We Need More Time

Chapter Five

Outskirts Of New York
Present Time

Abby walks around while shaking her hands out, how could she have been so stupid? Of course, this Bucky wouldn't trust her enough to help! It had taken years to convince her Bucky to even step foot in New York to see Steve from a distance! How could she trust this guy to be any different?!

"Well well well." A snarky voice laughs, causing Abby to whirl around in surprise. She hadn't heard that voice in ages. 

"Echo Frost." Abby hisses while taking a slight step away from the man in front of her. He still looked the same, wearing the dark blue suit that looked too tight to function with his black hair blowing in the non-existent wind. 

"Abby." He chuckles. "So nice to see you messing up another timeline." 

"What do you want?" Abby questions. 

"Oh, the same thing you do." Echo replies. "The sphere."

"You're going to have to kill me to get it first." Abby scoffs. "There's no way in hell I'm letting you near that." 

"That can be arranged." Echo laughs before shooting an arrow of ice towards Abby's head. Immediately, she raises her hands in an 'X' formation in front of her. A large, blue force field appears in front of Abby's body. 

The ice gets absorbed by the force field before it is shot back towards Echo with as much, if not more, force than he had used. Echo jumps out of the way and lands in a crouched position a few feet away, with a large smirk on his face. 

"Oh! I was so sad when you left us!" Echo shouts while shooting more ice particles towards Abby. "I missed our fun little get-togethers!" 

"Really?" Abby cries while attempting to dodge every one that's thrown in her direction. "Cause they seemed a little old to me!" 

Abby uses the momentum to kick Echo in the face, bringing him to the ground and effectively stopping the ice shower. Though Echo doesn't stay down for long and he's soon standing once again. 

"Aren't you wondering how I got here?" Echo laughs while throwing a punch towards Abby.

"Not...really." She grunts after getting hit in the shoulder. 

"Well." Echo states while shoving her against a nearby tree. "Your little lab rat was a great help. Though I doubt there will be a trip back for you." 

He slams her against the tree over and over again until a trickle of blood finds itself down the back of Abby's suit. She shouts in anger and kicks Echo in the gut, sending him back to the ground. He releases Abby and she too falls but Abby quickly uses the tree to stand again. 

"I swear to god." Abby threatens while repeatedly punching and kicking Echo anywhere she could reach. "If you...hurt him...I'll kill you." 

Echo grabs her by the wrist and slams Abby to the ground again. "Oh, sweetheart. He wishes all I did was hurt him." 

Abby watches as Echo's eyes start to turn a bright white, ice travels down his arms and starts to freeze Abby's hands. She could no longer feel them and she knew if he slammed them anywhere, she'd lose them. Abby closes her eyes and tries to force what little fire abilities she had to the surface, it wasn't much but they'd have to do. Abby hadn't trained that side of herself yet. 

The strong feeling of power swirls in her stomach, her whole body increasing in temperature until she's literally scorching the ground below her. Abby screams in anger and a flame erupts across her body, Echo shouts in pain and flies back to avoid any more burns. 

The sound of rockets and approaching citizens fill the air, Abby pushes herself to her elbows to watch Echo smile at her. "Until we see one another again, Abby. This is a whole new world to choose from, maybe we'll see each other again near the statue of liberty...since that's still a thing here." 

"Go home." Abby hisses.

"Not till I'm holding that sphere." Echo scoffs. "Don't worry, I'll take good care of the people here. They haven't met someone like me yet, so it shouldn't be too hard to get their good graces." 

"Maybe it will be after you've fought our daughter." Steve Rogers' voice scoffs from their right. 

Immediately, both of them whip to the side to see the entire team of Avengers standing with their guns aimed towards Echo. Each wore a glare or just a fighting face that made Abby's heart clench, she hadn't seen that for ages either.

"Guess that's my cue to go." Echo laughs. "Abby, don't be too long. It's boring without you one step behind me." 

"You little piece of shit!" Abby screams while shooting up from the ground but Echo is already flying away, his laughter floating back with the breeze that still was nonexistent. 

Abby heaves while placing her hands on her hips. It was even more imperative that she find that sphere, she couldn't let Echo reach it first. Who knows what he'd do back home in order to get his way, her mind slowly floats to Max. She'd just spoken to him! Had it happened before? Was he okay? 

"Abby?" Tony whispers while placing a hand on her shoulder, the blonde jumps away from him with a sharp intake of breath. Tony slowly looks at her with hurt in his eyes, he didn't want to scare away his daughter after losing her not long ago, he actually didn't want to let her go but that didn't seem appropriate at the moment.

"Look, I know you're all trying to fix whatever is broken here." Abby scoffs. "But you can't. There are more oppressing matters that are waiting and I'm not going to sit around pretending to be someone I'm not. I have a sphere to find and a stupid ass motherfucking bitch to destroy. So if you'll do me and my world a favor, just leave me alone. This is hard enough as it is!"

With that, her mask clamps down and Abby shoots into the air. No one makes a move to stop her, though they all watch the black suit fly in the direction that Echo had gone but much faster than he had been going.

"Cap," Natasha whispers. "I don't think this is going to be as easy as we hoped." 

"Yeah," Steve mumbles. "I know."

"Who was that guy?" Peter demands. "Do you think he's an agent that's feeding her this thing about other dimensions? Is he one of the agents that are keeping her where she is?"

"He probably is." Sam nods to confirm. "If they have someone pretending to be an enemy, Abby will always go after them. Which means, during their fights, he can do whatever Hydra needs him to do." 

"Well, we have to go after her!" Pietro yells. "Abby is my best friend! Your daughter! We can't let her face this alone, no matter how hard we thought it was going to be. Abby needs us, more than ever." 

"Hate to say it but he's right." Clint gruffs. "We have to go after her." 

"Yeah, I agree." Tony nods. "But first we need a plan, something to lure her in so we can at least make her weak enough to get into the tower." 

"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" Peter smiles while bouncing on his feet.

"Yes but don't smile." Tony orders. "It is such an immoral thing to do." 

"Okay..." Steve slowly puts his hand in the air. "What the hell is going on?"