2371/JAFA: Just Another Flying Agent

JAFA: Just Another Flying Agent
Date of Scene:	07 July 2020
Location:	Financial District
Synopsis:	Mockingbird takes flight and drones are caught mid-heist.
Cast of Characters:	Bobbi Morse, Sam Wilson, Daisy Johnson

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Bobbi Morse has posed:
Usually when SHIELD flashes their badges to enter an otherwise secure building they are doing so for enforcement, sometimes for intelligence. Rarely for final field testing of brand new equipment based on alien technology. But it's need to know and building security definitely do not need to know.

The wind on top of Deutsche Bank Co Building is a bit windy today, but they can shelter between the gigantic HVACs. The sun is shining, the sky is blue. It's perfect for a test flight. Bobbi has it in a duffle bag, since wearing it around generally before they've approved it would defeat the purpose of testing it.

Bobbi looks to Daisy and says, "I think Agent Wilson is joining us via the sky, but I don't see him on the horizon."

Sam Wilson has posed:
There's a reason Bobbi doesn't see Sam on the horizon. If you're going to fly into the Financial District without the bulk of a jet, there's really only one way to experience it: well below the skyline, swooping and rolling between the skyscrapers like they're the world's most high-ticket obstacle course.

When Falcon does come into view, it's jetting straight up from a power climb up the side of the Deutsche Bank tower. His wings are folded into a neat delta at first, but as he slows at the pinnacle of his precipitous climb, they unfurl and he tips backward into a loop. 270 degrees of pitch bring him back to a standard flight attitude, level to the horizon and facing down, and he comes in for a running landing next to the other two agents, his articulated wings folding back into their casing once he has his feet under him.

He grins cockily, lifts his goggles up to his forehead, and greets them both with a quick, friendly "Nice day for it."

Daisy Johnson has posed:
Having been part of the development of the wings Daisy is here today with a few technological devices of her own. Mostly to measure on how successful their work was, and make nothing goes haywire. She starts setting up on the rooftop, her laptop open on the ground and a few cylinders she sets on the edge of the rooftop.

"I can't see him either but ..." she turns her head to the side, as if hearing something and then peeks. "Welcome! And that's a cool hero landing there." she teases the other SHIELD agent, easy smile to her expression.

Her attention then goes to Bobbi. "And good news, there's about ..., 0% chance that the wings will malfunction today. Well, I had to round out some numbers but it will be fine." a thumbs up given to Bobbi.

Bobbi Morse has posed:
From the duffle bag Bobbi takes out the custom fit backpack made in sleek modern materials. It's designed for her torso. She slips her arms through the arms and tugs the straps tight, clips in the line across her belly. It fits her SHIELD uniform in color and style. Hanging from the back, loosely, the wings act like a dual set of cloaks when they're not activated. Hidden within the memory fabric are Thanagarian flight suit plates.

She does a twirl and lets the fabric wrap about her briefly before it settles back in place. "I'm going to have to do some hand to hand combat training while wearing this next. I don't want to get them caught in anything." She smirks and then picks up her tablet and connects it to the wings.

The verifier program runs, checking the response from the wings is still the same as expected by the machine learning they ran on them. The used the artificial intelligence to design a matrix of Thanagarian commands that ultimately loops back on itself so it's always predictable. If it ever fails this test, the wings could be wildly unpredictable. The tablet gives the green light.

Bobbi looks up as Sam comes in for an impressive landing. "Sure is," she replies to him and then grins at Daisy, handing her the tablet. "You rounded up, right?," she jests back to Daisy. All their simulations for the control system have been green lights for days now and they worked in the wind tunnel just fine too.

Sam Wilson has posed:
Sam flashes Daisy and Bobbi a grin as he lands. "Hey, thanks. I gotta have something up my sleeve to make sure the Avengers don't kick me out," he says. As Bobbi slips into the suit, he folds his arms and gives the setup an evaluating look. When she twirls, he raises an eyebrow, shakes his head in mock regret, and comments, "They made yours a lot more 'fashion' than mine." More seriously, he adds, "Bet they weigh a lot less, too. We going with tethers again today, or do you want to handle takeoff yourself?"

Daisy Johnson has posed:
Doublecheck is a thing, so that's what Daisy does. Security is why she was hired in the first place afterall (or well, breaking security! But that's details!), the powers only came later. So when she takes on the tablet she nods, thumbing on it as she checks on the results, brows furrowed.

"All tests are checking out. Should be good to go. Remember, it's just like the wind tunnel, but if you fall there's hard concrete under you." an helpful smile to Bobbi then a look to Sam, laughing.

"She is so vain, you got no idea." But then as they get more serious about the preliminaries on takeoff she steps a bit aside, "Oh, just one last thing." she tells Bobbi, reaching into her bag and coming out with a small case which she extends to the other woman. "Thought it'd be appropriate considering it's the first flight aaaaand I still hadn't given you your birthday gift. Though there was a good reason for it."

Bobbi Morse has posed:
"No tether this time Sam. We have cracked this alien tech right now.. by not understanding a single thing about how it actually operates. The joys of machine learning. You specify the desired outcome and the range of inputs and then it just keeps trying until it gets the reward. Eventually the model narrows down to the most efficient and then done, you have a program that you don't understand but works perfectly. For a small rounded percentage of perfectly."

There's a smirk on Bobbi's lips as she explains the danger of using alien technology to defeat gravity. "We gave it several hundred thousand more hours of compute power since the last attempt and this time used an adversarial network." She knows enough to trust the computer geniuses in SHIELD to get this stuff right.

On her watch, Bobbi swaps from 'Off' to 'Auto' to 'On'. The memory fabric snaps in to shape from loose cloak like to decidedly wing like. She turns it back to 'Off' and the wings become fabric once more. Auto-deploy isn't new technology at least, it's the same as any parachuter has to warn them it's time to deploy the chute.

"Hard concrete, yes, but also a Falcon. We're going to be testing just how maneuverable it is, so it better darned work." There's a gasp of feigned upset as she is accused of being vain. Perhaps it's a little true. Favouritism is a real thing apparently, she might very well snap down another agent for that level of sass. But not Daisy, Daisy is everyones younger sister whether she wants to be or not.

The gift takes her by surprise and she opens the case to see her Mockingbird goggles.. stylishly upgraded. She smirks and shakes her head, "Very funny, you've been trying to make me look like a superhero ever since you saw me kick that guy off the roof when you were just a probie." She puts on the goggles and it is somewhat transformative, completing the ensemble - she looks like Mockingbird, not Agent Morse.

The goggles light up with the new user interface, not just IR mode but flight mode too. "Hoollly moley." Her eyes flick this way and that as she navigates the data readouts, "Daisy this is incredible. How long did it take you to make this?" She sees the various flight modes and energy levels and battery reserves. It looks and acts a lot like Stark tech, which is no surprise given the arrangements SHIELD has with Tony.

Sam Wilson has posed:
Sam stares back and forth between Daisy and Bobbi, his amusement mingling with concern as he points out, "You two sure do seem to round a lot of important numbers. Just make sure that fallback doesn't involve any actual falling, cool?"

He steps back and takes a sweeping look at the finalized Mockingbird outfit when it's complete, and nods his approval. "You better not be trying to take my job," he tells Bobbi, smirking slightly. "I figure there's room for two bird-themed powerless fliers, but if Daisy decides to take to the air as, I dunno, shaky bird, we're both in trouble."

He gives her goggles a glance, trying to ascertain from the outside what she's seeing, to limited effectiveness. "For the HUD, try to keep it to minimal flight readouts until you're comfortable with the flying. The tactical stuff can wait, and you definitely don't want to be distracted while you're learning."

Daisy Johnson has posed:
"It was mostly scavenged from the normal operative goggles and then an upgrade with a certain armorer I know. Because my contacts aren't only on SHIELD, see?" But Daisy seems pleased that the goggles are to the other Agent's liking. She nods. "And yep, the UI still needs some tweaks, but you can do those at your own leisure." She then sits down on the ground, folding her legs together and setting her laptop on them, booting up those links to the wings so she can follow the progression, along with a camera to let her see whats going on.

"Sam, we are SHIELD, it means that there's always a little danger where SCIENCE is involved." a faint grin but then she nods. "Though no worries, protocol was followed. This is still alien tech though so.., there's always that risk factor. I am actually hoping we are able to figure out a way to understand the thanagarian language eventually instead of having to brute force it with machine learning, would reduce risk."

Though then she can't help but laugh at being called Shaky Bird. "Oh, if only you knew ..." she looks rather amused at that for some reason, but doesn't elaborate.

Bobbi Morse has posed:
Bobbi pats the staves on her hips and the pistol strapped to her tummy, "These are the only weapons I have, there's not much tactical to get beyond predictive flight path planning and obstacle avoidance - both of those seem like a reasonable thing to keep on by default, right?" She flicks her vision to 'On' and the wings snap back in to place.

"Hooo-kay Daisy, here goes nothing." She glances up just a touch and the wings start to glow within the material, a warm purple and her feet lift ever so slightly up off of the ground. "I hope you haven't come up with anything too exciting for this test flight Sam." They're doing science, everyone is either Dr. Last name, or First names.. given Bobbi's the only Doctor here and this isn't her field of Biochemistry.. it's first names.

Bobbi double checks the straps and movement as she effectively dangles. She looks up a little higher and rises up. "Testing descent mode." She shuts her eyes as if blacked out and the wings lower her back to her feet on the ground. She opens her eyes again and the read-outs indicate back to normal function. "Okay, great. Huh.. Sam.. you know Daisy can fly right? in a weird.. shaky bird kinda way," she winks to Daisy and then looks back to Sam. "Okay, I trust this rig, let's do this. Lead the way."

Sam Wilson has posed:
Sam watches Bobbi's initial flight with close interest, belying his lighthearted banter earlier. The antigravity and gliding her suit provides are pretty different from the flight characteristics he's used to. "It's your call, but you have to have good situational awareness, not just instruments, for tight flying. Nothing wrong with those features, but just make sure the visual displays aren't distracting you or blocking your view," he answers her questions. Like most natural pilots, he has /extensive/ opinions about cockpit instrumentation, but he leaves it there.

He nods over to Daisy when she comments on SHIELD's special relationship with saftety, replying, "Hey, I ride a rocket with metal wings, I get it. If you're both confident, I'm there with you." But then Bobbi reveals that Quake can already go airborne, and Sam shuts his eyes and tilts his head back, noisily letting out a slow breath. "Great. There goes the neighborhood. Not to mention my sweet gig."

At the signal to start the flight, he snaps back to business, takes a running start, and lifts off at about the gentlest pace he can do without stalling. His wings open wide and he coasts over the rooftop. "First up," he says over headset radio, "A slow ring around the top of the building, just to get you warmed up on the controls and into the deep end where heights are concerned." He executes the maneuver himself without much fuss, dipping below the line of the roof and scooting through a full circle at a reasonable pace.

Daisy Johnson has posed:
"Well, flying but in a rather loose manner. I have near zero maneuverability while up there.." But then they are going airborne and Daisy's focus goes down to the laptop. She taptaps on the keyboard, a keen eye following the readings. "So far, so good." she speaks over the comms to the duo. "Wings on green."

Her eyes go up from the screen and she cranes her neck forward to cast a look down the roof when they start going about the building. She never gets tired of watching technology in action!

Bobbi Morse has posed:
Bobbi gives a thumbs up to Daisy as she takes a running jump after Sam and looks up to get some altitude. It doesn't behave like a jet, but her momentum is preserved for the moment, before she angles the wings in to the motion for it to start pushing her up to higher speeds. She starts catching on Sam and slows it down.

"Sorry sorry," she says over the comms, "Didn't mean to get in your thrust vector. I promise I don't want my face burnt off. Roger that Quake, wings are green." She draws her arms to her sides and straightens out her legs as she tilts her body, the software detecting the intent to turn and giving the wings the necessary alien instructions to bank her in the circle, following Sam around the building. "Whew, this ain't so bad," she comments over comms.

"Alright, this is SHIELD, let's bump this up two notches." Bobbi can tell it's going to take her a while to really feel natural doing this, but her experience as a jet pilot also has her itching.. she has a need, a need for speed. Between the two setups, they already know Sam will win easily in a straight line race. His rig is exceptionally good at tight turns too, but they don't know how good the Thanagarian tech is for that.. or at least, their version of it.

Sam Wilson has posed:
"You'd better stay unmaneuverable!" Sam teases Daisy. He adjusted his path almost instinctively as Bobbi rose up behind him, keeping her out of his wake -- he does practice what he preaches, where situational awareness is concerned -- and he rolls and rides on his back to flash her a grin after they complete their lazy circuit of the building. "Alright, alright, Chuck Yeager," he radios, his amusement apparent. "With me, dive 200 feet to get speed and then level off. Maintain momentum and corner around the tower as tightly as you can."

He rolls to invert, tucks at the waist, and then plummets out of view, his wings dropping back into that streamlined V shape. He doesn't bother applying thrust, as gravity's doing all the work, but at this angle he's picking up an alarming amount of speed nonetheless. His wings spread wide again as he sweeps out of the dive, rocketing near enough the windows to reach out and scrape his fingers against them if he wanted. To make his own cuts around the tower's corners, he rolls onto one wing, passes the turn, and then flaps the metal ailerons forward powerfully, blasting himself onto a new vector each time.

Daisy Johnson has posed:
When the two of them burst out of the building and Daisy follows them to the edge she gets all that escape wind on her face. And there goes her nice hair-do. Ah well! But she brushes it out of her face and focuses back down on the readings she is getting. When they start on going faster she hrms. "Careful, lets not get too overconfident with it.." but considering who she's talking to it's like preaching to the choir most likely!

The image flares up on her screen and she finally gets to see whats going on, continuing to read on the wing sensors though now choosing to stay silent and letting them both focus on their aerial maneuvers!

Bobbi Morse has posed:
Over comms Bobbi laughs and says, "No breaking the sound barrier in Fidi, if we shatter windows that bill will end up on Hill's desk and then I'll really be in trouble. Ahhh that's a roger on the not overconfidence Quake." She smirks and tilts her head and tucks her legs up, causing the wings to shift their position to dissipate the anti-gravity affect. Some of the technology in play here isn't to do with the Thangarian wings at all, but how Daisy and Bobbi decided to set them in the flight suit housing.

It works, in that Bobbi begins to plummet face first. She pushes out her feet to re-angle the plates once more and she travels a smooth arc around the tower. Her cornering isn't as tight as it could be and she winces in concern as she flies rapidly past the next building over.

It's then that Bobbi sees the dozens of machines clinging to the building. Some with instrumentation poked in through small holes in the glass. They set in the shadows so as not to be noticed, but they certainly recognise that they were noticed. Their instruments retract and the dozen drones take to the sky in pursuit.

"What the... uh.. we got.. bogies?," Bobbi says with slightly concern, "And they're gaining on me fast." Come on wing suit, more ooomph... sadly, it is not a jet like Sam's.

Sam Wilson has posed:
"Wait, bogeys? You can't be ser--" Sam's own instruments light up as the drones take to the air, and the radio channel crackles with his sigh. "One day -- that's all I ask. One. Sane. Day." Rather than bother with banking and all that nonsense, he folds his wings away entirely, tucks into a roll, and somersaults in midair. Once he's facing back along his own vector, he straightens back out and fires the Exo suit thrusters for a perfect reversal.

Within moments, he's blasting past Bobbi in the opposite direction, fists forward and wings fully extended. "I will PUNCH you out of the SKY if you don't BACK OFF!" he yells, and then almost immediately makes good on the threat, diving through the middle of their formation and bashing one target back.

The comm channel lights up with his questions. "Quake, what have you got? These things autonomous or remote controlled? Should I be worried that I just rammed one?"

Daisy Johnson has posed:
"Welcome to SHIELD, Agent Wilson!" This Daisy says through the comms when Sam asks for one sane day. Good luck! And join the club of those taken by SHIELD's craziness.. Though Daisy is already furiously typing on her laptop, taking in the readings she is getting from the wings and mixing them with her own computer expertise, looking for communication waves in and out.

"The flight pattern suggested remote controlled but ..., I am finding no signals though ..." a moment later as she sees a couple of those drones detaching from the main squadron and trying to go around to pincer around Falcon she says. ".. Attention on your six, guys. They are acting autonomously. Let me see if I can hack into one.."

And try she does, those fingers working lightspeed but then .. "Ooof, they have some serious technological protection on. State of the art, and weaponized. I am going to continue see if I can disrupt them."

Bobbi Morse has posed:
As Falcon screams by her Bobbi turns her head and sharply stops her momentum, hovering in the air. One drone takes the punch straight on, its rotors becoming a mangled mess as it falls from the sky. Drones zoom past them both and start to circle back around, breaking off in to two groups. Four of them turn back toward Sam, while three turn to pincer Sam. The remaining four turn back around toward Bobbi.

Bobbi leans in to the motion and starts to fly toward them too. With two on her left, two on her right, at the last moment she veers to the left and grabs one of them. The pair twirl in the air sickeningly fast, except that Bobbi has experienced high G's before, she keeps it together and pulls a stave out of her thigh and jams it in to the machine. With a press of a hidden button, she lights it up, giving it a massive electrical jolt. As she stabalises from the spin, the drone drops from the sky.

It is the loss of the second drone that makes the drones approaching Sam from the side reveal their weapons - laser cutters, spikes, blades, and one draws out a harpoon...

Sam Wilson has posed:
When he sees the weapons come out, Sam jets upward at an angle, trying to keep anything trained on him pointed away from the building and Bobbi. "Okay, never mind, I don't feel bad about wrecking your cousin at all," he hollers at the airborne weapons platforms. Still, he's not exactly keen on sending bullets flying in the middle of the Financial District. It's not a very superheroic look, all things considered.

Instead, he opts to use the rescue cable he brought with him in case things went badly for Bobbi. He holds up one wrist and launches a large tethered net at the nearest cluster of drones. As many as he can catch in it, their rotors should jam on the fiber weave and each others' chassis. Let 'em harpoon each other, for all he cares.

Daisy Johnson has posed:
Thinking on the fly Quake brings up a map of the area, looking over the schematics and then points out. "There's an abandoned building two blocks south." she says over the comms. "If you are able to bring them there it should be safe for anyone on the ground." because being SHIELD meant they thought about civilians first. A couple of taps later she says. "I sent the coordinates to you both."

And then as the hacking isn't going that well she frowns. "I won't be able to hack into these guys. Try to bring me one sort of intact if you can. I want to study it."

"Do they have any markings?" She then asks, still looking for a clue on who they are working for.

Bobbi Morse has posed:
"Intact?!," exclaims Bobbi with exasperation as the other three tracking her wheel back around. She looks up and shoots straight up as fast as she can make the wings fight gravity. The speed is faster than she expected, certainly it performs well but she notes the sudden drop in battery power to 37%. "Quake, incoming with three hostile drones, get your good vibrations on." She peaks up over the top of the building casting a t shape across the top of the building. The three drones shoot up behind her - literally, these ones have guns. Bobbi gets a projective alert on her HUD and twists and flies toward Daisy, then banks up suddenly right before her so the drones are within quaking distance.

The three drones coming at Sam from the side fly right in to the netting and there is a wild whirring sound as they accelerate their angular velocity and crash in to each other in a violent mess and begin to fall down toward the roof of the building below. The other four break off in to two groups much like they attempted to do with Bobbi and they too reveal small machine guns. They begin to fire...

Sam Wilson has posed:
The rescue tether's magnetized clamps activate, snapping the net shut around the ensnared drones. Now Sam has a bag of angry drones on a rope. Great. He dives and swoops as bullets fly past, a couple ricocheting off of his armored wings. He turns to fly directly toward them to reduce his target profile, juking and weaving through the most complex pattern he can manage with a sack of dead weight dragging him down.

He was going to try to keep to nonlethal weaponry in a civilian setting, but in this case, hey: they started it. His free arm snaps up, his wrist launcher selects a shrapnel RPG from Tony's stockpile of old Stark weapons, and he sends an explosion into the middle of the drone formation. That ought to at least hold them off for a while, if not down a few.

Trailing his sack of drones, he rockets upward alongside the building, then crests the edge and arcs outward, swinging his cargo around in a wide curve that terminates when it crashes into the surface of the roof, maybe 30 feet from Daisy's computer setup. "Drones I can deliver. Intact?" He waggles a hand. "Ennh."

Daisy Johnson has posed:
"I am noticing a reading off the wings--" Most likely the drop on power, but then Daisy is cut off when apparently..., they are coming to her position?!?! She slides the laptop to the side and scrambles up to her feet. It was a good thing she brought the gloves with her even when it was apparently an inoffensive small wings test.

So she sets herself on the edge of the roof, waiting for that right moment. She knew from which angle Bobbi was coming from so it's a matter of waiting ... One, two seconds after Bobbi slingshots past and then she unleashes, sending concussion blasts through the air that hit the drones square on. Poor little things.. Two of them break midflight while the last one just crashes down on the roof hard, also breaking up. Nope, none intact. She lets out a sigh...

Though then there's that loud sound of more drones being squished. She jumps and turns, hands at the ready to send more destruction yet when she notes it was Sam squashing on the bugs she smirks. "It will have to do."

Bobbi Morse has posed:
Bobbi skids to a stop on the roof top. Why is there always gravel on the top of roofs? it makes it so hard to stop when you want to. The detonation knocks two of the drones out, leaving just two more following after Sam that rise up over the top of the edge. Bobbi is a quick draw and she pulls the pistol loaded with ICER and fires at the first drone that appears. It hits, but the ICER round does nothing on a machine - it's designed for biological neutralisation.

"Shit! Everybody we have two more," she cries out as she dashes to get behind one of the HVACs. One of the drones dives away from the building while the final drone continues to target Sam and shoots. The drones that Daisy quakes hit that impossible wall of vibrations and come crashing directly down on to the roof to add to the pile that Sam has brought.

Sam Wilson has posed:
Sam drops to the rooftop near the netted drones and gives Quake an apologetic shrug. "Some of them might still be intact enough to try to shoot you?" he offers, by way of consolation. Speaking of which...

He raises his left wrist and is about to send his own drone to monitor for any he missed, when the stragglers leap into view and make their presence known. Instead of diving for cover, he makes his own, armored wings swinging up to surround him in a protective shelter. He runs toward the roof's edge, away from the others, hopefully drawing their fire with him to leave an opening for the others. Regardless, when he reaches the roof's edge, he's just going to jump off.

Daisy Johnson has posed:
With Sam serving as a beacon to the drones guns it makes it easy for Quake to take them out. Just point and shoot. Or in this case, point and quake. Some shots still hit the wings but then there's the sound of the drone getting ripped apart midair as it gets those good vibrations going.

"Heh, I will live not having an intact one... At least there's lot of material to study..."

She runs over to the edge of the building where that last one drone flew down to, but it's now out of reach for her. "Damn it .."

Though with Daisy being a glass half-full kind of person she adds. "Well, at least your wings got fully tested today.."

Bobbi Morse has posed:
Bobbi nods her head to Daisy and looks rather serious when she says, "Hey Sam, I don't think you have to worry about being out of a job any time soon." She lets out a long breath and stares at the drones. "I think they were hacking the stock exchange." She walks back over to the edge of the building and looks down at the window she saw them perched on. "I'll put a team together and we'll check it out tonight."

She turns around and the wings turn to 'Auto' mode. "Well I might as well keep wearing it, get used to the weight.. because they're amazing and I think I'll make them my standard uniform from now on."

She offers her forearm to Sam, "You're brilliant as always." She then smiles to Daisy, "And you saved my bacon.. again. That's going in the report."