ooops, i meant to say the end of part 3, but it looks like i wont have the time. but, here is one more!
I Can Hear the Drums
Chapter 25
No one watched Natasha do it. She thought someone might be hanging over her shoulder, or sitting behind some monitor, somewhere, staring and silently judging as she plucked the pink product right off the shelf and considered it in her hand. She resisted the urge to look both ways. Only thieves in movies or guilty wannabees did that.
She wanted this, and she was taking it, and she was not going to pay for it. That was how the five different pregnancy tests found their way into her bag. Paranoia made her imagine the entire world had gathered to observe the theft, but that was all it truly was. There was hardly a soul left in the state, let alone the little corner store on 5th and Broadway of Manhattan. The food had all been stolen, or gathered by government officials, elves, normal humans, and super heroes. Nothing was left on the planet that might prove edible. No one knew how long the human race might be displaced from their planet. Nothing could be left behind.
Pregnancy tests weren't a hot commodity, apparently, unlike the empty racks of condoms that existed beside them. Rinon's vision had shaken her to the very core. She knew this was just a precaution. A stupid one she could hardly believe she'd fed into, but a precaution nonetheless. That was her attempt to convince herself the entire drive back home.
She considered dumping the entire bag into a waste pin in the abandoned lobby of Stark Tower, but for some reason didn't. She considered stuffing them under Clint's bed when she reached their shared room, but walked into the bathroom with them instead. She even considered flushing them down the toilet after opening the first box. Natasha did none of those things she considered.
As crazy as it sounded, she had to know for sure, which is why when Pepper walked in to find her, Natasha was pacing the length of Clint's room in a disjointed haze. Five hormone-finding strips were laid out on Clint's dresser top, waiting the two minutes it took to turn red or blue, one line or two, pregnant or not pregnant.
Pepper had been saying something as she walked in. She had a portfolio in her hand, which instantly slipped out and skittered across the floor. Her hand remained extended and frozen. There was no stopping Pepper from unseeing it all, regardless that Natasha considered knocking her unconscious right on the spot. Terrified that Tony might be soon to follow, Natasha lunged across the room and slammed the door shut. She threw the lock and stood, pressed against the entry.
"Don't scream," Natasha pleaded. "You scream and, even if I like you, I will shoot you, do you understand me?"
Open-mouthed and gulping like a fish, Pepper's head wagged. Her finger pointed to the row of tests. "Is . . .is that . . . Are you...?"
"I'm not!" Natasha blatantly pointed out. "I mean, I can't. You know that."
"Well, yeah...I mean...I do know that. But, what are you doing? Are you hiding in here?" Pepper took a step toward the line up, and Natasha rushed over to cut her off.
"No!"
Pepper stopped instantly and Natasha struggled to calm down. She was an assassin. A master spy. She could get herself out of this one. "No, don't look. I'm just taking a precaution, that's all."
"Missing a month and taking one test is a precaution, this is panic." Pepper pointed out. Her round, doe eyes filled in mirth. "Natasha, are you really thinking this could have happened? And stop the tough thing, Tony does that with me and I see right through it."
Natasha considered fighting her on it, but eventually gave up. There were only a few people in her life she chose to drop the I-can-murder-you-with-my-pinky act, and Pepper Potts made that list.
Refraining from revealing too much of Rinon's secret, Natasha did share her nervous anticipation about her encounter with the Sarhorn, and what she might have read into his words with her. Barton lived, if Natasha lived. They knew, or thought they knew, that Clint wasn't going to live at all.
"Unless he means you're pregnant." Pepper put together.
Natasha agreed, tense as a drum. The time was up on some of the tests, but she couldn't bring herself to even look at them.
"When was the last time you two…" Pepper let her voice trail off. Somehow, the fact that she was meant to come down to the living quarters and retrieve Natasha because the world was about to be destroyed with a cloud of poisonous gas, mattered a lot less.
The idea of Natasha Romanov and Clint Barton having a baby? That was front page news.
"Not since before he left to find Quill. It's been months." Natasha folded her arms, suddenly self-conscious of the way Pepper was staring at her abdomen.
"How many? Like two? Three?"
"I don't know. Maybe four?" that was a lie. She knew the exact date Barton and she had had sex just to spite Loki sleeping next door. Not that the sex wasn't good, it just wasn't what she had planned for her first evening on the Gateway. Since the moment Rinon's vision beat that word, that feeling, into her soul, she simply couldn't shake the idea that something within her had altered. She counted back those days, and arrived at precisely fifteen weeks. It had been that long since he'd held her last.
"Do you want me to look to see if they're positive?" Pepper asked.
"No...Yes. No." Natasha changed her mind on a dime. This wasn't like her. What in the world did potential pregnancy do to her decision making? She tried to shake off the indecision, and took in a deep breath. She could do this.
Pepper reached over and held her hand, braving a punch to the nose if Natasha felt too threatened. Thankfully, that didn't occur. Together, they turned and took a few careful steps toward Clint's dresser top.
Nothing in Natasha's world was easy. She'd been experimented on for years. First infused with the soldier serum, then scarred for life to prevent ever becoming a mother. She was a Black Widow.
Russia didn't think a woman like her, with her experiences, training, and pricey anatomical changes should be able to procreate. They'd robbed her of motherhood in a time when she didn't care. She never expected to live outside of the Red Room Initiative, and finding love was as foreign of a concept as Bagel Thursday. Clint Barton introduced her to both. Whether or not he would also be the one to guide her in motherhood, would remain a mystery for now.
The minute they decided to at last brave the potential fears of what a positive test might bring, the room exploded in a wave of blaster fire. Pepper screamed. Natasha grabbed her, pulling the woman to the floor as the shots sliced Clint's room in half. The Kree warships had arrived.
Pepper lifted her head when the gunfire ceased. She looked toward the dresser where Natasha line of sight went also. There was nothing left. The entire upper half was destroyed, its contents littering the bedroom and the new hole into the adjacent bathroom. Natasha pushed up to her feet as the Kree warship peeled away. Three Alfheimr fighters were on its tail.
"Get up! We've got to move before they drop the gas." Natasha instructed, yanking Pepper to her feet.
Pepper kicked around in the rubble of shattered concrete and dry wall. "Maybe we can still find one!"
"No time!" Natasha shouted. She forcibly dragged Pepper away, leaving behind their answers in the smoldering wreckage.
Natasha barreled through the chopped up doorway, and took off for Stark's room. Pepper was right on her heels. She extended her leg and kicked the private quarter's door.
This room, too, was already on fire. Another Kree ship dove through the air, past the hole cut into the side of Tony's private suite. Seeing movement inside, it swung around. Its guns extending.
"Run!" Natasha screamed.
They bolted across the room, hit the bedroom doorway, and slammed right through it. The elevator doors to the landing platform a floor above them were propped open, but the elevator itself was gone. The cabled whistled in the air, smoking, as the car plunged ten stories down. Somewhere below, they heard it hit, explode, and a chunk of fireball and sprockets came rocketing up toward them.
Natasha and Pepper ran back for the main room. A gas grenade, containing the same deadly neurotoxin the Kree were dropping all over the world, had been shot into the room, cutting off their escape. Natasha yanked the door closed. Pepper pulled up the collar of her shirt, and wrapped it over her mouth and nose. The super soldier did the same.
They were trapped.
:(:):(:):
Clint tried to remember the name of the call girl Quill frequented. So much had happened since being in Cross Lake last, that he'd already forgotten. His rage and fear both worked in tandem to break his concentration on the world right in front of him. It was a good thing Drax came along, or he might have forgotten which way to turn at the fountain in the center of town. He remembered what the outside of the brothel looked like, but little else. He imagined the rest would come the minute he stepped through the front doors.
They landed easily enough at Cross Lake, just outside of Denali's tavern. His friend had already been called and informed of the events the minute they broke through the atmosphere. He met them outsides, sans his traditional heels and beehive wig, and instantly ferried them to the two-story wood home erected behind the diner. It resembled any traditional western home, with a style popular for the 1700s. Out on this untamed rangeland, it was oddly fitting.
A flutter of movement erupted when Groot and Drax muscled Peter's table-made-gurney through the front door. Denali's wife made plenty of spade in the front parlor and gathered the youngest of the over one dozen children into the kitchen. The oldest girl, though, remained with two of her brothers. She smiled at Clint. Denali's daughter was a surgeon for a while before he moved his family off of Earth. Clint knew Peter was in no better hands than right here.
He didn't stay long himself. Once the room was made ready and Pym dragged Loki and Gamora out to find a place for Clint's new portal, Barton left. He could trust Pym to get things done. He might have been nearing his sixties, but Hank was still an Avenger. Loki fought him. He wanted to find the Gauntlet with Barton and professed to some keen danger awaiting him in the district that Loki had yet to warn him of. All Clint heard was more lies. He'd say anything to get his hands on that treasure, especially now.
"The light on your sphere grows brighter, my friend." Drax said.
Clint snapped out of his thoughts to look down at the stone. Sure enough, it was glowing like the tail end of a lightning bug. "We're close." He said, clamping the sphere shut again.
"You believe this woman to possess it?"
"I'm not sure what I believe. It's here, somewhere. And this is Pete we're talking about. He hides things in plain sight. Stupid places. Like sticking an Easter egg on the hood of a car. Everyone always seems to find that one last because it's just too obvious."
Drax looked up and down the roadway of the red light district. He was good at obvious. In fact, it was something he often excelled at very well. Rocket called him Captain Obvious, though he knew of no such military ranking in the word. Either way, he never seemed to rise to a rank above Captain, which became frustrating at times in the twelve years since he'd been in the position.
He looked up at the signs swinging in the breeze or the gutters. He checked the windows, and noted the characters within, all drinking, playing cars, or dragging of women. The more Drax searched, the more he had the feeling of missing something. So he stopped.
Clint went on a little ways more, trying to locate the place where he'd watched Quill fall out a window. At the same time, he tried not to remember how happy he'd been when he helped do that or how Loki agreed to assist and the smiles on their faces before scaring the crap out of Star Lord. A lot changes in a few short weeks of being in space. He noticed Drax wasn't following. "You all right?" Clint asked.
Drax turned away, and looked back up the roadway they'd come from.
"Drax?" Clint asked.
"I believe I have fulfilled my duty as the Captain on Obvious things." He said, facing Clint. He smiled, which on a man such as him instilled just as much fear as it did confidence.
"Um, ok. Why don't you explain what you mean?"
Drax lifted his finger and pointed back in the direction they'd come. Clint worried that he was pointing out an incoming Loki, but that wasn't the case. Humoring him, Clint walked back to his side and stared in the direction he indicated. His heart jumped right into his throat.
"You are a genius!" Clint exclaimed, jogging back toward the heart of the town and the four colored fountain erected there. He should have thought of it before when Loki and he first arrived. This was exactly the place where a man like Peter Quill, who resorted to a dance off with a Kree usurper, would hide the most prized possession in the galaxy.
"I have never been called that." Drax replied, confused.
"Take the compliment." Clint stopped at the edge of the fountain and looked down into the well of coins, jewels, and other precious articles left by weary travelers. It seemed no matter where one found himself in the galaxy, the tales of wishes being granted from fountains still held true in public eye. The Gauntlet had to be in there, buried under a mound of coins. Loki's old warning kept him from sticking his hand in too quickly.
The lion stone that highlighted the top of the fountain was only there because no one had found a way to steal it. The fountain was likely defended by either some hidden body guard or held its own systems for repelling a would-be thief. To test the theory, Clint removed one of his arrows and carefully dunked the feathered end into the water. Almost instantaneously, the shaft melted. Acid, check.
"I would not suggest retching your hand in." Drax pointed out.
"Yeah, got that." Barton said. He rooted around in his pockets to come up with some form of metal or coin. Finding neither, he looked at Drax and held out his open hand. "Lend me a coin."
"I have no need for trivialities such as monetary award to remain in my pockets."
Clint gave him a sterner look.
Drax withdrew a unit and handed it over. Clint hovered it over the water next and dropped it in. in seconds it, too, completely disintegrated. Drax leaned over the water as he watched his money dissipate out in a ring.
"I don't get it, how did the rest get in there if it all just burns up? Is it some kind of trick?" Clint asked. He made another ring around the fountain, searching high and low for some sort of placard or instruction on its use. It was possible that the mound of treasure at the bottom was completely fictitious, like a hologram Tony might create. There had to be a trick to it.
Clint pulled the orb out of his jacket and accessed the cover again. The time stone was glowing brighter than ever. It could sense the gantlet was close by. Clint snapped the lid shut. He checked pis pockets again, let down his quiver and searched through a few of its compartments. He tended to have random bits of cash stowed for emergency. He soon uncovered a penny and triumphantly dangled it over the water.
"Please let this one work." He whispered to no one in particular. The coin dropped, hit the water, and see-sawed its way to the bottom. Beneath its new weight a few piles of coins shifted. He could see the unmistakable glow of a bright, red stone hiding beneath. Wishing well, he thought. He had to make a wish to drop something in the well.
The fountain shifted on its base. Clint backpeddled in surprise as the entire structure suddenly came to life. The lion stone retracted downward as the shifting scene at the top reformed, molded, and created the face of a true lion. It roared into the night with its massive black jaws opened toward the distant planet that Cross Lake orbited. The historic scenes all flowed in their own time lines. Frost Giants battled Asgardians. Celestials beat back the advance of Galactus. Dark elves floated through a matt of black space with their light elf counterparts shutting them out of Alfheimr forever. At the very base of the fountain, the seven Sarhorns who were at one time crouching with the weight of the galaxy full of history on their backs, now stood up. They were taller than Clint, their faces made of black stone, iron ore, and flecks of color that caught the shimmer from the district lights. When one mouth opened, they all opened. A voice appeared that they all shared.
"For he who wishes with his heart
For he unsettled torn apart
Your strength we sense, we see, we feel
A sacrifice to come, a fracture to heal
Ask the Founders all you must
Ask the Founders, you we trust."
Drax came to stand beside Clint and look up into the stony faces. "This did not happen when we put the glove into the fountain."
"You helped put it there?!" Clint shouted.
Drax shrugged.
"Well, what am I supposed to do? I need the Gauntlet back. Do I just ask them?"
Another useless shrug.
Clint had entertained many strange conversations in his past with worlds full of peculiar people but never before had he been asked to converse with a statue. There was no time like the present. "Um, yeah. Hi. I'm here to take the Infinity Gauntlet. It was placed here, uh, in you for safe keeping and I need it returned to me."
The faces of the four Sarhorns Clint could see all turned to look down at him. We wondered if this was about to turn into a sphinx moment and they would resort to asking him a riddle.
"The founders hear his spoken plea
They consider the thoughts that motivate thee
Our choice to release the treasure to you
Not lightly taken, we must chose."
"Fair enough." Clint said, holding up his hands in supplication. He didn't have all the time in the world, but if the magical talking fountain with seven magical talking Sarhorns, and a magical roaring lion wanted to talk amongst themselves, who was he to try and stop them? He hoped that by now Rocket would have gotten a hold of Tony and the others. For some reason the communications in the Tower were down and they had to reroute the call through the Gateway to try and get in touch with Rinon's flagship. It was easier doing that work from the ground on Cross Lake.
The night covered world around them began to shake awake. Windows, doorways, and boardwalks came alive with a thousand species all poking out of their holes in interest. A few had seen the peculiar happenings of the fountain before. After all, most men wished for treasure and if they were good enough, sometimes the Founders gave it to them. Others went away empty handed. Most of the regulars and workers took a meager interest in the proceedings and returned to their stations. Clint was just one more traveler in a sea of others passing through.
"A decision reached
A heart unbreached
Pure in soul
And torn in toll
Your treasure is here, now take
From the Founders of this Cross Lake"
The stone Sarhorn directly in front of Clint retracted his hand, and pressed it into his own abdomen. The stone melted away beneath the searching fingers and soon it reappeared. The dripping wet Infinity Gauntlet extended toward him. Clint looked at it with trepidation. Surely the gawkers could see from their positions what treasure just appeared out of the fountain's water. He wanted to take it, stuff it into his jacket, and run off before anyone could stop him, but seeing the water gave him pause.
He elbowed Drax. "You're the one with thick skin. You take it."
"My skin is not thick," Drax said.
"I mean, you grab it because this archer doesn't exactly need his fingers melting off," Clint elaborated. He cast a wary glance around the square. Now that the show was mostly over, the people were retreating back to their drinks, cards, women, and men. A few stragglers remained in the shadows. Those were the ones he worried about.
"I do not wish for my fingers to suffer under the onslaught of poisonous water."
"Then slip your knife into it and pick it up," Clint replied.
The darkness crawled in on him. He felt it like a cool wave floating over his heart and a heightened sense of something shooting adrenaline through his veins. Something whispered by his ear. He turned again to find the owner of the voice but there was no one beside him save for Drax. He listened. The voice returned. Louder, more desperate.
"RUN!" it screamed.
Forgoing his initial concern, Clint reached out and snatched the Infinity Gauntlet out of the statue's hand. He touched it into his pocket and tried to shove Drax aside. "Move!" He ordered. Drax tried to comply at first. Suddenly an arrow appeared out of no where and pierced though his thigh. The giant buckled and toppled over onto his face.
The darkness of the four corner town exploded in a shower of light. Something went whistling by them and hit the fountain. Half a second later, the colors, light, rock, and water of the grand structure detonated. Clint threw himself into the dirt beneath Drax. The face of the Sarhorn Clint had spoken with tumbled through the air and slammed into a post across from them. The lion stone shot straight up into the air, followed by a cascade of celestials, light elves, and human figurines. When the world stopped moving around them, Clint unearthed himself from beneath the mountain of fresh and pushed Drax onto his back. He looked down at the arrow sporting from his flesh and his blood ran cold. It was an elven weapon.
"I will kill he who has pierced my flesh!" Drax roared.
Clint called his bow to his hand and pulled an arrow against its string. They couldn't stay in the open like this. The explosion was bound to drag the horrified patrons out of their holes again to see what was the matter. For now the billowing black smoke clouded the air around them and kept their forms hidden. Beside him, Drax yanked the arrow out and considered it angrily.
"Can you stand? Cause we really, really need to go right now."
Drax proved himself by struggling up. Clint gave him the crook of his arm for a handhold, but remained trained on the smoke around them.
"Behind you!" That warning voice screamed again.
Clint swung around, but held his arrow steady. He had an idea of what he may find but actually seeing it himself gave him pause. It was the Southling girl, the prostitute from the tavern up the street. She had her Elven bow, her elaborate carved arrows, trained between his eyes. Her hand quivered against the string.
Clint stepped back once, to show his submission. It worked with her before and maybe she'd take it as a sign he still meant her no harm. He didn't want to kill her, or even wound her. She was nothing more than a terrified, alone, child. "Don't do this, Southling. There is nothing I have done to you here beside try to show you respect. You can still walk away from this."
She took another trepidous step in his direction. The smoke and ash flew up around her as the superheated rock literal burned like coals in a fire. Clint could see streams of tears dragging down her face as she stared him down. "Vie mel yṻla hale." I don't want to do this, she whispered.
"Then don't. Step back and I won't hurt you." Clint pulled his arrow a little closer to his cheek and rested his hand along his jaw. He didn't have to kill her, but he could stop her.
The Southling sobbed. He struggled to understand why as her hand slipped along the nock of her arrow. She was going to release it. Clint was faster than her. He sent his arrow up, just over her head, and the tip sliced through the string on her bow. He ducked to the side as the bow did the one thing he'd always warned his archery students about. It exploded. No tension was left to keep the limbs pulled back, so they shot forward incredibly fast. The upper limb snapped instantly, sending splinter shards in every direction. The lower limb followed the first, but it wasn't until it recoiled that the wood broke off. The transected string collapse like a rubber band. An edge of it flew into her face, nearly scarring her eye as it cut a neat line through her cheek. The arrow went wild. Clint had lost a few bows in his younger days to broken strings, dry firings, or other nonsense. He'd seen bad archery accidents before, but this ranked with one of the worst. The Alfheimr made bows were incredibly strong to keep up with the power of their wielders. Breaking one was like setting off an industrial slingshot.
The shock of the thing should have stopped her, or at the least frightened her. The Southling seemed completely unfazed. She came at him with a knife instead. Though only a young elf she still had a hundred years of heavy training for war beneath her. She was as strong as Thor. Drax might have stepped to Clint noble aid instantly, the Southling threw him off as if he was a paper airplane. Clint drew another arrow but his hesitation at killing her was the edge she needed to get in close. She grabbed the human by his jacket front and forced him back into the side of a building. The glassware a small wall away rattled with the impact of his body. Just in front of them, the smoking wreckage of the fountain was finally beginning to die down. Three of the closest saloon fronts had caught fire. Flames licked into the air of the red light district and man, woman, and beast went pouring into the roadway to scoop sand on the destruction before the whole block was consumed.
The Southling's fist tightened around Barton. She produced a dagger from her waist and flourished it forward. Her eyes were wide in terror, disbelief. It was as if she wanted to stop and could not.
"Help me!" she whispered in a desperate plea.
"You can stop this! Let me go! You don't have to do this!" One of Clint's hands reached up to catch her wrist, preventing the blade from plunging down into his chest. The other sought out his own knife.
"I must!" She cried. Forcing her hand down more. If Clint resisted any longer, she was going to break his arm.
"No you don't! You have a choice! Can help you! I can talk to Rinon, to the queen. I can bring you back home again. But if you kill me now, that is never going to happen, do you understand?!" Clint found his knife. He tried to flick it open, but his hand slipped on the grip and it went clattering to the ground. Drax was trying to get to his feet. The arrow wound slowed him down. Within seconds a fourth saloon began to catch fire. The heat of it swept across the street, bringing a barrage of cinders with it. The archer used his second hand to help support the first and prevent the swiftly coming death.
"He promised to let me go. He promised to let me go home. I just wanted to go home."
Clint's world crushed. Suddenly, it all made sense.
A shot rang out in the streets, reverberating in the air like canon fire. The people screamed, ducked for cover, and escaped the fires threatening to spread farther and farther. The Southling's hands went lax against him and the dagger tumbled away.
"No!" Clint screamed, catching her in his arms. Standing just behind her with a gun in his hand was Hank Pym.
The Avengers checked his pistol and returned it to the pancake holster at the small of his back. He smiled a little at Clint. "I thought she had you for sure. Glad I decided to show up when I did."
Clint want to reach out and strike him but the girl was going limp in his arms. He lowered her to the ground, trying to stem the blood flow from her wound. Her hand fell open to the side of her and he saw there what he came to expect. The purple brand. Thanos' new mark for his spies and slaves. He must be hard at work calling in all his favors across the galaxy. The Southling was a single piece of that ever expanding puzzle.
She tried to form words through the blood-stained lips, but Clint told her not to struggle. He wanted to get her help, but knew there was no use. Pym was deadly accurate with a gun.
"I'm taking you come." Clint told her, stroking the side of her face in is hand. "I'll take you there myself. You won't be a lost soul. Not anymore."
He imagined her thanking him in Elvish, smiling, and gently passing into the next life in his arms. But his eyes never deceived him. She only looked forward into the sky as the darkness closed in on her. She was cold, terrified, wild with fear. He held her and spoke calm Elven words as she struggled against death itself until that mighty beast won and her body fell emptily against him. Clint's eyes closed and he held her a little tighter. Pym looked down on the scene more than a little confused. He wanted to say something, but Clint's grief kept him quiet for a time. Drax limped over, rubbing the new knob of the back of his head.
"We must leave the dead elf and return to our ship," he said bluntly.
Clint lifted his eyes to look at them. "We aren't leaving her. She didn't do this because she wanted to. She's another child of that Enchantress's old tricks. Just like I was once. This wasn't her fault. It's not fair to leave her."
Pym hiked a thumb at the destruction around them "The big guy is right, though. Barton we've got to make tracks. This place is going to come down on us."
Pym had a point. They needed to get moving again. Clint slipped his hands under the Elven girl and held her against his chest. Together the three of them stole beneath the fire smoke toward the light side of the moon. The Infinity Gauntlet, and the Southling's body, went with them.
that's all for now! poor natasha cant get a break.
Next time: Escaping earth, escaping Cross Lake
please review!