Bird Set Free | Natasha Romanoff ✓

Chapter Forty-Five

Aquila was still on high alert at the sudden change in the atmosphere with the eerie feeling that had settled deep within her bones, she wasn't taking any chances. She had already leapt to her feet, ready to go protect Natasha if need be, even though she could protect herself just fine. Aquila had just turned behind her to help Quinn up but was only met with Quinn's horror-stricken face. 

"Aquila. . ."

"Quinn?" Aquila asked in concern as she watched her close friend disintegrate into ashes right in front of her. 

"Tell Steve I love him, will you?" Quinn mumbled, leaning back. "It's all going to be okay."  

"Quinn! You can't do this. Steve needs you!" Aquila continued to shout at her but Quinn only stared up at the sky, a single tear rolling down her cheek both she disappeared completely. 

Aquila sunk back to the ground in shock. They had lost. They had actually fucking lost. And it had cost Quinn her life. Her mind immediately went back to Natasha, praying, praying that she hadn't been given the same fate. 

Aquila made her way back to the clearing where she had attempted to fight with Thanos only a few minutes ago, now he was nowhere to be seen. The giant purple dick had probably run off the second he was done ruining the lives of millions. 

Aquila looked around at the significantly smaller group that had gathered in the clearing. Grief already settling on their features. Before looking directly towards Steve, dreading telling him about Quinn. 

Natasha Romanoff ran into the clearing, clutching at her side, looking in shock at Vision's corpse, bleached of all color. 

"Oh, thank god." Aquila quickly muttered, moving over towards Nat. 

"What is this? What the hell is happening?" Rhodey shouted, looking around. 

"Oh, god."

The strange device that had once belonged to Nick Fury continued to emit a beeping sound as it was hooked up to the battery system within the Avengers Compound. The red, blue and gold patterns that lit up the screen were still highlighting its surrounds in their colors until suddenly the battery finally gave way, the beeping slowing to a halt and the color giving away to a black screen. 

Aquila Cadman stood in the corner of the room, slowly shaking her head as she turned to look at the holographic screen in the middle of the room. 

The red lights that lit up the globe in front of her were only becoming more and more frequent. The global missing people record was already well into the three billion range and the numbers were only climbing by the millions as each second passed. 

There were already so many people missing in the room at that very moment. Wanda, Sam, Bucky, Quinn, Bea among the billions of others. 

Even Keira was gone, the pressure quickly becoming too much as she had left the Compound suddenly to go look for her missing father, trying to cling desperately onto the last part of her biological family that she had left. 

Aquila shared a look with Natasha who was standing next to Steve, a look of horror clear as day across her face. 

"This is a nightmare," Steve mumbled, turning to face the two of them, the numbers only continuing to climb. 

"I've had better nightmares." 

"Hey," the three of them in the room turned at the sound of Rhodey's voice in the doorway of the room. "So that thing just stopped doing. . . whatever the hell it was doing."

Aquila, Steve, and Natasha followed behind Rhodey into the lab, where Bruce still sat working on the computer trying to analyze why the transmitter device had suddenly shut off. 

"What do we got?"

"Whatever signal it was sending finally crapped out," Bruce informed the remaining team as they gathered in front of the device. 

"I thought we bypassed the battery?" Steve asked turning to Bruce. 

"We did," Rhodey told him in return. "It's still plugged in, it just. . . stopped."

"Reboot it and send the signal again," Steve told Bruce.

"We don't even know what this is - "

"Fury did," Natasha cut in, looking around at the fragile team. "Just do it, please. And tell me the second you get a signal. I wanna know who is on the other end of that thing."

The team turned around only to come face to face with a young blonde woman. Her suit was red and blue with a bright gold star sitting in the middle of her chest.

"Where's Fury?"