Chapter 9 - Catalyst
Laugh, and the world laughs with you;
Weep, and you weep alone;
They want full measure of all your pleasure,
But they do not need your woe.
Be glad, and your friends are many;
Be sad, and you lose them all,
There are none to decline your nectared wine,
But alone you must drink life's gall.
-Solitude by Ella Wilcox
Yo-Yo stood at the opening of the secret underground base and took a breath. The quiet hovering of the Zephyr above her was reassuring, as was the elongated reinforced rope around her torso that connected her with the plane.
"Ready when you are," Coulson's voice came in her ear.
She nodded and lifted a thumb in confirmation. She took a second to mentally recite the directions in her head before taking off at a dead run. The destination was so deep into the compound that several times she was sure she'd missed a turn. So when a green glow seeped through the doorway of the room around the next bend, she was relieved.
As she crossed the doorway, she nearly tripped over at the person laying just within, before she looked up and froze at the scene. The holographic images didn't quite do the real thing justice. There were the bodies of the Avengers, strewn around Iron Man in the center, but the cameras failed to capture just how lifeless the bodies looked. It didn't look as if they were sleeping, it looked as if they were dead.
Shaking away the unrest the scene produced, Yo-Yo focused on the green thing hovering above Tony Stark. Taking the right side of the room, she made her way around the entity. Left arm shooting out once she was near enough to the densest area around Tony, she began filling up the sample container.
The alien light had been so still that she yelped and stumbled when it suddenly moved, and damn if it wasn't fast. Tendrils of light nearly looped around her arm before she remembered her fail safe and hit the button Fitz indicated on her belt. The electrical hum of the device coming online was comforting, the quick retreat of the tendril closest to her more so.
Getting her feet back, she made a dash for the door, deciding that whatever she'd collected would just have to be enough. However, as she exited the room and turned the corner, she couldn't help but look back. Her eyes went wide at the sudden closeness of a new mass of tendrils. She could feel it pushing against whatever protective field Fitz had put on her. The surprising sensation of cool liquid on her neck gave her the motivation to put on a burst of speed as she rocketed back to her original position, back to safety.
Adrenaline high, she could barely catch her breath as she made turn after turn, unnecessarily fearing the reverse order of directions and too terrified to remember she need not worry about going the right way.
By the time she got back to her starting point she was frantic with fear, nearly jumping up the dangling rope without breaking her sprint (at normal speed this time) away from the lip of the opening.
"Pull me up! Pull me up!" she screamed hoping they could reel her in before she was caught again.
The harsh tug upwards left her legs and arms still scrambling forward as if she could traverse the air.
"Go!" she gasped. "We have to go!" she insisted as they pulled her back on board.
"Whoa. Yo-Yo slow down. You're okay," Daisy reassured with a hand to her bicep.
"No. No it's right behind me. It was right behind." Yo-yo continued, spinning once she was on her feet to see the door to the Zephyr closing, no sign of green energy in sight.
"It was right behind me," she insisted again, heart rate refusing to come down, hairs still standing on end.
"Did you make contact?" Coulson demanded.
"It was there! It was there!" Yo-Yo murmured nearly tripping over herself to turn in a circle and ensure there were no flashes of green hiding just behind her.
"Hey!" Coulson's snappy command drew her attention back. The firm hand on her shoulder grounded her. "Did you make contact?" he asked again.
"I… I…" she started to take deep breaths, finally beginning to slow down. "Yes. It- it touched my shoulder. Before I could get away."
"Let's go," he said, grabbing the sample container out of her hands and promptly turning to head further into the ship.
"Sir?" she asked jumping to keep up with him and then slowing down to force herself not to run. The feeling of being chased continued to linger, giving her goosebumps.
"We're going to FitzSimmons to make sure the only thing you brought back is in this container. And then you're going to medical."
In the bowels of the structure there is no one around to hear the angry exclamation of Iilk's ire as the tiny quick piece of meat slips through his fingers. He'd been bulking up the last day or so, unable to resist drinking more and more deeply. As a result, he isn't as quick as he used to be, which really annoys him because the little human that nicked him was fast.
No matter, his small loss in speed is made up for in strength and he can feel the tendrils of his energy follow her up and out of the cavern. They tickle along her skin even as her distance increases, and his influence decreases. By the time his energy dissipates he has learned much, and what he has learned does not make him happy.
It seems he hadn't been quite as thorough as he'd believed when he caught his current feast. There were people looking for them and now they knew where he was. Still, he knew it would take them time. They were trying to build some sort of weapon that would stop him, but he knew building things wasn't a quick or easy process. He'd just have to stop playing with his food and get serious.
A part of him was worried by the confidence he could barely glean from the two scientists keeping the stolen part of him alive. Caution advised him to collapse the opening where they were entering his domain, though he knew when they returned it wouldn't deter them for very long. As he headed back to the chamber he decided not to let it worry him too much. By the time they returned with anything feasible, he'd be long gone.
Steve gasped as he just managed to get the shield in front of the unibeam a suit of armor sent his way. Regardless, he went flying across the chamber, back crunching noisily against the wall behind him. He'd wanted to antagonize the suit into attacking him hard enough to really hurt. That attack, however, was beyond hurtful; it may very well have killed him.
Fine line indeed.
A gunshot distracted the advancing suit and gave Steve a few precious moments to survey how the rest of his team was doing.
The huge green form of the Hulk was an obvious draw. Steve had thought the big green guy would have wiped the floor with the suits and had actively cautioned him not to eliminate all of the suits as they'd need at least one threat to accomplish their goals.
However, it seemed as if the suits were holding their own. In fact the Hulk had been ensnared twice and had nearly lost consciousness the second time before he managed to punch his way out of the pile up.
His deafening roar was immediately followed by a flying suit, and Steve tracked it's progress over to Romanov and Barton who had been holding their own so far, but seemed to be flagging. There were just too many suits and each time they destroyed one–
Steve groaned audibly as another suit pushed through the doorway and made a bee-line straight towards him. Heaving himself up he gripped his shield tightly and charged back into battle, hoping he was only a couple more hits away from freedom.
*.*
Banner was rarely cognizant when the Hulk took over. He understood that on some level he must be, or maybe it was only that the Hulk was cognizant when Bruce was in control. Either way he'd been surprised the first time he'd Hulked out in front of Betty and the big guy hadn't harmed a hair on her head.
He still remembers screaming, straining against the thing inside of him, his fear palpable as he tried to stop the violent transformation happening too close to the woman he loved. He needn't have worried though. He knew now that Hulk would never hurt her. Just like he knew Hulk would never hurt Tony. Not intentionally. Not if it was in his power to protect the man. So as the Hulk grabbed an armor that had gotten too close and tossed it across the room like a sack of potatoes Bruce came to terms with what they would have to do.
The Hulk raged against him, arms twitching to move, to punch, to hit, but Bruce urged him to be still, repeating the truth of the matter as many times as needed. The Hulk was never going to win in a game where he needed to lose. Fighting was his M.O. It was not in him to take a punch and not send one right back. No, that was Bruce's area of expertise.
He'd most likely die. The minute there was an opening the suits would be on them. Jarvis had advised against such a course of action but they were out of options. While there was a chance Bruce would simply return to his own body if he died, there was absolutely no chance if they couldn't get outside of their mental prison.
Tony needed help now.
Later would be too late. Trying again wasn't an option. So they worked together, both straining against their very cores to do something that had never been done. If this worked the way he wanted, by the time the others noticed, it would be too late.
*.*
Natasha flipped over Clint's back emptying the clip of the gun in her right hand while simultaneously reloading the one in her left. She'd resumed shooting before she hit the ground. Moving quickly she sidestepped a suit that dove for her and shot it in the back with her bites, now fully recharged.
This was her last back-up power pack. She would have to end this quickly.
The unibeam that lit up the small chamber like stadium nearly distracted her enough to get a face full of metal. She side-stepped in time for it to miss her face, but it clipped her shoulder. She bit her tongue as she went stumbling back a few steps before raising her uninjured arm and getting another electrocuting shot off.
In the brief interim she got a glance at Steve and whipped her gun out, sending a warning shot that went bouncing off the armor towards the suit that had nearly disintegrated him a second ago. It took the bait, changing directions to head directly towards her.
"See you on the other side," she gasped, noting Clint's last EMP arrow taking out a group of five assailants.
Then, she deliberately stepped in the way of the advancing armor and took a glancing blow to her temple. She didn't feel the rock wall she hit on the way down, but she did hear Clint cry her name in alarm, and as instructed willed herself the fuck out before everything went black.
*.*
Clint was getting too old for this. His breath came out labored as he flipped and spun, using the thin upper ledge of the small chamber to weave through the suits. As usual, him and Nat made a good team. She would round them up, and then he'd deliver one of his EMP arrows into a group of them.
Too bad the EMPs didn't have a longer range. While really helpful in this particular situation, in the real world Stark had cautioned that taking out the tech of your nearby allies along with the enemy was counterproductive.
They'd just finished rounding them into a corner when a bright flash nearly blinded him and made him fumble the notch. It was only a split second but one of the suits managed to get past him. He didn't worry though, Nat would take care of it.
Except that she didn't.
"See you on the other side."
Her gasp of pain made his gut clench as his arrow went flying. He turned in alarm, but wasn't quick enough to stop the suit she threw herself in front of.
"Nat!" he yelled, seeing five more suits enter the chamber in his peripheral but too busy taking out the one that had sent her flying into the rock wall with a horrific crunch. For a moment he was sick to his stomach as he watched her flop to the ground, her chest visibly heaving in an effort to keep beating.
He nearly began tearing up before her last words registered, and he remembered why they were fighting. That split second of distraction was enough though and he was barely able to dodge the beam aimed at the side of his head.
Unfortunately, (or fortunately?) there was nowhere to go. Steve was busy with two suits of his own, and without Nat he was quickly surrounded.
He was braced for the metal punch headed towards his ribs, hoping it to be the final blow to kick him out of here, when everything went black as yet another memory took over.
Tony tries not to stagger as he puts the finishing touches on the latest version of the suit. By this time in the day, he'd normally either be still down in his lab or crashing from the previous week's lack of sleep. In fact, he'd been on his way to do the latter when the solution to a problem he'd been working on regarding the suit's hydraulics system had suddenly struck, and he'd grabbed the closest halo screen he could find.
That was nearly eight hours ago.
Now his head is pounding from the lack of sleep, his legs feel like they'll give up on him any moment, and his back aches from swiveling back and forth between the various displays projected along either side of the windows, but the updates for the Mark 46 are moments from being finished. There's just one more adjustment he needs to make.
A noise draws his attention, and Tony glances up from his makeshift work station in the communal kitchen to see Steve, Clint, and Natasha exiting the elevator. Both of the spies are wearing sweats, clearly returning from another sparring match in the gym. Steve looks preoccupied and flustered, staring at the new StarkPad Tony had given him last month.
He registers their presence with a brief glance, but his mind is so occupied with finishing, he doesn't manage more than a grunt of acknowledgement before returning to the project at hand.
God, he's so tired. Just a little bit longer...
"Tony, I need you to have a look at this." The deep frown is evident in the Captain's voice as he holds the device aloft.
"Yeah, hang tight."
"Tony, now. This is kind of important." Steve makes his way across the kitchen, clearly expecting Tony to stop what he's doing immediately and help him with whatever it is.
Tony frowns. He hadn't heard the alarm go off, so there's not a call to assemble. Whatever it is, he decides, it surely can wait a few moments more. The sequence is coming together beautifully. He only needs to tweak it just a little—
"Tony—"
"Yeah Cap, I got ya. Just give me two more seconds—"
"Could you just—"
"One more second!" He holds up one hand as he uses the other to key in the last few strokes into the computer with a flourish. "Aaand...Got it!"
Tony claps both hands together in a moment of triumph and feels the familiar jolt of satisfaction he always gets when finishing a project. One more thing he doesn't have to worry about should they actually get called out.
The surge of joy dissipates quickly, however, and he's left feeling shaky and facing an impatient and clearly not amused Captain America.
"Okay Cap, I'm all yours, whatcha need?" Tony flashes his brightest smile in complete opposition to the exhaustion nipping at his heels. He's a master at it by now, hiding his fatigue until the point of literal collapse. A point he's currently nearing, but then they didn't need to know that.
The super soldier begins to restate his issue, but before he gets a chance Clint shoulders past them both on his way to the refrigerator.
"Woah, Stark." Barton recoils dramatically, scrunching up his nose. "Shower much? You stink worse than me."
"What?" His brain isn't working as fast as usual. Even geniuses start to lag when nearing 70 hours without sleep.
"No offense," Nat raises one eyebrow diplomatically, perching at the far end of the breakfast bar, "but you do look a little rough around the edges, Stark."
"Oh, that." Tony looks down at the grease-stained T-shirt and jeans he's been wearing for the past three days. Yeah, he probably doesn't smell too good either. "Well, I was just going to bed, so maybe I'll have a shower after."
"Going to bed?" Steve frowns. "Tony, it's 2 o'clock in the afternoon."
"Yeah. I-I know that." Tony glances at the clock on the halo screen. He had not in fact known that, but what does it matter anyway. "I was up late, so sue me."
"Must be nice to have grown up rich and never had a real job, huh? No schedule, no responsibilities. Sleep, eat whenever you want." Clint snorts before opening the fridge to peruse its contents.
"Hey! I've had plenty of jobs. Probably more than you."
"Yeah, sure," the archer shrugs, his face still buried in the fridge. "You got any more of that fancy deli meat from uptown?"
"Second shelf on the right, toward the back. Are any of you planning on telling me what you want anytime soon?"
"Yes," Steve perks up, taking yet another step closer to Tony. "I need you to have a look at these schematics SHIELD sent me as soon as possible. They're long, they're confusing, and I can't make heads or tails of them."
Steve holds out the tablet for him to take and there's a familiar, sick sense of wrong, wrong, wrong twisting in the pit of his stomach. It's only a lifetime of practice that keeps every muscle in his body from tensing.
"You know...why don't you just send it to me via email, or something. I can take a look at it when I get back to the lab."
"No, Tony," Steve presses, oblivious to the other's internal struggle. "It'll only take a second to look through them, and I'd rather have your input now as opposed to later."
"How 'bout this. Set it on there and, I'll get it in just a moment."
"What? No, why? You're standing right here. Just take it." Steve pushes the end of the tablet into Tony's chest with a bit more force and his expression becomes a bit harder than before. Cold eyes challenging him to make another excuse.
It's annoying because he knows the Cap is right. It shouldn't be a big deal. Just take it you moron. Stark men aren't sissy little bitches. Tony tries to shove down the irrational fear clawing at him and force his hands to cooperate, but it's like they have a mind of their own. They keep rebelling, cringing back on impulse. After a moment, he does manage to get his hands to hoover vaguely around the StarkPad and it looks as if he's going to succeed in taking it.
But then Steve lets go.
Tony instinctually recoils, and the fumbled tablet crashes heavily to the floor. It lands first along the seam, breaking open the casing, then bounces several times before landing face down, the distinct sound of breaking glass enough to assure that the screen has also shattered.
All of them wince at the sound.
For a moment Steve just stares in shocked silence at the broken piece of technology, but soon enough his face reddens in obvious anger.
"Damnit Stark!" Steve kneels to pick up what he can of the pieces. Sharp bits of black mirror, falling as he does. The back of the tablet has come completely separated from the front, exposing various chips and wires.
Tony grimaces, as he takes in the damage. "Eh, sorry about that."
"Really? Because it seems pretty clear to me that you did it on purpose."
Tony tries not to bristle. Of course, Mr. Self-righteous has to start with an accusation. Must be a day that ends in Y.
"I told you, I don't like being handed things."
Clint snorts at that while Nat just rolls her eyes, but Tony ignores them.
"This is—this is ruined." Steve's head is bowed as he stands once more, still surveying the broken pieces in his hands.
Tony sighs as a small hit of guilt kicks in. He knows Steve isn't good with technology. The man out of time had only just recently begun getting comfortable using the tablet, and it's easy to see how genuinely upset he is at it breaking.
"Don't worry too much about it, Cap," he tries for a reassuring tone. "Plenty more where that came from."
Apparently, that is not the right thing to say.
"You can't fix everything with money, Stark," Steve snaps, his glare joined by matching ones from Clint and Natasha.
"But I can fix this," Tony quips back. He's confused as to why Steve is making such a big deal out of this. He hadn't paid for the StarkPad anyway, and Tony has, like, a gazillion more. It shouldn't be a big deal. But no, Steve was too much like Howard. Practicality didn't factor into it. It's not the fact that it broke, it's the fact that Tony broke it. It doesn't matter that Tony can fix it. It only matters that Tony's is responsible for breaking it in the first place.
"That's not the point," Steve all but scowls.
"Yeah," Clint pipes in from his perch on the other side of the bar. "Might be a little hard to understand for spoiled rich brats who were born with a silver spoon in their mouths, but it kinda hurts our feelings when self-important jackasses think they're too good to take things from dirty plebes like us."
"Don't you think you're being a bit dramatic?"
"Ha!" Clint laughs, "I'm the one that's dramatic? You just let a perfectly good tablet get smashed to bits for no good reason. Other than you're too good to take it."
Tony tries not to scoff, he really does. Because honestly, he's heard this one too many times at this point. Actually, so many times, he's starting to get really tired of it. He has no problem getting his hands dirty. Haven't they seen him go all-in alongside his clean-up crews after a battle? Hasn't he done enough domestic chores—cooking for them, serving them drinks and cleaning up after meals—to contradict this notion that he somehow thinks he's better than everyone else?
And hasn't he worked tirelessly for them, adding to his already extensive workload from Fury and SI, to update all their gear and keep their weapons running in top shape, practically bowing to every demand, seriously exploring every whimsical idea they throw at him? Sure, he has money. And sure he doesn't feel bad spending it, but he hasn't been lazy or condescending, well at least not on purpose. And half of the time, he's spending money on them!
Besides, he doesn't know why he has such a stupid problem, but it's not like he's kept it a secret, so why can't they just accommodate him for once?
A surge of anger wars with a wave of embarrassment, and it takes all of Tony's considerable focus to suppress the flush threatening to creep over his ears.
"This is ridiculous. It's just a tablet. I broke it. I'll replace it."
"No, you're side-stepping the issue, Stark," Steve interjects before Tony can dismiss this whole conversation. "The point is, if you weren't so busy being…well, you…it never would've broken in the first place. Now it's a waste of time and money. Plus, I've gotta figure out how to recover everything I had stored on here."
"I could help wi—"
"And really, it's just the kind of petty, childish behavior I'm coming to expect from you, which is sad considering I know your father was a good man. It's disappointing he didn't raise you better than this."
Tony is about to make some quip about petty practically being his middle name, when that last comment hits like a punch to the gut and his mouth audibly clicks shut.
Steve is wearing his patented 'Captain America disapproves of you' face as he takes another step closer to him, using his considerable height advantage to loom in that vaguely threatening way Tony has always hated. He hated it when Howard did it, and he hates it just as much when Steve does it. Why is it that people always love to remind you how much bigger and more powerful they are?
"If you ever want to be even half the man your father was, you need to get over having everything your way, and start taking things seriously."
Any attempt to remain calm or snark his way out of this one dissipates, as the ball of anger in the pit of his stomach bursts into flames.
"Sorry, Cap. I didn't know the fairy tale, rainbows and kittens version you did," Tony spits. He tries to control his tone, but he can't quite help the bitterness that leaks through. "Maybe you were all buddy, buddy with my dad, but the Howard I knew was a cold, heartless bastard, who never gave a shit about me and couldn't wait to ship me off to boarding school the first chance he got."
"Well, gee. I wonder why. It'd take a saint not to want to be rid of you at some point."
Tony knows the comment shouldn't hurt all that bad. He should just brush it off like he does everything else. After all, far worse has been said about him, and said loudly, for the majority of his life.
But for some reason coming from his team, from people he is beginning, against his better instincts, to trust. After all their battles together, after over a year of living together…it cuts deeper than he would've ever anticipated.
Suddenly his ears are ringing, the world feels like it's spinning and he's worried his legs really will give out in front of everyone, a final confirmation of his worthlessness for all to see.
Tony knows he should stand his ground. Come up with something witty and dismissive to show that they haven't got to him. But all he can think about is how to get out of here. He can't argue something he already knows is true. Howard had screamed it at him during every beating, every cold look, every snear. He can't deal with this.
To his utter embarrassment, he flees. Turns and stumbles toward the elevator without another word. He's tired, he just needs to sleep, forget everything else.
"What a drama queen," he hears Clint snicker in the background.
That's right. Just a spoiled, worthless brat who they kept around for the gadgets and the free rent, that's all he is to them. That's all he'll ever be. He doesn't know why he's so disappointed. He doesn't know why he ever thought it'd be any different.
Guilt and remorse rain heavily down on Steve, mingling sickly with the self-hatred and hopeless sense of worthlessness that permeates from Tony. Feelings he'd caused. Now that he is getting to experience the other side of it, he finds his own behavior ugly and abhorrent.
Unfortunately, he doesn't have much time to think about it. Before he can register any more than that, the scene changes. It's not the chamber or the white room, so Steve knows they've been drawn directly into another flashback.
They're in a cave of some sort. The place is dark and flooded with a sense of fear, and there are men speaking harshly in a language he doesn't understand, as they drag a semi-conscious Tony into the room between them.
Stark is already bloodied when they tie him to the slab. It's filthy, crusted with dirt, old blood, and god only knows what else. Steve notices one man in particular, thin and shaking, who seems to be in charge of what is about to happen. The other men bark at him, pointing their guns before he takes up one of the gleaming tools from the metal tray next to him and begins the long, merciless procedure.
The whole thing is a nightmare shit show, sadistically played on a repeated loop. Stark's chest is flayed open. His tortured cries and desperate pleas rend the air as he writhes beneath the scalpel.
Several of the men are yelling, trying to hold him down. There's so much blood they're all covered in it, especially the one in round glasses, straddling him. The blood doesn't seem to deter them though, they just grip the mechanic harder as the doctor changes instruments, no longer holding a scalpel, but a saw in his hands. Steve has only a second to realize what they are about to do before the buzzing begins and the saw comes down. Tony's screams reach a fever pitch of sheer, mindless agony.
Eventually, they dose him with a chloroform, and for a few moments Tony goes blessedly limp. But after a short while he awakens and it starts all over again.
Steve yells for them to Stop! Stop hurting him! But Steve has no body here and thus no voice. There's so much noise. Tony's shrieks are gut-wrenching and visceral, and his terror and pain leak into Steve's brain like needles dipped in poison.
Impotent and chained by silence, Steve screams with him.
Natasha woke and froze, the only indicator she was conscious was the large breath she took before she could control the strength of it. Her heart hammered in her chest and she resisted raising her head to check on the skull that she had felt crack against the wall a mere second ago. With her eyes closed she chanted the truth, forcing her limbs to relax as several microflexes confirmed that her skull was still intact and she wasn't in any more pain than the bruise she'd gotten on her temple and elbow when she'd collapsed to the ground.
Tuning her senses outwards she could tell the others hadn't gotten out yet as there was no movement, and no one else besides maybe Clint would be trained at playing dead as a precautionary tactic in enemy territory.
Painstakingly, slowly she lifted her lids, taking a moment to reorient herself. She'd been in a different position when she'd been flung against the wall in Tony's mind. In reality, she lay sprawled in the doorway of the chamber. Her shoulders lay within the hallway and she cracked her lids open further as the green light of the alien and warm light of Tony's sentinels allowed her to see several feet down the dark hallway.
Shifting her eyes down, she could just see the inside of the room where the green light intensified. She knew Tony would be on the slab in the center of the room, and she tried to remember where the others had been standing before they collapsed. Bruce had been the closest; she knew that. Steve was probably right on his heels. That left Barton, who would have hung back closer to her position.
She quieted her heart and strained her ears to hear any sound of movement. Very, very slowly she tapped out a light Morse code, just loud enough for someone nearby to hear, but soft enough to hopefully escape alien notice. The green light didn't move beyond it's strange shifting pulse but she didn't hear any response. She waited a full minute just in case. She'd given him warning before her little departure stunt and had no idea whether he'd taken the cue and followed her out.
She couldn't tell how time had worked while they were trapped in Tony's mind. Seconds could have passed or it could have been days. Focusing back on herself, the hollow feeling in her stomach and the dryness of her mouth alerted her that some time had indeed passed, though it couldn't be more than a few days. Anymore, and they would have all died from dehydration.
Time as a factor reaffirmed, she tried to decide what to do. The weaker Tony got the more the excess hormones would ravage his system. Attacking the entity solo may end up with her back where she started, which wouldn't help anybody. While she could see it now, it had been completely undetectable before and there was no telling if it could disappear as quickly as it had appeared. How did she fight an enemy that she couldn't even perceive?
The smart move was to slip away and get help. She knew that SHIELD was monitoring their progress. She was sure it had been at least 24 hours. They would know by now that something had gone wrong and send a team to retrieve them, and with something this big she'd put money on Fury sending his best agents. That meant Coulson and his gang; a formidable team with a pair of brilliant minds that may be capable of finding a way to fight this thing as long as they knew what they were walking into.
Decision made, she began the laborious task of picking herself up. She had no idea how fast this thing could go but Stark had indicated that it could go faster than she could run, so alerting it to her presence was very much not ideal. Her finger taps had gone unnoticed however, so using that as her threshold for volume she painstaking began to shift herself further out of the room.
Her heart hammered in her chest, eyes constantly shifting to monitor the green glow behind her, a sight she didn't dare look at just yet. It took her five minutes to work her way onto her knees. Time enough for the dirty floor beneath her nose to tell her a story she didn't understand but hoped was true. Someone else had been here. Swiveling her eyes about she could make out the drag of Tony's body and the footprints of the other four Avengers. But overlaid on several of the prints was a fifth pair, smaller than any of the other prints including her own.
It took her another five minutes to make it from her knees to her feet, as she cast about for a logical explanation. There could be more entities besides the glowing one behind her, but there'd been no indication that it had human form, much less feet. Plus the prints below her looked smudged and sloppy, as if the person had been running. They'd have to have been incredibly fast to outrun their captor though.
The name of a SHIELD asset popped into her mind as she took her first step away from the door. She stopped. If her reading was correct then SHIELD was already aware of their situation and most likely making a plan of rescue. If that was true then perhaps her mission had changed. With help on the way it may be better for her to try and help her comrades here, or create a distraction.
Uncertainty warred within her mind, but there was no time for hesitation. She needed to make a choice.