There was a lot of ways Darcy expected an average day to start.
Those 'ways' had grown by leaps and bounds since joining SHEILD and becoming Coluson's partner.
But even then, she reasoned that there had to be some limit. Surely. Right? There had to be one mundane thing still locked away safe in the realm of "normal".
With a vindictive check mark, she marked off depositing her paycheck as no longer being a safe, non-work related thing.
The concrete wall gave an unhealthy groan that jolted her from her reflection as another blot of energy sliced in to it, sending up a cloud of thick white smoke and dust and splitting the air with an electric wail. This was a very bad thing as Darcy had chosen that particular wall to hide behind.
No, I couldn't just leave when the rest of the hostages ran screaming. She thought, as she fumbled to draw her gun from it's holster. The SHIELD training had sunk in, it seemed and she was in full force 'stop the bad guy mode' only, there was just one thing...
"It's a monkey!" Darcy screamed in to her ear piece over the noise of the laser gun.
Coluson, the bastard, seemed amused on the other end, "Mandrill is a mutant, not a monkey. He recently escaped from prison and now, thanks to you, we know where to pick him up at."
"The monkey is robbing a bank!" Darcy insisted, dropping the gun and clenching her hands against her ears as another shrill whine sliced through the air. This one was closer, showering the young agent in debris. In an effort not to be crushed by the falling wall, she scrambled across the lobby keeping as low to the ground as possible. So far monkey man hadn't noticed her.
Right, because all the sane people left.
"Try to stay calm." Coulson coached, "back up is on the way. Don't engage him." He added, as if that wasn't the furtherest thought in her mind.
Gun Gun Gun! She berated herself as she realized she was no longer holding it. With a quick scan, she looked back over to where she had just ran from.
Ah ha! She shot a side glance to the monkey mutant and finding him still preoccupied with helping himself to the contents of the vault, made a mad dash for her discarded firearm.
"What do I do?" She hissed, as it belatedly dawned on her that she was back where she started, hugging the crumbling lobby wall for cover.
"Keep him there till the Mutant League arrives or we do. Don't let him leave." The tone wasn't humorous anymore. It held the tightness of an order and it was clear he expected her to carry it out. Never mind that this was her first solo confrontation. Or that up until the five minutes ago, she didn't know there was mutants.
"I feel like there's some fatal gaps in my training, partner." Darcy yelled back. If Coulson retorted, it was lost because the monkey, this so called, Mandrill, had finished filling up his two large trash bags with the contents of the vault and was doing a loping stride across the lobby. Heading straight towards where Darcy was currently holed up.
Shit. There it was again, that irrational need to protect others. To do her job. To prove to herself. AKA her personal death wish. Looking around the jagged corner of broken concrete, Darcy clutched her gun. Coulson trusted her to do this, to hold the bad guy till the heroes got here and she was going to do that.
Somehow.
"SHEILD!" She yelled, jumping to her feet and blocking his path. With more gusto than she felt, she pointed her gun towards the advancing mutant and mentally apologized to Coulson for engaging the enemy. If he had been here, it's likely her partner would have known how to keep the rampaging ape occupied without compromising himself. But Darcy wasn't her partner and hadn't learned the subtle art of combat.
Turns out, the monkey was a lot closer than Darcy thought. And a lot bigger than he had seemed when he was standing at the back of the vault. Up close Mandrill looked like a man sized chimpanzee who had a flare for capes and bright colored spandex. Complete with wicked looking claws and a gapping, fang filled mouth.
Darcy really wished she would have noticed the claws before getting out from hiding. Apparently her casing for danger still needed some work.
Mandrill paused in mid stride in the middle of the wreckage, switching one bag bulging with cash from hand to his hand-like foot as he considered her. Oddly enough, one of those large fish filled tropical tanks had managed to escape the carnage and as luck would have it, he was standing right next to it. A single piece of dry wall was bobbing up and down on the top of the water. It was absurd that Darcy took note of that. Almost like her mind was pointing out the little things it could process and not the six hundred pound impossibility in front of her.
"Shield." He repeated back, with a deep throaty growl. It was hard to tell through the throaty tones of his voice, but Darcy thought she picked up on sarcasm. "One SHIELD agent?" He asked, sniffing sharply. "This will be insultingly quick." He snarled, "And extremely painful."
With an animal grace, he tossed the bags aside, launching towards Darcy in the same deft movement. There was just enough time to register Mandrill was shooting towards her before a huge, meaty hand smashed in to her side, tossing her across the lobby.
By some twist of lucky, Darcy landed on one of the plush leather couches that dotted the sitting area, cushioning her fall as it toppled over from the force of her landing. It was a tribute to the long hours of physical training with Coulson that Darcy had managed to not only turn the end-over-ass fall in to a roll, but that she held on to her gun while doing so.
Any pride she felt at the feat was crushed as Mandrill let out a primal scream and rushed her again with inhuman speed.
Muttering a stream of 'oh nos' - Darcy ran. Behind her, the air was filled with sounds of furniture breaking, the brittle cracks of walls giving way to the fury of the monkey as he jumped from pillar to pillar, closing the distance in seconds.
At the last second, Darcy spun around and fired. There hadn't been time to aim, hadn't even been time to think. The auto pilot of her brain took over, all she registered was the recoil tossing back her arms and the monkey screaming in anger.
There was a few things she learned right away after that. The first being that she needed a much, much bigger gun. At first, she wasn't even sure she hit him until his scream of pain confirmed she had. The second, and this one was far more important - even after hours of shooting range practice, she was a still a lousy shot. The tuff of skin missing on the monkey's ear didn't do much in the 'contain the threat' field. Oh but it did wonders on his mood.
With salvia dripping from his fangs, Mandrill screamed at her and lunged. He plowed in to her with the force of a semi-truck, sending them both slamming in to the ground - Darcy on bottom, thank you very much. Her back announced it was done for the day, closing down in shades of pain that blossomed around her lungs. Mandril recovered first, pulling back a huge paw to rip her to shreds.
In the end, it wasn't her SHEILD training that saved her. It was a basic math. Big male anything straddling her equals slamming her knees up with enough force to knock the bastard to a new singing range. He couldn't even scream when her knees hit home. All he could do was fall over on his side, clutching his abused manhood.
Gasping, Darcy rolled away, from him. There was a steel girdle of fire and saw dust around her ribs and a sharp throbbing pain broadcasting from her side that let her know the monkey had probably caught her with his nasty claws. Those things could be pushed aside by the very real threat of what would happen if monkey-man got a chance to repay the sex change.
She didn't feel much better with her trusty .22 back in hand after discovering it had the fire power of a pea shooter but hey, it was that kind of day.
"Move," She managed to force out, "And I'm going to shoot you. Again."
Thank all that was good and great in the world that SHIELD agents picked that moment to swarm up around her. Wearing all black and carrying, Darcy noted with some bitterness, guns the size of Texas, it took them only a few minutes to bind Mandrill up tight and carry him out to the waiting armed guard.
It was only when she felt Coulson's familiar hand on her shoulder did Darcy notice she was still pointing her gun at the empty spot Mandrill had been in.
"You ok?" He asked.
Darcy wetted her lips. "Yeah, yeah fine. Good. Hey look, I caught the bad guy."
"Yeah, you did. Let's get you checked out and I can debrief you after." Darcy nodded, lowering her arms. Coulson signaled to someone behind her, probably the team medic. "What were you doing here anyway?" He asked as they waited.
"Cashing my check."
Coulson frowned, "Why don't you use the SHIELD branch bank? They handle all agent finances."
"Oh I know." Darcy answered. "But they have this deal going on, if you open a checking account you get a free iPad."
"Huh." He looked her over and smiled. "You did good today. It was exactly what I had in mind, but you did good."
Turned out praise from her partner did wonders on her mood, and despite it all, she returned the smile.
The medic team came over with a stretcher, the tall man in the front with blonde hair gently led her over to it. They started to bandaged the gashes on her leg as they rambled off questions about her medical history. Darcy must have answered because the questions kept coming, but she couldn't really focus. All her attention was on her partner, that was busy directing agents around the lobby. In the middle of the hustle and bustle, a distraught man in a business suit came over to Coulson, motioning to the disaster of the lobby with a kind of frantic distress. There was some nodding on Coulson's part before he pulled out his SHIELD badge and instantly, the man - Darcy guessed the bank manager, was all thank you's and gratefulness.
The medics were about to push Darcy's wheeled stretcher away when she noticed Coulson fishing something else out of the breast pocket of his suit. It was a folded piece of paper, the same off blue as her own paycheck stub. He said something to the manager, who blinked a few times in surprise before snapping out of it and slowly nodding. It took the man a few tries to get the gate to the counter to open, but once he did, he handed Coulson a form.
Just before Darcy lost the sight of the lobby, she could have sworn she saw the manger take the form back from Coulson and hand him black box with the symbol of an apple on it.