"So we are hiding on top of a giant Midgardian ship in the sky?" I whispered to Thor as the small metal plane landed.

The two men who revealed themselves as Tony Stark and Steve Rogers walked off the plane onto the deck of the giant floating ship.

"Yes." Tony said from in front of me.

Echo was walking slowly next to me, I hadn't wanted to put him back on my arm. I liked having him out next to me, it made me feel safe.

Loki was walking silently between Thor and I. He hands were bound and he had a mask over his mouth preventing him from speaking.

"Do the Midgardians really believe I just need my mouth to speak?" He said telepathically to me.

"They believe in the power of physical force, and do not recognize the power of the mind." I replied smiling.

Loki looked over at me.

"I missed your smile most of all." He continued.

"Loki..."

"No Cade we really need to talk. In private." He nodded towards Thor.

Echo nudged my leg, turning me towards the door that would allow us to descend into the belly of the ship.

The guard behind us poked Loki in the back pushing him forward, Loki stumbled a step and I shot a murderous look at the guard, who cowered under my gaze.

More guards joined us as we walked through the door, but before they could take Loki away, he squeezed my hand. They surrounded Loki and Thor pulled me away from him, so that we could follow after Tony and Steve who were going in a completely different direction.

"Thor, what is going to happen? I don't think they will let us take Loki." I told him telepathically.

He sighed. "I'm not sure Cade. I have a good feeling though, and when has that steered us wrong?" He thought, sending me a smile.

"Loads of times! Your idea to go to Jotunheim made you have a great feeling. That day that got us thrown in the dungeons of the light elves in Alfheim, you literally said 'I have a good feeling about this'. Two weeks of eating rotten fruit Thor. Two weeks!" I replied coolly.

Thor snorted.

Tony and Steve turned to look at us and I gave them a winning smile.

My telepathy was mostly a secret that Thor and I used in battle. It had gotten stronger when Loki left, just like all the other powers I had suddenly unlocked.

The hallway we were walking down opened up into a giant room filled with people sitting at different kinds of desks. Huge windows let in natural light from the outside. The sun was rising quickly starting yet another day.

A man wearing a huge black coat and an eye patch stood in front of us. His hands were crossed in front of his chest, but I wasn't afraid.

Echo eyed the man warily, and leaned into me, trying to comfort me.

"So you two are who everyone is talking about." The man with the eye patch said calmly. His eye sank down to look at Echo, then rose back up to look at Thor and me. "I am director Nick Fury."

Thor spoke up, placing Mjolnir on the glass table next to us. "I am Thor Odinson, and this is Cadence, daughter of Cain the strong."

"Why are you here?" Fury asked.

"More importantly why do you have a huge ass wolf?" Tony asked from his seat at the glass table next to us.

I laughed under my breath. "We are here for Loki and the tesseract." I replied.

Steve sat up at mention of the tesseract. He and Tony sat at the glass table beside a red haired woman, and a small nervous looking man in glasses.

The man in glasses stared at me and I gave him an encouraging smile, he immediately looked away a red color on his cheeks.

Okay that was adorable.

"Well Loki is under our watch now, and until he tells us where the tesseract is we will not be giving him to you." Fury said just as calmly.

Obsidian melted down my arm and shifted into a sword in the sheath on my waist.

"We will help you find the tesseract." Thor replied, placing his hand on my arm.

"Not now." He told me.

I took in a deep breath and moved my hand to relax at my side, rather than on the hilt of Obsidian.

"Wait, how did you do that with the sword?" The man in glasses exclaimed at the table, standing up.

"Obsidian has a mind of it's own." I replied coolly. I placed my hand back on it, and pulled it out of the sheath. "It is whatever I want it to be." I concentrated and let Obsidian shift into a axe, then a large silver bow, finally settling back on a sword and sheathing it at my side once more.

"That's incredible!" Tony exclaimed leaning forward against the table.

I shrugged. "It mimics any weapon I deem fit."

"With that kind of technology-" Tony began to say before he was cut off by Thor.

"Obsidian is not to be tampered with, it is Asgardian technology and will remain as such." Thor said gruffly. "Back to the task at hand. Loki has an army called the Chitauri, and he means to lead them against your people."

"An army from outer space?" Steve asked.

I nodded. "They are not of this world or any world that I know of. They are quite brutal, I have read books of their race. Nobody knows where they came from, only that they leave destruction in their wake."

"So he's having Selvig build a portal to bring them here." The man with the glasses concluded, taking a step back from the table.

"Wait, Erik Selvig?" I asked. "Thor isn't that Jane's friend?"

Thor nodded awestruck. I felt worry cross through Thor's mind.

I took his hand in mine.

"Hey look at me." I said calmly. Thor turned and made eye contact with me. "Erik is going to be okay Thor."

He bit his lip, but nodded agreeing.

"Loki has him under some kind of spell." The red-haired woman said coolly. "He has Erik and one of ours."

"Mind control?" Thor asked.

She nodded.

Thor looked back at me. "You think you'll be able to break the control."

I shrugged. "I should be able to, but I'll have to be around him to break the spell."

"I just want to know why Loki let us catch him." Steve said.

"I don't think that we should be focusing on Loki, the guys mind is like a bag of cats. You could smell crazy on him." The man with glasses said.

I snorted, and nudged Thor in the shoulder. He sent me a dark look.

"Crazy or not, Loki is Asgardian and my brother." Thor replied, still frowning.

"He killed 80 people in two days." The red haired woman said flatly.

I shrugged, "He's adopted."

Thor laughed and bumped his shoulder into mine.

No one else thought it was funny.

"Loki stole something called Iridium." The red haired woman continued.

"Iridium? Why would he need Iridium?" The man with glasses replied.

"It's a stabilizing agent." Tony said rising from his chair and making his way over to where Fury was standing.

"Does Selvig need any kind of power source?" Steve asked, looking utterly confused from where he was sitting.

"Well he has to heat the cube to a higher temperature to make the portal open." The man with glasses said quietly.

" I don't believe we've met, but your work on anti-electron collisions is unparalleled. And I'm a huge fan of how you turn into an enormous green rage monster, Dr. Banner." Tony said making his way over to the man in glasses grabbing his hand tightly.

An enormous green what?

I shot a look over at Thor, who laughed at my reaction.

"It's Bruce actually." The man with glasses replied slowly easing his grasp away from Tony.

At that moment a tremor ran through my body, making me reach out and grab the nearest chair to steady myself. Concern flashed across Thor's face as he grabbed my shoulders steadying me.

"Cade are you okay?" He asked me.

I pressed a hand to my head. "Yeah, I'm just really tired. My day is starting to catch up with me." I smiled weakly at him.

Thor looked over at Fury. "Is there a place here that we can retire to? It's been a long day for both of us."

He nodded. "Natasha escort them to their rooms."

The red haired woman rose from the table and motioned for us to follow her. Thor made a move to pick me up and I waved his hands away.

"Don't even think about it." I warned him. He laughed at my ferocious look, but moved backward removing his hand. He picked up Mjolnir off the table and followed behind the woman. I turned and began to walk behind her, letting out a high pitched whistle for Echo to follow me.

We followed Natasha through the winding corridors, finally arriving at a closed door.

"This room is for you Cade." She turned and pointed to the room on the opposite wall. "And this room is for Thor. In the morning we expect a full explanation about Loki and his army."

"Thank you." I said to her, giving her a small smile.

She nodded and walked away quickly back towards the main room.

I turned and opened the room quickly, with Thor following me. I collapsed into the bed in the middle of the room. I could hear Echo snorting around and saw him jump into the chair in the corner of the room. I felt the bed dip as Thor sat down next to me. He exhaled loudly and threw himself back on the bed.

I laughed loudly, my voice muffled by the mattress.

"Cade." Thor murmured softly.

"Mhmmm." I groaned into the bed.

"Why do you think that he's doing this? Why do you think he hid for so long?" Thor said. I could hear the pain in his voice.

I raised my head off the bed and looked at him. His face was downcast in a frown, but he stared upwards at the ceiling.

"Thor, look at me." I mumbled. He turned his head and made eye contact with those stormy blue eyes of his.

"Loki is difficult to understand. He always has been. I used to think that I did understand him, but now I'm not sure why he does the things he does." I said.

Thor looked away. "I thought it would be different this time."

"Did you see him Thor? Something happened to him when he was gone, someone did something to him." I exclaimed rising from the bed and crossing over to the wardrobe on the other side of the room. There were clean soft clothes in the drawer, and I grabbed a pair of pants and a shirt.

"Yes something happened to him. I just hope that he will tell us what happened and why." Thor huffed out.

"Thor close your eyes." I announced.

"Why?" He said sitting up.

"Because I want to get out of this armor." I raised an eyebrow.

He blushed and shut his eyes, throwing himself back on the bed dramatically. Obsidian melted into a bracelet on my wrist and twisted around it comfortingly.

I quickly stripped off my armor and changed into the soft pants and t shirt. When I turned to look at Thor he was sitting up on the bed, his eyes open, staring at me.

"Did you look freak?" I asked him narrowing my eyes.

"No." He responded immediately, but he blushed.

"Don't make me hurt you Goldilocks."

He laughed and stood up. "Now can I change without you looking?"

"I don't know, can you?" I contradicted, sitting on the bed facing him.

He smirked at me and released the clasp on his breast plate, pulling it off and making himself shirtless in front of me.

I felt a blush creep up into my cheeks, but I couldn't look away. My voice caught in my throat, and for the first time in my life I thought of Thor as something other than a friend.

"Are you okay?" Thor said suddenly concerned, thinking that I was having a reaction to being tired. He took a step forward trying to comfort me.

"Yeah, I'm fine. I just have to go to the bathroom." I said suddenly standing up and moving to the small bathroom quickly. I splashed water on my face.

Get it together Cade. Thor is your best friend always has been, don't ruin that. You know that your track record with guys is not the best. You don't want to lose Thor too.

When I walked out of the bathroom Thor was sitting on the end of the bed, wearing a shirt and pants.

"So I guess you aren't going back to that room across the hall?" I asked.

He shook his head. "No. I think we should stick together."

"Okay." I tried to be calm as I got into the bed.

Thor and I had shared a bed before, it had never been weird, but something felt different. When Loki "died" I had stayed in Thor's room every night, he never left my side. He was always there to help me with my nightmares, but in the last year he had been more caring than he ever had. I thought he wanted to be with Jane, but maybe I was wrong.

He held open the covers for me as I got into the bed. He slid in next to me.

The air around me was suddenly enveloped in Thor's musk. I had never realized how much that smell comforted me until now.

He fell asleep almost instantly and his consistent breaths lulled me into a deep sleep.