Because Raina (part 9)
Disclaimer: see previous chapters.
AN: this chapter contains a brief crossover with the Avengers.
Lincoln Campbell was not sure how he felt about camping, for throughout most of his life, he was an urban person, not a rural one. As a doctor, he was used to a certain level of living, (which was relatively posh), and as a fugitive... he was not a fugitive for very long, actually, until Raina and the others found him in Texas and picked him up.
Then there was Australia, but again, it did not differ too much from his life in Li Shi, but in a good way. Lincoln always did know that he could take (or tolerate) nature in registered doses, but camping? This was something else.
Admittedly, this camping had been largely impromptu in itself: the latest piece of Kara Lynn's mission, (one written in ancient Greek) had been finally deciphered, leading her, Grant Ward and the others to the U.S.' east coast, of all places. There, the team discovered yet another cache of hidden knowledge, yet another prehistoric (probably artificial) creature guarding it, and had generally come out on top, even though the animal in question was even bigger than their bear-dog was, and with an even meaner (much meaner, actually), disposition. Needless to say, they decided not to keep it, and so Alisha took Dr. Powers and the rest to the Avengers, to give it to them for their own mascot, for the Hulk could certainly handle the critter, right?..
So far so good, but this did mean that Lincoln, Raina and the older couple were left 'roughing it' in the North American woods – a situation that Lincoln had never expected himself to find in (he wasn't big on camping – see above). Grant, on the other hand, was clearly enjoying himself, and so was 'Ms. Palamas', as the two of them were currently cuddling and talking to each other, sotto voce, in Spanish. Lincoln's Spanish was progressing in itself – Grant and Kara Lynn talked in Spanish to each other almost as much as they did in English, Raina was doing her best follow them, and he was following her. 'Wait for me, I'm the smallest', sigh
"What are you thinking about?" Raina, (speaking of her), asked with a slight smile. "Moody, are we?"
"More like that I could use some more Spanish, so maybe we can have a session of our own?" Lincoln asked, slyly. "It'll be still some time before Alisha returns with our ride, so how about we talk – and we walk around?" he added, picking up a fallen maple leaf from Raina's fronds. He thought about it some more and put it back instead. "You look really nice here," he added, unintentionally.
"Right," Raina blushed chestnut. "Let's do have that walk, Romeo, and then we'll talk."
Lincoln grinned.
/
"All right, team!" Daisy told her Warriors (Joey, Yo-Yo and the werewolf), "we're here on a recon mission first and foremost. The man, Gideon Malick, he is powerful, probably very dangerous, and most likely he is quite unpredictable. We are not engaging him if he is here, and if he is not... then it is for the better. Proceed!"
The group split into two pairs – Joey went with Yo-Yo, Daisy went in with the werewolf. They entered the building, looked around and whistled. "This isn't what the director expected, right?" Joey spoke.
Daisy mutely nodded. The building was trashed – everything inside of it was destroyed, demolished, burnt, etc. There was no sign of life in it either, none at all.
"You know," Joey continued, "this reminds me of an electric fire, for some reason."
"As opposed to-?"
"Fire started with gasoline, for example, or spilled car fuel," Joey elaborated. "I have seen plenty of fires while working in the construction."
"I thought that you were some big-shot spy?" Yo-Yo pointed out.
"I was, but I was undercover for a reason...plus how do you think that I know about fires so much? I am no Hawkeye, you know, who can defeat an opponent with a bow and an arrow at 30 paces-"
"Anyways," Daisy continued, "let's assume that it was an electric fire of some sort...and the residue on the walls is purely some sort of coincidence?"
The werewolf chose this moment to sneeze and to give Daisy (and the others) a very pointed look. "Right," Daisy spoke into the comm.-link. "FitzSimmons? It's your turn?"
Several moments later a swarm of new DWARFS, with new built-in equipment and designs flew in and began to access the situation – all by themselves. "Leo, Jemma?" Daisy continued to speak through the comm.-link. "You know that the building is empty, right?"
"Yes, but, you know? Maybe there's some biological mutagenic contaminant left behind?" Jemma did sound somewhat apologetic over the same link. "It's not that we're scared, we're, just, um, thinking that maybe you four should get out and go through quarantine and check-up? I'll do the check-up, BTW."
It was then that one of the little robots came too close in contact with the waxy green substance – and it proved to be rather corrosive, as the mini-machine collapsed into a tiny pile of smoking machine parts, literally speaking.
"I didn't see this one coming," Yo-Yo spoke next to Daisy, rather than from her old position. "Boss, commander? I did some scouting right now, and there seems to be no life forms, none whatsoever."
"You're fast," Daisy said slowly, "but not that fast-"
"And I didn't cover the whole building, just the nearby rooms," Yo-Yo confessed. "After I had almost run-into this green waxy gunk I am not taking chances, not even with my speed – not in these casual shoes."
"Acknowledged," Daisy grimaced. She herself had been sending out vibrations a-la feelers to see what would come up, and so far came up empty. "FitzSimmons? The building still appears to be deserted. Send-in the clean-up crew?"
"On it!" Simmons spoke in an especially bright tone of voice, as even more robots (bigger ones than the DWARFS) rode in.
"Seriously?" Daisy suppressed the urge to kick one of them. Barely.
/
"So, this is the progress?" Coulson spoke with his usual bland smile, (though it was a bit more frayed around the edges than the usual), "no nothing?"
"I wouldn't call it nothing – just one demolished office," Rosalind Price shook her head. "ATCU wasn't just one office, you know, or rather isn't. I have been in touch with other people at the other offices – so far they have not been hit, by Hydra or by anyone else, but that probably won't last."
"I didn't know about the other offices," Coulson commented to her in an easygoing tone.
"They're a relatively recent development; those antidote pills do provide an interesting alternative to the containment units," Rosalind replied in an equally easygoing tone. "Phil, remember when I told Malick that all the reports were positive? I lied – well, not exactly lied, but I can tell you that his replies were polite, but not exactly positive. True, he is just one shareholder out of several, but-"
"Shareholder?" Coulson's curiosity continued to grow.
"ATCU is a joint public-private venture, with the U.S. government being the main shareholder," Rosalind explained. "Malick didn't have as much clout in the Unit as he would've liked."
"Yes, but the word 'unit' implies, well, a singular unit-"
"You haven't yet met Ms. Garner. She was planning to expand all along, and the antidote pills, no matter how temporary, were just the right thing to do."
"I remember hearing about the woman," Coulson continued thoughtfully. "She's not an American, is she?"
"Her parents moved here from Britain; she has the accent from time to time, but otherwise? She is not exactly a foreigner... Anyways, we will be meeting her in a couple of days, so we're going clothes shopping."
"Excuse me?" It has been a while since Coulson experienced female logic directed at himself directly, not since the Battle of New York, and so he was caught flat-footed. "What do you mean, shopping?"
"Phil, you're a wonderful man, but Ms. Garner is something else. I would rather meet the First Lady when she got her head full of steam in one of her social projects, than Ms. Garner. When you meet her, you'll understand."
"Aha," Phil fiddled with his collar. "How does this work, exactly?"
"I'm going to ask Ms. Garner for advice – plus, if Malick has become whatever he has become, she needs to know. I confess that I would rather do it with you," Rosalind gave Coulson a look, and the latter did what other men usually have done: he caved.
"Am I interrupting anything?" Melinda May got into the office.
"No, nothing," Daisy said brightly, even as Rosalind and Coulson looked away, in slight embarrassment. "What's up?"
"We located Ward and the others. Do you want to come?"
Daisy blinked and realized that the older woman was talking to her. "All right," she spoke, swallowing from the sudden nervousness, "but let's do it the other way around – you talk, I loom. Well, sort of – I don't do this looming very well yet."
"Mack is coming with us too," Melinda spoke with a tiny smirk (especially for her). "He'll do the looming with you." She paused and added, in a much more serious tone, even for her: "That said, considering that agent 33 is involved, I'm not sure that looming will be required."
"Point," Daisy agreed, before she was interrupted by Rosalind:
"I'm sorry, but what am I missing? Last time I heard, Ward and the others weren't your friends?"
"It's complicated, but the truth is? None of them are particularly friendly towards Hydra; in fact, they all dislike Hydra much more than S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent 33 in particular had been once one of us, but had been captured, brainwashed and abused by Hydra; I doubt that she'll pick them over us, and she and Ward and the others seem pretty tight," Melinda finished the long speech (by her standards).
"Yes, but why are you getting involved with them?"
"Because Hydra sucks – big time," Daisy joined in. "Apparently, even some Hydra agents would rather not be Hydra agents. We are wondering if we cannot increase the flow, see? Fewer Hydra agents – fewer Hydra agents for us to fight in particular." She paused and added a trifle bashfully: "We're not making them S.H.I.E.L.D. agents or anything, but we are making deals with them, D.C."
"D.C.?"
"Director Coulson," the aforementioned D.C. explained.
"As opposed to Direct Current, I suppose," Rosalind nodded, in understanding, before smirking slightly. "Although you're pretty direct as well, and as for the current-"
"We're going now!" Daisy said faux-cheerfully and fled, followed by May, from Coulson's office.
/
Several hours later...
The plane landed in the middle of a national park. "Doesn't look like one of Ward's typical haunts," Mack muttered to May, even as they (and Daisy) came out. "He struck me as an urban sort of man."
"No, not really," Kara Lynn answered instead, as she, Ward, and the others just stared at the emerging trio. "I remember you, incidentally. You're Mackenzie, right?"
"Yes, but call me Mack," the big grunted, secretly pleased that the beginning is not immediately hostile. "Everybody does. Anyways, May and Daisy and the rest of us are wondering if you're interested in working with us against Hydra again."
There was a pause, which was finally broken by Ward. "That's a pretty big, or vague, offer," he said slowly. "What exactly are we looking at? Because as Skye and May here can attest, the last time we tried this, it didn't go so well for either side."
"True," May nodded, "but this time it's different. Your former underlings, the ones you have met in Italy, they have brokered a deal with us against Hydra. We were hoping to continue this trend, and-"
"Stop, let's talk Hydra itself for the moment," Grant interrupted her. "The truth is, Hydra itself is an assemblage of various cells, often with various goals in mind, without any loyalty between themselves. The Japanese, especially have been stirring – the last time they did it, it was in the nineties, and neither Garrett nor Whitehall had been happy with them."
"And you still claim not to be loyal to Hydra?" Daisy could not help but to ask – seeing Grant just sitting there, looking like a perfectly ordinary man just rubbed her wrong.
"I had an epiphany or two about that," her former S.O. agreed, giving her a blank look, "but I'm not going to share them, especially with you. Can I continue?"
"Yes, please," Melinda gave the younger woman a look of her own. "Go on."
"There's not much to go on. Most of the lower ranks – such as Kaminsky, for example – are largely mercenaries; on occasion, they were actually employed legitimately by the old S.H.I.E.L.D. itself. I am not sure whom are they working for, Hydra-wise, but it probably comes down to the basic issue of self-preservation, and when it comes to mercenaries, I cannot make any predictions, Cavalry, any more than you can."
"Self-preservation, you say?" Melinda nodded and gave Ward the last depiction of Malick's own metamorphosis. "Would this work?"
Grant took one look at the image and promptly gave it over to Lincoln and Raina: "What do you two think?"
"All right," Lincoln took a break. "The UnBodied are called so, because they are UnBodied, they transformed themselves into beings of pure energy, without any flesh like you or I. Only it does not work that way – we in Li Shi do not know why, but sunlight, especially direct sunlight, weakens and kills them. Plus, energy weapons are good too, but to counter this, the UnBodied acquire new bodies: either they create them out of inorganic matter, like golems, or steal them, by consuming the souls of other people."
"Souls? Souls are real?" Daisy stared.
"What do you think the UnBodied are, just people without bodies? They're souls, spirits without them," Lincoln said simply. "Daisy, just because we're not normal doesn't mean that we're soulless."
Daisy looked away, so Mack took over. "We never implied that, man, you know it. How does this relate? I mean," he quickly amended, "what has happened to this man after you and Daisy got through with him, well..."
"Well what?" Lincoln grew curious.
Mack exchanged looks with the other two and told them as to what had happened in ACTU, as well as what had had happened immediately after the storm in Sacramento.
"Oh boy," Lincoln gulped. "People, we got a problem. I think that Malick had already gone his metamorphosis-"
"He's also an UnBodied?" Grant specified.
"Looks like it, yes. Now he has fused with the Sacramento guy, and his might just have doubled or worse."
"I say," Daisy grimaced. "Twice I hit him with everything I got, and it barely slowed him down."
"Have you used the cannon that the FitzSimmons had built for you-"
"They're rebuilding it in a better way-"
"It won't work. As long as the UnBodied has a body, direct approach will not work," Lincoln shook his head. "I'm not sure if I know anything else about them-"
"Then come with us," Mack suggested gently. "Grant and Kara Lynn can help us work with the mercenaries, you two can help the FitzSimmons figure out how to deal with Malick next-"
"Excuse me," Grant said politely, but firmly, and taking Kara Lynn off to the side, began to talk to her. Sadly, it was in Spanish, so the others, (well, mostly the S.H.I.E.L.D. group) had trouble following, even May.
"Ok," Kara Lynn finally switched back to English. "We'll do it, if it is okay with you two," she nodded towards the younger couple.
"Hm," Raina put on an exaggeratedly thoughtful look on her face, while the others, including Lincoln, waited patiently. "I won't object, although, Ms. Palamas, this means that sooner rather than later you will have to make a choice. There are too many options, so I cannot tell you what it will be, but you will have to make a choice. It's your call."
"I'll take it," Kara Lynn nodded to the younger woman, before shifting her attention back to May and the others. "Very well, we'll come to the HQ, but, well, I do have my own mission – my old S.H.I.E.L.D. mission – so we will be working on that too."
"It's acceptable," Melinda nodded. "Anything in particular?"
"Right now we'll be working on some Native American languages," Kara Lynn grimaced, "also have you forgotten? We have a bear-dog," she indicated the animal in question (it had been busy eating a deer), "so please don't put us into a vault, would you?"
"If you won't do anything that merits that – deal," Melinda nodded. "Anything else?"
"I just, we just, can you keep Hunter and Morse away from us?" Kara Lynn faltered for the first time. "We would rather not deal with them, if you please. If it is necessary – fine, but if it isn't..."
"That can be arranged," Melinda nodded. This was not an unusual request, especially by the standards of the old S.H.I.E.L.D. – yes, the agents were a team, but some worked better with others than with a third party, or vice versa. While Hunter and Morse were agents, and Kara Lynn and her party were not, if they were to be working with S.H.I.E.L.D., some arrangements could be made... "Is that it?"
"Deal." Kara Lynn nodded, and the two women shook their hands.
(For her part, Daisy was not sure that having Grant and his party back in S.H.I.E.L.D., even on a temporary basis, was a good idea. Judging by the closed, subdued look on Grant's face, he did not think so either.)
/
Meanwhile...
"Whee! I'm the Crimson Queen of Kostopchin!" yelled Wanda the Scarlet Witch as she rode the huge andrewsarchus that Dr. Amanda Powers and co. had pawned off to the Avengers as their mascot. "Bow before my power!"
"Never! Rein of death, baby!" yelled the Falcon as he used his flying technology to get onto the top of things.
"Is it too late to exchange some of them for the super-adaptoid of Justin Hammer's?" Natasha muttered to Steve in regards to their protégés.
"Nat, relax." Hawkeye, who initially came here to be some sort of a special guest star, finished his lunch, propped his prop bow and arrow, and joined the others, before joining the fray of the younger generation. "Your thunderbird friend is still cooler, I bet. Now if you'll excuse me, I need to be Legolas." He put on a jaunty hat and ventured forth.
"...And this is why Laura can have him," the Black Widow told her partner. "Want to join in?"
Steve shrugged, blushing. Apparently, he did.
/
Meanwhile...
"...And so, the deal with made," Daisy finished telling the story to the FitzSimmons. "Ward and the rest of his party are back in S.H.I.E.L.D."
"Does it bother you?" Leo Fitz gave Daisy a piercing look.
"I could ask you the same question."
"Yes," Leo said flatly. "Jemma may be friends with the flower girl – sort of, when they start to talk botany and biochemistry and natural sciences it's just weird, but Lincoln is no more interested in joining the discussion than I am. Kara Lynn Palamas once tried to end me, before the Arctic mission, and Ward...he is Ward. Either he is faking it, again, or...he is not faking it, and that's just worse." He visibly shivered. "And this is on top of the fact that none of the residue makes sense! We talked to Joey, some signs do indicate an electrical fire, but others are more indicative of a chemical flame, acidic, rather than basic, in nature, and-"
"Fitz! I got it. You two are stumped!" Daisy spoke with a smile, trying to diffuse the rant.
"We're not stumped – we are just at a temporary dead end," Jemma glared, before trying to diffuse the situation herself. "And also, nice leadership skills in there-"
"Please. It was an empty building. A hollowed-out building, like how worm eats an apple from the inside out, nothing more. We found nothing; you guys are at a temporary dead end, and honestly? Yes, this alliance will not be a very good one – for both sides. May and Kara Lynn may have an understanding, but the rest of us? No, just no."
"And yet, Malick's worse," Leo shivered. "I remember Sacramento. I remember what happened after, after you fell asleep. It was devastated, at least in part. It probably wasn't as bad the battle of New York, but still." He shivered. "And Malick wants to bring this back, or to do something along the similar lines, I don't know. He's insane."
"Ward thinks so too," Daisy confessed, reluctantly. "As soon as they boarded the plane he began to write down the list of the people he knows, or knew, in Hydra – name, rank, serial number. Apparently, he hopes that some of them at least will abandon ship once they'll learn about Malick's true nature and that he's the sort of an InHuman that eats minds and steals bodies."
The FitzSimmons gulped. "He is?" they asked as one.
"Yes, according to Lincoln. Guys, he is like that bloke from Sacramento. When we came into his apartment, we saw a bunch of things, but one of them was a human skin with organs gone, or liquefied, or something," Daisy shivered herself. "Those UnBodied are not like the other InHumans, they're something else, something nastier."
"Well, of course they are," Raina stuck her head into the lab room. "Also, either Melinda May or director Coulson has a strange sense of humour or irony. The four of us will be next door to the two of you," she gave the FitzSimmons a smile that was not exactly friendly. "Yay."
"Hey, I thought that we were getting along," Jemma said in an indignant tone of voice.
"We do, the rest of us – not so much," Raina shrugged. "And back to the previous topic – check out the Index, it got quite a bit of information on all sorts of gifted – not just the InHumans, werewolves too, for example."
"You're too nice," Daisy muttered. Currently, Raina reminded her of her pre-Puerto Rico self, and not in a good way.
"No, I'm not," Raina shook her head. "I once was too jealous instead – too jealous of you, Daisy Johnson. This is why, I suspect, the Obelisk had made me green. Ever since I found friends of my own, my jealousy is going down, but it still shows."
"Grant doesn't have any friends," Fitz snapped.
"And if you hadn't tried to cop a feel of me back on the Greek island I would actually believe you," Raina smirked. "To Grant, you embody everything that he never had, and lost all the same," she pointed to Fitz. "And as for you," she turned to Daisy, "it will be interesting to see just what Ms. Palamas will choose, with you around, because you know what, Daisy Johnson? Your destiny is to be a leader, a great and glorious leader, taking the others onto your glory, for the ride. This is your power. Bi-Grant Ward's power is different – he makes his own destiny, he burns through the obstacles, and no one can affect him, not unless he chooses them to. This is his power; he just has trouble controlling it. Between Ms. Palamas, and I, and even Lincoln," here Raina blushed slightly, her golden eyes dimmed a bit, and she stopped looking like some sort of a Disney villain, "he is getting the hang of it. Anyways," she turned back to Jemma, "we're having tea. You want some?"
"Why not?" Jemma shrugged, apparently confused, or caught flat-footed, "what kind is it?"
"Herbal," Raina replied. "We kind of gotten to like it-"
"I'll try it, but I make no guarantees," the British agent said in a rather prudish, and British, tone of voice.
"Great, come on!" Raina nodded, and the two women left.
"...Did Jemma just went to have tea with the hoodoo woman of the swamp wannabee?" Leo asked Daisy.
The InHuman agent just shrugged and began to work on her own part of the anti-Hydra plan.
TBC
AN2 – this is taking place before the Civil War movie.