There was silence and nobody moved for what felt like an eternity before Darcy witnessed as a singular person, an older grandfatherly looking man, raised himself from the ground and stood tall.

"Not to men like you."

Loki chuckled. "There are no men like me."

"There are always men like you."

He just sighed, holding out his scepter. "Look to your elder, people." Darcy's heart dropped as the end began glowing a vibrant blue. "Let him be an example." A beam shot out the curved tip, heading straight toward the old man.

It connected with a resonating boom, but it wasn't the old man that is connected with. Captain Fucking America stood from where he had hunched behind his shield after having landed in front of the civilian in just enough time to block the blast. Never mind the fact that he was supposed to be dead in the Arctic Ocean, the entire situation was almost worth it to see the stream of light bounce back and knock Loki on his ass. Almost. Not really. Darcy was still scared shitless, but it would definitely be a fun story for later if she – and Jane – survived.

Red-White-&-Blue just stood all majestically and shit before walking toward psycho numero uno, who was getting back up to his feet as his doubles flickered out of existence.

"You know, the last time I was in Germany," America The Beautiful began. As he spoke, a couple of the civilians he passed popped up off their knees in support of their unlikely hero. "and saw a man standing above everybody else, we ended up disagreeing."

Loki was up before he had finished, staring that the Star Spangled Man with a Plan like prey (I'd eat him up too, Darcy's mind supplied unhelpfully). "The soldier. A man out of time."

Apple Pie gave a smirk that would melt the panties off of any hot blooded American woman. "I'm not the one who's out of time." On cue, a super spy-looking jet arrived, hovering behind Mr. Patriotic himself and pointing a rather big, scary looking gun in Loki's, and subsequently Darcy's, direction.

Darcy had never really found herself attracted to women, but the voice that blared out of the jet might just have caused a bisexual awakening in her. What the fuck was up with superhero's and being so unbelievably attractive?

"Loki, drop the weapon and stand down." Loki ignored the order and instead channeled his inner greased lightning and sent a beam toward the aircraft, a beam that was expertly avoided by the red-headed spyssassin piloting. It was enough of a distraction for Land of The Free to throw his shield and catch Loki off guard.

'Okay, okay, okay! deep breaths. he's distracted by the Ghost of America's Past. Now is the perfect time to find Jane.' Only it wasn't because that shield kept flying everywhere and lasers kept beaming out of Loki's staff, and the idea of accidentally getting hit by either of those was really off-putting. Still, Darcy took a careful step out from behind the marble column she'd been using as cover. She needed a better angle if she was going to search the crowd for Jane. Already, everyone was scrambling away from the two battling figures. Men and women of all ages, some of which she had spoken with inside, were running off in all directions. Jane could be any one of them, and Darcy called out her name, looking everywhere for that deep blue gown. "Jane?!"

She kept part of her attention on the fighting out of the corner of her eye, moving closer with each call for her friend until she was down at the bottom of the steps, trying to find a safe route around. Loki was all magic and weaponry, using his spear to knock the Captain off balance, but Mr. USA held his own fairly well with hand-to-hand moves that reminded Darcy of the old boxing videos that her grandfather used to watch. Most of the crowd had dispersed by that point though, and Jane was still nowhere in sight

Her attention was drawn away from both the fight and her search for Jane by the sudden sound of ACDC permeating the area. Both Loki and Captain Rogers paused in their attacks and all three watched in confusion as a small ball of light grew rapidly in the distance. It was easy to recognize the suit, and ego, of Tony Stark flying it's way into battle, even from that distance. When he was close enough that Darcy could make out the shape of his helmet, he righted himself in midair and sent a blast from his hand repulsors at Loki. He went flying backwards and Darcy shrieked as he crashed into the steps at her feet. For the second time that night she lost her balance, but this time there was no hot-arms-guy to save her and she landed straight on her ass, scrambling away from, and likely flashing, the god. Loki struggled to sit up straight, and Tony - with the Ice-Pop Patriot at his side - casually strolled over with what looked like every weapon in his suit popping out and preparing for fire.

"Make your move, Reindeer Games." Loki seemed to realize he was outnumbered in this instance, and slowly raised both palms up as a signal of surrender. "Good move."

Tony's face mask lifted up and he looked up at Darcy as Loki's golden armor faded back into what looked to be a standard Asgardian-style garment. "You okay there, short stack?"

"Better than I was five minutes ago," Darcy let out a breathy response, she leaned farther back as Loki tilted his head to get a look at her, a gleam of recognition in his eyes. "Though it would help if you didn't throw crazed gods in my direction anymore."

"Noted." Tony nodded his head toward the landing jet behind him, not taking his eyes off of Darcy. "Captain."

"Mr. Stark."

"You wanna escort Mr. Leather Fetish here to a place he can be properly chained up?"

"On it," Let Freedom Ring grabbed Loki's arm with one hand and his discarded scepter with the other, marching them over to the opening loading bay of the Jet. Tony relaxed a fraction, the weapons of his suit retracting.

"Are you injured?" He seemed hesitant to move any closer to her, though the look of worry was evident in his eyes.

"I'm fine." Darcy assured him, pulling herself off the ground only to nearly fall back again as he lost her balance for a moment. "I wasn't with everyone else. Hid behind a pillar for most of it all, but I can't seem to find-"

"Darcy!" She whipped her head around toward the sound of the voice of the one person she'd been looking for since everything started turning upside down.

"JANE!" She bolted toward her boss and best friend, who was just exiting the museum with a worried look on her face. "Where have you been?!" she shrieked, drawing the woman into a bone crushing embrace.

"I was in the bathroom when I heard screaming." Darcy could feel the shiver that went through the older woman. "I locked the door and hid in the stall. I only came out after hearing music start to blare."

She pulled back, holding Jane at arms length and staring at her like she grew an extra head. "You were hiding in the bathroom this whole time?" A hysterical giggled escaped Darcy's lips when she gave a hesitant nod of affirmation, then she pulled her back in for a hug before anyone could catch her leaking eyes. "I was so worried."

Jane didn't respond, just tightened her grip and nodded.

"I hate to break this up," Tony coughed from behind them. "But we kind of gotta skedaddled, and I am not leaving you behind."

Darcy sniffled, and subtly wiped her eyes before pulling away from her favorite scientist and turning to glare halfheartedly at Tony. "Next time send us to Norway."

The woman known as The Black Widow - Darcy had heard enough about her from Tony's ranting about SHIELD spying on him, to know that she was as deadly as the name implied - spoke quietly into her headset from the pilot's seat while Tony and the Captain whispered harshly to each other in an argument that Darcy couldn't make out.

She and Jane were sat across from the bound-in-cuffs Loki, and while it was difficult not to let herself catch his curious, and freaking obvious, stare she did her best by keeping her boss engaged in small talk about how weird the whole situation was.

The jet was tense and quiet, only occasionally broken up by mild turbulence that shook the cabin. After another five minutes of hushed conversation and being hyper-aware of Loki's gaze, Darcy stood up with a huff and wandered over to the two still hovering behind the Widow.

"I don't like it," she heard the Captain whisper harshly to Tony.

"What? Rock of Ages giving up so easily?" Tony glanced back, catching Darcy's approach but not giving her any indication that privacy was needed.

"I don't remember it ever being that easy," he admitted, looking back as well, his gaze landing on her for only a moment before moving on to Loki. "This guy packs a wallop."

"Still, you are pretty spry for an older fellow." Tony shifted, opening up the conversation to include a third. "What do you think his thing is? Pilates?"

"What?"

"Tony," Darcy admonished. "He's right. This is the guy that nearly leveled a town because he was angry about being adopted."

"The one where you saved all those puppies?"

"Tony!"

He sighed. "A) It was really more of a village, and B) it was his robo-toy that did all the dirty work."

"Tony, I'm serious," she growled, her annoyance seeming magnified by the sound of thunder off in the distance. "I would gladly trade barbs with you any other day, but… you saw the footage. If the mythology and evidence line up like they seem to then he shouldn't have been that easy to take down, even with the both of you." She glanced over at the Captain, who was looking at her curiously.

He suddenly stuck out his right hand, a small smile perking his lips up. "I don't believe we've officially met. I'm Steve."

"Nope!" Tony declared. "None of that!"

"What?" Steve looked as confused as Darcy felt, his hand falling limply back to his side before she could give it a shake.

"You do not get to go 'apple pie' on my-" Tony seemed to choke of the sentence, and the sounds of thunder grew. Minor turbulence shook the cabin. "M-my lab monkey."

"Excuse me?" She looked at him like he'd slapped her grandmother. "He wasn't-" she scoffed, "besides, he can 'apple pie' all he wants. You're not my-"

Suddenly lightning lit up the hold, thunder drowning out anything else that she might have said and causing everything around her to shake. Tony reached out to steady her, his metal hand gripping her arm to keep her from falling.

"Where's this coming from?" She heard the resident spyssassin ask, the thunder continuing to rumble overhead. Darcy looked back to see Jane clutching her safety belts with white knuckles. Loki appeared to be apprehensive staring out the window, and likely for good reason if what she assumed was correct.

"What's the matter?" Steve taunted him from behind her. "Scared of a little lightning?"

While he didn't necessarily come across as scared to Darcy, his uneasiness was otherwise palpable, and he kept his eyes on the crackling sky as he gave his response.

"I'm not overly fond of what follows."

Blinding light flashed as an enunciated thud could be heard through the roof, and the ship jolted harshly sending Darcy to the floor. Her dress - the stupid cocktail style torture device that she could not wait to burn - ripped up her thigh, though the sound of it doing so could not be heard over the roaring of the wind as the back ramp began to lower. 'Great, now I'm flashing everyone,' she groused in her head as her hair whipped in all directions, the pins that had been holding it up doing nothing to secure it against the harsh current wrenching through the cabin.

The ground jerked from underneath her again, and in the same instance a familiar figure landed on the open incline.

She's recognize that because-I'm-worth-it head of golden locks anywhere.

"THOR!"

His gaze had been fixed on Loki - his obvious target if the look of displeasure and the beelining of his strut meant anything - but it tore over to Darcy at the sound of his name. Confusion crumpled his brow, and he halted his steps towards his brother to turn toward her.

"Lady Darcy?"

"Thor!" If possible, he was even more shocked to recognize that it was Jane who sat across from Loki, still wearing her blue gown, strapped in tightly, and holding of dear life ('that must be nice' Darcy thought. She was pretty sure the wind was about to rip her own dress straight off).

"Jane!" Oh, there it was. That golden retriever smile. It was like he ran into her randomly at the store after a week instead of stumbled across her while going for his brother in a greased lighting rage after a year.

"Now there's that guy." Tony's voice carried over roar, and a pair of metal covered hands pulled Darcy back onto her feet. He had pulled his helmet back on while she was distracted with the weird god drama happening in front of them, obviously preparing to attack one or both of the princes.

"Another Asgardian?" the redhead yelled from the front seat, her hands flying over the controls in an effort to close the back hatch.

"Doesn't matter," Tony responded. "If he frees Loki or kills him the Tesseract is lost."

"His name is Thor!" Darcy cut in, holding her back back from her face as best she could. This fucking wind was going to make her want to shave it all off. "He's the prince of Asgard! Loki's brother!"

"Jane! Lady Darcy!" Said god's voice boomed above all other sound as their pilot manage to begin closing the ramp. "How did you end up present on this flying transport prison with that of the likes of Loki." He looked down at straps hold Jane in and the metal arms holding Darcy up and his voice took on a deadly edge. "Have you been held captive against your will by this metal man and his associates?"

"No!" Darcy assured him, scrambling away from Tony as Jane managed to unfasten the belts holding her in place. The ramp latched shut, the wind abruptly dying down and easing the women's approach to their protein blessed friend. "They saved us! They're friends."

His face eased again. "Then they have my thanks." He turned to Tony and Steve, completely ignoring his horse-fucking brother who didn't seem to mind in the least. "I do not know who you are or why you hold my brother under lock, but any ally of these women is an ally of mine."

Tony's face shield lifted, but his suit still whirred in anticipation. His eyes kept flickering from Darcy, to Thor, to Loki who had settled comfortably back into his chair and was ignoring them all sans a small mutter of 'you are not my brother'.

"Does mother know you weareth her drapes?" he asked by way of introduction.

This was going to be a long ride.