THINKING OUT LOUD || Avengers

-)Thirty Eight: Home Décor the Norse Way(-

It's difficult to keep track of a story with so many moving parts when you don't have smash cuts to fall back on. They just don't work as well in writing. Look, I'll show you:

Krill watched the screen in front of him with growing apprehension, Greg taking a stance against the back wall of the room with his hands folded militarily behind his back. 

In a lab around two hundred yards to their right, buried beneath the thick cement that had built the RAF base back in the thirties, Daniella Attberry sat on a table like the kind you'd see in a science classroom. Her feet swung over the gap as she watched Natasha Romanoff tear apart a cupboard full of chemicals with an intense and methodic fury.

And far over their heads, Sam Wilson and the Vision decomissioned (read: exploded) aircraft after aircraft on the surface, and lightning whipped turrets and towers and tarmac into a hurricane of rubble that sent black-clothed people scattering directly into deadly swathes of red light. A blonde figure in tight jeans with a leather jacket stalked through the carnage. Jogging at her heels was none other than Captain America, who- to be perfectly honest- seemed relieved just to take a back seat at the whole 'Captain' deal.

See, on a screen that would be seven seconds. Boom, boom, boom- we've established the situation. Move on. But here, that's a whole tenth of this chapter. I only get nine more sections like that before I have to wrap this thing up for another week. I have to establish where everyone is in case you forgot, progress the story, probably throw in a couple of puns and wrap it up in two thousand words. And this is why the movies are better (other than their writers being professional, experienced, fantastic at their jobs and, you know, paid).

Anyway, since we're running out of room here, let's go back to the second of those shots. Where our protagonist, now with less than three hours of life left in her, waits while a Russian spy takes a crash course in chemistry.

With a frustrated sound, Natasha slammed the door to the fifth of the cupboards she had excavated shut. She spun to face Dani, "You recognised the thing they put in you. What was it?"

"I'm... Not good with names." Dan said apologetically.

Nat fought the urge to hit something, "Okay, what does it do?" 

"Slows down my heart. So blood doesn't get to my brain hole." She tapped the side of her head.

"Right. So logically..." Nat turned to the pile of drugs she had cultivated on the floor, snatching up a syringe and going of the label. There was a doubtful expression on her face.

Dan tried to peak over her shoulder, "What is it?"

"A steroid. Ish."

"What will that do?" She asked.

"Speed up your pulse again." Nat pulled a face, "Or give you a heart attack."

Dan frowned, "That doesn't sound good."

"Well, let me know if you think of another option." Nat pocketed the syringe, "Now we get out of here."

She nodded, and hopped off the table. Or tried to. As soon as her feet hit the floor, Dan felt her legs turn to jelly. Nat was only just able to catch her by the armpits before the went down.

"Whoa." Dan blinked up at the pale oval haloed in red that she was pretty sure had been a super spy only a second earlier, "Do you usually go like that?"

"Like what?"

"All splodgy and..." Dan shook her head thickly, "Can you please turn the lights down a little? They're hurting my eyes."

The shape that used to be Natasha Romanoff hoisted Dan's arm around her shoulder, "We need to move."

And Dani completely agreed. They would move. Just as soon as she remembered what legs were.