Calming The Beast

11.

Cap and Clint Barton walk towards and into the quinjet followed by Bruce and Logan. A young shield pilot looks and stands in their way.

"You are not authorized to be here..."

"Son....just don't" Steve warns, the agent swallows nervously and then flees. Logan smirks amused, Natasha hurries onto the jet behind them and throws a duffel at Logan's feet, her duffel.

"Figured you'd need it" Natasha offers, Logan smirks.

"Thanks" She comments and crouches opening her duffel, she smiles seeing her favourite handgun inside, good, they didn't mess with her stuff. She pulls out her gun and the spare clips tucking them into the back of her jeans as well as her pockets. Bruce raises an eyebrow at her. She shrugs back.

.......................

On the Bridge Fury looks the window of the ship, contemplating. Agent Hill walks up to him, knowing.

"Sir" Hill greets.

"Agent Hill?"

"Those cards, they were in Coulson's locker, not in his jacket"

"They needed the push" Fury holds up Coulson's cards. A loud noise screeches. Fury looks out to see Iron Man flying off as well as the quinjet. "They found it. Get our communications back up, whatever you have to do. I want eyes on everything"

"Yes, Sir"

.........................

Iron Man arrives at Stark Tower where Selvig, activates the CMS device, holding the Tesseract.

"Sir, I took off the arc reactor" Jarvis informs Tony. "The device is already self-sustained"

"Shut it down, Dr. Selvig" Tony snaps at Selvig.

"It's too late! It can't stop now. He wants to show us something! A new universe" Tony stares at the older scientist a moment before nodding to himself.

"Okay" Iron Man aims his hands toward the CMS and fires. The energy from his boosters shatters with a deafening crack! Selvig falls backwards.

................

Down below, citizens of New York look up at Stark Tower.

.................

Iron Man stares in disbelief at the CMS ... unharmed.

"The barrier is pure energy. It's unbreachable" Tony flies down from the roof of the tower. "The Mark VII is not ready to be deployed" Jarvis warns.

"Skip the spinning rims. We're on the clock" Tony lands his suit and goes through the gauntlet and unsuits him. Loki looks up at him, smiling. They proceed to walk into the penthouse.

..................

Loki walks in, holding the sceptre. Tony casually walks towards his bar against the wall.

"Please tell me you're going to appeal to my humanity" Loki offers.

"Uh...actually, I'm planning to threaten you"

"You should have left your armor on for that"

"Yeah, it's seen a bit of mileage. You've got the blue stick of destiny. Would you like a drink?" Tony asks.

"Stalling me won't change anything"

"No, no, no! Threatening. No drink? You sure? I'm having one"

"The chitauri are coming, nothing will change that. What have I to fear?" Loki asks.

"The Avengers" Loki looks at him, confused. "It's what we call ourselves, sort of like a team. 'Earth's mightiest heroes' type of thing"

"Yes, I've met them" Loki comments.

"Yeah, takes us a while to get any traction, I'll give you that one" Tiny agrees. "But, let's do a head count here. Your brother, the demi-God; a super soldier, a living legend who kind of lives up to the legend; a man with breath-taking anger management issues; his mysterious genius ex-girlfriend; a couple of master assassins, and you, big fella, you've managed to piss off every single one of them"

"That was the plan"

"Not a great plan. When they come, and they will, they'll come for you" From underneath the bar table, Tony pulls on bracelets, a honing device.

"I have an army" Loki comments.

"We have a Hulk" Tony argues. "There's no throne, there is no version of this, where you come out on top. Maybe your army comes and maybe it's too much for us, but it's all on you. Because if we can't protect the Earth, you can be damned well sure we'll avenge it" Loki slowly walks up to him; raising the sceptre.

"How will your friends have time for me,when they're so busy fighting you?" Loki asks, then taps Tony on the chest with his sceptre. PING! Nothing. Confused, Loki tires again. PING! Nothing. "It should work"

"Well, performance issues. You know?" Tony offers. In anger, Loki grabs Tony by the throat and flings him across the room.

"Jarvis. Anytime now" Tony begs. Loki grabs Tony by the throat again.

"You will all fall before me" Loki throws Tony out the window. Tony freefalls down the side of tower. From behind Loki, an elevator opens and a red pod shoots out. The pod laser signals the bracelets around Tony's wrists. The pod begins to transform into the Mark VII suit. It latches onto Tony. Iron Man. The suit flies up before he hits the ground or the gazing people. Loki looks up, angry. Iron Man lingers outside the broken window.

"And there's one other person you pissed off! His name was Phil" Loki raises the sceptre. Ion Man fires at Loki, sending him on his ass.

..........................

Selvig looks up at the sky. The Tesseract's energy beams into the sky. The beam then forms a vortex, which then opens up another portal. A hole in space rips open, and from it, the chitauri army spills out in flying chariots, carrying energy rifles with a bayonet on the end.

................

Dean is half asleep when the news breaks on the tv across from him, Sam sits eating muesli at the kitchen table, his eyes drift to the tv and he pauses, spoon to his mouth.

"Dean" he starts trying to rouse his brother. "Dean" he states louder, Dean jerks a little waking, he turns to glare at Sam who nods to the tv. "Turn it up" Dean glances to the tv, his own eyes widening, he reaches for the remote and increases the volume.

"Call Logan" Dean tells Sam who fumbles to get his cell phone out of his pocket.