A lot of noise erupted from the basement. Tony messed with what he had down there and worked on his suit. He was standoffish lately, so we left him alone to tinker with his toys. Our backpacks were packed with essentials and food just in case we needed to leave in a hurry.

Ira curiously observed everyone, taking in our actions and how we did things. She relaxed against the chair off to the side of the living room and tilted her head when she didn't understand something. Eventually, she pulled out a notebook and started writing notes in her language. Natasha curled up in one of the window seats and read a book. Bruce flipped through some new schematic he was designing. Peter and Steve played a board game. Both of them were tied and all of their concentration was put into the game.

Clint walked in and carefully sat down next to me while holding a giant cup of coffee in his hands. He held the cup like it was the holy grail itself, carrying the most divine fluid in the world. He inhaled before taking a sip, moaning at the taste of it. Barton missed coffee so much. The taste. The smell. It was like his lifeline right now. "You guys don't know what you're missing out on. This is the richest, most delicious coffee I've ever tasted. The warmth envelops your entire body and sends chills down your spine. The spices mix around the cup and fills the air with an aroma of mouth-watering goodness. When you take a sip, the nutmeg and pepper dances across your tongue and settles in your mouth to leave a tingling aftertaste."

By the end of his description, almost all of our mouths were watering for some of that coffee. "Too bad this is the last brew of this particular coffee. Tony only had one pouch of it left," Clint added and took a long drink.

We all groaned in unison and I threw my head back against the couch. What a tease. I relaxed against the soft couch cushions and drifted into a happy state of mind. All of us were together, safe, and cherishing modern furniture to our heart's content. I lifted my head and looked over at the two boys playing the board game. Steve glanced up and locked eyes with me, forming a small grin on his lips. I smiled in return and was about to say something until Barton spoke up again.

"Do you guys trust me with your lives?" He set the cup down in his lap and looked at it blankly. Clint wasn't usually the one to look down on himself, but something really hit him to the core. His voice almost fell to a whisper, "I've read some internet conversations saying that I'm useless and don't contribute to the team..."

"We trust you, Clint," we said in unison. We glimpsed at each other and waited for someone to speak up first.

Steve took the initiative to talk, "You're an expert marksman and Avenger."

"You're funny and a good gamer," Peter added to the list.

Bruce chipped in too as he peered up from his schematics, "You're great at making coffee and scaring the crap out of Tony."

I set my hand on his shoulder and looked into his blue eyes. Damn. Everyone took the good characteristics. I ran through my memories, going back over six months. After I almost killed Steve, he consoled me. That's it. That's another thing about him that we love. "You give great advice and really bring this team together, Clint. I don't know what we'd do without you."

He nodded slowly and flexed his jaw. His eyes grazed over Ira and fixated on Nat, who listened in on the conversation, but didn't take part in it. Clint watched her in silence, admiring the light making her blonde hair glisten and her green eyes sparkle as they scanned the page. "Nat, you trust me, right?"

Natasha closed her book and set her hands on top of it. A smile tugged at the corners of her lips, but never quite made it fully. Her eyes flickered over to him and softened. Her voice subtly hinted at her fondness of him and she quickly covered it up, "Yeah, I do. I do."

Clint's face darkened to a light pink and held his gaze. "Thanks, guys. It really helps that you said all of that." His thumb ran over the cup back and forth as he sat in thought.

The room became full of silence and gestures. Smiles from across the room, steady gazes, shifting positions, and peace and quiet to wrap it all up in a bow. Steve moved one of his game pieces and handed Peter the dice. Romanoff watched Barton as he drank his coffee, finishing off the last of it. Bruce closed his notebook and tapped his pen against his chin in thought. Ira observed us and her eyes moved back and forth like she started calculating something.

"Take cover!" Tony screamed from the basement.

It all happened in a matter of seconds, but God, it felt like minutes.

An explosion went off outside, shaking the whole cabin and shattering the windows. Hot glass flew everywhere and we all sought refuge on the floor. Steve flipped the coffee table over to shield Peter, Clint, himself, and I. Natasha and Bruce were too close to the windows to be covered safely and Ira didn't move a muscle. Her hair flew about wildly, but her eyes remained focused on me. She unsheathed her sword and I shook my head at her. We agreed to not kill anyone...yet, at least. A sharp ringing stuck in my ears and my eyesight blurred a bit.

"What the hell...?" Peter whispered as he tried to get his bearings. His hand scratched at the floor and he swayed from side-to-side like the world spun faster than he could comprehend. I held him steady and brought him to his feet slowly.

Clint pushed himself up off of the floor and winced. "Natasha? Nat, are you okay?" He dragged his fingers down his arm, which bled from the big gash in his skin.

"Yeah...yeah, just a bit cut up," she groaned from her position. She forced herself up and walked over to Barton in almost a daze. The skin on her face had tiny rips in it from the impact of the glass shards. Her nose bled and her green eyes seemed to focus on nothing in particular.

Tony ran up the stairs in his Iron Man suit, the red and yellow paint shining in the sunlight. He held two backpacks and moved quickly across the room. "Is everyone all right?" All of us nodded collectively in response. "Good. It'll take a while for them to get passed the openings. Jarvis has input lasers in place of the windows now and will take out anything they throw in. They can't make it through the walls unless they have a weapon I don't know about, which ultimately is quite rude."

"Remember the plan," Steve advised in a low grumble. He quickly moved around the room to snatch his shield from the corner and his backpack. All of us struggled to do the same, helping each other out here and there to walk or carry items.

"Do you hear that?" Bruce whispered to all of us. He took the two bags from Tony and put them on his back. We listened in on our surroundings intently. "It's like they all vanished..."

Steve hesitated at the door, holding the door knob in place. "Or they're all just hiding to ambush us..." he trailed off and nodded to all of us, indicating his next action. He took a deep breath and swung the back door open, holding his shield in front of him as he charged outside. Tony immediately flew off with Bruce in his grasp away towards our destination. Bruce didn't want to hulk out if the situation went bad, so Tony volunteered to take him. We stayed in tight formation, watching the outskirts of the trees to see any movements. Our mission was to get to the car safely, which stayed parked in between some trees.

BOOM!

Steve pulled Peter to him and covered him. I shielded Clint and Natasha as we dropped behind a couch. Ira dropped to her knees, low enough to miss any debris that flew into the air. The heat kissed my skin and left it flaky and all too red when it was over. I cringed and urged them forward. "Switch to plan B, guys," I ordered.

Nat and Clint nodded and ran off in one direction, while Peter and Ira went off in the other. Steve and I glanced around, listening to the gunfire arising from the trees. He tugged my arm and headed towards Peter and Ira. "We can't let Peter go alone with Ira. We barely know her."

"Us four then...let's go." I ran with him, deflecting any bullets that I could by controlling them. The attackers used a mixed variety of metal and plastic bullets. The sounds of the guns going off faded away and my heartbeat sped up. The power flowing through my fingertips surged with greater intensity, jamming the metallic bullets in the guns before they could even fire. Adrenaline shot through my veins, making my mind process things faster to the point where it seemed like things were moving in slow motion at times. When we caught up to them, they were being surrounded by agents.

Peter threw webbing at a few of them and proceeded to go with hand-to-hand combat for the rest. He hit a guy in the throat, rendering him unconscious in seconds. He kicked an attacker and threw another one down onto the ground. Peter took a few hits, and quickly retaliated with hits of his own. Ira kept putting her hand to her sword, but retracted it and went in for a punch. She downed four guys before one even managed to touch her. She whipped her leg out and her foot impacted on a girl's jaw, sending her to the ground.

Steve and I joined the fight, eager to protect them in any way we could. Punches, hits, kicks, even some biting happened over the course of twenty seconds. Steve glanced over at me a few times to make sure I was still in the fight. I was going strong and using portals to confuse the attackers. Some of them shot into the portals, and only shot themselves in various places because the other end of the portal popped up behind them. They all cried out in anger and pain, but none of them were close to dying.

It wasn't until we got a good look at our enemies that one of us spoke up. "S.H.I.E.L.D. agents? Did Coulson send them?" Peter asked and launched some webs at the agents. They twisted on impact, gluing the guns inside of a tight cocoon, unable to fire.

Steve grunted as he threw his shield, "No. There's no way he'd agree to this. Maybe someone else is calling the shots." He ducked and slammed a guy's head into the ground.

"How did they find us?" I questioned, breaking a gun in half with my powers and hitting a guy over the head with it. I huffed and kicked another guy that came up on Peter's blind spot.

"I don't know," Rogers spit out. He caught his shield and slammed it into an agent's chest. The wind was knocked out of her and she stumbled backwards into her teammates.

"I thought we were done with the whole on the run thing for a while," I commented. I twisted an agent's arm behind his back and forced my foot onto a woman's chest, making her fall over. Ira took it a step farther and kicked her head.

Peter hesitated for a moment, "Well...knowing our luck, it makes sense."

"I don't know how we were found so quickly." Steve fought with a couple guys as we made our way through the forest and brooded. None of this made sense to him. His eyebrows raised and furrowed from time to time, his brain racking to figure out the problem. There had to be something...

Ira gasped sharply and reached for her arm, covering a bullet wound. Blood gushed out and began to leave a trail on the ground. Peter quickly turned to her, threw some webbing onto it, and eventually stopped it from bleeding out. A spark of amazement flashed across his features at his idea working, but quickly replaced with a look of determination to get to our destination.

A truck full of agents burst through the trees in front of us. All of us nearly collided with each other as we turned sharply to our right. Steve and I covered our six, while Peter and Ira lead the way. Steve lifted his shield to block bullets from hitting the group and I tried my best to keep the agents back far enough. Slowly, but steadily, we made our way to Xavier's safe house.