Sooooooooory! I'm back with a new chapter... this is the second to last one... We're almost done! (Part of me is happy... I've been DYING to do a Yuri! on Ice fic...) But here you go! *tries to make up the long wait to you by give you virtual cookies*
Maria Hill looked out over the top of the windy helicarrier, currently floating in the Atlantic Ocean. Coulson and Fury would be joining her soon, but for now, her many hand-picked agents were grabbing weapons for the raid. If Red Skull was working with Loki, God knows how many soldiers they could be fighting.
"Hill!" Maria turned around to see Fury and Coulson jogging towards her. "Wheels up in five!"
"Yes, sir! Where's the girl?"
"She's locked up safe and sound," Coulson yelled over the wind.
Fury looked at the several dozen agents awaiting orders. "Our top priority is getting Stark and the Avengers out. He turned to the team that was staying on the helicarrier. "Be ready with medical for Stark if he needs it." Then he turned to the entire group. "Load up!"
Inside the quinjets, Fury set up a radio link with all the squad leaders. "Squads, check in."
"Squad A1, reporting."
"Squad A2, reporting."
"Squad A3, reporting."
"Squad A4, reporting."
"Squad B1, reporting."
"Squad B2, reporting."
"Squad B3, reporting."
"Squad B4, reporting."
Fury nodded, gave the signal, and the nine quinjets took off.
3 hours later
Clint couldn't take it; seeing a… friend in pain was mentally scarring. Well, I didn't realize Stark was something more than a teammate. Maybe something will come out of this, and not just all of us alive.
But it could get much worse. Loki was kneeling by Tony, pulling the billionaire up by his neck, and aggravating the numerous wounds covering the man from head to toe. Loki had a knife pressed against his throat, threatening and interrogating the Avengers one by one.
Bruce and Thor did not possess the information that Loki wanted, and every time the claimed to not know, Loki made another cut in Tony's neck.
Natasha didn't know what to do. As much as she had been trained, she had never been prepared for a situation like this. The instructors at the Red Room had not taken account to the fact that she would be a part of a team, and much less prepared for the fact that she might have friends she cared about. One of her greatest weaknesses were her friends, even though she would never admit it.
Steve knew, of course, what Loki was looking for, and though he knew, Tony would never forgive him if he relinquished his information. That was enough to keep him quiet.
Suddenly, the door banged open to reveal Nick Fury, Phil Coulson, and Maria Hill standing there, guns cocked and faces angry, ready to shoot anything that came across their path to recover their lost comrades. "Drop the knife and put your hands up where I can see them."
Loki snarled. "I don't have time for this." He stood up, letting Tony fall to the ground with a grunt, and the knife in his hand turned into its threatening true form. He aimed the spear at the three in the doorway, but a deep rumble echoing throughout the compound stopped him, as he looked around, War Machine crashed through the ceiling, punched Loki in the face, and knocked the Asgardian out cold.
The faceplate opened to reveal a sweaty James Rhodes looking at Fury. "You didn't think I was going to let you have all the fun without me?" He looked down at his bloody, half-unconscious friend. "We should hurry up."
He looked up to see the stunned Avengers staring at him, still trapped in the energy cages. Rhodes looked around. "Can somebody figure this out?" At this point, some of Fury's agents had found the security room, and shut of the cages.
Steve rushed forwards towards his friend laying on the floor. "Tony? Can you say something?" He started prodding at the man. "What hurts?"
The tired genius opened his swollen eyes and glared at the soldier. "Everything."
Bruce knelt by the man's head. "We need to hurry up. He's running out of time."
Steve nodded and picked up the man, earning a quiet groan. Fury nodded from the doorway. Thor walked forwards, picked up his brother and the scepter.
The group walked out to find a few dozen SHIELD agents waiting for them with guns at the ready.
"Ready?" Fury inquired.
"The quinjets are ready to go, sir."
"Good."
The group moved quickly through the hallways, where they turned a hallway to find a dozen or so soldiers, likely Hammer's men, ready to shoot.
"Put your hand where we can see them!"
The group eyed each other, and moved as fast as lightning. Thor summoned Mjonlir, and the hammer came crashing through the wall behind the soldiers. As the men dove for cover, Steve ran with Tony through the startled men and rounded a hallway with Bruce, Fury, and Clint tagging along. The two men kept running through the hallways with Fury yelling at them through the fray.
"Stop right there!" Loki was staring at the group with disheveled hair and scepter gripped tightly in his hand. Thor was standing behind him with eerily blue eyes. Loki must have escaped and put him under the scepter's spell.
"Capitan!" Maria ran up behind them and held out the shield to the man. But before Steve could hand Tony off and take the shield to fight off the mind-controlled demigod, Loki ran up and grabbed Tony before anybody could do anything.
Steve took the shield, and with a yell, launched himself at Loki, who only summoned Thor to knock the super soldier out of the air. And, with a blood-curdling shriek, Loki plunged the scepter into Tony's stomach.
Tony's POV
The last thing Tony felt was pain. Unbelievable pain. The pain he had felt in before was nothing compared to this… How long had it been? Hours? Days? Weeks? Tony certainly hoped that this would be it. Steve was here, they were fine. Thor was there, as was Bruce, Natasha, Clint, and the SHELD agents. But maybe… this won't be for anything…
And those were Tony's last thoughts before everything faded to black.
There you go! My school gets out this Wednesday, so the next chapter should be up fairly soon. But don't take my word on that... you all know by now that I am absolutely awful at updating quickly.