"I can't believe they wouldn't tell me about this," Max ranted as she hopped down the stairwell, taking each level two steps at a time. "What… because I don't have superpowers I don't get to be involved in this sort of stuff?"

"I don't think it was a purposeful decision." Loki's calm, verging on amused, tone did nothing to quell her temper, and she shot him a look over her shoulder. "I think it might have been a family decision."

"You knew about it!"

"Well, only because I pried in the laboratory this morning—"

"Still!" She huffed, throwing open the door to the main floor and stalking down the corridor, away from the kitchen and living room. "Maybe I want to be involved in this stuff too!"

"Tony Stark hardly warrants this much dramatics—"

"It's not dramatics," she snapped, whirling around and pushing against his chest—which seemed to hurt her hand more than anything else. "I was the one calling for action, and now that stuff is happening, no one thinks to include me?"

"Max…"

"No, I want to see Johnny off," she stated with a firm nod. Apparently Ben was even making the effort to go down to the basement level of the tower. Peter's big mouth had let the news slip while they were doing dishes: Johnny was meeting with Tony Stark, who apparently had a formula crafted to successfully kill the aliens. Apparently, Loki had also been aware of the send-off since breakfast and hadn't bothered to share the information. When she challenged him about it ten minutes earlier, he insisted he didn't think the mission would turn into anything of value.

"You're getting worked up over nothing."

"No, I'm not." She pointed to the open elevator shaft. "I want to be a part of this… I want to find a way out of all this, and I don't want to be the babysitter forever. I get to be involved sometimes too!"

"Fine, fine," he said, hands up in surrender. "By all means…"

She looked back at the opening again, shifting her weight from foot to foot, and then sighed.

"Well, I need you to… to… You know, help me down," Max babbled. She had no arm strength on a good day, so there was no way she could shimmy down the elevator cables on her own.

Her cheeks went pink when he grinned at her, and he stole a quick kiss as he marched by.

"Well?" He stood at the vast opening, on the edge of darkness, and arched an eyebrow. "Are you coming?"

"Yes, yes, I'm coming," she muttered, stalking toward him and twirling her finger in a circle—a request to turn around. Once he did so, Max hopped up on his back and wrapped her limbs securely around him. "You good?"

"Of course." The response almost sounded like a scoff, and she dug her heel into his side for it. She poked her tongue out at him when he glanced back at her, and before she could get another word in, he jumped into the shaft.

Her stomach was practically in her throat during the freefall, and she buried her face in his neck, muffling her shriek of pure terror. Stale air raced by them, and she could feel her loose t-shirt flapping off her back, trapping the coolness against her skin. When his feet collided with the cement at the bottom, Max was sure she heard something crack, and she half-expected the whole tower to collapse in on them.

"You good?" he drawled. Her arms and legs were locked tight, unable to unclench around him, and she struggled to lift her head.

"Fuck you," Max hissed. "That was so unnecessary."

"It was enjoyable though…"

Everything was shaking, and she couldn't feel her fingers or toes—they were numb. As Loki clambered out of the shaft and into the even darker basement level, she started to get some feeling back in her limbs again, and she slowly loosened her grip on him.

From what little light radiated from the flickering yellow bulbs, she could see the rest of the tower's occupants—Sue included—standing near the stairwell into the sewer system. They seem to have removed whatever blockage Loki and Ben had painstakingly added over the last few weeks. While the rest of them looked fairly ordinary, Johnny was wearing a skin-tight blue suit with the number '4' on his chest—a suit that didn't leave much to the imagination. Much to her embarrassment, he caught her looking, and she felt her cheeks blaze when he smirked.

"Max has informed me that she wishes to be involved," Loki announced as they approached the group, and she swatted him on the chest.

"Dude."

Ugh, that felt awful. She hadn't said "dude" since she was twenty. Max wrinkled her nose at the strange taste it left in her mouth, and then cleared her throat as all eyes flitted over to her.

"I just…" She swallowed, trying to sit up straighter on Loki's back. "I just want to be in the loop. Peter said you were… doing something this afternoon?"

Reed shot Peter a look, but much to her surprise, no one looked especially angry to see her there. Perhaps they weren't purposefully trying to exclude her from anything—even though they had every right to do so. After all, she was a stranger (sort of) to the tower, and definitely to the family, and she had no powers to contribute to the fight. Still, she liked to think she was part of the catalyst that got everything moving.

Plus, keeping busy kept her mind off Nolan, and although she felt like she had adequately celebrated him last night with Loki through hours of discussion and stories and tears, she needed to keep busy to keep moving. Getting involved was definitely one way to do that.

"Tony Stark is meeting Johnny on David's Island in an hour," Sue told her. The woman sounded as stressed as she always did, and as Max watched her shove a black bag into Johnny's hands, she realized that she wasn't annoyed—Sue was concerned. Her little brother was going out there alone, and she was concerned. Max would have been too: it could have been Nolan. "He says he has a serum that already works on the aliens, and he has some samples and ingredients for us."

"Oh."

"Don't forget to put everything in the bag," Reed insisted, pointing at it as Johnny slung it over his back. "I made modifications so it's fire-resistant—"

"Yeah, yeah, I got it," Johnny muttered, readjusting the straps. "This isn't the first time you've done it… It's kind of old news, Reed."

Sue let out an exasperated sigh. "Johnny, please focus."

"Guys, I'm fine." He grinned at Max again, and she felt Loki's hand tighten around her shin. "This isn't my first rodeo."

"Why should we even trust Stark?" Ben rumbled from the shadows. He stepped forward, the light bulbs casting irregular shadows across his face. "Why should we care? Where's he been this whole time anyway? Doesn't he live in this city?"

"Because Stark is a genius," Peter said, sounding almost cautious with his answer. Max snorted.

"Aren't all of you geniuses?" she mused, wrapping her arms snugly around Loki's neck—she certainly meant to include him in the collective statement. Ben looked at her, turning his entire body because he lacked the neck to swivel his head, and she swore that he was smiling. It was a genuine expression, the best he could make anyway, and she grinned back.

"Tony says he has done his own personal tests with the alien tissue years ago."

"I had hoped he would do something useful with it," Loki said suddenly, making Max frown. He readjusted his grip on her, jostling her around somewhat, and then cleared his throat. "I dispensed with a Pagurolid during my previous stay on Earth. Stark came to collect the remains."

"What?" she hissed. "In Masonville?"

"Well, yes—"

"Why didn't you tell me?" The others seemed to be speaking quietly amongst themselves, perhaps sensing the sudden shift in her tone. Loki, on the other hand, seemed oblivious to her mood.

"To be fair, there were a number of things I didn't tell you back then."

"Put me down."

"Max…"

She repeated the request softly, and he finally set her down, not letting go of her until each foot was squarely on the ground.

There was a heaviness in her stomach that made her uneasy, and she stepped around him, eyebrows furrowed and arms folded. When he said her name again, almost like a plea, she shook her head.

"We'll talk about it later," she muttered as he frowned deeply at her. She then marched across the cool cement in her socked feet and stood next to Peter, her back to Loki. "Good luck, Johnny."

"Thanks, but I was born lucky," he said, each word practically purred out. "See you on the other side, chumps."

"Don't lead them back here," Sue blurted needlessly. He rolled his eyes at her, and then darted out through the opening and disappeared into the bleakness of Manhattan's underground tunnel system.

Four bright streams of light shone down on Johnny's face, and for a brief moment of quiet, he stared up at the manhole grate, expressionless. He had covered a lot of ground in the last twenty minutes, moving quickly into the sewers and away from the voices in the underground tunnel. Fleetingly, he wished he could share some of his sister's power—this would have been so much easier if he were invisible. However, he couldn't be blessed with good looks and all the mutations, so he'd have to settle with what he had.

He readjusted the straps one last time, making sure they weren't too constricting over his shoulders. Arms up, arms down. Arms out, arms in. Knees too—just for balance. Water trickled by his feet, and there was a stench in here that he wouldn't subject Victor Von Doom to on a good day. But it was quiet. The voices were full of emotion in the other parts of the tunnels, rattling off the walls with fervor, and he assumed that Manhattan's underground resistance was still going strong—or relatively so, given the circumstances.

This was for them. This was for Sue and Reed and the kids. Hell, this was even for Ben. This was for everyone on this damn island, the island where he bounced from club to club without really feeling anything anymore, and the island was all that mattered. Let them give it their best shot—he hadn't outrun jets in at least two years, and he was starting to miss it.

His neck cracked noisily—once, twice—before he took a deep breath.

"Here goes nothing," he muttered. Adrenaline coursed through him. He could feel his fingertips pulsating, his toes throbbing. "Flame on!"

There was nothing that made him feel more alive than lighting up. The flames gushed out from his chest. They engulfed his head quickly—face, eyes, nose, mouth, and ears. They traveled down his arms, sparing the backpack any trouble, and licked across his torso. His toes were warm, but comfortably so, and without much effort at all, he hopped up and propelled his body into the air.

The manhole covering shot up with him, clattering noisily on the pavement when it landed. He saw the eyes of street-walkers turn to him, dull and lifeless, and the tank rumbling on the next avenue over stopped moving. He hadn't felt this alive in months—maybe even years. There was a clamour below him, and as he weaved through skyscrapers, taking in the real view of his city, he noticed that there were figures coming together on the streets. Some were uniformed, but for the most part, they were regular civilians. Looking, pointing, running.

He circled the Empire State Building twice, studying the cityscape of Manhattan, and then shot off in a burst of flames when a helicopter took off from a medical research center. They had chosen a day-time meet-up in order to avoid the dangers that came at night—and the fact that Johnny would stand out like a beacon in the darkness. Still, the day had a lot of cloud cover, and before long, it wasn't just a single helicopter in pursuit of him.

Instead, there were three military-grade helicopters whirring behind him, and soon after he heard the telltale sounds of artillery leaving a barrel. Bullets littered the air around him, and he switched into evasive maneuvers. Twirling, twisting, sudden drops—they were all in his arsenal. He could have tried to roast one of them, but he didn't want to try getting close enough to do any damage. The key was to lose them over the various boroughs between Baxter Tower and David's Island.

He changed his mind mid-flight. Instead of going directly north, Johnny turned sharply and raced across Brooklyn—that was where a lot of the fighting was. He wanted to let anyone watching know that they weren't alone. If the Cap was holding down a fort, his eyes glued to the city, then he was bound to notice the Human Torch flying through his neighbourhood. Maybe he'd actually try to do something for Manhattan then… That was, if he could ever get Brooklyn clear.

The helicopters were relentless in their pursuit, and they all dropped below standard flight distance to follow him around both high and low-rise buildings. A sharp turn in Queens managed to send one careening into an apartment complex. The building erupted in a ball of fire, dust, and cement—he hoped no one who mattered (i.e. any human) was inside.

By the time he was circling Brentwood and West Babylon, he'd lost another helicopter at an overpass. When he raced by an abandoned bus station, there were a group of raggedy people who raised their guns in salute, opening fire on the last helicopter. Johnny grinned triumphantly, though when he hit the Atlantic waters just moments later, he realized he had lost his tail—the helicopter had circled back for the gunmen.

Pausing, he hovered some thirty feet above the dark blue waves, watching for signs of a fight. He was too far gone to help them now, and Stark was waiting on him. Still, it was strange that his alien escort backed off after a couple of bullets from civilians…

As he lingered, debating whether or not he ought to go back and help, he realized why the helicopter had pulled back. Four high-tech military jets shot out of the JFK airport. They roared up into the air, climbing higher and higher, and then fell into formation. It wasn't a moment for panic, but Johnny opted against going back into the city with those guys. Instead, he shot up, hoping for cloud cover instead.

The jets were far more relentless than the copters—and much faster. He was pulling out all the tricks in his books, both above and beneath the clouds, and even then he hadn't managed to lure any of the aircrafts into colliding with one another. They were trained, efficient pilots, and while Johnny could predict a lot of their moves before they made them, that didn't mean he could outrun four in a situation like this. He should have asked Reed for weapons, not a fucking backpack.

Just as he decided to make a go back to the city, hoping that they'd stop firing if it meant hitting a building with important alien assholes in it, one of the jets exploded. Engine parts and cockpit windshield pieces plummeted toward the water, and Johnny stopped for just a heartbeat—and then let out a sigh. It was about damn time the guy showed up.

Stark was a red and gold blur as he shot across the sky, with lasers and torpedoes pummeling two other jets in unison. Johnny leapt out of the way to avoid the rainstorm of metal and plastic, shielding his eyes out of habit. The lone remaining jet still had its sights set on him, and he dropped down toward the water when it fired at him, taking the freefall to give Stark the all-clear to nuke the sucker. Moments later, debris cascaded down to the ocean, and he dodged all of it with ease.

When the sky was clear, Johnny turned back in the general direction of David's Island. Stark, however, seemed to have a change of plans, and out of the corner of his eye, he spotted the Iron Man suit shooting toward Block Island instead. Johnny frowned: the whole point of choosing their original destination was that it wasn't inhabited. Still, at least they were together. Shaking his head, he surged off after him, following with an eye still peeled for other enemy aircraft.

He touched down on the sandy, rocky shore of Block Island only moments later. His fire extinguished, and he hoped he'd look invisible to the rest of the world without the light around him.

Stark kept his mask down as he approached, and Johnny arched an eyebrow.

"Thanks, man."

The suit stopped in front of him, staring through its slits at a slight winded Johnny Storm, and then finally lifted its facial exterior.

Tony Stark looked like absolute shit. Johnny had had his fair share of times with horrible hangovers, bouts of the flu—when he wasn't a superhuman, mind you—and days where it was better to stay in bed. The man standing in front of him looked like an awful combination of all three: sunken cheeks, dark rings around the eyes, a yellow-tinged complexion. His hair was scraggy and unkempt, and the smell that radiated from him was enough to knock anyone out. Johnny held his ground out of professional courtesy, but he still tipped his head backward, frowning.

"Where the hell have you been?" Johnny demanded, cutting him off when he saw the man part his lips.

"South America."

"Reed says it's a black hole down there."

"Because I made it that way," Stark said. His voice was scratchy, as though seldom used. "No incoming or outgoing information unless it's through one of my machines."

"And people are okay with that?" He was skeptical of the idea to begin with, but he couldn't imagine an entire continent of people disconnecting from the rest of the world.

"Peru is entirely alien-free." The suit's side opened, and Stark retrieved two plastic containers and a small notebook. "Brazil is roughly three-fourths of the way there. Argentina is about the same… Ecuador is my next project."

"Right."

"People do what I tell them because I'm keeping them out of a war," Stark told him. "My serum can be made as a liquid or gas form, and it does its job."

"Why don't you deliver it yourself? Don't you care what happens here?"

"America is the Cap's country," Stark sneered, his beady eyes darting toward the mainland fleetingly. "Let him deal with it."

"But he isn't really, is he?" Johnny accepted all the supplies, tucking them neatly in his bag.

"You'll need a few extra ingredients, but I made a list." He pointed at the bag, obviously ignoring Johnny's rhetorical question. "You may be able to find them in Stark Tower, but I know for a fact Oscorp has most of them on retainer."

"Why didn't you—"

"Too unstable for the flight," Stark mused. "I'm sure it'll be fine for cross-city traveling, however."

Johnny stared down at the bag in his hand, feeling the full weight of the world's salvation there. He shook his head.

"Why haven't you just been giving this to everyone?"

"I don't play for the team anymore," Stark snapped. "This is a personal favour for Reed… Everyone else can do what they want."

"People are dying and you have a solution—"

"Everyone dies."

He wanted to fight more, but he couldn't get around that logical. So, he changed the subject, knowing that the previous topic was as unmoveable as Thor's hammer.

"Are you drunk?"

"Only in the mornings," Stark insisted. Gin practically oozed out of the man's pores, but he had tried to politely ignore it for the duration of the meeting. "Take care, Storm."

"You should fight for your city."

Stark stopped after a few steps, waves crashing up along the shoreline, and then looked back at him.

"Yeah, I probably should."

His visor settled down into place, hiding his face once more, and Johnny watched the suit launch into the sky. He soon disappeared behind the clouds, followed by the renewed roar of enemy jets.

AUTHOR'S NOTES:

Sooo. This is shorter and less detailed than my usual updates. I've been in and out of the ER and clinics for the last two days because I had this horrrrrible bout of pain that I thought was my appendix. Turned out to be nothing. All the tests done and there's nothing to show for it except for my awful lingering stomach cramps. So. I'm sort of on painkillers and taking the day off work… I figured I might as well get this chapter out!

I've started reading Civil War by Stuart Moore—it's the novelization of the graphic novel. I like it a lot. It's been helping me shape the FF and Stark and Peter and the whole world. Unfortunately, some of my random musing ideas appear to be canon (without me realizing), and I'm debating where I want to go with this story based on that. This universe is AU, but I suppose I can dip and dabble with established things. It's nothing too big that would alter the plot in any substantial way, I guess.

I'm looking forward to writing the fallout of Loki and Max's moment of awkward in this chapter. I've been adding some things here and there to my plot outlines, so yeay me.

Sorry, I'm in a weird headspace at the moment.

I go on vacation in two weeks for two weeks back home. I've got a friend coming with me who has never been overseas, so I'm actually doooing stuff with her this time. My aim is to try to get at least two more updates out before I go, and then maybe one over the holiday. We'll see.

Anyway. I'm going to go binge-play Zoo Tycoon and pointedly ignore all my chores because I'm a wounded animal who wants to nest.

LOVE YOU ALL!