Gathering Storm

"Alright, move in!"

The S.H.I.E.L.D agents entered the Treetop Saloon one by one, guns raised. The hazmat-suit-clad team spread out as they filed in, surveying the eerily quiet establishment. The cool light of the midday sun illuminated the shards of the shattered front window, casting rays of light through the desecrated restaurant.

The agents moved deliberately, carefully avoiding the overturned chairs and shattered plates littering the room. One of them, the squad leader, raised his hand, signaling for the others to stop.

"Go check the back," he whispered to the soldier to his right. The agent nodded before carefully making his way to the kitchen and opening the door. Peering inside the pitch-black space, the soldier raised his weapon. He turned back to the leader of the group, silently confirming the order he had been given. Receiving a nod from his superior, the soldier turned and stepped into the darkness.

The soldier clicked on the flashlight attached to his gun and looked around. Half-finished meals sat on the counter, some of which had begun to attract flies. Pots and dishes were scattered haphazardly about the floor. Rounding a corner, the intrepid agent came to a halt. Viscera covered the wall in front of him, glimmering in the light.

The soldier tightened his grip on his weapon. He had been trained for this. Stay calm. Breach and clear.

A strange, garbled noise drew the agent's attention away from the gruesome scene. Swiveling to his right, the agent locked eyes with a woman standing behind a counter. The woman took rasping breaths as her gleaming, yellow eyes remained locked with his. The woman's veins seemed to pulsate beneath her pale, semi-translucent skin. The agent's raised his weapon

"Miss?" he asked. "Are…"

Without warning, the woman let out a guttural, gurgling cry and charged at the soldier. The agent reacted on instinct, firing a round into the mad woman's chest. She stumbled and let out an incoherent cry, but quickly recovered. Steeling himself, the soldier held down the trigger of his weapon, felling the mad woman in a hail of bullets.

He finished reloading his weapon just as the other agents burst into the room, guns raised and flashlights on.

"We heard shots," the leader stated.

"Contact," the soldier explained tersely. He shined his flashlight down at the woman's body and stepped back to avoid the rapidly forming pool of blood beneath his feet. "I'm fine."

"This is all just…Jesus," one of the agents chimed.

"Area seems clear commander," another added. "Orders?"

"Any survivors?" the commander asked.

"Negative," answered another member of the group

"Then head back to the staging area," the commander stated. "Ward is expecting a sit-rep."

It took the soldiers half an hour to reach their destination, a makeshift S.H.I.E.L.D. encampment on the outskirts of the town. Personnel mulled about, ducking in and out of the hastily constructed tents that served as temporary quarters, storage rooms, and medical facilities. The weary soldiers filed in to one of the medical tents, where they removed their gear and underwent decontamination procedures. Once cleared, most of the group headed towards their temporary quarters, eager to get some rest after a harrowing and exhausting morning.

The squad leader watched from the entrance of the medical tent as his men left, chatting and joking as they were wont to do. He silently wished to go with them. After spending the morning fighting…those things…he was beginning to tire out. However, duty called. He would get some rest after making his report.

He soon found himself at the entrance to another tent. Ducking inside, the squad leader found a S.H.I.E.L.D agent seated at a table, frantically typing away at a laptop. Reports and charts covered the folding table serving as the agent's desk. The squad leader stood silently, watching his superior jot down notes in a document before taking a gulp from a water bottle a replacing it on the desk beside his computer.

"Commander Ward," the squad leader greeted with a salute. The seated gentleman's eyes lifted from his work and settled on the weary squad leader.

"Lieutenant Shepard," Ward replied, leaning back in his chair. "Your report,"

"Sir," Shepard responded. "We searched all building in sector eight. 24 contacts in total."

"Any survivors?" Ward questioned.

"No," replied Shepard, shifting on one foot. "One of my men had a particularly close encounter with an infected individual, but he says it didn't touch him. The CDC doctors cleared him when he got back to camp."

"I don't like all these CDC lab types meddling in our business," Ward stated, turning his attention to a report on his desk. "They're just more civilians for us to babysit."

Shepard hesitated for a moment before responding. "This is their jurisdiction, sir."

Ward grunted as he typed a quick note on his laptop. "Hmph. That's what they said." The impatient commander picked up a paper on his desk and surveyed it. "You are dismissed, Lieutenant."

Shepard saluted silently before slipping out of the tent. Taking another drink of water, Ward put down the document he was holding and clicked a link on his laptop. A window with a rotating, segmented circle appeared onscreen, and Ward silently cursed being in the mountains. His phone reception had been shoddy all morning, and now his laptop was beginning to act up. Why couldn't S.H.I.E.L.D buy better equipment? He had hoped that the partnership with Stark Industries would remedy technological problems on the ground, but new tech had been less than forthcoming. If Stark was down here cleaning up the mess, Ward mused, maybe he would get off his ass and start fixing the problem.

Well, being a billionaire and a member of the Avengers had to have some perks.

Ward's laptop beeped, snapping him out of his train of thought. A woman's face appeared onscreen, her expression one of thinly veiled frustration.

"Director Hill," Ward greeted.

"What's the status on the ground?" Director Hill queried, dispensing with the pleasantries.

"We've completed our search of the town. No survivors. Just monsters.

Hill grimaced. "An entire town dead almost overnight. Shit." The normally composed woman leaned back and frowned as she skimmed a report on her desk.

"Two weeks. Two towns gone overnight. And we're still not even close to containing this."

"We've cut off access to and from Alpine," Ward commented. "We set up a perimeter around the town, and a second perimeter 5 miles outside that. We've diverted all traffic; so far no one seems to suspect anything."

"Good," Hill replied. "We need to make sure this stays secret until we contain it. Word of this gets out, we'll have a PR nightmare on our hands. Any developments on the CDC's end?"

"Nope," Ward answered. "They keep saying that it's unlike any disease they've ever seen. Apparently, no one knows what it is or how to treat it."

Director Hill shook her head. "We've been tracking the spread of the infection. The towns hit so far have followed a line heading East. Whatever's doing this is on the move. We need to find it and contain it before it reaches a more populated area."

"But without any survivors, we have no leads," Ward added.

Director Hill's expression darkened. "But we do know one thing. This disease can't be natural. Someone set this up. Someone with the resources and intelligence to engineer a threat that we don't have an answer to."

The S.H.I.E.L.D. director stopped for a moment, eyeing her subordinate intently. After a moment, her demeanor relaxed, and she turned away from the screen.

"Get back to work Commander. I have to make a call."

A young boy leaned forward as he dug around in his beaten red backpack. After a moment, his eyes lit up and he withdrew a wrapped granola bar. Placing the snack at his side, the boy plunged his hand into the satchel once more, this time retrieving a box of band-aids and a scratched canteen. He opened the box and silently thanked his luck upon finding one Captain America bandage left.

The boy closed his backpack and scooted over to the open door of the boxcar he was occupying. The wind gusted by, whipping up his disheveled hair and chilling his hands. He huddled into himself and stepped away from the windy door of the car.

Stretching out, the child unwrapped the bandage and carefully applied it to the cut on his knee. It wasn't hurting too bad anymore, but he had heard somewhere that not putting a band-aid on a cut could make it worse.

Satisfied with his handiwork, the boy scooted over to the open door of the boxcar he was occupying, sat down cross-legged, and unwrapped his food. For a few quiet minutes, he munched on the somewhat stale granola bar and watched the mountains and forest rush by.

This was definitely the prettiest place he had ever seen. He hadn't been to a lot of places, but this one had a lot more trees than the other places he had been. He liked the green. He liked the cool, fresh air. He liked the quiet. Maybe he could find a place like this to live. A place where no one would hit him or throw bottles at him. Where the monster couldn't get him.

The child's expression grew serious. He hadn't seen the monster since that nice lady had given him food a couple days ago. He hoped that the train would take him as far away from that thing as possible. Then, he would…um…

…what would he do?

Running and hiding hadn't given him much time to think of a next move. Maybe he'd find his parents somewhere.

Wait, do I have parents? I have to, right...? They're probably looking for me...

Leaning back, the boy rested his head on his backpack. Right now, all he wanted to do was take a nap. He'd figure out a plan later. Reaching back, the boy unzipped his backpack and pulled out a faded, blue blanket. Snuggling into the blanket, the kid turned onto his side and fell into a fitful sleep.

"You summoned me, Charles?" Dr. McCoy asked as he entered the X-Mansion's owner's private study. Looking up from the titillating novel he had been reading, the professor smiled and marked his place before setting down the book on the coffee table.

"Yes, Hank. I hope I haven't interrupted anything important."

"Nothing that can't wait," the fuzzy doctor responded.

"Good," Professor Xavier said, "because I have an errand for you to run."

"Oh?" McCoy exclaimed.

"While using Cerebro this afternoon, I located a new mutant signature in Arizona. I've been tracking it for the better part of the afternoon. I was hoping you might locate the mutant and bring it back to the Institute.

"What have you learned about this mysterious mutant?" McCoy asked.

"Very little, I'm afraid," Charles responded. "I was hoping you might be able to uncover some clues as to the nature of this elusive character. After all, you have proven yourself to be a capable detective. Though, I caution you to be discreet. In light of recent events, I feel that it would be in our best interest to exercise a degree of…"

"…subtlety." McCoy finished.

"Precisely," Charles replied. "When can you leave?"

"I shall depart posthaste," Dr. McCoy stated.

"I will input the coordinates into the Blackbird," Xavier said, following his mutant colleague out of the study. "Good luck, and be careful."