A/N writing in italics is someone's thoughts
Jess sighed as Ruby and Aine flicked peas at each other with their spoons; two years hadn't done anything for their immaturity. It was nice to see all of them but she seemed to be the only one who had grown up, of course she had spent the two years learning to control Titania, as the beast called itself.
"Hey Jess," she heard Aine call, bringing her out of her thoughts, "What have you been doing? We haven't seen you in ages,"
"Not much," she said, which was technically true, since she had spent the whole time meditating.
"Why so secretive?" Betty asked never having liked secrets much, since her parents used to have so many.
"Yeah she has point," Ruby said, "My Dad used to say we would be the next avengers, meaning we can't have any secrets from each other,"
"Guys I'm not hiding anything," Jess said hating the fact that she had this monster inside of her that she had to constantly fight off. Even though her friends knew about Titania, she didn't like talking about it.
"Guys maybe we should leave it," Aine said, she maybe reckless but she wasn't an idiot, she could recognise the signs that Jess couldn't control the monster.
"No," Ruby said sternly before turning back to Jess, "We have to know we can trust you,"
"This is ridiculous," Jess yelled, "I've known your whole life, literally, and you questioning whether you can trust me,"
"Guys this is stupid," Aine said, 'When did I become the voice of reason', "Didn't you mum just say we shouldn't be fighting?"
"We are not fighting, Aine," Betty said, "I agree with Ruby their shouldn't be any secrets."
"Are you trying to tell me you don't have any secrets." Jess said her blood slowly starting to boil.
She was slipping; She could feel the monster crawling itself into her consciousness. Her mind relived the memories of her first and last kill, the girl screaming, her heart in her hand and the girl's father screaming. Jess tried to fight the urge, the urge to give in. She began to take deep breaths, to calm herself, to stop Titania from emerging, but, as always, it was just too strong.
"Get away from her," Aine yelled. As she recognised the signs she ran over to Jess trying to calm her down, "Tell your Mum we're going to need help."
Jess looked at her friend, she was trying to get her to do some sort of breathing exercises, but they both knew it wouldn't work. Lifting up and arm Jess hit Aine away, she went flying across the room; unfortunately Jess' image inducer broke in the process. Jess looked over at her friend to say sorry but Aine wasn't there, she had gotten up and ran to warn the others that Jess was about to turn.
Jess felt the monster come alive, desperate to see the sun, to see freedom, and she realised she couldn't fight it any longer, so she slumps over, defeated. As the beast came to life she was pushed into the very back of her subconscious unable to do anything. She might as well have not existed.
'However I've got to keep fighting it because I'm the only who can.'
Ruby and Betty ran towards the main control room to warn everyone about Jess, they just hoped that Aine was able to hold her off for long enough to give everyone a head start.
"Mum!" Ruby yelled not able to see her straight away, she yelled twice more before her mum actually appeared from a huddle of S.H.I.E.L.D agents. "Jess has gone nuts, Titania's about to emerge we have to act quickly."
"What did Aine do?" Maria asked straight away putting the blame on to Aine since Stark had always tried to provoke Bruce.
"It wasn't Aine," Betty said standing up for her friend, "In fact Aine's trying to calm Jess down to give us more time,"
Suddenly there was a rattling from above before metal plates from the ceiling came down along with a body and a section of the ventilation system. Soon enough the body stood up and was revealed to be Aine brushing herself, she walked over to everyone a grimace on her face.
"Correction was trying to calm her down," Aine coughed batting dust away from her face before turning to Maria, "I think you need stronger ventilation ducts,"
"They are not designed to hold a human body," Maria shrilled, "Now where do you think Jess will head,"
"Probably her lab," Betty spoke up, "It's one of the only familiar places to her on the whole ship and I think even the monster would recognise that,"
"Ok," Maria said a plan formulating in her mind, "You guys try to head her off try to head her towards these coordinates," said coordinates showed on a screen Aine plotted them into her map of S.H.I.E.L.D on her watch computer, "I'll be there with a place to keep her contained,"
"Let's go guys, Aine you have the map!" Betty yelled to everyone as they all headed towards the labs none of them sure if they could actually pull this off.
"Surely we should have heard her by now," Ruby moaned, the three of them had been wondering around the helicarrier for ages and they hadn't heard a peep from Jess. Ruby's mum had called them five times already to check Jess hadn't knocked all of them out.
"My Dad said Bruce nearly killed my Mum when he changed on the helicarrier," Betty told everyone she used to love stories about New York when she was younger.
"Maybe Jess has better control then we thought," Aine thought aloud, the silence disturbed her it was like when you where in the same house as a young child and you couldn't hear them and when you found them they were chewing through a wire.
"Doubt it, she threw you across a room if you don't remember," Betty reminded Aine before tapping the side of her head, "Or did she give you brain damage,"
"Like we would notice if she had brain damage," Ruby joked causing Aine to punch her roughly on the arm. "Ow! Calm it on the super strength their Aine,"
Before Aine could reply Betty put an arm out in front of the two and signalled for them to quieten down. Once they were all quiet they could hear a mumbling coming from a nearby room. The three crept into it to see a S.H.I.E.L.D agent lying up against the wall a bruise forming on their jaw but other then that they didn't seem to beaten up.
"What happened here Agent Lewington?" Ruby asked using her best commander voice although she was pretty sure she already new what had gone down.
"Monster," was the only word the agent managed to get out before he went into a blood coughing fit and had to support himself with both hands.
"I've already informed medics they should be hear soon." Betty told the agent from behind Ruby assuming that they agent hadn't done so himself.
"Jess is gonna kill herself when she finds out she hurt someone." Aine murmured not seeming to be worried about they agent coughing up blood on the floor.
"Let's worry about that later first of all we need to track her down." Ruby told Aine before putting the agent into a position where he wouldn't choke on his own blood.
"Something tells me that's going to be harder then it sounds."