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@blackjackofalltrade
“C’mon, we gotta head out this way Jack, there’s a shortcut I saw through the blueprints of this place,” Rocket said as he lead them away.
Where was the Milano? He wasn’t exactly sure but he had just given signal to Quill to let the guy know they needed to be picked up.
“If ya say so...”
He had his doubts, but what choice did he have at this point? He’d accompany Rocket to the Milano for the numbers = security factor, but after that? He was out of here faster than a shooting comet.
“ Yeah I don’t know where this thing would be safe exactly, but our plan was to get it back to Quill and figure that part out next. I don’t know… maybe he thinks we can use it to kill Thanos but personally I think we just need to get it as far away from that purple moron as we can,” Rocket gripped back. He didn’t care about the worth of the orb. As much as he liked having his pockets full of units, he’d rather stay alive for the time being.
“Sounds good t’me.“ Even if he’d rather have the billions of units, speaking from a personal perspective. But he could live with just surviving this. There were other, less completely insane scores to be made in the galaxy.
“Where’d ya guys stash the Milano? Figure we can jus’ get it onboard and get outta this place.”
“I was more gesturing towards the fact we almost got killed but… yeah, that all seems normal t’me. I guess the plan is to get it far from the reach of Thanos?” Rocket shrugged.
“Yeah somethin’ like that?? There someone we can unload it on? Gotta say I’m not a fan of carrying this titan-bait around. Even fer all the units it’s worth-- which I know is a flarkin’ lot.“
It was in his voice that he was more than a little tempted to just take the treasure and bolt with it, sell it at some exorbitant price in some disreputable market. Score the dough, let the dumb thing get lost in the galactic underground...
“Don’t act like this doesn’t happen all the time.”
“Yeah--. Yeah--!! ‘Cause it’s just a run-of-the-mill job when ya got a weapon o’ mass destructing in yer hands an’ some head galactic honcho inside that buildin’ lookin’ fer ya. What do we even do with this thing, Rocky?“
He asked, gesturing to the roughened orb container that held the Power Gem within its otherwise unsuspecting contours.
Not The Hero Type || Blackjack, Rocket, Groot, & Thanos
“They’re after the stone!!” came a panicked cry from one of the corpsmen before Blackjack tranked him. Certainly their presence would not be forgotten even after a drug induced sleep.
“So much for security,” Rocket mumbled before taking off.
Rocket rushed to the protection device harboring the orb, using Blackjack as his cover as he made a grab for it. Things seemed to halt into slow motion for a moment as he reached out in mid-jump to get the power gem.
Success: they were at the climax of their mission. Rocket had a pouch on his waist that he slipped it into, before he went towards the door, having had the mercenary hare clear the room.
“Alright I got it, let’s get outta here!” the smaller Halfworlder ordered, reloading his gun again, just in case.
There was no use in being stealthy. They’d lost the element of surprise when news broke of the mad titan coming to Xandar in search of the gem. But what they lacked in stealth they hopefully regained in speed, or at least efficiency. They were here. The gem was here. It was theirs now.
Blackjack had done his work and blasted a clear path through. Groot kept the guards at bay, swinging his thick arms like clubs as he roared in frustration. For once, the tree and raccoon were doing a good thing by stealing. Why could the Nova corpsmen not see that?
Once Rocket had secured the orb, Groot continued his assault on the guards. Now they were even higher-risk targets. Rocket, his partner, must be protected at all costs now more than ever. The Halfworlders loaded their guns, and Groot continued his offensive. They had to move with great speed here if this mission was to succeed.
He bellowed a mighty “I am Groot,” before urging his partners to move along. They were all doing their part, and for the grand majority their efforts seemed to be paying off. The din of panic grew louder and Groot turned for a moment to see what the commotion was about. He encouraged Rocket and Blackjack to keep moving- he would catch up in moments.
Having left Iron Man and Hawkeye in a fight to death against one another, Thanos was content to turn his attention on the massive building before him that housed the gem. It mattered not if they died now or later–one way or the other, all of them would feel the cold embrace of his lover.
It came as a mild surprise to see such a trail of destruction ahead of him already, but then again, the Nova Corps had surely been unwilling to give up the gem without a fight. A fight that whoever was trying to take the gem before Thanos arrived had done for him, leaving him all the more prepared to deal with them accordingly.
Now, Thanos had seen many a strange creature in all his travels, but when his eyes fell upon Groot, he nearly laughed. The leftover combatants that surrounded them were giving a feeble attempt to stop him–Thanos stilled them with a single flash from his hand, tossing their bodies like ragdolls through the air. Facing down the tree-like being, Thanos sneered. Two smaller creatures darted just out of sight behind it, and the Titan’s chest tightened as he felt that cosmic tug. They had it. The little ones had the gem.
“I believe you have something that I want,” Thanos boomed. “I suggest you relinquish it to me, if you value your lives.”
The wet, crunching sound of multiple bodies hitting the walls of the heavily securitized hall would have turned any head to look back behind them. Most of all those who actually gave a lot of value to their own lives. Most of all to beings like Blackjack O’Hare, far from a cowardly creature: but intelligent enough to know when the game held players with odds too uncomfortable to gamble with.
This had just become one such game.
“We gotta move, Rocky, we gotta move--!!“
Blackjack yelled over the din, grabbing the other Halfworlder by the arm and attempting to tug him away again. Back to their route out of this place. Rocket had to know they had no chance against this guy. Not with what they had on them. Not here in someone else’s backyard. If they handed over the gem, or the big titan got it by other means: they were dead.
The conclusion was simple. They had to get the gem out. Whether Rocky wanted to go down fightin’ alongside his tree friend (given that the big flora colossus was still facing the titan, twigs bristling and whatever) was up to him. But either way, that gem was makin’ it outta here!!
If Rocket didn’t come his way within the next ten seconds (how much time could a tree buy them?), he would literally tear that pouch right off his belt and run like flarkin’ hell anyway.
Not The Hero Type || Blackjack, Rocket, & Groot
Rocket got to the door on Groot’s shoulders, having aided in taking down the nova corpsmen alongside with Blackjack. When they got to the door, he got down and hooked a small device to a security door’s computer panel. A few taps on the screen while the ringtail hummed to himself and the doors swung open.
Be-bing!
They were in. The security door swung open and there was a metal display at the end of the hall waiting, the room had more corpsmen in it guarding it ready to attack the three of them, all of them confused and panicked due to the heist.
“Take ‘em out Blackjack,” Rocket ordered, adding in a few new cartridges to his own gun as quickly as possible before joining in.
Groot followed the small Halfworlder into the elevator, toting Rocket who was still helping him to scout the area. They were drawing closer to their goal. The two creatures communicated with one another while Groot remained rather silent and waited for instruction from them.
It was a little cramped for space, so Groot was grateful to be free of the confines of the metal lift shortly after. It was calmer here, betraying the utter chaos they had ascended from.
“I am Groot.”
He lumbered along, lowering Rocket to the floor as the three prepared to square off against the Corpsmen who would try to stop them here. They were so near to their goal. There was no failing here.
Groot’s barky exterior thickened with sharp protrusions, and he waited for no creature as he engaged in frightening off the Nova guards. He roared at them and swung his fists, inciting a panic. He picked up one guard by the scruff of his collar and shoved him back out the large metal door.
“I am Groot!”
Hopefully this would clear the path for Rocket and Blackjack to work towards obtaining the infinity gem ensconced within.
He couldn’t believe he had to set his blaster to ‘stun’.
This was the only thought that popped into his head as the great tree monster next to him bellowed ferociously and at once set about spreading mass panic among the Xandarian guards. Once he flipped the settings Blackjack got right to it, letting out a tremendous yell as he ignited the blaster’s functions.
A colossal burst of cyan-shot energy exploded from the barrel of his blaster, sweeping the room at his deliberate direction and forcibly throwing a good number of the Nova Corps elites into the walls behind them. Instant knock-outs and decommissions. The Halfworlder stops after one sweep, not wanting to risk hitting either of his teammates as they moved forward and engaged with ther rest.
Blackjack wasted no time in holstering the blaster and scampering through the chaos of battle, straight towards the display case at the end of the hall. He was easily the fastest sprinter of these three, only made sense he make the grab-- right?
There was a small rough orb- kinda looked like a mini comet- placed atop a high pedestal, surrounded by a last set of glass(?) walls. Had to be it. There was nothing else in here. He dodges a last Corps soldier with ease, swerving and outpacing him to the goal. Once he reaches the glass obstruction he takes his blaster out again, sets it to Absolute Mayhem before punching a special switch.
A shrieking blast tears into the super strong material, set at a frequency that ricochets over the entire structure and shatters it. The loot is now entirely free for grabs.
“GRAB IT.“
He yells to the other two as he deals with that guard who’d just caught up to him.
Not The Hero Type || Blackjack, Rocket, & Groot
There was this pathetic kind of guilt that lied in the pit of Rocket’s stomach from knowing what they had to do, that or maybe fear. He really had a problem differentiating those two things from one another. While he had a pretty colorful criminal background, going against the law its self wasn’t his bag.
Good thing this was bigger than that.
Rocket, who brought a few tricks up his nonexistent sleeves, pulled out his work tablet and his nimble fingers guided a hologram map of the building. “Well the gem is gonna be in a metal orb, I think that’s all ya gotta know,” Rocket said.
“Right then… seems we gotta take this hallway down and… take an elevator up… then I’ll hack into the security system. Trank any Novas ya see so they don’t do anything stupid.”
“That should be fun, right?” The whole place was chaos. Wasn’t that typical?
Down a small case of stairs and down some ridiculously white hall they came to the elevator they needed to take. Rocket closed his hologram display and pocketed his tablet, pulling out his own modified tranquilizer before quickly scurrying up the giant tree-creature’s tangle of branches, preparing to fire at anyone who stood in their way.
Groot followed the two creatures through the halls of the Nova Corp. building, lumbering slowly behind and dealing with any of the corpsmen who retained shreds of an idea that impeding the mission of the three bandits was in any way advisable. Groot swung his barky arms to clear a path around the place, moving Xandarians along gently as he could.
“I am Groot.”
He ducked his head to get through the makeshift door that Blackjack had blasted into the wall. Groot stepped one foot first and then the other through the opening and then stood tall, waiting for direction.
Groot observed as Rocket withdrew a holographic map, listening for directions. For the most part, his job as he understood it was security. To make sure the two creatures of Halfworld made it to the gem. Anything less was sure destruction. But maybe if they got out of this alright, the reward would be handsome. Granted that there was anything left to be rewarded with.
“I am Groot.”
When Rocket climbed atop his shoulders, he began to scout out for the best path to get towards the security main. Rocket’s nimble digits would take care of the rest and disable the system. Once inside, taking the gem should be relatively easy.
Groot couldn’t help but fear, though, that they could possibly be leading their foe right to the treasure the mad titan so desperately sought.
But he didn’t let the others know.
As soon as they made it to the elevator, Blackjack started jamming his thumb repeatedly against the call button. Leaving it to the two heavy guns to take out any Corps goons headed their way in the meantime. (Not that he wasn’t a heavy gun, he just didn’t fancy takin’ any hits for a mission he hadn’t even come up with).
While the flora creature and his Halfworld compatriot took on the panicked Xandarian forces, Blackjack popped open the barrel of his blaster and restrung a few wires to speed up the recharge process. Who knew what sort of walls they’d come up with when they got to the actual holding location.
Clapping it shut, a toothy grin lit up his face when he saw the affirmative lights gleaming from the screen display attached to his big gun. Now officially packing 100% more power. His head darts up at the sound of the elevator, and with a yell he alerts the other, scurrying inside and holding the door open for them.
It’s a rough fit, especailly with the tree creature and press of fire on them, but soon the doors are closed and they’re on their way. A mere some seconds later finds them at a heavily sealed off doorway, elevator sufficiently broken so that no-one could follow them up here.
Slowly Blackjack approaches the doors, his blaster humming quietly as red lenses survey and flick over the huge metal structure.
“Okay, Rocky. Do yer stuff.“
Well if it isn't my old pal BJ. How you doing?
Could be better if ah’m honest. Got a lot goin’ on right now, Rocky.
Angela must not have hid her emotions well enough, making her a bit off guard. Seeing at BlackJack avoided her questions, she figured she would do the same, and with that she stood up and walked over to him.
“What are we waiting for, lets get going I can’t wait to see how this all plans out.” She gave him a cocky grin as she looked at him waiting for a reply.
At the very least she figured she’d see how things went and enjoy the ride while she was on it.
“.... If ya say so...“
Blackjack trailed awkwardly. Truth be told, he wasn’t too keen on having someone following him around while he was tracking Rocket down. Least of all a stranger, least of all a heavily armed stranger. It wouldn’t kill him to let her hang around a bit longer, just so long as one thing was made clear.
“Okay but here’s the deal. Once I close down on Rocket? I’m off. That’s my business. I’ll catch ya some other time after that, maybe.“
Maybe not. But who was he to predict the future these days.
“Yeah I bet this bucket could use a few upgrades,” he said as he went to the controls, and started yanking wires, before plugging it into a silver bar he pulled out of one of his pouches… the bar being the stick projector of his work tablet, and he showed Blackjack some of the weak areas of his ship’s specs and talking about improvements he thought they needed.
Rocket obeyed the rules of Blackjack’s ship, but ended up getting antsy as hell and ended up quietly working on schematics on his tablet on his own, trying to ignore the dwelling eyes that he’d feel creep up on him, only giving as much as an annoyed glance back at the culprits.
Time came soon enough that the mercenary’s ship was able to port at the mining community bore from a celestial skull. Seeing the familiar nebulas around them Rocket closed his screen.
“Now we’re talkin’,” he said with a grin as he saw they were nearly there.
“No interruptions, no casualties. This has been a good smugglin’ trip.“
Blackjack had gestured emphatically as their ship had broken Knowhere’s atmosphere. Once they’d come to port, the engines powered down and the ship came to a comfortable stall. The ramp lowered for them to disembark, though it was only Blackjack himself who accompanied Rocket off the ship.
He was pretty chuffed and pleased with himself. A successful ride through space, lotsa units headed his way, and his mind now turned to them upgrades Rocket had been yammering to him about. It’d been a productive day.
He comes to a stop once his feet touch the ‘ground’, folding his arms and leaning against one of the supporting frames of the lowered ramp.
“I’m stickin’ around only a lil while, so make sure ya get the rest of them units to us within the next coupla hours.“
Not The Hero Type || Blackjack, Rocket, & Groot
Now this was more his scene. Inside a building, evading and/or taking care of Nova dumbasses as they came left and right at the trio that had just ‘walked into their most heavily guarded building’. As if strolling through one of their pretty public parks, or kicking past one of their shimmering water fountains. Now Blackjack didn’t blame them for being a little uptight, hell even somewhat paranoid: not every day your whole city and planet were under attack by the Mad Titan.
Still, they could be making their job a little easier. At least answer his questions when he kept loudly demanding where they kept the ‘Power Gem’. Apparently that was the name of the thing they were looking for, information that had wittled down to his long ears in the brainless chit-chat that had swum around Rocket’s little teammates. Speaking of, he still couldn’t believe he was even part of this venture. Sweet talks of billion-figure units and the Nova Corps turning their head the other way for a while enough to coax him into doing what he did best.
The fact that it was Rocket and his flora friend with him in this only sweetened the deal. If it had to be anyone out of that whole crew, he’d want it to be these guys. A large explosive sound ricochets from his arm as his blaster burns yet another hole through a solid wall, the long legged Halfworlder stepping through the sizzling ‘doorway’ hole he’d made as he cast his head back and idly talked aloud to the other two.
“So what does a ‘Power Gem’ e’en look like? I’m just sayin’, how do we e’en know when we’ve found the d’ast thing??“
She paid no mind to his actions, what it all came down to was, it had nothing to do with her. It was already fair enough she could stick around for the ride. “Ahh ya don’t say,” was all she could comment about his future plans. The quadrants made her a bit curious, but not enough to really care to ask more about it.
His last comment did strike her as a bit odd. Was this not him being “normal” now she wandered. Her face remained cool though as she tried not to pay much attention to it. She wasn’t by any means worried, just curious about it.
“..........................“
Blackjack had packed up and hefted his bag over his shouler at this point,but turned and watched the lady with a curious eye. Her words had left him at an awkward impasse. He could just... leave. Pretend he wasn’t interested in what she had to say any more. But, that’d be a lie. He was mostly no longer interested, but. With an armor and weapon like that, he kinda wanted a good read on what she was thinking right now.
“What? Why’re ya still lookin’ at me funny?!“
"Happy Easter Ya D’ast Jackasses!"
“Yeah… you and your whole flarkin’ crew… Why’s everyone gotta be like that when I get on their ship? I mean gods forbid I might tune up your tech… Sheesh…”
At least Quill for the most part let him do his thing on the Milano. Probably why they got along as well as they did.
“You know… it’s fine,” he snapped, really not caring but the underlining issue was he just needed to get off that planet without causing a huge scene and attracting more attention to his current location since he was … alone. “just get my ass to Knowhere.” the ringtail said in a huff.
“Now that we can do.“
Blackjack voiced with at least a degree of enthusiasm, if belaboured. Ultimately he was just glad to have Rocket onboard with ‘the rules’. Truth was he was expecting the other being to be unable to keep his trap shut about what could use even extra tinkering around here - Blackjack would then make his own decisions about whether to let Rocket have at it.
With supervision, of course.
“We’ve got a whole flight ahead of us -- we can talk about the tuning up.“
And with that he turned heel, and headed up to the cockpit.
Rocket followed after boarding the ship as soon as he was summoned up by his fellow Halfworlder. He couldn’t put his finger on it but being on the ship gave him the same kinda vibe being in prison did… maybe it was just the whole ‘being surrounded by criminals’ thing.
“You are familiar with Knowhere’s coordinates, right?“ he asked, not wanting to risk being dropped off on some no named rock past Krylor.
“It’s us. O’ course we are.“
Blackjack had spun around on foot, gesturing to the veiled figures that lurked in the shadows. Quiet, all eyes on Rocket. Almost as if he was a new species altogether, when in fact they just shared the stringent ‘long time on see’ sentiment of their leader. They watched the almost-stranger as he walked further into the ship’s interior.
“Rules: Don’t touch anythin’, I’ll have my eye on ya, an’ I always choose the tunes.“
“Right behind ya,” Rocket said, as he followed the taller Halfworlder.
He had this hunch of why Blackjack kept insinuating how much risk might be involved wasn’t just for the danger itself that might just involve the attacks that could happen just by harboring a Guardian… but perhaps his reservations lied in the association. He pulled out his blaster just to have it out incase they had any trouble heading to the ship.
There was an underlying discomfort because of the exact reason Blackjack had confidence in their verbal contract, he was going to be outnumbered and while he had enough confidence that Blackjack was going to keep his word… he wasn’t sure how it’d sit with the rest of those mercenaries.
------------------
“Wait ‘ere.“
Blackjack had told his shorter companion after they’d arrived at the landing site of his ship. It was an impressive thing, for its custom modifications that spoke of unusual and particular technological innovation. Expertise showing itself in the blooms and shutters of plated metal for heavy, aerodynamic armor; extra gun ports under the sharp jagged wings, and blaster rail guns jutting out like two protruding fangs from the prow of the ship.
Perhaps thematically, the dominant color in her scheme was black.
Blackjack slinked up the ramp and disappeared inside. It was some time before he showed himself again, walking only a few steps down the ramp before he stopped and jerked his thumb back into the shadow-y interior.
“Mmkay. Yer good.“
By which he meant, the Brigade were fine with ‘im tagging along. For now, anyway. He’d promised them a quick drop. Nothing ‘committed’.
Seeing how her tension was obvious, she sighed and leaned back against a wall before speaking. "Well usually when people have to take care of business with others it ends up that way, at least from my experience." Her tone was calm and almost devoid of any emotion. True she did become friends with the guardians, but at the same time it was non of her business. Whether or not she had any intention to help them in trouble was up to how she was feeling when the time came.
She could tell this wasn’t going to go anywhere and that he would say as little as possible. Though she wasn’t the talkative type, it was probably best to change the subject. The warrior crossed her arms and gave him a smug look. "So after all this is over you got any other plans? I’ll probably go back to finding some scum to turn in." Her lips made a small grin at the thought of wrangling up some unsuspecting bounty.
Blackjack passed over her words of experience, pretending he hadn’t heard them. Rude, and obnoxious; but that’s just how he could be sometimes. Especially when he was avoiding a subject, which as of now, he officially was. The rest of the stuff she wanted to talk about was fine though. He could talk about that.
That stuff was easy.
“Same ‘ere. ‘Cept further out, I know some good quadrants for business... It’ll be back to those, and to ‘normal’.“
That was the ideal outcome, in any case.
