AN: Obviously I don't own this, Marvel does.
AN: This story is not canon compliant. It keeps some aspects of most of the movies while ignoring others. The following prologue will explain as much as possible.
Prologue
The Avengers had been apart for months. Things had been difficult for them in the months following the Battle of New York.
Tony Stark, after the incident with Killian, returned to his New York home: Avengers Tower. Bruce Banner, who had been staying at the Tower, kept Tony from going off the deep end while also helping to recreate Stark's suits. The pair had been causing mayhem for Pepper Potts ever since they moved in. In secret, however, Tony had improved the technology to integrate himself with technology. He used some of the information he had learned from Extremis to further the technology. While he was still testing and improving his abilities with the new Extremis, he could control at least some technology that wasn't Stark Tech. Of course he hadn't told anybody yet…
Clint Barton, after a long vacation, came to the Tower to work as a SHIELD liaison. He found that Tony and Bruce were good company and he had enough work to stay busy. Tony and Bruce had yet to figure out where he disappeared to every couple of weeks but Clint was always happier when he returned.
Steve and Natasha, working as partners and as more, worked for SHIELD and the Avengers. They shared an apartment in the Tower when they were there or at one of their other apartments. The recent revelation that HYDRA was still around and working within SHIELD had brought Steve and Natasha to the forefront of the battle against HYDRA. All SHIELD personnel had been extensively checked for connections to HYDRA. Several, such as Jasper Sitwell, had attempted to fool several agents only to be imprisoned. Now they were chasing down leads on an agent they had encountered: the Winter Soldier. Steve had a hunch about the Winter Soldier and it was starting to intensely bother him.
Along the way, he met Sam Wilson. It started as just jogging around DC. Then Steve would invite Sam to drinks with him and Natasha. Soon they were training together and Stark had acquired a set of wings for the former soldier. Now Sam was working as an associate of the Avengers and was working his way onto the team.
Thor was a different story. After repairing the Bifrost, he, the Warriors Three, and Sif began to clean up the Nine Realms. He returned to Earth and to his beloved Jane Foster. It took only months for the initial buzz of dating a god to wear off and by then they both agreed the relationship wouldn't work out. While they remained friends, Thor left Jane to live at Stark Tower.
As for Loki, the Trickster was imprisoned on Asgard for his crimes. He was not allowed any visitors not even his wife but his mother still found her way around it. After all, mothers know the back doors to everything in the universe. They also know more than idiotic, stubborn, and arrogant husbands that wait centuries to tell their sons that they're adopted only to realize that it was too late and nearly get the universe destroyed in the process. ("Now Frigga." "No Odin! My mother was right about you! Arrogant and idiotic she said! No intercourse for a millennium!" "Frigga!")
Phil Coulson was not dead. After several months in deep freeze, Phil had been revived. Now on the mend, he was working his way back from patient to desk worker and now slowly back to handler. Fury, knowing that the truth would come out sooner or later, had informed the Avengers that Coulson was mending after an experimental treatment and may come back to taser them if they didn't behave. Thor, who had experienced the weapon, instantly cleaned up the mess he had made in the Avengers kitchen after blowing up a second microwave.
Elsewhere on Earth, other superheroes were forming. The X-Men, still young teenagers with a great deal of learning to do, were staying off the grid for the moment…most of them at least. Wolverine still caused mayhem but nothing could stop Wolverine from being Wolverine.
In the Tri-City area, Peter Parker had gained his abilities. SHIELD, after one too many close calls on Peter's part, had recruited him along with others to make a team. Luke Cage, soon to be known as Power Man, had been orphaned by his SHIELD parents and sought a home at the same place that had taken their lives. Danny Rand, millionaire, orphan, and CEO of Rand Industries, had returned from another land to gain experience in the Western world. He soon found a friendship in Luke that he could not find elsewhere. Ava Ayala, White Tiger, had been recently orphaned and passed on the ability of the Tiger by her father. Now struggling in the world, Ava found a home within SHIELD. Last, and to him certainly not least, was Sam Alexander, Nova. Taken from Earth as a young boy, Nova had been trained by the Nova Corps and the Guardians of the Galaxy. The Guardians, on their trip through the solar system, had dropped him off after paying a visit to Grandpa Quill. The teens, for that was all they were, would become known jokingly within SHIELD as the Super Crew.
Things were going right in the world, for the most part. But as usual in the world of superheroes and gods, nothing could stay calm forever.