Unlike Tony, Jane wasn't supported by half-alien nanites, but this didn't seem to make much of a difference in the intensity of her focus. Long after Steve would have given up for neck-strain—even if she was short enough to walk beneath the roof, she still had to crane her head back to look up at it—she was still at it, her hands pressed against the silver surface, occasionally mumbling to herself. Steve, meanwhile, kept guard and tried not to fidget too much. He itched to go and scout the area around, but it wouldn't be wise to split up, even if the place probably wasn't like Maklu.
At long last, as the quality of light entering the telescope-pit began to grow redder and dimmer, she dropped her hands from the ceiling interface and stepped back for enough space to stretch—then immediately yelped, her hands flying to the back of her neck. "Oh, ow, ow!"
"Crick in your neck?"
"Crick from hell." Jane rubbed her neck forcefully. "And I thought the university desks were ergonomic failures. Huh. Maybe these aliens are different."
"I've seen some that are," offered Steve, thinking of the Makluans. Although the Makluans, according to Thor, were shapeshifters; Steve had seen both humanoids and dragons and other, way weirder things among their number. But that still proved that they were out there.
"Yeah. Ow." Jane rotated her head forward, then leaned over and touched her toes, grunting with the effort of stretching muscles that had frozen into place. "Ohh, I shouldn't have stopped, I'm going to have a time getting going again."
"Maybe you should take a break."
"Haha. No. Loki's going to be back soon."
Probably. They had little time left. "Any luck with reprogramming it?"
"No." Jane grimaced. "It's just a telescope, Steve."
Steve held up his hands. "Sorry. Past a certain point it's all magic to me."
"Sufficiently advanced, yep. We'll catch up." She stretched one last time, then raised her hands again, going back to it. But the look on her face was grim, not the intense curiosity she'd been settling into before. She was being driven to search through necessity, not a genuine love of the art. Or maybe she just needed to get her mind back into the zone for it.
A half-hour later, as the sky above grew truly dark, Loki's return split the air like a thunderclap, one not unlike the massive sound produced when Tony dumped out his subspace pocket. Steve clapped his hands over his ears as the mirrored surface proved that it could reflect sound just as well as light and the echoes temporarily overwhelmed everything else in this place. At least it didn't crack, though Loki would have deserved it if it had.
'And how have we been, children?' Steve thought he saw Loki say. His lip-reading wasn't the best. It looked bitchy enough to be something that Loki might say, though.
'Ow,' Jane mouthed, which was at least easier to figure out.
"Is it dark enough?" Steve asked, when he could hear himself think again.
Jane was still glaring at Loki, and didn't seem to hear him—heck, maybe she didn't. Steve's hearing was more acute, and left him more vulnerable to ridiculously loud noises, but at least his eardrums healed over quicker.
He tried raising his voice. "IS IT DARK ENOUGH OUTSIDE YET?"
"Yes, yes, it's fine." Loki shot him an irritated glance, and then Jane one too, muttering, "Of course, she could not simply leave the telescope ready." He strode over to where the roof flattened and raised his hands against it. Immediately the mirrored surface rippled and metal surged upward and over, spreading out above.
"If this is a device to avoid being seen, then somewhere in this device is a list of all places that must be checked," said Loki, pressing his hands more closely against the mirrored surface as it finally ceased rippling. The glow of his magic spread about his hands, sinking into the roof. "All that is required is to find it... a spell for which I have been researching all day, and, at last, have returned with, triumphant."
"Right, sure," muttered Jane crossly. She had one arm wrapped around herself and looked tired and stiff, now that her concentration had been broken, but she left her other hand on the roof, looking up to check it frequently. "Oh, sure," she said, a moment later, more acidly, but with a defeated note that let Steve know that Loki had found what he'd been looking for.
Steve stepped back, away from the middle of the telescope—although from what he remembered of his high-school physics classes, the entire lens was important to the telescope, so no matter where he stood he was probably interfering with it. But Jane didn't seem in a hurry to get them out of the way, and she'd know and care, right? Although he wasn't seeing the lens light up at all, either. Did that mean it didn't reflect any light at all, or that the light concentrated by the dish above was still too diffuse?
"A few minutes for it to view all aspects of the sky we wish to see," murmured Loki.
"And then what?"
Loki raised an eyebrow at him.
"You said you needed a 'paragon' to crack this thing," said Steve. He gestured at the telescope they were standing inside. "I'm not seeing that you need our help here." For that matter, why hadn't Loki managed to open the telescope earlier? It couldn't have been that he was unwilling to swim down to the bottom of the pool... or had that been it? Had there been some secret test that Steve had been oblivious to?
"Oh, I'm sure we'll see—ah," said Loki, looking back to where his hand pressed against the interface. "Damn."
"What?"
"Security protocols have locked us out." Loki smiled in what was apparently an attempt to be reassuring, for once, as it had far less teeth than his other smiles. With only the light of the stars and his magic to go by, it still looked positively ghoulish. "Fortunately, when it comes to illusions and riddles, I'm very good."
"Not that good," said Jane, bringing her other hand up to press it against the ceiling as well. "It hasn't locked me out—it's just you." Then, snidely, "I wonder why it wouldn't like you."
Loki pulled his hands away, then put them back again. He frowned. "So it has. What—ah." Was it Steve's imagination, or did his eyes gleam brighter in the dim glow? "You do it, then." He lifted his hands away and waved carelessly.
"What, you give up?"
"There's little point in struggling against it. As you said, you're not locked out."
"Well—fine." She glared back up at the interface.
The bowl moving above wasn't really anything Steve could hear, per se—even for him, it was at the lower range of his hearing. But something that massive being moved caused a vibration that he could feel resonating in his bones. In the darkness, from down here, he couldn't tell if it was all moving as one piece, like some sort of oversized satellite dish, or if the quicksilver that comprised it was just flowing into a new position.
"Scans coming through," said Jane, her eyes fixed upward. "Oh, wow. If I had a laptop, an adapter, anything..."
Loki's eyes flashed with amusement in the darkness. This time Steve was sure they had actually flashed, or flared—that had been illumination.
"...that's why it locked you out, isn't it?" Jane finished, pulling her hands down. Above them, the dish stilled.
"You are a paragon of learning, Lady Foster."
"Dr. Foster, thanks," she snapped, her hands clenching into fists.
"Dr. Foster," he amended smoothly. "Some of us have baser concerns—such as, oh, the salvation of the multiverse. Shall we go?"
Jane turned her head away sharply. Her hands were still clenched. After a moment, she tucked one away in the pocket of her coat, and reached up to tap twice at the ceiling with the other.
The effect was immediate; the sound, immense. Two straight cracks ran down the telescope lens, crossing in the middle, perfectly aligned with the corners of the inverted pyramid above. In the walls around them something massive groaned as ancient machinery came to life for the first time in an age, and the four segments of the lens began to tip downwards, tilting, opening to the below. Beneath Steve's feet the glass, or whatever it was, turned suddenly slippery as it sloped. He swung his shield around as hard as he could, aiming the edge for the glass, but it bounced right off, completely failing to dig in. He began to slip. Jane had been further from the centre—she yelped, slapping her palms against the glass and trying to get traction just as Steve was, but it was just as useless.
"Loki!"
"I can't!" Loki called back, a note of panic in his reply. There were flashes of green light, bursts of un-coordinated magic. Loki snapped his fingers, but nothing happened.
The lens segments tilted further and Steve slid faster. Before he could fall over the edge, he coiled his feet beneath him and pushed off and up, leaping across the ever-widening gap to the segment that Jane was about to slip off of. His hand closed about her foot—and then they were both in free-fall, falling down through impenetrable darkness. The stars above, Loki's magic light—both were gone, lost.
Jane screamed as they fell, and Steve grit his teeth to keep from doing the same. He couldn't see the bottom, couldn't see anything. He twisted over, putting himself between Jane and the bottom, and the shield below them both. If there was a bottom to this pit, it was a futile gesture—they'd fallen too far already.
And then they hit... something. Something with enough force to make the edges of the shield dig into his body, and to squish Jane against him in turn, but no more than that. A moment later, and they fell into water.
It was deep water. It closed over his head—cold, and he was choking, drowning—he'd lost track of Jane—
The water fell away, knocking him down but leaving him in air, blessed, blessed air. He rolled to hands and feet—wetly; there was still a good inch of water between him and the ground, or wherever this was—and hacked up a lungful of water, then just gasped for breath. After a few seconds, he remembered Jane and in the same instant realized she was next to him, also hacking up water. Loki, a dozen feet away, was doing the same—looking very mortal now, in the pale illumination coming up from beneath the floor.
"Oh god, let's not do that again," gasped Jane. "Ever."
"With you there," Steve said, and coughed some more.
"Where are we?" she asked, starting to get up, and then—"Ohhhh."
"Jane?"
"Stop moving," she said, her voice hushed, "And look down. Properly."
The water was still disturbed enough that nothing was really clear, but he could see ribbons of light through it—blues, mostly, edged with greens and purples. And they were moving. He'd thought that was just the water itself moving, but as the surface stilled, Steve could see that the lights were actually moving independently, curling about themselves... flowing. And beyond it... were those stars?
"The bottom of this forsaken world," said Loki, voice rasping, as he climbed to his feet. He glanced down, and shuddered. "Looking out the other side."
"The Temple of Uttermost Winds," breathed Jane. "Oh my god. It's solar wind."
"Not—quite," said Loki. His voice broke in the middle, and he clapped a hand over his mouth, then removed it almost immediately. "Not quite. Dr. Foster. Those aren't—those aren't stars."
She looked at him oddly. "What are they, then?"
"Realities," said Loki, and he let out a small, hysterical giggle and immediately covered his mouth again. When he next spoke it was muffled. "And the wind is the Dragon's Breath."
"Tony told me about that," said Steve. He didn't add, sort of. No point complicating things, not with Loki suddenly giggling. Steve took a few slow steps to put himself in front of Jane, and with each step, the water swirled in against his boots, reminding him that, actually, it was damn cold. He'd need to talk to Tony about water proofing. No doubt it would be a lot easier to talk about than this place. "The... framework of the universe, I thought he called it."
"More like the space where the framework exists," said Foster. "The gap, I mean. The framework exists within it—I mean, it's all there in the math, in the physics, how our wormhole bridges work. But... wow. This is... an amazing representation." He could picture her expression from the awe in her voice.
Loki squeezed his eyes shut, bringing up his other hand, too—a child, hiding, terrified. There were small tremors in the water at his feet.
"Loki?" Steve asked. "Hey. Loki..."
"Wow. Okay. Uh. What's, um, going on with him?"
"We should back off," said Steve, suiting action to words and shepherding Jane behind him. He didn't dare take his eyes off Loki, though, as he carefully stepped through the water, darting glances down to check if he was about to back off of anything.
"Did he just—lose it?" hissed Jane, keeping her voice low.
Steve waited until they were a bit further away before he answered her, although he couldn't be certain that they'd be out of Loki's range of hearing. He didn't actually want to let Loki out of his sight-line—if Loki moved, Steve wanted to see him coming. Even if there was every chance that Loki could just use an illusion to fake it, and even if it was likely that he could overpower Steve no matter anyway, Steve would take whatever small chance he could get.
"You know how... Tony was crazy, right?"
"Darcy—Darcy thinks he's still crazy."
"I don't know about that. I do know that he was actually mentally ill, hearing... voices... this was, um, while he was working on extremis."
"What, seriously?"
"Yes." Steve glanced down at his feet and up again. Had Loki moved? No, he was still right there. Steve had caught sight of something else, though, a bright point that had been hidden beneath the swirling aurora, but was visible now that they'd moved to see it at an angle rather than looking straight down at it... which meant that it had to be a lot closer than any of the stars, which hadn't seemed to move at all. "What is that, down there?"
"Something shining brighter... a closer reality?" Jane theorized, and then he heard her shake her head, her coat ruffling at the motion. "No, wait, the zombie-fying nanovirus is because he was actually crazy? I thought it was the, the terrorists."
"Yeah, that was them. Um, but the mental illness was because of something that happened the first time he travelled between realities. He crossed, well, this place we're standing over, and saw something he shouldn't have."
"So you're saying SHIELD's planning to turn its agents crazy."
"No," said Steve, exasperated. "That's a different way to travel." He sincerely hoped. "I'm saying whatever is below us is dangerous. I don't think we should be looking at it."
"Then why did you just ask me to look down there!"
"I meant directly! I don't think we should look at it directly," Steve backpedalled. "I think we'd know if it was affecting us, it sounded like it was pretty obvious. But I think his problem is that he's been through it." He gestured toward Loki. "That looks kinda like a flashback." Or just a general nervous melt-down—or maybe something far less human. Loki was, after all, an alien.
"Great," Jane muttered. "Just great. Okay. Let me try... oh, cold, cold, cold," she chanted, crouching down to stick her hands in the water, against the surface of the floor. "And... okay, yes, it works the same way it did above. And my hands are going numb."
"Don't put yourself at risk of frostbite." Which reminded Steve that he needed to keep an eye on her for hypothermia. He was only mildly chilled, but he ran hot. Jane, on the other hand, was a heck of a lot smaller than him, and without the benefit of his metabolism.
"Ha, ha... okay. This is more straightforward." She withdrew her hands, shaking them off and tucking them under her armpits, shivering violently as she rose. "Cold. Okay. I think I can modify the floor, a bit like the telescope. Make it thicker and raise us up again, or make it thinner, or make it go away." She bit her lip. "And... I don't think that is a closer reality."
"Why not?"
"It's too much closer and brighter. The other points don't seem to shift at all when we do, but that one does—it's like comparing a comet to the backdrop of stars. Plus, we're still in a reality, here, and two realities being able to get so close like this without causing some sort of weird destabilizing effect seems unlikely. It could be like a binary system, but those are hell on planets, and this place is pretty hospitable to human life. And finally—it's blue, shiny, and hidden beneath the telescope."
"You think it's the Gem?" Steve was doubtful. "He didn't mention it would be shining like that." The Soul Gem he'd seen hadn't.
"Well... I guess you're the one who's seen one before. But it has to be something."
"You're probably right," Steve murmured, frowning. Loki still hadn't moved from his spot, but was still shaking like a leaf. He didn't seem to be paying any attention to the conversation, or even be aware of Steve and Jane at all.
God above, but even Loki didn't deserve that.
Probably.
"Right," said Jane, following his gaze. "So we just need to somehow retrieve it, while not... turning into that. Okay. Easy."
"Really?"
"No." Jane shot him an exasperated look, and shivered harder. "Only the top of this platform extends—there's no option to flip it. And that's not just a matter of reprogramming it. If I tried the entire thing would destabilize and lose phase coherency—not good."
"Okay," said Steve slowly. "What about... gravity?"
"Gravity? Ohh... you're actually pretty clever—I mean, not that I thought—I didn't think you were stupid, or anything, I just—that's a good idea!"
"So it might work?" Steve asked, keeping the dryness from his voice with what was, he thought, rather admirable effort.
Jane crouched down again. "Yes, I think—I see your point, okay. We have artificial gravity here on this strip, and... yes, that reverses on the other side. So... if there's a hole in it, whoever walks through doesn't fall, they just flip over. I could maybe reduce the gravity, and then it would actually be possible to just jump up and grab it, maybe? Um, assuming the lack of atmosphere wasn't fatal. Or the... not-there-ness of it. Although there's gravity in it." She frowned, rubbing her hands together to warm them. "It's not just a wall, it exudes pretty complicated field on that side, too. It's like it... pushes back the nothingness of it? But I don't know what that would mean for looking at it."
"Okay." Right. Tony had lived with this for six months, and made zombies—but his decline had been gradual, and controlled in its own way; if Steve just told SHIELD, or told Jane to tell them, then his would be a whole lot less damaging. And, hell, maybe it could be controlled with medications and therapy. He was insisting Tony go—he could take his own advice. "Okay. You need to build a wall, between you and it. Can you alter its shape that much?"
"Oh, sure. But, Steve—"
"Build a wall to protect yourself, then drop me through. Modify the gravity, I'll grab it, let me back through, and that'll be it—we'll be good to return to the surface."
"But—I can't—you'll go crazy!" Jane protested.
"Well, you can't do it—you need to control the floor."
"I can do that just fine on either side." She uncrossed her arms to put them on her hips, drawing herself upward. It didn't actually make her look any more imposing. "In fact, you don't have the vote here, since it's me who can do it."
Her voice was rising—partly bluster, partly fear. Hell, she knew what she was not-quite-volunteering for.
"Dr. Foster," Steve held up a hand, "the fact of the matter is, we need you sane back on Earth a hell of a lot more than they need me. I'm just a soldier—they can afford to take me off-duty long enough to get my head put back together. If we're going to fix, ah, other stuff, we need you."
"That's bullshit," she snapped. "Bullshit. No. Okay. There has to be a way. Blindfolds, obviously, don't work, or Tony wouldn't have—but if we have—"
"From what I understand, it goes through all barriers, once you're over there. One of the smartest races in the multiverse couldn't come up with a way around it." They'd brought in Tony, instead—and been stymied by him. "Doc, c'mon."
Steve started walking back over to Loki, and Jane, refusing to be left behind, hurried after him. She was mumbling under her breath, and then, louder, "Absolutely not. I'm not going to send someone out to get their mind ripped apart, or whatever it is that this does. I'll—rock-paper-scissors."
Steve stopped, a few paces back from where they'd started. "What?"
"We'll rock-paper-scissors for it," said Jane, her fist held out in front of her. "Fair's fair. Whoever wins gets to see the underside of the multiverse up close and personal." There was a horridly cheerful expression on her face, a mask that did nothing to hide the fear in her eyes.
"Jane. You don't want to do this."
"Neither do you."
"I know my duty."
"So do I! This is the fate of the entire Earth, and more, and—"
"And we need you as a scientist." He gestured out at the starscape around them, and up, where far above, the segmented telescope lens loomed somewhere out of sight. "You figured this out in no time flat, and I still don't have a clue what the heck you were even looking at."
"Well, no, it's a neural feedback interface—"
"And I have only the vaguest idea what that is, but how many other scientists—even SHIELD scientists—could get it that fast? Tony says we owe you half the portal theory in the first place—"
If it came down to it, the things Steve knew about Tony... no, that wouldn't happen. Maybe death wouldn't stop a soul, or the Makluan mantra, but Steve wasn't normal. They could stick him in deepfreeze long enough to work out a solution, if he became a risk.
"Yeah, but—rock-paper-scissors!" She was glaring at him, and shaking from more than just the cold. "Look, I am not backing down on this, I am not just letting you go off and nobly go crazy!"
Steve eyed her, marshalling arguments.
Or...
"Fine," he grit out, clenching his own hand into a fist. "Fine. Rock—"
She joined him, pumping her fist up and down in the same manner, for "—paper, scissors," but though he kept his eyes locked on hers, his focus was on her peripheral vision—on the muscles in her hand, so tightly clenched... clenched, and not moving as their hands came down for the last throw... halfway down and at the last moment before it would become suspicious, he flipped his palm open, faster-than-human reflexes making it like a spring releasing.
"Shit," said Jane, looking at her rock to his paper. "But scissors is always more likely to be chosen, it's been shown..."
"I figured you'd think that," Steve lied.
"But that's cheating!"
"And what were you doing?" Steve shoved his shield onto his back—even if it made him feel vulnerable, not having it held ready when Loki was right there, there was no way he wanted to lose his shield to the Void. "You lost fair and square. Wall first, then drop me through."
"But—" Jane looked down, and after a visible struggle, stopped herself from protesting further. "Damn it. Don't—just—hold on to yourself," she said instead, the words coming out half-disjointed.
"I will. I'm ready."
"Okay." Jane took a deep breath and lowered herself to press her palms through the icy water again. "Okay. Be okay, okay?"
"I will."
Jane scrunched her eyes closed, and a nearly invisible wall of glass—or whatever the floor actually was—rose up around Steve. When she opened her eyes and spoke again, he couldn't hear her: it was sound-proof. He could read what she was saying though: 'Okay. On three. One. Two. Three.'
The floor beneath his feet wobbled, then vanished, and Steve flipped into a roll, tucking himself in tight. There was no good way to prepare to land; his inner sense of balance was gone, and their alien surroundings didn't lend much to a visible sense, either. He peeked his eyes open for a moment, and saw Jane couched underneath the floor, upside down... then his feet hit something solid and he craned his head upward, opening his eyes long enough to get a glimpse of the shining stone far above.
Jane must have changed the gravity field at that moment, because his whole body at once felt lighter. He couldn't see the blue Gem, but it had to be up there, right? Just past the aurora—the 'dragon's breath'. He didn't see the dragon, not yet, but there was no point in sticking around to find out. He kicked off, and the low gravity took him further than it ever should have, sending him soaring up through a veil of blue light.
Not light.
Worthy...?
Not our place. Not gods.
...give up our trust, after all this time...
Far down here.
Never found... until now...
No dragon's breath, nor solar wind, either. Steve breathed, the sudden whispers making him forget he had meant to hold his breath, and breathed in thoughts—a multitude, the hopes and fears of an entire race—hide us, don't let Them see, far beneath the Earth, oh god, oh god, help us—they rose in a clamour and he knew that if he listened, he would be overwhelmed.
Steve coughed frantically, expelling them from his chest and his mind, and the Gem was right in front of his eyes. Past it his eyes met another's, staring back at him from across the shining blue. He reached out, but couldn't quite grasp the Gem in his fingers; it slipped through. An illusion.
You braved madness to come here... not for yourself.
Will you be leaving, Stranger?
Yes, Steve tried to say, but there wasn't actually any air in this place: only thought.
Then swear... that you will bury it behind you.
...bury us...
I will, Steve promised, and his fist clenched around something hard. He fell.
The ground caught him and broke his fall gently, stretching beneath his weight and then dissolving. Gravity flipped over, and he fell back 'up', which was now down, and lay gasping on the floor in an inch of frigid water—an inch, even though the floor he was lying on was, he saw after a moment, three feet above where Jane's feet were. He coughed, breathing out blue light, and frantically sucked in air—sucked in something real.
"Steve?" Jane asked frantically. "Steve? You okay?"
"M'okay," he said, and coughed again.
"You're, uh, breathing light, what is this stuff?"
"I got it," he said, and opened his fingers. In his grasp, the Gem shone, but only gently. Its inner light was hidden. He gripped it tight again before he could lose it, and one glance across Jane showed him—
—she was worried about him—
—this place was so cold and god, she wanted to go home—
—selfishly, she was also worried about herself, if he went insane—
—she felt guilty—
—so relieved, angry at her guilt, she had a right to safety—
—guiltier—
—the pursuit of knowledge: and look where that had landed Darcy—
—bystanders caught up, and wasn't she supposed to be a bystander?—
—at this point she'd drink even Bruce's godawful tea, at least it was hot—
—Steve clapped his free hand over his eyes and forced himself to loosen his grip on the Gem. The flood of her thoughts cut off as he shoved them away—and then, for a moment, his finger was on the trigger, and if he pushed any harder he suddenly knew he'd be shoving thoughts in instead. He fumbled the Gem and nearly dropped it.
"Steve! Are you okay?"
"Yeah," he got out, voice rough. In his own head, he pictured his shield: himself behind it, and Jane firmly on the other side. Keep your hands to yourself, Rogers. And your brain, too. "Yeah, I—this is it, alright."
"Oh. Uh." Jane twitched nervously. "Uh, are you reading my thoughts?"
"Trying hard not to." He opened his eyes, staring at the ground, then realized he could still see the light-beings past it, and shut his eyes again. "It wasn't—I don't know what that was, but I don't think that was the Gap."
"It wasn't?" He could hear the curiosity in her voice, hear—nope, he wasn't hearing that. He told himself so firmly, and managed to make it true after a second. "But the basic data here, what's programmed into the floor, it thinks it is."
"The, um, the people who built this place, they're still hiding." Steve rubbed his forehead. "I think it was a test. When we go up... the telescope. Can you pull it down, permanently? The people here don't want to be found. I promised."
"I—well, okay, that's creepy. Yeah, I can, Steve, but..."
Scientists. "I promised them."
Jane sighed. "Yeah. Okay. But..."
He let himself wonder what the but was long enough for it to become apparent that the answer wasn't mysteriously appearing in his mind, courtesy of the Gem. Good. Warily, he risked a glance upward. She was regarding him with considerable concern, and no small amount of wariness of her own, but she looked reassured when he met her gaze and nodded. "But?" he prompted.
She tilted her head, her eyebrows raising meaningfully. Steve followed her glance... ah.
The Gem had thrown him more off-balance than he'd thought, if he'd forgotten Loki standing there.
If it were anything like the soul gem he'd had, it would work on Loki, too. He could use it to find out whatever Loki was plotting, what tricks he had up his sleeve, what cruelty he intended towards Tony. Push hard enough... he could stop Loki. Could he change him permanently?
Oh, God, was that his own thought? Or the Gem's? Stephen Strange had warned him that the soul gem liked stealing souls. Did the Mind Gem, bigger and nastier than a mirror gem, do the same with thoughts?
Steve shuddered, a body-wracking jolt that sent droplets of water flying off to disturb the not-quite-pond all around them. The water near Loki was already disturbed—Loki was still shaking, still with his hands over his face, hiding from something only he could see.
Looking at an Asgardian with the soul gem had been almost more than Steve's mind had been able to bear. It had nearly brought him to his knees. If he tried doing the same with the Mind Gem, it could backfire badly. But... on the other hand, he couldn't fight Loki off, physically. And he couldn't just surrender the Gem. If it came down to it—
—he wouldn't change his mind. Couldn't. That would be too much of a violation, no matter who the victim was. But if it came down to holding Loki in place... that was something else. He still didn't want to find out if it was doable.
"I mean," said Jane, breaking the silence. "I. Um. I could bury him down here, with it. Or drop him through. Without gravity on that side." She added this last in a rush, nearly choking on the words, like she was trying not to be sick.
Murder, she meant.
Worse than murder, if the place beyond—past the alien consciousnesses—was the Gap after all. Loki had fallen through once before, after all, like Tony had. If he hadn't died then... if he could survive it...
"No," said Steve, finding his voice at last. "No. We're better than that. And I have the Gem. We'll be okay."
"I hate him," Jane mumbled. She sounded relieved, though.
Steve shook his head, and let that be his agreement. "You can raise us up—now?"
"Yeah." Jane put her hands to the side of one of the walls she'd raised. The side itself was covered in an inch of water, which in defiance of whatever gravity existed on this side, didn't flow at all. "Yeah. Okay, keep your balance. This might be rocky."
No sooner had she finished speaking than the floor shot up beneath them, so fast that they both slipped, the light from below vanishing beneath God knew how much glass. Jane yelped as she fell over, fumbling about—the only glow now was from the Gem, too dim for a normal human to see by, and in the confusion and the dark she cried, "No, stop!"
They stopped, so abruptly that they were in effect tossed up into the air. Steve tucked in his legs and managed to find his balance so that when he came back down, he landed on his feet and stayed there. Jane wasn't so lucky; she hit with a splash and a cry of pain.
"You okay?" he asked, leaning over despite his inclination to stay away for so long as he held the Gem—going closer was dangerous...
"Ow, funny bone," she gritted out. "I'm—I'm fine..."
"This is very wet," said Loki's voice, and there was a slight hissing noise as one of his lights bloomed into existence. Steve looked over at him to see steam rising off of him in a cloud: he'd dried off his clothes with magic, apparently.
He didn't bother offering to do the same for Steve or Jane. Instead the focus of Loki's gaze constricted, the full force of his attention snapping onto Steve and what Steve was holding. Steve hadn't risked putting the Gem in a pocket, not when Loki was right there. But maybe he should have, because Loki could sense, it, somehow—
Steve's control must have slipped; he felt Loki's intent a moment before it crystallized, a surprisingly harmless spell, one intended to simply pluck the Gem from his hand. His grip tightened, although he knew—in the same way he knew what Loki was casting—that it wouldn't do any good against this particular spell. But his increased awareness of the Gem was like opening a door, and he wasn't fighting against seeing Loki as he was against seeing Jane—
—all of them would pay in the end and all of them in the end and all pay
—mirrors shatter shatter glass falling falling he think of no it wouldn't
—whisper and the dark came down and twisted spider
—going dying
—salvation there point of light light light not-dark not-shadow shade silhouette mistaken—
—should have should have plan no where had it gone—
"Don't," Steve told him. It was not just a word.
Loki froze in his tracks, eyes wide—and then furious, as Steve thought desperately of his shield again, raising it on his arm in unintended mimicry. He didn't want to see in Loki's head. Loki's mind was like Tony's had been, that brief time Anthony had shown him, but somehow even worse—Tony had been lost in despair, fear, and confusion, but with the Gem Steve could see that Loki's mind was scattered, and whether it was the norm for Asgardians or not, he couldn't tell and didn't want to. If he wandered in there, he would get lost.
Loki glared at him, and Steve was grateful, because it meant he was safely inside his own head instead—safe, compared to trying to change that monstrous, ruined landscape. One command to freeze Loki, quick and dirty, and get out, stay out. Don't try to change anything. Don't get trapped.
"Ah," said Loki.
"Looks like you get to keep your word about seeing it safely into someone else's hand," said Steve firmly.
"You can't make full use of it on its own, Captain. No mortal could, even with its companions." Loki's expression gave nothing away, but enough still slipped through the Gem for Steve to feel the lie, hear the desperate whispers of Loki's barest, nearest thoughts, all focused on possession of the Gem.
Well, even in the first place he hadn't thought Loki was telling the truth about being willing to give it up.
"Jane," Steve said, not taking his eyes off of Loki, "can you get us the rest of the way up?"
"Um." It came out rather squeaky; Jane cleared her throat. "Uh. Yeah. I'll try to make it slower this time."
He heard splashing as she knelt, and then the floor moved again, but this time it was more like an elevator than a sling-shot. He barely jolted, sliding one foot only a half-inch before he was balanced again. All the while, Loki didn't stop looking between him and between the Gem in his hand with a hunger that wasn't present on his face, but entirely in his thoughts...
Steve thought harder about his shield, until the sense of him dimmed to the barest whisper—and then he didn't dare block Loki out any further.
"When we get to the surface," he said, keeping his voice controlled, "Jane's going to collapse the mirror in. Then you're going to bring us back to Earth, exactly where we left from. If you try to do anything else, I'll know, and I'll stop you."
"You could simply do it through me," Loki said. No physical sign betrayed his nervousness.
"Mortal," Steve tossed back at him.
"Idealist," Loki sneered.
"Please shut up," said Jane, and since she was in charge of the ride, they did.
Stars appeared through a hole overhead—suddenly enough that there had to have been something in the way for them not to have been visible earlier. The telescope lens, perhaps, or some other part of the apparatus. They rose toward it steadily, the temperature dropping in a way that would have been nearly unnoticeable if Steve hadn't been soaked through. Loki's light started casting reflections off of the approaching ceiling—and then they were up, through, and standing in the middle of the massive mirrored bowl. It was wobbling.
"O-kay," said Jane. "This is... we should get out of the middle, first."
Steve nodded to Loki. "Lead the way."
Loki did, not without sketching a mocking bow. Steve could hear the furious rage behind it, a snarl not unlike the scream of a thwarted toddler—but toddlers wouldn't think of stars like broken glass, would they? Steve shuddered and forced himself to pull back, again. Loki's mind was like quicksand—too easy to sink in without noticing, and hard to keep afloat.
One side of the mirrored bowl drooped in front of them, and then, like taffy stretched too far in the sun, slowly fell apart, creating a clear space they could walk through. They made their way up the slimy steps, out past the—
Movement. Loki whirled, spells turning to defence, and Steve raised his shield—blocking one blow, an attack out of the darkness from a mind he couldn't sense even with the Gem, and then pain—something, faster than he'd been able to catch, smashed into his other side, bones in his arm snapping and the Gem oh god—
He didn't know what had hit him. Two forms loomed out of nowhere, shaped—barely—like humans but made only of blank stone. Jane was screaming; around them, the bowl continued its collapse, casting reflections everywhere, two of Loki, one distended horribly—
"STOP!"
Their attackers froze at Loki's shout. Steve, in the middle of ducking under a blow, finished his roll and wrenched himself to his feet. He couldn't feel his hand, which meant his arm was probably going to hurt like a son-of-a-gun as soon as the adrenaline wore off and the pain kicked in. "Jane! You okay?" he called.
"Down," hissed Loki, gleefully, and Steve crashed to the ground.
He should get up, back on his feet.
The thought didn't quite seem to make sense.
"You really should have looked further," came Loki's voice, amused.
Steve thought, Roll over. He rolled over, and looked up at Loki. The green spell-light was gone; the only illumination other than the stars was the gentle blue glow of the Mind Gem, held lightly between Loki's outstretched thumb and fore-finger.
"Looking at you now," said Loki, "I think, perhaps, I was mistaken. With this Gem... this true version, not some paltry reflection... even a mortal would be able to overcome their own limits. It's one of the keystones of creation, after all."
Steve didn't say anything.
"But of course you wouldn't look further than my surface thoughts. That would be a violation. Or might have you violated. And so it all comes out as it was meant to in the end. I may not have been able to break into your mind so easily, Captain... but did it not occur to you that I could modify my own memories? You see."
He gestured. Steve looked over to where he pointed. The two stones that had framed the ruined Temple were gone. They had been moved and distorted. He recognized them now. They had been enchanted to wait for him to return with the Mind Gem and then attack him. He knew this the same way he'd known to roll over and look up at Loki, the same way that the tiny portion of him screaming in horror knew that it would have been silenced except for Loki wanting it there. The bastard enjoyed having some portion of Steve realize what was happening, even as every other thought fell to Loki's control.
"A simple enough preparation: mindless automatons, to spring a trap on someone who would be able to sense any mind about to act against him. And then I merely had to bury my own memories of setting the spell," Loki said aloud. "If there had been any risk that you would have looked, it wouldn't have been so easy—the Mind Gem can break any such spell I could cast, of course. But you'd never look. And now that I have the Mind Gem..."
Steve sat up, and got to his feet. He stood still.
Loki leaned over to whisper in his ear. "Now you can't hide anything from me."
Steve thought of the phrase that Tripitaka had chanted to control Tony.
"Oho, so that's what had him so worried. I had wondered, but you know, total panic makes almost as marvellous a defence as your shield. This will be most useful. You see, despite the encouragement you should have been, he hasn't yet done as I'd asked. But now—" Loki paused, one long finger raised in the air. "I think I'll have you encourage him yourself."
Syllables rolled off Steve's tongue, alien and nonsensical. He spoke without pause for breath, until he was wheezing, and then he stopped.
"Excellent. How many other ways can you be of use, Captain?"
Steve thought of SHIELD's base. Steve thought of the personnel there. Steve thought—
"—something a bit deeper. When the time is right..."
Steve agreed with the certainty that settled in his gut.
"...but I'll be merciful. Until then—forget."
Steve forgot.