3514/Epicenter: The Debrief

Epicenter: The Debrief
Date of Scene:	22 September 2020
Location:	Director Fury's Office - Triskelion - New York
Synopsis:	Bobbi recounts the end of Whitehall's branch of HYDRA. She is put on forced medical leave and assigned to R&D until they understand the new super soldier serum she created and used on herself.
Cast of Characters:	Bobbi Morse, Nick Fury, Maria Hill

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Bobbi Morse has posed:
Agent Bobbi Morse has done debriefings to Fury before. Sometimes, things get Big with a capital B and he wants to know more. Other times, he's happy to let his agents do the thing he's entrusted them to do. A major HYDRA operation at war with SHIELD? that wasn't just a capital B, that was a capital BIG.

Bobbi Morse had spent some time in the medical wing after returning due to actions she took in the field. While technically now on medical leave until Agent Simmons can clear her physically for active duty, she must still be available for time critical work. This counts as that.

She adjusts her uniform, the 'working at a desk' one that is, not her field uniform with all the weapons and armour. She checks her tablet has the documents she needs. Then, she approaches the secretary to Fury and is buzzed in. With a deep breath to comport herself, she enters Fury's office.

"Director, Deputy Director. Field Leader Morse reporting for debriefing," she says standing at attention. She takes her job very seriously, and always will.

Nick Fury has posed:
As anticipated Agent Morse is right on time, which is good, as Fury and Hill were just finishing up one of their daily tet a tet to keep the vast machine that was SHIELD running smoothly.

"Guess that's our ten o'clock," Fury remarks as he checks his watch. "Come in Agent Morse," he calls after pressing the intercom. After all the door to Fury's office was eight kinds of soundproof and likely several kinds of other thing proof as well.

Maria Hill has posed:
Hill nods to Fury, not saying anything verbally, but the lifted eyebrow she gives him as Morse is buzzed in speaks volumes. She moves from her seat across from Fury to standing beside him, where poor Bobbi will have to deal with both of them staring her down during the debriefing. She brings her nearly-empty coffee cup and her tablet with her, though she's not drinking from the one nor reading the other.

Bobbi Morse has posed:
Bobbi nods to them both and she opens up her tablet and takes the warm seat left by Hill. "Director, where would you like to start. At the end or the beginning?" She rests her tablet on her lap and has her business face on. She can never tell just how the higher ups will take the decisions she made in the field. There's not much to be done about them after the fact unless SHIELD has a time machine hidden somewhere.

Nick Fury has posed:
Fury nods for Bobbi to take a seat then, when asked where to begin he says, "At the beginning Agent Morse, at the beginning, and don't leave anything out." Fury didn't have the time to be briefed on the same mission more than once so when he did get a briefing from someone other than Hill he tended to want it all down to the last detail.

He settles back to listen, finger steepled in front of him.

Maria Hill has posed:
Hill sets her mug down on a side table next to her tablet, then folds her arms across her chest, giving Morse a 'you heard the man' look. There's a hint of support in her expression for a moment, but only just.

Bobbi Morse has posed:
    Bobbi nods curtly to Hill, catching that expression, and Fury. She begins, "Yes Sir. Out of the ordinary, my asset Toshiro Mori, freelance engineer with no moral code, contacted me saying he needed to see me, it was urgent. This has never happened with my asset before. He put himself out on a limb giving us the location of Whitehall's operation in upstate New York. I suspect he might be in trouble.

    But given how out of the ordinary it was, I took Agent Simmons along as backup, just in case. As you know she asked me to train her for Senior Agent. When I arrived at Toshiro's place, I noticed the guards had changed and his long time servant was missing. Toshiro started talking about 'great things'. I knew something odd was up, so I used the alert phrase and took a gun from one of the guards. It was then that Lance Hunter fought his way out of a back room. Toshiro had abducted him. A stalemate, I could see Toshiro really wanted to kill him. I surrendered hoping this would help me get answers and give me a chance to get Lance free. Unfortunately, they also then captured Agent Simmons. We were then transported via submarine."

Nick Fury has posed:
Fury nods taking in the details looking over at Hill. "Agent Hunter, former level four, still owes you a beer from the thing in Switzerland?" he asks checking the facts. Also there's a little nod to confirm Hill was free to jump in as she liked, standard operating procedure when it came to Fury and his high-level people.

"And was there any particular reason you went with only an agent out of R&D for back up, Agent Morse?" he asks Bobbi.

Maria Hill has posed:
Nodding with a hint of amusement on her face, Hill replies, "Well, if we're being technical, one from Switzerland, and one from losing a game of darts about four months later." She tilts her head, as if considering. "Ah, and a third from a bet we made regarding Agent Ward." No indication on what that bet was, and no, she will not clarify right now. She does, however, give Morse a lifted eyebrow as Fury asks his question. She's interested in that answer, too.

Bobbi Morse has posed:
There's a small smirk as Hill lists out more beers Lance owes and she nods her head, "Yes Sir, that Lance Hunter. He has been working as a mercenary since he left us. Not making a good living of it either. He's been learning that mercenaries with a conscience don't get the good jobs."

Bobbi was expecting that question, "I believed she would have been sufficient backup Sir, however, the guards were wearing a watch. A new improved version of the super power delivery system HYDRA were using last month. The watch allowed them to select between various powers they'd taken from Inhumans. Agent Simmons had positioned herself to back me up. Her fire arms proficiency and tactical have been coming along great. One area that she still falls down in is improvisation.

    The submarine docked in an underground facility, carved in to a mountain. We were taken up to an office that had an overlook from the side of a cliff out at an ocean. The way the ocean moved I guessed pacific. Given we'd left from Fukuoka it was a safe bet. The HYDRA facility was recently carved out of the stone. They were still moving in, crates everywhere, people working on installations. They were all wearing those watches.

    In the office was Daniel Whitehall. He got to the point, I was to create the, as he put it, 'longevity serum' for him. I could see from his palor that he was running out of time. We had previously summised from footage that he was using the Inhuman serum he'd created with an Inhuman healing ability to keep himself alive - but as we know, anything made that way will cause heart attacks. He was literally dying from his cure to death. He knew his time was running out and needed an alternative. Presumably he somehow found out I was the author of the definitive paper on Super Soldier Serums... and he threatened the death of Hunter and Simmons if I did not comply."

Nick Fury has posed:
There's a nod about the matter of only having Simmons for back up. It's one of those sorts of nods Hill and even Bobbi might recognize, that the information had been stored for later.

"Any idea of how he found out about that paper, if I recall correctly, like most things dealing with super-soldier serums, it was very highly classified."

Bobbi Morse has posed:
    Bobbi shakes her head, "No Sir. I wish I knew. Even Nadia Pym knew about it. The Red Room had my paper and somehow Whitehall had my paper. At least they didn't have the unredacted version. Whitehall definitely didn't know what was required to make the super soldier serum work, he didn't provide the necessary equipment. The leak might be linked to the work Agent Carter is doing. She has found poignant information about HYDRA lacking from our digital databases. She found the original hardcopy files though.

    They took us down to their lab slash prison. There on the medical table was a dismembered twitch corpse. There was also another prisoner there named Jacob. Jacob, it turned out, was the missing link in the technology Whitehall had created. His power allowed one DNA sequence to meld with another. However, it turns out he had used his own ability on himself to remove his ability. Whitehall's technology is no longer viable, as the required source compounds are no longer available. Jacob passed away in the cell.

    Lance attempted an escape. We took down two of their guards when Toshiro came to talk with me, however there were plenty more guards and.. again.. super powers. I found a vial of the Jacob compounds and came up a plan. I kept the plan from my colleagues because I knew they would protest.

    Agent Simmons noticed that the corpse was no corpse when Jacob explained that this is Jia. She heals. Simmons re-assembled her and she healed before our eyes over several hours. Jacob+Jia is how Whitehall was staying alive and had de-aged so much."

Nick Fury has posed:
"We'll need to look into that," Fury remarks to Hill about the report. If SHIELD files are popping up in the hands of the Red Room and HYDRA something is /definitely/ wrong.

"So Whitehall was harnessing the power of these individuals to make his super-watches?" following the threads that Bobbi was spinning out.

Bobbi Morse has posed:
    Bobbi nods her head again, "Yes Sir. The biological signature is the same. Now that Jacob is gone, he will be unable to make any more. The existing stocks are another question. But even those watches will run out of serum, not to mention they are a death sentence. According to Jacob, he cut Jia up and left her like that because he was so angry with Jacob.

    Agent Simmons invented a new kind of improvised weapon - a dendrotoxin grenade. Lance improvised weapon and grenades.. and I worked on my terrible idea Sir. I regret to inform that I broke protocol and created a new kind of super soldier serum outside of SHIELD labs and without your express permission."

    Bobbi frowns a touch and glances down, "The knowledge I'd learnt about the Infinity Formula," she glances at Maria after saying that name, unsure if even she had been given clearance to know about it. She looks back to Fury, "When working with Agent Simmons to save Agent Carters life.. plus my intimate knowledge of the Super Soldier Serum.. plus the Inhuman magic of Jacob's compounds. I invented a new formula, one that combined all three. It just sort of.. came to me.

    I knew we needed superior fire power. Using one of Whitehall's watches ourselves wouldn't level the playing field, there were far too many of them. But.. if we had a Captain America with us, the guy who almost single handedly took down HYDRA in World War 2? well.. then we'd have a real chance of not only escaping, but finally taking Whitehall down."

Maria Hill has posed:
Unknown to Morse, Maria has been given Infinity Formula. Not that even a twitch registers on her expression as Morse brings it up. Though she does interrupt. "Morse, where is the formula now? As it's obvious there's a leak somewhere, I think this is a highly relevant issue to address."

Bobbi Morse has posed:
    Bobbi shifts in the chair as Maria gets to the crux of the situation. "I took it, Deputy. I was not going to put it up to debate amongst Simmons and Hunter, or even Jia. It was my responsibility as the senior agent on the mission to put the mission and them ahead of myself. There was a real chance taking it would cause me to have a life ending heart attack, but if it gave me the time to get them out of there and deal with Whitehall... so I took it. There is no more of it, the rest I burnt away. The lab we were in didn't have any surveillance, Hunter and I checked the moment we got in there."

Nick Fury has posed:
Fury's face becomes the picture of not-impressed at the idea of one of his agents tinkering with something quite that dangerous. He does seem satisfied that the serum is gone, except for what's in Bobbi's blood. "I assume there were no notes and any that there were have been destroyed?"

Maria Hill has posed:
Hill's expression mirrors the Director's, though she doesn't say anything. Her lips twist slightly in disapproval.

Bobbi Morse has posed:
    Bobbi nods her head, "Yes Sir. With a superior weapon, we enacted the escape plan. I would beat down the door, Simmons would throw in her dendrotoxin grenade, then we move in and fight for our lives. Once we succeed, I sent Hunter to deal with Toshiro, I went to deal with Whitehall and I sent Simmons with Jia to relieve HYDRA of their submarine for our escape.

    The grenade took out seven of the HYDRA guards. It was during this battle that I experienced my first acute myocardial infraction. It was extremely painful but I was able to take on the remaining eight with Hunter, Simmons and Jia. Also defending my colleague and allies by drawing in their use of super powers. Being electrocuted is extremely unpleasant."

    She takes a breath and says, "I then went to Whitehall's office. He had guards in there that I was easily able to down. He was looking extremely ill and attempting to take his Inhuman medicine. I ... stopped him from taking the medicine and he expired.

    I'm unclear on what transpired with Hunter, but given the way he operates, I expect Toshiro Mori is dead too. With Simmons taking the submarine, ...apparently Jia used the radio to call for help. She took details. A man named Gordon appeared, perhaps a teleporter?, and took Jia with him. I piloted the submarine out of the HYDRA base and not too long after the submarine was attacked with bombs and the entire HYDRA base exploded. The mountain and cliff that it was in collapsed down on itself.

    Any other evidence of the formula died with that base. Whitehall is gone and his super power technology can no longer be created."

Nick Fury has posed:
There's a nod from Fury that the information is gone. "All the same, we'd best send a team to the island and make sure that tech and any information is gone for good. I'd bomb the damn place but China gets nervous with that sort of thing in their backyard."

There is a glance with Fury's good eye to Hill, "Well Director, what do you think Agent Morse should take away from this little expedition of hers?" he asks her.

Maria Hill has posed:
Hill gives Morse a flat look. "Things I had already assumed she knew, Director: expect everything to go Tango Uniform from the jump, every time." She glances back over to Fury. "I might have a solution that will suffice for bombing the damn place //and// China looking the other way, but we'll discuss that later, sir." Her attention moves back to Agent Morse. "Sir, I advise disciplinary action to be taken following a full two week medical leave that WILL be adhered to better than she adhered to her last vacation." There's a hint of a smirk on Hill's lips for a moment. "Physical disciplinary action, which will double as testing to see the limits of this new Super Soldier Serum. Assuming that is acceptable to you, Director?"

Nick Fury has posed:
Fury nods to Hill, "Sounds just like what I was thinking" he agrees before turning his good eye to Bobbi. "I hope you get along well with Director Levine in R&D, they're going to be your new best friend for the next couple of months while we figure out what sort of effects this new serum has long term, and if it can be synthesized out of your blood. For your sake let's hope it can't be." All that and whatever Hill will be dreaming up for her.

Then Fury does settle back in his chair, "It's for your own good, you know as well as anyone super-soldier serums are dangerous thing to let out in the world, so we want to make sure your new one is well and truly bottled up," he says, before getting to the other side of all this. "That said, good work on making the best of a bad situation, I may think how you did it was reckless, but I'm not losing any sleep about Whitehall and his branch of HYDRA being wiped out."

There is a no to Hill about the bombing options before he asks her "Anything else you would like to add Director?"

Maria Hill has posed:
"I'm good, Director." the Deputy Director straightens her uniform slightly, and picks up her coffee cup and tablet.

Bobbi Morse has posed:
Bobbi nods her head to Fury and Hill. "Thank you Directors. I'll let Coulson and Gonzales know my status as soon as I get back to my desk." She frowns a touch and then nods. She folds up her tablet and stands, stands to attention. Then to Maria she says, "And yes ma'am I will take this medical leave seriously." She looks back to Fury, "Am I dismissed Sir?"

Nick Fury has posed:
"Good," Fury says to Hill before lookin back to Bobbi and nodding, "You're dimsissed, thank you for your report." And with that Bobbi is free to go.