Post by DiscipleofBob on Apr 1, 2015 4:06:09 GMT -5
Agents of SHIELD #8:
Serpent Society
Serpent Society
This should have been a simple SHIELD op, a sting, capture, and finally extraction of one of HYDRA's more affluent members on a rare moment that she was exposed enough to be targeted.
Captain America had studied SHIELD's intel file closely. Ophelia Sarkissian, who went by Lady Viper, led a team of superpowered criminals called the Serpent Society, with an obvious theme. Individually they were just D-list supervillains, as Barton put it, but with Viper at the helm they were a dangerously efficient team.
Even so, the 'Serpent Society' itself was a front for HYDRA. The angle was simple, approach some criminals or misguided youth, provide them with tech and even powers, train them from novice thugs to cold, calculating killers, and then promote them to higher positions within HYDRA.
Rogers had to read it twice. Being the leader of a notorious supervillain team was just a cover. On top of that, Viper had chosen a high school gym for her recruitment drive. The most wanted woman in the world, and she was in a public school gym. Even if the HYDRA agents with her were dressed like teenagers, they were easy to spot. It was as if Viper thought she couldn't be caught, or, more likely, that she wanted SHIELD to try.
Nearly everyone on the team had encountered Viper in the past, so they knew to be careful. A direct assault would no doubt let the slippery Viper escape, so first they had to cut off all the exits. Romanoff would slip past the guards, infiltrate the gym unnoticed via ventilation ducts, and make sure Viper was present.
Danvers would pilot a cloaked Quinjet just out of range enough as not to be heard, but close enough that it could still pick off the disguised HYDRA guards. Whatever entrances it couldn't cover, Barton would keep an eye out from a sniper position on a building opposite. Payne would booby trap exits inside the building, then monitor them to make sure they weren't set off by random teenagers.
Every agent was in position. Every exit was sealed. Their contingencies had contingencies. Everything was in place.
Then Barton smashed through a window.
"What the hell is he doing?! He's supposed to provide support!" Coulson checked to see if Barton had dropped his comm. To his surprise, it was still active and the GPS showed his new, correct position. Barton had gone from still and quiet, to the point where as far as the GPS could tell he might have been asleep, to zipping across the buildings.
"It's Barton. You know his record and expected him to stay on-script?" Carol pointed out.
"I was hoping he'd wait for the first mission to start," Coulson said as he rushed to the console. "Stand by. I need to recalculate for Barton's ad-libbing."
The air suddenly started rushing out of the cabin as the door to the Quinjet flew open. Captain America was standing by, ready to jump, shield already in hand. "Mission's already started, Coulson. You do what you need to do, I'll do what I need to do."
"But Barton-"
"Can be dealt with later. Remember what's at stake here. War doesn't give any do-overs." Captain America gave a quick salute and leaped from the open hatch. Coulson and Carol could only watch from their seats as Captain America descended shield first without a parachute, at least fifty feet up.
Captain America crashed down on the first guard shield first in what should have been impossible to survive for any other person. Defying death and physics, Captain America rolled upon landing and threw his shield at the first guard in his sights. The shield destroyed the guard's gun and crashed into the guard's torso, knocking him down before the shield ricocheted back to Captain America's hand. The other two HYDRA guards quickly pointed their submachine guns.
Captain America lowered his body and charged, keeping almost his entire body behind the shield in a long-practiced stance. The spray of bullets struck his shield and fell harmlessly to the ground.
The Captain bashed his shield into the first guard's chin, then in the same swift movement grabbed him by the collar and slammed the guard into the ground before a stray bullet could hit him. Captain America had to crouch with his shield to make sure the guard wasn't torn apart by the other's weapon. All he had to do was wait for the last remaining guard to reload to strike.
Before that could happen, the Quinjet decloaked right behind the guard. The sudden presence of a heavily armed SHIELD fighter hovering next to him was enough to stun the guard long enough for Cap to close the distance. By the time he turned around, he was staring directly into Captain America's chest. The Captain quickly grabbed the guard's gun and tossed it. "Stand down, soldier."
The HYDRA guard grinned. Most HYDRA agents were taken out by normal SHIELD agents. He had the distinct honor of facing the legendary Captain America and in the service of HYDRA's greatest leaders. "Hail-"
A sock to the jaw from the Captain interrupted the HYDRA agent's big moment. The HYDRA guards taken down, Captain America shot a thumbs up to the cockpit of the Quinjet.
"Captain America, I presume?"
The Captain quickly turned to see a pool of darkness forming on the rooftop. The shadow quickly grew until two figures rose from it, one being a man shrouded in a cape so black it was undistinguishable from the shadows. The other figure was still growing, larger than any normal humanoid form.
"They told me you might be coming. I'm not sure I would have ever believed them if I weren't ssseeing it for myself," the cloaked figure said with a sadistic grin, one of the few parts of his body visible. "I feel like the luckiest supervillain in the world to get firssst shot at killing THE Captain America. Your death will earn me quite the promotion. I'll no longer be jussst one of Viper's lackeys. Even the Barons will remember the name of Sssidewinder after today."
"No credit goes to your friend there?" Captain America asked, waiting for the increasingly large shadowy figure to make a move. As he expected, it lunged from the shadows at the Captain, who despite the creature's size and speed, tumbled out of the creature's path. The creature was more dinosaur than man, with green scaly skin, a reptilian mouth filled with fangs, a long tail with spikes all along his spine, and a large fin sticking up on his head.
"The benefit of working with a monssster like Death Adder here is he cares lessss about the glory and more about the meat." The 'Death Adder' didn't hesitate to pounce at Captain America like a wild animal, its claws raking against the shield and its mouth snapping to get a taste of the Captain.
=====(S)=====
"He's got Captain America pinned! What are you doing? Take the shot!" Coulson said frantically.
"This isn't a pea shooter, Coulson. They're too close. Even on a direct hit there's a chance the bullet could rip straight through Death Adder and hit Steve. I'm waiting for the open shot," Carol replied. "Besides, it's Captain America. Have a little more faith."
While Carol tried to line up the shot, a floating shadow suddenly engulfed the windshield. Sidewinder was barely visible on the other side of the glass. "I don't think he's going to give us a chance," Coulson said just as Carol unbuckled herself from the pilot's seat.
"What are you doing?!"
"Coulson, take the wheel. I'm going to give Steve some support. This bird's useless as long as the target's on the ground or inside anyway." While Coulson frantically switched the controls over, Carol opened the hatch door, drew a pistol, leaned outside the craft and took several potshots at their attacker.
Between Sidewinder's veiled body and erratic movements, it was impossible to tell if he'd been hit or not. Sidewinder did, however, abandon blocking out the view of the entire cockpit. Instead, black tendrils lashed out at Carol, wrapping around her limbs and pulling her out of the cockpit. The teleporting villain moved to take her place, but just as he entered the Quinjet, three small grenades, thrown by Carol at the last second, were at eye level when they exploded into flashbangs. Sidewinder was thrown out of the Quinjet too dazed to try and recover back on.
Fortunately they were no longer high enough for the fall to be lethal, although Carol had a parachute. Sidewinder crashed into the ground, no longer an enigmatic shadow but a black mess.
"You've got one chance, Viper. Drop the case," Barton said with arrow drawn and bowstring pulled back.
His target's dark green lips curled up in a smile. "About time. I was starting to think SHIELD would never show their faces, and then what kind of targets would we have our demonstration on?"
"The only target here is you," Barton quipped before nodding in the direction of some of the other HYDRA agents. "Well, and her. And him. And the two guys behind me. And some of the small-fry, but not sure I need to waste ammo on them."
Gunfire from outside echoed throughout the gym. The teenagers looked at each other worryingly, and many were eyeing the exits.
"Ladies and gentlemen, I can assure you that everything is control. The arrival of SHIELD agents was not unforeseen," Viper addressed the crowd calmly, paying no attention to the arrowhead pointing in her direction as she paced across the stage. "In fact, take this opportunity to see what we're offering, what we are truly capable of, and you can be too."
"Really? You're just going to continue with the Shamwow commercial with an arrow aimed at your throat?" Barton said annoyed. Of course he kept an eye on the other snake-themed criminals advancing from all sides. He might have been more worried if the black shadow he knew to look out for descended from the vents onto a member in the back.
Romanoff timed her landing to knock out one of the Serpent Society's ladies, introducing her face to the concrete before she even knew Romanoff was there. One down she quietly snuck around to another Serpent and jumped her from behind. Before her prey could react, Romanoff shot a dart from her gauntlet into the supercriminal's neck. She quietly fell to the floor unconscious, and Romanoff stalked off towards her next prey with no one yet being the wiser.
Picking off targets, one by one, whoever strayed from the cabal of snakes. The next target was more difficult, a muscular, much more powerfully built woman than the others. Romanoff tried the same, taking her from behind as well, but in addition to being absurdly strong, Anaconda's arms, true to their name, could twist back far enough to pry Romanoff off and throw her to the ground.
Romanoff knew she would never be able to silently take down the entire gang and that it was only a matter of time before the Serpent Society members would be able to confront her directly. In addition to the heavy-armed Anaconda waiting to squeeze and crush Romanoff like a grape, another servant of Viper's this one with blades attached to his arms and his lower torso replaced with a snake's tail.
"Black Widow here," she said quietly over the comms. "Mamba and Racer are down. Now engaging Bushmaster and Anaconda."
Meanwhile, Viper had opened her case to reveal the multicolored vials within. Barton was still forced to wait for an opportunity while other members of the Serpent Society closed in. "Didn't I say something about dropping the case? Pretty sure I made that clear," Barton warned again, uncertain of his options with this many targets in close quarters.
"Oh, you poor naïve little SHIELD-boy," Viper said in a mock motherly voice. "Go ahead and shoot if you think it will make you feel better."
Barton knew that as soon as one arrow was loosed, the other Serpent Society members and possibly some of Viper's recruits would swarm him. Still as Viper approached the first teenage recruit, his draw on the bow tightened. "I know exactly what you're trying to peddle to these kids. I'm not going to let that happen."
"Feel free to try and stop me," Viper said with a smile as she plucked one vial, filled with a sparkling yellow material, and was about to hand it to the first teenage recruit.
"Crap," Barton muttered as he released his arrow. Rather than break the glass, the arrow managed to catch the vial by the handle perfectly as to not damage it as it was pinned to the wall. As soon as he fired, he already knew the rest of the room would attack. He fell backwards as two sickly green energy bolts flew right through where his chest just was.
As he used the momentum to do several backward flips, Barton drew several arrows and launched them at the attacker, Asp, a woman with a glowing green hands, continued to launch energy projectiles. Focused on dodging the blasts, Barton managed to graze her with an arrow, but he was still on the defensive. At the same time, another Serpent, Rattler, fired shockwaves from his fists. Barton barely dodged them but only because he was constantly moving, and even then he could feel the air rushing as shockwaves missed him by a hair's length. Then there was Puff Adder, Viper's muscle with ever-growing mass who was growing larger with each passing second. Not only did Barton have to dodge waves of projectiles, but also a giant out for his blood.
"Are you quite done?" Viper taunted while preparing another vial from the case.
"Almost!" Barton yelled between dodging attacks, drawing a special arrow and firing it through the fray, striking and embedding itself in the center of said case.
"What was that supposed to do? Everything's still intact," Viper laughed. Her amusement was cut short. After a several second delay the arrowhead exploded in rapidly expanding foam. Viper dropped the case to avoid getting trapped and all the contents were trapped in rapidly solidifying foam.
"Oh, you poor naïve little HYDRA girl," Barton laughed as he continued to flip away from the three supercriminals.
Before the teenagers had been manipulated by Lady Viper into staying despite the danger, but as the battles progressed from one small skirmishes to multiple superpowered fights throughout the gym, they scattered, heading for the nearest exits.
When a few of the kids neared the locker rooms, the door burst open with Frank Payne standing in the way. They froze in terror at the burly, heavily armed SHIELD agent. Payne scowled and stepped aside. "Go on, get outta here. Go do your homework or argue with your parents or something."
"Y-you aren't going to arrest us?" one of the students asked.
"Not unless any of you are shitty thugs with snake themes goin' on. Count yerself lucky, and next time you feel like going out and raising hell or scoring, try something a few rungs below 'join terrorists'." The kids nodded as Payne waved them through. Even with his permission, most of the teenagers paused in shock when they saw just how many devices had been rigged at the entrance.
While Payne was grumbling about 'babysitting' duty, Barton barely dodged a massive punch from an arm wider than his entire body. Using the opportunity, he kicked off the nearest wall and leaped on top of Puff Adder's arm, walking across his enemy's shoulders with ease. His two other opponents were less likely to shoot if there was the possibility they could hit their friend, or more likely, they were less likely to shoot if there was the possibility they could hit the guy who could crush them in one hand and probably knew where they slept.
That extra bit of care was what Barton needed to launch a small barrage of arrows. Four fired at Asp, two at her wrists two at her legs, and all of the arrowheads folded out at the last second to instead bar her to the wall. The last arrow was fired at Rattler, who had been shattering all of Barton's arrows with his shockwaves. This one was blown apart like the others, but this time it exploded in a dizzying display of colored sparks right in front of his face. Rattler's vision was filled with bright flashing colors. For the moment, he fired off several shockwaves in random directions.
One such shockwave fired off in Frank Payne's direction. As soon as he saw some of his handiwork violently shake, with only two teenagers left trying to escape that way, Payne tackled both of them as far back into the corner as possible.
All of the explosives went off at once. Concussive blasts, flashbangs, tear gas. Payne hadn't made the trap too lethal, especially in the case of something like this happened, but the force was still enough to level the entryways, and even put Payne under a pile of rubble.
Barton and Romanoff were too focused on their own fights to dig him out right away. While Barton was deciding how to tackle the behemoth whose skin had shrugged off regular, incendiary, shock, and explosive arrows, the ceiling above suddenly caved in. Death Adder fell first and smashed on top of Puff Adder, with Captain America not far behind, though in much better condition than the other two.
"Well, those are all mine," Barton said with a smirk. "I guess we should probably help Natasha..."
"Help with what?" Romanoff asked as both Bushmaster and Anaconda had fallen unconscious, though apparently no one but Romanoff saw how.
"That looks like all the Serpent Society SHIELD knows about," Captain America noted, but quickly became concerned. "Where'd Viper go?"
Slipping out of the chaos had been easy, especially when the booby trapped exits exploded in SHIELD's face. Viper had walked right past the buried SHIELD agent while her minions were still fighting. Even if any of them made it, they were all replaceable, just thugs with customized powers based on what she was able to provide. It was about time for a new roster. Starting with the dark-skinned young woman she was forcing along.
"Let me go! Please!" the girl pleaded.
"I'm afraid I can't do that, sweetie. Don't worry, I won't hurt you. As long as you behave, that is," Viper replied in her eerily soothing yet still threatening voice. "You see, everyone else back there is just a plain little nobody, jealous of anyone with real power. You, on the other hand, are quite special."
"I... I don't know what you're talking about."
Viper smiled. "I think you know exactly what I'm talking about. I think it's the reason you came to see me today. And I think we're going to become very good friends."
"No! Let me go!" The girl struggled, but her captor was much stronger, and this wasn't the first time she needed to do something like this.
As Viper and the girl turned a corner, the click of a gun cocking stopped them in their tracks. "You heard the lady, let her go. Then put your hands on the wall, Viper. It's over," said Carol Danvers, gun drawn and ready.
"Far from it, dearie," Viper whipped around and suddenly had the girl by the throat as a human shield with her pistol trained on the girl's neck. "Now step aside. Unless you want something unpleasant to happen."
To be continued...