A/N:
And I've made some revisions to Thor: The Dark World… and I'm pretty sure you guys are going to hate me for it, too. Great. Anyway, back to Agents of SHIELD. After this chapter, only two left before Thor: The Dark World.
Shout outs toNN010 for encouraging me with this story (as it is longer than my other one ) and Guest, for giving me this wonderful idea. You know the one. Thanks!
Disclaimer:
-_- You guys know the drill.
-:-
My heart was beating in my chest so fast it felt like a train was running through me. My hair had been torn free from my braid and now whipped in front of my face, blinding me momentarily. I could feel my body stiffening up from the crash. I heard shots, sirens, explosions, screams, so much that I felt like I was going to explode if I didn't block out the noise.
And then through it all, I heard Natasha's voice. It was so quiet against the other noises that it was a miracle I heard it at all. I could see him, his long hair whipping in the wind, his metal arm glinting in the sun. Frantically, I tried to locate Natasha. Her voice was coming from behind a car near me. He heard her, too, and knew where she was.
"Natasha!" I screamed out, running towards the car. I was so focused on getting to my teacher, my best friend, and my sister to notice that he had thrown something on the ground, which rolled under the car where Natasha's voice was coming from. I didn't realize until it was too late to turn and run the opposite direction that he had thrown a grenade.
The explosion ripped through the air. It was louder than everything else. I felt the excruciating heat kiss my skin, blisters popping up immediately. I flew back and hit the ground, my head cracking against the asphalt with a sickening crunch.
The last thing I heard was Natasha screaming my name.
I woke in my bunk with a gasp. I was breathing heavily. My hands and eyes went to my arms, and only seeing smooth, unblemished skin. There was no explosion. Natasha wasn't there. I was on the Bus, with Coulson and the rest of the team. I was safe.
My bunk opened, and my hand instantly went for the gun under my pillow. I was too high on adrenaline and fear to notice that it was just May until she said, "Stand sown, Paige. It's just me." When my eyes focused on her face, and I realized who "just me" was, I lowered the gun and put it back under the pillow.
"May," I sighed, pushing my fingers through my hair. It was only then that I realized I was sticky with sweat and that my sheets were twisted around my legs.
May looked at me. "You had a dream," she stated, as if she had known all along. "Romanoff said you have them a lot. She also said that you probably won't want to talk about it, but I should ask anyway." Of course Natasha would tell her. I'd been having the dreams ever since New York. Most of them were vivid, and most of them were about the future, as if I didn't already know what was going to happen, but none of them were… that vivid. It really shook me.
Still, I couldn't about it. "I'm fine, May," I lied. "It was just a dream. Nothing important. You'd better get on the stick." She gave me a long look, probing my face to see if I would spill if she pushed the issue. Apparently, she found no evidence (or if she did, decided not to push it anyway), because she nodded and left. I looked at my clock to see it was four in the morning. I knew I wasn't going to be able to go back to sleep. Untangling my legs and standing up, I pulled on some leggings and a tank top before padding down to the cargo hold. I stretched a little to warm up first, before pulling out the punching bag. I located some wraps and wound them expertly around my hands before pulling my hair up into a messy bun.
I fixed my stance, set my sights on the bag, and began swinging.
-:-
When Simmons came downstairs, Fitz trailing her, both stopped at the bottom of the stairs and watched Paige beat the crap out of a punching bag for a moment. She looked completely focused on the object in front of her, her fists and feet connecting with it again and again. That was when Simmons noticed that the girl was barefoot. Sweat covered her body, rolling down her face and neck in droplets, and she was panting from exertion.
"Goodness, it's only eight in the morning and she's already at it," Simmons said quietly, although she wouldn't be surprised if Paige had heard her anyway. All specialists seemed to have supersonic hearing.
"You'd think she was training to be in the Olympics," Fitz muttered back.
"Well, she is a SHIELD agent, cleared for field work," Simmons said. "They're pretty much synonymous, if you thing about it. Come on, let's not stand around and gawk at her." Simmons then moved into the lab and set to work.
-:-
I was still going at the bag when Ward and Skye came in at five, and when they finished up an hour after that, and when FitzSimmons came down a couple hours after that, and when Coulson came down ten minutes after that. I only stopped when Coulson put a hand on my shoulder. I controlled the urge to swing around and attack, because I didn't want to hurt him.
"How long have you been at this?" he asked.
"I dunno. What time is it?"
"Nearly eight."
"About four hours, then," I replied, and he gave me a stern look. "Stop looking at me like that," I sighed. Then I answered his unspoken question. "Like I'm an idiot for pushing myself for so long. I took brakes and made sure to stay hydrated."
"Go get ready for the day," he told me in a resigned tone. "We'll be in Sweden soon." I nodded and opened a fresh bottle of water. I downed that one in four giant gulps before turning to put away the punching bag. Coulson, satisfied with my response to his order, moved over to the SUV, where Skye was hunkering down for some "me time." Her words, not mine. While I worked, putting away the equipment and unwrapping my hands, I vaguely listened to their conversation. Something about robbing banks, armored cars, casinos, and that someone was stealing millions in diamonds before I was finished and headed upstairs to take a shower. I soaped through my hair twice, relishing in the lukewarm water. After I was done, I dried my hair, put my remembrance braid back in, and started to braid my hair before remembering my dream. My fingers froze for a moment, before I undid the start of the braid and pulled my hair up into a ponytail. I pulled on a short sleeved blue shirt and tight black jeans, pulling on my heeled combat boots. I secured my whip around my waist and a gun in the waistband of my pants before heading to the kitchen to get something to eat.
-:-
In Sweden, I was assigned to come with May, Skye, and Coulson to check out the attack scene. It was a subway station, on a train. As we walked, Coulson talked and explained the situation to us.
"Yesterday fifty-five men, all military, were hired by one of the largest gem brokers in the world. They dressed the men in identical outfits, gave each one a randomly assigned briefcase, and sent them along twenty-five different routes here in Stockholm," Coulson told us. "No one knew which briefcase contained the diamonds, but they were still stolen." He signed a form shown to him by one of the Swedish guards lining the way to train car of the theft and murder. Skye was on her phone.
"Why the kabuki theatre?" May asked.
"They were afraid because someone's targeting diamonds," Coulson replied. "An armored car in Milan, a safe in Monte Carlo, and this."
"Not exactly low-profile heists," I said with a whistle. Whoever was doing this (I knew who was doing it, even though I couldn't quite remember her name) was pretty good to pull those off. The only other people I knew who would get away with it for sure was Natasha and May.
"Over thirty mil total," Coulson told me grimly, kneeling down at a bloodstain on the floor of the train car. The bodies were long gone by now. "Each theft occurred despite heavy security."
"These sound like inside jobs," May said, and if I didn't know any better, I would've agreed completely.
"A lot of people share that opinion," Coulson replied, and I knelt down to get a better look at the blood splatter. It was also on the pole next to it. I could see the scene play out in my head. A man was standing there, holding on. Lights go out, people panic, the man is knocked to the ground and forced to relinquish his hold. There were two initial pools of blood on the floor, leading me to believe that the hand holding the briefcase containing the diamonds had been cut off. A professional.
"You don't," Skye said, pulling me out of my inner CSI moment briefly. "CCVT cameras catch any of the action?"
"FitzSimmons is checking. The system went dark for an hour," Coulson said, standing up. I stayed squatting on the floor, eyes running over the blood pattern. It ended up on the pole because of several contributing factors: one, the way the knife might have cut through the wrist; two, the jerky motion of the train; and three, when the body hit the ground, it might have splattered up. "They think it was hacked."
"It was the same thieves every time?" May asked.
"Yes, but it was just one thief. A women," Coulson told us. "And she did it all with her eyes closed." I stood up, rolling my shoulders and feeling the burn of over-worked muscles. I should've taken something before leaving the Bus.
"Eyewitnesses ID her?" May and I asked at the same time.
"Black, athletic build, late twenties-early thirties," Coulson said. May and I shared a look. We were both thinking Romanoff up until that point, even though I knew it wasn't her.
Skye spoke up. "So you asked how she could've cracked the system," she said. "I have a pitch, but it's way outside the box."
"I live outside the box," was Coulson's reply.
"Technically, you live inside a plane like the rest of us," I said. Oops, focusing on the wrong thing. Right. Murder, thefts, idea. Focus.
"There are people in the world with superpowers, right?" Skye continued, ignoring me. Any other time I'd be offended, but this time I was grateful. "What if this woman had ESP or something?"
May shut that down with facts. "There are no credible studies that support pre-cognition, telepathy, or extra sensory perception."
"Okay, so science says no," Skye said. "But this woman knew impossible things. And why'd she close her eyes? That's either random or totally important. Was she listening?" Skye tapped her index finger against her temple. "Or was she reading minds?" At our dubious looks, Skye balked. "I'm gonna go… play with my phone now." And she sat down on a bench.
"There are a few studies that support extreme heightened senses," I said, capturing everyone's attention. "Take Clint for example. His eyesight is above and beyond twenty-twenty. And maybe Skye's not that far off. While the culprit may not be reading minds, she certainly had something or someone helping her."
May turned to Coulson. "Why does HQ want us to investigate these heists?"
"They don't," Coulson said. Oh yeah, I forgot about that. "I picked this out. Any luck?" Coulson asked Skye.
"Yep," Skye replied. "I'm getting full bars, which means if I was down here, and fifty-five guys were in scary red masks, you know what I would do?" she stood up and handed phone to Coulson. "Instagram." On the screen was a picture of a man in a red mask.
-:-
Once back on the Bus, Coulson had me pull up all the posts on the web containing those men. Once I was finished, I handed him a tablet to control the photos.
"It's amazing," he said. "Every year this part of our job gets easier. Through Facebook, Instagram, and Flicker, people are surveilling themselves."
"Don't forget Snapchat," I added. "It's not popular yet, but I bet it will be. Especially among my age group." You take a picture, send it to someone with a message attached, and after they receive it, the picture "disappears." They don't disappear, though. You can still find them on the web.
Skye nodded in agreement before saying. "With many filters to choose from. I could do this pretty well when I was hacking for the Rising Tide, but you guys tag and search in ways the rest of us never dreamed."
"Obviously someone dreamed if it," I said. "Otherwise we wouldn't be doing it at the moment."
"I can run facial recognition software on the photos," May said. "Cross-reference them with our criminal databases."
"You don't have to," Coulson replied as the track and tag software locked in on a woman in the background of a certain photo. She matched the description from the eyewitnesses. "That's the thief. Her name is Akela Amador."
"You're certain?" May asked.
"I should be," Coulson replied, looking as if he had seen a ghost. Which he had, in a way. A ghost from his past. "I trained her." Skye and I exchanged looks, hers clearly asking if I knew what he was talking about. I knew he had trained someone before becoming Strike Team Delta's handler, because Clint had told me the bits and pieces Coulson had told him, but I knew whom he had trained because of my place of origin.
We followed Coulson through the plane while he explained. "Akela Amador was a SHIELD agent. Seven years ago she led a raid on one of Vanchat's GULAGs. Everyone believed that she and the other two agents were killed," he said as we went downstairs. "I had my doubts, so I sent in a second team, just in case. The found a lot of carnage, but couldn't confirm that any of it was Amador. It left the possibility open."
"That's why you chose this op," May pieced together. "When you heard about the heists."
"This is personal," I added. I knew the dangers of working personal ops. We all did. They usually didn't end well.
Coulson ignored us. "There are only a few women in the world who could pull off something so impossible," he said. "Since you and Paige are on the Bus, I thought it had to be her." And then he went into the briefing room.
Ward was waiting for us. "Swedish customs confirmed that Amador left the country using an alias on a Swedish passport. She flew into Belarus, bought a train ticket to a town called Zloda," he told us. My eyes ran over the screen, taking in any and all information posted there. Not much, as it was just her ID card from her time as a SHIELD agent. "I've also put together a list of individuals who can fence that many diamonds. There's been no contact or activity." I scanned over the faces that appeared on the map.
"Maybe she's saving them for a rainy day," Coulson said. "Buying something special. Let's focus on finding Amador."
"I'll let HQ know she's alive so they can assist with the manhunt," May said.
"I'd like to hold off on that," Coulson said, and we all gave him looks. Thirty minutes in and he's already trying to cut HQ out of the mission. Victoria Hand was going to have his (as well as ours) hands in shiny metal bracelets attached to shiny metal chairs with a pane of one-way glass. He continued, "Until we know more. Contact Belarus authorities; find us a place to park the Bus. Put together a list of inns, hotels, and pensions near Zloda. There can't be that many of them. We'll find her." Ward started to put together the list. May and I headed out of the room, but she went to contact the Belarus authorities, and I went to go call Fury.
I pulled the phone off the receiver, hit three, and said, "Willows, Paige, temporary Level Eight." The call went through, and I waited for one, two, three, four, five rings before Fury picked it up.
"About time," he said irritably.
"Going after Akela Amador," I murmured. "Holding off with telling HQ. It's personal to him."
"Fine. Keep me posted, Willows." We hung up and I looked over my shoulder to ensure no one had seen or heard me. I was in the clear. I left the vicinity, heading to the kitchen. It was a mess in there still, from everyone going in and out. Plates were left on the counters, remains of uneaten food, crumbs, everything. I tightened my ponytail and set to work, washing dishes by hand (even though there was a dishwasher), drying them, putting them away. I washed off the table and counters, putting any leftovers in the communal fridge, and basically played Bus-keeper for a good half hour.
Of course, then I had to go get ready for Belarus.
-:-
Once we touched down, Coulson, ward, Skye, and FitzSimmons set out in the van. I stayed on the plane with May, as I was ordered by Coulson to work on my schoolwork. Honestly, I think he was just trying to keep me out of the field and from getting hurt again. Okay, I guess I could understand that. My track record wasn't looking so hot, with me getting knocked out on our first mission, then getting several bullet grazes on our second. This was our fourth mission on the team. Two out of four, I'd gotten myself injured. May was in the briefing room, playing the middleman between HQ and Coulson. While I did my Biology homework, I muttered my vocabulary words for Italian, German, and then Russian. I found that the best way for me to learn languages was for me to use repetition and to not focus on it directly. It's kind of like watching TV and listening to music at the same time. If you only have one earbud in, you can still hear the TV. Since human brains can't focus on both equally, one of them takes the fore, and the other is on a back channel.
I had just finished Biology and was starting on History (I hated American history as much as I hated English history) when May came out of the briefing room with a grave look on her face. "Skye and FitzSimmons were attacked. They're coming back now." I dropped my history and followed her to the catwalk over the cargo bay. Fifteen minutes later, the rest of the team came in. May was furious. I wasn't much better myself.
After we had determined that there were no injuries, and everyone got back to work, Skye got us back onto the feed that she had found earlier. Together, we watched in perplexion as Amador was looking at herself in a mirror.
"Where's the camera?" Coulson asked. After a minute of watching Amador messing around with her eye, we all came to the same conclusion, but only May voiced it.
"It's her eye," she said. "She's the camera." Amador closed her eyes, and we could see the metal implant inside her skull.
"It switches to backscatter when she closes her eyes," Fitz observed.
Skye looked at Ward. "You're a robot," she said. "Can you do that?"
Ward ignored her and asked, "Who has tech like this." The answer was painstakingly obvious, but Fitz said it anyway.
"We don't. Not like this. Not this small and internal. It's at least a decade ahead of anything I've seen."
"Well, the "tech of the future" has been created today," I said. "And obviously not by SHIELD. So that means that someone out there has tech that can be used to wreak havoc. Do you have any idea how may problems something like this could cause us?"
Fitz glared at me and continued. "Though, no that I've seen it, I could maybe approximate the backscatter x-ray, a micro-transceiver that somehow doesn't fry her brain. An internal power source…"
"All miniaturized," Simmons continued. Then they both chorused, "That's genius!"
"We have to bring her in," Coulson said.
"We have to take her out," May argued. "She's a weapon. I'll call HQ, see if we can bring in a task force to help us."
"Our team can handle this." Coulson was adamant. This was the problem with personal missions. People get sentimental, and then they get stubborn, and then they think they can take on the world and end up hurting people in the process.
May moved over to him. "I get it," she said. "I feel responsible. Maybe you pushed her too hard. But she tried to kill three members of our team."
"If she wanted us dead, we'd be dead," Coulson argued.
"We got lucky," May countered. "You want to risk our lives again?"
"You told me you were ready for combat, that you had my back," Coulson accused.
"Don't ever doubt it," May said evenly. "But you are defending this girl at the expense of the team."
"Because we protect our own," Coulson said,
"With all due respect, sir," Ward cut in. "She's not one of our own." While they were busy talking, Amador had been busy as well. And I wasn't the only one that noticed.
"Guys," Skye said, capturing their attention. Amador was writing a message on a piece of hotel stationary—Can I sleep?
"Why does she have to ask for permission?" Simmons asked. Her question was answered as a reply to Amador's note popped up at the bottom of the feed—Stand by.
"She's not being watched," Coulson realized. "She's being controlled. We have to find her. We'll take shifts watching the feed. Sooner or later, she'll look at something that will clue us in on her location."
I saw the look on May's face before she said, "I'll take the first watch." After everybody had left, she turned to face me. "Don't say anything," she ordered me.
"My lips are sealed," I replied. "But Coulson will be furious, and I'm not taking the fallout for this."
"That's fine," May replied. "As far as he'll ever know, you didn't know a thing." I turned around and left.
It was of no surprise to me when May went missing later that night, only to return with an unconscious Amador and a livid Coulson.
-:-
I resisted the urge to fiddle with the glasses on my face. I had tried to resist doing the mission, but once Coulson had given the order, and I had no reason not to do it, I had no choice. We were headed to the Todorov building, and I was driving because I didn't have a choice. Skye was in the backseat, handling the technical side of things. At the moment, the glasses (rectangle-shaped and black plastic frames that were so not my style) were hooked up to a laptop while Skye ensured that I would still receive the images and messages once they were disconnected.
Inside, I was freaking out. Ward was supposed to do this mission, not me. I could be completely messing up the Timeline. People could die because of this! No, I wouldn't let it come to that. I would just have to make sure that things go like they did in the show. I need to make excuses and a game plan.
It was too late. We stopped at our destination. "Where are we?" Skye asked.
"Todorov building," Ward replied, hunching down slightly to get a better look at the place. "I think it's research, not military."
"Looks like a prison," I said. "We wireless yet?"
"Yep. Ready to detach," Skye said, and I felt her hand behind my ear, pulling off the wire connected to the glasses. "Don't look at me," she warned. "They need to think you're her." Apparently her free hand had landed next to Ward's head and hit his ticklish spot. After she noticed his movement (I was watching from the corner of my eye), she said, "And oh my God, Super Spy is ticklish!"
"Testing backscatter," I said before Ward could say anything. I reached up and hit a button. Next thing I know, I'm seeing in x-ray.
"Good to go," Skye said. She handed me a wireless transmitter/receiver. I stuck it in my pocket.
Ward looked at me, and I looked back from the corner of my eye. "Remember, we can't help you in person," he said, and I nodded slightly. I opened the door, got out, and headed for the building. I kept a steady pace—not too fast, as to be obvious I'm in a rush, but not so slow as to tip off whoever was watching me that I wasn't focused. Once inside, I looked around.
"Fitz and Simmons are prepped for surgery," came Skye's voice through the comm in my ear. "It should be any minute now." I followed the line, the prox card in my hand. "Hey, remember, you don't have the same skin color, so don't look at your hands when you swipe the card." I know she was just trying to be helpful, but she was kind of distracting.
"I know," I murmured through slightly parted lips. Without looking down, I scanned the card, and moved past the guard and further into the facility. I followed the crowd, my modest pumps clicking on the floor. I had changed into a business suit—a navy blue pencil skirt and blazer with a white shirt underneath and heels. Not the best outfit for fighting, but whatever worked. "Approaching Delta Three." I took out the card, and once again swiped it without looking.
"Careful! Mirror," Skye warned me. I was thankful that she had, because I had completely forgotten about it. I turned my head away like I was cracking my neck. I knew Coulson was tracking the handler, and that FitzSimmons were starting to perform surgery on Akela to take the kill switch out of her. I turned the corner. Once outside of a room marked with the number five, I got a message—Target confirmed. Stand by.
"What do they mean target?" Skye asked.
"It's never good," Ward replied. "Especially for the target." I ducked out of sight of the security guard on the inside.
"Let's hope it's a knockout and not a kill," I muttered. I frantically racked my brain for a reason to get out of this. They're going to want me to seduce the guy. It was supposed to be Ward on this mission, not me, and he was supposed to have problems getting in.
"You should get out of there," Skye said.
"I've come this far," I replied. "I'll finish it. Whatever it takes." I peered into the glass at the guard and got the message—Seduce him. I took several deep breaths.
"What are you waiting for?" Ward asked.
"Shut up," I hissed back. "Next time, you get to seduce the stony security guard. He doesn't look like he'll fall for it."
"Let me see," Skye said. "Nope. Odds are he'll call backup. You're gonna have to get emotional. Please don't die." I took a deep breath, scanned the card, and went inside. The guard stood up immediately. He asked me to show him my identification. I made a show of looking all over for it, and then began to get flustered. Soon, tears began running down my face, and I thanked the heavens for waterproof makeup. I blubbered on about how this was so important to my career and that if I didn't get in there, my family would starve.
When it became clear that wasn't working, I sighed. "I guess not." He moved forward to grab me, but in three precise movements, he was out cold on the floor. I wiped the tears off my face, scanned my card and it let me in. I found myself in a room (wow, what a surprise). There were chalkboards on the walls, and two guys on typewriters who stopped and looked at me before going back to work.
"What now?" Skye asked. "Are you supposed to grab one of these guys?" I walked forward, scanning the walls until I caught sight of certain writing. Circles and lines connected strangely, with equally strange writing. The alien writing. The image of my glasses froze for a second, as if they had taken a picture, and I got another message—Mission complete. Good luck. Good luck. That didn't bode well for me. I left the room, back where the security guard was still out cold. A countdown timer on his computer caught my eye.
I growled. "I figured out what I need the security guard for," I said. "His password."
"Maybe I can talk you through a hack," Skye said. "Give em a minute." The last second turned into a zero.
"We're ut of minutes," I said, and then alarms began blaring. I knelt down and stole the guard's gun. "Ward, meet me in the south side of the building ASAP!" I left the room, hiding the gun.
"Gotcha," Ward said. I kept my head low, trying to look inconspicuous, but it failed as soon as the first guard came in. I started running, pulling out my gun. The guard followed me. Whoever said running in heels was hard was an idiot. Of curse, I was only wearing one inches. It was a whole lot harder with four inches. I heard a phone ring as I ducked into a hall. Turning on the backscatter, I could see the guards and took shots at them as I ran. Fitz called, distracting me, and I looked right into a mirror.
"Fitz, cut the wires now!" I yelled. I kept moving, ducking guards until I decided to take a short cut. I jumped through a window, landing on a cargo trailer. Taking off my heels, I ran along the glass-covered metal (sustaining several minor cuts) until I could drop down, right in front of the SUV. Ward barely managed to hit the brakes in time. I climbed in the passenger seat. "Let's go." Ward peeled out of there.
Once back on the Bus, Simmons took care of my minor cuts from the glass.
I only hoped I hadn't just entirely screwed up the Timeline.
-:-
So this was quite a long chapter. And don't worry, Paige did not screw up the Timeline. It's just fun to make her worry ;) And now she's yelling at me. Whoops. Until next time, my lovelies!
Love, Angel