Chapter 19
“So, you want me to go back there.”
AU Steve murmured, he wasn’t really asking, he was just stating what Tony tried to avoid saying plainly.
“Yeah, pretty much.” Tony winced, guilt eating him from the inside at the hollow look on the chained man’s face. “It’s the only way for us to get inside and be able to go back home. But no one will force you to do anything, Steve. You are free to make whatever choice you want. If you want to not do this, no one will blame you.”
The soldier didn’t answer for a few tense seconds, as he stared at the floor intently.
When Tony was about to lose hope, AU Steve looked up at him with a determined look on his face that, for a second, he looked almost exactly like his own Steve.
“I will help you.” He said firmly, but Tony could detect the slight tremor in his voice at the thought of going back there.
“Are you sure about this?” Tony raised an eyebrow at the chained man.
“No.” AU Steve sighed, but kept his gaze at Tony. “But I can’t let another world suffer by them. You gave me back myself. This is the least I could do.” A faint smile appeared on his face then. “Besides, I have an extra badge with me. It will be a shame to not use it.”
Tony eyed him for a second, unable to withheld the soft smile that took over his face.
“Every version of you is a sweet dumbass.” Tony chuckled as he shook his head, trying to hide how his heart banged at the thought of his husband, suffering back home.
“Wait, am I something to you in your world?” AU Steve asked with genuinely surprised look on his face, like he couldn’t believe a version of Tony would care about him.
“Yeah, actually, you are probably the most important person in my life back home.” He raised his left hand to show him the wedding ring with a gentle smile on his face.
AU Steve’s eyes widened as he looked at the ring in pure shock, then back at Tony’s face.
“Really?” he whispered in disbelieve.
“Yeah, really.” Tony confirmed patiently, feeling his sadness for the other man increase.
AU Steve looked down at the floor, a sad smile on his face.
“Well, I am glad he didn’t suffer the same fate.” He murmured softly, looking back at Tony with the same sad smile. “I am glad he has you.”
***
Alarms were blaring from the moment the power went out in the entire tower.
Rage itched itself on Dark Tony’s face as he reached towards the tablet to check the tower’s statues.
“I can only get the backup power and it is not enough.” He announced in frustration, turning to Dark Dean, who was getting equally frustrated at him at the delay.
“Everyone in the building has been accounted for.” Dark Dean stated with a deep frown. “Where might more people be hiding?”
A deep frown appeared on Dark Tony’s face, as he remembered something in the Tower’s blueprints when he checked them.
“There was a hidden computer room or something in the floor over us.” He announced as he turned to his king. “They may be in there.”
“Lead the way.” Dark Dean nodded at him, then turned to two soldiers next to him. “You two stay here. Keep an eye on both angels.”
***
After they left, the two soldiers stood in the dark room.
Castiel was tense in his restrains, feeling something about to happen in any second.
He wasn’t wrong.
A vent opened in the ceiling, from it, jumped Raven and Charlie to land right in front of the two soldiers, and hit them with the shotguns in their hands.
The two soldiers, taken by surprise from their sudden appearance, didn’t have a second to react.
“Take that, you Nazi motherfucker!” Charlie exclaimed with a smile, before rushing with Raven towards the weakly struggling Castiel. “Hey, come with me if you want to live!”
“How long have you been waiting to say that?” Castiel murmured weakly, as he gave the red head a smile.
“Probably my entire life.” Charlie grinned at him, as she and Raven started to release his bindings.
“Come on, Cas, we will get you out of here.” Raven promised, while helping him up.
He was too weak to walk on his own, so each girl took an arm and wrapped them around their shoulders. Supporting him as they all rushed out of the room to the corridor.
They walked as fast as they could, while trying to hold up Castiel’s weight.
“You are heavier than I thought.” Raven murmured as they rushed towards the elevator at the end of the corridor. They could hear the sound of heavy feet rushing behind them.
“I am sorry. Dean had been feeding me a lot lately.” The angel murmured; eyes half open as he struggled to keep himself upright.
“That and you have been working out. You are so buff, it’s awesome.” Charlie grinned at him as she adjusted the hand on his chest to support him more. “Nice and hard.”
“Thank you.” He gave her a tired smile, just as they reached the elevator’s doors.
“We need to hurry.” Raven said frantically, as she heard the sounds coming closer.
“I got it. I got it.” Charlie reassured as she kept pressing the elevator’s button persistently.
When the doors opened, the relieved looks on their faces were wiped away at the sight that met them.
Castiel, immediately, pushed the two girls away from him, just as a beam of energy hit him right in the chest, sending him flying to hit the wall hard, then fall to the floor with a thud.
“Cas!” Charlie screamed in panic, while Raven stared with wide eyes, as Ultron got out of the elevator after shooting Castiel.
“I don’t believe that Master Stark is done with you yet.” Ultron said mockingly, as he turned to sneer at Charlie, who took a step back with panic in her eyes.
Meanwhile, a group of black soldiers came from down the corridor, making their way towards the angel and the two women.
***
A military car approached the entrance of the facility, where a group of soldiers were standing, armed, and staring suspiciously as the car stopped in front of them.
“Your papers.” The captain of the soldiers ordered as he approached the car, with his gun ready.
AU Steve, who was driving the car, turned to him with a cold look in his red eyes.
He was thankful he found eye lenses back at the hideout, or he could have been found out easily, if he showed up with his blue eyes back to normal.
He stayed silent, maintaining the act of being his mind-controlled self.
“Your papers, Captain, now.” The soldier ordered again, even more firmly.
AU Steve just nodded towards the backseat, where the glass rolled down, revealing Dean, dressed in complete black, with a cold, dead look on his face.
“My king! My apologies, your majesty!” all the soldiers tensed and bowed in deep respect. Frightened at the sight of their ruler.
“As you were.” Dean said icily, as he eyed the soldier.
“Let them through!” the soldier ordered, turning to the other soldiers.
Dean hid his smile as the gate was buzzed open to let their car through.
Dean and AU Steve were successfully inside the facility.
***
“Hail to our king!”
Every soldier in the room shouted, while saluting, the moment Dean and AU Steve stepped into the controlling room.
Dean saluted back, maintaining the same cold look on his face.
It was hard keeping that face all the time.
After the salute, he started to make his way into the room, with AU Steve a constant presence by his side.
“My king!” Dark Bobby’s voice rang in surprise as he rushed towards Dean, a perplexed look on his face, with a very obvious burn on the side of his face. Probably because of AU Erik’s attack. It made him look even more bitter. “We were not expecting you, your majesty.”
“Nor was I anticipating being back so soon.” Dean said in the coldest, most cruel voice he could manage, as he eyed the man with piercing eyes. “Thanks to your incompetence, the doppelgangers, My doppelganger, escaped his execution.”
“Yes, he did.” Dark Bobby stated, as he met Dean’s eyes just as piercingly.
“And?”
“We are exhausting every possible means to locate them.”
“Good.”
Dark Bobby trailed his eyes over Dean’s face, then towards AU Steve’s face, who remained unchanged.
“Would you like us to delay deployment until we do so, your majesty?” Dark Bobby asked carefully, eyeing Dean intently.
“Deployment?” Dean let out before he could help himself, confusion filling him as he exchanged a quick look with AU Steve, who looked equally confused, but was hiding it well.
“She is inbound and ready.” Dark Bobby grinned mysteriously, as he gestured towards a screen.
Dean turned towards the screen, which showed the hangar, where the closed gateway was, along with a very large battleship, that looked suspiciously like Tony’s Time ship, that he built back home, but was larger and far more armed with hundreds of weapons.
“The doomsday device.” Dean muttered with a frown as he eyed the large vessel, AU Steve looked like it was the first time he laid eyes on it as well.
Apparently, Dark Tony didn’t tell him everything.
“The Wellenreiter is fully operational. Completely done being powered by our resident battery.” Dark Bobby reported proudly. Dean’s brows furrowed more at that. Resident Battery?
“It is ready, my king.” The man turned to him expectantly. “Shall we send her through?”
Dean was in a tight spot here. If he banned that ship from going to their world, they will definitely know he wasn’t really their king and their chance of going home will be snatched from them.
He had no other choice.
“As scheduled.” He ordered firmly, keeping his eyes straight on the screen.
“Begin.” Dark Bobby ordered, turning to the soldiers in the room.
Immediately, the gateway opened, revealing a cylinder, huge amount of energy, that was so strong it shook the room. Obviously, this was their gate to their world.
The huge battleship started to move towards the gate, until it disappeared into it.
“The Wellenreiter is on its way.” Dark Bobby announced with a vicious smile on his face. “Hail, victory!”
“Hail victory!” every soldier in the room shouted back.
Dean exchanged a look with AU Steve, then back to the screen.
“Hail, victory.” He murmured begrudgingly along with the soldiers.
***
Back in the tower, Dark Tony was tapping into his tablet, while eyeing Raven and Charlie, who were being held by two soldiers.
The tower was still pitch black inside and out.
“Report.” Dark Dean ordered as he entered the room, making his way to the genius.
“Good news. The Wellenreiter has made the transition to this world.” Dark Tony reported proudly as he looked at the king.
“Castiel is the one who matters right now.” The king stated firmly, waiting to hear news on the angel.
“That red light we are flooding him with, it’s burning off.” Dark Tony frowned at that. “So pretty soon, his cells will be desaturated, we cannot perform the surgery.”
“Fix it.” The king ordered impatiently.
“I can’t.”
“This is your tower. Your brain. So, turn the power back on.”
“I can’t, because the system has been encrypted.” Dark Tony met Dark Dean’s eyes coldly. “It will take me a long time to undo it. Time, we don’t have.”
“Who encrypted it?”
“Well, by miss Bradbury, of course.”
They both turned towards the red head, who now had a very pale face and an increasingly nervous girlfriend a few feet away from here.
Both harshly restrained.
***
Dean was walking around the control room, looking around as discreetly as he could, under the careful eyes of Dark Bobby, who never took his eyes off of him.
He walked over to AU Steve, who gave him a subtle nod towards a specific device in the middle of all the controllers.
Dean immediately understood that it was the dampener. If he pressed a certain button in it, it will let his team inside the facility, fully powered and with all their strength.
He took a step towards the device, but then stopped at a voice behind him.
“Is there anything else I could help you with, my king?” Dark Bobby’s voice sounded behind him. Dean felt there was a sarcastic tone in it, but he wasn’t sure.
“No, that’ll be all.” Dean dismissed him. His voice as emotionless as his face.
“Very well.” Dark Bobby nodded and turned to leave.
Dean was about to sigh in relief, but it was short lived.
“Before I go, I have something for you, my king.” There was a smirk on the man’s face that made Dean a little nervous. From the corner of his eyes, he could see AU Steve tense as well. “A gift. To celebrate your return.”
Dean nodded at Dark Bobby to proceed, feeling uneasy.
“Guard!” he called out firmly.
Immediately, a door opened, revealing two soldiers dragging a female prisoner.
A prisoner that Dean knew her face too well.
As they brought the woman and forced her to her knees with her face covered in tears, Dean’s own face paled.
It was Charlie’s doppelganger.
“Well, I know how much you enjoy executing rule breakers, This one broke many of them.” Dark Bobby gave him a sly grin. “We discovered that woman handing her rations to the work camp children. Strictly against camp rules, of course.” He pulled out a gun and handed it over to Dean, who had no choice but to take it.
AU Steve was getting more and more nervous by the second.
Dean’s eyes remained on AU Charlie’s tired, tear streaked face.
“Those children were starving.” She whispered weakly, looking down at the floor, her body shaking in fear.
Dark Bobby scoffs and turned to look expectantly at Dean, who took a step forward and raised the gun towards AU Charlie’s head. More tears slid down her face.
But he didn’t shoot.
“This must be hard.” Dark Bobby tsked in fake pity. “I heard your doppelganger considered a woman that looked exactly like her as a sister to him.
Dean stared at AU Charlie’s face for a long minute, gun raised towards her head.
Well, he could do a lot of things, but not this.
He turned and aimed the gun at Dark Bobby’s head and shoot.
But nothing happened. The gun clicked, but nothing came out.
The Dark old man let out a loud cruel laugh.
“Did you really think I would hand you a loaded weapon without verifying who you are?” he mocked, raising his voice in pure rage at the last syllable.
In less than two seconds, soldiers around them moved, raising their guns towards Dean. Ready to shoot.