Both Cecile and Steve walked into the lab where Fury, Bruce and Tony were. Steve slammed an old HYDRA weapon down on one of the lab tables. Cecile crossed her arms and glared at Fury.
"Phase two is SHIELD uses the cube to make weapons. Sorry, computer was movin' a little slow for me," Steve apologized to Tony, not meaning it.
"Weapons based off HYDRA models," Cecile added.
"Rogers, we gathered everything related to the Tesseract, this does not mean-" Fury started before Tony spoke over him.
"I'm sorry, Nick. What, were you lying?" Tony asked, pushing a blueprint of a missile that was projected on one of the monitors.
"I was wrong, Director," Steve said, holding onto his belt buckle. "The world hasn't changed a bit."
"Did you know about this?" Bruce asked Natasha who entered the room along with Thor.
"You wanna think about removing yourself from this environment Doctor?" Natasha said back, not answering his question. Bruce laughed.
"I was in Kolkata (Calcutta), i was pretty well removed," Bruce said.
"Loki's manipulating you," Natasha said carefully.
"And you've been doing what exactly?" Bruce asked, bitterly.
"You didn't come here because i bat my eyelashes at you," She responded.
"Yes, and i'm not leaving because suddenly you get a little twitchy," Bruce said back, pointing towards the blueprints. "I'd like to know why SHIELD is using the Tesseract to build Weapons of Mass Destruction."
"Honestly, i would very much like to know as well, Director," Cecile commented, looking towards him.
"Because of him," Fury said, pointing at Thor.
"Me?" Thor asked, confused.
"Last year, Earth had a visitor from another planet who had a grudge match that leveled a small town. We learned that not only are we not alone, that we are hopelessly, hilariously, outgunned."
"My people want nothing but peace with your planet," Thor stated, a little defensively.
"But you're not the only people out there, are you?" Fury asked. "And, you're not the only threat. The world is filling up with people who can't be matched. They can't be controlled."
"Like you controlled the cube?" Steve asked.
"Your work with the Tesseract is what drew Loki to it," Thor started. "And his allies, it is a signal to all the realms that Earth is ready for a higher form of war."
"A higher form?" Steve asked.
"You don't mean…" Cecile said quietly.
"You forced our hand," Fury said. "We had to come up with som-"
"A nuclear deterrent," Tony interrupted. "'Cause that always calms everything right down."
"Remind me again how you made your fortune, Stark," Fury responded.
"I'm sure if he still made weapons, Stark would be neck deep-" Steve started before Tony interrupted again.
"Wait, wait, hold on, how is this now about me?" Tony asked.
"I'm sorry, isn't everything?" Steve asked.
"I thought humans were more evolved than this," Thor commented.
"Excuuuse me, but do we come to your planet and blow stuff up?" Fury asked. Everyone was arguing now, and Cecile was trying to keep her temper under control. She walked around everyone in the middle, her mind spinning, like somehow being drawn to something. She couldn't hear them anymore, her ears were ringing. The sound of her heart playing through with the incessant ringing.
It was beating quicker now, growing as the tension in the room did, every emotion creating a bigger storm in her brain. Growing with each passing second until her eyes glazed over with that all too familiar blue. She was behind the table that held the scepter now, her fingertips going towards the glowing orb inside the blade. Her heart was racing, feeling as though it was beating so fast it stopped.
She needed to escape, she needed to leave, before something happened. She had no idea what her powers could do, not yet anyways, and today wasn't going to be the day where she blew her top and caused an incident. Her hand was around the scepter now, along with Doctor Banner's, she was leaning across the table, to keep ahold of it.
"Doctor Banner, Cecile, put down the scepter," Steve said. Everyone in the room was on edge and Cecile quickly let go and sped out of the room. She stopped right outside and leaned against the wall of the hallway. Her breathing was erratic and her heartbeat was uneven. She was desperately trying to catch her breath, slow her heart.
All of a sudden the ship shook, and the shock-wave that erupted from the lab knocked her back a bit. This was not going to help her one bit.
Using the wall as a support, she rounded the corner back into the lab, seeing smoke and shattered glass all on the floor, which was half gone, thanks to the giant hole in it. "Put on the suit." Steve said to Tony, his voice distressed.
"Yep," Tony stated getting up.
"You too," Steve said towards Cecile. He grabbed her arm and also helped Tony along as well.
The three of them hurried through the ship to where Tony kept his suit after Cecile had quickly slipped hers on, not really caring that the two men were in the same room. It was panic time, and that's what everyone was doing.
"Engine three, i'll meet you two there," Tony said, before walking down a separate area. Cecile hurried after Steve, who was currently headed towards that very engine.
"Shit," Cecile said out loud, listening to the entire ship, trying to figure out the state everyone was in. "Bruce turned."
"Great," Steve muttered, his jaw clenched. They continued forward, and reached the door to their destination. Steve and Cecile heard some people from within, calling for help, and Steve pried the door open, and both hurried around the men inside and went to the edge of the blown out portion of the room.
"Stark!" Steve called off the edge, looking down and trying to keep his balance while holding onto the railing of the yellow ladder. "Stark, i'm here!"
"Come on, Tony, where are you?!" Cecile exclaimed, standing behind Steve.
"Good," Tony responded, zooming in with his suit on and edging closer to the damaged portion of the ship. "Let's see what we got. Gotta get the superconducting cooling system back online before i can access the rotors and work on dislodging the debri."
"I need you two to get to that engine control panel and tell me which relays are in overload position," Tony said, pointing to it before flying off to fix what he could. Steve jumped up first, using his momentum to swing forward into the room after grabbing onto an extruding pipe.
The pure adrenaline running through Cecile's body was the only thing keeping her going at the moment, and she knew it. After she was sure Steve was away from the opening, she hopped up herself, with far more grace, considering she was more flexible than he.
Steve pulled out the panel and was looking over it with confusion as Cecile hopped up. She leaned over beside him and tried to find what Tony was talking about. But the panel was far more advanced than she had predicted, and neither her, nor Steve, knew what they were looking for.
"What's it look like in there?" Tony asked.
"It seems to run on some form of electricity," Steve stated, exasperated as he dropped his hand heavily against his thigh.
"Well, you're not wrong," Tony responded. Tony explained what it looked like to Cecile, since she would have more knowledge about what he was talking about looked like.
"Anthony, from what i can see, the third, fourth, and seventh relays are in the overload position," Cecile stated, running her fingers along the panel. Tony ran her through the process of resetting them before Steve called out to Tony.
"Okay, the relays are intact!" Steve said, pushing the panel back in. "What's our next move?"
"Even if i clear the rotors, this thing won't re-engage without a jump. I'm gonna have to get in there and push," Tony stated.
"Well, once that thing gets up to speed, you'll get shredded," Steve said.
"That starter control unit can reverse the polarity long enough to disengage maglev and-" Tony started before Steve interrupted.
"Speak English!"
Tony seemed irritated before asking, "See that red lever?" Steve looked over along with Cecile. "It'll slow the rotors down long enough for me to get out. Stand by it and wait for my word."
Steve jumped over and stood by it. Cecile stayed put, figuring that she would be back-up just in case something happened. Cecile decided now would be a good time to try to listen to the surroundings inside. She slowed her breathing and her still racing heart enough to where it wasn't a distraction and closed her eyes, leaning against the wall.
She could hear everything. The blasts and firing of guns. The giant rage monster going through the floor of the lab. And footsteps, coming near them. Her eyes shot open. "Steve, two men, heavily armored, large gun," She said quickly, pointing to the lower level.
"Stay put," He warned, before looking towards the men entering through the opened door. He saw a grenade get thrown, hitting it away from the area Cecile was before jumping to the platform and landing in front of her, causing her to jump back quickly, before he bounded off, jumping off a protruding metal beam, then proceed to punch one of the men in the face using his momentum from falling.
He then kicked the machine gun out of the other guy's hand, punched him and kneed him in the gut, before throwing him off the edge. "Steve, more are coming!" Cecile called, ducking back behind the wall as she heard gunshots.
She watched Steve as he jumped up from the bottom with a machine gun and started to fire back at the man firing at him. He was carefully stepping back towards the lever, and trying to get out of the range of fire as he continued to fire on the unknown assailant.
Cecile tried to hear the situation again, and noticed that another one of the engines stopped, causing the entire ship to start falling. "Oh, pour l'amour de Dieu*." She spoke in her native tongue. She grabbed onto anything on the wall that could keep her steady, not paying attention to Steve until she saw him slip from out of the corner of her eye and start falling.
"Steve!" She screamed, almost going to jump after him had he not pulled out his grappling hook in time to get it to connect to the platform. She was watching both Steve and the man, racking her brain with what she should do. Finally, she pulled out a knife that was concealed in her boot before throwing it at the man, clipping his cheek, and causing a cut.
"Cap, hit the lever," Tony stated.
"I need a minute here!" Steve called.
"Lever, one of you, now!" Tony said, his voice more distressed.
"Kind of indisposed at the moment," Cecile said, stepping back as a spray of bullets came flying at her. She watched as Steve crawled back on the platform, avoiding bullets from the man now.
"Uh oh," She heard Tony say quietly before rather loud pinging from the suit, and grunting from him resounded through the headset in her ear. She saw Steve reach up and pull the lever, and soon after Tony came flying straight into the man firing at them, both going back into the hall.
Both Steve and Cecile sighed at this, before giving each other a quick nod. Cecile jumped over to join Steve with a small smile, and checked him over quickly to make sure he was in decent shape. Her smile disappeared, however, when Fury started to speak.
"Agent Coulson is down."
"A medical team is on its way to your location."
"It's already here." He said. "They called it."
Cecile inhaled sharply, and covered her mouth with her hand. She could see both Steve and Tony deflate slightly at Fury's words.
"Etes-vous sûr qu'il est partie? Il est pas une erreur*?" She asked quietly.
"Yes, it's not a mistake." Fury responded.
[1] Oh, for the love of God.
[2] Are you sure he 's gone? It is not a mistake?
-o-o-
Tony, Steve, and Cecile were around the large conference table on the bridge of the helicarrier. They had changed out of their uniforms awhile ago and were all sitting defeated and shocked after hearing the news of Coulson, none of them looking at each other. Fury was standing at the head of the table staring at some cards that were in his hands.
"These were in Phil Coulson's jacket," Fury stated, before throwing the cards on the table. They were smeared in blood. Coulson's blood. "Guess he never did get you to sign em."
Fury sighed deeply and continued to talk while Steve picked up the card of Captain America and stared at it. "We're dead in the air up here. Our communications, location of the cube, Banner, Thor. I got nothin' for you. Lost my one good eye… Maybe I had that comin'," Fury stated, sounding defeated while he leaned against the table. Tony hadn't moved an inch or even looked up from his spot, turned away from everyone. Steve just placed the card back down before looking up at Fury. Cecile's hands were clenched tightly in her lap as she stared at the cards on the table.
"Yes… we were going to build and arsenal with the Tesseract. I never put all my chips on that number though cause I was playing something riskier." He paused, moving his way closer to where Steve was seated and gripped one of the office chairs before moving around to stand behind Cecile's chair. "There was an idea, Stark knows this, called the Avengers Initiative. The idea was to bring together a group of remarkable people, see if they could become something more. See if they could work together when we needed them to, to fight the battles we never could. Phil Coulson died still believing in that idea, in heros."
Tony abruptly stood up before walking out of the room, seemingly done with what Fury had to say. Cecile continued to look at the door Tony left through, even though he was long gone as Fury kept talking. "Well, It's an old fashioned notion."
"I want to help people," Cecile said quietly looking towards Fury, determination flicking in her eyes. She remembered back to her room, listening to the crime and the cries for help. She stood and walked right in front of him. "I… I will help people, not for you, not for SHIELD, but for every damn person in this city and this world."
She quickly turned towards Steve, nodded, and walked out of the room without another word.
This is the last pre-written chapter that I have, let me know if you guys like this and I'll continue! I've kinda been off an on writing this for the past two years so that would be why there are so many chapters.