MCU :: MARVEL UNIVERSE :: MCU
MCU :: MARVEL UNIVERSE :: MCU
S.H.I.E.L.D. was pissed at her. Well... that was a big understatement, but really what was new? It had been a couple of weeks since she left New York and Skye was still living in motels but they were a little better off than the ones she came across on her impromptu trip to California. She kept in contact with Dinah and Frank. Making sure that they were still alive—standard friend stuff.
She was adjusting quite well to her new environment and she was working at a local martial arts dojo she found just outside of the city of Los Angeles. It was owned by a little old lady by the name of Madame Gao—she was sweet and harmless. But that assessment was Skye's first mistake she'd later discover.
Madame Gao welcomed Skye into her dojo immediately—the place wasn't like any other dojo that was littered around the city. It had character to it. It was traditional and it always smelled like sandalwood and not gym mats and sweat. It was as if Skye really needed the job, but more like she wanted something to do to occupy her down time.
There was hardly anyone ever there other than Madame Gao and a couple of guys in fancy suits that followed the woman around everywhere she went. But Skye's hours or pay never wavered despite the lack of business, so who was she to complain? She had a feeling this woman was something more than wise looks and mystical riddles.
Skye was willing to bet that her cane was more for beating the shit out of someone as it was for helping her walk.
But despite her theories—Madame Gao liked her and Skye liked to think that she knew how to get herself out of a pickle if it ever came to that. Skye knew she had her own methods of checking out Madame Gao's background, but as a villain herself—she figured it was not her business. Madame Gao never said anything to her when she caught Skye on her laptop doing more than just browsing the 'web.
Right now her top priority was rattling around S.H.I.E.L.D.
MCU :: MARVEL UNIVERSE :: MCU
It was midday when Madame Gao approached Skye, without her bodyguards this time and while the woman undoubtedly unnerved her to a degree, Skye respected her. She pulled out of the S.H.I.E.L.D database and closed her laptop to give the older woman her undivided attention. The sounds of a man getting his ass handed to him in the dojo area fading into the background.
"Are you enjoying your stay here, little one?"
That was another thing that Madame Gao did that Skye recognized as favoritism, something that Madame Gao did with no one else in this place. Give her a nickname. An endearing one.
For the most part she ignored it, ignored the warmth at the pit of her stomach—but damn her inner child for eating it up. Skye wasn't blind, or deaf, she knew her heritage (she looked in the mirror every morning) and she heard Madame Gao speaking in mandarin all the damn time when 'potential customers' came in. Skye didn't understand the language in full, but she recognized it enough to keep up.
Skye nodded, already unsure of where this was going, "Yeah, I like it here. It's peaceful."
"Of course it is. No one is brave enough to dare disturb my sanctuary."
"Right." Skye really didn't know what else to say, she knew that Madame Gao was working an angle but the hacker couldn't really decipher what for. Madame Gao always wore the same expression, like this amused all knowing little smirk—it was innocent. Skye didn't buy it for a second, but she didn't know how to read the woman either.
"Have I done something wrong, Madame Gao?"
Madame Gao smiled at Skye as she came around the counter, and if she noticed that the hacker tensed up more, she didn't let on—not that Skye would really be able to tell if she noticed or not.
"Of course not, little one. I simply wish to have a discussion with you. About your place in my business."
Skye watched the woman warily as she made her way to the corner of her little front desk stand, turning little by little as Madame Gao moved. And it wasn't lost on Skye that the woman had forced her to turn her back on the door. Giving her no choice. She either turned her back on the door or Madame Gao. And Skye wasn't keen on doing either.
"Oh? What about it?" Skye asked casually, keeping her tone light and curious as she went to the opposite corner and leaned back against the wall with her arms crossed. She was closer to the door, but she was now able to see it and Madame Gao.
The older woman noticed and nodded slightly, and Skye got the impression that she impressed her but she was still confused. Impressed her for what?
She gestured towards Skye laptop, "I noticed that you are always on this. You seem quite adept with technology."
"You could say that...why? Need help with yours?"
Madame Gao smiled, but it was chilly and Skye's blood ran a little cold, "Would you like to learn Shaolin Kung-Fu?"
Skye blinked, staring at the the elderly woman. Because hell yeah she would, the business front of Madame Gao's operation (whatever the hell it was) might have been slow but the few customers they did have well—the instructors were bad ass, in Skye's opinion. So yeah, she would but she also knew that everything came with a price and sometimes the price was worth it and sometimes...it wasn't.
"I don't know...depends."
"Ah," Madame Gao gave Skye a look she didn't recognize, "On?"
"On what you want from me?" Skye scoffed.
Madame Gao inclined her head ever so slightly, tapping her cane once on the floor drawing Skye's eyes momentarily to the odd vibration—that was no ordinary cane. There's steel in there. "I want that."
Skye looked up again, startled, "I'm sorry, what?"
"I am no fool, Cipher. I know who enters my city and why."
Skye looked up, alarmed—she was caught too far off guard to play dumb. But there wouldn't have been a point other than to waste time and they both knew it. The weight of her gun on her back becoming heftier. "What do you want from me, Madame Gao?"
"It is simple. I have a friend that needs financial needs. I have another friend that can provide."
"So? Go to a bank."
Madame Gao tapped her cane again, harder this time, and Skye fought to keep her eyes focused on the woman in front of her, "I come to you."
"And if I say no? Tell you to fuck off?"
Madame Gao smiled and Skye immediately decided that it was nothing that wanted to see ever again, "I know several government agencies that would be very interested in your whereabouts."
"Wow, totally not the sweet old lady I thought you were," Skye scoffed as she took the offered slip of paper and the flash-drive cautiously from Madame Gao, almost expecting her hand to get chopped off or something.
She glanced at the paper, noticing two different account numbers, she assumed that the first one was going to be the one that she would be extracting the money from.
"I'll get right on it immediately...like I have a choice. This is black mail, y'know."
"Another chapter in your life, little one. The wheel constantly turns. We must adapt to it's position or be crushed beneath it."
"Whatever. Anything else?"
"The address on the back is where you shall deliver the money. She will be waiting for you in two hours." two hours? Yeah no, I can do this in my sleep.
"She? She who?" this was starting to become more than what Skye wanted to do with her day, "And how the hell did you know who I was?"
"The Hand knows all, little one."
The Hand?! "Shit..." she whispered. She's heard of the organization, more like she's heard whispers but they weren't very rainbows and ponies type of whispers either.
Madame Gao remained silent and offered Skye that damn all knowing smug smile before she wandered out of her work area. And briefly, Skye wondered how someone so frail and old could move so damn fast and quietly. She looked down at the paper in her hand again with a heavy sigh before moving to close the door so she could get to work.
"The Hand...shit," she'd rather be dealing with S.H.I.E.L.D than this group.
MCU :: MARVEL UNIVERSE :: MCU
It took Skye all of an hour to get into the freaking Russian bank account and let it be known; Russian banks have top notch cyber security. It took Skye a little while longer to get in without being detected and alerting the bank (because then her life would've been considerably more difficult).
Skye honestly couldn't believe how much money was in the account. She was practically erasing it from existence. Sure, she's robbed plenty of low key wealthy babies for her own gain and those had been some heavy amounts. But this? Skye had a feeling she was stealing from an actual corporation rather than just one person.
Once she was finished with her job, curiosity got the better of her and she dug a little deeper into who Madame Gao (and herself, by association) was stealing from and her mouth dropped in shock when she realized.
"No way," Skye laughed under her breath, "Well, S.H.I.E.L.D...looks like you and I meet again." she noticed that another hacker was trying track her trail (and location) and she figured S.H.I.E.L.D had caught onto what she had just done. And really, Skye couldn't exactly believe it either.
She was a little bitter that she hadn't thought to do it herself, but she was young—she still had plenty to learn. Skye quickly keyed in a few codes, effectively trapping S.H.I.E.L.D little hacker and sending back a virus that would keep them busy for a good while. Whoever it was wasn't the normal run of the mill S.H.I.E.L.D hacker, and she figured they brought someone in from the outside. They were smart enough to pick up her nearly non-existent trail ( there was no way Skye could actually hide taking a hundred million from one of their accounts and expect them not to notice) but they were smart enough to actually keep up with her.
"Sucker."
Skye inputted the address into her phone before she packed up her laptop and clocked out for the rest of the day, and probably forever. It was a good forty-five minute drive, give or take the traffic, but she was on a bike.
She'd get there in thirty if she didn't run into any cops. As she was leaving the building, she didn't spot Madame Gao anywhere but she had a feeling that the woman was watching her but from where, Skye had no idea. She couldn't even feel out the woman's energy signature. She never truly could, it was like she was dead or something. Skye had chosen to ignore it up until this point, now she regretted her ignorance.
Skye put on her full faced helmet and mounted her Harley Fatboy, making it roar to life. She wasn't sure who she was supposed to be meeting exactly, but Skye figured she'd know her when she saw her. Idly wondering if she was ancient as Madame Gao.
Bested by the old people. Way to go, Cipher.
MCU :: MARVEL UNIVERSE :: MCU
Thirty minutes later...
Skye parked across the street, cutting the engine and pushing down her kickstand as she got off her bike and set her helmet down on the seat. The building across the street was pretty damn swanky from what she could tell on the outside. It was the type of place where people like her avoided like the plague. Skye looked around, trying to find anyone suspicious but aside from the occasional celebrity and typical Hollywood type on the sidewalks. Skye deemed it safe enough.
The bellboys opened the doors for her as she approached and if she thought the outside was impressive, the inside was even more so and Skye suddenly felt out of place as she whistled lowly and earned a glare from the people behind the front desk. The professional hacker just winked at them and started to subtly look around for her client.
Hoping to just 'know' when she saw her. It would've been fucking easier if she had a hint other than it was a woman. It had only been thirty seconds and Skye was already annoyed to death. She knew she should've been expecting someone fancy given the amount of money they wanted, but fucking Christ! Everyone in this place was fancy!
Except for her. "Oh."
There was a woman sitting at one of the dining tables dressed elegantly, not fancy. She was decades older than Skye but probably eons younger than Madame Gao (Skye snorted). She had a look that separated her from the rest of the crowd. A cunning and ruthless look in her eyes, and Skye could see it from across the lobby. She could see the calculating intelligence when she smiled the moment their eyes met.
This was the type of person Cipher worked with. Through a computer screen. Not face to face. Her fight or flight mode was kicking in towards flight but Skye was carrying too much money on her back—she didn't want that heat on her from both S.H.I.E.L.D., and The Hand. She could handle S.H.I.E.L.D just fine. She didn't wanna be dealing crazy freak ninja's on top of that.
Despite her concerns, Skye found herself heading towards the table the mysterious woman was sitting at and watched as her smile grew with every step she took until she was standing right next to the table. Skye took notice of a brunette woman sitting at the table next to theirs wearing a smart suit and eating alone.
Their eyes met briefly, and Skye got the distinct feeling that she wasn't the typical Hollywood type. Skye looked back at her employer, still standing, "I don't wanna be here longer than necessary."
The mysterious woman smiled at Skye as she gestured towards the empty chair. "Please, my dear...have a seat."
MCU :: MARVEL UNIVERSE :: MCU
"Are you hungry, my dear?"
"Not really my kind of restaurant. Look, I'm pretty sure that you've got some bad guy monologue for me, but I'm really tired. So, no offense? But I don't even know you so what is it that you want? Madame Gao wasn't all that informative."
"My name Alexandra Reid, and judging by that look on your face...you know exactly who I am."
"I knew your name, not what you looked like."
"Well, now you do."
"But it still doesn't answer my question."
Alexandra ignored her in favor of informing their waiter of her choice of wine, only requesting one glass along with the check. And she took her sweet time closing the menu and handing it over. It irritated Skye to no end. This woman may have all the time in the world but Skye was living on borrowed time if she stayed in one unfamiliar place for too long. (didn't stop her from doing it though).
She wanted to just get up and walk away but there was something sinister about this woman that kept her in the overly plushy seat with the golden yellow threading. Skye's fist clenched in her lap beneath the table to keep from shaking things around her due to her fried nerves. She was starting to get the feeling that she had somehow fallen into a trap—and Dinah and Frank would kill her for it if they ever found out.
She and Alexandra sat in tense (well, for her) silence, waiting for the waiter to return. Fortunately, he returned promptly and left them alone for the duration of their meeting. Skye wasn't given enough time to figure out a game plan but she was good at improvising at least. She figured shooting her way out would be a great start if it came to that.
"You're younger than I expected," Alexandra murmured, but Skye heard her just fine, "For someone with such an impressive record."
"Um, thanks?" Skye was uncomfortable, her body language screamed it and Alexandra was practically feeding on it. Alexandra set a black card on the table between them and smiled. Skye looked between her and the card that seemed so bright against the white tablecloth for a full minute before picking it up hesitatingly. There was no name. No number or nothing but there was a chip.
"What...what the hell is this?"
"The money you acquired from S.H.I.E.L.D...it's yours, and that is how you will spend your hard earned work."
Skye had been right; it was a set up from the beginning. Skye dropped the card back onto the table as if it was hot. She didn't like being toyed with—she hated it. She pushed her chair back slightly, ready to bolt, "Tell Madame Gao I quit."
"I have a job for you, Daisy."
Skye froze as if a bucket of cold ice water straight from the Arctic had been poured over her head. She tried to fight the reaction but she couldn't, she was caught too far off guard. She had already been thrown off her game from the start, this was just pushing her over the edge now.
"You don't know me, lady. This meeting is over." Skye rose from her chair, backpack slung over her shoulder. Pissing off The Hand be damned, she didn't care anymore. But Alexandra stopped her before she could fully commit to the bad idea.
"Daisy Skylar Johnson. Also known as the infamous Cipher. The most wanted cyber-terrorist known to S.H.I.E.L.D., the FBI, the military, Interpol and the CIA. And unknown to most, the first Inhuman to be born...not transformed."
Skye stood stock still, her back to Alexandra, face blank, fist clenched. She was ready to turn this womans bones to dust and high tail it out of another goddamn city. Hell, the country.
For the first time since arriving, which was careless on her part, she noticed that most of these guests weren't guests at all. Men and women dressed to the nines, paid to blend in...paid to be unassuming, a false sense of security. Paid to lure her into a trap.
Skye looked to the brunette sitting at the table next to Alexandra's and found her cool blue eyes staring back at her intensely, it was unnerving.
She glanced out the window, towards her bike...goddamn it. They were there too. She could make a run for it. But how far could she really get?
Dinah is going to kill me seven ways to Sunday.
Alexandra finished her wine and stood behind Skye with the quietness of a feline, agile and silent that didn't necessarily belong on a woman of her stature. She was contented when she came up behind Skye, grabbing the card and the hackers arm and walked her out of the hotel. Skye was too paralyzed to cause much of a scene.
Alexandra was being surprisingly gentle as she led Skye towards an all white Cadillac SUV that was waiting for them just outside the front door. The brunette breezed by them easily with her long legs and opened the door for them, and Skye was just now realizing that she had two deadly looking batons at her side.
There was a man sitting in the third row, directly behind Skye and he wouldn't even so much as look at her—it was setting off more red flag alarms in her head. And she couldn't figure out why she hadn't used her fucking gun yet. Or her powers.
Skye was doing her best to control her breathing and her quakes but shit, she was having a zero to one hundred type of day it seemed. And she just couldn't seem to get her shit together.
Alexandra slipped the black card into Skye's jacket pocket while simultaneously brushing back a loose strand of her with her other hand, and it would've been nurturing and warm in a way if she hadn't just kidnapped her.
"I need your help, Cipher," the brunette in the front seat looked back over her shoulder again at Skye for a brief moment, Skye found her look odd—but she had other things on her mind to be worried about.
Skye swallowed harshly when she felt Alexandra's hand slip between the seat and her back, and took the gun from it's hiding place. She should've stopped her then, but she was frozen in place.
"I...I don't know what else you want me to do. I gave you the money from S.H.I.E.L.D. What the hell do you want from me?"
Alexandra handed the gun to the woman in the front who dismantled it easily, letting the pieces fall onto the floor and Skye cursed her for it, but Alexandra took her chin and forced their eyes to meet again, "The money was a test, I don't need it. Consider it as a payment for your real job."
"Which is what?" Skye snatched away from the woman, or at least she tried to, but Alexandra was stronger than she looked.
"Your body is a vessel, Daisy. From the gods."
"You're fucking crazy," Skye hissed, "I'm not working for you, lady and that's final." Skye flipped her hands down towards the floor and the driver nearly swerved into oncoming traffic when the SUV shook violently.
Skye could see the fear and anger flash in Alexandra's eyes, but she also saw the glee and satisfaction, "You're still under the impression that you ever had a choice. Do it."
Skye felt the impact before Alexandra's words could really register in her mind, and Alexandra held firm onto Skye's face, watching as her pupils dilated. She could feel Skye's saliva and blood mixing over her fingers as the young adept hacker tried to speak. But all that came out where grunts and wheezes.
Skye's body jolted when the tingle sensation turned into the most intense heat she's ever felt in her life. It was sharp, piercing through through her mind as she tried to process what Alexandra was saying to her but she couldn't make it out. The ringing in her ears was loud, and she could hear the others shouting but for what she didn't know.
Skye didn't realize that her powers were going haywire, and that California was getting hit with an earthquake. Her earthquake.
Skye turned her head or at least she thought she did, but she was staring down at the three sharp points that were sticking through her Queen shirt. Through her back. Through her torso just beneath her breasts, a little to the right—not quite in the middle.
It hurt even more when she looked at it.
She could taste the blood in her mouth and she couldn't stop it from spilling out as she looked down at the three holes forced into her body. She was trying to curse these people and more blood was coming out and she was finding it harder and harder to breath.
The ringing had long stopped and she could hear Alexandra whispering in her ear to relax. Just relax...everything will be right soon...
Skye didn't feel much of anything anymore. Not even as she watched the blades being pulled out of her body...
This hurt so bad...
Those were the only thoughts racing through her mind...it hurt more than getting shot. It was more intimate, overwhelming and Skye was scared. She lived on the edge but she didn't wanna go. She wasn't ready, not like this.
Not in the backseat of a car with people she didn't even know left from right.
She hadn't even realized that she was crying or that Alexandra was fucking coddling her and wiping away her tears as she was bleeding out all over the womans white leather seats. Alexandra pulled Skye into her side, cradling her head to her chest as the younger woman shook in her arms. She kissed the crown of her head, whispering reassurances over and over until Skye stopped crying.
MCU :: MARVEL UNIVERSE :: MCU
MCU :: MARVEL UNIVERSE :: MCU