AN: I'm back! Sorry for the long period of no updates; pandemic life took over a bit, but I'm determined to get back to doing what I enjoy. This chapter is a little rough, I kept putting it off and putting it off, and I just need to get something out there even if it makes me wince. Otherwise, I will give up on this project mentally forever as the Marvel Universe continues to expand.

"I'm disappointed in you, Natasha."

Although the words registered, the redhead was in too much pain to respond to her teacher. Lying curled up in the fetal position on the floor, Natasha's entire world was focused on trying to remember how to breathe again.

She wasn't sure what Yoruichi had hit her with, but whatever it was, it had been damn effective at stopping her cold.

Sometime in the past few days of sparring, Yoruichi had figured out a way to keep track of her. The cunning kunoichi had happily demonstrated this ability repeatedly by rearranging Natasha's insides. The Shinigami claimed it was simply growing familiarity with her spiritual signature and nothing more. However, Natasha was certain there was some trick to it the other woman wasn't sharing.

A tanned foot flipped the mortal onto her back, magnifying the agony wracking her body as she tried to choke in some air to her starved lungs. Her petrified diaphragm was locked in the down pull motion. The muscle could not do anything but spasm painfully with the occasionally failed effort to return to normal function.

Yoruichi peered down at her with her golden feline eyes, an annoyingly superior smirk adorning her face. "Oh, come on, you big baby, that was a love tap. I didn't hit you that hard!"

Still panting for air, Natasha raised a trembling hand and flipped the other woman the bird, getting a chuckle out of her sensei.

The shorter woman hummed an unfamiliar tune as she watched her protégé slowly force herself to her knees.

"You're using your powers all wrong," the dark-skinned beauty lectured critically, uncaring of the other woman's suffering. "It's tempting to see every problem as a nail that needs to be hammered, but your gifts are far more subtle. It's not meant to be used for brute force. Honestly, I'm disappointed; I would have thought your upbringing would have taught you better."

Finally able to gulp down air again, the Russian allowed herself a wince while pushing off her knees.

"What else am I supposed to do?" she wheezed, the pain slowly receding to a dull aching throb. "In case you forgot, I just learned about these powers about a week ago."

Yoruichi rolled her eyes. "Bit of a wasted week from my perspective. It's fun kicking your pretty little ass into next week, but even that's only entertaining for so long. You need to start thinking outside the box if you want to tap into the full potential of your abilities."

"I'm listening," Natasha said with a scowl, wiping at the spittle that had dribbled out the corner of her mouth.

It was stained pink from the stinging cut on her lower lip and the multiple abrasions in her mouth from where she'd bit her cheek.

Gross.

The Shinigami cocked her head to one side. "Well, I notice your powers are always centered around your shadow. You use it to try to trap me, or you wrap it around yourself as armor, but it's always attached to you in some way. So why don't you try separating it and see what happens?"

The spy frowned as she considered her mentor's words. She had been calling upon her powers instinctively, not putting much thought behind the how and why. Every new thing she had done, she'd pulled out of her ass out of desperation to avoid another crushing defeat.

The healing hot springs in Ichigo's underground lair were utterly amazing, able to turn her black and blue body good as new after just half an hour of sitting in it. But it still hurt like hell to get her ass kicked that hard, not to mention her trampled pride.

Focusing inwards, Natasha wordlessly drew upon her shadow as she had done hundreds of times before. As usual, the mercurial substance surged up from her feet as her shadow shrank, but this time, she mentally commanded the inky substance to stop. Forgoing pulling her shadow over herself or forcibly projecting it towards a target as she had always done, Natasha pictured the substance separating from her feet instead.

Her shadow elongated and squirmed formlessly on the ground for a moment before slowly inching away from her feet and separating with great reluctance. A strange feeling filled the cavity in her abdomen. If Natasha had to describe it with words, she would say it felt like her spleen and liver were being forcibly pulled in opposite directions.

Disturbing, but not necessarily painful.

Her shadow continued to writhe in confusion, uncertain what to do. Now that it was separate from its master, the Rorschach inkblot shapes it formed bubbled away like a stirred stew. Slowly, tendrils of the shadows began to lift out of the mess, forming odd blobby tentacles that swayed helplessly in the air.

"I see where you're going with this," giggled Yoruichi with a waggle of her eyebrows. "You got a real future in the niche tentacle hentai business if you master your powers."

Scowling at the woman, Natasha tried directing the tentacles to club the snarky Shinigami. Unfortunately, she only succeeded in making them wave sluggishly before fusing together to form one giant tentacle that flopped impotently in Yoruichi's general direction.

The Goddess of Flashstep didn't even bother moving out of the way. With a careless jab of one foot, Yoruichi sent the eyesore flopping anemically backward with barely any effort.

"Fail," she said with an exaggerated double thumbs-down motion. "But at least it's something. Can you control the shape at all?"

"I'm trying," Natasha replied through gritted teeth, mentally willing the 3-dimensional shadow to split into finer strands.

It squirmed for a moment, trembling as it rose to its full height. The quivering intensified, the shape bulging oddly in different places as it tried to respond to its master's will. Then, without warning, it exploded messily with the rude sound of extended flatulence released from the bowels of some giant beast.

Natasha spat a mouthful of the inky black substance, pawing away at the goopy mess that had covered her. It tasted like nothing she had ever put in her mouth before, the oozy substance feeling oddly dry, sucking all the moisture out of her mouth like a cotton ball. Luckily it had no scent; that would have been too much to bear.

She turned to look at Yoruichi, who living up to her namesake, had flash stepped about a hundred feet away. The woman was doubled over, laughing hysterically.

"I'm glad you find this all so amusing," Natasha snarled at her sensei when the woman returned with another lazy flash step, tears still in her eyes.

Her concentration broken, the mercurial shadow bits oozed back towards her feet, pooling together like liquid metal to reform her shadow. Finally, when all the bubbling pieces had made their way back to her shadow, it flattened out into the shape of an inanimate puppet, slave once more to her motions.

"Hmm, I can't expect you to be able to figure it all out in one week, I suppose," Yoruichi sighed theatrically.

A mischievous look crossed the woman's face. Glancing sideways at Natasha, the Shinigami tapped her chin thoughtfully.

"Say, how would you feel if we tried cheating our way through this training thing?"

"Cheating?" Natasha asked slowly, testing the word like she had never heard of the concept before.

She was a spy by trade; there was no such thing as cheating in her books. Either you got the job done, or you didn't.

The Black Widow always got the job done.

"I figured I'd tried beating the powers out of you," Yoruichi said with a casual flip of her hair, waving her hand dismissively. "It worked with Ichigo, but obviously, you two aren't cut from the same cloth. I might have something that could speed up this whole, acquainting yourself with your powers thing we've got going. Keep in mind, this has only been used with Shinigami, and only two people have successfully done it."

"What happens to those who are unsuccessful?" Natasha questioned doubtfully.

"Dunno, only two people have ever tried it," Yoruichi said with a careless shrug. "Either way, we wouldn't be going full blast, so I doubt it will kill you. More than likely, nothing will happen. Worst case scenario, you get your ass handed to you some more. Frankly, there is an extraordinarily small chance this might kill us both."

She punctuated her last statement with a wide smile and a pinching motion with her pointer finger and thumb inching together in front of her face. "Tiny chance. Your call."

Natasha scowled at the other woman, unable to decide if she was joking. "And you'd risk throwing your life away just to help train me?"

Yoruichi cocked her head to the side. "I'm curious to see your potential, curious enough to wager my life. But, honestly, it's much more likely that you'll die, and I'll be fine either way."

The former KGB spy snorted at the lack of care for her wellbeing. But, oddly enough, that did make her feel better. "Alright, let's try this cheating method of yours."

Yoruichi pulled up a giant white humanoid paper cutout from seemingly nowhere, rubbing her hands together with an excited expression.

"This here is the Tenshintai," Yoruichi announced with a fond pat of its flat head. "It's a tool a friend of mine developed to speed up the training process for those who have someone powerful enough to act as a spiritual battery for them. Ichigo successfully used this to achieve what most would take ten years to accomplish in just three days."

Natasha felt an eyebrow quirk at that little tidbit of information, wondering just how powerful Ichigo was compared to other Shinigami. She never did manage to weasel out more details from either of her new acquaintances. Both had insisted in their own way that the afterlife shouldn't mix with the living.

"And you think I can do the same?" she asked skeptically.

Yoruichi guffawed, slapping her knee. "Hell no!"

Natasha scowled, crossing her arms angrily. "Well, then why are we trying this?!"

The shorter woman snorted. "You're nowhere near the development of being ready to evolve your powers just yet, assuming you're eventually able to do that at all. No, I think what this will do is awaken your powers further. Funny as it is watching you throw your shadow around like an angry toddler, it's not really getting us anywhere fast."

Natasha sighed. There wasn't much time left. Did she really have a choice?

"How does this work?" the spy asked, approaching the flat humanoid cutout.

The Shinigami scratched her chin thoughtfully. "Well, it takes someone like me who has the juice to spare to forcibly manifest a Shinigami's Soul Sword into the material world. You're not a Shinigami, so I'm not even sure your powers will be able to manifest themselves in the same manner when we do this. We're just going to wing it and see what happens."

The explanation was far from adequate to Natasha, but the clock was ticking. She needed results, and she needed them now. It wouldn't be the first time she went with some half-assed plan to get results; she hadn't died yet.

"So, what do I do?" she asked after a moment of contemplation.

Yoruichi thumped the chest of the human cutout. "Normally, we'd have a Shinigami stick their soul sword here, but you don't have that. Why don't you stick that fancy gauntlet of yours in and see what happens?"

Natasha nodded hesitantly. The Gauntlet was something she had discovered by accident when she had first been playing with her powers. While she could use her shadow to cover her whole body, she created a much more detailed and durable version of the armor when she focused only on her hand.

The Gauntlet was different from her full-body armor. The shape was much more defined, the sharp angular curves much more pronounced than the often smooth featureless form of her full armor. It was capable of penetrating through reiatsu-enforced material her other shadow creations couldn't even put a dent into. The one time she had managed to land a hit on a distracted Yoruichi was with the Gauntlet. She had actually managed to send the infuriating woman flying backward through a rocky outcrop, utterly destroying the unfortunate geological feature.

The swift beatdown she got after was well worth seeing the other woman on her ass.

Yoruichi and Ichigo had theorized that there was probably even more to the Gauntlet than that. But manifesting it for even a few minutes had left Natasha utterly drained. They had warned her not to train with the Gauntlet until she had a deeper reserve of reiatsu, especially if she was training by herself.

It was her one ace in the hole if she ever found herself up against something she couldn't put down conventionally, but it was a risky gamble. Either she put down whatever she was fighting, or she'd be out of gas and out of luck. The Gauntlet was a potent weapon, but it sacrificed all her defenses to favor an all-out attack.

Focusing her mind, Natasha imagined her fist encased in the hard black substance she had come to associate with her will. Her shadow shrank towards her feet and crawled upwards towards her right hand. She watched as the messy black shadows slithered over her arm, creating the dark-plated armored glove with cruel hook-like claws at the end of her fingertips.

Even just holding it in this form, Natasha could feel her reiatsu draining noticeably. Turning to face the cardboard cutout, she noted briefly that Yoruichi had leaped back to put some distance between them. Her mentor's expression was uncharacteristically serious and focused. She gripped an odd-looking set of glowing prayer beads now wrapped tightly around her own hand, the same hand that Natasha had encased in the Gauntlet.

Thrusting her fist through the mannequin's chest, Natasha was surprised when her whole arm was swallowed into the chest cavity, her limb seemingly fused up to the elbow.

Yelping in surprise as she felt a tug on her vanished appendage, she tried to pull back but found too much resistance for her to free herself. Planting a foot on the lower abdomen of the mannequin, she used the extra leverage to pull harder, adding her leg muscles to help draw her arm back out.

Finally, after an eternity of tugging, her hand broke free. The redhead fell backward on her butt ungracefully, scrambling on all four to get away from the humanoid cutout that began glowing with a dark halo.

Slowly, the cutout fell inwards as if it were being burned, the edges crumbling away, the material collapsing toward the center by an invisible hand. The ball of paper formed a black singularity the size of a marble before slowly ballooning outwards until it was large enough to be used as a basketball.

The obsidian sphere was so perfectly smooth that the light reflecting off allowed it to double as a poor mirror. The form and definition of what was reflected were dark and oddly distorted but still distinguishable. Natasha stepped closer to peer into the black ball, a comically warped version of herself squinting back out from the sphere.

She reached out a hand and watched as her smoky reflection did the same. Giving in to temptation, Natasha touched the black sphere, her finger creating a ripple through the tranquil surface.

The ripples spread out, the waves increasing in intensity until the whole ball became a trembling mess trying to hold itself together. After a long moment, the black sphere expanded and flattened, turning into a black full-length-sized mirror that continued to ripple from where her finger had made contact.

Natasha took an unconscious step back from the sinister doorway. Her eyes widened when her twin reflection remained with her hand reached out, finger pointing at the center point of where the ripples were coming from.

Then, it reached out.

First, it was just a finger poking through, followed by the hand up to the wrist. Then the elbow, shoulder. The head bent at an unnatural angle as if unable to quite make its way through, held back by the very fabric of reality. Then, with a terrible wrenching motion and awful squelching noise, the black substance gave way.

Natasha could only watch in horrified fascination as her reflection stepped out of the two-dimensional gateway. The woman that stood before her was a perfect twin to her, but it was as if whatever universe she had stepped out of only allowed for two colors. Her skin was a deathly shade of white, whiter than any corpse Natasha had ever seen. Her hair and lips were a dark hue of midnight. Her clothes perfectly matched what Natasha currently had on, a mismatch of opposing dark shades of various intensity.

But what trapped Natasha's attention was her twin's eyes. They were pitch black, pupilless things that gazed out soullessly, no light of life present.

The Russian raised a hand hesitantly and noted that her shadowy twin mirrored the motion. She waved, watching as the colorless Natasha across from her did the same. Turning her head to the side, she watched it happen in the same fashion, the expression on her clone a perfect reflection of hers.

"Try talking to it!" shouted Yoruichi from her perch. "Ask it for a name!"

Feeling silly, the spy gave her body double a glance before opening her mouth hesitantly. "My name is Natasha. What's your name?"

Her clone moved her mouth, lips mimicking her exact words, but no sound came out. Natasha frowned, watching as her twin scowled back at her. This wasn't getting her anywhere.

"Try hitting her!" encouraged Yoruichi eagerly from the background.

"I'm not hitting her!" Natasha called back irritably, turning to glare at her unhelpful mentor.

"Well, do something else," whined the princess of the Shihouin clan. "This is boring! And a waste of my reiatsu."

Natasha was about to respond testily when she caught the minute widening of Yoruichi's eyes.

Alarmed, she whirled around to face her clone. Her identical twin had summoned the Gauntlet in her right hand during the brief moment she had taken her eyes off her. The black glove was smaller and much more form-fitting than the one Natasha had managed to create. It was smooth and regal looking with no vicious curves and edges present. Even to Natasha's limited senses, her twin's gauntlet exuded more power than she had ever managed to draw upon.

The colorless Natasha knelt and slammed her gloved palm onto the ground. A cancerous black shadow spread from the point of contact, swiftly exploding outwards and swallowing them both before Natasha had the time to even cry out in alarm.

Yoruichi frowned at the perfect black half dome that consumed her protégé and her twisted twin. Honestly, she hadn't really expected anything to happen. Theoretically, the manifestation of the soul sword required a second half to work. They'd never tried anything like this with the Fullbringer users; doubtless, Kisuke would love to get his hands on the data from this little experiment.

Assuming Natasha survived whatever was happening.

The Shinigami could not sense her protégé's reiatsu at all. Whatever her clone had done had completely erased her presence from the material world. Either the final manifestation of Natasha's powers was just that powerful, or she had been transported to another dimension altogether. Yoruichi could cut her reiatsu to the Tenshintai, but if Natasha really was stuck in another dimension, that might strand her with no way to get back to the world of the living.

Staring down at the power beads she was channeling her reiatsu into, the experienced Shinigami guessed she had enough power to keep things running for 24 hours. Maybe a little longer.

"Sink or swim, kid," Yoruichi muttered as she sat down cross-legged.

She closed her eyes, breathed out evenly through her nose, and centered her mind. Yoruichi easily fell into the familiar rhythm of meditation to help regulate her reiatsu. This would maximize the time she could buy Natasha.

Now it was all up to her to try to find a way out.

Scene Break

Natasha knew that she could not hope to compete with the Hulk in direct hand-to-hand combat. There were plenty of more inventive ways to commit suicide if that was what she was looking to do. For example, throwing herself headfirst through an active jet turbine or maybe taking a nosedive into an active volcano.

It was hard to believe those "accidents" she had arranged for her marks had been accepted at face value after investigation. People's ability to try to ignore reality was truly astounding.

The hulking monster outclassed her in size, weight, and hitting power to a laughable magnitude, reiatsu enhanced armor or not. Maybe she might have the edge in agility and speed. That "maybe" came with a big question mark and many legal disclaimers.

Being smaller and squishier didn't feel like an advantage when the Hulk was your opponent.

No containment system in the world had ever successfully held the brute born of a science accident. Even if Natasha could somehow lure Banner to the cage they had specially made for him, there was the problem of it being occupied by Loki at the moment. Thor was the only individual on the Helicarrier who stood a chance against the Hulk.

Natasha just had to duck and weave long enough for the Norse godling to arrive to tag her out of this lopsided matchup.

The Russian met the Hulk's charge head-on, throwing her body into a power slide at the last moment possible. Inches away from eating a knuckle sandwich the size of a shopping cart, she threw herself flat on her back and slipped between the Hulk's leg, the near-miss of its fist enough to raise the hairs on the back of her neck.

The adrenaline of near-death gave her arms unusual strength. Razor-sharp black blades slashed out at the exposed oversized Achilles tendon thick as pythons. The blades bit into green flesh but did not severe the ligament as she hoped.

A rage-filled howl was the only warning she received as a vicious backhand nearly caught her unaware. Even just the blowback caused by the missed hit was enough to send her stumbling towards a support pillar.

Allowing the force to drive her towards the post, Natasha absorbed the excess energy of her own momentum into her legs. Using the largest muscle in her body to its maximum effect, she pushed off against the wall with all her might, sending her rocketing back towards the Hulk.

Her explosive movement launched her on a slight upward trajectory. Natasha halted her speeding motion forward by grabbing an overhead pipe. A wise choice as the open-handed swat from the Hulk would have turned her into pancake had it caught her.

Shifting her strategy, Natasha focused her mind, calling upon her powers more deeply than ever. Her black form dissolved and expanded outwards, the oblong black shape clinging to the ceiling like an oversized cocoon.

The Hulk snarled, picked up a piece of debris the size of a compact vehicle, and hurled the object at the cocoon. It burst like a popped soap bubble on contact, sending globes of blackness splattering across the room.

From each of the dark splatters, bodies began to emerge. Smooth statues that looked like cheap knockoff versions of Natasha's dark armor, humanoid but missing all the fearsome features that decorated her armor. In a matter of seconds, half a dozen homunculi charged at the Hulk from all directions, taking advantage of their numbers and agility to confuse the giant.

The great fiend roared as the shadowy figures leaped onto its body, clinging to each limb. One even jumped onto its back to put its large green head in a chokehold that did very little to affect the giant's airway. The Hulk flailed about, trying to shake off its attackers as they attempted to wrestle him to submission through the sheer weight of their bodies.

A dark body was dislodged with a mighty kick and sent splattering across the wall like some work of abstract art done in all black paint. Another was crushed to mush as the Hulk rammed his shoulder against a metal pillar, trapping the unfortunate clone. The one clinging hopelessly to its thick neck was snatched up and slammed onto the ground before a green foot the size of a child's sled stomped it from existence.

As the green giant continued to struggle with the remaining shadow clones, unbeknownst to him, his own dim oversized shadow cast by the artificial overhead light rippled unnaturally.

A hand emerged, silent as a ghost, bracing against the ground. The appendage hoisted Natasha out of the shadow into view as a stealthy swimmer emerging from a pool would. As the last of her shadow clones were crushed back into nonexistence, the spy found herself within arm's reach of the Hulk's titanic back.

Focusing all her reiatsu, Natasha exhaled her breath and called forth the Gauntlet. Something must have alerted the Beast to her presence. It turned around just in time to receive a picture-perfect uppercut that would have made Mohamad Ali proud.

Natasha had struck with all her power. The enhanced strength and reinforced glove collided with the Hulk's jaw hard enough to crack open a mountain. A thunderclap echoed in the dimly lit room, and the emerald titan fell back a couple of paces, an expression of astonishment crossing its features.

The Gauntlet cracked down the middle of her forearm, then splintered into pieces, vanishing without a trace. The strength fled Natasha's body all at once as the last of her reiatsu reserved were spent. It took all her considerable willpower not to collapse to the ground.

The bewildered look on the Hulk's face turned to a grimace. He rubbed his jaw where Natasha had punched him before puckering up his emerald lips and spitting on the floor.

An odd clink sounded, and Natasha made out an oversized molar covered in dribble and dark green blood that shined like spilled motor oil.

The grimace became a scowl as the titanic creature cracked the knuckles on both oversized hands menacingly, the only sound being the heave of its massive lungs.

Its intent was quite clear.

Natasha didn't need any more warning than that to know what to do. She turned tail and forced her exhausted body to haul ass out of there. The roar that echoed behind her physically felt like a push to the back, lending her feet renewed energy. Adrenaline shocked her system as her body used up every last ounce of resource it had left to aid her flight.

The fear mixed with the overpowering cocktail of natural and synthetic hormones made her want to vomit. The spy pushed back against the instinctive terror, knowing her intelligence was her only chance at getting out of this mess alive.

She made it halfway up the maintenance stairwell before it was violently jerked out from beneath her feet. Ingrained training had Natasha lunging upwards, reaching up just high enough to secure a handhold on the overhead ceiling to dangle out of the Hulk's reach. Frantically hauling herself up, she felt the missed swipe from the Hulk displace the air from beneath her body.

Fighting the swell of panic in her chest, she began crawling through the vents as quickly as possible, elbows and knees squirming to push her body through the confined space. Trying her best to ignore the panels being torn out one fistful at a time by the enraged Hulk, she continued snaking her way between the ventilation units.

Finally seeing an opening, she wriggled past some more pipes before finding a gap large enough to drop to the open area below.

Whirling around, the Russian tried to spot the Hulk, but much to her surprise, it was nowhere to be seen nor heard. Fighting to control her racing heart, she listened, but the natural hum of the Helicarrier masked any other unusual. How could such a large creature be so unnaturally quiet?

Hands reflexively finding her pistol, Natasha began to make her way carefully through the maze of machinery, eyes peeled for danger and ears straining. It looks like she got to play hide and seek with the Hulk—lucky her.

Keeping her breathing even through her nose, the enhanced spy kept her chemically treated eyes moving from shadow to shadow. The low light did little to hamper her vision, but the constant hum of the machinery was getting disorienting. Periodically, she could pick up the shuffle of massive feet and the huffing of the giant's breath, but the echo from the room masked the direction they were coming from.

Her heart nearly leaped out of her chest when she rounded a corner and found the monstrosity lurking just over her. Before it could open its mouth, she fired two shots up past its head towards the pipe behind its head. The label suggested it carried some coolant to keep the nearby machinery running. Too bad it wasn't flammable, but it would have to serve as a distraction.

Cold gases poured down into a blanketing mist over the Hulk's form as its angry roar was muffled by the coolant. Natasha was already running before the pressurized gas reached the floor. The heavy thumps of footfalls behind her lent her feet strength despite her vision graying out at the periphery from exhaustion.

Darting between more humming equipment, she found herself in a tight-lit corridor of metal frames. Charging down the runway, her hopes of the small space slowing the Hulk down died as she could hear the monster tearing through the structures as it gave chase, heedless of any obstacles in its way.

Drawing deep into herself, she tried one last attempt at calling upon her armor to give her more speed. The small momentary spark she felt flickered like a dying candle, then vanished.

This was going to hurt.

To her best recollection, Natasha had been in 64 car accidents, 42 of the collisions intentional on her part. Of the remaining 22, twice she had been physically struck by a moving vehicle, failed attempts to stop her from reaching her target. Painful but never enough to prevent her from getting the job done.

She threw herself mostly out of the way as the Hulk tried to run her over. It wasn't even close to a direct hit, just a glancing shove of its shoulder as it blew past like a runaway freight train.

This time she did not have her armor to cushion the blow.

One moment the spy was mid-leap; the next, she was lying on the floor staring up at the ceiling. There was an odd ringing in her ears, and she was unable to recall the journey in flight and the wall that had stopped her airborne body.

Dimly, she noted that there were no feelings in her legs, but her tastebuds were working fine, judging by the coppery tang of blood in her mouth.

Natasha barely registered the Hulk as it stomped into view, the ugly expression on its face promising a swift end for her.

A smile twitched on her blood-stained lips.

'I wonder if Yoruichi will be the one to send me to hell?' she thought idly as the massive green form blurred towards her.

The wall exploded outwards just before she was crushed, and something collided bodily with the Hulk, sending both figures tearing away from her position.

Stunned at her turn of fortune, Natasha could only gasp in pain as her brain took a moment to register that she was not quite dead yet.

Laying in the carnage of her close call against the Hulk, she began to shake uncontrollably. Natasha couldn't tell if it was from the adrenaline and endorphins still pumping through her veins now that her body wasn't moving or the fright from the near-death experience.

She didn't know how long she lay there, gasping in air and trying to regain mastery over her body, the distant din of battle doing little to motivate her to move. Finally, she recovered enough to check her body for the extent of the damage.

Fingers moving, check. Toes, probably a few broken, but still responding. Slowly Natasha ran down the body parts list as she had been trained to assess before pushing her trembling frame into a sitting position.

"It's Barton!" barked Fury over her earpiece, the sound of his voice sending a jolt down her aching spine. "He took out the main system and headed for the detention lab. Does anybody copy?!"

The name of her best friend sent new life into her tingling limbs. Forcing her screaming body to comply, Natasha struggled dutifully to her feet. Already her mind was triggering the backup stores of hormones in the spare adrenal glands she had surgically added to her body.

No quitting. No surrender. That was the Red Room way, something she could not escape even to this day.

Spitting the blood from her mouth and blowing a sweat-covered bang out of her face, Natasha touched her output mic with determination in her eyes.

"This is Agent Romanoff; I copy. On my way."

Scene Break

Thor winced as his bullish charge lost momentum, sending him rolling onto his back alongside the massive green ogre he had tackled to save the sorceress from being crushed. Shaking his ringing head, the Norse God of Thunder rolled to his feet to find himself opposite the emerald giant.

It wasn't often that Thor found himself looking up at someone, standing at six foot three and weighing over 250 pounds; rare was the foe who got the better of Thor in size. Today that foe happened to tower a good three feet over his head.

"Banner, you need to control yourself," Thor tried, glaring into the menacing Beast's eyes. "You are amongst friends. I don't want to-"

Thor jerked back as a massive fist swung at him, dodging by a hair's breadth. Sidestepping the next few overhead swings that cut through the air like missiles, he saw an opening. He instinctively countered back, wincing as his fist connected with Banner's jawline.

It was like punching a mountain! Doable but idiotic.

The blow did little to slow the ogre despite rocking its whole body. The two otherworldly titans fell into a fast exchange of blows as they danced around each other, the size of the Hulk belaying a surprising grace.

Once it became apparent that Thor would not be overpowered by sheer force, the Hulk showed a surprising adeptness towards footwork and economy of motion. Its swings became more compact, knees and elbows adding to the fray. Thor almost fell for a feint, jerking back at the last moment as he recognized the cunning gleam in the eyes of his foes. The floor shuttered as the two titans trade jabs, the air whistling as fists flew, a mixture of grace and supernatural strength.

Finally, an overhand blow came too swiftly for Thor to dodge, and he had to block, crossing both hands at the wrist to keep from being flattened. An instant rain of overhand hammer fists came down upon his guard like lightning strikes. Each fury-fueled blow drove his feet further and further into the groaning platform that supported them.

'Damn, I hope this isn't the bottom floor of the Helicarrier,' Thor thought with a grimace as his arms ached.

Trapping a massive fist that came down in the crook of his elbow, Thor dropped his weight to the ground, hoping to drag the ogre off balance and throw it.

The Hulk stared down in confusion at an equally confused Thor when all he managed to do was dangle off the giant's wrist like a child hanging off their father's arm.

"Oh crap-"

The punch from the left hand cut off Thor in mid-curse, sending the Asgardian flying backward through supply crates, scattering weapons and various other equipment in a manner that would have killed a mortal.

Pushing himself up from the floor, Thor reached up to touch the wetness he felt from his nose. Pulling his hand back, he chuckled when he noted the spots of blood coating his fingertips.

"A true challenge at last," he murmured as he casually blew the flood from his nose. "Forgive me, Banner, but it seems you leave me no choice but to take you seriously."

Standing up, he stuck his right hand out and silently called upon Mjolnir, smirking as he stared into the glaring face of the Beast that had made its way over to him. Each stomp of its giant bare green feet caused the floor to tremble, the bellowed challenge from the giant echoing painfully in the cargo bay.

The Hulk charged, a green humanoid-shaped engine intent on turning Thor into roadkill.

Faster than the speeding giant, a blur flew past its shoulder into Thor's extended outstretched hand. For the second time that day, the Hulk was hit with something hard enough to send it reeling back. But, unlike Natasha's hit, Thor's swing sent the giant flying bodily backward, tearing through cargo containers before smashing into the back end of an F22 fighter jet that spun sideways into a wall. The ensuing explosion from the collision took out the entire structure and opened the room to the howling winds outside.

The Hulk glowered at the blonde man as it pushed itself out of the wreckage. Instead of repeating its failed charge, the green giant snatched up a piece of the fighter jet's wing and hurled it like an oversized discus toward the Asgardian.

Thor surged forward, ducking underneath the deadly projectile before coming up and launching his favorite weapon at his adversary.

Hulk had followed its thrown improvised projectile with another charge, but this time it was ready. Smoothly sidestepping to put itself off center from Thor's throw, the green giant managed to snatch the thrown weapon midflight despite the speed at which it was thrown.

Unluckily for the Hulk, the magical nature of Mjolnir made it impossible to be wielded or lifted by anyone deemed unworthy of its might. The giant found itself dragged back by the flying weapon, his great weight slowing its flight before bringing it crashing to the metal floor.

Howling in frustration, the Hulk grabbed the handle of the weapon, which looked comically small in his hands, and began tugging fruitlessly on the enchanted weapon. At that moment, Mjolnir looked more like a child's toy than a weapon of legends. The monstrous creation of science pulled, its massive muscles straining, veins bulging, and the floor underneath its feet buckling from its efforts. But no matter how much strength the Hulk put into it, the hammer remained stubbornly stuck to the floor.

Thor summoned Mjolnir with a thought, throwing the Hulk off balance as the weapon returned to its rightful owner, a flying knee to the face sending the great Beast stumbling back.

Leaping onto its gargantuan back, Thor encircled the monster's thick neck, using his weapon as a strangling device to pacify Banner's alter ego.

"You need to calm yourself!" Thor bellowed as the Hulk bucked and thrashed beneath him like a lassoed bull. "Don't make me-!"

His threat was interrupted by the Hulk leaping straight up, tearing them through the floor above them. Both titans lay still for a moment, stunned by the violent motion they had just been put through.

Hulk recovered first, snatching up the smaller man in one hand that encompassed the entire girth of the Asgardian's chest. The thrashing that followed was something even Thor had rarely experienced. His teeth rattled in his skull, and he could taste blood as the Beast didn't even give him enough time to summon his weapon.

'Sorry, Banner,' Thor thought as he channeled the energy he was known for.

Lightening began to spark between his fists, but before he could unleash a bolt of the energy, a thunderous repetitive roar cut through the shielded windows from outside the carrier.

Yelping in slight fright, Thor curled up protectively as hundreds of 50-caliber rounds tore through the cargo bay like a tsunami of angry hornets, tearing into the Hulk's huge fleshy back.

The Hulk howled in pain as the anti-armor rounds tore into his hide, not enough to draw blood, but still, it stung something fierce.

Rage sufficiently redirected, the Beast turned its menacing scowl at the intruding fighter jet that had bravely opened fire and leaped onto the aircraft with a resounding crack.

Scene Break

Steve swore as he ducked behind some pipes, the familiar whistle of ricochet bouncing off metal ringing loudly in his ears. He really wished he had his shield with him right about now.

During the war, the vibranium disk never left his side, night or day, wake or sleep. Even when he showered, the shield was within arm's reach, ready to protect and serve.

'This time period has made me soft,' the super soldier mused as he inched forward through the maze of dimly lit pipes, ears open for the comparatively clumsy footsteps of the operators who had infiltrated the Helicarrier.

Sensing someone round the corner, Steve ducked into the shadow, hands reaching down to unsheathe the combat knife he always had strapped to his ankle. Holding his breath, he watched as the nose of a rifle inched itself into sight, followed by the quick, sure steps of one of the infiltrators.

Knowing they would not be searching for him alone, he allowed the first man to step past as he swept the area, waiting for his partner. Steve was not disappointed.

A gloved hand reached out from the darkness, clamping across the second soldier's mouth to muffle his cry of alarm. The razor-sharp knife opened the man's throat before he could warn his partner.

Steve shoved the body forward in the same motion, swiftly jabbing the serrated blade into his victim's left kidney for good measure. The first man was sent stumbling under the dead weight of his dying partner.

To the operative's credit, he managed to pivot quickly as he fell, but still far too slow to be a real threat to the super soldier.

Steve's free hand caught the submachine gun's barrel and pushed it upwards. The short deafening burst went into the ceiling rather than the intended target. The combat knife was jammed viciously into the side of the infiltrator's neck. The second stab was so violent the body was practically decapitated, only a handful of stringy flesh and skin keeping the head attached.

As he lowered the body to the ground, the head fell off and hit the floor, the helmet head clattering loudly. Wincing at the noise, Steve kicked himself for making such a rookie mistake.

The hardened soldier paused to listen for the sound of approaching enemies to investigate the sound, and hearing none, he swiftly fell back into old battlefield habits.

Snatching up the automatic weapon, the veteran quickly looted the two bodies with practiced hands. An unfamiliar modern pistol was checked to ensure the safety was on before being jammed into his waistband. A bandoleer of magazines for the main weapon was secured across his chest along with a pair of frag grenades.

Still hearing no one, Steve took a moment to familiarize himself with his stolen weapons. The future had become brighter and sleeker than what he remembered, which was reflected in the weapon design. The gun was lighter than most he had ever used during the war, hard polymer plastic replacing much of the cold hard metal he was used to. A dial, a scope, and other unfamiliar accessories were attached to the weapon's sides. Something had been added to the end of the gun barrel, muffling the shots from deafening to a muted roar.

But it was still a gun; the trigger was where it was supposed to be, the magazine released as it should, and the ammunition checked and swapped out for a full clip just like any other gun he had used. The weapon looked futuristic but was still the same instrument of death at its core, just with a shiny new coat of paint.

Hearing the footsteps rushing towards his position, Steve tore off a part of the headless man's shirt, swiftly wrapping one of the grenades in a makeshift cocoon of fabric. Pulling the pin, he counted down the seconds needed to cook the grenade and tossed it underhand towards where he could hear the enemy approaching before ducking back into cover.

The fabric absorbed the sound of the grenade hitting the floor just as he intended. The two enemy operatives ignored the unfamiliar sound, walking straight into a face full of shrapnel, instantly killing the lead man.

The second operative died from a quick double burst of the commandeered enemy weapon. One deadly trigger pull put three rounds into the chest and another handful into the head for good measure.

Steve watched dispassionately as the bloody man crumpled to the ground, senses on full alert for more fighters.

After waking up from the ice, Steve found himself in a strange time period, eighty years after his life had ended. The passing of ages had changed people's memories of the war, of what Captain America stood for.

Honor, Duty, Truth, and the American Way of Life. He had mouthed off all those words as was expected; after all, Captain America had started off in the propaganda arm of the military. And a part of him did hold true to those things. But the reality of being pushed into what would later become the beginning of America's black ops program never quite let him live out those ideals.

Steve Rogers was a killer at the end of the day and a damn good one despite his beliefs. The kid from Brooklyn was the terror Nazis spoke of in hushed whispers. He was the unkillable machine of a man who stalked through the bloody trenches and broken cities, leaving a trail of lifeless bodies behind him.

To those who didn't know him, he was the fabled hero who helped end the Nazi's reign of terror. To his friends, he had been a capable, reliable, gifted, but still just a man. To his enemies, he had been the boogeyman that came at night to drag them to eternal sleep, never to see their loved ones again.

Captain America's legacy was one of the enduring fights for freedom that left a long trail of cold corpses, widows, and orphaned children.

History seems to have conveniently left out that part.

"Rogers, I'm suited up. I'm headed to the engine. Where are you?" Stark sounded off in his communication piece, breaking the soldier out of his brief moment of morbid reflection.

"Hunting," whispered Steve back into his mic, listening for more enemies.

It was silent.

"Well, hunt faster, I'm 2 minutes out, and I can't fix this thing alone," the billionaire retorted blithely. "We're about 5 minutes away from falling out of the sky, so try not to be late."

Dashing over to a juncture, Steve took a quick peek at the map to figure out where he had to go to get to assist Stark. The map indicated he was about four floors away from where he was needed, a half dozen flights of stairs between him and where he needed to be.

"Should have worked on cardio first," Steve muttered as he lowered his head and began running.

Scene Break

Clint moved with purpose, intent on joining his men in creating more chaos to assist with Loki's escape. A brief tingling in his neck alerted him to an enemy presence. He turned and shot blindly without hesitation, years of surviving deadly missions making his trust in those gut feelings absolute.

His shot missed, his stalker dodging sideways in a familiar manner.

"Hey Nat," Clint greeted as if he had just run into her in a corridor at SHIELD HQ between missions.

"Clint," she responded evenly as she stepped fully out of the shadows.

Hawkeye whistled as he took in his friend's beat-up form. "Damn, what'd you do? Arm wrestle with Thor?"

"Something like that."

He charges her, shoulder down, intent on blitzing her with his larger body, one of the few advantages he had over the female assassin. She retaliated by lashing out a foot, the limb smashing into his sternum with enough force to make his ribs creak.

Clint ignores the pain and swings at her head with his carbon fiber bow, trusting that her skull will break long before his weapon. Natasha jerked her head aside and speared her hand towards his throat, but he caught it between the bowstring. The archer twisted violently, throwing his entire body into the motion to bring her down to the ground.

Slippery as an eel, the redhead slipped out of the wristlock, ducking with her fall to roll beneath some pipes. A hand smashed against his bad knee on the way down, hobbling his movement.

"Fuck!" he hissed as he felt something pop in the hinge joint of his leg.

Another arrow was sent off into the darkness to buy time, barely missing the woman's head and forcing some distance between them.

Clint rolled over the top of the pipes and swiftly found himself on the other end of a charge that quickly turned into a dizzying hand-to-hand exchange.

Only high-level practitioners knew it, but a fight required very little focused attention after a certain point. Hundreds of hours spent drilling and sparring made each movement a mere reflex that often happened before thoughts could follow. The eyes perceive motion, and the body reacts as it had hundreds of times before. Locks and throws mixed in with punches and kicks flowed from one movement to the next, forming a chain of kinetic action aimed at maiming and killing.

There was no thinking, only acting and reacting. Clint's mind could wander off to think about other matters while his body did the work if he wanted to. The other secret that only people who have put their lives on the line in CQC knew, not just sparring, was that actively thinking slowed you down in a fight. People talked about fight IQ all the time, but anyone who tried to actively analyze consciously while fighting slowed themselves down during an exchange. You brought the frontal lobe in right before you start swinging and during lulls where you back up to catch your breath.

In the moment?

There's only kill or be killed, no room for anything else. The one who practiced more usually ended up winning. The question now was, who had practiced more between the two of them?

Their exchange was barely half a minute, but the beat-up Natasha was clearly losing. A headbutt from Clint sent the smaller woman reeling backward, and he drew a combat knife in the brief few seconds he had bought himself while she rallied.

Clint favored the Karambit knife, a short curved blade shaped like a claw with a ring at the end. The comfortable grip was worn smooth from hours of practice and years of use, an old friend custom-made to fit his hands. The weapon of Indonesian make was considered somewhat of an exotic weapon, ironically first actually used by farmers to help agricultural harvest.

He rushed her, the knife held in an underhand grip, swiping out in short arcs that would have split flesh down to the bone. Natasha danced between his strikes, moving with the kind of nimble grace he was used to seeing from her despite her injuries. She trapped his arm in a lock, swiftly bringing her weight down on the elbow joint, clearly intent on snapping it.

Clint instantly relaxed his arm, turning what should have been a broken arm into a possible hyperextension only.

Tossing the blade upwards, he snagged the ring of the weapon with the pointer finger of his free hand and brought it down in a deadly stabbing arc aimed at her neck. Again he found the fatal blow intercepted by his wily opponent.

Snarling, he hoisted the smaller woman up through sheer force and slammed her against the opposite wall, earning a grunt of pain from his friend. Then, jerking his trapped arm free, he snatched at her hair, yanking her head back painfully to expose her throat to the knife in his opposite hand.

The blade inched closer to her throat as he pushed against the hand she had put up, barely holding his weapon back. He howled in pain as she did something with her hip, causing him to drop his arm low enough for her to sink her teeth deep into his forearm.

"Bitch!" he swore, letting go and spinning her with a shove of his shoulder.

Catching the disoriented woman off guard with a brutal knee to the stomach, he grabbed her by the back of her form-fitting uniform. Clint sent the doubled-over woman head first toward the wall with all the strength he could muster, intent on splitting her head open with the weight of her own body.

Instead of seeing her skull crack open like a melon, Natasha vanished into the wall. He hesitated momentarily, wondering if whatever Loki had done to him had finally broken his brain.

Cautiously edging forward, Clint probed the wall, investigating cautiously to see if this was a hologram protecting some high-security room he was unaware of. He'd be surprised if Fury clued him into all the secret rooms on the Helicarrier. His fingers found a solid surface, and he ran his hands up and down the shadowed length, finding no secret corridor to open.

Lights exploded in his eyes as pain erupted in the back of his head like a flashbang grenade going off next to his face. Clint blinked stupidly, registering that he was on the floor as his brain rebooted, trying to remember where he was and what he was doing.

A redheaded woman stepped into view. It took him a moment to focus his eyes and recognize who he was staring stupidly up at. It was like a fog had been lifted from his mind; the head trauma had done something to reset the influence Loki had him under.

"Natasha?" he managed weakly.

His response was a boot to the face that blacked out his world.

Scene Break

Thor's ears were ringing dully, but his blood ran hot in his veins. The brave pilot had distracted the great ogre long enough for him to get his bearings, but it was apparent the mortal was no match for the Beast currently tearing the aircraft apart as it careened away.

Summoning Mjolnir with a thought, Thor was about to jump out after the pilot when the earpiece he was handed sounded off with the one-eyed Director's alarmed voice.

"We lost visuals on Loki! Does anyone have eyes on Loki?!"

Torn between saving the pilot and checking on his brother, the godling swore to himself bitterly and chose his kin. One mortal's life was insignificant compared to the damage the God of Mischief could get up to if freed.

'Forgive me, pilot,' he thought grimly. 'Your people will know of your sacrifice, I swear it.'

Spinning the hammer, he threw the enchanted weapon, letting it carry his body towards where his limited magical senses told him Loki was. Mjolnir tore through the six floors separating him and his adopted brother like paper. His flight brought him upwards past frightened mortals who yelled and screamed as he unexpectedly burst past them through the metal surfaces that separated floors.

He glanced at the strange open room, face settling into a terrible scowl as he laid eyes on his brother. The doorway to the glass cage holding him opened, and Thor charged with a snarl, intent on bringing his sibling to heel by force as he had done so many times before.

Instead of slamming into the smaller man, the blonde found himself going through him to crash painfully headfirst into the reinforced glass prison.

His heart sank into his stomach as he heard the door slide shut.

"Are you ever not going to fall for that?" Loki's voice floating in, a mixture of amusement and disappointment.

Thor got to his feet, eyes widening as he spotted his brother by the panel, finger over the trigger.

"The humans think us immortal," chuckled Loki, his eyes glinting with malice. "Shall we test that?"

"Don't-!"

The undercarriage opened, and the cage plummeted to the ground.

Loki chuckled to himself as the howling winds subsided when the opening closed. "Safe trip, brother."

"Move away, please."

The God of Mischief rotated slowly, carefully eyeing the mortal that had made the polite request approaching him. An oversized weapon whirred ominously in his hands despite the casualness of his approach.

Loki stepped back from the panel, eyeing the man's name badge. "And what exactly do you think you'll be able to do with that…Mr. Coulson?"

"Who knows," the man said with a bland smile. "It's a prototype we created after you sent the Destroyer to New Mexico. Never been tested on a live subject. You make one wrong move, and we're both going to find out what this bad boy does."

Loki lifted the scepter he had liberated, causing Coulson's trigger finger to twitch.

The illusion of the God of Mischief flickered, and the real Loki appeared behind Coulson, spear point exploding out of his chest in a bloody mist.

The agent crumpled to the ground bonelessly with a soft gasp of pain.

"You should have fired when you had the chance Mr. Coulson," Loki said coldly with a shake of his head. "You mortals and your rules of engagement."

The downed agent coughed blood but managed to look up at the Asgardian with the same bland smile despite the pain he must have been in.

"You're going to lose, you know."

"I beg your pardon?" Loki asked with an incredulous raise of his eyebrows. "Do you not see what is happening? Your heroes are scattered, and your floating fortress falls from the sky. Where is my disadvantage?"

"You lack conviction," the dying man murmured, eyes beginning to glaze over. "It's in your nature."

Loki scowled down at the dying mortal at his feet. "I don't think-"

Whatever the God of Mischief was about to say was interrupted by the blast of the energy rifle. The ball of plasma sent him rocketing through the wall, his body tearing through the reinforced structure from the power of the prototype weapon.

Agent Coulson died with a small smirk on his face, content he got the last word in.

Scene Break

An F22 flew at 1498 miles per hour at full throttle. To put that into perspective, that's roughly 25 miles a minute. The pilot had punched out the second it was apparent the aircraft wasn't going to be saved, but in the minutes the out-of-control F22 had spun with the Hulk tearing it to pieces, it had already flown too far away from the Helicarrier for the Beast to return.

Howling in frustration, the green giant continued beating on the burning fighter jet, plummeting towards the desert below. As it neared the ground, the Hulk leaped, pushing its body away from the wreckage and landing with enough force to create a small crater where it landed.

The remains of the plane crashed some distance away, an intense fireball lighting up the dry setting of the desert with a thunderous noise.

The green giant glared at the sky and bellowed, its voice loud enough to displace air and create a concussive blast visible to the naked eye.

Snarling in helpless frustration, the Hulk took in its immediate environment with narrowed eyes. All around it was a scene of destruction, craters on the ground, broken rocks, and overturned remains of trees. Yet clearly, not all of this had been caused by the rain of burning wreckage from the pieces of F22.

No, the damage done here to the environment was a familiar scene to the green giant. Many times, the Hulk had fled after defeating one army or another, only to vent its anger out in the lonely wilderness until its wrath was spent.

Bruce Banner might not have recognized the cause of these craters, but the Hulk did. These had been done by fists fueled with rage.

Its sharp ears caught the steady gait of footsteps, and the gargantuan brute looked over its shoulder to eye the newcomer.

The tanned man was tall, with shaggy brown hair pulled into a loose ponytail that fell to his shoulders. Warm eyes betrayed the menacing power the Hulk could instinctively feel. Like the blonde man the Hulk had been fighting earlier, this was no ordinary human.

He stood firm with the kind of conviction that allowed men to tame the world in ages past, back straight and scarred shirtless torso visible to the world. Yet, despite his seemingly calm exterior, his torn clothing and blood-stained knuckles spoke of something familiar to the Hulk.

Here stood before it a kindred spirit, another being consumed by malevolent rage. Yet he did not appear to be burning with the hatred that tortured the Hulk. Instead, there seemed to be a dam holding back an immense swell waiting to be called upon and unleashed, controlled despite its ferocity.

"I was just thinking that I needed a real opponent to shake the rust off," the human called out to the Beast after a long staring contest, neither willing to blink. "How fortunate you should come falling out of the sky in my hour of need."

Chad smiled as the Hulk beat on its chest like a great silverback and bellowed a wordless challenge.

A fine opponent to test himself against.

Power poured from the deepest wells of his soul, his arms instantly transforming into the familiar instruments of chaos and death.

Dropping into a fighter's stance, the large man jutted a palm out, beckoning in a taunting manner.

AN: So we got to see more of what Natasha's capable of. No, she does not have the equivalent of Bankai, as you can see with the beating she took from the Hulk. We'll learn more about what happened in her little experiment with Yoruichi later. Next chapter, the story keeps moving, and we get a little Hulk vs. Chad action. I've had this idea since I introduced him, so I'm excited to finally get the chance to explore how Chad's powers evolved during the war.

Please leave me your thoughts in the reviews, good or bad I always enjoy hearing what people think of my writing. Stay safe until next time (hopefully not another almost 2 years…).

EXTRA SCENE (did it happen? Is this an alternate universe to my alternate universe? I'll let you decide)

Phil Coulson had seen a lot of things in his time as an agent of SHIELD, watching as good men and women died by seeming random circumstances outside their control. Some chose to stand their ground, whether physically defending against the odds or morally against the powers that be. He always figured a good death would be to spit one last time in the enemy's face before the darkness claimed him, and in a way, he managed to do that.

He'd welcomed the darkness with a smile, content he'd gone down swinging, a mortal man standing defiant against a god. He had not expected to wake up next to his dead body.

Phil watched in morbid fascination as the medics tried desperately to restart his heart. His body jerked reflexively as the defibrillators sent a jolt through his unresponsive form. They would pause and try to stem the bleeding in his chest in-between the jolts of electricity; they'd even tried injecting a stimulant to get his ticker going again.

But even as he continued watching from his out-of-body experience, he knew there was nothing they could do. Phil had seen enough death to know from a glance at a person whether they had a chance of making it or not. He didn't need a medical degree to know he wouldn't have a second chance.

The grim set of Fury's jaws and the darkness in his single visible eye showed the Director had come to the same conclusion.

"Sorry boss, looks like I'm retiring before you are," Phil said sadly as he watched the medics finally give up and proclaim him dead. "Always figured that might be the case, but a real shame about all those vacation hours I saved up."

The Director waved the two medics aside and knelt to gently close Phil's eyes.

"I'll get that son-of-a-bitch who did this to you, Phil," Fury promised solemnly. "I'll make him pay."

"Never took him for the sentimental sorts."

Phil turned in surprise and noticed a short, dark-skinned woman nodding at the touching scene before them.

"Was he a good boss?" she asked, cocking her head to one side.

Phil could only stare in confusion at the newcomer that no one else in the room was reacting to. "Uh…are you talking to me?"

Her feline eyes bore into his, and the playful smirk indicated that she was indeed talking to him. Ghost of Phil Coulson.

"Only spirits and the spiritually sensitive could see and hear us right now, Agent Coulson. You kicked the bucket in a pretty spectacular fashion!"

The woman jerked a thumb at the hole in the wall Loki had been thrown through. "Ain't every day a vanilla human pulls a fast one on an Asgardian. You got a brass sack on ya!"

Phil coughed in embarrassment at the crass compliment from the beauty before him. "I take it you're Death then? I never really believed in all the religious claims, but I always wondered if there might be something after it all ends."

The woman chuckled, drawing the katana by her side. "I looked into your history Phil; I think we could use someone like you on the other side. There have been signs that bigger things are afoot, and it looks like the mortal realm will get involved whether they want to bury their heads in the sand or not. Normally I'd send your soul through the gates and let the universe sort things out, but I could use a man of your exceptional talents."

"Are you offering me a job?" Phil asked with a raised eyebrow. "I was hoping for some eternal rest when I finally bought the farm."

The woman chuckled. "Rest is for the weak. The afterlife is as ugly as the world of the living, with many more powerful beings running around. If you decide you don't want any part of it, I'll respect that and send you on like anyone else."

The dark-skinned beauty crossed her arms, katana sticking out past her shoulder. "Or, you can continue the game you've been playing with higher stakes. The hours will be long, nobody will ever thank you for what you do, and the benefits are nonexistent. There's a good chance you'll end up being devoured by beings that can eradicate souls."

Phil barely had to think about it.

"Where do I sign?"

The woman chuckled, drawing her blade and stabbing it into thin air. A light immediately blinded the hallway, and a perfectly crafted doorway of Japanese stylization split open the air, showing an infinite glow from within. "I think you're going to fit right in."

Phil took one last look at the Helicarrier, noting that they had already carried his body away while he had been chatting with Lady Death. Fury was still standing there, hands clenched, his single eye glaring at the bloodstain on the ground where he had died.

Steeling his resolve, the man moved towards the portal before looking at the smiling woman.

"What do I call you?"

She smiled, nodding at the gateway. "When you get to the other side, tell them you're there on the recommendation of Yoruichi Shihoin. I'll catch you around, Phil."

Nodding once, Phil stepped through the gates, wondering what awaited him on the other side.