Dangerous Woman
❝Somethin' 'bout you, makes me feel
like a dangerous woman. Towers of gold are still too little.
These hands could hold the world.
I've got red in my ledger. Oh if looks could kill, I'd be a dead man walking.❞
A "SHOT IN THE DARK" NO...
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Sage woke up to the sounds of Loki barking at something. Her face scrunched up at the loud sound, something she did not enjoy being woken up by. "Shh Loki, it's nothing." Loki pushed her arm with his snout a few times, trying to get her attention to something. Once he stopped barking, that's when she heard it. The loud, and constant beeping of something electronic. She sat up a little, brows furrowing.That's strange... She sat up more, looking around to see where the noise could possibly be coming from. Her eyes flicked up to the computer, and she stood up slowly, praying nothing was wrong.
Displayed on her computer screen were the Avengers' tower cameras. But... she couldn't see anything. A small screen was at the bottom left part of her computer, blinking white and red. WARNING: EXTERNAL CHIP MALFUNCTION, it read. "Oh shit..." She said aloud, realizing that she had definitely messed up. While she was taking her little nap, the chip had diverted the power from the Avengers' tower elsewhere, and now she had to figure out how to fix it before they found her. She sat down in her chair quickly, and disconnected the hard drive from her computer. "Dammit now I have to destroy it and make a new one." Sage moaned, putting it to the side for now.
Putting her attention back on the situation at hand, Sage realized that she was in over her head. She had absolutely no idea how to fix this. Yeah sure, she was a tech "genius" but she had never done anything like this before. She started to panic, her fingers threading themselves through her wavy blonde hair, her breaths becoming more shallow as her foot tapped madly at the floor. Contain your panic before it consumes you, she told herself, knowing that if she didn't, she would freak out, which was the opposite of what she needed right now. Sage closed her eyes, and took deep breaths, focusing on the feel of Loki's fur against her legs. After a few minutes, she was able to refocus her attention on the computer without feeling like she was about to lose it.
She knew she was running out of time, so she had to think fast on a solution. Her first guess was to hack into the city's main power frame, and redivert the power back to the Tower, but she knew it wasn't going to be easy. Her fingers flew across the keyboard as she tried to do it as quickly as possible. But fast meant mistakes, and she knew she couldn't have that. She forced herself to take her time, and do it right, so she only had to try once. "Why does this always have to happen to me..." She complained under her breath. She was trying to convince herself that no one had noticed that the power went out, but she knew it was a lie. Sage's train of thought was broken when she realized that someone else was going back in and locking her out of the firewalls that she had already cracked.
"You have got to be kidding me..." She groaned loudly, realizing that this was going to take her much longer than she thought.
***
"Alright Red Head, I think we can all agree it's time for you to find our little buddy Sage, don't you think?" Tony was on the phone with Natasha as she made her way through the blackened halls.
"How do you know she's the one doing it? There could just be a blackout Stark." She questioned.
"Well I know because she's currently trying to divert the power back to the Tower, and I keep kicking her back out of the city's firewalls." Tony told her, matter of factly.
"Oh yeah, just because it's a hacker doesn't automatically mean it's her Tony, come on." Natasha rolled her eyes.
"Do you really think anyone else would be able to undo my firewall locks?" Natasha pursed her lips, realizing that he was right.
"Fine, send me her address and I'll start making my way over there." She sighed, hanging up the phone. Come on Sage, you don't want to do this. As a matter of fact, I don't want to do this. Natasha used her phone's flashlight as a guide so she could find her way back to her room, and put on her suit.
***
By the time Natasha got to Sage's apartment, it was empty. The room was filled with silence, and everything was still. She walked around, trying to find clues as to where Sage might've gone. She saw the dog bowls on the ground of the kitchen, and noted the size of them. She wrote a few things down that she observed. But the main thing she noticed was that there was no technology to be seen. No laptops, no keyboards, or even computers. She must've taken everything with her.. "Hey Tony," Natasha called him, coming up with a plan.
"Yeah, what's up? Is she there?" Tony sounded like he was preoccupied by something.
"No, she's gone. And she took all her tech with her," she looked out the balcony window. "But I have an idea that just might work. What if we threw a party? Like a big one, where we invite tons of people we don't even know."
"That would be nice, but do you really think that she would be dumb enough to go to a party where the Avengers are looking for her?" Tony sounded doubtful, working on his next piece of tech.
"Hmm.." Natasha thought for a few moments, continuing to look around when an idea struck her. "What about a masquerade?"
***
Natasha left an envelope on the floor of Sage's apartment, inviting her to the Masquerade, making sure that this wouldn't be the last time Ms. Sinclaire dealt with the Black Widow.
