Author: Black Dragon on the Rocks/animealam
Rating: T
Pairing: None so far, mentions of one sided Steve/Peggy
Summary: The Universe stared at the boy for what seemed an eternity to him, only to change into a decrepit, dirty alley, and that was the last thing Steve saw before loosing consciousness. The small frail boy banished in a flash of blue flames. Be warned VERY AU Young Time Travelling genius tech savvy Steve.
Disclaimer: I don't own the Avengers, I'm just borrowing them. I'm using a good number of the movie dialogs, even if I added bits and pieces so some of them. So if something looks familiar they are obviously not mine, and belong to their respective owners.
Warnings: NOT SLASH, AU, Completely totally AU, Time Travel, Younger Steve, Violence, Adoption, Smart Steve, Technopaths, Technopath Tony, Technopath Steve, Canon Character Deaths, Minor Character Deaths, OOC-ness, there are quite a lot of movie dialogs which I decided not to change but I did add my own twists and turns to make them a bit more interesting.
Characters: Steve Rogers, Tony Stark, Bruce Banner, Natasha Romanoff, Clint Barton, Thor, Nick Fury, Phil Coulson, Maria Hill, Sarah Rogers, mentions of Bucky, mentions of Peggy Carter, mentions of Howard Stark, mentions of Colonel Phillips, mentions of the Howling Commandos, Jarvis, Pepper, Happy, Rhodey
Timeline: Pre Avengers, Captain America: The First Avenger, Avengers, Post Avengers
Author's Note: I'm back to longer chapters. This was a very short one in the original draft I had of the story, but I was not happy with it. So much of this chapter I wrote since I started posting the story.
kawherp: For Sarah it's been only three months since she last saw Steve. He was a frail little thing, and a Mama's boy as well back then. I tried to leave hints about it without actually saying in past chapters, I'm not sure how successful I was at that.
Sarah needs to make a really big adjusment in how she treats and even thinks about Steve. She knows her son is Captain America in her mind, but her heart doesn't undertand it yet. She was a fan, so she's aware of what he did, and a lot of what he's capable of, but she's also his mother and she wants him safe since she lost him once already.
Total size without notes: 6,053
Keys:
"Speaking aloud."
'Thoughts'
'Name: /Mental interfacing between technopaths and/or tech\'
Facing Loki
They took off before anyone could stop them, just a few moments after Iron Man. As promised Tony allowed Steve to keep a connection open; he got to see and experience first hand how Tony actually operated the suit. It was all through mental commands.
The Iron Man suit was an extension of Tony's mind. No one but a very powerful technopath would have been able to fly it. It really was awe inspiring, and it served to keep Steve's mind from the fact he was back on a plane. The suit was on its last legs, but still Tony managed to get it back to New York and his tower.
"Sir, I've turned off the arc reactor," JARVIS informed him as he approached the tower. "But the device is already self-sustaining."
"Shut it down, Doctor Selvig," Tony demanded.
"It's too late! She can't stop now. She wants to show us something! A new universe."
"Okay." Since the 'possessed' doctor was not going to shut it down, Tony fired the repulsors at the device containing the Tesseract; without much success.
"The barrier is pure energy. It's unbreachable," JARVIS informed him.
He had also tried to connect with the machine, but the barrier protected it from him. Tony tried again, this time Steve had caught on to what he was doing and joined in the assault, with no luck. He mentally swore, and it was echoed by Steve. The bounce against the barrier had been rather painful.
"Yeah, I got that," Tony snarked to JARVIS.
Steve: /Any ideas on how to get through that?\ He was getting visuals as well, thanks to the suit's cameras. /Because even a concentrated attack by both of us is not getting past the barrier.\
Tony: /None yet,\ he admitted, /but I agree, brute mind force—even if I call upon the two other technopaths in New York City, plus the few others with long enough range and power to actually do more than chat—is not going to cut it.\ He was tempted, and would probably leave it as a last resort. Because trying was better than not. /We're only starting, though. Loki's here,\ he told the younger technopath. /I'll stall for as long as I can, so get your asses here ASAP.\
Steve: /We're going as fast as possible,\ he told him after consulting with the quinjet's instruments. He really could not ask either of the two assassins without sounding like a little kid on a car trip. /Be careful, Tony.\
"Plan B," he muttered to himself, "stall Loki."
"Sir, the Mark VII is not ready for deployment," JARVIS warned him.
"Then skip the spinning rims. We're on the clock." There was no way he would be anything but a menace to himself if he tried to use the Mark VI. It was barely able to keep itself on the air, and its responses were becoming sluggish.
He landed rather abruptly, and Tony had to admit it was not one of his best. The spinning rims began removing the suit as he walked towards the pent house. Loki was there, just outside. As he made his way inside the pent house, Tony kept his eyes on the Asgardian. Loki too made his way inside.
"Please tell me you're going to appeal to my humanity," Loki said as he leisurely entered the penthouse. Like he owned it, and it irked Tony the man dared deface his home, well one of them anyway.
Steve: /He's not human, so why bother?\ he quipped.
Tony: /Steve!\ he protested because he almost snorted at the comment.
"Actually, I'm planning to threaten you," Tony said as he made his way to the bar.
"You should have left your armor for that," Loki pointed out sounding too conceited for Tony's tastes.
"Yeah. It's seen a bit of mileage, and you've got the glow stick of destiny. Would you like a drink?" He actually felt the kid's Really? A drink? Much like he would have when mentoring another technopath. Tony would have to think about it later, as Steve was already past the mentee stage.
Tony: /Quiet, you! I'm improvising here!\ He projected what was the mental equivalent of a friendly cuff to the kid's head.
Steve: /Sorry about that.\ His tone was rather sheepish. /Just be careful Tony, Loki's unpredictable.\ He tightened his mental shield to keep himself from distracting Tony. Loki was not mentally stable, and that made him all the more dangerous.
"Stalling won't change anything," Loki told the Iron Man showing he was not fooled by his actions.
"No, no. Threatening," Tony stressed. "No drink, you sure?" he insisted. "I'm having one." Tony went behind the bar and chose his best brandy. He actually did need a drink. The past day had been very stressful, eventful, and full of shocks.
"The Chitauri are coming," he stated confidently. They were already assembled and ready for action as soon as the portal opened. "Nothing will change that. What have I to fear?"
Loki walked towards the floor to ceiling windows confidently, and took in the impressive view of the city. It was nothing like Asgard, but he could admit it possessed an appeal of its own. Perhaps he would make it his capital, with the metal man's tower as a monument and reminder of his triumph.
"The Avengers," Tony responded. "That's what we call ourselves, sort of like a team. 'Earth's mightiest heroes' type of thing."
"Yes. I've met them," Loki said with a sardonic smile. Those
buffoons had been too easy to manipulate. He did not consider them a threat to his plans.
"Yeah. Takes us a while to get any traction. I'll give you that one," Tony admitted. "But let's do a head count, here. Your brother, the demigod." Oh! Loki didn't like that. Man talk about some major sibling rivalry! He picked one of the Mark VII's tracking bracelets and put it on discretely. "A super soldier, a living legend who kind of lives up to the legend."
Tony felt the kid's surprise and pride at the compliment, and he sent Steve the equivalent of a mental path on the shoulder. Tony put on the second tracking bracelet, making sure to keep Loki distracted so he did not notice what he was doing.
"A man with breathtaking anger-management issues," he went on. "A couple of master assassins, and you big fella, you've managed to piss off every single one of them." He did not include himself, since it was a foregone conclusion.
"That was the plan," Loki told the midgardian arrogantly.
"Not a great plan," he pointed out.
Tony did not see the sense in getting them all pissed at a common enemy instead of at each other... Or perhaps Loki did not know his plan to make them fight with each other had been foiled. He mentally smirked, then passed this little tidbit of information to Steve. The kid was sure to find a way to take advantage of it.
"When they come"—Tony began walking away from the bar, looking more confident than he felt at the moment, even when he was certain his team mates would be there soon enough—"and they will, they'll come for you."
"I have an army." Loki smiled certain he had the winning hand. The Chitauri were fierce as well as experienced warriors, and had conquered other Realms for their Master.
"We have a Hulk," Tony countered. The big guy counted practically as an army on his own. Never mind the fact he was virtually indestructible.
"I thought the beast had wandered off," he said dismissively, and secretly more than a bit relieved.
Loki had heard, and later seen the green monster's handy work, gruesome was a rather mild term to describe what those midgardians looked like once the beast was through with them. Whatever those wretched midgardians did to enrage the monster, it must have been bad. Loki would never admit it, but he had actually feared for his life for a moment.
"You're missing the point. There's no throne, there is no version of this where you come out on top," Tony stressed. "Maybe your army comes, and maybe it's too much for us, but it's all on you. Because if we can't protect the Earth, you can be damn well sure we'll avenge it," and that was a promise.
"How will your friends have time for me, when they are so busy fighting you?" Loki touched Iron Man's chest, but nothing happened. He tried a second time, with the same lack of results. "This usually works," Loki mused confused.
"Well, performance issues, is not uncommon." The arc reactor in his chest was clearly non conductive of whatever energy was used for mind control. "One out of five..." he began.
Loki clearly did not react well to his allusion to the Asgardian's ability to rise to the occasion, or his lack of success at controlling him. Loki was clearly offended and enraged. He was grabbed by the throat and thrown away like he weighted nothing.
"JARVIS, anytime now," Tony muttered as he stood up. But Loki grabbed him by the throat again.
"You will all fall before me," he snarled.
"Deploy!" Loki raised him off the floor, and the guy was using only one hand. That was... not good.
Fuck, he was going to be strangled! He grabbed the hand holding him trying to escape its hold. Things got worse though, Loki threw him out of the window, and he had no suit. He was going to splatter on the side walk. Then the Mark VII left after him, led by the tracking bracelets.
Tony was lucky, or maybe it was because the tower was really a very high building. But the suit actually caught up with him, and molded itself around him. Just in time to avoid splattering onto some passersby. He flew back up rather pissed. No one expelled him from his own home, no one.
"And there's one other person you pissed off. His name was Phil," Tony said once he was level with the penthouse.
Then Tony blasted the Asgardian as he had been itching to do. Unfortunately, he was too late to stop Selvig from opening the portal, and Chitauri began falling from the sky in droves.
Tony: /Where the hell are you? The portal is open, and the Chitauri are coming through in droves.\ He was panicking slightly, and knew Steve felt it. He was surprised to feel a wave of calm wash over him and felt Steve's confidence in him to stall their enemies. It helped.
Steve: /We're going as fast as we can. I have visuals of the city, and I can see the beam of light going up from the tower. Hang in there, Tony, we should be joining the fight soon.\
Steve tried to send as much reassurance and confidence in the older technopath's abilities as he could, knowing Tony would sorely need them since he was on his own until they got there.
"Right, army," he muttered to himself. It did not look good for them.
Tony: /I'll do what I can, Steve, but they are too many, and come on some type of flying chariots.\
He began unloading his arsenal on the incoming Chitauri, but he did not think he was making much of a dent in their numbers. It was not that he had not hit some of them, because he had killed several. The problem was there were simply too many of them.
"Stark, we're on your three, headed northeast," Natasha informed him through the com. She could see the beam of light coming from atop the tower, and the portal above.
"What, did you stop for drive-thru?" He snarked, then instructed, seeing as he had several of the flying chariots in hot pursuit. "Swing up Park. I'm going to lay them out for you."
The Battle
Agent Romanoff had very good aim, and they managed to take out a good number of the Chitauri tailing Iron Man. Then Barton continued on his way towards the tower, where Loki was. Meanwhile Romanoff kept shooting Chitauri vehicles out of the sky. They were not too many yet, but Steve was concerned they would be too much for just the three of them.
They reached the tower, where they discovered Thor made it back from wherever he had fallen in Hulk's cell. The blond Asgardian was battling his brother, while agent Barton positioned the quinjet to try and take Loki down.
The dark haired Asgardian managed to avoid being hit, but they were not so lucky, and a blue ray from the scepter hit one of their turbines. It burst into flames, and Barton fought with the aircraft to keep it on the air, as well as away from any buildings and civilians.
As they lost altitude, Steve could do nothing more than hang on for dear life. With an impressive show of skill, Hawkeye managed to crash land the ship away from any people. As soon as they stopped moving, the three of them descended from the quinjet and Steve tried to assess their situation.
They were about three, or perhaps four, blocks away from Stark tower, which was the epicenter for the invasion. From where they might have a better chance to stop the Chitauri. They had to try to close the portal.
"We got to get back up there," Steve told both Barton and Romanoff as he moved towards the tower.
They were coming to the intersection where Romanoff shot the first Chitauri off Iron Man's back when a very strange groaning kind of sound reverberated on the streets. The three of them stood there watching the portal as a large whale-dinosaur type of... being came out of the portal.
The thing was huge, had some kind of armor and very, very large teeth. It also floated in the air much like a real whale would do in the water. It flew slowly, almost leisurely, over them, and from it came down Chitauri foot warriors. He could barely believe he was seeing a live troop carrier.
Steve's disbelief meter simply short-circuited, it had been too much, and that was saying something taking into consideration he was a time traveller. He really would not be shocked by anything else that happened.
The only thing he had left was just to plough through, and try his best to fall back into his war time mindset. He had a mission, and he needed to do whatever it took to complete it successfully and with the minimum of civilian casualties.
"Tony, are you seeing this?" He asked the billionaire through the com. His mind was in more than a bit of a mess to even attempt a connection with the other technopath.
Tony could feel the very shocked kid's mind in the back of his own, even though neither of them were consciously holding a connection. It was very much like they had a mentoring link, which should not be possible because he did not think Steve needed one anymore. Never mind the fact he had not initiated one.
That boy knew very well how to shield his mind, and link with tech. Hell he was good enough to hack SHIELD's mainframes without being discovered, and with only crappy tech. Tony had to admit not all technopaths could have done it. In fact, there really were very few of them who could
As Tony shot out after the... Thing, he responded, "seeing, Steve, still working on believing," he said unable to hide his own shock. "Where's Bruce? Has he shown up yet?"
"Bruce?" Steve was not sure if he was going to show up, who knew where the Hulk had ended at after he fell off the jet which distracted him from destroying the lab.
"Just keep me posted," he instructed and went after the... Flying dinosaur whale thingy.
Steve: /You really think Bruce will show up? Because frankly, we're really going to need the Hulk.\ He told the older technopath as he assessed their situation after the Chitauri foot soldiers started attacking civilians.
Tony: /I know he will, he might even be able to point the Hulk this way. Hopefully Big Green will choose to smash Chitauri, since they are rather more of them than us. Now, I have a whale thingy to fish.\
"JARVIS, find me a soft spot," he told the AI as he flew keeping the ugly looking thing within sight.
Steve, Black Widow, and Hawkeye kept making their way towards the tower. There were abandoned cars, and people were beginning to seek refuge where they could. They came upon some abandoned taxis, and they used them as cover while choosing their next move.
"We've got civilians trapped up here," Clint informed the Cap as he took in the public transport bus filled with people. They were atop the bridge at Park, where the real fighting had started in the air.
Several Chitauri vehicles flew past at breakneck speed, but Steve was able to see the dark haired Asgardian atop of one. "Loki," he muttered. The Chitauri were creating havoc for those on the street passing below the bridge. "They're fish in a barrel down there, he told his team mates.
At that moment they came under attack by a group of Chitauri foot warriors. Black Widow retaliated immediately, and Hawkeye searched for a good position to shoot his arrows.
"We got this. It's good. Go," Natasha told the soldier. She knew he would do his best to get the civilians on the street below out of harms way. Clint and her had been through worse odds, so she knew they could take care of things.
"Do you think you can hold them off?" Steve asked not wanting to leave his team members at a disadvantage, although he did know they were quite capable of fighting against negative odds.
"Captain," Clint said prepping his arrows. "It would be my genuine pleasure." Like Natasha, he had red in his ledger, and he needed for his own sake to wipe it off.
Besides, he did have a few issues to solve, what best than to take his anger off on Loki's allies? He got an arrow with an electric point from his quiver, got it ready on the bow, and in one swift movement Clint broke cover to shoot at the middle Chitauri in the team of five approaching them. Perfect head shot, and the electrified arrow took the others flanking his target as well. Natasha at the ready, covered his back.
Steve took advantage of the distraction his two teammates created to jump off the bridge to the street below, and make his way down the street. Chitauri air warriors shot at him from their vehicles. What he had learned of Parkour became quite handy as he ran jumping over obstacles, and avoided the blue rays being shot at him.
Up ahead he noticed a group of police officers were making a stand, and trying to take down as many aliens as they could. Not that they were doing much good with the type of guns they were using, and at the speed those things flew. Steve jumped atop a patrol car, and almost got shot by the eldest of two officers. He wasted no time in issuing orders, already having the beginnings of a plan formed.
"You need men in these buildings," he instructed signalling each of the buildings he was talking about. "There are people inside, and they're going to be running into the line of fire. You take them to the basements, or through the subway. You keep them off the streets. I need a perimeter as far back as 39th."
"Why the hell should I take orders from you?" the older officer demanded.
Steve was not used to people disobeying his commands, not since he rescued the 107th. The Chitauri reached them, and began shooting at everything causing as much destruction as possible. A large piece of metal, probably part of a car almost hit him, but he raised the shield and it simply bounced off it.
A Chitauri foot warrior landed besides him, and Steve reacted using the shield to block the attack, then hit the alien off the car. A second warrior tried to shoot him at close range with one of those odd weapons they carried. Once again the shield held, and he fought the warrior off.
The first one recovered, and Steve took care of it, then the second tried to shoot him again, but he grabbed a hold of the gun and used his shield to cut off the arm holding it. Then he sent it flying against a vehicle a few feet away, using a bit more force than strictly necessary.
It seemed all that was needed for the officer to obey his instructions was a little show of force, as well as skill. Steve was not happy, but at least the people in those buildings would be evacuated. The police officer walked towards his people and got them moving.
Mission accomplished, Steve went back to his team. Just in time as well because more Chitauri were coming, and they had surrounded Black Widow and Hawkeye. The later was about to be shot at close range, but Steve crashed down shield first onto the attackers, and knocked them out. Then he just kept using his shield as a weapon, hitting any Chitauri which came within range.
Chitauri were cornering them, leaving no safe escape route for Barton and Romanoff, as Steve could have jumped off the bridge with no trouble if it had been only him. There was the wrecked bus he had used earlier... Perhaps he could go down first and catch the others.
Before Steve could truly form a plan of escape to avoid the new wave of foot warriors, lightning fell from the sky, taking care of their attacker. The team was coming together, concentrating in one place. Only Bruce and Tony were missing.
Thor landed hard, and Steve immediately approached him for a report, as the last time he had seen the Asgardian he had been at the tower fighting Loki. "What's the story upstairs?"
"The power surrounding the Cube is impenetrable," he informed the young Captain somberly. It was not good news.
"Thor's right," Tony agreed through the com. "We got to deal with these guys."
"How do we do this?" Natasha asked having heard Stark, and turning towards the young man whom Fury had named their leader; even after suspecting he was not yet an adult.
"As a team," Steve told her. It was the only way, Loki had known he would have little trouble if he divided them.
Loki had tried to create enmity between all of them, but he did not know his plan had been foiled. Instead of separating them, he actually made them a team, with Loki himself as their common enemy.
"I have unfinished business with Loki," Thor told them. He loved his brother, but he had gone too far and had to be stopped.
"Yeah? Get in line," Clint told him as he inspected the arrows he collected from some of his enemies' bodies.
"Save it," Steve told the both of them. It was not the time to fight each other. "Loki's going to keep this fight focused on us," he informed them, "and that's what we need." As Tony had said to him back in the helicarrier, the Asgardian made it personal. "Without him these things could run wild. We got Stark up top. He's going to need us to..." he began explaining his plan when the sound of a beat up motorcycle approaching them distracted him.
Steve turned to look at whoever was crazy enough to be out on the street to find Tony had been right, and Bruce had found them. They all approached him, the others more surprised by his appearance than he was.
"So, this all seems horrible," Bruce told them seeing the destruction those aliens had already caused, and he knew it was just starting.
"I've seen worse," Natasha told him.
"Sorry," Bruce apologized, although he was glad the Other Guy had chosen to listen to him for once. It seemed having a common enemy made him more willing to listen.
"No, we could use a little worse," she told him.
The Hulk had surprisingly chosen not to hurt her, and she suspected Banner had had something to do with that. As both Stark and Rogers believed, it seemed the scientist did have more control than they gave him credit for. Not only that, the Hulk was actually capable of communicating at a very basic level.
"Tony, we got him," Steve informed him.
"Bruce?" Tony asked for verbal confirmation, mostly for the other's benefit, there was no need for the others to know Steve and him had ways of communicating silently.
"Just like you said," he confirmed.
"Tell him to suit up. I'm bringing the party to you." Well, that was one way of saying it, the damn thing was gaining on him.
"I... I don't see how that's a party," Natasha could not help but comment dumbfounded at Stark's audacity. That flying monster coming their way was huge, and she did not think they could get rid of it easily.
"Bruce, now might be a really good time for you to get angry," Steve suggested as the older man began walking towards the fast approaching whale-thingy.
"That's my secret Cap, I'm always angry," he said and let the Other Guy take control.
He simply pointed him in the right direction, and from their experience with Kraft, Bruce knew the Other Guy would listen this time as well. Since he willingly let him out, the transformation took practically no time. Hulk was free, just in time to knock the ugly thing out.
The whale like thing was many more times larger than Hulk, but one powerful punch was enough to stop it. The thing almost fell on the rest of the team, its armor falling apart all around them. Tony shot a mini missile at it, stopping its forward momentum, and giving them all time to cover themselves.
Steve pulled Black Widow under his shield, while Hawkeye sought cover behind a yellow cab, and Thor simply covered his face. The Chitauri really, really hated the fact that ugly thing was killed. They yelled in protest, while Hulk roared back at them.
The team was complete, all six of them ready to defend their planet. Stark landed as well, all forming a circle watching each others' backs as they kept their eyes on the enraged Chitauri.
Natasha raised her eyes to the portal, and saw more of the ugly flying things coming through. "Guys," she called their attention to the things, and they all looked up.
"Call it Captain," Tony said deferring to the kid. He had the experience as a leader, and it was one of the many things Steve clearly excelled at. The kid turned to look at him surprised.
Steve: /You'll follow my lead even when you know my age?\ This was so unexpected.
Tony: /It'll be an honor Steve, sixteen or not, you are more than capable. Fury chose you to lead because you have proven to be a good leader. Don't doubt yourself now kid.\
"Hulk only listen to little Cap," Hulk told the young one when he saw the doubt in his eyes. "Hulk likes little Cap. Hulk smashed bad men who scared and hurt Cap."
The Hulk approached him, and patted his head in a surprisingly gentle and very careful gesture. Steve could only stare at the green rage monster in shock. Was he understanding right, and not only did Hulk knew what those men did to him, but had actually killed them? For him? And did the others know?
Did they know what Kraft and his minions did? For a moment he felt unable to breathe, like the asthma was back. How could he face them? How could they trust him to lead them? Turning to look at his team Steve could see understanding in their eyes, and to his utter shock, some sadistic satisfaction. They knew, perhaps not all of it, but enough, and they approved of the Hulk's actions. Despite what happened, they were still willing to follow his lead.
"Hulk made example of bad men," he sounded quite satisfied with this. Bad men would know now not to mess with Cap because Hulk would be angry. "Others not hurt little Cap, or Hulk do to them what Hulk did to bad men. Hulk avenge Cap." He looked completely serious with the threat he had issued.
"You killed them Hulk?" It was not the place to ask, and yet he could not help it because he needed to know. Steve needed to know those bastards would not be around anymore.
"Hulk not kill, Hulk made sure they die soon," he grinned rather evilly. Those bad men got what they deserved, and even Bruce agreed. Hulk made sure those men would not hurt him again, and would not let others hurt him so ever again.
Steve was shocked, Hulk made sure Kraft, Wilkins and Frampton would never hurt him. He... Well from his words he suspected the green giant made sure they had a slow, and probably very painful death; and he did it to protect him? To avenge him?
He was not sure what to think. On one hand Steve really was not fond of the idea of killing for revenge... With a few exceptions. Those three, along with Arnim Zola, and practically all of HYDRA. So... Okay, maybe he was not as against killing in revenge as he thought he was. Besides, coming from the Hulk, his actions were more like a sign of affection.
"Thank you Hulk for making sure they won't be around," Steve settled for saying after he took several deep breaths.
It was not the time to dwell on personal problems, they had an invasion to stop. He did allow gratitude at Hulk's unexpected desire to protect him to color his voice and show in his face. The big giant patted his head again, rather affectionately, then said.
"Little Cap tell Hulk what to do, Hulk listens."
Steve looked at the others, who stared at him with varying degrees of shock. Without even trying he had managed to do what no one had been able to. The Hulk was willing to listen to his orders, not only that, he would follow them. Steve took another deep breath to center himself, and called the plan.
"All right, listen up. Until we can close that portal, our priority is containment. Barton, I want you on that roof"—and he pointed to the highest building near them—"eyes on everything, call out patterns and strays. Stark, you got the perimeter. Anything gets more than three blocks out, you turn it back or you turn it to ash."
"Can you give me a lift?" Clint asked Stark.
"Right. Better clench up, Legolas," Tony said picking Barton up from his harness and taking off towards the building Steve pointed out.
"Thor, you got to try and bottleneck that portal. Slow them down. You got the lightning. Light the bastards up"—he turned to Romanoff— "you and me, we stay here on the ground. We keep the fighting here. And Hulk... Smash." The green giant grinned rather gleefully and went off clearly loving the order, and quite pleased to be doing some more smashing.
From then on it was a blur of activity, as battles tended to be. Fighting Chitauri after Chitauri, and making sure the civilians were as protected as possible. He was injured several times, but nothing he could not handle.
They were doing the best they could, but at times it seemed it would not be enough. Thankfully the National Guard did arrive, and they began taking care of the civilians, giving them the time to focus on getting rid of the Chitauri.
Steve could not help but wonder where the other members of the Armed Forces were. They were sorely needed. Some Black Hawks would not be amiss to keep the perimeter contained, and F-16s would be helpful to bottle neck the portal.
At some point he gave Natasha a push so she could board one of the flying chariots. It was a surprisingly daring, and dangerous move, but she got on board, and even got the Chitauri flying it to head more or less where she wanted. Natasha somehow managed to get to the tower and find a way to close the portal.
"I can close it," Natasha informed them as she managed to pierce through the energy barrier using Loki's scepter. "Can anybody copy? I can shut the portal down."
"Do it!" Steve made the call.
"No, wait," Tony told them.
He had just received a call from Fury telling him the stupid members of the World Security Council had decided to nuke New York City, not caring about the eight million or so civilians in the area. Because a nuke would not just devastate Manhattan, but Queens, Brooklyn, the Bronx, Harlem, and just about the whole city.
It would be a worse tragedy than Hiroshima and Nagazaki together, as between them there had been less than 500,000 casualties. Not that it had not been a terrible tragedy, because it was. But New York City had eight million people living in the area, not counting the tourists and those on business trips. The death toll would be catastrophic, never mind the economic repercussions of destroying the country's financial capital.
"Tony, these things are still coming," Steve protested.
They really needed to close the portal because, frankly, there were way too many Chitauri for just the six of them. He could not help but keep wondering where the hell were the Army, and the Air Force? Surely aliens attacking New York City would merit their presence but so far there were no signs of them anywhere.
"I've got a nuke coming. It's gonna blow in less than a minute"—he accelerated as JARVIS traced the best route to intercept it—"and I know just where to put it."
"Tony, you know that's a one way trip," Steve warned him. It was laying himself on the wire for the protection of others.
Steve: /There must be another way.\
Tony: /Sorry kid, as you told me not long ago, 'sometimes there is no other way'. Give hell to SHIELD for me, and keep an eye on Bruce.\ Tony blocked the connection with the kid, there was no need for Steve to feel him die.
Dying while connected to another technopath was enough to leave the living one so shocked they ended catatonic at best, in a coma at worst. It recently happened to Francois, their most powerful router. He was in a coma because his very young mentee was run over by a car, and she did not make it. He did not want Steve to end like that.
"Save the rest for the turn, J."
"Sir, shall I try Miss Potts?" JARVIS suggested.
"Might as well." He was going to say goodbye, not that he really wanted to, but the call went unanswered. Then he was through the portal and staring into space.
He flew as far as he could go, hoping the nuke would keep on its trajectory as it should, then let go of it. Tony was able to see it reach the Chitauri mothership and hit it, the explosions were spectacular, and the last things he would see. A very fitting end, he so loved blowing up things. Then he was falling, the lack of air getting to him, and everything went dark.
They waited to see if Tony made it out of the portal, but when he did not Steve had to make the call. He did not want to do it, he had come to like Tony. The older technopath was becoming a friend, perhaps even a mentor. Unfortunately there was no other option.
"Close it," Steve instructed Natasha sadly. Just like with Bucky, he was once again leaving a man behind.
