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Loki hadn’t seen a Midgardian in centuries, not since the last time he and Thor had gone down to their realm and been worshipped as gods. Well, he supposed he’d seen some while looking in on Thor’s banishment, but he hadn’t been there in the flesh. It’d been centuries since that. He certainly hadn’t expected to find one here, of all places.
He’d expected his fall from the Bifrost to kill him, had hoped for it, even. He hadn’t expected to slip into the Void between the realms, to the very place where the Mad Titan had been exiled. Loki had only ever heard of Thanos in whispers, hadn’t even been fully sure the other was real, until he was forced face-to-face with the being. Thanos was interested in Loki’s ability to slip along the branches of Yggdrasil. When Loki refused to help him return to the Nine Realms, Thanos had shown his displeasure.
Loki had never before known such pain.
He didn’t remember being moved into what he would later come to know as his prison cell, but it was there that he regained awareness and recovered from the rough treatment. It was also where he came to know the others in the Mad Titan’s possession. They were divided into two groups: those who had sided with Thanos, and those who defied him. There were all manner of creatures, from all across the Nine Realms, but it was the Midgardian who caught Loki’s attention the most. How had he come to be here?
He was an adult of the species, Loki was fairly certain, with facial hair and all the same markers that came with an Aesir male reaching their majority. He was smaller than most Aesir, though he did have some muscle to him. Or he had, at least. Most of it had been lost to his captivity, but the traces of it were still there. His hair was a deep brown and his eyes were the color of mead. In his chest, a powerful orb of blue energy glowed brightly. His name, Loki learned, was Anthony Stark.
It was the orb that had caught Thanos’ interest, since he normally wouldn’t pay a mere Midgardian any mind. In this, Loki could not blame him. For all his knowledge of magic, the orb still boggled even the god. Perhaps if he were back upon Asgard, with his supplies and all of the things tucked away in his quarters… But that was another life. Either way, Loki knew Anthony was a singular being. The fact that he had been able to create such a thing was beyond exceptional.
“Hey, Sleeping Beauty,” the smaller man greeted from his own cell as Loki was reawakened from Thanos’ latest round of torture. “You’re lookin’ good over there.”
Loki shot him a glare.
“Are all Midgardians this irritating, or is it just you?”
Anthony grinned at him.
“It’s a special gift. A defense mechanism, you could say. We Earthlings developed it as a way to ward off predators.”
“Such a shame that out here it is more likely to get you killed,” the ex-prince said dryly.
As usual, Anthony didn’t seem the least bit bothered by his words. His attitude was hard for Loki to grasp sometimes. He returned from his own sessions with Thanos and The Other quaking and babbling, nigh broken, but bounced back to this carefree manner every time. He even managed to drag Loki’s mood up a great deal of the time. Sometimes, he even made the god think they might actually have a chance of getting out.
“So, I’ve been thinking, Reindeer Games-“
“I have told you not to call me that.”
“-that we’re not gonna be getting out of here on our own. We’re gonna need some help. From the outside.”
Loki sighed. If he didn’t play along, Anthony would just pick up both sides of the conversation. Sometimes, he believed the Midgardian had been driven mad long ago and was only faking sanity the rest of the time.
“And how do you propose we get this help? We have already attempted many a method to get a message out to either your people or mine,” not that Asgard could really even be considered Loki’s people anymore, “using each of our different methods.”
“Right. Well, I remembered this time Pepper got onto me for overthinking things too much that year I decided to take over throwing the company Board of Directors social event, which is really just an excuse for them to feel special and I was mostly only taking it over because I wanted to fuck with them anyway. I had such plans-“
“Anthony.”
“Sorry. Getting off track. Got it. Anyway, it occurred to me that maybe we’ve been overthinking this situation, too. If there’s anything I’ve learned from watching con movies, it’s that everything goes a whole lot smoother when you have an inside man.”
Loki dragged himself up off of the stone ground and into a seated position so he could get a better look at the other captive.
“I do not understand how those two ideas are related.”
“We’ve been trying to work around Barney and his cronies all on our own this whole time, right? Well, what if we tried working with them, instead?”
Loki recoiled at the very suggestion.
“You wish for us to give in?” he hissed incredulously.
Instantly his mind leaped to the suspicion that Anthony had finally been broken and was now being used against him, or that he’d never truly been a captive in the first place. It hurt more than he cared to admit.
His fears were quieted when Anthony gave a derisive snort.
“Yeah, no. I’m not interested in helping destroy the entire universe. Thanks anyway. Maybe next time. No, I just figure that we could maybe pretend to give in. Or at least one of us could. Both of us giving in might be a bit suspicious. And by a bit, I mean a lot. But if we could use his own desires against him, trick him into giving us what we want by making him think we’re giving him what he wants… All we have to do is get one of us to Earth. I have people there who could help us.”
Loki frowned.
“Yes, yes, your SHIELD. You’ve mentioned. It’s hardly a simple plan. It would be nigh impossible to pull off.”
“Yeah,” Anthony drew out hesitantly. “That’s why I think you need to be the one to do it.”
The god stiffened. He had expected Anthony to volunteer to do it. Anthony was always the first to throw himself into harm’s way or take the more dangerous position of a plan. Of course, there was no reason for Thanos to send Anthony to Midgard, but there wasn’t exactly a reason for him to send Loki there, either.
“Why?”
It was only a single word, but it asked every question Loki needed an answer to. Anthony fidgeted, looking away and avoiding Loki’s gaze.
“Because I won’t be able to do it. He wouldn’t believe it coming from me, and you’re the only one who could actually get to Earth anyway. You’ll have to convince him you managed to get the information out of me, but you’re, like, a male, alien, Natashalie so you should totally be able to manage.”
That was suspicious. That was horribly suspicious.
“What information?”
Anthony’s shoulders bunched up as he curled in on himself. Loki wished he could reach out for the other man, to offer him some form of comfort when he was clearly feeling so uncomfortable.
“You know the Titan is interested in my arc reactor because of its similarities to the Infinity Stones… The truth is that’s it’s based on one. I know where one is.”
Loki gaped at him. There was nothing Thanos wanted more than the Infinity Stones. He would do whatever it took to get his hands on them. They’d be lost or sealed away by Bor, though. No one knew where they were any longer. The pieces started to fit together.
“It’s on Midgard,” he breathed, hardly believing it. “There’s an Infinity Stone on Midgard.”
“Yes,” Anthony admitted, though it sounded like it pained him to do so.
He had protected the secret for so long. It probably felt like a betrayal to say it now, even to an ally. Still, Loki had to know.
“Which one?”
Anthony squeezed his eyes shut and took a deep breath before answering, his gaze locking with Loki’s.
“The Tesseract.”
Loki’s breath caught in his throat. If Thanos got his hands on the Tesseract, he would be able to go anywhere in the Nine Realms. That sort of temptation could blind him to a great many things. It seemed impossible but… they might actually be able to pull this off. They might actually have a chance after all.
So caught up in the rush of excitement at the prospect of freedom, Loki didn’t realize the pleased hum in the back of his mind was not his own.