Bex was surprised to find that she was the first to arrive on the helicarrier. To be honest she preferred being there early as opposed to late so she could prepare herself to meet and greet Fury's little flock of weirdos she'd been added to.

The Avengers. She'd thought it was a joke when she'd first heard of the people they were recruiting for it – and apparently she hadn't even passed the inspection. But hey, when the world was in peril it seemed the council and S.H.I.E.L.D. were okay with lowering themselves to using temperamental mutants to get the job done. Besides, deep down Bex knew she would do whatever it took to get Clint back alive and hopefully unharmed.

She had been able to remove her wig and makeup but was still uncomfortable with the regulation civilian clothing she'd swapped the sparkling monstrosity of a costume for. Not wanting to be in the S.H.I.E.L.D. clothes she'd changed into any longer than necessary, Bex went below deck and quickly sought out the control room. She'd been on the helicarrier many times before, but she still made sure to map out all of the identical looking hallways. It only took a moment of relearning the path for her to find Agent Hill standing at the main panel of the controls. When she spotted Maria Bex practically ran over and spat out her words.

"I'm here – can I change?"

The woman's eyes narrowed, but she nodded back to her stoically.

"Suit up, then head back to the main deck to wait for the jets carrying Agent Romanoff and Banner as well as Agent Coulson and Rogers. Their ETA's are thirty minutes approximately."

Bex quickly left, heading towards the floor where her locker was located. Without further delay she yanked off the S.H.I.E.L.D. t shirt and sweat pants she had put on immediately after getting out of that horrific, yellow dress and pulled on her uniform.

Her uniform was unlike that of other female agents', but she preferred hers anyway. It was composed of a black long sleeve shirt similar to under armor but with reinforced pads on the elbows, forearms, and shoulders that made sniping more comfortable when lying down for hours at a time and a pair of thick, dark green cargo pants she usually tucked into combat boots. She decided she might as well take her mask out and simply hung it from her belt loop, opting not to put it on yet.

Feeling a bit better being back in her work clothes, Bex then turned to her weapons locker and removed the four coded locks that included fingerprint and iris identification before yanking it open. With efficiency learned from long-term usage, she slung a holster at her waist as well as one at her hips and put a Glock in each. She painstakingly counted out her ammo and made sure to strap in extra clips to her various pockets.

Finally, she looked back at the largest thing she had stored on the helicarrier with an enormous, excited grin. Surrounded carefully with velvet and looking like the most beautiful thing in the world if she did say so herself, was her third favorite sniper.

"Oh sweet baby, I missed you."

Bex took a few minutes to check it over completely before assembling it, wiping it down, and then fully loading it. The gun had been custom made for her – it was slightly smaller than the standard issued sniper, but just as powerful. With a sigh of contentment, she slung it over her shoulder and let it lay across her back while she filled a few more of her pockets with ammunition for it. When she was all done getting ready and had closed her locker back up she couldn't help but lean forward and close her eyes, letting her forehead press against the cool metal and taking deep breaths to wrap her mind around the situation.

Fuck, she wished she wasn't here. She wished Clint hadn't gone and gotten himself involved so she could just refuse to join Fury's boy band. But she couldn't, because he had.

And oh my god, she just realized this meant now her creepy neighbor would have to look after Sarge for a few more days, or however long this mission took. The lady always used baby talk around her, which was incredibly bizarre when it was directed at a 110 lb. German Shepherd. Bex felt a pang of sadness at the thought of her dog, who she hadn't seen in weeks. Sarge had originally been approved by Coulson as a sort of therapy dog when Bex had just joined S.H.I.E.L.D. – somehow she had been able to sense when Bex was about to have an uncontrolled burst of power. Now her dog was one of exactly six things she cared about in this world – one of which was her favorite sniper.

Knowing she had put it off as long as she could, she took a deep breath and gathered her composure before leaving the locker room and heading back onto the top deck.

Walking onto the deck felt like facing a firing squad.

Okay, that was an exaggeration – Bex was almost positive she could deflect the bullets anyway if she ever faced one – but she was dreading the whole "teamwork" thing. But she figured that just because Fury and Coulson were making her play nice didn't mean she had to be nice. There was no way she'd be kissing Rogers' ass or just sit around being a little underling to be ordered around by the oh-so-illustrious Captain America, even if he was Phil's hero.

She only had to wait a few minutes for the first plane to arrive, time she spent cataloguing every agent she knew on the deck as well as what they were armed with and her chances of subduing them if they attacked her suddenly.

Natasha was the first person to get off of the small aircraft, striding confidently onto the deck in a leather jacket Bex could admit she wanted to steal. Only moments later Coulson's jet landed as well.

Following Natasha was Steve Rogers and Bruce Banner.

Yay.