notes: so we still don't have a christmas tree yet, but i did give in and start teen wolf last week. and somebody please talk to me about it because i'm falling apart. please. also everyone's really hot and it's super unfair. anyway, do you guys do anything special for the holidays? (hanukkah included, okay.)
chapter title: needle in a haystack
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{rock and roll baby, don't you know that we're all alone now?}
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In retrospect, they probably hadn't been completely prepared for much of anything on this mission. At least, that remains Lucy's theory. But things really went to hell when they arrived at Everlue's mansion. They had both agreed that Natsu should stay out of sight, but still on the premises as backup if anything were to go wrong. Lucy would get the open maid position and therefore be let into the gigantic house so she could search for the package while simultaneously uncovering Everlue's dirty secrets.
But, as it turns out, none of that actually happened.
"He called me ugly, Natsu! Ugly," Lucy wails, clinging to her partner's arm. "Did you see those other maids?! Did you?! One of them looked like a cow—and I know that's kind of mean, but seriously—and yet he somehow has the gall to call me that!"
Natsu doesn't look away from the floor plan he's been studying for the past five minutes. "You know, you're very vain, Lucy."
The blonde scoffs at him and crosses her arms. "Shut up, here I was, all ready to charm him with my feminine wiles, but no. Whatever, did you see him? Total perverted doucheface. That mustache, Natsu, that was definitely a pedo mustache. And he was twirling it, which, you know, not creepy at all. I can't wait to take him down. But that's going to be a problem, because hello, he apparently prefers a different type of woman so I can't get in."
He nods absentmindedly and points to a spot on the blueprint. "Yeah okay, sure. What is this?"
Lucy leans over his shoulder and rolls her eyes before snatching the paper away. "Natsu, just…okay. Give me that. You were trying to read it upside down," she turns it right side up and smooths it out, "honestly. That's a third story balcony, it seems to be out of the way for the most part."
Natsu squints at the towering mansion through the trees. "We could get in there. You can pick locks, right Lucy? They wouldn't have let you graduate if you couldn't pick locks."
"Why the hell do I have to do all that work? Aren't you supposed to be the hero here, or something?" she shakes her head. "Yes I can pick locks, but how are we going to get access to the third story?"
He grins at her, and she suddenly feels self-conscious and a little nervous. "It's time for Plan T."
"What," she begins hesitantly, "exactly is Plan T?"
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"Never again," Lucy swears as she falls to her knees and her palms hit the balcony floor.
Natsu is positively beaming, but she feels more than a little lightheaded. He holds out Lucy's grappling gun and she gives him a queasy look before slipping it back into its designated place on her belt. At least he let her change out of the slutty maid uniform, but now it's back to the bodysuit, so she's not sure if that's a win or a loss on her part.
Her partner had changed too, in order to preserve his actual identity if somebody happened to stumble upon them. So instead of his normal tee shirt, jeans, scarf, and sneakers, he's dressed in dark leather pants tucked away into the same color boots, and a dark crimson leather, form-fitting jacket. It has the same color hood, only in a different fabric, because hello, his hair is technically a calling card. Like seriously, how many guys have rosy pink hair?
Not that many.
(She's not going to lie though, he looks kind of hot. Like, it defines his muscles and just...yeah, okay. Not that she'd ever admit it to him. The last thing he needs is a boost like that to his ego.)
Anyway, so Plan T was apparently otherwise known as "Take 'em by Storm" in which they just broke into Everlue's mansion immediately and cleared out just as fast. It actually seemed kind of logical because hopefully Everlue hadn't been tipped off, so they could just avoid everyone, get what they came for, and leave. Unfortunately, most plans never actually went according to their layout, and Lucy knew this.
Example: she had not been expecting Natsu to ask for one of her SHIELD issued gadgets. It was basically just a glorified grappling hook, only the actual hook part was super tiny and could penetrate brick and concrete if needed. So, after they had successfully made it onto the grounds which were suspiciously quiet and lacking in activity, he'd aimed at the wall above the balcony, and fired. Then he'd wrapped his arm around her and pulled them both up. The retract button also had a speed demon mode, apparently, which she learned the hard way.
"Come on, Lucy. It wasn't that bad."
She gapes at him. "You were this close to dropping me! I felt your grip slipping!"
Natsu waves a hand at her dismissively and casually strolls up to the balcony doors like they're not breaking and entering. He puts a hand on the glass panes near the handle and Lucy watches in awe as it melts beneath his touch. He reaches inside the newly-formed hole and unlocks the door before turning the handle and pushing it open.
"I wasn't about to drop you," he says, "and even if I had, I would've caught you. Now, after you."
She stands and steps through the door, and Natsu soon follows. The room they're in is dark, and she can't see much considering that it's close to sunset, and there's no a lot of natural light filtering through.
"I don't know what this room is, but according to the floor plan, the library is a few doors down from here. I think if we just—ow, what the hell?"
She reaches for her penlight to see what she'd run into, but Natsu holds up a hand. "No need," he tells her as flames spring forth from his closed fist.
Lucy blinks at the sudden light. "Thanks."
The blonde turns to see what she'd slammed her forehead into, and almost screams. There's a suit of armor bearing down on her, sword held at ready. She slaps a hand over her mouth and takes a step back as Natsu moves to examine the rest of the room.
"Hey Lucy, look at all this," he whispers in amazement at all the old artifacts and cultural symbols surrounding them. "I saw a vase like this in one of Levy's files one time."
Lucy swats his hand away. "Don't touch that, you moron! It's over a thousand years old—you could break it!"
Natsu shrugs and moves to locate the door as she examines the contents from the room. "Everlue must be quite the collector, and a shady one at that. I know for a fact that this jade dragon went missing on a transport form museums last year. And that necklace has been 'lost' for at least ten."
"So now we know that he's obviously in touch with the illegal smuggling business, cool. Also, I found the exit," he grins at her from behind a case of shelves and gestures toward the door.
She rolls her eyes, but follows him anyway.
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They're looking for a book. A really specific, genuine, one of a kind type of book that is not sold in stores everywhere and not available on Nook or Kindle. One book, in a library filled with literally thousands.
Lucy wants to cry, but instead focuses on sorting through dozens of titles all at once.
"This could take days. We can't be here for days. Someone's bound to discover us eventually if we do that," she murmurs, and Natsu grunts in agreement.
They work methodically from the end of the shelf to the other—Natsu takes the lower ones, and she's on a ladder checking the higher titles. After thirty minutes, he partner suddenly starts laughing. She turns to him and he grins, holding up a book with some she could never unsee on the cover. "Hey Lucy, I found a porno!"
"Natsu," she groans, and is about to give him the whole 'this is a serious mission please treat it as such as I do not particularly wish to be fired' lecture when he suddenly freezes.
He pulls out a book out of the shelf—it looks almost as big as War and Peace, good heavens—and holds it up. "I found it!"
She almost falls off the ladder completely in her rush to get down to ground level. Natsu hands her the volume and she gasps. "This is a work from Kemu Zealon? I thought I'd read everything by him! We can't destroy this, Natsu!"
"Lucy," he says sternly, sounding a bit agitated, "that's our job. Our orders were to retrieve the book and destroy it. SHIELD's orders. Erza's orders."
The blonde clutches the book to her chest and dances out of his reach when he tries to snatch it back. "But—" she begins, but never gets to finish as the doors to the library burst open and in walks Everlue, with one of his maids behind.
Lucy and Natsu stare at the corrupt politician and the sumo wrestler of a woman with wide eyes. Duke squints at the blonde, and recognition lights his beady little eyes. "You're the ugly girl from earlier today! And you," he turns to Natsu, but seems to be at a loss for anything to say.
At least he got a disguise because, you know, the whole secret identity thing.
Duke turns back to Lucy. "I knew something was off with you, and it makes sense. People try to steal things from me all the time, I should have known," he catches sight of the SHIELD emblem on Lucy's suit, and pales a little. "You're with SHIELD."
"So you've heard of us," Natsu says, a slightly manic grin peeking out from under his hood.
Everlue scowls. "Give me the book, girl. It's mine."
Lucy pulls out a pair of glasses (also SHIELD issued, and allow her to read hundreds of words per second) and opens the volume. "Well at least let me read it first."
"Now?!" Natsu and Duke shout at the same time.
Everlue sputters for a few seconds before pointing an accusing finger at Lucy, who shrinks back. "No matter! You're attempting to steal what is rightfully my property! I have resources to deal with people like you!"
He snaps his fingers, and two bodies drop down from the library balcony. Lucy's eyes are wide as she looks back and forth between the two towering men and the book in her hands. Both of them have a strange wolf-like symbol printed onto their clothing. One of them is dressed like a guy out of a bad eighties cop movie, and has an afro. He's taller than the other man—who has a long braid though most of his head is shaved, and looks like he just stepped out of the Karate Kid. Also, he's carrying an enormous frying pan.
What.
"Mercenaries," Natsu warns her and takes a defensive stance in front of the blonde. "From the Southern Wolves, we've been tracking them for months. They're dangerous, Lucy."
Lucy glances back down at the book. "Hold on them off," she whispers lowly, knowing he has enhanced hearing. "There's some kind of secret to this book. I think it's important. Oh and, close your eyes."
He nods, and she pulls out a small canister from her belt and tosses it between them and Everlue's party. It explodes it a bright white light and a high-pitched screech echoes throughout the room. When Everlue and the rest of his group can see again, Lucy and the book are gone.
"Take care of him," Duke hisses at the two men, "I'll go after the girl. She has something that belongs to me."
Everlue disappears out the door, sumo maid in tow, and the mercenaries take their fighting stances. The shorter one speaks first. "We are brothers from the mercenary group called the Southern Wolves, and we will be annihilating you today."
Does he think that if he doesn't use any contractions that he sounds more imposing or something? Natsu rolls his eyes.
The taller one cracks his knuckles. "Killing one of SHIELD's agents will definitely increase our popularity in Everlue's type of community, and that means more money. We won't disappoint."
"Enough talking," Natsu says, grinning and eager for a fight. "Let's get this party started."
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Water drips off the ceiling and hits the stone floor, and the sewer reeks, but it's the safest hiding place at the moment. Or at least, it had been the nearest. After she'd thrown the flash bang, she'd slipped down into the lowest level of the building to get away.
Lucy sucks in a breath as she flips through the pages. "Oh wow."
I can't believe this, that's inhumane, how could anyone do such a thing?
She stands from her spot near the wall. "I have to get this back to headquarters like, five minutes ago."
"That book won't be going anywhere, girl, and neither will you," Everlue sneers from behind her.
The blonde spins around and clutches the hardcover to chest. She narrows her eyes at him, this monster who has done such terrible things, and scoffs. "What? Are you going to lock me up like you with Mr. Zealon? Do you want me to write a bad novel about you too? Or maybe you'll just tax me and my family until we can't afford food. Or—"
She cuts herself off as he holds a gun level with the space between her eyes. "Or maybe I'll just put a bullet in your brain instead."
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end notes: okay, so i was kind of in a rut with natsu because he's, y'know, and i didn't know what to do for a suit. like, i just couldn't imagine him in spandex (heaven forbid) or a mask, and i also almost completely forgot about his hair. so i was completely unoriginal and kind of used roy harper's (arsenal) from arrow. so if you have any questions, just look it up. i didn't feel like explaining in detail. (also, there's a mask under that hood, just forgot to mention it.)