Saturday morning arrived a little slower than usual for Clara.
Daisy had mercifully granted the class a chance to sleep in—normally school started at eight, but today they wouldn't gather until nine.
"Clara—why are you still wearing your school uniform?" Jeresia pounced on her the moment she arrived, clinging to her neck like a koala. "Ms. Daisy said we could wear our regular clothes!"
"It's all the same," Clara said calmly. "The uniform looks fine too. Now let go—you're going to strangle me."
"I won't! I'm not letting go!"
Their playful scuffle made Linda McGim, who sat behind Clara, watch with undisguised envy. Linda was painfully shy and timid. Clara looked out for her when she could, but at best they were little more than polite acquaintances.
"Hey, scaredy-cat," a sharp voice cut in. "Did you bring what I told you to bring yesterday?"
Blocking Linda's path was Jubina Loxter, the class bully. Spoiled at home and taller than most kids her age, Jubina loved picking on the weak.
She was careful, though—she'd once tried to provoke Clara and backed off after being firmly shut down.
Linda was her favorite target. Even when Clara occasionally intervened, Linda never dared to tell her parents.
"I… I forgot," Linda whispered.
She glanced nervously toward Clara, silently begging for help.
"Oh? Got some nerve now?" Jubina raised her fist threateningly, enough to make Linda's eyes brim with tears. "Want me to hit you?"
"Jubina," Clara said evenly, stepping in, "are you planning to hit someone again? Don't you remember the essay Ms. Daisy made you write last time?"
A few weeks earlier, Jubina had been caught bullying a girl from another class. She'd been forced to write a thousand-word self-criticism—a nightmare for someone with mediocre grades.
After behaving for a while, it seemed her old habits were back.
"Clara Johnson, you again!" Jubina snapped. "All you know how to do is tattle! Teacher's pet!"
Clara shrugged. "That's true. I do tattle. You're welcome to ask Ms. Daisy to stop listening to me."
That indifferent attitude only made Jubina angrier. To her, Clara was the perfect princess from a fairy tale—and she herself was just a clown by comparison.
The assembly whistle blew. Jubina scoffed and stormed off.
Linda, however, remained frozen, convinced she'd made an enemy for life.
"Linda," Clara said quietly, "if you can't say no for yourself, no one can protect you forever."
She'd given this advice many times before, always without effect.
"Why do you bother with her?" Jeresia muttered. "She's scared of everything. A bug could make her cry for half an hour."
"And you're brave?" Clara shot back. "You're afraid of bugs too."
"That's different! I'm not scared—I just think they're gross! And I never cry!"
At 9:05 a.m., the school bus pulled out on time. The trip would take about an hour and a half. To pass the time, Ms. Daisy led the students in singing nursery rhymes.
Their clear, childish voices drifted through the bus windows, drawing smiles from passersby along the road.
….
Using his intimate knowledge of S.H.I.E.L.D., Clint Barton disabled one of the Helicarrier's turbines with a single well-placed bomb.
If even one more turbine failed, the massive flying fortress would plummet from nine thousand meters—a catastrophic disaster.
The explosion occurred not far from the lab. The shockwave hurled everyone inside violently off their feet.
At that altitude, repair crews couldn't be deployed externally. The job fell to Tony Stark—his armor could fly, and he was a mechanical genius.
But the Helicarrier's greatest threat wasn't the damaged engine.
It was Bruce Banner.
This had all been part of Barton's plan.
The "bait" and the "watcher" he mentioned were Loki and the scepter.
Barton knew how desperate Fury was to recover the Tesseract. Once Loki's scepter fell into S.H.I.E.L.D.'s hands, Banner would inevitably be brought in to study it—using gamma radiation to track the Tesseract.
At the appointed time, Loki only needed to activate the scepter.
Barton could then trace Banner's location through the gamma signature.
The explosion would strip the beast of restraint.
And once the Hulk was unleashed… the Helicarrier would tear itself apart.
The plan worked.
Shaken by the blast, Banner lost control.
The Hulk erupted, smashing everything in sight.
What Barton hadn't anticipated was Thor.
Though Thor couldn't defeat the Hulk, he was strong enough to stall him. With the help of pre-arranged fighter jets drawing the monster away, the Hulk eventually fell from the Helicarrier, plunging into the world below.
With Steve Rogers'—questionable but earnest—technical assistance, Tony finally repaired the damaged turbine.
But the system was dead. The only way to restart it was manually—by pushing the massive rotor himself.
"At full acceleration, it'll tear you apart!" Steve shouted.
There was a red lever nearby—pulling it would slow the turbine enough for Tony to escape. Tony entrusted that task to Steve.
Simple in theory.
Except Barton's men had infiltrated the Helicarrier.
The moment they spotted Steve, gunfire erupted. Steve had to dodge bullets while guarding the lever—pure trial by fire.
Clint Barton was an elite S.H.I.E.L.D. agent. Not quite Natasha's equal—but terrifying as an enemy.
Barton struck again, sabotaging the central command deck and destroying Engine One. With two turbines gone, the Helicarrier began to tilt and fall.
The moment Natasha pinpointed Barton's location, she moved.
She would drag her friend back from hell—no matter the cost.
Meanwhile, Barton sent a team to free Loki.
When Thor arrived at the containment cell, Loki was already stepping out.
Thor rushed forward—straight into Loki's trap.
The glass prison sealed shut around him.
"This works on you every time," Loki sneered, genuinely concerned for his brother's intelligence.
The cell was designed to drop from the Helicarrier under heavy impact. After striking it once, Thor dared not attack again.
Just as Loki prepared to send his brother plummeting, Agent Coulson arrived—armed with S.H.I.E.L.D.'s newest weapon.
A year earlier, Loki had unleashed the Destroyer to kill Thor. Thor had destroyed it, leaving the remains on Earth—where S.H.I.E.L.D. recovered them.
During research, the Destroyer had accidentally reactivated, causing serious damage. Fury's solution was simple: dismantle it and repurpose the parts into weapons.
When it came to recycling old tech, humanity had limitless creativity.
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