More Than One Way

The smell of copper filled my nose. Which was a good thing, of course. The men looked around, desperately wanting to find me. I had just taken down three of their men without them seeing me at all. This made them terrified, which also made them sloppy. And that, my friends, gave me the upper hand.

I hopped down from hiding in the dark ceiling and landed quietly and gracefully behind one of the men that had trailed away from the rest of them. I grabbed a random rope that was nearby and wrapped it around his neck before he could scream out for help. As soon as he was unconscious, I was back up in the ceiling and crawling to a new location.

There was only two men left. I knew that I could take them down easily. So I jumped down, letting my black boots hit him in the face. He fell unconscious with a soft thud. The last guy turned around and aimed his small pistol at me. He ordered me to freeze. I put a hand on my hip and cocked my head to the side. I gave him this look, as if saying, ‘do you really think I’m gonna do that?’

As soon as he started to shoot, I was jumping from wall to wall, zig-zagging to confuse him. And it worked. I pounced on him and pulled the gun out of his hands. I used the handle of it to hit his forehead and he was out just like the rest.

I stood up and placed the gun in my holster, replacing the gun that I had already used as a distraction. I walked swiftly to the end of the room where the giant safe was located. Examining the keypad, I noticed the smudged numbers indicating that whoever unlocked and relocked this safe, didn’t wear gloves. The oils from their fingers easily gave away the pass code. I grabbed one of the guard’s gloves and put it over my own hand.

Punching it in, I bit my lip. What if this wasn’t worth it? What if it was just like the others? I shook my head, letting the negative thoughts slip out of my brain. The safe’s door opened as I ripped the glove off and threw it back down on the floor.

In the middle of the safe was a podium with a glass case covering the white box. Inside that box could be the answers to my prayers. Then I wouldn’t have to steal for a living and I could go back to being a normal person. The box was a bit heavy, making me believe that there was a lot of the dosage inside of it. I grabbed it and ran out of the safe and up the wall to the ceiling where I came from.

When I got out of the building, I thought I was safe. But I was greatly mistaken. Many soldiers were standing before me with different guns pointed at me. I stopped completely, trying to analyze how to escape. I was surrounded my guns, not to mention there was a few helicopters standing by.

I sighed softly and stood my ground as one of the men in a uniform approached me. He took the box and handed it off to other man. Then he grabbed a hold of my hands and forced me to walk forward. I obeyed, even though I knew that I failed. Not only did I fail myself, I failed my mother.

The soldier lead me to one of the helicopter where I was handcuffed to one of the chairs. I just hung my head low as the men were mumbling to one another. The one that had the white box, opened it and handed it off to one of the other soldiers. That’s when they stared to ask me questions.

I didn’t answer any of them. That caused them to become angry. They slapped me, hit me, kicked me. They even threatened to shoot me. But I didn’t break. I never broke. They wanted to know what I had broke into a top secret laboratory and stole something as big as that. But I only stared them in face with my hard, dark look and didn’t say a word.

The helicopter touched down around four in the morning. It was still dark outside. But the sun would be coming up any moment. After being dragged out of the aircraft and into a building in what I believe to be in the middle of nowhere, the first thing I smelled was something strong and roasted like. The smell was what I learned to be coffee.

But I stayed focus. They lead me to an office that was high up in the building. The room wasn’t too flashy. Not too big either. It was a reasonable sized office. A desk, a couple of chairs, a few other things that cluttered the room. And the windows were huge. Covered the whole wall.

A tall, black man was sitting in the chair that was behind the desk. He had an eye-patch on and a long, black trench coat. I made sure to leave my face emotionless.

I was suddenly thrown to the ground by the two soldiers that had brought me. I fell to my knees and just stared at the ground. I didn’t exactly know what was going to happen to me, but I wasn’t afraid. I couldn’t afford to be afraid at this point.

“We found your freak for you,” one of them shouted, “She‘s all yours. And we expect that money soon, Fury!”

They stormed out of the office, leaving me with the man with the eye-patch. He stood up, clearing his throat, causing me to look up. I followed suit and stood. He motioned me to sit, which I did. He sat back down and ran his hands along the folder that he had on his desk.

“Well, Miss Robin Galifahy, you are one hard person to find,” He said opening the folder.

My lip twitched when he said my last name. I didn’t hear it a lot and that caused it to sound foreign on his tongue. Well, technically it was. I shrugged my shoulders once before picking at the dark blue nail polish on my nails.

He pushed a piece of paper towards me, causing me to sit up and look at it. I already knew what it was, but I read it over anyways. All they needed was my signature. Then they could use me like a lab rat.

I sighed softly and stated, “We’ve been over this before, Fury. I can’t do this right now. Maybe in a few years, bu-”

“But you need to find medicine for your mother?”

There was a slight smirk forming at his lips. Of course he knew the reason behind all my crimes. I guess it was just the fact that he said it out loud. I quickly shut my mouth and stared at him, glaring.

My mother was sick. I didn’t, nor none of my clan knew what it was. So, I was chosen to find out what it was and a cure for her. Turns out she had brain cancer. And apparently, there was no cure for cancer. So I’ve been sneaking around top secret laboratories stealing so called ‘cures’.

He pushed the paper towards me a bit more before relaxing in his chair. I pushed a piece of my dark hair behind my pointed ear, looking down at the paper.

“You know, I could find someone to help your mother,” He said looking at me, “All you have to do is sign.”

I closed my eyes, knowing that he was right. He could find someone to help my mom. But the question was, would he? That was a risk I had to take. A smug smile broke out on his face when I lifted my hand, in which he placed a pen inside.

I scribbled my name on the straight line at the bottom before slapping the pen back down on the desk. He didn’t flinch. He was too proud of himself.

“Welcome to the Avengers Initiative.”