Next Avengers: The Flight of the Hawk

New York

James woke up and something felt different. He grunted and stretched, pushing his arms forwards and arching his back inwards. He shook his head and looked around, somewhat confused. Everything was in black and white. He sat up and looked at the mirror nearby, yelping in surprise. He looked like a dog! He looked himself over in surprise and fear, whining.
"<Hey!" he barked, turning circles. "<What's going on?!" (A/N: Anything past the arrowhead in the quote is animal speak.)
"<Quiet down," someone growled nearby. "<AAAH! Why do I have claws?!"
"<I have no idea," someone purred nearby.
"<Am I a cat?" someone asked.
"<EVERYONE MEET IN THE ENTRY HALL!" James yelled, jumping off the bed and running towards the door, slamming headfirst into it and bouncing onto his rear. He shook his head and got up, grabbing the doorknob in his teeth and twisting it until it opened. He ran outside, slipping on the wood floor and yelping, landing on his stomach. A grey spotted hyena burst out laughing nearby, walking up to James.
"<You SLIPPED!" he laughed, lying down in front of James. "<You look stupid."
"<Thanks, Pym," James snapped back, nipping his nose before standing up and walking past him. Pym yelped and rubbed his nose before standing up and following James.
"<What are you doing?" a young lioness asked, walking up beside them and making them jump.
"<Torin?" James asked.
"<Yes," Torin replied. "<Hello, James."
"<You're a lion!" Pym exclaimed.
"<And you're a hyena," Torin replied.
"<Who's a hyena?" a black panther asked, walking out beside them.
"<Pym," Torin replied. "<And you're a panther, Azari."
"<I know," Azari replied.
"<Do you guys know what happened?" a spider monkey said, swinging out the door.
"<No idea, Penny," James replied, looking back at her as he lead the pack of animals to the entry hall to meet Peter and Sam. "<As far as I know, we all woke up like this."
"<This is so odd," Azari said, looking at the group. "<These things don't normally happen."
"<I think we all know that," Pym replied sarcastically.
"<Hey, guys!" Peter yelled from the entrance hall. He was a spider monkey too, albeit a bigger one.
"<Dad!" Penny yelled, running up to him and hugging him.
"<Hey, sweetie," Peter said, hugging her back. "<You okay?"
"<Fine," Penny replied, backing away. "<Where's Sam?" Peter grimaced.
"<Trying to cope with himself," he replied. "<He hasn't accepted it as well as we have."
"<What did he turn into?" Torin asked hesitantly.
"<He told me not to tell," Peter replied slowly.
"<What?" James growled, baring his teeth for a half second.
"<A-"
"<DONT SAY IT!" Sam shrieked. Peter flinched and looked up the stairs.
"<I WASNT!" Peter replied. He sighed and rolled his eyes. "<It's pretty bad."
"<Lets go find out," Penny said cheekily, jumping onto the stairs and running up the banister on all fours.
"<I wouldn't," Peter replied. James followed her, jumping up the stairs along with Torin and Pym. Azari hesitated, but followed with Peter. Penny opened the door to Sam's room, revealing a somewhat destroyed room with red, blue and yellow feathers scattered everywhere. A macaw with mainly blue feathers, but with a red crown in the shape of a star on its forehead and yellow-tipped wings, three yellow circles in an upside-down triangle shape on its chest, and yellow feet was standing on the dresser. Pym started laughing the minute he saw it, rolling on his back and kicking out with his back feet.
"<Sam?" Penny laughed, looking at him.
"<Guys, be nice," Torin snapped.
"<Leave me alone!" Sam squawked, flying into the closet.
"<He's a parrot?" Azari asked, wrinkling up his nose.
"<Uh, yeah," James said, looking at them. "<Back off."
"<Sam?" Peter said, swinging into the closet. "<I tried to stop them. I'm sorry."
"<Just go," Sam replied, curling up in a corner. Peter sighed, swinging back out and glaring at the kids.
"<Get out," he said, whacking all them. "<Go! Leave the bird alone!" The kids all walked out with Peter, feeling slightly guilty.
"<So..." Pym said. "<What now?"
"This," someone replied, teleporting nearby in a swirl of green smoke. Everyone looked over at them, gasping. Loki stood there, smirking.
"<Loki!" Peter yelled.
"Exactly," Loki replied. "You can thank me for your little transformation, too."
"<Why you-" James snarled, barking at him.
"No one likes a noisy dog," Loki said, snapping his fingers and making a muzzle appear around James' mouth. He whimpered and pushed at it, rolling around and trying to get it off.
"<You turn us back!" Torin roared, stalking towards him with Azari on her right flank.
"And why should I?" Loki replied. "It's quite fun seeing you so unsure of yourselves. Sam was my favorite, honestly. I always thought he was loud and obnoxious." Torin roared and attacked, Loki disappearing at the last second. She fell threw as he appeared nearby, Azari whirling and attacking him with a snarl. He managed to get a few good swipes at Loki before the trickster teleported again, right to where Pym was waiting. He lunged forwards and bit Loki on the arm, holding on tightly until he was thrown off with a concussion blast. Loki teleported to hover in midair where no one could reach, firing blasts of green energy. Peter and Penny had gotten the muzzle off of James while the others were fighting, so he could fight, but it seemed all for naught. They were getting picked off one at a time.
"<Why are you doing this?" James barked.
"Because I want to rebuild the world the way it was meant to be," Loki replied. "With me as its king."
"<Not this again," Peter groaned, facepalming.
"Silence!" Loki yelled, firing at Peter and nearly hitting him. Peter shrieked and backed up, scurrying up onto the couch with Penny. "You will all bow before me!"
"<Never!" Torin roared, backing away from another blast. "<Even as animals, we will fight back!"
"<And you can't stop us," Pym added, getting back on his feet.
"Are you sure about that?" Loki replied, starting to form a spell in the air. The animals backed into a pod, not sure if they should fight back, escape, or face the inevitable. Suddenly a blur of blue, red and yellow came streaking in, dropping something on Loki's head and blowing it up, knocking Loki out and disabling the spell. Sam flew down and landed on Loki's head, folding his wings up against his body.
"Polly brought a cracker," he said, almost seeming to smirk.
"<Sam!" Peter screeched, jumping down off the couch and running over. "<You did it!"
"<Couldn't have done it without Black Widow," Sam replied, using a wing to gesture up the stairs. "<I borrowed one of her grenades."
"<So, I'm assuming you're okay with this now," Pym said.
"<I'll deal," Sam replied. "<It's got its perks."
"<So Loki's trying to take over the world again," Peter said, crossing his arms. "<He knows we're vulnerable."
"<Well, most of us don't even have opposable thumbs," Azari stated, lying down and looking at his paw. "<Or opposable anything."
"<Hey, I've got talons," Sam said, lifting up a foot. "<Pretty close to hands."
"<I said most of us," Azari growled, making Sam screech and flutter backwards.
"<This is going to be extremely hard to work with," Penny sighed. "<Even though we may have hands and tails, they're pretty small."
"<We can't shoot a gun, or a bow," Peter added. "<Heck, we probably couldn't open the fridge."
"<We're going to have to rely on each other more than we ever have," Torin said, lying down as well. Pym sat down nearby with James. "<We all have traits that everyone else doesn't."
"<At least we all kept our brains," James said. "<Mostly."
"<Yeah, I have a weird craving for dead stuff," Pym said. "<Think I could eat Wolverine if I found his body?"
"<No," everyone replied.
"<Nevertheless, we all need to try to operate like normal," Penny said. "<Until we can reverse the curse."
"There's only one way to reverse it," Loki grunted from nearby. "And it's the hardest way of all."
"<What?" James asked, walking over and baring his teeth.
"An act of true love," Loki replied. "Oh, and it never comes as easily as a kiss."
"<Someone's been watching too much Disney," Sam finally said after a few minutes of silence.