NOTE: Now you guys get to find out what happened with the explosion! I loved writing this chapter. I'm excited to see what everyone thinks. Got an extra long chapter just because I'm happy with how it's going. That's all!
After the explosion ended, smoke drifted and filled the hallway outside of Coulson's office.
"What was that!?" Steve yelled over the alarms. They opened his office door and Phil stealthily peeked out.
"I don't know! It looks like it might have come from the lab!" Coulson replied. "We need to evacuate this area of the carrier. "I'm alerting your team. Who knows what kind of damage we're dealing with!" He said as he typed on his phone. "They should be here within a matter of minutes."
"I need to find Agent Well's!" Steve said with slight panic in his voice.
"First we need to get people out. I'm sure he's alright." Coulson said reassuringly.
Steve nodded and they stood outside his office ushering people to meet on the top deck while helping a few injured people walk up the stairs towards safety.
The annoyingly loud alarms finally stopped and the rest of the team showed up not long after that.
"What happened?" Clint, Natasha, Tony and Thor were standing and waiting for their orders.
"All we know is that something in the lab exploded and whole ceiling caved, blocking the other section of the carrier. We don't know how many people are trapped back there." Coulson responded.
"We can't find Agent Well's and we don't know if he's one of the trapped or if he's up top. Last time I saw him he was heading to the berthing but he could have stopped along the way." Steve said.
"Thor, Stark and Steve, we're going to need help clearing the wreckage. Agent Barton and Romanoff, can you two go topside and find out who else is missing and see if Dr. Banner needs any help?" He asked and everyone nodded in agreement.
Clint was about to leave when Steve pulled him aside.
"You have to find him, Barton. I'm going to be down here clearing all of this stuff so I can't leave."
"We'll find him Cap, don't worry." He replied. Steve nodded appreciatively and headed back to the hallway to join Thor and Tony who had started clearing away ceiling debris.
Meanwhile…
Gunnar heard the explosion and the door to the berthing slammed shut. The fire protocol system failed and locked him in the large room alone.
He banged on the thick metal door. "Is anyone out there?" He yelled over and over. He didn't hear anything and immediately remembered that Steve was out there and now he couldn't get to him. He remembered that he left his com system back at the tower. He tried to break the door down but he wasn't strong enough to get it open and it remained sealed tight.
All he could do was sit and wait until someone found him, which left him a lot of time to wonder and worry.
Back to the others…
They had cleared part of the wreckage and rescued a couple people when Steve heard: "Well's isn't topside. I'll keep looking, there's a lot more ground to cover, don't start worrying yet."
Steve started clearing at a faster rate while still trying to stay as calm as possible.
"There's a beam down that's blocking the rest of the hallway. If we can get that out then we should be able to evacuate whoever's back there. But, we have to be careful." Tony said.
The three of them slowly moved the heavy beam and laid it across the ground. Then they moved the surrounding debris and clouds of smoke poured out. 3 coughing lab assistants walked out slowly. They picked 2 more off the ground and carried them to Dr. Banner on the flight deck.
"Was he back there?" Agent Barton asked over the com.
"No. He wasn't. But he still could be. I'm going back down." Steve said to Barton as he headed back down. "I'm going to go down further and make sure nobody else is down there."
"I'll check all the surrounding rooms. Thor, can you come with me?" Clint asked. Thor nodded.
In the berthing…
Gunnar could here noises coming from up above and then a slow trickle of smoke came in through one of the vents in the room.
"That's great…" He said to himself. He started banging on the door again but nobody came.
He sat back down on the lowest bunk and continued to wait it out. He was worried about Steve. He didn't know if the explosion had reached him or not.
Meanwhile…
Thor and Clint started clearing out the rooms attached to the lab section and still didn't see Gunnar but found a couple more stranded agents.
"Cap said he was last seen heading down to the berthing area. They're right below the lab. We haven't checked down there yet." Thor said.
"The stairs leading down are blocked." He replied.
"Let's go see if we can get down there. It's really the only place left to look." Thor stated.
"Hey Cap, we're heading down to the stairs to see if he's on the lower level."
"Roger that." He answered.
In the berthing…
After 30 minutes the smoke was starting to get heavy. He transformed into a dog and got as low to the ground as possible. He was trying to stay as alert as possible because he knew someone was bound to find him. The noises got closer and he mustered up all of his strength and started barking as loud as he could.
Outside in the hallway…
They headed down to towards the stairs and cleared a path slowly. After 30 minutes of clearing everything out of the way they finally made it down to the hallway and heard barking. It was smoky and Clint covered his mouth and nose with his sleeve. He already had a pair of goggles on. (He was wearing a long sleeved suit because of the cold weather and wasn't planning on using his bow for this particular assignment.)
"This one!" Clint pointed to a door and Thor used his Asgardian strength to pry it open.
The smoke rushed out and Clint ran into the room trying to find Gunnar he finally spotted him laying on the floor.
"Well's!" He yelled. "Come here buddy."
Gunnar got up slowly and Clint leaned down and held on to him. He could hear his breathing had become slightly shallow and whiney so he picked him up and carried him out of the room and up the stairs. Gunnar laid his head on Clint's shoulder and let him help.
"We got him Captain." Thor said on his com. "He's perfectly fine. We need to have Dr. Banner look him over but he's not hurt."
Steve sighed in relief and went back up topside to meet the rest of the team. As soon as he saw them he ran over to where they were.
"Gunnar, I'm so glad you're safe!" He leaned down and pet Gunnar who was sitting next Clint who we're both getting checked over. "I'm starting to think you enjoy scaring me…" He laughed.
He stayed close to Gunnar when they went back down after the smoke had cleared out to finish cleaning up major debris on the carrier. Everyone was accounted for and another crew came to relieve them and Coulson let them go back to the tower. They were dirty and tired from the long day and night.
Coulson pulled Steve aside before they left and said "we still need to talk about what happened. I'll head over to the tower after Christmas and the three of us can discuss what happened."
"Yes sir." He replied.
Gunnar transformed back to human when they rode the quinjet back to the tower. He laid on the empty row of seats and fell asleep. When he woke up they had arrived back on top of the tower. Everyone got up to leave and Gunnar jumped up.
"Thanks Clint, I'm really glad someone found me." He said.
"I think you just stayed in there to get out of doing all the heavy lifting." Clint joked and Gunnar smiled. "See ya inside?" He asked. Gunnar nodded.
"I need to thank you too Thor. Thanks for breaking down the door." He said.
"You're welcome brother of Asgard." He boomed with delight.
Gunnar walked into the main living room of the tower and went back to his room to get all the grime off of his body. It was relaxing to stand under the hot water and he dropped his shoulders, letting the heat pound on his upper back and neck.
After all the events that happened that day, he was ready to get some sleep. But after seeing his team members not giving up the search to find him, he knew that they had his back.
Now he just had to prove he had theirs.
In the living room…
"I swear that kid is going to give my grey hair." Steve commented. Bruce, Tony, Clint and Steve were clean and relaxing on the couches in the living room. Clint snickered quietly.
"Well it would be fitting of your age, gramps." Tony remarked.
"Funny…" He replied sarcastically.
"There's the mongrel!" Tony said almost shouting. Gunnar came strolling out of the hall in dog form and flopped up on the couch in between Clint and Steve. He rubbed his nose across Steve's hand indicating that he wanted to be petted.
He snuggled up in the space between the two guys and started getting sleepy so he put his head down and shut his eyes. Natasha walked out and saw the guys talking in low voices. She gracefully sat down on the other couch next to Bruce and their conversation continued a while longer.
When it was time to turn in for the night Clint and Steve walked down the hall and Gunnar followed Clint into his room. Steve saw this and his ego was slightly bruised.
"Traitor!" Steve joked half heartedly.
Gunnar jumped up on Clint's bed before he had a chance to get in it.
"As much as I would love you in my bed…" Clint said with great sarcasm. "I think Cap needs his buddy."
Gunnar whined pathetically.
"I know you're happy I found you back at the helicarrier, but you said thanks already. That's enough, trust me." He commented.
Gunnar stayed put. He was going to make sure everyone knew he was there for them.
"Alright, but stay on the other side. You start spooning me and you're getting kicked out." He barked in response.
Clint shut off the light and Gunnar moved over to make room for him. "Night kid."