The first time my brothers and I rode in an airplane it crashed. While Victor and I walked away with a better understanding on how they worked, Jimmy walked away with an utter fear of them. While he refused to show that fear and got onto airplanes with little to no complaint it was when the turbulence started that he lost his composure.
"Son of a bitch."
A smirk pulled at my lips at the sound of my brother's grumbled voice. I cracked open an eye and looked over at him, not at all surprised to find him tense and clutching the seat like a lifeline. "You doing okay there, Jimmy?" I questioned.
A sneer pulled at his lips as he looked over at me. "Shut up, Lizzy," he growled.
"Just warn me if you're going to throw up."
"Lizzy."
A snort of laughter left me at that as another wave of turbulence rocked the plane. "This isn't as bad as that flight from Paris."
He groaned and dropped his back to rest against the wall. "Don't remind me."
"What happened on the flight from Paris?"
My smile grew at the sound of Steve's voice and I looked over to him, once again pleased that he had sat next to me. "The plane's engine stalled and we dived 30,000 feet before I managed to get us level again."
Steve's eyebrows shot up at that. "Before you leveled it?" he asked.
I gave him a pointed look. "Are you really that surprised that I know how to fly a plane?"
He laughed at that and shook his head. "No, I guess not," he answered. "Any reason the engine stalled? I wouldn't take you as a pilot who doesn't check her craft."
I snorted at that. "It was an old plane," I said, deciding that telling him it was a Curtiss 18T and that the flight had been in 1918 was probably a bad idea.
He seemed to accept that answer. "You must be a pretty good flyer then," he praised.
"A lady never brags," I stated. "Her accomplishments should speak for themselves."
Steve beamed at that. "Believe me, Ellie, they do," he told me.
I could feel my cheeks redden at that and I resisted the urge to giggle like a love sick school girl. "I'm glad my efforts aren't wasted."
"Far from it."
"You two are going to make me sick," Jimmy growled out.
I grimaced at that and looked back over to him. "Are you sure it's not just the plane?" I asked, my tone far from amused.
The corner of his lips twitched into a small smile. "No, I'm sure it's you two," he answered. "The sugar you two are giving off is going to give me a tooth ache."
I wrinkled my nose and stuck my tongue out at him. "You're just being a sourpuss because you have to jump out of a plane," I stated.
He barked out a laugh. "That's the part I'm looking forward to."
I couldn't help but laugh at that. "I have to agree with you," I told him. "I do love jumping out a perfectly good airplane."
"That's because you have issues."
"That's the pot calling the kettle black."
"Well we are related."
"Unfortunately."
"Really, Lizzy?"
"Unfortunately."
"Please tell me we're jumping soon," Jimmy pleaded, looking over me and to Steve.
The Super Solider seemed highly amused by the sibling teasing and nodded. "We're a few minutes out," he answered before undoing his harness and getting up. "Suit up!" he called over the roaring hum of the engine.
I followed suit and undid my harness. I took the opportunity to stretch out from the two hour flight and caught Steve watching me from the corner of my eye. "Something wrong, soldier?" I asked, unable to help the smirk.
He cleared his throat and shook his head, turning his attention back to his parachute. "Did I ever tell you how beautiful you look in that uniform?" he asked, his voice quiet enough so the others wouldn't hear.
My cheeks reddened once again and I distracted myself with pulling my parachute from its stashed position under the seat. "And you look rather dashing in yours," I complimented.
"Why thank you," he said. "Someone very special to me made it."
I raised an eyebrow. "I didn't know you and Howard were so close."
He nearly dropped his parachute he started laughing so hard.
I smiled proudly at that and pulled on the parachute, quickly doing up the harness, silently thanking Howard for upgrading them. I couldn't count how many times I'd broken my legs due to a failed parachute. "Who's going first?!" I called, turning to face the others.
They all looked to each other, seeming more than hesitant to speak up.
"I'm going first," Jimmy stated, his tone firm as he jerked on his harness. "The sooner I'm off this fucking thing the better."
Steve nodded in understanding. "Hit the ground running. We're dropping into enemy territory so there might be-"
Whatever he was about to say was lost as a thundering boom filled the air and a violent tremor shook the plane. We pitched forward and crashed to the floor of the plane, landing in a heap.
"Howard?!" both me and Steve shouted as we untangled ourselves.
"We've got some unexpected company!" Howard yelled back from the cockpit. "Hang on!"
"That's not really an option!" Steve stated, his arm shooting out to wrap around my waist as another tremor rocked the plane.
"Howard, we can't-" I was cut off as one of the explosions went off a little too close to the plane and the smell of fire filed the air. "Shit," I growled, using Steve's shoulder to push myself up and looked out one the windows to the wing. I wasn't at all surprised to find it on fire. "Engine 1 is on fire! Howard, you'll have to jump!"
"What?!"
I stumbled as I made my way over to the cockpit. "I'm sorry, do you want to blow up?!" I asked, bracing in the doorway and looking down at him. "Get your parachute on or you're jumping without one."
He looked back at me, a panicked look on his face. "Have I ever told you that I have an issue with heights?"
"You what?!" I snapped, lurching forward as another explosion went off. I reached over his shoulder and undid the straps holding him down.
"Uh, El, what are you doing?" he asked.
"Hold the yolk steady," I told him, grabbing hold of one of the straps and jerking on it, tearing the top free of the seat. I stretched it out and wrapped it around the yolk before tying it off. "Up," I ordered, grasping his arm and all but pulling him from the seat. I pushed him out of the cockpit and was pleased to find that Steve and Jimmy were the only ones who hadn't jumped. "The wing's going to blow, he's coming with us," I told them, ducking down to grab another parachute.
"El, I really don't-"
We were once again thrown as the aforementioned on fire wing exploded, sending the plane spinning. Everything became a blur as we thrashed around, the open jump door becoming a vacuum and one by one they were pulled out into open air.
I blinked against the assault of the wind and tried to locate the screaming Howard Stark. Flattening my arms to my sides and bringing my legs together I shot towards him, wondering if my parachute would be enough to hold both of us.
"EL!" he shouted when he spotted me, holding both his hands out to me.
I slammed into him, my arms coming up to wrap around his shoulders as we tumbled down out of control. "Howard, wrap your arms around my waist and grab your wrists!" I told him.
He did just that, making sure that there was no chance of his letting go of me.
"Is this parachute going to hold both of us?!"
He shook his head. "Not for long!"
I grimaced at that before reaching up and pulling the cord.
The parachute deployed and jerked them to a slower fall but overall not doing much to stop their fall.
"I'm going to try to steer us away from the trees but the parachute will rip at some point and we will fall!" I told him. "I'm going to twist us so I take the initial impact but it's still going to hurt!"
He nodded, his eyes darting up to watch the silk canvas above us. "We got about five minutes before it gives. Make them count!"
Grabbing hold of the handles I maneuvered us over the trees, the distance between them and us becoming shorter and shorter. We cleared a rather dense patch of forest when the unmistakable sound of ripping was heard and like a string had been cut, we began to fall. I brought my arms back around him as I twisted us around so my back was to the ground.
"I think my issues with heights is gone!" he shouted, watching the ground get closer and closer.
I hit the trees laughing.
Soon our yelps of pain joined the snaps of breaking branches as we plummeted to the ground. It seemed like an eternity before we came to a stop, the parachute catching on a branch and yanking me to a standstill while Howard's grip slipped from my waist to around my ankles.
I took the moment of sudden stillness to breathe and found the familiar taste of blood in my throat. With a grimace of pain I shifted my shoulders and felt the searing pain just under my shoulder blade. "Howard, are you okay?" I asked, my voice strained from the fluid filling my lungs.
"Nothing that won't heal," he answered out of breath. "What about you?"
"S-something's pierced my lung," I told him. "I'm g-going to pass out soon so you'll b-be on your own."
"Think you can swing me over to that branch?"
I looked over to the closest branch and decided that it wasn't an unreasonable distance away. "Yes. Start swinging," I told him.
He nodded and began to swing his legs side to side.
I pulled in a strangled breath and began to lift my legs to help his swings. A grunt of pain left me as he reached out for the branch, his weight shifting to just one of my legs.
He latched onto the branch and swung his other arm around while his legs came up. He lifted himself up and was soon straddling the branch. "I have to pull it out right?" he asked, pushing himself up to crawl along the branch towards the trunk.
I nodded. "If you w-want me to heal faster."
"Hang on," he said, reaching up to pull himself onto the higher branch. He moved cautiously as he inch down it, probably silently praying that it wouldn't break under him. He stretched out across it and reached down towards me, his fingers outstretched towards my left shoulder.
A gurgled gasp left me when he pulled the piece of branch from my back. The healing burn was instant, my body working fast to keep me from passing out, the blood in my lungs disappearing just as quickly as it had appeared. The black spots that had become my vision was clearing up, allowing me to see just where we had landed. We were stuck about 15 feet above the ground and as far as I could see there wasn't a break in the trees.
"Do we know how far off course we are?" I questioned.
Howard tossed the piece of branch away and pushed himself back up. "5 miles at the most," he answered, dropping his head back to look through the trees, his eyes squinting. "God, you can't even see the sky."
A frustrated sigh left me. "I've been in worse situations, we'll be fine," I assured him, wincing as the torn muscle kitted back together. "I have a compass and a map, we can find our way. Plus Jimmy and I can find each other as long as one of us is up wind."
Howard let out a laugh. "Not to mention Steve. I bet he's pretty frantic now."
"He knows I can take care of myself."
"He also knows that a Human can't survive a fall like that," he pointed out.
I frowned at that, knowing very well what he was insinuating. "Well, it's a good thing for both of us that I'm not," I said before reaching up and jerking the tab that released the parachute cords from the harness. I dropped down the remaining 15 feet, hitting several more branches before landing flat on my back. A relief filled sigh left me when the snow pressed into the still open wound, the cold numbing the burn as it knit the torn muscle back together.
"El? Are you still alive?!" he called down.
I pulled in a grateful deep breath. "I'm alive. I'm just going to stay here till you climb down, okay?"
He chuckled at that. "Okay."
I watched him as he struggled down the tree, his shoes slipping on the bark. "Why are you wearing dress shoes?"
"Because I had dinner plans with a beautiful brunette," he answered, his foot slipping off the branch and sending him chest first into a lower one. "Oh god," he whimpered out.
"I'm sure she'll reschedule when you tell her you survived a plane crash," I told him. "You can even tell her that it's made you appreciate life and how short it is."
He grunted as he pulled himself onto the branch. "You make it sound like I'm going to propose to her."
"She'll think you are too," I said. "It'll make things easier for you."
"I thought you were against my womanizing ways?"
"If they can't see you coming then they deserve it," I stated.
He let out a sarcastic laugh. "Thank you, El, that makes it so much better."
I smiled at that. "You're very welcome, Howard," I said as I pushed myself up, the burn in my shoulder starting to fade. I looked back at the snow and found a rather large patch of red. "I've only worn the damn uniform twice and there's already a hole in it," I grumbled, twisting my right arm around my back to feel just how big said hole was. "There's no way they're not going to notice that," I sighed, tracing the fist sized hole.
"Just tell them it caught a branch and tore," Howard told me. "It's not exactly a lie."
"It will be when there's not even a scratch on me."
"You could always just tell them," he suggested.
I barked out a laugh. "Do you really see that going well?" I demanded. "'Fellas, the reason I didn't die is because I'm immortal. Oh, and while we're at it, my brother's one too!'" I exclaimed, glaring up at him. "Pull your head out of your ass, Howard, I can't tell them."
"Fine, we'll chalk it up to it being a miracle," he allowed before silently cursing when his foot slipping again and he was forced to the next branch. "And you're not immortal."
My eyebrows furrowed. "What?"
"You have a hyperactive regenerative healing mutation with a dash of wolf DNA thrown into it," he explained. "It might take a few hundred years but you will die eventually."
"How much is a few hundred years?"
"Let's put it this way, you'll look 30 when you're 300."
Panic suddenly clenched at my heart. "What about Steve?"
Howard paused to look down at me. "What about Steve?"
"How long is he going to live?"
He hummed and thought about it for a moment. "Honestly, if he doesn't get himself killed his life span matches yours pretty closely," he answered, a small smile pulling at his lips. "So if you do decide to follow the whole 'true love' route and live happily ever after he won't die on you of old age."
His answer seemed to curb the panic. "That's not a false sense of security, is it?"
"El, I'll never give you a false sense of security about something like that," he told me, swinging down onto the last branch before letting himself fall to the ground. "It just had to snow, didn't it?" he asked.
"It's Germany, Howard, of course it snowed," I said, pushing myself to my feet and walking over to him. "Let me see you," I demanded, reaching for his head.
He allowed me my fussing and stood still as I checked him for any injuries.
"How does your head feel?" I asked, prodding at the cut above his eyebrow.
Howard hissed and slapped my hand away. "I'm a little dizzy but I think that's allowed after what just happened," he said.
I rolled my eyes. "You probably have a concussion," I mused.
"I'll be fine," he dismissed. "It's not like I could sleep out here anyways."
A snort left me. "You'll have to if you want to keep sane," I reminded him.
He grimaced.
"Oh come on, it's not that bad. You've camped before, haven't you?"
"Once when I was a kid," he answered, "and I was chased by a bear."
It was sad that that didn't surprise me. "Well, the good news is that here you'll only have to worry about Nazis."
"Wow, that's a load off my mind," he snipped out.
I chuckled. "Oh you'll be fine," I assured him, undoing the parachute harness and letting it fall to the snow. I stepped out of it and kicked it further into the trees. "You're with the Mutant, remember?"
He nodded. "While I have complete faith in your abilities I would feel much better if I had a gun," he stated, looking me over before reaching out and snatching one my handguns from its thigh holster.
"Howard, you couldn't hit the broad side of barn if it was five feet in front of you. You're just going to hurt yourself," I stated, moving to take it back from him.
He let out a dramatic gasp and held the gun out of my reach. "El, I make these things for a living, I'm not going to hurt myself."
"You said the same thing about that flash grenade and you were blind for a week," I argued. "I am not carrying you when you shoot yourself in the foot."
He smirked at me. "You will and you know it."
I put on a smug look and crossed my arms over my chest. "So you are going to shoot yourself in the foot?"
He opened his mouth to answer but stopped when he realized what he had said.
"That's what I thought."
He huffed and tucked the gun into the inside pocket of his jacket. "Let's find out where we need to go."
After a few minutes of arguing over the map before we set off in the direction we thought we needed to go, trekking through the snow and trees. Howard had pulled his stolen gun out of his jacket and held it tightly in his hand, his eyes wide as they looked for any sign of danger. The whole thing was amusing and it was just the thing I needed to keep me from worrying about the others. While I knew that Steve and Jimmy would be just fine it was the rest of the Howling Commandos that had less of a chance. One of the few things on their side was the fact that they jumped when and where they were supposed to, putting them in the safest place.
"Steve and Jimmy couldn't have fallen that much farther from us," Howard suddenly stated, his voice quiet enough for just me to hear.
I glanced back at him. "They had longer air time than we did," I reminded him. "They'd land closer to the others than we would."
He nodded. "True, but they wouldn't just leave us."
"If they're smart they will," I stated.
"What?!"
I shushed him. "They'll head to the landing spot and wait to see if we make it. If we don't show up after an hour then they come looking for us. There's no reason for the entire team to be separated."
He seemed to pout at that but didn't complain.
I considered giving him a false sense of security but lost the thought when the sound of a snapping twig split the air. I grabbed hold of Howard's arm and pulled him towards me, flattening both of us against the trunk of a tree. Lifting my nose in the direction the sound had come from I pulled in a deep breath and cursed when it wasn't familiar. "Unfriendly," I breathed.
Howard had the common sense not to panic.
Clenching my right fist the bone spikes split my skin and extended out. "Grab a rock and throw it in front of us," I whispered, keeping an ear tuned to the foreign footsteps.
Howard crouched down and picked a decent sized stone. He pulled in a calming breath before chucking it back the way we had come.
The footsteps changed direction and started towards us in a cautious pace.
I held my breath as I waited, my arm raised at the ready. I swung myself around as soon as the man stepped level with the tree, my spikes entering his throat and through his spinal cord.
The usual choked gasping escaped him as he struggled to breath around the blood flooding his lungs and sudden inability to feel anything below his neck. Relaxing my hand the spikes retracted and he fell to the snow, his blood polluting its pristine color.
"Holy shit," Howard breathed, looking between me and the body. "Holy shit."
I chose to ignore him and reached down to grab a hand full of snow to wash the blood off my hand, the tears from the spikes already healed. "There's bound to be a few more, we better keep moving," I stated.
Howard swallowed hard and nodded, pushing himself back up. "That was, uh….terrifying and oddly reassuring," he told me.
I couldn't help but laugh at that.
"I knew you would carry me," Howard stated smugly.
I growled as I shifted his weight higher up on my shoulders. "And I knew you would hurt yourself," I stated back.
"But I didn't shoot myself in the foot," he countered.
"No, you stabbed yourself in the leg," I agreed. "Something you have still yet to explain," I reminded him.
He let out a frustrated sigh. "Can't you just accept that it happened and move on?"
"Either you tell me or I make something up," I threatened, tightening my grip on him as I climbed over a fallen tree. "And my version will not be kind."
He groaned and went completely limp. "It happened when I rolled."
A snort of laughter left me at that and I nearly dropped him. "You mean you stabbed yourself when you tried to summersault away from the last Nazi?" I asked, having to stop as I struggled to stay upright through my laughter.
Howard grumbled. "Yeah, yeah, laugh it up."
"That's so much better than what I could have come up with," I gasped out, my eyes watering before a tear streaked down my cheek. "Oh Jesus."
"I'm so glad that you can take pleasure from my pain," he deadpanned. "It gives me a warm fuzzy feeling where my stab wound is."
Another snort left me before I pulled in a deep calming breath, the air coming out in a stutter around suppressed laughs. "Oh, Howard, you are a doll," I stated before trekking forward.
"Thanks, El," he said, sounding as far from amused as one could get. "If you say anything to the others I'll tell them about the tabby cat."
I glared back at him. "You wouldn't dare."
"You know I would."
I sneered at that but knew he was right. "Fine," I agreed.
"Good. How much longer?"
I sighed and looked around us. "We should be right on top of it," I stated.
"Do you think they went looking for us?"
I shook my head. "We would have ran into them if they had," I reasoned, slowing till we were standing in the middle of a small clearing, the moon shining through and reflecting off the snow.
"Don't you and your brothers have a secret whistle or something?" he asked. "I mean, you guys lived in the woods didn't you?"
I shot him a glare but unfortunately he was right on both accounts. I leaned down and shifted Howard over far enough for him to stand on his own, the man hobbling slightly from him only having the use of one leg. Pulling in a deep breath I whistled out the tune my brothers and I had used since we were children, the sound splitting the stillness of the forest.
There was a moment of tension filled silence before the whistle was returned.
I let out a sigh as a smile stretched across my face. "Told ya we were close," I said before allowing myself to fall back into the snow, my arms and legs spread out.
"Really, El? Snow Angels?' Howard asked.
I let out a small giggle as I began to flap my arms and scissor my legs, effectively making a Snow Angel. "When was the last time you made one?"
Howard thought about it for a moment before shrugging and letting himself fall opposite me. "Ow," he deadpanned once he had settled. He let out a grunt as he began to move his arms and legs. "My angel's going to have a stab wound," he stated.
A snort of laughter left me at that. "And whose fault is that?"
"God's."
"So he's stabbing people now, huh?"
We both looked over to find Jimmy heading towards us, that cocky smirk on his face.
"Glad to see you're in one piece," I stated, pushing myself up and holding my hands out to him.
He chuckled and stopped in front of me. "Surprised you're the same," he admitted, grabbing my hands and pulling me to my feet. "You two landed pretty hard."
"I got impaled," I told him.
His eyebrows shot up. "That's is?"
I wrinkled my nose at him. "What do you mean 'that's it'?" I demanded, leaning down to grab a hold of Howard's hands and pull him up as well. "I would consider almost drowning in my own blood 'traumatic' not 'that's it?'"
"You've had worse."
"The parachute caught in one of the trees, if Howard hadn't of been there I would have been stuck for hours," I told him. "I would be an immortal piñata."
Howard shook his head as he clutched to my arm to keep balance. "I already told you, El, you're not immortal," he stated.
I rolled my eyes. "And you also told me that I'm not going to look 30 till I'm 300," I reminded. "Someone who lives for that long of time and can't die by natural causes is an immortal."
"Technically, an immortal can't-"
"Why don't you two finish this fascinating conversation when we're not in enemy territory?" Jimmy suggested, giving both of us a pointed look. "Get a move on."
I silently berated myself so I looked back to Howard. "Do you want me to carry you or do you want to hobble?"
"I'll hobble, thank you," he answered, letting go of my arm and limping through the snow in the direction Jimmy had come from.
I had to bite my lip to keep myself from laughing.
"What the hell happened to him?" Jimmy asked, leaning over so he could whisper to me.
I considered telling him the truth but Howard's threat of telling the tabby cat story still held its weight. "Let's just say that he tried to be badass," I answered.
Jimmy didn't seem to need more information than that. A bright smile pulled at his lips as he shook his head. "What I would give to have seen that," he said.
"He's being a child," I muttered, looping my arm through Jimmy's and pulling him after the hobbling genius. "We're going to have to hold him down when I stitch him up."
"That's going to be a laugh and a half," he stated, allowing me to pull him along. "I thought your soldier was going to have a panic attack."
I looked up at him. "He's okay though, right?"
"He's not even dented," he assured me. "It took me nearly ten minutes to convince him to go to the landing point instead of finding you."
A frown pulled at my lips. "That's a problem."
Jimmy hummed in agreement. "You're both compromised," he mused. "You know, he wouldn't be so ready to arms if he knew that you can't actually die."
"I'm getting real tired of this conversation, Jimmy," I told him.
"He deserves to know, Lizzy."
"And you think I don't know that?!" I snapped, pulling my arm away from him. "You think that it doesn't bother me? That keeping something like this from him doesn't leave a bad taste in my mouth?!"
"Lizzy-"
"For the first time in my life I'm actually looking forward to the future," I said, my voice a harsh whisper. "And I know I am being extremely selfish by keeping this from him but I am terrified of what will happen when he finds out."
"What do you think will happen?" he demanded, his tone almost defensive.
"The same thing that happened with Mom."
The anger disappeared instantly and an expression of understanding remorse replaced it. "Oh, Lizzy."
"I can't see that look on his face," I stated, shaking my head. "I can't."
"I know," he said, bringing his arm up and around my shoulders, pulling me into his side. "I'm sorry, I'll stop pushing," he promised, pressing a kiss to the top of my head.
I let out a calming sigh and curled my arm around his waist. "This is getting ridiculous."
"Amen to that, sister."
Sorry this is so late in the day but it's a miracle that I remembered it was Friday at all.
Let me know what y'all think of the chapter.
Love=Reviews
