Frost waved her hand, unleashing a storm of hail and large chunks of ice on the cogs. She then turned to Jack. "Pleased to meet you. I'm known as the Rose of Ice, but you can just call me Rose" A smile that almost seemed real formed on her lips as she grabbed Jacks hand for a cold handshake. "And you...must be Jack. Having trouble handling the overgrown duracell bunnies alone?" Inside, Frost sighed. This job better had to pay well, both of them that is. She should probably demand a bonus from Contact.
As the cogs were beginning to escape the ice storm, she froze on of them to the ground and sent some iceshards to take care of the second. "Last one is yours"
"Oh him?" Jack waved his hand as the clockwork let out a downward hum and fell to th floor, "He's already finished, he just didn't know it yet. Miss Rose was it?" Jack took a moment blatently eyeing Frost up and down before nodding and letting his tail flit back and forth a bit. "You'll do nicely. Here I found a hole full of the buggers over here. Think they might have gone into production." Jack pointed to the pile of scrap metal piled high next to a warehouse with a beaten path leading from its base into the warehouse.
Frost blew some hair out of her eyes. "Nice trick you got there. Advanced illusions and superspeed, correct?" Frost created an ice miniature of a cog, then crushed it in her hand. "Soo...why is it you need me to help you? Not that I mind, but you seem quite capable of handling things yourself" Frost waved her hand, turning the pile of clocks into a block of solid ice. "No reason to give them free spareparts."
"Aye, I can handle a few clockwork no problem." Jack told her while he went rumaging through the scraps and parts scattered in front of the warehouse, tossing small pieces of broken clockwork and scrap over his shoulder. "You see love, thought I might get lonely on this one, and besides." Jack lifted a small cylindrical object from the mangled torso of a long since deactivated Sprocket and eyed it over carefully. "I need someone to carry these." he said and tossed the cylinder to Frost.
Jack walked to the large steel doors of the warehouse before him and threw them open dramatically, both doors flying open, slamming against the walls and quickly slamming shut again. Jack turned around slowly to face Frost not far behind him.
"Miss Rose, I think we're going to need more then snowstorms and illusions." he said cheerily as someting huge slammed violently into the doors producing a clang loud enough to be heard for half a mile.
Helsing sat at thwe bar with his cell phone to his ear and his PDA in his hand. "Mmmhhmm, okay. I'll call him as soon as I can, bye," Helsing said. Galatic Jack, this guy sounds like a sure fire character, Helsing thought as he dialed Jack's number. "Hello, is this Galactic Jack? I'm looking for work. O my name? Kyle Helsing...."
Frost grabbed the cylinder "Some man you are, getting a woman to carry his stuff for him." Frost nodded at the door "What did you have in mind?" Frost began emitting cold blue waves of frost, chilling the air around her. "It can't be that bad, what do you have in there anyway? Clockwork king? A horde of dukes? Your mother-in-law?"
Jack's face contorted, "Mother in-law? But I'm not..." Jack was inturrupted by a large mechanical claw bursting through the doors about a foot above his head. "Princes, three of them. Hold on love."
Jack became a blur of motion and swept behind Frost, sweeping her off her feet and into his arms before leaping to the roof ofthe building. Both took on a certain transparence as Jack let Frost to her own feet, in the process of which he gave her rear a firm grab.
"We just might have to call in some boys to handle this one." he said, preparring to duck an incomming strike from his 'partner'.
Icegun handed Contact on of his business cards. "Greetings Contact. Let me introduce myself, I am known as Icegun. I am president and owner of CEO protection services. Nice to meet a fellow businessman. I have come by to congratulate you on your business sucsess and to also inquire about one of your employees." Icegun's tone was formal during this statement. "I was wondering about an associate of yours named The Sly Fox. I have heard many things about him and have aslo had an encounter with him."
~King Garment Works...
Jack and his one-woman team appeared in fuzzy shades of green through the scope of the large rifle perched on the edge of a building across the street. Laying flat against the rooftop was a man in a blue and white First Strike uniform, his eyes covered with dark goggles and his face hidden behind a breather.
"Confirmed contact with multipul hostile targets," the operative said touching the com at the side of his helmet. "Preparing to interdict hostiles," the agent closed the com and drew back the bolt on his rifle, taking bead on the door and chambering a heavy round.
~Back at First Strike...
Contact exchanged buisness cards with the man and smiled. He hadn't heard of his outfit and was always interested in the competition.
"The pleasure's mine, Mr. Icegun. Thank you for your kind words."
"Mr. Fox? Yes, he works for me," Contact raised an eyebrow above the gold rim of his glasses, "In fact he sits on The Board. What buisness do you have with him?" Contact remembered Sly's previous run in with Icegun, even if Icegun didn't remember he was there. He watched him carefully, judging his reaction.
Frost sent a beam of freezing energy towards Jack's family jewelry. She didn't expect it to hit the mark, but it was worth a shot. "the next time your hand gains unauthorized access to my behind, I will freeze it off" Frost said with a smile.
er feet left the roof, and she was floating a few inches above it.
"So, do we fight now or wait for your bunzai buddies to show up?" Frost had a bolt of razor sharp ice ready in her hand.
Jack was able to move just fast enough to attain a frozen patch on his rear sure to upset his drycleaner. As he gulped a sigh of relief his sharp alien eyes spotted a brief flicker of reflected light. Jack smiled to himself and thought, "always on the job".
Jack turned and gave a wink to Frost and then once again became a blur of motion. He lept from the top of the building to land in front of the doors sure to soon burst, rotating himself in mid air, his own momentum caused him to keep skidding accross the pavement once he landed. Jack waved his arm though the air just as the three Princes broke through the steel door. With a tremendous flash of light the middle Prince clutched his eyes as he was thrown back several feet, a huge gaping hole in its mechanical head gave preface to its winding gears coming to a halt.
If this were anything but real life, now was when the soft rock and roll guitar rifts would ring in to accent the Heroe's amazing moves. Instead, Jack was sent flying as a double dose of electrical bolts arced through the air to his position. They had slammed into a nearly invisible wall of force in front of him, but they had still slammed rather hard.
The Operative exhaled slowly, then squeezed the trigger. A whisp of air was the only evidence that anything outside of Jack's motions was afoot. The slug slammed into the face of the Duke and it stumbled back, sputtering before it fell back, whatever force animating it dispersing.
On the roof, the Operative slid the bolt back, chambering another round and lining up his next shot.
~Meanwhile, back at the office~
Sly had had enough of this... he wasn't going to run around having people not trust him, just because of his past.
Furthermore, he wasn't going to let his employer, let alone his friend, sit through whatever Icegun had to say with him "hiding" in the next room...
Straightening his hat, he mumbled an incantation, and was suddenly in his FSS Field Uniform. Taking a breath and squaring his shoulders, he marched out to the lobby.
"Yes, Mr. Icegun, what exactly DID you want to talk to my boss about?"
Frost sent the ice bolt straight at one of the princes...and missed. A curse left her lips, as she began showering the the robots with hail and chunks of ice. "That should slow them down a bit..." She aimed carefully as a blast of ice left her hands and this time actually hit it's mark. It hadn't done nearly enough to take it down, but it was a start. Unfortunetly it had also caught the attention of the prince, and soon Frost found herself in a rather painful web of electricty.
Icegun held up his hands defensively, "What a minute gentleman, you thought my problem was with Sly? Nothing could be further from the truth. I have had nothing but good dealings with him since our first meeting. I do admit we did have a problem then, but we have since gotten past that. In fact, he has helped me on occasion. Whether he knew it or not. I just asked if he was here because I had planned on taking him to lunch. Actually I am suprised he is here right now. After talking to him the other day, he made it seem like he was always out handling the clients. I believe his exact words were "They couldn't handle half the work without me" but of course all of us need a minute or two to rest and recover from our battles." Icegun looked towards Contact, "Actually my problem is with a ceartin fellow that is called Jack. He lives in my neighboorhod and well I hate to mention this, but he keeps breaking my windows when he runs bye my home. I don't think he does it intentionally, the rocks in the road are propelled from the wake of his superspeed into my house and they have a bad habit of shattering my window. I have left him notes in his mailbox, but it looks like no one has checked it in days. I was wondering if you could mention it to him and see if he can hold down his speed while in the neighboorhood. I would hate for him to accidently hit a car or god forbid a child. The results would be disasterous."
Contact glanced sideways at Fox and grinned his confident/smug half grin.
"Well, I certainly think we can spare the Baffling Fox for an hour or so, after all," Contact pushed his glasses up over his eyes, "Company policy says he gets a lunch."
"As for Jack, he's not one of mine, but I know who you're refering to. Galactic Jack is purely a solo act, save the occasional female he suckers into joining him," Contact made no mention of sending Frost to join him. Truth be told, he hadn't even know it was Jack until his Operative reported back to him... He never would have sent a potential freelance recruite along to be manhandled. He'd have to cover that mistake later, money would likely fix it, he thought to himself.
"I have a location on Jack currently, but you may want to catch him later. He's a touch 'busy' at the moment," Contact said absently, scribbling down directions to the King Garment Works on a piece of paper and handing it to Icegun.
"That's the place, but don't say I didnt warn you."
Sly Fox could NOT believe his luck!
"Well well well, thank you Mr. Icegun. I must say I thought you had forgotten that brief time we teamed up. It's nice to know I made SUCH a good impression! But then, I suppose I always do!"
Fox glanced at the paper in his new friend's hands.
"You know, we could head over there, Icegun... I mean, after all, I wouldn't want a lady of Frost's delicate nature to be at the whim of such a lecherous man as Jack!"
Sly suddenly turned to Contact. "You ok, boss? You swallow a bug or something? What's with all the coughing?"
Contact cleared his throat and smiled, "Was just considering the source, Fox. Oh and don't forget what happened the last time you tried to be smooth with that particular young lady," he grinned.
"In any case, if you leave now you can probably catch them still."
Icegun grinned under his helmet. He knew that The Sly Fox said he had a way with the ladies, at least that is all he seemed to talk about when they had teamed up. "Well Sly, shall we head out? I have taken enough of Mr. Contacts time. I still want to hit somewhere for lunch though. Do you know any good restruants in Kings Row?"
"All I know is everytime I go to Flander's Chicken they are closed. Let me call for a few pizzas, though, and have them delivered to that Garment Works address..."
Icegun shuddered at the mention of pizza. "Everytime I order pizza, a couple of wiseguys show up and want to explain how I need protection. The also screw up my order too. Lets try the new mexican place El Super Mexicano. I could go for a carne asada burrito." Icegun stopped once they got outside and looked at Sly. "By the way, I found your wallet. It was at the magic store in Talos Island" Icegun handed the wallet to The Sly Fox. "You should probably keep a better eye on your stuff."
Sly, not having a wallett, (he never carried one) looked down at it for a second...
"ummm... thanks? ..."
But he couldn't bring himself to do it.
"This isn't mine Icegun... although I really can understand why you might have thought so... I mean, how many other wallets have Bad "M.F." stiched onto them... gee... actually, you take this back. I'm not sure I want to hold onto this.
OK! You get the food, and I'll rush over to that warehouse! Come on! The poor Lady Frost is in the midst of evil! Plus, there are clockworks there!"
With a flash Sly teleported off on his way...
Jack knew his job well, better then most people. One of the things that set him aside is he knew when things were about finished. Sure he waved his hands around and produced brilliant flashes of light, powerful illusions to tear at the clockworks and Frost did her part too. The one action that made Jack different is when the last of the giant robots was about to fall, he called his publicist.
"1212 Potter Way by the King Garment Works, get the post, the times and the herald here and feed them 'Jack Recycles, Clockwork Just Tin Cans.'" he said over his phone while he and Frost cleaned up the number of sprockets and cogs running about after they had taken the royalty. Each of Jack's brilliant flashes of light masked another shot from the operative's rifle.
As the duo finished with the last few clockwork the news vans began to arrive, the sun had already sunk behind the walls and the sky was quickly turning a deeper blue. Jack wasn't ready just yet, though: Frost was about to learn why Jack carried such an impressive record of rescued damsels and an almost equally impressive record of restraining orders.
Jack called out to Frost, "Rose! Look out!" as he made a wave of his hand in her direction and blinded her with a flash of white light.
Disoriented and stunned, Frost could make little struggle as Jack sped under her and swept her feet out from under her, carrying her in his arms he stepped twords the multitudes of reporters just now stepping from their vehicles.
"GJ, who's the lady?" barked a reporter, pointing a microphone twords Jack.
"How did you know the clockwork were here?" came the question of another.
Jack stood completely upright, still carrying Frost who was slowly comming to, his figure imposing and strong. "Actually Rose here happened to be investigating the area. We were both doing some work for Chintiny Research and it just happened that she stumbled upon the very group of Clockwork I had marked for disassembly." Jack slowly let Frost back to her feet as she regained her eyesight, a well placed hand he would later claim occupied the space it did only to keep her from falling. "But it was only when I heard the desperate cries of miss Rose that I realized the clockwork inside this warehouse," Jack waved a hand "had taken ,my fiance hostage in a foolish attempt to demoralize and capture me."
Jack flashed his pearly whites and held Frost close at the hip while the reporters took a few photos. It was good publicity, but it was mising something Jack thought. Then he had it, a perfect ending to another front page story.
"And we are both very proud to announce that we'll be donating all of our pay for this job to one of my many sponsored charities." Jack smiled again and gave a thumbs up identicle to the one on his posters and comic books before he prepared to dodge whatever wrath Frost was about to send his way.
Microphones and cameras were thrust in Frost's face as her eyes opened fulling seeing.
"Congratulations maam, how's it feel to be engaged to the famous Galactic Jack?" they proded. "Does it bother you to be dating such an older man?"
All he did was smile as the others arrived and another FSS operative left his perch unseen, shaking his head in disapproval. Someone was about to ask for a bonus.
Frost was, to say the very least, furious. She had absolutly no intention of donating any of her money to anyone but herself. Ofcourse she could just ignore Jack's promise. No, what really got her cold hatred rolling was the fact that he had used her for this media stunt. Well, she could play that game as well.
Frost smiled warmly to the press as she turned to Jack, wrapped on arm around his neck, and.... kissed him passionately. Her tongue opened up Jacks teeth, he was obviously expecting something quite different. Her other hand went down to touch a place between his legs. She breathed in through her nose, and breathed out, icecold, freezing Jacks mouth, effectively shutting him up. Her other hand froze a rather essential part of Jacks body.
The press was clapping and taking pictures. This was great stuff! Ofcourse they didn't notice any of Frost's tricks. She let go of Jack as she whispered in his ear: "I warned you."
Then she turned to the press, smiling warmly. "Jack is very romantic and old fashioned, actually he promised me he wouldn't drink alcohol til we are married...in 2008." This was indeed a perfect revenge, and almost worth it, just one more thing...
"We wanted to marry before that ofcourse, but Jack is going to Africa to help the children there for the next four years."
Now, it had been worth it. "I have some buisness to do, so I'll leave you alone to interview Jack about it. Goodbye honey" She looked at Jack and a smile more fake than that of a politician came over her lips. She took off towards the FSS guys. She was indeed about to ask for a bonus. A BIG one.
"%$#@!" was all the two suddenly heard from a conference room off of the main reception area.