Renee Grayson drummed her fingers on the metal table of the outdoor café she sat at. An empty notepad sat to her left with a blue pen and her smartphone on it, and a ham sub was sitting in front of her. She was starting to get anxious. Where was her SHIELD agent with the new scoop he had promised?!
She took a breath to calm herself, and idly took a sip of the iced tea sitting next to her notepad. Renee Grayson was a reporter for the Washington Post, and her column always dealt with SHIELD. SHIELD hated her. Her Editor-In-Chief and readers loved her.
Her friend at SHIELD had just called to tell her about something big that had happened in Puente Antiguo, the site of the first Human-Asgardian interaction and the first time humans met aliens. All he had said was that it had to do with Asgard and Loki.
Covering the events of New York and the enemy general Loki – an Asgardian by the way – was Renee's biggest topic. The moment Loki's name was mentioned by the SHIELD officer Renee promised she'd meet him at the Café du Parc. Now he was late, and Renee was getting worried about her next big scoop going down the drain.
Someone sat at the table across from her and Renee looked up. She expected to see her SHIELD friend and was surprised instead to see a red-haired woman. Her heartbeat increased when she realized it was Natasha Romanoff of the Avengers. Romanoff's entrance had been smooth enough that no one had noticed her yet.
"Waiting for someone Grayson?" Romanoff asked her.
"What concern would that be of yours?" Renee challenged with a huff.
Now her friend would never come. He'd see Romanoff and run out. It would be hard to get him to meet her again.
"You are a SHIELD concern," Romanoff replied.
"The public has a right to know the information SHEILD is keeping locked up," Renee replied hotly. "You knew about the Asgardians and aliens over a year before the Battle of New York, and yet did nothing to warn us."
"So one of your articles informed the public of," Romanoff said pointedly.
Romanoff still hated the fact that Grayson had made that bit of news public. It had been a month since New York, and SHIELD was still catching a lot of heat for not revealing the truth about aliens beforehand. They had successfully created the Avengers team to counter a threat, but no, that wasn't good enough.
The two glared at each other. Renee was always going around in circles with any SHIELD personal that came near her. Be it an Avenger, or a field specialist they had sent to her to try and coax her to stop publishing.
Unfortunately for SHIELD, Renee Grayson was the granddaughter of Rockwell, one of the member of the World Security Council that oversaw SHIELD's activities. They could speak to her, but could take no further actions such as classifying her documents or arresting her. Renee was untouchable and she knew it all too well.
"I'm afraid to tell you that if you're waiting for Joshua Mendez to come and tell you about our activities that you are going to be waiting a long time," Romanoff warned casually.
Renee sat straight. Damn! They'd finally caught him! There went her next big story…
Rockwell had assured SHIELD that he was not the one feeding her information, and SHIELD had confirmed that. Renee was taking advantage of him to stay immune, but she was not getting information from him. That position belonged to a SHIELD member.
Renee crossed her arms with a huff. "I don't suppose you'd like to comment on the recent incident with Puente Antiguo and Loki?"
"I'm afraid not," Romanoff said.
Inwardly she recoiled. Renee knew about Loki's involvement! How much did she know about the incident?
"Worth a try," Renee shrugged innocently and grumpily took a bite of her sandwich.
Romanoff knew that this wouldn't stop Renee. Renee would use her status as Councilman Rockwell's granddaughter and talk another SHIELD agent around to telling her what was going on. Joshua Mendez was the third agent she'd swayed to talk to her since New York, and New York was only a month ago.
Romanoff was impressed by the fact that Renee had managed to talk three highly-ranked SHIELD personal into breaking their oaths of confidentiality in a mere month. With the first two agents, Renee had threatened that her grandfather would take action against them if they disobeyed her, and had even managed to fabricate evidence to make her threat seem sincere.
SHIELD had spoken to Rockwell, and he had told them that he would do no such thing. They had been able to pass on assurances to their agents. Romanoff had thought that with that threat gone that they would be done with leaks. Renee was nothing if not creative to have talked the third agent into helping her without the threat of Council intervention.
Rockwell had been one of the original World Security Council members, and both of his children had been highly-decorated SHIELD agents. It was so annoying to learn that his daughter's child was set on bringing SHIELD down. Renee was a fresh graduate from a two-year university and not even 21. She wasn't even old enough to drink and she had already caused SHIELD as much trouble as Loki.
"You know," Renee said as she stirred her tea with her straw idly. "If you gave me back my security clearance for SHIELD then I would stop pestering your agents."
Romanoff fixed her with a stern glare. "You lost your security clearance when you revealed to the world about the Battle of Puente Antiguo and SHIELD's prior knowledge of aliens before the Chitauri. I can assure you that you will never get that clearance back, granddaughter of Mr. Rockwell or not."
Renee finished off her tea, and glared at Romanoff through her blue-wire rim glasses. The rectangular lenses caught the light as she tilted her head up to get the last bit of her tea. Romanoff didn't even understand why Renee wore those glasses since her vision was already 20/20. When she had asked at some point Renee had said once that it made her look more like a real reporter – whatever that meant.
Renee set the glass down a little loudly on the table, and picked up her sandwich. Before she took a bite she told Romanoff that, "if that's all then you might as well leave. There's nothing for me to do but finish up my sandwich and go back to the office."
Being a third-generation SHIELD agent (even though it was formerly), Renee Grayson was as good at hiding her intentions and reading others just as Romanoff was. Romanoff always had trouble reading her. The frustration reminded her of her attempt at reading Loki's intentions when he had been a prisoner on the Helicarrier. She had managed to get the truth only because he had let his anger take over. Renee knew better then to do that, but the similarity was still troubling.
Renee swallowed her bite of sandwich and glared at Romanoff with her pale blue eyes. "Why are you still here? You've already spoiled me of my attempt at a story. Make yourself scarce and go chase down some Chitauri black marketers like the rest of SHIELD is doing."
Romanoff almost groaned. How did Renee know about the black market? She supposed that by now she shouldn't be surprised considering that Renee was a member, if not the outright founder, of the hacktivist group Rising Tide. One month butting heads with Renee was one month too long, and Romanoff did indeed leave before Renee could start pestering her for another comment.
Renee swallowed her sandwich and waved down a waiter to refill her tea. The waiter came and refilled it. When he walked away, Renee sighed and slowly put her phone and notebook back into the purse sitting by her feet. It seemed that she wasn't going to be getting a good scoop after all.
Someone sat at the table across from her, and Renee looked up in surprise. Was Romanoff back? No, it was a woman she had never seen. The woman was very beautiful with long ink-black pulled back in a ponytail and angular storm gray eyes. Her skin tone said she was Asian, but her eyes looked Egyptian, and her facial features belonged to several European countries. She didn't look any older then Renee.
"Hello," Renee greeted the stranger politely.
"Hello Mrs. Grayson," the woman said.
Renee frowned. "Look, if you're another SHIELD agent then you can leave. Romanoff already gave me an earful and stopped the information handoff. Your precious secrets are safe."
The woman laughed quietly, a quiet laugh that sounded almost like a purr. "I am not SHIELD. I have simply read your articles."
"Oh," Renee felt herself blush for revealing that she had just spoken with Romanoff. What a slip of information! "I'm sorry. Who are you then? Rather, what can I do for you?"
"You may call me Mira," the mysterious woman introduced.
Mira held out her hand to shake hands with Renee, and Renee did so out of habit. She felt the weight of something being transferred from Mira's hand to her own. Renee knew better than to open her hand and look at it. From what she could feel, it seemed like a flashdrive.
"I think you will find that somewhat enlightening," Mira promised Renee.
Was there information about the recent chaos at Puente Antiguo on the flashdrive? Renee crossed her arms casually on the table and leaned forward to get a better look at this "Mira." Mira's emotions were so perfectly controlled that Renee couldn't discern anything.
"Thank you," Renee said.
She'd see about enlightening herself. SHIELD had switched the flashdrive of her second informer with one that had a virus on it. The virus had crashed her computer. Renee would have to check every file on an independent computer before she put her laptop at risk again with this flashdrive.
Renee looked up from her sandwich to ask "Mira" something, and jumped when she saw that Mira was gone. The chair was pushed in and everything. Quickly, Renee scanned her surroundings but there was no sign of Mira. It was as if she never existed.
The weight of the flashdrive in her hand was real at least, and Renee supposed that was all that mattered. She finished up her sandwich and waved down the waiter for her bill.
"Mira" walked along the street away from the Café where she had left the human and into a nearby library. There she was to meet a contact with one of the human organizations Karr had assigned her to help. She prowled around the books for a few minutes before reaching the right stack. Idly, she let her fingers trail on the spines of the books near her.
"Did you do it?" Someone standing on the opposite side of the bookshelf asked quietly as they pretended to be looking at books.
"The reporter has the information," Mira promised. "I suspect she'll publish it as soon as possible."
"Well done Mira," the human said cheerfully. "That should give SHIELD something to think about."
Mira knit her eyebrows together when she heard her alias. It annoyed her, but she supposed she couldn't go around using her real name.
"This cloak and dagger nonsense is boring," Mira muttered truthfully. "When will we go into battle? I miss killing."
Her contact chuckled. "Soon enough Mira. SHIELD will fall and there will be killing enough to satisfy even you when our sleeper agents awaken."
Mira made another face at her slurred name as she muttered threateningly. "It better."
"Hail Hydra," her contact from HYDRA whispered and walked away.
Mira gave a tsk as he left. HYDRA was so brazen, giving their salute in a public place. Just because they had SHIELD filled with their sleeper agents they thought they already ruled the world. Their plan of feeding Renee information was sound however. It would keep SHIELD busy looking at the outside world and their eyes away from their own ranks and the enemies within.
The usefulness of an alias was obvious, but Mira still hated hiding behind it. She was no human, and her name was not Mira. In reality, Mira was Nira of Vanaheim.
Now you see why i went off on a little tangent last chapter about Nira? She's here, following Karr's orders. You might already know that Karr is an alias and what his real name is, but you might now. Nira is a reoccurring villain in my stories, and i really love her. Hopefully you'll agree with me that she's an amazing villain in due time.
Yeah, the HYDRA Uprising happens in my stories. It doesn't happen like it does in the movie, but it does happen.
Renee Grayson is your stereotypical reporter, and she has caused SHIELD so much trouble.