The Trial of Jean Grey - Log 6

[x-gambit.livejournal.com]

Strike team one under Remy goes after the main holding area to retrieve Jean



The teleport in left no more than a whisper from the air being distorted, and Remy stepped out with his ramshackle assault team. He's worked with Blink before, and Cammie was part of his team. But Arthur and Adrienne were new to him in terms of deploying into the field. He didn't necessarily know what to expect, which made an already dangerous and difficult mission even more so. They had found enough intel to pinpoint the area that Jean was likely being held and Ororo's team should provide more than enough distraction for Marie-Ange's to shut down the security alerts. That still left them with a heavily guarded prison complex to crack.

"Scorpion, Blink, watch de corridors." Remy said, positioning them out to watch for distractions as he approached the panel beside the door they were in front of him. The emergency exit from the prison was heavily rigged with locking systems, but it had the advantage of being largely unguarded. All they had to do was break through some of the best security tech in the business. "Cover Girl... really? Cover Girl? Fine, dis is a thirteen pin security keypad. Think you can get us a correct code?"

Adrienne struck a model's pose and finished it up by flipping Remy off. With an innocent smile she set her middle finger against the keypad to get the code. "Before I open it," she inquired a moment later, starting to type, "is there going to be an army on the other side of this door? Because, y'know, I wanna make sure you guys are ready to party or some other action movie line before I crack this thing."

"I think Cover Girl is a delightful name," was an answer to a question no one had asked. Arthur, however, provided an earnest smile with the statement as he peeked over Remy's shoulder inquisitively.

"Non, no army. Dis is de only way in dat doesn't involve killing hundreds of Indian special forces." The door hissed open, and an innocuous corridor extended out in front of them. Remy walked to the edge of the door and squatted on his heels, looking down the hallway. Finally, he nodded and stood up.

"Like Remy thought. Multiple security systems, a dual override, and EM pulsers dat would interrupt teleportation. Which is where you come in, homme.”

Arthur gave the Cajun even wider smile, happy to be on use. "Where do you need me?"

Remy clasped Arthur on the shoulder. "It would take an extremely lucky man to make it to de end wit'out tripping de alarms. Heard dat you de one to talk to 'bout luck. You think you can get to de end?"

This got a scoff. "I have no idea, but I did do my share of spy films."

Arthur squinted down the hallway and rolled his shoulders, "What kind of bet would you put on laser motion sensors? They're always in this type of scene." His body language was confident, and he hopped a couple times experimentally. There was no movement from the bandoleer of throwing knives strapped across the blond's chest, and this seemed to please him.

"I always figured laser motion sensors were a movie thing," Adrienne mused, touching one of the walls to try and glean some more info for Remy off of it. "So I'll bet you five hundred bucks."

"You heard de lady, homme." Remy said, stepping back to let Arthur go.

The ex-star took a deep breath, letting his whole body relax. There was a dramatic pause before he tensed, readying himself, and readied his first step.

Nothing. No alarms.

Another step. Nope.

Arthur turned back to shrug at the audience as he kept a normal, unconcerned pace down the hallway without any excessive theatrics or gymnastics. It was not, however, a straight shot. A pivot here to look back. A tiny scuff of the feet there in a slick spot. A tense pause to react to some imagined sound from an adjoining hallway. All tiny microgestures that resulted in deftly avoiding traps that only luck knew were there. It wasn't long before he was at the end, and how Arthur intended to cap his performance with a flourish and bow was instead replaced with impressed slackjawedness as the blond found he had a shadow.

Remy's eyes and senses had tracked him carefully, imprinting those moves in his mind. As Arthur finished, Remy launched into motion, exactly mimicking the other man's movements until in moments he was standing next to him.

"Good job. Hit you switch on three." They flipped the overrides simultaneously, shutting down the security systems in the tunnel.

"Oh gee," Clarice headed down the hallway, "That was...." too easy wasn't quite right, especially given Longshot's powers, but....still. "I was looking forward to some sort of weird contortionism and involved contraption to get through the sensors, but nope. We got a four leaf clover and Mr. Mimic instead," not that she was complaining.

"Dis is you issue? Next time, Remy let you teleport in de teeth of de enemy." Remy said, prepping the door. "Once dis is open, Remy and Longshot make a distraction. Scorpion, you need to locate Phoenix as soon as possible. Cover Girl, you and Blink get her out, ASAP."

Adrienne nearly forgot she was talking to Remy and not Scott and almost complained about wanting to hang out some more with Arthur- she really liked that guy- but caught herself at the last moment and snapped her mouth shut. She didn't think he'd appreciate another of her special one-fingered salutes, either, so she just nodded and slapped her hand against an adjoining wall at the end of the corridor they'd come down. "They brought her down this way," she told Clarice and Cammie with a nod of her head, leading the way and Reading the walls every few feet as she tracked the route the guards had taken Jean.

"Well then, what are we fucking waiting for?" Cammie said, pulling the binding off of her left arm, "I have an itchy stinger."

As the three ladies left, Arthur and Remy were alone by the door. An echo of a passing patrol sounded faintly from the complex’s interior, but the television star seemed more concerned with running a hand through his hair anxiously.

It took a few heartbeats for him to find words for what he wanted to say. His words were quick since Adrienne and all were getting steadily further away. “Listen, Remy, I think it would be best if I went alone. I mean, bullets" — then the door Remy had prepped opened early, giving the passing guards full view of the South African television star’s brainstorming session. Remy’s position was still concealed behind the doorframe.

There was a beat and Arthur struck his most sincere smile. “Hey mates. I was looking for the restroom. Got any ideas?” He winked, and his left eye pulsed a starburst of yellow light. “Oh, hey, look at the time…”

Arthur took off down the newly exposed hallway at a sprint, drawing both guards in the opposite direction from what Adrienne’s reading indicated. A shot sounded over the guard’s confusion exclamations, and then a loud hiss accompanied the sudden release of compressed coolant. A white fog quickly covered the adjoining hallway.

A familiar voice came trailing back in retort, but faded from earshot quickly. “Good try, but what did that extinguisher do to you?”

"Guess dat's a distraction." Remy said as he entered the fog. Normally, he'd be lethal, but he wasn't looking to create a massive body count. Instead, he plunked off guards one by one, rendering them unconscious as he slipped in and out of the fog like a wraith, striking quickly and disappearing as fast.

Adrienne stopped suddenly in the maze of corridors, only twice having to duck out of sight of passing guards, and did a 'tada!' gesture for Clarice and Cammie in front of a nondescript-looking door. "I present to you... the cell of Doctor Lush."

"....all that security and this is it?" Clarice asked dubiously, looking at the door. It was solid metal with a lock, but nothing that looked too serious. Then again, they probably hadn't expected anyone to get this far without passcodes and security clearances. Reaching into a pocket, she pulled out a little lockpick kit. She'd learned to crack safes years earlier from Remy and lock picking was an easy offshoot. "Alrighty then, here we go..."

"Let's do this," Cammie said, ready for a fight and striking a fighting stance, her green eyes hard and her left hand up and balled into a fist. The fact that there weren't any guards in the cell threw her and she put her fists down, "The fuck...?"

The cell reminded Jean of the Box, except without the comforts. It was merely a concrete slab, sink, and toilet. The imperial guard, once they had captured her, had made some...modifications that were not kind. As a result, Jean could not do much but lay on the slab. She heard the fighting in the corridor, the voices of the cavalry. But her mind was elsewhere. She remembered the dreams. It felt like more than just a what could have been. And she also felt something from within, stirring. Somehow she knew that the collar was only like putting a band-aid on a dam to stop it from leaking.

When the door opened, Jean tried to move, but her body felt disconnected from her mind. It refused to do much other than lay there.

"No....they'll kill you," she said.

Adrienne gave Clarice and Cammie her best 'is she kidding right now?' side-eye look before she smirked at Jean. "We got this far but now someone's going to kill us? So... they weren't trying before? Good to know!" she joked, touching the wall to check its history for bobby traps or...something- she had no idea what, really- that might kill them. "C'mon, Lushy," she cooed good-naturedly as she crossed the cell to the concrete slab and took one of Jean's hands to help pull her up. "Maybe you can rent some vacation property here and come back later, but for now you're booked on a flight home. I got you a ticket to the Rockettes Spring Show. Can't miss that."

Only when she'd pulled Jean up did Adrienne notice the kinky-looking dog collar she had on. She touched it and frowned at her friend. "Ruh roh. I really should pay more attention to what Frost Enterprises does," she muttered to no one in particular. "I can see people talking about a 'feedback system' and a 'suppressor', but I have no idea what those things mean. I think having a professional deal with disabling that stuff would be better for all involved. Don't want to explode you." She flipped open a tiny compartment to reveal the wiring inside the collar. "I can disable the receiver on the remote detonation, though. So, y'know. You don't get exploded."

"Okay, let's get the fuck out of here now. While we still fucking can," Cammie pointed out, "We might not get another chance."

"So long as I can get her out," Clarice agreed, leaving quickly was a good idea. "I can't promise I'll be able to get back in though with the shields," maybe? Hopefully. She didn't want to abandon those inside without a quick way out.

As if she were making a shoe, Adrienne hummed as she worked on disabling the remote detonation function of Jean's kinky dog collar, tongue poking out from between her lips. "No offense," she muttered to Cammie and Clarice, "but I'm totally fine with not coming back in here. Ah hah! Done! No exploding Doctor Lush remotely," she explained proudly.

"Thanks," Jean said. There were so many of them here to save her. But Sam, and Sharon, and Yvette, and Matt would never be. Or Nathan. Or Moira. God, did Rachel know? They were dead, they were all dead. It would never be the same. Why could they never be happy? Why did it always end in pain?

Her eyes seemed to flicker orange for a split second, almost hardly noticeable, but the collar did. A light turned red as a jolt of electricity ran through her that made her body start to tremor. Slamming back down on the slab, she gritted her teeth, choking back a cry of pain. She clenched her fists tightly until it passed.

"Feedback...system," Jean explained between breaths.

"And that's my cue to get the fuck out of here," Clarice stated, taking Jean's arm. "Let's make like a fetus and head out," joke. Laugh so you don't cry. Do your job.

"Shit. Yeah," Adrienne commented, shaking out the hand she'd been holding Jean's arm with, having gotten a small jolt from the electrical collar, "let's find someone to get this thing off before her brain gets fried."

Opening a portal, Clarice disappeared along with her two guests. Time to move this lame-ass party elsewhere.


***


Remy looked at his communicator blinking, indicating that Jean had been teleported out of the prison. Good, now it was time to get everyone else out. He and Arthur had caused chaos through the prison, sending guards running in every direction and depleting their numbers by knocking them out. He paused as Arthur trotted next to him.

"Time to get back to de others. Storm will have her hands full right now."

"Right," Arthur affirmed in a chipper whisper as he finished reloading recovered throwing knives back around his chest. His eyes was still glowing, but as they traced a route that seemed to be solely in Remy's head, there seemed to be little concern for that. There had been no guard patrols that had come close due to sudden route changes or improvised traps Remy had left to mislead as they made their way to the rendezvous. It took a lot of luck for these things to work. An idle thought, like an itch, made Arthur want to openly wonder how much luck the two of them had to spare.

However, the two of them were practically alone. It was almost leisurely. So, instead, Arthur filled the silence with another bother, "Why not just have Miss Scorpion go back with Blinker?"

He was new to codenames.

"Because we going to need her when we hit de rest of de Guard." Remy caught the man's expression. "She's been very well trained. She'll make it to where we're going."