Chapter 2
"Mia!"
A sharp rapping on her door roused Mia from her sleep of the dead.
"Mia!" It was Darcy. "It's like nine thirty, you should probably wake up! Or you'll be…late for something…" she trailed off.
Mia sat up bolt upright in bed, glaring over at her clock with one eye stuck shut and her hair a disheveled mess. "SHIT!" she yelled, when she saw the time. It really was nine thirty. AM. Nine thirty AM.
Her day had just gone in the toilet.
"Yeah, I know," Darcy said, laughing a little through the door as Mia rushed out of bed, catching her foot on the blankets and falling to the ground with a loud and ungraceful thud. "Listen, Jane and I have been called away to Toronto–"
"Tromsø!" Jane yelled from another room. Probably speed packing again, Mia thought.
"That's what I said!" Darcy called back stubbornly. "Tromsø. We're gonna be gone for a week this time, will you be okay?"
Mia looked over at the door from her closet, alarmed. "A week? That's rather…sudden." Suspicious, her mind said.
"Yeah, just got the call this morning," Jane relayed. "They're paying for everything, it's a good gig. If only we just had a little more…time…"
"We even get a private plane," Darcy agreed enthusiastically. "Part work, mostly vacation. Awesome." Then she called back to Jane, "Where the hell is Tromsø, anyway?"
"Norway," Mia grumbled. "It's in Norway, Darcy." Great; after her creepy ass phone call/threat the day before, she got to stay home by herself for a whole week. "Peachy."
"So…a snowy holiday then." Darcy sounded a bit less enthusiastic now. "Let me just…go and pack my parka."
"Relax, Darc," Mia called through the door. "Tromsø is big on parties. It's literally called 'the Paris of the north'; so you won't be sitting in an igloo somewhere bored out of your mind."
"Then I'll pack my sexy snow-boots," Darcy said sarcastically. "Hooray."
Mia shook her head bemusedly her friend, and came out of her bedroom with a wicked grin. "Don't forget your sexy thermals."
"Damn!" Darcy swore on her way to her bedroom. "This is looking better and better, Jane."
"Oh, perk up," Jane called from the kitchen table, where she was speed-eating cereal. Mia joined her, plunking down in a chair and grabbing for the nearest box. She shoved aside Darcy's cake plate (still covered in dark chocolate crumbs) and dumped a serving in a bowl she'd nabbed from the cupboard.
"Well, good luck," Mia said, much more lightly than she felt. "Whatever they have you working on; a trip overseas will be nice."
"Yeah…" Jane looked at Mia's unusual state of disarray concernedly. Mia was usually always made up perfectly; for her to be this out of order was a bad sign. "Are you sure you'll be okay? I mean, you can call a friend or something to stay over if you want…"
"I'll be fine," Mia reassured her, forcing a smile. "I'll help you pack, if you want."
"Don't you have places to be?"
Mia waved her off. "I've already effed up my day by sleeping in. Helping a friend pack for a trip won't screw it up anymore."
Jane grinned. "Great. I really could use the help."
After wolfing down her cereal at a rate that would probably give her a stomach ache, Mia went into Jane's room and helped her pick out a week's worth of outfits.
"There," she said twenty minutes later, gazing at the clothes folded in the suitcase proudly. "Work clothes, civvies, pajamas, dressy outfit, gym outfit, snow outfit; work shoes, sneakers, booties, snow boots, and towels." She shuddered. "Never trust your hotel to have decent towels. You'll nearly always be horribly disappointed."
With a laugh, Jane slipped on her flats and zipped up the suitcase. "Darcy you ready?"
"Ready to roll," Darcy called back happily. They went out into the main area, where, true to her word, Darcy was wearing an enormous parka–and sunglasses.
"Let's get this show on the road," she crowed, grabbing a few equipment bags and taking them outside. "Ooh, look! They sent a limo!"
"A limo?" Mia wondered. She and Jane moved to the window to see that there was indeed a black stretch limo awaiting the scientist and her intern.
"Cripes," Mia muttered. "They really went all out, didn't they?"
"Guess so," Jane said, slightly uncomfortably. Then she shrugged. "Well, that's a nice change. Beats the Mini any day."
"Oi!" Mia cried, slapping Jane's arm. "Don't diss the Mini!"
Jane laughed. "I left the keys on the kitchen counter, in case you want to use it while we're gone."
"Thanks, I just might," Mia said thoughtfully. It could help her catch up on her rounds, if she didn't need to wait for public transportation.
After waving as the limo pulled away with her friends inside, Mia made her way back up the stairs to the flat; she needed a shower and a really big cup of coffee before this day was going anywhere.
An hour and a half later, she sat at her desk; ready for the day, she quipped mentally, before scrolling through her dubiously full email inbox and sighing.
Rather suddenly though, and before she could get to work (or fetch the necessary doughnut,) her mobile went off. She answered it through her Bluetooth.
"This is Paxton," she said primly, typing away at her mayoral candidate overview with one hand while sipping coffee with her other.
"Miss Paxton, this is Agent Coulson from SHIELD." Mia sat up straighter and set the coffee down.
"Agent Coulson. This is a surprise," she said, sounding surprised indeed. "What have I done this time, to garner SHIELD's attention?"
"Actually, this has nothing to do with you, Miss Paxton," Coulson replied. "We have reason to believe that your life is in danger, and would like you to come in."
Mia had worked with Agent Coulson before, and knew how the whole 'I'm telling you what to do even though you're a civilian' thing went. "Coulson, I'm not on the SHIELD watch list. Government, sure; but politics 'supposedly' have nothing to do with SHIELD." She made sarcastic air quotes at the obvious lie. "So why the sudden concern?"
Coulson sighed. "Have you received any strange phone calls in the past day?"
Mia's stomach dropped. She said nothing.
"We're sending a car to pick you up," Agent Coulson relayed matter-of-factly. "Be ready in five minutes." The line disconnected.
"Rude," Mia commented, rising from her seat. She didn't like working within the system; too many loops to jump and way too much corruption for her liking (or ideals, you know.) But this seemed fishy. She wasn't so important that SHIELD should be concerned if her life was in danger, which meant only one thing: they weren't concerned about the threat to her life, but who had made it.
True to Agent Coulson's word, a black SHIELD vehicle pulled up five minutes later as Mia stood with her brown trench coat and black scarf wound warmly around her. The blustery fall weather buffeted her from the left side, whipping a few strands of hair into her eyes.
The rear car door popped open, and look who was inside?
"Miss Paxton," said Phil Coulson, with that grimacing smile of his. "Sorry about the sudden disturbance; I assure you it's necessary."
"No problem," said Mia sarcastically, stepping down and taking a seat next to him. The door closed with a heavy thud and pulled away from the curb.
Luckily, the car was much warmer than the weather. "So where are we going?" she asked. "Oh no what, let me guess: Stark Tower. Agent Fury hasn't forgiven me for slighting Stark in that article–even though Stark himself has. We're even buddies now! Pepper and I had lunch yesterday."
"I know," Coulson said with a hint of amusement in his eyes. "But Stark Tower isn't safe enough a location."
"And what is?"
"I'm not at liberty to say," he confessed. "And…" he hesitated briefly. "I'm sorry for this."
"Crap," Mia breathed, seeing his look. "Coulson, don't you DARE use that trial sedative on…" She felt a sharp prick in her right arm. "…me."
The last thing she saw was Coulson giving her an apologetic look as the car faded away to blackness.
. . .
Mia awoke to a strange, low buzzing noise.
She was lying in a Spartan, grey adorned bedroom, her messenger bag set carefully on a chair in a corner. On a table next to the small, twin sized bed was a tablet–not her own, which she'd gotten as a gift from Tony; this looked like SHIELD property.
She sat up a bit stiffly to find she was still in her coat and scarf. Finding them unnecessary in the climate controlled room she was in, she pulled them off and tossed them across to the chair. Then, tossing her hair irritably at the thought of Coulson's uncouth tranquilization of her person without consent, she swiped a finger over the tablet device to unlock it. Given from the light streaming in through the window, it was early morning of the next day.
A video of Nick Fury immediately sprang to life. "Miss Paxton," he said nodding at the camera. "This is a prerecorded message that will be delivered to you as soon as you're conscious."
Mia snorted contemptuously. "I could totally sue for that," she quipped.
"You won't," Fury said confidently, as if responding to her. Mia raised an eyebrow suspiciously. "Yeah, I knew you would make some sarcastic remark about your rights as a civilian." His face grew horribly serious. "Unfortunately, the rights of the world may be at stake, if that makes you feel any better."
This sobered her up. Given her lie detecting skills, Mia could tell at once he was being completely truthful–besides, this supported her previous theory of some sort of threat.
"SHIELD is currently at security level seven. I'll leave it up to Stark to explain the details to you."
"Oh, goody. I don't mind seeing old Ironhead again. Although, given the fact he gets to lecture…" Mia shuddered. "This may get ugly."
"You'll find him in the laboratory. And DO NOT wander, Miss Paxton! I know you're always eager to find fuel for your stories, but now is HARDLY the time." Director Fury glared at the screen before the camera shut off.
"Hmm." Mia said thoughtfully, before rising and saying, "Game on, then."
Leaving everything behind except her tablet (NOT the one Fury had given her,) Mia stepped out of her sparsely decorated room and into an equally sparse hallway lined with doors similar to her own. She turned on the device and allowed its tracking systems to give her an overlay of the craft she was on (decidedly craft, as the floors were emitting a faint vibration that could only be attributed to engines.) She found that she was on some kind of immense air carrier, about a mile above sea level which probably meant they (rather aptly) had some kind of shielding device.
"Illegal observation, Fury," she muttered, following the coordinates to the lab, "didn't even have to look for trouble, when it's right beneath my feet."
Finally, after going down two levels and through countless corridors, she finally reached the correct door, slowing down so that her oxfords wouldn't give her away. Mia saw Tony deep in conversation with a woman sporting cropped read hair that was immaculately styled. Mia immediately felt self conscious, in her deep green dress that suddenly seemed so girly. The woman was rocking her jumpsuit, body glove thing, and Mia the Anarchist looked like an eleven year old. Fabulous.
"Natasha, relax," Tony was saying, while unpacking some interesting looking gadgets. "She's a political journalist, not a ninja spy woman like you." The woman glared at him. "You get the point. In fact, if SHIELD is that concerned for her safety that they would jeopardize their public image by letting Mia Paxton on board their top secret base, then there really must be something to that message." He laughed as he said her name. Mia Paxton. Apparently, the idea was completely ludicrous when she was involved. This was a good enough ego boost for her.
"My thoughts exactly," Mia said, stepping into the room. The woman's hand went for her gun, but the journalist didn't even flinch. "Stark's got a point on the ninja thing. My words aren't dangerous–well…"
Tony rolled his eyes. "Speak of the devil."
"Oi!" Mia back handed him. "I gave you a glowing review on your energy initiative, so can it."
"Take it easy, cat eyes!" Tony laughed, and Mia scowled, seeing how Pepper's pet name had carried over to her unofficial boyfriend/boss. "I didn't mean anything by it. How much of that conversation did you hear, anyway?"
"Enough," Mia admitted, "though not all of it. But I agree with you: SHIELD must have some ulterior motive to bringing me aboard a vessel like this. Just walking down the hall gave me enough writing material for a month. I mean, did you see those drones they have parked in hangar B7? Holy geez. Not to mention this level of technology, which they are clearly keeping from the public. Normally that's something I'd convict you of, Tony."
Stark shrugged. "True enough," he said, fiddling with some dials on a device as he powered it up. "Boys and their toys, etcetera etcetera. Have you met agent Romanoff?" He gestured to the other woman. Mia raised an eyebrow.
"Natasha Romanoff?" she asked interestedly. The woman threw a look at Stark before admitting to her identity.
"Yes." She held out a hand. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Miss Paxton. A couple of your articles actually helped in the capture of a few of my old enemies–without my having to be involved." She gave a terse smile. "Thank you."
To Natasha's surprise, Mia grinned at this. "Glad to know it helped someone; usually it kinda works the other way." She looked around at the room. "And don't worry guys: for the duration of our stint on this ship-thing, I'll keep my research on…other things. Not the people I'm working with."
"Works for me," Stark agreed, and the woman nodded. She put a hand to her ear, as if listening, and muttered a short reply. "I'm needed on the bridge," she announced. "If you'll excuse me." She nodded at both Stark and Paxton, and left.
"Well, she reinvents the term standoffish," Mia announced. "I thought I was bad when I'm not working. I know she has her reasons, but…wow."
"Don't worry, she makes me feel like a lesser woman, too."
Mia looked at the man in shock for a moment, and snickered. "Touché."
Tony chuckled. "Yeah, well. I don't think we've seen the worst of the standoffishness, either. According to Fury, he's got Captain Rogers and Dr. Banner en route as we speak." He was staring hard at the screen but Mia caught a distinct note of disdain as he said 'Captain Rogers'.
Mia's eyes widened. "You mean Captain America and the Hulk?"
"Try not to fan-girl," Tony said with an eye roll at her reaction.
"It's not that," she said irritably, starting to pace the room. "It's the fact that he's bringing both of them…and he's already got you and the Black Widow herself in house. What could possibly be that bad?"
"So you don't know what's going on." Tony said dubiously. "This may be a first."
"Fury left a note," said Mia, making a face. "Saying I should come to you for information."
Stark sighed. "He would."
"You're sighing? I'm the one who has to listen to another of your 'presentations'. At least this one doesn't have slides."
"Hey! My presentations are good!" Tony objected.
"Yeah, if we were in high school science class, complete with rickety chairs and annoying people throwing spitballs," Mia scoffed, crossing her arms.
Tony narrowed his eyes at her. "Alright," he muttered. "I see how it is." He pulled out a device that kind of resembled a projector–that is, if a small black cube could look like a projector. "Check out my new pet project." He pressed the top of the box, and immediately the room around them was turned into a 360° degree, 4D hologram computer.
Mia said nothing for a moment, eyeing the room skeptically. "Is this safe?"
"Of course it's safe," Tony scoffed, moving some icons and files around. "It's a computer."
"You know what I mean."
"No, it hasn't been board approved yet," said Tony wearily.
After a moment of hesitation (during which Stark was bracing himself for a lecture,) Mia touched the screen herself, moving a news tab to a position in front of her for better reading. "Awesome."
Though moderately surprised at the anarchist's sudden (and unexpected) approval, Tony decided not to let it show; and to reply in that language they both spoke so well: sarcasm. "What, is the 'justice police' so easily swayed now?"
"Shut up and give me the rundown, Stark," Mia said, watching as the news feed displayed an article about President Winters. She quickly closed the tab, scowling. "Better yet, pull up the information and I'll draw my own conclusions."
"As you wish," Stark said with a dismissive shrug.
He then proceeded to display all of the information he had regarding their current situation. It took a good twenty minutes for Mia to work through it all.
"So this 'Loki' guy," Mia said, narrowing her eyes at his image on the screen, "is trying to take the Tesseract and use it for…what exactly?"
"We don't know yet," Tony admitted. "Hopefully when Dr. Banner gets here he might have some speculations of his own. The only real expert on the Tesseract, Dr. Erik Selvig, was taken along with the cube; so that kind of leaves us in the dark. According to my information, SHIELD was trying to use it as a sustainable energy source."
"Yeah, well." Mia pulled up a photo of the Tesseract onscreen. "My information says otherwise."
Stark knew that Mia, as a political vulture, had access to some of the best sources available; the fact that she was well received in print ensured that those leads she received weren't dead ends. He was about to ask just what those leads were, when an agent came in.
"Miss Paxton is required on the bridge," the agent said shortly, before walking away to a post a little ways down the hall.
Mia gave Tony a confused look. Tony himself looked surprised, but merely turned off the black cube and said, "Well, go on. Do that thing that you do, with the innocent persuasive behavior and lie detecting. Find out what SHIELD really wants with a political anarchist, and ah...let me know." He winked at her, nudging her with a shoulder as her handed her a laminated card. It was a security pass, level seven clearance. He was giving her the go-ahead to snoop. The cheeky bastard, she thought with a smirk, but she took it from him and slipped it into her dress pocket.
Mia rolled her eyes, but picked up her tablet device off the table and followed the agent out of the lab. "Will do, Ironhead."
"What did I say about that?!"
"Back atcha!" she called back sassily. "'Cat eyes'?"
Tony groaned.
Mia chuckled to herself. Vengeance was sweet.
Out in the ship's hallways, they passed countless agents dressed in grey uniforMiss Even Stark had been dressed in black and grey, making Mia wish she had opted for something a little less colorful. On their way up a staircase, the entire ship jolted, Mia falling against a wall painfully. "What was that?" she asked, seeing the agent looking rather unaffected. A strange sense of vertigo settled in her stomach. "Take off," the agent said simply, and
When they made it to the bridge, the feeling only increased. The entire ship was sleek and metallic, but the bridge was clearly the pride of the vessel.
There, she saw Director Fury standing proudly, gazing out of the window as the ship rose out of the ocean, its engines revealed. The 'ship' was an air carrier.
"Wow." She said flatly, but still a bit impressed. "This now tops my list for best kept secret in America."
"Miss Paxton," Fury acknowledged her without turning around; however, two other men did, as did agent Romanoff. "I assume you have been brought up to speed?"
Noting how he didn't name Stark as the one who had told her, Mia nodded. "Yes, as much as can be expected–though, why you'd want me to know about your organization's inner turmoil escapes me."
"Loki is a threat to more than just SHIELD," Fury said harshly. "His target is world domination, and as someone who works with egotistical power hungry liars for a living, I figured you input would be valuable." He turned to give her that one eyed stare down that probably made lesser men cry.
Mia didn't flinch; she merely clasped her tablet behind her back and blinked calmly at him. "That seems logical. However, a teleconference could have accomplished that much."
"Indeed." He left the console and came down to stand with the others. "Miss Paxton, this is Captain Steve Rogers, and Dr. Bruce Banner."
"Ma'am," said Captain Rogers, and shook her hand. Then, for some reason, he gave Fury a ten dollar bill.
"Captain," Mia said politely, refusing to go all googly eyed in front of one of America's greatest heroes. Rogers seemed surprised by her professionalism, but said nothing more.
"Miss Paxton."
"Dr. Banner, it's a pleasure," Mia said, also shaking his hand. "You wrecking up Harlem actually chased out a few operations that had been running underground in the slums for awhile. Thank you for that."
"Oh." Banner seemed taken aback. "At least something good came of it." He gave a small smile before turning to Fury. "So how long are we staying?"
"Once we get our hands on the Tesseract, you're in the wind," he told the scientist.
"And just how close are you to recovering it?" Mia asked curiously.
"We're sweeping every wirelessly accessible camera on the planet," agent Coulson said from below the deck they were standing on.
"Invasion of personal privacy," Mia muttered loudly enough for others to hear her.
Coulson went on. "Cell phones, laptops. If it's connected to a satellite, it's eyes and ears for us."
"You," Mia said, glaring at the agent. Coulson gave her an apologetic smile. When she didn't back down though, he got jumpy. "What?! I already apologized!"
"Yeah, before you injected me with an anesthetic serum that is still in its trial stages of testing!"
"Agent Coulson was only following his orders," Fury defended the man.
Mia snorted. "Well, it's nice to know you're the one who okayed that bit of infringement."
"That's still not going to find them in time," Romanoff said, redirecting the conversation away from the stare-down Fury and Paxton were having and back to the real problem.
"You have to narrow your field," Banner agreed. "How many spectrometers do you have access to?"
"How many are there?" Fury stated hypothetically, crossing his arms and looking away from he woman. Mia beamed in triumph. Agent Romanoff looked flabbergasted. Did that journalist just outstare Nick Fury?
"Call every lab you know," Banner told Coulson. "Tell them to put the spectrometers on the roof and calibrate them for gamma rays. I'll rough out a tracking algorithm, basic cluster recognition. At least we could rule out a few places." He looked to Fury, rolling up his sleeves in a business-like manner. "Do you have somewhere for me to work?"
Fury nodded. "Agent Romanoff? Could you show Dr. Banner to his laboratory, please?"
"You're gonna love it, Doc," Romanoff said smoothly, escorting the man from the room. "We've got all the toys."
"Just don't touch Tony's stuff, or he'll be seriously miffed!" Mia called after them.
"Duly noted," Banner said, giving her another of his small smiles. Mia smiled back. He seemed like a really sweet guy, actually; if not a little troubled. But then, who in their group wasn't?
"Tony?" Captain Rogers asked, sounding a little…jealous? Was that it? Maybe it was just confusion.
"Yes. Tony Stark is a…an acquaintance of mine," Mia said carefully. "I'm friends with his assistant, Pepper."
"I see." For once, Mia had trouble telling if the man was suspicious of her or merely wary of whom–and what–she was. Coming from him, she didn't really care. It wasn't personal; she just had a few issues with what he stood for.
Fury then got distracted talking to the man, while Mia looked around the bridge appreciatively. The structure and technology was definitely impressive, to say the least; it shouldn't have been allowed without public consent. But Mia knew better than most that the government and any organization powerful to hold levy within that bracket didn't ask for the approval of the masses when it came to special ops.
Finally, her eyes fell on a tall figure monitoring the activity of the data imputers in the room. It was a familiar face.
"Maria?" Mia walked up to the woman and nudged her gently. The agent had been bent over some other agent's shoulder, instructing on how to run a certain scan according to SHIELD protocol. When she heard the journalist's voice, however, she turned around and broke into an uncharacteristic smile.
"Mia! Oh my god!" With a laugh, the two hugged mid-bridge. "I haven't seen you in what, two years?"
"Two years," Mia agreed. "Not since the Markson-Regent occurrence."
"You two know each other?" Fury came up behind them, sounding a bit taken aback.
Suddenly, Maria was all business. "Yes sir. Miss Paxton and I worked together on a few cases awhile ago, back when I was still working for the Bureau."
"Good," said Fury, sounding too pleased for Mia's liking. "Good to see old friends reunited." He paused. "Agent Hill, will you please escort Miss Paxton to her quarters? And give her access to all files regarding the Tesseract and Loki; I know Stark told you what he knew, but I would prefer for you to look over all the material for yourself."
Mia didn't bother protesting that she'd already done so; having files willingly handed to her was a rare occurrence, and who knew? Maybe she had missed something important. Already it seemed like something wasn't adding up; especially about this Loki person. Why did that name seem so familiar? She needed to do her own research.
"Absolutely, I'd be glad to."
Director Fury watched the journalist leave with agent Hill, concerned. He turned and walked to the edge of the balcony. "Coulson."
"Yes sir?" Coulson looked up, surprised.
"Are you sure it's her? She's definitely the one?"
"Yes sir," said Coulson firmly. "100 percent DNA match. She's the girl."
"Good," Fury said again, watching the hallway the woman had left down. "Then let's keep her interested." He pulled a strip of newspaper from his pocket, scanning the headline ponderously.
When the time came, this could be very helpful indeed.