Unexpected

Getting Dirty

I didn't get too far in my search before I was attacked again. It had only been a few minutes and I was looking around the edges of the battle that looked pretty deserted when a blue blast of energy hit me, almost knocking me off my craft and I spun out. I pulled at the handles, trying to regain control, but I couldn't get the craft to obey me before I slammed into the side of a building. The metal scrapped the cement of the building, causing sparks to fly around me as I slide down until I hit the ground where I was thrown off, tumbling away a few feet from my craft. I groaned, trying to push myself off some hard lump under me, rolling onto my stomach. Moving my hand there, I rediscovered that I had that knife. I'm just lucky that I hadn't been stabbed with it after my fall.

Just then another bolt of energy hit merely a foot to my right. My head flicked up to see a Chitauri on foot stalking towards me with one of their alien guns in hand and aimed straight at me. In an instant I had jumped up from the ground, the knife clutched in my hand. Before I could think my fight or flight instincts kicked in and knowing that as soon as I turned around I'd be shot in the back, I surprised the creature by charging straight at it. It shot again, the blast so close to my head that I could feel the momentary heat singeing the side of my face. I refused to even consider for a moment what would've happened if it had actually hit me. Instead, unnaturally quickly, I was right in front of the creature and had slashed at its arm with the knife blade. Its howl of pain was appalling, more like a metallic screech than something made of flesh and bone. Its arm flung out to hit me, but I ducked, managing to jab the knife into the alien's other wrist.

Dropping the gun it lifted its knee sharply, catching me in the chest before I could rise up out of its way. A grunt escaped my lungs and I tried to pull more air into my body as I staggered back, holding the knife point out towards the thing, but it came flying at me in a rage, taking hold of my knife hand in one of its and grabbing for my hair with the other. Ducking my head out of the way I released the blade from my captured hand, and to my surprise, actually caught it with the other before making a swipe with it up the creature's torso. Not giving it even a second to react, I switched the knife back to my right hand and tried to stab it in the chest, but missed as it took a step back, so my blade barely nicking its shoulder. Out of balance from my attempted attack it took ahold of me and flung me away onto the ground.

Jumping up again, I gave it an elbow in the face as it had bent down to grab my prostrate body, following up by swinging with my left arm and giving it a good punch in the face that in turn sent the alien flying several feet away. Thank goodness that my energy power-up from the Tesseract shield was still working! In a few steps I was standing over it, but it didn't appear to be moving. Maybe it had hit its head too hard on the ground during its fall and had been killed by the impact.

It was not so. Just as I was making a move to turn to find my craft and see if it was still working, the creature grabbed my ankles, dragging me down before scrabbling on top of me. I tried to stab at it, but it had taken hold of my arms, trying to pin me down. Its hands covered mine in an attempt to hold them in place. It was strong and it had the upper hand, obviously since it was on top of me, but I found that I was actually making a good fight. Struggling, it took every muscle in my body to keep my arms up from the ground. As soon as I was pinned I would be done for, I was sure of it. Its hot blood from the cut on its torso dripped on me and saliva from its shrieking mouth dribbled on my face, but I refused to let these facts distract me. I had to push it off me, get the upper hand somehow, but I was losing the battle. I gritted my teeth, pushing upwards as the alien put more weight on my hands, trying to force them down. I couldn't keep them up like this, straight up from the ground. I could feel my arms bend further and further towards the ground. Just before I was sure my arm would snap, I twisted to the left suddenly, making the creature follow its own misplaced weight and it tumbled onto its back. In this same movement I flipped on top of it, straddled its body, and ripped my hands from its grasp. With all my strength and with both hands, I plunged the blade into the creature's chest.