Chapter Text
There were aliens falling from the sky, or so he was told. All he could hear was thumping, explosions, and the whirring of foreign machinery—a lot of screaming. Something big was moving overhead. It thrummed through his very core, making him think of water and swimming and the horror of the public pools where the pressure of dozens of other bodies moving through the water around him had been almost too much to bear.
“Matt, are you crazy?” Foggy’s voice was a comfort in the insanity around them.
He was not, in fact, crazy. Perhaps he looked that way to Foggy. Well, he probably looked that way to everyone. They were packed into this place like oversized sardines smelling of stress-sweat.
Matt stood at the edge, just beside the window, with his ear pressed to the wall.
They were afraid to get too close to the window. Once they got the gawking out of their system, someone had pointed out how visible they were. Everyone had moved toward the interior, almost as one. It had been alarming, the sudden crush of people. Body heat and sweat and pounding hearts and stifled whimpers and salt—someone was crying—the hissing of fearful whispering. Foggy had not been pleased with him when he shoved his way free of the press of the crowd with near violent intent.
He was far enough from the window that he was not in a direct line of sight. If the aliens came close enough to see him, they would all be in trouble anyway. Confined as they were, they had nowhere to run, no place to hide. Those guns (lasers? Pressure rifles? There was the sound of unbelievable power behind them) would tear through their ranks like a gunman through a crowded shopping mall.
It was not as though he needed to press his ear to the wall to know what was happening outside. However, when he reacted to a sound he should not be able to hear, it was all that much more plausible if everyone thought he was expanding his senses by doing something this ridiculous. Not that he knew what he would do if it came right down to it. From what he could tell, the aliens were far more advanced, technologically speaking. His fists might not be enough against that kind of firepower when so many hostages were at stake.
Foggy’s life was at stake.
Upstairs, a window shattered. Footsteps overhead.
Matt cringed at the sound of a hundred panicked voices, whispering, whimpering, crying, and hissing. Heartbeats raced. Somewhere in the crowd, someone was hyperventilating.
The cries grew louder and more pronounced a moment later. Matt jumped when Foggy’s hand closed around his arm. His friend—his stupidly brave friend—dragged him away from the wall and behind the dubious shelter of a fallen table where a half dozen other people were already pressed together. The stink of fear and sweat was overpowering, and Matt found himself instinctively struggling to get away, resisting Foggy’s pull, his own breathing accelerating into unhappy gasping.
Above, the aliens smelled foreign and impossible. Matt’s nose had never met the like. It was worse than the smell of the people whose hands were everywhere, helping Foggy keep him down and quiet.
Matt might feel bad later, but at the moment he had no problem with putting his elbow in the chest of the guy who thought it would be a good idea to put a hand over his mouth. The action ended that particular restraint immediately. Unable to do much about the rest—there were at least four different peoples’ hands upon him—Matt twisted and wrapped himself around Foggy. If anything, he could protect Foggy. They would have to go through him to get to this man.
Foggy misinterpreted, naturally. So did everyone else. At least it had the added benefit of removing most of the restraining hands from him. Foggy became an octopus, hugging Matt with all his might, and Matt used his own weight to drag him down and into the shadows of the balcony.
Some woman was rubbing his back. Matt did not want to risk drawing attention to himself and Foggy by telling her to stop.
It took a tremendous amount of effort to focus past the slamming of Foggy’s heartbeat to find the aliens above them. They were big, heavy, but moved with ease. A metallic tang to the air suggested armor, while the whir of mechanics with each movement suggested either the armor was technologically advanced, or they themselves were.
They were not attacking outright. They hovered, making threatening snarls, but there was no shooting. One of them was standing quieter than the others, which was worrisome. As was the persistent beeping.
Another window broke. Someone in the crowd yelped.
“Oh, my god!”
A hum of whispers, caught in terror and excitement rippled through the group. It took a moment for Matt to catch a coherent statement above the impact sounds of someone fighting overhead.
“It’s Captain America!”
Foggy was trying to see. Matt resisted. He knew what was happening up there, and whoever was fighting the creatures was doing well but not great. He knocked one out, kicked another. The idiot was throwing one of them to the first floor.
The impact sent small shockwaves rippling through the tiles.
Foggy gasped. His arms tightened around Matt’s back, restricting his breathing.
Then the world was a maelstrom of heat and ringing silence and debris.
It was so much later that Matt woke. Not to say he had been unconscious. He had simply been going through the motions, letting people push and pull him where they may, unable to hear their orders or platitudes.
His ears popped, and the world came back into focus. He was back on the street, walking slowly with the crowd of tired, frightened, relieved people. Foggy was to his left, arm hooked through Matt’s. Some stranger was on his right, gripping his arm gently, fingers tightening each time Matt stumbled.
“Where are we?” Matt asked, the first thing he had spoken since being pulled from that hellhole in Midtown.
“We, my friend, are walking back to Columbia,” Foggy answered. “They’re probably going to tell us to pack up and go home for a week while FEMA comes through and does their thing.”
“What happened?”
“Aliens attacked,” Foggy narrated, “Superheroes came. Captain America kicked the crap out of a few in the bank before one of the aliens set off an explosion. The next time I get the bright idea to turn a trip to the bank into a field trip to see Stark Tower, remind me of the glory that is the ATM. Curb.”
It took taking a hard step off the aforementioned curb to realize why Foggy had broken his own story to utter the incongruent word. Even worse was the way the guy holding his right arm braced him, throwing off his usual balance and making it that much more difficult to regain his footing. He shook free of the stranger’s hold, waving an apologetic hand in thanks and turning his attention back to Foggy’s explanation.
“You freaked out,” Foggy continued once they were stable. “It took three of us to get you off the ground and out of the bank. How are your ears?
“Ringing,” Matt admitted. “Captain America? Didn’t he die back in the forties?”
“Color me surprised,” Foggy shrugged. “Might have just been some guy dressed as him. Either way, he saved us. Another curb. Oh, and Iron Man flew a nuke into a wormhole and killed all the aliens. At least, that’s what everyone is saying. Pretty amazing, right?”
Matt nodded faintly, adding a belated, “Right.” He tightened his grip on Foggy’s arm. He was probably walking closer than was truly necessary, but no one seemed to notice or mind. It was difficult to form a coherent thought beyond aliens falling from the sky.
“Captain America,” Matt said again.
Foggy laughed, a little too high, a little too loud.
“Captain America,” he agreed.