Chapter 9
Darcy woke up choking on a scream. Coughing, she blinked through the tears leaking down her face to stare up at the ceiling of the small apartment. Flashes of her nightmare burned through her head: holes in the sky, flinty eyes glowing bright in the darkness, and the red liquid that floated over everything, leaving destruction in its wake.
She rolled on her side, intent on hiding her face in a pillow, but Jane was there, sitting beside her twin bed. Seeing that Darcy was fully awake, she climbed in with her and snuggled close over the blankets.
“Hey,” she whispered softly, “I heard you crying in your sleep again. Sorry I didn’t wake you up. Last time I did, getting stuck in MSS seemed to freak you out more, but I didn’t want to leave you alone.”
Darcy grabbed Jane’s hand from where it had been hovering over her and held it. “Sorry that I woke you up.”
Jane blew a raspberry at her, and Darcy rolled her eyes. Thinking that the serious moment was over and feeling better now that the images from her nightmare had stopped their instant replays in her mind, she moved to get up out of bed, but Jane held her fast. Her friend pulled her back down to eye level again. “I’m worried about you. This has been happening a lot, these nightmares, ever since…” she swallowed before continuing, “since Norway.”
She was always painfully careful to avoid mentioning the Battle of New York, and Jane especially did not mention He-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named or His radio silence for the past two years. There had been many intensive tequila and ice cream therapy sessions where they behaved more like overdramatic middle schoolers than fully grown adults in the beginning. While Darcy didn’t think Jane would ever be okay with the situation, she did think Jane, with her help, was working towards being okay in general.
“I’m fine, boss lady. I’ll admit that the dreams are freaky-deaky, but they’re just dreams.” Darcy finally wrangled her hand free from Jane and crawled over her as gracefully as a girl who had just woken up from the aforementioned freaky-deaky dreams could. She moved from her little alcove of a bedroom to the kitchen for some water. Nothing like nightmares to give you cotton mouth from hell.
Jane stayed reposed on her bed, but turned to face her, propping her head up on her bent arm. “This isn’t fine, Darce. And with your gifts, they might not just be dreams. There is a prophetic aspect to what you can do, so I’m not sure we should be writing things off. Maybe we should go back to Culver. Betty is worried, too.”
Darcy glared at her from over the rim of her cup, finishing it off before she responded.
“I swear to God, you two are the worst mother hens. We are not uprooting ourselves because I’m having bad dreams. They’re just that: dreams,” Darcy moved back to her bed and patted Jane on the shoulder, “We’re here because there were some neat atmospheric anomalies, remember? Erik was way excited about them when he called us. Even if he hasn’t actually shown up yet.”
Jane harrumphed and got up. “Fine. But if they get worse, we are either calling Betty and making her come here or going back to Culver so we can figure this out.”
“Yes, ma’am!’ Darcy responded. “Now, I have places to be, people to see.” A glance at her watch told Darcy she needed to hurry if she was going to be on time.
“What places? What people?” Jane squinted at her.
“Noneya. Especially considering your super secret ‘appointment’ today at lunch that you refuse to tell me about.”
Jane blushed and stammered on her way across the living to her own bedroom. Darcy was pretty sure she knew what the so-called appointment was; mostly because when she was changing Jane’s ringtone earlier to a ridiculous rap song that she knew would drive her friend crazy, a text from someone named Richard came through. The message had one too many emojis to be platonic. Darcy really hoped that the secrecy was because Jane was nervous about liking this guy and not because she was trying to force herself into moving on too quickly.
But that was a mystery for another time. For now, she had a mission to complete.
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Darcy had met Ian in their first week in London at the Caffé Nero down the street from their apartment. The place was actually Jane’s mom’s home, but she’d decided to Eat, Pray, Love it months before and had closed up her apartment while she toured the world. They’d been cleaning out the place for two days straight and still hadn’t gotten rid of all the cobwebs. After the dusting the third shelf full of very pretty but very dirty crystals, Darcy came to the conclusion that Jane’s mom was a total hippie. Darcy teased Jane with the numerous horoscope clippings and astrology charts, but Jane had answered that it was her mom’s love of the stars that had sparked her own interest.
Upon discovering there was an entire closet they had missed stuffed to the ceiling with musty boxes, Darcy had declared she needed more coffee before touching it and had headed out to grab some. She’d been in line to order when the dude had caught her eye. He’d been wearing a knit hat that was an exact replica of Jayne’s from Firefly, and it was such a majestic sight that she had abandoned her position in line to go over and ask about it.
Ian had blushed bright red and fumbled awkwardly when she smiled at him, and she had decided she was adopting him on the spot. She’d seen him every once and a while since then at the same spot, although he’d swapped the Jayne hat for a regular old beanie along the way, and they’d chat. She saw that he was studying notes on infrared astronomy early on because she was nosy with a tendency to read over shoulders. The easiest way to adopt him became clear: use him as slave labor and hire an intern.
Unfortunately, he was oddly reluctant to join the cause. Darcy was pretty sure that he was just playing hard to get because he totally fangirled when she name dropped Jane. He might not know it yet, but she was going to win him over if it was the last thing she did. He actually knew Science!, bonus points for it being Jane’s flavor of Science!, and Darcy thought it would only help Jane’s happiness if she had someone to really talk about her work. As much as she loved Jane and was smart in her own right, the things Dr. Foster liked to talk about were above Darcy’s head.
It was with this mentality that she entered the coffee shop, spotting Ian in his customary seat in the corner. He grinned when he noticed her walking up to him, opening his mouth to presumably greet her but she slapped a hand over it before he could get anything out.
“Today, you are going to listen to all the reasons that you will be my intern and at the end of my speech, you will excitedly accept the position. There is no other option here.”
She removed her hand, sat down across from him, and began.
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Richard had not been what Darcy was expecting when she’d pinged Jane’s cell phone to find her. She wouldn’t have done it, but the machines were going crazy. Ian, who actually knew what the hell the machines did, had gone bug eyed at the readings they were giving, so Darcy made the executive decision to date crash.
She may have also been the teensiest bit curious.
Richard had been nice enough and (Darcy had been close enough to hear his banging a lot of dudes comment) pretty funny, but he’d still been a bit boring. Admittedly, the Norse God of Thunder was a tough act to follow.
Also, Darcy definitely though it was a little weird that he mistook a girl in a heavy coat, scarf, and beanie as the waiter, but whatevs.
Even with all of his nondescript, unassuming charm, Jane was clearly still gun shy. It broke Darcy’s heart, but she was sure the only thing that would heal Jane’s own was time.
Jane may have been short with her on the car ride over to the anomaly, but Darcy could see the relief in the sag of her shoulders. Darcy could take the blame if it meant Jane wasn’t pushing herself when she wasn’t yet ready.
Ian popped forward from the backseat like a deranged prairie dog with the GPS to direct Darcy. Jane reacted like an actual deranged prairie dog had attacked her, which Darcy thought a little much. She was so startled that she couldn’t even absorb Ian’s heart eyes when he said how honored he was to be working with her.
Rolling her eyes, Darcy turned left.
“I have totally mastered driving in London,” she said over the echoes of car horns.
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Darcy felt it the second Jane went from being just down the hall to being… gone. It was something she had been working on with Jane and Betty, that supernatural awareness of souls or life forces or whatever term worked with your belief system. It had become background noise to her after months of practice, but the sudden absence of Jane’s brought the sense to the forefront.
She tore up the stairs, shoving kids out of the way to run towards where she had last felt Jane. Panic was clawing it’s way up her chest, but she took comfort in the fact that Jane wasn’t dead, just gone. Although, disappearing out of thin air was still panic inducing in and of itself. The hallway was a dead end.
Ian came to stop behind her, heaving and bent over. “Darcy? What’s the matter?”
“Jane’s gone.”
Ian straightened, having caught his breath, and moved to stand beside her. He joined her in staring at the wall at the end of the hallway. “What do you mean she’s gone? She ran up here, but she must have just turned another way.”
Darcy took a step towards the wall. It was impossible, but she swore that she felt a breeze coming from the plaster. She put a hand up to touch it, but the air just above the wall wavered like a television losing signal.
“Intern! Did you see that?” she called out behind her.
“See what? It’s just a wall.”
There was something just before the wall. She could see it clear as day now that she knew it was there, a perfect circle where the air wasn’t as crisp as it should be. Jane wasn’t here, but Darcy could still feel her. It was a confusing sensation like she was in two places at once. The familiar burn of Jane’s energy felt like it was billions of miles away, but also like it was just beyond the hazy circle. Darcy didn’t know how to get billions of miles away, so she took the more expedient route.
Turning around to face Ian, she tossed him a quick “Sorry for this,” and took a step backwards as he gaped.
Her feet touched on solid rock, the footsteps echoing in a huge cavern.
“Darcy? Oh, thank God,” came Jane’s relieved voice through the darkness. She was kneeling before an ominously glowing statue thing. Darcy moved towards her, but stopped after a few steps.
“Get away from that, Jane.” Darcy was finding it hard to focus on her friend. Her gaze kept wandering back to the statue, or, more accurately, to the familiar red light inside, though it took a second to place it. It was the red liquid of her nightmares, the one that turned everything to darkness.
‘Except that’s not all it was’ a corner of Darcy’s mind whispered to her with a voice much deeper than her own, ‘Take it for yourself and find out.’
Jane was talking to her, but Darcy couldn’t hear her. She’d started forwards again, mind filled with visions of herself with glowing red eyes and worlds at her feet.
It was the image of all of the dead men, women, children, by her hands that shook Darcy out of her trance. Her hand was outstretched to the cracked stone, the red liquid almost to her fingertips.
Darcy stumbled away, horrified at herself. Jane moved to catch her, and braced herself on the stone to stand. The red light, with Darcy no longer available, latched onto the nearest thing: Jane.
Jane screamed as it pushed under her skin and up her arm, scratching at her flesh to get it out. Darcy was frozen in fear. Jane swayed, and fell, eyes rolling back in her head.
Darcy caught her before she hit the ground, trying to shake her awake. She could feel whatever that was, that red glowing liquid, brimming under Jane’s skin, but it no longer sang to her with its siren call. Looking around them, Darcy did her best not to let the super creepy abandoned mega-cathedral vibe send her into hysterics.
She had to get Jane back to Earth, which she didn’t need her abilities to know they were absolutely not on, and drummed up the meditation techniques that Betty had taught her. Their little Trio had done a lot of testing with her abilities, and the results had indicated that Darcy could potentially do more than just travel between MSS and one spot. Betty theorized that it was like any other skill that required practice, so she had invested a lot of time in mentoring Darcy on things to help focus her thoughts and emotions.
Darcy channeled her breathing and pictured her mind casting out a net, feeling for any spots like before, perfect circles of strange air.
She found nothing. Sitting down, she maneuvered Jane so that her head and torso were cradled in Darcy’s lap. Her eyelids were fluttering which Darcy took as a good sign, although she hoped it didn’t mean nightmares. She thought of this morning in Jane’s mom’s cozy little apartment and of how comfortable her tiny bed was despite it’s size and of the stupid leaky faucet they still hadn’t fixed in the kitchen and of the barista at Nero’s who knew her order now and of that cute kid who was dumb enough to think they were cops and of poor Ian who was probably scared out of his nerdy little mind because she had walked through a freaking wall…
And suddenly, Darcy found herself falling through the floor with Jane safely in her arms.
Or rather, the floor was moving through her. The whole cave was moving farther and farther away from them, all the while she remained sitting cross legged, lap full of unconscious astrophysicist. Darcy kept calm, chest rising and falling evenly, even as stars and comets and fucking planets faded in and out all around them. Darcy didn’t dare move a muscle throughout the whole process, not until they were sitting in the hallway where they started, as if nothing out of the ordinary had ever happened.
“There’s no place like home, I guess,” Darcy whispered to herself, trembling.
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How could he have blown his first real op so thoroughly?
While it was true that he wasn’t a field agent, that should have no bearing on his immense failure. Ian had been thrilled when he was awarded this assignment, not to mention flattered beyond words that it had been the legendary Agent Coulson who had recommended him. It was a chance to collaborate with Dr. Foster on what was, in his opinion, the most revolutionary work ever done in the field of astrophysics.
He had taken his duty quite seriously, had studied all the manuals on espionage that SHIELD had to offer, and had barraged the Level 4 specialists of his acquaintance with a veritable deluge of questions, all in the name of proving himself worthy of such a mission.
Yet here he was, first day of complete infiltration, and he had lost them like a set of car keys.
Not even the adventures that Fitzsimmons had shared with him via heavily redacted emails had recounted such personal disasters. At least, not ones where they were the culpable party, but in this, Ian could only blame himself.
He could not even accurately describe where the women had disappeared to because how does one explain a human fading into a solid wall?
With the weight of his situation hanging from his neck, he called SHIELD to report his sins.
They were there within the hour, a small team searching the area thoroughly. He was busy being interrogated via Facetime with Commander Hill herself, nearly soiling his pants with the stress of it all, when a large boom had him ducking for cover.
He was blinded by a tunnel of bright light which evaporated to reveal Thor himself. Ian did soil his pants a bit then.
Everyone launched into action, scurrying towards the Thunder God, but he seemed unaware of them, his eyes scanning the perimeter before striding through the agents to enter the building.
“Jane!” he bellowed into the cavernous room where they had floated the lorry just hours earlier, “Jane! Where are you?”
Ian was about to interrupt to inform him that they were all trying to answer that very question before a high, nasally voice echoed from above.
“We’re up here!”
None of the agents could have been expected to keep pace with an Asgardian, but many gave it a valiant effort. As it was, by the time they found Thor and the missing women in question at the very site of their disappearance, Darcy and Thor were playing a gentle yet intense game of tug-of-war with the body of an alarmingly comatose Dr. Foster.
“Should we send for a medic?” Ian asked an agent next to him, but was given no response. Rude.
Thor was speaking calmly to Darcy, but there was a flint about his eyes that made Ian nervous.
“She will receive the best care in Asgard; this, I promise you. Simply release her, and she shall receive attention all the sooner.”
“Listen, buddy,” Darcy, who was still crouched on the ground with most of Dr. Foster’s body weight on her legs and her arms wrapped around the doctor, “She is not going anywhere without me. You don’t get to come in here and throw out orders like it’s your job!”
“It is my job, Darcy. I am a prince if you’ll recall.”
“Not prince over me or Janie! She’s not going without me!”
“I cannot simply take you to Asgard! Cease this bickering and let me take her!”
“Like hell I will! Also, as you so charmingly mentioned, you’re the damn prince! You can take me, and you goddamn will!”
Thor sighed, his body armor shuddering at the violent expulsion of air. “If it will get Jane there, then alright. We shall go together. Let me carry her outside, you are not as strong of body as you are of tongue.”
“No sweat of my back, pal,” Darcy muttered as she relinquished her hold on Jane’s chest.
A decisive “Move,” from Thor had SHIELD personnel parting to make way for them, and once outside, they disappeared in that same tunnel of light.
A furious “What the fuck is going on over there?” emanating from his hand reminded him that he was still on the video call with Commander Hill.
Ian went white.
“Um.”