Soldier Boy

Hell on the Helicarrier

The middle of the room exploded sending us flying in different directions. I landed on top of Steve by the door with Tony next to us. I rolled off Steve.

"Put on the suit." Steve said to Tony as he helped me up.

"Yeah." Tony said as he got up and we ran out of the room.

"Someone needs to get outside and batch that engine." Hill said through the comm.

"Stark, you copy that?" Fury asked through the comm.

"I'm on it." Stark said as we made it down to where his locker room is.

"Engine 3. I'll meet you there." Tony said and he split from us. We ran to the engine. Steve opened the door to find 3 workers. 1 of them was injured. The others carried him out.

"STARK! STARK, WE'RE HERE!" Steve yells through the comm.

"Good." Tony says as he flies in. "Let's see what we've got. I got to get this superconducting coolant system back online before I can access the rotors, work on dislodging the debris." He started moving this around. "I need you to get to that engine control panel," He pointed. "and tell me which relays are in overload position." He then disappears into the engine. I grabbed Steve's hand and lifted him up and flew over to the platform where the panel is. I let go of him and looked for the panel. Steve found it and opened it up. He pulled the panel out and stared at it with a confused look.

"What does it look like in there?" Tony asks.

"It seems to run on some form of electricity." Steve says.

"Well, you're not wrong." Tony says.

"I got it." I kneeled down next to him. I started to put the relays back in place.

"Okay, the relays are intact." Steve said once I finished. "What's our next move?" He pushes it back into the panel and closes it.

"Even if I clear the rotors, the thing won't re-engage without a jump." Tony said. "I'm going to have to get in there and push."

"If that thing gets up to speed, you'll get shredded." Steve said.

"That stator control unit can reverse the polarity long enough to disengage maglev and that could-"

"Speak English!" Steve cuts him off.

"You see that red lever?" We looked around to see the lever. "It will slow the rotors down long enough for me to get out. Stand by it. Wait for my word." Steve jumped over to it. I followed. As we waited, 2 guards came out. One pulled out a grenade. He threw it at the engine. I quickly used my powers to move it away before it exploded. Steve jumped down and started fighting them.

"Stay by the lever!" Steve yelled as I was about to help him fight. He punched one of them unconscious and threw the other off the carrier. Another guard showed up and started shooting at Steve. I used my powers to make a shield around him. Steve jumped up and grabbed a gun. He started shooting. He made his way back to me. The carrier started leaning sideways. We were falling. I dropped the shield and used my powers to hold the carrier in place.

"Grrrr." I gritted my teeth in pain. It was taking a lot out of me. I never used this much power before and I never lifted anything this heavy before. My legs started to shake. The guard shot at Steve again and he kept taking steps backwards. He slipped and fell off the platform but quickly grabbed onto a loose wire.

"STEVE!" I yelled.

"Cap, hit the lever." Tony said.

"I need a minute here!"

"Lever, now!" Steve climbed back onto the platform. We continued to get shot at.

"Steve! Pull the lever!" I screamed out. Steve finally did. Tony came out with a damaged suit and tackled the guard. I stopped using my powers and fell to my knees exhausted. We let out a breath of relief. I looked over at Steve.

"Are you okay?" He asked.

"Yeah." I breathe out. "Yeah, I'm fine." He helped me up. "I've never used that much power before." I said leaning into him.

"Agent Coulson is down." Fury said.

"A medical team is on its way to your location." An agent told him.

"They're here." Fury replied. "They called it."

We found ourselves at the bridge. I was sitting next to Steve with Tony a few chairs away. I was still wearing my suit.

"These were in Phil Coulson's jacket." Fury held a deck of cards. "I guess he never did get you to sign them." He tossed the cards on the table. Steve hesitantly picks one up. It was a picture of him in his first suit from the 40s. "We're dead in the air up here. Our communications, the location of the Cube, Banner, Thor...I got nothing for you. I lost my one good eye. Maybe I had that coming. Yes, we were going to build an arsenal with the Tesseract." Fury slowly walked around the table. "I never put all my chips on that number, though, because I was playing something even riskier." He stopped at the chair next to me. "There was an idea, Stark knows this," He started walking again. "called 'The Avengers initiative'." He stopped at the chair between Steve and Tony. "The idea was to bring together a group of remarkable people, to see if they can become something more. To see if they can work together when we needed them to, to fight the battles that we never could. Phil Coulson died still believing in that idea. In heroes." Tony shot out of his seat and left the room. "Well, it's an old-fashioned notion." Steve looked over at me. He gave me a look of him asking me permission to go follow Tony. I just nodded and looked back down at the table.

"Get some rest." He said to me then got up and left to follow Tony.

"You're more powerful than you realize, Perez." Fury said and I looked up at him. "You held the carrier for 6 minutes and 42 seconds."

"Took a hell of a lot out of me, Nick." I said looking away.

"Practice is what you need. No more hiding." He said and grabbed the cards from the table. I just nodded at him. I slowly got up and walked out of the room. I made it over to the locker room that was assigned to me. I sat down on the bench tired. I took in a deep breath and looked over my shoulder to see the file Hill gave me when I first arrived. I slowly picked it up and held it in front of me. My elbows rested on my knees. I slowly opened the file and started reading through it.