13 Chapter 13

Natasha Romanov/Black Widow

Natasha worked at the computer she was standing at, trying to help coordinate the worldwide efforts against HYDRA. With the help of X and Jarvis, she was being kept apprised of numerous situations across the planet. Most were successful, considering the fact Steve's announcement, the shutdown of HYDRA communication, and the Hercules app gave SHIELD a massive advantage.

Some losses were taken, however. The Sandbox, a research facility in Africa dedicated to handling dangerous materials and weapons had been taken by one Donnie Gill and several HYDRA researchers. Another location, the Treehouse, was destroyed by an unknown Enhanced when HYDRA was unable to take it.

Still, in a broad sense, they were winning.

As Natasha worked, she shared a glance with Clint. Clint nodded over at Pierce, who had his phone clenched tightly in his hand. Natasha smirked and Clint grinned. Fury looked over at them, then smiled when they indicated Pierce holding his phone.

Before any of the three could say or do anything, Councilman Rockwell spoke. "Fury... how are we going to come back from this?"

Fury turned to look at the tall councilman. "What do you mean?"

"We're losing hundreds of people, resources, millions of dollars in equipment," Rockwell shook his head. "We're not going to be able to recover from this."

"That's not true," Natasha said. When everyone looked at her, she continued typing. "We're at war, so these losses are expected. Not preferred, but expected."

"You really think this is just a war?" Pierce asked with a smirk. "This won't end with HYDRA falling. We have a lot of thumbs in a lot of pies. You win today, it'll just leave a lot more of us tomorrow. Cut off one head, and two more shall grow in its place." As Pierce spoke, he pressed a button on his phone.

The screen immediately displayed an image. Pierce stared in shock at his phone. All there was were two minimalist symbols, side by side on the screen. Iron Man's mask shining gold on a red background, and an Omnitrix dial on a metallic background.

"I'm sorry, did you just try to kill me?" Clint asked, sounding offended. "I mean, damn, I thought we were having a pretty good conversation just now."

"I know," Natasha said with a smile. "Rude."

Pierce looked around. After a moment, he smiled sheepishly. "Well, it was worth a try."

"I'm sure you think that," Fury said. He stepped towards Pierce and took his phone from him, tossing it over to Natasha, who placed it in her jacket pocket. "You might want to take those off," Fury said to Rockwell and Singh, pointing at the security badges on their chests. "They're set to explode at a certain signal."

Clint and Natasha were already taking off the badges, the councilmen hurriedly following.

"Here's your problem, Pierce," Fury said dismissively. "You're playing by rules that don't exist anymore. Same with the rest of the world. Rules I've known were outdated since the 1990's. It's part of why I supported Insight, why I brought the Avengers together."

"You just weren't willing to take the full steps necessary-" Pierce started to say.

"No, you were taking steps in the wrong direction," Fury said. "But, luckily, you did give us something useful to take you down," Fury smiled at the confusion in Pierce's eyes. "How do you think we're tracking down HYDRA operatives so easily? Pulling them all out of their hidey holes?"

Pierce didn't seem to understand for a moment. Then his eyes widened in shock. "Zola's algorithm."

The councilmembers looked at each other but didn't seem to understand what he was talking about.

"Pretty useful bit of tech," Natasha added. "X, Jarvis, how long do you think this would have taken without it?"

"Several days ma'am," Jarvis said.

"But with it, we have a compiled list already," X added. "I suppose we must thank Mr. Pierce for creating it, in an ironic fashion of course."

Pierce stepped forward, anger in his eyes. "You son of a bitch, Fury!"

"I'd blame Tony and Dial actually. But I think you've had your day in the sun for long enough." Fury looked at Clint. "Knock him out, please. We can talk to him later."

Pierce got a needle in the neck before he could respond. He glared for a moment longer before passing out. The councilmembers still seemed confused, but also looked relieved to see Pierce unconscious.

Natasha flipped through several screens as Hawkeye dropped Pierce to the ground. "Sir, do you want us to join the others in the fight? I think I've done all I can here."

"Hmm," Fury nodded after a moment. "I'll have some of the agents come up to guard us. Wait till they get here, then you two go and help."

"Understood."

Steve Rogers/Captain America

Steve missed the old days. The days when Bucky Barnes was his friend through one of the worst wars in history. Not just because fighting him, rather than alongside him, was breaking Steve's heart.

But also because Bucky was a hell of a lot harder to fight nowadays.

"Raagh!" Steve shouted, kicking Bucky in the chest. Decades ago, a blow like that would have broken Bucky's ribs. Instead, he simply fell to the floor, rolled up, and started slashing at Steve with a knife, lashing out with lethal speed and force few could have matched.

The two stood in the garage of the Triskelion. The whole place had been basically turned into a war zone, with cars blown into scrap, bullet holes in the concrete around them, and the smell of smoke in the air. SHIELD and HYDRA agents fought through the large space. HYDRA was trying to open the large steel doors that lead to the outside, trying to let in the various ground vehicles they had available. SHIELD, of course, was doing whatever they could to prevent that until those vehicles were destroyed.

Steve and Bucky danced in the center of the battle. Steve slashed outwards with his shield, Bucky blocked it on his robotic arm. The Winter Soldier spun his knife around and tried to stab it into Steve's chest, but was blocked by a quick twist of Steve's shield. The knife skittered along the red and white paint for a moment. Bucky kicked at Steve's legs, sending him to the floor, then tried to punch him. Steve rolled out of the way, leaving Bucky to punch the asphalt. A fluorescent light above was destroyed by a stray gunshot, throwing sparks down on them. They danced a moment longer, fists, shield, and knife fighting.

Then Steve blocked a hail of gunfire on his shield. He looked at the shooter, narrowing his eyes when he saw who it was.

Rumlow, leader of STRIKE team, was firing an assault rifle at Captain America. The soldier had a grim look on his face.

Bucky capitalized on the attack, moving to Steve's left side to kick him in the ribs. Steve rolled with the blow, hopped back to his feet, and ran through the garage. His shield rose up once more to block Rumlow, Bucky following close behind.

"Tony, I could use you here!" Steve shouted, sliding behind a car and turning to confront Bucky. The two superhumans battled for a moment, Rumlow running to find another angle on Steve. As Steve fought, he tossed his shield at a pillar. The shield, in complete defiance of physics, bounced off the pillar, then a wall, slammed into a blown up car's hood, then hit Rumlow in the chest. The traitorous soldier was thrown back with a yell of pain.

Steve grabbed at Bucky's head and kneed upwards. Bucky took a knee to the face, blocked the next one, and threw Steve off of him. He reached for a gun strapped to his back and pulled it out to shoot at Steve. Steve kicked his arm to the side, then blocked the knife stabbed at his face. For a moment they struggled against each other.

"You know me!" Steve said, their eyes meeting. "We were friends, Buck! You went to my parents funeral, we fought in the war! Hell, we went on double dates together!"

Bucky froze for a moment. Confusion, pain, and sadness filled his face. Steve dared to hope. Then Bucky raised his gun and pointed it at Steve's face. Steve barely dodged, a bullet filling the space his head had been in. Steve punched Bucky in the face, leaped over the car they had been fighting next to, and rolled to grab his shield, raising it to block the next bullets Bucky fired at him.

Steve noticed Rumlow struggling to rise closeby. The soldier had a hand clutched to his chest, and was raising his gun to shoot at Steve. Steve dismissed him as unimportant, instead focusing on sprinting towards Bucky. Rumlow's hand tightened on the trigger as he prepared to shoot at Captain America's back.

A yellow beam of light slammed into Rumlow's back, sending him flying. He rolled along the ground for a moment, fly up, then hit a stone pillar. Rumlow struggled to his feet, then he fell to his knees before tipping over. Moments later, an armored man flew ahead. A SHIELD agent, seeing Rumlow's gun, grabbed it and ran to confront the other HYDRA members, leaving Rumlow unconscious and forgotten on the pavement.

Steve raised his shield when he got close to Bucky, Bucky's robotic fist slamming into the shield with a loud clang. Bucky spun around and kneeled, shooting at Steve's stomach. The bullets were barely blocked, though one sliced into Steve's bicep. Steve hissed in pain but forced himself forward. Bucky pulled the trigger on his handgun, then tossed it aside when it emptied. Steve ran towards Bucky... and leaped over him.

Bucky had one moment to stare at the person flying towards him before hastily raising his metal arm in time to block the beam of yellow light shot at him. The sheer force of the blow sent Bucky flying backward right into Steve, who grabbed him from behind, leaned back, and slammed him into the floor in a perfect suplex. Bucky snarled, struggling out of Steve's grasp and rolling away.

"No luck talking him out of it, huh?" Tony asked as he landed next to Steve.

"Therapy is tough," Steve confirmed. He took a fighting stance next to Tony.

For a moment, Captain America and Iron Man squared off with the Winter Soldier. SHIELD and HYDRA agents continued to fight in the background. The Winter Soldier narrowed his eyes, and Iron Man raised his arms to point at him.

"Stand down," Tony said simply.

Bucky's response was to run forward. Tony fired his repulsor blast at him, Bucky dodged to the left. He leaped on the side of a pillar, jumped off of that to dodge the next beam, then punched Iron Man with his metal arm. Tony staggered back, and Bucky tried to capitalize on the blow, only to lean back out of the way of Cap's shield when it came flying at him. Steve ran up and threw a kick, forcing Bucky to duck. Iron Man threw a punch that was blocked by Bucky's arm, Steve knelled down to punch Bucky in the ribs. Bucky was forced back with a grunt. Iron Man and Captain America stepped forwards, and Winter Soldier backflipped out of the way of another repulsor blast.

"Your friend is annoying!" Tony quipped.

"He's usually more accommodating," Steve returned, running forward.

Bucky grabbed the shield where it had landed as the two superheroes came at him, quickly putting it on and blocking a beam from Iron Man. The yellow blast reflected off to aim at Captain America, who somersaulted over it before continuing his room.

"You need to stop throwing your primary weapon!" Tony yelled, punching at Bucky, who blocked the armored mans' haymaker on the shield.

"It's a good tactic!" Steve defended. He slid along the ground and kicked Bucky's kneecap, forcing him to kneel. "It bounces back!"

"I'm gonna give you an upgrade one of these days, old timer!" Tony threw a jab which Bucky ducked.

"Would you two shut up!?" Bucky shouted. He threw an uppercut into Steve's chin, only to get a repulsor blast in the chest. He tried to roll back, but Steve grabbed him by the leg in mid-roll and pulled him back. Iron Man punched him in the face, and Steve forced him onto his back. Tony grabbed his arms. Bucky spat out a tooth and looked up at them with wild eyes. "Arrgh!"

"Trying to help you, Buck!" Steve yelled, holding down his friend from rolling away.

"You have a funny way of showing it, Steve!" Bucky yelled.

They struggled a moment longer before Tony and Bucky realized Steve was laughing.

"Did you just snap!?" Tony asked, forcing Bucky arms behind him.

"He called me Steve," the Avenger out of time said with a grin. Bucky froze at that before once more struggling to get out of Tony's grasp.

"Yay, he's still a confused super-assassin," Tony finally snapped on a pair of restraints around Bucky's wrists. "Can you put him to bed now?"

Steve, still grinning, pulled out a syringe. The pair forced Bucky to stand up. "See you when you wake up, Buck."

Bucky had enough time to stare at Steve with anger. Then the syringe was stabbed into his neck, and he was out like a light.

"Okay, take him," Iron Man said. "I've got to help Falcon."

Captain America nodded, throwing his restrained and sedated friend onto his shoulder. "Got it. See you in a bit."

As Steve ran off, Iron Man looked over at the HYDRA soldiers fighting. His targeting system focused on them as he turned his head to look around. Then the shoulder panels on his armor opened, firing projectiles.

In an instant, twelve men fell to the floor, groaning in pain from projectiles in their hands and feet.

Iron Man stepped forward. SHIELD agents, seeing him, took positions at his side, pointing their guns. "I suggest you boys surrender," Tony said casually.

One STRIKE member began to raise his gun. A repulsor blast slammed into his chest, throwing him back with broken ribs for his troubles.

The other HYDRA soldiers seemed to stare at him. Then, one by one, they started putting down their guns. Tony began to step forward, stopping when he bumped into something. He looked down to see he'd accidentally stepped on Rumlow's hand. He gently stepped around the unconscious man and ignored him as someone cuffed the STRIKE leader.

Mahmoud Schahed/Dial

In the main flight bridge of the Insight helicarrier I had infiltrated, I could hear the captain yelling at his crewmembers. With my senses as strong as they were, it was easy to hear what was happening through the steel door down the hall from me.

"What the hell happened!?" He yelled as I strode towards the door. He didn't seem to understand why he was now grounded.

"All our power is being pulled by something else!" A crewmember said. "I can't raise maintenance."

"Damn it!" The captain yelled. "It must be that monster! We need to-"

I smashed down the door with a kick. As I stepped inside, the men inside stared at me in horror. Blitzwolfer had that effect on people. I took a whiff of the air as the captain staggered to rise from his chair.

"IT department," I joked half-hardheartedly. About six men, including the captain. Two of them were soldiers, one close to me, a woman with wide eyes. That woman snapped her gun towards me and got a sonic blast for her troubles getting thrown into a bank of computers. The other soldier fired at me, and I ran on all fours to dart out of the way. As soon as I was behind a set of controls, I tapped the Omnitrix and leaped at him.

"Rath!"

"Let me tell you something faceless HYDRA goon! Rath's gonna beat you silly!" I yelled out as I grabbed a crewmember and threw him aside.

There was a bit of relief in becoming the tiger wrestler. Rath didn't see my kill as anything but a necessity. It wasn't something to discard, but I felt more pragmatic about it. Kinda funny that for all his ridiculousness, Rath was better at handling what I'd done than most of my other aliens.

I walked through a stream of bullets. The soldier screamed as I prowled forward through the room. I raised a claw and slammed it into a computer. As I continued to walk, the claw sliced through the steel and glass of the console, cutting a long line.

"Get behind me!" The soldier yelled at the technicians and captain. They moved to do so.

I leaped forward and kicked the soldier in a lightning-fast move. He flew back and slammed into the door behind him. His eyes roll up and closed, the man passing out.

"Let me tell you something, Faceless-HYDRA-Goons-Two-Through-Six! Rath thinks you Moronic-Nazi-Worshipping-Idiots should surrender," I told the stunned crew. "Or not! Rath doesn't care either way, but Rath wants the excuse to beat you down!"

The captain responded by slamming a button on his console. "Hail HYDR-urk!"

He was interrupted by me grabbing his head. "OPHIUCHUS FACE-PLANT!" I rammed his head into the console with brutal force, breaking his nose and leaving him to pass out on the floor. "Damn it!" I yelled when I saw what he had done. The crewmembers tried to run. I tapped the Omnitrix.

"Feedback!"

Pulling energy from the helicarrier around me, I fired bolts of electricity at two of the crewmembers, leaving two standing. Ignoring the ones now shaking on the floor, I leaped over the console. "He activated something, what was it!?" I asked quickly. They shook their heads. I zapped one of them, leaving him to fall on the floor with his muscles seizing, and turned to the last person standing, a woman with red hair. "What did he do!?"

"S-Self Destruct!" she squealed. "Pierce's orders! A way to kill you all! It'll blow up the whole Triskelion! A last resort!"

"What the hell?" I asked in shock.

"I-It was just in case," she said hurriedly. "The rest of HYDRA would use the explosion as a political ploy, to let them justify control over the populace, to help the world even if we died!" The last words were said with the heady belief of only the worshipful. "We may fail, but we will still save the world from itself!"

"You've been drinking too much of the cult punch," I said in disgust, zapping her and leaving her on the shaking on the floor with her friends.

Just then, someone knocked on the window. I looked to see War Machine floating there, holding Creel. I waved him in, and War Machine blasted the window with a low powered repulsor blast, flying inside. As he entered, the Omnitrix timed out. I looked down at my hands, sighing in relief when I saw they were clean, then looked at Rhodey.

"The captain activated the self-destruct," I said as Rhodey landed.

His faceplate snapped up, showing me his worried face. "Shit. Can we stop it?"

"No idea," I said quickly. "I'm going to turn into Jury Rigg once the Omnitrix recharges and see if I can stop it. Jarvis, X, can you guys do anything?"

"No sir," X said. "The controls are disconnected now. The Insight carrier will explode soon, no matter what is done by us. This is a hardware issue."

"Well luckily, Jury Rigg is a hardware kinda guy," I said firmly.

Rhodey dropped Creel, stepping over to join me. Creel smoothly landed, rose up, and grabbed Rhodey's right arm. He squeezed down at the same time as he absorbed the material of Rhodey's suit. Rhodey yelled out when his forearm gauntlet was destroyed in a single squeeze.

"You should have used an organic material for the syringe," Creel sounded almost sad. Creel slammed a headbutt into Rhodey's minigun, destroying it, then grabbed Rhodey's left wrist and pulled both of War Machine's arms back, placing a knee against Rhodey's back. Rhodey struggled, and for a moment they held against each other, but Creel had Rhodey pinned with superior positioning and the enhanced strength of his form.

"Stop!" I yelled out.

Creel, the same black color as Rhodey's armor now, looked up at me. The two continued to struggle, but Creel was listening I raised my hands up.

"Creel... we have about," I looked at the console. "Three minutes left before this thing blows. I can save us. I know you've been brainwashed," I said.

"My compliance will be rewarded," Creel said softly. "I must allow the self-destruct."

"Yeah, yeah, that. But I can fix you! Zola, he was terrified someone would try to brainwash him. He came up with ways to reverse it, to even stop it. We can help you," Creel's eyes widened, and he almost lost his grip on Rhodey's arms. "Please... fight the conditioning. You can be free. We can all escape, can stop the explosions, just... please."

For a moment, I held my breath. Creel stared at me. The clock on the computer lowered bit by bit.

Then, with pain in his eyes, Creel began to pull back hard on War Machines arms. Rhodey yelled. The Omnitrix suddenly went green, and for some reason, a hologram popped up without my prompting. I tapped the watch and leaped forward as Creel began to break Rhodey's spine.