Chapter 17
The morning consisted of waking up at the crack ass of dawn, neither's training allowing them to sleep past that. Since they were awake, they got up, though it did end up with both of them at the diner at the crack ass of the clock whenever the sun decided to rise.
Breakfast was a quiet affair where Salem had to refuse to take the mini pistol Bucky had on him at all times.
After a staring contest between both former HYDRA captives, Salem grumbled about old people and took the damn gun.
)()()(
"Answer your fucking phones!" Salem almost screamed as the ringing kept coming.
LILITH was trying to get through to Peter and Ned at the same time but neither of them were answering.
Salem had just figured out that if the artefact went through a scanner of any sort, including metal detectors such as the ones that would be used at the Decathlon venue, it could turn the artefact into an explosive.
She was driving as fast as possible within the legal limit but there was unexpected traffic due to a construction site nearby. It took Salem far longer than it should have for her to get anywhere near where she should have been ages ago.
"Fina-fucking-ly!" She said when she got through to Ned. "Where's the core? And where's Peter?"
"Peter's with Michelle, talking about a book or something. Core?"
"The purple thingy! The one I wanted," She said.
"Oh, don't worry. It's safe in my backpack," He said. "I'll be a moment. We're going through security."
"No! Don't—" She slammed her hands on the wheel, taking a breath to calm herself as she sped up. "LILITH, where is he?"
"Ned is at the Washington Monument with the Decathlon group," LILITH said. "They have gone through security and the core has now been made explosive. You have a couple of minutes before it explodes. Want me to tell Peter to suit up?"
"Yeah," Salem parked, jumping out of her car as soon as possible while grabbing her sunglasses. She activated her suit, bringing the gun and strapping it to one of the holsters that suddenly appeared on her thighs. "Thank you, Shuri!"
She sprinted towards the monument, a little faster than the average Avenger so she was getting looks from people around her as her hair changed to be completely white. She activated a primal part of her abilities as she groaned in frustration as she had to put on her gloves.
Salem slipped them on, letting them conform to her hand shape once again as fear rushed itself into the forefront of her mind. She shook the fear of pain away, letting anger and determination replace it.
"Where is he?"
"Spider-Man is at the base of the monument."
LILITH zoomed in as Salem looked in that direction, letting her see the figure of Peter speaking to MJ. He suddenly looked around, catching sight of her running towards him before he excused himself with a sheepish smile. MJ shrugged him off.
"His senses alerted him to the danger," LILITH said, then paused as there was a rumble at the top of the huge tower. "The Chitauri core has detonated and caused severe structural damage to the elevator."
"Fuck," She muttered as she continued towards the monument, getting there just in time to see Spider-Man appear suited up. She was lucky because as she was running, she was charging up her energy resources.
As Spider-Man climbed the wall on all fours, Salem stepped onto the wall of the monument like gravity didn't matter to her. He climbed while she ran up,
"How are you doing that?" He had to yell, only quietening when Karen and LILITH connected comms. "What else can you do?"
"A lot more shit," She said. "Ten minutes before it completely blows."
"We'd better hurry up!"
They continued upwards until they were only dots to the viewers below them.
"You have one hundred and twenty-five seconds until catastrophic failure," Karen said, making Peter falter as he took in the information.
"Not a great time to stop!" Salem walked over, encouraging him to continue again.
"She's right," LILITH said. Unexpected motion has caused the deterioration to escalate. You need to hurry."
"We know!" They stopped at the top of the monument. "Karen, activate a reconnaissance drone and find us a way in."
A tiny, spider-shaped robot came out of Peter's suit. It flew around and found the best entry point, a window on the southwest of the monument. Peter faltered again when he realised how high up he was. Lucky for him, Karen was much more empathic than Salem would have been.
"You have also not reinstalled your parachute, so a fall from this height would most likely be lethal,"
That made Salem pause.
"You haven't fucking what?" She almost screamed into the comms as she tried to hit the window with her fist. "Guys. Such idiots."
"I agree."
"Me too."
The sound of helicopters was unwelcome as they came closer. Salem felt the twitch to just take the pistol and shoot at one of the pilots to just get them away, she squashed it down.
"This is DC Metro police. Identify yourselves!"
"Avenger by proxy!" Salem screamed at them so they could hear. "We have been authorised for missions within the United States of America by the Avenger Creed."
The helicopter faltered but quickly left after that. Salem's desire to shoot them down went away as she broke through the window and got both herself and Spider-Man into the building.
They leapt towards the elevator shaft, Peter quickly getting hold of the falling elevator with his webs as Salem went to help one of the students out. She got one out before Spider Man's footing broke, the glass shattering and making him fall forward.
She swore silently, taking one look down the shaft before jumping down it. Softening her landing by grabbing hold of the pieces of metal that surrounded the shaft, she got down to where Spider-Man was holding up the elevator with his strength and webbing.
"What are you doing?" Bucky's voice said in the intercom between them. "How the fuck did this happen?"
"Is that? You know who— Winter Sergeant?!" Spider-Man said, not realising that the others could hear him speak.
"Yeah, it's me," Bucky said. "I'm outside doing damage control. Salem, get the core and get out of there. Parker can help them out. I'm watching the feed from Salem's sunglasses."
"That's so cool!" Ned said. "You're both superheroes here to save us!"
"I've never heard of superheroes with white hair and Magic?" Liz said, accusingly. "What's your name anyway?"
"Medusa."
Bucky had given her the suggestion to name herself as such. Since her love for snakes and the fact that her hair would stick up everywhere when she woke up, he thought Medusa suited her well.
She grabbed the webbing from Spider-Man, letting him create another one to anchor the elevator better. It took less than half a minute with their equal super strength but the elevator was at the right level for them to get out.
Ned and Mr Harrinton got out first, Spider-Man right after. Medusa got out next since she was closer. She went back for Liz but before they could hold hands to get out, the elevator started to fall along with Liz.
Medusa had anchored herself, sensing that Spider-Man was going to be too slow for any help.
As the elevator fell, Medusa jumped.
Liz screamed in fear as she felt weightless, closing her eyes for the impact she knew was going to come any second. Instead, she opened her eyes to see Medusa holding onto the metal wire cage that surrounded the shaft of the elevator, one hand linked between the thick wires while the other held Liz by her hand.
The elevator broke several floors beneath them, destroyed.
"You'll want to close your eyes for this bit," Medusa said, half smirking as fear surfaced on Liz's face as she let go.
Liz screamed, closing her eyes again.
Medusa sighed, touching her sternum with her glove to get a quick boost.
Smoke seemed to appear around her as Medusa appeared at the bottom of the shaft, ready to catch Liz as she fell into her arms without another scratch on her.
After getting Liz out to the ambulances to check for any injuries, she went over to Bucky as Spider-Man turned back to Peter and disappeared.
Cameras were all around them as Bucky tried to sort out whatever was needed. The media was going to have a brilliant day about this. The press tried to get interviews with both Bucky and Salem as Medusa but they were quickly ushered away by police.
)()()(
The press was having a field day with the pictures and videos from the other day, circulating them around.
Pepper had the media department of Stark Industries alert her to any news that had to do with the Avengers, wanting to keep an eye on Tony, and apparently now Salem too.
She rewatched the videos that spanned the whole scene of the monument accident, catching sight of a Medusa and Winter Sargent as they spoke to authorities in regards to what happened.
While the average person who didn't know Salem personally, Pepper could tell simply by the way Medusa carried herself that they were one in the same. And when Pepper realised, it was like a veil was lifted and she could see everything about Medusa that made her Salem.
Pepper remembered that Shuri made the Medusa medallion, making a note to send a gift to the princess as a thank you.
)()()(
Every call she got from her dad, she declined it in favour of not having to deal with him then. She sent him a text that said the core was unusable and had been destroyed, which did happen but not voluntarily.
Salem spent the next couple nights at the compound, more because she didn't want to be alone. She took her old room back, taking enough with her to last a couple of days.
She hadn't realised that both Wanda and Vision had left the compound, choosing to become back up if there was a need. They were off somewhere.
The compound felt empty as it was only Rhodey, Bucky and herself at the moment. Though Rhodey was at the Accords HQ more often than not.
)()()(
"So," MJ started, sitting down at the table with Salem as lunch came. "What's your plan for Homecoming?"
"Homecoming?" Salem repeated, making a face. "I didn't plan anything. Realistically, I didn't plan to even go to this school but plans changed."
"You going stag then?"
"Probs,"
"Fair," MJ nodded. "Dress or no dress?"
Salem made a face. "I haven't decided yet. Too much shit's been happening for me to concentrate on a stupid dance. Don't even know if I want to go."
)()()(
Salem lounged on the sofa of the living area of the compound, wearing a pair of leggings and a grey t-shirt as she chomped on brownie ice cream.
On a huge holographic screen, the footage was showing the three men from Peter's arms deal. LILITH was scanning the other two individuals while Salem read a file on Aaron Davis as she also watched Peter as Spider-Man go out and confront the guy.
"Spying on the kid?" Bucky asked, quickly taking a seat near her as he dipped a metal finger into the huge bowl of ice cream she had.
She jabbed the spoon at his metal arm. "Of course. Someone needs to keep an eye on him."
"Not because you think he's cute?" Bucky grinned, jumping up as Salem went to lunge at him.
"Fuck off!"
"I'm not wrong then,"
"Screw you, Barney,"
"Watch him," Bucky gestured to the feed from Spider Man's suit. "He found them. And now Stark is calling him."
She slumped in her space on the couch, taking the ice cream as Tony began to speak to Peter through the suit. Both Bucky and Salem knew this was supposed to be a private conversation but they didn't care, they had no real sense of privacy anymore, not since HYDRA conditioned it out of them.
"Incoming call from Tony Stark," Karen said, accepting the call before Peter could stop.
"Got a sec, Mr Parker?" Tony asked, obviously in a car as he called.
"Uh," Peter thought quickly. "I'm at school actually."
"No, you're not," Karen said.
Tony didn't look convinced but he shook it off. "Nice work in D.C. I was surprised to see Salem helping you. Medusa? Good name."
Peter didn't know what to say to that so he went with "Okay."
"My dad never really gave me a lot of support…" Tony said, looking away in shame. "And since I can't break the cycle of shame with Salem because she refuses to talk to me recently, I wanna try—"
"Uh, I'm kind of in the middle of something right now,"
Tony scowled. "Don't cut me off when I'm complimenting you. Anyway, great things are about to— What is that?"
The ferry blew its horn loudly, alerting.
"I'm at band practice."
"That's odd. Happy told me you quit band six weeks ago," He paused, eyes narrowing in the way only a parent did, making Peter feel guilty for lying. "What's up?
"I gotta go. Uh, end call,"
Tony turned angry. "Hey—!"
Salem just snorted as she took another mouthful of ice cream. "Ha. Dad deserves that!"
"Does he?"
"Why wouldn't he?" Salem said, tilting her head. "He's letting a literal teenager fight battles without any training and expect him to follow orders. Like come on, that's asking for trouble…"
She continued to eat the ice cream.
Bucky gestured to the screen. "Looks like he did ask for trouble."
"What?" She sat up, looking at the screen before dropping the spoon in the bowl as she stood up. "Fuck. Fuck. Fucktiy fuck. How'd he get the FBI involved already? Watch Duke for me!"
She grumbled as she suited up, touching the medallion and only needing to tuck her gloves into a pocket before she was good to leave.
"And she says she doesn't like him," Bucky shook his head, sitting down where she had been as LILITH activated Salem's feed for him to watch. Duke slithered to lay on the armrest next to him, curling up in a small pile.