Disclaimer: I do not own the Avengers, or anything that is recognised.
~*8*~ is a scene break
Italics is a Thoughts and foreign languages
Out in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean Tony Stark, in his Iron Man suit, was deep down in the water cutting a pipeline transport that leads directly to Stark tower, with a laser cutter coming from the hand of his suit. After cutting a square piece of the pipeline out he then attaches a Stark prototype energy reactor to the smaller pipes inside. It twists and latches on to the pipes properly, then extends to cover the uncovered pipes before lighting up with a blush green glow. Iron Man straightens up before he launches himself straight up out of the water just barely missing a cruise ship before setting off towards Stark tower.
Weaving through the buildings of New York he talks to Pepper over the comlink "You're good on this end. The rest is up to you"
"You disconnected the transition lines? Are we off the grid?" Pepper is heard saying through the link as a video pops up on his HUD (heads up display).
"Stark Tower is about to become a beacon of self-sustaining clean energy" Tony says with an air of smug satisfaction.
"Wow. So assuming our arc reactor takes over and it actually works" Pepper says.
"I assume" Tony says as he turns down a side street and the tower comes into view "Light her up"
As Iron Man flies straight to the Stark tower building just as the power is switched on and the whole thing starts to light up from the bottom, the last thing lit up is the massive STARK that is prominently displayed on the front.
"How does it look?" Pepper asks excited.
"Like Christmas, but with more... me" Tony says sounding extremely satisfied with the results.
"Gotta go wider on the public awareness campaign. You need to do some press. I can do some more tomorrow. I'm working on the zoning for the next billboards" Pepper says going into business mode.
"Pepper, you're killing me. Remember? Enjoy the moment" Tony says a little exasperated that she was bringing down the mood.
"Then get in here and I will" Pepper replies in a very sultry voice.
~*8*~
Tony arrives at his skyscraper penthouse lands on the extended platform. As he walks down the steps leading to an arched cat walk robotic aches circle up and around him extending to latch onto various parts of his suit and removing the all as he makes his way for the door.
Just as the robotic arms reach for his chest plate JARVIS speaks up "Sir, Agent Coulson of SHIELD is on the line"
"I'm not in. I'm actually out" Tony says as they finish taking off his suit.
"Sir, I'm afraid he's insisting" JARVIS says apologetically just before entering the room and walking over to Pepper.
"Close the line Jarvis. I got a date" he says as he walks down to the main space of his penthouse.
Pepper is stood, looking up at the monitors at lots of diagrams and readings for the reactor device.
"Levels are holding steady... I think" She says biting her lip.
"Of course they are, I was directly involved. Which brings me to my next question: how does it feel to be a genius?" Tony asks coming to a stop directly behind Pepper after throwing his comm onto the table.
"Well, ha, I really wouldn't know now, would I?" Pepper says turning to face him.
"What do you mean? All this came from you" Tony says gesturing around the room vaguely.
"No. All this came from that" she says pointing to and then tapping the miniature arc reactor in his chest.
"Give yourself some credit, please. Stark Tower is your baby. Give yourself... twelve percent of the credit" Tony says rubbing his hands up and down her arms in whats supposed to be an affectionate gesture, the effect of which was then completely ruined by his words.
"Twelve percent?" Pepper says with a raised eye brow sounding completely offended.
"An argument can be made for fifteen" Tony says trying to redeem himself but Pepper is not willing to listen.
"Twelve percent? my baby?" Pepper says incredulously.
"Well, I did do all the heavy lifting. Literally, I lifted the heavy things. And sorry, but the security snafu? That was on you" Tony says defensively.
Pepper makes a noise of offence before deciding to head over to the mini bar for some champagne.
"My private elevator..." Tony starts.
"You mean OUR elevator?" Pepper says pouring herself a glass.
"...was teeming with sweaty workmen. I'm going to pay for that comment about percentages in some subtle way later, aren't I?" Tony trails off knowing he deserves it before taking the glass Pepper poured for him.
"Not gonna be that subtle" Pepper says smugly.
"I'll tell you what. Next building's gonna say 'Potts' on the tower" Tony says tipping his glass towards her for a toast.
"On the lease" Pepper compromises going in for a toast, before Tony pulls away "...Call your mom, can you bunk over?" he says like a child pleading for candy.
"Sir, the telephone. I'm afraid my protocols are being overwritten" JARVIS interrupts.
"Stark, we need to talk" Coulson's voice can be heard from Tony's Stark phone on the table nearby. Tony picks up his phone and looks into it at Coulson.
"You have reached the life model decoy of Tony Stark, please leave a message" he says to him evenly making Pepper laugh.
"This is urgent" Coulson answers not willing to waste time.
"Then leave it urgently" Tony says almost petulantly. At that moment the elevator doors open and Coulson appears in his standard suit and tie, Alana standing beside him wearing a chequered shirt under a brown waxed leather jacket, a pair of dark blue faded ripped style jeans, a pair of brown, heeled boots, along with the Dog tags and cross and an arrow ring that Clint had given her for good luck during her first mission, carrying a black leather bucket bag.
"Security breach" Tony says before pointing to Pepper "That's on you"
"Mr. Stark" Coulson greets politely
"Phil! Come in" Pepper says before turning to Alana "Sorry, I don't think I know you"
Ignoring Tony who is mumbling something about Phil's first name being Agent.
"Alana Clancy, I always wanted to meet the woman that has such control over Stark" Alana says introducing herself with a grin.
"Come on in, we're celebrating" Pepper says smiling, already liking the woman.
"Which is why they can't stay" Tony says trying to get them to leave.
"We need you to look this over" Coulson says as he holds out a tablet "Soon as possible"
"I don't like being handed things" Tony says backing away slightly waving his free hand as if to brush it away.
"That's alright, cause I love to be handed things. So, let's trade" Pepper says passing him her glass of champagne and taking the tablet from him, only for her to then takes Tony's glass and give the tablet to him.
"Thank you" she says sipping from his glass, as Alana tries to take the glass from Coulson for herself, pouting when he moves it to a table out of her reach.
"Official consulting hours are between eight and five every other Thursday" Tony says bitingly.
"This isn't a consultation" Coulson says seriously.
"Is this about The Avengers?" Pepper says before backtracking "Which I...I know nothing about"
Alana snickers softly before answering Pepper "Yup, we're in some need of the Earth's mightiest heroes now"
"The Avengers Initiative was scrapped, I thought. And I didn't even qualify" Tony says refusing to admit that he was pouting a little.
"I didn't know that either" Pepper says smiling at Alana as she snickers again.
"Yeah, apparently I'm volatile, self-obsessed, don't play well with others" Tony lists off still pouting as he heads over to his work station.
"That I did know" Pepper says in agreement with that assessment.
"This isn't about personality profiles any more" Coulson says.
"Whatever. Miss Potts, got a minute?" Tony says as Pepper walks over to him, he plugs in the tablet downloading the files into his own databases.
"You know, I thought we were having a moment" Tony says petulantly.
"I was having twelve percent of a moment. This seems serious, Phil and Alana seem pretty shaken up" Pepper says wanting him to get his priorities straight.
"Is that her name? How did you notice? And why is he Phil?" Tony asks still typing away
"What is all of this?" Pepper asks effectively distracting him.
"This is, uh..." Tony says dragging his fingers up the monitor ans seems to almost fling the files onto the holo-screens surrounding them "This" he finishes as they all light up with the profiles of the people considered for the Avengers.
On the first screen there is Captain America in action in in WWII, the Hulk roaring, smashing up tanks and cars as the army try to apprehend him at Culver University, Thor fighting the destroyer just after having gotten his powers back, one of Alana, Clint and Natasha shooting enemy combatant on their latest team mission to Budapest and the last one is of Loki and the Tesseract, along with the basic information and accomplishments of each individual. Tony and Pepper look at all the displayed in shock, especially at the screen containing the Hulk seeing him throw a tank as he rampages through the campus.
Pepper looks quickly around at all the profiles before sighing "I'm going to take the jet to D.C. tonight"
"Tomorrow" Tony disagrees.
"You've got homework. You've got a lot of homework" Pepper points out.
"Well, what if I didn't?" Tony questions turning to face her.
"If you didn't?" Pepper says wanting to make sure "You mean when you finished?" Tony nods his head in acknowledgement "Well, um...then..." she leans up to whispers something enticing into his ear.
This makes Tony straighten up with a dreamy look in his eyes, clearing his throat as he says "Square deal. Fly safe"
Pepper kisses him before calling over her shoulder "Work hard" as she heads over to leave with Coulson and Alana.
"So any chance your driving by La Guardia" Pepper asks them as she approaches.
"We can drop you" Alana says with a smile.
"Fantastic" Pepper says smiling back before turning to Phil and asking "I want to hear about the cellist. Is that still a thing?"
"She went back to Portland, it didn't work out" Coulson answers politely as Alana snickers.
"How could you not know she was still married?" She laughs at him "People like us have to do back ground checks for a reason y'know"
"I was trying to be less paranoid" Phil says pointedly not letting any emotion show.
"How's that workin' out for ya?" Alana snorts making Pepper laugh as Coulson whacks her playfully on the arm with the back of his hand.
Tony watches them leave before turning and grabbing the Tesseract in holograph form, looking worried now that no one was around to see.
~*8*~
Inside a Quin Jet flying low over the Ocean Steve Rogers is sitting down holding a tablet, watching the footage of the Hulk's during the attack by the Army at Culver University.
He looks up slightly as the Pilot announces "We're about forty minutes out from base, sir"
Agent Coulson stands up from his seat next to a sleepy Alana and walks over to Steve seeing that he has some questions.
"So, this Doctor Banner was trying to replicate the serum that was used on me?" Steve asks.
"A lot of people were. You were the world's first superhero. Banner thought gamma radiation might hold the key to unlocking Erskine's original formula" Coulson finishes just as the Hulk roars with fury as he smashes a jeep apart causing both there eyes to fall to the screen.
"Didn't really go his way, did it?" Steve says a little shaky.
"Not so much. When he's not that thing though, guy's like a Stephen Hawking" Coulson says but Steve just looks confused so he explain himself better by saying "He's like a smart person. I gotta say, it's an honor to meet you, officially"
Steve smiles at Coulson vaguely feeling a little overwhelmed at the sight of the Hulk, not that he would ever admit it.
"I sort of met you, I mean, I watched you while you were sleeping" Coulson says sounding a bit creepy as Steve looks down knowing what he meant but, not really wanting to think about the time he spent in the ice. He stands up, turns off the tablet and walks over to the front to stand near the cockpit with Coulson following.
"I mean, I was... I was present while you were unconscious from the ice. You know, it's really, it's just a... just a huge honor to have you on board" Coulson stumbles trying to correct himself thinking he might of offended the man as Alana snickers at him.
"Well, I hope I'm the man for the job" Steve says.
"Oh, you are. Absolutely. Uh... we've made some modifications to the uniform. I had a little design input" Coulson says hoping to take the Captains mind off of what ever seems to have bothered him so much.
Ignoring Alana sleepily coughing the words Fan Boy Steve says to Coulson "The uniform? Aren't the stars and stripes a little... old fashioned?"
"With everything that's happening, the things that are about to come to light, people might just need a little old fashioned" Coulson replies nodding his head before turning to go back to Alana making her lie down as much as she can on the bench that runs the length of the jet and ordering her to get some sleep, knowing she hasn't had any since this whole mess started over 36 hours ago.
~*8*~
The Quin jet lands down on what seems to be a colossal battleship. It has two runways. One with direct access to a hangar at the rear is aligned along the spine of the vessel. Coulson, Alana and Steve walk down the ramp, meeting up with Natasha at the bottom.
Natasha takes one look at Alana's rumpled appearance and nods her head in thanks to Coulson for making her get some rest, knowing she wouldn't have done so any other way, but also knowing she needed it to be in top form.
"Agent Romanoff. Captain Rogers" Coulson introduces smiling at the last names a little.
"Ma'am?" Steve greets with a nod.
"Hi" she says to Steve before turning to to Coulson "They need you on the bridge. They are starting the face-trace"
"See you there" Coulson says to all three of them before walking away.
"There was quite the buzz around here, finding you in the ice. I thought Coulson was gonna swoon. Did he ask you to sign his Captain America trading cards yet?" Natasha says playfully smiling as she leads them over towards the edge of the ship out of the other Agents way.
"Trading cards?" Steve asks smiling.
"They're vintage, he's very proud" Alana says, speaking for the first time.
Natasha spots Banner looking around cautiously, not seeming to notice them as they start walking towards him, Alana breaking off to help some of the Agents with some gear before heading inside for a cup of coffee.
"Dr. Banner" Steve says as he spots Bruce walking up to him holding out a hand to shake.
"Oh, yeah. Hi. They told me you'd becoming" Bruce says shaking his hand.
"Word is you can find the cube" Steve says straight to business.
"Is that the only word on me?" Bruce questions cautiously.
"Only word I care about" Steve says assuringly.
Bruce nods in thanks before gesturing around "Must be strange for you, all of this"
"Well, this is actually kind of familiar" Steve says taking a deep breath.
"Gentlemen" Natasha says to them after speaking to someone over the comm "you may wanna step inside in a minute. It's gonna get a little hard to breath"
Suddenly the carrier starts to shake as it prepares to take off, the Agents rushing around them to finish strapping down all the jets and cargo.
"Is this is a submarine?" Steve asks looking around curiously.
"Really? They wanted me in a submerged pressurized metal container?" Bruce asks incredulously.
They both move closer to the edge of the vessel and look over the edge, just in time to see 2 massive turbines rising up out of the water, Steve looks around in awe as the carrier starts to rise off of the Ocean top, where as Bruce just smiled shaking his head ruefully.
"OH, NO. THIS IS MUCH WORSE" Bruce shouts so that he can be heard over all the noise, before he and Steve follow Natasha inside the carrier.
~*8*~
Agent Hill is in front of the main command desk in a room full of Agents moving around doing there designated duties, she turns to Nick Fury who is stood at the top of the central cat walk over looking the windows that see out into the open sky.
"We're at level, sir" She says to him.
"Good. Let's vanish" he replies.
"Yes sir," she says turning to the computer again before announcing "engaging retro-reflection panels" as she activates the panels, which reflect photographed images of the sky to render the carrier comoflaged.
Steve and Banner walk through the main control room noticing all the high level technology surrounding them, Steve heads up towards Fury.
"Gentlemen" he says in greeting taking the 10 bucks Steve offers him. Fury walks over Banner and extends his hand. Banner, reluctantly shakes it.
"Doctor, thank you for coming" he says releasing the man's hand seeing the man's reluctance and not wanting to scare him off so soon.
"Thanks for asking nicely. So, uh... how long am I staying?" Bruce questions clearly not taking Fury's welcoming at face value and wondering if he will ever be aloud to leave.
"Once we get our hands on the Tesseract, you're in the clear" Fury assures, not letting it show that he is not quite telling the whole truth.
"Where are you with that?" Banner asks wanting to get to work.
Nick Fury turns to Agent Coulson to let him explain, while Natasha eyes an image of Clint Barton on a computer screen, she looks over towards the door just as Alana walks into the room carrying a cup of coffee.
"We're sweeping every wirelessly accessible camera on the planet. Cellphones, laptops. If it's connected to a satellite, it's eyes and ears for us" Coulson explains in more detail for Steve's benefit more than anything else.
"That's still not going to find them in time" Alana says neutrally as she crosses her arms over her chest.
"You have to narrow the field. How many spectrometers do you have access to?" Bruce agrees taking off his jacket.
"How many are there?" Fury says, sounding quite smug about that fact.
"Call every lab you know" Bruce says ignoring his tone "tell them to put the spectrometers on the roof and calibrate them for gamma rays. I'll rough out a tracking algorithm based on cluster recognition. At least we could rule out a few places. Do you have somewhere for me to work?"
"Agent Clancy, would you show Dr. Banner to his laboratory, please" Fury orders to Alana, she nods and heads for the door expecting Bruce to follow her.
"You're gonna love it, Doc. We got all the toys" Alana says in a false cheerful voice, having just spotted the picture of Clint on the monitor near Natasha, seeing the image upsetting her far more than she was willing to let on to anyone.
~*8*~
Steve and Coulson are standing near the Agents that are scanning all the satellite imagery for any hits to the facial recognition software they have running, trying to locate Loki.
"I mean, if it's not too much trouble" Coulson asks trying to remain professional.
"No, no. It's fine" Steve says kindly.
"It's a vintage set. It took me a couple of years to collect them all. Near mint, slight foxing around the edges, but..." Coulson starts to explain before being interrupted by Agent Sitwell.
"We got a hit. Sixty seven percent match. Weight, cross match, seventy nine percent" Sitwell reports.
"Location?" Coulson demands heading over.
"Stuttgart, Germany. 28, Konigstrasse. He's not exactly hiding" Sitwell says sounding slightly suspicious about that fact.
"Captain, you're up. Clancy your back up" they both nod and they along with Natasha head towards a Quin Jet where a co pilot was already suited up and ready to go.
~*8*~
Loki slowly walks out of the Gala after taking someone's eye out. His suit shifts and changes into his Asgardian armor as he bangs his sceptre down on the floor shouting demandingly to the panicking crowd "Kneel before me"
The crowd ignores him, continuing to try and run away from him until an astral projection of Loki appears, blocking the crowd. Two more projections appear blocking them all in, all the projections grin as they raise their spectres and a blast of energy connects them, encircling the crowd.
"I said. KNEEL!" Loki yells loudly causing everyone to fall silent and they all get down to their knees bowing their heads in front of him. Loki spreads his arms as he walks between them all smiling.
"Is not this simpler? Is this not your natural state? It's the unspoken truth of humanity, that you crave subjugation. The bright lure of freedom diminishes your life's joy in a mad scramble for power, for identity. You were made to be ruled. In the end, you will always kneel" Loki says smugly enjoying their submission, until an elderly German man stands up.
"Not to men like you" he says raising his chin high and proud looking at the wanna be ruler.
"There are no men like me" Loki sneers.
"There are always men like you" the brave man corrects.
"Look to your elder, people. Let him bean example" Loki says raising his sceptre as it starts to glow brightly, making the man look at it fearfully.
Just as the beam of energy shoots out of it, Captain America arrives, he just manages to dive in front of the man blocking the blast with his shield, knocking down Loki as it rebounds back at him.
"You know, the last time I was in Germany and saw a man standing above everybody else, we ended up disagreeing" the Captain comments casually standing up and walking forward.
"The soldier. A man out of time" Loki sneers as he pulls himself up.
"I'm not the one who's out of time" the Captain says calmly.
Above the Captain the Jet arrives. A compartment on the bottom of it opens and a machine gun comes out and is pointed towards Loki.
"Loki, drop the weapon and stand down" Natasha says over the loud speaker.
Loki immediately send a bolt of blue energy towards the jet, Natasha manages to manoeuvre it just in time, giving Cap the time to throw his shield at Loki.
The Captain runs forward and throws a punch straight to Loki's face, Loki who barely reacts strikes forward with his sceptre only to be blocked by his shield twice as Loki brings it round to hit again. Knocking the Captains shield to the side slightly he jabs the sceptre into his chest sending him flying backwards. The Captain getting up onto his knees says "Back up" through the comm's, just before he throws his shield at Loki who bats it away.
Running at Loki the Captain throw a right hook straight to the side of Loki's face, dodging two strikes of Loki sceptre and jabbing him in the ribs just as Alana jumps down and sends a flying kick at Loki, which knocks him back enough for her to land in a roll, before standing up again.
Throwing two punches left then right she gets blocked only to use the momentum of the block to throw a spinning kick at his head leaving himself open. She jabs him twice in the chest forcing him backwards before sending an elbow to his jaw creating a space between them. Alana moves to go into another attack when Loki hits her hard in the stomach with his sceptre throwing her away where she lands with a thud.
Standing over her, Loki points the sceptres tip on the back of her head forcing her to keep her head lowered yelling "Kneel"
"Not today!" she says knocking the sceptre away and spinning in a low kick knocking his feet out from under him just as the Captain send a kick to his head flipping him over, Loki lands on the stairs hard.
Suddenly, AC/DC's "Shoot to Thrill" starts blasting out of the Quin Jets speaker system and Tony Stark in his Iron Man suit flies through the air touching down near them landing in a crouch, he stands up and pulls out every piece of weaponry the suit has and aims them all at Loki who has just managed to flip himself back over.
"I think he's compensating for something" Alana says to Steve when she sees all the weapons Stark has pointed at Loki making him laugh at the familiar banter between soldiers after a fight.
"Make your move, Reindeer Games" Iron Man says ignoring what Alana said, Loki puts up his hands and surrenders as his armor materializes away.
"Good move" Alana comments offhandedly
"Mr. Stark" the Captain greets politely.
"Captain" Tony returns.
AN: Thank you to beulah2013 for reviewing. Thank you to everyone who added this to their favourites and alerts.
I have decided to not give myself a limit to chapters, I said 7 or 8 which when I originally separated it all up that was about right but, I have found myself not wanting to write the parts away from the Avengers (Hawkeye doesn't count until he's not being controlled anymore). So, unless there is something that fits I am going to leave them bits out, which means I no longer have a solid number for chapters, I'm just gonna go with the flow and see how it ends up (But I am aiming for at the very least 6).
My OC (if you haven't read the character profile) doesn't understand her own emotions well, so it will be a while before she realises that the reason she feels so worried over Clint is that she is in love.
Hope you like it please tell me what you think.
I'll have the next part up as soon as possible, Sarah x