The sudden beeping interrupted their arguing.
"Sorry, kids, guess you won't get to see my little party trick," Bruce muttered as he stalked off to the screen to see the locations.
"Where is it?" Fury asked roughly. Bruce's eyebrows furrowed as he looked at the readings.
"Well, there's on large reading. I assume that's the tesseract itself, but there's also several smaller readings heading towards an unkown location at extremely high speeds," he said, flicking the screen to send the information over to Tony.
"That's probably Agent Barton and the others," Natasha said, looking at the group of blue dots.
"Yes, and whatever their after is not going to be good for us. Several agents and I will try to get the tesseract itself, I want the Avengers going after that group of people. Any ideas for where they're going?" Fury demanded.
"Jarvis?" Tony asked. A voice rang out from the computer console,
"After going over the data, I believe that the most likely location is a history museum located in Leadworth, Britain. There is an object in there giving off a faint signal similar to the tesseract," Jarvis replied.
"Alright, Jarvis, let me know when you know which object specifically. We're heading for england!" Tony said, fist pumping his way out the door. Bruce shook his head and ignored Thor and Fury's arguing, probably about who should get the tesseract, and walked out. He was not planning on going on this mission at all. Stick him right in the middle of a fight in a museum filled with precious breakable artifacts? Bad idea. As for Steve, well, he was grumbling the whole way thereabout getting along with Ironman. It wasn't until they were almost there when Ironman received word about what the group was probably after. Clicking the side of his head, he opened the speaking channels to all of the Avengers.
"It's called the Pandorica and legend says that it contains the most powerful and most terrible fiend who ever lived," Jarvis' voice echoed.
"So, it's got something really bad inside it," Tony clarified.
"Not just bad, Man of Iron, a terrible fiend who has destroyed hundreds of worlds and ruined lives," Thor spoke.
"So you know what's in it?" Steve asked. There was a pause.
"Not exactly, but I have heard the stories and Loki has as well," Thor said.
"Right, so it's got something really really bad inside it. I'm guessing we don't want to let it out?" Tony asked.
"No shit, Sherlock," Natasha replied scathingly. Really, she may be one of the best fighters in the world, but she didn't have any super powers of any kind. And she was worried about Barton.
"Hey now, I happen to quite admire Sherlock. He's got a lovely wit" Tony said, you could hear his smirk.
"We're here," Steve interrupted. And indeed they were. As the plane flew over the museum, the group jumped out. Natasha and Stave both opened their parachutes as they landed on the roof, Tony and Thor flying in.
"Well, I think we managed to beat them here. Lets go set up a welcome party," Tony said, striding towards the rooftop door. It was locked, but nothing a little Ironman strength couldn't open. Steve glanced up at the fading sunlight.
"Well, at least we know the museum is closed," he said, "Now lets go find this Pandorica and then we can establish a perimeter."
The group walked down the stairs and out into the lobby of the museum. Tony had to secretly admit that museums were really creepy at night, everything looked like it wanted to brutally murder them.
"Over there," Natasha said, gesturing. There was a hallway with a cheerful sign directing readers towards the Pandorica. They walked down and found themselves in a large, mostly empty room. Well, empty except for the enormous gray box in the middle.
"Amazing!" Tony exclaimed as Jarvis brought up all the facts about the box he could detect. The technology that had gone into the creation of the thing was incredible! There was even tech that Jarvis couldn't identify, the thing was thousands if not millions of years beyond them! There was no doubt in Tony's mind that this thing was of alien origin.
"Right, we'll want to set up a perimeter. Stark, I want you up on top of it since you have night vision. Let me know if you see anything. Romonov, I want you to search the room. There are sometimes hidden doors in museums for the staff to get around, make sure there's no other entrance or exit. Thor, I want you to go into the hallway and watch for them from there, I we're lucky we can bottleneck them. Make sure to keep an eye out for Barton's arrows," Steve said, barking off the orders.
"Excuse me?" A gentle voice asked. The Avengers paused to turn and see a young man dressed in a night guard suit. "You aren't supposed to be here and I have to request that you please not touch the Pandorica." Tony sighed, he hated dealing with teenagers.
"Look, kid," Tony started, the boy snorted but Tony ignored it, "this museum is about to come under attack by a group of highly trained assassins. They are after the Pandorica. Can't tell you why, that's classified, but they are dangerous. So, shoo," Tony said, waving his hand. The boy looked up at them, thinking for a moment instead of protesting immediately like they had thought he would.
"Why would a group of assassins be after the Pandorica?" He asked.
"They're being controlled by an evil alien with crazy powers. Now get, we can't have civilians getting in the way," Tony said. However, before the kid could open his mouth, he was interrupted.
"Have we met before? You look very familiar..." Thor said, tilting his head sideways. The kid shrugged.
"Listen, you can have your fight, but not in here. Take it out there," The kid said, gesturing towards the empty hallway. Suddenly, however, the kid spun around and snatched an arrow out of the air. An arrow that had been coming straight towards his head. He looked at it blankly for a moment before an enormous scowl overtook his face. He turned down the hallway where there were now several fighters charging. Thor ran past the kid, howling and throwing his hammer. The kid back pedaled to stand protectively in front of the Pandorica. Tony frowned, he would have told the kid to leave, but the display of dexterity and shocked him speechless. What was a college age kid working as night time security guard doing with top quality fighting skills? Even Natasha probably couldn't have caught one of Barton's arrows without warning!
However, Tony put it out of his mind as he ran down the hallway to fight against the assassins. It was hard to judge the amount of force to knock them out without killing them, but he managed. If a few slipped past him and Thor, they still had to deal with Steve and Natasha who were an amazing fighting force on their own. Plus that kid, who might have fighting prowess as good as Natasha's. The problem was not most of the agents, no, the problem was watching for arrows. They were rare, Barton was probably counting them, but they came when you least expected it and right towards your most vital area. He ducked under one, but watched with horror as it flew behind him and straight towards a particular red haired woman whose back was turned.
"Look out!" Down she went, barely being missed by the arrow as the kid tackled her to the ground. The arrow flew over the two of them and wedged itself into a grove of the Pandorica. The boy stared at the arrow and reached up, grabbing the shaft and pulling it out. He looked at it for a moment, but when he turned around his face was twisted by rage. He yelled, charging through the assassins like they were mere toys. They kid batted them aside, hardly even trying, and ripped a nearby sword off the wall. He used it like an expert, taking down the agents one by one. Unfortunately, he didn't seem to care if they lived or died. Bodies fell around him as he walked through, completely focused on the archer hiding at the opposite end of the hallway.
Slicing down a particularly tough opponent, the boy spun around and pointed his hand towards Barton. Tony was shocked when the fingers dropped, like they were on hinges, and bullets fired from the digits. Barton collapsed. Natasha yelled and ran over to check his pulse before confirming that he was still alive. The rest of the assassins went down quickly and soon Tony was calling up SHIELD to bring in a clean up crew. Thor patted the kid on the back.
"You make an excellent warrior, young one!" He exclaimed. Tony looked at the kid, his hands certainly didn't look like they could come apart and shoot. And where would he reload, anyway? Why would a cyborg or a robot or whatever be working as a night guard anyway? No, he must have imagined it. The kid must have grabbed a gun from one of the bodies he took down and used that. Tony must have seen it wrong.
"Thank you, but I'm not really that young" The boy replied, shaking his head.
"Don't worry kid, everyone is young compared to him," Tony said, gesturing at Thor. The kid smiled gently but didn't say anything.
"What is your name soldier?" Stever asked.
"Rory. Rory Williams, sir," The boy, Rory, responded. Steve nodded and clapped him on the shoulder.
"Good work, I'll put in a good word for you if you ever need it," Steve said, walking past the kid. They were going outside to board a plane while SHIELD cleaned up. They still had to find the tesseract after all. Tony look at the kid contemplatively, there was just something about him.
"Stark!" Natasha's voice called as she walked out. Tony shook his head, he had to be imagining things. The boy was just a night guard. A night guard with ninja skills, but a night guard all the same. However, as Tony was exiting the room holding the Pandorica, he couldn't help but notice a plaque up on the wall.
"According to Legend, wherever the Pandorica was taken throughout it's long history, a centurion would be there guarding it. It appears as an iconic image in the art work of many cultures. There are several well documented accounts of his appearances and his warnings to any who attempted to open the box before it's time. His last recorded appearance was during the London Blitz in 1941. The warehouse where the Pandorica was stored was destroyed by bombs but the box itself was found the next morning, a safe distance from the blaze. There are many eye witness accounts of a figure in traditional Roman clothing carrying the box from the flames. Since then, there have been no sightings of "The Last Centurion" and many speculate that, if he ever existed, he perished in the fires of that night, performing one last act to defend the box he had been protecting for nearly 2000 years."
Tony looked from the plaque to the strange kid, depositing the (Roman!) sword he had been using back in it's display. It was on display right next to some old Roman armor that looked to be in surprisingly good condition.
'I'm not really that young'
The amazing fighting skills, honed over many years.
No. There was no way.
Tony shook his head as he walked out, finally heeding Steve's cries for him to hurry up. It was ridiculous. And besides, what kind of Roman name was Rory Williams, anyway?
In honor of Rory, who was willing to wait 2000 years. Someone like that deserves a lot of respect.
Also in honor of my bunny, who died yesterday and led to my splurging on Doctor Who episodes with lots of ice cream.