Chapter Text
The Justice League showed up in the lobby of the first floor of the Tower. It was a large group. Granted, Tony could barely name the six core members, but he was pretty sure two of them weren’t part of the JL. The first was a young boy hovering next to Superman in a Superman hoodie, jeans, sneakers, and a cape. His eyes were red and puffy, and he was sniffling a little. The other was Lex Luthor, who was wearing handcuffs and looking both hopeful and nervous.
The Bats were there too, and they walked past Tony toward the elevator, the boy hovering behind them. Superman watched them go with concern written across his brow, his gaze quickly turning to Batman as he passed his children getting off the elevator. There was a brief hushed conversation before the group continued on their way.
“How is he?” Wonder Woman asked.
“Alive.” Batman swept forward and turned to the Avengers. “Luthor has been assisting us with this mission in return for rescuing his daughter. He’ll be held here until the mission is complete.”
“What are we waiting for?” Katy asked.
“Foxglove,” Batman replied. “One of her associates will be running the mission. They should be here any moment. Get Luthor locked up and wait for us in the training room.”
The Flash shrugged. “Okay?” Tony watched beneath his helmet as the other heroes filtered past, wondering amongst themselves about the new Iron Man.
True to Batman’s word, a few seconds later, there was another weird flash of blue light, depositing three women in the lobby. One was in a fox costume, and the other two were dressed head to toe in black and wearing masks. The shorter of the two in black stepped forward and pulled off her mask.
Clint was off like an arrow from the good old bowstring. He was ugly crying, sniffling, and wiping his nose on the back of his hand like a first-grader caught in a snowstorm. Tony couldn’t blame him. Natasha was hugging Clint back just as tightly, and neither looked like they were going to let go anytime soon.
“Nat-” Clint croaked.
She squeezed him tighter. “I’m just glad I taught you to whistle.”
Clint laughed wetly, and Natasha peeked her head over his shoulder to smile at the others. “Hi, guys.”
“Natasha,” Banner said brokenly, tears dripping down his chin onto the floor.
“It was you,” Bucky said softly.
Natasha nodded. “You ready to finish it?”
Bucky and Sam both nodded, and she motioned for them to come forward until the Avengers were all part of one massive group hug. Well, most of the Avengers. Tony and Peter just stood frozen.
With great effort, Natasha peered around Banner’s great bulk. “You too, маленький паук. Get in here, Spider-Man.”
Peter glanced at Tony, and Natasha’s gaze turned to him as well. Her eyes softened. “Did you think I would come back without you?”
Natasha broke free from her prison of love and walked over to Tony, placing her hands on his shoulders and pulling him close until their foreheads touched. “We’ll get it right this time, I promise.”
Tony relaxed into her touch, letting out the breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding. “I missed you.”
“They missed us too.”
“I know.”
“We both had our reasons.”
“Yours are probably better than mine,” Tony admitted. “Let me guess, didn’t want to tip Hydra off?”
“I could stop them better if they didn’t know it was me, yes. But I missed you all so much.”
Natasha pulled back and Clint wiped his eyes roughly, handing a handkerchief to Banner, and Tony realized his face was wet too. It was then he noticed Natasha’s companion, a green-skinned woman with purple hair.
“Gamora?”
“Nebula’s sister?” Rhodey asked.
The woman nodded, “I am she.”
“We’ll get on trying to contact your family right away,” Tony promised.
“I hope after this mission,” Gamora said.
“I still want an explanation,” Clint huffed. Natasha opened her mouth to respond, but Clint continued. “After the mission.”
Natasha closed her mouth with a smile, and Tony snapped his visor back down as the Justice League and Bat clan filtered back in. Natasha turned to her audience. “The X-Men will be joining us at the base. They weren’t comfortable meeting here, and I’ve already debriefed them. Our mission is to take down a large Hydra base containing five thousand prisoners in cyro. Don’t mess with the pods; there will be time for that later. Our priority is beating the crap out of the Hydra agents inside and capturing them so they can be brought to justice. We’ll wipe any files pertaining to the prisoners and move them, then leave the agents and everything else neatly tied up for the authorities when we tip them off. Most of you will be the brute squad. A few of you will be assigned to guard the technology keeping the cyro pods running. There are multiple failsafes in place, so a technological glitch won’t lose all of their prisoners, but Hydra will know how to bypass that and kill them all. I need you to make sure that doesn’t happen and keep the pods running smoothly. For the Justice League, you know your assignments, and I’m sending you the finer details now.
“Iron Man, you’re going with the tech squad. Batman will update you. Bruce, I know you’re great with tech, but I need your muscle more. Spider-Man, I’m partnering you with Red Hood.” There were a few gasps from the JL crowd, and a few people shot Batman looks. “He’ll meet you there. You two have one job. Find Rachel Luthor and get her out alive. She’s a twenty-one year old female with blue eyes and red hair. I know you want to help elsewhere, and you may be tempted to stop and do so. But please, she’s the most vulnerable right now. Get her out.”
Spider-Man nodded enthusiastically. “So when are we headed out?”
Natasha grinned. “Right now. The Watchtower will teleport us right in. From there, follow the maps to your respective posts. This is going to be fun.”
“Can I say it?” Sam asked.
Batman sighed heavily but nodded, and Sam looked to the ceiling with a grin on his face as the Bat clan hurried to join the group. “Beam us up, Scotty.”
Sam had to admit it was really fun to watch all the Hydra goons jump out of their seats at once, looking like they’d crapped their pants. It was even cooler (and surprising) to see Wanda rise above them with a wicked grin and say, “Miss me?”
That got Hydra’s attention, and they started shooting at her. The X-Men spread out like a shockwave with Wanda as their center. It was an awesome sight to watch them rip into Hydra’s ranks.
“Alive, Logan,” Wanda reminded Wolverine, and the man growled. Sam felt a hand grab his wrist and start pulling. He looked up to see Green Lantern John Stuart hovering above him.
“Come on, they’re the big distraction. We’ve got to clean out the rest of the base.”
Sam gave him a thumbs up, and the Lantern let go, flying after Superman deeper into the base. Sam turned to Bucky, slinging Captain America’s shield off his back. “Let’s go crack some skulls for Steve.”
Bucky gave him a hard smile. “I know a spot I’d love to see wrecked.”
“Then, by all means,” Sam said, “lead the way.”
As the other heroes spread out, Spider-Man hung back. He stuck himself to the wall and looked around for a familiar red helmet.
“Over here, Flying Flip.” Peter looked down to see Jason jogging toward him from the hallway behind him. “I took the old-fashioned way,” Jason explained as he ran past Spider-Man. Peter dropped down and hurried to catch up. He webbed several agents to the wall as they ran past them while Jason shot them in the arms and legs.
Peter’s Spider Sense went off, and he barely flipped out of the way of a bullet. Jason turned and shot the Hydra agent, who dropped with a cry. But three more rounded a corner to take the agent’s place.
“Guess Lexy was right to worry about Rachel,” Jason said. “You go ahead. I’ll hold them off.”
“But-”
“You’re faster than me. Now go!”
Peter swung across the hall and around the corner into a long corridor filled with cells with glass walls for at least one hundred yards. He could hear someone shouting up ahead and he swung towards it. A dozen cells from the end of the corridor, a young woman matching the description of Rachel Luthor was banging on the glass wall of her cell. Peter opened his comm. “Guys, do we have a code for the door, or do I just smash it in?”
“Give me a minute,” a distorted voice said, and true to their word, the door slid open a minute later. The girl inside bolted past him, running past the last few cells deeper into the base.
“Wait!” Peter called out. “I’m here to help you-”
“Yeah, I got that,” the girl shouted back, not slowing.
“You’re headed the wrong way!” Peter shouted. “The exit is that wa-”
“I know!” the girl yelled. “But we have to save the others!”
“We’re already doing that!” Peter said in exasperation as he chased after the girl. “We have to get you out of here-”
“Spider-Man,” Jason said in Peter’s comm, “hurry it up. We got more goons incoming. Lots more.”
The girl burst through a set of swinging doors, and Peter slid to a stop behind her. They were in a messed up torture lab filled with empty cots. Well, mostly empty.
Peter opened his comm again. “Um, Voice in My Ear? We’re going to need backup.”
“What the freak is that?” Tony spluttered.
“Alien technology, I presume,” Batman said. “Let’s not find out what happens when you break it.”
Tony immediately started blasting the Hydra goons away from the freaky alien generator. They seemed pretty determined to break it and Tony found the thing vaguely familiar.
“You know which aliens we’re talking about here?” Tony asked.
“Don’t shoot at them!” Batman snapped.
Tony rolled his eyes beneath his helmet. “How do you suggest I get them off then?”
“Drag them off, and next time, bring something besides explosives and ion beams,” Batman said as he threw a Batarang, knocking three goons out.
“You still didn’t answer my question,” Tony said.
“No, I don’t recognize it, but I assume it’s from wherever the prisoners originated from,” Batman speculated as he punched a Hydra agent in the face.
“Well, then, how am I supposed to fix it?”
“It’s not broken yet,” Red Robin pointed out as he swept the feet out from under a goon with his bo staff. “No one’s messed with the other systems yet.”
“Um, guys, we’ve got a lot more goons incoming,” Ned said.
“Oracle,” Batman said, “we need backup. And see if anyone knows what that is.”
“ I do,” Foxglove’s voice crackled over the comm. “It’s a reactor core. If the top part crashes down, it will cause an explosion big enough to wipe out the whole base. They’re trying to kill us all.”
“Typical Hydra,” Bucky spat over the comm.
From above them came a large boom as a grenade exploded against the top of the arc reactor. There was an ominous creak followed by several Hydra agents running in with bazookas. Tony watched as Batman’s hand flew to his ear.
“Hood!” he yelled into the comm. “You need to get Rachel out of here! The whole base is going to blow soon.”
There was a tight laugh over the comm. “Well, good thing you’re here to diffuse the bomb this time, old man.”
“Hood, they’re trying to destroy a reactor core. If that happens, the resulting explosion will destroy the whole base. You need to get out now!”
“No can do,” the Red Hood said. “Rachel, Spidey, and I aint leaving. We’ve got three more prisoners out of cyro that can’t be moved that Hydra’s determined to kill.” Tony could hear gunfire over the comms. “Figure something out; you’re the gosh darn Batman!”
The line clicked closed, and Batman stared up helplessly at the smoking reactor. The hoard kept coming, launching rockets and grenades. “Oracle, sound the-”
“No,” the distorted voice responded. “I’m redirecting the cyro life support systems to the backup generators. I just need three minutes, and then I promise I’ll have everything handled.”
Batman looked to Red Robin, who shook his head defiantly and said, “Alright. Three minutes, Oracle. But if they’re not already en route to help us here, I want everyone out of the base.”
“You heard the Bat,” Oracle said, “Vamoose!”
You could tell the moment Wanda appeared on the scene. A red mist seeped into the room and men went flying into walls as she floated into the room. Rockets stopped in mid flight and exploded within red cocoons. By now, the top part of the reactor was dangling by a thread, and Tony felt his heart stop as it fell the same moment Oracle shouted, “Now!”
Wanda flung her hands out, a hexagon of red forming around the reactor at the same moment Strange created a portal. Wanda yanked the reactor off the wall and threw it through the portal, Strange snapping it shut as soon as it passed. Even so, some of the shockwave from the explosion swept through, knocking everyone off their feet.
“Where’d you send it?” Ned asked.
“Titan,” Stephen replied, hurrying to deal with the Hydra agents now getting to their feet. An iron ring knocked ten of them out, and Tony looked up to see Shang-Chi in the entrance with Superman and Sam behind him. There were another dozen minutes of butt-kicking before Oracle informed them that all butts had been kicked.
“Oh, sweet,” Spider-Man said. “Um, Mr. Batman, the Red Hood told me to tell you that we found Poison Ivy and Harley Quinn. And Iron Man? You and the other Avengers might want to come to my location real quick. It’s Captain America.”