Mini crisis of the week: My friend and I keep on hearing we look like we're together? Like? y'all she's gay and I'm open but? we're more like sisters? It's like everyone knows we're together, and the two of us weren't informed that we're dating? ik i'm clingy af and have attachment issues but Can I Just?

Yes, okay, RANT DONE. (Honestly it's hilarious if I didn't suddenly realize my catholic parents might think it too.)

Chapter Warnings: Character Death, flowery description of some stuff, HAND WAVY EVERYTHING (idk anything), Time skips

TIMELINE: Thor the Dark World to some time during CA: Winter Soldier

ARC 2: CHAPTER 11
Eulabeia

-0-

It's November and the air is rife with mounting tension.

It takes Harley an entire day to figure out what's happening, Magic buzzing and dancing across his skin and setting him on edge. When he does, Harley called up J.A.R.V.I.S., not desperate but wanting to do something about it.

"Jarvis," Harley says as soon as the call picked up. "You have access to a lot of stuff right?"

To his credit, J.A.R.V.I.S. merely replied, "Of course, young sir."

Harley nods, idly rubbing a hand up his arm to alleviate the uncomfortable goosebumps that sprung from another bout of his Magic testing the air. "Like, global sensors and stuff?"

"Stark Industries have subsidiaries and is in partnership with various companies that have them, yes."

"Okay, yeah," Harley opens up the readings that his Magic had detected, the data translated into something less Magic-y and more crudely science-y. Harley was no physicist, but it would have to do. "See, I want you to monitor these anomalies. The inconsistencies are small for now, but I have a feeling it would grow worse over time. Wouldn't want to get caught off guard."

There's a short pause when Harley uploads the files and J.A.R.V.I.S. processed it.

"I assume this would be part of our 'not allowed to ever tell anyone unless needed' agreement." J.A.R.V.I.S. stated dryly, inadvertently still sour of how Harley had managed to bypass protocols and subroutines like it wasn't even there.

"Yep," Harley nods along with his response. "But you can alert Mr. Stark about it. Just- uhm, maybe not my involvement. Say it came to your attention or something. Technically, that wouldn't even be a lie. Override: S-E-C Custode, Jarvis."

"ACCESS: GRANTED; Code: F-I-D-S-E-C Custode. Of course, Mr. Keener." J.A.R.V.I.S. relayed calmly, as if this were a normal occurrence. Which wasn't, to be quite honest, but J.A.R.V.I.S. is great at being unflappable. And that was all sass because J.A.R.V.I.S. didn't need to vocalize that.

(The Fidelius, functioning as it should be, yet still quite different. Only able to to bind living beings.)

"Would you like to be informed of the progress with these findings?"

"I can't really do anything about it, could I?" Harley asked rhetorically, feeling his Magic grow restless again and he had to consciously stop it from reacting to nothing. "Just alert me if it's something really bad. I think Mr. Stark would know what to do with it."

"Would you like me to inform sir you have called?"

Harley thinks for a moment, eyes glossing over the workbench and his half-hearted attempts at getting his mind off things, straying over the mezzanine he'd been spending more time in.

(He thinks of sleepless nights and feeling hollowed out. Thinks of dreams that wake him up, and numb coldness that he desperately did everything to chase away.)

He finally says, "Yeah, sure. If he's not busy."

J.A.R.V.I.S. doesn't respond and Harley didn't have to wait long for the call to patch through.

"Yo, kid."

Harley makes a show of wrinkling his nose, puts his troubles away in favor of this one thing he shouldn't do to himself yet does anyway. "There's something seriously wrong with you using modern phrases, mechanic. You should stick to your own generation's vernacular."

"Excuse you, Keener, that word has been around before you were even born."

"Whatever you say," Harley parries as he usually does, the smile on his face growing more genuine by the second. "What's your retired iron ass been doing since we last talked? A month's a long time, mechanic."

"Stop calling my ass a retired iron. It's a damned fine ass, thank you very much." Mr. Stark glared at him before rolling his eyes and going back to what he was working on before Harley called, running a gloved hand over his already messy and greasy hair "And technically, this is me stepping back so I can focus on SI and my personal life, to get my head screwed back in its proper place. Not that it's any of your business."

"But you tell me anyway."

Harley's smug retort earned him a, "God, why do I deal with this kid?"

Harley settles in his chair, letting the banter that followed and inevitable devolvement into science and engineering to wash over him, deftly avoiding Avengers business and egging on J.A.R.V.I.S.'s dry wit.

(Lets the crippling cold and numbness fade away until it comes back. Lets himself be what he needs for someone else without asking for something back.

Compassion for compassion.)

See? Harley's able to not be a total social disgrace. He won't let his mechanic fall apart like that again.

-0-

Later, much later, as in two weeks from when it started, Harley felt a full body shudder engulf him and his Magic going haywire, lashing out at something that wasn't there, screaming dangerdangerdanger in his head. Harley trembles, heart pounding and breath coming in quick pants.

It's late evening and he's in his room alone in the house. He'd sent Emma to stay with Mrs. Davis ever since Harley felt the change in the air, so there's no one to be cautious about.

Gritting his teeth and strong-arming his way through the irrational dangerdangerdanger that still rang through his mind and wrecking his control over his emotions, Harley apparates into the garage, tamping down his Magic's reactions until he's in the warded mezzanine where all sorts of protections and wards harmlessly absorbed and stabilized the blind attacks his Magic kept on unleashing.

The area had been cleared of sensitive projects, leaving it bare with only the floor space where he used to train his Magic in, so Harley had no need to be in complete control anymore. Once this thought registered, he sagged into the floor, sparks of Magic coloring the air, its pulsating movements matching with the rapid beating of his heart.

He was so absorbed in working through the ringing mental alarm bells that he barely heard the "Mr. Keener?" coming from the speakers of the computer.

"Y-yeah," Harley manages to wheeze out, muscles too tense and cold to move from the fetal position he'd curled himself into. "He-hey, Jarvis. What's up? That weird thingie with the scans turned up with so-something?" Because obviously it did. Harley hated this feeling of not-fear and not-caution and not Knowing.

"As a matter of fact, yes." J.A.R.V.I.S. delivered it in such a calm manner that Harley wanted to throw something at him. "Several Einstein-Rosen bridges have opened up one after the other all over London, England, but seems to be concentrated around a town called Greenwich. In addition to that, an aerial vessel of extraterrestrial origins has entered earth's atmosphere through one of them."

And this is the moment the presence made itself known again, a faint and barely there impression of, align realms, mutedly entering his thoughts.

(Not an echo. It doesn't repeat, doesn't let itself be completely settled into his mind. It's a passing thought, a passing impression. Information relayed once and some of the context stripped away from it.)

Harley twitches and uncurled from his position, powering through the urge to destroy a threat that wasn't near him and wrestling control of his Magic. Still, he doesn't leave the safety of the wards. "And what's being done about that?"

"Sir has deployed teams to evacuate the town as soon as the readings became unstable," J.A.R.V.I.S. dutifully reported. "Mr. Odinson and his friends seem to be focused on the extraterrestrial creatures." A pause, then, "Sir thinks they are handling it poorly."

"Of course he does." Harley muttered, huffing and puffing like he's ran a couple of kilometers without stopping, cold sweat dripping down the back of his neck and over his brows. "He made that gravitational stabilizer didn't he?"

"Sir and Doctor Banner had designed one once they discovered the anomalies, yes."

Harley traces a wisp of Magic that tried to escape the wards, reaching out to somewhere too far away. He peers down the glass railing, down to the monitor of the computer that showed live-feed data. "D'you think it'll work?"

"The simulations proved to be somewhat successful," J.A.R.V.I.S. helpfully flashed the test results and calculations on screen. "But it is only a temporary solution. Doctor Erik Selvig has had more time to prepare for this phenomenon and has the necessary equipment to deal with it."

"Okay." Harley regulated his breathing, finally feeling his muscles uncoil now that enough time has passed, but his Magic remained alert and sensitive to every change in the air. "Okay. So they're not gonna tear through the fabric of reality?"

"Ah," J.A.R.V.I.S. lagged in hesitation. "Sir seems to believe so."

Harley couldn't help the wry smile that stretched his lips. Tony Stark was equally clever as he was naive, trusting one Aesir to deal with a threat. A threat, if Harley was to believe what his Magic was blindly cautioning him about, that has another Stone in its possession.

(Three again, now, on earth. Two again, once it's returned.

Earth has seen most of the Stones, never once knowing what it means.

The clock's still ticking.)

Harley had heard of Thor Odinson both as Harrhan and Harley Keener.

The prince was great in a fight, having just as much blood on his hands as Harrhan did, but the prince's were of enemies threatening the peace of the realms, not of the innocent and helpless. Not even in as much short years as Harrhan; the Aesir's deeds had spanned across more than a handful of centuries.

(Monster. Traitor. You're no better than Volde-)

However, even an asgardian prince of laudable strength and power would find it hard to go against a wielder of a Stone.

But.

Just as much as Harley believed in his own knowledge, he also likes to think he has faith in the decisions of his mechanic.

"Then we'll just have to wait."

-0-

Just before J.A.R.V.I.S. relayed the eventual end to what could have been another moment of destruction of earth, Harley feels a moment of connection and familiarity before it disappears.

-0-

A few days later, Harley is just working on his homework when the computer screen lights up with a call notification. Harley blinked, mystified that for the first time, 'You Know Who I Am' is the one reaching out to call him instead of the other way around.

(Harley failed to ignore the flutter of warmth at another barrier being broken.)

"Hey, Mechanic." Harley greets as the screen revealed an excited and manic looking Tony Stark, eyes tired and bags obvious even under the tinted glasses he wore. "Just so you know, it's so weird that I only realized I've always been the one calling you."

"Huh." Tony (Tony? Yes, that sounds about right) blinked a couple of times, pocketing his shades and seeming to relax by the minute, secure in the privacy of his car. "Really? Wow. That shouldn't sound rude, but it does. Rude of me, that is. I'm sorry."

"Nah," Harley grins, shoving a couple of M&M's inside his mouth, idly scrawling out sentences for a stupid essay on prehistory stuff he didn't exactly care about. "Just a weird thought. You haven't been rude or anything. I know you're busy, anyway. So why'd you call?"

"Did you just eat M&M's without organizing it by color?!" Tony sounded genuinely scandalized, completely ignoring his question. "That- that's blasphemy!"

Harley tilted his head consideringly before deliberately eating a few more differently colored candy chocolates, blithely goading the engineer. "Yeah, why? Is there a problem?"

"Kid, everyone knows you have to separate them before eating them bycolor." Harley comes to the conclusion that Tony was suffering from too little sleep and too much caffeine with the way his words nearly stumbled together. "Even Brucie-bear does it. And Barton. Rhodey doesn't, but he hit his head when he was a child so he doesn't count."

It says much, to Harley, that Tony called him in such a vaguely delirious state.

(Trust him.)

"I hit my head when I was younger." Harley shared, amused by the very twitchy genius he was speaking to. "Lots'a times. Got stuck in the hospital once."

"What." The engineer sounded alarmed. "Why?"

Harley shrugged, entirely dismissive. "Fell off the stairs. Didn't hurt though, I'm used to pain."

He misses the narrow-eyed look that crossed the man's features, buried as it was with the usual barbs.

-0-

It's snowing again, winter dogging their doorsteps with icy licks and a just as cold foreboding.

They don't set up anything except for the small Christmas tree in Mrs. Davis's apartment.

Christmas eve came. It's somber, presents unopened and hidden in crevices they don't look at. None of them were in a festive mood. Mrs Davis spends more time at the pub, Harley cooks the usual food they ate.

Even with how well-done they are, the food tasted like ash.

-0-

"Happy New Year, Emma." Harley greets, for the first time in this lifetime spending the turn of another year in silence. The room is dark, no trace of plastic trumpets or glow sticks or merriment or celebration.

"Happy New year." She says back, burying herself into his embrace.

-0-

Harley had always hated hospitals.

Harry Potter was more than familiar with the infirmary, Harrhan stayed in the healers' rooms at least once a day, and Harley had spent a lot of time seeing doctors.

Sure, he's not so visibly averse to it, but there's something about the sharp smell of antiseptic, rushing doctors and nurses, and stark white walls that grated on his nerves. The air is always pungent with death and decay, of time running out and consciousness straddling the line between living and dying. Of desperate individuals barely clinging on to the hope of their loved ones leaving the hospital for good.

He hates it more, now, seeing Emma on one of those beds again. She's so small, so frail looking with tubes connecting her to machines and IV bags that Harley didn't even know what does to her.

They're in an isolation room that they couldn't afford, Emma's condition requiring her to be set apart from the others.

It's just measles, really, but little Emma's body was too weak to fight against it. Nothing could be done. Not with her HIV, not with the outbreak that more than a quarter of the town is suffering from. Not with how low they are in the hypothetical priority list of patients the small town hospital had.

It's just a matter of days is what they don't say.

-0-

"Not like mom, right?" Emma whispered, her hand lying limp in his.

And Harley laughs because what else can he say?

(What else can he do when tears have long dried from his eyes? What else can he do when he'd long accepted what will happen?

What else can he do when he felt nothing but the water filling his lungs?)

-0-

Harley Keener is twelve when he loses his sister.

-0-

They bury her urn right beside his mom's.

(He buries a little bit of his hope there too. Like he did with Hermione and Ron and Neville and Luna and all the other faceless yet significant people in Harry Potter's life. Like he didn't do as Harrhan. Like he didn't do with Harley's mom-)

Harley watches, numb and cold and accepting. Mrs. Davis had a hand gripping tightly on his shoulder, showing her sympathy and support.

He knows she's caught it too, sees her sweating and coughing, feels the higher than normal heat of her body, watches her sniff and dab at her red, watering eyes that has nothing to do with crying or being drunk. Harley doesn't forget how old she already is.

"Your dad's a right bastard," Mrs. Davis says, voice still hoarse and words still slurred, most nights still not spent sober. "He should be here."

"No." Harley shakes his head and turns to leave. "No, he doesn't. He never really cared about mom. Or Emma."

"With you." Mrs. Davis follows right beside him, not making a move to touch him despite her habit of showing her emotions by touching the person. She knew better, now. "He cared about you, at least. He should be here for you, with you."

Harley knows she'd been cornered into taking him in, had done it because of pity and misguided gratitude to no one in particular.

"Things happen." He said instead, remembers words uttered near insultingly, but with more understanding that mattered than blind sympathy could ever achieve.

Maybe he should say something more just to alleviate the concern that rests heavily in Mrs. Davis's eyes. Harley smiles at her, perfectly smooth and bright and slightly sad and doesn't reflect what he actually feels.

(The Keeners had never been a family.)

People came and went. Harley knew this more than anyone.

-0-

"Hey, Jarvis."

"I'm sorry Mr. Keener, but sir is very busy right now."

"Oh." Harley licks his lips, swallows down the hard pang of disappointment. "Okay."

J.A.R.V.I.S. hung up.

Eulabeia (Εὐλάβεια), spirit of discretion, caution, and circumspection

A/N: *sweats nervously* uh, poor Harley...?

So there's quite a bit of time skips, cuz, like, my timeline is; IM3 December 2012, T:DW is set in November 2013, and CA:WS is around April or May 2014. If y'all notice I stick to canon. That's cuz this is my first time writing for Avengers and I'm not very comfortable with straying much too far until I get a better handle on things.

It's gonna diverge, don't worry. In fact, it's slowly doing so now. Just let me do my world-building and practice in peace and at the pace of my flobberworm attention span. Chapter 16 is done!

I love y'all for your continued support of this fic!