16 Chapter 16

Darcy and I take a booth table away from other patrons after getting a cup of coffee to wait.

Natasha arrived nearly on the hour in a rather non-descript car. She sees me sitting with Darcy and walks into the cafe. 

I get my first look at her in casual clothes. She's wearing a brown leather jacket with tight black jeans and Converse shoes. I have to admit, Natasha looks good in basically everything she wears.

She walks over to where we are sitting and as she gets close, Darcy perks up,

"Wow, you're way hotter than I expected," Darcy says bluntly, taking in Natasha from top to bottom.

"Thank you," Natasha replies, raising her eyebrow questionly as she looks at me. 

"Natasha, this is Darcy Lewis. She works under Dr. Jane Foster. I met them yesterday during a run-in with another 'Stone'," I explain, tapping the medallion under my shirt.

"That's not the only thing you ran into last night..." Darcy says under her breath as she sips her coffee, causing me to choke on mine.

"Already with another woman, even when you haven't taken me on our date, especially when you know who I am, that takes balls," Natasha stares at me suspiciously while crossing her arms.

I sigh, put down my coffee, get my breath back, and give Natasha my full attention.

"I'm truly sorry, Natasha. I don't have an excuse other than a lot happened. If you want to rescind your agreement, I'll fully understand."

Natasha stared at me straight in the eye for a few moments before looking over to Darcy, who was looking back and forth between us like this was a soap opera,

"Well, at least you have good taste in women," Natasha says as she looks Darcy over.

I fully expected her to tell me to fuck off and forget about our date. So her reaction caught me off guard.

"Oh, don't worry, he's handsome an all, but I'm not looking for a boyfriend. You don't have to worry about me getting in the middle... unless you want me to," Darcy smirks and wiggles her eyebrow at Natasha. 

"Who knows..." Natasha responds with a light smile of her own on her lips.

She turns back to me and looks me in the eye seriously,

"As long as this isn't a repeating incident in the future, I'd still like that date." 

Okay. This could have gone way worse. And I would have deserved it for being an idiot.

I nod solemnly,

"You have my word."

"Well," Darcy speaks up, breaking the tension, "It was fun meeting you Natasha, I always love a good drama but, I need to go and make sure my intern didn't ruin any of Jane's equipment."

She gets up and waves back to us as she leaves the shop.

"Let's go, we'll talk in the car," Natasha says to me.

Getting into the car, Natasha starts to drive toward the location of the person she was ordered to speak to,

"So Fury brought you into the 'infestation' issue within SHIELD?" I ask her,

"Yes, Fury asked me to rendezvous with an old SHIELD contact who has more knowledge about Hydra than anyone else. He's been even more paranoid than usual since your little revelation."

As I was about to ask her who this contact was, I felt a massive burst of spatial energy ripple out from behind us.

Looking behind us, I saw the sky begin to warp and shimmer until the overcast sky was replaced with a bright vibrant green opening, stretching for miles overhead.

The rapid appearance of this anomaly caused both panic and curiosity. People on the sidewalk were taking out their phones to start taking pictures and videos of the event. While others went to hide indoors as fast as possible.

Traffic came to a screeching halt as drivers and occupants got out of their cars to look as well.

I stepped out of the car along with Natasha who had immediately taken out her phone,

"This is Romanoff. Do we have intel on this event over London?"

I noticed that this was more spatial energy released all at once than the past few days combined. I tried to understand what was going on when I noticed something coming out of the opening.

At first, they looked like jagged rocks falling out of the sky until they started changing course. One whizzed overhead, allowing me to get a good look at it.

They had a long flat blade-like front to the ship with a large, flared, oval connected behind it that glowed red at the front.

They didn't seem to be attacking, but rather searching for something.

A much larger ship grabbed my attention as it exited the anomaly. It was massive, being almost the size of a skyscraper. It was shaped like a capital 'T', and at the center of the cross was a floating sphere that glowed an ominous red.

This ship didn't fly around, instead, it headed straight for the ground. Plummeting out of the air, it speared into the ground below, causing a massive boom and the ground to shake.

I looked over to Natasha, she looked shocked at this all happening so fast so I got her attention,

"Natasha!"

Her head snapped over to look at me, taking a moment before getting herself in order and focusing.

"I'm going to go for the large craft to see who or what this is," I tell her before kicking off the ground and flying up into the air.

I saw that the other 'ships' were circling the big one now, like a swarm around a queen. Flying closer to them didn't cause much of a reaction but I noticed the base of the large ship had opened and numerous humanoid-shaped beings were walking out, a quick estimate put them at over a hundred.

The majority of them are wearing black and white, sleek-looking armor with pale-white faceplates, making them all look indistinguishable from one another. But the two at the front of the group were different, one of them was twice the size of the rest of them, wearing a heavier, more bulky armor with a helmet that had large curved tusks, and walked a few paces behind the one in the lead.

The leader of this group wore armor like the majority but wore no faceplate or helmet leaving his ashen-pale white face visible. The most noticeable part of him, besides his pale complexion, was his short pointed ears.

As I fly closer the leader looks up and sees me. Raising his hand into a fist, he brings all of those behind him to a halt and continues to look at me as I land in front of him. Staring intently at me he raises one hand and points at me,

"You. I sense the Ether upon you. Give it to me, now!" He commands.

"How about you introduce yourself first, huh? And what is the reason you are here." I retort, not liking this guy's tone, I can tell he's looking down on me already.

"Silence! Give me the Ether or face the consequences." He barks out, waving a hand at his side, causing the large one behind him to step forward and growl.

"I'm not sure what this 'Ether' is, but if the first thing you are going to do is threaten me, you are not going to like how this ends."

I stare him dead in the eye, not backing down while pushing out my power. I put the entire area under my control as I noticed people had started to gather at the edges of the park where the ship had landed. If this was about to get violent, I didn't want them caught up in it.

"We shall see..." The leader sneered, motioning for the big guy to go.

The large warrior gave a bellowing roar and he pushed off the ground and began charging at me like a bull. As he was getting closer I noticed pulsing red lines stretch out like veins, from his chest and crawl across his arms and legs, all the way to his feet and his neck.

I only let him get half the distance between us before imposing my control on him, causing him to halt mid-step and freeze. Unable to move even after struggling, he let out an enraged roar toward me.

I noticed that the pulsing in the veins was quickening and his eyes began to glow from underneath his helmet. Light began to radiate out from him and he began to release steam from every inch of his body.

I quickly erected a barrier, encasing him on all sides, and it was a good thing too, as moments after I finished the warrior detonated into a massive explosion that filled the entire space with purple and red flames.

After the explosion finished and the flames were extinguished, I dropped the barrier. The smoke and ash created by the explosion blew off across the field, revealing a huge crater, glowing with molten earth.

The leader's eyes widened seeing his warrior had been stopped without me moving a muscle. He raised his arm and barked out,

"KILL HIM! BRING ME THE ETHER!"

The army behind him drew long, curved swords and began to charge at me as well.

Seeing as this wasn't going to end diplomatically, I pushed out my power, causing the Reality Stone to react.

From my medallion, I felt the power of the Reality Stone start to flow out, first into me then into the surroundings, manifesting itself in the form that I had first found it in. Its paradoxical form began to orbit my body like a mix of red and black sand, and blood.

I extended my reach out toward the charging army and the Stone followed my will, shooting out tendrils like tree roots toward every charging elf. When they connected with the elf, they pierced straight through them and branched again toward those behind it.

Extremely quickly, the entire army had been impaled by the red and black limbs. Moments after the last ones at the back had been struck, a pulse shot down the tendrils. A bright, glowing red wave traveled through each tendril, and as it passed through each one of the elves they exploded into ash particles and faded away before they could hit the ground.

All that was left was the leader, standing all alone in front of his ship. His only remaining allies are in the smaller ships that remain in the air around the large ship, but I begin to take care of those as well, not wanting them to cause any havoc.

I focus on all of the smaller ships and the Reality Stone follows again, this time instead of branching tendrils it launches small bolts of itself toward each of them in the air. On contact they rapidly disintegrate the ships till nothing is left.

Turning back to the leader, he's completely still and wide-eyed as he looks around him still coming to terms that all of his forces are now gone.

"Im-impossible..." He whispers to himself, "No one else can harness the Ether but me."

As I move to walk toward the elf, I hear a thunderclap overhead, causing me to pause and look up, expecting possible reinforcements. 

Instead, I see a massive multi-colored beam of light pierced through the clouds slamming down ten feet to my right. I only noticed now that the huge anomaly in the sky had faded with only a few tiny distortions remaining.

As the beam fades away, I see Thor standing there alongside Jane Foster.

"You're a little late for the party, Thor," I call out to him, causing him to turn to me looking confused.

"Heimdall said Midgard was under attack. I came as fast as I could. What happened, Dante?" He asks, Jane stands behind Thor, using him as a human shield.

"I've dealt with them, all that remains is him," I point to the last elf, "He came with an army, looking for something called the 'Ether'."

"I see. It is good you had it all in hand then. What is to be done with that one?"

"He came here with threats and violence, if I hadn't been here who knows what they would have done to the people here," I say as I focus on the elf who is still staring dumbfoundedly into the sky. Pushing an intent outward, the stone reacts and attacks him, obliterating him in moments.

Looking up at the huge ship, I ponder whether it's best to destroy it as well.