After her fight with Loki, Astrid returned to the main deck and stood in front of the large glass windows, overlooking the clear, blue sky. White puffy clouds were scattered across the peaceful sky. But the peacefulness of the view before her did not calm her inner turmoil.
She regretted what she said as soon as she left the room and she wished that she could take back what she said, but she knew that was impossible. If he didn't hate her before, he certainly did now.
Thor had come to see how she was after her talk with Loki, but she waved him away, telling him that she was fine.
"I watched the footage, Astrid," he told her quietly.
Astrid closed her eyes and looked away. "I'm fine," she reiterated firmly.
She saw in Thor's eyes that he didn't believe her, but he nodded and placed his hand comfortingly on her shoulder before he walked away.
The background chatter of the people at their desks, tapping away on their keyboards and relaying information that Astrid did not understand, irritated her slightly. All those people moved on as if nothing had happened. She felt a few of their eyes on her, but she ignored them.
She did not know how long she stayed before that window, before she heard an explosion and felt the ship shift sharply to one side, sending her reeling to catch her balance.
She whipped around as she saw some workers scattering away while others starting tapping furiously on their screens and keyboards.
She summoned a dagger into her hand quickly, calmed by its reassuring weight in her palm. Her mind cleared as she surveyed the room around her, checking that everyone was alright, before heading towards the door. She had to find Thor and the others.
Fury came running in the room, demanding status of the carrier. Astrid turned towards him. "What happened?" she demanded.
"We lost power in one of the engines. Stark and the Captain are dealing with it," he reassured her, while looking at multiple screens at once.
Astrid nodded in response. "I'm going to find Thor," she stated before turning towards the exit when she noticed a small cylindrical object was thrown into the room.
"Grenade!" a woman shouted. Astrid had a feeling she knew what it would do. And there was a scrawny man standing right next to it.
She acted before she knew it. Astrid lunged towards the man, knocking into him as the object blew up. The force of the blast pushed Astrid forward, knocking the man onto the ground and she ended up in a crouch over the man, shielding him from the heat and force of the blast.
After the ringing stopped in her ears, Astrid looked over her shoulder to make sure it was safe, before looking down at the man again. "Are you okay?"
His frightened gaze locked with hers and he nodded slowly, eyes wide with fear.
"Good," Astrid said, rolling her shoulders to release the small amount of discomfort she felt from the weapon blowing up right behind her.
She stood up to see that many people were still on the ground when she heard the firing of more weapons. She looked up to see men flood into the room and heard some of the workers behind her begin to return fire.
She summoned another dagger and twirled them once in her hands before running forward, dodging bullets along the way, to cut her way through the men. She heard a few shouts of surprise before weapons were pointed her way. Astrid lunged forward into a front flip to land next to a surprised enemy. Before he could aim towards her, she had already sliced the back of his calf, sending him to the ground. A quick stab with her dagger finished the job.
She turned quickly, seeing the end of a weapon coming towards her face. She twisted away, making her daggers disappear, before grabbing the weapon in her hand and twisting it out of the man's grasp. She threw it to the ground and twisted his arm behind his back, hearing a snap and the man cry out. She kicked the back of his knee, forcing him to the ground before a quick blow to the back of this head put him out.
As she let him slump to the ground, she looked over to see how the mortals were doing. Most were shooting back at the men that were slowly coming from down the hallway. She quickly headed that way, coming face to face with more men. With a few quick jabs and slices from her daggers, the remaining men in the hallway were also down.
Astrid walked back onto the ship's deck to see some of the people looking awestruck. She glanced at them in a confused way, before turning to Fury and his second in command, Maria, who had some blood dripping down from her temple. When she opened her mouth to speak, an explosion across the room made her flinch and shy away. A few moments later, another explosion towards the middle went off.
With a quick glance upwards, she saw a man with a bow firing explosive arrows towards the people. He fired a third arrow that landed on one of the devices that they called "computers", and a moment later, most of the screens around her went dark. Fury started shooting back towards him and he ducked out of the way, leaving now that he had accomplished what he wanted.
A red alert came up on one of the screens. Malfunction: Engine 1 Power Loss.
Astrid watched as the remaining screens faded to black, before she felt the ship tip drastically to one side as two engines failed. She grabbed onto a railing beside her to keep herself up as people started sliding towards one side of the ship.
Only a few moments later, the ship started to right itself, allowing Astrid to let go of the metal rail.
"Stark must have gotten the other engine working," Fury stated, pushing on a variety of buttons on his screen.
Now that the carrier was stable, Astrid headed towards the door once more before she heard a loud roar echo throughout the entire carrier, making her freeze in her tracks. Her dagger materialized in her hand once more, her entire body tensing at the amount of pure rage that she heard in the roar.
"Banner…" Fury whispered, his eyes wide. He turned to Astrid. "This was his plan."
"What?" Astrid questioned.
"His plan was to release the Hulk. This is him," he explained to her quickly. "You must get to him. This is his plan to escape."
Astrid's eyes widened in realization and nodded before quickly exiting the room and entering the darker hallway. She could hear more footsteps farther down the hall and decided that she wanted a larger weapon. The dagger disappeared from her hand and she summoned a sword in its place. She was not as used to its heavier weight compared to her daggers, but she needed to get to Loki as quickly as possible.
She swung her sword in a quick arc, familiarizing herself with the weapon again while also getting it into place to strike before a thought hit her. These people were mind controlled.
They aren't doing this out of their own free will. They are being controlled. I can't kill them.
Astrid let out a soft sigh and sent her sword away. She glanced around her and in the debris that was scattered around her from the fight, found a thick pipe that was about as long as her sword. She bent down and picked it up, noticing it weighed about the same, before continuing stealthily down the hall.
As she got closer to a corner, she heard more footsteps and quiet mumblings. She paused around the corner and listened to them come closer to her. With her make-shift weapon held poised to strike, she waited.
As soon as the first man came around the corner, she struck and with a loud thump to the side of his head, he went down.
A few shouts of surprise sounded from behind him as he crumpled down to the floor and Astrid came around the corner, the pipe swinging in her hand. The man that was directly behind the first raised his gun, but Astrid swiftly knocked it away with her arm, sending it to the ground, while kicking the man hard in the chest, knocking him back into the person behind him. They both tumbled to the ground in a tangle of limbs.
As they went down, another came up and with a quick swing, he too went down. That is when the last two started shooting.
Astrid quickly raised up her arm to shield her face as a few bullets bounced off her armor. With a yell, she twisted her body around, sending her foot into the side of one of the men, using the momentum of her entire body to knock him off his balance. And that is exactly what happened. His small, frail Midgardian body did not hold up against her strength and it sent him flying into the wall.
She then jabbed the end of the pipe into the last man's stomach, effectively knocking the breath out of him, before she grabbed the front of his pathetic attempt at armor, and threw him into the other wall, watching him slump down onto the floor after leaving a large crack in the thick wall of the aircraft. She surveyed the unconscious bodies around her before continuing down the hallway, dropping the pipe along the way.
Astrid continued towards Loki's cell, taking out a few more stray soldiers in her path with her hands, not needing a weapon and not wanting to kill any of them.
After some time, she finally found the hallway that led to Loki. She didn't seem to recall it taking her that long the first time. She must have gotten turned around in the maze of this carrier. Midgardian technology was so confusing.
As she made it to the closed door, she glanced down at the pad thing next to it. Natasha had placed her hand on it to get the door to open before, but Astrid did not have time for that. She slammed her fist into the pad, shattering the screen and sending smoke billowing from the device. An alarm sounded around her but she paid no attention to it as she pried the door open and slipped inside.
She was greeted with an empty space, causing her to stop in her tracks. The cage was gone. How could it be gone?
A choked noise caught her attention and she spun towards one of the walls to see Coulson slumped against it, a large red spot blooming on his white shirt. Astrid gasped and rushed towards him, kneeling at his side.
"What happened? Where is Loki?" she questioned hastily as she examined his wound. It was deep and still bleeding.
"I blasted him through the wall with this thing," he gestured down to the large gun that was laying across his lap. Astrid looked at the gun and over towards the other wall, where there was a large hole. "But he got away," he finished sadly.
Astrid's gut twisted, but she turned back to Coulson, trying to focus some of her magic onto him, though healing magic was not something that she had focused much time on.
"And Thor…" he broke off. Astrid's eyes shot back up to his.
"What about Thor?"
"He's… He's gone," he finished sadly.
Astrid's entire body froze. "What do you mean?"
Coulson's tired but kind eyes met hers. "Loki tricked him into the cage. That cage was meant in case we ever needed a place to put Banner. One scratch on that glass would send him down to the earth below. It was a last resort, but we had it if we needed it." His eyes turned sad. "Loki dropped the cage while Thor was in it. That glass is practically unbreakable. I'm so sorry," he finished softly.
Astrid's heart clenched painfully, her eyes stinging with the threat of tears.
"I tried to stop him," Coulson said quietly, his gaze falling away from hers.
She cleared her throat, forcing the large lump away before talking quietly, "It's okay. You did your best," she soothed. She could see the light slowly leaving his eyes and his skin becoming more and more pale. Her efforts were not working. She desperately called for more magic, a soft purple glow coming out of her fingers and wrapping themselves around Coulson and his wound, but she knew it was too late and she was not skilled enough to save him. Tears pricked the corners of her eyes, the sadness overwhelming. That she could not save Coulson. That Thor was dead. That Loki killed him.
Another pair of footsteps quickly entered the room and Astrid looked up to see Fury standing there. When he saw Coulson, he quickly rushed to Astrid's side and crouched down beside her.
Coulson looked up at him. "I'm sorry boss. The god rabbited."
"Just stay awake," Fury demanded, reaching up to twist his head to face his. "Eyes on me."
Coulson gave a small smile. "No, I'm clocking out here."
Fury shook his head, "Not an option."
Coulson looked up into Fury's eye and gave him a reassuring smile. "It's okay, boss." He paused, taking a breath before continuing, "This was never gonna work, if they didn't have something to…" He broke off, his words cracking as he tried to continue. "To…"
Astrid watched as Coulson's gaze broke away from Fury's and his body relaxed into the wall behind him, his eyes staring blankly at a spot between the two of them.
Fury's head dropped and Astrid saw his jaw clench. The tears threatened to overwhelm her once again as her hands stopped moving, the purple hue fading away. Fury sat there for another moment before he stood up and moved away, but Astrid couldn't bring herself to. Not yet.
With a deep breath, she placed her hand over Coulson's cold one and let his final thoughts flood her mind. A woman playing some sort of large instrument. Friends and family that he would never see again. Loki stabbing him in the back with his scepter while Thor cried out in the background. But the most frequent images she saw were ones of Fury and Coulson together. In some of them, they looked younger. Fury still had both eyes. Others were them more recently. But they seemed to always be smiling or laughing.
As the images slowly faded away, Astrid let go of his hand and she felt the tears sliding down her face. She closed her eyes for a moment before standing and heading out of the room, not being able to be there for a moment longer.
She wandered aimlessly around the carrier, not caring where the endless maze took her as she let her feelings out. The tears continued to steam down her face, but she couldn't bring herself to care. She had lost both of her brothers today. What would she do when she returned home? How could she go home and look into the eyes of her parents and explain what had happened?
As she passed a doorway, she heard the voices of Steve and Tony.
"Haven't you ever lost a soldier before?" Steve asked Tony.
Tony spun around to face him. "We are not soldiers." He spit, before pushing past the Captain and leaving the room, not even sparing her a glance as he passed her.
She heard Steve sigh softly before turning around, startling slightly at her presence, before quickly calming down.
"I'm sorry about Thor," he said softly, his kind and sympathetic eyes meeting hers. Astrid bowed her head in acknowledgment, trying to keep the tears at bay.
He nodded slowly and started to walk out of the room as well, but Astrid grabbed his forearm, stopping him in his tracks. His icy blue eyes met hers.
"Thank you." Astrid whispered softly. He gave her a small smile and she let go of his arm and he left the room.
"We found him," Steve came rushing into the room, causing Astrid to whip her head up towards him. "We found Loki." Astrid's eyes flared and she nodded, standing up and following him to the small aircraft where Natasha and another man were waiting.
Upon seeing the other man, Astrid summoned a dagger and was ready to attack before Steve pulled her back.
"What are you doing? He was in the carrier when we were being attacked. He was attacking us!" her confused eyes meeting Steve's. She noticed that the man looked away from her as if ashamed.
"Clint was being controlled. You know this. Natasha woke him up," Steve explained.
Astrid turned to Natasha. "How did you do it?"
She smirked and glanced at Clint. "I hit him really hard on the head."
Astrid looked at the man, Clint, and studied him for a few moments. He certainly did not seem like the man Astrid had seen earlier. With a flick of her wrist, the dagger was gone and she approached Clint. His eyes turned fearful as she came towards him and thrust her hand out towards him. "I'm Astrid."
Clint looked at her in shock before glancing towards Steve and Natasha.
Astrid became a bit self-conscious. She turned her head towards Steve. "Am I doing it wrong? Is this not how Midgardians greet each other?"
"No! No, that's right," Clint blurted out, causing her eyes to meet his again. "I just wasn't expecting you to forgive me that quickly," he admitted sheepishly.
Astrid smiled. "You were not in your right mind. I do not hold it against you."
Clint finally smiled at her before taking her hand and giving it a firm shake. "I'm Clint. It's nice to meet you."
They all boarded the aircraft, shooing a poor boy out of it, and took off.
Astrid sat by Steve in the aircraft. Barton and Natasha were flying it towards someplace that kept referring to as Stark Tower. They said that this is where Loki would be.
Steve handed her a small device. "Put this in your ear. This will allow us to keep in contact with you."
Astrid glanced down at the foreign object, but nodded and slipping it into her right ear.
As they were getting closer to the city, they heard a loud whooshing sound. Astrid stood up and looked up at the sky. She watched in horror as the sky ripped open and dozens of aliens started pouring through. Astrid's entire body froze as she watched them rain down onto the city below.
As they got into the city, Clint started firing the aircraft's weapons towards the aliens as they flew around the city. They continued firing as they approached the large tower and Astrid saw two figures fighting on the rooftop. A flash of a red cape made Astrid smile.
Clint turned the craft towards the building and began firing towards the figure adorned in green and gold. She saw Loki throw Thor onto the ground before turning and aiming his scepter at the aircraft. A blue blast shot out of the end of the scepter and crashed into one of the wings of the vehicle.
Astrid grabbed onto the ceiling above her as the craft began to lose control and spiral back towards the ground and Clint fought to steady it.
With a crash, the aircraft landed on one of the streets. The back door opened and they all piled out, looking up at the horror in the sky.
Astrid watched countless aliens zipping around the sky, destroying anything that they could, killing anyone in the process.
Natasha pulled out her guns and started firing at any enemy that came close to them and Clint did the same, though he pulled out a bow. Astrid decided that she liked this man.
She turned to Steve. "Can you handle this without me? I'm going to find Loki."
He turned to look at her and she saw the concern in his eyes, but he must have seen the determination in hers because he finally nodded. "Go. We'll be fine." He gave her a reassuring smile and Astrid took off.
As she raced down the street, she summoned her sword again, cutting down any alien that came in her path. As she fought them, she kept her eyes peeled for Loki. She finally spotted his signature green cape billowing from the top of a building a bit farther down the street.
"I found him, but I can't get to him. Can someone get me up there?" Astrid shouted into the earpiece as she took off towards the building.
"I'll get you up there, Princess," Tony responded almost immediately.
At the sound of blasters nearby, Astrid glanced over her shoulder to see Tony coming towards her. He grabbed the back of her cape up by her neck and hoisted her up into the air, carrying her up towards Loki.
"Give him hell, princess," Tony said to her before dropping her down towards the roof.
This time, she braced herself and fell into a flip as she landed, dispersing the force equally among her body, though the wind was still slightly knocked out of her.
"Well, look who it is." A laugh sounded from behind her, causing her to spin around at the familiar mocking tone. Loki stood in all his glory, golden horns curled proudly against his head, green cape flapping in the wind.
"If it isn't Astrid." He spit out, his eyes full of anger and distaste, something she never saw aimed towards her.
"Stop this Loki, please," Astrid said calmly. She wanted to summon a weapon but she refrained, afraid it would set him off.
"Why should I listen to you?" he demanded.
Astrid paused for a moment. "Because you're my brother," she finally replied softly.
Something flickered in Loki's eyes but it disappeared as quickly as it came. "If I remember right, you disowned me too. Just like everyone else."
"I was angry Loki. I was angry at you, angry at father, and angry at Thor. You know I didn't mean what I said," she took a small step forward, her arms out as if to calm him. "I could never mean that," she finished in a small voice.
Something similar to regret flashed in Loki's eyes, though she didn't have time to question it because a loud roar caught her attention.
Her eyes whipped into the sky, where a large serpent-like creature came through the portal. She gasped softly, her eyes glued to the monster, watching how it floated through the sky, dropping more aliens along the way.
She wasn't paying any attention to Loki when she should have been. She should have never turned her back on him.
She suddenly felt a searing pain in her stomach and she gasped. She glanced down at her stomach and saw the tip of Loki's scepter protruding from her stomach.
Loki's cruel laugh sounded right behind her ear and she turned to look over her shoulder at him, the betrayal stinging. His eyes met hers, but they were cold and hard and also bluer than she remembered.
Then, he yanked the scepter out of her, the tip red with her blood, and Astrid fell to the ground, gasping in pain, a red spot spreading across her stomach. Loki stood over her, blood dripping from her scepter as he smiled down at her.
Astrid rolled onto her back, clutching her stomach, hoping to stop the flow of blood, but it still drained through her fingers. Her nerves were firing too fast for her to try and use magic, but she knew that even if she could, she wasn't experienced enough to accomplish anything.
The pain was excruciating and tears slipped down her cheeks as Loki was grinning down at her. Her pain-filled eyes finally met his and she gasped out. "Kill me."
Loki's surprised was evident on his face. "What?"
"Kill me." Astrid repeated, refusing to tear her gaze away from his. "Kill me, if that's what you really want. I don't want to live without you as my brother, but you're not the brother you once were. I don't want to see you in jail for the rest of your life, so kill me. End my suffering already," Astrid finished with a gasp of pain and threw her head back as the pain got worse. Black started to creep around the edges of her vision.
She couldn't see Loki's reaction. She desperately tried to see his face and caught a glimpse of his icy blue eyes as they seemed to flicker for a moment, before turning back to their normal shade of blue-green.