Chapter 2
The Wakandan jet flew over the mountains of the Tian Shan range, over snow-covered crags shining silver in the light of a nearly full moon. Sam watched out the windows, T'Challa was in the pilot seat, Bucky kept readjusting his bionic arm.
"You sure you up for this?" Steve asked him quietly.
"I'm sure I'm going to do anything I can to save Shuri." He glanced at T'Challa. "I owe her and Wakanda everything. I'm up for this."
"We're getting close," T'Challa announced.
They slowed and circled around the mountain where the mystery aircraft disappeared. There were no obvious entrances, no anomalous readings.
"We can't risk shooting at the mountain," T'Challa said. "We get out and find an entrance on foot."
They landed the cloaked jet behind a nearby ridge. The Black Panther led the way through the deep snow.
"We split up," he instructed them. "Keep in communication. If you find an entrance, wait for the rest of us."
The attack came even earlier than they expected. Four spiderbots, bigger than any they'd seen before, rose up from beneath the snow. Too big to fly, they towered above their foes on long, spindly metal legs.
T'Challa rushed at the nearest spiderbot. Bullets bounced harmlessly off the vibranium Black Panther suit.
Steve threw his shield. It lodged in the midsection of one of the bots, then took a chunk of metal out of it when he summoned it back.
Sam flew above the fray, laying down cover fire.
"We've got two more coming, from the southeast and northwest. I see a light on the hillside to the northwest; I think it's an entrance to an undergound structure." He did a spin to dodge incoming ordinance, then opened fire on the pursuing spiderbot.
Bucky shot at the underside of another one. He heard bullets bouncing off metal. He needed a clearer view to determine the best place to aim. He threw a flare and by its light aimed for the shifting joints where the legs attached to the body. One of the bullets damaged something crucial, and one leg froze up. The bot began tipping over, damaged but still a threat.
He leaped toward it, followed by a hail of fire, and punched his vibranium arm throough its shell, peeling off a strip of metal.
He caught sight of T'Challa and Steve teaming up against one of the giant spiderbots while Sam distracted another.
Bucky tore a wire out of the one he was fighting, then tossed a miniature explosive inside it and leaped away before it exploded. The smoking shell fell to the ground.
Steve and T'Challa had taken out another one. There were still four left. Strategically, they should retreat. Bucky scanned for an escape route. There was a boulder field down the slope. The bots wouldn't be able to follow them through it.
"T'Challa," he said over the comm. "We need to retreat. I'll lay down cover fire, the rest of you get down the mountain."
"We're not leaving until we find my sister, and no one's getting left hehind."
Bucky wasn't surprised by his decision. He didn't waste any more breath arguing about it. He leaped off a boulder on top of one of the bots.
One of its legs twisted up and around, stabbing at him. He dodged it while trying to punch through the bot's shell. He clung to the bot as it swung around, trying to shake him off. As long as it was attacking him, it wasn't attacking the others.
The spiderbot suddenly stopped attacking him, and instead started moving. It climbed up a cliff, leaving Bucky dangling, clutching the hole he'd punched in the bot's shell. The giant spiderbot climbed sideways around a cliff, moving away from the fight. It let go of the rock face with the two arms upslope and began falling upside down. It was going to fall down the cliff. It would destroy the bot, but crush him in the process. Super strength or not, Bucky didn't think that was something he would survive.
Swinging beneath the falling bot, he let go, launching himself at the sheer cliff hoping to find a handhold once he hit it. After a second or two of being airborn hundreds of feet above jagges rocks, he slammed into the cliff and clawed at it with his metal arm, stopping his fall with a jolt.
He looked back. The bot was still falling, but he saw gun turrets emerge from its central node, aiming at him. Time seemed to slow down. He watched bullets explode from the falling bot, on a trajectory to tear through him.
He hoped death would at least be quick.
And then a blur of red and black moved in front of him. The Falcon spun, deflecting the bullets with his wings.
The spiderbot tumbled down the mountainside. And so did Falcon. The bullets had damaged his suit. Bucky grabbed for him with his free hand, but a split second too late. Falcon folded his wings around himself in an attempt to shield himself from the impact. He bounced off rock, was airborn for a few seconds, then plunged into a snowbank, which collapsed with the impact. The Falcon was lost to sight in seconds in an avalanch that roared up the mountainside, swallowing up the echoes of the spiderbot smashing against the rocks further below.
When the avalanch fell still, Bucky watched for a minute, looking for any movement to indicate life beneath the mass of snow and rock. There was nothing.
He climbed up to the top of the ridge. The wreckage of three spiderbots lay scatteted across the mountainside. The other two were gone. So were Steve and T'Challa.
Bucky walked down to examine the battlefield. Steve's shield lay abandoned in the snow. Footprints told the rest of the story: after the bot Bucky was fighting took him out of play, the other three had taken out one more of the bots. That was probably when Falcon went after him, probably on Steve or T'Challa's orders. One of the remaining bots had cannonballed into Steve, crushing him into a snowbank. T'Challa had run after him, but had been intercepted by the other bot. Somehow, they had both been restrained and taken.
Bucky fell to the ground, breathing heavily. He was the only one left to fight, but he didn't know what to do. Steve was his best friend, and T'Challa had become like a brother to him; he wanted to go after them. But Sam Wilson had risked his life to save him. There was a chance he was still alive, but if he was it wouldn't be for long.
He made his decision and got to his feet.