Tony Stark watched as his missiles bounced harmlessly off the Chitauri leviathan. The enormous beast turned and roared back at him in annoyance as it adjusted its flight pattern to begin tailing him.
"We got his attention. What the hell is step two?!" He yelled at JARVIS as he increased his flight speed to outrun the monstrosity.
Meanwhile, the rest of the Avengers were busy on the ground, fighting back wave after wave of an apparent endless amount of Chitauri soldiers. Even knowing what they'd be walking into, it seemed like things had gone from zero to one thousand in a matter of minutes.
Clint flipped one onto its back and quickly rammed an arrow down on its face while Natasha used a stolen energy rifle to light up a line of approaching aliens. Steve quickly covered their backs by slinging his shield through the middle of a troop of Chitauri attempting to flank them, and yet, they were still swarming like hornets. Just as it seemed the trio was about to be overwhelmed, bolts of blue sparking light flew by their heads, disintegrating multiple Chitauri soldiers where they stood.
"What the hell?" Clint said, looking around.
Hermione popped out from behind a bit of fallen debris to continue her assault on the alien invaders. Light of all colors flew from both of her palms as she slung spell after spell out towards the enemy almost faster than the eye could follow.
"Who the hell is that?" Clint yelled, puzzled at the sudden appearance of the brown haired woman.
"No idea, but I'm not going to complain about it right now." Steve responded as he slammed another soldier on its back while Hermione continued mowing down additional Chitauri.
Suddenly, dozens of lightning bolts erupted from the sky, cutting down the hoard of incoming Chitauri reinforcements. The God of Thunder slammed down on the ground with his hammer in hand just a second later.
Hawkeye immediately turned to the unknown woman. "Hey, who are y-..." But stopped abruptly. "She's gone?" He finished, almost as a question.
"Nevermind her, for now." Steve said quickly. "What's the story upstairs?" He asked as he touched his earpiece.
Thor was the first to respond. "The power surrounding the cube is impenetrable."
"Thor is right." Tony's agreed, crackling over the earpiece. "We've got to deal with these guys."
"How do we do that?" Nat questioned, not trying at all to hide her negativity.
"As a team" Cap responded with almost one hundred years of pure American determination.
"I have unfinished business with Loki." Thor interjected gruffly.
"Yeah, get in line."
Natasha almost smirked at Clint's quick response.
"Save it." Cap responded before "dibs" continued being called out. "Loki's going to keep this fight focused on us, and that's what we need. Without him, these things could run wild. We've got Stark up top - He's going to need us…"
Steve's speech was cut unexpectedly short at the sudden sound of a small motorbike puttering up to the gathered heroes. The group looked up, realizing that Bruce Banner had finally arrived to the battle. Swinging his leg off the rundown bike, he looked around at the chaos with an almost bemused expression.
"So, this all seems horrible." He casually commented to the group.
Natasha shrugged. "I've seen worse."
"Sorry about that." He responded sincerely.
"No." She argued gently. "We could use a little worse."
"Stark?" Steve barked into his earpiece. "We've got him."
"Banner?"
"Just like you said." Steve responded.
"Then tell him to suit up." Tony said. "I'm bringing the party to you."
The Avengers watched as Tony came into view in the distance as he banked hard around a skyscraper, the Chitauri leviathan right on his tail and roaring furiously.
"I…...I don't see how that's a party" Natasha stuttered, still shocked at what she was seeing.
Tony dove suddenly, hugging the pavement as closely as possible as the enormous beast continued gaining speed and intensity, both barrelling closer and closer to the group of Avengers. Bruce and Steve made eye contact quickly before Bruce began walking towards the incoming behemoth.
"Dr. Banner" Steve said with only a hint of concern in his voice. "Now might be a really good time for you to get angry."
Bruce turned and looked at Steve over his shoulder. "That's my secret, Captain." He said with a smirk. "I'm always angry."
The small dark haired scientist leapt into the air, his body erupting in a flash of green. In a move too fast for the human eye to truly comprehend, the green muscular body of the Hulk had replaced that of the shy Dr. Banner and was now sailing through the air towards the still roaring leviathan.
The Hulk roared as he met the leviathan head on, burying his fists into the beast's nose, stopping its progress almost immediately. Steve's eyes widened as the leviathan's momentum forced its tail end to flip skyward towards the head, it's armor plates clicking off one by one as the monster was forced into the unnatural angle.
Immediately taking advantage of the defenselessness of the great beast, Tony fired dozens of missiles in rapid succession. The missiles easily penetrated the soft flesh of the leviathan's back. The resounding boom of the detonating missiles sent an ear-shattering wail of pain from the leviathan as its body exploded into countless flaming pieces.
"Take cover!" Natasha yelled as she skidded to a stop beside Steve underneath his shield as the group waited for impact.
"Protego Maxima!"
Hermione darted out from behind the city bus that had acted as her cover spot as the bright shimmering gold shield erupted from her palms. Extending across the entire Avenger group, Hermione watched in satisfaction as the flaming hail storm of exploded carcass bounced harmlessly off her shield. The Avengers stood up from their makeshift covers and looked at her with confusion.
"Who the hell ARE you?" Clint asked exasperatedly, tossing his hands in the air.
"This tiny Midguardian has skills!" Thor boomed, laughing despite the severity of the situation.
Hermione glanced over and noticed that the redheaded woman in the tight black suit already had two pistols pointed at her forehead.
"I'm not the enemy." Hermione said, slightly offended. "They are!" She complained as she gestured skyward.
"I don't discriminate. Sorry." The redhead said back cooly.
Hermione didn't feel like she was sorry at all.
Steve took a step towards her. "I'm sorry, ma'am. We appreciate your...barrier...thing, but what Natasha is trying to say is-"
Tony hit the ground suddenly, his helmet shifting upwards to reveal his sweating face. "Hey guys, not to break up the group therapy meeting, but we've kind of got a problem up there - Who are you?" He trailed off as he pointed towards Hermione.
"I'm Hermione." Hermione said reluctantly.
"Want to share how you were able to shield an entire block from a giant flaming alien carcass?" Clint said sarcastically.
Tony's eyebrows flew to his hairline as he looked over at Hermione.
"I'd prefer not…" Hermoine hedged, unsure about how honest she wanted to be with the group of supers. "I'm not quite sure you'd even believe it." She finished lamely.
Tony barked out a laugh. "We're fighting in an interdimensional battle against alien invaders on a Sunday afternoon in Manhattan, and you're worried about us believing where you got your set of fantastical powers?"
Hermione shifted nervously.
"I'm a witch."
Hermione watched as the group blinked back silently at her.
"Yeah, that's pretty mild compared to all of this." Clint scoffed as he gestured around.
"A witch!" Tony yelled gleefully, the possibilities already running rampant in his mind. Natasha merely rolled her eyes at the billionaire, but, thankfully, pulled her weapons down from Hermione's forehead.
Hermione was positive Thor had stopped listening to the conversation a long time ago.
Steve shrugged, apparently in agreement with Clint before rounding back on Hermione.
"Alright, Hermione." Steve started. "We're outmanned and outgunned - We could honestly use all the help we can get. You in?"
Hermione looked up at the trickle of blood on the side of Steve's head before answering.
"Yes."
Loki stood on the highest platform of Stark Tower looking down at the wasteland that was once Manhattan.
"Send the rest." He said firmly.
From the glowing blue portal in the sky, thousands of additional Chitauri chariots and soldiers poured out of the opening. The bellowing roars of unseen leviathans were a signal of what was to come if they weren't stopped.
Down below, Natasha slammed another clip into her pistol, her eyes widening at the unbelievable amount of Chitauri joining the fight.
"Guys." She said simply.
Tony slammed his faceplate down quickly. "Call it, Cap!"
"Alright, listen up. Until we can close that portal up there, we're going to use containment. Barton, I want you on that roof - eyes on everything. Call out patterns and strays. Stark, you've got the perimeter. If anything gets more than three blocks out, you turn it back or you turn it to ash."
Clint looked up towards the top of the indicated skyscraper. "Wanna give me a lift?" He said with a smirk to Tony
Tony gave a half-hearted sigh. "Right. Better clench up, Legolas"
The boosters on Tony's feet roared to life as he and Clint went soaring into the air and out of sight.
Steve turned back to the rest of the group. "Thor, you've got to try and bottleneck that portal. Slow them down. You've got the lightning - Light the bastards up."
Hermione watched in slight awe as the demigod nodded before beginning to swing his hammer in tight circles at his side. Tilting her head in curiosity, she watched as the hammer spun faster than her eyes could keep up with before the muscular man soared into the air with a crack of thunder that almost made Hermione gasp in surprise.
Steve continued to the two women left in the circle. "The three of us - We stay here on the ground, keeping the fight here."
"And Hulk?" Steve said.
Hermione turned and realized that the enormous green Hulk had been standing in the circle with them the whole time. Looking up at his bulging green muscles, she was astonished to realize that Bruce Banner's alter-ego could put Hagrid's impressive stature to shame.
The Hulk's head snapped to attention at the sound of his name.
"Smash." Steve finished with a smile.
The Hulk smiled a cheshire grin worthy of the Weasley twins before jumping into the side of a building, taking dozens of the Chitauri soldiers out with him as he continued the line of destruction up the massive skyscraper.
Hermione quickly fired a blast of blue light into the chest of an incoming soldier as the trio took a defensive stance against the Chitauri reinforcements. They began working through wave after wave of an apparent endless supply of soldiers. It seemed as though every time one would be taken down, three more would take its place.
Hermione fell into her stride much more quickly than she had thought she would. She was cutting down the Chituari in an almost clinical manner. Apparently, even though the war had been almost 13 years ago, her muscle memory didn't fail her. She felt the sweat prickling her forehead as she shot beam after beam of light into the enemy, shielding her new allies' backs when able, not realizing in the moment that with every Chitauri energy beam that was deflected harmlessly off her shield, she was gaining more and more of the trust of Steve and Natasha.
Watching as a Chitauri beam broke through Natasha's defenses, hitting her square in the stomach, Hermione jumped to cover the redhead as she crumpled momentarily on one knee. Steve was by her side almost instantaneously as Hermione cleared the immediate threat and threw up several shields.
"Captain, none of this is going to mean a damn thing if we don't close that portal." Natasha said to Steve, clearly exhausted.
Steve looked at her grimly. "Our biggest guns couldn't touch it."
"Well," Natasha said, a look of concentration on her face while gesturing skyward. "Maybe it's not about guns."
Steve gave her a small smile. "If you want to get up there, you're going to need a ride."
"I've got a ride." She said, mustering a sense of false bravado that Hermione could see through immediately. "I could use a lift, though."
"What are you doing?" Hermione said carefully, unsure of what the assassin's plan was. Holding her palms out wide to keep her shield strong, she glanced back, confused.
She watched as Natasha backed up against the broken railing of the sidewalk and turning back towards Steve.
"Oh, you know." Natasha responded almost cheerfully. "Just a little something that will probably hurt."
Steve tilted his Captain America shield and braced himself in preparation.
"Are you sure about this?" He asked with obvious doubt in the plan.
"Wait!" Hermione almost yelled as Natasha's intentions clicked into place in her mind. "I can get up there loads easier than what you have in mind." She explained passionately, still trying desperately to hold her shield in place with the barrage of Chitauri energy beams slamming into it relentlessly.
"Don't worry." Natasha scoffed. "It's going to be...fun."
"No, no!" Hermione tried to argue again. "You don't understand-"
Hermione watched as Natasha ignored her and sprinted full out at Steve's tilted shield, jumping at the last moment and allowing the formidable strength of Captain America to launch her shockingly high in the air. She almost had to close her eyes as she watched the redhead throw a hand out and grab onto a passing Chitauri flying chariot. Thankfully, Natasha was very good at her job, and Hermione watched in relief as she quickly pulled herself onto the back of the quickly fading form of the Chitauri driver.
"That was SO unnecessary." Hermione said with a rueful smile and a shake of the head.
"Did you have a better idea?" Steve responded in defense of his teammate, not pausing to slam his shield into the face of a Chitauri.
"As a matter of fact, yes. I did." Hermione said with huff.
Looking at the line of Chitauri closing in on the pair, Hermione suddenly turned on the spot, seemingly disappearing from sight with a loud crack. Steve's eyes widened as he watched his new ally reappear in almost the same second behind the row of soldiers, blasting them in the back with the precision of a sniper.
"Right..." Steve said, trying to give his brain a moment to process what he just saw. "Witch."
"And that was exponentially easier to do than the ridiculously reckless acrobatic display that I just witnessed from the other one." Hermione said while gesturing in the direction where Natasha had disappeared.
"This day just gets weirder and weirder." Steve said to himself as he and Hermione continued plowing through waves of enemy troops.
"Stark. You've got a lot of strays on your tail" Clint called out over the earpiece as he continued firing arrows relentlessly into the chariots whizzing by his perch at the top of a skyscraper.
He found a moment to look over at the trail of Chitauri flying closely to Tony as the Iron Man suit weaved between buildings hundreds of feet in the air.
"Just tryin' to keep them off the streets." He deadpanned back to the archer.
"Well, they can't bank worth a damn."
"Hm. I will roger that." Tony responded before beginning a series of quick turns and maneuvers that had the Chitauri quickly dropping like flies.
"Oh-boy!" Tony said victoriously. "Nice call. What else you got?"
"Well, Thor's taking out a squadron down on 6th."
"And he didn't. invite. me." Tony joked over the earpiece before streaking across the sky towards 6th Ave.
"Hawkeye!" Natasha shouted over the earpiece.
Clint turned his attention to Natasha, who was rapidly approaching his perch on the back of one of the Chitauri chariot drivers.
"Nat, what are you doing?"
"Uh, a little help!" She replied hastily.
"Oh." Clint replied, realizing Natasha could barely control her aircraft, and Loki was hot on her heels in his own Chitauri aircraft.
Clint nocked an arrow, waiting for the exact moment to release. "I got it."
Releasing the arrow, it streaked across the sky heading straight for Loki's head. Only inches from reaching its target, Loki reached up and snatched it out of the air, sending a taunting smirk up at Clint. The arrow suddenly exploded, sending Loki careening off the chariot and bouncing across the platform of Stark Tower.
Smirking to himself, Clint reached for another arrow to continue mowing down the hoard of incoming Chitauri. He realized almost too late that his quiver is empty.
"Um. Guys, I may need a little backup up here." He grunted into his earpiece as he began fighting hand to hand with the onslaught of invaders.
"Hermione?" Steve asked from the ground before glancing up to the rooftop where he was sure Clint would be. "Can you get up there?"
"Not a problem." Hermione answered, happy at least one person on this team, besides herself, had a little sense.
Turning on her heel, the loud crack that resounded startled Steve before he turned back and slung his shield into the Chitauri troop rushing at him.
Hermione felt her feet touch down onto the gravel of the building's rooftop before she began firing at the Chitauri that had overrun the man she knew to be "Clint", now. Fighting back to back with the almost-stranger, they were able to hold them off with minor damage to themselves.
"You ok?" He asked her, panting heavily from the prolonged battle
Hermione closed her eyes, trying to breathe deeply to regain some of her stamina. "Yeah - Some bumps, bruises, and maybe a few stitches, but I'm fine. You?"
"Same." He replied simply.
Glancing down the side of the building, Clint popped back up on his feet again.
"Time to go." He said quickly as he shot a grappling hook into the side of the building.
Realizing that a slew of chariots were in the process of firing into their location, Hermione turned to apparate the two of them to safety when Clint tackled her over the side of the building.
"What the bloody hell-!" Hermione started before it morphed into a scream.
Clint held onto her tightly as the rooftop they were just on exploded completely, sending the two of them swinging dangerously from the wire still attached to Clint's bow. Careening towards the windows of the skyscraper, Hermione braced herself as the pair crashed through a glass pane and into a lower floor of the building. Groaning at the force of the impact, Hermione rolled over to check on her companion.
"That's not good." Clint remarked weakly as he poked the large shard of glass sticking out of his chest.
Hermione was at his side immediately.
"Alright, hold on. I can heal you." She said, nervous energy and tension coating every word she said.
"You sure?" He asked, wiping the little droplets of blood that dribbled down his chin after coughing painfully. The resignation written on his face giving away his true feelings. "She's going to kill me for dying here."
"Who, Natasha?" Hermione said absentmindedly as she began pulling potions out of her newly enlarged bag. "You aren't going to die here. Just keep breathing for a second longer. You'll be right as rain"
Tipping back potion after potion into his mouth, Hermione gently removed the shard protruding from his chest and immediately began murmuring healing incantations. Clint's eyes widened in surprise as he watched the jaggedly torn flesh of his chest knit itself back together tightly in reaction to her song-like words.
"Wha-"
"Witch." Hermione said simply with a smile. "It's not perfect though. You're going to have to stay here for a bit before you will be able to rejoin the fight. Give it a minute for the pain potion to take full effect, yeah?"
"No promises." He replied stubbornly.
"I'm going to go down and help the others." Hermione said as she turned to go. "See you down there in a bit."
"Hey." Clint said, stopping her movement. "Thank you, Hermione. I owe you more than you realize." He told her with heartbreaking sincerity.
Hermione gave him a blinding smile. "Don't mention it. We're almost teammates, right?" She said with a laugh.
Turning on her heel, she apparated away from the mending archer with a quick crack.
Landing in the same spot on the ground where she and Steve had been fighting the Chitauri earlier, Hermione tried to figure out how much time had passed since the portal had opened. An hour? A day? She had no idea. Looking around, she realized that Steve must have moved on to a different park of the city to fight, because he was nowhere to be seen. Seconds before apparating somewhere else in the city, Hermione noticed two small children sprinting down an alley about a block or so from her position, five Chitauri soldiers hot on their heels.
Needing no other incentive, Hermione apparated to a nearby overturned car and continued sprinting after the two children. Finding them a street over taking cover under some fallen debris, she began firing into the backs of the unsuspecting group of enemies, watching as they crumpled one by one as her spells rang true.
Catching a bit of movement out of the corner of her eye, Hermione spun and fired on the Chitauri that were trying to take advantage of her blind side. Dodging the energy beams that whizzed by her from their blasters, Hermione continued firing spell after spell.
Hearing an ear-piercing scream of agony, Hermione looked up and realized that one of the Chitauri had caught one of the young girls. Dropping her shields immediately, Hermione began sprinting towards the screaming child, ignoring the white-hot searing pain that erupted in her side on her way to them.
Punching the creature to get it to release the small child, Hermione turned her palms to the dazed Chitauri.
"Bombarda!" She yelled in vindictive glee.
She watched as the alien's body, quite literally, exploded into hundreds of pieces. Finding a dark satisfaction in the death, Hermione turned to the children.
"Run. Don't look back, and don't stop. Just run" She instructed them firmly.
Not needing to be told twice, the older of the two nodded her head, grabbed the hand of her sister, and tore out of there like a bat out of hell.
Turning back towards the incoming troop, she was discouraged to see their numbers had somehow increased tenfold and were now closing in on her.
As the first spell left her palm, Hermione gasped in pain as she fell to a knee. Throwing up a shield, she took a moment to look down at herself.
"Oh no." She groaned, realizing there was an impressively large hole in her side.
Realizing that her flimsy tshirt had provided no protection against whichever Chitauri weapon that had found its target, Hermione reinforced her shield as much as possible before sinking down to the pavement. She had used all of her healing potions on Clint - How was she supposed to know she needed to stock herself with an entire battle's worth of potions before she left her flat this morning? Murmuring the few healing incantations she could to hopefully stop the bleeding, Hermione took a deep, shaky breath.
She realized that her adrenaline was wearing off, but she knew she needed to hold out until one of the others found her.
She was lying flat on her back when she heard the unmistakable sound of a jet. She glanced towards the gaping blue portal in time to see Tony Stark flying some type of missile straight towards it before disappearing from sight. Her head then lolled to the side as she watched with drooping eyes as dozens of Chitauri trying desperately to break through her shield.
Hermione's eyes shut just seconds before every Chitauri in Manhattan dropped to the ground, dead.