Violent winds battered the inside of the holding cell, the thick glass pulsated as the pressure within mounted ever higher. Whatever dust had settled within the cell prior to the wind storm now circled the extends, whirling about in a frenzy of motion, obscuring the figure in the center of the chaos.
Ellie sat, head down, in the middle of it all, red hair freeing itself from the tight bun atop her head and whipping about her face. Air seemed to leech out through her pores in a painful never ending release of current. Her hands tightly clutched a silver watch. Taking it off had been emotionally difficult, putting it back on in the midst of this storm would be physically so. Several more minutes passed as the raging winds contrasted with her stillness.
Finally she slowly began to push the watch back onto her wrist. It took great effort and strength despite the lightness of the device. Once she had it settled, she began to gradually twist the dial on her watch from it’s current spot at zero all the way up to ten. The wind that roared around her calmed with each partial turn until not even a gentle breeze remained. She took a few minutes to breathe in the still air.
Movement outside the glass caught her attention. Normally she would have to wait inside for at least an hour before one of the guards would come to check on her and let her out of the holding cell. This person was certainly not one of the guards, and someone Ellie had only seen a handful of times in the past.
She reached up and pulled her red curls from the bun and shook them out of their tightly woven state before cocking her head to the side and nodding towards the person outside the glass. “Came to see the show?”
The school was just coming into view, and Rogue had been flying for a solid hour minutes, in a jet plane that hardly got any use now except from the southern mutant. The powers that she had borrowed were just beginning to wear off, considering she had made sure this time to have prolonged the skin-to-skin contact with the students she had borrowed from. The mission had been a success, sort of--the bad guys had been stopped (some powered people holding up a bank with hostages), but Rogue had gotten a nasty hit to the head, and she was a little dizzy. Not exactly perfect conditions for flying a plane, but she had to get back somehow.
With some difficulty, Rogue landed the plane in the underground chamber. It was jerky, and there was a little bit of a screech and a grind in some part of the plane somewhere--she must have landed at the wrong angle. She hoped that wouldn’t be a problem later, but there was no one to look at it to tell her if something was wrong. Maybe she’d hire someone to look at the landing gear, just in case.
Rogue was getting out of the plane when she saw him. Blue and furry as always, very tall, and to Rogue, at least, eliciting a feeling of resentment. Look who decided to show his face. She held a hand to her head and walked toward him, one eyebrow raised. “Hank,” she said. “Fancy seeing you here.”
Blood Star Finale: Disappointed Dad | Hank and Remy
The enemies couldn't decide on a nightmare with Remy. Jamies, Rogues, even Jean-Lucs were fighting him. It was all fake, was Remy's mantra. What he wasn't prepare for was a gang of Juliens attacking from all ends. Ya not welcomed here, Diable Blanc! Something felt like a stab in Remy's gut, then shoulder. The world seemed to fade as he felt rushing wind. Something was carrying him away, unbeknownst to him, it was too the medic ward.
Hank saw Earth's defenders fighting furiously among a dark swath of the invading Foesitians. They looked like former X-Men foes, old girlfriends, lost friends, and even versions of himself. The doctor ignored all of that. His task was clear. As soon as Remy was swarmed by opponents and dropped to the ground, he sprung into action.
With a mighty leap, Beast landed in the center of the enemies next to the fallen Cajun. The blue apeman roared and let his frustrations out on a Magneto and an Apocalypse. They went flying in opposite directions as Hank proceeded to pound Mr. Sinister into the ground. Scooping up Remy, he found himself face to face with the pale dead Dahlia Hsiao. Clenching his teeth, McCoy turned away quickly and bounded back to the medical tent.
Remy heard the roar and groaned. Whoever grabbed him was fuzzy... Fuzzy? He opened his eyes, vision a little blurry.
"Hank?"
Remy's voice was raspy but loud enough for the other to hear. They were in what looked like a makeshift hospital - how many furry doctors were there?
"Indeed, Remy," the physician replied in a somber tone. He set his former teammate down gently on a gurney. "It appears that the powers that be possess a perverted sense of humor."
Placing his medical pack down beside them, Hank began to examine his patient. "I am going to be required to remove your garments. I cannot work with your shirt and coat remaining on your body." He slipped the jacket off as smoothly as possible and with a quick cut of the scissors, the shirt was open. Bleeding from the shoulder and stomach. Hopefully no organs were damaged.
"Ah, 'member the first time we met. Wanted ya ta'do that." Remy chuckled humorlessly. "Then ya got all blue an'beary."
It was too mechanical. There were times Hank had patched him up and teased him or joked with him or threatened him to sit still. But he guess this was Remy's fault too.
"I'm sorry.."
It would be dishonest to say that Henry had not thought of a similar joke himself. He did not give any response and just continued to rummage through his backpack. He retrieved some adhesive bandages, gauze, and a quick-bonding foam dispenser.
Beast delicately brought Remy to a seated position. "I must examine your back as well." A quick scan with his instruments revealed that Le Beau had been fortunate. The Foesitian strikes had gone clean through his side but managed to miss any vital organs. Foam squirted out of the gun to close the wound, then Hank laid down the gauze, and finally applied the bandage to keep it all in place.
"Good," said the doctor coldly. "You ought to be." His blue-grey eyes pierced into Gambit. Standing to his full height, he towered over his old friend and continued to work on his shoulder.
Remy didn't break his gaze with Hank. "I never ... This wasn't supposed ta'happen. None a'HYDRA was supposed ta'happen. I never meant ... I never meant ta'betray ya's. But Hank, ya gotta agree. There ain't no place for me back at the school anymore."
Remy's side hurt and he's shoulder was burning. But he ignored it. He had to go back out and fight. He had to make this right.
"There could have been." Hank side-eyed him and slapped another bandage on, not so carefully this time. "You were Braddock's closest confidant. You could have swayed him and ended this disastrous series of events before they had ever begun. Better yet, you could have informed the X-Men and brought Braddock down together."
Dr. McCoy leaned in and attended to the last injury on Remy's back. "Hundreds of thousands of people died because of your mistake," he whispered into the other man's ear. "If only you had done the correct thing at the time, they would have remained alive. My students, students you also instructed, would not have to live in fear along with the rest of the planet, of being exterminated by extraterrestrial forces. The woman I loved would not be in the ground now, if you had made the right decision. Since I learned of your betrayal, I wanted nothing more than to give you the old one-two punch to the face. But now I realize something: living with the guilt that your negligence and inaction led to so many deaths is a better punishment than I could ever dream up."
Remy looked at Hank. "Bring Jamie down? Hank, don't confuse my apology with regret. Hank," he sighed. "They lived in fear before. Ya know how it is ta'be a mutant. This was gonna be a better world.
"I don't mean for ya'love ta'get hurt. I lost the love a'm'life ta." Remy sighed.
"I was gone before Braddock came. I wasn't there when the Foestians came through. Even if I was, there was nothin' I could do."
Hank finished his work patching up the wound and withdrew. "Fine," he said simply. "Comparing how damaged we both are serves no purpose and distracts from the mission. Obviously everyone has suffered loss these past several months and you are no exception."
The mutant physician sighed and returned Remy's jacket to him. "I just cannot comprehend how you thought that causing all this death and destruction would result in a better world."
"I'll admit, I didn't know all this destruction was going to happen. But it's like Noah." Remy sighed. "Rebirth."
Beast grunted unenthusiastically. "Do you believe you made a mistake then?" he asked, genuinely curious. Soon the other mutant would have to return to the fray, but in the mean time, Hank wanted to extract as much information out of him as possible. If he understood Remy's motivations, then maybe, just maybe, he would be able to forgive his old friend.
Remy didn't answer right away. Did he? What mistake was it? Leaving Jamie to his own psychotics?
"Some mistakes, I did make."
McCoy looked back at him. Gambit almost appeared sad and defeated. The scientist had thought he wanted this, but seeing Remy now changed all that. He extended a hand to help his former teammate up off the gurney.
"I do not know if we can ever make matters right between us again, but perhaps this conversation can serve as the first brick in that foundation."
Remy took Hank's hand and offered him a grim smile. "I'd like that. I ain't meant ta'hurt ya. If it helps, if I survive this," he sighed. "I ain't goin' back ta'Hydra."
Henry nodded solemnly. "That is a fair start."
"I mean, I ain't goin'back ta'the school either." Remy made sure that was known. He didn't want to make it seem like that would be an effect of that decision.
"Indeed," he replied, sorrow tinging his voice. "I made that abundantly clear. Nor would I force you to return to us. I merely hope that you make the wisest decision for yourself."
Remy rubbed his shoulder, his wounds giving dull burning feeling. But it would have to do. "Don't sound so sad 'bout it... Even if I ain't an X-Men, don' mean I'm dead. Ya ain't gotta sit Shiva for me."
Hank sighed again. "No, I supposed it is not the worst path to take." The mutant physician glanced at the battle briefly. "We are needed out there. This can continue once we are victorious."
Remy grinned. "Such an optimistic. Ya think we makin' it outta here?" He said as he went towards the exit.
"Well, somebody has to be," Hank said, almost smiling back. "You can blame Charles Xavier for that pesky attitude of mine."
Remy laughed, grabbing his coat, deciding to ditch the torn shirt. "Nah, that's all ya." He looked back at the battle field, seeing a clear path back into the mess.
"See ya at the end, Hank." Remy ran back in, right back into the mess.
Closed/solo thread that is set after Detroit and just before the Save the President thread.
Other characters mentioned here:
aiming-at-light - Tyler Brandt
savagescholar
Considering Jock had never been on a boat in his life before (he was convinced that the Staten Island ferry did not count), he adapted to life at sea quickly and almost completely. He didn’t experience any sea sickness and while the sailors he was sailing with did not trust him at first, their mistrust of him did not last long.
He mucked in when he could with the chores and every couple of nights or so, he would come out of his cabin to join in with the sailors’ card games. He bonded with the lot of the crew to the point that they called him Jock-Strap and stopped asking what he was doing in his cabin that was so damn important and secretive.
Because that was the whole point for him being on the ship in the first place: his important and secretive mission from S.H.I.E.L.D.
Being out in the middle of nowhere with some of the best tech he’d ever gotten his hands on meant Jock was able to find Hydra’s system of networks easily. What wasn’t so easy was actually getting into them and decrypting them.
He had spent hours couped up in his cabin, his fingers tap, tap, tapping away at various keyboards and buttons, trying to crack the seemingly endless amount of code Hydra had written to protect itself. If members of the crew didn’t drop by every now and again and insist Jock join them for card games, there had been every chance Jock wouldn’t have left his computers alone. Normally when he was working from home, he hated interruptions. Here he was glad of them. Talking with the rest of the crew and hanging out with them helped his brain calm down and get some perspective on what he was doing and why he was doing it.
He sent back reports on his progress (or lack of) to Brandt every Thursday via an encrypted communication channel he had written himself. He also sent reports to Hank McCoy too because Hank had been the one to encourage Jock to help Brandt and S.H.I.E.L.D. in the first place. Jock hated the fact that his progress reports were always so empty, highlighting the fact he was getting nowhere fast.
After a month of practically nothing, everything happened all at once.
Jock had been talking with one of the crew mates, a guy about his age called Bobby, about the Yankees chances of winning anything this year when one of Jock’s machines started beeping. Bobby barely had time to ask what that meant as Jock raced back to his cabin and slammed the door behind him. Finally one of his decryption programmes had hacked into Hydra’s communication networks. One of his screens was filled with messages going back and forth between Hydra agents. The latest was them speculating if Nick Fury was still alive or not.
Jock scrambled to get the newly hacked information sent off to Brandt and McCoy when another machine started to alert him to something else. It’s screen was filled with symbols and characters Jock had never seen before. Instinct told him it was alien. He hit send on the message about Hydra and turned back to the alien stuff. He typed furiously to get any and all translation programs working on it.
One beep meant on more alert. It was a message. It was from Brandt.
Brandt was dead.
Jock slumped in his chair, his hand on his mouth. He didn’t want to believe it. He refused to let himself believe it. What the fuck was he supposed to do now?
Jock wiped his hands over his eyes and got back to work. He continued to send message to Brandt with the hopes that his successor could be trusted with this kind of information. He messaged Hank about Brandt and about the alien discovery. He even messaged his Mom, although he didn’t mention anything about the work he was doing; he needed to contact her as his grief for Brandt got worse.
The machine working on the translations beeped again. Jock turned his head to look at the screen as one word flashed up in bold lettering: THANOS.
Shit. Fuck. Bugger. Crap.
One last round of messages about the translations was sent before Jock bolted out of his cabin to the ship’s helm. “Jock-Strap,” Captain Holmes said cheerfully, “what you doing up here?” The Captain’s cheerful disposition quickly faded when he saw the grim look on Jock’s face.
“I gotta get back to New York, Captain,” he said, pleading with the Captain with his eyes. “The shit is hitting the fan hard.”
“That top secret stuff you been working on, it’s to do with that ain’t it?”
“Yes sir. Please. There ain’t much time to waste. I gotta get back.”
Normally Captain Holmes wouldn’t take orders from strange civilians who were hitching a ride on his ship. Normally Captain Holmes wouldn’t take any orders from anyone other than one of his superiors. Normally Captain Holmes would’ve kicked the hitch-hiking civilian out of the helm. This was not normal.
{text} Hello, my darling. How are things fairing with you back in the Big Apple? You are in my thoughts. - Henry
[Text] Henry! I was actually just thinking about you. Well, no one has taken a bite out of it so things are going pretty great. How are things over there? I hope you are well. -Dahlia
Sitting in Doctor McCoy's office always reminded Jock of all those times he got in trouble at school. He got dragged in to talk to the principal so many times he actually lost count, and every visit made him feel even worse than the last. No one was particularly surprised when Jock finally dropped out of school and Jock had never expected to feel that awful feeling of dread in the pit of his stomach he had always felt before seeing the principal again.
He wasn't even in trouble with Doctor McCoy!
He was here to get back online and help McCoy do some hacking. Jock was itching to get back into his favourite trade after being unexpectedly cut-off following the explosion in Detroit. He could understand the reason for the shut-down but he couldn't stand the lack of access. He couldn't feed his addiction to hacking and if he didn't find a way to sate it soon, another addiction of his would soon surface and he really didn't want that to happen.
He nervously chewed on one of his fingernails while he waited, his right leg bouncing up and down restlessly. He kept checking the time on his watch, sighing out exagerratedly when he saw that only another thirty seconds had passed since the last time he checked. "C'mon, Doc," he muttered. He just had to be patient, but patience had never been one of his strong points.
Location: Madripoor, Southeast Asia
Time: Somewhere around 3:00 AM
Darkness had descended upon the environment hours before and had swallowed the details of the surroundings completely. The ominous thunderclouds above were concealed in the blackness as consequence of their presence, which had blocked out the illuminative stars and equally radiant moon. The notorious assassin approached the concealed location waded in shadows, hidden in the shades of countless trees of which the leafless branches reached towards the sky not unlike claws. The scent of rain filled her nostrils, but her attention was located somewhere else as she manoeuvred soundlessly but with undeniable pace through the neighbourhood. The ominousness didn't bother her.
Aware that she remained invisible to the prying eyes of questionably innocent civilians, she reflected upon her time with the Secret Avengers. The man, codename the Beast, she had become acquaintances with when both of them operated under the protective concealment of the labels superheroes and members of the black ops branch in which the both of them had been rather abundant components. Nevertheless, she had never approached them with business unrelated to the organisation, nor had she been able to decide the extend of his adherence. Nonetheless, considering questioning him would inevitably raise suspicious towards her as consequence, she would not. His trust in her capabilities and intentions was of importance in this mission, especially since her agenda differentiated from his but the successfulness of said different plans depended on him more than was favourable.
As consequence of their statuses the partners had travelled towards their final destination separately. Natasha, herself, had arrived hours prior in Lowtown, Madripoor, when the clouds had been less present and the sun had been capable of illuminating the earth beneath. The place had once been a haven for pirates, a tradition that was somewhat continued with the lawless quality of the island. The nation had been supposedly taken over by HYDRA with Madame Hydra as de facto ruler, using the island to finance terrorist plots against the world. Hydra's terrorist operations had already caused deaths in the thousands. Therefore the widow figured she'd devastate them before the situation became even more uncontrollable, which was the real reason she had agreed to an operation with the Beast.
He had been told that their collaborated intentions were to save the women that had been abducted and were to be sold. SHIELD had woven a web of lies for the widow again, now it was up to her to pull the correct thread at the correct time to unravel the truth in such a manner that he would feel obliged to help. It'd be hard, but it was doable, Natasha concluded as her pale knuckles made contact with the material of the door. One knock, another, and then silence. Patiently she waited for him to open.
