Disclaimer: I do not own the Avengers. The Avengers belong to its respective owners. I merely own my OC. Just writing for fun, and not for profit.

Chapter 8: Falling Fortress

Steve and Tony looked up at each other.

"Put on the suit," Steve said.

"Yup," Tony scrambled up off the floor.

"Zoe?" Steve asked, glancing behind him. He walked over to her, and helped her up off the floor. He leaned her against the threshold side of the door. He glanced down at the petite woman to see if she was hurt. She had a deep red cut on her forehead, but nothing else major.

"I'm okay," she caught her breath, and motioned her chin out the door to follow Tony. "Go."

Steve nodded, and he followed Tony out the door.

~*A*~

On the bridge, the agents scrambled to keep their home afloat the best they could. Everyone reached for their weapons, prepared to take on the uninvited invasion.

~*A*~

Zoe let out a small groan, as she felt a cloth dab her forehead. She looked up to see Thor, trying to clean the wound on her forehead with his handkerchief. "You are not well, Daughter of Sawyer, you need medical attention."

She shook her head, and winced at the painful touch. "No," she said. "We need to help them. Everyone's scattered. Where's Director Fury?"

"I'm here," Fury said, getting up from the floor. Zoe ducked underneath Thor, and he frowned. He folded up the handkerchief and stuck it within his belt. She grabbed onto his shoulder and pulled him up to his feet, as he used the edge of the table to pull himself up at the same time. "Hill!" he said, trying to call for his second in command, who was currently shouting orders at the other agents on the bridge to get this Hellicarrier back in the air.

"Somebody's gotta get outside and patch that engine!" Hill said in her earpiece.

"Stark you copy that?" Fury asked through his earpiece.

"I'm on it," Tony replied through Fury's earpiece.

"What do you want us to do?" Zoe asked.

"If you can help tame Banner with Romanoff downstairs," Fury said, placing an earpiece into the palm of her hand.

Zoe looked at it with wide eyes and looked into his.

"I'll clear you for a level seven agent," Fury said, glancing at Thor, who nodded in return.

Fury headed out the lab. "Coulson initiate lockdown in the detention section," Fury ordered. "And head to the armory. Romanoff!"

Zoe attached her earpiece to the curved shell of her ear, and hit the on button so she could hear the rest of her teammates and what was going on.

~*A*~

"We're okay, right?" Romanoff said before she glanced at Bruce, who'd fallen flat on his stomach and seemed like he was trying to fight the monster that was inside of him.

~*A*~

Meanwhile Agent Barton led the turned agents behind him onto the main deck of the Hellicarrier. He ordered an agent to break into a level inside. A metal piece fell down, and the agent jumped in. They lowered the cable and Agent Barton jumped in, twirling down the cable to join his recruits.

"Keep that engine down!" Barton ordered, pointing to engine one.

"Yes sir," the agent replied.

"Detention, wait for my orders, going dark," Barton said to another.

The agent nodded. "Yes sir," he said, making the move towards the detention area of the Hellicarrier. Barton turned to the remaining two agents. "Stay close," he said and headed downstairs toward the bridge.

~*A*~

"Engine three, I'll meet you there," Tony said. Steve nodded, and jogged toward his destination while Tony walked into the storage room. He took out his cell device to activate his Iron Man suit, hidden behind the iron doors.

~*A*~

Zoe stood in the middle of the lab frozen in place once she heard the loud roar ripple in her earpiece. She winced, nearly taking out her earpiece at the growl coming from the Hulk. She looked into Thor's concerned eyes with fear.

"I can't," she whispered, shaking her head. She stepped back into the table, cowering with a sudden fear washing over her. "I can't do this."

"Daughter of Sawyer," Thor said, stepping closer to her. She was staring at the ground, shaking as she heard The Hulk rippling in anger downstairs.

She looked up at Thor's voice. "Call me Zoe, please," she said.

Thor smiled slightly at her. "Zoe, your director would not have chosen this task for you if he did not think you could handle it. Right?"

Zoe swallowed hard, and looked up into his kind eyes. "But Loki isn't the only prisoner on this boat."

"Your past is done. Your past does not make you who you are. What you do after is what makes you, you," Thor said, placing his hands on her shoulders tenderly. He gave her a gentle squeeze of encouragement. "Now, will you help me? Or will you swallow in the depths of sorrow and despair?"

Zoe took a deep breath, and wiped the dry tears away from her eyes.

~*A*~

"Bring the carrier to zero eight one south!" Fury said as he climbed up on the bridge. "Fly us to the water!" He ordered his pilot.

"We're flying blind," the pilot said. "Navigation recalibrating after engine failure!"

"Is the sun coming up?" Fury demanded, stepping forward.

The pilot turned to stare at the window, and the sun's rays poured through. He winced. "Yes?" he asked.

"Then put it on the left," Fury pointed in that direction. "Get us over water. One more turbine goes down and we drop!"

The pilot quickly pressed the screen in front of him, getting to work as fast as he can.

~*A*~

"Stark! Stark, I'm here!" Steve said, standing in the midst of engine three that was falling apart right before his very own eyes. Iron Man flew over one of the engines, trying to cool it down.

"Gotta get the super-conducting cooling system back online," Tony said, reading Jarvis's readings through the inside of his helmet. "Before I can access the routers, and work on dislodging the debris."

He pushed the heavy engine fan and locked it place. "I need you to get to that engine control panel and tell me which relays are not intact and overload it in the right position."

Steve jumped up and across to the router, and pried it open. He glanced at the wires and the lights that appeared to be in a confusing maze to the soldier's eyes.

"How's it look in there?" Tony asked

"It seems to on some form of electricity!" Steve shouted over the noise.

"Well, you're not wrong," Tony said.

~*A*~

At the other side of the Hellicarrier, Agent Romanoff ducked underneath metal pipes, and climbed down the metal catwalk, in search for the Hulk. With her gun in her hands she crept through the dark inside the engine room, and looked up in search for the green guy.

Suddenly the Hulk appeared out of nowhere, growling at her. She gulped, and froze, until she saw an engine pipe ahead of her. She shot two bullets into the steam pipe effectively. The steam broke loose in the Hulk's eyes, and he backed away from it.

She ran in the other direction. "Sawyer? Thor?" Romanoff called on her earpiece. "Where the hell are you?"

~*A*~

Zoe listened to his words fill her ear with warmth and kindness like a hug that she desperately needed. She took them to heart. She looked into his eyes.

"I will help," Zoe said, smiling back at him.

Thor grinned and the two headed off, running down to the level four engine room. "We're heading to you, Romanoff, stay put, or don't stay put…um, just hide?" Zoe asked.

They ran down the stairs to the different weaving levels, heading for the Hulk.

"Romanoff, we're on our way, where are you?" Zoe asked, glancing warily at Thor.

"Coulson's going to the detention center, alone," Romanoff replied shakily on the other end of her earpiece.

Zoe stopped, frozen and looked to Thor, and then pressed the button on her earpiece to return Romanoff's call. "I can handle Loki," she said. "I'm sending Thor to you."

"Copy," Romanoff said.

"You try to bring Banner back to us," Zoe said, facing Thor on the catwalk.

"Are you sure?" Thor asked, turning toward Zoe. "Loki is not like you. You know this. He turned one of your men-"

"I know," Zoe said. "I know. I've tried to fight him before." Zoe said, taking out one of her knives out from the small pocket of the inside in her boot.

She pressed a tiny button on the side of the hilt of her knife. It turned into a double spear on each end of the hilt that rested in the middle of her hands. She gripped onto it tight, and pressed another button. Blue electricity spluttered to life from both ends. "Handcrafted specifically within S.H.I.E.L.D's weapon design input. And I know just how to stop him."

Thor raised an eyebrow at the interesting instrument in front of him that glowed blue and silver in his eyes. "Okay then. Just be careful."

"I promise," Zoe smiled, and ran in the other direction to go find Coulson.

~*A*~

The Hulk was about to charge after Agent Romanoff who was cornered into a set of metal pipes, until Thor suddenly crashed into the Hulk, and crashed into the wall and into another room, rolling onto the ground.

Thor looked up from his fall, and into the green monster's eyes as he slowly got up. The engine workers ran out of there as fast as they could.

Thor stood on his feet, trying to match up against the Hulk as the Hulk completely towered over the God of Thunder. Thor bravely threw a punch in his face, which only angered the Hulk. The Hulk brought down his hand to crush Thor, but Thor held his own weight against the Hulk as strong as he could.

"We are not your enemies, Banner," Thor grunted, as he tried to hold off the Hulk's fist off of him. "Try to think!"

But the Hulk had gripped onto Thor's fist, hanging the God of Thunder in the air. The Hulk didn't listen to Thor's please and tossed him into heavy metal cases.

~*A*~

Zoe ran down into the detention center, and saw that Loki was nowhere in sight. She froze in her trek, glancing around her surroundings. "Loki," she called out. "Come out, come out wherever you are," she sing-songed. "This baby won't hurt much. It'll just hurt you a lot."

A dark chuckle filled the room that sent shivers down her spine. "Daughter of Sawyer. I know you."

Zoe turned around in circles, trying to figure out where he was. She stopped when Loki appeared in front of her with an agent tight against his chest, as his arm wrapped around the agent's throat.

The agent had fear in his eyes. Zoe swallowed hard, eyeing the agent struggling against Loki's hold on him.

"You don't know me," she said quietly, keeping her weapon close by her side. "But if you want, you can get to know me, if you'd just let him go first, and we'll talk."

Loki smiled. "Okay," he said, and letting the agent go. "Attack," he whispered in the agent's ear.

The agent took out his gun and aimed it at Zoe. Zoe ducked and rolled onto the ground. She raised her spear and whacked it against the agent's ankles, causing him to fall on his feet. The agent rolled over onto his stomach and glared at her. She stood up onto her feet, warily, and was about to advance on the agent, but Loki gripped her neck and shoved her hard against the glass cell, and kicked the spear out of her hand. It rolled onto the ground. She winced.

"Agent Barton told me about you too," he said with a chuckle.

"We got perimeter breach, hostiles are in motion," Zoe heard the voice on her earpiece and tried to get out from Loki's grip on her.

Zoe glared into his eyes as she struggled to get out from underneath his chokehold on her. "Can't be anything too exciting," she coughed, trying to pry his hands away from her neck.

He inhaled her scent deeply, and she shivered, not liking this guy at all. He totally rubbed her the wrong way and she had to get out of this very fast. She tried to knee him in the groin, but Loki locked her legs together to keep from struggling so much.

She looked over her shoulder and saw that the agent dressed in black got to his feet. He was holding his gun, aimed at her.

"How you like to stall, how you like to pretend to be a hero, when you're not," Loki said. "Did you really think saving your director was going to make everything better?" Loki chuckled at her facial expression of mixed painful feelings running through her. He must admit. This was one interesting human before his very own eyes.

"I must say, it is adorable, the courage you have to try and stop this fortress of yours to keep from falling apart when you have no real ability," Loki said. His taunting words stung her ears and down to her heart. She tried to ignore him the best she could, but his words slithered towards her heart in the worst way that made her feel so helpless. Zoe pushed down her tears the best she could but she know it would be no use against him.

"You're a lost soul too lost that will never find her true place in this world. No one loves you. Not even your own father. I know what that's like," he continued.

"Engine one is now on shut down,"

"It's Barton, he's heading for the detention level, does anybody copy?" Zoe wanted to talk back into her earpiece, but Loki ripped her earpiece out and tossed it away from her.

She whimpered as she tried to break free but he shoved her hard against the glass. She choked out a sob at the burning pain running through her body. "To not have a father," he said softly. She looked into his cold green eyes that sadden for a brief moment. "To not have that sentiment of a parent that should be sentimental and warm, and caring. We're the same you and me."

Zoe felt her eyes start to water again. No. She shook her head. "I'm not like you," she whispered.

"Keep living like this, trying to save everyone you care about, and only just trying?" he asked, sensing her fears. "And you will be," Loki said. Loki pressed the button on the other side of the door and the glass door opened. She fell backwards inside, and he kicked the side of her stomach hard with his boot. She rolled inside and onto her stomach, groaning in pain, and moping in sorrow at Loki's definitive words.

Loki pressed the button, and the glass doors closed, leaving her inside, leaving her broken.

Loki grinned as Agent Barton walked into the room, handing Loki his scepter.

"Everything's secure, sir." Barton said.

Zoe turned her head to the side of the glass, and frowned in horror. Loki smiled at her as he gripped onto the scepter. "Good. Now finish them off…starting with Agent Romanoff," he said.

"It would be my pleasure, sir," Agent Barton pulled out his bow and arrow ready to fight.

Zoe tried to scream out but everything just came out in a hoarse whisper as Agent Barton ran off to put an end to Agent Romanoff.