Revamped!
Chapter 76: Escaping SHIELD Island Part Three
SHIELD Island - 3 Hours and 10 Minutes till Detonation
"We should've dumped Ivory here and maybe she wouldn't have escaped," James says as he steps over a fallen tree.
Xavier, who walks ahead of him, laughs a little. "That's a good idea except she would've escaped at this moment."
"True."
"How about we find Ivory and then we can talk about disposing of her here?" Daniel nods.
The guys nod. Ivory has been under the radar ever since she escaped SHIELD prison a while back. There have been agents assigned to keep tracking her down but there were no findings. Normally, it would be good that nothing is coming up since an optimistic approach to this would be that Ivory isn't doing anything, but the more realistic theory is that Ivory is being keen on keeping her bad intentions private.
Emily walks behind the boys, having Jarvis in her Iron Man suit do multiple tasks at once: fix the security breach, track how much time they have left, and find Iqadi. Everything except the ticking clock isn't working for her.
"Considering that Ivory was your first mission and you still haven't found her is kinda pathetic," Emily says. The boys rightfully ignore her. "Speaking of being unable to locate hot women, I'm having trouble finding Iqadi since I'm pretty sure her Panther suit was made to be undetectable."
-o-
3 Hours and 5 Minutes till Detonation
On the other side of the intimidating island forest, Angela and Merida walk ahead of Imanu and Apollo. The girls have their weapons ready to fire because they're unsure of where the inmates are exactly and whom they would encounter. On the other hand, Apollo seems lax about being here, as if he's on vacation, and Imanu is glad to be beside Apollo for that reason.
"Do you think bringing Apollo here would restore some memories?" Angela asks.
"Maybe. He could get hit in the head by an inmate or my bow."
Angela laughs a little. "But we need to talk about Iqadi. She's a panther and those are stealthy creatures so maybe she's just hiding somewhere. If she sees us, she'll jump out."
"Panthers are also hunters so there's the chance that she already attacked someone here. Actually, Iqadi would've hidden and attacked."
"Or that she didn't survive the crash at all."
"Shut the hell up."
Angela and Merida stop to look at each other. Despite having complete optimism and faith in Iqadi's survival, there is always that pinging thought at the back of their minds about the possibly of Iqadi dying or already being dead, especially given their location.
Suddenly, Angela's tracking device on the island's inmates starts to beep loudly. As she goes to check it, a large thump causes them to jump off the ground and stumble back, some fall. From the ground, Merida scrambles to load her bow as Angela searches for the tracking device she lost mid-air. Apollo and Imanu look at them and, from behind the girls, they see a twenty-foot reptile/robot hybrid staring at them, possibly scanning each of them. The moment Merida holds her bow up, the robot flares its defence panels which reflect the sunlight into their eyes.
"Well, that's not fair!" Angela exclaims. "This has to be a failed sentient experiment SHIELD couldn't shut down."
Merida and Angela scurry to the side as the robot leaps forwards to attack them. Apollo leaps back to his feet. With instant reflexes, he grabs Imanu and pulls him to the sidelines, behind some trees.
"Any weaknesses?" Merida says as she starts firing her arrows at it. "I didn't read the file Daniel sent!"
"If it's a robot then we need to get to the hard drive!" Angela yells back, dodging a swipe from the robot's giant lizard tail.
"It's also a lizard," Merida reasons. "Wouldn't its insides be organic?"
Angela huffs. "Again, not fair!"
-o-
3 Hours and 1 Minute till Detonation
Emily takes another look at the clock ticking down and notices a red light flashing in the corner of her eye. As she further examines it, she recognizes it as an approaching inmate.
"Something's coming from above," Emily tells them.
"You should hide," Xavier tells her.
"So should you."
"Emily, you're fixing the security system, tracking time, and finding Iqadi."
"I also have armour."
Nobody moves. Everyone is on edge as a large shadow flies from above and lands in front of them. The creature stands up as straight as a flagpole. It's at least a couple of feet taller than them and so much stronger. It seems to be a failed experiment of a mutated ape with sharp wildcat jaws, salivating. A hybrid. The island as a few of them. The monster's eyes are an opaque shade of red and look around spastically as if it wasn't sure where to look and it doesn't see them.
As the four of them look up at the monster without moving, Daniel's heart stops as he recognizes the hybrid from the files. He looks at his team and they look back. Daniel covers his eyes. Then, he gestures to his ears, nose, hands, and mouth before pointing upwards repeatedly. Daniel expected the others to nod their heads but they look confused.
"What?" James questions, breaking the silence.
The monster suddenly looks right at them. It jumps over their heads and lands in a pouncing position, ready to make its next move. The group turns around to face it, ready to fight but they don't move. The strange creature just does the same as it did before as it just looks around mindlessly, searching for a target.
Daniel looks at his friends again and mouths the words slowly this time.
Blind. Other senses heightened.
Xavier silently groans, unsure about what to do since he was stuck with the two chatterboxes of the group also known as Emily and James. He then waves to get James's attention. Once captured, Xavier moves a hand up towards his chest, pulsating it outwards so James gets the message. James nods. He points a hand out in the distance and fires a bioelectric blast in the distance to send the monster somewhere else. As the monster leaps, the team starts running and flying the opposite way only to start being followed since nobody could escape silently.
-o-
2 Hours 57 Minutes till Detonation
As Angela and Merida continue to fight the robot-lizard hybrid, Apollo stands beside Imanu to be his shield since one of their priorities for this mission besides getting Iqadi and fixing the island's security's system, they had to make sure Imanu stayed alive, especially since he doesn't believe in violence as an answer. Besides, if Iqadi was Apollo's friend, this is what friend's do for each other.
Imanu looks at Apollo who is acting as if the fight in front of them was just an act and not real. He isn't sure whether to be glad that Apollo's calm or frightened.
"Should you help them?" Imanu asks about Angela and Merida.
"They're fine," Apollo responds. "They have SHIELD training."
The two men watch as the robot slams Angela to the ground. As Angela attempts to get up, the robot is about to stomp on her but stops at the sound of Merida loading her bow for another shot. Merida fires a boomerang arrow that has a rope around it just so it'll tie around the robot and make its limbs useless for it. As Merida fires, the robot catches the boomerang and whips it back at Merida like a cyclone. The rope entangles Merida and she falls over.
Apollo laughs and Imanu looks at him concerned. Then, Apollo's face goes blank when he sees Angela and Merida struggling to get up and about to be squished.
"Huh," Apollo says, surprised. "I thought that would've been easy for them. Will you be fine on your own?"
"I'll manage," Imanu responds.
Apollo jogs over to the robot. He holds his hand out, summoning his greatest weapon. The sky fills up with dark clouds, thunder, and lightning, causing the robot to look at him. Apollo starts laughing gleefully as his axe lands in his hand and it's fully charged with lightning. The rush of adrenaline his weapon provided is the boost he needs. He leaps into the air and strikes the monster, sending everything down due to its impact, including the trees which break from their roots. Even Imanu falls to the ground.
Once all is calm, Apollo drops his axe on top of the dead robot. He cheers for himself due to the adrenaline that runs through his veins at top speed. Although that was only a second long, it was just the taste of battle he needed.
"That was satisfying," Apollo says. "Aren't you glad I came along?"
Angela and Merida huff at him. Apollo looks down and sees that they're on the ground right beside the defeated robot. He goes to help up Angela as Imanu runs over to untie Merida.
"A warning that you were bringing your Asgard power tool would have been nice!" Angela exclaims at him. "You could've gotten us all killed!"
"But you're all alive," Apollo replies. "Which, by the way, you're welcome."
Angela is speechless. She frowns at Apollo who continues smiling at her. He picks up his axe and holds it up as he starts walking again.
"Onwards!" He exclaims. "We have a Panther to find!"
