3. Don't try to steal my thunder god.

"Hawkeye, my friend, do you still live?" Clint groaned, trying to push himself up but his arms and legs refused to move.

"Thor, I'm pinned down!" He shouted in alarm, gasping at the pressure on his chest. He squinted, trying to force his blurry vision to focus and Thor's bowed head and hunched shoulders swam into view.

"Indeed," the Asgardian tried to nod. "some great weight seeks to drag us down."

"This is bad," Clint stated, struggling to fight back panic. "JARVIS?" there was a faint clicking noise but no response from the Tower's AI.

"We are compromised," Thor observed.

"Looks like," Clint agreed. "We have to assume that the Tower's already infiltrated and the others are incapacitated. Can you move at all?"

"It is a struggle," Thor admitted. "It took me several minutes to reach you. Give me a moment and I will attempt to lift you."

"No," Clint winced when his head refused to move. "Thor, listen to me, you need to get out of here and bring help. I'll only slow you down. Every second could count. You don't have time to waste. Try to get clear, I'm no good to you like this anyway."

"I cannot leave you like this," Thor protested firmly.

"If you don't we're both going to get killed," Clint insisted. "You're barely keeping your head up and I can't move at all. You need to use what strength you have to get clear of this field and get backup." Thor shook his head slowly, groaning as he struggled to his feet, his shoulders bowed.

"Thor, let go of me!" Clint demanded as Thor's fingers tangled in the front of his henley. Thor let out a grunt, slowly dragging Clint across the floor. "I mean it! Damn you! let go of me and get the hell out of here!"

"I will not leave you in the middle of the floor to be slaughtered like a lindworm," Thor declared with conviction.

"What in the name of hell is a lindworm?" Clint snapped, he let out a pained groan as Thor dragged him another foot. "You know what? Forget it, I don't care. Let me go before you pass out!" The air rushed out of his lungs as he was dropped to the floor.

"You're putting me in the closet," it was an observation more than a question and he stared up at Thor who was leaning against the supply cupboard door, gasping for air.

"You will only bluster loudly until I comply with your wishes," Thor stated. "I would prefer to move about with less commotion."

"Respect, Thor," Barton smiled softly despite the thread of fear he could still feel twining under the surface.

"I shall return for you as soon as I am able," Thor promised, pushing himself up. He slammed the door of the storage cupboard shut and Clint listened to him stumble slowly away. Clint drew in a slow shaky breath, his eyes tracing the walls of the dark closet, cataloging each item. A bag of basketballs hung on the hook directly over his head. Two of them were completely flat from the time he and Steve had tried to teach Thor to slam dunk. A can of tennis balls rested on the shelf above his feet over the collection of rackets. Natasha had painted cartoon faces of all the Avengers on them with a sharpie and she and Tony had spent an entire afternoon once smacking them into a cardboard cut out of Fury they'd taped on the gym wall. In the far corner he could just make out a hula hoop and he bit his lip, tears stinging his eyes as he remembered Bruce and Pepper having a hoop off in the rec room last Christmas. Damn, he hoped they were all right.

He closed his eyes, trying not to think about it, straining to hear the sound of Thor's feet dragging slowly across the gym floor.

"In here!" It was an unfamiliar voice and Barton froze, holding his breath at the sound of a machine gun pin being pulled back. "This one's still moving!"

"You are unwelcome here!" Thor declared with all the aplomb he could muster. Which was quite a bit, all things considered.

"Take him out!"

Clint nearly bit though his tongue to keep from crying out but the gunfire he expected to hear was supplanted by the sound of an electrical discharge and he stifled a curse. Thor hated tasers.

"Turn the field off in here and secure him!" the stranger ordered, Clint only had a moment to register the words when suddenly the pressure on his arms and legs disappeared. He fought the urge to draw in a gasping breath and he clapped his hand over his mouth, drawing in two deep breaths through his nose before he slid silently to his knees and peered though the crack in the closet door.

"How was he even moving?" One of the black clad soldiers demanded. They were outfitted like special forces but there were no markings on their uniforms, there faces almost entirely obscured by safety glasses.

"I think it's the Asgardian," One of them stated, kicking Thor's arm to make sure he was well and truly incapacitated.

"Don't mess around," one of the others, clearly their commander, barked. "tag him with a controller and take him down to holding." Clint watched as one of the soldiers attached a black disk to the back of Thor's neck and four of them hoisted him up, groaning under his weight.

"We've got another," the commander relayed though the radio.

"We just tagged Stark and Rogers," another voice answered. "Is that all of them?"

"I don't know," the commander shrugged, his eyes scanning the gym suspiciously. "Our orders were not to assume anything. Go through and make sure the rest of the levels are clear."

Clint watched in silence as he retreated, his footfalls reverberating down the hall. This evening had gone downhill rather quickly for a night off. He swore under his breath. Sometimes he was really glad to be the Avenger everyone forgot about.


"Why can't we get a cab?" Darcy demanded in frustration, folding her arms over her chest in a sulk, glaring at Natasha out of the corner of her eye. The redhead had shed her coat partway, letting it pool at her elbows to reveal the scooping neckline of her red sheath dress.

"If that doesn't get us a ride nothing will," Jane shook her head. Betty turned to look at her, and the pair sighed. Betty, shrugged out of her overcoat, smoothing out imagined wrinkles in her dress and and Jane undid the tie on her sweater, pulling it back from the neckline of her blouse.

"You're nuts," Darcy observed, pulling her leather jacket tighter around her little black dress. "I'm freezing!"

"Anyone with any sense is getting out of this part of the city as fast as they can," Phil shook his head. "Ladies, I'd suggest we cross the street and try to get a cab going north. We can go to Mt Sinai and I can call in a helicopter and have you all evacuated until this is cleared up."

"There isn't a helipad at Mt Sinai," Pepper stated. Phil only stared back at her with an unreadable expression.

"I'm not going anywhere," Betty insisted, folding her arms over her chest.

"Me either," Pepper agreed. "Phil they're in trouble and SHIELD headquarters is completely cut off. You can't just walk away from them."

"I hadn't intended to," he intoned flatly. "I intended to leave you in Agent Romanov's care and head there directly myself on foot."

"Through the park?" Jane asked in horror.

"At night?" Darcy added. "Alone?"

"It's not as crazy as it sounds," Natasha replied with an elegant half shrug.

"You can just forget that plan," Pepper shook her head, her brow furrowing angrily. "Tony is in there and no offense Phil but I'd very much like to see him alive again. You're going to need backup."

"Ms. Potts," Natasha said gently, a sympathetic look on her face.

"No," Pepper declared firmly. "I'm sorry Nat, but no, don't do that. We've been through too much for you to do a Rushman on me now. Back me up here." Natasha seemed to think it over a moment before turning to Phil with an almost helpless expression.

"What's a Rushman?" Darcy whispered loudly. Jane shrugged in reply.

"If anything happens to any of you," he sighed, looking each of them over a moment before turning back to Natasha. "This is a horrible idea."

"Phil, they'll be dead before we can get backup here," Natasha insisted. "They're all we've got." Phil rubbed the bridge of his nose between his thumb and finger with a sigh, looking up once more at Avengers Tower.

"What do you think?" He asked seriously.

"Has to be an electromagnetic forcefield of some kind," Jane answered, giving it a considering look. "It's probably locking out all the access points. It's definitely interfering with transmissions."

"Is there a way around it?" Natasha asked.

"Doesn't JARVIS have one of those EMP things?" Darcy asked. "Tony said something about it the other day."

"Yeah it's on the lower levels below the labs," Betty nodded. "He installed it to take out any ground assaults. JARVIS could activate it on voice command but we'd have to get a transmission though the field."

"We might be able to do that from close proximity," Jane suggested. "It depends on the strength of the field. If it's localized enough we might be able to punch though."

"The second everything went crazy JARVIS would have gone into lockdown." Pepper pointed out, turning to Phil. "So the normal protocols won't work. Do you think that you can get past that?"

"I don't know," Phil shrugged, his brow knitting. "Maybe."

"You're going to hack JARVIS?" Darcy declared in disbelief. "That I'd like to see."

"He's done it before," Natasha stated, an amused smirk curling her lips.

"Seriously?" Darcy gaped up at her. The assassin nodded.

"I was there," Pepper assured.

"That is so totally badass!" Darcy squealed, turning to Phil. "Can I be you when I grow up?"

"So just to be clear," Phil drew in a long slow breath. "We're going to cross Central Park in the middle of the night, try to worm past a forcefield, hack into the most advance AI in the world and try to trigger an EMP that will take out half the tech in a three block radius in the hope that it's enough to give five probably restrained Avengers enough leverage to turn the tables on this weeks' supervillain?" Everyone was silent.

"Sounds about right, yeah," Betty nodded.

"I'm on board," Natasha shrugged.

"Well it's the best we've got," Pepper pointed out. Phil nodded in grudging agreement. He held out his arm to Pepper and she linked hers around his elbow smiling. With a shake of his head he looked up at the light, hurrying across the street with her, the others hot on their heels.

"Are we going to get mugged?" Darcy asked, popping her gum. "I've never been mugged."

"Darcy," Jane shot at her warningly.

"I like this plan," Darcy continued, half skipping ahead to join Natasha who flung an arm around her shoulder. "I'm excited to be a part of it."

"Darcy, for the love of god!" Jane growled as Betty and Phil struggled not to laugh. "Stop talking!"


Bruce blinked his eyes open slowly, drawing in a shaky breath. He felt as if he'd been buried beneath a concrete wall and he stared up at the ceiling of the elevator for a long moment, unmoving. He could feel a trickle of something wet creeping down his forehead and he raised a hand.

His hand didn't move.

Panic seized in his chest and he struggled to tamp it down, drawing in slow, steadying breaths.

"No," he whispered, screwing his eyes shut. "you can't transform in here. The elevator's too small. You'll rip it apart, you'll fall down sixty floors and tear yourself to ribbons in the elevator shaft. Stay calm." The wave washed over him, ebbing only slightly and he gritted his teeth.

"JARVIS?" he forced out.

"...ow... may I... hel..p...you..doct...anner?" the AI's voice stilted over the intercom.

"Oh that's really not good," Bruce drew in another slow breath. "JARVIS, are we on lockdown?"

"...es...octor."

"That's something, at least" Bruce sighed. "Let's keep things to yes and no for right now, ok?"

"Ye.."

"Great," Bruce closed his eyes again, calming his breathing. "Is Tony incapacitated?"

"Yes." Bruce swore under his breath.

"What about Steve?"

"...es."

"Thor?"

"Ye..."

"Clint?" Bruce felt his chest tighten.

"No."

"Finally some good news," Bruce swallowed. "JARVIS is this gravity field covering the whole building?"

"No,"

"So it's localized," he paused. "To just the top floors, right?"

"..es"

"Can we call for backup?"

"No."

"JARVIS, is someone in your systems?"

"No," Bruce breathed a sigh of relief.

"JARVIS, enact Protocol Ocean-13" Bruce ordered, his voice shaking only slightly. He closed his eyes, hoping desperately that the elevator safety brakes would hold. There was a long pause.

"No,"

Bruce bit his lip, breathing slowly.

"You're not leaving me with a lot of options here, buddy," Bruce pointed out.

"N..." JARVIS answered.

"Any bright ideas?" he asked hopefully.

"No."

"I thought not," Bruce admitted. "If I transformed, do you think the field would still be able to hold me?" There was another long pause, far longer than was normal for the AI to run calculations.

"JARVIS?" His breath caught in his throat. He could swear he heard footsteps in the corridor beyond the elevator door. He hissed out a curse.

"JARVIS, belay that!" he ordered. "Have we been infiltrated? JARVIS!"

"He's in here!" an unfamiliar, muffled, voice shouted.

"Oh god let it be SHIELD," Bruce pleaded. "JARVIS?!"

"Get it open!"

He knew that voice and his blood ran cold in his veins. He could almost feel his eyes begin to turn green. Good idea or not, it was going to be his only option left in just a moment. He let out a shout of pain as his hands grew, but the transformation wasn't taking place normally, as if the field were somehow holding him back.

The door slid open and the last face he'd ever wanted to see again appeared.

"Hello, Dr. Banner," General Thaddeus "Thunderbolt" Ross declared, a vindictive smile curling his lips. "Fancy seeing you here."

It was the last thing Bruce saw before a tranquilizer pierced his neck.