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"Is that everyone?" Stephen Strange asks, looking over at Wong.
"What, you want more?" Wong says, slightly irritated. Does Strange even know how many sourcerers were gathered together to make this happen? And he wants more? The audacity of the Sourcerer Supreme!
"Oh, wait." Stephen pauses, and opens a portal above them.
A screaming man falls from it, landing ungracefully on the ground. He huffs.
"Now it's everyone." Strange says matter of factly.
The man on the floor breathes heavily, and throws his head back to remove his long raven hair from his eyes. "I have been falling," He starts, clearly pissed off. "For ten minutes!"
"Yeah, good to see you too Loki. Now get up, there's a battle going on." Strange chides.
Loki sighs and pushes himself up to his feet, turning to glare at Strange. "You've got to stop doing that."
The Sourcerer Supreme looks at Loki with a raised brow. "No."
Loki rolls his eyes, and a brilliant green light shines across his forehead as his helm materialises. The same light shines in his hands, his daggers materialising as well. He takes a battle stance, looking across the field to the opposing side.
Chitauri and Outriders. And at their head, Thanos. A younger Thanos, in all his armour and without the stones. Loki is moderately confused by the sight, in all honesty. Actually, he's confused by the fact that he's even alive. He died, at the hands of that purple bastard, he knows he did.
The Norns obviously have different plans for the trickster.
"Avengers!" Captain America shouts, and all the chatter from the army seems to quiet. Thor drops to his side, and Steve catches... Mjolnir? But Mjolnir was destroyed? Goodness, Loki has a lot to catch up on. "Assemble!" Steve finally finishes.
Thor starts the battle cry, and Black Panther's cry follows as the whole army runs to meet Thanos' forces in the middle. Loki too, runs with them.
His magic travels up his daggers and engulfs the blades in a green flame. He meets his first opponent, an Outrider, which he instantly stabs in the jugular. It dies, and such a death feels underwhelming.
Loki continues to stab and slash at various enemies in an elegant manner, and one by one they all fall to his feet. He flicks his daggers, and the green flame splits off to create multiple magical daggers, which he sends flying in all directions. This clears a path for him to advance further.
He keeps going, leaving a trail of Chitauri and Outriders in his wake, he doesn't show any signs of stopping. He shoots magic blasts from his daggers that kill instantly, his expression breaking into a smirk. Bloodlust fills his veins like it hasn't since he was young, and Loki just keeps killing.
He's so focused on himself and fighting that what everyone else is doing doesn't matter to him. There's shouts and screams, a gauntlet of stones being passed from Avenger to Avenger.
Hold on. A gauntlet of Infinity Stones? Loki looks around to see Mjolnir fly past, a string with a kid holding the gauntlet at the end of it. Loki stops and stares for a moment, mesmerised by the power he can feel the stones giving off.
There is a sharp pain to his head and he hits the ground with a thud. "Argh..." Loki groans, touching the sore patch of his head gently. There is blood on his fingertips and he grunts in frustration.
"Long time, no see, Prince." An all too familiar voice sneers, and it takes every inch of Loki's resolve not to flinch.
"Ebony Maw." Loki spits the name like it's venom on his tongue.
The Maw just inclines his head, boulders rising from the ground and being launched at Loki. He rolls away quickly, very narrowly missing every impact until Maw has ran out of ammo. Before he gets to his feet, he flings a magic dagger at his opponent.
Maw steps out of the way before it hits him, and Loki quickly disperses the dagger into sparkles before it can hit a friendly. He growls.
"Why do you still fight when you know it's useless, runt?"
Loki flinches at the name.
"Thanos hasn't forgotten your failure." Maw says, walking closer to Loki. "Just because he hasn't been able to find you, doesn't mean that your punishment hasn't been waiting for you." The Maw smirks. Loki felt the need to tilt his head in confusion, but stopped himself from doing so. As far as Loki is aware, he was killed for his failure of Thanos, on the Statesman. Maw was there, he watched as Loki's neck snapped. So why is he speaking as though that never happened?
Whatever, that isn't important, what is important is getting out of this alive. Loki steels himself and stands up. He's breathing heavily. "You know," Loki starts. "You always did talk far too much."
Maw hisses, and throws more rocks at him. Loki puts up a magical shield, and the projectiles harmlessly bounce off it. Loki chuckles and smirks. "I have grown, Maw." He spits.
"You are still no match for me!" Ebony Maw hisses, pulling up metal bars from the destroyed Avengers compound and launching them at Loki. He dodges one, only to be struck and knocked off his feet by another. The collision creates an awful snapping sound, and Loki looks to see the left horn from his helm has snapped off.
He growls. "Now, I'm angry." Loki teleports behind Maw, before his opponent has the chance to turn around, Loki impales him on his dagger. The green light blade extends, and Ebony Maw gasps in shock for a moment. Loki pulls the knife out and leaves the Maw to bleed out. Alone, and in pain, as Loki was left to many years ago.
Loki turns away, and gently touches the gash in his head again, realising the impact of the metal bar had deepened it. He growls, feeling light headed. This is not a place for weakness, Loki, get it together.
He turns his head, noticing how the battle seems to have died down. Sanctuary II has fallen from the sky, and Thanos is being held back from snapping his fingers by a woman Loki does not recognise. She is glowing, though, which Loki concludes is a good sign. He watches in shock as Thanos plucks the power stone from the gauntlet and hits the woman away with it. Loki lunges into action, then. No. The purple bastard will not snap his fingers.
He doesn't make it in time, and Iron Man collides with Thanos, and struggles back and forth for a while before Tony is thrown off. Loki is still running when Thanos snaps his fingers, and nothing happens. He gasps and stops.
Tony Stark has the Infinity Stones.
"Stark!" Another person wearing a mask and long red coat flies into the scene, and places his hand on Tony's shoulder.
The power from the stones shoots through the other man, and Loki realises then what it is they're doing. More of the Avengers filter in, joining hands with one another and sharing the power of the stones between them.
"It's not... Possible!" Thanos mutters, in complete shock.
Thor joins the chain of Avengers, and Loki takes that as his cue then to announce his presence to his brother. He makes a break for it, running to Thor, who looks at Loki with an incredibly surprised expression.
"...L-Loki..." Thor stutters, not quite sure he's believing his eyes. Loki just puts his hand on Thor's shoulder, letting the stones' power flow through him with a grunt. "... You... You're alive..." Thor whispers.
"Yes, I am... Can. Can we discuss this later? There's a purple bastard to destroy-"
Thor nods, and the chain of heroes completes itself.
"And we. Are. The. Avengers." Tony grits out, and snaps his fingers.
The power from the stones rips through everyone, and they all collectively gasp in pain and shock at the sudden surge of energy. Light blinds them all temporarily.
When it clears, Loki opens his eyes to witness quite possibly one of the most glorious moments of his life. Thanos' army, a source of great torment for the trickster, is turning to dust before his very eyes. Loki chuffs, his eyes suddenly stinging. Relief washes over him completely.
"It's over..." He mutters.
"Not yet." Thor says, pointing behind Loki. He turns, to look at Thanos looking defeated. All of the Avengers watch and wait.
The grin that splits Loki's features when Thanos begins to disintegrate is perhaps the widest he has smiled in his thousand year long life.
He looks Loki right in the eye, and Loki stares him out. They keep their gaze locked on each other until Thanos' eyes become but ashes in the wind.
"Mr. Stark! We did it! We won!" The enthusiastic Spider kid exclaims.
"Yeah..." Tony says, a little weakly. "Yeah. We did." He removes the gauntlet from his hand, and Pepper hugs him from behind.
A hand clasps Loki's shoulder, and he jumps slightly, turning to see it was only his brother. Thor gives a relieved looking smile, and Loki returns it for a moment. "... What happened to you?" He asks.
Thor just chuckles. "Ah, brother. That is a long story."
Loki rolls his eyes, "We definitely have time."
Thor insists on Loki accompanying him to Natasha Romanoff's funeral. Loki isn't exactly sure why, but he understands and respects Thor's need to say goodbye.
The funeral is more of a memorial, considering that Romanoff's body has not been recovered. They have nothing, really, to lay to rest.
"There should be a statue of her, in her honour." Tony says. "Because without her sacrifice, the universe wouldn't have been saved."
Clint sobs quietly. They were close, Loki knew. He was prepared to use them against each other during the battle of New York. He shakes his head, not wishing to keep thinking about that.
"Thank you, Nat, for being the voice of reason for us men of the Avengers." Tony continues. "Without you, we'd have probably all killed each other." Loki hears Thor chuckle sadly at Stark's statement. "You were the one person that kept me and Rogers from absolutely destroying each other, when we had our falling out." Loki raises a brow in question of that. Thor's eyebrows seem to narrow, indicating that he knew nothing of this either.
"See, one of the greatest things about Natasha, was that even when she was at her lowest, she'd still try to help those closest to her, if she could." Tony sniffs. "And I know that she wouldn't want us to cry for her. If she were here, she'd probably tell us all to 'man up, stop being such a cry baby.'" There were a few sad sounding chuckles at that statement. "She was selfless in the best way. And I'm going to miss her." Tony shakes his head. "Natasha was the heart and soul of the Avengers, and her legacy will continue to live on, in all of us." He smiles sadly. "Thank you."
For a reason Loki can't seem to find, he feels hollow and numb, for the rest of the day after the funeral.
"So, how did you survive," Thor points to Loki's neck. "You know..."
Loki raises his hand as though to touch his neck, but stops himself. "... I'm not entirely sure."
Thor raises an eyebrow. "What do you mean?"
"I mean. I was dead. I knew I was dead. And suddenly, my heart started to beat again. My wounds were repaired, and I could breathe. The next thing I knew, I fell through one of those portals and landed on the battlefield." Loki shrugged.
Thor strokes his beard, considering what his brother has just said. He looks like he's trying to be a wise old King, but he is desperately failing. Loki can't hold back his smile.
"I wonder if Bruce wished for you back..." Thor murmurs.
Loki raised a brow in a mocking manner. "Don't be absurd."
"No, he had the gauntlet and snapped everyone we lost back. It didn't work for Natasha, unfortunately. But. You're here, and I can't explain that any other way..."
Loki shrugs. "Perhaps the norns just have different plans for me, and dying ruins those plans."
Thor chuckles. "Maybe, maybe brother."
There is a pause, and Thor stands up.
"Where are you going?" Loki asks.
"I need to show you something." Thor says, not turning back.
Loki gets up and follows.
Thor leads him to that cliff. The very same cliff that the brothers witnessed Odin die on. Thor sits on the same rock he had back then, in the same position. Loki hesitates.
"Sit down." Thor offers.
Loki nods and sits silently, looking out over the cliff edge and to the sea. He takes a deep breath. The energy left by Odin's passing here is still noticable, despite it having been five years.
Thor sighs. "This is what father wanted, five years ago." He says. "Us, side by side, on this cliff, ruling," Thor points back the way they came, towards the little village of New Asgard. "That. Them. Giving them hope. Being that beacon of light, shining out across the universe..."
"That's incredibly cheesy." Loki says.
Thor chuckles and shakes his head. "Ah, brother, you always were better with words than I."
Loki nods at that statement.
The wind gently blows the brothers' hair, and Thor looks up to the sky. The clear blue sky. He points up at it. "Look, brother."
Loki looks. "It's the sky, Thor." He says, slightly irritated.
"No," Thor starts. "The sun is shining on us again."
Loki's eyes widen. It takes him a few moments to find his voice. He considers, briefly, turning to sarcasm to mask his emotions, but.
"Yes." He says a little distantly. "Yes, it is. Exactly as I said it would." Loki grins, looking at the sunny sky. "Perhaps you were right, brother."
"Oh?" Thor looks at Loki. His little brother looks like a cat, basking in the sunlight.
"Everything is fine." Loki says, meeting Thor's eyes.
Thor scoffs, and smiles. "Sentiment works well for you."
"Don't point it out," Loki says, pointing at Thor. "That ruins it. I shan't be sentimental if I am to be ridiculed for it."
Thor shakes his head. "It's not an insult!"
"Really?"
"Yes. It's just a." Thor pauses to think. "It's my way of saying I like seeing your sentimental side."
Loki hums. "Don't get used to it." He says with a mischievous grin, knowing that Thor will pick up on the lie.
They both laugh, something they haven't done together in almost two decades.
"I missed you, brother." Thor says when he's calm enough. "I missed you so much."
Loki smiles, his chest suddenly feeling warmer. "I'm here, now." He says softly.
"Yes." Thor says. "And you still owe me that hug."
"Take a shower first." Loki deadpans.
"I have showered!" Thor protests.
Loki laughs. "I'm joking, brother."
Thor rolls his eyes and stands up. Loki stands too, but before he reaches his full height, Thor's arms are already wrapped around him. For a moment, Loki stiffens under the touch in surprise. After a beat, he relaxes into his brother's warmth, hugging him back.
How long had Loki dreamed of this? The feeling of belonging settles itself neatly into his heart, and Loki sighs in contentment. Finally, a bit of peace in the universe.