The Time of The Universe

Rose Tyler silently entered her flat, barely managing to lock the door behind her as she tiredly made her way into the kitchen. She smelled the chili from a few days ago, Loki must have been reheating left-overs, something Rose hated, but dealt with like any other person. He glanced up at her, the corner of his mouth twitched up as he took in her disheveled form. She was certain her eye make-up was smeared in at least two different places from her rubbing her eyes, desperately trying to stay awake at work, her hair was probably in worse condition, not that Rose really cared, she just had to remain presentable, what with being the owner's daughter and all.

"Long day at work, I'm assuming." Loki asked, amused. That jerk. Rose could have reached over and smacked him, too bad she knew better than to do that, what with Asgardian/Frost Giant's bones being a lot harder to break than Humans. Rose figured she'd break her hand if he didn't move his head away to soften the blow.

"Yeah." She muttered, deciding that she was too tired to deal with him tonight. She knew if she didn't go to sleep soon she'd have to deal with that nasty chili he made. Loki had decided to take up a hobby when he began living with Rose, fresh off faking his death during the events with the Dark Elves, Loki deemed cooking a Midgardian worthy skill. Unfortunately for Rose, he didn't understand how to simply follow a recipe, he stated that he had been alive longer than any of these "stupid Midgardians" and therefore knew how things like this should go.

"It's a good thing I babysat Tony today. I wouldn't have been able to deal with Rex." Loki said, taking a ladle and dishing out the chili into two bowls. Rose's stomach practically flipped at the horrible smell, she was glad Loki's back was turned and couldn't see her wrinkle her nose in disgust. Rose glanced around, looking to see if her little brother was still here. There wasn't a glimpse of that tuft of blonde hair Tony had anywhere. She turned back to Loki, feeling slightly disappointed, if there was anyone who could have possible made Rose feel better it was Tony, not Loki and that chili he was currently handing to her.

"Yeah?" Rose agreed, taking a few spoonfuls of soup to appease Loki. She didn't want to upset him, she couldn't handle anymore of his moppin' around the flat.

Loki took a sip and frowned at it, setting it on the counter. "That doesn't taste right."

Rose nodded in agreement, taking that as an opportunity to set it down on the counter. She yawned, loud and fake. She smiled at Loki and went to lay on the couch, leaving him to figure out what was wrong with his stupid chili.

She stared up at the glass screen, something her Doctor, the Meta Crisis one, installed before he died. It would show Rose the universe and what was happening on various planets when the Tardis was unusable. Rose stared up at it, watching different species at a market place on Xander. A place Rose had only visited one, something her Doctor had said didn't exist in their original universe. He made it sound like Xander was the Gallifery of this universe. Xander wasn't as advanced as Gallifrey, but was anything? Rose fell asleep while watching a man storm around Xander angrily, a piece of metal following him.

Rope was wrapped around her, digging into her arms, rubbing against her ankles. She managed to keep her breathing slow and open her eyes slightly. Rose was now thankful for the forty hours of mandatory Torchwood Agent training. There were two figures, talking quietly. Loki was sitting across from Rose at the kitchen table, he was also bound, though his restraints seemed to be a lot tighter. He glanced at Rose, his eyes grim as they flickered back to the figures. The lighting was dim in the kitchen but Rose could make out that there was a man and woman. The man had a bow in his hand and a quiver strapped across his back. The woman had red hair, the lighting was just strong enough to make that out. It seemed an unnatural shade of red, something one could only get out of a box, the only person who had that hair color naturally was Natalia Romanova, someone the Doctor and her had met when they took a trip to Russia in 1971, not one of their best ideas. The man with the bow must have been Clint Barton, the guy Loki had basically possessed during that New York stunt three years back.

"Ms. Tyler, all our intel said you would be out of the apartment at this point. Sorry you got messed up in this. Thought Loki had the stone taken away from him so he couldn't use that mind control bullshit anymore." Clint said, he turned, aimed an arrow at Loki's head. Rose frowned, she couldn't let him die, they had lived together for two years, she had helped heal Loki from the torture Thanos had caused. Clint didn't know about Thanos, who was still out there. Odds were that Clint would be a target, Thanos would want to know how the Stone effected him. Clint would become a guinea pig.

"Agent Tyler." Rose corrected, causing Clint to slightly lower his bow. "I thought you spies had a shred of dignity. Tying up a man and executing him for something he didn't have control over. Do you think you were the only one effected by the Mind Gem?"

"Mind Gem?" echoed Natalia, speaking up for the first time, she ignored the look of annoyance Clint directed at her. Natalia moved towards Rose, kneeling down so she was at eye level. "I believe either you or Loki should explain."

Loki shook his head desperately at Rose. She glanced away, her eyes scanning the room, trying to find her sonic screwdriver, something inherited from her Doctor. It was on the counter, closer to Loki than her. Clint shook his head as if trying to clear his thoughts. He lowered his bow, pointing the arrow at Loki's foot rather than his face. Progress.

"I'd rather not." Loki said after at least five minutes of silence. In a swift motion Natalia had pulled out a knife and pressed it against Rose's throat.

"Clint and I are here because someone told us that you were simply vacationing in London. Had pictures of you with a blonde kid, they thought you were kidnapping him, panicked and called Maria. We rushed over from Manhattan, Stark was using his private jet, we had to buy tickets from one of the passengers. The trip from New York to London will always be hell. You tortured Clint, Loki, using him as a pawn in your game. We've been trying to help him recover from what you did. You've put us through more than enough. I think we deserve answers."

"We're all just pawns in Thanos' plan, since you want to know so badly. You would have been safer not knowing of course." Loki chewed at his bottom lip, glancing up at the ceiling. He had been sworn not to tell anyone anything about Thanos, under the threat that one of his children would come after Loki, bringing him back and leaving him in Thanos' hands. Dying was the least of one's worries around Thanos.

"Thanos? Who's that?" Clint demanded, releasing the tension on his string, setting the arrow back in his quiver.

"Ask Thor." Loki turned his head away, staring at the fridge.

"Why don't you, Loki?" Natalia asked, moving to cut Rose free of her restraints. "Agent Tyler will be coming along with us, just to make sure you don't try anything. You seem to care about her." The last alien who cared about Rose left her here, she didn't want to know what would happen with the next one. Natalia yanked Rose from the chair, the knife still pressed against her throat. Rose remembered that Natalia had been in Red Room when they –her Doctor and her- encountered her, she was trying to break free of her programming. She had told Rose something if she turned on them, her weak spot, a place Red Room programmed in, they made one area of tissue more sensitive than the others was beyond Rose. She used this to her advantage, she swung up and hit the neck right underneath Natalia's jaw to the right side. Natalia fell back on her heels, dropping the knife and placing both her hands on her jaw. Her eyes were wide, calculating.

Rose reached down and grabbed the knife, realizing how screwed she was, perhaps if she simply stayed in the chair and allowed Natalia to lead her to wherever she would have been able to escape, but Rose figured, why not wait. She glanced at Barton, he had the arrow aimed back at Loki's face. Natalia would be up again in a moment, knowing and blocking her weak spot. And then Clint stopped breathing, frozen in place, his chest was definitely not moving. Natalia wasn't moving either, balanced awkwardly on her feet as if she had been moving to stand. Rose moved forwards, sawing at Loki's rope with Natalia's knife. He wasn't moving either, though his expression seemed almost proud of Rose, it was frozen there, usually an emotion like that would flicker across Loki's face, so whatever had paused everyone had done it in an instant, it wasn't something collectively building up to this. She moved to the counter, brushing the rope remains off him, from this angle she could see a blue bruise forming under his eye, Natalia or Clint must have hit him with the back of a knife or a bow. Rose snatched the sonic screwdriver and physic paper off the counter, shoving the latter into her pocket, while holding the sonic like a weapon.

She slowly moved towards the kitchen, grabbing bananas from the kitchen, she wasn't sure how much time she had until they started moving again. She could run off, abandon Loki, but that was never going to happen. Rose carefully plied the arrow off Clint's string, she replaced it with a banner, balancing it on his hand, she decided not to replace his other arrows, figuring she didn't want to piss the pair of them off too much. She moved towards Natalia, who had been perparing to pull a gun, she pried it from Natalia's hands, replacing it with the banana. Finally she moved back to the spot she had originally been standing, tucking the knife away, she brandished the screwdriver, aiming it at Natalia.

"Okay then..." Rose said. Everything sprung back to life. Natalia lunged forwards, the Widow's bites sparked for a moment before the Sonic disabled them. That barely seemed to disrupt Natalia,who tackled Rose, bringing them both on the floor. She wrapped both hands around Rose's neck. Loose enough to allow her to breathe slightly, just enough to disable. Rose struggled, kicking up at Natalia, trying to get her off. After a what seemed like a life time, Loki was thrown on the floor next to Rose. The corners of her vision were starting to go black when Natalia released her grip. Rose sucked in a breath, wondering if this is what it felt like to be a fish out of water.

She turned her head to see Loki staring at her, his eyes wide, the rest of his face had the signs of bruises forming. Everything that wasn't covered in his forest green t-shirt and jeans seemed to be forming bruises. That hadn't happened before to him, it didn't make sense until Clint dropped his broken bow on the ground, huffing slightly, he seemed to be looking a lot better than Loki, making it seem like he had just taken Clint's beating. Natalia helped Rose up. She frowned at Rose before picking Loki up off the ground. She glared at Clint, lifting her hands in the air and signing something at him. Rose never had the chance to learn it, and it wasn't something the Tardis translated, which made Rose want to learn it more.

"Are you okay?" Loki whispered, lightly brushing his fingers against her throat.

"Yeah," she tried to say, but it came out hoarse, she could barely hear herself say anything. Loki's eyes filled with fury for a moment before becoming dull. Natalia turned back towards them, her eyebrows flicking upwards.

"We're going to Dr. Foster's apartment." Natalia said. Clint joined her, wrapping handcuffs around Loki's wrists, not bothering to look at Rose.

Author's notes: I have about 9,000 words of this written so far, should I keep going or just leave it? This will also be a crossover with Guardians of the Galaxy. Please let me know, otherwise I don't know if I'll post anymore on this website. once i have a little more written the fully revised and possibly beta'd version will be posed on ao3.

and if you have any requests on something you'd like to see in this story, i will try to add it. Or if you have any comments or notice any errors.

Thanks for reading!