Chapter 2209: Battle of the Twin Cities! (50)_1

Natasha crawled out from the debris with a face full of dust. The smoke in front of her had not yet dispersed, but she could vaguely see Stark lying farther away. As indicated in the information provided by the Behavioral Analysis Technology Department, this evil Iron Man did not possess any special abilities nor was he a superpower user.

It would be best to seize this opportunity to capture him. Despite the throbbing pain in her chest and arm, Natasha pushed herself up from the ruins. It's then she noticed a long cut on the back of her forearm, made by a shrapnel judging by the shape of the wound.

"Damn it, who throws fragmentation grenades in urban warfare?" Natasha swore in Russian under her breath, regained her balance and stood up, only to find out her ankle was also sprained, and now quite swollen.

She took a deep breath and focused her attention. Usually, doing so would speed up the healing of her wounds, but she had no time to rest. Stark was lying unconscious at the entrance of the alleyway; another grenade and he'd be finished.

Natasha staggered towards him. Halfway there, a smoking grenade rolled behind her. She gasped in fear, launching herself forward to shield Stark.

Another explosion and when the dust cleared, Natasha had a gash of twenty some centimeters on her back. Fragments of shrapnel pierced into her thigh and her forehead bled profusely where it hit a piece of debris.

Stark, previously knocked unconscious by the blast, came back to his senses to see the once beautiful female agent covered in blood, looking like a demon that just crawled out from hell.

He instinctively gasped, sobered slightly at Natasha's murderous glare, and then realized that she had suffered those injuries protecting him.

"You've been ordered to capture me alive, haven't you?" Stark tried to put on a brave face, asking with a smirk.

"We can't lose another world's richest man, get up quickly."

Despite her severe injuries, Natasha astonishingly managed to stand. She took a deep breath, lifted Stark up, who embarrassingly found that she had certainly noticed his legs were weak.

Natasha did not have the leisure to worry about that, she pulled Stark towards the nearest alleyway. They had not walked far when there was another loud explosion. Stark turned around in horror to find a building not 200 meters away from them collapsing.

"Where is your armor?" Natasha asked without turning back.

"No energy left." Stark replied emotionlessly, then he added, "It's not just you who's after me. Osborn wants me dead more than anyone else."

Natasha limped in front, briefly examined Stark and found no visible wounds on him. She then turned back around and continued walking. "You've picked quite a place," she commented.

"Thanks, but I just got here myself," Stark followed Natasha into the alleyway, fumbling his steps, "Osborn and the robots of the Hammer Arms Industry were taken down by something. That's how I got the chance to hide here."

"You should know that being captured alive by me is your only chance to survive," Natasha mocked, "do you really think you can survive here?"

"We just got caught up in some gang crossfire," said Stark dismissively. "One could only say that the arms dealers in this place called Gotham are damned good at what they do, managing to get so many weapons into the hands of the gangs."

Natasha scoffed, "the gang you're dismissing so casually nearly just sent you to your grave with a single grenade."

"You can't take me away," Stark shook his head, "under no circumstances will I go back to that rigid and boring S.H.I.E.L.D. with you. You'd only lock me in a prison or a lab, forcing me to design ludicrously stupid weapons based on your foolish ideas."

"Even though I want to tell you, you are far more fashionable than you think, there's no doubt that they would do just that, yes."

Natasha brushed her hair back, a move that caused the wound on her back to bleed more. Stark hesitated a moment, then asked, "Are you sure you don't need bandages? Do you know how far it is to the nearest hospital?"

"I'm a bio-enhanced being with super healing abilities, dimwit."

Stark's face fell. Natasha was clearly not falling for his tactics, but then again, it stood to reason; how could an experienced female agent be manipulated so easily?

"Though I don't know why the cowardly Hammer and Osborn dared not enter, there's no doubt that this place will become my new base for a comeback."

Stark surveyed the surroundings. Aside from the high walls on both sides of the alleyway, there was nothing else. Still, he looked at the bricks on the wall with interest, "I fear it will be simpler than you and your silly organization think."

Natasha just hummed coldly, not throwing any comments. The two of them continued walking until they emerged from the alleyway onto an adjacent street. Yet, the end of this street was still just the Gotham River. They had not left the area.

"Go over there." Natasha saw a building by the river that was somewhat shorter than the others. The door to the rooftop was off-center, a good landing spot for a helicopter.

"You think I'll just surrender and wait for your agents?" Stark stopped, crossed his arms, and looked at Natasha, "Thank you for saving me, but this is where it ends."

As he finished speaking, he turned to leave, but the sound of gunfire rang out, bullets whizzed past his ears. Stark attempted to duck and cover, but Natasha rushed over, grabbed him, and threw him out of the alleyway.

She pinned down the struggling Stark with one arm, looked back vigilantly to see a group strolling down the street with an armored car and heavy firepower. The bullets were shot by them.

"What the hell is that?" Natasha exclaimed,"Surely it's not the Marines."

"That's clearly not marine equipment."

"How do you know?"

"Because I made their equipment."

Stark also peeked out, eyes rolling upwards to see the other side and commented, "That's a police armored vehicle, just painted in jungle camouflage. If you didn't know, you would think it was pulled from the Vietnam battlefield."

"Who are these guys? Where did they get hold of such large equipment?" Natasha asked curiously.

"The logistics department leaks like a sieve, and so does S.H.I.E.L.D.," Stark leaned against the wall, looked up and said, "Armored cars? Big deal. It would be impressive if they could get their hands on a tank."

Boom, boom, boom…

Stark suddenly looked up, a massive tank came into his view, crushing the street like a ferocious beast.

"Isn't that a German Panther tank??!!" Stark raised his voice, "How did they manage to bring that thing in here?! Where's customs??!!"

Boom!!!

The tank fired its main gun, instantly collapsing a nearby two-story building. Now they knew how that previous building had collapsed.

They pressed themselves flat against the building, afraid of being spotted by the observers through the telescopes. Stark took a deep breath and turned to Natasha, "When is S.H.I.E.L.D.'s backup getting here?"

"Who said we would definitely not be found by them.... Hey? Coulson? Yes, I just requested firepower support. Yes, I've got Stark. We need to get out of here."

"What? Send a helicopter? No, no, no, first, provide firepower support... they're already here?!"

Natasha turned to look at the sky. One of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s small armed helicopters, which were typically used for picking up agents and targets, was slowly flying towards them.

In the space between the buildings, they saw gunfires blazing wildly. Even for non-agents and weapon masters, they could tell those were machine gun fires. The low-flying armed helicopter unsurprisingly nose-dived.

Natasha slapped her forehead in frustration.

"Coulson, Coulson, respond. Forget about the armed helicopter. Send in a bomber to clear the way."

There was silence from the other end of the communicator for a while. Natasha knew that Coulson had probably gone to ask for permission from the higher-ups. Finally, Coulson spoke again in a heavy tone, "No can do, the mission's level is not high enough, we can't disable the fire safety. We can't open the armory."

"You son of a bitch, Nick!" Natasha gritted her teeth and cursed.

"You better not be expecting me to eliminate two thousand people?!!"

Nick sighed and said, "You have to prove we didn't do this."

"When did you start wearing the same pants as the military?"

"I mean it wasn't done by people from our Earth. This is a crucial point in the battle of public opinion. You must help us win it."

Natasha forcefully rubbed her temples, "What do you want me to do?"

"No matter how we explain, they will definitely believe that the city government is oppressing them, preventing them from speaking out, and therefore, causing a massacre. So all we need to do first is..."

Just as he was speaking, a crackling noise came. Natasha hit the communicator with a puzzled frown. "What the hell? How could there be interference on an exclusive satellite channel? What does the technical department do?"

"Hey!!!"

The sudden shout startled Natasha. An oddly familiar yet unfamiliar voice came from the communicator. But it wasn't just from the communicator. The voices appeared on the TV in the shop window, the radio on the second floor balcony, and the screen on the distant building at the same time.

"Welcome to Gotham, listeners. What we're focusing on right now is the traditional holiday event in the old town of Gotham - the Deer Hunting Festival."

"Each spring, uh, I mean, summer, autumn? Yes, that's right, autumn. When autumn comes, a group of ignorant and hungry deer accidentally enter the hunting ground of the old city."

"Innocent and stupid, defenseless, tender, and juicy. Although they may look different from the common elk, moose, reindeer that people usually see, please don't question it. They are indeed cute little deer."

"About the customs of this festival, well, they might be a little sloppy and rushed, but I still need to say this, the more you kill, the cooler you are!!!"

"Go ahead, hungry wolves! Use your sharp teeth to tear up your prey, fill your grumbling stomachs. The victor will become the best-- hunter!!!!!"

The radio signal was cut off.

At that moment, Natasha heard howling and cheering from all the surrounding buildings. Amidst the uproar, the war had arrived.