Title: Fairytale of New York. Chapter 1/4
Summary: In the summer of 2018 Thanos attacked New York, and every Christmas Eve two of the survivors meet to talk about their fallen friends.
Warnings: Major character death, Suicidal thoughts, suicide.
Notes: Back at the start of November 2013 I went to a ridiculously early Christmas party and everyone groaned when the DJ kept playing Christmas songs, apart from one song: Fairytale of New York by The Pogues. When I got home, I wrote 90% of this fic.
Please note that as I wrote the majority of this in 2013, it is set after Thor: The Dark World, so is AU to the events of the films that were released after that, hence there will be no Scarlet Witch, Vision etc featured.
Last warning for Major Character Death. Seriously, pretty much everyone dies!
Fairytale of New York
Chapter 1 of 4
The first time Tony ended up sitting on the floor of the drunk tank on Christmas Eve was in 2018.
The winter had been brutal, with snow thickly carpeting the ground since mid November, which had hampered the clean up operations that were still ongoing some six months after Thanos' attack on the city.
The whole attack still seemed like a bizarre nightmare to Tony and he often woke screaming in the middle of the night, seeing the giant ship appear in the atmosphere once more.
There had been no portals this time, no evil Asgardian gods, no warnings, just a giant grey ship hovering over the skyline of New York and a booming voice that echoed across the city, promising the gift of death and destruction for all.
Doors opened in the colossal craft and waves of smaller vessels poured out, spilling through the streets and firing high-powered laser guns at anything that moved.
Fury issued frantic orders that the army would deal with the Chitauri vessels, but the Avengers were to attack the mother ship and bring it down by any means necessary.
.
.
Bruce had been the first to fall.
Not long after they entered the ship, through the still open hangar door, Hulk had charged from the Quinjet and attacked the Chitauri who were swarming around the deck. The Avengers looked on in horror as they realised the power of the new weapons their enemies carried, weapons strong enough to bring down Hulk, and they realised just how vulnerable they were this time.
Clint went next, Tony assumed. He'd stayed behind to defend the Quinjet so they would still have a means of escape if they needed one, but they never did find his body among the wreckage.
They fought their way through the ship; killing every soldier the Chitauri threw at them, until they came to a well-defended room.
"Gotta be something important in here, right?" Natasha asked.
"I doubt it'd be so guarded if it was where they store the toilet paper," Tony replied.
"We need to get in there," Steve agreed, as he smashed his shield into the head of a Chitauri soldier and crushed it against the wall.
When all the Chitauri lay at their feet, a smoking mass of black blood and indistinguishable parts, Thor smashed the door off it's hinges and entered the room.
"Loki," Thor gasped upon seeing his brother chained to a metal table, covered in the tattered rags of his armour, with blood seeping from some hidden wound beneath the leather, which pooled at his side before dripping onto the floor. "I thought you dead."
Thor moved swiftly across the room, and pounded at the chains with Mjolnir until they began to shatter under the blows.
"It's gone, Thor," Loki mumbled as Thor hauled him upright. "We tried to stop him, but we weren't strong enough."
"Who wasn't strong enough?" Thor asked as he wiped a trickle of blood away from the corner of Loki's mouth.
"Asgard," Loki said quietly. "It… it lays in ruin."
"And father?" Thor asked.
"He was sleeping when Thanos attacked. We had no warning, no sign. I woke father and we led the Einherjar against the Chitauri together and managed to decimate over half their forces, but it was still too late." Loki said. He shook is head and then quietly added, "Father is dead. They all are."
"What of Sif?" Thor asked desperately. "What of Fandral and Hogan?"
"They fought bravely, but in the end they too fell," Loki admitted.
Thor's face turned dark. "And yet you alone live while Asgard was destroyed? What did you do? Hide in the shadows like a coward while my friends died?"
Loki jumped from the table and shoved Thor in the chest violently, pushing him up against the nearest wall and placing his forearm across Thor's throat. "Do not dare to speak to me of cowardice! You think I wanted to be captured? You think I wanted to watch while my home burnt, along with every person I have ever known?"
"Guys," Tony interrupted. "Are you gonna fight, cos we kinda have a suicide mission to finish here and we're on the clock."
Loki looked at Tony, then back at Thor, and sighed heavily as he released his arm from Thor's throat, then said, "We have not time for this."
"I am glad, brother," Thor said shakily. "I am glad you still live."
"We will not live much longer if we stay here," Loki replied, and then he turned to Steve. "What is your plan?"
"To bring the ship down," Steve replied.
"And then?"
"Er, that was pretty much it," Tony replied.
"You fools," Loki cackled. "You're all going to die, you know?"
"Banner has already fallen, Loki," Thor said quietly. "And I hold little hope that Agent Barton still lives."
A brief look of shock and confusion crossed Loki's face before he covered it with a smirk. "Then I would imagine my help is required."
"You'd help us?" Steve asked.
"Help you defeat the monster who destroyed the kingdom that is rightfully mine?" Loki asked with a raised eyebrow. "I will not rest until he lies in tatters at my feet."
"That's good enough for me," Natasha replied, and Tony nodded in agreement.
Thor fixed Loki with a pointed stare. "And later we shall discuss your lies, once this is over."
"What lies?" Loki asked incredulously.
"The fact that you faked your own death and left me to suffer in grief for years on end again," Thor said roughly.
"Oh get over it, Thor," Loki snapped as he moved towards the door. "Anyone would think you weren't happy to see me."
.
.
Loki led the remaining Avengers down into the bowels of the ship where they fought a brigade of Chitauri soldiers that were guarding a heavily fortified room. The door had proved a problem, until Tony had located a hidden panel in the wall and managed to short-circuit the electrics inside it.
As the door slid open the Avengers entered and small lights in the floor began to flood the cavernous room with light.
"This…" Thor started as he looked around the room at the items that stood on short display pillars. "This is the contents of the weapons vault."
"Thanos ransacked it and had everything brought here," Loki said as he walked into the room and began to walk between the pillars.
They followed him as he wend a path down the space, until finally he stood before a pillar that was surrounded by smaller pillars, at the end of the room.
"It cannot be," Thor gasped.
"What is it?" Steve asked in confusion.
"It's the gaudiest disco glove I've ever seen," Tony quipped.
"It is the infinity gauntlet," Thor replied. "The most powerful weapon throughout all the realms."
"Oh, that kinda sucks," Tony replied.
"But brother, if he has the gauntlet why does he not wield it?" Thor asked.
"Thanos only possesses five of the six infinity stones and without the final stone he lacks the power to charge it," Loki replied. "He believes the final stone may be here on Midgard."
"So if we could find that stone first we could use it against him?" Steve asked.
"We have no need to search," Loki replied.
"And why is that?" Tony asked.
Loki moved his hands and the air between them began to swirl until a blue box appeared. "Because I already possess it."
Thor watched as Loki quickly placed the casket on the final pillar before the blue colouring that had started at his fingers could spread further than his hands, and asked, "You had the casket all along? Why did you not use it when you attacked Midgard last?"
"It is a Jotun weapon," Loki replied. "It is vile to touch in every way, but now we have need of it."
The stones around the gauntlet began to glow and an eerie light began to swirl within each one, which then coalesced into a stream, one from each stone in different colours, each stream heading towards one of the gems attached to the gauntlet.
There was a flash of light, which caused them all to turn away, and when they looked back the stones were gone, but each one of the gems was pulsing with raw power.
"Put it on," Loki said to Thor.
"It is a weapon of magical power, brother, surely you would be able to control it better than I?" Thor asked.
"You would trust me to wield an object of such power?" Loki asked with a raised eyebrow.
"A fair point," Thor replied, then he reached over, picked up the gauntlet and placed it on his right hand. "What do we do now?"
"We fight," Loki replied.
The battle to get to the control room was not easy, but with Thor wearing the gauntlet, using Mjolnir to target the Chitauri with almost pinpoint accuracy, they had quickly arrived at the central control deck of the ship.
Thor leaned heavily against the door, drawing large breaths, and then shook his head to clear it.
"Are you well?" Loki asked, laying a hand on Thor's shoulder and then snatching it back as he was stung by the massive energy that flowed through his brother's body. "Why did you not tell me, you fool?"
"I will manage," Thor ground out through gritted teeth.
"You will die if you keep that thing on a moment longer. The power is too much for you to bear,"
"I will bear it," Thor said, straightening himself up. "I have little choice."
Thor raised his hand and they watched as the door began to warp and then vanished, revealing the empty command room and the clock that was silently counting down on the screen.
"No," Loki said as the clock hit zero and a high-pitched sound began to echo from the depths of the ship.
Thor raised his ungloved hand, placed it on Loki's neck and pulled him closer as the ship began to tilt and fall from the sky.
.
.
.
Tony woke, laid on his back, and staring up into a hole that extended up through the floors of two decks. He lay for a moment, his ears buzzing and his head spinning as he tried to catalogue his injuries, but then his hearing cleared and he realised someone was screaming.
He pulled himself painfully to his feet, suddenly glad of the shielding of the suit which had no doubt saved his life, and made his way over to where Loki sat with his legs bent at awkward angles, cradling Thor's broken body in his arms.
Tony had thought that Thor was an indestructible god, that nothing could ever harm him, but the stoved in portion of his skull and his lifeless eyes dispelled that theory. Thor, the brightest, bravest and strongest being that Tony had ever known was gone.
"Loki," Tony said, placing a hand on his shoulder. "We need to get out of here."
Loki looked up at him with wide eyes, a river of blood running the left side of his face from an open wound on his scalp. His mouth opened and closed a few times and he finally said, "It wasn't supposed to end like this."
"I hate to say this but Thor is gone. You can't help him now. We need to look for the others and go," Tony said, noting that one of Loki's pupils was blown so wide his eye looked almost black. "There could be more explosions and all that metal above our heads looks pretty precarious so we need to get out of here before it falls."
Loki blinked, trying to clear his vision, and then looked back at Thor. "Then let it fall. I care not."
"You're going to die down here an-"
"Good," Loki interrupted.
"I know you're upset, but I'm not leaving you here," Tony said firmly.
"Go, now!" Loki shouted, and then he looked back up at Tony. "Leave, before I kill you myself."
Tony's attention was dragged away by a moan somewhere to his left, and he shouted, "Natasha? Is that you?"
"Tony?" Natasha called out.
Tony moved towards her voice and began digging in the rubble until he found her, pinned by the ankle by a fallen beam, and as he began to dig her out Loki leaned over Thor's body again and let out a moaning wail.
.
.
It took an hour for Tony and Natasha to navigate their way out through the wreckage of the downed ship as they picked their way over debris and through the maze of blocked corridors.
They had been forced to leave Steve's body in the command room, pinned beneath a massive girder that had cleaved his body in two, and even though he was still alive they'd been forced to leave Loki too.
He had sat weeping and rocking Thor's lifeless corpse in his arms during the time it had taken to dig Natasha out, but eventually his cries had ceased as his breathing grew ragged and slow, and finally he slumped unconscious over his brother's body. Tony had wanted to try to carry him out, but one tug on his arm showed that he would have been impossible to lift.
They stepped out into the fresh air, blinking at the dappled sunlight that streamed through the leaves of the few trees that still remained standing in the south east corner of Central Park, where the ship had fallen, and Tony looked out over the skyline and saw the empty space between the buildings where Stark Tower used to stand.
He hadn't known it at the time, but Thanos had seemingly realised his plan was about to be foiled, and shortly before setting the self destruct on the ship and teleporting away by some unknown means, he had ordered all the smaller Chitauri vessels to attack the tower and they had reduced it to a pile of smoking rubble.
Pepper had been at the tower at the time, and Happy had tried to get her to safety, but it was too late. It took three weeks to dig through to the basement parking garage, where they were found in the back seat of an armoured car, their arms wrapped around each other. There wasn't a single scratch on either of them, and Tony still woke from nightmares gasping for breath as he suffocated along with them in the back of the car.
Natasha retired the next day. Handed in her weapons and changed her name.
Tony liked to think that she made her life for herself somewhere in Florida, settled down and had baby after baby, all with gorgeous red hair.
He knew that probably wasn't true, but it was a comforting thought amid the wreckage of his life.
.
.
.
It was Christmas Eve 2018 and Tony hadn't protested at all when the police arrested him for public urination in the alley behind a rundown bar. They'd taken his details, but Tony had fallen over his own feet, started giggling, and said, "I'm sat in my own piss."
One of the officers had knelt down in the snow next to him, placed a hand on his shoulder and said, "Mr Stark, you need to go home."
"Home? What's that?" Tony slurred. "You know I used to have a bigggg house right in the middle of the city and then aliens knocked it down. Killed my girlfriend too, and pretty much everyone I know."
The policemen talked with low voices, and then crouching man said, "Mr Stark, we're going to take you somewhere safe. You shouldn't be out here all alone tonight."
Tony sat with his back against the wall of the holding cell, surrounded by men of various ages who were all shabbily dressed.
"It's cold out," the old man on Tony's right slurred.
"That it is," Tony nodded.
"Better to be in here than out there on a night like this," the man laughed wheezily, and then he coughed loudly. "Won't have to worry about it much longer. Won't see another one."
"I live in hope," Tony sighed.
"Have yourself a merry little Christmas," the old man started to sing. "It may be your last. Next year we may all be living in the past."
"Those aren't the lyrics, you old bum," someone shouted from across the cell.
"Those are the original, proper lyrics," the man shouted back and then he continued to sing, "Have yourself a merry little Christmas. Pop that champagne cork. Next year we may all be living in New York…"
Tony turned his face away and closed his eyes. He thought back to Christmases past and better times, of giant stuffed rabbits and stockings above the fireplace in yet another house that had be reduced to rubble.
He thought of his friends who were dead, of Steve and Bruce, of Thor and Clint.
Tony was the lucky one, wasn't he? He was still alive.
"Happy Christmas, Pepper. I love you baby," Tony whispered to himself as he laid his head back against the wall with tears running down his face.