[center][img]http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130612040929/marveldatabase/images/a/a3/Gambit_Vol_5_Logo.png[/img]
[b]South Bronx, New York
September 7th, 2012
11:23 AM[/b][/center]

Remy laid half nude atop the motel bed, his white boxers caught the sunlight like a crystal, refracting and reflecting. He snored loudly for a moment, which turned into a steady moan. He fumbled with the pillow as if it were uncomfortable and turned into a fetal position. A small discolored circle on Remy’s waist was all that was left of his physical wounds from the fateful day when he lost his family; the mental wounds would always be there, like a ghost, they would appear and chill him to the bones. 

A quiet noise breached the humid summer silence. A humming signaled the presence of a drone, it’s shadow was cast into the motel room from the window. The little white floating robot was no larger than a microwave, no smaller than a toaster. It was a disk with an armored shell. A small prong extended from its centrifugal form and tapped the window, it shattered. Remy awoke violently from his sleep, in a moment he was stood atop the bed. The little drone expertly floated into room and landed on the floor, a hologram appeared above it, Fence’s face. 

“Glad to see you’re up.” Fence was sitting in a train headed down the eastern seaboard, he’d catch a biplane in Florida. Fence was rather picky about how he traveled, never in a way where he was completely trapped in, what he considered, a death trap. He’d fly the biplane, he could leave the train at any of the many stops. He was sitting in a private booth by himself, speaking into his newly fixed HUD. 

“I wasn’t till yo’ damn drone came through the window!” Remy sat at the edge of the bed, lazily stared at the virtual representation of Fence. “What dis doing here anyway?”

“I’m on my way down to Florida, I won’t be able to meet you. But, HARDy here has some equipment and documents for you. I found a place for you to stay, a friendly place. Make sure you read everything I sent you before you head out…”

“HARDy?”

“Oh, yeah, I built him last night, while you were out. Cool hu? It stands for Helpful Assistance and Recon Drone.”

“Well, dat’s just adorable.” Remy responded as he wiped the tiredness from his eyes.  “When will you be back?”

“I’d like to be back by Monday, we should be able to hit the target a few days after that.”

“Yeah, yeah, don’t say too much over dese channels.” Remy felt a little vulnerable in this motel. He knew the espionage game, he knew the different ways in which people could gather information. Remy was pretty sure no one had followed him to the motel, so physical surveillance was very unlikely. And, of course, Remy trusted Fence’s encryption methods. But if there is one thing the Cajun learned during his escapades with espionage types, it was that you could never be too careful, or too paranoid. 

“Please, Remy. I built HARDy, and set up his comm channels myself. Do you think I’d leave a hole in the gate? Don’t insult me. This is a secure channel. Anyway, see ya!” Fence replied, smiling. He was proud of Remy, they were going into the breach, two adventurers out on a limb. Remy was always prepared, always thinking; Fence couldn’t think of a better partner. 

The hologram disappeared and the drone lifted off of the ground, that’s when Remy noticed he wasn’t being controlled, HARDy was intelligent. He hovered right over the bed, the cameras twirled from the plastic band running along it’s center, positioning itself perfectly over the pillow. A PDA fell from a compartment at the bottom of the drone’s body, a GPS came out behind it, and then a paintball case filled with the prototype metal balls. 

The twitching feet came back into Remy’s mind, his throat ripped to pieces by metal bits and his face burned to a crisp. Seeing the metal orbs again made him feel a twinge of regret, they were killing machines, especially when combined with Remy’s deadly powers. Cards were far less deadly. Sure, there would be scratches, at the worst someone would die days later from impact shock, but nothing so brutal as fragmentation explosions. 

“Hey, can I speak to Fence again, HARDy?”

HARDy bobbed a little in the air, hovered over to the ground and sat again. Fence came up as a hologram moments later. 

“Fence.”

“Yes, Remy.” Fence seemed a little annoyed. The fact was that a very beautiful woman had slipped into his booth, she was a bit of a technophile, it seemed. There was a blossoming of those. Fence had just promised to order a bottle of chardenea. 

“I don’t know if I want to use these pellets.”

“Why?”

“I killed an agent last night…”

“What?!? Where?”

“In my apartment, it was terrible. There was shrapnel, Fence.”

“Yeah, I was worried about that. The batch I just gave you have been redesigned. The shrapnel was an accidental consequence of the old design. I’m sorry you had to go through that.”

“I think I’ll be alright. It’s not the first time I’ve killed a government official.”

There was an eerie quietness over the line, both Remy and Fence were embarrassed by that truth; each for different reasons. “Anything else?” Fence finally asked.

Remy thought for a moment, shook his head. “No, I’ll talk to you later.”

“Yeah, HARDy will patch us through once you get to your new home.” And with a click the hologram was gone. HARDy zipped up and out of the room as Remy slid into his body suit. 


[center][b]59th St Subway station, New York
3:30 PM[/b][/center]

The glistening A train started up and then chugged out of the station, almost everyone left on the platform made their way to the stairs. Remy, wrapped in his overcoat, slid into the shadows of the subway tunnel and began running down the darkened highway. A puddle of muck splashed under his feet as he detoured into a small hallway which ended in a manhole. Remy dropped down in and plunged even further into the muck. Remy ended up at a delta of sewage-ways, he stood on a platform on the side, looking down the red-lit corridor. Remy carried a duffle bag over his shoulder, he turned to his right and began walking. It was easy to ignore the smell, Remy had surprisingly been in worse. He smiled when he saw the green light which signaled the location of his safe zone. A vaulted door, outfitted with a security panel, shone in the verdant light. Remy plugged the numbers he’d been given into the keypad, a fingerprint scanner revealed itself directly below the keypad. Remy removed his glove, unlocked the door, and stepped in. It was a moderate space. Nearest the door was a small cot with a dresser at its feet. Opposite the cot was a couch and desk. Set up on a concrete dais was a kitchen area, a bathroom was hidden to the side behind an opened iron-bar gate. 

Remy placed his bag down and sat on the cot, the vault door closed automatically behind him. “I could get used to this place,” Remy commented as he fell to the pillow, he’d need some rest before a heist Fence had planned for him for later that night.