Hi everyone. It's been a very long time, mainly because it turns out moving to the capital, starting university and writing academically in your field really drains the writing juice. But nevertheless here is the next chapter, with the promise of more to come (soon this time).

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the characters aside from my own OC. The rights of the other characters belong to Marvel and its affiliates.

Enjoy!

When Coraline had begun her first year at university, she had found it hard to sleep. The 18 year old was used to rural life, where the skies were dark and the only noises were made by owls or crickets or cats, but instead she was faced by the sounds of sirens, of shouting and the constant bright skies of a city under smog.

It was the shouts that always woke her then, and on board the Helicarrier it was shouts that brought her in from the dark behind her eyes.

"Come on Cora, you have to get up!"

Cora tried to cling to the sound, try to work out who it was and what they were doing that was making her shoulders shake and head throb.

"Cap, we have to go!" Another voice was shouting, and there was the sound of crackling too, like someone was standing on tin foil just out of frame.

"I'm not leaving her, not like this," The first voice softened ever so slightly, but in the next second was back to full volume as the shaking intensified.

"Get up, come on. Up!"

Up.

That word…it echoed around the historian's head. Up, up, up, up.

Steve narrowly missed a kick to the gut as the woman in front of him startled into consciousness.

Her eyes roved, her breathing hitched, and the super soldier had to remove one of his hands from her shoulder to instead pin her ankles for fear of another jab to the kidneys. But Coraline was awake, she was breathing and she was blinking beneath his hold and that was enough for Steve.

It took a few seconds for her breathing to steady, her mind to kick back into focus, but as it did she noticed the aching in her temples them, as the smell of dust and smoke and burning that clogged the air around them.

"Explosion?" Cora questioned as she brought a hand to her head. Above her she could see Steve's concerned expression and behind him, a slightly battered looking Stark.

"Yes," Stark answered before Steve could. "And judging by the altitude loss it hit an engine."

"So we're falling out of the sky," Coraline's voice was calm – very different from the visage the historian had been putting out when she had rushed out what felt like hours before.

"Yes, currently."

Steve glared at Stark for his blunt reply, but Cora remained unfazed as she shrugged off Steve's hold and braced against the wall behind her for support.

"Can we fix it?"

Steve interrupted.

"You should see a medic, Cora."

"What," She scrunched her eyes in confusion, before the involuntary flinch as Steve brushed his fingers against her temple reminded her why her head hurt, why every movement of said head brought with it the slight tang of metallic red in her nostrils, why a medic might not be so bad an idea.

Another jolt of the floor under their feet, and the spitting of computer systems back in the room she had so quickly vacated minutes before reminded her why going anywhere near S.H.I.E.L.D's doctors was out of the question.

"It's fine," Her voice was frail, which she cursed as she continued because why couldn't she sound strong just once when she needed to lie convincingly. "If what you say is true Mr Stark, there will be people who will have a greater need of medical attention."

Steve's shoulders sagged as he conceded to her point. Stark, however…

"You're very well spoken for someone who couldn't stand upright a few seconds ago."

"You're very aware of the inner workings of a flying aircraft carrier for someone who got thrown into a wall recently," Coraline retorted, before another pang to her temple made her raised eyebrow expression crumple.

"That is what happened right?" She asked more softly, "We all got thrown?"

"Yes," Steve replied equally quietly, while Stark spoke over him:

"I'm allowed to know a lot about engineering, I'm an engineering genius. No explosion has or will ever change that. Genius is as genius does. You on the other hand –"

"As much as I'd really like to see where you are going with that conversation," Cora said with just enough ire for both the super soldier and the scientist to know exactly where she thought the conversation was headed, " Shouldn't we be doing something, to help or to fix the engine or –"

Both Stark and Rogers straightened as tinny shouts reverberated in their ear pieces.

Cora hadn't been given one, just another way in which she had been kept in the dark, she noted with tired frustration. So she could only wait as the high pitched mumbling ended, was replaced by a slightly deeper set of barks, and for Tony to reply with a determined: "I'm on it!"

"The engine that got hit could be functional again," Stark explained as they began to half walk half shuffle along the corridor, avoiding debris and being ever mindful of the shaky steps Coraline was trying to hide that she was taking. "They can't usually do repairs while the ship is airborne, but then they don't usually have me on board."

In better circumstances Steve would have rolled his eyes at this. This time he gritted his teeth and stomped the kindling of a fire out with his boot.

"I…we, "Tony corrected, "We need to get to engine 3 to see what is stopping the rotors from turning, and fix it."

"How much did that pain you to simplify that explanation?" Coraline asked as she brought up the rear. A glance back by Stark confirmed his suspicions that she was smirking.

"Go on," She irked with a humorous glint in her eye, "Throw in some technical words, get it out of your system."

"I can't work out if you're witty or just concussed, Quinn" Stark responded as he focussed back on the path in front of him.

"Now isn't the time for jokes, Stark," Steve snapped as his patience wore ever thinner.

"Hey, don't look at me. It's all Gallows Humour back there."

Cora had the decency to look a little sheepish when Steve turned his attention to her, but that look was forced from her features as the ship groaned in expectation, and the following tilting motion caused the historian to stagger into the nearest wall with a thud.

"Son of a-" Cora muttered as she slowly unfolded her crumpled legs to return to the upright position.

She hated boats, because of the feel of the engines rocking beneath her. She hated planes because she insisted she could feel the clouds being bumped over beneath her feet. Both things made her stomach lurch and her brain freeze with nerves. Combining both while also sporting a headache the size of a small nation was doing her body absolutely no favours.

When someone grabbed her arm as the next lurch tipped her sideways, she automatically assumed it was Steve. Cora looked up at the angle she realised had become practiced to allow her eyes to meet those of the taller soldier.

Instead her eyes met those of the man she'd begun to study in her history of weapons manufacture module all those years ago at university.

"You can't go on like this, Quinn," Stark didn't let go as Coraline tried to shrug him off. "You may have balls when it comes to psychopaths but you're practically green and we haven't even gotten to the dangerous bit yet."

"I'm fi-" Coraline stopped herself mid protest, realising that the analytical mind eyeing her up and down would never fall for the kind of placations that had satisfied Steve. Instead she switched her answer. "I've got to do something useful. People could be trapped, or need medical attention or…"

She trailed off even as Tony spoke over her.

"You need medical attention."

"So do you," She fired back, before quietening as she saw Steve doubling back along the corridor out of the corner of her eye.

"You can have mine," Tony said loudly while releasing her grip.

Steve's confused expression mirrored Cora's, but if anything this only encouraged Stark onwards.

"It's an open channel between the higher clearance agents and all of us, should give you some pointers of where to go and what to avoid."

"What?" Steve and Cora echoed each other.

Tony shushed them with a raised finger as with the other hand he produced an ear piece from his ear with a flourish.

"I'll have Jarvis wire me back into the comms channel once I'm suited up. No need for two and I'm guessing you don't have one."

"A comms unit," Cora said in understanding, while Steve objected: "Why would she need that, we're not splitting up."

There was a pause, ended only when Tony surreptitiously leant across and pinched Cora's arm.

"Ow…I mean, I'm going to go help the other agents," Cora fidgeted through the lie.

"What, where?" Steve sounded as incredulous as someone trying to be gentle could be.

"At the medical bay," Cora's reply was quiet, as if somehow volume would change how awful the lie was. Behind her, Tony face palmed.

Steve looked Cora in the eye, and she used all her effort not to shy away from the eye contact.

"I just want to help people," She all but whispered as a last ditch attempt to convince the soldier.

Steve sighed, bit his lip ever so slightly, and then returned his gaze to Cora's with a concerned expression.

"You said when you get scared you don't…uh…you don't cope so well."

"I'll be fine." Cora tried to put all her shaky confidence into that statement. She conceded at Steve's continued worried expression. "I'll be on the comms the whole time. Paranoia never hurts when there is actually a threat."

Stark smiled at this, though Steve remained unconvinced.

Sighing, the historian used the next shiver of the ship's spluttering engines to stride forward, grabbing Steve's arm as she did so and putting some distance between them and Stark.

"It will be OK, Steve. You have more important things to worry about. This ship needs you –" Steve went as if to interject this, but Cora continued. "Stark's ego needs to be quelled by someone and Fury still needs his ass whooped so until that can happen you have to help people where you can, and I'll help people where I can. OK?"

"OK," Steve responded with steel in his gaze.

Cora nodded in ascent as she let Steve go. The soldier lingered in front of her, but was cut off from his next intake of breath, his new point of argument, by Tony pushing in front of him and handing Cora the earpiece.

As if on cue, she could hear the crackling of voices; loud and alarmed tinged even in her palm. The two men in front of her paused as they heard it, Steve through his ear piece and Tony through the static of Cora's. Both straightened at the barked commands and the ever so frantic tone, though Tony feigned nonchalance with a smile and the twinkle of mischief in his eyes.

"Duty calls."

Steve looked at Cora steadily for a few seconds. Their eyes didn't meet, instead his flicked up and down her body as she squinted in confusion. Of all the times to be checking her out?

"Hey, Medicine Woman," Tony called back as he made his way presumably further towards the engine. It took a minute for Cora to get the reference – her pop culture knowledge was average at best, and that excluded times of life threatening danger, so by the time she did Tony was already nearing the turn with Steve in pursuit.

"Stay away from the engines. I need you alive so a historian can document how epically I save the day this time."

Roger that, Coraline thought grimly as another groan of the ship sent her half jogging half stumbling in the opposite direction.

aAa

She ran into Coulson quite by accident. Of course she had run into a lot of people by accident. Her headache wasn't improving and Stark clearly hadn't had his moment of epic-ness yet because the ship was still tilting enough to throw the historian into walls on more than one occasion.

One of these tilting moments brought Cora into the arms of Coulson as he was rounding a bend and she was trying to figure out which way to take.

"Oof," She managed as her body went sideways and her brain stubbornly refused to go with it.

"What are you doing on this level?" Coulson barked. The man who had smiled co-conspiratorially in the supply cupboard only days before was gone. This was the agent who dealt with the likes of Stark and Banner on a daily basis.

"The explosion," Cora put a hand to her temples as she squinted through an explanation. "Stark and…and Captain Rogers went to fix the engine. I wanted to help too."

She had been following Coulson – who had only stopped long enough to prop her back up on her own two feet before moving off again – but her final sentence had the agent spinning round and halting her progress.

"You want to help." He said seriously.

"Uh…yeah?" Cora didn't know why she suddenly felt her answer was wrong, but something in the agent's eyes made her really wish she could reconsider her answer.

Coulson paused and stared at her. Not the kind of medical staring Dr. Banner had, or the worried staring of Steve. This was analytical, self-assured.

Coulson's gaze snapped back to hers.

"Two floors down, near Dr. Banner's lab, there is a supply room with a retinal scanner. Your iris scan will open it. Inside is your equipment. The area is in lockdown because of The Incident, but you have the clearance to get through. Do you understand?"

No! Cora monologued internally. What in God's name was this man talking about.

Outwardly though, she nodded. This was enough for Coulson, or perhaps the shouting in his ear - the same shouting Cora could hear from outside his headset even if it wasn't transmitting to hers - got too loud to ignore.

He reached the end of the corridor before her reply left her mouth.

"Agent Coulson," she called. The agent fidgeted on the spot as he halted, clearly wanting, needing to be somewhere else and quickly.

"I…uh…I," Cora couldn't get her words to work. Standing in a corridor with the smell of charred plastic in the air and a man in a suit looking flustered in front of her she could only think about the corridor in her blessedly calm museum and the palm fronds that had originally hidden Agent Coulson from view.

"Save me an opening night ticket to your exhibition, Dr. Quinn," Coulson managed a small smile at the historian as he broke her from her panic sliced thoughts. "And I want at least one piece of free Captain America merchandise from the gift shop, call it recompense for the damage to my nose."

"Ha," Cora's laugh sounded so out of place amidst the chaos and charred airship, but it was comforting all the same. Coaxing a smile, the historian looked up to see if the agent matched it.

Coulson was already gone.

aAa

She couldn't get to the supply room.

Not for want of trying. She'd navigated the maze of corridors that made up the Helicarrier, even with the continual shuddering beneath her and churning around.

No the reason she couldn't get to the supply room was because there was a man outside it. A man in full combat gear. A man with a gun. A man who was clearly talking into an earpiece that wasn't on any of the frequencies Cora could pick up.

Coraline hadn't done that much in the way of Special Ops history. It wasn't really her area, or her interest. But she'd been in rooms with enough spy films playing to recognise the stereotype of 'heavily armed tactical mercenary'. And even if that was blatant stereotyping mixed with a lack of real tactical knowledge, the uneasy feeling permeating in her gut was enough for her feet to cement to the floor and her brain to whirl.

There was no anecdote she could recollect, no past experience she could rely on to give her the answer she needed. She was alone; in a skirt that didn't really allow for movement and heels which were teetering every step she took; and there was a man with a gun standing in front of the only room on this ship she had any direction to head towards.

"Oh…screw it!"

Cora skidded into the corridor, losing a shoe in the process as she tried to gain traction on the metallic floor surface.

"Help, you've got to help!" She exclaimed as she let the shakes of the floor take her down to her knees in front of the armed man. The tears that accompanied the shake in her voice were not entirely false, nor were the tremors of her hands as she looked up at the masked man in what she hoped was a picture of innocence.

"One of my friends, he…he got hit by something when the explosion…. He needs help and I can't lift it off and …please…please help me!"

The man titled his head beneath his helmet, the scrutiny clear in his body language even if his expression was masked.

Cora took in another ragged breath, preparing for another round of make believe begging, but the sound of the man's voice stopped her in her tracks.

"I've got a woman here. Administrative uniform. Requesting assistance. How should I proceed?"

"Please help," Cora escalated her pleading as her eyes flickered with the unease that came with knowing she was being scrutinised from not just this man but by whoever was on the other end of his comm. "There's no one else on this level and my comm isn't working and…and…"

The man moved his gun and Cora felt the words dry in her throat.

"Leave this area. You are not authorised," Each of the man's sentences was accompanied by a gesture with his gun.

"No, please. I know I'm not authorised but I need help and you're here so…"

"Leave!"

Cora's hands were in the air without her even realising it as she stared at the gun now pointed at her face.

"Ok, Ok," She flinched away as the man once again gestured with the gun down the corridor. "I'm sorry, I'll just go…"

Dammit, she thought as she took a step back in the direction she had come from. Trying to plead her way through or at least distract the guy long enough to somehow get into the room was the only half-baked plan that she had.

Suddenly the man was in front of her, and she was bouncing off the Kevlar of his body armour.

Cora reeled, and as she did had a second to notice that the man had raised his visor and his eyes, tinged blue in a way that was just a bit too bright to not be unnerving, reflected a look of sceptical concern. That thought though, before it had had a chance to churn around her head, was dispelled by the raising of the man's gun back to her temple.

"She is an Initiative member, confirm?"

The voice of the man seemed more gravelly now, as if exposing even a shred of skin from beneath his armour had infused just a smidge of humanity into the robotic exterior.

Cora didn't bother raising her hands this time. Staring at the man, at his pupils blown wide beneath the blue tinge, she realised two things in quick succession.

This man couldn't see her. Not really, and not in a way that pleading or crying or raising her hands in surrender would help. Which led her nicely into realisation number two.

This man was going to kill her. And there wasn't anything a historian in heels on some godforsaken flying motorway could do about it.

"Copy. Initiate 28061948 detained. Permission to neutralise?"

If there had been more time, perhaps Cora could have done something. True, her mind was coming up blank apart from an overwhelming claxon call to abandon ship, literally if necessary, if it meant getting out alive. But maybe she could have thought of something.

But there wasn't more time.

There was a crackle of the man's ear piece, which even Cora could hear, though perhaps adrenalin was helping with her hearing for that one.

There was a shuffle as he adjusted his aim. The click of the safety being turned off, something so cliché but all the more chilling when your mind is ever so helpfully telling you that this is it, the last thing you hear will be the cliché click of a safety trigger.

There was her own gasp, and the thudding inside her head that was overtaking the claxon, or maybe keeping beat with it.

And there was no time to ponder this, or any other thought.

Because then there was the shot.