A crippled shank spirals away from Sif's blade, engine whining urgently as it strains and stutters with the fruitless attempt to stay aloft. It crashes into the snow nearby and explodes, spraying meltwater through the air. Unlike some of their masters, the drones have metal hides. Whatever alien alloys they're made of doesn't hold against Asgardian steel, but Palmer's bullets ping and ricochet back when they hit... at least until one shatters a robot's glowing 'eye'. It turns to stare at the human, one eye smoking and the other two aglow, and then cycles its weapon up for automatic fire.

Matt might be too busy to help, however. The sound of engines guides him in ducking around his shank; his batons come straight down on the jets at the back. He risks a burn from the jets if he's not careful or lucky- but the electricity and the jets don't mix well. It too squeals and skids away and explodes as it fails to halt the overload. For all their advanced tech, these things don't seem terribly sturdy. Two more have just... spontaneously fallen apart before they could shoot?

If Loki doesn't notice something's up, Matt surely will. There's a soft scrape of claws on bark; a quiet scrunch of snow below the wind, a discordant hiss and smell of chemical vapor - and something invisible is about to leap at Sif, long blades crackling. Nor is it the only unseen assassin lunging out of the snow and the shadows...