THE CHARACTERS IN THIS STORY ARE BASED OFF CHARACTERS AND SETTINGS THAT ARE THE PROPERTY OF MARVEL INC. AND THEIR RESPECTIVE AFFILIATES. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, I THOUGHT OF THE STORY BUT THE WORLD IS THEIRS
They're late....and this water is freezing.
She think to herself. Of course the suit protects her from the cold, but intellectually she knows it's there as she is currently floating four feet under the surface of the Celtic Sea, with the Sea Wall just barely over the horizon.
You'd think a giant international evil conglomerate could at least make the trains run on time.
Just then her target starts to come into view and just like she planned they will pass directly over her position.
Well at least if they can't be on time they're following the proper most efficient programmed course.
A massive airship is soon passing overhead, four-times larger than the Helicarriers SHIELD used to use. The timing is critical if she's going to get close to the airship without being detected. They would detect anything else coming at them from any other angle, even something just above the surface of the water. That is why she is waiting for them to come to her and has got all of her electronic countermeasures running full strength. Now is the time to make her move.
"Engage F-1"
Her hard-light fins transform into hard-light wings just as she breaks the surface of the water heading straight up at the flying fortress. The blindspot is very specific, anything larger than a person or wearing anything as dense as armor would be tagged even at this angle. Pretty soon she's reached the underside of the airship, the next part is even trickier.
"Engage infiltration plan A."
The timing of the next part is crucial, so she's spent days preprogramming her infiltration. Just before reaching the airship she fires a grapple line and cuts power to her hard-light wings. Her momentum swings her around feet first towards one of the emergency levitation units breaking through the grating as if it wasn't even there. Disengaging the grapple she is flung straight up the tube extending her arms and legs to slow her ascent at just the right place. Using her legs to hold her position, claws extend from her gloves and she slices open a hole large enough for her to crawl through.
One impossible task down, only three more to go.
Crawling through the industrial underbelly of the airship making note of how the layout is different from the blue-prints she studied. It is mostly the same but the separation points between panels is an inch short on each panel. Going the whole length of the ship those inches should add up to have enough for a whole other room, if she's right a secret room. But first...
First stop: 12th floor, raw materials for building giant evil robots.
Coming across the lower storage bay full of crates with the monthly supply of ore for the Iron Sentinel plant in Nebraska. Everything here is business as usual but it's not the ore she's here for, it's the guard on duty.
Jason Shaw is just a guard for Ferrum Tech, he wanted to join the Iron Army but his father Malcolm Shaw is pretty high up in the company and didn't want his son in danger. In fact Malcolm Shaw is looking at a promotion, a promotion that could put him in charge of most of Europe. Something that any decent person wouldn't want to see, Malcolm Shaw uses power to hurt others. Jason Shaw is at least diligent in his work, this is a milk run, he could be sitting back watching a holo-vid. But no he is patrolling up and down the aisles wearing body armor and carrying a pulse rifle.
It's easy to keep track of his location with her infrared goggles and her vibranium-soled boots make her movements completely silent. A foot-long cylindrical device appears in her hand as she approaches him from behind. Hitting the activation button and plunging the neural sword into his body overloading his nervous system. She catches him before he can fall and carries him to the hallway and dumps him in an escape pod before relieving him of his security card and pulse rifle.
Placing her own computerized card over the pulse rifle she tricks the bio-metric scanner into believing she is Jason Shaw allowing her to use it. Next she does the same with the security card and uses it to access the power conduits under the floor in the lower storage bay. You can't sabotage the engines on a airship this size but there are weak points. Firing two blasts into each power conduit means the engines won't be getting the power needed to stay airborn. Once that's done she tosses the bio-metric pulse rifle aside. The computer logs will of course show that it was Jason Shaw's personal bio-metric pulse rifle that downed the ship. And knowing Ferrum Tech's policy of guilt by association there is no way Malcolm Shaw will be getting that promotion after his son sabotaged their shipment.
Rushing back into the hallway she pauses at the escape pod just long enough to toss the security card inside and activate it sending Jason Shaw on his way. First rat to desert a sinking ship, at least that's how she hopes it will look. Two impossible tasks down and two to go. Finding out what Ferrum is hiding and hopefully escape with her life.
Her goggles pick up two heat signatures descending in the nearest elevator. Leaping up into the overhead cables shimmying between them to remain unseen just as the elevator doors open.
"That idiot Shaw fired his weapon into the power conduits and now he's activated an escape pod! What the hell is he trying to pull?"
One guard asks the other as they pass underneath headed towards the lower storage bay. With a clear run to the end of the hall where the hidden room is located. It appears to be a dead end and she can't risk using her claws or other cutting tools to get in.....but a power overload might work.
"BW-1."
Touching the wall sending a severe electrical charge into it. Nothing happens.
"SR-2."
A more powerful electrical blast this time and it works. The wall slides open revealing a lab dominated by a huge tube holding a massive suit of armor.
"This is why Ferrum diverted this ship to Britain? To pick up a Hulk sized suit of armor? What secrets can I get from you in....?" She checks her computer card as she hooks it into the computer displaying technical readouts on the suit in the tube. "....90 seconds before we splash down."
There is too much information there for her to get in 90 minutes let alone 90 seconds but she waits until she's got 15 seconds left before she detaches.
Infiltrate the airship, check. Frame Jason Shaw, check. Find out what Ferrum is hiding, check...kinda. Now impossible task number four, get out alive.
The sound of multiple escape pods ejecting means they weren't able to find a way to stay flying. That'll make escape easier. Rushing back to the escape pod she jettisoned Jason out of she opens the security door and feels the rush of sea air as the airship is just meters from hitting the ocean at full speed. Diving down the short tube she hits the water an instant before the ship does.
"SR-1."
Hard-light fins and oxygen-diffusion system activate and manage to carry her away from the wreck as it breaks up from hitting the water. As water fills the lower levels it floods the already damaged power conduits and causes secondary explosions. Pieces of shrapnel are blasted high into the air, but one of them goes higher and straighter than most. It keeps going, a trail of fire behind it as it changes course and continues on the airship's course towards New York City.
(Continues in the next chapter: Mockingbird the Avenger - Part 2)
Marvel: Iron Age - Mockingbird the Avenger part 1
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