afterglow - tony stark

39

      Things seemed bleak.

Phil Coulson was dead. Thor had fallen in the glass cell. And then he heard the news that Eira fell off the helicarrier along with the Hulk.

He felt like his heart plummeted into his stomach. He was saving the plane when he could have been saving her. He felt sick.

It brought him so much dread to try to get ahold of her through the earpiece because...what if she didn't respond? What if she was gone...forever? He couldn't breath right as he spoke, hoping to hear her voice.

                Then she spoke.

            "You think you could get rid of me that easy?" he could hear her voice and he just knew that she had a small smile.

             "How did you possibly survive that?"

           "Hulk. He caught me," she answered. "I'm with Bruce now and I guess we'll head into New York. Just tell me when you find Loki."

             "Will do, angel."

              _____

               Eira was walking with Bruce towards the city. He was now wearing new clothes and he had a slightly anxious look on his face, "I'm not sure this is such a good idea. The Hulk is...chaos."

               Eira told him that when Loki was located, they would need the Hulk again. And when Tony did get back to her about Loki being at the Stark Tower, it was obvious that was going to be true.

             "He's more like a child," Eira clarified before she gave him a soft look. "And I promise that when this is all over, you'll come back."

               "I don't really trust promises, Eira."

             "You can trust mine," she smiled before they saw a blue beam shoot up into the sky in the distance and then aliens started coming down from the portal into space.

              "Woah," Eira said as her breath hitched as Bruce commented at the same time. "Well, that's not something I ever thought I'd see."

                She gave him a look then before she said gently, "We're going to need the big guy."

            Bruce sighed a bit. Then he closed his eyes and when he opened them again, they were glowing green. His body started to ripple and grow bigger until the Hulk stood in front of her.

             He stared down at her with a soft look as she smiled, "Hulk...we have a problem, big guy."

             She pointed at the portal into space in the distance, "You think you can handle an army?"

            He roared at the challenge before she smiled wider, "Then let's go handle an army, shall we?"

        Hulk quickly picked her up and set her down to sit on his massive shoulder. He held a hand over her legs to keep her steady before he took a massive leap into the air with a ferocious roar.

_____

They were flying through the air practically from one of the leaps that the Hulk took. She had her arms wrapped partially around his neck to hold on.

But she saw her friends below being attacked by the aliens and she raised one of her hands slightly, making small lightning strikes form in the air above the heads of the aliens before the lightning hit them; they all fell down at once.

Thor was confused as he did not control that lightning before the Hulk landed before all of them. Eira was sitting on his shoulder before she smiled, "It seems like you guys could use some help."