James Bond Wishes... (pt.3)

February 01, 2018:

Having escaped the pirates with help from hired locals Natasha finds herself back at square one…

Characters

NPCs: Eben, the Count, Cobra, Zayin

Mentions:

Plot:

Mood Music: [*\# None.]


Fade In…

Madripoor, again, perhaps, odds are likely, craggy foam soaked rocks make up the beach, past coral reefs, free of shark feeding frenzy and the 'Red Eel' pirates, now, its the wilderness, a stretch of sandy gray that breaks in to sparse greenery and then jungle. Eben is on his back, pale as the moon thats rising in the distance, mouth agape.

There are fires n the distance, out on the ocean's surface, ships still smoldering, the let off of it blacker than the backgrounds purple and orange skies, lights are shooting out, coastal patrol, more pirates, even a few low flying cars and cycles, more helicopters.

The north of them along the island shows the glowing lights above the beachhead, a shine that stands out that designates the city itself, bright, lit up, inviting if not for all the criminals, murderers, cutthroats and agencies within seeking her head.

Once the two of them were on the beach, Natasha didn't waste a moment. She'd lost her backpack and her jacket which had all of her supplies in it…

She emerged from the woods with a handful of fruit pulled from a tree, bananas of all things. She handed one down to him. "Any injuries that I am not able to see?" Nat asked him as she sat down beside him, her black clothing covered in swaths of muddy sand. She peeled one of theo ther bananas she had and took a bite from it while her eyes went out ot the sea and the fires that were casting large plumes of black smoke… she hoped they were all dead out there.

A loud gasp from Eben and he starts coughing up water, a loud yell escapes him, "SHARKS!" He kicks to the left then the right only to end up on his hands and knees looking up at Black Widow, choking in air now.

"We're alive, I'm alive… oh man, did you swim us all the way here?" Sat on his ass now looking out in to the ocean, there is wreckage out there, it used to be his boat and his captain. A somber expression falls over his features and he tucks his arms over his knees, "This… is awful."

Ebens fingers begin to rake through his hair, tugging at it, his glasses are gone, lost somewhere. Both flipflops too.

Natasha just sat there observing the man as he rolled over and shot awake, causing the banana to fall into the sand. She just continued to munch on the one she had and she stared at him. "Yeah." She said about swimming all the way here. "I did." Soviety super soldiers… watch out for their stamina.

"I'm sorry about your boat." She said, her green eyes going down to the half banana she had left. "… and your captain." And her green eyes went back up to his face.

"If we can get out of here, I can get you another boat. Though, honestly, I think you should start looking into other professions. Perhaps something not quite so dangerous." She's one to talk! Maybe it was her own desires there though?

"There will only ever be one boat for me." Eben whispers, "That was her." He sounds more upset about the vessel than his Captain, "You're not tired? You… swam… " Both of his hands come out in a chop motion in tandem, "from wayyy out *there*."
Like Eben is doing the robot his hands come back to the beach, away from his indication at the burning fires in the Pacific, "To. here."

"Also you were like fighting, a ton of guys. So many. How are you still moving?" A labored struggle to his feet and he starts to walk numbly, "We have to get back to Lowtown. I know people that can help us."

His walk is like a person would expect, barefoot on a dark beach, the occasional hop and stop, throwing things, bitching.
"I think that was a jellyfish…. oh ow yeah, that was a jellyfish. That stings."

Natasha finished the rest of the banana while the man did his wordy thing and then she dug a little hole in the sand and burried the peel beneath it with some swiping hand motions. "Come on then." She said, rising up to her feet. She dusted her hands off on the sides of her black jeans, her gear was used-up a little but but she still had one gun and a couple of explosions, as well as those deadly bracers on her wrists.

"Cardio." She tells him then. "Do your cardio and eat your vegetables. You won't wear out so much either, fight back that severe dad body thing you got going on there." She gave the man a lopsided smirk, her trademark expression of sass.

"Who's your contact here?" She asked onward then.

"I'm a vegetarian, lady." Eben says through a rasp of pain, hopping on one foot. "I know my damn vegetables." He snaps. His voice rising high. Kinda shrill…

"I.. I'm sorry. I don't mean to lose my temper at you, this is just a very emotional moment for me." A hand sliding up over his face, then hes biting a finger, walking and limping, muffled noises exiting in to his fist. Then his teeth snap off. "Just, can't believe it's all gone. Years, years of so much, I had an actual vintage Atari 2600 from 1977 in there… "

A pause, a step, "Also Captain Huran, he was kind of my friend. I mean, I owed him money so thats good but we really bonded over bubble gum, he loved his bubble gum. Big Chew… " A hand slides up, fingers fishing around in his wet pocket, a slender half torn piece of tin wrapped gum pulled out, pushing some in to his mouth, "This is for you, Captain… "

It's a stumbling walk, slow, his heads down, "My contacts? I guess, like, about everyone. I'm first crew, served under the Count when it was his boat. Before he took the injury, that one that really fucked his knee. Put him out work and now he's just a guard for the wharf, bartends too. We'll hit his place up first."

"Who all is after you anyways? I mean, I know China White, shes got a lot of pull but the tech ranges they were hitting, the garble I picked up… just, we're talking new level here."

He spins suddenly and points, "Your phone! Do you have it still?"

Natasha didn't have a -whole- lot she could say about the emotional and sentimental things he lost on the water. "Captain Huran knew what this job entailed… He died out there fighting with everything he had, it was an honorable death." That was about the best she could say as Eben stuffed the gum into his mouth. "The Atari isn't gone either, its just going to be played by fish now instead of you."

"Everyone is after me." She replied to him further then as they walked, she was staying up by the tree line and not just walking down an open beach. "We need to find some clothing to better hide ourselves, because even the senior citizens are probably going to be in on this hunt at this point."

"And the phone is at the bottom of a fish guts barrel, so unless its water proof… and you're up for bobbing for fish guts… then its off the options list." Her red hair was drying and it was bobbing up and down around her head as she walked, so she reached up and back to tie it into a little tight knot on the back of her head.

Natasha is well aware of her hair being a pretty big sign of her identity in this hunt.

"Fish can't pla… Oh HA HA, very funny." Eben says, his voice barking and loud as he follows up after her, his hands reaching down to wring out his shirt, "Worst client ever." He says glumly, "The pretty ones are always so cruel."

Several hours later…

LowTown at night is a dangerous place, dark streets that go in no direction that makes sense, most of them ending up in turf of one gang to the next, clubhouses, bars, seedy places, the wharf especially rough, many of the people who come to Madripoor are criminals from other countries trying to make a living, as they walk them in the dark, low lighting is everywhere, mostly candles, lamps, lanterns, firepits, burn barrels, theres coughing, laughter, drinking. Its best never to stray too close to one group as they move, just flitting like shadows from one dark walkway to the next, "Just a little more." Eben is beat, his feet hurt, his back hurts, his toes hurt, his hair hurts, yes, his hair. She has heard it all.

Once they got back into the city, Natasha used what money she had left in her pants to buy another jacket and hat. She got herself a military green coat and a blue beanie cap that she could slip on over her head and cover up all of her red locks.

She rejoined Eben out where he was stumbling around and she looked over at him. "Are we there yet?" She teased him, she could tell he was on his literal last leg here, barely able to keep going… while she looked like she just woke up and was fresh with endurance.

"Am I going to have to give you a piggy back ride?" She asked him then. "Cause that'll take some money off of your paycheck when we get out of this."

Nat's green eyes were ever-looking-out though, for anyone that looked like a threat.

"Yeah, the Counts is up ahead. We can hunker down there." Eben motions towards a small shack thats out on one of the old wharfs, one that looks high above the beach like the tide has not touched it in a while, nets hang off around the dock around it, its got grass forming and there is a large patio, tables with lanterns and people drinking at them.

Eben leads Natasha up the sandy slope to the door opening it up to the smokey interior, for the hour its nicely packed, high ceilings, long bar, an expansive back area that no one can see in to. The tropic military+pirate of all eras embraced here, many of the men within look the role, ex-soldiers, private contractors, mercenaries, pirates, she can see tattoos of all kinds sported, Special Forces, SAS… it's here, a real rough place, the sort of place one would expect an old smuggler and mercenary to run.

People look over, shouts of 'Eben!' ring out in chorus, hands raise and people pat him on the shoulder, shake his hand or joke with him as he shoves past, motioning for Natasha to follow him, it's once they get to the bar he is leaning over it, looking left to right.%R%RTheres a woman there, blonde, tall, willowy but strong cheekbones, cut like a wasp, "Eben, you make mistake coming here." A thick accent.

"I know but the Eels wont dare come here."

"It not Eels you worry about. Go in back." Natasha gets a stare from the hard faced woman, her skin leathery, smoker worn, aged, hair platinum blonde. A fellow Russian.

"Right." Natashs said before they made it up to the place and… well, once they got in her eyes went all around… she wasn't thrilled to see a bunch of people who likely would do anything to make money off of her head being turned over to China White, but hey, if Eben thought this was a place they could go then she figured he was mostly right, she didn't think he WANTED to die afterall.

"Lovely place." Nat muttered to him prior to the blonde coming over and when she did, Nat just smiled at her. A seocnd later and she blinked her eyes at the woman and spoke in a flawless french accent. "Je ne sais pas o je suis, cet endroit est trs troublant!" Exclaiming that she didn't know where she was and that this place was very unsettling!

Play up the 'helpless girl' routine, it worked pretty good in these kinds of places… until the roughians inevitably get handsy anyway.%R%R"You go as well." The woman says with a sneering drag to Natasha, "In back, through blanket door and down hall, last room on left. Only room on left." The French gets a look of disdain, the woman slides her a glass of clear liquid, vodka. "Take and go. I am only bartender… " Half lidded eyes roll away from the Black Widow, dismissive-like.

Eben exhales, "Count is going to be pissed we wrecked his girl. Huran was a service buddy of his too." From the looks, the sounds, everything around them. Word has already spread. "He'll keep us safe though. House us long enough to get somewhere far away from here so we can finish the job."

Yes, Eben insists on completion. Despite his attitude hes fully devoted to making this thing still happen and to get her extracted.%R%RDown the hall and to the left he goes…

Natasha gave a smile to that sharp edged bartender, she wanted to say something in Russian to her… but she knew well enough that that was a bad idea. She just turned around and followed after Eben, keeping close to his shoulder (awkwardly so likely) just to appear like she was a poor scared little woman.%R%ROnce they were in the hall and out of the main room she separated though and fell back to her normal style of a stalking-predator-type, waiting to kill the next person that crossed them.

"A real family establishment, I'll have to leave a positive Yelp review once I get back home." She teased her companion.

She walks the hallway with him, her eyes scanning around… up and down, side to side. She takes the left turn with him.

Eben and Black Widow are inside the confines of the Count's room that enclosure hosting an office is now trashed, a singular lamp swaying in a circle above the battered dark skinned man, mouth gagged and head slackened, he looks up at them both with one puffy eye, swollen with obvious repeatedly applied impact.

The blond techie stumbles back, in to the wall and slides down it, aware that there is two additional people in here.

Zayin, the man who rather dapper in a bowlers hat, Pinkerton style mustache and garb, even a monocle keeps a long thin dagger leveled out, along the count's throat.

"I do, know who you are." Eben says, the brief dialogue before Natasha enters catching him, filled in with his final words as the 'suited man' before him is met with what could be absolute and real terror, just about on par with his waking and screaming about sharks earlier. Also a real fear as he and Natasha had been dumped in to chum infested waters…

Standing behind the Count under that swinging light is another man, clad in black and red body armor, a large clawed hand curling down around the Count's throat. Bald head, pale skin and reptilian like yellow eyes.

Natasha, in her incognito street clothes, appears behind and beside Eben now into this room. Her green eyes scan about it and she sees the other people present. Her right hand comes up out of her military-green jacket pocket and she pulls that black beanie-cap off of her head allowing her red hair to fall back down around the sides of her face at shoulder-length.

Natasha leans over toward Eben and she whispers at his right ear. "What did you just have us walk into…" She says to the man. "I trusted you…" She adds through gritted teeth with her pink lips barely moving, frustrationg thick on her whispery-hued voice.

"It would be in the interest of this man's health and your own to surrender peacefully." The 'suited gentleman' encourages. "My companion is not the most reserved of hirelings."

Eben looks over towards Natasha and his hands rise above his head, he whispers to her, "I am sorry… "

The reptile and armored figure behind the Count stares at Natasha, a twitch of his lips and she'll see the sharp needle teeth beyond lips. "The Black Widow. You have been making quite a ruckus… "

"Ruckus?" Natasha repeated as she pulls her eyes off of Eben, assuming that he just walked her into a trap now to try to bargain his own freedom from this entire scenario… which was fine, whatever, she couldn't blame him for that.

Natasha's eyes fall on the man who just spoke that word to her and it makes her smirk lopsidedly in response. "I was just doing my job. Its all the piss poor 'security' that tried to stop me, that caused the ruckus. Had I been left alone, it would've all been over quietly and efficiently, I assure you."

The super spy clears her throat then, her hands were inside the pockets of her street jacket… she just pulls them out and puts her wrists together. "I surrender." She tells him in a disturbingly casual tone of her husky voice. "I'm yours to take into custody, Constable."

That, was easy?

"We represent something entirely different than the piss poor security you have dealt with." The genteel fellow says with some disdain at the word usage.

The snake sneers, "I am a serpent, do you recognize me?" The man steps around from behind the count, his movements fluid, no bend just motion. Graceful and yes, serpentine. "Cobra." He whispers to Natasha, "They call me, the Cobra." Rather proud of that he extends a metal chain, it forms in to a hoop and starts to slide towards Natasha's held together wrists. "We will know one another soon enough Widow."

"Enough of that, our business here is concluded. Count, a pleasure. Eben… be wiser next time. You knew coming here was a mistake, but then, you have never been known to have much of a spine have you?"

A bored sigh from Zayin and he waves behind Natasha, "If you're going peacefully this will all be quite simple. If you're going to resist." A sudden smile and that one monocle catches a flash of light, "Please, do not tarry, but know that your death is not our desire. Simply your captivity and deliverance to an interested party."

"Cute name." Natasha says to the Cobra, giving him a fairly plain look while he steps toward her. Her eyes briefly look down to the hooped chain being put around her wrists. She still has those Widow Wrists Guards on, poking out beneath the cuffs of her dark olive green jacket, but they may or may not be easily overlooked.

"If I had any intention of resisting, I would've done it while you were all speaking to me. Clearly I'm far more interested in turning myself in so that I can advance to a different place, because I don't find this particular place to be very… advantageous toward my likelihood for any survival."

With that said, Natasha's green eyes turn and lock onto Eben's face. "And I really need to survive long enough to make Happy Feet there pay for my sudden but inevitable betrayal." She gives the Techie a sardonic little smile and then looks back to her captors. "So where do we go from here? I assume there's a sedan waiting behind a doorway somewhere? Thats how this usually tends to go."

"More intelligent than I had anticipated." Zayin regards, "A pleasure as always, Count. Remember please stay on my Mistress' good side." A lift up and drop down of the bowler cap and the man is struting out of the room, a cane obviously containing a sword within, spins around in a twirl.

Cobra yanks on that cord and it tightens roughly upon Black Widow's wrists, he looms near her, "You should have resisted." He purrs, then jerks her out of the room and in to the main area of the bar.

Outside awaits a set of boats, sleek black things with mounted weaponry upon them. Men in black armor stylized with small red snake emblems stand at the ready, weapons in hand.

Once a sub faction of HYDRA, she should be remembering details about this particular group called Cobra. Allied to the Serpent Society now they have been working globally as a hired and privatized military.

Eben doesn't look at Natasha, he is set to untying the Count, yelling for help once they are out of the room. It appears he might have been the one to betray her…

The bindings were tightened and the small petite redheaded SHIELD spy was pulled along by her captor toward whatever destination lay ahead for her on this rather messy mission.

"The night's still young." Came her response to him while her eyes went from the back of his head toward the Cobra guards that were awaiting her, to each of them she offered a wide smile, almost flirtatious… because that was the game. Men are, by and large, idiots who're controlled by their baser instincts and one of the most simplistic way to get them to believe that a woman wasn't a threat, was to flirt with them… even if just a little, because they're so depraved for a woman's attention that the little flirt will melt their impression of her down… to those very base instincts, and thats how the Black Widow often poison's her male enemies against her.

"Boats." Natasha quietly quips since they hadn't gagged her. "Why not. I feel like my last boat trip ended before it ever really had a satisfying conclusion. Hopefully this helps with that." Natasha looks over to a guard standing beside her. "OCD you know?" She softly says to him with another little grin.

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