Noelle - Day 68 (Read on!)

So yeah.
I promised you guys yesterday that I would post two R.M.S. story parts, but...well, how do I put this.  Hmmm, the thing is, I just like pulling your leg!  I crack myself up sometimes.

Anyway, but I don't have any plans for this wonderful Tuesday, and schools starting back up, so I don't want to like spend too much time making you read boring stuff, so it's just the R.M.S. story parts and then I'm outta here.  Bye y'all - have a great day!

Random Marvel-based Story (Parts 30 & 31) {Click the link below to read}

Jess had never seen the team so relieved as when she limped into the training hall.  It’s over, she couldn’t help but thinking, but she brought her mind back to the task at hand.  “Alright,” she said briskly, ignoring the looks she was getting.  “Fill me in.”

With narrowed eyes, White Tiger explained about the note and what they thought it meant.  Jess nodded once and rolled her chair over to the computer without another word.  “What are you doing?” Spider-man demanded.

“Nick said that it was in S.H.I.E.L.D. key codes.  If I can figure out what key it was, I might have a better chance of figuring out who it is this time,” Jess said without looking away from the screen.  She typed a few more lines, then clicked the enter button.  The computer buzzed, then started trying codes.

Nova turned the chair so that Jess was facing the team that she was so blatantly ignoring.  “You.  Explain.  Now.  Where did you go, and who is this?”

Jess looked him cooly in the eye and said, “If I did know who this was, what makes you think I would tell you?”  Sam hissed slightly with anger.

“We’re your team, Jess,” Peter said, gently pulling Nova away from Jess.  “We just want to know what’s going on and...where did you get those injuries?”

Jess moved her arm so that you couldn’t see the dripping cut on her side, but the damage was done.  “There’s no time for explanations now.  I was - I am just doing my job, that’s all. “

The computer buzzed again and said in a the typical sugary automated voice, “Three matches acquired, please state official password to continue.”

“Dragon3751, passcode 5310969Zeta,” Jess said without skipping a beat, toggling onto a different view screen.

“Voice activation accepted,” the voice said, added a moment later, “View matches for coded search results?”

“Yes,” Jess said calmly with a glance at the angry team behind her.  Without turning around, she spat, “You wanted to talk, team?  I’ll talk - my way.”

She took a small pocket drive out of one of her pant’s pockets and plugged it into the nearest slot.  Jess narrowed her eyes, staring directly at her team, saying, “Computer, download flash drive into computers Section B 30 - C 45, secure the training hall, security level Beta, manual override by Dragon3751.  Shut down security cameras for specified areas, delete footage for past half hour, same activation code.  Run program 4.2Gamma, targets pre-selected.  Shoot to stun or disable, not to kill.  Pull up matches on viewscreen, cross search discarded matches by origin location, time, and security level.”

Ava and Luke looked at each other as the computer buzzed again.  Jess had always been tech savvy, and one of the best at computers in the team, but they had never heard her use any of this kind of stuff.  How did she even have the clearance to do this?  The training hall’s security doors clanged shut around them, and without so much as a single alarm bell going off, the lights abruptly went out.

Iron Fist provided light by his glowing hand, but Jess didn’t seem to need it to do whatever she was doing.  Spider-man hovered behind Jess, trying to follow whatever she was doing with the code, but judging by his face, it confused even him.

After a moment of standing around in the dark, Jess said quietly, “Computer, have targets been eliminated?”

“Yes, Clara, all selected targets have been temporarily disabled.”

“Clara?  Since when are you called Clara?” Nova exclaimed.  Danny felt his stomach twist as he remembered the day at the Avengers tower when JARVIS had called Jess Clara.  He should have said something!

“Fire up lights in training hall only, then show results for cross-search,” Jess said, eyeing the computer screen.  If she had even heard Sam’s words, Jess was refusing to respond to any of her teammates - if you could even call them that anymore.  The cross-matches showed up, a long chart with information that the team couldn’t make heads or tails of.

“Computer...”  Jess said slowly, her eyes glazed over.  What was going on behind them?  “Is the Gordon-Lake code used in any of these possible solutions?”

“Yes, it is used in one match,” the computer said pleasantly.

“Run program 89.2Beta, using the Gordon-Lake match and the active translation,” Jess said thoughtfully after a moment.  The threat the team had received earlier that day popped up in the air, each letter like a tile.

“‘Where is she?  Give me your teammate or none of them will see the light of day’,” Jess quoted, talking to the team.  “A bit of an odd wording, isn’t it?  Computer, was the program a success?”

“Yes, Clara,” the computer’s female voice said cooly.  “Program 89.2Beta identified the message to be a double.  Odds of this message reaching your hands were 67 to 100.”

“That’s all I needed to know,” Jess said with a twisted grin, tapping on the message in mid air.  The message instantly changed to ‘Are you lying?  I know who you are Clara.  Come out and tell the world the truth.’  “This,” Jess said, turning to the team, “Is what happens when you ignore the past.”

*******

The web warriors were in shock.  They were locked in the training hall with Jess, security cameras off.  She had, by the looks of it, hacked the computer to the point that she had total control of the helicarrier and everything on it.  This was the Jess they had known for a year, the Jess that had fought by their side in every battle, even when she had no obligation to.

As if things could get no worse, Jess added, “Once we clean up this threat mess, I’m leaving the team.”

Danny felt like he had been punched in the stomach.  What was wrong with Jess - mind control, or a nanotech, or....  A small voice in the back of his mind told him that this was the real Jess though, the Jesse that he had caught glimpses of and warned Peter about, all those months ago.

Cutting through the silence, Nova quietly said, “This is what you were talking about with Iron man, wasn’t it, Jess?  ‘Project WW is over.’”

“Is that what we are to you?”  Spider-man said, building on Sam’s angry words.  “A project?  Something you can just end?  We are your team!  You can’t just-”

“I can and I will!”  Jess said furiously, cutting across Peter’s words.  She closed her eyes and sank back into her chair.  “I have to.”

“Fine,” White Tiger said, her mask covering her raging emotions.  “Leave.  But you promised to clean up this mess.  Who or what is killing who and why?  And how did you know about the double message?”

“The Gordon-Lake code was a code that me, Tony Stark, and Widow developed a couple years back.  Because of its letter-to-number transmitting, it’s compatible for what’s called a Trojan horse code, or as you said, a double, and you have no idea what I’m talking about do you?”

The team shook their heads, but said nothing.  Jess continued, “It was never used very much because the Gordon-Lake code was not a very stable one.  In words for the slow ones in this room, it’s easy to break and decode.  Obviously, it’s then useless, unless you do a Trojan horse.  I’m the only one who ever used Gordon-Lake code in a Trojan horse, and only in my person files.  I precoded them as a personal log in the S.H.I.E.L.D. database.”

“Somebody hacked you, didn’t they,” Spider-man said slowly.

“Yes, and that somebody has some very sensitive information on me, and everybody I care about,” she said, with a firm but subtle suggestion that they were not among those people.  Danny felt like he might throw up.  “They’re trying...they’re trying to get me to come out of hiding.”

“Who are they?”  Luke asked coldly, ignoring the fact that Jess wasn’t exactly hiding in his book.  They had bigger problems to deal with - bigger fish to catch.

Jess looked away, refusing to make eye contact with any of them.  “Someone I hoped never to meet with like this.”

Nova glared at the brooding Jess.  “Could you be any less vague, Batman?”

She turned back to the team, her face hard, and said sharply, “No, I can’t.  This is not something I ever wanted to happen, not here, not now, not ever, especially since you...since you’re involved.  I didn’t want you guys to get hurt.  Not because of me.”

Oh no, Danny’s eyes widened with alarm, what have we done?  Jess was trying to protect us this whole time!