system and into one of the closets, the one closest to where they needed to go, only to find what looked like over a dozen armed agents on the way.
"Damn." Ward cursed at the sight.
"The processing center is at the end of that hall." Astrid pointed out, not-quite-helpfully.
"Give me your ICER." Ward instructed unexpectedly.
"What are you gonna do?" She had a bad feeling.
"Pave the way for you." He answered simply.
She didn't know if she should feel touched by his worry, or affronted by the fact that he didn't believe she could fight as well, in the end she settled for the first.
"There's like a hundred guys out there." She hid her mix of worry and annoyance with dramatics, she was good at that, had always been.
"Twelve, or maybe fifteen." Ward corrected with the slightest roll of his eyes. "Level-five foot soldiers, basic armor package, and no other way through. The others are depending on us."
"But it's suicide." She insisted.
She didn't understand, was it really worry for her well-being that stopped him from even allowing the thought that she might be able to help; or did he simply not believe her capable?
"Not if I don't die." He replied in an attempt at carelessness, except his tone turned grim almost right away as he added: "And if I do..."
"Wh... slow down." Astrid snapped, suddenly having no idea what switch had been flipped.
"...maybe I deserve to." He finished in the same dark tone. "I killed an innocent man, Skye..."
She rolled her eyes at his use of her real name, she'd been pretty insistent on no one doing that, it was too risky, for her, and everyone else as well. At least she knew they couldn't do it (either accidentally or intentionally) if there was someone present who didn't know the truth already.
"You didn't know." She tried to make him focus on the positive, the last thing they needed was him going all suicidal on her, on them all. "You thought you were doing the right thing. You thought he was going to..."
"To hurt you." He finished for her, looking into her eyes, absolutely serious.
That one, she wasn't expecting. It was true the false Clairvoyant had mocked them about her, about her 'death', and how the rest of the team would be next, beginning with her (and why he'd fixated on her, she'd no idea, she was technically the newest member of the team!); still, it was one thing to suspect, or even know, that things were like that, and an entirely different one to hear the person say it to your face... for a second Astrid wanted nothing more than to point out that she never asked him to kill anyone... yet, she realized such a comment wouldn't help their situation any, she was trying to make sure he survived, not that he killed himself faster.
"If we make it out of this, maybe we can... grab a drink, you and me." He offered unexpectedly.
"Are you...?" She thought he had to be insane.
"Remember in that bar in Dublin, you offered to talk?" He went and mentioned the very time she was thinking about. "I didn't want to talk. I needed to keep things compartmentalized."
"Like with May?" Astrid drawled, then scoffed at his look of surprise. "I'm not an idiot. We live in the same plane together, for god's sake."
"Well, with her, I knew I could." He insisted. "With you I didn't want to risk it."
"I was offering to talk, Ward, not to have sex with you." She pointed out.
It wasn't like she'd never had casual sex, really, because she had. And then there had been Miles, which was an entirely different can of worms... but really, she hadn't been offering sex to Ward, not back then, not ever. She just wasn't interested in him that way. Regardless of AC's insistence that their kiss had been a mistake, that her attraction to him (and his to her, because she knew it existed even if he denied it a thousand times...) could never come to anything, she wasn't about to give up, it just wasn't in her blood...
"I'm not saying that." He assured her, a bit too fast. "I'm saying I want a chance to take you up on it, to have that talk." He looked away with a sigh. "Look, I know I'm not that guy. I'm too locked-down, too boring...
"When we make it out of this yes, let's have a drink." She interrupted him.
She might not be interested in him romantically, but that did not mean she couldn't be there for him, be his friend, it looked like he might need one. And really, hadn't she been the one to say they were all family? Family was supposed to be there for each other, always, she would be there for Ward when he decided he needed her...
Then, as if things weren't already complicated enough, he had to go and kiss her! Astrid didn't even get the chance to react in any way (which might have been a good thing), for just a second later Ward was standing by the door, guns at the ready.
"Seeing how I might die and all that... what the hell?" He chuckled darkly at her over his shoulder before getting ready. "Lock the door behind me."
Astrid still couldn't respond, too shocked by his actions. Finally she managed to open the door to him, to allow him out, and then close it again behind him; all the time her instincts screaming all kind of imprecations against him. When... if... When Ward returned she as going to teach him that no one could steal a kiss from her!
From inside the closet she could hear the echo of punches, kicks, muffled groans, thudding, rushed footsteps, among other noises that signaled the fight going on. All the while her mind kept wondering on the best response to the stolen kiss. She was debating between yelling his ear off, or the more traditional sound slap, when a much better option occurred to her:
"I'm not a little girl in need of protection..." She muttered to herself. "And I'll show him that."
With that in mind, Astrid took hold of the nearby broom, snapped off the end so she was left holding something similar to her staff, before opening the door silently and taking a look out to make a plan. As it turned out, it was probably a good idea that she decided to step in, and there wasn't that much time for planning, as Ward was down and being beaten. So with that in mind, Astrid decided to forgo any plans and wing it (she was pretty good at that, anyway).
Ward saw her coming, though too late to do anything about it, before he could even open his mouth (or his attackers could become aware of her), she was upon them. The broomstick served her pretty well to knock out a couple of agents before it broke, then it was all about the kicks and the punches, which she was actually quite decent at, if she said so herself.
At some point one of the men managed to distract her enough for another to get into her hard and punch her in the face, hard enough to make her head turn harshly. What the men attacking her were not expecting was when she did not go down with that punch. Instead Astrid simply turned twisted her head this way and that a couple of times until it cracked once, then spit out a mouthful of blood (the hit made her bite the inside of her cheek) to the side, before she spun on a heel, delivering a roundhouse kick to the man who had punched her, followed by an uppercut to the one who had distracted her first.
She finished her turn fluidly, already on guard to continue fighting. It wasn't necessary, as Ward dropped the last guy right then. She was about to comment on what a good team they made, when Ward spoke:
"Are you insane?!" He snapped at her.
"What?" That, she wasn't expecting.
"You didn't need to do that." Ward chided her. "I told you I would take care of them."
"Like you were taking care of them when they were beating the hell out of you?!" She couldn't help but snap back at him. "I was just trying to help you Ward. Besides, I'm not a little girl who needs to be protected. I'm as much of an Agent as you are."
"You made yourself an Agent, does't mean you are one." He retorted abruptly.
By the look on his face the moment the words came out of his mouth, it was obvious he hadn't meant to say them, though that didn't change the fact that he was thinking them.
"I cannot believe you just said that..." She whispered, in absolute shock.
"Skye..." He began, obviously chagrined by his own words.
"Don't... don't say anything." She waved his excuses/apologies aside, she did not have time to deal with them. "Lets just get this done. The others are counting on us."
"You're right." He agreed, trying to appease her. "You ready to hack this system?"
"Who said anything about hacking?" She asked flippantly, allowing a mischievous grin to herself as she showed him the contents of her pack: explosives. "There's no time to be subtle, lets go."
They set up the explosives quickly and easy enough. Ward tried several times to apologize for his words but Skye wouldn't let him. It wasn't that she was offended by his exact words, per say. She understood perfectly why Ward believed that, it's not like she hadn't pretty much done that, really. Hacked and spelled her way into S.H.I.E.L.D., in her identity as Astrid Avery. But that did not mean she did not deserve to be an Agent; she could still remember something Ward had told her, when they were visiting the S.H.I.E.L.D.-Hogwarts:
"All you need to join is a dedication to the greater good... Coulson saw that in you the moment he met you."
It was as true in that moment as it had been over five months before, did Ward no longer believe that, or was it that he'd never truly believed it? She did not know the answer to that question, and was almost afraid to find out.
She didn't really have much time to focus on that, in any case. As soon as all the explosives were in place she and Ward hurried down the hall and around a corner to wait. The first explosion was nowhere as big as she was expecting; yet, right as Ward was commenting on that fact, the second one came, several times the intensity of the first one (the former had been more of a warning). It was enough to make the whole building vibrate, at the same time it took out the main systems, including the one that had re-routed the plane and was keeping it grounded.
Then, right as the young woman was about to comment on the satisfaction she felt as the success of their mission, she felt power fill her... or more like the echo of power. She stumbled briefly, but ignored the hand Ward offered, instead righting herself immediately and turning instantly in the direction she could feel the pull of resonating power coming from:
"He's awake..." She murmured to herself, quietly.
Ward might have questioned her comment, if he'd heard her at all, that is, but Astrid wasn't really paying any attention to him; all her focus was on the remnants of the power she could practically taste in the air. Something had happened, though she had no idea what exactly. Something had happened and it had caused Phil to unlock his power, finally...
The brunette wasn't worried, not really, even if Phil was new to his power and had no real idea how to channel it, the raw power would be more than enough to carry him through practically anything. She wasn't worried about him... doesn't mean she didn't rush to meet him and the rest of the team, make sure they were all fine.
They were, of course. And so was Victoria Hand... who, as they found out, wasn't actually the Clairvoyant. No... that title actually belonged to the one person none of them had ever considered (even when things had gotten most tense and accusations flew all around): John Garrett.
As Astrid went to stand beside her AC, watching all the loyal SHIELD Agents marching those who had been revealed to be from Hydra, with Garrett closing the line, she couldn't help but think of her mother's prophecy:
"It seems we've found your crows and foxes..." Phil commented quietly to her, his mind on the same track as hers.
"I wonder if that means Agent Garrett was the Coward and Traitor..." Astrid murmured back.
"Maybe they all were." Phil suggested.
"Maybe." She agreed.
And yet, in a corner of her mind, she couldn't help but think they were missing something, something important... though she had no idea what it might be.
Before someone says anything about me making the alien a Jotun when I know many insist it's a Kree... look at it this way. Sif said that from all the 'blue aliens' in the universe, the Jotun were the only ones who'd ever been on Earth... and while I'll be the first to point out she could have been wrong, the last thing I need right now is to get into the mess that more alien races would bring. Also, it allowed for the conversation I wanted between Skye and Phil.
I know the prophecy is a mess and it's likely that anyone who actually has any decent knowledge of such things will want to lynch me, but I'm taking poetic and literary license in this. Also, I have the honest belief that such gifts would present themselves in a manner that allows the individual to interpret it, which may or may not fit what others say certain things mean. In other words, if Skye believes that crows are bad and ravens are good, when she has prophetic dreams, crows will represent bad omens and ravens good things, because that's how her mind translates the images.
Next chapter: The 'war' truly begins between SHIELD and Hydra, the Team-Family fights to endure together, revelations of Skye's past (and my take on the whole Miles-mess), more prophecies... next week!
As I've said before. The third part of this series: Astrid, will handle several crossovers. This is because, as you may or may not have realized, "Astrid" will handle my version of the rebuilding of SHIELD, it will also have the new version of the organization building bridges with other individuals and groups of gifted people (hence the crossovers). Some I have at least half planned already: (X-Men, Amazing Spider-Man, Moonlight -series-, Batman -Nolan trilogy-), other possibilities include the Secret Circle books, Harry Potter, Smallville, Once Upon a Time... What I want is for the readers to tell me what they want, if you would like to see a specific crossover (if it's a series specify the moment). They won't be of vital importance precisely. Right now the plan is to do one per chapter, as a way to maybe fix things from other fandoms, maybe develop details from my main characters, and have some fun as I lay the ground-work for the main and final part of the series: "Meneliel".
So let me know what you wand and what you like!
See ya around!