Here comes the next chapter and I would like to thank my Beta: lillisa34.

Also, I have decided to dedicate this story to my faithful dog Nico who died on April 1st after living with me and my family for over 15 years. He was very faithful, playful, gentle Labrador-Pointer, but also a protector and mischief maker and I will miss him very much.

And apparently this story has been nominated for two awards and I have not the foggiest what to do:

1. ) The Non-Canon Awards - www. thenoncanonawards . wordpress . com (remove spaces)

2.) 2016 BetterinTexas Fiction awards

Now on with the story: Have fun and please (*begging on my knees*) leave a comment. Thank you!


Bella the shield Chapter 13

Bella was dodging another one of her opponent's vicious attacks. Six month of almost every day physical martial arts training with Natasha, Clint and other agents and her clumsiness was a thing in the past!

Fighting against Natasha was the most difficult practice, because she never held back lately and Bella learned a lot from her. Clint was fighting like a protective mother hen or like a bigger brother. He demanded a lot during practice, but she had detected that he always held back.

For the other agents she was training with, she was still the rookie, who had not even been to the academy. This meant that they loved to prank her and never held back. She had no problems anymore to run at full speed for hours, and fight against more than one opponent.

Her weapon training extended to not only small handguns, but also other bigger ones, knives, swords and grenades. Agent Harkness was a big help and because she still had huge respect for these kinds of things. She knew that these arms were not for fun, but for taking lives and she did not know if she would be able to take one if she had too.

When she had asked him why she had to learn how to use swords Natasha's only response had been: "You'd be surprised." Harkness had told her that no one would expect her to kill, but she should be aware of scenarios where she could save countless lives by killing just one person.

Unfortunately, she could imagine them, but still did not like it. Knowing that she would not be able to go to any university in the foreseeing future, Bella had downloaded several reading lists of the biggest Universities and was slowly working through them.

To her uncle's delight, she had also started to expand her knowledge of foreign languages and different slangs. The Roman Languages were no problem for her as they were all quite similar in structure and lexique, the Semitic languages were more challenging as she had to learn new alphabets, but she soon discovered their similarities and was able to improve slightly. Russian was very challenging for her, as she seemed to have a deep-rooted distaste for the big country and especially its leader. Knowing only parts of what has been done to Natasha in the Red Room and the distaste created, for the first time in her life, she had learner's block for learning a language.

Natasha even needed to tutor her, a fact that had her uncle, Clint and Eric in stitches. A week after her adventurous graduation, she had finally gotten rid of her vampire scar through Dr. Cho's Cradle. The team diligently removed it and Dr. Cho had then proceeded to create new tissue using the Cradle. She really could not tell the difference between Dr. Cho's created tissue and her own.

One late evening, she was sitting on her bed, and marvelled at S.H.I.E.L.D. technology and realized she was finally free of that cold ugly scar. Stark and S.H.I.E.L.D. had then fought over the small sample. Stark had finally found, after long and tedious negotiations, a compromise with the agency. This was the first compromise he had ever made in his life and was a real testimony how important the current vampire problem was. He worked at an S.H.I.E.L.D. facility for the uncovering of any secrets the tissue held.

Bella saw finally an opening in her opponents defence and wanted to use it, but just as she tried to move her right hand a disturbingly loud and regular sound appeared, which she knew meant evacuation. What the Hell is happening?! All the agents around her froze and after a heartbeat started running to help with the evacuation. Jogging through the corridor to her sleeping area, she saw Maria Hill, Fury's second beside her Uncle running through the corridor yelling something that sounded like Tesseract in her headphone. Bella stopped in her tracks. If the Tesseract was reacting strangely than she should go down and look if she was able to help Eric stabilizing it. She had after all read his work, allowed or not, and helped him with the base calculations sometimes. With his connections to several top notch Universities she thought it best to help him. Clint was also down there surveying everything while Natasha was on a mission. Maybe I should ask Phil? Nah, no time. With that, she ran towards the area where she knew the stairs were. Taking the lift during an evacuation was never a good idea and the protocol was forbidding it except moving tech. Running and skipping several steps she finally managed to come down fast to the lowest base level and raced along the corridor grey buzzing with people. The security door towards the stairs had been open. This was not good!

"Eric, what is going on? Can I help?" she asked jogging towards her mentor past the testing apparatus and the screening panels.

"Bella! The Tesseract is just misbehaving. Look at the readings!" he mentioned. The blond NASA scientist in the room rolled her eyes at her not believing that Selvick included the girl without a Degree.

Bella stood next to the blonde scientist and checked the readings of the past four hours. Eric and another scientist stood in front of the Tesseract again and every time they tried to poke it with a large metal stick, it spiked as if it was defending itself. Bella checked again and realised that they must have tried to shut the electricity off. As the Tesseract was an energy source, it was turning itself on again. However, what worried her most was the gradual fast rising energy levels. In addition, low-level gamma radiation. She knew that alpha and beta radiation was not dangerous to the human being, but gamma radiation was very harmful. If that thing exploded then it would be hundred times worse than Chernobyl. Suddenly another fluctuation on the screen that indicated, like the readings before that; there would be a bigger spike.

"Talk to me doctor." The voice from the Director, walking towards Selvick and the Tesseract.

"Director," Selvick stated stepping down from the walkway the Tesseract was located.

"Is there anything certain?"

"The Tesseract is misbehaving." he said and the blue cube was spiking just as he said the word misbehaving while the scientist standing before it hissed.

"Is that supposed to be funny?" Fury scolded. "No it's not funny at all." Selvick answered him promptly. "She is not only active but she is …behaving."

"I assume you pulled the plug." Fury wanted to know. He knew that sometimes scientists were focused on complicated problems; and did not think about the simplest answers to solutions.

Nodding at the director he said:"She is a power source. We turn off the power and she turns it back on. If it reaches peak level…" You've been prepared for this, doctor." Fury interrupted him. Harnessing energy from space." "We don't have to harness." Selvick answered him from behind the screen."Our calculations are far from complete. She is throwing off interference and low-level gamma radiation, nothing harmful." Fury who had been staring at the very object of their conversation turned his gaze back to the scientist and stated: "That can be harmful."

Looking at the data, Bella started to get an idea, but she hoped that she was wrong. "Eric, I think I have an idea." she called him and had several set of eyes on her. Why did I not keep my mouth shut? She hated that she was temporarily the centre of attention.

"Agent Swan, what are you doing down here?" the director asked her knowing full well that he had allowed her to assist Selvick from time to time.

He calls me Agent? "Sorry, I heard Agent Hill saying something about the Tesseract and looked to see if I would be able to help. The security doors to the stairs was open." she stated and received a nod from him.

"What idea do you have concerning the Tesseract?" Eric asked her but she started to explain. "We are creating a portal to the other end of space to harness energy. If we have done nothing to set it off, then maybe it is from the other side?" she explained.

"The other side?" Fury clarified. "Yes. A portal can be open from both sides. We do not know where it originally came from. We do not know the technology out there. So maybe the tampering has been from the other side." Bella explained further getting a very pensive look from the large man.

Turning away from her, he ordered Barton down from his "nest" via his headpiece, came sliding down a rope, and reported. "No one has come or gone when it started spiking. Bella was the first running down after the evacuation alarm. Selvick's clean, no contacts." Pointing at Bella, he stated further, "Like the kid said, the tampering wasn't on our side."

The blond NASA scientist called again."Doctor, it's spiking again." But this time it was one of the strongest spikes as it shook the entire building and Bella pulled the other two men down the ramp who were all to happy to comply and followed her as she put more distance between them and the blue cube, which seemed to not stop it's spiking. Actually, it seemed that the spikes became more frequent as if they were counting down to something. All eyes were on the Tesseract whose spiking accelerated while looking like a blue spiral and Bella did not dare to breathe as her heart started to beat faster.

All of a sudden, there was a dull loud sound and the Tesseract was spiking again! With its longest spike towards the higher round walkway and created a round formation of complete energy, Bella could make out something that looked suspiciously like space and stars. It seemed that she had been right earlier. Just as she started to accept that she saw real stars inside a huge bunker, there was an explosion of blue energy. Which forced her back a few steps, and to close her eyes. With her eyes closed, she could hear a sizzling sound and someone breathing heavily far away.

When she opened her eyes, she stood next to Fury and saw someone kneeling on the round walkway at the very end of the room. Four heavily armed security personnel were soundlessly moving towards the stranger. The stranger was slowly looking up, still breathing heavily. He had black shoulder long hair, was very pale, almost as pale as a vampire was, and dressed in dark clothes and was holding a spear. Every fibre in Bella's body was screaming danger and she did not even have a weapon to defend anyone or herself.

While the stranger was standing up slowly, he took in his surroundings and saw the four men slowly moving towards him. Two operatives were standing next to the Tesseract with a familiar looking, dark haired female. He narrowed his eyes at her. What in Odin's cursed name is the girl from my dreams doing here?

"Sir, please put down the spear!" the dark skinned man who seemed to be their leader ordered. Nevertheless, Loki had no desire to put down his weapon. Looking almost lovingly at the crystal as if contemplating it he suddenly stopped and fired an energy spike towards the man who was pulled aside by the smaller man next to him. The girl also jumped out of the way and therefore he missed his target, but all hell broke loose as four men started shooting at him that never went through his armour. Jumping down at two, he killed them with his spear and he shot two of his hidden knives at the other two also killing them instantly. "Shit, I need a weapon!" Bella cursed and Barton tossed her one of his countless hidden handguns that she immediately unlocked. While Loki attacked the blond NASA scientist she kneeled next to Barton and started shooting at the stranger's head, who reacted by shooting another of his spear's spikes towards them.

Bella and Barton jumped out of the way in time but one of the other operatives was hit full on. Barton, having emptied his clip just managed to stand again when the alien man came at him with his spear, but Barton moved out of the way and tried to attack Loki using hand to hand combat. Unfortunately, the large man stopped him and held his left arm. Trying to wiggle out of the grip Barton realised that he was not strong enough. "You have heart." the stranger said lifting his spear towards his prey's heart and Bella still lying on her stomach on the floor saw that Barton's eyes turned a dark shade of blue then to a lighter shade, while he gasped and stopped fighting the stranger. When he looked at the stranger malice towards him was gone. Bella could not stand and watch and before she knew what she was doing she jumped up and attacked the stranger herself while she shouted: "No!" Barton!" Just as she about to reach him, he turned around and caught her arm. His delicate hand was cold and she did not want the same to happen to her. She did not want to lose her mind again. He was controlling Barton! She kicked towards his hopefully vulnerable area, but he blocked her again bringing up the spear to her heart. "You are a spirited fighter! I need that." he smiled putting the spear above her heart and she could feel the cold rushing over her body towards her head, but it just washed over her and never reached her eyes. Instead, it looked as if it was repelled back into the crystal. The stranger lost his winning smile as if he could not explain what he had just witnessed. He lessened the pressure holding her hand as he stared at his spear in wonder. Bella still having a clear head wiggled out of his grip, spun around and kicked her elbow with all force against the spot between his shoulder blades and to his astonishment, he bowed forward from the force of her attack. Angry, he retaliated by turning around and pushing her. Bella had no time to process what just happened as she flew backwards. Letting her temporarily out of his sight, he touched one other man with his spear, which automatically became his minion.

In the meantime, Fury had used the distraction of the fight to get the Tesseract in its usual silver metal case that was specifically designed for the cube. Bella slowly stood up again. Her back would probably get some nasty bruises. She crouched to one of the dead security guards and unclipped his still unused handgun. She knew she could not attack the stranger, but the Tesseract in his hands was unthinkable. The damage he could do was completely unthinkable. She had to help Fury get the Tesseract out of the stranger's reach.

Just as Fury closed the case and stood up as the dark haired stranger said, "Please don't." It almost sounded vulnerable. "I still need that." However, Fury rebuked. "This does not have to get any messier."

But the arrogant pale man hissed."Of course it does. I've come too far for anything else." Fury turned around again. "I am Loki, Of Asgard." The stranger finally presented his name. Eric, bowing over the blond NASA scientist and checking for a pulse seemed to know the name as his head perked up. "Loki!" he murmured standing up. Bella had heard from the incident in New Mexico from her uncle when he had explained how he had first met the scientist. This maniac had sent the destroyer to flatten a small town, because he was jealous of his elder brother! Not good!

"And I come with glorious purpose." Loki was interrupted by Eric who was standing up while calling. "You're Loki, brother of Thor." This seemed to madden his look. "Eric, step back." Bella ordered. He walks too close to him!

"We have no quarrel with your people." Fury calmly tried to convey to the mad man.

"An ant does not have a quarrel with a boot." Loki said, but was interrupted by an irate Bella. "Are planning to step on us?"

Nevertheless, he did not answer her directly but started to boast striding towards Eric. "I come with glad tidings." Turning towards Fury again, he stated. "Of a world made free."

"Free of what!" Fury and Bella said in unison as she stepped next to him on the platform. "Freedom is life's great lie. Once you accept that in your heart." he said turning fast towards Eric and Bella could see that another person was becoming Loki's minion. "Sir, Get the Tesseract, away." Bella hissed at Fury while she clicked the safety of her new handgun, shouted, and waited for the opportune moment. "You say peace, but I think you mean the other thing." Fury stated while nodding shortly at Bella to indicate that he had understood her.

"Sir, Director Fury is stalling. This place is 'bout to blow and drop a hundred feet of rock on us. He means to bury us." Barton informed Loki while marching up to him.

"Like the Pharaohs of old." came the calm answer from the man standing behind her.

"He is right. The portal is collapsing in itself. We have two minutes before this goes critical." Eric cut in. Loki turned his head towards Barton and nodded. However, Bella was faster and shot a warning shot towards the man who had taken part in her training while shouting "Now!" Fury took her cue and rushed towards the exit with the case. Loki blocked the shot with his staff and shouted to get after him! Barton, Eric and the security man were on the director's heels. However, Bella had none of it. She could not attack Loki, but the other three were human and she could at least try to stop them. Nevertheless, unfortunately Loki had more tricks up his sleeves. Just as Fury was about to get out of the door Loki appeared in front of him and blocked the door. Bella confused about the two Loki's' in the room and tried to attack Barton but was pulled back by one of the two Loki's by her hand. Barton gave one shot and obviously hit the director who yelled out in pain. Bella wanted to wiggle out of Loki's grasp but he pulled her closer and while one hand was holding her, the second arm, still holding the staff, wrapped around her throat and she started to have difficulties breathing and she started struggling. He was killing her! She desperately hoped that the director had gotten away with the Tesseract while she could not take it anymore and darkness was engulfing her after such a long time.