December posting 10: Ransom of the Redheaded League, MCU/HL AU
Chapter 2/? is up at the A03, after needing a lot of changes for reasons that I will happily discuss if anyone cares. It's now starting to get out of hand. I would also like to say, who the hell thought taking that place was a good idea? Oh HELL. Oh, well. Have some complications.
Standard warnings: WIP, no idea when it will get finished, but all the chat and speculation on things has me plotting and revising and writing again, so thank you all for everything!
Ransom of the Redheaded League
* | * | *
Phil Coulson waved one of the juniors agents over to talk to the sergeant from the Prefecture of Police, relieved that Fontaine had ended up based out of Europe. She spoke fluent French and was very soothing without actually giving information away.
Once the police were under control again, he went back to the much more important discussion. "Jarvis, if at all possible, I need the old plans for the Musée de L'Armees, the ones from after the rebuilding of Paris but before World War II. If they aren't available online, we'll send agents for the hard copies as soon as you have a location. And let me know as soon as you crack that jammer."
"Of course, Agent Coulson. I believe I should be through in approximately five minutes more." Jarvis added, "Ms. Potts will have left me useful data."
Jarvis either didn't have permission to discuss it or didn't think 'how' was relevant right now; either way, his data was always reliable and Phil had other matters to work on. "I'll be here when you've got it," he agreed and tapped his comm to mute input until Jarvis got back to him.
The next task was to find out how the invading force had gotten in unseen, to make plans for a counterattack. Ideally, Coulson wanted a second, separate way that a SHIELD team could go in equally unseen and hit from within, but first they had to figure out how this OpFor had done it. They also needed to figure out who the OpFor was.
The local SHIELD team had set up a base camp just outside the organized chaos of the police perimeter. Three folding tables had shown up, their surfaces almost buried in tablets displaying images coming in from agents around the building. One analyst was busily notating a map, while four more ran facial recognition searches from the photos.
Before he could make it over to see if they'd found any new maps, Coulson heard a voice he knew from two dozen South American and European field ops. There were very good reasons Sebastian Holzer had ended up the senior agent for Western Europe. "Coulson, I have a 'civilian' I want you to meet."
Coulson had no trouble catching the irony in Holzer's description. He glanced back at the outer police line in time to see Holzer waving a stranger in. Holzer fell in at the civilian's shoulder in perfect position to contain him; somehow the stranger made it look like a subaltern walking next to a senior officer.
Hearing that thought focused Coulson's attention more tightly on the newcomer in question. Short-cropped brown hair had receded much like Coulson's own, but it was the expression and stance that led Coulson move to greet him. Despite his tuxedo, the newcomer didn't look like a politician or a socialite. He was slim, alert, and carried himself like a military man on a battlefield, spine straight and head constantly moving as he took in details. He also had his hands free and ready for trouble.
The stranger's eyes were flicking steadily across the open ground between the line of agents and the façade of the Musée; he took in the gala attendees silhouetted against the curtains of the French windows and his mouth tightened. When his attention turned to Coulson, the stranger returned the same swift evaluation he'd just received; he nodded after that second's glance, filing the information and tentatively pleased.
Any other time, this meeting and their reactions would have been amusing or grounds for an invitation for coffee and a meeting of like minds. Now Coulson thought he might end up glad to have this man here if he was half as competent as he appeared.
Holzer let his glance travel over his team's work as he came to a halt in a spot that left the 'civilian' bracketed between the two senior SHIELD agents on site. He also used English to say, "Mr. Constantine, this is Philip Coulson, a senior SHIELD agent and our expert on Stark Industries and its people. Coulson, this is Marcus Constantine. He's a director at the Musee de L'Armees and asked to come annotate the maps for us."
Up close, Constantine's hair showed some grey at the temples which made the twenty years more believable. He used British-accented English when he said quietly, "Agents. To be precise, I've worked here for twenty years. I probably know the building better than anyone but the cleaning staff and they're trapped in there. If I may show you my wallet, it has my ID card and you're welcome to confirm that information."
Holzer nodded his agreement. "The information and the ID would both be helpful. Thank you, sir."
Constantine extracted his wallet from his jacket pocket and his ID from his wallet, moving slowly and precisely.
Holzer took the proffered card and handed it over to one of his agents, almost without looking. Almost; it didn't go to the nearest man. "In the meantime, what maps we have are over here, sir."
Constantine followed them to the center of the tables, ignoring the techs working with tablets to focus in on the printouts that had just been dropped on the center of the table. "And if I'm lying, prison time will be the least of my worries?"
Holzer smiled, a quick twist of lips under a mustache as black as his hair was prematurely white. "That sums it up neatly."
Coulson shrugged. What he wanted was blueprints; what they had so far, was a line diagram of the Museé from its website. Most of the interior walls probably weren't on there. On the other hand, they now had a museum director. "We'll hope you check out, yes. Until then, let's see what you can tell us. You're former military, Mr. Constantine?"
"Everyone asks that," Constantine said absently, one hand flicking through the diagrams on a large tablet; the image looked like the Google Maps view of the area, but it had SHIELD annotations on it. "I'm Marcus , by the way, or Marc if you're really in a hurry."
Which didn't answer the question, but it wasn't a bad deflection. "If I'm in that much of a hurry, sir, it will just be duck, get down, or run." Coulson added, "Our major concern so far is that we don't yet know their entry point. Do you have any idea how at least two dozen men with weapons could get in unnoticed?"
Constantine looked up. "The South Korean Consulate didn't see anything?"
"Their sightlines are restricted, but no, they didn't. Or so they told our agents." Holzer shrugged. "Take it with a grain of salt, but they have a mutual interest in reporting so large a security hole."
Coulson's phone pinged at him, and he announced, "I have blueprints from the 1980s." He set the email attachment printing, snagging the first pages as they came off and dropping them onto the table.
Holzer helped arrange them into order, saying only, "Bless your contacts, Phil."
Constantine nodded. "Agreed. These are more useful than the '50s plans." He snagged a bright blue pen and began marking occasional doors closed or openings in walls as he went. Agent Solberg, one of Natasha's favorite analysts, was already taping pages together to make the floor plans easier to read.
Constantine took the new floor with an absent thank you and annotated, trading sheets back and forth with Solberg until the taped and marked floors were spread in an arc on the table, basement at the left, third floor at the right.
"If you don't know how they got in, then you don't know how they can get out, much less might get out. Yes. I know of five possibilities." That statement brought the techs' heads around, and Holzer shifted to watch Constantine even more attentively, settling into a patient, waiting alertness that took in the maps and the man's hands.
Constantine ignored both sets of reactions and took the red pen Solberg gave him to start circling problem areas. "First floor: here and here. The walls were there this morning, but in the 1800s there were accesses from the old sewer system. They were bricked up, painted over, and mostly forgotten when new sanitation lines were run to accommodate the Metro." He indicated a third location. "The Metro line originally had stairs up to us, debouching into the foyer here when this was still the Veterans' Memorial."
Coulson nodded slowly. "I wondered if they couldn't have found some kind of underground access somewhere. There are too many of them, and the catering company is too well-known and well-vetted to have this many attackers infiltrate them."
"And too many embassies nearby would have noticed a great many fit, active strangers, yes. I'd consider the Metro access the most likely if they came in from that floor." Constantine shifted the map to display the second story. "This is a storage room now, but at one time, this wall was a doorway into the west wing. They could have come through the second floor hallway there; security would have been lower there but there's still too much chance they'd have been observed by embassy security. Your last option is that they've come up through basement, via the old water run-offs to the Seine."
The Prefecture sergeant had come up while they were talking; he stared first at the plans and then at Constantine. "My God. Those are the city maintenance tunnels, sir. We monitor them."
Constantine shook his head. "I don't mean the maintenance tunnels, sergeant. I mean the old Roman sewers under them. A tunnel ran… here." He traced a line along the maintenance tunnel, veering slightly upriver at the last moment. "You monitor the tunnels to watch for flooding. I very much doubt you monitor five meters from your tunnel's end point. If they used divers, they could come and go with minimal notice. The entry was probably silted, but they have to have been preparing this for a while. If so, they've had time to clear the old sewer, come in a few meters up, and then drill in and loop your cameras." He shrugged, wry and resigned, and went on, "Who'd notice? Any number of boats up and down the Seine are still being used as housing; it's fashionable. One good party could cover the divers and one heavy rain would excuse the silt load in the water. It's only a matter of timing."
Coulson promised himself that coffee and a long talk with this man later -- after a very thorough background check. "Useful starting points. Thank you, Mr. Constantine." Five seconds' rapid calculation left him resigned to the necessity, but it wasn't his operation. Holzer got to make the call, and take the blame if Constantine were injured or killed.
Holzer stroked his mustaches up into a curve, then back to straight while he thought. Phil still thought he'd read too much Poirot although Sebastian always claimed it was to see who'd underestimate him. Behind Constantine, Rietveld was holding his ID back and giving a thumbs-up. Holzer reached for it without looking away from Phil. He also raised an eyebrow, waggling one thumb up and back down as he glanced at the Museé.
Coulson reluctantly nodded, then held up a hand and moved aside when he heard a throat being cleared, tapping his comm off of mute. "Jarvis. What do you have for me?"
"News from Ms. Potts, sir, and an address for more up to date floor plans. If the set I already sent will do, however, I suspect you have other priorities. As of seven minutes ago, the known count was forty-six enemy forces, described as wearing dark blue dive suits with hazmat helmets. They are carrying blue-light energy weapons, including grenades. The only match I have for such a description is from Howling Commando reports during World War II, in missions against Hydra strongholds. Ms. Potts did not know how they got in, nor their motive."
"She said dive suits, Jarvis?" The sewer option seemed more likely as an access if so, but… what was their goal?
"Dark blue dive suits and hazmat helmets. Ms. Potts final comment was that one Marcus Constantine would be a site expert."
Coulson glanced to the side where Constantine was already discussing viewpoints up and downstream on the Seine. "He's already turned up."
"I have taken the liberty of sending you a picture of him from the museum's website, matched against society pages from three Parisian newspapers, so that you can confirm his identity," Jarvis said. "Last, Ms. Potts has acquired assistance of some type. Another woman suggested Mr. Constantine and Ms. Potts immediately agreed. I do not know who it was; I have never heard her voice before."
"Are they varying the jamming, Jarvis, or are you still in?" Coulson checked his phone. "And yes. The photos you found match. Thank you."
"Good. For the moment, I still have access. I believe I have sorted out their style, as sir would say. Should Ms. Potts transmit again, I will let you know immediately. I suggest you move quickly, Agent Coulson. Having looked at the floor plans, I see no feasible way they can hope to hold that building with only forty-six people. They must retreat soon, with or without their hostages."
Coulson nodded. "I know. Contact me as soon as you have anything else, Jarvis."
"Of course," Jarvis said and cut the line again.
Coulson turned back and told Holzer, "All right, we have an update on the problems. Current OpFor count is forty-six." Activity around the ops table slowed and Solberg started making notes. "Description was 'dark blue dive suits with hazmat helmets.' Ms. Potts also reported blue-energy weapons."
Rietveld looked up and said, "Are you sure the suits were dark blue, sir?"
"Yes. Why?"
Holzer shook his head. "My problem for now, Coulson. Anything else?"
"It's not bad enough?" Coulson shook his head. "More news as I get it."
"Right." Holzer said calmly, "All agents: Agent Coulson has the lead to retake the museum. Priority is the safety of the hostages, but if you can get me prisoners, do it. I have the perimeter and all necessary diplomacy. Rietveld: go in with them and report to me as soon as you have any news on the outfits or the weapons. Solberg and Fontaine are mine, Phil; strip the rest as necessary. I'll coordinate with the Prefecture and call in backup." Dark brown eyes met Coulson's, equally worried by the new weapons.
Holzer's grandmother had been Hydra; he might be more worried than Phil.
Coulson nodded. "Flak jackets, people; some of the weaponry will probably still be standard. Break into five man teams. I want point person for each team back here in two." Coulson turned to their civilian - not that Constantine was - and asked, "Are you willing to stay in case we need further help, Mr. Constantine? I can get you a vest, but I can not guarantee your safety."
"I'm not asking ask you to, Agent Coulson. I have friends in there, and coworkers, and patrons who are here because I sent them invitations. Beyond that, I suspect you'll need my assistance flushing out rats, if nothing else. Give me a vest and I'll go with you as a native guide and translator where necessary."
"Why aren't you in there now, sir?" Coulson asked, already watching squads of agents form up and debating which of them could both guard Constantine and be discriminating about which of his orders they followed. His orders would almost certainly be useful; the question was how far his interests and SHIELD's ran together.
Constantine gestured at the police line. "The lady in the emerald ball gown is the widow of one of our senior generals; she's one of the guiding forces behind the Widows and Orphans Fund tonight's function was to benefit. Her train from Avignon ran late." He added dryly, "Yes, I know you have to check that too. Madame Duval, coming in on the 6:40 train. She was supposed to have been in on the 2:00, but her daughter presented her with a grandson."
Coulson nodded. "We don't have time to check; you're going. Solberg-"
Solberg had been digging in a van; she turned back around with body suit and two pairs of boots. "Mr. Constantine. You'll stand out too much in the suit in the middle of our teams. They'll shoot you as an intel asset. One of the pairs of boots should fit, I think. And I'll go check Madame Duval, Agent Coulson."
She set off towards the line at a fast jog that didn't seem frantic and Coulson made a mental note to see if she wanted to transfer back to the helicarrier.
Constantine had the tac suit in one hand, the two pairs of boots in the other, but he hadn't moved to change or simply started stripping off there. Coulson would personally have put money on the latter if Barton had been there and offering the bet. "What is it?"
Constantine was scanning the area with eyes more than head. He finally shook his head and said quietly, "I'm not entirely sure." And he turned away and began to change, scanning the line of police and onlookers rather than his museum.
That worried Coulson, too.
* | * | *
If you catch any typos, please let me know! Thanks!
Original post on Dreamwidth | Leave a comment on DW | Read
comments on DW
Given the new LJ 'design' decisions, please comment on DW if you can.
Standard warnings: WIP, no idea when it will get finished, but all the chat and speculation on things has me plotting and revising and writing again, so thank you all for everything!
Ransom of the Redheaded League
* | * | *
Phil Coulson waved one of the juniors agents over to talk to the sergeant from the Prefecture of Police, relieved that Fontaine had ended up based out of Europe. She spoke fluent French and was very soothing without actually giving information away.
Once the police were under control again, he went back to the much more important discussion. "Jarvis, if at all possible, I need the old plans for the Musée de L'Armees, the ones from after the rebuilding of Paris but before World War II. If they aren't available online, we'll send agents for the hard copies as soon as you have a location. And let me know as soon as you crack that jammer."
"Of course, Agent Coulson. I believe I should be through in approximately five minutes more." Jarvis added, "Ms. Potts will have left me useful data."
Jarvis either didn't have permission to discuss it or didn't think 'how' was relevant right now; either way, his data was always reliable and Phil had other matters to work on. "I'll be here when you've got it," he agreed and tapped his comm to mute input until Jarvis got back to him.
The next task was to find out how the invading force had gotten in unseen, to make plans for a counterattack. Ideally, Coulson wanted a second, separate way that a SHIELD team could go in equally unseen and hit from within, but first they had to figure out how this OpFor had done it. They also needed to figure out who the OpFor was.
The local SHIELD team had set up a base camp just outside the organized chaos of the police perimeter. Three folding tables had shown up, their surfaces almost buried in tablets displaying images coming in from agents around the building. One analyst was busily notating a map, while four more ran facial recognition searches from the photos.
Before he could make it over to see if they'd found any new maps, Coulson heard a voice he knew from two dozen South American and European field ops. There were very good reasons Sebastian Holzer had ended up the senior agent for Western Europe. "Coulson, I have a 'civilian' I want you to meet."
Coulson had no trouble catching the irony in Holzer's description. He glanced back at the outer police line in time to see Holzer waving a stranger in. Holzer fell in at the civilian's shoulder in perfect position to contain him; somehow the stranger made it look like a subaltern walking next to a senior officer.
Hearing that thought focused Coulson's attention more tightly on the newcomer in question. Short-cropped brown hair had receded much like Coulson's own, but it was the expression and stance that led Coulson move to greet him. Despite his tuxedo, the newcomer didn't look like a politician or a socialite. He was slim, alert, and carried himself like a military man on a battlefield, spine straight and head constantly moving as he took in details. He also had his hands free and ready for trouble.
The stranger's eyes were flicking steadily across the open ground between the line of agents and the façade of the Musée; he took in the gala attendees silhouetted against the curtains of the French windows and his mouth tightened. When his attention turned to Coulson, the stranger returned the same swift evaluation he'd just received; he nodded after that second's glance, filing the information and tentatively pleased.
Any other time, this meeting and their reactions would have been amusing or grounds for an invitation for coffee and a meeting of like minds. Now Coulson thought he might end up glad to have this man here if he was half as competent as he appeared.
Holzer let his glance travel over his team's work as he came to a halt in a spot that left the 'civilian' bracketed between the two senior SHIELD agents on site. He also used English to say, "Mr. Constantine, this is Philip Coulson, a senior SHIELD agent and our expert on Stark Industries and its people. Coulson, this is Marcus Constantine. He's a director at the Musee de L'Armees and asked to come annotate the maps for us."
Up close, Constantine's hair showed some grey at the temples which made the twenty years more believable. He used British-accented English when he said quietly, "Agents. To be precise, I've worked here for twenty years. I probably know the building better than anyone but the cleaning staff and they're trapped in there. If I may show you my wallet, it has my ID card and you're welcome to confirm that information."
Holzer nodded his agreement. "The information and the ID would both be helpful. Thank you, sir."
Constantine extracted his wallet from his jacket pocket and his ID from his wallet, moving slowly and precisely.
Holzer took the proffered card and handed it over to one of his agents, almost without looking. Almost; it didn't go to the nearest man. "In the meantime, what maps we have are over here, sir."
Constantine followed them to the center of the tables, ignoring the techs working with tablets to focus in on the printouts that had just been dropped on the center of the table. "And if I'm lying, prison time will be the least of my worries?"
Holzer smiled, a quick twist of lips under a mustache as black as his hair was prematurely white. "That sums it up neatly."
Coulson shrugged. What he wanted was blueprints; what they had so far, was a line diagram of the Museé from its website. Most of the interior walls probably weren't on there. On the other hand, they now had a museum director. "We'll hope you check out, yes. Until then, let's see what you can tell us. You're former military, Mr. Constantine?"
"Everyone asks that," Constantine said absently, one hand flicking through the diagrams on a large tablet; the image looked like the Google Maps view of the area, but it had SHIELD annotations on it. "I'm Marcus , by the way, or Marc if you're really in a hurry."
Which didn't answer the question, but it wasn't a bad deflection. "If I'm in that much of a hurry, sir, it will just be duck, get down, or run." Coulson added, "Our major concern so far is that we don't yet know their entry point. Do you have any idea how at least two dozen men with weapons could get in unnoticed?"
Constantine looked up. "The South Korean Consulate didn't see anything?"
"Their sightlines are restricted, but no, they didn't. Or so they told our agents." Holzer shrugged. "Take it with a grain of salt, but they have a mutual interest in reporting so large a security hole."
Coulson's phone pinged at him, and he announced, "I have blueprints from the 1980s." He set the email attachment printing, snagging the first pages as they came off and dropping them onto the table.
Holzer helped arrange them into order, saying only, "Bless your contacts, Phil."
Constantine nodded. "Agreed. These are more useful than the '50s plans." He snagged a bright blue pen and began marking occasional doors closed or openings in walls as he went. Agent Solberg, one of Natasha's favorite analysts, was already taping pages together to make the floor plans easier to read.
Constantine took the new floor with an absent thank you and annotated, trading sheets back and forth with Solberg until the taped and marked floors were spread in an arc on the table, basement at the left, third floor at the right.
"If you don't know how they got in, then you don't know how they can get out, much less might get out. Yes. I know of five possibilities." That statement brought the techs' heads around, and Holzer shifted to watch Constantine even more attentively, settling into a patient, waiting alertness that took in the maps and the man's hands.
Constantine ignored both sets of reactions and took the red pen Solberg gave him to start circling problem areas. "First floor: here and here. The walls were there this morning, but in the 1800s there were accesses from the old sewer system. They were bricked up, painted over, and mostly forgotten when new sanitation lines were run to accommodate the Metro." He indicated a third location. "The Metro line originally had stairs up to us, debouching into the foyer here when this was still the Veterans' Memorial."
Coulson nodded slowly. "I wondered if they couldn't have found some kind of underground access somewhere. There are too many of them, and the catering company is too well-known and well-vetted to have this many attackers infiltrate them."
"And too many embassies nearby would have noticed a great many fit, active strangers, yes. I'd consider the Metro access the most likely if they came in from that floor." Constantine shifted the map to display the second story. "This is a storage room now, but at one time, this wall was a doorway into the west wing. They could have come through the second floor hallway there; security would have been lower there but there's still too much chance they'd have been observed by embassy security. Your last option is that they've come up through basement, via the old water run-offs to the Seine."
The Prefecture sergeant had come up while they were talking; he stared first at the plans and then at Constantine. "My God. Those are the city maintenance tunnels, sir. We monitor them."
Constantine shook his head. "I don't mean the maintenance tunnels, sergeant. I mean the old Roman sewers under them. A tunnel ran… here." He traced a line along the maintenance tunnel, veering slightly upriver at the last moment. "You monitor the tunnels to watch for flooding. I very much doubt you monitor five meters from your tunnel's end point. If they used divers, they could come and go with minimal notice. The entry was probably silted, but they have to have been preparing this for a while. If so, they've had time to clear the old sewer, come in a few meters up, and then drill in and loop your cameras." He shrugged, wry and resigned, and went on, "Who'd notice? Any number of boats up and down the Seine are still being used as housing; it's fashionable. One good party could cover the divers and one heavy rain would excuse the silt load in the water. It's only a matter of timing."
Coulson promised himself that coffee and a long talk with this man later -- after a very thorough background check. "Useful starting points. Thank you, Mr. Constantine." Five seconds' rapid calculation left him resigned to the necessity, but it wasn't his operation. Holzer got to make the call, and take the blame if Constantine were injured or killed.
Holzer stroked his mustaches up into a curve, then back to straight while he thought. Phil still thought he'd read too much Poirot although Sebastian always claimed it was to see who'd underestimate him. Behind Constantine, Rietveld was holding his ID back and giving a thumbs-up. Holzer reached for it without looking away from Phil. He also raised an eyebrow, waggling one thumb up and back down as he glanced at the Museé.
Coulson reluctantly nodded, then held up a hand and moved aside when he heard a throat being cleared, tapping his comm off of mute. "Jarvis. What do you have for me?"
"News from Ms. Potts, sir, and an address for more up to date floor plans. If the set I already sent will do, however, I suspect you have other priorities. As of seven minutes ago, the known count was forty-six enemy forces, described as wearing dark blue dive suits with hazmat helmets. They are carrying blue-light energy weapons, including grenades. The only match I have for such a description is from Howling Commando reports during World War II, in missions against Hydra strongholds. Ms. Potts did not know how they got in, nor their motive."
"She said dive suits, Jarvis?" The sewer option seemed more likely as an access if so, but… what was their goal?
"Dark blue dive suits and hazmat helmets. Ms. Potts final comment was that one Marcus Constantine would be a site expert."
Coulson glanced to the side where Constantine was already discussing viewpoints up and downstream on the Seine. "He's already turned up."
"I have taken the liberty of sending you a picture of him from the museum's website, matched against society pages from three Parisian newspapers, so that you can confirm his identity," Jarvis said. "Last, Ms. Potts has acquired assistance of some type. Another woman suggested Mr. Constantine and Ms. Potts immediately agreed. I do not know who it was; I have never heard her voice before."
"Are they varying the jamming, Jarvis, or are you still in?" Coulson checked his phone. "And yes. The photos you found match. Thank you."
"Good. For the moment, I still have access. I believe I have sorted out their style, as sir would say. Should Ms. Potts transmit again, I will let you know immediately. I suggest you move quickly, Agent Coulson. Having looked at the floor plans, I see no feasible way they can hope to hold that building with only forty-six people. They must retreat soon, with or without their hostages."
Coulson nodded. "I know. Contact me as soon as you have anything else, Jarvis."
"Of course," Jarvis said and cut the line again.
Coulson turned back and told Holzer, "All right, we have an update on the problems. Current OpFor count is forty-six." Activity around the ops table slowed and Solberg started making notes. "Description was 'dark blue dive suits with hazmat helmets.' Ms. Potts also reported blue-energy weapons."
Rietveld looked up and said, "Are you sure the suits were dark blue, sir?"
"Yes. Why?"
Holzer shook his head. "My problem for now, Coulson. Anything else?"
"It's not bad enough?" Coulson shook his head. "More news as I get it."
"Right." Holzer said calmly, "All agents: Agent Coulson has the lead to retake the museum. Priority is the safety of the hostages, but if you can get me prisoners, do it. I have the perimeter and all necessary diplomacy. Rietveld: go in with them and report to me as soon as you have any news on the outfits or the weapons. Solberg and Fontaine are mine, Phil; strip the rest as necessary. I'll coordinate with the Prefecture and call in backup." Dark brown eyes met Coulson's, equally worried by the new weapons.
Holzer's grandmother had been Hydra; he might be more worried than Phil.
Coulson nodded. "Flak jackets, people; some of the weaponry will probably still be standard. Break into five man teams. I want point person for each team back here in two." Coulson turned to their civilian - not that Constantine was - and asked, "Are you willing to stay in case we need further help, Mr. Constantine? I can get you a vest, but I can not guarantee your safety."
"I'm not asking ask you to, Agent Coulson. I have friends in there, and coworkers, and patrons who are here because I sent them invitations. Beyond that, I suspect you'll need my assistance flushing out rats, if nothing else. Give me a vest and I'll go with you as a native guide and translator where necessary."
"Why aren't you in there now, sir?" Coulson asked, already watching squads of agents form up and debating which of them could both guard Constantine and be discriminating about which of his orders they followed. His orders would almost certainly be useful; the question was how far his interests and SHIELD's ran together.
Constantine gestured at the police line. "The lady in the emerald ball gown is the widow of one of our senior generals; she's one of the guiding forces behind the Widows and Orphans Fund tonight's function was to benefit. Her train from Avignon ran late." He added dryly, "Yes, I know you have to check that too. Madame Duval, coming in on the 6:40 train. She was supposed to have been in on the 2:00, but her daughter presented her with a grandson."
Coulson nodded. "We don't have time to check; you're going. Solberg-"
Solberg had been digging in a van; she turned back around with body suit and two pairs of boots. "Mr. Constantine. You'll stand out too much in the suit in the middle of our teams. They'll shoot you as an intel asset. One of the pairs of boots should fit, I think. And I'll go check Madame Duval, Agent Coulson."
She set off towards the line at a fast jog that didn't seem frantic and Coulson made a mental note to see if she wanted to transfer back to the helicarrier.
Constantine had the tac suit in one hand, the two pairs of boots in the other, but he hadn't moved to change or simply started stripping off there. Coulson would personally have put money on the latter if Barton had been there and offering the bet. "What is it?"
Constantine was scanning the area with eyes more than head. He finally shook his head and said quietly, "I'm not entirely sure." And he turned away and began to change, scanning the line of police and onlookers rather than his museum.
That worried Coulson, too.
* | * | *
If you catch any typos, please let me know! Thanks!
Original post on Dreamwidth | Leave a comment on DW | Read
comments on DW
Given the new LJ 'design' decisions, please comment on DW if you can.