AN: Alright, I had randomly started rereading this story and the more times I read it, the more I started disliking Piper's character. Piper had started out as a pretty awesome concept, but I think I failed to portray that concept in a way that did the original concept justice, so I've decided to rewrite the story and change Piper's character quite a bit. I hope the new and improved version of the story and Piper will be as well received as the old version was.
DISCLAIMER for the WHOLE story: Don't own jack squat, except for the OC(s). I'm not making any money off of this as it's just purely for entertainment purposes.
PS - I'm also taking some serious liberties with certain things such as how Fury's left eye got injured since it was never actually specified in the movie. I know how it got injured in the comics and such, but that doesn't really seem to fit with the movie. I apologize in advance to any purists or whatever.
PSS - Title inspired by the song Smash the Control Machine by Otep.
"Are you sure it's a good idea to bring her in, sir?" Maria Hill asked cautiously as she followed her superior down the brightly lit hallway, the thick soles of her boots making a soft thudding sound with each step down the linoleum hall.
Nick Fury, director of the secret government agency S.H.I.E.L.D., glanced briefly over his right shoulder at the dark haired woman before looking forward again, "She would be a valuable asset to the agency, Agent Hill." He stated calmly, though his mouth tightened slightly in a small hint of irritation.
"I understand that, sir." The high-ranking agent replied as she and Fury came to a stop in front of a thick, heavy looking metal door with an retinal scanner and hand scanner, "It's just that we'll already have to worry about The Hulk, are you sure you want to bring in another unstable person. Especially her?"
"We have no choice." Fury said flatly then he put his hand on the scanner before letting the retinal scanner sweep across his good eye.
A soft beep sounded from the scanners followed by multiple soft clicks and whirls from inside the metal door. Maria swallowed thickly and rested her hand on the gun at her waist when a final click and a soft, pneumatic hiss signaled the metal door opening.
Agent Hill sucked in a sharp breath of air when she laid eyes on the hunched over figure sitting in the middle of the heavily built metal cage in the middle of the concrete room, restrained to what bore an almost uncanny resemblance to the electric chair with chains that were nearly as thick as her wrist crossing over the figure's body.
Gunmetal gray eyes suddenly snapped open, the slit pupils narrowing into thin slashes, and Agent Hill tightened the grip she had on the butt of her gun when those eyes fixated on her with a predatory intensity from behind long, shaggy silver-gray hair. Fury reached out and put his hand on the younger agent's shoulder, causing the dark-haired woman to jump with a small gasp. A muffled raspy, wheezing sound emitted from the woman chained to the chair in the metal cage and Agent Hill felt her face flush in embarrassment and anger even as goose bumps broke out across her flesh at the sound.
Fury nodded towards the closed door, turning towards the restrained woman before he could see Agent Hill move to stand guard as he had silently instructed her to do. He stepped closer to the cage and clasped his hands behind his back, staring at the shaking and laughing woman sitting in the middle of it impassively. The straitjacket she wore was barely visible underneath the chains that kept her shackled to the chair, the body underneath hidden completely from view, but Fury didn't need to see under the straitjacket and chains to know she was whiplash lean with hard muscles coiled tightly around her slender frame. Her hair was a dull shade of silver-gray like silver shavings and a long tangled mess that hung around her face in straggly strands though her hair did nothing to hide the metal mask covering the lower part of her face and mouth.
"Piper Ann Lennart." The S.H.I.E.L.D. director intoned impassively as he locked eyes with the caged woman, "It's been a long time."
Piper Lennart smiled from behind the metal face mask and licked the small bead of blood that welled up when the skin of her chapped lips split.
"Nicholas Joseph Fury..." She cooed back in an almost teasing tone, her voice a harsh rasping growl from lack of use, "How's the eye, Nicky? Come to have me to take that last five percent of your sight away?" Piper chortled to herself in a distinctly feline-like manner when she saw a muscle tick in the bald-man's cheek, "I'll take that as a 'no' then. To what do I owe the pleasure of your visit, Director Fury? Surely it wasn't to reminisce over such fond memories, hmm?"
Fury locked his jaw and glared coldly at the woman, "The world is in grave danger, Miss Lennart."
Piper gave a disinterested snort and blinked once languidly at him, "The world is always in danger, Director. What does that have to do with me?"
"The Avengers' Initiative." The tall man replied coolly, watching as the woman's cat-like eyes sparked with interest.
"And here I thought you didn't make the same mistake twice, tsk-tsk, Director." Piper purred in her raspy voice, her eyes glittering dangerously from behind her shaggy hair as she straightened as best she could in her restrained position, "Alright, Nicky, you've got my attention. I only hope you don't live to regret it."
Shifting forward slightly in her metal chair, Piper clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth and shook her head in a mock admonishing way as she stared at Director Fury standing outside her cage in front of her. Her gunmetal gray cat eyes were speculative as she contemplated the situation the director of S.H.I.E.L.D. had informed her of with the vaguest of details. He had skimmed over what had happened with the Tesseract and Loki at the S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters three nights ago and had spent most of his breath attempting to recruit her for his crusade to get the little cube of alien power back.
"You want me to help save the world from a supercharged god from Norse mythology?" The mutant woman drawled, her voice muffled from her mask, "Oh, Nicky, you flatter me so sweetly, but you've lost your goddamned mind if you think I'm going to help you."
Fury locked his jaw and leaned forward, glaring heatedly at the obviously amused woman shackled in front of him, "Do you think this is a game, Lennart? We're talking a world-wide security risk. Life on Earth as we know it could end if we don't get that cube back!"
Piper tossed her head and looked off to the side with an indifferent expression, "What do I care? The world turned its back on me, it seems only fair that I do the same thing." She suddenly looked back at Fury and leaned forward, her gray eyes sparking maliciously, "Say I did agree to help you just to get out of this prison, what's stopping me from sinking my claws in your back as soon as it's turned and throwing my lot in with the bad guy? From what you just told me, it seems he's more likely to win despite the little band of Merry Men you're trying to put together."
"You won't." Fury said after a moment and he leaned back, crossing his bulky arms over his chest and looking at her with a smug expression, "You're a feral psychopathic sociopath, but you're not stupid. You won't join up with Loki, because you know all that bastard would offer you is slavery and if there's anything you hate more than humanity, it's being controlled."
"A choke collar is still the same, no matter how prettily you dress it up, Director." Piper stated drily with a haughty toss of her head, her gray eyes flashing red for a brief moment as her ire rose, "The way I see it, I'm either a slave to some power hungry god with an inferiority complex or I'm your attack pet, only let off my chain when it suits you."
"No, what I'm offering you a single chance to redeem yourself and earn your freedom from this hell hole you've been in for the past twenty-three years." Fury replied calmly, shrewdly watching the woman's expression, "A chance to wipe your record clean, a band new slate, as if your bloody past had never happened. All you have to do is help S.H.I.E.L.D. nail this bastard and get the cube back, then you can be free. Or you can rot in this room until you either die or Loki finds you, it's your choice."
"I'll be free? Truly free?"
"Yes, no more concrete walls or metal cages." Fury responded with a small incline of his head, "You'll be relocated to a remote area of your choosing and of course you'll be monitored to ensure that you aren't a danger to humanity."
"Of course..." The shackled woman murmured and she stared at him narrowly, before looking at the ground with her head tilted slightly to the side as she weighed her options in her mind.
Suddenly she lifted her head up and her gray eyes flared a deep, bloody red and her lips curled into a bloodthirsty smile beneath the metal mask.
"When do I start?"
Author's Note: Alrighty, sorry it's so short, but this is just kinda like a prelude/prologue type thing, but I hope it's okay for the first chapter of Paying The Piper Rewritten. We'll get a better description of how Piper's physical, mental, and emotional changes in the next few chapters, but until then I hope you like the new version of her!
EDIT 11/8/2013: I edited how long Piper was imprisoned since I incorrectly did the math based on how old she is, which will be revealed in a later chapter. For now lets suffice to say she is older than she looks. If anyone was wondering the original time she spent imprisoned was 13 years and has now been update to 23 years instead.
