Hulkling had decided that Speed could handle Nal-Rogg alone, so he turned his attention to Cobalt Lad. Flying over he saw that he had hit Cassie in the neck hard enough to give her a coughing fit, and was rounding on Wiccan. By the time he got there, Cobalt Lad had smashed through his forcefield and had punched him in the stomach. "Just like old times, freak…"
Hulkling landed on Cobalt Lad with both feet. "Word of advice, doofus," he said, as he heard the other young man struggling for air, "Don't use that word when I'm around."
"Yeah?" gasped Cobalt Lad, struggling to get up, "and what are you, his boyfriend?"
"Yup."
Cobalt Lad stopped, clearly not expecting this. "Oh." He brought his fist up, catching Hulkling in the side of the head. "Good."
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With the Vision, stopping the Were-Ape should have been easy. But it's preternatural regenerative powers made it almost immune to the Vision's phasing powers, and his heat-vision had slowed it down but not otherwise helped. It came down to a battle of strength.
Patriot looked around the field. Cassie was back down to normal size, Kate was missing, and Tommy –
He was horrified as Nal-Rogg managed to connect with Tommy just as he came with arm's length. It was a glancing blow, but with Tommy's own speed, the power of the blow was magnified several times. He went flying.
"Vision, go help Speed! Let me deal with the Ape!"
As Vision departed, Patriot wondered how. The thing had shrugged off most of his brute force attacks, and now he could swear it was grinning…
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Nal-Rogg had been impressed by the son of Mar-Vell. The biometric scans he had managed to get would give Kree biologists whole new pathways to explore. As well as the honour he had restored to the family name by keeping to the fight in the face of an interruption.
Nal-Rogg had been infuriated by the fast human who had tried to distract him from the son of Mar-Vell. His unique physiology had been difficult to quantify when he was moving at top speed.
But as he stood over the fast human, now comatose, and prepared to use his mace-shaped cosmi-rod to deliver the sentence that was the fate of all who tried to cheat Kree law, he felt an intangible hand move through his stomach. He turned to see the robot, and for the first time that day, Nal-Rogg was amazed. That the humans had such machinery! And, although it was advanced, it was not so far advanced that Kree science could not examine it without good result.
As the Vision solidified his hand inside Nal-Rogg, Nal-Rogg brought up the recorder he had been given and connected it to the skin of the Vision and hit 'record'. To the Vision, it was the equivalent of having a half-solidified hand stuck through his chest. Both of them passed out from shock.
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The rope arrow had got her out of the arena. Now she was running, running through an empty stadium looking for the greatest mass murderer in human history, to threaten him using a bag full of pointed sticks. It was the kind of thing you'd laugh at, if your friends weren't facing the prospect of an imminent, meaningless death.
Hawkeye broke through the final row of seats, and she saw the only lights in the stadium on a platform on the top of the stadium. A set of steps led in that direction, and she took them two at a time.
Putting a non-trick arrow in her bow, he jumped out of the stairwell and pointed the arrow at the two people sitting in the light. "Neither of you had better move!"
"Hmm," said the Grandmaster. "Well Kang, is this something else you neglected to tell me?"
"He's not controlling this," said Hawkeye. "I am. Now – turn off whatever freaky crap is keeping us here. This – ends – now."
Kang laughed. "You think you can end this fight with some harsh words and medieval weaponry? We are shielded, Miss Bishop. Nothing you can do will make us reconsider."
Hawkeye stood there for a second, feeling foolish. She should have considered this. They were already ignoring her, turning back to the fight, and one of her friend would die.
Her thought was interrupted by a whirring noise. A floating device was moving around the two chairs. And based on the way it was bouncing off the air, she had a hunch that it was on her side of the shield. Was it important?
Hey, what's the worst that could happen? She pulled the arrow back and let fly.
There was a flash.