agentward

[agentward]

'If the job was easy, it wouldn't be any fun'.

- Agent Ward

PART 2

The touchdown at the HYDRA facility was anything but smooth. The ground was charred and showed signs of explosive damage in places. The single above ground farmhouse building stood ominously silent as the SHIELD team approached it.

The underground complex was entirely another issue. In stark contrast to the silence above, the underground facility was nothing short of a pandemonium. The cacophony of noises making such a racket that no one even noticed the entrace of the SHIELD operatives. The facility resembled a warzone with clusters of armed men and women running around, carrying the wounded to safety and scientists huddled in their labs.

Despite the unnerving and shocking scene in front of him, Director Phil Coulson continued guiding his agents through the maze of corridors to the heart of the complex. The facility was essentially, hence it was simply designed as such with the labs hastily constructed or remodelled from rooms on the periphery of the complex. At the heart of the complex were 2 halls connected to one another by a set of parallel corridors. Along each corridor were a line of cells, each no more than 5 foot long and not even equally wide, with strange contraptions built into each cell making it more clastrophobic.

Clearly these cells couldn't fit an average agent without causing damage in the long and short term, thought the fledgling director. Turning his flashlight into the darkened corners of the cell, the director squinted his eyes to see into the barely lit cell. A gasp of horror escaped him as he found himself staring at face of a young girl, barely above the age of 5. Lying in her lap was another child, a boy no older than 4. They were clearly emancipated and showed signs of brusing and injury. Calming the rage that threatened to explode within him, the director signalled for his team to look into the other cells. As he had expected, each cell was home to one or more children. Each of the team members had similar reactions, disgust, hatred and pure anger towards the monsters running this inhumane prison. No doubt HYDRA had ulterior motives in setting up this facility, Director Coulson dreaded finding out what else these poor innocent children had to undergo. Changinng his orders, he instructed his team to begin an evacuation of the prison facility and called in an even larger SHIELD strike team and Med-Evac teams.

As the armada of SHIELD agents slowly evacuated each of the cells, Agent Melinda May noticed one of the children hesitant to leave. The 6 year old girl was adamant in staying put saying that she couldn't leave him alone. When questioned on whom she didn't want to leave, the girl replied that she didn't want to leave her cell neighbour alone because they promised each other.

Walking with the girl into the corridor, the seasoned agent approached the other cell. A quick peek into the cell made the infamous Cavalry's throat burn with bile. The cell was empty except for a large pool of blood on the floor. The walls were riddled with bullet holes and blood splatter. Tightening her grip in the ICER, she quelled her instinct to hunt the monsters who had tortured and killed innocent children. Turning to the girl, she lied to her trying to get her out but it failed as the girl stood her ground. Seeing no other option, she told the girl that her friend was dead but the girl adamantly shook her head and pointed down the corridor towards a hall. Even from the distance, it was evident that the hall was the source of the pandemonium as she heard the telltale sounds of gunfire and flashes of explosions. Whatever was happening here, it was happening in that hall and in that hall was trapped an injured child, either dead or bleeding to death judging from the amount of blood in the cell.

Handing the girl over to the another agent, she radioded the acting director and gathered two more specialists to assist her before setting off towards the hall. Her guilt ridden consciousness simply kept replaying her memories of the Bahrain Incident, making it impossible for her to walk away. But this is not Bahrain, she reassured herself to little effect.

[agentward]

If the mission were easy, it wouldn't be any fun.

- Agent Ward

PART - 1

It was nearly 11AM when the acting director of S.H.I.E.L.D got the call. Despite the brief nature of the call, the urgency of the caller was easily palpable. The search for HYDRA's base of operations paid off. A SHIELD operative had discovered a well hidden base teeming with soldiers. It was time for SHIELD to go on the offensive. Or so thought the interim director as the strike teams approached the base.

Hidden in an underground bunker on a remote farm, the base spanned nearly twice the size of the farm with a concrete and steel reinforced blast resistant structure. Only on infiltrating the base, did the SHIELD strike teams learn that the base wasn't the center of HYDRA operations, as they previously assumed, but it was a secure detention facility as part of the incentives program. The last time Phil Coulson and his team had been to one of these facilities, he had to kill one of his best friends and lament as his traitorous second-in-command escaped the facility, after knocking out the infamous Melinda May. An action for which she had yet to forgive him and eagerly looked forward to repay him. But the traitorous specialist had not escaped without injury. In the battle with the Cavalry, he had fractured his larynx and suffered a penetrating flesh wound in the foot. Nonetheless, the Asian-American agent had a bone to pick with the double agent and was eagerly looking forward to it.

To be continued.....

[agentward]

If only things went this way!

#4 human shield for biospecialist please!

“Listen to me!” Simmons yells. She’s got to to be heard over all the noise Grant and the other cops are making. They’re trying to restrain him because they think he’s a mugger or would-be rapist or something and he’s trying not to murder them.

Seriously, he’s trying so hard not to use lethal force that one of these losers has managed to get a handcuff on him. Yet another instance where his life would be just so much easier if he didn’t have to play SHIELD all the time.

“He was helping me,” Simmons goes on, trying to sound cool and level-headed and not like she just narrowly escaped a kidnapping attempt. “He’s a SHIELD agent!”

“Oh,” says the cop gently leading her away from the melee, “we know. And we know you are too, Agent Simmons.”

Grant’s surprise is enough of an opening the other cuff is closed around a drain pipe.

“What,” Simmons says more than asks. Luckily her shock’s stilled her too. The fake cop is having some trouble dragging her any closer to what Grant guesses is also a fake police van. She teeters on the high heels she bought for her cousin’s bachelorette party. The same party that brought her and Grant more than a thousand miles from the team that’ll be too far away to help when they don’t check in in a few hours.

“Don’t worry,” the fake cop soothes. “You’ll have all the toys. Everything SHIELD could offer you and more. And you’ll be treated well—so long as you’re productive.”

“What about Ward?” she asks, a touch of hysteria pulling at her voice.

“You’ll have new bodyguards. If you’re good, maybe they’ll be as pretty as SHIELD’s.”

To Grant’s left one of the grunts is unholstering his sidearm. They’ve all backed off now he’s restrained, but not far. All he needs is that moment, the one right before the trigger’s pulled. These guys are pros so they’ll know the sound’s coming. They’ll tense up, the smarter ones will even cover their ears to protect them. That’s the opening. Take out the gunman. Then the big guy. If he’s lucky he can knock Goliath here into someone else, maybe even two someones. If he’s really lucky he’ll manage to hold onto the gun when he takes out the first one. He just needs that opening-

Which evaporates right in front of him when Simmons appears between him and the gun. Somehow she managed to break free and chose to run back to him instead of just running.

They are so having a lesson on tactics in a life-or-death scenario when this is over.

“No!” she gasps. Her breathing’s ragged from the adrenaline but her voice is firm. “If you want me to work for you, you won’t touch him.”

The grunts exchange a few looks. To Simmons it probably looks like they’re considering her demand. To Grant it looks like they’re trying not to laugh.

She sighs. “Listen. Your employers, whoever they may be, want me for my mind. Obviously this means you don’t need Agent Ward-”

“Uh,” Grant says. Simmons reaches blindly back, laying a soothing hand on whatever part of him she touches first. He wonders if he should let her know she gets his peck, not his shoulder.

“-and you also don’t need to leave me unharmed. I’m quite capable of exercising my genius with a broken bone or two.”

“Simmons,” Grant says, voice low enough he’s hoping it sounds to her like a growl. What the fuck is she doing?

“But I assure you, I am quite stubborn when I have a mind to be. If you shoot him or break his bones or put so much as one of his hairs out of place, I will die before I help your employer with so much as a cake recipe.” She tips her chin up and from this angle Grant can only imagine the I’m smarter than you and we both know it look on her face. “Do we understand one another?”

The grunts look more uncertain than before. Uncertain enough that they miss Grant breaking his own thumb and slipping the cuffs. They don’t miss when he shoves Simmons to the ground, but they’re all a little busy being beaten to death with every ounce of berserker rage he can summon up this many months later to worry about her anymore.

“Well,” Simmons says a quarter of an hour later, when he’s standing over the bodies. “That was…”

He rounds on her. “Stupid.”

She recoils. From the insult or his anger or the blood and viscera clinging to him, probably all three and, frankly, he’s glad. She should be afraid.

“What the hell were you thinking?” he demands, looming over her.

She stares, eyes wide. Which just proves how stupid she is. She’s afraid of him but a few minutes ago she didn’t bat an eye at the guys with literal guns who were trying to kidnap her and enslave her to whatever psycho warlord or billionaire wants her mind.

“My job,” he says tightly, “is to protect you. Your job is to be protected. Not to throw yourself in harm’s way just to-”

“To protect you!” she snaps back. The fear’s swept away, replaced by anger of her own. “They were going to kill you. You can’t expect me to stand by and watch that happen!”

“Yes. I can. Because that’s my job. I take the bullet for you. Not the other way around.”

She scoffs and now he gets to see that smarter than you look for himself. “I know that prior to this assignment you were very comfortable playing the lone wolf, Agent Ward-” he struggles not to recoil from the title; it’s been a long time since she dropped it- “but you’re part of a team now. You have friends, whether you like it or not. So you’d best get used to people putting you first once in a while.”

She whirls, smacking him in the face with that ponytail of hers. “Now I’m going to call this mess in to the local SHIELD satellite office. I suggest you start checking for pulses. They’ll want someone to question.” It’s clear from her tone she expects if none of the perpetrators are available, SHIELD will turn their attention to him and his excessive response.

Grant doesn’t bother checking. The local office is run by a Hydra agent who owes him a favor; his little killing spree will be swept under the rug in a few hours and he and Simmons can get back to the Bus.

How he feels about going back there with her after what she said and did, he’s not ready to think about.