A/N: Chap 10 review responses are in my forums as normal. Thanks for reading.


Chapter Eleven: The Caged Bird

Fury looked exhausted.

Natasha knew the look—the half-lidded eye and the conservation of movement. It was easy to forget because of how good a shape he kept himself in, but Nick Fury was not a young man.

She entered the command deck from the back entrance. Ahead, through the viewing dome, she caught a spectacular view of a coastline in the distance, and beyond that, the Gulf of Mexico. It wasn't their original destination, but the very first thing their alien guest told them upon surrendering was how easy it would be to kill them all.

"I could knock this machine from the air in two shots," Swan told them. "Loki chose to let you capture him. Don't presume this machine is safe."

So, they were heading south at top speed to get over water.

Hill was running things-the youngest Deputy Director in Shield history had the double burden of her duties, and the lingering doubt that she got her job through favoritism. Natasha thought the other woman's doubt was silly. Of course she got the job through favoritism. There were over a hundred senior agents who were easily more qualified and deserving. Coulson, for example.

Fury favored her not because of her looks, but because of her loyalty. For a spymaster, that was far more important than tenure. Just like he kept Coulson in the field for the same reason.

The director himself leaned against a handrail and stared down into the operations pit they had dedicated to the search for the tesseract. Sitwell was senior in the pit, but so far there wasn't anything to report. On the monitor, she could see Thor and Rogers speaking to their winged prisoner.

She walked over and leaned on the rail, facing away from the pit. "Any word on Coulson?"

Fury blinked back exhaustion and forced himself to focus on Natasha. "He's in surgery in Austin. Last word I heard was 'optimistic'."

Natasha knew better than to be optimistic. Things hurt more when you had hope. Still, she'd seen people survive worse. Turning around, she saw on one monitor SHIELD response teams swarming through Stark Tower.

"She said they were going to New York."

"If they are, they aren't there yet," Fury muttered. "I'm beginning to think Loki kept her in the dark too."

"She admitted he probably did. 'Course, she could be lying. Soooo, who's Vers?"

In the pit below, she noticed how hard Sitwell was trying not to listen. If she noticed, she knew Fury noticed.

He left the rail without a word and drifted to the conference table. He sank into one of the chairs tiredly. "A friend I ran into back in '89," he said. "She was the inspiration behind the Avengers project. The fact our girl name-dropped Vers makes me think she's telling the truth."

On the floor, they heard a voice call, "Commander, we have an unscheduled arrival. Quinjet ABB-729. Climbing to forty thousand, requesting landing clearance."

"Over a civilian area?" Hill sounded pissed. "Put me on."

Natasha dismissed it as Hill walked over to handle the issue. "Loki hasn't moved in his cell." She put her phone on the table, with the CCTV footage playing. The villain simply sat on the floor in the middle of the floor. Occasionally he moved his head as if in reaction to something, but otherwise remained still.

"He's waiting," Fury muttered.

"For what?"

"I don't know, but I'm pretty sure I'm not going to like it."

Hill's frantic voice rose above the normal din of operations. "Shots fired! Shot's fired! Hostiles have…"

The explosion from the port side of the ship hit so hard Natasha went flying from her seat. The air filled with alarms as the floor lurched sickeningly to the port side of the craft. She caught a brief glimpse of the coastline turning at the entirely wrong angle.

Fury picked himself up, all signs of exhaustion burned away by adrenaline. "Report!"

"External explosion! Engine three is down!" Hill's voice scratched a little from barely contained panic. "Engine 4 is compensating, but it's running at 105% capacity. We have gunshots fired in the main bay. Hostiles are...grenade!"

What?

Natasha dove into Fury's side as a grenade hit the floor near the director's station. She felt a hard, sickening thud in the meat of her calf and bit back a cry. All around, wounded personnel were crying out for help. Consoles across the floor were sparking.

Fragmentation grenade. A strike team in heavy tactical gear rushed into the room with assault carbines at the ready. Hill, her face coated in blood from a nasty cut on her head, looked up from where she'd fallen and then cursed as the first infiltrator opened fire.

Despite the hit to her calf, Natasha jumped up and rolled over the conference table. The move brought her feet into position to kick the rear-most of the four-man squad right in the face.

She knew the team was professional when only two of the remaining three turned to address her, while the leader continued to spray gunfire across the command deck. Hill was trying to return fire, as were two other agents, but the leader had a commanding position over them and a sharp eye.

Natasha dove behind her target; the two men tracked her position perfectly and fired until she drew even with their colleague. The man himself attempted to get clear but she hit him with a widow's bite that acted like a taser.

As good as the infiltration team was, they made one fatal flaw. They lost eyes on Nicholas J. Fury.

The one-eyed director of SHIELD ignored the two gunning for Natasha, instead firing with deadly accuracy into the back of the lead infiltrator's neck, just under his helmet. The man dropped; the two firing on Natasha realized the danger, but by then Fury had already closed. He didn't try punching or kicking. He drew to point-blank range and fired his Glock at weak points around their armor.

Natasha deployed her second Widow's Bite and took her first target out for later questioning. Rolling, she kicked at the remaining agent's knee just as the man managed to knock Fury's gun out of the line of fire.

The distraction allowed Fury to finish him with brutal efficiency.

Hill stood, thinking the attack was contained, only to spin away with a cry and a spray of blood. Fury and Natasha both looked up to the main ventilation shaft and saw a figure partially obscured behind the vents. She and Fury both fired, but the position was well protected.

An arrow flashed out, striking a console across the floor, and then the shadow was gone.

"Barton," Fury hissed. "Romanov, you hit?"

"I've had worse."

"Loki. Go!"

He was heading toward Hill as Natasha left to go after Barton and, presumably, Loki.

Her earpiece pinged. "This is Rogers. What's going on?"

She answered. "This is Romanov. Loki's making a move. Hostiles on board and one engine is down. I need eyes on Loki's containment module!"

Natasha knew in her gut, just like she knew that politicians were corrupt and everyone died, that the moment Loki got off the Helicarrier they were going to crash. She ran as best she could with a chunk of shrapnel in her calf, until she reached deck 8. One way led to Swan's isolation pod, near the prow of the ship. The other led to Loki's containment module near the aft.

She turned and limped toward Loki, only to blink as a large figure joined her. Steve Rogers still wore his Captain America costume. He even had his shield hung from his back. "Romanov," he said with strained calm. "What's the word from the bridge?"

"Bad," she muttered. "Where's Thor?"

"He went ahead."

"You?"

"I turned on Swan's emergency ejection system. If we end up going down, I don't want her getting crushed. You know, just in case she's telling the truth."

Too damned trusting. Natasha thought the girl was putting on a fine performance, and was going to kill them the moment she got what she wanted. But none of that mattered at that moment. They burst into the containment chamber room just in time to see Thor, roaring with anger, fly through Loki into the containment chamber itself.

The figure Thor flew through faded into nothingness as the door to the chamber slid shut. Loki himself reappeared a second later holding the scepter. "Stupid and vain," Loki said with a deaths head grin.

"No!" Steve rushed forward, his shield on his arm, but he was too late.

Loki hit the emergency eject button and sent the module and Thor shooting down into what looked like a lake a few hundred feet down. Loki frowned for a moment before he took a face full of Red, White and Blue. The blow sent the Asgardian stumbling back, but as Rogers followed on, Loki recovered and fired his Scepter.

The effect blasted both men apart, but Rogers took the brunt of the hit on his shield, which transferred the energy of the blow into him flying backward. Loki was thrown against a wall and shook his head before recovering. He smiled at Natasha and saluted with his scepter before disappearing through an airlock.

Natasha risked a look through the ejection channel. They were passing over what looked like baseball fields and a school, but she saw curving rivers as well. They were only a thousand or so feet up and descending fast.

"Seal the room, we're going to be landing soon," Natasha said.

Rogers, picking himself up, shook his head and stared at the bulkhead. "Go after him?"

"Without Thor or Stark, we're not going to stop him," she predicted. "We need to check on Stark and Banner. Where'd Loki get the scepter from?"

"Right."

They sealed the chamber to make sure the ejection channel didn't end up sinking the ship if they made it to water, and then rushed up the stairs as fast as her calf allowed. They reached the command deck and ignored it to rush toward Banner's lab.

She didn't hear any roars or broken walls, so hoped that Banner hadn't turned. They reached the lab and she bit back a curse when she found both Banner and Stark on the ground. Rogers rushed forward, then frowned as he held up a canister from the floor. "Is this…?"

The pessimist in Natasha barked out harsh laughter at the irony. "Anesthetic. Probably the same they used on Swan."

Stark groaned, then turned on his side and puked out dried blueberries all over the floor. "Oh, that's why I don't drink more," he muttered.

Natasha stood and looked out the window of the lab. She could see the command deck opposite, and the land giving way to water below. They were very low now. She had a mounting feeling in her gut that something bad was about to happen.

"Natasha, a hand?"

The feeling mounted in her gut. She realized why, too. This operation was being conducted by Barton. He might have been doing Loki's will, but it had his fingerprints all over it. She wasn't sure what Loki was after in being captured, but it felt as if Swan's capture interfered with it somehow. So, if that plan didn't work, Barton would be the failsafe.

"Guys," she said over her shoulder. "Brace yourselves."

"What?" Stark sounded confused from the anesthetic their attackers forced on him.

When the blow came, it shocked Natasha despite her expecting it.

The explosion was on the port side, the same as the first. As the ship tilted violently and began sliding from the air, she said a silent prayer of thanks to Swan. If they'd lost engines at 60 thousand feet, not only would they all die, they would likely have taken out whatever community they hit.

But she could see water under them only a hundred or so feet down. Which meant when the floor turned sideways to drop them down, while gravity went on its head and threw them up, she had some small hope that a few of them would survive.

Abruptly the world turned white as crash foam blasted into the lab. It hardened around her, making it a challenge to breathe when the helicarrier crashed with a sound that turned her gut into jelly. Within the insulation of the crash foam, the crumpling of the port side of the helicarrier and the shattering of the ship's keel did not rupture her ear drums, but it was a close thing.

It did leave her head ringing. The lights went out, plunging the foam into darkness. It lasted only moments though as the foam began to sublimate around her face with each breath. As it did so, she heard a new sound through the foam.

Growling. Angry, bestial growling.

The foam did not transmit vibration well, but even so she could feel something large moving nearby. "Banner!" Rogers' voice sounded clear enough that Natasha thought the foam was almost gone.

Banner was gone too. All Rogers got was an ear-splitting roar, followed by the sound of tearing metal.

The foam sublimated away, giving Natasha her first glimpse of the world post-crash. Her gut lurched as she saw, through shattered windows, the command deck opposite them. Water was already lapping at the broken glass dome. They appeared to have crashed at almost a 45 degree angle in relatively shallow water.

But the command deck, like the lab, was positioned on the bottom of the ship, connecting from Deck 7.

"Natasha, are you hurt?"

She turned and saw Steve looking at her worriedly. "We need to get people to the upper decks," she said. "We're going to flood when the ship settles."

"I need my suit," Stark was muttering.

"Come on!" Rogers took her hand and pulled her toward the door. Across the way, she could see Fury struggling to carry Hill and direct stunned command staff up the steeply tilted floor. Rogers pulled her further, and as he did so she saw a hole ripped through the roof of the lab, and another hole above that as well.

The relief felt guilty, as if she were a bad person for being glad the monster she feared had fled.

They had to climb at a sharp angle. Natasha winced with each step as her calf made the foam that hadn't sublimated turn red. "You're hurt!" Steve noted.

"Occupational hazard," she said.

She turned at the sound of tearing cloth. "I can see the shrapnel," the inventor said as he studied her calf. "But I don't have the tools. This may help with the bleeding short term."

He'd ripped off his T-shirt, exposing his bare chest and the mini-arc reactor embedded in it so he could wrap her wound. He then looked around. "I'm gonna get the suit," he declared. "I can't do anything like this."

The surface they were climbing up dropped several inches, making all three of them slip and slide back down the tilted and far wall. Around them, the sound of groaning, straining metal screamed through the air.

"Well, shit," Stark said.

All three shouted when the helicarrier's elevated starboard side dropped like a hammer. Water exploded into the lab with the intensity of a firehose through shattered windows. Flailing, Natasha tried to find some purchase in the water when she saw the lab door slide shut with a resounding metal crash.

"No!"

Rogers jumped forward, powering through the water that was quickly filling the lab, and tried to force the door. He struck it with his vibranium shield and used it as a lever, but she could see he wouldn't be fast enough. It wasn't just the lock he was working against-it was the inverse pressure.

She felt hands on her waist as Stark tried helping her get above the water level and move her toward the center of the room, when she shook her head and realized the obvious.

Banner made another door for them.

"Rogers, front and center!" Stark called.

His head barely above the water Rogers turned and saw the hole that Stark and Natasha were already at.

She began climbing; she cut her hand on a sharp piece of twisted steel, but didn't slow down. A hand grabbed her arm and she looked up to see a uniformed tech with a cut on their forehead helping her.

"Thanks!"

Stark followed, then Rogers. This room was just as sealed as the room below, but in this case the air pressure was helping keep the water below out. A team of three environmental techs huddled around the room looking terrified; bits of crash foam still clung to their uniforms.

"Sirs, ma'am, any word what happened?" The tech who helped her looked to be in his early twenties.

"Hostiles," Rogers said. "We can't stay here. Where's the nearest stairwell? We need to get above the water line."

"Two meters to the left, past the bulkhead. But sir, the door's…"

This time, with better leverage, Steve was able to jam his shield into the seal of the door and use it to snap the lock. He brute-forced it open; as he did so water started seeping up onto the floor. "Everyone out, make for Deck One," he ordered.

They emerged in a hallway filled with injured, stunned survivors, many of whom were still walking around with crash-foam clinging to their uniforms. "Everyone make for Deck One!" Rogers bellowed.

Personnel began to obey. "I'm heading for my suit," Stark said again. "I can get underwater with it, search for survivors."

"Go, get the suit," Rogers agreed.

Natasha pointed. "Steve, the command deck is under water too."

He turned and ran, and Natasha followed as best she could. The number of injured personnel hindered their progress, but the ship wasn't that large. When they reached the sealed starwell that led down to deck six, she could hear voices crying out for help.

Once again with his shield and brute muscle, Steve got the bulkhead open and desperate, soaking wet command personnel started pouring up out of the stairwell.

Sitwell was among them, looking shaken and angry. Natasha grabbed his arm. "Where's Fury?"

"Went back for Hill, don't know where he is." He jerked his arm from her hand and fled with the other agents.

When the personnel were out, Rogers dove down the stairs with Natasha a step behind, until they reached the water several feet above Deck Seven. Rogers put the shield on his back, took a deep breath, and then dove into the water.

Natasha knew better than to follow, but the waiting grew agonizing.

He was under water for five of the longest minutes she'd ever had before he came back up. "I found them," he said between gasps. "Fury got them into a ventilation shaft that still has air. A beam broke and blocked access. I can't get to them."

The weak red emergency light from the bulb above dimmed as a shadow appeared. Natasha looked up and felt her stomach drop when faintly luminescent, alien green eyes stared down intently at her.

Without her armor, Natasha could see why Banner thought Black Swan was a teenager. Her long limbs looked just on the gangly side. With her arms bare and her neck exposed, she saw more clearly the thick lines of symbols that run up her arms and neck. She did not appear wet at all, though her hair was wind-blown.

Rogers climbed up out of the water and saw her.

"I gave the Odinson my word," the girl said. "It's all I have, now. How can I help?"

"How long can you hold your breath?" Steve asked.

"Weeks. When I am not being tripped and ambushed."

Natasha rather doubted that, but Steven didn't care. "We have people trapped in a ventilation shaft under the water. There's heavy debris blocking the way."

She moved down the steps; her wings made slight shushing noises as they brushed against the metal walls. "Go. I'll fetch them."

"Do you know where Thor is?"

"I crashed some place called Kemah. Thor crashed north of there. He is above, now, helping."

Natasha bit back her relief. "And Banner?"

The alien actually smiled. "He prefers to be called Hulk. He gave me a boost to reach you from Kemah. He does not like to swim, though."

Rogers actually chuckled. "Thank you for your help. We'll wait here for you…"

"We are in shallow water. It will be more efficient for me to just take them out into the bay. There are rescue boats here. Go. I will save your colleagues."

She didn't dive into the water, she just walked calmly. She didn't even bother with a deep breath. Rogers watched her go a moment before turning to Natasha. "Think she made a splash when she crashed?"

"A Goth teenage girl with wings, tats and daddy issues? Oh, I wouldn't be surprised if she's already signed a record label," Natasha said.