Chapter Text
Dear Mother in Heaven, Haruhi thought, sighing as she looked despondently around at the wreckage surrounding her. WHY?!
The thought was a bit muddled, but it seemed to cover a good deal of the last two days, all things considered.
Why was she surrounded by pieces of building and what appeared to be robotic cats? Well, the explanation for that seemed to be, because the twins had decided to only turn half of them into real cats. A solution that would likely to be its own problem in 6 months or so, but that type of thinking appeared to characterise the tricksters.
Why were there evil robotic cats attacking Tokyo? The answer to that one at least was easy as anyone could tell you that the main occupations of the Avengers were protecting innocent civilians from rampaging supervillains and stopping invasions of Earth.
Of course though that was what the public thought; now she knew that most of their time was spent causing mass hysteria in media outlets, eating local sweetshops out of stock (unless they were already out - generally leading to a rampage that would put most supervillains to shame) and, apparently, developing weaponry to be sold to their enemies. Under assumed names / identities of course, and only once Kyoya had assured himself that it wouldn’t work against local law enforcement, for all that it seemed to work well enough against his teammates. And of course, she couldn’t forget how much time certain team members spent pranking various supervillains or posing in the mirror to assess their best angle for saving kittens.
Perhaps the best question then, Haruhi considered, shuffling a little higher up on the wall was, WHY DID THEY KEEP BRINGING HER ALONG?!
As of two days before, she’d been happily working towards her law degree and occasionally lime-lightening as a second-string hero for small, low notice crimes. Then, she’d helped blow up a robot terrorising a local magic shop - which as it turned out was a front for some evil organisation and likely then connected to the aforementioned catbots. As the robot she wrecked was an Otori prototype, she’d quickly found herself footing the bill, which, considering she didn’t have several billion yen lying around, seemed to have translated into being a de facto Avenger until such time as she’d paid off her debt, or turned to supervillainy.
“We have a deal with SHEILD to help ‘rehabilitate’ villains, so unless you are capable of slipping between dimensions you might as well get used to the new costume.” The mechanised voice of Ironman would have startled her out of her thoughts as he touched down in front of her, if her spider-sense didn’t already go off like a claxon anytime Kyoya Otori, “Billionaire-Genius-Shadow-Ruler-of-All” was in the vicinity.
For all that he was co-leader of the Avengers, Kyoya was terrifying even without his suit and, from what Haruhi had seen, likely the shadow director of several of the organisations that SHIELD and the Avengers frequently butted heads with.
“There is very little profit to be made in the destruction of the world,” Kyoya continued, waltzing over to her to lean against the door frame she was above. He flipped up his faceplate and tilted his head up to smirk at her, “and it’s very messy to have my labs blown up randomly. I could be working on something important; better for everyone involved if it’s organised properly.”
Luckily the appearance of Mori and Honey saved Haruhi from having to respond to that statement.
“Nee Haruhi!” Honey called out, apparently having reverted back to his normal size and disposition, allowing the taller teen to piggy-back him around as he collected his used arrows. “Wasn’t that fun?”
Haruhi smiled nervously at him, forgetting that the new suit the twins had given her blocked most expressions. As she’d just teased his alter-ego into punching straight through the building who’s rubble she was currently perched on, she decided it would be better to humor him. “These types of fights aren’t really for me, and I think SHEILD is likely going to be mad at us all for all the damage.” She said rather apologetically, releasing one hand from the wall and gesturing at the rubble.
“Why would SHEILD-“ “Be mad at us?” Haruhi sprang off the wall and twisted in the air, landing far enough away to watch as the remnants of the wall, which were not prepared to hold up the combined weight of two Asguardian demi-gods, collapsed. Kyoya, who really seemed to have a sixth sense for this type of thing, snapped down his faceplate, but otherwise appeared unconcerned as he was covered in dust and trickster.
“Loki!” Coyote shouted jumping to his feet, “Loki, are you hurt?!”
As Haruhi watched Coyote launched himself at the prone form of his brother, helping him stand, and dusting off his hair, and began slowly moving towards them if in case they needed help.
“Dearest brother, if you had been hurt; I don’t know what I would have done!” Coyote cried, wrapping his arms around his twin.
“No, if you’d have been hurt,” Loki said, loosely twining his arms around his doppleganger’s neck, “I would have never forgiven myself!”
Haruhi checked her advance as they seemed fine from the sheer amount of brotherly tears and feeling up that was going on and well, Ironman hadn’t even spared them a glance, which was rather more than the crowd of reporters that had followed the racket were doing.
“Such brotherly devotion!” “Such sibling love!” “Kyaaa” Several hundred pictures were being taken by the look of it, but as long as they were of the twins and not of her in this ridiculous outfit (spandex - even Otori modified and partially enchanted - was a friend to no one), she had no complaints. Really though, it looked like she might have to try to explain public decency laws to them again, brotherly love appeared to have a very different meaning in Asgard.
“SHEILD’s support for the Avengers is non-negotiable,” Renge commented from where she was moving towards the crowd of reporters. Haruhi sighed and started to slink away, nominally Renge’s role was SHEILD contact, but that somehow translated into several hundred more pictures being taken when she arrived and organising their upload to twitter. It was pretty much a moot point anyways, since Kyoya always had the best pictures, sold via a line of exclusive merchandise.
“You’ve met the head of SHEILD, right Haruhi?” Honey said and now that Mori was done his collections, it looked like the group was beginning to congregate as they always did after a battle.
“And you’ve met” “Captain Ouran” The twins added smirking at her even as they moved to lean against the still intact portion of all wall surrounding Kyoya, who continued to ignore them and rather turned his gaze on Haruhi.
“You should really pay more attention to who signs your cheques,” Kyoya commented smugly at her.
“If I got a cheque-“ Haruhi jumped to the side and rolled, narrowing avoiding the 200lbs of aforementioned supersoldier launching at her. “Maybe I would." She finished springing to her feet.
Pulling a textbook roll of his own and springing up to stand with nary a hair out of place, Captain Ouran, or Cap as everyone called him, turned to her, smile blinding and huge, saying, “Ne, ne Haruhi! Did you see me? Didn’t I look great?”
“Yes, yes,” Haruhi nodded distractedly, still trying to parse what the others had been getting at, since no, he couldn’t be related to the head of SHIELD. Not just the plain fact that Tamaki was an idiot, but he was also apparently a hundred or so years old, which would seriously complicate things.
“I hope the reporters got some pictures from my left side!” Tamaki continued gushing happily and turning his smile towards said reporters, several of whom fainted away at the sight. “I think that 45 degrees from my left is my best side, don’t you agree Haruhi? Maybe the Daily Bugle has some, or Kyoya-“
Really, Haruhi thought, the fact that this blathering idiot was the head (nominally) of one of the greatest superhero teams in the world, when he was so... so...
“Annoying” Haruhi blinked, realising she’d spoken aloud, only to watch as Tamaki was sent flying into the crumbling rubble beside the building by her words.
“New attack?” Mori commented, starring at her expectantly as the others converged around their trapped and twitching leader.
“I don’t think so?” She hazarded. It had been several years since she’d been bitten afterall and it didn’t seem to be a very “spider” related attack, and at this point it was not the strangest thing she’d seen over the last two days.
“It’s super effective though!” Laughed Loki, poking the twitching Cap in the side.
“You must be a real gutzy second string.” She felt two arms wrap around her shoulders as the twins vanished only to close her in. “You seem like you could be a very fun toy, Webhead.”
She sighed - choosing to ignore them, since if they weren’t setting of her spider-sense she just couldn’t be bothered.
“Unhand Haruhi, you demons!” Tamaki shouted, emerging from the rubble and slinging his shield at them. Luckily they were all able to dodge, or vanish, out of the way, which really made the whole attack fairly ineffective to Haruhi’s eyes.
“Mother! The twins are teasing Haruhi!” He continued pointing ineffectually at Kyoya, and as he started to chase the twins throughout the rubble, Haruhi selected another nearby wall section to get out of their way.
“You had better not be referring to me Captain.” Kyoya snarked, “please remember who funds the majority of this operation.”
“Nee Haruhi,” Honey sitting on Mori’s back was just high enough to not interfere with laconic archer’s quiver and almost tall enough to look her in the eye. “Have you decided on a name yet?”
“Ummm, no?” Haruhi said, keeping a weather eye on Tamaki chasing the twins around the area, much to the amusement and cheers of the collected reporters. “I hadn’t really planned on being a serious hero. I mean I really appreciate the costume, it’s much more durable than the one I’d put together, but I’m not really interested in being a full-time superhero.”
“Not interested?!” Captain Ouran skid to a halt in front of her, nearly going ass over tea kettle as one of the twins took the opportunity to trip him. “But don’t you want to help others? I mean, you’re kind of small and wimpy with really creepy powers, but you’re a natural at this!”
Haruhi blinked behind her mask, unsure if she should be offended or not at that.
“That’s it!” Tamaki’s smile grew even wider as he continued, showing off just how glorious teeth created with the pinnacle of human DNA could be. “1000 acts of heroism. If you perform 1000 acts of heroism with us, we’ll consider your debt clear and you can go back to your normal life.”
“What?!” Haruhi choked disbelieving. “What? No! I didn’t agree-“
“You did good work today, Spiderman.” Tamaki held his hand out to her as she stared at him.
“Spiderman?” The twins chorused, “Are you sure about that Cap?” Even in her daze, she could see the two identical Cheshire cat smiles they were directing at the Captain.
“I’m sure spiders are just very misunderstood creatures,” Tamaki was still holding out his hand, although he gestured empathetically with the other. “Certainly no one pays them enough attention, but they might be the only friend to some! No Charlotte! No!!” As Tamaki descended quickly into blubbering tears, Haruhi looked questioningly at the others, but they seemed to be quite happily ignoring the continued outburst and repeated snuffles of “Charlottle, poor Charlotte”.
“So Spiderman,” Haruhi looked across and into a blinding flash from Ironman’s armor. “Excellent, I needed to diversify the trading card line.”
“You can’t just sell pictures of people without their permission!” Haruhi began only to be cut off as Kyoya continued, “and how pray tell were you planning on paying for the 3 police cars currently webbed to Main Street and this building that you taunted Honey into hitting? I guess we could add it to your debt, make it an even 1500 acts? A bit of a discount from me, as it just happens that I was considering this area for my new office tower.”
Haruhi wondered fleetingly where the thin line between villain and Kyoya was, if one existed.
“Have you been to Avenger mansion yet, Haruhi?” Tamaki interrupted, coming back to his feet, his crying apparently over.
“Ah, no?” Haruhi said as she flipped off the wall to land beside him; following her talk with Kyoya, she felt a little too exposed up there just right now. If anything Tamaki had proved to be an excellent shield when needed.
“You should move in!” Tamaki gushed at her.
“What?! No, why would I-“ She began, only to have her objections waved to the side by a blue gloved hand.
“Great!” Tamaki began, smiling broadly at her as he ordered. “Loki, Coyote - grab her possessions, Mori - arrange transport, Kyoya - arrange a suite.”
“What about me?” Honey asked, scuffling his foot across the debris from where Mori had placed him.
“Please eat some cakes Honey, it’s important to keep your blood sugar up following a transformation. And Spiderman?” Tamaki turned the full devastating force of his smile on her.
“Yes?” Haruhi starred.
“Welcome to the Avengers.”