Kimmy: Chapter 2

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When we last left Kimmy Miles, she had saved a jogger from three muggers using her strange abilities she had struggled to keep hidden, but was spotted by none other than Steve Rogers, otherwise known as our favorite Captain!

All Steve Rogers wanted was a loaf of bread. That's all, but as he walked down the streets of Brooklyn toward the grocery store and heard the muffled cries for help and the sneers of some unsavory characters nearby, his instincts kicked in as he took off running to the rescue.

Only someone had already beat him there, and what he saw was worrying.

As he sat in Director Nick Fury's office, trying to recount what he witnessed, Fury leaned back thoughtfully in his chair. "So, to get this straight, you got outran by a little girl in your own neighborhood?"

"Ah, well," Steve began with a rueful smile. "I wasn't ever really trained for what to do when you come across a teenage girl who can fly and shoot fire and water and whatever else out of her fingers in a back ally way."

Fury grinned. "What did she look like?"

Steve pictured the frightened expression on her young face again. "Long red-blonde hair, kind of pale, seemed around sixteen or seventeen years old. She looked kind of wiry and skittish."

"Eye color?"

"No clue. She didn't let me get close enough to find out. Any word on the woman she helped yet?"

The director nodded. "Sheila Hamlin, thirty-eight. As soon as we got your call we intercepted her at the police station and got a statement from her. She says a demon killed those men, wreathed in fire. She did say this demon's eye color was blue, and that she looked around 5'6'' or so."

Thoughtfully, Steve rose and began to pace the office. "So are we going to find her?"

"We'll try. We made need you and Tony though," Fury replied. "Clearly she has capabilities beyond normal agents. We'll also send Natasha. The security camera that was attached to the building was destroyed before we got to it. Water damage. She must have come back after escaping you, so we're back at square one."

"What do we do if we find her?" Steve questioned.

Fury stood and moved toward the door, pausing to look over his shoulder. "Convince her to come in if she's a friend. Bring her in if she's a foe. Either way, bring her to Stark Tower and have Bruce and Tony look her over. We don't know what her purpose is here, but I always assume it's never good."

All that night Kimmy sat trembling in her bed, eyes wide open. At the slightest noise, her nerves went haywire, checking ever door and window twice to be sure they were locked. Carlisle and Doris had barely acknowledged her existence when she had gotten home, gesturing lamely at a plate of mashed potatoes and corn, which she barely touched. Any second someone could burst in and try to take her away. She felt the urge to run away tug harder at her stomach when a car passed by, but resisted it. Out in the open she would likely be more vulnerable than in a decently secure house with her foster guardians.

Still, when morning came with no incident, she began to relax a little. Maybe the man who had chased her gave up, assuming he was hallucinating or something. Kimmy considered her options. Faking sick and staying home could work, until she realized Carlisle and Doris were both heading out to work and would leave her home alone. School might be too out in the open though. Then again, being surrounded by people could help her blend in and not be noticed.

All things considered, Kimmy went to school, tucking a kitchen knife she swiped in her backpack, just in case.

Despite moving around a lot, she actually really did love school. It was where she could learn to have a future once she was no longer a ward of the state, maybe a future in robotics or engineering. Her teacher in the engineering class, Mr. Payne, frequently praised her work, especially the little drone she was in the process of constructing out of spare parts in the scrap pile.

Forcing something of a smile (though it was probably more of a grimace), Kimmy hurried down the halls to the robotics classroom, aware of the late bell ringing insistently behind her as she made it through the door. "Sorry I'm late, Mr. Payne, I- "

Her sentence died as she realized the man standing at the front of the classroom was definitely not her robust teacher, instead a wiry man with a tidy goatee and playful eyes, instantly recognizable as the billionaire inventor Tony Stark, who looked up from the roll sheet to see her. "How are you doing?" he drawled, staring at her a lot longer than Kimmy felt comfortable with.

"Er," she said, not really knowing what say. Her fellow classmates looked in an equal state of awe and surprise.

"Name?" Stark asked.

She found her voice. "Miles. Kimmy Miles."

He ran a pen down the list until he found it. "Ah, there you are. Take a seat."

Slowly, she moved toward the only open table, front and center before Tony Stark. He folded his arms and regarded the class, eyes flicking frequently back down at Kimmy. "Hey, kids. My name is Tony. Stark. You may know me by my small business, Stark Industries. So, I asked your teacher if I could switch him jobs for the school day to, you know, get back down to my roots." From the way he said this, it was apparent this wasn't really his idea. "I think what I'll make you do is a free-for-all. Build me something awesome. Whoever brings me the coolest stuff gets a hundred bucks. Sound fair?" The class nodded enthusiastically. "Terrific. Get to it. Try not to kill each other with hot or pointy objects. I don't think that'll look good for me as a sub."

Kimmy sprang to her feet with everyone else and hustled to the material cabinets. She had a drone she was halfway done constructing, it just needed a little more programming… Was she glad she had come to school after all! Having her work viewed by the genius company owner could be an amazing opportunity for her, maybe even pull her out of the foster system for good. A little bit of suspicion about the circumstances lingered into the back of her mind, but were soon pushed aside to make room for the circuitry and rotators of her project.

Engrossed in her work, she didn't notice Stark coming closer and peering over her shoulder until he spoke, making her jump. "That's a little drone," he said interestedly.

Blushing, Kimmy shrugged. "Can't do much bigger at this school, but there's a lot more to it than meets the eye." She flipped it over to show a hatch on the underside. "He has a small port that can be opened manually or remotely that's big enough for a first aid kit. It's kind of a prototype. You can fly it out to stranded hikers or something like that and they ca patch themselves up while you use the pinging system to locate them." She had gotten the idea from a news article on drones with a defibrillator that could be flown out by paramedics ahead of them, but in a smaller scale. It was kind of silly, but Stark seemed to approve.

"Sounds useful," he said, reaching a hand to tighten a minute screw, then moving to stand across the worktable from Kimmy, looking her squarely in the eye. "You know," he began quietly, "I bet there's more to you than meets the eye, Kimmy." He raised an eyebrow.

She felt her neck grow warm, the pit in her stomach clenching painfully. "Sir?"

Stark winked slyly. "You know who else this could help? Joggers attacked by muggers in the street."

Now her stomach was jolting, palms sweaty. "I suppose it could." She tried to sound as innocent as possible. "It has limitless potential."

"I'm willing to bet you do too." To her enormous relief, Stark turned away and moved to another work station. "Keep up the good work, Kimmy."

At the end of class, Stark predictably declared Kimmy the winner. She secretly wasn't surprised. Her drone was quite a bit more advanced than most high school students could manage. The bell rang and everyone gathered up their bags to leave for the next class. "Hold on, Kimmy," Stark called when she was nearly out the door. "You forgot your hundred bucks."

Hesitantly, she turned and moved back to the front of the classroom, where Stark handed her a Ben Franklin, which she tucked in her pocket and turned to go again. "Wait," Stark stopped. A flicker of anxiety sparked inside of her, but she obeyed, facing him. He rubbed the back of his head and stared her down. "How was my teaching? Too subtle?"

"Sir?" she said again, confused.

He tossed up his hands exasperatedly. "I think we need to talk. Steve?"

Kimmy whirled around just in time to see two men, including the one that had chased her yesterday, close and lock the door with a small click. Up close, the man who had pursued her was very tall, with light hair and blue eyes and very well built. The other man was shorter, with dark hair and a darker complexion. All three men regarded her warily.

"This her?" Stark asked the blonde man.

He nodded. "Yep."

Heart pounding, Kimmy slowly let her hand wander behind to her backpack's front pocket. "Who are you? What do you want from me?"

The blonde man moved closer to her and held out a hand. "My name is Steve. I believe we almost met yesterday."

Play dumb, she thought desperately. "Sorry, but I don't think I know you," she said edgily, struggling to unzip the pocket subtly. "I really should be going back to class, if you'll excuse me." She turned to go, but the darker man blocked the door.

"Hello, Kimmy," he said with a tight smile. "I'm Dr. Banner. Bruce, if you prefer."

They brought a doctor! They're going to cut me open! Kimmy internally panicked, but struggled to keep composure in check. "Pleasure meeting you, Doctor, but you're blocking the door and I don't want to be late for class."

Stark stepped forward gently put a hand on her shoulder. "Ki- "

Kimmy finally managed to close her fingers around the handle of the knife and whirled around, aiming for Stark's arm. She really didn't want to hurt anyone, but the image of being dissected like a lab frog burned before her eyes as she slashed toward him with a yell.

A pair of large hands seized her wrists and yanked her away from Stark, forcing the knife from her and slamming her against the wall. Kimmy found herself face-to-face with the tall blonde man, Steve. She struggled uselessly against his powerful grip and closed her eyes, not wanting to look at him.

"Nice try," said Steve as gently as he could. "We don't want to hurt you. We just want to ask you a few questions. If you come with us, we'll take good care of you. Does that sound okay?"

A warm feeling spread up her right arm, and then her left, pulse rising. Out of instinct, Kimmy battled the impulse and struggled to cool off. Steve frowned as he noticed the temperature change of the wrists he had pinned beneath his hands and intense look of concentration on her face. "Miss? Are you okay?"

Dissected frog, Kimmy thought before her eyes flashed open, now glowing an intense red. Steve yelped and nearly let go in surprise. "Guys, I think she's doing it!"

Kimmy struggled even more fiercely, trying to touch her hands together. If she could just get them close enough…

The men moved in around her. "Natasha, Barton! Get in here! I think she's going to blow!" Stark bellowed. Kimmy couldn't see to who, nor did she care as she inched her hands above her head, finally getting within range of each other to spark.

Steve released her with a gasp of surprise as the spark ignited into flame, curling around her hands and up into the air. Focusing, Kimmy formed it into a sphere and flung it at the men, who scattered, leaving the door clear. Another fireblast and the door exploded, leaving a smoldering hole in its place. "Banner, if you're going to help, now would be a great time to let the other guy out!" she heard Stark yell vaguely from behind as she launched toward the door.

A roar forced her to glance over her shoulder, rooting her to the spot. What had once been the quieter, dark-haired doctor was now a hulking green humanoid beast, flinging the tattered remains of a shirt and coat aside and hurled at her. Kimmy screamed in terror and sent another fireblast barreling toward the creature's chest, cutting it off and sending it flying back into a wall, where he disappeared through in a cloud of smoke and dust and debris. Another enraged roar told Kimmy that the creature wasn't done yet, and she made a hasty exit.

Arrows flew around her and exploded into clouds of gas and dust, but Kimmy swirled her hands above her head, creating another vortex to surround her, feet rising off the ground and sending her up above the men around, blasting a hole in the roof of the one-story school and soaring through it. Another arrow whistled past her head, missing by inches and again exploding into a cloud of smoke. This time, however, a net appeared and wrapped around her legs painfully tight. With the new unbalance Kimmy began to lose height. She panicked and lunged east toward the ocean and prayed that no one was looking up.

Back at the school Steve looked up at the massive, charred hole in the ceiling and groaned. "Stark, why didn't you get into your suit and go after her?" he said angrily.

"I just polished him back up!" he replied indignantly.

The massive green creature groaned and fell onto his back, eyes closed, slowly decreasing in size. A scarlet-haired woman crawled through what was left of the door, followed closely by Barton, bow still in hand. "We lost her?" Nat inquired, peering interestedly at the ceiling.

"No, that's her," Stark said sarcastically, gesturing at a half-green, groaning Bruce on the floor. "It was Bruce that flew through the ceiling in a rain of fiery hell."

Steve called for Fury, who answered languidly. "I take it by the flaming school building that your meeting didn't go well."

"We lost her, but it looked like one of Barton's net-arrow things got her and she fell toward the ocean."

Bruce sat up, holding his head in pain and pulling his shredded jeans strategically over himself. "She could drown in that net. We need to hurry and find her."

"Already on that," Fury said. "I'm on my way to the harbor with two helicopters and a submarine. Meet me there in a twenty minutes. The school will be taken care of. There aren't any casualties as far as I can see at this point, thankfully, so please hurry."

"Yes sir," Natasha said, already halfway out the smoldering door with Barton close on her tail. Steve and Stark stayed back, the first thoughtfully rubbing his chin.

Stark nudged him. "Cap, you planning on following?"

Steve closed his eyes and thought about the girl, the expression on her face, her body language, her actions. She didn't seem like she was trying to hurt anyone, acting out of fear. The look of terror on her face when he had stopped her from slashing Stark and pinned her against the wall burned in Steve's head. He opened his eyes again. "Stark, if you were a scared teenaged girl, where is the first place you'd go?"

"A bar?" Stark replied with a shrug. "I don't know; it's been a while since I was sixteen. Not as long as you, old man, but still a while."

The captain shook his head. "And this is why you don't have kids. I'm going to check on a hunch. I'll see you later."

Stark activated his suit, the metal folding over his frame from the pack on his back, and took off through the ceiling hole as Steve made his way out the smoldering wall hole.

"Uh, guys?" Bruce called anxiously. "Could someone get me some clothes?" Silence. "Anyone?"

It was very late when Kimmy finally showed up on the doorstep of Carlisle and Doris's apartment, dripping wet and freezing and scared. She had spent hours sitting with her knees to her chest, back up against a rock formation, sobbing. Crash-landing in the ocean wasn't a big deal for someone when they could create an air pocket for themselves underwater. The big deal lay in what was coming next.

She had messed up horrifically. The people pursuing her were smart, and clearly resourceful, not just random oddity-chasers. The fact that the great Tony Stark, rumored to be contracted by secret branches of the government, was involved scared her, almost as much as the giant green monster or the arrows or the tall blonde man.

Three basic rules she had followed all her life: Keep your abilities hidden, don't let anyone know of your abilities, run far away and never return if anyone ever saw them. Why couldn't have she just run away after she helped the jogger?

Well, Kimmy wasn't going to make that mistake again. As she trudged through the front door she formulated in her mind what she was going to take with her when she ran away from Brooklyn, after her foster guardians went to bed.

The sight of Doris and Carlisle's faces stopped her cold in her tracks. They were waiting for her, in the kitchen. Their expressions were enough to give anyone chills, especially Carlisle's, who's droopy, basset hound-looking face was tight with cold fury, a brown bottle dangling languidly from his hands. Kimmy's heart began to pound all over again, especially when he spoke in a low, dangerous tone. "Where have you been?"

"I'm sorry, I-I went swimming with some friends," she lied. Her shaking now had little to do with the chill of the water in her clothes. "It- "

Carlisle took a swig from the bottle and slammed it on the table hard, causing Kimmy to jump. Doris just stared blankly at her. "Have we done anything to make you unhappy?" he roared. "Done anything to make you disobey our simple rules?"

Kimmy backed away from the table, edging toward her bedroom. "N-no, sir. I'm sorr- "

Rising from his chair heavily, he lumbered toward her, eyes clouded with drink. Kimmy had never fully comprehended how large her foster guardian was until that moment. "We take you in," he snarled, "put clothes on your ungrateful back, feed you, and send you off to school out of the goodness of our hearts, and you thank us by disappearing and coming home dripping wet with some lie about 'swimming with friends'?" The last part he raised his voice mockingly. "Do I look stupid to you? We got the call from school about the bomb that went off. You decided to pull a fast one on us, make us look stupid in front of your precious caseworker and be taken away, along with all the money you bring."

This stung so much Kimmy was taken aback. She had realized foster guardians get paid a subsidy for taking in a child, but she hadn't ever thought hard about how that might be the sole reason why her guardians take her in.

That thought train quickly derailed when a blinding pain struck her square in the eye, knocking her back into the wall. She could feel blood from Carlisle's ring dripping down her cheek as she vaguely saw through stars her guardian going in for another swing, fist closed. She threw herself out of the way and hurtled down the hall to her bedroom, him at her heels bellowing obscenities and swinging his fists before she made it and slammed the door, locking it behind her. He pounded on the door, rattling the frame. "I had better not see your ugly face or you'll get it!" he shouted. "Don't you dare come out of there again!" The sounds of his heavy footsteps down the hall again faded away.

Kimmy took a deep, shuddering breath before touching her cheek and feeling the blood from her cut. The skin around it was swollen and painful beneath her light fingertips. A sob racked her body and she collapsed on the small, rickety bed, tears mixing with blood, where she remained before slipping into sleep, all coherent thoughts vanishing.

Maybe it was a sixth sense. Maybe it was a new noise in the quiet, beyond the sounds of cars passing and the neighbors upstairs moving about. Whatever it was, it caused Kimmy to suddenly wake from her curled position. She slowly sat up, inwardly cringing at the unpleasant stiffness of dried blood and tears on her face before slowly climbing out of bed and padding silently to the door. The sounds of Carlisle and Doris snoring heavily in the room next door were almost a comfort to her. Now was her chance to run!

Suddenly, she sensed movement behind her and froze. The hair on her arms prickled. Kimmy silently counted to three before whirling around to face the intruder, arms up in defense.

No one was there, only a blank wall with a window to the left, by the bed. She edged toward it and peered out into the back ally of the building complex. It was as empty and dark as it always was. Even still, Kimmy couldn't help but reach behind the bed and retrieve the aluminum baseball bat stored for just in case before glancing back out the window.

"I don't see how a little metal stick would be of much use against a true foe," said a cold, smooth voice.

Kimmy let out a strangled yelp and whirled around, bat raised, to face a tall, thin man with pale, pointed features and shoulder-length jet black hair swept back from his face. He wore dark clothing with a long green robe-looking garment over it. His face was contorted into a lazy smirk as he leaned against the door, arms folded.

"Honestly, mortals are interesting that way," he continued. "Believing that willpower is all that matters, waving around their tiny weapons threateningly before a mighty enemy, all for naught."

She had to force out her words. The man radiated danger. "Who are you?" she stuttered, back pressed against the window frame.

The man chuckled. "I am a god, child. You appear to have sparked the curiosity of my enemies, and thus have sparked my own. I hear you can do strange things, can you not?"

"Wh-what?" Kimmy said blankly, trembling under his icy gaze.

"Your ears seem to be in proper working order," the man said irritably. "What is it that you can do?"

Kimmy shook her head. "Leave me alone. I've done nothing wrong."

He laughed harshly. "Leave you alone? But we're only just beginning." In the space of a blink, he was upon her, face inches away from her own, the bat yanked from her hands and cast aside with considerable ease. "Let's make this easy on both of us. What is your business with the organization known as S.H.I.E.L.D.? Or the vigilante group that call themselves the 'Avengers'?"

Kimmy moved to fall backward out the window, prepared to summon a vortex to fly her away, but the man's long, cold fingers closed over her arms, freezing her. "Don't make this more difficult than it needs to be," he ordered, his breath on her face. "Just tell me what I need to know. I can be quite mean when I choose, and believe me, you will not like to see me get mean."

"Let me go," she begged feebly, twisting her head to avoid looking him in the eye. "I'll scream."

Again, the man laughed coldly. "And who will come to the rescue? Your pathetic excuse for guardians in the next room? Was it not they that gave you that nasty mark on your cheek? They won't save you. No one will."

A flash of lightening and a crash of thunder illuminated the room from outside, causing the man to jump and release her. She took it as an opportunity to make her escape out the door, but he seized her once again and dragged her around in front of him, hands like ice around her, wheeling her to face the window.

Another man was there, this one with long blonde, flowing hair and heavily muscled arms, red cape and silver armor-clad. In one hand was a heavy-looking, two-sided hammer that he twirled in his grasp like a toy. "Brother," he said in a deep, booming voice.

"The mighty Thor returns?" the man holding Kimmy sneered. "It's been awhile. Couldn't be bothered to visit me in prison?"

"Loki," Thor moved forward, but the man tightened his grip around Kimmy, causing her to wince. Thor stopped. "What are you doing? Have you stooped so low as to harass defenseless mortal girls?"

Loki chuckled hollowly. "You cannot speak of harassment of mortal women without speaking with hypocrisy. Or have you already forsaken your mortal love affair, Jane?"

The blond man's face darkened red. "Leave her out of this. What is your business with this mortal?"

"No, I think we ought to bring her in," he argued, grinning sadistically.

Kimmy stomped hard on the man's foot, and he released her, grunting in pain. She didn't hesitate to fly toward the door, throwing it open hurtling straight into the chest of a now-all-too-familiar-figure.

"Thor," Steve acknowledged with a nod. He was now wearing a patriotically-colored body suit and helmet-mask, a round shield slung over his shoulder. Behind him, Kimmy recognized the others she had met in school.

"Captain Rogers," Thor reciprocated the nod. Kimmy backed away, now trapped in between two enemies, heart hammering fiercely in her chest.