InsaneJournal

Who: Valkyrie, Drax, Peter Quill
What: weapons plot - Drax and Val have infiltrated the fight club for enhanced persons as participants, to allow their manager, Peter Quill, time to cozy up to an Estonian weapons dealer.
Where: Estonia
When: umm...sometime in April!
Rating: Red (dead, without redemption!), for bloodshed and f-bombs.

It made sense that the Fight Club in Estonia took the word 'underground' very seriously. No one was supposed to talk about Fight Clubs anyway.

This particular band of weekend warriors decided to locate the festivities in a massive bunker under a former Soviet base. It was a place that hearkened to an era when Russia was combating any semblance of Western decadence. The most design worthy aspect were cracked concrete walls stained by the occasional piece of jutted out rusted rebar. Any lights were connected with seemingly unending serpentine electrical cords, slithering off to humming portable generators outside. And the only luxury outside the building people were squatting in to sleep was a port-a-potty that filled up to overflowing, one hour after everyone arrived.

Full of bet bookies, gawkers, and contestants of various sizes and shapes, there was little room to move around in the makeshift arena. It was alive with noise, from the sound of fists cracking noses when someone couldn't make good on a bet, to cheers and jeers for current contestants. Over the din, the loudest sounds were reserved for the screams of those losing a match. If they were lucky, they were carried out on a stretcher. If they were unlucky, they left in a body bag.

Away from the crowds watching the brutal matches take place, there were many side rooms and corridors were much easier to roam through. They were so full of back alley trade with sketchy goods, that this made a place like Knowhere look like a religious retreat.

There was one person who forgot the reason they were there, other than looking for a fight. That person was Drax the Destroyer. Since there were few who could best an Asgardian and a warrior as hardy as Drax, they won several matches that day. He was even growing bored, while waiting for the last matchups. The blood needed to stay burning through his veins, so they needed to keep fighting before any weariness set in.

He stood in the middle of the fighting ring with his arms folded over his massive chest. Now it looked massive...er. Drax nodded. Yes. It was massiver.

"Bring me your most hardened warrior," he called out to the cheering masses, "and either myself or the murder angel will defeat them!"

A veritable bear of a man began throwing people out of his way, coming toward the ring.

And by bear, he was at least half bear by the looks of it. Eight feet tall and half of the body covered in muscles and brown hair, the man's eyes were shining with beady hatred and chipped fangs were poking at odd angles out of his mouth. the nose, ears, and hooves were rather pig like. So he might be half pig too, with half a man left in there somewhere. There were percentages involved. By the looks of it, he was a genetics experiment gone wrong on an already enhanced individual. It's best left at that, ok? Ok.

Drax took one look at the beast, craning his neck back as it climbed into the ring. As soon as beast henceforth known as ManBearPig was towering over him, Drax suddenly began laughing.

"You are disgusting!" he said, pointing at his new opponent. "I thought Quill's obsession with his hair was ridiculous, but you...you are covered in it!"

With the swing of one mighty hairy arm, Drax went flying out of the ring, knocking over gawkers like they were pins at a bowling alley. He hit the wall so hard that it looked as though a Drax sized crater would be left behind, once Drax crawled out of it. He wasn't moving, presently.

“Odin’s beard.” The Valkyrie muttered under her breath. She was dressed in her Sakaarian leathers. While there were few who would recognize her dressing armour, she didn’t want to risk that. She had done well to keep her head down and insert herself so far, showboating wouldn’t present them with anything of value. As demonstrated by the Drax sized hole in the wall near her.

She’d been leaning off to the side, boosted up on a crate with her back against the wall so she could see over the hoard, she watched Drax as he took on one opponent after the other. If he was bored, then she was practically asleep. The only thing keeping her on her toes was that they had not yet cleared fights for weapons use which meant that she was going into this without her sword… or her daggers… or… her axe… or even her sharpened broom handle. But as her partner was used a cookie cutter for cement, she hopped down off the crate.

Her eyes narrowed as she watched ManBearPig or whatever the bleeding Hel he was step forward, and in an instant, she was in the air, jumping and boosting herself by jumping off a shoulder in the crowd, landing on the animals back and wrapping her thighs around his head from behind so she could reach down and jam a thumb into his eye. While this worked wonderfully to wound him, it also made actually moving a lot harder, and the beast began to stumble. This would be the part, where if they had swords, she would slice it across his neck. Unfortunately, she didn’t have it and instead had to settle for simply jumping down and avoiding the now stampeding … thing. “Drax? Are you dead?”

Drax already crawled out of his concrete cookie cutout and was laughing, leaping through the air in a wide arc that ended with the ManBearPig. The pair crashed into the crowd of onlookers before many of them could run away.

"Finally!" he yelled, already feeling triumphant. As they rolled away from one another, Drax stood up and declared, "I have slammed the body as the wrestlers of professions do!"

ManBearPig shook off the hit with a roar and took a bite out of a bystander who had been too paralyzed by fear to get away. When that bite didn't prove satisfying enough, it ripped the man in two, right down the middle.

"We should line our clothes on him next!" Drax was utterly unfazed by the horror unfolding around him. He held out one arm to demonstrate what he meant to Valkyrie, seemingly oblivious to the screams of terror from the dying...or the soon to be dying.

In the beginning, Peter had been watching Val and Drax demolish opponent after opponent. When the team had been set up, yeah, Peter had been a little put out that he hadn't made the cut but at the same time, he was loving the bright red Adidas tracksuit and aviators he got to wear.

Even his fake name was awesome: Stevenson Longarm. How fucking cool was that?!

He went around introducing himself to everyone, schmoozing around to one and all while he tried to ferret out information. Eventually, he'd sidled up to another similarly dressed man by the name of Nikolaj, and they'd struck up conversation. Being that Peter had a pocketful of cash ('this wad is only slightly bigger than my junk') and apparently had more to implement his own club in neighbouring Sokovia, the two quickly started talking details about weapons and where to get them. Copious amounts of vodka were ordered, and Peter was glad for the enthusiastic way he toasted the Estonian, because it allowed him to slosh most of the drink out before taking the smallest sips. His pants and sneakers were drenched, but he was sober while his colleague? Not so much.

Peter was just about to narrow down a name when complete bedlam occurred. Peeking up, he groaned inwardly.

Drax. Fucking Drax.

ManBearPig roared with rage as it was clotheslined, throwing off anyone nearby and tearing through the crowd in the opposite direction of where Peter was. It was like a creature from Hell set loose. Limbs were torn from bodies and blood rained down as it began gnawing on a Russian drug tsar.

"YOU WILL NOT ESCAPE ME, HAIRY BEAST," Drax bellowed over the din as he and Valkyrie attacked, clearly intent on taking the beast down.

Nikolaj pursed his lips and nodded in approval. He had money on these newcomers and he wasn't disappointed so far. Mr. Longarm was good company to drink with and seemed to be of equal intelligence, with an eye for style. The business talk hit all the right notes. Like the songs of Lady Gaga.

"I like you and your large junk, my friend. Let us talk at some business," he told Peter. "Come to my office. It is through this door here."

He began walking through an open doorway that had two bored looking guards outside the doors. Inside was some clutter in a dark corner and a cheaply made Ikea desk with two lawn chairs, situated in the middle of an old concrete shower room with rusted nozzles. The only thing upon that desk was post it notes and a clunky orange and white iMac from 1998.

"Retroactive and still most efficient," Nikolaj said, pumping a fist at his prized vintage possession. "No one knows how to defeat backwarding technology now days!"

Peter nodded approvingly at the iMac. He’d never seen one before, and thought it was amazing. It looked different than the slim computers that Tony Stark had but hey -- bigger was always better, right?

“Nice.” If the guy wasn’t so sleazy, Peter felt that Nikolaj would have been a good ally. In fact … maybe he could be an informant for Peter. Wouldn’t that impress Fury, Peter having CONNECTIONS all over the word? Oh yeah. It totally would.

Flopping down in one of the lawn chairs, Peter clasped his hands over his stomach, his legs stretched out. “So let’s talk business, buddy. You are clearly a man of exquisite taste and are doing amazing out there. I mean, you have so many meats on a stick being sold out there, like that? GOLDEN.” He pointed a finger at Nikolaj. “You’re the man. And then they can stab each other with the skewers or get really bad splinters.”

“Our medical care is horrific here, yes. This was a good idea.” Nikolaj nodded thoughtfully. This American was a great find. “I also offer band-aids at a low cost. You come to see fights, and Nikolaj ensures you enjoys yourself.” He smiled widely, showing several gold teeth. “Before we can begin, my friend, I do need you to strip.”

Peter blinked a few times. “Uh. What?”

Nikolaj motioned a hand, and the bored guards suddenly became bouncers, walking threateningly to Peter. “Please. I wish to see everything. Cannot take chances here. You understand.”

No, Peter did not understand, but it wasn’t the first time he’d been told to get naked. Sighing with type of dejected smile, he lifted up his hands to show he was going to cooperate. He cursed the fact that he forgot to wear good underwear. His mother had always told him to do that, in case of an accident. Well Mom, Estonian gangsters were on that list now. Before too long, he was naked and since he was Peter, he didn’t even bother to hide his junk.

“Excellent.” There was that gold-toothed smile again. “I see you were not lying about your junk. We can begin negotiations. Sit.” And Peter did, still completely naked. Whatever.

There was a symphony of screams and the entire building shook, sending concrete pebbles raining down through long cracks in the ceiling. A lonely piece of rebar popped out of a nearby pillar, the metal looking as though it was reaching for a lifeline that wasn't there.

While the battle continued raging, there was a battle cry that seemed to be rising in volume over everything. A battle cry of "AHHHHHHHHHHH!" that distinctively belonged to Drax. Who, true to his moniker, was destroying everything as he made his way to the door. He looked forward at the Estonian crime lord with a crazed expression, and promptly stabbed both guards with the stolen shivs clutched in his hands.

Blood sprayed in an artful arc, akin to to old Hollywood movies where swimming girls leaped into cascading fountains. Then the bodies hit the floor.

There was a five seconds of shocked silence as that happened, where Nikolaj sat as though frozen across from a very naked Peter. Then the man shot up onto his feet, grabbing his plastic chair and running for a lone window that was hanging off a single rusty hinge.

"Enough with beings middle mens!" he yelled, setting the chair down and climbing up onto it in order to crawl through the window just Drax came into the room, huffing and puffing looking for his next target. The last thing Nikolaj was heard saying after he squiggled his tracksuit clad booty through the window was, "NYET! I has twenty-three children to pays for!"

Drax ran into the room and stopped just short of leaping over the desk to grab onto the escaping Nikolaj's feet. Meanwhile, the crime lord put that tracksuit and those knock-off Nikee shoes to good use, as he made an escape across the bleak Estonian countryside.

Target completely forgotten about, The Destroyer looked Peter over and said in a much more conversational tone, "You're naked. Are we going to prison again?"

“GODDAMNIT DRAX!” Peter kicked randomly at the earth, stubbing his toe in the process, causing it to bleed slightly. “And where are those fucking band-aids…” He glared at Drax, ignoring the steady stream of people running out and the complete chaos. Peter could only assume that Val was involved in this as well, and whatever. She probably had some blood lust to sate or some bullshit too.

“You know,” Peter continued, reaching for his smiley face boxers. “That was the best lead we had, and now? Now we have nothing. He was JUST about to tell me where to get these weapons.” Said weapons were actually stacked in a corner on the back wall. A mental reminder was made to ensure that those weapons came back with them. Funny how Nikolaj jumped ship so fast.

And 23 kids? Damn. No wonder the guy needed money.

With his pants back on, he lifted his shades to his head and sighed. The iMac stood there, but there was no button. “I bet all we need is on that thing….but how the fuck do you turn it on??” He tapped the side. Nothing. He spoke to the computer. Nothing. He tried rubbing his eye on the screen but that was awkward and uncomfortable and still nothing. So he hit it a bit. Tapped it some more. Batted it backwards. Forwards. Nothing.

“Well. I got nothing. The files are lost forever, trapped on this thing.” And a pity too. From what Peter had glimpsed earlier, there had been some folders titled “big titty porn’ and ‘Niko’s stash -- no touch!’

Drax thwapped the computer and even jabbed a shiv at it, uselessly. He didn't see an on button and stabbing it didn't work. He even tried pressing the apple that looked like a button.

After grunting a lot like an angry animal, Drax picked up the circular mouse and spoke into it, "I would like you to open files."

The iMac sat there, large and orange, and definitely turned off.

Drax hit the mouse against it, and then turned it over to try moving his finger over the flat bottom surface, like the Terrans did to select things on a touch screen. Unsurprisingly, this didn't work either. Neither did touching the actual screen.

"I will break it open and take the files from inside this dysfunctional plastic carrying case," he said. He raised a fist to punch it to pieces and stopped, appearing to have one lone reasonable thought before he picked the iMac up and cradled it against his bloodied muscular bosom. "Wait. Perhaps we should take it to the Furious one. He might know how to best hack it apart without harming the papers within."

After a moment of silence, that one brief glimmer of hope that Drax had a working brain cell was wiped out of existence as he added, "I think the blood of my foes has leaked down between my butt cheeks."

Blood lust could definitely be a phrase to attach to Valkyrie. It wasn’t that she craved murder it was just… when the chance happened to present itself… why waste it? It wasn’t like these people were good or trying to help as they were. They’d concocted a fake fight club to trick un-enhanced humans into getting themselves killed for fun all while running weapons to evil beings. She was doing the world a favor at this point.

She had also lost Drax. Or Drax had lost her, she wasn’t sure which. She did know that somewhere along the way she’d ended up plunging her daggers through no less than 15 individual bodies. It helped to have hiding places in your armour. After searching for a few minutes, she finally stumbled upon… well she wasn’t quite sure what she stumbled upon.

“Did you really just threaten to…” She couldn’t help herself, leaning against the wall and pinching the bridge of her nose with her fingers, Loki was rubbing off on her. “I can’t leave you alone for a minute…”

Sighing, she walked further into the room, stopping to look Peter up and down, raising one eyebrow before continuing to Drax and the computer, prying him out of the hug position so she could at least look it over a little more. “Assuming you idiots didn’t already break what we need, Fury or Stark will be able to find what we’re looking for. Let’s go home.”