So it goes with saying that only things I own with any connection to MARVEL I bought on Ebay or Etsy. MARVEL COMICS & MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE are their own creatures and I have nothing to do with either of them aside from the fact I enjoy reading or watching them, and am grateful for the ability to play in their world. I claim nothing, and I receive nothing for this, expect the pleasure of putting something out into the world.
You can also find this story on ARCHIVE OF OUR OWN under the same title and pen name along with a place to post suggestions.
Don't forget to check out the Photobucket album listed on my profile page too. (My apologies. I didn't realize FF removed the links. I have corrected the problem in what way I can, so for those who like the visual additions, feel free to check them out.)
DAY FOUR
CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED AND ONE
FRIDAY, MAY 4TH 2012
1026 HOURS
CENTRAL PARK ZOO
64TH ST AND 5TH AVE
DUNCAN AKA ALEX
These fuckers almost shot my leg off, and I'm laying here, trying to make a tourniquet with my hoodie string! It's bleeding a lot less than I thought it would, but I figure thats gotta be from the sensation her hand left before she stood.
She got my thanks for that, but I'm still pissed, because I'm pretty sure this leg is a lost cause. Its hanging on by muscle strings and tendons after all, and the only good luck I have besides her is that it missed the artery. Theres still plenty of smaller vessels in a leg though.
She's doing great. She fighting the aliens off to keep them from tearing apart more of me. She hasn't let them touch me once during that. But we're gonna lose.
She's taken down most of the first that appeared, but more have shown up. There not even interested in me, I don't know if she's noticed that. Their attacks are fixated on her. She's wielding a melee weapon. If they wanted they could have shot me by now. But they're too busy using staffs that can shoot energy as just staffs. They want her, and the want her alive.
I should find some comfort in that, but I already listened to her scream as they snapped part of her arm. Whoever gave these things their orders, I really doubt it was Loki. He may be crazy, but he's obsessed too, and he wouldn't tell them to hurt her like this. He has dissension in his ranks, and its gonna beat the shit out of her.
One of them thrusts his spear at her, and she manages to spin around it, hitting the owner in the nose area with the base of her club, sending the alien stumbling back. Another one just takes its place in the line though.
It swings the butt of its own weapon at her in retribution. She successfully ducks under it though and spins around as she her weapon. She hits that prick in the shin, embedding spikes in its leg even as she uses the momentum to rip his foot out from under him.
Her own momentum doesn't stop. As that one falls another one aims its spear at her. She knocks the point down though, and away from her, before she twists her aim and clocks that one in the face too with the end of her spiked club.
He falls, and the first one rises, but her focus isn't on either of them. Letting the momentum carry the club she brings the top of it up over head down onto the one she tripped, caving into the back of its head with a massive dent in its helmet.
That makes the one approaching back up a little and gives her time to wiggle those spikes out, but not for long. It moves in, with two of its spear buddies backing it. That makes her cautious, but spearman #1 is brave. It tries to stab her, but she swings down under the spear and blocks it. Then when he retreats for another lunge, she follows, and drives that club right into its stomach. When it bends in pain, she brings it down on his skull too before he can get back up. The blood I see running down her side says her block wasn't perfect.
Again they back up a little, making it two on her right and one on her left. They either aren't used to fierce women, or they grossly underestimated the power of blunt weaponry. For good measure she brings her heel down on his head, just to be sure.
That makes the one on the left move back in. His spear swinging down as he goes in for the thrust, while the other two assholes move in for their opportunity.
She blocks again from the bottom, lifting it up as he pulls back to lunge once more. She doesn't hit him with the club first though. The aliens twists away a little, and she takes advantage of the angle. Her foot drives into the back of its knee, jerking the thing at the wrong angle and brings it down. Grabbing the club in two hands as it falls she makes a thrust of her own. Hitting the creature with it like a bar to the back she knocks it the rest of the way off balance before she moves both hands to the base of the club and starts to swing it over head again to cave in another skull.
And then everything goes wrong.
FRIDAY, MAY 4TH 2012
1027 HOURS
CENTRAL PARK ZOO
64TH ST AND 5TH AVE
AR(NORA)
I couldn't see! My vision blinked out, and my eyes burned! My whole face burned! Heat and the sting like hot coals just hit me, right before one of my enemies did.
My grip on the club faltered as one hand released it, instinct automatically bringing it around to cover my face from a cause that wasn't really present, and that shifted all its weight into the opposite hand. It almost slide free before I tightened my grip on it.
Not that it mattered as I was barely finished altering my hold on it, when I feel the skin slice open across my ribs.
The club fell again a little from that, but I let the downward swing guide it, and even though I could barely see, I felt the head of it hit that beast in the gut. I knew it didn't knock it down though, so I reverse the swing and take out its leg too. Then letting the momentum carry the club in a loop, I took out its face, knocking the helmet clean off.
I wanted to keep going, the creature was still alive, and there was nothing between me and its head now. But I felt my hands split open with cuts, and my entire left side felt like it hit a wall. The shock of it made me drop to my knees, and drop the weapon. The slickness of my own blood making it too hard to hold. The foot that kicked it away made sure I didn't get it back, before it kicked me in the face too, knocking me on my back.
It paid for that when I sunk my knife into its ankle. That made me feel better, but it terrified me too.
It confirmed something I suspected. The knife I stabbed it with was coated in my blood, and it did nothing! I don't know what these creatures are, I don't know their flesh, or their DNA. I can't affect things I don't know! My magick won't work on them! I don't have enough time to figure them out, not in a fight, and they're not letting me reach the trees or grass.
The horse kicks me again, or maybes it's a moose. This one's foot felt much bigger as it drove into my stomach. The pain did me a small favor though, as it made me roll more than an actual choice, and it spared me the end of a spear. The impact pain in my back didn't help though, and it was quickly joined by pain that was actually mine, and the spear in my shoulder!
FRIDAY, MAY 4TH 2012
1028 HOURS
CENTRAL PARK ZOO
64TH ST AND 5TH AVE
DUNCAN AKA ALEX
NORA! Shit, shit she's gonna get killed. She screams as it rips the blade out of her, the spear and the barrel coated with so much of her blood it runs like a thin stream before it turns into fat drips.
They don't stop there though. She tries to roll away, and get back to her feet, but they've got her surrounded now, the four that are left. One of them drives its foot down on top of her knee. It doesn't break it, but I can still hear it pop as it hits the ground hard, drawing another screamed snarl out of her.
She tries to cut the bastard for it but her arm gets swiped off its path, and she get the butt of one of their guns against the side of her skull.
They're gonna beat her to death by accident, if they don't just change their mind and shoot her. But here I am, with two good hands, that I haven't been using to defend her because I'm trying to save my own life.
I couldn't tie the tourniquet the string snapped at one point, cheap ass russian shit! and wasn't long enough, so I had to hold the slippery cord with both hands. But if she dies I'm gonna die anyways, so fuck it. I made one of their heads explode.
FRIDAY, MAY 4TH 2012
1028 HOURS
CENTRAL PARK ZOO
64TH ST AND 5TH AVE
AR(NORA)
They had me on the ground, crawling because they refused to let me climb back to my feet, and retreating to a place without escape. I knew the glass to the seal pen was behind me, but it was the only direction I could move!
Another one tries to stab me in the leg as I hear Duncan's gun go off, before I kick his spear out of the way and do the same to his leg, hoping to bring something in range I can cut, but another one beats me to it.
His weapon comes down into my shoulder, making my whole arm and muscles go numb from the blow, until it roars back to life like fire from the pain.
I was against the first wall of the seal pen that separated the zookeepers walkway from the central garden, and now some of my arm is through the glass.
I don't have time to think about though, because my weight breaks the rest of the cracks into pieces, and I can feel gravity pulling me down into the few feet of drop of the walkway.
I try to catch myself, my arm swinging out before thought could catch up, and now my arm and hand also had glass embedded in it. I didn't really have time to care about that though, because I also had an alien hand wrapping around my throat.
FRIDAY, MAY 4TH 2012
1029 HOURS
CENTRAL PARK ZOO
64TH ST AND 5TH AVE
DUNCAN AKA ALEX
I blew off one of their heads, and I think I hit another one in the spine given his furious thrashing from the waist up, but they shot me in the side and the shoulder again, before they kicked me down and pressed the barrel of one of their weapons to my head.
They haven't pulled the trigger yet, because they seem to be sadistic. I don't know if these things can smile, but seeing the gunman flick his head toward her and back again made it pretty clear. They want me to watch before they kill me.
I can see her, she's being held by an alien as it stands in the zookeepers walkway of the seal pond. she's choking under its grip, but I can see thinking too. She has one of her legs wrapped around its arm to take the weight of her body off her neck, and to make it hard for her to hold her weight like that. With the other leg, she is just kicking the shit out of the maskless bastard's face!
That works well right up until it sinks its teeth into her calf. That thing has a face like a pitbull fucked a goat. Its nothing but jaw and blunt teeth. And it's got her screaming.
Turns out that's not its goal though. It must have some understanding of how her body works, because right after she starts screaming it slams her down into the water of the seal tank. It's trying to drown her!
FRIDAY, MAY 4TH 2012
1030 HOURS
CENTRAL PARK ZOO
64TH ST AND 5TH AVE
AR(NORA)
No! No, no, no! I remember this! I remember the terrible crushing pain and panic as my lungs started screaming for air. 'They' did this to me before too, when 'they' wanted to see if 'my people' really needed oxygen to survive.
I lost some air before I forced the scream to stop. The time between the feel of the water against the back of my head, and the liquid covering my nose wasn't long enough for me to keep it all, but I refused to drown that easily.
It was determined though. Its teeth sunk farther in and ground into the bone, making it very hard to hold back the scream.
I wasn't alone in this fight anymore though. It threw me into a sea lion tank. I may not be able to influence them like I can with dogs, even if I had the time, but I don't have to. This is a predator in their environment, and they know what to do with those.
I can see them, feel them. Their bodies swimming so close they brush mine too as they attack , throwing themselves at the creature. They're slamming their mass into it, biting it, and helping me.
It can't fend them off effectively while if it's busy holding me under the water and biting my leg. It only has two hands.
The number of its hands and the aid of the sea lions doesn't matter though. Not when I feel my tibia break and the shattered pieces of my fibia carve lines through my muscles. Not when I feel at least half a dozen ribs on my back crack, the agony and the abruptness of it makes it impossible to really count. Not when the rest of the pain that follows. It's like this? This is how I die?
FRIDAY, MAY 4TH 2012
1030 HOURS
CENTRAL PARK ZOO
64TH ST AND 5TH AVE
DUNCAN AKA ALEX
The sound of her scream was distorted as it rose out of the water through a column of bubbles, and then it was followed by nothing. Not even the sound of water splashing as she struggled.
That was terrifying. But not as terrifying as the sight of a grenade hitting the alien with his gun on me!
NOTES FOR THE READERS:
If anyone was confused, the pains Ar(nora) feels from Loki are these:
Hawkeye arrowing Loki in the face.
Loki crashing through the glass fence and rolling on left side.
Hulk hitting Loki in the stomach or torso and throwing him into the building.
Loki's back hitting the wall and him falling to glass covered floor on his hands.
And of course HULK SMASH!.