Okay guys so holy shit did I tell you I was doing a co-author piece for the Last Archangel with inukagome15?
No?
[In case you couldn't tell I'm super excited about it]
This is about half of what we've written so far, so the second chapter will probably show up relatively soon. In any case, I think it turned out pretty well. I will completely unabashedly say that the idea was mostly mine, but inukagome got pretty into it as well.
Disclaimer: I do not own Supernatural or Marvel. Or the majority of the Last Archangel, but considering I worked with the owner to write this I don't think that needs to be included.
Honestly, they'd only gone to track down Doom in the first place because it was easier to do that and overthrow him (or something along those lines) than to deal with his stupid robot attacks every month or so.
You'd think he'd find another superhero team or major city to bother, but no. Always New York.
It got to the point where they'd rather invade his stupid, booby-trapped castle than deal with it.
"Stop calling it stupid," Steve said impatiently over the comms. "You've said it at least ten times by now. We get it."
"But it is!" Tony's voice was crackly over the wavelength. "Come on, Steve, he can't even build proper robots. And this castle is, frankly, a disaster. Who built this thing?"
"Probably Doom," Natasha replied, grunting as she dealt with some of the defenses - i.e., more robots.
"That explains a lot," Steve heard faintly. "I mean, he can't even build a decent booby trap."
Ignoring Clint's snigger (you'd think a grown man could handle hearing the word 'booby'), Steve replied, "You disabled them all before they could activate."
"He could have put in a backup plan."
"A backup plan for angels?" Steve could hear Peggy's grin. "I don't think that exists, Tony."
"Well, he could at least try." There was a moment of silence during which a roar echoed faintly. "I see Hulk's having fun. Anyone got eyes on him?"
"Nope," Clint answered, everyone else echoing him. "Well, I saw him a little while ago, but he's moved on now."
"Okay." Pause "I've almost cracked this place's force-field magic whatever, so if anyone's coming in with me or close enough – get ready."
"On your call," Steve said, jumping over a felled tree and sprinting towards the castle that loomed on the hill. Whatever else could be said about Doom, he was definitely more than a little dramatic.
"Ohshi—"
The comms crackled, a whirr and a piercing noise making Steve wince and put a hand to his ear. It lasted barely a second, but the silence that came afterwards was what worried him.
"Tony?" No answer was forthcoming. Trying not to panic, Steve made for the door Tony had found. When he rounded the corner, Peggy and Gadreel were already breaking through it in their hurry to get to Tony.
There was a slew of rubble on the other side, a corner of the wall having been blasted off. The scorch marks on the pieces made Steve think it had been a repulsor. "JARVIS, you got anything on Tony?" He asked, not slowing down.
"Mr. Stark exited the suit before going down," JARVIS said, worry evident in his voice. "I have the location of the suit, but not him. He thought he heard someone and went to investigate."
Steve swore under his breath, walking into the room. The suit stood at the far end, eyes glowing in the dim light. A door was open near it; before any of the three could do anything, however, there was a crash and two people came tumbling through it.
One of them was Doom.
The other was Tony.
Steve lunged towards the pair, a figure appearing and pulling Tony away from the enraged scientist, but—
Wait a minute.
That wasn't Gadreel.
That was Tony, too.
The first Tony looked just as bewildered, but the second one only glanced at Steve with a strangely blank expression, then vanished with an all-too-familiar flutter of wings.
It took Doom trying to get at Tony again for Steve to react, spinning into action and sending his shield hurtling through the air, hitting Doom in the stomach. He went down with a pained grunt, even his armor unable to stand up to the force of Steve's vibranium shield.
"Tony, are you all right?" Steve asked, looking him over closely. He wouldn't usually have asked, but something wasn't right. Tony hadn't even made an effort to shield himself from Doom, despite the suit being mere feet away. He looked bewildered, like he was forgetting something important.
It wasn't a look Steve had ever seen on him before.
"I…think?" Tony sounded doubtful of this. "I'm just…" He looked down at Doom. "I probably shouldn't have messed with a machine built by a man calling himself Doom."
"What?" Clint asked over the comms. "What's going on?"
"I'm not sure," Steve answered, keeping an eye on Tony as he backed away from Doom. "I'll get back to you on that." Tony's sense of humor was definitely intact.
"You saw that, too, didn't you?" Peggy asked him, eyes on Doom and Tony. Her visor was doubtlessly giving her readings as to Tony's vital signs, and she didn't seem overly worried, which was good.
But Gadreel frowned, his eyes elsewhere.
Doom was getting up, one hand on Steve's shield. He looked up at him, glaring through the eyeholes of his mask. "You will pay for this, Captain. Attacking me in Latveria without justifiable cause...I will see you all drawn and quartered!"
"I don't know," Tony said. "I think attacking New York on a near monthly basis is enough cause for us to come and bust your door down."
"I have diplomatic immunity," Doom said with great dignity, snapping his head around to glare at Tony.
"Immunity, schimnuity," Tony's voice said. Another Tony appeared behind Doom, one eyebrow raised and a shit-eating grin on his face. "I always found politics boring."
Steve blinked. "I'm…what? Tony?"
"That'd be me, yes," the first Tony said, also looking at the second Tony that had appeared.
"You," the second Tony was saying to Doom, "you pissed me off. I mean, so not cool. You just don't do that, you know? Hitting me like that out of the blue…" He screwed his nose up, looking the picture of offended. "I think I'm totally justified in saying that that was completely uncalled for."
Doom didn't have time to protest before the second Tony was moving, grabbing him by the throat and throwing him across the room. Doom crashed into the wall, cracking the stone. His armor seemed to protect him from the worst of the damage, since he got up again, but Tony – the one who had thrown him – was in front of him again in the blink of an eye.
The first Tony had ducked behind a table that someone had knocked over and Steve joined him, laying a hand on his shoulder. "You all right?"
"Yeah, I just—" Tony pressed the heel of his palm against his forehead. "Trying to figure out what happened."
"You don't know?" Steve was distracted momentarily from his worry when Doom started shouting.
"Unhand me!"
"Yeah, that's gonna happen." It was Tony's voice, but Tony was sitting in front of him – so which one was the real one?
"What's going on?" Natasha asked curtly.
"I don't—" Steve started, only to cut off as there was another smacking sound when the Tony fighting Doom threw him around again. He heard another flutter of wings and looked up to see that Gadreel had disappeared.
"Is this normal?" Peggy slipped into view, coming to crouch besides Steve. "Tony separating into different people?"
Steve shook his head, and at the same time there were several disbelieving exclamations from over the comms.
"I'm sorry - what?!" Clint sounded startled.
"He split into different people?" Natasha was disbelieving.
"I'm definitely me," Tony informed Steve. "There's nothing but me in there."
"In where?" Steve looked askance at him.
Tony pointed through the door he'd come out of. "That machine did something weird, but—" He winced, pressing his hand more forcefully against his head. "I know I don't usually get headaches. Something's up."
Steve did his best to ignore the shouting and general ruckus the other Tony and Doom were causing, but it was difficult. "Do angels get headaches?"
"Nope." Tony lowered at his hand, staring at it like he'd never seen it before. "You don't think—"
The door crashed open again, and both of them turned sharply to see whether it was friend or foe.
The scene in the room was frozen for a moment. Steve and Tony were crouched behind an overturned table, Peggy standing near them with her gun raised protectively. Clint and Natasha had just burst through the door, dismembered Doombots lying on the floor behind them and occasionally fizzing with electricity.
The other Tony stood in the middle of the room, crouched over Doom and head raised to observe the newcomers.
"So," he said, far too casually for the situation. "Couple of you were late to the party, huh?"
"You know," Clint began, "I was kinda hoping this was a joke."
"I think it would be obvious by now that the weird shit always happens to us," the Tony next to Steve said. "It's like Murphy's law." He probably meant to lighten the mood. Steve would have given him a 'not now' look, except he was focused on the Tony currently standing on Doom.
"But why?" Clint groaned. "I've had enough of this with the weird stuff you keep bringing back home."
"Oh, you're blaming this on me, now?" Tony complained. "Blame Doom; it was his freakin' machine."
"Well, if the shoe fits…" Clint winced as Natasha stepped on his foot, jerking her head to the other Tony contemplating Doom, who was still lying prostrate under him, having accepted the fact that he was utterly outclassed.
"You know," the other Tony said contemplatively, looking back down at Doom, "I think I know just what to do with you. It's perfect, really. Don't know why no one's thought of it before."
"This isn't going to end well," Peggy said, swiftly standing.
"I wouldn't—" Tony started, about to reach out to stop her.
Steve had no idea what happened next beyond the other Tony snapping his fingers in a familiar motion. In the same moment,, a shiny statue of Viktor von Doom appeared before him, standing in a regal pose that was ruined by the giant dunce cap crowning his head.
It wouldn't have been that weird, except it happened at the same moment that Doom disappeared from under the other Tony's feet.
The other Tony beamed. "Perfect."
"What the fuck." Clint blinked. "Tony, did you just – did you just turn Doctor Doom into a statue?"
The other Tony held up his hand. "Ah, I'm not done." Giving the Doom statue a contemplative look, he snapped his fingers again, the statue disappearing from the room. "Now I am. Continue." He gestured vaguely at Clint.
Steve stood up cautiously, holding his shield in front of him – just in case. "Who are you?"
The other Tony grinned at him. "I'm Tony," he said, as if it should have been obvious, and then tilted his head to the side. "Well, mostly. That"—he pointed to the Tony now standing next to Peggy—"is Tony. Nice name, but—" He sighed, shaking his head. "Doesn't really suit me, y'know? It's more his name than it is mine."
"He's the Trickster," the Tony next to Peggy said, eyes on the other one.
Other Tony – the trickster – snapped his fingers, pointing at Tony. "Yes. Exactly. You still remember, don't you?" He was still grinning – it was an unnervingly predatory look, one that didn't belong on Tony's face. "I was wondering
about that…seeing as I know I don't have all of mine, does that mean that the rest of you have the rest of them?"
"Rest of you?" Steve's eyes flickered towards Tony before returning to the Trickster, who was undoubtedly the most dangerous being in the room at the moment.
Gadreel picked that moment to appear again, right behind the Trickster. He gave the Trickster a dirty look, one that Steve had only seen him give Thaddeus in a completely different universe. "Please don't."
The Trickster looked back at Gadreel. "'Please don't' what?" He sounded mocking. "Please don't cause chaos? Please don't mete out justice? Sorry to burst your bubble, angel, but that's kinda my job description."
"I'm aware, as the brief description Gabriel gave me of your character was certainly enlightening," Gadreel replied.
"Oh, hey, I remember him," Tony said suddenly, drawing everyone's attention. "Kind of."
"Gadreel, are you telling me that Gabriel is somewhere out there?" Steve was aware he sounded rather dismayed, but it was rather difficult to be anything but.
"He pulled you out of Doom's path," Gadreel said, nodding towards Tony. "I was confused as to how you had become divided into two people, so I pursued him in search of an explanation."
"Two people?" Natasha said tersely. "What do you mean?"
"The one I spoke to moments ago was Gabriel," Gadreel said quietly. "The one next to Peggy is Tony. And you…" He regarded the Trickster with something like contempt. "You are a part of him I hoped we would never have to see."
"Well," a voice that sounded like Tony said, "that doesn't bode well for me."
Heart sinking slightly, Steve turned towards the door.
Another Tony was leaning against the doorframe, observing the events. "Don't mind me," he said conversationally. "I'm just the audience."
"Christ," Clint said. "How many of you are there?"
"Only four," the fourth Tony said. Gadreel was looking at him with barely concealed distaste, which was odd, since the being looked exactly like Tony.
He definitely wasn't, though – that much was obvious.
"Loki," Gadreel said, making Steve do a double-take and take a closer look at the one in the doorway, who grinned.
"It's nice to be recognized," Loki-Tony said, standing up straight and leisurely. His hands were resting in his pockets, and he didn't look like he had any intention of fighting – but then again, looks could be misleading. "I, however, don't know you, so if you'll excuse me—"
"Whoa, hold on," Clint said, stepping forward. "We can't let you just—"
"Did I ask for permission?" Loki's hands were by his side, and just raising one was enough to make Clint stop. Loki smirked. "No, is the answer you're looking for."
"What about Tony?" Peggy asked, standing her ground as Loki turned to look at her. "Surely you have to realize that you're all the same person. Do you really want to stay separate?"
Loki's smirk had become more of a lazy, knowing grin. "As a matter of fact," he said, "yes."
He vanished in a crackle of green before anyone had the chance to reply.
"That's my cue, then," the trickster commented. Gadreel lunged at him, but the being vanished in a puff of something faintly blue before the angel could catch him.
"That went well," Tony said airily. "I think I get it now, what people mean when they say you wouldn't recognize yourself if you met them."
"This is not the time," Gadreel said shortly.
"It's always the time."
"Tony," Steve interrupted, "seriously. Just, stop for a second."
"And by the way," Clint said, "other-you is an asshole. Both of them."
"Thanks, Clint, that means a lot."
"We should return to the Tower," Gadreel said, before they could go any further, "and decide what to do next."
Sobering, Tony looked back at the room where the mysterious machine that was responsible for this mess was located. "I'm gonna need that machine."
"If you're thinking of using it to split a certain someone who gets very angry into two, I vote no," Clint objected.
"No, I wasn't, actually. Having Hulk around 24/7 would be a terrible idea. I think I broke it, anyway." Steve turned to follow Tony as the latter started descending the stairs, hearing more footsteps behind him as the team followed.
"You broke it?" he echoed. "How?"
"No idea," Tony said. "I'll figure it out."
Jarvis looked worried when they got back to the tower and Steve saw him again, but then again he had a right to be. They all remembered how things had ended up the last time Tony lost his memory.
At least this time it wasn't everything.
"I'm not dead, you know," Tony said, scratching the side of his neck absentmindedly and squinting at his cell phone. He put it away a few seconds later. "You can stop giving me that look, J."
"Your vitals are different," Jarvis said, concerned.
"I was just split into quarters," Tony pointed out, sounding utterly indifferent about the entire affair.
"He is healthy," Gadreel assured Jarvis, not looking away from the "evil machine of doom," as Tony had called it as they were transporting it.
"Um, in case you forgot, I'm standing right next to you, Gadreel." Tony gave the machine a thoughtful look. "But I admit the machine's kind of striking…if you get past the whole 'created by Doom' thing."
"Speaking of Doom…" Jarvis looked pained. "There have been reports of a statue bearing his likeness appearing in Times Square. Efforts to remove it have been unsuccessful so far, and all attempts at contacting the Latverian Embassy have failed."
"Because that's Doom," Clint said, fingering the sharp head of an arrow that Tony had been working on a few days ago. "Which crazy Tony turned him into."
"I'm going to go ahead and be offended by that," Tony said, "since, technically, he's me."
"You are both parts of Gabriel," Gadreel reminded Tony. "But you are different parts, so technically—"
"Yeah, I get it." Tony walked around the catwalk that had been set up in the room. It had been attached to the machine, so they'd had no choice but to bring it. Luckily, the Tower had the room to hold it. Several parts of it were dented, like something – multiple, very heavy somethings – had been thrown away from the machine. "Still got no idea what this thing was meant to do. Unless Doom was trying to split himself into halves or something."
"We can figure it out," Bruce said, walking around to the other side and squatting to inspect it from a different angle. "Doom's no genius."
"He's a mad genius," Natasha pointed out.
"I'd put him a bit more on the 'mad' side," Peggy said, leaning against the metal railing. Her hair was still in the braid she had put it in before the fight. "I've dealt with enough men like him to know the difference."
"Are you getting anything from this?" Steve asked Jarvis and Gadreel.
"I will need to run more extensive scans before I can ascertain anything," Jarvis answered, eyes blanking for a second before refocusing on Steve.
"It appears to be magical in nature," was Gadreel's response.
Tony instantly grimaced. "No, really? Ugh, come on." His nose wrinkled further. "I hate magic." He seemed oblivious to everyone's stares.
It was Gadreel who spoke first, eyebrows furrowed. "I would not have expected that of you."
"It makes no sense," Tony complained. "It's all just"—he waved his hands vaguely—"and then poof. Where's the science behind it?"
Clint was filming Tony, possibly for Pepper to see later. He could also be doing it for blackmail purposes, but ordinarily Tony didn't mind a bit of blackmail.
Whatever he did later usually ended up being worse than what had been instigated against him in the first place. Bucky had stopped trying to rile him up because after Tony turned his prank around on him – which had left Bucky stranded in an ice rink without an escape hatch for hours – even though he was still nursing a sore spot about the slippery floors on the Helicarrier.
"You realize how ironic that sounds, right?" Steve tried to laugh, but Tony just continued staring intently at the machine like he was trying to x-ray it, sans suit.
"Sort of," he said absentmindedly. "I just don't get how it works. I know I used to, but—" He gestured vaguely, not really succeeding in getting anything across.
"So you remember some things," Natasha said.
"I remember my life," Tony said, looking up at the ceiling. "And then there's a point where it's a bit like looking through warped glass…like remembering a dream. After that, it clears up for a short period"—he glanced askance at Steve—"but then the same thing…" He shrugged.
Tilting his head thoughtfully, Gadreel said slowly, "That must have been when you were one with Gabriel."
Tony shrugged again, dropping his gaze once more to the machine. "I can't really say. But I think remember some of it like it was a really nutty dream."
"But you remember enough?" Jarvis asked suddenly.
Steve understood instantly what Jarvis was referring to, but there was a brief second of confusion on Tony's face before he also seemed to understand.
"Yeah," Tony said, already half-turning to the door of the workshop. "It's okay, J." He cracked a grin. "You're a hard guy to forget."
Jarvis's answering smile was strained. "It did happen."
Tony's head dropped in acknowledgement, at the same time as the workshop doors slid open and Bucky entered, zeroing in on Steve.
"Is it too much trouble for you to keep me updated?" Bucky demanded, poking Steve in the chest once he was close enough to do so. "I had to hear from You that you were back! JARVIS kept giving me the brush-off."
"I'm sorry," Steve said guiltily. "I forgot."
"I get it," Bucky said. "The machine's shiny, but you're not Tony. You can come upstairs or give me a ring and let me know that New York's protectors are back."
"Dad!" Sam's voice shouted - or shrieked, really. The sound reverberated through the workshop, Steve's ears ringing from the volume.
There was a brief flicker of what seemed like panic on Tony's face before a small figure darted into the room, taking a flying leap at him. He staggered, arms coming up on reflex, but kept his balance. Then another, bigger body joined the fray, and Tony hit the floor.
There was a stunned sort of silence for several seconds, the two bodies on top of Tony's utterly still in surprise.
Against Steve's side, Butterfingers pressed her fingers to the back of his hand, whispering, "Is he okay?"
"I'm okay," Tony groaned, answering the question for Steve, sounding pained. "Just…give me a minute."
"Are you hurt?" Sam asked worriedly, small hands patting at Tony's face.
Dummy rolled off Sam and Tony, looking guilty. "Sorry!"
"It's fine." Tony stood up, carrying Sam's weight more easily now. "Give me a warning next time, though. You two are getting heavy. What do you eat, bricks?"
"You lift cars with one hand," Butterfingers pointed out, You nodding in agreement next to her.
"That was once. And on a dare," Tony said. "And I'm not really in the right shape for that right now."
Dummy grabbed at Tony's waist, looking up at him with big eyes. "Are you sick?" he asked, voice wavering. "But…you don't get sick! And nothing's exploding."
"I don't explode things when I get sick!"
Steve couldn't help but remember how bad Tony had been before; he hadn't, strictly speaking, been sick, but it was close enough that he couldn't quite call what Tony had said the truth. And he knew there had been some violent incidents since coming back home, even if Tony hadn't spoken of them. The lights of the tower had never tended to flicker before.
"He's not sick," Natasha said. "He just got in the way of this machine."
Dummy peered up at it, climbing higher on the railing of the catwalk. "What does it do?"
"We're trying to figure that out." Bruce peered around one of the metal supporting struts. "Ah, maybe don't try and touch it or anything—"
Dummy hopped back down before Steve could ask him to. "Okay." He looked back up at Tony. "So what happened?"
'That," Tony replied, "is a really weird story and we should probably get everyone else together so I don't have to explain it more than once."
"Okay, so…" Pepper looked like she dearly wished Tony would stop getting into trouble all the time. Or at least, that's what Steve was getting from her expression. "There's four of you. Running around doing who-knows-what."
"Technically, I'm one-fourth of me and the other three-fourths are running around, etc." Tony was surprisingly relaxed – or, well, not that surprisingly. He was still Tony Stark. "But yes, in a nutshell."
"You know what," Rhodey said from where they had him projected on the wall, "I'm not even surprised anymore. I've reached my limit. Nothing is gonna be crazy after some of the stuff you've done."
"Sometimes I just want to go and sun myself on a nice beach in Hawaii," Pepper said, sighing. "But then I remember that I turn into a lobster if left too long in the sun. And that the board would all resign within the week if you were left to your own devices."
"That's ridiculous," Tony said. "I say a few days, at most. Definitely not a week. They're politicians."
Pepper made a face at him. "That isn't at all reassuring, Tony."
"What – you want a vacation?" Tony spread his hands. "I think you've got several years of vacation days, actually—"
"Good Lord, no, you'd set the city on fire if I left you alone that long."
"If we could get back on topic?" Rhodey interrupted. "I'm confused, though. I get that you're Tony and one of you is Gabriel, but who are the other two then?"
"Loki," Gadreel answered, eyes on the table. "And a being known as the Trickster."
"I still don't get what a trickster is." Clint sounded frustrated. "Yeah, so he turned Doom into a statue and stuck him in Times Square. What's that supposed to do for him?"
"Gabriel explained it to me," Gadreel said, looking up at the group. "A trickster is a demigod of sorts, a being that sets itself up as judge and jury when it finds someone it thinks is deserving of justice. And, more often than not, it also serves as an executioner." His face was sober. "Which he did to Doom."
"His idea of delivering justice to Doom was turning him into a statue and sticking him in Times Square?" Rhodey asked incredulously.
"I was told they have a sense of humor, albeit a warped one."
"I knew your sense of humor wasn't natural," Clint told Tony, who just made a face at him.
"If I may interrupt," Jarvis said. "There are already many internet forums dedicated to the statue – trying to figure out where it came from and so on. Doom is a particularly self-consumed man. I imagine the idea of so many people dedicated to him would thrill him."
"So," Natasha said slowly, "the Trickster gave him exactly what he wanted, but made sure he wouldn't be able to enjoy it."
"Hold up," Rhodey said. "Is no one else paying attention to the 'executioner' bit? You're telling me this trickster regularly kills people? Because it thinks they deserve it? I thought you said it was a part of Tony."
"It is," Tony insisted, not meeting anyone's eyes. "He is, I mean."
"We all have our dark sides," Natasha said softly, glancing sidelong at Tony.
"None of us have ever killed for fun," Clint said flatly.
"It wasn't for fun," Tony said immediately, and then looked bewildered.
"You remember being the Trickster?" Steve's stomach had plummeted when Gadreel said 'executioner,' and for a minute he thought – or hoped – he'd heard wrong.
"Not really." Tony looked uncomfortable. "I mean – I definitely used to have memories of that, but – I just get the feeling that it wasn't. He thought they deserved it."
"You don't remember?" Pepper looked concerned, leaning over the table towards Tony. "How much did you forget?"
"I remember being Tony," Tony replied, frowning at the table in thought. "And then…anything from before then, or when I was Gabriel – when I had more than just a soul, I guess – that's sort of blurry."
Natasha seemed to have come to a realization. "You're Tony," she said. "You've just got memories of when you were Tony. Maybe the memories of being an angel all went to the part of you that was Gabriel."
"It makes sense," Bruce said slowly, twiddling with his glasses. "I mean, I doubt Doom could create anything that could copy memories or mess with them. Strange might be able to, but he's not here to ask. Maybe they just got split between the four of you."
Gadreel looked thoughtful. "Given that Loki did not recognize me, and the Trickster identified me solely as an angel, I think that this is the most likely answer for what has happened."
"We've got another Loki running around?" Rhodey ran a hand over his face. "You think that's something our Loki could handle?"
"I am uncertain, given the differences between the pagan gods of my home universe and the ones here." Gadreel was visibly frustrated. "I am afraid that my time spent in Heaven's prison has done me no favors in terms of my knowledge of anything nonhuman."
"Wh – Heaven has a prison?" Bruce looked absolutely gobsmacked, mouth open in stunned surprise. "Heaven?"
"I know," Clint said casually. "Even the nice places lock people up."
"Don't worry," Gadreel said, seemingly uncaring of the bombshell he had just dropped on half of the room. "The prison is for the angels, not the human souls."
"Because that's Hell," Tony added.
"Which went wrong somewhere," Gadreel said, mouth twisting slightly. "But enough. We were speaking of Loki." He took a breath. "Given the talents he has shown, I would say that the Loki of this universe should be capable of handling him."
"Do we need to 'handle' him?" Pepper looked worried. "He's a part of Tony. Can't we just…convince them to go back together? Do we know how to do that yet?"
"So far, I haven't been able to tell much about the machine," Bruce admitted.
"Loki said he didn't want to get back together," Peggy reminded them. Steve jumped – he hadn't heard her come in.
"He didn't?" Pepper sounded bewildered. "Why not?"
"He didn't stick around long enough to give a reason." Peggy took the empty seat at the end of the table, blocking the projector for a moment. "Sorry, Rhodes. In any case, I don't know why they'd want to stay separate, and we'll only get answers if we find them. The Trickster didn't seem too keen on it either."
Setting a tablet on the table, Peggy let JARVIS pull out its data and display it in a set of holograms in the center of the group. Video clips and blog posts rotated before them, along with blurry pictures.
"I've been going through the information JARVIS has compiled and putting together a map of sorts," Peggy said, tapping a stylus against the table. "We need to keep track of the locations of the Trickster and Loki. Tracking Gabriel is out of the question at the moment, but our two other friends aren't as successful at laying low."
Peggy pulled up a map with green and red dots highlighted in various locations. "The Iron Man suit on site recorded energy signatures that could be attributed to the two, and we've been able to track them to these general locations. There's a margin of error, but it isn't that big. Green is Loki, red is the Trickster."
"They're not going to stay out in the open, though," Bucky pointed out from the back, finally speaking up. "Even split up into quarters, they're still smart enough to realize that would be just stupid."
"Which means we need to go after them before they find a way to disguise themselves," Steve said.
"We may be too late for that," Peggy informed them apologetically. She magnified a video clip that was several minutes long. "Jarvis found this posted a few minutes ago, but as you can see…"
The clip was shaky – probably taken from somebody's phone – and whoever was talking was speaking some dialect that Steve wasn't immediately familiar with. The view abruptly switched, and someone mentioned Tony Stark, clearly surprised.
The man they were filming was obviously Tony, looking at something out of the camera's view. It took only a moment for him to realize he was being filmed, looking sharply at the camera and making the person holding it exclaim in the same language.
He stared for a moment, then turned away. Peggy paused it at the same moment, giving the group a clear view of how his hair was suddenly brushing his collar and much lighter than it had been moments previously. It was difficult to tell, but Steve thought he even looked shorter.
"Well, great." Clint sounded as irritated as he looked. "Now how are we supposed to find them?"
"Was that Loki or the other guy?" Rhodey asked.
"Loki, I believe," Peggy said, fingers skimming over the map and enlarging it. "Their power signatures are remarkably similar, when it comes down to it."
"There is an additional margin of error to be accounted for when calculating whether the target is Loki or the Trickster," Jarvis said. "I can only advise caution."
"But it's not like they're going to hurt us, right?" Clint asked, half-chuckling. "I mean, we're all friends…"
"That depends," Tony said slowly, not at all boosting Steve's confidence.
"On what?" Peggy's voice was calm.
"On whether they remember you."
"I think it's rather safe to say," Bucky said nonchalantly, "that we're probably as close to fucked as we ever get. Who wants dibs?"
"Let's not be hasty, James," Natasha cautioned, though there was a small smile pulling at her lips. "We still don't have a plan."
"We're not killing them," Tony said sharply. "We've no idea what that will do."
"That wasn't ever the plan," Steve reassured him. "We'll bring them in alive."
"But maybe not all in one piece," Clint added. "I'm sure you can heal yourself."
"That doesn't mean it's not painful, you ass."
"Let's keep the violence and maiming to a minimum," Steve interrupted, eyebrows scrunched together disapprovingly. He heard Bucky snort and mutter something under his breath. "We don't know what we're up against, whether they're hostile or friendly, and we still have to figure out what that machine did."
"We know what it did," Tony said. "But how's another question."
"Which will be interesting to find out," Bruce added.
"It's a shame Doom's not around for me to ask," Natasha said, sounding disappointed. "I would've enjoyed prying that out of him."
"No doubt," Peggy agreed. "But then we would've had to deal with a diplomatic incident that would make S.H.I.E.L.D.'s fall look like a birthday party."
"Diplomatic immunity doesn't work that way," Rhodey complained, "but no one ever listens to me when I point that out."
"It's magic," Pepper said, only sounding slightly like she was joking.
"That, and people still give me the stink eye for up and vanishing during the Leviathan thing." Steve was surprised that Rhodey still brought that up – but then again, it hadn't been that long ago.
"Was a god hauling you out not official enough?" Clint had a small smirk on his face.
"Because he's an alien." Rhodey waved a hand. "And you know how the U.S. government is about aliens. Even aliens that are mythological Norse gods. And now we have two Lokis running around. As if one wasn't enough."
"Should we call Loki?" Bruce suggested. "The one who isn't Tony, I mean. He might be able to help, not just fight."
"He might not be able to come," Natasha pointed out. "They might be busy with things on Asgard."
"No harm in trying." Tony got up. "Who remembers that all-seeing guy's name?"
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