"We are heading in towards him." I say.
I see Kal-EL behind a wall and silently drop down behind him. I give him a cuddle to say he has done a good job. Clint and Nat drop behind me. I take a sleeping dart gun. Not and I shoot both guys at the same time.
"You two together are scary," Coulson comments seeing us in Kal's feed.
"Thanks," Nat and I thank at the same time.
We both smile at each other. Kal clears the next room, us following behind. Coulson's team move in to apprehend the two knocked out henchmen. Kal notices camera's where the kids are kept and a few guards. I peek in.
"Good thing Clint brought my laptop," I whisper. "You two got the guards?"
"Got your back. Kal you gonna help us?" Clint asks him, handing me my laptop.
I sit down by the door and start to hack the camera. They both go in and fight the guards.
"That's gonna hurt," I say to Clint.
"I couldn't agree more," he says slamming a chair into the guy.
Kal bites a guy and doesn't let go. He starts hitting Kal, but he doesn't let go. Nat hits the guy with a dart.
"You won't get to kill our team." She says.
"He finally made it on the team?" Clint asks.
"Clint, he's been on the team since I got him." I say still typing quickly.
"What? He has?" Clint asks.
"Yeah, he has," Nat says fighting another guy while Clint is standing there in confusion. Kal is lying on the ground. "Mind helping?"
"Oh shit!" Sorry," Clint says jumping in. I finally get the camera's down.
"Camera's down," I say.
Coulson's team files in taking down the guards with precision. I head over and wrap Kal's foot in a bandage. I'm thinking broken leg. Kal limps around, while Coulson's team starts removing the scared and crying children. We have juice and cookies waiting in the back of the bus for them with warm blankets. One agent per child. The agent drops the child off at the bus and goes and gets another. This way no child gets lost.
Clint has left to go meet up with Grant. Nat and I clear the rest of the building locating older children. They were probably abused. They get extracted. Nat, Kal, and I decide to hide in the shadows waiting for the Romans to come back. The kids are taken back to shield headquarter. The children who have no parents will be raised within the shield program, like I was. Very few know about the program. Fury keeps it quiet wanting to keep the children safe.
"I can't believe there was even newborns here," I say revolted by the idea.
"It's disgusting," Nat replies.
"Well, I'm not just going to sit back and wait. I'm going to see if they have any paperwork of any kind. I'm also gonna see if they have any alien tech like the other places like this. Maybe we can find some of the sold kids and other operations." I say getting up.
"Sounds good, I'll give you a heads up if the targets arrive," Nat says.
"Thanks, I say from the office. I head to the computer in there. I decide to hack in and check that first. I don't find anything detailed but I do find toy shop finances. I transfer the contents of the computer on to my flash drive. This way I can go through it with a fine-tooth comb in a more comfortable place, like my bed. I start pulling out cabinets. I see boxes of paper in them.
"Hey Coulson, some of your team still here?" I ask.
He unmutes his comm and I hear crying in the background.
"Yeah, there are," he says.
"I need some of them to take boxes of paperwork to our SUV. I'm gonna have it scanned and store it that way." I say. "That way we can find the information we need."
I take pictures of what I find before I touch anything and I'm of course wearing my leather gloves. The team walks in and take the boxes to the SUV. The lead comes in and tells me that it fills four SUV's. They will get it back to the academy and start scanning it. After that they will have the evidence put into storage till the case.
I keep looking for other papers around the building taking pictures of where I find it and adding it to an extra file box. I hand it off to the last driver of the SUV and they drive off. I pull out my laptop and sit beside Nat.
"What are you planning on doing?" She asks.
"I copied the hard drive on the computer here. I'm going to start going through it and taking notes about it, that way we don't miss anything," I explain to her.
"You're doing very well. Even people who have been running cases for years miss some of the stuff your making sure to get," Nat points out.
"I don't want them getting away. I want to take them all down. To do that I need all the evidence," I tell her.
"Well, I'm proud." She says with a smile. "Did you see anything linked to aliens?"
"No none at all sorry," I reply.
"What's that?" She asks pointing to my screen.
"It's financials for a toy shop. I think that's the front for this operation," I reply.
"They kept financials and paid taxes?" She asks confused.
"Yeah, they probably thought it would be harder to bust and less likely for people to look into." I say. "It's actually smart in an evil way. Because a lot of mafia and gang leaders get busted for tax evasion."
"Girl's incoming," Clint says in the comms. I close my laptop and put it off in its case. I don't want it to get broken. I put it off to the side.
"We're ready," Nat replies.
The Romans step into the warehouse.
"Why Hello." Nat greets them.
"Who are you?" Damien asks.
"Who I am doesn't matter. It's who you are that matters, Damien Roman." She says.
"Damien Roman married to the lovely Hannah Roman who is beside you. You both have a gambling addiction." I say. "You are severely in debt and are using a toy selling business to pay it off. Do interrupt me if I get anything wrong. Only it isn't toys that you sell. You sell children. On paper you call the boys Teddys and the girls Dolls. Depending on the age group they are referred to either as new, like new, or loved. You did pay your taxes with in good and business is booming. But you aren't the brains behind the operation. I want who is."
"We…. We don't know who he is?" Hannah stutters through.
"Oh, then who does the 95% cut go to?" I ask.
"We are to just drop the money into an account." Damien admits.
"But I know you all keep record of the players. You are the only ones to pay taxes." I tell them. "So, you're smart. You're less likely to be looked into. It looks like your running a legal operation."
"We got told he wants to meet us today. Because we sell a massive amount, and no one looks twice. The deal was we sell children, they pay off a portion of our debts. But he is only paying enough to keep the loan sharks off of us." Hannah says.
"I guess we are going to be waiting here to meet the big boss, then. Because I want to meet the big boss." I say.
"Me too," Grant says walking in with Clint behind him.
"Ooo, the boss? I've only been waiting months to meet him. I'm so excited." Clint says sarcastically.
"What time is he supposed to come?" Nat asks.
"In two hours," Damien tells us.
"Good that gives us time to arrest you and get you guys out of here." I say shooting him with a dart.
Hannah screams and I shoot her. Grant and Clint take them to the van with the guards/ The driver takes off and another van is brough in, in its place.
"The big boss will definitely have guards." Clint says.
"You ready for fight then?" Grant asks.
"I am, but is Kal-EL?" Nat asks.
"He doesn't want to leave just yet," I say.
"So, this is Kal-EL," Grant says coming over to him. He sticks his hand out allowing Kal to sniff it. After Kal accepts it, he pets Kal. Grant gets down on his knees to give Kal a good scratching.
"The op is going the way you wanted." Grant says.
"Yeah. I knew it was my time to lead an operation. You may not feel ready, but I know I am. Nat made sure of that." I tell him.
"Yeah, sorry about that." He replies.
"It's all good. You thought you were doing what was best." I say.
"Where is Garrett?" He asks.
"I believe May has him in the helicopter. Ready to drop down at the entrance when they come in the building." I tell him.
"Do you really think he would be best used in the helicopter? Maybe he would be better used on the ground here?" He asks.
"Did Garrett tell you to say that?" I ask him in return.
"No," he says while nodding his head 'yes'.
"Alright," I say almost like I don't believe it for Garrett's benefit. "No, he will stay in the bird. Any act of his disobeying that he will be written up," I threaten.
I do hope Garrett is listening. I know May would have him mute his comm while in her helicopter because of the background noise.
"In coming," Clint says from his perch.
"He's good," Grant comments.
"Yeah, he's the best sniper there has been. He can see very far away," I say.
As we all get into position. Kal comes and stands beside me. An old man comes in with about seven henchmen.
"Looks deserted," one of the henchmen says. "Are you sure we are at the right warehouse?"
"Yes, I'm sure. They said it would look deserted at first but if you head straight to the office, it will look less deserted. That's what makes them seem so effective." The old man says.
They head towards the office. Nat signals for us to box them in. We want to get them all. They go in and we quietly walk to block entrance. We hide behind the wall in the doorway.
"It looks like they picked up and moved," the skeptic henchmen says. "It looks like they had paperwork here but packed up and moved it."
"They could have been cleaning up the mess for our arrival," The old man says trying to deny the henchmen.
"No, your henchman is right. Except the Romans didn't clean house. I did." I say stepping out of the shadows.
"Who are you?" he asks.
"Shield," I say confidently pointing my part gun at him.
"What's that?" he asks confused.
"It's a law enforcement agency. One of the lesser-known ones," I say.
"Oh, well then." He says.
The henchmen start shooting. We shoot back. We head in and start fighting hand to hand as well. The old man runs. I notice Kal-EL takes off after him. I take down two guys so does Nat and Grant. Clint takes one down from his perch. One that tried to get away. Grant and I both take off after Kal-EL. I just run.
"Sam, Kal is to your left run straight in that direction," Coulson tells me coming on the comms.
"Thanks," I say turning in that direction and running as fast as I can.
I keep pushing myself harder and harder until I see Kal-El in my sight line. I don't want Kal to get more hurt. I see him try to cut the man off. The man swerves to avoid him. He keeps running. Kal finally gets close enough to jump on to him and that's what he does. He pounces into the air hitting the man's back and down he goes. Kal-EL growls standing on him. I make it to them.
"You're under arrest," I say.
I zip tie his hands together behind his back. I lift him helping him up. A grey-haired wig falls off. He has dark brown hair.
"Wanted the seniors discount?" I ask.
I notice some of his face peeling off. So, I peel the rest off. It's prosthetics to change the way he looks, very impressive. No camera would be able to tell what he looks like that way. I lead him back to the warehouse where he's put in the prison van.