Massive apologies for missing last week's update, I was very busy with work among other things... no worries though, as I will be updating twice today! There's two more chapters after this one, making the total to 18 chapters.
Disclaimer: I do not own any Marvel characters that may be used or any Marvel storylines or arcs.
Claimer: I only own the character Elizabeth Jones (Lowri Jones and any other names she uses) and her story past, present and future.
Recap
"So how come you burned a guy?" Steve asked.
"This doctor used speech to get into someone's mind, to hypnotise them. He controlled what they were thinking and what they were doing, and he got into Howard's mind. He made Howard fly a plane over the VE celebrations in New York in 1946, Howard was going to drop this gas called Midnight Oil. Howard invented it as a way to keep soldiers awake but it has other, undesired effects."
"Did this doctor hurt you?" Steve asked quietly.
"No. But I hurt him. He did try to get into my mind, to warp me against everyone else. But I set my hand on fire and held his mouth shut." Lowri said, she looked away from Steve as she remembered the pain in the Russian's eyes, ain that she caused.
"You really came into your own, didn't you?" Steve asked gently.
"It was all down to you, Steve." Lowri said, she looked up at Steve and smiled. "If you hadn't been so slow when the second German assassin came to find you, then I wouldn't have needed to save your life or show my impeccable skills."
Steve chuckled. "Obviously, you haven't lost your confidence." He said.
"Well, maybe I did a long time ago. But now, who can go up against a woman with unnatural abilities?" Lowri asked.
"Aliens." Nat called back to her.
"Okay, well, I hope they're flammable." Lowri replied.
"Loki isn't." Nat called.
"That's a mere setback." Lowri called back.
The jet soared closer and closer to New York and right in the centre of it, where Stark Tower is, was a bright blue beam shooting right up into the air.
"Well, this is kinda familiar." Lowri noted as she rose to her feet and headed to the back of the cockpit.
"It sorta does." Clint added.
"What's those things flying around that?" Steve asked, pointing at the blobs flying around the Tower.
"Not a clue. Guess we'll find out when we get there." Lowri said.
Lowri felt the anticipation of a fight deep in her bones and her fingertips tingled. She knew this was going to be a long and hard fight, they were going up against a demi-God and an army of aliens which is something none of them had ever done.
There's no strategy to be planned because their only informant of alien activity is AWOL, so they were going in blind.
"Stark." Nat said into the communications, they were heading over the city quickly heading for Stark Tower. "We're on your three, headed northeast." Nat reported.
"What, did you stop for drive-thru?" Tony asked in his usual sarcastic way. "Swing up Park, I'm going to lay them out for you."
Clint lowered the jet and they swooped in between the tall buildings and they sped towards the tower.
As they neared, they had a better view of the blue beam which turned out to be a portal to another world, much like the portal that brought Loki to this planet, but this time it was bringing hundreds and hundreds of alien fighters, whizzing about on strange contraptions, shooting at things and blowing things up.
"Better get the big guns ready." Lowri said quietly. She leant against the back of the chairs and looked out the window. Steve was just behind her, looking out the window too.
Clint swung them up Park and Tony shot past them in his new Iron Man suit with a long line of Chitauri soldiers flying behind him, following closely.
Nat engaged the guns and opened fire on the Chitauri and just before the dust cleared to reveal the stone wall, Clint pulled up sharply.
Clint kept the control stick back and flew the jet up the side of Stark Tower and as they rose, they all saw Loki and Thor fighting on the balcony.
"At least we've got Thor back. That's some advantage." Steve noted. While Thor stumbled backwards from Loki, seemingly injured, Loki aimed the sceptre at the jet and shot one of the blue beams. The shot hit one of the jet's engines in the wings and the jet began falling straight away. The jet tilted backwards and began spiralling.
"Nose down!" Lowri yelled, the warning sound coming from the cockpit told them the jet was losing too much height and speed. "Nose down, Clint! We're gonna stall!" Clint was too late to save the stall and the jet spiralled out of control. Steve fell backwards but he quickly grabbed onto the side of the jet.
Lowri lost her grip on the back of the chairs and fell backwards too, she couldn't grip onto anything else and she headed for the back of the jet quickly.
Steve grabbed hold of her and pulled her against him, he wound his arm around her waist and his hand splayed on her stomach, holding her firmly against his side. Her hands were braced on his chest and she looked up at him, very aware of how close they are.
The jet crash landed onto the ground hard and the whole aircraft juddered violently as they hit the earth. Steve held onto Lowri tightly so when the jet crashed hard, both of them remained upright.
Clint and Nat jumped out of their seats and headed for the back of the jet immediately as Steve and Lowri untangled themselves. Nat glanced at them and smirked as she passed by.
Steve and Lowri were just behind Clint and Nat as they got out of the jet and straight away, they jogged onto the nearby road to see what was going on.
"We gotta get back up there!" Steve yelled as he started off at a run, heading for Stark Tower.
He led Lowri, Clint and Nat up the road and towards Stark Tower, they had to climb a set of stairs to reach the road just in front of the Tower. Civilians dashed past them with anxious, worried and scared looks on their faces, some of them were covered in dirt and rubble where they had been caught under fire by the Chitauri, others were relatively clean and others had blood on them.
The portal above them was wide open and Chitauri kept on spilling from within the large hole in space on their flying ships. A loud roar that shook Lowri to her bones was heard coming from the portal and within seconds, the portal was filled with this enormous creature, sort of like a whale but flying in the air.
"Stark! Are you seeing this?" Steve yelled into the comms. His voice buzzed in Lowri's ear but she couldn't take her eyes of the flying beast.
"Seeing, still working on believing. Where's Banner? Has he shown up yet?" Tony asked, his voice buzzed in Lowri's ear too.
"Banner?" Steve repeated.
"Just keep me posted." Tony ordered.
It was chaos. There was no order to the attacks and a lot of civilians were getting hurt because of it. they were rushing as quick as they could to get as far away from the city as they could but the Chitauri are fast on their flying ships, they flew up and down the roads, blowing them up.
"We've got civilians still trapped up here." Clint stated quickly as the Chitauri army began bombing nearby roads and the road they were on.
The four of them dove for cover beside abandoned cars and pulled out their weapons. Clint brought out his bow and arrows and quickly set about firing them into Chitauri soldiers that edged closer, Nat and Lowri pulled out their guns and immediately began shooting.
"They're fish in a barrel down there." Steve said, he looked down at the road where they had parked their jet. As Steve brought himself back into safety of the car, Lowri caught a glance of Steve's stern face as he made plans in his head.
She had only ever seen his style of leadership in film and media but never in real life, not really. But now, she was finally seeing his leading style.
Steve looked back down at the civilians wilfully, he wanted to go down there.
"We got this." Nat said, she glanced at Clint and he nodded at her, then Nat turned back to Steve and Lowri. "It's good. Go."
"Are you sure you can hold them off?" Steve asked, he looked at Nat and Clint and then he looked at Lowri as if he was torn.
"Captain," Clint said, drawing Steve's attention to him. "It would be my genuine pleasure." Clint finished. He loaded his bow with another arrow and took out one of the Chitauri soldiers.
Steve got up and held up his shield as he stepped around the car. Lowri got to her feet too and followed him but he turned back and tried to push her back to the car.
"What are you doing?" Steve asked.
"What are you doing?" Lowri asked, she narrowed her eyes at him as she looked up at him. He narrowed his eyes at her too and tilted his head.
"You stay up here and help Barton and Romanoff." Steve said.
"I'm coming with you. Nat and Clint are alright up here." Lowri replied. Steve looked like he was going to talk back but Lowri cut him off before he could begin, "You're the one who wanted me out of the office."
Steve stared at her with his mouth dropped open and she stalked past him. She slid her guns into the holsters once more and she pulled herself up onto the side of the bridge. Lowri turned back to Steve and smirked at his stunned look.
"Are you gonna stand there all day? Or are you gonna fight these damned aliens?" Lowri asked before stepping off the bridge.
She summoned her fire and flew up to the level of the flying ships and she directed a fireball at one of them and she was delighted when they caught fire easily and burned aggressively.
Steve had jumped down onto an abandoned yellow school bus just underneath the bridge and he was quickly running down the road towards where the police force had set up a barricade.
He landed on a police car and spoke urgently to two of them standing close to the barricade but it looked as though the police men weren't listening.
Lowri tackled one of the Chitauri from a nearby flying ship and cut out her fire as she tumbled with the Chitauri soldier down and down. She landed on her back on the bonnet of the police car, making both the policemen jump out of their skins, and giving Steve a scare too.
The Chitauri soldier landed on top of her, it hissed and growled at her and then brought out a long, sharp knife and tried to plunge it into her chest. Lowri used the back of her forearm to block the Chitauri's knife arm and then Steve's shield knocked the Chitauri's head backwards and it was thrown from her with its neck broken.
Steve offered her his hand silently but he had a knowing smile on his face. Her actions certainly caught the attention of the policemen. She took his hand and he lifted her onto the car beside him and in the space of a moment, there was a massive explosion as the Chitauri soldiers still flying in the air began bombing the street.
Obviously, they weren't too happy that one of their own had been killed.
Lowri sent up a wall of fire, blocking the dust and debris from hitting them and Steve handled the attacking Chitauri soldiers with ease. She turned back to Steve after dropping the fire wall and she spied the two policemen turned from them, one of them speaking into his radio, carrying out Steve's orders.
Steve dropped the Chitauri weapon that he held and jumped down from the car and turned back to her, with a smile he offered her his hand once more and she took it. He held her hand as she jumped down.
"That caused a bit of a scene." Lowri said as they walked away from the scene they had just caused.
"All down to you falling onto a cop car." Steve said with a smile.
"I like the theatrics." Lowri noted. "Besides, they weren't listening to you, and now they are."
"Thank you. And that was cool, what you did with that fire wall." Steve said. Lowri smiled at him.
"Do you know why I was the one that was selected to travel with you to New York in 1942?" Lowri asked. She walked around an abandoned car and looked up at Steve.
He slowed his pace and looked at her, "No." He said gently.
"Peggy suggested that I travel with you because she knew what I could do and I think Chester just wanted someone to travel with you. But he put me with you at that safe house because he knew I must have had some sort of field training and he was sure that nothing would happen. But Peggy told me that I was your bodyguard."
Steve's eyes widened and he chuckled. "You? My bodyguard?"
"Well, I did save both of our lives." Lowri pointed out.
"Very true." Steve said, they reached the yellow bus that was just under the bridge. "Well, I am glad that it was you in the car with me. Otherwise, we wouldn't have had that god-awful and embarrassing conversation." He jumped up onto a nearby car and turned back to her. "Do you need any help, dame?"
Lowri laughed as she took his hand and pulled her up onto the car. "Oh, that was an entertaining conversation." She said as he gave her a boost up onto the bus.
"Well, I'm glad you found it entertaining. It was scary for me. Do you not realise that you can be a little bit intimidating sometimes?" Steve asked as he got up beside her.
"Me? Intimidating?" She asked innocently. Her smile betrayed her and Steve shook his head at her. They pulled themselves up onto the road where Nat and Clint were still fighting the Chitauri soldiers.
Steve and Lowri dashed across the road and Thor landed beside them as they met up with Nat and Clint.
"What's the story upstairs?" Steve asked.
"The power surrounding the Cube is impenetrable." Thor stated.
"Thor's right. We gotta deal with these guys." Tony added.
"How do we do this?" Nat asked, the question was one on everyone's tongues, everyone except for Thor has never faced anything like this and it was completely new.
"As a team." Steve answered firmly. He looked around the group quickly and he gave off the look of a leader and Lowri liked that.
"I have unfinished business with Loki." Thor said simply.
"Yeah? Well get in line." Clint said as he counted his remaining arrows.
Lowri pressed her lips together and surveyed the scene. If these two were only fighting for revenge, then they may be clouded, and she should definitely be in that line too, given the past few days. She shook that feeling off and looked up.
"Forget your little tiffs with him." Lowri said, both eyes went to her. "Right now, there's an army of aliens flying over us and we need to work together to keep them contained."
"Elizabeth's right." Steve said slowly, "Loki is gonna keep the fight focused on us, and that's what we need. Without him, these things will run wild. We got Stark on top, Elizabeth is gonna join him. They're gonna need us to-" Steve was on a roll but he was cut off by the rumble of a motorcycle approaching slowly.
Lowri caught sight of a dishevelled Bruce Banner, wearing clothes that were far too big for him and he looked pale, grey and exhausted. He stopped the bike and got off, he headed for them quickly but warily.
"So," Banner began as he came to a stop a few paces away from the group. He looked around him and then looked back at the group. "This all seems horrible." He added.
"I've seen worse." Nat replied. She shifted her shoulders uncomfortably and kept her eyes trained on Banner.
"Sorry." Banner said, his voice gentle and filled with remorse. Nat must have got hurt by Banner a few hours ago.
"Stark, we got him." Steve said urgently.
"Banner?" Tony asked hopefully.
"Just like you said." Steve noted.
"Then tell him to suit up. I'm bringing the party to you." Tony said and then Lowri's stomach dropped.
"Tony, your parties always end up in a disaster." Lowri said. Any party that Lowri had been to of Tony's always ended up in something dramatic happening.
"Well, you're gonna love this." Tony replied.
A second later, they spied Tony flying around a corner just down the long road and just a few feet behind him was one of those whale-like-creatures, following closely.
"I don't see how that's a party." Nat said slowly.
This huge creature was approaching them with an impressive speed and Lowri felt her fingertips tingle.
Steve braced his shoulders and lifted his shield closer to him as he looked at this huge thing. Banner turned away from the group and began walking calmly towards the alien whale, drawing the attention to him.
"Doctor Banner." Steve called, Banner turned back to the group as Steve called him. "Now might be a really good time for you to get angry." Steve added.
Banner had a smile on his face. "That's my secret, Captain. I'm always angry." Banner said, he turned from the group as the alien whale approached. Tony flew overhead and turned in mid-air to watch as Banner drew his arm back simultaneously as he transformed into a huge, green rage filled creature. His fist slammed into the alien whale's face and the entire body just crumpled.
The body flew upwards into the air and began falling towards the group as it tilted forwards. Various bits of the body armour flew from the creature and fell down on them.
"Hold on!" Tony yelled, Lowri couldn't take her eyes from the alien whale and she stood in the middle of the road, unmoving while everyone else took cover. She felt an arm wrap around her waist and she was pulled under a familiar shield.
Lowri automatically reached for Steve and held to him as Tony aimed an explosive at the alien whale and caused the bit in the air to explode and bits of flesh and armour rained down on them.
The Chitauri foot soldier that clung to the buildings above them began roaring and hissing at them in disproval. Banner roared back, just as loud and just as echoing.
Steve got to his feet quickly and Lowri was just behind him. They stepped into a circle with everyone else. Tony landed and stepped in too.
"Guys." Nat said warningly. Her eyes were looking up at the portal while more and more Chitauri soldier came through.
"Call it, Captain." Tony said.
Steve looked back at the group. "All right, listen up. Until we can get that portal closed, our priority is containment. Barton," Steve began, he turned to Clint. "I want you on that roof, eyes on everything. Call out any patterns and strays." He ordered, "Stark, you got the perimeter. Anything that gets more than three blocks out, you turn it back or you turn it to ash." Steve commanded.
"Can you give me a lift?" Clint asked Tony.
"Right. Better clench up, Legolas." Tony remarked. He stepped up beside Clint and held him to his side before flying off up to the roof, dropped Clint off at the room and then he shot up into the sky to attack the flying Chitauri soldiers.
Lowri kept her eyes on Steve and she watched as he moved fluidly, giving out the commands as if this was natural to him. She now knew personally how easy it was to follow him into battle.
"Thor, you gotta try and bottleneck that portal, slow them down. You got the lightning, light those suckers up." Steve ordered. Thor swung his hammer in circles and nodded before shooting into air and landing on top of a tall building with a spike at the top, very close to the portal. Steve turned to Nat, "You and me, we stay here on the ground. We keep the fighting here." Steve turned to Banner, "And Hulk," Steve began, he pointed to the Chitauri soldiers above them, jeering at them, "Smash."
Banner grinned wickedly and then shot into the air with a loud roar.
Steve turned from Lowri to say something to Nat and Lowri placed her hands on her hips and looked at his back.
"You forgot me." Lowri said slowly.
Steve turned to look at her and a smile grew on his face as he stepped closer to her, he put on hand on her shoulder and looked into her eyes.
"Use that fire of yours and burn those things to hell." Steve commanded.
Her smile radiated and it grew wider before she turned from him and began running towards the edge of the bridge.
She summoned her fire as she threw herself off the bridge, she was eager to see how much damage she could cause to the Chitauri soldiers that got in her way.
Lowri boarded the flying ships and took them down with her fire, she jumped ship before the Chitauri soldiers could attack her and if she didn't get to them, they were taken out by either Clint or Banner.
There were a few times when the Chitauri managed to stab and slash at her with their knives and they sometimes managed to get their hands on her and throw her from the flying ship before she could do any damage.
She was cut and bruised all over her arms and torso but she managed to kill more than the amount that hurt her.
Now that Lowri was flying around, those that did shoot the blue beams didn't hit her at all and for that, she was thankful. She couldn't deal with an injury like that at this time.
Lowri shot towards one of the flying ships and flew over it, she was aiming to hover over it and set it on fire but she was hit in the stomach as she flew over and she was thrown backwards onto the flying ship.
She almost rolled off but she clung on and pulled herself on. The two Chitauri soldiers turned to her, but the one at the front was the one controlling the flying ship turned back to control it while the one at the back, pulled its knife out and wielded it at her.
Lowri ignored the blood dripping from her side and she kicked the legs of her attacker out from under it. Lowri fell to the floor and used her feet to push the Chitauri from the ship and she crouched on the balls of her feet and turned to the Chitauri soldier at the front and quickly grabbed the knife from where it had fallen to the floor. She sliced the Chitauri soldier's neck and he bled out, then fell to the earth.
She turned to leave the flying ship before it could fly out of control and she spied Loki flying away from her with a sickening smile on his face. It was he who had shot the blue beam at her. She threw herself from the flying ship and summoned her fire but nothing came to her.
For a long moment, it was as though she was frozen in mid-air and she saw Loki hold up a hand and she realised he was the one control her fire. How is that even possible?
Lowri felt heavy in the air and then Loki opened his fist and she dropped. Her fire wouldn't come to her, there was nothing she could do slow down her fall.
She fell far too quickly and she saw the looming yellow bus, welcoming her. She landed with a painful thump and the metal bus crumpled around her.
Her breath escaped her lips and her eyesight dimmed as pain exploded everywhere.
Again, massive apologies for not updating in the last week. I did have enough time to go out on a date and the guy I went with took me to see the new Avengers Infinity War (good choice, right?)
The second chapter of the day will be up later on. The last chapter of this story will be updated next week!
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