"Found him!"

Everyone looked up at the arrival of Captain America and everyone's least favorite god-except for Tony, who had moved so suddenly that he'd accidentally caused his fractured arm more pain and was now swearing. Loki could feel their eyes on him like sniper scopes, but what did he care? He immediately went to the darkest corner of the room, glaring at the wall in front of him and avoiding anyone's gaze. All the Avengers had been assembled...except for Thor, of course. Thank Odin. No, don't thank him. Thank yourself. Stars above, what did he know about himself anymore?

"What'd you find out, Reindeer Games?" poked Tony. For the crippled one, he was brave in speaking first. Especially to Loki. Having reached his chosen corner, the Asgardian situated himself against the wall as he replied, folding his arms tightly as if it were cold.

"I'm going to pretend you didn't call me that," he stated patiently, shifting his weight onto one foot and casually crossing the other over it. "Try again."

"What'd you find out, Loki?" repeated Tony, the emphasis on Loki's name making it clear that he meant 'Reindeer Games.' Still, an improvement, if you lowered your standards. Loki met Tony's eyes for an uncountable moment, letting his tacit disdain sink in, before abruptly looking away as if it were nothing.

"Nothing new," he lamented with a small shrug. "I ran into a four-legged killing machine, but then it was distracted by another killing machine the color of a raw vegetable, so I got away fine. Almost died. Who cares?"

"That raw vegetable is the only reason you're still alive," stated Hawkeye, his dry sarcasm only feeding Loki's ire. "Banner knew that he was the only person who could distract that thing, so he suited up."

"That thing is Kinners!" snapped Loki, his temper flaring at such a careless mention of one of his only remaining friends. The room went quiet, from equal parts confusion and fear for what still did not make sense. Loki blinked and looked closer at them, as if he couldn't believe they could be such idiots.

"What, you thought it was some trick of the light?" he snarled vehemently. "Or the air pressure? Oh, I know! Even better, it must've been one of my illusions! Classic God of Mischief, trying to sow discord among the merry troupe of adventurers. Because that worked so well last time."

"Don't act so offended," muttered Natasha, though her face was carefully neutral in keeping with her training. "You're the one who went out there alone. If you'd gotten yourself killed out there, it would've been your fault."

"Well, I don't see any of you trying to get her back," he growled, looking away. Steve looked at Loki with furrowed brows, trying to piece something together that lay just on the tip of his tongue.

"You...she was-" he began slowly. Loki sighed impatiently and glared into his eyebrows, swiftly tiring of the soldier's tentative figuring.

"Yes, she was my friend, too." he stated finally, deciding to stare at the ceiling in an attempt to avoid the eyes of every other sentient being in the room. But the sniper scopes were still there. He could feel their red dots trained on his head and his heart, trying to discern what he was thinking or feeling. All for the purpose of spilling his blood. It was all the same.

But she hadn't been. Why?

"Unlike anyone else," he started, his bitterness fading as he went on. "she actually went to the great trouble of understanding me. I suppose that's what friends do. I wouldn't know, she's the only one I ever really had." The room fell silent. None dared to interrupt his solemn soliloquy. She must not have been such a close friend to anyone else, the way they were politely ignoring him. Why only him?

"And now she's a thing," he lamented, the acrimony returning to sour his speech. "a ruthless hunter. A heartless animal. She could kill me. $^#, she could very well kill us all, and she wouldn't even care. In fact, I think she will, seeing as there's nothing stopping her. You know you can't keep her out there forever. She's not mindless, she's clever. She's bound to find us somehow, and when she does..."

More silence. Nobody else wanted to say it. Who wants to die, let alone admit it?

"So what do we do?"

Only one who was too well-acquainted with death to be afraid of it anymore.

Everyone looked straight to Captain America. His eyes went from person to person, the look on his face making it clear that he didn't understand why everyone was looking at him like he had just given the Nazi salute. He went to Stark to back him up.

"She told you things about werewolves, didn't she, Tony?" he asked, a tinge of plead in his voice. Startling as if waking up from a trance, Tony took a moment to answer him.

"Not much," he recalled, scowling a little. "Some junk about how there aren't very many anymore, so the ones that are still around are über-violent, and that the only way to turn into one is by getting bitten and surviving. She said something about a potion, and silver, and really bad cramps-"

"Wait, stop," commanded Loki. For once nobody seemed to recall that he was the most hated person in the room. "Silver. That's what it was, silver. Only material that can kill a werewolf."

"Kill?" echoed Tony, aghast. Natasha shrugged nonchalantly.

"What else are we good for?" she murmured to herself. Tony was about to snap out a retort to the contrary, but Loki shot first.

"I doubt it'll come to that," he said quickly, his mind on a roll now that he had something to work with. "Like I said, she's smart. If she knows we can kill her, even if we don't want to, then she'll at least think twice about a full-on attack. Which is good, because honestly, if she had a mind to attack us head-on she'd rip us to pieces. A potion, though? Could be useful. Do you remember much else?"

"She said it was called wolfsbane or something," Tony continued, kneading his brows in an attempt to glean more from his memory. "I don't know, Banner paid more attention than me. I thought she was joshing us."

"So you shouldn't have sent the Hulk to distract her?" snided Loki with a fake smile rivaling Mycroft's. "What a revelation! Who knew?"

"But!" exclaimed Tony suddenly, snapping his fingers in an epiphany. "We recorded the whole thing! It's all there, in the lab. Maybe she left us something useful."

"Then let's move out." said Cap briskly, stepping out the door. Yet something he saw out there made him freeze in his tracks.

"Rogers?" asked Hawkeye suspiciously. Steve looked back at them with wide eyes, then looked back out at the sputtering electrical panel down the hallway. The only illumination was given by the yellow sparks that fizzled from its mangled conduit. Not daring to believe his ears, Tony sprang to his feet and scrambled to see. He trembled.

"That panel was protected by titanium casing," he whispered shakily. He kept his voice low because with the terror in his voice it was either that or an earsplitting scream. The presumably indestructible titanium casing lay ripped in half on the floor, still spinning slowly from the recentness of the sabotage.

"We're in the dark," gulped Loki, staring through the black window before him. He remembered how useless his illusions had been with a fresh thrill of fear. "It has the advantage in the dark."

"Then why hasn't this room gone-"

Oh, Tony, why did you have to say it?

The room went black.

"Light! Someone!" blurted Loki. He heard people searching pockets and feeling tables frantically for flashlights. Then he remembered that he had his own light to give, and tried to forge through the panic to focus. But try as he might, he couldn't bring his heart rate down or take deep breaths. It was out there. He knew it. It was coming. He could feel its dark purpose exuding, its silent paws on the sleek floor, its keen eyes trained on his throat. How foolish had he been to think Kinners was still underneath that guise of fur and fangs? A monster was afoot. And Kinners was no monster. She was gone, suffocated by the curse of the moon.

Gone? No. She couldn't be.

Hawkeye was the first to bring up a flashlight. He shone it out through the window. It was right there, eyes glowing and ears pricked. And Cap was still at the door.

"Close the door!" screamed Romanoff. Steve yanked the doorknob towards himself before she'd even opened her mouth. But there was a paw caught in it, scraping eerily. She roared her pain into Steve's ear, even as they played a life-and-death tug of war. They were too evenly matched, and Steve's adrenaline wasn't enough. The door inched winder and wider open, so wide that she got another claw in to pull. Thinking fast, Steve kicked at one of her paws, but she slashed back at him, missing his shin by a hair. Shaking herself from her paralytic fear, Black Widow shot three rounds into her hand, which finally made her relinquish her hold on the door. Only for a heartbeat. Long enough.

Steve slammed it shut and locked it in the space of an eyeblink. Growling unhappily, the wolf slowly slunk away. Nobody dared to move until the very echoes had died away. Then everyone released breaths they didn't know they'd been holding, slumping against walls or running hands through hair in an attempt to calm down. That had been way too close. But now they were trapped. It knew exactly where they were. All they knew was that it was out there somewhere, watching and waiting until they decided to make their next move. Nobody dared to say it. Everybody knew it. Only Tony was brave-or, perhaps, naive?-enough to speak it aloud.

"Now what?"