Chapter Twenty-Six

A/N: 3k 3k 3k!!! Yes!!! Also, quick shoutout to @stormyxlegacy for the encouragement. Thank you guys, I love you for all your support!! ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

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Ward and I waited for Marco and Tess to leave the bar and opt for one of the small tables scattered around the room, then we approached them.

"Marco and Tess?" asked Grant.

"Who wants to know?" asked Marco. He and Tess were both looking at us with extreme suspicion, and I realized this might be harder than anticipated.

"My name's Derek and this is my fiancee Kayla. We were referred to you by a friend of ours. We're big supporters of your movement."

"What friend?" asked Tess, if anything looking more suspicious.

"Cole Matthews," I said, without hesitation. SHIELD had kept his hacker identity intact, so we didn't have to worry about them knowing he joined SHIELD.

"Really? Well, why don't you two take a seat," said Marco.

Grant and I sat together, waiting for Marco and Tess to initiate the next move.

"So what is it you think you can do for us?" asked Tess, leaning forward on her elbows.

"Anything you need. We're not computer geniuses like the two of you, but we're tired of governments and secret agencies hiding things from the people. Anything we can do to help put a stop to that, we'd love to be a part of," I said. It was hard not to choke on the words as I said them, but I managed.

Tess and Marco looked at each other, still seeming a little skeptical, then turned back to us.

"Give us a minute to discuss," said Tess, gesturing for us to leave.

"Sure thing," said Grant. He took my hand and we stood together, heading back towards the bar.

"Think they bought it?" I asked.

"I think so. You were pretty convincing with your 'freedom of information' speech," he said.

"Thanks," I replied, rolling my eyes.

"Now we wait. Hopefully, they'll let us in."

"Do you think headquarters ever gets tired of us? I mean, we're set to pick up these two, and instead we're trying to infiltrate the Rising Tide."

"As long as we keep getting results, I'm sure headquarters will love whatever we choose to do."

He had a point. We each ordered another drink, then finally, Marco and Tess waved us over.

"Showtime," Grant muttered, taking the lead as we walked back towards their table.

"Alright, you want to join us? Fine. We've got an assignment for you to prove yourselves," said Marco.

I nodded to Grant. "What's the assignment?"

"Since you can't hack, you're going to do face to face stuff, which is much more dangerous," warned Tess.

Grant and I glanced at each other, then turned back to Tess with a determined look.

"Whatever it is, we'll do it," said Grant.

"Okay then. Marco and I were set to meet up with some people later tonight to get a few physical file folders on several large organizations withholding information. Since you both need to prove yourselves, you can go in our place," said Marco.

"Alright. Where's the meet and who's it with?" I asked, trying to sound all business.

"Down by the docks. You're meeting with the head of a tech firm, he should be tall and bald, wearing glasses. We have a code word to make sure we're meeting with the right people. You should say "The docks are nice tonight" and he will reply "Yes, they certainly are." Do you understand?"

Grant and I both nodded.

"Good. Then go. Meet us back here in twenty-four hours," finished Marco.

Grant and I stood, shaking hands with Tess and Marco before heading out the doors of the club.

"I think we did it," I said, climbing into the driver's seat of the car.

"Now we just have to pull off this meet."

"You know, I think code words would be a good idea."

"What?"

"Code words. Like, we should have code words for stuff."

"What do we need code words for?"

"I don't know, just anything that comes up. Like, if someone was pretending to be one of us and the other needed to check or like if one of us gets captured and we have different code words to trigger different courses of action. We need something better than "The docks are nice tonight" though," I mused.

Grant shook his head. "What would you suggest instead?"

"Hmm... maybe Zebra or something, that wouldn't normally come up."

"Zebra? What would that be code for?"

"I don't know! But it can't hurt to have a few good code words prepared in case of emergency."

"I guess I'll keep an ear out for good code words then."

"That would be much appreciated Grant. One of these days something's going to come up and you're going to have to be like "Wow, Samantha, good call on the code words. I'm so lucky to have such a smart and talented partner like you." And I'll be gloating on the inside, but I'll be humble on the outside because I'm just that amazing," I said.

"Okay Slater, keep dreaming. Turn left up here."

I turned and found a good parking space for the car, then Grant and I climbed out and started walking around the docks.

"See anything to do with the guy we're supposed to be meeting yet?"

"No... I'm starting to get a bad feeling about this Samantha, keep an eye out."

"I always keep an eye out."

"Well then keep two out."

I wanted to throw out some witty comeback, but I was starting to get the same feeling as Grant. Something felt off, and I wasn't sure what, but my gut was telling me we could be in some serious danger.

Grant and I stood next to each other as we swept the docks, trying to look inconspicuous while still covering each other's blind spots. Since it was nearing midnight, we didn't have to worry about civilians, but we didn't want to scare off the guy we were supposed to be meeting by giving away the fact that we were Agents of SHIELD.

Suddenly, as we made our way around a big shipping crate, like the kind trains carried, a dozen armed guys with masks came out from the shadows and surrounded us.

"I'm getting the feeling we were set up," said Grant. We moved to stand back to back with each other, both drawing our concealed weapons.

"The docks are nice tonight," I called. I was met with silence. "Yeah, I'm starting to get that feeling, too."

The men surrounding us hadn't attacked yet, which made me think they were waiting for something. After a minute of tense silence, it turned out to be a someone.

"Who are you and what are you doing here?" asked a man, just joining the circle. He was clearly the leader, since all his men had waited for him to show up before doing anything. They wore masks and I got the bad feeling that we had stumbled upon one of the area's gangs.

"We were told to meet someone here," said Grant, taking the lead.

"Told by who? This is our turf! Nobody comes here without our permission."

"Look, this was clearly some kind of mistake. We're not trying to step on any toes, so we'll get out of your way and off your turf," said Grant. He was trying to end this without a fight, but I don't think either of us held out much hope for that solution. Worth a shot, though.

"No, you see, we can't do that. If we let you get away with trespassing, everyone will want to try it. So you're going to have to pay," said the leader, taking a menacing step towards us.

"I count twenty guys," I whispered to Grant out of the corner of my mouth.

"We can take them. Break to your right and go for cover once we're out of this circle. Try not to get shot."

"Got it. Zebra on you."

Grant shot me a look before turning back to the leader of the gang.

"If you're set on making it a fight, then that's that. But if you're trying to keep your street cred, you should try to avoid getting beat in a group of twenty people by just the two of us."

"You're an arrogant one, aren't you? Teach 'em a lesson boys."

"ZEBRA!" yelled Grant, lunging for the nearest guys in the circle to my right and his left. Grant had made the leader mad enough that they wanted more satisfaction than just a bullet in the head, which made it much easier to not get shot. Our window wouldn't be open for long, though.

I ran smack into the nearest guy, knocking him and his buddy unconscious as quickly as possible. Grant had taken out another two, giving us a hole in the circle to slip through.

We ran as fast as we could behind the nearest shipping container so nobody could get a clean shot on us.

"They know this area much better than us, which puts us at a disadvantage," I said, crouching next to Grant and looking around for any attackers trying to get the jump on us.

"They're a bunch of street thugs and we're trained agents. We can deal with their home-court advantage."

We didn't have time to discuss before another ten guys from the circle sprinted around the edge of the container, guns at the ready.

Grant and I managed to get the jump on them, and we got close enough that they couldn't fire without fear of hitting one of their own. We could have taken a shot, but we didn't have the cover to get into a firefight and I always preferred the nonlethal option. Besides, our advantage was in our training, and we had spent years practicing hand to hand combat.

We managed to take down the group of ten, only taking minor damage ourselves.

"Six are still unaccounted for, including the leader," I said, breathing hard. One of those guys had hit me square in the stomach, and he had seriously knocked the wind out of me.

"That doesn't bode well. Let's head for the car, since we don't know the landscape of this area well enough to hope to find them. The leader's arrogance probably means he'll make himself known before he attacks, but be on guard just in case."

"Always," I answered, raising my gun and slowly walking with Grant towards our car. We almost made it to the car before we were ambushed by our missing six guys.

"Not getting out of this that easy!" yelled the leader, rushing me with a knife. I could have shot him in the head, no problem, but I had never killed anyone and I didn't want to start. I holstered my gun and dropped into a crouch, ready to meet the attack.

The leader had absolutely no technique, just strength, which I had learned how to use against an opponent on day one. With a few moves, I took the knife from him and turned him around so I had the knife against his throat, keeping him between me and Grant and the rest of the gang.

The leader cussed me out and called me a bunch of different, colorful names that I can't repeat,  but he couldn't get away from me.

"Guns down," I ordered the rest of his gang. They looked hesitant, but their leader was scared enough to order them to drop their weapons.

Grant started going for the car to get handcuffs, and some of the guys took a few steps forward, but I held the knife closer to their leader's neck.

"Don't move," I warned.

Grant came back quickly, handcuffing the five gang members without knives to their necks before they could think of running. Grant handcuffed the leader, and I pulled out my phone to call someone to pick these guys up.

I wasn't sure who to call, so I called Coulson, and he said he'd figure it out.

After waiting a few minutes, several local cop cars rolled up to collect our captured baddies.

"There's another fourteen unconscious back there a ways," I said, gesturing towards the area where we'd first been ambushed.

"Wow. We've been after these guys for a long time. Nice job," said the lead cop.

"Thanks!"

"My name's Officer Tom Ryan, if you ever need anything, let me know. I'd love to help you in return for helping me finally get these guys behind bars."

"Well, thank you, Officer Ryan. I appreciate it."

"No problem ma'm," he said, smiling and tipping his hat as I walked back to the car with Grant.  Grant looked disgusted.

"What's the problem?" I asked.

"He was flirting with you."

"No he wasn't!"

"Yes, he was. For a spy, you're completely blind."

I huffed and threw open my door, and Grant did the same.

"Whatever," I said, "Let's forget it and go find the hackers who set us up."