A/N: Right! Here it is, and I hope you like it! This is the actual story now. I'd love some comments, I really would, and thanks to Helca Maica and Fangirl 666 for the comments so far!

And a weird note: The three themesongs for this are Radioactive, It's Time and Demons by Imagine Dragons, and Loki's theme is the Diamond Dogs album by Bowie. I don't know why.


Chapter 1:Bottom Of The Pit Right To The Top

Somewhere, a long way away from where Tony Stark had a bunch of low-ranking demons cornered in New York, a group of dragons held a virginal girl hostage.

The girl had sharp features, big brown eyes and wavy brown hair, and she would have done anything to escape from her predicament.

Not that the dragons cared, but the thought was nice.

The monsters chanted, opening a rift that they then threw the girl into.

Screaming, and then silence.

After a short time, the girl floated back out of the chasm, limbs glowing and seared, eyes burning with supernatural power.

"My children." She said affectionately. "Thank you. Do you have the book?"

One of the dragonmen triumphantly waved the book they'd read from to open the passage from Purgatory. "Yes, Mother."

"Good. I have someone else I need to bring back." The Mother of Monsters smiled.

-O.O-

As aforementioned, Tony Stark was in New York, facing three low-ranking demons in a crappy apartment while holding a dart gun.

A lot of this part of town was starting to look like that; the flat was gloomy and dirty, and the room they were in was a combined living room - dining room - kitchen situation. Hardly luxury.

"See, I've been working on a new toy." Tony said. "Darts full of saline holy water. Now, I know it won't kill you, but I canguarantee it'll hurt like shit."

By the look the demons were giving the chunky grey dart gun, they agreed.

"What do you want, Stark?" One of the demons, possessing a stocky blonde man, said.

Tony was pretty certain he was becoming notorious to demons, now that he was building weapons capable of hurting them. These ones had been worried from the moment they'd seen him.

"Pretty simple. What's Amora doing?" Tony questioned.

In the month and a half since Loki had died, Tony had been working his ass off to keep an eye on Amora, and keeping the other Avengers - that was what the motley group of six were calling themselves now - busy.

Bruce was gathering information, basically. On the names Tony could remember - Amora, Skurge, Malekith, and Lorelei - and any scrap of information on Heaven, Hell and Purgatory there was.

Clint and Natasha were in charge of, quite simply, trying to contact Heaven, under the assumption that Heaven, angels, God, they were the good guys. They weren't getting far. Angels don't just pick up the phone, apparently.

Thor was looking for anything about Purgatory. He had the most experience with monsters, the most motivation - Loki - aside from Tony, and the most contacts, so that was his job. And so far, he had come up with little. Theology suggested it didn't exist. Apparently there was a book somewhere, but that trail had gone cold with the burglary of the archive it was supposedly housed in.

And Steve? Steve - a highly religious man, for the record - had been helping Natasha and Clint, as the three faithful members of Team Free Steve, and had been wholeheartedly determined to make contact with those he'd worshipped his whole life, but had been waylaid a little about a month after they'd started by the fact his home district of Brooklyn was currently being slowly and subtly besieged by Djinn. Apparently the Alpha Djinn was in the area. According to Bruce, monsters across the country were getting more audacious. It didn't bode well.

"Am- Amora?" The blonde male demon said, terrified. Funny. Amora's name often had that reaction.

"Yes. Amora. You may have seen her; she's in charge of you." Tony snarked.

"I won't talk about her." The demon sniffed, full of resolve. "What she can do to me is far worse than anything you can do, Tony Stark."

Tony shot the demon. It went down screaming. "Well, that's what you get. Would either of you two like to volunteer some information?"

Both of the demons remaining shook their heads frantically. "She's a lot scarier than you are."

"Really." Tony deadpanned. "How 'bout Malekith?" More terror. "Lorelei?"

This wasn't going far. The Big Three, as Tony thought of them, were obviously capable of far more unpleasant punishments than salt and holy water.

"Anything at all you'd like to tell me that you think might help your case?" Tony asked.

"You're - you're looking for a way to get someone out of Purgatory, aren't you?" The demon in an Asian woman meatsuit said.

"Depends. Got anything for me?" Tony frowned.

"There is a way! There's a book, I heard about a book, it has all the sigils in it for access to Purgatory." The demon continued.

"The book's a false trail." Tony said. "No points for you. If there's nothing else-"

The two demons were obviously keeping their eyes on the squirming demon on the floor, fully aware of the pain they could be experiencing if they didn't think of anything.

"Nothing at all?" Tony mocked, aiming the dart gun.

The other demon, not the Asian woman, spun, tried to use its telekinesis to remove the gun, but Tony shot first.

Two demons down, screaming on the floor. One demon left, considering a quick self-exorcism to avoid being shot. Tony was definitely keeping the dart gun. Field testing showed positive results.

"What about you, black eyes?" Tony said to the last demon. "Any news?"

The demon managed to say "There's been a lot of killings recently."

"Oh, come on. A kid could've told me that." Tony snorted.

"They're related. All killed by monsters, all around the same age." The demon explained, running her hand through her black hair, thinking of what she could and couldn't say. "It's no coincidence. The monsters are working together for their mother, Eve."

"Eve. You mean, like Garden of Eden Eve?" Tony said disbelievingly.

"Her, yes. She got instructions out from Purgatory to kill these humans, I don't know why. That's all I know." The demon said. "Let me go. I told you something. You should investigate that."

"Maybe I will." Tony said, levelling the dart gun at her. "You should leave."

She took the message and walked quickly out of the apartment they'd been camped in, leaving her two teammates on the ground. She'd be back later.

Meanwhile, Tony left the building, made it to the Chrysler, chucked on Loki's leather jacket for warmth - the arms were a bit long but it smelt like Loki so he always wore it, not just to remind him of the vampire he'd loved and lost, but also to remind him of why he was hunting Amora - and got in the car, intending to head over to Brooklyn to help Steve wherever possible. Then ring Bruce and find out the connection the demon had hinted at.

-O.O-

Generally, the bizarre happenings across America weren't affecting Thor. He'd been on the trail of the Purgatory book for a long time, keeping out of the spotlight, and now that scent had gone out, he was following the trail of the men who'd taken it.

The men, he'd discovered, were not men. He wasn't completely certain what they were, but they definitely weren't men by any means. They had a predilection for taking virginal girls - the town had lost plenty so far - and the archive that had lost the Purgatory book was also down one box of solid gold Mycenaen artifacts.

Bruce, after a few hours of deliberating over his database, said it was dragons, which didn't exist. A+ for effort.

So Thor decided to disregard species, take a shotgun, silver knife, cartridge with rock salt, and a bottle of holy water, and stake out the abandoned storm shelters the whatevers were hiding in, camping in his chunky silver car, Mjolnir. If there was even the slightest possibility of saving the girls Thor knew were trapped there, or retrieving the Purgatory book, he would take it.

Unfortunately he did neither.

Turns out, they'd been hiding a van in one of the shelters, having caved in a wall, and they drove out before he had a clue what was going on.

Snapping to full consciousness, he twisted the key in the ignition and fired up Mjolnir to follow them.

-O.O-

Thor missed Loki at a time like this. Not twisted, scary vampire Loki, but his kid brother. The one who'd unwillingly followed him out on hunts and done all the brainwork. He had been so cute. Besides that, kid Loki would probably have understood what he was watching.

Because the so-called dragons or whatever were doing something to one of the girls they'd taken. And Thor couldn't figure out what the hell was going on. Unwilling to just charge in when he didn't know what he was dealing with, he was watching the things from afar.

So far, to his surprise, they'd chanted from the selfsame book he'd been tracking, opened a huge hole in the ground, and thrown the girl in. Then the girl had come out again, smiling creepily and glowing like a motherfucker.

Tony probably wouldn't be happy with just that as a witness statement, but Thor was a little distracted. See, right after the girl had come out of the abyss, and after she'd affectionately greeted the things that had gotten her out - Thor was calling possession, unless the girl had multiple personalities - another woman had turned up, looking pissed off.

She looked surprisingly like Amora, making Thor suspect that this was Lorelei. Tall, powerful, blonde, and dressed like a back alley's finest. Of course, both bodies being vessels, there was no reason for them to look similar, but who knew how vain they were - Tony said they were supposed to be sisters, however that worked with demons. Then her eyes rolled back white and he lipread the glowing virginal girl saying the name 'Lorelei' or maybe it was 'Lovino', so yeah, probably Lorelei.

After that, shit got real. Lorelei attacked the girl, fire and things Thor couldn't comprehend, and the girl got her dragony things to attack back with their hands glowing hot.

The dragons were butchered. Lorelei tore them apart. Thor had seen a lot of gore in his life, and he still had to bring his eyes away from his binoculars. It was all so horribly messy.

When Thor looked back again, they were all dead. Little bits remained, and nothing else.

And oh, did it make the girl mad. She was all righteous fury. Thor was certain she shouted 'my children!' in rage.

Her and Lorelei stood face to face, arguing viciously, too fast to lipread. It seemed neither was actually capable of killing the other, both being too powerful to be killed by anything except a powerful and specific weapon. After an intensely harsh slew of vitriol, Lorelei vanished and the girl wandered away barefoot, taking the book from the van where it had been left and walking into the night.

Thor valued his life a little too much to follow. He needed to call Tony.

-O.O-

Natasha and Clint were currently staying at a Trappist monastery. If there was any place to contact God, staying for free and working for the monks for a few weeks was the one. Holy ground and all that. And they could learn more about the angels they were up against.

They weren't allowed to sleep in the same bed - not being married - but they were sharing a dormitory.

Having spent the day praying to God and anyone else who was listening, as well as working at the monastery, they wandered into their dormitory at a mere 9 o'clock post-dinner to discuss their plans before the evening service.

Instead, walking into the dorm, they were greeted by the sight of a large black bald man, missing an eye, in an intimidating coat.

"Greetings, Clint Barton, Natasha Romanov. I am the Archangel Fury, and I'm here to talk to you about your Avengers." He said.