Chapter 41
Harry idly toyed with the sceptre, waiting for Loki-Two to awaken. He directed a bit of power through it and blasted another hole in the wall. He frowned as he noted that it had not taken any of his energy—Asgardian magic usually did. Wizard magic did not, and yet this was nothing like wizard magic.
Wizard magic drew from energy—magic—in the area around you and directed it through you and then your wand. With this, however, all the energy seemed to stem from the gem at the sceptre's head.
He did not dare to touch it until he had tested it further and interrogated Loki-Two about it. Even now, he could feel the gem reaching out to him, attempting to do…something to his mind. What, he knew not.
'Have you ever seen anything like it before?'
'Yes,' Loki said. 'I once saw a glowing gem. Unfortunately, it did not seem to be a sentient source of infinite power.'
'I, too, also once saw a gem. It was not, unfortunately, glowing. I'm not sure whether or not it was a sentient infinite power source, though. I didn't think to ask it.'
In front of Harry, Loki-Two shifted slightly, probably attempting to conceal the fact that he was awake. That said, he couldn't have shifted much more, seeing as he was chained to the wall.
"Stop pretending to be asleep!" Before Loki-Two could react, Harry flicked his wand, spraying Loki-Two with mild water. Cold water wouldn't have worked as well, what with him being part Frost Giant.
As it turned out, mild water also did not wake him up.
"Perhaps he's really still unconscious," Harry muttered. "I should electrocute him."
'Or you could just use the counter spells to the stunning spells.'
"What fun would that be?" He smiled and pressed his wand up against Loki-Two, silently sending the most powerful electric shock he could muster through him.
Loki-Two spasmed for a few moments, before coming to rest with a groan.
"Congratulations, Loki, you've awakened!" Harry exclaimed. "Welcome to my humble abode!" He motioned at the window and the storm raging outside. "I hope that the chains and the storm and the black stone walls are suitably ominous and evil for you! I was considering hosting you in the dungeon, but it's not just airy enough."
One of Loki-Two's eyelids cracked open. "Of course. One can only be imprisoned in so many dungeons before the experience begins to grow stale. This is quite the breath of fresh air."
Harry nodded sympathetically. "You see, my trick is not to get captured in the first place. It's quite easy when I'm stronger than almost everyone on the planet. Unfortunately for you, you don't exactly have that advantage." He paused. "Well, maybe you do, actually, seeing as I'm basically you."
"You're…me?"
"Well, no, but you're in my head."
"As nice as that is, you're not my type."
"Don't try and lie to me, you whore. You know well as I that people who look almost exactly like you are just your type."
Loki-Two shook his chains. "Of course, and my attraction is only enhanced when they chain me up."
Harry grinned. "Anyway, that's enough foreplay. Let's get down to the action. So, what happened to you after you fell from the Bifrost?"
"I fell for a while." He shrugged. "And then I ended up here. Are you going to explain why you look like me?"
Harry stroked his chin. "Let me think… No." He smiled. "Well, not until you tell me how you came across the pretty gem and the pointy sceptre."
"Is 'with great skill' an acceptable answer?"
"Is 'if you don't tell me, I'm going to invade your mind and see if it causes some kind of paradox' an acceptable answer?"
Loki-Two raised an eyebrow. "A paradox?"
"Well, maybe. For all I know, you're just me from the future who was deliberately defeated in order to maintain the timeline. Or you're the Loki in my head from the future, who didn't need to be deliberately defeated, since he's a little bitch anyway."
Loki-Two blinked. "I'm fairly sure that I am not from the future."
"Stop avoiding my question, you slag. How did you get the sceptre?"
"Well, I—"
"—am bored." Harry surged forward and grasped Loki-Two by the hair, yanking him forward to force him to make eye contact. With the mental force of a dozen freight trains, he ripped into Loki-Two's mind, Loki with him, guiding Harry through his own defences with careless ease.
Loki-Two had no time to react, to realise that his attacker knew every one of his weaknesses, every backdoor that he had made.
Harry sifted through Loki's thoughts and, once he found the memories relating to the sceptre, followed the trail, and he was suddenly in a world of blue—a place not of this world, or of any other of the Nine Realms, for that matter.
A humanoid stood before him, seven feet tall and inhumanly muscled, his shoulders broad and his skin blue. Even in the memory, his piercing blue eyes seemed to tear into Harry's as he passed over the sceptre to Loki, as he sent him to Earth with two goals, to see steal the Tesseract, and to see Earth subjugated—or destroyed.
Harry staggered backwards, stunned from the memory by the being's sheer mental presence. "Who the hell was that?"
Loki-Two's eyes were clenched shut. "Thanos, the Titan."
'Thanos,' Loki murmured. 'I have heard the name—I have heard the legend. I did not think that he actually existed, though. He is an immortal being, thousands of years old. His origins are debatable, and I've heard a dozen different theories. He may be from Earth, though, seeing as his name derives from the Ancient Greek for death.'
'He sure as hell doesn't look like he's from Earth.'
'Indeed. I've never paid much thought to him, seeing as I didn't actually think that he existed. He is believed in by lunatics and no one else, on Asgard. They make up mad conspiracies about him being involved in some of the assaults on Asgard over the millennia, and so on. He supposedly pursues omnipotence, which he believes he will gain if he finds all six of the so-called Infinity Stones.'
'Do they exist?'
'Yes, I do not know what they are specifically, or if they truly grant omnipotence, but…'
Harry glanced at the sceptre, and at the gem at its head. 'You don't think…'
'There are supposed to be six stones: Mind, Soul, Space, Reality, Time and Power. The sceptre controls minds.'
Harry grabbed Loki-Two by the chin and forced him to look up. "Is this an Infinity Stone?"
For a few moments, Loki-Two looked puzzled. "An… Why did I not think of that?" Anger flashed across his face. "I should've thought of that—I would've thought of that. There's some kind of mental block on me—some compulsion to obey Thanos. Or there was before you bulldozed your way through my head."
"Is that a thank you?"
"Yes, a thank you for stabbing me, kidnapping me, and forcefully reading my mind."
"You're welcome. It's all part of being a superhero, you see. I've got to help people, by whatever means necessary." He paused and frowned. "Or is it not using whatever means necessary? I can't remember. I think I'll just go that Batman route and go and beat up some mentally ill people."
"Do I count as mentally ill?"
Harry punched him in the face. "How's that for an answer?"
Loki-Two groaned. "I think you're the only mentally ill one here."
"Oh, I am." Harry stabbed himself in the throat with his wand and slumped to the floor.
Loki-Two stared at his body for a few moments. "I can tell what is an illusion and what is not an illusion, you know."
Harry sat up. "That's a shame. It's always exciting to see people panic when you kill yourself or their family or destroy their country in front of them."
"Indeed. Perhaps now you might indulge my curiosity?"
"Fine," Harry sighed. He stood and began to unbuckle his belt.
"That's not what I meant."
"You're going to have to be a lot less ambiguous, then."
"Can you, perchance, tell me why you look like me?"
"Yes," Harry said. "We look alike because we have the same hair colour, the same eye colour, the same body type, the same height, and a very similar facial bone structure."
Loki-Two sighed. "And perhaps you might be inclined to tell me why we share all of these features? Are you an illegitimate son of mine, perhaps?"
"No, I am your father!"
"What?"
"Haven't seen Star Wars, then? Uncultured swine. Anyway, it's because when you fell off of the Bifrost, a piece of your mind was ripped off and managed to push its way into my mind. So I'm basically a deranged version of you mixed with a deranged version of my real self, but mainly you, seeing as you raised me."
"A deranged version of me…"
"Yes, I'm still unsure as to why I'm deranged. It's either because you're not good at manipulating minds and brain activity as you think you are, because I've hit my head a lot, because one brain isn't enough space for two minds, or because I fake it so that other people underestimate me, or because I fake it because it's funny as hell."
Loki-Two nodded. "Of course."
"So, do I let you go now?"
"I would prefer that."
"Don't you like my company?"
"I think I would like it more if I were not chained up."
"But how do you know that for sure?"
"If you released me, I'd have sampled both and would be certain as to which I liked more."
"But what if Thanos is still influencing you?"
Loki-Two sighed. "What can I do to persuade you to let me go?" After a moment, he added, "Please don't take off your trousers."
Harry smiled. "Just tell me where the Tesseract is."
Harry threw open the doors to the abandoned warehouse Loki-Two had borrowed. Banging the bottom of his sceptre on the ground and wearing Loki's clothes, he marched in.
"My loyal followers," he hissed.
'I do not sound like that.'
"As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted…my loyal followers, bring me the Tesseract."
A man in a lab coat rushed forward. "But you said—"
"I don't care what I said!" Harry exclaimed. "I have frequent mood swings! Now, bring me the bloody Tesseract!"
"Of course, sir."
"Don't call me 'sir.' Call me 'my lord.'"
"Of course, my lord."
Harry smiled. "That's more like it."
A group of soldiers rushed off to presumably get the Tesseract.
Harry turned back to the scientists. "Do any of you have any explosive-making tips? At the moment, I mainly make nitroglycerin because the fumes smell nice and I accidentally made a few tonnes of nitric acid so decided to buy a few tonnes of sulphuric acid."
The soldiers in the room all seemed to scratch their heads as one whilst all the people in lab coats sought to speak as one.
'I'm not sure I'd be asking for explosive-making advice.'
"The voice in my head is right. Don't tell me about explosives, guys."
Loki sighed.
"I don't exactly have to be subtle. What are they gonna do? Throw the Tesseract at me?"
As if in answer to that, the two soldiers who had gone to get the Tesseract came back, now holding it in its glass case between them. Luckily, they didn't throw it at Harry.
"Thanks," Harry said, grabbing it from them and setting it at his feet. He glanced around. "Since I'm a superhero now, I should probably help all of these mind-controlled people."
'That does sound like something a superhero would do.'
'I'm not sure about that. Batman would probably just punch all of them. The Joker would shoot all of them.'
'I'm not sure that the Joker is a superhero.'
'Why? Because he's a clown, you racist?'
Harry waved the sceptre around vaguely. "Be free, my children," he said.
Nothing seemed to happen.
"Well, I tried. I guess I've now got a private army of sleeper agents." Harry sighed. "Go back to your normal lives, guys. I'll call you when I need you." He picked up the Tesseract. "Now let's go and use the sceptre on Loki—he'll make a great stunt double."
