2556/They Heard The Sound of Snikts

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They Heard The Sound of Snikts
Date of Scene: 22 July 2020
Location: Bronx (Bronx)
Synopsis: X-23 spots a small group of Morlocks beating someone senseless and intervenes and two SHIELD Agents stumble into something, and someone, they never expected to.
Cast of Characters: Laura Kinney, Jane Foster, Melinda May




Laura Kinney has posed:
Laura was on the way to a second hand clothing shop where, upon first arriving she had bought some of her first 'Real Girl' clothes. The clerk had been very helpful, if not a bit curious of Laura and initially had mistaken her as having, perhaps, austism or some other learning disability due to her odd behavior. Laura had merely recognized the kindness, and also the variety of clothes - most of which she found both comfortable and pragmatic should she ever be in a fight.

it was just past closing time, and Laura now had a small paper bag, held by handles, full of a few new shirts and a pair of pants or two as she walked, fearlessly, through the Bronx as a few broken streetlights and other closed businesses made this particular part seem especially dismal, and dangerous.

One would not be mistaken in that estimation. Just off the street - out of sight of where some traffic might come in a disused parking lot, Laura saw them. Figures. Six of them. Five of these siloutted figures, shadows only to most eyes, were threading around one. Dim voices could be heard by Laura's keen ears.

"You shouldn't be lookin' at us funny. You think we're disgusting, don't you?"

She could also see several weapons in those shadowed hands. And so, the teenage girl, seemingly with just a paper bag in her hand full of clothes, begins to make a beeline for the gang activity.

Jane Foster has posed:
Rarely is the fieldwork of being a spy glamorous. Mostly it involves observation, paperwork, and monitoring. Lots and lots of monitoring. Cue a job that truly requires more than one person, if only to keep an eye out for trouble.

When a frozen "palace" appears out of the blue in the dead of summer, you can bet someone might want to check it out. Most people might take to ice palaces as a glorious if unnecessarily extravagant addition to the habitually most bedeviled and neglected of the five boroughs -- though admittedly, Staten Islanders have quite a bit to say about that.

Precautions might not be entirely out of sync with necessity. A drive with someone actually capable of backup should the situation prove tricky isn't only for show; it's not as though Jane Foster can up and borrow an unmarked sedan from SHIELD for no reason. However, the past hour setting up certain discreet sensors able to detect dimensional fluctuations and certain kinds of radiation. Her superior probably isn't stringing them up but having a competent hand who can also potentially bedevil, say, ice giants or evil mutants or the occasional irate spirit might also be advantageous. Considering New York nearly went to its knees a few weeks back, sensible precautions are sensible.

The last of the sensors gets installed at a predetermined destination, a business barely clinging on and apparently doing something or other with at-risk youth. It's a nice thought, a sentiment in a place where such things die of neglect and lack of water.

For this purpose, the rather high-profile scientist is dressed down, dully so, and murmuring into her comms link: "That's the last of them. Would you be willing to shift over to visual and audio to see if they work, please?" Always polite, her. Doubly so with Melinda, as anyone of the cohort who remembers how SHIELD brought her in needs to be treated wiht respect. "The infrared and ultraviolet settings are coming in clear."

Flicking on said sensor might just pick up the trouble with Laura, no doubt, the mutterings of danger.

Melinda May has posed:
May sits in the van... not the Bus; nothing with wings (damn it)... and monitors the feeds the scientist has set up. "Switching over," she says calmly, tone betraying no trace of her actual thoughts about this mission one way or the other. She keys a few commands into the portable surveilance system and watches expectantly as the monitors light up and the audio feeds start streaming in.

"Feeds are good," she says presently. "Signal is strong..." Her voice trails off with a somewhat pensive tone... only to come through as a whispered, "Oh, for cryin'..." a moment later. Then, louder, "Yeah, the feeds are great. Picking up a bunch of punks getting ready to rumble."

In the van, her eyes flick from feed to feed, and she frowns. "And there's a kid heading their way." A beat. She considers. She sighs. "Hill's gonna kill me, but I'm going to intervene."

Because she's The Cavalry. (Even if she hates that name.)

Laura Kinney has posed:
Outside, two of the five of the group kick, hit, and push the object of their distate further into the shadows, making intimidating remarks, threatning, working each other up into a frenzy and feeding off of it, like a building storm.

There's a brief, green, sickly flare, like swamp gas, followed by a faint scream of terror that causes Laura to begin running towards the group of five. Silently. Or near-so.

Around the poor normal boy, the asphalt begins to melt, smoking, the acid spat from the lizard-faced mutant bubbling, and smelling awful.

Laura pauses, slowing her steps as she comes up right behind them. And, oddly for her, instead of outright ambushing and attacking them, she calls, "If youwish a fight, then fight me."

Heads turn, though eyes are still kept on the target so he doesn't escape. Natrually, viewing the scant form of the teenage girl, the twenty-smethings and other teenagers of more physically noticable mutant traits begins to laugh - and not all in human-like voices.

Jane Foster has posed:
No bus here. No quinjet hovering over head. Inconspicuous things in the Bronx need to be simpler, plainer. Plain Jane herself is not, for all that she resides in a precarious spot sliding out of the darkened stoop of the building, leaving its covered lobby. No bulb lights the way, an expense of electricity not worth the effort, anyhow. The sensor tucked away still has a clear view of the sky but nothing to signal too much interest, discreet in its size and shape.

Pulling her light jacket around her a little closer, the heat of summer bears down on the brunette. Nothing worse than layers in a muggy New York night, but she hastens to cross the road like anyone going from point A to B in this run-down, derelict corner of the borough ought to. Lagging here invites trouble.

May doing her thing causes Jane to pause on the sidewalk, discreetly tagging the SHIELD-issue cellular phone she keeps relayed to a chronically updated app reading for gamma radiation in trace amounts, minute fluctuations in the dimensional fabric speaking to interruptions or transmissions from the dark side. Or, you know, pesky teleporters. It's still in process, and she checks the dance of data on display. "It looks to be stable. No signs here. Unless..."

The conversation dips back and forth. "A kid? Of course, I've got you covered. Let me get back." Already on the move as Melinda probably is, she is a slim shadow painted up the sidewalk, moving at a handsome clip. That flare of light is forgettable; the green flash is absolutely not. At a distance, she has to choose her marks: vehicle first, senior agent second, then the others third. "I've got the medical kit in there. Which way?" The teenagers in their hurtful array of spite vibrate through the sensor's arc, just proof younger you are, the worse you are. Sometimes.

Melinda May has posed:
Yeah. May is so 'plain' tonight, that she's even in plainclothes. Mostly. Black jeans, combat boots, a black tank under a lightweight black leather jacket -- depite the heat. So, you know... same basic colour scheme. But, no insignia. And, yeah. She brought her weapons because... On duty!

She slides out of the van, a discrete SHIELD com unit in her ear so she can talk to Jane. "Alley," she says succinctly, referring to one, of course, most visible via the newly installed sensors. "Multiple hostiles. One... no, *two*... victims? Targets." For lack of a better word. At any rate, they don't seem to be with lizard face and his crew.

"Oh, yippee," she says dryly, voice quiet as she pulls out an ICER. "Mutants." Either that or aliens.

She moves in that fast half-trot gait most agents learn -- fast, efficient, and less strenuous than a flat out run (not to mention easier on the weapon handling). "Going to try to break it up, but be prepared in case things go south."

Which, you know. They will. They always do.

Laura Kinney has posed:
May is more right than she knows. Because the 'well intentioned girl' buys the poor muggle boy some time to recover from the broken ribs and bruises no doubt he's recieved - both to his physical body as well as to his ego, and one of the members snarls, "Keep an eye on him, Scalez. We got this one."

The largest of the 'gang' of Morlocks pulls back his hoodie to reveal a crown of demonic-looking horns over his head and discolored skin of the hue of dirty bathwater that's sat for weeks undisturbed in a tub. He swing at Laura with one massive arm and Laura neatly ducks to one side.

Then there's another scream. This one isn't of terror, though. It's of sheer agony. Pain. The 'huge' arm is no longer swinging. IT's - flopping, as if someone had cut the string on a puppet. Or, a set of tendons and muscles.

Calmly, Laura states, "You are lucky you are not a threat. Otherwise, you'd be dead." She looks to the other members, the claws on her right hand showing.

"She's a mutant too! One of -those- mutants. Get her!" 'Scalez' shouts, pushing the boy froughly into the ground.

They're too focused on Laura, now, to see any other inference that may be coming from outside sources.

Things went so very south. So very faast.

Jane Foster has posed:
Weapons where an astrophysicist are involved usually involve a screen, a whole lot of distance, or an energy pulse directed by someone else. An ICER is the best Jane has most days, for this is New York and pulling a gun on someone is a bad, bad thing.

"Two targets? For the love of Frigga," she murmurs under her breath, answering May. "That changes the landscape a bit. Maybe you will set them straight." She can always hope. Always.

Still, her pace falls back into a different kind of craft, using cover of darkness through the entry of the alleyway. After beelining from the van's whereabouts, since one never leaves their getaway unchecked, she carefully maneuvers her path in the senior agent's wake. Her lope is at least smooth; try running in sand on a beach for hours on end, practice will grain endurance.

"I'm with you," she answers, soft, breathy in keeping that coverage. Which gives her pause at seeing someone with a comparatively impressive set of horns outlined against the sky. Another scream to split the night, something that will haunt her nights to come.

No stumbling, back to the wall. Take cautious aim to cover May, these things she can do.

Things naturally go south, and she can only follow the lead.

Melinda May has posed:
May, the consumate professional, does *not* swear. Not aloud, anyway. Even as it becomes increasingly obvious they're dealing either with mutants... or something some hell dimension coughed up and decided not to take back.

"Freeze!" she calls out, taking aim at the nearest of the aggressors. "SHIELD. This is a restricted area." Maybe a little white lie that? But hey. Leverage is leverage. Hill will probably yell at her, but she yells at everyone. Fury might yell at her, too. But... again. Every. One.

She'll cope.

"Stand down, boys," she calls, face never cracking so much as a glint of humour. "Or this is going to get messy--" she glances at the blood coursing down the big guy's arm. "-er." MessiER.

Of course, when they refuse to listen -- and we all *know* they'll refuse to listen, right? -- she's ready to fire.

Night-night.

Laura Kinney has posed:
May's target goes almost instantly down, a tall lanky individual, who, as he collapses onto the ground almost seems to fall bonlelessly. Not because he's merely knocked out, but there's no rigid form to him at all; it's like watching one of those wind-swaying air dolls that promotes free cell phones, or oil changes on the road when the air machine runs out of air and they deflate.

That leaves three more, Scalez, and two others.

Scalez snarls, "Shit. Shitshitshit. Fucking SHIELD. Get them, Ripper."

'Ripper', oddly, the smallest of the 'gang', no bigger than Laura pulls his hands out of his hoodie pocket to reveal two chitonous claws. He snaps this together, and the asphalt suddenly spears up, several spikes of instant stalagmites of sharp, deadly creation. One of these skewers Laura through the leg, preventing her - momentarily from attacking. She cuts the asphalt spear apart with her claw, pulls her leg off of it.

She looks back to May. Looks back to - yes, to Janet, too. Spotting her, impossibly, in the darkness. Impossibly to most poeple that don't have her acute senses.

She begins to hobble, staggering in her walk, towards the group, now. A pair of claws pop out of her other hand, and she says one word.

"Run," as she looks at them with eyes of a girl who has murdered before. And, will murder again.

It's too much for the Morlocks. They all begin to run, even the horned one, holding his arm and whimpering in pain and fear.

Ripper puts up a hasty ashaplt 'shield wall' in their wake to hide their escape route as the move towards the closest sewer hole to scurry back into.

Laura watches, waits, staring at the wall as if by merely looking at it she could fell it. But it's not the wall she's looking at. She's tracking them, with her nose - and her ears. Satisfied they really are gone, she looks back at the boy. Her claws are retracted.

The gaping hole in her leg begins to seal itself, closing like on video games or movies where a healing spell is cast, or healing potion is drank.

"you're alive," Laura tells him, plainly.

The boy screams, and backpeddles, too afraid to parse what, exactly, has happened.

Jane Foster has posed:
When in doubt, level the ICER and wait. May calls attention to herself and Jane takes that cover of attention to drift a little closer, using what protection the alleyway can offer to advance slightly closer.

Ugly as the smell and sights may be, she doesn't blink. The brunette has earned her place here, backing up the Cavalry. Because having Melinda bellowing at her is rather like facing a squad of einherjar, and she would probably rather avoid any similarity.

The ICER in both hands is braced, training a clean path straight for the aggressive punks who just don't listen.

Maybe they never had the chance to connect A to B.

"Let's go for the rational side." Unlikely as that is. She doesn't know a Morlock from a warlock or the girl responsible for savaging the gangers.

A hiss escapes her lips when that girl is now impaled to the ground. Hesitation is unacceptable under the circumstances, and she takes a shot if Ripper isn't fast enough. Because sometimes beating feet isn't enough.

Sometimes there's a justice in that.

"I see."

Melinda May has posed:
Always. Always with the impossible, weird, tearing up the pavement crap. Bad guys *live* for that stuff, May is sure. If it's not weird earth manipulation powers and lobster-claws-for-hands, it's superscience gone amok. (Yes, she's looking at *you*, Brainiac.)

Add mutants into the mix and you get lots of slice-and-dice happy, walking plasma cannons on top of all the "normal" level of insanity.

And just think: She actually signed up for this crap! *le-sigh*

May lets out an almost silent chuff of air through her nose. If it were vocalized, it'd be a snirk. As it is, it's certainly a sign that she's unimpressed with the fleeing Morlocks.

She moves cautiously over to where Flat Balloon Lad lays, wanting to make sure he's still breathing and is not lying in wait. When she's satisified he's out for the count, she attempts to approach the screaming kid in the midst of it all.

"Hey!" she says, extending a hand, palm out, ICER still ready just in case. Her voice is surprisingly gentle, given how gruff she can usually be. "Hey... Easy. Easy, kid. You're safe now." She eyes Laura cautiously. "I *think*."

She hopes. Otherwise, she's not sure they have enough rounds to take down someone with Healing Factor. Even if she does look like she's 90 lbs soaking wet.

Laura Kinney has posed:
Ripper thought he had made it out. But in his fear of going to face-to-face with a woman who has killed, who, clearly, could and would kill, there's 'holes' in that wall. And Jane is savvy enough, or lucky enough (call it what you will) to find a gap, and nail the concrete-shaping mutant in the back, and he goes skidding.

His 'friends' don't even stop to pick him up. THey're too busy running from Murder Girl and SHIELD operatives.

"Yes," Laura agrees with a methodical, almost emotionless pronouncement that one might expect from a seasoned military specialist, or Senior SHIELD Agent or Field Leader. But, she's clearly barely old enough to have graduated high school if not still in it.

Laura looks into the darkness again where Jane's shot came from. Where she lurks, smartly, in the darkness. "She is with you?" Laura asks, making certain there are no further threats, even as the last vestiges of wounds seal. Healing Factor indeed. Healing Factor set to Insane. The blood of the wound soaks her pants, the asphalt behind her. But she's not concerned with that.

The boy seems to gain some sembelance of reason with Laura's claws retracted, and May's reasonable voice and assurances. He nods, unable to find his voice just yet, shaking and taking a few swallows of air, before finally spitting, "Th-thanks."

Jane Foster has posed:
Is violence ever the answer? Sometimes justice levels a sword or a hammer; sometimes a girl needs to resort to questions instead of sending an energy blast flying through the air.

Jane slides out from the alley with the ICER at the ready, scaling where the different entry points in a largely open space might be. Not her idea of fun. Not her idea when there is someone beclawed who just got impaled and keeps walking.

"Hello," she calls out, much less frightening or fraught than Melinda might be, even in calm mode. "Are you quite all right?"

This general question ultimately settles on Laura. "I'm going to check on the gentleman over here. I will keep my distance, just so we are clear."

Right, calm the boy and the be-clawed woman, even if those claws are back. Medical training certainly applies and she can name the lack of injuries. "There's someone I dropped back here and I need to check his vitals. Once I have him stable, any assistance for patching him up is next."

Melinda May has posed:
Though it's likely clear by now, May nods to Laura in answer to her question. "Yeah. She's with me." Reasonably satisfied that none of the punks are getting up anytime soon, she holsters her ICER and takes a better look around the scene. "Do what you need to do," she tells Jane, entirely trusting her partner to know what to do.

(You don't send stupid agents out into the field with May, after all.)

Weapon holstered, hands raised neutrally to display no threat, she moves a step or two closer to Laura, so she's not shouting across the alleyway. "What's your name?" she asks. "I'm Agent May, this is Doctor Foster."

Step one: Try to build rapport. Maybe not the best woman to try that... then again, with the mannerisms the kid displays? Maybe not the worst.

Laura Kinney has posed:
Laura knows of SHIELD. Knows they are not The Facility. Or Alchemax. Or Weapon X. Her senses aren't indicating any elevated heartbeats, or other abnormalities that might provide her with a clue that there's deceit in their words. But, still. Laura isn't a fan of authoritative agencies.

As Jane is confirmed to be May's partner, Laura 'stands down'. The shifting of her from 'at the ready' to 'standing down' is so slight it might be missed to the untrained eye. She looks back to May and is dead silent for the longest moment, just staring at the Agent. Finally, she says, "Laura." And that's all May's getting. But with SHIELDs resources and what May and Jane have seen, it's probably all they need, too.

Laura moves, then, to pick up her bag of clothes, without interest in any further conversation at present or a look back to the boy who had been the target of the Morlocks hate and grudges to see if he's okay, or to try and get a 'thank you' out of him for her interference on his behalf.

She pauses, at Jane, "You are too loud," she tells the Agent, reproachfully.

She then reasserts her locomotion, heading back towards the bus station to hitch a ride back to Westchester.

Jane Foster has posed:
Most certainly, Jane knows a thing or twenty about field medicine. While she lacks a license to practice per se, she has the next best thing. Her swift pace takes her from Laura and Melinda, a nod to her superior in passing. "Thank you." The basics of a medikit always go with her, the bigger one in the van certainly not necessary at this point. She can hope, at least.

Down to her knees beside the man felled by the ICER, she proceeds to carefully check his pulse and go through the movements essential to confirming his vitals. Since any injuries are likely superficial that she did, she takes her time turning him to his side.

All seems well enough here, so to speak. The only elevated heartbeat is the kind from the run, and making sure the fellow she dropped isn't about to get up and bite her. "Clear. Is your leg okay, Laura?" Laura is a safe, easy name. The question is the same.

Right, too loud. Her expression remains mostly calm. "Right."

Melinda May has posed:
"Hey, wait!" May calls after Laura as she retreats. "Where are you go-- *SIGH*" Never mind. The kid's gone too fast. Which probably means her leg is fine.

"Yeah," she tells Jane drily. "She's good." *Silent snirk.*

She drops her hands and glances to see how Jane is doing with Ripper before moving to double check Deflated Balloon Lad again. She takes the time to secure both him and, once Jane is done, Ripper, too. "Would you mind seeing to our young friend over there?" she asks the doctor politely, regarding the poor kid who'd been attacked. The one with the broken ribs.

To that end, she calls a contact at the NYPD's mutant taskforce department and suggests he and his partner -- and an EMT squad -- come down to take over the scene. Let them deal with the kids and the assault charges that may crop up (but probably won't, unless Screamer over there decides to press 'em). All this?

Yeah, let's keep this one more-or-less off the books for now. A quiet word with Hill and/or Fury about it, just to CYA. Then, figure out who 'Laura' is... *before* launching any greater investigation.

If one is even warranted at that point.

Sounds like a *great* plan to her.