Taking another sip of his whiskey-laced cappuccino, Tony leaned back in his leather chair as the rest of the Avengers present contemplated his unusual story. His brief talk with Rose left his mind too busy to allow him to sleep in until his usual waking hours, so he'd made his way to the kitchenette on the common floor and waited for the others to arrive. After recovering from the initial shock of seeing Tony up so early without pulling an all-nighter, they'd agreed to sit down and hear him out, not expecting the improbable recap he provided them of Rose's visit.
"And you're sure you weren't drunk?" Clint asked again. Tony didn't even bother gracing him with a response this time, sighing exasperatedly into his cup and rolling his eyes.
Bruce, who had been thinking quietly for a minute or so, spoke up next. "Could you possibly expand on what you meant by this girl not being 'normal?'"
"She looked human enough," Tony said, furrowing his brow a bit. "But she had this sort of presence. Like, she looked human, and she acted human, and all of her mannerisms seemed human, but… If 'human' was a rung on the evolutionary ladder, she was one above that."
"Do you think she was Asgardian?" Natasha asked seriously from her place next to Clint on the barstools. She'd been the only one taking Tony's retelling analytically from the start, which he was grateful for.
"No, Rose was definitely not a Norse goddess. I'm pretty sure she called herself a 'seer of light,' though, along with a bunch of other stuff that made even less sense than that one." After having JARVIS perform a thorough search on the more fantastic names she had used to refer to herself, Tony had found a frustrating lack of anything enlightening in the least and achieved similar results with the 'mysterious' author R. Lalonde. Tony shook his head and turned his attention back to the others. "Cap," he said good-naturedly, "you've been unusually quiet this morning. Any theories? Breakthroughs? Astounding epiphanies? Revela-"
"I just don't understand," Steve interrupted, setting his coffee cup on the glass table next to him. "What would drive a girl and her brother to resort to going on a suicide mission when they were only thirteen? And who was hunting them? I'm not even going to start on all the timeline nonsense, but you have to wonder exactly what kind of world they're coming from."
Natasha looked concerned. "Just because they're kids doesn't mean they should be underestimated. What if they were being hunted because they were a threat?" Bruce and Clint murmured in agreement, and Tony couldn't help but remember the dangerously protective look in Rose's eyes when she'd warned him not to hurt the arriving twins.
Speaking of which- "Hey, guys." The other four turned their attention to Tony once more as he spoke over the escalating debate that had started up. "I maaaay have forgotten something when I told you guys about this earlier."
Clint's eyes narrowed at his sheepish confession, but before he could speak, the overhead crackled to life and Fury's voice filled the room. "Avengers, assemble and meet up at the tower's launch pad in five minutes." A few more inquisitive glances were thrown at Tony as everybody rushed to their rooms to grab equipment and supplies. Downing the rest of his lukewarm drink, he placed the cup in the sink before heading to the elevator that would take him to his workroom and his suit.
Five minutes later found Iron Man, Hawkeye, Black Widow, Captain America, and Doctor Bruce Banner being buffeted by insanely strong winds on the launch pad. Upon stepping out of the elevator, Natasha, Clint, and Bruce all immediately crouched low to the ground to avoid being swept off the roof and crabwalked to the Quinjet while the more sturdy heroes did their best to make a mad dash towards the Quinjet's relative safety. Once all five were safely inside and Steve had pulled the door shut, the Quinjet rose sideways, the howling wind pushing them westward.
"Avengers," Fury greeted from one of the passenger seats.
"What the hell is that wind?" Clint snapped back at the same time Tony replied "Nice day out, isn't it?"
Fury waited for the heroes to take a seat with a grim visage before beginning the debriefing in earnest. "A little past four a.m. this morning, winds all along the northeast coast started picking up at an unprecedented rate. As of now, if it gets any stronger we're going to have to issue a hurricane warning. Our monitors are showing the beginnings of one only a couple miles away, which should be impossible due to the utter lack of tropical weather up here. Even weirder is the fact that not only has it not moved at all, it's actually repulsing clouds instead of drawing them in and reducing visibility. Clear skies extend from one point above the Atlantic for six miles in all directions. This is not a natural storm. Your job is to find the source and take it out before any major damage gets done to the coastline, either by the wind or the waves. We clear?"
"Crystal, sir," Steve replied earnestly, assuming his position as team leader.
"Good. Captain, Hawkeye, and Black Widow will be taking the two smaller jets in the cargo hold and Iron Man is flying on his own. Doctor Banner, you'll be monitoring any readings of unnatural energy here in the Quinjet. The rest of you will be dropped off in the eye of the storm. Everybody has their comms?" A round of nods confirmed this and they were dismissed to their individual duties.
Moments before their departure, the wind quieted abruptly; the eye had been found. In quick succession, Iron Man and the two fighter jets took off into the deceivingly blue sky. A brief command to JARVIS had Tony flying straight up, determined to go until he found either the cause of this mess or a clear vantage point of the unusual storm. He had his suspicions, though, and he figured he better tell the others before he landed them in major trouble. "Remember that part of the story I left out?" he asked into the intercom.
"Can this wait?" Steve's voice replied tersely.
"Nah, I'm getting this feeling that it's going to be pretty relevant in the near future."
"Don't stall, Iron Man," Natasha demanded.
"Okay, okay! So when I asked Rose about why she chose to talk to me now and not some other time-"
"Rose?" Fury asked intimidatingly. Damn, Tony'd forgotten to tell him. He was just a mess this morning, wasn't he?
"Long story short, some possibly alien chick visited this morning and told me that she and her buddies are going to be arriving here pretty soon; there's six of them where she's at, but two are due to arrive early and I'm pretty sure this is them. She got really scary when she told me that we better not hurt them so I don't think going in and shooting at whatever this is is really the best idea."
"And you couldn't have mentioned this sooner?" growled the commander.
A startled sound from Bruce could be heard in the background of Fury's comm, and his own flickered to life moments later. "We're getting huge energy readings directly above you, Tony. Something just broke through the atmosphere and it's no small space rock. We'll have visuals in a second, but I think it might be slowing down."
Sure enough, Tony could see the beginnings of a small golden blur when he looked up. "JARVIS, zoom in on that." Closer inspection revealed an ornately gilded golden ship that had to be the size of the Helicarrier; the sunlight it reflected almost made it painful to look at. Just as Tony was about to add power to his thrusters and fly closer, a small box of red text appeared on his helmet's screen.
TG: whoa bad idea dude that ship is still going pretty fucking fast
TG: id advise backing up a few hundred feet unless you wanna be knocked out of the air by that monster
TG: just let them handle it on their own theyre pretty strong kids
TG: jesus i feel like their dad or some shit
TG: i know you can do it junior youre a tough kid
TG: now go punch that ten ton battleship i believe in your ability
TG: not you though iron man
TG: you can just chill and watch the show
TG: but youre gonna have to catch them in a minute so dont wander off too far got it
"What the hell…?" For the second time that morning Tony was baffled at the easy invasion of his space. The text box closed just in time for Tony to watch as something blue launched off of the now much closer battleship. Twisting in the air, the small shape made its way to the front of the ship that was currently pointed directly downwards. As he flew out of the ship's path, Tony zoomed in even more and was startled to find that the blue thing had a distinctly human figure.
"We have a visual," Bruce announced suddenly. "Are you guys seeing this?"
"You mean the person that just flew out the ship?" Tony asked. "It almost looks like they're trying to catch it."
"Do you think they're alright?" Cap sounded worried. "There's no way they're actually trying to catch it, right?"
Now that the ship was only a couple hundred feet from where Tony was hovering and quickly closing the distance, he turned on the live feed from his helmet so the others could watch as he ventured closer. As he reached the point of the ship, he turned his thrusters skyward in order to keep up with the leviathan's speed. Turning his head to get a good look at the person in blue, Tony was shocked, though at this point he supposed he shouldn't have been.
"Is that a kid?" Steve asked incredulously. Sure enough, at the tip of the hull, a skinny boy with a shock of black hair seemed to be pushing wind against the ship. The air all around them was focused on this one point; he was slowing the ship down, Tony realized. Light blue pajamas accompanied by yellow sneakers and what could only be described as a long, blue windsock hood flapped wildly in the wind as the boy put everything he had into gathering and concentrating the wind power. The determined look was replaced with one of surprise and a bit of apprehension as he noticed Tony flying near him. His eyes flicked between the ship and Iron Man, trying to decide which he should focus on.
Taking a bit of pity on the poor kid, Tony flew in closer and started firing his own energy at the ship's hull. With the three jets zipping around them, they kept at it until the ship was almost nearly stopped at less than a hundred feet above the churning ocean water. Tony, acknowledging that his own power wasn't needed now that the boy was keeping it from falling straight into the ocean purely through wind power, turned his hands and feet downwards once again.
As he turned, a black form flew past him despite the wind and settled next to the boy. A girl in a long black dress was now hovering in the air, arranging what almost looked like five detailed rubber balls around her via a few hand motions. The last one was locked into place and a crackling green pentagram began to glow under her feet. Smiling serenely, she formed two opposite L-shapes with her hands and slowly started bringing them together. Unbelievably, the mammoth battleship was shrinking in time with the space between her hands and the wind lessened as the boy put less and less effort into propelling it. Finally, when it had reached the size of a child's toy, a quick beckoning motion summoned the ship and the five orbs to circle around her hand and the pentagram disappeared.
The wind continued to dwindle rapidly and the girl looked worriedly to her counterpart, who seemed to be wavering in the air. Thanks to the red text, Tony knew what was going to happen before it did; the girl had just wrapped her arms around the boy when he stopped floating altogether. Before they could drop more than a few feet, Tony caught them easily. Both kids were rather gangly and light enough for him to handle without a problem.
The boy was out cold. His blue windsock hood dangled beneath them, revealing a multitude of cowlicks in his black hair. Square glasses rested on the bridge of his nose, miraculously firmly in place despite the fall. Those, accompanied with the light sprinkling of freckles and slight overbite, made him look more than a little nerdy, but Tony found that the look seemed to suit him. The girl, on the other hand, had an absolute mess of long black hair that had fallen out of the twin-tailed hood. Ruby slippers and striped stockings accompanied a loose black dress that Tony swore he could see stars in. The detail that startled him, though, was the pair of furry white ears sticking up from her head eagerly. Bright green eyes blinked at him from behind circular lenses and she smiled, revealing an overbite similar to the boy's.
"Thanks for the catch!" she said appreciatively, as if he'd just caught a fruit that had fallen out of her shopping cart. "I thought this might happen. John's been trying to slow us down all day. I don't think any of us have ever done something for so long; it's incredibly draining. We were almost the speed of light earlier, so I'm really glad we had a plan in place for this. Crash landing probably would have hurt." No, crash landing would have killed them, Tony thought.
He had almost forgotten he was streaming the footage to the jets before Fury said, "We're bringing the jets to you. Get in here and then we'll take them to the Helicarrier for questioning."
"Fine, fine, Patch. But I hope you're not under the impression you can leave me out of this." Laughing at the tortured sigh from Fury, Tony did his best to stay balanced using only the two thrusters on his feet while he waited for the Quinjet. He watched the two small fighter jets get loaded back onto the sleek plane before it slowly descended in his direction.
"That is such a cool plane," the girl was gushing. "I wish I had a plane like that! I'd fly everywhere and see all my friends whenever I wanted to- actually, I guess that it doesn't do universe-hopping, huh. Well, whichever friends are currently on Earth! This is Earth, right? I'm not just in a dream bubble, am I? But how could I be dreaming of this place when I've never seen it before? Ah, I'm asking you all these questions, but I don't even know what species you are! Can you talk? Wait, that's silly, you were just talking!"
Tony took the opportunity to speak as she paused for breath before she continued her onslaught of queries. "Last time I checked, I was human, and this was Earth. Never heard of a dream bubble, though. Also, you said that ship was going almost the speed of light earlier- how the hell did you slow it down with only wind?"
"Like I said, John's been working on it all day." The "obviously" was implied. "We've had the math worked out for years now. But… I don't think this is where we're meant to be. It feels different than it should. I don't suppose there are any new games coming out soon?"
Aaah this ending feels so abrupt but there was just no good way to continue it! Oh well, haha
First off, thank you so much for the reviews and follows and favorites! Every notification made me smile- you guys are wonderful! I'm so used to deviantART where I get maybe like five favorites for the stuff I don't post in a bunch of groups that this really surprised me!
So yeeeah please don't mind my choppy action scene-thing; these are one of the main things I'm trying to improve on since I usually don't write them as I prefer to stick to slower-paced stories. Plus I was just so excited to bring John and Jade in, I definitely feel like I rushed it! It should be a few more chapters before the asteroid arrives, though.
My Homestuck playlist is at 151 songs now, and I totally listened to it the entire time I was writing this. Definitely check out horizon and PhemieC- their songs are huge sources of inspiration for this story.
Okay okay insanely long a/n is over now! Thanks for reading!
-z
(PS- my novice quad got first place in our race today! It's our last time ever to race as novices in that boat so I'm really glad we won! The End for real now, haha)