Little Bird's Vengeance Chapter 62 Without All the Data
"What's happened to Red? Is he that cut up about this guy betraying his trust?"
Cassie was watching the security camera feed from Tim's room in the penthouse lounge. It wasn't perving. There was a standing agreement among all the Titans that watching each other sleep when bed rest was ordered was nothing more than monitoring for health purposes. Well, that's how Tim had described it, and the exact agreement had been more that if Tim did it, they could do it too – doubly so when it was Tim who most needed someone to keep him in line. At least this time he actually had done what he was supposed to and gone to bed.
"He's gone and got himself sick again," she sighed, looking over at Tony. The Avengers had returned from the Helicarrier and were now watching her watching the sleeping teen.
"He had a cold only a few weeks ago," Banner said, frowning. "How is he sick again?"
Cassie stared at him. "He didn't…? No, of course he didn't. Moron. He lost his spleen, and permanently compromised his immune system. Did he never mention the meds he has to keep taking?"
"He said they were his pain meds," Natasha commented. "That his immunities drastically limited the range of effective painkillers."
Cassie moaned. "And of course he knows you could tell if he was lying, so he only told you a half-truth. Damn Bats. No, he took a sword to the spleen and now needs to take antibiotics every day to avoid getting sick every week. And today he decided to sit in the ocean for an hour or two, and so he's got pneumonia."
"He's immunocompromised. That explains so much," Clint commented.
"Yeah, well, he needs to learn to share, and he'll be out for a week at least, which is not something we need right now," Kon grumbled.
"Is he the only one who can work out what's going on with this man you think is a traitor?" Steve asked.
Cassie turned around as the Avengers started to gather with the air of an imminent briefing. She'd been to enough of them to recognize the slight anticipation and wariness. "We don't know who he is, exactly. Rob could find out, but there's no way he's going to release the data for us to find our mystery crook."
"Just give me a name, I'll look into it," Tony shrugged.
Cassie winced. "There's no way that would end well. Believe me, that would betray trusts we cannot afford to jeopardise right now."
"What's the worst that could happen?" the billionaire asked rhetorically.
Cassie took him seriously. "Rob gets better, finds out, and decides the best thing to do is to take us all out and dismantle SHIELD. He will probably do a fairly good job of it."
"He's not that good," Clint scoffed.
Kon chuckled darkly. "Believe me, he's got tricks you wouldn't think exist. He customarily carries a very specific radiation source just in case he needs to put me on the ground."
"So what do you suggest?" Steve asked.
"We wait until Rob gets better, and see what we can do to take out the grunts," Cassie sighed.
"How can we be sure AC is okay?" Skye asked. "We get assigned a secret mission – which we don't exactly have the best track record of – when Coulson's still shook up from his kidnapping and all the secrets Fury's been keeping."
May stepped out of the corner. "We don't know everything," she stated. "Fury's communique was deliberately vague. He said that he, personally, had been entrusted with certain secrets in exchange for them remaining unrecorded. He gave Coulson certain codes that may allow him to gain the contact's trust."
"Can you give us that again please?" Fitz asked.
The five SHIELD agents (well, four and Skye) were gathered in the briefing room while Coulson was investigating the hijacked Quinjet alone. Skye was trying to surreptitiously hack the computers via her phone to get more information, but Ward and May were both fixing their eyes on the little device.
May scowled. "Fury has made a deal with a new asset," she explained. "This asset gave Fury information, and in exchange, Fury agreed to keep the information secret and out of the records. For whatever reason, Fury considered it safe for the secrets to remain unrecorded, and the trust of the asset worth that concession. But the asset has a contact, and the deal includes the contact's secrets. The contact is mildly unstable, and Fury believes he would benefit from confiding in Coulson. He told Coulson to be completely truthful, and the stick to the confidentiality agreement. He gave him a few hints that will tell the contact Fury sent him."
"So…does Coulson actually know what's going on with this contact?" Simmons asked.
"I didn't understand all of the message," May shrugged. "Coulson did, and he's the one who needs to know. What he knows, I suspect depends on whether or not the contact trusts him."
"You're being awfully chatty, May," Fitz commented.
"The message was disguised by being sent low security; Coulson wanted me to interpret it for you before Skye read it and misunderstood," May said simply.
"Thanks, May, really appreciate it," Skye said, putting away the phone. "Do we know the names of this asset or contact?"
"The asset is codenamed Red Robin," May informed them. "The contact is Red Hood."
"I can work with that," Skye said quickly, picking the phone up again.