3220/Lockdown in WAND

Lockdown in WAND
Date of Scene:	23 November 2017
Location:	Triskelion, New York City
Synopsis:	Skye and visit Lara at WAND. There's some laser Floyd (no I am not too old Skye!) and now they've got themselves a quest. Cue the Indiana Jones music.
Cast of Characters:	Hawkeye (Barton), Quake, Lara Croft

---

Hawkeye (Barton) has posed:
Lara gets word a new find has been brought in by a field team investigating a dig in Ireland. The object is metallic and has glyphs that as yet nobody is able to recognize so it's been sent up to WAND for Lara to have a look at in one of the labs.

Meanwhile, Clint and Skye are on their way up to the WAND offices, to see if Lara can be coaxed away from her books and such for a bit of archery practice. "Yeah, I keep forgetting Tony has a brother, seems like an alright guy, but still don't quite know what the deal is there," Clint is saying when they make their way to Lara's office and knock on the door. "Hey, Croft, you up for shooting things?" Clint says, right to the point.

Quake has posed:
Skye nods, trailing along after Clint. "Sorry I missed him. But yeah, needed to check in with Fury about things. So, is Stark-lite as bad as Tony?" She chuckles, shaking her head as imagining anyone as bad - or worse - than Tony Stark. "Not sure the world has enough room for two egos that size."

She lets Clint do the knocking. "She's up for shooting things. She'll say she isn't, but she is."

Lara Croft has posed:
Lara's office door looked to have been closed, but the latch wasn't fully engaged and when the knocks came to the door it caused it to slightly open up a good 3 or 4 inches. Enough for them outside to see that the lights in the office were off, but there was still light coming from inside of it... almost like a disco ball level of lighting.... except stranger. The lighting was a bright green and it was moving around the walls inside, and beyond just that, there was music playing inside the office... an eerie sort of sound to it, quiet like a soft and slow whistle.

Lara was in the center of her office with all of her furniture pushed out of the way of the middle of the floor... she was looking upward toward her own ceiling and she was holding a notepad... when the door partially opened, she had no idea, just continued to stand there with her back to it while scribbling somet notes down and letting her eyes follow after the green mysterious marking being projected onto her walls by a small orb floating in the air above her head...

Hawkeye (Barton) has posed:
Clint snorts, Stark-lite, he'd have to remember that one. "He was pretty proud of himself so I'd say odds are good. Not that his tech wasn't good. Had this gun that could fire any round, single shot though," Clint shrugs. Guns weren't really his thing but it was still pretty cool."

As the door is pushed open by his knocking and Clints finds Lara and the orb. "Oor maybe not," Clint says trying to parse what was happening there. The note pad was a good sign he though, but still, weird stuff like this creeped him out more than a little. "Hey, Lara, you okay in there?" he asks giving Skye a 'what the hell?' sort of look. WAND was super weird.

Quake has posed:
Skye nods absently. "So what did he have with him, anyway? Seeing as I missed the show. And what was up with Fury recruiting Buckyon the spot, huh? Think that will stick?" She grins, as though she hopes it does.

But she, too, has to take a pause and give Lara the stare of 'uh.. weird'.

"Hey, Lara? Everything okay? I mean, dig the remodel, but place is gonna be hard to work in."

Lara Croft has posed:
Lara only pulled her attention away from her work when she heard both of their voices behind her. She looked back over her shoulder at the two of them and then looked away--then looked back and pointed up to the dark sphere about the size of a softball floating in the air above her.

"They're talking to us." Lara said to them both with a big silly smile to the other two. She turned around and walked toward her office door, pulling it open. "Come in, come in." She urged them, and should they, she would shut the door behind them.

Once isnide they'd be immersed in the dark green glow from the orb above their heads.

Lara walked back over beneath it and pointed up at it with the butt-end of her pen. "this is the seventh of its kind that I have found." She told them, trying to explain... but since Lara had spent the better part of the past several hours in her own world, she wasn't quite 'here' in there's just yet.

"Its... its a Dropa Sphere. I've been collecting these since..." She fell a bit distant and considered that. "Since Valentine's Day, I guess... My birthday."

Lara's eyes re-focused on the two of them and she showed them a sly grin. "Have you heard of a Dropa Stone?" She asked either of them.

Meanwhile the sphere above them continued to slowly spin, casting green shapes all across the walls of Lara's office, and those standing within it.

Quake has posed:
Skye looks about in semi-wonderment as the glow encompases them when they enter the room. From outside, there's no way to fully appreciate this. "Huh? Dropa whats? Holy shit that's kinda neat."

The young woman watches the illuminations play along the wall. "Are they trying to communicate? Or just.. you know, hang out?"

Clearly she's not heard of a Dropa Stone.

Hawkeye (Barton) has posed:
"He had that gun I mentioned and an android. Apparently the android was the less impressive thing," he says with a shake of his head. "No idea," Clint says about Bucky before his eyes narrow a little, and he smiles, "You do seem /awfully/ happy about him being around. Something I should know?" he teases.

Then it's all glowing stones and trippy lightshows. "Can't say that I have," he says about the stone. "Saw a Laser Floyd show at a planetarium once, looked kind of similar."

Lara Croft has posed:
Lara listened to them both and it amde her release an exhaled laugh at their commentary, but Clint is who Lara pointed at with her pen next. "Yes." She said to him. "Like that. Only... the idea was created, much, much further back in time. Look. Wait." Lara would then move to get her office chair and she'd wheel it back to the center of the room.

A second later and the nimble woman was scaling the chair while it wobbled dangerously underneath her (she was never the safest of people her entire life).

Lara reached up to the ceiling and she grabbed the sphere and detached it from the string she had hanging there. Now it came down with her and she showed it off, the green light illuminating her hand as she showed it to the two of them. "This..." Lara pulled the sphere open and the light inside of it shut off, leaving them in darkness. There was a *click* and Lara's flashlight came on, she removed the jade colored disc from inside of the sphere and offered it over to Clint and Skye. "Think of it as a... vinyl record, and the sphere is the record player. The imagery it was putting on the wall was the incomplete map of, well, to put it lightly, an ancient alien temple."

Quake has posed:
Clint gets a *look* "Laser Floyd? How old are you anyway?" She shakes her head at him. "Maybe I don't want to know, and no, you shouldn't have to worry about Bucky. Do I need to worry about Nat?"

Skye sticks her tongue out at him, as if to make a point.

Lara's antics get a frown from Skye, until she's handed the disc, which she peers at, "That's weird shit man. And why only incomplete? Shouldn't it all be on the disc, or do you need a full set?"

Hawkeye (Barton) has posed:
Clint grins, "I am sure they still do those shows somewhere. You can't beat the classics," he counters with a grin. Yeah, no comment on his age though but it wasn't like he was in his grey hairs though. That grin gets a little wider when it turns out he's sort of right. "See, ancient Laser Floyd. I know things, Skye." He just chuckles about the Bucky thing and rolls his eyes. Her point is made.

He watches, Lara, he'd read her book, he's not too worried about her climbing wobbly chairs after the stuff she'd been through. Though the whole alien map thing plus the rest earns a nod. "Ancient alien marketing ploy, got to buy the whole set to get where you're going?" he asks with a slight smile.

Lara Croft has posed:
"Kind of." Lara answered both of their final questions directed at her. She dug around inside of her pocket and she pulled out a different stone disc. This one was a dark red. "I found this one at the bottom of a lakebed after a sinkhole appeared and drained the lake dry in the Bayin'gholin Mongol Prefecture in China." Lara swapped the dics out and she'd then turn back to the chair to scale it again.

As Lara was scaling the chair and reaching up toward the ceiling, the sphere suddenly BURST RED in her hand and sent beams of brilliant light in all directions out of her grasp until she hooked it on the little string and let it hang free... careful to make it not swing about as she lowered back down to the floor on her feet.

"Watch this." Lara softly said as she took a step back. A second later, on the western wall, a seven foot tall arachnid creature suddenly passed THROUGH the wall and walked toward them, it was all the same crimson shade as the light coming from the sphere above.

The arachnid creature stood up on its hindmost legs and a sound started to emit from the sphere, chittering 'noises'.

"Its talking to us." Lara said. "Like a recording... Only I haven't been able to decipher what it is saying... But I believe it has to do with the sinkhole itself, that the disc came from. I think there's an underground cavern network there, I just... need to go back to explore it further."

Quake has posed:
Skye nods absently, off on a train of thought as Lara goes on. "So, some sort of puzzle. Get them all together and you can see the whole picture." Another nod as she watches the *burst* "Woah, that's kinda awesome and freaky all at once. Shame it's not more of those pulses of light, though. Those are kind of like some sort of code. Not sure noises are my thing, though. Did you try slowing it down? Speeding it up? Playing it backwards? Watching it on one of those things that show the frequencies?"

Hawkeye (Barton) has posed:
"Gah," Clint says as the spider-thing comes through the wall and starts clicking at them. The hand goes towards the bow but stops, as he lets out a slight breath. "A little warning would have been good," he grins at Lara.

Though, ater the momentary surprise he walks towards the image doing a slow circle of the thing. Skye's suggestions make sense, and he adds, "And you said you've found seven? Any idea of how many are in the set?"

Lara Croft has posed:
Lara would watch them both and she'd listen to their commentary while her eyes would travel from the glowing red Spider Creature taking up the majority of that side of her office now while Clint walked about it, it remained where it was... chittering and gently moving some of its appendages.

Lara looked to Clint and slowly shook her head. "It could be as few as ten... It could be... hundreds. Perhaps more than that."

Lara would glance toward Skye then. "I have some linguistics training, I'm capable of taking forms of any given language and deciphering back to the version of said language that I am most familar with, but this... even if I slowed it down, its like nothing I've ever heard of. Not that that is a bad idea, but... I need a linguistics expert to delve into this."

Lara held the jade disc up in her hand, but in the dark/red light, it merely looked black in her hand. "These have been around for a very long time. There are knock-off versions sold in all manner of gift shops in China... so now its quite difficult to tell which ones are real and which are simply, not."

Lara looked up to the ceiling. "Its the sphere that lets me know the authenticity, without lab testing of course." She then softly sighed... "I have more research to do. My apologies... I've been rambling like a mad woman. Did you two need something of me?"

Quake has posed:
Skye shrugs. "Not a linguistics expert. But if I got a better look at the discs and what they're doing, might be able to figure out what the gaps are. Annnnnd, you probably already have looked at those angles. Nevermind. Shut up Skye."

She grins at herself.

Hawkeye (Barton) has posed:
Clint ducks a waving appendage as he completes his circuit, "So there could be any number of discs?" Damn. He was sort of curious about this now. "And so what's your plan then? Check out the sinkhole? Try to find more clues?" he asks. "And we were coming to see if you wanted to come shooting with us, but this right here, so much cooler."

Quake has posed:
Skye has to agree with Clint. Strange alien blippy things? Mysterious maps? Spidery creature speaking in another language? Okay, maybe not as exciting to her as it was to him, but she could appreciate the whole thing.

"Ooooo, unauthorized visits to mysterious places, likely causing Fury to foam at the mouth? Count me in."

Lara Croft has posed:
Lara looked between the two of them and she'd offer a soft smile toward them. "Shooting. Oh. Uh... I would, I've just been... a little focused since retrieving this latest lead."

Lara walked over to her office's doorway and she flipped the light switch on causing the room to be bathed in soft white light and it made the red glowing beams and holoprojected arachnid almost impossible to even see anymore.

"Here." The archaeologist said as she walked to Skye and handed her the jade green disc. "You heard the music coming from this sphere, yes? I believe that that music is a 'key' that will unlock doors within the temple that it was displaying. I've... unfortunately been too pre-occupied to locate the temple's exact location, though I have a few leads on that as well."

One thing was true though, since joining WAND, Lara Croft had had far more work to do than she had ever thought possible. SHIELD really had a lot of strange shit to investigate...

Hawkeye (Barton) has posed:
Clint smiles when Lara says she's been preoccupied, he glances to Skye, "A lot of that going around these days," he turns back to Lara. "So, no worries, we can shoot anytime, this, was really cool."

He quirks a brow when Skye is given the disk and he grins. Well this would be interesting. "So, we find the temple then we go exploring?" he asks, because, yeah, he's so on board with this.

Quake has posed:
Skye quirks a brow at Clint. "Heh. Thought I was looking at this seeing if I could figure out if it related to computer code in any way, shape, or form. But what, you want to go on an adventure hunt?"

Then she laughs. "Wait, I did just say I was on board with that, didn't I? Something about Fury foaming at the mouth?" There's a shrug from the woman and a grin for Lara, "If we don't come back, uh.. I've got nothing. Lie."

Lara Croft has posed:
Lara would show a grin to the both of them and she'd softly shake her head side to side as her hands wehnt down to the side sof her thighs. "I have clearance only to take myself... wherever I want around the globe. I have to get clearance from either May or, well yes, Fury... before I'm allowed to take--and put risk to--either of you. So... we'll have to ask for mum and da's permission first." She said with a teasing grin.

"You're welcome to come though, I do not exactly... believe that the danger level on this expedition would be overly high. Though, I believe the Jade Temple is located somewhere in South America and there could be potentialities that it might fall within hotly contested areas of the jungle there-in. In which case, the danger level could be rather high indeed."

Lara released a light exhale. "I have to do some more research. I need to speak with my contact at the New York Public Library, which I plan to do tomorrow, but from there I expect to have enough information to go off of."

Hawkeye (Barton) has posed:
"Damn right I do. I've been wanting to do something like this since I saw Raiders of the Lost Ark as a kid," Clint grins to Skye before taking in what Lara has to say about the dangers and the temple being in a potential conflict zone. "Well, if the folks sign off on it, then, yeah, I'm game. So let us know what you find out and we can go from there."

Quake has posed:
Skye had been all ready to say something, but Clint's remark has her snickering. "Oh my god. I'm sleeping with an overgrown boyscout." She shakes her head at him. "Good thing I love you, because wow. Just wow."

But it's more than evident she's teasing him.

"Ugh. Mom and dad will likely say no. I mean, you two? Maybe. Me? I'm geek girl. Not hands on in the field first choice. But I'll check out this disc. Who knows. Maybe something will come of it." She sounds disappointed, though.

Lara Croft has posed:
Lara would show a smile to them both and she'd lean backward and sit down on the corner of her desk which was pushed up agains tthe wall opposite that the still hovering arachnid was standing... still chittering though the noise was quiet and almost just an odd background sound now.

"Field training is the most effective form of training." Lara said to Skye then. Lara looked between the two of them, having not known that they were an 'item' but then again, that kind of thing always slipped passed her since her nose was always down inside of a book or her computer.

"I'll let you both know what I come up with soon then. We'll see where it goes from there?"

Hawkeye (Barton) has posed:
"What?" Clint says spreading his hands. "I figured it'd be boyishly charming at worse," he grins.

Yeah, Lara's getting a real show here, and he glances over to check her take on it before he says, "Sounds good, I'll work on Mom and Dad for us too, just to make sure they're on board."

Quake has posed:
Shekye laughs, "Oh, you know I don't mean it. Kind of jealous a bit. I'm not nearly that adventurous. And sure. You work on mom and dad. And Lara?" She turns to the other woman, "I'll see if I can do anything with this. Still on for more sessions?"