Chapter 12 – Cards, Quinjets, and Helicarriers

Steve Rogers observed the young girl sitting across from him. Her… casual appearance contrasted greatly with the other S.H.I.E.L.D. related figures that he had encountered in the few weeks he had been awake. While he still knew little of the modern world that he was trapped in, he knew that by modern day standards, this girl appeared completely normal. But what really confused the captain was how young the girl looked. She looked no older than fifteen.

With what they were all apparently getting into, the captain couldn't help but feel worried for this young lady.

Catching his stare, Carrie put on a nervous smile. "Hi."

Returning the smile, Steve nodded his head. "Hello. I'm…"

"Steve Rogers. I know. I read your dossier." The girl said. "I'm Carrie White."

Steve blinked. She read his dossier? But that would imply that she would be involved with the Avengers Initiative. He had initially assumed that she was the daughter of one of the agents.

"So, Carrie, what brings you to S.H.I.E.L.D.?" Steve asked with interest. He was hoping that she was an intern, or something that wasn't too dangerous. Carrie looked down nervously.

"I'm an initiate… for the Avengers Initiative."

Looking shocked, Steve looked over the girl again. He found absolutely nothing special about the girl. She looked small, innocent, and fragile. Not someone who should be associated with S.H.I.E.L.D.

"Er, pardon me for asking, but how old are you?" Steve asked.

"I'm actually seventeen. I'll be turning eighteen in a few months." Carrie answered honestly.

At that moment, Steve's concern for Carrie increased. He had thought that S.H.I.E.L.D. was smart, yet here they were recruiting a seventeen year old kid to be in one of the agency's most elite teams.

After a few moments of gaping, Steve asked Carrie the question.

"Why?"

Carrie raised an eyebrow. "Why what?"

"Why would they let you into the initiative?" Steve said. "I mean no offense or anything, but you don't really look like… well… you know."

The blonde teen gave a small smile. "It's okay. I'm not entirely thrilled about it either. Luckily I'm just an initiate, so for now I'm going to observe."

Steve shook his head, still speechless at the thought of such a young person having such a dangerous job. "What can you do?"

Sighing, Carrie decided she may as well give the super soldier a demonstration. Looking around, she spotted Agent Coulson's bag. Searching through it with her mind, she felt around and eventually located the familiar dossier.

Steve blinked at the sound of something unzipping and looked over in shock to see that Coulson's bag was opening on its own. Then, a file floated out, levitated above Steve for a few moments, before dropping down on his lap. He looked up at Carrie in shock, and she just smiled.

"Read it."

Steve studied the futuristic piece of technology, and eventually activated it.

The name "Carrie White" was displayed on the screen, and the tab proceeded to list off the girl's dossier. As he read the information on the screen and watched the videos, Steve looked even more stupefied. Sure, Fury had mentioned the existence of aliens in this time, but he never said anything about psychics.

"You're telekinetic?" he asked, looking up at Carrie.

"Yeah." Carrie said.

Steve read over more of the file, and his eyes grew even wider when he read about Chamberlain. He saw videos depicting scenes of destruction and buildings on fire. He looked at Carrie, and then back at the video. How could someone so young cause so much damage?

Carrie grimaced when she saw Steve's expression and started to explain herself. "I had a difficult home life. My momma was a little out there, and my classmates didn't give a care about me. It became too much for me, and I…" Carrie took a deep breath. "I snapped."

Blinking, Steve read some more and read over the incident at the prom. His eyes widened in shock. Pig blood? What kind of sick joke was that? He looked back at Carrie.

"One of your peers did that to you?" Steve asked, shocked and somewhat furious that a person could be that cruel towards others.

Carrie looked sad now, rubbing her arms as if she were cold. "They thought I was weird cuz of how my momma raised me to be. Don't get me wrong, I loved my momma and I do believe in God, but she took it all way to extremely. Everything was a sin in her eyes."

Steve kept quiet for a few more minutes, thinking. Then, realization dawned on him. Slowly, he asked, "Your mother was a religious fanatic, right?"

Carrie looked at him with guarded eyes. "Yes."

Steve continued, "And she believed anything unnatural was a sin, right?"

"Yes."

"Your mother… how did she react when she discovered your powers?" Steve asked, afraid of what the girl's answer would be.

Carrie's face went blank, and she didn't answer. She just looked away from Steve and out the window. Steve closed his eyes and breathed. He felt terribly sorry for this girl. She spent her entire life being bullied and tormented by her peers and even her own mother. Nobody deserved that. In truth, he felt some kinship with the girl. He knew what it was like to be bullied.

Choosing to leave the girl alone for now, Steve took Coulson's bag and looked at more of the dossiers. The first one he took out was that of Dr. Bruce Banner. He read it over, and found himself intrigued by the connections between him and Banner. At that moment, Coulson climbed back from the passenger's seat up front to see how the two passengers were dealing.

Steve looked up at Coulson. "So this Dr. Banner was trying to replicate the serum that was used on me?"

"A lot of people were." Coulson responded, and then smiled with admiration. "You were the world's first superhero. Banner thought gamma radiation might hold the key to unlocking Erskine's original formula."

Steve looked back at the dossier and played a video of the Hulk tearing apart Culver University. He smiled sheepishly. "Didn't really go his way, did it."

"Not so much." Coulson chuckled, shaking his head. "When he's not that… thing, the man's like a Steven Hawking."

Steve looked up at Coulson confused. Coulson silently cursed, remembering how out of place the captain was right now. Fortunately, Carrie piped in, not even looking in their direction.

"He's like a really smart person."

Coulson gave Carrie a smile of gratitude, and then turned back to Steve. He folded his hands, taking in a deep breath. "I gotta say, it's an honor to meet you, officially. I sort of met you, I mean, I watched you while you were sleeping."

Steve gave a raised eyebrow, while Carrie tried her best not to laugh at the awkwardness. Realizing his mistake, Coulson sputtered. "I mean, I was...I was present while you were unconscious from the ice."

Looking a little uncomfortable, Steve got up and walked towards the front of the jet, resting his arm against the top while he surveyed the ocean below. Coulson kept speaking, trying to give a good impression to his hero.

"You know, it's really, it's just a...just a huge honor to have you on board." He said.

Looking out the window, Steve muttered, "Well I hope I'm the right man for the job."

"Oh, you are." Coulson assured. "We've made some modifications to the uniform. I had a little design imput, myself."

Steve blinked, looking confused. "The uniform?"

Coulson nodded, smiling. Steve continued. "Aren't the stars and stripes a little... er… old fashioned?"

Coulson sighed, and then looked out the window. "With everything that's happened, the things that are about to come to light…"

He looked up at Steve in hope. "People might just need a little old fashioned."

ooooo

In a deep underground area, people were bustling around, trying to get some important, and nefarious, work done. It's not like any of them knew what they were doing. They were being controlled, like puppets.

And a certain mischief god was the one pulling the strings.

Loki watched as his mindless servants did their work. Soon the device would be ready, and he would begin his glorious crusade against the pathetic mortals.

Suddenly, the scepter's gem started to glow, and Loki grimaced. Closing his eyes, he surrendered his mind to the mental call from the great weapon. He felt his mind being pulled into the astral plain, and once it stopped, he opened his eyes. He was standing on a rocky surface… in the realm of the Chitauri.

Feeling a psychic presence nearby, Loki turned and saw the Other, the master's intermediary. The Other was a cloaked figure, whose eyes were concealed by his hood. His face was gray and wrinkly, and his teeth were horribly jagged and dirty. He had six fingers on each of his hands.

"The Chitauri grow restless." The Other hissed at Loki. Loki didn't need to ask to know that this creature held a strong amount of distaste for him.

"Let them grow restless." Loki responded. "I will lead them in the glorious battle."

"Battle?" The Other scoffed. "Against the meager might of Earth?"

"Glorious, not lengthy." Loki assured. He then gave the Other a look of weariness. "That is if your force is as formidable as you claim."

"You question us? Question him?" The Other hissed, loudly, motioning upwards to a pedestal where a dark figure sat upon a throne, gazing out into the endless plethora of stars. "He who put the scepter in your hands? Who gave you ancient knowledge and a new purpose? When you were cast out? Defeated?"

Loki glared daggers at the creature. "I was a king! The rightful king of Asgard! Betrayed, exiled."

"That's not how I heard it." The Other growled, flashing his hideous teeth with a hideous smile.

He slowly strode up to Loki, smiling at him. "I heard… that you, the great prince of Asgard, were raped of your greatness. By a simple human girl, who bested you. Both in strength…" The Other smiled. "and in soul."

Loki's face screwed up in anger. The Other took notice. "Did I strike a nerve, Asgardian? Could it be that as you stood before her during that final dispute that you wished to… fuck her?"

"Enough!" Loki snarled, and his eyes briefly flashed from green to red. The Other stepped back, but his smirk remained. Loki regained his composure, but continued to glare menacingly at the Other. "I do not make threats. But until I open the doors, until your force is mine to command, you are but words."

The Other slowly approached Loki again, moving around him menacingly. "You will have your war, Asgardian. But know this."

The Other came up directly behind Loki, hissing in his ear. "If you fail, if the Tesseract is kept from us… there will be no realm, no barren moon, no crevasse where he can't find you."

Loki took a glance up at the throne, and felt the evil emanating from the great being. He shuddered. The Other gripped his shoulder, hissing. "You think you no pain? He will make you beg for something as sweet as pain!"

The Other put his hand on Loki's face, and Loki felt a brief flash of pain as he was suddenly forced out of the astral plain. Breathing heavily, he looked around to find himself back on Earth, in the underground facility. He looked at the scepter apprehensively, and then stood upright. His face was pasted with fury and determination.

He would not fail. They would all fall before him.

ooooo

Coulson, Steve, and Carrie stepped off of the jet as it landed on the helicarrier, which was still waterbound. As they stepped off, they were greeted by two familiar faces.

"Agent Romanoff, Agent Wrekk." Coulson nodded at the two women. Steve blinked at them. One of them, a pale woman with green eyes and shoulder length red hair, looked completely normal in jeans, a red shirt, and brown leather jacket. But the other one, a girl with gray eyes, ivory skin, and long, brown, curly hair, was dressed in a uniform that looked like something out of a fairy tale. It was a dark brown hooded tunic with a few patches of red, and had some hawk-like characteristics. The scalloped armor on the gauntlets looked to be in the fashion of talons, along with the spurs on the boots. The belt buckles adorning the chest piece looked like hawk skulls and beaks. She wore long red gloves that had armor plated wrist wraps that looked like they had seen a lot of combat. The fingers were sharp and talon like. She wore grieves that had similar plating, but they were ridged and edgy around the ends. On each shoulder there was a metal shoulder plate. But the most noticeable thing was the pair of metal, angel-like wings coming out of her back.

"Hi, Phil." The girl, Agent Wrekk, greeted. Agent Romanoff nodded at them. Coulson motioned a hand towards Steve and Carrie.

"Ladies, this is Captain Rogers and Ms. Carrie White."

"Hi." Romanoff said plainly, clearly unimpressed.

Soladat, however, greeted them more warmly. "Nice to meet you both. Hope you two are ready for this."

Carrie just smiled nervously, while Steve shook the girl's hand. Then he looked her over. "Do you always dress like this?"

Soladat smirked. "Only on duty."

"She uses it to express her eccentricities." Romanoff butted in, casually. Soladat just shrugged.

"I'm not into the skin tight jumpsuits. Rides up too much."

Rolling her eyes, Romanoff turned to Coulson. "They need you on the bridge. They're starting the face trace."

He nodded and walked off toward an entrance. "See you there."

Steve, Natasha, Soladat, and Carrie began walking together. Natasha spoke. " There was quite the buzz around here, finding you in the ice. I thought Coulson was gonna swoon. Did he ask you to sign his Captain America trading cards yet?"

Steve looked confused. "Trading cards?"

Soladat jumped in, grinning. "They're vintage. He's very proud. Trust me, you'll hear about them soon enough, just like everyone else on the helicarrier."

They kept walking and saw a man in a brown jacket and pants and a purple buttoned shirt. He seemed lost, and was looking around everywhere trying to figure out where to go. He looked out of place amongst the S.H.I.E.L.D. busily running around the carrier. From the pictures Carrie had seen, she figured it was Dr. Banner.

Most people seemed scared of the doctor, due to his condition. Soladat, however, was not afraid of him. After briefly encountering the Hulk in New York, she believed that the monster had a little bit of humanity somewhere deep in its enraged heart.

Smiling, she waved. "Dr. Banner! Hi."

Bruce turned to look at the four coming his way. He looked confused by the presence of the young blonde girl accompanying the other three, but greeted them anyway, albeit nervously. "Hi."

Steve greeted the doctor as well. "Word is you can find the cube."

Bruce looked around, nervous, and whispered, "Is that, eh… the only word on me?"

"It's the only word I care about," Steve said sincerely. Bruce smiled with gratitude. Before anymore words could be exchanged, something fell out of the sky and landed with a loud thud a few meters away from the four. They all turned towards the object with wide and confused eyes, and saw that it was a blonde woman with piercing blue eyes holding a hammer and dressed in a strange… armor.

The woman stood up, twirling the hammer around, smirking. "Hey."

Soladat smirked. "Darcy Lewis. I had a feeling Fury would call you in, too."

Bruce, Steve, and Carrie looked in shock. Steve whispered over to Bruce. "Looks like I owe Fury ten bucks."

Darcy looked over to Steve, and her eyes widened and she gave him a smile. She walked up to him and shook his hand. "Hey, you're Captain America, right?"

Steve smiled slightly, amused by this girl's behavior. "Yes…"

"Cool!" Darcy said ecstatically. "So then you're a superhero, then. That's great! I'm a superhero too!"

"That's… very nice." Steve said. Carrie and Bruce chuckled slightly, amused. Natasha, who had been silent most of the time, came up, looking at Darcy suspiciously.

"How did you manage to find us on your own?"

Darcy just shrugged. "Coulson just said to find the aircraft carrier with the S.H.I.E.L.D. logo on it. Wasn't hard really."

"Excuse me," Soladat suddenly spoke up, "but you guys might want to step inside in a minute. It's going to get a little hard to breathe."

"Is this a submarine?" Steve asked, confused.

"Really? They want me in a submerged pressurized metal container?" Bruce asked dryly.

Bruce, Steve, Darcy, and Carrie wandered over to the edge of the boat, and looked surprised as the water started to churn and whip around violently. Suddenly, the boat started to ascend, and the four watched as four enormous propellors surfaced from the water and began to spit. Then, the Helicarrier began to lift itself out of the ocean.

"Okay, now this is awesome." Darcy said, smiling.

Bruce grinned to himself. "Oh no, this is much worse."

ooooo

On the bridge of the Helicarrier, Fury saw Black Widow and Archangel leading Captain America, Thordis, Bruce Banner, and Carrie White into the room. They all looked around in amazement at the many computers and agents bustling about. Upon seeing Fury, Steve nodded.

"Fury."

"Captain." Fury greeted back, and then smirked when Steve handed him ten bucks. He turned towards Bruce. "Doctor, thank you for coming."

"Thanks for asking so nicely." Bruce said sarcastically. "So, uh… how long am I staying?"

"Once we get our hands on the Tesseract, you're in the clear." Fury promised the nervous doctor. Bruce gave him a look.

"And uh… how are you with that?"

Fury pointed to Agent Coulson, who the others didn't even notice until now. Coulson explained the situation. "We're sweeping every wirelessly accessible camera on the planet. Cell phones, laptops. If it's connected to a satellite, it's eyes and ears for us."

Soladat shook her head in uncertainty. "That's still not gonna find them in time."

Tapping his chin in thought, Bruce spoke. "You have to narrow the field. How many spectrometers do you have access to?"

Fury raised an eyebrow. "How many are there?"

"Call every lab you know, tell them to put the spectrometers on the roof and calibrate them for gamma rays. I'll rough out a tracking algorithm based on cluster recognition." Bruce gave Fury a smile. "At least we could rule out a few places. Do you have somewhere for me to work?"

Smiling, Fury motioned towards Natasha. "Agent Romanoff, would you show Dr. Banner to his laboratory, please?"

Natasha nodded and then led Bruce out of the bridge and into the hall. "You're gonna love it, doc. It's got all the toys."

Fury watched them leave, when he suddenly felt someone tapping his shoulder. He looked over to see Darcy standing there. "Uh, hey."

Fury nodded. "Ms. Lewis."

"Yeah, it's nice to finally meet you." Darcy nodded. "Any word on Loki yet?"

Fury shook his head. "Not yet. But we will."

Darcy nodded. "Good. This guy isn't someone you want to mess with."

"Is there anything else you can tell us about this guy."

Darcy stopped, and then turned back to Fury. "I might…"

While Fury and Darcy were chatting, Soladat and Darcy were left standing in the background. Looking over at the girl, Soladat smirked.

"Some day, huh?"

Carrie blinked and looked over at the agent, shrugging. "I guess."

Soladat snorted. "You guess? Are you saying every morning is like this?"

Carrie frowned. "Okay, fine. So this is a little much for me. It's not like my life is normal or anything."

Soladat felt guilty, remembering the girl's past. "Right… sorry. So, uh… what do you think of all this?"

Carrie sighed. "I don't know. In retrospect, I can't say I'm too excited about this. I'm not a superhero."

Soladat chuckled. "Neither am I, really. I'm just an assassin."

"That's different." Carrie said. "Assassins have reason to kill. I mindlessly slaughtered hundreds of people in just one night!"

Soladat sighed. "You were confused and scared. It's not like you really knew what you were doing right?"

Carrie just shook her head. Soladat continued. "Look, think of this as a second chance. If not a hero, then at least try to lend a hand when necessary, okay?"

Carrie thought it over, and sighed. "Okay."

ooooo

Bruce followed Natasha into the lab, and his eyes nearly bulged out of his skull when he saw some kind of… thing standing in there. The creature nodded in their direction.

"Agent Romanoff." It spoke. Natasha nodded back.

"Hikesh." She turned back towards Bruce. "Doctor, this is Xegh Hikesh, our extra-planetary liaison. He'll be working as your assistant in this operation."

Hikesh, following human customs, put his hand out in greeting. "It is good to make you acquaintance, Bruce Banner. I've heard good stories of your scientific achievements."

Bruce just stood gaping at the Prothean. Hikesh blinked in confusion, and then looked at Romanoff. "I am confused. I had thought the shaking of hands was normal in human greatings?"

Natasha shook her head. "It is. He's just… surprised."

Hikesh blinked in confusion once again, and then his eyes flashed in realization. "Ah, I see."

He looked back at Banner. "I am sorry if my appearance as startled you."

Bruce just shook his head. "No, it's eh… it's fine. Fury just didn't tell me we had an actual… alien on the team."

"There's a lot Fury neglects to share with us." Natasha clarified, and then turned to leave. "You two have fun."

Bruce and Hikesh watched the Widow leave, and then looked back at each other. Bruce breathed awkwardly. "So… you're a real live alien?"

Hikesh cocked his head to the side. "As opposed to a fake dead one?"

Bruce blinked. This was going to be an interesting day…

ooooo

Back on the bridge, Darcy, Soladat, Carrie, and Fury all listened in amusement as Coulson told Steve about his collection. Steve just listened with discomfort.

"I mean, if it's not too much trouble…" Coulson said, but Steve shook his head quickly.

"No, no. It's fine."

They stood silent for a few moments, and Coulson turned back towards Steve. "t's a vintage set. It took me a couple of years to collect them all. Near mint, slight foxing around the edges, but..."

"We got a hit!" A man, Agent Sitwell, spoke up. Everyone turned towards him. "Sixty seven percent match. Weight, cross match, seventy nine percent."

Darcy herself came up behind him and looked at the screen. Her heard skipped a beat when she saw the man in the picture. "It's him."

Sitwell looked at her, then back to the screen. Coulson came up, asking for the location.

"Stuttgart, Germany. 28, Konigstrasse. He's not exactly hiding." Sitwell explained. Fury looked over at Steve.

"Captain." Steve looked over at Fury. "Your up."

Nodding, Steve quickly left the bridge to suit up. Darcy stood up and looked at Fury intently. "I'm going, too."

Fury looked at her, unsure. But she quickly explained herself. "I'm the only one whose ever gone up against this guy. You're gonna need me."

Fury thought it over, and then nodded. Darcy nodded back and quickly followed Steve.

Chapter twelve, done. Chapter thirteen, will be posted sometime tomorrow. In that chapter, Thordis and Captain America confront Loki in Stuttgart. Then, someone else who isn't Iron Man shows up and things take an interesting turn. Review pleaz.