[Dreams of the Waking Man: Eighth Nightmare] Hired
(HAH, yes, i'm still trying to decide between three or four plotlines, so the story is in a very awkward place right now........)
because anti-heroes are so much more fun than heroes.
warnings: Earth-339. a little slash. reference to mental illness and the use of controlled substances. sci-fi. world-go-boom. language: r (for f***, s***, and f*ggot).
pairing: Nate/Wade, with some background Laura/Julian and Daken/Lester.
timeline: 2019, about two hours after the Big One.
disclaimer: i doesn't owns the movies, comics, or characters. or the assorted objects of pop culture reference.
notes: 1) i think Daken resents the idea of needing someone's help, in general. and i think he doesn't like the fact that Wade and Lester are almost friends. 2) it'd be more accurate to say they've all been assassins, rather than mercenaries.
Hired or The Return of the Dork Avengers
“Maybe I shoulda asked this before,” Wade muses, looking around the shuttlebay. “How are we gonna find the Dork Avengers?”
Laura tries (mostly successfully) to stifle a snicker. “Dork Avengers. Good one. Don’t worry, I can smell the symbiote a mile off. Damn thing stinks.”
She sniffs a bit, frowns.
“What?” he asks.
“It’s a fainter scent than it should be…weaker, somehow.”
“Gonna be a problem?”
“No, I can still track it.”
So they follow her nose. There seem to be a lot more people per square foot on the Avenger than on Providence, and Wade thinks for a moment that it might be the very first carrier they sent out. While Providence left room to walk down the corridors properly (and run, in a pinch), the press of refugees on the Avenger is so thick that they have to find their way like mountain goats in the nastier parts of the Himalayas.
And there they are.
To civilians, to people who’ve never seen them up close, the Dark Avengers (what’s left of them, anyway) might be invisible.
To Wade and Laura, they stick out like sore thumbs.
Daken still dresses like a frigging Parisian yuppie metrosexual, sprawled with a careless grace, expensive shoes on Karla’s lap. Bullseye leans against him, back-to-back, hunched in a bloodstained hoodie and gnawing his nails like he’s been off his meds a while. Karla has a look on her face like she can barely stand the sight of all the compressed humanity around them. And Mac, scrawny and human and pathetic, clings to Karla’s arm and eyes a crying teenybopper nearby like he’s wondering whether she’s trans-fat free.
“Well, if it isn’t the rejects,” Wade drawls.
Daken sneers up at him. “Funny, I was about to say the same thing.”
“Daken,” Laura says with a polite nod.
“Laura,” Daken replies just as casually.
Wade prods Bullseye’s leg with his foot. “Might wanna check on your boyfriend, kid; he don’t look too good.” And he knows he shouldn’t call Daken ‘kid’-Daken’s got to be about twenty years older than Wade-but he really comes off as some lazy, spoiled frat-boy. “How long’s he been off the anti-psychs?”
“None of your fucking busin-”
“Two days now,” Bullseye grunts. “Or five. And I feel like I wanna fuckin’ tear my skin off. Thanks for asking.”
Wade shifts. “Well. A roomful of Machiavellian crazies is currently running the joint, and I was thinkin’ it might be nice to have somebody reliable around to help keep ‘em in line. Said ‘somebody’ would even get his prescriptions filled nice ‘n regular.”
Bullseye scrambles up eagerly.
Daken leaps to his feet. “We don’t need anything from you,” he hisses.
“And yet here you are,” Wade says. “This is my fleet now, Junior, and if it weren’t for me, you’d be a pretty little pile of radioactive ash. Don’t like it? There’s the door.” He gestures toward the nearest airlock (plainly labeled with a lit sign, like an exit at a movie theater). “But I’d watch that first step if I were you.”
“Shit,” snorts Bullseye. “They’re desperate or crazy to put you in charge.”
“Wouldn’t be the first time. Well, rookie?”
Daken glowers. “He’s not going anywhere with you.”
Wade slowly draws a blade from his back. “Wasn’t talkin’ to you, twinkletoes. Me ‘n Bullseye go way back. Did a lotta merc work together-almost friends, even. He’s got a vivid imagination, and that’s of use to me. Sit down and shut up.”
“You want to start a fight? Here?” Daken says.
“Nah, I was thinking I’d do what your old man would do-cut you in half and drop you over the side.” Wade points the blade at Mac. “And you can eat almost anything you want-tacos, pizza, fucking prime rib for all I care, but no people. You eat anybody and I’ll cut you into a dozen pieces, set you on fire, and then drop you over the side.”
“You don’t scare me,” Mac sulks, crowding closer to Karla.
Bullseye laughs. “He should. He’s at least as hard to kill as you are. And since the brain-overhaul seven years back, he’s smart on top of being a devious mother-fucker.”
“We could get you an overhaul, B.”
“Hell no,” Bullseye scoffs. “Last time somebody offered something like that, I ended up with microscopic robots in my blood and a need for daily medication.”
“Pfft. You got off easy. You coulda ended up like me.”
“If I believed in God, I’d thank him every day.”
“What’s it gonna be? Pills or no pills, you do somethin’ bad-like killing some random feeb-and I’ll handcuff you to Tinkerbell there and lock you in a very small room where you’ll have to listen to him whine for weeks.”
Bullseye snickers. “Too late. You realize I’ve been listenin’ to this prissy faggot whine for more than a decade now?”
Impressed, Wade raises his eyebrows. “No shit. Has it really been that long?”
“Ten years last month.”
“Happy belated anniversary.”
“Fuck you,” Bullseye says with a grin.
“We got a deal?” Wade presses. “Come with me, keep the hippies ‘n fascists in line, and you get an endless supply of pills-as long as you behave.”
“Shit. Get me my meds, before I remember how nice it was to be able to breathe without asking permission.”
Laura smirks. “When my husband gets like that, I hit him. I think yours might enjoy it too much.”
“Hey, mind your own beeswax, girl.” Bullseye takes a step forward. “You just get me my pills, and I’ll keep your plotting pals in line. Also wouldn’t mind getting a shot at the fucker who nuked my new TV…I fuckin’ loved that thing. Latest StarkTech, fifty-inch LED.”
Daken’s face doesn’t give much away, but his eyes hold the desperate tension of a man watching everything slip through his fingers. Wade feels the old pull of attraction and knows he’s won. If Daken feels cornered enough to resort to using kooky pheromones, he really is at the end of his rope.
Wade sheathes his sword. “I appreciate the thought, kid, but I’m just not that into you. C’mon, rookie.” And he turns and starts back toward the shuttlebay.
“Wait,” Laura says.
He pauses between a trio of teenage boys in gang colors and a snoring guy with the forearms of a dockworker.
Bullseye is just standing, looking back over his shoulder.
It’s as good as holding out a hand.
Wade privately muses that most of the time the master only thinks he’s in charge…it’s really the pet who has all the power.
Daken’s expression smoothes from barely concealed hostility back to its usual aloofness, and he starts walking as though he just happens to be going their way (like a cat, and it’s not the first time Wade has made the comparison).
Smirking, Wade turns again.
“Hold up,” says Karla, and Wade groans.
“Yes?” he says.
She’s standing now, and Mac is trying to hide behind her. “I don’t really give a shit who I work for, as long as I get fairly compensated. You pissed off the world’s governments. You’re gonna need some kinda defense force to keep them in line, right? All I want is a room I don’t have to share-” Mac whines like a puppy. “-we don’t have to share. Give me that, and I’ll beat the shit outta whoever the fuck you want.”
“You’re hired,” Wade says, and looks at Laura while Karla starts daintily picking a path through the hip-high press of refugees. “See, Greenie? It’s possible for the questionably-good and the less-questionably-evil to get along. We’re all mercs here. Let’s have a little professional courtesy, hm?”
“Actually, I was never technically-” Laura starts.
“Hurry up and get me my damn pills,” Bullseye says loudly.
The flight back to Providence is surprisingly companionable, all of them crowded into the shuttle like one big, grudgingly semi-happy, extremely dysfunctional family with a nervous little dog (“I can’t feel my arm, Mac. Jesus, he’s not gonna set you on fire right now…”).
The war room is in the same degree of bustle as when they left. People are arguing about policy, discussing defensive strategies, collating census data, talking about the rendezvous, worrying about the future, asking for coffee… Over by the projector, Stark’s puttering with the satellite setup (probably replaying the Nate Speech).
And then everyone notices who just entered the room.
Silence falls, followed by guns cocking, powers charging, and claws being unsheathed. (“Get off me, Mac, you damn squid!”)
“Hey, everybody!” Wade cries jovially. “Look who I found!”
Logan is the first one to move. He stalks over, stops three feet away. “Care t’ explain, Wilson?”
Wade jerks a thumb over his shoulder. “Good ol’ Bullseye has a knack for paranoid plotting that I figure will come in handy while weathering a few decades of world war, and he’ll work for pills that we can mass-synthesize. Blondie and her Chihuahua over there are willing to kick butt for room ‘n board.”
“I’ll take a broom closet with a mattress,” Karla snorts. “As long as the door locks.”
Logan lifts his chin. “What about the boy?”
Wade hears Daken mutter something foul in Japanese, can practically feel him seethe.
Bullseye shrugs. “Eh, he’s bulky, but I consider him carry-on.”
“Aw, c’mon!” Wade whines. “I’ve been waiting ages for the perfect time to use that line!”
“Snooze ya lose,” scoffs Bullseye. “Payback for all the times you stole my awesome lines.”
“Bitch.”
“Primadonna.”
They share a snicker.
Wade waves a hand in a circular motion. “Anyway, Logan, I actually trust these guys marginally more than the so-called ‘legitimate’ Avengers of either coast. Mercenaries are pretty damn loyal, long as they’re getting paid and it’s in their own best interests. And everyone has to play by the rules in my fleet. You start a fight with one of them, and you are out. And since it’s you, I’ll give ya the chance to see if you can flap your arms hard enough to fly, bub.”
Logan sheathes his claws. “Suit yerself, Wilson. I sure as fuck hope you know what you’re doin’.”
“Ditto. Now, somebody get Mr. B his crazy-pills, find a private room for Dr. Sofen and her pet tentacle-monster, and figure out whether Jules ever got back with Irene and Weas.”
Slowly, stiltedly, the bustle resumes.
Nate towers over everyone at the conference table by dint of not being seated.
Wade goes over.
“Wade, are you sure-”
“Shut it, Priscilla.”
“Don’t you think it’s awfully forgiving to-”
“You would’ve given them the same chance.”
Nate frowns. “The chance to stand within fifty feet of our teenage daughter? Not so much.”
“Nathan, my dear, have you met our daughter? She’d send ‘em running.”
.End.
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