Chapter 12: Working Together

"How's your head, Stay?" Natasha mumbled to her younger sister, who was sitting next to her, trying to slow her breathing.

Anastasia reached up to touch her head. "It's healing." She looked over at her sister. "Don't worry about me, Nat. It's your ankle that I'm more concerned about."

Natasha reached down to examine her injured ankle, hissing in pain as she touched it. "Two broken bones, major bruises. Nothing too bad," she muttered.

Suddenly, the ship started tipping to the side. Anastasia and Natasha fell backwards and smacked into the wall behind them, Natasha landing on top of her sister, who cursed in their mother-tongue. Anastasia looked to her for answers on what might've caused the ship to tip.

"There must be two engine failures. That's the only way that this ship could plummet to the ground," Natasha grumbled as she pulled herself up. She turned to Anastasia, who had passed had passed out on the floor next to her. Natasha panicked for a second before her sister shot up, opening her eyes, which were pitch black. When she calmed down, they turned back to their normal green and she looked at her older sister.

"Are you okay?" Natasha asked cautiously. Anastasia nodded, standing up and dusting herself off.

"Okay, you shouldn't walk on that foot, so stay here until someone can get and engine working again. No doubt Iron Man is on the job. If he's alive, that is."

Natasha nodded, knowing that there was no chance of changing her sibling's mind. Anastasia gave her a warning look before sprinting off at an inhuman speed to the closest engine. She silently followed three armed SHIELD agents to the engine where Steve was.

Anastasia's eyes met the Captain's and he gave her a look that said 'Get to safety'. She silently shook her head.

One of the agents tossed a hand grenade over at the broken engine. Apparently they weren't on their side. They must have had something to do with the Helicarrier's engines failing.

Cap swung down under the railing and hit the grenade down, making it go off under the Helicarrier. He landed in front of the 'agents', kicking one of them and throwing them off the ship. One of them started shooting at him, but Anastasia snuck up behind him and snapped his neck.

She dropped the man as he went limp in her hands to see the other impostor shooting at Steve, who lost his footing. She gasped in horror as she watched him fall from the enormous ship. The sniper turned to shoot her, but froze when he noticed her fists glowing. They looked like they were covered in icy blue flames, but he was sure he was hallucinating. He raised the machine gun in his hands and went to shoot at her, but she lifted her hands and shot the icy flames at him.

Anastasia ran past the pile of ashes that had been the impostor two seconds ago, looking down over the side of the Helicarrier to see if she could spot Steve. She sighed in relief when she found him handing onto a cord, dangling in the air and desperately trying to pull himself up to the ship again.

She reached down for Cap to grab her hand and pulled him up to stand next to her. he immediately went to the red lever on the wall and turned it as quick as he could. Anastasia heard more footsteps approaching them and braced herself for another fight, although her body was tiring very quickly. She chose to use emerald green flames, like the colour of her eyes, and felt the flames lick at her fingertips, not burning her. They felt smooth, like moisturiser against her skin.

She saw four men come around the corner, all holding machine guns, which immediately pointed at the pair up the stairs. they fired at the two of them, and Steve and Anastasia jumped down from the platform, Steve throwing punches and kicks at two of them, and Anastasia whipping flames at them.

Anastasia was using vampiric speed to dodge the bullets, but when Steve was tackled to the ground by two huge men, she was momentarily distracted. She was running low on energy and didn't move fast enough. She was knocked back by the impact of two metal bullets shot into her stomach.

She fell to the ground, trying to gather any leftover energy that she could. Steve had seen her get shot and fall to the ground, and he fought with a new determination. He defeated the two that he was fighting, but the sniper that shot Anastasia turned to face the gun at Steve, who ducked as he was showered with bullets.

Then out of nowhere, Steve saw Iron Man fly past, right into the sniper, knocking him flat on his back and landing on top of him. Iron Man rolled off the impostor and laid down on the ground next to the unconscious man, completely exhausted.

Steve got up and raced over to Anastasia. He didn't know why he cared about her more than he cared about the others. He wasn't in love with her, but he had felt this way when he first met Peggy, all those years ago. Maybe he was beginning to move on.

He knelt down next to the unconscious girl, quickly checking if she was breathing. She gasped suddenly and woke up, chocking and grunting in pain. Steve's eyes darted to her face.

"Steve?" she groaned, coughing as she attempted to sit up, before crying out in pain. Steve helped her sit up and moved her to lean against the wall. Her breathing was laboured and there was blood all over her clothes.

"What can I do?" he asked, mainly talking to himself, but Anastasia answered anyway.

"I can't heal unless the bullets are out." She grunted as she readjusted her seating position. "We need to get the bullets out. Now." Steve was at a loss of words, to say the least.

Before Steve could fully process what she'd just said, Anastasia moved her hand over her stomach and began feeling around for the two bullets. She quickly found and recovered one, hissing to hide the loud cry of pain. Steve pulled himself together and helped her recover the last bullet.

Once both bullets were removed, Anastasia's wounds began to heal. "Thank you, Steve."

"No worries, Ma'am."

"You can call me Anastasia, you know," she smiled shyly.

Steve nodded. "Are you okay now?"

"Yes, I'm fine now. Thank you." She looked at his face. "Are you okay?"

"Perfectly fine, thanks." They gave each other a look before Steve helped her up and they both walked over to see if Tony was okay. They kneeled beside him and Anastasia tapped on his faceplate.

"You there, Tony?" she asked. The lights in the eyes of the faceplate were off, as was his Stark Reactor, but his faceplate lifted up and they both sighed.

"Yeah, I'm okay," he replied. He looked at Steve. "Of course, I'd be better if you'd pulled the lever when I said."

"Well, I was kind of busy hanging off the side of this ship!" Steve replied exasperatedly.

Anastasia sighed. "Both of you need to stop your bickering," she declared, causing them both to look at her. "We need to see if everyone's okay and if Loki's still here. We have work to do." The two nodded, Steve in understanding and Tony seemingly grudgingly.

Tony picked himself up from the ground after refusing both Steve's and Anastasia's help. The three of them made their way to the bridge, wondering just how much damage had been caused.

That's all for today, folks. I might be able to update a couple more chapters on the weekend or next week because I'm on school holidays right now. Yay for me! And for anyone else who has holidays right now! Hope you all liked it! Please review! It will make me write faster!

xoxo Tigger xoxo