The world has never been a place in which safety has always been guaranteed, in which justice has always been efficient and in which evildoers are always punished by their actions. Dreams are demotivated each day, courage is rooted out and the ability of making the difference is taken out by those who want to keep their so-comfortable stability. But, despite all the shit, there are those who are tired of just watching and decided to do something about it so that our lives were a little bit more bearable.
On the ruins of what has been someday a battleground, it was lifted formerly a monumental extension in the memory of those who came to fight for a continuous life, a better life, and couldn't go back. The survivors now returned their homes, some of them took what was left from their partners to be buried in their due reality, others left empty-handed, trying to accept the fact that there was nothing left of their friends to take back. The feeling of loss was spread through each corner of the planet, they won for a very high cost and the powerlessness sensation prevailed by each one still breathing. Now all of them understood that they were nothing in the face of what still peeked in the outside universe.
The civils who protected the alternative reality provided by wizards, gradually went back home and didn't even tried to force a normality that didn't exist a long time ago. The reality was open to the access to multiverse, allowing each one going back home. It was raining at those moments of farewell, as if the Earth felt sorry for all the deaths it was forced to bear.
Jennifer Walters came back with an expression of someone who had accomplished her mission and through the same portal, the actors headed again to a world in which heroes had no superpowers, in which lives saved by their roles were not threatened by villains with inhuman gifts and in which their new allies were just characters in an HQ.
- Do you promise that you won't let people forget who my father was? – Morgan asked, observing the man who was identical to a certain genius, playboy, philanthropist and who he would miss so much.
- I can risk saying that they wouldn't forget him even if I do nothing. – He held her, not because he felt like Tony or because he considered the girl his daughter, but because he understood how a gesture like this makes the difference for children like her.
The tears of the little one wet his shirt and Pepper's look burned on her skin, so as Rhodes', Happy's, Peter's and Harley's. That was a family that, even after so long, still needed this illusion that wherever Iron Man is, he's fine. They would never get over it completely, but they could live with that.
The correspondents still alive of each interpreter were also there and exchanged looks with those people so different from them and so alike at the same time, as if they didn't need words to share what they were feeling. Probably, they would never meet again people as amazing as their reflected images. One by one, they left that remarkable reality and, at last, only Tom Hiddleston stayed behind.
It was still disturbing to Odinson to see someone like the trickster god not feeling the impulse to prepare for any kind of manipulation, but, looking at the human, he almost wanted to close that portal and keep him as the true Loki, regardless the consequences. It was expected that he wouldn't see that much lack of falsehood on his brother's face again.
- Is he alive? – The god asked the man who stared at a specific point for too long, as if expecting something.
- He never stays dead for much long. – Thomas answered with a shrinking shoulder and, even though his words had been a gap for many interpretations, there was nothing in him that gave away everything he knew. – An advice, Thunder God. – His eyes lifted to find the other's blue and he stepped back, not intending to linger to leave. – When he comes back, take him to eat a pizza and avoid judging him so much, as you always do.
- The actor left to reunite to the others, not minding how the blond one would react to his tip. There was still time before he actually needed to understand it. The jotun's inconstancy would take him to return eventually to the world of the alive, but the son of Odin didn't know what to expect about how he would do it and how he would be when that happened.
Near there, in another access portal, it was heard a sharp scream of horror, which deviated the attention of everyone to the place. It was the time of the Fantastic Four coming back home, however, when they saw the passage of their world opening, what faced them back was the vastness of a planet covered by the dust of those who used to be its inhabitants. Completely desperate, they threw themselves to the world they were supposed to protect, running and flying not believing what their eyes were seeing, attaching to a thread of hope that that was just a mischief. They arrived at the tower where they lived in instants, being followed by some other heroes, trying to help the remaining of that population.
The problem was there was no remnant. Susan and Reed went first to the bedroom of the firstborn, just to find it empty like the rest… Johnny hugged his sister when she fell to the ground in panic and disbelief, they just watched still when Richard didn't accept what his eyes saw and deviated from the people to go straight to his lab. He would track each living being on Earth, but he would find his son and all the other humans.
His elastic body worked with the precision he didn't have for a long time, each satellite between his properties and even those which were not his were dominated by him together. He verified each detail and only then started to believe they were not there when their protected needed the most. There was no life manifestation despite all of those who came to help… except, maybe, for two or three weird scanning on the area testing the most dangerous ideas to be developed.
Just like when he passed through the corridors and stairs running before, not allowing anyone else coming with him. Until he finally found the forced door of the restricted area and went through it, regardless of whatever was on the other side threat level. Silence and more silence, followed by a walking noise that cautiously were coming to him.
His eyes scanned each inch of the place, absorbing information and trying to understand what was going on there. He found a small fragment of what looked like an interdimensional portal, something that who was hiding tried to expand, but he couldn't understand what that might mean.
- I never thought that I would be happy to see you. – A voice he hated so much, that belonged to one of his team's worst enemies, spoke.
- Doctor Doom! – Reed automatically put himself in a defense position, however it didn't last when he looked at the wrapping the man had in his arms and at the milk-smelling vomit that dirtied the other's clothes.
- I must admit your son is a very special child. – Doom didn't look like happy holding the baby, but at the same time, he almost seemed interested in keeping him.
Uncontrolled, Richards took his son out of the enemy's hands and held him so carefully that seemed to be afraid that the baby could broke. He didn't pay much attention to the other after that, since Victor, now, looked like more someone who thanked him for showing up than someone who destroyed his own planet. He would worry about his presence later, when everyone got back to normality.
Unrelated to the commotion and relief that took over the family or the desperation of feeling they had totally failed, another group of people found themselves in a very alike situation. When the very same scientists who started the biggest heroes' reunion that ever existed, they opened a passage so that these and all the other mutants could go back to their own homes. What they saw was an agglomeration of fell skeletons, in the last stages of decomposition.
Differently of the other reality, all those remaining on the Earth they were born had the same end. Colleagues, friends, relatives… all of them gone while deluded believing they were fighting to save them.
There was no reaction at first, they were in a too high state of shock to accept and assimilate all the revolt they were feeling. But even immersed in suffering, guilt, angry and the tears, they understood that they were not completely alone when the people of the world they battled welcomed them as they were part of it.
It was the end of a legacy they fought to achieve in their own home, but also a new start for the Fantastic Four, Doctor Doom and the tens of surviving mutants. Maybe this alternative society didn't turn them into freaks as many of the among the dead believed them to be. Maybe things in this place wouldn't head to extinction and together each one of them could collaborate for a much better future than they would have alone. However, this is a too positive thought for someone to believe in now, while the wound is so open. Someday, maybe, most of them can live with the losses so that then they are able to look ahead, without the weight of the past failure.
(…)
There wore memories that a trickster god forced to hide, others that he changed in a way that even he could convince himself that those events were not real, and those he so confidently erased that certain occasions in his life lost sense. But now it is safe to say about a time when he ran away from a sentence with the Tesseract in hands.
Two thousand twelve is presented in two different ways in the history we know, in the first, Loki was arrested and taken back to Asgard to be prisoned by his own father and, in the second, a temporal intervention made an infinity stone get to his hands. The first trajectory took him to a state of much more well-developed emotions and then to the death for sacrifice, the second, otherwise, has never been properly told.
The mistake of the avengers on that day they reverted Thanos' snap of fingers was that they didn't certificate there were no gaps, no fails. The prince lived in a parallel reality to the one we know after stealing the cosmic cube, making the events after that no longer be the same we know.
The jotun knew that Odin wouldn't accept him back home, and he really didn't want to see the king again, but this wasn't his biggest problem. Even if he ran away to the other side of the universe, the prize that the titan would put on his head was still counting and, because of that, he eventually allowed himself to explore the multiverse. He started finding different opportunities that he couldn't experience ever before, and all this so wonderful, infinite knowledge. It was almost impossible not giving in to temptation of enjoying the priceless treasures he now had. Days, years, decades or centuries could have past and the god wouldn't even notice along his journey.
His gifts started to expand in a level that no other god had ever achieved and his relentless greed could have destroyed him in his own mighty, however, there was a reality that changed his priorities. In it, he saw Spatium for the first tiem, Tesseract wasn't just a key for his most ambitious goals, his former silent and more constant company was an alive being he started to like.
The presence of the enigmatic cube helped him to arrive at even more fascinating places, he saw the most beautiful kingdoms and the most breathtaking landscapes, he met all the worlds as no one ever did and participated in the most varied intrigues to get what he wanted of each new place he found. His life developed and was wonderfully good, or at least it was until he found the seventh infinity stone.
Spatium had never mentioned the existence of Ego, so as it seemed to hate it in the same intensity it loved it as a part of it. The golden shape was the most repugnant thing he had ever seen, a so-instable and controller melancholic monster that his first will was to ignore completely its existence and follow his journey. He would have never come back to it if the Living Tribunal itself didn't show up. "It's your fate, Loki", "You have to do this, Loki", "The lives of all multiverse depend on you, Loki", "You will grant a future, Looki", "You were born to this moment, Loki", and all this bullshit that would have made his brother go to war feeling honored. The problem was that the prince had no honor and not even by far was interested in the salvation he apparently had to cause.
Of course, the entity being very close to its omniscience, already knew all this and also knew very well how to negotiate. It didn't make much sense in the jotun's mind that they gave him the power that the creature was offering him, not even the gaps for all the chaos he could cause. Maybe they were really desperate to the point of depending on him.
As soon as he began to act, even in the first attempts of approximation, the prince felt each attempt of the proud stone to enter his mind and then simply allowed the passage, showing exactly what it wanted to see. After that, convincing it how the Asgardians were magnificent wasn't hard. Conquering its interest, he just needed to enter in a reality correspondent to one he had been born to start his subtle modifications, taking advantage of the fact that it was conceded to him the ability of wandering through time.
It wasn't complicated at all to handle Ego for the god of war, tricking Alane, or guaranteeing his other self in the future convinced Odin to adopt him. Feeling pleasure in seeing Thor almost dying in an adolescent adventure came as some natural thing and he didn't mind seeing them putting that contention mask in that young image of him. Assuming the appearance of the witch to write a book of possible allies to the beings of Midgard and putting himself in the spotlight as if his supposedly master still considered him worthy wasn't even a challenge; he let each part to fit perfectly. The jotun made his father to want him to become Nemesis' partner, he liked to see the disgusting thing taking over Sigyn, appreciated each moment of the deal that the Father of All and the entity made.
He traced each line that would take him to the right moment, not just because they had convinced him to, but because he decided he liked that. Convincing Death that it should kill Sigyin, not being distrusted by anyone was an interesting job to do, so when the young left, he arranged Ego to arrive at the planet it would flourish, started a new civilization so that it kept distracted and provided each detail till the day Asgard invaded the marvelous kingdom that was growing at the expanse of a power they shouldn't have. Loki saw Oding ordering the young heir to hide that cursed thing where no one could reach and as a good servant, he offered himself to help. The boy was fool, as he would be until adulthood, his mental defenses were weak and instants were enough to enter his mind and making him to forget his important task.
The stone was left on the ground around, lost until the moment of coming back arrived. The jotun also ensured that no one asked about Thor abilities to hide mystic artifacts.
A long time passed in instants for him, while he also made the disagreements between the brothers to happen, he drew a series of other events to match his interests and to the goals of the cosmic entities too.
The prince gave back the Tesseract to the reality it was originated in, lived in the Midgard where his plans were developed during some significant periods like in first and second world wars, indirectly collaborating for both sides and after that only came back when humans were getting to the 1970's, manipulating results that would give Cold War an end. Everything was going as he wanted, what also included guaranteeing that that younger version of himself grew up powerful and contained, so that no one payed too much attention to it.
Maybe, between all his ideas for the future he needed to unleash, the funniest was playing with genetic. Nemesis had more affinity to the human body, but it didn't mean that a perfect body couldn't bear it. He started looking for the apples of the orchard of Iduna, so powerful fruits that some would say it has power to give immortality, but soon Loki changed them so that they achieved the accomplishments he desired. Since the beginning of humanity, he traced grand lineages that had no idea of how important they were, one by one he allowed their qualities to be transmitted in their minds, it was stablished an ideal for what someday would be that bearer child, not noticing a kind of fascination for that so insignificant mortal, it created marks through the whole condemned soul of the jotun.
There were so many lives under his influence, so many people were united because of him and that generated lives over the so diverse circumstances just so that he moved on, flawless. However, when the last generations grew, his anxiety and devotion for a woman he didn't know made him to cause love to someone for the first time. When Jasmin and Kevin exchanged looks, a so powerful connection took place that they got involved very fast, they were so meant for each other that recognized themselves as soulmates. With Amanda Armstrong and Jude, otherwise, the passion came directly from his magic and they could have been a wonderful family so that the father of the chosen one was born, but while she was pregnant, Amanda resisted his enchants and discovered a terrible cheat, which led to a not-that-pleasant effect and Jude ended up with a scissor attached to his throat. It's a shame she had to handle that baby for a family that wouldn't treat him as she wanted him to be treated, the god could see ahead and didn't like the idea of his genetic bet end up dead by the carelessness of an ex-agent, so Loki convinced that mother to handle that child to adoption. Howard Stark and Maria wouldn't be the best fathers and wouldn't treat Anthony with the same care he had from Kelly of the couple formed by the god, but they would do it and make the little one to become exactly what he needed to.
Catching attention of a playboy as Tony for an attractive woman as Kelly was one of the easiest things he had ever done in all his journey, they were attracted to each other in one night with an as burning desire as the fire itself and forgot to certificate if the condom was damaged. Linna born nine months later, screaming, covered with blood, tears and smiles, a lovely and healthy little girl. The prince of Asgard delivered the baby, for the first time in a long he permitted himself to accept something like affection to take over him completely as he saw that little dirty and scandalous thing moving in his hands.
The jotun just saw her again when her mother took her to an archeologic expedition of a great historic value. It wasn't wise to leave unknown and potentially dangerous artifacts in-hands of a child, so as Kelly wasn't fool enough to the point of doing that, but the prince just had to make part of the research team to take the strongly sealed little box to the girl. He loved to see how she reacted to his presence with the enthusiastic joy of someone who trusted him, however, it was despicable to see Ego entering her body as if it wanted to absorb all she could offer. Her cry that day was the only thing that made him to feel remorse for having brought her to that game of gods and divine beings.
From the moment the girl united herself to the stone on, Loki knew he didn't have to be there anymore, so he provided that the Soskovia from the future was rebuilt in the years after Ultron and that no one talked about what had happened there, it was just a fun act to cause possible disagreements in other times and at no moment he doubted that someday this would cause some great difference in the way he planned to trace later.
Nemesis would ruin itself and wouldn't need his contribution to be destroyed anymore, or at least not in this carnal shame he had. Around sixteen years after Linna's birth, the jotun he grew would find his end by Thanos hands, and not even for a second this, from another reality, thought to allow him to stay dead.
To get to his other self on that date, he would need to have the passage through the dead kingdom and it made no sense to believe that Death would willingly welcome him. His first impulse was to cause a remarkable enough distraction so that it didn't look to its belongings while he altered them to accomplish his desires. It was in the soul of Wade Wilson that he found a wonderful gap to enter unnoticed.
While mutant and entity involved themselves sexually for the first time, the gates for the gap between Hel and Valhalla became unprotected, the opportunity was straight in front of his eyes and there was no way to deny that the god was good enough in infiltrations to pass and walk through all that distorted world unnoticed.
The book of the dead wasn't not even by far as well-kept as expected, it was almost as if the proud of its owner impeded her from thinking about someone getting so close to it. Loki felt everything around trying to reject him, everything seemed to notice he was an intruder in those lands and the world itself tried to expel him, causing him so much discomfort he really considered leaving. However, when the pages enrolled by the heavy leather were touched by his hands, nothing in the whole universe could have been capable of stopping him. His actions were quick and with no hesitation, he searched for his name and didn't stop to erase it till there were no vestige that his name had been written on those grand leaves that gave Death the control over all souls.
Some seconds were enough to dissipate all that pressure on him and the world became as peaceful as when he wasn't there. With a triumph smile he walked back to the exit without more distractions to cover him, not trying to hide. Nothing stranger his presence, nothing tried to destroy him and no manifestation of life could see him. When he passed through the gates again it was like someone limitless in the transition between life and death.
When the sixteen years have passed and he knew that the neck of his correspondent was already properly broken, the first thing he did was to go to Hel. What definitively wasn't a pleasant experience. The more he deepened into the dark kingdom, the more he desired not to have come, each instant more around there caused agony and repudiation at endless levels. But, despite everything, he knew his journey would be worth it.
The time in that hell didn't pass the same way it did outside, eternity extended itself in the most torturing way, and his impression was that he was spending millennials in there, while probably he hadn't crossed the entry for some hours. Finding his other self among so many suffering souls was like looking for a specific grain of sand among all of them.
That Loki wasn't expecting for salvation, he wasn't counting on anyone who could want him back to the point of rescuing him. He didn't see himself as worthy of the suffering that the place imposed him, but understood that no one would act to avoid him to stay there and that he was alone to the point of believing that only one person in the world of the alive missed him. When he saw his own reflection offering help, he deeply believed he was going crazy and his vision was nothing more than a hallucination caused by delusions. If his savior didn't know so well the other's mind, it would take a real eternity to convince him that it wasn't a cruel joke, but yes someone really able to take him out of there.
The jotun's skin was rotten and severely damaged, he seemed to be so ruined that his ability of being rational all along the time he passed in a so destroying world was commendable. The god still alive held in his hand as a holder to not make him to hesitate and dragged him back all way through which he had come before, almost as if he was dealing with a scared cub.
They walked to the passage for the living kingdom, but to leave there was a condition. If the dead left Hel without a body, he could only be born again as a child, what undoubtedly would mess up his so-well-engineered plan, so to avoid so much delay, their souls needed to unite as one.
His last act with the predominant memories of the one who wandered through almost whole multiverse was hiding himself in his Frost Giant shape in the most remote continent of the mortal planet. With the welcoming snow on his skin, Loki started tracing a series of spells in himself, knowing that he would be found at any time. He faked his new base, hided everything he didn't need to remember and mixed all the useful knowledges with those he acquired at the moment he made do exist only one trickster god in that reality. When he finished, he was nothing more than a prince who had sacrificed himself for his brother and that somehow was able of surviving again.
(…)
There was a conscious and a free-from-barrier-about-his-past part of the jotun that recognized some details of what happened around after walking once again through the dead kingdom and returning to what remained of his body. He knew that it was nothing but fragments piled up by someone who desperately tried to bring him back, but, even though, he felt he was progressing and taking form with someone else's power. Maybe having attached to the gifts of an immortal human had been a good idea, even when everything was drained from his existence, a part of himself remembered of not letting go the lint of immortality he had copied and that guaranteed him to eventually take back his physical form.
The god knew, even after seemed to be days, that he was nothing but a little unborn child, but he felt the warm of a powerful body protecting him, even not knowing who it was or why it cared. Some things about the battle they have fought were running through his mind and Loki couldn't help seeing again the moment he'd taken away the life of the only true friend he had for his so long life, he understood that he would have to deal with the loos of his precious stone at some point, but decided he would do it when who bothered to save him could get out the dimension they have put them.
(…)
Odinson didn't step away from the ruin left on the battlefield, nor from all his improvised monuments, even after many weeks have passed. His friends believed this was just a way of dealing with the fault and with his newest losses, but the truth is that he couldn't stop thinking about the last words said by the actor with his brother face before he left. That man knew something, he was looking forward someone to show up before he went away, and if by any chance this person was Loki, then the god wouldn't stop waiting till he had his hands on the adopted Asgardian again. Whether to hold him or to throttle him, the son of Odin just needed to know his grief tears were once again for the son of a bitch who faked his own death, for if it wasn't… Well, maybe picking him up in the hell wasn't such an impossible thing.
Stephen was the only one to contribute to the belief that the brother was alive, he mentioned that the actor had asked his access ring before the Emperor arrived and that he hadn't given it back when he left. Loki, as a disciple of a supreme witch, could be able of getting out the mirrored dimension with it. These were the hopes that kept him there sit on a rock, staring at the horizon, accompanied only by his fox, Lin's cat, and stormbreaker.
Night was already fallen again when the animals started to get disturbed. When those little furry things stood up and ran to a place a few meters away, his first instinct was to follow them with a racing heart. The first sparks of a portal showed up, which meant someone was coming back. Ah, Odinson would definitely throttle him.
However, when the portal was completely formed, who stumbled through it wasn't the trickster brother, it was a naked, weak and a very marked-skin woman with a little blue baby on her lap. Even if she wasn't what the he expected, the god quickly held her when noticed her legs faltered, he prevented her from falling on the ground. Doctor Strange had taught some techniques of his magic to Stark when he cooperated with the prince under Nemesis' influence and Tom had left the ring in the hand of the beheaded body of Original while the Emperor attention wasn't on him, knowing she could take them out of there.
When the blond looked in the tired eyes of the woman, all he saw was the same brown he had already seen in the iris of her father and when he looked at the child, what he saw has the skin of the Frost Giants and the red eyes of the species; a way too young body to understand, but smart enough to make him to watch each trace of the jotun disappear, giving way to Asgard people's characteristics.
The next instants after were like a blur in Odinson eyes, he could only remember getting to the remnant of the Avengers, handling them the girl and the cat and disappearing with the fox and the baby. They would take care of her, but, for now, his focus would be that little fragile thing on his arms.
(…)
Lin Stark was still alive, though everything led to believe she wouldn't last much longer. Whether for the hatred of the survivors or for her own body, each second her resistance was threatened and in addition even more drained each time they failed stabilizing her. The regeneration that the Nemesis' power enabled her to reach saved his life at first, but with the Original's death, she had no control over this gift anymore, and, therefore, her cells started attacking each other. When she succeeded with the gamma rays and the super-soldier serum, it was the energy she kept inside herself that prevented her body to collapse, but nothing could stop the chain reaction in her body now.
Her body rested in Wakanda, being protected by warriors from anything or anyone who tried to attack what was left of her life. Those who believed someday she was an ally and that had something close to a friendship raced against time to keep her breathing and her family wouldn't abandon her even for a second.
Family… that was a weird definition to apply to people who get involved with her after everything she had done, even if most of her bad acts hadn't been exactly her choice. However, Pepper, Cat and Morgan stayed with her despite all the contraindications and so they would unless they expelled them from the bedroom.
The little one observed, watching each breath claimed by her sister's lungs as if it could be the last. Maybe it really was. Her mother slept on an armchair nearby, but she refused to leave the other Stark, even laying down on the bed with her, reading one of the books that seemed to catch the interest of the older.
There was a trepidation behind the eyelids of the Iron Girl, as if she could, in fact, listen to the words of the younger.
(…)
Linna knew the particular world of the soul stone enough to know that she would be there when she opened her eyes. She realized that his body couldn't bear anymore the weight of the life she carried for all her years, and that now she was the child who she used to be when still believing to be able of having a normal life, but even those were good sensations, there was nothing that could make her to truly absorb them.
Her mind was in complete silence and she was alone, something that by itself made her to be concerned and suspicious. She couldn't recall the last time she felt so much freedom. Her trained instincts tried to discover what happened as she stood up, with each fiber of her child body alert and ready to fight anything that could be coming.
That absolute silence suffocated her more and more for each second she spent walking to the empty horizon. There was nothing there, no life manifestation, movement, sound or a mere reminder that was not a dream. Maybe that was her new home in an after-death life, or a punishment of a superior being, but Stark didn't show even for a second the discomfort that took over her entrails. She just walked and walked, till her feet hurt and her body so violently protested that her legs faltered and her face fell to the ground once again.
Her thoughts were cloudy and reasoning was much harder than it used to be, however, she still strived trying to keep the pace she had since her only friend taught her: don't show true feelings when they can become a weapon to be used against yourself, understand what's going on, stay calm, manipulate the game to your own favor, win.
Lin repeated a series of words and memories on her mind that used to keep her awake before, but as her vision blurred and the memories turned to be confusing, she shrank in fragility, trying to hide the tears falling from her eyes. So many things made no sense now…
There was a noise of steps very near that tensed her body and then, she felt the fresh breeze of the seas she someday desired to feel. She didn't move, of course it was a kind of trick and though she was prepared to attack the unknown, she couldn't react when realized that thing was standing in front of her.
The first thing she saw was the pair of male shoes that the stranger used, a piece that transmitted its high value even to the as unexperienced eyes about it as hers. The second was the movement of the bones and the muscles of that form of life when it bended down to touch her. Stark waited for the impact of an hallucinating pain that has never come, while what she got was a fondle on her backs, very alike to what she knew as cuddle.
Her eyes turned up confused, after all, maybe it was just a joke of one of the stones, however, who stared her back was a man who she stopped dreaming of knowing a long time ago. Anthony Stark.
He exhibited a big and welcoming smile, as if he was really happy in seeing her, there was no pity, angry, fear or disgust, nothing of what she thought to be on that beautiful face when she met him. The cry stopped in her throat with a much more suffering hiccup than any other she remembered having let out. Tony accepted her as a whole, Lin noticed, he didn't mind the monster, her appearance, her flaws, mistakes and weaknesses. Even when she looked at his eyes and was sure he knew each horrendous detail of what she had already done or of what was done to her, he didn't judge her.
The long arms of the adult body embraced and raised her, holding her as if she was the most important of his belongings and as if it was a rare feat which he didn't want to damage under no circumstances. Tony didn't claim when she hid her face on his neck's curve, nor when tears wet the so-fine clothes he wore.
That man represented for a long time her idealization of a happy life, since she was a little child, his paternal figure was his biggest hero and example, the most admirable among the human beings, always so amazing in her sight that there was a long time in which she would give up anything to become someone like him. But years passed and the childish dream disappeared, she started to understand that most part of what she knew about her father was nothing but her own imagination and he would never love someone as broken as her.
Maybe this had been the feeling Stark kept the most to herself, all the proud she felt with each news about Tony's journey, about all the conquests of him and about how he was the man making the difference in people's lives, someone different from those who destroyed her body. Her father was someone she thought she could trust under no hesitation, a safe haven much different from which Loki offered her, a good man she thought to have arrived to save her in each weird bang she heard in the years of her captivity. Lin deeply desired to meet him, but every time she thought it could really happen, she stared at her own face and remembered the horrendous creature she really was.
More than a welcoming embrace, that was her redemption. They had come to pick her up to join her to the new homes in a world much beyond what she knew. And yes, they… Tony wasn't alone. When Lin gathered enough strength to recover, she felt the presence of another person, of a woman. Staring the horizon, the gap between the realm they were and the other, the younger saw someone whose face she couldn't remember.
Her mother was also there. Kelly, the outgoing young woman, Kelly, who had his life taken in the very same day Stark's existence took a definite way to disaster. She was like a usual woman, not extraordinarily beautiful as many would expect of someone who caught the momentarily attention of the genius, playboy and philanthropist, but even out of the patterns it was enough to look just once to understand why she was so attractive. Her mother had a natural charisma, and looked at the world as if she had all the love it needed. Linna had never observed before that his adult form had many more traces of his mother than of the man who so many would compare her to, and now she was also ashamed of all the dark feelings she had in her heart.
Kelly neared to where they were with an uncommon caution in the matter of her, and her different eyes searched Anthony's as if challenging him to ward her. Her pudgy arm reached the wet face of her daughter and she dried a stubborn tear insisting to free itself, for Lin, it was a permission ask, as if she understood her pains and hesitated to touch her for not being part of the category of people whom she still could trust. The woman wasn't a heroin, not even knew a world in which super-heroes were each day more common, she screamed for help when cockroaches remembered they could fly and pull an all-nighter crying for the characters of her favorite stories, she loved to discover new things and liked to bring knowledge to the world. She wasn't as amazing as someone who sacrificed himself to save infinite lives, however she'd done the same if she was on his shoes. Kelly was someone who would do anything just to put a smile on someone else's face.
Linna tilted her head towards her mother's hand, it was her own way to show she accepted her too.
The comprehension of what she could had had if the destiny hadn't chosen her was the worst part. She knew she would have been very loved, that she would have had the chance of making tens of friends, that she wouldn't feel so much pain and that she would never have forgotten how it was to call somewhere home, but now, all of this was nothing but frustrated expectations of a child.
That open gate that led to a far-world caught her attention, in that place, her former desires could come true and for a moment, that possibility was the most wonderful thing she could feel. There was no fear in her body when she nodded, showing to those two people she was ready to go. However, when Tony took his first step towards her new home with the woman he couldn't know better, the younger's skin tingled, it was the closest thing to physical pain she could feel, and his eyes understood the sadness her parents transmitted, even striving a lot to hide.
The absence of words was so spontaneous, whatever had allowed that meeting had also taken away from them the chance of interfering more directly. None of the both wanted to take her to the dead world, not truly, it was her choice and if she decided to stay among the living, she could keep this memory of the family she never had.
Her body frost and the steps stopped inches before the crossing, when they realized her hesitation. Was really there something else a shoddy promise that kept her alive? Something worth to stay? Something that made her feel some pleasure in keep breathing? Linna didn't know. She stared the horizon again, where new opportunities arose, and saw some other people, as if they awaited or just wanted to make her to remember something, though Stark didn't know their faces.
Her body hair shivered, she knew who was each one of them. In the center, the one once called Odin, on the right, Frigga, and on the left, Sigyn; she could also see Howard, Maria, Benjamin Parker and Farbauti. Men, gods and a Frost Giant, come from Hel or Valhalla just to make her to remember everything waiting for her in life. Farther and less visible than the others, stood Death itself, someone who, even risking destabilize the new-won balance, offered her a choice, and furthermore, generated a resistance lost a long time ago that could be the difference. Linna didn't know the reasons of the entity, but she didn't doubt that Utrimque was involved in all this, considering the place where she was, everything seemed to be a selfish effort of what was left of the stone to keep her alive and loyal to her own word.
Kelly and Tony held her close and stared at her firmly. Lin could almost hear them saying to the cosmic laws to go fuck themselves and that she should stick to the opportunity offered to her. There was no prison waiting for her on the other side, but there are friends awaiting his coming back, and an infinity of universes to be explored, if what she wanted was a new and better life, resources for this purpose were everywhere since she decided to keep breathing.
The biggest problem was that she didn't want to come back to the cruelty she knew on Earth and that she would like to try what Valhalla had to offer. It was a shame that Death looked at her with eyes of implicit threat of causing her the most various kinds of suffering for all eternity if she didn't accept to go back. Sometimes the girl used to believe she wouldn't have so many problems if the living beings stopped to be so manipulating.
Part of her would love to pass through that gap just for a challenge she knew she would lose, but something still very alive in her body felt the warm of a caring that didn't come from any of those people but from someone who loved her as intensely as some of them. She still had loved ones who awaited her and missed her, sentimentalism was a damn shit.
Linna stick to the recomforting sensation that came from the other side and smiled, unbelieving her own decision.
- I love you. – she said to her parents. – I respect you. – She said to the other dead ones. – I iw jamdoxeo zi faki mi isboyomi is ws kokda, som otsexa zi imdigo ozi. (And I would love you to get impaled with a cactus, but I admire that you are here). – She said to the late father of al in Asgard language as enjoying her grimace of dislike and releasing from the safety of her family.
The yearning she felt as soon as she put her feet on the ground was terrible, but not as intense as she thought it would be. Her parents seemed to be more radiant with the perspective of her not giving up than when they found her minutes ago. With the image of they both smiling, Lin closed her eyes, detaching from that world and spreading her energy through each cell of her body.
(…)
The population wanted the execution of Linna Mary Stark, but appreciated the fact she was locked in a cage, slowly dying. Her trial had been on that very same day, though the edgy feelings contributed for the violence and injustice to win and a term that pleased everyone was given after a mutant interfered. Charles Xavier didn't like to have to use his powers in these kinds of situation, but he used them anyway and showed each one attending the trial what he saw inside the troubled Nemesis' mind.
After all this conflict and the discussion of contradictory ideas, the sentence was given. It was on Odinson to pick the condemned up and take her to the stage of the confirmation that she would pay for her crimes, few were the ones who cared about the fact she spent months unconscious and showed no improvements till the moment, it made no difference for those people if she were been handled to the arms of the death with the decision they made.
It was already expected that the woman was a Pandora's box of surprises, but the god got shocked when passed through all the exasperated protections of the cell and found the brown eyes looking at him while the hand, missing some fingers, cuddled the fluffy fur of her pet cat.
There was nothing healthy on her appearance, however there were no doubts that that was a very much more positive situation than that she presented before. His restrained smile opened when he got close and she reached out her arms lazy as if she already knew where she was going to.
- You scared the hell out of us. – The Asgardian commented as driving away the animal and raising her on his arms.
- I bet everyone thought I wouldn't save the day. – Something like fun shined in her eyes, what was reflected through his too.
- Some still believe it.
Odinson carried her as if she were lighter than a cloth doll and tried to give her all the comfort he could transmit while walking through the silent corridors, being received, soon after, by an enraged crowd. They clearly didn't expect she was awake and this fact as scared them as angered most of the attendants, but Lin just shivered on the lap of his friend as if she felt sorry for all she had caused.
People from all around the planet gathered together in New Asgard to witness the end of all fear that the daughter of Iron Man arose in their hearts and there weren't many known faces among those who wanted her death, only victims who she couldn't even remember of having hurt. The woman found each look towards her, answered them with the same intensity, not keeping it for too long, following to the next and next as Odinson took her to a place with a simple grand-important demarcation.
The last person she saw before preparing for her sentence was Carol Denvers, someone who directed to her so much hatred that she wanted to disappear. The only thing that she could do was to try to demonstrate with her eyes all the guilt she felt, how good it was that she used to be a great liar, because she feared to be hit in the case the other distrusted she practically didn't care.
When her friend stopped, Linna was in front of Valkyrie. She would be condemned by a court of extraterrestrials gods, after all, she wasn't that close to be a real human, so the human laws usually weren't applied to her. It seemed fair for her, someone among Midgardians had a good brain.
The blade of the Almighty God, who she had insulted moments before, held by the queen wasn't her biggest deal. There were definitively more things to be worried about now, for example, the tears of her little sister that agonized her so much. Peter, Harley and Pepper were with Morgan, it was great that she didn't have to see whatever happened alone, but the woman expected that they wouldn't make that scene much cruel. She didn't want to traumatize the child again.
- Linna Mary Stark. Accused of countless crimes about the manipulation of an unmanageable entity.
The queen started to list the names of all those she had caused terrible damage; however, she wasn't listening anymore. It made no sense in having saved her before, if she would end up dead now. She didn't have to worry, but there was someone her heart needed to certificate to be fine, and this person wasn't in her eyesight.
- Goldilocks… - Lin called in a whisper, sticking her fingernails to his skin just to be sure she would get his attention. – When you discover the whereabouts of your brother, I need you to tell him… - Valkyrie took a pause to emphasize her next words. – I need you to tell him that everything we had was as real for me as it was for him
The voice of the queen sounded like a thunder and all the murmur was shut, she was in fact a powerful goddess, worthy of her status.
- In the name of all I repudiate you, - she slammed the blade on the ground once and the bang echoed through all the place. – In the name of all I forbid you from having a life in Midgard, - The magic chained her wrists, as if it was a life sentence. – In the name of all I ban you to distant lands and I order you to never come back to our planet.
There was no time for answers or for her to show her indignation, at the moment she was trying to drive away from the son of Odin, Bifrost involved them and the only thing she could do was to look at what she thought to be her new family, in a way to say her last goodbye.
Earth disappeared from under her feet and that power took them so far away that not even the knowledges her former friend had confided her could give a notion about where they were going. She saw galaxies passing through her eyes in seconds, saw a wonderful part of what the universe had to offer and then a distant place was closer and closer. So much close that she hit against her own face before she could protect herself. Maybe it wasn't a good idea to fight against the protection of the god of thunder, he was there, completely full and with his dignity untouched while she fell straight to the ground, not knowing even if she could stand up again.
- That what you said about telling my brother… - his feet were close enough to touch her backs. – I think you will have to do this for yourself.
She wanted to yell at that beautiful creature and stretch that perfect face, but when she raised her head, she noticed a grand spaceship stopped a few meters away and the ironic-smiled being leaned on the wall after the access ramp. Ah, she would punch him too, just because she wanted to punch something, but first would hold that trickster prince and would only release him when he was willing to stab her.
Linna held the reached-out hand of the Asgardian and tested her own legs to decide if she could walk, when she made sure they were firm enough to walk alone, she raised her face and walked to that new perspective of life. May One Above All decide which ways he would trace next, nothing was more important at that moment than enjoying the only place she could call home: the comfort of the arms of her prince.
- Hi, little monster! – Loki looked a little younger, as if he weren't completely recovered from the last battle they fought.
- Hi, it's good to see this ugly face again! – His smile was truthful and only got bigger when the welcoming face of her friend turned mad. – I mean it… She pulled him through his clothes, keeping him close. – I missed you.
- Me too. – He rolled his eyes and frowned his pucker when his brother walked in the spaceship whistling indiscreetly. After the nosy one drove away enough, he raised his right hand to her hair, cuddling her briefly. – I feel I should take your advices to the heart and don't handle you so much mortal weapons again.
- I'm the voice of reason in our relationship, it's you who don't listen.
Their eyes met and the words were no longer needed, their free hands interlaced and both knew that they were complete with one another. It would be a great luck if the universe survived their madness.
Loki will return in Avengers: The Start of a New Age.
