Chapter Sixteen: Blood and Water

"Someone could break your neck, coming up behind you, always coming and you'd never have a clue." -Grimes

Steve was terrified.

A few feet away from him, Audrey was lying unconscious on the sidewalk. He couldn't get to her, though, because of the onslaught of Chitauri. As soon as he got a break from the aliens' assaults, he lifted a hand to his comms. "Audrey's down. We need a medic here, as soon as possible."

To hell with it. Steve knocked a few more Chitauri out of the way, before running over to Audrey's side. He couldn't tell if she was breathing or not. If she was, it was too faint to be anything sustainable.

"Does anyone copy?" Steve repeated, trying to keep the panic from edging into his voice. "Audrey is down."

"I copy," Tony answered. His voice was grave. "What do you mean by down?"

Before answering, Steve threw his elbow back into a Chitauri approaching him from behind. He picked up the soldier, and threw it hard at another swarm of incoming Chitauri, disorienting them. Then, he removed one of his gloves and pressed his fingers to Audrey's neck, searching for a pulse.

"Rogers?" Tony repeated.

Steve felt the slightest pulse beating through Audrey's veins, and relief came over him in waves. He hadn't felt relief this strong since he'd rescued Bucky back in '43. It didn't seem that long ago. It was hard to believe that almost a century had passed since then.

"She's got a pulse," he reported. "It's faint, but it's there."

"What happened?" Tony asked. There was a crash within his audio, and Steve flinched, his heightened hearing making the noise all the more loud.

"One of the Chitauri blasts hit her." He glanced over his shoulder, worried. "I don't know how long I can ward them off. Can I get backup down here?"

"On my way." For once, there was no humor laced in his voice; no irony, no sarcasm. He was all seriousness. Steve found it almost… unnerving.

He glanced down at Audrey. Steve knew that Peggy would kill him if Audrey died on his watch. After everything he'd missed—her birth, all of her firsts, her teenage rebellion, her first day at S.H.I.E.L.D.—he'd missed almost all of it, and now she was slipping through his fingers. Fate couldn't be this cruel, could it? To take everything from him, give him a daughter, and then take that from him, too?

With her blue eyes closed, he saw how much she resembled Peggy. She was every bit her mother's child. But as he looked closer, he saw how much she had in common with him. The blonde hair, the nose. She looked exactly like his mother had, when he was just a boy and Sarah was still young. And just as she was every bit Peggy's daughter, she also also every bit his.

For the first time, Steve actually admitted to himself: this is my daughter. He'd missed a hell of a lot. But he'd woken up after the crash, and maybe that wasn't such a bad thing after all. Maybe he hadn't lost everything.

Assuming, of course, they would make this out alive. Which he was beginning to doubt as the minutes ticked on.

Audrey stirred.

"Sweetheart?" Steve prompted, holding his breath for fear that he'd imagined her movement, and that she was still close to slipping away from him.

"On your six," Tony announced through the comms. Steve switched the audio on his off, too worried about his daughter to think about the logistics of an alien invasion. Tony landed a few feet away, and quickly got to work obliterating every Chitauri that came too close.

"Dad?" Audrey mumbled.

It was so quiet, but the word almost knocked him over. Dad. Dad. Dad. As much as he'd run the facts through his head since waking up, he'd never been called dad by her. It definitely wasn't her first time saying it, but it was his first time hearing it.

Steve felt a wave of something bittersweet hit him. If he'd found a safe landing place, like Peggy had suggested, or if he'd been able to get on the plane faster, or get Red Skull off earlier, maybe this wouldn't be the first time. Maybe he would've gone back to America with Peggy and married her and they would've gone dancing. And he would've stepped on her toes, of course, and they would've found out about the baby together. He'd have painted a nursery, and the two would've gone shopping for cribs and baby blankets. They could've been peaceful, and happy. He could've been there as she grew up—for her first words, her first steps, her first day of school. But he'd missed it. Steve wondered if he would've tried to save himself had he known about the baby. Honestly, he wasn't sure.

But he couldn't dwell on hypotheticals. The fact was that he'd crashed the plane, and he'd survived, and now he was in the twenty-first century fighting off an alien invasion, and his daughter was by his side.

"It's me," he told her. "It's… I've got you. We're trying to get a medic here for you."

"I'm fine," Audrey replied. Her eyes were open now, squinting as she looked up at him. "There's no time for a medic. I just need a second."

The entire front of her uniform had been scorched by the blast. Audrey breathed sharply and rapidly, sucking in oxygen like she was starving.

A hissing sound from behind him alerted him of the presence of a Chitauri. Steve lifted up his shield, wordlessly hurling it at the alien without so much as glancing over his shoulder. It ricocheted off the creature's body and landed in his hand, and he set it back down next to him.

From her spot on the ground, Audrey gave him a wry smile. "Looking a little worried there, Cap."

Worried was an understatement. But now wasn't the time to argue about semantics. He needed to make sure she was safe, and then focus on making sure the world was safe.

"I might not be as beefy, but I'm still a super soldier," she reminded him.

"Do you need help getting up?"

Audrey brushed him off, easing herself into a sitting position, and, grabbing Steve's hand, onto her feet. She took a few limping steps before giving him a small smile. "Let's go punch some aliens back into space."

"I've cleared the balcony for Foster," Natasha reported into the comms feed. Audrey was still dizzied by the hit, and she knew that at least three of her ribs were broken, but the Avengers were not going down yet. Not until they'd given the fight everything they had. "Does anybody copy? Now's the chance. Selvig's unconscious and Loki is occupied."

"Copy that," Audrey answered. She turned to Steve. "I'll get my team on Foster right now." She switched her comms channel to Caroline. "Carmichael, do you copy? We've got Stark's balcony cleared for Doctor Foster. We need to get her here as soon as possible."

"I copy, Aud. We've got a chopper ready to go."

"Nonsense!" interrupted a third voice. Thor. Audrey wanted to question how he'd managed to intercept the channel, but didn't have the mental energy to try and understand the ins and outs of godhood at the moment. Maybe another time. "I will accompany the Lady Jane myself."

"Who's this guy?" Caroline asked, unenthused.

"That's Thor," Audrey answered.

"How does he plan on transporting Foster?"

Audrey opened her mouth to reply, but when she saw Thor flying across the horizon, hammer in hand, she cut herself off. "Like that."

"Oh," Caroline said. "I see."

"I'll explain later," Audrey promised.

Switching her comms back to the Avengers channel, Audrey relayed the information. "Thor's got Foster and he's heading to the Tower. Romanoff, you're going to need to cover her." Audrey's inner handler was emerging, as she began to understand the plan. "She's going to need to discuss details with Selvig before anything can be done, but she's got the majority of a plan laid out."

Steve gave her a nod, impressed, and switched his comms back on. Audrey, pleased with herself, continued.

"What's Banner's status?"

"Uh…" Natasha said. "He's currently tossing Loki around Stark's living room like a ragdoll."

"I'm gonna have to renovate the whole building, huh?" Tony asked.

"Not now," Audrey chided him.

Steve jumped in. "With Loki taken care of and the balcony protected, we'll need Stark, Audrey, and I on the ground. Barton too."

"I've got a solid, uh, one arrow left," Barton announced.

Audrey and Steve shared a look. "The military is starting to arrive," Audrey said. "If you can get bullets from them to load your guns, that's better than nothing."

"Copy," Barton answered.

"This is the last stand," Steve reminded them. "It's now or never."

There was something devastating about this moment. Audrey didn't know what was going to happen next, but she prayed she would come out of it alive. If they didn't succeed, humanity would fall to its knees before a selfish and cruel god. They were so much better than that.

If Audrey was going down, she was going down swinging.

She and Steve launched their attacks. She was angry-angry about how many times she'd come too close to death today, angry that Loki had walked onto Earth and assumed he owned the place-and all of that energy poured out of her, in every swing of her fists and every kick she landed. As Steve charged forward, using blunt force to destroy as many of the Chitauri as he could, Audrey worked on dodging attacks and carefully aiming her batons to hit the aliens in their weak spots.

This city was her home. It was her father's home and Tony's home. This planet was hers. These people were her people. She would not surrender. Every life lost today had been lost to greed and to terror. Audrey was determined to stop the number of lives lost from growing.

As she mercilessly tore through the swarms of Chitauri, Audrey got faster. The pain in her ribcage began to fade, and the pumping of her heart stemmed less from fear, and more from power.

If aliens came too close to her, Steve tossed her the shield. Audrey would catch it, block a hit, and throw it back. They'd grown accustomed to the language of each other's fighting. Before she knew it, Audrey was able to predict Steve's moves and he was able to predict hers. She supposed that it had a lot to do with the fact that they'd been trained by the same woman.

"I can close the portal," Natasha's voice cut through their sparring, her urgency apparent. "Foster and Selvig have a plan. I repeat. I can close the portal."

Audrey turned to Steve, who looked exhausted. It occurred to her, then, how fast this had all happened for him-how he'd come out of one war and entered directly into the next. She herself was tired, and hoping the fight would end soon. She nodded at the Captain.

"Do it," Steve commanded. Audrey looked up at Stark Tower, at the hole in the sky, at the Tesseract radiating impenetrable amounts of energy. But before she could become too invested in the idea that the fight was over, Tony's voice interrupted.

"No, wait!"

Tony's frantic cry sent a wave of worry into Audrey's chest. Now was not the time for him to be contrary, but he knew that. Which meant something was actually going on.

"Stark, these things are still coming," Steve argued.

"I got a nuke coming in, it's gonna blow in less than a minute. And I know just where to put it."

The only organization that Audrey knew to be as ruthless as to send a nuclear bomb into a highly populated city was the World Security Council. They were willing to wipe an entire city off the map to save the world. Audrey understood it. The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. But they were so close to getting out of this. They were minutes away from stopping Loki.

But as Audrey looked up at the hole in the sky and considered, she realized that there was no way for Tony to get the nuke into the portal without going through it himself.

"Stark, you know that's a one way trip," Steve spoke up solemnly.

Oh my god. Audrey's breath caught in her throat. Tony was going to sacrifice himself for them, for the world. She tried to think of another way out. Any way out, but she knew that there was none. If the nuke wasn't sent through, millions of people would die. But if it was, she would lose one of her best friends, someone who was practically her brother.

Her eyes began to well up. Tony had grown up with her. She'd been there when he'd built his first inventions, for almost every Christmas, for every one of his birthdays. Tony had always wanted to play superheroes when they were kids, and pretend to be Batman while Audrey pretended to be Superman. That same kid, who'd launched himself off of arm chairs and knocked over lamps constantly, was about to die to save the world. Audrey was paralyzed with grief.

As she watched Tony's red suit fly higher and higher into the sky, she held her breath. He skated off the side of Stark Tower, barely pulling the bomb away before it ran through the building. Audrey couldn't remember when she fell to the ground. All she could remember was that one moment, Tony was there, and the next, he wasn't, swallowed up into the portal, in another world

"No," she whispered. The word slipped out before she could stop it.

And then—

Silence.

Audrey couldn't bear it. She slammed her eyes shut, ignoring the scraping of the gravel into her knees. Even as the Chitauri fell, and the Leviathans crashed, she couldn't feel like they'd won. Not yet. Not when Tony had died for it.

"Close it," came Steve's voice. Audrey's eyes flew up towards the portal, which was now radiating blue like it had veins. Tony was still trapped inside. But the explosion would come back and possibly damage the portal to the point where it could never be closed. Audrey watched, terrified, as the sky sewed itself back together, and then closed up blue as ever, as if nothing had happened.

But there was something else—something falling. She held her breath. They couldn't have gotten that lucky. Could they?

But as the figure neared the ground, Audrey recognized its red and gold body. It was Tony. He was in free-fall, gaining momentum as he hurtled towards the ground. Just as quickly as her hopes were raised, they were dashed again, as Audrey realized that he'd certainly die on impact. To her left, Thor was winding up his hammer, prepared to try and save him. Before he could take off, though, the Hulk flew across Audrey's peripheral, grabbing Tony like a doll before scraping down the edge of a nearby building, rocketing onto the street, and sliding a couple dozen feet across the concrete while cradling Tony in his arms.

What the hell.

Audrey was exhausted. She didn't want to get her hopes up again, but she stumbled over to where the Hulk was. The beast rolled over, leaving Tony splayed on his back on the concrete.

Thor and Steve were hot on her heels.

"Is he breathing?" Steve asked.

Thor ripped the faceplate off of the suit, tossing it aside haphazardly. Tears were streaming down Audrey's face at this point. Tony wasn't moving. The light in his arc reactor had gone out. As the dust settled around them, the battle over, Audrey started to accept that he was gone. She'd lost Tony, but the world had been saved. Loki had been defeated. They'd won the war. She wouldn't call it entirely pyrrhic.

Her thoughts were interrupted when the Hulk emitted an impossibly loud roar. Tony gasped, startled awake by the sound. Audrey let out a sob of relief.

"Oh thank God," she cried. Her nose was running and she was a mess and battered and bruised, but she didn't care. Tony was alive. They were alive. They'd saved the freaking world.

"What the hell?" Tony gasped. "What just happened? Please tell me that nobody kissed me."

Audrey rolled her eyes, smiling in spite of the tears. She wanted to sock Tony in the shoulder for that, but she was too happy to hear him being snarky again.

"Jesus, Aud, get it together. No need to be sappy." Tony gave her a teasing smile.

"You idiot, you almost died."

"Haven't we all?" Tony shot back.

Audrey couldn't argue with that. A beat passed.

"We won," Steve said finally.

Audrey beamed at her dad. "We did. We won. We stopped an alien invasion."

" Alright. Hey. Alright. Good job, guys!" Tony cheered. He lifted his head up, and then winced, letting it fall back onto the street. "Let's just not come in tomorrow. Let's just take a day. Have you ever tried shawarma? There's a shawarma joint about two blocks from here. I don't know what it is, but I wanna try it."

"We're not finished yet," Thor said, cutting the celebration short. Audrey followed his gaze to the top of Stark Tower. Loki. Although they'd defeated his army, they still had yet to reckon with the man himself.

"Fine," Tony agreed, rolling his eyes. "But shawarma after."

By the time they'd hiked the stairs to reach Tony's penthouse, Audrey's legs had gone completely numb. She was ready to sleep for about ten years, or maybe eat for the next few days and then sleep. And her throat was dry. She would give anything for some water right now. Anything.

Looking around, Audrey observed all the cuts and bruises the team had sustained. Her head was still throbbing, likely concussed. She'd been crying moments earlier. Her knees were scraped and her arm was bleeding. And her entire torso was sore from the Chitauri blast. She tried to recall what had happened with very little success. She remembered being knocked onto the floor. Steve called for a medic. She'd assured him she was okay. Dad, I'm fine.

Oh shit.

She'd called him dad.

Audrey sent a panicked look towards Steve, who was entirely focused on Loki. Maybe he hadn't noticed that she'd said it? Maybe she'd said something else. Like, Sad, I'm fine. Wait. That was more worrisome.

The blonde thought for a moment. Of course he'd noticed. Steve Rogers wasn't an idiot. He was, however, her father. Maybe it was time they both started admitting it.

Loki was crawling across the floor, badly bruised and—Audrey hoped—very humiliated. When he turned around, they were all armed in the event that he tried to strike them again. Thor brandished his hammer, Natasha held up the scepter, Clint had nocked his last arrow. Steve held up his shield and Audrey had a baton in each hand. Behind her, the Hulk had his hands clenched into fists. If Loki tried to make a move, he wasn't going to get very far.

The God of Mischief rolled over, surveyed the group, and then settled into a look of resignation. "If it's all the same to you, I'll take that drink now."

a/n: and that closes out the battle of new york for us folks! moving on we'll have recovery, bonding, and some angst. it's gonna be fun! shoutout to my beta CatrinaSL and also to Quinn for looking over this chapter for me. i hope you enjoyed and please leave a review on the way out if you can

Chapter Seventeen: Moving On

Still, they couldn't go back. That much was certain. They were here, in a shawarma joint with two gods, two assassins, and two geniuses. They had lost a hell of a lot. But they had each other now. And that gave them a chance. Audrey didn't want to throw that chance away.