Heroine ϟ Marvel [3]

10.15

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Destiny Arrives

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"Did it work?"

"Honey?"

"Bruce, you alright?"

"Don't move him."

"You guys hear that?"

"Guys, I think it—"

"Oh, God..."

"Everyone get down!"

Ana flinched awake with a groan, eyes opening when a drop of cold water hit her forehead, trailing down the side of her face. It was dark. The air was thick with smoke and ash. Her lungs were full of it. She strained to make out any sort of indication of where she was. Her eyes still burned. She was on her back. Something heavy and ragged pressed against her chest. Another drop smacked against her. She tried to move her hands and feet. Felt the way they brushed against dust and debris. It surrounded her. When Ana went to stretch her torso, to remove the unwelcome weight on her, she cried out when she felt pain radiating from her left side. The sensation seemed to let her memories of what happened mere minutes ago kick in.

The Avengers Compound had been attacked.

The last thing Ana remembered was a seeing a dark spaceship overhead when the panels on the skylights retreated. Bruce was hurt, lying on the ground. They all rushed to him. His right arm, the one that held the gauntlet, was lifeless. The Infinity Stones had taken their toll. Tony sprayed cooling foam over Bruce's arm to protect the limb from any further deterioration. Richard had been fussing over Ana, trying to get her to concentrate when she had frozen in place. The accustomed sense of danger warming the back of her skull, keeping her motionless. She recalled the sound of energy blasts closing in, barely able to warn her friends in time before everything went black.

At the thought of her friends, her family, her team... Ana's fingers flexed, curling into fists of fiery plasma. With gritted teeth and hardening determination, she ignored the pain as if it was only in her imagination and got up. The heavy object, a piece of the laboratory's ceiling, was tossed aside like a minor inconvenience. She clambered to her feet, using fallen tables as a crutch. She dusted herself off. The armour of her new suit without a single scratch. Ana huffed out a chuckle. Tony was quite the marvel.

She could make out a fizzling source of light ahead and moved towards it, stepping over rubble and littered equipment. At the sight of a cracked screen by the door, Ana's smile was wiped clean off her face. Oh, no. The explosions had sent her into one of the secure lab rooms, only accessible by a code. The blast door had locked her inside. She recognised the moment she found herself in. On the Quantum Tunnel test run, Ana had ended up in the exact same spot, a week in advance, in an alternate reality. That was seven days ago. Ana's breathing picked up. This couldn't be happening. Not again. History repeating? Or future taking shape? Either way, Ana didn't want to go through it twice. She leaned against the wall, raising her right index finger to put in her code. She held her breath. Pressed a sequence of numbers. On the test run, her code didn't work. Ana let out a sigh when the broken screen lit up green in confirmation, accepting her code. She stepped back as the door creaked and groaned, the hydraulic system working hard to offer her a way out. It managed to lift upwards a few inches. Ana squinted at the narrow opening. There was no way she could fit through there.