Who: Jen and Roy NPCS: Civilians + Would Be Robbers Where: NYC When: Thursday, May 31, 2012 - afternoon What: Roy and Jen stop a bank from getting robbed. Rating: PG-13
He was late, and he felt awful about that. It had been his idea for them to meet for lunch - meet at a restaurant for some food, while he was on break from work. Because he had to tell her that Lian’s mom was in town. Had been in town. Was going to continue to be in town. She said she wasn’t here to cause trouble, but Roy figured Jennie needed to know just - well if she was going to make random appearances at the apartment, Jennie needed to know, since she was often there.
Then after lunch Roy was going to have to scram back to SHIELD to finish off his day there, and Jennie could do whatever she had planned for the afternoon. That meant that this would just be lunch, because he really did have to go back to work …
Although work had been a bit hard to escape. Agent Barton had stopped him on the way out the door with a question and the two of them had gotten into a bit of verbal back and forth before Roy had been ‘really I have to go.’ and taken off. Because he had been running late he hadn’t grabbed his regular jacket on his way out of the hellicarrier, so when he took his seat across from Jen, he was wearing his black SHIELD jacket, with the SHIELD logo on it.
“Sorry,” he mumbled as he leaned across the table to kiss her. He knew she hated being late, and he figured that the fact that he had been displaying amazingly bad time management skills so far in their relationship wasn’t earning him any brownie points.
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Jen hated being late. She didn't hate people who were late. And despite the fact he was engaging in behavior that typically annoyed her, she found that she couldn't exactly hate him for a minor indiscretion. Besides, her time hadn't totally been wasted, Jen had her smart phone out and she was catching up on her email and blog responses, which was another source of income for her, thanks to some of the ads on the website. Every little bit counted when she was trying to squirrel away enough money to move out, or a rainy day, whatever came first.
She tipped her cheek into him as he kissed it before settling down, eyes still focused on the tiny screen over her phone. "HI sweetie," she greeted finally once she was finished up and returned the phone to her purse. She was just taking him in now and noticed the SHIELD jacket, which caused her to smile. He looked so cute it in it, which she felt no shame in saying. "Look at you. All official and the like." Jen didn't mind the fact that Roy worked for SHIELD, in fact she was impressed by it all. He did her best to keep her out of it so she really didn't know what was going on, but she wasn't fussed with them knowing who she was. No more than the average citizen who had nothing to hide.
"Does that jacket come with handcuffs?" She asked, leaning in and grinning in his direction, and otherwise completely oblivious to what Roy needed to tell her. If she had been she wouldn’t have been so cavalier, but a bit more serious.
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He was going to tell her that he was all official like sure, and it was official business (with a pain in the ass supervisor) that had delayed him from enjoying her company, but her question about the handcuffs caught him off guard. A slow lazy grin spread across as his face, as he got settled in his seat, and looked across the table at her.
“It does - but I left those back at work. But I’m not going to need them right? You weren’t planning on creating a public disturbance today right?” As he asked this, he moved his foot under the table so that his foot brushed her leg.
Yes, Roy was avoiding the serious bit of conversation that he needed to have with her.
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"Well no, but its still disappointing," Jen teased. "Maybe later, though, huh?" Whenever that would be. Their track record was not so hot lately. Roy was always busy. Not that Jen wasn't, but her schedule was definitely more flexible and she was able to move things around. Not to mention he had a daughter, which was a big obstacle to work around. They were managing for the most part, but Jen wanted to see her boyfriend more often than she could. So, she said dirty things to him on occasion, like introducing handcuffs into their bedroom time.
"I'll behave, I promise. Unless you ask me not to.” Jen grinned. “So!” She settled back in her seat and looked at Roy, with her head tipped. “I’m glad we could meet today. Its good to see you.”
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think</i> about what he was about to say, and he said it. "Well you know i always appreciate some bad girl behavior."
Yes - that was rather obvious wasn't it? Lian’s mother was a very bad woman, at times, although apparently she had turned over a new leaf. Feeling a bit stupid, Roy was quick to move on. Because he wasn’t ready to broach the subject of Cheshire-Jade right at the moment.
He looked suitably remorseful when she said that it was good to see him. "It's good to see you - sorry about not being around so much, and again for being late. Work - but you know you've got my undivided attention now." He was leaning forward as he said that and making eye contact to show how serious he was. "So tell me, how's the postgraduate life going is it ..." He trailed off as movement over Jen's shoulder caught his attention. Frowning, he moved in his seat so that he was looking past her, and out of the large plate glass window that was at the front of the restaurant.
There was a bank across the street and there was some kind of ... disturbance going on. He could see people running out of the bank doors, and he swore under his breath.
"Hey, remember the other night we talked about how duty calls sometimes and you gotta answer?"
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"Well, maybe if you're good," she shot back, grinning like a fool. Jen was amused right now, that they were having this exchange right here in public. Maybe something would come of it, maybe not, either way, she was thinking about all sorts of dirty things she'd like to do to him when she got her hands on him next. Really, this on again off again, with them was not conducive to her peace of mind, because her sex drive was in overdrive and she needed to cool it. But for now there were things that she couldn't have and, man, did she want them.
"Still job searching," she admitted. "It blows." Jen shrugged. "I'll find a job, but maybe I need to up the game and start hitting the bricks," she said when she noticed his eyes glaze over.
"That's got to be some kind of record," she stated, unamused. "I'm sorry listening to me talk is boring you," she snipped, until what came out of his mouth next. "Is there something going on behind me?" She asked, only slightly feeling like an ass but mostly gearing up for some action.
“Should I look?”
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“Yup.” Roy answered her, still looking out across the street at what was going on over there. He was thinking that some action might be nice - that talk before about handcuffs and being good, and being bad had made him want for a different kind of action, but what was going on across the street would work.
Although he did feel bad that it appeared what should have been a nice date-like lunch was going to turn into something else.
“I got my gear in my car.” Which for Roy meant, he had his arrows, his bow, and a couple other weapons in the trunk of his car, he did have a knife on him, but that was it. He honestly felt a little bit naked with just that on his person, but this was supposed to be have been a nice lunch with his girlfriend, so he hadn’t come armed to the teeth.
He watched more people come out of the bank, followed by a guy in the standard issue black ski mask, waving a gun around, and gave a shake of his head. “I don’t know what the deal is, I see one un-hospitable looking fellow, on the bank steps, but oh he’s heading back inside. Maybe he’s got some friends in there.”
As he was talking, Roy was getting up from his seat and getting ready to bolt for the door and his car, then he paused and turned to look at Jennie. “Umm, I’m probably going to have to do this as a SHIELD agent.” He sounded a bit apologetic as he said that, he could have just taken off the jacket but the jacket and the badge he had in his pocket might help calm the situation down. And if that didn’t work the arrows he planned to shoot might help convince the ski masked guy (and anyone else he was with) to sit down, shut up and stop robbing that bank.
“So …” He glanced around the restaurant, most of the patrons had become clued in to what was going on, and had rushed to the window to look out. “If I had it, I’d say with a vested in me by I don’t know someone, I’d declare you a temporary SHIELD deputy agent. But I don’t have that - so guess it’s SHIELd agent and green girl to the rescue.”
And no, he wasn’t going to ask Jen to not go, or sit this out. Any firepower was welcome, and Jennie did stuff like this, asking her to sit this out would just be stupid.
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Only when Roy confirmed that there was indeed something happening, did Jen turn in her seat and follow his line of vision. Okay, yeah, she agreed, that wreaked of suspicious behavior - guns, ski masks, the whole nine yards. She spared a backwards glance at Roy to see what he wanted to do. She knew Arrows and Lanterns had been working together for a long time, since before she had come onto the scene, so she wanted to let him take point presumably because he had been doing this longer, sort of. But also because she wanted to circumvent any arguments that might arise do to them having conflicting ideas about what needed to be done, or rather how to go about it.
She nodded along and didn't move from her seat quite yet, just let him go through the whole rigmarole of fake deputizing her, even though she thought it was kind of silly, that stuff about being impressed by his SHIELD prowess obviously not applicable at the moment. This was not Jen’s first rodeo, though but she almost worked exclusively with Kyle Rayner who had a distinct way of doing things and before that her brother, making Jen used to both taking and giving orders.
“So, what’s the plan, stan?” She questioned, already in her head forming her own ideas. She kept her voice down, even though most everyone rushed to the window to gawk at what was happening across the street. “Go grab your gear and meet back here? You should let me see how many are in there,” Jen suggested gently, since she could be bullet proof if necessary.
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“Well I have to get to my car, and then back.” Roy frowned for a second, as he looked out the window. “Have to guess that the cops are on their way … and if they show up, I’m supposed to let them do their thing.” Yeah, Roy’s tone suggested that he thought he could handle this better then a cop. That might or might not be true, and was probably part of the reason why some cops didn’t like vigilantes. That ‘I can do your job better and while wearing a mask and a silly hat’ kind of attitude. Some SHIELD agents had that kind of attitude to though …
He looked over at Jennie and flashed her a quick grin.
“All right you want to go in first then?” Did he feel weird asking his girlfriend to go into a bank with armed robbers in there? A little, but his girlfriend had a version of awesome cosmic powers, so hey she was better equipped to go in there green powers a blazing.
“I’ll be there to cover you fast as I can.”
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“Sure, okay.” That was easier than she had thought. And standing from her seat, Jen gave Roy a quick peck and a “See you soon, don’t be long,” before getting her game face on and going into GL-mode.
Not really knowing how many people were inside of the bank, Jen was pretty sure (the fact that she was only “pretty sure” she neglected to mention to Roy) she could take on three dudes with guns. But she wasn’t about to rush in all guns a-blazing either. She was in control of the situation. Jen focused on the task and calmly stalked towards the door, her costume manifesting in a flicker of light - white on green, with her signature asterix on the chest. Her eyes narrowed. These douchebags ruined her date and someone was going to have to pay for that. And she knew exactly who to direct her ire at - gun toting bank robbers were the ones who had it coming.
Jen made her way through the crowd, who parted for her, and into the bank, simply pushing open the doors like it was nothing. Jen just merely leaned against the wall of the lobby while the robbers continued to be menacing and empty out the bank at gunpoint. “You know that’s pretty stupid,” she called out, while inspecting her nails. “I mean, I wouldn’t do that.” This earned the attention of the bank robbers, there were four of them she noted, who leveled their guns at her. “I wouldn’t do that either,” she warned.
“Get out on the ground!” The leader shouted.
“Mmm. I don’t think so,” she replied. “You see, you ruined my date. And I don’t get to see my boyfriend enough. So, lets make this quick. Either you cooperate and give yourselves up or I’m going to have to drop the lot of you like fourth period French.”
“What are you waiting for? Shoot her!” The one who was standing in the vault shouted to the others.
Jen looked disappointed and heaved a sigh. Now she was annoyed - why did no one ever listen to her? Jen splayed her hand and erupted in a green light that molded to her body and flickered all around her. A light that was similar but unlike any other Green Lantern in existence, something that was unique only to her. She had them all wrapped in chains, manifesting them around the criminals in an instant and constricting them together to prevent them from using their weapons, because they were now all cuffed together with manacles and leg irons. When you're powers were only limited only by your imagination, then there were not limits.
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Roy had moved as quick as he could, from the restaurant to the car where he had grabbed his bow and a few other pieces of weaponry that he kept stashed in his trunk.
He had seen her head up the stairs of the bank, while he had been getting his bow, and by the time he had that, she was in the bank doing her thing he figured. He had to fight his way through a crowd of people although luckily no cops - yet - to get up the stairs the bank. Once the cops showed up this was technically their party, and a lone SHIELD agent would have no business butting in.
He got there in time to see Jen take out the guys with the guns - that was pretty nifty, and maybe a little hot even.
“Nice job.” He glanced around, but Jennie seemed to have taken care of things. Cool. Maybe they could still salvage some lunch time.
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By the time Roy met up with her, Jen was so focused on the task at hand that she almost glared at him for interrupting.. He might have been doing this since he was fourteen, but so had Jen, what with having her cosmic powers since puberty. It meant she was very good at what she did, but also sometimes when she was working she could become a little intense, but her expression softened almost immediately afterward.
"Thanks," she replied, politely if not a little distant. She wasn't sure how this was suppose to work. Should they pretend they know each other? Didn't know each other? Green Lanterns were easier to deal with, because not only was it a built in secret identity, it was a title. But was he Roy? Agent Harper? Or something else?
"I can hold this until the cops come, but then I think I should..." She should probably stick around to give a statement, but she kind of didn't feel like it either. Pulling on the chains, she dragged the criminals forward.
"Do you want to wait outside with me?" She asked.
As they made their way towards the front of the building, Jen gave Roy a run down of the details, how there were four robbers, not three. And that the bank manager had pressed their panic button so cops were most definitely on their way. When they got outside something just didn't feel right and Jen couldn't shake the feeling that something was, in fact, very much wrong but she couldn’t say exactly why.
She looked at Roy, her brows knitted together. "If you were going to rob a bank, what would your exit strategy be?" She posed the question to him, oscillating around that they were forgetting a big piece of the puzzle. The getaway car was parked just across the street - a discrete white utility vehicle, whose driver was about ready to take a potshot at the pair when he saw that his fellow hoods were being apprehended.
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Roy was pretty quiet on the walk outside- hey the good guys had won and the bad guys were going to go to jail. No one had gotten hurt so really this was very much a win for everyone, right? Right. Except he was a little annoyed that he hadn’t got a chance to shoot anything. Hey he might not have flashy cool powers, but Roy liked to show off when he had the chance.
When they got outside and she asked him what his exit strategy would be if he had robbed a bank. Instead he frowned; “Well I’d have a getaway car, someone waiting for me …”
He couldn’t say why one bit of movement in a sea of chaos caught his eye, but there was something about the van across the street, all white and clean and not having an identifying mark on it. And now the window was rolling down.
“Down!” He snapped at Jen, grabbing her arm, as he dropped to the ground as well. He didn’t mean to snap, he just wanted her down on the ground, as fast as possible.
There was the sound of a gunshot, and one of the robbers that Jen had encased green constructs of chains, yelled as the bullet went over his shoulder. Didn’t hit him but obviously scared him. Wonderful now guns were being shot, and there was going to be even more panic.
The getaway driver perhaps realizing that he had made a very big mistake, peeled out of the parking spot he had been in, and started gunning it down the street, like he was going to go right through any car, or person that got in his way.
Well look at that. A chance to use his bow after all.
Roy grabbed an arrow, took aim and fired. Then again. Having now lost two tires, the van spun out and smashed into a light pole, and the cops (who had by now made their way to the scene) surrounded it.
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Jen did not need to be told twice when Roy had given the directive to hit the deck and dropped to the ground, bringing her hands around her head to protect it. So, Jen hadn't been in a ton of shootouts, this being the first, but she could follow instruction and thought it wise to listen to the guy whose name was Arsenal.
She cursed her her breath when she realized what was happening, that not only they were getting shot at, but the criminals as well. Damn it. That was on her if they had gotten hit. Jen was determined not to let that happen and so had to work double time now to block out the anger (alright, and a little fear) to keep it together. She threw out a bullet proof shield in the event that there might be a second or third shot taken and while she was doing that, Roy was doing his thing. It was nice to know that they could, in fact, function as a couple and as a team. Jen made a mental note to say something, just not know when she needed to pull together every scrap of focus that she had to keep the constructs in place.
Eventually Jen picked herself up off the ground, and lowered the shield as she did. "Nice work," she said, smiling despite feeling weary at the situation. What a day for a date. The sooner that this was all handled the sooner she could leave, being more frazzled than she cared to admit.
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“You okay?” He glanced over at her - she looked okay, and was smiling so that was good right? And not like he could give her a physical once over kind of check right here in front of all these people …Mostly because she was in her crime fighting gear, and he was in his SHIELD jacket, and well that would probably send the wrong message about SHIELD and superhero interaction.
He was worried for her, well worried mixed with some sort of admiration, because the way she had taken the robbers down inside the bank had been cool. Or at least the part he had seen had been cool. But she did look okay so the worry was fading fast.
“Guess we gotta talk to the cops …” He gave a glance towards the bank robbers who were still being contained thanks to Jen. She was going to to have to stay around at least, until regular handcuffs got put on those guys, and he was going to have to show his badge and prove it was all right for him to carry it around, and shoot tires out of cars.
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“Okay, sure,” she agreed with a nod, even though she very much did not want to deal with the cops just then and there. It always took so long to give a statement, transfer custody, plus answer all of the requisite “hero” questions that’d be directed her way about being a meta. And right now the only thing on Jen’s mind was going home and chilling out, de-stressifying. But she was made of sterner stuff than that, and always followed things through to the end. Even when the tasks were undesirable. Especially when the tasks were undesirable.
Once it was all said and done, though, she bid Roy a solemn farewell, with no promise of contact afterwards. She just needed to go and be alone for a while.