[ chapter fourteen ]
Andi wasn't sure how long they were in the air but soon enough, the jet had arrived at their destination. Steve was the only one who got off though, on the roof of the building where the cradle was supposedly being kept.
"Two minutes," Andi could hear Steve saying through the earpiece. She could see him as he walked into the building, from where she stood beside Clint at the controls. "Stay close."
From there, there was nothing anyone else could do but wait, and so they did, till soon enough, they heard Steve's voice through the earpiece again. He'd found Doctor Cho.
"He's uploading himself into the body," Doctor Cho said amid small pants. Andi didn't know what it looked like down there, but she heard the fizzle of electricity, and the tiredness in Cho's voice, so she assumed that something had happened down there. Something bad.
"Where is he?" Steve asked.
There was silence through the earpiece, and Andi assumed that meant that Doctor Cho didn't know.
"The real power is inside the Cradle," Cho said after a few moments of silence. "The gem from the scepter. Its power is uncontainable. You can't just blow it up," she said softly. So that was what Ultron needed the scepter for. Aside from a body made of vibranium... he'd have the power of that stone. The stone that helped enhance Andi's powers, and gave Wanda and Pietro their powers. "You need to get the cradle to Stark."
"Did you guys copy that?" Steve spoke into the earpiece, and Andi nodded before realising that he couldn't see her. She didn't get to say anything anyway because Clint answered. "We did," he was nodding too, but his gaze was on the streets below. His eyes wandered before fixing onto something and Andi leaned over to get a better look. It was a truck, and it had the laboratory logo on it.
"There," Clint murmured and then spoke louder. "There's a truck from the lab. It's right above you, Cap. On the loop by the bridge." From beside Clint, one of the monitors began to make a noise and Andi stood back to watch as it scanned the contents of the truck, giving an x-ray image. "There are three of those robots in there with the cradle. I could take out the driver."
"Negative," Steve's voice came back almost immediately. "If that truck crashes, the gem could level the city. We need to draw out Ultron. I'm near the bridge. I can get onto the truck. Stay alert for back up."
And from there, Andi heard only the sound of traffic as Steve prepared to do whatever he had in mind.
Andi looked back at the monitor that had an image of the scanned truck. Three robots but no humans.
"How come Wanda and Pietro aren't on the truck?" Andi wondered aloud, staring at the image.
Clint shrugged, keeping his gaze on the streets below, and likely on Steve. "Maybe they knew we were coming and have some other tricks up their sleeves," he suggested. "I wouldn't be surprised."
Andi bit down on her lip. He might be right but something told Andi that there was something else going on. She just didn't know what.
The sound of metal hitting metal alerted Andi and she looked out through the windshield to look down. Steve was hanging on the side of one of the truck doors, flailing about as the truck continued to move. Shortly after she caught a glance of that, she watched as the door suddenly flew off from the top hinges, throwing Steve into the air before he landed on the door that was now scraping across the road, its bottom hinges still attached to the back of the truck.
"Captain?" Andi spoke instinctively, wanting to help.
"I'm fine," he groaned through the earpiece. Andi was far up but she could see him struggling to hold on. "Ultron's definitely unhappy," he added. "I'm going to try and keep him that way."
"You're not a match for him, Cap," Clint warned.
Steve sighed. "Thanks, Barton."
Shortly after that, Steve was thrown off of the truck completely. Clint changed course of the jet to follow his movements, so they could send in back up when necessary. Andi only heard a lot of metal hitting metal, which she assumed was Steve's shield and Ultron's metal body. All of that metal made her feel like she could be of more assistance, but how Steve was managing to do all that on a moving truck, she had no clue. Andi was sure she would have fallen off and been run over by now.
She was starting to understand why nobody wanted her to come along for things like this.
"We've got to do something to help, right?" She said, nonetheless, glancing between Clint and Natasha. The redhead was already standing at the table like structure that sat in the middle of the jet.
"Way ahead of you, kid," she said, pressing a button that caused the table to move. It opened up to reveal a motorcycle — with the biggest wheels Andi had ever seen on a motorcycle. Then again, she'd barely even been exposed to a bicycle.
Natasha mounted the bike and readied herself before glancing to Clint. Andi followed her gaze.
"We've got a window," Clint said, lifting his hand to grasp a small lever. "Four, three, two... Give him hell." At that, he pulled the lever down, and below Natasha, a set of doors opened up. The bike dropped just as Clint moved the jet closer to the road, and before she knew it, Andi was watching Natasha speed down the freeway on the bike, picking up Steve's fallen shield as she went.
"I'm always picking up after you boys," she muttered, causing Andi to smile a little.
"They're heading under the overpass. I've got no shot," Clint informed through the earpiece while Andi paced whatever area was available inside the jet. The doors Nat had gone through had closed now, and the table had not come back up. Probably to leave room for the cradle, if all went well.
"Which way?" Natasha asked.
"Take a right," Clint informed after a few seconds, to wait for her to reach that turning in the road. Andi heard metal on metal again soon enough, which meant that Steve got his shield back. She felt better knowing that the two of them were backing each other up, instead of fighting alone.
But she also couldn't see anything because, like Clint said, the truck was under the overpass. Whatever was going on was blocked to their eyes.
Andi heard a few shots. Not gunshots, but whatever it was that Ultron's robots shot out. Nobody seemed affected by it though, because Andi could hear Natasha screaming at civilians to get out of the way while Steve continued to grapple with Ultron on top of the truck.
A sudden crash made Andi more alert. She couldn't see anything still, but she could hear it, and the sound of Steve grunting as he was flung from the truck. It was a miracle he wasn't crushed by some other car because Andi had a feeling that a few happened to get flipped over. She looked to Clint with some alarm but he remained focused on the overpass, as though he would see the truck any minute.
Despite not looking at her, he seemed to sense her uneasiness. "Don't worry, kid," he said softly, turning the jet slightly in the air. "They know what they're doing."
"Clint," Natasha's voice came through the earpiece yet again. "Can you draw out the guards?"
Clint looked around through his windshield. "Let's find out." The jet moved through the sky, coming to the edge of the road, where the overpass turned, but the road beneath it did not. Andi knew the truck would now be exposed, and Clint was just waiting.
Merely seconds later, they saw it. Steve and Ultron were still on the roof, and Clint waited for a good shot before he fired at Ultron with the jet's built in weapons. The bullets only seemed to annoy Ultron, unfortunately.
The two remaining robots from inside the truck flew out, and now aimed for their jet. "They're coming for us," Andi pointed out, which was pretty obvious.
"Hold on tight," Clint muttered, giving Andi barely a second to grab onto the nearest chair as the jet went straight up into the air, and against gravity completely. There was a bit of jerky movement, when the robots latched onto the hood of the jet, trying to do some damage. Clint managed to shake them off by doing a spin in the air, which, admittedly, made Andi feel a little sick.
Her fingers remained clenched around the chair, but she allowed one hand to travel to her stomach, as though that would make her feel better. Looking to Clint, she noticed that he seemed completely unfazed by doing a few fast twirls in the air. She didn't want to ask how many times he had done that.
Andi braced herself for more of the same, but the robots left them alone after that. Confused, Andi glanced through the windshield to see that they were flying back to the ground. To the truck.
"They're coming back to you," Clint informed both Natasha and Steve. "So whatever you're gonna do, do it now."
From what Andi could hear, Steve was still battling Ultron, only they didn't seem to be on top of the truck anymore.
Natasha's voice soon came up again. "I'm going into the truck," she said. "Cap, can you keep him occupied?"
Moments later, a tired voice replied with a grunt. "What do you think I've been doing?"
There was a little less of the traffic noise now, leading Andi to believe that Natasha had gotten inside the truck.
"She's down there and we're up here. How is she going to get the cradle to us?" Andi asked Clint, staring down at the road where she could vaguely see what was going on.
"I guess we'll have to wait and find out," Clint muttered, also staring intently at the truck. The robots had now reached the truck too, but instead of going inside, they went underneath. Andi was confused, till moments later, the truck seemed to move... up? It was flying. The robots were moving it off the road and into the air.
That was actually better. They had more of a chance to get the cradle into the jet if the whole thing was in the air.
Andi's heart was beating a mile a minute but she remained focused on the truck, prepared to help in any way if she could.
"Be ready," Natasha said. "I'm sending the package to you."
Clint sat up straighter and stared at the truck that was now flying through the air. "How do you want me to take it?"
"Uh... you might wish you hadn't asked me that."
Andi didn't get it but she wasted no time trying to figure it out. In fact, at that moment, something else caught her attention. Wanda's voice.
"Please, don't do this," Ultron was saying.
Wanda's voice was the one to respond. "What choice do we have?"
Andi was alarmed. Had they changed sides? Did they realise that Ultron was the real enemy? She had so many questions. She wanted to get down to them, and all of her thoughts in that moment almost drowned out Clint;s yelling voice.
"Andi!" She snapped out of it and looked to him. He was wildly gesturing for her to move aside, and she did so quickly, grabbing onto a railing as the back door of the jet opened up wide. She understood now. The Cradle was going to just come flying in.
"I lost him," Steve's voice came up through the earpiece. "He's headed your way!"
Andi was prepared for this. The back door was open, but Ultron was a robot at the end of the day. Just a hunk of metal. Metal that she could shred apart and melt if she wanted to. Andi kept her eyes on the sky but for the time being, she saw nothing except the truck, with Natasha still inside it.
Merely seconds later, she watched as the cradle began to move. Natasha was clinging onto it, and Andi stood close to the edge of the jet, ready to pull her in or do something, in case anything went wrong.
Fortunately, the cradle slid right into the jet, just barely brushing against Clint's chair because he pulled up at the last minute, instead of pointing the jet downward like it had been, to catch the cradle.
Clint grinned triumphantly once the cradle was secure. "All right, Andi move away from those doors, they're going to close."
Andi hadn't realised she was still standing so close to the edge. After making sure that Natasha was safely inside, she moved to step further into the jet, only she didn't get to. She felt a cold metal clamp onto her leg before she could take another step, and her eyes widened.
"Andi!" Natasha yelled, getting off the cradle to come to her aid. Her hand had just reached out, mere inches away from Andi's own outstretched arm, but it was too late, because Ultron had dragged her away from the plane. And she had no idea where he was taking her.
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