<<< One thing after another, Open

[Sharon Carter]

May 20th

After The Hollow

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Sharon watched silently as their communications were ripped out of their control, the children of Skrullos informing the world in a movie-esque monologue of their intentions. The entire situation was like a bad episode of Battlestar Galactica, but instead of robots impersonating people it was an alien invasion. But was it technically an invasion when they'd been here for so long?

So it begins.

A thousand thoughts and facts flipped through her mind like a bad picture book as the speech went on. What they wanted meant very little to her, in fact, and the only thing that sparked anything in her was the comment that their heroes had been 'scattered, weakened, trapped.' Was it new information to her? No. But that didn't mean that her thoughts didn't drift to one who had disappeared amongst the countless.

Refocus. Keep your head in the game. They were in an intricate game of chess and right now the last thing she needed was to let herself take her eyes off the board. The other team had the advantage right now, so all she could do was her job. Make the big show and rely on herself and her knowledge to keep herself alive.

Stepping into the main area of the helicarrier the agent was met with silence as the screens went black.
well played.

To many that message would be disheartening, knocking everyone into a fuel of questions and acusations against one another. Agent 13 was one step ahead of that.

"Are you all going to just sit there? They just handed us a big piece of the puzzle we've been toying with this entire time." She spoke loudly and with authority. Even those with no hold of power could gain it in a situation like this. She wanted to nip the concerns in the bud, get people focused on what needed to be done. "Lets get our communications back up and running. The easiest way to assess our situation is shut off in front of your faces. Fix the problem, get them back up and running. Has anyone contacted Hill?"

Straightening her uniform, Agent 13 moved to look at the rest in the room. "Remember that right now what the world needs is each and every one of us. Humans, mutants, none of that matters. They need to see that SHIELD will continue to do what it does best, protect the people. The need to see that we will do what needs to be done as long as the need for us exists. That is why we are here."

[Druid]

Sebastian's jaw was aghast as he along with the other SHIELD agents watched on as the worlds communication systems were hijacked by the alien invaders. He couldn't help but find it amusing that these aliens announce themselves to the world in the same monologue style that was cliched in the sixties.

"Duuuuudeee" Was the only words that managed to form from his mouth though. Given that the world had mutants, super heroes and all over weird and whacky forces. Why would it be so out there that there were aliens too? The first thing that he could think of as the announcement began to sank in was what were we going to do fight off such forces?

"So... er now would be a great time to find out that Area 51 truly existed and that the government was about to pull out its own armada of spaceships." The truth was even before his powers manifested Sebastian was a geek and the idea of there being aliens and spaceships made him mess his pants a bit. But for now he had to remain professional, he was a SHIELD agent and he was going to do his duty and acquit himself in the best way possible.

Sebastian was pulled out his geekgasm by Agent 13, he looked across to her and put his serious work face on. "I'll see if I can help get messages to the other helicarriers, and see what the situation is at other places on Earth."

[Sharon Carter]

Considering everything weird and unusual they did know about the world, including mutants, Aliens wasn't a big jump away. However Sharon Carter had never put much stock into the theories of life outside of their planet, there was enough to deal with inside. Though maybe that was where she'd first gone wrong...

No point in thinking about that now. There was too much time invested in this to think back to the time before the skrull switch, or at least, before Sharon had become forcibly aware of the alien 'invasion'.

Sebastian spoke next in a joking manner, something that in a different setting would probably have gained a bigger laugh, but it seemed to be helping with the others in the room. Maybe making fun of the situation was what they needed to push past the 'oh my god aliens' hurdle. But talking about Area 51 saving the day? That seemed like it could only happen in a comic book.
"I wouldn't hold your breath for that, Agent."

Stepping down towards where Druid worked, she checked on a few others first but so far had turned up nothing aside from positive checks to the system. They were still flying and that at least was a good sign.

"Anything yet?"

She paused for a moment to take a look at another one of the darkened screens. "Do we know if they infiltrated our system remotely or if there was a bug planted in it?"

[Henry Orchard]

Henry’s quarters on the Liberty comprised one tiny room wherein could be found a cot, a desk, a basin and not a whole lot else. There wasn’t even a chair and Henry had to perch on the edge of the cot if he wanted to sit at the desk. The desk itself was not very small and generally whatever he was working on would spill over and be balanced on the rim of the basin. What it lacked in comfort and habitability it more than made up for in privacy.

These days he adored privacy. His work with SHIELD had so far been emotionally and physically harrowing and it proved conducive to his fragile temperament to keep out of the way of everyone else. Additionally the ‘leaking’ effect that he had first experienced after the breakout had only shown signs of worsening. He blamed this on the recent frustrations at Point Pleasant and Boston, a prognosis that the doctors at MDIV agreed with. They had recommended these relatively isolated quarters so that any episodes of involuntary manifestation happened would cause minimal distress. It had not been explicitly stated who exactly was being saved from this distress but Henry suspected it was probably everyone but him.

His mobile rang and he fished it from his pocket but before he could even raise it to his ear the world ended. He had to steady himself against the wall as he met those burning yellow eyes and the words of the Skrull Queen sounded off the inside of his skull. In that moment he knew that everything had been for nothing. These past months they’d been crawling around in the dark, fumbling and pawing at something they had no chance at stopping or even understanding. His pulse raced, his gut tightened and his vision lost all focus.

The panic crested and the world dropped out from under Henry.

An age passed.

The return was like passing through a breaking lens. All the little details each picked out in turn in perfect detail and clarity before they spun away, back into the haze. The cold ache in his fingers, dug into the metal rim of the basin. The criss-cross pattern of his skin stretched tight across pale knuckles. Ringlets of dark and light in the welded seams of the faucets. Bright, oily colours swimming about on the surface of bubbles on the soap. The ashen faced man staring at him from the mirror.

Henry returned the stare and tried to think. He needed to get moving his mind refused to refocus and the threads of his thoughts slipped out of his grip and back behind a curtain of minutiae. The fine shadow in the rings under his eyes. A slight indent where the thumb met the wrist that he did not remember. The texture of his socks under his heel annoyed him.

Unthinking, he returned bent down and undid his laces, slipped out of his shoes and placed them on the counter with the socks balled up inside. Cold blossomed through his bare soles, rolling up between his toes and washing away the irritation and with it this strange, fleeting clarity. He took another look in the mirror, there was another man there now, who vaguely reminded Henry of himself. That man stooped, washed his hands and left the bathroom, abandoning a pair of shoes in the process.

Henry drifted through the corridors of the Liberty. He still couldn’t quite break down the last of this haze and his thoughts only ever seemed to brush ever so gently against him. He had a vague impression that he should probably be in the Ops Room and he steered himself towards it. He ambled and meandered, and eventually came to the imposing security doors by the longest route possible. He gave the guard his ID and as they waited for the authorisation to come through Henry thought it rather strange how everyone was interested in his shoes. They were from Marks and Spencer. Nothing special.

The doors to the Ops Centre opened with a hiss and a clunk. Henry stepped through and having successfully arrived found that he had no idea what he was doing there. He shuffled about for a bit in the entrance way, a shoeless, pale little man with a confused expression. He remembered and look one very large theatrical step forward.

“Did anyone see the thing?” he announced to no one in particular. “There’s, um, kind of a thing happening.”.