Chapter 9

Loops remaining 8/20.

"Let's look at this objectively. If I get close to Kaecilious, it's only a matter of landing the finishing blow. But he cannot see it coming. How?"

Ash muttered to himself as he swung the axe in his hands right through the neck of the first Chitauri.

The decapitated head was flung away, leaving behind a geyser of blood. Ash neatly snatched the blaster that had previously been in the Chitauri's hands and aimed it at another, just as the building around them trembled. He squeezed the trigger, the body of the Chitauri getting blasted out of the building. Then he crouched behind a desk.

"The problem is his magic, intellect and martial arts. So basically everything."

The desk was pin cushioned with blaster fire but by then Ash had pushed off of it and was waiting for the alien to make it's next move.

Ash pulled the trigger and the Chitauri landed without it's upper torso.

"He has me outmatched in everything. My one advantage are the loops."

The glider passed over his head and without fail he turned the blaster towards the ceiling and begun shooting.

The last Chitauri fell in a heap next to Ash, smoking from the blaster fire and smelling like burnt plastic and meat.

"I got 7 more chances before I lose my life. This time permanently. Let's make them count."

Ash got up and started looking around the office, maybe he could find something that could help him with this?

His search yielded a degree of success but he wasn't sure how helpful what he had found would be. He spared a glance at the clock and winced. 10:51 am. He wasn't sure if the timing was off but he could try to follow the previous plan and use Thor's attack to flush out Kaecilious.

Jumping on the glider, Ash took off to the sky, managing to grab the attention of a group of Chitauri who chased after him with a grudge. Turns out spitting your mama jokes is universally the best taunt one can make.

Behind him the force had more than doubled from the initial 10 gliders that had been following him. Okay this was perfect. Ash knew the relative position of every Avenger. Clint was up in the rooftops snagging any glider that came near him and making even more impossible shots.

Ash had waved at him as he passed by, leaving a shocked Hawkeye awkwardly waving his hand back. Captain America was on the ground managing the other Avengers and generally being a bad ass. Iron man was on Leviathan duty and Thor was fighting Loki.

The only one Ash was yet to see was Black Widow and the...

Boom!

An explosion appeared from the back of the gliders following him closely. Ash widened his eyes and swerved right at the last minute, just as wrecked machine parts and screaming Chitauri were thrown away by a giant green creature.

Ash spared a look behind and what he saw made his blood ran cold. Over a quarter of the initial Chitauri force after him was simply gone. He needed to get out of the air now! Ash dove down to the ground at high speeds, feeling the shockwaves from the results of another attack pass through him.

A roar followed soon after and the Chitauri gliders left over begun to scatter in all directions in fear. Hulk jumped off a skyscraper, shattering the windows through sheer strength and managed to tag six of the gliders nearest to him. The blaster fire only served to annoy him as he enclosed his fist around the head of a Chitauri.

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From the corner of his eyes, the green rage monster spotted a Chitauri glider escaping towards the ground. A few hundred meters away was a cordon and behind that, the police and evacuating civilians. Hulk couldn't let the Chitauri get near the cordon because it would spell doom.

He spun, using a glider as a foothold and threw the Chitauri in his hands towards the fleeing glider. The Chitauri's neck broke as it sailed through the air and managed to barely miss Aden. A feeling of danger had overcome the teen minutes before collision.

Ash backed to the right, riding the glider above the deserted sidewalk. His heart hammered in place, knowing that he was yet to escape death. Why the fuck was the Hulk attacking him?! Looking down at himself, covered in blue blood and standing on an alien craft, Ash had to admit he looked pretty attackable.

Thank goodness he had managed to escape the 7 feet plus wall of muscles before he died. Otherwise that kind of...

Clash!

Krakoom!

Boom!

Ash pulled on the brakes of the glider as something broke through the building above him and landed just feet away to his front. Ash gulped as glowing green eyes watched him from inside the dust cloud.

The dust settled and Ash got the first look at the Hulk. His spine tingled with fear at the sight that greeted him. Ash had been wrong. He just had to be! This wasn't a 7 foot creature. Coupled with the cords of muscles that shifted with every move, he looked larger than life. And he was staring at Ash like a dead man.

Ash's eyes flicked over to the corner of his eyesight.

8 loops remaining.

He couldn't fuck this up. The more chances he got to beat Kaecilious, the sooner the mission was over and he could get back to a normal life. All he had to ensure now was that he made it out of here alive.

He tried to think back about all the facts he knew concerning M.C.U hulk. For starters, he was not as dumb as people seemed to think. Which meant treating him with respect was the way to go.

Ash jumped down from the Chitauri, the action making Hulk sniff in confusion, probably wondering what a teenage boy covered in blue blood was doing flying around in an enemy craft.

Ash held up his hands slowly, to show he meant no harm. That's when everything went wrong. Blaster fire exploded from his back towards the Hulk. Ash took a glance behind him and saw a few Chitauri soldiers pour on the sidewalk, blasting their weapons at the bigger target. Hulk. And Ash was between them.

A roar of fury escaped the Hulk as he lost all reason, only aiming to destroy his enemies.

"Oh crap."

Ash managed to bite out those words right before he was slapped aside by the Hulk's large hand. Despite the loops making Ash stronger, faster and more durable, put up against the raw force of a gamma fueled being, he came up short. He still had no idea how he was getting stronger, the loops were supposed to reset everything.

Which meant his injuries and every other change made in every successive loop. He estimated that he was now two times stronger than when he started. So approximately 10 loops to get twice as strong. Was it like a reward for enduring the pain? Ash had no idea.

What he did know however was that he was not doing this again. Every bone in his body broke or rather shattered as he rag dolled on the street, strips of flesh getting torn by the hard tarmac before he slammed past an open car door and then landing, body mangled through the window of a flower shop.

Blood bubbled out of his mouth as he tried to breath and failed. Chips of glass dug into his body painfully and all Ash could feel was the frantic beat of his heart as it tried to stave off death. Ash knew it was only seconds until the grim reaper came for him.

There was something about death that was...sacred. Ash's life did not magically flash through his eyes. What happened however was that his sixth sense exploded in utility as his soul left his mortal coil and he could feel everything. For a split second, Ash could swear he saw the image of the Ouroboros glowing in the corner of his eyes, then darkness claimed him.

Loops remaining 7/20.

Ash woke up with a sudden cry, startling Linda who had been standing next to him, about to touch his shoulder.

"Sorry."

The boy muttered getting up as his thoughts ran a hundred miles per second. Wasting time while getting to Kaecilious had had disastrous outcomes. An encounter with the hulk that ended up badly for the teen.

He only had 7 more chances left. He couldn't waste anymore loops plus dying kind of sucked. Especially getting slapped aside like a two bit extra. Ash stepped down on the anger. There was nothing he could do to the Hulk but if he survived this...him and the big guy were going for a few rounds. That is if he managed to turn his fate into one of those generic power fantasies he had read about or watched.

Ash grabbed the jacket slung over the chair, turned and addressed the crowd the same way as before, pulled on the fire alarm, grabbed the axe and any other useful thing in the office he could find and waited.

When the Chitauri landed on the floor like he knew they would, Ash wasted no time in decimating them. Whether it was his increased strength or him having memorized their moves or his will and need to live fuelling his actions, or even a combination of all three things, Ash destroyed them and jumped on the glider.

This time everything went according to plan. Once he clashed the glider on top of Kaecilious, Ash ducked under the debris and waited.