Summary:Agent Petrovna is sent to WAND. Is this a hazing? Log Info:Storyteller: None |
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"Go take this to WAND." Laynia had been told. She'd been given a box wrapped in brown paper that says 'DO NOT OPEN' in very thick sharpie letters and told where the WAND section door was. Said door turned out to be a broom closet which when opened revealed a swirling golden vortex that had immediately sucked her in. A very brief eternity later, she'd found herself standing in a multilevel stone room with monitors and holograms and what look like crystal balls and all manner of people walking around many of whom are quite clearly not human.
"Can I help you?" There's a well built, brown haired man standing near the spot where Laynia just appeared in a puff of light and butterflies, next to a tattoo'd asian who seems to have a folder that's got orientation materials in it.
"I'm Agent Turner, by the way. This is Prospect Kurita. Did you get a bit lost, Miss…?"
Okay, you know, even for Laynia being sucked through a portal of golden light is a bit of a 'trippy' trip. She's fairly used to teleportaion, she DOES it after all — sort of. Not having any experience with WAND she didn't know what to expect, but this? Definitely would not have even been in the running for a guess!
Eyes of cinnamon peer about at the menagerie, at the bizarre mix of Hogwarts and Babylon 5, and then with hrmph, and a nod she turns to answer the man who just just addressed her.
"Perhaps?" Laynia admits. "Agent Laynia Petrovna, attached to SHIELD and SWORD." A nod. "I have this package, was told to bring to WAND, door I was pointed too had golden portal…then I was here. So…is this WAND then?" She smiles to Prospect Kurita. "Privyet."
"Uh hi." The tattooed woman says. She's tiny really, particularly compared to Koa. Short, standing at 4'11" and slender - fit though - her arms and torso covered in tattooes and marks.
She's clutching the folder to her and glances to Koa when Laynia speaks. "This is WAND, yes. Were you told who to bring it to?"
"This is WAND yes." Koa nods. He peers at the package and sees a little marking on it. "May I… oh, yes. That's for me. Well, her really." He jerks his head to Keiko. "But we shouldn't open it here. Why don't you both come back to my office. Prospect Kurita's just been meeting people and now it's time to fill out forms."
He motions to the two women to follow him and heads up the stairs.
"That accent is… Russian, yes? Keiko's from Peru, though I know she doesn't quite sound it." Also Keiko is not a Hispanic name, though Peru DID import a lot of Japanese farmers back in the day.
"I don't believe I've seen you around before, Agent Petrovna. Oh, don't shake that box Keiko. I'd hate for you to vanish or turn into salt."
Is that a joke… it has to be yes?
Laynia not a /big/ girl, but she's solid - somewhere between farmer's daughter and model in build, not really in either niche, too sturdy for model, too curvy for farmer's daughter. She's also about a head taller than Keiko, though half a head shorter than the muscular Koa Turner.
"You have beautiful body art, Prospect Kurita…and no, was not given name, just box and 'go there'." She seems a blend of vexed and amused. "Still, gold portal - nice touch."
She nods, "MMmm." And goes along to Koa's office. "Peru, is nice country, or…was. Have not been recently." She smiles then as the question. "I am relatively new, only onboard a few weeks, so da, am new." She walks with hands clasped in the small of her back, and keeps a wary eye on everything around her. She does looks quizzically at Koa about the saltage, though, she's really hoping that's not a thing, and she'll have words with the clerk who gave her the box if it proves to be so!
Keiko's accent is a bastardized version from south america. Hard to say where she had come from and yes, she looks very asian. "Rad tebya videt" she finally adds to Laynia, nice to meet you in Russian. Not well accented but it's not bad - like someone who has lived with a russian speaker for a while.
The art that Laynia comments on is of animals. Wolf, Harpy Eagle, Raven, Tarantula and two Mythical creatures - a dragon and Barghest. All so very lifelike though they're features seem corrupted, demonic in many ways.
"You know Illyana won't let me sign these without someone to check them over, Koa." She says quietly. "Gracias, Agent Petrovna. They have been with me for a long while." As they walk, Laynia will see the silvery tattoo on Keiko's back - the outline is that of an imp and it covers her from neck to hips.
Interesting too how she moves between english, russian and spanish.
"What's in the box for me?" the peruvian takes the box from Laynia, handling it carefully. "He probably isn't joking about that - packages around here, things in general … can do things. And call me Keiko. Most everyone does."
She's a serious little thing, Keiko is. No joy shows on her face.
Turner's office turns out to be part standard agent office and part museum. There's little trinkets, masks and statuettes all over the place, and a few on his desk that are clearly being studied. Some are greek, others egyptian, some slavic or chinese or… well, most anything one can think of. He sits down at the desk and motions for the other two to make themselves comfortable.
"If you've not been here long you probably haven't been down here before then? I know some folks like to send newbies to WAND to freak them out a little."
As Keiko is making her way in Laynia will see a puff of smoke on Keiko's shoulder. A cat appears. It has two heads, one of which looks like it was surgically attached. "Meow. Meow." The heads go in stereo.
The cat tosses a dead trout at Laynia's lap, offering a gift, rubs one head on Keiko's hair and then vanishes as quickly as it came.
Koa coughs. That might be WHY newbies get sent here. "Annnnnyway, yes Keiko, I'll help you read it. Maybe Agent Patrovna will too. Would you mind terribly, Agent? Keiko here never learned. She had kind of an odd childhood."
He starts to flip through the pages, scanning and then motioning for Keiko to offer some to Laynia. "So what is it that you DO for SHIELD, exactly? Keiko here is a… arcane summoning specialist."
He'll let her get further into that if she likes.
"Oh, you can open that box now."
What's inside appears to be a knife, a small stack of stone wafers, a box of what LOOKS like sugar cubes and several pouches.
"Ah, your utility kit." Koa takes one of the cubes and tosses it at a little tin soldier on one of his file cabinets… which turns into salt.
"It's temporary, thankfully. But highly inconvenient when recruits do it to themselves."
Laynia's accent is Muscovite, pure Moscow. Her English is actually quite good, but Russian is definitely the woman's first language. She lights right up with Keiko replies in Russian. "Vy khorosho govorite na russkom." You speak Russian well. "Illyana, good Russian name." She comments, then hands the box over to Keiko as the smaller woman reaches, but frowns a bit at the news about the non-joking. "Da? I will have to speak to mailroom clerk who delivered to me then, should have warning label beyond 'Do not open'."
A warm laugh at the newbies thing, and then Laynia. "Ah, is good thing then, to be part of hazing means acceptance. I suppose I will not do terrible thing to clerk."
Her eyes are alight with mirth, however.
Which lasts until she receives a gift of dead trout in her lap. Acutely aware of dead fish, she picks it up by the tail, and looks to Keiko. "Thank your friend?" She doesn't know about the tats, but the thing DID nuzzle Keiko, so that's not a big stretch, and then sets it aside on some papers that don't look important. She hopes.
Attention returns to Koa as he asks her to read, and Laynia smiles. "Da, I would be most happy to assist. So long as is in English, of course, I do not speak Spanish or Japanese." Obviously Russian is an option, she doesn't mention it. A smile at the question. "Field Agent, Mister Turner, I have power over Darkforce but also espionage training. Codename is Darkstar."
The utility kit is DEFINITELY not the sort of 'standard issue' rig she's used to. The salt thing? Wow. Laynia just stares at the poor ex-tin-now-salt soldier. "Bozhe moi."
It's the weight on Keiko's shoulder that has the woman looking. "Besas!" It's the closest thing to a smile that Laynia has seen. When the cat rubs its ears in her hair, Keiko rubs back and then its gone. "I wanted to visit with her …"
Yes, Keiko's decided that's a her.
"Illyana is my … " her eyes cut to Koa, fingers touching the black leather with pink silvery lines running through it, that has literally melded with the flesh on her neck. "… friend." That might explain why she speaks Russian, yes?
"If I knew I could find Illyana, I would ask her to check these but …" she lets Laynia have the folder as she peers into the box. "I read a bit now, Koa…" comes the slightly reproachful response. "Field kit? What is it I'm supposed to do with these? I would just call Bella or Mirlo or Cullen if I was in trouble."
"What's in the pouches?"
Koa holds his hand out for the fish and as he does, the cat reappears in his hand. "Meow. Meow." Then it leaps to Keiko's lap, starts kneading and settles down.
"Well. Wish granted. Don't say I never did anything for you." Koa says dryly. That thing STINKS of formaldehyde.
"Just make sure we're not asking her to sell her soul, her first born - er, second born - or anything like that. Illyana is a big believer in reading contracts before you sign them. And yes, good Russian name." He'd say 'for a good Russian' but 'good' is probably not the word for her. Decent, yes. 'Good' is possibly stretching the definition of the word beyond what it will handle.
The packet really IS a standard SHIELD HR packet. Laynia's probably seen a lot of that paperwork recently.
"The stones are emergency teleport wafers. Break one and it'll bring you back here. The knife is an athame, it's part of the uniform, and the salt is for capturing hard to deal with things. Or repelling ghosts." Koa says matter of factly as he also reads. "The pouches are for holding all of that. They SHOULD be empty but if one of them has dessicated centipedes in it, er, just dump those. That's old issue."
WAND is rather strange.
"So what IS the Darkforce, Agent? I'm afraid I'm not familiar and it's definitely not something that's come up in my arcane experience. Assuming I'm not asking about anything that's overly classified?"
"Ah, a friend, is good." Laynia is thinking 'lover', and is totally unconcerned by that. The heart loves what the heart loves after all, right? She's not right about the lover thing, probably…but that's not an unreasonable mis-leap to make given context. DEFINITELY would explain the Russian too.
While Keiko explores the kit and Koa explains, Laynia reads over the contract and is pleasantly surprised to find it a standard HR packet! THIS she is familiar with. "Oh, is good, same packet I was given, Keiko. I will read carefully, and also aloud if you wish, but is standard packet." She DOES make sure of that of course.
She does find the cat zombie a curious mix of cute but horrifying. Actually 'X but horrifying' seems apt for a lot of this place!
"Darkforce? Is dimension of fear and darkness, I have symbiotic link to it, my mutant power allows me to control with great facility. Is not classified."
Cinnamon eyes go black, dark wisps rising around them as she manifests a small black mouse in her hand. A construct only, but reasonably accurate save it is /pure/ black…something, not entirely matter or energy. With a grin it floats a few inches over her hand as she concentrates to make it move about as if walking on a floor only it can see.
It's a reasonable leap to make and it's not one that Keiko would ever consider. This is going to be interesting later, for sure.
With Besas back, Keiko's face softens a little and she scritches the monstrosities ears. "I wonder if I should get Elena a pet, Koa. An earth pet, not a demon and not a spirit bound to her…" Poor Laynia, that's got to make her wonder. "Piotr … I don't know what Piotr would think. He wasn't happy about me coming here."
"Uh, you should read it aloud and I'll listen. Illyana will want to know that I did." The peruvians attention is fixed on Laynia, leaving the rest of the field kit on the desk for the moment. Dessicated centipedes? Besas might like those, though.
As the darkforce manifests and starts to float, Keiko frowns and rubs her arms. "It's a form of magic but by the darkchild, it feels different… almost … cold." Keiko's never really spoken about how magic feels on her tattooes.
When Keiko swears 'by the Darkchild', Koa looks up from his reading but doesn't say anything. Bezas though leans forward and both heads make sort of excited trilling sounds. It MIGHT pounce. Possibly.
Or it might teleport which is what it does, vanishing and appearing mid air to try to drop down onto the construct.
"A dimension of fear and darkness?" Turner's eyebrows lift. "That sounds rather familiar does it not, Keiko?" It sounds a lot like Plokta's domain. Laynia gets a 'what an odd coincidence' kind of look.
"How did you come to have that link, if I may ask? Please don't say you were raised in a cult."
He sounds quite serious about that.
"If you keep swearing by her name, Keiko, she MIGHT show up at some point." She probably can't hear it, sure but Names are odd like that.
It is a bit odd to see such /normal/ behavior from a formaldehyde reeking two headed -teleporting- cat, and yet that is just what Laynia is seeing. Part of why she created a mouse was to see how the creature reacted to it. It lacks any scent really, and it is definitely cold, it also makes no sounds.
Laynia needs a fair amount of concentration to make it move around, so when Besas port-pounces, she grins and the mouse wisps out of existence - the Darkforce sort of attenuating into 'smoke' and then vanishing.
A nod to Keiko. "I read aloud then." She smiles to Koa to make sure that's okay, then does so. Should Keiko have any questions she'll be patience itself in answering to the best of her own knowledge.
To Koa. "Fear, Darkness and Cold, da. Is not comfortable place for most - can cause madness. with prolonged exposure. Fortunately I am safe there, and those in contact with me are protected for most part, is best not to linger, though."
She laughs softly at the cult question. "Nyet, was raised in state run orphanage, trained to be Soviet Super Soldier. My link is mutant power, is deeper than I originally thought…is complicated." Isn't everything?
Politely. "May I ask who Darkchild is?"
"Sort of? Plokta was the giver of wishes though, fear … wasn't his thing but there's other he used. What were they're names? They drew on similar power, didn't they?" There's a meaningful look at Koa, who had tried to drain one of them. "It's strange though and maybe there's a tie in…?"
Keiko scritches Besas' ears as she readies to pounce, not wincing as the cats claws dig in.
"You … is it the same program Piotr and Mikhail were made part of, Koa?" All so very good Russian names.
"The Darkchild? It's Illyana, she … " a look to Koa "If it calls her, then she can read these and I'll sign and she can tell Piotr that I was careful." For a moment, there's something much younger about Keiko, than the early thirties and experiences written on her face.
"Can we say it's complicated?" she finally finishes to Laynia, though she might want to clarify a few things.
"Doctor Eclipse and Master Darque." Koa supplies. "Nasty customers." Darkforce users? Maybe, maybe not. Now Koa's going to look into their files and see, again, though.
Bezas huffs as her prey disappears. She looks around for a few moments and then teleports back to Keiko's lap.
"Doubt it…" Koa murmurs. "I don't know that either of the Rasputins were ever in a super soldier program though it might be worth a look…" Rasputin? There's a name from history and not really a common one.
"The Darkchild is kind of sort of her god. Ess." That should make things clear as mud for Laynia.
In fact clear as mud probably describes her entire trip down to WAND.
"I have never thought of Darkforce Dimension as magical place." Definitely not Tahiti! "But could be? I know there are others who can manipulate it, I am perhaps stronger than most, but cannot say. My link to it is very strong." Laynia is not unwilling to entertain that it is might be magic, however. That would actually explain a lot. "So far as I know there is no life there, none but me, or…my other self." See? Complicated!
At the names. "I do not know any Piotr, but I have met Mikhail Nikolaievitch Rasputin…my program is older, but he was in similar." Laynia smiles when Koa adds the Rasputin, so she nods to Keiko. "I think it must be same person, but not same program. Or…later iteration of same, hard to say. We met in Mutant Town." Okay, yeah, a lot of clear as mud going on right here. From all parties involved.
"The closest to peer I recall was Blackout, his powers were very similar to mine, but it has been decades, do not know if he even lives anymore."
A blink. "I see…a god. Ess." Laynia's mud obscured vision thinks now the Darkchild is some sort of shapeshifter or perhaps hermaphrodite. Hey! She doesn't know!
Definitely this is one of the weirder days Laynia's had - which is saying a lot.
Looking to Keiko and Koa, she rubs her chin. "I could show you, if you wish." Laynia offers. "The dimension."
Keiko sighs. Her personal life is so confusing. "Goddess. Splinter Lord of another dimension." She explains. "Maybe one day, I will tell you more. But Mikhail is my brother in law. Piotr is his brother and was taken to be in a russian government program as well." beat "I don't think the Mikhail you met and my brother in law are different."
There's not that many coincidences in the world.
"The way you draw energy, it's magic or close enough to it that I can feel it with my tattooes." Keiko casts a look to Koa and nods slowly "I would like to see it, see … if it's like anything we've seen or felt before. It might be important."
Koa nods slowly, clearly weighing things. "Fair enough. Possibly not the best idea right this second. I'd want some more kit before I stepped anywhere like that. But yes, might be good to investigate."
By way of explanation he nods to the Russian agent. "We've dealt with beings that are from or draw on a dimension of darkness and fear. If you're connected to them in any way it would be good to know, both for you and us. They're likely to hold a grudge and they're not the kind of people you can simply get rid of."
He sighs. "I think you can sign these Keiko. When you're ready." And when Laynia is done reading.
"Before you go, Laynia, would you a bit of a snack? I think I saw some Pirozhki in the break room." Why would that be there? Welllll the breakroom table MIGHT have anticipated the Russian guest.
Yes. The table.
Goddess…good, that's much easier on the brain-meats of one Laynia Sergeievna Petrovna Krylova! And just you try saying /that/ mouthful of a name five times fast. She smiles. "He was nice, polite, wanted Kvass after helping unload van for shelter along with others there." Laynia has to agree that the chance of there being TWO Mikhail Nikolaievitch Rasputins in the world, and both in Russian military programs is slim, still. "Just to be absolutely certain is same man - is your brother in-law Cosmonaut, Keiko?" Okay, that's got to be the clincher! Not that one was really needed.
Darksar does look a little concerned at the thought of others messing with her Darkforce, that's -not- cool. "I think it will be good idea to find out if they are same people, yes." She looks concerned at Keiko's assertion she is drawing on magic, she knows very little about it, unless tales of Baba Yaga count! But in the tales the unwary always paid a heavy price.
A sigh. "Da, Koa Turner, I agree we need to look into, and understand if you want better kit. Is not a safe place, even with me there, is not safe to stay long."
Laynia is very happy to read the papers to Keiko and help her get them all signed.
"Pirozhki? That sounds nice…do you have strong black tea?" Too much to hope for Russian, but who knows? Not her.
The table? Well, okay, maybe The Table Knows!
"Da. Mikhael was missing for many years, though he might not have told you that. But that is my brother." Brother. The Rasputins have become family for Keiko and she might be finally starting to admit that.
"Pirozhki? I would like that." She'll listen to Laynia though and then sign those papers first.
Piotrs gonna kill her.
"Yeah, we always have tea. Gotta for reading tea leaves for one thing and if you're going to do that might as well be good tea." Koa gets up from behind his desk and his eyes gleam just faintly red for a moment. "Also brain bleach, but you shouldn't need that." Beat. "Yet."
"Come on Agent and Agent-To-Be. Let's go fortify ourselves before we once again storm the walls of bureaucracy."
Welcome to WAND. Where the banal and the weird walk side by side.
Mass Hysteria, I tell you.