CHAPTER THIRTEEN
In the end it was unanimous. If this was going to be the showdown they plan it to be then they all decided it should take place at the prison. At the place where most of them had been locked up for their stand against the Sokovia Accords and for their loyalty to Steve. The place where the two sides of the Avengers had gone for round two and lost Wanda and Vision.
Barely a day after the Avengers' visit to Wakanda and Sharon found herself approached by a random man posing as a Wakandan guard. Clint had an eagle's eye view of the whole thing going down and true to Natasha's words, Sharon played the brainwashed informer role beautifully. It was to this prison that she had directed them. A supposedly rescue attempt number two that was actually meant to draw General Ross troops out into the open and better yet Stryker's band of brain-washed mutants.
Clint turned around, feeling a hand on his shoulder. "Have I ever thanked you for sticking with me all this time, Barton?" It was Steve garbed in his Captain America suit down to the new shield Tchalla has designed for him to replace the one he had left behind with Stark on their last fight in that Russian bunker.
"No need to sound like this is gonna be our last fight, Cap. I do plan to keep seeing your pretty face around. 'Specially now that you and Nat have stopped being idiots." It was probably a good thing that the Captain America's mask keeps his face hidden at that moment, Clint thought with an amused smile.
"To be fair, a case can be argued that Nat's the bigger idiot. I at least know how I feel about her," Steve said, a hint of a grin on his face.
"A case can be argued, but not by anyone wanting to keep all their limbs intact," Clint said with dry chuckle.
Their light moment was put on hold with the arrival of Tchalla, Sam and Sharon, all three in their suits. The levity immediately left Clint as he took turn studying the others. If everything goes to plan, this would be the last of their days as fugitives. On the other hand, even if everything goes to plan, they still might not all make it out alive. And from the solemn faces on the other four, Clint knew they were all thinking the same thing.
At that same instance, the sound of marching boots commenced and Clint watched as lines and lines of men dressed for war poured out of the door of the prison. Above them, three choppers brought in sniper units to the tower of the prisons.
A loud voice boomed out from the vicinity of inside the walls. "Steve Rogers, you and your men are now surrounded. You will not escape this place unharmed. For the sake of those good men standing beside you, we advise you to make the right choice. Stand down, Captain." It was General Ross.
Clint gave a nod in answer to Steve's questioning look and broke out into a grin at Steve's reply. "With all due respect, General. We can do this all day."
"They've got Fantastic Four late last night," Tony announced solemnly. Natasha looked up from her act of cleaning her guns to frown at the news.
"Thing too?" she asked him, quietly and felt her heart sink at Tony's nod.
"For people who've been deep inside Southeast Asian rainforests and Asgard, can we have that again but with a lot more context this time?" Banner asked, turning his attention from looking out the window at the clouds to the other Avengers in their suits.
"Four superheroes, Mr Hu..-Banner. Definitely good guys. Powerful good guys too. They surfaced not long after you guys fought Ultron in Sokovia," Peter piped in. "Mr Plastic, Invisible Girl, the Human Torch and Thing."
"Thing?" Thor asked, dubiously.
"Yup," Tony said, sounding the p. "Imagine Banner's Other Guy but replace it with rocks for fists. Well one solid block of rock with arms and legs, to be precise. Not something we would want to face especially in brainwash-mode."
"We facing them?" Natasha asked, almost casually.
Tony stood and gave each of them meaningful looks. "Ross called us in," he stated, folding his iron-clad arms. "Want our help putting the fugitive Avengers down."
Thor gave Mjolnir a couple menacing swings. "Indeed we will."
The troops came to a sudden stop a few feet from where Clint stood alongside Steve, Sam, Sharon and Tchalla. They moved into combat position, merely waiting for the call from General Ross to start attacking.
"We're a little outnumbered here, Steve," Sharon said in a measured tone.
Just as soon as she said that, the Avengers plane came into view.
General Ross boomed out once again. "The Avengers will be here momentarily. Last call to surrender, Captain."
Clint squinted his eyes against the glare of the sun. He felt Steve tightened up beside him as they all watched the figures of Natasha, Tony, Thor, Banner and Peter Parker striding towards them.
"Cap," Tony greeted behind his iron mask. "You've been duly notified to surrender?"
Steve nodded his head, grimly. "Message received, Tony. Loud and clear."
"Then nothing else left to do but fight," Tony said with a shrug. With these words, he marched forward to where Clint stood and decisively turned around to face the lines of armed men. Similarly, the rest of the Avengers too took position alongside their former teammates. Natasha stationed herself firmly between Steve and Clint.
Immediately General Ross stepped out from his previously secured position within the prison walls. "Tony Stark," he boomed into the bullhorn. "What is the meaning of this?"
Tony faked an innocent shrug. "Oh, I thought it's pretty clear? We Avengers are sticking together."
"Those men are criminals who broke the Sokovia Accords. Do you really mean to stand by such men?"
Again Tony made a production of looking at Clint then let his eyes move to Steve and then the rest down the line. "All I see are men who have bled to keep the public safe time and time again, General. I think we'll have to agree to disagree on this one."
There was ominous silence from the General. His answering reply came in the sound of the soldiers readying their guns.
Beside her, Natasha felt Steve looking at her and she turned to meet his eyes. "Are you sure about this?" Steve asked her and she knew by 'this' he meant choosing to fight with him against the task force.
Shrugging lightly, she shot him a teasing look and smirked. "Yeah. It's gonna be fun." And laughed at the answering grin on Steve's face, hoping fervently that this would not be the last time she would laugh this day.
And the fight begun.
Thor's hammer dealt the first damage to the army of men, striking it down hard to the ground and the force of the electrical current was enough to bring a horde of armed men down. Hawkeye, with the help of Falcon's wings, was quick to position himself at a vantage point and between them quickly took the snipers out. He knew Falcon, like him, felt the strain in trying to pull back their punches when taking care of the snipers, considering these were the groups that had rained bullets down Wanda's body. But Steve had been very clear in his reminder en route to the prison. Minimize casualties; avoid another Sokovia at all cost.
Clint looked down just in time to catch the man swiftly pulling Natasha behind his shield as a group of men targeted their guns on them. "Well, that won't do at all," he murmured under his breath and skillfully let loose a couple of arrows at the men. And laughed under his breath as Natasha slid out from behind the shield to take care of the remaining soldiers.
Spiderman was fighting alongside Agent 13 and Clint had to admire the skills on the kid, webs and all. Sharon, too, was pulling her weight, taking down three surrounding men without breaking a sweat. There certainly is a future for that one in the Avengers, if things don't get too weird between her and Steve.
The fight was certainly going in their favour. All this even before Banner turned into the other guy. Ironman alone was taking many of the second and third waves of men. And so far they were doing well on the minimal casualties deal.
Then the door to the prison exploded and out marched the most intimidating looking bunch of superheroes/super villains, all made worst by the vacant looks on their faces.
Clint knew from here on now shit just got real.
"Steve, I swear you pull me in behind that shield one more time, I'm going to take it from you and let Hulk play frisbee with it!" Natasha snapped, not altogether in an unaffectionate tone as she swiftly threw an elbow in one soldier's face even as she shot at the leg of another.
"Those are very real bullets flying around you, Nat," Steve said with a grimace, throwing the object of Natasha's contention at a group of nearby soldiers.
"No shit, Cap? And here I thought these are just Nerf bullets," she laid on the sarcasm as she did a power run and flung a flying kick into the chest of a heavy-set man. As soon as the man was down, she kicked away his rifle and turned back to give Steve a fierce look. "Stop trying to shield me and focus on your fight!"
From the furious look Steve threw her way, she knew she was in for an earful. But before he could say anything, there was an explosion and the prison door flung out to reveal the imprisoned mutants. There were the three X-Men, Fantastic Four as well as Azazel, Psylocke and Pyro. And they were all armed in combat gears.
Natasha locked eyes with Steve. "That red one is a mean son-of-a-bitch, Cap. Gotta keep on your toes for this."
Not long after she said this, Pylocke moved the blocks of fallen debris from the last fight with her telekinetic powers and Natasha quickly dove behind Steve's shield to avoid the suddenly raining stone blocks.
"Shit, these are very powerful mutants, Steve," Natasha muttered under her breath as she watched Banner charge into the Thing, turning into the other guy midway.
"And we're the Avengers, Nat," Steve reminded her, gave her arm a quick squeeze before charging forward himself to take on two members of the Fantastic Four, Ironman giving him some air support.
Natasha grimaced, took quick note of the fight ahead of her and quickly narrowed her focus on Psylocke. The mutant fights skillfully with her dual swords and has the added advantage of telekinesis. But Natasha has never backed down from a job before and she kept this in mind as she sprinted to take the woman by surprise.
Her instincts were however just as finely-honed as Natasha's and she had to quickly bend her body backward to avoid Psylocke's thrust of her pink, glowing sword. Her reply was a hard kick that succeeded in disarming one of Psylocke's sword and she followed this with another kick to the woman's knee, bringing her down with a loud accompanying howl. Before Natasha could celebrate what she thought as her victory, however, she caught one of the female X-Men sprinting towards her. She braced herself for the impending hit but was wholly unprepared for the force of Rogue's kick, sending her hurtling in the air before her body smashed against one of the walls of the prison.
"Fuck," she muttered, feeling blood in her mouth from the impact her head made against the wall. To her momentary relief, Spiderman had taken over her fight and was more than a match for Rogue's super strength. But the scant moment she took to take stock of the fight before her turned her relief into deep alarm. At one side Steve and Ironman were barely holding up their fight with Mr Pastic and Invisible Girl. The blonde in particular was using good use of her powers to keep shielding herself and Mr Plastic from the worst of Ironman's fire power. Hawkeye had made his way to ground level and was rapidly moving to avoid the showers of ice from Iceman. In the middle was where the fiercest battle was going on as Falcon hurried over to give Thor and Hulk air support against Azazel and the Thing. Sharon, Natasha noted with growing concern was already down for the count though she was relieved to see she was still breathing.
Trying very hard to bury the pain down, Natasha made it to her feet and readied herself to join the fight again. She quickly made her way to where Rogue was beating punches into Spiderman and quickly attacked her from behind. Unlike the mutant, Natasha had no super strength to boast of but she has been trained on specific parts of the body that can exact the most pain. She quickly landed several blows to the plexus in the pit of her opponent's stomach and Rogue collapsed in a heap on the ground. She barely glanced to check on Spiderman before she saw Psyclocke jumping in her direction, her sword thrusting out. Natasha threw her body down and tried to spin away but let out a scream of agony as the sword pierced her side. At the corner of her eyes she watched as Steve turned at the sound of her pain. Taking this opening, Mr Plastic swiftly threw a punch to the side of Steve's head and Natasha watched in horror as Steve went down.
From then on out, the fight become more or less a blur to Natasha as she tried to hold on to consciousness through the pain. Beside her Spiderman had managed to completely immobilize Psylocke with his special web. Ignoring the woman, he kneeled down to check on Natasha's wounds. "Natasha, this is very deep. You shouldn't…" Natasha shook her head, urgently, and pointed where Steve was slowly getting to his feet.
- "I'll be fine," she cut in. "Go help Steve!"
Peter spared her a doubtful look but at her insistent push quickly sprinted way to give Steve and Ironman some much-needed back up as Pyro had now entered the fight as well.
Another cry of pain rang in the air and Natasha watched helplessly as the Thing caught Falcon in his fist and effectively smashed him against the surrounding wall. So that was another Avenger down. Hawkeye on the other hand managed to get an arrow into Iceman but not before Shadowcat phased him into the solid pavement, effectively immobilizing him for the rest of the fight.
"Shit, shit, shit," Natasha cursed as she realized that they were now merely down to Steve, Spiderman, Ironman, Thor and the Hulk. Just as she was thinking this, a loud booming crash caused her to whip her head around just in time to see the Hulk on his knees and slowly turning to Banner as he lost consciousness. It appeared that the combined effort of both Azazel and Thing had been just the right force to bring the other guy down. It was right at that moment that Natasha knew that there was no way that any of them of was going to walk out of this fight. Instead of paralyzing her with fear, the thought sufficiently numbed her enough to make her slowly get up to her feet.
But Natasha wasn't the only one keeping an eye out on the fight. She watched in growing horror as Steve's attempt to get to her side was intercepted by the Human Torch who quickly set himself on fire and sent waves after waves of fire bolts in Steve's direction.
"No!" Natasha screamed.
But the fire never reached Steve. Instead a wave of familiar red energy pushed hard against the fire and it ricochet back to its source. Sure enough the familiar beloved figure of Wanda jumped to stand between Steve and the Human Torch and right beside her stood Vision.