CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR:
KNIGHT IN SHINING ARMOR

THEY ALL STOOD THERE ON the battlefield, ready for the fight. The fight to save Vision. The fight to save her best friend. To save the world from Thanos. Salem was tense, but she was ready. She had her weapons ready. Two guns on her and several knives and weapons. She was worried about Wanda, not liking the woman out of her sights. There was a lot of this battle that Salem had foreseen, and there was a lot that she hadn't, and that was the part that worried her.

Salem watched as Steve, T'Challa, and Natasha all walked down to the edge of the barrier where the woman alien that they had fought back in London stood with a giant standing beside of her. Salem watched her try to break through the surface with her weapon only to fail and Salem couldn't help the satisfied smirk that fell on her lips at the aliens failures. Words were exchanged between the three heroes and the alien, it wasn't a few moment later until the trio were joining the line of warriors once more.

     "Did they surrender?" Bucky asked Steve, glancing towards the man who was standing on the other side of him.

     Steve didn't look at Bucky as a sigh fell from his lips. "Not exactly." That's when T'Challa started the Wakandans in their war cry, something that echoed all throughout and somehow managed to prepare everyone for the battle. They watched as Proxima signaled for the other creatures to attack, and they did, running towards the barrier and almost getting through only to be cut in half and killed. They looked like dogs gone wrong, and it made Salem cock her head to the side in slight disgust and curiosity, raising an eyebrow.

     "Looks like we pissed her off." Natasha muttered.

     "Clearly." Salem scoffed. She pursed her lips for a moment as she looked at the creatures. She was truly curious now. "I just have one question. What the fuck happened to these creatures? They look like a bunch of dogs that went through an extremely bad experimentation. I wonder what kind of ridiculous name they have. You think one of them would be called Jerry?"

     "This is what you're worried about?" Natasha scoffed as she looked towards Salem.

     "The first one to attack me, I'm naming Jerry."

     "Oh God. . ." Natasha sighed, shaking her head at the woman.

     That's when Okoye speaks up, grabbing their attention. "They're killing themselves." Her words were filled with horror and her eyes were wide as she said this. As a few of the creatures managed to squeeze through the border with their bodies intact, a few of the Wakandans take a knee and raise their shields. The warriors standing them level their spears over their shoulders, and on T'Challa's command, fire at the quickly approaching dog-like creatures. Along with T'Challa's men, Bucky used his gun whilst Bruce―︎who was currently placed in the Hulkbuster―︎uses the pulsars on the suit.

     Sam, who was flying over head and at the edge of the barrier, send Redwing out to fight and says, "You seen the teeth on those things?"

     "Dog teeth, but with seven layers." Salem continued.

     Rhodey, their other air man, was quick to warn Sam. "Alright, back up, Sam. You're gonna get your wings singed." He flies overtop of the hideous monsters and allows mines to fall and hit the creatures, killing them. However, that's when they noticed that the creatures were starting to run around the barrier.

     Bruce was the one to speak up. "Cap, if these things circle the perimeter and get behind in us, there's nothing between them and Vision."

     Steve furrowed his eyebrows in determination before saying, "Then we better keep 'em in front of us."

     "How do we do that?" Okoye questioned, glancing towards T'Challa.

     "We open the barrier." T'Challa simply replies. He puts the com that is located on his wrist up to his mouth and says calmly, "On my signal, open North-West section seventeen."

     "Requesting confirmation, my king. You said open the barrier?" One of his people responds.

     T'Challa nods and says, "On my signal."

     "This will be the end of Wakanda." M'Baku says in realization, glancing around at the creatures that were getting farther and farther around the barrier the longer they stood there.

     "Then it will be the noblest ending." Okoye responds with a firm nod.

     "You know, they're kind of cute in a disgusting and disturbing way." Salem said as she readied her weapons in her hands before turning her head to look at Natasha with a smile on her face. "Think I can keep one as a pet?"

     "And name it what?" Natasha rolled her eyes.

     "Hmm. . ." Salem furrowed her eyebrows before smiling. "Sparkles."

     "Sparkles?" Natasha turned her head to look at Salem with raised eyebrows. "There is nothing sparkly about those things."

     "Exactly! The irony." Salem breathed with a satisfied smile. Natasha just shook her head, though she found a smile forming on her features.

That's when Steve readies one of the vibranium shields T'Challa gave him while T'Challa walks in front of the crowd. Finally, Salem's true fears started to set in. She found herself reaching out to sqeeze Natasha's hand. Natasha looked at her before offering her a reassuring smile and nod, and Salem tried her very best to return it, but her heart only continued to grow heavier and heavier as the seconds passed by. She turns back to T'Challa, and the next two words that fell from his mouth started the battler. "WAKANDA FOREVER!" He crossed his arms over his chest and his mask appeared over his face before the barrier opened and the creatures poured into Wakanda.

Everyone went charging forward except for Salem who decided to teleport right in the middle of the group of creatures and started her fight from there. She sliced at the creatures, teleporting right before they could snap at her, making them turn in continuous circles as they tried to attack the girl. But she always managed to kill them. Salem had to admit that it was much easier to kill them with her weapons, but when she needed to, she would pull out her gun and quickly shoot down a few before going back to fighting with her knives.

The creatures were a lot stronger than she had anticipated, knocking her to the ground and causing her to roll just in time for one to jump onto the spot she had just been, she shot this one and went to stand up, but the waves of the dog-like creatures only grew larger and larger until Salem found herself outnumbered, trying her best to fight them whilst on the ground, but their slobber kept slapping her in the face, and it was quite stressful to her. Eventually she had to cross her knives as one of the creature came biting at her face and she tried her best to gain control of the situation, but she was failing.

It wasn't until the creatures were suddenly all knocked from her that she sat up in confusion. Salem furrowed her eyebrows and forced herself up from the ground as she looked around before noticing a bright light in the middle of the field, and that's when she noticed Thor standing there with a new weapon in his hand, Rocket and Groot stand beside of him.

     "Haha!" Bruce laughed loudly. "You guys are so screwed now!"

     Lightning surrounded the god as he started running forward before jumping in the air and yelling out, "BRING ME THANOS!" He slammed on the ground and killed any of the creatures that were around him before destroying anything in his path and going so far as to fly put of the barrier and destroy the ships that the creatures had come on.

Salem quickly continued getting back into the rhythm of her fight, teleporting when needed and killing any creature that came close to her. She was so invested in the fight, that she almost didn't notice the giant spiked wheels that suddenly appeared from the ground. She only noticed them when the sound of T'Challa's voice filled her ears.

     "Fall back!" He yelled. "Fall back now."

Salem looked around for a moment before finding herself frozen, watching as a row of the wheels were coming straight for her, Natasha and Okoye not too far from her. She didn't think to teleport away, because she was too busy trying to figure out what exactly it was that she was looking at. Natasha called out for Salem, but it fell on deaf ears. It wasn't until Wanda suddenly landed in front of her and used her powers to lift up the wheels before throwing them aside that Salem snapped out of it.

     "Why was she up there all this time?" Okoye questioned, looking towards Natasha who only smirked.

     Wanda turned to look at Salem who let out a breath. "Hot."

     "You said you would be careful." Wanda huffed as she joined Salem's side.

     "I was very careful."

     "Tell that to the wheels of death that almost murdered you."

     "Good thing I had my own knight in shining armor to save me." Salem smiled and Wanda just rolled her eyes and Salem chuckled before giving her a kiss on the cheek before they both turned away from one another and dove back into the fight.