The feeling was back.

That unnerving, raw reaction that scraped at her brain, lingering there as though it was trying to take over her thoughts and go deep, deep, deep into her very being. Willow didn't like it—it was unnatural, unknown and she didn't know what the cause was as her fingers wiggled in a nervous manner and a pent-up feeling of aggression built in her chest.

When Willow walked into the lab, the first thing that drew her gaze was the HYDRA assault rifle sitting out on the silver table for everyone to see. It gave her a bitter taste in her mouth knowing that something she and Steve had fought against so many years ago was just as much a part of their present lives.

"What is this?" She snapped, gesturing at the weapon.

Steve's face clearly showed how angry he was as well and he looked at Fury for an explanation.

"We gathered everything related to the Tesseract," the man said calmly, "and this does not mean that we're—"

Tony cleared his throat and turned his computer screen for everyone to see where blueprints of weapons popped up all over.

"I'm sorry, what were you lying?"

"Look, it's not—"

Willow cut him off.

"You wanting the cube to make weapons is no better than Loki wanting it for his own purposes. This," she roughly shoved the rifle across the table, "is proof enough that we had no business trusting you in the first place."

Everyone began to argue—so much loud bickering that she lost her concentration on pulling herself away from her anger.

"It's his M.O., isn't it?" Bruce's distressed voice broke through the wall in Willow's mind and she shook her head, feeling a little heavy-eyed. "I mean, what are we, a team? No, no, no. We're a chemical mixture that makes chaos. We're...we're a time bomb."

She glanced at Natasha, who looked a little unnerved.

"Why shouldn't the guy let off a little steam?" Tony threw an arm over Steve's shoulder and the man pushed him away with a scowl.

"You know damn well why! Back off!"

"We need to go." Natasha murmured to Bruce.

"Where?" He demanded. "You rented my room."

"Bruce," Willow said as calmly as she could, "please let us remove you from here. It's not a good environment for you to be in right now—"

"And who decides that? Not you. It sure as hell isn't me anymore." He glared around the room. "That room is there in case you needed to kill me, but you can't. I know, I tried...I got low. I didn't see an end, so put a bullet in my mouth and the other guy spit it out! So I moved on. I focused on helping other people. I was good, until you dragged me back into this freak show and put everyone here at risk!"

Willow, Fury and Natasha slowly reached for their guns as Bruce obliviously picked up the scepter, it's gem glowing brightly.

"You wanna know my secret, Agent Romanoff? You wanna know how I stay calm?" He growled.

"Dr. Banner...put down the scepter."

At Steve's gentle urging, he seemed to snap to and carefully put the staff back in its place, shaking his head as though trying to make sense of what had just happened.

"Sorry, kids. Guess you don't get to see my party trick after all."

Willow let out a relieved sigh as the scientist turned to look over the monitors when Tony, who had finally had enough of Steve's antics, went to leave the room.

"You're not going alone!" The billionaire slapped his hand away as Steve grabbed his arm and moved to face off with him.

"You gonna stop me?" He growled.

"Put on the suit, let's find out."

"I'm not afraid to hit an old man."

"Put on the suit."

The feeling.

"Oh my gosh...,"

It was the last thing Willow heard before her ears suddenly burst and she found herself airborne as though she was moving through deep, thick liquid when time came crashing back down and she quickly slammed into the floor of the laboratory. Glass rained down on her shoulders and she winced as her ears began to ring and smoke clogged her airway, making her cough violently.

"Willow!" Steve shouted over the crazed sounds of emergency alarms.

"I'm here!" Her hands scrambled at the floor to avoid the shards of glass and she gasped in surprise as Steve grabbed her under the arms and set her on her feet.

"You alright?"

The young woman nodded, her body aching from where it took the force of her fall. She looked out the window that had exploded where one of the engines were up in flames and then back to the lab—Thor, Natasha and Bruce were gone, Fury leaning against one of the tables.

"Rogers, I need you on the detention level!" He demanded as the men disappeared. He was holding his side and grunting in pain, but stopped Willow from advancing any closer.

"I'm fine! You go and make sure Loki doesn't get out!"

Willow ran out of the room to find the Helicarrier in turmoil.

Red lights were flashing and people were running through the halls to get to their stations, shouting instructions to each other as the super soldier sprinted for the detention level when a loud roar echoed throughout the ship. It made the hairs on her neck stand up straight and an involuntary shiver run down her spine. The sound wasn't human nor was it animal and she knew exactly what it meant—Loki's plan had worked.

A man suddenly stepped out of the shadows and right into her path, forcing her to stop. He had a sheath of arrows on his back and a bow in hand, his eyes a strange blue with a hardened expression on his face.

"Agent," she said cautiously.

For a moment, the man didn't seem like he was going to do anything when he quickly nocked an arrow and loosed it straight at her head. Willow barely had enough time to move out of the way when the man rushed forward, yanking her arms behind her back and causing her to shout out in pain. She used her legs to push off from the wall and shove them backwards, the momentum making him loose his grip. She held onto his wrists with one hand and twisted around to face him, pulling her gun out with the other to hold it to his head.

"Who are you?" She demanded.

The man didn't answer, whacking the gun away and sweeping her legs out from under her. He scrambled to get her in a chokehold as her breath was knocked out of her lungs, the struggle to inhale being cut off once he knelt and locked his arms around her neck.

Already having tried to breathe, she had lost most of her oxygen and desperately slapped at him. Her vision began to blur and her head, though in extreme pain, grew heavy.

Willow gritted her teeth as she ran her hand down her leg, grabbing ahold of her knife and jamming it into the side of his thigh. He shouted, dropping his hold on her as she rolled forward and away from him, turning into a crouch and kicking her leg out to slam her foot into the side of his jaw.

The man flopped to the ground and the super soldier laid there for a second to catch her breath before picking herself back up. She decided to leave the blade in his leg, but retrieved her gun and kept it in her hands in case anyone else tried to stop her.

Surprisingly, the path to the detention level was empty and silent, but she kept up her guard as she hurried down the hall when the young woman ran into a rather big someone.

"Willow?" Blood was trickling from his forehead, but it didn't seem to faze him as he looked down at her grimly.

"Where are you going?"

"Fury sent me to keep an eye on Loki."

He nodded and the pair ran off, finally reaching the detention section after a maze of halls just in time to watch in horror as the door to the prison hold slid open.

"No!" Thor yelled.

They charged and Loki crouched, Thor wrapping his arms around the shimmering image of his brother and Willow running right into his back as he paused in confusion, sending the both of them to the floor of the glass cage. She leapt to her feet just as the door clicked into place and slammed her fists against it angrily.

"Temper, temper," he cooed.

The young woman shot the glass at the same time Thor swung Mjolnir and they both stopped as the cage began to violently shake, an effect of their attempts to escape.

"I expected my foolish brother, but I did not know you would come. Did you miss me that much?"

"Don't flatter yourself," she growled.

"It is a pity you're stuck in there," a guard under Loki's manipulation walked in to hover near his side as he strode to the control panel and slowly opened the little box, "for I so wanted to test the theory of us being immortal. Although, getting rid of you would mean one less person I'd have to deal with."

He glanced at Willow, giving her a mischievous smirk.

"And I really did like you."

"Go to hell."

Suddenly, a cry emitted from Loki's guard and his unconscious body fell to the floor to reveal Agent Coulson who stood in the doorway with a large gun.

"Move away, please."

Loki, who had frozen at the sight, slowly backed away from the control panel as he moved into the room.

"You like this? We started working on the prototype after you sent the Destroyer. Even I don't know what it does." He lifted the gun higher.

"Do you wanna find out?"

She was watching Loki intensely as though the force of her gaze could pin him into place when a sharp gasp, an inhale of both nothing and everything, made her heart freeze on the cusp of falling into despair.

The tip of the real Loki's scepter protruded through Coulson's chest and the man, with his eyes wide in disbelief, glanced at them strangely.

Her mouth fell open as Thor shouted and slammed his fist against their prison in a fit of rage, the both of them sharing a feeling of sorrow as he slumped against the wall and slid to the ground. She pressed her hands against the glass, desperately wanting to reach him, to rush to Coulson's side and tell him that everything would be okay—that he'd be okay.

It was when he lifted his head to look at her with blood streaming from the corner of his lips and eyes that were fast losing their light that she whispered the words only reassuring to herself.

"I'm so sorry," her voice broke and her hands, trembling fiercely, curled at the self-satisfied expression Loki wore as he strode towards the control panel.

He pressed the button that opened the hatch underneath them and Willow gasped at the vast empty blue, backing away from the center and clutching at the sides of the cage as her heart pounded noiselessly and crashed around her head all at the same time.

"The girl, Loki," Thor croaked.

He searched his brother's eyes hopefully, but he only glanced at Willow in what she could only assume was disdain.

"Means no more to me than you do."

Willow didn't know what she was going to achieve through it, but she pulled out her gun once more and began to unload every single bullet into the glass wall and the last thing she saw before going unconscious was that smirk—that unholy, lingering smirk.

It was burnt into her mind, reaching into the deepest parts and invading what she could no longer call hers anymore. He was of every part of her existence and she writhed in disgust, in abhorrence for the assault on her mentality when her eyes shot open and she let out a strangled gasp that was quickly beat out of her when her back slammed against a glass wall.

"Willow!" Thor roared as the both of them rolled around like bugs in a jar that had been dropped from a great height. She was hyperventilating as she tried to scream, to grasp some kind of sense and physical hold, but she hadn't the ability to do so as she was thrown back and forth and up and down.

"Thor!" She cried, crashing against his back and flying downwards and away from him as they both struggled to grab ahold of each other.

The god of thunder, hammer in hand, pulled with all his might against the force of gravity and firmly planted his feet as Willow was tugged sideways right through the middle. His two second window was already gone by the time he pushed off of the wall, but he somehow managed to grab Willow round the waist while holding Mjolnir out and smash through the glass right as it exploded against a reef jutting out into the ocean.

He quickly released Mjolnir in order to keep ahold of the young Rogers and she buried her face in his chest, his arms a tight yet unbreakable cage as he twisted and landed on his back. Thor ground his teeth together as they skidded along the earth, the man letting out a breath of relief when they finally came to a stop. He could feel the young woman trembling and was uncertain as to whether he should release her when she patted him on his chest with a shaky breath and slowly tried to get up.

Thor was quick to help her to her feet and she gave him a grateful smile as she looked out towards the ocean where the cage had landed. Her face was deathly white and she began to twist her hands around in an anxious manner, muttering to herself and taking deep breaths as if to calm down.

"Willow?"

"That wasn't my first time," she said abruptly, looking at him with panicked eyes, "falling out of the sky."

They stood together as Willow struggled with her mind—the flashbacks, the guns and the smoke, the cry of dying soldiers, the fatal train ride, the plane—and just like that, it was all over, leaving her feeling like an empty husk of a human being as she crouched to the ground and slapped a hand over her mouth to keep the god of thunder from hearing her keening sobs. Thor tentatively laid a hand on her head as her body shook from the force of her cries and he listened sadly to the broken sounds that her hand could not muffle.

When she finally came to, Willow roughly brushed the remaining tears off of her face and straightened with an abashed expression.

"Sorry," she muttered, "I didn't mean to break down on you like that."

"Not at all, young one. The hardest battles are fought by the strongest warriors and you are very strong. Unfortunately, our battle is still ongoing," he waved her after him, "come. Help me find my hammer."

She began to scan the empty field for Mjolnir, ignoring at the moment the sense of dread that was slowly rising up from her stomach and haunting her every step as they got closer and closer to their fight—one she didn't know if she was entirely prepared for.

—————-
☀︎ celine's corner ☀︎

thor is such a gentleman, he's so adorable—