Arc Six. Chapter One Hundred Seventy-One. Out Of The Fire

Swimming was boring but at least it was exercise, Peter decided. The water barely had any temperature as he flowed through it as Dusk. He'd subconsciously slipped into Venom but that was a big no-no. gotta be careful. The last thing he needed was for the cops or Shield to shoot him thinking he was helping whatever assholes were doing.

He remembered and paused for a moment, The launch of the Shield fleet was today. As part of his bargain for trashing a bit of Times Square Tony had upgraded a new helicarrier fleet, the triskelion? Peter tried to remember, it was a long time ago that Fury had told him, well, told him off as he wasn't allowed to go within 100 feet of Stark and was barred from Shield HQ and the construction yards while he worked.

No wonder they had picked today to launch their little attack. Dusk shook his head, great, three giant repulsor helicarriers to fight and making sure he was still heading towards the coast, started swimming again.

As he swam he heard and felt the roar of a motorboat heading towards him and taking a look at a large speed boat was heading his way. No markings and as no one opened fire he hoped they could be friendly,

"Ahoy the scurvy dog," he heard a woman shout,

Great, Emma, and trending water he waited until she got closer.

"I always wanted to be a pirate darling. Do you want a lift?" and she motioned to the well stock speedboat, more a pleasure barge and a tray of cold meats and champagne flutes held to a wooden board were laid out on its back seat. The man piloting the craft, not Sabertooth this time, a cleanly shaven Japanese man, who paid him no mind.

"Oh, and what'll it cost me, a cab to new york in this traffic would be murder on the wallet." She had him by the balls, as he really needed to get back to New York, but he wasn't about to make it easier on her, not for one minute.

"A meeting, between you and my colleague, Mr Shaw, is all I ask, and maybe a little one on one time" she leaned over the side of the boat, resting her elbow on its edge and dipped a hand into the water. "Not too much, just a little lunch, a little proposal and I can get you back to New York a lot faster than your own powers can."

Dusk curse, "fine fine, meeting, but you know the others will never agree to the second one"

Emma laughed and extended a brilliantly clear hand, "oh I can be very persuasive darling," and as he hauled Dusk into the speedboat she grasped him to her very ample chest and whispered in his ear "very very persuasive"

Never one to pass up a freely offered opportunity, Peter, slipping off his symbskin, moved closer, letting himself be nestled between her breasts. She was almost as large as Felicia and even his nicely toned arm sank into the pillowy soft flesh, "pity my girlfriends are the persuading type, and really, I'm more afraid of them than you, so while the bounce is nice and the softness is amazing, I'd rather had something to eat" and pulling himself away he let his clothing rearrange itself and sat next to the charcuterie board, "do you mind?" and he motioned to the board,

Stifling a laugh Emma shook her head and lifted a glass of champagne from the holder keeping it steady, "not at all darling, " and with a seductive smile and a wink "feel free to sample anything you fancy" and she took a sip from her glass.

Peter shook his head and layered cuts of chicken onto a cracker of some kind, "so tell me about Shaw, I mean, I get how devilishly handsome I am but really, so far, Selene and Charles haven't made the best impressions. Is Shaw just as big an asshole, or will I get an actual reasonable conversation from someone for once?" and Emma gave out a small laugh from behind her glass,

"Shaw is the biggest arsehole of them all darling" and as the mention of his name there was s growl from the driver "oh calm down Ichiro, you know you're only working for him to get to Wolverine, and it's not like he doesn't know exactly that I think of him. As for you Peter, he wants your power, he wants what all men want, things that aren't theirs. The big question is whether you'll give it up willingly or if you'll force his hand." and leaning back, Emma raised an eyebrow at him, "so, do I tell Shaw you'll play nice, and the meeting is on, or do we prepare for a fight. I'm a talker and a lover, it won't be me he sends. You met Sabretooth, and we have a few more, inventive fighters you will have trouble defeating, especially if falling from the sky is an issue" and Ichiro snorted,

"He is not that impressive, Shaw is wasting his time," he said, in Japanese.

Peter stuffed the cracker into his mouth, chewing slowly, and as he swallowed. "I watch a lot of anime," he replied and Ichiro rolled his eyes and Emma laughed,

"well darling, it seems it should be interesting at least," and Peter smiled at her as he made himself another snack.

As Peter was enjoying his boat ride, the situation in both the Shield HQ and the Academy was more serious.

Peter had been correct, and the group had waited until the first liftoff of the new triskelion helicarriers was in full swing before they launched their attack. With most of the staff at the presentation and the academy off for the day, both buildings were easily taken. Pockets of resistance held up but soon withered and faltered against superior and better-organised forces.

Fury and his Enhanced team were holed up in the main Shield HQ, taking fire from the newly outfitted agents, wielding the pulse weapons. Based on the tesseract powered designs of the '40s.

"You think these guys know who I am?" Fury asked as he ducked behind a barricade hastily built from desks and office partitions.

"I think that's why they're firing on us," Coulson answered, taking aim and returning fire before ducking back down behind a desk.

Blue clouds of energy whizzed past them and Fury knew it was just a matter of time before they were captured. Hill had been hit earlier and lay, pale and sweaty, while Sharon held a pad to her side. The blood had stopped but even being Enhanced was just prolonging her suffering,

"Think if we surrender they'll take us alive?" Fury asked seriously as another bolt of energy impacted against the barricade.

"You maybe, but us, I doubt it," and Fury shook his head,

"Not good enough then, can you move?" and Mariah nodded,

"I'll kill them all if I have to," she replied through gritted teeth and Nick chuckled,

"Moving is good enough, just get ready to run on my signal," but Coulson took Fury's arm and shook his head,

"Self-sacrifice won't get us anything more than a few minutes, and that's if they don't just shoot you." but Fury patted his shoulder,

"Doesn't matter, we need reinforcements. HQ is gone, we can only hope that the others are doing better than us. Now, get ready to run. Hey! I am going to stand up, Do Not Shoot Me." Fury yelled over the barricade and threw his gun out. "Go go," he motioned to the trio, and staying low they made their way over to the fire escape door. As Fury stood several black body armoured agents all pointed their guns at him and he held up his hands. As the fire escape doors swung open they turned and fired, blasting the door to pieces and Fury had no way of knowing if his agents escaped or not.

"Sir, we have Fury, orders?" one of the agents spoke into his radio. "The Supreme Leader would like to see you," and cuffing his hands behind his back, lead him to an elevator at the centre of the building.

As the elevator dinged open Fury saw Alexander Pierce, sat on a desk holding a pistol in one hand and a glass of scotch in the other.

"So glad you could join us Nicholas, please, pour a drink, this isn't for you." and he motioned over to the rest of the World Security Council, all laying dead on the floor, a bullet in the middle of their foreheads. "Cleaning up, and for this, I prefer to do it personally," and reaching over he fired once more and a secretary, crying and cowering being the desk, cried out and slumped back.

Fury walked over to the drinks tray, and lifting the decanter top sniffed it and then poured out a double fingers worth, "So, what do we call you? Supreme Leader?" and Pierce laughed,

"Oh, that was the old days. It's director, just like it always has been. Just changing a few rules is all." and taking a swig of his drink Pierce moved over to the centre of the room.

"Shield is still Shield, and it always will be. MODOK told us this was the best time for our takeover, Stark's little stunt pushed us to move ahead of schedule and your little team finalized the deal. Oh yes yes we know, Olivia Octavious came over to our side," and Fury paused as he was about to take a drink,

"Oh, Parkers gone, see." and he clicked a remote and the screen came on, a feed from War Machine and he watched as the containment from for the Hulk was lifted out into the lower atmosphere, where the trio struggled before Rumlow flew off, leaving them to their fate.

"So, your little freak show is gone, your own team is gone. All that's left of the old school is you, Nick. So, we do this one of two ways, easy. Transfer complete control of the agency over to me and you get a nice cell, maybe a decent meal once in a while and we leave you alive and alone. Hard, I put a bullet in each body part until you give in, and I have a lot of bullets."

Fury swallowed his scotch in one go, "if I do this, you guarantee immunity, I don't feel like a bad scotch is a good last meal." and Pierce sighed and scowled,

"It's not really a choice Nick. I mean, I could just put a bullet in you right now and use the emergency override to trigger the transfer but, I would prefer to do things, well, at least this, peacefully."

"Fine, but tell me this, what group of assholes do you belong to?" and Fury leant over to the eye scanner,

"In the '40s, after the war, Shield, well the SSR, ran Operation Paperclip, greedy for all that nazi knowledge, not really too careful about who they let in. We're not nazis, the idea of purity and blue eyes blonde hair being superior is just a fallacy proven wrong by science. No, we just want a better life free from those mutants, the freaks like Venom and those other two, and of course, for everyone to behave, just to follow orders while we create a paradise."

"So Hydra then, cause that still sounds like Aryan bullshit to me, just a bigger target, one you know the public will fall for."

"Oh, you mean like Venom? He was easy. John's death, JJ's little meltdown, spreading our message all over the media was brilliant don't you think. I mean, we couldn't have even counted on Osborn going off-script but he did and it still worked out for us. Even those two gods," and Peirce snorted as he said it, "I mean, aliens pretending to be mythological deities, that got the fundamentalists up in arms as soon as they hit the news. Oh, we've already won Nick, so just stop stalling and-" but he scrunched his shoulders in agony, dropping the pistol as the feeling left his body, a black blade extending through each of his shoulders,

"Yeah, don't shoot someone who's bulletproof," and the secretary changed back into Natasha, "get all that?" and Nick nodded.

"Took you long enough though, Parker making you soft." and Nat snorted, she had hidden as soon as Peter alerted them all.

"He makes me soft alright, right after I make him-" and Nick shook his head.

"I don't want to hear that, dammit. Get the codes, we can perform the lockdown from here but I need the second director's emergency code, or proof of termination to trigger the emergency override." Natasha stood and fired several times into the body of Pierce, twice in the chest and twice in the head, she owed him for the countless lives he took before she was dragged into the control room.

"Think he's dead enough?" and Fury nodded.

"A little bit, yes. Drag him over to the scanner." and as Fury lifted his eye patch, the unhealed eye, still scored and scratched from the attack, was scanned by a pale blue light.

"Director Fury recognised." Natasha lifted the body and slapped the limp hand on the machine's palm reader.

"Director Pierce, life signs nill. Director Fury, do you wish to initiate an Emergency Override of Shield systems?"

"Yes, deactivate all security badges except these agents, lock all doors, trigger every damn alarm in the building and full lockdown protocols. Incursion event in progress."