|
       |
*
After getting pinched, the drive seemed to last into infinity. The van that housed Teddy-Simmons bumped and careened through numerous roads, passes, and interchanges. There'd been quiet chatter about imminent plans and the Simmons-replacement mission. But finally, they had stopped. The van slowed upon entering some kind of facility. The temperature seemed to drop, and the first passage had a nearly dank smell - like the recirculated air of a cold storage room or basement buried deep within the ground.
Yet Teddy-Simmons didn't exactly have the capacity to move. He was supposed to be asleep. And sleeping bodies don't react to everything around them. But even in his not-slumber, he can feel the change in the lights, the strange crispness in the air, and the incredibly stark smell of bleach that permeates every inch of the creaking ground beneath him.
The displacement feels almost familiar, and the way the gurney he's been set upon weaves through the hall has a nearly reminiscent frame. But even in the reminiscence, something unsettles. There's familiarity. He, on some level, knows this place.
The sound echoes with marching feet and marching orders in a language he can't understand. But then, after a moment, the bed comes to a stop.
SHIELD - The Triskelion Lab
The crunch of crisps echoes through the microphone of Fitz's ear piece as he nomnomnoms nervously. To the side of the room, the constant banging of someone in the closet has him twitch slightly; grateful that Sterns had laid waste to this lab only days earlier. No one is around to hear !Simmons struggle against her closet interlude. Instead, the real Simmons remains safe and sound, and Leo Fitz the worst spy in the history of SHIELD.
Rumours of a plan to rescue Peggy had reached most people's ears. It's likely why the Skrulls had sent in !Simmons to spy on things, and it's fortunate that Leo already had a man on the inside to replace real Simmons.
The number of Jemmas out and about makes him overwhelmed. Or, it would if he weren't such a wreck about it.
BANG BANG BANG
The whack against the door of the closet prompts Fitz to wince. "Fitz! I don't know what you think you're doing but you have to let me out of here!"
Leo squints and glances towards the stairs as something begets his attention, "…this probably looks really bad…." His nose wrinkles. "Uh… that's not Jemma." He points towards the door.
*
Bobbi strode into the lab she'd ducked out of days before, her brows lifting as she eyed the cabinet where muffled noises escaped from. An apple half eaten in her grip. She was in her standard uniform rather than a lab coat. She'd been in on the plan, hell, she'd helped form it at the resturant. So as she passed the cabinet she banged on it with a fist in passing.
"Oh give it a rest. We're not stupid, shut up." She snarled, and kicked the bottom of the cabinet for good measure before she turned toward Fitz with a smile.
"Hey, are we getting this show on the road?"
*
Carol was walking down the corridor by the lab when she heard the commotion, pausing a bit. Wearing the standard SHIELD uniform, she changes direction from where she was going, going into the lab as she glances between Bobbi and Fitz, "Everything alright?" Her eyebrow arches a bit as she looks at the cabinet, then back to the other two agents.
*
Unlike every other central European about now, Wanda neither compulsively smokes or drinks coffee. Tea, on the other hand, she quaffs in volumes bound to earn an approving nod out of MI6. But this is SHIELD, not UKCOZY, and she might be the odd person out. Downing the last of the warm liquid in a mug leaves her contented as a cat, and the offending drink disappearing when certain agents vanish into the bowels of the building. The brunette frowns slightly to herself, and then draws her coat around her, headed down to discover what the nature of the fuss is. So it might seem. Her footsteps aren't audible much as she descends into the corridor and then the lab, looking back over her shoulder. "It is, of course, a Tuesday. Tuesday and its noise."
*
Billy ABSOLUTELY does not belong here. He's a kid, okay, he's like TOTALLY AN ADULT who is absolutely allowed to drink, but he's … young. Ernest. And not at all comfortable with scary government labs. Where they dissect people like him. So he is in a black outfit with a red cape— no one better say anything about that— his usual Going out To Save the World costume. And looking nervously around as he follows along with Wanda, making a solid immitation of trying to be her shadow. Her red shadow. Well she IS the Scarlet Witch, after all.
*
"It's a work in progress, yeah?" Fitz offers towards Bobbi. The chair he sits on, complete with wheels (that he's so proud of because it lets him literally slide around the lab, a feature that makes Jemma complain on the regular), slides back towards one of the many lab benches where he tugs a sheet away from some equipment. The beep beep beep of a signal follows Teddy on the makeshift map device they've rigged. "Right now it looks like they've stopped just outside the state." He taps the map. Technology does wonders.
And Carol stops by to look. Fitz squints and his gaze shifts to Bobbi. And then two week's worth of lying about the plan catch up to him in one long admission of guilt and exasperation: "I swear it's not Jemma in there — I mean it's not the real Jemma — she's in — " he waves his hand as if to say it's not important " — the one in there is an impostor that we subdued because they sent her to replace the real Jemma that we'd already replaced in order to get Director Carter back." He clears his throat and shrugs before he turns his gaze towards Bobbi with just a hint of apology.
He notes as he taps the side of his head. "I have my earpiece in still. If it's an emergency, Teddy can touch base. And real Simmons is uh…"
BANG BANG BANG
"…well, she's not in a closet." He shrugs.
The signal on the tracker, however, begins to skip, and Fitz's gaze deadens. "Uh. So." His eyebrows draw together. "I have some," his hand waves slightly, "not great news." With a cringe his gaze flits, "I think he's entering orbit." That was always the concern.
"I'd like confirmation that he's got the Director in his sights, but it might be best if…" his cheeks puff out before he looks towards those with mission experience. Yes, he will divert to their judgment. If only so he can eventually get back to his lab and his tinkering rather than the cloak and daggers nonsense.
*
Bobbi crossed her arms after banging on the cabinet, her gaze narrowing as she glanced back at it upon the bang. "Hey, keep trying that, and we'll see if your species is capable of surviving a fire under your feet, how's that?" She snapped, hatred for the aliens burning in her blue eyes. Then it was gone as she glanced back to Fitz and leaned over the table, a dismissive glance offered toward Danvers.
"Yes, welcome to the secret plan within a plan plan. Coffee should be over there.." She waved behind her. And frowned faintly as Fitz spoke. "We did cover the secondary tracking, correct? With the mild raditation? And we did cover contacting Act-F for use of their possible out of orbit capabilities? Yes? Tell me we did."
*
Carol says offhandedly to Bobbi, "They can't." Then she blinks a bit, wondering where /that/ came from, then shakes her head, "Okay, so, you have a Simmons decoy being taken to where they are, hopefully, holding Director Carter and were going to track them down and do a rescue." She glances between Bobbi and Fitz, making sure she's not missing anything, "And… when were you going to tell some of the heavy hitters, or is that what you're doing now?"
At the mention of out-of-orbit capabilities, "I… probably have a way around that. At least as far as getting everyone up there is concerned."
*
Finding Wanda behind someone out of the blue might be an upsetting enough experience, but the duplicated effect of two people where they might not be is double the surprise. Right? The witch does not slouch into the lab or evince any sort of discomfort on her path, gliding straight in to the hammerbeat of the threatened shapeshifter stowed in a locker. "So creative, Agent Morse. This is very good. I have liked your actions in the field," she says, announcing herself in the event no one turns around to see where the coffee is, in fact, a young woman in a corseted leather coat the colour of a good claret, and the marginally brighter young man of mildly younger years in her wake.
"No one thought that he might go up to space?" The question follows lightly on Carol's, and she dares to offer a bright-by-Wandaland-standards smile in the agent's direction. There is a certain fondness absent in her bearing much of the time. "Is the Director in space? We will help get her back. I have another way should you not have enough ways in, Agent Miss Danvers."
*
Space? Billy blinks a moment, then shrugs a bit. Whatever, his expression says! "I was going to get everyone there. That's what Teddy came to me to see if I could arrange, why he recruited me on his rescue team." he offers a little tentatively, looking around the room for awhile, "Is anyone like super awesome here?" Pause, "Besides Wanda and me?" he adds, "You know." He wiggles fingers. Electricity dances between them. "I mean you don't have to tell me or anything I'm just been from the start a little worried this rescue mission was undergunned, so I'm just like… you know… checking. And hey there is absolutely no debriefing or interrogating or dissecting anyone named Aether in return for him helping the secret creepy government agency, okay? I want that firmly understood."
*
"We have a secondary tracker and then some?" Fitz squints as he looks towards Billy, still wholly unsure exactly how that works, but not quite wanting to know the answer. His gaze shifts again towards Bobbi, "We have some access if we absolutely need it, yeah?" his eyes narrow somewhat. "But… if there are alternate means," of course, he's aware of many things in play at this moment.
"Uh, we definitely thought space was an option, yeah? Which is why we — " his eyebrows draw together. "We had a lot of thoughts around that. And we don't know for sure if the Director is or isn't in space… this was a way we could — " he's stumbling again. "There was a window. They wanted Simmons. We sent someone they wouldn't expect. We infiltrated. And. Uh. Space was always in the cards. But yeah, we can access other resources if needed, but it would be better if we could pursue this… well, now-ish instead of getting those resources moving, yeah?"
*
Bobbi folded her arms shot Carol and Wanda, and the little red unit of a boy that followed in Wanda's shadow a look. "Oh, space? Noo, never considered that aliens from some other planet would ever take their prisoners from here to space. That would.." She faked a dramatic gasp and roll of her eyes, "Make sense. Yeah, no we considered it as an option. We took the risk as a feasible possibility to try to find everyone that was taken." She shot them all a dry look and leaned her hip against the table.
"Also we considered the 'big guns' as you so kindly put it, yes. Why do you think we've increased blood work samples? For more lab excitement?" She was snarky, but then again, Bobbi had had a bad week. Bad few months, the whole invasion was getting to her.
That and drawing questions to her from Fitz was always preferable when the man was so gosh darn cute and vulernable to prodding.
*
Carol looks at Bobbi, "We'll argue about who should have told whom what later. Right now, it sounds like we finally have a lead, so." She turns and looks at Billy, giving the teen a wry grin, "Since it might take me some time to get my asset up and running, you said that you could get everyone there?" And at Billy's question about being super awesome, Carol just grins, "Something like that, yes."
*
Attitude hits an unimpressed wall. Talking space-octopi and teenaged attitude in the form of one's own pale likeness provide a measure of weary patience for posturing. Bobbi's irritation doesn't leave much of a mark on Wanda's expression or poise, though she gives the slightest inclination of her head in the direction of Carol. "I take responsibility for Aether. Teddy asked. He can have you back when he is with us. Good?" If they trust the Transian witch, then better for her to avoid arguments later. "Let's open the door and be out of this place. Time is not coin we have much of."
Spoken like a survivor and a thief, in a way.
*
"I need a door. Any door. You know. A thing that opens and closes and that people can go through." Billy says to Fitz, glancing at the way they came in, "Preferrably a door you don't mind needing to be replaced." Okay, he does not strictly speaking need a door but its how he's figured out how to go about approaching this problem, "As soon as Teddy stops moving— hey did he stop, Fitz?— I'll colocate the door and we can go save him." There's a moment when he pauses, thinking he is forgetting something: "OH right and that other lady." Priorities, you know? With at least one person speaking up for their super awesomeness, Billy looks a little relieved.
Fitz directs him to the closet, and Billy heads over to it with a nod to Wanda, "Right. Opening the door."
BANG BANG BANG "Oh hush." says Billy, "This is hard." And he rests his hand on the door.
And nothing happens? Well, to everyone but Wanda nothing likely seems to happen. He's not totally concentrating on Teddy: on something Teddy did that was simultaneously awesome and the worst thing anyone had ever done ever. He's not forcing reality to become, for one second, entirely about Teddy and about nothing else. He's not thinking about the door and forcing it to impossibly exist in two places at once. "I need to get to Teddy." he says, and reality does not *break* ever so slightly, in an ever so careful way, a crack opening up and shivering. "IneedtogettoTeddy." he repeats, and widens it, making it fit exactly between the door. "INEEDTOGETTOTEDDY." He pants. And … that's it. He steps back, looking… tired. "Okay, whoever is super awesome, go through." Into… the closet? He waves at the closet, "It'll be there for … I don't know how long so hurrying is good."
*
Fitz casts Bobbi a grateful smile. It's unassuming, timid, and just a hint bashful. Undoubtedly, Leo has his quirks. He still doesn't want to draw attention to them if he can help it. He lifts his eyebrows at Carol, but he leaves no remark. The simple multitude he could attempt to explain would convolute things further in light of the pact he'd made with the REAL-Simmons; a pact he'd managed to breach in two weeks flat. Failed spy; failed friend. He'd spend the better part of the day rehashing that later. The fact that he'd opened up ranks was telling enough.
When the portal opens, he's tossing earpieces towards those present, giving them a way to communicate back. "No idea the range. May be that you can't chat back, yeah?" his eyebrows lift. "But will provide support as I can, yeah?"
SOMEWHERE IN SPACE
The gleaming walls of a medical facility richocet, giving great light and length to a world entirely set apart. Four people reside in the room the team finds itself. !Coulson stands askance a gurney whereupon !Simmons (aka TEDDY) rests with a hand pressed to her forehead. Two other doctor-types dressed in labcoats sit about the room. While the lights above are white, red ones along the side of the building blink semi-irritably, and the buzz-thrum of the facility kicks into high gear.
*
Bobbi shot Carol a dry look at the near lecture like tone aimed her way, arms still crossed as she didn't budge toward the 'door'. She was human, plain and simple. Recover missions were not her specialty, nor were fighting aliens. So the blonde shrugged, turning to glance at Fitz. "I'll maintain security here and keep and eye on the ground. Make sure none of them wise up to what's going on or try to interfere." She picked up a radio.
"I'm going to scout around and make sure we're clear. Contact me if you need help Fitz." She nodded toward him, and left with only a glance spared toward Wanda.
"Good luck." She offered with a two fingered salute.
*
Carol looks at the closet door, then at Billy, then back at the door, "Alright, I'll take the lead. Let's get going." She glances back at the others, then opens the door and steps through to the other side. Which hopefully isn't going to cause a bunch of boxes to fall on her.
*
Acting Director Phil Coulson is sitting in Peggy Carter's office, having a heated direction with General Ross on the red telephone. "General, this has become non-negotiable! I need a backup plan and you will-"
*CRACK*
The bending of reality somehow catches the man, and he finds himself sitting on a chair, with half a desk before him, and a phone cord severed, dangling from a handset. He blinks, turns to look around, and finds himself settling upon the double of himself.
"Wow. I look good."
He quickly opens a desk drawer and withdraws a standard issue pistol. How lucky it wasn't in the other drawer still back on Earth. That said, the quintessential suit hops to his feet and follows along. Alongside Wanda, he asks, "Status Report?"
*
Narrowed eyes take in the shifting of reality to match Billy's will. Wanda remains within arm's reach of him but makes no effort to interfere until he is quite finished, no further traces of atoms rearranging themselves to suit his whims visible to her highly strange perceptions. One doesn't simply walk into Mordor unprepared, even cosmic or ionospheric Mordor, so her hands coming together brings down a shielding veil around herself and the younger mystic. Don't expect to see them, and they probably aren't there to the standard range of vision and hearing. Barring no one else, she steps through the door after Carol.
It of course might not seem like that, for now Coulson is talking to empty air. Unless he flattens behind her, then he might see her and nothing else. "Getting the director. Not lethal unless they are bad. He and I are your out routes."
*
"Yeah you might need to do the exit, Mo-anda." breathes Billy to Wanda, seeming seriously winded by the effort of opening is special take on a magic portal, "I don't know how soon I'll be able to do that again. Assuming it doesn't stay open long enough. I don't know exactly how long it'll stay there. There is a certain slight possibility it'll be permanent or at least until I make it go away." Permanent? He didn't mention anything about that to the SHIELD people. Oops. Its not actually permanent, but Billy just doesn't know. "Anyways, so yeah, like, everyone hurry—" And he's rushing through the door, following Carol and Wanda and the others, his first reaction is to see some creepy dude standing by… this girl. Wait: Teddy is shapeshifted into a girl. The spell brought them to Teddy. So: Teddy is the girl. (Momentarily he contemplates this and finds it something he doesn't quite AT ALL approve of) He reaches for !Coulson, and wills into place some bands of pure telekinetic force to wrap around and ensnare him. Unfortunately, its FAR weaker then it normally is, as he hasn't recovered yet.
*
The appearance of a door is enough to set things into motion. !Coulson reaches for the energy weapon at his waste — an innocuous looking gun, but the telekinetic energy works its magic and in short order his hands are caught.
"Anomaly in sector twelve!" one of the doctors pronounces into a comlink as they retrieve an identical weapon to !Coulson. He fires the very normal looking gun. But instead of a bullet, a blast of blue energy shoots into an array towards the group.
One of the personnel, meanwhile, draws a very large needle that he aims to use on Teddy. The hypodermic needle filled with clear fluid matches that which had been used on Teddy in the white van that had taken him in the first place. And the Simmons-look-alike isn't going to be effected. He wasn't the first time; he won't be this time.
Movement in the hallway(presumably it's a hallway??) seems to suggest they are likely to face far more than three aliens.
Within seconds, several more !SHIELD agents (some recognizable, others not) open a door. Armed, they enter carrying weapons of various sorts, but each is large, forboding, and generally awful. Among them are !Morse, !Maximoff, and !Johnson.
The blasts of various energy weapons fly towards the heroes in different patterns.
*
Carol blinks, "Oh, this is going to be /fun/." She cracks her knuckles, then launches into the air and flies right into the blue energy array. And… it doesn't even seem to faze her as she absorbs the power, crashing down into a group of !SHIELD agents, scattering them like tenpins as her fists seem to glow with the power that she took in. "We'll make you a deal. Give us the Director and we might leave you with a ship."
As one !SHIELD mook tries to raise his blaster-rifle-thingy towards her, Carol nonchalantly blasts him with a energy beam from her fist. "Maybe."
*
Teddy's eyes widen and he doesn't have to pretend to be surprised by a door opening where there wasn't a door before. Nor by those coming through it, even though he was sorta, kinda expecting it. Well, not the door but a rescue. Just not a door into the spaceship from Earth as part of the rescue. Then again, Billy did mention it as being possible. Seeing the alien approach with a needle, !Simmons rolls off the gurney on the far side and holds her hands up. "No, wait. Don't." Wait. Why's he still pretending? !Simmons starts getting taller, broader, greener, much more muscular and most definitely male. And then he punches the needle holding alien in the face. Hard. "It's not polite to drug a lady."
*
"… and armed?"
Coulson leaps beneath the desk, which finds itself plastered by alien laser bullets.
"With lasers!"
Coulson peeks from beneath the desk and finds himself looking at his own lower half. He crawls forward to get a better shot, and shoots his lesser half aimed at the armed hand.
*
Clarity remains to Wanda, who watches Carol fling herself into action, intercepting blasts. They can gush over the success of that plan later. The witch spins on her heel to face !Coulson, not an ounce of mercy burning in those cocquelicot eyes. Telekinetic force only needs to hold him so long as it takes to raise her hand, a tiny spheroid balanced upon the tip of her index finger. Pointed at him, the hex rapidly gains a brilliant light with the implicit purpose to wash away his grip on consciousness. Taking them down with nonlethal force was the name of the game. Not her fault, of course, if they shoot their own!
*
Witchy-witch teamwork, go! Billy flashes Wanda a grin, "I gotta learn me how to do that." Alas he won't be able to, but still. Once he sees !Simmons become Teddyhulk, he looks visibly relieved, but he holds himself back somewhat, — then he sees !Maximoff, and he looks outraged. "Oh no you didn't" and he flings a hand out — the telekinesis no longer needed, he switches to his other powerset, The Lightning. There's a bright flash of light as a bolt surges out of his hand to slam into !Mom, as he forgets 'non-lethal' and tries to end her. Unfortunately, with his strength what it is, its not as high powered as he would like. That and lightning isn't as fatal as people sometimes think. Still. "You were gonna kidnap HER? You flipping creeps!"
*
Carol's blast waylays the fellow it takes aim at. The fellow is plastered — beaten through sheer force. The energy of the weapons is highly volatile, and when used on the aliens themselves, definitely offers some semblance of beatdown to them.
Teddy both surprises and creams the doctor who had been treating !Simmons. No one had been expecting an impostor. Evidently this was not a plan the Skrulls had anticipated or even prepared for.
Coulson manages to shoot… the other guy, driving the weapon from his grasp entirely in the process. It's nice that his desk provides such great cover because it gets a heavy blast of an energy weapon that then burns up some paperwork — hopefully it wasn't imminently important.
!Coulson easily slips into unconsciousness from Wanda's efforts. The deep sleep reflects in the quiet snoring that emits from the back of the man's throat.
The lightning Billy sends to !Mom causes her skeleton to reflect brightly, which… is very not human. In fact, it turns out Skrull skeletons light up considerably under the force of lightning. And while Billy certainly doesn't end said Skrull, the iridescent colour and odd shape of the beings skull, bones, and general makeup demonstrate something entirely UNhuman.
Thanks to their training and efforts the action seems to die down for the time being, giving them a few moments to regroup before, undoubtedly, another onslaught will come their way.
*
Carol glances at Teddy's shapeshifting, then blinks, "Impressive! But you'd /think/ shapeshifters would be ready for someone attempting to shapeshift to fool them, right?" She grins and moves rapidly into the fray, pretty much unfazed by the Skrull weapons as she works on taking out the ones bearing the heaviest-looking weaponry with her energy blasts. And if one gets too close, like that sneaky !May coming up behind her… well, that's when they get punched into the nearest bulkhead.
*
Teddy pushes the gurney out of the way then looks over at Billy. "You're early. I haven't had time to find the their Director yet. They were about to take me to something called the nursery where they're holding prisoners. Strange name for a prison, isn't it?" And he doesn't really want to know why it's named that. "We should go this way." he says and starts for the 'real' door leading out. "Can you get a fix on her?"
*
Scrambling from behind the halves and now burning desk, Coulson holds the gun at his side until he runs forth and comes upon the gun dropped by his imposter.
Look at pistol. Look at alien laser gun. Look at pistol.
Poor pistol is let aside, clattering to the floor only to be replaced by far more advanced, distant third cousin twice removed.
The Acting Director observes the controls for a moment, before flipping a switch that causes the alien gun to whine in a pulpy, sci-fi manner.
"Danvers? Take point. Let's go get our Peggy back."
Moving aside to flank the others, Coulson readies the Skrullblaster and makes to fire as soon as more bad guys come into view.
*
Nothing like using the existing apparatus to cause more trouble. "Aether, again if you can!" Those lessons in arcane violence come to the fore as Wanda follows the forked lightning, her own likeness illuminated in a magnesium-white flash leaving a tightened line along her sharply delineated jaw. Watching herself sizzle a painful, miserable judgment is a somewhat harrowing experience, and it reinforces her purpose.
A word hovers on her lips, her hands rising in a flickering motion to bind the remnants of electrical discharge on the air. "Ramifica." Her bidding calls the plasma to follow channels opening up, twigs splintering off the main branch, diverging and cutting again, essentially forking to lengthen Aether's range and path towards the unfortunate Skrull. Possibly Carol, for that matter, feeding her more power. When it comes to crowd control, sow the wind and reap the lightning storm.
*
Billy takes only a brief moment to breath before he holds both hands out and quickly obeyes Wanda, the electricity arcing around his body as if in an embrace for a second before another lightning bolt coalesces between his hands and blasts out towards !Mom, aided by RealMom he might be back up to his full strength. He's moving forward as he does, because staying here is a bad idea, and if they have to blast past the foes to get out and to Peggy, so be it. Plus Teddy is going that way: he can't lose him again, "I don't know enough about her to try to pinpoint her." She's never kissed him, after all. He looks questioningly over to Wanda.
*
The group spills into the hallway, an area that is stark as anything they'd seen previously. The white on white motif continues, but it seems to wrap in a circular motion with the rooms of interest to the centre intersecting off a main sphere — a pattern which should look painfully familiar to Teddy. Director Weaver had the plans for this station in her desk; plans that he'd taken a photograph of.
The winding hallway leads down to more doors into the centre. Outside the hall, large window like screens display the stars and Earth itself; a sight that would likely be something to behold if there weren't imminent danger in their path.
Another crew of Skrulls meets them in the hall, but the fluster exhibited seems to suggest they aren't entirely sure if these are their people or not. Evidently impersonation can go both ways, as already seen.
*
Carol takes the lightning charge from Wanda, grinning to herself as she absorbs the energy, giving her another boost. Going into the hall and seeing the Skrulls approaching, she looks back at Coulson, "Director, I can keep these guys occupied, if you want to keep looking for her."
Then, she launches herself at the Skrulls, shouting, "FOR HALA!!!" as she lands in their midst. Apparently, genetic memories are harder to hold back when fighting the Kree's ancient enemies, taking an opportunity to blast a !Danvers in the face, "Of all the… arg!"
*
Teddy can't help but pause when he sees the windows looking out upon space and Earth. "So cool." he breathes. But alas, he's interrupted by Skrulls. Skrulls which seem to be occupied. "I think they're this way." he says, deciding to take Carol at her word and continue on. "I saw the blueprints to this place."
*
"Wanda, go with them," Coulson directs Wanda, nodding his head toward Billy and Teddy. Apparently he's going to remain behind with Danvers, because Phil Coulson has a rule; never leave one agent alone in the battlefield.
Still, she seems to have it well enough under control. He's got a backup plan that he quietly hopes will not come into play, but he needs to be prepared for it nonetheless. So, while Carol goes to work on the Skrulls, he moves toward the wall, searching for anything that might resemble a communications interface. "Help! She's one of them!"
Here's to hoping one of those Skrulls might break free and come to help him. Hey, they don't know that !Coulson is goo, right?
Here's to also hoping Carol takes the hint.
*
Admiring the view of space for someone whose very being resonates with stars practically begs Wanda to halt. For a moment, staring out into the void and allowing memories to filter through, briefly. Sanity on the battlefield counts for something. She nods curtly to Coulson, and draws into a quick dash. A metric kilogram of honey may end up thoroughly consumed by daybreak to replenish her stores for this fiasco, but until then, the witch gestures to Billy and Teddy. "Follow this." Biting into her lip brings up the rich protest of a sting, then she draws out the mudras with some difficulty. Not for nothing is she drilled constantly by the Sorcerer Supreme, and it shows. A globe manifests between her palms, not large, about the size of a navel orange. Shedding plum sparks, it buoys up into the air and zips away, wobbling between the walls and searching for the signature of Peggy Carter, missing director at large.
*
Billy's looking to Wanda was for good effect, apparently. He flashes her a quick grin when the shiny lighty thing appears, and with a quick nod, he's movingn after it. After two steps he's floating in the air and wrapping his telekinetic force around him for a makeshift shield: he's faster and more maneuverable this way, and marginally safer. "Okay! Teddy! Follow the Wandawisp, she wooshed it into a tracker!"
*
Teddy's instinct is right on the money. Having peered at the blueprints before, he has a good idea of where to go. The nursery is exactly down the way he instructs, and the orange globe Wanda creates zips in the same direction. Following both, the crew, in short order, come upon another room. The keypad outside presents the first barrier, but it yields easily enough to their machinations.
Once inside, unconscious bodies frozen in large cylindrical yet-see-through containers line the room. Numbers are printed across the top of each in large block characters. Among them are a few familiar faces, including the Director of SHIELD. Peggy Carter looks serene. She appears as she always has: solid, stoic, British.
Each of the human bodies seems to display much the same expression. Asleep. Peaceful. Almost empty.
Back down the hall, the Skrulls aren't easily letting the SHIELD agents be. While they take the zaps and some are dispensed with, others come up behind them. Coulson manages to find some kind of communications panel, but the characters are in a language he has no understanding of. It's odd to say the least.
*
Carol glances back at Coulson, but doesn't exactly have time to acknowledge his scheme as she's set upon by yet more Skrulls. She keeps getting hit by the blasts, which she can mostly absorb, though she starts to actively glow now, even as she's unleashing blast after blast, taking out the !SHIELD agents as she makes a most effective distraction.
*
Teddy leads the way by memory as much as he's following the wisp. And when they get to the kidnapped agents, he lets the others take the lead. He has no idea how to get bodies out of giant test tubes. Instead, he goes back out to the hall to keep watch. "We should blow the ship up before we leave."
*
The floating orb circles needlessly around Peggy's cylinder, eager to prove its usefulness with all the highly limited sentience such a spell possesses. Shedding a soft glow of lilacs and orchids over the the Director, it might almost make the horrific scene marginally pretty in a way. Always is the little things that count, right?
Slower to follow than the other two, Wanda's caution gives itchy fingers. Bringing a knife to a blaster fight, however, limits options. "What they have done…" Bitterness tinges the incomplete sentence, emotions rising on her gorge and shoved away. Composing herself over some moments, she gives her head a sharp little shake. "Could they survive going through the air back to Earth?" Foreign accent alert; the limitations of her English are maddening, but the best she can manage. "Agent Danvers might fly the ship. She was part of NASA, and very good in the air…" Luftwaffe is so the wrong word here. "Military air group. This is much to move. Together, both of us, maybe? But if it is not enough, it's many bodies."
*
For a moment, Coulson considers the shame of his timing. If he'd only taken the vigor half an hour ago, maybe he'd be able to make sense of it all… but as it is, the drug is dying down, and with it, his amped up perception level. "Damn," he curses, then throws four or five switches without even really considering it. At worst, it might throw the aliens' comms into disarray.
Flattening against the wall, he levels the Skrullblaster and fires away at some of those who keep attacking Carol. Essentially, he's using all of the Carol mayhem as cover, of a sort, and picking his shots as he can.
"Maximoff, report!" he calls over his own comm system.
*
Billy looks to Wanda for a long moment, uncertain, but he nods, "We can try." He looks to Teddy, "If we open a big door, can you get them through? I don't know if it'll work but I can't think of any other way to save everyone, not just the Director lady." Pause, he looks around, "Whichever one she is."
*
Carol suddenly flies up in the air, then rapidly descends, crashing down into the deck with a shockwave that knocks the remaining !SHIELDies around her flat. She then looks around and… blinks as there's none left, between Coulson's sniping and her own work. Then she looks over at Coulson, moving over towards him, "Has Wanda found them yet?"
*
Teddy looks back at Billy then over at the statis tubes. "Yeah, that won't be a problem. If you can open something large enough, I can get them through. No problem." They can't each weigh much more than a ton or so. Two at most. "And then we can blow up the ship if someone can't fly it back down." Alien invaders don't get sympathy.
*
Wanda reaches into her pocket and comes up with a nutrient-dense bar of the sort used in the military, space program, and by desperate parents trying to keep their preschoolers satisfied between meals. Hastily munching it down, she takes those critical moments to give herself a caloric burst while measuring out the dimensions in the middle of the room. Her little trace spell fades out, and she walks the orbit widdershins, three times anticlockwise, hurriedly eating her tasteless bar and drawing shapes with her fingers. Or she's conducting music silently, whatever it is. On the third circle around, the witch nods to Billy. "I think it is wide enough. Say where, and we will do it. Trishul willing, we will land in one piece."
*
Well, there's no preventing it. Phil gets knocked right on his ass too, but fortunately, he was able to hold onto the alien gun. "Yeah," he discerns based on the comm chatter. "We'd better hurry, or we'll miss our trip outta here."
Turning, Coulson runs down the hallway, following the sounds of voices as they draw louder.
*
Billy watches Wanda, nodding his head slowly, and eyeing the circles she traces, and he goes over to crouch down right at the edge, laying a hand on the ground. This isn't a door, but… The door was just to help him visualize. "I'll get it started and if you could add your wooshing to mine at the end when its forced open, I think I can do it. And maybe not blow up." So he concentrates, and he presses, and he thinks. Where to? Why, Central Park. A very specific place in Central Park, the very first place he stepped foot in 1963. He doesn't discuss plans of where, or others might suggest a better idea, but that place he can feel a travelling affinity for. "Escape from mars." So he concentrates, and reality bends, and… "Escape. From. Mars." and… cracks, shatters, and for a breath there is a giant tear in the fabric of everything, and then… "ESCAPEFROMMARS"… and its knitted back together and there's a giant hole in the ground.
*
The hole in the ground gives the out to get back to Earth. The space and capacity to do so is magicked by those capable of guiding the cohort home. And in short order, with each of the tube-bodies in tow, the heroes reemerge in Central Park.
The world of the vessel is left behind with its aliens left to fend for themselves.
A central problem still remains.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow. I feel my fate in what I cannot fear. I learn by going where I have to go. We think by feeling. What is there to know? — Roethke
*
Billy? He promptly throws up. Loudly.