A Taste of Vengeance

The ship was complete chaos. SHIELD agents were running all over the place as Steve and I made our way to the failing engine. Loki’s attack was in full motion and he had succeeded in catching us unawares. The smoke coming from the charred parts of the ship and the bodies littering the hallways was devastating.

In part, I felt somewhat responsible for not seeing the attack coming. I should have been able to sense the plane a mile off. Even if Barton was able to shield his thoughts from me, I should have sensed them, I should have sensed them all. But I was distracted, and that was exactly the way Loki wanted me.

It seemed no matter how hard we tried to predict what he was going to do, Loki was one step ahead of us. Even when Natasha and I had gained our information, he was always ahead, always planning. He was smarter than I gave him credit for- than we all gave him credit for, and now we were paying the price most dearly, which is exactly the way he wanted it.

We came to a door finally and banged on it until someone let us through. We rushed through but stopped immediately, almost walking right off of the ship. The wind knocked right into me, sending me stumbling backwards for a moment before I caught my balance and stood still. The air was ripping around us and roaring in our ears.

The side of the ship had a hole completely blown in the side, pieces of metal ripped and jagged like chipped teeth and wires swinging in the wind, sparking and spewing with electricity. This was going to be quiet and interesting job, with little space to move and lots of air whipping around.

“Stark!” Steve called through the earpiece, yelling over the wind. He glanced upwards, looking at the flames that engulfed a part of the plane. “Stark, we’re here.”

“Good,” He answered. I saw the gleam of red in the sky and looked up as Stark flew in, assessing the damage through his mask. “Let’s see what we got.”

Tony flew over to the blown turbine, assessing the damage. I followed his train of thought. We needed to fix the cooling system, the rotors and getting the large pieces of debris out of the turbine before we could even think of starting it back up. I did the calculations in my head and decided we only had minutes before they got to another engine. With two engines out, we’d be out of the sky.
“Shall I check the relay panel?” I asked him.

“Yeah,” he answered, flying off in a different direction, murmuring to himself. “Tell me which panels are in overload.”

“Alright,” I turned to Steve. “Time to see how good you are, Cap.”

I crouched on the heels of my feet before jumping up six feet up and six feet across, catching what was once a rafter. I swung forwards once and up over the bar, landing perfectly along the slender beam, much like a cat. I smirked, glad that at least one of my abilities could not be used against me, still sensitive at how easily Loki had bombarded me.

I jumped up another level, landing on all fours into a most feline crouch. I was starting to think maybe I should nick name myself something else. Maybe instead of keeping the name from my past, The Black Bane, I should be Night Leopard or Black Panther. Both were quite fitting names, and I decided I would run it by Steve later.

That was the thing about reading minds as well: I could think of a million things all at once. I was running through tactics to turn on the turbine, new super hero names, and watching as Steve easily jumped from his spot below and swung on the bar up to my level with no difficulty. I smiled to myself, noting how fetching he looked while doing all of that. Somehow I had managed to charm an incredible sexy guy, which was totally beyond me.

Steve walked past and threw open the metal compartment containing all the breakers. It sparked dangerously, revealing several wires and patterns that glowed with orange electricity, but what I looked at was how every single relay was blinking red and in overload position. Of course not one of them could be green, making it a lot harder to fix.

“How’s it look down there?” Tony asked when we said nothing. Steve and me exchanged glances.

“It looks like it runs on some form of electricity,” he said, throwing his hands up at a loss.
“You’re not wrong.”

“All switches are in the red, Tony,” I explained, pushing Steve out the way. “We’re not going to be able to start up the engine electrically, we’re going to have to do it manually. I’ll clear the relays down here, check the rotors.”

“How do you know all of this?” Steve asked me as I began flipping switches.

I took out my knife, cutting wires here and there and twining their insides with other wires. A few lights flickered green. “My parents were scientist,” I explained while I worked. “It’s in my nature to be extremely smart with mechanics and science. That, and I’ve hotwired a car once or twice during jobs.”

“Once or twice?” he asked skeptically, flipping the switches I gestured to.

“Okay, maybe more than once or twice. Sometime there weren’t people around to give them a little psychic nudge.”

Steve rolled his eyes at me, pushing the last switch into place. All lights were blinking green as he shut the compartment, saying, “The relays are intact, Stark. What’s our next move?”

“Even if I clear the rotors, like Bane said, it won’t start with a jump. I’m gonna have to get in there and push.” That, was a most dangerous idea.

“But if it gets up to speed you’ll get shredded,” Steve pointed out, looking up to were Iron Man stood in his gleaming red suit.

“That lever should increase polarity and that will decrease it long enough too-"

“English, Stark.”

I looked at Steve and said, “He means pull that big red lever when he tells us to. It will give him a window- a small window, Tony - to get out of there before the engine makes Tony into shiny red and gold confetti.”

“How descriptive of you.” Tony’s tone dripped with sarcasm. “Now go stand by it until I tell you otherwise.”

“Bossy,” I muttered, jumping over a large gap in the floor and catching myself against the wall on the other side. Steve followed suit.

I leaned against the wall for a few long moments, trying to get my thoughts in order. Ignoring the voices in my head was difficult in the chaos of things. Thoughts and images were being thrown around so wildly that I could barely concentrate on my own thoughts, even wondering if some of them were my own. I noted as well that some strains of thought would vanish in moments of fear and horror. I knew that this was because the owners of those thoughts were being killed, their minds and feelings exterminated.

“What is it?” Steve asked, looking down at me. Dirt and sweat covered his face but somehow, I don’t think anything in that world could have tainted his beauty.

“I can feel them,” I breathed, closing my eyes and trying to ease random thoughts and fears of the people on the ship, invading their minds and pushing positive thoughts in place. “I can hear their thoughts, and fears, and feel them die… but there is bravery.. and hope.” I opened my eyes. “There is always hope- we’ve got company!”

Men in SHIELD uniforms came to the damaged part of the ship, looking up at us. Steve hesitated, not understand why anyone in SHIELD attire would be a threat, but I heard the thoughts long before they threw the grenade at us, thrusting out my palm and rebounding it, sending it down.

Steve and I both jumped in unison to the dock below, charging the enemies. Steve engaged the first one quickly, knocking his gun from his hand while I leapt over them, landing on the other, thrusting a knife downward as I did. The knife sank into their shoulder, but did not pierce much skin through the padding and protection of the uniform.

I was thrown off and shoved into a wall but I was acting quickly, thrusting into their mind to find that it was under Loki’s control, completely foreign and alien to me. I tried to find any form of motor controls, but it was shut to me. I was going to have to do this the hard way.

I side stepped a swing, grabbing the man’s arm and kicking up my leg, bringing him down forwards by the neck and pulling his arm behind him. He grunted and tried to throw me off, but his strength was nothing compared to mine as I removed and fired my gun telepathically, causing him to remain motionless.

Gravity was suddenly an issue. The ship tilted without warning, sending me to the floor and sliding helplessly to the edge of the ship. I screamed and grabbed on to a pole, hanging off the ship from hips down. My face hit the floor as I sighed with relief, heart pounding in my chest as the ship careened back and forth, all control of flight lost.

“Engine one is down,” Fury barked in my head. “It’s Barton. He needs to be taken down. Does any body copy?”

There was a long period of silence as I pulled myself up. “This is Agent Romanoff,” Natasha came in. Her voice wavered and she did not sound like herself. “I copy.”

“Natasha,” I said quickly into the earpiece, not caring if everyone else heard. “It’s not Barton in there. Do what you have to do.”

“I will,” was her only reply.

I ran and jumped up to where Steve was as more enemies came behind me, firing at will. Steve picked up an assault rifle and begins firing back at them as I landed gracefully, turning and raising my gun, firing at the other men and blocking bullets with my mind. My head rang with the sound of gunshots and I was about to make a smart comment about Steve’s aim when the ship staggered, knocking me off my feet in one swift motion.

I tumbled off of the ship and into the air, a scream ripping through my throat, knowing I had nothing to grab onto. But Steve reacted faster than I did, grabbing my arm as his other arm grabbed a loose cable, suspending us both. The sudden stop yanked my arm extremely hard and I felt a pop in my shoulder as it ripped out of place, causing me to yelp in pain, grinding my teeth and shutting my eyes.

It was like fire unleashing through my shoulder as I hung, dislocated and in pain. The wind tore at my feet as I dangled over thousands of feet of empty air. I was suspended like a helpless Christmas ornament, life tangling by a thread. Literally.

I looked up and saw the fear on Steve’s face as he slipped half a foot down the cord. Fighting the wind, his weight, my weight, and holding on with a single hand was more than many superheroes could do. He strained to hold on tighter, his grip on my arm tightening, but it didn’t take a genius to know my weight was too much.

“Steve-"

“I will not let you go, dammit. Don’t ask me to do that,” he yelled at me, completely cutting off my sentence.

“I wasn’t going to ask you to let me go, you idiot. I’m afraid of heights. Throw me.”

“What?” he demanded, as if I was crazy. He looked down at me, blue eyes squinting in the wind. We slipped forward and I shut my eyes for a moment in fear, trying not to let it overpower me.

“Throw me god dammit!”

“Hit the lever!” Tony called, voice sounding strained.

“Uh, I need a minute here,” Steve thrashed, trying to make a decision.

“I need you to do now-“ Tony was cut off by the sound of banging. Steve heard it as well and before I could yell at him, he leaned down and threw me, sending me flying like a bullet up several levels. I landed off balance, due to the injured arm, but threw up a mental wall, sending the bullets being fired at me off in different directions.

With my good arm, I grabbed the red lever, pulling as hard as I could. I ran over to the edge of the catwalk and grabbed the cable, and pulled Steve up telekinetically, using my good arm as a guide for the energy. I brought him up and dropped him roughly, muttering an apology from the strain.

We both laid on the floor against the wall, ragged and exhausted as Tony shot through the opening in the wall, taking out a man firing at us. My shoulder was throbbing with pain and I gasped for air. This was a lot harder than any work I had done, and I was starting to hate Fury for bringing me in on this god for saken initiative.

I rolled my head to look at Steve. “Did you really think I was going to let go?”

He smiled at me. “You’re unpredictable, it seemed like something you would do.”

I laughed. “Exactly, I’ll never do what you expect, Cracker Jack.”

Steve shook his head and rolled his eyes, but leaned down and kissed my briefly nonetheless. It was odd, to be laying on the ground beaten and life threatened, and yet, to be joking and kissing someone who genuinely made me feel like this was all worth it. the feel of his lips against mine momentarily eased the pain in my shoulder, and sent shivers down my spine. His lips set mine on fire, and I was actually annoyed when he pulled away, resting his head on top of mine.

And then everything changed.

“Agent Coulson is down,” Fury said, voice split with emotion. My heart stopped and my head snapped up, knocking Steve’s away from mine. I stretched out my mind, searching for his, but I couldn’t find it. I jumped up, standing erect and began scouring the ship for him.

“A medical team is on its way,” Hill said confidently.

“They’re already here…” Nick paused, his voice trailing off and thick with emotion. Nick did not ever reveal emotion. “They called it.”

“NO!”