|
   |
It's long after nightfall and it's a worknight. Steve looks at his watch by bending back his armor. "Just a little bit longer," he says to the figure in the darkness. They're standing atop a roof, looking over what is rumored to be a haven for organized crime. Steve isn't sure that it's not just a way for people to be racist against Mutants, but it seems like something he should check out.
Her role tonight is simply surveillance. To let Steve know, by radio, what is happening outside of the building should he need to be inside it. She is, in short, the eyes and ears.
But, then he hears something.
He holds out a hand to her and tilts his head. "Someone's coming."
*
While Steve had met at least moderate reluctance at the prospect of training at the gym, there had been none about surveilling folks. In fact, for Jack, this feels like a relatively normal Saturday night — with the exception of the life and death limits. Surveillance involves angles. And angles? Simple math. Ah, math. It's good to be home.
Jack leans back on her heels. Her jaw tightens and she takes Steve's hand. "Wait, isn't that my line — " she is the watcher, after all.
*
Skali arrives from East Village.
*
Skali has arrived.
*
Skali leaves, heading towards East Village [EV].
*
Skali has left.
*
"No need to run." Danny lands lightly on the edge of the roof, garbed in the green and gold of the Iron Fist with a mask tied over her head. She straightens up with a grin, though she looks around herself as well to make sure she's not the only one who's been taking the rooftop route.
Tilting her head to one side, she takes a look at Jack as she comes a little closer. "You're new." And oddly familiar. Darkness is a pain like that.
*
Steve's eyes flash confusion at Jack's words until he gets it, "Oh, right. Yeah." His whispers go normal once he realizes who's approaching them. "Don't punch her with that hand of yours, huh?" He smiles, "How are you doin, Fist? This is…uh…" Bucky?
*
Whatever her name is, Jack sincerely hasn't given it any thought. The new-comment warrants a strange, and very lopsided grin at the assertion. There's a moment of trepidation at the thought, and new somehow warrants an extra breath. "I… guess I am." The smile tightens, taking a much more guarded edge as she shrugs. Action doesn't always follow intention. "Just keeping an eye out for Cap." Clearly.
*
"Hey, the demon, vampire, and monster population's down a good ninety-nine percent, so life's gotten a lot easier," Danny smiles ruefully back at Cap, offering a hand over to Jack when she gets close enough. "Iron Fist. Good to see he's not on his own." Danny's not really the mothering sort, but she does like to see people happy. And safe. "Watching the warehouse, right?" she asks, tipping her chin toward the building in question.
*
"Yeah, you know anything about it?" Steve offers a pair of binoculars to Iron Fist. He brought two and let Jack have his straight away, given her responsibilities. "Didn't know if there was anything true to the rumors that there was organized crime in this part of Mutant Town or just folks wanting to complain about Mutants."
Every so often the warehouse opens and a truck comes out or a truck goes in or a guy goes out or a guy goes in. Pretty normal fare, other than the fact that it's late at night.
*
Jack inhales a sharp breath and considers the thought as she peers through the binoculars. "Well," her lips twist to the side thoughtfully, "given the time, it's pretty weird that anyone is delivering anything to the warehouse. Or, really," the binoculars lower, "that anyone is working this time of night. Except maybe security. I could see building security working right about now."
*
"Not really," Danny shakes her head, taking the binoculars to get a look for herself. "Except like your friend says, there shouldn't be people moving around like this. So it's fishy. Could be some of the people who'd been setting up shop in Hell's Kitchen and moved out during the whole mess there set up a temporary base of operations here?"
*
"Could be," Steve admits. "Or could be a misund—"
BLAM
BLAM BLAM
Or maybe Jack is right.
"Go. You get back, I get front," Steve says to Danny as he flings himself over the side of the ledge and disappears into the night and begins to plummet towards the ground.
Inside the warehouse there are people talking much louder than before.
*
Jack just holds onto her radio as she watches Steve head to the ground. She slides back into the shadow and lifts the binoculars to watch. Carefully she scans the street below.
*
"Or there could be shooting," Danny winces, taking a running leap for the edge of the roof. Her route down is a little more circuitous than Steve's - she's only human, regardless of her skills - bouncing her from fire escape to windowsill to dumpster before she hits the ground in a crouch. She doesn't stay there long, taking off for the back door.
*
As Danny runs by, she can see Steve leaping through a window and, presumably, sending broken glass everywhere. Immediately the gunfire begins to ring out and rather than just pistols, we're getting some good old fashioned 1930s style machine gun action.
When Danny gets around, she'll find that all the focus is on Captain America and there's no one who will be looking in her direction because they're all shooting at him. Through the window she will see 2 vans, 1 Cadillac, and three bodies on the floor.
Down the way, Jack will notice that there is a car that begins to start running and turns its headlights on. It begins moving slowly towards the warehouse.
*
Jack slowly treads towards the edge of the building and stares out at the car on its way towards the warehouse. She lifts the radio, and pushes the button to make a call to one of the parties' below, "Stars and Stripes, if you can hear me," she mutters into the radio, "you've got company. Vehicle down the block going too slow for comfort — "
*
Danny slips through the doorway at the back, taking advantage of the distraction. She's not bulletproof, but she's pretty good at working around them. Especially when she can get herself a human shield. Her first strike downs one shooter, though she keeps an arm around his neck, holding him in front of herself as she rounds on the next shooter, letting the last squeeze of the trigger fire in his direction. With two down, she drops the first man to the floor, already stepping into a third as a golden glow kindles around her fists.
*
"Gotchya Lady Liberty!" Steve yells into his radio, not sure if she'll be able to make it out over the gunfire. With Danny mowing down guys from behind, the gunfire lightens, until the last few men all happen to run out of clips at the same time.
"You guys have made a big mistake," Steve says ominously as he throws his shield, which promptly smashes the face of one foe and seems to disregard physics as it smashes into another, knocking them both to the ground!
There are but four more.
But then, there's a car. The one Jack mentioned. It pulls to a stop in front of the warehouse. Doors open and two large bricks, bigger than anyone Jack may have ever seen, get out. The giants make their way to the overhead doors.
*
Jack's eyes widen substantially as she brings the radio to her lips again. There's a small tremble in her hands as her fingers find the button on its side, "Two goons incoming. Ridiculously large. Big car out front. They're going to the doors. You two gotta get outta there!
"
*
Danny isn't stopping. She can't hear the comms either, so she's not aware that there are bigger ones incoming. She's human, but she's just so fast. Every motion is precise, nothing wasted, years of training ingrained in every muscle fiber. Training and sparring partners are hard to find here in New York. This is the only time she really gets to let loose.
*
Steve hears it, but can't do anything about it right now. He's slamming his knee over and over into the ribs of one of the men who he feels may have murdered those guys on the ground. He doesn't even hear the garage doors open. But as they blot out the light from the far wall, he starts to get the idea.
He works quick to get rid of the guys in front of him and then fires his shield at one of the men. It bounces off. No effect. Steve then runs right at them and leaps upward, about to try and reach for a kick to the throat, one of the sensitive points. But he's caught in midair. And choked.
*
The movement is enough. After radioing Steve, Jack runs to the fire escape and begins picking her way down the building, continuing to watch the road beneath as she moves. It's probably not the wisest move, but it's the only one she's got. She mutters an apology to her mother quietly underneath her breath as her feet make purchase with the stairs.
And once she hits the road, she cranes her neck to peek at the car left in front of the warehouse and evidence of any remaining occupants. She inhales a slow breath and ducks behind the corner, quietly contemplating the vehicle.
*
Danny has the rest of the normal-sized men on the ground in short order, but when she turns to check on Steve, it looks like he's having some other problems. "Well. You're a big pair." She's dealt with bigger, though. The one who's not choking Steve is his own concern, but she can't just let the other one kill Captain America.
Her fists glow golden and bright as she dives in to help, aiming a powerful strike at the giant's wrist.
*
Jack looks, but there's no one left within the car. Both of the occupants seem to have gotten out so it just sits there, idling. Presumably it is their getaway car after they crush Captain America and Iron Fist.
WHAM!
The blast by the Fist explodes the wrist in a rhyme that would fit much better a decade from now. The first explodes ina shower of …rocks? The giant yells as his hand is now missing. Well, it's not missing, it's lying there on the floor. In his anger he punts Steve right into the cinderblock wall!
*
With the car empty, Jack slides up to it and opens the driver side door. "The odds of surviving a motor vehicle accident when a pedestrian are about 1 in 46 depending on speed and duration…" she murmurs to herself. "No real momentum here, and they're huge. Broken legs almost imminent unless they can stop the car." Which would be a feat.
Her foot covers the gas pedal and she mutters quietly to herself, "I've got a bad feeling about this," before fulling pressing her foot on the gas, causing it to lurch forward through the open garage door… right towards the currently non-injured muscle.
*
Oops. That's not how Danny meant for that to work out.
But there's no time to lament what happened. There are two giant…well, giants. And one of them tried to take out Captain America, which is a problem. Punching stone was part of her training before she even became the Iron Fist. She can do this all day long.
Focusing her chi, she begins to pummel the giant, taking a strike anywhere she can to try to take a chunk out.
*
Jack's acceleration takes the car right through the knees of the untouched rock-monster who looks like a man. It carries right through and the knees turn to rubble as the car breaks through another weak point.
Meanwhile, Iron Fist begins pummeling, but finds that it's harder at the places where there aren't natural weak points.
In a rage, Steve has his shield and is leaping behind the one who punted him and attempting to drive his shield right into its throat!
*
Jack frowns as she puts the car in reverse to look at the other muscle. Again she accelerates to run over the giant hulking robot(?) once more. Her eyes widen and she just keeps shaking her head, ever-thankful that she bothered to put on her seatbelt.
*
Joints are fair game, then. When Danny can't make headway on the torso, she goes to the other arm, snapping at wrist and elbow, then goes low with a kick for the knees. Good news: Steve seems to have survived the punting. Good to know.
*
Now that they're all fighting the same dude, things get pretty tight. Jack runs the car right back into the other guys legs, busting them up good and proper. Steve goes flying onto the hood just after Danny snaps all sorts of pieces. A second later, it's all over.
Steve's head comes down over the window, looking at Jack upside down. "There's a joke somewhere about women drivers. I'm not going to make it." He grins at her and winks.
*
Relief washes over Jack's expression as she sees Steve rather than another assailant peek through the window. "Thank God it's you," she manages with a flicker of a smile. "Fist, you okay?" she calls back before opening the door to step out of the vehicle. "And, for the record, young men are more likely to get into accidents than women," she lifts her hands, "true story."
*
Danny flips backward, kicking off the main body of the giant just as Jack drives a car through him. She lands lightly, looking back up to check on the other pair. "All limbs accounted for," she replies to Jack, smile flashing beneath her mask as she straightens to get a look at the carnage. "How about you, Cap? Still breathing?"
*
"Gonna need a massage," Steve says as he looks over towards Danny. "But I should be alright." The moaning of the rock-monster mutant men is pretty bad and Steve feels badly for them, until he remembers how they are part of the crew who killed these guys. Then his sympathy wanes.
As sirens begin to approach, Steve reaches for Jack's hands to help her out of the car. "Fist, I'm not sure how much you like talking with the cops. If you could help keep the gal incognito, I can talk to the cops, or vice versa."
*
"Good!" Jack brightens towards Danny. A nod is given to Steve as she is drawn out of the car. "I'd like to really stay in the background on this… I'm just a spectator anyways." She takes a few steps back. "I can head back to the roof?" she offers.
*
"Yeah, not much for talking with the cops," Danny smirks, taking a step back. "Cameras. You know. Roof sounds like a good place to be," she nods, giving Jack a speculative look for a moment. Poor Steve. That's the look of someone who's going to have questions when Steve isn't around.