5312/Italian Getaway

Italian Getaway
Date of Scene:	23 February 2021
Location:	Vogel Enterprises offices, Italy
Synopsis:	Peggy flies May and Lester Colt to Italy on some 'flight training hours'. They secretly get off and go to bugging the offices of Vogel Enterprises, who supply many of the Quinjet parts. Bucky comes for back up and has a memory he can't quite trace. But the recon mission is successful.
Cast of Characters:	Peggy Carter, Melinda May, Lester Colt, James Barnes

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Peggy Carter has posed:
The note left to Lester was a strange one -- 'Meet for a beer? We should catch up for old times. Join me 11 am. -P. C.' And an address for a rural area in northern Westchester. Maybe there is some sort of home brewery up in that direction? It still means he's been given a test -- how much does he trust Peggy Carter and will go somewhere on her request without any official SHIELD communication between them. She seems to be avoiding the phones or comm units.

Meanwhile, there is a brewery there. But closed on Mondays, it's got several huge old farm fields that have fallen out of use. One of them is where the QuinJet is parked, currently in stealth mode. Peggy sits in the cockpit with May, waiting quietly to see if the man is actually going to show. "Dollman is... incredibly effective in combat. He'd be good on our side if... If no one else has gotten to him first. I can't remember the last time I sent him on a stealth mission and I've been helping manage him since the 60s."

Melinda May has posed:
May sits in the co-pilot seat, this time -- simply because that's where she was when they took off. She needed, after all, to sell the idea this is a training flight. And, in many ways, it is. Never let it be said that Melinda May can't multitask. "I haven't worked a lot with him," she says. "But his abilities will certainly come in handy, here." Anytime there's a stealth mission and someone can get into the unexpected places, it's a bonus.

She watches out the window, but the jet's radar and sensor suites are going, too. They should pick him up before long. Especially if he hasn't turned off his SHIELD phone and comms... and who ever does?

Lester Colt has posed:
     Off from the distance a lone contrail flies through the sky. It's small, barely a pinprick on the distant blue skies. High above the clouds and flying at hypersonic speeds he's dressed in a blue cover camouflage to blend in and break up his body against the sky. Add on top of that the simple fact that he's currently only 6 inches tall and one would be hard pressed to tell that he's anything more than a drone flying in the sky.

     He twists and turns diving through the cloud cover down towards the ground smashing a tiny doll sized hole through the cover as he echoes with little more then the crack of a gunshot off in the distance. His goggles are slicked hard with the condensation of the cloud covering as he slows down slower and slower still before kicking his feet up and applying counter velocity from his jetpack to allow him to slow down to a stop at ground level.

     Down goes the jetpack off of one shoulder and then the next and soon after goes off his poncho like camouflage covering dropped onto the ground. As he returns to normal size behind the bushes the gear remains sized for a little doll allowing him to pick them up and toss them back into his pocket leaving the man dressed in his usual going about town clothes: A camouflage sleeveless shirt over a long sleeve plain button down with black gloves and thick cargo pants over combat boots. That simple looking black bandana of his covering his bald head as he makes sure to put his 'toys' safely away in a little storage case walking out from behind a nearby building.

     "Jetpack never gets old." He says to himself with a smile, looking around for the brewery.

Peggy Carter has posed:
And then a few sensors are going off. It'd be quite concerning if Peggy wasn't directly expecting it. She sits up just a bit straighter, refining the scans to double check that it's who they expect it to be. "Contact. Well... at least he came. Now to figure out how to make certain he's on our side. The last test was effective but...awful. Not certain I want to use it again. I'm open to any suggestions?" Peggy asks her colleague. It's clear the dirty feeling she had about the 'test' from the weekend is still lingering in the air. It's a dirt that doesn't wash off easily.

As Lester is walking about, the moment he is looking in the direction of the Quinjet, Peggy drops the cloak. The ramp opens for him a second later, an invitation clearly for something a bit more than a beer. When he's coming up the ramp, Peggy's voice echoes over the interal coms into the loading dock. "I thought we might try a European brew. We're in the cockpit, join us, will you?" The commentary is a little too chipper, like she knows they are being watched or maybe doesn't want to scare him away. But something is very... Very off.

Melinda May has posed:
"Yeah," May grunts. "I'm not big on that test." She had a very long shower, after that mission, and her skin is still crawling. "But I'll follow your lead," which is a nice way of saying she doesn't have a much better idea at the moment. When she does, though, Peggy will be the first to know.

As the sensors go off and Peggy drops the cloak, May reaches out to silence the alarms and starts prepping for take-off. They won't be waiting long for Dollman to get himself situated. They're on a time limit; training flights only take so long... and Italy is 6 hours ahead of New York. How late are those bars open, anyway?

Lester Colt has posed:
     Lester takes his time looking around just enjoying the fresh air as he watches for signs of snipers or people watching from the shadows. Good ol paranoia gained from years in the service. Then his paranoia pays off the moment that the jet decloaks.

     There's a number of alarm bells going off. It doesn't take a special agent to figure out something's off. He's still in a good mood on the outside as he walks towards the jet.

     He knows the layout of a quinjet like the back of his hand having worked with S.H.I.E.L.D. and the jets a lot over the last ten years, as such he's keeping in the back of his mind the usual escape routes just incase. There's every intent in the back of his mind that he might just need to evacuate if things go rough here.

     The lights glint off of his mirrored goggles as he walks up the ramp and into the jet listening carefully to the words said trying to parse if there's more to it. His head bobs lightly in time with the sound from his walkman as he moves in further into the craft and up into the cockpit.

     "Evening agents." He offers moving in to take a seat up front for the trip. "I'd ask why the secrecy but think that might defeat the purpose of secrecy."

Peggy Carter has posed:
As soon as the loading ramp is back up and the bay repressurized, Peggy's doing her take off checks and then recloaking them before starting to lift off. She's got enough flying hours now that the motions are second nature, something that can be done while her mind is going a hundred miles an hour in another direction. But that's the goal, right? Make flying built in muscle memory, and the aged once-Director is clearly getting there. But it means her eyes are mainly on the cockpit, so she's trusting May to read the man behind them.

"Lester... feels like it's been ages since we really caught up. Ah.. tell me. How much do you remember about Project Paperclip...back in the day?" She tosses that out with a level of casual which is rather too hide. Purposefully trying to sound at ease about it. Trying to give him room to feel however he wants about the matter.

Melinda May has posed:
May swivels in her seat, as if conversationally, to watch Lester as Peggy questions him so casually. It's somewhat unusual for the pilot, who's known for her focus on task -- especially behind the stick. But she's not really behind the stick right now, is she? She keeps half an eye on what Peggy's doing, since she's technically the instructor here. But she engages with the other agent, too. Who knew she could multitask so well?

True to form, however, the taciturn Asian doesn't say much, other than to reply affirmatives to the preflight check when required. She turns back briefly during liftoff, to allow for that operation, but once they're in the air and climbing, her attention is fully back on Dollman.

Lester Colt has posed:
     "That was when they were trying to snag as many of the Nazi scientists as possible before the russians could right?" Lester starts off taking himself a seat fairly comfortably. "I wasn't really up on all the details but I've always been of the mind that if we get a leg up on the bad guys, we can always lock them in a cell later, so it was worth it." He doesn't seem too invested in the question but he's still trying to figure out what the two are getting at here as he gets the idea that this might just be more about an operation than it is drinks.

Peggy Carter has posed:
Silence lingers from Peggy for a few heartbeats. This was harder than what they did over the weekend. Or, at least, more imprecise. There's nothing but the sound of the large jet taking off into the sky around them and the very faint changes in G force while Peggy sets in a course for somewhere in Europe. If Lester decides he's got to escape now, well, he's going to be taking quite the air ride.

"Where you aware that there were a handful of HYDRA scientists included in Paperclip? How would you feel about working with some of their scientists now?" Peggy checks their course one more time before she finally turns, a calm and pleasant smile on her lips which doesn't quite reach her eyes. Was she asking him to join HYDRA?

Melinda May has posed:
May's face is no less nor any more neutral than usual. Indeed, she's got her habitual, faint scowl between her brows -- the one that always makes her look like she's likely going to hit something before the night is through. There's probably some truth to it. Rare is the occasion when Melinda May takes to the field without hitting something.

Of course, Peg's known her long enough to know that's just her mission game face. Her shoulders are relaxed enough, aside from betraying the subtle tension regarding the line of questioning the Brit is following, and her hands are light on the board in front of her -- not really doing anything, since Peggy's got the controls. But she's watching. She's listening.

She's waiting.

Lester Colt has posed:
     "Paperclip or HYDRA's scientists?" Lester asks as he reaches into his little pouch on his belt pulling out a syringe to inject himself with his regularly scheduled dosage. He clenches his fist into a ball tight on the spot as the contents fill into his vein flooding through before collecting the needle in his hand making a motion as if he's disposing of it into his pocket.

     "Because the last time someone asked me to work with anyone HYDRA it didn't work out too well for them dir-" He catches himself mid word pausing as he looks back up. "Peggy." His eyes narrow as he palms the needle weighing his odds against two highly trained agents one of whom could most likely easily take him on her own in a fair fight. He'd have to play dirty.

     His mind goes back to Cuba, it's a dark place.

Peggy Carter has posed:
"Both, really...HYDRA scientists who came in from Paperclip. HYDRA is HYDRA, right? Why don't you tell me what happened?" Peggy's now fully turned towards Lester in her seat. The quinjet will alert them if something is off, now that they've climbed high enough, it's pretty much coasting to Europe. Her dark eyes are even and serious as Lester has ever seen them. More so, even. The last time he saw this look in her eyes, the mission was life and death with the odds a bit closer to death. She has a single, dark screened, unmarked tablet in her lap. Not SHIELD equipment. But she's had it near, waiting, since the start of this.

For just a moment, her eyes flicker to May. A slight bit of questioning, perhaps even prompting permission for the other woman to ask questions as well.

Melinda May has posed:
Oh, when May has questions, she'll ask them. She'd rather hear Lester's story, though. Since the plane is on autopilot, now, and Peggy is still at the controls, the Asian woman unbuckles and pushes out of her seat. She moves back into the compartment with Lester, but past him, towards the rear. Stretching, she reaches up into an overhead bin and casually pulls down a black canvas bag, listening all the while.

Lester Colt has posed:
     Colt rubs his thumb and forefinger together keeping his eyes open he's got a decent visual on all sides but he knows that he can't keep an eye on everything. "HYDRA killed my father in-law and trapped me for two years at six inches tall, then had the gall to try and get me to work with their boys to kill civilians."

     He shakes his head. "So I made sure the whole squad of traitors walked head first into a wall of pungees." There's a long moments pause as he gets that glint in his eye. "Sorry you can keep your recruitment drive some place else, think I'll be leaving."

Peggy Carter has posed:
"Lester. Wait." Peggy states quietly, the firm, but gentle, command behind her tone undoubted. She speaks in a way only someone who has commanded people for decades can keep command. She's also sitting a little straighter now, fingertips readied to pass over that tablet she has. "This is not a recruitment drive. Not... exactly." Her dark eyes flicker to May, giving a slight nod for the woman to ask any other questions she has, but Peggy seems to be content with what she's heard and ready to hand that tablet over.

Melinda May has posed:
"Relax, Colt," May says, once he starts getting too antsy. She leaves the equipment she was looking at in the bag, zipping it back up and shoving it back up into its bin. "If we were HYDRA, do you honestly think we'd play this song and dance to recruit you?" Not when HYDRA has so many other recruitment methods... most of which would probably default to shrinking him down and putting him in a jar. Probably with some piped in chemical concoction to make him more ammenable to 'compliance training'.

She looks past him to Peggy, who's got that tablet. "Once you've seen what Carter's got, you'll understand."

Lester Colt has posed:
     Lester pauses for a moment holds up a finger, puts the finger back down and then pauses for a long moment. "You know you're almost certainly right." He flicks the syringe round and round his fingers before tossing it back into the bag of used syringes that he carries around on his person for impromptu throwing weapons.

     He reaches out powering up the tablet to check out the display over for a quick check to see what's on its contents. "Paranoia's served me fairly well so far though." As he looks over the pad and its contents.

Peggy Carter has posed:
Definitely not a SHIELD tablet, and not connected to the internet. It might as well be a note book or an etch-a-sketch for all it can do. But that's all Peggy needs it to do. She gives Lester a simple smile and turns back towards the controls. "I just felt like it'd be nice to catch up with an old friend while I finish some Quin Jet hours. A brief stop in Europe, enjoy the evening, then back home. We all could use the break and I needed the training hours anyway."

Peggy gives May a firm, approving nod. She's content with what she's seen, as a profiler and a woman who knows the man. Now she's mainly concentrating on getting them to Europe as quickly as possible.

On the pad is a simple message: 'HYDRA has infiltrated SHIELD. Probably since Paperclip. We don't know how high up it goes. Gathering evidence in Italy. Will explain more when we are off craft. Get ready for a recon mission and bug drop. Don't trust SHIELD tech, kill cellphone and comms. Delete after reading.'

Melinda May has posed:
As they near Italy, May returns to the cockpit, sliding into the co-pilot's seat. She glances over to Peggy, as she slides her piloting comset over her head. Then, she lifts a spread hand to the other woman, fingers folding down in a steady countdown. As her hand forms a fist, she reaches under the console and does... something. A series of amber lights ignite on the HUD.

Adjusting her mic, she activates the radio. "Europe Actual, this Quebec-Juliet-Zero-One-Two, enroute to Icarus. We are a training flight. Our boards have just lit up like a Christmas Tree. We are diverting from flight path. Gonna set down and run a diagnostic."

"Copy that, Zero-Two-One," comes the reply from the SHIELD installation tasked with keeping track of the flights in this area of sky. "Can you confirm the issue?"

"Not yet," May replies. "That's what the diagnostic is for. But I can tell you we are in danger of cascade. The sooner we're down, the sooner we're safe."

"Roger, Zero-Two-One. Recommend you land at the following coordinates." The operator reels them off.

May rocks her head impatiently from side to side, waiting for him to finish. "Negative, Actual. We do not have control enough for that. Decending below cloud deck, now. Expect to touch down in five." A beat. "When we know where we are, we'll let you know."

She reaches under the console again, and the HUD readings change, transmitting problems that are way worse than what's actually going on. They interrupt the comms chatter, causing most of what Europe Actual says to be lost in static and making it seem for all the world like the jet is experiencing severe electronic failure.

It's fine, of course. But Europe Actual doesn't know that, since the jet is now completely off the radar.

The Asian looks back over to the Brit and gives a ghost of a smile. "All yours, rookie," she says.

Lester Colt has posed:
     Lester reads over the message and quietly deletes the contents with a few quick button presses. The thing isn't quite as sturdy as the mill tech he's used to but it's about as useful as some of the bricks he's used over the years. He sets the now empty pad back down in front of himself relaxing down into the chair somewhat more naturally now that he knows he's not in immediate danger of horrific and instant murder death, only relatively oncoming murder death down the road.

     He looks up at the comms chatter as the flight nears Italy. His attention moving over to see how May handles things. He gives a light smirk that shows a flash of pearly white teeth as he watches her work her magic at the controls kicking back and relaxing as they duck down ready to take a nice smooth landing down towards the target.

Peggy Carter has posed:
Just in case the QuinJet was caught en route or they couldn't get permission for training hours today, Peggy had a back up. Bucky Barnes. She's handed him a file, privately, when they were out with Lili one afternoon. A file meant to be burned. The offices of Vogel Enterprises in Naples, Italy. A strange place for a business selling aircraft and quinjet parts of many companies in the US, but that's where it's located. Peggy has reason to believe that Vogel may be HYDRA, or HYDRA aligned, but no proof. Yet. So the offices need reconned, bugs planted, and the whole operation monitored as close as possible without being altered to loyal SHIELD agents being onto them. Bucky's on the ground and, if he's going to have back up, they're to meet him a block away from the offices in about 10 minutes. Hopefull he'll have back up. He knows the details better than anyone but Peggy.

On the craft, Peggy's brows arch as she sees what May is doing. She gives the woman a sideways, approving smile, and starts genuinely looking over what alarm warnings she is getting as she begins to take them down into a stripped bare olive field (the Olive blight has hit Naples incredibly hard) just outside of the city. It looks like they are randomly landing, even if it is quite strategic.

Once she has them down, she speaks into the cockpit as she takes her tablet back and types something quickly. "I'm going to stay with the jet and see if I can run diagnostics, get what is wrong from the inside. Why don't you two take a walk around and see if you can notice anything suspicious on the outside?" She shows them both the tablet's face. 'Meet James Barnes at this street address in 10 minutes. He has rest of intel and job.' It seems Peggy is actually staying behind.

Melinda May has posed:
Someone needs to stay with the jet and play quarterback, it's true. And, given the skillsets here, it makes sense in an odd way that it'd be Peggy this time, and not May. Thus, May pushes out of her chair, saying for the flight recorder, "Yeah. You know how to do that. C'mon, Colt. Let's make sure we're not carrying a gremlin somewhere."

Striding down the length of the craft, she reaches for and grabs that bag again, slinging it on to her back. Then, she hits the big red button that opens the back hatch, sticks a private comm into her ear, tosses one to Colt, and gives Peggy a thumbs up. They don't have long to get where they're going, which means they'd best doubletime it.

James Barnes has posed:
There is a Bucky, right where he's supposed to be. Like a wizard, he arrives precisely when he means to. Just another tourist in a leather jacket and jeans, lingering over his little demitasse of espresso. Looking around with a curiosity that one might attribute to being said tourist....but is actually comparing the current bustling city with the bombed-out wreck swarming with triumphant Italian partisans that he remembers. A little piece of crystal clarity, bobbing up out of the past, despite HYDRA's very best attempts to destroy it.

Lester Colt has posed:
     Colt comes back to a stand from his spot dusting himself off as he walks towards the ramp. "That's the thing about gremlins, never know when they'll strike." As he plugs in that private com into his setup. He's got everything ready to go on his person as he walks down the ramp and into the city streets of Italy.

     To be fair it's a fairly alien environment for him really all things considered. So much of his time had been spent in the dense jungles of Vietnam, the harsh deserts of Quroc and Afghanistan, the frozen tundras of the arctic but so little time in scenic vacation spots like Italy. It feels honestly a bit strange really as he power-walks down those cobbled roads trying to move as quickly as he can without drawing attention to himself.

     Italy was the place where his father had cut his teeth during the war, the great hero of the great war. "Abusive asshole." He says under his breath to no one in particular as he looks at the beautiful buildings in every direction with that little bit of spite in his voice only just coming down towards the address.

Peggy Carter has posed:
Vogel Enterprises is in a higher level building on the outer edges of the city. Still enough to be 'city', but it's a European, old city, so it's only 10 stories instead of 60-80 and of older construction. There are cafe's near it, people bustling through the town casually as it's after dinner hour. But the winter has broken into early spring temperatures, people are out at bars, getting dessert, and generally enjoying themselves.

Vogel Enterprises itself seems to own the top two floors of this higher story building. There's a night desk security guard on in the lobby and the usual, general security cameras both outside the doors and inside the lobby, elevators, and stairwells. It looks like a boring set of investment offices, otherwise, and everyone other than the guards has gone home for the day.

Melinda May has posed:
May is dressed in black jeans, a dark blue top, and her usual black leather jacket. It's better than advertising "HEY LOOK, I'M SHIELD!" all over the place. She greets Bucky with a nod and then they head on to find the building.

Taking up a position in a narrow alley across the street, she slings the bag from her back and unzips it. "I've got what we need to disable the electronic security," she tells the two men. "But I think you're the best one to go do that, Colt. You're less likely to be seen, if you shrink down." She holds up a small disk about the size of a quarter. "Use this to bridge the hot wires in the box. Its onboard programming will do the rest." Because, yeah. She trusts Daisy Johnson to know her stuff.

Her eyes flick to Bucky. "You want to take out the nightguard, or shall I?" If he does it, it'll probably be a very straightforward action. If she does it... well, she might try the subtle approach, first. It'll still probably end up with a punch to the head.

James Barnes has posed:
There's something faintly arch in Buck's face, as he rises, leaves tip and more than enough for his bill, and joins his colleagues. "I'll do it," he says, easily. Relaxed, untensed, but certainly less grim than he's been in months past. Like this is a welcome warm-up.

A punch to the head is very definitely in the arsenal, but then....he does have a little taser on him. Something that won't leave distinctive handprints in some poor security goon's skull.

Lester Colt has posed:
     Lester has changed into a different type of camouflage for this little trip. Black cargo pants and a black sleeveless shirt with a black long sleeve shirt underneath and his black bandana to cover that bald head of his. It may not blend in the most with everyone else around him but it blends in a bit better than the military style american camouflage that he always wears to pretty much every occasion rain, snow or shine.

     He takes a long moment sizing up the building before he adjusts his yellow mirrored goggles on his face. "Colt's ready to bolt." He offers before shrinking down in a matter of seconds. As he shrinks he leaves behind outlines of himself, each one fading away as he shrinks smaller and smaller until finally he is no taller than 6 inches in total. The process only takes about three seconds in total before he looks like nothing more than an action figure standing on the road side however his jump catapults him up to the level that he can snag that metal disk right out of May's hand as if he were superhuman in nature.

     In spite of his reduced stature the miniscule Colt manages to run with a great deal of speed, almost as if he were still a full sized man covering a great deal of ground as he keeps up alongside bucky He darts under the tables making for his target the security panel beside the door. He's got it in his sight as he makes a strong leap up into the air with a single mighty bound.

Peggy Carter has posed:
If there's any one watching or following them, they are beyond good. No one looks up as the trio meet at that little cafe, no one is following them around the corner to Vogel Enterprises, and no one watches them as they skim past the building for the initial look. The security guard inside is alone and somewhat bored looking, scanning over a phone as he sits up almost straight in his three piece suit. This isn't a meat guard, muscle protection sort of business, it's a proper looking corporation with more money than sense business. At least, on the outside.

Of course, to Colt's eyes, the world is comically large. The fake marble columns in the lobby of the office building look like they are meant for giants and the steps up between the sidewalk and the front door would be a challenge if he wasn't so strong. The guard is definitely not noticing him approach the door or knock out that outside security camera. It's disabled rather neatly, though it might be noticed to be down sooner rather than later, depending on what they used to take it out. The front doors aren't locked, apparently some people are expected to come and go after hours. That's why there's a guard at the desk.

Melinda May has posed:
Yeah, the camera feed might jump a moment, but it doesn't blank out the screen. Daisy's stuff is better than that. It just won't be very useful to them down the road.

May gives Bucky a brief nod as he sets off to deal with the guard. She picks up her bag, slings it back over her shoulder, and palms a couple of taser disks, just in case there are more guards between the lobby and their destination.

Once that guard is down, she's moving towards the stairwell. Bit of a hike, eight storeys up, sure. But she'd hate to get trapped in the elevator. She takes the stairs swiftly and efficiently; her work outs are still tough enough to make this look easy.

Lester Colt has posed:
     Doll Man does what he does best speeding through the building one room at a time tracking the shadows of the camera's movements and hiding in those dead zones. He waits for the right moment, and leaps into action with each new room speeding across with his normal sized strength to bound and jump his way to the cameras and slap bugs onto the side of each of the cameras clearing the path one by one with great effort and skill from his shrunk down size to do his duty.

James Barnes has posed:
Buck heads straight for the guard....after making sure he's not likely to inadvertantly squash Colt under a combat boot. His Italian is still fluent, but not entirely accentless, and the accent, of course, is Brooklyn. "There you are!" he says to the guard in that tongue, as if utterly delighted by the meeting. "You son of a bitch, I never got to pay you back that fifteen euro you gave me when I was an exchange student. Took me way too long to track you down...." Arms out, like he's expecting a hug. The guard gets one whether he wants one or not, a hug punctuated by a high voltage jolt. The guard sags, and Buck deposits him tenderly in his chair....and zipties him to it.

Peggy Carter has posed:
The cameras are quite efficently dealt with, the guard looking up when the door opens so he totally misses the six inch tall man. Melinda is given time to slip past as the guard looks entirely confused by Bucky's words. His head tilts, an awkward smile crossing his mouth as he's a bit too Italian polite to say he has no clue who the man is. "Sir...I am sorry, I don't remember...ah... Hello!" And he's leaning in for that hug because it's happening and he doesn't wish to be rude. Then he's down, a slumped body into the chair, no chance to even push the emergency call button. No one outside seems to have noticed the strange exchange.

It is 8 floors. Lester is managing to keep ahead of May, disabling the few cameras that are in the stairwells and clearing her way up to the quiet, night-time dim offices of Vogel Enterprises. There is one guard on duty here as well -- he looks a little more rough and tumble with some body armor up top, the first hint maybe this isn't just a trading company. There is one office at the far end of the hall with a light on, someone working quietly, but otherwise the place is abandoned.

Melinda May has posed:
May isn't interested in wasting time dancing with armed and armoured thugs -- especially when she doesn't have the same level of advantage. So, she takes a page out of Romanoff's book and flings one of her palmed taser disks down the hallway. It slides across the smooth tile, ending up between the guard's feet before it ignites in an electric blue flash. 50,000 volts ought to drop anyone short of Bucky, in this place.

The second taser disk is prepped for the unlucky soul in that single, lit office. But she doesn't toss it until she sees just where they are... and how they react to the guard.

James Barnes has posed:
With Buck himself, well, that'd lock up his arm and make him a very irritable cyborg indeed. But for now, he's moving on at that easy jog, having left the poor guard looking like he's taking a nap.

"Guard down here's dealt with. What're you guys seeing up there?" he wonders, voice rusty. He's up one of the emergency stairwells, converging on May's position.

Peggy Carter has posed:
The man at the end of hallway is, hilariously, a bit oblivious to what is going on at first. How can one tell? The faint music that was playing in his office suddenly is overtaken by the fact he's singing along to the opera he's listening to. Alone late night in the office? Why not sing along. But then he's up and on his feet, copies needed of whatever he's working on, so he casually begins to step out of his office, the singing dead since he's in the guard's hallway.

Melinda May has posed:
The guard is no longer a threat, slumped at his station as he is. The second taser disk spins out along the floor to stun the hapless singer, as well. Only once he's down does May start moving further into the hall. "Took down a second guard," she tells Bucky over coms. "And some guy who thought tonight was a good night to work late." He was wrong about that. Definitely not a good night for that. "We're starting our look-see."

She stops by both the guard and the singer to check their vitals and make sure they're both unconscious, but relatively unharmed. Satisfied, she stoops to pick up the papers the man was going to photocopy. Hey, you never know... it could actually be what they're looking for.

Regardless of what's on them, however, she continues moving through the space, planting bugs where necessary and stopping to search for files proving -- or maybe disproving; unlikely, but possible! -- what Vogel is really doing.

James Barnes has posed:
Computers might as well be magic, as far as Buck's concerned. Which Daisy has wisely accounted for by adding software to the little drives he has in his pocket that make it idiot-proof (and even cyborg-proof); the programs on them go to work the moment they're plugged in to the network. Opportunity to slap a few bugs on the undersides of desks, too, of course.

Peggy Carter has posed:
Sadly, the photocopies aren't about DC, but they are from an interested outside investor happy with their work in the Americas. A certain Jason Gyver, a name that both May probably has seen on Peggy's list of possible descendants from Paperclip. And as Bucky is going through the offices, there is some sort of echo in his head. Memories. Things buried, distant and deep, but Vogel was a name on the lips of his handlers at one point in time. A point horribly burried, but being surrounded by it now? Some of those echoes are coming back. Nothing concrete enough to be proof, but there enough to be distinctly uncomfortable.

Has he been in these offices before? Surely not...

Melinda May has posed:
May stores the information about Gyver away; she'll mention it to Peggy, later. Like Bucky, she plugs a USB into computers -- looking specifically for the more secure servers, since they're the ones likely to have the good stuff. She checks their time. "We need to exit soon," she says over comms. "The camera interference program won't last a lot longer. If there are other guards, they'll notice."

That said, she's planted most of the bugs she can and is now working through filing cabinets, scanning quickly for any mention of DC at all. Shipping manifests, project reports... anything.

James Barnes has posed:
He's rolling along cheerfully enough, until that hint of memory makes his brain stutter. Buck's left paused and blinking, crouched by a desk. His voice over the comms is changed, abruptly, gone to the hoarse whisper of a kid afraid the abandoned building he's in is haunted.

"I remember something here," he tells May, in that voice. "I....something to do with HYDRA and Vogel. I...I was around Naples during the war, but it isn't that, I don't think." Gone from that brash, easy professionalism to that weird hesitation.

A beat or two later and he sounds more like himself. "I hear you. Almost done here...."

Peggy Carter has posed:
And then, one of the computers May is monitoring, the one from the man who was working, gets a message, in Italian of course: '<<Frederico, Tomas is out of contact, are you there? Is everything alright?>>' But the screen is open. Someone's trying to make contact. They're going to get found very quickly if they don't clear out soon. Someone is probably trying to poke at the camera feeds as well, if they know the guard is down. The time for chasing memories is over.

Melinda May has posed:
May isn't surprised by Bucky's words -- insofar as she already knows Vogel is very likely dirty. But the fact he remembers something? That may still be significant. "Do you rememer when you might have heard it?" she asks, not expecting a clear answer now. Maybe over beers later, when he's had time to process. Or maybe not. Memory, especially traumatized memory, is unpredictable that way.

Her eyes scan the screen briefly. She picks up a sticky note from the desk and sticks it over the lens of the webcam, just in case. "Time to go, gentlemen," she says sharply. "They know the guards are down." With that, she's moving back to that stairwell, tripping swiftly down the flights, heading for the emergency exit. Yeah, it might set off an alarm, but that hardly matters now.

Once they're on the street, it'll be easy to disappear into the crowds and make their way back to that scrubbed olive field and their cloaked ride home.

James Barnes has posed:
A shadow, a myth, a Cold War ghost story, fleeing down the concrete steps of the safety stairwell in heavy combat boots. Time indeed, and Buck knows that the timing of the exit is the most crucial timing of all. Don't linger, don't loiter, don't wait. Out by another route, to make his circuitous route to their rendesvouz, at a tourist's casual stroll.