The Soldier's Goddess

Rescue

        "So we all know the plan," hissed Steve, and they all murmured in agreement. The S.H.I.E.L.D. jet had landed in Vienna, where the Doctor's last known position had been. Pepper had, rather reluctantly, left New York to stay at her mom's for a bit, until this was all sorted. She understood why though, so as soon as she had been driven off, they made their way to Vienna. Reed had brought the rest of his team with him; Susan Richards, aka the Invisible Woman, and Reed's wife; Johnny Storm, aka the Human Torch; and Ben Grimm, aka the Thing. With Steve were Natasha, Bruce, and Clint. Tony was flying in his suit, behind them. A large group of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents were with them too. They reached the mansion where the co-ordinates had sent them, and landed. Creeping in, they found it initially deserted, but continued searching, while Tony flew around the outside of the building to reach the upper floors. A loud cry from above stopped them dead in their tracks.

        "Kari," whispered Steve and ran towards the sound, the others hot in pursuit.

        "I'm not telling you anything, you bastard," she screamed at her torturer. 

        "Oh you may not need to, my pretty," he was saying, in a silky, but scary voice. "We will get it one way or another, but it will be quicker and much less painful for you if you tell me now."

        "Do I look stupid?" He hit her across the face with an iron bar and Steve couldn't take it any longer. Storming into the room, he threw his shield at her attacker, knocking him to the ground. The battle was over pretty quickly, when, refusing to surrender, and about to throw a knife at Kari's head, Natasha shot him between the eyes and he fell to the ground. Untying her, Steve wrapped his arms round Kari, who was sobbing into his shoulder.

        "It looks worse than it actually is," she grimaced, trying to stand up, wiping her eyes on her dirty sleeve. She was limping badly, so Steve picked her up and carried her back to the jet, while some of the agents stayed behind to clear up and find out what they could from what was left there. Kari started crying again. "I thought I'd never see you again," she said, as Steve tried to stop tears from falling down his cheeks. "I knew you would come for me, but as much as I tried, I wasn't sure if I would hod out before he would end up killing me." She curled up into Steve again, then suddenly bolted up straight. 

        "What's the matter?" Steve asked her.

        "Tony, I need to talk to Tony."

        "Why?"

        "This was just a distraction," she said. "They wanted you all out of the Tower. They are after something in Tony's lab. Something to do with the arc reactor."

        "Capsicle, tell her I heard her, I'm headed home now," Tony yelled over Steve's ear piece. "Meet me there."

        "You heard him," shouted Steve. The rest of the agents were just running back to the jet now, having heard the whole thing.

Back in New York, they headed straight for Stark Tower. 

        "Looks like it's already started," smiled Bruce. Everyone looked out of the window to where he was looking and were greeted with the sight of Tony falling sixty-eight floors to the ground.

        "Not again." Natasha sighed.

        "Does he do this alot?" asked Ben.

        "Yeah, pretty much," Clint replied. "Though the effect is better when he's actually wearing his Iron Man suit." By the time they landed on top of Stark Tower, JARVIS had deployed the latest suit which had gone flying down to meet Tony and engulfed him. He flew back up pointed his blasters at Doctor Faustus, but Reed and Ben had gotten there first. It was all over pretty quickly, thankfully. They never got what they were looking for, as they hadn't counted on JARVIS defending the Tower until everyone got back.

After Fury had the Doctor back to S.H.I.E.L.D., Tony looked at the chaos all around him.

        "Pepper's gonna kill me," he said. Natasha caught Kari's eye, and they both started chuckling.

        "Come on, mate, we'll help clear it all up," Bruce said. Between them all, Avengers and Fantastic Four, things were cleared and tidied pretty quickly. Kari wasn't allowed to help. Steve and Bruce had nagged her to go to the hospital ward (yes, Stark Tower had everything), so she went down with Natasha and Susan. They helped her wash and get into a fresh bed there, then once Bruce was ready, he came and checked her over; Steve hot on his heels.

        "She'll be fine, Steve," he said. A night here to rest and she will be ok to carry on as normal." He stitched up a couple of wounds on her back, and left her be.

        "Thankyou," she said, gripping Susan's hand and smiling.

        "It's ok, Kari," she replied. "I'm glad to help out friends."

Steve sat with her for a while longer, chatting about everything and anything, except what had happened tonight. There was always time for that tomorrow. Once she had drifted off to sleep, with Steve holding her hand and stroking her head, he kissed her gently and went back upstairs.