CHAPTER THIRTY SIX
"Clint!" Natasha called out as she held her partner down whilst he strained against the restraints holding him down on the bed. Barton searched round the room with glazed eyes before focusing on Natasha's face,
"You're gonna be alright." Natasha reassured him with a small smile.
"I gotta flush him out." Barton groaned out as he shut his eyes tightly. A tightening of his arm made him open them again,
"We don't have that long. It's gonna take time" Natasha warned him as she undid the restraints.
"I don't understand, have you ever had someone take your brain and play? Pull out some stuff and stuff other things in its place? Do you know what it's like to be unmade?" Natasha looked at him sharply,
"You know that I do" she told him coldly before standing up and pouring him a cup of water. Barton gave her a apologetic look before sitting up and swinging his legs to the floor,
"How did you get him out?" he asked. Natasha turned round with the cup in her hand,
"Here" she said, handing it to him before taking a seat next to him.
"Cognitive recalibration." Natasha answered. Barton gave her a puzzled look and she gave him a small, amused smile. "I hit you really hard in the head" she elaborated. Barton rolled his eyes slightly,
"Oh, thanks" There was silence for a few moments,
"Tasha, how many agents?" he asked her quietly.
"Don't" she warned him, "Don't do that to yourself Clint. This was Loki. This was monsters and magic, something we were never trained for" she told him sternly, trying to stop him from going down that particular road.
"Loki, he got a way?" Barton asked. Natasha sighed and nodded her head,
"Don't suppose you know where?" she asked though she knew it was in vain,
"No. I didn't need to know so I never asked" Barton answered. Natasha nodded her head as she stood up. "He's gonna make his play soon though. Today." Clint added.
"We've gotta stop him" Natasha stated.
"Yeah? Who's we?" Barton asked in disbelief.
"I don't know. Whoever's left!" Natasha snapped. Barton looked at her calmly,
"I suppose I'll sleep better if I put an arrow through Loki's eye socket" he commented. Natasha smirked as she took the seat next to him,
"Know you sound like yourself" she told him. Barton watched her,
"But you don't. You're a spy, an assassin not a soldier but know you want to wade into a war? Why? What did Loki do to you?" he asked her softly.
"He didn't…" Natasha started heatedly,
"Natasha" Barton needn't say more. Natasha sighed and bowed her head,
"I've been compromised." She looked at him. "I've got red in my ledger, I would like to wipe it out" she told him quietly. Barton placed one of his hands on hers and squeezed gently.
"You have, you are and you will" he informed her before standing up and walking into the adjoining bathroom.
"Is this the first time you've lost a soldier?" Steve asked calmly. Stark spun round furiously,
"WE ARE NOT SOLIDERS! I am not marching to Fury's fife!" He yelled angrily.
"Neither am I! He's got the same blood on his hands as Loki does. Right now we've got to put that aside and get this done. Now Loki needs a power source, if we can put together a list..." Steve refuted. Stark stared at the wall whilst Steve defended himself,
"He made it personal" he stated, thinking to himself.
"What?" Steve questioned puzzled, "That's not the point.
"That is the point. That's Loki's point. He hit us all right where we live. Why?"
"To tear us apart" Steve answered, trying to follow Stark's reasoning.
"He had to conquer his greed, but he knows he has to take us out to win, right? That's what he wants. He wants to beat us and he wants to be seen doing it. He wants an audience." Stark half thought out loud and half explained.
"Right. I caught his act at Stuttengard." Steve stated slowly understanding.
"Yeah. That's just a preview, this is opening night. Loki's a full-tilt diva. He wants flowers, he wants parades, he wants a monument built in the skies with his name plastered..." He trailed off for a moment before spinning round to face Steve, "sonofabitch! My tower"
"Time to go" Steve ordered as soon as he entered the room. Natasha stood up immediately,
"Where're we going?" she asked.
"I'll tell you on the way. Can you fly one of those jets?" Natasha looked at him like he was an idiot,
"I already flew you on one. Forget that already?" she asked annoyed. Steve looked at her sheepishly,
"sorry" before anything else could be said, the bathroom door opened and Barton stepped out.
"We're going out?" he asked, throwing the towel he was holding back into the bathroom. Steve looked at Natasha for confirmation. Natasha nodded at him sharply whilst giving him a small glare. Steve nodded back before looking at Barton,
"You got a suit?" he asked.
"Yeah" Barton answered. Steve nodded again,
"Then suit up" he ordered before spinning round and marching out of the room. Natasha and Barton shared a quick look before following the Captain.
After spending twenty minutes gathering up their various equipment, Captain America could be seen stalking through the hangar bay towards a quinjet with the infamous Black Widow and Hawkeye flanking him. A young pilot walked over them with his hands out of front of him,
"You're not authorised to be here" he said, his eyes on the Captain. Steve held up a hand to silence him,
"Son, just don't" he stated. Natasha walked past them all and sat down in the pilot chair, leaving the others to get rid of the young agent. Hawkeye joined her a few moments later,
"Not in the mood to deal with the younger generation grandma?" he asked quietly with a smirk, as Steve shoved the poor guy out through the open ramp before slamming down on the entrance button, cutting off anyone's attempt to prevent their take off. Natasha glared at her long-term partner,
"Shut it Barton or I'll do it for you" she threatened as she started the take off sequence. Barton just chuckled before helping her,
"You might want to hold on to something Cap, we're good to go" he called out a minute later.
"You sure no one's gonna blast us out the air for taking off unauthorized?" he asked as he wrapped his arm tightly through the cargo net. Natasha didn't spare him a glance,
"We'll be fine Captain, relax"
"The CHITAURI are coming, nothing will change that. What have I to fear?" Loki asked amused.
"The Avengers." Stark answered. When all he got was a confused look, he rolled his eyes and explained, "It's what we call ourselves, Earth's Mightiest Heroes, that type of thing." Loki gave him an extremely amused look at that,
"I've met them." Stark smirks,
"Yeah, it takes us a while to get any traction; I'll give you that one"
"But, let's do a head count here. Your brother, the demi-God; a super soldier, a living legend who kind of lives up to the legend; a man with breath-taking anger management issues; a super secret master assassin, and a ridiculously accurate archer , and you, big fella, you've managed to piss off every single one of them." Stark lists of whilst drinking his alcohol beverage. Loki just continues smirking,
"That was the plan"
"Not a great plan. When they come for you and they will. They'll come for you" he told the evil god whilst secretly putting his Iron man activation bracelets on behind the bar. Finally Loki lost his smirk,
"I have an army" he boasted.
"We have a hulk" Stark threw back.
"I thought the beast had wandered off" Loki spoke spitefully.
"You're missing the point. There's no throne, there is no version of this, where you come out on top. Maybe your army comes and maybe it's too much for us, but it's all on you. Because if we can't protect the Earth, you can be damned well sure we'll avenge it ." Stark told him seriously. Loki walked slowly towards him,
"How will your friends stop me when they are so busy fighting you?" he asked as he suddenly brought his sceptre up and touched it to Stark's heart. A ping echoed round the room and Loki frowned before trying again.
"That's supposed to work" he mumbled. Stark spoke up with a hint of a smirk on his face,
"Well performance issues, you know?" Loki growled and grabbed Stark by the throat in anger before shoving him out of the glass window. He watched as Stark activated his armour and flew away before stalking away towards the roof.
"Stark are you seeing this? Steve asked as he watched in disbelief as a giant whale like robot came flying out of the open portal.
"Seeing. Still working on believing" came Stark's reply, "Hey has Banner turned up yet?" he asked completely changing the topic
"Banner?" Steve questions. Stark inwardly sighed,
"Just keep me posted" he answered before flying off to try and take down the giant whale.
Steve was about to say something else before a massive explosion caused him to put his thoughts on hold. The trio on the ground looked as one to see a chain explosion go off as gas mains were shot at and erupted making cars explode and flip over. Citizens fled in a screaming mass, trying to get away from the flames.
"Those people down there need assistance" he said worriedly. Natasha drew both her guns and began to take down the aliens that had landed nearby with unnatural skill,
"Go. We've got this" she ordered without taking her eyes off the enemy. Steve was momentarily stunned at her ability before nodding,
"Sure you've got this?" he still had to ask. Natasha inwardly rolled her eyes at his continuous worries,
"Captain, it will be our genuine pleasure" Hawkeye answered him, as he fired an explosive arrow at a group of aliens.
"You're wasting time Captain. GO!" Natasha snapped at him, still firing with ridiculous speed and accuracy. Steve didn't respond this time, rather just left.
"He was just checking Nat" Hawkeye told his annoyed partner as he continued to take down alien after alien, "Not like everyone knows what you're truly capable of" he pointed out reasonably.
"He should already know that if I say the situation is handled then it's handled" she responded irritated before pulling out a small grenade from her utility belt and throwing it at a group of incoming aliens,
"Take cover!" she called out quickly as she crouched behind a car, Hawkeye following quickly. The grenade went off, taking out all the remaining aliens that had been converging on them.
"You've gotten some new toys Nat. I'm jealous" Hawkeye commented lightly. Natasha rolled her eyes,
"Shut up and help them" was her answer as she pointed in the direction of a tipped over school bus, "I'll cover you" she added. Hawkeye nodded as he placed his bow back into his quiver and ran quickly over to help get the children out. He heard Natasha behind him shooting at any alien that got with ten meters of them.
"This is like Budapest all over again!" Natasha commented causally over her shoulder as she continuously fired her weapons again and again. Hawkeyed gave her a weird look before joining her, firing his bow at the enemy, having finished saving the children,
"You and I remember Budapest very differently" he replied.
After firing the last bullets in her guns, rather than reloading them, Natasha placed them back into their holsters before picking up one of the alien's guns. Natasha began firing energy blasts in every direction, hitting at least one alien for every blast. Steve rejoined them, just missing being blasted by Natasha,
"Impressive." He commented looking round at the numerous aliens lying dead in the street. Natasha gave him a small smirk before continuing to fire her new weapon. Hawkeye spared a look at the Captain before following Natasha's lead. Suddenly lightening strikes around them, taking out every single alien within seeing distance. Thor landed with a loud thud next to Steve.
"What's the story upstairs?" Steve asked the thunder god.
"The power surrounding the cube is impenetrable" Thor answered swiftly.
"Thor's right. We've gotta deal with this lot first" Stark spoke over their com link. They all watched as more and more aliens exited the portal.
"How do we do this?" Natasha asked.
"As a team" Steve answered. Natasha inwardly rolled her eyes at the cheesiness of the comment but said nothing.
"I've got unfinished business with Loki" Thor told them all.
"Yeah?" Hawkeye commented, fingering one of his arrows, "get in line"
"Save it. Loki is gonna try and keep the fight on us, something that we need. Without Loki, these things will run wild. We've got Stark on top, he's gonna need us to..." he trailed off as the sound of a motorbike came louder and Banner got off.
"Well this all seem horrible" he commented looking round. Natasha smirked.
"Stark you were right, Banner showed up" Steve spoke up.
"Good. Tell him to suit up, I'm bringing the party to you" he had just finished that statement before he flew by with the giant whale on his tail.
"I, I don't see how that's a party" Natasha commented confused. Hawkeye gave her a grin whilst the others just ignored the comment. Bruce began to walk toward the whale,
"Doctor Banner, now might be a good time to get angry." Steve told him, Bruce smirked at the Captain,
"That's my secret Captain. I'm always angry" he said just before he hulked out and punched the whale in the face making it flip over. Stark appeared suddenly again and fired a rocket at a previously unknown soft spot making the entire robot alien thing explode. The aliens surrounding them on the buildings and in the air roared angrily at the lost. The Hulk simply roared back in defiance.
Loki glared at the group with hatred burning in his eyes from his spot on the roof,
"Said the rest" He ordered the alien with him. With an unseen signal, aliens en mass began to pour out of the portal. Natasha noticed them first,
"Guys?" she asked, pointing up. All the avengers followed her gaze and looks of disbelief appeared on every single of their faces as they looked on at the ever growing number of aliens approaching them. 'Today is not a good day' Natasha thought tiredly.
A/N: Heya guys. Sorry for the late response, really got stuck in real life for a while. Just letting you guys know that i'm only planning on covering the ending of this film and the winter soldier. This was a origin fic originally and I have other stories in the works as well. I'm also planning on doing a flash back to the scientist mission mentioned in the WS.
If anyone else has any ideas for missions Natasha did during her early days let me know and i'll try and write some.
Thanks for the support for this story- means a lot
Stay Tuned