Chapter 16

Back-Up

Tony

It's easy to follow the trail of destruction – the pouring rain is putting out the fires and in most places it hadn't really gotten started, but Hulk and Abomination broke trees all along the way. Subtlety isn't exactly their strong suit.

It doesn't take long before I come upon a little lake – as soon as I clear the tree line (which goes almost right up to the water) I see the ugly one holding Hulk under water. I am so screwed.

I use the unibeam – that's my only hope against this thing. I blast it right in the back at as close a range as I dare get. It does damage – it opens a huge gaping wound in the creature's back and causes a shower of green blood – and His Ugliness shrieks in pain (a sound ranked roughly between bomb sirens and the screams of murdered children in terms of pleasantness) and whirls on me. It moves so fast I don't have time to change direction or even move back before a huge fist slams into me and sends me to the ground. I knew better than to get so close.

It's not content to just swat me – this time it focuses on me. Which is bad because just the swat does a huge amount of damage – both times I felt it rattle my bones and I could hear the armor denting. I roll quickly to avoid a huge fist slamming down on me and engage the thrusters to fly away – the thing catches me by one foot and slams me into the ground twice. Both times I feel something snap – thankfully not my spine – but the worst pain is in my hip, which feels like it got wrenched so hard I'm not going to be surprised if I take my armor off and find it's not attached anymore.

The thing shrieks again – they had to have gone out of their way to give it hellish sound superpowers – and it drops me in a hurry, turning on the newest annoyance. Kat was smarter than me – she stayed further back and is taking cover behind a tree – but I know how fast it is so I ignore the pain and roll over to aim one more blast at it's back – Kat shot an arrow into the wound I already made, even though it had started to close. I fire again, lower than her wound to increase our coverage area of destruction. This time I must hit something important because it finally runs – it lets out its earbreaking shriek one more time and then hauls it to the lake, I guess to put out the fire.

Kat, in a move I think is suicidal, drops her bow and quiver and runs like hell towards the lake, stripping off her armor for reasons I can't fathom.

"Tony – do not try to fight that thing anymore," Jarvis tells me sternly.

"Jarvis I …"
"I mean it Tony – do not." I feel parts of the armor coming undone – some parts fall away, others will have to be pried away because of the beating.

"What are you doing?!"
"Making you not a threat and lowering you on Mr. Blonski's priority list."
"That thing is Emilianus?!" I ask in horror – my helmet falls away but my earpiece remains stuck to my ear. I look down and I'm glad to see my leg is still attached, despite how it felt – but it is broken to two places, the ankle and the hip (I am too young to have a broken hip). The other snap was my ribs I think – my sides hurt like hell.

"Tony, be still," Jarvis scolds me as I sit up on my elbow, looking to see what Kat thinks she's doing – I see her yanking Spruce, naked and covered in blood, both red and green, to shore. I was so busy fighting Mr. Ugly I forgot about Spruce – but I force myself not to worry about him and my eyes find Blonski in the lake, floating on his back but not moving. He looks pretty dead. Good, I can worry about Spruce.

I roll over and start to drag myself to him. "Tony, you have several broken ribs and you are currently putting yourself at risk for …"
"Puncturing a lung, I know. If I do let me know," I say brusquely. My chest plate is intact so he can still monitor my thoracic condition. Kat is trying CPR and mouth-to-mouth but she's bad at it – she only has really basic training. His head isn't far back enough and her rhythm isn't right, and on top of that she's too gentle and she's bending her elbows so she won't hurt him.
"Stop – you're blowing air into his stomach, tilt his head back more," I gasp as I struggle to get to him, but suddenly twenty yards is impossible for me.

"Hold it Tony!" Finnick is on the way, running. He's been doing drowning revivals since he could walk, so I really do stop then. I watch, barely able to breathe (well, that's mostly because of my ribs) while Finnick takes over from Kat. He tilts Spruce's head back further and breathes for him, then starts pumping his chest in what looks like a much better rhythm. He keeps his elbows straight and I may not be the only one with broken ribs before all is said and done.

"Spruce, please, wake up," I beg out loud, even though I know he can't hear. How long was he under?! I know it's about six minutes without oxygen before …

Death.

A twig snaps and I turn my head and I'm looking right in Clint Barton's eyes – he's less than ten feet from me, holding his bow at the ready, and he's got an arrow aimed for right between my eyes.

I freeze – most of my weapons fell away with my armor, and if I tried to use the unibeam, he'd fire before I could aim. And I would kill him for sure – I don't want to do that.

I flash back to Phillip slumping against me, his blood soaking through my shirt, and maybe I do.

I wait, not wanting to risk firing at him. "Tony, I recommend that you think of something to say," Jarvis scolds me urgently. No. I'm not going to beg. I'm not going to defend myself to a madman. If he wants to be the Capitol's puppet he can go right ahead. "Tony – swallow your pride and tell him …"
"Clint!" it's Peeta's voice. Peeta is tearing through the woods, screaming, "Clint! Stand down!" At that, Katniss finally turns around – her eyes widen and her eyes lock on Clint's back.

"What did you do to that little girl?" Clint asks me. I very nearly sarcastically tell him I humped her brains out, but I know that will just get me killed and the thought is so gross I hold my tongue.

"Tony, you had better tell him …" Jarvis starts.
"Does it matter what I say? You're always going to believe what the Capitol wants you to," I say harshly instead. I hear footsteps of several people running towards us.

"Tony, swallow your pride and beg right now …" Jarvis pleads, all hint of composure gone.

A figure gets between me and Clint. "He didn't do anything to Brandy, Clint," Stephen says evenly, but his hands are shaking. "He's a jackass, but he's not a child molester."

To everyone's surprise, Clint lowers his bow. "Are you okay?" he asks me stiffly. It takes a while to answer.

"Better now that you're not pointing a deadly weapon at me, but …" I look over and Spruce is sitting up, looking despondent, his feet drawn up to his chest with his arms around them. "Spruce! Buddy!" He looks up at me and gives me a feeble smile and … holy ...

There is blood, red human blood, in his mouth – like a lot of it, and that's with his mouth being rinsed by gasping for air in the lake. It's all over Finnick and Katniss's faces too … He must see the look on my face because he looks confused, then visibly runs his tongue over his teeth and then just looks horrified …

"Let's get you cleaned up," Kat says gently, and puts a hand on his shoulder.

"Um can you … not look?" Spruce asks sheepishly. She nods and turns her back, and I start trying to crawl to him again while Finnick takes him back into the water, making sure to stay in the shallows.

"Don't hurt yourself, I'll help," Clint says and leaves my side, and I breathe a little easier. Peeta closes the distance to me and kneels, looking at my leg. "Geez," he whispers softly as he looks at it. Katniss starts to step closer but I shake my head and gesture her back – I don't think that will help the situation with Clint. I see Peeta doing the same thing and almost laugh. Then I see how stricken Stephen looks by the situation and it's not funny anymore.

I look back to the lake and see Blonski is mid hideous transformation – he's halfway back to human, with bones popping and limbs sticking out at angles that shouldn't be possible. "Peeta can you swim?" I ask.

"No …"

"What about you pipsqueak?" I ask Stephen. He wrinkles his nose at the nickname and shakes his head.

"Catnip, go get Blonski – tow him in. Peeta go back up to the village and see if they have any knock out drugs to spare." Without a word, they do as they're told – it's a little bit of a power trip – and Kat dives back into the lake and Peeta heads back towards the village. If Blonski is still alive, we need to make sure he stays under indefinitely – if I have to I'll use the paralyzer – and if he's dead an autopsy might tell us more about how to fix Spruce when this is all said and done.

Stephen finally stops staring at Clint and turns to me and looks me over. He acts like he's going to go for the hug. "No no – broken ribs," I protest quickly, even though it's unlikely he could hurt me any worse since my chest plate is still on. He was amazing during the whole battle – he must have killed twenty or thirty guys during the skirmish. I almost complement him on his kills but at the last minute I realize how that would sound … I'm not a savage. He kneels by me, looking at my leg. "At least your bone didn't break the skin."
"So far as I can tell – don't know for sure about the ankle." He looks around and spots Finnick's trident and goes to pick it up.

"Please don't stab yourself," Finnick says over his shoulder as Steve carries it back. "Or Tony – his mother's probably already hysterical enough and I wouldn't want to be you if you hurt her baby boy," he adds in a teasing tone. I hadn't thought about Mom until now, but now I know she's going to be a wreck watching. I know Finnick expects me to be embarrassed but … I am a Mama's boy. Everyone knows it. No point pretending otherwise.

Stephen presses the prongs of Finnick's trident into the joining of my chest and back plate and as soon as he does the pain is a thousand times worse and I just stop myself from crying out in pain – I do gasp and I know I must make a face because Stephen stops immediately. "Sorry, Tony, but it's gotta come off …" I know he's right but part of me just wants to see if I can wait to fly back to base to get it off – they can put me under there. I really wish I could have a drink. For the first time I notice several of the camera people standing around – Dad's floating cameras are also around.

"Does one of you want to make yourself useful?" I call sharply to them. It would help if one of them held me steady while Stephen applied force. One of them, a woman, nods and comes forward and stands behind me. I turn my head to look back out at Katniss – she's towing Blonski at a good pace.

"Hold on – let's wait. I need to give her something," I say.

We wait for what feels like a long time but must only be a couple of minutes until Kat tows Blonski ashore. Even though he's the enemy and was never that pleasant even before the war, I find myself relieved that in the transformation he appears to have gotten certain anatomical features back. I notice that Kat is determinedly not looking and decide to mess with her a little. "Well, I'm glad that he got back his …"
"Tony!"
"I was going to say ears. Geez, Kat, get your mind out of the gutter." Stephen, being the nice guy that he is, takes off his jacket and throws it over Blonski's lower half so Katniss won't have to have visual contact with the male form anymore. No one comments on this.

"Okay, Kat, you're gonna take this," I toss the sonic paralyzer to her. "And you're going to cover the ear pointing towards it …"
"That make sit sort of awkward to hold, doesn't it?"
"It does. Design flaw," I concede, even though I intended to use it in my suit where a sound filter could block out the noise anyway. "Anyway, hold it towards Blonski, cover your ear and press that button. Don't do it for too long – I don't care but I don't think Fury would be happy if the cameras got one of his Avengers killing an incapacitated enemy combatant."

"So how long do I do it?"
"I don't know … thirty seconds should do it. Just count to thirty slowly under your breath." She does as I say, and I'm not sorry to see Blonski convulse and I hope he's in pain, even though he's not awake. After the beating he just gave Spruce, I enjoy it quite a bit. Kat pulls back, and walks back towards the place where … ugh. Clint is just standing there, staring at me.

My eyes go to Spruce immediately, he's standing up now with Finnick and someone else's jacket wrapped around his waist like a loincloth. His eyes are huge and staring – I'm trying to think of something to say when the camerawoman takes me by the shoulders and Stephen tries again with the prongs. I know this is going to hurt so I brace myself. Even bracing myself, when Stephen applies force, pain shoots through what has to be every nerve in my body and everything goes black.

Author's Note

Hi guys I hope you enjoyed the posting binge. Unfortunately this may be the last one for a while - gonna do my best to be more timely but, as I said on the note for chapter 11, life has a very high probability of getting in the way.

Also a quick note that Hulk and Abomination aren't quite as powerful as they are in the comics/movies, but you probably already got that by now. I figured I better put that in or else it was all just going to boil down to a Hulk/Abomination cat fight.