FIC: A Most Marvellous Adventure (11/?)
Angel. Her best friend, mentor, and saviour dead.
A chill spread through her like a virus. Now she had nothing to go back for. It wasn't like she'd be missed, not with a whole army of -. "Shit!" Faith sprang to the side of Xander, grabbing him as he slumped into the alley's dirty wall. "What's up, Harris?"
"All those people dead, 'cause of us," Xander mumbled, eyes glassy with shock.
"We don't know for sure it was something we caused," Faith clumsily comforted, her hand wrapped around Xander's brawny forearm. "And even if it was, it was the mage doin' the spell not us."
"We're the ones who stopped him," Xander mumbled.
"And if we hadn't we'd be dead, not in this freak madhouse," Faith retorted.
"It's our fault," Xander whispered.
"Damn it!" In her panic she spun Xander around to face her and shook him. "Youse gotta keep it together, we've only got each other! I can't-." Faith forced her tone under control, conscious her shouting might well draw unwanted attention. "I can't manage in this world on my own."
Xander blinked, the desperation in her tone getting through to him. "Yeah, sorry. What's the plan?"
Faith released her grip on Xander and stepped back, suddenly discomforted at just how close they'd been. Faith smiled weakly. "I use my head for butting things remember? 'Sides you're the one who knows this world, that's why I need ya." Faith winked. "Hate to break it to you, but it ain't for your looks, honey."
"Yeah," Xander nodded slightly, brow furrowing. "We need to find out why SHIELD are after us."
"Eh?" Faith fell in beside Xander as they started down the alley. "What difference does that make?"
"Well we haven't done anything, but we can't prove that if we don't find out what we're wanted for in the first place," Xander replied.
"Yeah," Faith nodded, "guess that makes sense." Faith snorted. "Heh, me bein' accused of somethin' I haven't done, major plot twist."
Xander half-smiled. "It is sorta unprecedented."
"Hey," Faith bumped hips with her friend, "didn't have to agree."
Xander's smile broadened slightly. "Seemed the polite thing to do."
"Ha," Faith glanced up at the mocking voice floating down from the fire escape, "I feel like I'm co-starring in a buddy movie."
The speaker was a striking Latina with long, silky black hair, wearing a skin-tight, deep-cut v-neck white outfit with black stripes, her outfit finished by a tiger's mask on her face, and paws on her hands. "'Fore you ask," Faith muttered, "I ain't dressin' in anythin' like that." Faith joined Xander in backing away, her eyes fixed on the woman. "'Kay, what's the 411 if she attacks-." Faith's eyes widened as the woman dropped out of the sky to land in a crouch in front of them. "Or rather when!"
The woman came in fast, shooting a heel at Faith's face that she leaned away from. "This is the White Tiger!" Xander announced.
"No really," Faith slapped the foot away and spun into a roundhouse kick that her rival ducked under before leaping at her. "I'd have never guessed!" Faith met her rival's leap with a hook to the jaw that knocked her back, blood flying from the Latina's mouth.
The White Tiger stumbled back, dust scuffling under foot. "She's one of the good gals," Xander reported. "Slightly better than human, but you should be able to take her."
"Should? Such confidence!" Faith blocked a knee to her side on her left forearm, while using her right to block a hook to her face, then stepping in to deliver an headbutt that the White Tiger parried on her forearm.
The impact of the collision ran up and down her neck, but Faith ignored it to throw an uppercut that the White Tiger glided to the left of before driving a knee into Faith's thigh. "Shit," Faith stumbled back, then the moment her opponent surged in to take advantage reversed her momentum and caught her adversary with a fist to the gut. The moment the other woman began doubling up, Faith snatched her into a front facelock and cinched in hard before leaning in to deliver a coldly whispered message. "Listen bitch, when you wake up remember I coulda snapped your neck like a twig. Think 'bout that when you're deciding whose good and whose bad."
Xander chortled as she released White Tiger and allowed her to slump to the ground. "Unique way of making a point."
Faith shot her buddy a smirk. "Hey I'm pissed, alpha, and on the run, never a great combination." Faith picked up the limp Hispanic and dropped it in a dirty grey dumpster, the rotting stench that arose forcing Faith to rear back in disgust. "Jesus!"
"Didn't you already make your point?" Xander queried.
"Hey, whatever reality we're in, New York's a rough place," Faith defended. "I put her in there to make sure no-one hurts her while she's unconscious."
"And the fact she'll wake up covered in garbage?" Xander queried.
"Fringe benefit," Faith grinned.
"You know how you said we needed to find out why SHIELD was after us?" Faith said as they made their way across a darkened park. Xander nodded. "How do you figure to do that?"
Xander grimaced, he hadn't actually thought that far ahead. Seeing as Faith was looking to him to come up with a plan, he thought quickly. "There's two ways of doing it. Either we break into one of the SHIELD bases and hack into their system-."
"Heh," Faith snorted. "Unless my eyesight's really, really bad you're no Red."
"True," Xander bobbed his head, hiding his pain at the thought of his oldest friend. He smiled inwardly at Faith's reassuring squeeze of his hand. "In that case, our next best chance is to grab a high level SHIELD agent and question them."
"High level?" Faith queried.
"Fury, Hill, Dugan, Bridge, from memory a couple of others." Xander replied.
"Jeez," Faith groaned. "What a fuckin' choice." Faith shook her head. "Guess we go through door 2 then. Any ideas how we do that?"
"Help!" A shrill cry from another alley saved Xander from having to admit he didn't have a clue. "Get offa me!"
"Shut it bitch!"
Faith rolled her eyes as he started towards the commotion. "Ain't it enough we've got our own problems?" the curvy Slayer grumbled before following suit. "Now we've gotta solve everyone else's at well?"
He leapt from roof to roof with a skill and ease that only a tiny minority could match or exceed. The night's cool wind stroked his face like a lover's touch, bringing with it a myriad of smells drifting up from the streets below. At the same time his enhanced auditory senses effortlessly filtered out the city's sounds, the nightclubs, the traffic, conversational chatter, while ceaselessly searching for anything that aroused his suspicions.
"Help! Get offa me!"
The moment he heard the shriek, he changed direction in mid-leap, heading unerringly towards the disturbance, his senses picking up more details as he approached. There were four attackers, one victim, a woman. And, his interest quickened, a pair were already moving to intercept them.
"Take the near one, centre, and far side are mine," Faith instructed as she raced around the corner to find a quartet of heavy-set thugs, one black, one latino, and a pair of whites all around a now no longer screaming just whimpering black girl.
Faith sensed rather than saw Xander's nod, well-used to workin' in a team with her friend. And then she was on the attack, driving her heel into the lower back of one of the whites, the man crumpling as another spun around and tried a clumsy backhand.
Faith laughed, not even trying to duck the blow that bounced off her cheek, savouring the shocked look on her would-be assailant's face while side-kicking another thug in the knee. Even as the man fell away, his face greying in pain and hands dropping to his probably shatter knee-cap, Faith attacked the man stood in front of her.
The perfect punch requires a lot of things, power, speed, precision, balance, experience. Faith started at the legs and powered through her entire body, twisting at the waist, her arm shooting out, extending full-length so that her palm crashed into the man's beefy chest.
Bone cracked as her palm hit home, the man gasping as his legs flailed helplessly, knocking him on his ass, eyes closing as he passed out. The first man she'd hit was back up, a chain swinging down at her.
Faith leaned to the right, her mane billowing as the chain passed by. Her hand shot out, grabbing the chain and wrenching it from her would-be attacker's grip. Even as the guy's jaw dropped at her effortless power, Xander caught him with an overhand right to the side of his head that dropped him like a stone.
"So you're the two who have the super-hero community up in arms."
He smirked as the two looked up to him crouched on his fire escape landing. He'd arrived in enough time to see the entirety of the fight. The man was capable enough, but in no way exceptional. The woman on the other end had a combination of grace and power that was in some way reminiscent of Danny Rand or Cap.
"Oh boy," the man said breathlessly, "Matt Murdock. It's a huge honour."
All amusement fled at the utterance of his name. Daredevil stepped off the edge of the landing. The wind whistled around him as he fell, landing in a legs-apart crouch, just in front of the duo. "You know that name how?" he demanded, his voice low and dangerous.
"Hey back off Redskin," growled the woman, "lay one finger on him and I'll cut your balls off and stuff them in your ears." The moment the woman started forward, his arm shot out, flinging his billy-club between the woman's legs, bouncing it off the wall behind her, and back to his hand. "Shit!" the woman wailed, hers was a Boston accent he decided, as she hit the ground and glared up impotently at the stars. "Just in case anyone's listenin', I fuckin' hate this reality!"
Beneath his mask, Daredevil's lips quirked up in a smile at the woman's helpless rage, but he was careful to keep his voice hard. "I asked you a question?"
"Um we're both from another reality we're you're all comic book characters," he sensed rather than saw the man's blush, "and I'm a big fan." Daredevil raised an eyebrow. It sounded ridiculous yet also sounded very true. "I know you can tell that we're telling the truth because it's one of your powers. So I also want to say that SHIELD are making a big mistake chasing us. We haven't done anything wrong. This is a big mistake. We need your help-."
"Xan, we work better -."
"Faith," Matt guessed the man's gaze hasn't moved from him, "you said I was the expert here, let me be the expert."
"Xan in charge," Faith groaned. "And every day I think this reality couldn't suck more ass!"
"We need your help, I have a sorta plan, but I need to your help to execute it." Xander continued. Daredevil nodded encouragingly when the young man fell nervously silent. The young man slowly explained his plan. It was a plan with a hundred holes in it, but it was probably better than nothing, and it amply illustrated the youth's knowledge of their world.
Finally he nodded. "I've got a safe house we can use tonight."
"Xan-."
"We can trust him Faith," Xander interrupted.
Faith let out a long-suffering sigh that Matt somehow knew she had a lot practice with. "Okay."