Chapter 8
"Anything yet?" Steve asked as he saw Natasha and Bobbi walk off the elevator.
"Nothing," Bobbi said, her brow furrowed. She headed straight for the living room and slumped down in a seat on the couch between Mack and Lance.
It had been nearly a week since Coulson's team joined the Avengers. The two teams spent days in the labs, in their rooms, or out on the streets doing everything and anything they could to find any information on their mystery bug man. Unfortunately, each day seemed to only lead to a dead end. No one had found anything. No sightings. No hideouts. No super soldiers. And no bugs. It's as if the man had disappeared, as if he never existed.
"We looked around the city for a possible location that the guy could be hiding in," Natasha said, pulling a water bottle out of the fridge. She took a drink before looking at the super soldier. "Yet again nothing."
Steve pursed his lips as he took a drink from his coffee. "Have you heard anything from the others?"
"Coulson, May, and Barry went out to look again today haven't contacted back," Lance answered. "Last I heard they were looking by the piers and hadn't seen anything. I'm starting to believe this is a lost cause. We've got nothing on this guy. Ow!" he exclaimed, rubbing his arm as he glared at Bobbi. "That hurt," he said with a slight edge to his voice.
"Good," Bobbi said, glaring at him. "Stop being a downer and actually have some optimism to this mission. We can't just give up."
"What about Bucky, Sam, and Trip?" Clint asked, sitting in an arm chair as he twirled a pencil in his hand as Nat took a spot in a chair next to his. "Anything from them?"
"None," Steve said. He sighed, placing his hands on his hips as he stared ahead, lost in thought. He leaned on his elbows against the counter as he clasped his hands in front of his mouth. "We've looked everywhere haven't we? Where could he be?"
"Nothing on the guy's location then?" Tracey said as she and Skye walked off the elevator. She chewed her cheek when everyone gave their own various answers of no.
"Yeah we're not having much luck on our part either," Skye grumbled as she and the other hacker took a seat at the kitchen counter. "This guy seriously doesn't want to be found. Or he's some new weirdo that just started a new hobby bug and robot collections." She opened up her laptop and gestured to the screen where a bunch of files and windows took over. "We've looked through every possible database. Unless he was part of some organization that we don't know we won't find anything on him."
Tracey blinked, her eyebrows shooting up. "Skye, that's it!" she exclaimed.
The brunette looked at her puzzled. "What's it?" she asked.
The blonde hacker turned to her computer and began typing furiously at the keyboard. "What if he was part of an organization? Maybe not one we don't know, but one we do."
"What are you getting at Trace?" Clint asked, sitting up in his seat. He craned his neck to look from his spot in the living room to see what the woman was doing.
"It's exactly as Skye said," Tracey said, her eyes scanning her computer screen as she went through different files. She clicked something and she turned to the others as she waited for something show up. "What if this guy was part of a group we've faced before? And who's the group that we've all dealt with numerous times?"
"Hydra," Mack said, his eyes growing wide in realization. "Trace, you're a genius!"
Skye smiled brightly at the other female hacker before turning back to her own computer. "If we search for any members who quit or were fired, we could find him."
"Exactly!"
The rest of the group on the floor were on edge as they waited for anything from the two women at the kitchen counter. The air in the room was tense as the seconds ticked. Fingers might as well have been crossed as they waited with bated breath. Steve stood behind them, peering over their shoulders as he watched them at work, his brow furrowed as he watched different names of people from Hydra fly across the screen. Different images of men and women popped up one after the other. He prayed that the two hackers were right and that this person was from Hydra. They needed to find them no-
"Found him!" Skye announced. "It's a man named Michael Burnow," she said, moving out of the way to show the image of a dark, nearly black, haired man on her computer screen.
"That's the guy?" Lance exclaimed. "He doesn't look threatening at all!"
"Well neither do you and yet you're on the team," Bobbi said with a smirk.
"Let's not forget that you're the one who recommended me to Couslon," Lance retaliated.
"What does it say about this Burnow guy?" Mack asked, stepping up and hoping to break the two quarrelers apart.
"Well he was in the science division of Hydra, no shock there," Tracey said, reading off the man's files on her computer. "He was one of their best scientists. However, he was only with Hydra for three years."
"What happened that got him thrown out?" Natasha asked, stepping up beside the blonde. She leaned a hand on the counter and peered over her friend's shoulder to look at the files for herself.
"Apparently he quit," Skye spoke up.
"And he wasn't hunted down or anything?" Bobbi questioned, raising a brow. "I highly doubt Hydra would have let him leave with his knowledge on them."
"That's the thing," Tracey said, "he disappeared. He somehow was able to escape Hydra before they could do anything about him."
"But what happened that made him quit Hydra?" Steve asked, brow furrowed. "I don't see why anyone would want to quit Hydra if they joined in the first place."
"Unless he was undercover," Lance said, eyeing Bobbi who stuck her tongue out at him. "But with this psycho out on the loose, I highly doubt he was undercover."
"It says here he had some idea for an experiment. Anyone care to take a guess as to what it was?" Tracey asked, looking from one person to another.
"Create super soldiers?" Clint asked with an eye roll.
"Eyup. He claimed he could recreate a super soldier serum that was even better than the original one that was used for Captain America. Problem was he kept using up all their resources, equipment, and only focused on that," the blonde woman stated.
"He avoided all his other duties that were required of him. He ignored all other orders. They found him unreliable and useless as a needed member for the science division," Skye added in. "They planned to get rid of him, but he realized their plans and somehow escaped. No one's seen or heard from him since. It's like he's never existed."
"Well clearly he exists," Mack said, crossing his arms. "We know who he is now and his backstory. The problem now is trying to find him."
"You found him?" Jemma said as she, Fitz, Tony, and Bruce walked off the elevator. "That's fantastic news!" she exclaimed as she bounded up to the rest of the group.
"What did you guys find out?" Tony asked as he stepped up next to Steve.
"We were able to figure out who the guy creating the bugs is," Skye answered, turning the computer to show the billionaire the image of the ex-Hydra scientist.
"This guy?" Bruce asked. He shook his head. "Yeah I've never seen him before. He doesn't look that like much. But then again, I'm one to talk," he said with a chuckle.
"Does he work for anyone? What um…uh…organization," Fitz said, saying the last word quickly once he remembered it, "is he working for?"
"Hydra," Skye said with a glare at the computer. "Well, he used to. He quit and disappeared for a few years."
"Until now," Tony said, rubbing his hand against his chin. "So now we need to find the guy. This Michael Burnow," he said, leaning forward and reading the name on the file.
"Problem is," Jemma said with a arch to her brows as she looked at everyone, "we've looked everywhere, but still no sign of him."
Tracey chewed her cheek as she crossed her arms. It was silent among the group, all contemplating on their next move. The hacker perked her head up as something dawned on her. "We have the bug," she said.
"Yeah great observations, Picassa," Tony said with an eye roll.
Tracey quickly shot the scientist a glare before addressing everyone else. "We have the bug. Tony wasn't able to figure out who the creator was from the design. But what if we use the bug to lead us to Burnow?"
"That's actually a good idea," Skye said, her eyes widening slightly as she looked at Tracey. "What if we send the bug back to Burnow? Fitz, Simmons. We could use one of the dwarves' cameras and track where his location is."
"That actually might work," Steve said, nodding his head as he crossed his arms.
"Yeah, but this Michael guy will notice something's off about his bug. He'll realize something's up when the bug randomly shows up at his base. He has to know that Space Cadet took the bug," Tony pointed out.
"Space Cadet?" Jemma whispered to Tracey.
"Barry."
"Ah. Galaga?"
"Yep," Tracey answered, smiling at the giggling scientist.
"Tony's got a point," Mack said. "Once Burnow finds out we know where he is, he could pack up everything and hide out somewhere else."
"That's true," Steve said. "But I think for now we should stick with it and figure out the final details later."
"Got it. I say we head to the bus and check out the D.W.A.R.F.S," Bobbi said.
"Dwarves?" Bruce asked. "I'm guessing we're not talking about short men."
"They're actually D.W.A.R.F.S. We'll show you!" Jemma said, leading the group to the elevator with a bounce in her step.
ooOOoo
"Interesting," Tony said. He stared at the tiny flying robot in front of his face. The robot flew around the currently wrecked room and landed on the table in the middle of the room. "You designed these?" he asked, turning to Fitz and Simmons.
"Yes," Fitz spoke up as he and the rest of the team stood around the holotable. "They're um…they're um…"
"Quad-copters," Jemma spoke softly. She cast her gaze to the floor when she saw Fitz go rigid.
"We created them after we got out of the um Academy," the male scientist continued.
"And you call them dwarfs?" Bruce asked as he examined another one of the seven quad-copters.
"Yes. D, W, A, R, F. It stands for drones wirelessly automated to retrieve forensics," Jemma explained with a smile on her face. "We use the D.W.A.R.F.S. to help us scan any evidence we find during missions."
"We use these tablets to control them and um…uh…" Fitz picked up one of three tablets laying on the holotable and began snapping his fingers as he tried to remember the word.
"Monitor?" Mack offered.
"Yes. Thank you," Fitz said. "We use them monitor areas we can't reach or need to um…um…infiltrate. We can take the cameras from Sleepy here," he said, holding up another drones of the seven, "and install it into the bug Burnow created. We'll have to take some time to get the um programming before we can release use the bug to track Burnow's whereabouts."
"We just need to get the schematics from the bug," Jemma stated, looking to Tony and Bruce.
"Not a problem," Tony said. He waved a hand over the holotable, turning it on. Holograms appeared over the table and the bearded man began playing around with his own tablet until new images and information appeared. "Done."
"Figures Tony Stark would know how to use this thing," Lance said with a chuckle.
"I am me," Tony said with a smirk.
"Thank you," the female scientist said to the billionaire as she pulled the bug's blue prints from the holotable towards her side. "Fitz and I can get started right now. To speed things up of course."
"That'd be great," Steve said, smiling, oblivious to the light blush on the woman's cheeks.
"There's one more thing Tracey found in the news reports' footage," Skye spoke up, walking up to the table with Tracey.
"What did you find?" Natasha asked, raising a brow as she leaned back on one of her legs and crossed her arms. "What did we miss?"
Tracey tapped a few keys and a new image appeared above the holotable. "This man," she said, waving her hand and enlarging the image.
"Oh come on!" Lance exclaimed. "She knows how to use this thing too? None of us, but Fitz and Simmons knows how to use this thing."
"I do, too," Skye said with a laugh. "Fitz and Simmons taught me. Ask nicely and they might do the same for you."
"Living with Tony Stark you learn a few things here and there," Tracey said with a smile as she placed her laptop down and moved her hands around.
"Oh I like you," Jemma said, smiling brightly as she looked at Tracey, who in turn smiled back. She looked back at the image of the still from the news report. "What did we miss? We've all seen the reports."
"This man," Tracey said, pointing to a light brown haired man in the background of all the chaos. She pulled up another video and paused at a certain point.
"He's there again," Clint said, brow furrowing. "He's not running like everyone else."
"Exactly. He's there in the background during all three attacks. He's watching. That's it," Skye said, pointing to him in another image. "He's there, but why?"
"He's definitely not Burnow," Bobbi said, crossing her arms. "An assistant?"
"That's our guess," Tracey said. "Which is why I might have a possible plan for the bug. If we can somehow slip the bug to him in some way, we can easily get it to his base and track where he takes it."
"That's not bad," Natasha said, nodding her head. "We can also get him to see that we have it, which he already knows we do. Most likely he needs to get it back to Burnow. If we can get him to take we're in."
"So all we have to do is start working on getting the camera in the bug and then come up with some sort of plan to get it to Burnow's little secretary," Tony said. He clapped his hands. "Alright then, let's get going."
Well I guess this counts as a filler, but at the same time it's progressing the plot. Not sure. But I hope you like it. Also I hope that I didn't make Tracey a Mary Sue in this chapter in anyway. I tried to split hers and Skye's work and findings evenly. Both are hackers and are able to use those skills quickly and think logically. So I really hope that I didn't make Trace too smart or Mary Sue-ish in any way! If I did I in no way intentionally did that :(
If you'd like to ask the Avengers, Madison twins, and anyone in the tower any questions, feel free to send in a message on my tumblr. If you have a prompt you'd like to see for Life at the Tower/AUs feel free to send a message on my tumblr, PM me here, or leave it in a review.
I would love to hear what you guys think of the story so far because this is the first time I'm actually coming up with a decent plot for a story and trying my best at coming up with good enough dialogue and ideas for the plot. I'm really nervous about how this story is going so I'd love to hear what you guys think so far.
Thank you guys for everything!