2016-01-08 HYDRA's Homecoming
This scene is rated R
Warning: Rated R for graphic descriptions and language.
2016-01-08
Players: Lissandra Vorhes, Captain America, Director Carter, Natasha Romanova, Ghost
GMed by Director Carter
Title: 2016-01-08 HYDRA's Homecoming

Rating: If you have an R or higher rating, set the rating box and rating tag to R, if it is below that, keep it at everybody

The quinjet was nice. Hell, *better* than nice, especially compared to the bucket of bolts planes that Steve was accustomed to flying in. The routine flight had been boring up until this moment, actually. A loop of a course over rural Pennsylvania as to not draw FAA attention or bother anyone in the more crowded NY/NJ air spaces. But somewhere in the middle of an area which is too rural to even be amish, there is a weird… Blip. An energy reading. Energy of the type that SHIELD scans for, not just a regular power plant.

Steve is not use to a plane that didn't make some kind of racket when you flew in it. Lose bolts, panels, or even a window or two was not unheard of in the times he rode in planes before though no-one ever mentioned it much because that was just the way it was. Though without these things the flight was a bit errie as he rode in the jet, but of course he was a bit distracted by him looking out the window the whole trip. He had not been bored just quietly looked out at the scenery the first time he got a good look at it he was happy they took the long route. He had his old gear on (Dried out of course) of a heavly worn, and slightly tore at places Captain America outfit with his shield on his back. He had tried the new stuff that shield offered, but it all felt funny, and he swore it made him itch. He is looking out as he hears the Blip, and doesn't have to be from the future to know what that was.. though, maybe he didn't know it was energy he did know it was something showing up on their.. He thought about it.. in the shows he had been watching he had heard them called sensors.. so that is what he went with for now. He wondered what it is so he taps the seat Lissandra is in keeping the questions short with "Trouble?"

Lissandra had been asked by one of the SHIELD techs helping her disperse the new quinjets why she had designed the pilot chair so it could be collapsed into the floor. Well, it's so she can fly them without having to wear her armor suit (although it's on board in storage… never leave home and all that). Her wheelchair is locked into place at the controls and she's taking the time to explain them to Captain Rogers as they've been flying. "Overall I've worked to keep things as close to standard avionics as possible, even though the plane itself is anything but standard. So our pilots will only have to worry about learning the undersea and orbital controls." It has no visible engines or thrusters, a streamlined form almost reminiscent of a manta ray's body, and moves more like something organic than mechanical. And yes, it's rather eerie in how quiet it is especially with the stealth suite active.

When the blip comes up on the sensors, a mental command from her implants calls for a more detailed reading while she angled the jet in the direction of the odd energy reading. "Not sure. Let's take a look and see if it's a trap." She says this with a wicked grin as she takes the quinjet down near the ground for terrain-following flight… just in case the blip has unfriendly guns.

Coming closer, well, it looks like a *compound* of some sort. A single dirt road from a back lane gravel road that branches off of a tiny two lane interstate is the only way to and from what *should* be an abandoned bard and clearly is not. Heavy trucks line the outsides, modern roofing over two different large buildings. And, getting closer, nothing is really showing up on their readings except for a single blip of energy leaking from somewhere that probably isn't shielded quite well enough. Tesseract energy.

Steve looks at the thing, and whistles. "Wow you guys really let them people just set-up like that? I mean I don't think I see a goverment official in sight." and looks over at them again his eyesight really good as he can see them from a distance. "You might want to circle around and drop me off at least if you want to fly over. Who knows if they are friendly to us, and I would much rather come in from two ways then one if they are not." he smiles at her, and points. "Maybe just at the entrance there." he checks his gear.. Suit, check.. shield, check.. Gun, check.. Yes he carries a gun now, ya never know when ya might need one and that shield agent was really nice just giving him one without asking much questions.

"Oh, this is not good." Lissandra is very familiar with this particular energy. You don't forget something that was being shot at you by a few hundred HYDRA goons your first day on the job. She starts to circle the compound, does a check on the sensors to try and locate what's keeping the very solid buildings and vehicles from showing up and also try to get a better idea where the Tesseract energy is coming from. "Captain, I hope you're all thawed out because we seem to have located what's most likely a HYDRA facility under construction." Then she keys the jet into the gravsat communications net so her transmission won't give away their presence here to anyone listening on the ground.

"Attention HQ, this is quinjet ULJ-12 at transmitted coordinates. Tesseract energy reading has been detected. We are investigating and might need backup on standby." Captain Rogers' orders are given a brisk nod as she angled the jet so that its mass will block view of the back door opening. "Be careful, Captain. That energy reading is every kind of bad news. Once I drop you off, I'll circle to the other side and keep an eye out."

And then it's clear that *something* has keyed the base off. Maybe it was their sheer proximity. Maybe their own energy readings. Maybe HYDRA had better sensors these days. Who knows. But suddenly the whole place is errupting into action. Vehicles are clearing out, at least three dozen people can be seen spreading out from the buildings, into those vehicles and elsewhere. With some focusing, the HYDRA symbol can be seen on a few uniforms and, at least, the back of one truck. No one is shooting a them — yet. It seems they are mostly evacuating.

Steve smiles, "I am as thaw as I am going to get, and I am always ready to crack down on some Hydra agents.." he pulls his hod up, and moves to the back of the Jet. "It is kinda my thing." he adds with a wink as he hops off the Jet without a parachute to land in a roll till he is kneeling with his shield infront of him. He hasn't drawn his gun yet, but tries to run behind one of the buildings as fast as he can shield ready to throw as he sprints faster then an olympic runner. He has seen them running around, and hopes to use the distraction as his chance to get behind cover, knowing the gun would be too loud right now he can only use his shield as he sprints for the closest square building that might hide him at least from most of them. He does hold the earpiece as he moves. "Oh looks like we rialed them up.. Do you have anything to detect explosives on that plane, Hydra isn't known for leaving lose ends, and they don't seem to be shooting."

"Captain, all of my tech is full-service. And stay clear of the access road. It's about to have a serious pothole problem." Lissandra steers the quinjet so she's facing down the road facing the evacuating vehicles. Since they seem to have been spotted she disengages the stealth suite so the jet, and its design that HYDRA hasn't seen yet, comes into full view with its weapons deployed. Twin gattling-gun looking weapons spin up to speed and fire energy bolts into a fifty yard stretch of the road, tearing it up to the point of virtual uselessness. She activates the external speakers, "Attention; you are operating illegally on United States soil. Cease all activities, lay down your arms, and surrender!" Then she mutters to herself, "Yeah, like that'll happen," before keying back into comms w/ headquarters. "HYDRA presence confirmed on site. Captain Rogers is in the field."

The presence of a man on the scene who is *supposed* to be a ghost does draw the attention of more than a few agents. Communications go wild, the name 'Captain America' uttered far more than a few times. No one starts shooting quite yet. The heavy built trucks, military grade, are starting to very quickly pull away. Lights are going dark around the place, leaving nothing but the quinjet spotlight to give them any visibility. Well, the spotlight, and the sudden report of weapons that now just open up and pour towards Steve Rogers. It seems the place has decided two methods of handling this — 1. Keep a heavy unit on Steve Rogers and keep shooting until he's dead or the place is cleared out 2. Evacuate as many directions as possible. The land is flat enough the trucks don't need that road, but Lissandra can probably take down at least one or two while they're getting out of there.

Steve continues to run getting a good distance before the gun fire starts, he see's his target the far end of the Warehouse door he doesn't even stop as he does see two Hydra agents in his way. With a throw of the shield he bounces it off their head, and catches it as it returns midsprint. Rolling as he hears the heavy weapons fire the first two shoot over his head showering him with dirt as he grabs their guns, and dives backwards behind the Warehouse finally as more shots come in, but the heavy weapons fire is too close and throws him backwards behind a wall. "Okay… they have seemed to improve their aim in the last 70 years." he adds over com, as he ignores the pain from that last concusive blast he takes out the blue core of the gun and reconizes it immediately "Fall back.. do not give them a sitting target this ammo can tear though your jet." he adds peeking around the corner just to get more gunfire at him. He gives a little "Son of a biscuit.." as he takes a deep breath and throws out the core of the gun above the men that are incoming waiting for it to fall close then shoots it with the other gun. Which is about all he can do as he is shortly pushed back again by heavy fire having to fall back inside the building or risk getting more scrapnel showered on him.

As the trucks scatter and HYDRA soldiers start to engage the Captain, Lissandra's hands dance across the quinjet's controls. "Retune AG field in pilot bay to ninety-six percent of maximum. Retract heavy plasmas, load kinetic lances." She puts some extra air between the quinjet and the ground to give the targeting systems a wider view of the field. She centers the crosshairs on the engine of the nearest truck and fires the kinetic lances. A pair of six-inch javeline made from a metal she hasn't bothered to name yet impact with the engine block at roughly eight times the speed of sound, hitting with the force of a meteor impact. The truck's front end goes into the ground, its tail and flips up and forward, and that's one dead truck. "Acknowledged, Captain. Stay intact or the Director will kill /me/." She says no more as both she and Captain Rogers have their own things to deal with.

While she takes out two more trucks in the same manner as the first, she tunes into HQ again, "We could definitly use that backup now, Command. Tesseract weapons are in play and HYDRA personnel are scattering. Request four wing-pairs of quinjets and any agents and enhanced allies that are available. Copy this call to Avengers HQ."

The numbers against Steve are almost overwhelming. HYDRA has learned in it's old age. But there is something else among the gunfire — Flashes. Camera flashes. Just a few, and it might be hard to make them out among the gun fire, but someone is getting photos of the man who is supposed to be dead. Captain America does manage to get one of those weapons, but whatever he has planned… it doesn't work. Technology has come a long ways. HYDRA has learned a lot. The sloppiness of the war has had to be cleaned up. Most of those sloppy units died. Steve is kept under suppressive fire for another five minutes before a final truck pulls away.

Lissandra, for her part, has some super excellent firing on the fleeing trucks. She gets three of them dead to rights, smoking craters in the rolling hillside. Within the 15 minutes that it takes the back up quinjets to get there, the entire place has gone… Quiet. Dead quiet. Lights gone, weapons dead, bodies on the ground of dozens of HYDRA agents. The warehouses are cleared. They weren't set to expode or, if they were, it failed. It seems eeriely… lonely now. A hundred miles from any real civilization. A graveyard of warehouses and trucks and bodies.

Steve pops his head out again, and looks.. "Well that sucks.." he shrugs a bit to himself and starts looking around. Over the earpiece.. "So do you think you could track them down again?" as he searches over the dead bodies for identification, collecting a few of their weapons as well for the Stark boy later. He grumbles to himself.. That was too easy they had them out numbered but they ran.. why?

Lissandra doesn't chase down any vehicles that manage to get out past her weapons fire. She just tags their sensor returns and starts to lay down covering fire for Captain Rogers, using the quinjet's antipersonnel weapons to scatter or take out any groups large enough to be a genuine threat to him. Then as the site goes quiet and the backup arrives from HQ, she puts her jet on the ground near the Captain's position and answers his question over the comms, "I've put a sensor tag on the ones that got away. Agent Umbra to backup, I'm shooting you my sensor feeds on escaped vehicles. Task two wing-pairs to track them down. They've got some kind of sensor dampening tech so keep your eyes open. Captain, I'll be right out."

She wheels back to the rear of the jet as the cargo pod holding her suit opens. A couple minutes of lifting herself into it and plugging its inputs into the sockets on her body and she's on her feet and hopping out of the back of the quinjet. "Umbra is active and mobile. Set up a perimeter guard on the site and start a search. Watch out for traps and watch each other's backs."

The hulking, empty warehouse buildings wait them, empty of people, or so it seems. The doors are opened, as are the back cargo bays that were so hastily unloaded. There are some dead trucks off to the side that could also be explored, but ofer all the peace really seems rather off now. Out of one of the quinjets that has come to land near, Director Carter herself comes with a unit of soldiers. They all look quite ready for a fight that is no longer occuring. Dark eyes snap to the side, staring at Steve in the shadows and the approaching Lissandra. "Report." Is all she demands before giving any other orders. Every hackle she has is up.

One of the crew that climbs out of the quinjets is a transfer and with a stern frown on his face. He goes by the call sign Maine, and wears the standard SHIELD issue uniform and has his standard issue firearm drawn and lowered by his side. He walks up with the crew, one of the nameless few in the list of soldiers pouring out with Peggy's troops.

Steve picks up what he can, and start wondering about the complex away from the approaching people. He is listening as he walks around the building just to see if there is anything left, a person hiding, a bomb ticking, just about anything that might be around in his first walk about. He lets Lissandra face Peggy, as for now he needed to not be seen until he is able to pick out some concrete from his arm which he really didn't want her to see. He had taken worse in the war so wasn't too worried about it, but it was good to get a once over before the whole crowd stomped over the scene, and changed everything. So he just quietly walks taking mental notes of the locations, and situations of things.. Is that door open, or closed.. is there drag marks.. etc.

Lissandra sighs inside her suit as she gives the Director a brief run-down of the site. "Routine shakedown flight turned into a bit of a dust-up, Director. Sensors tagged Tesseract energy signatures. HYDRA chose to flee the site and really didn't give much of a fight considering they had a massive advantage of numbers. Captain Rogers is making an initial sweep of the site, and my sensor drones are activating." As she speaks a dozen basketball size spheres drift from her quinjet and start to fly an overlapping search grid, all sensors recording the site. "If you recall our discussion when I returned to duty, these are the weapons that HYDRA used against us at Groom Lake. I'll need time to make contact with them when we're back at HQ." She leads Peggy and the agents with her towards the warehouse that the Captain is investigating. "See anything that tells us why they were here, Captain?"

The doors are mostly closed, though a few have been shot open. They weren't the best technology, this building was put together a bit shoddily, actually. Maybe meant to be a fast shelter, or it's just been a primary plan, a testing area, who knows. The weapons were way better than this actual building. Peggy's eyes cut across the area, giving Maine and his team a brief, greeting nod, but the woman in the black jumpsuit is all business now. She frowns a bit as she doesn't see Rogers, but she also doesn't ask. She then looks back tp Lissandra, listening to the initial report. Her expression turns a bit grim and she nods. "Redder, Rogers, I want everything left behind catalogued. Start on the trucks. Vorhes. Maine. Romanova. With me." Peg yells loud enough, hoping he's around. Then she nods to the doors.

Brining up his non dominant hand to give hand signals to his men, Maine quickly releases his men to go do their jobs, then he quickly snaps over to Director Carter. "Sir." He reports in, his voice not exactly young as he's not a green horn by any stretch. A few grey hairs are on the lower side of his beard though he does maintain a professional and experienced manner about himself. "What are your orders." He asks, waiting, his eyes never still.

Lissandra nods and moves to the building with Director Carter. Before opening the doors, she calls another four drones from her quinjet and sends them in ahead of the group. Lights on their smooth spherical surfaces turn on to give the agents a way to see the building's interior. "For all the personnel and equipment they were hauling, I'll lay a round of drinks that there's more to it below us." Her suit's sensors are also active, scanning for hollows in the structure, active power feeds, surface residue or anything else that might give a clue as to what HYDRA was doing here. She keeps her weapons deactivated for the moment.

Natasha had been checking over her weaponry whilst riding silently on the Quinjet. She'd been issued a lot of new guns lately and they were all LTL in nature, so she was spending a lot of her spare time getting used to using them and asking techs tons of questions on how to improve them (techs loved that sort of thing, don't they?!). Dart after dart were jammed into the ammunition housing of either of the two main weapons that she carried and she inserted them both into the high holsters on her sides. She would rise up to her feet upon arrival and trailed after the Director, she liked going off on her own… but if she were ordered to stick with a team, then she'd obey. Quietly, the Black Widow followed along.

Lights are dead in the first warehouse they enter, the one closest to the road, so Lissandra's drones are a great help. Nothing blows up. Nothing jumps out at them. They are greeted by vast, flat emptiness, nothing in the ceiling of the room. But the floor is covered by beds. Dozens and dozens of beds. Probably almost a hundred across the wide, vast ward of a room. Most are unoccupied, some still have bodies in them though, still. Not moving. Not breathing. There are wires hanging from other beds. A whole line of beds with steel head holds over them. Blood pools on the floor in some places where it seems subjects were just ripped out of their trappings and dragged out. Monitor screens shine dark. Nothing in the room moves, breathes or makes a sound other than the team crossing the door.

Carter doesn't go first, she knows better than that. She lets Maine and a few others take the first line but when there is no incoming fire, she crosses the door's threshold. One step. Two. Three. Then she stops dead in her tracks. Dark eyes span the room as drones cut light across the lines of medical beds and bodies. One last spot light catches a symbol on the wall. HYDRA's symbol. For once, Peggy Carter is left dead silent.

"HOLD!" Cries out Maine, lowering his weapon, but still keeping it in front of him. His off hand is held up with a fist, signaling the halt of advancement. He spots the carnage in a few of the rooms and takes a slow, cautious step as he pulls out a bright and small flashlight in his off hand, pointed into the room and he takes a step in, clearing the corners with quick practiced movements. Once he feels secure he steps up and bends down to the blood pooled on the floor and examines it. "This isn't good Director." Maine says, trying his hardest to mask the disturbance in his voice but a sliver slips through.

Lissandra is many things; inventor, engineer, pilot, former street racer. But above all that she's a doctor. So when the group enters the warehouse and the drones illuminate row upon row of beds and the corpses in some of them even she takes a moment to process the sheer number of empty beds and all they imply. Then she's walking to the nearest corpse-laded bed to examine the dead body more closely. "Not good is an understatement, Maine." Like the agent, her voice only betrays a small portion of the bile rising in her throat. Then she goes to work, using her suit's sensors to probe the corpse without making contact. With no idea what went on here she takes no chances on contagion. "I recommend keeping distance from the bodies unless you have a breath mask and gloves."

Natasha followed after Lissandra, curious to know what the doctor would find out with her tools. She otherwise lets her eyes roam about the interior of the building and take in all the sights that the others were commenting on. She, herself, remains silent… having not spoken since the Quinjets had taken off back at base. She is merely, observing and waiting for her abilities to be useful to the party.

There are more bodies missing than present, but from the shape of the beds and the wires at all of them, they were probably almost all occupied earlier. A body farm indeed. And one they didn't care about enough to defend or well clean up. No one and nothing responds to Lissandra's touch. One line of bodies all have burn marks that indicate probably having been electrocuted. Another line of bodies have foam at the edges of their lips. Sickness or cyanide. Who knows. The low scent of death and coppery blood is beginning to fill the room, lined by the medical, sterile scent of a hospital behind it. And then, suddenly, int he far corner, a monitor kicks alive on the wall. It's slightly staticy, because it's taken a bit of gun fire, but a masked face appears.

"We had what we needed here. They would not have had to die if you didn't interrupt. But, it is always good to see familiar faces. Cut off one head, two shall take it's place." The mask smiles, just slightly, and the video dies, leaving them in silence again. Somewhere, blood drips off a bed.

The director swallows back tightly, taking another two steps into the room. Peggy blinks any emotion or moisture from her eyes, looking away from the monitor and back to the group. "…I want that video analyzed, voice included. Vorhes, I need you to head up the… cataloguing of all bodies, medical equipment… Everything in this room. It's your area. All other projects are on hold until we have some answers. Romanova, Maine… do you recognize any of this? Other than the obvious?"

Maine steps forward, lifting his hand to press his wrist against his nose, to try and block the stench but it's not that effective, the smell is already that pungent. The former soldier steps onward, making sure the room is secure but moving towards the next point of interest. He leaves the computer to the tech types, especially after the order from Carter, taking a look towards Natasha and solidifying his own answer, "No sir." He responds curtly and quickly. He doesn't have any insight that is exclusive to him, so he keeps his mouth shut.

Lissandra doesn't seem to really notice the monitor powering up or the taunting that comes from it. She does nod when Director Carter gives her instructions. "Captain Rogers can hitch a ride home on one of the other birds. I'll use mine as a quarantine transport for the dead. Too many things to detail, but it's certain that these people were all used as test subjects. And there's almost certainly no way they were ever going to live through it, no matter what Faceless Guy said." She lets out a long cleansing breath and stands up again. "I'll have the Clean Lab set up for autopsies, and will need one good example of any weapons or technology sent to my lab for analysis. I can't do much more with the tools I have here, but…" she pauses and looks towards the door, "We should check the other building in case it's more like this."

Natasha turned to the video screen when it came on, and she simply walked right over to it and stared right at the face, uncaring if there were a camera that allowed the masked person on the other side to look back at her… she just wanted to absorb every detail of the video and listen to every syllable of their spoken words. When it shut off she stared at the monitor for a moment, blinked her green eyes once and then turned around when the Director spoke her name. She first looked to Maine and then to Lissandra. "Its always test subjects." She said to Peggy. Her eyes returned to Lissandra. "Doctor, can you check to see if these are mutants?" She asked of Vorhes then.

While that can probably be answered, it's not something that can be answered in this situation. The second unit begins a quick jog, going towards the other building. Over the comms a moment later comes 'Same as the first building. A few less bodies over here. A lot more blood.' No more surprise videos. Nothing else. Just a graveyard and an old enemy in front of them all.

Peggy sighs, rubbing one hand across her face. It's the only crack she shows the whole time. "…Nothing left to do here. Tag and bag. Vorhes, tell me whatever you need. Blank check." And quieter, below her breath, just to herself as she turns back for the door. "…F*ck this."

With Lissandra's recommendation, Maine lifts his hand and quickly splits his team into two, and he starts to move with one half towards the door to begin to help check the other building, figuring they're able to do a breach and clear on their own and help the other crew. "Director." Maine speaks up, moving closer to Peggy and slipping his gun away in its holster during his march towards her. "This is a win for us, We'll get these assholes." Whispers Maine for no one else to hear and without her response he moves back to help Lissandra, mostly covering her six and doing anything she orders of him or his crew.

Lissandra nods to Natasha at her request, "I'll be certain to check." She listens to the results from theother building, then after the Director gives her parting orders does a mental inventory of what she'll need just to get this site cleared and catalogued. "Time to call in the techs and corpsmen. This is going to be a long night. I'll be back once I've slipped out of something comfortable." She takes the time to transfer from her armor back to her wheelchair before rolling up her sleeves and getting down to the dirty details.

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