March 18, 2016:
A meeting at the Grindhouse gets interrupted … Green Arrow turns up.
The Grindhouse Cafe - New York
Characters
NPCs: Agent Matthews, Agent Jefferies
Mentions:
Plot:
Mood Music: None.
Fade In…
When Green Arrow infiltrated Mount Weather, he found a Gotham phone number. A phone number that was unlisted and seemingly unregistered except … traces show that it gets calls, quite regularly. Hopefully he or one of his team has been monitoring.
Fifteen minutes ago a message was received on the phone that contained numbers. Numbers that can be recognised as Latitude and Longitude co-ordinates. Numbers that he might recognise as being near The Triskelion - not the building itself, but near it. Oliver might recall that the coffee shop, The Grindhouse, that many SHIELD agents (including one Doctor Jemma Simmons) frequent on a reasonably regular basis.
At the Grindhouse, Jemma, May and Julia are catching up. With SHIELD compromised, there's certain discussions that are safer to have in public - go figure. Jemmas security detail are at one table (Matthews and Jefferies), whilst the three women are talking quietly at another.
"So what I've found from the testing with the prototype Daemonite detector is that it works, but the power supply is going to be an issue."
And… Julia is there in her civilian garb. She's eyeing the security detail now and then with a worried glance… worried that they are still angry at her over… well, everything.
"Let me get this straight. Daemonite.. like parasites in human bodies? Or shapeshifting types who look human?" She hasn't caught up on all her briefings just yet obviously.
Melinda May sits quietly with the other two women as Jemma explains, her attention actually a bit more on their surroundings than the conversation itself. She's heard all of this already, and moreover, it's the technical stuff that she only has a vague inkling about. "Alien species, so far as we've been able to determine, but able to take control of a human host much like a parasite." And now she's reminded of a particular sci-fi series that Coulson used to watch. A bit unrealistic, but the female lead was at least not portrayed as a bimbo even if she was a tall, blue-eyed blonde.
"What precisely is the point of having phones everywhere if no one ever picks up." Oliver grumbles to himself as the attempt to call is once again ignored by the destination. It certainly couldn't be on his end, naturally riding a motorcycle at extremely high and dangerous speeds through city streets was completely unlikely to cause any sort of connection issue. The sunlight fading away into the early evening was enough to help him blend through a few areas and around cars, cutting his headlight on the motorcycle at times to prevent the visual notice of authorities that might be watching for speeders, the scramblers taking care of technological methods.
Ever since he had handed over the information to Jemma, provided by Felicity of course, Oliver had kept a monitoring eye on the numbers and some other of the resources just in case; and it would turn out that this was precisely a just in case situation. Another hard corner is taken, the handlebars of the motorcycle scraping along the curb of a street to send up a brief shower of sparks before it straightens to gun down an alley, heading faster to the destination as Oliver slaps redial on his phone yet again. "How is it busy every damn time I call?" The frustrated tone of his voice echoing within his helmet. Just a few minutes out, too close for his comfort. The accelerator is depressed further.
"As May said. From what I've seen, they are one and the same, but don't ask me how a 15ft Lizardlike creature fits into a human bod——" Jemma's words are cutoff as the window them explodes and the power to the cafe is cut.
Through the window come six heavily armed men and women, dressed all in black with balaclava's covering their faces.
Matthews and Jefferies dive for Jemma, knocking a table over dragging her behind it…
Nodding in agreement with Jemma, Julia reacts the way she always reacts. Her reflexes and reaction time are stupidly fast. So she is already up and out of her seat as the guys are charging towards the window. Her goal is to use her limited bodymass, and much less limited strength… to try to tackle the leaders of the charge and carry it all back outside, away from customers and other bystanders. She doesn't bother speaking. She just acts.
Melinda May is likely one of the few in the room to not be taken completely by surprise, though she does have to throw up a hand to keep glass from hitting her in the face. Even as the two guards are scrambling to pull Jemma to safety, she hefts her own chair and swings at the closest black-masked person with as much force as she can muster. You just messed up one of the very few coffeehouses in Manhattan that can actually make a decent cup of tea. You are now officially on her shit list.
Oliver rounded the corner on the motorcycle just moments before the attack began, enough for him to stash the bike in an alley and grab the duffle off of it from the back. He had really hoped that he was wrong, but he wasn't.
As the attacks begin, the release of a high tensioned string echoes from across the street as a green clad figure looses an arrow in the direction of one of the attackers, followed by a second coming shortly thereafter. But despite the Arrow's intention to deal with the threat, he turns and speaks through the voice modulator that alters his tone to a deeper one, directing it towards any nearby civilians. "Get out of here!"
It's a good thing the cafe is frequented by SHIELD agents. Perhaps the attackers hadn't considered that. As the attack comes, it's not only May and Julia that leap into action, other Agents put themselves between the civilians and the black garbed folk, some even hustling the civilians out. Perhaps there'll be few casualities… maybe.
Julia manages to tackle the nearest black clad figure, tumbling through the broken window onto the sidewalk. The blackclad figure, swings her rifle down at the blondes head, with tremendous force.
Mays chair is blocked by her target, but that's only mildly effective… the figure goes stumbling sideways across the cafe but recovers quickly, raises their weapon, aims at May and pulls the trigger.
Green Arrows arrow finds purchase, slicing into another attackers bicep from behind - this one though seems ambidexterous and turns to face the oncoming threat, spraying bullets in Arrow direction.
Meantime the other three attackers enter the cafe methodically. "We know she's here and we know she's got support. Find her and take them out.
Jefferies looks to Jemma, who has blood running down her face - she didn't cover her face when the glass blew, "Stay down, Doctor Simmons. We'll get you out of here."
A rifle butt isn't going to stop Julia. She is far more durable to blunt force trauma than most people are. But it still hurts. She gets hit and sees stars for a second… momentarily stunned by the blow.
She even loses her grip on her target… but she shakes her head and jumps into the air when the next blow comes in, evading it just barely before a foot is kicked back to send her opponent reeling, but also to propel her towards another group of them. "Anyone got a clue who these guys are?!" she calls out.
Melinda May isn't faster than a normal human, but she IS far more experienced at fighting people who thinks taking guns to fistfights automatically make them winners. Only partly dodging the shot aimed at her — we're about to find out exactly how good the ablative plating inside this jacket is — she rushes at the figure. The kid gloves are officially off. She'll apologize later for any PTSD she causes any civilians. No she won't. Butterfly swords are brandished and in almost the same motion aimed to decapitate her opponent.
In the same category of life as Melinda, merely a normal human being, The Arrow has to rely on tactics and experience more than anything. When the spray of bullets flies at him, he quickly flips himself over behind a car to safety waiting a few moments before popping up to fire an arrow, followed by a second and third. If the first one misses the barrel of the weapon, perhaps the next two will find their target. Hearing a woman call out, asking who they are, The Arrow responds from where he is at. "SIGMA, or at least some of their mercs."
The SHIELD agents are doing a good job of getting the civilians out of there. Although of course there are the ridiculous few who are stopping to take photos and of all things… selfies…. May and Julia might be caught in those.
Julia's kick does indeed send her opponent reeling, but they are good. Flipping over, regaining their feet, they aim a laser rifle at her.
May is peppered by laser fire, not ballistic weapons … her vest should provide some protection from that. Those butterfly swords, are used with great effect and slice into her attackers neck. They're done for …
Olivers first arrow misses, but that's ok, the next two hit the barrel of one of the rifles aimed at him. A hand gun is produced and aimed at him.
The last three attackers move through the cafe, kicking tables out of the way until they get to the one that Jemma is hidden behind. Matthews pops up and aims a weapon right in one of the three's face … bam there's not much left of that guy… but the other two now draw a bead on the biochem and Jefferies, as Jefferies tries to urge her out of there.
Whilst all attackers seem to be dressed in unrelieved black, May and Julia are close enough to see a small insignia on their collar …. in the shape of a jade green cleaver.
Kick and leap and charge and.. Julia just stops all of a sudden. Laser rifles, "Hey, what are…" and the weapons fire. She just leaps to one side in a superfast movement. She says, "Did you say Sigma?!" as she moves back towards the attack. She's well trained and believes that she should always be on the attack if possible.
She notices the guys targeting Jefferies over there, and a gesture manifests psi-webs to yank the furthest weapon out of alignment… pulling the other two so that all of them miss Jefferies, "SIGMA?!" she calls out as she name once more as she growls. "The Section…" she mutters as she takes a glancing blow… she was distracted, and her left shoulder takes a rather icky looking laser burn.
Melinda May doesn't turn toward the attackers that have zeroed in on Jemma. Instead, she hurls one of her butterfly swords side-hand at the one that Matthews didn't just shoot in the face like Marvin from Pulp Fiction while she lunges after the last. The blasts that have hit her haven't knocked her down, but that doesn't mean they didn't hurt, and she's channeling that pain into the determination to put these bastards down even more decisively.
The arrow draws and nocks an arrow as the man he is facing pulls a gun on him. He's already hit in one of his barrel's, doing it a second time is far to much of a stretch; so this time when the arrow is loosed it flies for a distance before unravelling to reveal a net. Ah the joys of 'trick' arrows as hopefully this netted arrow will … tie up .. the attacker long enough for him to offer assistance to the others.
"They are after that woman." The digitized voice of the Arrow calls out towards the other people nearby, 'that woman' being indicated with a motion of his head meaning Jemma. Even as he makes the declaration of 'duh' he is moving trying to avoid getting shot whilst getting closer, a very dangerous combination of two activities.
Olivers netted arrow really does the trick. Tangling the attacker up, good and well, incapacitating them for a short while.
Back in the cafe, it all happens in a bit of a flash. Julia's psi-webs and Mays butterfly sword all target one of the remaining two targetting Jefferies. Matthews is still turning to draw a bead on the second, so is Jefferies and … Jemma explodes into action, ducking close to the second, stepping inside their reach and jabbing sharply into their solar plexus, following that up as they bend by grabbing their head and pulling it down, to meet her knee on the way up…. and then flipping them onto their back.
Breathing heavily, the biochem doesn't let go… she might not realise what she just did.
As Oliver passes the netted merc, he'll notice the camera they're wearing…. all of this footage has been transmitted somewhere. If The Section didn't know Green Arrow was involved before, they do now.
"Sigma… damnit." mutters Julia as she clutches at her shoulder with her right hand and moves inside.
She watched Jemma do her thing and just.. stood there, staring in dumbstruck awe. "Well, I am going to assume she learned that from you…" she says towards May. Then… she drops to one knee and shakes her head, "Pain sucks. Y'know?" she adds.
Melinda May narrows her eyes at Jemma, because the biochemist did NOT learn that from her. But whomever she learned it from has just earned a bit of May's gratitude. And a little ire simultaneously. "Jefferies, call it in." Her voice is a bit strained sounding as takes a small step to one side and sinks into a vacant chair in the middle of the mess. That's the only other concession to the fact that she's likely hurting as much as Julia is. That, and her butterfly sword left where it was thrown.
The Arrow looks down and spots the recording device on the man that was wrapped up in the net. Looking up at the others and trying to keep himself in a profile stance; it really does help with identities surprisingly, the man speaks again. "They have recording devices on them. It may provide some insight to what they were doing if you can see what they saw leading up this attack." For a moment longer he stands there before turning to start making his way back towards the area he originated, no sense in sticking around while SHIELD asks questions.
It takes a few moments for Jemma to recover, mostly because Matthews puts his hand on her shoulder and murmurs "You can let go now, Doctor Simmons."
"Wha… oh!" the biochem blushes as she realises what she just did. Looking around, Julias' words finally registering she shakes her head "These aren't SIGMA. You'll know them when you see them. What makes you think they were? Oh right…" looking to the green clad man who is now walking off "Why did you say SIGMA?" she calls after him. Maybe he'll hear.
Jefferies, seeing May sink into a chair, heads over to speak to the Senior Agent quietly, as much cover as he checks she's alright "Agent May, we need to speak about Doctor Simmons. That's not the first time she's done that and she's not learnt it from anyone we've seen."
It won't be long before the SHIELD Med Teams and clean up teams arrive. There's at least one of the attackers alive … enough to interrogate at least.
Thank god Julia has a healing factor. She flares her nostrils and asks, "Wait, they were recording?" She snorts then and sighs, "Damnit. Now they know I'm still in the game. They'll be sending another team after me and…." She surges up to her feet and takes off running down the street….
Only to launch into the air on a web made of mental energy….
——
Melinda May lets Jefferies check on her, nodding at his soft words. She'll definitely be speaking with Jemma about that very non-biochemist-like reaction. Then Julia takes off and she stops Matthews from trying to go after her with a soft, "Let her go." The woman has her priorities straight. And May will definitely have to call in some favors to get her an even more secure place to stay, because she also refuses to take chances. "Simmons. That one has a pin on his lapel." she gestures toward the one that she attempted to decapitate with at least some degree of success.
The Arrow pauses as Julia runs past and flies off via webbing of some kind. The figure looks that way then back towards Simmons after she speaks, the shoulders of the green clad man lift in a shrug. "SIGMA, The Section, DEO… all roads lead to Rome." The cryptic statement comes and then he turns, pulling an arrow from his quiver and firing it up and across the street, exiting in much the same fashion Julia just did; only his is via cable arrow that has a recoiling in it that allows him to be pulled up and away towards whatever location he originated from.