One Wish Upon a Star (Secret Avengers)

[razor]

Nick Fury

"Ain't you heard... Nick Fury's got more lives than a cat!"

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"Final initiation sequence. Execute kill order if mass event occurs and biometric changes."


Three blips on the screen. Then a green one, confirming the status for the kill order if need be. This was also set for the other members of this ragtag group that he had gotten together. Fury had three of the original four horsemen of the Apocalypse. Deadpool, Gambit, and Blob were all... Morally ambiguous at best. The hero life didn't suit them. Too hard to be a hero, too soft to be a villain. The Merc had too much of a heart. He had a desire to do good, but his actions didn't imply that to the masses. The Thief was a thief. No other words about it, but he had a heart. That much was certain. Same with the Blob. Nothing would get rid of that big heart of his.
A buncha pansies, is what Fury would normally would say.


At the same time, this was something that they were needing to do. Their hearts hurt for the things that they did for Apocalypse. They needed to do something. Wolverine was untraceable, sadly, but the essence of the team was here. These three needed each other now. They needed to do something for the world too. To give back, in a way. Something that they couldn't do without.


To all three members of this little squad, a few blips would come from a device given to them by their Nick Fury LMD. The device would say "It's time."
The device, whenever they pressed the button, they would be teleported into a stealth jet with Nick Fury looking at them with crossed arms.

---

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[aquarius]

He'd been worried about this signal. Gambit knew it was coming, but until then he only had to keep a low profile, which didn't entirely mesh with his lifestyle. Once it came though? He knew enough to expect that it would get ten times worse, if he was lucky. He'd already contemplated various plans and ideas for the parts of the mission he knew about, and naturally speculated about what parts he didn't. Which of course lead to thinking about what parts he'd never be told about. Nick Fury was basically the king of secrets, after all. He'd only share them with someone he trusted, and that's why he told nobody his secrets.

A wise policy, Gambit had to admit.

Still, the signal came and he knew what was needed of him. Time to get caught up in yet another world crisis that had a high chance of ruining his life forever - assuming he lived through it of course.

He picked up a small bag of what he considered essentials, a few changes of clothes and some difficult to obtain tools of his chosen trade, and after a deep breath he pressed his button and let the world shimmer and change around him until he was face to face with (almost certainly an LMD of) the most secretive man in the world.

"You rang?"

[Ysmir]

"Cool. I always knew atheists would someday save the world."

---

A few claps came from the front of the stealth jet. Walking from the cockpit of the aircraft on autopilot came a sleek looking fellow in a fashionable white and black trenchcoat. He held his arms out when he beheld Remy LeBeau.

"The 'Ragin' Cajun' himself -- such a riveting nom de plume. It is a travesty we've had so few opportunities such as this to exercise our skills together, no?" The thief cocked his head, crossing his wrists behind his back.

Fantomex was never one to throw in his lot with the government, but then, like him, Nick Fury was merely a product of his surroundings; in no way was he bound to abide by them. Quite the contrary, such an undertaking like the one laid before them now was anything but sanctioned, and that fact alone added a fair bit of excitement to the whole mess that Fantomex found enticing.

The money helped, too. Oh, lots of money.

And Gambit? Fantomex certainly knew of him, and it was even possible the Cajun knew of Fantomex, given the company they both kept. But he'd only ever seen the fellow thief in passing. This was an opportunity to see which of them was truly the master of their particular craft. Fantomex already knew the answer, though.

"You look no worse for wear, considering the circumstances, mon ami," he added, stopping his slow stroll next to Fury. "I welcome you back to the land of the not-indoctrinated. It must feel nice."

[Martyr]

THE BLOB IN

ONE WISH UPON A STAR

---

There was a lot wrong with this. Gambit he knew. Gambit he understood. He had been twisted and he had been turned into a horseman just as the Blob had. Where Blob had been Famine, with an ever-present, never-ending hunger, Gambit had become Death, taking his already destructive power and amplifying it. It made sense then that they fell within Fury's big plan. The idea that those already enthralled to someone like Apocalypse would necessarily not possibly be under someone else's thumb at the same time. He banked on the first mutant being smarter, more powerful than that, or at least their enemy being more stupid.

But, their quartet was not complete. It wasn't that that he was complaining about. Deadpool was an annoying jerkass. Wolverine usually couldn't be bothered to have anything to do with the X-men, let alone some fly by night team like this.

Then why, exactly, was Fantastico or whatever his name was here? "If you're going to throw in one of those Weapon whatever guys, Fury, why didn't you go with the girl Wolverine, or that floating potato guy, ain't he one of those?"

The Blob for his part was dressed simply. He wore his old costume, a blue-black unitard with matching forearm sleeves and boots. The sleeves and boots had gold accents that complimented his gold belt.

Template adapted from Silv.

[razor]

Deadpool

"In the immortal words of Clark Whatsisname -- up, up and away!"

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Deadpool was doing that thing he always does. Ya know, complains about not being on any teams and then joins like five? Yeah, that thing. First, he joined this lovely team of people that didn't like to be called it, but were basically the Secret Avengers. Then, after that, he joined X-Force with his old buddy Cable, which basically technically kinda made him a part of the X-Men. Then, on top of THAT, he was getting set up to be on a team that he didn't even know about yet. So it was going to be quite an ordeal to focus on all those teams, but he liked it.


The head of a Nick Fury LMD, the one that got destroyed by Cable a few threads ago, told him to accept the teleporting. He'd, of course, allow it. That being said, he was kind of nervous. When working with a man like Nick Fury, there was a lot of controlled chaos. The kind that directly foiled Deadpool's normal chaos.


Teleporting in, he'd see his old Horseman bunkmates. Well, except for Logan and also a new face... Fantomex. They had tangoed briefly in the past, but not much to make note of.


"Well well well, the gang's all here. The old band getting back together for the sequel. The bad boys doin the good things. Except for the one in all white over there. He doesn't even go here! What's with the all white anyways? Moon Knight called, he wants his getup back!"

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Nick Fury

"Ain't you heard... Nick Fury's got more lives than a cat!"

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Fury would put the plane on autopilot and walk into the hangar area. With that, he'd look to Deadpool before pushing past him, making sure everyone knew of his presence before speaking up.


"Hello, you four. You all already know the drill, but I'll give you a refresher so you understand the severity of this mission. There is an alien force called the Skrulls, who have infiltrated our planet with plans unknown to me. They are able to mimic anyone and everyone, showing no restriction on who they can mimic. This mimicry is seemingly all the way down to the deepest memories. The four of you are here for very specific reasons..."


"Three of you were victims of the mutant menace Apocalypse, for which I am sorry. His mechanations were specifically tailored for YOUR DNA. Any deviation, even slight, would have killed you. Since that day, I have been monitoring the three of you, and I know with a certainty that you have not been switched..."


"As for Fantomex, his ability would make it so that I am unable to track him anyways. The nature of Fantomex's power is unknown, so I do not feel that Skrulls would be able to catch Fantomex. Even if they could, I do not feel that they are able to mimic his power. If they can, then I believe that we are in more trouble than any of us can help. Going off of that assumption, Fantomex is now a part of this team."


"The plan is simple. The four of you will be stealing something that I feel will give us the ability to discern whether or not someone is a Skrull. I will not tell any of you what this is, as that information may be relevant to anyone that is a Skrull, assuming my observations were not thorough enough somehow. You will know very well what you are stealing once you reach the location I provide. This team is specialized for the job that they need to handle, and I have full confidence that you will be able to achieve what you are here for."


"Deadpool and Blob. You will both be running distraction. You two will exit this ship first by air drop. From there, you will break into this base as loud as possible. You need all eyes to be on you. Crack as many heads and blow as much up as you need to. You want the entire base to be focused on you."


"Gambit and Fantomex. You will be a part of the stealth team. You will be getting instructions from me on where to go to steal this item while everything is distracted. Not that you need the distraction, given both of your skills, but we need this to work for certain. After you have retrieved the item we need, you can debate your morality on whether or not you want to bring down this base while you're at it."


"Depending on the group's decision, you will either rejoin Deadpool and Blob to bring down the full force of justice on this person's ass and destroy their operation, or we will pull Deadpool and Blob out of there, getting away with our item for certain."


"The drop zone will come in fifteen minutes, so make it quick."

---

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[aquarius]

If there was one person that Gambit considered an insult to his professional dignity, it was Fantomex. Him being present went greatly against what he'd expected based on Fury's statements to him before now, so naturally Gambit voiced his concerns in a way he knew the unexpected interloper would not understand but that Fury, veteran of the second world war, would. "qu'est-ce que ce fou fait ici?" ((What is this imbecile doing here?))

The answer that came from the spy of spies was... not all that encouraging. 'I trust this guy because we know too little about him' didn't sound like Fury at all. As such, Gambit automatically put both Fury and Fantomex into the 'expected to be a Skrull' column. The details of their assignment, though? The hints pointed towards stealing something advanced from... presumably villains. AIM? possibly the High Evolutionary or Sinister or someone like that? If that was the case then Gambit would not complain too much about collateral damage. The clarification of 'person' rather than a group left Gambit hoping it would be Sinister. If so, he'd not have much difficulty making his mind up on how destructive to be once their mission was complete.

Once their briefing was apparently complete, Gambit simply nodded and put his bag down, opening it up and taking various gadgets and tools from it, each one entering one of his many pockets. It took only a minute or so, and quite a few things were left in his bag at the end, which he closed back up again.

"Ah may not like this jackass, but Gambit will work with him. An' Gambit respects Wade an' Fred. They be mah friends, for better or worse."

[Ysmir]

"Cool. I always knew atheists would someday save the world."

---

Fantomex folded his hands behind his back. He looked to the one aptly named "Blob", and he scoffed.

"Logan is a paltry excuse for an expert, unlike myself. Killer? Yes, he's very good at that. Perhaps useful for fighting, too, but an infiltrator? Non. Apples to oranges, my dear Blob. Apples to oranges. You will see when we are in the field." He spoke with the practiced patience of a true silver-tongue, with gusto and confidence. In a way, it was these traits that endeared him somewhat to Fury -- or at least, that's how Fantomex imagined it. The jury was out on how Nicholas truly felt.

Still, this was to be expected. He had something of a reputation in the mutant world, and it wasn't always a good one; in fact, it bordered on the downright horrendous at times. But despite his best efforts to work hard to undo that, it wasn't exactly easy when all the good you did was clandestine. Nobody knew about his efforts to free captive mutants held across the globe -- and if he had it his way, no one ever would.

A bad reputation suited him much better than a good one.

"Monsieur Wilson," he observed with a nod, "it's been a while."

The briefing came and went swiftly, and Fantomex's three minds went to work grinding the gears and considering his options going forward. It sounded simple on paper, but operations such as these rarely were. He stepped away from Fury and toward Remy, despite his prior objections. Fantomex's face was masked, but one could possibly make out the trappings of a smile beneath it.

"I hope one day you and I can be friends, Gambit," he said. "I understand why you have trepidations. But I truly do respect your skills."

As always, it was difficult to tell whether the mercenary was being genuine, though his tone betrayed absolutely nothing about his true intentions. At the very least, Fantomex was willing to play ball with whoever for the good of his payday.

[Martyr]

THE BLOB IN

ONE WISH UPON A STAR

---

They were doing a heist thing. Blob could do that. Quite a few missions for both the Freedom Force and the Brotherhood involved going to some place and stealing something usually for some weird ass machine the feds or Magneto were building. Fury didn't say what it was.

What the hell was with pencil pusher government types and not just saying crap? Need to know usually applied to what the hell they were looking for. What if they figured this random Ferrari in the parking lot was exactly what Fury was talking about? What if they got to a room full of stupid science gizmos that all look like IKEA furniture?

Gambit was playing friendly like. He kept saying his own name. What sort of person does that?

The Blob laughed when told to make as much noise as possible. It was a deep chuckle. "Yeah, they'll send everything they can if they know what's good for them. Not that it'll matter. Nothing moves the Blob!"

Template adapted from Silv.

[aquarius]

Everyone had their little piece to say, except highly unusually for Deadpool. Wade being quiet was so drastically out of character that it kind of reassured Gambit that he was still him. No Skrull would make such an egregious mistake in an impersonation. So as Fantomex spouted the drivel that his reputation had lead Gambit to expect from him, he shook his head in response.

"Logan can sneak up on jus' bout anyone, even actual ninjas. He may not be the best at it, but he is very close. After we do this, ah'll let you know if he better than you. And for now... Gambit switched back to French suddenly ((could you confirm if you are in fact a fraud pretending to speak French because you secretly wish you were me?))"

At least Fred was still reliable, it seemed. Deadpool could always be counted on to create a distraction, but that didn't mean it would serve the intended purpose. The Blob might not be smart, but that meant he would be able to follow a simple plan without 'improvising' too far. Once he'd set things going, Deadpool would surely add his own brand of chaos to the mix, and then it was just a matter of making sure they got in and out before anyone realised what was going on. But without knowing what they were about to head into, Gambit had no idea if that would be hours, minutes, or mere seconds.

That made it all the more fun, of course...