It's Raining Men
As the quinjet approached Stuttgart, Germany, that night, the comm. systems were set to pick up any noise that was coming from Loki's location. If they were about to enter a hostile or hostage situation, they needed to know. They had managed to hack into security footage from around gala that had called in an attack and were able to see what was going on too.
The footage spared no detail of a crowd of people running out of the building, a man in green armor with a golden helmet that had two curved horns coming out of the top, holding a scepter with a blue glowing stone set in it, stalking all of them out. The people were trying to make an escape into the surrounding streets, civilians instantly rushing back the ways they'd come at the sound of screaming, police arriving to help with the situation, but the man they assumed to be Loki, just held up his scepter and fired an energy blast at them, flipping the cars over and subduing the police.
Olivia flinched at the sight and had to look away for a moment, it was clear to her that whatever was powering Loki's weapon was of the Tesseract in origin. It was the same energy she could remember the weapons of HYDRA being like, and the amount of destruction that was being done just to the police cars in general told her as much. Just like everything else that had become more advanced in the last 70 years, so had new weapons the Tesseract could power.
"Kneel before me!" Loki's voice came over the audio. It was clear the crowd was still fleeing and disregarding his presence and his order. But within the blink of an eye, another Loki appeared, blocking their way, and another and another, until the people were surrounded by images of Loki, all with their own menacing scepter.
"Can this craft go faster?" Olivia murmured to Natasha who was piloting the quinjet.
"If we go any faster we'll blow out cover," Natasha frowned, though it was clear in her voice that she would have loved to send the jet straight to the people. But if they came in too fast Loki would see them, and if he fired that weapon at them and managed to take out the jet, it could land on the people or buildings and cause more damage.
"I. Said. KNEEL!" Loki roared.
Olivia shook her head as they watched the frightened people move to their knees, falling silent in the face of Loki's anger and power.
"I really hate bullies," Steve murmured, Olivia reaching out to take his hand as they watched, helpless to do anything until they were closer.
Loki just grinned smugly and held out his arms wide as he spoke to them, "Is not this simpler? Is this not your natural state? It's the unspoken truth of humanity, that you crave subjugation. The bright lure of freedom diminishes your life's joy in a mad scramble for power, for identity. You were made to be ruled. In the end, you will always kneel."
"Is it awful that I want to punch him in the face?" Olivia asked, to a series of responding 'No's from everyone in the jet.
"I'll pop in one good for you," Steve promised her, squeezing her hand back tightly before he made his way to the ramp in the back of a jet, getting ready for his own attack.
Olivia watched as an older man refused to kneel and stood strong in the face of Loki, "Not to men like you."
"There are no men like me."
"There are always men like you."
Olivia turned and made her way over to the ramp to help Steve. Seeing Loki fixating on the older man, it didn't take a seasoned battle veteran to know what would happen next, opposition had to be dealt with and eliminated, an example needed to be made.
"Look to your elder, people," they could still hear Loki speaking as Olivia began to man the controls of the ramp while Steve took his place, ready to jump, "Let him be an example."
Steve quickly hurled himself out of the jet, quickly assessing the situation on his way down. Loki had lifted the scepter, clearly ready to fire another blast at the older man. So he maneuvered himself to land in front of elderly fellow, his shield raised all ready, to block the blast and direct it back at Loki. He smirked when he saw the Asgardian knocked back on his bottom from the force of it. Though it told him something more about his current enemy which was enough to have him on the alert. Loki was resilient, a blast like that would have killed any normal human, but it only winded this enemy. He would need to be careful.
"You know," he began as he straightened up once more, "The last time I was in Germany and saw a man standing above everybody else, we ended up disagreeing."
Steve heard a thump behind him, and knew it was Olivia having follow him out of the jet. He could hear her softly murmuring to the older man, checking that he was alright and uninjured. So he noted to himself that the people were safe behind him with her, and strode towards Loki as the man picked himself up.
"The soldier and the medic," Loki sneered, before laughing when Steve stepped to the side to block his gaze from Olivia, the man showed his weaknesses far too easily, "The poor little humans out of time."
Olivia looked up with a frown at that. As far as the file that held all their intel about Loki went, he was not human and not of Earth. There should have been no way for him to know about them, about their situation...until she realized he had compromised SHIELD agents, some of whom were likely privy to that information. They hadn't said in the mission report what the compromising was beyond the fact that anyone compromised by Loki seemed to obey his orders. It hadn't listed whether they were mindless drones or if the man had actually been able to twist them to his side yet still maintaining their minds. Now it appeared those who had been compromised were taking Loki's side, were assisting him with their own intelligence and knowledge, not just blindly following orders. And that made things infinitely worse. For any SHIELD agent to be able to divulge such sensitive and classified information to Loki, it wasn't just she and Steve who were known to Loki but everything else SHIELD had in its arsenal, all their bases, codes, enemies...it compromised the entire organization.
"We're not the ones who're out of time," Steve told Loki as the quinjet lowered itself yo hover just a few feet away, its weapons system opening and aiming straight at Loki.
"Loki, drop the weapon and stand down," Natasha's voice rang out.
Loki quickly lashed out, sending a blast from his scepter at the jet, causing it to pull out of the way just in time. But it was enough of a distraction for Steve to begin to engage with Loki, throwing his shield at the man to turn his attention over to him. Olivia quickly turned to the crowd and managed to get them to flee now that the other Lokis had disappeared with the man otherwise engaged. Olivia kept Steve in the corner of her eye though, making sure he wasn't being overpowered by Loki, that he hadn't been hurt. She heard his shield clatter to the ground and looked over to see Steve now fighting fist to fist with Loki.
In the blink of an eye the man had managed to get Steve onto his knee, "Kneel!" he ordered.
She had just taken the step over to assist, when Steve managed to kick up and send Loki stumbling away with a firm slam of his foot, "Not today!" Steve shouted.
But Loki got another advantage, landing another hit on Steve and sending him falling to the side just as an odd song began to play over the speakers of the quinjet. It was quite loud and obnoxious, Olivia was instantly not a fan of it, and she didn't quite know what was happening as she didn't think Natasha would play something of the sort in the middle of a mission.
"Agent Romanoff," a voice spoke within the song, broadcasting over the quinjet speakers, "Did you miss me?"
Olivia, Steve, and Loki looked up at the sky as a man in gold and red armor flew over them, firing a blast at Loki and knocking him to the ground. The man touched down and strode closer to Loki, holding up what appeared to be every weapon in his arsenal to keep the man down.
"Make your move, Reindeer Games," the man Olivia now recognized as Iron Man from the files, Tony Stark, threatened. Loki put his hands up and made his armor vanish, "Good move."
"Mr. Stark," Steve greeted as he stepped beside Iron Man.
"Captain," the man returned, "Should we flip for who gets to cuff him?"
But just as he spoke the quinjet set down and another SHIELD agent who had been piloting the craft with Natasha came out to do escort Loki into the craft.
Tony turned, watching the man's progression, when Olivia caught Tony's eye. He reached up to the helmet of his suit and pulled it off of his face, staring at her for a moment, "Huh..."
"I'm sorry?" Olivia spoke as she walked over to them, her eyes drifting over Steve to make sure he hadn't been hurt before she focused on Tony.
"The way dad talked about you, I thought you'd be taller," he shrugged, "Do I get to call you Liv?"
"We'll have to see," Olivia remarked, a little thrown by Tony's countenance and mannerisms. He seemed quite a bit more carefree than Howard had been, perhaps even a little more flippant, and, by his last remark, perhaps maybe a touch more arrogant, "For the moment," she held out a hand to shake his, "Olivia Williams, I'm very glad to meet you Mr. Stark."
He rolled his eyes at that, "Let's not do formalities. To you, Tony," before he pointed at Steve, "You, Stark."
Steve just shook his head at that, "We need to get back to base and find out where Loki stashed the Tesseract."
He took Olivia's hand, the two of them starting to walk back to the jet with Tony following, when Olivia felt a hand on her shoulder. She stilled and turned to see the older gentleman who had stood against Loki was standing there.
"Major...Major Britannia?" the man spoke, but the hesitation in his voice told her that he honestly wasn't sure if he was speaking to the right person.
She smiled and nodded, "Yes? I'm sorry, were you hurt? I should have something in my bag that..."
But, before she could finish, the man quickly stepped forward and hugged her tightly, startling her for only a moment before she returned the hug, never one to turn them down now that she can control her strength more.
"Danke," a man murmured as he pulled away, tears in his eyes, "Danke sehr," he began to fumble for the English as he took a breath, "My brother, my brother fought in the war. He fell, and he said there was an angel who picked him up, helped him to safety. My brother would not have lived past the war if not for you. Danke, danke, dass du meinen bruder gerettet hast."
"Of course," Olivia told him, gently pulling him into another hug as he began to weep in gratitude, patting his back in comfort, the man mumbling half in German and half in English, just thanking her over and over for saving his brother.
Steve couldn't help but smile as he watched the moment unfold. For as much as they needed to return to base with Loki, he would not interrupt this for anything in the world. It wasn't lost on him that he seemed to receive more praise and recognition for his efforts in the war than Olivia did though he always did his best to remind others she had been by his side through it all. He may have been on the front lines, he may have been leading the attacks against HYDRA, but if it hadn't been for Olivia so many more lives would have been lost. She deserved all the praise and recognition in the world, for undergoing Dr. Erskine's experiment, for putting herself in a position to have to help so many wounded men in dire straits, to have that burden of their lives in her hand, and for the kindness and the compassion she showed everyone. He had always been proud of her, and he thanked God everyday for having her in his life.
He was glad someone else was recognizing all she had done too.
~8~
There was a tension within the quinjet as Natasha and another SHIELD agent piloted the craft back to their air base. It wasn't just Natasha's obvious concern with the storm they were flying through, one that seemed to have come out of nowhere, it wasn't just the fact that Loki was in their custody, held in such a small space where he could cause quite a bit of destruction if he managed to free himself. It wasn't even just that Steve and Tony seemed to be a bit short with each other. Olivia couldn't really put her finger on exactly what one thing it was, tensions were just high.
"Said anything?" Olivia looked over when she heard Fury's voice speaking through Natasha's headset, standing closer to the cockpit than Steve, who was nearer the ramp with Tony.
"Not a word," Natasha replied.
"Just get him here. We're low on time."
Olivia couldn't help but feel like that might have been partially her fault. She knew that time was of the essence with this mission, yet she had spared an extra minute or two to speak to the old gentleman in Germany. She hadn't had the heart to cut him off before he had been able to get out his full thoughts to her. The man seemed to realize, though, that it was a very serious situation and he hadn't taken very long. But she knew just how much every moment could count on a mission. And now they were a few minutes late because of her. No one in the jet would say it, but she was sure some of them must have felt it.
She moved away from the cockpit and sat across the jet from where Loki was. The man was tied up and handcuffed to his seat, but she felt like there should be more eyes on him, she didn't trust him worth anything.
"I don't like it," she could hear Steve whispering to Tony.
"What?" Tony spoke just as quietly in return, "Rock of Ages giving up so easily?"
Perhaps that was where the tension laid, it was something everyone had noticed. Loki was in possession of a Tesseract powered weapon, yet he gave up when one man held a laser at him? She had seen Red Skull being attacked by an entire army, and yet he had not given up the power of the Tesseract that easily. The man was resilient, he was strong, and he was clearly clever. And yet he handed himself over as though it was nothing. He didn't struggle, he didn't speak, he didn't try to turn them on each other with his words, she didn't know what his game plan was but it was putting everyone on edge.
"I don't remember it ever being that easy. This guy packs a wallop."
"Still, you are pretty spry, for an older fellow. What's your thing? Pilates?"
Olivia had to look over at Tony for that, a mixture of confusion and befuddlement on her face, adding yet another difference between Tony and his father. Even when they were headed into the enemy camp, even when Howard had been flirting somewhat with Peggy, there had always been a note of being serious, of knowing what needed to be done, of keeping focused. Tony had seemed to be both insulting and somewhat complementing Steve at the same time. He certainly was far more flippant than his father had been.
"What?" Steve seemed confused too.
"It's like calisthenics. You might have missed a couple things, you know, doing time as a Capsicle."
Olivia wasn't sure how to react to something like that, Tony had seemed somewhat alright with her, but it was becoming clear to her that he had something of an issue with Steve with the backhanded compliments. While she didn't expect respect from every single person, firmly believing it should be earned, she did at least expect it from those who worked for SHIELD. She and Steve had more than earned a modicum of respect for all they had endured during the war, for all of their efforts against HYDRA.
Just as she would respect Tony, and any other SHIELD agent she came across, because they were making efforts to keep the world safe. Tony seemed to want to needle Steve more than respect him.
Steve seemed to try and steer the conversation away, "Fury didn't tell us he was calling you in."
They knew Tony was going to be part of their search for the Tesseract, he was listed among the specialists being called in by SHIELD. But neither of them had known he would actually be in Germany, acting in his Iron Man capacity. Dr. Banner has been brought in for his mind, not because he was the Hulk.
Tony smirked, "Yeah, there's a lot of things Fury doesn't tell you."
"Oh dear," Olivia gasped slightly as she nearly fell off of the bench she was sitting on when a bolt of lightning nearly hit the jet, causing it to shake violently.
"Where's this coming from?" Natasha grumbled to herself though they could all hear her.
"Is there something wrong?" Olivia asked, though when Steve looked over he saw she was directing the question at Loki, who appeared quite tense and very displeased with the situation.
"What's the matter?" Steve asked the man, "Scared of a little lightning?"
"I'm not overly fond of what follows," was all Loki replied.
He hadn't even finished speaking when what felt like lightning actually hit the jet this time. Although Olivia and Steve looked up, hearing something thump onto the ship, before the sound moved to the ramp. Barely a second later, the ramp was torn open, a man in silver armor with a red cape and blond hair reaching in to grab Loki by the throat, yanking him out of the ship, flying off into the storm.
"Now there's that guy," Tony quickly put the Iron Man helmet back on, preparing for another fight.
"Another Asgardian?" Natasha called back, trying to turn the quinjet around.
"Think the guy's a friend?" Steve called above the noise of the storm, Olivia rushing over, parachutes already in her hand.
"Doesn't matter," Tony moved to the open ramp, "If he frees Loki or kills him, the Tesseract's lost."
"Tony wait!" Olivia shouted.
"Stark, we need a plan of attack!" Steve agreed.
"I have a plan: attack," Tony said, not giving them a moment to reply as he drove out of the side of the jet, activating blasters on his armor to speed after the two Asgardians.
"Here," Olivia quickly helped Steve put on one of the parachutes, Steve returning the favor as soon as he was secure.
"I'd sit this one out!" Natasha called back to them.
"We can't just leave Tony alone," Olivia argued, not just because he was Howard's son, but just in terms of human decency.
"Never leave a man behind," Steve quickly secured the last strap on Olivia's parachute.
"These guys come from legends, they're basically gods," Natasha warned.
"There's only one God, ma'am. And I'm pretty sure he doesn't dress like that," Steve answered, moving to the edge of the ramp with Olivia. He gave her a firm nod, which she returned, before the two of them quickly jumped out of the ship after Tony.
~8~
Olivia did her best to keep Tony in sight as she and Steve parachuted down towards land. Even in the dark of night, they could still make out the flashing lights of laser blasts and crackling electricity thrown between Tony and the man who had seized Loki. The fugitive Asgardian himself was standing high above the two feuding people, his arms crossed, freed of his bindings, just watching them. Olivia frowned when she caught sight of it, he wasn't even making any attempt to escape, which only added more to her suspicions and thoughts about just how easy it had been to apprehend him in the first place.
Her attention was brought back to the fight Tony was having when there was a crashing noise as Tony flew straight into the man's back, trying to take him out. But the other Asgardian was just as resilient as Loki appeared to be, managing to stand his ground.
Steve seemed to realize the severity of the situation, from his own battle with Loki, and quickly maneuvered his parachuted to take him down directly at the fugitive. He crashed into Loki as he landed, knocking the man to the ground, and appearing to knock him out as well. He quickly unstrapped himself from the parachute and looked up at Liv, just a moment behind him, only just landing a few feet away.
"Go," she called over to Steve, a cross between an order and an urging, "Help Tony, I can secure Loki."
Steve gave a firm nod and turned, rushing to the edge of a small cliff, hopping on top of a fallen log and looking down at where the other Asgardian was about to pounce and hurled his shield at the two of them, ricocheting off of the man's hammer, his weapon, and off of Iron Man's chest plate, drawing both of their attention.
"Hey!" he shouted down at them, managing to grab his shield back, "That's enough!" he spared one more glance behind him, to see Olivia was making quick work of securing Loki with another pair of handcuffs, before he jumped off of the log and down to the other two men, "Now, I don't know what you plan on doing here..." he spoke to the Asgardian.
"I've come here to put an end to Loki's schemes!" the man shouted.
"Then prove it! Put the hammer down."
"Um, yeah, no!" Tony scoffed, "Bad call! He loves his hammer..."
Tony barely got the last word out before the other Asgardian slammed his hand into him, hurling him away with little effort. He barely paid Tony any mind as he strode towards Steve, not even noticing Olivia appearing on the log above them.
"You want me to put the hammer down?" the man demanded, before leaping into the air, raising the hammer above him, clearly intending to bring it down on Steve himself.
Olivia jumped off of the log, landing on the ground, trusting Steve would be able to handle the man with the hammer, but needing to check on Tony for he had not gotten up yet. The Asgardian reached Steve, who had raised his shield, bracing for an impact, and slammed down against the shield.
Both sides clearly underestimated the power of the other for a massive explosion of light appeared, a reaction from the vibranium shield with the electricity generated by the hammer, sending out a massive shockwave that threw everyone off their feet, and destroying everything surrounding them.
Tony groaned as he managed to stand up, looking around at the utter destruction that had been caused, seeing Steve pick himself up as well, both of them looking at the Asgardian, who finally appeared calm or startled enough to actually listen to them instead of react when he saw the two men would not back down and were ready to defend themselves against him with a power of their own.
"Are we done here?" Steve demanded, sounding completely done with the situation.
The Asgardian merely gave a short nod, signaling he would not attack them if they did not attack him in return.
"Steve?" Olivia called.
Steve instantly turned around to face her when he heard the slightest hitch in her voice, something like a whimper but not quite, called out, "Liv!" and rushing to her side.
She was standing there, with her left hand pressed onto her right side, he could already see bits of red seeping between her fingers, she was wounded. Just as he reached her, she reached out with her right hand to put it on his shoulder for more stability. Her breathing not labored or intensive, but clearly focused. While he and Olivia had a higher pain tolerance than most, the wound was still a wound that needed to be treated.
"No," Olivia murmured when Steve moved to try and pull her hand away to look at the injury himself, "I've already examined it, it's fine, looks worse than it is, but I should keep pressure on it."
"She alright?" Tony quickly moved to her other side, reaching out with to grab her arm gently for more balance, "What happened?"
"It was nothing," she said quickly, "I lost my footing, and fell on quite a sharp rock."
It was quite embarrassing now that she said it out loud, how she had been felled by a mere pointy stone. But it was the truth. She was sure, had she not said anything, they would assume Loki had attacked her. Steve would be out for blood if that happened, they needed Loki in one piece. She had jumped down from where Steve had, only moments before the Asgardian with the hammer had slammed it onto Steve's shield causing the shockwave. She hadn't anticipated the energy from the wave to be as much as it had been or she would have braced herself better.
The man seemed to realize it had been his blow with the hammer that had caused her harm, and he stepped forward, "I offer my most sincere apologies," he began, before he looked up at Steve for the next part, "I did not mean to cause harm to your woman."
Steve grit his teeth at the description. While Olivia was his best girl, and so much more than that, it felt like an objectification when others called her 'his woman.' But it seemed to hit both him and Tony just then that THEY had both had a hand in her injury with how they had opposed and held themselves with this man. They had engaged him to the point where he had attacked the way he had and she'd gotten injured because of their ego.
"I'll be fine," Olivia insisted, "Honestly, I will, I don't lie about wounds. I just need to get back to the jet so I have a more stable and sterile place to treat it. And we need to get Loki back to base," she looked to the man with the hammer for that, "He has taken an object of enormous power and means to harm the people of this world with it," she explained to him, "We would like to take Loki with us so we might be able to find it."
The man looked between Tony and Steve, before smiling, "Why didn't either of you say that in the first place!"
Tony opened his mouth to answer, but just shook his head, turning to Olivia and gently tugging her, as though trying to take her away from Steve, "Let me get you back to the jet..."
"No, I can help her back," Steve countered, stepping closer to Olivia instead of tugging her nearer to him, "She's my partner, I can take care of her."
"Ummm...if you could take care of her she wouldn't be injured right now, just saying," he said at the last two words with his hands held up in surrender.
"Stark..."
"Look, the jet is still in the air, you won't be able to jump high enough to reach it. Neither of us is going to trust Point Break here with her. One of us has to stay here, with him to make sure Loki is secure. I'm the only one here who can fly her to the jet so she can take care of her wound sooner...unless you like seeing her suffer..."
"Tony, please, enough," she looked between the two, knowing Tony's words would upset Steve very much. He always hated to see her in any sort of pain and strove to protect her from everything. Tony was being quite unfair to him, to try and spin this time as though it were Steve's fault, "We secure Loki and wait for the jet to land," she gave the order, fixing all of them with a firm look that told them there would be no argument about it, before she turned and began to walk off, back in the direction they had left Loki.
Steve shot Tony a glare and hurried after Olivia, sweeping her off her feet so he could carry her the rest of the way.
They both deftly ignored the whipping noise Tony made behind them, not sure what it meant and not really wanting to know.
A/N: Olivia seems to be comparing Tony to his father a bit here, I know, but she's slowly going to be getting to know Tony for who he is as a person not as Howard's son. It's sort of just something she couldn't help doing when she found out Howard had a son, wondering what he was like, if he was like his father at all :) And Tony, I feel, is a little conflicted about how to feel about Olivia. I always felt like he partially blamed Steve for how distant his father was growing up, that he might resent him a bit and that's where some of the animosity comes from. A leader of armies with a man who would rather work solo would but heads, but I feel like sometimes Tony made it a bit more personal. But he doesn't know how to react around Olivia because she's a woman and he wants to be respectful of her in that regard, but she was also part of the problem with his father, but she seems like a compassionate person so he can't quite openly or fully hate her, but he doesn't know how to express himself so for now he just sort of tries to be neutral :/ But I have quite a few moments planned for Tony when it comes to Olivia once he gets to know her ;) Whether or not Steve will be pleased with all of them we'll have to wait and see ;)
Poor Olivia getting hurt :( I know she and Steve are quite resilient, but I figure with a shockwave as powerful as the one Thor created, it could probably send her flying back with enough force that hitting a rock at the right angle would hurt her :( In the long run it will actually be the catalyst to a turning point for her, which we'll see very soon ;)
Some notes on reviews...
Oh I have quite a meaningful moment planned for when Olivia decides if she should let Tony call her Liv or not ;)
Natasha is certainly going to be a big supporter of Olivia finding her 'inner warrior' ;)
That sounds like an awesome trick for the drink :) There was definitely a bit of protective jealous Steve with Coulson, it made me laugh :) I'll have to watch that video, it sounds amazing :) Tony might try to flirt with Olivia once he sort of gets past his general resentment of the two supers, but it may be short lived as he will have plenty more material to tease Olivia with and irritate Steve over ;)
Iced tea is going to be something that haunts Olivia for a while to come ;)