The Winter Warrior // Captain America

«Chapter 35»

"Buck!" Anna shouted as she spotted him waiting for them outside the entrance hall. She, America and Sam came to a stop. "You okay?" 

"Yeah, fine. You? Where's the jet?" Bucky asked.

"We're fine. The jet's in hangar five," she said. 

"We gotta go. Come on!" Steve shouted in her ear and Anna flinched at the sudden sound. 

"We're on our way. Let's go," America answered. The four of them took a sprint, America purposefully slowing her pace, and quickly caught up with Steve and the others.

A sudden bright beam carving into the ground stopped them in their tracks. Anna looked up and saw a red-skinned man in a green suit and a cape hovering in the air. This must be Vision, she concluded, remembering Steve talking about him in the car.

"Captain Rogers!" he called out. "I know you believe what you're doing is right. But for the collective good, you must surrender now." 

Tony, Natasha, T'Challa, Rhodey, and Spider-Man landed on the other side of the line, standing opposite of Steve's group, metaphorically and literally. Vision joined them, soundlessly lowering himself to the ground.

"What do we do now, Cap?" asked Sam softly.

"We fight," Steve stated firmly before stepping forward, walking toward the others with a solid pace. 

The fast pace quickly changed into a steady jog before they broke out in a sprint. Sam and Wanda took off in the air and so did Tony, Rhodey, and Vision. America sped off, leaving behind nothing but a blurry line.

T'Challa leapt into the sky and aimed his fist at Anna's head, but she swiftly ducked aside and kicked him away from her. He restored rather quickly and began landing punches and kicks, Anna doing the exact same thing.

What once had been a properly functioning team of superheroes, was now a group of individuals who each fought for what they thought was right. Anna fought for her freedom, Steve fought to keep his sister safe, both Bucky and Sam helped their friends, America helped her husband and long lost friend, Tony wanted to keep the Avengers together, and T'Challa wanted to avenge his father's death.

Anna saw the opportunity and landed an uppercut to Black Panther's head. He fell backwards but instantly came back up. He wrapped his hand around her throat and she did the same, pushing him away from her. She kneed him in the stomach but he barely flinched. "I didn't kill your father," she told him through gritted teeth.

"Then why did you run?" T'Challa asked her before Anna regained the strength in her arm and managed to pry his hand from her throat. He twisted her right arm to the back and she felt it crack before he kicked her in the side. She was flung through the air and hit a container. 

She looked up and saw T'Challa's claws approaching quickly toward her throat. She held her breath but T'Challa's claw was stopped mid-air by red wisps. Wanda Maximoff rushed forward and flailed her hands through the sky. T'Challa was thrown aside and Wanda jogged toward Anna, heaving her off the floor. "Thanks," Anna panted. 

"No problem. Come on," Wanda said and the two took off. Wanda went after Rhodey and Anna sought her brother. 

She spotted him dropping a container on Spider-Man, who was luckily strong enough to hold it up. She sprinted up to Steve. "How did you know he could hold that?" she asked him.

"I didn't," he said before taking cover behind a pile of crates wrapped into plastic foil 

She sighed before focusing on the task at hand, getting out of here. "We gotta go. That guy is probably in Siberia by now," she told her brother. 

Steve looked up. "We gotta draw out the flyers," he said. "I'll take Vision, you get to the jet." 

"No!" exclaimed Sam through the comms. "You get to the jet. Both of you. The rest of us aren't getting out of here." 

"He's right. If we wanna win this one, some of us are gonna have to lose it," Bucky said.

"This isn't the real fight, Steve!" America added.

Anna looked at Steve and he said, "Alright, guys. What's our play?" 

"We need a diversion. Something big," Sam replied.

"I got something kinda big, but I can't hold it very long," said Scott. "On my signal, run like hell. And if I tear myself in half, don't come back for me." 

Anna frowned in confusion. "He's gonna tear himself in half?" she asked quizzically.

"You sure about this, Scott?" Steve asked.

"I do it all the time!" he said. "I mean, once. In a lab. And I passed out." A short moment of silence fell where everyone awaited Scott's next move. Through the comms, Anna heard him chant, "I'm the boss, I'm the boss, I'm the boss... I'm the boss!" 

The next second, Ant-Man expanded until he was about as tall as a house, if not taller. He held onto War Machine's foot as he laughed maniacally.

"I guess that's the signal..." Steve muttered, completely baffled by the sight before him.

"Way to go, Tic-Tac!" Sam exclaimed.

"C'mon," Anna told Steve and they took off. Scott distracted the others and they had a window to get to the jet. They were close, just a couple dozen feet. But before they could even get close to the hangar, the control tower next to it came thundering out after Vision had used his beam to cut it in half.

Anna slowed her pace but the tower was held up by Wanda's red wisps. Steve sped up and Anna followed closely behind. As they walked underneath the floating rubble, it suddenly came crashing down on them. Anna leapt forward and escaped right on time, and so did Steve.

They were forced to stop when Natasha Romanoff stood between them and the jet. "You're not gonna stop, are you?" she asked Steve.

"You know I can't," said Steve.

She sighed. "I'm gonna regret this." She raised her fist and shot a taser blast at them, but it flew right through the space between Steve and Anna and hit the person behind them. Black Panther sank to his knees, convulsing and shaking at the electricity from the taser. "Go," Natasha told Steve and Anna and they nodded before sprinting toward the jet while Natasha kept T'Challa at a safe distance by continuing to shoot taser blasts at him.

Anna climbed into the jet and Steve followed quickly. He sat down in the cockpit and Anna strapped herself to the seat behind him. Steve turned on the jet and it hovered above the floor for a second before it took off, flying over the heads of T'Challa and Natasha. 

T'Challa tried grabbing onto the wheel, but it retracted into the plane and he dropped down, losing his last chance to get to Anna. 

She let out a sigh and closed her eyes, but opened them again when she heard repulsors approaching from behind the jet. She looked to the side and found both Iron Man and War Machine closing in quicker than she would like. "Steve, we have a tail," she informed her brother and he glanced over his shoulder. He then pressed the lever forward and the jet sped up.