Vault 613
Agents Smith, Abercrombie, & Bautista
Maria had made her way into Creed Financial and then waited for Tinley and Niah to come over, she started to feel a little bit nervous if she ran into Luminous again, also a part of her did worry about Novikova who would be facing her as well.
"So what happens if we run into Luminous again?" Maria asked Tinley as she took out her collapsible bow just in case there was any guards that had found them yet.
Niah joined Maria, she frowned at Maria's question. Niah would happily fill Luminous full of ICER rounds if she could. She knew she had gotten lucky before and she probably wouldn't get the chance to do it again, but she really wanted to. She looked to Abercrombie for her opinion on the matter.
Tinley finished her preparations, checking her gear.
"Hopefully the other team will take care of her and it won't be a problem, but if she does show up we will take her down. But our mission is the vault and I want that as priority number 1." Tinley walked over to the door of Creed.
"Keep an eye out for guards. Incapacitate and move on. We don't want to light up our position before we even reach the lower level. Ready?" Maria nodded towards Tinley as she took out her collapsible bow, she took a moment and took a deep breath as she gave their team leader the thumbs up.
"Ready to go then." Maria said as she made sure that her suit was in working condition now and then made her way inside notching a regular arrow just in case.
Thankfully, Barton, Renoir, and Flynn had managed to clear out a majority of the security on this floor. As the team walks, they'll be able to see stray arrowheads every now and then. There are small signs of a struggle, but all of it points to fighting on the part of their fellow S.H.I.E.L.D. agents so there is nothing to be too concerned about. There are two options to get down to the level where the vault is: a staircase that indicates it goes down to sub-basement 2 and an elevator that requires a 16 digit passcode to be entered to unlock it.
"Let me see if I can see what the code might be." Niah pulled off her glove and reached forward touching the buttons. She could see in her mind Baron von Strucker typing a passcode, as they typed she copied their input. There was a ding as the elevator was summoned. Niah pulled her glove back on.
"That's a handy power." She said under her breath.
Tinley waited as Bautista worked, wondering if the girl could, in fact, see the code. Sure enough, she managed to summon the elevator.
"Nice work Agent Bautista." She stepped inside the elevator and waited for the other two and hit the button for the lower floor and the vault.
"The others took care of the guards up here, but there may and most likely is more resistance down below, so be ready." "Awesome work." Maria said to Niah as soon as they stepped into the elevator and then Tinley pressed the elevator button, and felt it lurch downwards towards the bottom floor. As soon as the elevator opened Maria poked her head out and counted out three guards, doing their patrol rounds.
"I count three of them, how do you want to take them out?" Maria whispered back as she moved back in looking towards Tinley.
Niah smiled and nodded in thank you to Maria. Considering there being hostiles she didn't want to make a noise before they were ready. She drew her ICER and waited for Tinley's command. She might be able to tell if there were more than the three guards but if she turned on her enhanced listening she would be in danger of messing up her ears if bullets started flying. If Tinley asked her to she would though.
Tinley cursed under her breath. Three guards and all three of them together. She thought a minute and came up with a plan.
"Ok here's what I want to happen. Maria, shoot an arrow and make noise. I'm hoping only one will break away and you can knock him out when he does. I can take out two in one and Niah can back me up just in case. Worse comes to worse, I have shock batons with their name on it and we all go charging at them. Sound good?" "Sure thing." Maria said as she took out an arrow from her quiver, she wasn't even paying attention to which one she was grabbing for really. Maria then quickly stepped out from the elevator again and shot it at one of the guard by the time it was released Maria silently smacked herself as she picked out the wrong arrow.
"Jerry, go check that out!"
"Why's it always my turn to check it out?"
"Because Jerry Gergich is a dumbass name, now GO!" one of the guards scolded.
The guard named Jerry sighed, splitting off from the other two as he went to go investigate the source of the arrow.
Niah facepalmed almost at the exact same time as Maria. She held back a snort of laughter but looked to Tinley waiting for her to take point. Somehow the ploy had worked even though Maria had grabbed a grappling arrow instead of a normal one. It was nice to smile even if it was for a brief second. Niah had her ICER ready and waited to see if Tinley would need her assistance.
The rule of threes followed as Tinley facepalmed too. However, it seemed to still do the job as one of the guards was sent to check. And, really, Jerry Gergich was a dumbass name. Tinley motioned for the two to follow the plan still as she made her way over to the two guards. As soon as she was able to, she sprang forward, batons at the ready as she set them to stun and smacked the both of them at the same time. It did, in fact, shock them, but they did not go down.
In fact, quite the opposite, it seemed to piss them off as one managed to punch Tinley in the chest and the other grabbed her and pinned her to the wall.
"Listen, boys, a girl likes to be wooed before we get to this point." She hoped the others could manage to get these clowns down, and quickly.
Maria watched as the guards turned their attention towards Tinley, one of them then pinned Tinley against the wall looking over towards Niah.
"Take out the other one." She told her, as she drew out the correct arrow this time as she watched rather closely as she took a deep breath and fired the arrow, watching as it pierced the guard and fell dead and gave Tinley a slight nod.
Niah took aim and shot off three ICER rounds in quick succession. The first missed, but thankfully it didn't hit anyone else.
"Shit," She said under her breath and took the other two shots. One grazing the man and then the third finding its new home in the man's stomach. He was down for the count. She sighed relieved with the man down.
Baron Von Strucker, codename Fenris, stepped into view. He took his gun and emptied the chamber into the fallen guards. It didn't matter that most of them had already been taken out - they were weak and HYDRA could not tolerate weakness. He then took in the three and gave them a twisted smile.
"Welcome home, children," he said to the three. He stared at each of them in turn, knowing their files and what they were capable of.
"Oh, forgive me," he said, putting in what looked like earbuds.
"I can't have you reading my mind, Agent Abercrombie." Though she did not recognize the voice, once she got a look at him she knew who he was and it made her skin crawl. HYDRA was bad enough, and now they had this twat to deal with.
"Wolfgang von Strucker. Still not tolerating weakness, I see. And don't worry, I don't need to read your mind to know you and what you think. Well Fenris, are we doing this the easy way or the hard way?" She cracked her knuckles and held on to her batons. She knew the answer and she was desperate to kick his ass.
Maria jumped slightly when she heard the gunshots go off, when she looked up she saw Baron von Strucker himself feeling very uneasy right now as she got an arrow out ready. She wasn't really sure what to do right now, and looked towards Tinley she was ready to attack him, she made sure that she had her bow trained at him.
"So, are you here to kill us or something? Yeah, Antonie had been right. This had been a terrible idea. She should have stuck with the lab job, he wouldn't be dead and neither would several of her other friends. Now she faced someone who as far as she knew was literally unkillable. What caught her as odd though was that he had said "welcome home" to them. As if this location was their home. She had no place in HYDRA, she was too gay and non-white for that. She shifted on her feet slightly anticipating an attack. She did not want to get within hand-to-hand combat range with him. Niah was ready to dodge, and her ICER was still in her hand from shooting the now dead guard.
Von Strucker laughed, shaking his head slightly.
"Why would I kill you after all of the resources HYDRA invested into your creation?" Tinley shook her head a bit. What had he just said? HYDRA invested in them? No, that was not possible. It was a SHIELD project.
"Nice try von Strucker. Mind games don't work. So, again, do we need to kick your ass or will you let us go without violence?" Truth be told, Tinley was wavering. The news hit her, but it could not be true, could it?
Maria glared directly at Von Strucker when he revealed that HYDRA had invested into their creation, she was getting angrier as she felt her hands shake slightly she aimed for his heart.
"I'm not going to be HYDRA's puppet." Maria said just as she was about to aim, Tinley spoke.
"No! Don't kill him! Not yet. I want answers first and I will have them." Which made her lose her aim, as the arrow flew lodging itself into his thigh.
That was fine Niah thought, filling him full of ICER bullets wouldn't kill him. She unloaded her magazine. Anger and resentment that had been building in her was being cooled with each pull of the trigger and when she was done he was on the floor. She blinked. Seriously? She had taken out the Fenris with ICER bullets?
She had accounted for Maria shooting him, but she had not accounted for Niah ICING him. Still, he wasn't dead, just out cold.
"All right, Maria, tie him up really good. Niah, use medical tape to tape his mouth. Priority is still the vault and we will empty that. And once done we will leave and I expect answers to all the questions I have. Ever single one. And they better be damn good answers or someone is going to get hurt." Maria stared at Von Strucker laying on the ground unconscious, shaking her head slightly as she looked over towards Tinley and nodded slightly, as much as she wanted to kill the guy they did need to get some answers right now.
"Alright then." Maria said as she slung her bow over her shoulder, seeing the grapple arrow she had used earlier and walked over towards it easily tearing off the cord attached to it. She then sat up the unconscious HYDRA leader and started to tie him up and she made sure that they were as tight as possible.
Niah pulled from the medkit she had grabbed the roll of medical tape. And started taping up his mouth. She paused and pulled the earbuds he had put in earlier out and then continued the process. She decided to just use the whole roll, she had another in the bag if she needed it for a medical reason. As she did that she considered what to do with the earbuds, it wasn't mistrust in Abercombie that made her consider putting it in her pocket and keeping them. It was mistrust in HYDRA. Everything that had happened so far was making her paranoid. If Abercombie wasn't the only person with mind control powers she did not want to be on the receiving end of it. She looked at Abercrombie and put the earbuds in her pocket.
"Just in case HYDRA gets to you and you need me to slap it out of you." Tinley allowed her team to tie up von Strucker, noticing Niah pocket the ear pods. It made her feel weird and a bit ticked off, though it was a smart move and, like she said, who knows what would happen now.
"Smart." Once done, Tinley made her way down the hall towards the vault. As she did so, she was unaware of the laster near her foot as it passed through it. She heard the telltale sound of bullets being shot before she moved her head back, just in time to see them hit the wall.
She breathed a sigh of relief, knowing how close that was to the end.
"All right, seems we are not out of this yet. Traps ahead. Proceed with caution." Maria held Von Strucker for a moment, as she dragged the unconscious guy a little bit further, and then she started to notice something, and quickly held out her hand towards Tinley and Niah.
"Hold on, watch him for a moment." As Maria noticed there was another series of traps in front of them. She took a few steps backwards and took a deep breath, as Maria then ran forward and started to jump, and hop, skip and did a backflip towards the end deactivating the traps that were there.
"It should be safe to continue now." Tinley didn't stop Niah from pocketing the earbuds, she was thankful for that, even though she had seen a flash of anger cross her face. She had agreed with the potential necessity for it. Tinley turned the corner and a barrage of bullets caused Niah to duck out of instinct. Everyone was safe though. Maria then took point and handed Niah the unconscious body of von Strucker, in an amazing display of acrobatics that Niah would never have been able to pull off and reminded Niah that Maria had been an athlete before joining SHIELD (and accidentally HYDRA). With the all-clear Niah started dragging von Strucker's body forward down the hall after Maria and toward their goal of the vault.
Tinley proceeded onwards, she would deal with Niah later. For now, Maria managed to get all of the traps disarmed. She clopped her way down the hallway, unaware as her thoughts raced due to recent events. Eventually, she landed in front of the vault. Reinforced and with a code.
"Don't suppose you can figure out this code Agent Bautista?" Maria stood in front of the vault, and then made her way over towards Niah.
"I got him again, go ahead and see if you can find out the code." She told her friend as she took Von Sturcker again, holding him firmly against her, while looking over her shoulder so far there weren't any guards yet from earlier. But she remained alert as well.
Niah removed her glove after handing over von Strucker and reached to touch the panel. As before she could see the code being typed and she copied the movements for it. There was a click as the door was disarmed and unlocked. She put her glove back on with a smile. HYDRA may have paid for her powers to be made but she was going to use them to tear them down and destroy them.
She knew having Niah with her was a good call, even if the girl didn't seem to trust her. Once the vault had opened she got a view inside. Gold the likes of which only Harry Potter would know (yeah she read Harry Potter. She IS British after all!). And one unconscious Rhodes. Tinley quickly ran over to make sure he was alive. Once she confirmed she faced the others.
"All right, he is alive. Continue the plan as normal. Empty as much as you can carry because I am not leaving HYDRA with a cent left. After that, we take Rhodes and von Strucker and we head back. If possible, we make a quick return trip to gather more, but we get what we can now." She began to empty the vault, carrying roughly 18% of its contents.
The moment the vault door opened she looked around seeing all of the gold that was inside of the vault itself, then she stared at the ground seeing Coronel Rhodes there on the floor. She looked towards Niah for a moment and wondered how he would take the news that his nephew was killed she then spotted there was a cart inside of the vault as well.
"We can use the cart, it would make the trip much easier." She suggested, as Maria moved over and started to slowly move the gold onto it.
Niah let out a low whistle when the door opened to reveal PILES of gold. Tinley went to Rhodes. He was okay, that was good, but now they had a TON of gold to move and two unconscious people. An extra hand or two would have been nice, but at least Maria noticed a cart. Niah started help load the gold onto the cart. Between the two of them they were able to get about 75% of the gold onto the cart. There was no way she could carry both the gold and one of the people. She frowned. There was still a good amount of money left in the vault.
"Okay, what do we do with the rest?" Tinley was not about to let HYDRA have anything, either von Strucker, Rhodes, or their gold. She quickly radioed for help.
"When able, Cassandra, can you help us clean the vault out? We found Colonel Rhodes locked in the vault and we have a prisoner for transport too. Once done the vault will be cleared and we can evacuate." She signaled to the others to get ready to leave. They needed to exit soon.
Cassandra looked towards the Luminous team for a moment after hearing the message from Tinley.
”I’m on my way now be there shortly. She said as she turned around and made her way towards the elevator, and went down to the bottom floor. Eventually catching up to the others seeing the gold, as well as von Strucker, and Colonel Rhodes.
”Looks like you guys did a good job down here.” Cassandra said, as Maria looked towards her and smiled slightly adjusting her weight a bit holding von Strucker.
"I can carry Colonel Rhodes if you take the rest of the gold." Niah said to Cassandra after a small nod about the situation. Niah didn't feel like she had done a terrible lot, though she supposed she had been useful. She had gotten both codes and had ICED von Strucker. She picked up her friend's uncle and knew she would have to tell him soon what happened to Sami, and that she hadn't been able to figure out his cryptic message. She nodded to Tinley once Rhodes was secure, Niah was ready. She hoped Cassandra would be able to get the last of the gold.
Tinley met Cassandra and walked to the vault with her. Once inside, they were able to get both bodies and the remainder of the gold. Tinley would not let HYDRA have the satisfaction of money, their prisoner, or one of their leaders. So she took them all.
"Good work team. Now let's get out of here. I have a lot of questions that need answers."
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