Agent Staves; Avengers Assemble [BOOK 1/?]

XVII - an injury and a blast

"Hey there, man! I didn't die, don't worry, you can try again - " Regina grinned brightly at Loki, who was looking at her with raised eyebrows as she took out most of the chitauri flying around him.

"How unfortunate." Loki didn't seem the least bit concerned with her picking off his defence - if anything, he seemed amused. "You're putting in a lot of effort for something you cannot stop, Regina Staves." He hissed at her. Regina couldn't help but feel slightly sick at how he said her name - being incognito for the majority of her carreer, nobody had ever said her name so venomously.

She scoffed, "Believe me, I know that." She nodded, grunting as the chitauri got a hit to her side, sending her nearly off the edge of the commandeered craft. She struggled to hold onto it, just barely managing to pull herself back up. "Oh, you greasy green bastard." She seethed, realising that Loki had taken the chance to get ahead of her. She pressed another button to it, making it go faster to catch up to him. "Sneaky little -" She choked on her last word as she felt a sharp pain in her back. She concentrated her energy on the spot, sending electrical currents up the blade and into the chitauri, blasing it off of the vehicle.

"Miss Staves, you have suffered a severe injury. I suggest you stand down for the time being."

"Staves, what happened to you, talk to me." Tony spoke to her. Regina swallowed down the pain and reached behind her to pull out the blade, throwing it off of the ship as she set it to start again. "I'm good." She said confidently - her only priority now was making sure Loki didn't leave her sight.

"That's not what Jarvis is saying. Tap out, kid, you can't take any more of this-"

"Not your call, Stark." Regina snapped. She stood up straight on the aircraft, readying herself as it lined up with Lokis one. "I said I'm good." She pushed herself off, jumping across to kick off what was essentially Lokis chitauri chauffeur, turning around to give the god a wicked grin. "I've got him right here."

Loki made no move to hurt Regina, but leant forward menacingly. "You're fighting an endless battle. You should listen to them. Stand down. All that will come of this is your death." He said to her. It was less of a threat, Regina thought - to her, it sounded like more of a warning. At lewast the guy had enough of a moral code to not want to murder a teenager, Ironic, since that';s what he had tried to done very recently.

She looked over her shoulder, seeing a figure on the corner of a building ahead of them, and turned back to Loki. "Coming up to you, Barton. Take the shot."

"What? Absolutely not, you can't take that-"

Regina rolled her eyes. "Wasn't a conversation topic. Do it." Barely half a second later, Loki caught an arrow in his fist. He took a glance at it, amused, before looking to Regina with a look of victory, eyebrows furrowing as he noted her smug smile.

"Made you look." She grinned, pushing her hands down on the consold and kicking him in the chest, leveraging herself to roll back over the controls so that when it blew up in his face she didn't get the worst of it, the blast and subsequent explosion of the craft sending her flying through the air with him.

She closed her eyes, concentrating despute the agonising ripping she could feel through her body, and when she hit the floor of the tower it was with the smallest of drops and the maximun amount of pain. "Oh, god, that was such good aim," She groaned, attempting to lift her head as Loki landed with a much heavier thud a little while away.

"Staves, you alive over there?" She heard someone asking, but she couldn't pin the voice well enough anymore. "Regina, do you copy?"

"Stark.... owes me a hundred bucks..." She murmured, taking a shaking breath before letting her eyes fall shut.