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xp_logsTopaz, Molly, and Natasha unexpectedly run into one of their missing teammates. Things don't go as planned... or particularly well. Luckily, backup arrives.
Note: Translations are beneath a secondary cut at the bottom of the post.
They paused at edge of the basement and Topaz frowned as she scanned the area quickly, feeling for a moment like she was in one of Tandy's horror movies. The area before them was almost completely empty, which she was fairly certain was abnormal.
A long hallway stretched before them, various doors dotting the doors, all propped open. Topaz didn't dare try to get close enough to look into one of them, though. "There aren't as many people down here," she murmured to the other women. "Should be a pretty straight shot."
Molly's face fell the moment Topaz said the last sentence. "Nope. It's going to be completely horrible. Bad bad bad. We're not jinxed at all, no sir... ma'ams," she mumbled back, her face twitching as she watched for signs of movement. It was so quiet down there. Not creepy at all. "Nope," she added, for good measure.
Natasha couldn't help but agree with Molly. It reeked of a trap. She was getting really tired of those. Whatever they were about to face was prepared for them. Likely from Kyle and Clint being taken. She moved ahead of Topaz, glancing at the open doors around them. "No other option than through. I'll take point. I've been told you're combat trained. Be ready to use that," she said as she pulled a few stingers from the pocket where her pea pod was and tucked them into each hand. "Gemstone, if anything changes in the feel around us, let me know."
"Yes ma'am," Topaz murmured with absolutely none of her usual sarcasm. The entire area felt oddly silent. Almost oppressively so. She didn't like it.
Their footsteps echoed against the hard linoleum floor, and Molly felt more than a little apprehensive. Still, she tried not to show it. If this were a horror movie, they'd have the broody, foreboding music to make it worse. But at least that showed it wasn't real. This was real.
And it was like something stole the people here and gobbled them up.
The open doors Natasha strode past held nothing interesting. The rooms contained varying arrays of furniture. Some with desks that looked left in the middle of a task, evidenced by the scatter of paperwork, pens, and sometimes abandoned meals. She frowned. Normal humans, acting of their own free will, sought out nourishment. The building wasn't designed to hold secrets but it still felt like they were being funneled to a certain destination. The closer they came to the end of the hallway the louder a strange sound became. Something scraping or scuffing along. As Natasha stepped through the doorway she placed it as rubber soles shuffling along linoleum.
"Hang on," Topaz said suddenly, straightening up. "There's somethin' comin'. Somethin' not right."
There were crashes - two, one clearly a body hitting a wall, and another of something being smashed on the ground before one of the few closed doors squealed barely open. A clawed hand with raw knuckles thrust through the gap, and smashed against the door panel.
The door slid open smoothly, but the man standing in the doorway moved like he was having a seizure. His jaw worked constantly, twitching and snapping shut, he clawed at his own arms, his shirt was shredded, and a long claw mark disappeared into the waist of his jeans like he'd tried to tear himself open.
He lurched once, slamming himself against the door frame, and then leaped at the women, growling inhumanly.
Natasha instantly threw her stingers at the man even as she recognized it was Gibney. She dodged his wild lunge, using one of those open offices for maneuvering room while immediately reaching for more stingers. He had a healing factor, a pretty rapid one at that, and she'd need more than just a couple to take him down. At least with him focused on her, Topaz and Molly could figure out some way to get him controlled.
Molly rolled up her sleeves and clenched her fists. Something got to him. And if he wasn't careful he'd hurt people. And when he got back to normal he'd feel really sad about it. So she wasn't gonna let him do that.
Snarling beasts were something Molly had grown used to. Just... not with her former teachers. She also half expected to find herself back in the classroom, and for Kyle to sport a set of shark teeth. This was... actually, kinda worse with it REALLY being Kyle. Asgardian monsters were so much easier to deal with.
Backing up a few feet toward the opposite end of the hallway, Molly took off into a sprint, then tackled Kyle, wrapping her arms, and legs, around him in a tight bear hug that kept him from using his arms and legs. They hit the floor with a heavy, sickening thud, sliding across the linoleum before smashing into the wall. "Wildman, you totally need a time out!" she said, trying to keep her head back from his jaws snapping at her face. "Um... guys? A little help? His breath smells like fish and pennies."
Topaz jerked back, fumbling for a minute. She couldn't do anything that wouldn't do some serious damage to Kyle...
Wait. There was one thing. She let out a long breath and turned her focus to Kyle's mind, trying to push past the concerning blankness and need to obey, and she poured as much fear as possible into his head, trying to overwhelm him.
Kyle's growling grew louder, faster, more frantic and desperate. It became a high-pitched whine that rattled Molly's senses as he struggled in her grasp and tried to bite her, but his teeth slid off her skin, leaving only light pink marks that faded almost instantly.
"Dude..." Molly exclaimed. Kyle's muscles were super tense, and he was suddenly shaking. It was kinda like holding on to a furry, slippery, slobbery, eel. "It's us! You gotta be in there somewhere!" After a moment Molly made a face, then head butted him, just enough to daze him to get him to stop squirming. "Please... snap... out of it!"
She really hoped they had a plan. Cause Molly's Rodeo Variety Hour was not going to work for long.
Natasha was reminded strongly of some of the worst seizures she'd ever seen as Kyle and Molly rolled to a stop in a tangle of limbs. Some she'd induced and others she'd helped fake. The more dramatic, the less people asked questions - too traumatized to want to deal with it. Right now, Molly's super strength and invulnerability were their only saving graces. She rolled the stingers between her fingers, then came to a decision. They needed something more potent and she had just the thing that would give even a healing factor pause. But even that would need a bit of a boost. She deftly switched the stingers for one of the epi-pens in the pea pod, which she then quickly jabbed into her arm. No anti-histamine for her. Nope, lab purified adrenaline courtesy of Clint and their various contacts.
She slid the modified wrist guards off and tucked those away with the stingers. She slowly flexed her wrists so just the tips of her prongs showed. No need to blow through more adrenaline than she needed. They hadn't refined her adrenaline crash parameters yet, and in truth this was the first time she'd be using her new abilities. Evidently no time like the present. Kyle's shirt was garbage, so a few more holes wouldn't matter. Once her prongs started to glisten, she flexed both wrists fully and jabbed them into Kyle's chest until she felt the venom drain into him.
Kyle fought as viciously as ever, bucking, biting, trying to scratch Molly's invulnerable eyes out. He got one leg up and over her neck, and then went deadly still.
His head cocked to one side, and let out a horrible hissing noise, mouth foaming, nose running and snot all over his face.
Kyle grunted and stopped fighting. Then his eyes locked down onto his chest, where Natasha's wrists were pressing hard into his muscles. They followed the prongs up her arms, and slowly over her shoulders and then to her face. His eyes, bloodshot and jaundice-yellow, met hers.
The words that came out of his mouth sounded like "Wash Artichoke, Pirogie Gore Et, Crans Eye" all Slavic consonants that sounded alien in the so-very-American Kyle Gibney's mouth.
Natasha's first thought was his accent was atrocious. Whoever taught him needed to be shot. His eyes told her he did and didn't recognize her.
Then the words registered.
Time slowed. She heard nothing but the rushing of blood in her ears, felt the dull thud of her heart in her chest, and then fractured red fog enveloped her. She couldn't look away. Sight tunneling until it was all she could see. But it wasn't complete. Not utterly, not like what it could be. She gave a long blink and the circling of her thumb over the hourglass mark on her left wrist stopped. "No, it's not."
Natasha blinked again and a shudder ran through her. Her lips thinned as she glared down at Gibney.
"Da, Crans Yee. Alfha Beet. Ya Blesha Shalom Put Murder..." the mangled Russian was spat out of Kyle's mouth, all wrong from his lips, and he bit at Molly's face, teeth scraping off her cheek. His voice grew strangled and raspy.
Natasha's mind blanked out at the next set of words even as she uttered the response, "Ya predpochel by letat'." It was like all the switches were flipped to OFF. Her eyes closed and all the tension in her body was cut free. Her head rolled forward as she slumped to the ground in a graceless heap, cushioned marginally by the dense winter gear she was in.
For a moment Topaz was stunned as she watched Natasha go down. She was the only one there who knew what they were doing and now she was -
Topaz shut the panic down before it could go any further, deciding to do something useful with it instead. She turned to Kyle and shoved it all into his head.
In a single snap, everything was clear. Norbert wasn't awesome. Molly was. Topaz was. Clint's weird Russian friend was pretty cool. Kyle went limp in Molly's arms, collapsing on top of her. His body seized once, and he let out a horrible rattle from his lungs as his overtaxed healing factor shut down almost everything.
Only for him to snap his eyes open and choke out green bile tinged with metallic flecks a moment later, splattering it violently on Molly and Natasha. He collapsed, eyes wide but unseeing, barely breathing and soaked with sweat.
Topaz backed slowly away from Kyle, assuming Molly could handle him if he woke up, and went to kneel beside the unconscious blonde. "Natasha?" She said quietly, pressing two fingers to Natasha's neck to check her pulse. Okay, she was still alive, at least. That was something. "I think she's down," Topaz reported over her shoulder to Molly, some of the earlier panic creeping back. What the hell were they supposed to do now?
"Him too. Also, ew."
Molly was still in 'WTF?' mode, her body stiff, wide-eyes glancing at Natasha with a frown as she continued to hold Kyle a couple more moments, the man's head on her shoulder. After a moment she reached up and tentatively grabbed his hair to pick up his head to get a look, seeing a bit of drool coming from his gaping mouth before dropping it back down with a loud thunk. He was snoring. Setting him down on the ground, Molly glanced between the two of them, then stared down at herself with an extremely grossed out look on her face, trying really hard not to retch herself.
It was with great pain that Topaz sacrificed her jacket to tuck under Natasha's head. "So what-" She cut herself off abruptly, head snapping up. "Someone's coming," she said darkly, scrambling up, magical energy already gathering in her hand. "Someone who's not buggered up." But also not someone she recognized. "Don't know if that's good or bad."
"You can dismiss that," the approaching figure advised, their voice low and deep. Their footsteps were slow and deliberate, as if to warn of their approach while making it clear there was no danger. The figure eventually stepped out of the shadows, revealing a tall, well-muscled, dark-skinned man in a black turtleneck and trousers, sporting a shoulder holster with a pair of pistols. He stopped several feet away to survey the scene in front of him. "The hell happened to Romanoff? Never mind. You're Topaz and Molly Hayes? Special Agent Everett Thomas. Barton called me for backup. Where is he?"
Never one to take orders, Topaz sized the man up for a long moment, not hesitating to poke him empathically to find any sign of a lie. Now that she had a good look at him, she did vaguely recognize him from around the mansion, and after a long moment she finally let the magic die away as her hand fell to her side once more. "Topaz, Molly." She pointed to herself and Molly as she said their names. "When did Barton call you? He's been out of touch for hours now."
"This morning. Requested backup because one person was missing and he was being followed." Which, judging by Natasha's lack of consciousness and Clint's absence, was a likely possibility. He stepped past the two young women to kneel next to his former co-operative and gently pressed two fingers against her neck. "No obvious trauma. Okay, fill me in, what happened here?"
Molly hovered over Kyle and Natasha protectively. Not from Ev, really. Just from anything else that might pop out and snarl at them... and also to put Kyle back to sleep if he woke up from his nap and got all growly again.
"Wildm--child disappeared. So Hawkeye went to look for him and then he disappeared, too, but he had a tracker so we tracked him here. And we found Wildchild, but not Hawkeye and he was acting weird, like animal, y'know? But I gave him a bear hug so he wouldn't scratch anybody up and Black Widow took him down. But then he said some words I didn't understand and Black Widow fainted. Then you showed up and you already know what you did so hi, nice to meet you. I'm Molly," she said with a bright, albeit frazzled smile. "It's just us now, though. We still don't know where Hawkeye is. Or why Wildchild attacked us. Or um... what to do next. But hooray for backup!"
"Agent Romanoff has a... complicated past." Most of which Ev knew very little about, but his mind could fill in some of the blanks from what he did know. "Gibney just spoke some words and she went out cold? Trigger phrase, most likely. How he would know it, though, I have no clue. But she'll be out for a while. We can't wait for her to regain consciousness. We should put her somewhere safe until we can come back for her."
"Somewhere safe is probably a bit loose, all things considered," Topaz said dryly, looking around. "Not sure anywhere is really safe here." She frowned for a moment, eyes landing on what looked like the door to a utility closet. "Put her in the closet. I can put up a ward so no one can get in. Or out, so she might be a bit annoyed when she wakes up, but we can just stand back when we open the door."
It was the best of bad options, so Ev nodded in agreement, carefully picked up Natasha, and took her to the closet, where he gently laid her down. He would apologize later, but she would surely understand. "How about Gibney? Will he heal from this or do we need to put him away for safekeeping, too?"
Molly didn't hate fish. She didn't love it either. But having it all over her from someone's stomach was really not making her a fan. She crouched down to feel Kyle's pulse. His heart was steady. "Dunno yet," she said. As she glanced over him, she spotted something weird on the floor amid the vomit, shimmering in the light.
Topaz watched Everett put Natasha in the closet, and once the door was closed she cast the spell. The air around the door shimmered for a minute before fading back to normal. "If anyone tries to get close to the door I'll know," she said as she backed up. "No one's getting past that though unless they're stronger than me and there aren't exactly an abundance of magic users around here."
"Uh... guys?" Against her better judgment, she reached down and picked up a tiny metallic piece from off the floor. It was about the size of a piece of glitter. "I think I found something. Can somebody grab my kit and my phone from my backpack? There's a little red lens in there that I need." She'd do it herself but she didn't want to get anything else dirty. On the plus side, she got to try out the new little toy she made! For real this time!
At Molly's request, Topaz went to grab the brunette's bag, finding the requested items and handing them over. "Here."
"Thanks!" Molly said, opening her kit to grab a small red lens that she clicked onto her phone. After a couple of moments, Molly squinted thoughtfully. "Huh," she said, both surprised and amazed at the same time.
Ev stood behind Molly and looked over her shoulder at the devices she held. "What is that? Some sort of implant?"
Grabbing a Petri dish from her kit, Molly nodded. "Something like that. It's a nanite. A tiny robot that's linked to a bunch of other little robots. They work together," she said, dabbing the nanite from her finger onto the dish. She also got some more off the floor, completely ignoring how gross it was (even if she totally knew how gross it was). "I saw an IT office on the floor plans nearby. We need to go there. I have an idea for how to take care of them."
Topaz warily eyed the unconscious body of her former English teacher, frowning. She dug through her pea pod and found a pen, poking him with it uncertainly. "Wonder when he's gonna wake up."
Ev stood by the door to the IT office, one of his guns in his hands. No one else nearby that he could sense, which offered some mild comfort. At least if they were discovered, it would not be by mutants. He turned to Molly and cocked his head. "How's it going?"
Molly was hunched over a table wearing a pair of magnifying goggles as she fiddled with someone's cell phone that she'd found in a drawer. Tiny mechanical parts and copper wiring were littered all over the table. She'd popped open the casing for the back of the phone and was currently soldering some pieces together.
"Almost got it. I'm making a EMP... electromagnetic pulse. It should disrupt the signal for the nanites. Assuming they're the problem. The downside is... it'll probably fry any other electronic items in the area, too, so we'll be without comms," she said, then glanced over to Kyle. "He's got healing powers, sooo I'm guessing when he got poisoned, his body saw everything as like... the enemy and rejected all of it, including the nanites, so he barfed everything up at the same time. Lucky for us, cause now I get to science the crap out of them."
"Ugh." Kyle rolled over on whoever's coat he'd been set on and tried to untwist the sore everything in his back and legs and arms and entire body. "No more poking." It was probably unintelligible, since he wasn't sure if he'd even said anything, or just wished he had like the last three times someone had poked him.
He rubbed at his face, and instantly regretted it, his hands smelled awful. "Kay, so did I puke? The fuck happened?"
"Yeah, guess the fish wasn't agreeing with you," Topaz said dryly. "Can't imagine why. Sorry about messing with your head. I'd say I won't do it again, but I can't promise anything if you're gonna attack a second time."
"Welcome back," Ev greeted flatly. "Long story short, someone apparently infected you with mind-controlling mini-robots, you incapacitated Agent Romanoff with a few words, Hayes hugged you so hard you threw up the mind-controlling mini-robots, and now we're here. Also hi, Everett Thomas. Agent Barton sent for me"
Kyle sat up and rolled his head. His neck cracked a few times, and as he stretched, his back popped several more times. "I did what to Natasha?" he asked, confused by everything Ev had said, but mostly entirely that part. "Fuck. Where's Clint?" As he moved and stretched, his face contorted into expressions of pain, and relief, and mostly confusion. "Lemee guess. Missing, because mind-controlling mini-robots. Well, I gotta name for that guy at least. Norbert. Pretty sure I remember some guy named Norbert, and he was the coolest dude I knew. Except you know, totally he wasn't."
"Norbert?" Topaz repeated, raising an eyebrow. "Not exactly the name you think when you imagine a super villain."
"I knew a super villain named Franklin," Ev said.
"Rory and Mortimer." Kyle added. "I think it's a thing. Bad dudes have dumbass names."
Ev shrugged. "Hayes retrieved some of the nanites from you, Gibney. She's constructing something to disable them for when we encountered more infected people. Most likely including Agent Barton. How much do you remember since you were infected? Do you remember your fight with Romanoff at all?"
Kyle stood carefully and stretched backwards, going over until his hands touched the ground behind him. "Not a lot. Kinda remember her stabbing me but I'm not stabbed. That'd hurt different." He stood back upright, and methodically cracked all his knuckles. "I, uh, healing factor might've been part of that. I totally remember feeling like shit."
"You had more tiny robots in you than a Transformers movie so you're totally allowed," Molly said as she worked. After a moment she was thoughtful, then bit her lip apologetically. "And you still kinda don't look so hot right now either. Sorry. You sure you're okay?" she said, glancing up.
"Yeah," Kyle's bruises were already fading to an ugly rusty water color.
The device made a little beeping noise, and Molly paused. "Oh, hey! It's done, by the way. Awesome! One nanite neutralizer. Hmm... bot blaster?" she tapped her chin.
"Machine masher?" Ev offered. His gaze swept over the room and he nodded. "We should get going. Gibney, you good to go?"
"Rest of it'll heal once I get moving," Kyle kicked out both legs to shake out some aches, and both his hips popped loudly. "Jesus, Mols. I sound like a bowl of cereal. Hey, did anyone leave a note for Natasha? In case she wakes up and wants to kick my ass for whatever I did to her?" He rummaged through his pockets and pulled out a few crumpled post-it notes. "Topaz, gimmie that pen..."
"And here I thought we were just gonna let whoever is most unbreakable open the door and take the first hit when she comes out swinging," Topaz said dryly as she handed the pen over.
Translations:
1. Wash Artichoke, Pirogie Gore Et, Crans Eye: Your artichoke pie is burning, Red.
2. Da, Crans Yee. Alfha Beet. Ya Blesha Shalom Put Murder: (Literally: Alphabet is the step to wisdom.) You have to learn to walk before you can run, Red.
3. Ya predpochel by letat': I'd prefer to fly.
Note: Translations are beneath a secondary cut at the bottom of the post.
They paused at edge of the basement and Topaz frowned as she scanned the area quickly, feeling for a moment like she was in one of Tandy's horror movies. The area before them was almost completely empty, which she was fairly certain was abnormal.
A long hallway stretched before them, various doors dotting the doors, all propped open. Topaz didn't dare try to get close enough to look into one of them, though. "There aren't as many people down here," she murmured to the other women. "Should be a pretty straight shot."
Molly's face fell the moment Topaz said the last sentence. "Nope. It's going to be completely horrible. Bad bad bad. We're not jinxed at all, no sir... ma'ams," she mumbled back, her face twitching as she watched for signs of movement. It was so quiet down there. Not creepy at all. "Nope," she added, for good measure.
Natasha couldn't help but agree with Molly. It reeked of a trap. She was getting really tired of those. Whatever they were about to face was prepared for them. Likely from Kyle and Clint being taken. She moved ahead of Topaz, glancing at the open doors around them. "No other option than through. I'll take point. I've been told you're combat trained. Be ready to use that," she said as she pulled a few stingers from the pocket where her pea pod was and tucked them into each hand. "Gemstone, if anything changes in the feel around us, let me know."
"Yes ma'am," Topaz murmured with absolutely none of her usual sarcasm. The entire area felt oddly silent. Almost oppressively so. She didn't like it.
Their footsteps echoed against the hard linoleum floor, and Molly felt more than a little apprehensive. Still, she tried not to show it. If this were a horror movie, they'd have the broody, foreboding music to make it worse. But at least that showed it wasn't real. This was real.
And it was like something stole the people here and gobbled them up.
The open doors Natasha strode past held nothing interesting. The rooms contained varying arrays of furniture. Some with desks that looked left in the middle of a task, evidenced by the scatter of paperwork, pens, and sometimes abandoned meals. She frowned. Normal humans, acting of their own free will, sought out nourishment. The building wasn't designed to hold secrets but it still felt like they were being funneled to a certain destination. The closer they came to the end of the hallway the louder a strange sound became. Something scraping or scuffing along. As Natasha stepped through the doorway she placed it as rubber soles shuffling along linoleum.
"Hang on," Topaz said suddenly, straightening up. "There's somethin' comin'. Somethin' not right."
There were crashes - two, one clearly a body hitting a wall, and another of something being smashed on the ground before one of the few closed doors squealed barely open. A clawed hand with raw knuckles thrust through the gap, and smashed against the door panel.
The door slid open smoothly, but the man standing in the doorway moved like he was having a seizure. His jaw worked constantly, twitching and snapping shut, he clawed at his own arms, his shirt was shredded, and a long claw mark disappeared into the waist of his jeans like he'd tried to tear himself open.
He lurched once, slamming himself against the door frame, and then leaped at the women, growling inhumanly.
Natasha instantly threw her stingers at the man even as she recognized it was Gibney. She dodged his wild lunge, using one of those open offices for maneuvering room while immediately reaching for more stingers. He had a healing factor, a pretty rapid one at that, and she'd need more than just a couple to take him down. At least with him focused on her, Topaz and Molly could figure out some way to get him controlled.
Molly rolled up her sleeves and clenched her fists. Something got to him. And if he wasn't careful he'd hurt people. And when he got back to normal he'd feel really sad about it. So she wasn't gonna let him do that.
Snarling beasts were something Molly had grown used to. Just... not with her former teachers. She also half expected to find herself back in the classroom, and for Kyle to sport a set of shark teeth. This was... actually, kinda worse with it REALLY being Kyle. Asgardian monsters were so much easier to deal with.
Backing up a few feet toward the opposite end of the hallway, Molly took off into a sprint, then tackled Kyle, wrapping her arms, and legs, around him in a tight bear hug that kept him from using his arms and legs. They hit the floor with a heavy, sickening thud, sliding across the linoleum before smashing into the wall. "Wildman, you totally need a time out!" she said, trying to keep her head back from his jaws snapping at her face. "Um... guys? A little help? His breath smells like fish and pennies."
Topaz jerked back, fumbling for a minute. She couldn't do anything that wouldn't do some serious damage to Kyle...
Wait. There was one thing. She let out a long breath and turned her focus to Kyle's mind, trying to push past the concerning blankness and need to obey, and she poured as much fear as possible into his head, trying to overwhelm him.
Kyle's growling grew louder, faster, more frantic and desperate. It became a high-pitched whine that rattled Molly's senses as he struggled in her grasp and tried to bite her, but his teeth slid off her skin, leaving only light pink marks that faded almost instantly.
"Dude..." Molly exclaimed. Kyle's muscles were super tense, and he was suddenly shaking. It was kinda like holding on to a furry, slippery, slobbery, eel. "It's us! You gotta be in there somewhere!" After a moment Molly made a face, then head butted him, just enough to daze him to get him to stop squirming. "Please... snap... out of it!"
She really hoped they had a plan. Cause Molly's Rodeo Variety Hour was not going to work for long.
Natasha was reminded strongly of some of the worst seizures she'd ever seen as Kyle and Molly rolled to a stop in a tangle of limbs. Some she'd induced and others she'd helped fake. The more dramatic, the less people asked questions - too traumatized to want to deal with it. Right now, Molly's super strength and invulnerability were their only saving graces. She rolled the stingers between her fingers, then came to a decision. They needed something more potent and she had just the thing that would give even a healing factor pause. But even that would need a bit of a boost. She deftly switched the stingers for one of the epi-pens in the pea pod, which she then quickly jabbed into her arm. No anti-histamine for her. Nope, lab purified adrenaline courtesy of Clint and their various contacts.
She slid the modified wrist guards off and tucked those away with the stingers. She slowly flexed her wrists so just the tips of her prongs showed. No need to blow through more adrenaline than she needed. They hadn't refined her adrenaline crash parameters yet, and in truth this was the first time she'd be using her new abilities. Evidently no time like the present. Kyle's shirt was garbage, so a few more holes wouldn't matter. Once her prongs started to glisten, she flexed both wrists fully and jabbed them into Kyle's chest until she felt the venom drain into him.
Kyle fought as viciously as ever, bucking, biting, trying to scratch Molly's invulnerable eyes out. He got one leg up and over her neck, and then went deadly still.
His head cocked to one side, and let out a horrible hissing noise, mouth foaming, nose running and snot all over his face.
Kyle grunted and stopped fighting. Then his eyes locked down onto his chest, where Natasha's wrists were pressing hard into his muscles. They followed the prongs up her arms, and slowly over her shoulders and then to her face. His eyes, bloodshot and jaundice-yellow, met hers.
The words that came out of his mouth sounded like "Wash Artichoke, Pirogie Gore Et, Crans Eye" all Slavic consonants that sounded alien in the so-very-American Kyle Gibney's mouth.
Natasha's first thought was his accent was atrocious. Whoever taught him needed to be shot. His eyes told her he did and didn't recognize her.
Then the words registered.
Time slowed. She heard nothing but the rushing of blood in her ears, felt the dull thud of her heart in her chest, and then fractured red fog enveloped her. She couldn't look away. Sight tunneling until it was all she could see. But it wasn't complete. Not utterly, not like what it could be. She gave a long blink and the circling of her thumb over the hourglass mark on her left wrist stopped. "No, it's not."
Natasha blinked again and a shudder ran through her. Her lips thinned as she glared down at Gibney.
"Da, Crans Yee. Alfha Beet. Ya Blesha Shalom Put Murder..." the mangled Russian was spat out of Kyle's mouth, all wrong from his lips, and he bit at Molly's face, teeth scraping off her cheek. His voice grew strangled and raspy.
Natasha's mind blanked out at the next set of words even as she uttered the response, "Ya predpochel by letat'." It was like all the switches were flipped to OFF. Her eyes closed and all the tension in her body was cut free. Her head rolled forward as she slumped to the ground in a graceless heap, cushioned marginally by the dense winter gear she was in.
For a moment Topaz was stunned as she watched Natasha go down. She was the only one there who knew what they were doing and now she was -
Topaz shut the panic down before it could go any further, deciding to do something useful with it instead. She turned to Kyle and shoved it all into his head.
In a single snap, everything was clear. Norbert wasn't awesome. Molly was. Topaz was. Clint's weird Russian friend was pretty cool. Kyle went limp in Molly's arms, collapsing on top of her. His body seized once, and he let out a horrible rattle from his lungs as his overtaxed healing factor shut down almost everything.
Only for him to snap his eyes open and choke out green bile tinged with metallic flecks a moment later, splattering it violently on Molly and Natasha. He collapsed, eyes wide but unseeing, barely breathing and soaked with sweat.
Topaz backed slowly away from Kyle, assuming Molly could handle him if he woke up, and went to kneel beside the unconscious blonde. "Natasha?" She said quietly, pressing two fingers to Natasha's neck to check her pulse. Okay, she was still alive, at least. That was something. "I think she's down," Topaz reported over her shoulder to Molly, some of the earlier panic creeping back. What the hell were they supposed to do now?
"Him too. Also, ew."
Molly was still in 'WTF?' mode, her body stiff, wide-eyes glancing at Natasha with a frown as she continued to hold Kyle a couple more moments, the man's head on her shoulder. After a moment she reached up and tentatively grabbed his hair to pick up his head to get a look, seeing a bit of drool coming from his gaping mouth before dropping it back down with a loud thunk. He was snoring. Setting him down on the ground, Molly glanced between the two of them, then stared down at herself with an extremely grossed out look on her face, trying really hard not to retch herself.
It was with great pain that Topaz sacrificed her jacket to tuck under Natasha's head. "So what-" She cut herself off abruptly, head snapping up. "Someone's coming," she said darkly, scrambling up, magical energy already gathering in her hand. "Someone who's not buggered up." But also not someone she recognized. "Don't know if that's good or bad."
"You can dismiss that," the approaching figure advised, their voice low and deep. Their footsteps were slow and deliberate, as if to warn of their approach while making it clear there was no danger. The figure eventually stepped out of the shadows, revealing a tall, well-muscled, dark-skinned man in a black turtleneck and trousers, sporting a shoulder holster with a pair of pistols. He stopped several feet away to survey the scene in front of him. "The hell happened to Romanoff? Never mind. You're Topaz and Molly Hayes? Special Agent Everett Thomas. Barton called me for backup. Where is he?"
Never one to take orders, Topaz sized the man up for a long moment, not hesitating to poke him empathically to find any sign of a lie. Now that she had a good look at him, she did vaguely recognize him from around the mansion, and after a long moment she finally let the magic die away as her hand fell to her side once more. "Topaz, Molly." She pointed to herself and Molly as she said their names. "When did Barton call you? He's been out of touch for hours now."
"This morning. Requested backup because one person was missing and he was being followed." Which, judging by Natasha's lack of consciousness and Clint's absence, was a likely possibility. He stepped past the two young women to kneel next to his former co-operative and gently pressed two fingers against her neck. "No obvious trauma. Okay, fill me in, what happened here?"
Molly hovered over Kyle and Natasha protectively. Not from Ev, really. Just from anything else that might pop out and snarl at them... and also to put Kyle back to sleep if he woke up from his nap and got all growly again.
"Wildm--child disappeared. So Hawkeye went to look for him and then he disappeared, too, but he had a tracker so we tracked him here. And we found Wildchild, but not Hawkeye and he was acting weird, like animal, y'know? But I gave him a bear hug so he wouldn't scratch anybody up and Black Widow took him down. But then he said some words I didn't understand and Black Widow fainted. Then you showed up and you already know what you did so hi, nice to meet you. I'm Molly," she said with a bright, albeit frazzled smile. "It's just us now, though. We still don't know where Hawkeye is. Or why Wildchild attacked us. Or um... what to do next. But hooray for backup!"
"Agent Romanoff has a... complicated past." Most of which Ev knew very little about, but his mind could fill in some of the blanks from what he did know. "Gibney just spoke some words and she went out cold? Trigger phrase, most likely. How he would know it, though, I have no clue. But she'll be out for a while. We can't wait for her to regain consciousness. We should put her somewhere safe until we can come back for her."
"Somewhere safe is probably a bit loose, all things considered," Topaz said dryly, looking around. "Not sure anywhere is really safe here." She frowned for a moment, eyes landing on what looked like the door to a utility closet. "Put her in the closet. I can put up a ward so no one can get in. Or out, so she might be a bit annoyed when she wakes up, but we can just stand back when we open the door."
It was the best of bad options, so Ev nodded in agreement, carefully picked up Natasha, and took her to the closet, where he gently laid her down. He would apologize later, but she would surely understand. "How about Gibney? Will he heal from this or do we need to put him away for safekeeping, too?"
Molly didn't hate fish. She didn't love it either. But having it all over her from someone's stomach was really not making her a fan. She crouched down to feel Kyle's pulse. His heart was steady. "Dunno yet," she said. As she glanced over him, she spotted something weird on the floor amid the vomit, shimmering in the light.
Topaz watched Everett put Natasha in the closet, and once the door was closed she cast the spell. The air around the door shimmered for a minute before fading back to normal. "If anyone tries to get close to the door I'll know," she said as she backed up. "No one's getting past that though unless they're stronger than me and there aren't exactly an abundance of magic users around here."
"Uh... guys?" Against her better judgment, she reached down and picked up a tiny metallic piece from off the floor. It was about the size of a piece of glitter. "I think I found something. Can somebody grab my kit and my phone from my backpack? There's a little red lens in there that I need." She'd do it herself but she didn't want to get anything else dirty. On the plus side, she got to try out the new little toy she made! For real this time!
At Molly's request, Topaz went to grab the brunette's bag, finding the requested items and handing them over. "Here."
"Thanks!" Molly said, opening her kit to grab a small red lens that she clicked onto her phone. After a couple of moments, Molly squinted thoughtfully. "Huh," she said, both surprised and amazed at the same time.
Ev stood behind Molly and looked over her shoulder at the devices she held. "What is that? Some sort of implant?"
Grabbing a Petri dish from her kit, Molly nodded. "Something like that. It's a nanite. A tiny robot that's linked to a bunch of other little robots. They work together," she said, dabbing the nanite from her finger onto the dish. She also got some more off the floor, completely ignoring how gross it was (even if she totally knew how gross it was). "I saw an IT office on the floor plans nearby. We need to go there. I have an idea for how to take care of them."
Topaz warily eyed the unconscious body of her former English teacher, frowning. She dug through her pea pod and found a pen, poking him with it uncertainly. "Wonder when he's gonna wake up."
Ev stood by the door to the IT office, one of his guns in his hands. No one else nearby that he could sense, which offered some mild comfort. At least if they were discovered, it would not be by mutants. He turned to Molly and cocked his head. "How's it going?"
Molly was hunched over a table wearing a pair of magnifying goggles as she fiddled with someone's cell phone that she'd found in a drawer. Tiny mechanical parts and copper wiring were littered all over the table. She'd popped open the casing for the back of the phone and was currently soldering some pieces together.
"Almost got it. I'm making a EMP... electromagnetic pulse. It should disrupt the signal for the nanites. Assuming they're the problem. The downside is... it'll probably fry any other electronic items in the area, too, so we'll be without comms," she said, then glanced over to Kyle. "He's got healing powers, sooo I'm guessing when he got poisoned, his body saw everything as like... the enemy and rejected all of it, including the nanites, so he barfed everything up at the same time. Lucky for us, cause now I get to science the crap out of them."
"Ugh." Kyle rolled over on whoever's coat he'd been set on and tried to untwist the sore everything in his back and legs and arms and entire body. "No more poking." It was probably unintelligible, since he wasn't sure if he'd even said anything, or just wished he had like the last three times someone had poked him.
He rubbed at his face, and instantly regretted it, his hands smelled awful. "Kay, so did I puke? The fuck happened?"
"Yeah, guess the fish wasn't agreeing with you," Topaz said dryly. "Can't imagine why. Sorry about messing with your head. I'd say I won't do it again, but I can't promise anything if you're gonna attack a second time."
"Welcome back," Ev greeted flatly. "Long story short, someone apparently infected you with mind-controlling mini-robots, you incapacitated Agent Romanoff with a few words, Hayes hugged you so hard you threw up the mind-controlling mini-robots, and now we're here. Also hi, Everett Thomas. Agent Barton sent for me"
Kyle sat up and rolled his head. His neck cracked a few times, and as he stretched, his back popped several more times. "I did what to Natasha?" he asked, confused by everything Ev had said, but mostly entirely that part. "Fuck. Where's Clint?" As he moved and stretched, his face contorted into expressions of pain, and relief, and mostly confusion. "Lemee guess. Missing, because mind-controlling mini-robots. Well, I gotta name for that guy at least. Norbert. Pretty sure I remember some guy named Norbert, and he was the coolest dude I knew. Except you know, totally he wasn't."
"Norbert?" Topaz repeated, raising an eyebrow. "Not exactly the name you think when you imagine a super villain."
"I knew a super villain named Franklin," Ev said.
"Rory and Mortimer." Kyle added. "I think it's a thing. Bad dudes have dumbass names."
Ev shrugged. "Hayes retrieved some of the nanites from you, Gibney. She's constructing something to disable them for when we encountered more infected people. Most likely including Agent Barton. How much do you remember since you were infected? Do you remember your fight with Romanoff at all?"
Kyle stood carefully and stretched backwards, going over until his hands touched the ground behind him. "Not a lot. Kinda remember her stabbing me but I'm not stabbed. That'd hurt different." He stood back upright, and methodically cracked all his knuckles. "I, uh, healing factor might've been part of that. I totally remember feeling like shit."
"You had more tiny robots in you than a Transformers movie so you're totally allowed," Molly said as she worked. After a moment she was thoughtful, then bit her lip apologetically. "And you still kinda don't look so hot right now either. Sorry. You sure you're okay?" she said, glancing up.
"Yeah," Kyle's bruises were already fading to an ugly rusty water color.
The device made a little beeping noise, and Molly paused. "Oh, hey! It's done, by the way. Awesome! One nanite neutralizer. Hmm... bot blaster?" she tapped her chin.
"Machine masher?" Ev offered. His gaze swept over the room and he nodded. "We should get going. Gibney, you good to go?"
"Rest of it'll heal once I get moving," Kyle kicked out both legs to shake out some aches, and both his hips popped loudly. "Jesus, Mols. I sound like a bowl of cereal. Hey, did anyone leave a note for Natasha? In case she wakes up and wants to kick my ass for whatever I did to her?" He rummaged through his pockets and pulled out a few crumpled post-it notes. "Topaz, gimmie that pen..."
"And here I thought we were just gonna let whoever is most unbreakable open the door and take the first hit when she comes out swinging," Topaz said dryly as she handed the pen over.
Translations:
1. Wash Artichoke, Pirogie Gore Et, Crans Eye: Your artichoke pie is burning, Red.
2. Da, Crans Yee. Alfha Beet. Ya Blesha Shalom Put Murder: (Literally: Alphabet is the step to wisdom.) You have to learn to walk before you can run, Red.
3. Ya predpochel by letat': I'd prefer to fly.
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