Hello lovelies! Chapter twelve for you! I hope you enjoy, and review!

Disclaimer: I still don't own the Avengers. Sadly. Dangit marvel. Just share why don't you.

Chapter Twelve-Rogue

It happened in a flash, in the train's brief moments of pause at the platform. The SHIELD agents boarded with the civilians, and Clint and Steve exited away from everyone else. The door proved to be barely any trouble at all for Steve, and Clint laughed in a huff of frantic happiness at how smoothly that had gone as the two of them tried to flatten themselves against the stone-cold, rounded walls of the tunnel.

The train starts moving again, loudly, slowly, and when it's finally gone, the bright lights disappearing into the darkness, Clint hears clapping.

Which is already a bit odd, because Clint isn't used to people applauding his quick thinking, and even more odd, considering that no one is supposed to be paying attention to them.

Clint's eyes snap from the train to scan the platform, which is quickly emptying, the citizens being sort of herded out by nondescript men in plain black suits. Damn it. More SHIELD employees. And then his eyes land on what's directly across from him, black jacket nearly as imposing as Fury's. She's not tall, and she's middle aged and deceptively unthreatening, but Clint knows that she's not to be trifled with. She stops clapping and smirks down at them.

Quite frankly, Clint should have seen that coming. But he's sleep deprived and not used to fighting against SHIELD, so he'll forgive his own mistake. Once he's done escaping from that mistake.

"Agent Barton," she says. She's British, and her accent is clipped and unkind.

Clint doesn't say anything, just tenses and holds his bow up. Steve stands facing forward, ever a soldier, and he is the first to speak.

"Who are you?"

"I'm Nick Fury 2.0," she says, smirking and shifting her weight, reaching into her coat and pulling out a handgun. "New and improved, in case you didn't understand that reference, Captain."

Steve narrowed his eyes a little bit. "Why does SHIELD need a 'new and improved' Nick Fury? He seems to be handling things just fine. Considering the alien invasion that just happened."

"Because he was failing his responsibilities. That alien invasions shouldn't have happened at all, but thanks to the former Director Fury, it did. But all of that is beyond you two, and hardly matters to you anyway, Captain Rogers." She turned to Clint. "It matters to you though, Agent Barton. It matters rather a lot, actually."

"What do you mean by that?" His voice is steady, calm, but his bow is still raised threateningly.

"You're a liability, Barton. A remnant of a fiasco of an alien invasion. And worse, you're one of the bad parts of that alien invasion, and the new and improved SHIELD can't have unstable, highly dangerous agent on the loose. If there's one thing Fury and I agree on, it's that you're a danger to all of SHIELD."

"So you're here to kill me."

"Oh, you're a clever one." She clicks her tongue, tilting her head with such thinly veiled contempt that Steve wants to cringe. "Such a loss to the program." And then she cocks the gun. "If we're going for drama here, what with the trains and the bad lighting, I'd like to add; Agent Barton, you are relieved of duty."

Clint doesn't plan on standing by while she kills him. Her gun is deafening, and his ears ring as he watches his arrow bury itself in her leg-he doesn't want to kill her, not before his questions have been answered-but she's already collapsing onto the ground, eyes widened in shock.

Steve lowers his gun and looks at Clint. They don't say anything to each other, but Clint nods in appreciative acknowledgement of Steve's actions, before turning back to look at the SHIELD agents.

The SHIELD agents have already started moving, urgency reflected in each bullet that they fire, ricocheting off the walls and pinging with all the quietness of a hundred window panes shattering at once.

If the SHIELD agents are quick, Steve and Clint are quicker and better trained, instincts honed by aliens and adrenaline. They've maneuvered around the agents, attacking them from both sides. But there's only two of them, and seven of the SHIELD agents, and without much space to work with, it stops looking good for Clint and Steve.

"We're going to have to get out of here now or we're not getting out alive at all," Clint says frantically, and Steve knows what he says is true.

"So, do any of you remember that whole 'British invasion' with the Beatles and the weird clothing?"

Predictably, Bruce's bizarre inquiry is met with confused and vaguely annoyed looks.

"Is this relevant?" Natasha snaps, turning back to her screens.

"Yes." And Bruce taps the small, portable computer screen that Tony has convinced him to use. What he has been looking at, examining carefully and methodically for the last half hour appears on Tony and Natasha's screens. It's just, to the un-examining eye, a series of computer code. "Look. Look at where it's from."

"Is that-?" Tony starts to ask, turning to some of the paperwork that Bruce has found, lists of the computers at SHIELD and the software that has been installed in each to keep track of the goings-on of every computer.

"This is the virus that hacked and wiped all of the SHIELD computers," Bruce clarifies.

"And the virus originated from a SHIELD computer?" Natasha's used to betrayal, but not from SHIELD, and she's not sure she wants Bruce to answer.

"Now look at the access code."

Natasha leans in the read the screen. "285/Andrews? That's-that's one of the Council members."

"The Council?" Thor asks, silent up until now. "The ones that ordered your city to be destroyed?"

"Yes."

"Well, what are they doing wiping SHIELD history?" Tony asks, scanning through more of the SHIELD database.

Now that there's an actual definite name to put with the problem, Natasha demand for answers sees her figuring it out before anyone, her fingers moving quickly across the screens. "This," she says after a few brief minutes, turning the screen to face Tony and Bruce. It's a private memo for the higher ups of SHIELD, the ones that get the heavily encrypted memos containing the secrets of the universe and the like.

Fury steps down as SHIELD Director, replaced by K Andrews as of 2:04 PM.

The rest is written like a press release, a brief statement that glosses over the morning's events, using the hacking of SHIELD's database as justification for Fury's removal from his position. Justifying with the hacking, the alien invasion nightmare, with SHIELD agents going rogue and setting free the very person that led the invasion against earth.

It all seems very valid, and that puts a sick feeling in Natasha's stomach. This organization that she believed in, had come to trust completely, had fallen apart so quickly, and after something that should have only been considered a success no less.

Loki has joined Tony, Bruce and Thor where they stand gathered around Natasha's computer, and he points at something at the end of the memo.

What does that say?

Tony looks at what the pale god points at. "Former SHIELD assassin accused of freeing alien terrorist leader Loki confirmed dead."

Natasha's face drains of blood, eyes wide. "No." Her voice is empty, cold, distant, as she turns away from the computer. "That can't be true, it can't be."

Bruce looks at Loki. "Is it true? Can you see if he's alive or not?"

Loki has already closed his eyes, suddenly very far away, searching for Clint.

He's alive.