357So sorry I posted a chapter for the wrong story! It was near midnight when I tried to post last, and I was pretty tired, so...
A big thanks to readers Mythweaver and Spectrashine for pointing that out! As for those who were curious, it's from a fic in the Initial D fandom, from a fic I'm currently writing called Lost Boys. Now here's the real thing! :)
Daniel paused for a moment, taking a deep breath. "She's with Loki..."
"She's what!?" Tony's eyes flashed, and he glared at the raven haired teen. "You left her with him!?"
Daniel glared at Tony, pushing his glasses further up his nose. "Look, I have civilians to get to the safe zone- Amy will be fine."
There was a rumbling in the distance, as an apartment collapsed, the ground shaking from the force of the impact.
By the time Tony had turned around, Daniel was already running, leading the old woman and toddler towards safety.
A heavy hand on his shoulder caused Tony to turn, coming face to face with Thor. "Stark. We must go. Th others need our help..."
Tony stepped back, shaking his head, eyes widening with surprise. "You can;t expect me to leave her with Loki..."
"Stark." Thor spoke gently. "She has made her choice. Now you must trust in her ability to do so. My brother would not hurt a child, and you're ion cannons are needed..."
Tony pursed his lips, looking anything but pleased, before the mask on his helmet slid down and he was following Thor into the sky, away from their city block and towards the rest of the Avengers.
Within an apartment building, a red-haired teenager with a nose piercing had grabbed the nearest things she could find from the basement complex of the apartment and some things she'd liberated from a few apartments.
A blow torch, a roll of duct tape, a canister of gasoline, and a super soaker squirt gun she'd found in a child's room were all she really needed. When duct-taped to the end of the super soaker, flame-up, the blow torch made a perfect ignition device. And when filled with gasoline, pumped, and fired, the super soaker made an excellent flame thrower.
As Harper ducked out into the deserted streets, picking her way through the alleys, she couldn;t help but wonder how Daniel and Amy had made out. She'd lost track of them, as their plan had basically dissolved after the city block had been detonated.
She founded through the alleys in her black converses, heart pounding in her ears.
You idiots better be alright. You're the only real friends I have.
She skidded to a stop, breath catching in her throat for a moment. There, standing alone in the middle of a street, stood a massive frost giant. The lumbering creature turned, scrutinizing her with blood red eyes, rocky form intimidating as it stepped towards her.
Harper wordlessly lit the blowtorch, the hiss of the gas igniting sending pin pricks down her skin. These bastards attacked my friends... threatened my world...
She raised the squirt gun- a blast of flame enveloped the massive creature, which let out an agonizing roar...
"You messed with the wrong planet, motherfucker!"
The tide started to change when Thor joined the fray, Mjionoir delivering heavy bows tot he frost giants surrounding the mortals and Tony's ionizing cannons providing stiff backup.
The frost giants seemed to sense the tide was changing- all too soon, they were nothing but ice crystals on the pavement.
Steve frowned, looking troubled. "That's it? You'd think their invasion force would be larger..."
"Would you rather there were more?" Natasha asked, rolling her eyes slightly from where she was helping patch up a wounded Clint.
"No, it's just..."
"There are more." Thor said simply. "They could muster an invasion force of at least 90."
"Maybe some died in the explosions?" Clint suggested, wincing as Natasha dabbed at a spot of frostbite on his upper arm.
"Perhaps." Thor said, frowning. though he didn't look convinced.
They'd come from nowhere. Materializing from within the alleys, they were the lucky insurgents who'd avoided the inferno.
There had to be at least twenty of them- they'd taken both the mortal and god by surprise, storming them while Amy had been trudging through the ashes, gathering car batteries, and as Loki healed his own minor injuries with muttered incantations.
The mortal's shout had been his first- and only- warning. The blast signaling the discharge of a thermal cannon later, and the mortal was jogging towards him, eyes wide and face pale, frost giants flowing out of the alleys on all sides of them.
They'd taken cover behind a concrete support pillar that was, partially, still standing. It shielded them- they picked off the first few frost giants who dared charge close enough, before there was an eerie silence.
Amy was about to peer around the pillar to take stock of the situation when Loki pulled her back, his instincts telling him to. "Don't-"
He never got to finish that sentence, as the ground around them was pelted with blasts of magic so intense the concrete support shook.
The combined magic of 15 frost giants was formidable, if not catastrophic, when rained down upon hiding opponents.
Still, none of the blasts touched them.
In a small moment of ceasefire, Loki turned and whirled, sending a thermal incantation to the first frost giant he saw, killing him instantly.
The Jotuns shouted, and Loki manged to to scrape up the magic to off another one of them- the thermal cannon to his right discharged, before they were both ducking back behind the pillar as the remaining dozen frost giants shot at them.
Still, the 12 camped around them in the rubble were well-hidden, and no doubt closing in on their position. It was going to be a long, dawn out fight if they were lucky- and if they weren't, well- it would simply be a slaughter.
An arrow lodged itself in the icy shoulder spikes of a frost giant, who turned, looking at the offending object as though it were a toothpick. A moment later it exploded, the heat of the blast sending the frost giant reeling, roaring in pain- the large green fist of the hulk crashed down on the creature, a tremendous, rage filled roar continuing as a massive green foot slammed down, sending the creature;s large body a good few inches down into the pavement.
"Yeah! Take this you fucking snowmen!" Clint shouted over the chaos.
Tony was providing them with cover fire from above, while he distracted them with exploding arrows and Thor and Hulk played the muscle. Natasha was keeping a watch from atop the buildings with Steve, letting them know if any new giants were approaching. However, after their initial turning point in discovering the heat weakness, the number of frost giants they'd been fighting had been slowly dwindling.
As it was, only fire or so of the creatures remained, and they looked thoroughly bedraggled- it wouldn't be much longer until this whole nightmare was over.
Clint couldn't help but grin as he pulled back and let another arrow fly, striking another of the icy behemoths. Only a few minutes from victory.
The first frost giant came out from beneath his place of cover, and Amy turned, dispatching it with the ion cannon. Loki, in turn, scanned the rubble behind her, watching her back- they were still perched precariously beneath the cement support column...
"Loki!"
Three of the frost giants were rushing them- Loki once again gathered his dwindling magic to blast one with a thermal spell, the ionizing cannon dispatching the other- still, one of the original three continued charging towards them, and this seemed to inspire the remaining nine giants, who all got up at varying intervals from where they were hunkered among the rubble, charging at various intervals, screaming war cries.
The mortal shouted something, dropping to her knees among the soot and dust- Loki had enough sense left to realize she was trying to wire a fresh car battery to the cannon, and he blasted the nearest giant to himself, turning and running to cover her. Three more were charging at them, and when they were about to be overwhelmed, the blasting of the ion cannon once again graced his ears...
It was over within 3 minutes. 3 painful, arduous minutes. Frost giants carcasses laid scattered around them, bodies splayed at various intervals among the broken concrete, splintered wood, and plaster dust.
The mortal took one step and faltered, falling to one knee before her legs gave out completely.
Loki was able to put aside his own exhaustion for a moment to kneel beside her, shaking her anxiously.
"Amy?"
If he was in pain, he could only imagine what if must feel like to be a mortal, fragile as they were- and to be a child, not less.
Amy didn't stir, and Loki gathered the teenager, metal gear and all, into his arms, staggering back behind the concrete support beam and brushing her hair from her pale face with his own sooty hands.
A large scratch on her cheek stood out in stark contrast to her pale skin, and Loki swallowed. Her skin was hot to touch, and though he didn't think her exhaustion was mortal, it was unnerving to know his battle companion and friend was so suddenly out of commission.
"You fought well." he said hoarsely, though he doubted she could hear him. "Let me finish the battle. I'll protect you, if any more of them dare come..."
Loki looked up to see soot rain down from the sky in thick, black flakes- almost like snow, but much more gothic and ugly.
Loki sighed, letting out a long breath and leaning his head back against the concrete, staring up at the ashen sky.
"But I think it's over now. There's nothing left to fight."
"The boy- Daniel, his name was- he made it to the safe zone already. He was taking other mortals with him." Thor informed the others, looking around, concerned.
Tony had already taken to the skies, searching aerially for his daughter.
Natasha frowned, crossing her arms, and Steve spoke up, running a grimy hand through his hair. "We'll do a grid-search- check every part fo the battle zone for her first. Any objections?"
Finding none, Steve nodded, giving everyone their assigned area before he was jogging down the street, looking nervously for Amy.
BREAK
Clint was combing his own area of the grid with Thor, when he came face-to-face with a teen in the street. At first, he thought it was Amy. The girl was crouched over a frost giant, one of the two bodies laying in the street. She didn't even notice them as she approached, instead, she was busy carrying a red jug of gasoline towards the fallen frost giant, who was still struggling feebly to stand on his wounded leg. A discarded super soaker water gun and blow torch stood a few feet away.
The frost giant collapsed, laying still on the pavement, accepting defeat. The girl started to douse the creature in gasoline, eyes burning with hatred and teeth grit...
"Hey! Don't do that."
The girl jumped, surprised, to see Clint and Thor jogging towards her.
"He's alive?" Clint asked, looking down at he frost giant quizzically.
Thor nodded. "Though bad, he's not mortally wounded."
"Right. Let's keep it that way- he's our prisoner now."
Harper glared down at the frost giant in disdain, and Clint placed a gloved hand on her shoulder. "Don't worry. He'll more than pay for his crimes in a SHIELD facility..."
The red-haired girl only nodded curtly, turning and starting to jog down the deserted street.
"Hey! Where are you going!?" Clint called.
"I have to find my idiot friend!" was all the girl replied, and Clint realized he'd just med Harper Danvers- the girl who'd worked with Amy to warn them of this whole attack.
Steve sifted through the rubble- he found the odd frost giant carcass every now and again- the fires were beginning to burn themselves out, thanks to aerial drops of water, and he strayed into his own search sector, finding at first only the body of a lone frost giant, but gradually, more and more littering the street, until he cam,e to a completely collapsed apartment building.
Frost Giant corpses were splayed in the rubble everywhere.
Steve strode over the concrete- the building was in ruins- it was basically just a bombed out shell at this point.
Pieces of concrete, twisted metal, broken glass. The only intact part of the place was a few rather rough looking concrete posts which must've been major structural points...
it almost reminded Steve of what he'd seen in the war.
He came to a complete halt, however, when he approached one of the concrete pillars to see a rather ashen looking Loki cradling a small form closely.
Steve turned, ducking behind a nearby pillar and pulling out his comm.
"I found Amy. Loki's got her... and it doesn't look good." was all Steve whispered harshly, before he was turning around to peer at the god again. The small form in his arms showed no signs of movement, and Steve's heart began to race.
Amy had to be alright- she had to- not only for his sake, but for Tony's, she'd risked everything to warn him of the attack...
His hands were shaking so badly, he could hardly think, and he heard but barely registered Fury's voice over the comm saying that he was sending in all available units, and that Steve should stay hidden at all costs.
Steve suddenly found it hard to swallow. She'd be alright. She had to be. Or there would be blood.
Please review! :)
I'm sorry I haven't updated in so long, but I've just started nursing school, and it's very intense. Just know that every review motivates me to get my schoolwork done faster so I can get back to writing for you guys! :)