Eleanor's heart stopped slightly when she saw the look that Bruce gave the group, a slight look of fear flashing across his features. She didn't have much time to think about it though or get an explanation. Seconds later they were all thrown in different directions due to an explosion that was incredibly close to the lab.
The rest of the group managed to be flung somewhere inside of the lab, however, Bruce was standing near a glass wall that looked over another part of the helicarrier, and so Nat and Eleanor stood by it as well. They were sent flying through it, the glass easily smashing, and crashed harshly onto the floor below.
A very heavy piece of metal framing landed on Natasha's ankle, rendering her unable to move, and it was very painful. Eleanor had landed a few feet away from Natasha and Bruce, receiving another large blow to the head as instead of landing on her side as she had hoped for, she smashed into the ground on her back, her head slamming back onto the metal floor. Her skull was now pounding an excruciating amount as it wasn't that long ago that those rocks had decided to land on her.
Nat started to desperately try and free her leg, whilst Eleanor was trying to stop her vision from being completely blurred. She tried to sit up but a wave of nausea washed over her, so she dropped to the floor again, groaning in pain.
"We're okay", Nat said into her earpiece, looking between Bruce and Eleanor who did not seem okay. Bruce looked as though he was going to Hulk out, which would not be ideal at all.
"We're okay, right?", Nat said to the room.
When Banner started groaning out in pain and anger, it seemingly snapped Eleanor back into action due to the sudden adrenaline. She managed to sit and analysed the situation through squinted eyes as her vision slowly came back. After seeing that Nat was trapped she slowly moved forward towards her to try and free her girlfriend.
"Doctor?", Nat whispered. The two women were currently terrified, "Bruce, you gotta fight it. This is just what Loki wants".
Eleanor moved closer to Nat's leg and started trying to lift the metal framing, but it was heavy and so she was struggling. Panic was running through Eleanor's veins.
"We're gonna be okay, listen to me".
"This thing isn't budging", Eleanor whispered. Nat turned to look at her with desperation on her face and started trying to wiggle her leg out, whilst Eleanor was still lifting.
After only a couple of seconds, some engineers came running through and shouted to them, "Are you hurt?". The sentiment was nice but they needed to be very delicate right now, so this was not the time.
Nat shooed them away with her hand and turned back to Bruce, "We're going to be okay. Alright? I swear on my life, I will get you out of this. You will walk away and never ever-".
"Your life?", Bruce shouted at her, but it didn't sound like Bruce anymore. His body suddenly shot up and he started convulsing slightly, his body turning green. He then fell onto a lower level as his transformation continued. Eleanor and Nat looked at him in pure terror.
"Fuck fuck fuck", Eleanor said louder this time, trying to gather the strength to lift the frame, it seemed that the profanities worked as the frame moved slightly, but not enough for Nat to get her leg out.
The pair froze when the Hulk looked at them and started roaring, "I'll distract, you try get your leg out", Eleanor half-shouted before taking off at a sprint towards the stairs, yelling for 'Bruce' to follow. This was terrifying, he looked at her as though he wanted to murder her. Which he probably did.
Nat thought that she was absolutely crazy and wanted to shout at her not to do that, but her leg was trapped so it wasn't like she could yell out towards her or Nat might as well be dead now. She could only watch helplessly as her girlfriend ran off, being chased by something that could probably kill her with one punch.
When Eleanor turned her head slightly to look back at the Hulk, Nat's chest tightened as she saw the panic on her face as she continued her sprint. Now fueled by fear, Nat managed to wiggle her leg out from underneath the frame, the position that Eleanor had managed to shift it into had helped.
She stood and watched as Eleanor sprinted up the stairs, having to jump and flip herself over the railing of the next floor due to the staircase being ripped out from beneath her, Nat would have to try and climb up there instead.
Eleanor continued sprinting away, pieces of the floor being torn away behind her, she had never been this terrified, but she continued running, there wasn't much else that she could do. She wasn't even familiar with this part of the helicarrier so had no escape route planned in her head.
Nat had managed to climb onto the floor that Eleanor was on, using pieces of piping on the wall, and sprinted after her, having to jump over the gaping holes on the floor.
Nat's anxiety spiked further when she heard more roars from Hulk with lots of metal smashing, she didn't have eyes on the pair anymore and so had no clue if her girlfriend had been fatally launched into a wall or not.
However, her fears were put to rest ever so slightly when she rounded the corner. Eleanor was hiding behind some metal machinery, and so Nat slowed her footsteps down to be silent and stood next to her, both hunched over to avoid being seen.
They waited for a few seconds but they both knew that they couldn't wait there forever, it wasn't a good spot to be hiding in, they were practically waiting to be pummelled to death. There was no more room for them to be able to run if Hulk made a surprise appearance and they'd be turned into jelly immediately.
The two silently communicated with their eyes, something that they had an aptitude for with each other, and unholstered their guns at the same time, slowly walking around the corner to try and not draw attention to themselves. This didn't really work, however, as when they continued on their path, they caught his attention, only a few pieces of flimsy machinery standing between them.
Jumping out of their skins when he roared at them, Nat shot a pipe above him so that the steam coming out of it could distract him briefly, then they took off at a sprint in the opposite direction. Eleanor being in front reached back and grabbed Nat's hand. She was the faster runner of the two and so she dragged Nat along as fast as her legs could carry her.
The corridor was lined with glass doors, and they had to jump over some raised areas of the flooring during their sprint, which slowed them down slightly, but they somehow sped up even more when they saw Hulk barrelling toward them, smashing all of the glass during his rampage.
He only seemed to be getting closer to them, there was no way that they were going to manage to outrun him.
Eleanor's grip on Nat tightened with every passing second trying to make sure that she could get them out, but she wasn't able to.
He had caught up and hit Natasha to the side, sending her flying into a wall and crashing onto the floor. Eleanor stumbled slightly from the momentum from Nat being ripped out of her grasp.
He then started stalking towards Nat as though she were his prey, Eleanor watched in horror, not knowing what to do. She needed to get the attention off of Nat.
"HEY!", she yelled, making Hulk turn towards her with rage. Nat looked at her and desperately shook her head, but she was too winded to make a sound, she once again felt completely helpless. Eleanor didn't see Nat's silent pleas as her eyes were trained on the man in front of her.
He stepped forward, so she took a few steps back, stumbling in the process. There was no plan of action here, she couldn't fight him, couldn't run away, she was pretty much frozen in fear.
That was until her knight in shining armour arrived.
Thor came crashing into the side of the Hulk, both of them flying away from both women into one of the hangars.
Both women breathed out a shaky breath of relief, there were too many close calls then, they honestly didn't think that both of them were going to make it out of that situation alive.
Natasha shuffled to be in a more comfortable upright position whilst staying seated on the floor, and Eleanor rushed forward to crouch in front of her, "Are you okay?".
Nat looked at her and unexpectedly pulled her closer, smashing her lips against her girlfriend's in a passionate hold, needing closeness, to which Eleanor reciprocated the action, but abruptly stopped when Nat burst into silent sobs and started shaking her head, "You're so stupid, you can't do that".
Eleanor was confused, so tilted her head and frowned, "What do you mean?", she asked softly.
Nat continued to silently sob, "You can't leave me, you just can't", she choked out. Watching Eleanor be chased whilst she was stuck and couldn't do anything was the most terrifying moment of her life, and now that the adrenaline had worn off slightly, the fear of those moments had caught up to her and it was overwhelming.
"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, I'm not going anywhere, I promise. I got you, remember?", Eleanor whispered as she brought Nat in for a bone-crushing hug, both holding each other tightly.
They held each other for a few minutes before hearing Fury talking through comms. "It's Barton. He took out our systems. He's headed to the detention level. And other Loki Agents are heading to engine room 4. Does anybody copy?".
The two women let go of each other and nodded, "This is Agent Romanoff, I copy for Barton".
"Agent Hughes, I'm heading over to 4".
Eleanor helped Nat up and squeezed her arm before they parted ways. Nat headed to the detention level to give Clint a good smack around the head, and Eleanor going to assist in taking out a group that was probably going to try and damage another engine.
---
Eleanor sprinted her way down the hallways, it took about 3 minutes to get there, by which time there were already a few other SHIELD Agents trying to tackle the problem.
One of the mind-controlled Agents tried to slip out of the line of sight, but Eleanor spotted him and ran at him, tackling him to the floor. The man pulled out some sort of pocket-sized taser, and slammed it against her thigh, causing her to scream out in pain.
She grunted and grabbed his arm, yanking it away from her body, and twisted his wrist so that he had to drop the taser from the pain radiating up his arm.
He kicked her off of him, her landing on the floor with a thud, meaning he managed to get back into a standing position, but she quickly rolled over and harshly kicked his shin, then grabbed his ankle, yanking him back onto the floor.
He tried to reach for the taser again but was stopped once Eleanor had managed to reposition herself to boot him in the side of the head, with a lot of force from pent up anger, immediately knocking him out.
Standing, she hobbled back over to the other SHIELD Agents who also looked quite beat up, and they started restraining the Loki Agents, dragging them over to the infirmary. On the way Eleanor was trying to regain normal use of the leg that had been shocked with electricity, it was a very uncomfortable experience.
---
Once all of the Loki Agents were safely in a large infirmary room, Eleanor started walking toward one of the smaller infirmary-style rooms further across the helicarrier after Natasha had let her know that she had managed to get Clint back and that they would be in that room soon. It had been an exhausting day, her mind was going at 100mph, but her body was starting to get left behind, her muscles screaming at her to stop moving and to rest.
But she couldn't, she needed to go and see Clint to make sure that he was doing okay, she was happy that he was back and not in the hands of Loki.
For once it seemed like something was going their way, it left a little bit of hope burning instead of sitting in despair at Loki getting away, there was something else to focus on.
The good spirits quickly vanished though when Fury's voice echoes through her earpiece, "Agent Coulson is down". She froze, Coulson couldn't die. He just couldn't.
"A medical team is on its way to your location".
"They're here, they called it".
In the blink of an eye, Eleanor felt the whole world crashing down again. Coulson had always been there, even if they weren't able to see each other in person, he always reached out to the younger Agent, making sure that she was doing okay, and showing interest in what she got up to in her spare time. Along with Maria, he was one of the people that was there for her during her grief when she was younger. He'd always been someone to lean on, and now he's gone.
Leaning against the wall for stability, she felt her chest tightening, her hands were starting to tingle and go numb, and it felt like her clothes were too tight.
She allowed herself to slowly slide down the wall, pulling her knees up to her chest. She wanted to cry, but she couldn't. Her body was reacting, but her mind had gone numb, everything had become all too overwhelming, so she sat. Her body shaking, but her mind was blank.
Natasha was worried about the location of her girlfriend as she should have arrived by now, but she was still conversing with Clint, trying to reassure him that what had happened hadn't been his fault.
She must have sat against the wall for 10 minutes before Steve arrived, walking past her with purpose, before doing a double-take and turning around at noticing the younger woman on the floor.
He let out a gentle sigh before crouching down next to her and placing a firm hand on her shoulder, "You doing okay?".
She looked up at him with no emotion showing on her face, and shook her head, before placing her chin back on the top of her knees. Steve felt huge amounts of sympathy for the woman in front of him, he had felt like that before, where everything felt like it was falling apart, and your mind dissociates from it.
"I'm so sorry", he started, guessing that this particular reaction was about Coulson, "He died trying to stop Loki, and we can't let that be in vain. They're at Stark tower now getting ready for the Chitauri invasion, we need all hands on deck, can we count on you?", he asked delicately but with a sense of authority.
After a few seconds of contemplation, she looked up at him again, a new look of determination on her face, and nodded. It was either wallow alone in this hallway whilst Earth was being threatened, or get her ass up and help. She decided on the latter, and she was going to make sure that Loki didn't get away with this.
Steve stood and helped her up off of the floor, patting her back encouragingly, but without realising his own strength, so Eleanor had to stifle an 'ow' as he turned around gesturing her to follow.
"Where are we going?".
"Romanoff", he answered simply.
The two walked in silence until reaching the room that Nat and Clint were in. No words needed to be said.
Reaching the door, it opened to the side, revealing Nat stood staring at the door, looking between the Captain and the Agent. "Time to go", Steve said.
"Go where?".
"I'll tell you on the way, can you fly one of those jets?".
Barton suddenly made an appearance from the en suite, "I can". Eleanor gave a genuine smile at seeing Clint back to normal, but Steve gave Nat a hesitant look, he didn't know Clint and had only known him as the Agent under Loki's control. She gave him a nod of reassurance.
"You got a suit?", Steve directed at Clint.
"Yeah".
"Then suit up", Steve then left the three of them awkwardly staring at each other for a few moments.
"It's good to have you back, Clint", Eleanor offered with a small smile. He nodded back at her with a matching expression.
Nat caught Eleanor's attention by clearing her throat, she was unfamiliar with the closed-off aura that Eleanor was giving off, and so wasn't too sure about how to approach her. Eleanor snapped her eyes back to Nat and walked towards her, bringing her into another hug, only a brief one though as they needed to get a move on.
"You okay?", Nat asked softly, pulling away from the hug and searching her eyes for answers.
"Yeah, just- just want this to be over now".
Nat nodded strongly, "Well then let's make that happen".