I do not own Marvel, The Avengers or any of its characters. I only own my original character Arabella and anything else that seems out of place.
So here is the next installment in the Fallen Angel series. I really hope you enjoy it. I want to say thank you in advance to anyone who chooses to favorite, follow and review this story.
Fury walks into the lab, surprised to see Tony and Banner working on the scepter. Angrily he asks, "What are you doing, Mr. Stark?"
"Uh… kind of been wondering the same thing about you."
"You're supposed to be locating the Tesseract."
"We are. The model's locked and we're sweeping for the signature now. When we get a hit, we'll have the location within half a mile." Banner tells him.
"And you'll get your Cube back. No muss, no fuss." Suddenly Tony's monitor show a collection of secret files. "What is Phase 2?"
Suddenly, Steve drops an Hydra assault rifle on the table causing Fury, Banner and Tony to turn around. Cap is pissed off.
"Phase 2 is SHIELD uses the Cube to make weapons." Cap turns to Tony, "Sorry, computer was moving a little slow for me."
Fury tries to explain, "Rodgers, we gathered everything related to the Tesseract. This does not mean that we're making…"
"I'm sorry, Nick." Tony tells him, moving the computer screen towards Fury which shows plans of the weapons.
"What were you lying?" Tony asks.
"I was wrong, Director. The world hasn't changed a bit." Cap says.
At that moment Thor, Arabella and Natasha walk into the lab. Natasha keeps her eyes right on Banner. He returns her stare, pissed off.
"Did you know about this?"
"You wanna think about removing yourself from this environment, Doctor?" Natasha suggests.
Banner scoffs, "I was in Calcutta. I was pretty well removed."
"Loki is manipulating you."
"And you've been doing what, exactly?"
"You didn't come here because I bat my eyelashes at you."
"Yes, and I'm not leaving because suddenly you get a little twitchy. I'd like to know why SHIELD is using the Tesseract to build weapons of mass destruction."
"Because of him." Fury points at Thor. "And her." He points at Arabella.
"Me?" Thor and Arabella speak together, pointing at themselves.
"Seven years ago, Earth had several visitors from Heaven, that attempted to kill a pregnant woman, killed several innocent people and blew up a diner/gas station." Fury looked pointedly at Arabella, who glanced unsteadily around the room meeting several pairs of eyes.
"Then last year, Earth had a visitor from another planet who had a grudge match that leveled a small town. We learned that not only are we not alone, but we are hopelessly, hilariously, outgunned."
"My people want nothing but peace with your planet."
"And I'm here to protect your planet."
"But you're not the only people out there, are you? And, you're not the only threat. The world's filling up with people who can't be matched, they can't be controlled."
"Like you controlled the Cube?" Cap asks.
"You're work with the Tesseract is what drew Loki to it, and his allies. It is the signal to all the realms that the Earth is ready for a higher form of war." Thor says.
"A higher form?" Cap asks.
"You forced our hand. We had to come up with something." Fury says.
"A nuclear deterrent. Cause that always calms everything right down."
"Remind me again how you made your fortune, Stark?" Fury quipped.
After that it all spiraled out of control, everyone began accusing one another.
"I'm sure if he still made weapons, Stark would be neck deep…" Cap says.
"Wait! Wait! Hold on! How is this now about me?" Tony yells.
"I'm sorry, isn't everything?" Cap asks him.
"I thought humans were more evolved than this." Thor announces.
"Excuse me, did WE come to YOUR planet and blow stuff up?" Fury retorts.
"You give your champions such mistrust?" Thor snaps back.
Arabella snaps at Fury, "You asked us all to be here. Why go to the trouble if you didn't trust us."
Natasha pipes up, "Are you really all that naïve? S.H.I.E.L.D monitors potential threats."
"Captain America's on threat watch?" Banner says unbelieving.
"We all are," Natasha tells them.
Tony stares at Cap, "Wait, you're on that list? Are you above or below angry bees?"
"Stark, so help me God, if you make one more wisecrack…" Cap threatens.
"Threat! Verbal threat. I feel threatened!" Stark cries.
As the "team" argues, they don't realize the blue gem on Loki's scepter is glowing brightly.
Outside the Helicarrier, a lone carrier slowly hovers over the ship.
"Transport 661 Bravo, please relay confirm codes. I've got you on the computer, but not on the day log. What is your hull? Over?"
"Arms and ammunition. Over." Barton's voice comes through the radio.
Inside Barton and his crew suit up and arm themselves. Barton pulls out his hi-tech bow and arrows.
Back in the lab, the egos of these people keep rubbing off of each other and at any moment, the shit will hit the fan.
"You speak of control, yet you court chaos." Thor says smiling.
"That's his M.O., isn't it? I mean, what are we, a team? No, no, no. We're a chemical mixture that makes chaos. We're… we're a time bomb." Banner says advancing on Fury.
"You need to step away." Fury tells Banner.
Tony puts his arm around Steve, "Why shouldn't the guy let off a little steam?"
Cap pushes Tony off, "You know damn well why! Back off!"
Tony comes face-to-face with Cap, "Oh, I'm starting to want you to make me."
"Yeah. Big man in a suit of armor. Take that off, what are you?"
"Genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist."
"I know guys with none of that worth ten of you. Yeah, I've seen the footage. The only thing you really fight for is yourself. You're not the guy to make the sacrifice play, to lay down on a wire and let the other guy crawl over you."
"I think I would just cut the wire."
Cap smiles, "Always a way out… You know, you may not be a threat, but you better stop pretending to be a hero."
That did it, Tony is ticked, "A hero? Like you? You're a laboratory experiment, Rogers. Everything special about you came out of a bottle!"
Outside the ramp of the carrier opens. The carrier maneuvers next to one of the large turbine engines. Barton stands at the base, holding his bow. He pulls out a grenade tipped arrow. He points it right at the engine.
Then… Barton moves his aim and points the arrow about a hundred feet from the engine. He releases. The arrow flies out, but them sharply heads for the engine. The arrow punctures the engine, it has a visible timer which is counting down.
Back in the lab, Steve puffs up his chest at Tony, who just stands there, unmoving.
"Put on the suit. Let's go a few rounds."
Thor and Arabella laugh at them, Thor telling them, "You people are so petty… and tiny."
Tony rubs his head, moving away from Cap.
"Yeah, this is a team…" Banner starts to speak.
"Agent Romanoff, would you escort Dr. Banner back to his…"
"Where? You rented my room."
"The cell was just in case…"
"In case you needed to kill me, but you can't! I know! I tried!" He takes a deep breath, "I got low. I didn't see an end. So, I put a bullet in my mouth and the other guy spit it out! So I moved on. I focused on helping other people. I was good. Until you dragged me back into this freak show and put everyone here at risk!"
Banner slowly gets upset as he looks at Romanoff, who gets unnerved.
"You wanna know my secret, Agent Romanoff? You wanna know how I stay calm?"
Natasha and Fury have their hands down grabbing onto their guns.
"Doctor Banner… put down the scepter." Cap tells him.
Banner looks down and is shocked to see he's holding Loki's scepter. The computer beeps. They all turn to it.
"Got it." Tony says.
Banner puts down the scepter and walks over to the computer. "Sorry, kids. You don't get to see my party trick after all."
"You located the Tesseract?" Thor asks him.
"I could get there fastest." Tony says.
"Look, all of us…" Cap starts to say.
"The Tesseract belongs on Asgard. No human is a match for it." Thor tells them.
Tony turns to leave, but Steve stops him. "You're not going alone!"
Tony smacks his hand off, "You gonna stop me?"
"Put on the suit, let's find out."
"I'm not afraid to hit an old man."
"Put on the suit."
At that moment Banner who's looking at the monitors notices something about the Tesseract. "Oh, my God!"
Barton pulls the trigger on his bow, the arrow then explodes the engine of the Helicarrier.
Everyone is thrown in every direction. Steve, Tony, Fury, Arabella and Thor are thrown across the lab, as Natasha and Banner are thrown down in the lower equipment room. Steve looks up at Tony, "Put on the suit!"
"Yeah!"
Steve and Arabella help Tony up and out of the lab. Fury sits up clutching his ribs, he puts on his earpiece. "Hill?!"
Pandemonium erupts. Emergency alarms set off, fire extinguishers active near surrounding fires and ever Agent is in a spinning scramble for their positions and armaments. Agent Hill keeps the bridge as calm as possible.
"External detonation! Number 3 engine is down! Can they get it running?" She runs over to the man who was playing Galaga. "Talk to me."
He points to the monitor, "Turbine looks, mostly intact, but it's impossible to get out there to make repairs while we're in the air."
"We lose one more engine, we won't be. Somebody's got to get outside and patch that engine."
"Stark! You copy that?!" Fury yells into his earpiece.
"I'm on it!"
"Coulson! Initiate official lock down in the detention section then get to the armory! Romanoff?!"
Down in the lower equipment room Natasha's foot is caught below a beam. She looks over to Banner, who is breathing heavy, having landed hard. He is gripping the grated floor to maintain control, but his eyes are green, his face intense.
Natasha says quietly to herself, "We're okay. We're okay, right?"
Barton leads his men into the air ducts of the ship. They then rappel down into a corridor. "Keep that engine down! Dentition, wait for the cameras to go dark! Stay close."
Two of his men follow him, they head towards the bridge.
Tony, Cap and Arabella run through a dim, debris filled hall. "Engine three. I'll meet you there."
Cap and Arabella peel off as Tony approaches a tech room. Inside, Tony's Iron Man suit stands waiting, lit above in all its glory.
Banner's face in the dim light as he struggles to suppress the rage, but his face is growing, changing slowly. Natasha is pulling herself painfully free, talking to Banner… "Doctor? Bruce? You gotta fight it. This is just what Loki wants. We're going to be okay. Listen to me."
Two approaching SHIELD soldiers arrive to check on her. She furiously waves them away, they bolt out of there quickly.
"We're gonna be okay. All right? I swear on my life, I will get you out of this. You will walk away, and never, ever…"
"Your life?"
His voice has the change in it—the bitter amusement is morphing to a growled threat.
Natasha pleads, "Bruce."
Banner suddenly starts transforming into the Hulk and gives Natasha one last knowing look. Natasha struggles free of the rubble. She stops. The Hulk, sensing her, turns his head and puts on the face of a disturb monster. Natasha jolts up the stairs with the Hulk chasing after her. Natasha maneuvers like a Black Widow should. She rolls under a turbine, starts to crawl within the maze of pipes. The Hulk pulls them out from above the catwalk.
Natasha falls through under the catwalks, quickly and stealthily escaping. The Hulk lets out a roar of rage unlike anything. Primal. Not human.
Loki looks up, smiling mischievously as he hears the roar.
Fury runs onto the bridge and sees the chaos has increased even more than before. The helmsman is in complete disarray.
"Bring the carrier about to a 1-8-0, heading south! Take us to the water!"
"We're flying blind. Navigation's recalibrating after the engine failure." The helmsman tells him.
"Is the sun coming up?!"
"Yes, Sir."
"Then put it on the left! Get us over water! One more turbine goes down, and we drop."
Captain America, pushing with all his strength against the door to port side, sees SHIELD tech in full oxygen masks shoot fire extinguishers and cover from sparks—largely unable to do anything.
Engine 3 is totally dead, a large chunk of the port side is torn off.
"Stark, we're here!"
"Good. Let's see what we've got." Tony says flying in close to the damaged engine. Inside the suit Tony observes within his view screen the damaged engine and its layouts. "I gotta get this superconducting coolant system back online before I can access the rotors, and work on dislodging the debris." He looks down to Cap, "I need you to get to that engine control panel and tell me which relays are in overload position."
Iron Man flies into the giant cooling conductor. Cap jumps over to the other side of the broken railing, he gets himself to the control panel and opens it up. For a man who grew up as a yank, his first thought is, what the fuck is this!
"What's it look like in there?" Tony asks him.
"It seems to run on some form of electricity."
"Well, you're not wrong."
Natasha continuously crawls under the catwalk. She stops. Then—BOOM. BOOM. BOOM. The room vibrates. Rhythmically. Natasha pulls out her gun and slowly walks out onto the catwalk and spins.
…and then a ROAR. The Hulk. Natasha fires a shot into a liquid nitrogen pipe that hits the Hulk in the face. The Hulk smashes the shit out of it. Natasha begins to run through the maze of corridors. The sound of the monster is coming.
Finally, she reaches a long corridor. As she runs, behind her, the Hulk tears up the hallway, coming at her. Natasha turns to see, but the Hulk slaps her into the wall, smashing into the ground.
The Hulk marks his territory. Natasha looks up, a fear she has never felt begins to seep out. The Hulk raises his hand and is knocked off his feet by Thor who tackles him into the next room.
Both Thor and Hulk roll across the floor. Every person runs the hell out. Thor looks up at this magnificent beast. The Hulk stands up and moving like a boxer, wants Thor to make his move. The Hulk makes his move. Swing and a miss. Thor swings his massive hand and almost knocks Hulk off his feet. Hulk keeps swinging and missing, pissing him off. Finally, he brings his arm down, but Thor grabs it and wraps around it.
"We are not your enemies, Banner! Try to think!"
Hulk lifts his arm up, to Thor's surprise, and sends him flying as he punches Thor's face with his fist.
Iron Man continuously blasts broken debris off the turbine engine. It's bad, but still fixable.
"Okay, the relays are intact. What's our next move?" Cap asks.
"Even if I clear the rotors, this thing won't re-engage without a jump. I'm gonna have to get in there and push."
"Well if that thing gets up to speed, you'll get shredded!"
"That stator control unit can reverse the polarity long enough to disengage maglev and that could…"
"Speak English!"
"You see that red lever? It'll slow down the rotors down long enough for me to get out. Stand by it. Wait for my word."
Cap looks over at the side where he was, he sees the red lever and jumps towards it.
Back inside the Helicarrier aircraft port, Thor crashes through another stack of crates. As he raises his head, he feels something on his lips. Blood. As he swipes it off, the roar of the Hulk is not too far off. Thor extends his hand out. The roar gets louder and closer. Thor focuses. His hand strains toward mid-air, his eyes tight in concentration, the Hulk runs right at him. At the last second, Mjolnir flies into his hand and Thor uppercuts Hulk, who crashes into a fighter jet.
Hulk stands up, shaking his head like 'what the fuck just happened.' He shakes it off and angrily rips the tail off of the jet, torques his body like a Greek discuss thrower and hurls the massive plate at Thor. Thor slides and ducks under the tail. Jumping up, he throws Mjolnir with all his strength, knocking Hulk head over heels. Hulk falls down, hammer in hand. He tries to lift it, but can't. Mjolnir rests atop his hand.
Struggle as he may, Hulk wraps his hand around the hammer. The hammer doesn't move. To no avail— he strains with all his might, screams from the effort, bellowing. Thor jumps up again, kneeing Hulk in the face. Thor grabs his hammer, jumps on him, using the hammer as a lock for his choke hold. Hulk tries to pull him off.
On the bridge, Fury and Hill look over their monitors. Fury turns to Hill, "We need full evac on the lower hanger bay."
Agent Hill nods, she heads towards the exit, but a sliding grenade appears, "Grenade!"
The grenade goes off, sending her down the steps. Fury fires a shot at the open entrance, as he moves over behind the side of the entrance. A handful of Barton's men enter. Watchful, ready, waiting… Fury steps out, his gun drawn.
A shoot out and hand-to-hand ensues, but Fury is unable to stop one of them, which is why he is shot in the head by Agent Hill.
Inside the armory, Agent Coulson walks up to the armory door. He places his head into a facial recognition scanner, then walks into the room. Over his ear piece he hears, "We've got a perimeter breach! Hostiles are in SHIELD gear. Call-outs at every junction."
Back in the aircraft port, Hulk crashes from under the floor, sending Thor on his ass. Hulk grabs him by the neck.
On the bridge a gunfight opens up, Agents exchange fire with brutally efficient tactical soldiers.
"We have the Hulk and Thor on Research level 4. Levels 2 and 3 are dark."
"Sir, the Hulk will tear this place apart!" Agent Hill says.
"Get his attention." Fury says.
"Escort 6-0, proceed to Wishbone and engage hostile. Don't get too close."
"Copy."
Escort 6-0's jet banks to the right, heading towards the shuttle. Escort 6-0's pilot slowly makes his way in, and sees the action going between Thor and the Hulk.
"Target acquired. Target engaged." He pulls the trigger and fires the gun at Hulk.
A shower of bullets sprays the Hulk everywhere, as Thor ducks for cover. Hulk turns around, letting out his primal roar, he jumps up, takes a running start and leaps…
"Target angry, target angry!"
…Hulk lands on the jet's nose, the jet spins wildly. As the Hulk tears it apart, Escort 6-0's pilot pulls his ejection seat, but—the Hulk catches him, waves him around and then throws him away. Escort 6-0's pilot pulls his parachute, the jet explodes. The Hulk plummets to Earth, roaring his swan song.
Iron Man laser cuts a big piece of broken metal, he then jumps on it, relieving the rotors.
On the other side, Barton's men enter the port side. Captain America and Arabella look down, pondering if they are help, Cap looks to the red-head, "You think they're help?"
Before she can answer the SHEILD men begin shooting and throwing grenades at the two. Arabella hollers and ducks down behind a beam, "I'm gonna take a wild guess and say no!"
Cap jumps to the other railing and then down with Barton's men, as Arabella flies down. They begin to take out the men, even going as far as throwing several off. A few more enter, firing at the two. Suddenly Cap is enveloped by Arabella's wings. He hears the bullets bouncing off what sounds like metal, he looks quizzically at the red-head, who smiles, "Bulletproof."
Cap smiles, "Good to know."
Her wings release them, Cap grabs a Noveske Rifleworks Diplomat, which is a large word for 'big fuckin' gun,' and Arabella grabs Cap underneath the arms and flies them back up to their position, Cap firing down at them.
On the bridge the gunfight as gone down, but more of Barton's men enter and are taken by Fury, who is confused as to why they keep coming. "They're not getting through here, so what the hell…"
Suddenly, Barton shoots an arrow down to the bridge and explodes critical spots. Then he releases a multi-tipped arrow towards Fury, but instead hits his command desk, right above a USB outlet. Fury fires at Barton, but he's already gone. The arrow then self-activates and inserts itself into the outlets, hacking every single monitor and main frame. The hacking causes Engine 1 to shut off. Suddenly, the Helicarrier begins to dangerously tilt to one side.
"Sir, we've lost all power in Engine 1."
"It's Barton. He took out our systems. He's headed for the detention level. Does anybody copy?" Fury yells into his earpiece.
Still shaken by the Hulk ordeal, Natasha sits there, rocking back and forth, after crying for awhile. Summoning back all her coolness, she touches her earpiece. "This is Agent Romanoff. I copy." Natasha then springs up and runs for Barton.
Iron Man begins to push the rotor using boosters from his boots.
"Stark, we're losing altitude." Fury says.
"Yeah. Noticed."
The rotors start propelling faster and faster as Iron Man's boosters get more and more bright.
On the other side, Cap and Arabella continuously shoot at Barton's men, he using the gun and the Angel using fire, water, wind, and ice balls. Blinking at the wrong moment, Cap loses the upper hand and slides off the railing, but grabs a loose cable.
Thor runs into the detention section where he finds Loki, escaping. "No!" Thor charges his brother, Loki walks up to him and crouches down to attack. Thor only goes right through him, the false Loki dissipates into nothingness. The real Loki comes out from behind the cell door, which closes on Thor, locking him up as Loki smiles.
"Are you ever not going to fall for that?"
Barton walks alone down the catwalk, in a lightning fast move, Barton nocks an arrow, and turns around firing it at Natasha who dodges it. A hand-to-hand fight ensues. Natasha grabs Barton's bow fighting with him and causing him to let go of the bow, which she then takes but he quickly pulls out a knife.
Thor, in a fit of anger, slams Mjolnir onto the glass cell. To his surprise, the cell door only cracks, but violently shakes the ship. Loki stands there in caution, as does his guarding soldier. Loki smiles, walking over to the control panel, "The humans think us immortal. Should we test that?"
Suddenly, the guarding soldier falls down like a tree. Agent Coulson stands there, holding a Phase 2 weapon prototype. "Move away, please."
Loki moves away from the switch.
"You like this? We started working on the prototype after you sent the Destroyer. Even I don't know what it does." Coulson powers it up, "Do you wanna find out?"
A loud gasp is heard as Agent Coulson is impaled through the heart, the real Loki standing behind him.
"Nooo!" Thor yells loudly.
Arabella looks up hearing her friends pain laced voice, "Thor."
Loki sends Agent Coulson against the wall, he slumps down, breathing fast. Loki makes his way to the control switch. He gives his brother one last look. Thor looks at him, hopeful. Loki opens the hatch. Thor still hopes. Loki hits the button and drops Thor out of the ship.
Arabella looks out of the open area to see the cell plummeting to Earth, Thor trapped inside. Cap sees it too, "Go!"
"Are you sure?" She asks him.
"I'll be fine. Go, save him!"
Arabella nods running to the open area and diving towards the cell, her wings folded against her back sending her rocketing downwards.
Barton and Natasha continue attacking each other, Natasha kick boxes Barton's face. Feeling that, Barton takes a swing at her, but she grabs his arm, twisting it. Barton writhes in pain. Using his other arm, he tosses the knife over and begins to slash at Natasha. She dodges every move, but finds herself in a lock hold with him. As he forces the knife down, she bites his wrist, Barton lets go of the knife. Natasha wraps her legs around his neck, flips him over and arm locks him. She slams his head into a pipes rail. Barton goes down, hard. He looks up at her, almost coming to his real senses.
"Natasha…"
She coldcocks him, he's out.
Thor, trapped in the glass cage, bounces off the jumbling cell pod. As it draws closer to land, Thor tries to swing at the glass, but misses. The land draws closer. He looks up to see Arabella coming towards him, within twenty feet, her wings flare out slowing her descent. She studies the glass for a moment, thinking hard. It's supposed to impenetrable. She hits it with everything she has, nothing works. In a final attempt before crashing, Arabella coats a panel of the glass in ice, hoping Thor can break through it. Thor positions himself onto the glass door and leapfrogs just as the cage is about to hit the ground. The cell crashes into the shore as Thor crashes out onto the meadow.
Arabella lands next to him, "Well, that was fun."
Thor looks up, smiling at her, "You really are an Angel." They both laugh, Thor looks to the cage, "I guess SHIELD never counted on ice being used on their cage."
"I guess not. But just to be on the safe side, let's not tell them." The two share a nod and smile.
Loki has no remorse as he looks down, he closes the hatch and proceeds to leave.
"You're gonna lose." Coulson says in a weak voice.
Loki turns, "Am I?"
"It's in your nature."
"Your heroes are scattered. Your floating fortress falls from the sky… Where is my disadvantage?"
"You lack conviction."
"I don't think I'm…"
Coulson then shoots Loki with his Phase 2 weapon, causing Loki to be blown through the wall behind him. "So, that's what it does."
Back in the bridge, Fury sees on his view screen that the hatch has ben opened. Knowing Agent Coulson was sent there, he goes too.
Iron Man continuously spins Engine 3, giving it all he has. The rotors are propelling properly and fast, the Helicarrier levels out.
"Cap, hit the lever!"
"I need a minute here!"
"Lever, now!"
Tony lets go of the rotors, they spin by themselves. Tony is caught in one, he is now fucked. Iron Man slips into the rotors, getting chewed up by them.
Cap climbs up the loose cable and reaches the railing. Barton's man opens fire once more, as Cap pulls himself up and finally pulls the lever.
A vent opens up from Engine 3, Iron Man falls out, but the suit is heavily damaged, hardly keeping him up. Iron Man heads for Cap. Barton's man turns his aim to Iron Man, who tackles him into the wall. Iron Man rolls over, tired. Cap lets out a sigh of relief.
The carrier that brought Barton and his team now leaves, flying off into the distance, taking Loki and his scepter.
Fury runs in finding Agent Coulson still alive, barely. Coulson looks up, "Sorry, boss. The God rabbited."
"Just stay awake. Eyes on me!"
"No. I'm clocked out here."
"Not an option."
"It's okay, boss. This was never gonna to work… If they didn't have something…. To…" Coulson looks away, sighing his last breath. Fury looks grimly at him, as the medical team arrives.
"Agent Coulson is down."
On the bridge Agent Hill is being treated for a gash on her forehead, she listens in on her headset, standing up.
Another SHIELD Agent reports, "Paramedics are on their way."
"They're here." Fury reports. "They called it."