AN: I enjoy getting reviews.
"What is your business here?" the man demanded again, flicking off the safety on his AK-47 and pointing it directly at Luke Cage's chest.
Luke Cage forced himself to play the part of a terrified civilian. He looked up into the man's face, fear in his eyes. "Hey, man," he began, "I'm just passing through here with my buddy. We heard there's this awesome pizza joint on the other side of Harlem, and this looked like a quick shortcut. We don't want any trouble here."
"Pizza place? What's the name?" the man asked with a glare.
"It's Giordano's something, right, Danny?" Luke asked, looking back at his passenger as he said it.
"Yeah, Giordano's Pizza, I think," Danny replied, trying his best to look scared.
"Nice try," a voice said behind them. Danny swung his head around to look at the new speaker, a smaller man with a cruel face. "There's no Giordano's pizza place in the state."
"Are you sure? It's a new place," Luke tried.
"Yeah, so new it doesn't actually exist," the man behind them said with a cruel laugh, aiming his own AK-47 at them.
"Now answer the question: What is your business here?" the first man demanded. The barrel of his rifle was dangerously close to Luke's head by this point.
"Plan B, then," Luke muttered to Danny with an imperceptible nod. Danny suddenly grinned before placing his hands on Luke's shoulders. The two partners sprang into action simultaneously. Luke stood up to his full height and swung his leg over the motorcycle, the fear melting from his face as he did so, replaced by a mask of rage and raw anger. The force of his move pulled Danny up into the air as well. Danny jumped as Luke stood up, brought his knees in to his chest, and kicked out backward, pushing himself away from Luke's back as he did so. Danny twisted over in midair just before his feet connected with the chest of the startled man standing behind them, knocking him heavily to the ground. He landed in a catlike crouch over the man's prone form and began concentrating his chi energy in his right fist.
Luke Cage, meanwhile, had already wrestled the rifle out of the leader's stunned hands and used it to knock him unconscious. He turned the gun against the SUV in front of him, but thought better of simply hosing it down with lead. Instead he contented himself with breaking the front driver's side window with the stock of the gun and loosing a single round into the radio. The doors of the SUV swung open as the other occupants finally reacted and began to pour out and join the engagement.
Danny Rand looked up from his position crouching over the downed mercenary toward the SUV penning their motorcycle in from behind. A couple men had opened the doors to start leaving the vehicle. With a grin, Danny sprang toward the SUV, swinging his right fist down into the hood as he did so. The chi-infused blow caused the Suburban's back wheels to leave the ground and swing up over the front wheels. The vehicle's momentum carried it over onto its roof, which crumpled. The three men in the back row were all knocked unconscious when the vehicle connected with the ground. He heard the other four men groan; two were unable to move with their legs pinned, while the other two dragged themselves slowly out of the damaged vehicle through the windows. Danny placed first one and then the other of the men crawling out through the windows in a sleeper hold until they lost consciousness. Then he yanked the weapons out of the other two men's weak grasps and set them aside.
He looked behind him to see that the mercenaries from the lead SUV had climbed out and had his partner encircled. He shook his head and stifled a laugh, but ran over to the small crowd anyways. As soon as he reached them, he put his hands on a mercenary's shoulders and used the man as a spring to vault over the crowd. Just before letting go, he shifted his right hand over a few inches and squeezed a pressure point. The man didn't even have a chance to shout before he fell to the ground unconscious. Danny tucked into a flip and landed upright next to Luke. The two moved to stand back to back, staring at the six men standing around them with guns pointed at their chests.
"How do you want to play this?" Danny muttered under his breath, turning his head slightly to the right.
"Remember that kidnapper on Centennial last year? Let's do that," Luke answered.
"Works for me."
Danny charged the man standing directly in front of him. The man tried to crouch into a defensive stance, but Danny sidestepped to the right and chopped him twice in the side as he passed. The man winced and was thrown off guard. As soon as he was behind the man, he dropped to the ground and swung his left leg around, taking the gunman's legs out from under him. He fell backward toward Danny, who was lying on his back and had already brought both feet together and bent them at the knees. He kicked into the man's back with both feet, sending him flying through the air toward Luke.
Luke had turned to watch his partner's progress out of the corner of his eye as soon as he felt Danny move. When Danny kicked his man toward him, Luke reached out a hand and caught the man by both legs in his right fist. With a roar, Luke swung the man around in the same motion, knocking out the remaining five gunmen with their comrade's body. He dropped his human club in a miserable heap on top of two of his teammates' unconscious bodies.
The two Heroes for Hire quickly checked the sixteen men to make sure none were conscious or close to consciousness. As soon as they were satisfied, they zip-tied each man's hands and legs and laid them in a row on the sidewalk. Then Luke called Agent Hill to report in.
"Power Man calling Agent Hill, authorization MH-1972, do you copy?"
"What is it Luke?" Hill responded instantly.
"Iron Fist and I kind of ran into a snag."
"What kind of a 'snag'?" she asked dubiously.
"The kind that involves two Suburbans full of guys with AK-47s," Luke replied calmly.
"Status report," Hill commanded, shaking her head with a groan.
"They're all unconscious and zip-tied, and one of their SUVs is upside down."
"Did they manage to get a warning out?" she demanded.
"Negative; I think we took them too much by surprise for them to warn anyone. But we believe we are getting close to the location where they are keeping Iron Man, so we can't exactly stay here and babysit a bunch of unconscious guys," Luke answered.
"Okay, I'll send a team of agents from the New York field office to take care of them. They will be there in under five minutes."
"In rush hour traffic?"
"Just wait for them," Hill said tiredly.
"You know, if anyone from the mercenary group came down this street right now, he'd know they have a problem at a single glance," Luke said as soon as he disconnected the communicator.
"We have a few minutes; let's see what we can do to get the street cleaned up before those S.H.I.E.L.D. types get here," Danny responded.
While they waited for the S.H.I.E.L.D. team's arrival, Luke carefully turned the upside down SUV over and placed it back on its wheels. He pushed the vehicle back into the parking space it had been sitting in before they came down the street. Danny used chi-infused blows to smooth out the dents in the hood and roof as much as he could, while Luke pushed the other SUV into its parking space. Finally, they brushed as much shattered glass off the road as they could.
Four minutes and thirty-seven seconds after they had talked to Agent Hill, Danny was astonished to see three black Honda SUVs hover down the street toward them from the west. They slowly settled to the ground as the two small air foils on each side of the vehicles rotated 90 degrees and became wheels. Two S.H.I.E.L.D. agents dressed in black suits stepped out of each vehicle and brusquely nodded to the two Avengers.
"We replaced the two Suburbans, so if someone casually glances down the street, he won't see anything amiss. Unfortunately, that won't help too much if they take a closer look," Luke reported, gesturing toward the vehicles in question.
"That won't be a problem," the lead agent responded, pulling a kit from the back of his S.H.I.E.L.D.-standard (manufactured by Stark Industries and Honda Motor Company) Flying Utility Vehicle and striding purposefully over to the most damaged Suburban. Without even glancing again at the two heroes, the other five agents quickly began loading the unconscious gunmen into the back of their vehicles.
Satisfied that S.H.I.E.L.D. had the situation under control, the Heroes for Hire climbed back onto their motorcycle and sped off.
"Power Man and Iron Fist just had an altercation with some of Justin Hammer's mercenaries," Agent Hill announced to the rest of Team B through their quinjet's radio.
"What happened?" War Machine demanded.
"They didn't say exactly, but it sounded like they were following a lead and sprang a trap that had been set for anyone searching for Stark."
"Are they all right?" Danvers asked.
"They're fine; I think either of them could take on sixteen mercenaries singlehandedly and not have more than a couple scratches to show for it!" Hill observed wryly.
"Did the ambush element get a chance to report what was happening?" Rhodes asked, worried their cover had been blown already.
"Cage and Rand do not think so; they think their attack was swift enough and sudden enough that the mercenaries never saw it coming."
"Good," Rhodes said, sitting back down as the quinjet began its descent into small Westchester County Airport. Director Fury had called in a favor to have the airport shut down temporarily with a "fire equipment malfunction" so the quinjet could land covertly. Danvers expertly maneuvered the plane to hover next to the hangar farthest away from the terminal. As soon as its forward momentum stopped, she landed the quinjet smoothly on the tarmac. It was barely on the ground before a S.H.I.E.L.D. ground crew ran out of the hangar and started wheeling the jet inside and away from prying eyes.
As soon as the jet was safely inside the hangar, Rhodes turned to his team and said, "We're less than 22 miles from Harlem now, and Tony's got to be near there; that trap Cage and Rand sprang confirms it. We'll split up and search the area. Ms. Marvel, Ant-Man, and I will search from the air, but we need to be careful not to be seen—you've got your scanner, right, Marvel?"
"Affirmative," Danvers answered, pulling a small black box out of its holster on her utility belt and turning it on. The screen glowed faintly before she switched it off again and returned it to its place on her utility belt.
Rhodey nodded and turned to the other woman on the team. "Mockingbird, you, Power Man, and Iron Fist will search from the ground. Stay in constant radio contact and do not investigate any buildings alone. Let's get going."
Scott Lang activated the Pym Particles on his belt and shrank down to the size of an ant. A wasp flew into the quinjet through the open loading ramp, and Scott jumped on its back and flew out through the opening. Carol Danvers looked over at Bobbi Morse, who nodded to her. The two women walked down the loading ramp out of the quinjet side by side. As soon as they were out, Carol looped her arms under Bobbi's shoulders and pushed off from the ground. Rhodey followed the other members of his team as they all flew toward Harlem to begin the search, staying as close to the ground as possible.