"Dammit!"
The curse burst from Fury's lips, his single eye bloodshot as he stared at the tactical display. "Too slow! Why are we always a step behind?"
From the moment the first frost had touched Midgard, S.H.I.E.L.D. and the Avengers had been played. They had found the Tesseract, yes, but the massive spatial rift tearing open the sky over Manhattan made their discovery feel like a cruel joke. The war had barely begun, and already, despair was settling over the bridge of the Helicarrier like a fog.
How could they hold? This wasn't a skirmish; it was a planetary invasion. The enemy held every advantage, and the Avengers were a handful of souls against a tide.
Reality, as Emrys had predicted, was far harsher than any cinematic fantasy. The Chitauri Commander had no intention of a slow escalation. He deployed his full strength in a single, crushing wave.
Ten Leviathan bio-carriers—gargantuan, armored beasts acting as orbital drop-ships—disgorged thousands of Chitauri warriors. They rained down like a meteor shower, hitting the pavement of every major intersection in New York City. Overhead, flights of hover-chariots established air superiority, striking ground targets with pinpoint accuracy to clear the way for the infantry.
The invasion was professional. Efficient. The Chitauri were advancing in a disciplined grid, seizing high ground and establishing heavy firebases to negate any human counter-offensive. It was the work of a commander who had conquered a thousand worlds in Thanos's name.
And at the center of the storm, atop Stark Tower, stood the lynchpin. The Tesseract was no longer guarded by a handful of possessed scientists. Hundreds of Frost Giants, led by Laufey himself, stood watch. With the Casket of Ancient Winters in his hand, the tower had become an icy fortress.
Laufey and the Chitauri understood the importance of the portal better than the humans did. They had turned the five-kilometer radius around the tower into a kill zone. From the rooftops to the sewers, the Chitauri had fortified every inch. It was a "Maginot Line" of the stars—a layered, impenetrable defensive network that left no gaps for a stealthy approach.
Even Tony Stark, the most incurable optimist of the group, looked grim.
"That's my building," he muttered, though the usual snark was missing from his voice. "Those blue bastards didn't even ask for a lease." He was venting, trying to mask the suffocating pressure of seeing a literal army occupying his life's work.
So weak...
Emrys surveyed the room, his brow furrowing as he watched the Avengers waver. In the Hive Worlds of the Imperium, an invasion of this scale would barely disrupt the local nobility's gala. A few tens of thousands of xenos, and these "heroes" were already ready to break?
He would have to increase the intensity of their training once this was over. Weakness was a contagion he would not allow to spread.
"Despair is a luxury we cannot afford," Emrys said, his voice cutting through the panic like a vox-broadcast.
He infused his words with a subtle psychic pulse—a command of authority that resonated in their very bones. "Remember why you were assembled. You are the final shield. If you break, there is no one else to stand between Earth and the void."
The suggestion took hold. Faces that had been pale with fear hardened with a newfound, artificial resolve.
"What is the play, Emrys?" Fury asked, his voice steadying. He had no moves left on the board; he was entirely reliant on the man from the stars.
"I am going to give you a chance to save this world," Emrys said, his gaze settling on the group.
Tony Stark narrowed his eyes. "I don't like that look. Last time you gave someone a 'chance,' Thor ended up in a sensory deprivation tank."
"You won't be part of this specific strike, Stark," Emrys said, dismissing him. He turned to Thor and Banner. "I am preparing a specialized boarding craft. You two will be delivered directly to the enemy mothership on the far side of the portal."
He paused, projecting a schematic of the Chitauri hierarchy. "The Chitauri are a gestalt consciousness, a synthesis of biology and machine. They are slaved to a central command node within their primary vessel. Destroy the mothership, and the army on the ground will cease to function. It is the only way to win this without a decade of urban warfare."
He had excluded Stark, Romanoff, and Barton for a simple reason: a boarding action in the vacuum of a hive-fleet's wake required raw, transhuman durability.
"Just the two of us?" Banner asked, his face turning a sickly shade of green.
"Hardly," Emrys smiled. "You will be accompanied by two tactical squads of my Dark Angels. They will ensure you reach the bridge."
"I'm in," Thor said, his voice booming with the weight of his recent trials. He grabbed a retreating Banner by the shoulder, his grip like a vice. "Don't worry, Bruce. A boarding action is just a glorious brawl in a smaller room!"
"I... I'd really rather stay here," Banner stammered, looking at the ceiling.
Thor shifted his grip, his eyes flashing with a stern, martial light. "To refuse the call when the world screams for aid is a coward's path, friend Bruce. And I have very little patience for cowards today."
Banner looked at the God of Thunder, then at Emrys, and finally slumped his shoulders in defeat. He knew he didn't have a choice. The Hulk was going to war.