The Three Elements #3 (The Avengers)

Chapter 6: Shall We Suite Up

Mystique screamed and launched herself over to the cage filled with earth and trees. Trudy wasn’t even visible anymore. Mystique plunged her hand into the glass and as usual it melded through. But it was a huge mistake. A still growing tree branch curled out of the glass and grabbed Mystique by the throat. The blue girl stepped back and was lifted up by her neck by the plants. The sound of cracking glass shattered through the room and out stepped Trudy the colossal trunks of the branches smashing the glass of her cell. Mystique’s limbs wriggled in the air as she choked and tried to free the enclosing vine around her neck.

Trudy was so powerful and it was something of a spectacle to look at. The walls of my cell began to melt and fold over and down each other like a wave of clear water. I turned the supernova down and I breathed in the air around us. Water cascaded out as Harley’s cell was overwhelmed with water. The floor was covered in muddy water and the remnants of what were glass cells but now just sugared the ground in tiny jigsaw pieces. I saw that Mystique’s eyes were closing and her grip on the vice around her throat was becoming less and less sturdy. But Trudy saw no signs of stopping.
‘Trudy, remember who we are’ I told her slowly, ‘you’re no better, if you kill her’

 The vine enclosing Mystique’s throat came away but this time crawled up to her mouth so that she was speechless. Four trunks gnarled around Mystique’s limbs so she was completely defenceless.
Harley drew the water up and it was gone within a second. I rushed over to the computer and got it up and running. Blue holograms filled the room and so did the blood records. Finding the main database I began to copy in an override hack that I had learnt when I was eight. Tony showed me how to do it and it was how I managed to alter stuff on SHIELD’s database…which you did not hear from me.

The bug took a while to install so I went straight ahead and began to type frantically on the keyboard. I had not done this for a long time and if one digit was copied incorrectly it wouldn’t work.
‘How long is this going to take?’ Trudy asked not keeping her eyes off Mystique.
‘I’m not sure the last time I did this it took about ten minutes’ I said as I went back through my memory bank as my fingers shuffled and tapped across the keyboard.
‘Ten minutes?!’ Harley snapped.
‘The last time I did it was when I was ten, so I can probably do it in half the time’ I deadpanned, ‘besides you try remembering a thousand digits in the right order’

‘Just hurry up, I can’t hold on forever’ Trudy grumbled. I was about to retort but then I realised that I guess this was what Trudy was like out of her innocent shell. She was no longer a kid anymore.
‘Where are the blood samples?’ Harley asked Mystique. She just rolled her yellow eyes and looked away.
‘I’m sorry I don’t think that was a question’ Harley slapped her across the cheek. I winced. ‘Don’t make me do it again’

Mystique blinked three times and Harley raced off to the third computer grid and began to delete files by the bulk and as the screen and databases went blank, he then filled the main hard drive with water. Sparks flew and the whole thing seemed to hum out a turbulent tune that set my teeth on edge. The bug sequence was almost complete when I saw that there was an initiation system that allowed radio connection.

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Abandoning the bug sequence completely I set out to try and make some contact with the outside world. I got the meter up and began to play around with the signals and for a while all I got was static and a whole heap of Asian or Middle-Eastern mumbo-jumbo.
‘Does anyone know the American wireless signal?’
‘Do we look like we were born in World War II?’ Trudy snapped. Damn she was like a rabid Wolverine when she got hyped up. I closed my eyes and tried to remember what Director Fury told me. He told me SHIELD’s frequency and I must have been ignoring him because I could not for the life of me remember what it was.

‘I know the frequency for the Baxter Building’ Harley said out of nowhere.
‘The Baxter Building?’ I mused, ‘you know the Fantastic Four?’
‘Yeah, me and Johnny are mates’ Harley chirped. For a moment I forgot about what I was doing and where we were. Wow…it’s a small world. Before I could say anything Harley was turning the channel to get the Baxter Buildings broadcast. I listened in as Harley got the old-fashioned wireless up and soon I heard voices. It was like angels were talking through the receiver.

‘Hello can anyone copy, this is Naveen Stark’ I yelled through the mouthpiece. I got nothing the first time. Shit I didn’t know where we were…maybe they needed clarification.
‘This is Naveen Stark SHIELD agent and Avenger…can anyone copy?’ I shouted again.  Static filled my ears but then I heard a man’s voice on the other line. It was difficult to make out what he was saying.
‘Reed? Is that you?’ Harley interjected.
‘-ley…-e…wha-…go-ng…’ was all that was heard.
‘Johnny?’ Harley shouted louder like it would help at all. He turned the switch slightly to the left and the static almost completely disappeared.
‘Harley…ere-are-you’ the voice was so much clearer.
‘I don’t know Johnny but Reed’s gotta have some sorta signal tracker or something, just find us, we don’t have a lot of time’ he shouted. There was no reply just another jumble of shouts and mutters and I even think a scream.

‘You certainly don’t have time’ I turned around and faced Mystique holding a knife up to Trudy’s neck, the vines all gone and now was just a little frightened school girl.
‘Turn off the wireless or she dies’
‘Har-y, you-t-ere ate-‘ came Johnny’s voice. I stood up and Mystique clutched the knife tighter and pressed it against the white flesh of Trudy’s neck.
‘Now, if you would so kind as to press that big red button and hop back into your glass cabinets it would be much appreciated’ she slurred.

I put my hands up and steadily walked over to the door where there indeed was a big red button. What a cliché. I watched as a vine appeared from Trudy’s ankle and began to snake around Mystique’s feet. In a flash, Trudy tripped the other girl and snatched the knife from her and plunged it into her arm just like it was a needle. It was completely on impulse and Trudy backed away horrified that she had actually done it.

By then I had already pressed the red button and the radio connection had died.

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They came in a wave of leather and guns and shouts. It was overwhelming but we were able to handle the few that came through the door, but by then the whole place was echoing with deafening sirens. The few soldiers lay on the floor unconscious while Mystique struggled in a pool of her own blood. I clicked my fingers and made a circle of fire around her so that even if she did get the knife out she would be enclosed with violet flames. It seemed that we had about two minutes to get out the room and to safety. But the building was a maze. There was only one long hallway that seemed to never end when you thought it ended there was a door that led to an unending stretch of white sterile light.

We had to find someplace with weapons or materials we could use. But the place was now crawling with soldiers and we couldn’t step out into the light without being seen.
‘We have to make a run for it’ I muttered as I split the door open slightly. ‘Monsoon can you get an ice wall going?’ I asked my teammate.
‘I can try but not for long’ he said back. He was the first one who stepped out and almost immediately shouts and gunshots rang off the walls. However the bullets were caught in the wall of thick ice. A whole wall of frozen water which was as wide and high as the hallway was being moved and shifted down the hall as we progressed further. Trudy left a strangling vine inside the lab just to make sure any evidence of blood samples or us was destroyed and unable to recover.

Trudy and I went along the walls of the hall searching for an armoury. The ice wall was getting riddled with bullets and it was slowly and assuredly splitting and cracking.
‘Hurry up, I can’t hold it any longer’ Monsoon yelled over the noise of sirens and soldiers and gunshots. Finally the armoury was found and we all ducked in without a scrape on us. Trudy or Armadillo barricaded the door with trees trunks and Monsoon made sure it was reinforced with another ice wall.

The room was about half the size of the lab but it had endless options to choose from. Finely crafted swords and daggers, arrays of guns and ammo even a few bows and quivers of arrows. I walked straight to the gun section and held a familiar hand gun. It was cool and heavy in my hand and I was glad to finally get back in the groove of things.

‘Shall we suite up’