So it goes with saying that only things I own with any connection to MARVEL I bought on Ebay or Etsy. MARVEL COMICS & MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE are their own creatures and I have nothing to do with either of them aside from the fact I enjoy reading or watching them, and am grateful for the ability to play in their world. I claim nothing, and I receive nothing for this, expect the pleasure of putting something out into the world.
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DAY THREE
CHAPTER FIFTY FOUR
THURSDAY, MAY 3RD 2012
0850 HOURS
SUBTERRANEAN BUNKER
LOCATION UNKNOWN
DUNCAN
It was supposed to happen at 1200 hours, instead I'm making it happen at 0900 because I know the girl isn't gonna last that long and Terrance is right, I'm a goddamned idiot.
I didn't ask his opinion, and I certainly didn't ask for his consent even though my decision would just as likely put his life in danger as it did mine. Instead I told him to wake the bastard up, and when I tried to talk myself out of it I just grabbed my own syringe and headed to the cabinet to do it myself.
He tried to stop me and I split my knuckle on his jaw. I punched him, sending him stumbling back and using the end of the doctor's bed to steady himself. I didn't even mean to do it, and it surprised me just as much as it did him. Nothing about the way he grabbed my arm was threatening, it wasn't even meant to be a decent hold, it was just to get my attention. It didn't warrant the hit at all, and I'm usually a lot more restrained than that.
But I already did, so I shook it off and used his disorientation to my advantage, filling the syringe and pressing down on the plunger after the needle broke skin.
I didn't hang around after that. I simply grabbed some tape for my hand, told him if Barton's eyes were still technicolor to put him down before he got all the way up, and at the last inch of the door frame I finally said, "Sorry mate."
If it worked the way I wanted it to it was still going to take a little bit of time, and I needed to get my head back on. I've been doing this since before I was teenager. Training, missions, the looming truth of my friggin mortality. Dad was the director of S.H.I.E.L.D, and even though I was adopted, I was his son. I was always going to be a field agent, I was always going to do the dirty work, even long before I found out just who's dirty work I was really doing.
I was young and stupid back then, but I was proud. I was gonna protect my country, I was gonna help 'my dad' protect my country, I was gonna make him so proud. I was gonna remind him everyday how much the orphan he took in appreciated it. I was trained and I still didn't see what a snake he was under the skin. My eye almost itches I'm so pissed about that mistake!
I don't take pride in my work anymore, I just do it so I don't take the bullets either. But I could take some pride in this. I'm always going to pull the short stick, at this point it's just something I accept. No matter how things end for me they are never gonna end the way I want, that option fell off the table years ago. But occasionally I get to do something good.
I'm gonna help a woman escape an abusive dangerous man, and maybe if I do this right I can keep her from falling right back into 'their' hands. God, I wish I could suck it up and tell someone about HYDRA, but I really don't want to die, and I can't out run the push of a button.
But at least occasionally something goes right. Like right now, and my ears hearing the words. "I'm telling you it's probably nothing."
I'd been sitting on one of the stacks of supply crates, smoking one of my Winterman cigarillos while I busied myself with cleaning some of my guns. I personally prefer the size of a regular cigar, but that is a luxury that requires time, and with my life these little half corona's are small enough I can actually finish them. I'd really been hoping that I would have enough time this time too, since it's one of the few things I get to enjoy in my life, but the clock never stops moving. Oh well, there are other things I can do that I like.
The boy literally choked on his breath so hard he ended up having a coughing fit when my voice passed his shoulder as I asked what exactly 'nothing' was. I expected it might startle him or make him nervous, but the pants shittingly terrified reaction made more sense once I saw his face. There's a lot of faces down here, but I saw his a few times in the same ten foot radius of the dumb ass Rising Tide hacker we killed earlier. I bet they knew each other, and I bet even more that he saw me drag his buddy into that room.
This is actually perfect. Hackers are extremely useful, but they can be really annoying too. Its more common then its not that you find they come with a sort of arrogance. They believe they're better than us because all we are is hired muscle. Our skill set is pulling triggers and punching things, we aren't smart like they are, and generally they take advantage of the 'don't touch the tech team' rule.
There's not that rule here though, and it saves me the time necessary to intimidate this one into good behavior. If anything the rising count of homicide down here has him too well behaved, because the boy can't even remember how to speak.
Though he does stammer a little when I get tired of waiting and just turn the screen around, much to the amusement of the other merc, who'd been talking to me. "So we got a camera doon, ye wanna teel me wa?"
The question was for the hacker, but the fact that the other man answers really doesn't bother me as long is it gets answered. "He said it's just a glitch."
"A glitch?!" This time my first response is for the fellow hired gun and its delivered with a cocked eyebrow and a snicker, but the second has no humor. "Ur ye serioosly gonna gang wi' 'it's a glitch'?"
"I-I...There was s-so-some kids pl-playing w-w-with a b-baseball. I t-think it..." I never really did like stuttering, and I've already had my fill of it on this assignment just from the lady alone, so I really have no patience for his excuses and finish it for him.
"Hit th' camera, yeah, Ah got 'at. Ye ken whit else Ah ken, yer gonna gang up an' fix it." What I get from both of them is also really annoying. I expected as much from a scared hacker, but I expected better from a merc. "Oh I'm sorry, did ye miss th' memo waur terrorists aren't th' only ones fa use bairns. We got alien tech swatched frae S.H.I.E.L.D doon haur, sae tak' yer team an' thes divit upstairs an' check."
"Why's it gotta be my team?" The 'you're not the boss of me' reply is almost cute if it wasn't so disappointingly predictable. When Barton started collecting men he wasn't exactly picky it seems, and he called more than just my group, which is how I ended up working with this piece of shit.
Despite the fact I've been stubbornly pushing away the opinion I have on this guy I know exactly who and what he is. Malone, Bruno, 'Needle', Rollins, Schmidt, and Van-slyke all used to be soldiers until they got 'accused' of torturing a Canadian nun in Iraq. The case was dropped though since none of the witnesses stayed healthy enough to actually attend the trial. It still ended their military career though so they sought out different ways to fill their pockets.
"Cause Ah got a hen tae guard an' ye got urban experience. Sae act loch yer balls aren't jist fur shaw an' earn yer goddamn pay. heel fur aw Ah caur ye can tak' mah men tay, it's nae loch they got anythin' better tae dae."
THURSDAY, MAY 3RD 2012
0856 HOURS
SUBTERRANEAN BUNKER
LOCATION UNKNOWN
CLINT
I don't know what the deal with this Merc is, other than he has the swagger of agency training behind him. That alone makes me lock down my desire to beat him to death for what he put in my veins! I know I was chemically unconscious during that time, but I'm honestly surprised I didn't scream anyways. I know he didn't use much, but the closest comparison I can give it is the time I got hit by some burning shrapnel and that at least was confined to one spot, not my whole body.
It still hurts honestly, especially when I knocked out the blonde. I knew he was with the brown haired bastard, but I didn't really care. I didn't have a lock on his loyalties so I wasn't going to risk him alerting anyone, and I didn't like him anyways, because after Nora left the room he made a comment that really pissed me off. He commented to himself it was marvelous how well she passed for human, and he wondered if it was some sort of psychical adaptation.
He isn't the only one who thought of that. When I got her as an assignment I got the old files too. Footage, notes, pictures, all of it. HYDRA saw her as a means to make themselves better. The Red Skull thought they could use her to make another version of the super soldier serum, and they cut her to pieces trying to find a way to do that. They failed in the end, but not before they let her bleed too much on the table and put her in a coma that lasted the better part of a century.
That was the only reason they stopped experimenting on her, because she was their only 'specimen'. But now she is my little sister, so the reason I didn't straight up kill that blonde prick for thinking like a Nazi is that he's with the merc who wants to help her as much as I do.
The plan seems pretty basic, but I don't think he really had time for complicated. He didn't even really have time to tell me what the plan was, not that I need him to. As an Agent I'm trained to adapt and stay ahead of the situation so when I see at least two teams head up the tunnel that leads to the surface I know he is dividing the forces down here so I have less bodies to go through if things go wrong.
The thing is, I'm not sure things are going right. I know Loki isn't in the room with her because I heard her screaming for him to come back, something I don't even want to think about. But I can't find him out here either, and not knowing where that son of a bitch is at could be very bad for all of us!
Its a concern I don't have time for though when I, along with the rest of the men down here hear the distinct sound of a breaching round. He must have sent those teams up to meet an ambush. I'd be comforted by that except for the fact that I know it's not S.H.I.E.L.D coming down those tunnels with their guns drawn.
That breaching round was fired from a shotgun. That's a SWAT team tactic at best, S.H.I.E.L.D has more effective ways to take out a door. Which means I really need to get her out of here even quicker.
I shot Nick Fury in the chest. Even if he lives through it like I'm sure he will, as far as S.H.I.E.L.D is going to be concerned I'm still compromised. I'm sure they will put my face on the most wanted list, with a kill on sight order. They probably put her's on there too, after they saw what I did to her house. To her.
That bastard set me loose on her. I stabbed her, I was tearing off her damned clothes! I saw it all, I felt it all, I could taste her blood on my tongue, and all I could do was scream in my head. I saw the fear fill her eyes as I betrayed every ounce of her trust.
But then I heard the love in her voice, as she washed my face, as she told me she didn't blame me, and she still cared about me. As she told me to save myself. She was sacrificing herself for me, the man who stabbed her, and almost raped her!
Its why I have no more patience with whatever his plan is. By the time I reach her hall the chaos has reached there too. The scientists are in a panic, and the few mercenaries who aren't trying to keep the local law enforcement at bay are trying to calm them down and get the Tesseract machine on a truck. I vaguely see two of them carrying the still sedated body of Dr. Selvig out of sight but there is still no Loki and still no time.
Instead of waiting for him to get rid of the twenty year old who decided to take on guard duty I just step up behind the kid, half hearing him make a comment about how he suddenly doesn't have his scottish accent anymore, right before I take advantage of the distraction to put the kid in a choke hold and sheath my knife in the hypoglossal canal, severing his spinal column from his skull and ignoring my new 'friend's glare of disapproval.
"We don't have time for this. Alice is waiting."
NOTES FOR THE READERS:
In case anyone is confused about the name Alice in the last line, Clint is in fact referring to Nora. when Nora first woke up in S.H.I.E.L.D custody they told her she could not go back to using her old name because it wasnt safe, so for a while she went by Alice. A name picked for her by Clint after he saw one of the nurses reading Alice in Wonderland. Later her name was changed to the one she uses now and became Nora.
DUNCAN SCOTTISH ACCENT TRANSLATIONS:
So we got a camera down, you wanna tell me why?
So we got a camera doon, ye wanna teel me wa?
Are you seriously gonna go with 'it's a glitch'?
Ur ye serioosly gonna gang wi' 'it's a glitch'?
Hit the camera, yeah, I got that. You know what else I know, you're gonna go up and fix it.
Hit th' camera, yeah, Ah got 'at. Ye ken whit else Ah ken, yer gonna gang up an' fix it.
Oh I'm sorry, did you miss the memo were terrorists aren't the only ones who use children. We got alien tech stolen from S.H.I.E.L.D down here, so take your team and this idiot upstairs and check.
Oh I'm sorry, did ye miss th' memo waur terrorists aren't th' only ones fa use bairns. We got alien tech swatched frae S.H.I.E.L.D doon haur, sae tak' yer team an' thes divit upstairs an' check.
Cause I got a woman to guard and you got urban experience. So act like your balls aren't just for show and earn your goddamn pay. Hell for all I care you can take my men too, it's not like they got anything better to do.
Cause Ah got a hen tae guard an' ye got urban experience. Sae act loch yer balls aren't jist fur shaw an' earn yer goddamn pay. heel fur aw Ah caur ye can tak' mah men tay, its nae loch they got anythin' better tae dae.