[A few weeks later] [Night]
Peter Parker sat on the edge of a rooftop, mask on, feet dangling over the fifteen-story building. Beside him, Lorna Dane hovered a few feet off the concrete, arms crossed, green hair fluttering.
After six months of SHIELD training and simulations that hurt way more than they were supposed to, finally, they got their official hero licenses. Which meant tonight was their first patrol without someone barking orders in their ears.
Lorna glanced at him sideways. "So," she said casually, "how's your back, Pete?"
Peter groaned. "First of all, rude. Second, I told you, it was one spinal compression incident. One."
She smirked. "You screamed."
"I was emotionally expressing pain."
She laughed, drifting upside down just to be annoying. "Still sore?"
Peter stretched, then immediately regretted it. "A little. But I heal fast. Unlike someone who literally floats everywhere."
"Oh, please," Lorna said. "You shoot webs and even got a cool suit."
"Look who's talking," He pointed at her wristband. "You have the Widow edition suit, which is much cooler than mine."
She tilted her head. "You're just mad."
"I am extremely mad and a tiny bit jealous," Peter said. "It is wildly unfair that you can fly by manipulating the Earth's magnetic field. Do you know how many physics rules you break?"
"Enough to get this cool suit," She winked as she covered her arms with the black nanites before retracting them back.
Peter rolled his shoulders. "Okay, serious question. How fast can you actually go?"
Lorna grinned. "Supersonic."
Peter blinked. "No."
"Yes."
"How supersonic?"
She shrugged. "I've clocked over 761 miles per hour."
Peter stared at her. "What are you, a green missile?"
"Hey," she said. "I slow down near buildings. Usually."
"Usually is doing a lot of work there."
A scream echoed from the street below.
They both looked down. Below was a mugger with a knife. A scared man was pinned against an ATM, trembling.
Peter sighed. "License holders' first intervention?"
"After you, web boy."
Peter launched himself off the building, web snapping tight as he swung down in a clean arc. He landed between the mugger and the victim, hands up.
"Okay, buddy," Peter said cheerfully. "Let's all take a breath and reconsider our life choices. Put that knife down and surrender."
The mugger slashed wildly. "Get the fuck away from me, creeps!"
The knife vanished mid-swing.
The guy froze, staring at his empty hand as the blade flew upward and stuck flat against a nearby lamppost, humming softly.
Lorna floated down behind him. "Metal," she said lightly. "Bad matchup."
Peter webbed the mugger to the sidewalk before he could process reality.
"See," Peter said, helping the victim up. "That was great teamwork."
The guy thanked them about twelve times and ran off. Peter called the cops.
Police sirens approached.
Lorna lifted an eyebrow. "Next?"
A car engine roared nearby, tires squealing.
"Hey! Stop! Thief!" A middle-aged guy ran after the car.
They both looked at each other.
"Race you," Peter said as he decided to activate his boosters.
"You can try."
She vanished in a green streak.
"Hey," Peter yelled, already shooting forward like a bullet. "That was not a fair start."
By the time Peter reached the intersection, the stolen car was already suspended three feet off the ground, doors yanked open, thief dangling upside down by his jacket zipper.
Lorna floated above the hood, arms folded.
Peter landed on the light post, beside the car, breathing a little heavier. "You know," he said, "You could've just stopped the car without flexing your powers like normal heroes?"
"Normal heroes are boring."
He webbed the thief to a light pole. "You're impossible."
"You're slow."
"Ouch."
They took off again after calling the cops, heading back toward the rooftops. This time, Peter beat her by a second, landing in a crouch and throwing his hands up in victory. Well, she let him win for once.
"Ha."
Lorna touched down a moment later, unimpressed. "Congratulations. You won against someone who stopped to enjoy the view."
Peter flopped onto his back, staring at the sky. "Still counts."
She sat beside him, legs hanging over the edge, city lights reflecting in her eyes.
...
[Meanwhile… Stark Tower] [Med Lab]
Natasha lay back on the medical bed with her tummy exposed. Six months in, she was used to the checkup routine.
Tony stood beside the holographic display, arms crossed. Streams of data floated in the air like DNA readouts, neural development, metabolic stability and energy spectrum analysis.
"Okay," Tony said, scrolling through the holographic display before closing the device. "Everything looks normal and zero exotic energy spikes." He walked over to Nat and kissed her forehead.
"You aren't feeling any unusual discomfort or..."
Before Tony could start with his regular worried rant, Natasha pressed her palm over his mouth...
"MMMM!"
"I'm alright, Tony," She said with a little chuckle. She loves the way he takes care of her every day. "Take a deep breath and relax."
Natasha pulled her hand away and smirked when Tony blinked like his brain needed a reboot.
"You worry like it's an Olympic sport," she said. "If gold medals existed for overthinking, you'd already have three."
Tony snorted and leaned against the edge of the med bed. "Hey. I'm allowed. You're carrying a tiny Romanoff-Stark hybrid. So, we have to be careful."
She reached out and hooked a finger in the collar of his shirt, tugging him closer. "Relax. I feel good. Better than good, actually."
Tony raised an eyebrow. "Define better."
Natasha kissed him. Slow at first, then not so slow. Her hand slid to the back of his neck, familiar and confident, and she smiled against his mouth when she felt him tense.
"Okay," Tony murmured when they finally broke apart. "Not complaining, just taking notes."
She rested her forehead against his. "I don't know what it is," she said, lowering her voice. "Hormones, probably. Or maybe it's you walking around like a responsible genius dad. Either way, I've been… distracted and... 70% of the time horny."
Tony laughed softly. "You're blaming me for this."
"Absolutely," she said without hesitation. "One hundred percent your fault. You and your stupid concern and your stupid kissing and snuggling."
She kissed him again, shorter this time, teasing. Tony's hands hovered like he was trying very hard to remember this was a medical lab and not a terrible place to lose focus.
"I love you," he said quietly.
Natasha smiled. "I know."
Then Tony stiffened.
The lights in the lab flickered. Every sensor in the tower spiked at once. Tony's eyes snapped to the glass wall as the night sky outside lit up in a violent bloom of color. A massive rainbow explosion tore across the clouds, bending light and space.
'Bifrost?! What the fuck is going on?' Tony thought.
He turned back to Natasha instantly.
She had already pushed herself up on one elbow, calm despite everything. She met his eyes and nodded once.
"Go," she said. "I'm fine. We're fine."
Tony hesitated for half a second, then nodded. He tapped his wristwatch.
Nanites poured out, flowing over him like liquid metal, forming his classic red and gold suit.
"I'll be back," he said. "Try not to miss me too much."
Natasha nodded. "Be careful out there."
"Always am..." He winked.
He used the Space Gem to open a portal to the outside sky and blasted through it in a streak of light, heading straight toward the disturbance. "Hermes, call Wanda and ask her to keep Nat safe."
"Affirmative, boss," The AI replied.
Natasha lay back against the bed, one hand resting on her stomach, listening to the fading sound of repulsors and the distant rumble of something big arriving on Earth.
She smiled faintly.
"Show-off," she muttered.
...
[Outside]
The night cracked open.
Peter was mid-sentence, complaining about something extremely important and scientific, when the sky above him detonated into color. A massive rainbow bloom ripped across the clouds, bending light like someone had grabbed reality and twisted it hard.
Peter jumped up. "Uh. Lorna?"
She was already standing, eyes locked upward. The air around her buzzed faintly, magnetic fields twitching like they were nervous.
"That was not fireworks," she said as she felt the change in the electromagnetic force and gravity.
The rainbow flare hung there for a few seconds, violent and unstable, like a wound trying to close. Then it collapsed inward.
And something fell out of it.
A body.
Peter felt a rush of panic. "Oh no. That's a person. He's falling too fast. You try to slow his fall and I'll make a web-bed to catch him."
The figure tumbled end over end, sparks of blue-white energy flickering around him.
Lorna didn't hesitate. Green light flared around her boots as she pushed off the rooftop, already accelerating upward. The nanites flowed out of her bracelet, covering her body and forming the black suit. "I'm on it."
She barely cleared ten meters before something tore past her.
A red-and-gold streak cut through the air like a missile with opinions. The shockwave rattled windows and slapped Peter's mask tight against his face.
Tony Stark flew past them at ridiculous speed, repulsors screaming.
"Stay back," Tony's voice snapped over external speakers. "I've got this."
Lorna pulled up short, hovering as the displaced air rocked her sideways.
Tony angled his body, thrusters flaring harder as he locked onto the falling figure. HUD data scrolled fast. Velocity, mass, energy spikes that made zero sense. Upon a close look at his face, he was sure about that guy's identity.
'Thor!'
"Okay," Tony muttered inside the suit.
He wrapped both arms around Thor and fired every stabilizer he had. Repulsors screamed in protest as he forced their combined momentum sideways and then down. The impact still cratered the street, asphalt exploding outward as Tony landed hard on one knee, skidding a dozen meters before stopping.
Smoke and dust rolled through the intersection.
Tony stayed still for half a second.
He had thought of using the Space Gem for a stable landing, but considering the exploding Bifrost and injured Thor... Well, Tony didn't want to take unnecessary risks of exposing his Infinity Gems. Who knows what's out there? The one who injured Thor might be watching them.
He looked down at Thor.
He was tall, with long blonde hair, broad, and his armor was damaged. His chest rose and fell, uneven but alive. Faint arcs of lightning crawled across the armor and then faded. But there was something else... A trace of murky black energy that made someone like Tony shiver.
The Mind Gem in his head instantly decoded the black energy signature and gave him the information.
Tony frowned. "Fuck! All-black!"
Peter webbed down and Lorna flew behind him. Both of them landed beside Tony.
----
..[POWERSTONES AND REVIEWS]...
If you want to read early advance chapters, you can join>: www.patr eon.com/XcaliburXc
[I have > 14 advance chapters] [No double billing]