"Before creation itself, there were six singularities, then the universe exploded into existence and the remnants of this system were forged into concentrated ingots... Infinity Stones. They appear as large gems of various colors, and hold unimaginable power," Loki told them as they gathered in the observation lounge of Stark's Tower. They'd locked the Scepter in a vault surrounded by an energy containment field that the genius had designed after his first encounter with the weapon.
"What do they do?" Dr. Banner asked.
"Each has a different basis of power, of purpose. You've now seen two of them, Jane Foster and her team have seen three and we know where a fourth now resides."
"The Tesseract was one," Fury guessed.
Tony nodded. "And the Scepter."
"The Aether was an Infinity Gem?" Darcy asked.
"Yes. The Aether is now also held in Asgard; Odin plans to send it elsewhere lest the presence of two stones invite the attention of the Titan. It is, in its solid form, a red gem and controls reality. Malekith used it to twist the reality of his dying people into a pocket where they could survive in stasis until the gem surfaced again."
"It has already been sent," Fastný interjected. "Sif, Hogun and I delivered it to a secure location before Thor brought your…then betrothed to Asgard."
"Good. Now, both of the blue crystals used for the Tesseract and the Scepter were only containers for Infinity Gems. The crystals harness and focus the gems' powers. The Tesseract, as you named it – Asgard calls it the Cosmic Cube, holds the Space Gem. Outside of its amplifying crystal it is still blue. Among other capabilities, it can create portals across vast distances. It was hidden on Midgard countless millennia ago. The crystal in the Scepter holds what is called the Mind Gem. It is a yellow stone that allows its master to read, subtly influence, or totally control another's mind or, to a limited extent, to allow its master to exert a mind over matter type of control over his or her own form."
"Were you controlled?" Romanov asked.
"To a point. I retained my autonomy despite what seemed to be years of torture, but I'm told was, in Asgard's point of reality, only six months. It was all I could do to convince the Mad Titan and his lieutenant that I was following their directives rather than doing all I could to give Midgard the best chance to defend herself."
"What would have happened if he'd found out?" Darcy asked, her eyes wide. Fastný, sitting beside her, snorted in derision.
"He would have ended me and would have found another puppet, one willing to believe his lies."
"Lemme get this straight," Fury said. "You're saying you fucking saved us from a worse invasion?"
"From a successful one, yes."
… …
"This, and his plan and actions to save Jane Foster and Midgard from the wrath of Malekith the Accursed is why our father pardoned him," Thor told the humans.
"Your father released me to Isis to pay his debt for his guards harming her priestess and to gain a necessary alliance with the Kemet," Loki snarled. "Had he his way, I would be tortured for half a millennia, despite my part in saving his Queen by creating a duplicate of her while she created one of your beloved and then ending Malekith's menace."
"T'was only a threat to urge your lady to call upon her goddess; he would have found some excuse to pardon you thereafter."
"I remain unconvinced."
Thor shrugged. Bringing his brother and his father back to comfortable terms might never be possible. "I shall try no further to persuade you otherwise. I have neither the words nor the patience." Loki simply glared at him. "Regardless; it is true, Loki's actions both against the Titan and Malekith saved this world from more damage and more deaths than they caused and that is why he walks free…do not protest that, Loki. Think you Isis would have you for her favorite daughter were it otherwise?"
His brother's mouth thinned. "No."
"Even so."
"Daughter? I thought she was a priestess and Isis just killed her so she could resurrect her as a goddess. What did I miss?" Stark asked.
Ka-Maat raised an eyebrow in Loki's direction and he sighed. "If you wish, darling."
"They might as well know the whole thing; otherwise people are going to think they can become gods or goddesses if they kiss enough ass."
"Did I forget to instruct you to begin watching your language again?"
"Yes."
"You should have done so as soon as the glamour was dropped."
"What fun would that have been? You dropped it as soon as we found out the room was deserted."
Loki glared at his bride while Thor tried to smother a chuckle. He was unsuccessful and Loki turned the sour look upon him. "It is humorous, Loki."
"Ka-Maat," he began in a quelling tone, turning to address the others, "was originally born more than four millennia ago in what you call Ancient Egypt. She was the literal daughter of Isis and a human priest of Osiris. Her birth was shrouded in secrecy and the priest took her to the Temple of Isis to be raised as the next High Priestess and Avatar of the goddess."
Heads turned toward Ka-Maat who shrugged. "I only remember bits and pieces of my earliest lives," she told them.
"Centuries later," Loki continued. "The Pharaohs were supporting the cult of Ra over the legacy of Isis, even though they were said to hold the throne by her will. An army was assembled and attacked the main temple where Ka-Maat presided. Her guards were overwhelmed and she was killed."
"Jesus," Tony muttered. "Centuries?"
"She was half Kemet," Thor reminded the genius. "Her natural lifespan should have been at least a millennia if not two."
"More like four," his sister by marriage interrupted. "Isis is much older than Odin and she's about middle-aged for a Kemet."
"When the gods first left Midgard, treaties were reached and while we're not sure how or why as no one will speak of it, Asgard ended up with an artifact called the Lotus Staff in her treasury vault. It holds one of the Infinity Gems, a green one known as the Soul Gem. It can capture a soul, hold it in an alternate realm and then return it to a body…not necessarily the same one."
"Uh…" Banner was looking alarmed.
Ka-Maat grinned at the man. "This allows them to repair even a fatally wounded body while preventing the soul from moving on and then returning it to its body once the body is fully functional again. It's far easier than a true resurrection which is what they had to do for me this time. When my original body was killed the Kemet were weakened by a war and didn't have the strength to do a true resurrection. The best Isis could do was ensure I was reborn with my old abilities and some of my memories until such time as she could do more."
"This time," Fury said.
"Yep. Apparently there was some kind of prophesy, though of course, no one will clue us in."
"Of course," Fury spat. "Do they think we're children?"
Thor chuckled and his brother smirked before telling the man: "They know that you are children."
… …
Nick had had enough of condescending crap from so-called gods. "Maybe they're too goddamned old to appreciate that more information means we make better decisions. We don't have hundreds of years to contemplate our actions. We're lucky if we have a hundred hours sometimes."
"Not this time," Thor told him. "Even the prophesies to which I am privy…"
"Very few," Loki interjected snidely.
"True. But even those are so far-reaching and can change on the smallest thing that having overmuch knowledge of them would be disastrous." Loki nodded now at Thor's words. If those two agreed on something…hell, Nick didn't even want to think about it.
"It's like what psychics do," Ka-Maat said. "They can only tell you what will happen if you heed the warning signs and don't make decisions totally out of character for you. They can also tell you what should happen if you change your mind based on advice from other persons and if it's a good change, guide you to that other person, or warn you away from someone who would influence you in a bad way. But nothing is absolute."
"Some things are absolute," Loki chided. "It is the manner of arriving at them and the final results that are mutable." His wife shrugged with a slight nod of agreement.
"Can you tell us what the absolute thing is?" Nick asked, putting a lid on his irritation.
"A personal invasion by the Mad Titan within my and Ka-Maat's lifetime."
"But not necessarily during ours?" he asked, circling his finger around to indicate the rest of the humans in the group.
"Correct. Though it most likely will be as both Frigga and Isis urged us to return here now. They are both gifted seers."
"That means we're fucked."
"No," Thor told him. "It means we must all work together, Æs, Kemet, Jotun, and Human, to defeat this menace."
Fastný smirked. "The one-eye was right; we are fucked."
… …
Darcy was really getting tired of the bitch's negativity. She wacked the blonde woman's shoulder. "If you can't say anything productive, keep your mouth shut or next time we're on the subway, I'll fake you out about getting off and leave you in the station in the middle of gang territory."
"I'm so frightened."
"The All-Father took your strength," Loki said evenly. "You would be at the humans' mercy. These gangs she speaks of are trained in street warfare."
"Shit." Ka-Ma-at clapped a hand over her mouth and looked at Loki. "Sorry, I just had an idea."
"Go on," tall, dark and hottie said. Darcy grinned at his no-nonsense tone.
"There are a lot of supers on this planet these days. Sure, most of them have small gifts, but some of them can be pretty radical, like those brats in Sokovia."
"There's a bunch of teams, too," Darcy added. "Though most of them won't work with the government. The Avengers were brought together by S.H.I.E.L.D., so they're kind of an exception."
"Such as?" Hottilicious asked.
"Well, there's the X-Men, and they have a bunch of kids in training besides their adult team. The Fantastic Four are out there, though they try to stay out of everything. Oh, and there's some young guy in a spider suit that shoots webs and is super strong, and that's all in the New York area. Who knows what's around in other areas or even other countries."
"S.H.I.E.L.D. knows-knew," Nick Fury told them. "Not that the data is available anymore."
"Bitter much, Nicky?" Tony asked. "J, you got S.H.I.E.L.D.'s data on other super groups?"
"Indeed, Sir. As well as on those who operate on the wrong side of the law."
"All we have to do is get them all involved and we'll have a kick-ahhh, really awesome army that the Titan could never expect," Ka-Maat said.
"Kickass," Darcy interpreted on the goddess's behalf. Ka-Maat grinned at her. "Yeah, it would be if they all got along."
"You do not believe they would put any enmity or jealousies aside to save the world they all call home?" Thor asked.
Darcy shrugged. "Some of them are bat-shit crazy."
"Which is why we never offered to sponsor some of them," Fury drawled.
… …
"But that's not all of the resources we could pull in. There was an old movie in the late seventies that postulated about street gangs joining forces and taking over a city. In the end, they couldn't get along well enough for that, but for the whole planet? I think they'd do it. There's a lot of street fighters, martial artists, hell, even the drug cartels might leave off their crap for something like this. We need to spread the word. Maybe offer limited amnesty if any of them fight and survive and want to go straight?" Kat looked around the room. Romanov was frowning thoughtfully. Hawkeye looked amused. The others just seemed to be giving her 'what the fuck are you thinking' looks…except for Loki and Thor.
"We did that for a war against Jötunheim," Thor said. "One of the heroes of that war was a former rebel warlord. He earned much honor and retired in peace once the war was over."
Loki was nodding agreement. "It could work, but the offer must be made quietly and with firm rules. Each one who accepts it would remain watched thereafter and must abstain from all illegal acts or the amnesty is fully forfeit."
"One problem," Fury put in. "We have no one with the connections to convince the powers that be that this is a good idea."
"We do have the platform," Loki pointed out. "Thor, Ka-Maat and I are meeting ambassadors from around your world. They would have to be carefully cultivated before an idea like this was shared with them. Asgard and the Kemet would need to be prepared to offer each country something valuable to soften them up."
"Crap. We'll have to discuss this with Councilor Neriðr," Kat muttered. "He'll say no just because it isn't his idea."
"Then, my love, we make him believe that it was his idea all along," Loki replied with a smug grin. "It is what I am best at."
… …
"You said there were six of these Infinity Gems," Romanov asked. "What do the two missing ones do?"
Loki frowned at the reminder. "The Power Gem is purple in hue and its power can generate enough force to destroy a planet." His customary smirk returned as the human shuddered. "The Time Gem, as its name suggests, is said to be capable of reordering time and is orange in color. While research points to the Power Gem being used fairly recently, nothing has turned up to pinpoint the location of the Time Gem."
"Well, it wouldn't," Stark said, sounding confident.
"No?" Loki knew where he was going with this, but he felt that the man deserved his moment for all of the aid he'd given him and Ka-Maat.
"If it reorders time, once it was used, no one would remember it being used because it never happened."
"Excellent deduction. Stark is correct; that makes it all but impossible to trace. It will likely have to be stumbled upon unless one who exists outside of what we consider normal time manages to track it down."
"Doesn't your all-seeing, uh, Heimdall do that?" Rogers asked.
"No. He is all-seeing in his current time of existence. He cannot see the past or future."
"Dandy," Fury muttered.
Banner looked up at them, his expression concerned. "Um, am I misinterpreting something here or would it be a really bad idea to get all of these gems in the same place?"
"Monumentally disastrous. That is what the invasion was all about. The Mad Titan, the orchestrator of it, had the Mind Gem. He knew the Soul Gem was out of reach in Asgard. The Power Gem is outside of the Nine Realms and he has one of his loyal subjects seeking it out. Its recent use suggests that they found it. The Reality Gem, was undetectable, probably because it was trapped between Realms with Malekith. He knew that having five of the Gems would draw the sixth to him, so needed to retrieve the Space Gem from MIdgard."
"But he still wouldn't have…oh, wait." Stark frowned as realization dawned. "If he had the Tesseract, he could get to Asgard to take the Soul Gem, and that would have given him three."
"Four as Asgard still had the Lotus Staff at that time. He cared nothing for Midgard other than its possession of the Gem. He planned to sacrifice all seven billion of you to his goddess, Death."
"Nuh uh, you told us that you were going to rule our planet," Barton objected.
"That is what he wanted me to believe and what I had to say in order to keep him from discovering I opposed his plans." He felt his lady's soft hand grasp both of his and looked down to see he was twisting them together. "I will not speak further on this," he told them, hating the weakness that slid through him. "Not now."
"I need a nap," Ka-Maat said petulantly. He looked into her eyes as he felt the lie. "Loki, take me to our suite please."
"Of course, my love. Gentlemen, Ladies, good night."
… …
"Drops a fucking bomb on us and disappears. Marvelous," Nick groused.
"Give him a break, old man. He's got PTSD bad and this had to have triggered a lot of shit," Stark told him.
He narrowed his good eye and stared at the inventor. "Don't tell me you believe he's not bullshitting us?"
"I know the signs, okay? Afghanistan taught me a hell of a lot more than how to build an Arc Reactor. Ka-Maat gave him a realistic reason to bail on us so he could save face and deal with an anxiety attack in private."
"I don't think he's faking it either," the Widow said quietly. "And I, for one, don't want to see Loki have a public breakdown while I'm within reach."
"Shi-it." He scrubbed his face with his hands and blew out a frustrated breath. Yeah, he understood PTSD, hell, he had a heavy dose of it himself. He'd just figured the crazy bastard was lying about it to get away with shit. "Thor, he's your brother. What do you think?"
The blonde sighed deeply. "I do not know this PTSD, but I do know and did see signs that Loki was losing control. That is something none of us should wish to experience."
… …
As she suspected Loki shifted them right to their play room in the Tower. She immediately assumed a fully submissive position and watched him through a curtain of her hair as he paced. Finally, Loki threw himself into the throne-like chair and gave her a brooding look. "Do not patronize me," he sneered. "You are no submissive slave."
"No," Kat replied, not raising her head. "But I love you and I am yours, always."
He stood and reached down for her elbows, drawing her to her feet, banishing their clothing in the process. "And should I demand your full and absolute submission at this moment?"
"Anything you need from me is yours, Loki. I love you and trust you."
Hard arms closed around her, all but crushing her to his chest. "Once again you undo me, my sweet toy." Kat remained silent, pressing her cheek against his cool skin, waiting for him to decide how he wanted to use her to regain his control. Loki moved, rather suddenly, scooped her up and carried her over to the wall where he reached for a lever that would cause a Saint Andrew's cross to slide out for use. He hesitated, and then let his hand fall back to rest on her back. "No."
"Loki?" Kat gasped as she found herself in their bedroom at the Embassy.
"I'm stronger than that," he said as he laid her down gently on their bed. "We're stronger than that. You bring me peace, my dearest wife."
She pouted and raised her face for his atypically gentle kiss. "Does this mean I'm not going to get any orgasms?"
Loki laughed outright. "You, my dear, are incorrigible."
… …
"Fine, so he's not faking it. Now what?"
Tony tried not to roll his eyes at Fury's frustrated tone. Hell, they were all frustrated. "We have the Mind Gem and that Titan will be coming for it through conventional space travel since Asgard has the Space Gem secured. Bruce and I had done preliminary readings on the Scepter back when we last had Loki in custody. There's a huge amount of potential in that thing. Maybe, just maybe, we can exploit that potential and find a way to protect Earth from the bad aliens without having to depend on the, uh, not as bad aliens."
He-Man's eyebrows rose. "Not as bad? My friend that could be taken as an insult by one less forbearing than myself."
"Sorry, but not sorry. We've had a mess on our hands since the All-Daddy dumped you here to teach you a lesson a few years back."
"Granted, but…"
"Hey," Darcy interrupted, loudly. "We've only known a few of you guys from the other Realms thing and seriously, dude, it's been half and half."
You could practically see the gears working behind the big blonde's eyes. "Malekith," he spat. "Yes, I understand."
"Well, and the bitch-Romeo-wanna-be, here." Darcy turned a pointed glare in Fastný's direction.
"Okay, can the editorial," Fury groused. "What did you have in mind, Stark?"
"An AI driven planetary defense system. That thing," he continued, gesturing at the holographic image of the Scepter that popped up, has properties that emulate an advanced version of JARVIS. What if we could use that potential to serve as a warning system intelligent enough to separate natural phenomena from something built by an intelligent race and to bring up a comprehensive defense system to prevent it from using any weapons on us?"
"Go on."
"I've given this a lot of thought since I went through that portal. I just didn't have the vision for upgrading the complexity of my AI programming until I revisited our scans. With that thing at hand, I just might be able to swing it."
"No," Thor interrupted. "Loki and I told you it is too dangerous to use."
"Chill out; I'm not going to use it, I'm going to examine it and take inspiration from it. I don't use other people's crap. That would be like asking Hammer Industries to make me a new suit. I haven't been suicidal for over a few years now."
He waited while the god considered his explanation. "That…very well. But do not, under any circumstances, attempt to invoke its power. That would surely bring destruction upon us all."
Considering he hadn't a clue how to invoke the damn thing that was an easy promise to make. "Of course not. No invoking, right Brucie?"
Banner frowned at him. "I'll keep a close eye on him, Thor. I promise."
"Hey!"
"Tony, you know you get carried away sometimes and throw every caution you've sworn to take to the wind."
"Well, um…I guess I can't argue that. Son of a bitch."
… …
Author's Notes: First sentence is lifted in its entirety from Guardians of the Galaxy though it is spoken there by another character. We also know from that film that the soul and time gems are orange and green…I'm not sure in which order as I have yet to see it, and the others are colored as noted in this chapter. I have decided the soul gem is green and time is orange for my AU. I've also altered my precepts a bit. Thor TDW did happen, but Loki had not been imprisoned so Frigga did not die and approved Loki and Thor to go after Malekith. Loki did not appear to die in that venture and when they returned, Odin sent him and Thor to Las Vegas after the Aether was captured and before he sent it off world with Sif and company. Why? For some damn reason the characters have been shouting that it happened, just not the way Marvel portrayed it in that movie. Sigh.
