Author's Note: Yes, why am I starting another story when I'm bad at keeping up with the ones I already have to work on? Well, the more stories I have going, the more compelled I am to keep writing up chapters, if only so it doesn't feel like I'm giving one story special treatment (yes I'm treating them like they're my children). Besides, if I have the ideas, I may as well start, then if I hit a roadblock on one I have another story to fall back to. Now that I've graduated and have a more regular schedule, maybe I'll be better at keeping up with chapters. Maybe not. We'll see. But I'd still like to know what you all think, so favorite, follow, review, hit me up for a chat if you like! Also, disclaimer, I do not own anything Marvel. I have creative control of Jenna and her team, maybe a few other characters as we move along, but no recognizable Marvel figure.
Chapter One:
It was her day off.
That was all Jenna could think about as she stood on the New York sidewalk, staring up at the sky like everyone else as a shimmery, blue portal opened to release hundreds of…aliens…from outer space.
It was her day off.
That was all she really had time to think before the first explosion threw her to the ground.
Still a little stunned, Jenna pushed herself up on her elbows and stared around. The Sidewalk she'd been standing on was ripped up, the air was thick with clouds of dust, and though her ears were ringing, she could faintly hear people screaming around her.
She had seen this all before.
Jenna pushed herself up, stumbling slightly, and reached for her phone. She had to call the guys, she had to get her gear. Baker and O'Malley were on duty today, she knew that for sure, but who else was in? Noyd? Barrett? Savcic? She leaned against the building, fumbling with the touch-screen buttons on her phone, cursing herself for upgrading to the newest Stark model. 'Damn Tony Stark, always needs his stuff to be ten times harder to use than it needs to be,' she thought furiously to herself. She held the phone up to her ear as she looked up at the street, eyes wide at the destruction.
"Grant! Where the hell are you?!"
Ah, so they hadn't left yet.
"I'm downtown on the corner of 39th and Park," she said, hurriedly, pulling herself back into the alcove of the building next to her. "Sir, it's bad. The crew needs to get down here now - it's chaos, I have no idea how many civilians may be trapped. Cap, this is like -"
"Looks that way." Captain Astin said quietly before brusquely returning to the immediate concern. He couldn't pause at the past now. "I've called everyone back in and Pearce is getting the truck ready. Hang on tight, and we'll meet you there."
"Yes sir." Jenna kept her ear pressed to her phone even after the call had been dropped. She hadn't realized until that moment that she was shaking, the phone bumping against her cheek as she tried to steady herself.
She peered out from around her corner. A bus had overturned across the street from her, and she could hear cries coming from inside. The aliens (dear Lord, aliens) were zooming past on some sort of air vehicle. If anything moved, they shot it.
Jenna's eye found the bus again, and the second there was a gap in the flying vehicles, she launched herself out of the alcove and across the street to the bus. She circled quickly to the back and started pulling on the emergency door, the trapped passengers quickly gathering around to push with her.
"Damn," She muttered, digging her heels into the ground. "Really could use Hilda right about now."
Her eyes met the eyes of a little girl inside the bus, whose arms were wrapped arrow d her mother with tears streaming down her face. "It's okay!" She called, not sure if anyone could hear her over the explosions and ringing in their ears. She started glancing around at the street earnestly, gaze falling on a loose pipe a few feet away. "It's okay," she called again. "I'm going to get you out, just hold on one second!"
She dashed out to the pipe, stumbling a little over the cracks in the pavement. 'Potholes are going to be a real bitch now,' she though absently as she wrapped her hands around the pipe. Thankfully it wasn't too heavy, and in another stroke of luck it had bent at the end, which would hopefully help it function as a crowbar on the door.
As Jenna turned back to the bus, one of the aliens landed almost directly in front of her, hissing and snarling as she shrieked. She hadn't realized it while they were flying around, but these things were tall, at least 6 and a half feet tall. She was strangely reminded of the cicadas that used to plague her childhood camps - a crusty shell with crackling joints that was just continuously making noise.
The alien snarled and started advancing on her, holding some sort of staff with sharp points on the end. Jenna backed up swiftly, raising the pipe up over her head like a bat before tripping over a chunk of concrete and falling on her back. Her heart was pounding as she stared up at the alien. 'I cannot believe that this is how I'm going to die,' she thought. 'After everything…I am going to get killed by a freaking alien.'
The alien raised its staff, snarling at her as the tip glowed blue. Before Jenna could even scream, a red, white and blue blur came in between her and the alien, causing it to shriek out again and move to sweep the staff upwards. In the blink of an eye the arm holding the staff hit the ground and the alien toppled over backwards with a final death screech.
Jenna's wide eyes moved form the dead alien to the red, white and blue blur, now standing still. It turned out to be a man, wearing a suit that looked like someone had taken an American Flag challenge on Project Runway, and holding a round shield that was also painted red, white and blue. He turned around and Jenna could see that he was wearing a blue hood that had eyeholes cut out, but still covered half of his face. It didn't mask those bright blue eyes though, which were assessing her quickly. "Ma'am, are you alright?" He asked, holding out a hand to help her up.
Jenna grabbed his hand, letting herself be pulled to her feet, before nodding numbly. "Yeah, I'm okay." Her eyes fell on two other people, a red-headed woman in a black catsuit and a man holding a bow and arrow, and just behind them was the bus. Jenna jerked around to find the pipe lying where she'd dropped it. She yanked it up and ran to the bus door again.
"Ma'am, you've got to get off the street!" Shouted the man who'd saved her. The other man shot an arrow into the neck of another alien who landed near them as all three ran for cover by the bus.
"There are people trapped in here!" Jenna snapped, trying to wedge the pipe in between the door and the bus side. She could almost get the edge of the pipe inside, but it was just too wide to get in all the way.
The blue-gloved hand gently landed on her shoulder and pushed her to the side, and the man took her place, putting both hands in the crack Jenna had been working on and wrenching the doors open himself.
Normally Jenna would be staring at this guy's back, jaw dropped, because he pulled the door open like it was a piece of paper what the actual hell, but almost immediately he was handing her the little girl out of the bus and she took her on autopilot. The little girl wrapped her arms around Jenna's legs as her mom was helped out, and then the red-head was directing them into the nearest subway entrance.
Just as the last person had exited the bus, another explosion rocked the ground. The man turned back to Jenna, grabbing her elbow. "Now I'm really going to have to insist that you leave!" They both glanced towards the subway, but more aliens had started flooding in. The arrow man was shooting them at a ridiculous speed and the red-head had picked up one of their spears to shoot.
"It's okay, we've got this!" She yelled back over her shoulder. "Go!"
Immediately the star-spangled man grabbed Jenna around the waist and picked her up.
"Hey!" She squealed, trying to wiggle down. "What are you doing?!"
"Trust me, it's faster!"
"What the hell are you-" And he was off.
Holy shit he was fast.
The guy had raced down two blocks to the police cars set up as a mini, if slightly useless, blockade. Several cars had been over-turned, sot he guy leapt up onto one and walked on top of the nearest cop car to two officers standing there before setting her down.
"You need men in these buildings," he said without any prelude. "There are people still inside and they're going to be running right into the line of fire. You take them into the basements r through the subway. You keep them off the streets. I need a perimeter as far back as 39th."
The cops just stared at this guy, this ridiculously patriotic looking guy who was just telling these NYPD cops what to do. Even Captain Astin couldn't get away with that.
"Why the hell should I listen to you?" One cop asked.
Before anyone could respond Jenna felt herself getting thrown at the cops. One caught her as she shrieked, almost falling over. When she looked back, the flag man was holding his shield up as two aliens landed on the cars behind them. He then punched on in what Jenna could only assume was its face, before jumping up and spinning to kick another one away. He then threw the shield so that it ricocheted off a third alien's head and bounced back to his hand.
Now it was time for Jenna's jaw to really drop.
The two cops looked at each other for a moment before one pulled up his radio. "I need men in the buildings to lead people down and away from the streets. We're going to set up a perimeter all the way down 39th Street."
The two cops raced off, leaving Jenna and the flag men at their cars. The man got down off the roof and put a hand on Jenna's shoulder. "You should follow them, get somewhere covered." He said, glancing back to where a giant green monster had just handed on a bunch of aliens at once. "Just get safe."
As he started running off, Jenna finally got her voice back. "Who even are you?" She yelled. What kind of man dressed like a walking flag, gave orders to cops, and punched aliens in the face?
He paused, half turned back to her, and shrugged with a small smile. "I'm, uh, Captain America." And with that, he took off running back towards the thick of the fighting.
Jenna stood there, staring at the swarm of aliens that seemed to be distracted by the guy - Captain America - and his friends, only vaguely noticing Tony Stark fly overhead in his Iron Man suit. Iron Man, a bow man, a hulking green monster, aliens, and a guy who she was pretty sure died back in World War Two? Jenna was starting to think she'd just never woken up that morning, that this was all still some really insane dream.
She didn't have long to dwell on it though. Aliens were still shooting in her general direction, and people were still running around on the street. Jenna barely had time to duck before a stray shot flew over her head, and with that her mind was back on the situation at hand. Two police officers were shepherding people into the nearest subway station, so Jenna made her way carefully to the opposite side of the street to guide others.
"Head to the nearest subway entrance or basement!" She called, aiming people the right direction as they dashed past. "Get to cover quickly!"
Just as she had cleared an alcove of people covering in the shadows, sirens started blaring, and Jenna could not have been more relieved to see Engine 97 pulling up the street, Ian's head poking out of the top.
The fire truck pulled to a stop cross from Jenna and all at once Ian, Brady, Lucas and Gary were spilling out of the back, Brady holding a helmet in his hands and Captain Astin climbing out of the front with Naomi. Jenna ran to the truck, head down, and was immediately pulled to the shelter of the doors.
"Jesus Grant, off all the days you had to take off!" Brady yelled jokingly, but his eyes were wide and roaming over the ripped up streets and aliens swarming like bees.
"Yeah, well, I always wanted a front row seat to the real-life Independence Day." Jenna said dryly.
Brady handed her the helmet and Ian had grabbed her gear, allowing her to shimmy into the firesuit. Captain Astin looked out over the chaos before turning back to Jenna. "So what's the situation, Grant?"
Jenna tugged her helmet on and pointed to 30th street. "The police are working on setting up the perimeter all the way down 39th. The priority right now needs to be getting all civilians off the street and into the subway or a basement, anything to keep them out of the way."
"What about the aliens?" Alphonse said, standing in the door of the truck. "What are we supposed to do about them?"
As if in response, the red and gold flash of Iron Man zoomed by, blowing up on an alien speeder on his way. Jenna jerked her thumb towards him. "There's a team on that." She said simply. "We just want to make sure they can worry about fighting - we'll worry about search and rescue."
The crew all glanced at each other, nerves frayed, before Captain Astin nodded.
"All right. Everyone pair up, two to a building. Make sure everyone gets out and into the subway. Stay with your partner!"
As Jenna and Brady ran to the nearest office, she glanced back over her shoulder down the street, where the circle of aliens was swarming. She could just barely make out a flash of blue in the middle of the swarm, but there was no time to dwell on it.
Pausing was dangerous. It was time to go to work.
