super long one today because i'm not sure when i'm next posting? (christmas n stuff!)

...

"Barton," Christie drawled dryly as she propped herself up by her elbows. She scrubbed away the tears on her damp cheeks before he could see. Clint was a good friend of hers, but he had never seen her cry before - and she wasn't ready for that to change now of all days. Clint shoved his weapons back into their holsters and slowly made his over to where Christie lay on the floor. Now she was both sweating buckets and looking utterly drained of all life.

"Well, Whitey," Clint sighed, bending over her with his hands planted on his knees. "You look a hot mess - good to see that nothing's changed, huh?"

"Likewise you twat," Christie muttered back, hissing in pain as she slowly stood to her feet with his strong assistance. Renesme took this as the perfect opportunity to slip into the bathroom as she desperately needing to pee.

"What are you doing back so soon? Mission accomplished?" Clint guessed, whilst sneaking a glance at the two other beautiful women with a risen brow.

"Damn! What gave it away?" Christie replied with a sarcastic gasp. Jennie coughed slightly from beside her and straightened herself up with pursed lips. "Oh, Barton…this is Jennie and Delilah," Christie introduced them tiredly. "Renesme is the one in the bathroom. Girls…this is Clint Barton."

"It's a pleasure to meet you, good sir," Jennie smiled softly, those large brown eyes of her full to the brim with admiration. Delilah and Christie shot knowing glances at each other whilst Clint smirked at Jennie and nodded back at her.

"Nice to meet you. You guys are from Asgard, right?" he asked.

"What gave it away?" Christie muttered sarcastically under her breath.

"We are indeed Mr Barton Sir!" Renesme called excitedly from inside the running shower. "However did you know?"

"Good to know sarcasm is universal - but I was actually on the job when your buddy Thor came down to New Mexico. Kept asking where Jennie, Renesme and Delilah were, drove us all batsh*t crazy. Kinda connected the dots from there," Clint sighed as he leant himself up against the walls.

"Huh? So he didn't mention me?" Christie frowned, making her way into the little kitchen for some water.

"Nope, just some other chick. Annie…Anner? I can't remember, can't say I care. He wasn't making much sense," Clint dismissed, giving a careless yawn as the girls exchanged amused looks with each other. "You seen Tash since landing?" he asked Christie cheekily.

"Does it look like I'm ready to punch someone yet?" Christie drawled. "No? Then clearly I haven't."

"Like I said…good to see nothing's changed. I'll catch up later, Chris. Gotta run." And with that, he used a wall to propel himself up towards the ceiling, and crawled into a large air vent before totally disappearing.

Once he had gone, Christie let out a relieved sigh.

"Who was that?" Jennie gasped on awe, clearly still a little awestruck.

"Fellow spy partner, part time friend and full time pain in the ass," Christie muttered unenthusiastically. "We had some…interesting times together - but I'd rather not discuss them right now."

"Oh! You two share the same sort of banter. Do you two not get along?" Delilah frowned out curiously.

"Over my dead body," Christie scoffed back. But then she thought about it properly. "Well…actually, he's not that bad anymore. But that's probably because we barely see each other. Looks like distance works better for us."

"Ah. But nothing romantic, no?" Jennie double-checked with glinting eyes.

"Er…no," Christie frowned.

"Good, because he was utterly gorgeous," Jennie sighed dreamily, sinking onto one of the beds in a daze.

"I mean…if that's what you like," Christie shuddered as she ran her fingers through her hair. There were a few moments of comfortable silence before someone dared to speak again.

"So… will you be alright? You know, with everything?" Delilah decided to be the one to ask tenderly.

"I'm sure I'll be fine. It still hasn't really hit me yet, to be honest," Christie mused back, carefully placing her water bottle back down on the granite counter. Then came the words that stunned them all.

"I….I don't think he died."

The girls turned to frown at Renesme as she slipped out of the bathroom with a fluffy towel clutched to her body. Her fiery red curls were wet and sticking to her freckled skin and she looked completely refreshed - but her words were stale.

"No, Ren, don't you dare!" Delilah barked sharply, her crystal blue eyes already enraged.

"Wait Delilah - let her speak," Christie muttered back.

"NO!" Jennie barked suddenly, startling them. "Don't be daft! You were just starting the healing process, so let's NOT do this."

"I agree. Renesme, do not start sharing false hope on an empty theory!" Delilah hissed, stomping over to stand next to Jennie in solidarity. But Christie stood in the middle of all three of them, a little confused as to why they all felt so passionate all of a sudden.

"My theory isn't empty!" Renesme snapped.

"What's your theory, Ren?" Christie murmured. Jennie and Delilah waited for her to explain with stony faces.

"Evil like that doesn't just disappear," Renesme explained quietly, still clutching her towel to her body. "Do you guys think that the same thing possessing Loki would allow him to die? There must be something else going on here. Frigga pushed Christie down at the same time that Loki supposedly fell. But for what reason? Why didn't she allow her stay in Asgard if the biggest threat, being Loki, had finally been neutralised? And even if he wasn't, Thor and Odin were both alive, so Loki wouldn't be able to carry out any more evil, would he?" There was a sickening silence amongst them. "Frigga must've known that it wasn't the end. Maybe he'll be back-"

"Back to do what?" Jennie scoffed disbelievingly.

"He was a powerful being," Renesme grunted through gritted teeth.

"It doesn't matter how powerful he was! He's definitely not going to resurrect from the abyss of darkness that is the bottom of the galaxy!" Delilah yelped.

"But how do you-"

"HANG ON!" Christie shouted, swiftly silencing them all. She looked at her friends with squinted eyes of disbelief. "Delilah, Jennie…what's the problem with him being alive? Why…why is that such a bad thing?"

"If he's alive, the chances are he'll return a completely different person," Jennie swiftly explained.

"Yes. There is some form of truth in Renesme's theory. If he survived the drop it won't be the good that saved him," Delilah explained to Christie as gently as she could. "Would you rather him die semi-good or return completely wicked?"

Christie didn't have to think twice - she already knew what she'd rather.

"I…need to go," she mumbled shortly, before spinning on her heel and leaving the room.

"Well, that went well," Jennie sighed once the door had slammed shut. She threw her head back dramatically and Delilah started pacing up and down the bunker.

"Well I still think he's alive," Renesme muttered as she shamelessly dropped her towel in front of them to shove on a fresh set clothes - black trousers and a tank top, not dissimilar to Christie's outfit.

"Ren, I cannot believe you mentioned that ridiculous theory in the state she was in! That was ridiculously insensitive of you, you've said your piece and enough is enough now - so let it go!" Delilah snapped at her as if she was a child.

"Whatever you wish mother," Renesme sighed carelessly, unbothered by their energy. "Can you guys go and wash, please? You look and smell rancid."

…

"Christie?" Coulson began quietly as he approached her. She was rigidly standing in the control room a few minutes later, her eyes focussed on Selvig as he cautiously handled a strange, blue glowing crystal-like cube. "Christie?" Coulson tried a little louder after receiving no response.

"Mhm?" Christie hummed without turning round.

"I was thinking…maybe you should talk to someone about what happened," Coulson suggested carefully. He knew it was a shot in the dark but he had to at least try - she looked so broken that it was starting to upset him. "We have people on site if you need it-"

"No. I'm fine." Coulson took a patient breath through his nose and tried a different angle instead.

"Was he a good man?" he asked.

That caught Christie off guard.

She looked up to face him properly, looking him dead in the eye to gage whether or not his question was sincere. But she knew Coulson's character, and she could tell that it was.

"Yeah," she finally sniffed before turning away from him. "He was. I think you'd actually like him, in a…fascinating kinda way." Coulson released out a small chuckle and turned his attention back to Selvig again.

"Look…Christie - I understand you're still grieving..."

"Understatement of the century," Christie murmured, rolling her eyes.

"Okay, can we try and not go down the sarcasm route?"

"Coulson, can we not go down any route? I really would rather not talk about it yet. I'm nowhere near ready," Christie sniffed, with a hint of apology lingering in her tone. She knew he was just trying to do what was right, but she had already started to build an emotional barrier around the subject for protection. So Coulson gave a small shrug and began to walk away - but then Christie suddenly stopped him. "Wait!" He frowned and spun around again.

"What?" he frowned, taking a few paces toward her again.

"Do you think there's a chance that he's still alive?" Christie asked him under her breath. Confusion washed over Coulson's face before he shook his head and folded his arms.

"God, is that a possibility now? I hope for your sake that it's not, or else Fury is gonna be pretty damn pissed and I'm always at the receiving end of that," he replied flatly. Then he gave a sigh, relaxed his shoulders and dragged his knuckles across his forehead. "I wasn't there to witness the magnitude of the fall and I don't know how things go in Asgard but...if Thor could withstand that kind of fall, then maybe Loki could too. They are gods, after all. He could've landed anywhere. Who knows if he even really fell? You said you didn't even see it happen." Christie gave an understanding nod before turning her attention back to the glistening blue cube again. She soaked up Coulson's words like a sponge, running through them repeatedly in her mind.

"So…what's with the one shaded Rubik's cube?" she finally asked with a sigh.

"That? Selvig said it's called the 'Tesseract', but apparently it's been… 'misbehaving' for a while. Whatever the hell that means," Coulson answered quietly, so not to disturb Selvig's concentration.

"Where the hell did it come from? I've never seen anything like it before," Christie muttered with a wondering frown.

"Can't disclose it, cos we're not even sure of it's origin. But it's higher level stuff, Christie. It's not from our damn world, that's for sure," Coulson replied, crossing his arms. Christie racked her brain for a few seconds before those steely grey eyes lit up as if it was Christmas morning - and Coulson knew that look all too well. "No no no, don't start meddling," he groaned quietly, squeezing his eyes together and pinching the bridge of his nose. "If it's not you involving yourself in Level 7 stuff, it's Natasha-"

"I have to go," Christie blurted out hurriedly, already making her way back to room. "I'll meet you guys down here this evening! And stop comparing me to Romanoff!"

"What's her beef with Romanoff?" one of the agents close by asked Coulson curiously as Christie disappeared from the control room.

"It's a long story," Coulson answered him with a sigh. "I hope for all our sakes that we don't have to call her in whilst Christie's still around. It…it won't end well. It never does, with those two."

…

Jennie and Delilah sipped their sweet teas in the kitchen whilst Renesme flicked through a book on all things Asgard on the sofa. She had taken it from the hideout room when the Frost Giants attacked and held onto it ever since.

Neither of them were speaking to each other. It was awfully awkward.

Suddenly, Christie burst back into the room and slammed the door behind her. "Ren! Thank god you brought that book down with you - I need to see it, please!" she exclaimed as soon as she lay eyes on it. Renesme blinked rapidly but stood up to pass the leather-bound book over anyway. Once it was in Christie's hands, she flicked through the thick pages until she got to the letter T, and found the Tesseract's designated page. "Gotcha," she whispered, scanning the page for all the relevant information even though much of the language was dated and unfamiliar to her. "It's a portal. Selvig said its misbehaving which might mean something is trying to get here…and…oh god, it can't possibly be-" Jennie and Delilah choked on their tea before Christie could even finish the sentence, whilst Renesme didn't look fazed in the slightest.

"You mean there's a chance Loki isn't dead and is using the blue cube to arrive on Midgard? How strange. I wish someone would have suggested such an outcome," she murmured to herself with a mock frown.

"Oh Christie please, that sounds like rather a drastic reach, does it not-" Delilah began like a broken record.

"Look, I'm not saying that Loki's alive," Christie argued back, her grey eyes already shimmering with tears of desperation. "I'm not even hoping for it - I'm just making observations, and this one actually makes sense."

"Christie, ANYTHING could be using that thing as a portal!" Jennie exclaimed, slamming her cup down. She had had enough at this point - how many times were they going to go over the same thing? "Not everything revolves around him! You have no proof, you're clinging onto NOTHING."

"Oh give it a bloody rest, Jen! You never liked the guy, so it's no wonder that you don't care - get off my ass!" Christie snapped angrily. Jennie let out a dry laugh and waved her off, standing to her feet.

"You know what, Christie? I'm tired of mothering you. Do whatever you want with this desperation for the bad guy to return - I genuinely no longer care," she whispered, before storming out. Christie bit back every scathing word bubbling up within her whilst Delilah jumped up to run after her instead.

But Renesme was left sitting there, stunned at Jennie's disrespect.

"What a woman. Come Christie, bring the book. I'll help you translate it," she offered up kindly. Christie took a deep gulp before sending a small thankful smile her way.

"Cheers, Ren."