Chapter 18: "No Biggie"

TW: Violence, Gore

Tony landed on one of the terraces of a nearby building for Clint to make his nest for however long this battle went on. The archer jumped down with a soft thump, pulling an arrow from his quiver as he surveyed his surroundings, keeping track of the troops he could see in the distance.

Kat and Tony's departure was almost as brief as that, but Kat suddenly asked him to wait and hopped down herself and threw her arms around Clint like she had before with Natasha.

"Please, be careful. I can't lose you again." Kat muttered to him a bit of worry etched into her features.

He hesitated, a look of sadness on his face, "I will, I promise. You too, Kat."

"Kat, we've got to go." She heard from behind her. From inside his helmet, Tony's chest swelled with guilt. He knew this was her job and she was trained for situations like this, but that didn't make it any less terrifying that they were sending a literal kid into battle on her own.

Little did he know that she took out thirty other Chitauri not even a half hour ago.

Clint kissed her temple, weary to let her go, before unwrapping her arms from around him and nudged her towards Tony. She obliged with little protest and let Tony hoist her up again, the two adults exchanging a nod before the pair shot off towards the skyscraper.

~

As the two neared the roof, Kat repositioned and let her feet dangle miles above the ground, Tony keeping a tight grip on her arms. Once they were over the platform, he dropped her down onto the gravel before zooming off once again. She ran a few steps before rolling over her shoulder and stood up straight.

"Don't die on me. Got that, kid?" She heard Tony say over her earpiece.

"Yeah, same goes for you too. I don't want to have to save your metal ass, old man." Kat replied, squinting through the sunlight, watching as he flew off taking out Chitauri in his path. "Promise?"

"Promise."

Kat gazed at the large metal contraption. She could see the glowing crystal blue cube inside through the shield that surrounded the entire machine. Cautiously, she approached the forcefield and let her hand lay on top of it for a second before yanking it away as an icy hot sting and a strong wave of energy rush through her.

Shaking her hand to dull the pain, she spotted Dr. Selvig, laying on his side a few feet away. She debated whether she should waste a minute to check on him, but there was a possibility that he could help her get through. Though, after only one step, four Chitauri dropped down in front of her between her and the Doctor.

She bounced on the balls of her feet, readying herself for another fight. "Alright, so that's how it's going to be. Well, happy birthday to me."

Her eyes lit up once again with the pure white, different wisps of color surrounding her entire body and creating a flame affect in her palms. All at once, two of them approached, guns raised. Bending over backwards to dodge one's aim, she pulled herself back up and kicked the other's gun away and threw into the other's line of fire, killing him and knocking the first over.

Noticing the other two beginning to approach, she grabbed the gun she had knocked out of the other's hands and fired directly at them. Having trained for so long, it didn't take much effort for her bullets to hit them right in the eye, which was one of the few spots not shielded by their armor. It was a gruesome sight, but she didn't have the time to stop and think about it too much before the first soldier that she knocked over before had recovered.

Before it could get any closer, she raised her left forearm and created a small shield in front of her as she sprinted towards the thing. It just kept firing until she was right on top of it. Leaping up, she brought both of her legs and planted her heels into its chest and pushed off, landing harshly onto her back as her opponent was sent hurtling over the railing and falling to the cement below.

A few cries of pain escaped as rocks dug into her back, and for a second, everything seemed pretty okay. That was, until her body felt like it was on fire. Apparently, the adrenaline had started to wear off pretty quickly.

She looked down to see her new suit scorched with gaping holes exposing her skin in two places. Her right thigh was severely burnt from a blast that ripped her skin open. She could feel blood gushing from it and from a slightly less prominent gash on the upper part of her left arm from where a bullet had glanced off the side of her shield and managed to catch her.

And last but not least, there was a large open wound on her in the right side of her stomach just below her ribs. Katrina wasn't exactly sure what kind of bullets or guns that the Chitauri had, but she knew they hurt, and she knew that the bullet was still inside of her. She could feel the bullet shift as she breathed heavily.

For a minute, she just lay there in a daze, trying to put as much pressure onto her wounds as she possibly could, but she didn't have enough hands. The warm blood pooled beneath her suit and through her fingers dripping onto the gray and white rocks that she lay on, but she had other things to do. So, she turned onto her left side, and pushed herself up with her injured arm.

A loud shriek slipped through her gritted teeth as she struggled, but she pulled herself together and stumbled over to the contraption. As she limped, she brought her right hand up, her fingers twitching as the multicolored thread began to appear and stitch up her wounds as best she could to help the healing process, but even with everything she had stored up, it would take an hour or two.

"When someone gets the chance," She said a bit too casually over the radio, "I'm going to need a little help up here."

"Are you okay, Kat? What's wrong?" She heard Natasha say sounding absolutely exhausted, but still concerned for the girl.

"Uh, yeah!" Kat replied in a cheery tone, holding back the fact that she felt as if she was drowning. "I just got a bit shot, that's all. No biggie."

She heard Clint's worried voice join their conversation, "What?! You got shot?"

"Only, like, three times." Katrina muttered jokingly before suddenly coughing up some blood. "Well, that's not good."

~

"Captain, none of this is going to mean a damn thing if we don't close that portal." Natasha pointed out, shaking her head.

"Our biggest guns couldn't touch it. If Kat's down, then we have to find another way." He replied.

"Well, maybe it's not about guns."

He nodded his head, "If you want to get up there, you're going to need a ride."

"I got a ride. I could use a boost through!" Natasha suggested, taking a few steps back, prepping herself.

Cap hesitantly raised his shield in front of him, angling it upwards at a tilt. "You sure about this?"

"Yeah, it's going to be fun!" She confirmed, her voice raising an octave. Honestly, she wasn't really sure about what she was doing or if it was going to work, but she had to get up to Katrina somehow. "Hold on, Kat. I'm on my way."

~

Blood still dripped from Katrina's wounds as she typed away furiously on the computer controlling the Tesseract, leaning heavily on her left leg. Her vision would haze over every few minutes, but she would just quickly shake it off. Her brown eyes scanned the screens for anything that could power the device off, but she had scoured every single control, and there was absolutely nothing. This was not going to be easy, especially not in her state. She wanted to believe that she could do this on her own, but with the amount of blood she had already lost, she was going to need some help.

Surprisingly, Doctor Selvig groaned and opened his eyes turning onto his back. Katrina waited for a moment, unsure of whether he was still under Loki's control, but telling from the fact that his eyes were back to their normal blue, she decided it was safe.

Not waiting any longer, she limped over to him, collapsing to her knees next to him, "Doctor Selvig, are you alright? Are you with me?"

"Agent Hart?" He finally spoke, his voice raspy, "Are you alright?" Selvig asked, noticing her wounds.

"I'm fine. We need to shut the Tesseract down--" She smiled, letting a relieved breath out now that there was a better chance and quickly healing the small wound on his head. She was about to continue but was cut off by something landing with a thud behind her.

Katrina turned and got into a defensive position as strong as possible with her weakened strength, but luckily it wasn't another Chitauri soldier. Instead, it was Natasha Romanoff.

"Kat?!" The woman shouted, ignoring everything else for a moment, but soon noticed all the blood. "Oh, god."

"I'm alright." Kat assured her, shaking her off. "We need to take it down and I don't know if I've got enough juice to overpower the Tesseract. Especially not now."

"The scepter." The Doctor interjected, causing both of them to turn to face him. "Loki's scepter, the energy—the Tesseract can't fight. You can't protect against yourself."

"It's not your fault. You didn't know what you were doing." Natasha explained, seeing the shame in his eyes.

"Well, actually I think I did." He asserted, "I built in a safety to cut the power source."

Katrina's eyes widened once she realized what he meant, "Loki's scepter."

Selvig nodded, "It may be able to close the portal, along with your help, young lady. And I'm looking right at it." He finished glancing over the edge of the roof.

Katrina and Natasha follow his lead, spotting Loki's scepter lying in the middle of the terrace below.

Completely abandoned.