Sorry for how late this is - I started back at school this week and have had a few things to get on top of. Anyway, it's a bit of a short chapter. Oh, and lift in this context means elevator (sorry to my american readers if you get confused, although you've probably seen it often enough anyway.)
Natasha watched as the computer's clock changed from 11:59 to 12:00. She turned one of the inactive monitors so that it reflected the doorway - if anyone saw her meddling in the control room, she wasn't prepared to find out what her punishment might be. Besides, she wanted this job, despite her lack of enthusiasm in the board room.
After another brief outline of The Plan, they'd been escorted to personal rooms - where, among other things, Clint found his bow and quiver, Thomas the duffel bag (and also the missing bolt from his prosthetic.) and Natasha her jacket, wherein she searched now for her phone. It was cheap and disposable, but with so many eyes on her, it seemed better not to dispose of it; she'd cautiously handed out her number to friends alike and kept the device in one of many secret pockets. It vibrated slightly, and she realised that she had received a message from a certain Steve Rogers.
Rummaging around, she managed to find a lead that would connect the charger space to a USB port and plugged it into the computer. A quick play around with the computer terminal and she was tracking where the message came from.
It hadn't been long since S.H.I.E.L.D's downfall, and it looked as if Steve had chosen to stick around Washington to look into the files that she had given him before he went off on any adventures.
The elderly move at a leisurely pace.
As she took mental note of the location, she turned her attention to the phone.
'Can't read shorthand. Trip to Norway possible. You coming?'
Natasha sighed at Steve's eagerness to get her help.
It's too soon she thought as she typed a one word reply.
'Busy.'
Slightly irritated by the interruption, she tossed the phone aside.
More pressing matters await.
Oddly alert, Thomas, Natasha and Clint were settled in the meeting space from earlier. They were each munching on an energy bar that tasted like cardboard but seemed to deliver the energy it promised.
As well as looking further into the reality machine's origins, Natasha had searched around the archives for information on the teleport systems. What she had found breached upon interesting - both machine and teleport technology was found in a meteor wreckage (perhaps Asgardian? It was unlike artefacts of theirs she had seen before) and was worked from there by scientists in this division. As it was not of earthly origin, anything that they developed (there were several projects, it seemed) always developed faults and would only work to a certain extent. The scientists involved had kept these projects secret for close to a century - there had always been too much fault for it to be commercialised - although the scientists did appear to have separated and begun work in different groups.
Well, if anything, they seem to have a moral compass.
The information they had previously received about the machine seemed to be fairly extensive, but it seemed that she had only breached the tip of the iceberg where the teleport was concerned. After looking through a dozen pages of mathematical equations, she reached the project details and conditions. In short, the teleport required a ridiculously accurate set of co-ordinates and measurements to accurately transport a person from one place to another. As well as this, you could not teleport out without a starting disc - although, by the looks of things, you could possibly teleport into a place without a receiving disc. This would be extremely risky however - and some notes suggested that the side effects of this, in the rare instances that the feat was pulled off, were far beyond the mild nausea the group had experienced upon arriving in France.
She had shared her new found knowledge with Clint and Thomas, hoping that she was doing them a favour by doing so. Clint's hand reached for the coffee pot.
"These guys have got it all pretty well covered." He said. "A lot of my stuff's in lock-up at the moment."
"They even returned my pistol to me." Added Thomas, in the way that he usually just added things. "Oh, and they found the bolt off my leg."
"That leg's going to be the death of you." Natasha mumbled through an oat filled mouthful.
"Nat's right. I'll call Stark when this is over and get something fixed up."
"There's a few things we need to go over with Stark."
Clint mumbled something inaudible in agreement. Thomas laid down his bar and turned to talk to Natasha.
"When I met you, I wasn't expecting you to look like you did on the TV."
"When I met you, I wasn't expecting a 19 year old with a missing leg and a gun. What's your point?"
"From what Mr Barton has told me, I was expecting a cover."
A chuckle came from the other seat. "Kid's got a point."
"You've got 'kid' calling you Mr Barton - you don't have much of a say in this. And I don't always need a cover."
"But surely it would have been safer to change your appearance - for all of us."
"Hey, we're having fun aren't we?"
Thomas scoffed.
"Look, give me a rest. I just got back from an errand and the shops ran out of hair dye."
"Sounds to me like you're out of practice, Romanoff." Clint teased.
She tore off a chunk off her energy bar and tossed it at his head. He faked a painful gasp and rubbed the spot as if it was sore.
"How much we getting paid for this again?"
"Enough to get you a place with a guest bedroom."
"Is this the sort of thing we want to be fighting for, though? Keeping things secret for a bunch of people we hardly know?"
"We can get to know them." suggested the 19 year old.
Natasha shook her head subtly. "We've not got a lot of choice in what to fight for. Sometimes our views aren't represented. Now, trade in company work for personal justice if you want. But that's not going to pay the bills."
"You don't have bills to pay, last time I checked."
"I've got a place, I just don't use it much."
Thomas leaned back, feeling more comfortable with the discussion and evidently not missing the sudden opportunity to talk without invoking some kind of disagreement. "You didn't have a lot of things with you before - have you got a store of things around there?"
Natasha's mind cast to the conversation that morning. Thomas' father had been watching. "Something like that."
Clint chuckled again. "When are you visiting Carlos next, Tom?"
"Oh yeah, you said you travelled around."
"Soon, I hope."
"I'll take you down next week if you want."
"That'd be good." he smiled, and it was a sort of odd half-smile that conveyed more happiness than it hid.
Doctor Natine wandered in and ordered them to their separate rooms. When they reconvened, they were all wearing black jumpsuits with half a dozen things hanging precariously from a utility belt.
"There's a minibus that will take you and your equipment to the warehouse where the blueprints and instructions are. Easy enough, you get in, avoid too much noise and get out. We'll get there late, so you'll only really have to deal with night patrols."
Somehow, it seemed that no-one in the room actually believed that.
"So why haven't you got the instructions to shut off your machine?" Natasha asked, a sly connotation to her tone.
"Well, one way we managed to keep the world from getting its hands on this was to compromise with people. Our neighbours have the instructions for switching it on and off, and we have the machine. The so-called blueprints that they own show how you can fix and adapt the machine rather than build it, but it seems that one without the other is pretty much useless. Now we have a little bit of an advantage, considering we have the physical device in our possession - but don't let them know that."
With a sickly sweet smile, she led them into a large room where they stocked up on guns and knives and, for Clint, arrows. The ones he carefully selected now weren't specialised like those he was used to, but it was evident that the people here had taken care to produce some that were of the same size and weight.
"Did you find out that Thomas' dad was a source for these guys before or after you hired the kid?" began Natasha, loading a Glock.
"Do we have to do this now?"
"Just don't expect the conversation over dinner not to be heated."
"When isn't it heated in the first place? Okay, let's go."
The team began walking to the door of the store room, but Natasha hesitated.
"Wait, he's not coming." she said, indicating Thomas.
"Why not? He's perfectly capable."
"We're not taking a kid on this mission Barton!"
"I'm legally an adult." countered Thomas, who, although clearly listening to their debate, had grown tired of the archer's and the spy's arguments. Especially the ones over him.
"He wants to come."
"We don't need him."
"It's a simple enough mission."
"To start with."
"We've already planned everything out. We can't do this without him now."
"S.H.I.E.L.D ditched an entire assault team for me once - wanna bet?"
"I'm coming with you." The call from the back of the room was not taken entirely seriously.
"He's coming with us." Clint confirmed.
"If he comes with us now, he's not coming back."
"The amount of times you've said that to me..."
"I'm not joking Clint."
"I'm not leaving him behind. Besides, he can look after himself."
They had moved into close proximity. She stared at him, again standing a good bit above her, and let her big sad eyes do the talking.
He wasn't having any of it.
"Nat. Just let him have this one."
Natasha sighed in response and turned away. "I'm not happy about this."
"Come on. We've got a bus to catch."
The bus journey left plenty of time for reflecting on the past few days, in fact, it left a good amount of time over as well, time which the trio used to recap the plan.
Clint felt tiredness creep into his veins, but he knew better than to attempt rest. No, it was better to stick to what he'd do on any mission - hold out until complete exhaustion. It would come eventually.
The lighting of the cramped space was poor at best, and the archer was relieved when he stepped out into the warm, clouded night. Admittedly, the light levels were far worse, but it was, at least, far less artificial.
And open space. Open space is good.
He regarded the air for a moment longer before he followed his team mates into the warehouse. Even in the dark, it was brutally clear that there was more to this complex than met the eye; platforms, lifts and entrances to deep dark corridors littered the interior with no particular symmetry.
Entering the warehouse proved to be simple - weaving through it in the dark was what would prove to be more difficult. Clint perched on a platform and took down a few lone agents hanging around the entrance to a lift.
"We're clear Widow." he whispered into a comm set that seemed fairly developed, even by S.H.I.E.L.D's standards.
"I copy. Pirate, are you in position?"
A disgruntled murmur confirmed that Thomas was indeed in position, despite his hastily prepared (and not very well liked) codename.
"Okay, go."
And with that, Clint tracked the small figure below him as she rolled gracefully to the lift. As she fiddled with the control panel there, Thomas half emerged from the shadows, watching the space that Clint himself could not see.
Everything was...
Right.
On schedule, he dropped to the lower floor and swept the surroundings for security. There was nothing wrong. Except -
He heard a shot ring out from behind him a few seconds after he fired the arrow, and now ran for cover. His elbows scuffed against the rough floor as he skidded behind some boxes. Flicking his head around, he searched for his partners.
They had hidden behind the sides of the lift for cover on instinct. They were poised behind the cold steel doors.
Doors which were now closed.
Thank you for reading!
I'll get onto the next chapter, but I can't guarantee that I'll get it out by Monday.
Likely thing is, I'll have a break and write for a long session, then upload from then on.