Chapter 27: Lemurian Star

(Quinjet in the air above the Indian Ocean)

Rumlow is standing in front of a screen debriefing the mission.

"Target is a mobile satellite launch platform, The Lemurian Star. They were sending up their last payload, when pirates took them, 93 minutes ago."

"Any demands?" Cap asks.

"A billion and a half." Rumlow answers.

"Why so steep?" Cap asks.

"Because it's S.H.I.E.L.D's." Rumlow says.

Cap pauses for a second and realizes something. "So it's not off course it's trespassing."

"I'm sure they had a good reason." Natasha says.

"Y'know I'm getting real tired of being Fury's janitor." Cap says back clearly frustrated.

"Relax it's not that complicated." Natasha says back.

"How many pirates?" Cap asks Rumlow.

"25, top mercs, led by this guy. Georges Batroc ex DGSE, Action Division. He's at the top of Interpol's Red Notice. Before the French demobilized him, he had 36 kill missions. This guy's got a rep for maximum casualties." Rumlow explains.

"Hostages?" Cap asks.

"Mostly techs. One officer. Jasper Sitwell. They're in the Galley." Rumlow says.

"What's Sitwell doing on a launch ship." Cap asks to no one in particular.

"Alright I'm gonna sweep the deck with Luke and find Batroc. Nat, you kill the engines and wait for instructions. Rumlow, you sweep aft, find the hostages, get em to the lifepods and get them out, let's move." Cap says giving out orders to the team.

"Secure channel seven" Cap says into his coms device.

"Seven secure." Nat affirms.

"So, either of you do anything fun Saturday night?" Nat asked Luke and Cap.

"Well, all the guys from my barbershop quartet are dead so, no, not really." Cap says sarcastically.

Nat smiles at the comment and looks at Luke.

"Trained some, and flew around a little." Luke said.

"Oh some "Bird Watching"?" Nat jokes to Luke.

"Sighs... You're really not gonna let that go huh?"

"No, not until you agree to our deal, I want to fly to so you just have to give me a ride. Besides, I can't believe you never said you had powers even after a year and a half." Nat teased.

"Wasn't my call, and you know it." Luke said annoyed.

"Alright fair enough." Nat relented.

{Coming up on the drop zone Cap.} The pilot said over the radio and Cap pushed the button to open the back.

"Y'know if you ask Kristen out from statistics, she'll probably say yes." Nat continued to joke with Cap.

"That's why I don't ask." Cap said as he was putting his helmet on.

"Too shy or too scared?" Nat teases.

"Too busy." Cap says.

"And Luke, I heard through the grapevine, that Jenny was asking about you." Nat said.

"Which one is that? The girl with the long ponytail?" Luke asks as he put his Vanitas helmet over his head which connected to his ninja gaiden suit but left it's visor up.

"No that's the one with the white rabbit tattoo. From headquarters. " Nat said.

"It's the blond one with glasses that sits at the middle desk!" Cap shouts as he jumps out.

"Oh, her? Well, She is very cute." Luke says.

"So you'll ask her out?" Nat asks.

"Now why would I do that when I still got you?" Luke asks Nat jokingly as he winks at her, puts his visor down, and jumps out as well.

Nat just roled her eyes and continued to put her parachute on. Then one of the S.T.R.I.K.E team members looks at Rumlow stunned.

"Were either of those two wearing a parachute?"

"No, no they weren't." Rumlow said chuckling.

Luke is free falling through the air when he releases his wings and uses them to dive down faster towards where he sees Cap and then opens his wings and glides down silently onto the deck.

Cap just hits the water in a pencil dive and then climbs up the anchor chain. When Cap gets on board, Luke is already rushing through the deck taking out pirates left and right with throwing knives he had attached to his suit. After he got far enough from Cap, his claws came out and he started slashing left and right before throwing the guys overboard.

Cap took the other side of the ship and ran into a couple guys and was using his hardlight shield more than his metal one as it could be remotely controlled and he could litterally summon it back to him like Thor does with his hammer.

Both Luke and Cap finishing clearing the deck before Cap stops near the Captain's Cabin just out of the eyeline of the glass window. Meanwhile Luke is in the communications center with a drive, downloading S.H.I.E.L.D intelligence and uploading a back-door, kill/override code, and a way to mask it's signal if tracked. Luke then teleported back to his spot waiting for Cap to give the order.

The S.T.R.I.K.E team finally got in position to save the hostages. Three members of the S.T.R.I.K.E team used rappelling lines to stand right outside the port holes on the side of the ship and had targeted each pirate they could see from their vantage point.

At the same time Rumlow waited for the lead pirate of the hostage takers to speak with the pirate standing guard outside the room to knockout the guard and place a barrier charge on the door that will blow the door down, while keeping the hostages safe.

{S.T.R.I.K.E Team in position.}

{Natasha what's your status?}

Nat didn't answer Cap on the coms because she was still busy kicking ass.

{Status. Natasha.}

{Hang on!}

Natasha finally knocked out the last guy in the engine room.

{Engine Room secure}

{On my mark. Three, Two, One!}

The S.T.R.I.K.E members outside hit their targets and just as the leader was about to shoot, the door was blown down and he was shot as well.

———————————————————

(Back in the Captain's Cabin)

Batroc's communications operator is having trouble getting through to the others.

"The line went dead, I cannot reach them."

Batroc then hears the sound of wind rushing behind him and immediately ducks down, narrowly avoiding Cap's shield. Cap jumps in through the window only to be kicked by Batroc who then runs towards the door and kicks it open. But, when Batroc turns the corner he runs into Luke who grabs him, and throws him out a nearby window hoping to knock him out, but when Luke went to the window and looked down he didn't see him.

Cap had just gotten his Shield out of the wall and rushed out.

"Thanks for the assist, where'd he go?" Cap said.

"No problem. And i dont know, he just disappeared after i threw him over the railing." Luke replied.

As Cap was about to head down he heard Rumlow on the coms.

{Hostages en route to extraction. Romanoff missed the the rendezvous point Cap. Hostiles are still in play.}

Cap then got on the coms.

{Natasha, Batroc's on the move, circle back to Rumlow and protect the hostages.....Natasha.}

Cap didn't hear a response and then Batroc came out of nowhere and kicked at Cap who just shrugged him off just in time to see Luke land next to him.

Luke and Cap then went towards Batroc who had just recovered and was waiting in a fighting stance. Based on his stance, Luke could tell that Batroc was an agility focused fighter and prefered to fight with his legs rather than his arms.

"Hmmm, interesting." Luke mused while Batroc glared at him.

Batroc knew he was outnumbered and stupidly believed that Luke was the easier target and felt if he incapacitated Luke then he could focus on Cap.

Batroc lunged at Luke and tried to kick him. Luke simply sidestepped his leg and grabbed it. He lifted Batroc using his outstretched leg and threw him towards Cap who had ran and kicked him back to Luke who grabbed him and flupped him on his back heavily, knocking the wind out of him and since his head also hit the ground hard he seemed to get dizzy and then just laid there.

With Batroc knocked out for the moment, Luke secretly used his telekinesis to remove any dangerous items that Batroc had on him, at least the ones he could see.

Cap started to move away from Batroc for the moment and was about to try to contact Natasha again when Batroc suddenly woke up and charged at Luke. Cap intercepted him and picked him up and ran with him through a door, breaking said door in the process. Cap then punched Batroc so hard he KOed him.

Cap looked up and saw he was in a control room and Natasha was there.

"Well this is embarrassing." Natasha said teasing.

"What the hell are you doing?!?" Cap demanded.

"Backing up the harddrive, it's a good habit to get into." Natasha joked.

"Rumlow needed your help what the hell are you doing here?!?" Cap said clearly frustrated as he walked towards Natasha.

Cap then looked at the screens. "You're saving S.H.I.E.L.D Intel." Cap said realization dawning on him.

"Whatever I can get my hands on." Natasha says as she continued to download the files.

"Our mission is to rescue hostages." Cap said angrily.

"Actually, that was your mission. Ours was slightly different." Luke said as he walked in and had just dropped a bound and gagged Batroc on the ground just in case he'd wake up.

"You too?!?!" Nat said as she finally finished downloading the info onto a silver drive and started to walk past Cap. She didn't know Luke was given the same mission as her.

"Fury wanted to cover all the bases and I was supposed to get the Intel as a backup in case something happened to yours." Luke explained to which, Nat nodded.

Cap was very angry now. "You two just jeopardized this whole mission!?!?!" Cap said as he grabbed Nat's arm as she passed him.

"I think you're overstating things." Nat said.

"I'm sorry Cap, but I'm inclined to agree with Nat here. We may not have told you about what we were told to do but you have to trust in your team. S.T.R.I.K.E got the hostages out just fine and honestly, they didn't need Nat's help." Luke said trying to justify their actions.

"That doesn't change the facts, and the fact is, you both went behind my back. Fury went behind my back!!!" Cap snapped as he walked out while grabbing Batroc and smacking him again as he seemed to be stirring.