Flarfegnugen

 

            “So… that guy,” begins Agent Barton, taking a sip of his bottled water and pointing towards the corpse that lay on a table in the holding cell before them. “Can turn into a dragon? How does that work?” He really didn’t know why they put him in a holding cell; the guy was dead, right?

            “Brilliant observation, Agent Barton,” Phil replies dryly, standing with his hands clasped behind his back. They were waiting on the director to come debrief them, staring at the ravenette lying on the table. “I have no idea. I suppose Director Fury will have to explain it for us.”

            “I would if I could,” the director states, walking up to them, looking nearly as tired as Phil. He offers a file to the brunette, who looks it over briefly before handing it over to Barton.

            “This… is all we have on this guy? Physical appearance, name, and that he was captured and restrained… a little over a hundred years ago. How was he even still alive after so long? Did they freeze him or something?” Barton was clearly baffled at their lack of intelligence on the male. A noise inside the chamber before them causes all but Phil to jump slightly, who simply shakes his head and starts towards the door.

            “I’ll do the interrogation,” is all he says before entering, the events of the night already too surprising for him to find it strange that the man was still alive. He stares at him, gasping softly on the table, still unconscious but breathing now, the wound in his skull just finishing closing up. A short while later, his slitted blood red eyes flutter open, staring at nothing for a few moments before flicking to Phil. “Sorry about the headache, didn’t know how else to subdue you.”

            “Hm…” the gravelly tone of his voice was still there, the rumble not from his throat, but from his chest. Turning his head to the right, he coughs and spits out the bullet that had entered his brain onto the floor next to Phil’s feet. The brunette looks down at it, nudging the twisted metal with the toe of his shiny black dress shoe before looking back up to the restrained male tiredly.

            “You’ve made my day longer than it should have been, Jeremy Williams. So I’m going to ask you a few questions, and you’re going to answer them. That clear?”

            “Unlock these cuffs and it will be… if not, they’re coming off anyway.” Jeremy lifts his arm as far as it will go, gazing at the shackle around his wrist as though it were a bug that landed uninvited upon his skin. With a quick glance to Fury and receiving a nod back, the brunette unlocks the cuffs, then steps back a few feet. “You know it won’t help, if I were to attack you.”

            “Pardon?” The ravenette motions to the space between them and shrugs, rubbing his wrists before standing to stretch, several pops resounding off the glass. Phil shrugs and rests his palm on his gun, taking yet another step backwards. The distance would at least give him the time to unholster the weapon and lift it, hopefully squeezing off a round before Jeremy caught him. “So why did you ask for me to unlock them, if you could do it yourself?”

            “Courtesy, Agent Coulson. And I didn’t want you shooting me again. Do you know what it feels like for a bullet to ricochet around in your skull? Not pleasant, rips up your brain before finally settling, still hot from the friction of it traveling down the barrel. It’s like someone making scrambled eggs with your brain matter with a spatula they heated up and stuffed down a garbage disposal.”

            “Wait, how do you know my name?”

            “Do you think that I wasn’t listening to you all chatter on the radio? I have very good hearing you know.” Phil shakes his head a little and stuffs his hand not on his gun in his pants pocket.

            “Our file on you is… minimal at best. Tell me about yourself, who you are, what you are, and why you were being held in D level, which was apparently above my pay grade.”

            “Tsk, tsk, that’s not a question, Agent Coulson. I said I’d answer questions, not commands. And it would be wise never to do that again, I don’t particularly like it.”

            “Fine… Could you tell me about who you are, what you are, and why you’re here?”

            The ravenette shifts a little, then walks towards the door, looking out of the window next to it at the two men watching from the other side. With a smirk, he lifts his finger and begins writing in the glass, backwards, so the two could read the words, the scratching filling the room’s silence. ‘Nice eye patch. Arrow boy, next time, why don’t you give up after the fifth arrow?’ Barton gives him a funny look before crossing his arms over his chest, apparently not fond of the nickname.

            “I can’t tell you everything about me… that would take far too long. What I am… Well, that’s also something I can’t really explain right now. Why I was being held? That’s something different. See, a little over a hundred years ago, the organization from which this one grew out of decided that it was best for the world that I be restrained. Some jackass human thought I was a threat when all I wanted to do was rip Viktor’s heart out and make him eat it. They surprised me, caught me off-guard, and shoved a piece of wood through my chest, thinking that it would kill me. When all it did was paralyze me, they had me frozen. And this was before cryogenic freezing, so they shoved me into a little tiny box and poured liquid nitrogen into the tanks. Well, over time, I managed to discreetly turn off the valves, until the wood thawed enough for my ribcage to force it out as it healed. That was earlier.” Jeremy turns to the brunette, leaning against the glass, picking dirt from beneath his fingernails as he waits for another question.

            “I see…” was all Agent Coulson could get out before the other started talking again.

            “Get the eye patch in here; I need to talk to him. And you, go wash that blood off your cuff, it’s driving me nuts.” Blinking, the brunette looks down at his cuffs, frowning as he finds the droplet of blood. “Don’t ask questions I know you’re going to, just go do it. Use arrow boy’s water, he’s not drinking it.” Phil Coulson nearly loses his composure as Jeremy calls Barton ‘arrow boy’, masking his short snicker by pretending he needed to cough, leaving the man through the door he stood by. Fury raises his good eyebrow at the request but enters the room, the ravenette smirking as Coulson persuades the archer to let him use some water on his cuff.

            “So, what did you need to talk with me about, Jeremy?” Fury asks calmly, watching the man with scrutiny.

            “I have a request. You’re not going to like it, but I need it,” he starts, turning to the tall black man. Despite the director’s height, the ravenette was still taller, though his slightly-slouched stance didn’t show it well. “I need a pint of blood from twenty males. And I need it in a bag of some sorts… something that won’t leak, rip, or break. And then I need you all to go away for a little while. You’ll know when I’m finished.”

            “Why? I can’t just give you the blood from twenty of my men just because you asked for it.”

            “And there you go asking questions! I’m not just asking for it, I need it, because if I don’t get it, you’re not going to like me very much. Instead of only having killed one person today, I’ll add you and arrow boy to the list. I’m trying to establish a working relationship with you; I can’t do that if you’re sitting there smelling like my next meal.”

            “Meal?” Phil asks, walking into the cell.

            “Yes, meal. Now, is it going to happen or…?” The director contemplates the request for a moment, then brings his walkie-talkie up to his lips, sending the order out to his assistant. Jeremy smiles and leans back against the glass, crossing his arms over his chest loosely in a relaxed stance. “See? That wasn’t so difficult was it? Now, this won’t go unrewarded… I’ll explain some more when I’m finished. Shoo.” The ravenette shoos them off like children out of a kitchen, sitting down on the table with a light sigh.

            Fury shakes his head and shuts the door, beckoning Barton and Coulson out of the observation room, contemplating Jeremy quietly. He stops some way down the hallway and leans against the wall, tapping his chin with his first knuckle. Shortly, a woman pushing a cart laden with a large black body bag passes them, looking quite disgusted with her task.

            “That was quick,” Phil notes, rubbing his face with his hand. He really wished he could just sleep, but he also knew that he wouldn’t be able to until they talked to Jeremy more. “So what’s the plan, Director?”

            “Well… Viktor is the only one that seemed to know anything about him. Barton, did you happen to catch what they were saying?”

            “Nickname’s Hawk-eye, not Hawk-ear,” the archer shakes his head as he speaks.

            “Or ‘Arrow Boy’,” Phil quips, getting a chuckle from Fury.

            “I guess we’ll just have to see what he says then. Don’t know what he wanted with the-“ The woman that had just passed them comes running back, covering her mouth as though she were about to throw up. Phil jogs over to the door, but can’t open it, Jeremy’s voice coming over the com.

            “Stop trying, Coulson, you’re not going to open it,” he purrs softly, the metal of the door metamorphosing into a solid sheet of metal. “I’ll change it back when I’m done, be patient…” True to his word, the door becomes a door again a few minutes later, allowing them back into the darkened room. The lights flicker back on, Jeremy laying on the table staring up at the ceiling, body bag gone from the room. The only thing odd was the fact that he was now wearing pants, pants made of a shiny black fabric and zippered up one leg.

            “Uhhhmm…” Barton starts, earning a wicked grin from the man inside the cell, who jumps off the table and walks over to the glass, the material rippling and parting for him to pass through with ease. Agent Coulson immediately grabs his gun, but before he can even lift it, the ravenette is upon him, thrusting him against the wall with his gun knocked to the floor.

            “Agent Coulson… I have something to tell you…” Jeremy leans in and whispers into the man’s ear before letting him go, chuckling softly before running a hand through his long black hair. “You can tell them if you’d like, I don’t care.” Turning to Fury, he straightens and looks him straight in the eye. “You humans call my kind vampire, though it’s not as simple as that. You call us that because we can only consume liquids, namely, blood.”

            “You can’t eat human food?” Fury blinks, surprised by this.

            “Well, I can’t eat solids. They make me throw up… And you’d want to barf too, knowing what’s in some of your food. Never eat a hot dog, ever. It’s so disgusting…”

            “I like hot dogs,” Agent Coulson blinks, now on the bench a few feet to the left.

            “Of course you do,” Jeremy quips, earning a look from the brunette.

            “Did you just…”

            “I did.”

            “Hm, well then.” Barton looks between them confusedly, while the director simply shakes his head. The large African American goes to speak, only to be silenced by Jeremy.

            “Well, it’s time for me to go now. Your computers were extremely helpful… I’ve been hacking them the entire time we were talking, but don’t worry, I’m not going to ruin you or anything. I just needed information about who you are, what you do, and the outside world. I’ve been asleep for a hundred and four years after all.” He turns around as he speaks, walking up to the glass and running a finger down it. Before they could stop him, he steps forward, disappearing into a portal that opens before him, closing with a soft pop. The director sighs and stares at the spot for a moment, then turns to Phil.

            “You can go to sleep now, Agent Coulson. You too Agent Barton.” Coulson gives a relieved sigh as the man walks away.

            “Finally…”