The Multiverse in a Nutshell

by Pennington Inkwell

Smarter Than You Think

This time, everyone gathered down in the lab, which had a similar display to their meeting room upstairs. There were a couple of faces Sunset hadn't seen yet, apparently the two remaining members of Coulson's team. One was an older woman with shoulder-length black hair. Sunset could tell just from her posture that she was a woman not to be crossed. The other was a man with short-cut hair and traces of stubble. The moment that he had entered the room, a change seemed to come over Penn. He had instantly tensed up and made his way across the room to Sunset's side, placing himself between her and the stranger. The act hadn't gone unnoticed, the man and Penn sharing a glance at one another. Penn had simply nodded politely, but Sunset noted the absence of a smile on his face like when he had greeted the rest of the team. She made a mental note to ask him what kind of problem he had with the agent later.

"Now, to pick up our conversation from the point where it was interrupted..." Coulson glanced at Penn, who blushed and rubbed at the back of his neck.

"Sorry about that, I guess I was in worse shape than I thought I was when I got here. I'm fine now. No fainting, scout's honor!"

Coulson nodded and brought up a still frame from the video the day before: a perfect shot of the five ships floating in space. "Mister Penn, why exactly would this image make you faint?"

"Just 'Penn' is fine. Each of those are Dalek warships. Each one is capable of holding at least two THOUSAND Daleks. Five ships makes an invasion force of at least ten thousand."

"Ten thousand? That could decimate an entire country!" the male agent muttered.

"Try 'entire planet.'" Penn replied. "Daleks are killing machines. There could be only a handful of them and they wouldn't stop until every human on the planet was dead."

"Which is why we need to eliminate these scouts now." Coulson turned to address the duo of scientists. "Fitz-Simmons, tell me you've got SOMETHING that can help with that!"

"Yes!" both replied in unison.

"Simmons managed to separate the creature from the life-support systems. We're working on trying to find some kind of biological weakness we could use to bypass the outer shell and attack the creatures inside directly." Fitz cheerfully announced.

"And..." Simmons continued. "Fitz managed to not only separate the weapons system from the main body to make it handheld," she motioned to the table, where the gun portion was laid out with a long string of wires leading back to the body. "Thanks to the information Sunset Shimmer gave us, we know that reverse-engineering it is our best shot at creating a weapon that can penetrate their shielding. And managed to access the data core!"

It was at this point Skye raised her hand. "Fitz and I have been working like crazy trying to decode it, but my best estimate would be that we need at least twenty-four hours to crack the encryption."

"The planet's at risk, we don't have twenty-four hours!"

"Coulson, that's the best we can DO! We're already working ourselves to the bone, we didn't sleep at all last night!"

Sunset watched Penn press the tips of his fingers together and tap them against his forehead. "Wait... wait wait waitwaitwait..."

"Well, forget the encryption, we need to focus on weapons. Fitz, how long until a working prototype?"

"I'm missing something..." Penn whispered, tapping harder at his head. "Something important, something..."

"If we stop working on the decryption? Four, maybe five hours?" Fitz strolled over to the place where the gun was laying.

"That's a question, not an answer, Fitz. Every second we don't beat these things is another second people are dying out there!"

"What if we take this one gun and wipe out the scouts? Would that buy us time?" the male agent spoke up, picking the gun off the table and examining it closely.

"Or they might send a retaliatory force," The older woman growled. "More Daleks, greater violence. If they're a militaristic race, they'll respond to a show of force in kind."

Penn, meanwhile, was beginning to groan with exertion, eyes screwed shut as he slammed the base of his palm against his forehead. "Come on! I know I'm forgetting something!"

Everyone in the room was beginning to stare at him, and Sunset reached out to tap him on the shoulder.

"Penn? You okay?"

The moment she touched him, his eyes flew open wide and he slammed both hands on the table.

"THE DATA CORE!"

He glanced around the room, as if expecting everyone to instantly understand what he was talking about. Even Sunset had to admit that it was a mystery to her, and the way everyone was exchanging worried glances told her that she wasn't the only one. The only one keeping his eyes fixed on Penn was Coulson.

"Yes? What about it? I'm sure it's full of useful data, are you saying it has something we can use to beat these things faster?"

Penn turned away from the table, clasping his hands together a pointing his fingers ahead.

"Just... just let me talk through this. The Dalek database is the single most extensive wealth of data in the whole universe, possibly even more so than the Time Lords! They're a hivemind of data, everything observed by every Dalek going and feeding into their store of information." He spun on his heel, pointing the fingers of each hand at Skye and Fitz. "They have one of the most advanced securities known, and you two think you could crack it in a DAY?"

"Definitely!"

"I-I think so..."

Penn grinned and punched the air. "GREAT! I knew you were clever, but that's just GENIUS!" He spun back to face Coulson, leaning out over the table on both hands. "I've got an idea. It's crazy, but if it works the whole planet will be safe from the Daleks, possibly for good!"

Sunset thought she saw the beginnings of a smile tugging at Coulson's lips as he asked the question everyone was thinking.

"Well? What is it?"

Penn grinned and walked to the back of the room, pacing back and forth.

"Okay, so, in the past, a truly genius hacker proved herself able to exploit a connection to the Dalek database, she went in and deleted all files on a single individual, one that the daleks had been hunting for millenia, and the Daleks just... forgot him! Their memories of him had been wiped completely clean, even the ones that had just seen him less than a day before!" The pace of his pacing increased every time he changed direction. "If someone IS smart enough to crack their system and get inside, they could theoretically make the Daleks forget ANYTHING!"

"Like a planet?"

"YES! Imagine if we did that for a whole PLANET!" Penn continued his pacing, now power-walking from one side of the room to the other in only a couple seconds. "But you can't just delete the information, right? All that will happen is that they'll get to have the joy of discovering Earth all over again! Soooo..." he turned back to face the group, waiting for someone to finish the train of thought.

"If we can delete things, then... that means we can replace them, too, right? Put in our own data?" Fitz asked. Penn grinned and pointed a finger-gun at Fitz with a gleeful fake firing noise.

"KA-POW! One hundred points to Ravenclaw! SO, we'll have to split into two- no, three teams! Team one, Techies! Fitz and Skye, you two need to crack that data core and write a program that'll wipe Earth out of their memories and replace it with something REALLY unappealing! Meanwhile, team two, the specialists..." he took a moment to gesture to the two agents Sunset hadn't been introduced to, "are going to have to wipe out the scouts in a swift and decisive manner! If they're here at the same time we change the memories and see something different, all of this could be for nothing! Finally, team three is going to have to find a way to deliver the altered data core to a place where it could be connected to the main database..." he strode his way up to the front of the room, staring intently at the picture of the flying saucers. "Most likely.. there. I should probably be on that team, so..."

There was a brief moment of silence as the wind seemed to fall out of Penn's sails. He seemed to deflate slightly as his manic moment came to an end and he sheepishly looked at the floor, turning to face Coulson.

"O-or, at least, that's how I would do it, sir. Sorry, I wasn't trying to order your team around..."

For a minute, it was like he was a completely different person! Sunset was slightly in awe at the transformation. For a moment, Penn had been practically oozing confidence, held himself with a presence of a man completely in control. And then all at once it was gone and he had returned to his alter-identity as a mild-mannered pizza guy.

Coulson patted Penn's shoulder. "It's a good plan, I can overlook the faux pas." He smiled and poked a finger into Penn's chest. "That enthusiasm's good, hold on to that." He sighed, then turned to the rest of the team.

"Skye, get working on cracking that encryption. Fitz, finish making that gun mobile!" Both of them nodded, Fitz rushing to the table with the Dalek's gun and Skye rushing out of the room. "Ward, Mae, I need both of you to get ready to suit up. The moment that gun is operational, you're going out and wiping out the scouts we've been tracking. Discretely." The other two agents nodded, both walking out of the room together. Finally, his gaze turned to Sunset and he drew Penn's attention with a pat on his shoulder.

"Miss Shimmer, Penn, may I speak with you two for a moment in my office?" He calmly strode his his way out of the room. Penn shot Sunset a nervous glance and shrugged. She rolled her eyes and simply fell into line behind him.

"That... was amazing! How much of that did you make up as you went along?"

Penn sheepishly glanced back at her.

"Well, I DID say I needed to talk my way through it... Fake it 'till you make it, you know?"

Sunset could only smile and shake her head. That was the kind of excuse she was used to hearing from Rainbow Dash. Coulson led them through the upper level towards the front of the plane. Finally, they all walked into a small room. It was clearly an office, with a large desk and shelves lined with what looked like antique spy devices and models of every kind. It was like she was standing in a museum devoted to the history of the organization she was working with. Coulson took a seat behind his desk, interlacing his fingers and letting out a long sigh. He turned a tired-looking glare on Penn.

"What were you thinking? What you suggested about going out onto that alien ship is insane! There's NO WAY I can allow civilians to put themselves in the line of fire like that! It goes against every rule and regulation SHIELD has!"

Sunset watched Penn shrink back and away in the face of Coulson's reproach. A shadow of shame fell over him as his eyes shot down to the floor. Sunset felt indignation well up in her chest.

"Hey, he was just saying what makes sense!" Sunset stepped forward. "And he just gave you a plan to save the world!"

"And I AM grateful for that! But suggesting the idea of putting himself on the Dalek ship-"

"Ourselves." Sunset folded her arms over her chest. Penn's head snapped up, eyes wide with surprise. Sunset smiled and rolled her eyes. "You didn't think I'd let you go alone, did you?"

"Absolutely not." Coulson declared. Sunset turned back to the government agent, narrowing her eyes.

"Sir, with all respect, I know how to size someone up at a glance. The only two people on your team who are left are Simmons and you, and Jemma wouldn't last five minutes in the middle of a ship full of crazy killer robots! You have to be here to coordinate your team! You are out of hands!" She moved up to the desk, leaning in to look Coulson in the eye. "Penn and I were as close to that monster you have downstairs as I am to you right now. And we walked away. We aren't just your only choice, we're your best choice." Coulson didn't flinch at her, still as a statue as he stared right back into her piercing gaze.

"Unacceptable."

"You don't have a choice."

There was a moment of tense silence. It felt like Sunset and Coulson were locked in some kind of battle of will, caught in a stalemate as they waited to see which one of them would flinch first. Coulson's eyes narrowed.

"Get out of my office."

Sunset nodded.

"You'll know where to find us... sir." Sunset turned back to Penn, who had lost all color in his face, took hold of his hand, and led him out of the room. She tugged Penn all the way back to the living quarters where he finally moved under his own power to throw himself onto the couch.

"Y-y-y-you just- You JUST-"

Sunset rolled her eyes.

"Too much is on the line for us to follow every rule in the book, Penn, and I can already tell you're too busy hero-worshiping this guy to stand up to him when he's wrong!"

"You can't volunteer to go on that ship! It's crazy! It's insane!" Penn leaned forward and grabbed her by the shoulders. "A Dalek ship is practically certain death! Their lasers are so powerful they'll scramble your organs like eggs!"

Sunset folded her arms and narrowed her gaze.

"YOU volunteered to go, and you expect me to just let you go in alone?"

"I vo- I volunteered? I- I did, didn't I?" Penn held his palm up to his forehead and propped his elbow on his knee. "I think I'm going to faint again..."

Sunset reached up and pulled his hand away from his head, clasping it in both of hers.

"Hey. Penn. Keep it together, buddy. We're going to make it through this, okay? Where was that confidence you had when you were making this plan? It's a good plan!"

In his eyes, Sunset saw uncertainty and fear, worry. She didn't need to be a mind reader to know that he was terrified. She reached over and unzipped the pouch at his side and reached inside, grabbing the card from the top.

"Hey, remember what you said? A good duelist can overcome any challenge with his wits and the 'heart of his cards,' right? Well, your cards are right here! They're not going anywhere!" Slowly turned over the card in his hand, revealing the card he'd been showing off to her earlier: Ghostrick Angel of Mischief. "And I'm not going anywhere, either."

Penn took a long, deep breath, and Sunset felt his grip on her hand tighten. Finally, he let go of his breath and her hand at the same time.

"Okay. Right. It'll be fine. Everything is going to be fine..." he whispered, rising out of the chair on shaky legs. "W-why don't we go find something to eat?"

Sunset smiled, glad that her encouragement had gotten through to him.

"Sounds good to me, buddy."

Comments

[Gravity012]

Love this so far.

[Oreng Pingvin]

10076662
Yes

[Dark Enigma]

I love your depiction of Sunset. You are hi-lighting all her best qualities while keeping her in tune with her character. It's amazingly well done and I can't get enough.

[Pennington Inkwell]

10723333
Thank you!