3065/I Have a Cunning Plan, Baldrick

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I Have a Cunning Plan, Baldrick
Date of Scene: 05 November 2017
Location: Triskelion, New York City
Synopsis: Agents Natasha and Skye get down to business with a trial run of their Hydra counter-attack. Alls well that ends well... until it doesn't.
Cast of Characters: Black Widow (Romanoff), Quake




Black Widow (Romanoff) has posed:
    In preparation for their join op, Natasha has been spending more time behind a computer lately. She's still doing her assignements on the outside, but she's spending long hours working on a simulation program or three. If they are going after such a slippery target, she's wanting to be sure her own skills are up to the task. Particularly since Skye is honestly the better at this sort of thing. Once she had the simulations completed, she set up one of the work rooms with a pair of computers. They are on a table on opposite sides from one another. There are a variety of drinks on the table, within reach of either side. There are even snacks. No reason to get the munchies while practicing.
    She had sent a message to Skye the day before to schedule a time. Thus now she waits for the arrival of the other woman.

Quake has posed:
    Despite the fact that this is literally what Skye does.. for a living almost.. for some reason, she's anxious about this particular meeting. Not just because the stakes are so high, but because despite all the training she's done at SHIELD, and the numerous times she's landed on her ass, or failed at a task, she's never really been evaluated on what she can do with her butt behind a computer. Well, not unless you counted the actual attack, or cleaning the systems afterwards and setting the traps in place. Which, of course, counted...
    Still, it wasn't the same. Here was someone who she'd totally discounted on this level prior, and now they were going to assess one anothers skills in preparation for the final event. Somehow that felt very different.
    The whole walk over, to make the appointment time, she psyched herself up. "You're good at this, Skye. Maybe the best, even. This is not the time to get ghosts in the machine and fuck up. Hear me? You go in there, and you shut the system down. No excuses. No mess-ups. No getting caught."
    And there was the real crux of it all: the getting caught. Because she had been caught once before. And she wasn't walking away from the big day with her identity intact.
    By the time she's in the room, though, she's all sassy smiles and quips of, "Hey. Got the cold coffee? Isn't a real hack-job without candy bars and cold coffee."

Black Widow (Romanoff) has posed:
    "I figured you were more the energy drink type of gal," comes the easy response of Natasha. She actually does have a cup of coffee but it's steaming hot. The cup is white with a little unicorn on it jumping over a rainbow. It wasn't hers. She just had brought the coffee cup and thermos from her place thus ending up with the borrowed cup from her significant other. It was that or the one of a dozen Disney options. He'd miss the uniocrn one the least. She thought.
    "Tony helped me get these all set up. They are not connected to anything here at SHIELD, just each other. I have three simulations. Two of them pit us against an A.I. programmed to keep us out. The third puts us head-to-head instead, so we can evaluate our skills together and against."
    She takes a brief sip of coffee then continues. "To be honest, I know you are better. I've read up on you. But it should be a good exercise."

Quake has posed:
    Skye's all flash of smirk, "Me? Energy drinks? They rot your teeth." In truth, when she was in front of a computer, lost in code, most anything she ate or drank was about the same. Candy bars were just convenient. And the coffee? Well, it was always cold because she'd forgotten about it.
    The cup was eyeballed with a shake of her head. "That cup is going to accidentally fall on the floor before we're done. I really hope someone is not terribly attached to it."
    She nods, taking up a position at one of the consoles. "I didn't get to see your files. Yet." It only now occuring to her that she actually could request them - Fury had said anything she needed, and in truth, she probably could have used that. Though after this exercise, she'd likely know all she needed anyway.
    There's a succinct nod, as the young woman becomes much more serious. "I'm good. Tony thinks you're better than he is. I'm counting on him not being wrong. Don't hold anything back when it's head to head. In tandem, the object of the first should be to work together. Get a feel for one another. The second will be in tandem, but separate missions. We make that one taste like the real thing. The third will be no holds barred. You fuck me up any way you can. You are going to be my Hydra, and we're going to learn everything we can about one another's abilities during it. Unless you have a better idea on order?"

Black Widow (Romanoff) has posed:
    "Do not threaten the cup. It gets broken, I have to shoot you," Natasha says simply as she taps a few keys on the keyboard in front of her. "Otherwise, my boyfriend would do the shooting and he isn't going to be able to claim it was an accident during a training exercise." There is the culprit for the cup. The fact she is dating a man who likes unicorns, another topic entirely.
    "I've got it pulled up for the joint mission. Whenever you are ready, just start us off." She settles the cup to her left, close to her keyboard and just out of reach of Skye unless the woman stands up. She is not chancing the safety of that cup.

Quake has posed:
    Skye quirks a brow. "That horrible thing is yours? And your boyfriend gave it to you? He musn't like you very much." There's a twist of her lips over a grin. "Nope, sorry, can't picture you with a boyfriend."
    The cup is left to relative safetly, Skye acquiesing to take an Energy drink, but it looses something in the gesture when she doesn't even open it.
    At her seat, Skye gives a nod. "Begin." And with that, her fingers start flying across the keyboard, tabbing windows open and watching the streams of code begin flying on by.

Black Widow (Romanoff) has posed:
    "No, he didn't give me this cup," Natasha says as the data begins to flood her screen. Her fingers are moving rapidly across the keys, green eyes flicking from one window to the next on her screen. It's almost as though she isn't concentrating on five different streams of data at the same time, plucking information from one place, tapping into a line of code then inserting it in a completely different spot. "It's his cup. I just borrowed it." She doesn't flick her eyes away from the screen as she considers that last comment though.
    "And what is so strange about me having a boyfriend?"

Quake has posed:
    Skye shrugs, eyes darting to one of her windows, "Ideally, we'd have headsets. Wired to a secure frequency. Something that rotates through channels.. Close down that loop if you can. It's looking for us. I'm going to write up a string that'll find those for us faster. Just don't get complacent. Knowing Tony, it's a decoy."
    Her gaze flicks up and over, "What's so strange? I don't know. You just seem so remmoved from things. Hard to imagine you connecting with another human being."

Black Widow (Romanoff) has posed:
    "On it," Natasha responds as she quickly types in a few lines, plugging them and cutting off the search loop pretty neatly. Only for another to pop up in a different place. She falls silent a few moments as she follows the pattern. Break, respawn. Then she finds what she was looking for. "There we go." The link is broken and the search loop doesn't return. At least not for the moment.
    "I'm not different than anyone else. I'm human. It's...difficult for me to connect but it has happened a few times in my life." The fact of how few time that is compared to her life span? Not something she's discussing. Her age is a very closely guarded secret. So if Skye gets access to those records, she may be in for a surprise.

Quake has posed:
    Skye is silent for a few as she continues to scan the incoming lines of code, watching the loop strings pop up continually until Nat takes them down, her own lines, ready for insertion.. just as what she'd expected happened. It was a trap. A clever one, too, one that had taken Nat's own bits, followed them back, and regurgitated them.
    "Oh for fuck's sakes," Skye bites out, scrambling to not get caught up in the feedback. "Kill the window. Open another through a different link. Once that's secure, don't touch that path until we get it locked down. We're going to have to come at it through the back end." All the while working to close any of her own affected windows, losing the work in several of them in the process.
    "Didn't say you weren't human. Just.. hey, I get it. I'm not miss molly sunshine myself. World's a lot easier if you don't let people in. Kinda how I've gotten by. Hardly judging you."

Black Widow (Romanoff) has posed:
    "What the hell..." Natasha already has that window down and she is working in another area with a string of code waiting for the moment. More datae glides by on the screen. "He wrote a new language. Remind me to hurt him the next time I see him. Give me a moment I...a-ha, I see what he did." Her fingers are flying over the keyboard now as she finds what she thinks is the right code to break through the new patterns he installed in the simulation.
    "Well, my first love, who I married, died. Supposedly. Only to turn out to be alive. Seems he was working for Mother Russia and the whole thing was a ploy to draw me in. Well, that's what I believed at the time. So..."
    Her voice fades as she plugs in her new code. Suddenly that infinite loop reappears but now it's a quick flash by of the following text....

HI, LADIES! KNEW YOU'D GET IT!

Quake has posed:
    There's no cheering when the cascade is stopped, and Skye is ready with her own blocker code on Nat's tail. "That really sucks. What kind of asshole.. no, I take that back. That whole To Russia with Love thing, huh? Thought that died out long ago, though?"
    She's not complacent about their small success, and when the singular line of text flashes on by, Skye's mouth twists over that trademark grin, "Oh, Tony, you are a fucking asshole. That just lost you half that lunch money buster."
    Though, in truth, he'd done exactly what he was supposed to. (Though it may only have been the line of snark she intends on punishing him for)..
    "Right, so, he's not likely to try that again.. but he might. They might. I'm sending you a line you can use, but you need to randomize the key on it. Figure you should be able to manage that." And as she speaks, the line is transfered. Just a simple shutdown. Not even self-replicating or anything that will insinuated itself into the system. It's literally the equivalent of dropping a cinderblock wall into the code. One might say crude, but effective, though knowing Skye, there is probably another use to it all.

Black Widow (Romanoff) has posed:
    "Intereting," Natasha says as she examines the code that is passed over to her. "I wouldn't have thought to use that particular integer there. Nice." Then she continues as she was, going back to her story. "Yeah, it was a long time ago. Despite the press, those things still go on. Daily." She puts in the randomizer code then tests it privately in a little seperate window to make sure it will work. All good, smooth as silk.
    "So that sort of history gives a woman trust issues. I'd hate to have to kill another man for betraying me that way." Whether she means in love or his attempt to force her to work for the enemy, hard to tell. The important part is the fact she apparently killed her former husband. Maybe she's exaggerating?

Quake has posed:
    The bits of code start falling into place, and Skye looks pleased. Very pleased. "Learned that little trick from a Russian, ironically. But what we're going to do with it is the real treat. That I taught myself.. You're good. Most folks fall apart when they're being thrown commands and lines and attacks all at once. Usually where the dividing line on hackers starts weaning the wannabes out. Watch for it. You'll know when it happens. When it does, you're going to enter the line of code I'm sending now. I'll enter it here, and then we're going to close all but the main window. If we did this right, we'll own the simulation. If not, I'm sure Tony has some smartassed comment we're going to see."
    She taps away methodically without looking up, eyes flicking between windows, even as the line of code is transferred.
    "Really? Still going on?" Skye shrugs with a nod. "Learn something every day, huh? Thought China was our biggest problem bar Hydra. By the way, we're going to be facing some Asian style code if I'm not mistaken. If not from Tony, from the real deal. I've run into this particular hacker before. She's good. Very good. Has a few signature moves. Remind me and I'll make sure you've seen them. We all have them. Even you. You should know at least one of mine before we're done."
    She does look up then. "Remind me not to leave you if we ever get married. Or at least talk to you about it first."

Black Widow (Romanoff) has posed:
    "Don't try to brainwashe me into joining Hydra and you'll live through the experience. Look at Clint. He's still breathing," Natasha saya as she lays the code into place and considers. Something there in the code. It's off. She's not sure what. "One sec. Something weird over here." She pops open a couple more windows then finds that line that has her bothered. "Look at this." She forwards a copy of it over. "Tony set another trap. If we trigger without deactivating this one, he'd have had us. Give me a couple of minutes."
    Her fingers continue to fly as she works on writing a bit of code, while setting up some extra lines of interference first. Then she goes back to the originl and slips the code in smooth as silk. A momant later, the trap is deactivated and a giant smiley face appears on their screens for a second. It's gone as fast as it appeared.
    "I hate you, Tony. Alright, ready when you are," she says.

Quake has posed:
5tThere's an appreciative noise from Skye at that, "Niiiice catch. Missed it myself. He's no slouch either. Glad he didn't pull punches." She sees where the code is off and watches the fix, even as she scans for other bits he might have placed to catch them up.
    "Clint?" Skye looks over. "I'd have thought you would have brought up Bucky. He's pretty cool. I mean, as far as agents and stuff go. Haven't really spent much time with him. Wait, Clint's the asshole who shot at us."
    "Tony hates Tony," Skye mutters, eyes doing a final scan. "On my count. Three. Two. One.."

Black Widow (Romanoff) has posed:
    "Winter Soldier was shooting at you too. So why is he a cool guy but Clint's an asshole?" Natasha rebuts. Even as she is doing so, she is reacting to the end of the countdown. Everything is shut but the target window and she drops the code into the lines scrolling past. "Fire in the hole."
    It takes a moment but then the screen begins to flash as the code sends out the data, interfering with the code they have infiltrated perfectly. One moment the system is holding them at bay, the next its security collapses and they are given a fireworks display celebration care of Tony Stark.

Quake has posed:
    The code works like a charm. One minute it's just seemingly unconnected lines lines. The next, it's collating all random factors from the blocks they put in place, and tying them together like a barbed wire fence. Or, in this case, a firewall of Skye's making. One designed to collapse inward and take the system with it. It's the first trail of the code she's hoping to use on the big day.
    There's a hint of a laugh at the fireworks when they come. "Such a show-off. Oh, Tony. Next we meet.."
    Skye looks over. "Why him and not Bucky? I don't know. We met over dinner. It's just a thing you say, right? And Bucky was here the day of the attack. I guess I feel more like he's part of the team?" She shrugs.

Black Widow (Romanoff) has posed:
    That gets Natasha's attention and there is a sudden frown on her face. "Bucky has been with SHIELD a few months. Clint has been with them for years and is one of the best agents we have. If not for Clint, I would still be on the other side of the cold war that supposedly is no longer happening." Natasha says flatly. "Do not ever imply that Clint is less a member of this organization or team than anyone else. He is my best friend and he ahs saved my ass more times than I can count. Bucky is a good man--now. He will do the right thing but give Clint the respect he is due or we have nothing more to talk about."
    She then turns back to her computer screen. The coffee is picked up though it has cooled considerably. "Ready for second simulation when you are." And just like that, the Black Widow has gone as cold as the coffee.

Quake has posed:
    Skye sits back at the reaction she's garnered. "Woah. First off, didn't say he wasn't part of the team. Said he wasn't part of the team I worked with. Look, lady, I'm trying to find my feet here. This place? I didn't ask for it. I was made to be here. It's taken a lot for me to actually accept that maybe I belong and I want to stay. So maybe you can back off some with the don't you dares and the rest of that shit and appreciate that I actually made an effort, huh?"
    With irritation she gets up from her computer. "I'm taking ten on the roof. We can finish this later if you're still here."
    And with that, Skye's gone.